Aspects of Spinoza’s Theory of Essence

Lærke, Mogens

doi:10.1093/oso/9780198786436.003.0002

Cited by 10 publications

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“…Therefore, this distinction cannot be invoked to explain away E2D2 and E3P7 in favour of a second kind of essence which is common to multiple individuals. See also Laerke (2017) for an extensive argument against reading Spinoza's theory of essences in terms of common essences.…”

Section: Do Essences Results From Another Causal Mechanism?mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…4 However, the most straightforward and extensive argumentation for this specific view can be found in the work of Mogens Laerke. He criticizes the Platonizing interpretation of the essence-existence distinction in terms of two separate ontological levels and argues that this distinction is only "aspectual" (Laerke, 2016(Laerke, , 2017. However, he thereby distances himself from a "perspectival" reading that has been suggested by people such as François Zourabichvili (2002, pp.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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A Perspectival Reading of Spinoza's Essence-Existence Distinction

Vermeiren

2022

Dialogue

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This article examines the essence-existence distinction in Spinoza's theory of modes. This distinction is commonly made in two ways. First, essence and existence are separated by cause. Essences are understood to follow vertically from the essence of God, while existence follows horizontally from other modes. I present textual and systematic arguments against such a causal bifurcation. Second, essence and existence are distinguished by their temporal nature. Essence is eternal. Existence is durational. However, in several passages, Spinoza writes that eternity and duration constitute two ways of understanding nature rather than two really distinct aspects of nature.

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Section: Do Essences Results From Another Causal Mechanism?mentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

A Perspectival Reading of Spinoza's Essence-Existence Distinction

Vermeiren

2022

Dialogue

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“…18. See Laerke (2017). In a somewhat different context, Kristin Primus (2019) has recently argued that Spinoza's God does not cause finite and infinite modes as distinct from each other.…”

Section: Individual and Universal Essencesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Spinoza on the Essences of Singular Things

Bender

2023

Ergo an Open Access Journal of Philosophy

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Essences play a central role in Spinoza’s philosophy, not only in his metaphysics, but also in his philosophy of mind, his theory of affects, and his political philosophy. Despite their importance, however, it is surprisingly difficult to determine what exactly essences are for Spinoza. On a widespread reading, the essence of X is nothing but the concept of X. This paper argues against this identification of essences and concepts. Spinozistic concepts are maximally inclusive: the concept of X contains everything that is needed to make X conceivable. The essence of X, in contrast, is more limited in scope and does not include everything that is needed to make X conceivable. Thus, Spinoza avoids the ‘overloading’ of essences and the problems that would ensue. The account developed in this paper has a surprising implication, namely that the essences of non-divine, singular things do not suffice to render these things fully conceivable on Spinoza’s view. Thus, Spinoza breaks with a tradition according to which the essence of a thing states ‘what the thing is.’ As a result, his conception of essence is much further removed from traditional Aristotelian accounts, and from other seventeenth-century accounts, than usually acknowledged.

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“…As indicated above, I think that for Spinoza, the formal essence of a thing is the essence of the thing insofar as it is conceived by the second kind of cognition or the reason, while the actual essence of the thing or the conatus of it is the essence of the thing insofar as it is conceived by the third kind of cognition or the intuition. For an interpretation along this line, see Laerke (2017). (See also Brandom 1976.…”

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confidence: 99%

The Necessity of Finite Modes in Spinoza

Han

2023

KJP

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It is standard to think that in Spinoza's system, all things are necessary and in no sense contingent. However, in his classic book, Spinoza's Metaphysics, published in 1969, Edwin Curley argues based on the proposition 28 of the first part of the Ethics that Spinoza endorses necessitarianism of only a modest kind, according to which when it comes to finite modes, there is a sense in which they are contingent. In this paper, I revisit Curley's argument. Commentators have responded to Curley's argument, showing that Spinoza's remarks on infinite modes entail that finite modes can in no sense be contingent. But this alone falls short of dispelling Curley's misgivings about the standard interpretation, for it remains unexplained why Curley is wrong in thinking that the proposition 28 supports his moderate necessitarian interpretation. In defense of the standard interpretation, I bolster the usual response to Curley in greater detail than has been done in the literature and explain why, pace Curley, the proposition 28 plays no evidential role in support of Curley's interpretation.

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Aspects of Spinoza’s Theory of Essence

Cited by 10 publications

References 0 publications

A Perspectival Reading of Spinoza's Essence-Existence Distinction

A Perspectival Reading of Spinoza's Essence-Existence Distinction

Spinoza on the Essences of Singular Things

The Necessity of Finite Modes in Spinoza

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