2010 South Central Seminar in Early Modern Philosophy Abstracts

Yitzhak Melamed, Johns Hopkins University
“Causa Efficiens: Spinoza’s Monster Cause” melamed photo

One of the main characteristics of early modern philosophy is the emergence of strictly mechanistic explanations. In this paper I point out and explore the central role Spinoza assigns to the efficient cause. In the first part of the paper I argue that when Spinoza mentions causes in the Ethics, he almost always refers to efficient causes. I will particularly argue against a recent view (mainly developed by French scholars) according to which Spinoza’s causa sui must be a formal, rather than an efficient, cause. In the second part I show how Spinoza reduces each of the remaining three Aristotelian causes to the efficient cause. In the third and final part I point out that in order to allow the efficient cause to fill the roles of the three other Aristotelian causes, Spinoza had to expand the traditional understanding of the efficient cause.

Anat Schechtman (Yale University)
"Moving Beyond the Cogito: Descartes’ Argument for the Idea of an Infinite Being schechtman photo

The Third Meditation argument for God's existence relies on the premise that the meditator has an idea of God, an infinite being. Descartes is customarily interpreted as simply allowing the meditator to help himself to this premise at the outset of the argument. As Bernard Williams has suggested, Descartes presumes that the presence of this idea "requires no proof." On this interpretation, Descartes is taken to hold that certain aspects of the mind and its ideas are transparent or self-evident, and therefore it is transparent or self-evident to the meditator that he has an idea of an infinite being. Since many scholars (e.g. L.J. Beck, Williams, Edwin Curley, Margaret Wilson) deem this transparency thesis problematic, they tend to find the indicated premise, and hence the entire argument for God's existence, suspect at best. This paper offers a more favorable interpretation that aims to articulate, in a systematic manner, Descartes' (and the meditator's) justification for this premise.
    The interpretation is developed in two stages. First, I argue that it is not transparent or self-evident to the meditator that he possesses the requisite idea of an infinite being. Granted, it may be self-evident to him at the outset of the proof that he possesses some [aliqui] idea of an infinite being (as reported at AT VII 40/CSM II 28; cf. AT VII 24/CSM II 16). However, it is not self-evident that this idea has maximal objective reality, as the argument for God's existence requires. For at the outset of the argument the meditator might harbor mistaken beliefs that imply that his idea possesses less objective reality than it in fact has. Presumably, the meditator must avert such mistakes before he can justifiably hold himself to have the idea the argument requires.
    Next, I propose that the meditator accomplishes this by considering his idea in relation to other ideas he possesses at this point. In particular, the meditator clearly and distinctly understands that his idea of a finite being depends on his idea of an infinite being, and hence that he could not have an idea of a finite being unless he had an idea of an infinite being, an idea with maximal objective reality (AT VII 46/CSM II 31; cf. AT V 356/CSMK 377). I suggest that this dependence is ontological (viz., the dependent entity exists in virtue of the entity upon which it depends), and is comparable to the dependence of a mode on its substance. Once the meditator realizes that this dependence relation holds he can proceed with the argument. Since he evidently possesses an idea of a finite being--namely, his idea of himself as a finite, thinking ego--he can justifiably hold himself to have the idea of an infinite being, with maximal objective reality, on which the former idea depends.
    The paper concludes with some potential implications of this interpretation for our understanding of Descartes' method, including a comparison with Broughton's broadly transcendental reading of the Meditations.

Geoff Gorham, Macalester College (Minnesota)
“Hobbes’s Corporeal God: A Defense” gorham photo

    Hobbes explicitly and repeatedly affirmed that God is material: "a most pure, simple invisible spirit corporeal" (EW 4 313). But in the perennial debate about the sincerity of Hobbes's theism, both sides have generally dismissed his Corporeal God (CG) as inconsistent with his concept of body or with his concept of God [e.g., Douglas Jesseph, "Hobbes's Atheism," Midwest Studies in Philosophy 26 (2002), 140-66]. I defend CG, but not to shore up the case for a theist Hobbes: CG is not God in any standard sense. Nevertheless, I argue that CG serves a function in Hobbes's system similar to the Gods of his contemporaries Descartes and More--as a foundation for his natural people.
    First, I absolve CG of four alleged incoherencies. The first two concern corporeal nature: (i) CG cannot be a body since Hobbesian bodies are bounded and finite; (ii) CG cannot have a place since Hobbesian space is a function of the imagination. The first problem ignores Hobbes's distinction between determinate and indeterminate magnitude. The second ignores his distinction between imaginary and real space. The third and fourth alleged incoherencies concern divine nature: (iii) CG cannot be God since Hobbes says God has no parts; (iv) CG cannot be God since Hobbes says God has no dimensions. Hobbes avoids the third problem by allowing CG to have parts that are merely conceptually distinct. He avoids the fourth problem by allowing GG to have dimensions but not figure.
    Next, I explain the relation between CG and finite, determinate bodies. In the Answer to Bramhall Hobbes relies on an elaborate analogy whereby CG intersperses with ordinary matter in the way we perceive "mineral water" combines with "river water": "changing it everywhere to the sense" while retaining its own homogenous and invisible essence. Given the power of such "liquors," "can it then be doubted that God, who is infinitely fine spirit, and withal intelligent, can make and change all species and kinds of bodies as he pleases?" (EW 4 310). On this model, CG plays several important roles in the foundation of Hobbes's physics. In De Corpore Hobbes remarked that Aristotelian prime matter was useful in accounting for radical change in bodies, e.g. from water to ice (DeC 8, 24; EW 1 118). CG plays a corresponding role in his own system, producing change by a sort of chemical transformation, as the mineral water changes the river into "milk." CG also solves a problem at the cosmological scale. All causal interaction is by the immediate transfer of motion (conatus) between contiguous bodies (DeC 2, 8, 7; EW 1 116). Such transfer typically involves a net loss of conatus because ordinary bodies resist one another (DeC 3, 15, 7; EW 1 216). Since bodies do not move themselves, it follows that the total conatus in a finite world will diminish over time. Since CG's own conatus does not diminish because propagated through an "infinitely fine spirit" lacking resistance, CG provides an unfailing source of motion to finite bodies.
    Finally, I compare CG with the Gods of Descartes and More, which are incorporeal, but serve similar purposes and face similar difficulties. However shocking to Hobbes's opponents, CG is not out of place among the pantheon of seventeenth-century "physico-theologies."

Al Martinich, University of Texas, Austin
“Authorization and Representation in Hobbes’s Leviathan” martinich photo

    In Leviathan, Hobbes holds that prospective subjects authorize a sovereign to represent them. Authorization typically involves alienating some rights to the sovereign; and representatives are "artificial" persons. While this view sounds straightforward, the exact nature of authorization, representation, and personhood and their relations to each other has been greatly debated. I will argue first, that Hobbes’s best account of the origin of sovereignty (by institution) is the one given in chapter 21 of Leviathan, according to which authorization of the sovereign does not itself involve any alienation of rights; the second is to show that according to his explicit account of “person” in Leviathan, nonnatural persons are representatives, not the things represented; and third, that the primary political relation of representation is between the sovereign, who is an artificial person, and each individual subject. These three goals explicate Hobbes’s distinctive view of the relation between authorization and representation.

Matt Kisner, University of South Carolina
“Spinoza on the Possibility of Adequate Ideas: A Solution to the Wild-Goose-Chase Problem” kisner photo

    Eminent Spinoza scholars, such as Michael Della Rocca (Representation and the Mind-Body Problem in Spinoza, 183) and Steven Nadler (Spinoza's Ethics, 165), have argued that, for Spinoza, it is impossible for humans to have adequate ideas. Although Spinoza claims that we can have adequate ideas (2p38, 2p47), these commentators argue that he is not entitled to this claim, since it is inconsistent with his broader commitments. This conclusion is potentially problematic, since Spinoza's ethics revolves around the notion that we attain freedom, happiness and our highest good through rationality, that is, adequate ideas. If we cannot have such ideas, then Spinoza's ethics appears to be an exercise in futility, directing us to unattainable ends and providing guidance that cannot be put into practice; call this "the wild-goose-chase problem." This paper motivates the problem and offers a solution.
    The paper motivates the problem by explaining how Spinoza rules out the possibility of humans having adequate ideas. Della Rocca defends this claim on the grounds that adequate ideas represent their objects' causal antecedents, which, in the case of finite modes, are an infinite chain of causes. Since we are finite beings, our ideas cannot represent this chain and, thus, cannot be adequate. Eugene Marshall ("Adequacy and Innateness in Spinoza," 167) responds that this argument only rules out having adequate ideas of finite modes, while allowing for the possibility that humans can have adequate ideas of attributes and God's essence, as Spinoza claims. The first part of the paper offers a further argument in support of Della Rocca's claim, one that avoids Marshall's objection. In short, the argument is based on the claim that having an adequate idea, for Spinoza, is equivalent to being the adequate cause of one's own idea. Since humans cannot be an adequate cause of anything, as Spinoza admits (4p4), the argument concludes that we cannot have adequate ideas. Consequently, it appears that we cannot attain the goal of Spinoza's ethics.
    The second part of the paper offers a solution to the wild goose chase problem. The solution takes its cue from Spinoza's theory of freedom. Since Spinoza defines freedom as being the sole cause of oneself, being free is equivalent to being an adequate cause of oneself, which, at the mental level, is equivalent to being an adequate cause of one's own ideas, that is, having adequate ideas. Consequently, we can look to Spinoza's view on the possibility of freedom to explain the possibility of having adequate ideas. Drawing on a passage where Spinoza distinguishes absolute and human freedom (TP 2, 7), I argue that we should also distinguish absolute and human adequate ideas, which is supported by a close reading of Spinoza's claims about them. According to this distinction, we cannot have adequate ideas in the absolute sense, though we can have a weaker kind of human adequate ideas. This reading explains how Spinoza is entitled to claim, without contradiction, that we can have adequate ideas. It follows that there is no wild goose chase problem, since Spinoza's ethics directs us to a kind of adequate idea that is attainable by humans.

Eric Stencil, University of Wisconsin
“Arnauld and the Doctrine of the Creation of Eternal Truths (1642-48)” stencil photo

    In recent years, the Cartesian philosopher Antoine Arnauld (1612-1694) has started to receive some much-deserved scholarly attention. One question in particular which has garnered a lot of interest is whether Arnauld followed Descartes in embracing the Doctrine of the Creation of the Eternal Truths (the Creation Doctrine). While Arnauld never explicitly offers his view, there is a vast array of interpretations of Arnauld on this issue. The standard interpretation (held, e.g., by Henri Gouhier, Emmanuel Faye, and Elmar Kremer) is that he rejected the Creation Doctrine. Denis Moreau and Steven Nadler have recently offered strong arguments that Arnauld held the Creation Doctrine. Finally, other scholars (e.g., Tad Schmaltz and Vincent Carraud) have argued that Arnauld did not have a considered opinion one way or another, or at least, that the texts do not provide us with an answer.
    One noteworthy feature of the debate about whether Arnauld endorsed the Creation Doctrine is that, with the exception of Faye's argument, all accounts that argue that Arnauld denied the Creation Doctrine focus on Arnauld's early writings from the 1640's (e.g., The Fourth Objections), while those that argue that Arnauld held the Creation Doctrine focus on Arnauld's later work from the 1680's (e.g., his correspondences with Leibniz and Malebranche). This suggests the interpretative possibility that Arnauld changed his position sometime during his life.
    In this paper I focus on the texts from the 1640's and argue that by 1648 Arnauld held the Creation Doctrine. Specifically, I examine the development of Arnauld's view through four texts: the Philosophical Conclusions (1641), Fourth Objections (1641), Quod Est Nomen Dei? (1647), and the New Objections to Descartes' Meditations (1648). I begin by considering the Fourth Objections, as it is the most often cited work in interpretations of Arnauld as denying the Creation Doctrine. I argue that, while there is no indication in this text that Arnauld held the Creation Doctrine, the interpretations of Ndiaye and Kremer are overstated. I continue to examine the other texts from this period and argue that by 1648, Arnauld held the Creation Doctrine. I defend this thesis in two steps. First, I argue that there is a clear shift in Arnauld's views about God between the Fourth Objections on one hand and Quod Est Nomen Dei? and the New Objections on the other. Second, I argue that in these texts one can see Arnauld's two main motivations for the Creation Doctrine already in place: reconciling Cartesianism (e.g., a Cartesian conception of matter) with God's omnipotence and a strong commitment to the Doctrine of Equivocity and the Principle of Divine Incomprehensibility.

Julie Walsh, University of California, San Diego
“Locke’s Last Word on Freedom: The Correspondence with Limborch” walsh photo

    Philippus van Limborch pressed Locke for two years about the tension between two views defended in Locke's Essay Concerning Human Understanding: volitional intentionality and the doctrine of suspension. To hold that volitions are intentional - which means that they require an object and that something must motivate the desire of the object - is to deny blind agency. On Locke's account, the will is motivated by pleasurable perceptions and so volitions are always determined by antecedent causes (we cannot will to will, "Of Power" 23, 25). Locke introduces the concept of suspension of desire in the second edition of the Essay, where he argues that the mind has the ability to "suspend the execution and satisfaction of any of its desires, and so all, one after another, [the mind] is at liberty to consider the objects of them; examine them on all sides, and weigh them with others" (II.21.47). The tension between volitional intentionality and suspension of desire is generated when we wonder, as Limborch did, how we can suspend a volition if it is determined by antecedent causes?
    Vere Chappell ("Locke on Freedom of the Will," 118-21), for instance, takes certain changes made to the fifth edition of "Of Power" to be a repudiation of his earlier view of volitional intentionality and takes Locke's correspondence with the Dutchman Limborch, in 1701-02, as the catalyst for this change in view. In this paper I argue that Locke does not give up intentional volitions as a result of his exchange with Limborch. I analyze all of their letters on this topic and illustrate that Locke's responses, both in his letters and in the sections of the fifth edition of the Essay that are changed in light of this correspondence, are, for the most part, far from opening the door to undetermined volitions. Many of them, in fact, serve to reaffirm his commitment to volitional intentionality - we need thought, judgment and the decree of the will in order to have liberty.
    There is, however, a comment from Locke to Limborch that presents a particular challenge for my reading. Locke writes (28 September 1702) that "there are some cases in which a man is unable not to will, and in all those acts of willing a man is not free because he is unable not to act. In the rest, where he was able to will or not to will, he is free." (Chappell takes this letter to be direct evidence of Locke's change of view, and direct evidence that the change is due to Limborch.) The second sentence of this remark strongly suggests a repudiation of volitional intentionality. By looking to Descartes' distinction between freedom of spontaneity on the one hand, and freedom of indifference as the lowest grade of freedom on the other, I propose that we can defend Locke's view against this suggestion. The upshot of such a defense is the preservation of the consistency of Locke's position on human freedom.

Han-Kyul Kim, Temple University
“ ‘The Supposed but Unknown’: A Functionalist Account of Locke’s Substratum” kim photo

    What is very special about Locke's theory of substance is that while he did not abandon this traditional notion, at the same time he did not clearly characterize its inherent nature, instead calling it "unknown." According to Locke's Essay, substance is a "supposed but unknown support" (II.23. 2) or "a supposed I know not what" (II.23.15); the qualifier "unknown" is negative, and the qualifier "supposed" is positive. Locke's innovative use of these positive and negative qualifiers gives a unique account of substratum, which has often been misinterpreted. In particular, the negative qualifier "unknown" has invited criticism since the first appearance of the Essay: sometimes it is taken to suggest a naked substance, sometimes to be stealthily proposing some sort of materialism, and sometimes to signify an indeterminate position on the nature of substratum (e.g., substance dualism vs. materialism). This paper proposes an interpretive tool with which to approach the highly controversial definition of substratum.
    I shall argue that the conjunction of negative and positive qualifiers replaces Descartes' constitutional rationalism with a type of functionalism that is distinctively Lockean, and which has been largely and unjustly neglected. Locke neither suggested a naked substance nor any sort of ontological materialism. Nor did he defend Cartesian dualism. Locke's unique position can only be appreciated when the dual qualifiers - "unknown" and "supposed" - are examined with equal weight.
    Section 1 will outline Descartes' One Principle Attribute Rule (OPAR), which has been widely adopted as the perspective from which to review the Lockean qualifier "unknown." Section 2 will argue that the negative qualifier "unknown" represents a denial of the OPAR, while the positive qualifier "supposed" implies an adherence to the Principle of Sufficient Reason (PSR). When conjoined, the dual qualifiers suggest a functionalist account of substratum that characterizes reality in terms of its causal role, rather than in terms of its "principal" or inherent nature. Locke's notion of substratum, insofar as it is defined not in terms of its composition but in terms of its function, may appear to be insubstantial or empty. Yet, it never represents any ambiguous or indeterminate position on the nature of substratum. Section 3 will explore Locke's notion of reality or substantiality in reference to the eighteenth-century dynamic conceptions of matter.
    Locke's philosophy has very often been interpreted and criticised from the perspective of the OPAR, based on the assumption that Locke was committed to the OPAR. My proposal is that Locke's use of the qualifier "unknown" should be taken to stem from his rejection of the OPAR, while he adheres to the PSR. Commentators have missed this critical point, and even those who contend that Locke's theory of substratum constitutes an anti-Cartesianism are suspiciously imprecise. The lack of study on these two philosophers' respective notions of substance in regard to the OPAR is a striking omission, which I shall remedy in this paper. Section 4 closes the paper by illuminating the significance of Locke's functionalism, noting some parallels this shares with more recent views on substantiality.

kulstad photo Mark Kulstad, Rice University
“The Epistemic Status of Laws of Nature in the Philosophy of Leibniz”

    [No abstract currently available.]

Todd Buras, Baylor University
“Hume’s Principle, Reid’s Counterexample” buras photo

    Reid's central challenge to Hume is a counterexample, or family of counterexamples, to the copy principle. Hume claims, famously, to have given a "compleat answer to Dr. Reid." In this essay, I lay out Reid's challenge, look for an answer in Hume, and assess the completeness of the answer (or answers) found. Depending on what we take Hume's answer to be, I show that it is either incomplete or no answer at all.

Marina Folescu, University of Southern California
“Some Remarks on Reid’s Theory of Imagination” folescu photo

    Roger Gallie ("Reid: Conception, Representation and Innate Ideas," 321) argues that Reid held the following position, with regards to conceiving entia rationis: centaurs, winged horses, unicorns and the like can be conceived, but the bare conception of a centaur is a general conception, and never a singular one. This interpretation seems to be supported by the text of the Essays on the Intellectual Powers of Man (Brookes/Haakonssen ed), but there are some complications to consider. At least some entia rationis are bearers of names: "Pegasus" and "Don Quixote" are familiar examples, that Reid himself discusses. Since Reid believes that "an individual is expressed in language" by a proper name (IV.1, 303), and since we use "Don Quixote" to refer to a certain comical medieval knight, it must follow that not all conceptions of Don Quixote are general. Thus, something must be wrong either with Gallie's interpretation of Reid, or with Reid's position itself. This paper argues that Reid's position is consistent: one can use one's imagination to conceive of a winged horse or a centaur, and one would thereby imagine an individual. Although it is true that bare conception seems to give rise to general conceptions only (e.g., the conception of a triangle is general), imagination, which is a species of conception, is not restricted in the same manner.
    To develop this argument, I propose to take a closer look at the role played by the power of imagination in Reid's people. Imagination proper is that type of conception which can be employed about visible objects (IV.1, 306.) Any visible object is an individual: it doesn't make sense to say that one can see a general object, since we only perceive individuals (V.1, 355-56). Reid argues that the things which cannot be objects of sense cannot be objects of imagination, either, which further implies that one imagines only individuals, and not universals. In fact, Reid plainly says (V.6, 394) that universals are not things that can be imagined, because they cannot be objects of any external sense.Thus, Gallie cannot be right that by conceiving Pegasus (and others like it) we form a general conception, since this would mean that Pegasus cannot be imagined. Pegasus is one of the paradigmatic examples of an imaginary (and hence imagined) being, and Reid would not want to deny this. Furthermore, Reid explicitly says that centaurs, fictional men, winged horses and the rest can very easily be imagined, and not only barely conceived (IV.1, 301; IV.2, 310). This is done by forming singular thoughts, in the form of imaginings, about these entia rationis. The paper concludes that Reid endorses the following position: some bare conceptions are general, others are singular. Only the latter can be properly called creatures of imagination. At a closer analysis, the problem raised by Gallie simply dissolves.