Habit’s simplification costs spirit a sacrificial alienation of itself.

Evidence

Habit is the process whereby the contingent becomes essential. Man can ‘present the genus’to the degree that habit is the unforeseen element of the genus. Habit, then, appears as the future of the undifferentiated genus. — Catherine Malabou, The Future of Hegel, 601 (#expands, via linked claim)

With habit, a new form of the soul’s relation to its body comes into view, and this delivers the spirit from the threat of madness. In the etymology of the word ‘habit’ we discover the Latin word habere: habit is a way of ‘having’, and, in this sense, a kind of possession, a property. We see the same semantic connection between the Greek word ις which derives from the verb “ειν. This verb means ‘to have’, but as soon as it is followed by an adverb, it changes its meaning to include ‘the state of being in one way or another’. #Εειν is therefore a particular kind of having which becomes a way of being. Hegel brings out here the sense of a ‘having’ derived from a ‘mechanism’. Habit is in truth ‘mechanism of self-feeling’ (Mechanismus des Selbstgefühls). — Catherine Malabou, The Future of Hegel, 384 (#expands, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Simplification makes determinations both more and less universal, mourning what it suppresses — Catherine Malabou, The Future of Hegel: Plasticity,…, 1058; Habit etymologically converts having into a way of being — Catherine Malabou, The Future of Hegel: Plasticity,…, 384; Habit is spirit’s mechanism for converting resistance into supple instruments. (+3 more)

Related

• Habit is spirit’s reduction of nature into possessable logical determinations (similarity 0.89)
• Habit entails spirit’s self-sacrifice into lifeless determinate form (similarity 0.88)
• Habit transforms contingent acts into essential determinations of being. (similarity 0.86)
• Habit etymologically converts having into a way of being (similarity 0.86)
• Habit is the process whereby contingent determinations become essential (similarity 0.86)
• Habit is spirit’s mechanism for converting resistance into supple instruments. (similarity 0.85)
• Habit is the plastic operation rendering the body fully pervious (similarity 0.84)
• Habit makes the soul regain a second nature (similarity 0.84)
• Habit is an intentionally-produced alteration that defines how humans acquire form (similarity 0.83)
• Man’s habit-forming power exemplifies spirit’s incarnation in time. (similarity 0.83)
• Habit is the condensation of an organism’s environment into its constitution. (similarity 0.83)
• Habit enables the soul to hold content without immersion or indifference. (similarity 0.83)
• Habit produces the plastic character making man both universal and individual. (similarity 0.83)
• Habit is a genuine plasticity translating psychic and somatic into one another (similarity 0.83)
• Habit, following Aristotle, is an alteration that does not corrupt but forms spirit. (similarity 0.82)

Broader Connections

• Habit transforms contingent acts into essential determinations of being. #expands (0.85) — Catherine Malabou, The Future of Hegel, 601
• Habit etymologically converts having into a way of being #expands (0.82) — Catherine Malabou, The Future of Hegel, 384
• Habit is spirit’s mechanism for converting resistance into supple instruments. #expands (0.78)