Philosophy

Leucippus and Democritis: The Atomists Phi/105 8/18/2012 Leucippus and Democritis: The Atomists The Pre-Socratic philosophers I found to be the most compelling is the ideas of Leucippicus and Democritis. These early Greek philosophers are also called the Atomists. The Atomists had two leading ideas which were all things were created of tiny indestructible particles called atoms and the idea of motion needs no explanation. While other early philosophers had many astounding ideas I thought the Atomists were absolutely fascinating. The atomists can be attributed to atomism. Leucippicus for the basic idea and Democritis for working out the details on that basic idea. The atomists believed everything is made up of atoms composed of the exact same matter but there is variation in size, shape, and weight(This may be considered controversial.) They believed atoms are infinite and continuously in motion thus the varying combinations come and go. The combining, disassembly, and re-assembly can be seen within many everyday things such as the generation, decay, erosion, or even the burning of everyday materials. (Moore, B., & Bruder, K. 2011) Sometimes the Atomists were accused of maintaining that chance collision of atoms cause them to come together to form a particular set of objects and not some other set of objects. The Atomists believed the motion of atoms had no real purpose but yet they also believed the atomic particles operated within the strict physical law. (Moore, B., & Bruder, K. 2011) They also held the strong belief things are not left to chance and things do not just happen out of sheer coincidence. While many Greek philosophers thought motion needed a void where the object could change positions. Another Pre-Socratic philosopher gave a highly convincing argument that empty space or void was impossible. (Moore, B., & Bruder, K. 2011) For this reason-empty space is nothing and nothing does not exist. To the atomists, it was apparent to perception that things move and was simply indisputable and because things move and empty space must be real or motion would simply be impossible.( Moore, B., & Bruder, K. 2011) I found the Atomists ideas so compelling because of their intelligence of the time period. There was nothing really to help them in their ideas except their word and the power the persuasion. They lived in between the fourth and fifth century BCE. There were no such things as microscopes or science in general for that matter. The idea that the atom eventually became one of the most common terms regarding the universe. I am absolutely flabbergasted by the idea that two people in Ancient Greek times used as something as simple as common sense to discover the atom and it would take many years for science to finally prove their theory as true. The desire to know the reality that underlies how everything looks and help to provoke the Atomists to want to figure out what constructed the natural world. I think the Atomists ideas regarding the atom may be one of the most influential of the scientific community for the main reason they put a name on a particle that is part of everything that is anything human or otherwise in the entire universe: the atom. . Reference Moore, B., & Bruder, K. (2011). Philosophy: The power of ideas (8th ed.). New York, NY: McGraw Hill.