DYNAMISM. - From δύναμις (force, energy) is called d. every philosophical system which, denying the dualistic antithesis matter-force, reduces material reality to a complex of unextended entities, essentially active, conceived either as substantial realities, or as simple points of force, elements of energy. D. stands historically in opposition to mechanism, for which the material world is a pure aggregate of extended atoms.
Leaving aside the hints that can be found in Pythagorean and Stoic doctrines, the principal representative of d. in modern philosophy is Leibniz. Leibnizian d. is substantialistic: the world would result as constituted of an infinite quantity of substances-force, simple units, "metaphysical points" (Syst. nouv., 11), monads (from the Greek μονάς, unit). Bodies are aggregates of monads; their extension is phenomenal, whence the monads that compose them are not truly distant from one another. In the monads is repeated, albeit in different manner and degree, the nature of the whole cosmos. The monads do not admit extrinsic relations of action and reaction or of mutual influences; they are autonomous, closed systems, "impenetrable" (Monadol., 7); but by the radical spirituality that is immanent in them they are all endowed, each in its own way, with a force of appetition and a power of representation, more or less conscious, of the whole universe (Monadol., 15, 19). And it is by this power of representation that in every unit of which the world is constituted, the nature of the whole is found again. The degrees of difference in the clarity and distinctness of representation of the monads are innumerable: from the lower monads that stand almost at the base of the universe, endowed with an obscure and unconscious representation, whence matter results, one ascends gradually to the supreme monad, God, pure spirituality that represents the universe in a perfect manner, and is therefore infinitely active. Pre-established harmony, that is, the intrinsic conformity of each monad, in dependence on the supreme monad, explains the appearance of their coordination and mutual influence. The principles of Leibnizian d. were accepted by C. Wolff and H. Lotze.
The pre-critical Kant accepts a realistic d.: bodies are constituted of monads, which are simple, but fill real space with a sphere of activity, "sphæa actionis, qua externas utrinque sibi praesentes arce ab ulteriori ad se invicem appropinquatione" (Monadologia physica, prop. VI). After the Critique of Pure Reason, having posited the unknowability of the thing in itself, Kant explains the phenomenal appearance of corporeal substance in time and space, without the monads, as the result of a double force mutually equilibrating: attraction and repulsion (Metaphysische Anfangsgründe der Naturwissenschaft).
Realistic is the d. of R. Boscovich: bodies result as composed of simple and unextended elements, locally individuated and separated in space; attractive and repulsive forces, mutually coordinated according to special relations, explain all the specific activities of nature.
P. Carbonelle and D. Palmieri substantially followed the d. of Boscovich.
The ultimate and current form of d., arisen in modern physics as a reaction to classical mechanism, is energeticism, defended by W. Ostwald, E. Mach and by numerous students of physics. In its absolute form energeticism suppresses matter as a positive reality beyond the energies and forces that manifest themselves in the world. Indeed, affirms Ostwald, those things that are said to be essential attributes of matter: extension, weight, mass, are nothing but factors of energy (L'énergie, Paris 1910, p. 163), and physics finds nothing else in matter but forces and relations of forces; it is therefore at the very least superfluous to posit, beyond the coordinated system of energies, matter as substance. Energeticism has found a support in the current electronic theories of matter. Which, however, as hypotheses of purely physical interpretation, in no way authorize the extreme philosophical affirmations to which energeticism sometimes arrives, to the point of transforming itself into universal metaphysical phenomenism.
It is evident that d., as a philosophical system of interpretation of matter (it is not intended to speak of d. as a scientific theory: v. for this MATTER) in its various historical formulations, is in contrast with the Aristotelian-Thomistic conception of the hylomorphic composition of bodies (v. HYLOMORPHISM). But, as such, d. is a simple metaphysical hypothesis not demonstrated by theoretical principles, nor required by the facts. The negation of the objectivity of extension and of space, which d. involves, represents its most serious negative aspect in antithesis with the demands of realism. And, moreover, inconsistent is the essential presupposition from which d. sets out, namely the insolubility of the aporias inherent in the notion of the real continuum: v. CONTINUUM.
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Ugo Viglino