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Faculty of Arts and Philosophy Student number 01105279 Academic year 2015 – 2016
Spinoza on Human Nature An inquiry to Spinoza’s conception of the essence of man
Master Thesis submitted in fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of
Master in the Arts of Philosophy by Camille Blanckaert
Promotor: prof. dr. Eric Schliesser
Co-‐promotor: dr. Daniel Schneider
Committee member: dr. Michael Istvan
Statement relating to copyright The author and promotor give the permission to use this thesis for consultation and to
copy parts of it for personal use. Every other use is subject to the copyright laws, more
specifically the source must be extensively specified when using from this thesis.
Camille Blanckaert. Ghent, August 2016
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Word count 1: 31573
Word count 2: 33480
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Acknowledgements A little more than a year ago, I finished Spinoza’s Ethics for the first time. In the five years I
have studied philosophy I have never encountered a philosopher that has fascinated me
the way Spinoza does. Now, many months of intensive study later, I am still as captivated
by Spinoza as I was the first time I went through his writings. At first, it needs some
perseverance to get past his rigorous geometrical method–which I learned to appreciate
over time–but if you carry through, a most beautiful philosophy unfolds. Although Spinoza
lived and wrote in the 17th century, still a lot of his ideas are inspiring today and, if I’m
honest, I have to say that reading the Ethics truly has changed me. I was in a different place
the first time I laid my hands on the Ethics and, before I really realized it, this book became
the safe ship that would guide me to another place. A better one. Spinoza taught me how to
let go, and that’s why I have not let go of him. Although it’s time now to put away the Ethics
for a little while, this is certainly not goodbye.
I came to this research question during one of Daniel Schneider’s seminars on Spinoza
during spring 2015 and I’m glad that dr. Schneider later agreed to be my supervisor on this
project. Daniel, I want to thank you, not only for your insights and guidance through this
year, but also for introducing me to Spinoza’s thought in the most inspiring and passionate
way. I also want to thank dr. Istvan for being so kind to share his dissertation with me and
for his useful comments that have guided me through the abstract world of universals.
Next, I want to thank professor Schliesser for his willingness to promote this thesis.
Lastly, I want to thank my friends and family. In particular I want to thank Camille, Barbara
and Rafael, for helping me out when it was most needed; my flatmate, Dylan, for always
believing in me and my boyfriend Nelis, for being there for me every step of the way. But
most of all I want to thank my mother, for the courage she showed in the last couple of
years and for passing this on to my sister, to me and to everyone she knows.
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Table of contents
Word count ............................................................................................................................................. v
Acknowledgements .......................................................................................................................... vii
Table of contents .................................................................................................................................ix
Abbreviations .......................................................................................................................................xi
Introduction ...........................................................................................................................................1
1. Nominalism and Realism explained..........................................................................................4 1.1. Introduction..............................................................................................................................................4
1.2. Nominalism ...............................................................................................................................................7
1.2.1. Non-‐Constituent Anti-‐Realism......................................................................................................................7
1.2.2. Constituent Anti-‐Realism or Trope Theory.......................................................................................... 12
1.3. Realism .................................................................................................................................................... 14
1.3.2. Non-‐Relational or Immanent Realism .................................................................................................... 16
2. Fundamental notions in Spinoza’s metaphysics ................................................................ 18
3. Spinoza and universals ............................................................................................................... 25 3.1 Spinoza as a Realist .............................................................................................................................. 25
3.1.2 Literature ............................................................................................................................................................. 25
3.2 Spinoza as a Nominalist ...................................................................................................................... 35
3.2.1. Spinoza on universals .................................................................................................................................... 36
3.2.2. The ontological status of the attributes ................................................................................................. 40
3.2.3. The attributes are real, but not universal ............................................................................................. 46
3.2.4. Spinoza’s theory of knowledge .................................................................................................................. 52
3.2.5. Spinoza on essences ....................................................................................................................................... 56
3.2.6. Spinoza’s conception of man ...................................................................................................................... 64
3.2.7. Spinoza’s Nominalism explained .............................................................................................................. 64
4. Spinoza’s ethics.............................................................................................................................. 68 4.1. Introduction........................................................................................................................................... 68
4.2. The conatus ............................................................................................................................................ 70
4.3. Good, evil and the model of the free man .................................................................................... 76
4.4. Spinoza’s moral philosophy ............................................................................................................. 80
4.4.1. 4P30 – 4P37 ....................................................................................................................................................... 82
4.4.2. Human nature ................................................................................................................................................... 84
5.Conclusion........................................................................................................................................ 88
Bibliography........................................................................................................................................ 91
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Abbreviations
Used translations of Spinoza’s works
For the Ethics and all other words of Spinoza I am using Curley’s translation in (a), except
for Spinoza’s letters, for which I use Shirley’s translation in (b).
(a) Spinoza, Benedictus de. The Collected Works of Spinoza. Edited and translated by E. M.
Curley. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1985.
(b) Spinoza, Benedictus de. The Letters. Edited by Steven Barbone, Lee Rice, and Jacob Adler.
Translated by Samuel Shirley. Indianapolis, Ind: Hackett Pub. Co, 1995.
In this paper the following abbreviations were used:
In the Ethics
A axiom
defaff definition of the affects in the third part of the Ethics
app appendix
def definition
dem demonstration
cor corollary
l lemma
exp explanation
P proposition
post postulate
pref preface
S scholium
For instance, 5P42S stands for the Scholium of the 42nd proposition of the fifth part of the
Ethics.
xii
Spinoza’s other works CM Metaphysical Thoughts
Ep Epistolae
KV Short Treatise on God, Man and His Well-‐being
TIE Treatise on the Emendation of the Intellect
1
Introduction
In his Ethics Spinoza speaks often of human nature. The importance of this term should not
be underestimated, because it seems to form the link between his metaphysics and his
moral and political theory. But, then–before anything else–one question emerges. How
should we comprehend Spinoza’s conception of the human essence? Does he hold that the
human nature is a universal one, which can then be instantiated in infinite many particular
human beings? In other words, does Spinoza allow for species-‐essence in his philosophy?1
Or should we interpret essences as always being particular, meaning that every man’s
essence is numerically distinct from another’s essence? This problem will be the main
subject of this thesis. It’s one specific part of the question where Spinoza exactly stands in
the debate concerning universals. Although this debate has existed for a while now, still no
consensus has been reached among Spinoza scholars and has known a wide range of
answers, going from various kinds in Nominalism to Platonic or Relational Realism. An
explanation for this can be found in the fact that there appear to be various valid
arguments for a Nominalist reading as well as for a Realist interpretation. This paper is
intended to find out which of those arguments is wrongly interpreted to be supportive of a
Realist or a Nominalist view.
The reason why Spinoza’s position in the debate of the problem of universals is
problematic, mainly revolves around his concept of the human nature or essence, which
seems to be Realist in nature, and his clear rejection of species-‐essences in 2P40S1. The
reason why it is important to find out whether or not Spinoza allowed species-‐essences in
his ontology, is because both answers provide us with a different understanding of
Spinoza’s moral philosophy. In the former case there is truly a general human essence in
which we all share and that binds us all together. In the latter case, human nature is only a
useful construct, which means that Spinoza will have to rely on something else to build his
collaborative morality from.
In this thesis I will argue that Spinoza didn’t allow universal essences neither in his
ontology nor in his moral philosophy, but that he uses Realist terms as human nature as
1 When I speak about species, I mean species of all kinds. If there is a general nature for human beings, there will be a universal essence for all genera.
2
mere modes of thinking, which allows him to more easily explain his views on morality and
politics. This solves the apparent problem of Spinoza’s usage of certain ‘Realist’ concepts in
his moral and political theory and his conception of man. To come to this conclusion, this
inquiry to Spinoza’s conception on universal entities is divided in two different parts: an
analysis of Spinoza’s metaphysics followed by an analysis of his conception of man and
ethics. I do this because Spinoza’s metaphysics has explanatory priority over his
conception of man, his moral philosophy and his political theory. This means that Spinoza
should treat universal essences in latter part in the same way as he does in the former part.
That is, at least, if Spinoza’s metaphysics are consistent with the moral philosophy that
should flow out of it. This research will thus also focus on Spinoza’s consistency on his
conception of universals through his Ethics.
I will start with a discussion of the main positions in Nominalism as well as in Realism,
where I will point out which particular position in Nominalism Spinoza endorses, which is
Trope Theory or Constituent Anti-‐Realism. The reason why I present a detailed discussion
of the other schools in Nominalism and Realism is because in order to provide a rejection
for a certain interpretation, an explanation of what exactly that theory consists of is
needed.
After this, I will continue with a short summary of some of the fundamental notions in
Spinoza’s ontology. I will use this chapter to point out the various elements in his
metaphysics that I will focus on in the following part of this paper.
Next, I will present the multiple possible arguments for Realism that can be given, mainly
by discussing Realist literature, after which I will present my own analysis of Spinoza’s
position towards universal essences where I will conclude that he is best understood as a
Nominalist, and more specifically as endorsing Trope Theory. In this analysis I will often
hark back to Realist arguments. By showing where and why they fail, I can argue why a
Nominalist reading is preferable. The most important arguments in this section of my
thesis will concern the ontological status of the attributes, where I will conclude that the
attributes are real but not universal, the fact that adequate knowledge is possible in a
Nominalist interpretation of Spinoza’s attributes and, lastly, that Spinoza understood
formal essences as well as actual essences to be unique to the thing that possesses it.
To end, I will move on to Spinoza’s moral philosophy, where I will show that, although it
doesn’t seem this way at first sight, it is consistent with Spinoza’s denial of universal
3
essences in his ontology. Therefore I will start with examining Spinoza’s conatus doctrine,
where I will argue that a thing’s conatus, or its actual essence, is particular and unique to
its possessor. This means that there are no species-‐essences according to Spinoza. My next
step, then, will be to prove how Spinoza can build a collaborative ethics out of something as
particular as the conatus doctrine. I do this because the main argument that supports this
view is 4P30-‐31, which shows that men can agree in nature. Agreement in nature is hereby
the last term that seems Realist I have to analyze to prove that there doesn’t have to be
anything universal about having something in common according to your nature. I will
argue that this agreement in nature does indeed mean we have something in common with
other men, but not that this entails that we share something strictly identical. What we
have in common with each other is our set of adequate ideas, which are not strictly
identical, but are best to be understood as tropes. This means that they can be exactly
similar while still being numerically distinct.
With this I will conclude that Spinoza does not allow for universal essences, not in his
ontology nor in his moral philosophy. Although it is true that Spinoza often uses terms that
seem Realist in nature, he only uses these terms as modes of thinking. These are no real
beings but mind-‐dependent concepts we can use to better describe and understand the
world that surrounds us. I will argue that, as long as we are aware that terms like human
nature don’t refer to anything real, there is no problem in using them.
4
1. Nominalism and Realism explained
1.1. Introduction
Before I will start my analysis of Realist as well as Nominalist arguments to find out
whether or not Spinoza understood human nature to be universal, I will first discuss
most schools in Nominalism as well as Realism. After having summarized a certain
branch of Realism or Anti-‐Realism, I will shortly explain how we should analyze
Spinoza’s conception of man according to this theory, and with this I will also shortly
point out why and which kinds are (in)consistent with Spinoza’s philosophy.
The problem of universals is an old one. It has been around since at least the time of
Plato and although many philosophers (from Aquinas to Ockham to Peirce) have tried to
solve it, the debate still continues today.
A good way to introduce the problem of universals is nineteenth century philosopher C.
S. Peirce’s distinction between a token and a type. In brief, Peirce displays the following:
The The
and then asks how many words there are. Now there are two ways to answer this
question: on the one hand, one can say that there are two words but on the other hand it
is also legitimate to say that there is only one word. Peirce’s answer to the question
would have been that there are two tokens of the same type.2 From this simple example
the problem of universals clearly emerges: how should we analyze the sameness of
type? Are both ‘the’s’ to be seen as two numerically distinct particulars, only united by
something as, for example, resemblance, or are both words an instance of the same
universal.3
Although he initially used this question to talk about semantics, it is perfectly possible
to apply this distinction to examples that concern more to the topic of my research
2 Spinoza, “Treatise on the Emendation of the Intellect.” 3 A universal is apt to be one and the same in many. It is a qualitas entity, or in other words a property, a nature, an essence, a type, that allows identity in diversity. For example, if roundness is a universal, then everything that is round will be an instance of the universal roundness. It provides a tighter connection between two particular objects than exact resemblance. Istvan, “Spinoza and the Problem of Universals: A Study and Research Guide.”
5
question, namely ‘Does Spinoza allow for universal essences in his Ethics? In other
words: how should we understand the human essence (or the essence of a horse or a
table or the little rock in your shoe if you want)? Is it instantiated by all particular men
and, thus, is there something that is the universal human essence (or horseness,
stoneness, etc.) or does every man possess its own, individual, particular essence? And
how should we analyze the fact that two people can seem to share the same property,
take for example the characteristic of rationality?
Now the dispute between the Realists and the Nominalists is not about whether or not,
there are two tokens of the same type in the above table, but about how we should
analyze their ‘sameness’. I will cite Butler’s distinction in identity to better understand
what the trouble is all about.4 According to the eighteenth-‐century philosopher, Bishop
Joseph Butler, there are two ways of looking at identity: identity in the strict sense and
in a loose and popular sense.5 Strict identity can be defined as: a and b are identical if
and only if a possesses the exact same properties as b.6 Now take the example of the sea
yesterday and that same sea today. According to the principle of the Indiscernibility of
Identicals the former can’t be strictly identical to the latter, for its properties can vary
from day to day. One day a sea can be heavy and treacherous but calm and peaceful the
next. We can say that we are looking at different parts of a larger unity. Butler’s nuance
of identity clarifies why something as ‘sameness’ needs a little bit more specification.
What does it mean when two tokens are of the same type? Are they both strictly
identical or should we understand this identity in a loose and popular manner?7
With this in mind, we can pick up where we left off: the Problem of Universals. That is,
how can different particulars own the same property?
When you define the identity between two tokens in terms of strict identity, you find
yourself in the camp of the Realists. Most of this group of philosophers accept, next to
particular entities, a kind of entity–universals–that is apt to be one in the many. This
4 Consulted via Armstrong, Universals. An Opinionated Introduction. 5 Butler’s main concern, however, had nothing to do with the Problem of Universals, but was about identity over time. 6 This is also known as the Indiscernibility of Identicals and can be expressed in symbols as: (∀P)(∀x)(∀y)((x=y)⊃(Px≡Py)) with P standing for property and x and y for entities. 7 Armstrong, Universals. An Opinionated Introduction.
6
means that, for instance, when there are two brown horses on a meadow, both are an
instance of the universal nature of horseness. In other words, they possess the exact
same essence that is wholly and equally present in each of them.
Anti-‐Realists, also known as Nominalists, will understand this ‘sameness’ only in the
loose and popular sense. For them, the tightest agreement we can allow between the
two horses is exact similarity–a now rather vague term that will become clear later on in
this chapter. From this it follows that both entities will each have their own particular
essence.8 The Nominalists understand everything in the world as particular or
individual, meaning that there is no room for something as the universal essence of
‘horseness’ in their ontology. They might try to describe both horses, for instance, as
being different members of the same class to explain their sameness of type, nature or
species.
Before I continue with a more detailed discussion of various Nominalist and Realist
schools, I would like to add an extra word on properties and relations. A Realist accepts
properties in his metaphysics and will treat them as real constituents of things, while the
question of the ontological status of properties has lead to division in the Nominalist
camp: extreme Anti-‐Realists reject properties while moderate Nominalists allow them,
on the condition that they are particular.
So let’s go back to those two horses in the meadow, both being the exact same shade of
brown. A Realist will say that those horses really possess or share a couple of properties
that are strictly identical9, in this case: horseness and brownness among others. Since
Realists allow universals in their ontology, they will understand the brownness as a
universal. In this case, the color brown is a universal property that can be instantiated in
infinitely many individuals. Or, in other words, all brown things are instances of the
universal brown. Extreme Nominalists, also called Non-‐Constituent Anti-‐Realists, will
allow talk about properties, since it is impossible to ignore them in practice, but will try
to use, for example, something as a natural class to explain the similarity of both horses.
While Moderate Anti-‐Realists, also known as Constituent Anti-‐Realists or Trope
Theorists, will understand this as both horses actually having the property of being
8 It needs to be noted here that not all Nominalists would follow this. Some Nominalists deny essences altogether. Istvan, “Spinoza and the Problem of Universals: A Study and Research Guide.” 9 This means they are not even numerically distinct.
7
brown but that each horse’s brownness will be particular and numerically different from
the other. Both color tropes will be exactly similar but not strictly identical to each other.
In general, Realists explain agreement between two individuals in the sense of strict
identity. They deny that there are only particulars in the world and accept the existence
of universal properties and relations, that fulfill the role of the constituent of particular
things. Nominalists, however, allow only individuals in their ontology and thus analyze
agreement between two entities in the sense of loose identity. Two entities can be
identical in no respect, only exactly similar. Some variants of Nominalism will deny that
an individual can really possess properties, while others welcome particular properties
when it comes to characterizing individuals.
1.2. Nominalism
The acceptance or denial of the existence of properties is not the only dispute that
divides the various Nominalist schools. Except for the fact that they all agree that
everything in the world is particular, there are many different ways in how the apparent
identity between different individuals is explained. I already discussed the first
fundamental division in the Nominalist tradition, namely between the extreme Anti-‐
Realists, a view that reached its peak especially in the early modern period; and the
moderate Anti-‐Realism, a theory that enjoys more popularity today than it ever did.10
We can further divide extreme Nominalism in objective Relational, subjective Relational
and a Non-‐Relational varieties, as will become clear from the following discussion.
1.2.1. Non-‐Constituent Anti-‐Realism
The first tradition of Nominalism I will discuss is Non-‐Constituent Anti-‐Realism. This
approach used to be very popular but now has fewer supporters than before. As already
explained above, Non-‐Constituent Anti-‐Realists will not allow properties in their
ontology. This means they will have to find another solution to explain how individuals,
the only entities they allow, can seem to be of the same sort or nature. As will become
clear in the next chapter, this kind of Nominalism will turn out to be insufficient to
explain the apparent identity between individuals for Spinoza. There are two reasons for 10 In what follows, I have mainly based myself on the structure of the second chapter in Istvan, “Spinoza and the Problem of Universals: A Study and Research Guide.”
8
this. Firstly, the denial that properties exist cannot be reconciled with multiple aspects
in Spinoza’s philosophy. In his theory of knowledge, adequate knowledge of the
properties of things can be obtained by reason. From this knowledge and the knowledge
of the common notions, it’s possible to proceed to the third kind of knowledge, which is,
as will become clear, the greatest good the human mind can attain. Spinoza doesn’t only
allow properties in finite modes, he attributes properties to substance as well. Next to
stating that the finite modes are in fact nothing else than God’s properties (by
1P16dem), in the KV he also makes clear that ‘being the cause of all things, the greatest
good, eternal, and immutable, etc.’ are all propria of God.11 The second reason why
Spinoza can’t endorse a Non-‐Constituent Anti-‐Realism, as Istvan notes, is because of the
ontological status of the attributes.12 This argument will be discussed and made more
clear in the third chapter.
The two possible analyses of how an individual can be characterized are Relational and
Non-‐Relational Non-‐Constituent Anti-‐Realism.
a) Relational Non-‐Constituent Anti-‐Realism
There are many different types of Relational Non-‐Constituent Anti-‐Realism but what
binds them all is the way they characterize an individual. For o to be F, the non-‐property
individual o must be in relation to another non-‐property individual F. This means that it
is impossible to characterize an entity outside of a relation and that there is nothing like
Fness that o really can have. For instance, two round apples will not actually own the
property ‘roundness’ and their sameness will not be explained in terms of strict identity,
but knows a variety of explanations.
The two big groups we can distinguish in Relational Nominalism are a subjective one,
including Predicate Nominalism and Concept Nominalism, and an objective one, with
Class Nominalism, Mereological Nominalism and Resemblance Nominalism as its most
notable branches.
11 Spinoza, “Short Treatise on God, Man, and His Well-‐Being.”, P. 89. 12 Istvan, “Spinoza and the Problem of Universals: A Study and Research Guide.”
9
Subjective The subjectivist analysis analyzes o’s being F in terms of o’s relation to the classifying
mind, instead of in virtue of the things themselves. The two most popular kinds of
subjective Relational Anti-‐Realism are Predicate and Concept Nominalism.
Predicate Nominalism explains the sameness between different particulars by stating
that o has the property F if and only if o falls under the predicate ‘F’.13 This view is
classified under Relational Nominalism, because outside of o’s relation to the predicate
term ‘F’ it would be wrong to characterize o as F. It is subjective because there is no
foundation in reality to be found for o’s characterization as ‘F’ except for the fact that we
applied this predicate to it. There is nothing in the world like roundness that a round
individual as an apple can have as a property.14 If we wouldn’t have invented the
predicate ‘round’, the apple would in fact not even be round. The truthmaker for o’s
being F is merely a word.15 Concept Nominalism basically works in the same way, only
the predicate gets replaced by the mental entity of a concept. In other words, an apple is
round if and only if it falls under the mental concept of roundness.
Both forms share the general form of explanation that we can only say that o is F
because we have classified them under a certain man-‐made predicate term or concept.
Objective Falling under Non-‐Constituent Anti-‐Realism, objective Relational Nominalists also deny
that entities can have properties. So what they have in common with the former
tradition, is that they both don’t analyze o’s being F as a matter of a property of o, but
they disagree with the subjectivists by holding that it is merely a matter of the
classifying function of our minds. Objectivists hold that o can be characterized as F,
independent of the classifying mind. O’s being F should then be understood as o being in
a relation with the non-‐property entity F.16 The three most used forms of this school of
Nominalism are Class Nominalism, Mereological Nominalism and Resemblance
Nominalism.
13 Armstrong, Nominalism and Universalism. 14 Istvan, “Spinoza and the Problem of Universals: A Study and Research Guide.” 15 Ibid. 16 Ibid.
10
Class Nominalists analyze o’s being F as o being a member of mind-‐independent the
class of F things. So for an apple to be round doesn’t mean anything more than the apple
belonging to the class of round things. The classes themselves need to be construed as
individuals, for instance there is only one class of all the round things, although the list
of members can be endless. Since the class of all the round things will be around even
when there are no thinking beings to classify individuals. This form of Nominalism is
called objective.17
Mereological Nominalists define o’s being F as o being a bit of the mind-‐independent
heap of F things. Since it is, in a way, very similar to Class Nominalism no further
explanation is necessary.18
The third form of objective Relational Nominalism is called Resemblance Nominalism.
The general approach of both aforementioned views stays the same in this variety, the
only thing that changes is that o’s being F means that o resembles some mind-‐
independent paradigm F thing. To explain the sameness of two or more tokens they
appeal on the primitive, objective notion of resemblance.19
To apply both branches of this kind of Nominalism more explicitly to my research
question, I will have to show how they both analyze the human essence. Both schools
will understand the human essence to be individual, because they won’t allow universals
in their ontology. This is clear from what I have discussed above. According to Relational
Non-‐Constituent Nominalism, an individual can only be characterized as a human being,
if the individual falls under the predicate of a human being. This predicate, or concept,
however, doesn’t refer to anything real in the world. It’s a concept that was invented by
men to better understand the world around them. There is thus nothing like ‘a human
being’ or a universal essence that all human beings share, to the contrary, there are only
individuals in the world, each possessing their own individual essence, and we only call
certain particulars human, because our mind recognizes certain similarities between
them. The same goes for objective Relational Non-‐Constituent Nominalism. The only
difference is that a certain individual can be characterized as being human independent
of the classifying mind. To say someone is human, is to say that (s)he is a member of the
17 Ibid. 18 Armstrong, Nominalism and Universalism. 19 Ibid.
11
class of human things, with the class being constructed as an individual. In both cases,
there is no universal human essence to which they refer to be able to characterize
particular human beings.
b) Non-‐Relational Non-‐Constituent Anti-‐Realism Non-‐Relational Non-‐Constituent Anti-‐Realists don’t give a further explanation for o’s
being F then just o is F. According to them there is no further explanation possible. So, in
contrast to the Relational version of Non-‐Constituent Anti-‐Realism, there is no kind of
explanation of why we can analyze a certain individual o as being F. Subjective
Relational Non-‐Constituent Nominalism points to o’s relationship to a mind-‐dependent
non-‐property individual, for example the predicate F. There is no such thing as F, we
have invented it to make it easier to describe the world around us. On the other hand,
objectivists rather refer to something real to characterize o, like a certain class or
resemblance structure. Non-‐Relational Non-‐Constituent Anti-‐Realists can refer to F, but
they refuse to further characterize F. They cannot use the aid of mind-‐independent
classes or mind-‐dependent concepts to explain o’s being F. O is just F. And that’s the end
of it. No more information about o’s being F can be given. In more precise terms: an
apple is round because it is round. And there is nothing more we can say about the
roundness of the apple. Any further explanations as the apple is round because it
belongs to the class of round objects or because we predicate the man-‐made property of
roundness of it, are not allowed.20
Although this particular school in Nominalism can’t give an explanation of why we can
characterize a certain individual as being human as Relational Non-‐Constituent
Nominalism can, we can still conclude the same result: there is no such thing as a
universal essence of man by which we characterize particulars. I have already shortly
summarized the reasons why Non-‐Constituent Nominalism is not the best way to
understand Spinoza’s philosophy. I will further discuss these arguments in the next
chapter.
20 Ibid.
12
1.2.2. Constituent Anti-‐Realism or Trope Theory There is another school in Nominalism, however, that takes a whole different road when
it comes to properties and relations: Constituent Anti-‐Realism or Trope theory. Contrary
to Non-‐Constituent Anti-‐Realism they accept properties and relations, but hold that
these are non-‐universals or particulars. Also called modern Nominalism, it is somewhat
a middle ground for extreme (Non-‐Constituent) Nominalism–that only allows concrete
particulars-‐and extreme (Relational) Realism–where universals are found in a separate,
transcendent realm–and it has the advantage on the other forms of Nominalism that, by
accepting properties, they can explain how two or more particulars can be similar but
individual at the same time. While extreme Nominalism encounters the difficulty from
the fact that we can’t avoid talking about properties in practice–they will allow such talk,
buy they do not really believe that an individual can possess properties–trope theorists
can really analyze o’s being F as o’s having the property Fness, if and only if F is an
abstract particular21.
G. F. Stout, a famous advocate of Trope Theory, gives a clear example of how we need to
see these abstract, particular properties: when we have a red curtain and a red carpet in
the exact same shade of red, you don’t only have two numerically different individuals–
the carpet and the curtain–but also two numerically different properties or, in this case,
rednesses. Both rednesses are two distinct tropes, although they are–let us assume–
inherently exactly alike.22
What, then, unifies the class of all red tropes? There are two ways to approach this
problem. On the one hand the class of all the rednesses can be said to form a primitive
natural class. In other words we can call this a Trope version of the Natural Class
Theory. This is a view that was upheld by G. F. Stout. On the other hand, we can say that
all rednesses resemble each other in some degree, with resemblance as a primitive and
not analyzable notion. This trope version of Resemblance Nominalism was formulated,
among others, by D. C. Williams.23
21 Istvan, “Spinoza and the Problem of Universals: A Study and Research Guide.” 22 Armstrong, Nominalism and Universalism. 23 Armstrong, Universals. An Opinionated Introduction.
13
So what are tropes exactly? In The Elements of Being: I Williams describes tropes as ‘to
stand for the abstract particular which is, so to speak, the occurrence of an essence.’24 To
be more clear on what he exactly means with the term ‘abstract’ he gives the example of
a lollipop: the stick of the lollipop – the gross part – is what is concrete (just as the whole
lollipop is) and the color component (or the shape/taste component if you want) are the
fine parts or the abstract parts. A concrete particular, e.g. a lollipop, is thus composed of
abstract particulars or tropes.25 According to most trope theorists the whole world only
consists out of these tropes. They are the primary constituent of the world and all
concrete particulars are composed of them.26 If we would take the example of a statue –
a concrete particular -‐ then its form, its texture, its color etc. would be the tropes that
compose it.27 Tropes, being abstract, yet not universal; and particular, yet not concrete,
are actually a perfect substitute for universals.28
Now, since the goal of this paper is to find out if human beings have universal or
particular essences according to Spinoza, I will apply this theory to humanity and men in
particular too, as I did for Non-‐Constituent Nominalism. When you endorse Trope
Theory instead of e.g. Class Nominalism the class of concrete men, with members as
Socrates, Aristotle, Duns Scotus etc., will have to make place for the class of abstract
humanities, which contains members as the human trope in Socrates, the human trope
in Aristotle etc.
Next, I will take the example of Socrates and rationality, for reasons that will get clear
further in my paper, to more clearly explain what tropes exactly are. Socrates is to be
taken as a concrete particular, in other words, he is fully determinate and composed of
multiple unrepeatable abstract entities, such as rationality. Hence the property of
rationality is one of the tropes that compose the concrete particular that Socrates is.
24 Williams, “On the Elements of Being: I.”, P. 7 25 Ibid. 26 Ibid. 27 Williams, “On the Elements of Being: II.” 28 In ‘The Structure of Appearance’ Goodman gives a clear explanation of the words concrete, abstract, universal and particular. Firstly we call something concrete when it is fully determinate, on the contrary, when we call something abstract, this indicates that it is partly indeterminate, the individual contains no concretum; thirdly an individual is universal when it contains no unrepeatables, while for an individual to be particular it needs to be exhaustively divisible into unrepeatable complexes. Goodman, The Structure of Appearance. P248-‐250
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Aristotle and Socrates might both possess rationality and not only are Aristotle and
Socrates two numerically different entities, but so are their properties of rationality. The
particular rationality of Socrates is something that characterizes him, so another way to
describe tropes could be particularized ways things are. 29 So the similarities we can find
between all the rationalities of men are merely the same in the sense that two soldiers
have the same uniform, rather than that two brothers share the same father.30 In this
way it is possible to assert that two distinct particulars have an exactly similar (but not
identical) property, without having to make an appeal to universals.
For reasons that will become clear in the next chapter, I believe that Trope Theory turns
out to be the best way to understand Spinoza’s whole philosophy and hence his
conception of man and the human essence.
1.3. Realism When you want to accept properties and relations in your ontology but don’t want to
define them as particular, then you find yourself in the camp of the Realists concerning
universals. Here, when two tokens are of the same type (or kind, species, nature if you
like) their sameness is analyzed in terms of strict identity. That is, o’s and p’s being F
mean that both particulars share a common ontologically real property, a universal, that
characterizes them.31 The unity between both particulars, provided by a universal
property or relation, is the tightest one possible, because a universal can be one in the
many. In other words, when we say that apples are round32, this means that both apples
share the common property that is roundness. And the roundness in apple x is not
numerically different to the roundness of apple y.
Although all Realists agree on this general approach, Realism can be further divided into
two groups: Relational Realism and Non-‐Relational Realism. Their point of disagreement
is where to place universals: on earth, subsisting in things or in a different transcendent
realm.
29 Williams, “On the Elements of Being: I.” 30 Istvan, “Spinoza and the Problem of Universals: A Study and Research Guide.” 31 Although, stating it like this can be misleading. It is wrong to think that for every predicate, there should be a corresponding universal . 32 Ofcourse, this counts for all round objects.
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1.3.1. Relational or Transcendent Realism
Traditionally ascribed to Plato33, this theory explains o’s being F as o having a relation to
the transcendent universal or Form of F.34 Relational Realists, also called extreme
Realists, place their universals in a separate realm outside of space and time, a ‘Platonic
Heaven’ one may say, from the particulars, who find themselves in the ordinary world,
that instantiate them. Instantiation, then, becomes a relation between two different
realms.35 Universals, according this theory, are anterior to particular things (universalia
ante res), this means that their existence does not depend on any individual that
instantiates it. This makes it possible for this theory to allow uninstantiated universals.
The division between extreme and moderate Realism can be made by their acceptance
or non-‐acceptance of the Principle of Instantiation, or the question whether we should
allow uninstantiated universals or not. I have chosen not to use this separation because
the allowance of these kind of universals rests on these two findings: firstly, take the
example of ‘unicorns’. A word like ‘unicorn’ is a perfectly meaningful predicate, and
since this predicate exists, one can think that there must exist something concrete that
instantiates it. But since it doesn’t, because ‘unicorns’ don’t really exist, there must be
uninstantiated universals (that we then will place in a ‘Platonic Heaven’ since there is no
place for them on earth). This first argument is a bad one. As I said above it is wrong to
think that for every predicate, there should be a corresponding universal. It’s not
because a certain word exists, that there needs to be something real that corresponds to
it. The other argument that brought Plato to the acceptance of uninstantiated universals,
is that–although we speak of perfect circles and lines in geometry–in the world itself
there is no such thing as a perfect circle. The same argument goes, for instance, for
virtue and justice. Nothing in the world is always perfectly just, but still the universal of
justice is there. Plato solved this problem by saying that we describe everything on earth
by comparing them to the perfect Forms, located in a Platonic Heaven, but ordinary
things can never fully instantiate a perfect Form. This however leads us to the difficult
33 Important to note is that it important to know that Plato’s theory of Forms does more than only solving the problem of identity in diversity. 34 Armstrong, Nominalism and Universalism. 35 Armstrong, Universals. An Opinionated Introduction.
16
notion of degrees of instantiation (with the impossibility to ever reach the highest
degree) that would lead me too far.36
In short, this Platonist form of Realism answers the question of ‘how can two
numerically distinct apples have the exact same property?’ as that they both stand in
relation with the universal property ‘roundness’ that is to be found in a separate
transcendent realm. The last step I need to undertake, then, in my discussion of
Relational Realism is to apply it to human nature. If Spinoza were a Relational Realist, he
would characterize a particular individual as human, by saying that it is an instance of
the universal essence of men. Sharing in this universal essence is what makes an
individual human. And because we are talking about Transcendental Realism here, that
means that this universal human nature would then fall within in a separate,
transcendent realm. I will present the reasons why Spinoza could not have endorsed this
kind of Realism in the next chapter.
1.3.2. Non-‐Relational or Immanent Realism
In contrast to the former view, Non-‐Relational Realism doesn’t place universals in a
separate realm but brings them, so to say, ‘back to earth’.37 Universals are not prior to
particulars but subsist in them. This means that, for a universal to exist, there needs to
be at least one individual that instantiates it. The roundness of a round object can only
exist because there are round objects and it will then be ‘in’ each of the round objects
that instantiate it.38 So here we have–in contrast to extreme Realism where the
universalia are ante rem– universalia in re. For o to be F it means that o possesses the
universal Fness but without F individuals there would be no Fness.39
If Spinoza would have endorsed Immanent Realism, just like in Trancendent Realism, all
particular human beings would share in the strictly identical universal human essence.
The difference with the former view, is that the human essence would find itself not in a
36 Ibid. 37 This position is often ascribed to Aristotle, but this debate has not yet reached consensus. Some think he might have been a Nominalist, some equate his view to Immanent Realism. What we do know for sure is that he rejected Plato’s otherworldly universals. Ibid. 38 Armstrong, Nominalism and Universalism. 39 Istvan, “Spinoza and the Problem of Universals: A Study and Research Guide.”
17
different realm but in its instances itself. If there would be no human beings, than the
universal human essence could never exist. But, on the other hand, this doesn’t entail
that if one human would die, the human essence would perish with him.40
40 I would like to note that many of the merits and/or the challenges that face various of these views remained underexposed in this chapter. I also have generalized some of the Realist and the Nominalist standpoints, because going into too much detail on these matters would lead me too far. However, this is not a problem for the main aim of this thesis, because a brief survey of the diverse views on universals is already sufficient to begin a research on Spinoza’s conception of the essences. For a more detailed examination on the pro’s and the con’s of as well Realism as well as Nominalism, I would like to refer to Armstrong, Universals. An Opinionated Introduction., Armstrong, Nominalism and Universalism. And Armstrong, A Theory of Universals.
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2. Fundamental notions in Spinoza’s metaphysics Although it seems like the question if Spinoza is a Realist concerning universals mainly
seems to revolve around the concept of human nature, and thus whether he allows
universal species-‐essences or not, yet this is not where the whole discussion mainly
takes place. An important part of this inquiry locates itself in the first two parts of the
Ethics, where Spinoza discusses the attributes and famously rejects universals. (2P40S1)
The reason we cannot directly begin investigating Spinoza’s idea of human nature to
conclude if there is a universal human essence or not, is because to obtain adequate
knowledge of Spinoza ethics, it is important to have an accurate understanding of his
treatment of universals in his metaphysics first. In his letter to the translator of Les
Principes de la Philosophie Descartes provides us with a useful metaphor to demonstrate
this:
“Puis lors qu’il s’est acquis quelque habitude à trouver la verité en ces questions, il
doit commencer tout de bon à s’appliquer à la vraye Philosophie, dont la premiere
partie est la Metaphysique, qui contient les Principes de la connoissance, entre
lesquels est l’explication des principaux Attribus de Dieu, de l’immaterialité de nos
Ames, & de toutes les notions claires & simples qui font en nous. La seconde est la
Physique, en laquelle aprés avoir trouvé les vrays Principes des choses materielles,
[…] Ensuite dequoy il est besoin aussi d’examiner en particulier la nature des
Plantes, celle des animaux, & sur tout celle de l’homme; afin qu’on soit capable par
aprés de trouves les autres sciences qui luy font utiles. Ainsi toute la Philosophie est
comme un arbre, dont les racines sont la Metaphysique, le tronc est la Physique, &
les branches qui sortent de ce tronc sont toutes les autres sciences, qui se reduisent
à trois principales, à sçavoir la Medecine, la Mecanique & la Morale; j’entends la
plus haute & la plus parfaite Morale, qui, présupposant une entiere connoissance
des autres sciences, est le dernier degré de la Sagesse. ”41
Just like for Descartes, Spinoza’s metaphysics have explanatory priority over his ethics,
the former being the roots and the latter being only the last branch of the tree of
41 Descartes, “Lettre Au Traducteur Des Principes.”
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philosophy. His ethics is rooted in how Spinoza takes the world to be. It grows, so to
speak, out of the discoveries Spinoza does in his metaphysics. So we can only arrive at
adequate knowledge of the nature of men if we start with their ontological basic
principles.42 If we want to find an answer to the question if there is a universal nature of
man, we will have to investigate Spinoza’s metaphysics first. This is the reason why this
chapter will revolve around some of Spinoza’s most fundamental metaphysical notions
and their relation to the problem of universals.
Spinoza begins his Ethics with explaining what he understands under what is self-‐
caused. It’s no coincidence he decided to open the Ethics with this definition, since it
demonstrates the important distinction that underlies Spinoza’s whole metaphysics. It’s
the distinction between the two kinds of being namely, whatever is, is either in itself or
in another (1A1). Or, in other words, whatever is, is either the cause of itself or caused
by another. (1D1)43 The former stands for substance or God. Substance is that which is
in itself and what is conceived through itself. (1D3) This means that one doesn’t require
another concept to be able to understand God’s essence, which is eternal and cannot be
conceived except as existing. (1D1) The first 14 propositions concern God alone and
sketch a first description of it, stating that it is an eternal44 (1P19), necessarily existing
(1D1), unique (1P14), absolutely infinite (1D6), indivisible (1P15S2), free45 (1P17cor2)
entity that is the immanent cause of all things.46 (1P18) This means that infinitely many
42 But although Spinoza agrees with Descartes on the fact that all knowledge is derived from metaphysics, he doesn’t agree with the order of the derived sciences. For example Spinoza doesn’t agree with Descartes that we need to obtain knowledge of ourselves before we can obtain knowledge of God and the material world. Curley, Behind the Geometrical Method. A Reading of Spinoza’s Ethics. According to Spinoza ‘the mind understands itself the better, the more it understands Nature.’ Spinoza, “Treatise on the Emendation of the Intellect.”, § 39 43 The distinction between ‘the being of essence’ and ‘the being of existence’, as Spinoza describes them in the CM, will be further discussed and elaborated in 3.2.5 Spinoza, “Appendix Containing Metaphysical Thoughts.”, P. 304 -‐ 305 44 Eternal existence for Spinoza does not equal existing for an unlimited amount of time. Eternity simply cannot be explained by duration. It’s existence outside of time. 1D8 45 God is the only free cause. We can call him free, not because he freely chose to create everything there is in the sense that he could’ve have chosen to do otherwise, but because it is compelled by no one and acts only from the necessity of his own nature. 1D7, 1P17cor2 46 From this it is clear that substance is prior to its affections. 1P1
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things in infinitely many modes necessarily flow out of God.47 (1P15, 1P16) However, it’s
wrong to understand God to be the creator of the universe as traditionally depicted in
the Judeo-‐Christian tradition. He is the immanent cause of all things, which means that,
although it is prior to its affections (1P1), everything is actually in God.48 Nothing is
outside of it but instead everything inheres in it. God is no transcendent creator outside
of his creation. We shouldn’t understand Spinoza’s God in terms of our traditional
concepts. The God that is depicted in the Ethics is not the anthropomorphic God from the
Old and the New Testament, that has chosen to create the best out of all the possible
worlds. God does not reward his most devote followers or punish those who go astray.
This means that we don’t need to obey, fear and/or worship substance to be able to
experience a happy afterlife. In fact, there even is no personal afterlife according to
Spinoza. (5P34S) The fact that the world was not the product of conscious creation also
goes in against another major human prejudice–namely, the teleological worldview
where everything in nature acts on account of an end.49 Just like applying a moral and
psychological dimension to God, this is yet another example of attributing human
characteristics to Nature.50
47 Nothing in the world is contingent, because things could not have been produced by God in another way. We only conceive things as contingent, because we try to understand it by the common order of nature, instead of by our intellect. 1P33 48 Melamed, among others, is a recent defender of this view, which is the traditional understanding of the relation between substance and its modes. However, it has its opponents. Curley, for example, argues against substance-‐mode inherence by claiming that we best understand the dependence of the modes in terms of efficient causation. For a more detailed discussion of this, see: Melamed, “Spinoza’s Metaphysics of Substance: The Substance-‐Mode Relation as a Relation of Inherence and Predication.” 49 God did not create the rain so that the grass would grow so that we could feed the cows that are intended to feed us. God did not give us teeth to chew. The world was not created for us and Nature has no goal set before it. (1app) This brings along the fact that human beings are not special. We are just as much a part of Nature as everything else there is. Spinoza’s conception that man is not a dominion within a dominion (4pref) is yet another claim that goes in against the traditional attitudes by his contemporaries and predecessors. In the preface of the third part of the Ethics, Spinoza critizes all those who believe that man rather disturbs than follows the order of Nature, as if man has absolute power over their actions and are not subject to certain laws and rules of Nature. This is mainly a reaction to Descartes, who states that the human mind has absolute power over his actions and absolute dominion over the affects. Spinoza’s reaction to this is that men are just as much a part of Nature as everything else and, thus, that all the laws and rules of nature apply just as much to men as to everything else. There is no bifurcation between men and the rest of the world, they are all subject to the same set of laws. In this argument, we can clearly conceive Spinoza’s naturalism. Rocca, Spinoza. 50 However, from this we should not conclude that Spinoza completely despises any form of theology. The main thing I wanted to make clear here is, firstly that Nature does not act according to an end, secondly that it is wrong to construct God like the perfect imagie of
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God consists of infinite attributes, each one expressing an eternal and infinite essence.51
(1D6) The attributes are what underlie all of God’s properties or are what constitute its
essence. (1D4) Without the attributes expressing substance, each in their own certain
way, it would be impossible to understand substance and without substance there can
never be any attributes to express its essence. This implies that both are tightly
entwined in an intimate relationship.52 Like substance, the attributes are eternal and
exist necessarily (1P11, 1P19) and, thus, are in itself and conceived through itself.
(1P10) But they are not, like God, absolutely infinite but only infinite in their own kind.
We can only know two of the infinitely many attributes, or in other words all the
attributes, that constitute God’s essence: Extension and Thought. (Ep. 64) Extended and
thinking substance are expressions of the same substance, only expressed in two
different ways. (2P7dem) Each of the attributes are distinct from each other and form
their own closed causal system. That is, there can’t be a causal relation between
attributes. They are completely distinct. More specifically, it means that a mode of
Extension can’t stand in a causal relationship with a mode of Thought. Both are actually
just two different expressions of the same thing. The former being conceived under the
attribute of Extension and the latter under the attribute of Thought. (2P7)
What is in itself and is conceived through itself, or God consisting of infinite attributes, is
what we must understand under Natura Naturans or the active component of Nature.
Out of God, the ever creating active cause of everything, necessarily flows Natura
Naturata. (1P29S) Now we find ourselves at the other side of the distinction of the two
kinds of being or in the realm of the modes, which are in another and are conceived
through another.53 Contrary to substance or its attributes, the (formal) essences of the
finite modes do not entail existence.54 Instead of eternal existence we can attribute
durational or determinate existence to these finite entities, meaning that they can come
ourselves and lastly, that we should not act morally out of fear for God’s wrath or out of the hope that He will reward us. We should act benevolent towards others out of reason. 51 Since substance is indivisible according to Spinoza, it might seem contradictory to say that he consists of infinite attributes. However, it is wrong to understand Spinoza’s God as an aggregate of distinct attributes. For a more detailed elaboration of this problem see 3.2.2. 52 The question if substance can be identified with all of its attributes will be discussed in 3.2.2. 53 Or, in other words, the modes are in and are conceived through God, since everything what is, is in God. 1P15 54 The difference between formal and actual essences will be discussed later on in this paper, more specifically in 3.2.5.
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into an go out of being.55 This doesn’t mean, though, that they are contingent, for
nothing in Nature is contingent. All things have been determined from the necessity of
God’s nature to exist and to produce effects in a certain way. (1P29dem) This indicates
that nothing could have been in another way than it is now, because everything is
determined from eternity to eternity. (1P33) Substance is not only the cause of their
existence but also of their essence. However, we have to be careful when we speak of
God causing the finite modes, given the distinction between Natura Naturans, which is
God insofar as he is considered as a free cause (1P17), and Natura Naturata, or what
depends on God and can only be conceived through God. Since Spinoza famously
identifies God with all of Nature, we can infer from this that Natura Naturata must be
God too, but not as he is considered as the absolutely existing necessary immanent cause
of all there is. Thus, Natura Naturata is God insofar as he is considered in another way.56
(1P29S) The finite modes, being God’s properties, are expressions of God’s essence in a
certain and determinate way.57 (2P1) Infinite substance cannot stand into a direct
connection to the finite modes, because whatever follows directly from God’s absolute
nature is eternal and infinite. The determinate modes will have to be caused by a
mediation of the infinite mediate modes. So we can say that God is the cause of singular
thoughts (modified substance conceived under the attribute of Thought) or singular
bodies (modified substance conceived under the attribute of Extension) insofar as it is
considered to be modified by another finite mode with a determinate existence.
(1P28dem)
Now let’s apply all this to what concerns my research question, namely: is there a
universal essence of man according to Spinoza? If we could describe Spinoza’s 55 For Spinoza, to be able to exist, is to have power and to be able not to exist, is to lack power. (1P11altdem) Since God’s power, by which he and all things act, is nothing but his essence (1P34) and his essence entails existence, we can conclude that God always acts. The singular finite modes stand in stark contrast to this; being subject to the passions and the order of Nature, finite modes cannot always act. Because finite modes do not necessarily exist, they will be able to lack power and be passive. As opposed to substance, that is compelled by no one and can thus act from its nature alone, finite modes will be subject to resistance and instead of truly acting according to their essence, they will be acted on. We can locate the power of acting of the finite modes in their conatus, or the striving to persevere in their being. 56 Nadler, Spinoza’s Ethics. 57 I infer this from 1P16dem, where Spinoza states that the more properties a thing infers, the more the thing expresses reality. And since God’s essence involves the greatest reality and from its essence infinitely many thing in infinitely many modes flow, these modes are God’s properties. This view, however, is not a position that is adopted by Spinoza scholar.
23
metaphysics in a hierarchical order then substance, being the efficient cause58 of
everything there is, would be located at the top. From the fact that God is the only
substance and there couldn’t be any other substance, we can infer that God is unique.
(1P14) From this it seems we could make the claim that the unique essence of God is
bad news for the Realist camp. However, this argument is flawed. It is not because you
are a Realist concerning universals, that you can only allow universal entities. Moreover,
a Realist could argue that God is just the only instance of its essence. Spinoza’s monism,
in other words, won’t be of much help to defend a Nominalist interpretation of
Spinozistic essences. The status of God’s attributes however, expressing its eternal and
infinite essence in infinite ways, will prove to be very important in the inquiry to
Spinoza’s conception of essences.59 Take for example the attribute of Extension.60
Extension seems to be a property which all finite bodies (chairs, tables, the pebble in
your shoe etc.) seem to possess. In this case Extension, and the property of being
extended, seems a universal or common property all bodies share in.61 But on the level
of Natura Naturata we can find some elements that seem Realist too. First we have
universal Natura Naturata, or the infinite, eternal modes which have been immediately
created by and thus immediately depend on God. These modes are eternal and infinite,
and thus immutable, because they follow directly from God. However, because these
infinite immediate modes are still located in Natura Naturata they cannot be in
themselves but will have to be in their respective attribute.62 What is immediately
produced by God in the case of Extension are Motion and Rest and in the case of Thought
the Absolute Infinite Intellect. (Ep. 64) Take the realm of Extension as example again, or
more specifically the immediate infinite mode that will have to be conceived through the
attribute of Extension, here it’s not difficult to see why some understand these entities
to be universal. The rules of Motion and Rest, namely that bodies ‘now move more slowly,
58 As an immediate cause or as far as it is modified by a finite, determinate mode. 59 Let’s suppose that the alleged identification between God’s and its attributes isn’t able to provide sufficient proof that the attributes have to be unique, just like substance is. 60 I prefer to use Extension above Thought because these kind of example are les difficult that the ones that revolve around Thought. It’s easier to think of extended things, or bodies, than about thoughts, which are a way more vague concept than the former. Ofcourse, given 2P7, whatever applies to Extension, applies to Thought, since they are both two different expressions of the same essence. 61 Haserot, “Spinoza and the Status of Universals.” 62 Spinoza, “Short Treatise on God, Man, and His Well-‐Being.”
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now more quickly, and absolutely, that now they move, now they are at rest’63 are
universal and govern the behavior of all finite, extended bodies.64 Next in line are the
mediate infinite modes. These are the modes which are produced by the mediation of
the infinite immediate modes. The example in the case of Extension is the face of the
whole universe and for Thought is the idea of God. (Ep. 64) The finite, determinate
modes are last in line, being caused by God insofar as it is modified by another finite,
determinate mode. It’s safe to say that Spinoza intended us to comprehend these modes
as singular, particular things given 1P26cor, 2P1dem and 2P2dem. In each of these
propositions Spinoza explicitly refers to the finite modes as being singular or particular.
However, with this I have not yet proved that the essences of the particular modes are
universal or singular.
Now I have shortly touched on Spinoza’s most basic metaphysical notions and their
relation to my research question. As we will see in 3.1.2. Realists often use Spinoza’s
conception of the attributes and the immediate infinite modes as evidence for their
claim that Spinoza was a Realist concerning universals. I shall treat all arguments that
are sympathetic towards the Realist reading in 3.1. and all the arguments that are in
favor of the Nominalist camp in 3.2.
63 Spinoza, Ethics., 2L2dem 64 Everything that is, is determined so by the divine nature. But to understand the concrete behavior of particular, finite and determinate modes we have to look further than only the eternal rules of Motion and Rest. To comprehend why a certain mode now goes faster or slower in a certain direction or why it suddenly is at rest we have to observe the movements of other bodies they stand in interaction with. 1P28
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3. Spinoza and universals Now I have displayed the various views on universals, I can start to examine Spinoza’s
position towards universal essences. This chapter is divided in two main parts. The first
part concerns the possible arguments that can be made for a Realist interpretation of
Spinoza’s writings. Since this is not my own view, I will mostly rely on literature to point
out the various arguments. The second part will concern my own analysis of Spinoza’s
Nominalism. Here I will not only focus on textual evidence and my own arguments, but I
will also try to refute the Realist arguments where possible. At the end of this chapter I
will then argue that Spinoza is best understood as a Trope Theorist.
3.1 Spinoza as a Realist This chapter is intended to show the possible arguments are for a Realist interpretation
of Spinoza. To do this I will appeal to a literature survey as well as a series of textual
evidence from Spinoza’s CM, KV, TIE and the Ethics. In my discussion of the literature I
will mainly focus on Francis Haserot’s article ‘Spinoza and the Status of Universals’.
Although I don’t think that Realism is the right way to analyze Spinoza’s philosophy, still
it can be interesting to discuss Realistic arguments in a neutral and unbiased way. This
is because, although I believe the view ultimately fails, it can be instructive to
understand the difficulties the Nominalist view encounters and it can even be helpful to
make certain Anti-‐Realist arguments stronger. That’s why I will incorporate many of
Haserot’s arguments in my argumentation for Spinoza’s Nominalism.
3.1.2 Literature Haserot argues that the problem of universals is connected with the nature of the
attributes.65 The ontological status of the attributes is an important question that needs
to be solved in order to properly understand Spinoza’s ontology. The problem lies in
how we should interpret them: are they to be seen as subjective, and thus mind-‐
65 Haserot, “Spinoza and the Status of Universals.”
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dependent entities, or objective, which means they are mind-‐independent entities and
thus actually existing in the world.66
According to Haserot the only way to interpret the attributes in an objective way, as
really existing, is to be a Realist concerning universals. The attributes then become the
universal common properties of their respective modes; which is for Haserot the only
way in which objective knowledge of reality of God becomes possible. In contrast to the
Realist view, he states, Nominalism can only endorse a subjective understanding of the
attributes, which then turn into mere entia rationis or beings of reason. Entia Rationis,
concepts that were created by a thinking mind to be able to better understand the world
that surrounds it, is a term Spinoza himself uses in ‘Appendix Containing Metaphysical
Thoughts’ in his first published book ‘Principles of Cartesian Philosophy Demonstrated in
a Geometrical Manner’.67
‘A Being of reason is nothing but a mode of thinking, which helps us to more easily
retain, explain, and imagine the things we have understood. Note that by a mode of
thinking we understand … all affections of thought, such as intellect, joy,
imagination, etc.’68
According to Haserot, viewing the attributes as subjective concepts has many
consequences that stand in stark contrast to almost everything Spinoza advocates for.
Nominalism and the subjective status of the attributes that comes with it, leads to the
impossibility of understanding God and the world that necessarily flows out of it.
Objective knowledge has no place in their system, because the laws of nature transform
into a mere whim of the mind, translated into words that may or may not refer to
something real in the world. The only basis for the Anti-‐Realist’s knowledge are his own
senses. The world, an illogical and weak cohesion of particulars, that lies outside our
66 For now it will be enough to know what the problem consists of and how Haserot believes it should be understood. A more elaboration of the problem and its possible solutions will be presented later in this paper. 67 Important to note is that Spinoza’s discussion of the first two parts of Descartes’ Principles is not merely a summary. He complements it with own examples and other parts of Descartes’ writings to clarify his arguments. The ‘Metaphyiscal Thoughts’, the appendix, is also much more than just an interpretation of Descartes. Even more, some parts of it are even best to be understood as independent from Descartes. This means that the appendix can be important to understand Spinoza’s development as a philosopher. 68 Spinoza, “Appendix Containing Metaphysical Thoughts.”, P 299
27
skulls becomes obscure, unfamiliar, unknown. With the lack of the possibility of
objective knowledge, all there is left for the Nominalist is subjective truth or opinion.
Science becomes impossible because the universal laws of logic are mental constructs
and turn into mere conventions. And this how Haserot concludes that metaphysics
becomes impossible for the Nominalist.69
From 2P40S2 to 2P47, where Spinoza elaborates about his theory of knowledge, it
becomes clear why Spinoza is diametrically opposed to a system where both reason and
rationality become impossible. For Spinoza the world is inherently knowable and,
therefore, there is a rational explanation for everything in the universe. Moreover,
human beings are capable to fully grasp a limited amount of these explanations.70 Of
course, the fact that we are capable of having adequate knowledge, doesn’t mean that it’s
easy to obtain it and that we are not prone to inadequate ideas, as will become clear
from the third chapter in the Ethics. We can find one of the most clear-‐cut expressions of
this in the Scholium of 2P47, where Spinoza states that ‘The human mind has adequate
knowledge of God’s eternal and infinite essence’.71
‘From this we see that God’s infinite essence and his eternity are known to all. And
since all things are in God and are conceived through God, it follows that we can
deduce from this knowledge a great many things which we know adequately, and so
can form that third kind of knowledge of which we spoke in 240S2 and of whose
excellence and utility we shall speak in Part V.’72
After all, the whole goal of the Ethics, namely to show how one can reach his greatest
joy, to eternity73, is only reachable through objective, intuitive knowledge. One can only
attain this kind of knowledge by having an adequate idea of God, and thus of its
attributes. And that’s where Haserot’s claim about the objectivity of the attributes comes
back: the only solution to escape the mental cage of Nominalism is to accept the
attributes, or common properties as Haserot calls them, to be universals. This way
objective knowledge of God becomes possible, and also the understanding, or
69 Haserot, “Spinoza and the Status of Universals.” 70 Della Rocca, Spinoza. 71 Spinoza, Ethics., 2P47 72 Ibid., 2P47S 73 Spinoza, “Treatise on the Emendation of the Intellect.”
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blessedness, that comes with it. The same goes for truth: for Spinoza truth is objective
and in no way can it bear any subjectivity. True definitions are true because of their
intrinsic rational nature and not made up out of conventions.74
In the second part of his inquiry, Haserot’s attention shifts to textual evidence for his
claim that Spinoza is a Realist concerning universals. He starts with discussing one of the
most quoted arguments for a Nominalist interpretation of Spinoza’s writing, 2p40S1
that goes as follows:
‘But not to omit anything it is necessary to know, I shall briefly add something about
the causes from which the terms called Transcendental have had their origin – I
mean terms like Being, Thing, and Something. These terms arise from the fact that
the human body, being limited, is capable of forming distinctly only a certain
number of images at the same time (I have explained what an image is in P17S). If
that number is exceeded, the images will begin to be confused, and if the number of
images the body is capable of forming distinctly in itself at once is greatly exceeded,
they will all be completely confused with one another. (…) Those notions they call
Universal, like Man, Horse, Dog, and the like, have arisen from similar causes,
namely, because so many images (e.g., of men) are formed at one time in the human
body that they surpass the power of imagining – not entirely, of course, but still to
the point where the mind can imagine neither slight differences of the singular
[men] (such as the color and the size of each one, etc.) nor their determinate
number, and imagines distinctly only what they all agree in, insofar as they affect
the body. For the body has been affected most [NS: forcefully] by [what is common],
since each singular has affected it [by this property]. And [NS: the mind] expresses
this by the word man, and predicates it of infinitely many singulars. For as we have
said, it cannot imagine a determinate number of singulars.’75
74 Haserot, “Spinoza and the Status of Universals.” 75 Spinoza, Ethics., 2P40S1
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Although this seems a radical rejection of all universals from Spinoza’s side, Haserot
shows that Spinoza’s position against universals is a little bit more complicated. This
proposition from the second part of the Ethics indeed clearly turns down a certain kind
of universals, namely the sort that is the result of confused images. Because human
beings are only able to form a certain amount of distinct images, they will confuse them
with each other once that number is exceeded. This will lead to the fact that they will fail
to make distinction between the bodies and that they will bring all the bodies that agree
in a certain characteristic under the same category. For instance, everything that is a
featherless biped will be brought under the notion of Man. However, one of the main
problems with this method is that everybody forms these notions in a different way. The
conditions to fall under the species of ‘Man’ are completely subjective: for one person
the characteristic that all human beings share will be having humor, while for another it
can be rationality etc. Haserot, although being a Realist, agrees with Spinoza that there
cannot be any such thing as these imaginative species in the world. These universals are
indeed mere fictions of the mind that contain no rational basis whatsoever. Universals
like these are the result of the first kind of knowledge, that can offer us no adequate
ideas. Thus these notions cannot have a place in Spinoza’s rational ontology. There is,
however, another sort of universality that Spinoza does allow, namely rational
universality.
The first part where Haserot finds evidence for this claim is in Spinoza’s doctrine of the
essences. The main thing he wants to prove here is that one essence can be instantiated
in multiple things, or in other words if one essence can be one in many. If this is the case,
then we are dealing with universal essences.
The first passage he uses to state his point is 1P8S2, a proposition he reads as ‘any
number of individual triangles can exemplify the same nature’.76 This clear example of
universalia in re is not the only argument for universals he finds back in this Scholium.
Spinoza’s point that one can have a true idea of the essence of non-‐existent things is an
example of uninstantiated universal, or universalia ante rem. Haserot reinforces his
argument by pointing out this passage about true ideas in the TIE:
76 Haserot, “Spinoza and the Status of Universals.”, P. 479
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‘ As for what constitutes the form of the true, it is certain that a true thought is
distinguished from a false one not only by an extrinsic, but chiefly by an intrinsic
denomination. For if some architect conceives a building in an orderly fashion, then
although such a building never existed, and even never will exist, still the thought of
it is true, and the thought is the same, whether the building exists or not.’77
The next cited passage from the Ethics, 1P17S, a much used Realist argument, further
specifies the meaning of essences in Spinoza’s system. It not only confirms that essences
are universal but also states that they are eternal:
‘For example, a man is the cause of the existence of another man, but not of his
essence, for the latter is an eternal truth. Hence, they can agree entirely according
to their essence. But in existing they must differ. And for that reason, if the existence
of one perishes, the other’s existence will not thereby perish. But if the essence of one
could be destroyed, and become false, the other’s essence would also be destroyed.
[NS: and become false.]78
This is a clear example of Spinoza’s use of universal essences, that make identity in
diversity possible. It also makes clear that, although the individuals are dependent upon
their essence, the argument does not go the other way. If one person dies, this does not
mean that the whole of humanity will perish. The universal human essence will not be
affected by this kind of events. Again, this sounds very much like Relational Realism.79
Further arguments for Spinoza’s Platonism are the fact that the essences are mind-‐
independent, that they are not perceived by the senses80 and that they are the objects of
real knowledge. 81
77 Spinoza, “Treatise on the Emendation of the Intellect.”, § 69 78 Spinoza, Ethics., 1P17S 79 It is important to note here that Haserot speaks of universalia in re as well. His reading of the Ethics is largely the one of a trancendent Realist, but it does contain traces of Non-‐Relational Realism as well, although in a lesser extent. 80 Or in Spinoza’s words: ‘… non experientia nullas rerum essentias docet.’ Spinoza, Epistolae ; Stelkonstige Reeckening van Den Regenboog ; Reeckening van Kanssen., Epistola X 81 Spinoza makes this clear in 1P40S2, where he speaks about the third kind of (intuitive) knowledge: ‘In addition to these two kinds of knowledge, there is (as I shall show in what follows) another, third kind, which we shall call intuitive knowledge. And this kind of knowing proceeds
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The universality of the essences derived by reason and the fact that they are the objects
of objective, real knowledge stands in stark contrast to the consequences of the
Nominalist reading explained above. But although all the textual evidence about
essences seem in favor of the Realists, this is not the end of the road yet. Haserot is right
in pointing out that 2def2 can cause some trouble for his Platonist interpretation. The
second definition of the second part of the Ethics reads as follows:
‘I say that to the essence of any thing belongs that which, being given, the thing is
[NS: also] necessarily posited and which, being taken away, the thing is necessarily
[NS: also] taken away; or that without which the thing can neither be nor be
conceived, and which can neither be nor be conceived without the thing.’82
This definition seems to be the opposite of the above cited proposition. Here, instead of
talking about universal, independent essences, Spinoza seems to speak of unique and
particular essences that are dependent on the thing that instantiates it. The
contradiction, however, is only apparent. It has only to do with Spinoza’s double use of
the word ‘existence’ and is not to be considered as a real problem. There is real
existence or, in other words, the kind of existence that is attributed to God. God’s
essence implies existence. But this is not the case when we talk about existence viewed
sub specie durationis, or existence as it is attributed to particular things. This kind of
existence is apprehended by our imagination instead of by our reason and it is not
eternal but durational. The nonexistence of a thing Spinoza is referring to in this case is
not real, only durational. Only in this sense we can view essence apart of existence.83
As for the argument that essences are particular and unique is also only a troublemaker
at the surface. It is not because two particular individuals, take Peter and Paul, each
possess their own essence that this implies that only particular essences can exist. That
Peter and Paul each have their own individual essence, does not have to preclude that
there can’t be a universal human essence that relates to all human beings.84
from an adequate idea of the formal essence of certain attributes of God to the adequate knowledge of the [NS: formal] essence of things. Spinoza, Ethics. 82 Ibid., 2def2 83 Haserot, “Spinoza and the Status of Universals.” 84 Ibid.
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But it doesn’t stop here. Textual evidence for Spinoza’s Realism is not only to be found in
his metaphysics and talk about essences, but in his conception of man and moral
philosophy as well. Take for example the earlier mentioned Scholium of 1P17. Firstly, it
is stated that two or more men can agree entirely according to their essences and
secondly that, if you take away one human, this doesn’t change anything for humanity
itself. This is a clear-‐cut expression of a universal human nature that all human beings
share. Another remarkable argument in favor of Realism is Spinoza’s choice of words in
2A2. Here Spinoza writes ‘Homo cogitat’, or ‘Man thinks’. If Spinoza were a Nominalist,
only accepting particular entities in his ontology, then why didn’t he formulate this
axiom as ‘Homines cogitant’? Making it sound much more particular and Anti-‐Realist this
way. And this is not the only time Spinoza uses the notion ‘man’ in a universal sense.
Take for instance 2P10, where he speaks of ‘the form of man’.85 This definitely seems
like there is something strictly identical–the human form– that all human beings share.
The whole form of man is something all human beings are instances of. Given 2P40S1
we need to watch out that we don’t understand under ‘the form of man’ the images all
human beings form by means of their imagination. This image will be different for
everybody. This inadequate idea can teach us nothing about the real essence of man,
because it will only contain certain external properties, such as color, size or certain
traits. The universality in the essence of man is a rational one, that is not formed
differently by different thinking things that try to characterize something by its external
features by using only the first kind of knowledge. Or, as Haserot points it out: ‘The
essence of man and his properties are true universals, i.e., rational universals, and
constitute the significant features of the ‘form of man’ as contrasted with the accidental
superficialities of his durational existence.’ 86 However, although Haserot is right in
pointing this out in 2P10, he does not make the most of this proposition. Next to his
argument, that I have just discussed above, there is another interesting element in this
proposition that deserves some attention. I am talking about Spinoza’s use of the articles
here. To make my point more clear I will first quote 2P10 in its original version, or in
Latin, then in Dutch, as it is in the ‘De Nagelate Schriften’ and then one last time in
Curley’s English translation.
85 ‘Ad essentium hominis non pertinet esse substantiae, sive substantia formam hominis non constituit.’ Spinoza, Tractatus de Intellectus Emendatione ; Ethica., 2P10 86 Haserot, “Spinoza and the Status of Universals.”, P. 490
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1) ‘Ad essentiam hominis non pertinet esse substantiae, sive substantia formam
hominis non constituit’87
2) ‘Tot de wezentheit van de mensch behoort niet het wezen van zelfstandigheit; of
de zelfstandigheit stelt niet de vorm van de mensch.’ (my emphasis) 88
3) ‘The being of substance does not pertain to the essence of man, or substance does
not constitute the form of man.’ (my emphasis)89
In Latin no articles are used. This makes it difficult to know whether to translate
‘formam hominis’ with an indefinite or a definite article. A translation of ‘a form of man’
instead of ‘the form of man’ would be more supporting for a Nominalist reading of the
Ethics, since it doesn’t suggest a kind of universal form of man that is shared by all
individual human beings. However, Curley chose to translate it with a definite article,
which is suggestive to a universalist reading of Spinozistic essences. This translation is
probably based on 2P10’s translation in Dutch in the ‘Nagelate Schriften’ where a
definite article is used, which, in Dutch, always refers to something general.90
The last part of Haserot’s inquiry concerns Spinoza’s conception of man. Here two
important arguments for Realism can be found. First of all are the adequate ideas and
reason. Spinoza’s concept of both conflicts with a nominal interpretation of man,
because the adequate ideas human beings share are all identical. The same goes for
reason. The dictates of reason are exactly the same for all rational beings.91 In other
words: reason and adequate ideas are rational universals which can be instantiated in a
unlimited number of modes. And because reason is something all rational thinking
87 Spinoza, Tractatus de Intellectus Emendatione ; Ethica. 88 Spinoza, De Nagelate Schriften van B. D. S. : Als Zedekunst, Staatkunde, Verbetering van ’T Verstant, Brieven En Antwoorden. 89 Spinoza, Ethics. 90 There is some evidence that Spinoza had read the first two parts of the Dutch translation of the Ethics, parts that were translated by his friend Balling. If this truly is the case, then Spinoza had probably given Balling directions and enhancements of the text. This means that Spinoza probably approved of the use of the definite article, which refers to a general form of man. Curley, “Editorial Preface to the Ethics.” 91 Haserot, “Spinoza and the Status of Universals.”
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things share, the path to salvation is too.92 Secondly, the other common property found
in men is the ‘striving by which each thing strives to persevere in its being’ or the conatus.
(3P7) This is nothing less than the actual (shared) essence of all finite modes. The
conatus may seem as something particular and highly individual, since individual can
experience it differently, but the conatus we all feel in our own particular way is the
same shared essence that is instantiated in all of us. 93
In short we can conclude that there are various arguments to be found for Realism in
Spinoza’s writings, provided that his refusal of universals in 2P40S1 is interpreted in the
right way. Namely that Spinoza’s system does not allow for man-‐made generalizations of
particular objects, but that it does require intellectual universality in order to make the
world rational and knowable. One of the most important conditions for objective
knowledge is the ontological status of the attributes. Not analyzing them as objective,
and thus real, results in a sort of mysticism that cannot coexist alongside Spinoza’s ideas
of the world and knowledge. According to Haserot, the only way we can view the
attributes as objective, is as universals. They are the common properties of the modes
and without them rational or intuitive knowledge would be impossible. The only kind of
knowledge that would be left would be through the senses, something Spinoza explicitly
condemns in 2P40S1. Not only in Spinoza’s metaphysics, but also in his theory on
essences and his conception of man traces of Realism can be found. So it seems, although
Spinoza explicitly condemns Aristotelian universals in 2P40S1, there is still room for
another kind of universal in his ontology. These universals are apprehended by our
reason. So the question about universals for Spinoza turns from ‘Are there universal
entities?’ to ‘Which entities are true, rational universals and which ones are fictions?’.94
With this I have summarized the arguments that support reading Spinoza as a Realist
concerning universals.95
92 Ibid. 93 Ibid. 94 MacKinnon, “The Treatment of Universals in Spinoza’s Ethics.” 95 It must be noted that with this summary I definitely haven’t summarized all the arguments for Spinoza’s Realism. There are much more and more recent studies than Haserot’s. Istvan’s dissertation, Istvan, “Spinoza and the Problem of Universals: A Study and Research Guide.”, which I have used mainly in my second chapter, is a good example of a more recent Realist interpretation of Spinoza.
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3.2 Spinoza as a Nominalist In the previous part I have shown that there appears to be strong evidence that supports
a Realist reading, but, as I will show in this part, these arguments fail to give a satisfying
answer to a Nominalist reading of Spinoza’s writings. This part is meant to examine and
point out why Spinoza can’t be a Realist concerning universals. In this first section I will
begin with discussing a couple of textual evidences in order to construct a basic
understanding of Spinoza’s Nominalism so I can use this basis to further built my
counterarguments against the Realist literature I have discussed in 3.1.2.
In the second part of this chapter I will work as follows: after discussing Spinoza’s
rejection of universals in 2P40S1 and multiple other Nominalist arguments from the TIE,
KV and CM, I will proceed to an elaborate discussion of the ontological status of
Spinoza’s attributes to make clear that a Nominalist understanding of them does not
have to be–as Haserot claims–subjective and, thus, inconsistent with Spinoza’s rational
worldview. Moreover, as I will show in 3.2.7., a subjective analysis of the attributes only
goes with the Non-‐Constituent form of Nominalism but goes in against a Constituent
Anti-‐Realist analysis, meaning that Haserot’s argument against Nominalism actually only
works for one particular school in Nominalism, as has been pointed out by Istvan.96 In
the concluding part of this section I will therefore conclude that Spinoza endorses a
Constituent form of Nominalism.
In brief, my argument will show that the attributes can be understood as objective,
really existing entities without therefore being universal. When they are real, they are
not universal and when they are universal, they are not real but apprehended by the
imagination. Further I will show that this means that knowledge in a Nominalist
Spinozistic system is possible and explain why this is important for Spinoza. After all
this I will shift my focus to Spinoza’s talk about essences, where I will first discuss 1P17S
and secondly Spinoza’s conception of actual and formal essences. From here on, it will
become clear that Spinoza is committed to unique, particular essences and that real
universal essences are nowhere to be found in his metaphysics. I won’t take up the
discussion of Spinoza’s conception of man and his moral philosophy here, since my next
chapter will completely revolve around this topic.
96 Ibid.
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3.2.1. Spinoza on universals
The first and best known argument I will discuss here is 2P40S1, of which I have already
presented Haserot’s Realist interpretation in 3.1.2. The first Scholium of 2P40 is seen as
one of the most clear pieces of evidence of Spinoza’s disdain for Aristotelian universals.
Universal notions like Man, Horse, Dog etc. are highly confused ideas that can never
provide us knowledge of what a particular man, horse, dog, or the like, really is. This is
because, to form these notions, we rely on sense-‐perception or imagination instead of
our intellect. We always have to understand the knowledge obtained by the imagination
in relation to the own body. We say the human mind imagines something, when it
regards external bodies ‘through ideas and affections of its own body’. (2P26dem2) This
way we can never obtain a complete knowledge about the object, but only a partial one.
And these perceptions, that will always be stuck in their temporal perspective, do not
provide adequate knowledge. (2P25) We arrive at forming universal notions such as
‘Man’ because our mind, being finite and limited, can only manage to form a certain
amount of images at the same time.97 Once this number is exceeded, we’re not able to
perceive one image distinct from another anymore and so we will confuse them with
each other. Take for example ‘man’. We perceive more images of them at the same time
than our imagination can handle. This results in the fact that we will only be able to
distinctly imagine a certain part in which all men agree, insofar as they affect the body.
And this we express by bringing all human beings under the word or class man, and
predicate this property, in which they all agree, of all its members. However the class we
are talking about is mind-‐dependent and everyone forms this class in a different way.
This is because each of us gets affected in a different way, according to the disposition of
our bodies. This means that one person will understand an animal of erect stature under
the word man , while another will regard human beings as rational animals. Both of
them are equally wrong, Spinoza explains in the first chapter of the Appendix Containing
Metaphysical Thoughts.98 We cannot explain the human essence by referring to a
certain–mind-‐dependent–class. In other words, these common properties we predicate
of a group of particulars of the same kind are no objective fact in the world but man-‐
97 Under ‘the image of something’ Spinoza understands ‘the affections of the human body whose ideas present external bodies as present to us’. (2P17S) In other words, we shouldn’t understand ‘images’ as actual figurative representations of things. 98 Spinoza, “Appendix Containing Metaphysical Thoughts.” P 301
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made concepts and can thus differ among different people. It’s not difficult to
understand, then, why Spinoza warns against the use of inadequate notions like these.
2P40S1 isn’t the only passage in Spinoza’s writings where he tries to warn us for the
dangers of trying to understand the world in an abstract or general way. Next to other
passages in the Ethics–take for example 2P48S–we can find other rejections concerning
conceiving things abstractly similar to 2P40S1 in the Treatise on the Emendation of the
Intellect. In §76 Spinoza states that Nature can never be conceived abstractly or, what is
the same, universally.99 And in §93, where he warns us, when we are dealing with the
investigation of things, to ‘take very great care not to mix up the things that are only in the
intellect with those that are real’.100
It seems to me that Spinoza’s use of words here seems to show that the earlier used
expression of ‘disdain for universals’ is out of place. Spinoza is clearly warning us here
not to mix up real beings with concepts that are mind-‐dependent, but he is not despising
the latter. Even more, I want to argue that Spinoza actually thinks these concepts can be
useful in our daily life. These man-‐made concepts are, in contrast to real beings, modes
of thinking. There are two different types we can distinguish: beings of reason and
beings of the imagination. The appendix of the first part of the Ethics provides us with a
clear description of the beings of imagination, namely
‘And because those who do not understand the nature of things, but only imagine
them, affirm nothing concerning things, and take the imagination for the intellect,
they firmly believe, in their ignorance of things and of their own nature, that there is
an order of things.’ 101
99 §76 goes as follows: ‘But as for knowledge of the origin of Nature, we need not have any fear of confusing it with abstractions. For when things are conceived abstractly (as all universals are), they always have a wider extension in our intellect than their particulars can really have in nature. And then, since there are many things in nature whose difference is so slight that it almost escapes the intellect, it can easily happen, If they are conceived abstractly, that they are confused. But since, as we shall see later, the origin of Nature can neither be conceived abstractly, or universally, nor be extended more widely in the intellect than it really is, and since it has no likeness to changeable things, we need fear no confusion concerning its idea, provided that we have the standard of truth (which we have already shown). For it is a unique and infinite being, being which there is no being’ Spinoza, “Treatise on the Emendation of the Intellect.” 100 Ibid., §93 101 Spinoza, Ethics., 1app
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Beings of the imagination are modes of thinking like good and evil. They refer to nothing
real, but are only modes we imagine to compare certain things to each other. They can
be useful in, for example, encouraging certain behavior like the model of the free man
does. For the beings of reason, or ens rationis, we can find back a definition as early as in
the Appendix Containing Metaphysical Thoughts and The Short Treatise on God, Man, and
his Well-Being. In the latter, Spinoza describes them as ‘things that are in our intellect
and not in Nature; so these are only our own work and they help us to understand things
distinctly’.102 But it’s the Appendix that provides us with a more comprehensive
definition. Beings of reason are what ‘help us to more easily retain, explain and, imagine
the things we have understood’.103 The explanation goes further:
‘By what modes of thinking we retain things
That there are certain modes of thinking which help us to retain things more firmly
and easily, and when we wish to recall them to mind or keep them present to mind,
is sufficiently established for those who use that well-known rule of Memory, by
which to retain something very new and imprint it on the memory, we recall
something else familiar to us, which agrees with it, either in name or in reality.
Similarly, the Philosophers have reduced all natural things to certain classes, to
which they recur when anything new presents itself to them. These they call genus,
species, etc.’104(emphasis mine)
Spinoza then continues with stating by which modes of thinking we explain things (time,
number, and measure) and by what modes of thinking we imagine things (blindness,
extremity or limit, term, darkness, etc.). Although ens rationis have no object that exists,
meaning that there is no real entity such as the species of ‘Dog’, ‘Horse’, ‘Man’ etc., still I
think it’s wrong to understand them as the result of a function of our mind we need to
repress. Spinoza spends a lot of time warning us for the dangers of the imagination, but
this does not entail that modes of thinking are inherently wrong and something we need
to avoid at all cost. I want to argue that these concepts, although only confused, partial
knowledge, can actually help our reason in our day to day life. As finite modes, human
102 Spinoza, “Short Treatise on God, Man, and His Well-‐Being.”, P. 92 103 Spinoza, “Appendix Containing Metaphysical Thoughts.”, P. 299 104 Ibid., P. 300
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beings are limited in their capacities. This does not mean that we can never obtain true
knowledge–according to Spinoza we can–but when we understand things according to
our intuition–the third kind of knowledge–this is only for a certain moment in time. We
should understand this grasping of things rather as a kind of temporarily ‘angelic
embodiment’, as Schliesser calls it, instead of a state of mind that is everlasting.105 That’s
why I think modes of thinking, although not real, can be useful for us. But we can only
experience the advantage of using these kind of terms when we realize what they are,
namely that they are not real and do not refer to anything real in the world but that they
are mind-‐dependent notions we form because our imagination has its limits. As long as
we are aware of these dangers, and always keep in mind what modes of thinking truly
stand for–which is in fact nothing at all—then it is safe to use them to describe the world
we live in. Take for example the model of the free man, which is, as I already made clear
above, an entity of imagination. It’s a concept that doesn’t refer to anything real and that
we have construed ourselves, but still it is useful to use it as a model that shows us how
to act, as Spinoza does. We just need to be aware of the fact that there is no such thing as
the perfect human being. Actually trying to achieve this model, is nothing else than
chasing a ghost. But from the second we are aware of this, we will never experience
sadness because of the fact that we will never be able to reach that ideal. On the
condition, of course, that we adhere to Spinoza’s warnings concerning these kind of
terms.
Other references to the inadequacy of universals, abstractions and species-‐essences
seem to be spread among most of Spinoza’s writings, from the TIE to the Ethics we can
find back traces that lead us to a Nominalist interpretation of Spinoza’s philosophy. I
don’t have the place here to discuss them all, but I will name a couple to show that
Spinoza’s rejection of these general entities has been present from his most early
writings on.
In Spinoza’s TIE, or his discourse on the method, in which Spinoza tries to provide the
right method to come to adequate knowledge that will bring us eternal joy, there are
several passages that point to the inadequacy of universals or abstractions. Take for
example § 93:
105 Schliesser, “Spinoza on the Politics of Philosophical Understanding Susan James and Eric Schliesser Angels and Philosophers.”
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‘Therefore, so long as we are dealing with the Investigation of things, we must never
infer anything from abstractions, and we shall take very great care not to mix up
the things that are only in the intellect with those that are real. But the best
conclusion will have to be drawn from some particular affirmative essence, or, from
a true and legitimate definition. For from universal axioms alone the intellect
cannot descend to singulars, since axioms extend to infinity, and do not determine
the intellect to the contemplation of one singular thing rather than another.’106
This passage doesn’t only make clear that abstraction, or universals, can’t provide us
with adequate knowledge of the world because they are not real beings. It also shows us
that real knowledge of a singular thing comes from its particular (formal, as will be
become clear later on in this paper) essence. So here we can also find proof for Spinoza’s
commitment to particular essences.
That universals are no real beings is also shown in other parts in Spinoza’s writings, for
example in the CM107 and the KV108. The KV also contains other important arguments
that go against genera. So does Spinoza make clear that ‘Peter must agree with the idea of
Peter, as is necessary, and not with the idea of Man’, meaning that there is no such thing
as a general essence of man.109 Or at least no real being. From all this it is clear that
universal, or species-‐, essences only exist in people’s minds. They are concepts we use to
more easily retain and describe the world, but that can never provide us with adequate
knowledge of real, singular things.
3.2.2. The ontological status of the attributes
The question whether the attributes are to be understood as subjective or objective
wasn’t raised by Haserot for the first time and there is still no complete consensus
among Spinoza commentators. The definition that is at the root of this discussion is 1D4:
‘By attribute I understand what the intellect perceives of a substance, as constituting its
106 Spinoza, “Treatise on the Emendation of the Intellect.”, § 93 107 Spinoza, “Appendix Containing Metaphysical Thoughts.”, P. 328 108 Spinoza, “Short Treatise on God, Man, and His Well-‐Being.”, P. 122 -‐ 123 109 Ibid., P. 87
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essence. (my emphasis)’110 Subjectivists believe that the attributes are not ontologically
real, but only a way of perceiving things. While objectivists see attributes as mind-‐
independent real entities, the subjectivist camp consists of two groups: extreme and
moderate subjectivism.111 The former, a view held by Wolfson, analyzes the attributes
as man-‐made concepts, invented by our finite intellect, while the latter sees them more
as the product of the intellect, where ‘the intellect’ can be understood as being finite or
infinite.112
Besides ID4 there a couple more passages to find in Spinoza’s writings that could point
to a subjectivist understanding of the attributes. In both IP4 and Ep4 Spinoza makes
clear that ‘outside the intellect there is nothing except substances and their affections.’113,
with the affections meaning God’s modes.114 One has to admit that this does sound like
there is no place in Spinoza’s ontology for something else than substance and the modi,
thus excluding the existence of entities as the attributes. Another, more decisive
argument, is to be found in Ep. 9. It reads:
‘By substance I understand that which is in itself and is conceived through itself,
that is, that whose conception does not involve the conception of another thing. I
understand the same by attribute, except that attribute is so called in respect to
the intellect, which attributes to substance a certain specific kind of nature.’ (my
emphasis) 115
Here, again, Spinoza seems to explain the attribute as something that is only perceived
by the intellect and thus not a real, mind-‐independent entity existing by itself. The
attributes–a product of our thinking minds–are a way to perceive substance and don’t
seem to deserve their own place next to substances and modes in Spinoza’s ontology.
110 Spinoza, Ethics., 1D4 111 Nadler, Spinoza’s Ethics. 112 Eisenberg, “On the Attributes and Their Alleged Independence of One Another: A Commentary on Spinoza’s ‘Ethics’ IP10.” 113 Spinoza, Ethics., IP4 114 ‘By mode I understand the affections of a substance, or that which is in another through which it is also conceived.’ Ibid., ID5 115 Spinoza, The Letters., Ep. 9
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But the objectivists seem to have more textual evidence on their side, not in the least by
Spinoza’s ‘identification’ of attribute and substance. Not only does Spinoza define them
as necessarily existing (IP11), or in other words that their essence involves existence
(Ep. 9), conceived through itself (IP10), eternal (IP19) and immutable (IP20),
characteristics we can all find in Spinoza’s definition of substance; he also seems to
equates both concepts in IP19, IP20Cor2, IP29S and Ep. 9 by using sive, a term that
indicates an equivalence.116 Ep. 9 contains more indications that the words ‘substance’
and ‘attributes’ are just two different ways to say the same thing, namely in Spinoza’s
example of how the names ‘Isreal’ and ‘Jacob’ refer to the same individual.117 I quote
Nadler for a better understanding of this argument:
‘Each name simply stresses a different feature of the thing named: ‘substance’ refers
to its ontological status, its ‘thing-hood’, while ‘attribute’ refers to the fact that it
has a distinct character or nature.’ 118
From the fact that Spinoza holds a certain identification of substance with its attributes
and from the fact that God necessarily exists we can infer that the attributes also
necessarily exist and, thus, that they are a real ontological feature of reality and not a
way of merely perceiving it. The idea that there is no real distinction between substance
and its attributes is something we can trace back all the way to Spinoza’s Appendix
containing Metaphysical Thoughts’, where he states that there is only a distinction of
reason to be found between substance and attributes.119 This means that the distinction
between substance and its attributes is something made by the intellect. However, we
116 IP19: ‘Deus, sive omnia Dei attributa sunt aeterna.’ (my emphasis) and IP20Cor2: ‘Deum, sive omnia Dei attributa esse immutabilia’. (my emphasis) and IP29S: ‘Per naturatam autem intelligo id omne, quod ex necessitate Dei naturae, sive uniuscujusque Dei attributorum sequitur, hoc est, omnes Dei attributorum modos, quatenus considerantur, ut res, quae in Deo sunt, & quae sine Deo nec esse, nec concipi possunt.’ (my emphasis) Spinoza, Tractatus de Intellectus Emendatione ; Ethica. And the relevant passage in Ep. 9 going as follows: ‘Haec, inquam, Definitio fatis clare, quid per substantiam, sive attributum intelligere volo, explicat.’ (my emphasis) Spinoza, Epistolae ; Stelkonstige Reeckening van Den Regenboog ; Reeckening van Kanssen., Ep. 9 117 ‘However you want me to explain by example – though it is not at all necessary – how one and the same thing can be signified by two names. Not to appear ungenerous, I will give you two examples. First, by ‘Israel’ I mean the third patriarch: by ‘Jacob’ I mean that same person, the latter name being given to him because he seized his brother’s heel.’ Spinoza, The Letters., Ep. 9 118 Nadler, Spinoza’s Ethics., P. 58 119 Spinoza, “Appendix Containing Metaphysical Thoughts.”, P. 323
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have to be careful not to take the equation between substance and its attributes too
literally. It’s not because there is only a distinction of reason between both, that this
turns God’s attributes into substances. After all, there is only one substance, but
infinitely many attributes.120 So after you have given this identification some thought,
here are a couple of problems that pop up. Firstly it seems to contradict the fact that the
attributes are all distinct from each other, something Spinoza states in IP10S. If the
attributes of Thought and Extension are both identical to the essence of the same
substance, then how can they be distinct?121 This observation shows that simply
identifying substance with its attributes is jumping to conclusions. The relationship
between both concepts is a bit more complicated than that. Spinoza sees substance as a
unique and indivisible entity whose infinite and eternal essence is constituted by infinite
attributes. Substance, in other words, is not some aggregate of attributes that is divisible
into separate parts (or, in this case, the attributes). Curley, in his words, describes it as
‘a particular complex of very special elements’.122 A clear and proper solution to this first
problem we encounter can be found when we identify substance and attributes as was
formulated by Olli Koistenen.123 He states that, although the concepts of both substance
and its attributes are identical, still substance cannot be identical with its attributes.
This way substance can said to be conceived both through itself and its attributes,
without claiming that its definition involves another concept. Substance and its
attributes are intimately intertwined and are always in it together: without the
attributes the intellect can’t apprehend substance. But it also works the other way
around: there can never be an idea of an attribute without the idea of the substance it
constitutes.124
Another important problem that comes up with the identification of substance and the
attributes was formulated for the first time by De Vries in Ep. 8.
120 Melamed, Spinoza’s Metaphysics. 121 Eisenberg, “On the Attributes and Their Alleged Independence of One Another: A Commentary on Spinoza’s ‘Ethics’ IP10.” 122 Curley, Behind the Geometrical Method. A Reading of Spinoza’s Ethics., P. 30 123 Ofcourse there are multiple different formulated answers to this question. Take for example Gueroult’s ens realissmum, where he states that God is the result of the unity of an infinity of other substances (the attributes) Deleuze, “Guéroult’s General Method for Spinoza.” 124 Viljanen, “Spinoza’s Ontology.”
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‘Finally, at the beginning of the third Scholium to Proposition 8, we read: “Hence it
is clear that, although two attributes may be conceived as really distinct (that is, the
one without the aid of the other), it does not follow that they constitute two entities
or two different substances. The reason is that it is of the nature of substance that
all its attributes – each one individually – are conceived through themselves, since
they have been in it simultaneously.” In this way you seem, Sir, to suppose that the
nature of substance is so constituted that it can have several attributes, which you
have not yet proved, unless you are referring to the fifth definition of absolutely
infinite substance or God. otherwise, if I were to say that each substance has only
one attribute, I could rightly conclude that where there are two different attributes
there are two different substances.’125
The proposition De Vries is referring to is probably IP10 in the final version of the
Ethics, where Spinoza states in the Scholium that ‘although two attributes may be
conceived to be really distinct (i.e., one may be conceived without the aid of the other), we
still cannot infer from that that they constitute two beings, or two different substances.’126
So how should we understand that an infinite amount of distinct attributes, each
expressing an eternal and infinite essence, constitute the essence of only one substance,
instead of multiple? In the Ethics Spinoza seems to be taking the easy way out by simply
stating that ‘it is far from absurd to attribute many attributes to one substance.’127 But in
fact, his argument is more elaborate than that. From IP9 and Ep. 9 it is clear that, the
more attributes are attributed to an entity, the more reality or existence it has. God, or
substance, being a perfect, infinite and absolutely necessarily existing being, would not
be perfect or infinite, or necessarily existing if not all the attributes were attributes to
it.128 Otherwise God would be limited, missing something and this would be a
contradictio in terminis. If we accept the definition of God, we need to accept that it
possesses infinitely many attributes.129
125 Spinoza, The Letters., Ep. 8 126 Spinoza, Ethics. 127 Ibid., IP10S 128 Cf. ID8, IP8, IP9, IP11 and IP34. Ibid. 129 I do want to note here that the problems that were discussed here, deserve a more elaborate discussion than I have provided here. But going into full detail on these matters is outside the scope of this paper. For a more refined discussion on this matter I gladly refer to Viljanen,
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The final argument the subjectivists rely on to prove their point is the translation of
‘constituere’. They believe Spinoza intended the verb to be a synonym of ‘explicare’. ID4
would then sound much more subjective than was intended, because the attributes
would then be a mere tool to explain substance to someone, instead of being
ontologically real entities.130 However I believe, based on the textual evidence and the
consistency of the objectivist arguments, that it is clear that the attributes were intended
to be interpreted as objective by Spinoza and thus that ‘constituere’ in ID4 is best
translated as ‘to constitute’.131
Not only the textual evidence is in favor for the objectivist camp, the subjectivist
interpretation seems to contain a big contradiction. When you hold that the attributes
are dependent on the intellect, which is a mode of Thought, then the attributes would
not be conceived through itself but through another, which is actually the definition of a
mode. (ID5) This conclusion contradicts a very important distinction Spinoza makes in
his metaphysics: the distinction between two kinds of being. The first kind of being is
described the opening definition of the Ethics132: ‘By cause of itself I understand that
whose essence involves existence, or that whose nature cannot be conceived except as
existing.’133 Spinoza is here referring to substance, or what is in itself and conceived
through itself (ID3), and the attributes, constituting that essence (ID4) and are thus
conceived through itself as well (IP10). When it pertains to something’s essence to exist,
it means that we can’t conceive them as not existing. It pertains to its essence to exist
and thus it exists necessarily. The second you understand what substance and attributes
are, the second you grasp their essences, it is impossible to conceive them as not
existing. As long as you doubt their necessary existence, you don’t completely
understand what substance and its attributes are. (IP11S) The other kind of being is one
where its essence doesn’t involve necessary existence. And since ‘whatever is, is either in
itself or in another’ (1A1) it means that this kind of being can only be understood, or “Spinoza’s Ontology.”, Curley, Behind the Geometrical Method. A Reading of Spinoza’s Ethics. And Nadler, Spinoza’s Ethics. 130 Eisenberg, “On the Attributes and Their Alleged Independence of One Another: A Commentary on Spinoza’s ‘Ethics’ IP10.” 131 For a more detailed reply to this argument, see Donagan, “A Note on Spinoza, Ethics, I, 10.” 132 One of the main reasons I understand this distinction to be an important element in Spinoza’s metaphysics is because Spinoza begins his first chapter ‘On God’ not with a definition of God, but with a definition about the first kind of being. 133 Spinoza, Ethics., ID1
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conceived, through the concept of another thing. (1A2) We are talking here about the
modes, the properties of substance (IP16Dem) or the affections of the attributes.
(IP25C)
In other words, interpreting the attributes as subjective and, thus, perceiver-‐dependent,
would mean that the attributes would not be in their selves, but in another; hereby
turning them into modes. Something which, keeping Spinoza’s ontology in mind, is
impossible. Again, because the most of Spinoza’s writings clearly point to an objectivist
understanding of the attributes, I do not believe that this is a reason to accuse Spinoza of
being inconsistent in his conception of the attributes. It only shows that the subjectivist
position is untenable for any Spinozist. The intellect is a mode, thus belonging to Natura
naturata, while the attributes belong to Natura naturans.134 So they simply cannot be
dependent on the intellect, because they are ontologically prior to it.135
With all this, it seems to me it has been proved that the objectivist interpretation of
Spinoza’s attributes is the only right view there is. The attributes are real and it is
possible for the intellect to apprehend them and thus have knowledge of God and the
world that necessarily flows out of it.
3.2.3. The attributes are real, but not universal
But why, then, does Haserot claim that the Nominalists give a subjective interpretation,
a view we have now proven to be impossible, of the attributes? He infers this conclusion
from the fact that a Nominalist can never allow common properties in his ontology.
According to Haserot, the Nominalist must understand these common properties as
entia rationis. So far so good, Nominalists indeed do reject common (strictly identical)
properties that can be shared by multiple entities. Some forms of Nominalism even
reject the existence of properties. Haserot, however, is mistaken in his analysis of the
attributes, calling them the ‘common properties of their respective modes’.136
First of all, the attributes are in no means the properties of their respective modes. They
are not only ontologically prior to them, as I have already demonstrated above, but
Spinoza explicitly calls modes the affections of God’s attributes in the corollary of IP25.
134 Spinoza, The Letters., Ep. 9 135 Friedman, “An Overview of Spinoza’s ‘Ethics.’” 136 Haserot, “Spinoza and the Status of Universals.”, P. 469
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Understanding extension as a property that a finite particular mode can have and share
with all other extended modes, or bodies, is conceiving extension abstractly, which is
done by the imagination. This means that when we speak of a chair being extended, we
use the term extended as an abstract term or as a mode of thinking. As already stated
earlier in this paper these entia rationis help us to ‘more easily retain, explain, and
imagine the things we have understood.’137 Extension, when understood in this sense, can
then be used as a universal, abstract term that we imagine to better understand the
world around us. However, extension conceived as a property of finite extended modes,
is universal but it is not real. There is no such thing as the property of being extended.138
The only way to conceive Extension as real is by means of the intellect, without any aid
of the imagination. We can only conceive substance to be extended in a real sense, since
Extension is one of its infinitely many attributes that express its eternal and infinite
essence. When we understand Extension as it really is, and thus not imagine it, we will
understand that it can’t be universal in this way. Extension only belongs to the unique
being that God, or substance, is. It is then easy to understand that Extension, being an
attribute expressing God’s essence, can’t be used as a predicate of finite, particular
modes. Extension is not a property that all modes equally possess, but instead modes
are in Extension. They are actual parts of the attribute.139
The importance of realizing the difference between conceiving things by means of the
imagination or by means of the intellect, is something Spinoza warns us for in the fifth
Scholium of IP15:
‘If someone should now ask why we are, by nature, so inclined to divide quantity, I
shall answer that we conceive quantity in two ways: abstractly, or superficially, as
we [NS: commonly] imagine it, or as substance, which is done by the intellect alone
[NS: without the help of the imagination]. So if we attend to quantity as it is in the imagination, which we do often and more easily, it will be found to be finite,
divisible, and composed of parts; but if we attend to it as it is in the intellect, and
conceive it insofar as it is a substance, which happens [NS: seldom and] with great
137 Spinoza, “Appendix Containing Metaphysical Thoughts.”, p. 300 138 Steinberg, “Spinoza’s Ethical Doctrine and the Unity of Human Nature.” 139 Rice, “Le Nominalisme de Spinoza.”
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difficulty, then (as we have already sufficiently demonstrated) it will be found to be
infinite, unique, and indivisible.
This will be sufficiently plain to everyone who knows how to distinguish between
the intellect and the imagination–particularly if it is also noted that matter is
everywhere the same, and that parts are distinguished in it only insofar as we
conceive matter to be affected in different ways, so that its parts are distinguished
only modally, but not really.’140
Conceiving Extension as a universal property that can be predicated of all bodies by
means of the imagination, as Haserot does, is exactly what Spinoza warns us for in the
above quoted proposition. He wants us to be aware of the fact that we, as finite beings,
tend to mostly view things from our own temporal viewpoint and that this is something
that we are not naturally aware of. Viewing reality under the imagination leads us to
believe that, e.g. Extension is a real, universal property that is shared by the external
bodies we see around us.
Spinoza’s warning to be aware of the distinction between apprehending things by the
intellect and by the imagination we have to make,–which I have already touched on in
my discussion of 2P40S2 in 3.2.1–can not only be found back in the Appendix Containing
Metaphysical Thoughts, where he writes about real beings and beings of reason, but it is
also one of the main topics in his Treatise on the Emendation of the Intellect. This
discourse on the method to obtain objective knowledge has as its main purpose to teach
us how to distinguish between the intellect and the imagination, or in other words how
to know the difference between necessary true ideas and all the rest. Only true
knowledge can continuously give us the greatest joy, to eternity.141 This treatise shows
us that we can never conceive the origin of Nature abstractly or universally.142
Abstractions follow from our imagination and can never bring us a true knowledge of
what things really are like.143
To fully understand where this recurrent difference between understanding things
through our imagination or apprehending things as they really are by the intellect comes 140 Spinoza, Ethics., IP15SV 141Spinoza, “Treatise on the Emendation of the Intellect.” , § 1 142 Ibid., § 93 143 Spinoza, Ethics., 2P40S1
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from, I need to go deeper into an important distinction in Spinoza’s metaphysics that
underlies the whole of Spinoza’s philosophy: the eternal and the temporal aspect of
reality. 144 VP29S makes clear that we can conceive things in two ways: ‘insofar as we
conceive them to exist in relation to a certain time and place’145, or sub specie durationis
and ‘insofar as we conceive them to be contained in God and to follow from the necessity of
the divine nature’146, or sub specie aeternitatis. Just like we imagine that the sun is only a
hundred feet away from us, we imagine that Extension is an abstract property of the
modes rather than it being a real being, as an expression of substance. When we
understand things with aid of our imagination, or sub specie durationis, we understand
things through the affections of our own body (2P26dem2) instead of understanding
what the real essence of the thing is like. On the other hand, conceiving things sub specie
aeternitatis is apprehending things as they really are, something which is done through
reason. (2P44Cor2) Reason perceives things as they are truly in themselves, or as
conceived through God’s essence, as real beings (VP30dem). In contrast to imagination,
the intellect will conceive things in relation to their necessary, infinite and eternal
causes instead of their temporal, contingent relations.147 Understanding what Extension
truly is, which is a real being that we cannot understand as universal, is an example of
viewing it under a species of eternity.
It should be noted that it does not mean, because there are two different aspects under
which we can conceive reality, that there are two different kinds of reality as well.
Spinoza is talking about only one reality, that we can understand in two different
ways.148 Thomas Lennon gives a good example to properly understand this:
‘… constructing an isosceles triangle just is to construct a triangle whose base
angles are equal, and to think about the one is to think about the other, albeit in a
different way, for they are the same thing.’ 149
144 For an elaborated and interesting view on the two aspects of reality and the two different kinds of being, that of essence and of existence, that underpin this view see: Viljanen, Spinoza’s Geometry of Power. 145 Spinoza, Ethics., VP29S 146 Ibid. 147 Nadler, Spinoza’s Ethics. 148 Viljanen, Spinoza’s Geometry of Power. 149 Lennon, “The Rationalist Conception of Substance.”, P. 13
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At first sight, it might seem that Spinoza condemns the use of imagination and views it as
a kind of tendency we need to conquer. However, the imagination actually plays an
important role in Spinoza’s philosophy150. The modes of thinking are useful (but
abstract, mind-‐dependent) terms with the function to help us better understand the
world around us. They are fictions that help us bring order and structure where needed.
Take for example the model of the free man we can find back in 4pref. This model is a
fiction that we ourselves have set up by aid of the imagination and can be used to better
explain Spinoza’s intentions in part IV of the Ethics. The same goes for the universals
Spinoza warns us for in 2P40S1. So although the imagination can be a useful tool, still it
is important to be aware of the dangers it brings with it. The reason that Spinoza keeps
going back to the distinction between the intellect and the imagination is because he
wants us to understand that we can never grasp the true essences of things as long as
we don’t realize when we are conceiving the world sub specie durationis and when we
are not. Human beings are not a dominion within a dominion, (Ivpref) but they are as
much a part of Nature as every other finite mode and thus as subject to its laws as any
other thing. This means that we can never fully escape the fact that we have inadequate
ideas, no matter how hard we try to. (IIP36) Spinoza thus indeed warns us for abstract
notions, such as universals, but this does not mean that we can never use them. Even
more, in our everyday practical lives it is difficult not to. This is the reason why we
should find back universal notions as ‘man’ and ‘mankind’ in Spinoza’s ethics. Not
because they are real entities, but because they are useful tools to explain things.
The fact that modes exist in Extension and depend on it, can be taken as an argument
against Aristotelian Realism. In Non-‐Relational Realism, the existence of the universal
depends on the actual existence of at least one particular that instantiates it. If there are
no round objects in the world, then the universal property ‘round’ would cease to exist.
However, this is not how it works for Extension. The existence of the attribute of
Extension can never depend on the actual existence of any extended, finite particular
modes.151 Rather, they depend on it and exist in it.152
150 For an interesting article on this idea, see: Williams, “Thinking the Political in the Wake of Spinoza.” 151 The attributes are, in a way, dependent on the existence of substance. I say in a way, because they are not dependent on substance like modes are. The attributes are particular expressions of
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But not only evidence against Aristotelian Realism can be found in Spinoza’s writings,
Transcendental Realism, too, is not let off the hook. Not only does Spinoza criticize those
who blindly follow the authority of Plato, Aristotle and Socrates in Ep. 56, he also
literally describes their concepts of things as intentional species153 and substantial
forms as ‘bits of nonsense’.154 In Spinoza’s ontological framework there is simply no
room for something as transcendental essences that float in some other realm.
Everything there is, is in God. There is no transcendental realm that can house
transcendental essences. Everything is already contained in God.155 Fail to understand
this and you fail to understand the whole of Spinoza’s metaphysics, and thus his whole
philosophy.
The only way to properly understand God–and everything that necessarily flows out of
it–is by means of the intellect, or sub specie aeternitatis. This way of properly grasping
reality is the only way to reach blessedness and experience eternal joy. When we say
that a chair is extended, we are using extension as an abstract term. Here the ‘property’
of extension can be viewed as a universal notion, shared by all modes, but not as really
existing. It’s only a way comprehending things under a certain place and time. Only
substance can truly be viewed as extended. Extension here is a real notion, but not
universal. I quote Rice in order to make this conclusion extra clear:
‘Mais chez Spinoza l’extension pour autant qu’elle soit universelle n’est pas réelle, et
l’extension pour autant qu’elle soit réelle n’est point universelle; et c’est précisément
cet aspect de la pensée de Spinoza que néglige Haserot.’156
When we say that substance is extended, we understand it by our reason, but we can’t
say that finite modes are extended in the same way as substance is. In the former case,
we can say that Extension is real but not universal, while in the latter case the property
God’s essence. Without God, there wouldn’t be any attributes, but without the attributes, we wouldn’t be able to understand God. 152 Steinberg, “Spinoza’s Ethical Doctrine and the Unity of Human Nature.” 153 Directed against Aristotle. See also IIP40S. 154 Spinoza, The Letters. 155 Friedman, “An Overview of Spinoza’s ‘Ethics.’” 156 Rice, “Le Nominalisme de Spinoza.”, P. 23
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of being extended is universal, but not real. From this we can conclude that the
attributes are not common properties of their respective modes.157
3.2.4. Spinoza’s theory of knowledge Let’s go back to the attributes themselves. Now that it has been shown what they are
certainly not, namely common properties of their respective modes; we can focus on
what they truly are. Extension, as an attribute, does not only express God’s infinite and
eternal essence in a certain way, it is also what makes up–what Spinoza calls–our
‘common notions’. We can infer this from the demonstration of 2L2, where Spinoza
states that:
‘For all bodies agree in that they involve the concept of one and the same attribute
(by D1), and in that they can move now more slowly, now more quickly, and
absolutely, that now they move, now they are at rest.’158
The common notions are notions that every human mind knows adequately simply
because the mind is the idea of the body, which is, by D1, always extended.159 Since all
bodies agree in the same extended nature, it is easy to see why Spinoza describes them
as common notions. Having the attribute of Extension in common automatically brings
with it that the extended modes will also have its immediate infinite modes in common.
In other words this means that all finite bodies are governed by the same rules of Motion
and Rest.160 Of course, given 2P7, there have to be common notions in the case of the
only other attribute we can know, namely the attribute of Thought. Spinoza does not 157 In my elaboration of this conclusion I have only spoken of the attribute of Extension, but ofcourse this counts for all the attributes. According to Spinoza substance is expressed by infinitely many attributes, of which we can only know two: Extension and Thought. Ep. 64 158 Spinoza, Ethics., 2L2. It is important here that we understand this lemma in the proper way. Saying that bodies agree in the same attribute, does not mean that they share in that attribute. After all, that would infer that extension is a property where all bodies, or finite extended modes, share in. Saying that all bodies agree in extension, means that they all exist in and depend on extension. 159 Nadler, Spinoza’s Ethics. 160 The immediate infinite modes are modes that are immediately created by God. They are eternal, immutable and infinite in their own kind. However, because they are part of Natura naturata and not of Natura naturans, they can’t be conceived through itself, but require the concept of another thing to be understood , which are the attributes. Spinoza, “Short Treatise on God, Man, and His Well-‐Being.”, chapter IX. The immediate infinite mode in the case of Extension is Motion and Rest and in the case of the attribute of Thought, the Absolute Infinite Intellect. Spinoza, The Letters., Ep. 64
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explicitly refer to these mental common notions in any of his writing, but given his
doctrine of parallelism it is safe to assume that the realm of Thought is governed by
rules just as the realm of Extension is. So common notions are actually just certain
features that all modes have in common in their respective attribute.161
That the rules of Motion and Rest–and given the attribute parallelism, the rules that
govern the realm of Thought–are the same for every finite, changeable mode is another
argument the Realist camp gives for a universalist reading of the attributes. However, in
the following passage in the TIE Spinoza shows that the attributes will be to us like
universals but when we conceive them as they truly are–according to the order of the
intellect instead of the common order of Nature–we can only conceive them as singular:
‘That essence is to be sought only from the fixed and eternal things, and at the same
time from the laws inscribed in these things, as in their true codes, according to
which all singular things come to be, and are ordered. Indeed these singular,
changeable things depend so intimately, and (so to speak) essentially, on the fixed
things that they can neither be nor be conceived without them. So although these
fixed and eternal things are singular, nevertheless, because of their presence
everywhere, and most extensive power, they will be to us like universals, or genera
of the definitions of singular, changeable things, and the proximate causes of all
things.’162
The attributes might function like universals would function in a Realist system but this
does not mean that the attributes are universal. Thus, it is not the case that, although
Nominalism won’t allow universals, there aren’t any mechanisms that can replace them.
All bodies indeed agree in the rules of Motion and Rest, namely that they ‘can move now
more slowly, now more quickly, and absolutely, that now they move, now they are at rest’
(2L2dem), but having certain rules in common does not entail that they share an
identical property. Saying that two (or more) modes ‘agree in certain things’ does not
necessarily entail that they share something strictly identical.
161 Schliesser, “Spinoza on the Politics of Philosophical Understanding Susan James and Eric Schliesser Angels and Philosophers.” 162 Spinoza, “Treatise on the Emendation of the Intellect.”, § 101
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The possibility of adequate knowledge is very important for Spinoza, not in the least for
the ethical consequences and the blessedness that it brings with it–things that Spinoza
respectively treats in the fourth and the fifth part of the Ethics. Adequate knowledge, or
eternal knowledge, comes with the highest virtue and eternal joy we can attain. This is
why the fact that the common notions have a place in a Spinozistic Nominalist system is
a very important one. More specifically, without them adequate knowledge would
become impossible.
In 2P40S2 Spinoza introduces us to the three different kinds of knowledge, in
hierarchical order: opinion or imagination, reason and intuitive knowledge. The first
kind of knowledge is knowledge we have based on sense experience or having heard or
read certain things. (2P20S2) For Spinoza, this is the only cause of falsity or error.
(2P41) Knowledge that results from our imagination is called inadequate, or confused,
because it does not teach us what things truly are. When a human mind imagines
something it, instead of providing us true knowledge about external bodies, only regards
external bodies through ideas of the affections of its own body (2P26dem2) and the
ideas of the affections of the body never involve adequate knowledge of external bodies.
(2P25) The knowledge we obtain via our senses, or the affections of our own body, will
always be partial, because it can only provide us information of how the external body
affects our body, instead of knowledge of how the body really is in itself.163 This means
that the only knowledge that will be obtained, will be through ‘the order and connection
of the affections of the human body’ (2P18S) or, in other words, conceiving things in
relation to a certain place and time, or sub specie durationis. This stands in stark
contrast with conceiving things through the order of the intellect, or under a species of
eternity, where we understand things in relation to their whole necessary causal eternal
history.164 The second kind of knowledge, or reason, is what arises from our common
notions and the adequate ideas of the properties of things. (2P40S2) In the first
Scholium of 2P40 Spinoza warns us not to confuse common notions with universals.
Universals are a confused abstraction of many particular things and everyone will form
universals differently, because everyone will focus on a different commonality between
163 Jarrett, Spinoza. 164 Wilson, “Spinoza’s Theory of Knowledge.”
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the different particulars.165 Opposite of these man-‐made terms are the common notions,
which are the same for everybody and are not abstracted from particulars.166 The third
kind of knowledge or intuitive knowledge is ‘a kind of knowing that proceeds from an
adequate idea of the formal essence of certain attributes of God to the adequate knowledge
of the [NS: formal] essence of things.’167 Spinoza explains the three different ways of
obtaining knowledge with the metaphor of a mathematical problem: trying to solve the
question by using the rules your teacher once told you without any demonstration is an
example of the first kind of knowledge; while calculating the conclusion by yourself, by
using deductive, intermediate steps that you found by using reason, is an example of the
second kind. Solving the riddle by the third kind of knowledge, means that you can
intuitively grasp the result by one single act of the mind, without requiring steps of
reasoning. (2P40S2) Together with the third kind of knowledge, or intuitive knowledge,
reason is the source of adequate or necessary true knowledge, (2P41) so it is easy to
understand why there is a kind of split between the first kind of knowledge and the
second and the third, with the latter two being necessarily adequate and the former
being inadequate. The difference between the two true kinds of knowledge is a bit more
complicated to formulate.168 I think it is accurate to say that intuitive knowledge
provides us with a deeper understanding of the world, going beyond reason, and
consists of an immediate grasping of the mind instead of a deductive calculation.169
From this it is clear that the common notions are an important and indispensable
element in Spinoza’s epistemology, being the stepping stone to scientia intuitiva, ‘whose
foundation is the knowledge of God itself’. (VP20S) Intuition, as well as reason, perceives
things under a certain species of eternity. As already showed above it is important to
strive to obtain this kind of understanding of nature, since it teaches us to regard things
as necessary (2P44) and gives us insight in the eternal, infinite causal chain of nature.
165 One man will understand ‘a featherless biped’ under the term ‘Man’, while another will think of an animal of erect stature. Spinoza, Ethics., 2P40S1 166 Nadler, Spinoza’s Ethics. 167 Spinoza, Ethics., 2P40S2 168 In fact, there is still no consensus whether both kinds of knowledge contain the same content or not, given that the second kind of knowledge (the common notions and the adequate ideas that follow from it) seems to be very general while the third kind of knowledge is way more specific, being about the essences of particular things. However finding an answer to this question goes outside the scope of this paper. For a more detailed discussion of this question, see: Schliesser, “Spinoza on the Politics of Philosophical Understanding Susan James and Eric Schliesser Angels and Philosophers.” and Nadler, Spinoza’s Ethics. 169 You can also find back this idea in Deleuze, Spinoza, Practical Philosophy., P. 58
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And since the power of the mind is only defined by knowledge and this results in a
greater power over the affects. (VP20S) Moreover, intuitive knowledge, which wouldn’t
be possible without the common notions, is nothing less than the greatest striving and
the greatest virtue of the mind. (VP25) The more we understand in this way, the more
we understand God (VP24) and the more we understand God, the greater our
intellectual love for God will be. (VP33) This love, or blessedness (VP42dem), is the
eternal, active joy Spinoza talks about in the opening paragraph of the ‘Treatise of the
Emendation of the Intellect’. This is nothing else than experiencing the joy of God and in
this also consists our greatest satisfaction and perfection of the mind and our greatest
freedom. And with this I have proved that the common notions have their place in a
Spinozistic Nominalist system, for they are no ens rationis but real, non-‐universal
entities, and I have also shown why this was important for Spinoza’s philosophical
system. I now consider Haserot’s first main argument, namely that the consequences of
a Nominalist interpretation of the attributes can’t be reconciled with Spinoza’s rational
conclusions about the nature, to be refuted.
3.2.5. Spinoza on essences
1P17S
I will start with 1P17S, according to the Realists concerning universals one of the most
prominent arguments for universal essences. Considering that this Scholium can be
summarized as ‘individuals are dependent on their essences but not the other way
around’, it is not difficult to understand why providing a Nominalist answer is not an
easy task to accomplish. To make it easier to follow the subsequent Nominalist solution
to this problem I will quote the concerned Scholium a second time:
‘For example, a man is the cause of the existence of another man, but not of his
essence, for the latter is an eternal truth. Hence, they can agree entirely according
to their essence. But in existing they must differ. And for that reason, if the existence
of one perishes, the other’s existence will not thereby perish. But if the essence of one
could be destroyed, and become false, the other’s essence would also be destroyed.
[NS: and become false].170
170 Spinoza, Ethics., 1P17S
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Although it seems to be a lost cause for the Nominalist at first sight, Rice succeeds in
formulating a convincing solution. His argument breaks down into two parts. Firstly, he
argues that in the Scholium above Spinoza is not talking about one single essence that is
shared by two different men, but about two different essences and two different men.
And secondly, instead of dealing with the act of sharing one single essence, the example
seems to be about similar essences. To agree according to their essence does not have to
mean that those two men must share a strictly identical essence.171
Formal and actual essences
I will now begin to refute Haserot’s second part of his inquiry, namely the part where he
shifts to the textual evidence for his claim that Spinoza makes use of rational universals,
as opposed to the fictitious universals Spinoza describes in 2P40S1. In this part he
mainly focuses on Spinoza’s talk about essences, with the main question being: is there
anything as the universal essence of man?
Haserot doesn’t only use 1P17S to prove that the essence of man is not dependent on the
existence of a single human being, he also sees it as proof that essences are eternal.
Although he is right about the essences being eternal, mind-‐independent, not perceived
by the senses and the objects of true knowledge, when he says that an essence does not
indicate existence in the durational sense, he doesn’t recognize the difference between
the formal and the actual essences.172 This is also the reason why he fails in his
refutation of 2def2. The second definition of the second part of the Ethics one of the most
cited pieces of text as proof that the essence of a thing is unique to its possessor, as
opposed to them being able to be instantiated in multiple modes of the same kind.173
However, following this claim blindly just because it happens to be the mainstream
171 Rice, “Le Nominalisme de Spinoza.” 172 Haserot, “Spinoza and the Status of Universals.” 173 It’s important to be careful with the term ‘uniqueness’. With saying that an essence is unique to its possessor, I don’t mean that the essence itself is unique in the sense that there can’t be anything like it. As I will show in the last chapter, the actual essences of human beings are–although particular–exactly similar to each other. This is the opposite of being unique. The uniqueness of essences is an argument that rather points to Realism, since–although there can be multiple instances of the same essence–there will be no other essence that is exactly like it, as Istvan rightly pointed out to me.
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position would not honor my research question. Therefore 2def2 needs a little bit more
elaboration.
‘I say that to the essence of any thing belongs that which, being given, the thing is
[NS: also] necessarily posited and which, being taken away, the thing is necessarily
[NS: also] taken away; or that without which the thing can neither be nor be
conceived, and which can neither be nor be conceived without the thing.’174 (my
emphasis)
I believe that the essence Spinoza is talking about in this definition is the actual essence
of a thing, or the striving by which it perseveres in its being. If this is right, there are two
things we can infer from this definition: firstly, the existence of the essence depends on
the existence of its mode and secondly, essences are entities that individuate its
possessor. From the former we can easily infer that an essence is indeed something
unique that belongs to the thing that possesses it. Without the actual essence; we cannot
conceive the thing but whenever the thing perishes, its essences perishes with it. This
can hardly be interpreted, then, as a universal essence.175 Suppose there would be
something as a universal human essence, which could then be instantiated in an
unlimited amount of particular human beings. Following 2def2, if the essence can’t exist
without its instantiation, this would mean that if one particular person dies, the whole of
humanity would die with it. But this is absurd. So from this we can infer that 2def2 is
evidence for a Nominalist interpretation of the essences.
The doctrine of the conatus can be used to enhance this view. 3p7 goes as follows: ‘The
striving by which each thing strives to persevere in its being is nothing but the actual
essence of the thing.’176 If we add 2L7 to this, we can understand the thing’s actual
essence being the striving by which it tries to retain the same ratio of motion and rest.
This way an individual can be affected in many ways, while still retaining its nature and
without losing its form. (2L5) We can understand this striving as individually oriented
behavior that is unique to its mode. The actual essence of a thing, or the desire to
174 Spinoza, Ethics., 2def2 175 As will become clear later on in this section, a thing also cannot be conceived without its formal essence. However, the existence of the formal essence does not depend on the existence of the thing. 176 Spinoza, Ethics.
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preserve its being, can never be the essence of another because then it would also strive
to preserve the other’s being.177 We can know that the essence Spinoza talks about in
3P7 is the same as the kind he is talking about in 2def2, because the actual essence of a
thing is dependent on the actual existing of the thing. When the thing dies, the striving to
persevere in its being will die with it. While on the other hand the thing cannot exist
without this striving to preserve its existence. This reasoning is similar to the one of
2def2, where is stated that the essence is dependent on its respective mode and vice
versa. No mode without essence, and no essence without the mode. Therefore, the
essence will be unique to the thing that possesses it.
However, with this argumentation I have not completely won the argument yet. Not
everyone agrees with this interpretation, which means that 2def2 might not be as
straightforward as I have argued before.178 One of the possible different readings of
2def2 I have already showed in 3.1.2., namely Haserot’s Platonist reading of Spinozistic
essences. As I have already discussed, he argues that interpreting 2def2 as a proof for
particular essences results from failing to notice Spinoza’s dual sense of the term 177 Martin, “The Framework of Essences in Spinoza’s Ethics.” 178 There have been formulated a handful of counterarguments for this thought. I will formulate an answer to Haserot’s argument I discussed in 3.1.2. in what follows. The other counterexample I want to highlight is one by Karolina Hübner. She states that reading that ‘any thing’ in 2def2 can only stand for a particular, single mode is reading it in a question begging way. According to Hübner this argument also goes for 3P7. Interpreting ‘its being’ as particular is to impose your own interpretation to the text, because there is nothing in Spinoza’s writings that forces you to read it that way. Hübner argues that both 2def2 and 3P7 can also be understood as referring to a more general essence or a species essence. The universal essence of men would then be instatiated in something general as humanity. Without the essence of men, humanity cannot be conceived; but without humanity there cannot be the essence of men. This would then be a school example of universalia in re. There is no reason to prefer a particularist reading above a more general reading of the essence Spinoza is talking about. She then concludes that both are compatible with both a particularist or a universalist view. In other words, 2def2 cannot provide us sufficient reason to state that essences for Spinoza are, indeed, particular. Hübner, “Spinoza on Essences, Universals, and Beings of Reason.” I have to admit that I’m not sure if my elaboration of 2def2 and Spinoza’s conatus doctrine is enough to refute Hübner’s argument. However, her view doesn’t oppose mine, it just points out that 2def2 cannot exclusively be used as proof for a Nominalist understanding of Spinozistic essences. So maybe 2def2 isn’t strong enough to prove my claim but since 2def2 is not the main argument for my conclusion, I don’t see her argument as undermining my conclusion, namely that Spinozistic essences are unique to its possessor. Her point will eventually even turn out to reinforce my conclusion. What I want to argue in my fourth chapter is that Spinoza does admit mind-‐dependent species essences to help us explain certain things and to help us to understand the things around us. As I have already stated in this chapter, I dont believe that Spinoza condemns the imagination but only wants to warn us for its dangers. We can thus use species-‐essences as long as we are aware of the fact that they are not real beings, but modes of thinking.
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‘existence’. Existence that follows from God is real and is apprehended by the intellect
while existence can also by apprehended by the imagination. In this case existence is not
real but understood under a species of duration. Since essences are eternal they don’t
entail existence in the latter sense. This means essences can never be dependent on the
duration of their object. In 2def2, according to Haserot, Spinoza is not referring to real
nonexistence, but to the durational form. In other words, when one human being dies,
the universal essence is still not affected.179
This argument fails to support Haserot’s Platonist reading, because he fails to see the
difference Spinoza makes between formal essences, belonging to the being of essence,
and actual ones, which belong to the being of existence. A view that underpins Spinoza’s
dual view on existence.180 Formal essences are indeed eternal, immutable (VP22)
entities that don’t depend on the existence of the object it individuates but on the ‘divine
essence alone’.181 We can clearly infer this from the following quotes from the KV and
CM:
‘Understand the definite nature, by which the thing is what it is, and which cannot
in any way be taken from it without destroying it, as it belongs to the essence of a
mountain to have a valley, or the essence of a mountain is that it has a valley. This is
truly eternal and immutable, and must always be in the concept of a mountain, even
if it does not exist, and never did.’182
‘To this we reply that the formal essence neither is by itself nor has been created, for
both these presuppose that the thing actually exists. Rather it depends on the divine
essence alone, in which all things are contained. So in this sense we agree with those
who say that the essences of things are eternal.’183
Eternal essences don’t only make things what they are, they can also best be understood
as, what Viljanen describes as, the blue-‐print of reality that make up the ‘prime layer of
179 Haserot, “Spinoza and the Status of Universals.” 180 Viljanen, Spinoza’s Geometry of Power. Because a discussion of this topic goes outside the scope of my paper, I will not be able to provide a detailed elaboration of this subject. For this see: Valtteri Viljanen’s ‘Spinoza’s Geometry of Power’. 181 Spinoza, “Appendix Containing Metaphysical Thoughts.”, P. 305 182 Spinoza, “Short Treatise on God, Man, and His Well-‐Being.”, P. 61 183 Spinoza, “Appendix Containing Metaphysical Thoughts.”, P. 305
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reality itself’.184 They determine the way things are in an immutable and eternal way.
Formal essences are the essences by which we can obtain true knowledge of a particular
thing.185 These are the essences we grasp when Spinoza is talking about the third kind of
knowledge, or scientia intuitiva. When we apprehend a thing through our intellect–or
sub specie aeternitatis–we are able to grasp these formal essences, and the properties
that follow from them.186 This means that it’s the formal essence that makes the thing
what it is. To conceive a thing as it really is in itself, thus without any external relations,
is to conceive its formal essence. But, for Spinoza, a thing’s most inner essence isn’t
equal its most essential property.187 Knowing a thing’s properties does not equal
knowing a thing’s essence and thus truly understanding what the thing is. This is clear
from 2P40S2, stating that we only grasp a thing’s essence by the third kind of
knowledge, while we can have adequate ideas of its properties by the second kind of
knowledge and the following passage from the Short Treatise:
‘First, we do not see that they give us here any Attributes through which it is known
what the thing (God) is, but only Propria, which indeed belong to a thing, but
never explain what it is. For though existing of itself, being the cause of all things,
the greatest good, eternal, and immutable, etc., are proper to God alone,
nevertheless through those propria we can know neither what the being to
which these propria belong is, nor what attributes it has.’ (my emphasis)188
Although this passage revolves around the essence of God189, it contains Spinoza’s
understanding of (formal) essences in general: the essence of a thing can’t be equated to
184 Viljanen, Spinoza’s Geometry of Power., P. 11 185 Spinoza, “Treatise on the Emendation of the Intellect.”, § 93 186 Note that, although Spinoza speaks of properties, these are not to be understood as universals. At the end of the chapter I will argue that the best way to understand Spinoza is to read him as a Trope Theorist. And, as I have showed in the second chapter, Trope Theory does allow universals, on the condition that they are constructed as particular. 187 Jarrett, “Spinoza on Necessity.” 188 Spinoza, “Short Treatise on God, Man, and His Well-‐Being.”, P. 89. 189 The passage I have just quoted is Spinoza’s counter argument for the fact that God is commonly defined as ‘omniscient, omnipotent, eternal, simple, infinite, the greatest good, of infinite compassion etc’ (Ibid., P. 89) According to Spinoza it is wrong to use such properties to define God. Although these properties do belong to God, they can never explain what God really is. Only the attributes are what express God’s essence. This is because these properties always presuppose one of God’s attributes. For example the property of omniscience will presuppose
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the properties that follow from it. What then makes up the essence of a finite mode, is
not a necessary property it has, but rather something unique to the individual from
which all its properties can be derived.190
However, this is not the kind of essence Spinoza is referring to in 2def2. The definition
revolves around actual essences or the conatus of a thing. The conatus is ‘the striving by
which each thing strives to persevere in its being’.191 So actual essences define the power
of the thing by which it strives to persevere in its being. (Ep. 64) In contrast to formal
essences, the actual essence of a thing, which is understood under a species of duration,
does depend on the durational existence of its possessor. When this striving to exist is
removed from a thing, it will logically perish and when the thing itself perishes, the
conatus dies, so to speak, with its subject. Without the striving there can’t be durational
being and without an existing thing, wherein the conatus is located, there can be no
striving. This means that the actual essence, or the striving of the thing, is dependent
upon the thing it individuates, as stated in 2def2.
The distinction between formal and actual essences can best be understood as a modal
one, meaning that the former can exist without the other, while the latter can’t. This
means that the essence of a thing can be understood clearly and distinctly without the
thing actually (or in Spinoza’s words: durational) existing. But without a formal essence
determining what the thing is from eternity, there can be no actual essence since there is
nothing that can undertake the striving to persevere in being.192 This also follows clearly
from § 101 in the TIE, where Spinoza states that:
‘The essences of singular, changeable things are not to be drawn from their series,
or order of existing, since it offers us nothing but extrinsic denominations, relations,
or at most, circumstances, all of which are far from the inmost essence of things.
That essence is to be sought only from the fixed and eternal things (…)’193
the attribute of Thought. Without Thought, we would never be able to understand that particular property. Curley, Behind the Geometrical Method. A Reading of Spinoza’s Ethics. 190 Jarrett, “Spinoza on Necessity.” 191 Spinoza, Ethics., 3P7 192 Jarrett, “Spinoza’s Distinction between Essence and Existence.” 193 Spinoza, “Treatise on the Emendation of the Intellect.”, § 101
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with the ‘fixed and eternal things’ standing for the attributes. When we grasp the formal
and inmost essence of a thing, we comprehend them in the attributes of God.194
In short, when the thing exists, the actual essence exists and vice versa, while when a
formal essence exists, the thing only possibly exists. This is because a thing’s formal
essence doesn’t imply its existence.195 A formal essence can perfectly exist without a
thing that actualizes it.196 This means we can understand the actual essence of a thing as
the actualization of the formal essence of a thing.197
Haserot was thus right in stating that Spinoza was only referring to durational existence
in 2def2, but he was wrong thinking that the essence Spinoza was talking about, was the
eternal, formal essence. A thing can indeed not be conceived without its formal essence,
but a formal essence can be conceived without the thing, just like the concept of a
mountain will always include a valley, even if it doesn’t exist or has never existed.
Nothing changes in the formal essence when the thing perishes, because it’s not
dependent on the thing. But the actual essence, to the contrary, can never be conceived
without the thing, because it is the durational existence of the thing that maintains the
striving to preserve that existence. There will be no striving without the thing and there
can be no thing, without the striving. Or at least, the thing cannot stay in existence
without the striving to preserve in that existing. You have both or you have nothing.198
194 Spinoza, “Appendix Containing Metaphysical Thoughts.”, P. 304 195 With substance as being the only exception to the rule here. 196 Note that the existence I am talking about when I am referring to eternal essences, is not the durational existence of a mode. It’s eternal existence, which cannot be explained by duration or time. 1D8 197 Garrett, “Spinoza on the Essence of the Human Body and the Part of the Mind That Is Eternal.” 198 It must be said that one argument is missing in this part, namely 1P8S2. This Scholium, that was discussed in 3.1. really seems to infer that there are general essences that can be instantiated in infinitely many particulars and it’s seems difficult to provide a Nominalist answer for this problem. I mention this, because it allows me to shortly touch on one other possibility that I haven’t really discussed in this paper, namely that Spinoza was inconsistent in his conception and usage of universals. It’s possible that–although most of his writings show that he was a Nominalist–the passages that are difficult to interpret, were simply intended in a Realist way. Still, I think that, to a large extend, it is best to understand Spinoza as a Nominalist. That is, if I am right in my analysis that Spinoza was no Realist concerning universal essences.
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3.2.6. Spinoza’s conception of man
The only issue that remained untouched until now is Spinoza’s conception of man. Is
there such a thing as the human nature, being something that all human beings possess
and share with each other? According to the Realists, there is. Two of their main
arguments, namely the second axiom and the tenth proposition of the second part of the
Ethics, I have already discussed in 3.1.2. and given a Nominalist answer in 3.2.4. Haserot
further continues his analysis of Spinoza’s conception of man by discussing the conatus
principle and men’s adequate ideas. To prove his point he argues that the former is a
striving that is shared by all things of the same kind, even though it can feel like it’s a
particular striving. Secondly he states that, since the set of the adequate ideas of all men
are the same, they must be universals. Because of the importance of Spinoza’s
conception of man and the different ethical consequences that are attached to both
possible Nominalist and Realist readings, I will dedicate my last and final chapter to a
discussion of a non-‐essential reading of human nature. In this chapter I will also shortly
touch and discuss Haserot’s arguments about human nature for his Realist, Platonic
reading.
3.2.7. Spinoza’s Nominalism explained In the previous part of my paper I have argued why Spinoza is best understood as a
Nominalist, regarding essences as particular and unique to their possessors, by
discussing various textual fragments from Spinoza’s Ethics, KV, TIE and CM and by
refuting Haserot’s arguments for a Realist, more specifically Platonist, understanding of
Spinozistic essences. I have discussed and explained 2P40S1, a Scholium that is a clear
proof of Spinoza’s retention of the existence of entities such as the universal essence of
man. I have supplemented this particular piece of evidence with other propositions such
as 2def2 that show Spinoza’s use of essences, both formal and actual, as particular and
unique to its possessor. I have considered Spinoza’s monism, which shows that his
philosophy cannot be reconciled with a system that allows solely for species-‐essences.
Together with this, I have presented various counterarguments for Non-‐Relational as
well as Relational Realism. Non-‐Relational Realism is not consistent with Spinoza’s
conception of the attributes, because Extension is not a universal property in which all
finite particular modes share. Instead, I have argued that Extension is something they
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exist in and depend on. Secondly, Relational Realism fails because there is no room for a
transcendental realm in Spinoza’s ontology, since there is nothing outside God.
I have started my refutation of a Realist interpretation of Spinoza’s metaphysics by
arguing that Nominalism doesn’t have to go hand in hand with a subjective analysis of
the attributes. I’ve shown that they are ontologically objective and thus real entities that
constitute God’s unique, eternal and infinite essence. With this I have argued that when
we understand the attributes as real, we cannot understand them as universal. When we
interpret them as universal, they are mere concepts that are the results of our
imagination. With this I have also proved that real knowledge is possible in a Nominalist
Spinozistic system. Lastly, I have explained Spinoza’s usage of seemingly Realist terms
such as human nature by defining them as useful modes of thinking. These are man-‐
made concepts that Spinoza allows in his theory to more easily explain and understand
certain things–provided that we are aware that they are no real beings. From all this I
have concluded that Spinoza doesn’t allow real universal entities in his ontology. Or as
Spinoza says it himself in the KV: ‘God, then, is a cause of, and provider for, only particular
things.’199
But with all this, it has still not been specified what kind of Nominalism Spinoza exactly
endorses. In what follows now, I will argue that Spinoza can be best understood as a
Trope Theorist, or a Constituent Anti-‐Realist. I infer this from the fact that Spinoza
rejects the Non-‐Constituent version, both the Relational and the Non-‐Relational one, of
Nominalism. Let us first look to at Bennett’s criticism of a Nominalist reading of
Spinoza’s Ethics to further understand the claim I just made:
‘He writes at times as though he were a nominalist, allowing existence only to
particulars. In the Metaphysical Thoughts he writes that ‘Universals do not exist,
and have no essence except that of particulars.’ (I/263/5), and echoes of this linger
on in the mature work. Some commentators have held him to this, trying to explain
away the strands in his thought which go against it. They have said, for instance,
that what he admits into his ontology is not really the universal extension but only
the extended realm, which is a vast particular. That interpretation, although wrong,
is plausible; but other doctrine of Spinoza’s cannot be given plausible nominalist
199 Spinoza, “Short Treatise on God, Man, and His Well-‐Being.”, P. 87
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readings. Most notably, in Ep40s2, he says that reason involves knowledge ‘of
the properties of things’, which would be odd (to put it mildly) if he denied the
existence of properties.’ (my emphasis) 200
Spinoza does indeed allow properties in his ontology. This is not only clear from P40S2,
which states that we can obtain knowledge of the properties of things through the
second kind of knowledge or reason, but also from 1P16dem, which demonstrates the
modes are nothing less than the properties of God. More specifically, from the given
definition of any thing a number of properties necessarily follow, and the more reality a
thing has, the more properties follow. A definition of a thing is what explains the inmost
essence of a thing. And once we know the essence of a thing, we can know its properties
that further characterize it.201 The properties referred to here are best understood as
really existing instead of mere inventions as Predicate-‐ and Concept-‐Nominalists do. We
can infer this from what Spinoza understands under what a definition is: ‘it is what
explicates a thing as it exists outside the intellect’.202 This means it will give a true
description of the thing instead of only describing how we are affected by the thing, as
modes of thinking do. In contrast to the latter, the former has a real external object to
the intellect, while the object of the latter definition has no real existing object.203
But the acceptance of properties in your ontology does not entail that Nominalism is out
of the question. This is ignoring Constituent Anti-‐Realism or Trope Theory. Trope
Theorists do allow properties in their metaphysics, if and only if, these properties are
constructed as individuals. Trope Theorists then explain the apparent identity between
things as exact similarity. If two apples are the exact same shade of red then there are
not only two distinct particulars–the two apples—but also two distinct properties of
red, which are exactly similar.
Haserot’s analysis of Spinoza’s conception on universals is, just like Bennett’s passage
quoted above, an example of a refutation that goes against the whole of Nominalism
while actually only giving counterarguments for one particular school in Nominalism,
more specifically Non-‐Constituent Nominalism. This branch in Nominalism indeed
rejects properties and is thus rejected by Spinoza. This is not the only reason why a Non-‐
200 Bennett, A Study of Spinoza’s Ethics., §11.2 201 Spinoza, “Treatise on the Emendation of the Intellect.”, §95, §96 202 Spinoza, The Letters., Ep. 9 203 Curley, “Experience in Spinoza’s Theory of Knowledge.”
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Constituent Anti-‐Realist analysis of Spinoza’s writings is not possible. Namely, a Non-‐
Constituent understanding of Spinozistic attributes is to consider them as–like Haserot
rightly points out–entia rationis. The attributes of God are what underlie all of its
properties. To say that substance is extended is to explain God in the most general
way.204 But these principal properties that constitute the essence of substance cannot be
real entities for Non-‐Constituent Anti Realists, since they do not allow such entities in
their ontology. This means they will have to find another solution to explain how an
individual can be characterized.
According to Non-‐Relational Non-‐Constituent Anti-‐Realism we can’t give a further
explanation to o’s being F than o’s being F.205 The non-‐property individual F, however,
can never embody the kind of qualitas entity that the attributes are for Spinoza’s
substance. Therefore Spinoza rejects this branch of Non-‐Constituent Nominalism.206
Relational Non-‐Constituent Anti-‐Realism tries to solve this by saying that o is F if and
only if o stands in a relation to F, provided that o, F and the relation between both are
construed as non-‐property individuals.207 Given God’s uniqueness (1P14) and the fact
that the attributes can never be real entities for Non-‐Constituent Anti-‐Realists, we can
conclude that Spinoza also rejects this form of Nominalism.
This means that, because of Spinoza’s commitment to the objective ontological status of
the attributes, Constituent Anti-‐Realism is the only kind of Nominalism that can explain
Spinoza’s various passages that show that he only allows particulars in his philosophy.
This being said, I take Spinoza’s endorsement of Constituent Nominalism, since he
allows properties and defines the attributes as real, as being proved. In my next chapter
I will discuss the consequences of my findings I inferred from Spinoza’s metaphysics to
his conception of man and his moral philosophy. More specifically, I will try to give a
Nominalist explanation of how people can agree in nature–which Spinoza often refers to
in the fourth part of the Ethics–without therefore sharing a strictly identical human
essence
204 Nadler, Spinoza’s Ethics. 205 See 1.2.1.b 206 Istvan, “Spinoza and the Problem of Universals: A Study and Research Guide.” 207 See 1.2.1.a
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4. Spinoza’s ethics
4.1. Introduction The former chapter was intended to investigate whether or not Spinoza’s was
committed to universal essences in his ontology. Now that we haven’t only concluded
that Spinoza does not accept universal entities in his metaphysics but also that Spinoza
necessarily had to endorse Trope Theory, if he wanted to be consistent with his own
metaphysics and his theory of knowledge. This means that Spinoza explains apparent
identity in terms of exact similarity; instead of–as Realists do–in terms of strict identity.
It seems odd then, that if for Spinoza all essences are particular, he often refers to
human nature in multiple passages in the Ethics. He does this especially in the fourth
part of the Ethics, where he frequently uses the term of agreement in nature as part of
the foundation on which he builds his collaborative morality. But not only agreement in
Nature, also Spinoza’s conception of reason, which guides rational men through life,
seems a universal element in Spinoza’s ethics. Reason, being the collection of men’s
adequate ideas, seems to be exactly the same for every active, free man who acts
according to his own nature, which means that he acts rationally and virtuous. Does this
mean that Spinoza’s ethics cannot be understood without some crucial universal
elements? To solve this problem, I will have to show that agreement in nature does not
have to entail that two (or more) people share in the same, strictly identical and
universal human essence. If this argument turns out to fail, then this would mean–if I am
right in my analysis of Spinoza’s metaphysics–that there is an insurmountable
incoherence in Spinoza’s philosophical system.
Although it may seem like Spinoza is in a lot of trouble at first sight, this is only apparent.
This chapter will show that Spinoza’s ethics do indeed follow from his metaphysics in a
consistent way. Just as there is no room for universals in his metaphysics, there is no
room for objectively existing universals in his conception of man or his ethics. In what
follows I will argue that for Spinoza two (or more) men agree in nature, when they both
live according to the guidance of reason. (4P35) This means that only when we act
rationally, or virtuously, men can agree according to their essence. However, the
property of rationality–or to express it more exactly: the set of adequate ideas–is not a
universal property that is shared by all rational men, but an abstract particular or trope.
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This means that men can have adequate ideas that are exactly similar without these
adequate ideas losing their individuality. When we think of the human species, we don’t
think about a real being but about a mind-‐dependent collection of similar individuals.
The classifying function of our mind is inherent to our thinking and this makes it easy to
be confused between the modes of thinking and the real beings. This means that we can
understand Spinoza’s foundation of his collaborative morality in a Nominalist
framework and that his ethics are consistent with the claim that there are no universal
entities. On top of that, I will argue that Spinoza does allow us to use mind-‐dependent
species-‐essences to better retain and explain certain things. This is also the reason why
Spinoza so often uses concepts like ‘human nature’. As long as we are aware of the fact
that modes of thinking are no real beings–something which Spinoza warns his readers
for multiple times not only in the Ethics but also in his TIE, CM and KV–we are allowed to
use them in our daily and practical lives. Modes of thinking are no concepts we need to
get rid of. On the contrary, in the preface of the fourth part of the Ethics Spinoza writes
that we have to retain these kind of words, like for example perfection, because they can
be useful to us as long as we use them in their rightful meaning.
In this chapter I will proceed as follows: firstly I will discuss the conatus doctrine, out of
which not only Spinoza’s theory of the passions flows but also, since it’s the foundation
of virtue, his collaborative morality. After this I will proceed to other particular elements
in Spinoza’s conception of man and his ethics, where I will mainly focus on a discussion
of the notions of good and evil. My next point will mainly concern the question of how it
is possible to build a collaborative ethics from something as singular and individual as
the conatus. In other words, in this part of the chapter I will show how a common
society can be possible in a Nominalist framework where all essences are unique and
individual and where there is thus no such thing as a shared human nature to rely on. It
is in this section where I will discuss how Spinoza’s argument of agreeing in nature can
be understood in Constituent Anti-‐Realism. Then, I will shortly discuss and refute one
particular argument in Bennett’s criticism against Spinoza’s moral philosophy in order
to show that his ethics are truly consistent with his ontology, because Spinoza doesn’t
allow universal entities in both. I believe that my interpretation of agreement in nature
shows Bennett’s criticism stems from an misinterpretation of 4P30-‐31. Lastly, I will
explain why Spinoza uses universal terms like human nature and the form of man and I
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will show that, although they are not real beings, Spinoza understands universal notions
as useful as long as we keep in mind that they don’t refer to anything real.
4.2. The conatus The conatus principle, or the striving by which each singular thing strives to persevere
in its being, is the actual essence of each thing. (3P7) As we have already showed in the
previous chapter, the conatus is strictly unique to its possessor since it perishes once the
thing it belongs to dies. This striving is something that, according to Spinoza, is found in
every single thing in the world. Then why is it necessary to discuss this doctrine in a
paper about a Nominalist interpretation of Spinoza’s ontology and ethics? This is
because, men’s actual essence, or his active desire insofar as he understands, is the first
and only foundation of virtue.208 In other words, acting virtuous is nothing else than
acting truly according to our essence. Only when one acts according to its essence, we
can say that he/she acts instead of being acted on. Because of its importance for
Spinoza’s overall project, we need to further elaborate 3P7 in order to be sure we truly
understand what Spinoza means by it. So what does it exactly mean to strive to
persevere in your being and what does this being exactly refer to? This is the main point
on which I will focus in what follows.
The conatus doctrine has its roots in Spinoza’s metaphysics, more specifically in
1P25cor and 1P34dem. This corollary and proposition in the first part of the Ethics show
that finite modes are expressions of God’s power in a certain and determinate way. This
means that our actual essence is a certain and determinate expression of God’s power.209
The first step to a proper understanding of ‘the striving by which each thing strives to
persevere in its being’ (3P7) is to understand that the being the proposition is referring
to indicates more than only the duration of the body. It is not because Spinoza explicitly
denies the possibility of self-‐destruction in 3P4 that this means one should persevere in
208 A man’s active desire is not exactly the same as his desire in general. A man’s desire stands for ‘any of a man’s strivings, impulses, appetites, and volitions’ (DefAffI) Desire is nothing but a man’s striving that is related to both a man’s mind and body of which he is conscious. (3P9S) One has desires both insofar as it has adequate as inadequate ideas. However, when something acts insofar it has inadequate ideas, we cannot say that it acts, but is acted on. Therefore, we only act virtuous when we strive to preserve ourself insofar as we have adequate ideas or when we act under the guidance of reason. (3P3, 3P9, 4P20, 4P22) In this case, we can call the desires active. This will become more clear in 4.4.3. 209 Viljanen, Spinoza’s Geometry of Power.
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existing no matter what. To persevere in being is not equal to trying to live as long as
you can. At least for human beings, the actual essence seems to refer to something
bigger than that.210 In the Ethics we can find three passages that prove that the being we
strive to preserve, is more than only making sure our heart keeps on beating.
The first argument we can turn to to support this claim is the last paragraph of the
preface of part four of the Ethics, where Spinoza states that ‘no singular thing can be
called more perfect for having persevered in existing for a longer time’. From this we can
conclude that persevering in being for the longest time possible does not bring us closer
to perfection, or in other words, closer to acting truly according to our essence and being
the adequate cause of your effects. Secondly, 4P20S, where Spinoza describes Seneca’s
suicide as ‘avoiding a greater evil by submitting to a lesser’, and 4P72S, where is stated
that one should never commit treachery to save one’s own life, show that death is not
the worst thing that could happen to us and that acting according to our actual essence
can’t be equal to fighting to preserve only in our durational being. The last and most
important argument is 4P30S, which reads as:
‘For I dare not deny that–even though the circulation of the blood is maintained, as
well as other signs on account of which the body is thought to be alive–the human
body can nevertheless be changed into another nature entirely different from its
own. For no reason compels me to maintain that the body does not die unless it is
changed into a corpse.’211
From this it is clear that we do not only strive to physically exist, but we strive to retain
our nature or our form, which is a certain ratio of motion and rest. (2L5) From this it is
clear that our body strives to persevere in more than only to make the actual duration of
the body to last longer. Of course, to be able to strive to retain our form, where the
priority of our bodily striving lies, we have to actually exist. Striving to preserve a
210 It’s important to note that, although I do use the term ‘human being’ here, there is nothing like a true human essence, of which all indidivual human beings are instances of. The reason that we can refer to things as the human species, is a result of our classifying minds and overloaded imagination, as Spinoza explains in 2P40S1. I will use concepts as human beings and human nature, because they come in handy to make certain points. But they can never refer to something real. As I will argue later on in this paper, Spinoza only used these terms in this sense as well. 211 Spinoza, Ethics.
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certain ratio of motion and rest is rather difficult when you’re dead. Spinoza makes this
clear in the following proposition:
‘No one can desire to be blessed, to act well and to live well, unless at the same time
he desires to be, to act, and to live, that is, to actually exist.’212
From this and 2P7 we can infer that our mind also strives for something more than
merely durational continuation, which is blessedness.213 Blessedness is the eternal,
intellectual love for God that arises from the third kind of knowledge. (5P32cor, 5P33,
5P42dem) Whenever we understand things by the third kind of knowledge, we can say
that we have adequate ideas and insofar as we have adequate ideas, we can say that we
act. This means that one will only be guided by his own nature or essence instead of
things outside of him, which makes him the adequate cause of his actions. When we say
that a person acts, it means that he truly acts from his essence alone, or from reason, and
this is nothing else than acting virtuously. (4P26) But insofar as one is guided by
inadequate ideas, we say that he is acted on, or undergoes things. That is, he cannot be
the adequate but only a partial cause of his effects. (3D2, 3P1) In this case we say that
someone lacks power. This means that the behavior of such a person will never be
determined only by his own nature, but also by things that are outside him. Someone
like this will never really act, because his passions will act for him. He will never really
speak, because his passions will speak for him. He will be nothing more than a plaything
of his passions, constantly drawn in different directions as an uncontrollable boat on a
rough sea. A passive ‘slave’ that fails to perfect his power of acting. (3P12, 3P28, 3P44S,
3P53, 4P37S) In contrast to someone who is led by reason and whose actions can be
understood by his essence alone, people who let their passions act for them are mostly
determined by external things. This means that they are not free. A free man is
somebody who is determined by his nature alone and his actions can always be
212 Ibid., 4P21. Other passages that support this thought are 3P4 and 4P20S, where Spinoza makes clear that a thing could be self-‐destructing. To first condition for living well, is actually being alive. However, as I shall point out later, this is not where the priority of our striving lies. 213 Our bodily and mental striving are exactly the same, only now conceived under the attribute of Extension and then under conceived under the attribute of Thought. They are two different expressions of the same thing. When the striving is only related to the mind, it is called will and when it is related to both our mind and body, it is called appetite. We can call this appetite desire when we are consicous of it. This desire is the actual essence of men. 2P7, 3P9S
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understood as bringing him closer to blessedness or absolute perfection. As I already
discussed in the first chapter, freedom for Spinoza has nothing to do with making a
certain choice while it was possible to decide otherwise. (1app) Freedom for Spinoza is
equal to being able to act according to the necessity of your essence. (1D7) God is the
only absolutely free entity in Spinoza’s ontology, because there is nothing that can
compel its actions. (1P17) For finite modes, however, acting freely turns out to be a bit
more complicated. Or as Viljanen describes it: ‘Temporal reality is a field of constant
contest, and consequently things in it do not get to exist and to operate in a hindrance-free,
‘frictionless’ world.’214 To act according to their essence, finite things will always have to
compete against other external things, such as for example the passions. People who
lack power will be subject to their affects that will control them, instead of being able to
control their own behavior. Spinoza call this the ‘bondage of the affects’. (4pref) The
only way to break the chains of the passions, is the striving to preserve in your own
being. This is nothing but acting insofar as we have adequate ideas and, thus, being self-‐
determined.215 And what we strive for from reason is nothing but the striving to
understand things by the third kind of knowledge or the knowledge of God. (4P26) And
the more we understand, the more we will be able to restrain the affects and break, so to
speak, the chains the passions have laid upon us. (5P6) Even more, since acting
virtuously is the same as the striving to persevere in being, or, as we know now, the
striving to understanding, this means that the greatest virtue of the mind is to
understand God. (4P28) From this knowledge, the greatest satisfaction of the mind
arises. (5P27) And it’s this pleasure, that is accompanied by God as a cause, that results
in the love of God, or blessedness together with the greatest joy, to eternity. (5P32) And
since joy is the same as the passage from lesser to a greater perfection, than the greatest
joy, or blessedness, must be equal to perfection itself. (5P33S) In a way, you could say
that we share in the joy of God. Thus, insofar as we understand and know things by the
third kind of knowledge, which is to conceive things sub specie aeternitatis, we are
endowed with the greatest human perfection. (4P62dem) Knowledge of God is thus the
214 Viljanen, Spinoza’s Geometry of Power., P. 102 215 It is important to keep Spinoza’s criticism of Descartes in 3pref. A man is not a dominion in a dominion. We are necessarily a part of the whole of Nature, which means that there is no such thing as a man that is a 100% free. Human power is limited. We will always be determined by things that are outside of us in a certain degree. Being able to understand this, will make our knowledge of God only greater and this will then result in you being less acted on by your passions. 4appXXXII
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greatest thing the mind can strive for and can attain.216 The knowledge of God, which is
infinite and eternal, is the greatest good for those who strive to act virtuous, or those
who strive to act according to their nature, and is not a scarce good. (4P32) To the
contrary, it ‘can be possessed equally by all men insofar as they are of the same nature’.
(4P36) It is common to all and can be equally shared be infinitely many people. This
means that all men that act virtuously, or men that agree in nature, will never have to
compete against each other for it. On the contrary, they will support and encourage
others to act virtuously. They will not only desire the greatest good for themselves, but
they will also desire it for everybody that is around them. And the more they
understand, they more they will desire this and strive to make other people act
according to the guidance of reason. With this the foundation of the common society is
laid out as well: if everyone lived according to his/her essence, and thus under the
guidance of reason, everyone could strive to preserve its own being without being
contrary to another. (4P37) Even more, other men of the same nature will be useful for
one another (5P35cor2) because they will encourage and help each other to perfect
their own power of acting.
In brief, not merely the desire to live, but to the desire to live well is the essence of
man.217 (4P21dem) Although it would be absurd for any finite mode to desire to die,
nevertheless, what we truly strive for is something more than just the continuation of
our physical being. We strive to produce effects that can only be understood by our
216 Given 2P7 there should be a greatest good our body can attain too. Spinoza hasn’t explicitly pointed out what exactly this is, but from Spinoza’s model of the free man we can infer a thing or two. From 4P45S we can understand that the greatest good for the body is a constant new and varied nourishment, but always in moderation, so that the body,which consist of a great many parts of different natures, can be capable of many different things. 217 I think that we could take this claim even further, namely that what we strive for is not only to experience eternal joy like God does, but also to experience being like God does. Or in other words that we strive for eternal being. I conclude this from Spinoza’s doctrine of the eternity of the mind, which he explains in the last chapter of the Ethics. In 5P23 Spinoza states that ‘the human mind cannot be absolutely destroyed with the body, but something of it remains which is eternal’ and from 5P38dem we can infer that, the more we understand sub specie aeternitatis, or under the second and third kind of knowledge, the more of the mind remains. In other words, the more we understand, the less we get affected by the passions and the greater the part of the mind that remains after the death of the body and, thus, is eternal. So actually striving to understand is nothing else than striving for eternity. But because of the difficulty of Spinoza’s doctrine of the eternity of the mind, unfortunately there is no room in this thesis to research and discuss this claim in detail. For a more detailed discussion of this see Youpa, “Spinoza’s Theory of the Good.”
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essence alone. We strive for a knowledge of God, which results in blessedness or the
highest satisfaction our mind can obtain.218 When we understand things by the third
kind of knowledge, or sub specie aeternitatis, we have an understanding of the eternal
and infinite and necessary causal chain of Nature. It is the understanding that everything
necessarily follows from God’s nature and nothing could ever have been otherwise.
Understanding things to be contingent, is to understand them by the common order of
nature or by the imagination. (2P44cor1) When we understand adequately that we will
always be a part of Nature, we will suffer less under the passions that restrain us.
Knowing that everything is the world is necessary, will show us that it is useless to sob
over things we could have avoided or to wonder ‘why me?’. (4appxxxii) The more we
understand, the less the chains of the passions will constrain us. Striving to act according
to what is in your own advantage, is the striving to understand, which will not only show
us how to live well but will also provide us with the greatest peace of mind we can
attain. It’s the desire to be self-‐determined and to perfect our power of acting, because
being determined by our nature alone is where human perfection lies. (4pref) This
brings me to Spinoza’s conception of the free man and how we should understand
perfection, good and evil. But before I will discuss these concepts in detail, I will first
explain why this part is of any importance for my thesis.
Although I have already showed that the conatus must be individual and particular,
firstly by showing that Spinoza’s won’t allow universals in his metaphysics, secondly by
making clear that the conatus must be unique to its possessor by 2D2 and thirdly by
explaining that Spinoza’s ethics must follow from and be consistent with his
metaphysics, still it seems like the conatus is a universal essence. According to Spinoza
every single finite mode possesses this striving but it just seems weird to subscribe the
kind of striving I just discussed to a stone or a shrimp. How could the striving to
understand be of any advantage to them?219 This seems to make room for the possibility
of species-‐essences, where every species has its own kind of striving. That the Ethics is
essentially written for the use of human beings, would explain the fact that Spinoza has
only described the human-‐like conatus and has not mentioned others. But, as I have
218 The greatest striving of the mind is eternal knowledge, while the greatest striving of the body is to retain its ratio of motion and rest. But both kind of striving are exactly the same (by 2P7), only expressed in two different ways. 219 Ofcourse, this is just an assumption. I cannot know what is truly going on in a shrimp’s mind.
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already showed above, this would be inconsistent with Spinoza’s metaphysics. Since
species are no real beings but only mind-‐dependent concepts we form to better retain
things, there cannot be a universal species-‐essence that is instantiated in every
particular member of the same kind. In other words, there can be no such thing as a
species-‐dependent-‐conatus. The striving by which each thing strives to preserve its
being must be unique and dependent to the thing that possesses, which is a singular
finite mode. How, then, can we explain that the conatus of things of the same kind, such
as human beings, seems to be exactly the same in each individual? The answer has
already been given and discussed in 3.2.7. Tropes are the best and most consistent way
to explain Spinoza’s conception of the conatus principle. More specifically, every unique
striving of a particular thing is best understood as a trope. The reason why the conatus
of things of the same species seem identical to each other, is not because they all share in
one universal conatus, but because they are exactly similar to each other while still
being numerically distinct from each other. This way we can explain the apparent
identity between two (ore more) strivings while still keeping Spinoza’s conception of
man consistent with his metaphysics.
4.3. Good, evil and the model of the free man Things strive to persevere in their being insofar as they have adequate as inadequate
ideas. (3P9) This is because finite minds can never fully escape having inadequate ideas.
One can only try to have as many adequate ideas as possible in order to be as active and
self-‐determined as possible. But a perfectly free and rational human being does not
exist. We will necessarily always be a part of Nature. So, because the essence of the mind
is constituted by adequate as well as inadequate ideas, we will strive to preserve our
being insofar as we have both kinds of ideas. Spinoza calls this striving, when only
related to the mind, “will”, and when it is related to both the mind and body, “appetite”.
Desire, then, is identical to our appetite, with the only difference that we are conscious
of it. (3P9) The subsequent Scholium, then, exposes the basis of Spinoza’s conception of
good and evil.
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‘From all this, then, it is clear that we neither strive for, nor will, neither want, nor
desire anything because we judge it to be good; on the contrary, we judge
something to be good because we strive for it, will it, want it, and desire it.’220
3P57, then, by saying that ‘the desire of each individual differs from the desire of another
as much as the nature or essence of one differs from the essence of another’ makes clear
why this subjective conception of good en evil seems problematic at the least.221 If good
and evil depend on each individual’s desires, good and evil turn out to be completely
arbitrary and can thus stand for anything, varying from day to day and from person to
person. One day I might consider hamburgers as a good thing because I desire to eat
one, while my sister, who is a vegetarian, will see this desire as absolutely evil. So let’s
break this down a little further: good and evil are no objective properties that can be
predicated of real beings, but are mere modes of thinking, which have no real object.
(4pref) We don’t want certain things because we judge them as are good but we call
certain things good because we want them. On the opposite, we don’t avoid certain
things because they are evil, but we call certain things evil because we want to avoid
them. What is good, is just what is useful for us. (4D1) Although this doesn’t sound
objective at all, this isn’t the biggest problem we have to worry about now, since there
seems to be an inconsistency in Spinoza’s understanding of good and evil. I’ll use the
example of cyanide to further explain this: cyanide is nothing evil in itself, we only call it
evil because it is bad for our health and thus prevents us to preserve our being. In other
words, what is good is what helps to preserve our being or nature. Or, again in other
words, what increases our power of acting. With this the inconsistency becomes
emerges; if the good is what satisfies one’s desires and what helps one’s conatus, how,
then, does Spinoza explain that we often desire things that turn out contrary to our
advantage in the end? Take for example addictions or the desire for revenge, the former
resulting in bad health and possible death and the latter might result in prison or a
different type of punishment.
The solution for this apparent inconsistency lies in 3P58 and Spinoza’s perfectionism.
Both are rooted in the conatus doctrine.222 We can understand 3P58 as a kind of a break
220 Spinoza, Ethics., 3P9S 221 Ibid. 222 Kisner, “Perfection and Desire: Spinoza on the Good.”
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with the foregoing part of the third chapter of the Ethics. After discussing the passions,
which are all certain forms of joy, sadness and desire, Spinoza shows that apart from
these passions, there are other affects that are only related to us insofar as we act, or
insofar as we have adequate ideas. (3P3) Only joy and desire survive the transition to
these kind of ‘active’ affects, because sadness is what diminishes our power of acting.
(3P50dem) These kind of affects, or active desires, differ from the passions in the fact
that they are not something that we undergo and of which we are only a partial cause.
(1D1, 1D2)
To make things more understandable, take for example the passion of jealousy and the
desire to hurt someone that follows from it: when we hurt someone out of jealousy, we
don’t really act, but we undergo the passion of jealousy passively, which means that we
will let jealousy act for us instead of truly acting ourselves. This means we are not the
adequate cause of the effects that follow, but only a partial one, because the passion of
jealousy, which is external to our nature, is responsible for how we behave. We may say
that that the desire to hurt someone is not really yours. It’s imposed on you. We are
acted on only insofar as we have inadequate ideas or insofar as we imagine things.
(3P56dem) This stands in contrast to the active desires, which follow only from our
essence. This means that we will be the adequate cause of our effects. Further, from
4P19 we can infer that the desire to increase our power of acting is man’s very essence
or nature, that is, desires are particular strivings or particular expressions of our
conatus.223 And since perfection for Spinoza is nothing but the essence of a thing insofar
as it produces an effect, or acts, this means that the desire to increase our power is the
same as our desire to perfect our essence. (4pref) In other words, active desires will
always strive to achieve something in our advantage, namely in increasing our power of
acting. So when Spinoza says that the good is what we strive for, he is only referring to
our active desires here. This means that the inconsistency between both is only
apparent.
From all this we can conclude that our striving to preserve our being is nothing else than
the desire to act in our advantage or to increase our power of acting. That is, satisfying
your desires is the same as acting according to your essence. That is, only if we
understand as desire, in this case, only those active desires which follow solely from our
essence, thus increasing our power and perfection. This means that these desires arise 223 Ibid.
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from reason, since we are only said to act insofar we have adequate ideas. Thus, we call
something good because we strive for it, want it, desire it and we strive for it, want it,
desire it because it will bring us more power of acting and will bring us closer to the
model of the free man we have set for ourselves.224 (4pref)
From this we can conclude that Spinoza’s conception of good and evil isn’t as arbitrary
as it first seems. Although he endorses a (rather special) desire-‐satisfaction theory of
good and evil, still this doesn’t entail that what is considered as good or evil can vary
from day to day and from person to person. From this kind of conception of good and
evil an objective moral theory could never follow. We should only call something good
when it increases our power of acting or perfection. We only call something good when
our desires have arisen from reason. Good and bad are indeed dependent on what we
desire, but what we desire is not arbitrary. Human nature is not arbitrary. The things
we truly desire are the same for everybody. We all strive for our own advantage, which
is nothing but striving to understand or to live under the guidance of reason. Our active
desires will be the same as all other’s active desires because they follow from the same
set of adequate ideas. Thus whatever satisfies our desires is what will increase our
power of acting.225
But does this mean, then, that Spinoza does allow for universal entities in his conception
of man? Our adequate ideas and our active desires that flow out of it are not arbitrary ,
because they are the same for every human being. This could mean that the basis of
Spinoza’s moral philosophy is build on universal entities. My answer, and I think
Spinoza’s too, would be that it’s not. Since our desires follow from our natures, which I
have already argued to be tropes–being exactly similar but still numerically distinct– our
desires will be trope-‐like too. Good and evil are, although no real beings, not arbitrary
because all rational people possess exactly similar, but distinct, rational desires.
Spinoza’s conception of man and of good and evil are thus still consistent with his 224 The model of the free man is a universal concept, or a mode of thinking, that we have invented ourselves just like we form universal ideas of houses, buildings, towers etc. The more something looks like the universal idea we have imagined for it, the more we call it perfect. This is the same for the model of human nature. The more one approaches the model of the free man, who is completely self-‐determined, only acts from reason and thus always acts according to his own essence, the more perfect we call that person perfect. From this follows that under good we understand what brings us nearer to that model and what we call bad is what prevents us of becoming more like the model we have set for ourselves. (4pref) 225 Kisner, “Perfection and Desire: Spinoza on the Good.”
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metaphysics. This claim will become more clear after I will have argued that our sets of
adequate ideas, from which desires follow, are tropes too. I will discuss this argument–
which is central for my Anti-‐Realist analysis of Spinoza’s ethics–in the next section of
this chapter, where I will discuss how we should exactly understand what it means ‘to
agree in nature’.
4.4. Spinoza’s moral philosophy Just like Spinoza’s conception of good and evil turned out quite differently after we had
properly examined it, the same goes for Spinoza’s conception of benevolence. He firstly
seems to condemn benevolence in 3P27S, by showing that acting from benevolence is
acting out of pity. And since pity is a form of sadness, it diminishes our power of acting.
In this case we only want to act to the benefit of another to take our own sadness away,
because when we look at someone we pity, it saddens us (2P21, 22) As I have already
showed, this kind of desire to help someone out of pity can never be a desire that follows
only from our essence. Pity is a passion that makes us act in a certain way that is not in
line with our active desires that will aid our striving to preserve our being, or our
striving to understand and thus to attain eternal joy. However, just like Spinoza’s desire-‐
satisfaction theory of good and evil didn’t mean good and evil are completely arbitrary,
3P27S doesn’t immediately entail that there is no room for any kind of benevolence in
Spinoza’s moral philosophy. Actually his remarks on benevolence in that Scholium are
just one of the things that make Spinoza’s moral philosophy so compelling and
interesting. Although he doesn’t explicitly names it, there is a kind of active benevolence
that we only practice insofar as we act or understand.226 This is because Spinoza wants
to make clear that we should not reach out to others out of pity, fear of punishment or
hope for a reward and the happiness that comes with it, but because acting virtuous
(which is nothing but the essence of man insofar as we act. 4D8) is happiness.
(2P49corIVa,b) The only basis for acting benevolent should be reason. (4P50) We
should only be motivated to help and support others because we act under the guidance
of reason, which means that we understand that another rational man is the most useful
thing for another rational man because they will aid each other in reaching the greatest
226 Ibid.
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good the mind can attain, which is knowledge of God.227 Spinoza’s project is one that
tries to show us that acting to your own advantage goes hand in hand with acting to the
advantage of others, since the striving to persevere in being is nothing else than acting
from adequate ideas, or acting rationally. And acting insofar as we have adequate ideas,
increases our power of acting. And since, by 4D8, power is nothing else than virtue;
acting virtuous is nothing but a man’s essence. (4P22)
The next step in this chapter is to show how Spinoza succeeds in building a moral
philosophy out of something as individual as the conatus. If the striving by which each
thing strives to preserve its being is as particular and unique to its possessor as I have
argued above, then how can the actual essence of men be the foundation of virtue?
(4P22) One of the key concepts for this claim is agreement in nature. From 4P30-‐31 we
can infer that what is good for us, is what agrees with our nature and we agree in nature
with someone when we our natures have something in common. Realists interpret the
former claim as: insofar human beings share the same human essence, and act according
to that essence, they cannot harm one another. From here it is not difficult to see why
we get confused easily by thinking that human nature has an important role to play in
Spinoza’s moral philosophy, serving as a bridge between his metaphysics and his moral
and political philosophy.228 Realists find support for this claim in Spinoza’s frequent use
of concepts like human nature and the form of man in multiple passages in the Ethics,
with 4P35dem being only one example. Thus, my goal in the following section of this last
chapter will be to show how we should understand agreement in nature, then I will
discuss how this fits in a Nominalist framework and lastly, I will explain why Spinoza
often seems to refer to human nature and the like. Something which seems weird at the
least, since in the last chapter I have showed that Spinoza clearly only endorses
particular entities and essences. To do this I will first have to briefly lay out Spinoza’s
argument for his collaborative ethics in order to point out the role of agreement in
nature and how we should understand this.
227 But someone who helps others without being motivated by reason or pity, Spinoza calls inhuman. (4P40S) 228 Rice and St. Louis University, “Tanquam Naturae Humanae Exemplar.”
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4.4.1. 4P30 – 4P37 Although Spinoza’s transition to a collaborative philosophy from our actual essence
deserves a detailed and thorough discussion, I cannot go into too much detail because
this debate lies outside of the scope of this paper.229 However, I do think a brief
summary of Spinoza’s moral philosophy is necessary for this project, since many of the
Realist arguments find their roots in Spinoza’s talk on human nature. Without an
elaboration of what it means ‘to agree in nature’, this research would not be complete.
One could argue that the only way to find out Spinoza’s position on universals is by
investigating his metaphysics and his talk on essences and that this paper could have
actually ended at the end of the third chapter. Although it is certainly true that Spinoza’s
metaphysics precede his ethics and that the only right way of understanding the Ethics is
by first studying his ontology and using your findings to accurately understand
Spinoza’s conception of man and morality, still I think this research would be incomplete
without a study of the later parts of the Ethics. After all, by proving that his ontology is
best to be understood in a certain way, does not entail that his moral philosophy will
certainly be consistent with it. And the only way to find this out is by further
investigating Spinoza’s moral philosophy.
We can find the argument for acting from benevolence and forming a rational society
from 4P30 to 4P37. The argument goes as follows: insofar as a thing agrees with our
nature, it is necessary good for us. With ‘to agree in nature’ Spinoza means that
something cannot harm us insofar as we have something in common to our nature.
Having something in common, or agreeing in nature, stands for having some essential
property in common.230 For a Nominalist, it is possible to speak of two individuals
sharing essential properties, however their relationship will be analyzed in terms of
exactly similarity instead of strict identity. When a Nominalist, or more specific a
Constituent Nominalist, since Non-‐Constituent Anti-‐Realism doesn’t allow properties in
its ontology, says two or more individuals have a certain property in common, he won’t
be speaking about three things–as Realists do–but only about two things. A Realist
analyzes a shared property in terms of strict identity, which means that there will be 229 See Steinberg, “Spinoza’s Ethical Doctrine and the Unity of Human Nature.”, Barbone, “Virtue and Sociality in Spinoza.” and Kisner, “Spinoza’s Benevolence.” for interesting discussions on this topic. 230 Kisner, “Spinoza’s Benevolence.”
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three entities: individual A, individual B and the property F, which is instantiated in both
individuals. A Nominalist, however, will only be speaking about a binary relationship
between two individuals. To say that two individuals have a certain property in
common, is to say that they both possess their own numerically distinct property that is
exactly similar to the distinct property of the other individual. There is thus no general
property with which it stands in relation but, only two, particular and distinct properties
that are exactly similar.231
The properties I am talking about here must be essential properties for the argument to
work. Possible shared properties as wearing a brown hat, owning a big house etc. won’t
do the trick.232 Essential properties are what follow from the essence or the definition of
a thing and make a thing the kind of being that it is. The essential property that is shared
by all humans is, by 4P35, rationality. Or as Spinoza articulates it: ‘insofar as men live
according to the guidance of reason, must they always agree in nature.’ (4P35) Since
rationality is the essential property of the human kind, it means that it is the greatest
expression of our essence. This means that acting according to reason, or acting
virtuous, is the best expression of our nature. Since rational people agree the most in
nature with other rational people, they must be good as well as useful for each other. 233
Further Spinoza will argue that acting from our essence will turn out to be the same as
acting benevolent to others. This is because other rational men make it easier for each
other to reach the greatest thing our mind can strive for: the eternal knowledge of God
which will give us the greatest joy, to eternity. This is why, as soon as we act from reason
and we understand that acting benevolent to others is benevolent to ourselves, we will
always strive to support others in acting under the guidance of reason. (4P35S) Taking
care of yourself, means taking care for your environment and to neglect your
environment, is to neglect oneself.
This stands in stark contrast with men who don’t agree in nature, or people who don’t
act according to their essence. We say that men don’t have anything in common, when
they don’t act but are acted on. This means that, instead of acting according to the
guidance of reason, one will act under the guidance of the passions which are imposed
on him. Being subject to the passions, or acting insofar as you have inadequate ideas, is
231 Rice and St. Louis University, “Tanquam Naturae Humanae Exemplar.” 232 Kisner, “Spinoza’s Benevolence.” 233 Ibid.
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the only way for men to be contrary to one another or to hurt and harm each other. If
everyone would live according to the guidance of reason, a property we share, everyone
would be able to strive to preserve his being without injuring anyone else. Even more,
they would be of aid. From this the doctrine follows that
‘contributes to social life, insofar as it teaches us to hate no one, to disesteem no one,
to mock no one, to be angry at no one, to envy no one; and also insofar as it teaches
that each of us should be content with his own things, and should be helpful to his
neighbor, not from unmanly compassion, partiality, or superstition, but from the
guidance of reason, as the time and occasion demand.’234
The central argument for 4P30-‐31, however, can be read in two entirely different ways.
What exactly does it mean ‘to agree in nature’? Does this mean that there is something
as the human nature? This claim doesn’t seem unlikely, since Spinoza uses those exact
words in his Ethics more than once. However, I want to propose an alternative reading
to this one. An interpretation that can support his claim of benevolence and that is
consistent with his metaphysics. This is what I will discuss in the following section.
4.4.2. Human nature In what follows I will propose a Nominalist reading of what it means ‘to agree in nature’
that is consistent with Spinoza’s metaphysics.235 As stated earlier, ‘to agree in nature’ is
to have something in common with our nature. What I want to argue here is that
agreement in nature doesn’t have to entail that two things share a universal essence. As I
explained above, to have something in common can be analyzed in a relationship
between two things, both having a numerically distinct property that are exactly similar
to each other. Just like a table and a carpet in the exact same shade of red can both have
234 Spinoza, Ethics., 2P49SIVC. Of course, since our power is not infinite, we will always be subject to the affects to a certain extent. (4P37S2) 235 The argument I will present here now is not the only alternative to a Realist reading of agreeing in nature. Steinberg, for example, offers a very interesting (conceptualist) view on what it means ‘to agree in nature’. According to her we all share in human nature, with human nature being a kind of particular super-‐entity that is a complex individual construed by more simple particular elements–human finite modes–which are then again construed by more simple parts and so on. According to Steinberg, then, ‘to agree in nature’ is to say that human beings share a common nature. That is that they are each a part of the higher-‐order individual entity that is mankind. See Steinberg, “Spinoza’s Ethical Doctrine and the Unity of Human Nature.”
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the property of being red in common without red being a general property that can be
instantiated in infinite individuals. What men then have in common in their nature is, as
is clear from 4P35, the property of rationality.236 As long as men have in common that
they are rational, they will always agree in nature and be good and useful for one
another. Thus what men have in common isn’t actually the same human nature, but
exactly similar collections of adequate ideas which makes us act in our own advantage
or virtuous. This property of rationality–or the set of adequate ideas– that human beings
have in common with each other, then, is–as I have already argued–the same for
everyone.237 This is because our sets of adequate ideas are exactly similar to each other
or tropes. This means that, although rational men all have the same set of adequate
ideas, which makes them to strive for the same greatest good, these ideas are still
distinct from each other. They are as particular as the men that are possessing them. We
can then explain the apparent identity between them in terms of exact similarity, instead
of strict identity. The set of adequate ideas of one men is only equal to the set of
adequate ideas of another like two soldiers share the same uniform, and not like two
sons share the same father.
It is this that Bennett has overlooked when he concludes that Spinoza ‘fails at every step
in his journey towards his collaborative morality’.238 He interprets 4P30-‐31 as ‘that what
helps or harms me must help or harm anything exactly like me’239 (my emphasis) and
concludes that this premise is of no use for Spinoza, since he needs an argument that
explains how something can be helpful or harmful to me with respect to individuals that
looks similar to me, but not strictly identical. However, Spinoza never intended those
propositions, that are crucial for his moral theory, like this. Bennett is right in stating
that the argument–interpreted like he does–is useless for Spinoza. But he is wrong in
236 Note that for Spinoza ‘rationality’ isn’t really a property. It’s actually better to understand rationality as the collection of adequate ideas a man can have. But, because it is more convenient to speak in terms of properties and rationality, I have chosen to work with these terms. 237 The question that emerges here is what this property exactly is? I think Williams his description of tropes can help us further here. If tropes are ‘occurrences of essences’ then the property of rationality is best to be understood as an occurrence of our essence. Williams, “On the Elements of Being: I.”, P. 7 238 Bennett, A Study of Spinoza’s Ethics., § 69.8 239 Ibid., § 69.8
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thinking that, ‘to agree in nature’ two things have to share something strictly identical in
common.240
If there are no universal entities to be found in neither Spinoza’s metaphysics, nor in his
moral philosophy, this means that there are no general or species-‐essences. Or there are
at least no universal essences that refer to real beings. But why does Spinoza so often
seem to use these kind of terms, then? Is he being careless in his usage of words? I will
argue that, although he often uses universal terms, Spinoza does not believe there is a
universal human nature. He uses these terms not because he is careless. To the contrary,
he uses them consciously and for a reason. I believe that Spinoza’s remarks on
perfection and good and evil in the preface of part four most clearly support this view. In
the first part of the preview Spinoza explains how perfection and the notions of good
and evil are no real beings but mind-‐dependent modes of thinking we have formed
ourselves. It lies in our nature to form universal ideas (see 2P40S1) of both artificial and
natural things and when something (doesn’t) match the universal idea they have formed
for it, they will call it (im)perfect. However calling something perfect or imperfect, good
or evil, indicates nothing real in things. They are mere modes of thinking we feign when
we compare one thing to another. There are no such things as universal examples which
Nature has set for itself and in which it can fail or succeed. However, after making clear
that these modes of thinking don’t refer to anything real in nature, Spinoza adds that ‘we
must retain these words’ because they are useful on the condition that we use and
understand them in the right way. What is perfect and good is what will bring us closer
to the model of human nature or the model of the free man, who is led by reason alone
(4P68dem), is always self-‐determined, always virtuous and would, thus, never act
deceiving but always act honestly (4P72). Although Spinoza uses a model of the human
nature, this doesn’t mean there is an actual universal human essence. Even more, in
4pref Spinoza provides us with the proof we need to realize this model is a construct by
saying it is a model we have set before ourselves, just like we have done with the
universal models of things. The model of the free man is a mind-‐dependent exemplar
that can aid to support and explain certain behavior. Just like universals and other
modes of thinking, it is not a real being, but is a result of the working of our imagination. 240 Ofcourse, this is not the only argument Bennett uses to criticize Spinoza’s collaborative morality. But this paper isn’t the right place for discussing and answering all his objections.
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Without them it would be a lot more difficult to make sense of everything. Since our
mind is finite, we’re not able to directly process everything we see in the right way and
then these modes of thinking come in handy to more easily understand, retain and order
everything in the world. Although Spinoza often warns us for the dangers of the
imagination, he didn’t the modes of thinking as useless and unnecessary concepts we
need to get rid of as fast as we can. To the contrary, they can help our reason to easier
understand and explain things. As long we are aware of the fact that human nature is not
a real essence, but only a construct to more easily explain Spinoza’s moral philosophy, it
is a useful concept. And that is the reason why Spinoza often uses universal sounding
terms as well. Because they are useful and often a way less-‐complicated and shorter way
of explaining things, like his moral theory. From this I want to conclude that Spinoza did
allow us to use mind-‐dependent species-‐essences, just like he did, to better explain and
retain things.
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5.Conclusion The intention of this paper was to find out whether Spinoza understood the human
essence to be universal or not. Although 2P40S2 is often assumed to be the most
important and central argument to rule out universal essences, there are multiple other
elements in Spinoza’s philosophy that need to be further examined. Even more, to show
that Spinoza didn’t allow universal essences in his ontology as well in his conception of
man and moral philosophy, only relying on 2P40S2 is not enough. It’s not because he
dismisses imaginative species-‐essences, that all our work is done. We need to find out if
he allowed any universal entities in his metaphysics and consequently in his ethics.
The first elements that deserve our scrutiny are Spinoza’s attributes. By proving that
they are ontologically real but not universal, we can infer that knowledge is possible in a
Nominalist interpretation of Spinoza’s Ethics. I have showed that comprehending the
attributes as being universal, rests on conceiving them sub specie durationis instead of
by means of the intellect. The distinction between the imagination and reason is one
Spinoza often warns us for and will prove to be important to understand Spinoza’s use
of the modes of thinking. Secondly, I discussed the immediate infinite modes, or the
rules of Motion and Rest. Although these rules are the same for all finite bodies, still they
are not universal. Just like the attributes, through which they are conceived, they are
singular but–if we conceive them through the means of our imagination, as we naturally
do–they will seem universal. The last important component in the investigation of
Spinoza’s metaphysics is his conception of the essences. After all, we are trying to find
out whether or not Spinoza allowed general species-‐essences, like the essence of man. In
this part I have made clear that there are no general species-‐essences according to
Spinoza. I proved this by showing that the actual essences as well as the formal essences
are unique to their possessor. I say unique to their possessor instead of unique, because
all our human essences–although particular–will be exactly similar to each other, which
is the opposite of unique. This is because Spinoza’s Nominalism is best understood as
Constituent Anti-‐Realism. I have come to this claim by excluding all forms of Non-‐
Constituent Nominalism, because of their analysis of the attributes and their denial of
properties.
89
The second part of my inquiry concerns Spinoza’s conception of human nature and the
question if this concept is consistent with the metaphysics I have discussed in the
former part. I begin with a presenting a thorough elaboration of the conatus. After
showing that the actual essence of all men is exactly similar, I have explained that this is
no problem for my claim that Spinoza was a Trope Theorist. Since our actual essences
are best understood as tropes, we can demonstrate that–although they are exactly
similar–they are each numerically distinct from each other and, thus, are no universal
essences. The exact similarity of the human essences explains why all men strive for the
same common good and why they can agree in nature. In brief, ‘to agree in nature’
means to have something in common in terms of exact similarity, which is, for human
beings, rationality. Or in a more exact way of saying it, the collection of adequate ideas.
Living according to the guidance of rationality is nothing but living according to one’s
essence and thus acting in one’s own advantage. When we act without being dominated
by our affects, we act virtuous and we will support others to act rational as well, because
there is nothing more useful than rational men. They will help each other in attaining
what they both strive for: understanding. And the greatest thing they both strive for is
knowledge of God, which will bring us the greatest joy and satisfaction of the mind. This
blessedness or knowledge of the infinite chain of Nature will make it easier to break the
chains of the passions, whereby one will act rationally and can’t be harmful to other
rational men. And like this, the circle is complete. It’s clear form this that we shouldn’t
see the fact that there is no universal human nature as a loss. Spinoza presented a moral
philosophy that doesn’t need men to share the exact same human nature to be able to
act benevolent toward each other. And this is what is so beautiful and inspiring about
his ethics: we should never act virtuous only because we recognize ourselves in
someone we pity, but we should help others out of reason.
The very last thing that needs some elaboration, then, is Spinoza’s use of terms as
‘human nature’. Terms like these are no real beings, but modes of thinking. Spinoza uses
these concepts because they are useful to explain things and easier to work with. As long
as we keep in mind that they are formed by our imagination and not by our intellect,
there is no problem in using them.
From all this I conclude that, for Spinoza, there is no such thing as a universal human
essence that all human beings share. Every thing there is, possesses its own particular
90
essence that cannot be predicated of multiple individuals. Human nature is a mind-‐
dependent concept we feign to easier retain and explain things. Still, the fact that there is
no real metaphysical unity among people doesn’t entail that it’s impossible for us to
connect. Our reason is what connects us, not our essence. And this is where the beauty
of Spinoza’s ethics lies.
91
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