The Independence and Dependence of Self-Consciousness: The Dialectic of Lord and Bondsman in Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit (original) (raw)

Hegel's Self-Consciousness In Relation With Christianity

Academia Letters, 2021

This paper aims to apply the self-consciousness concept of Hegel to change of Greeks and Romans from Paganism to Christianity with the political change from Republic to Empire as he also put it in Early Theological Writings. The point is that people feel the need of changing their religion since Roman Empire with its new political system could not provide a space for them to develop their self-consciousness. Hegel's understanding of self-consciousness, we should focus on two important concepts: first one is "the other" and latter is "equality" or in his terms "independency". As he explains in the very beginning of "Independence and Dependence of Self-Consciousness: Lordship and Bondage", the self-consciousness could be achieved only through being acknowledged by others. Yet, this process of being acknowledged should not be one sided. The selves should acknowledge each other mutually. For the other is equally independent and self-contained, and there is nothing in it of which it is not itself the origin. The first does not have the object before it merely as it exists primarily for desire, but as something that has an independent existence of its own, which, therefore, it cannot utilize for its own purposes if that object does not of its own accord do what the first does to it. Thus, the movement is simply the double movement of the two self-consciousnesses. Each sees the other do the same as it does; each does itself what it demands of the other, and therefore also does what it does only in so far as the other does the same. Action by one side only would be useless because what is to happen can only be brought about by both. (11-112) The quote signifies the fact that the process of self-consciousness is not one-sided action as people assume, but; it necessitates an other to reach it. Facing with an "other" is not only

Self and Other in Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit

Journal of Indian Council of Philosophical Research 18 (2011): 1-18

A overview of the "Self-Consciousness" chapter of Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit. I analyze the basic significance of each of the three themes of the chapter, (which Hegel calls "desire," "recognition," and "thought"), and I consider how the relationship between self and other is constituted in each of these fundamental relationships.

Hegel on the 'Other': introducing the concept of recognition in Hegel's Phenomenology

2009

This paper introduces the notion of Recognition in the section of Hegel’s Phenomenology of Spirit entitled ‘A. INDEPENDENCE AND DEPENDENCE OF SELFCONSCIOUSNESS: LORDSHIP AND BONDAGE’ by way of a commentary. Hegel’s view is that in order for any self-consciousness to obtain it must be acknowledged as such by another self-consciousness. For Hegel, acknowledgement emerges as a necessary condition for self-consciousness. As such, Hegel’s account of self-consciousness raises the problem of intersubjectivity, or the account of the relation between more than one self-consciousness and I suggest, without attempting to establish, some intuitive lines of defence of the Hegelian position. I suggest that the dialectic of lordship and bondage, or as it is commonly referred to, the Master-Slave dialectic, cannot be fully comprehended without an adequate understanding of Hegel’s account of Recognition.

2016 Hegel on Recognition. Self-Consciousness, Individuality and Intersubjectivity

"I that is We, and We that is I.” Perspectives on Contemporary Hegel, ed. by L. Ruggiu and I. Testa, Leiden, Brill, 2016

Hegel criticized all philosophies that begin with an I as their founding principle. But exactly what is his presumed overcoming of an egological perspective? In this paper I would like to show the role of recognition in intersubjectivity in Hegel’s philosophy. My thesis is twofold: first, intersubjectivity, self-consciousness and recognition are quite distinct notions; second, self-consciousness is not the result of recognition, so that all attempts at grounding a universal self-consciousness on the Chapter on the struggle between lord and bondsman in the Phenomenology of Spirit cannot make good on their promise.

From Self-Consciousness to Reason in Hegel’s Phenomenology of Spirit

International Philosophical Quarterly, 2013

The transition from self-consciousness as the unhappy consciousness to reason as the critique of idealism is among the most important in Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit. Yet this transition is implicit and not readily discernible. This paper investigates (1) whether we can discover and describe any roadblock that the unhappy consciousness is able to knock down, or despite which it is able to maneuver, and so become reason; or (2) whether the unhappy consciousness arrives at an impassable dead end and either manages to create a detour around it or just begins again, unexplained and unexplainably, almost ex nihilo, as reason; or (3) whether, despite its implicitness, there exists a continuous, tenable, and unimpeded path from self-consciousness to reason.

Self-Preservation and Self-Consciousness in Hegel's Phenomenology of Mind

E. Balsemao Pires (ed.): Still Reading Hegel, 2009

The central position that the chapter on “self-consciousness” occupies in Hegel’s Phenomenology of Mind can be seen not least of all in the daunting quantity of secondary literature it has spawned. However, typically the literature focuses on the development of mind from desire through the master-slave relation to mutual recognition. The comparison of life and self-consciousness (mind) seems at first glance to be incidental. However, it is my contention here that this comparison is of great significance to the system of the Phenomenology as whole.

Intimacy and the Possibility for Self-Knowledge in Hegel’s Dialectic of Recognition

The achievement of self-consciousness in Hegel's Phenomenology hinges on establishing a relationship with another self-conscious being. How this is accomplished, and even that it is accomplished in Hegel's text, are topics of dispute and misunderstanding in the literature. I show how Hegel argues for this intersubjective origin of self-consciousness, first, by comparing Hegel's analysis of lord and bondsman to Sartre's analysis of intimacy. Second, I focus on two interpretive challenges. First, I argue that the staking of life comes from an other-oriented epistemological relation, and not simply from an immediate concern with dominating the other. Second, contrary to many interpretations which see the bondsman's development arising out of an isolated activity merely between himself and the products of his labor, I argue that the slave's ability to gain knowledge of himself as a self is only possible by establishing a relationship with the lord. This point is essential because, if readings of the bondsman's development as isolated from the lord are correct, then Hegel has in fact not succeeded in showing that self-consciousness only develops out of intersubjective recognition.