Buddhist Atomism

"Abstract atomism" is another name for "Buddhist atomism". Since 1999 I have been developing an atomic theory. I give my theory two names, (1) the philosophy of the Abstract Atom (or just Abstract Atomism), and (2) the R-theory of time. This theory is merely an attempt to make further progress in the field of philosophical atomism (which is also called metaphysical atomism, mereological atomism, or just atomism). In doing this, my theory of atomism goes further than I ever imagined it would beyond the traditional accounts of atomism, and for that reason I give it these two entirely new labels: Abstract Atomism and the R-theory of time.

When I used the word “atom” in the above sentences I am not referring to the atoms that scientists study, but rather I am addressing the philosophy of atomism. Atomism is the philosophic position that all of reality is composed of a partless, irreducible type of particle called a true atom. Notice that this is not the same sort of entity that scientists refer to when they discuss atoms. The scientists’ atom has parts, and thus would be made of true atoms, rather than itself being a true atom. For these reasons, atomism is the study not of scientific atoms, but rather of philosophic atoms.[1]

The groundwork for Abstract Atomism and the R-theory of time is put forward in my publications that have appeared or will appear in Disputatio, Metaphysica, Axiomathes, Dialogue: Canadian Philosophical Review, The Indian International Journal of Buddhist Studies (IIJBS), Sorites, and Journal of Indian Council of Philosophical Research--where my publications soon coming out in IIJBS, Sorites and JICPR, are the most significant to laying the foundation for Abstract Atomism and the R-theory of time. These publications give new evidence for the philosophical positions called presentism (only the present moment exists), mereological nihilism (parts and wholes do not exist), metaphysical nihilism (ordinary objects do not exist), which can also be called blob theory (reality, ultimately, does not contain any structure whatsoever). These positions are in fact very old, going back to some of the ancient Greek atomists, some of the ancient Buddhist atomists, and others, and they may have some affinities with some interpretations of the philosophy of Parmenides, with some accounts of the philosophy of Brahman, and with some interpretations of the mathematical and scientific findings of quantum physics. But at this point I have labeled my theory "abstract atomism" due to the fact that in a few ways it moves beyond these theories and thus contains new elements (this is laid out most explicitly in the conclusion of my article coming out in IIJBS).

The similarities my theory has with Buddhist atomism are the similarities I have found most notable. The Indian Buddhists, such as Dharmakīrti, developed a type of atomism that is a philosophy about reality as being composed of atomic entities that are momentary flashes of light or energy. [click here for information on issues to do with film and Buddhist atomism.] (In this sense of the word "energy" as it is being used here, ultimately only energy [or light] makes up reality, and thus energy and matter are not considered identical to one another, or to be the same sorts of "stuff", and this may be a very different position than that held by Einstein and other physicists who often consider energy and matter as both existing rather than just energy). Stcherbatsky discusses some of these issues I am discussing here to do with Buddhist atomism:

...[T]he Buddhists denied the existence of substantial matter altogether. Movement consists for them of moments, it is a staccato movement, momentary flashes of a stream of energy... "Everything is evanescent“[2], says the Buddhist, because there is no stuff... Both systems [Sānkhya, and later Indian Buddhism] share in common a tendency to push the analysis of Existence up to its minutest, last elements which are imagined as absolute qualities, or things possessing only one unique quality. They are called “qualities” (guna-dharma) in both systems in the sense of absolute qualities, a kind of atomic, or intra-atomic, energies of which the empirical things are composed. Both systems, therefore, agree in denying the objective reality of the categories of Substance and Quality,… and of the relation of Inference uniting them. There is in Sānkhya philosophy no separate existence of qualities. What we call quality is but a particular manifestation of a subtle entity. To every new unit of quality corresponds a subtle quantum of matter which is called guna “quality”, but represents a subtle substantive entity. The same applies to early Buddhism where all qualities are substantive… or, more precisely, dynamic entities, although they are also called dharmas “qualities”.[3]

Metaphysical nihilism, blob theory, mereological nihilism, and, I argue, Buddhist atomism, are positions that give rise to a philosophy of reality where--despite what is typically believed to be the case by the average human about empirical reality--reality is in fact unstructured, monistic, and non-complex. According to each of these positions, reality may only consist of bare particulars, and no properties (at least no mind-independent properties: properties that are not mere fabrications of mental reality [see conceptualism]). This is the position I specifically argue for in my forthcoming paper, "Blob Theory", set to come out in Sorites in 2006.[4]

There is one more important issue to discuss with respect to Buddhist atomism. Note that metaphysical nihilism, blob theory, mereological nihilism, and, I argue, Buddhist atomism, are positions that lead to the position that the only real items outside a non-nirvanic an observer are philosophic atoms (for a nirvanic observer, there is no such thing at 'outside' the observer or 'outside' the observing self). We do, however, have then a dualist reality in Buddhist atomism: there are philosophic atoms on the one hand, and there are selves or observers of some sort on the other. Consider how Atmanspacher addresses this issue:

...there is the classical stance of strong reduction, claiming that all mental states and properties can be reduced to the material domain (materialism) or even to physics (physicalism)... This point of view claims that it is both necessary and sufficient to explore and understand the material domain, e.g., the brain, in order to understand the mental domain, e.g., cognition. More or less, this leads to a monistic picture, in which any need to discuss mental states is eliminated right away or at least considered as epiphenomenal. While mind-brain correlations are still legitimate though causally inefficacious from an epiphenomenalist point of view, eliminative materialism renders even correlations irrelevant.[5]

This leads to the position that there are two kinds of 'stuff': atoms and experiences. This also can be called the standard interpretation of Indian Buddhism. This position has been written about in a very lucid passage from Dreyfus, that is in his classic text, Recognizing Reality: Dharmakīrti‘s Philosophy and its Tibetan Interpretations:

According to the Sautrāntika explanation, only infinitesimal atoms and moments of consciousness are real. Everything else, such as a shape or a color, is real only inasmuch as it is taken as an object of conventional practice. This view is not unlike Wilfrid Sellar’s claim that objects such as tables, ice cubes, and colors do not really exist… Our commonsense notions of such objects are false but cognitively useful... …[A]lthough Dharmakīrti never provides a detailed statement of this ontology, we could expect him to follow th[e] Sautrāntika view. Several traditional and modern scholars have explained Dharmakīrti in this way, emphasizing that in his system reality is reducible to partless atoms interacting with moments of consciousness… This… explains our perceptions of extended objects. In reality, there is no extension but just the causal interaction of infinitesimal atoms with partless moments of consciousness. I call this interpretation of Dharmakīrti’s ontology the standard interpretation.[6]

Metaphysical realism is based on the intuition that our perception of external objects is accurate. External objects would exist then according to the way we perceive them; that is, as having extension and unity. This is not possible, however, since the individual particles, which compose the objects, cannot crease individually the impression of extension. Since no individual atoms has such an aspect, there is nothing in reality that corresponds to our impressions of extension.[7]

Extended objects cannot be identified with their atomic parts, since they are extended (assuming they exist) and atoms are infinitesimally small. They cannot be different either, for in this case they would exist apart form these atoms. Since no such object has ever been observed, we have to accept that extended objects are not different from their atomic parts. Since they are not one either, we have to conclude that extended objects do not exist externally . Why, then, are we perceiving extended objects if they do not exist? Dharmakīrti answers: “The appearance of a cognition, which is not distinct [from its object], as being so is indeed a distortion”… Our perception of extended objects is without support in the external world and therefore mistaken. Extended objects appear to exist separate from our consciousness, but in reality they do not exist externally. We perceive them as such, however, because our perceptions are distorted.[8]

In Western philosophy, this type of position, where only experiences and philosophic atoms exist, is perhaps similar to position held by Kant (in his transcendental idealism), and perhaps Democritus and Quine, and it has some affinities with the present day philosophy of Peter van Inwagen and Trenton Merricks.

The important point to note is that this position leads to a critical question: If metaphysical nihilism, blob theory, mereological nihilism, and, Buddhist atomism were in fact correct theories, then we have a question of what the experiences are, as they seem not to be reducible to atoms. This, I consider, to be a fundamental problem of philosophy.

Notes

[1] Since Peter van Inwagen’s book Material Beings, philosophic atoms (basic building blocks), such as those discussed by the Presocratic Greeks (Democritus, etc.) are now usually called “physical simples”. “mereological simples”, or “material simples”. There is much current dialogue in the literature on this issue from such philosophers as Merricks (2001), Markosian (1998), Hudson (2001), McDaniel (2002, 2003), Zimmerman (1996a, 1996b), and several others.

[2] Nyāya-sūtra, IV. 1. 24 ff.

[3] Stcherbatsky 1962 (1930), vol. 1, 19.

[4] Moreland writes:

In Chapter 2, reasons were given for rejecting extreme nominalism… Among other things, EN [extreme nominalism] is what has been called a blob theory regarding concrete particulars. A blob theory of ordinary concrete particulars is consistent with a mereological analysis of those particulars as wholes constituted by separable parts; but a blob theory renders concrete particulars structureless entities with no internal differentiation of properties and relations within those concrete particulars. In this sense, EN treats concrete particulars as simples and thereby fails to acknowledge that the redness, circularity, size and other features of Socrates are real entities that are neither identical to each other nor to Socrates as a whole. (Moreland, 2001, Universals, Magill-Queens, p. 74.)

[5] Atmanspacher, Harald. 2004. "Quantum Approaches to Consciousness," Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. <http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/qt-consciousness/> Section 2.

[6] Dreyfus, 1997, 85.

[7] Dreyfus, 1997, 101.

[8] Dreyfus, 1997, 102.