Leibniz

Nossa proposta é investigar como ocorrem as metamorfoses da noção de substância simples no sistema leibniziano, entre Discurso de metafísica, Sistema novo da natureza e a comunicação das substâncias e Monadologia. Trata-se da mesma substância ou são noções diferentes?
Partimos de aporias de sua época e a polêmica entre os métodos modernos e escolásticos. Apontamos as críticas de Leibniz a ambos, partindo das insuficiências modernas aos excessos escolásticos, passando, assim, do campo da física ao campo lógico, em vista das questões metafísicas. Apoiando-se na exposição lógica, acabamos tentando reconstruir, involuntariamente, todo o sistema a partir do princípio de identidade, para conseguir apontar com mais clareza as inovações de Leibniz que reconciliam os dois partidos em sua síntese original.
Ao final, fazemos breves apontamentos particulares sobre cada um dos três textos e tiramos nossas conclusões, se as diferentes expressões da substância simples, nossa questão motriz.

A fresh translation and in-depth commentary of Leibniz's seminal text, the Monadology.

Written in 1714, the Monadology is widely considered to be the classic statement of Leibniz's mature philosophy. In the space of 90 numbered paragraphs, totalling little more than 6000 words, Leibniz outlines - and argues for - the core features of his philosophical system. Although rightly regarded as a masterpiece, it is also a very condensed work that generations of students have struggled to understand.

Lloyd Strickland presents a new translation of the Monadology, alongside key parts of the Theodicy, and an in-depth, section-by-section commentary that explains in detail not just what Leibniz is saying in the text but also why he says it. The sharp focus on the various arguments and other justifications Leibniz puts forward makes possible a deeper and more sympathetic understanding of his doctrines.

http://ojs.francoangeli.it/_omp/index.php/oa/catalog/book/510?fbclid=IwAR1kePaq_Yq-hpJUZ63DNFlz1dpKcQfE3UXX8VdxRnZYQmnWuyUTl3CpL7o

Il volume riunisce contributi che, rispondendo ad un’esigenza oggi molto sentita, si interrogano sui concetti di libertà, responsabilità e imputazione: si tratta di categorie fondamentali non solo in ambito morale, per definire la colpa del soggetto agente, ma anche in ambito giuridico, per definire una pena che sia equa e giusta.
I saggi qui presentati analizzano, da un lato, le condizioni di attribuzione di responsabilità e di libertà all’essere umano; dall’altro, rintracciano forme di libertà anche in riferimento alla natura (tradizionalmente compresa come regno della necessità) e all’indagine filosofica stessa. Si dispiegano così differenti prospettive, che risultano complementari nella comune ricerca di un fondamento filosofico.
A partire da un classico della filosofia antica, Platone, si giungerà, passando attraverso le concezioni della libertà di Leibniz, Kant e Fichte, alla filosofia di Hegel, di cui proprio nel 2020 si celebra il duecentocinquantesimo anniversario della nascita, proseguendo da qui verso la contemporaneità. Ci si interrogherà, infine, sul significato della pratica filosofica e sulla responsabilità che essa comporta.

Scritti di: G. Battistoni, G. Erle, S. Fuselli, P. Giuspoli, F.L. Marcolungo, F.
Menegoni, A. Moretto, A. Schmidt, K. Vieweg.

Naturrecht AUFSATZSAMMLUNG 19-3 Leibniz und das Naturrecht / hrsg. von Luca Basso.-Stuttgart : Steiner, 2019.-201 S. ; 24 cm.-(Studia Leibnitiana : Sonder-hefte ; 54).-ISBN 978-3-515-12288-7 : EUR 44.00 [#6467] Die Geschichte des Naturrechts ist lang, und in der Frühen Neuzeit machte diese Denkfigur grundlegende Änderungen durch. Immer aber blieb das Na-turrecht als eine Herausforderung bestehen, an der man sich rechtsphi-lophisch, politiktheoretisch oder auch theologisch abarbeiten mußte. Daher kann es nicht verwundern, daß viele Denker in einem mehr oder weniger engen Bezug zum naturrechtlichen Denken stehen, so eben auch Leibniz, dem der vorliegende Band 1-er geht auf einen Kongreß in Padua 2016 zu-rück-in der verdienstvollen Reihe der Sonderhefte der Studia Leibnitiana nachgeht. 2 Dabei stehen auch manche anderen Denker zur Diskussion, zu denen sich Leibniz in ein kritisches Verhältnis setzen mußte. So wird er denn auch hier im Zusammenhang mit dem Naturrecht konfrontiert mit Aristoteles, Augusti-1 Inhaltsverzeichnis: https://d-nb.info/1176674730/04 2 Zuletzt wurden besprochen: Leibniz and the European encounter with China : 300 years of "Discours sur la théologie naturelle des Chinois" / Wenchao Li (Hg.).-Stuttgart : Steiner, 2017.-295 S. ; 24 cm.-(Studia Leibnitiana : Sonderhefte ; 52).-ISBN 978-3-515-11733-3 : EUR 56.00 [#5645].-Rez.: IFB 18-2 http://informationsmittel-fuer-bibliotheken.de/showfile.php?id=9011-Leibniz im Lichte der Theologien / Wenchao Li ; Hartmut Rudolph (Hg.).-Stuttgart : Stei-ner, 2017.-345 S. ; 25 cm.-(Studia Leibnitiana : Supplementa ; 40).-ISBN 978-3-515-11465-3 : EUR 62.00 [#5215].-Rez.: IFB 18-2 http://informationsmittel-fuer-bibliotheken.de/showfile.php?id=9010-Leibniz in Latenz : Überlieferungsbildung als Rezeption (1716-1740) / Nora Gädeke ; Wenchao Li (Hg.).-Stuttgart : Stei-ner, 2017.-262 S. : Faks., Diagramme ; 24 cm.-(Studia Leibnitiana : Sonderhefte ; 50).-ISBN 978-3-515-11474-5 : EUR 46.00 [#5484],. Rez.: IFB 17-4 http://informationsmittel-fuer-bibliotheken.de/showfile.php?id=8729-Leibniz et Bayle : confrontation et dialogue / éd. par Christian Leduc ...-Stuttgart : Steiner, 2015.-452 S. ; 24 cm.-(Studia Leibnitiana : Sonderhefte ; 43).

My aim is twofold. On one hand I will make a survey of the struggles for and calamities involving individuality on the part of 17 th century philosophers with respect to different corporations and institutions. This is the proper task of my paper. Further, while accomplishing this proper job I will present a specimen of a renewed philosophical history of philosophy, which turns its back on two methodological extremes. At one extreme, referring to the history of philosophy is hardly more than a purely ornamental illustration of the proper thesis or argument elaborated independently of all historical refl ection. At the other extreme lies a hyperphilological way of looking at historical facts loosing all contact with contemporary philosophical research and research communities. Both extremes can be found in contemporary thinking abundantly. Let me start with the best-known declaration of the philosopher's independence, not only from the traditional wisdom of the theologian, the rhetorician, and the phi-lologist, but also, and foremost the institutions traditional wisdom traditionally inhabited. None of the religious orders famous for philosophical scholarship, not even the Jesuits who nourished him in their college are accepted and acknowledged by the philosopher of the Discourse on Method without reserve. Nor do their secular successors fare better: The spirit that breathes through the sixth part of this text is that of deep suspicion against the typical scientifi c-scholarly corporation of the age, the private circles around a patron, semi-organizations whose existence depends not only on the providers of the fi nancial means but also on eager secretaries like Mersenne and Oldenburg. However deeply Descartes himself must have depended on the system of patronage, the passion in his colleagues' mind he suspected of dominating their but not his scientifi c research was not curiosity, but rather envy-just enough for the wish to remain separated from them: the tension between dependence and separation could not but be eased by the publishing of the Essays anonymously by an alien in the Nether-lands. As is also well-known, the story of an individual mind comprised in the Discours de la methode (»histoire de mon esprit«) came to be considered as the outer shell of an inner core, as it were, a real philosophical conviction that the individual, as a continuously thinking being, who, in rare instants of her life performs-ought to perform-what has traditionally been termed the cogito argument, is superior over the multitude, and even the community. Nothing really prevents us from seeing the cogito-like specifi c way of overcoming the certainty available in mathematics-apparently still all too »communitarian« in character-in the discovery of and reliance on the metaphysical solitude of the ego as an act of separation from institutionalized communities and even from the most sublime ones.

Resumo: Neste artigo analisamos as críticas apresentadas por George Berkeley, em The analyst (1734), ao método das fluxões e à inconsistência intrínseca à noção de infinitésimo do cálculo diferencial e integral, introduzido por Isaac Newton. Procuramos mostrar que as críticas de Berkeley não eram de todo infundadas, uma vez que foram necessários quase duzentos anos para que viesse a ser introduzida por Karl Weierstrass a definição rigorosa de limite, que propiciou uma solução para o problema dos infinitésimos. São mencionadas ainda duas outras teorias contemporâneas, com abordagens distintas para a solução da questão do infinitésimo: a análise não-standard de Abraham Robinson e o cálculo diferencial paraconsistente proposto por Newton da Costa. Apesar de serem citados alguns autores importantes para o desenvolvimento do cálculo, este artigo não se propõe a analisar suas obras e não pretende apresentar uma história do cálculo diferencial e integral. Palavras-chave: George Berkeley, método das fluxões, infinitésimo, cálculo diferencial paraconsistente.

This dialogue foregrounds the interological nature of media ecology as a style of exploration into the human condition. Besides Marshall McLuhan, it also brings Gilles Deleuze, field theory, and the I Ching, et cetera, to bear on media ecological inquiry. The idea is to reveal a pattern instead of defining a term. RESUME Ce dialogue met en relief la nature « interologique » du style d'exploration de la condition humaine que propose I'ecologie des medias. Pour ce faire, il fait intervenir, en plus des reflexions de Marshall McLuhan, la pensee de Gilles Deleuze, la theorie des champs et le « Livre des transformations» (Yi King). II s'agit moins ici de definir un terme que de reveler un « motif » (pattern).

Modern akılcılığın Descartes ve Spinoza ile birlikte önemli temsilcilerinden biri Alman filozof Leibniz (1646-1716)'dir.  Varlık felsefesinde spiritüalizmi/tinselcililik benimsemiştir. Var olan her şeyin bileşik cisimlerden meydana geldiğini, onların ise ruh benzeri basit tözler olarak monadlardan meydana geldiğini ileri sürmüştür. Monat, fizikteki atomun karşılığı olarak metafizikte kullanılır...

This paper explores the question of Leibniz’s contribution to the rise of modern ‘science’. To be sure, it is now generally agreed that the modern category of ‘science’ did not exist in the early modern period. At the same time, this period witnessed a very important stage in the process from which modern science eventually emerged. My discussion will be aimed at uncovering the new enterprise, and the new distinctions which were taking shape in the early modern period under the banner of the old Aristotelian terminology. I will argue that Leibniz begins to theorize a distinction between physics and metaphysics that tracks our distinction between the autonomous enterprise of science in its modern meaning, and the enterprise of philosophy. I will try to show that, for Leibniz, physics proper is the study of natural phenomena in mathematical and mechanical terms without recourse for its explanations to metaphysical notions. This autonomy, however, does not imply for Leibniz that physics can say on its own all that there is to be said about the natural world. Quite the opposite. Leibniz inherits from the Aristotelian tradition the view that physics needs metaphysical roots or a metaphysical grounding. For Leibniz, what is ultimately real is reached by metaphysics, not by physics. This is, in my view, Leibniz’s chief insight: the new mathematical physics is an autonomous enterprise which offers its own kind of explanations but does not exhaust what can (and should) be said about the natural world.

C omo anunciamos en el primer número del volumen 46 de la Revista Latinoamericana de Filosofía, se publica aquí la segunda parte del "Dossier Leibniz", con trabajos que abordan los antecedentes escolásticos de la teodicea leibniziana y la recepción de la que fueron objeto sus ideas en el pensamiento de Charles S. Peirce y Hermann Cohen. Al igual que los artículos de la primera parte, las versiones prelimi-nares de cada uno de ellos se discutieron en el simposio "Leibniz: ciencia, lógica y metafísica", celebrado el 12 y el 13 de diciembre de 2018 en la sede del Centro de Investigaciones Filosóficas (CIF). El primer artículo de esta segunda parte, "La metafísica de la creación de Duns Escoto: el entendi-miento divino como locus de los posibles", de Olga L. Larre, expone la doctrina escotista de la creación del mundo, con el objetivo de establecer las bases para un estudio comparativo con la teodicea leibniziana, que exhibe notables coincidencias con la metafísica de Duns Escoto. Por su parte, Javier Legris, en "La tradición del
http://rlfcif.org.ar/index.php/RLF/issue/current

Contemporary theories of sovereignty often focus on how the idea of sovereignty, as supreme and absolute power, can be made compatible with the limitations and restrictions introduced by the principles of federalism and separation of powers. In this essay, I turn to Leibniz, an overly neglected figure in the history of political thought, and his political writings in order to demonstrate that he developed an original account of both forms of the limitation of sovereignty in the Early Modern period. In order to do so, I discuss the division of sovereignty between princes and the Holy Roman Emperor that constitutes a federal argument in Leibniz' theory, and the operation of the system of independent tribunals limiting sovereignty that forms the argument for the separation of powers. By compiling these two aspects of Leibniz' thought that have not been previously discussed together, I aim to demonstrate that Leibniz created a theory of the limitation of sovereignty that appears to be one of important sources of some central topics in contemporary political thought and that he should be studied on an equal footing with other classics of Early Modern political thought.

Monadoloji Leibniz’in felsefesinin bütünün bir özetidir. Leibniz tarafından 1714 yılında Viyana’ya yaptığı son yolculuk sırasında, hem yüksek bilimsel kültürü hem de üstün siyasi meziyetleriyle kendini gösteren Prens Eugène de Savoie için Fransızca kaleme alınmıştır. Prens eseri paha biçilmez bir hazine olarak bir çekmeye kapatmış ve en fazla onu tanımak isteyenlerin görmesine müsaade etmiştir.
Monadoloji Leibniz’in sağlığında yayınlanmamıştır. Kœhler onu Almancaya ve Hansche da Latinceye tercüme etmiştir. Bu tercüme 1721’de Acta eruditorum’da Principia philosophiæ seu theses in gratiam principis Eugenii conscriptæ başlığıyla yayınlanmıştır1.
Bu eser, Latince başlığının da işaret ettiği gibi, Leibniz’in felsefesinin ana noktalarını özetleyen bir dizi tezden oluşur. Ama Leibniz felsefesinin incelenmesine bir giriş hizmeti göremez. Tam tersine bu felsefeye zaten vakıf olan bir okuma gerektirir

1. Reconstrucción del contexto histórico de redacción de la obra. Primeras ediciones en el s. XVIII
    2. Ediciones de la Monadología. Interpretaciones histórico-críticas de la génesis de la obra
    3. Traducciones y ediciones de la Monadología al castellano
    4. Relación de las ediciones, traducciones y principales estudios histórico-críticos que se ha publicado de la Monadología

S’il faut une preuve que ce ne sont pas les plus grands génies qui guident la vie du monde, nous pourrons également la trouver dans le fait que, lorsqu’Einstein voulut scruter le dense brouillard du futur social humain, il ne sut parvenir à aucune conclusion d’une véritable hauteur, et retomba dans ces peu géniales formules que lui avait transmises un passé usé, et il ne tenta même pas, lui le puissant iconoclaste de la pensée, de se dégager de ce misérable piège.

Here I have uploaded the final draft of my long introduction to the correspondence. Anyone wishing to quote etc., will need to get hold of the book. However, content-wise it is pretty much what appears in the final version and includes my best efforts to provide an account of Leibniz's views on substance and body at that time.

This volume as whole contains a new critical edition of the correspondence between Leibniz and Burcher de Volder (based on manuscript sources), a translation of the correspondence into English, and an 80 page introductory essay which advances a number of novel theses regarding Leibniz's metaphysics. Also included is a selection of letters from the intermediary correspondence between Leibniz and Johann Bernoulli. Many of the letters by Leibniz (and all those by De Volder) are translated into English for the first time.

本稿は、「初期近代における抽象と概念形成」の1章を予定しているものである。本章の目的は、近世を代表する哲学者である、デカルトやロック、ライプニッツにおける抽象と概念形成の問題を論じるに当たり、 その準備作業として、17 世紀西欧における「抽 象」(abstractio, abstraction)の言説を調査し、その一般的使用を分析することから、17 世紀 における抽象概念の一般的理解を見積もることである。本稿が注目したい独自の論点は、「抽象」およびそれに関連する用語に限定した仕方での、17世紀スコラからライプニッツまでの抽象概念の受容と変容である。とりわけ注目したいのは、アルノーとニコルの『ポール・ロワイヤルの論理学』（初版1662; 第2版1664; 第5版1683）およびライプニッツの『人間知性新論』（1703-5）において、真理を導く抽象として積極的に擁護される「精神の抽象」（absraction de l’esprit, abstraction d’esprit）という規定である。この「精神の抽象」に注目する理由は、彼らが精神の抽象を擁護したことだけでなく、抽象観念を否定したバークリやヒュームらと対比する上でも、この概念が重要な指標となると考えるからでもある。そこで本章では、当時のスコラ哲学における「抽象」の定義と用法を確認する。そのためのコーパスとして、当時しばしば参照されたいくつかの哲学辞典を取り上げたい。まず、当時のスコラ哲学の語彙を集成しておりデカルトらも参照したゴクレニウスの『哲学レキシコン』 (1613)を参照する。ライプニッツもまた、自ら館長を務めたハノーファーの図書館に、ゴクレニウスとミクラエリウスの『哲学レキシコン』のコピーを持っていた 。そして、両辞典には、「精神の抽象」という用語が明確に出現している。そこで、次にミクラエリウスの『哲学レキシコン』（1662）も適宜参照し、「精神の抽象」という規定の起源とその精確な意味内容に迫りたい。最後に、ジルソンのINDEX SCOLASTICO-CARTÉSIENの「抽象」の項を参照し、そこで引用されているエウスタキウスの『哲学大全』における抽象の分類の観点からデカルトとスコラ哲学の関係について簡単に触れることで、次章で扱う予定のデカルトおよびデカルト派の哲学における抽象概念にかんする考察につなぎたい。

Leibniz is important for our contemporary situation because he presents a definitive philosophical theology for dealing with the typically modern problems, in particular problems associated with nihilism, solipsism, political biomedicine, the mechanist-materialist worldview, and the pervasiveness of digital media. In this short Discourse alone, Leibniz anticipates so many modern innovations as to rise considerably above the level of mere prescience or insightfulness. There are specific passages in the work that state fundamental claims of algorithmic information theory, neo-classical economics (utilitarian calculus), the relativity of motion, as well as anticipations of the typically modern variants of nihilism, solipsism, and atheism. Interpreters might tend to see Leibniz’s prescience of these modern ideas as endorsement, when, in reality, he is constantly denouncing these as errors and warning against the imprudence and danger of the modern innovators. Leibniz was not a modern philosopher at all, but was attempting to overcome and correct typically modern errors, in order to preserve religious sanctity and tradition. He valued religious sanctity above all else, as the absolute highest importance for existence, individually and societally.

Despite the importance of the variational principles of physics, there have been relatively few attempts to consider them for a realistic framework. In addition to the old teleological question, this paper continues the recent discussion regarding the modal involvement of the principle of least action and its relations with the Humean view of the laws of nature. The reality of possible paths in the principle of least action is examined from the perspectives of the contemporary metaphysics of modality and Leibniz's concept of essences or possibles striving for existence. I elaborate a modal interpretation of the principle of least action that replaces a classical representation of a system's motion along a single history in the actual modality by simultaneous motions along an infinite set of all possible histories in the possible modality. This model is based on an intuition that deep ontological connections exist between the possible paths in the principle of least action and possible quantum histories in the Feynman path integral. I interpret the action as a physical measure of the essence of every possible history. Therefore, only one actual history has the highest degree of the essence and minimal action. To address the issue of necessity, I assume that the principle of least action has a general physical necessity and lies between the laws of motion with a limited physical necessity and certain laws with a metaphysical necessity.

Proofs of God in Early Modern Europe offers a fascinating window into early modern efforts to prove God's existence. Assembled here are twenty-two key texts, many translated into English for the first time, which illustrate the variety of arguments that philosophers of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries offered for God. These selections feature traditional proofs - such as various ontological, cosmological, and design arguments - but also introduce more exotic proofs, such as the argument from eternal truths, the argument from universal aseity, and the argument ex consensu gentium. Drawn from the work of eighteen philosophers, this book includes both canonical figures (such as Descartes, Spinoza, Newton, Leibniz, Locke, and Berkeley) and noncanonical thinkers (such as Norris, Fontenelle, Voltaire, Wolff, Du Châtelet, and Maupertuis).

Lloyd Strickland provides fresh translations of all selections not originally written in English and updates the spelling and grammar of those that were. Each selection is prefaced by a lengthy headnote, giving a biographical account of its author, an analysis of the main argument(s), and important details about the historical context. Strickland's introductory essay provides further context, focusing on the various reasons that led so many thinkers of early modernity to develop proofs of God's existence.

La meraviglia di fronte al mondo è un antico tema della filosofia. All'inizio, essa si presentava come sacro stupore e meraviglia cosmica. Col tempo, è giunta a contemplare l'esistenza dell'uomo e il suo rapporto con le cose. Una sintetica formulazione è di Ludwig Wittgenstein: “Ciò che è un mistero non è come il mondo sia, ma il fatto che esso sia”. Eppure il suo essere così e non altrimenti può a volte suscitare un sentimento affine allo stupore e diverso dalla meraviglia: lo scandalo. Mantenere la propria capacità di stupirsi per come va il mondo non sarà qualcosa di misterioso in sé, ma attendibilmente è il segreto di un pensiero vitale, contro ogni noia, conformismo o assuefazione.

This volume tells the story of the legacy and impact of the great German polymath Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (1646-1716). Leibniz made significant contributions to many areas, including philosophy, mathematics, political and social theory, theology, and various sciences. The essays in this volume explores the effects of Leibniz’s profound insights on subsequent generations of thinkers by tracing the ways in which his ideas have been defended and developed in the three centuries since his death. Each of the 11 essays is concerned with Leibniz’s legacy and impact in a particular area, and between them they show not just the depth of Leibniz’s talents but also the extent to which he shaped the various domains to which he contributed, and in some cases continues to shape them today. With essays written by experts such as Nicholas Jolley, Pauline Phemister, and Philip Beeley, this volume is essential reading not just for students of Leibniz but also for those who wish to understand the game-changing impact made by one of history’s true universal geniuses.

This translation of Quod Ens Perfectissimum existit is based on the critical edition in Sämtliche Schriften und Briefe, Series 6, Volume 3, 1980, pp. 578-579. Leibniz composed this little proof in November of 1676. His basic strategy (with some interesting differences) is also followed by Kurt Gödel in his own ontological argument.

Written in 1714, the “Monadology” is widely regarded as a classic statement of much of Leibniz’s mature philosophical system. In just 90 numbered paragraphs, Leibniz outlines – and argues for – the core features of his system, starting with his famous doctrine of monads (simple substances) and ending with the uplifting claim that God is concerned not only for the world as a whole but for the welfare of the virtuous in particular. This essay begins by considering the circumstances of composition of the “Monadology” and its publication history before offering a detailed analysis of the claims and arguments found therein; I suggest the text is best read as dealing with three distinct realms, the metaphysical (§§1-60), the physical (§§61-82), and lastly the moral (§§83-90). The essay concludes with a consideration of the fate and influence of this seminal text.

In this paper I argue that there is an important sense in which we should regard Leibniz as an advocate of mysticism. I make the case for this claim by considering the complex phenomenon of mysticism itself and Leibniz's discussion of what he terms 'false mysticism' (I.e., quietism) and what he refers to as the "true mystical theology" in an article of that name. The principle claim is that Leibniz is a "rational mystic", i.e., one who thinks that we have the capacity to be directly acquainted with God via our innate idea of God.

En la presente ponencia quiero adentrar, de manera admitidamente superflua, el tema de la libertad frente a la predestinación. Es uno de los grandes problemas de la teología que lleva a su vez al problema del origen del mal en el mundo y el actuar del hombre, es decir, pasamos de una metafísica de la voluntad a una razón práctica.

There is an infinity of figures and of movements, present and past, which enter into the efficient cause of my present writing, and in its final cause, there are an infinity of slight tendencies and dispositions of my soul, present and past.1

Over the past 2500 years, the concept of free will has been debated by some of the most brilliant minds in ancient and modern history. This paper discusses landmark theories by five well-known philosophers. There are several definitions of free-will. Sometimes, it is described as an innate characteristic possessed by human beings. In juxtaposition, the theory of causal determinism states that free will is limited or does not exist. Philosophical arguments are presented by: Plato, Hobbes, Hume, Leibniz, and Hegel. Plato offers a dual theory that offers limited support for free will. Leibnitz includes theological tenets to make the case for predetermined outcomes. Hobbes and Hume contend  that moral beliefs and ethical standards are conditions that support causal determinism. Hegel’s treatise on “Freeing of the Will”  aligns with Taoist philosophy and links the evolution of the universe to human spiritual development and self-realization.

The Russian philosopher Nikolai Onufrievich Lossky (1870–1965) adhered to an evolutionary metaphysics of reincarnation according to which the world is constituted of immortal souls or monads, which he calls “substantival agents.” These substantival agents can evolve or devolve depending on the goodness or badness of their behavior. Such evolution requires the possibility for monads to reincarnate into the bodies of creatures of a higher or of a lower level on the scala perfectionis. According to this theory, a substantival agent can evolve by being gradually reincarnated multiple times through a sort of process of metamorphosis from the level of the most elementary particles all the way up to the level of human beings or even higher. In “Ученiе Лейбница о перевоплощенiи какъ метаморфозѣ” (“Leibniz’s Doctrine of Reincarnation as Metamorphosis,” 1931), Lossky argues that the works of Leibniz contain scattered elements of such a systematic evolutionary doctrine of reincarnation as metamorphosis and he attempts to reconstitute this doctrine. The present article is intended as an historical introduction to the translation (published in the same journal issue) of Lossky’s “Leibniz’s Doctrine of Reincarnation as Metamorphosis.”

The philosopher Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz famously asked: “Why is there something rather than nothing?” His answer was that God Himself is a necessary being that could not have failed to exist. Every physical object exists because of some external explanation, but God is necessarily existent and He has no explanation for his existence other than the fact that He must exist in order for anything else to possibly exist. Why we have a world that is seemingly contingent or unnecessary (since it could have not existed) is explained by God’s just decree. For Leibniz, the world had an explanation of its existence, and because of this he advocated a principle of sufficient reason for any fact whatsoever. In this paper I examine Leibniz’s account of the principle of sufficient reason in relation to his understanding of divine and human free will and I will particularly examine an objection that accuses Leibniz’s system of being essentially fatalistic. I will concede this objection and I will argue against Leibniz’s account of the principle of sufficient reason, arguing that a weaker principle is essential for one not to devolve into theological fatalism. As a result, I will describe an account of free will as given by philosophers that is not bound by the stricter principle but by the weaker principle and I will describe the theological benefits that such a view of free will shall bestow upon the philosophical theologian who, like Leibniz, desires to know more about God’s necessary and contingent properties.

It is well known that Leibniz was an omnivorous and eager reader. His references to ancient authors are quite frequent. Admittedly, he is not much in the habit of citing classical poets or other merely literary authors in order to support his claims or to ornate his texts, though he occasionally does so. He not only frequently cites ancient philosophers but also to historians and mathematicians. My impression is that his knowledge of the ancient heritage and the philosophers especially is quite thorough. He certainly did not stay content with reading doxographies or summaries but studied primary texts or at least parts of primary texts very carefully. This can easily be shown for several Platonic dialogues, Aristotle's Metaphysics, the Physics and the Organon, the fragments of Democritus, Cicero's philosophical writings and many others. He even makes a point of insisting about both Plato and Aristotle that they must be studied freshly without the slanting of their followers. In general he treats the ancients with respect but without veneration. He is not oblivious to the fact that they lived at a different time and did their work under different conditions from his contemporaries. Most importantly they were not Christian. He does, however, not much attempt to historicize the ancients, and he treats them more or less in the same way as contemporary or, for that matter, medieval philosophers. Often he mingles ancient, medieval and modern thinkers in his discussions treating them as it were indiscriminately.