The Philosophy of Spinoza & Leibniz - Bryan Magee & Anthony Quinton (1987)

Anthony Quinton discusses the 17th-18th century philosophers Spinoza and Leibniz with Bryan Magee in an episode of this 1987 series on the Great Philosophers. Both were rationalist philosophers who developed elaborate philosophical systems out of only a few basic principles of reason, but ended up with quite different views. Spinoza was a monist and pantheist. He identified everything with one substance, what he called "God or Nature", and understood everything as a mere aspect or mode of this great unity of existence. Thus, there is ultimately only one true entity or being for Spinoza. He rejected any personal conception of God, as well as free will and purpose within nature, leading many to think of him as an atheist. Leibniz, on the other hand, embraced plurality in his system. He posited an infinite array of indivisible substances that he called "monads" which were immaterial, incorporeal, mind-like points or atoms. These were taken to be fundamental, making Leibniz something of a panpsychist or an idealist. The existence of matter was taken to be derivative, a mere appearance of something ultimately mental or quasi-mental in nature. Like Spinoza, he was also a determinist who thought everything had to have a complete explanation, leaving no genuine room for objective randomness or chance. And he also agreed with Spinoza that there were innate ideas and knowledge which we possessed prior to any sensory experience of the world. Both thinkers went on to have a huge influence on other philosophers, as well as on many important scientists. (My Description)
The full series: • The Great Philosophers...
00:00 Introduction
04:44 Rationalist Background
07:37 Spinoza’s Vision
13:35 Spinoza on Mind & Matter
16:32 Freedom & the Emotions
19:54 Was Spinoza Religious?
23:40 Leibniz on the Monad
28:14 Leibniz on Two Kinds of Truths
32:19 Leibniz on Mind-Body Interaction
35:46 Leibniz on Free Will
38:23 Contributions
#philosophy #spinoza #bryanmagee #leibniz

[@neil6477]

Why don't we have TV programmes like this anymore? Once upon a time it was substance over style. TV had a simple presentaion but some deeply profound material. Now, it's style over substance - great presentaion but such utterly trivial content!

[@slide6strings]

Now we have the internet. Sill takes a lot of work to wade through tons of crap to find good information and thoughtful discussion. That hasn't changed in 400 years.

[@hendrikstrauss3717]

​@@slide6stringsI guess the main difference is that these programs were often publicly financed, and had authoritative appeal to listeners and guests. Now we have relatively decentralized creatorship, and good luck getting a world class academic hosting a show on philosophy with endless hours involved for your KZbin channel

[@phoenixrises1311]

Mankind is slowly moving towards destruction.. Therefore the first things to go are Reason and the desire for knowledge..

[@neil6477]

You have more faith in reason and the desire for knowledge than I do. Seems to me that such concepts have been used to justify the growth of destruction! Every time an atrocity occurs, there is always someone who can use reason to justify their actions.@@phoenixrises1311

[@zuz-ve4ro]

because both philosophical traditions reach their pinnacles with thinkers explicitly advocating anti state socialism, or democratic socialist states, a thing opposed by every historical empire, let alone private tv stations. see Foucault, Deleuze, Rawls, Arendt or Fromm for example.

[@sietzebosman]

how I wish I had a grandfather like this.

[@TheBigFella]

I've watched this video at least 20 times. Having watched it I went out and managed to find the books that they wrote. I wish I was as clever and articulate as they are.

[@Wingedmagician]

god damn i love this so much. worth watching half a dozen times

[@Gminor7]

This excellent 43 minute conversation is a fairly complete summary of the 3d semester of my undergraduate Philosophy degree in 1976. Much clearer to me now than then.

[@fabiodeoliveiraribeiro1602]

Dualism and Monism. Without understanding the difference between the two, it is not possible to imagine the abyss that exists between Spinoza's philosophy and Leibniz's. This distinction also has a curious origin. Spinoza abandoned Judaism, but not the main characteristic of that religion (the belief that everything that exists participates in the unique substance of the deity). Leibniz distinguishes appearance from essence taking into account a fundamental characteristic of Christianity (the distinction between the material and spiritual world). In Spinoza, nature acquires a dignity that it could never have in Leibniz's philosophy. Spinoza and Leibniz also cannot agree on what it means to know something, not even on the essence of man who reflects on himself, on the world and on himself in the world.

[@3ru97c43]

Anthony Quinton is such a pleasure to listen to and McGee does what he does best, as always

[@dionysianapollomarx]

Great audio. Much better than previous versions. I still have some of the Magee series downloaded in my hard drive. Lol.

[@gavaniacono]

AQ is extremely clear. And pleasant to listen too. McGee as always keeps things on track. How close was Spinoza to idealism, a heresy, but nevertheless. An analytical idealism. For a rationalist as well to stray that far is marvellous.

[@vinm300]

AQ is one of the few (the only ?) guest to address the audience directly (ie to the camera) Very enjoyable & enlightening

[@mentalitydesignvideo]

fantastic lecture, both in its encompassing scale, accessibility and clarity. Also, plummy upper-class accents are a special treat. Takeaway: Spinoza an absurd cut-rate Buddhist, Leibniz 300 years ahead of his time predicting Information Theory and Quantum Mechanics.

[@derendohoda3891]

Leibniz was a time traveler, prove me wrong. 🤣

[@christopherlees1134]

Outstanding discussion!

[@TheBigFella]

Wonderful wonderful video- thank you for uploading

[@dadofstigandstu4552]

“This kind of Solomonic carve-up of the cosmic baby…” So good.

[@unnecessaryrandomvideos3956]

This channel has supreme intellectual conversations what we now call podcasts except they are just mids.

[@CarlosElio82]

16:15 "The "wrinkles of reality" at one and the same time have these two aspects, a physical aspect and a mental aspect." It sounds very close to de Broglie's duality.

[@pkumarsachin4442]

It is truly remarkable how the east amd the west come together with Spinoza. If one were to replace Spinoza with Shankracharya, this presentation will make just as much sense.

[@esorse]

Wouldn't zero as the ideal-material number for no quantity at the start of a number line, resolve the issue of adjacent zero-dimensional points accompanying an infinity assuming space?

[@RichMitch]

Is this a re-upload?

[@Philosophy_Overdose]

Yes, I'm re-uploading all of these in this series because I wanted to increase and improve the audio quality on them. Sorry about the inconvenience!

[@RichMitch]

@@Philosophy_Overdose no inconvenience! Audio and visual quality is ace!

[@user-yb1hn1tb3d]

​@@Philosophy_Overdosethank you man🌹🌹🌹

[@CatastrophicDisease]

So basically the Parmenides and Heraclitus of the early modern period?

[@SwitzerlandEducation4471]

The fault that people in our country keep doing is they easily forget ; Naguib Mahfouz

[@sonarbangla8711]

How is it that British philosophers discuss Leibniz without mentioning his theory of 'sufficient reason' and 'relational essence' constituting reality.

[@user-yj9tv6bz4g]

If as you say " God is in everything," and we cannot communicate with God to find out things, we are forced to create science, or in other words, methods of finding out, and thereby understand more about material things, in out relatively simple manner, or things we perceive in our individual realities. To be objective we have to agree on what we see, and yet we find we all see differently, therefore how can we ever come to an agreement, any of which agreements might be a false one. So as Edward De Bono said we have to find out a truth that works until we find a better truth, always seeking perfection. So that arguing on these subjects, due to our intrinsic lack of knowledge is in the end futile! We use what knowledge we glean from our forbears and develop that as far as we can in a positive manner, to make this world interesting, and understand how materials in it work, just as the religious try to find out more about their mythical world, by praying to God, or is it nature, and nature hasn't been able to communicate on the level we have developed, even if it wants to. God perhaps doesn't really wish for us to understand all, like the religious leaders who do not describe all to their congregations, cloaked in mystery, but then being a human myth and not a proven fact, how can one explain what life is? Life itself is akin to a myth, too good to be true! If you came from another planet where there were no trees, no rivers etc. How could they explain what they see any more than a magical myth. I myself do not believe in any gods, but do think that it is a way of calling all this mystery something, not so keen on choosing humans as an example, rather a spirit, that is the quick in us, and that gives, or manifests itself, as what we call life in all around us. Thereby closer to the scientific description of life as pure energy, energy in different forms ever changing as we know it does, or they do. This we do not like because we only understand a certain amount about energy! But more than about God. The writings from ancient times being only the science of religion as it has developed, and is often based on here-say from others, passed on, and like gossip, becomes distorted into something it didn't start out as. Nothing proven to be fact, apart from experiences of, perhaps, the quick of the energy that moves and changes. As I experienced myself at five years old, I lay down in bed and became one of the lines of pale coloured light traveling and changing as they travelled, seeing them but disembodied part of them. It was the same kind of experience one gets on becoming, so-called enlightened, where one feels at one with all, the whole. I felt I had been privy to something beyond my understanding, and yet took part in it, and felt so excited about it, and happy doing so. M. Ann Waddicor 28th August 2023.

[@dikkie2913]

Exciting stuff. Thanks for sharing.

[@benquinneyiii7941]

The creator with the creation

[@owenparker-hughes4510]

Lol these old dons in casual conversation explain these philosophies better than any actively lecturing professor I’ve come across. Extraordinary how steep a decline in human intellectual quality we’ve seen.

[@stefos6431]

Mr. Quinton is wrong about the Jewish Religion not propitiating God and just accepting things......The Tanach is loaded with propitiations and requests to Hashem.

[@zeroonetime]

TIME Timing God.

[@benquinneyiii7941]

His god

[@MikeLeFlem]

I don't think people understand how dumbed down today's culture is. Good lord.

[@johnovegas]

oh no not this couch again.

[@temperedwell6295]

23:02. Where did Quimton get the idea that the Jewish religion doesn't have a place for a petionary prayer or asking God to do things for you? This may be the most preposterous statements that I have ever heard. He couldn't possibly have been so ignorant, and his claim leaves me shaking my head. It makes me doubt the validity of anything he says.