This paper criticizes the epistemological doctrine of moderate rationalism that has been defended in recent years by such writers as Laurence BonJour, Alvin Plantinga, and George Bealer. It is argued that this new form of rationalism is really no better than the old one and that the key claim common to both---that intuition or rational insight provides a satisfactory basis for a priori knowledge---is untenable. Most of the criticism is directed specifically against Laurence BonJour’s recent “dialectical” defense of the doctrine. (...) Since BonJour’s defense is essentially an attempt to show how a priori knowledge is possible, an alternative, empiricist view of a priori knowledge is presented that eludes his objections and is supported by the criticism brought against moderate rationalism. (shrink)

Very close analysis of Baruch Spinoza's wording in describing individuals rather than things. Individuals, but not collections such as a political state or club, each have their own specific conatus, or essence. Collectivities, like nations or institutions, fail to meet this necessary condition of individuation.

Spinoza's doctrine of the uniqueness of substance has been interpreted as absorbing individual self-consciousness into an all-embracing whole.

This essay explores logical and physical readings of Spinoza’s Ethics. It argues that Spinoza made logic more like physics, rather than making physics into logic. A dichotomy between the metaphysical and physical is inappropriate in thinking about his work. One way to understand his approach is through quasi-Kantian terms, of making physics possible, although his work has left the question of what exists to those pursuing research to find out.