I am not sure how long ago it was that 'Hegel's Hotel' started to percolate in my mind as the name for this philosophical and psychological treatise that I am aiming to finish in an organized and coherent, understandable fashion. Let us say that it was 5 years ago although the roots of my appreciation for Hegel's dialectic philosophy go back to the early to mid 1980s.
Before that, the roots of my rational-empiricism, cognitive therapy, and humanistic-existentialism go back to my 5 years at The University of Waterloo, culminating in my Honours Thesis in Psychology which I finished in 1979.
My roots in General Semantics (Language in Thought and Action, S.I. Hayakawa), and Psycho-Cybernetics (Maxwell Maltz) go back even a couple of years further than that to my last two years in high school, 1972-1974. It was these two books that 'changed my inner world', excited me towards the study of psychology in University, the study of Adlerian Psychology, and Gestalt Therapy after university, and from my studies in Gestalt Therapy, Jungian Psychology, and Psychoanalysis, I was finally exposed to the 'mastermind philosopher' behind the birth of Dialectic Clinical Psychology -- and that was G. W. Hegel (with all due respect to Nietzsche who was also an important common influence).
Hegel created the dualistic and dialectic paradigm and Nietzsche created the 'fire and passion' behind the birth of Clinical Psychology in the 1880s and 1890s. Ironically, Nietzsche wrote a brilliant little book -- his first -- 'The Birth of Tragedy' (BT) in a Hegelian dualistic and dialectic mold, i.e., when he traced the 'Apollonian vs. Dionsysian' dichotomy in man's mental and emotional makeup back to the beginning of Ancient Greek Tragedy, where it was largely lost thereafter in Western History as 'Apollonian Rationality' after Socrates and Plato came to dominate most of The Western Landscape until some 2000 years later when the Romantic philosophers and poets (Rousseau, Goethe, Schelling...) and then Schopenhauer threw much of Western Rationality into the trash can in the name of different ideals: i.e., Romantic Sensuality, Emotionality, and Mysticism in the case of Rousseau, Goethe, and Schelling; Eastern Mystic Philosophy as an escape from human narcissism and irrationality in the case of Schopenhauer.
Paradoxically -- or should I say 'tragically' -- Nietzsche abandoned the Hegelian dualistic and dialectic paradigm shortly after BT and never went back to it again as he started to develop his own philosophical version of 'Dionysianism', 'The Will to Power', and 'The Philosophy of The Superman'.
Hegel's dialectic approach didn't come out of nowhere. In fact, it came out of the same ancient Greek Pre-Socratic roots that Nietzsche partly focused on -- and then abandoned, at least in its dialectic rendition, after BT.
Anaxamander and Heraclitus can be viewed as the first two Western Dualistic-Dialectic Western Philosophers; Lao Tse arguably the first Chinese dualistic-dialectic philosopher (arguably the creator of the Chinese concepts of 'yin' and 'yang' that are still being used today some 2500 years plus later).
Indeed, at times I have been tempted to call this philosophical treatise 'Anaxamander's Hotel'. Or 'Anaxamander's and Hegel's Hotel'. However, for the sake of simplicity and clarity, anytime I have left the name 'Hegel's Hotel', I have always come back to it.
Hegel was the German idealistist philosopher who most clearly articulated the idea of 'dialectic philosophy' and the 'dialectic paradigm or formula' of 1. 'thesis', 2. 'anti or counter-thesis', and 3. syntheis, even though Kant, Fichte, and Schelling, were all partly using this idea before Hegel.
Still, it was Hegel who wrote arguably the most monumental and revolutionary philosophical treatise in Western history: 'The Phenomenology of Spirit/Mind' (1807).
Marx turned Hegel's thinking upside down and created 'Dialectic Materialism' as the beginning of his 'deconstruction of Capitalism' and his 'Communist Manifesto'.
Kierkegaard set about 'deconstructing' Hegel's massive, high fallutin' abstractionism....although Kierkeggard wasn't really any easier to read....Still, Kierkegaard emphasized 'concreteness' and 'living in the moment' in his philosophy, and came up with his most famous quote: 'Life must be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards.'
Schopenhauer hated almost everything about Hegel (the two were lecturing in Germany at the same time and Hegel was getting all the attention) -- mainly what he perceived as Hegel's overidealism....and Schopenhauer compensated for this with arguably the most pessimistic philosophy that was ever created by a Western Philosopher. Think 'Lord of The Flies' and you are thinking Schopenhauer.
To be sure, Hegel has been idealized, criticized, and sometimes hated perhaps more than any other philosopher (except maybe Marx with his anti-Capitalist and pro-Socialist Philosophy) in the history of Western Philosophy.
And yet, Hegel's Dialectic Philosophy with some humanistic-existential and deconstructive modifications, that make Hegel's philosophy less 'historically deteministic' and more 'humanistically and existentially free will', remains a powerful force in today's philosophical landscape.
But what I have in mind is perhaps -- or probably -- either a little or a lot different than what might be in the mind of any other modern day Hegelian or Post-Hegelian philosopher.
Indeed, no other Hegelian or Post-Hegelian Philosopher is likely to reach as deeply into the study of the history and evolution of Western Clinical Psychology as I am here.
Nor is any Hegelian or Post-Hegelian Philosopher likely as interested in Ancient Greek Mythology and Ancient Greek Dialectic Philosophy as I am.
Finally, I know that there is no Hegelian or Post-Hegelian Philosopher out there who is capable of bringing the history and evolution of Western Greek Mythology, Philosophy, and Clincal Psychology all under the same roof -- 'Hegel's Hotel' -- as I will here.
My vision, my goal is to help all of us, as much as possible, break out of a deep philosophical tradition, a deep Aristolean tradition, of reducing every human conflict to an 'either/or' paradigm.
This is what Hegel was trying to escape from, trying to get us all to break free from.
A does not always 'cause' B. Or 'B' does not always 'cause' 'A'.
Nor are the boundaries of 'A' and the boundaries of 'B' -- either as a concept or as a natural phenomenon -- always mutually exclusive.
A and B can both influence each other.
And A and B -- even if they are polar opposites -- are still partly 'defined' by each other.
You can't define 'day' without defining 'night'. And you can't define 'black' without defining 'white'.
Words and natural phenomenon both have 'associative connections' (things that are similiar in properties to them), and 'polar, opposing connections' (things that are opposite in properties to them).
And opposing polarity doesn't always create 'repulsion'.
Indeed, just as often opposing polarity creates 'attraction'.
We have all heard the saying, 'Opposites attract'.
Well, sometimes they attract. Sometimes they repel. And sometimes they do both.
In the field of sexuality, A is a man, B is a woman, A and B copulate and create a child, and now you have a new 'natural phenomenon' -- that is partly A and partly B.
Thesis (the man), counter-thesis (the woman), and synthesis (the child).
This is the essence of dialectic logic and the dialectic paradigm.
Life is not only about 'either/or'.
Life is also about 'either/or' -- coming together in dialectic harmony and synthesis.
If not for a long while, at least a short while.
Molecules come together, molecules break apart.
People come together, people break apart.
People come together seeking union.
And they break apart seeking freedom and individuality.
Like the coming in and going out of the tides.
Like Apollo and Dionysus dancing together, then fighting against each other.
Like night ruling the day, then day ruling the night.
This is the essence of Anaximander's Philosophical World,
Turned into Hegel's Dialectical World,
Turned into DGB Dialectic Humanistic-Existentialism,
As contained within,
Hegel's Hotel.
Where all philosophers and psychologists, past and present, meet, talk with each other, fight with each other, negotiate with each other, and integrate with each other.
Yes, it is an idealistic Philosophical World.
But once you have read Hegel's Hotel,
And ideally internalized it,
Then what it does is it gives you the power to say something like,
Damn it! I am stuck inside of Schopenhauer's Room again...I have to get out....I want to trip over to Rousseau's Room, or Schelling's Room, or Diderot's Room, or Apollo's Room, or Gaia's Room, or Hera's Room, or Jung's Room, or DGB's Room...and see if I can enjoy a different philosophical paradigm...
You get the idea....
That's the idea behind,
Hegel's Hotel.
-- dgb, Jan. 13th, 2011.
-- David Gordon Bain,
-- Dialectic Gap-Bridging Negotiations...
-- Are Still in Process...
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