Bennett 1

Christopher Bennett
Visions of Mortality Section 4
Dr. Tomas Crowder-Taraborelli
“Illuminating Physics by Philosophy”

“It is often of great consequence in what groupings and positions the same primary
elements are combined… Such is the power letters derive from mere alteration of order.”
(Lucretius, Book 1, Lines 820-826)
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Uninformed views of the world often create mythical metaphysical landscapes,

replacing informed thoughts with creative treatments of reality. The philosophies of

Epicureanism circa 50 B.C. provided an important contrast to the myths of the age by

defining reality by reason. The Roman philosopher and poet Titus Lucretius Carnus stood

at the artistic and intellectual avant-garde of this camp through the contributions of his

extensive work On The Nature of Things. One of the most important endeavors of

Lucretius’ thought was a willingness to merge philosophical precision with physical

reality, producing a physics reasonably defined by the human faculties. In Book 2 from

lines 795-809, Lucretius proffers an explanation of light and color based on his

philosophical foundations alone; he concludes that atoms are colorless. Lucretius cannot

forge physical reality through a philosophy of physics alone, however; in doing so, his

valid argument equates perceptions with reality itself and is unsound.

Reconstruction:
1. Primary elements of things do not emerge into the light. [Premise] ( Line 797)
2. Colors do not appear in darkness. [Premise] (Lines 799-800)
3. Even in light, specific colors are produced by specific incidences of light. [Premise]
(Lines 800-806)
4. Therefore, color is dependent on light and emerges into it. [Follows from 2, 3]
Conclusion:
5. Therefore, color is not a primary element of things and atoms are colorless [Follows
from 1, 4]

Lucretius’ most important premise is that primary elements do not emerge into the

light. Within the passage itself, no justification is given. In lines 749-757, Lucretius

clarifies that primary elements do not change. Lucretius maintains that if things

constantly changed absolutely everything would be reduced to nothing, since change

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implies the instantaneous death of whatever just existed. Primary elements must be

consistent to not be meaningless and therefore can’t change. Thus, if something emerges

into the light and changes, it cannot be a primary element.

Lucretius then establishes two further premises. The first is that color does not

appear in the darkness. Lucretius spends no more than a sentence presenting the premise

in the form of a rhetorical sentence. Brevity doesn’t lessen usefulness, for the premise

establishes that without light, there can be no color. The second is that specific incidences

and angles of light produce specific colors. This is by far his most developed premise,

and Lucretius spends a great deal of ink describing the changing colors of the dove and

peacock with poetic flourishes. Lucretius implies that since different colors are created by

external incidences and angles, they are dependent and cannot be produced on their own.

With his premises established, Lucretius does very little other footwork; he even

orders conclusions before some of his premises. Premises 2 and 3 taken together prove

that color is dependent on light and so emerges into it. Lucretius then syllogistically

employs his original premise; if colors emerge into the light, color cannot be a primary

element of things because it changes. Thus, atoms are colorless and the argument is valid.

Lucretius’ argument, however, is not sound. Because the premises are based on

the framework of Epicurean physics, they are susceptible to flaws in this thought system.

The most cogent counterargument lies in attacking the flawed assumption that one can

define reality rationally through basic perception alone. Both logical loopholes and

obvious counterexamples emerge to Lucretius’ first premise because of this flaw.

If certain intrinsic properties of things will only emerge into the light, then the

first premise is false. Since darkness will render one’s sense of vision unusable, it’s clear
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that no visual stimuli can be perceived in this condition. So light is a prerequisite to sight,

but that does not mean that all things that emerge in light emerge because of light alone.

Lucretius confuses reality and the intuitive perception of the observer precisely at this

point. When stripped down to specific elements apart from infinitely malleable parts, it

becomes clear that all atoms possess basic visual forms and shapes that will only emerge

into or be visible in the light. A block of pure gold or a vial of mercury will have a

specific visible texture or form and a specific state in liquid or solid form. A painting will

vary in hue but the texture of that paint and the forms of the piece can only arise in light

as well. These qualities do not exist because light has made them emerge, but rather

because they are indicative of the tangible physical reality of the atoms that compose

these materials. To reference Lucretius’ example, while the feathers of doves and

peacocks might vary in hue as light strikes them differently, their basic shape and form

and the quality of being iridescent itself derives from the innate atoms of the feathers.

Therefore, counterexamples exist as many innate or primary things emerge into light.

Due to his confusion of perception with reality, Lucretius’ first premise also

becomes meaningless and thus untrue as intuitive definitions become regressive.

Lucretius defines a primary element as something that does not change. By his own

words, any change implies death and a move towards nothingness, yet things that change

certainly do not cease to exist. Further, any time something changed it would

automatically become transient and move towards nothingness or void, an absurd

conclusion. Given that almost any property can conceivably change, it’s also not clear if

anything can be a primary element except for light and darkness themselves- an ironic
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contradiction. It’s clear that Lucretius bases assumptions on other ungrounded

assumptions, all based on intuitive perceptions of change, elements, and color.

In order to gauge Lucretius’ response to this counter-argument, one must take into

account his larger philosophical context as well as his narrowly deductive reasoning.

Lucretius would argue that the supposed disconnect between perception and reality is a

misunderstanding of his philosophy; he would argue that these basic concepts of color,

change, elements, and atoms are needed to define the world reasonably before one can

perceive and judge fairly. For Lucretius, mind comes before and defines matter.

As for the specifics of the counterargument, Lucretius would argue that color is

totally dependent on light and thus changeable in a unique way. Lucretius would

distinguish the counter-examples of form by arguing that a red ball would still be a ball of

a specific form in a dark room but would be still be truly colorless. He would also point

out that properties such as shape and form all change, and so the counter-examples don’t

really involve primary elements. Regarding logical holes, Lucretius would likely agree

that change itself is unavoidable because all matter inevitably acts on matter, but would

clarify that this definition is specific to things that are infinitely as opposed to possibly

malleable. The very existence of color is defined by change; the concept of change in

general is not nearly so broad and thus not so potentially regressive.

While these distinctions might be mostly valid, they are still inadequate to

reestablish his premise. Lucretius would still be ignoring an epistemological flaw in his

framework itself; it’s essentially impossible for him to completely address a response that

questions the very basis of the metaphysics that he uses in all of his assumptions. The

counter-examples and regression are still valid as well because Lucretius’ distinctions
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based on color only strengthen his true conclusion that atoms are in fact colorless. His

arguments would do nothing to refute the fact that his premises are still flawed; some

non-infinitely malleable properties do in fact emerge into the light, and change as an

intuitive concept cannot be cleanly used to ground a definition of primary elements.

Lucretius’ works are impressive; many of his insights into the physical reality of

light and color are accurate even today. However, the creation of physics by

philosophical logic alone could not produce wholly sound arguments. Lucretius’

argument that atoms are colorless is valid and interesting, but unsound because of grand

statements about atomic properties that correspond more to basic perceptions than reality.

Lucretius’ philosophy is commendable but not without flaw; his arguments have an ironic

tendency towards metaphysical assertions that belie his ultimate purpose.

(1340 words)