Georg Hegel

1770-1831 Hegel, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich

German philosopher who developed a dialectical scheme that emphasized the progress of history and of ideas from thesis to antithesis to a synthesis. Hegel was the last of the great philosophical system builders. His work, following Immanuel Kant, Johann Gottlieb Fichte, and Friedrich Schelling, thus marks the pinnacle of classical German philosophy. An absolute idealist inspired by Christian insights, Hegel found a place for everything—logical, natural, human, and divine—in a dialectical scheme that repeatedly swung from thesis to antithesis and back again to a higher and richer synthesis. His influence has been as fertile in the reactions that he precipitated—in Søren Kierkegaard, the Danish existentialist; in the Marxists, who turned to social action; in the logical positivists; and in G.E. Moore and Bertrand Russell, both pioneering figures in British analytic philosophy—as in his positive impact.