Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'Queries to the 'Opticks'', 'Notes on Comments by Fardella' and 'talk'

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4 ideas

9. Objects / B. Unity of Objects / 1. Unifying an Object / c. Unity as conceptual

13160	To exist and be understood, a multitude must first be reduced to a unity [Leibniz]
	Full Idea: A plurality of things can neither be understood nor can exist unless one first understands the thing that is one, that to which the multitude necessarily reduces.
	From: Gottfried Leibniz (Notes on Comments by Fardella [1690], Prop 3)
	A reaction: Notice that it is our need to understand which imposes the unity on the multitude. It is not just some random fiction, or a meaningless mechanical act of thought.

9. Objects / B. Unity of Objects / 2. Substance / c. Types of substance

13161	Substances are everywhere in matter, like points in a line [Leibniz]
	Full Idea: There are substances everywhere in matter, just as points are everywhere in a line.
	From: Gottfried Leibniz (Notes on Comments by Fardella [1690], Clarif)
	A reaction: Since Leibniz is unlikely to believe in the reality of the points, we must wonder whether he was really committed to this infinity of substances. The more traditional notion of substance is always called 'substantial form' by Leibniz.

15. Nature of Minds / B. Features of Minds / 1. Consciousness / a. Consciousness

6668	If the present does not exist, then consciousness must be memory of the immediate past [Marshall]
	Full Idea: Given the paradoxical nature of the 'present' moment, maybe we should understand ALL consciousness as memory, with the split second of the 'specious present' being very vivid and very brief memory, with the rest of the mind remembering in lower degrees.
	From: David Marshall (talk [2004]), quoted by PG - Db (ideas)
	A reaction: This strikes me as a highly plausible, and very illuminating remark. For the time paradox, see Ideas 1904 and 5102. Anyone researching consciousness in the brain should think about this, because it will just be a special sort of memory neurons.

26. Natural Theory / D. Laws of Nature / 1. Laws of Nature

16746	Principles of things are not hidden features of forms, but the laws by which they were formed [Newton]
	Full Idea: The (active) principles I consider not as occult qualities, supposed to result from the specific forms of things, but as general laws of nature, by which the things themselves are formed.
	From: Isaac Newton (Queries to the 'Opticks' [1721], q 31), quoted by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 23.6
	A reaction: This is the external, 'imposed' view of laws (with the matter passive) at its most persuasive. If laws arise out the stuff (as I prefer to think), what principles went into the formulation of the stuff?