The Enlightened Virtuoso: God as the only Necessary Substance

Monday, September 12, 2016

God as the only Necessary Substance - a monistic conclusion

"Whatever is, is in God, and nothing can exist or be conceived without God." ~ Benedict Spinoza

"His theology is essentially impersonal, just as his conception of the physical world is essentially theological. All causality obeys a logical paradigm, and all explanation is really a form of proof. To understand the causality of things, therefore, is to understand a complex mental operation, undertaken by an infinite mind." Roger Scruton, Spinoza: A Very Short Introduction (New York: Oxford University Press, 2002) p. 51.

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Welcome

Dear reader,

Welcome! This blog started off as a personal project meant more for myself than anyone else. In that regard, it has served as a catalog for the resources I tend to enjoy. However, recent circumstances have changed the way I have utilized this medium. For a while I began using it as a public journal, following the example of my personal journal. While it may seem strange, I use my journals as a record of intellectual exposure and growth rather than mediums of creative outpouring. I often post quotes that I have found particularly meaningful. For me, this is a way of documenting what I have been exposed to and how my own thinking has developed. In that sense, my journaling is perhaps a bit unusual. It works for me though and I hope that it may be of interest to you as well.

To some extent, this journal is an experiment with Siegfried Kracauer's note that, "We must rid ourselves of the delusion that it is the major events which have the most decisive influence on us. We are much more deeply and continuously influenced by the tiny catastrophes that make up daily life" (Die Angestellten, in Schriften, vol. 1, 252). This blog is obviously public, yet it's not really created for anyone other than myself. If you find something that's of use or value, all the better! It does, after all, serve as one of my research resources and it may serve that purpose for you as well.

Thanks for taking the time to read what I've either recorded or written.