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.84, pp.43-60, 2022-03-10

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In previous studies, we have shown that for Spinoza, mental representation through ideas is subsidiary to divine self-predication, which is found in every divine attribute. This leads us to reconsider the status of the attribute of thought. This is the aim of this study.In the first section, we consider an internal problem of Spinoza’s theory of “infinitely many attributes.” This problem originates from Spinoza’s account, according to which the attribute of thought contains every idea of every object belonging to every other attribute. This account seems to suggest that the attribute of thought would be as enormous as the totality of every other attribute; however, such asymmetry seems inconsistent with the nature of attributes, which should express the same divine essence equally. Our construal of Spinoza’s theory of ideas solves this problem primarily because we take Spinozistic ideas for mere external signs essentially dependent on divine self-predication within every attribute, including the attribute of extension.This conclusion indicates a possibility that Spinoza’s basic worldview would be purely materialistic and his non-materialistic theory of “infinitely many attributes” would be a non-essential addition to his true system. In the second section, we evaluate this possibility by using an external-contextual approach instead of an internal-textual one and find two plausible motivations behind Spinoza’s invoking the “infinitely many attributes” theory. One is his strategic choice for refuting the Cartesian argument of substantial-dualism from “real distinction” of thought and extension. The other is his demand for a correspondence theory of truth in some adequate form, which, however, we consider to be inessential for his true system.