Formal, transcendental and speculative logic

Abstract

This article aims at exploring and making explicit the relationship between formal and speculative logic. This relationship is built on an internal development of the notion of “logical form”. Firstly, I will take into account Wolff’s logic. I will show that Wolff’s logic is already a logic that goes beyond the formalistic way in which
this discipline is usually conceived. In fact, Wolff conceives of logic as a discipline that concerns “objectivity”. Secondly, I will show that the transcendental step taken by Kant consists in a shift from an abstract conception of the conceptual logical determinations to a theory that understands logical determinations as oriented to the objects of knowledge, that is to say, to the content of knowledge itself. Thirdly, I will show that Hegel’s logical project is not that far from the conceptual network proper to both formal and transcendental logic, since it is an investigation of this very network, that is to say, it is meant to explain the internal structure of each of its knots. More specifically, I will show that Hegel’s aim is to develop a notion of “logical form” that is no more limited by (and dependent on) an external content: for it is an absolute form, that is to say a form that is able to produce its own content through the development of its inner dialectical movement.