I've been recently looking at the definitions of contingency as offered in his cosmological argument and according to him: " necessary propositions, when the analysis is continued indefinitely, it arrives at an equation that is an identity… But in contingent propositions one continues the analysis to infinity through reasons for reasons, so that one never has a complete demonstration, though there is always, underneath, a reason for the truth, but the reason is understood completely by God, who alone traverses the infinite series in one stroke of mind."
"In other words, a proposition is necessary (or expresses a necessary truth) if, in analyzing it, one arrives at a statement of identities. A simple example can be found in arithmetic: “2+2 = 4.” Since “2 = 1+1” and “4 = 1+1+1+1”, we can easily show that the original statement can be reduced to “1+1+1+1 = 1+1+1+1.” Here we have an obvious case of an identity and one where we can say that the concept of the predicate – in this case, “4” – is contained is contained in the subject, “2+2” (or “(1+1) + (1+1)”)."
I think I understand this with regards to necessity but how does a statement about the actual world such as "The universe entered in it's current state 13.8 billion years ago" according to Leibniz be analysed infinitely and ultimately be contingent?

Last edited by AKG (4/17/2016 6:20 am)