801 - 1

[R Srivatsan]

801 - 1.  Clearly, in actuality (i.e., "out there in the world") the knowing substance -- i.e., the form of the cogito, or the being of thought, exists before it is able to conceptualize itself as such.  This is because the concept is as yet a seed, a mere soul of possibility which has not yet looked inward.  Until this happens, what exists is simply a representational consciousness: because unless the I looks inward, it only sees the outside as its opposing externality -- it can only represent this other to its otherwise opaque self.  This is the self of sense-certainty.

Because cognition (at this early stage referred to in these contrasting lines) is only the spiritual consciousness for which any being (what is) only "is" (i.e, being is pure and simple being -- an opaque being of sense certainty); in so far as this spiritual consciousness is only a being-for the self, or being of the self or the concept (not its essence or concept), cognition is only simple, it sees the richness of substance, the world around it, without comprehending it.  See paragraph 91 (or my notes on this paragraph) of Sense Certainty.  At this stage, what substance shows itself as to consciousness is screened, concealed, because substance is as yet selfless, i.e., unspiritual.  What is certain is only the existence of that being in thought, and thence in its most primitive stage, which Descartes posited as the prime position, the certainty of the thinker.

Thus in the beginning, the substance observed is only seen abstractly -- as a being there for sense certainty.  But because concept (as the self-concept, as the dynamic architecture of thought) propels itself forward, self-consciousness enriches itself and the substance is fully incorporated in the subject, in other words, raw undigested substance is sublated into the structured matter of thought.  This negative movement of thinking is as much a positing of what is there.  And this negation-of-substance--positing-of-matter proceeds until it replaces the amorphous substance entirely with its thought out matter. 

in a counter parallel to this movement from being-to-concept for the naive consciousness, when the (blind) being (or unreflective drive) of the concept is replaced by the concept (self-knowing form) of the concept, i.e., when the concept is fully aware of itself as the concept, or yet in other words, the concept is self-conscious, it is the parts, moments, aspects that are first seen and then whole is the filled unity of these parts. 

To be contd...

Srivats 

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R Srivatsan
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There is only one solution if old age is not to be an absurd parody of our former life, and that is to go on pursuing ends that give our existence a meaning – devotion to individuals, to groups or to causes, social, political, intellectual or creative work … in old age we should wish still to have passions strong enough to prevent us turning in on ourselves. One’s life has value so long as one attributes value to the life of others, by means of love, friendship, indignation, compassion. - Simone de Beauvoir