Abstract EN:

This work attends to explain the conditions of Spinoza's theory of affective imitation (Ethics, III, 27). Behaviour and theory of knowledge are taken into account as dimensions of the communication problem. This first part (I) focuses on the cartesian account of behaviour, as far as corporel causality is concerned. It suggests an interpretation of the few lines, in L'Homme, devoted to the communication of corporal dispositions between similar machines. The second part sets the light on the propositions that explain or follow mimetic behaviour whose first interest lies on the lack of consciousness. Spinoza's own conception -opposite to Descartes'- of sensation, imagination and feeling is discussed here (II-III), so that the demonstration of Proposition III, 27 becomes possible (IV). Our hypothesis is that Spinoza's way implies an expressive account of perception. In the last chapter (V), relations between rational and mimetic behavior are at stake.