Democritus

Lore & Background

According to Aristotle, Democritus was born in Abdera, on the coast of Thrace. He was a polymath and prolific writer, producing nearly eighty treatises on subjects such as poetry, harmony, military tactics, and Babylonian theology. His birth year was fixed by Apollodorus in the first year of the 80th Olympiad, or 460 BC, while Thrasyllus had referred it to as the 3rd year of the 77th Olympiad. Democritus had called himself forty years younger than Anaxagoras. His father, Hegesistratus—or as others called him Damasippus or Athenocritus—was possessed of so large a property, that he was able to receive and treat Xerxes on his march through Abdera. Democritus spent the inheritance left to him by his father on travels to distant countries, which he undertook to satisfy his extraordinary thirst for knowledge. He traveled over a great part of Asia, and, as some state, he even reached India and Aethiopia. He must also have visited Egypt, and Diodorus Siculus even states, that he lived there for a period of five years. He himself declared, that among his contemporaries none had made greater journeys, seen more countries, and made the acquaintance of more men distinguished in every kind of science than himself. Among the last he mentions in particular the Egyptian mathematicians. Theophrastus, too, spoke of him as a man who had seen many countries. In Greece itself, he endeavored by means of traveling and residing in the principal cities to acquire a knowledge of Hellenic culture and civilization. He mentioned many Greek philosophers in his writings, and his wealth enabled him to purchase the works they had written. He thus succeeded in excelling, in the extent of his knowledge, all the earlier Greek philosophers, among whom Leucippus, the founder of the atomistic theory, is said to have exercised the greatest influence upon his philosophical studies. The account of his hostility towards Anaxagoras is contradicted by several passages in which he speaks of him in terms of high praise. It is further said, that he was on terms of friendship with Hippocrates, and some writers even speak of a correspondence between Democritus and Hippocrates; but this statement does not seem to be deserving of credit. As he was a contemporary of Plato, it may be that he was acquainted with Socrates, perhaps even with Plato, who, however, does not mention Democritus anywhere. Aristotle desc

Reader's Guide

Democritus wrote on ethics as well as physics. Democritus was a student of Leucippus. Early sources such as Aristotle and Theophrastus credit Leucippus with creating atomism and sharing its ideas with Democritus, but later sources credit only Democritus, making it hard to distinguish their individual contributions. It was Democritus who, in his numerous writings, carried out Leucippus's theory of atoms, and especially in his observations on nature. These atomists undertook the task of proving that the quantitative relations of matter were its original characteristics, and that its qualitative relations were something secondary and derivative, and of thus doing away with the distinction between matter and mind or power. In order to avoid the difficulties connected with the supposition of primitive matter with definite qualities, without admitting the coming into existence and annihilation as realities, and without giving up, as the Eleatic philosophers did, the reality of variety and its changes, the atomists derived all definiteness of phaenomena, both physical and mental, from elementary particles, the infinite number of which were homogeneous in quality, but heterogeneous in form. This made it necessary for them to establish the reality of a vacuum or space, and of motion. Motion, they said, is the eternal and necessary consequence of the original variety of atoms in the vacuum or space. All phaenomena arise from the infinite variety of the form, order, and position of the atoms in forming combinations. It is impossible, they add, to derive this supposition from any higher principle, for a beginning of the infinite is inconceivable. The atoms are impenetrable, and therefore offer resistance to one another. This creates a swinging, world-producing, and whirling motion. Now as similars attract one another, there arise in that motion real things and beings, that is, combinations of distinct atoms, which still continue to be separated from one another by the vacuum. The first cause of all existence is necessity, that is, the necessary predestination and necessary succession of cause and effect. This they called chance, in opposition to the νοῦς of Anaxagoras. But it does the highest honour to the mind of Democritus, that he made the discovery of causes the highest object of scientific investigations. He once said, that he preferred the discovery of a true caus

Did You Know?

• Democritus was known in antiquity as the 'laughing philosopher' because of his emphasis on the value of cheerfulness.
• He traveled over a great part of Asia, and as some state, he even reached India and Aethiopia.
• He once said that he preferred the discovery of a true cause to the possession of the kingdom of Persia.
• Ancient accounts claim he lived to be over a hundred years old, with some saying he was 109.

Notable Quotes (Wikiquote)

"Often paraphrased as "Nothing exists except atoms and empty space; everything else is opinion." — Democritus "Sweet exists by convention, bitter by convention, colour by convention; atoms and Void [alone] exist in reality. (trans. Freeman 1948), p. 92." — Democritus "We know nothing accurately in reality, but [only] as it changes according to the bodily condition, and the constitution of those things that flow upon [the body] and impinge upon it." — Democritus "Medicine heals diseases of the body, wisdom frees the soul from passions." — Democritus