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.
Now this is a concept that I find quite interesting. I love to try to understand things through Spinoza's mindset and I love it even more when I just cant quite get what he is trying to say. For this particular example, what if a man comes along that is so virtuous to the point where deception is never even an option? This man would choose the end of his own life over having to deceive someone in order to save it, as that would be non-virtuous. It's crazy when one has to determine what the lesser of two evils is because it can never be done in a non-relative situation. Do people actually always do what's best for them? I don't think so. And what exactly is a free man, and would this man be so free as to not even be bound by reason? I understand the whole good over evil thing but I can see many situations where deception is the evil over death.
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