| Bio: |
Born: about 460 BC in Abdera, Thrace, Greece
Died: about 370 BC
I am best known for my atomic theory, having postulated that space, or the Void, had an equal right with reality, or Being, to be considered existent. He conceived of the Void as a vacuum, an infinite space in which moved an infinite number of atoms that made up Being (i.e. the physical world). These atoms are eternal and invisible; absolutely small, so small that their size cannot be diminished (hence the name atomon, or \"indivisible\"); absolutely full and incompressible, as they are without pores and entirely fill the space they occupy; and homogeneous, differing only in shape, arrangement, position, and magnitude.
I came to beleive these things approx 440 years before the birth of Christ, needless to say that I was a little ahead of my time.
I am also an excellent geometer, having postulated that the volume of a cone is one third of that of a cylinder having the same base and equal height, and that the volume of a pyramid is one third of that of a prism having the same base and equal height; that is to say, Democritus enunciated these propositions some fifty years or more before they were first scientifically proved by Eudoxus. |
