The subtle distinctions and individual explanations we pile up in an attempt to retain in philosophy the empirical notion of ‘Body’ are simply patches sewn into a worn-out fabric. The very basis of our speculations about matter is defective. We must understand bodies in some other way than that we have hitherto accepted. The problem is how.
My own body is not these cells or those cells that belong exclusively to me: it is what, in these cells and in the rest of the world feels my influence and reacts against me. My matter is not a part of the universe that I possess totaliter: it is the totality of the Universe possessed by me partialiter.
The limited, tangible fragments that in common usage we call monads, molecules, bodies, are not complete beings. They are only the nucleus of such beings, their organisational centre. In each case, the real extension of these bodies coincides with the full dimensions of the universe.