Book Review: Philosophical Essays by G. W. Leibniz

Philosophical Essays by Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, translated by Roger Ariew and Daniel Garber

Leibniz was part of the philosophical tradition struggling under the impact of Descartes. Descartes intended to restart philosophical thinking by reevaulating the starting point. He used his methodical doubt to strip away any uncertain or unclearly grounded knowledge and worked his way back up to the existence of the world and of God. Along the way, he posited a distinction between the material and the spiritual with an attempt to reunite the two principles that most agree was not successful. Subsequent philosophers tried to sort out the problem of what's really real--the material or the spiritual, or some way to combine both. Leibniz's solution was monads.

For Leibniz, reality is made up of simple substances and compound substances. Each compound substance is an aggregate of simple substances. The simple substances (monads) are indivisible parts of reality that are therefore unchangeable (they have no parts to move around or rearrange) and eternal (they cannot be destroyed). They are not just particles of matter, they have a force or power in them. They can be the forms or souls in things, the principle that makes the compounds what they are (so they are like Aristotle's forms). They also contain the potential for everything, since the whole history of the monad and what it will be a part of is already in it. In modern parlance, the macrocosm is contained in the microcosm. Leibniz works out a lot of consequences from this system about the nature of the world and of God.

While he crafts an interesting philosophical system, it's hard to see that it represents reality accurately. The monads are simple and indivisible but they are distinct from each other and also have at least the potential of being any other thing. Nothing every really dies, the monad that was the soul of the person or animal continues on and may re-aggregate again. God exists outside this system but He created it and sustains it in existence. Since God is good and intelligent, the world is the best one possible and is coherent and comprehensible. The idea does not present the real world as most people know it. I found his system interesting but ultimately unhelpful.

Mildly recommended--this is more for people interested in the history of philosophy.