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HARTMANN, KARL ROBERT EDUARD VON (184...

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Originally appearing in Volume V13, Page 36 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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HARTMANN, KARL See also:ROBERT EDUARD VON (1842–1906) , See also:German philosopher, was See also:born in See also:Berlin on the 23rd of See also:February 1842. He was educated for the See also:army, and entered the See also:artillery of the See also:Guards as an officer in 186o, but a malady of the See also:knee, which crippled him, forced him to quit the service in 1865. After some hesitation between See also:music and See also:philosophy, he decided to make the latter the serious See also:work of his See also:life, and in 1867 the university of See also:Rostock conferred on him the degree of See also:doctor of philosophy. He subsequently returned to Berlin, and died at Grosslichterfelde on the 5th of See also:June 1906. His reputation as a philosopher was established by his first See also:book, The Philosophy of the Unconscious (1869; loth ed. 189o). This success was largely See also:clue to the originality of its See also:title, the diversity of its contents (von Hartmann professing to obtain his speculative results by the methods of inductive See also:science, and making plentiful use of See also:concrete illustrations), the fashionableness of its See also:pessimism and the vigour and lucidity of its See also:style. The conception of the Unconscious, by which von Hartmann describes his ultimate metaphysical principle, is not at bottom as paradoxical as it sounds, being merely a new and mysterious designation for the See also:Absolute of German metaphysicians. The Unconscious appears as a See also:combination of the metaphysic of See also:Hegel with that of See also:Schopenhauer. The Unconscious is both Will and See also:Reason and the absolute all-embracing ground of all existence. Von Hartmann thus combines " See also:pantheism " with " panlogism " in a manner adumbrated by See also:Schelling in his " See also:positive philosophy." Nevertheless Will and not Reason is the See also:primary aspect of the Unconscious, whose See also:melancholy career is determined by the primacy of the Will and the subservience of the Reason. Precosmically the Will is potential and the Reason latent, and the Will is void of reason when it passes from potentiality to actual willing.

This latter is absolute misery, and to cure it the Unconscious evokes its Reason and with its aid creates the best of all possible worlds, which contains the promise of its redemption from actual existence by the emancipation of the Reason from its subjugation to the Will in the conscious reason of the enlightened pessimist. When the greater See also:

part of the Will in existence is so far enlightened by reason as to perceive the inevitable misery of existence, a collective effort to will non-existence will be made, and the See also:world will relapse into nothingness, the Unconscious into quiescence. Although von Hartmann is a pessimist, his pessimism is by no means unmitigated. The individual's happiness is indeed unattainable either here and now or hereafter and in the future, but he does not despair of ultimately releasing the Unconscious from its sufferings. He differs from Schopenhauer in making salvation by the " negation of the Will-to-live " depend on a collective social effort and not on individualistic See also:asceticism. The conception of a redemption of the Unconscious also supplies the ultimate basis of von Hartmann's See also:ethics. We must provisionally affirm life and devote ourselves to social See also:evolution, instead of striving after a happiness which is impossible; in so doing we shall find that morality renders life less unhappy than it would otherwise be. See also:Suicide, and all other forms of selfishness, are highly reprehensible. Epistemologically von Hartmann is a transcendental realist, who ably defends his views and acutely criticizes those of his opponents. His See also:realism enables him to maintain the reality of See also:Time, and so of the See also:process of the world's redemption. Von Hartnmann's numerous See also:works extend to more than 12,000 pages. They may be classified into—A.

Systematical, including Grundprobleme der Erkenntnistheorie; Kategorienlehre; Das sittliche Bewusstsein; See also:

Die Philosophic See also:des SchOnen; Die See also:Religion des Geistes; Die Philosophic des Unbewussten (3 vols., which now include his, originally See also:anonymous, self-See also:criticism, Das Unbewusste vom Standpunkte der Physiologic and Descendenztheorie, and its refutation, Eng. trs. by W. C. Coupland, 1884) ; See also:System der Philosophic ins Grundriss, i.; Grundriss der Erkenntnislehre. B. See also:Historical and See also:critical—Das religiose Bewusstsein der Menschheit; Geschichte der Metaphysik (2 vols.); See also:Kant's Erkenntnistheorie; Kritische Grundlegung des transcendentalen Realismus; Uber die dialektische Methode; studies of Schelling, See also:Lotze, von Kirchmann; Zur Geschichte des Pessimismus; Neukantianismus, Schopenhauerismus, Hegelianismus; Geschichte der deutschen Asthetik seit Kant; Die Krisis des Christentums in der modernen Theologie; Philosophische Fragen der Gegenwart; Ethische Studien; Moderne Psychologie; Das Christentum des neuen Testaments; Die Weltanschauung der modernen Physik. C. Popular—Soziale Kernfragen; Moderne Probteme; Tagesfragen; Zwei Jahrzehnte deutscher Politik ; Das Judentum in Gegenwart and Zukunft; Die Selbstzersetzung des Christentums; Gesammelte Studien; Der Spiritismus and Die Geisterhypothese des Spiritismus; Zur Zeitgeschichle. His select works have been published in to volumes (2nd ed., 1885-1896). On his philosophy see R. Kober, Das pliilosophische System Eduard von Hartmanns (1884) ; O. PlGmacher, Der Kampf urns Unbewusste (2nd ed., 1890), with a See also:chronological table of the Hartmann literature from 1868 to 189o; A. Drews, E. von Hartmanns Philosophic and der Materialismus in der modernen Kullur (1890) and E. von Hartmanns philosophisches System ins Grundriss (1902), with See also:biographical introduction; and for further authorities, J.

M. See also:

Baldwin, See also:Dictionary of Philosophy and See also:Psychology (1901–1905).

End of Article: HARTMANN, KARL ROBERT EDUARD VON (1842–1906)

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