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Full Idea
Void makes it impossible for anything to move, since in a void there is nowhere for a thing to move to more or less than anywhere else, because the void by definition contains no differentiation.
Clarification
'Void' is total emptiness
Gist of Idea
Movement is impossible in a void, because nothing can decide the direction of movement
Source
comment on Democritus (fragments/reports [c.431 BCE]) by Aristotle - Physics 214b32
Book Ref
Aristotle: 'Physics', ed/tr. Waterfield,Robin [OUP 1996], p.95
A Reaction
A lovely application of the Principle of Sufficient Reason. However this assumes that the cause of the movement is going to be in the void (telos?), rather than in the body which will move (modern causation?).
| 13217 | The void can't exist, and without the void there can't be movement or separation [Parmenides, by Aristotle] |
| 5100 | The void is not required for change, because a plenum can alter in quality [Aristotle on Melissus] |
| 24059 | Democritus is wrong: in a void we wouldn't see a distant ant in exact detail [Aristotle on Democritus] |
| 5101 | Movement is impossible in a void, because nothing can decide the direction of movement [Aristotle on Democritus] |
| 20905 | Growth and movement would not exist if there were no void to receive them [Democritus] |
| 20918 | Void is a kind of place, so it can't explain place [Aristotle] |
| 14043 | The void cannot interact, but just gives the possibility of motion [Epicurus] |
| 20822 | There is no void in the cosmos, but indefinite void outside it [Zeno of Citium, by Ps-Plutarch] |