Buyse, Filip:
A New Reading of Spinoza's 'Letter 32' to Oldenburg

In: The Concept of Affectivity in Early Modern Philosophy  / Boros, Gábor ; Szalai, Judit ; Thóth, Olivér István (Hrsg./Eds.). - Budapest : Elte Eötvös Kiadá, 2017: 104-123.

Contains bibliography: 122-123

Literature type: Articles
Language: English
Thematic areas: Philosophy of nature, Anthropology / psychology / doctrine of affections / body and mind, Contemporaries and context
Subject: Ep., Complete Works
Subject (individuals): Boyle, Robert ; Geulincx, Arnold ; Huygens, Christiaan ; Oldenburg, Heinrich

Complete bibliographic evaluation: yes
Autopsy: yes
English commentary: "The starting point of this paper is an apparent paradox in Spinoza’s reply to a question - concerning the agreement (or the coherence) between bodies in the universe - that Robert Boyle had addressed in Letter 31 to the Dutch philosopher via Henry Oldenburg. In the first chapter (2) of this paper, I will indicate what the problem is and put it in context. In the next chapter (3), this paper tries to resolve the paradox by suggesting that Spinoza had applied the mechanical analogy of the synchronization of pendulum clocks. My claim is that although it seems that bodies can determine themselves, they are externally determined by synchronization. Subsequently, this paper gives some arguments (4) in favor of the plausibility of this hypothesis. In the next chapter (5), the difference between the synchronization hypothesis and Gueroult’s pendulum hypothesis will be addressed and opposed to Deleuze’s interpretation. Finally (6), this paper gives a reason why Spinoza does not mention the “pendulum clock” in his explanation of Letter 32, even though he might have been inspired by the motions of pendulums (clocks) in his conception of the ratio of motion and rest of bodies." (Annotation by the author)URL: http://Google Books hu/media/2017/10/The-Concept-of-Affectivity-in-Early-Modern-Philosophy_READER.pdf

Link to this page: http://spinoza.hab.de/detail.php?id=18155&LANG=EN