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Single Idea 7696

[filed under theme 7. Existence / A. Nature of Existence / 5. Reason for Existence ]

Full Idea

The historical honour of having first raised the question "Why is there something rather than nothing?" belongs to Leibniz.

Gist of Idea

Leibniz first asked 'why is there something rather than nothing?'

Source

report of Gottfried Leibniz (On the Ultimate Origination of Things [1697]) by Dale Jacquette - Ontology Ch.3

Book Ref

Jacquette,Dale: 'Ontology' [Acumen 2002], p.89

A Reaction

I presume that people before Leibniz may well have had the thought, but not bothered to even articulate it, because there seemed nothing to say by way of answer, other than some reference to the inscrutable will of God.

Related Idea

Idea 5062 First: there must be reasons; Second: why anything at all?; Third: why this? [Leibniz]

The 18 ideas with the same theme [why do things (or anything at all) exist?]:

458 Nothing could come out of nothing, and existence could never completely cease [Empedocles]
1707 Maybe necessity and non-necessity are the first principles of ontology [Aristotle]
17179 There must always be a reason or cause why some triangle does or does not exist [Spinoza]
19400 Possibles demand existence, so as many of them as possible must actually exist [Leibniz]
19401 God's sufficient reason for choosing reality is in the fitness or perfection of possibilities [Leibniz]
5062 First: there must be reasons; Second: why anything at all?; Third: why this? [Leibniz]
7696 Leibniz first asked 'why is there something rather than nothing?' [Leibniz, by Jacquette]
19341 There must be a straining towards existence in the essence of all possible things [Leibniz]
19428 Because something does exist, there must be a drive in possible things towards existence [Leibniz]
3942 I do not believe in the existence of anything, if I see no reason to believe it [Berkeley]
5646 Hegel gives an ontological proof of the existence of everything [Hegel, by Scruton]
16007 I assume existence, rather than reasoning towards it [Kierkegaard]
7692 Being is maximal consistency [Jacquette]
7687 Existence is completeness and consistency [Jacquette]
19662 It is necessarily contingent that there is one thing rather than another - so something must exist [Meillassoux]
17320 Either p is true or not-p is true, so something is true, so something exists [Liggins]
19482 Current physics says matter and antimatter should have reduced to light at the big bang [New Sci.]
19483 CP violation shows a decay imbalance in matter and antimatter, leading to matter's dominance [New Sci.]