Freedom and Reflection: Hegel and the Logic of Agency

292 Pages·2011·1.75 MB·English

by  Christopher Yeomans

Freedom and Refl ection
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Freedom and Refl ection
Hegel and the Logic of Agency
Christopher Yeomans

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Yeomans, Christopher.
Freedom and refl ection : Hegel and the logic of agency / Christopher Yeomans.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references
(p. ) and index.
ISBN-978-0-19-979452-2 (alk. paper)
1. Hegel, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich, 1770–1831.
2. Free will and determinism. I. Title.
B2949.F7Y46 2012
123'.5092—dc23 2011034620
1 3 5 7 9 8 6 4 2
Printed in the United States of America
on acid-free paper
A man once had a ball, you know, the kind children have, but not made out of rubber,
of celluloid, transparent, and inside there are little lead shots. Children can rattle it and
throw it. Then the man took the ball and threw it and he thought: there are lead shots
in it, so I can throw it, and the ball won’t run any farther, it’ll stand still right on the
spot I intend it to. But when he threw the ball, it didn’t go the way he had intended, it
made one more jump and then it rolled a bit, about two hands sideways . . . You see, the
ball don’t go the way you throw it and the way you want it to, it goes about that way,
but then goes a little bit farther and perhaps a great bit, you see, and a little bit sideways,
too.
Alfred Döblin, B erlin Alexanderplatz
An old proverb rightly says, “The stone belongs to the devil when it leaves the hand
that threw it.” By acting, I expose myself to misfortune, which accordingly has a right
over me and is an existence of my own volition.
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Philosophy of Right
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For my parents, Peter L. Yeomans and Margie Yeomans-Oliver.
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abbreviations
WORKS OF G.W.F. HEGEL
EL Part I of the Enzyklopädie der philosophischen Wissenschaften im Grun-
drisse. Edited by U. Rameil, W. Bonsiepen, and H. C. Lucas. Vol. 20 in
Gesammelte Werke . Hamburg: Meiner Verlag, 1992. References are by
section number, with R indicating the remark following the section,
and Z the addition from Hegel’s lectures. English quotations are from
The Encyclopedia Logic, translated by T. F. Geraets, W. A. Suchting, and
H. S. Harris. Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing, 1991.
EG Part III of the Enzyklopädie der philosophischen Wissenschaften im Grundrisse
(1830). Vol. 10 of TWA. References are by section number, with R indicating
the remark following the section, and Z the addition from Hegel’s lectures.
EN Part II of the Enzyklopädie der philosophischen Wissenschaften im Grundrisse .
English quotations are from the P hilosophy of Nature. Translated by M. J.
Petry. New York: Humanities Press, 1970. Citations are by section number.
ETW E arly Theological Writings , translated by T. M. Knox. Philadelphia: Uni-
versity of Pennsylvania Press, 1975.
PhG Phänomenologie des Geistes . Vol. 3 of TWA. First reference is to the
German pagination. Second reference is by paragraph number to
Hegel’s Phenomenology of Spirit . Translated by A. V. Miller. New York:
Cambridge University Press, 1977.
PR Grundlinien der Philosophie des Rechts. Edited by J. Hoffmeister. Ham-
burg: Meiner Verlag, 1995. English quotations are from E lements of the
Philosophy of Right. Translated by H. B. Nisbet. New York: Cambridge
University Press, 1991. Citations are by section number.
TWA Werke in zwanzig Bänden: Theorie Werkausgabe . Edited by E. Molden-
hauer and K. M. Michel. Frankfurt a.M.: Suhrkamp Verlag, 1970. Cita-
tions are by volume and page number.
VGP/LHP Vorlesungen über die Geschichte der Philosophie (Dritter Band) . Vol. 19 in
Sämtliche Werke. Stuttgart: Frommanns Verlag, 1928. The (LHP) reference
is to vol. 3 of his Lectures on the History of Philosophy. Translated by E. S.
Haldane and F. H. Simson. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1995.