Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • Greek philosopher who developed one of the first atomist theories of the universe and espoused the doctrine that pleasure, along with self-control, is the goal of human life.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • proper noun A Greek philosopher (c.460-c.370 BC). The originator of the atomic theory together with his teacher Leucippus.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun Greek philosopher who developed an atomistic theory of matter (460-370 BC)

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Ancient Greek Δημόκριτος (Dēmokritos).

Support

Help support Wordnik (and make this page ad-free) by adopting the word Democritus.

Examples

  • Most suggestive of all is the quotation from Thrasyllus preserved by Diogenes Laertius (Diogenes Laertius IX 38), in which Thrasyllus calls Democritus a zealous follower of the Pythagoreans and asserts that Democritus drew all his philosophy from Pythagoras and would have been thought to have been his pupil, if chronology did not prevent it.

    Pythagoreanism Huffman, Carl 2006

  • By contrast, atomists such as Democritus took those determinate particular objects they called ˜atoms™ to be the substance of the universe.

    Substance Robinson, Howard 2004

  • Aristotle accused mechanists such as Democritus and

    BEHAVIORISM R. S. PETERS 1968

  • Atomists such as Democritus and Lucretius argued that all of nature is the result of random bumps and movements of atoms falling in a plenum.

    Baptist Standard 2009

  • "Truth," said Democritus, "is at the bottom of the abyss; and the abyss is bottomless."

    Steve McSwain: Perspectives Of A Former Fundamentalist Christian Steve McSwain 2011

  • "Truth," said Democritus, "is at the bottom of the abyss; and the abyss is bottomless."

    Steve McSwain: Perspectives Of A Former Fundamentalist Christian Steve McSwain 2011

  • Democritus famously proposed that all matter consists of microscopic particles, called 'atoms', which are not themselves composed of other particles.

    Archive 2009-02-01 Gordon McCabe 2009

  • His reading went back to the Greek philosophers Democritus and Epicurus, but he got his Darwinism primarily by way of the English science and philosophy popularizer Hugh Elliot and from Darwin's foremost German disciple, Ernst Haeckel.

    Archive 2009-08-01 2009

  • And so, contra your assertion that there is intentionality inherent in everything, according to my view of reality intentionality is an emergent property of a universe in which (to quote Democritus of Abdera once again) "all things are the fruit of chance and necessity" and there is no empirically detectable intentionality in anything, except for those active entities which have encoded programs that guide their behavior.

    Against Darwinism 2009

  • He crossed the river Nestos just west of the Greek city of Abdera, once home to the philosopher Democritus, who had first proposed that all matter was composed of indestructible particles called atoms.

    Alexander the Great Philip Freeman 2011

Comments

Log in or sign up to get involved in the conversation. It's quick and easy.