Notes on Leibniz: Philosophy, Key Concepts, and Influence

Leibniz: Overview of His Philosophy and Contributions

• Philosophical Context

  • Philosophers studied this semester include a range of influential figures.

  • Leibniz is notable for lacking a definitive work comparable to others like Descartes, Spinoza, or Kant.

  • Key texts:

  • Monadology (1714, posthumously published)

  • Discourse on Metaphysics (completed in 1686, published in 1846)

  • New Essays on Human Understanding (finished in 1704, published in 1765)

  • Leibniz excluded from Hutchins and Adler’s Great Books of the Western World due to a lack of a singular definitive text.

• Influential Life and Early Education

  • Born in 1646, died in 1716, Leibniz displayed precocious intellectual abilities, influenced by his father's library after his father’s passing at age 6.

  • An autodidact, he read extensively and desired deep understanding and innovation in various fields.

  • His chaotic approach to learning was critical for his development, and he was highly regarded as a polymath, arguably the greatest since Aristotle.

• Range of Interests and Accomplishments

  • Known for contributions across disciplines: mathematics, metaphysics, geology, politics, theology, physics, chemistry, economics, and linguistics.

  • Strived for order and classification, evident in his interest in logic.

  • Benjamin Scharfstein reflects on the impressive range of Leibniz's intellectual pursuits and the unity among them.

• Key Philosophical Concepts

  • Principle of Sufficient Reason:

  • States that everything must have a reason or cause for its existence or occurrence.

  • Central to discussions of God's role in existence and contingent versus necessary truths.

  • Monadology:

  • Proposes that reality is composed of simple substances, or monads, which are indivisible, non-extended entities that reflect the whole universe from their perspective.

  • Monads are non-physical, aligning Leibniz with panpsychism—the belief that consciousness pervades the universe.

  • Individuation:

  • Essential properties define an individual; every property is integral to its identity, moving away from Aristotle's essence and accident distinction.

  • Theodicy and Best World:

  • Leibniz's defense of God's goodness in light of evil argues this is the best of all possible worlds, famously critiqued by Voltaire.

  • Contingent and Necessary Truths:

  • Distinction between truths reliant on facts (contingent) and those necessary in all possible worlds (necessary).

• Leibniz’s Logic and Metaphysics

  • Criticism of logic's treatment of existence:

  • Inaccurate assumptions about the necessity of existing subjects in universal propositions lead to misunderstandings, as existence is not a predicate (Kant).

  • Impact of Mathematics:

  • Co-discoverer of calculus, with infinitesimals playing an essential role in his philosophical views of the universe and its components.

• Cosmological Argument

  • Leibniz argues for a first cause based on the principle of sufficient reason, leading to the necessity of a non-contingent cause (often understood as God) for the existence of contingent facts.

  • Ontological Argument:

  • Arguments for God’s existence based on the concept of a maximally perfect being.

  • Similarities to modern philosophical arguments about necessary existence (e.g., Plantinga).

• Influence and Reception

  • Evaluated as a rationalist philosopher among the greatest in history for emphasizing clarity and reason behind phenomena.

  • Responses to Leibniz's thoughts and principles continue to shape contemporary discussions in metaphysics and philosophy of science, with persistent debates about the plausibility of his views.