Philosophy of Spinoza

This redirect is about the philosophy of Spinoza. For Spinoza's biography, see Baruch Spinoza.

Spinoza lived from 1632 to 1677.

One of the three great Rationalists, Spinoza's philosophy encompasses nearly every area of philosophical discourse, including metaphysics, epistemology, political philosophy, ethics, philosophy of mind and philosophy of science.

Samuel Shirley, who translated Spinoza's complete works into English, summed up the significance of Spinoza's philosophy as follows:

To my mind, although Spinoza lived and thought long before Darwin, Freud, Einstein, and the startling implications of quantum theory, he had a vision of truth beyond what is normally granted to human beings.

Spinoza's philosophy is largely contained in two books: the Theologico-Political Treatise, and The Ethics. The former was published during his lifetime, but the latter, which contains the entirety of his philosophical system in its most rigorous form, was not published until after his death in 1677. The rest of the writings we have from Spinoza are either earlier, or incomplete, works expressing thoughts which were crystalized in the two aforementioned books (e.g., the Short Treatise and the Treatise on the Emendation of the Intellect), or else they are not directly concerned with Spinoza's own philosophy (e.g., The Principles of Cartesian Philosophy and The Hebrew Grammar). He also left behind many letters which help to illuminate his ideas and provide some insight into what may have been motivating his views.

Philosophy of Religion

Spinoza's Philosophy of Religion is largely contained in the Theologico-Political Treatise. In that work he advances the view that we should interpret scripture on its own terms, by carefully studying it, and not with any concepts or doctrines which cannot themselves be derived from the text alone.

Biblical Exegesis

Spinoza expresses his view best in the following sentence from the Preface to the Theological Political Treatise:

[It] is further evident from the fact that most of them assume as a basic principle for the understanding of Scripture and for extracting its true meaning that it is throughout truthful and divine--a conclusion which ought to be the end result of study and strict examination; and they lay down at the outset as a principle of interpretation that which would be far more properly derived from Scripture itself, which stands in no need of human fabrications.

Political Philosophy

Tractatus Theologico-Politicus, a name Wittgenstein later paid homage to in his Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus

Spinoza's political philosophy is deeply influenced by both the turbulent time period in which he lived, and by the fact that he happened to live in a comparatively liberal place in Europe, which allowed him freedoms he wished to preserve and defend, as he says in the Preface to the Theological Political Treatise:

Now since we have the rare good fortune to live in a commonwealth where freedom of judgment is fully granted to the individual citizen and he may worship God as he pleases, and where nothing is esteemed dearer and more precious than freedom, I think I am undertaking no ungrateful or unprofitable task in demonstrating that not only can this freedom be granted without endangering piety and the peace of the commonwealth, but also the peace of the commonwealth and piety depend on this freedom.

For further reference, see: [1]

Philosophy of Mind / Psychology

The Human Mind

Spinoza argues for a distinct conception of the human mind in Part Two of The Ethics. He says the following:

The first thing that constitutes the actual being of a human Mind is nothing but the idea of a singular thing which actually exists.(Ethics, Part Two, Proposition 11)

He then argues that it follows that "the human Mind is a part of the infinite intellect of God."(Curley 1985, pg. 456) Further, in Proposition 12: "Whatever happens in the object of the idea constituting the human Mind must be perceived by the human Mind"(Curley 1985, pg. 456) From this we get a clear rejection of Descartes' mind/body dualism: "The object of the idea constituting the human Mind is the Body, or a certain mode of Extension which actually exists, and nothing else."(Curley 1985, pg. 456)

The Emotions

One thing which seems, on the surface, to distinguish Spinoza's view of the emotions from both Descartes' and Hume's pictures of them is that he takes the emotions to be cognitive in some important respect. Jonathan Bennett claims that "Spinoza mainly saw emotions as caused by cognitions. [Though] he did not say this clearly enough and sometimes lost sight of it entirely." Spinoza provides several demonstrations which purport to show truths about how human emotions work. The picture presented is, according to Bennett, "unflattering, coloured as it is by universal egoism"

Human Freedom

For more, see: [2]

Metaphysics

Spinoza's metaphysics is comprised of one thing, substance, and its modifications (modes). Early in The Ethics Spinoza argues that there is only one substance, which is absolutely infinite, self-caused, and eternal. He calls this substance "God", or "Nature". In fact, he takes these two terms to be synonymous (in the Latin the phrase he uses is "Deus sive Natura"). For Spinoza the whole of the natural universe is comprised of one substance, God, or, what's the same, Nature, and its modifications (modes).

Substance

Spinoza defines "substance" as follows:

By substance I understand what is in itself and is conceived through itself, i.e., that whose concept does not require the concept of another thing, from which it must be formed.

This means, essentially, that substance is just whatever can be thought of without relating it to any other idea or thing. For example, if one thinks of a particular object, one thinks of it as a kind of thing, e.g., x is a cat. Substance, on the other hand, is to be conceived of by itself, without understanding it as a particular kind of thing (because it isn't a particular thing at all).

Attributes

Spinoza defines "attribute" as follows:

By attribute I understand what the intellect perceives of a substance, as constituting its essence.

From this it can be seen that attributes are related to substance in some way. It is not clear, however, even from Spinoza's direct definition, whether, a) attributes are really the way(s) substance is, or b) attributes are simply ways to understand substance, but not necessarily the ways it really is. Spinoza thinks that there are an infinite number of attributes, but there are two attributes that Spinoza thinks we can talk about. Namely, thought and extension.

Thought

The attribute of thought is how substance can be understood to be comprised of thoughts, i.e., thinking things. When we understand a particular thing in the universe through the attribute of thought, we are understanding the mode as an idea of something (either another idea, or an object).

Extension

The attribute of extension is how substance can be understood to be physically extended in space. Particular things which have breadth and depth (that is, occupy space) are what is meant by extended. It follows from this that if substance and God are identical, on Spinoza's view, and contrary to the traditional conception, God has extension as one of his attributes.

Modes

Modes are particular modifications of substance, i.e., particular things in the world. Spinoza gives the following definition:

By mode I understand the affections of a substance, or that which is in another through which it is also conceived.

Substance Monism

The argument for there only being one substance (or, more colloquially, one kind of stuff) in the universe occurs in the first fourteen propositions of The Ethics. The fourteenth proposition expresses Spinoza's commitment to substance monism:

Except God, no substance can be or be conceived.

Spinoza takes this proposition to follow directly from everything he says prior to it. Spinoza's monism is contrasted with Descartes' dualism and Leibniz's pluralism. It allows Spinoza to avoid the problem of interaction between mind and body, which troubled Descartes in his Meditations on First Philosophy.

Causality and Modality

The issue of causality and modality (possibility and necessity) in Spinoza's philosophy is contentious. Spinoza's philosophy is, in one sense, thoroughly deterministic (or necessitarian). This can be seen directly from Axiom 3 of The Ethics:

From a given determinate cause the effect follows necessarily; and conversely, if there is no determinate cause, it is impossible for an effect to follow.

Yet Spinoza seems to make room for a kind of freedom, especially in the fifth and final section of The Ethics, "On the Power of the Intellect, or on Human Freedom":

I pass, finally, to the remaining Part of the Ethics, which concerns the means or way, leading to Freedom. Here, then, I shall treat of the power of reason, showing what it can do against the affects, and what Freedom of Mind, or blessedness, is.

So Spinoza certainly has a use for the word 'freedom', but he equates "Freedom of Mind" with "blessedness", a notion which is not traditionally associated with freedom of the will at all.

The Principle of Sufficient Reason (PSR)

Though the PSR is most commonly associated with Gottfried Leibniz, it is arguably found in its strongest form in Spinoza's philosophy. Within the context of Spinoza's philosophical system, the PSR can be understood to unify causation and explanation. What this means is that for Spinoza, questions regarding the reason why a given phenomena is the way it is (or exists) are always answerable, and are always answerable in terms of the relevant cause(s). This constitutes a rejection of teleological, or final causation, except possibly in a more restricted sense for human beings. Given this, Spinoza's views regarding causality and modality begin to make much more sense.

Parallelism

Spinoza's philosophy contains as a key proposition the notion that mental and physical (thought and extension) phenomena occur in parallel, but without causal interaction between them. He expresses this proposition in The Ethics (Part Two, Proposition 7) as follows:

The order and connection of ideas is the same as the order and connection of things.

His proof of this proposition is that it is clear from Axiom 4 of Part One of The Ethics, namely:

The knowledge of an effect depends on, and involves, the knowledge of its cause.

The reason Spinoza thinks the parallelism follows from this axiom is that since the idea we have of each thing requires knowledge of its cause, and this cause must be understood under the same attribute. Further, there is only one substance, so whenever we understand some chain of ideas of things, we understand that the way the ideas are causally related must be the same as the way the things themselves are related, since the ideas and the things are the same modes understood under different attributes.

Epistemology

Spinoza's epistemology is deeply rationalist. That is, unlike the later empiricists who rejected knowledge of things as they are in themselves (in favour of knowledge merely of what appears to the senses), Spinoza thinks we can have a priori knowledge, knowledge of a world external from our sense perceptions, and further, that this is tantamount to knowledge of God. The majority of Spinoza's epistemological claims come in Part Two of The Ethics.

Truth and Falsity

Spinoza's notions of truth and falsity have to do with the relation between ideas and their objects. He thinks that:

Every idea that in us is absolute, or adequate and perfect, is true. (Ethics Part 2, Proposition 34)

Falsity consists in the privation of knowledge which inadequate, or mutilated and confused, ideas involve.(Ethics, Part Two, Proposition 35)

Adequate Ideas

From this it is clear that the notions of adequate and inadequate ideas are important for understanding how Spinoza's view works. This may be explained in the following way. Spinoza argues that "All ideas, insofar as they are related to God, are true."(Ethics, Part Two, Proposition 32) Since by "God", he means the one substance which exists necessarily and absolutely infinitely, it follows that an idea (a particular mode under the attribute of thought) as it is without reference to knowledge a particular person has, is necessarily true, since it just is a particular instance of God's essence. That is, true ideas are true because they "agree entirely with their objects"(Ethics, Part Two, Proposition 32) These ideas are, then, perfectly adequate.

Inadequate Ideas

Spinoza argues: "All ideas are in God; and, insofar as they are related to God, are true, and adequate. And so there are no inadequate or confused ideas except insofar as they are related to the singular Mind of someone."(Ethics, Part Two, Proposition 36, Demonstration)

Three Kinds of Knowledge

Spinoza discusses the three kinds of knowledge in Scholium 2 of Proposition 40 of Part Two of The Ethics.

The First Kind of Knowledge

Spinoza thinks there are two ways we can have the first kind of knowledge:

1. From random experience: "from singular things which have been represented to us through the senses in a way that is mutilated, confused, and without order for the intellect; for that reasons I have been accustomed to call such perceptions knowledge from random experience."(Curley 1985, pg. 477)
2. From imagination: "from signs, e.g., from the fact that, having heard or read certain words, we recollect things, and form certain ideas of them, which are like them, and through which we imagine the things."(Curley 1985, pg. 477-478)

He calls these two ways "knowledge of the first kind, opinion or imagination."(Curley 1985, pg. 478)

The Second Kind of Knowledge

Spinoza argues that the second kind of knowledge arises:

from the fact that we have common notions and equate ideas of the properties of things."(Curley 1985, pg. 478)

He goes on to explain what this means in the propositions which immediately follow.

The Third Kind of Knowledge

This can be referred to as Intuition, but it means something rather technical for Spinoza. The third kind of knowledge is a particularly important part of Spinoza's philosophy because it is what he thinks allows us to have adequate knowledge, and therefore know things absolutely truly. As he says:

there is (as I shall show in what follows) another, third kind, which we shall call intuitive knowledge. And this kind of knowing proceeds from an adequate idea of certain attributes of God to the adequate knowledge of the essence of things.(Curley 1985, pg. 478)

Ethics

The opening page of Spinoza's magnum opus, Ethics

Spinoza's ethical views are deeply tied to his metaphysical system. This is evident from the following claim (The Ethics, Part 4, Preface):

As far as good and evil are concerned, they also indicate nothing positive in things, considered in themselves, nor are they anything other than modes of thinking, or notions we form because we compare things to one another.

It is also apparent from this that he is a kind of subjectivist about moral values. That is, he does not take good and evil to be real properties/facts in the objects we attribute them to, but rather, they are simply thoughts we have about the comparative value of one thing to another for a particular person.

"Good" and "Evil"

Spinoza gives the following definitions of "Good", and "Evil" in Part Four of The Ethics:

By good I shall understand what we certainly know to be useful to us.

By evil, however, I shall understand what we certainly know prevents us from being masters of some good.

From this it is clear that Spinoza's view of moral value is in some sense instrumental. That is, the goodness or badness of a particular object or action is measured not by some intrinsic property, but by whether we take it to be useful to us or not.

Blessedness

Spinoza's notion of blessedness figures centrally in his ethical philosophy. Blessedness (or salvation or freedom), Spinoza thinks,

consists...in a constant and eternal love of God, or in God's love for men

. And this means, as Jonathan Bennett explains, that "Spinoza wants "blessedness" to stand for the most elevated and desirable state one could possibly be in"(Bennett 1984, pg. 371)

See also

• Baruch Spinoza
• René Descartes
• Gottfried Leibniz
• Thomas Hobbes
• Rationalism
• Necessitarianism
• Determinism
• Free Will

Further Reading

• Jonathan Bennett, A Study of Spinoza's Ethics.
• Michael Della Rocca, Spinoza.
• Edwin M. Curley, Behind the Geometrical Method.
• Steven Nadler, Spinoza's Ethics: An Introduction.