Abstract
This article aims to evaluate the role of image in the history of atomism and its relation with the idea of visualization of the invisible of matter, focusing on the epistemological perspectives of Gaston Bachelard. The origins of atomism are linked to vision, but it is only in the late sixteenth century that the atomistic iconography appears. In the article, the author seeks to evince the human temptation to "the realm of images": (1) starting by expounding the importance of the "metaphysics of dust" (according to Bachelard, dust conferred a founder imagery to the atomistic thesis); (2) noting that the term "atom" has designated several entities and emphasizing the importance given to geometry in atomistic conceptions, so present throughout the history of philosophical atomism; (3) making considerations about one of the first images of the atom - Area Democriti, of Giordano Bruno; (4) by highlighting the problematics of the image in contemporary atomism and of its radical abstractionism; (5) exploring the paradox of the usefulness of images from various works of Bachelard; (6) showing that Bachelard does not seem to take the concept of image in a broad sense and that to distinguish images of non-images is to assume that it has an essence and stable classification; and, finally, (7) pointing to the fact that increasingly the philosophy of science attempts to investigate what function the iconography may have in scientific creation and transmission of knowledge.
Keywords
Bachelard; Atomism; Imagery; Atomistic Iconography
Fig. 1: G. Bruno, 1591, p. 50. In: Lüthy (1998, p. 61)