della rocca, m - spinoza and the metaphysics of scepticism

7/27/2019 Della Rocca, M - Spinoza and the Metaphysics of Scepticism

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Mind, Vol. 116 . 464 . October 2007

doi:10.1093/mind/fzm851

Della Rocca 2007

Spinoza and the Metaphysics of

ScepticismMichael Della Rocca

Spinozas response to a certain radical form of scepticism has deep and surprisingroots in his rationalist metaphysics. I argue that Spinozas commitment to the Prin-ciple of Sufficient Reason leads to his naturalistic rejection of certain sharp, inexpli-cable bifurcations in reality such as the bifurcations that a Cartesian system positsbetween mind and body and between will and intellect. I show how Spinoza identi-fies and rejects a similar bifurcation between the representational character of ideasor mental states and the epistemic status of these ideas, a bifurcation to whichSpinoza sees the radical sceptic committed. Spinozas rejection of this bifurcationhelps to explain some of his most cryptic statements concerning scepticism and alsoreveals a promising and highly metaphysical strategy for understanding and re-sponding to scepticism.

Spinoza is primarily a metaphysician. By this I mean notthat Spinoza is

more interested in traditional metaphysical topics than in other, appar-ently disparate areas of philosophy such as moral philosophy, politicalphilosophy, and epistemology. That is certainly not the case. One ofSpinozas strengths as a philosopher is that his interests range so widelywithin philosophy. What I mean by saying that Spinoza is primarily ametaphysician is that his metaphysical commitments dictate his posi-tions in these other areas. Thus Spinoza derives his positions in otherparts of philosophy from his metaphysical views. For Spinoza, theapparently disparate areas of philosophy are only apparently disparate:they are unified by basic metaphysical principles. In this way, forSpinoza, philosophy is a unified whole in much the same way that real-ity is a unified whole. One might say that Spinoza is monistic not onlyin philosophy but also about philosophy itself.

Elsewhere I have argued that metaphysics is fundamental toSpinozas psychology, to his account of action and the affects (DellaRocca 1996b). In this paper, I will attempt to show that Spinozas episte-mological viewsin particular his way of dealing with a certain formof scepticismalso derive, in surprising ways, from his metaphysicalcommitments, commitments that also underlie his psychology.

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Mind, Vol. 116 . 464 . October 2007 Della Rocca 2007

1. Naturalism and bifurcation

To illuminate these commitments, it will be helpful to begin withSpinozas naturalism, and to understand his naturalism it will be help-ful to focus for the moment on Spinozas psychology. In the preface topart III of the Ethics, Spinoza famously contrasts his account of theaffects with those of his predecessors such as Descartes:

Most of those who have written about the affects, and men's way of living,seem to treat not of natural things, which follow the common laws of Nature,but of things which are outside Nature. Indeed they seem to conceive manin Nature as a dominion within a dominion. For they believe that man dis-

turbs, rather than follows [magis perturbare, quam sequi], the order of Na-ture. (G II, p. 137)1

He goes on, later in the preface, to articulate his own view of the placeof man in nature and in so doing he also gives his clearest statement ofwhat I take to be his naturalism:

nothing happens in Nature which can be attributed to any defect in it, forNature is always the same, and its virtue and power of acting are everywherethe same, that is, the laws and rules of Nature, according to which all thingshappen, and change from one form to another, are always and everywherethe same, namely through the universal laws and rules of Nature. (G II,p. 138)

Spinozas problem with Cartesian and other accounts of the affects isthat such views introduce an objectionable bifurcation between humanbeings and the rest of reality. Here we have non-human nature whichoperates according to one set of laws and here we have another part ofrealityhuman beingswhich operates according to a different set oflaws or, perhaps, no laws at all.

By contrast, Spinozas own view is one according to which humanbeings and the rest of reality are not explained in such different waysone according to which human beings and all else operate according tothe same laws. Such a unification of explanatory principles is the heartof Spinozas naturalism about psychology: human psychology is gov-erned by the same principles that govern rocks and tables and dogs.More generally, Spinozas naturalism, as I understand it, is the view thatthere are no illegitimate bifurcations in reality.

What exactly, in Spinozas eyes, is so bad about such bifurcation? Acrucial clue comes when Spinoza says that, on the view he rejects, mandisturbs rather than follows the order of nature. The fact that, on this

1 I generally follow Curleys translations of Spinozas works. I employ a minor variant of Cur-leys method of citing passages from the Ethics.


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Spinoza and the Metaphysics of Scepticism 853


view, human beings disturb the order in the rest of reality suggests thathuman beings cause changes in the rest of reality or that the rest of real-ity acts on human beings, but that these dependence relations betweenhuman beings and other things cannot be understood in terms of lawsat work generally.

How then are these relations of dependence to be explained? First ofall, it is important to note that, for Spinoza, the relations must be ableto be explained. Spinozas Principle of Sufficient Reason would requiresuch explanationmore on this in a moment. But, again, how toexplain the relations? If they cannot be explained in terms of laws at

work generally, then perhaps they are explained in terms of special,local laws of naturehuman interaction, as it were. These local lawscould not be derived from general laws at work throughout nature forthen the behaviour of human beings would, after all, be susceptible to,explicable in terms of, general laws. So the behaviour, in so far as it isexplained in terms of local laws, would be explained in terms of irre-ducibly local laws. But then a version of our question arises again: whydo these local laws hold, if they are not derived from more generallyapplicable laws? Because they would be local, such laws would seem,well, anomalous, inexplicable. From the perspective of the general laws,there is no way, as it were, to see these local laws as coming, no way toderive these local laws. And thus the relations explained by the local

laws would be, in a way, still brute precisely because brute laws wouldexplain them. Thus, for Spinoza, disturbances are disturbing becausethey are ultimately inexplicable, because their occurrence would consti-tute brute facts.

In general, for Spinoza, whenever there is a dominion within adominion, that is, whenever there are two kind of things that operateaccording to different principles and are none the less dependent oneach other in some way, then the ways in which these things aredependent on each other are disturbances and, ultimately, inexplicable.

And what is so bad about inexplicable facts? The answer fromSpinoza would be prompt and forceful: inexplicable facts are ruled out

because they violate the Principle of Sufficient Reason (hereafter thePSR), according to which each fact has an explanation.2 In this light,

2 The clearest statement is in 1p11d2: For each thing there must be assigned a cause or reasonboth for its existence and for its nonexistence. The PSR can be seen also in, for example, 1ax2:What cannot be conceived through another, must be conceived through itself. This presupposesthat each thing must be conceived, and Spinoza makes clear that to conceive of something is to ex-plain it. See the discussion Della Rocca 1996a, pp. 34.


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we can see Spinozas naturalismhis attack against illegitimate bifur-cations in realityas stemming from his rationalist commitment tothe PSR. Disturbances of the natural order are disturbing preciselybecause they are inexplicable.

Some of Spinozas most characteristic views flow from his naturalis-tic rejection of inexplicable bifurcations. We can see Spinozas famousdenial of mental-physical causal interaction in this light. For Spinoza,there is no way to explain mental changes in terms of physical changes,or physical changes in terms of mental changes. This is because Spinozaholds (and here Descartes more or less agrees3) that there are no con-

ceptual connections between the mental and the physical. That is, fromthe concept of a physical entity, one cannot derive any conclusionsabout the existence or nature of a mental entity, and vice versa. 4 In theabsence of such conceptual connections between the mental and thephysical, Spinoza holds that any dependence between them would beinexplicable. It is actually not clear why Spinoza holds that there is noconceptual connection between the mental and the physical, and thus itis not clear why he holds that any dependence between them would beinexplicable. This is a sore point between me and Spinoza. But giventhat he does regard mentalphysical dependence as inexplicable for thisreason, he invokes the PSR to deny that there is any such dependence.5

Spinoza finds intolerable what he takes to be the Cartesian view that,

despite the unintelligibility of mentalphysical dependence, there isnone the less causal interaction and dependence between the two. ForDescartes, according to Spinoza, mindbody interactiongiven thisconceptual separationis inexplicable. Butand here Spinozarecoilsthat does not stop Descartes from insouciantly proclaimingthat there is none the less such interaction. Spinoza saves a rare bit ofinvective for Descartes on precisely this point. In the Preface to Part Vof the Ethics, he objects to the hypothesis of mindbody interaction asa hypothesis more occult than any occult quality. He goes on to chideDescartes this way in the Preface:

3 Thus in Comments on a Certain Broadsheet, Descartes says that attributes which constitute thenatures of things are such that the concept of the one is not contained in the concept of the other

(AT VIII-2, pp. 34950, CSM I, p. 298).

4 See, for example, 3p2: The body cannot determine the mind to thinking, and the mind can-not determine the body to motion, to rest, or to anything else ( if there is anything else). This claimderives ultimately from 1p10: Each attribute of a substance must be conceived through itself.

5 In light of such independence, how can Spinoza also hold, as he does in 2p7s, that the mindand the body are identical? That is a long story and one that ultimately also turns on the PSR. SeeDella Rocca 1996a, Chs. 7 and 8.


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he had conceived the mind to be so distinct from the body that he could notassign any singular cause, either of this union or of the mind itself. Instead,it was necessary for him to have recourse to the cause of the whole universe,that is, to God. (G II, p. 27980)

Finally, Spinoza emphasizes that his concern is with the inexplicabilityof mentalphysical interaction in this passage:

since there is no common measure between the will and motion [cum nulladetur ratio voluntatis ad motum], there is also no comparison between thepower, or forces, of the mind and those of the body. Consequently, the forcesof the body cannot in any way be determined by those of the mind. (G II,p. 280)

Here again Spinoza rejects a bifurcation between two kinds of thingthat are related to one another in inexplicable ways, two things thatseem merely tacked on to one another. In this way, Cartesian interac-tionism is a violation of Spinozistic naturalism and ultimately, forSpinoza, of the PSR.

In the same naturalistic light, we can see Spinozas rejection of a Car-tesian duality of will and intellect. On a Cartesian view (and whetherthis is the view of Descartes himself is a question I leave open here),there are two radically different kinds of mental states: ideas, states ofthe intellect which, by their very nature, represent things and are purelypassive, and volitions which may indeed mustbe directed at ideas

but which also involve a non-representational bit of mental powerwhich ideas, as such, do not have.6 States of each kind are needed inorder for an agent to believe something. The idea provides the contentto be accepted, rejected or doubted, and the volition provides the men-tal power needed to take up one of these attitudes toward the idea. Thevolition and the idea join together in this way to produce a belief.

Spinozas complaint about this picture is that it involves illegitimateconnections between radically disparate things. For Spinoza, the repre-sentational ideas and non-representational volitions (or at least thenon-representational element in volitions) have too little in common tobe able to enter intelligibly into relations of dependence. There is, as in

the mentalphysical case, no common measure between will and intel-lect in terms of which to make their dependence intelligible. It is truethat a volition and an idea are each purported to be mental items, buttheir differences are so radical that there is, it seems, nothing in virtueof which they are both to be classified as mental and nothing in virtueof which a volition and an idea can have any relations of dependence.

6 See, for example, The Passions of the SoulI, 17, and also Descartess letter to Regius, May1641(AT III, p. 372; CSMK, p. 182).


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For Spinoza, from the nature of ideas as ideas there is no way to see thevolitions coming, just as from the nature of a physical change, there isno way to see a mental change coming.7

Spinoza thus sees Descartes as falling prey to an analogue of themindbody problem within the mind itself. In both the mindbodycase and the willintellect case, Spinoza challenges the Cartesianacceptance of inexplicable relations of dependence between apparentlydisparate things. Spinozas approaches to these problems differ in thatin the mindbody case, he accepts the Cartesian conceptual independ-ence of the mental and the physical, whereas he rejects the Cartesian

disparity between the will and the intellect. Spinoza holds, instead, thatideas and volitions are identical and that ideas are inherently active. Inboth cases, though, Spinoza rejects any inexplicable relations ofdependence between the entities in question.

With regard to the nature ofbelief, this anti-Cartesian view emergesas the claim that all ideas, as such, are inherently assented to, no sepa-rate act of will is required. Of course, not all ideas are believed, but forSpinoza this is only because other ideas, other representations, havemore power and prevent a given idea from leading to action. This rela-tive powerlessness of an idea is what leads us to say that that idea is notbelieved, and the relative power of an idea is what leads us to say that itis believed. Thepowerin the mind comes solely from the ideas them-

selves. There are no separate volitions. To think that there are would,for Spinoza, be to introduce an unacceptable bifurcation within themind in violation of both his naturalism and the PSR.

For Spinoza, the feature of ideas that is responsible for their activityis simply their representational character. Ideas as such are of things,represent things. Thus Spinoza defines ideas as concepts of the mind(2def3). And, for Spinoza, the representational features of ideas exhausttheir features. That is, every other feature of an idea must derive insome way from its representational features. For again, consider: ifthere were some non-representational feature of ideas over and abovetheir representational features, and if these representational and non-

representational features entered into relations of dependence, thengiven their disparity how could they intelligibly be said to be related inthis way? Thus thepowerof an idea must derive solely from its repre-sentational character, from the fact that the idea represents such-and-

7 I have documented elsewhere the case for seeing this kind of concern with illegitimate interac-tion as grounding Spinozas rejection of a Cartesian bifurcation between will and intellect (DellaRocca 2003a). The main evidence is that Spinozas uses of the parallelism doctrine and his v iewthat all mental states derive from representational states seem to be premised upon his views aboutthe explanatory self-sufficiency of thought.


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such a thing in such-and-such a way. Further, there can be no qualita-tive or phenomenal features of ideas over and above their representa-tional features. Thus Spinoza holds a representational theory of themind.8 This is Spinozas naturalism at work, yet again ruling out inex-plicable bifurcation in the same way that he did in the case of mindbody interaction and in the case of the Cartesian account of the affects.

It is as if Spinoza is pleading with us this way:

The intuitive unease that we allor at least very many of usfeelabout mindbody interaction is at bottom an unease about unintelli-gible relations between disparate things and an unease about

violations of naturalism. And if you feel this unease, that is, if youhave even a shred of rationalism (and all you need is a shred), thenyou should feel equally uneasy about seeing anything else in themind besides representations and the representational features ofmental states.

That Spinoza wantsand has principled reasons for wantingtocharacterize all the features of mind in terms of representation is clear.But how representation can do all the jobs that are thus required of it isfar from clear. I will return to a version of this question in the final sec-tion of this paper where I show that, for Spinoza, the epistemic status ofa given mental statewhether it amounts to knowledge or certainty or

whether it fails to do sois also purely a function of that states repre-sentational features.

But first I want to call attention to an important twist in Spinozasuse of the PSR that emerges in his discussion of the relation betweenwill and intellect. As we have just seen, Spinoza insists that the relationbetween will and intellect, idea and volition must not be inexplicable orbrute. But now in meeting this demand that the relation be intelligible,Spinoza brings in a further use of the PSR. What volition must be inorder for there to be no violation of the PSR is simply representationitself. Volition is nothing but representation; mental action is nothingbut representation.

But what, for Spinoza, is representation? This is a big question, and Ican only touch on it here. The key point for our purposes is that, forSpinoza, to represent a thing is to explain it or to find it intelligible.This is evident from an important passage in his early, unfinished work,On the Emendation of the Intellect(Tractatus de Intellectus Emendatione;hereafter TdIE):

8 Leibniz holds a similar view. See Simmons 2001.


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if by chance we should say that men are changed in a moment into beasts,that is said very generally, so that there is in the mind no concept, i.e. idea,or connection of subject and predicate. For if there were any concept, themind would see together the means and causes, how and why such a thingwas done. (62)

That Spinoza holds that to represent a thing is to explain it also emergesexplicitly from the crucial fourth axiom of Part I of the Ethics: theknowledge of an effect depends on, and involves, the knowledge of itscause.9 It is important to note that although Spinoza speaks here ofknowledge literally cognition he also often phrases this claim in

terms of ideas.

10

This suggests strongly that he sees himself as placing arequirement on representation itself, on what it is to have an idea of athing. Spinoza makes a similar claim in letter 60 where he says, the ideaor definition [idea sive definitio] of a thing should express its efficientcause (G IV, p. 270). Spinoza says here that to represent a thing, to havethe idea of it, is to explain it.11 We represent things by seeing them in anexplanatory network. This is, of course, a highly unusual claim: weseem to be perfectly able to have ideas of things that we cannot explain,indeed of things of whose causes we are completely ignorant. ButSpinoza is, in some way, denying this common sense view. I think hehas interesting and provocative reasons for this denial, and we will seesome of those later in this paper.

Right now, however, we can see that, given that, for Spinoza, to rep-resent something is to explain it or to find it intelligible, in explainingwill in terms of representation, Spinoza is introducing the notion ofintelligibility in two related ways. First, the relation between will andintellect must be intelligible because Spinozas PSR requires that rela-tions and facts in general be intelligible. This is the first use of the PSR.But what will must be in order to be intelligibly related to ideas is noth-ing but representation which itself is nothing but finding a thing intelli-gible, nothing but explaining a thing in thought. This is the secondinvocation of the notion of intelligibility. So will must be intelligible,

9 Effects cognitio cognitione causae dependet, & eandem involvit.

10 See Letter 72: effectus cognitio sive idea, a cognitione sive idea causae pendeat.

11 Spinoza indicates that to see things through their causes is to explain them in 2p7s:

so long as things are considered as modes of thinking, we must explain [explicare] the order ofthe whole of nature, or the connection of causes, through the attribute of thought alone. And inso far as they are considered as modes of extension, the order of the whole of nature must beexplained [explicari] through the attribute of extension alone.


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and to be so it must be representation, that is, it must be finding some-thing intelligible. This is what I call the two-fold use of the PSR, the keyprinciple undergirding Spinozas rationalism and naturalism.12 We seesuch a two-fold use of the PSR also prominently on display in Spinozastreatment of scepticism, the topic to which I now turn.

2. Scepticism and bifurcation

I believe that Spinozas account of normativity manifests a disdain forinexplicable relations similar to that which he expresses in the other

cases we have already considered. I will focus in what follows on thecase of epistemic norms, though I believe similar points apply to moralnorms as well.

I want to argue that the sceptic is committed to some kind of primi-tive bifurcationin this case between the representational features of amental state and its meeting or failing to meet relevant epistemic stand-ards. I will then show that Spinoza sees that the sceptic is committed tosuch a primitive bifurcation and that Spinoza rejects scepticism for thisreason.

The kind of sceptic I have in mind is a certain kind of Cartesian scep-tic, one who doubts whether we have anyepistemic purchase on realityat all. This doubt emerges as a doubt even about ideas that, above all

other ideas, we take to be true. These are the ideas that are representa-tionally in order, ideas that meet the highest standards for internalcoherence: they contain no internal contradiction; they are maximallyclear and contain no confusion. One might put this by saying that sucha sceptic doubts the truth even of our clear and distinct ideas. Onemight say this, but I hasten to add that I am not putting forward anaccount of Descartess notion of clarity and distinctnessalthough Ido think Descartess notion has something to do with the notion ofbeing representationally in order. All I am doing is considering a scepticwho doubts whether ideas that are representationally in order in thisway are true. For convenience, I will from time to time invoke the

familiar Cartesian terms and call such ideas clear and distinct.I will also not have much to say on the more substantive issue of what

is involved in an ideas being representationally in order. I haveappealed to internal coherence and lack of confusion. But just what do

12 One can also see a two-fold use of the PSR in Spinozas account of representation as explana-tion. First, Spinoza demands that there be an account of what representation is, that representa-tion be explained. This is the first use of the PSR. Second, Spinoza holds that in order forrepresentation to be explained, it must be mental explanation itself. This is the second use of thenotion of explanation in this case. Thus representation is explained in terms of explanation.


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these features amount to? It is very hard to say, and I will not venture tooffer here an account of confusion in general or confusion as Spinozaor the sceptic might understand it.13 This is because the general charac-terisation of the sceptic whom I am considering does not require theresolution of these issues. All we need to specify at this point is that thesceptic I am concerned with takes ideas with a certain set of attractiverepresentat ional featurescal l these features c lar ity anddistinctnessand says that these ideas which, more than any others,we take to be true, may not be true after all.

The sceptic need not deny that there are or can be clear and distinct

ideas, but, for the sceptic these features do not constitute and, indeed,are not even necessarily connected with the certainty of the idea inquestion. More specifically, while these features may go along with themerelypsychologicalcertainty of such ideas, that is, with the fact thatsuch clear and distinct ideas are extremely compelling and perhapsimpossible to doubt while one is attending to them, they are none theless, for our sceptic, not normatively or epistemically certain. No matterhow clear and distinct the ideas are, the sceptic says, they do notamount to knowledge or genuine normative (and not merely psycho-logical) certainty. In what follows, whenever I speak of certainty I havein mind this kind of normative, not-merely-psychological certainty.

Equally, however, for the sceptic, the fact that such ideas are clear and

distinct does not by itself constitute the fact (if it is a fact) that thoseideas are notgenuinely certain. For the sceptic, these ideas fail to be cer-tain not because they are clear and distinct, but because of some furtherfeature which is independent of clarity and distinctness. Although thelack of clarity and distinctness, that is, some kind of internal incoher-ence, may entail that the idea in question is not genuinely certain anddoes not amount to knowledge, clarity and distinctness by itself doesnot, for the sceptic, entail lack of genuine certainty. So, for the sceptic,clarity and distinctness does not entail or constitute either certainty orits lack. Clarity and distinctness, on this view, is at most a merely psy-chological feature of ideas and not an epistemic one.

What, then, does constitute the epistemic status of clear and distinctideas if not their clarity and distinctness? For the sceptic, that epistemicstatus depends on epistemic features of ideas, typically other ideas.Why, on this view, doesnt a given idea amount to knowledge? Answer:because we cannot rule out the possibility, that is, we do not know orare not certain that, an evil demon (or whatever) is not making it thecase that the idea is false despite its clarity and distinctness and despite

13 For some steps toward an account of confusion in Spinoza, see Della Rocca 1996a, Ch. 3.


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its seeming to us to be true. For the sceptic, being certain of an ideadepends on being certain of such things as that God is not a deceiver.For the sceptic, if,per impossibile perhaps, the idea were to amount toknowledge or certainty, that would only be because we were alreadycertain, for example, that God is no deceiver.

We can see then that, for the kind of radical sceptic we are consider-ing, there is a sharp divide between epistemic features of ideas (i.e.whether or not they are genuinely certain) and other features such asclarity and distinctness. And it is precisely because of this separationthat the sceptic gets his scepticism going. If the epistemic status of

ideasor at least the certainty or positive epistemic status of ideaswere simply a function of their clarity and distinctness, then we wouldautomatically have certainty just by having clear and distinct ideas.(Recall that this sceptic does not deny that we have clear and distinctideas.) But because the epistemic status of ideas is a feature separatefrom clarity and distinctness, the door is left open for the sceptic. If thesceptic sees even an inch of daylight here, he will exploit it for all it isworth: for once the distinction is allowed, any putative fact that mightbe invoked to close the gap between clarity-and-distinctness, on theone hand, and truth, on the other, would itself be called into doubt andso could not legitimately close the gap. This is, of course, the problemof the Cartesian Circle.

Someone might try to allow the sceptic his daylight between clarity-and-distinctness and truth, and still hope to show that certainty can beachieved. I do not think that this is a promising strategy, and the his-tory of attempts to resolve the problem of the Circle bears me outhere.14 In any event, I will not explore that strategy here because I donot think it is Spinozas strategy. Instead, I want to focus on astrategySpinozas strategythat challenges the sceptics basic thesisthat there is a separation between epistemic and non-epistemic featuresof ideas.

This separation is what I have called a primitive bifurcation. As wehave just seen, from the representational features of an idea, in particu-

lar from the clarity and distinctness of an idea, we can draw no conclu-sion either way about the epistemic status of the idea. The epistemicstatus derives, in general, not from the ideas representational qualities,but from the epistemic status of other ideas. Of course, the epistemicstatus does require, and thus depend on, the ideas having some repre-

14 For some discussion and further references, see Della Rocca 2005. I should say also that, forreasons I explain in that paper, Descartess actual way of dealing with the Cartesian Circle is surpris-ingly close to the way of dealing with the sceptic that I find in Spinoza. See also n. 28 in this paper.


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sentational character, but the key point here is that epistemic statuscannot be derived from the representational features of ideas alone.And, obviously, the representational features of an idea cannot bederived from its epistemic status. For the sceptic, just by knowing thatan idea does not amount to knowledge, we cannot infer that the idea isor is not clear and distinct or that it represents such-and-such an objectin such-and-such a way. Thus we can see that, although the epistemicstatus of an idea is in some way dependent on its representational fea-tures, the epistemic status and representational features are merelytacked on to one another: there is no way to explain the connection

between the representational features of an idea and its epistemicstatus.

We can see this point in the following way: starting just from the rep-resentational character of an idea and even presupposing the represen-tational character of other ideas as well, there is no way intelligibly toget to the epistemic status of that (or any other) idea. From the repre-sentational character alone, there is just no way to see the epistemic sta-tus coming, as it were. And from epistemic status alone there is no wayto see the representational character coming.

We have seen this phenomenon already: in the will/intellect case,from intellect alone, from the nature of ideas qua ideas, there is no wayto see the distinct Cartesian volitions coming. In the same way, on the

Cartesian view from a physical change, there is no way to see a mentalchange coming. In each case, there is a relation of dependence betweentwo things that must remain inexplicable, and in each case Spinozawould rule out this relation for precisely this reason.

Again, I believe, Spinoza would plead with us this way:

If you feel an unease about the inexplicable relations, on the Carte-sian view, between the mind and the body, the will and the intellect,etc., then you should feel equally uneasy about the inexplicable rela-tion between representational character and epistemic status that isat the heart of the sceptical position.

Spinoza would point out, in effect, that what is wrong with scepticism isthat it conflicts with naturalism by introducing an illegitimate bifurca-tion between features of ideas and that, ultimately, it conflicts with thePSR in much the same way that various other Cartesian dualisms do.

The Spinozistic position I am presenting thus seeks to make scepti-cism vulnerable by laying bare its implicit and surprising metaphysicalcommitments: in particular, its commitment to the rejection of natu-ralism and, consequently, of the PSR. But, of course, this attack on


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scepticism is only as plausible as Spinozas case for both naturalism andthe PSR. We will see later how Spinoza might motivate these theses. Butfirst it will be helpful to see just how the view that I have attributed toSpinoza on scepticism emerges from Spinozas texts.

3. Spinozas texts and the two-fold use

Where does Spinoza say that scepticism involves a primitive bifurcationof features of ideas? An appropriate place to begin is Spinozas crypticclaim that truth is its own standard (2p43s).15 At least part of what

Spinoza means by this is that the certainty of a given idea does notderive from anything external to the idea. As Spinoza puts this point inTdIE 35 it is clear that, for the certainty of truth, no other sign isneeded than having a true idea. Or, as Spinoza explains more pictur-esquely in 2p43s:

What can there be which is clearer and more certain than a true idea, to serveas a standard of truth? As the light makes both itself and the darkness plain,so truth is the standard both of itself and of the false.

But what, for Spinoza, is it about a certain idea that makes it certain?Spinoza is quite clear that the certainty of an idea stems from its repre-sentational character. Spinoza says in TdIE 35, certainty is nothing

but the objective essence itself, i.e., the mode by which we are aware[sentimus] of the formal essence is certainty itself .16 The objectiveessence of a thing is just the representation of that things essence. SoSpinoza is saying that certainty is just representation itself.17

For Spinoza, then, by having a particular representational character,an idea is certain. In order for an idea that one has to be certain, onedoes not have to take the representational features as given and then askthe question: in virtue of what is an idea with these representationalfeatures certain (if it is certain)? No, Spinozas point is that the idea iscertain by virtue of its representational features alone. Spinoza sums itup in TdIE 36:

truth requires no sign, but it suffices, in order to remove all doubt, to have

the objective essences of things, or, what is the same, ideas.

15 Veritas sui sit norma (G II, p. 124). See also Short Treatise II, Ch. 15 (G I, p. 789).

16 certitudo nihil sit praeter ipsam essentiam objectivam; id est, modus, quo sentimus essentiamformalem, est ipsa certitudo.

17 Spinozas focus on essencesobjective and formalis due, I believe, to his view that onerepresents a thing by representing its essence. I will not go into the motivations for that view herewhich I discuss in Della Rocca 1996a, Ch. 5, and which is, I think, connected with his viewdiscussed elsewhere in this paperthat to represent a thing is to explain it.


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In these passages, Spinoza thus clearly removes the bifurcation betweenrepresentational character and epistemic status that is the hallmark ofscepticism. This is, I believe, strong evidence for the interpretation Ihave offered.

Is there any evidence that Spinoza sees this daylight as objectionablefor the reasons I have suggested that is, because it involves a primitivebifurcation, a brute fact, a gratuitous tacking-on? There is indeed. Inillustrating the point that ideas are inherently certain in 2p43s, Spinozasays that those who deny this view must see ideas as mute pictures on atablet. This is precisely the same metaphor he later uses in discussing

opponents of his thesis that the will and intellect are identical (2p49s, GII, p. 132). The key point in the case of the will is that ideasrepresentationsare inherently active, volitions, and not mute pic-tures. As I indicated earlier, Spinoza holds the thesis of the inherentactivity of ideas because to see the activity as imposed on ideas fromwithout (by a separate act of will) would be to introduce a kind of ille-gitimate interaction between an active, but non-representational men-tal item and a representational but purely passive mental item (seeDella Rocca 2003a). So in tying this doctrine about ideas inherentactivity to his doctrine about ideas inherent certainty, Spinoza linksthat doctrine about certainty to his pervasive concerns about illegiti-mate relations between disparate things.18

Here we see in Spinoza another instance of the two-fold use of thePSR. In effect, Spinozas first question in broaching the topic of cer-tainty is: what is certainty? In virtue of what is an idea certain? Or, moregenerally, in virtue of what does an idea meet or fail to meet particularepistemic standards? Spinoza does not want it to be a brute fact that anidea has a particular epistemic status, as it is for the sceptic who sepa-rates representational character and epistemic status. This is the firstuse of the PSR in this case. His second use emerges when he tells uswhat certainty is: it is representation itself. But representation is, forSpinoza, as we have seen, simplyfinding something intelligible or expli-cable. So in representing things we see them as intelligible or explicable,

as conforming to the PSR. This is the second use of the notion of intel-ligibility or of the PSR in this case. For Spinoza, not only must certainty

18 There is a similar linking of Spinozas views on certainty and his identification of will and in-tellect in note n of TdIE in 34. There in discussing the inherent certainty of an idea, Spinoza saysrevealingly:

Note that here we are not asking how the first objective essence is in us. For that pertains to theinvestigation of nature, where we explain these things more fully, and at the same time showthat apart from the idea there is neither affirmation, nor negation nor any will.

One could say that Spinoza redeems this promissory note in the latter stages of Part II of the Ethics.


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or epistemic status not be a brute fact, not only must certainty be intel-ligible, but the only way for epistemic status to be intelligible is for it tobe nothing but representation or finding something intelligible. Just aswill is understood in terms of representation or finding somethingintelligible, so too is certainty to be understood in these terms.

In tying certainty to representation in this way, Spinoza faces animmediate problem: if certainty is a function of representation, thenwhy should we not conclude that allideas are certain? After all, all ideasjust are, as we have noted, representations. In answering the sceptic inSpinozas way, we seem to have gone from one extremeall ideas are

doubtfulto the other all ideas are certain. How then, for Spinoza,can ideas fail to be certain?19 Spinozas answer would be that just asideas are certain in virtue of their representational features, so too theyfail to be certain in virtue of their representational features. HereSpinoza would appeal to the notionsthe representational notionsof unclarity and confusion. Ideas are certain to the extent to which theyare clear and distinct, and they are uncertain to the extent that they failto have these representational qualities. Thus Spinoza speaks of theprivation of knowledge which inadequate, or mutilated and confused,ideas involve (2p35). Of course, we are still in need of a full-blownSpinozistic account of confusion (not to mention mutilation!), but wecan see in general terms at least that, for Spinoza, all epistemic status

positive and negativeis to be cashed out in terms of representation.

4. How does representation pull this off?

Spinozas account up to this point whatever else you might think ofitseems to be an ambitious attempt to see certainty as inherent to atleast some ideas, to see certainty as just a function of representation.But unless Spinoza has an account of how mere representation can pulloffthis epistemic trick, his response to the sceptic will seem unmoti-vated. How, then, for Spinoza does representation constitute certainty?The answer turns on Spinozas rationalism. In answering this question,

I will, as before, focus on the positive casefully certain ideasandonly glancingly engage the issue of how ideas that are less than fully cer-tain have this lesser status in virtue of representation. I will approachthis question also by asking, in the first instance, how the representa-tional character of ideas can, by itself, guarantee the truth of the ideas.

19 A similar problem arises from Spinozas parallelism which seems to entail that all ideas aretrue. For discussion of this problem, see Della Rocca 1996a, Ch. 6. See also Short Treatise II, 16, 7(G I, p. 83).


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After that, I will more briefly consider how, given that representationcan guarantee truth, it can also constitute the certainty of the idea.

How then does representational character guarantee truth? Recallthat, for Spinoza, to represent something is just to explain it, to find itintelligible. For simplicity, I will put this point by saying that represen-tation is mental intelligibility. So our question becomes: why does find-ing something intelligible guarantee the truth of propositionsconcerning that thing? Why should even the clearest, most coherentidea be true? This is at bottom the same sceptical question with whichwe began.

To answer this question about truth, let us dig down to another ques-tion: what is it in virtue of which a given proposition is true? This is aperfectly natural question to askespecially for a rationalist, such asSpinoza, who is always asking in virtue of questions. The naturalanswer is that the truth of a proposition consists in the fact that theproposition is of a certain state of affairs which exists or obtains. Let usbracket the question of what it is for a proposition to be of a given stateof affairs20 and focus instead on what it is for a state of affairs or indeedanything to exist. In other words, what does existence consist in? Thistoo is, I believe, a perfectly natural question for a rationalist to ask.Indeed, I think it is natural full stop. We want to be able to say what it isthat distinguishes states of affairs or things in general that do not exist

from states of affairs or things that do. What is it that J. K. Rowling hasthat Harry Potter lacks? Or what is it that Bushs being president of theUnited States has that, say, my being president lacks? Without such anaccount, there would be an inexplicable relation between true proposi-tions and false ones: in virtue of what are just these propositions trueand these false? There would be no good answer to this question if welacked an account of what it is for a proposition to be true, to be suchthat a given state of affairs which the proposition is about exists. Andprecisely because there are relations of dependence between existingstates of affairs and non-existing states of affairs (e.g. certain states ofaffairs fail to exist because other states of affairs do exist), this inexplica-

ble division between states of affairs would count as an illegitimatebifurcation in the terminology of this paper.

In this respect, existence is analogous to causation. Reductionistsabout causation believe it is perfectly natural to demand that an

20 Presumably, Spinozas answer would be that in keeping with or at least in analogy to hisparallelism of2p7 and 2p7s a proposition is of a given state of affairs by entering into depend-ence relations among other propositions that mirror the dependence relations among that statesof affairs themselves.


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account be given of causation, that it be possible to specify what unitesthe various cases of causation between events and distinguishes thosecases from ones in which events are not causally related. To leave thisdifference between two kind of cases primitive or inexplicable would, inthe terminology of this paper, be to introduce an illegitimate bifurca-tion. Reductionists have offered various accounts, but they agree on thelegitimacy of the demand. I have sketched elsewhere (Della Rocca2003b) an account of causation as conceptual connection, developingwhat I take to be Spinozas account (and introducing yet anotherinstance of the two-fold use of the PSR). But that specific account is not

something that I am pressing here, rather I just want to point out thatthe demand for an account of causation seems perfectly natural,though not, of course, uncontroversial. In the same way, I think that thedemand for an account of existence is perfectly natural.

What account, then, does Spinoza offer? For Spinoza, for a thing toexist is simply for that thing to be intelligible or conceivable, that is, forthe thing to be capable of being explained. If you want a slogan, thentake this: existence is intelligibility. I have made the case in detail else-where (Della Rocca 2003b) for attributing this view to Spinoza. Let megive a few highlights here. For Spinoza, Gods essence is identical toGods existence (1p20). Further, Gods essence is just the fact that God isself-conceived or intelligible through himself.21 Spinozas view is that

what holds for God also holds for other things, that is, to use the lingo,for Gods modes. Of course, modes are not self-conceived as God is.Rather, their essence is to be conceived through something else, namelyGod (see 1def5, the definition of mode). None the less, just as Godsexistence is Gods intelligibility, the fact that God is intelligible, so toothe existence of anything else just is the fact that that thing is intelligible.Thus Spinoza says in 1p25s: God must be called the cause of all things inthe same sense in which he is called the cause of himself. Now God iscause of himself in the sense that Gods essence makes God conceivableor intelligible and this intelligibility is Gods existence. If, as Spinozasays in 1p25s, God is the cause of a mode in the same sense in which he

21 See the definition of substance, 1def3, and keep in mind both that God is defined as a sub-stance, and that, as Spinoza says in 3p4d for example, the definition of a thing states its essence.Spinoza actually defines a substance as that which is not only self-conceived, but also as that whichis in itself. So perhaps Gods essence is for God to be self-conceived andin itself. Perhaps, then,Gods essence is not simply Gods being intelligible through himself, it also consists in part inGods being in himself. However, I believe that ultimately the in-itself relation is not different fromthe conceived-through-itself relation. I cannot fully develop this point here, but I would argue thatsuch an identity holds for Spinoza because there is nothing in virtue of which the two relationscould be different, and therefore a distinction between the in-itself relation and the conceived-through-itself relation would be an illegitimate bifurcation.


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is the cause of himself, then Spinoza must mean that Gods essencemakes the mode intelligible and this intelligibility is the existence of themode. So, given that Gods existence is his intelligibility, I do not seehow God could be the cause of modes in the same sense as he is cause ofhimself unless the existence of modes is their intelligibility. Thus, forSpinoza, the mere intelligibility of a thing is the existence of that thing.Other things differ from God only in that God is intelligible throughhimself and modes are not, but are rather intelligible only through God.Still, in all cases, the existence of a thing is its intelligibility.

Spinozas view that existence just is intelligibility represents another

two-fold use of the PSR. Spinoza requires that existence be explained.This demand is an application of the PSR and represents the first use. Insaying that existence is explained in terms of conceivability or intelligibil-ity or explicability, Spinoza says, after insisting on a demand for an expla-nation of existence, that existence is explained in terms of explicability,that is, it is conceived in terms of conceivability. This second use of thenotion of intelligibility is the second fold in the two-fold use of the PSR.

This view that existence requires an explanation and that it isexplained in terms of intelligibility itself has a number of striking conse-quences, only three of which I will highlight here. First, since for some-thing to exist is for it to be intelligible, then something that does notexist must literally be unintelligible. What does not exist does not exist

precisely because it cannot be coherently conceived, that is, because itsexistence would involve a brute fact. For Spinoza, the realm of existenceexhausts the realm of the conceivable or intelligible. This claim is at theheart of Spinozas necessitarianism, a thesis I take Spinoza to be express-ing in 1p33: Things could have been produced by God in no other way,and in no other order than they have been produced.22

The second consequence is even more striking. And this is so becausethis consequence is not a consequence of the claim that existence isintelligibility, but of the apparently tamer claim that existence requiressome kind of explanation in much the same way that, according to thereductionist, causation does. To say that existence is explicable is to say

that for each existing thing, there is something in virtue of which itexists, something that explains its existence. This statement is, however,tantamount to a version of the PSR, the claim (in part) that there is asufficient reason for the existence of each thing that exists. One can see

22 For a different and more detailed defense of a necessitarian reading of Spinoza, see Garrett

1991. Curley and Walski 1999 mounts a powerful defense of a non-necessitarian reading ofSpinoza. I cannot here enter directly into this debate.


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the considerations I just raised as providing an argument for the PSR. Ifone finds plausible the view that existence needs to be explained, onewill also find the PSR plausible.23

One can see Spinoza as pleading with us in this way to accept thePSR:

If (as all right-thinking people are) you are at all uneasy about seeingcausation as a primitive relation, about regarding the distinction be-tween cases of causation and cases in which events are not causallyrelated as a primitive distinction; if you are at all uneasy about thekind of unintelligible connections that mindbody interaction would

involve on the Cartesian view; if you are at all uneasy about seeing, asDescartes does, human psychology and behaviour as not covered bythe laws at work throughout nature; if you are at all uneasy about thesharp divide between representational and non-representational fea-tures of mental states, a divide that Descartes and many otherphilosophers accept, then you will also have positive reason to see ex-istence as requiring an explanation, to see the distinction betweentrue propositions and false ones as not primitive. And if one does ac-cept the explicability of existence, then one is committed to the PSR.

Here then one can see the motivation for the kind of rationalism andnaturalism in terms of which I have framed my discussion of Spinoza.

Finally, the claim that existence is intelligibility helps us to identifythe sources of Spinozas view that to represent something is to find itintelligible. Start with the plausible assumption that to represent some-thing is to represent its existence.24 Then consider that, given the iden-tity, for Spinoza, between the existence of a thing and its intelligibility,it follows that when we represent a thing, we represent its existence,that is we represent its intelligibility, that is we represent the way it isexplained. Thus Spinozas rationalist identification of existence andintelligibility leads to his view that to represent a thing is to explain it. 25

23 Portions of this and the previous three paragraphs have been adapted from Della Rocca

2003b24 Perhaps Kant is making this point in his criticism of the ontological argument when he says,

when I think a thing, through whichever and however many predicates I like, not the least bitgets added to the thing when I posit in addition that this thing is (Kant 1781/1787, A600/B628).Perhaps Hume makes the same point: the idea of existence is nothing different from the idea ofany object, and when after the simple conception of any thing we woud conceive it as existent, wein reality make no addition to or alteration of our first idea (Hume 1739, p. 94).

25 There is, perhaps, still a gap between representing the explanation of a thing and explainingthat thing. Perhaps. But in any event, this line of thought helps us at least to begin to see whySpinoza holds that to represent a thing is to explain it.


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One challenge to this argument might be the following: even if exist-ence is identical to intelligibility, it need not follow that representing athings existence is representing its intelligibility. Perhaps one is notaware of the identity between existence and intelligibility, and so theinference does not go through. I think that this objection can be obvi-ated by pointing out that there is good reason to think not only thatexistence and intelligibility are identical for Spinoza, but also that theconcept of the existence of a thing just is the concept of its intelligibility.If this is so, then existence and intelligibility are not just metaphysicallyidentical, but, as we might say, conceptually identical. This even more

intimate connection between existence and intelligibility allows theinference to go forward. But where does Spinoza say that the concept ofexistence just is the concept of intelligibility? Perhaps the clearest indi-cation comes from the definitions of substance and mode (substanceand mode exhaust the things that exist). Spinoza defines thesenotionsat least in part26in terms of the way in which these thingsare conceived or explained. Thus, it seems that for Spinoza the conceptof a thing is the concept of something that is explained in some way.From here it is but a short step to say that the concept of the existenceof a thing is the concept of its intelligibility.

Let us come down to earth now and return to the mundane matter ofradical scepticism and to the problem I identified in Spinozas response

to scepticism. We now have the resources to make progress on thisproblem. The problem was this: there seems to be no connectionbetween what I have called mental intelligibility that is, for Spinoza,representationand truth. Why should finding a proposition intelligi-ble be correlated with the truth of that proposition? Or, why shouldfinding something intelligible be correlated with the existence of thatthing? The answer should now be clear: given that the intelligibility of athing is, for Spinoza, just the existence of that thing, it follows that infinding something intelligible, one is grasping its existence. So, forSpinoza, it is incoherent to supposeas the sceptic doesthat onefinds something intelligible and yet that thing does not exist. This then

is the connection between mental intelligibilityfinding somethingintelligibleand truth.

This connection between representationmental intelligibilityand truth may seem to be in tension with Spinozas explanatory barrierbetween the attributes. Consider the representation or idea of a body.This representation, as I am arguing, is by its nature a grasp of the exist-ence of that body. Thus there is a connection between a representation

26 See n. 21.


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and an extended state of affairs. This connection may seem to goagainst the explanatory barrier because a particular representation ishere explained (at least partially) in terms of an extended state ofaffairs. But this is not so: there is no such explanatory relation. Yes,there is guaranteed to be an extended state of affairs for each represen-tation. This guarantee flows not from the nature of thought or of exten-sion in particular, but simply from Spinozas parallelism between theattributes as outlined in 2p7 and 2p7s. The explanation of the idea of abody of the representation of a body is not the body itself, butrather another idea, namely the idea of the cause of the body. The

explanatory chain of ideas is not disturbed by any extended state ofaffairs (and, vice versa, the explanatory chain of extended states ofaffairs is not disturbed by any ideas). Because each explanatory chainremains pure, the explanatory barrier is preserved.

I mentioned earlier that even if there is such a connection betweenmental intelligibility and truth, it may not follow that when one findssomething intelligible one is therebycertain. Certainty, of course,requires more than just truth. However, what we are talking about hereis not just intelligibility, but mentalintelligibility, that is, finding some-thing intelligible, knowing that it is intelligible. For Spinoza, given thatintelligibility is existence and, indeed, that the concept of existence justis the concept of intelligibility, knowing that something is intelligible is

already knowing that it exists. For Spinoza, seeing that something isintelligible, that is, being able to explain it, is already being certain thatit exists.

Of course, the ability to explain something can come in degrees.Confusiona representational feature of mental statescan cloudour grasp of e

della rocca, m - spinoza and the metaphysics of scepticism

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