The future is neither fully visible nor invisible but frustrates anticipation by surprise

Evidence

Why, at the end of this work, do we invoke the concept of reading? The reason is clear. The Hegelian idea of plastic reading confers on the notion of ‘to see (what is) coming’ its real meaning. ‘To see (what is) coming’ denotes at once the visibility and the invisibility of whatever comes. The future is not the absolutely invisible, a subject of pure transcendence objecting to any anticipation at all, to any knowledge, to any speech. Nor is the future the absolutely visible, an object clearly and absolutely foreseen. It frustrates any anticipation by its precipitation, its power to surprise. ‘To see (what is) coming’ thus means to see without seeing – await without awaiting – a future which is neither present to the gaze nor hidden from it. Now isn’t this situation of ‘in-between’ par excellence the situation of reading? — Catherine Malabou, The Future of Hegel, 1239 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

To distinguish this structure from the future as it is ordinarily understood, we will name this structure ‘to see (what is) coming’ (le ‘voir venir’), obeying Hegel’s injunction to philosophize in one’s own idiom. ‘Voir venir’ in French means to wait, while, as is prudent, observing how events are developing. But it also suggests that other people’s intentions and plans must be probed and guessed at. It is an expression that can thus refer at one and the same time to the state of ‘being sure of what is coming’ (‘être sûr de ce qui vient’) and of ‘not knowing what is coming’ (‘ne pas savoir ce qui va venir’). It is on this account that the ‘voir venir’, ‘to see (what is) coming’, can represent that interplay, within Hegelian philosophy, of teleological necessity and surprise. — Catherine Malabou, The Future of Hegel, 250 (#expands, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Reaching a projected future never delivers what was awaited, yielding structural disillusion — Jean-Paul Sartre, Being and Nothingness: An Essay on…, 453; An open project enfolds future modifications, so catastrophe feels fated rather than surprising; The future is neither wholly invisible nor foreseeable but surprises by precipitation — Catherine Malabou, The Future of Hegel: Plasticity,…, 1239 (+3 more)

Related

• The future is neither wholly invisible nor foreseeable but surprises by precipitation (similarity 0.94)
• The future’s anticipatory structure holds teleological necessity and surprise together (similarity 0.92)
• The Hegelian future is neither foreseeable nor hidden but an in-between (similarity 0.91)
• The future is what the For-itself has yet to become, its determining possible being. (similarity 0.89)
• One expression can hold certainty and ignorance of the future together. (similarity 0.88)
• The French idiom ‘voir venir’ fuses certainty and ignorance of what comes (similarity 0.87)
• Seeing what comes means seeing without seeing, a future neither visible nor hidden (similarity 0.86)
• Positing the future as plasticity displaces the future’s definition as a moment of time (similarity 0.86)
• Reading is the in-between experience of seeing and not seeing what comes (similarity 0.86)
• Anticipation of the future always operates through some form of blindness. (similarity 0.84)
• Anticipation and radical surprise coexist within a single act of awaiting the future. (similarity 0.84)
• Reading Hegel requires a beginning that both foresees and does not foresee what follows (similarity 0.83)
• A truly open future requires an accidental, non-appropriable event. (similarity 0.82)
• Understanding surprise in advance may itself defuse the shock (similarity 0.82)
• The future requires both anticipation and absolute surprise working together (similarity 0.81)

Broader Connections

• The future is neither wholly invisible nor foreseeable but surprises by precipitation #corroborates (0.95) — Catherine Malabou, The Future of Hegel, 1239
• The future’s anticipatory structure holds teleological necessity and surprise together #expands (0.80) — Catherine Malabou, The Future of Hegel, 250