Ac

Actuality

A philosophical concept concerned with the development of processes and conceptions. In social and natural processes, Actuality refers to all the conditions for something, both essential and inessential coming together, and a thing going beyond being a potentiality and becoming a “reality” [ – Reality is a synonym for Actuality].

In Hegel’s Logic, as the third stage of Essence, Actuality is the completion of the genesis of the Notion, in which all the contradictions of this genesis are concentrated leading up to the formation of the Notion. Hegel sees Actuality as the dialectic of possibility & contingency, of Cause & Effect and ultimately of Freedom & Necessity.

In cognition, Actuality refers to understanding something to the point where all the causes and effects are understood in their interconnection with each other and the immediate given form of the thing is understood fully as identical to its existent essential content.

Further Reading: The section on Actuality in Hegel’s Logic, or Hegel’s Outline of Logic and Actuality (Cause & Effect).