Editing Materialism (section)

{{Short description|Form of philosophical monism which holds matter to be the fundamental substance in nature}}
{{Redirect|Materialists|the 2025 film|Materialists (film)|other uses of the term materialism|Materialism (disambiguation)}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=February 2018}}

'''Materialism''' is a form of [[monism|philosophical monism]] according to which [[matter]] is the fundamental [[Substance theory|substance]] in [[nature]], and all things, including [[mind|mental states]] and [[consciousness]], are results of [[material]] interactions of material things. According to philosophical materialism, mind and consciousness are caused by physical processes, such as the [[neurochemistry]] of the [[human brain]] and [[nervous system]], without which they cannot exist. Materialism directly contrasts with monistic [[idealism]], according to which consciousness is the fundamental substance of nature.

Materialism is closely related to [[physicalism]]—the view that all that exists is ultimately physical. Philosophical physicalism has evolved from materialism with the theories of the physical sciences to incorporate forms of physicality in addition to ordinary matter (e.g. [[spacetime]], [[energy|physical energies]] and [[force]]s, and [[exotic matter]]). Thus, some prefer the term ''physicalism'' to ''materialism'', while others use them as synonyms.

Discoveries of neural correlates between consciousness and the brain are taken as empirical support for materialism, but some [[Philosophy of mind|philosophers of mind]] find that association fallacious or consider it compatible with non-materialist ideas.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://edwardfeser.blogspot.com/2011/01/against-neurobabble.html|title= Edward Feser: Against "Neurobabble"|date= 20 January 2011}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://archive.nytimes.com/opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/12/19/a-real-science-of-mind/|title= Tyler Burge, A Real Science of Mind - The New York Times|date= 19 December 2010}}</ref> Alternative philosophies opposed or alternative to materialism or physicalism include idealism, [[pluralism (philosophy)|pluralism]], [[Dualism (philosophy of mind)|dualism]], [[panpsychism]], and other forms of [[monism]].

[[Epicureanism]] is a philosophy of materialism from [[classical antiquity]] that was a major forerunner of modern science. Classical atomism predates [[Epicurus]]: fifth‑century BCE thinkers [[Leucippus]] and [[Democritus]] explained all change as the collisions of indivisible atoms moving in the void.<ref>{{cite web |title=Ancient Atomism |website=Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy |url=https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/atomism-ancient/ |access-date=17 April 2025}}</ref> Epicureanism refined this materialist picture. Epicurus held that everything—including mind—consists solely of atoms moving in the void; to explain how parallel falling atoms could ever meet, he postulated the ''clinamen'', an extremely slight lateral deviation that initiates collisions without invoking supernatural causes and that need not imply genuine indeterminism.<ref>{{cite web |title=Epicurus (section 4.2: The Swerve and Collisions) |website=Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy |url=https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/epicurus/ |access-date=17 April 2025}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |author=Tim O’Keefe |title=Epicurus on Freedom |publisher=Cambridge University Press |year=2005 |chapter=5 “The swerve and collisions” |pages=95‑118}}</ref>