• Schopenhauer on Spinoza: Animals, Jews, and Evil
    In David Bather Woods & Timothy Stoll (eds.), The Schopenhauerian Mind, Routledge. forthcoming.
    Schopenhauer’s philosophical engagement with Spinoza spreads over many fronts, and an adequate – not to say, complete – treatment of the topic, should cover at least the following issues: Schopenhauer’s critique (and misunderstanding) of Spinoza’s pivotal concept of causa sui; Schopenhauer’s claim that Spinoza confused reason [ratio] and cause [causa]; the relationship between Schopenhauer’s and Spinoza’s monisms; the eminent role that both philosophers assign to causality; and finally, Scho…Read more
  • Descartes' Method
    In Lawrence Nolan (ed.), The Cambridge Descartes Lexicon, Cambridge University Press. pp. 508-513. 2016.
  • Spinoza ’s letter of June 2, 1674 to his friend Jarig Jelles addresses several distinct and important issues in Spinoza ’s philosophy. It explains briefly the core of Spinoza ’s disagreement with Hobbes’ political theory, develops his innovative understanding of numbers, and elaborates on Spinoza ’s refusal to describe God as one or single. Then, toward the end of the letter, Spinoza writes: With regard to the statement that figure is a negation and not anything positive, it is obvious that matt…Read more