Concept
Vacuum
Overview
space that is empty of matter
Overview adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0; see the article history for authors).
In the original texts
Passages from public-domain books where Vacuum is discussed.
And, in truth, by the term vacuum in its common use, we do not mean a place or space in which there is absolutely nothing, but only a place in which there is none of those things we presume ought to be there. Thus, because a pitcher is made to hold water, it is said to be empty when it is merely filled with air; or if there are no fish in a fish-pond, we say there is nothing in it, although it be full of water; thus…
René Descartes, Selections from the Principles of Philosophy
states what it is; names the idea; author linked in the graph; opens on it
Were we making an extended analysis of the opposed view, it would be necessary to point out that it denies itself. For it is only _through_ the vacuum that the atoms are isolated or independent, and the sole function of the vacuum is to serve as the background of the atoms. The atoms are separated only in virtue of their connection, and the vacuum is what it is--pure emptiness--only on account of that which is in…
John Dewey, Leibniz's New Essays Concerning the Human Understanding
names the idea; states what it is; opens on it
Second Proposition. On the vacuum. The original Mutakallemim also believe that there is a vacuum, i.e., one space, or several spaces which contain nothing, which are not occupied by anything whatsoever, and which are devoid of all substance. This proposition is to them an indispensable sequel to the first. For, if the Universe were full of such atoms, how could any of them move? For it is impossible to conceive that…
Moses Maimonides, The guide for the perplexed
names the idea
All the natural philosophers from Thales to Plato rejected a vacuum. Empedocles says that there is nothing of a vacuity in Nature, nor anything superabundant. Leucippus, Democritus, Demetrius, Metrodorus, Epicurus, that the atoms are in number infinite; and that a vacuum is infinite in magnitude. The Stoics, that within the compass of the world there is no vacuum, but beyond it the vacuum is infinite. Aristotle…
Plutarch, Complete Works of Plutarch — Volume 3
names the idea; states what it is
For vacuum, whether we affirm or deny its existence, signifies space without body; whose very existence no one can deny to be possible, who will not make matter infinite, and take from God a power to annihilate any particle of it. 23. Motion proves a Vacuum.
John Locke, An Essay Concerning Humane Understanding, Volume 1
names the idea
Philosophers who discussed Vacuum
- Al-Farabi
- Aristotle
- Fakhr al-Din al-Razi
- Chrysippus
- Blaise Pascal
- Robert Boyle
- Strato of Lampsacus
- Democritus
- Empedocles
- Franciscus Patricius
Related ideas
- General relativity
- Isaac Newton
- Ulama
- Physics (Aristotle)
- Ancient Greek philosophy
- Jean Buridan
- Al-Farabi
- Luminiferous aether
- Pneuma
- Geometry
- Islamic world
- Stoicism
- Moon
- Aether (classical element)
- Dark energy
- Matter
- Atmosphere
- Momentum
- Drag (physics)
- Oxygen
- Plato
- Photon
- Observable universe
- Quantum mechanics
Place in the tradition
Part of Democritus.