To Be or Not to Be? Schelling’s Multidimensional Logic of Being and Non-Being

Abstract

Schelling’s Philosophy of the Ages of the World, which he developed from 1810 until the 1820s, still holds a special appeal for readers today: The countless drafts and notes, never brought into a published version by Schelling, bear witness to an incessant struggle with language and thought, and at the same time can be counted among the most ambitious texts Schelling produced. Schelling’s frequent use of images and metaphors in these texts makes it difficult to recognize the logical and dialectical structures operative in them. However, it will be shown in what follows that these structures are indeed operative and that the text does not proceed merely associatively. In his Philosophy of the Ages of the World, Schelling drafts a new dialectical logic that can and must be placed alongside that of Hegel. Yet, Schelling does not only conceive the logic in terms of an ontology (as does Hegel), but also integrates descriptions relating to will and intuition. These descriptions are not only intended to facilitate the reader’s understanding, but are part of the essence of the logical development itself.