Change refers to a difference in a state of affairs at different points in
time. Although it is a familiar experience, an analysis of change provides subtle problems which have occupied
philosophers since the
Presocratics.
Heraclitus is the first philosopher known to have directly raised such issues, with
aphorisms such as "one cannot step into the same river twice". The
Eleatics were particularly concerned with change and raised a number of problems, including
Zeno's paradoxes, which caused them to go as far as insisting that change was impossible, and that reality was one and unchanging. Later philosophers would reject this conclusion, instead developing systems such as
atomism in attempts to circumvent the Eleatic problems. In the
modern era, some of these problems would enter the domain of
mathematics, with the development of
calculus and
analysis. These developments were regarded by some as solving problems of change, but others maintain that philosophical issues persist.