Combining Texts

Ideas for 'Saundaranandakavya', 'Letters to Burcher De Volder' and 'The Sceptical Chemist'

unexpand these ideas     |    start again     |     choose another area for these texts

display all the ideas for this combination of texts


1 idea

17. Mind and Body / A. Mind-Body Dualism / 1. Dualism
Soul represents body, but soul remains unchanged, while body continuously changes [Leibniz]
     Full Idea: The essence of the soul is to represent bodies. ...The soul and the idea of the body do not signify the same thing. For the soul remains one and the same, while the idea of the body perpetually changes as the body itself changes.
     From: Gottfried Leibniz (Letters to Burcher De Volder [1706], 1699.03.24/04.03)
     A reaction: This seems to rest on the Cartesian Ego, as the essence of mind which does not change. And yet elsewhere he describes the Ego as a mere abstraction from introspected mental life.