Monadology

Having just finished reading the Monadology by Leibniz, I find it interesting how blatant the will to rationalism errors on the side of irrationality. Leibniz posits such grandiose theories: the infinite mirror present in the folds of every substance, the perfect harmony which is God’s architecture, and the transition from soul to spirit which occurs from matter to man. Many of the conclusions are based on the moral valuation of what must be the perfect legislation of God. The Monad itself, in reading the entire passage, becomes something conscious, infinite, indestructible and continuous with all other monads—while maintaining complete difference from them. “66. Hence it can be seen that in the smallest portion of matter there is a world of creatures, living beings, animals, entelechies, and souls. 67. Thus every portion of matter can be conceived as a garden full of plants or as a pond full of fish. But every branch of the plant, every limb of the animal, every drop of its humors, is again such a garden or such a pond.” Leibniz’s reasoning would have the singularity of the monad infinitely in flux, while maintaining an irreducible mass and ‘appetition’ which makes it possible to perceive without growing dizzy. Thus, he demands his theory into existence, in order to protect the contradiction which is finite perception and the thought of infinity. As a mathematician, he deems finite thought, the algebraic equation, as thinking infinity. This is because within the infinitesimal there is a continuity with all other matter that assures knowledge of all when perceiving one. But this is purely tautological, and it hides the antinomy of Reason which Kant latter jumps upon, in direct argument to Leibniz. It is tautological because perception of the particular does in fact cause the very dizzying sense of infinity which Leibniz claims the perfect harmony of the world prevents. Giving God a priori responsibility for this dialectic thinking eliminates the process of becoming which begins with Kant’s critique of Leibniz and is completed by Hegel’s critique of Kant. (Kant removes certainty in Reason, Hegel gives back Reason’s authority by intuiting that its very contradictions are its becoming.) Leibniz paints the very kind of picture which Hegel condemns in the famous Preface, the monochromatic formalism of the scientist. So that the very rigor of Reason expires in a flat picture, in Leibniz’s case, of undeniable beauty. What would be an interesting departure is to see how Deleuze experiences the monad as the unfolding of relation and experience without holding it hostage to a priori distinctions. The monad itself, which is for Leibniz the logical conclusion of the ¾’s empiricism which is existence for humankind is for Deleuze the whole picture, absent God and value. It is the universal singularity. Not only does Deleuze take this idea from Leibniz, he also takes from him the concepts of activity and reactivity. “49. Creatures are said to act outwardly in so far as they have perfection, and to suffer from other creatures in so far as they are imperfect. Thus activity has to be attributed to the monad in so far as it has distinct perceptions, and passivity in so far as it has confused perceptions.” But for Leibniz this all becomes very confused when he resorts to the perfection of God, and thus he gives God the power of selection, for it is God who knows whether or not one substance should act upon or be acted upon. It is Deleuze via Nietzsche who gives this selection back to man himself, by the process of valuing evaluation, by the affirmation of the eternal return, which is similar to the simple substance of Leibniz which maintains itself outside of nature. Unlike nature, which is constantly generating and dying, we, the monads, are irreducible machines. And this is perfect and harmonious.