Keywords
Atomismo emergentista
Categoría de relación
Vínculo sustancial
Jerarquía natural Ultimate reality
Emergentist atomism
Category of relation
Substantial Chain
Natural hierarchy
How to Cite
Abstract
Concerning the essence of ultimate reality, the history of ideas has handed down to us four natural philosophies: atomism, hylomorphism, electromagnetism and the mathematism of spacetime. In this essay I propose some thoughts on atomism, a doctrine which has given us a good deal of substantial scientific knowledge on nature. It is as if from the beginning of rational thought biological evolution has sown in man one of the essential intuitions to understand the world, i.e. that every object is a compound of ultimate elements. But I do not state that a system is a whole equal to the sum of its parts, and that is why the truth of atomism is only partial and needs to be corrected and completed. Attention will be called to the fact that the main problem of an atomism aspiring to explain the natural hierarchy from ultimate components (emergentist atomism) is a lack of appreciation of the value of the relation among components. Now if there are ultimate components of the Universe, how should we imagine them or conceive of them so that natural systems be as they are? As a contribution to the answer to this question I will set up a list of the properties the ultimate components of the Universe should have – if they exist – so that nature, natural hierarchy, be as it is. .
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