Invention and Extension

Some objects of invention are famous epochal machines, e. g. the wheel, the incandescent light bulb, etc.  Others are more modest makeshift devices that facilitate everyday activities.  And others are not objects, but problem-solving courses of action.  Common to all cases is a moment when nothing becomes something, a moment that is familiar to most people.  Nevertheless, Philosophers who dedicate themselves to the micro-analysis of human experience tend to ignore such moments.  Instead, they tend to gloss over them with an application of the Principle of Sufficient Reason to invention, usually in terms of the purpose an invention is designed to serve.  But while the need for e. g. efficient reliable illumination might explain the functioning of the incandescent light bulb, it does not explain the moment when the mental 'light bulb' suddenly appears to Edison.  The general difficulty that invention poses to most Philosophical systems is that it consists in a moment of discontinuity, whereas they aim for experiential homogeneity.  Now, Spinoza's doctrine entails a potential accommodation of discontinuity--the attribute of Extension, which, if conceived as dynamic, becomes Extending, and to extend is discontinuous with a previous resting point.  Accordingly, Extending creates discontinuity, while Thinking re-integrates it.  Spinoza does not analyze the attributes in this way, but it does accommodate invention.