93 ideas
| 20186 | Unlike knowledge, wisdom cannot be misused [Zagzebski] |
| Full Idea: A distinctive mark of wisdom is that it cannot be misused, whereas knowledge surely can be misused. | |
| From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], I 1.2) | |
| A reaction: She will argue, with Aristotle, that this is because wisdom (and maybe 'true' knowledge) must include 'phronesis' (practical wisdom), which is the key to all the virtues, intellectual and moral. This idea is striking, and obviously correct. |
| 19694 | Wisdom is the property of a person, not of their cognitive state [Zagzebski, by Whitcomb] |
| Full Idea: Zagzebski takes wisdom as literally properties of persons, not persons' cognitive states. | |
| From: report of Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], p.59-60) by Dennis Whitcomb - Wisdom 'Twofold' | |
| A reaction: Not sure about this. Zagzebski uses this idea to endorse epistemic virtue. But knowledge and ignorance are properties of persons too. There can be, though, a precise mental state involved in knowledge, but not in wisdom. |
| 19359 | Leibniz aims to give coherent rational support for empiricism [Leibniz, by Perkins] |
| Full Idea: Leibniz's philosophy largely serves to justify and enable a coherent empirical account of the world. | |
| From: report of Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]) by Franklin Perkins - Leibniz: Guide for the Perplexed 4.I | |
| A reaction: A nice counter to the simplistic idea of Locke as empiricist and Leibniz as rationalist. Leibniz is explicit that science needs a separate 'metaphysics' to underpin it. Perkins says Locke constructs experience, and Leibniz analyses it. |
| 13086 | Metaphysics is a science of the intelligible nature of being [Leibniz, by Cover/O'Leary-Hawthorne] |
| Full Idea: For Leibniz, metaphysics is above all a science of the intelligible nature of being. | |
| From: report of Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]) by Cover,J/O'Leary-Hawthorne,J - Substance and Individuation in Leibniz 4.3.1 | |
| A reaction: [Their footnote gives two quotes in support] I could take this as my motto. We are not studying the 'nature of being', because we can't. We are studying what is 'intelligible' about it; my thesis is that the need for intelligibility imposes an order. |
| 16710 | Leibniz tried to combine mechanistic physics with scholastic metaphysics [Leibniz, by Pasnau] |
| Full Idea: Leibniz made a sustained attempt to combine a mechanistic physics with something like a scholastic metaphysics. | |
| From: report of Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]) by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 20.1 | |
| A reaction: This seems to me clear enough, and a lot of current philosophers seem to underestimate how Aristotelian Leibniz was. |
| 16897 | Reason is the faculty for grasping apriori necessary truths [Leibniz, by Burge] |
| Full Idea: Leibniz actually characterises reason as the faculty for apprehending priori, necessary truths. | |
| From: report of Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]) by Tyler Burge - Frege on Apriority (with ps) 2 | |
| A reaction: No wonder it is called the Age of Reason when the claims are this grandiose. |
| 3346 | For Leibniz rationality is based on non-contradiction and the principle of sufficient reason [Leibniz, by Benardete,JA] |
| Full Idea: Leibniz distinguished two fundamental principles of rationality - the principle of non-contradiction and the principle of sufficient reason. | |
| From: report of Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]) by José A. Benardete - Metaphysics: the logical approach Ch.18 |
| 3347 | Leibniz said the principle of sufficient reason is synthetic a priori, since its denial is not illogical [Leibniz, by Benardete,JA] |
| Full Idea: Leibniz assigns synthetic a priori status to the principle of sufficient reason, readily conceding that one can deny it without fear of inconsistency. | |
| From: report of Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]) by José A. Benardete - Metaphysics: the logical approach Ch.18 |
| 20221 | Precision is only one of the virtues of a good definition [Zagzebski] |
| Full Idea: Precision is but one virtue of a definition, one that must be balanced against simplicity, elegance, conciseness, theoretical illumination, and practical usefulness. | |
| From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], III 2.1) | |
| A reaction: Illumination looks like the dream virtue for a good definition. Otherwise it is just ticked as accurate and stowed away. 'True justified belief' is a very illuminating definition of knowledge - if it is right. But it's not very precise. |
| 20220 | Objection by counterexample is weak, because it only reveals inaccuracies in one theory [Zagzebski] |
| Full Idea: Objection by counterexample is the weakest sort of attack a theory can undergo. Even when the objection succeeds, it shows only that a theory fails to achieve complete accuracy. It does not distinguish among the various rival theories. | |
| From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], III 2.1) | |
| A reaction: Typically counterexamples are used to refute universal generalisations (i.e. by 'falsification'), but canny theorists avoid those, or slip in a qualifying clause. Counterexamples are good for exploring a theory's coverage. |
| 8627 | Leibniz is inclined to regard all truths as provable [Leibniz, by Frege] |
| Full Idea: Leibniz has an inclination to regard all truths as provable. | |
| From: report of Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]) by Gottlob Frege - Grundlagen der Arithmetik (Foundations) §15 | |
| A reaction: Leibniz sounds like the epitome of Enlightenment optimism about the powers of reason. Could God prove every truth? It's a nice thought. |
| 9147 | Number cannot be defined as addition of ones, since that needs the number; it is a single act of abstraction [Fine,K on Leibniz] |
| Full Idea: Leibniz's talk of the addition of ones cannot define number, since it cannot be specified how often they are added without using the number itself. Number must be an organic unity of ones, achieved by a single act of abstraction. | |
| From: comment on Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]) by Kit Fine - Cantorian Abstraction: Recon. and Defence §1 | |
| A reaction: I doubt whether 'abstraction' is the right word for this part of the process. It seems more like a 'gestalt'. The first point is clearly right, that it is the wrong way round if you try to define number by means of addition. |
| 19375 | The continuum is not divided like sand, but folded like paper [Leibniz, by Arthur,R] |
| Full Idea: Leibniz said the division of the continuum should not be conceived 'to be like the division of sand into grains, but like that of a tunic or a sheet of paper into folds'. | |
| From: report of Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690], A VI iii 555) by Richard T.W. Arthur - Leibniz | |
| A reaction: This from the man who invented calculus. This thought might apply well to the modern physicist's concept of a 'field'. |
| 18080 | A tangent is a line connecting two points on a curve that are infinitely close together [Leibniz] |
| Full Idea: We have only to keep in mind that to find a tangent means to draw a line that connects two points of a curve at an infinitely small distance. | |
| From: Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]), quoted by Philip Kitcher - The Nature of Mathematical Knowledge 10.1 | |
| A reaction: [The quote can be tracked through Kitcher's footnote] |
| 18081 | Nature uses the infinite everywhere [Leibniz] |
| Full Idea: Nature uses the infinite in everything it does. | |
| From: Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]), quoted by Philip Kitcher - The Nature of Mathematical Knowledge 10.1 | |
| A reaction: [The quote can be tracked through Kitcher's footnote] He seems to have had in mind the infinitely small. |
| 21982 | I only wish I had such eyes as to see Nobody! It's as much as I can do to see real people. [Carroll,L] |
| Full Idea: "I see nobody on the road," said Alice. - "I only wish I had such eyes," the King remarked. ..."To be able to see Nobody! ...Why, it's as much as I can do to see real people." | |
| From: Lewis Carroll (C.Dodgson) (Through the Looking Glass [1886], p.189), quoted by A.W. Moore - The Evolution of Modern Metaphysics 07.7 | |
| A reaction: [Moore quotes this, inevitably, in a chapter on Hegel] This may be a better candidate for the birth of philosophy of language than Frege's Groundwork. |
| 7565 | Leibniz proposes monads, since there must be basic things, which are immaterial in order to have unity [Leibniz, by Jolley] |
| Full Idea: Leibniz believes in monads because it would be contrary to reason or divine wisdom if everything was compounds, down to infinity; there must be ultimate unified building-blocks; they cannot be material, for material things lack genuine unity. | |
| From: report of Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]) by Nicholas Jolley - Leibniz Ch.3 | |
| A reaction: It is hard to discern the basis for the claim that only immaterial things can have unity. The Greeks proposed atoms, and we have no reason to think that electrons lack unity. |
| 10419 | If relations can be reduced to, or supervene on, monadic properties of relata, they are not real [Leibniz, by Swoyer] |
| Full Idea: Leibniz argued that relations could be reduced to monadic properties and so were dispensable, and some still agree, saying relations supervene on monadic properties of the relata, and are not actually real. | |
| From: report of Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]) by Chris Swoyer - Properties 7.4 | |
| A reaction: At the very least a background of space and/or time seem required, in addition to any properties the relata may have. y only becomes 'to the left of x' when x appears to its right, so the relation doesn't seem to be intrinsic to y. |
| 13078 | Relations aren't in any monad, so they are distributed, so they are not real [Leibniz] |
| Full Idea: The relations which connect two monads are not in either the one or the other, but equally in both at once; and therefore properly speaking, in neither. I do not think you would wish to posit an accident which would inhere simultaneously in two subjects. | |
| From: Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690], G II:517), quoted by Cover,J/O'Leary-Hawthorne,J - Substance and Individuation in Leibniz 2.4.3 | |
| A reaction: Where Russell affirms relations as universals, and scholastics make them properties of individuals, Leibniz denies their reality entirely. It seems obvious that once the objects and properties are there, the relations come for free. |
| 12713 | Forms have sensation and appetite, the latter being the ability to act on other bodies [Leibniz, by Garber] |
| Full Idea: Leibniz's form contains both sensation and appetite, and he seems to associate appetite with the ability a body has to act on another. | |
| From: report of Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]) by Daniel Garber - Leibniz:Body,Substance,Monad 3 | |
| A reaction: It strikes me (you may be surprised to hear) that this concept is not unlike Nietzsche's all-mastering 'will to power'. I offer Idea 7140 in evidence. |
| 13087 | The essence of a thing is its real possibilities [Leibniz, by Cover/O'Leary-Hawthorne] |
| Full Idea: In Leibniz's view, the essence of a thing is fundamentally the real possibilities of that thing. | |
| From: report of Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]) by Cover,J/O'Leary-Hawthorne,J - Substance and Individuation in Leibniz 4.3.3 | |
| A reaction: Note that the essences are individual. On the whole I would prefer Leibniz in his own words, but this is too good to lose (..but see Idea 12981). It is the aspect of Leibniz that fits perfectly with modern scientific essentialism. |
| 12701 | Leibniz moved from individuation by whole entity to individuation by substantial form [Leibniz, by Garber] |
| Full Idea: By 1680 Leibniz had clearly abandoned the 'whole entity' conception of individuation, for a conception grounded in substantial form alone. | |
| From: report of Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]) by Daniel Garber - Leibniz:Body,Substance,Monad 2 | |
| A reaction: In other words, Leibniz became more of an Aristotelian, and more of an essentialist. |
| 13105 | The laws-of-the-series plays a haecceitist role [Leibniz, by Cover/O'Leary-Hawthorne] |
| Full Idea: Leibniz takes the laws-of-the-series to play a haecceitistic role. | |
| From: report of Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]) by Cover,J/O'Leary-Hawthorne,J - Substance and Individuation in Leibniz 7.5 | |
| A reaction: Idea 13092 for law-in-the-series. He thinks that a law-in-a-series is unique to a substance, and so can individuate it. That is a pretty good proposal, if anything is going to do the job. Perhaps I do believe in haecceities, as unique bundles of powers? |
| 16513 | Identity of a substance is the law of its persistence [Leibniz] |
| Full Idea: For there to be a certain persisting law which involves the future states of that which we conceive as one and the same continuant, this is what I say constitute's a substance's identity. | |
| From: Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690], G II:264), quoted by David Wiggins - Sameness and Substance 3.1 | |
| A reaction: This is a key remark for those who thing 'persistence conditions' are basic to metaphysics. I'm not so sure. |
| 12035 | Leibniz bases pure primitive entities on conjunctions of qualitative properties [Leibniz, by Adams,RM] |
| Full Idea: Leibniz is committed with apparent consistency to both a purely qualitative character of all thisnesses, and to primitiveness of individual identity. He regards thisnesses as conjunctions of simpler, logically independent suchnesses. | |
| From: report of Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]) by Robert Merrihew Adams - Primitive Thisness and Primitive Identity 5 | |
| A reaction: Hence Leibniz is held to say that all of the qualitative properties are 'essential' to the object, since all of them are needed to constitute its identity. Hence absolutely nothing about an object, even an electron, could be different, which is daft. |
| 13091 | Leibnizian substances add concept, law, force, form and soul [Leibniz, by Cover/O'Leary-Hawthorne] |
| Full Idea: To the traditional idea of substance (independent, subjects of predication, active, persistent) Leibniz adds, distinctively, complete individual concept, law-of-the-series, active force, form and soul or entelechy. | |
| From: report of Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]) by Cover,J/O'Leary-Hawthorne,J - Substance and Individuation in Leibniz 6.1.1 | |
| A reaction: 'Form' seems to be Aristotelian, and 'soul' seems ridiculous. I don't think the 'complete concept' is much help. However, the 'law-in-the-series' is very interesting (Idea 13079), if employed sensibly, and 'active force' is spot-on. Powers define reality. |
| 7561 | Substances are essentially active [Leibniz, by Jolley] |
| Full Idea: For Leibniz, it is the very essence of substances to be sources of activity. | |
| From: report of Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]) by Nicholas Jolley - Leibniz Ch.2 | |
| A reaction: This makes the views of Leibniz sympathetic to modern essentialism (of which I am a fan), because it places active power at the centre of what it is to exist, rather than action being imposed on matter which is otherwise passive. |
| 12715 | Leibniz strengthened hylomorphism by connecting it to force in physics [Leibniz, by Garber] |
| Full Idea: A standard criticism of the scholastic notions of matter and form is that they are obscure and unintelligible. But in Leibniz's system they are connected directly with notions of active and passive force that play an intelligible roles in his physics. | |
| From: report of Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]) by Daniel Garber - Leibniz:Body,Substance,Monad 4 | |
| A reaction: This seems to me to be very appealing. Aristotle was clearly on the right lines, but just ran out of things to say, once he had pointed in the right direction. Maybe 'fields' and 'strings' can fill out the Aristotelian conception of form. |
| 11878 | Leibniz's view (that all properties are essential) is extreme essentialism, not its denial [Leibniz, by Mackie,P] |
| Full Idea: The view standardly attributed to Leibniz, that makes all an individual's properties essential to it should be regarded as an extreme version of essentialism, not a denial of essentialism. | |
| From: report of Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]) by Penelope Mackie - How Things Might Have Been 1.1 | |
| A reaction: Wiggins disagrees, saying that Leibniz was not an essentialist, which is an interesting topic of research for those who are interested. I would take Leibniz to be not an essentialist, on that basis, as essentialism makes a distinction. See Quine on that. |
| 11862 | Leibniz was not an essentialist [Leibniz, by Wiggins] |
| Full Idea: Leibniz was not an essentialist. | |
| From: report of Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]) by David Wiggins - Sameness and Substance Renewed 4.2 n4 | |
| A reaction: Assuming this is right, it is rather helpful, because you can read mountains of Leibniz without ever being quite sure. Mackie says he IS an extreme essentialist, treating all properties as essential. Wiggins makes more sense there. |
| 16504 | Two eggs can't be identical, because the same truths can't apply to both of them [Leibniz] |
| Full Idea: It isn't possible to have two particulars that are similar in all respects - for example two eggs - for it is necessary that some things can be said about one of them that cannot be said about the other, else they could be substituted for one another. | |
| From: Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]), quoted by David Wiggins - Sameness and Substance 2.2 | |
| A reaction: [from a 'fragment' for which Wiggins gives a reference] This quotation doesn't rest the distinctness of the eggs on some intrinsic difference, but on the fact that we can say different things about the two eggs. |
| 8650 | Things are the same if one can be substituted for the other without loss of truth [Leibniz] |
| Full Idea: Leibniz's definition is as follows: Things are the same as each other, of which one can be substituted for the other without loss of truth ('salva veritate'). | |
| From: Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]), quoted by Gottlob Frege - Grundlagen der Arithmetik (Foundations) §65 | |
| A reaction: Frege doesn't give a reference. (Anyone know it?). This famous definition is impressive, but has problems when the items being substituted appear in contexts of belief. 'Oedipus believes Jocasta (his mother!) would make a good wife'. |
| 13828 | Necessary truths are those provable from identities by pure logic in finite steps [Leibniz, by Hacking] |
| Full Idea: Leibniz argued that the necessary truths are just those which can be proved from identities by pure logic in a finite number of steps. ...[232] this claim is vindicated by Gentzen's sequent calculus. | |
| From: report of Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]) by Ian Hacking - What is Logic? §01 | |
| A reaction: This seems an odd idea, as if there were no necessary truths other than those for which a proof could be constructed. Sounds like intuitionism. |
| 13084 | How can things be incompatible, if all positive terms seem to be compatible? [Leibniz] |
| Full Idea: It is yet unknown to me what is the reason of the incompossibility of things, or how it is that different essences can be opposed to each other, seeing that all purely positive terms seem to be compatible. | |
| From: Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690], G VII:194), quoted by Cover,J/O'Leary-Hawthorne,J - Substance and Individuation in Leibniz 3.4.4 | |
| A reaction: Since 'heavy' seems straightforwardly opposed to 'light', we would have to ask what he means by 'positive'. The suspicion is that all things are compossible by definition, so it is not surprising that impossibilities are a bit puzzling. |
| 4307 | A reason must be given why contingent beings should exist rather than not exist [Leibniz] |
| Full Idea: A reason must be given why contingent beings should exist rather than not exist. | |
| From: Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]) | |
| A reaction: Spinoza rejects all contingency, but this seems an interesting support for it, even though we may need a reason for something where God does not because it is self-evident. |
| 15883 | Leibniz narrows down God's options to one, by non-contradiction, sufficient reason, indiscernibles, compossibility [Leibniz, by Harré] |
| Full Idea: Leibniz sets up increasingly stringent conditions possible worlds must meet. The weakest is non-contradiction, for truths of reason; then sufficient reason, for rational worlds; then identity of indiscernibles, for duplicates; then compossibility. | |
| From: report of Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]) by Rom Harré - Laws of Nature 4 | |
| A reaction: [my summary of a very nice two pages by Harré] God is the source of the principles which do the narrowing down. |
| 18822 | Each monad expresses all its compatible monads; a possible world is the resulting equivalence class [Leibniz, by Rumfitt] |
| Full Idea: Leibniz argued that each monad mirrors or expresses every monad with which it is compossible. Hence compossibility is an equivalence relation among monads; possible worlds may then be identified as the corresponding equivalence classes. | |
| From: report of Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]) by Ian Rumfitt - The Boundary Stones of Thought 6.1 | |
| A reaction: [Rumfitt cites Benson Mates 1986:IV.1 for this claim] There is an analogous world of all the human minds that are in communication with one another - something like a 'culture'. |
| 7837 | Leibniz proposed possible worlds, because they might be evil, where God would not create evil things [Leibniz, by Stewart,M] |
| Full Idea: In his early writings the principle of sufficient reason made it difficult for Leibniz to conceive of possible things;...raising this to possible worlds means God does not choose things that are evil, but chooses a world which must have evil in it. | |
| From: report of Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]) by Matthew Stewart - The Courtier and the Heretic Ch.14 | |
| A reaction: Where we think of possible worlds as explanations for conditional and counterfactual truths (I take it), Leibniz developed the original idea as part of his huge effort to achieve a consistent theodicy. |
| 13080 | Leibniz has a counterpart view of de re counterfactuals [Leibniz, by Cover/O'Leary-Hawthorne] |
| Full Idea: When Leibniz has the grounds of de re counterfactuals in mind, a counterpart picture, we have argued, is at work. | |
| From: report of Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]) by Cover,J/O'Leary-Hawthorne,J - Substance and Individuation in Leibniz 3.2.2 | |
| A reaction: If Leibniz were a 'superessentialist', then individuals would be totally worldbound (because their relations would be essential). Cover/Hawthorne argue that he is just a 'strong' essentialist, allowing possible counterparts. Quite persuasive. |
| 20188 | Modern epistemology is too atomistic, and neglects understanding [Zagzebski] |
| Full Idea: There are complaints that contemporary epistemology is too atomistic, and that the value of understanding has been neglected. | |
| From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], I 2) | |
| A reaction: This is because of the excessive influence of logic in contemporary analytic philosophy, which has to reduce knowledge to K(Fa), rather than placing it in a human context. |
| 20223 | Epistemology is excessively atomic, by focusing on justification instead of understanding [Zagzebski] |
| Full Idea: The present obsession with justification and the neglect of understanding has resulted in a feature of epistemology already criticised by several epistemologists: its atomism. | |
| From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], III 2.2) | |
| A reaction: All analytic philosophy has become excessively atomic, because it relies too heavily on logic for its grounding and rigour. There are other sorts of rigour, such as AI, peer review, programming. Or rigour is an idle dream. |
| 19332 | For Leibniz, divine understanding grasps every conceivable possibility [Leibniz, by Perkins] |
| Full Idea: For Leibniz, what is this understanding which God has? What does it contain? All possibilities in all possible combinations, that is, everything which can be conceived. | |
| From: report of Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]) by Franklin Perkins - Leibniz: Guide for the Perplexed 2.III | |
| A reaction: I like this, because it strikes me as essential that understanding should embrace possibilities as well as actualities. Perkins points out that the possibilities are restricted by an awareness of the limitations imposed by combination. |
| 20217 | Truth is valuable, but someone knowing the truth is more valuable [Zagzebski] |
| Full Idea: Of course we value the truth, but the value we place on knowledge is more than the value of the truth we thereby acquire. It also involves a valuabe relation between the knower and the truth. | |
| From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], III 1) | |
| A reaction: Hard to assess this. I take truth to be a successful relationship between a mind and a fact. Knowledge needs something extra, to avoid lucky true beliefs. Does a truth acquire greater and greater value as more people come to know it? Doubtful. |
| 20191 | Some beliefs are fairly voluntary, and others are not at all so [Zagzebski] |
| Full Idea: My position is that beliefs, like acts, arrange themselves on a continuum of degrees of voluntariness, ranging from quite a bit to none at all. | |
| From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], I 4.2) | |
| A reaction: I'm sure we have no idea how we came to hold many of our beliefs, and if we see a cat, nothing seems to intervene between the seeing and the believing. But if you adopt a religion, believing its full creed is a big subsequent effort. |
| 20222 | Knowledge either aims at a quantity of truths, or a quality of understanding of truths [Zagzebski] |
| Full Idea: Getting knowledge can be a matter either of reaching more truths or of gaining understanding of truths already believed. So it may be a way of increasing either the quality of true belief (cognitive contact with reality) or the quantity. | |
| From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], III 2.1) | |
| A reaction: I'm not sure how one would increase understanding of currently believed truths if it didn't involve adding some new truths to the collection. There is only the discovery of connections or structures, but those are new facts. |
| 5509 | Leibniz said dualism of mind and body is illusion, and there is only mind [Leibniz, by Martin/Barresi] |
| Full Idea: Leibniz held that dualism of mind and body is an illusion and that both are really the same thing, and that this thing is mind. | |
| From: report of Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]) by R Martin / J Barresi - Introduction to 'Personal Identity' p.22 | |
| A reaction: I am puzzled by this, as Leibniz is famous for the view that mind and body are parallel. See idea 5038, and also 2109 and 2596. Monads are, of course, entirely mental, and are the building blocks of reality. Clearly I (and you) must read more Leibniz. |
| 7568 | Leibniz is an idealist insofar as the basic components of his universe are all mental [Leibniz, by Jolley] |
| Full Idea: To say that Leibniz is an idealist is to say that simple substances, the basic building-blocks of the universe, are all mental or at least quasi-mental in nature | |
| From: report of Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]) by Nicholas Jolley - Leibniz Ch.3 | |
| A reaction: This is a bit different from the Berkelian type of idealism, which says that reality consists entirely of events within thinking minds. Is a monad the thinker or the thought? |
| 20225 | For internalists Gettier situations are where internally it is fine, but there is an external mishap [Zagzebski] |
| Full Idea: In internalist theories the grounds for justification are accessible to the believer, and Gettier problems arise when there is nothing wrong with the internally accessible aspects of the situation, but there is a mishap inaccessible to the believer. | |
| From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], III 3.1) | |
| A reaction: I'm sure we could construct an internal mishap which the believer was unaware of, such as two confusions of the meanings of words cancelling one another out. |
| 20226 | Gettier problems are always possible if justification and truth are not closely linked [Zagzebski] |
| Full Idea: As long as the concept of knowledge closely connects the justification component and the truth component but permits some degree of independence between them, justified true belief will never be sufficient for knowledge. | |
| From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], III 3.1) | |
| A reaction: Out of context this sounds like an advertisement for externalism. Or maybe it just says we have to live with Gettier threats. Zagzebski has other strategies. |
| 20228 | We avoid the Gettier problem if the support for the belief entails its truth [Zagzebski] |
| Full Idea: The way to avoid the Gettier problem is to define knowledge in such a way that truth is entailed by the other component(s) of the definition. | |
| From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], III 3.1) | |
| A reaction: Thus she defines virtuous justification as being successful, as virtues tend to be. This smacks of cheating. Surely we can be defeated in a virtuous way? If the truth is entailed then of course Gettier can be sent packing. |
| 20227 | Gettier cases arise when good luck cancels out bad luck [Zagzebski] |
| Full Idea: The procedure for generating Gettier cases involves 'double luck': an instance of good luck cancels out an instance of bad luck. | |
| From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], III 3.2) | |
| A reaction: You can end up with the right answer in arithmetic if you make two mistakes rather than one. I'm picturing a life of one blundering error after another, which to an outsider seems to be going serenely well. |
| 20194 | Intellectual virtues are forms of moral virtue [Zagzebski] |
| Full Idea: I argue that intellectual virtues are forms of moral virtue. | |
| From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], II Intro) | |
| A reaction: This contrasts with Sosa, who seems to think intellectual virtues are just the most efficient ways of reaching the truth. I like Zabzebski's approach a lot, though we are in a very small minority. I love her book. We have epistemic and moral duties. |
| 20206 | Intellectual and moral prejudice are the same vice (and there are other examples) [Zagzebski] |
| Full Idea: Maybe the intellectual and the moral forms of prejudice are the same vice, and this may also be true of other traits with shared names, such as humility, autonomy, integrity, perseverance, courage and trustworthiness. | |
| From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], II 3.1) | |
| A reaction: I find this claim very persuasive. The virtue of 'integrity' rather obviously embraces groups of both intellectually and morally desirable traits. |
| 20208 | We can name at least thirteen intellectual vices [Zagzebski] |
| Full Idea: Some examples of intellectual vices: pride, negligence, idleness, cowardice, conformity, carelessness, rigidity, prejudice, wishful thinking, closed-mindedness, insensitivity to detail, obtuseness (in seeing relevance), and lack of thoroughness. | |
| From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], II 3.1) | |
| A reaction: There are thousands of vices for which we don't have names, like thinking about football when you should be doing metaphysics. The other way round is also a vice too, because football needs concentration. Discontent with your chair is bad too. |
| 20215 | A justified belief emulates the understanding and beliefs of an intellectually virtuous person [Zagzebski] |
| Full Idea: A justified belief is what a person who is motivated by intellectual virtue, and who has the understanding of his cognitive situation a virtuous person would have, might believe in like circumstances. | |
| From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], II 6.1) | |
| A reaction: This is a whole-hearted definition of justification in terms of a theory of intellectual virtues. Presumably this would allow robots to have justified beliefs, if they managed to behave the way intellectually virtuous persons would behave. |
| 20210 | A reliable process is no use without the virtues to make use of them [Zagzebski] |
| Full Idea: It is not enough that a process is reliable; a person will not reliably use such a process without certain virtues. | |
| From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], II 4.1.2) | |
| A reaction: This is a point against Sosa's reliabilist account of virtues. Of course, all theories of epistemic justification (or of morality) will fail if people can't be bothered to implement them. |
| 20187 | Epistemic perfection for reliabilism is a truth-producing machine [Zagzebski] |
| Full Idea: Just as a utility-calculating machine would be the ideal moral agent according to utilitarianism, a truth-producing machine would be the ideal epistemic agent according to reliabilism, | |
| From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], I 1.2) | |
| A reaction: Love this one! For consequentialists a successful robot is morally superior to an average human being. The reliabilist dream is just something that churns out truths. But what is the role of these truths in subsequent life? |
| 13092 | The essence of substance is the law of its changes, as in the series of numbers [Leibniz] |
| Full Idea: The essence of substance consists in ...the law of the sequence of changes, as in the nature of the series in numbers. | |
| From: Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690], A 6.3.326), quoted by Cover,J/O'Leary-Hawthorne,J - Substance and Individuation in Leibniz 6.1.2 | |
| A reaction: Thus we might say, in this spirit, that the essence of number is the successor operation, as defined by Dedekind and Peano (and perhaps their amenability to inductive proof). I like this. Metaphysicians rule - they penetrate the heart of nature. |
| 19354 | Leibniz introduced the idea of degrees of consciousness, essential for his monads [Leibniz, by Perkins] |
| Full Idea: The designation of degrees of conscious awareness is one of Leibniz's most significant innovations, and it is fundamental to almost every aspect of his account of monads. | |
| From: report of Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]) by Franklin Perkins - Leibniz: Guide for the Perplexed 4.I | |
| A reaction: A very important development, which seems to have been ignored by philosophers for three hundred years, since they usually treat consciousness as all-or-nothing. Introspection makes degrees obvious, and I suspect sparrows are down the scale. |
| 20218 | The self is known as much by its knowledge as by its action [Zagzebski] |
| Full Idea: It seems to me that the concept of the self is constituted as much by what we know as by what we do. | |
| From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], III 1) | |
| A reaction: People take pride in what they know, which indicates that it is of central importance to a person's nature. Hard to evaluate ideas such as this. |
| 7841 | We think we are free because the causes of the will are unknown; determinism is a false problem [Leibniz] |
| Full Idea: The will has its causes, but since we are ignorant of them, we believe ourselves independent. It is this chimera of imaginary independence which revolts us against determinism, and which brings us to believe there are difficulties where there are none. | |
| From: Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]), quoted by Matthew Stewart - The Courtier and the Heretic Ch.16 | |
| A reaction: It seems that in his notebooks Leibniz was actually a (Spinozan) determinist. So he should have been, given his view that we live in the best of all possible worlds, and his claim that mind and brain run like two clocks. (Ideas 2114 and 2596) |
| 5510 | Leibniz has a panpsychist view that physical points are spiritual [Leibniz, by Martin/Barresi] |
| Full Idea: In Leibniz's panpsychism, the so-called 'physical' points are souls or spiritual 'monads'. | |
| From: report of Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]) by R Martin / J Barresi - Introduction to 'Personal Identity' p.23 | |
| A reaction: I'm not convinced that 'panpsychism' is the right description for Leibniz's theory of monads. I take panpsychism to be either a dualist or a dual aspect (or property dualism) view. Leibniz seems to believe there is strictly one substance. |
| 7564 | Occasionalism give a false view of natural laws, miracles, and substances [Leibniz, by Jolley] |
| Full Idea: Leibniz's three objections to occasionalism are: it disturbs the concept of laws of nature used in physics; it introduces perpetual miracles; and it doesn't recognise activity of substances (leading to the Spinozan heresy that God is the only substance). | |
| From: report of Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]) by Nicholas Jolley - Leibniz Ch.2 | |
| A reaction: I wonder what would happen if, within the viewpoint of occasionalism, God suddenly packed up and abandoned his job? Presumably the world wouldn't disappear, so there would still be substances, but passive ones, in chaos. |
| 20205 | The feeling accompanying curiosity is neither pleasant nor painful [Zagzebski] |
| Full Idea: Most feelings are experienced as pleasant or painful, but it is not evident that they all are; curiosity may be one that is not. [note: 'curiosity' may not be the name of a feeling, but a feeling typically accompanies it] | |
| From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], II 3.1) | |
| A reaction: If a machine generates a sliding scale from pain to pleasure, is there a neutral feeling at the midpoint, or does all feeling briefly vanish there? Not sure. |
| 19372 | Concepts are ordered, and show eternal possibilities, deriving from God [Leibniz, by Arthur,R] |
| Full Idea: Leibniz understood concepts as corresponding to eternal possibilities, with both concepts and their ordering having their foundation in the divine mind. | |
| From: report of Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]) by Richard T.W. Arthur - Leibniz 2 'Nominalism' | |
| A reaction: It is is no longer the fashion to think of concepts as 'ordered', and yet there is a multitude of dependence relations between them. |
| 13467 | Leibniz was the first modern to focus on sentence-sized units (where empiricists preferred word-size) [Leibniz, by Hart,WD] |
| Full Idea: Leibniz seems to be the first modern philosopher to focus on sentence-sized units that he called propositions. The Empiricists among the moderns focused on word-sized units like ideas. | |
| From: report of Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]) by William D. Hart - The Evolution of Logic 2 | |
| A reaction: Historically, the sentential logic of the Stoics has a claim to have started this one. I find my initial sympathies to be with the empiricists. |
| 19365 | Limited awareness leads to bad choices, and unconscious awareness makes us choose the bad [Leibniz, by Perkins] |
| Full Idea: For Leibniz, while the limits of our knowledge explain why we sometimes choose things we think are good but which turn out to be bad, the force of minute perceptions explains why we sometimes choose things that we know are bad. | |
| From: report of Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]) by Franklin Perkins - Leibniz: Guide for the Perplexed 4.IV | |
| A reaction: To be overwhelmed by selfish greed doesn't sound like a 'minute perception'. Leibniz thinks all desires are reactions to perceptions. Observing our degrees of knowledge is an interesting response to the intellectualist view of weakness of will. |
| 20202 | Motives involve desires, but also how the desires connect to our aims [Zagzebski] |
| Full Idea: A motive does have an aspect of desire, but it includes something about why a state of affairs is desired, and that includes something about the way my emotions are tied to my aim. | |
| From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], II 2.6) | |
| A reaction: It is standard usage that a 'motive' involves some movement towards achieving the desire, and not merely having the desire. I'd quite like to stand on top of Everest, but have absolutely no motivation to try to achieve it. |
| 8110 | Leibniz identified beauty with intellectual perfection [Leibniz, by Gardner] |
| Full Idea: Leibniz identified beauty with intellectual perfection. | |
| From: report of Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]) by Sebastian Gardner - Aesthetics 1.2.1 | |
| A reaction: Well he would, wouldn't he? Swots like Leibniz are inclined to value things which only they can fully appreciate. There may be intellectual subject matter in the study of a rose, but I do not believe that it is needed to appreciate the beauty. |
| 20216 | Modern moral theory concerns settling conflicts, rather than human fulfilment [Zagzebski] |
| Full Idea: Modern ethics generally considers morality much less a system for fulfilling human nature than a set of principles for dealing with individuals in conflict. | |
| From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], II 7) | |
| A reaction: Historically I associate this move with Hugo Grotius around 1620. He was a great legalist, and eudaimonist virtue ethics gradually turned into jurisprudence. The Enlightenment sought rules for resolving dilemmas. Liberalism makes fulfilment private. |
| 7569 | Humans are moral, and capable of reward and punishment, because of memory and self-consciousness [Leibniz, by Jolley] |
| Full Idea: For Leibniz, it is by virtue of possessing memory and self-consciousness that human minds are moral beings, capable of reward and punishment. | |
| From: report of Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]) by Nicholas Jolley - Leibniz Ch.4 | |
| A reaction: I like this because it makes no mention of free will (though Leibniz struggled to defend free will). I would add meta-thought (the ability to ponder and evaluate our own thinking), which makes a change of mind possible. |
| 20193 | Moral luck means our praise and blame may exceed our control or awareness [Zagzebski] |
| Full Idea: Because of moral luck, the realm of the morally praiseworthy / blameworthy is not indisputably within one's voluntary control or accessible to one's consciousness. | |
| From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], I 4.2) | |
| A reaction: [She particularly cites Thomas Nagel for this] It is a fact that we will be blamed (more strongly) when we have moral bad luck, but the question is whether we should be. It seems harsh, but you can't punish someone as if they had had bad luck. |
| 20199 | Nowadays we doubt the Greek view that the flourishing of individuals and communities are linked [Zagzebski] |
| Full Idea: Modern moral philosophers have been considerably more skeptical than were the ancient Greeks about the close association between the flourishing of the individual and that of the community. | |
| From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], II 2.2) | |
| A reaction: I presume this is not just a change in fashion, but a reflection of how different the two societies are. In a close community with almost no privacy, flourishing individuals are good citizens. In the isolations of modern liberalism they may be irrelevant. |
| 20196 | Virtue theory is hopeless if there is no core of agreed universal virtues [Zagzebski] |
| Full Idea: An analysis of virtue is hopeless unless we can assume that most of a selected list of traits count as virtues, in a way not strictly culture. ...These would include wisdom, courage, benevolence, justice, honesty, loyalty, integrity, and generosity. | |
| From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], II 2.1) | |
| A reaction: This requirement needs there to be a single core to human nature, right across the species. If we are infinitely flexible (as existentialists imply) then the virtues will have matching flexibility, and so will be parochial and excessively relative. |
| 20200 | A virtue must always have a corresponding vice [Zagzebski] |
| Full Idea: It is important for the nature of virtue that it have a corresponding vice (or two, in the doctrine of the mean). Claustrophobia is not a vice not only because it is involuntary, but also because there is no corresponding virtue. | |
| From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], II 2.3) | |
| A reaction: Presumably attaining a virtue is an achievement, so we would expect a label for failure in the same field of endeavour. The failure is not purely negative, because bad things ensue if the virtue is not present. |
| 20201 | Eight marks distingush skills from virtues [Zagzebski, by PG] |
| Full Idea: The difference between skills and virtues is that virtues must be enacted, are always desirable, can't be forgotten, and can be simulated, whereas skills are very specific, involve a technique, lack contraries, and lack intrinsic value. | |
| From: report of Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], II 2.4) by PG - Db (ideas) | |
| A reaction: [my summary of her II 2.4 discussion of the differences] She observes that Aristotle made insufficient effort to distinguish the two. It may be obscure to say that virtues go 'deeper' than skills, but we all know what is meant. 'Skills serve virtues'. |
| 20203 | Virtues are deep acquired excellences of persons, which successfully attain desire ends [Zagzebski] |
| Full Idea: A virtue can be defined as 'a deep and enduring acquired excellence of a person, involving a characteristic motivation to produce a certain desired end and reliable success in bringing about that end'. | |
| From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], II 2.7) | |
| A reaction: She puts this in bold, and it is the culminating definition of a long discussion. It rather obviously fails to say anything about the nature of the end that is desired. Learning the telephone book off by heart seems to fit the definition. |
| 20207 | Every moral virtue requires a degree of intelligence [Zagzebski] |
| Full Idea: Being reasonably intelligent within a certain area of life is part of having almost any moral virtue. | |
| From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], II 3.1) | |
| A reaction: The fact that this bars persons of very limited intelligence from acquiring the Aristotelian virtues is one of the attractions of the Christian enjoinder to merely achieve 'love'. Anyone can have a warm heart. So is virtue elitist? |
| 20214 | Virtue theory can have lots of rules, as long as they are grounded in virtues and in facts [Zagzebski] |
| Full Idea: A pure virtue theory can have as many rules as you like as long as they are understood as grounded in the virtuous motivations and understanding of the nonmoral facts that virtuous agents possess. | |
| From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], II 6.1) | |
| A reaction: It is important, I think, to see that a virtue theorist does not have to be a particularist. |
| 20213 | We need phronesis to coordinate our virtues [Zagzebski] |
| Full Idea: We need phronesis (practical wisdom) to coordinate the various virtues into a single line of action or line of thought leading up to an act or to a belief. | |
| From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], II 5.2) | |
| A reaction: If I have a conflicting virtue and vice in a single situation, something must make sure that the virtue dominates. That sounds more like Kant's 'good will' than like phronesis. |
| 20209 | For the virtue of honesty you must be careful with the truth, and not just speak truly [Zagzebski] |
| Full Idea: It is not sufficient for honesty that a person tells whatever she happens to believe is the truth. An honest person is careful with the truth. | |
| From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], II 3.2) | |
| A reaction: Not sure about that. It matches what Aristotle says about courage, which also needs practical reason [phronesis]. But being sensitive and careful with truth seems to need other virtues. If total honesty is not a virtue, then is honesty a virtue at all? |
| 20197 | The courage of an evil person is still a quality worth having [Zagzebski] |
| Full Idea: In the case of a courageous Nazi soldier, my position is that a virtue is worth having even in those cases in which it makes a person worse overall. | |
| From: Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski (Virtues of the Mind [1996], II 2.2) | |
| A reaction: A brave claim, which seems right. If a nasty Nazi reforms, they will at least have one good quality which can be put to constructive use. |
| 7574 | Natural law theory is found in Aquinas, in Leibniz, and at the Nuremberg trials [Leibniz, by Jolley] |
| Full Idea: Leibniz rejects Hobbes's legal positivism in favour of the older natural law theory associated with Aquinas (which says nothing can be a law unless it derives from natural justice). The older view was revived at Nuremberg, to prosecute Nazis. | |
| From: report of Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]) by Nicholas Jolley - Leibniz Ch.7 | |
| A reaction: This seems to suggest that Hobbes and co were using Ockham's Razor to eliminate morality from the law, but that the Nuremberg situation (and modern trials in The Hague) show that there is a necessity for natural law in international situations. |
| 12728 | Leibniz rejected atoms, because they must be elastic, and hence have parts [Leibniz, by Garber] |
| Full Idea: Leibniz held that there can be no atoms in nature, nothing perfectly solid and hard, since elasticity entails the existence of smaller parts that can move with respect to one another. | |
| From: report of Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]) by Daniel Garber - Leibniz:Body,Substance,Monad 5 | |
| A reaction: Thus, I suppose, we discover that atoms have mercurial electron shells. Are quarks or electrons elastic? The debate about true atoms is not over, and probably never will be. Leibniz's point is a good one. |
| 19374 | Microscopes and the continuum suggest that matter is endlessly divisible [Leibniz] |
| Full Idea: Micrographers observe qualities of larger things found in smaller things. And if this proceeds to infinity - which is possible since the continuum is divisible to infinity - any atom will be an infinite species, and there will be worlds within worlds. | |
| From: Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690], A VI ii 241) | |
| A reaction: [a work of the 1670s] The microscope had a huge impact on Leibniz, much more than the telescope. |
| 7560 | Leibniz struggled to reconcile bodies with a reality of purely soul-like entities [Jolley on Leibniz] |
| Full Idea: Leibniz seems never to have made up his mind completely on how to accommodate bodies within a metaphysic which recognises only soul-like entities as fully real. | |
| From: comment on Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]) by Nicholas Jolley - Leibniz Intro | |
| A reaction: [The soul-like entities are his 'monads']. His choice must be to either say they are unreal, or that they are real and separate from the monads, or that they are a manifestation of the monads. His problem, not mine. |
| 16683 | Leibniz eventually said resistance, rather than extension, was the essence of body [Leibniz, by Pasnau] |
| Full Idea: Leibniz eventually rejected extension altogether as part of the essence of body, and replaced it with resistance. | |
| From: report of Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]) by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 15.5 | |
| A reaction: This makes body consist of active force, rather than mere geometry. Much better. |
| 12725 | Leibniz wanted to explain motion and its laws by the nature of body [Leibniz, by Garber] |
| Full Idea: Leibniz seeks the big picture: the nature of body as a grounding for an account of motion and its laws. | |
| From: report of Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]) by Daniel Garber - Leibniz:Body,Substance,Monad 4 | |
| A reaction: Garber is contrasting this with Newton's approaches, who just pleads ignorance of the bigger picture. Essentialists must beware of inventing a bigger picture simply because they desperately want a bigger picture. |
| 16507 | The law within something fixes its persistence, and accords with general laws of nature [Leibniz] |
| Full Idea: Nothing is permanent in a substance except the law itself which determines the continuous succession of its states and accords within the individual substance with the laws of nature that govern the whole world. | |
| From: Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690], G II:263), quoted by David Wiggins - Sameness and Substance 3 epig | |
| A reaction: An interesting link between the law-of-series within a substance, and the broader concept of laws outside it. |
| 7859 | Leibniz had an unusual commitment to the causal completeness of physics [Leibniz, by Papineau] |
| Full Idea: Unlike most philosophers prior to the twentieth century, Leibniz was committed to the causal completeness of physics. | |
| From: report of Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]) by David Papineau - Thinking about Consciousness 1.4 | |
| A reaction: It has been suggested that Leibniz was actually, in private, a determinist (see Idea 7841), which would fit. Leibniz is enigmatic, but he may have proposed the closure of physics to glorify God, only to find that God was beginning to look irrelevant. |
| 15307 | Leibniz uses 'force' to mean both activity and potential [Leibniz] |
| Full Idea: At this early period exegetical problems abound, since Leibniz uses 'force' both for actually acting forces and for potentials or powers. | |
| From: Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690], 9.II), quoted by Harré,R./Madden,E.H. - Causal Powers 9.II.B | |
| A reaction: I take Leibniz to be a key figure in the development of the Aristotelian approach, because he connected Aristotelian potential and essence with 'force' in the new physics. This is helpful in reading him correctly. |
| 3889 | God's existence is either necessary or impossible [Leibniz, by Scruton] |
| Full Idea: Leibniz said that the ontological argument does not prove God's existence, but only the God's existence is either necessary or impossible. | |
| From: report of Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]) by Roger Scruton - Modern Philosophy:introduction and survey 13.5 |
| 7842 | Leibniz was closer than Spinoza to atheism [Leibniz, by Stewart,M] |
| Full Idea: Leibniz sailed closer to the winds of unbelief than Spinoza did. | |
| From: report of Gottfried Leibniz (works [1690]) by Matthew Stewart - The Courtier and the Heretic Ch.16 | |
| A reaction: This is an unusual view, but Stewart's view is that whereas Spinoza is always sincere in his writings, Leibniz is inclined to put a very conservative spin on his opinions. A key question for Leibniz is "Is God merely a monad?" |