Stephen Houlgate, in his book The Beginning of Hegel's Logic, puts forward the argument that Hegel's Logic is to be seen as an ontology. But is this view convincing? I'll try my best to reconstruct the argument for you, so you can assess it.
The Logic starts with the thought of indeterminacy or pure Being. As this thought is indeterminate it doesn't allow for any opposition between conciousness and the external world to be contained in it. This is why the thought of Being must be thought of as the opening up of thought towards Being. This leads to the conclusion that the thought of Being is not merely a thought, but it is Being that is thought. The thought of Being and Being itself are indistinguishable in pure indeterminacy. Indeed, the thought of Being and Being itself are identical in pure indeterminacy.
Now every logical step that follows from Being ("nothing", "being-there" etc.) follows necessarily. But this means nothing other than that all that follows in the Logic is not only a determination of thought but also a determination of Being. So the categories investigated in the Logic are ontological as well as epistemological in character. They display the necessary structure of thought as it thinks Being as well as the necessary structure of Being which my be the object of thought.
Is this interpretation of the beginning of the Logic concincing? More precisely, is it convincing philologically, i.e. does the text really yield this reading? And second, systematically spoken, is it sound?
Have a nice day
Edit: The situation may be different for the "Logic of the Concept". For the sake of simplicity I would like to constrain my question to the "Logic of Being" and the "Logic of Essence".
