Conatus – Self-determination – Subjectivity – Hegel and/or/with Spinoza

Conatus – Self-determination – Subjectivity – Hegel and/or/with Spinoza

Philosophisches Seminar, University of Heidelberg

Hörsaal 04a, Neue Universität, Heidelberg University

Universitätsplatz 1, 69117 Heidelberg

8–9.07.2026

Wednesday, 8th of July

9:45 Welcome, coffee

10:00 Ursula Renz (Graz): Spinozean acquiescientia in se ipso vs. Hegelian Reconciliation

11:00 Coffee break

11:30 Yitzhak Melamed (Johns Hopkins): Spinoza and Hegel on Self-Negation

12:30 Lunch break

13:30 Misa Sanada (Nagoya): From Conatus to Being-with-Oneself-in-Another: Mendelssohn, Jacobi, and the Path from Spinoza to Hegel

14:30 Coffee break

15:00 Bojana Jovićević (Ljubljana): Knowledge and Action in Spinoza’s Ethics and Hegel’s Logic

16:00 Coffee break

16:30 Julia Peters (Heidelberg): Privatio nihil est? Hegel’s Critique of Spinoza on Negative Affect

17:30 short coffee break

17:45 Birgit Sandkaulen (Bochum): Wie passt das Theorem des conatus zu Hegels negativistischer Spinozalektüre?

19:30 Dinner

Thursday, 9th of July

10:00 Oliver Toth (Heidelberg): Sensory and rational principles of action in Spinoza and Hegel

11:00 coffee break

11:30 Jack Stetter (Louisiana State/South Florida): State Individuality and War in Spinoza and Hegel

12:30 Lunch break

13:30 Martin Saar (Frankfurt): Hegel or Spinoza? Subjectivity, Intersubjectivity and “Transindividuality”

14:30 Coffee break

15:00 Ana-Silvia Munte (Tübingen): Spinoza’s Conatus and Hegel’s Stocking: Why a Mended Self-Consciousness is Worse than a Torn One

16:00 Coffee break

16:30 James Kreines (Claremont McKenna): Philosophy of Action and Priority of the Practical, Without Human-Perspective-Defensive Reasoning: Spinoza’s Conatus and Hegel’s Self-Determination

17:30 Concluding remarks, reception

20:00 Screening of the movie “Spinoza: Six Reasons for the Excommunication of the Philosopher”

Gloriette Cinema, Hauptstraße 146, 69117 Heidelberg

Followed by a podium discussion “Spinoza and the Good Life” with the director of the film David Ofek, and Michael Engel (Heidelberg University of Jewish Studies), Yitzhak Melamed (Johns Hopkins), Ursula Renz (Graz) on the therapeutic role of Spinoza’s philosophy, moderated by Julia Peters (Heidelberg).

The conference is free and open to everyone. Due to limited seating, we ask for registration by sending an e-mail to: [email protected].

Registration does not automatically include a ticket for the screening; tickets can be bought directly at the cinema independently from the registration.

The conference is organized by Julia Peters and Oliver Toth; it is generously funded by the DFG and is part of the project „Conatus, Trieb und die Erkenntnis der Freiheit: Spinozas Einfluss auf Hegels praktische Philosophie“.