17/148, The Under tion, what Hegel “appearance” * because although ‘conceptual through and through. Itis nota pure theory (a statement of laws or reg ies in the abstract) but itis completely theoretical. Th counting as a properly completed piece of scientific research. its experimental materials and equipment, is left behind. Modern discussions of nen a piece of jon by others who only the report to ‘Science” (as a result) framework may reach the rough again. But the repel procedures (if it is really needed) will not then be a repetition of ‘ment. The repetition of procedures has become necessary because, ‘retical framework, the older description of what was done is (for some reason) no longer adequate, In Hegel's terms, what happens is part of anew Erscheinung. In this example of the controlled experiment as Erscheinung we can ol another dimension of the thoughtlessness of Understanding. According divin ‘can only observe. Its experime 0 be limited to the kind of thought experiments that Kepler Real experiments wolve a free self-conscious activ- ‘conceivable in the ‘Understanding is confined to the interpretation of perceptual experience through lusion that arises from the tion of the concept of Farce back into ly is, is just the motion ofthe intelligible back into itself as Under- ‘What the passing show of appearance displays tothe intellect isthe eter- yy of natural law: When the con ir opposed rips to produce the ‘out a glorious sunrise and suns into day and back again. Here the totality of appearance takes us i Understanding identifies the “simple” movement have a table of sunrise and sunset. The eycle of day and night, 1 passage of the Sun through the Zodiac, these entrances” of Force. indifferently both real and ams about sunrise, moon phases, Zodiac houses. ing appearance becomes imple distinction through its connec- ive homogens when Hegel says now that “the ‘ng appearance becomes simple distinction” he means that the284 “The Pilgrimage of Reason in Sense-Certa city of the inn x becomes a simple continuum i just what in itself sim- the Understanding. The “universal in itself,” ie. sameness, ho ‘on the axis of a graph world where we can speak of “pas ut of the “present” we speak onl and minuses in order to set up the laws is a “still picture” of the resting equi supersensible world.” possible. Our system of jum of Being in this Pythagorean 19,/180, But there is more in appearance than this realm of laws. Appearancs comprehended x” is a pure abstraction which jon of natural science). onceive the “realm of laws” at wh .¢ have arrived as concretely ” for the Force in perception, but nota difference of “actual in the Understanding. The Hegelian “law of nature” cannot lack a “statement of prepare us for the vhen the moon is not observable because it is occluded by jal conception of the Heavens as the “utterance” of nen the telescope revealed extinct volea- Allofa did not ‘The law was not the “realm of law ‘The World of Intellectual Theory ‘noes strongly indicated that the same system of laws that operates on Earth, applies in his universal theory of motion, the Unders I is extremely df concept of law—t Newton's is deservedly one of the greatest names inthe hi ing arrived at its objective con- the “unconditioned univers Hegel concentrates attention on the [he sunspots required another law ike the cloudy night; and the dead volea- ” as observable.” decide just what Hegel means by saying \—"goes beyond law as such” and of “universal attraction” becauseis Force itselfas an energetic continuum. It pertain just as much to space as to bodies, because space is as much the utterance of Force as body is. Hegel does not think of gravity asa force that is propagated in Newtonian abs space, but as the force tha is expressed as both bodies and space. “Universal tion” isthe pure continuity of energy that “posits itself in these opposite modes. ‘There cannot be any /ams—not even the law of gravity—until these opposite modes exist ‘That is how the “pure concept of aw” is beyond law itself. The way in which iis “turned against law” logical structure ofthe law of, fed as masses). The law of gravity expresses their r ‘are external and indifferent to one another. In any stable gravita- their distinctive character as repulsive is hidden.” th of perfect reciprocity is not explicit im purely gravitational phenom- cena, But the gravitational mass holds together because every part of i cother part exactly as much a balanced quantum of attraction and repulsion that attracts everything el “distinction” in the continuum is a perfeet unity of the opposite di the pure concept. But ions” of is displayed in the law (agains action) and particu- In the context of the universal force (in which the conceptual moments are dissoci- “The World of Intellectual Theory 287 ated, differences as the many ones) ‘the conceptual moments are expl But as soon as the necessity for a multip cept of law is “turned against” law in a new way. Ev the concept, and its necessity is ust a contingent fact of experience. I polar force then it must be both positive and negative. This makes it a model case ‘of the concept of Force. Any statically electrified thing will both attract and repel rified poles. But that electricity should be polar is not a conceptual ‘not necessary that there should be injects the statement of the law of falling bodies into his dis force in which the inward iden- the actual concept of of those that do not fal the concept and its embodied shapes, (The next paragraph examines the external- ity of the moments in the gravitational theory of motion.) 2/183. Even ‘must be taken a primitive (or ray ‘contain distinctions. of being. That inwardness was revealed to our intellectual gaze as the concept of Necessity, We are beginning now to see that because ofits one-sidedly objective con- sciousness, the Understanding is unable to establish the existence of any necessity ‘The collocation of electricity and finite gravity (simple falling) in paragraph 152 vas not accidental; for the basic weakness of the Understanding is now shown to m of them as “forms of intuition” for the employ- the understanding, leave space and time logically unrelated. The order of Wf ago as a great continuum of motion, Thi terms of a polarized concept like magnet ied force like magnetism has to be though2B/ASA, 288 The Pilgrimage of Reason like that. Statie charges are bu fested separately and conti «essence of force is manifested, is a contingent phenomen« In ll cases, and especially in the fundamental (universal) case of motion, the separate phenomena must be understood as one whole, if they are to be grasped as manifestations of Force. But the putting of the phenomena together into these finite wholes—even the interpretation of the motion of Newton's famous apple and ‘of the Moon as part of one theory—is an apparently arbitrary act of the observer, ‘That is what makes finite “explanation” into a “tautology” (as we shall now see) ‘The law is simply the shorthand record of a regularity that we have observed and that we can treat as a “necessary connection.” But we have no {nto why these equations hold, ion only, so that the If we start with the Hegelian concept of Force, the existence of the “aether” becomes a synthetic w prior truth. ‘The actual law of gravity is still an empirical discovery. But the project of a “unified field theory” of all forces becomes the methodological goal of Under- standing; and we can see how the project ofa higher science of experience follows logically asthe reintegration of the concreteness that the Understanding is obliged to sacrifice chieve its own unity. Moreover, because of the properly conceptual character ofthe foundation of our a priori synthesis, this higher project is legitimated instead of appearing to be necessarily out of our reach. order ‘The Understanding does not recognize th the “inwardness of things Hence its explanations have only a definitional necessity. They are summary des tions in which the explanation isa tautology. ‘This paragraph begins by summarizing the argument about the ways in which observed laws are external to their concept. I have explained this as well as I can already, So I have omitted it in my analysis ofthe paragraph, and I shall not com- ‘ment upon it any further, ‘The “experience that Understanding makes” of its sylogistic connection with the inward nature of things, isan experience of the formal necessity science is ultimately all a matter of what what Hegel no reason why the law of about grav already feigning a hypothesis unless we take the theory (1 286 y of “appearance” from which predictions can be made deductively (and retrodictions too, of course). The theot