External Teleology and Functionalism: Hegel, Life Science and the Organism–Environment Relation

Scholz, Maximilian

doi:10.1017/hgl.2020.19

Cited by 3 publications

(3 citation statements)

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“…ENDNOTES 1 In addition to the references provided in the following three notes, see Düsing (1986), Dahlstrom (1998), Spahn (2007), Ferrini (2011), Khurana (2013, Englert (2017), Gentry (2019), Ng (2020), Scholz (2020).…”

Section: Anton Kabeshkinmentioning

confidence: 99%

Logical and natural life in Hegel

Kabeshkin

2021

European J of Philosophy

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In this article, I discuss the specific ways in which Hegel's account of life and organisms advances upon Kant's account of natural purposes in the third Critique. First of all, I argue that it is essential for Hegel's account that it contains two levels. The first level is that of logical life, the discussion of which does not depend on any empirical knowledge of natural organisms. I provide my reconstruction of this logical account of life that answers to the objection made by a number of Hegel scholars to the effect that Hegel does in fact rely on empirical knowledge at this place in the logic.The second level is that of natural organisms themselves. I argue that it is with the help of this separation of the logical and natural levels, as well as his doctrine of the impotence of nature, that Hegel, unlike Kant, (a) is able to claim that not everything in natural organisms is purposive, and (b) provide a philosophical, and not merely empirical, account of the distinction between plants and animals. In both of these respects, Hegel's position can be seen as a welcome advance over Kant.

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Section: Anton Kabeshkinmentioning

confidence: 99%

Logical and natural life in Hegel

Kabeshkin

2021

European J of Philosophy

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“… 9 In (Scholz 2020) I have shown in which way Hegel in these explanations was influenced by the methodologies of the life sciences of his time, which in turn applied a general kind of functionalism. Hegel also makes explicit reference to the paragraphs of the chapter on Teleology in the Encyclopaedia Logic in the context of digestion ( PN : §365R, 154–55/§365R, 364–65).…”

Section: Notesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Teleology and Basic Actions: A reading of the chapter on Teleology in Hegel's Subjective Logic in the terms of action theory

Scholz

2022

Hegel Bulletin

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In this paper I argue that there is textual evidence that the chapter on Teleology in Hegel's Science of Logic, read under certain premises, also discusses something that in contemporary analytic philosophy is called a ‘basic action’. The three moments of Teleology—(a) ‘The Subjective Purpose’, (b) ‘The Means’ and (c) ‘The Realized Purpose’—can be interpreted as (a) a certain intentional content in the mind of a subject, which can be expressed in the form of an imperative, (b) the immediate taking in possession of the body, which can be described as a basic action, and (c) the description of the relation of the event brought about by the basic action with other events in the world, which can be described in the terms of event-causality. This reading reveals an astonishing parallel to Donald Davidson's distinction between proper basic actions and their different descriptions in the form of events. In this way we can make Hegel's, at first glance, confusing identification of subjective purpose (intention), means (basic action) and realized purpose (event) comprehensible. Through that, the actual aim is to show that what I call basic actions are in fact an example of a more general thought that Hegel calls a teleological relation.

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“…On this notion and its historical derivation fromCuvier, cf. Ferrini (2009) andScholz (2020).24 For a criticism, cf Artiga & Martínez (2016). and the reply byMossio & Saborido (2016).…”

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confidence: 99%

The ‘Is’ and the ‘Ought’ of the Animal Organism: Hegel’s Account of Biological Normativity

Corti

2022

HPLS

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This paper investigates Hegel’s account of the animal organism as it is presented in the Philosophy of Nature, with a special focus on its normative implications. I argue that the notion of “organisation” is fundamental to Hegel’s theory of animal normativity. The paper starts by showing how a Hegelian approach takes up the scientific image of organism and assigns a basic explanatory role to the notion of “organisation” in its understanding living beings. Moving from this premise, the paper turns to the group of accounts in contemporary theoretical biology known as “organisational accounts” (OA), which offer a widely debated strategy for naturalizing teleology and normativity in organisms. As recent scholarship recognizes, these accounts explicitly rely on insights from Kant and Post-Kantianism. I make the historical and conceptual argument that Hegel’s view of the organism shares several basic commitments with OAs, especially regarding the notion of “organisational closure”. I assess the account of normativity that such accounts advance and its implications for how we approach Hegel. Finally, I argue that the notion of “organisation” is more fundamental to Hegel’s theory of animal normativity than the Aristotelian notion of “Gattung” or “species”, which by contrast appears derivative – at least in the Philosophy of Nature and the Lectures – and does not play the central role in his account maintained by some scholars.

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External Teleology and Functionalism: Hegel, Life Science and the Organism–Environment Relation

Cited by 3 publications

References 7 publications

Logical and natural life in Hegel

Logical and natural life in Hegel

Teleology and Basic Actions: A reading of the chapter on Teleology in Hegel's Subjective Logic in the terms of action theory

The ‘Is’ and the ‘Ought’ of the Animal Organism: Hegel’s Account of Biological Normativity

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