Letters from Tomis

Third in a series of reflections on my thoughts after reading What is Marxism: An Introduction into Marxist Theory by Rob Sewell and Alan Woods. The thoughts, opinions, and any errors are mine alone.

To ask “what is materialism?” is to step into a territory where philosophy, science, and politics collide with the sharpness of tectonic plates. It is to touch the pulse of a debate as old as humanity itself, pitting the tangible against the intangible, the seen against the unseen. Materialism—often maligned, often misunderstood—has a richness and a rigor that makes it not merely a worldview but a battleground. And as with all battlegrounds, the stakes are high, for materialism dares to strip the universe of its comforting illusions and forces us to confront reality as it is, rather than as we wish it to be.

At its core, materialism is the proposition that matter is the fundamental substance of reality. It rejects the idea that the universe is animated by divine will, cosmic purpose, or metaphysical essences. Instead, it insists that everything we experience—our thoughts, emotions, and aspirations—arises from the interactions of physical entities, governed by natural laws. To the materialist, the universe is neither a playground for gods nor a theater for metaphysical drama; it is a vast, indifferent expanse of matter in motion.

But this definition, austere as it may seem, hardly does justice to materialism’s implications. For materialism is not merely a description of the universe; it is a challenge to every superstition, every dogma, every comforting lie we have told ourselves to shield us from the cold light of reality. It is the insistence that explanations must be rooted in evidence, not in wishful thinking or mystical speculation. It is, in essence, the intellectual backbone of science, the worldview that makes progress possible by demanding that we test our beliefs against the hard facts of the world.

Of course, materialism has its enemies, and they are legion. From the theologian who insists that a soul animates the human body to the New Age guru who claims that “energy” and “vibration” explain all mysteries, the critics of materialism accuse it of being reductive, bleak, and soulless. They argue that materialism, in its relentless focus on matter, strips life of meaning and leaves us adrift in a purposeless void.

This criticism is as wrongheaded as it is tiresome. Materialism does not deny meaning; it relocates it. The beauty of materialism lies precisely in its refusal to impose an artificial meaning on the universe, allowing us to create meaning for ourselves. It liberates us from the oppressive narratives of religious and tiresome metaphysical systems, empowering us to take ownership of our lives. Far from reducing the world, materialism expands it, revealing a cosmos more wondrous and intricate than any myth could imagine.

Moreover, materialism does not merely liberate us intellectually; it has profound ethical and political implications. If the human mind is not a vessel for divine purpose but a product of the brain’s electrical and chemical processes, then the suffering of that mind becomes all the more urgent. Materialism demands that we address human needs here and now, for there is no celestial afterlife to compensate for the injustices of this world. It is no coincidence that materialist philosophies, from Marxism to secular humanism, have been at the forefront of movements for social justice, demanding that society be organized not according to divine right but according to human dignity.

And yet, materialism is not without its challenges. Its opponents gleefully point to the “hard problem” of consciousness, the question of how subjective experience arises from physical processes. They see in this question a fatal flaw, a gap in the materialist framework that can only be filled by something immaterial. But this argument is a sleight of hand. The existence of unanswered questions does not invalidate materialism; it is, in fact, a testament to its strength. Materialism does not claim to have all the answers; it claims only that the answers must come from evidence and reason, not from metaphysical hand-waving.

In the end, materialism is not just a philosophical position; it is a moral and intellectual stance. It is the insistence that we face reality with courage and honesty, that we abandon comforting illusions in favor of the unvarnished truth. It is, as the philosopher Democritus first envisioned it, a philosophy of atoms and the void—but also a philosophy of freedom, dignity, and progress.

So what is materialism? It is the realization that we are made of the same stuff as stars, bound by the same laws that govern the cosmos. It is the recognition that our lives, finite and fragile as they are, are all the more precious for being so. And it is the conviction that, in a universe indifferent to our existence, it is up to us to create meaning, to forge justice, and to leave the world better than we found it. To embrace materialism is to embrace the full weight of reality—and to rise, defiantly, to meet it.