Perspective Philosophy CRUSHED by Sleep Deprived Haz 🚀 Infrared Content Catalog

today we have has from infrared

and lewis from perspective philosophy

debating whether veganism

is an ethical duty a quick word about

format and rules opening statements are

eight minutes long

who goes first will be determined by a

coin toss i will warn you when you hit

five minutes you can wrap

up because when you hit eight i cut you

dead this will be followed by two sets

of alternating five minute responses

followed by

45 minutes of open discussion and

concluding with 20 minutes for audience

questions

regarding audience questions super chats

will be prioritized and asked in the

order in which they appear

if we have time non-super chat questions

should be marked by an asterisk so i can

quickly find them in the chat

rules of conduct are strict speaking out

of turn will result in 30 more seconds

of speaking time being allotted to the

other party

so save it for the response period or

for the open discussion segment

the use of slurs or personal abuse will

be met with an immediate ban and this

applies both to the audience and to our

participants

if either participant attempts to talk

over or challenge the moderator being

myself during this debate

they will first be muted and warned and

then removed i trust all this has been

made clear and that by participating

both guests

i will take at least to have tacitly

agreed to the rules as just laid out

with that out of the way we will flip a

coin to see who goes first for opening

statements

has your heads louis your tails

tails louis you go first you are going

to have eight minutes

for your opening statement starting

now

[Music]

okay hi everyone all right

so animals are inherently valuable

consciousness is inherently valuable

and the inconsideration of sentient

beings

is inherently wrong that is essentially

what i'm going to be arguing when i say

that veganism is an ethical

obligation an obligation is

a duty or a responsibility now i'm

arguing from a hegelian

position something that i know that has

at least tacitly

um endorses at least from what i've seen

he endorses

so hopefully we can make some headway

there

so all conscious beings have interest

desires and the capacity to feel pain

and pleasure

when we are considerate when we are

considering conscious beings and

conscious interests

we are considering what is the

foundation of value and

ethics as a whole if we are to agree

with the hegelian position

then what we are understanding is that

there is a right and a wrong

entailed in the world itself it's

objective it's not determined by you

or me or any given party it is something

which is

right and that we can discover that it

is right and then make it a law make it

a rule

i would say that we have already done

such a thing we already have

laws numerous laws which protect the

rights the life and liberty

of individuals within the state and

usually

humans of course this wasn't always the

case

the law used to protect classes of

individuals particularly

and even still is inadequate in many

cases to protect the overall

interests of the general population even

humans

not just animals veganism

is this consideration veganism is the

consideration that animals are not being

respected and

treated equally in the eyes of the law

as in their interests their desires and

their preferences are not being met

with reasonable consideration we aren't

considering that the pain of an animal

having its throat slit

is not justified because we wish to eat

them

because we wish to overpower them we are

considering ourselves more valuable

simply based on an identity

which we have constructed rather than

something which is true by nature

if we are to be honest with ourselves

i'm going to be honest with the reality

that we are

spawned from the unnecessary suffering

of any conscious being

defies what we are trying to do in in

ethics

that is express consciousness and

subjectivity to the greatest overall

possible degree

to create principles which genuinely

reflect the interests and value

at one moment i'm sorry lewis um

infrared please no burgers in my window

thank you

keep going you have 30 more seconds so

when we consider when we consider

animals and we consider their interests

and their pain and their suffering

what we are doing is the same thing that

we've done for hundreds of years we are

considering

that the values that we hold today or

have held in the past

do not encompass the conscious interests

of individuals throughout society

that for example black people are not

lesser that women

are not lesser and now animals are not

lesser just because of the identities

that we have

perpetuated upon them and so when we

consider the conscious interests of

other sentient beings we are being

more ethical more rational and

essentially doing the right thing so i

hope

that explains my position

and are you wrapping up yeah all right

that was pretty fast okay so

uh has let me reset the clock here

and you have eight minutes for your

opening statement

starting now so

in this debate the main thesis i will

defend

is that lewis or prospective philosophy

plainly fails to grasp the principal

significance of the hegelian conception

of ethics

additionally not only is his conception

of ethics incompatible with hegelian

philosophy

so to art actual contents relevant to

this debate

namely veganism vegans like mr lewis

arrive

by means of conceptual abstraction at

the sweeping insight that mankind's

current

and past dietary habits are radically

immoral and unethical

however such a position of radical

skepticism

towards norms in the first place the

widespread popularity of which can be

traced to the counterculture

is completely at odds with hegel's view

it's a position which assumes that the

content of morality can be arrived at x

nihilo

on the basis of an individually

contrived standard of reason

hey gillian philosophy is rather one of

reconciliation one which endeavors to

arrive at the deeper rationality of the

world and its norms

whereupon the rational individual who in

hegel's case is the modern cartesian

subject

discovers itself to be radically at odds

with it the definitive case being the

newfound political anxiety

provoked by the french revolution for

the europe's ancient regime

the content of tradition taken generally

as the norms customs and culture of a

given society obviously

do change but they do not change as a

result of being imposed upon by what

hegel calls the law of the heart

or the frenzy of self-conceit veganism

taken both as an ethical obligation for

the individual

and a collective vision of

transformation rests upon the unhappy

consciousness

which affords recognition only of a

contradiction between reality and this

same individual self-conceit

traditions change as a result of a

radical process of mutual recognition

between thinking

beings which animals could not possibly

figure into

in the past lewis has contrasted the

individualistic morality of kant to

hegel's ethical life

of state and society while the

distinction is superficially true

louis's conception of the hegelian

ethical life merely consists in an

elevation of kantian morality to the

level of voluntary collective enterprise

his misreading of hegel has its roots in

a form of neocontianism

that has its origins in the late 19th

century and spans from thinkers like

frederick lang all the way to habermas

hans principal error doesn't suddenly

disappear when the same abstract and

indeterminate morality shifts from the

individual to collective level

the collective reality relevant to hegel

is not something voluntary but objective

it doesn't register some kind of common

sight of radical skepticism or

abstraction toward the world

but has us its content determinate

relations which manifest a greater or

super-individual rationality

which hegels call geist or spirit it is

only in the harmony between the

individual will

and the institutions of the state which

the individual forms a part that the

achievement of ethical life is possible

but the institutions of the state for

hegel are not determined voluntarily by

the product of the individual use of

reason

they are rather the form of civil

society's self-consciousness

the contents of which being not their

moral conscience but their very being

hegel's rejection of volunteerism and

individual rationalism concerning the

institutions of the state

is best epitomized by his defense of the

institution of monarchy

it is precisely on account of the pure

contingency of the monarch's position

being inherited by tradition and

completely outside the sphere of

voluntary tradition by rational will

individual rational will that hegel

defends constitutional monarchy as the

site of a truly actualized freedom

thus from the hegelian perspective the

answer to the question posed by the

debate topic can be

answered with a resounding no the

question is itself absurd

duty to whom and for what the hegelian

ethical life

is not the product of any abstract or

indeterminate duty

but the harmony between the determinate

private interests of civil society

with the determinate rights and duties

imparted upon it by the state

there can be no real ethical duty

according to hegel that does not fit

within this scheme

it is also peculiar that lewis believes

the hegelian view would be favorable

toward veganism given hegel's very clear

distinction between humans and animals

that renders any notion of animal rights

and absurdity

within hegel's philosophy of nature it

is precisely spirit or geist that

distinguishes mankind from the animal

kingdom

in that work hegel details that an

animal is defined by the pure immediacy

of external contingencies

its own inner nature being among them

for hegel the animal can only exist as

an immediate individuality

its existence does not contain quoting

the generality that defines it

rather comes at its expense in the form

of an unending and violent struggle for

survival

conversely human beings exist in

societies civilizations and states

the universality of their being does not

strictly stand opposed to its actuality

but is rather defi indefinitely realized

through it which hegel calls history

itself

while vegans claim that such views are

outdated according to natural science

hegel's distinction stands the test of

time at the more fundamental level

an animal cannot have rights and is

qualitatively different from a human

being

one could not be a consistent hegelian

without acknowledging as much

thank you very much all right so

perspective philosophy you're going to

have five minutes to reply

starting

now so that was actually really

interesting i was actually surprised uh

to be entirely honest with you

you actually know that much about hegel

that was pretty decent i mean you're

absolutely wrong about the idea of the

cartesian subject

being the hegelian subject that's not

entirely wrong

um and i think thinkers like zizek and

lacon

would exemplify why that would not be

the case

in fact the cartesian subject implies

some sort of inherent knowledge

um an inherent self understanding which

is absolutely absent within the hegelian

dialectic

in fact self-understanding is the middle

term whilst the first term is

consciousness

so no you're wrong about that but

otherwise that was actually pretty

decent

um i am not actually arguing for

veganism x nihilo

i'm not arguing it from an abstraction

that we are dismissing all of the ethics

that has come before us in fact i see it

as a rational development of the concept

of equality that we have

we have arrived to this place and that's

how i introduced um

my um opening argument i said that the

essentially we no longer consider other

ethnicities we no longer consider

other genders as being lesser or weaker

than us hegel did actually see animals

as

lesser hegel did but hegel was alive 300

mil 200 something years ago

and um really his ethics are under his

own system

outdated he understood that ethics was a

progressive system that was developing

and his understanding of animals was

also underdeveloped as his

as his position on women he thought

women were lesser and inferior

just as he thinks that animals are

lesser inferior and he also thought

animals couldn't kill themselves we know

better now so even in terms

of raw psychological terms we know that

hegel's philosophy did not capture the

essence of an animal which is

unsurprising because it was 300 years

out there

now when we consider that you know the

concept of mutual recognition

mutual recognition does not allow for

the establishment of

what is ethical ethically right but more

the investigation of what is ethically

right

mutual recognition allows for the

establishment of self-consciousness

which is the middle term

in the hegelian dialectic which is

infinite the development of

self-consciousness allows for the

development of absolute spirit which

allows the individual to reconcile

themselves

with themselves so you say who am i

considering when i'm considering the

animal

i'm considering myself because there is

only the self understanding the self

whether that includes objects which are

absent and nihilistic in themselves and

being determinant

are ultimately unified in what is the

self

so even if i was considering an animal

uh as in its consciousness even without

its self-consciousness i'm considering

me because we are all united in

spirit that's the entire point the

consideration of consciousness itself

does not need to recognize an

individual's self-consciousness for them

to have

uh value children do not have

self-consciousness babies like before

the mirror stage

and they are valuable and so are

disabled people they have experiences

which are inherently valuable

which we become conscious of the whole

point of self-consciousness

is to become aware of the value which

exists which pre-exists

self-consciousness

and construct an identity which allows

for authenticity and freedom which is

the entire point of the hegelian

dialectic

hegel's hegel's dialectic is 300 years

out of date we have now

reached a point in which the concept of

equality has developed past where hegel

was

at that time the cartesian subject in

this respect is

absolutely um non-existent the subject

is developing

and moving past the point of um uh

of of an inherent or innate knowledge

which is trying to reconcile itself with

we are trying to reconcile ourselves

with a logos with something which is

uh logically uh uh logically right

within being

we are reconciling ourselves with what

would be considered

natural or with abstract right within

reality you see i'm talking about some

sort of abstract terms no i'm not

i'm talking about the concrete

definitions of equality and its

application

within our society today what we are

considering in that concept

and why the development of the hegelian

dialectic has

has brought us here which is why

philosophers such as jeremy bentham

uh peter singer thomas regan they are

all developing

upon concepts of equality and applying

them to animals which is why when jeremy

bentham said

one minute jeremy bentham said um

the what is it um what is it that should

trace the insufferable line

is it the faculty of reason or perhaps

the faculty of discourse but the

full-grown horse or dog is by far a more

communicable

or rational animal than an infant a baby

an infant of a week

a month or a year old actually a day a

week or a month old

the question is but if it were not what

would it avail

the question is not can they reason nor

can they talk but can they suffer

that is the question that we are asking

ourselves today within the dialectic and

that is the question that leads us to a

resounding

yes upon the consideration of animals

and their value

they matter we should consider them and

we should protect them in law

thank you very much are you done i am

great okay so has you're going to get

five minutes let me reset the clock

and

right you are good to start now so right

unsurprisingly you clearly don't know

what you're talking about and fail to

address any substantive point i raised

when i raised the point about the

cartesian slash modern subject being

relevant for hegel

it is only in so far as this such

subject is relevant for the entire

enterprise of modern philosophy and

modernity

as a whole including things like the

french revolution and so on

you mentioned people like zizek and la

khan but they were among

the most ardent defenders of this very

same insight obviously hegel goes far

beyond the limits of cartesian

philosophy

and what descartes affords of the

cartesian subject

but it is still the same modern abstract

and self-relating negativity of the

cartesian subject that

modern philosophy as a whole must begin

with as well as the modern subject in

general

um moreover it's really interesting that

you ground your view

of animal rights in some notion of

equality which you disgustingly also

apply to

uh ethnic minorities in women which are

on the same level of animal we should

assume equal

well this radical concept of equality

comes and traces its origin in none

other than descartes himself

um we can spar about that point later

now you say that when dealing with

animals you are considering the self yes

precisely and that's why there's no

dialectic process

in which the other actually participates

in that uh

consideration this is exactly why hegel

would describe it

as an example of the law of the heart or

the frenzy of self-conceit

and all the perversions and narcissism

corresponding to it

now hegel being old doesn't actually

address

the meat and potatoes of the fundamental

ontological distinction he's drawing

between animals and humans just because

it's from 300 years ago it doesn't mean

it's not fundamental to his philosophy

without which it becomes entirely

meaningless

now you compared the extending

of equality toward animals toward the

extending of equality toward women and

minorities

but the crucial piece of the puzzle

you're missing there is the actual fact

that minorities and women not only

participated but were the decisive

factor

in acquiring their own equality they

participated in a process

uh a dialectic and historical process of

mutual

self-recognition again this is something

that animals are not capable of doing

the only thing animals have going for

them is people like lewis who go on the

internet and claim that we have to give

them rights

now you mentioned children and disabled

people there's two prongs of why that's

ridiculous

children may not have self-consciousness

but there's no such thing as a species

called children

children are precisely the site in which

self-consciousness develops

it's not a static object now granted

disabled people may never develop a form

of self-consciousness

but they represent in the way we treat

them the way we do

in a good way is because of the pure

contingencies to which any individual

may find themselves

as a result of accidents of birth and

other matters of chance

ultimately disabled people form a part

of a human community they come from

humans and they form a part of our human

society otherwise the question

of our obligations toward them wouldn't

even be possible

now when i accuse you of engaging in a

kind of uh abstraction it seems like you

don't know what i actually mean

i'm not doubting the fact that you uh

fantasize about some process in which we

all

work together in this dialectic process

to achieve veganism

what i'm actually talking about is that

you counter pose some kind of product of

the individual use of reason to arrive

at an ethical or moral insight

against the whole of the world and

against the whole of society in the

whole of tradition

while appealing to this alone would

never possibly suffice

um it completely betrays the hegelian

spirit according to which

evaluating a tradition in reality so

entrenched

as the consumption of meat should lead

the individual to the path of

reconciliation

and understanding why this uh

consumption of meat

is so widespread despite the fact that

not everyone is supposedly as smart or

intelligent as you

it completely betrays the spirit of

higgle finally there's just the final

thing

ethics is for hegel a site of statehood

now you interpret this to mean that we

merely need to pass legislation

to extend rights to animals but again

the institutions of statehood and the

laws therein are not a matter of

voluntary determination according to the

individual

or collective in the neocontinent way

moral conscience

the determinate content of society's

institutions according to hegel

is the product of a deeper dialectic

between the private interests of civil

society

and the f and the rights and obligations

sorry the rights and duties imposed upon

them

by the state the contents of which can

only fit

within this scheme and within this

harmony you failed to demonstrate how

veganism could possibly do that

thank you very much and that's time all

right lewis you're gonna get another

five minutes to respond

let me reset the clock starting

now okay so that was um

i appreciate like why you say that i do

think i did actually respond i

don't think you picked up on it and um

if you

if the cartesian subject was only

brought up to recognize you know the

development of

philosophy then why didn't you mention

let's say like i don't know the freudian

subject or something along those lines

and the ways in which we are balancing

ourselves in relation to our desires

which would be

more hergelian but whatever if you think

that it's philosophically relevant to

a you know exploit you know explicit is

that right

yeah your position that's fair enough

okay

so where was i

right okay you said that i am arguing

from what is a nihilistic abstract

position now and you're saying that i

am trying to propose some sort of

methodology is really just a

you know an affirmation of a subjective

consciousness trying to

impose upon a notion of right from its

own subjectivity which would be what

hegel considers the irony of this

objective

i am not doing such a thing i'm actually

building upon the norms and traditions

of our society

which has led us to this consideration

the concepts that i'm using

are widely available in fact many of our

society already engage in notions of

welfarism

and the consideration of animals and

animal rights we have laws in the uk

which protect animals already

some of which have already been extended

and the uk has just recognized

animals as sentient hegel also

recognizes animals as sentient hegel

also recognizes animals as conscious

he he simply says that they cannot own

themselves

so they are not capable of

self-consciousness that's unsurprising

they aren't rational ethical agents

but this does not give us the can this

does not give us the right to them

it does not give us the right to dismiss

the

fundamental rationality which is imbued

within what they are that is not

something that hegel necessarily

dictates he says they have no right to

life and so on like that

of course he does it's in his interest

he also says women who knows how to get

educated

and that's why i brought it up i'm

saying hegel is wrong on some things

and he himself admits that he can be

wrong in terms of animals yes he is

wrong he admits that conscious he admits

the sentient he admits that they have

interests

he just basically says that they're

incapable of knowing those interests

not that we are incapable of knowing

those interests he points towards

he points towards subjects which are

valuable but dismisses their value

since they cannot become aware of it

externally from their experiences

within reality he is dismissing an

aspect of consciousness

because it cannot become aware of itself

just because it cannot become aware of

itself does not mean

that it is not positioned within the

hegelian dialectic

the hegelian dialectic starts at

consciousness and then moves to

self-consciousness

as the middle term the infinite middle

term which is the conscious

re-evaluation of itself

has what is what has led us here the

vegan as an identity

the identity of the animal lover the

carer of animals those individuals who

see themselves

as guardians and not persecutors of

other conscious beings

are much have a much greater

consideration of consciousness

than an individual who is not

considering those interests

they are considering interests of an

animal who does communicate

their interests to us and and you know

actually the funny thing is

is it is the necessary communication

which would have had to have happened

to allow the hegelian dialect to even

form to

produce self-consciousness which is

something recognized by thinkers such as

emmanuel levanas when he talks about the

resistance in the face

the resistance of the face um

of the ethics of the face and the

resistance the primordial resistance

which is necessary for language which

establishes

the negation required for determinate

objectivity

and the production of words so without

this

non-linguistic communication which can

be seen within the animal

we would not be capable of producing the

middle terms necessary for the hegelian

dialectic to form

so no i am actually responding to quote

unquote the meat and potatoes of your

argument one minute

and it's fundamentally wrong the reality

of the situation is yes

hegel makes a metaphysical distinction

between animals and humans

but only so far as they are not

self-conscious

that does not mean they are not

conscious it does not mean that they are

not considered within the dialectical

process

in fact they are fundamental and

integral to it the understanding of

spirit

as being one and itself of consciousness

as indiscernible from consciousness

which is the words he uses in the

science of logic

mean that we cannot dismiss any

consciousness

which exists in nature which means we

are bound

by the laws from which we by the laws of

right

which pre-exist our consciousness of

them hegel was unconscious of them

we have become conscious of them

thank you very much let me reset the

clock and has

you have one final five minute response

yeah it wasn't only the development of

philosophy lewis

the modern subject proper begins with

descartes this isn't a controversial

view it's the view of zizek and lacan

people you yourself mentioned

embarrassingly the freudian subject

doesn't enter the picture

until hundreds of years later so yes the

modern subject and the cartesian subject

are more or less interchangeable for

people who actually know what they're

talking about

and aren't uh grad students now you

claim to be building upon the norms and

traditions of our society but

you actually have to show for it there

is no imminent development of the

phenomena of veganism

among the broad strata of the people

it's only a tiny minority of overly

socialized and overly urbanized people

precisely the demographic that from as a

logical consequence of hegel's view

would be susceptible to the same frenzy

of self-conceit

and the unhappy consciousness that

propagate this cult of veganism it's not

actually gaining traction in the very

roots of our society

and there's a very clear reason for that

which you're not addressing animals

cannot

participate in a process of mutual

recognition

it doesn't now the fact that animals do

not possess self-consciousness

doesn't give us a right to them but

here's the thing

rights do not factor in this equation

whatsoever

because rights are determinate things

that are granted by the institutions of

the state

um uh not things that come out of thin

air rights simply don't factor into the

question of the treatment of animals

the custom moors and traditions of

society do which hegel doesn't believe

you can overturn or treat as completely

um

complete uh com treat in a way

completely from scratch from the

perspective of philosophy

hegel doesn't actually seek to

annihilate things like

tradition norms culture and religion by

means of philosophy hegel's philosophy

is meant

to be reconciled with those things the

question the deeper question of

the reality of those things is left

later for other thinkers

the fact that it cannot become aware of

itself means that it could not

possibly elevate itself to the status of

the subject

can you give me more time can you give

me more i'll give you 20 seconds

um okay now uh

it could not uh the fact that it can't

be aware of itself means it couldn't be

elevated to the status of a subject that

could be afforded rights or recognition

in the first place

for the ethical state or for the within

the scheme of the ethical life

that would be just as absurd as impoties

imposing duties upon animals as well

hegel is very clear that rights imposed

upon the rights given to the individual

are conditioned also by their duties and

vice versa

now obviously there's some kind of

connection between humans and animals

but and hegel makes that very clear but

actually

animals are not capable of language

proper in any meaningful sense

language for havel hegel does not simply

mean

the display of some kind of

communication this still fits within

hegel's description of animals are only

capable of

being acted upon by pure externalities

the communication by other members of

the species

being among those externalities it's

premised precisely by

language is precisely premised by

self-consciousness

and the radical alienation between a

being and its own essence the very

radical alienation that renders the

subjects relationship

to themselves the self-conscious subject

not only an immediate one impo

forced upon them by pure externalities

uh now you say that the laws of right

pre-exist our consciousness for hegel

that is true

but they don't exist in the either they

exist

in the form of the state which for hegel

is the realized form of humanity's

self-consciousness

the laws of right are not to be found

already existing

somewhere outside of the imminent

development of um

state and civil society they pre-exist

us

yes but not in a way that

but only insofar as they are already

mediated in the form of the institutions

of the state

oh you don't even need extra time are

you done yeah yeah that's it

okay fantastic so we're gonna move into

open discussion i'm just a heads up for

people in the audience if you want to

ask questions

um super chats of course will be

prioritized as i mentioned introduction

otherwise if you don't want to super

chat a question

put an asterisk at the beginning and the

end so i can find it in the chat

i can't promise we'll answer them all

but we'll we'll we'll do we can

um so i'm gonna set the timer for 45

minutes uh again just

to review the rules quickly um no

personal abuse no insults yada yada i

don't mind

insinuations of bad faith etc because

that can be part of a philosophical

discussion

but try to keep it civil and above all

do not

argue with me if i interject and give

someone time to finish their point

ready let's go yeah so would it be all

right if i respond and then you can

pick it apart and look and see yeah cool

so

you said um you said that uh

you know they're not subjects until they

become

and recognize themselves in terms of

self-consciousness

um i would absolutely disagree with that

i would make the distinction between an

agent and a subject in that respect

which is something which fits really

well in the hegelian dialectic because

of the

um the development from consciousness to

self-consciousness you say that um

language presupposes self-consciousness

quite the opposite i would say that

self-consciousness is the product of

language and i think that fits again in

the hegelian schemata

and levanas describes this as being able

to hover over our own existence

um and this is primarily from the

recognition

you know of each other as having a will

or having interests and actions within

the world which have

separated consciousness which is the

beginning of you know um

absolute spirit right the reality is

that uh the substance of spirit was

separated by action

the unifi the unit unified totality of

spirit has been separated into

individual

uh instances of consciousness because we

aren't aware of our universal nature

now the reason that we you know when we

do engage in recognition we do gain a

conception of rights we do actually

gain a conception of self um

understanding and we do

create civil society and the product of

laws which allow us to

emulate natural right but natural right

pre-exists even civil society

um the hegel actually states the laws of

right

are also simply there we have to become

acquainted with them

in this way the citizen has more for

firm or less hold of them

than they are given to them and our

jurist also abides the same point

but there is a distinction in the

connection with laws of right and spirit

investigation is stirred up and our

attention is turned to the fact of the

laws

because they are not different not

absolute laws of right are established

and handed down by men

the inner voice must necessarily collide

or agree with them

man cannot be limited to what is

presented to him but maintains that the

standard of right within himself

he is subject to the necessity and the

force of external authority

so he even says in that quote we do hand

down the laws of right

but we must collide or agree with them

to develop them

to correspond with the laws that are

simply

there the natural laws which pre-exist

us the same as the natural laws of

physics

yeah i mean other than the fact that i

would mention that obviously these

natural laws

are the laws of consciousness and not

self-consciousness which is the

awareness of those laws

oh has your silent your music okay yeah

i didn't say they aren't a subject

uh i said they are not a subject

relevant for rights in the states

obviously hegel makes it clear

in his philosophy of nature that animals

are some kind of subject but they are

not the subject

relevant for rights duties and ethical

obligations now you say that animals

hover over themselves and the world

but such a separation namely the

separation between

the animal and the world as mediated by

something like language

could never be proven hegel precisely

claims the opposite about

animals hegel claims that this very such

separation that allows a subject

to hover over the world over themselves

and the world

is not accomplished in the animal being

for the animal being there is

some kind of obvious separation but it

is not a separation that gives rise

to self-consciousness or language now

natural right may pre-exist civil

society

but you didn't actually hear what i said

with any degree of

precision these natural rights

are only mediated by the institutions

and the state

which rules over civil society for hegel

in other words

natural right does not first strike the

individual moral consciousness like

lightning and then come to determine

civil society in the state the laws of

natural

right develop in a manner that is not

premised by the insights of individual

reason

or the individual moral consciousness

they develop through a rational process

that is fundamentally

supra individual

now by super individual by the way i

don't just mean that individuals

collaborate or agree upon

certain rights and norms i mean that

it um comes as a kind of cunning of

reason

at their expense even in a way and their

expectations and so on and so on

so it's com it's a completely um

irrelevant point actually

the life two hours of sleep i forgot i

was gonna say the

grasp

the um okay i'll let you i forgot i was

gonna see

yeah um just to clear something up i

didn't see animals and hovered

over their own existence i was saying

that is how language allows for the

development of self-consciousness

and in so much i would agree that

animals do not have that same

self-consciousness

and that notion of identity they're not

in the middle term in the hegelian

dialectic

they're in the first term of the

dialectic they're in the consciousness

um and like there is something as well

to say

that the you're right in saying that the

you know the the the law the abstract

rights

are not you know essentially imbued

within us they don't strike us like

lightning as you said

they're essentially um developed and

uncovered

in relation to an examination of reality

itself of the self

understanding the self um but they are

premised by the immediacy of

consciousness

it is this investigation into ourselves

which is precisely what recognition is

an aspect of

and what i'm arguing in that is that

that primordial expression as eleven us

as levana says would be the foundation

of any and all

notions of resistance which would be

necessary for the negation of our will

is the foundation of self-consciousness

that animals themselves

um display and so without recognizing

this display of will within animals we

are negating the very same display

which has allowed us to develop the

self-conscious dialect

the self-consciousness which is the

dialectical middle term

within uh the hegelian dialectic

so in other words if we reject this

conscious display of interests and

value within animals then we reject the

same display

our ancestors and our traditions contain

epistemologically uh prior to their

um current mediation within civil

society

we reject the traditions and their

foundations which were produced

from these individuals who recognized

one another

and decided to form civil society and

create a notion of justice

and fairness and consideration of each

other within uh

abstract right which is an embodiment of

laws of fairness which exist within

reality itself

yeah but uh this examination you're

talking about isn't

actually an enterprise that occurs at

the level of the individual use of

reason

the uncovering you're referring to

precisely happens at a historical

and not individual level an individual

doesn't simply examine this like

sherlock holmes and then imposes their

insights upon the whole of society the

examination happens

in a way that is fundamentally supra

individual

and moreover the examination the results

of the examination in a sense are

already

predetermined i don't think you would

disagree with that but

so then the ques the burden rests upon

white explains the unhappy consciousness

of the vegan

in their kind of the manner by which

they seek to

um change the laws and impo

now impose their view and um

preach and so on and so on now it's

actually interesting because

even if we take into consideration

hegel's view of slavery which i would

have disagreed with at the time but for

reasons different

i would also grant the underlying

rationality for his position

hegel even opposed some a lot of the

kind of abolitionist fervor in england

and throughout europe

which simply sought to abolish the

institution of slavery hegel actually

thought

that slavery would be dissolved through

some kind of gradual

historical whatever process which

reflects

hegel's radical uh conservatism

now you could say that this is because

hegel was an old guy and it was 300

years ago

but this is what is fundamental to

hegelian philosophy now from a marxist

perspective

you could at the same time recognize

that slavery dissolved by virtue of some

kind of material

development in the forces of production

and it would be kind of the similar

insight as hegel's but ultimately

whether you're coming from a marxist

materialist or hegelian perspective this

kind of t

again friend tyranny of frenzied

self-conceit which hegel also critiques

as uh

present throughout the french revolution

is not compatible with the hegelian

perspective now

you mentioned that uh yeah

like i forgot what you said it was

something about animals

um representing a prior state of being

that premises are very

self-consciousness itself

i agree with that but i find the view

that the conclusion

that the necessary conclusion this leads

to is that we cannot eat animals

this would assume that the cultures of

mankind

uh treat in the rituals of animal

slaughter and animal consumption

animals only from the perspective of

some kind of abstract

dominating kaguto which

does not recognize the determinate

particularity of animals

but actually if you investigate from the

perspective of culture the real rituals

of animal slaughter and animal

consumption

you can even explain them in that way

you can even explain them in terms of

the way in which mankind

or self-conscious beings relate to their

antecedent

premises themselves you could even go so

far as to say that this is even true for

things like factory farming which

may appear as the quintessential example

of this dominating

cogito which does not recognize

the particularity of animals and simply

treats it as a kind of uh

raw material but it does not actually

succeed

in doing that in actuality and it does

reflect

if there is uh something like that

in a factory farming i say i guess i

would say from the marxist perspective

this is only insofar as it represents a

deeper relation

in our world today between mankind and

itself some kind of more fundamental

estrangement between humanity and itself

uh but still

there is no reason to think that the

recognition that the state of animal

being

is a necessary state that premises are

premises the very possibility of

self-consciousness

must lead us to the conclusion that

animals cannot be eaten

according to some abstract duty

um well i guess like the point i was

making is that it's not necessarily an

abstract duty but really the first judy

um and the only judy that really

uh we are that we are really engaged in

it is the essence of the will you know

judy is the essence of the will

um that duty is seen in animals and

that's what i'm

trying to argue here that when we

consider animals

um being the fundament as in like animal

behavior as demonstrating

you know desires and interests which um

exist externally to our own we are re we

are

essentially recognizing their power to

their power to negate our own interests

the the difference is in terms of mutual

recognition they can't recognize our

uh power to uh negate their interests in

the same

way they don't have the necessary

faculties to form a language and a

linguistic structure which allows for

that

uh diorak um conceptions of themselves

that can't form the eye

you know um that doesn't mean that the

relationship between us and animals does

not

necessitate our consideration of their

will

it means that they are incapable of

returning that consideration

and forming civil society with us and

that civil society

and that absence from civil society does

not ob

which means they are they can't be um uh

given positive rights within our society

in terms of let's say

uh the right to vote or something like

that but it does not mean that we have

the right

to you know um undermine what we would

consider

necessary faculties and i think this is

why for example i would say i would

disagree with hegel

and say the consideration of slaves um

or people who even accept their slaves

and i think this is kind of hegel's

point

you know the slave enslaves themselves

for hegel the the slave has

adopted the mentality of being

slave-like and needs to almost

fight their way out develop to develop a

self-consciousness which is independent

from the identity imposed by the

lordsman the bondsmen must work upon

themselves

um and i can see why he's arguing from

that i guess my disagreement would be

there

that the power structure from which we

um gain this self-consciousness

it necessarily does not mean that we

should

impose um unfair power dynamics

upon individuals so that they can

develop freedom

our consideration of their will is

separate from their consideration of

our will so this is how mutual societies

or mutually distinct societies or

mutually distinct spirits in terms of

abstract right would engage with each

other until they form an

uh uh you know a um a coalescence

within absolute spirit and the laws of

one land versus the laws of another

um hegel recognizes that the laws of one

land are superior to the laws of another

and talks about the progress

necessary within society to you know

essentially reach a more free society

um you know referencing is like

historiography

in um this philosophy of history

um this would mean that individuals in

let's say germany at the time that he

was talking

were obligated to treat other

individuals from society

that are external to germany in a way

that was considered

uh ethical by their standard and not by

the standard of those in an alternative

society

so if um you know a british person

disagrees with slavery then they ought

to treat

individuals as being equal and not

enslave them

and this would be a matter of um

actualizing the self-consciousness which

exists within the state

this is exactly the same thing i would

say about animals

when we recognize the consideration of

animals

um as having this primordial will which

does not recognize

itself we still must consider its

interests

we still must consider its value and in

that consideration of its value

we must find that although it cannot

know

the consequences of uh

let's say ethical ignorance that its

ethical ignorance

does not permit our ethical ignorance

so but the issue is that animals are not

human if there is an aspect of ourselves

that uh is somehow common with the

animal

it is a moment of a greater being of

which we alone form a part

i think there's a confusion here between

the view

of the animal being being a moment in

the being of geist or spirit

or the human being and from a broader

kind of

natural historical perspective of like

for example a kind of

evolutionary view of the way in which

animals develop and become

human these are entirely two different

processes

moreover i think this perspective is

radically not

hegelian i don't think hegel is trying

hegel believes

that animals are uh

incapable of um self-consciousness on

account of some kind of

pure contingency like a person being

disabled would there's actually a reason

why

animals are not human there is an inner

kind of

there is an inner rationality of the

animal being

itself that makes sense so far from the

perspective of the animal

not from the perspective but taken at

the level of the animal being which

makes sense and which

reconciles some kind of some kind of uh

deeper unity of opposites now

insofar as animals actually do figure in

this moment

of um the premises of self-consciousness

for

the human being it is so far as they are

consumed so far as they allow us to

subsist

and satisfy our base our own base uh

animal necessities

um it's very strange that

the ways in which animals consume one

another does not somehow figure for you

and the fundamental being of

the animal world in general now hegel's

view regarding slavery is not actually

prescriptive

but descriptive he doesn't say this is

what should happen per se

taken by itself he says this is actually

what happens

so when hegel critique and this is

actually something that happens and has

actually happened across history

conquered peoples become enslaved and

then

this initiates some kind of dialectic

process that produces real

historical changes and outcomes hegel

merely critiqued abolitionism

because he thought it was a vain attempt

to hover over this type of imminent

uh development in this imminent uh

process

it wasn't prescriptively saying that it

it should happen

it was happening for eagle now

you say that uh hegel

requires individuals to treat others

from different societies and states

by their ethical standard but the

reasons for this contradict

the conclusion that animals themselves

should be treated in the same way

because

plainly put animals don't have any

ethical standard animals do not belong

to a state

or a civil society and do not obey any

kind of

abstract or alienated norms or

institutions whatsoever for hegel

different societies and enter into

moreover a process again of mutual

recognition and mutual

development where it's tit for tat they

both participate and develop

in it animals aren't capable of that now

you talk about the fact that humans

are obliged and have a duty to fulfill

animal interests but if

animal interests if they are

intelligible

would be radically incompatible with

vegan veganism there are some

animals which for physiological reasons

must consume

and lead to the death of other animals

even beyond then the conclusion doesn't

actually follow from the premise

animal interests are in no way

compatible with the obligations

hegel believes um a given citizen of a

state has toward another human being

which is part of another state and part

of another community

or even just a random stranger

who isn't part of any clear society or

state

the difference for hegel is that this

kind of benefit of the doubt that can be

afforded to the stranger

um this sorry emptiness and

lack of determination apart upon on the

part of the stranger

contains and conceals uh

an imminent potentiality to enter into

the course of

um mutual uh

recognition and um being a part of

some kind of bigger community

um well i guess this is where i would

say

that say that animals aren't human

um neither is the the first um term in

the hegelian dialectic because humanity

presupposes a form of identity which has

not yet developed

um would you know like for example like

notions of humanity even in like the

history of philosophy

um you know like seeing each other as

you know members of um

you know um like was it like homogenous

like

homogeneous they of the same species and

that didn't develop in terms of

self-consciousness even historically

until a certain until a certain point

and then in terms of individualism

which you know allows the individual to

interact with their state

in a way which is a particular subject

versus

um you know um institutional

um obligations which mediates the

subjective

freedom and the object of freedom of the

state uh that didn't even develop

as in until like hegel really come

around so like these

these notions in terms of the

development of the dialectic

um weren't even present um at the point

of the at the point of the inception

the point of the inception art um

of the first premise of the dialect is

consciousness itself

the imminency and the foundation from

which all reality is

derived which is the consciousness is is

all that's really being considered

and you said that you know i think was

towards the start you said that

um i wouldn't disagree that the

end of history as it would like the end

of the hegelian dialectic would be the

same

well as an empty formulation in a

kantian sense

yeah it wouldn't be the same it would be

absolute knowing or absolute spirit

but what that actually looks like hegel

kind of leaves blank deliberately

because it's

not something that we are actually

entitled to know because of our

history our historicity um

and i don't think i don't know if you

would agree i disagree with that um

in so much i would say that hegel would

not have predicted the rise of veganism

and the consideration of animals as the

growing dialectical process

i think that it is the consideration of

the conscious standard which pre-exists

the logic that was developed within the

dialectic

in the philosophy of uh sorry in the

science of right

he goes so far as to say that um

where is it see if i can find it

a uh

and one second there just lost it

it's on the genesis of logic i do

believe

uh actually i know where i know where it

is i just realized i think it's page 45.

okay okay while he's doing that um for

people in the audience who have

questions put an asterisk on the

beginning and the end we'll be doing

audience questions in 20 minutes

thank you um

right okay he says that um here we may

quote it from like this is from the

philosophical sciences encyclopedia of

philosophical sciences

and he quotes himself um saying there is

nothing in heaven or nature or spirit or

anywhere else

that does not contain just as much

immediacy as mediation

so that both these determinations prove

to be unseparate

unseparated and inseparable and the

opposition between them

nothing real so in spirit there is no

actual opposition the negation of

negation leads to the unity of being

which is the unity of self-consciousness

and consciousness

animals are an aspect of consciousness

which we must become united with

and so with the development of the

dialectical process an inconsideration

of a conscious being

would be a lesser um

media mediated and a poor um

contradictory uh position within spirit

it would not be spirit as it is or

should be

it would be spirit as uh seen how we

would like it to be

and hegel actually mentions this in the

philosophy of right

where individuals come into conflict

with the law itself

um seeking to express what they think

ought to be the case

rather than what is the case and he says

that we need to essentially bend

to the to the existence of um value in

nature or the or value in consciousness

rather than the other way around

yeah but regarding the first thing you

said about the reason

for uh the fact that the end of history

or whatever

is not our philosophy of right and so on

and so on

was not realized until very recently

such changes whatever we want to make of

them is

assuming we're operating from this

strict to yelling perspective we're not

physiological or natural changes which

they would have to be in the case of

animals

i think again this is a kind of false

almost caricature of the hegelian view

according to which

there is this kind of linear progression

between

lower and higher forms of being but for

hegel makes it quite clear that there is

a reason why

animals exist as animals and it makes

sense animals are not moments

in animals themselves are not moments in

uh humanity's being human

humanity possesses an aspect within

itself

that is comparable to the animal being

but

animals themselves it's not

so the fact that for most of humanity's

history it did not achieve

the kind of uh whatever you want to call

it i forgot

what you were trying to say it's all con

controversial stuff

absolute knowing the end of history um

and so on and so on

this is not actually uh

this is not actually something

that um animals this is something that

was always

already possible for human beings given

their physiological and natural

presuppositions given where they already

stand within

the philosophy of nature this is not

true for animals

and regarding this as an aside regarding

the question of absolute knowing

yes it's true that its contents are not

transparently pre-established but i

think you're confusing

uh what absolute knowing actually is

absolute knowing will not consist in a

position that's going to possess

some kind of uh prescriptive stance

toward what is truly uh what

one really ought to do and like for

example

in terms of one's dietary habits and

ones participates

all of these things for hegel uh possess

objectivity they

possess objectivity in the form of moors

customs traditions and so on and so on

the position of absolute knowing ends

from the perspective of philosophy

itself

namely the philosopher hegel himself

um the one who is cogniza cognizant

of some kind of deeper harmony of um

history and being and so on and so on uh

regarding the thing you said about the

unity of opposites

and the implication of the relation to

animals i don't really think it's

important to point out that for hegel

there are no true

contradiction it's only a matter of

reconciliation the negation of it

yeah it's not without it's not relevant

to what i was saying obviously yeah

but regarding this kind of end state of

the relation between humans and animals

again the practice of the consumption of

meat

itself is just as compatible with this

such a um such a consumption affirms

on the one hand uh the premises of

self-consciousness namely the need to

to satisfy physiological base animal

instincts and so on and so on

and on the other hand affirms the

self-consciousness

as a higher moment of being above uh the

animal kind

so the conclusion plainly doesn't follow

that we can't consume

meat just because so i think you're

making

uh an error here you're making uh you're

not taking note of a necessary

distinction

of course animals within the greater

uh within the greater

fucking scheme

form a part and premise a possibility

of self-consciousness this does not mean

that we have an obligation

to protect animals

because the manner by which this

develops

has already occurred it already has

occurred it's something

that has occurred imminently and is not

the result

of um

like you so you talk about the

distinction between that the individual

must make

must bend to what is rather than what

ought right

but bending to what is in this case the

actual and um let's say

uh real relationship between mankind and

the animal world within hegel's scheme

acting in such a way that is cognizant

of what this

is in no way implies that animals

somehow

have rights and cannot be eaten and so

on and so on um

[Music]

if and again uh my argument is that the

the the best argument for what this

would look like is the very consumption

of animals

it's the very consumption of animals

that

uh that represents this

uh acting in regards to what

is so

um and that's why the consumption of

meat across the cultures and history of

mankind is laden with so much

tradition called careful tradition

culture and so on and so on

it can be even explained within this

hegelian scheme

um so yeah like animals

uh not being self-conscious is

not what i'm saying like i do agree

animals are not self-conscious

um animals are animals are not the

middle term

where the middle term um where the

self-consciousness which is

coming to know itself to develop into

absolute spirit that is

that is the dialectical process and it's

been developing since the inception

which was from consciousness itself

all the way through to the development

of absolute knowing which is the unity

of this middle term with the first term

in the conclusion

which is absolute knowing that's our

absolute spirit

which contains absolute knowledge that

absolute knowledge is as we say like

indeterminate and uh is

non-contradictory in

uh in relationship to nature like no

contradictions exist in nature

but the contradictions that exist within

us are what are driving us forward in

terms of the negation of negation

which is leading us to this absolute

spirit and so these contradictions

are contradictions are our our awareness

of the contradiction of the mediating

term ourselves

and nature we are realizing that we

ourselves have created

our identities which are inadequately

describing the system of drives

which pre-exists that identity we are

wrongly sublimating

and engaging in our desires within

society

as to not allow for the greatest

expression of subjectivity within this

hegelian dialect

dialectic which is why uh the conception

of a better and better society

is the greater and greater expression of

the system of drives

animals are within the system of drives

they are simply not

conscious of the system of drives we are

the mediating force

they are what we are they are part of

what we are mediating

they are subject to our um ethics

in our attempts to make sure that they

live good lives so for example

um you know our consideration of animals

an animal might want to get like

jabbed up or like you know some sort of

vaccine but we would do that to them

regardless of their

you know of their um resistance because

they are not aware

of the positives that would be affecting

them in terms of the system of drives

itself

because we are the self-consciousness we

are what determines

um the abstract notions of right from

which are

which you know determine our treatment

to them but what

is well we are what determine the

contingent laws which are reflective of

the imminent right

which is universal and necessary within

consciousness

the consciousness itself is immediate

consciousness itself contains immediate

notions of right which we are not aware

of

so the animals animals themselves and

all conscious beings contain this

logical necessity from which

ontological's necessity

predating logic actually in terms of the

hegelian dialectic

spirit is the necessary foundation for

the production of logic

and in such the resistance that exists

within animals

is the necessary negation from which

logic

requires we would have no notion of

negation and the law of

non-contradiction

at all um or the notion of identity at

all

without uh the negative force of an

external will

which is essentially what hegel is

pointing to so when we see an external

will embodied in an animal form

if it cannot recognize us it cannot form

a dialectical relationship

and form rules of abstract right that is

absolutely true

but being a conscious being it is

governed by those rules

just as we are the we do not produce

these notions of right

and therefore determine and govern uh as

we see fit based off

uh our mutual power relationship with

the other

the power relationship is actually an

obscurity really which is prevent

preventing us from seeing reality in a

way which is

un um corrupted by our attempts to

put our subjectivity over the

objectivity

of what we both share which is the will

so when we look at the fact that an

animal cannot engage in this power

relationship

or in a state of mutual recognition it's

not that the animal is not what we are

recognizing we actually must imminently

recognize the animal

to even have began the dialectic which

is i think you agreed to the animals are

conscious and we do recognize that they

are conscious and feel pain and pleasure

and so on

um animals simply do not recognize it

themselves

we do recognize that consciousness and

we do recognize it in the other but we

recognize as well

that are the rules that we have the

embodied traditions are expressions of

right

that are embodied in consciousness

itself within

ourselves and the other animals do

fulfill the mandate of being the other

they simply cannot fulfill that mandate

within a dialectical

process they cannot um continue

um the um they cannot continue

and form a relationship which you know

constitutes either a master slave

relationship

or a um constant conceptual development

they can't hold notions and concepts

uh we can and we hold notions and

concepts which embody them

and give them meaning just as much uh

well

sorry um highlight or explanate

the meaning that already exists within

them their pain and pleasure is valuable

in and of itself

we can't know that and meaning and has

to be this way for hegel

the and and i think you know thinkers

such as robert brandon

um even talk about how the

some the the foundations of semantics

have to be within reality itself

if we do not allow our words and our

meanings to be given

objective reality separate from this

self-conscious mediation within the

dialectic they

uh would be would lose grounding it

wouldn't actually make sense there would

be no unity

between what is the mediating force of

the middle term

unconsciousness itself which again is

why hegel

sorry about that which is why hegel says

that consciousness

or that um that in spirit there is

nothing unseparated

unseparated unseparated and inseparable

they are um okay lewis just try and wrap

it up in the next 30 seconds because

we're running up your time and i want to

get

lost keep going yeah that's absolutely

fine they are inseparable

and the notions between consciousness

and um

self-consciousness are unified in

absolute knowing and absolute right and

this would give

us the foundations for a perfect will

it would actually destroy um

subjectivity

in terms of um and united with

objectivity

the subject would be inherently

objective

if they were a um member

of the community which engaged in a law

which was

absolutely perfect and absolutely

correspondent

to the law of right within nature

okay um so it seemed like you said a lot

of

extremely irrelevant things um

as to the actual debate and point at

hand um

i don't even know if we're gonna have

time to cover all of it but i think i'm

just gonna try and simplify it

to put it simply you are confusing

philosophy of right with philosophy of

nature you're assuming

that the philosophy of right

is tasked with uh reproducing

voluntarily the philosophy of nature but

this isn't true

obviously philosophy of nature is a

premise

of the possibility of philosophy of

right

but it put differently obviously nature

is a premise of

humanity and uh spirit and so on and so

on

but this does not impose a duty or an

ethical obligation on part of

individuals

to um to uh

preserve this process in a manner

outside of the self-preservation and

self-realization of spirit itself in

other words

like i said animals are not somehow on

the ladder to becoming human agents and

we just have to cultivate

uh them as an aspect of our being and

uh because they represent or sorry they

um occupy this fear of drives that

whatever but animals will always be

animals this is what you're not

understanding this is why you're

confusing the two

things you're making a really crude kind

of

is ought to distinction which is foreign

to

hegel's position you're effectively

trying to say that

because hegel descriptively outlines

some kind of place humanity has within

the whole of nature

humanity then has an ethical obligation

to fulfill this um same

same premises but as a matter of fact

these premises are fulfilled in a manner

that is antecedent

to right and men are antecedent to

obligations

uh so it could not be possibly be the

case that

this could it would it would be constant

right moreover

even if in some sense this is what

happens

namely humanity must account for its

premises

obviously outside of the sphere of

ethics

and right since such a thing would not

be possible

hegel makes it very clear like if

for example if animals cannot

form within the scheme of ethics and

ethical life proper we can just condense

it that way

that is not our problem that's the

problem of nature itself

this is what is the result of nature

itself

superimposing some kind of duty

to account for our natural premises

beyond accounting for

our determinate natural premises

for example our need to survive and our

need to satisfy our animal-based wants

and so on and so on

is completely foreign to the hegelian

scheme we

ourselves are

we so far as we are concerned this is a

very important distinction

we ourselves so far as we

are concerned are the only

subject of um ethics and rights and so

on and so on

uh in regard sorry not ethics and rights

uh are only relevant in regard i got two

hours of sleep

in regards to our material premises now

uh you talk about

the fact that we both agree that animals

uh

are conscious i agree but only in the

very restricted hegelian

sense hegel remember is an idealist what

most people mean collectively by

consciousness

is in fact self-consciousness so i just

want to point that out for the audience

now you say that attending to the wants

or needs of animals it has to be this

way

on account of the very fact that animals

comprise the kind of premises

of thinking beings

but the manner by which animals comprise

the premises of thinking beings

happens in a way that is outside of the

sphere

of ethical uh duties of these same

thinking beings

for example hegel does not actually

speak of a right

to food or things like that

uh even even in so far as it concerns

our subsistence

so it's a kind of ought is distinction

we do

reproduce our physiological premises

that condition the necessity of

self-consciousness

but we do so only in so far as it is a

moment in

the realization of spirit we don't do so

as a

matter of imposing some kind of um

abstract duty upon

the world and upon culture and society

now

the crux i wrote notes separately to

remember what you were saying the manner

by which this unity of consciousness and

self-consciousness you're talking about

um expresses itself

imminently not voluntarily it doesn't

express

itself in a way that

it doesn't express itself according to

the voluntary will of the individual

it expresses itself

in the form of the very determinate

development

of history itself so this unity between

self-consciousness

and consciousness that you're talking

about

is something effectively already

reconciled

for hegel it's not that it's not the

fact that uh

we are not vegans means it's not

reconciled no it

is precisely reconciled moreover i find

it interesting that you neglect

the wider point that why can't our

cultural dietary practices of animal

slaughter and consumption and so on and

so on which have many

cultural meaning and laden with

depth and so on and so on why does this

not

according to your view accomplish this

very same

such unity why is it that the

consumption of animals necessarily means

that self-consciousness

denies the premises

its own premises in the form of

consciousness why could it not also

mean that it affirms its premises and

consciousness

after all isn't that why especially upon

eating meat and people being brought

together in a community to slaughter a

cow or something or a goat

that they basically express their

gratefulness

uh they're some kind of deep

gratefulness that

in a sense not much separates us from

animals uh but at the same time

something manages to and this is of both

a very humbling and uh

both are very humbling and empower sorry

uh

what's the fucking word dignified

experience

both very humbling and uh very dignified

so far as our humanity is concerned

um all right so we're running up to time

um yeah yeah

yeah um if you guys want to take five

minutes for going to questions to grab

water or something you've been here for

a long time

so for anybody in the audience if you

want to ask questions

put them in asterisks we'll go for about

15 or so minutes i think we're not going

to go too long our participants are

extremely tired

and um well thank you very much so we'll

come back in five minutes if you're both

cool with that you can go grab a drink

or something and then we'll

get started on audience questions sound

good would house be okay with this just

like

um just making a few points just just

essentially just off what he said there

only if you let me interrupt you

um yeah yeah that seems fair enough uh

within reason i'm

like going like just interrupt like

every two seconds or something just so i

don't actually say something

to say um yeah so um

um hegel doesn't outline humanity's

place

um like as in the beginning of the

dialectic in his philosophy of nature

it does that in uh in the phenomenology

of spirit

and this is the pre-philosophical work

really in the sense that this outlines

the onological commitments

necessary in philosophy for the

development in the science of logic

so and the beginning of this is

consciousness it's not

it's not the notion of humanity so

humanity's place in nature

is secondary to the its place in uh the

dialectic

which is yeah but the philosophy of

nature

outlines the process by which such a

being

whose development is expressed in the

philosophy

philosophy of mind is possible

um somewhat i think that hegel's notions

and i think kegels notions of nature

are tentative and i think that will

i think poor hegel at least you may not

agree with it before hegel himself this

is true

oh well for hegel it's it's certainly um

well i would say that it was it's a good

work i don't think that he's necessary i

would not i don't agree with everything

it says but

that's separate um i don't think there

is a confliction in nature in the sense

that we are consuming them

i do think that we can satisfy our uh

system of drives within a vegan society

uh we can sublimate

uh our base drives and needs uh with a

vegan diet

and we can live happy healthy lives and

yeah i'm not i'm not denying that that's

possible although i think i would argue

that point my point was that

this is not the only manner by which

this would be possible in the most

consistent and all manner in a way that

is in harmony with uh our

with the realization of spirit

um i guess that's the point of

contention because i would say that the

unity of dialectic is an

ever developing not reconciled process

between consciousness and

self-consciousness

that's precisely why it's reconciled

well it's reconciled in formal terms in

but not in um but not in um concrete

um real terms no it is it is precisely

reconciled

um no i think that there is the the

confliction between the individual and

themselves

which is why the development of spirit

the whole point for hegel is that

development

is itself a concrete something that is

concretely reconciled

in in becoming but it only is um

it is only truly reconciled when it

becomes unified

absolutely with himself which is the

point of absolute spirit

um which hegel claims was is

accomplished in his own

work yes but he also claims to say that

the

like it's almost it's reconciled its

absolute spirit

is an ever developing infinite isn't it

the infiniti yeah of course it's ever

developing but

for hegel that is precisely why it is

reconciled at the same time this

development

fits within the scheme of absolute

knowledge itself

yeah but absolutely no but it's the

contents of absolute knowledge are

obviously not

pre-written somewhere but um

the development hegel talks about is

already is already

uh reconciled in its form right whatever

form it so happens to be which hegel is

open about

yeah i would say that the absolute

knowing is a development from the

logic which is also developing so it's

like yes

hegel reckons recognizes that absolute

knowing is dependent upon the

philosophical forms that are available

to us

but they themselves are developing logic

itself is developing

from epoch to epoch from individual to

individual in terms of a societal

development

for for hegel his was the end

his was the accomplishment of absolute

knowing it was the culmination for him

this was the

ambition and scope of hegel's position i

know it's a contentious contended by

many

aliens but i think these hegelians are

kind of uh

chickening out as far as the actual

audacity of hegel's enterprise i don't

think that

i mean don't get me wrong i do think

that he's an audacious kind of guy i

don't think he's that audacious because

he does say that the child of the next

generation is superior to the gene

uh the genus uh the genius of this well

i think what's being mistaken here is

that

for hegel the enterprise of philosophy

is accomplished this doesn't mean

history itself is

ended in the strict sense of like there

will no longer be any development

after this obviously that's not hagel's

position but so far as it concerns the

ailment higgle considers there to be a

fundamental ailment in the enterprise of

philosophy

he considers this to be resolved in his

specifics i would agree with that i

would agree with that i would say that

hegel sees himself as

resolving the conflictions in society

and particularly the mediation between

the external and the internal world

which had plagued philosophy for like

over a thousand years

um i would say that okay guys this this

is interesting

i'm going to set a timer for this for 10

minutes then i'm going to go into

audience questions is that all right

you guys still want you guys don't want

five minutes to

like whatever i'm just gonna say one

more thing and then i'm happy to take

the break okay cool go for it

um so yeah i would say that you

mentioned like the community

bringing together to slaughter an animal

um as an act of

unification within consciousness i would

say that the slaughter of the animal is

the destruction of consciousness

in which an individual associates with a

particular identity

over the universality of consciousness

and represents something like an in and

out group

that would be fundamental to what we see

in

underdeveloped notions of right which

hegel points towards various cultures

and his philosophy of history

as having um and i would say that

communities which engage in this um you

know communal

action are ignorant to the

self-destructive process

which ultimately destroys their own uh

self-consciousness

um in in in in that why is it a

destruction of consciousness

because it's the inconsideration of

another of consciousness

in its of consciousness simplicity

why is that why can it not also be an

acknowledgement of consciousness

simplicity

and its relation to us i mean for

example

the animal kingdom is itself like i

think there's a lot of confusion here

the animal kingdom itself

is a site of extreme violence

or not violence proper i guess but it's

a site of

violence is an anthropomorphic term

animals are eating each other and

whatever dying for no reason and it's a

brutal whatever thing

so eating an animal is in a sense

acknowledging

the actual reality of consciousness

simplicity

actually rejecting eating an animal i

think would be this very same

annihilation of consciousness implicit

you're talking about the annihilation of

consciousness simplicity

is the rejection of the fact that

there's a distinction between

self-consciousness

and consciousness almost like there is

really a

imposition of the of whims that could

only possibly result from

self-consciousness

or whims or moral conscience upon

conscious beings like

you are superimposing the human

a product of a strictly human

perspective

um upon animals but animals themselves

don't really give a shit about any of

that

stuff they don't so when we eat an

animal we are in a sense

acknowledging this fact of both the

animal being and

our own being um i guess what i would

say to that

is that in the consciousness of the

animal do we still see the system of

drives

which is why you say animals do like act

on their own

impulses and uh hegel recognizes that

they act on their own impulses and are

actually slaves to them um

i don't disagree with that but that

precisely is why

it must be mediated by us as

self-consciousness as being

expressed as as forms of

self-consciousness

we ourselves possess drives we do we are

not elevated above our

drives to um determine them voluntarily

we are still

bounded by our own drives and hegel

recognizes as much it's why hegel

completely rejects the kantian moral

perspective because for hegel the

kantian moral perspective

is marked by what he calls the stamp of

particularity we are really given to our

drives whether we want to

elevate ourselves above them voluntarily

or not

i do agree with that actually um but

that's precisely why we share the exact

same

um primordial right as animals the

consciousness and the

system but this is the right that was

proven this right was already proven in

the fact that we human beings have

history

the right was not proven so far as

animals were concerned

but the proof is separate from uh well

actually the

like the right the right does not exist

for animals precisely because it has not

developed through the court through a

animals do not have a history

so what how can they possibly have this

right if this right

was not imminently developed in history

itself it's a right that

we alone are affording a recognition

to that that would be um a mistake to

say that the right as a development of

history the right as a

development of ontology that exists

separate from us our

understanding of right its development

is through history

the ontological development of right

occurs through the course of history

itself

the middle term the self-consciousness

itself is the development of

of history the understanding of

consciousness

is the development of history

consciousness is the development

of nature itself and so is right

yes but so but

right right both right and nature for

hegel

um are reproduced in this development of

history

exactly which is why we constantly try

to uh

remove the separation between what we

consider to be right or what we want to

be right in terms of power dynamics yeah

relationship so this this right is

suspended in history

itself and whatever initial right

um human beings possessed the insight

into it is developed by history but this

insight

is not some kind of individual

enterprise in which we look at animals

oh this fits somewhere within the scheme

it's something that

actually happens in history this is what

i'm trying to say

it actually does happen imminently it's

not because individuals

like sherlock holmes discovered

something i don't disagree i think the

the value of genius in

the hegelian dialectic is nominal like

it they're just expressions of the

spirit of the day

i i don't disagree with that um what i'm

saying is that

the laws and fundamental um notions of

rape which we have developed

uh respective of the right which exists

within nature

is um constantly growing and is a

mediation between um

us or what we think to be right and what

is actually right

and right but what is actually right

imposes

its reality not because

it imposes its reality in an imminent

way is what i'm trying to say

it's not because i would completely

agree i would completely agree with it

it's not it's not because we say this

is right uh but because we i know you

don't

you wouldn't like me using this word

abstract but because we arrive at it by

some kind of

abstract conceptual or even scientific

investigation

we discover what is right through an

imminent development of history itself

and i don't see veganism fitting within

the scheme of that

imminent development i don't see any

indications of it becoming

a phenomena that can subsist outside of

what hagel would call the unhappy

consciousness okay we'll call that we'll

call that an ending statement because

we're going to move into audience

questions if you want to touch on this

during the questions you're welcome to

uh louis yeah but um yeah um and in fact

since

uh has uh had the last statement i'm

gonna send the first question to you

um this is from uh g-nut does

prospective philosophy

realize that animals are savage beings

that rape and kill all the time

why should humans apply ethics to them

yeah i do realize that

animals are savage beings that rape and

kill all the time animals are horrible

man

like i don't know some of them are um

animals can be

vicious uh you know what we what many

would have considered natural

evils almost i mean evil being an

inappropriate term in a hegelian sense

but

you know the there's a lot of horrors in

nature i definitely understand that but

that doesn't mean that animals are not

moral subjects

or moral patients it means that they are

in

they cannot engage in a dialectical

process means that an animal like a lion

when it mauls a human

hasn't denied the value of our

experience for its own

it was unaware of our experience in a

way which is meaningful

and produces a notion of um conscious

conscience which is um uh developing

from you know this uh process of right

the instead an animal is um you know

subject to its impulses and its drives

it is moved by them it is a slave

to nature whilst we are not um in that

we can see that animals have drives and

are conscious

and they have value and wish to express

those drives they contain subjectivity

they simply do not own themselves and

cannot express that subjectivity

in a way that is um

uh capable of freedom in a hergelian

sense an animal can never be free

but an animal is valuable and for us to

be free

we must respect that value and try to

perpetuate their freedom

as much as possible to give the greatest

ontological foundation to our beliefs to

respect the middle term

just as much uh sorry the first term

just as much as the middle term

within the dialect process

and uh this is for has from eisenberg um

this is a two-parter uh has how do you

respond to a characterization of your

argument as quote-unquote evolutionary

colonialism

you recognize that ape humans got there

first by achieving self-consciousness

but you deny

animals their quote-unquote right to

evolve

[Music]

no please don't let me don't let me deny

animals right to evolve please evolve um

whatever that even means um

i i i don't see what you're saying uh

how are we denying the right of animals

here's what do you mean evolutionary

colonialism we're stopping the cows from

uh

uh having a uh monarchy because

we're eating them i don't see how one

follows i think i think achieving

absolute spirit

but yeah i mean i i to respond to that

um animal consumption does not first of

all animal consumption does not

necessarily

first of all here's why it's face value

wrong because

colonialism is not simply something that

was condemned by virtue of the guilty

conscience

of colonizers the colonial themselves

rose up and overthrew those

motherfuckers

so the day a cow and a goat can do that

be my guest cows and goats overthrow me

just like

you know people in africa were thrown

overthrowing the spanish and the french

and the british

please do it if if you can but i don't

think they're going to be doing that any

time soon that's my response

yeah i think you're going to eat those

words someday this is for perspective

philosophy

from angelo marney how important is

mutual recognition are

animals capable of engaging in history

um i don't think animals are capable of

engaging in history

um at least maybe not all of them it's i

guess it's possible that

some would be would be capable of um at

least

some forms of um conceptual development

some animals have been taught like some

more primitive linguistic concepts and

able to adhere

to them that doesn't mean that they

wouldn't necessarily be um

attributable to a dialectical form i

don't think that's necessarily important

the development of history

isn't a development that is meant to

replace nature

but is meant to develop our

understanding of nature

our understanding of right it's not

meant to replace right the fundamental

right

that existed at the beginning of the

dialectic when man was pre-linguistic

or partially linguistic or becoming

linguistic

was is the same right that is being

expressed

um at the end of the dialectic the truth

doesn't change it is fundamental it is

um inherent

uh within the ontology of being itself

what changes

is uh our mediation with it

thank you also from angela marnie for

has um has how do you feel about

posthumanism

it depends on what you mean by that um

i think a lot of the conceptions of

humanism

have thus far been straw straw men i

think uh i kind of

i did have many disagreements with him

but i kind of sympathize with um

the neo-rationalists i don't know if

they still call themselves like

reza negarstani and others who say that

we have underestimated what human means

thus far

human does not mean um

the subject of humanitarianism which is

something recent so

i think um we have underestimated what

is the human

uh thus far and if we acquire an

appreciation of the human

we will once again be allowed to

recognize the significance of uh

humanism as a historical phenomena which

has been strawmanned

in the modern age and not the modern but

the 21st century

thank you very much uh for perspective

philosophy

from voidborn wouldn't it be a more

grounded position to concede that

animals are not equal to humans since

they cannot form societies

so then humans being higher should be

allowed to preserve animals

um well this is this is what it depends

on what you consider the notion of

equality the notion of equality

is not the power dynamic in terms of an

individual's

um of an individual's ability to let's

say overthrow

another and for example the colonials

that were overthrown and

um defeated by the natives what they did

was wrong

not because they were overthrown but

because of the reasons that they were

overthrown

and the development of that

consciousness in

but that's only proven when they're

overthrown

the reasons are only proven in the act

of overthrowing

i would disagree i would say that it

develops within consciousness itself

the immediation between the individual

and the other can happen without let's

say a violent contestation

but the the point is finished and then

you're going to go okay

and yeah i would say the i would say

that is necessarily the case i would say

that we know this in terms of

there are many cultures that have been

absolutely annihilated by

other cultures as in their consciousness

and their spirit has been

incapable of having the ethical growth

which would necessarily gain

uh which would necessarily give us the

resistance necessary to

to develop it the point of the the point

of the matter is the ontological

resistance

of the will is what we become

um uh conscious of that is what we

become conscious of in terms of right we

see the resistance we see the harm

we see the negativity in terms of

consciousness and that

contradiction and we seek to resolve it

within a new dynamic which is what the

overthrowing process is

the overthrowing process is not a

development

of a notion of this is now wrong nor the

slavery was wrong

and therefore we seek to cast off these

chains

thank you okay has go yeah well i wasn't

aware we're still debating he's like

answering questions and also trying to

respond and rebuke my previous points so

that's why i

just want to do that but if you want to

if you want to object i'll give you i'll

give you a couple of minutes

okay sure yeah yeah i'm sorry i didn't

mean to like cause a contestation now i

was just yeah

so in in the case of um

in the case of the overthrowing this is

what you say you want to be the case in

your head but in real history as far as

real history is concerned

it is true that might is right it is

actually true

this is also true within the hegelian

scheme itself

how else does slave become slave and

master

become master the reason why slave

some kind of different result is

produced from the master slave dialectic

isn't because

some kind of guilty conscience on part

of the master but because of an imminent

development that renders this slave

puts the slave in a position superior

ultimately to the master

now regarding this business of entire

cultures and peoples

being annihilated i would contest that

this happens in a way

that does not ultimately affect the

imminent reality of uh

of the uh annihilating uh force in some

kind of way

i think that the pretension of europe

and america

to absolute power colonial powers of

absolute power

is a bluff they can't do it because

doing so would fundamentally affect

their own societies in a way they cannot

afford it similar to the israel kind of

uh

gaza situation can the israeli military

go and

do horrible things eliminate

gaza yes they can but they can't

physically yes but they still

can't not because it was determined

ethically but because

the consequences would not be uh

possible both internally and obviously

for the international scene

so this is what i mean the act of

overthrowing

is what effectively proves because we

don't know before the fact it is

effectively

what proves uh right and wrong

and thank you i i definitely disagree

with that i will say

i think that the the proof of right and

wrong

um is essentially established in the

self-consciousness that is

uh come to the conclusion that this

action of

um control and domination was wrong

that development that doesn't account

for the contingencies

of things like strategy and war and all

of those things for hegel are not

accidental contingencies they figure

within the deeper rationality

of right and or the will

so for hegel all of those contingencies

are not accidents the reason why for

example napoleon

defeats europe isn't simply because of

contingent whatever it's actually

because

this is in a sense right

from the perspective of history i

disagree i think that what he would say

and i think this is i think an

understanding of hegel would lend itself

to an understanding of ideological power

and

um political power just as much as

authoritarian power

so the direct opposition of the of the

individual

uh to us but this distinction

not only does hegel overcome this

distinction in history this distinction

is overcome in like

maoist guerilla war strategy or people's

war like

the etiology for example marxism

leninism

and its ability to strategically win

these are or

let's say win the class struggle these

are one and the same thing it's not like

oh first you're right then you win no

you winning

is proof that you're right if you can't

win you're not right so you have to win

basically well i would have i would have

said i would have said another thing i

would have said that i think it would be

embodied really in the philosophy of

someone like martin luther king

and the the developments that he managed

to produce uh non-violently but through

an act of resistance

and the resistance itself and its

demonstration to the world

showed um civil society the injustice

that was going on and allowed for

the development within civil society

without i'm more of a malcolm x guy so

let's just leave it there and that's

like the difference between us basically

one one question in terms of mao

they in and mao's philosophy do you not

think that he's fundamentally wrong on

his rejection of the negation of

negation

and um falling into i think uh

you know a a a form of uh particularity

and everything can be fundamentally and

almost nominalism really he has a

one-sided dialectic of um

kind of almost uh pure either pure

negation or this kind of pure

reconciliation i think mao was both

correct and incorrect he was correct

because his rejection of the

prior conception of the negation of the

negation allowed him to introduce the

concept of

infinity to the marxist dialectic which

is coming from chinese tradition

and the chinese philosophy and this was

an incredible achievement in innovation

ultimately negation of negation can

be made compatible with mao zedong

thought

but it must first take note of the

achievements of mao

tong thought but yes he doesn't he

rejects the nation negation of the

negation but

this is in a sense necessary for the

time and it's necessary

uh for that time for him to do that

okay thanks guys we're going to move on

to the next question um i'm going to

combine these two for has because

they're relevant to each other this is

from voidburn and noobslayer u

so question for has exceptions like

cephalopods and dolphins have been able

to express higher levels of

self-awareness and thought

why is it the fact that the species is

what matters but not the universality of

consciousness itself that matters

because the universality of

consciousness as you're putting it is a

kind of

it's not what hegel means it's a kind of

like new age spiritualism thing

so when it comes to all of the newly

observed things about dolphins and

even apes these still do not go beyond

the bounds of what hegel described

animals in the philosophy of nature as

being only acted upon

by immediate and pure externalities

so the fact that different animals

display different degrees of complexity

does not still does not accomplish the

necessary

um step toward

entering history entering itself there's

a qualitative difference that we're

talking about here

that's whatever i know you maybe saw

something about a dolphin

that impressed you or an orangutan but

this is still not enough

for them to be ethical subjects proper

thank you last question for perspective

philosophy this is from angelo marnie

how do you justify imposing moral

obligations on other people from a

hegelian perspective

um i don't i don't think that you can

impose a moral obligation

um or an ethical obligation really is

what we should say

in the sense that i don't think that we

can impose something that is outside of

outside of our society and the

development of the concepts from which

we share

everything that i'm saying is

conceptually um available

to you you not only speak the same

language but mostly were part of

uh the same culture most people that you

know watch my streams that are engaging

in this

have some shared um ethical concepts or

the majority of the

majority of which share the same ethical

concepts uh we share

to the point in which we could develop

um laws which

govern human behavior relative to each

other

and also to animals as well i think that

there are some societies which have not

hit this point

um and there are some individuals you

know some uh

you know aspects of spur which have not

hit this point and you can't force this

um progression you know hegel says moral

progression is impossible

uh and i agree with that but you can

challenge it with rational argumentation

and allow for the development of spirit

to happen from external

and internal critique and this is a

challenge to dogmatism itself

rather than a challenge to um rather

than the imposition

of a moral law upon an individual who

would have no

um conceptual connection to it but

doesn't

this kind of contradict the hegelian

perspective according to which

where upon the insights of reason so far

as the individual

is concerned conflict with the deeper

rationality of society in the world

so much worse for the individual's

insights it just reflects a narrow

perspective

so how could arriving at some kind of

conceptual

uh insight on part of the individual or

rational insight on part of the

individual

possibly have consequences for

uh the society as a whole

oh 100 must have the whole point of the

laws

the laws themselves are are produced

from the dialectical

um production the dialectical engagement

of subject and subject

uh there is no objectivity before that

and then the objectivity of the law

imposed upon those individuals is um the

freedom of the individual from their own

subjectivity and the

elevation of their subjectivity or to

the objective subject

um and and so that that is their freedom

so like to say that like um

like the difference is is that this has

to be reconciled within the

consciousness of an individual

uh hegel would see the um the

uh abstract enactment of a law from

which individuals did not

have a conceptual understanding of uh as

inherently wrong he actually points out

that laws from which individuals cannot

understand

such as the he points out a historical

event in which they hammered the laws

higher than anyone could see as being

inherently

unjustified and it actually prevents an

individual from engaging with the law

the law and punishment itself is meant

to enact the subjectivity

and maturity of the individual and so

the punishment of the individual when

they breach the law

is actually a a reconciliation of that

individual

with society and themselves we respect

that they knew the law

they could understand the law and that

they chose to act otherwise

define their so own subjectivity yeah

obviously that's true but

that still doesn't address the point

which is

if the law is the self-consciousness of

the individual then

laws are not established because

individuals come to insights in the way

that

you are coming to an insight here laws

are established because of a combination

of the

contradiction between state and civil

society where it's harmony

um the private interests the all sorts

of different kinds of factors

which are more fundamental particularity

passions

which are more fundamental than just the

individual's conceptual use of

reason but what they are is the

individual elevated to the point of

universality it's a relationship

and if philosophically yeah but this

comes on this yeah

yes hang on hang on hang on slow down

perspective philosophy finish your

thought then how's

um okay yeah i'm just saying it's a

relationship it's a hermeneutic

relationship between the individual

themselves

and the as an individual instancing of

the universal principle

so the individual themselves is um a

necessary

component in this so a society which

does not allow for the freedom of an

individual

and rejects the freedom of an individual

would be inherently

uh dogmatic and tyrannical and negative

for hegel

yes i understand that laws

elevates the self-conscious but here's

the thing

there's a reason why they have to exist

in the estranged form

of the law it's not just a matter of

kind of a

worldly convenience it's the fact that

this self-consciousness

is greater than what can be afforded by

the insights of individual

reason alone now the individual can be

cognizant

of the law but even

in being cognizant of the law this will

not fully satisfy

the demands of uh the rational subject

insofar as they do not recognize uh

the reality of a supra supra individual

irrationality that can often

uh come at the expense of their

expectations prejudices and beliefs

like a thief in the night so to speak

like uh as an expression of a higher

cunning i would agree i would agree with

that i guess the only thing i would say

is that we're supposed to

just just finish up really quickly

because it has two more questions needs

to answer and then we're going to wrap

up

yeah that's fine i just said that

essentially um that's true the

universality of reason is

you know essentially the driving force

of what we must give ourselves into

we must we are subject to the laws we

cannot override them in the irony of the

subjective

but that the laws are constitutive of

subjects

coming together reasoning together and

putting forward their rational

um their rational um conclusions

to produce the laws the laws should be

rationally attainable by

everyone and so um follow

what is um a testable and reliable

understand

testable and reliable to the

understanding of an individual

and be produced from all of the

individuals and the consideration of

those individuals

and not produced by a class of

individuals like a master slave

dialectic would

give itself into but hegel precisely

disagrees

when is precisely produced by a kind of

class of individuals uh not

democratically it's the class of uh

civil society

sorry it's the class of civil servants

the

well if you look at if you look at how

um how

hegel's society works it's almost like

trifecta isn't it

with the king sitting on the top so

you've got um

like you've got essentially civil

society um

was it civil society um individual

interests uh or private interests

and um and then is it the king or

there's

like another there's another um

institution i think that also mediates

but they're also all contradictory uh

drives within society

that are being mediated by the king it's

not yeah it's not democratic

and yeah but the king himself is and and

people

argue about whether he was just

essentially tipping his heart

essentially to the king at the time

because

uh and for his own political interest

which i think he was

because the king himself has no um

subjective formulation

they are entirely objective the king is

the form

is the king is purely the expression of

the will of the people

the king would be replaceable with an ai

like

not necessary i mean the king is

inherited by tradition and custom and

there's there's there's a

argument to be made for why hegel was

not necessarily

just trying to circumvent censors and so

on and so on

um obviously the king doesn't have a lot

of power

basically to some of what you were

saying but for hegel

it's not like this kind of neo-kantian

which is how i think you're describing

it this kind of neocontian

social democratic kind of we all get

together and rationally decide an

outcome in some kind of way for hegel no

it's

it's not it's hegel rejects this

volunteerism i think almost explicitly

in his form of the rejection of his

critique of the english reform bill

and his uh critique of the french

revolution and so on and so on

okay lewis final word and then we're

gonna move on to the next question

that's that's fair enough i think that

hegel

being um hegel it wouldn't agree with

something like a marxist london estate i

don't believe or any sort of um top-down

sort of

um dictatorship he may agree with the

dictate of the proletariat

dependent let's not get into this let's

just yeah yeah

that's fair um but i will say that hegel

does lend himself

to um i would say democracy um in many

ways which is why a lot of

you know hegelians are pro-democracy and

myself included i think that democracy

is analytic aliens like brandon and

pippin like the hardcore hegelians

not so much you know oh absolutely i

mean you can go and read um

the beginner's guide to the philosophy

of right written by david ross

who is more continental than fuck than i

don't know swiss cheese his name

sounds like anglo like what about kojev

and people like that like

real people i'm not denying that there

are people that do interpret hagel and

like hardcore

i think real hegelians continental

hegelians um

can be liberals even um i just think

that i think that is a bad stance to

take

i'm not a liberal um but you know what i

would say is that something like

um socialism and uh you know i would

even say something like

something close that even anarchism

lends itself to hegel in a way

let's debate about that another day

jesus christ

thank you very much guys all right uh

has there's

two final questions for you and then

we're going to wrap up so the first is

from uh horizonburg

uh could factory farming be a morally

acceptable practice under socialism if

so what conditions would need to be met

for to be acceptable

obviously it could be morally acceptable

i don't see where morality

is has relevance here um

morality i if i'm a socialist i'm a

marxist right so

for marx this kind of um

estrangement of morality and ethics and

religion

from the actual uh material reproduction

of society is a result of the division

of labor so for marx

um

the new society kind of reconciles all

of these things

into determinate forms of uh

labor and things like that it's not like

these are all

we approach things from is this morally

correct is this religiously correct for

marx all of these things

become um reconciled

so is factory farming morally accepted

well

it doing away with factory farming would

not

be because of moral considerations

that's your question

i think there are health considerations

and things like that to be investigated

but

from a moral perspective i don't see why

it's the problem

thank you and final question for has um

this is from josh henniosa

i take this to be a accusation of

two fallacies so i'll let you just

respond to them uh the first is

name the trait also you are appealing to

nature and tradition fallacy

i don't know what this name the trait

stuff is from

ask yourself i think i've i'd already

debated it i had i debated someone from

their server and i talked about

why this is not uh i watch that debate i

don't know i'll put it on

louis is familiar with it does he want

to give a quick explication well

just let me answer the second question

please i know what

name the trade is i know what name the

trade is i reject name the trait because

it's on dialectical that's my

summarization

uh the real difference between mankind

and animals

is not because of some kind of formally

and

arbitrarily formally intelligible trait

it's because of something suspended in

actual area it's proven in a dialectic

way not because of some kind of

axiom or dogma the second thing was a

question about

appeal to nature and tradition

um i didn't i didn't actually

appeal to nature and uh tradition if

this is what you're saying

um but that doesn't mean that

traditions attest to a deeper

rationality

um that requires one to possess an

attitude of caution

and more consideration like oftentimes

when people critique

traditions they're taking a one-sided

and very narrow

perspective in relation to those same uh

traditions they're not actually

understanding why those traditions have

stood the test of time and the reason is

not because

people are simply less intelligent than

you are

that would assume that tradition the

reason i have problems with this as a

logical fallacy is because it

assumes that the products of in the

individual use of logic

premise real human traditions but what

premises real human traditions is not

the individual use of logic

um what premises are traditions

is ontological it is our fundamental

relationship

to both our own being and uh nature and

so on and so on

so i reject this kind of uh

bullshit

thank you all right um so that's it for

questions so thank you gentlemen for

participating

um if uh anyone and thank you to the

audience as well for your questions and

for

being extraordinarily civil i greatly

appreciate that if

you are a small content creator and you

are interested in taking part in a

future scientist showdown dm me on

twitter or in the discord server

um if both of you would like to i

realize that i'm the smallest channel of

three of us here but if you'd like to

shout out your

channels and say what you're about um

please feel free

uh how's would you like to go first

yup i'm on uh youtube it's the infrared

just search infrared you'll find me i'm

big enough for that now

twitch.tv slash infrared show um

where marx is landing his channel but

we're not

just about politics you know i'm also

a really entertaining person and really

funny

um and i'm also doing debates a lot and

it's entertaining

especially when i can get uh more than

two hours of sleep

um so yeah come watch me i think for two

hours of sleep you did pretty damn well

uh lewis please yeah so hello and

perspective philosophy

you can find me at respect to philosophy

on youtube uh i do debates

like this one on thoughts on philosophy

veganism um

politics ethics and loads of loads of

other stuff really

um i do and longer form videos as well

even

outlining ontological uh positions and

ethics

and other you know philosophical

positions so yeah just

check us out and my audience check out

president sunday

and you know what actually check out

check out uh um infrared like that this

was actually

pretty productive i wasn't expecting

that so yeah

yeah i agree this is easily the most

interesting discussion i've hosted so

far granted only

only the fourth but um i hope this

pretends uh

the quality we'll be looking at in the

future anyways we're gonna call off now

so

thank you very much everybody and take

care