On Spinoza and the infinite thing:

Required Reading: Spinoza's Metaphysics, Omnipresence, Religion and the infinite thing, Naturalistic Pantheism

The idea of a God that is synonymous with universe mirrors the description of God that is laid out in 17th century Dutch philosopher Baruch Spinoza’s Ethics. In it, he frequently used the phrase “God or nature,” rather than merely "God" or "Nature" indicating that the two are essentially the same. (It’s worth noting here, that Spinoza was a Portuguese Jew, and not so much concerned with worries that the Catholic church might call him a heretic). Additionally, in the Ethics, God or nature (the infinite thing) has an infinite number of attributes or properties, two of which are Extension and Thought.

Extension in Spinoza's Ethics is analogous with my description of absolute space. Objects (which are known in these circles as ‘substance’) occupy space; that is, they are extended in space in terms of width, height, length, depth, etc. Spinoza described the differences perceived between those objects (substance) as being Modes – modifications of substance. So, in the context of the concepts that have previously been explained, these modes are what I have been calling "finite divisions" within the infinite thing. That which makes a hammer different from a salad is a mode. That which makes those objects perceivable at all is their extension, which is itself an attribute of the infinite thing.

If God is the same thing as the universe or nature – one infinite thing, and extension and thought are attributes thereof, it follows that human beings and all other living and non-living things are modes. The implication is that humans are not separate from god. In fact, humans are not truly separate from anything at all. The distance and separation we normally imagine between ourselves and god (up there), or ourselves and universe (out there), is an illusion. Neither a universe which surrounds us (readily apparent), nor a god which is ubiquitous (perhaps less apparent) is truly beyond our reach – and they are not at all separate from one another.



Next Week: On events, in which I explain the nature of events, and their relation to this whole ... thing.