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All the ideas for 'Commentary on 'De Anima'', 'talk' and 'Leibniz:Body,Substance,Monad'

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4 ideas

1. Philosophy / D. Nature of Philosophy / 1. Philosophy
22519 Philosophers are revealed by their fears [Billington]
     Full Idea: To understand any philosopher, ask 'What are they afraid of?'.
     From: Ray Billington (talk [2010])
     A reaction: Yes! So... Plato - disorder. Aristotle - ignorance. Augustine - sin. Descartes - uncertainty. Spinoza - fragmentation. Leibniz - superficiality. Hume - speculation. Bentham - egotism. Kant - self-deception. Nietzsche - nihilism. Russell - imprecision.
7. Existence / C. Structure of Existence / 6. Fundamentals / c. Monads
12695 Epicurean atomists say body is sensible, to distinguish it from space. [Garber]
     Full Idea: The Epicurean atomists also defined body in terms of the property of being sensible, in order to distinguish it from empty space, which is not sensible.
     From: Daniel Garber (Leibniz:Body,Substance,Monad [2009], 1)
     A reaction: This is a very illuminating bit of background, for those of us who have the knee-jerk reaction that monadology is barking mad.
22. Metaethics / B. Value / 2. Values / e. Death
16764 The soul conserves the body, as we see by its dissolution when the soul leaves [Toletus]
     Full Idea: Every accident of a living thing, as well as all its organs and temperaments and its dispositions are conserved by the soul. We see this from experience, since when that soul recedes, all these dissolve and become corrupted.
     From: Franciscus Toletus (Commentary on 'De Anima' [1572], II.1.1), quoted by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 24.5
     A reaction: A nice example of observing a phenemonon, but not being able to observe the dependence relation the right way round. Compare Descartes in Idea 16763.
26. Natural Theory / A. Speculations on Nature / 6. Early Matter Theories / g. Atomism
12705 Epicurean atoms are distinguished by their extreme hardness [Garber]
     Full Idea: In Epicurean atomism (of Cordemoy, for example) there is a world of basic things distinguished by virtue of their extreme hardness.
     From: Daniel Garber (Leibniz:Body,Substance,Monad [2009], 2)
     A reaction: Garber says that Leibniz espouses 'substantial atomism', which is different from this. Leibniz's atoms have active power, where these atoms just embody total resistance.