More on Certainty, and the possible "rough draft" nature of TEI

I had two principal aims in this discussion of TEI.  One was to see what ideas we could come to about why it was left unfinished, since it had been worked on before some of Spinoza's other works.  Also, could we conceive of any obstacles Spinoza was facing, if these might be causes of the unfinished status, and the apology appended to the work posthumously by Spinoza's friends.  So, back into the investigations....


On May 30, 2007, at 12:08 PM, Terry Neff wrote:

> On the other hand, it seemed to me that Donovan would prefer to
> only use the word
> "certainty" in discussing the highest kind of knowledge

Terry, (d. speaking)

I favor observing for the ideas expressed in all the various ways 
Spinoza is using the term. If such meanings are indicative of 
"roughness," or are part of didactic comments, that would be 
especially on topic in my view.

A few examples of his usage, off the top:
*****
TIE p[35] (1) Hence it is clear that certainty is nothing else than
the subjective essence of a thing: in other words, the mode in
which we perceive an actual reality is certainty.
*****
p25(3) We may, therefore clearly conclude that
the certainty arising from hearsay cannot be scientific in its
character.
*****
P35(3) Hence, again, it is clear that no one can know
the nature of the highest certainty, unless he possesses an
adequate idea, or the subjective essence of a thing:
certainty is identical with such subjective essence.
*****
P35(3) above, we have not yet reached in our study. We discern that 
in this context, an adequate idea involves >knowing the nature< of 
the highest certainty, as distinguished from reflecting the 
subjective essence of the thing, which is >identical with< the 
highest certainty. The distinction can be described thus:

adequate= affirmed as a simple fact, but external to the intellect.
subjective essence=reflected without division or "space" between the 
thinker and his thought. The latter idea is sometimes referred to by 
Spinoza as "the true idea," and most philosophers deny that we can 
thus conceive the ideas of things