What Advantages Does Spinoza’s Substance Monism Have over...

Spinoza’s philosophy as espoused in the Ethics was a response to Descartes’ dualism. Through works such as the Ethics, Spinoza seeks to address the main flaws in Descartes’ philosophy. These flaws included but were by no means limited to, proof for the existence of God and the interaction between mind and body. This essay will highlight the advantages of Spinoza’s monism over Descartes’ dualism by looking at Spinoza’s response to these issues. First, in order to consider the advantages of Spinoza’s substance monism over Descartes’ dualism it is necessary to show how each philosopher demonstrates their substance dualism or substance monism. Tim Crane defines monism and dualism as follows: â€Å"Monism denies that minds and their†¦show more content†¦While the above steps demonstrate Spinoza’s substance monism, they also show that the overarching factor in his philosophy is the argument for the existence of God and God’s attributes which necessarily follow. The advantage of Spinoza’s substance monism over Descartes’ substance dualism in terms of his metaphysics of God/Nature, is that Spinoza’s God is one that supports his entire system. Where Descartes’ Meditations is built on doubt, Spinoza’s Ethics is built on certainty and on a series of definitions. His notion that God is the only substance, the core of his monism, hinges on his definition of God/Nature: By God I understand a being absolutely infinite, i.e., a substance consisting of an infinity of attributes, of which one expresses an eternal and infinite essence (1def6) While Descartes sought, through the Meditations, to be certain of the truth of his own existence as a ‘thinking thing’ and then prove God’s existence, Spinoza turns Descartes’ argument on its axis. For Spinoza the argument that God exists as the only substance, because as a supremely perfect being he must necessarily exist is the basis of the Ethics. Spinoza’s statement of God’s existence as the only substance gives his argument a strong foundation from which to build the rest of his philosophy. The axiomatic format of the Ethics enables Spinoza to set out his philosophy in a more direct manner than Descartes. While Descartes