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31. - Certainty

from C

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 January 2025

By
Syliane Malinowski-Charles
Edited by
Karolina Hübner  and
Justin Steinberg
Karolina Hübner
Affiliation:
Cornell University, New York
Justin Steinberg
Affiliation:
Cornell University, New York
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Summary

Spinoza’s theory of truth has been an important topic of interest in the secondary literature, especially in comparison with Descartes’s conception of the clarity and distinctness of ideas. Certainty (certitudo) is a word commonly used by Spinoza throughout his works. Although it is never formally defined, Spinoza arguably makes specific epistemological and theological uses of it in addition to the usual meaning of certainty as that which is opposed to doubt. We can identify three essential characteristics of certainty in Spinoza’s thought: identity with the objective essence, being a feature of any true idea, and being self-evident.

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The Cambridge Spinoza Lexicon , pp. 79 - 82
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2024

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References

Recommended Reading

Carriero, J. (2020). Descartes (and Spinoza) on intellectual experience and skepticism. Roczniki Filozoficzne / Annals of Philosophy, 68(2), 21–42.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Deleuze, G. (1990). Expressionism in Philosophy: Spinoza, trans. C. V. Boundas. Zone. (Original work published 1968.)Google Scholar
Garrett, D. (2018a). Truth and ideas of imagination in the Tractatus de Intellectus Emendatione. In Garrett, , Nature and Necessity in Spinoza’s Philosophy (pp. 151–75). Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Garrett, D. (2018b). Truth, method, and correspondence in Spinoza and Leibniz. In Garrett, , Nature and Necessity in Spinoza’s Philosophy (pp. 176–98). Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gleizer, M. (2017). Vérité et certitude chez Spinoza. Classiques Garnier.Google Scholar
Malinowski-Charles, S. (2024). Spinoza on knowing that I know [MS].Google Scholar
Matheron, A. (1971). Le Christ et le salut des ignorants chez Spinoza. Aubier-Montaigne.Google Scholar

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