Full Idea
There is no multiplicity without true units.
Gist of Idea
There is no multiplicity without true units
Source
Gottfried Leibniz (Letters to Antoine Arnauld [1686], 1687.04.30)
Book Reference
Leibniz,Gottfried: 'The Leibniz-Arnauld Correspondence', ed/tr. Mason,HT/Parkinson,GHR [Manchester UP 1967], p.121
A Reaction
Hence real numbers do not embody 'multiplicity'. So either they don't 'embody' anything, or they embody 'magnitudes'. Does this give two entirely different notions, of measure of multiplicity and measures of magnitude?
Related Idea
Idea 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]