History of Philosophy and Spinoza

Following on from my previous post, the compulsory History of Philosophy modules were half Ancient Philosophy (Plato and Aristotle only) and half Early Modern (Locke, Hume, Berkeley, Leibniz, Spinoza, Descartes) and they covered various fields e.g. Epistemology, Science, Metaphysics, Ethics, Politics. Out of those, I only like Spinoza, and Hume as a second favourite. Although, apart from Spinoza, I wouldn't want to research these philosophers in themselves, I've made good use of these history modules by researching Mary Shepherd who argues at length against Hume, Berkeley and Locke. Luckily, there was no medieval (in history or elsewhere) except for 5 minutes on Aquinas over coffee in a coffee shop with the tutor, Simon Hewitt. There was a metaphysics tutorial mix-up which resulted in Simon saying that everyone had to email him to see him over coffee individually. So I did but I was bored with talking about Aquinas and it wasn't my essay topic either so the conversation turned to Logic instead. 

When I say I like Spinoza, it doesn't mean any approach will do. I'm very fussy! I've chosen to be in the same style and approach as Susan James because we are a good fit. We are both convoluted in our thinking and have a very scholarly, academic style. We just happen to click with each other - end of. She also happens to slot into my academic background and style I was taught when home-educated by my highly educated (educationalist/teacher) mother, prior to university. 

Philosophers are constantly trying to cause criticism and conflict between Susan James and myself where none exists, attempting to drive a wedge between us. We don't compete against each other so stop trying to fake that we do. No amount of trying to imitate her, put me off her, gossip about her /her private life/her as a PhD supervisor etc, or trying to incite her to show a dark side will succeed with me - I couldn't care less if she lost her temper and lobbed her eraser at you! I take a dim view of anyone who spreads malicious gossip or worse, be they students or philosophers. I've never done that about any lecturer that I've ever had, no matter what they have done or what I think of them. It's just bad form! Neither do I tolerate any attempt to manipulate me into switching allegiance from her to someone else. Frankly, I've had enough of philosophers' constant criticisms of Susan James. I am firmly in her camp! And it is not just because she was my lecturer, even if I'd met her casually at a conference, I would have preferred her style to other speakers and wanted to be in line with her approach. It's her unique, distinctive approach that I'm drawn to!

I wonder 🤔 if people mis-read my first, draft paper I wrote on Spinoza. Perhaps their wishful thinking leads them to believe I am somehow criticising her approach/interpretation of Spinoza. So I'll make it crystal clear. I was just laying the ground that my work won't look identical to hers, even though I agree with her interpretation. I stated this in my first, draft paper as a response to the usual crass, sexist comments that women have to put up with in academia, eg. insinuations that we somehow work together because we are both so stupid we can't possibly manage to do the work on our own, even though she's been successfully doing research without me throughout her whole career! (Later, this revived as a direct comment to me from an EU male lecturer after I had just finished my first presentation - no I didn't get help or a leg-up from Susan James (or anyone else), I'm just super good at philosophy and research! And if we had been working together on my paper, I would have credited her as co-author.) Or it takes the form of hints that our work looks very similar even though it doesn't - no, we haven't worked together/done research together during my BA Philosophy or subsequently, I should wish! If you can't see that our work is distinctively our own work and own academic authorial voice, then you need to go to Specsavers😂 and rethink being a lecturer/researcher in philosophy! 

Furthermore, there's no point in us both covering the same points - our work will look different from each other because we are filling slightly different research gaps. If our work looked the same, then we would be filling the same research gaps, which would be silly! There's also no need for me to overlap with her arguments. Rather than wasting my time doing a short, unsatisfactory summary (or a long repetition) of her arguments and work, I shall refer you to her work! I somewhat assume that if you are a philosopher/Spinozist, you are familiar with her work anyway. 

Superficial differences between her style and mine are mainly because she weaves things in more subtly than me. 

For instance, Latin. Everybody who went to Oxbridge when she did had to know Latin as an entrance requirement so she obviously has a good level of Latin too. She does explicitly refer to her Latin texts, both verbally at question time and in writing in her bibliographies at the end of her work. She peppers her work with the Latin words for Spinoza's key terms and concepts throughout her written work.  

Furthermore, my Jewish interpretation is also in line with her outlook, because I have heard her lecture on Moses twice, once on Spinoza's TTP (Spring term 2010) and later on Rousseau's Lawgiver theme in my final year. We're on the same page🙂👍 be it our positivity towards Spinoza, sensitivity towards Moses as a prophet and a lawgiver, our style, outlook, approach, convoluted thinking, old-fashioned academic methodology, and more! 

I think philosophers and students struggle with our old-fashioned style, whether it is the way we ask questions or whether it's following our academic train of thought. Unlike me, however, she gets dismissed for her ideas far too quickly e.g. at Q&A. Several times I've seen a speaker closing down potentially fruitful discussion by saying to her e.g. 'oh no, that won't work!' Well, actually, it will work, if you just let us all think about it together and work through it properly! If that's how they peer review her work, then we're losing many of her best ideas! And I have no idea how philosophers started up some nonsense about her not being analytical. They obviously haven't read and understood her work properly. Maybe people think if it's not Frege, it's not analytic. No, there are various ways to be analytical and hers is no less valid than Frege! 

Another superficial difference is that you see Logic terms and symbols more explicitly in my Spinoza work than hers. However, if you doubt she can do Logic, then check out her first book, Social Explanation - if you can read and understand the Logic she sets out there, go straight to the top of the class!