Beth Lord explores Spinoza’s rejection of natural moral equality and its relevance for modern democrac

Lord, Beth

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Are We Morally Equal by Nature?Beth Lord explores Spinoza’s rejection of natural moral equality and its relevance for moderndemocracyOur understanding of democracy is bound up with the concept of moral equality: the belief that allpeople are of equal worth and are entitled to equal respect. The doctrine of moral equality is acornerstone of democratic Enlightenment political philosophy. Jean-Jacques Rousseau famouslyclaimed that all men are born equal and free, and Immanuel Kant argued that we ought to treat allhuman beings as ‘ends in themselves’—as free, rational beings equally worthy of dignity andrespect. For these philosophers, we are morally equal just by virtue of being human, regardless ofour physical, intellectual, and cultural differences. This principle of a basic, inalienable equalityforms the core of much contemporary thinking about human rights, civil rights, and citizenship.Rousseau and Kant believed that moral equality derives from human rationality—the capacity todirect our own thinking, a capacity they take to be unique to humans and to be found equally in allof us. Today, we might be sceptical that there is any special ‘human nature’ that makes us differentfrom other animals, particularly one that consists in ‘rationality’. So where does that leave moralequality? If we agreed that other kinds of beings, such as primates and dolphins, also had thecapacity to reason, would that make them our moral equals, and entitle them to respect andrights?Benedict de Spinoza was a seventeenth-century philosopher who believed that there is nothingspecial about human beings that distinguishes us from the rest of nature. But that does not meanthat there is any natural moral equality among different kinds of beings, or among humans. Forhim, people are born unequal and are not automatically entitled to equal respect. What’sinteresting is that this view turns out to be compatible with the view that moral equality is intrinsicto democracy.Spinoza believed that all being is one, and this one being is equivalent to nature, alternativelycalled ‘God’. Spinoza’s God is not the theological God, but the inﬁnite being of the universe: thesingle substance of which all particular things are modes. Modes lack independent existence, anddepend on God for their being. Now, God is not only the physical substance of the universe, but itsthinking substance too. Each mode partakes of God’s physical and thinking substance, such thateach and every mode has both a body and a mind—though some modes (like rocks andgeraniums) have much less complex minds than others (like chimpanzees and humans). A rock’s‘mind’ is God’s idea of what is happening to the physical rock. A human mind is God’s idea of whatis happening to that human’s body, but it has a far more complex capacity to reﬂect on andunderstand this idea. For Spinoza, this is merely a difference in degree. Whereas Rousseau andKant claimed that humans are superior by virtue of having rational minds that transcend nature,Spinoza argued that everything has a mind and that everything is ‘part of nature’. Spinoza thusrejected the claim, implicit in the philosophies of Rousseau and Kant, that certain groups ofhumans (typically women and non-Europeans) are inferior by virtue of being more embedded innature. For Spinoza, everyone and everything is just as much part of nature.This looks like the basis of an argument for moral equality, not only for all human beings, but forhumans and non-humans alike. Yet Spinoza does not hold that all beings are equally valued. Hestated that human beings do not owe respect to other animals, plants, or things, and argued thatwe may use animals for any purpose whatsoever.This is based on his view that beings have different degrees of ‘power’. A being’s power or ‘naturalright’ is its capacity to persist in its being and to seek its advantage. Power is unequal betweendifferent kinds of beings, and those with greater power have a concomitantly greater right overthose with less. Because a farmer is more powerful than a horse, she has the right to use thehorse for transport. But a person who encounters a bear has no natural right not to be eaten by it.Unequal power, and our natural right over (some) other species, means we do not take individualsof other species to be of equal worth to us.What about moral equality among human beings? Here too, Spinoza argued that there are naturalinequalities of power and right. In a ‘state of nature’—that mythical time prior to laws and moralcodes, frequently imagined by early modern philosophers—more powerful human beings have anatural right to subjugate, use, and kill weaker ones, just as they would over weaker animals. Theweak have no natural right to live free of harm, and no one has any obligation to protect anyoneelse. In a state governed by nature, then, people are born unequal, with unequal levels of powerand right, and are perfectly entitled to use one another merely as means to ends.Inequalities of power and right extend into the democratic state. In Spinoza’s version of the socialcontract, each individual retains her natural power to seek her advantage. She does not give thatpower to a king, but pools it with the common power of the whole population. In the democraticstate, individuals continue to seek their advantage according to their own natural right or power,but they are now subject to civil laws and enjoy greater security. While acting from one’s naturalright is constrained in a democracy, one’s capacity for freedom is greatly enhanced. Freedom, forSpinoza, is acting autonomously; it rests on understanding what is truly to one’s advantage, andhaving the power to act on it.For Spinoza, members of a democracy are unequally free, because they are unequal inunderstanding and power. Those who are strong, fortunate, and/or enjoy favourablecircumstances will come to understand and act upon what is truly to their advantage, bothphysically and mentally. They will become more rational and more free: better able to actautonomously, undetermined by external powers. People who are weak, unfortunate, and/or livingin poor circumstances are less able to understand their true advantage and act accordingly. Theyhave less rational understanding and are less able to act autonomously in the face of causaldetermination by other people and things.Spinoza did not make the disadvantaged responsible for their lack of power, though he thoughtthat we all have the capacity to become more free; his Ethics provides a road-map for increasingour power and rational understanding. The more rational and free are, for him, better and moreMonday, 15 February 2016virtuous human beings. Spinoza’s goal was for each of us to be as virtuous, rational, and free aswe possibly can be—not for us to be equal in these respects.This is why Spinoza rejected the doctrine of natural moral equality. He believed neither that peopleare equally rational by nature, nor that they should aim to be. Rationality develops and variesaccording to our circumstances. Those who have developed more rationality are ‘better’ people,and their interests and actions are more highly valued, because what is most valuable for humanbeings is rational human beings who understand and act according to the highest human good.The state should work towards increasing everyone’s rationality; it is good that some are morerational so they may guide others most effectively. Spinoza argued that inequalities in reason,freedom, and ‘value’ are as natural as inequalities in power, and the superiority of some peopleover others in these respects is advantageous for human ﬂourishing.Equality does, nevertheless, have an important role to play in Spinoza’s version of democracy.Democratic citizens, unlike those in the state of nature, have equal civil right, an equal stake ingoverning and making the law. Equal civil right is not based on natural equality, since for Spinozathere is none. It rests, instead, on the social contract. Everyone—regardless of his degree ofpower or rationality—agrees to transfer his right from individual to collective ownership, andthereby gains an equal share of the resulting collective power. Each person’s equal share conferson him equal civil power and right, which sits on top of his unequal natural power and right. Whilea person’s ‘value’ is based on the extent of his rationality, equal civil right ensures everyone’spolitical and legal equality, as well as their equal responsibility to obey the law. Democracy makesevery citizen’s relevant interests equal under the law, and renders each citizen equally worthy ofjustice. This means that every democratic citizen is treated as morally equal, regardless ofwhether they are morally equal by nature.Moral equality is therefore not a natural condition for Spinoza, but is ‘artiﬁcially’ imposed in thestructure of civil law. It stems from a collective agreement that it is right that we think of oneanother as moral equals, rather than on core beliefs about human nature. At a time when we areless convinced that there is such a thing as human nature at all, this is a useful perspective toconsider. It suggests that we can and should uphold moral equality within our communities,regardless of our views about human nature and what might constitute it.Beth Lord is Senior Lecturer in Philosophy at the University of Aberdeen. This piece is based onher essay ‘Spinoza on Natural  Inequality and the Fiction of Moral Equality’, forthcoming in TheAshgate Companion to the Radical  Enlightenment, edited by  Steffen Ducheyne. Her researchfocuses primarily on the history of philosophy and its relationship to recent continental philosophy.She is the Principal Investigator of the AHRC project ‘Equalities of Wellbeing in Philosophy andArchitecture’, and well as the Director of the Spinoza Research Network. Image credit: Elvin, ‘Benedictus de Spinoza (1632-1677)’

Are we morally equal by nature?

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