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Is there an end to history?
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Whereas most generally think
of history as a record of past events,
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philosopher Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel
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considered it to be a rational process,
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moving towards completion.
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Make no mistake, by end of history,
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Hegel wasn't prophesying the end of the world,
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but to discover what he did mean we must first ask ourselves,
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"What is history?"
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According to Hegel, history is the progression of reason,
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brought about largely by confrontation and conflict.
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For example, if a group of rebels siege a castle,
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we have two opposing forces,
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the establishment and the challenger.
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Through this conflict, the opposing ideologies will collide
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and produce a new establishment.
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Like the one before it, this idea will eventually
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invite upheaval.
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And the dialectical process, yielding
heightened rationality, will continue.
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But such changes don't occur randomly.
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To Hegel, history is pushed forward by freedom,
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mankind's essential nature.
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As history progresses, we become more self-conscious,
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therefore, more rational.
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And, therefore, more free.
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For example, as a warrior gains more experience points,
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he is granted more skills.
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The more skills he gains, the more choices he has in combat.
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And thus he is freer.
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As the ages pass, we have become more free.
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During the age of the Orient, only the ruler was free.
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In ancient Greece, some were free.
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And in Hegel's time, following the French Revolution,
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it was thought that all should be free.
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So if freedom is the end goal of history,
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will there ever be a perfected state
that invites no more change?
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An end to the dialectic?
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In his book, The Phenomenology of Spirit,
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Hegel devised the concept of "world spirit",
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or the manifestation of reason
exhibited through a society's culture,
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including its philosophy, religion, and art.
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The ultimate freedom will occur when the world spirit,
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or collective consciousness of a culture,
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becomes entirely rational.
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Only then can a unified society
be established in which its laws
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and institutions will invite no more change
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because they are in perfect harmony with their culture.
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And, thus, the dialectical process of history will end.
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Hegel's philosophy of history inspired some of the most
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important thinkers of the 19th century,
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including one young poet who would one day become
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one one of the world's most influential figures.