LEIBNIZ AND THE LABYRINTH OF DETERMINISM (original) (raw)
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In this paper, we shall deal with Leibniz’s life history in brief, influences on his philosophy and his major works. His theory of monads will be analysed and his theory of truth (Logic) will lead us to a critique of the practicality of freedom in such a world. Here, we shall make reference to Aristotle While referring to Morden Philosophy, one might side-step Leibniz for a “fairy tale philosopher” but would encounter him later in Voltaire’s ‘Candide’. Nevertheless, if not in Voltaire, then possibly in critiques or letters written to rival his notion of “the best possible world.” However, in treating of Leibniz’s philosophy, we shall emphasise his theory of monads and how it influences his linguistic/philosophical analysis of language (subject and predicate) and logic. This analysis cannot avoid to lead us to the concept of freedom. In a world of immanent, self-contained atom like entities and a God who pre- orders reality to a definite final cause. Is freedom possible
Leibniz on Freedom and Possibility
In the Theodicy (1710) Leibniz refers to Diodorus Cronus' logical fatalism as an example of attributing the world with the wrong type of modality. How does Leibniz respond to the famous sophisms the Diodorian Master Argument is meant to reveal? What is Leibniz's notion of freedom, and what is the ontological source of freedom in light of Leibniz's assumptions about creation, possibility, and future contingents? Does Leibniz's account of contingency give us reasons for giving up on the claim that freedom and determinism are compatible? Or rather can the problem be solved with the notion of hypothetical necessity? In this paper I engage with these and related questions, which have attracted the interest of scholars (Russell, Adams, Curley, Rescher, et al) and contemporaries of Leibniz (Wedderkopf, Arnauld, Sophie Charlotte, Clarke) alike. I offer my own reading of Leibniz's account, defending its philosophical viability.
Possibility, Agency, and Individuality in Leibniz’s Metaphysics, Springer, 2007
2007
This work presents Leibniz’s subtle approach to possibility and explores some of its consequential repercussions in his metaphysics. Ohad Nachtomy presents Leibniz’s approach to possibility by exposing his early suppositions, arguing that he held a combinatorial conception of possibility. He considers the transition from possibility to actuality through the notion of agency; the role divine agency plays in actualization; moral agency and human freedom of action and the relation between agency and necessity in comparison to Spinoza. Nachtomy analyzes Leibniz’s notion of nested, organic individuals and their peculiar unity, in distinction from his notion of aggregates. Nachtomy suggests that Leibniz defined possible individuals through combinatorial rules that generate unique and maximally consistent structures of predicates in God’s understanding and that such rules may be viewed as programs for action. He uses this definition to clarify Leibniz’s notions of individuation, relations and his distinction between individual substances and aggregates as well as the notion of organic individuals, which have a nested structure to infinity. Nachtomy concludes that Leibniz’s definition of a possible individual as a program of action helps clarifying the unity and simplicity of nested individuals. The book thus reveals a thread that runs through Leibniz’s metaphysics: from his logical notion of possible individuals to his notion of actual, nested ones.
Leibniz -A Freedom Libertarian
Studia Leibnitiana, 2015
Leibniz’s views about human freedom are much debated today. While the traditional view has it that Leibniz was a compatibilist about freedom, some commentators are now suggesting that Leibniz can be read as an incompatibilist. This exciting new reading is often based on Leibniz’s Necessary and Contingent Truths (NCT). This paper shall argue that NCT supports not only an understanding of Leibniz as a freedom incompatibilist, but more radically, as embracing a particularly intriguing kind of libertarianism. On this Leibnizian brand of libertarianism, a human action may be both free and unavoidable (in the sense that the agent could not have acted otherwise). Drawing on the contemporary post-Frankfurtian debate on human freedom, the paper shows how this Leibnizian libertarianism is both intuitive and well-motivated.
In Defense of Leibniz's Theodicy
2012
G. W. Leibniz professes a commitment to historical Christian theism, but the depth and orthodoxy of his commitment has been questioned throughout the past three centuries. In this project I defend both the cogency and the orthodoxy of Leibniz’s philosophical theology and, by extension, its application to the Christian task of theodicy. At the heart of this defense is the central claim of this project, namely, that Leibniz’s philosophical theology represents a traditional brand of Augustinianism. In short, I argue that Leibniz’s theodicy is not his own, but is the tacit claim of a longstanding theological tradition made explicit and brought to bear on the problem of evil as articulated in Leibniz’s day. Accompanying this central claim are a number of subordinate claims, the most significant of which center on how we read Leibniz on providence and on free choice. Regarding the former, I argue that Leibniz’s understanding of providence has precedence in and is a recapitulation of older Augustinian views of the God-world relationship. As for free choice, I maintain that the Augustinian tradition is not only incompatiblist, or libertarian, but was recognized as such in Leibniz’s day. Hence in adhering to this tradition, Leibniz is knowingly adhering to a libertarian theology. I show that his adherence to this tradition and its views of freedom has significant textual support. My method of defense is both historical and constructive. On the historical side I focus primarily on contextual and textual analysis. However, insofar as this defense includes the viability of Leibniz’s theodicy for Christian theology and theodicy today, constructive engagement with Leibniz’s contemporary objectors and the current literature on the problem of evil is also required. Therefore, I devote the latter part of this defense to lingering objections and interlocution with current approaches to the problem of evil. In the end I conclude that Leibniz’s theodicy, when read in the light of the Augustinian tradition, is not only orthodox, cogent, and defensible, but is perhaps the most viable response to the problem of evil for traditional Christian theology, if not the inevitable response for a traditional Augustinian.
Pacific Philosophical Quarterly, 2014
In February 1676, one of Leibniz's main concerns is with the problem of the seat of the soul and its relationship with the body, to which, in two very short papers, he provides two different solutions: the doctrine of the flos substantiae and the vortex theory. By analyzing the former, I suggest that, despite what other scholars claim, it is far from being an earlier exposition of the notion of monad. I argue that this doctrine is entertained by Leibniz only for a period, but is rejected later on and excluded from the final monadic system. This hypothesis seems to be supported by the shift to the notion of a vortex, which – despite having some evident pantheistic and monistic implications – offers a different solution to the problem of mind-body union, by identifying the soul as the only cement of matter. In this article, by following the progress of such a shift, we discover some fascinating nuances in the young Leibniz's development.
“Leibniz’s Two Realms Revisited,” Nôus (42:4) 2008: 673-696.
Leibniz speaks, in a variety of contexts, of there being two realms-a "kingdom of power or efficient causes" and "a kingdom of wisdom or final causes." This essay explores an often overlooked application of Leibniz's famous "two realms doctrine." The first part turns to Leibniz's work in optics for the roots of his view that nature can be seen as being governed by two complete sets of equipotent laws, with one set corresponding to the efficient causal order of the world, and the other to its teleological order. The second part offers an account of how this picture of lawful over-determination is to be reconciled with Leibniz's mature metaphysics. The third addresses a line of objection proposed by David Hirschmann to the effect that Leibniz's doctrine undermines his stated commitment to an efficient, broadly mechanical account of the natural world. Finally, the fourth part suggests that Leibniz's thinking about the harmony of final and efficient causes in connection with corporeal nature may help to shed light on his understanding of the teleological unfolding of monads as well.