Persona Classification Layer
Compare Personas
Pick two or more historical figures to set their attribute fingerprints, dimension-by-dimension evidence, and shared school influences side by side.
Nicolas Malebranche
"We see all things in God" — occasionalism and the vision-in-God as the radical Cartesianism that solves the mind-body problem
Attribute Fingerprint
Rows where personas disagree are highlighted in gold. The full ontology grid (32 attributes) is shown.
| Attribute | Nicolas Malebranche |
|---|---|
| Time · Extent | Finite |
| Time · Ontological Status | Substantival |
| Time · Grain | Continuous |
| Time · Freedom | Deterministic |
| Time · Traversability | Linear |
| Time · Dimensionality | One |
| Time · Direction | Uni-directional |
| Space · Extent | Infinite |
| Space · Ontological Status | Substantival |
| Space · Curvature | Flat |
| Space · Dimensionality | Three |
| Space · Locality | Local |
| Matter · Extent | Finite |
| Matter · Ontological Status | Substantival |
| Matter · Conservation | Conserved |
| Matter · Dimensionality | Three |
| Matter · Locality | Local |
| Observer · Time Instance | Single |
| Observer · Space Instance | Single |
| Observer · Knowledge Extent | Mediated |
| Observer · Knowledge Retainment | Total |
| Observer · Physicality | Both |
| Observer · Agency | Passive |
| Observer · Number | Plural |
| Observer · Metaphysical Agency | Personal |
| Observer · Moral Authority | Revelation |
| Observer · Theological Method | Magisterial |
| Energy · Extent | Finite |
| Energy · Ontological Status | Substantival |
| Energy · Conservation | Conserved |
| Energy · Dispersibility | Irreversible |
| Information · Ontological Status | Substantival |
| Information · Cosmic Conservation | Conserved |
| Information · Personal Conservation | Conserved |
| Information · Granularity | Continuous |
Dimension-by-Dimension Evidence
What each persona's writings reveal about their stance on each of the six dimensions.
Time
Nicolas Malebranche
Linear created time under God's continuous causal action.
Space
Nicolas Malebranche
Substantival infinite space (Malebranche followed Descartes against Newton's absolute space in some respects but accepted infinite extension).
Matter
Nicolas Malebranche
Cartesian substantival matter; res extensa whose modifications are coordinated by God.
Observer
Nicolas Malebranche
Plural creaturely minds whose ideas are perceived in God's intellect. Personal metaphysical agency: the triune God of Catholic faith is the sole genuine cause.
Energy
Nicolas Malebranche
Standard physics within an occasionalist metaphysics: physical regularity is God's habit (sunna, in the parallel Islamic formulation).
Information
Nicolas Malebranche
Personal soul conserved; resurrection of the body.
Internal Tensions
Where each persona's working synthesis strains against itself.
Arnauld attacked Malebranche's vision-in-God doctrine in a long public dispute (1683-94) on grounds of theological orthodoxy and philosophical consistency. Leibniz objected that occasionalism makes God the author of every contingent event including evil. Hume credited Malebranche with the principal modern philosophical formulation of the problem of necessary connection — the seed that became the Humean revolution.