Part V. "Prinicples of Correct Living"

       In the first section of Part 5 of the Ethics, Spinoza discusses how reason can overcome the affects in dictating human action, and how we may best live by the guidance of reason in the absence of full knowledge of our affects. Ultimately, we are left with a theory of habituation, or the frequent contemplation of certain moral truths, discovered through reason, which will guide us through the unknown or poorly understood affects that harass us in our lives.

       Spinoza holds that insofar as we have adequate ideas, we act, and insofar as we have inadequate ideas we are acted upon (IIIP3). In this way, if we form adequate ideas of the affects that affect us, their power over us is lessened (P4). These adequate ideas will be attained through knowledge of the cause of the affects in question (IVP23). There are no affects, or passions, that cannot be understood (P4). Once the power of our reason is increased, through adequate ideas, such that it is greater than that of the affects, the power of the affects will be forced to conform with that of reason (A1, P3). In this way, reason can have power over the affects (P4S). When this happens, and to whatever extent we have adequate ideas of our affects, we are guided by reason and have power over ourselves.

       In the world, however, we may not always have the adequate ideas of our affects that would allow us to be guided directly by reason. As Spinoza explains, When "…we do not have perfect knowledge of our affects, [we must] conceive of a correct principle of living…" (P10S). These correct principles of living, or "maxims" (P10S), can be instilled in us through contemplation, and serve to lessen the extent to which we are acted upon by our affects (P9). These principles are akin to Aristotle’s Virtues. Through frequent repetition we may habituate ourselves to these Virtues, or principles, and in this way condition ourselves to live by the guidance of reason, a task that Spinoza suggests would otherwise be difficult or impossible in this world of imperfect knowledge (P10S). The crucial differences between the theories of Spinoza and Aristotle are illustrative of the essence of Spinoza's idea of correct principles. These differences may be seen most clearly in two points. First, that for Spinoza the repetition of these principles seems to be purely contemplative (P10S), while for Aristotle the virtues must be practiced in action. This is a manifestation of Spinoza's irrevocable separation of the attributes, which in understanding thought demands that the perfection of the mind be understood as nothing other than understanding (P4S). The second illustrative point is that for Spinoza, these principles are only a place holder for certain knowledge, to be relied upon in its absence. This stands in contrast to Aristotle's virtues, which are put forward as autonomous from pure reason, defined rather by one’s social environment. The comparison with Aristotle is useful for understanding the place and practice of Spinoza’s principles in our lives. Spinoza’s principles have value only in so far as they are derived from reason. They are universals, or generalizations, regarding what reason would likely prove to be the correct course of action in a specific instance. The principle, "hate is to be conquered by love" (P10S) demonstrates this universal quality. The principles lack an explicit understanding of the particular instance of circumstances on hand, and, in this way, lack the accuracy which comes of a purely rational understanding, based on adequate ideas, of the affects involved.

      Finally, in a discussion of the application of the principles it is important to note that these principles, being universals, and in this way necessarily imperfect, only lessen, through repeated contemplation, the power of the affects(P9). They do not dissolve the affects in the way hate and love are dissolved by having adequate ideas of those things hated or loved (P2). In this way the correct principles increase the influence of reason in our minds, but fall short of the dissolution of the affects that our minds accomplish when in a position of complete understanding.

the deception of free man

            In the end of book four, Spinoza is discussing the nature of a “free man”.  A free man, according to Spinoza is a man who acts through reason alone.  In 4P72, he claims that “A free man always acts honestly, not deceptively” (237).  In explaining this proposition, Spinoza claims that when a free man acts through deception, it must be virtuous.  This is because a free man is guided by pure reason, and as such would know that the deception would be the greater good.  So, if in some situation a free man deceives someone, then it is the case the in that situation one always deceive another. 

            However, Spinoza seems to be claiming in the demonstration of 4P72 that even in an extreme case where it would seem that it is ok to deceive someone (for example to save your life), a free man would not deceive.  The claim is that he would understand that the institution of agreements would be undermined if he were to start down the path of deception.  That is if the recommended course of action that reason would lead to were deception, it would be the proper course of action, regardless of any situational conditions.  In other words, if reason would lead you to deceive to save your life, then it would also lead to that course of action in all other situations, which Spinoza thinks is absurd.

            This whole line of reasoning seems to rest on the idea that people will always do what is best for them.  A free man would know that it is absurd to act through deception.  However, it would seem that reason would also dictate that one ought to do anything to remain alive.  No one good would be not to act through deception and another good would be to stay alive.  Following from 4P65, it seems that even a free man would, under certain circumstances be able to deceive.  If the free man has a choice between a good and an evil, he will choose the good over the evil.  So, if one needed to deceive in order to save his life, the line of reasoning would not be based on the virtues or vices of deception, but rather it seems that more important line of reasoning would be is it better to live or die, with deception being a second tier of reasoning.  Put slightly differently, but also derived from 4P65, there are two evils, deception and death.  The free man will choose the lesser of the two evils, which would be deception.

Reason, Emotions and Human Nature

In this particular section of the Part IV (4P28-4P52), Spinoza seeks to determine the relation between emotions and human nature. To begin with, Spinoza contends that if there is nothing common between a particular thing and human nature, then that particular thing can not affect human nature. That is because if a particular thing determines human action, then it follows from Spinoza's discussion of attributes (prop. 6, part II) that the nature of particular thing is bound to share the same attribute with human nature. Emotions such as pleasure and pain have something in common with us, since they respectively increase and decrease our power of acting (P. 29). Laying out this general condition, Spinoza goes on to specify how emotions correlate with the human nature.

The agreement or disagreement between human nature and particular things determine how they affect upon human beings. If any particular thing agrees with human nature, then it is essentially good (4P31). For the agreement in nature implies that agreed things can not diminish their respective powers, as it contradicts with already proven proposition that things can be destroyed only by things that are external to it(3P4). It then follows that insofar as things are bad (i.e. things which cause pain, diminish human power) for humans, to that extent they disagree with human nature. This may seem contradictory with what Spinoza has maintained earlier, namely, things can not affect us in any way if they have nothing in common with us (4P29). How then the pain-causing things affect us? The answer lies in the difference between being different from and being contrary to human nature. While the former does not affect us in any way, the latter affects us negatively. That is, the pain-causing things are in negative relation with human nature, while the non-affecting things are in no relation at all. However, things only can agree in power, not in the lack of power (P32). Passions, which belong to the latter category, do not thus agree with human nature. Passions are the form of emotions that “harass” human beings (P34). What is more, the passions are the root cause behind the prevalence of discrepancy among human being. For the passions – or the lack of power – bar human beings from agreeing with each other's nature. Peter appears as antagonistic to Paul only when Paul hates or envies something that Peter possesses (P34), regardless of the efficient cause of that thing (3P16). In contrast, reason paves the way for agreement in nature: “ Insofar as men live in accordance with the guidance of reason, to that extent alone they always necessarily agree in nature” (4P35). To demonstrate this crucial proposition, Spinoza specifies the relation between human nature and reason. Insofar as human nature is conceived according to the reason, to that extent things that emanate from nature are to be understood only through human nature. The law of human nature, as we know, dictates that human beings always seek what they consider good and avoid what they reckon bad. If a particular thing is good for human nature, then it is bound to be good for every man (4P35). Human beings thus agree in nature insofar as they live according to the dictate of reason. While the passion-directed hatred generates hatred, the guidance of reason repays the hatred with love (4P46). We can thus conclude that the guidance of reason  does not only safeguard human beings from the power-diminishing passions,  but also sets human beings in a harmonious relationship with each other. 

Hope and Fear

            Spinoza states that there are only three primary affects, joy, sadness and desire. Man’s very essence is desire, we act solely on it, and this includes all of our appetites and impulses (IIID1). He explains that joy and sadness are not states, but instead passages to and from a greater and lesser perfection (IIID2, D3). It is the journey, not the destination.

Hope and fear for Spinoza are basically interchangeable, they are directly related. We couldn’t have one without the other, since there are both instances in which we hope for something to happen, and in which we hope for something not to happen. It could thus be said that we fear this something from occurring. Spinoza defines hope as an “inconsistent joy” which rises from an image of a past or future thing which we doubt the outcome of. Fear is defined as an “inconsistent sadness” which also arises from an image of a past or future thing which we doubt the outcome of (IIIP18S2). He goes on to state that if doubt is removed from these, hope becomes confidence and fear despair, since we hope for something that we believe will bring us joy, and we fear the thing that we believe will bring sadness. But this is all in our minds, and we chose to believe that which is favorable to us, and deny things that we do not want to happen. Yet all things mean something different to each one of us; something I hope for could be someone else’s greatest fear (IIIP51).

Spinoza believes that hope and fear govern a lot of people’s lives (Nadler 206). People spend their lives either really desiring something to happen, or are in fear of the consequences of it happening. However what people don’t realize is that they have no real control, that they are all predetermined. But because men see themselves as being free, and as being causes of their ends, they buy into their hopes and fears and act according to them.This is how superstitions and omens are born, and begin to slowly take over people’s lives (IIIP50). Nadler notes, as does Spinoza in his TTP, that hope and fear are the very foundation of organized religion (206). People so badly want something to to happen or to not happen, that they would believe almost anything to help or prevent it from happening. But this is not a healthy way to live, being in a constant state of anxiety would make anyone go crazy. Especially since we have no real control over our ends anyway, so both emotions are just a waste of nerve cells.

Mind-body connection = Thought-extension correlation

Spinoza takes a radical view of expressing the mind-body connection as having no inter-causal relationship between each other, but instead being a correlation between two distinct attributes. These two attributes are ultimately the same thing, the substance of God expressed as the attribute of thought or the attribute of extension occurring simultaneously (3P2). Spinoza believes we err when we conclude our bodies are drawn to move by the command of our minds direction, and that the body also cannot determine the mind (3P2). But interestingly, by 3P1 “Next, from any given idea some effect must necessarily follow, of which effect God is the adequate cause, not insofar as he is infinite, but insofar as he is considered to be affected by that given idea”,  we are left questioning the relationship between the “given idea” and the “affected”. Simply because by D3, Spinoza defines affect as that which affects the body’s authority of acting as improved or lessened. So if the attributes of thought and extension are truly one and have no causal relationship, I’m left wondering how can an Idea affect the affections of the body and that not be considered causal?

 However, Spinoza goes on to explain that if God is affected by an adequate idea and is the cause of an effect, then that same mind (whom has the adequate idea) is also the effects adequate cause. This is interesting because he also says, by this causal-effect relationship, the mind acts (P1). This is all very perplexing to me because he really brings up a fascinating perspective in P2 when he separates the movement of body’s and the modes of thinking as not having a determinate relationship, but I can’t help but question by what he means in P1 when the ideas ultimately act.

               My only solution is that he stresses the importance of seeing thought and extension as not only distinct attributes, but also as the same substance that the order or connection is one. So there seems to be a cyclical-unity between these two attributes that only appears to be different attributes when viewed through the specific attribute, but is ultimately the same thing. It’s very difficult for me to understand thought-extension in this way, but he does have a point in his sleepwalking and other examples, and if anything raises an interesting perspective that perhaps we shouldn’t just assume our thought attribute is ultimately the cause of our actions/extension.

Intro to Images and Striving

For Spinoza all things act in accordance to their nature, for their nature must necessarily dictate how they are to act. Men are no exception to this law of nature because, contrary to popular belief, man is not determined by himself. The human mind, in particular, does not determine man’s body because they are two unique attributes of substance and though inseparable they have no causal connection.

Spinoza previously attempts to prove that Substance does not have any flaws in Part I of the Ethics. To believe otherwise is to assume that there is something lacking from that which is by definition absolute. While other scholars believe that man exists outside of nature Spinoza believes that man is merely a part of Nature and must behave in accordance to its laws. Spinoza states “Nothing happens in nature that can be attributed to any defect in it, Nature is always the same… the laws and rules of nature … are always and everywhere the same” (Ethics 153). Things exist the way they do because they always have and always will exist in this manner.

Spinoza challenges the idea that the mind and the body are separate entities that have the ability to influence one another. The mind does not have the ability to control the actions of the body because “all modes have God [or Nature] for a cause” (Ethics 155). As a result the mind and body of human beings are subject to the laws of Nature.

Although they are both attributes of substance the mind and the body have no causal interaction between them, the mind being an attribute of thinking and the body being an attribute of extension with. He states, “the body cannot determine the mind to thinking, and the mind cannot determine the body to [action]” (Ethics 155). These two attributes must only act in accordance to the laws of Nature and therefore they correspond to one another. “Things are able [to produce] nothing but what follows necessarily from their determinate nature” (Ethics 159).

Our minds ability to think and our bodies ability to act are simply just effects of the laws of nature not our ability to determine ourselves. As human beings our minds and our bodies are distinguishable expressions of Nature but not separable. The mind and the body are, by the laws of nature, determined.