Abstract

The first chapter of this three-part dissertation deals with the Leibnizian conception of a 'possible world'. Discussing, among others, the notions of substance, compossibility, representation and relations, it outlines an abstract Leibnizian cosmology--an account of possible worlds in which questions concerning existence are not raised. It is argued that Leibniz regards each possible world as a set of possible individual substances , and that the structure consisting of all possible worlds is the basic Leibnizian ontology. ;The second chapter presents Leibniz's major modal views, concerning essence, contingency, necessity and so on, and shows to what extent the cosmology of chapter I can serve as a model structure for the interpretation of Leibniz's modal notions. It is suggested that Leibniz's metaphysical views of existence and its modes are not representable in terms of his possible worlds structure. ;In the third and final chapter, I further investigate and assess the significance of the limited applicability of the Leibnizian possible worlds structure, noted in chapter II. Reacting against several other writers on Leibniz, I claim that the structure was intended semantically, that it was not, however, intended to apply to existence and its modes and therefore not to God--the unique necessary existent. Lastly, I defend the implicit Leibnizian semantics of de re modality against the charge that it cannot provide an intuitively acceptable account of unrealized potentialities