How to reconcile monadic simplicity with the successive plurality of the monadic states ? The doctrine of continued creation seems to entail the existence of independent temporal parts and thus lead to the thesis that the world contains only transitory things. I try to show how Leibniz has the resources to get out of this quandary. The analysis of the concept of extension shows that a plurality of states does not constitute a divisible aggregate. Then I examine the Leibnizian interpretation (...) of continued creation, by com- paring it to the scholastic and Cartesian Background. From thence I conclude that Leibniz’s final thesis is that monads are wholly present at each moment of their duration. (shrink)

The relation between extension and impenetrability is a major issue in the Descartes-More correspondence, which implies an analysis of the concept of extension. The mereological structure partes extra partes is a crucial element here. Both philosophers hold two opposed views of this mereological structure. I try to show that these two views can be traced back to scholastic discussions on quantity’s relation to extension. This background provides a vantage point, which enables to propose a new construal of the argumentative exchange (...) around impenetrability, and which casts some light too on our understanding of two properties – spissitude and indiscerpibility – which More attributes to spiritual extension in his later writings. (shrink)

La compossibilité chez Leibniz est la relation qui répartit les possibles en mondes distincts. Un problème central consiste à comprendre pour quelle raison tous les possibles ne sont pas compossibles, ou ce qui fonde la pluralité des mondes possibles. On examine ici ce problème en confrontant les thèses de Leibniz au réalisme modal de Lewis. Chez ce dernier, l’appartenance à un même monde est définie par l’existence de relations spatiotemporelles, ce qui exclut la possibilité d’univers-îles, ou mondes sans connexion spatiotemporelle (...) et permet de conclure à l’impossibilité qu’un monde contienne la totalité des possibles. L’interprétation cosmologique de la compossibilité attribue une position semblable à Leibniz. Mais cette interprétation exige de tenir l’harmonie expressive pour une caractéristique nécessaire de tous les mondes, ce qui est incompatible avec un certain nombre d’affirmations de Leibniz. (shrink)

Est-il possible de parler de ce qui n’est pas ou d’y penser sans présupposer une forme d’être pour cela même que nous pensons ne pas exister? La vieille énigme parménidienne, qui hante toujours la philosophie contemporaine, est au cœur non seulement de la philosophie médiévale mais aussi des études médiévales, comme en témoigne le récent ouvrage d’Alain de Libera sur la référence vide. L’objet de cette étude est en comparaison beaucoup plus...

This paper examines the problem of the basis of time’s asymmetry. I hold the view that there is an objective temporal asymmetry in Leibniz’s philosophy of time. I closely examine various asymmetrical phenomena, which can be candidates as an explanation of time’s asymmetry: (1) causation; (2) the flow of time; (3) the modal difference between past and present; (4) counterfactual dependence; and, finally (5) the asymmetry of the world’s progress and its direction and (6) of the progress of rational creatures. (...) I conclude that time’s asymmetry involves an irreducibly pragmatic aspect: the asymmetry of agency itself on which all other asymmetrical phenomena rely. (shrink)

During the seventeenth century, disputes over middle knowledge centered on the following question: does God know contingent states of affairs before He decrees to bring them about (the Jesuit view); or, conversely, does He know them after He has decreed which states of affairs He will bring about (the Dominican view)? This article intends to cast some light on Leibniz’s view of this question. Of central importance here is the notion of a possible decree (designed both to ground contingency and (...) to explain God’s knowledge). Despite his apparent proximity to the Dominican view, Leibniz maintained the prevolitional nature of God’s knowledge of contingent states of affairs. In order to establish this point, Leibniz’s view is compared to some little known developments in the theory of middle knowledge. (shrink)

The history of the relations between Leibniz and Spinoza is a matter of philosophical and scholarly controversy. This chapter aims to refer to the first thesis as the Necessity of Actuality and to the second thesis as the Plenitude of Possibilities. It examines how Leibniz's stance with respect to these two theses, and more generally his views on modality, grew out as a response to Spinoza's views. Leibniz explicitly connects Spinoza's attributes with the concept of a world. As most commentators, (...) Leibniz reads Spinoza as a necessitarian, which is a natural interpretation. The difference between Leibniz's and Spinoza's views would reside in their conceptions of God and of the mechanism whereby the actual world comes to exist. Leibniz entertains the hypothesis of reality encompassing a plurality of actual worlds, which seems to achieve the Plenitude of Possibility. (shrink)

In this paper, I examine a neglected debate between Francisco Suárez and Pedro Hurtado de Mendoza about the unity of composite substances. There was a consensus among the Jesuits on the fact that the per se unity of composite substances requires something in addition to matter and form. Like most Jesuits, Suárez and Hurtado further agree on the fact that this additional ingredient is not a full-blown thing, but a “mode of union.” However, while Suárez claims that the union is (...) achieved through a single mode, Hurtado maintains that it is necessary to postulate two distinct modes of union, one modifying form and another modifying matter. I argue that this disagreement actually reflects an important ontological debate about the nature of the items that serve as the cement of things and that it eventually leads later Jesuits like Rodrigo de Arriaga to conceive of union as a polyadic or “straddling” mode. (shrink)

Un enjeu central de la correspondance entre Descartes et More concerne le rapport entre étendue et impénétrabilité et implique ainsi l’analyse du concept d’étendue. Dans celle-ci, la discussion de la structure méréologique partes extra partes est essentielle. Ces deux philosophes comprennent de deux manières différentes la nature de ce rapport méréologique et on essaie de montrer que cette double compréhension trouve son origine dans les discussions scolastiques sur les rapports entre quantité et étendue. C’est à partir de l’éclairage apporté par (...) ce contexte scolastique que l’on relit l’échange d’arguments entre Descartes et More autour de l’impénétrabilité et que l’on analyse deux propriétés – spissitude et indiscerpibilité – que More attribue dans ses textes tardifs à l’étendue spirituelle. (shrink)

La necessite, bien qu'elle soit centrale en philosophie, est une notion particulierement difficile a elucider. Cet ouvrage tente d'en clarifier le contenu, en la distinguant notamment des notions voisines d'a priori et de l'analytique. Il presente egalement differentes approches reductionnistes de la necessite: le reductionnisme ontique (les theories des mondes possibles), le conventionnalisme ou encore le non-cognitivisme (la necessite provient des bornes de nos capacites cognitives). Le commentaire du texte de Descartes montre d'ailleurs que ces theses contemporaines apportent un eclairage (...) nouveau a l'interpretation de sa doctrine de la creation des verites eternelles. Enfin, l'un des enjeux de cet ouvrage est de defendre la legitimite de la notion de necessite contre l'idee selon laquelle elle serait scientifiquement inutile et metaphysiquement suspecte. Au contraire, recentree sur l'idee de necessite a posteriori analysee par Kripke et en connexion avec la notion d'essence, la necessite s'avere etre une notion philosophiquement feconde. (shrink)

This article bears on the topic of the temporal persistence of particulars in Leibniz's philosophy. It is focused on an analysis of some passages from definitional notes from the early 1680's where Leibniz sets out his main metaphysical theses. The paper contends that Leibniz analysed the identity of substances within a broadly Aristotelian framework, i. e. in terms of enduring metaphysical items (which are identical and wholly present at each moment of the particular's existence). It thus opposes an explanation in (...) terms of an atemporal substantial form, or law, causally unifying instantaneous states. Moreover it will be shown that (i) while Leibniz had some important insights into the possibility of what recent philosophers labelled a "perdurantist" account of persistence, (ii) he nevertheless had strong reasons given other theses of his system to reject an ontology of aggregates made of temporal parts in favour of a traditional, "endurantist" conception. (shrink)

À partir de l’analyse d’un argument présenté dans la correspondance avec More, cette étude examine la conception cartésienne du rapport de l’étendue à l’impénétrabilité à travers le prisme de l’imagination. Je montre que l’argument en question est une expérience de pensée qui s’appuie sur le caractère inimaginable d’une étendue pénétrable. Je défends l’idée selon laquelle la conception proprement cartésienne de l’imagination implique que le contenu et les limites de nos actes d’imagination dépendent des propriétés des images cérébrales. J’en déduis que (...) cette conception particulière de l’imagination explique pourquoi l’argument des lettres à More est concluant du point de vue de Descartes. (shrink)

This paper explores the scholastic context of the discussion about the unity of the composite or corporeal substance and the nature of the vinculum substantiale or substantial bond in Leibniz’s correspondence with Des Bosses. Three prominent scholastic views are examined: Duns Scotus’s antireductionist account of the composite substance as an entity irreducible to its essential parts ; Ockham’s parts-whole identity thesis, which entails a reductionist view of the composite substance; and Suárez’s explanation of the unity of composite substance through the (...) presence of a substantial mode of union. It is then shown that Leibniz initially combines a reductionist account of the composite substance, with the vinculum playing the role of bond among the component monads. In his last letters, he moves away from this to an antireductionist account of the composite substance, with which he now identifies the vinculum. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:The Medieval Heritage in Early Modern Metaphysics and Modal Theory, 1400–1700Jean-Pascal AnfrayRussell L. Friedman and Lauge O. Nielsen, editors. The Medieval Heritage in Early Modern Metaphysics and Modal Theory, 1400–1700. Dordrecht: Kluwer, 2003. Pp. vi + 346. Cloth, $149.00.This volume contains contributions that aim to show the continuity between late medieval thought and early modern philosophy, or, as the editors say, to investigate "the way that medieval thought (...) served as a fertile basis for developments in the early modern period" (3). As the title indicates, most papers treat topics more or less connected to modalities, either from a logical or from an ontological point of view. The nature of modalities is indeed at the core of metaphysics and philosophical theology. Ludger Honnefelder, Joël Biard, and Fabrizio Mondori all show the influence of Duns Scotus on the setting of modern metaphysics. The importance of theological matters in the development of philosophical thought has been acknowledged for a long time. Thus Chris Schabel ("Divine Foreknowledge and Human Freedom: Auriol, Pomponazzi, and Luther on 'Scholastic Subtleties'") sketches the story of the controversy over God's foreknowledge and future contingents from its setting in the early fourteenth century to Lutheran Reformation. He stresses the underestimated influence of Peter Auriol in this continuing debate. Still, revealed theology too exercised influence on the philosophy of logic. Trinity constitutes an until now little studied case, which is the subject matter of Simo Knuuttila's contribution ("The Question of the Validity of Logic in Late Medieval Thought"). He partly rehearses some of his well-known theses about the source of logical truths and modalities and analyses the constructivist aspects of Descartes's position, in so far as the laws of logic are said to depend on God's will. But the most original part of the study bears on the effects of Trinitarian constraints within the field of logic, especially in syllogistics. Medieval thinkers had to cope with syllogisms like: "The divine essence is the father; the divine essence is the Son; therefore the Son is the Father." In order to avoid the absurdity of the conclusion, many answers were elaborated: Robert Holcot removed the Trinity from the domain of validity of syllogistics, thereby relativizing it. Luther's claim that the principles of theology contradict those of logic looks like a radical version of this position. Adam Wodeham maintained contrariwise the universality of syllogistics: he held that the premisses are not syllogistic if they are interpreted as true (130). His account is based on the identity theory of predication and on the distinction between intensional and extensional identity, which both date back to Abelard.In the period covered by the volume, early modern scholastic, chiefly the Jesuit scholastic, holds a central place. Two articles insist on its originality and intrinsic value. Jeffrey Coombs ("The Ontological Source of Logical Possibility in Catholic Second Scholasticism") [End Page 208] analyzes the various metaphysics of modalities. He claims that three theories of the source of logical modalities were entertained during the early seventeenth century, which he labels respectively "transcendentalism," "modal voluntarism," and "divine conceptualism." All of these positions can be traced back to medieval theories; however, they received an extensive treatment in late scholastic thought. Coombs is especially illuminating when he emphasizes the importance of the grounding metaphysical structure: essences and their systematic relations through "Porphyrian trees." This generated two different accounts of the ontological status of essences: according to essentialist theories, complete Porphyrian trees are the basis of necessity and possibility, while according to a "string theories," only the logical connections between the components of the essential structure are available eternally (196).Yet the most striking novelty of the time lies in the systematization of a statistical interpretation of modalities through the "moral modalities," originating in post-Tridentine Catholic theology. In contrast to Hacking's thesis (see The Taming of Chance [Cambridge, 1990]), Sven Knebel ("The Renaissance of Statistical Modalities in Early Modern Scholasticism") contends that the concept of aleatory probability was first developed within this context. That an event-type Q is morally necessary means that Q is always the case, and that not-Q actually is never the case (236... (shrink)