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65. - Extension

from E

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 January 2025

By
Galen Barry
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 lists Extension (extensio) as one of God’s infinite attributes: “Extension is an attribute of God, or God is an extended thing” (E2p2). In fact, Extension and Thought are the only attributes of God that Spinoza explicitly names, and the only ones he thinks humans are aware of (Ep64). Extension is, roughly speaking, the attribute through which the physical world, or matter, is expressed. For example, it is the attribute through which such standardly physical notions as motion and rest are understood (E2a1, i/114). Since attributes are independent ways of conceiving substance (E1p10), and substance is the bedrock of reality (E1p1), it follows that we can conceive of the world as being irreducibly physical (in addition to being irreducibly thinking, and so on for every attribute).

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Chapter
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The Cambridge Spinoza Lexicon , pp. 162 - 166
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2024

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References

Recommended Reading

Bennett, J. (1984). A Study of Spinoza’s Ethics. Hackett.Google Scholar
Cover, J. (2003). Spinoza’s extended substance. In Gennaro, R. J. and Huenemann, C. (eds.), New Essays on the Rationalists (pp. 105–33). Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Gueroult, M. (1997). Spinoza. 2 vols. Aubier-Montaigne.Google Scholar
Peterman, A. (2015). Spinoza on Extension. Philosophers’ Imprint, 15(14), 1–23.Google Scholar
Schmaltz, T. (1999). Spinoza on the vacuum. Archiv für Geschichte der Philosophie, 81(2), 174–205.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

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