Philosophy Spinoza, Baruch: The Ethics HYPERLINKED, v1, 24 October 2009

[WT Sharpe]

The thing that stuck me most the first time I looked into The Ethics by Baruch Spinoza was his unusual writing style. To prove his points, he constantly refers the reader to other sections in his book, which often refer in turn to still other sections, et cetera. The entire book seems to be a kind of matrix that had been written neither forward nor backwards, but sideways. Reading the printed text is a chore that involves seemingly endless repetitive flipping between sections in order to follow his arguments.

Years ago, it occurred to me that Spinoza’s plan all along in writing his magnum opus was to wait until modern computers and hand-held e-readers were invented so he could properly hyperlink his work prior to publishing. Unfortunately, he died in 1766, a few years prior to the introduction of Windows computers, Macs, and Rocket eBooks and their descendants. After his death, someone — not realizing Spinoza’s intentions — went ahead and published The Ethics posthumously in 1677. Fortunately, I have now corrected that publisher’s mistake with this eBook edition..

This book contains well over a thousand hyper-links. When I first created the Word document on which this edition is based it took several months of intense work to complete. Now I offer this MOBI-formatted version to you, the lover of philosophy, free of charge and with no restrictions, as a labor of love.

NOTE 1: The following bibliographical details were provided by Patrica:

Author: Baruch [Benedict] Spinoza, 1632-1677
Title: Ethics [Ethica Ordine Geometrico Demonstrata]
Translated from the Latin by R. H. M. Elwes (1853-?]
1883.

Thank you, Patricia!

NOTE 2: This epub conversion from my original PRC file was done by Superlucky.

A big tip of the hat to you as well, Superlucky!

This work is in the Canadian public domain OR the copyright holder has given specific permission for distribution. It may still be under copyright in some countries. If you live outside Canada, check your country's copyright laws. If the book is under copyright in your country, do not download or redistribute this work.

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[Tullio]

Tom, this is fantastic. Thank you!

The epub version works great on my iPhone but I have no idea how to read this on a desktop computer? What application should I use? (I'd prefer on Mac).

[HarryT]

Adobe Digital Editions (download from Adobe) is a good free ePub viewer.

[Vector]

I didn't know it was there. I'm glad the new posts brought it to my attention.