Baruch de Spinoza (Hebrew: ברוך שפינוזה, Portuguese: Bento de Espinosa, Latin: Benedictus de Spinoza) (November 24, 1632 – February 21, 1677) was a Dutch philosopher of Portuguese Jewish origin. Revealing considerable scientific aptitude, the breadth and importance of Spinoza's work was not fully realized until years after his death. Today, he is considered one of the great rationalists of 17th-century philosophy, laying the groundwork for the 18th-century Enlightenment and modern biblical criticism. By virtue of his magnum opus, the posthumous Ethics, Spinoza is also considered one of Western philosophy's definitive ethicists.
Spinoza lived quietly as a lens grinder, turning down rewards and honours throughout his life, including prestigious teaching positions, and gave his family inheritance to his sister. Spinoza's moral character and philosophical accomplishments prompted 20th-century philosopher Gilles Deleuze to name him "The absolute philosopher" (Deleuze, 1990). Spinoza died in February 1677 of a lung illness, perhaps tuberculosis or silicosis caused by fine glass dust inhaled while tending to his trade.
Spinoza lived quietly as a lens grinder, turning down rewards and honours throughout his life, including prestigious teaching positions, and gave his family inheritance to his sister. Spinoza's moral character and philosophical accomplishments prompted 20th-century philosopher Gilles Deleuze to name him "The absolute philosopher" (Deleuze, 1990). Spinoza died in February 1677 of a lung illness, perhaps tuberculosis or silicosis caused by fine glass dust inhaled while tending to his trade.
Spinoza's ancestors were Conversos who fled from Portugal to escape the Portuguese Inquisition and return to Judaism. Some historians argue the Spinoza family had its remote origins in Spain; others claim they were Portuguese Jews who had moved to Spain and then returned to their home country in 1492, only to be forcibly converted to Catholicism in 1498. Spinoza's father was born roughly a century after this forced conversion in the small Portuguese city of Vidigueira, near Beja in Alentejo. When Spinoza's father was still a child, Spinoza's grandfather, Isaac de Spinoza (who was from Lisbon), took his family to Nantes in France. They were expelled in 1615 and moved to Rotterdam, where Isaac died in 1627. Spinoza's father, Miguel, and his uncle, Manuel, then moved to Amsterdam where they assumed their Judaism (Manuel even changed his name to Abraão de Spinoza, though his "commercial" name was still the same).
Substance, Attribute and Mode
"These are the fundamental concepts with which Spinoza sets forth a vision of Being, illuminated by his awareness of God. They may seem strange at first sight. To the question "What is?" he replies: "Substance, its attributes and modes". Spinoza, Carl Jaspers p.9
Spinoza's system imparted order and unity to the tradition of radical thought, offering powerful weapons for prevailing against "received authority." As a youth he first subscribed to Descartes's dualistic belief that body and mind are two separate substances, but later changed his view and asserted that they were not separate, being a single identity. He contended that everything that exists in Nature/Universe is one Reality (substance) and there is only one set of rules governing the whole of the reality which surrounds us and of which we are part. Spinoza viewed God and Nature as two names for the same reality, namely the single substance (meaning "to stand beneath" rather than "matter") that is the basis of the universe and of which all lesser "entities" are actually modes or modifications, that all things are determined by Nature to exist and cause effects, and that the complex chain of cause and effect is only understood in part. That humans presume themselves to have free will, he argues, is a result of their awareness of appetites while being unable to understand the reasons why they want and act as they do. The argument for the single substance runs as follows:
Substance exists and cannot be dependent on anything else for its existence.
No two substances can share the same nature or attribute.
Proof: Two distinct substances can be differentiated either by some difference in their natures or by some difference in one of their alterable states of being. If they have different natures, then the original proposition is granted and the proof is complete. If, however, they are distinguished only by their states of being, then, considering the substances in themselves, there is no difference between the substances and they are identical. "That is, there cannot be several such substances but only one." [3]
A substance can only be caused by something similar to itself (something that shares its attribute).
Substance cannot be caused.
Proof: Something can only be caused by something which is similar to itself, in other words something that shares its attribute. But according to premise 2, no two substances can share an attribute. Therefore substance cannot be caused.
Substance is infinite.
Proof: If substance were not infinite, it would be finite and limited by something. But to be limited by something is to be dependent on it. However, substance cannot be dependent on anything else (premise 1), therefore substance is infinite.
Conclusion: There can only be one substance.
Proof: If there were two infinite substances, they would limit each other. But this would act as a restraint, and they would be dependent on each other. But they cannot be dependent on each other (premise 1), therefore there cannot be two substances.
Spinoza contended that "Deus sive Natura" ("God or Nature") was a being of infinitely many attributes, of which extension and thought were two. His account of the nature of reality, then, seems to treat the physical and mental worlds as one and the same. The universal substance consists of both body and mind, there being no difference between these aspects. This formulation is a historically significant solution to the mind-body problem known as neutral monism. The consequences of Spinoza's system also envisage a God that does not rule over the universe by providence, but a God which itself is the deterministic system of which everything in nature is a part. Thus, God is the natural world and He has no personality.
In addition to substance, the other two fundamental concepts Spinoza presents, and develops in the Ethics are
Attribute:
By attribute, I mean that which the intellect perceives as constituting the essence of substance.
and Mode:
By mode, I mean the modifications of substance, or that which exists in, and is conceived through, something other than itself.
Spinoza was a thoroughgoing determinist who held that absolutely everything that happens occurs through the operation of necessity. For him, even human behaviour is fully determined, with freedom being our capacity to know we are determined and to understand why we act as we do. So freedom is not the possibility to say "no" to what happens to us but the possibility to say "yes" and fully understand why things should necessarily happen that way. By forming more "adequate" ideas about what we do and our emotions or affections, we become the adequate cause of our effects (internal or external), which entails an increase in activity (versus passivity). This means that we become both more free and more like God, as Spinoza argues in the Scholium to Prop. 49, Part II. However, Spinoza also held that everything must necessarily happen the way that it does. Therefore, there is no free will.
Spinoza's philosophy has much in common with Stoicism in as much as both philosophies sought to fulfil a therapeutic role by instructing people how to attain happiness (or eudaimonia, for the Stoics). However, Spinoza differed sharply from the Stoics in one important respect: he utterly rejected their contention that reason could defeat emotion. On the contrary, he contended, an emotion can only be displaced or overcome by a stronger emotion. For him, the crucial distinction was between active and passive emotions, the former being those that are rationally understood and the latter those that are not. He also held that knowledge of true causes of passive emotion can transform it to an active emotion, thus anticipating one of the key ideas of Sigmund Freud's psychoanalysis.
Some of Spinoza's philosophical positions are:
The natural world is infinite.
Good and evil are related to human pleasure and pain.
Everything done by humans and other animals is excellent and divine.
All rights are derived from the State.
Animals can be used in any way by people for the benefit of the human race, according to a rational consideration of the benefit as well as the animal's status in nature.[4]
Ethical philosophy
Encapsulated at the start in his Treatise on the Improvement of the Understanding (Tractatus de intellectus emendatione) is the core of Spinoza's ethical philosophy, what he held to be the true and final good. Spinoza held a relativist's position, that nothing is intrinsically good or bad, except to the extent that it is subjectively perceived to be by the individual. Things are only good or evil in respect that humanity sees it desirable to apply these conceptions to matters. Instead, Spinoza believes in his deterministic universe that, "All things in nature proceed from certain necessity and with the utmost perfection". Therefore, nothing happens by chance in Spinoza's world, and reason does not work in terms of contingency.
In the universe anything that happens comes from the essential nature of objects, or of God/Nature. According to Spinoza, reality is perfection. If circumstances are seen as unfortunate it is only because of our inadequate conception of reality. While elements of the chain of cause and effect are not beyond the understanding of human reason, our grasp of the infinitely complex whole is limited because of the limits of science to empirically take account of the whole sequence. Spinoza also asserted that sense perception, though practical and useful for rhetoric, is inadequate for discovering universal truth; Spinoza's mathematical and logical approach to metaphysics, and therefore ethics, concluded that emotion is formed from inadequate understanding. His concept of "conatus" states that man's natural inclination is to strive toward preserving an essential being and an assertion that virtue/human power is defined by success in this preservation of being by the guidance of reason as one's central ethical doctrine. According to Spinoza, the highest virtue is the intellectual love or knowledge of God/Nature/Universe.
In the final part of the "Ethics" his concern with the meaning of "true blessedness" and his unique approach to and explanation of how emotions must be detached from external cause in order to master them presages 20th-century psychological techniques. His concept of three types of knowledge - opinion, reason, intuition - and assertion that intuitive knowledge provides the greatest satisfaction of mind, leads to his proposition that the more we are conscious of ourselves and Nature/Universe, the more perfect and blessed we are (in reality) and that only intuitive knowledge is eternal. His unique contribution to understanding the workings of mind is extraordinary, even during this time of radical philosophical developments, in that his views provide a bridge between religions' mystical past and psychology of the present day.
Given Spinoza's insistence on a completely ordered world where "necessity" reigns, Good and Evil have no absolute meaning. Human catastrophes, social injustices, etc. are merely apparent. The world as it exists looks imperfect only because of our limited perception. Thus we see that Spinoza's ethical and natural philosophy were far too limited and narrow for the needs of the social philosphers who became important in the 18th century enlightenment.
"These are the fundamental concepts with which Spinoza sets forth a vision of Being, illuminated by his awareness of God. They may seem strange at first sight. To the question "What is?" he replies: "Substance, its attributes and modes". Spinoza, Carl Jaspers p.9
Spinoza's system imparted order and unity to the tradition of radical thought, offering powerful weapons for prevailing against "received authority." As a youth he first subscribed to Descartes's dualistic belief that body and mind are two separate substances, but later changed his view and asserted that they were not separate, being a single identity. He contended that everything that exists in Nature/Universe is one Reality (substance) and there is only one set of rules governing the whole of the reality which surrounds us and of which we are part. Spinoza viewed God and Nature as two names for the same reality, namely the single substance (meaning "to stand beneath" rather than "matter") that is the basis of the universe and of which all lesser "entities" are actually modes or modifications, that all things are determined by Nature to exist and cause effects, and that the complex chain of cause and effect is only understood in part. That humans presume themselves to have free will, he argues, is a result of their awareness of appetites while being unable to understand the reasons why they want and act as they do. The argument for the single substance runs as follows:
Substance exists and cannot be dependent on anything else for its existence.
No two substances can share the same nature or attribute.
Proof: Two distinct substances can be differentiated either by some difference in their natures or by some difference in one of their alterable states of being. If they have different natures, then the original proposition is granted and the proof is complete. If, however, they are distinguished only by their states of being, then, considering the substances in themselves, there is no difference between the substances and they are identical. "That is, there cannot be several such substances but only one." [3]
A substance can only be caused by something similar to itself (something that shares its attribute).
Substance cannot be caused.
Proof: Something can only be caused by something which is similar to itself, in other words something that shares its attribute. But according to premise 2, no two substances can share an attribute. Therefore substance cannot be caused.
Substance is infinite.
Proof: If substance were not infinite, it would be finite and limited by something. But to be limited by something is to be dependent on it. However, substance cannot be dependent on anything else (premise 1), therefore substance is infinite.
Conclusion: There can only be one substance.
Proof: If there were two infinite substances, they would limit each other. But this would act as a restraint, and they would be dependent on each other. But they cannot be dependent on each other (premise 1), therefore there cannot be two substances.
Spinoza contended that "Deus sive Natura" ("God or Nature") was a being of infinitely many attributes, of which extension and thought were two. His account of the nature of reality, then, seems to treat the physical and mental worlds as one and the same. The universal substance consists of both body and mind, there being no difference between these aspects. This formulation is a historically significant solution to the mind-body problem known as neutral monism. The consequences of Spinoza's system also envisage a God that does not rule over the universe by providence, but a God which itself is the deterministic system of which everything in nature is a part. Thus, God is the natural world and He has no personality.
In addition to substance, the other two fundamental concepts Spinoza presents, and develops in the Ethics are
Attribute:
By attribute, I mean that which the intellect perceives as constituting the essence of substance.
and Mode:
By mode, I mean the modifications of substance, or that which exists in, and is conceived through, something other than itself.
Spinoza was a thoroughgoing determinist who held that absolutely everything that happens occurs through the operation of necessity. For him, even human behaviour is fully determined, with freedom being our capacity to know we are determined and to understand why we act as we do. So freedom is not the possibility to say "no" to what happens to us but the possibility to say "yes" and fully understand why things should necessarily happen that way. By forming more "adequate" ideas about what we do and our emotions or affections, we become the adequate cause of our effects (internal or external), which entails an increase in activity (versus passivity). This means that we become both more free and more like God, as Spinoza argues in the Scholium to Prop. 49, Part II. However, Spinoza also held that everything must necessarily happen the way that it does. Therefore, there is no free will.
Spinoza's philosophy has much in common with Stoicism in as much as both philosophies sought to fulfil a therapeutic role by instructing people how to attain happiness (or eudaimonia, for the Stoics). However, Spinoza differed sharply from the Stoics in one important respect: he utterly rejected their contention that reason could defeat emotion. On the contrary, he contended, an emotion can only be displaced or overcome by a stronger emotion. For him, the crucial distinction was between active and passive emotions, the former being those that are rationally understood and the latter those that are not. He also held that knowledge of true causes of passive emotion can transform it to an active emotion, thus anticipating one of the key ideas of Sigmund Freud's psychoanalysis.
Some of Spinoza's philosophical positions are:
The natural world is infinite.
Good and evil are related to human pleasure and pain.
Everything done by humans and other animals is excellent and divine.
All rights are derived from the State.
Animals can be used in any way by people for the benefit of the human race, according to a rational consideration of the benefit as well as the animal's status in nature.[4]
Ethical philosophy
Encapsulated at the start in his Treatise on the Improvement of the Understanding (Tractatus de intellectus emendatione) is the core of Spinoza's ethical philosophy, what he held to be the true and final good. Spinoza held a relativist's position, that nothing is intrinsically good or bad, except to the extent that it is subjectively perceived to be by the individual. Things are only good or evil in respect that humanity sees it desirable to apply these conceptions to matters. Instead, Spinoza believes in his deterministic universe that, "All things in nature proceed from certain necessity and with the utmost perfection". Therefore, nothing happens by chance in Spinoza's world, and reason does not work in terms of contingency.
In the universe anything that happens comes from the essential nature of objects, or of God/Nature. According to Spinoza, reality is perfection. If circumstances are seen as unfortunate it is only because of our inadequate conception of reality. While elements of the chain of cause and effect are not beyond the understanding of human reason, our grasp of the infinitely complex whole is limited because of the limits of science to empirically take account of the whole sequence. Spinoza also asserted that sense perception, though practical and useful for rhetoric, is inadequate for discovering universal truth; Spinoza's mathematical and logical approach to metaphysics, and therefore ethics, concluded that emotion is formed from inadequate understanding. His concept of "conatus" states that man's natural inclination is to strive toward preserving an essential being and an assertion that virtue/human power is defined by success in this preservation of being by the guidance of reason as one's central ethical doctrine. According to Spinoza, the highest virtue is the intellectual love or knowledge of God/Nature/Universe.
In the final part of the "Ethics" his concern with the meaning of "true blessedness" and his unique approach to and explanation of how emotions must be detached from external cause in order to master them presages 20th-century psychological techniques. His concept of three types of knowledge - opinion, reason, intuition - and assertion that intuitive knowledge provides the greatest satisfaction of mind, leads to his proposition that the more we are conscious of ourselves and Nature/Universe, the more perfect and blessed we are (in reality) and that only intuitive knowledge is eternal. His unique contribution to understanding the workings of mind is extraordinary, even during this time of radical philosophical developments, in that his views provide a bridge between religions' mystical past and psychology of the present day.
Given Spinoza's insistence on a completely ordered world where "necessity" reigns, Good and Evil have no absolute meaning. Human catastrophes, social injustices, etc. are merely apparent. The world as it exists looks imperfect only because of our limited perception. Thus we see that Spinoza's ethical and natural philosophy were far too limited and narrow for the needs of the social philosphers who became important in the 18th century enlightenment.
Benedictus (Baruch) Spinoza (Amszterdam, 1632. november 24. – Hága, 1677. február 21.) a felvilágosodás korának racionalista filozófusa, a panteizmus képviselőjeként is ismerhetjük. Amszterdamban született, Portugáliából kivándorolt zsidó családban. Anyanyelve portugál volt. A protestáns eszme megismerése után eltávolodik a zsidó közösségtől, akik kimondják rá az ún. "héremet", „nagy átkot”, amely megtiltott mindenfajta érintkezést közte és a zsidóság többi tagja között. Ezt követően 1656 és 1660 között egy kiugrott jezsuita, Franciscus van den Enden iskolájában latint, klasszikus irodalmat, államelméletet és kartéziánus filozófiát tanult. Itt tanulta meg a lencsecsiszolást, mely később pénzkereső foglalkozásává vált.
1661-ben Rijnsburgba költözött, ahol tanítványainak megírja első értekezését Rövid tanulmány Istenről, az emberről és az ő boldogságáról címen. Ezt a művét fogalmazza át ugyanebben az évben a Tanulmány az értelem megjavításáról című művében. E két tanulmány célja a karteziánus filozófia alapjainak (Descartes: Principia philosophiae) megismertetése, és vizsgálata. Majd 1665-ben megírja főművét az Etikát.
Államelméletről is hagyott hátra írásos művet: a Teológiai-politikai tanulmányt (Wittgenstein híres műve ennek a tanulmánynak a címe után lett elnevezve). E tanulmányt 1670-ben névtelenül jelenteti meg, de hamar fény derül kilétére, és ettől a pillanattól a vitairatok üldözésének tárgyává válik. Műveit félreértelmezve kikiáltják ateistának, ami igen nagy hatással van későbbi munkásságára, ugyanis senki nem hajlandó megjelentetni műveit.
Élete vége fele még megírja a Politikai tanulmányt, de nem fejezi be, csak töredékeket ismerünk belőle.
Spinozát nemcsak a filozófia és az államelmélet problémái foglalkoztatták, hanem a matematika és a fizika kérdései is. Írt a valószínűség-számításról és a szivárványról is.
1677. február 21-én halt meg tüdőbetegségben.
1661-ben Rijnsburgba költözött, ahol tanítványainak megírja első értekezését Rövid tanulmány Istenről, az emberről és az ő boldogságáról címen. Ezt a művét fogalmazza át ugyanebben az évben a Tanulmány az értelem megjavításáról című művében. E két tanulmány célja a karteziánus filozófia alapjainak (Descartes: Principia philosophiae) megismertetése, és vizsgálata. Majd 1665-ben megírja főművét az Etikát.
Államelméletről is hagyott hátra írásos művet: a Teológiai-politikai tanulmányt (Wittgenstein híres műve ennek a tanulmánynak a címe után lett elnevezve). E tanulmányt 1670-ben névtelenül jelenteti meg, de hamar fény derül kilétére, és ettől a pillanattól a vitairatok üldözésének tárgyává válik. Műveit félreértelmezve kikiáltják ateistának, ami igen nagy hatással van későbbi munkásságára, ugyanis senki nem hajlandó megjelentetni műveit.
Élete vége fele még megírja a Politikai tanulmányt, de nem fejezi be, csak töredékeket ismerünk belőle.
Spinozát nemcsak a filozófia és az államelmélet problémái foglalkoztatták, hanem a matematika és a fizika kérdései is. Írt a valószínűség-számításról és a szivárványról is.
1677. február 21-én halt meg tüdőbetegségben.
Fő műve, az Etika megírásakor Euklidesz axiomatikus tárgyalásmódját használja: minden fejezet definíciókból tételekből és ezek bizonyításaiból áll. Egyrészt azt szeretné ezzel a módszerrel szemléltetni, hogy az egyszerű tételekből levezethetők a bonyolultabb, összetett elméletek, másrészt a korban szokás volt a szubjektivitástól olymódon mentesíteni a politikai témájú írásokat, hogy azokat a matematika tudományához hasonló objektív szigorúsággal fejtik ki. Az Etika öt fejezetből áll: 1. Istenről, 2. A szellem eredetéről és természetéről, 3. A szenvedélyekről, 4. Az emberi szabadságról, 5. Az emberi szabadság és az ész hatalmáról.
Fontos, hogy Istennel kezdjük, mielőtt az emberhez érnénk, mert ha az Istenről alkotott ideánk hamis, akkor az emberről alkotott ideánk sem lehet helyes. Istent Spinoza úgy határozza meg, mint „az, aminek a fogalma nem szorul másik dolog fogalmára, hogy abból alkossuk meg”. Isten abszolút végtelen létező, semmi nem korlátozhatja őt és rajta kívül nem létezhet semmi. Ezek szerint minden, ami a természetben van, Isten attribútuma: „Minden, ami van, Istenben van.” Spinoza szerint ez nem panteizmus, hisz Isten nem azonos a természettel, hanem ő általa lett teremtve, és létében megőrizve. (Panteizmus: a mindenség (pán) nem különbözik Istentől (Theosz).
Az ember, mint véges létező testből és elméből áll. E kettő az Etika érvelése szerint ugyanazon dolog más módon való kifejeződései; ez utóbbi megállapításból pedig Leibniz, némileg megkérdőjelezhető módon, azt a következtetést vonta le, hogy Spinoza egyfajta "paralellizmusként" jellemzi test és lélek viszonyát. Ez a magyarázat arra, hogy ha a testünkkel történik valami, rögtön érzékeljük is.
Spinoza a megismerés három formáját különbözteti meg:
Az imaginatio, amit bár képzeletnek kell fordítsunk, valójában lefedi a tapasztalat körét is. A mindennapi élethez nélkülözhetetlen megismerési mód.
A racionális megismerési mód. E megismerési mód a tudományokra jellemző megismerés módja. Általános tételekből vezetjük le az újabb ismérveket, közös fogalmakból következtetve operál.
Az intuitív megismerési mód. Az ész által feltárt ismeretekről belátja, hogy azok Isten szubsztanciájának kifejeződései.
Fontos, hogy Istennel kezdjük, mielőtt az emberhez érnénk, mert ha az Istenről alkotott ideánk hamis, akkor az emberről alkotott ideánk sem lehet helyes. Istent Spinoza úgy határozza meg, mint „az, aminek a fogalma nem szorul másik dolog fogalmára, hogy abból alkossuk meg”. Isten abszolút végtelen létező, semmi nem korlátozhatja őt és rajta kívül nem létezhet semmi. Ezek szerint minden, ami a természetben van, Isten attribútuma: „Minden, ami van, Istenben van.” Spinoza szerint ez nem panteizmus, hisz Isten nem azonos a természettel, hanem ő általa lett teremtve, és létében megőrizve. (Panteizmus: a mindenség (pán) nem különbözik Istentől (Theosz).
Az ember, mint véges létező testből és elméből áll. E kettő az Etika érvelése szerint ugyanazon dolog más módon való kifejeződései; ez utóbbi megállapításból pedig Leibniz, némileg megkérdőjelezhető módon, azt a következtetést vonta le, hogy Spinoza egyfajta "paralellizmusként" jellemzi test és lélek viszonyát. Ez a magyarázat arra, hogy ha a testünkkel történik valami, rögtön érzékeljük is.
Spinoza a megismerés három formáját különbözteti meg:
Az imaginatio, amit bár képzeletnek kell fordítsunk, valójában lefedi a tapasztalat körét is. A mindennapi élethez nélkülözhetetlen megismerési mód.
A racionális megismerési mód. E megismerési mód a tudományokra jellemző megismerés módja. Általános tételekből vezetjük le az újabb ismérveket, közös fogalmakból következtetve operál.
Az intuitív megismerési mód. Az ész által feltárt ismeretekről belátja, hogy azok Isten szubsztanciájának kifejeződései.
.jpg)
Nincsenek megjegyzések:
Megjegyzés küldése