Conatus: THIRD EDITION by Tom Wallace - HTML preview

C O N A T U S

If time is just a feature of the physical universe then there is also a sense in which all moments are eternal — or, it might be said — both eternal but also lasting no time whatsoever. This is one of those paradoxes that arises when trying to think of the universe in its entirety, and it’s especially so when the universe is regarded as somehow ‘one thing’ — ‘The One’.

The Idea of ‘The One’

Parmenides of Elea had a concept of an ungenerated, imperishable, indivisible, perfect and motionless universe that has come to be known as the ‘Parmenidean One’. This is similar to some Eastern concepts of nonduality and maybe an influence of later philosophers such as Spinoza and Leibniz. Philosophy is often described as ‘footnotes to Plato’, but Plato could equally be described as footnotes to Parmenides. Parmenides’ and Plato’s concept of The One was taken forward by neo-Platonists, most notably Plotinus. (For both Plato and Plotinus, ‘The One’ is also ‘The Good’).

If the universe really is The One, then it seems there cannot be an ‘ultimate substrate’, apart from The One itself. There can only be quality and relation.

‘The Many’

‘The One’, and such concepts as holism, require quite a bit of unpacking, since, clearly, the world that is seen around us is a blooming, buzzing confusion of multiplicity rather than a tranquil Oneness! The world, it might be said, is split in

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