Abstract
The aim of the paper is to illuminate some core aspects of Leibniz’s conception of judgement and its place in his conception of the mind. In particular, the paper argues for three claims: First, the act of judgement is at the centre of Leibniz’s conception of the mind in that minds strive at actualising innate knowledge concerning derivative truths, where the actualising involves an act of judgement. Second, Leibniz does not hold a judgement account of predication, but a two-component account that distinguishes between predication and alethic evaluation. Third, Leibniz understands the act of affirmative judgement in terms of establishing active dispositions, i.e. strivings, to make reasons available for future reasoning that aims at answering whether-questions (whether a proposition p is true or not). Correspondingly, he understands the act of negative judgement in terms of establishing dispositions to ban propositions from future reasoning that aims at answering whether-questions. In the final analysis, the acts of affirmative as well as of negative judgement turn out to be acts of changing memory dispositions.
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Notes
An exception is Losonsky (2001, ch. 7).
Note that this paper is concerned with Leibniz’s general conception of judgement. Hence, I will abstract from the differences Leibniz might recognise between theoretical, practical, aesthetic etc. judgements and merely be concerned with features that are, for Leibniz, characteristic of the activity of judging in general.
This view of Leibniz’s method comes close to the ‘conciliatory eclecticism’ Christia Mercer attributes to the early Leibniz (see Mercer 2001, 49–59).
I use the terms ‘rational soul’ and ‘mind’ interchangeably in this paper.
In his monadological metaphysics he calls them ‘simple monads’, ‘animal monads’, and ‘rational monads’ (see Leibniz’s Principles of Nature and Grace (henceforth referred to by ‘PNG’), sections 4–5 and his Monadology (henceforth referred to by ‘M’), sections 18–30). It needs to be pointed out, however, that Leibniz’s understanding of souls in general and of the three types of souls in particular very much differs from the Aristotelian scheme. For one, Leibniz understands all souls to be engaged in cognitive activity. More precisely, all souls—including simple monads—exhibit states (so-called ‘perceptions’) that represent outer things (in fact, they represent their own bodies perfectly and by virtue of representing their own bodies they represent the whole universe); and the inner activities of all souls are propelled by inner strivings (so-called ‘appetites’) that are sensitive to the contents of these representational states (the appetites strive at increasing the represented goods and at diminishing the represented evils). Furthermore, Leibniz rejects Aristotelian hylomorphism and accounts for the unity of soul and body in terms of the infamous doctrine of pre-established harmony.
Following Stephen Menn, I distinguish between Platonic and Platonist views. The former can be found in Plato’s writings, the latter in Platonist writers, i.e. writers who do philosophy on the basis of mainly Platonic doctrines (see Menn 1998, xii).
At an early stage of Book I of the New Essays on Human Understanding, Leibniz points out that ‘all the thoughts and actions of our soul come from its own depths and could not be given to it by the senses’. Having put his metaphysical cards on the table, Leibniz hastens to add that he will engage with Lockean views from the perspective of ‘accepted ways of speaking’ according to which ‘the outer senses can be said to be, in a certain sense, partial causes of our thoughts’; Sämtliche Schriften und Briefe (henceforth referred to by ‘A’) 6.6.74; see also A 6.6.6 and A 6.6.392. Leibniz applies here his methodological doctrine according to which, for reasons of persuasiveness, one should discuss positions from the opponent’s standpoint.
Leibniz believes that souls essentially are engaged in representational activity. The inner states of all souls—not only of animal and rational souls—are representational states.
Leibniz’s usage of the Latin ‘perceptio’ and the French ‘perception’ on the one hand and of ‘cogitatio’ and ‘pensée’ on the other is an intricate matter. He uses the former terms in three different ways: In a generic sense, they denote all inner representational states of all souls (see, for instance, PNG 2 and M 17). But apart from their generic sense, Leibniz also uses them in two slightly different contrastive ways. In the first contrastive use, he contrasts perceptions with apperceptions (see A 6.6.134, PNG 4, and M 14). In the second contrastive sense, perceptions are contrasted with thoughts (see Leibniz’s Discourse of Metaphysics (henceforth referred to by ‘DM’), section 14). Similarly, Leibniz uses ‘cogitatio’ and ‘pensée’ in a broad and in a narrow sense. In the broad sense, the terms denote all inner representational states of all souls, i.e. they are used equivalently to ‘perceptio’ and ‘perception’ in the generic sense (A 6.6.161 and A 6.6171). In the narrow sense, the terms denote only propositional acts in rational souls (see A 6.6.173, A 6.6.210, and A 6.1.286 revision note 16). In this paper, I use ‘perception’ in the second contrastive sense and ‘thought’ in Leibniz’s narrow sense.
Leibniz is famous for his innatism of ideas and truths. Primarily, ideas are innate to us. But since truths are merely relations of containment between ideas, with innate ideas come innate truths.
When I talk of dispositions in the following, I will mean active dispositions in the Leibnizean sense of strivings, not in the contemporary sense of passive dispositions that require a stimulus in order to get actualised.
See A 6.6.52 (innate ideas are dispositions) in combination with A 6.6.110 (there are no passive dispositions). From A 6.4.1370 we learn that ideas are faculties to think and since ideas are given to us by God (see DM 28), they must be faculties to think truths rather than falsehoods. False thoughts result from defective actualisations of ideas.
See DM 27.
See DM 9.
See DM 26, DM 28, and A 6.6.300.
Ideas represent natures (see DM 26) and the nature of a thing contains all predicates truly predicable of the thing (see DM 8 for the case of substances). Hence, ideas as strivings must be understood as including active dispositions to actualise all true thoughts about the thing in question.
See Die philosophischen Schriften von Leibniz (henceforth referred to by ‘GP’) IV 469–470 and IV 395. The notion of impediment is central to Leibniz’s metaphysics of substances as forces. I will not go into Leibniz’s conception of impediment in this paper, but restrict my focus on logical and epistemological questions.
See A 6.6.12 and 6.6.84.
Actual knowledge contrasts with virtual knowledge. A subject possesses the latter just in virtue of the possession of innate ideas; possession of the former requires actualisation of the virtual knowledge (see A 6.6.52, A 6.6.77, and A 6.6.86).
See GP III 291, A 6.6.12, A 6.6.76, A 6.6.84, and A 6.6.392.
See A 6.6.77.
The principle of identity comes in two different forms: affirmative A = A, and negative A ≠ non-A and A ≠ B, where B is an object of an idea that is different from the idea of A (A 6.4.1644 and A 6.6.361–362). As Leibniz explains, in order to become aware of primitive necessary truths in contexts of knowledge-seeking activity they only need to be ‘distinguished’ rather than ‘formed by the intellect and by the reason’ (A 6.6.12). This refers to Leibniz’s view that (true or supposed) instances of the principle of identity are involved in all our thinking in that thoughts express containment relations between ideas (see DM 8). Becoming aware of them only requires distinguishing them from the other elements involved (see A 6.6.84 for distinguishing ‘general principles [that] enter into our thoughts’).
Leibniz variously characterises the acts of inner sense as acts of conscientia (GP IV 357 and A 6.6.238), of reflection (A 6.6.14 and A 6.6.238), and inner sentiment (A 6.4.1830 and A 6.6.236).
See A 6.4.1500 and GP IV 357.
See A 6.4.1655.
See A 6.6.361–367 and A 6.6.434.
See A 6.6.89–94 and 101.
See A 6.4.1655 and A 6.6.361–368.
See A 6.6.12 and A 6.6.78.
See A 6.6.86.
See A 6.4.1655, A 6.6.361, and A 6.6.434. Hence, Leibniz includes the customary understanding of innateness in terms of immediate affirmation in his characterisation of innate primitive truths as immediate truths.
See A 6.6.368.
See A 6.6.368 and Opuscules et Fragments inédits de Leibniz (henceforth referred to by ‘C’), 495.
A 6.6.141.
See the quote from A 6.6.475 to be discussed in Sect. 2.1.
However, in some places Leibniz seems to apply a wider notion of judgement that also denotes affirmation of primitive truths. This seems to be the case in the piece On the Method of Distinguishing Real from Imaginary Phenomena (1683–1685/1686?) in which Leibniz explains: ‘I judge without proof, from a simple perception or experience, that those things exist of which I am conscious within me. There are, first, myself who am thinking of a variety of things and then, the varied phenomena or appearances which exist in my mind’ (A 6.4.1500/Philosophical Papers and Letters (henceforth referred to by ‘L’), 363). Here, Leibniz characterises affirmation of primary contingent truths as judgement. According to the wider notion, judgements are co-extensive with acts of affirmation and denial. However, the epistemically more significant notion of judgement is the narrow notion because it picks out those cases in which affirmation is given in light of reasons and in response to a whether-question.
See Frege (1956, 294).
See Frege (1956, 302).
This goes back to Plato’s Sophist and Aristotle’s De Interpretatione (see Soph. 262c–d and 263e; De Int. 16b26–17a26).
See Owen (2007, 412–418) and Buroker (1996, 8). Jennifer Marusic agrees that Locke does not distinguish between proposition formation and evaluation, but argues extensively that this does not have the devastating consequences generally thought it would have (see Marusic 2014). Gabriel Nuchelmans and Walter Ott, in contrast, claim that Locke in fact distinguishes between proposition formation and evaluation (see Nuchelmans 1983, 139–147; Ott 2002).
The locus classicus of this critique is Geach (1962, 24).
I understand the terms ‘enuntiatio’ and ‘propositio’ in the quotation as referring to linguistic acts. However, this is not self-evident. While ‘enuntiatio’ usually stands for a linguistic entity, this is not true of the term ‘propositio’. Leibniz uses ‘propositio’ in order to refer to linguistic as well as mental items. However, in the passage at hand, Leibniz’s use of the verb ‘ferre’ indicates that the reference is to linguistic items. It would not make much sense to think of acts of thinking as being conveyed by other mental acts. But it makes good sense to think of acts of thinking as being conveyed by linguistic acts.
Cf. Nuchelmans (1983, 220).
Leibniz also talks about judging what one represents, indicating that these are distinct acts, see Opera Philosophica Omnia I, 419–420.
See C 497.
Once propositions have become the object of a whether-question they are allowed to play the role of a premise in indirect proofs (reductio ad absurdum) in which their falsehood is revealed by deducing a contradiction. One reviewer raised the point that negatively judged propositions can be reconsidered. For instance, one can check the reasons for the previous negative judgement or search for new reasons that might speak in favour of the proposition’s truth. However, in such cases the question is not whether p, but whether the denial that p is well-founded.
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Acknowledgments
I would like to thank the participants of the conference ‘Perception and Negative Beliefs—from Plato to Kant’ (Hamburg, August 28–29, 2014) for helpful discussions on the paper’s topics. I would also like to thank the editors and the reviewers for their comments on the text.
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Barth, C. Judgement in Leibniz’s Conception of the Mind: Predication, Affirmation, and Denial. Topoi 39, 689–698 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11245-016-9422-z
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11245-016-9422-z