Spinoza: Intuition

Genevieve Lloyd’s Spinoza is quite a different thinker from the arch rationalist caricature of some undergraduate philosophy courses devoted to “The Continental Rationalists”. Lloyd’s Spinoza does not see reason as a complete source of knowledge, nor is deductive rational thought productive of the highest grade of knowledge. Instead, that honour goes to a third kind of knowledge—intuitive knowledge (scientia intuitiva), which provides an immediate, non-discursive knowledge of its singular object. To the embarrassment of some hard-nosed philosophers, intellectual intuition has an (...) affective component; it is a form of love, and ultimately given that human beings are finite modes of God/Nature (Deus sive Natura), it is a form of the intellectual love of God (amor Dei intellectualis). Some philosophers do not know what to make of this mysterious aspect of Spinoza’s philosophy, which is nonetheless firmly anchored in a reading of Part V of the Ethics. Nonetheless, this note will insist with Lloyd’s “Reconsidering Spinoza’s Rationalism” that such doctrine is an integral part of Spinoza’s philosophy. Moreover, it will be shown that Spinoza is well aware of the limitations of reason (ratio) in gaining scientific knowledge of the world and requires intuition precisely because of the inability of reason to represent individuals in their full particularity. Imagination too has a role to play in shaping scientific knowledge, although reason performs a vital critical role in disciplining and liberating the human mind from inadequate imaginary ideas. The result is an interpretation of Spinoza’s epistemology as both rationalist and intuitionist. DOI: 10.1080/24740500.2021.1962652. (shrink)

The study deals with the matter of three of the most puzzling doctrines of Baruch Spinoza's system, the so-called 'final doctrines', which are intuitive knowledge, intellectual love of God, and the eternity of the (human) mind. Contrary to many commentators, but also in concordance with many others, this account strives to affirm the utmost importance of these doctrines to Spinoza's system as a whole, but mostly to his ethical theory. Focusing specifically on the cultivation of the human mind, the paper (...) offers partial analyses of the central notions of these doctrines and their conceptual contexts. It is argued that the cultivation of the human mind, i.e., its determination to its perfect activity, should be considered as Spinoza's ultimate ethical goal, and that the mind truly only advances to this goal by means of these cognitive, affective, and intellectual transformations of thinking. (shrink)

**For my more recent views of the third kind of cognition, see my "Finding Oneself in God"** -/- Abstract: Cognition of the third kind, or scientia intuitiva, is supposed to secure beatitudo, or virtue itself (E5p42). But what is scientia intuitiva, and how is it different from (and superior to) reason? I suggest a new answer to this old and vexing question at the core of Spinoza’s project in the Ethics. On my view, Spinoza’s scientia intuitiva resembles Descartes’s scientia more (...) than has been appreciated. Although Spinoza’s God is not Descartes’s benevolent, transcendent God, Spinoza agrees with Descartes that the highest certainty requires that a cognizer correctly conceive of God and her causal relation to God; it is only with cognition of the third kind that a cognizer can be certain that her adequate (that is, clear and distinct) representations of extramental things agree with formally real, extramental ideata, and so are true. If this is right, a reading of Spinoza that has dominated scholarship since the Ethics’ publication is misguided: for Spinoza, it is not always the case that having (and recognizing that one has) a clear and distinct idea is sufficient for knowing that that idea is true. I end the chapter by suggesting why scientia is intuitive for Spinoza: Spinoza attempts to avoid Cartesian-Circle-style circularity by insisting that a cognizer must intuit the correct representation of God and God’s relation to things. (shrink)

While both intuitive knowledge and reason are adequate ways of knowing for Spinoza, they are not equal. Intuitive knowledge, which Spinoza describes as the ‘greatest virtue of mind’, is superior to reason. The nature of this superiority has been the subject of some controversy due to Spinoza's notoriously parsimonious treatment of the distinction between reason and intuitive knowledge in the Ethics. In this paper, I argue that intuitive knowledge differs from reason not only in terms of its method of cognition—but (...) also in terms of its content. More specifically, I maintain that there is something that is known by intuition, namely the unique essences of things, that is not known by reason. My argument is supported by an examination of Spinoza's account of essences in the Ethics, which reveals that he is committed to both unique and shared essences. Based on this dual commitment, I argue that whereas for Spinoza both reason and intuition can be said to reach adequate knowledge of the shared essence of a thing, the unique essence of a singular thing, which is nothing but its actual essence, can only be known through intuitive knowledge. (shrink)

In this paper we examine the idea of beatitudo in Duns Scotus. We begin with the Quaestiones super libros metaphysicorum, where the Doctor Subtilis presents a conception of the act of intellective knowledge through the natural meaning of beatitude. Taking up the famous incipit of the Metaphysics, Duns Scotus develops the idea of a maximum desiderium and a maxima scientia as a way of human and natural perfection. In conceiving this desiderium naturale as form of ultimate realization, he sees it (...) as similar to the knowledge of immaterial substances in statu viae. His definition of beatitudo also disagrees with the Thomist doctrine, developing it a priori as a cognitio intuitiva, making it possible for humans to achieve happiness in statu viae. In contrast, in Ordinatio IV, dist. 49, Scotus emphasizes the value of beatitude in its ethical and theological sense, taking recourse to the Augustinian and Boethian definitions in order to understand its nature as the full expression of the intellective, volitional a... (shrink)

This chapter investigates Spinoza's conception of reason, focusing on (i) the difference between reason and the imagination, and (ii) the difference between reason and intuitive knowledge. The central interpretive debate this chapter considers is about the scope of rational cognition. Some commentators have argued that it is only possible to have rational cognition of properties that are universally shared, whereas intuitive knowledge may grasp the essences of particular individuals. Another prominent interpretation is that reason differs from intuition only in virtue (...) of its form or manner of apprehension, and not in virtue of the content or ideas it apprehends. However, authors on both sides of the debate have held that reason is incapable of grasping singular things. After summarizing the debate, this chapter presents an argument that Spinozan reason is not blind to particulars: it is (at least sometimes) capable of grasping the causal structure that characterizes an individual. (shrink)

Spinoza unequivocally states in the Ethics that intuitive knowledge is more powerful than reason. Nonetheless, it is not clear what exactly this greater power promises in the face of the passions. Does this mean that intuitive knowledge is not liable to akrasia? Ronald Sandler offers what, to my knowledge, is the only explicit answer to this question in recent Spinoza scholarship. According to Sandler, intuitive knowledge, unlike reason, is not susceptible to akrasia. This is because, intuitive knowledge enables the knower (...) to greater power over the passions due to its immediacy, its foundation and because it engenders the boundlessly powerful intellectual love of God. In this paper, I consider to what extent intuitive knowledge is liable to akrasia by exploring whether Sandler's claim can justifiably be attributed to Spinoza. I argue that, given our modal status, it is not plausible to claim that akrasia would never apply to intuitive knowledge. Since intuitive ideas are the ideas of a finite .. (shrink)

I am not going to solve in this paper the plethora of problems and riddles surrounding Spinoza’s scientia intuitiva, but I do hope to break some new ground and help make this key doctrine more readily understandable. I will proceed in the following order (keep in mind the word ‘proceed’). I will first provide a close preliminary analysis of the content and development of Spinoza’s discussion of scientia intuitiva in the Treatise on the Emendation of the Intellect and the Ethics. (...) In the second part, I will address two closely related questions which have drawn the attention of many readers: (i) Is scientia intuitiva a cognition that is inferential? and (ii) Is scientia intuitiva a kind of cognition that is closely tied to causation? To the surprise of many, I will argue that Spinoza’s intuitive knowledge is both inferential and causal (in a certain rigid sense of ‘inferential’ and ‘causal’ to be explained below). In the third and final part, I will explain Spinoza’s preference for scientia intuitiva and his frequent use of mathematical examples, and then attempt to map the major remaining questions and problems surrounding the doctrine. (shrink)

This paper argues that Spinoza's main political writings are concerned, in part, with knowledge of essences as detailed in the Ethics. It is further argued that knowledge of the essences of states, and essential properties that belong to states, may be an example of the elusive scientia intuitiva or third kind of knowledge. The paper concludes by considering Spinoza's goals in his political writings and the importance of metaphysics and the theory of knowledge more broadly for early modern political philosophers.

In this paper, I consider Schelling’s early understanding of intellectual intuition. I argue that although the common interpretation of intellectual intuition traces it back to Fichte’s enumerations in the First Introduction to the Wissenschaftslehre of 1797, an examination of the early Schelling reveals that he was employing the term well before Fichte (already in 1795) and in a way that is decisively distinct from Fichte. Thus, I disagree with well-known Schelling scholars, including Xavier Tilliette, who regard the early Schelling as (...) a mere disciple of Fichte. In contrast, I argue that the more influential thinker in Schelling’s earliest development, especially with regard to intellectual intuition, is Spinoza. I illustrate through close textual analysis of Schelling’s Vom Ich als Prinzip der Philosophie (1795), that Schelling is employing a conception of intellectual intuition that mirrors Spinoza’s third kind of knowledge. I emphasize, however, that in spite of Schelling’s proximity to Spinoza, he retains a certain distance—one which he repeatedly emphasizes. I consider and provide an explanation of why Schelling continues to distinguish himself from Spinoza, in spite of the clear similarities in their understanding of knowledge and in their conception of the absolute as causa sui. (shrink)

Although Spinoza’s words about intuition, also called “the third kind of knowledge,” remain among the most difficult to grasp, I argue that he succeeds in providing an account of its distinctive character. Moreover, the special place that intuition holds in Spinoza’s philosophy is grounded not in its epistemological distinctiveness, but in its ethical promise. I will not go as far as one commentator to claim that the epistemological distinction is negligible (Malinowski-Charles 2003),but I do argue that its privileged place in (...) Spinoza’s system belongs primarily to its ethical importance, by which I mean that intuition’s value is prized by virtue of the agency it confers upon those who enjoy it. Spinoza often notes that what distinguishes the “wise man” is that he is more powerful, able to do more. That is,the wise and free person with whose description the Ethics culminates is set apart not, first and foremost, by virtue of possessing a scientific account of the true cosmological order. The Ethics is perhaps called an ethics, rather than a treatise on metaphysics or knowledge, because it concludes with a demonstration of how one comes to be able to do what is best and to live a more joyful life. Intuitive science is essential to the characterization of the power to think and live well. (shrink)

In this dissertation, I explore the distinction between reason (ratio) and intuitive knowledge (scientia intuitiva) in Spinoza’s Ethics in order to explain the superior affective power of the latter over the former. In addressing this fundamental but relatively unexplored issue in Spinoza scholarship, I suggest that these two kinds of adequate knowledge differ not only in terms of their method, but also with respect to their content. I hold that unlike reason, which is a universal knowledge, intuitive knowledge descends to (...) a level of particularity, including the adequate knowledge of one’s own essence as it follows directly from God, which is a superior form of self-knowledge. Since, for Spinoza, there is an intrinsic relationship between the pursuit of knowledge and how we live our lives, my interpretation of these two ways of knowing is that they are at the same time two ways of living. (shrink)

In Spinoza, what I call the ‘Being Individual Multiple’ is the multitudo. Its form of life is Democracy, understood as the autonomous and conflictual organization of collective dynamics and not one form of government among others. Combining an original mode of argumentation with a critical discussion of opposing interpretations, I maintain that democracy is the translation into politics of the third and highest kind of knowledge in Spinoza, intuitive science. I argue moreover that the multitudo self-organized in a democracy has (...) the capacity to experiment and express a different rationality with respect to the singular individual. Wisdom and democracy thus converge to give life to something unknown and original in western political modernity. (shrink)

This monograph aims to explicate Schleiermacher's early theory of religion in relation to his reception of Spinoza.

On peut trouver dans l’œuvre de Lévy-Bruhl des traces de la présence de Spinoza, en particulier de sa conception de la connaissance du troisième genre, ou « science intuitive ». Il apparaît que Lévy-Bruhl a travaillé à une « new science of metaphysics », aussi bien dans ses œuvres d’histoire de la philosophie que dans ses ouvrages ethnologiques.One may find in Lévy-Bruhl’s works traces of Spinoza’s presence, in particular of his conception of « knowledge of the third kind », i.e. (...) « intuitive science ». It thus appears that Lévy-Bruhl worked on a « new science of metaphysics » both in his historical researches and in his ethnological works. (shrink)

(2005). Intuitus and Ratio in Spinoza's Ethical Thought. British Journal for the History of Philosophy: Vol. 13, No. 1, pp. 73-90. doi: 10.1080/0960878042000317591.

La notion d’habitude est-elle amenée à jouer un rôle dans l’éthique spinoziste? Une première réponse à cette question doit être négative, si l’on considère que le concept et les formules servant à l’exprimer ne sont pas théorisées directement dans les textes et servent généralement à désigner les coutumes ou les traits constants entre les hommes, ce qui est un sens différent de celui qui nous intéresse spécifiquement ici. Pourtant, la question mérite assurément d’être posée, et ce dans l’optique d’une interrogation (...) sur le caractère réalisable ou non du projet éthique de Spinoza. Nulle philosophie morale n’échappe en effet à l’épineux problème de l’origine de la vertu, car celle-ci doit bien être possédée, ou du moins être accessible, pour que ce type de philosophie à visée pratique ait du sens. N’est-ce pas à la lumière de cette interrogation sur ce qui permet concrètement de passer à une vie bonne qu’il faut lire la proposition 20 de la quatrième partie de l’Éthique? Celle-ci affirme. (shrink)

Laetitia in Spinoza has a twofold meaning: on the one hand is a passion, then is a product of inadecuates ideas and is associated with the first kind of knowledge (Imaginatio); on the other hand is expression of the Conatus and is an active affect (Fortitudo) connected with the third kind of knowledge (Scientia intuitiva). This second meaning confront us to a happines no human, frozen, abyssal which prefigure thinkers as Nietzsche, Bataille or lanchot.

This paper explores Schelling's life-long fascination with Spinoza. Through moments of ambivalence and enthusiasm, one aspect of the latter's thought remains central for Schelling: the intellectual intuition of God/Nature. While he consistently emphasizes the non-objectifiable nature of the intuition (as constituting the ground of freedom), the influence of Spinoza is still apparent in what Schelling calls the Ullvordellklichkeit des Seills. Freedom is a response to an ungroundable necessity that consciousness lives out of, but behind which it can never penetrate. This (...) insight provokes a reading of Spinoza that departs from the conventional rationalist interpretation and gestures to an a-theological, yet mystical, understanding, which awakens a feeling not only for the sublime in nature, but for the sublime that lies at "the heart of what is." In the ensuing silence of the self, substance reveals itself as living spirit. Through this interpretation, the Neoplatonic truth of Spinoza becomes visible. (shrink)

(1999). Salvation as a state of mind: The place of acquiescentia in spinoza's ethics. British Journal for the History of Philosophy: Vol. 7, No. 3, pp. 447-473. doi: 10.1080/09608789908571039.

460 JOURNAL OF THE HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY 34:3 JULY 1996 Graeme Hunter, editor. Spinoza: The Enduring Questions. Toronto: University of To- ronto Press, 1994. Pp. xi + 182. Cloth, $70.00. This volume of eight essays is dedicated to the memory of the late David Savan, and originated from a conference held in his honor prior to his untimely death. The lead essay is by Savan himself, and most of the other essays acknowledge the influence of his work. The first three (...) essays address not only an "enduring question," but a question about enduring: namely, the nature of eternality and immortality in Spinoza's metaphysics. In a dense and detailed essay that amply rewards close analysis, Savan aims to clarify Spinoza's conception of eternity. That conception, Savan argues, cannot be identified with any of the three main conceptions dominant in previous philosophizing: eternity as sempiternity; eternity as Platonic timelessness; and eternity as neces- sary existence, following from a thing's own essence. Chief among his.. (shrink)

I argue that Spinoza’s concept of “intuitive knowledge” is rooted in his notion of experienced unity. Following an analysis of this notion of unity, and its general application to human emotional life, I provide an analysis of intuitive knowledge designed to integrate Spinoza’s notion of “Iiberation” with his theory of emotions. Two shorter sections are provide which deal with the Spinozistic concept of love, and the fact-value distinction within a Spinozistic framework.

I argue that Spinoza’s concept of “intuitive knowledge” is rooted in his notion of experienced unity. Following an analysis of this notion of unity, and its general application to human emotional life, I provide an analysis of intuitive knowledge designed to integrate Spinoza’s notion of “Iiberation” with his theory of emotions. Two shorter sections are provide which deal with the Spinozistic concept of love, and the fact-value distinction within a Spinozistic framework.

This paper is a discussion of which kinds of knowledge Spinoza himself employs in developing the system of the Ethics. The problem is raised by Professor D. Savan and further discussed by G. H. R. Parkinson. The thesis is (1) that no occurrence of the first kind of knowledge is to be found in the Ethics (against Parkinson), (2) that the main part of the analysis in the Ethics is conducted on the level of the second kind of knowledge (in (...) agreement with Parkinson), and (3) that the third kind of knowledge occurs frequently and plays a most important role in the Ethics (in part against Parkinson). The relation between knowledge and language, the distinction between two types of imagination, or two ways of imagining things, the translation of knowledge of modes of extension into knowledge of the mind, and the relation between the second and third kind of knowledge are main parts of the argument. The third kind of knowledge derives its significance in the Ethics from the definitions and axioms, particularly in Part 1. These definitions and axioms form the basis of the whole system of the Ethics, and at least some of them, it is suggested, belong to the third kind of knowledge. (shrink)

On se propose d’apporter la preuve que le concept d’intuition n’est pas essentiellement étranger au spinozisme mais qu’il s’y rattache très étroitement. Il subit drvers changements depuis l’interprétation irrationnelle, subjective et mystique du Court Traité jusqu’à l’interprétation objective et scientifique de Y Éthique. Sous sa forme finale, Spinoza conçoit la scientia intuitiva comme un organe de la recherche empirique.