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{{ZA}}

There are, roughly speaking, two philosophical approaches to an antagonistic constellation of either/or: either one opts for one pole against the other (Good against Evil, freedom against oppression, morality against hedonism, etc.), or one adopts a "deeper" attitude of emphasizing the complicity of the opposites, and of advocating a proper measure or the unity. Although Hegel's dialectic seems a version of the second approach (the "synthesis" of opposites), he opts for an unheard-of THIRD version: the way to resolve the deadlock is neither to engage oneself in fighting for the "good" side against the "bad" one, nor in trying to bring them together in a balanced "synthesis," but in opting for the BAD side of the initial either/or. Of course, this "choice of the worst" fails, but in this failure, it undermines the entire field of the alternative and thus enables us to overcome its terms. (Say, in politics, in the choice between organic unity and destructive terror, the only way to arrive at the truth is to begin with the "wrong" choice.) Therein resides the insurmountable difference between Hegel and the New Age notion of balancing the opposites.<br><br>