Leibniz’s Principle of Sufficient Reason from Monadology

Leibniz’s Principle of Sufficient Reason from Monadology

What is reasoning? How can a person use reasoning in their daily life? Could a person use sufficient reasoning? What are some interpretations of Leibniz’ Principle of Sufficient Reasoning? Leibniz came up with a principle for that, which Leibniz called it the “Principle of Sufficient Reason.” Leibniz introduced the Principle of Sufficient Reason from his Monadology. Leibniz went and defined the principle and went on and explained the principle. What I am going to do is to break down the Principle of Sufficient Reason and I will try to explain what Leibniz meant by his Principle.

What is the definition of the principle of sufficient reason? The Principle of Sufficient Reason (PSR): For any true proposition p, there is “a sufficient reason why it thus and not otherwise (32).” With this, Leibniz can state that the world we live in is the best possible world and that God exist. How is our world the best possible world and how does God exist? Our world could be a lot worse off then what it currently is. Every country could be a dictatorship; every country could have a communist government running it. And why would God create anything other than the best possible world for us to live in?

Here are some interpretations of the Principle of Sufficient Reason:

(i) Every event occurs for some purpose.
(ii) Every event has a cause.
(iii) For every state of affairs, there is an explanation of why that state of affairs either is the cause or is not the case.

About the first interpretation, which states “every event occurs for some purpose.” This interpretation is pretty self-explanatory, but pretty much that everything that happens, was supposed to happen. Like if the Worlds Heavyweight Wrestling Champion Ric Flair defended his championship against his number one contender, Hulk Hogan. There must be a winner and someone will walk out as the Worlds Champ. Ric Flair will walk out the match victorious and still be the Worlds Heavyweight Champion (or lose by disqualification or count out, which would lead to a re-match, but he will, still, walk out as Worlds Heavyweight Champ) or if Hulk Hogan would defeat Ric Flair and walk out as the Worlds Heavyweight Champion. The second interpretation states “every event has a cause.” The second interpretation means that everything that happens has a reason behind it on why it happened. Like if Hulk Hogan defeating Ric Flair for the Worlds Heavyweight Wrestling Championship by pin fall or submission. Hogan defeated Flair within the rules of a title change, which is why he won the Worlds Heavyweight title off of Flair. The third interpretation states “for every state of affairs, there is an explanation of why that state of affairs either is the cause or is not the case.” The state of affairs is the cause of the event that just happened. If the state of affairs didn’t happen, that means the result of which wouldn’t of happened. Why else would the result happen if the state of affairs didn’t happen? Good question. To explain the third interpretation in other words, if Ric Flair defended his Worlds Heavyweight Wrestling Championship, and he lost his Worlds Heavyweight Championship, to say, Hulk Hogan, that means Hulk Hogan either pinned or made Ric Flair submit. So Hulk Hogan became the new Worlds Heavyweight Champion off of the state of affairs that he pinned or made Ric Flair submit. But if Hogan didn’t pin or made him submit, that would mean that Flair would still be the Worlds Heavyweight Champion. From the interpretations of the principle, let’s get into why Leibniz holds this view.

The reason why Leibniz holds the view of Sufficient Reason, in my opinion, is because we can apply it to a couple of different truths. We imply it to the truths of reasoning and truths of fact. “The truths of reasoning are necessary and their opposite is impossible; the truths of fact are contingent, and their opposite is possible (33).” When the truths of reasoning are necessary and their opposites are impossible means that if ‘A’ happens, not ‘A’ can’t happen. In other words, Ric Flair can’t be the Worlds Heavyweight Wrestling Champion and not be the Worlds Heavyweight Wrestling Champion. He only can be the Champ, or not be the Champ. Then for truths of fact, they’re contingent and their opposites could still happen. If Ric Flair is the Worlds Heavyweight Wrestling Champion, he could lose the match and still be the Champ. Ric Flair can only lose the championship by pin fall or submission, and he could get himself disqualified or counted out to keep the championship. So he lost the match, but didn’t lose the championship to his number one contender. That’s a truth of fact. Back to why I think Leibniz holds these principles as true. Well, for the truths of reasoning and truths of fact, to me, it just makes sense. I think that’s why Leibniz holds the principle as true as well. Now to the interpretations of the Sufficient Reason, every event does occur for a purpose, for good and evil. People get good grades because they studied hard and took many hours studying for their classes, and people get bad grades because they didn’t care enough to take time and study for that class. What about every event has a cause? If you do good, good will come back to you. It’s Karma. It’s just that easy. Then to there’s an explanation of why a state of affairs is either the case or not the case. It’s just as easy as its Saturday or it’s not Saturday. It’s the case that it’s Saturday, or it’s the case that it isn’t Saturday anymore. But all-in-all, I believe Leibniz holds the Principle of Sufficient Reason because it makes sense and you really can’t argue against it.

Leibniz goes on with this principle as a part of an argument for the existence of God. I’ve explained the Principle so far with Ric Flair as Worlds Heavyweight Wrestling Champion and having Hulk Hogan as his number one contender. I’ve used the Flair-Hogan-Worlds Championship example over the argument of God because not everyone believes in God, and we can easily prove who the Worlds Heavyweight Wrestling Champion is, and currently, neither Ric Flair or Hulk Hogan are the Worlds Champ, because Flair is currently retired and Hogan doesn’t compete actively. I could have used two current professional wrestlers, but Hogan is most well known professional wrestler around the world and Ric Flair is arguable the greatest professional wrestler, ever. How I implied the Principle of Sufficient Reason to the Worlds Heavyweight Wrestling Championship, you can easily take that out and put in God into the argument. With me using the Worlds Championship example, in my eyes, proves that the Principle of Sufficient Reason as true. So if we change out the Worlds Championship example and put in God, why wouldn’t the argument still be true?

To conclude Leibniz’s Principle of Sufficient Reason, I would have to agree with the principle because of what Leibniz said on “the truths of reasoning are necessary and their opposite is impossible; the truths of fact are contingent, and their opposite is possible (33).” After looking into the interpretations and into the truths of this principle, I can’t formulate any argument that is strong enough to go against it. With Leibniz’s interpretations of his principle, which was every event occurs for some purpose, every event has a cause, and for every state of affairs, there is an explanation of why that state of affairs either is the cause or is not the case. We can also imply the principle to two different truths. We imply it to the truths of reasoning and truths of fact. “The truths of reasoning are necessary and their opposite is impossible; the truths of fact are contingent, and their opposite is possible (33).” As a result, the Principle of Sufficient Reasoning that Leibniz has presented as an existence of God, and hopefully using the argument towards the existence of something else, you can imply that God does exist with this principle.