From my bus journal of 07-11-07. (I call it my bus journal because back then I spent about 40 minutes a day on public transit. During that time I would read longer works and make notes. I have about seven journals filled covered to cover with my musings from those bus rides.)
Humankind is free only to the extent that it is not determined by anything external. But since this is in no way true in any of our acts we are not free at all. L & S p. 171.
The above came from a book I read regarding a single meeting between Leibnitz and Spinoza. Fascinating ready really if you are trying to get a handle on either existence or life in Amsterdam for an immigrant Jewish family in the 1600s. According to this interpretation of Spinoza there is no freedom, not really. The whole of existence in this view is ordained from the moment one atom struck another. Time too is an illusion (and that idea is not out of line with some current cosmological thinkers). We are what we are and there is no free will.
Spinoza is a challenge no matter which route you take to approach his writings. John Lennon in what is his probably his most iconic lyric asked us to, Imagine there's no heaven; it's easy if you try. No hell below us, above us only sky.” Spinoza was right there with Lennon. There is no judgment; there merely is existence, but a preordained existence. We are assigned our roles and our acts by preordination; we are fixed in all time. Freedom is an illusion.
For me I don’t like the concept that we don’t have will, that we don’t have impact on our lives or the lives of others. Just because I don’t like it doesn’t mean it isn’t so. I am still pondering this.
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