Notes for 9/22/2026

  

9/22/2026

Does Spinoza’s monism have any ethical implications?

 

[Philosophy Club every Wednesday, 5-6 pm, in the Buchtel College of Arts and Sciences room 436 ("The Cave")

Bioethics Club Tuesdays from 4:30-5:50 in CAS 436.]

 

Part 1: Monism

 

 

Motion as mode:

 

Ball Animation by Gurdip Singh on Dribbble

 

Necessitarianism

 

 

 

S thinks necessitarianism follows from his view of God.

 

God exists necessarily.

 

God has all attributes necessarily. So, God’s possession of any given attribute is necessary (not contingent).

 

All modes are modes of attributes, so all modes are “grounded” in God. (1p16c1 and 1p16c2)

 

Consider any mode M1 found in God.

 

What explains M1?

 

M1 must exist in and be conceived through something else (1d5).

What is this “something else”?

 

Two dimensions of answer:

 

First: Since every mode is a mode under some attribute or other, M1 must be “in and conceived through” some attribute A1. But all attributes that exist exist necessarily, so M1 can’t be contingent in respect of its relation to A1.

 

Second: M1 can be conceived not in relation to A1, but rather to some other mode (say, M2) which we can say is the proximate (“going-across”) cause of M1.

 

M1 can only be contingent if either:

a)          M2 is itself contingent, or

b)          M1’s relation to M2 is contingent.

But it can’t be (b), because then M1 wouldn’t really be caused by M2 (we’d have only a partial explanation for M1, and the rest would be unexplained).

 

So, all modes are either explained

(1)       by being grounded in attributes, in which case they are necessary because the attributes are necessary, (“vertical causation”) or,

(2)       by being caused by other modes, which are explained by other modes, ad infinitum (“horizontal causation”).

 

 

 

Is conceivability the same as possibility?

 

 

 

 

 

Part 2: Mind-body relation

 

Idea(x) = x (“idea of” relation) (S distinguishes formal (inherent) and representative (“objective”) reality)

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