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The appendix to Part I of #Spinoza's Ethics constitutes one of the most concerted arguments against #teleology in nature that I've found before #Darwin.
The other major one I have looked at is dependent origination in #buddhism which I have written about here https://bit.ly/3glD7bD
Do you know any others in #philosophy or elsewhere?
I'm aware I need to look more into #Hume #Bacon #Lucretius and #Pyrrho and I'm currently deep in #Nietzsche
![[II.] With this I have sufficiently explained what I promised in the first place [viz. why men are so inclined to believe that all things act for an end]. Not many words will be required now to show that Nature has no end set before it, and that all final causes are nothing but [5] human fictions. For I believe I have already sufficiently established it, both by the foundations and causes from which I have shown this prejudice to have had its origin, and also by P16, P32C1 and C2, and all those [propositions] by which I have shown that all things proceed by a certain eternal necessity of nature, and with the greatest perfection.
[10] I shall, however, add this: this doctrine concerning the end turns nature completely upside down. For what is really a cause, it considers as an effect, and conversely [NS: what is an effect it considers as a cause]. What is by nature prior, it makes posterior. And finally, what is supreme and most perfect, it makes imperfect.](https://cdn.masto.host/writing/media_attachments/files/109/381/659/409/944/358/original/c6f7a8cb18aa6836.png "[II.] With this I have sufficiently explained what I promised in the first place [viz. why men are so inclined to believe that all things act for an end]. Not many words will be required now to show that Nature has no end set before it, and that all final causes are nothing but [5] human fictions. For I believe I have already sufficiently established it, both by the foundations and causes from which I have shown this prejudice to have had its origin, and also by P16, P32C1 and C2, and all those [propositions] by which I have shown that all things proceed by a certain eternal necessity of nature, and with the greatest perfection.
[10] I shall, however, add this: this doctrine concerning the end turns nature completely upside down. For what is really a cause, it considers as an effect, and conversely [NS: what is an effect it considers as a cause]. What is by nature prior, it makes posterior. And finally, what is supreme and most perfect, it makes imperfect.")
I suppose another person to look into re: #teleology is #Heraclitus. If fragment 123 is better understood as "The natural companion of Physis is concealment," then this seems related to #Spinoza's insight on nature having no ends. Nature can't be understood with human reasoning, perhaps? https://perceiverations.wordpress.com/heraclitus-fragment-123/
Here's Edwin Curley, "#Spinoza: Issues and Directions" (1990) on #teleology again. Bennett's book seems to contend that Spinoza denies *all* final causes. But Curley thinks (and I agree) that he only denies them to Nature. @philosophy #philosophy
@bryankam #Lucretius 4.823-857
"Such explanations put effect for cause and are based on perverted reasoning; since nothing is born in us simply in order that we may use it, but that which is born creates the use. "
@venanzio This is fantastic, thanks very much. Whose translation is this out of curiosity?
Also, see you're an Epicurean! Do you think Epicurus held similar views? I sort of thought he might, but I recently went back through Diogenes Laertius and didn't find much. After this conversation... https://writing.exchange/@bryankam/109348485169674903
@bryankam The translation is by W. H. D. Rouse in the Loeb Classical Library.
I think Lucretius is here just expounding Epicurus' thought.
@venanzio Fantastic. Thank you! 
@bryankam For example in Epicurus' "Letter to Herodotus" (77-78): "Furthermore, we should not regard the courses and revolutions of the heavenly bodies as the operations of some deity who dutifully performs these functions, who decrees or did decree them... We must consider that it is the task of natural science to determine with precision the causes of the most important phenomena and that our happiness is bound up with causal knowledge of the heavenly bodies..." (trasl. G. K. Strodach)
Ou: "Mas afirmo, ainda, que essa doutrina finalista inverte totalmente a natureza, pois considera como efeito aquilo que é causa e vice-versa. Além disso, converte em posterior o que é, por natureza, anterior. Enfim, transforma em imperfeito o que é supremo e perfeitíssimo." (Autêntica, 2013, p. 69, trad. Tomaz Tadeu)
#Spinoza, quando entra de voadora de dois pés nos escólios e apêndices depois de dúzias de pgs de argumentação geométrica, é Fatality atrás de Fatality.
@bryankam see also 'useless suffering by Levinas 'the justification of the neighbour’s pain is certainly the source of all immorality.’ (Levinas 2017a, 88)
@bryankam oops, copied that from a piece of writing where i referenced two pieces from the same book hence the 'a'