The doctrine (widely
held until recently) that «matter» itself is fully
real (rather than an abstraction, derived from intellectual analysis of concrete really - existing things, as Aristotle
held), and that such self - subsistent «matter» is intrinsically inert (as opposed to self - organizing), arguably reached its full
flower in the late Renaissance.18 Part of contemporary divergence between theistic and naturalistic approaches may be understood to arise from overly complete internalization (by both naturalists and theists) of the cosmology that emerged from the scientific revolution of the seventeenth century — the cosmology in which «matter» was full
real, but intrinsically inert.