Kants evoluerende begrip van monaden: een reconstructie in het licht van de vroege receptie van Leibniz' monadologie

Leibniz's monadology has been rightly considered to have greatly impacted the development of eighteenth-century German philosophy up until Kant's Physical Monadology of 1756. Due to Kant's harsh criticism of both Leibnizian and physical monadologies after his 'critical turn,' scholars tend to neglect or marginalize the positive role of monadology in Kant's mature philosophy. I challenge these interpretations by arguing that Kant in his critical works did not completely reject monadology but redefined the nature and function of simple substances. Specifically, my analysis attempts to show that Kant reworked monadic features stemming from Leibniz's monadology in his account of monads qua objects in the idea, to which he assigns a fundamental regulative role. As regards physics, on the other hand, I argue that Kant never rejected Leibniz in favor of Newton, but attempted to combine Newtonian mechanics with a Leibnizian dynamical conception of matter. I support my thesis by (1) providing a comprehensive account of the shift from Kant's physical monadology of the 1740s and 1750s to his reappraisal of monadology in the period spanning from the 1760s to the 1790s, (2) situating this shift within the broader framework of the development of monadologies in the eighteenth century, and (3) exploring how this framework was shaped by the rising modern science of the time. Contrary to readings that emphasized Kant's alleged rejection of the Leibnizian-Wolffian paradigm in his critical philosophy, this dissertation provides new insights into Kant's enduring engagement with Leibnizian metaphysics and physics.