Geulincx, Arnold [addendum]

Arnold Geulincx was born in Antwerp, Belgium, in 1624. In 1641 he matriculated at University of Louvain, where he became a professor of philosophy in 1646. For reasons that never became clear but were probably of a religious nature (at Louvain there was much sensitivity over Jansenism), he was suspended from his duties and consequently dismissed in 1657/1658. He moved to Leiden, The Netherlands, and converted to Calvinism. After taking a degree in medicine he obtained permission to lecture on philosophy, but his position was regularized only in 1662, when he was appointed reader in logic. He became professor extra ordinem in 1665. In 1667 he died from the plague. Most of his works, dealing with logic, moral philosophy, physics, and metaphysics, were published posthumously.

Although the main merits of Geulincx's works on logic seem to be their elegance and precision, Karl Dürr (1939–1940, 1965) and Gabriël Nuchelmans (1983, 1984, 1986) show that he made some important steps toward a logic of propositions. According to him words like est and non are signs (notæ) by which to indicate the mental act performed with respect to a particular content. Every denial is the negation of an affirmative claim, and that means that an affirmation has been present to the mind (affirmatio inclusa). Accordingly, "Peter is not learned" must be interpreted as "It is not the case that Peter is learned" or also as "The sentence 'Peter is learned' is false."

Speaking of compound conditional sentences, Geulincx defines an antecedent as a statement that says that the whole of that which some other statement (the consequent) says to be the case, is indeed the case. Consequence is a form of containment (continentia): Between two statements A and B there obtains a relation of consequence if A says the dictum of B. Both the theory of containment and the theorem that every A implies the statement "A is true" are corollaries of Geulincx's idea that by making a statement one commits oneself to the truth of that statement and of everything entailed by that statement. For example, if one says "I am standing," this must be taken as an affirmation of whatever is entailed by that statement, such as, for example, "I am capable of standing." Accordingly, "I am standing" serves as the antecedent of any number of other statements to the truth of which one commits oneself.

According to Geulincx metaphysics is first philosophy or first science. It deals with the human subject, body, and God, each of which is the basis of a separate science: autologia, somatologia and theologia. The autologia basically consists in an exploration of the Cartesian cogito, which, however, Geulincx does not see as the basic principle of his philosophy but rather as a way to gain access to the realm of necessary truths. In fact, the more fundamental principle is the axiom that one can truly be said to make or do something only if one knows how it is made or done (quod nescis quomodo fiat, id non facis). This axiom allows Geulincx to claim that one is a passive spectator of the world, one's only activities being to will and think, albeit in a purely immanent way. Indeed, the world cannot be the cause of one's seeing and perceiving, given the fact that, since it can neither think nor know anything, it cannot be active. The only true cause is God and the only truly causal relation is that between God and the world. In fact, all philosophy should start with the concept of God, and the only reason why one has to start with the cogito is that the Fall has obscured one's faculties.

The result of Geulincx's analysis is that God is Being simpliciter as well as Mind simpliciter. This implies not only that all reality is ultimately mental but also that whatever is neither God nor part of God is nothing but an appearance. In fact, there are only two things that really exist, namely, Mind, which is the creator, and Body, which is the created. One's mind is part of the Divine mind (mentis quid). One's body is part of a phenomenal world. Particular three-dimensional bodies can be understood as limitations of the archetypal Extension that was produced in the act of creation. However, that there is a world, extended in three dimensions, can be known through the sensations God causes one to have. Finally, since contingent facts cannot be accounted for by principles of metaphysics (which explain only what is necessary), physics makes use of hypotheses, which must consist of clear and distinct ideas that together with the principles of metaphysics must be sufficient to explain all phenomena.

Like his metaphysics, Geulincx's moral philosophy is based on a corollary of his fundamental axiom, namely, that where there is no possibility to act there can be no will either (ubi nihil vales, ibi etiam nihil velis). In whatever way one acts, it is God that makes one act in that particular way. Accordingly, virtue is not to act in a particular way but to internally yield to God's will. Morality lies in the intention, not in the act. As a result, the cardinal virtues are dispositions: diligence, obedience, justice, and above all humility. On the contrary, passions are like sense impressions. Although they belong to human nature, they are relevant only insofar as they prevent one from developing the right attitude toward God's will. The most dangerous passion in this respect is self-love. In any case, the reward of virtue is that, freed from self-love, one enjoys peace and tranquility in this life.

Although much in Geulincx's philosophy goes back to René Descartes, it would probably be wrong to call him a Cartesian. For not only are the various parts of his philosophy differently connected (his metaphysics is crowned by his moral philosophy, not by his physics, which is comparatively independent), his metaphysics is, as has been shown by Brian Cooney (1972, 1978), basically an attempt to provide a metaphysical account of Divine Creation.

Accordingly, his philosophy has more affinity with Nicolas Malebranche's, with whom Geulincx shares a basically occasionalist interpretation of causality. Also, there is some similarity (although no affinity at all) with Benedict (Baruch) de Spinoza's philosophy, except, of course, that Spinoza rejects the idea of creation. In fact, Geulincx's starting point is fundamentally different. Whereas Spinoza argues that on the basis of Cartesian metaphysics it is impossible to account for creation, Geulincx takes creation to be a fact and attempts to make sense of it in terms of Cartesian metaphysics. However, the only way to do this is, he believes, to assume that creation consists in producing a world of appearance.

Not only Geulincx's metaphysics but also his physics is different from Descartes's, not because it would involve different concepts but because the status of their concepts is interpreted in a different way: Geulincx's concepts are hypotheses that, even if they are clear and distinct, are not automatically and necessarily true. This doctrine, which involves an interplay of empirical and metaphysical principles, has often been associated with Immanuel Kant's theory of judgment (Cassirer 1971–1973), but this is a bit far fetched. The best characterization seems to be that he is a Christian philosopher trying to find his way in the world of post-Aristotelian philosophy and availing himself of the language and concepts of his contemporaries to provide an intelligible account of the mysteries of faith.

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