In Platonia (according to Leibniz's metaphysics), every explanation is a cause !
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/leibniz-causation/#7 Leibniz's principle (which has it ancestors principally in Stoicism) is this: “Whatever is fundamentally explanatory must be an active principle” (Shapere, 45). The purely passive cannot do anything unless it is acted upon. At times, Leibniz seems to think that only the truly active exists: “we can show from the inner truths of metaphysics that what is not active is nothing, for there is no such thing as a mere potentiality to act without any initial action” (“On the True Method in Philosophy and Theology” W 64 (1686)). If all things that exist are substances, and the essence of substance is activity, then passive “substances” do not truly exist, since they are passive, that is, not active (Shapere, 46). Consider this especially clear passage where Leibniz not only attributes causal efficacy or activity to finite substances, but also causal efficiency or productivity: "Bayle asserts, for instance, that by purely philosophical meditations one can never attain to an established certainty that we are the efficient cause [la cause efficiente] of our volitions. But this is a point which I do not concede to him: for the establishment of this system demonstrates beyond a doubt that in the course of nature each substance is the sole cause of all its actions, and that it is free of all physical influence from every other substance, save the customary cooperation of God. (Theodicy §300) Roger Clough, [email protected] 9/26/2012 "Forever is a long time, especially near the end." -Woody Allen -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected]. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
