Becoming (philosophy)

In philosophy, the concept of becomingwas born in east-ern ancient Greece by the philosopher Heraclitus of Hep-hesus, who in the Sixth century BC, said that nothingin this world is constant except change and becoming.His theory stands in direct contrast to Parmenides, an-other Greek philosopher, but from the italic Magna Gre-cia, who believed that the ontic changes or becomingwe perceive with our senses is deceptive, and that there isa pure perfect and eternal being behind nature, which isthe ultimate truth. In philosophy, the word becomingconcerns a specic ontological concept which should notbe confused with process philosophy as a whole or withthe related study of process theology.[1]

1 HistoryHeraclitus (c. 535 - c. 475 BC) spoke extensively aboutbecoming. Shortly afterwards Leucippus of Miletus sim-ilarly spoke of becoming as the movement of atoms.

2 The becoming ontologyAccording to tradition,[2] Heraclitus wrote a treatiseabout nature named " " (Per phses),About Nature, in which appears the famous aphorism (panta rhei [os potams]") translated liter-ally as the whole ows [as a river], or guratively aseverything ows, nothing stands still. The concept ofbecoming in philosophy is connected with two others:movement and evolution, as becoming assumes a chang-ing to and a moving toward. Becoming is the processor state of being coming about in time and space.

3 Nietzsche on becomingGerman philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche wrote that Her-aclitus will remain eternally right with his assertion thatbeing is an empty ction.[3] Nietzsche developed the vi-sion of a chaotic world in perpetual change and becoming.The state of becoming does not produce xed entities,such as being, subject, object, substance, thing. These falseconcepts are the necessary mistakes which consciousnessand language employ in order to interpret the chaos of thestate of becoming. The mistake of Greek philosopherswas to falsify the testimony of the senses and negate theevidence of the state of becoming. By postulating being

as the underlying reality of the world, they constructed acomfortable and reassuring after-world where the hor-ror of the process of becoming was forgotten, and theempty abstractions of reason appeared as eternal entities.

4 QuotationsClemens Alexandrinus (Stromata, v, 105). Similar:Plutarchus (De animae procreatione, 5 p, 1014 A) con-cerning Heraclitus:

This universal order, which is the same forall, has not been made by any god or man, butit always has been, is, and will be an ever-livingre, kindling itself by regular measures and go-ing out by regular measures.

5 See also Being Physical ontology

6 References

6.1 Notes[1] Seibt, Johanna. Process Philosophy. The Stanford En-

cyclopedia of Philosophy (Fall 2013 Edition). Retrieved30 April 2014.

[2] Diogenes Laertius,"Vitae Philosophorum, IX, 17

[3] With the highest respect, I except the name of Heraclitus. When the rest of the philosophic folk rejected the testi-mony of the senses because they showed multiplicity andchange, he rejected their testimony because they showedthings as if they had permanence and unity. Heraclitustoo did the senses an injustice. But Heraclitus will remaineternally right with his assertion that being is an emptyction.]" http://publishing.cdlib.org/ucpressebooks/view?docId=ft5x0nb3sz&chunk.id=d0e10785&toc.depth=100&brand=eschol

6.2 SourcesOnline

1

2 6 REFERENCES

The materialistic becomingThe becoming of starsBecoming in modern physics's+Assessment&hl=it&um=1&ie=UTF-8&oi=scholartPhysical becomingPost-classical Physical OntologyStellar Becoming in Small ScalePhysical evolutionBooks and ArticlesR.Arthur,Minkowski Spacetime and theDimensions of thePresent in The Ontology of Spacetime, Vol. 1, Dieks, D.,Amsterdam, Elsevier 2006.M.Born, Einsteins Theory ofRelativity, New York City,Dover Publications 1962.A.Einstein, On the Electrodynamics of Moving Bod-ies, New York, Dover Publications 1952, pp. 3565.P.Fitzgerald, Four Kinds of Temporal Becom-ing,Philosophical Topics 13 1985, pp. 145177.A.Shimony, The Transient now (in Search for a Natural-istic World View), Cambridge,Cambridge University Press1993, Vol. II.J.J.C.Smart, Philosophy and Scientic Real-ism, New York, The Humanities Press 1963.G.Whitrow, The Natural Philosophy of Time, Oxford,Oxford University Press 1980.

A. Mitov - S. Moch - A. Vogt, Next-to-next-to-leading order evolution, Phys. Lett. B 638 (2006)61 [hep-ph/0604053] [SPIRES]

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