12774
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Without a substantial chain to link monads, they would just be coordinated dreams [Leibniz]
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Full Idea:
If that substantial chain [vinculum substantiale] for monads did not exist, all bodies, together with all of their qualities, would be nothing but well-founded phenomena, like a rainbow or an image in a mirror, continual dreams perfectly in agreement.
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From:
Gottfried Leibniz (Letters to Des Bosses [1715], 1712.02.05)
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A reaction:
[The first appearance, apparently, of the 'susbtantial chain' in his writings] I take this to be a hugely significant move, either a defeat for monads, or the arrival of common sense. Spiritual monads must unify things, so they can't just be 'parallel'.
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12777
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Monads do not make a unity unless a substantial chain is added to them [Leibniz]
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Full Idea:
Monads do not constitute a complete composite substance, since they make up, not something one per se, but only a mere aggregate, unless some substantial chain is added.
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From:
Gottfried Leibniz (Letters to Des Bosses [1715], 1712.05.26)
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A reaction:
This is the clearest statement in the Des Bosses letters of the need for something extra to unite monads. Since the main role of monads was to replace substances, which are only postulated to provide unity, this is rather a climb-down.
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12778
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There is active and passive power in the substantial chain and in the essence of a composite [Leibniz]
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Full Idea:
I do not say there is a chain midway between matter and form, but that the substantial form and primary matter of the composite, in the Scholastic sense (the primitive power, active and passive) are in the chain, and in the essence of the composite.
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From:
Gottfried Leibniz (Letters to Des Bosses [1715], 1716.05.29)
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A reaction:
Note that this implies an essence of primitive power, and not just a collection of all properties. This is the clearest account in these letters of the nature of the 'substantial chain' he has added to his monads.
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12753
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A substantial bond of powers is needed to unite composites, in addition to monads [Leibniz]
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Full Idea:
Some realising thing must bring it about that composite substance contains something substantial besides monads, otherwise composites will be mere phenomena. The scholastics' active and passive powers are the substantial bond I am urging.
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From:
Gottfried Leibniz (Letters to Des Bosses [1715], 1716.01.13), quoted by Daniel Garber - Leibniz:Body,Substance,Monad 9
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A reaction:
[compressed] This appears to be a major retreat, in the last year of Leibniz's life, from the full monadology he had espoused. How do monads connect to matter, and thus unify it? He is returning to Aristotelian hylomorphism.
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12781
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A composite substance is a mere aggregate if its essence is just its parts [Leibniz]
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Full Idea:
An aggregate, but not a composite substance, is resolved into parts. A composite substance only needs the coming together of parts, but is not essentially constituted by them, otherwise it would be an aggregate.
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From:
Gottfried Leibniz (Letters to Des Bosses [1715], 1716.05.29)
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A reaction:
The point is that there is more to some things than there mere parts. Only some unifying principle, in addition to the mere parts, bestows a unity. Mereology is a limited activity if it has nothing to say about this issue.
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9382
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Subjects may be unaware of their epistemic 'entitlements', unlike their 'justifications' [Burge]
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Full Idea:
I call 'entitlement' (as opposed to justification) the epistemic rights or warrants that need not be understood by or even be accessible to the subject.
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From:
Tyler Burge (Content Preservation [1993]), quoted by Paul Boghossian - Analyticity Reconsidered §III
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A reaction:
I espouse a coherentism that has both internal and external components, and is mediated socially. In Burge's sense, animals will sometimes have 'entitlement'. I prefer, though, not to call this 'knowledge'. 'Entitled true belief' is good.
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16618
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Intellectual and moral states, and even the soul itself, depend on prime matter for their existence [Blasius, by Pasnau]
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Full Idea:
Blasius argued that prime matter is the subject of all our intellectual and moral states. This implies that such states cannot exist apart from the body, which seems to imply further that the soul itself cannot exist apart from the body.
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From:
report of Blasius of Parma (Les quaestiones de anima (lectures on the soul) [1385], I.8 p.65) by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 06.3
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A reaction:
It seems that, under pressure, Blasius recanted this view in lectures given eleven years later.
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