
Contents
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Between Ethics and Socialism Between Ethics and Socialism
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Jakob Stern: From Freethinker to Spinozist and Socialist Jakob Stern: From Freethinker to Spinozist and Socialist
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The Challenges of Ethics The Challenges of Ethics
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Ethics, Affect, and the “Selbsterhaltungstrieb” Ethics, Affect, and the “Selbsterhaltungstrieb”
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Conclusion Conclusion
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5 An Ethics of Natural Necessity: Jakob Stern, Free Thought, and German Social Democr acy
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Published:January 2023
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Abstract
An uneasy relationship existed in the 1890s between German Social Democracy and the freethinker milieu from which many of its leading members came to politics. Jakob Stern, a one-time rabbi turned freethinker turned socialist sought to negotiate that relationship through appeals to Spinoza. Translating the majority of Spinoza’s works and authoring a general introduction, Stern derived from Spinoza an ethics of natural necessity that he saw as in alignment with the scientific socialism of Marx, Engels, and the German Social Democratic Party. Combatting the growing popularity of other philosophies – especially the legacies of Schopenhauer and Kant, as well as liberal free thought – Stern found in Spinoza an ethics of the affects that, he hoped, would appeal to freethinkers while also honoring the insistent immanent project of Marxism as he understood it. This chapter contextualizes Stern’s project amidst a growing interest in the relationship of ethics to modern natural science (especially to Darwinism) and, within that trend, amidst specific efforts to find in Spinoza a useful guide.
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