13082
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The complete concept of an individual includes contingent properties, as well as necessary ones [Leibniz]
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Full Idea:
In this complete concept of possible Peter are contained not only essential or necessary things, ..but also existential things, or contingent items included there, because the nature of an individual substance is to have a perfect or complete concept.
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From:
Gottfried Leibniz (Of liberty, Fate and God's grace [1690], Grua 311), quoted by Cover,J/O'Leary-Hawthorne,J - Substance and Individuation in Leibniz 3.3.1
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A reaction:
Compare Idea 13077, where he seems to say that the complete concept is only necessarily linked to properties which will predict future events - though I suppose that would have to include all of the contingent properties mentioned here.
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19413
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If we know what is good or rational, our knowledge is extended, and our free will restricted [Leibniz]
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Full Idea:
The more perfect one is, the more one is determined to the good, and so is more free at the same time. ...Our power and knowledge are more extended, and our will much the more limited within the bounds of perfect reason.
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From:
Gottfried Leibniz (Letters to Pierre Bayle [1702], 1702)
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A reaction:
I like this idea, which seems to me to derive from Aquinas. When I choose to eat and drink each day, or agree that 7+5 is 12, I don't complain about my lack of freedom in the choices. Goodness and reason are constraints I welcome.
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