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Leibniz on Intra-Substantial Causation and Change Davis White Kuykendall Jr

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Leibniz on Intra-Substantial Causation and Change Davis White Kuykendall Jr Purdue University Purdue e-Pubs Open Access Dissertations Theses and Dissertations 8-2016 Leibniz on intra-substantial causation and change Davis White Kuykendall Jr. Purdue University Follow this and additional works at: https://docs.lib.purdue.edu/open_access_dissertations Part of the Philosophy Commons Recommended Citation Kuykendall, Davis White Jr., "Leibniz on intra-substantial causation and change" (2016). Open Access Dissertations. 790. https://docs.lib.purdue.edu/open_access_dissertations/790 This document has been made available through Purdue e-Pubs, a service of the Purdue University Libraries. Please contact [email protected] for additional information. Graduate School Form 30 Updated 12/26/2015 PURDUE UNIVERSITY GRADUATE SCHOOL Thesis/Dissertation Acceptance This is to certify that the thesis/dissertation prepared By Davis White Kuykendall Entitled Leibniz on Intra-Substantial Causation and Change For the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Is approved by the final examining committee: Jan Cover Chair Jeffrey Brower Michael Jacovides Dan Frank To the best of my knowledge and as understood by the student in the Thesis/Dissertation Agreement, Publication Delay, and Certification Disclaimer (Graduate School Form 32), this thesis/dissertation adheres to the provisions of Purdue University’s “Policy of Integrity in Research” and the use of copyright material. Approved by Major Professor(s): Jan Cover Approved by: Matthias Steup 28 June 2016 Head of the Departmental Graduate Program Date i LEIBNIZ ON INTRA-SUBSTANTIAL CAUSATION AND CHANGE A Dissertation Submitted to the Faculty of Purdue University by Davis White Kuykendall Jr. In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy August 2016 Purdue University West Lafayette, Indiana ii For Lauren. iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would first of all like to thank my dissertation director Jan Cover. This dissertation would be non-actual were it not for the many dozens of hours in the summer of 2012 he spent patiently brainstorming with me in his office. I always left his office with a stack of books to read, a word of encouragement, and a spot in his calendar to meet again. I also would like to thank committee members Jeff Brower and Mike Jacovides for their guidance. During many seminars they taught, works of theirs I read, and one-on- guidance they gave me during my graduate studies, I learned a lot about how to approach the history of philosophy. I would also like to thank my fourth reader, Dan Frank, for his encouragement and feedback during the last stages of my project. I would like to thank my parents for their encouragement at every stage of my graduate studies. Lastly, I would like to thank my wife, Lauren Kuykendall. I met her at Purdue in my first year of graduate studies and I don’t want to imagine what the remaining five would have been like without her. iv TABLE OF CONTENTS Page ABBREVIATIONS ........................................................................................................... vi ABSTRACT ...................................................................................................................... ix CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION................................................................................. 1 1. Efficient Causation and Change.............................................................................. 2 2. Leibniz on Efficient Causation and Change ........................................................... 6 3. Dissertation Roadmap............................................................................................. 9 4. The Idealistic Interpretation of Leibniz ................................................................ 18 5. Methodological Approaches ................................................................................. 23 CHAPTER TWO: LEIBNIZ’S TRANSFERENCE ARGUMENT AGAINST CREATURELY TRANSEUNT CAUSATION, PART 1: THE TRANSFERENCE CONDITION .................................................................................................................... 27 1. The Transference Condition ................................................................................. 29 2. Leibniz’s Defense of the Transference Condition ................................................ 35 2.1 Philosophers who denied the Transference Condition.................................... 36 2.2 Was Leibniz arguing against a straw man?..................................................... 38 2.3 Divine transeunt causation and transference................................................... 41 2.4 The argument for the Transference Condition................................................ 42 2.5 The argument for the Transference Condition is a Leibnizian Argument...... 57 3. A Weakened Transference Condition................................................................... 65 3.1 The act/potency Distinction and the transference condition........................... 66 3.2 The transference condition and modifications................................................ 69 CHAPTER THREE: LEIBNIZ’S TRANSFERENCE ARGUMENT, PART 2: AGAINST TRANSFERENCE............................................................................................................ 82 1. Leibniz’s Substance-Accident Ontology .............................................................. 83 2. Why nothing in Leibniz’s Ontology can be Transferred ...................................... 86 2.1 Why accidents cannot be transferred .............................................................. 86 2.2 Why substances cannot be transferred............................................................ 96 CHAPTER FOUR: LEIBNIZIAN SIMPLE SUBSTANCES AND THE REALITY OF ACCIDENTS .................................................................................................................. 101 1. Leibniz’s “De Realitate Accidentium” .............................................................. 103 2. Leibniz’s Changing Stance on the Merely-Modal-Reality thesis....................... 112 2.1 Different Types of Realities.......................................................................... 114 2.2 The Arguments of DRA, Absolute-Realities and Limited-Realities ............ 116 2.3 Leibniz’s Mereology and Accidents ............................................................. 118 2.3.1 Shapes not Homogenous with what they Shape ............................... 131 2.3.2 Limitations are not Homogenous with what they Limit ................... 135 v Page 2.3.3 Absolute-Realities and Homogeneity ............................................... 137 CHAPTER FIVE: DETERMINISTIC AND INTELLIGIBLE LEIBNIZIAN SUBSTANCE CAUSATION ......................................................................................... 141 1. Leibniz’s Prima Facie Inconsistent Views on the Efficient Cause of Accidents 144 1.1 Creaturely Spontaneity.................................................................................. 144 1.2 The Efficacious-Substance Interpretation..................................................... 145 1.3 The Efficacious-Accident Interpretation....................................................... 146 1.4 Why not both Efficacious-substance and Efficacious-Accidents ................. 149 1.5 Against the Efficacious-Perception Interpretation........................................ 152 2. The Argument for the Efficacious-Appetition Interpretation ............................. 154 2.1 Rutherford on the Efficacious-substance Interpretation, Determinism and Intelligibility ....................................................................................................... 155 2.2 Why the Law-of-the-Series does not help the Efficacious-Substance Interpretation....................................................................................................... 157 2.3 Rutherford on the Efficacious-Appetitions, Determinism, and Intelligibility ............................................................................................................................. 159 3. Leibnizian Substance Causation ....................................................................... 162 3.1 Suarez on the Efficient Principle Cause Quod and Quo............................... 163 3.2 Why the distinction applies to Leibniz ......................................................... 165 3.2.1 Appetitions are powers .............................................................................. 165 3.2.2 Substances and Appetitions are Principles of Change............................... 166 3.2.3 Substances are Principle Quod Causes and the Appetitions are Principle Quo Causes ........................................................................................................ 168 3.3 The Efficacious-Substance Interpretation and Determinism, Intelligibility, and PSR........................................................................................................ 172 3.3.1 Scholastic Substance Causation and Determinism ................................... 173 3.3.2 Deterministic Leibnizian Substance Causation ........................................ 178 3.3.3 The necessity involved in Leibnizian Substance Causation ..................... 181 APPENDICES Appendix A. Leibniz’s Missing Overdetermination Premise........................................ 184 Appendix B. Leibniz on Transubstantiation .................................................................. 201 Appendix C. Translation of “De Realitate Accidentium” ............................................ 209
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