Event Universe

Event Universe
Author: Leemon B. McHenry
Publisher: Edinburgh University Press
Total Pages: 262
Release: 2015-07-01
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 1474404782

Leemon McHenry argues that Whitehead's metaphysics provides a better basis for achieving a unification of physical theory than a traditional substance metaphysics. He investigates the influence of Maxwell's electromagnetic field, Einstein's theory of relativity and quantum mechanics on the development of the ontology of events and compares Whitehead's theory to his contemporaries, C. D. Broad and Bertrand Russell, as well as W. V. Quine. In this way, McHenry defends the naturalised and speculative approach to metaphysics as opposed to analytical and linguistic methods that arose in the 20th century.

Whitehead's Metaphysics of Extension and Solidarity

Whitehead's Metaphysics of Extension and Solidarity
Author: Jorge Luis Nobo
Publisher: State University of New York Press
Total Pages: 466
Release: 1986-06-30
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 1438414803

At the base of Whitehead's philosophy of organism is a vision of the solidarity of all final actualities. Each actuality is a discrete individual enjoying autonomous self-determination, yet each also requires all other actualities as essential components and partial determinants of its own nature. This vision of universal solidarity, Nobo demonstrates, is the fundamental metaphysical thesis whose truth the categories and principles of Whitehead's philosophy were expressly designed to elucidate. The received interpretations of Whitehead's thought, Nobo shows, have ignored the mutual relevance of the solidarity thesis and the organic categoreal scheme and, for that reason, have grossly misrepresented many of Whitehead's most important metaphysical doctrines. Contending that the difficult tasks of interpreting and developing Whitehead's metaphysics presuppose an understanding of the solidarity thesis, Nobo explores that thesis and the metaphysical categories and principles most relevant to its elucidation. In the process, he not only corrects many misinterpretations but also develops important metaphysical doctrines that Whitehead neglected to make sufficiently explicit in his published writings. It is precisely in terms of the neglected doctrine of eternal extensive continuity, Nobo demonstrates, that the more puzzling aspects of the solidarity thesis are satisfactorily explained. He then shows that the extensional solidarity of all final actualities is an essential ingredient of the generalized conception of experience on which Whitehead builds his ontology, cosmology, and epistemology.

Principia Mathematica

Principia Mathematica
Author: Alfred North Whitehead
Publisher:
Total Pages: 688
Release: 1910
Genre: Logic, Symbolic and mathematical
ISBN:

Process-Relational Philosophy

Process-Relational Philosophy
Author: C. Robert Mesle
Publisher: Templeton Foundation Press
Total Pages: 136
Release: 2009-07-23
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 1599472082

Process thought is the foundation for studies in many areas of contemporary philosophy, theology, political theory, educational theory, and the religion-science dialogue. It is derived from Alfred North Whitehead's philosophy, known as process theology, which lays a groundwork for integrating evolutionary biology, physics, philosophy of mind, theology, environmental ethics, religious pluralism, education, economics, and more. In Process-Relational Philosophy, C. Robert Mesle breaks down Whitehead's complex writings, providing a simple but accurate introduction to the vision that underlies much of contemporary process philosophy and theology. In doing so, he points to a "way beyond both reductive materialism and the traps of Cartesian dualism by showing reality as a relational process in which minds arise from bodies, in which freedom and creativity are foundational to process, in which the relational power of persuasion is more basic than the unilateral power of coercion." Because process-relational philosophy addresses the deep intuitions of a relational world basic to environmental and global thinking, it is being incorporated into undergraduate and graduate courses in philosophy, educational theory and practice, environmental ethics, and science and values, among others. Process-Relational Philosophy: A Basic Introduction makes Whitehead's creative vision accessible to all students and general readers.

Quantum Mechanics and the Philosophy of Alfred North Whitehead

Quantum Mechanics and the Philosophy of Alfred North Whitehead
Author: Michael Epperson
Publisher: Fordham Univ Press
Total Pages: 279
Release: 2004-07-15
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 0823223191

This is an extended analysis of the intricate relationships between relativity theory, quantum mechanics and Alfred North Whitehead's cosmology. Michael Epperson illuminates the intersection of science and philosophy in Whitehead's work.

The Concept of Nature

The Concept of Nature
Author: Alfred North Whitehead
Publisher: Cosimo, Inc.
Total Pages: 213
Release: 2007-01-01
Genre: Science
ISBN: 1602062137

Hailed as "one of the most valuable books on the relation of philosophy and science," Alfred North Whitehead's The Concept of Nature, first published in 1920, was an important contribution to the development of philosophic naturalism. Examining the fundamental problems of substance, space, and time, Whitehead assesses the impact of Einstein's theories as well as the then-recent findings of modern physics on the concept of nature. For students and teachers of natural philosophy, this is essential reading. English mathematician and philosopher ALFRED NORTH WHITEHEAD (1861-1947) contributed significantly to 20th-century logic and metaphysics. With Bertrand Russell he cowrote the landmark Principia Mathematica, and also authored An Inquiry Concerning the Principles of Natural Knowledge, The Function of Reason, and Process and Reality.

Stubborn Fact and Creative Advance

Stubborn Fact and Creative Advance
Author: Thomas E. Hosinski, C. S. C.
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers
Total Pages: 285
Release: 1993-08-11
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 1461642620

"...an attractive alternative to Victor Lowe's Understanding Whitehead, Ivor Leclerc's Whitehead's Metaphysics, and Donald Sherburne's A Key to Whitehead's Process and Reality....Recommended for advanced undergraduates and beyond."-CHOICE

Modes of Learning

Modes of Learning
Author: George Allan
Publisher: SUNY Press
Total Pages: 238
Release: 2012-06-01
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 9781438441870

A highly accessible reading of Whitehead's writings on education and their connection to his metaphysics.

The Quantum of Explanation

The Quantum of Explanation
Author: Randall E. Auxier
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
Total Pages: 370
Release: 2017-03-31
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 1351792482

The Quantum of Explanation advances a bold new theory of how explanation ought to be understood in philosophical and cosmological inquiries. Using a complete interpretation of Alfred North Whitehead’s philosophical and mathematical writings and an interpretive structure that is essentially new, Auxier and Herstein argue that Whitehead has never been properly understood, nor has the depth and breadth of his contribution to the human search for knowledge been assimilated by his successors. This important book effectively applies Whitehead’s philosophy to problems in the interpretation of science, empirical knowledge, and nature. It develops a new account of philosophical naturalism that will contribute to the current naturalism debate in both Analytic and Continental philosophy. Auxier and Herstein also draw attention to some of the most important differences between the process theology tradition and Whitehead’s thought, arguing in favor of a Whiteheadian naturalism that is more or less independent of theological concerns. This book offers a clear and comprehensive introduction to Whitehead’s philosophy and is an essential resource for students and scholars interested in American philosophy, the philosophy of mathematics and physics, and issues associated with naturalism, explanation and radical empiricism.

Perspective in Whitehead's Metaphysics

Perspective in Whitehead's Metaphysics
Author: Stephen David Ross
Publisher: SUNY Press
Total Pages: 320
Release: 1983-01-01
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 9780873956574

Stephen David Ross presents an extensive, detailed, and critical interpretation of Whitehead's mature thought, emphasizing the fundamental role of perspective in Whitehead's cosmology, and tracing the conflicts and difficulties therein to tensions involving perspective in relation to other central features of Whitehead's thought. Ross isolates four principles as having a fundamental role in whitehead's metaphysics: perspective, cosmology, experience, and mechanical analysis. He argues that many of Whitehead's difficulties can be eliminated by raising the principle of perspective to prominence and by revising the other central features of Whitehead's theory accordingly. This book addresses key Whiteheadian texts and secondary interpretations of Whitehead. The discussion ranges over most of Whitehead's theory in Process and Reality, and offers a number of significant and, in some cases, novel views on different aspects of Whitehead's theory: perception, prehension, causation, objective immortality, self-causation, the extensive continuum, natural order, possiblity, concreteness, and God. Ross's concluding suggestions for modifying Whitehead's system promise to occasion much debate among process philosophers, theologians, and anyone concerned with Whitehead's thought.