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Full Idea
Leibniz is committed with apparent consistency to both a purely qualitative character of all thisnesses, and to primitiveness of individual identity. He regards thisnesses as conjunctions of simpler, logically independent suchnesses.
Clarification
Adams's 'suchnesses' are qualitative, and his 'thisnesses' are not
Gist of Idea
Leibniz bases pure primitive entities on conjunctions of qualitative properties
Source
report of Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]) by Robert Merrihew Adams - Primitive Thisness and Primitive Identity 5
Book Ref
'Metaphysics - An Anthology', ed/tr. Sosa,E. /Kim,J. [Blackwell 1999], p.179
A Reaction
Hence Leibniz is held to say that all of the qualitative properties are 'essential' to the object, since all of them are needed to constitute its identity. Hence absolutely nothing about an object, even an electron, could be different, which is daft.
15856 | A thing can become one or many, depending on how we talk about it [Plato] |
17839 | Some things are unified by their account, which rests on a unified thought about the thing [Aristotle] |
2297 | If I can separate two things in my understanding, then God can separate them in reality [Descartes] |
13160 | To exist and be understood, a multitude must first be reduced to a unity [Leibniz] |
12746 | We find unity in reason, and unity in perception, but these are not true unity [Leibniz] |
12035 | Leibniz bases pure primitive entities on conjunctions of qualitative properties [Leibniz, by Adams,RM] |
20362 | We saw unity in things because our ego seemed unified (but now we doubt the ego!) [Nietzsche] |
14252 | We should understand identity in terms of the propositions it renders true [Fine,K] |
13332 | Hierarchical set membership models objects better than the subset or aggregate relations do [Fine,K] |
14928 | Things are abstractions from structures [Ladyman/Ross] |
14481 | Wherever an object exists, there are intrinsic properties instantiating every modal profile [Thomasson] |