Hegel may be hard to read, but he guides you through the dialectic himself, doesn't leave it to you. So if you take the time to follow him, you can understand by just reading. At least I found it to be so in my readings of him. — Agustino

If you understand something that isn't stated by an author then you have no way of knowing whether that understanding is truly a reading of or a reading into.

Also, until you have read, and can summarize the main points of both the Phenomenology and the Logic I would not believe that you have understood Hegel. This is a monumental task; I don't claim to have achieved it myself.

That's wrong. We do know what the activity is: self-definition. The activity is comprehended. Metaphysics for us (or anyone else for that matter). Your objection is based on the idea only presences in existence are anything to us. Spinoza's point is knowledge extends beyond merely the finite states we encounter in our everyday lives. It is both useful and beautiful; one understands meaning extends beyond existing states and the necessary truth.

Think about entities in the world. An entities can have significance for you only insofar as it is either useful, beautiful, or you can have a personal relationship with it. In the last case it is a person or at least an animal with some personality. — John

Ok, but why must I be engaged with it in a personal relationship in order for it to have significance to me?

But since we cannot say what that activity is it is not really an activity at all for us. — John

We can say what that activity is - it is the constitutive activity of everything around.

If you understand something that isn't stated by an author then you have no way of knowing whether that understanding is truly a reading of or a reading in. — John

It is stated, between the lines. That's what makes Spinoza's Ethics rich - that's how he designed the system. His geometrical method was chosen precisely because the objects of geometry are not things, but spatial relationships - likewise existence consists in relationships and movement - not in static things. Each element is built by its relationships with every other element - that's in fact what it consists in. Spinoza is teaching you a dialectical logic beneath the simplistic and naive mask on the surface. The geometric method is actually meant to illustrate relationships - it's the relationships between the propositions which matter most, not only their content. They all cling together.

Also, until you have read, and can summarize the main points of both the Phenomenology and the Logic I would not believe that you have understood Hegel. This is a monumental task; I don't claim to have achieved it myself. — John

What use would summarising be? Didn't Hegel himself say precisely that philosophy cannot just give its conclusions without working them out, because if they are so given, then they are false? In this he distinguished philosophy from mathematics - mathematics can say just the conclusion. If philosophy states just the conclusion, and neglects the process of getting there, then it has stated a falsehood, because it is the active process of getting there which is significant, and which actually confers truth on it. This is again something that cannot be stated in words - its an insight, just like Spinoza's Ethics.

First there is disagreement over what infinite means with regards to the attributes. Is it infinite in a quantitative sense or a qualitative sense? In addition to this, granting it is quantitative (I'm not sure about this myself, we spoke of it before, and I just argued based on the idea that it is quantitative, but this is questionable), since the attributes are necessarily parallel, as I've argued before, there is no new knowledge that can be gained by having access to a different attribute - it would be only seeing the same thing from a different perspective - nothing would be gained in terms of knowledge. — Agustino

Yes, I have thought this myself. But the way it is stated in the Ethics certainly makes it seem that Spinoza has a quantitative sense in mind. And I don't understand what you mean by saying that the attributes are "necessarily parallel". Unless you can describe exactly how they are parrallel that just seems like playing with words to me.

We might say we know that thought and extension are interdependent if it seems to us that there can be thought without extension and no extension without thought. But then if there is no thought without animals and humans and all animals and humans had not yet arisen or had become extinct, would we want to say there is no extension? Perhaps extension is not dependent on thought. Extension however cannot be totally annihilated it would seem, and so absent a transcendent realm where thought could be absent extension, it would seem that extension is primary and that thought is dependent on it, rather than the other way around.

Yes, I have thought this myself. But the way it is stated in the Ethics certainly makes it seem that Spinoza has a quantitative sense in mind. And I don't understand what you mean by saying that the attributes are "necessarily parallel". Unless you can describe exactly how they are parrallel that just seems like playing with words to me. — John

They are parallel by describing the same thing and being correlated in the same way - if I know serotonin is released in someone's brain, then I know they are feeling happy - there needs to be no corroboration, since the one just is the same thing seen one time from the attribute of thought, and another time from the attribute of extension.

But then if there is no thought without animals and humans — John

This is wrong, because Substance always has a thought attribute even if no one perceives it. It's not perception that causes things to be as they are. For example, a series of sound waves can be described by a musical score, even if there is no one to think this or write it. Indeed, humans could not be aware of thoughts, if thoughts weren't already inherent in Reality.

For Spinoza, thought is not existing experiences. It's logical meaning. Without experiencing entities, it is still around. Thought can be around without the extension of "minds." It's a necessary activity. Like extension, it cannot be annihilated. Take away one state of existence, it defines the presence of another. Stop using one logical truth, another is defined. One cannot find the world without thought. Neither are primary.

This is why the fact that existing experiences are extension is so important. If we misread them as thought, if we think logic cannot be without experience, we reduce the infinite of meaning and logic to our finite states of experience-- we are a reductionist who says there is no meaning beyond how we exist.

If all we can say about Substance is that it is self-defining; that it's definition is simply that it is self-defining; then that is really no definition at all, because we don't know what it could mean for something to define itself.

And it is not correct anyway, as I have already pointed out. the infinite is defined not "through itself", but negatively against the finite. Substance is defined, not though itself, but negatively against modes. The absolute is defined not through itself, but negatively against the relative. What we don't understand and cannot positively define is thus apophatically understood and defined in contrast to what we can understand and define; and not really "in itself" at all; except in a purely empty, formal sense.

If all we can say about Substance is that it is self-defining; that it's definition is simply that it is self-defining; then that is really no definition at all, because we don't know what it could mean for something to define itself. — John

Absent its relationships with all other elements from the system yes. But if you truncate the system, and take it apart in separate parts, that is a mistake. You must look at the Ethics as one WHOLE - the truth is in the whole, didn't Hegel use to say something like that? :P

That's what you are getting wrong: we do know what it means for something to define itself. Rather than "meaningless" because it doesn't specify a phenomena, it is significant metaphysical point. In it we know, for example, that it doesn't take something else to define the possible existence of anything. We know any state is defined on its own terms, rather than being dependent on some other state or being for its logical definition and potential to exist.

Ok, but why must I be engaged with it in a personal relationship in order for it to have significance to me? — Agustino

I said something must be useful, beautiful or personal to you in order to be significant. I could have added other categories like good, admirable, and probably come up with many more. But the point is that something must be something to you in order to be significant. What can an undifferentiated substance, or even a substance that is an activity you cannot understand be for you? You might say that substance is something for you because you can understand its modes; because you experience them. But you do not experience them as the activity of substance, you just think of them that way, even though you cannot really comprehend what it means. So, it is really the modes that mean something to you; substance can be left out of the picture altogether if it can be nothing for you in itself, independently of its modes.

All you have done in pretending that we know what self-defining means is to repeat in different words, that we know it defines itself. We define it as defining itself. Very illuminating!

Alas, I cannot pus an image in front of you that can do the work of your intuition or imagination.

What else would self-defintion be? Defining someone else? Not defining anything? Any answer other than: "it defines itself" produces a contradiction with self-defintion.

But I have read the Ethics, and Spinoza cannot explain how substance produces its attributes and modes. The whole thing has intuitive appeal for sure, except for the depersonalization of substance; well really the whole notion of substance; I think it is better thought as spirit. The danger even with Hegelianism is that spirit is objectified and identified as rationality.

But the whole point is that when we come to this absolute we have exceeded the limits of our comprehension; and are better to rely on our God-given faculties of imagination and intuition, of poetry, of mythos rather than trying to push logic beyond its limits into trying to determine the indeterminable; which is to say into absurdity and emptiness, into "pouring from the empty into the void", as Gurdjieff used to say.

So, it is really the modes that mean something to you; substance can be left out of the picture altogether if it can be nothing for you in itself, independently of its modes. — John

No-one said otherwise. We've never claimed to be Substance. If Substance matters to us, it is a state of our experience, it is a mode we care about. We can, indeed, leave it out of the picture. Anyone can get on with their life without understanding Substance, just as one can get one without understanding just about anything.

But this is no longer talking about Substance itself. Now we are talking bout us, how Substance matters or does not matter to us, the truth of what we think and feel at a given moment, rather than the truth of self-defintion.

But I have read the Ethics, and Spinoza cannot explain how substance produces its attributes and modes. — John

The point is there is no "how." Nothing creates God. Self-defintion. There is no "how" to understand. It would mean claiming God was defined by something other than itself.

The point is Willow, that we can coherently define things only in terms of other things. To say that something can only be defined in itself or through itself is really just to say that is is indefinable to us. It might be able to define itself in itself, but if it can then it is a personality. The finite can define itself only in terms of something other, and only finite personalities can do this. If it is a case of "in God's image" or "as above so below" then the infinite can define itself in terms of itself because for it there is no other, but then it must be, to compete the analogy, an infinite personality.

We can say that the infinite defines itself, but we have no idea what this could really mean. We do know, however, that it is an empty formulation if we think substance does not have its own infinite experience and self-reflection; that is if we do not think of substance as a personality.

Then why should we care about substance one way or another or spend any time thinking about it? As I have pointed out before the idea of substance as identity is obviously very useful, even indispensable to us in making sense of our experience. But that useful way of thinking substance is the Aristotelian way of thinking substance as multiple.

This is wrong, because Substance always has a thought attribute even if no one perceives it. — Agustino

I don't even know what that could mean unless it means that substance is infinite personalty.

Anyway, I am enjoying the book. I do find this a fascinating area of thought; and I am interested to see if Macherey can convince of something new about Spinoza's philosophy, so I thank you for mentioning the book and being a catalyst spurring me to take it from the shelf, where it had remained unread for far too long.

:)

I know that. It's that very point which is gravely mistaken.

It's just the opposite. There is no finite state which is defined in terms of another. Self-defintion is infinite. It can never not be expressed. Not in a computer, a car, a person, a film, a instance of happiness or a falling rock. Substance cannot be undone, stopped or limited at any point. Whatever the world does, Substance maintains, is expressed by the world, with any finite states that are present. All finite states express an infinite personality.

Each finite state, no matter how it is caused , no matter how it is symbolic or parasitic with others, is it's own. No finite state has the power to terminate or end Substance, such that it would on longer be true it was its own. At no point can we take one finite state and say it is defined by another.

It's just the opposite. There is no finite state which is defined in terms of another. — TheWillowOfDarkness

This is absolute nonsense, Willow; any finite entity is defined in terms of its attributes and relations to other entities. These definitions are formulated in terms of general categories involving similarities and differences.

All finite states expresses an infinite personality. — TheWillowOfDarkness

So the infinite is personal then? I doubt Spinoza will agree with this. Does God have infinite experience of His own, just as we have finite experience?

Aside from the metaphysical point itself, to understand self-defintion and avoid the metaphysical errors thinking otherwise produces, there is no reason. As always, one is only ever seeking an outcome itself. if metaphysical coherency or Substance doesn't matter, then there is no point in thinking about it. We don't gain anything but itself, just as it is for any goal. There's no point buying a car unless the point is to get a car. Writing a post is pointless unless you that itself is the goal. And so on and so on.

In terms of coherent metaphysics, this is why the Aristotelian way of thinking substance as multiple is a terrible. It has us thinking that, logically, actions are about achieving something other than themselves, about accessing something beyond what we end up knowing or doing.

So the infinite is personal then? I doubt Spinoza will agree with this. Does God have infinite experience of His own, just as we have finite experience? — John

Yes. The infinite is knowable. Anyone might understand Substance, might realise how thing as defined in-themselves. The question here is not whether God has infinite experience (in the sense you are asking that doesn't make sense, as God is not an entity of extension), but rather whether we, in our finite experiences, have experience of the infinite. That's what makes it personal to us.

We experience or comprehend the infinite. Our personal relationship is knowing the infinite, our finite intuiting of the infinite, of the necessary truth.

This is absolute nonsense, Willow; any finite entity is defined in terms of its attributes and relations to other entities. These definitions are formulated in terms of general categories involving similarities and differences. — John

That's what many of the metaphysical traditions say: your self is given by this other thing, by this idea, by this rule. Spinoza's point this gets it backwards. General categories come out of the self rather than creating the self.

The general of "tree," for example, is formed out of many individual selves, many objects expressing a similar meaning, rather than being a rule which forms existing trees. General categories are formed by the similarities and differences expressed by individual selves.

Aside from the metaphysical point itself, to understand self-defintion and avoid the metaphysical errors thinking otherwise produces, there is no reason. — TheWillowOfDarkness

But you're not understanding anything that is not purely tautologous; that self-definition is self-definition, in other words.

Sure, anything is defined as itself, but to say the finite is defined only through itself is really just to say it cannot be defined. To define is to make definite, and only the finite can be definite; to be definite is to be 'set within limits', and the infinite cannot be set within limits, so really it cannot be defined at all, unless we say that it is defined against what it is not; the finite. Its only limit consists in the self-evident fact that it is not the finite, and thus it is really an empty formulation that say it is defined in or through itself.

In terms of coherent metaphysics, this is why the Aristotelian way of thinking substance as multiple is a terrible. — TheWillowOfDarkness

This is completely wrong-headed as I see it, since it is only the understanding of substance as identity, which means substance as multiple, that is actually useful to us in understanding our experience.

The question here is not whether God has infinite experience (in the sense you are asking that doesn't make sense, as God is not an entity of extension), but rather whether we, in our finite experiences, have experience of the infinite. — TheWillowOfDarkness

It doesn't matter how we define our experience; whether we call it experience of the finite or of the infinite. We do not enjoy infinite experience, that is for sure. It might be said that our experience, insofar as it always exceeds what we are able to determine it to be, and is thus to that extent is indeterminable, is in-finite, but this is a matter of quality, not quantity.

Anyway as usual you didn't give a straight answer to the question. If there were no experiencers; which there were arguably not prior to the advent of any animal or human life; would God nonetheless have infinite experience? You say the question makes no sense, that it is logically possible that an entity without extension could have experience any more than it is logically possible that it could have existence. I say we just cannot conceive what that existence and experience could be is all, since we are finite creatures and our logic is necessarily a logic of finitude.

If God cannot exist or experience then God is literally nothing; and thus could be of absolutely no import to us.

For sure, and it's that point of tautology which most metaphysics doesn't understand. In the traditions of metaphysics, the necessity of self-defintion is usually treated as either incoherent or incomplete. Say, for example, that mind and body are independently defined and parallel, and you are accused of not explaining "how" either can possibly be. Idealism, reductionism and correlationism all deny the tautology of self-defintion. Logic significance on its own, without something else, without us, without a presence of God in terms of existence, is considered nonsensical. At every turn, the challenge: "But how God ?" is issued. God in-itself is rejected. In a sense, the correlationist metaphysical tradition is the hardest form of atheism there has ever been. For them, God must always be given in something else, in us, in some finite state, rather than just being its own thing. For the correlationist metaphysician, we actually have to bring God into being, to bring the presence of God by imagining it, else that infinite isn't there or is incoherent.

The point here is tautology is significant. It is not, as the correlationist metaphysicians would have us think, meaningless. It's it own positive significance. In understanding the tautology, we intuit or imagine the necessary meaning. I know, for example, that I am Willow and you are John, without becoming confused by metaphysic impossibilities, such that I am really John too (e.g. solipsism), that I'm not really Willow (e.g. evil trickster demons) or that there are really no such people as Willow or John (e.g. nihilism, the "hard problem" ).

If there were no experiencers; which there were arguably not prior to the advent of any animal or human life; would God nonetheless have infinite experience? You say the question makes no sense, that it is logically possible that an entity without extension could have experience any more than it is logically possible that it could have existence. I say we just cannot conceive what that existence and experience could be is all, since we are finite creatures and our logic is necessarily a logic of finitude. — John

In the sense God experiences (i.e. the infinite), for sure. God is not limited to knowing one or a few things in one distinct experience at time. God is infinite, all at once, without any pause or distinction. It, by definition, cannot be a distinction of existing experience.

You aren't wrong that one cannot conceive infinite experience as anything in particular. That's the point. To be infinite is to defy being anything in particular. We cannot conceive what this experience or existence would specifically because the nature of the infinite is to be beyond such limits. There is literally no infinite to know in those terms. Your objection there is a "mystery," that somehow a hidden limit or distinct within the infinite, is incoherent. The infinite doesn't do such limits.

In a sense, the correlationist metaphysical tradition is the hardest form of atheism there has ever been. For them, God must always be given in something else, in us, in some finite state, rather than just being its own thing. For the correlationist metaphysician, we actually have to bring God into being, to bring the presence of God by imagining it, else that infinite isn't there or is incoherent. — TheWillowOfDarkness

This scholar is like John, he sides with Kant. But even he, somehow underhandedly, understands that for Kant, God / or the noumenon is a DREAM, and has no reality. Thus he actually does read Kant as an atheist. This is inevitable because if the noumenon's existence is known phenomenally, then the noumenon must be phenomenal. Spinoza undermines this - the phenomenon is the dream, and the noumenon is real.

self-definition — John

Self-definition is the only way to escape foundationalism. Only if you presuppose foundationalism does self-definition become incoherent, for the mere reason that the two are mutually contradictory. However, this very fact illustrates the superiority of self-definition dialectically - from the system of thought which adopts foundationalism, its self-definition demands that it negates self-definition as incoherent - this is in fact part of its self-definition.

If there is a foundation, then everything has to be reduced to that foundation which is a brute fact (of course, then it becomes incoherent when you try to explain the foundation - it necessarily remains unexplainable, just like Kant's "presupposed noumenon" - it remains a dream). However, if there is no foundation - and all that exists are relationships - networks - then truth is rightly seen as self-defined by the network (and its sub-networks) themselves. Truth ceases to be correlationist in other words - and becomes a matter of coherence in the network, not a matter of correspondence, since there is nothing outside of the network for it to correspond with (no noumenon/phenomenon distinction). Truth becomes a function of the Whole, not of the part - indeed the part is seen as illusory, because it is actually constituted by the Whole - it's nothing but a relationship within the Whole (even Kant arrives at this - the phenomenon must be generated by the noumenon - that's why it presupposes it). The Whole is self-defined - defined by itself and its inner relationships (hence we do know the noumenon). There is nothing outside of it to define it - there is no foundation. All definition is immanent - hence self-definition. This heals the divide between thought and reality - thought is always already real. Again, all this starts making sense, when you become properly dialectical :P - that's why Spinoza's criticism of Hegel would be that Hegel simply wasn't dialectical enough. When you stop seeing the Whole as being formed of parts (Objective Logic for Hegel) and start seeing the Whole as being formed of relationships (Subjective Logic for Hegel - although this needs to be emptied from its reference to personality - Subjective Logic is merely a certain kind of Logic, where things are constituted by relationships - dialectically), then you have performed the gestalt shift.

To shed more light on this: truth empirically is in the necessary correspondence of the attribute of thought with the attribute of extension (extension always has meaning). Truth metaphysically is in the internal coherence of Substance itself. Thus Spinoza dialectically does justice to both correspondence theory of truth, and coherence theory of truth, and welds them into his system - the two theories end up mutually supporting and defining each other, and thus defining Substance. Hegel's triangular dialectical Subjective logic is here.

I said something must be useful, beautiful or personal to you in order to be significant. I could have added other categories like good, admirable, and probably come up with many more. But the point is that something must be something to you in order to be significant. What can an undifferentiated substance, or even a substance that is an activity you cannot understand be for you? You might say that substance is something for you because you can understand its modes; because you experience them. But you do not experience them as the activity of substance, you just think of them that way, even though you cannot really comprehend what it means. So, it is really the modes that mean something to you; substance can be left out of the picture altogether if it can be nothing for you in itself, independently of its modes. — John

But Substance is beautiful, admirable and loveable in and of itself. That is why the intellectual love of God is the highest man can aspire to, according to Spinoza. There is no case of Substance being "undifferentiated" - all difference is dialectically contained within it - aufhebung. Substance is a critical totality, critical in the Hegelian sense. Substance isn't something I cannot understand - indeed Substance is more like the light which makes both itself and the darkness intelligible. Substance is more myself than I am - it's the closest thing to me, it's the logically first idea vera, without it, I cannot know anything. So if I make use of it in all my acts of knowledge, in what sense is Substance "unknown"?

But I have read the Ethics, and Spinoza cannot explain how substance produces its attributes and modes. — John

Yes he does actually explain it. It's between the lines. You read Spinoza's propositions individually as standing and falling on their own - as things, which try to form a Whole, instead of reading it as a Whole which forms the things - that's why his meaning remains hidden from you. Substance does not produce its modes, because Substance is not prior to its modes. It's not like first there is Substance, then there are the modes - it's not a temporal succession between the two at all. Rather the modes and Substance are temporarily simultaneous - self-defining. Book I doesn't come prior to Book V for example - they are simultaneous. It seems to me that you are confused by the temporal reading of Spinoza - reading it mechanically, as if the elements introduced first, constitute the elements introduced later. This is wrong. The elements introduced later, constitute the elements introduced first in-as-much as the elements introduced first constitute the elements introduced later, and cannot be understood or indeed even conceived without each other - hence self-definition. Spinoza is the Cartesian devil dressed in Cartesian clothes - but he undoes Descartes's mechanical understanding of philosophy and mathematics from the inside. It's ironic - he shows this mechanical understanding to be precisely what is false in philosophy and mathematics - indeed it shows itself to be false, hence why the Ethics is a dialectical text. Indeed I would go as far as saying that I think it to be the highest achievement of philosophy - an achievement which has still, in fact, not been realised, and I don't know if it will ever be realised. Spinoza is still far ahead compared to our current world, despite the tremendous advances we've made since Descartes's time.

Spinoza in fact used this false reading as a way to let people dismiss his philosophy as incoherent very easily - to avoid the charge of heresy, which he still didn't avoid ultimately - and because he understood that the masses of people are too entangled by biases and preconceived notions to reach up to it. But beneath it lies the Spinozist irony. The naivety that some read into him, is their own reflection. Spinoza's Ethics is one of the few texts which acts as a mirror - the DaoDeJing is similar in these regards - in that if one approaches it with a bias, they will find their bias confirmed in it. The more a biased person looks in the mirror of the Ethics, the more they see themselves reflected back unto themselves. But the more one removes bias from oneself, the more one becomes like a mirror staring into another mirror, and thus having a glimpse of the infinite in themselves - in-so-far as they do that, they reach true freedom, and see know themselves as eternal - as Spinoza aptly puts it in the last book of his Ethics.

But Substance is beautiful, admirable and loveable in and of itself. — Agustino

Substance is literally nothing except its modes. Why should I love nothing? In accordance with Spinoza's philosophy, God's experience is nothing without experiencing beings; necessarily fragmented into all the individual experiences, because there is no experience that unifies them unless God is an experiencing being. How would you conceive that all those individual experience could be unified into one in God if God is not thought as a divine person?

Yes he does actually explain it. It's between the lines. — Agustino

You can say whatever you like is between the lines. Why would I be motivated to believe it? I go only by what I find in the text, and I assess that.

You can say whatever you like is between the lines. — John

No I don't think you can. You have to look for it, you can't pull it out of your ass :P

Substance is literally nothing except its modes. — John

This is just false. The modes are things, Substance is an activity.

Why should I love nothing? — John

Strawman

How would you conceive that all those individual experience could be unified into one in God if God is not thought as a divine person? — John

Why do you think all these experiences should be unified into one? :s I don't even know what you mean by that. They are - in truth - one experience, which necessarily sees itself from an infinite number of viewpoints.

The dreaming is nothing except the dream. The water draining, is nothing except the vortex. Etc. etc. it makes no sense what you're trying to say. You can't conceive the modes without Substance. The modes without Substance - without the constituting activity - are nothing. And Substance without the modes can't be conceived of either, because there can be no activity that doesn't have a product, a manifestation. But the activity isn't the manifestation.

They are - in truth - one experience, which necessarily sees itself from an infinite number of viewpoints. — Agustino

Yes, and there is no experience beyond all the many experiences of individuals. These experiences and the individuals are what Spinoza refers to as 'modes'. They are activity itself, they are not "things", first and foremost. The identity of things is the very notion of substance. That which remains changeless through all the modal changes. But that formal notion of identity or substance is nothing to us beyond its usefulness in enabling us to make experience intelligible. Even non-sentient hings have such formal identities, and these non-sentient things are some of most substance like (in the sense of changeless) entities, things such as stones, mountains, grains of sand.

You bring to the table a preconceived notion of Substance which isn't Spinoza's but rather your own, which is heavily shaped by your readings of Hegel. That's unfair to Spinoza since you aren't judging him on his terms. You are just refusing to read Substance dialectically as it is meant to be read as evidence from the whole system, even from its structure.

Furthermore - experience is always from a point of view - a point of view always implies partiality, but God - being the Whole - can't have any partiality, and hence has no point of view, and it would indeed be incoherent for God to have one, for then God would be particular and empirical...