In his Ethics, Spinoza writes that “He, who has a true idea, simultaneously knows that he has a true idea, and cannot doubt of the truth of the thing perceived.”[1] The notion in this passage, which is referenced in multiple other passages in the Ethics, is that knowledge is an a priori function derived from that which is eternal. Spinoza thus considers knowledge of God as the only adequate idea, so that what is known is only that which is completely certain.[2] As eternal knowledge is completely certain, Spinoza seems to avoid the Cartesian skepticism that rules over the perceptions. Spinoza relies on his previously explained metaphysic in which all substance is one, that is, that all substance is God, and thus indivisible and infinite. However, such a notion seems to fly in the face of many variations of the classical foundationalist model of justified true belief epistemologies. The knowledge is already there, much like a Platonic doctrine of ideas, but is unique to Spinoza because of his doctrine of infinite substance. Thus, one does not need to prove that truth is had, which differs from the Cartesian method that seeks to correct false ideas to arrive at knowledge.[3] Furthermore, belief is unnecessary to knowledge because belief is not necessarily of the truth. Justification of this truth is unnecessary as well due to knowledge being of that which is already known. Thus, there seems an issue at work here, pointed out by Richard Mason in his article “Spinoza and the Unimportance of Belief,” that Spinoza “gave no clue about how the gap between belief and knowledge might be bridged, beyond a suggestion that immediate intuition seemed enough to sift true from false ideas.”[4] The answer to this issue seems largely unanswered. However, while Mason’s claim seems accurate in that Spinoza does not directly address the supposed separation of knowledge and belief, the answer lies implicitly in the Ethics, and is seen upon a closer examination of what Spinoza means by his doctrine of eternal knowledge. I will argue that Spinoza’s system does indeed account for Mason’s discrepancy between knowledge and belief; it will be seen that knowledge, according to Spinoza’s account, is not entirely separate from belief, but in a particular way entails belief.
First, I must briefly clarify Spinoza’s system. It is derived from a notably pantheistic metaphysic in which “There can only be one substance with an identical attribute…It does not exist as finite, for it would then be limited by something else of the same kind, which would also necessarily exist…It therefore exists as infinite.”[5] Such an infinite substance, according to Spinoza, can only be God.[6] Because there is only one infinite substance, that is, God, “Substance absolutely infinite is indivisible.”[7] It is from this notion that Spinoza is able to arrive at a concept of an eternal mind. He writes that “The idea of God, from which an infinite number of things follow in infinite ways, can only be one.”[8] Furthermore, “Infinite intellect comprehends nothing save the attributes of God and his modifications,” and since there is only one substance, there is only one idea that can be comprehended, specifically God as infinite substance.[9] Spinoza takes this idea of one infinite substance and intellect and carries it further to show that this notion leads to the deduction that there can only be one mind, so that the seeming individuality of particular minds are actually just infinite attributes of the one substance.[10] Thus, “Our mind (the one mind or substance, that is, God), in so far as it knows itself and the body under the form of eternity, has to that extent necessarily a knowledge of God, and knows that it is in God, and is conceived through God.”[11] This eternal mind, as recognized by Spinoza, is a natural extension of the one substance, but its main usefulness here is that it explains Spinoza’s position on eternal knowledge, that is, that knowledge is a priori and is of the infinite substance. Another way of stating this concept is that “Knowledge is of essence…the reflection of the ideal of Being.”[12] The Cartesian assumption that multiple minds, or a minimal distinction between God and individual self, exist separately is entirely true according to Spinoza’s framework.[13] Rather, the apparent distinction between the finite substance and infinite substance is actually just a matter of the “points of view of the whole.”[14] The one substance is thus in an infinite state of comprehending itself, and it does so by an infinite chain of attributes that simply appear as finite within the human mind.
One issue with the notion of eternal knowledge arises when Spinoza seems to believe that the finite mind continues to acquire knowledge after death.[15] This might seem unreasonable given Spinoza’s metaphysics of infinite substance. For example, Michael Lebuffe asks the question, “How can Spinoza hold that what is eternal is also a thing that can change over the course of one’s life?”[16] However, it is precisely this metaphysics that accounts for such a claim. First, Spinoza’s pantheistic account of substance renders death to the same level that it renders individuality—it seems to merely be a matter of point of view. That is, death of the individual requires the particular individual. What is thought to be the particular individual is actually just a modification of Spinoza’s one substance. Thus, death seems to merely be an alteration of the state of the substance. Yet this account of death does not entirely answer the issue of change seeming to occur in infinite substance. The answer is found in Spinoza’s claim that while the eternal mind of the infinite substance does not actually change by increasing or decreasing in knowledge, the finite parts, or individual minds, operate according to “proportions” in order to comprehend the one substance.[17] Lebuffe explains that “When other parts of a mind decrease, the eternal part of a mind can increase, as a proportion of a mind, without itself changing.”[18] Thus Spinoza introduces a certain amount of realization into his method. As noted, the finite parts of the one substance are only finite insofar as they merely seem to be particulars, acting as particulars on a practical level. Each mind is actually just a mode of the eternal mind. By introducing proportions, to increase the part of the mind that is eternal is to increase in realization of the eternal mind. Death is one way that this process is furthered, and so it can be seen that change does not actually occur, but rather infinite and finite knowledge remains immutable.
I suggest that by recognizing that there is a certain degree of realization involved in the reconciliation of supposed differences between finite and infinite minds, Spinoza’s system no longer seems to be antagonistic toward classical foundationalist notions, but is rather seeking to fulfill the demands of a suitable epistemology. Jon Miller writes that Spinoza’s a priori system of knowledge is not an effort to undermine foundationalism, but has the goal of correcting probabilistic systems such Descartes’ system, as “Any philosophical system, then, if it is to be satisfactory, must begin with what is epistemically basic.”[19] By outlining an a priori metaphysic, Spinoza seeks to make truth and justification the same; it is on this a priori knowledge that all other knowledge is based on. Thus it provides the foundation upon which other knowledge can be justified.
In response to the apparent separation between knowledge and belief, it is important to understand that from Spinoza’s system can be inferred an implicit distinction between belief alone and knowledge that entails belief, which I claimed earlier that Spinoza supports implicitly within his metaphysic. As demonstrated, Spinoza’s a priori system sets up a series of basic truths that are known. From these truths are derived that God, substance, and mind are one and infinite. To reconcile supposed changes in finite minds, it is recognized that the finite minds are actually just part of the infinite whole and are in the infinite process of realization. This is why Spinoza writes that “The mind’s highest good is the knowledge of God.”[20] He implicitly means that even after death the mind is still infinitely realizing God as infinite substance. Thus belief is contained within knowledge. Belief is not completely absent, as Mason might suggest, but is part of the realization process of the eternal mind. Knowledge of God, as Spinoza demonstrates, is definite so that it is absolutely known. It is unimportant for Spinoza to make belief a separate condition for knowledge since it is already entailed by this system. Furthermore, belief as a condition in itself leads to probabilistic doubt, a flaw that Spinoza recognized in Descartes’ system. By forming an a priori system of absolutely certain basic truths, “Spinoza is concerned to minimize the harmful effects of beliefs that cause strife and disorder,” therefore avoiding the pitfalls of Descartes’ methodical doubt.[21] Descartes recognized that knowledge of God was all-important, although Spinoza sought to correct some errors in his methodology.[22] The invocation of infinite substance as God and eternal mind allowed Spinoza to avoid issues with uncertainty present in Descartes, as well as form a certain and basic foundation on which one can have knowledge.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Benedict de Spinoza. Works of Spinoza: The Ethics, translated by R. H. M. Elwes. New York: Dover Publications, Inc., 1955.
Edmund Gettier. 1963. Is Justified True Belief Knowledge? Analysis 23, no. 6, (June 1): 121-123.
Jon Miller. 2004. “Spinoza and the A Priori.” Canadian Journal of Philosophy 34, no. 4: 555-590.
Leon Roth. Spinoza, Descartes, and Maimonides. New York: Russell and Russell, 1963.
Michael Lebuffe. 2005. “Spinoza’s Summum Bonum.” Pacific Philosophical Quarterly 86: 243-266.
__________. 2010. “Change and the Eternal Part of the Mind in Spinoza.” Pacific Philosophical Quarterly 91: 369-384.
Moira Gatens. 2012. “Compelling Fictions: Spinoza and George Elliot on Imagination and Belief.” European Journal of Philosophy 20, no.1: 74-90.
René Descartes. Meditations on First Philosophy, translated by Donald A. Cress. Indianapolis, Indiana: Hackett Publishing Company, 1993.
Richard Mason. 2004. “Spinoza and the Unimportance of Belief.” Philosophy 79: 281-298.
[1]Spinoza, Benedict de, Works of Spinoza: The Ethics, trans. R. H. M. Elwes (New York: Dover Publications, Inc., 1955), 114.
[2] Ibid.
[3] Mason, Richard, “Spinoza and the Unimportance of Belief,” Philosophy 79 (2004): 284.
[4] Ibid, 282.
[5] Spinoza, Ethics, 48.
[6] Ibid, 45.
[7] Ibid, 54.
[8] Ibid, 85.
[9] Ibid.
[10] Ibid, 96.
[11] Ibid, 262.
[12] Roth, Leon, Spinoza, Descartes, and Maimonides (New York: Russell and Russell, 1963), 110.
[13] Descartes, René, Meditations on First Philosophy, trans. Donald A. Cress (Indianapolis, Indiana: Hackett Publishing Company, 1993), 46.
[14] Roth, Spinoza, Descartes, and Maimonides, 110.
[15] Spinoza, Ethics, 267.
Lebuffe, Michael, “Change and the Eternal Part of the Mind in Spinoza,” Pacific Philosophical Quarterly 91 (2010): 369.
[16] Ibid.
[17] Spinoza, Ethics, 266.
[18] Lebuffe, Change and the Eternal Part of the Mind in Spinoza, 370.
[19] Miller, Jon, “Spinoza and the A Priori,” Canadian Journal of Philosophy 34, no. 4 (2004): 565.
[20] Spinoza, Ethics, 205.
Lebuffe, Michael, “Spinoza’s Summum Bonum,” Pacific Philosophical Quarterly 86, (2005): 251.
[21] Gatens, Moira, “Compelling Fictions: Spinoza and George Eliot on Imagination and Belief,” European Journal of Philosophy 20, no. 1 (2012): 76.
Descartes, Meditations, 17.
[22] Ibid, 25.
A Humanities Symposium 