Most of the 'pieces' of what you will learn in DGB Philosophy can be found in different formats and renditions elsewhere: Anaxamander, Heraclitus, Daoism, The Han Philosophers, Spinoza, Bacon, Locke, Hume, Diderot, Adam Smith, Tom Paine, Jefferson, Hegel, Schopenhauer, Marx, Kirkegaard, Nietzsche, Freud, Adler, Jung, Fairbairn, Fromm, Korzybski, Hayakawa, Fritz Perls, Sartre, Betrand Russell, Foucault, Derrida...all have something to important to say that I have found different ways of 're-stating' and/or 'newly integrating' their respective philosophical and/or psychological messages into what I am calling DGB Philosophy.
Ideally speaking, I would like 'Hegel's Hotel: DGB Philosophy' to be the ultimate integative philosophy treatise of the 21st century. Now obviously, time will tell whether I ever come anywhere close to this lofty ambition or not. But I have confidence in my integrating abilities and continually evolving knowledge here. Every week I manage to add about two or three more essays to the evolving structure and process of Hegel's Hotel.
Most of the foundation of Hegel's Hotel has already been laid, and realistically speaking, I think I probably need about another 3 to 5 years to finish the entire structure of Hegel's Hotel. I expect that Hegel's Hotel will be my one and only philosophical accomplishment in my lifetime if for no other reason than the fact that Hegel's Hotel is big enough to contain my life's philosophical work.
A case could be made that Hegel's 'The Phenomenology of Spirit' is the most important influencing force on 'Hegel's Hotel: DGB Philosophy'. Indeed, I will make that case myself even though I have not come close yet to seriously reading it. If you have ever tried to pick up 'The Phenomenology' and read it, you will begin to understand why. Regardless, the two key messages in 'The Phenomenology' have be re-stated and re-interpreted in literally thousands and thousands of different books. Indeed, I would list Hegel's 'The Phenomenology' as the number 1 most important philosophical work in both Western and Eastern history. Perhaps Kant's 'The Critique of Pure Reason' deserves some consideration here -- but I would say secondary consideration for the sole reason that without Kant's influence on Hegel (and perhaps Fichte's) there might have been no 'Phenomenology of Spirit'. Anyways, I will leave this debate for those of you who may be so inclined as to pick it up.
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A/ The two key ideas in 'The Phenomenology of Spirit' that directly or indirectly turned the world upside down...
1. The 'Hegelian' evolutionary cycle of: 1. thesis; 2. anti-thesis; and 3. synthesis although as any knowledgeable Hegelian scholar will tell you, Hegel never used these exact words. Still, with or without the words attached to this theory of 'dialectic evolution', this is still the most important idea, the most important theory, in the history of Western Philosophy. At least from my DGB philosophy perspective. Indeed, it is more important than Darwin's theory of evolution for two reasons: 1. it pre-dates Darwin's theory of evolution by over 50 years (1807 vs. 1859); and 2. it encompasses Darwin's theory of evolution (1. testosterone and male sperm -- 'thesis'; 2. estrogen and female egg -- 'anti-thesis' -- or visa versa, I'm not sexist; 3. united testosterone and estrogen, sperm and egg, resulting in a genetically integrated or synthesized 'child' or 'offspring' -- 'synthesis).
2. The 'master/slave' relationship: Marx jumped all over this idea; and so did the 'existentialists'. Marx's philosophy revolutionized the Eastern world -- not necessarily for the better, as three of the most sociopathic leaders in the history of the East -- Lenin, Stalin, and Mao tse Tung -- unfortunately, liked what they read in Marx. In this regard, Hegelian dialectical philosophy 'bi-polarized the world' leading to both 'extreme political left' and 'extreme political right' interpretations and reactions. In the latter regard, Hegel was influenced by Fichte, and Fichte's personality and philosophy were both pathological, influencing the rise of German Nationalism, anti-semitism, and Nazism, whereas Hegel, to my knowledge, definitely didn't have any 'anti-semitic' qualitities in him, nor does his philosophy. The worst that you might say about Hegel was that he was 'pro-Napoleon', or 'a pre-German Nationalist', or that he was a 'fair weather political philosopher' who tried not to stir up any trouble with the government who he was close to, and at least partly supported by. Hegel's description of the 'master/slave' relationship also brought into discussion the concept of 'alienation' which opened up the door to what, through Kiekegaard, Nietzsche, Camus, Sartre, and others would become the philosophical 'school' or 'related but detached network of schools' known today as 'existentialism' and/or 'humanistic-existentialism'.
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B/ The 20 Most Influenctial Philosophers (or Sets Of Philosohers) Relative to DGB Philosophy...
1. Hegel
2. Nietzsche
3. Perls
4. Freud
5. Fromm
6. Korzybski and Hayakawa (General Semantics)
7. Spinoza
8. Adler
9. Jung
10. Derrida
11. Foucault
12. Nathaniel Branden, Adam Smith, Ayn Rand (The Spirit of Humanistic Capitalism)
13. Marx (The Spirit of Humanistic Socialism)
14. Bacon (The Spirit of Science and Rational-Empiricism)
15. Locke and Hume (Empiricism and Empirical-Extremism/Skepticism respectively)
16. Alexander and Heraclitus (The Earliest Western Dialectic philosophers)
17. Daoism, neo-Confucionism, and The Han Philosophers ('yin' and 'yang')
18. Plato and Aristotle (The Ultimate Idealist and The Ultimate Realist-Empiricist. Together, they make up much of the foundation of Western philosophy.)
19. The Post-Freudians: Klein, Fairbairn, Kohut, Berne...
20. Jeffrey Masson: The Ultimate anti-Classical Freudian.
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C/ The 12 Most Important Philosophical Works (or sets of Works) Relative to DGB Philosophy
1. Hegel, 'The Phenomenology of Spirit', 1807
2. Nietzsche, The Birth of Tragedy, 1872
3. Perls, Ego, Hunger and Aggression, 1947
4. Strachey's 24 volume collection of Freud's complete works, 1964
5. 'The Philosophy for Beginners' Series
6. Erich Fromm, 1947, Man For Himself, 1947
7. Hayakawa, 1949, 'Language in Thought and Action', 1949
8. W.B.Cannon, 1932, 'The Wisdom of The Body', 1932
9. Korzybski, 1933, 'Science and Sanity', 1933
10. Erich Fromm, 1955, 'The Sane Society', 1955
11. Nathaniel Branden, 'The Psychology of Self-Esteem', 1969
12. Maxwell Maltz, 'Pscyho-Cybernetics', 1960
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D/ 21 Important Concepts In DGB Philosophy-Psychology-Politics...
1. Bi-Polarity (Multi-Bi-Polarity, Bi-Partisan Agreement, Opposite Polarities, Paradoxes...)
2. The Dialectic (The dialectic process, dialectic-democracy, dialectic negotiating, dialectic dancing, dialectic agreement, dialectic balance, dialectic-democratic balance)
3. Gods, Idols, and Archetypes
4. Anti-gods, villains, and demons
5. Ego-States
6. Gaps, Voids, Abysses, Chasms
7. Superior and Inferior Power Functions (Processes, Organs, Ego-states, Power Dialectics...)
8. Homeostatic Balance (Dialectic Balance, Dialectic-Democratic Balance, Homeostatic Balance Dialectics, Win-Win Dialectics...)
9. Projection
10 Introjection and Identification
11. Distinction (differentation) and Association
12. 'Loose' and 'tight' associations
13. 'Positive' and 'negative' stereotyping
14. Transference ('Positive' and 'negative' transferences, Transference Complexes, Transference Memories, Transference Scenes...)
15. Compensation (Compensatory attitudes, beliefs, values, behaviors, lifestyles, philosophies, transferences...)
16. Narcissism and Altruism
17. Truth and Sophism
18. Empiricism and Rationalism
19. Concreteness and Abrstraction ('Being grounded' and 'flying high with words and abstractions')
20. Classifying, labelling, 'negative labelling', confusing a 'negative label' with the 'reality of the situation and/or the person'.
21. Reductionism and wholism
-- dgb, Sept. 30th, 2008, updated October 1st, 2008.
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