Leibniz: Philosophy of Language

This book is the best and most comprehensive treatment we have of Leibniz' study of natural languages, on the same high level of scholarship, knowledge, and insight as the essay Sigrid von der Schulenburg published in 1937. With its rich detail and source references, it is indispensable both to Leibniz scholars and to students of the history of the study of language. The editor's careful indices make it possible to use the book also as a work of reference. The reviewer (...) shows that the chief impulse to Leibniz' study of languages was the need to disprove the Swedish thesis of the northern origin of the Germanic languages. (shrink)

Paralogismen betreffs der Leibnizschen Prädikatlehre werden aufgezeigt und widerlegt. Enthaltensein heißt die Inverse von Ableitung; den zwei Arten von Ableitung, die Leibniz kennt, entsprechen zwei Arten von Enthaltensein. Die beiden Arten von Enthaltensein bieten Leibniz die Möglichkeit zu der logischen und irreduziblen Unterscheidung zwischen notwendigen und bedingten Wahrheiten. Die Unterscheidung zwischen einem Individuum und einer Eigenschaft wird mit mengentheoretischen Methoden und auch mit Hilfe von epistemologischen Begriffen untersucht. Die besondere kategorische Form des Aussagesatzes impliziert, daß es für alle Aussagesätze nur (...) eine einzige Tiefen-Grammatik gibt, welche wesentlich verschiedene Ausdruckweisen von kategorischen Aussagen umfaßt. (shrink)

This paper is concerned with the problem of the validity of Leibniz's principle of the identity of indiscernibles in physics. After briefly surveying how the question is currently discussed in recent literature and which is the actual meaning of the principle for what concerns physics, we address the question of the physical validity of Leibniz's principle in terms of the existence of a sufficient number of naming predicates in the formal language of physics. This approach allows us to obtain in (...) a formal way the result that a principle of the identity of indiscernibles can be justified in the domain of classical physics, while this is not the case in the domain of quantum physics. (shrink)

In seiner Dissertano de arte combinatoria entwickelt G. W. Leibniz eine Methode, um Prädikate von einem Subjekt und Subjekte zu einem Prädikat zu finden, und er stellt eine Formel auf, um deren Anzahl zu berechnen. Ich möchte im Folgenden erläutern, wie diese Methode funktioniert und warum sie sowohl einen Teil der, wie Leibniz es nennt, logica inventiva als auch eine direkte Folge seiner Variationslehre bildet, die den zentralen Teil seiner Dissertano ausmacht. Im letzten Abschnitt dieses Beitrages werde ich auf einige (...) theoretische und historische Zusammenhänge zwischen der logica inventiva und der aristotelischen Logik eingehen. Insbesondere werde ich erläutern, in welcher Weise Leibniz' Methode mit einigen traditionellen Versuchen in Verbindung steht, die tota minora eines gegebenen Terms zu bestimmen, und ob die aristotelische Theorie der kategorischen Propositionen in der Lage war, Leibniz' Methode zum Auffinden von Subjekten und Prädikaten innerhalb der logica inventiva zu begründen. (shrink)

The dream of Leibniz and that of Frege, to create a lingua characteristica in order to demonstrate conceptual thought, incorporates in a wider process, the division and tension between the distinct Spheres which the human sub-species have been creating. Spheres which remain hidden by natural language, essentially spoken language. For the creation and demonstration of the Conceptual Sphere the establishing of a language of characteres has become indispensable, essentially written language. Is a consequence a tension is established between Natural language-Formal (...) language with their corresponding reductionist tendences. (shrink)

In this paper is aproached the Leibnizian project for a General Characteristics. Intended as a instrument to help the limitations and deficiencies of the natural human reason, the General Characteristcs presents itself moreover as a tool for expanding the power of the human thought by adopting and generalizing the methods of the algebraic representation. This goal however entails a difficulty when it is attempted to define with accuracy the extent of the project. At first place appears the problematic relationships that (...) Characteristics maintains with the act of thinking. In our approach is defended the idea that Characterstics expands the power to thinking by improving its ‘semiotical’ nature. Moreover it is raised the issue of the multiplicity of the Characteristics. In fact, Leibniz presents the Caracteristics as a way to resolve a plurality of problems at once, but these many tasks cast serious doubts on the uniqueness of the project, since Leibniz develops actually a plurality of Characteristics. Our response to this issue is that uniqueness can be saved if it is considered the role that the Combinatorial Characteristics or Science of Formulae plays in the project for a General Characteristics. (shrink)

Speech act theory has taught us 'how to do things with words'. Arresting Language turns its attention in the opposite direction - toward the surprising things that language can undo and leave undone. In the eight essays of this volume, arresting language is seen as language at rest, words no longer in service to the project of establishing conventions or instituting legal regimes. Concentrating on both widely-known and seldom-read texts from a variety of philosophers, writers, and critics - from Leibniz (...) and Mendelssohn, through Kleist and Hebel, to Benjamin and Irigaray - the book analyzes the genesis and structure of interruption, a topic of growing interest to contemporary literary studies, continental philosophy, legal studies, and theological reflection. Arresting Language identifies critical moments in philosophical and literary texts during which language itself - without any identifiable speaker - arrests otherwise continuous processes and procedures, including the process of representation and procedures for its legitimization. (shrink)

I claim that a genealogy of the philological racism known as ‘orientalism’ should include Leibniz as a founding figure. This argument is framed and motivated by recent publications that seek to exclude Leibniz from the history of race and racism by arguing that he insists on a linguistic, rather than ‘racial,’ schematic of human diversity. A survey of nineteenth-century race theory reveals that this distinction is not only specious, but these recent defenses only further implicate Leibniz in the linguistic tradition (...) that is orientalist racism. (shrink)

This is the second edition of an important introduction to Leibniz's philosophy of logic and language first published in 1972. It takes issue with several traditional interpretations of Leibniz while revealing how Leibniz's thought is related to issues of great interest in current logical theory. For this new edition, the author has added new chapters on infinitesimals and conditionals as well as taking account of reviews of the first edition.

This is the second edition of an important introduction to Leibniz's philosophy of logic and language first published in 1972. It takes issue with several traditional interpretations of Leibniz (by Russell amongst others) while revealing how Leibniz's thought is related to issues of great interest in current logical theory. For this new edition, the author has added new chapters on infinitesimals and conditionals as well as taking account of reviews of the first edition.

The account of vagueness Bertrand Russell provided in his 1923 paper, entitled simply “Vagueness” (see Russell [1923]1997), has been thought by some to be inconsistent. One main objection, raised by Timothy Williamson (1994), is that Russell’s attempt early in the paper to distinguish vagueness from generality is at odds with the definition of vagueness he presents later in the same paper. It is as if, as Williamson puts it, Russell “backslides” from his previous distinction (1994, 60), resulting in a conflation (...) of generality and vagueness that is at best problematic for a rigorous account of the phenomenon of vagueness. In this paper, I will defend Russell from this particular objection. While his 1923 paper may not be as clear at various points as one might hope, I do believe it is possible to construct a single theory of vagueness that can be applied equally well to his earlier and later discussions. Thus, Russell’s view is not ultimately inconsistent. In this paper, I will first present the interpretation of Russell’s concept of vagueness that falls prey to the charge of conflating vagueness and generality. Once the problem is clear, I will present an alternative interpretation, one that arises from certain reflections on G. W. Leibniz’s theory of perception. This Leibnizian interpretation of Russell, I will argue, resolves the apparent contradiction in Russell’s account of vagueness. (shrink)

The purpose of the article is to present John Yench’s a priori language as a continuation of Leibniz’s idea. Before I proceed to show the project of the Inter-Disciplinary International Reference Language, I would like to discuss the development of Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz’s view on artificial languages. I will try to show the evolution of Leibniz’s universal language: from its ideal conception to a tool which formalizes the whole of human knowledge. Also, I will show Leibniz’s influence on further ideas (...) of artificial language. I will compare his projects with Yench’s language – Idirl. An analysis of Idirl’s main assumptions will be useful to show the degree of continuation of Leibniz’s ideas in the a priori language of John Yench. (shrink)

The Dissertatio praeliminaris is one of the early works of Leibniz in which he proposes an elaborate critique, while presenting his own principles. In accepting several points of Nizolius's philosophy, the young Leibniz tries moreover to defend theses which have constituted the basis of many of his later theories. Three major topics will be examined in this article. First, the question of definition, which is taken from a grammar point of view, where clarity is, in fact, the only criterion to (...) establish the signification of words in usage. Second, perhaps the most important, concerns the problem of nominalism that puts Nizolius in opposition with Leibniz: they do not agree on the determination of signification, meaning whether it stands on conventions or on mental concepts. Third, the link between demonstration and induction as a consequence of a nominalistic approach is also discussed in Leibniz's preface. We are thus better able to understand the origins of Leibniz's philosophical reflection. (shrink)

We first present an edition of the manuscript LH VII, B 2, 39 in which Leibniz develops a new formalism in order to give rigorous definitions of positive, of privative, and of primitive terms.This formalism involves a symbolic treatment of conceptual quantification which differs quite considerably from Leibniz’s “standard” theory of “indefinite concepts” as developed, e.g., in the “General Inquirles” In the subsequent commentary we give an interpretation and a critical evaluation of Leibniz’s symbolic apparatus. It turns out that the (...) definition of privative terms and primitive terms lead to certain inconsistencies which, however, can be avoided by slight modifications. (shrink)

The main aim of our paper is to implement Leibniz's analysis of the conditional right in the framework of a dialogical approach to Public Announcement Logic. According to our view, on one hand: PAL furnishes a dynamic epistemic operator which models communication exchange between different agents that seems to be very close to Leibniz understanding of the dynamics between the truth of a proposition and the knowledge of the truth of that proposition (Leibniz calls the latter certification of its truth); (...) on the other hand, the dialogical approach provides a semantics for the dynamic epistemic operator in the context of conditional right by means of which: (i) the exchange between agents leading to a public announcement amounts to the (contractual) interaction of commitments of both the benefactor and the beneficiary of a conditional right (ii) the notion of certification is understood as an action, namely as a move where the beneficiary asks the benefactor to stand to his commitments, (iii) some restrictions specific to the logical nature of the head and the tail of the conditional right can be implemented by combining PAL with some features of linear logic within the same theory of meaning. (shrink)

This is the first, and indeed the definitive systematic account of the wide-ranging philosophical ideas of Leibniz. The author, a highly respected analytical philosopher, has brought his own formidable abilities to bear on the unwieldy and inaccessible corpus of Leibniz's work.