" DE-MENTES BRILLANTES"

Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (1646-1716)

The German rationalist philosopher, Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz (1646-1716), is one of the great renaissance men of Western thought. He has made significant contributions in several fields spanning the intellectual landscape, including mathematics, physics, logic, ethics, theology, and philosophy. Unlike many of his contemporaries of the modern period, Leibniz does not have a canonical work that stands as his single, comprehensive piece of philosophy. Instead, in order to understand Leibniz's entire philosophical system, one must piece it together from his various essays, books, and correspondences. As a result, there are several ways to explicate Leibniz's philosophy. This article begins with his theory of truth, according to which the nature of truth consists in the connection or inclusion of a predicate in a subject.
Together with several apparently self-evident principles (such as the principle of sufficient reason, the law of contradiction, and the identity of indiscernibles), Leibniz uses his predicate-in-subject theory of truth to develop a remarkable philosophical system that provides an intricate and thorough account of reality. Ultimately, Leibniz's universe contains only God and non-composite, immaterial, soul-like entities called "monads." Strictly speaking, space, time, causation, material objects, among other things, are all illusions (at least as normally conceived). However, these illusions are well-founded on and explained by the true nature of the universe at its fundamental level. For example, Leibniz argues that things seem to cause one another because God ordained a pre-established harmony among everything in the universe. Furthermore, as consequences of his metaphysic, Leibniz proposes solutions to several deep philosophical problems, such as the problem of free will, the problem of evil, and the nature of space and time. One thus finds Leibniz developing intriguing arguments for several philosophical positions--including theism, compatibilism, and idealism.
This article provides an overview of Leibniz's metaphysic. Consequently, this entry will not deal with Leibniz's work on, for example, aesthetics, political philosophy, or (except incidentally) physics. Leibniz's "mature metaphysical career" spanned over thirty years. During this period, it would be surprising if some of his basic ideas did not change. Remarkably, however, the broad outline of his philosophy does remain constant. This entry is predominately concerned with this broad view of Leibniz's philosophical system.