Spinoza - Science topic

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[Spinoza famously contends that “the order and connection of ideas is the same as the order and connection of things” (E2p7; C I, 451 / G II, 89). Based on this claim, he draws two consequences: that “nothing can happen in a body which is not perceived by the mind” (E2p12; C I, 457 / G II, 95), and that all things, “though in different degrees, are nevertheless animate” (E2p13s; C I, 458 / G II, 96). It remains unclear, however, what it means for any existing thing to have a mind which perceives everything that happens in the relevant body. In particular, it is unclear what role is played by consciousness in the definition of an individual’s mentality, since, against this panpsychist background, even simple things such as stones can be conceived of as being conscious of what happens in them (Ep 58; C II, 428 / G IV, 266).

In interpreting Spinoza’s texts and theories, I attend to a few fundamental premises, drawn from Spinoza himself, which thus determine the main features and limits of the theoretical framework explored by this research:

1. Spinoza’s theory of thought-extension parallelism,1 according to which “the order and connection of ideas is the same as the order and connection of things” (E2p7; C I, 451 / G II, 89) and “the order of actions and passions of our body is, by nature, at one with the order of actions and passions of the mind” (E3p2s; C I, 494 / G II, 141);

2. Spinoza’s rejection of mind-body interactionism, such that “the body cannot determine the mind to thinking, and the mind cannot determine the body to motion, to rest or to anything else (if there is anything else)” (E3p2; C I, 494 / G II, 141).

To these two claims, commonly maintained by Spinoza scholars, I add a third one, which — as we have seen — seems to follow directly from Spinoza’s thought-extension parallelism:

3. Spinoza’s panpsychism, according to which all individuals existing in nature, “though in different degrees, are nevertheless animate” and possess a relevant mind (E2p13s; C I, 458 / G II, 96).

Conclusion

To conclude, acquiring the habit of virtue, for Spinoza, is a complex process, totally determined by the way in which natural powers, common to all human beings, necessarily interact with the various circumstances and situations brought about by the external world. On the mental level, it requires the interplay of two functions of the mind, each of which acts according to its own necessary mechanism. On the one hand, there is memory, which passively receives stimuli from the external world and constantly feeds the mind with networks of images of external objects variously associated with each other. On the other hand, there is the striving of the mind to reason — that is, to understand things and order them according to the order of the intellect. By these means, memory becomes the necessary background that allows reason to unfold and flourish in time and become discursive reasoning, by allowing conclusions of right inferences to be retained, recalled and implemented through mnemonic devices. As long as memory allows this retention and retrieval of intelligible connections between images in the mind, it also allows the permanence in time or the retrieval of reasoning processes. This, eventually, provides an individual with the means by which she can acquire the “habit of virtue”, or a “firm and constant disposition” to overcome the power of passions and sad affects by reasoning. Yet, the capacity to have this or that network of images present to oneself at a given time, is entirely determined by our memory, also understood as a product of external causes affecting the human corporeal imagination. For what the mind can or cannot remember at a certain given time is always determined by the affections that, coming from the external environment, trigger in one’s body certain pre-existing networks of images or others. For this reason, the process by which we become virtuous remains always exposed to the risk of failure: for the power by which we strive to keep reasoning can be easily overwhelmed by the force with which random encounters constantly affect and variously dispose the human body, causing a constant mutation of images and memories, affects and desires. For this reason, in the TheologicalPolitical Treatise, Spinoza concludes that “only a very few (compared with the whole human race) acquire a habit of virtue [virtutis habitus] from the guidance of reason alone” (TTP XV, 45; C II, 282 / G III, 188).]

If Spinoza refers to emotions as weakness, then reason is sometimes the source of evil.

Les neurosciences permettent une meilleure compréhension des fonctions cognitives telle que l'apprentissage support de l'éducation. L'apprentissage passe par certains processus pour l'apprenant : l'attention, l'engagement actif, le feedback et la consolidation des acquis. Cela permet de comprendre les difficultés des apprenants et d'orienter les méthodes pédagogiques pour un bon résultat.

Maybe there's a Russellian Platonic Form -- the Form of not having a Form.... 🤣

The statement aligns with Michel Talagrand's work on probability and randomness, which won him the 2024 Abel Prize.

Key Points:

Talagrand’s Contributions:

Implications:

Talagrand’s work shows the need to complement rationalism with probabilistic methods to handle real-world complexities.

2024 Abel prize: Michel Talagrand wins maths award for making sense of randomness | New Scientist

In my opinion, there is a degree of mysticism in quantum mechanics because it is not properly formulated. It is generally recognized that ψ.ψ* represents the probability of finding the particle at a specified set of coordinates (the Born rule) but this has to be wrong. Consider a particle moving from A to B in accord with the Schrödinger equation. According to the Born rule, the most probable place to find the particle is at the wave antinode, but that cann0ot be correct because if you do the mathematics, the wave travels at half the velocity of the particle. The particle is at a pace where the wave has yet to catch up.

Now you can wave your arms and say the wave doesn't exist an dit is just a calculating aid, but even if that were true, if the most obvious simple calculation gives the wrong answer, how can it be a calculating aid?

There is a lot more wrong with current quantum mechanics, in my opinion. As an example, besides the Born rule two other Nobel prizes have been awarded with, in my opinion, incorrect physics. The award to Pople for his calculation of chemical bond energies uses the wrong orbitals and misses a quantum effect. The difference between what he uses and what I believe should be used is not large and is compensated for by assigned constants, i.e an empirical correction. The orbitals he should use are given by the relationship in I. J. Miller 1987. The quantization of the screening constant. Aust. J. Phys. 40 : 329 -346. As it happens, the carbon p orbitals do not have radial nodes, and the 2s orbital has only a minor effect so all is not lost

Similarly, the 2022mprize for showing violations of Bell's inequality is wrong. All they did was in calculating the results, they violated the conditions of deriving the inequality. If you do not believe me, show where the error is in Miller, I. J. (2023). Non-Violations in Bell's Inequality. J Math Techniques Comput Math, 2(6), 209-210.

I concede to being biased since I have published papers contradicting standard QM and In have also written two ebooks, one is "Guidance Waves", which outlines my answer to what I think is more correct, and "The Covalent Bond from Guidance Waves", which accounts for chemical bonds. The sim0lifications are clear. As an example, the calculations of bond dissociation energies for then triply bonded P2, As2 and Sb2 are within about 2 kJ/mol with no assigned constants, and a computer is not needed for what is one analytic function that inserts different quantum numbers.

Dear Professor Stephen I. Ternyik ,

I thank you very much for your observations!

I will further analyse the question of the liberation in Spinoza. It is a very rich subject.

I thank you very much again!

Yours sincerely,

Gianluigi Segalerba

maybe, because my Spanish languae competence is extremely poor, rather non existent, but perhaps better elaborate you the question somewhat.

because we have (ethics part I de deo)

e1p1

Propositio I . Substantia prior est natura suis affectionibus.

Demonstratio . Patet ex definitione 3. et 5.

and further the proof of e1p4:

e1p4d

Demonstratio . Omnia, quae sunt, vel in se, vel in alio

sunt (per axiom. 1.), hoc est (per defin. 3. et 5.), extra intellectum

nihil datur praeter substantias earumque affectiones. Nihil

ergo extra intellectum datur, per quod plures res distingui

inter se possunt praeter substantias sive, quod idem est (per

defin. 4.), earum attributa earumque affectiones. Q. e. d.

So now in the light of say these two: what's your question ?

Many systems have a property known as "criticality".If state of system changes enormously given small input, a system is critical.To know and understand of such behavior, we need to introduce some new concepts-theories i.e. the theory of critical phenomena..

Third form for Spinoza is more linked to System 2 because his intuition this is not the intuition described by System 1, but a metaphysical approach of the reason of System 2. If we can say this, it more like a System 2A. 

"Emotions", "passions" and "affects" are not the same thing, dear Gianrocco. The new "affect" literature is much more general, less descriptive and moral, and predicated on its societal and interpersonal imports.

That is why the present discussion uses pre-20th century philosophical insights and go directly into societal issues. A good example are the many books of Sara Ahmed, like The cultural politics of emotion, The pursuit of happiness and Queer phenomenology. Also Judith Butler, especially in Excitable speech: a politics of the performative; Precarious life: the powers of mourning and violence; Frames of war: when is life grievable?, among other strong texts. Many other authors are rethinking these terms and their relevance in the present.

Best regards, Lilliana

Persons embedded in organizations,communities, culture are involved in teleogical scenarios which give content and structure to those organizations,communities, culture.these personal teleogies are influenced by specific contexts organizational,communal, cultural immersion.

Dear Josef,

I only know the English translation and thus limit myself to this translation. I have another interpretation of the last line.  The tale said that Falsehood took the clothe of Truth and Truth being shy, it will never shows itself naked.  I see a little bit of the Kantian"s thesis that we will never know the things in themself (naked Truth).  I see also the Heraclitus extract that: <<Nature Love to Hide>>, a theme that Pierre Hadot explored in <<The Veil of Isis>>.  Established science is truth, but limited contextual truth   , not absolute/naked Truth.  

But the word <<falsehood>> is a bit too strong. Maybe the original tale was more nuance with something more like appearance instead of falsehood.  Maybe the original tale is an opposition between appearances and reality.

I'm not very familiar with neo-hegelian british idealism. I have read some Coleridge and know of his influences from the German parts of the world. Coleridge also tried to translate Goethe's Faust and went on trips to Germany with his fellow lake poet Wordsworth. Romanticism has at it's root an authentic form of freedom that is driven by an authentic commitment of some type of play. We never are so authentically ourselves at when at play Schiller believed. We gain this "play drive" when we are able to synthesize the formal and sensuous drives together. As we realize ourselves we are able to de-individuate ourselves and see a world that can be in harmony with ourselves. This is when our subjective self is married to the objective world. This is when one is more harmonized with the "absolute" and when one has is able to make "intellectual love" to god, as Spinoza put it.

Furthermore, both Spinoza and Hegel adopted a pantheist perspective. This also emphasizes another type of synthesis of the physical (formal) and the subjective (sensuous) together to form one substance. Spinoza was a pure deterministic rationalist. There is something there for everyone, and much that isn't. For him, unlike the romantics, there is no freewill and all that is good is purely rational-- which is that spark of divinity within all of us.

It's been a while since I've studied either. I hope this helps. If any of my information is wrong please let me know. :)

I was referring specifically to Perpetual Peace. My point is that it is a "transcendental principle of practical reason. In the old translation I have the last 4 paragraphs of "Eternal Peace" as Friedrich has it make this clear. It is neither a prescription nor a prediction. Such principle, if they are sound, apply universally, like the categorical imperative. They need to be typified to have any meaning for what we normally call political practice. We must act "as if" ("als ob") perpetual peace will occur. How a rational actor must think and what principles should guide conduct are what Kant can tell us about. I guess I think this is true of much, if not all, of his moral philosophy (practical reason). To go to making predictions one has to understand the principles of judgment, a very different thing. Without Kant, incidentally there is no Hegel, with Hegel there is no Marx. Hegel suggests that Kant is too abstract and does not understand the course of history, the development of the universal idea through history. Marx criticizes Hegel as too abstract as the 11th thesis on Feuerbach makes clear.

My main view is that one does not simply apply theory to discover correct practice. This, I think, is one the most important things that Kant, Hegel and Marx have in common.