C. Scott Ragland, Saint Louis University
"Descartes' Theodicy"

      Many scholars recognize that Descartes' Fourth Meditation deals with an epistemological version of the problem of evil: if Descartes was created by an omniperfect God, then how can he ever make mistakes? In response to this problem, Descartes offers a theodicy. However, commentators often fail to recognize the systematic nature of Descartes' theodicy, as well as its crucial importance for his epistemological project (For example, Cress suggests that the theodicy plays no role in the order of reasons of the Mediations, and Gilson claims that it is simply a poorly organized 'tissue of borrowings' from earlier theologians). Noting important parallels with contemporary and historical discussions of the problem of evil, this paper aims to articulate the structure and importance of both Descartes' problem of error and his theodicy.
      I argue that in the Mediations Descartes actually presents two different "arguments from error" against the existence of an omniperfect God. The first is the "general argument" which occurs in the first meditation, in the paragraph where Descartes first considers the possibility of a deceiving God:

General Argument:
(1) An omniperfect being would not allow any sort of error.
(2) There is error (arising from the senses).
(3) So, there is no omniperfect being.

The "Causal argument" occurs at the opening of the fourth meditation:

(1) If I were created by an omniperfect God, there would be nothing in me not caused by God.
(2) An omniperfect God would not cause error.
(3) So, if I were created by an omniperfect God, there would be no error in me.
(4) There is error in me.
(5) So, I was not created by an omniperfect God.

      Both these arguments are logical arguments against the existence of God. They are not merely probabilistic arguments. If successful, they would make it evident by the natural light that an omniperfect God does not exist. But Descartes takes Meditation Three to show that the natural light yields the opposite conclusion (God does exist). So the success of these anti-theistic arguments would yield a kind of antimony of reason: the natural light would prove unreliable by its own standards. Descartes' epistemological project depends on clearing reason of this charge, and that is why Descartes claims (in the synopsis) not to prove the truth rule until the Fourth Meditation.
      Turning to Descartes' theodicy, I show that it is a "mixed" theodicy responding to both of the arguments above. Descartes' appeal to misuse of free will (assenting to what is not clear and distinct) as the source of error blocks the causal argument (basically by denying the first premise). However, Descartes still has to face the general argument, which suggests that an omniperfect God would not even allow error through a misuse of freedom.
      Descartes responds by suggesting that God has some morally sufficient reason for allowing evil. The reason is NOT, as a straight free will theodicy would suggest, that God cannot realize the great good of freedom without allowing us to misuse freedom if we so choose. Descartes claims that God could have made us free, and yet infallible in our judgments, by making the scope of the intellect (while still finite) great enough to give us clear guidance regarding all the judgments we would ever make. Why then did God make us capable of misusing our freedom (why is the scope of the will greater than the intellect)?
      Descartes' response, I suggest, is a combination of the "skeptical theist" and "big picture" theodicy strategies. Descartes suggests that God made us prone to error because this somehow increased the overall value of the universe as a whole (big picture strategy), though we can never grasp the whole universe or see its value, so this greater good for the sake of which God allows our fallibility is in principle beyond our ken (skeptical theist strategy).
      I close by explaining why (given his epistemological goals) Descartes could not refute the general argument without also responding to the causal argument.

Abel B. Franco, University of Pittsburgh
"What Are Cartesian Passions About?"

      I will try to show, first, that Cartesian passions are both, but in different senses, about the soul and about external objects. Secondly, I will defend that, regarding the soul, passions for Descartes are "perceptions we refer to the soul" (Passions I, art. 25) insofar as they are about the state of the soul that results from experiencing that passion (which is both a mental and bodily event). And thirdly, regarding external objects-a much more problematic question-I will argue that passions are, more precisely, about their worthiness to be joined in order for the soul to become part of a unity of greater perfection.
      I will address the issue of the aboutness of the passions mainly from Descartes's physiological and functional accounts (of the passions) as presented in the Passions of the Soul (1649) and the related correspondence. Despite the relative lack of attention the physiology of the passions has received among philosophers, the numerous details Descartes provides about their generation serve establish good foundations to answer the questions of their aboutness in general (i.e. external objects vs. soul), of their specific aboutness regarding the soul in particular, and, partially, the question about their aboutness regarding the external objects. And insofar as the physiology also helps distinguish passions from both sensations and appetites, it helps demarcate their aboutness from, in particular, the aboutness of sensations.
      The answer to the question on the aboutness regarding external objects requires, I think, the consideration of the functional account of the passions, which is the main acknowledged purpose of their study (Passions I, art. 2). And this is so, mainly, because their function is measured and defined in terms of their usefulness. The physiology is also of great help in this sense. It indicates that there are, at least, three stages in the arousal of a passion in which their function is revealed: (a) the representation that triggers the bodily motions proper of the passions; (b) the bodily motions themselves; and (c) the inclination of the will (that is brought about by any passion).
      According to Descartes, our passions are useful in two general senses, regarding the body and regarding the mind-body union. As to the body, our passions advise the will about its perfection and about its preservation (Passions II, art. 137). And regarding the mind-body union, passions advise the soul about its perfection (that is the perfection of the union) (Passions II, art. 139). Now, insofar as the soul is superior to the body, the greatest usefulness of the passions is to advise the soul about occasions to increase the perfection of the min-body union (Passions II, art. 139). And insofar as our perfection is increased by joining a good (Passions II, art. 139)-in union with which we become part of a greater unity (Passions II, arts. 79 and 80)--, being advised about the external objects' worthiness to join them-that is worthiness to form with them a unit of greater perfection-is the main function and utility of our passions. In this sense, love appears as the most useful passion (Passions II, art. 139)--when it is based on true knowledge (e.g. Passions II, art. 138)-since it inclines us to perfect ourselves (that is to join goods with which we form a more perfect unity).
      Some other conclusions about passions are directly or indirectly rooted in the study of their aboutness. The conclusion that love is the most useful passion--together with the views that the main reason why the soul remains joined to the body is to have passions (To Chanut, 1 November 1646) and that the soul did join the body at some point during their existence (e.g. To Chanut, 1 February 1647)-suggests that an argument could probably be offered to support that (1) the reason for the soul to join the body is, precisely, to have passions and, in particular to experience love; and that (2) love is what keeps the soul joined to the body. On the other hand, insofar as our passions are "good" because they are useful (e.g. To Chanut, 1 November 1646) and perform their true function when regulated by "experience and reason" (Passions II, art. 138), reason appears as the guarantor of their function, not the obstacle to the realization of the inclinations of the will they bring about. In fact, once "tamed" by reason-i.e. once we have made sure they are doing what they should--their excess are not to be feared: "the more useful the more they tend to excess" (To Princess Elizabeth, 1 September 1645).

Fred Ablondi, Hendrix College, Conway, Arkansas
"François Lamy, Occasionalism, and the Mind-Body Problem"

      The standard historical narrative in undergraduate philosophy courses (dating back well into the 19th century) holds that Malebranche and his fellow occasionalists were drawn to occasionalism to solve the problem, bequeathed to them by Descartes, of how to explain the interaction between immaterial souls and extended bodies. In the past 15 years or so, however, several scholars, most notably Steven Nadler, have shown this story about the motivations behind the thought of the occasionalists to be a myth. Malebranche, Geulincx, La Forge, and Cordemoy adopted occasionalism for a variety of reasons, but none did so because of a need to provide an ad hoc solution to a perceived mind-body problem. Malebranche and Geulincx turn to occasionalism (in part) as a result of their analysis of causation and their understanding of what is required for something to be a true cause. Cordemoy, on the other hand, argues first and foremost for occasionalism to explain body-body interaction, and only later expands it to cover all cause and effect relations, including, inter alia, interaction between minds and bodies. And La Forge came to occasionalism as a result of his understanding of God's role as continuous creator of the world (Malebranche too would argue along these lines).
      Yet there is at least one Cartesian for whom the 'traditional' reading is entirely on the mark. François Lamy (1636-1711), a quarrelsome Benedictine, argues in the second volume of his De la Connoissance de Soi-Meme exactly as the standard story has it: occasionalism is there adopted explicitly on the grounds that interaction between entities as essentially disparate in natures as are mind and body can only be accounted for by invoking the workings of an omnipotent deity. In my paper for the Seminar, I want to discuss and analyze Lamy's argument, but not as an attempt to refute Nadler's general assessment-an assessment with which I am in agreement. On the contrary, the case of Lamy adds I think only further force to Nadler's warning that "we should be very careful about any general claims we may be tempted to make about 'the occasionalists'" ("The Occasionalism of Louis de la Forge," in Causation in Early Modern Philosophy , 73).

Andrew Youpa, Southern Illinois University, Carbondale
"Spinoza's Theory of Motivation"

      In the Scholium to Proposition 9 of Ethics Part 3, Spinoza states, "From all this, then, it is clear that we neither strive for, nor will, neither want, nor desire anything because we judge it to be good; on the contrary, we judge something to be good because we strive for it, will it, want it, and desire it" (Curley trans.). Here in the first clause Spinoza denies that a motivational state (i.e., a striving, volition, want, or desire) results from, or depends on, a judgment about something's goodness. This is followed by the claim that a judgment about something's goodness results from, or depends on, a pre-existing motivational state. Later in Ethics Part 3, he repeats, "For we have shown above (in P9S) that we desire nothing because we judge it to be good, but on the contrary, we call it good because we desire it. Consequently, what we are averse to we call evil" (3p39s). The phrase "but on the contrary" indicates Spinoza intends a sharp contrast between desiring something because one judges it to be good and judging something to be good because one desires it. It also seems to indicate that, in his view, the former relation of dependence never obtains while the latter at least sometimes does.
      Together these passages appear to be evidence that Spinoza holds that a judgment about something's goodness or badness is motivationally inert and, moreover, that such value judgments essentially reflect an individual's pre-existing motivational states. Nevertheless, in my paper I try to show that, contrary to what he might appear to say in 3p9s and 3p39s, Spinoza holds that in some cases a motivational state results from a value judgment. Thus, on the reading I defend, his theory of motivation contains two distinct accounts of the psychological order of value judgments and motivational states: an account of their order in those in bondage as well as an account of their order in those who are free. An individual in bondage is someone whose value judgments result from emotions and desires. A free individual, on the other hand, is someone whose emotions and desires result from his value judgments. So I argue that Spinoza's statements in 3p9s and 3p39s should not be treated as unqualified; that these propositions concern the order of judgments and motivational states in the minds of those in bondage alone. It is not until later in the Ethics-at the end of Part 3 and in Part 4 (e.g., 3p58, 4p19)-that we are presented with an account of the psychological order of value judgments and motivational states in the minds of those who are free.

Mark Bernier, Texas A&M University
"Leibniz on the Reality of Corporeal Substances"

      For Leibniz a corporeal substance is a union of body and soul. Whether this unity is an actual unity has been the subject of debate, in part because the status of bodies in his ontology is not clear. For example, Leibniz insists that there is nothing real in the world except simple substances, each of which has perception and appetite. Bodies and aggregates thus seem to be more phenomenal than real, and therefore corporeal substances (or the union of body and soul) seem to be phenomenal rather than real. I suspect, however, that for Leibniz corporeal substance is real, and not 'simply' a phenomenon. This paper is an attempt to show that this is the case. I will further contend that we can explain how corporeal substance results from monads in a way that supports the reality of a physical world.

Jill Hernandez, University of Memphis
"Divine Omni-Qualities and Human Evil: Interpreting Leibniz without Middle Knowledge"

      Much ink has been spilled over the Leibnizian questions of the problem of evil and the problem of human freedom. The problems are, on one hand, distinct: the first asks how the existence of evil can be compatible with Leibniz's notion of an all-holy, all-knowing creator God and the second asks whether Leibniz can account for human free will, if an omnipotent, fore-knowing God produces the whole reality of each individual in each instant in a natural order (Theodicy, 388; see also Adams (1994), 97). On the other hand, the problems are closely connected since, if God is an omniscient, omnipotent efficient and final cause, then it seems that such a being would also be the source or cause of evil, with the result that human action would neither be free nor morally blameworthy. (See, for example, Leibniz's Tentamen Anagogicum (Loemker, 478): "All natural phenomena could be explained mechanically if we understood them well enough, but the principles of mechanics themselves cannot be explained geometrically, since they depend on more sublime principles which show the wisdom of the Author in the order and perfection of his work.") Historically, most thinkers attempt to make consistent the Leibnizian God and human free will by appealing to the notion of "middle knowledge", that God knows what actions human agents will freely choose under any circumstances that could possibly occur. This middle knowledge approach salvages free will (humans in some cases freely choose), accounts for God's omni-qualities (his purity, power, and knowledge), and seems to absolve God of any culpability for evil done as a result of human action.
      Without doubt, there is some textual support for Leibniz's use of middle knowledge. What is far less clear, however, is that we can solve the Leibnizian dilemma of God and human free will only through the category of middle knowledge. Indeed, it is my contention that middle knowledge does not sufficiently capture, for Leibniz, God's knowledge of contingent, free human action, because middle knowledge interprets divine omniscience based on a class of actions rather than interpreting a class of actions based on divine omniscience. This project will, then, focus the problem of divine knowledge of human contingent, free action in a direction different than the one provided by the middle knowledge approach: We need to articulate human action based on God's knowledge. To be successful, I will relocate the discussion on a key distinction Leibniz makes (Theodicy II.58) between determined, foreseen, and resolved action. There are distinct types of allowable human action stemming from Leibniz's notion of divine omniscience, and so, human contingent action is indeed free--but not all human action is contingent, and so not all human action is free. Further, it is my position that God's knowledge does not extend to contingent events, but rather extends to the pattern of determinates, which in sum, motivate the agent to choose and so God cannot be the efficient cause of moral evil in any way.
      My position has some positive results. If the distinction between determined, foreknown, and resolved actions is aptly applied by my view, then it resolves a significant portion of the textual ambiguity surrounding divine knowledge of contingent events. If God's knowledge of contingent events is knowledge about the pattern of motivating determinates of free human action, then by "omniscience" we cannot mean "all-knowing," but "knowing of all things logically possible." I intend to show that God's omniscience need not include knowledge about particular contingent, free human choices. Third, if we find that "contingency" for Leibniz involves human choice that is dependent only upon reason and inclination, then I will argue that God cannot necessitate some human choices, since God does not causally necessitate particular individual inclinations. If my reasoning is sound, it would seem to solve both the problem of human freedom (since individuals can freely choose in the absence of causal necessitation) and of God's participation in bringing about evil. (God would not be implicated in causing moral evil, at least, if God does not necessitate free human action that is evil.) Finally, and importantly, my project assuages the difficulties posed by Leibniz's notions of human free will and the Divine while avoiding some of the extra-textual problems of middle knowledge.

Benjamin Hill, University of Western Ontario
"The Scholastic Sources behind Locke's Account of the Reality of Ideas"

      Being, Existence, Reality: this cluster of concepts is the linchpin of Locke's empiricist epistemology. Without the reality of ideas, "real truth" could not be distinguished from "purely verbal" truth and without that there is no basis for distinguishing real knowledge from "the Visions of an Enthusiast." Locke's explanation of ideational reality appears straight-forward--"By real Ideas, I mean such as have a Foundation in Nature, such as have a Conformity with the real Being, and Existence of Things, or with their Archetypes"--but such an appearance is misleading. What is the phenomenological structure and character of our recognition of this conformity between idea and being? A bald appeal to "the actual receiving of Ideas from without" is of no philosophical or phenomenological value since it leaves the whole question unresolved. Of all our ideas which seem to come from without, which in fact do? What is the criterion for dividing those that do from those that merely seem to?
      The phenomenological model often attributed to Locke can be called the containment model: we perceive the distinct "simple idea of existence" contained within or appended to all our real ideas of sense. Hume of course famously destroyed this model: "so far from there being any distinct impression [of existence], attending to every impression and every idea, that I do not think there are any two distinct impressions, which are inseparably conjoin'd . . . thus . . . the idea of existence is not deriv'd from any particular impression." So much for Locke then, right? Well, not if he had adopted a different phenomenological model. I argue that Locke held a richer semantic of ideas which allowed him to recognize intentional contents as immanent despite not being literally a part of or contained within their ideas.
      The key is a position L. M. de Rijk termed "semantic chiliasm." Ideas are "at the same time robustly material and highly spiritual" because they fuse their intensions with their extensions. Ideas are not tertium quae standing between minds and reality; they are inherently both material and noetic at the very same time. Locke, I argue, derived this model from the Scholastic logicians who studied at Oxford in the 1650s and 60s: Robert Sanderson, Philip du Trieu, and most importantly Martin Smiglecius. Carrying the philosophical load was the doctrine of suppositio. Significatio and suppositio form a conceptual nexus such that terms cannot truly signify except in some context determined by the term's suppositio. Signification cannot stand on its own if genuine thought is to occur; it is simply too vague. Its various senses must be disentangled, which is a purpose of supposition theory. By demarking the term's extension, supposition specifies the truth conditions under which it operates and in so doing that it determines the term's intension or signification. Now, for understanding Locke's theory of ideas, as important as what suppositio did was how it did it. Suppositio is "inseparably conjoin'd" (to use Hume's terminology) with significatio, but not as a distinct "object" (in the sense in which Locke described ideas as the "objects" of thought at I.i.8). Were suppositio presented to the mind as an object, it would be presented as a categormatic term in its own right, having its own signification and supposition. It would, in other words, be presented as an element contained within or appended to the signification, as that is a distinct idea or impression. It is not, however, a presentation in its own right. It is a noesis which we discern within, immanently, the significatio whenever it obtains in the context of discursive thought. This kind of noesis, I argue, was what Locke was referring to when he spoke of ideational reality and truth as involving "tacit" and "secret" references (II.xxx.1, II.xxxii.1-6), "intendings" (IV.iv. passim), and "suppositions" (II.xxxii.1-6, IV.iv. passim). I end with a brief discussion of how suppositio manifests in Locke's simple ideas of qualities and ideas of substance.

Francesca di Poppa, University of Pittsburgh
"John Locke on Moral Knowledge: An Epistemic Puzzle"

      This paper will offer an answer to an epistemic puzzle in John Locke's ethical theory. Early in his Essays on the Law of Nature, Locke claimed that men can figure out the content of the moral law by their 'natural light', i.e. by means of sensation and reflection. This is quite a counterintuitive position, especially since Locke rejected the innatist position that we may access God's law simply by reflecting on innate ideas. However, in this work Locke never explained how it is that our senses can offer us access to the content of God's moral law. An analysis of Essays on Human Understanding shows that even here Locke, though discussing extensively the nature of moral concepts, failed to explain how they are derived from the senses.
      After defining moral concepts as man-made mixed modes, Locke argued that, being man-made, they possess a clarity and certainty that complex ideas such as the idea of this or that substance ('gold', 'apple') cannot have. Because of this, moral truths are demonstrable: Locke's argument on the demonstrability of moral truths hinges on the fact that, while moral concepts such as sin or incest are arbitrarily composed, the relationships between such concepts (the agreement or disagreements between these complex ideas) are not arbitrary human constructs.
      Locke did offer examples of the reduction of moral ideas to simpler ideas, but the latter are far too removed from the perceptual realm. So, the relationship between moral ideas and our sense experience (internal or external), which Locke posited since his earlier Essays on the Law of Nature, is still problematic.
      In this paper, I argue that for Locke pleasure and pain, which for him are causally connected to good and evil (including moral good and evil), are reliable signs of God's commands, the same way secondary qualities, such as colors or smells, are reliable signs of those real properties of things that are relevant to our survival and well being. This allows Locke to frame morality in the context of an empiricist epistemology, but puts serious limits to his claim to a demonstrable 'science of morals.' Besides, as I will show in the end, it is not clear that Locke succeeded in his claim that the natural light is sufficient, independent of revelation, to direct us to heaven.

Michael Jacovides, Purdue University
"Associations of Ideas in Hume's Theory of Personal Identity"

      The greatest exegetical dispute over Hume's metaphysics concerns why he doesn't recognize the tension between his psychological naturalism and his causal projectivism. That is, how can he both offer psychological explanations that presuppose the reality of mental causation and also offer an account of causation as a relation that depends on the associations of ideas in an observer? The second greatest dispute concerns what worries him in his Second Thoughts about personal identity in the Appendix to the Treatise. After explaining his main argument for his account of personal identity, I put these problems next to one another and solve them both.
      I begin by carefully explaining the paragraph in which Hume advances his second argument for his account of personal identity. Next, building on that explanation, I explain the eleventh paragraph of the Second Thoughts. If I succeed, I will have both explained his theory of personal identity and also his dissatisfaction with it. The hitherto unrecognized exegetical key lies in Hume's reference to his derivation of his second definition of causation.
      Hume's second argument for his theory of personal identity runs as follows:
1.We never observe any real connection between objects (premise).
2.If identity is a real connection between perceptions, then we sometimes observe it (premise).
3.So, identity is not a real connection between perceptions (1, 2).
4.The identity relation holds between perceptions and is either a real connection or a merely attributed relation arising from the association of ideas (premise).
5.So, the identity relation is a merely attributed relation arising from the association of ideas (3,4).
      The first premise is explicit, both here and as the second problematic principle in the Second Thoughts. That he assumes the second premise is clear from his presentation of the problem. Proposition 4 gets us to the desired conclusion that the relation of identity is merely an attributed relation. Hume justifies this premise only by referring back to his discussion of causation, where he had also managed to move from the imperceptibility of a relation to analyzing it as resting upon associations of perceptions.
      This is the account to which Hume refers in his enigmatic eleventh paragraph of the Second Thoughts. The moment of truth in that paragraph runs as follows: "But all my hopes vanish, when I come to explain the principles, that unite our successive perceptions in our thought or consciousness, I cannot discover any theory, which gives me satisfaction on this head." He doesn't say that the problem is explaining what unites our perceptions; he says that the problem is explaining what "unites our successive perceptions in our thought or consciousness." He means what unites our ideas of our perceptions. For Hume, thinking is what we do when we have ideas, and the reference to consciousness must be read in light of previous two sentences, which state that on Hume's account, as on that of "most philosophers," personal identity depends on consciousness. Hume's view has that consequence, because, according to it, personal identity depends on an association between ideas. What's needed, therefore, is an obvious problem with the principles of association that bind our ideas of perceptions. Luckily, we have one.
      If the imperceptibility of real connections between perceptions implies that personal identity rests on the association of ideas, then parity of reasoning demands that we conclude that the psychological association between ideas also rests on the association of other, distinct ideas. That would lead to an infinite regress.
      Suppose that Plato's love of mathematics is part of the same person as Plato's love of wisdom. On Hume's account, these impressions are part of the same person only because the idea of Plato's love of mathematics is associated with the idea of his love of wisdom. His love of mathematics and his love of wisdom are only united indirectly "in our thought." But, Hume asks, how are we to explain their unity in thought? That is, how are we to explain the association of the corresponding ideas? By Hume's principles, the association of ideas is not a perceptible real connection and thus it must be analyzed as depending on the association of other ideas. This entails that behind the association of the idea of Plato's love of mathematics and the idea of Plato's love of wisdom must stand another association between the idea of the idea of Plato's love of mathematics and the idea of the idea of Plato's love of wisdom. This line of reasoning leads to the absurd consequence of an infinite tower of higher-level associations of ideas. Something has gone wrong.