PHILOSOPHY OF NEW TIMES AND THE ERA OF ENLIGHTENMENT, GERMAN CLASSICAL

GERMAN CLASSICAL PHILOSOPHY German classical philosophy is a special phenomenon in the history of European thought. In terms of the scale and depth of the problems raised in it, it can only be compared with Greek classical philosophy. Five philosophers: Kant, Herder, Fichte, Schelling and

61. German classical philosophy of the 18th–19th centuries German classical philosophy is a stage in the development of philosophy, represented by the following trends.1. Dualism (Kant) considers cognition as an activity proceeding according to its own laws. Specifics of the knower

Chapter 6 GERMAN CLASSICAL PHILOSOPHY The beginning of the Enlightenment in German philosophy is closely connected with the famous Christian Wolf (1679–1754), who systematized and popularized the teachings of G. Leibniz. Many philosophers not only in Germany, but also in Russia,

1. Marxism and classical German philosophy The circumstances of the origin of Engels’ work on Feuerbach The 80s and 90s of the 19th century were a period of generational change in the socialist movement. A galaxy of young revolutionaries who actively participated in theoretical discussions and

§ 2. German classical philosophy on the nature of law and state Representatives of German classical philosophy drew attention to the error of thinkers of the 17th-18th centuries, the essence of which was the confusion of law and law, as well as the identification of law with

The term "classical German philosophy" was introduced by F. Engels. Engels himself does not specifically explain what he means by “German classical philosophy.” But by classic we usually mean the highest measure of something, a certain completed form. And after the classics, as a rule, there is a decrease in level.

German classical philosophy covers a relatively short period, which is limited to the 80s of the 18th century, on the one hand, and 1831, the year of Hegel’s death, on the other (or the later anthropological, materialist philosophy of Feuerbach, which, however, came into conflict with the main character of German philosophy of this period - its idealism). For a number of reasons, it represents the pinnacle of philosophical development (ideas of the Renaissance, New Time, Enlightenment). The main representatives of this philosophy were its founder Immanuel Kant, his follower Fichte, Schelling, and the opponent of Kantian philosophy Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel.

As for the general characteristics of classical German philosophy, there is a shift in emphasis (in comparison, for example, with the thought of the Enlightenment) from the analysis of nature to the study of man, the human world and history. At the same time, Kant already clearly expressed the idea of ​​​​the autonomy of man and his history in relation to nature. Before this, philosophers knew, on the one hand, nature. and on the other, a person who was considered as a special kind of natural body endowed with an incorporeal soul. Representatives of the German classics for the first time realized that man lives not in the world of nature, but in the world of culture. And only by looking at it as a product of culture can one solve a whole series of philosophical mysteries. Also, the German classics go further than the rationalism of the New Age (Descartes, Leibniz, who believed that we learn about the essence of the world only by plunging into the depths of the mind itself, since the sensory diversity of natural bodies hides the basis of being from us). In the German classics we are talking about a reasonably organized reality, where the essence of the world is revealed to us directly. And the further the thought of German philosophers advances, the clearer it is that we are not talking about pristine nature, but about the world of culture, organized in accordance with the laws of Truth, Goodness and Beauty (metaphysics, ethics and aesthetics - three parts of Kant’s philosophy, which are dedicated to the discovery these laws). German philosophers derive this world of culture from the activity of the human spirit, and the thinking subject, thus, turns out to be the basis of the universe. They interpret human activity only as spiritual activity, and therefore representatives of classical German philosophy answer the most fundamental questions from the position of first subjective (Kant), and only then objective idealism (Hegel).

Another feature of this philosophy is that, having turned to the study of the subject, to the study of his active abilities, German philosophers leave the level of popular presentation of philosophy. “Up until the advent of Kant’s philosophy,” Hegel writes in this regard, “the public was still keeping pace with philosophy; before the advent of Kant’s philosophical teaching, philosophy aroused universal interest. It was accessible and people wanted to know it; knowledge of it was generally included in the idea of educated person. Therefore, it was practiced by practitioners, statesmen. Now that the confused idealism of Kantian philosophy has appeared, their wings are drooping. Thus, already with the appearance of Kant, the beginning of this separation from the usual way of consciousness was laid."

Thus, one of the features of classical German philosophy was that it was doomed to social failure. In other words, she could not become popular. And this is for the simple reason that serious science cannot be popular. Any popularization of science leads to the fact that first the scientific form is sacrificed for the sake of simplicity of presentation, and then the content itself - for the sake of ease of perception. As for the German classics, the opposite task was set here. Kant and Fichte in particular sought to transform philosophy into a science. It is with this that the methods of deduction (logical deduction and justification) and construction (metaphysical and dialectical) that they used to build a philosophical theory are connected.

Let us list some of the positive aspects of German classical philosophy. Kant's philosophy completes rational philosophy (started by Descartes). His philosophy reflected the theoretical reflection and understanding of the Enlightenment spirit of human freedom and equality in the period before the French Revolution. In German classical philosophy one can see the beginnings of the “philosophy of the active side” in Fichte, the foundations of a new natural philosophy in Schelling (his concept of the “dynamic process” in nature, close to materialist dialectics), the dialectical concept of Hegel (reinterpreting the old understanding of dialectics as a way of argument and discussion of problems towards its scientific construction, where dialectics becomes a method of understanding the developing reality). Starting with Herder, German philosophy introduces historicism, the idea of ​​development into the study of society and nature, and thereby rejects the non-historical and mechanistic concepts of the previous Enlightenment era (the idea of ​​development becomes central to Hegel’s dialectic).

Post-Kantian philosophy also carries out a serious critique of agnosticism (the theory of the unknowability of reality) and the entire previous rationalistic and empirical tradition.

The predominance of idealism in German classics is associated with the development of all philosophy after Descartes. In contrast to the ontological position of ancient and medieval philosophy as insufficiently substantiated, Descartes emphasized the idea that the most essential point from which philosophy must begin is the certainty of the knowing Self itself, the subject. Within this tradition, a number of modern philosophers place more emphasis on the subject (man) than on the object (world, nature), and give preference to the question of the nature of knowledge over the question of the nature of being (epistemology over ontology). In the philosophy of Kant, a similar privileged position of the subject and the theory of knowledge is also manifested (subjectivism, which began with the works of Descartes, is brought by Kant to its logical conclusion and therefore he can be considered the last consistent subjective idealist, which is due to the fact that in the subsequent phase of the development of German philosophy (Schelling, Hegel) there is a transition to an ontological position).

It can also be said that a characteristic feature of German idealism was pantheism (it was characteristic of Fichte, Schelling of the classical period and Hegel). The impetus for the development of pantheism was given by Kant with his criticism of metaphysical ideas (God, the soul, the idea of ​​world integrity), as well as the discussion that flared up at the end of the 18th century around the philosophy of Spinoza (caused by F. Jacobi’s book “On the Teachings of Spinoza,” which represents an atheistic interpretation of his philosophy).

Socially, German philosophy is evidence of the ideological awakening of the “third estate” (burghers, bourgeoisie) of Germany and the development of social and liberal political ideas of the New Age and the Enlightenment (in this regard, Kant and Hegel give some of the best interpretations of “civil society” and “legal states").

Contents 2
Classical German Philosophy 3
§ 1. Kant's philosophical system 4
Kant's ethical teaching 12
§ 2. “Scientific teaching” Fichte 14
§ 5. Schelling’s natural philosophy 19
§ 4. System and method of Hegel’s philosophy 23
Philosophical system 24
Dialectical method 38
§ 5. Anthropological materialism of Feuerbach 39
References: 45

Classical German philosophy
German philosophy of the late 18th - first third of the 19th centuries, represented by the names of Kant, Fichte, Schelling, Hegel, Feuerbach, is deservedly called classical. It marks an important stage in the history of world philosophical thought. The progressive ideas of modern philosophy found their continuation in it - faith in the power of reason, humanism, inalienable individual rights. But its main achievement is the development of the dialectical method, the substantiation of the world law of eternal development. This philosophy reflected both the main features of the era of formation of the new capitalist system, as well as the specific historical features inherent in Germany at that time. The classics of German philosophy were the ideologists of their bourgeoisie, which lagged significantly behind the bourgeoisie of advanced countries in socio-economic and political development. From the time of the Reformation until the end of the 18th century. Germany did not represent a single economic whole; the capitalist market was in the process of formation. It also did not represent a single political whole: the country was divided into almost 300 independent states, most of which were dwarf.
The economic well-being of the burghers largely depended on orders from the court and feudal lords, and on supplies for the army. This determined the political flabbiness of the German bourgeoisie. And although her interests did not completely coincide with the interests of the cadets, she obediently walked in the wake of the politics of the noble state.
These circumstances could not help but be reflected in German philosophy of that time, determining its dual, compromise, and sometimes contradictory nature. If the works of French educators were banned and burned, and they themselves were subject to legal persecution, even imprisonment in the Bastille, then German idealist philosophers were honored professors of German universities, recognized mentors of youth, and their works were published and distributed without any obstacles. But although they did not oppose the political institutions existing in the German states, their teachings were essentially hostile and incompatible with the feudal order, which had become obsolete. The dialectical method, developed especially thoroughly and consistently by Hegel, could easily be turned against these orders. This is what the most radical students of the Berlin professor did. Therefore, Marx called the philosophy of Kant, the founder of classical German philosophy, the German theory of the French Revolution. With no less justification, this definition can be extended to other representatives of classical German philosophy.
§ 1. Kant's philosophical system
The founder of German classical philosophy, Immanuel Kant (1724-1804), came from a family of artisans. His early abilities helped him get an education. He deeply studied not only philosophy, logic, theology, but also mathematics and natural science. The philosopher's entire life, poor in external events, but filled with tireless and intense creativity, was spent in Konigsberg. Here he studied, taught, was a professor for many years and at one time the rector of the university. Here he created all his philosophical and natural science works.
Kant's philosophical development is usually divided into two periods: the first - until the beginning of the 70s - is called "pre-critical", the second - from the beginning of the 70s - "critical", since it was then that the main works were written that brought the philosopher world fame: " Critique of Pure Reason, Critique of Practical Reason, and Critique of Judgment. The main work is the first work devoted to the theory of knowledge. The second "criticism" expounds the ethical doctrine, and the third - aesthetics and the doctrine of expediency in nature.
In the “pre-critical period” Kant dealt extensively and fruitfully with issues of natural science and pursued the idea of ​​development in nature. Based on the discoveries of Copernicus, Galileo and Newton, Kant in the book “General Natural History and Theory of the Heavens (1755) puts forward an ingenious hypothesis about the origin of the solar system naturally from the original nebula. Further, Kant comes close to the conclusion about the plurality of worlds, about the continuous process of their emergence and disappearance. The philosopher draws an analogy referring to the boundless fertility of nature, which, in return for the countless number of animals and plants that perish daily, produces no less of them in other places. In the same way, worlds and systems of worlds perish and are swallowed up by the abyss of eternity, but creation never stops: in others places in the sky, new formations arise and the loss is replenished in abundance. Half a century later, the French scientist Laplace, independently of Kant, gave a more rigorous, mathematical justification for the ideas about the natural origin of our Universe. After this, the “nebular” theory was called the Kantolaplace hypothesis. Although Kant’s book, due to purely random circumstances remained unknown to the public for a long time, Kant’s priority in creating the cosmogonic hypothesis is undoubted.
Kant is credited with creating another cosmogonic theory - the slowing down of the Earth's rotation due to the action of tides in the ocean. Kant's historical, dialectical approach to natural science dealt a significant blow to the metaphysical worldview that was dominant at that time. However, one cannot ignore the dual, contradictory position of the philosopher on this issue. On the one hand, he strives to give a scientific picture of the emergence of the Solar system based on the action of the laws of the development of matter. “Give me matter, I will build a world from it,” Kant declares, calling Newton’s opinion about the need for a divine first impulse “pathetic.” But, on the other hand, he sees the ultimate root cause of the world in God. The philosopher considers the very fact of the natural and regular development of the Universe from initial chaos to be the “only possible” basis for proving its existence.
Already in the “pre-critical period” Kant spoke about the limits of knowledge. If it is possible to give a purely natural, mechanical explanation for the emergence of the Universe from chaos, then this cannot be done for even the simplest living creature. Here, the philosopher thinks, teleological principles of expediency, based on the divine will, dominate.
The motives of agnosticism, the fundamental unknowability of the world around us, became leading in the “Critical Period”, constituting the specifics of what is called Kantianism.
Problems of the theory of knowledge stand at the center of the philosophical system of Kant and his many followers. In the preface to the Critique of Pure Reason, Kant writes: “I had to limit the field of knowledge in order to make room for faith.” Based on this main task for him, the philosopher developed a very complex epistemological structure.
The process of cognition includes three stages, three steps: sensory cognition, rational cognition, rational cognition. All our knowledge begins with experience, with the work of the senses. They are influenced by objects of the external world located outside of man, or, as Kant calls them, things in themselves. The philosopher does not give an unambiguous definition of this concept. In many places in the Critique of Pure Reason he explicitly states that things in themselves exist objectively, i.e. independent of human consciousness, although they remain unknowable. This understanding of the thing in itself as the basis of all phenomena, as the actual cause of human sensations, as objective reality, is dominant in Kant, which allows us to qualify it as materialistic. But he also has other interpretations. By thing-in-itself he means a boundary, ultimate concept that closes the circle of possible human ideas and limits people’s claims to knowledge of the world, as well as God, the immortality of the soul and free will. It is obvious that the latter interpretations of the thing-in-itself contradict the first and are idealistic.
The sensations caused by the action of things in themselves on sensuality, according to Kant, are in no way similar to the originals. They belong only to the subjective properties of sensibility, are its modifications and do not provide knowledge about the object. For example, the pleasant taste of wine does not belong to the number of objective properties of the feelings of the subject who enjoys it. Colors are also not properties of bodies, they are only a modification of the sense of vision, subject to some action from light. Consequently, although sensations are caused by the influence of “things-in-themselves” on human sensuality, they have nothing in common with these things. Sensations are not images, but symbols of things.
A similar point of view, which, as is known, was most thoroughly expressed by D. Hume, is called agnosticism. Agreeing with Hume, Kant adds something of his own. Although our knowledge begins with experience, it does not follow that it comes entirely from experience. Knowledge, according to Kant, has a complex composition; and consists of two parts. The philosopher calls the first part; "matter" of knowledge. This is a flow of sensations, or empirical knowledge, given a posteriori, i.e. through experience. The second part - form - is given before experience, a priori and must be completely ready to be in the soul, in the subject.
Thus, along with agnosticism, apriorism is a characteristic feature of Kant’s theory of knowledge. The question arises of where the a priori values ​​come from, i.e. pre-experimental forms of sensibility and all other a priori forms that Kant spoke about. The philosopher was forced to admit that he was unable to answer this question: “this question cannot be resolved, because for it. And for resolution, as for any thinking, we already need these properties.”
The concept of apriorism is the most important position of Kant’s teaching; on it he based the possibilities of achieving necessary and reliable knowledge. Kant shared the general prejudice of rationalism, which underestimated the role of experience, the role of sensory knowledge in the process of achieving universal and necessary knowledge. According to Kant, experience can never give judgments a true and strict universality, but only an assumed and comparative universality. At the same time, he believed that mathematical knowledge is absolutely necessary. He tried to get out of this difficulty with the help of apriorism: only a priori judgments are universal, reliable and objective. For Kant, the concepts “a priori”, “necessary”, “universal”, “objective” are closely intertwined and are used as equivalent. At the same time, he refused to recognize a priori knowledge as innate.
If, according to Kant, the “matter” of knowledge is of an experimental, a posteriori character, then the form of sensory knowledge is extra-experimental, a priori. Before the perception of objects of experimental knowledge, “pure” ones must exist in us, i.e. free from everything empirical, visual representations that are the form, the condition of all experience. So “pure”, i.e. a priori visual representations are space and time. According to the philosopher, space and time are forms of sensuality, not reason; they are ideas, not concepts. Kant argues this as follows: a concept is discursive and includes different kinds, for example, the concept “man” includes different kinds of people. But the same cannot be said about space and time. There is, as Kant thought, one and only time and one and only space. Consequently, space and time are single representations of an intuitive nature.
Space does not at all represent a property of any things in themselves; time also does not belong to things in themselves either as their property or as their substance. Kant, thus, takes away from space and time any claim to reality; he turns them into special properties of the subject.
Kant believed that with his teaching about the a priori forms of sensibility and reason, he saved science from Humean skepticism and subjectivism. But in fact, apriorism is only one of the varieties of subjectivism. Saying that there is only one space, he relied on the physics and cosmogony of his time, which really knew one thing, namely Euclidean space. A quarter of a century after Kant’s death, the Russian scientist N.I. Lobachevsky showed that the properties of space depend on the properties of matter and that Euclidean geometry is not at all the only possible one. Other systems of non-Euclidean geometry also emerged. The theory of relativity also put an end to the metaphysical idea of ​​the absolute independence of time, showing that the general properties of matter determine the properties of both space and time. Consequently, there are many forms of space and time, which refutes Kant's main argument for their a priori nature. The first stage of cognition - the area of ​​sensuality - is characterized by a person’s ability to organize the chaos of sensations with the help of subjective forms of contemplation - space and time. In this way, according to Kant, the object of sensibility, or the world of phenomena, is formed. The next stage is the area of ​​reason. Experience is a product of activity, on the one hand, of sensuality, on the other, of reason. Neither of these abilities can be preferred over the other. Without sensuality, not a single object would be given to us, and without reason, not a single object would be conceivable. Thoughts without content are empty, and visual representations without concepts are blind. Knowledge, therefore, arises from two conditions: sensuality and reason. Judgments of perception obtained on the basis of sensuality have only subjective meaning - this is a simple connection of perceptions. The judgment of perception must acquire an “objective”, in Kant’s words, meaning, i.e. acquire the character of universality and necessity and thereby become an “experienced” judgment. This occurs, according to Kant, by subsuming the judgment of perception under the a priori category of understanding. An example is given: “When the sun illuminates a stone, it becomes warm.” According to Kant, we have a simple judgment of perception, in which the cause-effect relationship between the sun's heat and the heating of the stone is not yet expressed. But if we say: “The sun warms the stone,” then a rational concept, or category of cause, is added to the judgment of perception, which turns this judgment into an experimental one.
Causality is one of the categories that are a priori principles of thinking. They serve as tools for processing sensory material. In the Critique of Pure Reason, Kant builds a special table of these categories. There are only 12 of them, which corresponds to the number of types of judgments according to the traditional classification of judgments in formal logic. These are the categories of unity, plurality, universality, reality, negation, limitation, belonging, causality, communication, possibility, existence, necessity. Kant cannot justify why there are exactly twelve categories and where they come from: “No further reasons can be given for this circumstance, just as it is impossible to justify why we have such and such functions of judgment, or why time and space are the only forms of visual representation possible for us."
The artificial nature of Kant's doctrine of categories was already clear to his contemporaries. Hegel rightly reproached Kant for dogmatism and formalism. According to Hegel’s figurative expression, the connection of sensuality and reason in Kant occurs in a purely external way, “just as, for example, a piece of wood and a leg are tied with a rope.”
By transforming causality into a subjective category of the understanding, Kant created numerous difficulties for himself. First of all, the “thing in itself,” since it exists outside the subject, cannot be considered the cause that, acting on the sensibility of the subject, generates the “matter” of knowledge. Further, all the achievements of Kant of the “pre-critical” period are called into question, especially his cosmogonic theories, since they, like all natural sciences, are based on the recognition of the objective nature of the laws of nature, including cause-and-effect relationships.
Kant in the “Critique of Pure Reason” argues that the principles of “pure reason”, realizing the application of categories to experience, make possible nature itself and the science of it - “pure” natural science. He found the highest legislation of nature in human reason: “Although it is strange, it is nevertheless true if I say: reason does not draw its laws (a priori) from nature, but prescribes them to it.”
The last and highest stage is rational knowledge. It represents the “highest authority” for processing the material of visual representations and for bringing it under the highest unity of thought.” Explaining these provisions, Kant points out that reason, unlike reason, generates “transcendental ideas” that go beyond the limits of experience. Such ideas three: 1) psychological (the study of
soul), 2) cosmological (the doctrine of the world), 3) theological (the doctrine of God). These ideas express the desire of the mind to comprehend things in themselves. The mind greedily strives to comprehend these things, tries to go beyond the limits of experience, but everything is in vain: things “flee from it” and remain unknown.
As a result, the mind creates only “paralogisms”, “antinomies”, “ideals without reality”, and becomes entangled in insoluble contradictions. Kant pays great attention to antinomies, i.e. contradictory, incompatible positions, each of which, according to Kant, can be proven; logically flawless. Kant has four such antinomies:
1) thesis - “The world has a beginning in time and is also limited in space”;
antithesis: “The world has no beginning in time and no boundaries in space; it is infinite both in time and in space.”
2) thesis: “Every complex substance in the world consists of simple parts and in general there is only the simple and that which is made up of the simple”;
antithesis: “Not a single complex thing in the world consists of simple things, and in general there is nothing simple in the world.”
3) thesis: “Causality according to the laws of nature is not; the only causality from which all phenomena in the world can be derived. To explain phenomena, it is also necessary to assume free causality”;
antithesis: “There is no freedom, but everything happens in the world only according to the laws of nature.”
4) thesis: “An unconditionally necessary being belongs to the world, either as a part of it, or as its cause”;
antithesis: “There is no absolutely necessary being, either in the world or outside the world, as its cause.” In other words, there is no God.
In the first antinomy, it is important to see an approach to revealing the dialectical contradiction between the finite and the infinite: the world is both finite and infinite in the sense that infinite matter is composed of finite quantities. The second antinomy poses essentially the same question as in Zeno's aporia - about the unity of the finite and the infinite, the discontinuity and continuity of matter. But from here the Eleans drew a metaphysical conclusion: since the movement and diversity of the world are contradictory, and any contradiction destroys thought, then movement is an illusion, the world is motionless and devoid of diversity. Kant does something similar. He believes that he proves both the thesis and antithesis of each antinomy equally flawlessly from the point of view of logic. For example, the fourth antinomy proves that God exists and that God does not exist. How to be? We must discard both thesis and antithesis. Logic and reason are powerless here. Belief in God is not a matter of science, but of morality, Kant believes.
So, antinomies are contradictions that testify to the powerlessness of reason, its inability to comprehend “things in themselves”, to go beyond the boundaries of experience. “There is something sad and humiliating in the fact that there is generally an antithesis of pure reason and that reason, which constitutes the highest tribunal for all disputes, is forced to enter into a dispute with itself,” states Kant.
It would be unfair not to notice the positive, progressive sides of Kant's theory of knowledge. In the "Critique of Pure Reason" the cardinal problems of the theory of knowledge and logic are raised, and an attempt is made to solve them dialectically. Kant was the first in modern philosophy to show the complexity and contradictoriness of the process of cognition. These ideas of his found continuation and deeper development in the philosophy of Hegel.
Kant's ethical teaching
Since theoretical (“pure”) reason has failed in its attempts to comprehend the world of things in itself, a person can only rely on “practical reason,” by which the philosopher understood the doctrine of morality, ethics. In his opinion, in the field of morality, man is no longer subject to necessity, which dominates with inevitable force in the sphere of phenomena. As a subject of moral consciousness, a person is free, i.e. connected to the world of things in themselves. Kant establishes a relationship of subordination between theoretical and practical reason: theoretical reason is subordinate to practical reason.
By practice, Kant understood not real activity, but the scope of application of moral assessments of people's actions. The basis of any moral assessments is the categorical imperative - the fundamental law of Kant's ethics. An imperative is a form of command associated with the category of what is due. The philosopher calls a categorical imperative a form of command that represents an action as if for its own sake, in relation to another goal. The imperative is not associated with the desire for the benefit or happiness of people, it is strictly formal, a priori in nature and has the form of a commandment, unconditional, mandatory for all people. The categorical imperative is formulated as follows: act in such a way that the maxim (basic principle) of your will at all times could serve as the principle of universal legislation. This principle is abstract in nature. It can meet a wide variety of requirements and postulates: religious commandments, conclusions of worldly wisdom, and much more.
The most important concretization of the categorical imperative is the “practical” imperative: act in such a way that humanity in your person, as well as in the person of everyone else, is certainly used as an end and never as a means.
These provisions, expressing the principles of humanism, had great progressive significance for their time. They contain a protest against the feudal-absolutist system that enslaves people. J.J. had a great influence on Kant's ethical and socio-political views. Rousseau. “There was a time when... I despised the mob,” Kant wrote. “Rousseau corrected me and sent me on a different path. This blinding advantage disappears; I learn to respect man...” Speaking for human rights, the philosopher emphasized that “a person who is dependent on another is no longer a person; he has lost this title, he is then nothing more than another person’s property... in human nature, slavery is the highest of evils.” . Kant borrowed from Rousseau the idea of ​​the independence of the moral nature of man from the achievements of science and culture, refracting it in his doctrine of the independence and originality of morality, the primacy of practical reason over theoretical reason. Kant, contrary to the dogmas of Protestantism and Catholicism, believed that morality is autonomous and does not depend on religion. On the contrary, religion must be derived from the principles of morality.
The practical imperative, declaring man to be an end and not a means, eliminates, in the words of the philosopher, “fanatical contempt for oneself as a person (for the entire human race) in general...”. A person cannot be anyone’s slave, including God’s servant. Therefore, “morality should be cultivated more than religion,” and “God is necessary only from a moral point of view.” God has been turned into an ethical symbol. Kant's philosophy thus comes close to deism.
Kant dreamed of eternal peace on earth, of a union of free states and free peoples as the guarantor of this peace. His treatise “Eternal Peace” is devoted to the rationale for this.
Kant is one of the key figures of world philosophical thought. Hegel rightly believed that in Kant’s teaching the main transition to modern philosophy took place. In his teaching about the categories of reason and the antinomies of reason, about the activity of the subject in knowledge and moral practice, the development of the dialectical method of knowledge began - the main achievement of German classical philosophy.
Kant had a huge number of followers and an equally large number of critics. He was criticized from the right and from the left. On the right: - from the position of consistent idealism - for the assumption of the materialist thesis about the existence of things in themselves, independently of the subject. On the left - from the standpoint of materialism - for agnosticism and apriorism, which led to subjective idealism. Hegel criticized him for this, but from the standpoint of absolute objective idealism and, what is very significant, from the standpoint of a comprehensively developed dialectical method.
§ 2. Fichte's "Teaching of Science"
Johann Gottlieb Fichte (1762-1814) was born into a peasant family. Thanks to his outstanding abilities and rare hard work, he managed to get an education. Unlike Kant or Hegel, Fichte's life was full of dramatic events. Fichte is not only a prominent representative of classical German philosophy, but also an ideologist of the German liberation movement directed against the French occupiers. At the same time, the progressive ideas of the French Enlightenment and revolution were reflected in his work. In 1793, he published (anonymously) two essays praising these ideas. In 1799, articles appeared in a philosophical journal in which Fichte identified the idea of ​​God with the moral world order. The magazine was banned by the government, Fichte was accused of atheism and dismissed from his position as a professor at the University of Jena. Only in 1805 did he manage to become a professor at the University of Erlangen. In 1807, in French-occupied Berlin, Fichte gave a series of public lectures - “Speeches to the German Nation,” c. whom he called for the unification of the country, its revival, and democratic reforms. The patriotic activity of the philosopher found a wide response in the states of what was then Germany. Since 1809, Fichte has been a professor at the University of Berlin, and in 1811-1812. is elected as its rector. In 1813 he joined the Landsturm (militia) and in 1814 he died in hospital, apparently contracting typhus.
Fichte calls his philosophy “the first system of freedom,” which frees the human “I” from the shackles of things in themselves, from external dictate. Philosophy, in his opinion, is not a worldview, but self-awareness associated with the character, way of thinking, and practical actions of the individual.
Fichte criticizes Kant's philosophy. He does not agree with the statement about the unknowability of things in themselves. This criticism is carried out from the right - from the standpoint of a more consistent subjective idealism. Fichte calls the primary reality the absolute human “I,” which includes everything that can be thought. “I” is a thinking subject with great activity. His activity results in a dialectical process: there is a movement from the initial position (affirmation) to the opposite position (negation), and from it to the third position (unity, synthesis of the first two positions).
In addition to the “I”, there is a “not-I”, or a certain object of nature, the surrounding reality. It influences the “I” and even determines to some extent its activity. According to the philosopher, it is impossible to understand with reason the mechanism of this effect; it can only be felt. Along with the theoretical activity of the “I”, thinking, the philosopher also recognizes unconscious activity. Unconscious activity includes the moral behavior of the subject: the fulfillment of his duty, obedience to the laws of morality and law.
"Not-I" not only exists, but also influences the "I". The physical nature of a person, his natural inclinations, which make up the “not-I,” encourage the “I” to act and at the same time distort the manifestations of morality, counteract the manifestations of moral duty. The stronger the influence of the "not-I", or the sensual nature of a person, the more difficult it is for the "I" to fulfill its ethical duty.
Fichte correctly grasps the contradiction that really exists between feeling and duty. But what should we understand by the category “not-I”? One may get the impression that, using unique terminology, Fichte expresses ordinary materialist views on the relationship between subject and object, consciousness and nature. However, this impression is deceptive. Fichte consciously distances himself not only from materialism as a philosophical worldview, but also from the half-hearted views of Kant, who recognized the objectively real existence of things in themselves. As Fichte emphasizes, the “not-I” cannot be identified with the thing-in-itself in the Kantian sense. The category “not-I” is the result of the activity of consciousness, i.e. product "I". It seems to ordinary consciousness that the things around it, nature, the whole world exist independently of human consciousness. Fichte is convinced that we are dealing with an illusion that can be overcome by philosophical thinking. In a word, the subject, “I,” is primary. His active activity, although of a spiritual nature, creates an object, the external world.
It is not difficult to discover that in Fichte’s reasoning there is a logical circle: “I” generates “not-I”, and “not-I” generates “I”. Trying to break out of this logical whirlwind, the philosopher introduces another category - intellectual contemplation,” or “intellectual intuition.” It is designed to eliminate the opposition between subject and object, but this opposition still remains, and its overcoming turns into an infinitely distant, unattainable goal.
Intellectual intuition belongs not to theoretical thinking, but to “practical activity,” by which Fichte understands the sphere of morality, moral “action” and “ought,” ethical assessments, which is very similar to “practical reason” in Kant’s philosophy. Here another contradiction arises in Fichte's philosophical system. On the one hand, he proclaims the omnipotence of reason, he calls his teaching “the doctrine of science,” the doctrine of science” (Wissenshcaftslehre). Philosophy is the science of science, the highest and unconditional foundation for all sciences, the universal method of cognition. On the other hand, theoretical reason is subject to “practical”, i.e. moral consciousness and will, which are comprehended intuitively, represent spheres closed to theoretical reason.
Fichte's philosophy is also burdened with other contradictions that are inevitable for subjective idealism. If we proceed from its premises and be consistent, subjective idealism inevitably leads to solipsism, i.e. the assertion that there is one and only “I”, and the entire world around me is its creation. Fichte tries to deduce from the original “I” the possibility of the existence of many other free individuals, other “I”. According to the philosopher, this deduction is also determined by the rules of law. If we recognize the existence of one “I,” then there can be no talk of any right or legality. Of course, this is so, but then the initial premises of subjective idealism as a monistic philosophy collapse. In fact, Fichte moves to the position of idealistic pluralism such as Leibniz's monadology. However, this path does not attract Fichte, and he leans toward objective idealism, combining it with subjective idealism.
In fact, Fichte uses two meanings of the concept “I”: 1) “I”, identical to individual consciousness and 2) “I”, not: identical to individual consciousness, the absolute “I”, i.e. superhuman consciousness. And this is already objective idealism. The philosopher does not always warn in what sense he uses the concept of “I,” which creates difficulties for understanding his thoughts. Both meanings sometimes coincide, sometimes diverge, and in this the philosopher sees the driving principle of thinking, the core of dialectics.
The evolution of Fichte's views should be taken into account. After 1800, he made significant adjustments to his philosophy. In the first period, subjective idealism prevailed in it. The Absolute “I” was considered as an unattainable goal of the subject’s activity, as a potential infinity. In the second period, the absolute “I” is interpreted as an actual being, equivalent to God, and everything that is outside this absolute is its generation, image, scheme. This interpretation is close to Platonism and is objective idealism. In the first period, the activity of the subject was identified with morality; in the spirit of Protestant ethics, activism was regarded as a virtue. In the second period, activity and morality were separated because they do not always coincide, and activity may not be virtuous.
Socio-political views also underwent changes: a transition was made from bourgeois liberalism to national patriotism.
Fichte contributed to the development of the dialectical method. True, he calls his method not dialectical, but antithetical. Unlike Hegel, the antithesis in Fichte is not derived from the thesis, but is compared with it, forming a unity of opposites. The “I” is set in motion and impelled to action by something contrary. The subject of activity is the “I” interacting with the “not-I”. A contradiction arises between the activity and the task it performs. The resolution of this contradiction leads to the emergence of a new one, and so on endlessly.
Fichte considers freedom to be the central category of “practical philosophy”. Like Spinoza, Fichte believed that man is subject to the law of causality, i.e. necessary. He interprets randomness as a subjective category; something by chance, the reason for which is unknown to us. But since everything is causally determined, everything is necessary. In the historical process, freedom is possible and it is achieved by awareness of necessity, which makes it possible to act with knowledge of circumstances. Therefore, freedom consists of active activity within the framework of recognized necessity. A practically active attitude to a subject precedes a theoretically contemplative one. The dialectic of the active activity of the subject is the most important feature of Fichte’s philosophy, which influenced the further development of classical German philosophy.
Fichte paid a lot of attention to the doctrine of law. The science of law concerns external relations between people and is different from ethics, which studies the inner world of man, based on freedom. Thus, law and ethics are incomparable. Law is based on relationships of reciprocity, on the voluntary submission of each citizen to the law established in society. The law is an agreement on civil society.
The state as a political organization can function only where there is property. People are divided into owners and non-owners, while the state is an organization of owners. Of course, this is a guess about the dependence of the law:. and state structure from economic relations, from the institution of property. In his work “The Closed Commercial State” (1800), Fichte advocates for the right to work and private property in labor. The task of the state is to protect these social institutions. Fichte stands for active government intervention in the economic sphere. It must regulate the monetary system, limit freedom of trade and competition, “in order to protect the interests of its citizens, to protect them from trade and financial expansion by stronger powers. These requirements can only be understood in the context of the specific historical conditions in which the German states found themselves at the beginning of the 19th century.
Fichte's philosophy is not just a connecting link between the philosophy of Kant, on the one hand, and the philosophy of Schelling and Hegel, on the other. It has great independent significance as a unique expression of the progressive aspirations of the radical strata of German society, as a philosophy of human freedom and active practical action.
§ 5. Schelling's natural philosophy
Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling (1775-1854) was born into a priest's family, graduated from theological seminary and the University of Tübingen, where he studied with Hegel. In his youth, Schelling expressed sympathy for the French Revolution, mainly for its Girondist wing. In the 90s he published works on problems of natural philosophy, which were received with interest by scientists and philosophers. On Goethe's recommendation, Schelling was invited as a professor at the University of Jena. During this period he communicates with Goethe, Schiller, Fichte, Hegel.
Schelling lived a long life. His work includes a number of stages. Apparently, the first one, associated with understanding the dialectics of nature, was especially fruitful. Schelling approached traditional philosophy of nature, or natural philosophy, as a dialectician. At the same time, he relied on major discoveries made by that time in physics, chemistry, and biology by such scientists as Lavoisier, Galvani, Brown, Volt, and Priestley.
Schelling opposes the metaphysical gap between “matter” and “force”, as well as the idea of ​​​​the existence of a special “vital force”. He also disagrees with the idea that light is immaterial. The philosopher views nature as a dynamic process that includes the evolution of inorganic and organic matter. He expresses a fruitful idea about the internal unity of nature. From these positions, Schelling criticizes the mechanistic concepts widespread in the natural sciences of that time.
Among the classics of German philosophy, Schelling came closest to understanding the philosophy of nature as the dialectics of nature. True, he understood this dialectic in an idealistic manner. Nature, from his point of view, is a purposeful whole, as well as a form of unconscious life of the mind.
The original purpose of nature is to generate life capable of knowing itself, i.e. endowed with self-awareness. Nature, said Schelling, “is the Odyssey of the spirit.”
In natural processes, Schelling sees an expression of the principle of differentiation of the original unity; every body is a product of the interaction of oppositely directed forces (attraction and repulsion, positive and negative electricity, magnet poles, etc.). Polarity, duality and at the same time the unity of opposite sides is a universal principle of nature.
In the phenomena and processes of nature, Schelling discovers dialectics, namely the unity of such opposing principles as necessity and chance, whole and part, internal and external, finite and infinite. Overcoming mechanistic ideas about evolutionary processes, he points to the emergence of something qualitatively new in the course of development. The dynamic process of nature consists of stages that are qualitatively different from each other. The highest stages, or forms, of nature are the lower ones raised to a degree. In other words, a quantitative increase leads to new quality.
Each stage of development contains all the lower stages in a “removed” form. Schelling approaches the formulation of the law of negation of negation, most fully and consistently developed by Hegel.
Schelling's views on the development of forms of thinking are unique. Traditional thinking, subject to the laws and rules of formal logic, is the sphere of reason, which is not capable of revealing the essence of phenomena. This can only be done by reason, not relying on ordinary conclusions, but through direct contemplation of the subject with the help of intellectual intuition. The mind discerns the hidden essence of things - the unity of opposites. But the mind is not ordinary, not ordinary, but “philosophical and artistic genius,”
The positive side of Schelling's natural philosophical views was the fight against the metaphysical, mechanistic worldview, the establishment of a dialectical way of thinking. However, like any natural philosopher of that time, he did not always take into account the specific data and conclusions of the natural sciences and came into conflict with them.
At the turn of the 18th and 19th centuries, Schelling concentrated his efforts on developing a “transcendental philosophy.” In it he saw the second most important part of his system. If the first considers nature from a philosophical position, then the second considers the subjective world, the history of consciousness from its lowest manifestations to its highest forms, to self-consciousness.
Although the subjective moment is proclaimed to be the only basis of all things, Schelling believes that transcendental idealism cannot be considered a type of subjective idealism. After all, he reduces the subjective not to the subjective feeling or thinking of the individual subject, but to the direct contemplation by the mind of the essence of things. But it is not an ordinary subject who is capable of such intellectual intuition, but a “genius” expressing absolute reason.
Schelling's "Transcendental Idealism" is an objective idealism based on the concept of the identity of spirit and nature. Spirit is not individual consciousness, but absolute superhuman intelligence, the self-consciousness of God. Absolute reason is the only reality in which the differences between the subjective and the objective are erased, all opposites coincide, and the possibilities of everything that can be are concentrated. Absolute mind gives birth to the Universe and there is nothing in the Universe except it. Absolute reason is neither spirit nor nature, but “the indifference of both,” similar to the indifference of the poles at the center of a magnet. Such views can be considered panlogism, but they are even closer to neoplatonism.
From about 1801 until the end of his life, Schelling preached the philosophy of identity, which developed into a philosophy of revelation. The philosopher abandons his youthful hobbies, when he showed some radicalism and free-thinking, substantiating, for example, the need for a historical and critical approach to the study of the Bible.
The philosophy of revelation goes far beyond the limits of philosophical criticism and rationalism characteristic of classical German philosophy. Moreover, it goes beyond the boundaries traditional for philosophy in general and goes into theosophy and mysticism. Schelling seriously argues that in the concept of God there are two parts, one is God himself, and the second is some kind of indefinite basis, “abyss”, “groundlessness”, irrational will. The splitting of the absolute is an act above the temporal and inaccessible to human understanding.
The Prussian king invited Schelling to the University of Berlin. However, Schelling's lectures on the philosophy of revelation disappointed the audience and caused protests from the progressive German public. The philosopher clearly outlived his fame and could not adequately replace Hegel in the philosophy department.
§ 4. System and method of Hegel’s philosophy
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770-1831) was born into the family of a prominent official. He studied at the Tübingen Theological Institute. For some time he worked as a home teacher. Served as director of a gymnasium in Nuremberg. From 1801 he taught at the University of Jena. At this time, together with Schelling, he published the Critical Philosophical Journal. Since 1816, Hegel has been a professor at the University of Heidelberg, and since 1818 at the University of Berlin. For some time he was its rector.
Hegel's work is considered the pinnacle of classical German philosophy. It continued the dialectical ideas put forward by Kant, Fichte, and Schelling. But Hegel went much further than his great predecessors. He was the first to imagine the entire natural, historical and spiritual world in continuous development. He discovered and justified the basic laws and categories of dialectics from the standpoint of objective idealism. He deliberately contrasted dialectics as a method of cognition with its antipode - metaphysics. Agreeing with the need to study the prerequisites of knowledge, which Kant insisted on, Hegel rightly reproached him for trying to present them outside the history of knowledge, in isolation from human mental activity. Kant, as we know, put forward the requirement: know the abilities of knowledge before you begin to know something. This is similar to the joke that is told about the scholastic who did not want to enter the water before he learned to swim, Hegel ironizes.
Hegel is an opponent of Kantian agnosticism and apriorism. He does not agree with the metaphysical gap between essence and appearance that Kant insisted on. Phenomenon, according to Hegel, is no less objective than essence. The essence is, i.e. is revealed in a phenomenon, and the phenomenon acts as a carrier of essence. This is the unity of opposites that cannot exist without each other. Therefore, Kant’s assertions about the fundamental unknowability of things in themselves are untenable. The thing in itself, Hegel teaches, is only the initial moment, only a step in the development of the thing. “So, for example, a person in himself is a child, a sprout is a plant in himself... All things are first in themselves, but the matter does not stop there.”
Contrary to Kant, the thing in itself, firstly, develops by entering into diverse relationships, and, secondly, is knowable, since it reveals itself in phenomena.
Criticizing Kantian subjectivism and agnosticism, Hegel recognizes the possibility of adequate knowledge of the world on the basis of the identity of thinking and being. Hegel believes that Fichte’s attempt to derive all of nature and society from the “I” is also untenable, i.e. from individual consciousness. He criticized Schelling for his tendency towards intuitionism and for underestimating the role of reason and logic. However, what Hegel and his predecessors had in common was an idealistic solution to the question of the relationship between consciousness and nature, matter. The differences between them on this issue are the differences between objective and subjective idealism.
Hegel's philosophy is the most rationalized and logical objective idealism. The basis of all things are the laws of thinking, i.e. laws of logic. But the logic is not formal, but coincides with dialectics - dialectical logic. To the question of where these laws came from, Hegel answers simply: these are the thoughts of God before the creation of the world. Logic is “the image of God as he is in his eternal essence before the creation of nature and any finite spirit.”
Philosophical system
The philosophical system is divided by Hegel into three parts: 1) logic, 2) philosophy of nature, 3) philosophy of spirit. Logic, from his point of view, is a system of “pure reason coinciding with the divine mind. However, how could Hegel know the thoughts of God, and even before the creation of the world? The philosopher simply postulates this thesis, i.e. introduces it without proof. In fact, his Hegel draws his system of logic not from sacred books, but from the great book of nature itself and social development.Therefore, the most seemingly mystical part of his philosophy - logic - is based on enormous natural scientific, historical material that was at the disposal of an encyclopedically educated thinker.
“Thoughts of God” turn out to be the most general laws of development of nature, society and thinking. It is in logic that Hegel's dialectical idealism is closest to dialectical materialism. In essence, this is materialism turned upside down and turned on its head. The matter, of course, cannot be reduced to a simple “turnover”. There are significant differences between Hegel’s idealist dialectic and materialist dialectic, as will be discussed below.
The starting point of Hegel's philosophy is the identity of thinking (consciousness) and being. Things and thoughts about them coincide, therefore thinking in its immanent definitions and the true nature of things are one and the same.
Logics. The identity of being and thinking, from Hegel’s point of view, represents the substantial unity of the world. But the identity is not abstract, but concrete, i.e. one that also presupposes difference. Identity and difference are the unity of opposites. Absolute identity, as with Schelling, excludes the very possibility of development. Thinking and being are subject to the same laws; this is the rational meaning of Hegel’s position on concrete identity.
Objective absolute thinking, Hegel believes, is not only the origin, but also the driving force for the development of all things. Manifesting itself in all the diversity of phenomena, it appears as an absolute idea.
The absolute idea does not stand still. It is continuously developing, moving from one stage to another, more specific and meaningful. The ascent from the abstract to the concrete is the general principle of development.
The highest stage of development is “absolute spirit.” At this stage, the absolute idea manifests itself in the sphere of human history and makes itself the subject of thought.
The philosophical system of Hegelian objective idealism has some features. Firstly, pantheism. Divine thought does not hover somewhere in the heavens, it permeates the whole world, constituting the essence of every, even the smallest thing. Secondly, panlogism. Objective divine thinking is strictly logical. And thirdly, dialectics.
Hegel is characterized by epistemological optimism, a belief in the knowability of the world. The subjective spirit, human consciousness, comprehending things, discovers in them the manifestation of the absolute spirit, divine thinking. This leads to an important conclusion for Hegel: everything that is real is rational, everything that is rational is real. Many were mistaken in interpreting the thesis about the rationality of everything that is real as an apology for everything that exists. In fact, what exists, Hegel believed, is rational only in a certain sense, namely, when it expresses some kind of necessity, a pattern. Only then can the existing be qualified as something reasonable. But as soon as the necessity for the existence of something disappears, it loses the status of reality and must necessarily disappear. Obsolete forms of life will certainly give way to new ones; this is the true meaning of Hegel’s formula.
So, logic represents the natural movement of concepts (categories) expressing the content of the absolute idea, the stages of its self-development.
Where does the movement of this idea begin? After a long discussion of this difficult problem, Hegel comes to the conclusion that the category of pure being serves as the beginning. Being, in his opinion, does not have an eternal existence and must arise. But from what? Obviously, from non-existence, from nothing. “For now there is nothing and something must arise. The beginning is not pure nothing, but such nothingness from which something must come; being, therefore, is already contained in the beginning. The beginning, therefore, contains both, being and nothingness; it is the unity of being and nothingness, or, to put it differently, it is non-being, which is at the same time being, and being, which is at the same time non-being.”
One may get the impression that we are faced with a verbal balancing act, devoid of meaning. Hegel's train of thought seems artificial if we proceed from natural scientific, deterministic premises. Indeed, out of non-existence, out of nothing, something cannot arise. But with Hegel we are not talking about the real world, but about the thoughts of God before the creation of the world.
If we abstract from the mystical plots of the divine creation of the world, being from nothing, then in the philosopher’s reasoning we will find reasonable content, or, as they say, a rational grain. Being and non-being is the unity of opposites. One category denies the other. As a result, a third category arises, which synthesizes both previous ones. Hegel calls this new category becoming. “Becoming is the indivisibility of being and nothing... in other words, such a unity in which there is both being and nothing.” Becoming - "; this dialectical process of emergence, which is appropriate to call becoming, represents a turning point when a thing as an established integrity does not yet exist, but it cannot be said that it does not exist at all. And in this sense, becoming can be considered the unity of non-existence and being. “Becoming is an unstable restlessness that settles and turns into a certain calm result.
If Hegel seeks to express the dialectical process of emergence with the help of the category of becoming, then the process of disappearance and destruction is expressed by him with the help of the category of sublation. It must be borne in mind that the German verb aufheben - to remove - has many meanings, including negative ones: to stop, cancel, abolish, liquidate. But at the same time it also has a number of positive meanings: to save, preserve, provide. Accordingly, the noun aufheben means both cancellation and preservation. Hegel also refers to the Latin language, where the verb tollere has two meanings: 1) to destroy, deny, remove and 2) to exalt. It is no accident that the philosopher uses linguistic polysemy. In this case, it expresses spontaneous dialectics and its main feature: the identity of opposites. In the world, nothing perishes without a trace, but serves as material, the starting stage for the emergence of something new. This pattern is reflected by the category of sublation, as well as the category of negation, which Hegel widely uses in his philosophical system.
Hegel calls the new category becoming. “Becoming is the indivisibility of being and nothing... in other words, such a unity in which there is both being and nothing.” Becoming is a dialectical process of emergence, which is appropriate to call becoming; it represents a turning point when a thing as an established integrity does not yet exist, but one cannot say that it does not exist at all. And in this sense, becoming can be considered the unity of non-being and being. “Becoming is an unstable restlessness that settles and turns into a certain calm result.
The synthesis of the categories pure being and nothing gives the category becoming, and from it a transition to the present is possible, i.e. to some specific existence. This is the scheme proposed by Hegel.
If Hegel seeks to express the dialectical process of emergence with the help of the category of becoming, then the process of disappearance and destruction is expressed by him with the help of the category of sublation. It must be borne in mind that the German verb aufheben - to remove - has many meanings, including negative ones: to stop, cancel, abolish, liquidate. But at the same time it also has a number of positive meanings: to save, preserve, provide. Accordingly, the noun aufheben means both cancellation and preservation. Hegel also refers to the Latin language, where the verb tollere has two meanings: 1) to destroy, deny, remove and 2) to exalt. It is no accident that the philosopher uses linguistic polysemy. In this case, it expresses spontaneous dialectics and its main feature: the identity of opposites. Nothing in the world perishes without a trace, but serves as material, the starting point for the emergence of something new. This pattern is reflected by the category of sublation, as well as the category of negation, which Hegel widely applies in his philosophical system. Each category expresses one particular moment, aspect of the development process and simultaneously serves as a starting point for the next category, which denies and removes the previous category. The new denies the old, but dialectically denies it, not simply throwing it aside and destroying it, but preserving it and, in a processed form, using the viable elements of the old to create a new one. Hegel calls such negation concrete.
For Hegel, negation is not a one-act process, but essentially an endless process. And in this process, he everywhere finds a combination of three elements: thesis - antithesis - synthesis. As a result of the negation of any position taken for a thesis, an opposition (antithesis) arises. The latter is necessarily negated. A double negation or negation of the negation arises, which leads to the emergence of a third link, synthesis. It reproduces at a higher level some features of the first, initial link. This whole structure is called a triad.
In Hegel's philosophy, the triad performs not only a methodological function, but also a system-creating function. This is not only a substantive principle, or a law of dialectics, but also a way of constructing a system. The entire architectonics, the structure of Hegelian philosophy is subject to the triple rhythm and is built in accordance with the requirements of the triad. In general, Hegel's philosophy is divided into three parts: logic, philosophy of nature and philosophy of spirit. These are not adjacent parts that can be swapped. This is a triad, where each part expresses a natural stage of dialectical development. At least, this is what Hegel himself thinks. He also divides logic into three parts: the doctrine of being, the doctrine of essence and the doctrine of concept. Each of these parts is also a triad. The doctrine of being, for example, includes: 1) certainty (quality), 2) magnitude (quantity), 3) measure. Quality consists of three parts: 1) being, 2) existence, 3) being-for-itself. Being, as we have already talked about, is a triad: pure being - nothing - becoming. Here the limit of division has been reached, or the triad, consisting of categories, each of which cannot be decomposed into triads.
It is neither possible nor necessary to expound this entire complex system of large and small triads. Let's look at some of the most important points.
its inherent quality. Due to qualitative certainty, things not only differ from each other, but are related to each other.
The category of quality precedes the category of quantity in Hegel's logic. This order generally corresponds to the history of human knowledge. Savages (like children) distinguish things by their qualitative certainty, although they do not know how to count, i.e. do not know quantitative relationships.
The synthesis of qualitative and quantitative certainty is a measure. Each thing, insofar as it is qualitatively determined, is a measure. Violation of the measure changes the quality and turns one thing into another. There is a break in gradualness, or a qualitative leap.
Hegel resolutely opposes flat evolutionism, which recognizes only a gradual transition from one qualitative state to another. “They say: there are no leaps in nature... But we have shown that in general a change in being is not only a transition from one quantity to another, but also a transition from qualitative to quantitative and vice versa, becoming different, which represents a break in gradualism, and is qualitatively different in comparison with the previous state." Through cooling, water does not become solid gradually, it does not first become mushy and then, gradually becoming harder and harder, reach the consistency of ice, but it hardens immediately. Having already reached the freezing point, it can still completely retain its liquid state if it is left alone and a slight shock brings it into a solid state.
Hegel gives another example, but from the moral field. Here, too, there are transitions from quantitative changes to qualitative ones, and the “difference in quality” turns out to be based on the difference in quantities. Thus, thanks to quantitative changes, the measure of frivolity is surpassed and as a result something completely different appears, namely crime. A qualitative leap can turn right into injustice, virtue into vice. The philosopher’s reasoning is also interesting: states, other things being equal, acquire different qualitative characters due to their difference in size. Laws and government change into something else when the size of the state increases and the number of citizens increases. The state has a measure of its size, exceeding which it uncontrollably disintegrates under the same state structure, which, at a different size, constituted its happiness and strength.
Hegel convincingly substantiates what later became known as the law of the transition of quantitative changes into qualitative ones and, vice versa, through leaps. The development of science and social practice confirmed the correctness of this dialectical law discovered by Hegel.
The dialectic of the transition from quantity to quality answers the question about the form of development of all natural and spiritual things. But an even more important question remains about the driving force, the impulse of this development. And here Hegel is looking for an answer not in the other world, but in reality itself. He formulates this answer in the doctrine of essence. “Merely wandering from one quality to another and mere transition from qualitative to quantitative and vice versa is not the end, but there is something abiding in things, this abiding is, first of all, essence.”
Quality, quantity, measure - all these, as already mentioned, are categories of being. These are the forms in which we perceive reality, and we perceive it empirically, through experience. But it is impossible to comprehend the essence of things experimentally. Essence is the internal basis of being, and being is the external form of essence. There are no pure essences; they are expressed and manifested in forms of being. Essence is the same being, but at a higher level. Essence, as the internal cause of being, is not identical with the latter, it is different from it. In other words, essence is cognized from the opposite of immediate existence. This means that knowledge must go in depth, revealing their essence in phenomena.
What, according to Hegel, is this hidden essence of being? Briefly speaking, in its internal inconsistency. Everything that exists contains contradiction, a unity of opposing moments.
Identity, the unity of opposites, is the key concept of Hegel’s logic. Ordinary consciousness is afraid of contradiction, considering it something abnormal. And formal logic with its laws (not contradictions, the excluded middle) prohibits logical contradictions. Hegel says a lot of unkind words about this logic. But in fact he is not against formal logic, but against its absolutization. Such logic cannot claim to be a universal methodology as opposed to dialectics. In this case, formal logic turns into metaphysics. Correctly interpreted formal logic prohibits absurd contradictions, doctrinal and verbal contradictions that cause confusion in reasoning. Hegel also fulfills these requirements, otherwise he would simply not be understood. But besides the contradictions of incorrect reasoning, there are real contradictions, contradictions of life itself. And no one can get rid of them. “Contradiction is what actually moves the world, and it is ridiculous to say that contradiction cannot be thought.” “Contradiction is the root of all movement and vitality, only insofar as it has contradiction in itself, it moves, has impulse and activity.”
Contradiction leads forward; it is the principle of all self-propulsion. Even the simplest type of movement - the movement of a body in space - is a constantly arising and immediately resolved contradiction. Something moves not only because it is now here and at another moment there, but also because it is at the same moment both here and not here, i.e. both is and is not located at a given point on the trajectory. Hegel proposes “together with the ancient thinkers” to recognize the contradictions they discovered in the movement. But it does not follow from this that there is no movement, but, on the contrary, it follows that movement is an existing contradiction.
The “ancient dialecticians,” and these are the philosophers of the Eleatic school and, above all, Zeno, revealed in their aporia the objective contradictions inherent in movement, space, and time. But since any contradictions were considered an unacceptable anomaly, an error in logical reasoning, the revealed contradictions were declared an appearance generated by the imperfection of sensory knowledge. And in its essence, the world comprehended by the mind is devoid of both movement and diversity.
Kant has a similar line of reasoning: the attempt of reason to comprehend things in themselves leads to antinomies, i.e. to insoluble logical contradictions. According to Kant, one should recognize the powerlessness of reason and the unknowability of the world. Hegel does not agree with this: the revealed contradictions testify not to the powerlessness of reason, but to its power. Antinomies are not a dead end, but a path leading to truth. “Since each of the two opposite sides contains within itself its other and neither of them can be thought of without the other, it follows that none of these definitions, taken separately, is true, but only their unity is true. This is a truly dialectical way of considering these definitions, as well as the true result."
It is impossible to metaphysically separate the finite from the infinite, discontinuity from continuity, freedom from necessity, etc. This is the essence of the dialectical way of thinking.
The doctrine of the concept is the third and final part of Hegel's logic. Here he most sharply expresses the point of view of absolute idealism. From these positions, the philosopher criticizes formal logic, which sees the concept as an “empty and abstract form.” “In fact, everything is the other way around: the concept is the beginning of all life, it is entirely concrete. This is a conclusion from all the logical movement carried out so far and therefore does not require proof here.” Why, in fact, does it not? Formal logic formulates the law of sufficient reason: every thought must be proven either by experimental data, facts, or with the help of scientific and other logical conclusions from already proven provisions. Therefore, proof can be either inductive or deductive. But Hegel doesn’t need any of this. The concept and other logical forms are not, as he believes, a reflection of things. On the contrary, things are secondary, they are reflections of concepts and must correspond to them. And concepts are of divine origin. After all, “God created the world from nothing, or, to put it differently, ... the world and finite things arose from the fullness of divine thought and divine plans. By this we recognize that thought, or, more precisely, the concept, is that infinite form, or free creative activity that does not require external material for its implementation." Neither concepts, nor judgments, nor conclusions are located only in our head and are not formed only by us. The concept is what lives in things; to understand an object means, therefore, to realize its concept.
All this, of course, is absolute idealism: real things in their essence are concepts, judgments and conclusions. However, there is a rational point here: logical forms are not a subjective creation of the human head (although, from the point of view of materialism, they cannot exist outside of this head), but a reflection of the laws of the objective world, the ordinary relationships of things. Hegel correctly emphasizes that concepts, judgments and conclusions represent a dialectical unity of such categories as the universal, the particular and the individual. But this unity is inherent in real things, the objective world, and then, and because of this, logical forms. Applying the dialectical method to the analysis of logical concepts, judgments, and inferences, Hegel, in contrast to traditional formal logic, revealed the dialectic of these forms. Marx rightly considered Hegelian dialectics to be the basic form of all dialectics, but only after it has been purified from its mystical form.
Philosophy of nature. Hegel considers nature to be the second stage in the development of the absolute idea. Nature is the creation of the absolute idea, its otherness. Generated by the spirit, nature has no existence independent of it. This is how Hegel solves the main question of philosophy, although he does not use this expression itself. At the same time, Hegel tries to dissociate himself from the traditional religious idea of ​​​​the creation of the world. The absolute idea at the level of logic exists, according to him, outside of time and space. It is no coincidence that these categories are absent from his logic. As Hegel says, it is wrong to talk about what happened before and what happened next. The expressions "before" and "later" are not suitable for this case. They express “purely logical” primacy and secondaryness. And although Hegel’s God is not entirely traditional, but an abstract idea of ​​the world’s mind, he still does not abandon the Christian dogma of the creation of the world.
Nature interests Hegel not in itself, but as a necessary stage in the development of the absolute idea. He considers mechanics, physics, and organics to be its manifestations in nature. The transition from inanimate to living nature completes a purely natural process. The spirit emerges from nature, breaking through the outer crust of materiality as something lower.
A preconceived philosophical scheme did not allow Hegel to properly understand the dialectics of nature. Oddly enough, the great dialectician did not accept evolutionary ideas that were advanced for his time in geology, organic chemistry, embryology, and the physiology of plants and animals. He called the evolutionary doctrine of the origin of more developed organisms from lower ones meaningless. In his opinion, all the diversity of changes in nature fits within the framework of the eternal cycle. Therefore, “there is nothing new under the sun,” and the diverse play of nature’s forms “causes boredom.” Only in the changes that occur in the spiritual sphere does something new appear.
At times, Hegel's reasoning about nature lacks any logic, be it dialectical or formal. Engels rightly calls the philosopher's statement that nature develops in space, but not in time, nonsense. After all, time is the main condition for all development.
Contrary to this, Hegel expresses deep dialectical guesses, which were confirmed in the further development of natural science. These, for example, include instructions on the transformation of quantitative changes into qualitative ones in chemical processes, and the understanding of electricity as a special form of movement of matter. In general, the philosopher was unable to overcome the metaphysical, mechanistic understanding of nature. He remained in the position of the old natural philosophy, the essence of which is that the philosopher, as a representative of the “science of sciences” and the owner of “absolute knowledge,” may not take into account the opinion of specialists in specific fields of natural science. This, apparently, should explain Hegel’s speeches against atomism, his non-recognition of the wave and corpuscular theories of light, and the assertion that blood globules are formed only when blood comes into contact with air. Hence the strange formulas: “light is the simplest thought that exists under the form of nature,” “sound is the complaint of the ideal,” etc.
Philosophy of spirit. This is the third stage of the Hegelian system, which is a synthesis of the previous two. Here the absolute idea awakens, as it were, frees itself from natural bonds and finds its expression in the absolute spirit. Man is part of nature. However human; spirit is a product not of nature, but of absolute spirit. And nature itself is generated by the spirit. “For us, spirit has nature as its prerequisite, it is its truth, and thereby absolutely first in relation to it. In this truth, nature disappeared, and spirit was revealed in it as an idea that has achieved existence for itself.”
Self-development of the spirit proceeds in three stages. The first is “subjective spirit” - individual human consciousness, divided into three types: anthropology, phenomenology and psychology. The second stage is “objective spirit” - human society and its three main forms: law, morality, state. The last stage - “absolute spirit” - includes art, religion, philosophy.
The problems raised by Hegel in “Philosophy of Spirit” are considered in more detail by him in a series of essays: “Phenomenology of Spirit”, “Philosophy of History”, “Philosophy of Law”, “Aesthetics”, “Philosophy of Religion”, “Lectures on the History of Philosophy”.
"Philosophy of Spirit" is a work devoted mainly to individual and social consciousness, as well as the dialectics of historical development.
Spirit is something united and whole, but in the process of development, transition from lower to higher. Hegel believes that the driving force behind the development of the spirit is the dialectical contradiction of subject and object, thought and object. Overcoming this contradiction, the spirit progresses in the consciousness of its freedom. “The substance of the spirit is freedom, i.e. independence from others, relation to oneself.” Real freedom, according to Hegel, does not consist in the denial of necessity, but in its awareness, in the disclosure of its content, which has an ideal character. The history of mankind is progress in the consciousness of freedom, but again freedom of spirit and thought. Of course, Hegel’s understanding of freedom was progressive in nature, since it was directed against feudal remnants.
As for the philosophy of history, in Hegel it is of a teleological nature, i.e. the development of society is directed towards a predetermined goal. The philosopher divides world history into three eras: Eastern, ancient and Germanic. The Eastern era is completely devoid of the consciousness of freedom; in the ancient era, the consciousness of freedom was achieved by a select minority, and as for the Germanic peoples, primarily the Germans, they have already reached the stage of freedom. The artificial nature and bias of such a scheme are completely obvious. The class system and monarchy (though constitutional) fit well, according to Hegel, into the category of freedom. He considered the state not only the embodiment of freedom, but also the procession of God across the earth. The limit to the development of human society and its political institutions is a constitutional monarchy, which preserves class features, but promotes transformations in the bourgeois-liberal spirit.
The events of world history represent a dialectic of individual “folk spirits”. Each people with its inherent “spirit” represents one of the stages or moments of world history. And world history fulfills the “absolute goal of the world.” However, the overwhelming number of peoples remain outside the bounds of progress and are declared unhistorical. They failed to express some moments of absolute spirit. The peoples of the East, the Slavs, were especially unlucky in this sense. They have no future and are forever frozen in their development. If world history begins in the East, then it ends in the West. Here the “absolute goal of the world” is realized. The development of human society, according to Hegel, must stop before the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin. Here is both the peak and the end of world history. Here it “stops its flow.”
Even higher than the state are art, religion and philosophy in Hegel's system. And not just any philosophy, but the philosophy of Hegel himself. It was in it that the absolute idea found its full embodiment. Hegel believed that the essence of the world is as it is depicted in his philosophy, especially in Logic. His philosophy is “the only”, “absolute”, “philosophy in general”.
Ironizing about such claims, L. Feuerbach noted: “But no matter how witty this author is, he still acts uncritically right off the bat, without asking himself the question: is it even possible for the kind of absolute to be realized in one artist, and philosophy in one philosopher."
Dialectical method
As already mentioned, in Hegel’s philosophy it is necessary to distinguish between a research method and a system, in accordance with which the material is not only presented, but also structured. The method, according to Hegel, “is the movement of the very essence of the matter,” the consciousness of the “internal self-movement of content.” For Hegel, it has a dialectical character, being the most general expression of the contradictory development of the world. The dialectical method, its principles and categories are developed mainly in the first part of its system. A system is the order of presentation of material chosen by the philosopher, the connection of logical categories, the general structure of the entire philosophical edifice. Unlike the method, which is determined mainly by the objective content of the world, the system largely bears the features of the author's arbitrariness. The main principle of structural construction is the triad, as we could see. It has a rational meaning (an expression of the dialectical law of the negation of negation). However, Hegel formalizes this principle and often uses it as a template to which specific material is forced to obey. Therefore, many category transitions are arbitrary and artificial. For example, the last triad in the system: art - religion - philosophy. To substantiate the logical connection between them, to show that philosophy is a synthesis, the unity of art and religion - this task remained unresolved. Hegel simply declares, but does not substantiate this construction.
Feuerbach, Herzen, Engels and other thinkers drew attention to the contradiction between method and system in Hegel's philosophy. The very spirit of the dialectical method contradicts the formalized conservative system. This contradiction cannot be classified as dialectical; it is a contradiction of doctrine, which is prohibited by both formal and dialectical logic. Hegel produces a paradoxical picture: dialectics with its struggle of opposites, spiritual and historical progress are actually turned to the past. They have no place either in the present or in the future: after all, the “absolute goal” of progress has been achieved. For Hegel, the dialectical method cannot serve as a tool for critical understanding and transformation of reality. For it to become such, it is necessary to discard the conservative system of Hegelian philosophy. And this was done by K. Marx and F. Engels. Idealist dialectics was replaced by materialist dialectics.
§ 5. Feuerbach's anthropological materialism
The galaxy of classics of German philosophy is completed by Ludwig Feuerbach (1804-1872), an outstanding representative of philosophical materialism and atheism. His philosophical views were formed under the influence of Hegel, whose lectures he listened to at the University of Berlin. However, Feuerbach was not a true Hegelian. Having switched to the position of materialism, he systematically criticized philosophical idealism and the religious worldview. For two years, Feuerbach teaches at one of the German universities, but he is fired for publishing a work in which he doubts the personal immortality of man, believing that only great acts of the human mind can be immortal. The doors of all universities in Germany are closed to Feuerbach, and he is forced to lead a secluded life in the village where his wife had a small factory.
Feuerbach creates a series of philosophical works, the most significant of which is considered to be “The Essence of Christianity” (1841). Feuerbach's materialism had a strong influence on the formation of the worldview of Marx and Engels. At the end of his life, Feuerbach joined the German Social Democratic Party and studied Marx's Capital. However, Feuerbach became neither a Marxist nor a revolutionary. All his life he avoided active political activity, did not take part in the revolution of 1848 and refused to run for the national (Frankfurt) assembly. He entered the history of philosophy as the last great representative of classical German philosophy.
Feuerbach called his philosophical system “new philosophy” and “philosophy of the future.” Having overcome Hegel's idealism, Feuerbach calls man a product of nature, and his mental activity the only bearer of reason. Only man can think; there is no superhuman divine mind in the world. This is evidenced by data from natural science and all experimental sciences.
Solving the fundamental question of philosophy materialistically, Feuerbach is convinced of the knowability of the world. He is a consistent supporter of materialistic sensationalism and an opponent of agnosticism. The new philosophy should proceed not from abstractions, but from sensory data, from experience. In this sense, Feuerbach calls the human senses organs of philosophy. The sense organs that a person has are quite sufficient for adequate knowledge of things, the philosopher believes. Sensory perceptions can be direct or indirect. As Feuerbach writes, “not only the external, but also the internal, not only the body, but also the spirit, not only the thing, but also the Self constitute objects of the senses. Therefore, everything is sensually perceived, if not directly, then indirectly, if not ordinary crude feelings, then sophisticated ones, if not through the eyes of an anatomist or surgeon, then through the eyes of a philosopher, therefore, empiricism quite legitimately sees the source of our ideas in feelings.”
Human feelings are qualitatively different from the feelings of animals. The sensation in animals is animal, in humans it is human, Feuerbach emphasized. Speaking against the speculative, i.e. divorced from the empirical basis of philosophizing, he pays tribute to theoretical thinking, capable of reflecting the inner essence of things, their natural connections. The truth of theoretical positions, according to the philosopher, is verified by their comparison with sensory data. Of course, such a criterion of truth cannot be considered reliable; it is not universal. As a result of a generally fair criticism of philosophical idealism, Feuerbach lost something valuable that was contained in the works of his great predecessors, and, above all, Hegel - dialectics, including the dialectics of knowledge.
Feuerbach believed that the subject of the new philosophy should be man, and philosophy itself should be the doctrine of man, or anthropology. The unity of being and thinking for a philosopher makes sense only when man is taken as the basis, the subject of this unity. “The new philosophy turns man, including nature as the basis of man, into the only, universal and highest subject of philosophy, therefore turning anthropology, including physiology, into a universal science.
Man is a part of nature, a natural living being. Natural science, primarily physiology, proves the inseparability of thinking and physiological processes occurring in the brain. Feuerbach dissociates himself from the views of vulgar materialists, who argued that thought is a special kind of substance that is secreted by the brain. Thought is a product of the brain, but it is immaterial. Not wanting to be identified with vulgar materialists, Feuerbach hesitates to call his philosophy materialism. Of course, this does not make the materialistic essence of his philosophy disappear.
Feuerbach's anthropological philosophy proceeds from the natural essence of man, who strives for happiness, loves and suffers, and needs to communicate with his own kind. His freedom depends on the environment, which either promotes or hinders the manifestation of his essence. As Feuerbach says, a bird is free in the air, a fish is free in the water, and a man is free where nothing prevents him from realizing his natural desire for happiness. Feuerbach speaks of man in general as a generic being. Such a view suffers from an abstract, naturalistic approach to man and ignores his social characteristics. As a humanist and democrat, Feuerbach understood that class barriers and privileges were contrary to human nature. But he did not know how to get rid of this evil. Being far from politics, the philosopher relied mainly on morality and ethics.
Like the French materialists, Feuerbach believed that the correctly understood interest of the individual ultimately coincides with the public interest. This is the theory of “reasonable egoism”, complemented by altruism. "I" cannot be happy without "You". A person cannot be happy alone, therefore, love for others is a prerequisite for social harmony, the goal of human existence. However, such a philosophical construction greatly simplifies reality, abstracts it from the prose of life, where, along with love, ill will, envy, malice, and enmity are often found.
Feuerbach recognizes the existence of both individual and group egoism. The clash of various kinds of group egoisms creates tension and gives rise to social conflicts. Feuerbach speaks of the “entirely legitimate egoism” of the oppressed masses, that “the egoism of the currently oppressed majority must and is exercising its right and will begin a new era of history.” These arguments can be considered as the embryo of historical materialism, but only as an embryo. Ultimately, the philosopher tries to explain social opposites by the anthropological characteristics of people.
Based on the anthropological principle, Feuerbach criticizes the opposition of ethical norms, characteristic of Kantianism, to the natural needs of man, his desire for happiness. Morality, opposed to human nature, is worth little. Therefore, one cannot consider sensual attractions as something sinful. There is no “original sin” on which religious teaching is based. Our vices are failed virtues, the philosopher said. They did not become virtues because the conditions of life did not meet the requirements of human nature.
Criticism of religion occupies a significant place in Feuerbach's work. He tried to explain the origin of religious feelings and beliefs from the standpoint of anthropological materialism. Religious feelings are generated not only by fear of the elemental forces of nature and the deception of priests, as the materialists of the 17th-18th centuries believed. According to Feuerbach, not only and not so much fear, but aspirations, hopes, suffering, ideals inherent in human nature, his entire emotional world, to a decisive extent, contribute to the generation of religious beliefs. Religion, therefore, has real life content; it is not accidental, but necessary for people. The birthplace of the gods, Feuerbach believed, is in the heart of man, in his sufferings, hopes, hopes. Unlike a cold mind, the heart strives to love and believe. In religion the whole person is expressed, but in a wrong way.
Man believes in gods not only because he has imagination and feelings, but also because he has the desire to be Happy. He believes in a blissful being not only because he has an idea of ​​bliss, but also because he himself wants to be blissful. He believes in a perfect being because he himself wants to be perfect. He believes in an immortal being because he himself does not want to die.
Feuerbach derived religious consciousness from the peculiarities of human nature, but he understood this nature itself not historically, but abstractly. Hence his interpretation of religion was ahistorical, abstract. The naturalistic approach to human essence prevented him from seeing the social content of religious ideas and their historical character.
If religion is born in the heart of a person, then it is as indestructible as human emotions are ineradicable. Feuerbach, however, assumed that religious-fantastic ideas would someday disappear. But when? Then, the philosopher answered, when the love of a person for a person becomes a religious Feeling and replaces traditional religion. Man will achieve on earth what religion promises in heaven. Atheism is the true religion, a religion without God, a religion of human brotherhood and love.
Religious beliefs and feelings are based on the alienation of certain human properties. Intelligence, strength, justice and other qualities are torn away from their specific carriers, generalized and multiplied many times over. Then they are attributed to fantastic creatures - characters of numerous religions. If birds had a religion, Feuerbach said, then their legs would appear as powerful birds. Man creates gods in his own image and the like, alienating himself and attributing to them his best qualities, but in a fantastic and exaggerated form. We must end this process of alienation, return to man the qualities that were taken from him, and reduce religious beliefs to their earthly, real basis.

The scope of the concept “classical German philosophy” includes the philosophical systems of Kant, Fichte, Schelling, Hegel and Feuerbach. Created in a relatively short historical period and forming a successive series, these systems have some common features. These include, firstly, the development of dialectics not only as a way of criticizing “pure reason” (Kant), but also as a universal method of cognition and an integral system of logical categories. Secondly, application; dialectical method to the historical process, attempts to formulate the laws of social development, however, on the basis of objective idealism. Thirdly, faith in historical progress, in the fruitfulness of scientific, including philosophical knowledge. And, finally, humanism, deep respect for man, who acts as an end, not a means (Kant) and as a universal subject of philosophy (Feuerbach’s anthropological materialism).
Classical German philosophy left a noticeable imprint on the subsequent course of development of world philosophical thought. It served as a theoretical source for the formation of the philosophical views of Marx and Engels, Herzen and Chernyshevsky. On its basis, influential philosophical schools of neo-Kantianism and neo-Hegelianism arose, the heyday of which fell in the last third of the 19th and the first third of the 20th centuries.

List of used literature:

1. Kant I. Critique of Pure Reason. 2nd ed. St. Petersburg, 1915.
2. Kant I. Prolegomena. M., 1934.
3. Kant I. Op. in 6 vols., T.P.S.
4. Hegel. Encyclopedia of Philosophical Sciences. Parts 1,2,3. M., L., 1929
5. Hegel. The science of logic. Op. T.V.M., 1937
6. Feuerbach L. Op. T. 1. M., 1956
7. Feuerbach L. Elected philosopher. works: In 2 vols. 1.,2. M., 1955
8. Philosophy: Part 1, History of Philosophy. Ed. 2nd., M., Yurist., 1998

The period of German classical philosophy is also called German idealism. The stage of development of German philosophy is presented by the teachings of Kant, Schelling, Fichte, Hegel, Feuerbach. Periodic frames 18-19 st.

German classical philosophy in brief

German classical philosophy is a rationalistic theory of transcendental idealism. It is represented by the philosophical developments of the following philosophers: Kant (critical philosophy, subjective idealism), Fichte (subjective critical idealism), Schelling (objective transcendental idealism, later switched to irrationalistic positive philosophy), Hegel (absolute idealism).

What is the difference between the theories of German classical philosophy?

One of the main questions to which the theorists of German classical philosophy tried to find an answer was how the reality of the external world and its sources manifested themselves.

• Kant: the world exists in the fullness of its content, which remains unknown to our rational knowledge (hence Kant’s characteristic dualism);
• Fichte: the external real world borders on the unconscious, forming a boundary that the subject cannot cross. “I” as transcendental knowledge, “Not-I” as the material, objective world. The latter pushes a person to create his own ideal world.
• Schelling: the boundary of the world is internal. It is understood as a dark fundamental principle or creative substance. In creativity the subject realizes himself. The creative substance itself is neither an object nor a subject, but the interaction of two.
• Hegel: The universal process is an immanent (internal) dialectical independent disclosure of the absolute idea. There is nothing outside this process, so the remainder of external reality is greatly abolished.

The problem of cognition of the external world, the interaction of object and subject led to great achievement of German classical philosophy- creating the idea of ​​personal freedom.

Kant's critical idealism

Immanuel Kant developed a system of philosophical knowledge to answer the exciting questions of existence:

• What is knowledge?
• What do I know?
• What should I know?
• What should I hope for?

Knowledge according to Kant begins with experience, but is not limited to it alone. To think about the listed burning issues, you need logic and a critical perception of the world. The limitation of consciousness manifests itself due to the fact that the world is divided into phenomena and things-in-themselves: phenomena and noumena.

Fichte's transcendental subjectivity

Fichte considers activity as an independent beginning of a person. It is primary for the philosopher. The only pure activity is the “I” or subject. The highest principle regulating this activity is the moral law. Morality is unconsciously inherent in a person; it does not often manifest itself in an active form, therefore the philosopher is one of the first to try to study the problems of the unconscious.

Schelling's creative philosophy

Schelling in his philosophy he studies the problems of creative activity and manifestations of the freedom of the subject. Schelling's epistemological problem (cognition) in the contradiction between the unconscious or theoretical and the conscious or practical in man.

Hegel's objective idealism

Hegel understands spiritual culture as a natural process - the universal mind, the world spirit, which, from the moment the sensory data appears, is formed by knowledge of laws and norms, regulating from within the process of spiritual development through self-knowledge of the absolute mind or idea. Hegel's merit in understanding the logic of knowledge, the theory of the doctrine of the world: categories of philosophy explained in the Science of Logic.

Feuerbach's philosophy of love

Feuerbach strived for a renewal of philosophy. He considers himself a materialist. For a philosopher, nature is the source of existence, including the knowledge that we receive. Since man is a part of nature, he is more a psychophysiological being than a social one. Criticizes Hegel for objective idealism. I also do not criticize religious consciousness in general, believing that it collects fantastic images, on which it is then based. Feuerbach "preaches" not love for God or for a higher principle, but love for a person, which is why he called his teaching “philosophy of love.”

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, Karl Marx, Arthur Schopenhauer, Friedrich Nietzsche, Ludwig Wittgenstein to modern philosophers such as Jurgen Habermas.

Story

Middle Ages

The origin of German philosophy dates back to the High Middle Ages, when universities appeared in Germany (Cologne and Heidelberg). One of the first forms of philosophical thought in Germany was scholasticism, represented by Albertus Magnus and gravitating toward the realistic direction. In addition to scholasticism, medieval philosophy in Germany was represented by mysticism (Meister Eckhart), which determined the pantheistic and intuitionistic features of German philosophy for many centuries.

Reformation

The teachings of Martin Luther had a huge influence on the development of German thought (including the views of his opponents). His key philosophical work is the treatise “On the Slavery of the Will.” Being theological in form, the treatise, however, tries to give answers about the role and place of man in contemporary society, which was a break with the previous purely theological tradition.

Education

19th century

German idealism

The three most prominent German idealists were Fichte, Schelling and Hegel. However, it is necessary to distinguish between subjective idealism (from the listed philosophers - Kant, Fichte, Schelling) and objective (Hegel). Hegel's views are radically different from those of other German idealists due to differences in logic. At the beginning of his career, Hegel was very seriously engaged in ancient Greek philosophy, especially the logic of Pythagoras, Heraclitus, Socrates and Plato. Hegel revived their logic and presented it as a complete system in his Science of Logic. He believed that at the basis of everything that exists is the Absolute Spirit, which only due to its infinity can achieve true knowledge of itself. For self-knowledge he needs manifestation. The self-revelation of the Absolute Spirit in space is nature; self-disclosure in time - history. The philosophy of history occupies an important part of Hegel's philosophy. History is driven by contradictions between national spirits, which are the thoughts and projections of the Absolute Spirit. When the Absolute Spirit's doubts disappear, it will come to the Absolute Idea of ​​Itself, and history will end and the Kingdom of Freedom will begin. Hegel is considered the most difficult philosopher to read (due to the complexity of his logic), so ideas may have been attributed to him that were misunderstood or mistranslated.

Karl Marx and the Young Hegelians

Among those influenced by Hegel's teachings were a group of young radicals who called themselves Young Hegelians. They were unpopular because of their radical views on religion and society. Among them were philosophers such as Ludwig Feuerbach, Bruno Bauer and Max Stirner.

XIX-XX centuries

Windelband, Wilhelm

Dilthey, Wilhelm

Rickert, Heinrich

Simmel, Georg

Spengler, Oswald

XX century

Vienna Circle

At the beginning of the 20th century, a group of German philosophers called the “Vienna Circle” was formed. This association served as the ideological and organizational core for the creation of logical positivism. Its participants also adopted a number of Wittgenstein’s ideas - the concept of logical analysis of knowledge, the doctrine of the analytical nature of logic and mathematics, criticism of traditional philosophy as “metaphysics” devoid of scientific meaning. Wittgenstein himself disagreed with the members of the Vienna Circle about the interpretation of Aristotle's philosophy.

Phenomenology

Phenomenology defined its task as an unpremised description of the experience of cognitive consciousness and the identification of essential, ideal features in it. The founder of the movement was Edmund Husserl; immediate predecessors include Franz Brentano and Karl Stumpf [ ] . The identification of pure consciousness presupposes preliminary criticism