The question of desire in Hegel and Lacan

Abstract

These reflections aim at showing how the question of desire is developed by two thinkers who, at first sight, are not related to each other: Hegel and Lacan. The first is a German philosopher who lived between the 18th and 19th century, and that belongs to the so-called idealistic philosophy. The latter is a French psychoanalyst who lived within the 20th century, and that is situated in the theoretical current founded by Freud. Nonetheless, both thinkers converge in the insights they elaborated about desire, so that the main issue that stands out,
both in Hegel and Lacan, is the acknowledgement of desire by another desire. This is the reason why this text is divided, from the formal
point of view, in four major parts: a brief introduction; 1. Desire: attempts at a definition; 2. Dialectic of dominion and servitude; 3. Lacan: desire and language. In this last part, emphasis is placed on the question of the real, that is, on that by which all the philosophers
try, in vain, to reach the signification as such.