Materialism — A metaphysical position holding that reality is fundamentally material. The Greek atomists (Leucippus, Democritus) proposed that everything is constituted of atoms and void. Marx’s historical materialism holds that material conditions of production determine forms of consciousness and social superstructures. Contemporary reductive materialism holds that mental states are reducible to brain states; eliminative materialism (Churchland) denies that mental states exist as autonomous entities.
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