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Single Idea 21252
[filed under theme 28. God / A. Divine Nature / 4. Divine Contradictions
]
Full Idea
If two propositions (about perfections) are incompatible, that cannot be demonstrated without a resolution of the terms, for otherwise their nature would not enter into the ratiocination.
Gist of Idea
Perfections must have overlapping parts if their incompatibility is to be proved
Source
Gottfried Leibniz (New Essays on Human Understanding [1704], App X)
Book Ref
'The Existence of God', ed/tr. Hick,John [Macmillan 1964], p.38
A Reaction
If God is omnipotent and wholly free, these appear to be fully separate perfections. But it is their implications (can God decide to do otherwise, given His foreknowledge?) which lead to a problem. So this analyis of contradiction is wrong.
Related Idea
Idea 1414
A perfection is a simple quality, which is positive and absolute, and has no limit [Leibniz]
The
106 ideas
from 'New Essays on Human Understanding'
5058
|
Animals have thought and sensation, and indestructible immaterial souls
[Leibniz]
|
5056
|
Material or immaterial substances cannot be conceived without their essential activity
[Leibniz]
|
5055
|
No two things are totally identical
[Leibniz]
|
5057
|
If you fully understand a subject and its qualities, you see how the second derive from the first
[Leibniz]
|
5054
|
Animal thought is a shadow of reasoning, connecting sequences of images by imagination
[Leibniz]
|
5053
|
The instances confirming a general truth are never enough to establish its necessity
[Leibniz]
|
11855
|
Substances cannot be bare, but have activity as their essence
[Leibniz]
|
11856
|
Qualities should be predictable from the nature of the subject
[Leibniz]
|
12932
|
The idea of being must come from our own existence
[Leibniz]
|
17079
|
Proofs of necessity come from the understanding, where they have their source
[Leibniz]
|
12931
|
Particular truths are just instances of general truths
[Leibniz]
|
4302
|
You may experience a universal truth, but only reason can tell you that it is always true
[Leibniz]
|
12930
|
The senses are confused, and necessities come from distinct intellectual ideas
[Leibniz]
|
12929
|
All of our thoughts come from within the soul, and not from the senses
[Leibniz]
|
12933
|
Arithmetic and geometry are implicitly innate, awaiting revelation
[Leibniz]
|
19360
|
General principles, even if unconscious, are indispensable for thinking
[Leibniz]
|
12934
|
We can't want everyone to have more than their share, so a further standard is needed
[Leibniz]
|
12936
|
There are natural rewards and punishments, like illness after over-indulgence
[Leibniz]
|
12935
|
Every feeling is the perception of a truth
[Leibniz]
|
12937
|
We shouldn't just accept Euclid's axioms, but try to demonstrate them
[Leibniz]
|
12943
|
Individuality is in the bond substance gives between past and future
[Leibniz]
|
12941
|
There cannot be power without action; the power is a disposition to act
[Leibniz]
|
12939
|
Wholly uniform things like space and numbers are mere abstractions
[Leibniz]
|
12940
|
What is left of the 'blank page' if you remove the ideas?
[Leibniz]
|
12944
|
It is a serious mistake to think that we are aware of all of our perceptions
[Leibniz]
|
12942
|
Memory doesn't make identity; a man who relearned everything would still be the same man
[Leibniz]
|
12938
|
An idea is an independent inner object, which expresses the qualities of things
[Leibniz]
|
12945
|
Thoughts correspond to sensations, but ideas are independent of thoughts
[Leibniz]
|
12946
|
The idea of the will includes the understanding
[Leibniz]
|
19357
|
The idea of green seems simple, but it must be compounded of the ideas of blue and yellow
[Leibniz]
|
12947
|
We only believe in sensible things when reason helps the senses
[Leibniz]
|
12948
|
A pain doesn't resemble the movement of a pin, but it resembles the bodily movement pins cause
[Leibniz]
|
19358
|
Colour and pain must express the nature of their stimuli, without exact resemblance
[Leibniz]
|
12950
|
We must distinguish images from exact defined ideas
[Leibniz]
|
12949
|
Light takes time to reach us, so objects we see may now not exist
[Leibniz]
|
12951
|
Abstraction attends to the general, not the particular, and involves universal truths
[Leibniz]
|
12952
|
Space is an order among actual and possible things
[Leibniz]
|
12953
|
Fluidity is basic, and we divide into bodies according to our needs
[Leibniz]
|
12955
|
If there were duration without change, we could never establish its length
[Leibniz]
|
12954
|
God's essence is the source of possibilities, and his will the source of existents
[Leibniz]
|
12956
|
Only whole numbers are multitudes of units
[Leibniz]
|
12958
|
Love is pleasure in the perfection, well-being or happiness of its object
[Leibniz]
|
12957
|
The good is the virtuous, the pleasing, or the useful
[Leibniz]
|
12963
|
Opposing reason is opposing truth, since reason is a chain of truths
[Leibniz]
|
12959
|
We discern active power from our minds, so mind must be involved in all active powers
[Leibniz]
|
12965
|
All occurrence in the depth of a substance is spontaneous 'action'
[Leibniz]
|
12962
|
Pleasure is a sense of perfection
[Leibniz]
|
12960
|
We understand things when they are distinct, and we can derive necessities from them
[Leibniz]
|
19364
|
Volition automatically endeavours to move towards what it sees as good (and away from bad)
[Leibniz]
|
19368
|
The will determines action, by what is seen as good, but it does not necessitate it
[Leibniz]
|
12964
|
If would be absurd not to disagree with someone's taste if it was a taste for poisons
[Leibniz]
|
19328
|
Without the principle of sufficient reason, God's existence could not be demonstrated
[Leibniz]
|
12967
|
I use the word 'entelechy' for a power, to include endeavour, as well as mere aptitude
[Leibniz]
|
12966
|
Objects of ideas can be divided into abstract and concrete, and then further subdivided
[Leibniz]
|
12969
|
The active powers which are not essential to the substance are the 'real qualities'
[Leibniz]
|
12968
|
A 'substratum' is just a metaphor for whatever supports several predicates
[Leibniz]
|
12970
|
We can imagine two bodies interpenetrating, as two rays of light seem to
[Leibniz]
|
12971
|
If two individuals could be indistinguishable, there could be no principle of individuation
[Leibniz]
|
13098
|
We use things to distinguish places and times, not vice versa
[Leibniz]
|
13075
|
No two things are quite the same, so there must be an internal principle of distinction
[Leibniz]
|
12973
|
We know our own identity by psychological continuity, even if there are some gaps
[Leibniz]
|
12972
|
Bodies, like Theseus's ship, are only the same in appearance, and never strictly the same
[Leibniz]
|
12884
|
The same whole ceases to exist if a part is lost
[Leibniz]
|
12974
|
People who can't apply names usually don't understand the thing to which it applies
[Leibniz]
|
12976
|
If our ideas of a thing are imperfect, the thing can have several unconnected definitions
[Leibniz]
|
12975
|
We have a distinct idea of gold, to define it, but not a perfect idea, to understand it
[Leibniz]
|
12978
|
A perfect idea of an object shows that the object is possible
[Leibniz]
|
12977
|
We will only connect our various definitions of gold when we understand it more deeply
[Leibniz]
|
12981
|
Essence is just the possibility of a thing
[Leibniz]
|
12979
|
The only way we can determine individuals is by keeping hold of them
[Leibniz]
|
12984
|
Real definitions, unlike nominal definitions, display possibilities
[Leibniz]
|
12983
|
A nominal definition is of the qualities, but the real definition is of the essential inner structure
[Leibniz]
|
12980
|
Genus and differentia might be swapped, and 'rational animal' become 'animable rational'
[Leibniz]
|
12982
|
One essence can be expressed by several definitions
[Leibniz]
|
12985
|
Maybe motion is definable as 'change of place'
[Leibniz]
|
12986
|
The essence of baldness is vague and imperfect
[Leibniz]
|
12987
|
For some sorts, a member of it is necessarily a member
[Leibniz]
|
12989
|
Our true divisions of nature match reality, but are probably incomplete
[Leibniz]
|
12988
|
The universe contains everything possible for its perfect harmony
[Leibniz]
|
12990
|
Real (non-logical) abstract terms are either essences or accidents
[Leibniz]
|
12993
|
Have five categories - substance, quantity, quality, action/passion, relation - and their combinations
[Leibniz]
|
12992
|
Logic teaches us how to order and connect our thoughts
[Leibniz]
|
12994
|
Gold has a real essence, unknown to us, which produces its properties
[Leibniz]
|
12991
|
Children learn language fast, with little instruction and few definitions
[Leibniz]
|
12995
|
The name 'gold' means what we know of gold, and also further facts about it which only others know
[Leibniz]
|
12811
|
We can't know individuals, or determine their exact individuality
[Leibniz]
|
12998
|
Understanding grasps the agreements and disagreements of ideas
[Leibniz]
|
12997
|
Analysis is the art of finding the middle term
[Leibniz]
|
12996
|
I know more than I think, since I know I think A then B then C
[Leibniz]
|
12999
|
Substances are primary powers; their ways of being are the derivative powers
[Leibniz]
|
13000
|
Truth is correspondence between mental propositions and what they are about
[Leibniz]
|
13002
|
It is always good to reduce the number of axioms
[Leibniz]
|
13001
|
Our sensation of green is a confused idea, like objects blurred by movement
[Leibniz]
|
13003
|
The Cogito doesn't prove existence, because 'I am thinking' already includes 'I am'
[Leibniz]
|
13005
|
Truth arises among sensations from grounding reasons and from regularities
[Leibniz]
|
13006
|
Certainty is where practical doubt is insane, or at least blameworthy
[Leibniz]
|
10056
|
At bottom eternal truths are all conditional
[Leibniz]
|
13008
|
Geometry, unlike sensation, lets us glimpse eternal truths and their necessity
[Leibniz]
|
13009
|
A reason is a known truth which leads to assent to some further truth
[Leibniz]
|
12805
|
If two people apply a single term to different resemblances, they refer to two different things
[Leibniz]
|
12806
|
Locke needs many instances to show a natural kind, but why not a single instance?
[Leibniz, by Jolley]
|
12808
|
Part of our idea of gold is its real essence, which is not known to us in detail
[Leibniz]
|
12807
|
The word 'gold' means a hidden constitution known to experts, and not just its appearances
[Leibniz]
|
21253
|
Descartes needs to demonstrate how other people can attain his clear and distinct conceptions
[Leibniz]
|
1414
|
A perfection is a simple quality, which is positive and absolute, and has no limit
[Leibniz]
|
21252
|
Perfections must have overlapping parts if their incompatibility is to be proved
[Leibniz]
|