Philosopher Profiles

“All hail the monad!”: this was Leibniz’s motto. He thought that the universe was made up of an infinite amount of individual monads (contradicting previous theories that the world was made up of a finite amount of non-individuated gonads).

Largely due to a rather cushy upbringing Leibniz was also convinced that the actual world was the most perfect of all possible worlds. However, it remains largely unknown that Leibniz’s original theory was that the actual world is the seventh most perfect world possible, just behind the five possible worlds made entirely of chocolate and the single possible world in which Isaac Newton did not exist.

Leibniz added a new twist to the Free Will argument against the problem of evil (previously advocated by the scholastics) by arguing that God does not permit physical evil or suffering: he only wills it hypothetically. This came as a great relief to the 80,000 people who died in the Great Hypothetical Lisbon Earthquake of 1755.

Leibniz’s other famous theory is the principle of sufficient reason, which claims that everything must have a reason. However, this was quite recently disproved with the invention of Furbies.

Gottfried Leibniz fun facts:

Leibniz's ground-up bones are a key ingredient in Leibniz-Keks biscuits.

Suggest Correction | Suggest Addition