„Logisch ist der Anfang, indem er im Element des frei für sich seienden Denkens, im reinen Wissen gemacht werden soll.“

— G.W.F. Hegel, Wissenschaft der Logik, I, Werke 5, p. 67

“The beginning is logical in that it is to be made in the element of thought that is free and for itself—in pure knowledge.”

— Hegel, The Science of Logic, Vol. 1

 

“In no science is the need to begin with the very essence of the matter, without preliminary reflections, felt more strongly than in the science of logic” [Hegel, Introduction to The Science of Logic, Vol. 1]. This statement also holds true for “Living Logic.” The distinction between the two—the science of logic and living logic—will become clearer as we uncover the “essence of the matter.” That’s one side of the story.

The other side is that the great thinker required an extensive work of “preliminary reflections,” spanning over three hundred pages, to guide his readers (if they don’t perish along the way) to this “essence.” This work is The Phenomenology of Spirit—one of the most challenging texts in philosophical thought. In this article, I cannot address the problems faced by the author of this work or lead readers smoothly to the concluding insights of The Phenomenology of Spirit to prepare them for grasping the beginning of “Living Logic.” In fact, this preparation is unnecessary, as the result of the Phenomenology is a “short cut” in the long journey of consciousness and its object toward their unity—pure knowledge. It plunges our thought into a state of “indeterminate immediacy,” which allows it to contemplate “pure being”—the beginning of both the “Science of Logic” and “Living Logic.” This somewhat clarifies Hegel’s statement above.

However, another circumstance compels me to refrain from any special “preparation” for perceiving the beginning of “Living Logic” through a detailed examination of The Phenomenology of Spirit. I’ll start with an introductory remark. After returning from the Gulag in 1933, A.F. Losev recorded his reflections during “quiet frosty nights” while guarding a lumber warehouse (by then he was nearly blind and could only “carry his weight” as a guard) in a lengthy article that remained unpublished during his lifetime. In the well-known eight-volume collection of his writings, the article was later titled “The Self Itself.” This work is quite difficult to comprehend, especially its first part, which is dedicated to the “touch,” the “hint” at the hidden or “mystical” essence of each thing, its “self itself.” From the very beginning, one must firmly grasp that this concerns the highest conceivable individuality of each thing, its absolute novelty and uniqueness. “Each thing is precisely itself and not something else [referring to a specific thing that, at this moment, is before me or you by our free choice]—thus, the self of the thing exists [this chosen one and no other]. However, all things together form something that is it itself [the author later calls this the absolute self], i.e., the self itself. Individual identities thus somehow enter into this absolute self. Moreover, in each thing, individuality is symbolically given in the form of the thing itself; in it, the thing itself is a symbol of its self itself. The self itself is equally contained in all things, thus being precisely the absolute self. Therefore, every existing thing is a symbol of the absolute self” [A.F. Losev, “The Self Itself,” Vol. 3, Moscow 1994, p. 351].

Furthermore, “the self itself is unattainable and unknowable. It is enveloped by the abyss of becoming, which generates its countless interpretations… Every becoming, including human spiritual activity, is always the becoming of the absolute self, because the latter, being everything, contains nothing outside itself. Every becoming thing and every person with their free spiritual activity is nothing other than a moment, expression, outpouring, action, etc., solely of the absolute self” [Ibid., p. 353].

Now, regarding the previously mentioned circumstance. At the very beginning of The Phenomenology of Spirit, in the first chapter, titled “Sense-Certainty, or the ‘This’ and ‘Meaning’,” Hegel embarks on his lengthy journey from the most immediate knowledge. In the preface to his work, he describes formations such as “Sense-Certainty” or the following “Perception,” etc., as “form formations” (Gestalten) and treats these “gestalts” as living entities, though he does not explicitly express this and may not even perceive it as such. However, one could infer from the perception of form formations as living entities the reason he called his work The Phenomenology of Spirit, as “the spirit gives life” [John 6:63], and the gestalts reveal (hence the term phenomenon) these formations of spirit as living entities. Yet, when discussing the genesis of the title of Hegel’s work’s, one must also briefly address its purpose.

The Phenomenology aimed to overcome the rift, stemming from Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason, between the “thing in itself” (better translated as the “thing by its deep essence” or simply “thing by essence”) and our representation, knowledge, or, more precisely, the concept of that thing. “The thing in itself seemed… to be the literal focal point of all the problematic aspects of Kant’s philosophy. It turns out that any concept of causal connection is the rational category applied to the knowledge of phenomena, and no reference to things in themselves is possible. However, this thing in itself underlies our knowledge, as it affects our sensibility, serving as its matter and content, thus becoming its cause, while our representations become the action of that cause” [Kupriyanov V.A., The Formation and Issues of Philosophy of Nature in the Early Works of Schelling, p. 3]. I’ll refrain from describing the “Sturm und Drang” initiated by the intellectual elite of Germany to discover the “channel” connecting our perception of things with the objective reality of that “thing by essence.” Finally, the young Schelling had the fortunate thought that if we define truth as the complete agreement between the object and knowledge, then we must explain how this identity of being and thought is possible, which we find in ourselves as our “ego.” “Thus, only in the self-contemplation of Spirit is there an identity of representation and object. Therefore, to demonstrate the absolute coincidence of representation and object, which underlies the reality of all our knowledge, one must prove that Spirit, in contemplating objects in general, contemplates only itself. If this is proven, then the reality of all our knowledge is secured” [Schelling F.W.J., Early Philosophical Writings, St. Petersburg: Aletheia, 2000, p. 202]. Thus, Hegel began to systematically build this proof, starting from immediate knowledge and culminating in absolute knowledge, rather than employing the “pistol-shot” method of his friend Schelling, which he hinted at in the preface to his Phenomenology (Ф 14).

In “Sense-Certainty,” from which immediate knowledge begins, the aspects of this form are distributed as follows. First of all, there is consciousness based on this certainty. Next, we have the object of consciousness, appearing as pure “this,” while consciousness itself is pure “ego” (I remind you that the object or thing is what “Сonsciousness…distinguishes from itself… [while] at the same time it relates itself… and the determinate form of the processing of relating, or of there being something for a consciousness, is knowledge” [Ф 82, Introduction, PoS]). However, there is another aspect that observes “Sense-Certainty” from the outside or “above”—this is discursive thought, which Hegel calls “we.” We find the object of “Sense-Certainty” as simply existing, or as essence, while the other is the non-essential, which exists in it not by essence but through the object; this is the “ego, a state of knowledge which only knows the object because it is, and which can as well be as not be. The object, however, is the real truth, is the essential reality; it is, regardless of whether it is known or not; it remains even when it is not known; but there is no knowledge if there is no object” [Ф 93, “The Object of Sense Certainty,” PoS]. I note that these last conclusions are drawn by discursive thought or our reason.

He asks it—”Sense-Certainty”— a question (as if it were a living being!), trying to ascertain: is there indeed an object in it, or is “this” the true essence, while knowledge is something non-essential? Or, in a more immediate form: what is “this”? Taking “this” in the dual form of its being, namely, as “now” and “here,” we divide our question into two parts: first, what is now?—We might answer, for instance: now it is night. To verify the truth of this sense certainty, a simple experiment suffices. We will record this truth; by being recorded, the truth cannot disappear. If we look again at the recorded truth now, at this midday, we will have to acknowledge that it has evaporated.

The “now,” which is night, persists, meaning that we interpret it [ourselves!] as something that it claims to be—as something existing; yet it turns out to be rather non-existent. The “now” itself (selbst) remains, but as a “now” that is not night. Similarly, it persists concerning the day, which exists now as a “now” that is not day, i.e., as something negative overall. This enduring “now” is thus defined as something that remains because the other—i.e., day and night—does not exist. Yet it remains just as simple as before, “now,” and in this simplicity, it is indifferent to what else appears with it: just as little as night and day constitute its being, it is equally neither day nor night; it is not at all affected by this otherness. Such simplicity, which exists due to negation, is neither “this” nor “that,” but a certain “not-this,” and is equally indifferent to whether it is “this” or “that.” We call this something universal; thus, the universal is what is true in sense certainty.

We also express ourselves about the sensory [referring to this unique “self itself!”] as something universal; what we say is “this,” is a universal “this”; or: “it” is, and thus is being in general. Of course, [and here the moment of truth begins!] we do not conceive of a universal “this” [which is understandable, as representation always pertains to something singular, unique, inexpressible, while the universal is always abstract, negative, and indifferent to the singular, as defined in the previous paragraph] or being in general, but we express ourselves about the universal; or: we simply do not articulate how we imply, “imagine” (meinen) it in this sense certainty. Yet language, as we see, is more truthful: in it, we directly refute our opinion (Meinung); and since the universal is the truth of sense certainty, and language expresses only this truth, it is entirely impossible for us to ever articulate any sensory being we imply.

Thus, Hegel references the peculiarities of language, and this serves as a reliable criterion for him. Indeed, language is a means of communication (from the word common or universal), so when I communicate with a friend and tell him that I spent the entire evening yesterday at my desk trying to articulate my thoughts, I do not need to describe my desk in detail for my interlocutor to understand me; that would be impossible. Hegel understands this well. However, I might spend time not at the desk I imagine or imply, but at this unique, singular one, and this self of my desk, as well as any object, is an essential (absolute!) condition for both my existence and yours in this world! At the end of the chapter “Sense-Certainty…,” Hegel rejects our opinion regarding the singularity of sensory objects as true, asserting that it always expresses something universal in response to the question: what is “this”? In other words, he effectively denies the “self itself” of each thing. This provides me with grounds to argue for the necessity of revisiting Hegel’s Phenomenology of Spirit. Its conclusion regarding pure knowledge as the absolute coincidence of the object and knowledge about it must necessarily include the “presence” of the indeterminate, which cannot be articulated but serves as the living “motor” of the logical process’s development.

Thus, Hegel begins logic with the category of “being,” or, in the author’s words, logic itself commences with this category as the most “immediate” and therefore the “most indeterminate,” i.e., the most suitable beginning for logic (any determination already represents a departure from the beginning!).

 

 

CHAPTER ONE

 

BEING

 

A. BEING

 

“Being, pure being, without any further determination. In its indeterminate immediacy, it is equal only to itself, and it is not unequal relatively to an other; it has no distinction either within itself or in relation to the external. If being had any distinguishable determination or content, or if it were established as distinguishable from an other, it would not retain its purity. Being is pure indeterminacy and emptiness.—There is nothing to be contemplated in it, if contemplation can indeed be said to apply here; in other words, it is only this pure, empty contemplation. There is also nothing to be thought in it; in other words, it is equally only this empty thinking. Being, the indeterminate immediate, is in fact nothing, and no more and no less than nothing” [§ 132, Chapter 1, Chapter 1, SoL].

Analysis 1. The “object” of our thought—pure knowledge—emerges directly from the Phenomenology of Spirit, leaving behind the long journey of consciousness and its object toward their unity—pure knowledge. Thus, it is pure being. This concept serves as the beginning for Living Logic. In this context, pure being proves to be entirely indeterminate. When thought applies its fundamental categories of equality and difference (as I emphasized above), it finds nothing, neither in it nor outside it, to hold onto for determination. So, what then in fact, i.e. what really, does our thought discover in analyzing pure being? It finds that pure being is indistinguishable from nothing due to its indeterminacy, and that pure nothing unexpectedly, suddenly replaces pure being as the beginning of logic. Now, logic begins with pure nothing.

 

B. NOTHING

 

“Nothing, pure nothing: it is simply equality with itself, complete emptiness, absence of all determination and content; indistinguishability within itself. — When we speak of contemplation or thinking here, it is important to note that it counts as a distinction whether we contemplate or think of something or nothing. Therefore, the expression ‘to contemplate or to think nothing’ signifies something. We [our pure thinking!] distinguish between something and nothing; thus, nothing is, exists [existiert in the original] in our contemplation or thought; or rather, it is itself empty contemplation or thought; and the same empty contemplation or thought as pure being.—Therefore, nothing is the same determination or, more precisely, absence of determination, and thus altogether the same as pure being” [§ 133, Chapter 1, Book 1, SoL].

Analysis 2. Here, thought encounters the same result: pure being has unexpectedly replaced pure nothing, and thought has returned once again to the first principle, to pure being. Does thought find any change in the latter as a result of this return? Thought finds no change in pure being—no vanishing, dissolution, or, moreover, Hegelian sublation—because, according to Analysis 1, there is “nothing, neither in it nor outside it,” for it to hold onto, and there is nothing in it to change in its thought analysis, because it remains indeterminate!

Yet there are evident moments of replacement in the thought of pure being with pure nothing and vice versa. Moreover, they occur, as stated in Analysis 1, suddenly and unexpectedly for thought; it cannot grasp the flow of transitions of being into nothing or nothing into being; they occur as if “behind the back” of thought, beyond thought! This circumstance alters our thought’s relationship to pure being and also to pure nothing as the beginnings of logic. Now, for thought, the beginning of logic becomes a cyclical process from being to nothing and back from nothing to being. But let’s not rush. The process itself, consisting of transitions from being to nothing and nothing to being, occurs “behind the back” of thought, which means it lies beyond thought and thus beyond logic; it is illogical! Can something illogical serve as the beginning of logic? — The answer is unequivocal: no, it cannot. Therefore, let’s allow thought to go further, revealing the true state of things, or rather, thoughts, materialized by their immediate presence in thinking, while continuing to use fundamental fragments from Hegel’s Science of Logic for comparison and to identify discrepancies.

 

C. BECOMING

 

The Process of the Vanishing of Being into Nothing and Nothing into Being

 

“Truth is neither being nor nothing; it consists of the fact that being does not transition but has transitioned into nothing, and nothing does not transition but has transitioned into being. But the truth is equally not their indistinguishability; it consists of the fact that they are not the same, that they are absolutely distinct, yet also unseparated and inseparable and that each of them immediately vanishes [suddenly, unexpectedly for thought] in its opposite. Their truth is, therefore, this movement [process] of the immediate vanishing of the one into the other” [SoL, Book 1, Chapter 1, 135].

Remark 1. A few preliminary words about the “absolute.” This term is borrowed from Latin and consists of the prefix “ab”—negation of what stands behind—and the word standing behind, “solut”—the solution. By solution, we mean the following: suppose we solve a problem by stating its initial condition and then making justified conclusions step by step from this condition, resulting in a solution. The following chain of justified conclusions is called a solution. The prefix “ab” negates this process; that is, thought must perform a negation—a reflection—to conceive these parts of the word together. What can this word essentially mean? — The term “absolute” does not arise fundamentally from any conclusions (solutions); on the contrary, everything arises from it! In this sense, “absolute” is a synonym for the word “God.” The term “absolute” translates from Latin as “unconditional.”

Why does Hegel use this word instead of “unconditional”? — He explained in his note to § 186 that the term available in his native language “calls to mind more what is immediate, whereas the foreign term suggests more what is reflected.” End of Remark 1.

Analysis 3. How, then, in the context of the above, should we understand the phrase “absolutely distinct,” as proposed by Hegel? — It indicates that this distinction between being and nothing cannot be derived from them; “… this distinction is inexpressible. Let those who insist on the distinction between being and nothing tackle the problem of stating what it consists of” [SoL, Book 1, Chapter 1, §151]. Indeed, from the above analyses, it follows that there is “nothing to hold onto,” meaning there is no basis for indicating the distinction between them. This distinction manifests not in themselves but in a third entity—in what they give life to through their unstoppable (but beyond thought!) transitions into each other—in becoming, which reveals itself due to their distinction! But let us proceed further.

 

Moments of Becoming: Emergence and Vanishing

 

The thought suddenly discovers and holds the return back to pure being as a result of the transition from pure being to pure nothing and the transition from pure nothing back to pure being, that is, as a result of a cycle. The flow of these transitions, or the cyclical process, remains inaccessible to thought; it is illogical!

In this cyclical process, thought identifies and distinguishes only the realized transition (as Hegel emphasizes: “… does not transition, but has transitioned into nothing”) from being to nothing—vanishing—as well as the realized transition from nothing to being—emergence.

These transitions—emergence and vanishing—manifest in thought as moments of a cyclical process, connecting them as they follow a sequential flow “behind the back” of thought and revealing this flow in thought as becoming. Vanishing and emergence are two moments of becoming.

Analysis 4. It necessarily proceeds from the previous discussion that immediately after the moment of vanishing there follows another moment—emergence, also necessarily. We can talk about the simultaneous vanishing of both moments and, consequently, about the vanishing of becoming, as Hegel does in the section titled “The Sublation of Becoming,” but only by excluding their following manifestation in thought and abstractly connecting them in some unity (Einssein), as he does in his logic. However, this is impossible without violating the truth that has emerged here! What has manifested here is that they arise (in thought) in the cyclical process suddenly, as the replacement of pure being with pure nothing and vice versa, but following sequentially, not simultaneously.

The process manifests through becoming in our thought now as a “ticking” back and forth (vanishing-emergence) in complete silence (hesychia). Did the process exist before we discovered it? — Of course, it did, does, and will! This means that regardless of whether we have already uncovered this process through becoming or not, it is somewhere “flowing,” “functioning,” “ticking”! And thought receives the true beginning of Living Logic—becoming!

Remark 2. I’d like to draw your attention to the above-mentioned German word Einssein, which is translated in our Science of Logic as “unity,” whereas the German word for “unity” is Einheit, which Hegel uses exclusively thereafter. The word Einssein translates as “being in one.” Isn’t it strange that the great thinker uses this particular term here? Being “in one” for the two—being and nothing—is only possible in one way: by instantly holding in thought and through thought one or the other, without stopping (!), which we achieved above. One could reveal the cyclical process in this way, aligning our exposition more closely with Hegel’s text. However, this would be what Hegel later calls (see SoL, point (a)) “determinate being in general,” an external reflection that he urges us to avoid as a deviation from “the moment in the development of the subject matter itself.” The development of the subject matter itself, rather than our external reflections on the subject matter, which sometimes seem very “clever” to us, is the main “nerve” of the logical process for Hegel—plus, we might add, for the “underlying”—mystical—”work” of Spirit! End of Remark 2.

Remark 3. A few words about the terms “suddenly,” “unexpectedly,” and “instantly.” In the Greek language, in Plato’s dialogue “Parmenides” (156 d), this is represented by the single word τὸ ἐξαίφνης, formed from the adverb ἐξαίφνης (exaiphnēs) through nominalization.

Plato uses the term “suddenly” in the sense of “instantly,” linking it in some way to time. However, neither time nor space applies in the “Science of Logic,” especially in “Living Logic.” Therefore, in our context, the term “suddenly” is understood as “unexpectedly.” What does “unexpectedly” mean in our context? — It indicates a leap, a flow that is elusive to thought, creating the effect of an instant leap from one to another or the replacement of one by another—the term I used earlier. This replacement occurs instantly, “suddenly,” as this “suddenly” evidently signifies something from which a change occurs in one direction or the other. Indeed, change does not begin with rest while it is rest, nor with movement while movement continues; however, this strange “suddenly” lies between movement and rest, completely outside of time (“Parmenides,” 156 e). I would rewrite Plato’s last sentence in relation to our study as follows: however, this strange “suddenly” lies between being and non-being, completely outside of logical flow.

The greatness of Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel lies in the fact that he elevated the formulation (note, this is not a determination!) of pure being to such a level of abstraction that it begins to move irresistibly, suddenly, leaping externally (in thought!) from one to another, returning to itself and thereby manifesting the “underlying” work of Spirit. He glimpsed this moment; the time for discovering the cyclical process flowing “behind the back” of thought had not yet come. And yet he captured “the movement of the immediate vanishing of one into the other” (see the earlier section “The Process of the Vanishing of Being into Nothing and Nothing into Being”). The word “immediate” here is very important, as it emphasizes the absence of any means (“special effects”) that initiate this vanishing; that is, the transition occurs unexpectedly, suddenly. Moreover, he expressed this in his own manner, which was later called “Hegel’s dialectical method.” For example, see subsection 2, “Moments of Becoming: …” (§ 179, Chapter 1, Book 1, SoL) where he states: “The one is a disappearance [in my translation, “vanishing”]; being transitions into nothing; but nothing is equally the opposite of itself, transition into being, emergence. This emergence is another direction; nothing transitions into being, but being also sublates itself and is rather transition into nothing, a disappearance. — They do not sublate each other; one does not externally sublate the other; each sublates itself in itself and is in itself its own opposite.” The last phrase is a Hegelian masterpiece that led me to an unexpected and fortunate discovery of the flow of the process in early January 1992. Suddenly and unexpectedly for me, it illuminated the internal “underlying work” of something or Someone, still unclear at that time.

To see how Hegel’s thought strives to express in the categories of a “Science of Logic” the “underlying work of Spirit,” which he seems to somehow sense, I will provide another fragment from §151: “But the third, in which being and nothing have their concentration [the noun Bestehen is translated here as “existence,” for which Hegel uses a different word, Existenz; see above in section Nothing], must arise here; and it has indeed arisen here; this is becoming. In it, they exist as different; becoming lives only insofar as they are different. This third is different from them;—they exist [the verb bestehen is translated here again as “exist”] only in the other, which means that they do not exist in themselves. Becoming is the concentration of both being and non-being; or their concentration is only their being in one [Sein in Einem, later in the original Hegel combines this phrase into one word—Einssein!]; this concentration is what eliminates their distinction.”

Try to feel the contradiction in this excerpt to understand the unusualness and complexity of speculative thought: becoming “ticks” back and forth due to the distinction between being and nothing on one side, while the fact of its existence as being in one of being and nothing eliminates their distinction on the other. This contradiction is resolved by the dialectical form of thought discovered by the ancient Greeks. Even Zeno formulates it in a negative form in his paradoxes. Socrates uses it in ethical discussions with his opponents, while Plato solidifies it in his dialogues as a universal form of expressing the fundamental categories of Reason! Hegel perfected this form of thought to its ultimate expression. What is remarkable is that he managed to express in this form the self-unfolding of the concepts of logic (the last phrase, emphasized by me, was first proposed by Hegel himself, perhaps even a little earlier by Fichte), excluding from this movement of thought the cyclical process that lies beyond logic (which he never uncovered!) and thus artificially avoiding the necessity of including this mystical component of the abode of Reason in the logical flow?—To answer this question, I will provide another fragment from “Science of Logic,” taken from the section “Sublation of Becoming.”

“The equilibrium brought about by emergence and vanishing is, above all, becoming itself. But becoming also converges [geht zusammen translates as “converges,” but not to the point of complete vanishing!] into a restful unity. Being and nothing abide in becoming only as vanishing; becoming, as such, exists only due to their distinction [due to their following vanishing]. Their vanishing [but not simultaneous, hence the next conclusion is incorrect] is therefore the vanishing of becoming, in other words, the vanishing of vanishing itself [this “arithmetic action” of Hegel (-(-) = +) seemingly was later enthusiastically accepted by everyone]. Becoming is an unstable unrest which settles [zusammensinkt—collapses, disintegrates] into a restful result.”

This passage contains many misconceptions, which I have partly already expressed above in square brackets, and I will add the following:—”converges into a restful unity.” It is unclear what Hegel means here by the word “unity,” let alone “restful”. He himself acknowledges this word as unsatisfactory and dedicates a substantial section of his reckonings to this in “Remark 2,” § 150. I will present only the result: “… the true result that has emerged here is becoming, which is not merely the one-sided or abstract unity of being and nothing. It consists rather in this movement, that pure being is immediate and simple, and for that very reason is equally pure nothing; that there is a difference between them, but a difference which no less sublates itself and is not [the indistinguishability that our thought encountered only externally—in reflection—resembles the procedure that Hegel called ‘sublation’; see below]. The result, therefore, equally asserts the difference between being and nothing, but as a difference that is merely supposed (gemeinten—imagined).” According to Hegel, the distinction is only supposed (it should be understood) by our external reflection because, in reality (according to him, of course), it is sublated by being and nothing themselves. So does one of the main discoveries of his “method” lie in his famous expression “sublation,” which he defines in the “Remark” at the end of the first chapter (§ 186)?—”Something is sublated only insofar as it has entered into unity [?] with its opposite; in this more particular signification as something reflected, it may be fittingly be called a moment.” To answer our first question, let’s first try to understand this.

As mentioned, thought, in analyzing pure being, suddenly apprehends its replacement with pure nothing. So, has pure being indeed “entered into unity with its opposite”—pure nothing—that is, has it sublated itself? — Externally, it seems so. But this is more our speculation (or rather, Hegel’s own external reflection!), because pure thought finds no “entrance,” let alone into “unity,” in this analysis; it does not perform such an act. We sense the hidden transition with our “spiritual feeling,”^* but we do not think it: it occurs “behind the back” of thought, which captures only the leap!

Furthermore, “being and nothing exist in becoming only as vanishing,” but not in one moment, as already stated, but following sequentially, thus giving “life” to becoming, making it a stable (!) “unrest.”

No matter how you look at it, Hegel’s attempt to bypass the cyclical process that lies beyond logic, by killing becoming in the momentary act of the vanishing of being into nothing and vice versa, likely resulted in the artificial construct later termed “Hegel’s dialectical method”! End of Remark 3.

Remark 4. Here, I use the term “moment” in the following definition. First and foremost, its translation from the Latin word “momentum,” taken from I.K. Dvoretsky’s “Latin-Russian Dictionary,” published in 1976: 7) motion: momenta sua sustentare C(icero) to be in continuous motion; 8) change, run, flow… cycle, turn; 10) alteration, change (levia fortunae momenta L(ivius Titus) small moments of fortune); 11) a segment of time or space, interval (natura parvis momentis multa mutat C(icero) nature changes greatly in a few moments); 12) instant, moment; 13) section, part, point…

From this, I derive a definition of “moment”: a moment is that which manifests in thought as part of a whole, in which this part changes instantly, suddenly, due to its (remaining) indeterminacy, rotating (cycling) “behind the back of thought” into its opposite, which also becomes part of the whole, and therefore a moment of it; and the analysis of the determination: this definition engages such meanings from the translation of “momentum” as “part,” “change,” “instant,” “cycle,” excluding meanings from item 11). End of Remark 4.

 

 

CHAPTER TWO

 

STAYING

 

a) Staying in General

 

Becoming is revealed in thought as the unity of two moments—emergence and vanishing—each of which instantaneously vanishes yet also, following, immediately re-emerges, equivalent in both directions. What remains, in other words, what stays in the equilibrium of instantaneous vanishing and instantaneous emergence? It is becoming itself, understood as the persistently recurring vanishing of one moment and the following emergence of another, viewed through the lens of its stability as staying (Dasein).

Remark 1. Becoming emerges as a new category of logic resulting from a process of transitions that our thought cannot fully grasp. The process itself is not a category of logic; it exists beyond it! Our thought discovers and fixes the result of its action but cannot define the flow of this action; it defies any determination. The first determination (before this, everything was indeterminate!) of “stable” arises as a quality referring to becoming, “ticking” back and forth as if in equilibrium, enclosing within itself an unstoppable process of transitions from being to nothingness and back, viewed from the perspective of being—one-sidedly. The process itself manifests for thought through becoming, acting as its “motor,” initiated by the “life-giving Spirit” that connects the unconnectable, the “Giver of Life”! End of Remark 1.

Analysis 1. In our literature, Dasein is translated as “determinate being.” This phrase, while conveying the category’s meaning, is imprecise and split in half, requiring constant mental effort to unify the two words into one coherent meaning. My translation—“staying”—avoids this flaw and emphasizes the stability of the enduring repetition of being, rather than merely the presence of being in a specific location (Dasein—being there) or, worse, being before us—externally present, which is inapplicable to logic according to Hegel’s own observations.

As a result of its discovery in thought, becoming arises, first, as a unity of two moments. This “duality” of becoming influences the nature of the functioning of its moments. Thus, the persistently recurring vanishing of the moments of becoming manifests in two ways within this unity (see the definition of a moment in Chapter 1, Remark 4): as a stable, enduring repetition of being (being… being… being…)—staying, and as a stable, enduring repetition of nothingness (nothing… nothing… nothing…)—negation. And second, “behind the back” of thought, where only reformulated moments of becoming—staying (reality) and negation (determinancy)—are manifested, flows the process of unceasing cycling (“oscillation” or “vibration,” as some prefer to say) of transitions from being to nothing and from nothing to being, due to their indistinguishability and their absolute difference.

Remark 2. Consider this example: the overwhelming majority of us believe that reality is what surrounds us. Opposite my window stands a residential building. Unless something extraordinary occurs—a quake destroys it, or a shell strikes it (which is quite relevant now), or something similar (or unprecedented) happens—it will remain (staying in its state as a residential building), while the trees around it will grow, imperceptibly changing their size (also staying in their state as trees). All this is based on the incredible stability of the proton! On the other hand, 20th-century physics has accustomed some of us to the idea that behind this apparent stability of our surrounding reality lie ceaseless processes of the transformation of matter, leading to the degradation of the building or, in the case of trees, to an increase in biomass that promotes their growth.

Another example involves elementary fundamental (structureless) particles—electrons, which appear as point particles (i.e., consisting of nothing) down to sizes on the order of 10⁻¹⁸ m (CERN). Here, defining particles as point-like emphasizes their simple staying without any internal “filling,” i.e., formally. However, if we accept this, it becomes unclear what distinguishes them physically—their essential determinacy. According to characteristics accepted by physicists, it is evident how an electron differs from a positron, but if we regard them as point-like, their physical differentiation (and the human mind always tends to want to perceive a distinction in their internal structure, that is their physical differentiation, beyond the formal distinction) “hangs in the air.” Such a concept cannot satisfy the inquisitive human mind. Physicists do not stop at such a state of affairs, so various models of the structure of elementary particles keep appearing: preon, string, and so on and so forth. End of Remark 2.

Remark 3. A few words about the terms “following” and “follows.” These terms arise from the thought manifestation of the flow of the cyclical process of transitions between being and nothing behind the “back” of thought. Hegel seemingly did not notice this aspect of the “logical process in the development of the subject,” which directly relates to logic itself. Indeed, after the substitution of being with nothing, there necessarily follows (necessarily!) the latter’s reverse substitution by being without any condition or inference (assistance!) from our thought; that is, unconditionally or absolutely. On the other hand, thought fixes this following: being and nothing do not “overlay” one another in their indistinguishability, nor do they vanish together, as Hegel assumed; rather, they separate and thus distinguish themselves through this following, differing absolutely, giving “life” to becoming—its “living ticking.” The following fixed in thought is pure thought (objective) without further determination or, in a word, is logical!

I will attempt to clarify this more definitively. For this, I will need some fragments from Hegel’s Encyclopedia of Philosophical Sciences (hereafter EPS), but in my own translation. The first fragment pertains to the beginning of thought. It concerns the state of our mental process when we learn to fix thoughts in their most abstract form, noticing and eliminating all attempts of the mind to add something that “fits a given situation” and thus focusing on the objective essence. But let’s turn to Hegel himself: “When we begin to think, we have nothing but thought in its pure indeterminacy, because the determinate already includes both [determinacy and mediation]; but initially we have neither. The indeterminate, as we have it here, is immediate, not mediated indeterminacy, not the sublation of all determinacy, but the immediacy of indeterminacy, indeterminacy prior to any determination, indeterminacy foremost. But this is what we call being [in the understanding of Parmenides]. It cannot be felt, seen, or perceived, but it is [unlike everything just mentioned] pure thought and, as such, it generates the beginning [of the Science of Logic]. Essence [explored in the second part of The Science of Logic] is also something indeterminate, but the indeterminate that, having already passed through mediation, contains determination as sublated” (§ 86, Addition 1, EPS).

Furthermore, in the second fragment, Hegel provides a definition of logical thinking: “the drive [der Trieb—translated as ‘the driving force, instinct’] to find a stable meaning in being or in both of them is the very necessity that compels being and nothing to move onward and gives them a true, i.e., concrete, significance. This movement is the logical derivation (Ausführung) and the further development of the concept. The reflection that generates deeper determinations for these beginnings, is the logical thought that generates such determinations, but not randomly, rather necessarily” (§ 87, Remark 1, EPS). I draw your attention to the subtle difference between what we obtained at the beginning of our work and fixed in our analyses and what the thinker offers us. Namely, it is not reflection that finds “deeper determinations for these beginnings,” but the beginnings themselves unexpectedly reveal their true “face” to thought. What is left for thought is only to follow these turns and leaps of the beginnings themselves and to register the resulting outcome. Therefore, the discussion here may not be about “logical thought,” but rather about the (objective!) Logos, which manifests unexpectedly and suddenly for thought due to a process that for thought is unexpected and hidden.

Of course, one could, without knowing or noticing (or ignoring?) this process, “construct” a chain of mental reflections, finding the transition of pure being into its opposite to be a unity with that opposite and thereby introducing a new definition into the science of logic, calling it “sublation,” as Hegel did. However, this would lead to at least two artificial constructs—unity and mediation (the latter arises because each of the beginnings in this transition allegedly loses its immediacy, but then how does one address the indeterminacy, which also automatically disappears? It is impossible to speak of any determination of pure being and pure nothing at the initial stage of the logical process, as thought at this moment has not yet revealed any stability of flow; it will obtain stability later, in the paragraph “Staying in General”). I won’t even make further mention of the infamous unity, which Hegel himself seemed to dislike.

In conclusion to this remark, I will repeat, slightly altering, one phrase from Remark 3 of the first chapter. After all that has been said, I think this phrase will be fully understood. Hegel’s greatness lies in the fact that he brought the formulation (note, not a determination!) of pure being to such a level of abstraction that it begins to move inexorably, suddenly, externally (in thought!), leaping from one to another, returning to itself and thereby manifesting the “subtle” work of the Spirit in how the concept of logic self-unfolds in our thought. End of Remark 3.

Notes

* Cf. the brief explanation of this phrase in footnote 7 on p. 378 in Ishtvan Pertsel’s article “Simeon the New Theologian and the Theology of the Divine Essence” in the book The Antique Tradition and Patrology, v. 4 (1/2), 2015: “The Biblical source of the term [“perception”] and, consequentially, the conception of ‘spiritual feeling’ are often ignored, and this allows researchers to speak of ‘spiritual mysticism’ regarding every place where this expression is encountered.” Back to main article