Leibniz's New Essays Concerning the Human Understanding: A Critical ExpositionDewey, John
Philosophy
Leibniz's New Essays Concerning the Human Understanding: A Critical Exposition
Dewey, John
Leibniz, Gottfried Wilhelm, Freiherr von, 1646-1716
Leibniz has another argument of a logical nature, as those already
referred to are of a physical: "Those who claim that extension is a
substance, reverse the order of words as well as of thoughts. Besides
extension there must be a subject which is extended; that is to
say, something to which it belongs to be repeated or continued. For
extension is nothing but a repetition or continued multiplication
of that which is spread out,--it is a plurality, a continuity, a
co-existence of parts. Consequently, extension does not suffice to
explain the nature of the repeated or manifold substance, of which the
notion is anterior to that of its repetition." Extension, in other
words, is nothing substantial, it is not something which can exist
by itself; it is only a quality, a property, a mode of being. It is
always relative to something which has extension. As Leibniz says
elsewhere: "I insist that extension is only an _abstraction_, and
requires something which is extended. It presupposes some quality,
some attribute, some nature in a subject which is extended, diffused,
or continued. Extension is a diffusion of this quality. For example,
in milk there is an extension or diffusion of whiteness; in the diamond
an extension or diffusion of hardness; in body in general a diffusion
of antitypia or materiality. There is accordingly in body something
anterior to extension."
From the physical side, therefore, we find it impossible to account
for the concrete properties of material phenomena from extension; on
the logical we find that the idea of extension is always relative to
that which is extended. What is that which is to be considered as the
bearer of extension and the source of physical qualities? We are led
back to the point at which we left the matter in the last chapter. It
is force, and force both passive and active. Leibniz uses the term
"matter" in at least three senses: it is the metaphysical element of
passive force _in_ the monad; it is the monad itself considered as,
upon the whole, externally conditioned or unconscious; and it is the
phenomenon resulting from the aggregation of the monads in the second
sense. The first is naked matter, and is a pure abstraction; the second
is the monad as material, as opposed to the monad, as soul; the third
is clothed, or second matter, or, concretely, body, _corpus_. The first
is unreal by itself; the second is one phase of substance; the third
is not substantial, but is a reality, though a phenomenal one. It
is from the substantial monad that we are to explain the two things
now demanding explanation,--that element in _bodies_ (matter in third
sense) which is the source of their physical properties, and that which
is the subject, the carrier, so to speak, of extension.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account