“....Matter is essentially dynamic, essentially temporal, essentially changeful. Objects (or matter) can’t be conceptualized as things whose existence can be grasped separately from their temporality. What is matter, on this mistaken view? A dust-covered china doll in a frozen pirouette on a chimney piece, a rock, an old boot, something just there, supremely motionless before our eyes, something that proposes itself as—in some fundamental sense—comprehensively given to us in this confrontation alone, wholly given to us in its basic essential quality as matter. And all this is wholly wrong....”
(Strawson, “Nietzsche on Mind and Nature”, in https://www.academia.edu/3051045/Nietzsches_Metaphysics_2015)

I never said you had no support for your thesis on the physics of materialism. Nevertheless, the topic is the metaphysics of it, which grants the physics but still asks why it should be so.

.Matter is essentially dynamic, essentially temporal, essentially changeful. — Mww

Matter, is essentially temporal, but it does not change. It is the aspect of physical existence which does not change as time passes, hence 'inertia', and "conservation of mass'. That's the way matter was defined by Aristotle, and the meaning has been maintained. Form is the aspect which is dynamic and changing.

What is matter, on this mistaken view? — Mww

Notice, matter as dynamic, and changeful is described by Nietzsche as a mistaken view. That's what I am saying too.

So the issue is what is a true representation of "matter"? And the answer is that it is that aspect of things which does not change as time passes, while the form of the thing changes. Here's what Aristotle says in Bk 2 of his Physics about "material cause", under 'The Conditions of Change': "that out of which a thing comes to be and which persists". In his Metaphysics he explains how the matter is the potential for an actual thing. So if we talk about bronze for example, as a material, or wood, we are not talking about any particular bronze thing, or wooden thing, but a material which is potentially many different things.

The "mistaken view" conflates matter with form. It is common in monism because monists do not accept the principles of separation required to understand this.

Footnote 18:
“....Some philosophers enjoy arguing about how best to characterize the relation between a statue and the lump of bronze of which it is made. This can be as good as playing chess. It’s absorbing, and provides great scope for ingenuity. But it has nothing to do with real metaphysics, for in real metaphysics the initial description of the case (we have a statue and the lump of bronze of which it is made) already gives us all the relevant facts. It does not itself give rise to any metaphysical issue. All that remains is juggling play, play with our existing concepts and categories and ways of talking, questions about how best to couch things given those concepts and categories and ways of talking...”

I bring this up because it reminds me of.....

we can assign to it the capacity to move, or be moved, and it is the movement of it which affects the senses. — Metaphysician Undercover

....in that the assignment of capacity to move or be moved is all the relevant facts we need to prove the reality of material objects, the actually movement of them claimed to be that which affects the senses being the juggling play with our existing concepts.

Well, I think the actual movement of material objects is something more than the juggling play of our concepts. But, we all see things differently, and that's why there's so many different metaphysics.

But it has nothing to do with real metaphysics, for in real metaphysics the initial description of the case (we have a statue and the lump of bronze of which it is made) already gives us all the relevant facts. — Mww

The question is, how is it the case that the statue is something different from the lump of bronze. Intuitively, we'd be inclined to say they are both the same, the statue is the lump of bronze. But the lump of bronze may be many different things, while the statue can only be the statue, or else it is not the statue. So clearly there is a very real difference between the statue and the lump of bronze. Call this the 'juggling play with out existing concepts' if you like, but isn't that what metaphysics is?

If a form isn't material then what is it made of?

If a form isn't material then what is it made of? — Gregory

A basketball is spherical. The material is leather. The form is a sphere.

How would I know? Do you know what matter's made of?

There might be issues with point 4. There have been attempts to redefine physics fully in terms of relationships so as to avoid the necessity of numbers being "real." Apparently they have been somewhat successful, at least for Newton's laws, although far more convoluted than the mathematical versions.

There is a lecture of this in the Great Courses' course on philosophy of physics.

There might be issues with point 4. There have been attempts to redefine physics fully in terms of relationships so as to avoid the necessity of numbers being "real." — Count Timothy von Icarus

As noted in the OP, the purpose of this discussion was to discuss the absolute presuppositions of a materialist view before 1905, before much of modern physics.

Sorry, I took that to mean "as of the observations of 1905," not as "only things published before 1905." The attempt to do physics without math was driven by the Quine-Putnam indispensability argument, which came after 1905, but has nothing to do with quantum mechanics or changes to physics after 1905.

My bad.

Sorry, I took that to mean "as of the observations of 1905," not as "only things published before 1905." The attempt to do physics without math was driven by the Quine-Putnam indispensability argument, which came after 1905, but has nothing to do with quantum mechanics or changes to physics after 1905. — Count Timothy von Icarus

I was just trying to get a handle on how most materialist scientists and philosophers saw things before quantum mechanics and other advances were made.