1p10 and 1p10s

1P10: Each attribute of a substance must be conceived through itself.

Dem.: For an attribute is what the intellect perceives concerning a substance, as constituting its essence (by 1d4); so (by 1d3) it must be conceived through itself, q.e.d.

I think the proposition is straightforward. Attributes constitute the essence of substance. Substance is conceived through itself, so anything that is essentially the same as substance also has to be conceived through itself. At this point, that doesn’t seem problematic to me. Extension is just extension. Thought is just thought in the way that quantity is just quantity or quality is just quality (yes, I’m still running the attributes=categories line). What does the scholium say?

From these propositions it is evident that although two attributes may be conceived to be really distinct (i.e., one may be conceived without the aid of the other), we still cannot infer from that that they constitute two beings, or two different substances. For it is of the nature of a substance that each of its attributes is conceived through itself, since all the attributes it has have always been in it together, and one could not be produced by another, but each expresses the reality, or being of substance.

I need to start by pointing out that the term ‘really distinct’ is a technical term. Employing ideas from scholastic philosophy, there are a number of different ways in which two things may be distinct for thinkers like Descartes or Spinoza. Spinoza lists three of them in chapter five of part two of the ‘Metaphysical Thoughts’ appendix to his Principles of Cartesian Philosophy (see Appendix 1). They are ‘real distinction’, ‘modal distinction’ and ‘distinction of reason’. The latter one is really no distinction at all. Spinoza gives the example of the difference between a substance and its attribute as being only one ‘of reason’. We can have a definition of substance and a definition of attribute that are not identical but we are not thinking of two different things. We are dealing with the difference between explaining what a thing is without saying what kind of thing it is and explaining what kind of thing that thing is. This is only a distinction ‘of reason’. Real distinction on the other hand is where two things can be conceived of independently and, for most versions of real distinction, can exist independently. So in scholastic philosophy two horses are really distinct because one can exist without the other and we can conceive one without the other. More relevantly, a substance whose attribute is extension and a substance whose attribute was thought, would be really distinct. Finally, there is modal difference. This is the difference between substance and its modes. Spinoza also says that it is the difference between one mode and another – even though two modes may often fit the definition of real distinction, Spinoza wants to keep that term only for substantial difference. That’s the position in the ‘Metaphyisical Thoughts’ but it’s no longer exactly the position in the Ethics. Spinoza has weakened the definition of ‘real distinction’ so that rather than meaning the difference between two things that can both be and be conceived independently of one another, it now only means that they can be conceived independently of one another. In the ‘Metaphysical Thoughts’ if two things could be conceived as really distinct, then they really were distinct. In the Ethics, Spinoza says: no, you cannot make that assumption any more. This is a direct contradiction to what he says in ‘The Metaphysical Thoughts’:

That distinction is called real by which two substances are distinguished [25] from one another, whether they have the same or different attributes, e.g., thought, and extension, or the parts of matter. This is known from the fact that each can be conceived, and consequently, can exist, without the aid of the other.

In the case of attributes and substance(s) we can no longer infer the consequent that just because two attributes are really distinct, then their substance are also really distinct. This is very odd as, if you recall, the difference between a substance and its attribute is only one ‘of reason’. Now if we were in the mood to be hyper precise, we could point out that Spinoza only says that they ‘can exist’ not that they do exist, or must exist ‘without the aid of the other’. In the scholium that I’m discussing, Spinoza says, look: just because two attributes are really distinct, we cannot infer that they must be the attributes of two really distinct substances. But if the difference between a substance and its attribute is only one of reason, then surely this inference is valid? What to do? Well, we need to modify our understanding of what Spinoza might mean by a ‘real distinction’, or what the distinction is between a substance and its attribute. Luckily there is a slightly different version of a real distinction to hand. This would be Scotus’ idea of a ‘formal distinction’ (formal distinctions are a species of real distinction). The idea that Spinoza is using formal distinction to explain what the difference between the attributes is not my idea. Deleuze argues this (though not in a way that I wholely agree with) in his Expressionism book. More recently, and much more to my liking, Andreas Schmidt has written a great chapter ‘Substance Monism and Identity Theory in Spinoza’ which goes into this idea at some length and detail (Schmidt 2009). I’m not going to go into all the ins and out of formal distinction but it does basically do what Spinoza is describing here: two independently conceivable attributes of the same substance.

Why have I gone on at such length about a single paragraph of a scholium? Well because it’s sneakily utterly crucial to the entire enterprise of the Ethics. The opening sentence of the next paragraph makes clear what is at stake here:

So it is far from absurd to attribute many attributes to one substance.

At various points I’ve mentioned a Leibnizian critique of Spinoza, namely that Spinoza has not shown that his concept of God (a substance consisting of an infinity of attributes) is not self-contradictory (i.e. that it is possible). What Spinoza explicitly claims here is only that we can attribute ‘many’ attributes to one substance, not that we can attribute an infinity of them. I suspect he doesn’t see that there is any further problem. Real distinction implies a strict one attribute per substance limit. If we do not have that kind of distinction in place, then there does not seem to be a reason why a substance could not have an infinity of attributes because there could not be anything that could limit substance in that way. I’m not sure how good an arugment this is. But you can see why, once you accept that thought and extension are attributes of the same substance, then it’s going to be hard to think of more opposed attributes that could pose a problem in their attribution to the same substance.

This is all such an important set of claims, that sticking it in a scholium seems slightly underhand almost – not least because he is using a variant (formal) of real distinction that is not the same as the one he used in the ‘Metaphysical Thoughts’.

Bibliography

Schmidt, Andreas. 2009. ‘Substance Monism and Identity Theory in Spinoza’. In The Cambridge Companion to Spinoza’s Ethics, edited by Olli Koistinen, 79–98. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Spinoza, Benedictus de. 1985a. ‘(Curley) Ethics’. In The Collected Works of Spinoza, translated by Edwin M. Curley, I:408–617. Princeton: Princeton University Press.

———. 1985b. ‘Descartes’ Principles of Philosophy’. In The Collected Works of Spinoza, translated by Edwin M. Curley, I:224–98. Princeton: Princeton University Press.

———. 1985c. The Collected Works of Spinoza, Volume I. Translated by Edwin M. Curley. Vol. 1. 2 vols. Princeton: Princeton University Press.

Appendix 1

(Spinoza 1985b, chap. V Of God’s Simplicity [I/257-8]).

Chapter V Of God’s Simplicity

The threefold Distinction of Things: Real, Modal, of Reason

We proceed to the Simplicity of God. In order to understand this [20] attribute of God rightly, we need to recall what Descartes has taught (Principles I, 48, 49), viz. that there is nothing in nature but substances and their modes. From this a threefold distinction of things is deduced (I, 60-62), viz. real, modal, and of reason.

That distinction is called real by which two substances are distinguished [25] from one another, whether they have the same or different attributes, e.g., thought, and extension, or the parts of matter. This is known from the fact that each can be conceived, and consequently, can exist, without the aid of the other.

The modal distinction is shown to be twofold: there is that between [30] a mode of a substance and the substance itself, and that between two modes of one and the same substance. We know the latter from the fact that, although either mode may be conceived without the aid of the other, nevertheless neither may be conceived without the aid of the substance whose modes they are. The former is known from the fact that, although the substance can be conceived without its mode, [35] nevertheless, the mode cannot be conceived without the substance.

[I/258] Finally, that distinction is said to be of reason which exists between substance and its attribute, as when duration is distinguished from extension. And this is also known from the fact that such a substance cannot be understood without that attribute.

Appendix 2

DISTINCTION, REAL
distinctio realis

onderscheid, dadelijk

The definitions Spinoza gives of a real distinction seem to follow the Cartesian usage of the Second Replies (AT VII, 162) and the Principles (AT VIII-1, 28), but it is difficult to see how Spinoza could allow that any two things might be really distinct in the Cartesian sense. For Descartes a real distinction can occur only between two or more substances, but for Spinoza there is really only one substance. Of course, each of the attributes satisfies the definition of substance, and each is really distinct from every other, but there is no possibility of any attribute existing without the others.

(Spinoza 1985c, 1:634)

DISTINCTIO; DISTINGUERE; DISTINCTUS; DISTINCTE

onderscheid(ing); onderscheiden; onderscheiden; onderscheidelijk

distinction; to distinguish; distinct; distinctly, I/145, 237, 244, 257, 259, 266, II/17, 21, 28, 96, 97, 99, 100, 120, 121, 123, 181, 210, 211, 249, 285, IV/55

DISTINCTIO MODALIS

wijzige onderscheid

modal distinction, I/248, 257, 258, II/59

DISTINCTIO RATIONIS

onderscheid van reden

distinction of reason, I/248, 258, 259, 280, II/282

DISTINCTIO REALIS

zakelijke onderscheid

real distinction, I/146, 151, 248, 257, 258, II/33, 52, 59, IV/55

DISTINCTIO VERBIS

onderscheid door woorden

verbal distinction, I/248

(Spinoza 1985c, 1:673)

real distinction

[I/146] In this way he would discover easily the real distinction between the soul and the body

[I/151] D10: Two substances are said to be really distinct when each of them can exist without the other.

[I/248] Why some have maintained a Metaphysical good

[I/257] However, those who eagerly seek some Metaphysical good, needing no qualification, labor under a false prejudice, for they confuse a distinction of reason with a real or modal distinction. They distinguish [5] between the thing itself and the striving that is in each thing to preserve its being, although they do not know what they understand by striving. For though the thing and its striving to preserve its being are distinguished by reason, or rather verbally (which deceives these people very greatly), they are not in any way really distinct.

[I/259] That God’s Attributes are distinguished only by reason

And from this we can now clearly conclude that all the distinctions we make between the attributes of God are only distinctions of reason [5] —the attributes are not really distinguished from one another. Understand such distinctions of reason as I have just mentioned, which are recognized from the fact that such a substance cannot exist without that attribute. So we conclude that God is a most simple being. For the rest, we pay no attention to the hodgepodge of Peripatetic distinctions [10] but go on to God’s life.

[II/33] great errors, who have not accurately distinguished between imagination and intellection. Such errors as: that extension must be in a place, that it must be finite, that its parts must be really distinguished from one another

[IV/59] For if corporeal substance could be so divided that its parts were really distinct, why, then, could one part not be annihilated, the rest remaining connected with one another as before? And why must they all be so fitted together that there is no vacuum? Truly, of things which are really [15] distinct from one another, one can be, and remain in its condition, without the other. Since, therefore, there is no vacuum in nature (a subject I discuss elsewhere),41 but all its parts must so concur that there is no vacuum, it follows also that they cannot be really distinguished, i.e., that corporeal substance, insofar as it is a substance, cannot be divided.

[IV/55] Hence they talk utter nonsense, not to say madness, who hold that Extended Substance is put together of parts, or bodies, really distinct from one another. This is just the same as if someone should try, [15] merely by adding and accumulating many circles, to put together a square or a triangle or something else completely different in its essence.