Philosophy Stack Exchange
Philosophy Stack Exchange

Questions tagged [leibniz]

Gottfried Wilhelm (von) Leibniz (1646 - 1716) was a German philosopher, logician and mathematician. He is associated with rationalism and the calculus.

The following are some sources for more information about Leibniz.

50 questions
14
votes
4 answers

What is it that Leibniz calls a “Monad”?

What is a “monad” as introduced by Gottfried Leibniz in his Monadology? What is the purpose of monads for Leibniz' philosophical arguments? EDIT: I've found basic definitions like those found in the comments, too. However I also found rather…
scravy
  • 655
  • 1
  • 9
  • 19
8
votes
1 answer

Why did Gödel believe that there was a conspiracy to suppress Leibniz's works?

It is known that Gödel was obsessed with Leibniz, and apparently he even believed that their was a worldwide conspiracy among academics to suppress Leibniz's works. Does anyone know where this came from?
user4281
  • 443
  • 3
  • 6
8
votes
4 answers

If the Platonic world exists how would we know?

If we assume existence of a non-material world of ideas that mathematics describes there are some questions that a Platonist has to address. 1) How is the ideal world related to the real one, where mathematics also plays a role? 2) How do we gain…
Conifold
  • 42,225
  • 4
  • 92
  • 180
7
votes
2 answers

What did Leibniz mean by saying this is the 'best of all possible worlds'?

This was famously satirised by Voltaire in Candide. But what did Leibniz mean by this? My intuitive understanding is this must be due to Leibniz's attempt at the problem of evil in Christian Theology. Given that God is a perfect being, he could not…
Mozibur Ullah
  • 1
  • 14
  • 88
  • 234
6
votes
1 answer

Was there a "mechanist" program of early rationalists, like Descartes and Leibniz?

Leibniz and Descartes are said to put forth "mechanist philosophies," but I am having trouble identifying what "mechanist" means. Does it involve their affinity to natural science and mathematics and their focusing on providing a philosophical…
PythagorasOnTheLineAgain
  • 61
  • 2
6
votes
1 answer

(Where) did Leibniz write "Sans les mathématiques on ne pénètre point..."?

Sans les mathématiques on ne pénètre point au fond de la philosophie. Sans la philosophie on ne pénètre point au fond des mathématiques. Sans les deux on ne pénètre au fond de rien. The above quotation, an early occurrence of which is found in…
Kahovius
  • 161
  • 2
5
votes
1 answer

Is actual always actualized from virtual in Deleuze's philosophy of virtuality?

In Deleuze's essay "The Actual and the Virtual," he discusses his concept of actual and virtual. In particular, he writes about Leibniz's view that force is virtual until it is actualized in space and that space is virtual until it is filled with…
Nikola Perović
  • 65
  • 1
  • 1
  • 6
5
votes
1 answer

Did Leibniz dismiss reincarnation?

I believe that I many years ago read that Leibniz discarded belief in reincarnation on something like the grounds that there is no difference between not having an earlier life and having a previous life while not remembering it. Did Leibniz express…
Sapiens
  • 318
  • 1
  • 11
5
votes
4 answers

Why does it matter if we live in "the best of all possible worlds"?

We can formalize the argument in this way: There is good and evil. The good tries with all its power to prevent the evil from doing more evil (otherwise the good wouldn't be the good). A possible world is the best world if it contains a maximum…
a_z_s
  • 174
  • 9
5
votes
2 answers

Does Cogito ergo sum need to be more specific?

Something about my translation has bothered me since I originally posted my question (which follows below). It concerns what Bertrand Russell wrote in "On Denoting". Ryno indicated a circularity with the way I originally reformulated Cogito ergo…
user2581
4
votes
2 answers

Is there an influence of Buddhist thought in Leibniz's Monadology?

In his Monadology Leibniz writes: each portion of matter can be conceived as like a garden full of plants, or like a pond full of fish. But each branch of a plant, each organ of an animal, each drop of its bodily fluids is also a similar garden or…
Mozibur Ullah
  • 1
  • 14
  • 88
  • 234
4
votes
1 answer

What makes Leibniz's definition of perfection unintelligible?

Leibniz defined a perfection as a simple, positive quality in the highest degree. Norman Malcolm says I do not find his definition of a perfection intelligible. For one thing, it assumes that certain qualities or attributes are "positive" in…
MCL
  • 143
  • 2
4
votes
2 answers

Leibniz monads/connection to the physical universe/atom

Today I heard that any object is an agregate of many, but finitely many Leibniz monads. I would like to know if it can be counted how many monads form an electron or proton. What is the difference and connection between a monad and an atom?
user2925716
  • 169
  • 2
4
votes
3 answers

Present importance of Leibniz Monadology

Has the monadology of Leibniz any influence on contemporary philosophy? Note. I do not ask about its historical importance but about its present influence.
Jo Wehler
  • 20,817
  • 2
  • 26
  • 77
4
votes
1 answer

Are there similar theory to Nikolay Bugaev's idea of "emergent morality"?

I need someone's insight to put into perspective the thoughts of an author I discovered only recently. Although this author's idea seems very intuitive - the kind of idea you might have as a child or teenager - I'm not sure I've ever heard it…
user21102
  • 61
  • 2
1
2 3 4