Intuition behind determinant of a matrix with $2$ equal rows In my linear algebra course, we have just proved that if a matrix $A$ contains $2$ equal rows, then $\det(A)=0$. 
I understand how the proof works, but could somebody offer a more intuitive explanation of why this is the case?

If 2 rows are equal then they are linearly dependant so you'll have a zero eigen value and so the determinant (which is the product of the eigen values) will be zero.
