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.
It is really amazing how consistent Spinoza’s view of the relationship between the mind and the body is with our current understanding of the correlation between conscious experience and brain states. While Spinoza’s substance metaphysics seems hard to prove either way, if we take up just the view that the mind is the idea of the body (2p13), this position is quite consistent with the view we would expect to hear espoused by a modern neuroscientist. I would imagine that most people in today’s age would allow that conscious experience, or what Spinoza would call the mind, supervenes on the physical states of the brain. Similarly, I imagine most people, based on their understanding of the physical nature of the brain and body, would deny that conscious experience could have any causal power over the body. There is always room for error and it is impossible to say what knowledge of the world is to come, but it always amazes me when the same position can be so well substantiated by the empirical sciences and rationalist philosophy.
ReplyDelete“the body cannot determine the mind to thinking, and the mind cannot determine the body to [action]” (Ethics 155) This is an interesting concept to me, and I honestly don't know if I agree with it. It seems to me that there has to be some way for these two attributes to be able to relate to each other beyond a correspondence. I do believe that there is some kind of relationship between the mind and body that I get the impression Spinoza is not addressing.
ReplyDeleteI have to agree with Alexander here. I definitely can't bring myself to believe what Spinoza is saying about the mind having no causal connection to the body. Of course it's perfectly in line with what Spinoza believes about God/Nature and all things affected by that. I mean I GUESS that I can see the mind as only a trigger that sends electrical pulses to parts of the body to make them work which in turn would be doubly physical and not the mind and mental states causing the body to work in place of those physical pulses. We don't actually think about or have mental conceptions of the way we want our body to work by which I mean we don't say "heart pulse now!" "and heart don't pulse now!". However, we do choose things such as when to move our arms and hands to pick something up which is a physical trigger of the brain but the brain does not make these decisions themselves, as it is our mental processes that tells the brain that it needs to send those pulses in this case. And similarly, the reverse works when the body signals to the brain that something is wrong. When we get hurt and feel pain for example, this same nervous system is what causes this feeling in the first place but it is our mind that actually registers the conception of what "pain" is, beyond it just being a certain feeling. And it is our mind that tells our body that maybe we have to respond to this pain accordingly.
ReplyDeleteI agree wholeheartedly with Spinoza when it comes to determinism. where I differ with him and Decartes is when they says the mind and body aren't connected. I see the point where Spinoza says the body or our concept of 'body' are reflections of our senses. I tend to look at it way, the brain is physical thing that holds our thoughts and feelings but not our intellect and mind per'se. BUT my brain can't be in New York and my mind somewhere else. I guess its a question of material (bodies) things affecting immaterial things (mind).
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