Steven Nadler
Professor of Philosophy and Humanities, University of Wisconsin-Madison
Steven Nadler is the William H Hay II Professor of Philosophy and the Evjue-Bascom Professor in Humanities at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. His books include Spinoza: A Life (2nd ed, 2018); A Book Forged in Hell: Spinoza’s Scandalous Treatise and the Birth of the Secular Age (2011); The Philosopher, the Priest, and the Painter: A Portrait of Descartes (2013); Heretics! The Wondrous (and Dangerous) Beginnings of Modern Philosophy (2017), co-authored with Ben Nadler; Menasseh ben Israel: Rabbi of Amsterdam (2018); and Think Least of Death: Spinoza on How to Live and How to Die (2020).
Written by Steven Nadler
essay
History of ideas
Why Spinoza still matters
At a time of religious zealotry, Spinoza’s fearless defence of intellectual freedom is more timely than ever
Steven Nadler
idea
Ethics
We have an ethical obligation to relieve individual animal suffering
Steven Nadler
essay
Ethics
When to break a rule
A virtuous person respects the rules. So when should the same person make a judgment call and break or bend them instead?
Steven Nadler
Why Spinoza still matters
Steven NadlerIn Aeon’s process of copyediting/proofreading, a change was made in paragraph 16 of my essay, changing ‘Ezra’ (the fifth-century BCE scribe) to ‘Abraham ibn Ezra’ (the twelfth-century philosopher), and I did not catch it in the proofreading stage. It was, of course, Ezra the Scribe (not Abraham ibn Ezra) whom Spinoza credits with editing the texts of the Hebrew Bible.