atomicism

English

Etymology

From atomic +‎ -ism.

Noun

atomicism (uncountable)

  1. (philosophy) Atomism.
    • 1822, Ralph Cudworth, “The true Intellectual System of the Universe, wherein all the Reason and Philosophy of Atheism is confuted, and its Impossibility demonstrated, &c.”, in Henry Southern, editor, The Retrospective Review, volume 6, page 55:
      And thus, in this first chapter, have we not only quite disarmed atheism of atomicism, or shewed that the latter, (rightly understood) affordeth no manner of shelter or protection to the former; but also made it manifest, that it is the greatest bulwark and defence against the same; which is a thing afterwards further insisted on.
    • 1883, Samuel Harris, The Philosophical Basis of Theism, page 287:
      A consciousness which has got rid of the thought of absolute being would become a prey to endless atomicism and dissolution .
    • 2023, Evandro Agazzi, Realism and Quantum Physics, page 170:
      Quite on the contrary, if we insist on the particle "allegory" we must grant that the so-called "particles" have strictly no individuality. In the end, the picture we get is closer to Plotinism than to philosophical atomicism!
  2. The view that a system as is composed of separable, independent, self-contained units that can be examined and manipulated individually.
    • 1982, Environment and Planning: Planning & design. B - Volume 9, page 393:
      In the history of knowledge, atomicism has been the moving force behind the vast majority of scientific breakthroughs, especially in physics and mechanics.
    • 2015, Claudio Guillen, Literature as System: Essays Toward the Theory of Literary History, page 57:
      But Cassirer may help us to realize that it is not geneticism alone that is being surpassed: a certain "atomicism” —i.e., the isolation of the single parts of a system — is also under general attack.
    • 2022, Marc Lavoie, Post-Keynesian Economics: New Foundations, page Page 17:
      The third pair of presuppositions concerns methodology: methodological individualism or atomicism versus holism or organicism.
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