著者

木島 泰三

出版者

法政大学文学部

雑誌

法政大学文学部紀要 = Bulletin of the Faculty of Letters, Hosei University (ISSN:04412486)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.82, pp.77-92, 2021-03-15

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As demonstrated in our previous paper, according to Spinoza’s agent-causation model, a thing’s conatus (striving) to produce or maintain its affectio (act or state) and its determinatio (causal determination) to produce or maintain its affecto are identical. Such conatus/determinatio bears predicational contents and thereby corresponds to the mental affirmation of ideas in the divine infinite intellect that comprises human minds. In this paper, we propose that Spinozistic mental representations are substantially based on the conatus/determinatio viewing a thing’s action or agent-causation as divine self-predication. For example, when a dog runs, the dog divinely selfpredicates its running as its affectio of itself as a subject. Such predication is self-reflexive in two ways: (1) The roles of the “subject term” and the “predicate term” are played by the signified thing and its affectio, respectively, rather than by external signs. (2) The subject of the predicative act is the “subject term” itself. Furthermore, we consider such self-predication as divine owing to two reasons: (1) It is an aspect of the basic causal process of Deus, seu Natura (God, or Nature). (2) The ultimate subject of such predication is Deus, seu Natura itself, and it predicates its affectio of itself. We also propose that such divine self-predication is regulated through a divine syntax, which is identical to the ontological structure existing in the world and the laws of nature. Conversely viewed, this suggests that the Spinozistic ontological structure and causal laws have an intrinsic communicative characteristic, similar to linguistic syntax.The aforementioned considerations have an important implication for the status of ideas. On the one hand, Spinozistic ideas are considered as truthbearers. Unlike general viewpoint, these truthbearers are not abstract propositions; rather, they are propositionally-structured mental acts involving affirmative forces. On the other hand, divine self-predicative acts are truthmakers, which possess propositional structures and predicative forces owing to the conatus/determinatio. Additionally, their common forces, which are indeed the one and same force, play majority of the fundamental roles required for mental representations. Hence, to realize full-fledged mental representations, merely a correlation is required between two different but isomorphic divine attributes, namely thought and extension. Such a correlation can turn mere modes of thought into ideas, but it can only provide a superficial status to them as external signs of bodies.Furthermore, we suggest that the self-reflexive characteristic of divine self-predication provides the foundation for “ideas of ideas,” which will be discussed in detail in our next paper.