Hegel was conservative. Words like this are bound to grab the interest of many politically interested folk, or shut down any interest of those of us who are just fed up with the discussion of liberals and conservatives. However, this did intrigue me enough to work through a bit of the lecture, if not all of it.
Conservative is not a term people think of when looking at Philosophers, but maybe this is because those uneducated in Philosophy only know such names as Marx, Plato, and Aristotle – all with not so conservative thought processes. Or maybe some of them were, I just don’t fully understand them enough. Oh well, back to Hegel. Capitalism and Democracy are presented by Roderick as being two of the most important keys to Hegel’s thoughts. Both of these may be simply from our thinking that they worked in the past, and could work again. But Hegel also mentions that the world is somewhat also scary in this regard, because it deals with so much work and thought. And eventually, if you stick to your guns, it gets trickier – “…because someone may expect you to do what you say.”
There is one thing I completely agree with Roderick on in this lecture though. As much as there is talk about a perfect society, or America being the top of all, it’s really not true. If we do not understand where good solid information and ideas come from, those who have lived out their lives, we become a “…society that produces…pathological (tendencies), it neither has nor deserves a very long existence.” Enough said America.
Rick Roderick’s Lecture:
P. J. Rumley 