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12710
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As well as extension, bodies contain powers [Leibniz]
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Full Idea:
Over and above what can be deduced from extension, we must add and recognise in bodies certain notions or forms that are immaterial, so to speak, or independent of extension, which you can call powers [potentia], by which speed is adjusted to magnitude.
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From:
Gottfried Leibniz (De Natura Corporis [1678], A6.4.1980), quoted by Daniel Garber - Leibniz:Body,Substance,Monad 3
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A reaction:
He boldly asserts that the powers are 'immaterial', but is then forced to qualify it (as he often does) with 'so to speak'. The notion that bodies just have extension (occupy space) comes from Descartes, and is firmly opposed by Leibniz.
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19384
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Space and time are the order of all possibilities, and don't just relate to what is actual [Leibniz]
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Full Idea:
Space and time taken together constitute the order of possibilities of the one entire universe, so that these orders relate not only to what actually is, but also to anything that could be put in its place.
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From:
Gottfried Leibniz (Reply to 'Rorarius' 2nd ed [1702], GP iv 568), quoted by Richard T.W. Arthur - Leibniz 7 'Space and Time'
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A reaction:
A very nice idea. Rather like the 'space of reasons', where all rational thought must exist, space and time are the 'space of existence and action'. Their concepts involve more than relations between what actually exists.
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