Corpuscularianism

{{See also|Atomism#Galileo Galilei}}

Corpuscularianism is similar to the theory of atomism, except that where atoms were supposed to be indivisible, corpuscles could in principle be divided. In this manner, for example, it was theorized that mercury could penetrate into metals and modify their inner structure, a step on the way towards the production of gold by transmutation.{{Cn|date=March 2025}}{{Cite book |last=Levere |first=Trevor |title=Transforming matter : a history of chemistry from alchemy to the buckyball |publisher=The Johns Hopkins University Press |year=2001 |isbn=0-8018-6610-3 |pages=7-8}}

Corpuscularianism was associated by its leading proponents with the idea that some of the apparent properties of objects are artifacts of the perceiving mind, that is, "secondary" qualities as distinguished from "primary" qualities.[http://www.vernonpratt.com/conceptualisations/d06bl2_1mechanical.htm The Mechanical Philosophy] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080611053822/http://www.vernonpratt.com/conceptualisations/d06bl2_1mechanical.htm |date=June 11, 2008 }} - Early modern 'atomism' ("corpuscularianism" as it was known) Corpuscles were thought to be unobservable and having a very limited number of basic properties, such as size, shape, and motion.

William R. Newman traces the origins from the fourth book of Aristotle, Meteorology.{{harvnb|Lüthy|Murdoch|Newman|2001|p=306}}. The "dry" and "moist" exhalations of Aristotle became the alchemical 'sulfur' and 'mercury' of the eighth-century Islamic alchemist, Jābir ibn Hayyān (died c. 806–816). Pseudo-Geber's Summa perfectionis contains an alchemical theory in which unified sulfur and mercury corpuscles, differing in purity, size, and relative proportions, form the basis of a much more complicated process.{{harvnb|Newman|2006|p=13}}. On the sulfur-mercury theory of metals, see {{harvnb|Norris|2006}}, and especially {{harvnb|Newman|2014}}.

Corpuscularianism remained a dominant theory for centuries and was blended with alchemy by early scientists such as Robert Boyle and Isaac Newton in the 17th century. In his work The Sceptical Chymist (1661), Boyle abandoned the Aristotelian ideas of the classical elements—earth, water, air, and fire—in favor of corpuscularianism. In his later work, The Origin of Forms and Qualities (1666), Boyle used corpuscularianism to explain all of the major Aristotelian concepts, marking a departure from traditional Aristotelianism.{{cite book|last=Osler|first=Margaret J.|title=Reconfiguring the World. Nature, God, and Human Understanding, from the Middle Ages to Early-Modern Europe|page=127|year=2010|publisher=Johns Hopkins University Press|location=Baltimore|isbn=978-0-8018-9656-9}} Boyle used it to develop his mechanical corpuscular philosophy, which laid the foundations for the chemical revolution.{{citation |author=Ursula Klein |title=Styles of Experimentation and Alchemical Matter Theory in the Scientific Revolution |date=July 2007 |journal=Metascience |volume=16 |issue=2 |pages=247–256 esp. 247 |publisher=Springer |doi=10.1007/s11016-007-9095-8 |issn=1467-9981}}

{{Main|Corpuscular theory of light}}Isaac Newton’s corpuscular theory of light proposed that light consists of tiny particles, or corpuscles, traveling in straight lines. In contrast, Christiaan Huygens proposed that light was wave. Until the 18th century, the corpuscular theory successfully explained reflection and refraction but struggled with diffraction. By the early 19th century, experiments by Thomas Young and Augustin-Jean Fresnel conclusively demonstrated the wave nature of light. However, the concept of light as particles resurfaced in the 20th century with the concept of photons, leading to the modern wave-particle duality of light.

In antiquity, the idea of gravitational corpuscles was invoked to explain the influence of the Moon over the tides.

When Newton introduced his law of universal gravitation, he considered that it was problematic as it behave as action at a distance.{{Citation |last=Berkovitz |first=Joseph |title=Action at a Distance in Quantum Mechanics |date=2008 |work=The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy |editor-last=Zalta |editor-first=Edward N. |url=https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/win2008/entries/qm-action-distance/ |access-date=2025-03-03 |edition=Winter 2008 |publisher=Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University}} Alternative theories to Newtonian gravity also expanded the use of corpuscles, Le Sage's theory of gravitation of 1748, considered that corpuscles exerted pressure over objects. Also aether theories were suggested to explain gravitation until the development of general relativity in 1915.

Ancient philosopher Empedocles introduced the idea of effluences to explain magnetic forces as seen in lodestones. René Descartes further developed this theory.

The philosopher Thomas Hobbes used corpuscularianism to justify his political theories in Leviathan.

• Atomic theory
• Atomism
• Classical element
• History of chemistry
• Imponderable fluids

{{reflist}}

• {{cite journal|last1=Bigotti|first1=Fabrizio|date=2017|title=A Previously Unknown Path to Corpuscularism in the Seventeenth Century: Santorio's Marginalia to the Commentaria in Primam Fen Primi Libri Canonis Avicennae (1625)|journal=Ambix|volume=64|issue=1|pages=29–42|doi=10.1080/00026980.2017.1287550|pmid=28350287 |pmc=5470109}}
• {{cite book|last1=Clericuzio|first1=Antonio|date=2000|title=Elements, Principles and Corpuscles: A Study of Atomism and Chemistry in the Seventeenth Century|location=Dordrecht|publisher=Kluwer|isbn=978-0-7923-6782-6}}
• {{cite book|last1=Lasswitz|first1=Kurd|author1-link=Kurd Lasswitz|date=1890|title=Geschichte der Atomistik vom Mittelalter bis Newton. Band 1: Die Erneuerung der Korpuskulartheorie. Band 2: Höhepunkt und Verfall der Korpuskulartheorie des siebzehnten Jahrhunderts|location=Hamburg-Leipzig|publisher=Voss|oclc=2361346}}
• {{cite book|editor1-last=Lüthy|editor1-first=Christoph|editor2-last=Murdoch|editor2-first=John E.|editor2-link=John E. Murdoch|editor3-last=Newman|editor3-first=William R.|editor3-link=William R. Newman|date=2001|title=Late Medieval and Early Modern Corpuscular Matter Theories|location=Leiden|publisher=Brill|isbn=978-90-04-11516-3}}
• {{cite journal|last1=Newman|first1=William R.|author1-link=William R. Newman|date=1993|title=The Corpuscular Theory of J.B. Van Helmont and its Medieval Sources|journal=Vivarium|volume=31|issue=1|pages=161–191|doi=10.1163/156853493X00132 }}
• {{cite book|last1=Newman|first1=William R.|author1-link=William R. Newman|date=1994|chapter=Robert Boyle’s Debt to Corpuscular Alchemy|editor1-last=Hunter|editor1-first=Michael|title=Robert Boyle Reconsidered|location=Cambridge|publisher=Cambridge University Press|pages=107–118}}
• {{cite journal|last1=Newman|first1=William R.|author1-link=William R. Newman|date=1996|title=The Alchemical Sources of Robert Boyle's Corpuscular Philosophy|journal=Annals of Science|volume=53|issue=6 |pages=567–585|doi=10.1080/00033799600200401 }}
• {{cite journal|last1=Newman|first1=William R.|author1-link=William R. Newman|date=2001|title=Corpuscular Alchemy and the Tradition of Aristotle's Meteorology, with Special Reference to Daniel Sennert|journal=International Studies in the Philosophy of Science|volume=15|issue=2 |pages=145–153|doi=10.1080/02698590120059013 }}
• {{cite book|last1=Newman|first1=William R.|author1-link=William R. Newman|date=2006|title=Atoms and Alchemy: Chymistry and the Experimental Origins of the Scientific Revolution|location=Chicago|publisher=University of Chicago Press|isbn=978-0-226-57697-8}}
• {{cite journal|last1=Newman|first1=William R.|author1-link=William R. Newman|date=2014|title=Mercury and Sulphur among the High Medieval Alchemists: From Razi and Avicenna to Albertus Magnus and Pseudo-Roger Bacon|journal=Ambix|volume=62|issue=4|pages=327–344|doi=10.1179/1745823414Y.0000000004|pmid=25509633 }}
• {{Cite journal|last1=Norris|first1=John A.|date=2006|title=The Mineral Exhalation Theory of Metallogenesis in Pre-Modern Mineral Science|journal=Ambix|volume=53|pages=43–65|doi = 10.1179/174582306X93183}}
• {{cite book|last1=Pabst|first1=Bernhard|date=1994|title=Atomtheorien des lateinischen Mittelalters|location=Darmstadt|publisher=Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft}}

• {{cite book|editor1-last=Lüthy|editor1-first=Christoph|editor2-last=Murdoch|editor2-first=John E.|editor2-link=John E. Murdoch|editor3-last=Newman|editor3-first=William R.|editor3-link=William R. Newman|date=2001|title=Late Medieval and Early Modern Corpuscular Matter Theories|location=Leiden|publisher=Brill|isbn=978-90-04-11516-3|ref=no}}

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