A Gottfried of All Trades: Leibniz and His Trans-Field Exploits
Benjamin Miller, Andrew Nauffts, Paige Pendleton
Boom Roasted.
You Gott FRIED
Logic and Philosophy
Leibniz is widely held within the “pantheon of seven great philosophers
(Ross, 1984),” and is considered a continental rationalist, alongside
Descartes and Spinoza. Their beliefs boiled down to formal logic, to
which Leibniz was a great contributor. Because he reserved any
categorization of knowledge to what could be deduced from truths of
reason, his ruminations on God, Man, Metaphysics, and even
Arithmetic all rely on proofs. His Principle of Identity and Principle of
Sufficient Reason are his keys to proving that anything and everythingfrom math to concerns with the soul and the Spiritual- can be broken
down to their most basic, mechanical operations. This sort of analytic
philosophy was based on definitions and symbolic thought rather than
empirical evidence. Again, this approach was born of his refinements
and contributions to the Binary System.
This system instructed Leibniz to use a method of division (genus
differentia) wherein things are branched by classes, and are composed
of component concepts. Think: Sign, Signified, Signifier. The ruling
class, or concept that is defined, must always be the most complex,
whereas everything that informs it is simpler, until you have things in
their simplest forms (sentence is the sign, the words or symbols are the
signifiers, and the signified is the meaning ascribed to these symbols
and concepts). In this subject-predicate approach, the relational stress is
now between, and not within. Example:
“Paris is the lover of Helen...asserts a relationship between two
subjects...each is true only because the other is true…(and) Ultimately,
God made Paris a lover because he was making Helen loved (Ross,
1984)” and vice-versa. So now the relationship between his arithmetic
and his logic becomes obvious to one, and we can return to his second
principle to view a similar relationship between his arithmetic, logic,
and metaphysical beliefs, as the one above.
A Leibniz Wheel
Born
Father Dies
Awarded Degree of
Master of
Philosophy
Awarded Degree of
Enters
Doctor of Law from
University of
University of Altdorf
Leipzig
1662
1654
1666
Calculus Wars
He believed that God created the “best of all possible worlds (Ross,
1984),” because it is the way it is, and not any other way.
Furthermore, things might seem bad (for instance, natural disasters,
disease etc.-criticisms which were often used against this infamous
statement of Leibniz, most famously in Candide by Voltaire) but only
due to our perspective, whereas they might seem worst by another’s
perspective. He wouldn’t create it another way, it’s a matter of
perspective, rather. So, where in binary everything can be broken
down to a 0 or a 1, the creation of the Earth reflects this symbology,
too; pure being (God, or a 1), and nothingness (0). God’s creative act
was therefore a “voluntary dilution of his own essence, and a
mathematical computation (Ross, 1984)” reflecting perfect numbers.
Key Terms
• Subject: “Identifies a substance (Ross, 1984).”
• Predicate: “Attributes a certain property to ‘Subject’ (Ross, 1984).”
• Principle of Identity: “This is the principle that a proposition is
proved to be necessarily true if it either is itself an identical
proposition, or can be reduced to one (Ross, 1984).”
• Identical Proposition: “[When] the predicate is explicitly identical
with or included in the subject (Ross, 1984).”
• Principle of Sufficient Reason: States that nothing is without
reason.
• Binary System: Numeral system which represents numeric values
using two symbols: 0 (empty) and 1 (full).
Needs Financial Backing.
Builds calculating machine
(Leibniz Wheel). Presents
it to Royal Society in
London, Becomes an
External Member.
Newton discovered calculus from 1665-1666 and planned on publishing it
around the same as his optics work publication but swore off publishing
after the hate he received from his first work (Bardi, 2006). From then on
even until after the death of Leibniz in 1716, Newton waged the war (Bardi,
2006). He has said, “Whether Mr. Leibniz invented it after me, or had it
from me, is a question of no consequence, for second inventors have no
rights (Bardi, 2006).” Leibniz took this threat seriously. He worked with
other great minds in Europe and they wrote letters backing up his own
cause. He would anonymously attack Newton and include these in his
publishing (Bardi, 2006). These two great minds independently had
brilliant ideas around the same time, so it was up to whoever published it
first to get the credit. Leibniz happened to do so, and so is credited as the
creator of calculus.
Visits London and is
Shown Some of
Newton’s
Mathematical Papers
1675
1672
From 1672-1676, Leibniz made his discovery of calculus while he spent a
few creative years in Paris. At this point he was a lawyer and had no
mathematical training, yet within a few years he compiled the work of many
great mathematicians and created calculus (Bardi, 2006).
Leibniz had two scholarly papers of his calculus works published in 1684
and 1686. These two papers single handedly give him the credit for being
the first creator of calculus. It took him the twenty years following to refine
his work. This time included Leibniz examining Isaac Newton’s Opticks to
further refine his work and studies. In 1704, Newton published “On the
Quadrature of Curves” in the back of Opticks to establish, what he thought
would be, his claim to owning the discovery of calculus (Bardi, 2006).
Newton had been quietly smoldering with feelings of humiliation and
jealousy towards Leibniz because he knew it was him who invented it first
(Bardi, 2006).
Became a Foreign
Member of the French
Academy of Sciences
Began Correspondence
with Samuel Clarke,
Newton’s Disciple.
Death
1714
1684
1716
July 1st, 1646 1652
1661
1664
1667
Arrives in Paris
as a Diplomat
Awarded Degree of
Gains Access to
Rejected for a Degree of Doctor of
Bachelor of
Father’s Library
Law; Leaves Leipzig Forever.
Philosophy
Works Cited
• Bardi, J. The calculus wars: Newton, Leibniz, and the greatest mathematical clash of all time. New York: Thunder's Mouth Press, 2006.
• "Bilder Und Videos Suchen: Leibniz." Bilder Und Videos Suchen: Leibniz. N.p., n.d. Web. 29 Mar. 2015. <https://de.fotolia.com/tag/leibniz>.
• "Candide (Random House 75th Anniversary Edition)." Barnes and Noble. American Classroom Libraries, n.d. Web.
<http%3A%2F%2Fwww.barnesandnoble.com%2Fw%2Fcandide-francois-voltaire%2F1100189377%3Fean%3D9780679642589>.
• Duigan, Brian. The 100 Most Influential Philosophers of All Time. 29 East 21st St., New York, NY: Britannica Educational Publishing, 2010.
• Jolley, Nicholas. Leibniz. 270 Madison Ave, New York, NY: Routledge, 2005.
• LSNA Conference 2015." LSNA Conference 2015. Ohio State University, n.d. Web. 29 Mar. 2015. <https://u.osu.edu/lsna2015/>
• Newton and Leibniz. N.d. Department of History University of California, Irvine. Web. 29 Mar. 2015.
<http://faculty.humanities.uci.edu/bjbecker/RevoltingIdeas/leibniz.html>.
• Ross, G. MacDonald. Past Masters: Leibniz. New York: Oxford University Press, 1984.
1673
1676
Discovered the
Differential Calculus
1700
Publishes His
Discovery of the
Differential Calculus
1715
Composes “Principles
of Nature and Grace”
and Monadology
INTD 220: History of Physical Science
Dr. McLean, Dr. Cope, Dr. Towsley