Biography of Leibniz

To view this lecture, it is necessary to log in to the site to view this lecture, you need to log in on the site 0 0 8. My name is Artem Petrovich Besedin, and this is an additional lecture on the course “History of the New Age Philosophy”. It is dedicated to the biography and works of Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz. This is a German philosopher, although in German he did not write a single philosophical work.

The fact is that in that era, the German language was not yet distributed as the language of literature, science and philosophy, and even with its compatriots, Leibniz, as a rule, corresponded either in French or in Latin. Therefore, the main works of Leibniz are written in these languages ​​- Latin and French - there are fragments in English, but he did not use the German language as a worker.

This fact is the more amazing that less than a hundred years after the death of Leibniz, it was difficult to imagine a philosophy in some other language except German. Leibniz was born on July 1. Already in the year he entered the University of Leipzig. Leibniz studied at the Faculty of Law, but also studied philosophy in his university years. He also studied at the University of Jena, where he left for one semester.

He graduated from the University of Altdorf, not far from Nuremberg. Leibniz became a lawyer, and his earliest published works were devoted to jurisprudence. At the same time, in the year he publishes the dissertation “On combinatorial art”, from the earliest years he was also interested in mathematics. In the year, Leibniz enters the service of the Mainz Elector. He was noticed by the Minister of this Elector in Altdorf and recommended for service.

Leibniz performed different tasks, but his main work was the diplomatic service, that is, he could say, he worked in his specialty after graduation, he also dealt with some legal issues. Thanks to the connection with the diplomatic service of Leibniz in the year, he went to Paris - the Center for European Culture and Philosophy. Already in the university years, he was interested in a new philosophy, but he had no good access to the latest books in German universities.

The universities themselves were arranged quite traditionally, in fact, Leibniz got acquainted with the scholastic or Aristotelian philosophy, maybe the authors of the Renaissance were available to him. Of modern philosophers, he definitely met Bacon, Galilee, Gassendi. But his real acquaintance with the philosophy of Descartes and other thinkers of the era that we considered in this course occurred after he came to Paris.

Leibniz was a very active young man. If you call a spade a spade, then a brilliant young man. In Paris, he immediately got acquainted with everyone whom he had to meet. Especially important for him was the acquaintance with Huygens. This had a decisive influence on the development of Leibniz as a mathematics. But including he met with Antoine Arno, with whom he later had a correspondence.

In Paris, Leibniz tried in every possible way to get literature on the latest philosophy. Including a copy of the "ethics" of Spinoza. At that time, Ethics was not yet published, it existed only in the form of manuscripts that spread through proxies, and an accidental person could not get a copy of it. Leibniz just could not get a manuscript for himself, although he possessed this manuscript was his compatriot, also a German nobleman.

Leibniz made copies of some papers of Descartes, including, for example, the "Rules for the Guide of the Mind." This turned out to be very useful, because subsequently part of the Cartesian papers was lost, and a copy of the “Rules for the Guide of the Mind”, which Leibniz made, is one of the sources for publishing this work at the present time. Leibniz at that time wrote letters to Hobbes.

He expressed not quite polite surprise and admiration for the fact that Hobbes, who was already eighty at that time, was still alive, and admiration for the philosophy of this great man.

Leibniz was an amazingly susceptible philosopher and always took a very conciliatory position in relation to the opposing views. In his philosophy, he tried to combine inconsistent things. And Hobbes, a philosopher, whom by the end of the 17th century they tried to literally exclude from the galaxy of European philosophers, whose name turned almost into a curse, almost into a synonym for an atheist, was a very important figure for Leibniz, he borrowed a lot from him for his philosophy.

Another aspect of reconciliation in the character of Leibniz was his attempts to reconcile Protestantism and Catholicism. Needless to say, this kind of undertakings, as a rule, do not find understanding from any side! Because of this, he earned a wary attitude both from the Protestants and he, being a German, was a Protestant, and from the Catholics. So, it was precisely the period of stay of Leibniz in Paris that had a decisive influence on his intellectual formation, the formation of as a philosopher and a scientist.Over the years, Leibniz also managed, in connection with his diplomatic work, to go to London.

There he met the secretary of the London Royal Society of Henry Oldenburg and was even elected a member of this society. However, in the year he was forced to leave Paris. The fact is that his employer died, the need for the service disappeared, Leibniz had to look for some new place. On the way from Paris to the German lands, Leibniz stops in the Hague, where he visits Spinoza.

Leibniz's notes have been preserved regarding what they were talking about. Including Leibniz, for example, discussed with Spinoza his evidence of the existence of God. In the end, Leibniz gets to the service of Hanoverian Elector, where it remains until his death in the year. With the years, Leibniz works there. During these forty years, several rulers of Hanover have changed, and Leibniz served in all of them.

During the time, while Leibniz worked in Hanover, he proved himself as a universal genius. This definition - “universal genius” - is suitable for Leibniz as well as possible. Probably, no one in the history of European philosophy can be compared with Leibnis in the vastness of his interests and horizons. Of course, we know Leibniz as a philosopher and are now considering in this capacity.

We know him as mathematics, physics, engineer. And, probably, to the least degree we know Leibniz as a historian, philologist, geologist. In general, no matter what science we took, if then, in principle, it existed, most likely, Leibniz in it was noted, up to the point that he was interested in Chinese culture and Chinese philosophy. It is known that he talked with the Jesuits who were in China to the missionaries, and received from them a copy of the Book of Changes.

In it, he discovered the famous hexagrams, and thanks to their research, he discovered binary calculus. To say that this person was brilliant is to say nothing. At some point, Leibniz was instructed to write the story of the Braunschweig House. He zealously got down to business. In the year, he went on a trip to Europe in order to collect as many materials as possible.

He traveled throughout Germany, went to Italy, gathered a colossal number of materials, did incredible work, attended abbeys, monasteries, libraries, rummaged in their huge scripts - storage of manuscripts. And his work, the story of the Braunschweig House, was supposed to begin, according to his idea, with a description of the geography and geology of Germany. But how can we talk about geography and geology, if you do not start a conversation about this with the formation of the world, with the principles of the formation of the Earth!

And Leibniz begins its history of the Braunschweig house from this. In fact, he created only the first part, which concerns the natural features of the area that he had to write about. But I must say that these observations themselves are of great value. Leibniz discusses both geology and why the water in the sea is salty, discusses where fossils and other similar issues come from.

It is clear that all this is very distant to the history of the Braunschweig house. I must say that later Leibniz published some of the materials found as simply collections. That is, he did not describe them, but simply published with his introduction. This also applies to his work on this story. In the year, Leibniz first meets with Peter the Great, the first emperor of the Russian Empire, then the king.

As part of the famous Great Embassy, ​​Peter visits Hanover. During their first meeting, Leibniz does not show much interest in Russia and Peter. But later he showed much more attention. The fact is that Leibniz was a theoretician or, one might say, a defender of the academic way of organizing science, that is, the academic in contrast to the university. He saw quite backward institutions at universities, crusaders of scholasticism, but the Academy of the type that had just begun to appear in Europe - the London Royal Society, the Paris Academy of Sciences, the Berlin Academy, which was created by the Leibnis himself in the year - he saw him as some almost ideal scientific communities.

It is interesting that Leibniz is a philosopher who began to actively publish in magazines. Now all employees of scientific educational institutions are required to be published in magazines - including due to what Leibniz did in due time. He believed that the method of disseminating information through scientific journals is progressive and extremely useful for the development of science.

And it was Leibniz in his correspondence, first of all with the courtiers of Peter, he did not directly correspond with Peter, who developed the idea of ​​the Russian Academy of Sciences. Thanks to his suggestions in Russia, it was the Academy, not the university, was created in the first place. One could say that Leibniz showed special attention to Russia. Indeed, in the last years of his life, he began to write a little more about it.

But the problem is that Leibniz showed special attention to everything.If we compare how much attention he paid to some issues related to Russia, then we will not see something outstanding and especially distinguished against the background of other problems. This dispute was extremely unpleasant, simply because, strictly speaking, he did not concern scientific questions, but often represented just an exchange of almost insults.

Leibniz, unfortunately, was in this dispute in a very disadvantage. We can say that he lost in him. I'm not talking about who really was the first to discover the calculus. Probably Newton was the first. But the fact is that such discoveries are not made alone. The contribution to the development of mathematics has made many scientists, and it would be unfair to give everything to Newton in any case, especially Leibniz most likely the first to publish the result, and this is also important.