Are There Simple Objects? Hegel’s Discussion of Kant’s Second Antinomy in Relation to Wittgenstein’s Tractatus

Wittgenstein’s Tractatus is marked by an internal tension between an analytic principle (centred on the concept of simple object) and a synthetic one (centred on the concept of form). I call this tension “the Cosmological Antinomy” of the Tractatus. I try then to deal with this issue on the basis of Hegel’s discussion of Kant’s second antinomy in the Science of Logic, where the general, anti-analytical presuppositions of Hegel’s philosophy clearly emerge. Hegel’s philosophy, as a philosophy of movement, of becoming and of life, is a philosophy of continuum, which contrasts with every atomistic conception of the world.