033 - What is Reality? The Real, the Actual, and the Rational According to Hegel

The Cunning of Geist

Hegel famously stated that "What is real (actual) is rational, and what is rational is real (actual). What does this statement mean?
The question of just what constitutes "reality" will be examined from four different standpoints - from a scientific viewpoint, from the perspective of one strand of Eastern philosophy, from a particular New Age tome, and, of course, from an Hegelian point of view.
Hegel postulates Absolute Spirt as the ultimate reality. This does not refer to some static, separate condition or separate being, but it is an ongoing, active, rational process that works itself out - comes to know itself - dialectically, through history.
Referring to Hegel's statement above, there is a key difference between the real and the actual. The abstract Logic may be real, but it needs to manifest through its other, Nature, in order to become actual. This podcast episode explores all this and more.
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