Doctor of Philosophy / The main issue to be articulated in this thesis is the proposition that Leibniz’s mature philosophy is best, or preferably, presented as a double-aspect ontology. All the arguments to be furnished herein support this case; however, their intrinsic weight and extent far exceeds that of the principal contention, so that the whole of Leibniz’s natural philosophy and metaphysics will be seen to be involved and to undergo some measure of re-orientation away from more traditional interpretive concerns. Part I follows Leibniz in his emendation of Aristotelian-Scholastic notions as a result of his need for a “higher, metaphysical principle” to remedy the defects of the ‘modern’ account of motion. From this flowed his new conception of substance. The fundamental premise of Leibniz’s metaphysics is that spirit and body lie in series. The cosmos presents itself as aspects of an unbroken continuum. Ineluctably our conclusions as to the ‘whole’ is therefore an intellectual reconstruction of the perspectives delivered to us by these aspects. This emerges most clearly from the phenomenotaxis which has been collated in this part of the thesis – apparently the first such exercise in the scholarly literature. All this involves a separation of domains which require appropriate levels of description to explain their autonomous features. A double-aspect theory seems indispensable to account for the one world to which these levels nonetheless refer. In Part II we engage with Leibniz’s conception of substance as a unit of force. From this protean idea (aka monad) the whole material and spiritual cosmos is derived. The basis of this theory is that to act is to be. Accordingly we arrive at an ontology of agency. The nature of a monad is to exert Daseinstreben, the equivalent of individuation. Included in its definition is an absolute freedom to act. God’s “concession” of existence therefore refers to the autonomous collectivisation of monads into universes eligible for actualisation. Accordingly Leibniz arrives at a theory of a self-constructing universe. Post-Arnauld, Leibniz discarded the complete concept, having realised that contingency breaks open the system of determinism. Accordingly Leibniz replaced the ‘sum of predicates’ doctrine with the law of the series. In this conception monads collect the asymmetrical and irreversible information relevant to their internal states; for it transpires that freely executed choices guarantee avoidance of indiscernibles. The section therefore presents a schema of the ten main issues entangled in the conception of agency as well as an analytical chart of the structure of monads. In Part III, the “Labyrinth of the Continuum” resolves the perspectives on the world. Leibniz declares his colours unambiguously – realism concerns the world of facts, idealism the realm of foun-dations. The Principle of Continuity covers a vast range of indeterminate parts which serve as the foundations of real parts. We investigate some case studies, e.g. petites perceptions and especially the Pacidius, in which the conception of an agent-in-motion is studied in depth to reveal Leibniz’s extraordinary conclusions on change. We also consider Shapes, Limits and Boundaries which are relevant to the theory of the self-constructing universe (infolding and unfolding order); and finally his models of self-similarity and scale invariance. PART IV is concerned with grounding existents from the principle of sufficient reason. The virtue claimed here for the double-aspect theory is the possibility of penetrating into the thought of an exceptionally complex thinker through more than one portal. It yields a greater variety of facets, an inner coherence and a much richer texture of thought than the traditional insistence on just one primary aspect reveals.

Proefschrift Universiteit van Amsterdam. / Met samenvatting in het Nederlands'.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Chicago, 1910. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 128-129).

Issued also as thesis, Göttingen. / Bibliography: p. 196-202.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Chicago, 1910. / Includes bibliographical references (p.128-129) Also available on the Internet. Also issued online.

Thesis (M.A.)--Memorial University of Newfoundland, 1999. / Bibliography: leaves 56-57.

Notes bibliogr. - Bibliogr. p. (327)--333. - Index.

Inaug.-Diss.--Tübingen. / Lebenslauf.

El artículo pretende estudiar el problema de la teodicea leibniziana, concretamente el problema del mal, desde una perspectiva crítica. Para ello me dedicaré a examinar las principales tesis del sistema de Leibniz con la finalidad de dar un marco apropiado para la comprensión de cómo este autor concibe dicho problema. La idea es mostrar en qué medida su sistema resulta insuficiente para abordar esta cuestión y examinar si la aproximación posmoderna de un autor como John D. Caputo puede proveernos de mejores herramientas para responder al complejo problema de la existencia del mal en el mundo.

Dissertação (mestrado)—Universidade de Brasília, Instituto de Ciências Humanas, Departamento de Filosofia, Programa de Pós-Graduação em Filosofia, 2014. / Submitted by Jaqueline Ferreira de Souza (jaquefs.braz@gmail.com) on 2014-12-30T10:49:18Z No. of bitstreams: 1 2014_JadsonAlvesdeFreitas.pdf: 1376905 bytes, checksum: 992a6d81a61086acacdd6595e8b309da (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Guimaraes Jacqueline(jacqueline.guimaraes@bce.unb.br) on 2014-12-30T11:45:51Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 2014_JadsonAlvesdeFreitas.pdf: 1376905 bytes, checksum: 992a6d81a61086acacdd6595e8b309da (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2014-12-30T11:45:51Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 2014_JadsonAlvesdeFreitas.pdf: 1376905 bytes, checksum: 992a6d81a61086acacdd6595e8b309da (MD5) / A questão sobre o que torna um sistema filosófico uma monadologia é esclarecedora e importante, uma vez que ajuda a entender algumas ideias e abre caminhos para maneiras alternativas de pensar a substancialidade, distinta das rotas norteadoras do pensamento ocidental, oriundas de Aristóteles e Descartes. Essa é a proposta deste trabalho: analisar as bases da monadologia de Leibniz como intuição para a formação de uma ideia geral sobre sistemas compostos por mônadas. Nesse âmbito, a concepção leibniziana das mônadas expressa uma rota específica na qual relações são anteriores às substâncias e tudo está conectado em um mundo onde a modalidade fundamental é a compossibilidade. Leibniz pensa suas mônadas organizadas de modo que cada uma, de certa maneira, prefigura todas as outras. No contraste com ele, as ideias de pensadores como Tarde, Whitehead, Latour, Schaffer e Quine, provam reter importantes elementos de uma monadologia enquanto rejeitam algumas dessas assunções específicas a Leibniz. Desse modo, elas permitem um diálogo conceitual com Leibniz, ao mesmo tempo indicando um outro caminho para a articulação dos pressupostos centrais de uma monadologia. O que emerge é uma monadologia em um sentido amplo que seria independente da maneira específica que Leibniz entendia suas mônadas. Cinco características fundamentais para a ideia de uma monadologia em geral são apresentadas e discutidas. Essas podem ser usadas para comparar diferentes sistemas de mônadas e posteriormente, entender melhor as opções concebidas por Leibniz. ______________________________________________________________________________ ABSTRACT / The issue concerning what makes a philosophical system a monadology is both enlightening and important, for it sheds new light into some ideas and paves the way for alternative ways to think of substantiality, different from the Western thought guiding ways of Aristotle and Descartes. That is the aim of this work: to analyze the foundations of Leibniz’s monadology as intuition for the development of a general idea about systems composed of monads. In that respect, the Leibnizian conception of monads show a specific way in which relations are prior to substances and everything is connected together in a world where the fundamental modality is that of compossibility. Leibniz thinks of his monads as concerted, in a way that each one somehow prefigures all the others. In contrast to Leibniz, the ideas of thinkers such as Tarde, Whitehead, Latour, Schaffer, and Quine prove to retain important elements of a monadology while rejecting some of these assumptions specific to Leibniz. As such, they allow a conceptual dialogue with Leibniz, at the same time indicating another way for the articulation of the central tenets of a monadology. What emerges is a monadology in a broad sense that would be independent from the specific manner Leibniz understood his monads. Five characteristics, imperative to the idea of a monadology in general, are presented and discussed. These characteristics can be used to compare different systems of monads and, in turn, to further understand the options devised by Leibniz.