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Article ID: CBB667612088

Substance and Force: Or Why It Matters What We Think (2017)

Phemister, Pauline (Author)

British Journal for the History of Philosophy
Volume: 25
Issue: 3
Pages: 526-546

URI: https://doi.org/10.1080/09608788.2017.1325727

DOI: 10.1080/09608788.2017.1325727

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Metaphysics Monads, monadology Ethics Physics 17th century Leibniz, Gottfried Wilhelm von

Leibniz believed the ‘true concept of substance’ is found in ‘the concept of forces or powers’. Accordingly, he conceived monadic substances as metaphysically primitive forces whose modifications manifest both as monads’ appetitions and perceptions and as derivative forces in monads’ organic bodies. Relationships between substances, and in particular the ethical relationships that hold between rational substances, are also foregrounded by Leibniz’s concept of substances as forces. In section one, we discuss the derivative forces of bodies. In section two, we consider monads’ perceptions and appetitions. Section three attends to ethical aspects of Leibniz’s account, focusing in particular on souls’ representative natures and the correspondence that obtains between perceptions in one and perceptions in all others. In section four, however, I argue that Leibniz’s commitment to the doctrine of the conservation of force makes it impossible for any one substance to pursue its own advantage by increasing its active force without there being a correlative disadvantageous decrease in the active force of substances elsewhere in the universe. While the reconciliatory proposals offered do not entirely remove the tension between Leibniz’s ethics and his physics, they do soften its severity and allow it to be regarded in a more positive light.

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Article Federico Boccaccini; Anna Marmodoro (2017) Powers, Abilities and Skills in Early Modern Philosophy. British Journal for the History of Philosophy (pp. 435-442). unapi

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