Talk:Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz

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This article is or was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment. Further details are available on the course page. Peer reviewers: Caleb Jeffreys.

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"Secondary literature" moved from article to talk page

Secondary literature

Modern biographies in English are Aiton (1985) and Antognazza (2008). An 1845 English biography by John M. Mackie is available on Google Books. A lively short account of Leibniz’s life, one also taking a critical approach to his philosophy, is Mates (1986: 14–35), who cites the German biographies extensively. Also see MacDonald Ross (1984: chpt. 1), the chapter by Ariew in Jolley (1995), and Jolley (2005: chpt. 1). For a biographical glossary of Leibniz's intellectual contemporaries, see Leibniz, Philosophical Essays. Translated and edited by Roger Ariew and Dan Garber. Indianapolis: Hackett, 1989, pp. 350-357.

For a first introduction to Leibniz's thought, see the Introduction of any anthology of his writings in English translation, e.g., Wiener (1951), Loemker (1969a), Woolhouse and Francks (1998). Then turn to the monographs MacDonald Ross (1984), and Jolley (2005). For an introduction to Leibniz's metaphysics, see the chapters by Mercer, Rutherford, and Sleigh in Jolley (1995); see Mercer (2001) for an advanced study. For an introduction to those aspects of Leibniz's thought of most value to the philosophy of logic and of language, see Jolley (1995, chpts. 7, 8); Mates (1986) is more advanced. MacRae (Jolley 1995: chpt. 6) discusses Leibniz's theory of knowledge. For glossaries of the philosophical terminology recurring in Leibniz's writings and the secondary literature, see Woolhouse and Francks (1998: 285–93) and Jolley (2005: 223–29).

Introductory:

• Jolley, Nicholas, 2005. Leibniz. Routledge.
• MacDonald Ross, George, 1984. Leibniz. Oxford Univ. Press.
• W. W. Rouse Ball, 1908. A Short Account of the History of Mathematics, 4th ed. (see Discussion)

Intermediate:

• Aiton, Eric J., 1985. Leibniz: A Biography. Hilger (UK).
• Antognazza, Maria Rosa, 2008. Leibniz: An Intellectual Biography. Cambridge Univ. Press.
• Brown, Gregory, 2004, "Leibniz's Endgame and the Ladies of the Courts," Journal of the History of Ideas 65: 75–100.
• Hall, A. R., 1980. Philosophers at War: The Quarrel between Newton and Leibniz. Cambridge Univ. Press.
• Hostler, J., 1975. Leibniz's Moral Philosophy. UK: Duckworth.
• Jolley, Nicholas, ed., 1995. The Cambridge Companion to Leibniz. Cambridge Univ. Press.
• LeClerc, Ivor, ed., 1973. The Philosophy of Leibniz and the Modern World. Vanderbilt Univ. Press.
• Loemker, Leroy, 1969a, "Introduction" to his Leibniz: Philosophical Papers and Letters. Reidel: 1–62.
• Luchte, James, 2006, 'Mathesis and Analysis: Finitude and the Infinite in the Monadology of Leibniz,' London: Heythrop Journal.
• Arthur O. Lovejoy, 1957 (1936). "Plenitude and Sufficient Reason in Leibniz and Spinoza" in his The Great Chain of Being. Harvard Uni. Press: 144–82. Reprinted in Frankfurt, H. G., ed., 1972. Leibniz: A Collection of Critical Essays. Anchor Books.
• MacDonald Ross, George, 1999, "Leibniz and Sophie-Charlotte" in Herz, S., Vogtherr, C.M., Windt, F., eds., Sophie Charlotte und ihr Schloß. München: Prestel: 95–105. English translation.
• Perkins, Franklin, 2004. Leibniz and China: A Commerce of Light. Cambridge Univ. Press.
• Riley, Patrick, 1996. Leibniz's Universal Jurisprudence: Justice as the Charity of the Wise. Harvard Univ. Press.
• Strickland, Lloyd, 2006. Leibniz Reinterpreted. Continuum: London and New York

Advanced

• Adams, Robert M., 1994. Leibniz: Determinist, Theist, Idealist. Oxford Uni. Press.
• Bueno, Gustavo, 1981. Introducción a la Monadología de Leibniz. Oviedo: Pentalfa.
• Louis Couturat, 1901. La Logique de Leibniz. Paris: Felix Alcan. Donald Rutherford's English translation in progress.
• Ishiguro, Hide, 1990 (1972). Leibniz's Philosophy of Logic and Language. Cambridge Univ. Press.
• Lenzen, Wolfgang, 2004. "Leibniz's Logic," in Gabbay, D., and Woods, J., eds., Handbook of the History of Logic, Vol. 3. North Holland: 1–84.
• Mates, Benson, 1986. The Philosophy of Leibniz: Metaphysics and Language. Oxford Univ. Press.
• Mercer, Christia, 2001. Leibniz's metaphysics: Its Origins and Development. Cambridge Univ. Press.
• Robinet, André, 2000. Architectonique disjonctive, automates systémiques et idéalité transcendantale dans l'oeuvre de G.W. Leibniz: Nombreux textes inédits. Vrin
• Rutherford, Donald, 1998. Leibniz and the Rational Order of Nature. Cambridge Univ. Press.
• Wilson, Catherine, 1989. Leibniz's Metaphysics. Princeton Univ. Press.
• Woolhouse, R. S., ed., 1993. G. W. Leibniz: Critical Assessments, 4 vols. Routledge. A remarkable one-stop collection of many valuable articles.

Online bibliography by Gregory Brown.

[end] [more from 'Collections' subsection]

• Ariew, R; Garber, D (1989), Leibniz: Philosophical Essays, Hackett {{citation}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |Authorlink1= (help)
• Bennett, Jonathan. Various texts.
• Cook, Daniel, and Rosemont, Henry Jr., 1994. Leibniz: Writings on China. Open Court.
• Dascal, Marcelo, 1987. Leibniz: Language, Signs and Thought. John Benjamins.
• Loemker, Leroy (1969), Leibniz: Philosophical Papers and Letters, Reidel {{citation}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |Authorlink= (help)
• Martin, R.N.D., and Brown, Stuart, 1988. Discourse on Metaphysics and Related Writings. St. Martin's Press.
• Parkinson, G.H.R., 1966. Leibniz: Logical Papers. Oxford Uni. Press.
• ———, and Morris, Mary, 1973. 'Leibniz: Philosophical Writings. London: J M Dent & Sons.
• Riley, Patrick, 1988 (1972). Leibniz: Political Writings. Cambridge Uni. Press.
• Strickland, Lloyd, 2006. Shorter Leibniz Texts. Continuum Books. Online.
• Wiener, Philip (1951), Leibniz: Selections, Scribner {{citation}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |Place= (help) Regrettably out of print and lacks index.
• Woolhouse, R.S., and Francks, R., 1998. Leibniz: Philosophical Texts. Oxford Uni. Press.

[end]

Boolean Algebra nonsensical mention

At one point in the article it says "Leibniz's discoveries of Boolean algebra and of symbolic logic, also relevant to mathematics, are discussed in the preceding section.", however this line is the only mention of Boolean Algebra in the article, so it seems this must be referencing a part of the article that has since been removed, which shouldn't be done without removing other parts of the article referencing it. Moreover, the article on Boolean algebra itself says it was invented by (and named after) someone who lived many years later, thus though of course mathematical discoveries often incorporate and require earlier mathematical discoveries, based on a little research I don't think this statement could be considered accurate in saying he discovered Boolean algebra.--68.92.95.26 (talk) 06:49, 16 April 2019 (UTC)

Language

Let's knock any 'EngVar' shenanigans on the head right away, shall we? The Manual of Style, as I understand it, makes it clear that the subject's national ties and own language set the course. Aside from English-English being one of the many languages employed in correspondence between Leibniz and Newton's respective camps, Leibniz himself was pretty much unquestionably German - or at least would have been, if he'd lived long enough to see Germany form. Germany, as is common knowledge, is one of the central members of the European Union, which itself employs several official languages, one of which is English. Since 'Brexit' the English in question is technically Irish-English so, curiously enough 'British English' doesn't get a slice of the action. But whichever way you cut the cake, it's hard to conceive of any justification for an article about this most European of men being written in American English, any more than one would envisage employing Shakespearean spellings to write about Carl Sagan. None of which, of course, in any way precludes the many welcome contributions to the article from across the Atlantic. ByzantiumLives (talk) 11:55, 23 July 2020 (UTC)

There are two guidelines: MOS:TIES and MOS:RETAIN. The former does not apply, as Leibniz was German (the European Union is an anachronism in this context), but the latter does. It's there precisely to avoid edit-warring between speakers of the various flavors of English. I shall therefore revert to the previous, U.S. English version of many years' standing. Favonian (talk) 12:04, 23 July 2020 (UTC)

I'm going to (politely, I hope) disagree there. The European Union is far from an anachronism in this context, as it is the result of Enlightenment thought which Leibniz had a part in (legally he actually wasn't German as died 154 years too early, although he spoke German). Edit-warring, I suspect, results from editors who do not stop and consider different perspectives before reverting to their respective comfort zones, so I'm going to resist the temptation to undo further changes for a day or two and encourage you to do the same. While you're mulling that over, you might enjoy having a trawl through some of Leibniz's correspondence, as he occasionally wrote in English himself - and, given his location in both time and space, it certainly wasn't in the American variant. As it happens, his monarch, as Elector of Hannover, also happened to be the actual King of England, so with that and the subject's own choice of English variant MOS:TIES most certainly does apply. As I speak/write in either variant myself, I don't have a personal hobby-horse to ride here - I would genuinely challenge a page about a US subject written in 'British' English - but I think you're going to have to reconsider there.ByzantiumLives (talk) 13:33, 23 July 2020 (UTC)

Variant spelling Leibnitz is common and should be mentioned

It's fine that the article prefers Leibniz, but the alternate spelling Leibnitz is very common and should be mentioned to alleviate confusion. It even appears with the T in images and citations in this very article. Can't quite figure out an elegant place to put it in the lead, but I think it deserves to contain at least a (Leibnitz) somewhere. - Rainwarrior (talk) 01:40, 22 February 2021 (UTC)