Abstract

In this study I try to show some numerical analogy between Leibniz s binary system and I-Ching s symbolic system of duo rerum principia, imagines quator, octo figurae and 64 hexagrams. But, there is really a formal logical accordance in their symbolic foundations, on which are based especially the Wittgensteins 16 truth-tables in his Tractatus-logico- philosophicus(5.101) and 16 hexagrams, as long as we interpret with the binary values 0 and 1, i.e. the Bi-Polarity, the logical tradition fromJ. Boole, G. Frege through B. Russell and A.N. Whitehead to R. Wittgenstein. So, I argue that the historical and theoretical root of that tradition goes back to the debate between Bouvet and Leibniz about the mathematical structure of I-Ching symbols and the Leibnizian binary arithmetic. In the letter on 4. 11. 1701 from Peking to Leibniz, Bouvet wrote that the I-Chings symbolism has an analogous structure with Leibniz s binary arithmetic. Corresponding to his suggestion, but without exact knowledge, in the letter of 2. January 1697 to the duke August in Braunschweig-Lueneburg-Wolfenbuettel had Leibniz shown already an original idea for the creation of the world with imago Dei which comes from binary progression, dark and light on water.