Single Idea 481

[catalogued under 7. Existence / A. Nature of Existence / 1. Nature of Existence]

Full Idea

No thing comes into being or passes away, but it is mixed together or separated from existing things. Thus it would be correct if coming into being was called 'mixing', and passing away 'separation-off''.

Gist of Idea

Nothing is created or destroyed; there is only mixing and separation

Source

Anaxagoras (fragments/reports [c.460 BCE], B17), quoted by Simplicius - On Aristotle's 'Physics' 163.20

Book Reference

'Ancilla to the Pre-Socratic Philosophers', ed/tr. Freeman,Kathleen [Harvard 1957], p.85


A Reaction

I take this to be the first axiom of the new subject of chemistry. Our world is just patterns of Being. The bigger puzzle is - why those patterns?