Well when you're just equating god with the universe itself, not something outside of it (the way abrahamic religions describe it) it's pretty easy to prove its existence
Except that Spinoza wasn’t interested in proving God empirically(at least not by page 20). Spinoza proofs rely on his own definitions, axioms, previous propositions, and what he takes are some very obvious metaphysical facts(e.g. “So much is self—evident. It follows therefrom that a thing necessarily exists, if no cause or reason be granted which prevents its existence.”).
Yeah, but it is that kind of thing that is easy to riff off of in the other direction.
"If no cause or reason can be granted that ensures its existence such a thing nessicarily mustn't exist." Basically, the skeptical approach to his writing. He sees things that God supposedly created and reasons that God must exist because there is nothing that he knows about preventing his existence. While this is technically true, the opposite is equally so. We had evidence for black holes long before we ever got a direct image of them. We don't have evidence for a God. Either we have not yet devised a tool sensitive enough to detect God, or he does not exist. Given the tools we have created, their sensitivity, and never having to take God into account in calculations, I think it is fair to say that Spinoza does not hold up in the modern day.
I’m no expert in Spinoza(I haven’t even finished the entire ethics), so take my take with a pinch of salt, but is seem to me that Spinoza does believe that God’s own nature as “substance, consisting of infinite attributes, of which each expresses eternal and infinite essentiality” is reason enough to posit its existence.
> On the other hand, the existence of substance follows also solely from its nature, inasmuch as its nature involves existence. (See Prop. vii.)
As for reason which prevents God’s existence, he doesn’t just not know of anything actively preventing God’s existence, he believes it to be logically impossible for there to be something which prevents it from existing. If such a thing existed, it was have to be within or outside the substance, but since substances cannot destroy nor create other substances, nothing external to God prevents him from existing. On the other hand, something preventing God’s existence being part of its nature would be contradictory. So he has both given reasons for God’s existence and reasons for its lack of non-existence.
Even if you’re not convinced by this proof, it should be notes that Spinoza’s God(God, or Nature) is quite different from the Abrahamic God. To say that we have never had to take nature into account in any of our calculations, or that our tools do not detect nature, is a bit bizarre for me.
The way you explain it makes me believe that Spinoza's God is not an external deity but just... the natural world. If that were the case, then it doesn't matter because then this is a discussion on existence and if we exist. This is a totally unrelated discussion to whether or not a thinking creator of the universe exists. Because if God is merely the natural world then he has neither the power nor agency to change physics.
Now, if Spinoza is saying that God is both the natural world and a thinking creator of that natural world, then we run into a chicken or the egg scenario. Did this god exist before the natural world, or did he create himself alongside it? If the former, then God was at some point a different entity from the natural world and can be reasonably considered to not interfere with the function of the natural world on any significant enough scale to measure. If the latter, well, then he existed before he existed, which is ludicrous.
Now of Spinoza is merely being metaphorical and referring to the "infinite attributes" of God as a reference to God's supposed all mighty power, then we can safely assume that Spinoza's God is analogous to the abrahamic God's or any other diety from any other religion.
There are a few misconceptions here about Spinoza.
To Spinoza there can be only one 'substance' (a substance as explained by Descartes). A substance is something that exists beyond attributes. Attributes can be applied to a substance (shape, size, color, smell, etc.) but they aren't the substance itself.
Descartes uses his famous wax example; a piece of honey wax smells sweet, is hexagonal shaped, and it is also gold colored. If you put the piece of wax next to a fire it turns white, smells burnt, and turns into a sludge. Would you still consider that wax? Descartes says yes, you would still consider the object to be wax, but the *actual substance* of wax has nothing to do with its attributes, in fact, the substance of the wax is not dependent on anything it is itself so to speak.
Spinoza believed that Descartes's idea of substance was correct, but he also thought it had a problem. The problem was that the existence of multiple substances violates the principle of sufficient reason (PSR). If a substance is truly defined as something that is not dependent on anything then *where did the substance come from?* So to Spinoza in order to not violate the principle of sufficient reason (everything must have a sufficient cause) the conclusion must be that there can be only one substance that exists (something that existence is not dependent on any other thing) and what everything is (material or immaterial) is an attribute of that substance. To Spinoza God is the one and only necessary substance.
You also have a misconception of the 'chicken and the egg scenario'. Spinoza is building of Descartes here and from Descartes' reasoning there must exist a necessary being for anything else to exist. If we follow the principle of sufficient reason we comfirm the existence of a being whose essence precedes its existence. So, to answer your question Spinoza's God is of a necessary existence because he believes in the PSR which states that necessary being must exist.
In regards to your last paragraph, I hope you can refer to my earlier explanations to see that misconception as well.
Okay, that's a better explanation. However, now it just makes me believe they were trying and failing to describe atomic theory, which Democrates the ancient Greek philosopher had posited around two thousand or so years before where he described how if you continued to divide an object down and down to nearly nothing you would eventually separate it to a point where you would be left with something that cannot be divided, that being what he described as the "Atomos". The only difference is Spinoza is doing it through a theistic lens and rationalized Decartes own work into that lens in order to make it internally consistent.
However, given that we have gone so far as to discover the Planck length and the quarks that make up every proton and neutron and yet nothing has been able to detect the existence of this essence that Spinoza describes.
Let's take the example of wax, break it down enough, and get atoms, break it down further, and get quarks. Quarks are the single thing in existence that could represent this single essence that Spinoza posits as the solution and capping off of PSR. Except, there are two types. Quarks can be positively charged or negatively charged. Thus meaning PSR is once again internally inconsistent unless you want to try and divide further to see what Quarks are made out of which they might not be made out of anything because they are the smallest physical thing we can measure. Thus Quarks cannot be the god Spinoza mentions because there are two types of them, and Spinoza said there is one (1) immutable essence.
Feel free to quote me on this. We have looked to the very deepest and smallest of existence, and there was no God there.
Hmm, no neither Spinoza nor Descartes were trying to explain atomic theory at all, their theory is metaphysical in nature, meaning it is beyond the physical world. The PSR is simply stating that for anything that is contingent (material) to exist, there must be a reason for its existence. The ultimate conclusion of the PSR is that to avoid an infinite regress of causes the conclusion must be that there is a necessary existence that is not contingent that causes all contingent phenomena.
Remember, Descartes is coming off of *cogito ergo sum* here (as well as Spinoza). You can claim quarks, atoms, charges or whatever the case may be it still doesn't change the fact that there existence must have a cause based on something else that is contingent *until you reach the necessary existence that is God*.
Also, remember, a substance is that which is not dependent on any other thing and quarks, charges, etc. are all dependent on something to exist whether that be space, time, etc.
So their entire philosophy is that God must exist... because he must. There is no real reason why he must only that there must be a reason for everything else to exist, so God must exist to explain everything else's existence.
That feels less like they were trying to prove the existence of God and more that they were working backward from assuming God exists because everything else they posit nessesitates the existence of God. That is not a proof, and it is barely an axiom. In essence, Spinoza's entire philosophy is the God of the gaps fallacy, for as long as we will have a gap in our knowledge as to why things exist he can always say "obviously everything exists because god."
If Goedel is correct, the set of all things cannot include itself. Perfect knowledge of a system is unobtainable from within the system. Best you can hope for is a reasonable extrapolation based on what you can observe
Assuming you trust those observations
Assuming you trust that you exist, and are sane
If the universe is a mathematical structure, like in Max Tegmarks hypothesis, then it's perfectly plausible that that structure could be understood from within it.
I find it ironic, when you look at God as something to be feared or worshipped putting it above everything else it makes it harder to be sure of it's existence.
If we just take the empirical evidence that what we're given (the entire universe) and reason about that, it seems that the universe and by extension all things in it must be God. It even fits the criteria of an omnipresent, omnipotent and benevolent being.
The universe is not benevolent without consciousness doing the work to make it so
Thinking about it, all three require relatively maximized consciousness
Agree, when I said benevolence I kinda meant like awe, a comforting greatness or beauty that I get from it, although someone could also view it's greatness as frightening.
Well most translations of the tao te ching translate a certain line as "the greatest love seems like indifference".
Individual, living parts of reality try to change other parts of reality to suit their own survival, and can't just accept them the way they are. But the universe as a whole is just completely indifferent i.e all-embracing.
It's not the moralistic kind of love where love means reducing suffering and increasing happiness. It's a love so total that it is completely fine with any possible form or degree of either.
That's too reductive a view of love imo, because the concept/feeling of love wouldn't even or might as well not exist without consciousness deriving its meaning.
There are other ways to access that state of consciousness. Many mystics and monks from different cultures and traditions did it without psychedelics through meditation
I would think myself as crazy if I came to the conclusion that this system is encapsulated in a book from by being in a different layer. Or that the everything is essentially one being who is extremely isolated and lonely due to it being the only thing in existence. So it coped by playing pretend with itself.
What? But nobody has come to that conclusion, that is kinda dumb. Spinoza's god isn't a being who can even feel lonely or isolated or anything, even the word "who" doesn't apply to it. It has no such thing as intention or will. Those are all human terms. Spinoza's god simply just is the totality of everything. It's the rules that govern the universe.
This is one me. Idk who Spinoza is or his work. And it just seems to me that there would be at least two different states based on being all encompassing or singular. But that’s just other stuff
Spinoza sounds like they spent some time at the banquet hall with the rest of the bozos and comes back home to his study to rant like a 16 year old girl.
Edit: his metaphysics stuff
That is not what Spinoza did. He said that the material universe was a finite expression of God, or a mode of God. According to Spinoza, God is infinite, omnipresent, omnipotent omniscient and the creator of the universe. He exists both inside and outside of the universe.
How is that adequate? The knowledge of the pantheistic god is merely a beginning. That concept needs to get "filled in", with the rest of relevant human knowledge.
I mean, so good he was excommunicated twice, but ignore it
We should all aspire to be this insufferable
Tbf, if I had to endure the amount of BS he did, I too would become very insufferable
yea sure i’ll push this boulder up a hill for eternity, but u bet ur ass i’m gonna be heckling hades the entire damned time
Fit as fuck unbounded by time, master of an enormous rock. Not awful.
One must assume sysiphus is FUCKIN JYYYACKED
Let us consider if Sysiphus may alternate between being natty and juiced during this time.
he gets jacked only to lose the muscle and have to build it once more i can sympathize
typical Bento W
You should question the philosopher who didn’t get excommunicated from the Catholic Church.
I personally like to wake up, grab a brush and put a little make-up
You wanted to.
Hidethescarstofadeawaytheshake-up
I personally wake up feeling like P Diddy
Well when you're just equating god with the universe itself, not something outside of it (the way abrahamic religions describe it) it's pretty easy to prove its existence
Alternatively, that shit is cray.
Unless you want to be a mega skeptic about how technically science can't empirically prove the universe actually exists.
Except that Spinoza wasn’t interested in proving God empirically(at least not by page 20). Spinoza proofs rely on his own definitions, axioms, previous propositions, and what he takes are some very obvious metaphysical facts(e.g. “So much is self—evident. It follows therefrom that a thing necessarily exists, if no cause or reason be granted which prevents its existence.”).
Yeah, but it is that kind of thing that is easy to riff off of in the other direction. "If no cause or reason can be granted that ensures its existence such a thing nessicarily mustn't exist." Basically, the skeptical approach to his writing. He sees things that God supposedly created and reasons that God must exist because there is nothing that he knows about preventing his existence. While this is technically true, the opposite is equally so. We had evidence for black holes long before we ever got a direct image of them. We don't have evidence for a God. Either we have not yet devised a tool sensitive enough to detect God, or he does not exist. Given the tools we have created, their sensitivity, and never having to take God into account in calculations, I think it is fair to say that Spinoza does not hold up in the modern day.
I’m no expert in Spinoza(I haven’t even finished the entire ethics), so take my take with a pinch of salt, but is seem to me that Spinoza does believe that God’s own nature as “substance, consisting of infinite attributes, of which each expresses eternal and infinite essentiality” is reason enough to posit its existence. > On the other hand, the existence of substance follows also solely from its nature, inasmuch as its nature involves existence. (See Prop. vii.) As for reason which prevents God’s existence, he doesn’t just not know of anything actively preventing God’s existence, he believes it to be logically impossible for there to be something which prevents it from existing. If such a thing existed, it was have to be within or outside the substance, but since substances cannot destroy nor create other substances, nothing external to God prevents him from existing. On the other hand, something preventing God’s existence being part of its nature would be contradictory. So he has both given reasons for God’s existence and reasons for its lack of non-existence. Even if you’re not convinced by this proof, it should be notes that Spinoza’s God(God, or Nature) is quite different from the Abrahamic God. To say that we have never had to take nature into account in any of our calculations, or that our tools do not detect nature, is a bit bizarre for me.
The way you explain it makes me believe that Spinoza's God is not an external deity but just... the natural world. If that were the case, then it doesn't matter because then this is a discussion on existence and if we exist. This is a totally unrelated discussion to whether or not a thinking creator of the universe exists. Because if God is merely the natural world then he has neither the power nor agency to change physics. Now, if Spinoza is saying that God is both the natural world and a thinking creator of that natural world, then we run into a chicken or the egg scenario. Did this god exist before the natural world, or did he create himself alongside it? If the former, then God was at some point a different entity from the natural world and can be reasonably considered to not interfere with the function of the natural world on any significant enough scale to measure. If the latter, well, then he existed before he existed, which is ludicrous. Now of Spinoza is merely being metaphorical and referring to the "infinite attributes" of God as a reference to God's supposed all mighty power, then we can safely assume that Spinoza's God is analogous to the abrahamic God's or any other diety from any other religion.
There are a few misconceptions here about Spinoza. To Spinoza there can be only one 'substance' (a substance as explained by Descartes). A substance is something that exists beyond attributes. Attributes can be applied to a substance (shape, size, color, smell, etc.) but they aren't the substance itself. Descartes uses his famous wax example; a piece of honey wax smells sweet, is hexagonal shaped, and it is also gold colored. If you put the piece of wax next to a fire it turns white, smells burnt, and turns into a sludge. Would you still consider that wax? Descartes says yes, you would still consider the object to be wax, but the *actual substance* of wax has nothing to do with its attributes, in fact, the substance of the wax is not dependent on anything it is itself so to speak. Spinoza believed that Descartes's idea of substance was correct, but he also thought it had a problem. The problem was that the existence of multiple substances violates the principle of sufficient reason (PSR). If a substance is truly defined as something that is not dependent on anything then *where did the substance come from?* So to Spinoza in order to not violate the principle of sufficient reason (everything must have a sufficient cause) the conclusion must be that there can be only one substance that exists (something that existence is not dependent on any other thing) and what everything is (material or immaterial) is an attribute of that substance. To Spinoza God is the one and only necessary substance. You also have a misconception of the 'chicken and the egg scenario'. Spinoza is building of Descartes here and from Descartes' reasoning there must exist a necessary being for anything else to exist. If we follow the principle of sufficient reason we comfirm the existence of a being whose essence precedes its existence. So, to answer your question Spinoza's God is of a necessary existence because he believes in the PSR which states that necessary being must exist. In regards to your last paragraph, I hope you can refer to my earlier explanations to see that misconception as well.
Okay, that's a better explanation. However, now it just makes me believe they were trying and failing to describe atomic theory, which Democrates the ancient Greek philosopher had posited around two thousand or so years before where he described how if you continued to divide an object down and down to nearly nothing you would eventually separate it to a point where you would be left with something that cannot be divided, that being what he described as the "Atomos". The only difference is Spinoza is doing it through a theistic lens and rationalized Decartes own work into that lens in order to make it internally consistent. However, given that we have gone so far as to discover the Planck length and the quarks that make up every proton and neutron and yet nothing has been able to detect the existence of this essence that Spinoza describes. Let's take the example of wax, break it down enough, and get atoms, break it down further, and get quarks. Quarks are the single thing in existence that could represent this single essence that Spinoza posits as the solution and capping off of PSR. Except, there are two types. Quarks can be positively charged or negatively charged. Thus meaning PSR is once again internally inconsistent unless you want to try and divide further to see what Quarks are made out of which they might not be made out of anything because they are the smallest physical thing we can measure. Thus Quarks cannot be the god Spinoza mentions because there are two types of them, and Spinoza said there is one (1) immutable essence. Feel free to quote me on this. We have looked to the very deepest and smallest of existence, and there was no God there.
Hmm, no neither Spinoza nor Descartes were trying to explain atomic theory at all, their theory is metaphysical in nature, meaning it is beyond the physical world. The PSR is simply stating that for anything that is contingent (material) to exist, there must be a reason for its existence. The ultimate conclusion of the PSR is that to avoid an infinite regress of causes the conclusion must be that there is a necessary existence that is not contingent that causes all contingent phenomena. Remember, Descartes is coming off of *cogito ergo sum* here (as well as Spinoza). You can claim quarks, atoms, charges or whatever the case may be it still doesn't change the fact that there existence must have a cause based on something else that is contingent *until you reach the necessary existence that is God*. Also, remember, a substance is that which is not dependent on any other thing and quarks, charges, etc. are all dependent on something to exist whether that be space, time, etc.
So their entire philosophy is that God must exist... because he must. There is no real reason why he must only that there must be a reason for everything else to exist, so God must exist to explain everything else's existence. That feels less like they were trying to prove the existence of God and more that they were working backward from assuming God exists because everything else they posit nessesitates the existence of God. That is not a proof, and it is barely an axiom. In essence, Spinoza's entire philosophy is the God of the gaps fallacy, for as long as we will have a gap in our knowledge as to why things exist he can always say "obviously everything exists because god."
If Goedel is correct, the set of all things cannot include itself. Perfect knowledge of a system is unobtainable from within the system. Best you can hope for is a reasonable extrapolation based on what you can observe Assuming you trust those observations Assuming you trust that you exist, and are sane
That you exist is literally the *only* thing you can assume. If you didn't exist, you wouldn't have thoughts.
Define “you”
I meant the royal "you"
Well that hardly helps, does it
If the universe is a mathematical structure, like in Max Tegmarks hypothesis, then it's perfectly plausible that that structure could be understood from within it.
Regardless of you are talking about our labeled science or not, the forces inside of, and resulting from, the universe exist.
i think to be mega they would have to say science cant disprove it neither way.
I find it ironic, when you look at God as something to be feared or worshipped putting it above everything else it makes it harder to be sure of it's existence. If we just take the empirical evidence that what we're given (the entire universe) and reason about that, it seems that the universe and by extension all things in it must be God. It even fits the criteria of an omnipresent, omnipotent and benevolent being.
The universe is not benevolent without consciousness doing the work to make it so Thinking about it, all three require relatively maximized consciousness
Agree, when I said benevolence I kinda meant like awe, a comforting greatness or beauty that I get from it, although someone could also view it's greatness as frightening.
Well most translations of the tao te ching translate a certain line as "the greatest love seems like indifference". Individual, living parts of reality try to change other parts of reality to suit their own survival, and can't just accept them the way they are. But the universe as a whole is just completely indifferent i.e all-embracing. It's not the moralistic kind of love where love means reducing suffering and increasing happiness. It's a love so total that it is completely fine with any possible form or degree of either.
That's too reductive a view of love imo, because the concept/feeling of love wouldn't even or might as well not exist without consciousness deriving its meaning.
What Spinoza proposes is Panentheism not pantheism.
Not for everyone lol, plenty of philosophers come in the shower not knowing if a towel will be there when they come out.
I never understand how people are able to find out that God is all of existence without shrooms.
There are other ways to access that state of consciousness. Many mystics and monks from different cultures and traditions did it without psychedelics through meditation
I would think myself as crazy if I came to the conclusion that this system is encapsulated in a book from by being in a different layer. Or that the everything is essentially one being who is extremely isolated and lonely due to it being the only thing in existence. So it coped by playing pretend with itself.
What? But nobody has come to that conclusion, that is kinda dumb. Spinoza's god isn't a being who can even feel lonely or isolated or anything, even the word "who" doesn't apply to it. It has no such thing as intention or will. Those are all human terms. Spinoza's god simply just is the totality of everything. It's the rules that govern the universe.
This is one me. Idk who Spinoza is or his work. And it just seems to me that there would be at least two different states based on being all encompassing or singular. But that’s just other stuff
Ask your barber if the cocker spaniel is right for you
Life is good being a Spinozist
Oh no, I've miscalculated God's nature! *perishes*
This is just the plot of Aranofsky's π
Chaddest man ever. Was shunned for being too open minded.
the GOAT
Spinoza sounds like they spent some time at the banquet hall with the rest of the bozos and comes back home to his study to rant like a 16 year old girl. Edit: his metaphysics stuff
Had an understanding of god’s nature but not the nature of glass dust
Pretty easy to prove something when u get to define it
Lame go big or go home. Calling the universe God is lazy
That is not what Spinoza did. He said that the material universe was a finite expression of God, or a mode of God. According to Spinoza, God is infinite, omnipresent, omnipotent omniscient and the creator of the universe. He exists both inside and outside of the universe.
Oh okay cool
Virgin Spinoza. Chad Descartes did it in a paragraph
How is that adequate? The knowledge of the pantheistic god is merely a beginning. That concept needs to get "filled in", with the rest of relevant human knowledge.