Any state of the world also has a logical expression, an infinite, which cannot be altered by changes in the finite world. — TheWillowOfDarkness
When Spinoza makes the distinction between objects of causality (finite) and the principle of self (infinite), your response is to claim the are the same (that it's only about objects in the world). You are missing the entire point Spinoza is making and haven't even addressed the concept he is talking about. — TheWillowOfDarkness
Only Substance is Real for the acosmist- — TheWillowOfDarkness
This is incoherent - you're using a notion of substance that would be completely foreign to Spinoza, Descartes, Aristotle, and the whole philosophic corpus. Substance is what necessarily exists - God can't partake of substances - rather God can be substance. Maybe what you're saying is that God is a substance with multiple attributes, say attributes A, B, C, D and we're a substance with attributes A and B only. Now let's see, why couldn't that be the case? (Spinoza actually DOES go through this and explains why it can't be the case)This notion that there can only be one substance is an unfounded assumption. God may be constituted of a multitude of substances, one of which is in our case the same substance as that of which the world and or our being is constituted. While God also partakes of a multitude of other substances, or unknowns elsewhere in existence. — Punshhh
After all those years of you claiming you studied Spinoza you still can't understand even the basics of his system. Have you bothered to read how Spinoza or Descartes CLEARLY define what substance is?OK, so what is substance then? If you cannot clearly say what it is, then it would seem to be utterly senseless to claim that it is the only real. — John
>:O Yeah maybe if you stop after reading the fourth book "On Man's Bondage", and never move to the fifth ("On Man's FREEDOM") :-dSpinoza believed the self to be utterly subject to the determinism he believed to be inherent in nature. He believed that the freedom we experience ourselves as being is an illusion due to the fact that we cannot be aware of all the causal factors determining our actions. — John
By substance I understand what is in itself and is conceived through itself" — Spinoza
Substance: A thing whose existence is dependent on no other thing.
Created Substance: A thing whose existence is dependent on nothing other than God.
Strictly speaking, for Descartes there is only one Substance (as opposed to Created Substance), since there is only one thing whose existence is independent of all other things: God.
And on you go, post after post engaging in insults and playing boring games. You should really be ashamed of yourself, there is no greater shame than to have a man let his own jealousy conquer him. Your jealousy is so great in fact, that you even have the audacity to suggest:The fact is that I really don't care about this kind of bullshit; I'm not here to trade insults or to play boring games. — John
But of course, you don't care about this kind of bullshit. Why suggest it then? I think you really do care, and the fact that you care tells the rest of us a lot about you. But again I really think you ought to meditate on this and bear the shame you have accumulated in silence instead of opening that mouth again and pushing yourself even deeper down in the pit. Shame on you John, shame on you.Why not start a thread and ask others to honestly express their opinions, no holds barred, about your behavior on these forums; you might be surprised! — John
This is not a very clear definition because we don't know if there exists such a thing. Spinoza ties it with Substance being in itself (not depending on other things) and requiring nothing but itself in order to be conceived. Because Spinoza makes such a distinction it ends up clear that substance is something that we MUST conceive in order to make sense of reality (and hence there definitely exists such a thing). Descartes' definition, and the definition provided by the Buddhist dictionary don't make this clear.'Nirvāṇa is the one dharma that exists without being the result of a cause'. — Wayfarer
Which is precisely how Spinoza could subvert Cartesianism ;)With respect to Descartes definition of substance — Wayfarer
In philosophic discourse the notion of substance is pretty clear at least in my opinion.A lot of the confusion here rests on the notion of what constitutes 'substance' — Wayfarer
Yes and using substence in a way that doesn't follow the use of it that has been philosophically established. You're just redefining words.Indeed, I allow a broad spread of definitions of substance. — Punshhh
How are they unfounded? Can you explain this when I just provided you the reasons for why there is only one substance, and the reasons for why this substance must be God? :sThe problem with what Spinoza is saying (as you have presented it), is that there are two unfounded conclusions, conclusions which cannot be supported using logic. — Punshhh
Yes unfortunately Spinoza's ontological argument works - unlike that of Descartes or St. Anselm. Your only option is to retreat into irrationalism if you want to deny Spinoza's point. Reason itself demands that we adopt such a conception if reality is to be intelligible at all. Of course you can say "fuck it, reality isn't intelligible", but that's your only option. And if you choose that, you're not really doing philosophy anymore. So if that's what you want to do, be my guest.You should know by now that we cannot think God into existence, or think eternity into our own guise. — Punshhh
:-} Is this how Spinoza has defined Substance? Yes or no? If yes, then please cite adequate evidence. If no, then your point is a red herring or at best a strawman.If substance is what constitutes — John
Buddhism generally in my opinion is that it is confused - it says everything and nothing, and hasn't clarified its teachings, the way say, the Catholic Church has — Agustino
And I'm not even mentioning that even if things were as you frame them - your question, "if substance is what constitutes, how could substance itself be constituted?" is just as stupid as the question "if the Prime Mover is what moves, how could the Prime Mover itself be moved?" — Agustino
I'm not saying it would be impossible, I'm saying it is incoherent. How would we make sense of that? I can make sense of touching you for example, because we're both physical and made of the same substance - atoms - hence we can interact. That's what it means to be of the same substance - being capable of interacting. So if God isn't of the same substance, and is thus incapable of interacting with us, in what sense does he even exist? — Agustino
Pretty much all metaphysics must have an idea of the uncaused, because otherwise you're stuck with an infinite regress no? So even materialism must have an uncaused cause - for Epicurus "atoms and void" are eternal. So the very attempt to make an intelligible whole out of reality leads to the idea.Anyway, the point of the post is not about Buddhism in particular, it's a cross-cultural comparison between Spinoza's and Descartes' idea of the 'uncaused' and a similar idea in Buddhist philosophy. — Wayfarer
Whether I understand it or not is besides the point I'm trying to make to you. I may very well think highly of Buddhism, and in fact I do. However - this doesn't change the fact that many of the people who claim to be Buddhists, who go to practice Buddhism, and so forth have misinterpreted the teaching. My point is political - Buddhism has been so misinterpreted by so many people that it is beyond saving - at least in the West. It becomes a host for liberalism/progressivism, and it merely becomes another way to spread them. It has no mechanism - as far as I'm aware, to stop these misinterpretations and correct them - practically speaking, it doesn't even seem to be doing so, instead it is happy that it is gaining converts.Have you considered that it's possible you don't understand it very well? Those sources are plainly polemical. — Wayfarer
I asked you a question. Please answer it.Of course, that is the point; it is stupid to think of God as "being of a substance", which was what I was trying to point out to you earlier. — John
:-} Is this how Spinoza has defined Substance? Yes or no? If yes, then please cite adequate evidence. If no, then your point is a red herring or at best a strawman. — Agustino
:s No it isn't stupid. Your question is stupid. If the Prime Mover does the moving then nothing moves it, so asking how could the Prime Mover itself be moved is nonsense. That's why in Aristotelian science it is known as the Unmoved Mover.Of course, that is the point; it is stupid to think of God as "being of a substance", which was what I was trying to point out to you earlier. — John
In what way is it flawed? Stop being pedantic and back-peddling. This is what you do every single time to run away. You gave your question - and the inability to answer it - as proof for the notion of substance being flawed. I've explained that given the notion of substance, your question makes no sense at all. If it makes no sense at all, that means that it's not substance that is at fault, but your question, and it can't be used as a criticism of substance. Therefore you have presented no case for how substance is flawed.You obviously fail to understand that I was presenting it as a stupid question, not posing it as a sensible question to which we should seek an answer. It shows that thinking of God as being constituted as we are, or in your terms as "being of a substance" is flawed. Typical lack of subtlety. — John
So even materialism must have an uncaused cause - for Epicurus "atoms and void" are eternal. — Agustino
OK, so what is substance then? If you cannot clearly say what it is, then it would seem to be utterly senseless to claim that it is the only real. — John
Number 1: This means that God isn't (or rather CAN'T be) transcendent. I meant to say that the notion of transcendence is incoherent - ie there is only one substance, there can't be many.You referred to God as being constituted as we are, as "being of the same substance" — John
Yeah - thanks to your lack of subtlety as you like to say, you interpret it that way. All that the statement meant is that God being transcendent is incoherent - ie there are no two substances.But if God is the substance that constitutes, then it makes no sense to speak of God as being constituted as we are or as "being of the same substance" — John
In addition to this I've asked you to provide evidence for what exactly you're referencing here::-} Is this how Spinoza has defined Substance? Yes or no? If yes, then please cite adequate evidence. If no, then your point is a red herring or at best a strawman. — Agustino
Spinoza's own arguments concerning the difference between necessary and contingent beings — John
Are you lacking in reading comprehension skills by any chance?But the question as to what is being is no easier to answer than 'What is substance'? — John
No - you totally misunderstood Spinoza. No wonder 180 didn't want to have anything to do with you. He would usually not bother with those of low intellectual capacity and would easily break conversation with them when they couldn't keep up. "The being of objects" - get off your Heidegger and other obscurantists. The modes of substance are the waves of the ocean, and the substance is the ocean itself. Is the ocean the "being" (understood in an ACTIVE sense) of the waves? Yes, but this is an incredibly obscurantist way of putting it, because being is usually understood as a noun, and in this case it's also an activity. So the fact that "God is thought as nothing more than the being of objects or beings" is dead wrong.In any case, it seems to me that to think of God as substance or being is to objectify God. This is not to say that God is thus thought as an object or a being, but that He is thought as nothing more than the being of objects or beings. — John
*facepalm* - The waves of the ocean are illusory - only the ocean is real (and divine) vs the waves of the ocean are real (and divine). The former is acosmism; the latter is pantheism. Now how the fuck is Spinoza a pantheist if God is wholly immanent? You have no fucking clue what you're talking about.This idea that God is being (wholly immanent) is really, without the accompanying idea that God is also transcendent of being, nothing more than pantheism. — John
"The being of objects" - get off your Heidegger — Agustino
By substance I understand what is in itself and is conceived through itself" — Agustino
Get involved in philosophical discussions about knowledge, truth, language, consciousness, science, politics, religion, logic and mathematics, art, history, and lots more. No ads, no clutter, and very little agreement — just fascinating conversations.