Maria Luiza Lima Seabra

We intend to investigate the role of the cogito in Leibniz’s thought, in light of his critique of Descartes and his conception of the “I think” as a factual truth apprehended through inner sense. Although Leibniz rejects its apodictic and demonstrative value, he acknowledges the cogito as a contingent and sensitive principle, relevant to the empirical constitution of knowledge. This research seeks to clarify to what extent the cogito and the intuition of the varia a me cogitandur can be considered foundational principles for the empirical sciences, and what role memory, temporal continuity, and inner sense play in the constitution of self-consciousness. We also examine the validity of inductive arguments that move from inner to outer sense, as well as the place of sensitive principles within the Scientia Generalis. To this end, the study will focus on analyzing texts in which Leibniz explicitly addresses the cogito—texts that remain largely unexplored in the scholarly literature—and which we also intend to translate