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Single Idea 12945

[filed under theme 18. Thought / C. Content / 2. Ideas ]

Full Idea

I distinguish ideas from thoughts. For we always have all our pure or distinct ideas independently of the senses, but thoughts always correspond to some sensation.

Gist of Idea

Thoughts correspond to sensations, but ideas are independent of thoughts

Source

Gottfried Leibniz (New Essays on Human Understanding [1704], 2.01)

Book Ref

Leibniz,Gottfried: 'New Essays on Human Understanding', ed/tr. Remnant/Bennett [CUP 1996], p.119


A Reaction

Leibniz's concept of an 'idea' is quite different from the empiricist notion of them, and strikes me as being much closer to Frege's notion of a concept. On the whole I like the Leibniz account best.


The 18 ideas with the same theme [mental events which internally represent reality]:

True ideas are images, such as of a man, a chimera, or God [Descartes]
Ideas are powerful entities, which can produce further ideas [Spinoza, by Schmid]
An 'idea' is a mental conception which is actively formed by the mind in thinking [Spinoza]
Ideas are not images formed in the brain, but are the conceptions of thought [Spinoza]
An idea involves affirmation or negation [Spinoza]
Ideas are the objects of understanding when we think [Locke]
The word 'idea' covers thinking best, for imaginings, concepts, and basic experiences [Locke]
Complex ideas are all resolvable into simple ideas [Locke]
Thoughts correspond to sensations, but ideas are independent of thoughts [Leibniz]
An idea is an independent inner object, which expresses the qualities of things [Leibniz]
The idea of green seems simple, but it must be compounded of the ideas of blue and yellow [Leibniz]
We must distinguish images from exact defined ideas [Leibniz]
True ideas represent what is possible; false ideas represent contradictions [Leibniz]
By an 'idea' I mean not an actual thought, but the resources we can draw on to think [Leibniz]
Berkeley probably used 'idea' to mean both the act of apprehension and the thing apprehended [Russell on Berkeley]
Only philosophers treat ideas as objects [Reid]
Mental representations are the old 'Ideas', but without images [Fodor]
Cartesian 'ideas' confuse concepts and propositions [Scruton]