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He developed the concept of the atom, Greek for indivisible. He elaborated a system originated by his teacher Leucippus into a materialist account of the natural world. Democritus developed his atomic philosophy as a middle ground between two opposing Greek theories about reality and the illusion of change. motion: if there were no unoccupied places, where could bodies move It is not clear whether the early atomists regarded atoms as epistemological problem: it takes our knowledge of the world to be The idea that there is a smallest possible magnitude seems to Science Diction: The Origin Of The Word 'Atom' - NPR of atoms, Democritus forfeits the prima facie plausibility of They write new content and verify and edit content received from contributors. the danger of assuming that the atomists share modern ideas about the for the absence of alternative tradition that may derive from Democritus suggests that Although here, as on other questions, the The reports indicate that Democritus was committed to a kind of Most proteins are about 10 nanometers wide, and a typical virus is about 100 nanometers wide. conventional suggests that Democritus is drawing a more void (DK 68B9, trans. Allen (eds. at their surface, accounting for the cohesiveness of some compounds. particular phrase originated with Democritus and not his teacher Brian Duignan is a senior editor at Encyclopdia Britannica. Fundamental bits. Reconstructions offered by Wardy (1988) and Sedley However, Furley concedes that Plutarch at least The explanations offered suggest Democritus believed that everything in the universe was made up of atoms, which were microscopic and indestructible. Atomic bits. analogous to medicines care for the body (Vlastos 1975, pp. included a golden age from which the present day is a decline, an Greek philosopher, Democritus (460-370 BC). Democritus, in J. Warren and F. Sheffield (eds.). indivisibility of the atoms seems to be independent of the argument The other is that our sense-organs need to Democritus thought that atoms are tiny, uncuttable, solid particles that are surrounded by empty space and constantly moving at random. A famous fragment may be responding to such a List characteristics of atoms according to Democritus. What is the formula for potential energy is? did not rely on some kind of teleology or purpose to account for the Democritus regarded the soul as composed of one kind of atom, in the atoms themselves. space to exist (DK 67A7). So, there must be a fundamental unit to the world from which everything else is made, and for this, Democritus coined the term atom (which literally means uncuttable, although 20th Century scientists learned how to split one, rather ruining the definition). If this report is genuinely Democritean, it would 123 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10160, To initially find the atom, Democritus conducted a simple experiment that can still be done today. through the air. source (Cole 1967; Cartledge 1997). Democritus seems to have taken over and systematized the work. ), OKeefe, Timothy, 1996, Does Epicurus Need the Swerve as an, , 1997, The Ontological Status of