A History of Philosophy | 63 Whitehead's "Science and Modern World"

Nature itself is value-laden, not value-neutral; values are not created by human minds and imposed on nature but are intrinsic to nature itself.

“value is not something that we create and add bring to nature the nature itself is value Laden and so he speaks of the aesthetic orderers and I deal with of a future in as much as this is a process philosophy the process is directional what direction to be achievement of value that ideal so it is a value achieving process laden with the possibility the potential but a value achieving process a teleological process”

Concrete fact is process, fundamentally constituted by prehensive events; each event is an individualized matter of fact arising from individualization of underlying activity, not from substantial independence.

“concrete fact is process its primary analysis is into underlying activity of prehension s' in the realize prehensile events each event is a matter of fact individual matter of fact issuing from an individual ization of substrate activity not substrate stuff that activity individualization does not mean substantial substance independence”

Whitehead reinterprets Berkeley's idealist claim 'to be is to be perceived' as 'to be is to be prehended'—reality is constituted by prehensions (acts of apprehension) rather than by perceived objects, with God's thinking making prehensions, not things.

“there's prehension it's plain that's the case there's apprehension here in this place of things which have a reference to other places what you see here are the real ones that exist at a distance prehension is both separate and preach spaces but separative and pre and prehensile well Berkeley's sentences contend that what constitutes the realization of natural entities is being perceived yes to be is to be perceived remember Berkeley well we can substitute the concept that the realization the reality is a gathering of things into the unity of apprehension to be is to pretend not to be is to perceive or to be perceived but to be is to pretend or to be pre handed yes a so Berkeley had a clue but he misread what what is what is realized the reality that comes into being is the prehension not the thing God's thinking doesn't make things it makes pretensions”

In Whitehead's later work, God has a threefold nature: God in the primordial mode is the unity of all conceptual possibilities (eternal objects); God in the consequent mode is affected by all actual events through prehension; God in the superjective mode holds out possibilities to new events, serving as the principle of limitation.

“the threefold nature of God you see a God in the mode of God in his primordial nature you see is the unity of all conceptual possibilities God in his consequent nature is God is affected by all events which he pre hence God in his super ejected nature is God holding out possibilities to new events in the world you see in its by that super ejected nature that he's the principle of limitation”

Whitehead holds an aesthetic theory of value in which all values ultimately reduce to aesthetic values: truth is valued for its aesthetic satisfaction, and moral goodness contributes to the aesthetic harmony of the whole.

“he seems to have an aesthetic theory of value let us say all values seemed ultimately to reduced to aesthetic values truth is valued for its aesthetic satisfaction goodness moral value contributes to the aesthetic harmony of the whole is ported to that reason so he has an aesthetic theory of value”

Whitehead's metaphysics is revolutionary because it posits a value-achieving, teleological natural order in contrast to modern science and earlier philosophy, which conceive of nature as value-free, blind, purposeless process and causal mechanism.

“that notion of a value achieving natural order that makes Whitehead so revolutionary in comparison with modern science and earlier philosophy a value achieving natural order so you can anticipate then that the general theme of the book will be to critique the kind of supposed natural order which is value free bear blind fact blind process causal mechanism without rhyme or reason”

Whitehead appeals to the Romantic poets (like Wordsworth and Shelley) as capturing concrete human experience and reacting against the aesthetic sterility of the mechanistic worldview, treating poetry as a source of philosophical insight into reality.

“he takes it that the poetry is dealing with concrete human experience not with theoretical abstraction Yesi but it's capturing the experience and so he takes it but the Romantic poets like Wordsworth Shelley reacting against that aesthetically sterile universe of mechanistic science so his chapter is called the romantic reaction reaction against what well it's the reaction against the sterility of that mechanistic world view from the standpoint of whether romantics regard as concrete human experience”

Whitehead uses 'vibratory existence' to describe the transient, coming-and-going nature of particular things, which applies equally to organisms (which are biodegradable), quanta of energy in quantum physics (which come and go), and events (which are the ultimate units of reality).

“vibratory existence meaning that they come and go vibratory existence and you can get that in various ways you'll find him talking about it in talking of John Locke's notion of simple ideas...later on when he gets to talking about quantum physics he comes back to this notion of vibratory existence because the quanta of energy in quantum physics come and go then if you think of the life cycle of any organism primitive or advanced we come and go we're biodegradable well the unit of reality in his theme is the event events come and go vibratory existence”

The dichotomy between mind and matter (Cartesian dualism) is a sheer abstraction; every event has both physical and conceptual aspects (a double-aspect theory) because events are constituted by both physical prehension (causation from prior events) and conceptual prehension (relation to eternal possibilities).

“chapter four critiques the 18th century thinking we're the antithesis of mind and bear matter is another sheer abstraction another sheer abstraction whitehead it turns out has a double aspect theory so that any event has both its physical and its conceptual aspect now you recognize that if you hark back to the analysis of an event and in his analysis of an event to the idea of prehension which is the way in which in a process objective data come into the act by what he calls physical prehension physical causation...and in addition to that it's the way in which eternal objects those eternal possibilities come into the act by conceptual prehension”

In the 18th-century atomistic view, space and time have a separative character (things are separated in space and separated in time); Whitehead argues space and time also have a prehensile character—prehension (causal connectedness) is of the very nature of events, so space-time events are intrinsically interrelated.

“the separative character of space and time so that things are separated in space separated in time that's involved in the atomism notion space and time separate us one from another now he maintains that's just a part of the story not the whole and insists that space and time in addition to having a separate separative character also have a prehensile character prehensile yeah that is to say prehension whether it's physical or whether it's conceptual is of the very nature of an event so that space-time events are interrelated by physical prehension yeah it's at the very nature of things the causal connectedness is intrinsic to the whole notion of an event”

Henri Bergson protested against the notion of simple location and instantaneous material configurations as a distortion of nature due to intellectual spatialization; Whitehead agrees with Bergson's critique but argues that spatialization is not necessary to intellectual apprehension—it is merely an accidental error of mistaking abstract for concrete.

“this simple location of instantaneous material configurations simple occasion of instantaneous material configurations is what Barrett's son has protested against well you've read a bit about Bergson in stop okay another process philosopher as far as it concerns time yes bearings on stressed relativity of time he protested against it so far as it's taken to be the fundamental fact of concrete nature he calls it a distortion of nature due to the intellectual spatialization of things I agree with parent son but I don't agree that it's a vise necessary to the intellectual apprehension of nature Edison thought it was and in subsequent lectures i endeavor to show that this spatialization is the expression of more concrete facts under the guise of very abstract logical constructions there's an error but it's merely the accidental error of mistaking the abstract for the concrete an example of what I call a fallacy of misplaced concreteness”

The faith in the order of nature that has made science possible cannot be justified by inductive generalization (due to Hume's problem with induction) but springs from direct inspection of the nature of things disclosed in immediate, concrete experience.

“faith in the order of nature which has made possible the growth of science is a particular example of a deeper faith this faith in the order of nature cannot be justified by inductive generalization why not well you remember Humes problem with induction you think the inductive generalization beyond present experience involves the principle of causation of which we have no empirical evidence well he's going to come back to that later up he anticipates it here that faith in the order of nature cannot be justified by any inductive generalization it Springs from direct inspection of the nature of things disclosed in our immediate present experience concrete experience”

The fallacy of simple location is the mistaken assertion that things have fixed locations in space and time abstracted from all other relations; in reality, locations are defined by relationships to other things, and when time is included, there is no simple location because all movement is relative.

“the fallacy of simple location is the assertion that things have fixed locations in space and time that if here is a spatial field things have fixed locations just like that simple location that is to say you think of their location as abstracted from everything else whereas in reality these locations are defined in terms of relationship to other things and by the time you bring the time dimension into the notion of spatial location then obviously there is no simple location you see in terms of the relationship between these three points if in the process of time this is moving that way and this is moving that way and this is say stationary then what you say about the relationship between point a and point B is going to be different at different times”

In concrete experience, we directly know that we are more than ourselves; our fragmentary experience sounds the depths of reality. We know that isolated details demand a system, that this system includes logical harmony (the order of nature as an iron necessity) and aesthetic harmony (the value-achieving ideal molding the flux).

“to know that in being ourselves we are more than ourselves to know that our experience dim and fragmentary as it is yet sounds the utmost depths of reality to know that detached details merely in order to be themselves demand that they should find themselves in a system of things to know that this system includes the harmony of logical rationality the order of nature the harmony of aesthetic achievement is that value achievement”

Whitehead calls Christianity 'a religion in search of a metaphysics'—suggesting that the metaphysical systems used to support Christianity have been inadequate, and his process metaphysics provides a more adequate metaphysical grounding for Christian theology.

“he speaks in one place of Christianity as a religion in search of a metaphysics a religion in search of a metaphysics what he means is that the metaphysical systems which have been pressed into service are inadequate what Christianity needs is a more adequate metaphysic and I think that granted his conception of Christianity which you remember is that of the Galilean peasant remember that phrase it's the Galilean Jesus granted that conception of Christianity he sees his metaphysic as the metaphysic for which Christian religion may be like which may account for the process theology that has come out of it”

Concrete experience—particularly the phenomenological description of a self-conscious perceptual event—is the paradigm through which Whitehead views everything else, serving as the lens for understanding all phenomena.

“his phenomenological description of a self conscious perceptual event no of a perceptual event in a self conscious being is the the lens through which he is able to see everything else you see that's the paradigm switch the metaphor”

Hume's problem of induction arises from his theory of external relations: because causal connections are not directly experienced (only constant conjunction of events), and because there is no internal relation between present and future experience, inductive generalizations about unobserved futures cannot be empirically justified.

“there are no internal relationships so that the association of ideas is by some sort of psychological process but there is nothing intrinsic to any one I'd rich means that something else is around the corner in other words it was the theory of external relations in Humes at a mystic view of ideas and impressions which means that you do not therefore have any impression of the causal connection between experiences or ideas or events the causal connectedness would be a relationship which you don't experience those relationships all you experience is constant conjunction sequence a followed by B always a followed by B always a followed by B but you don't see the relationship the causal connection is unknown and because the causal connection to what is as yet a beyond present experience is unknown how can you do make inductive generalizations”

The fallacies of simple location and misplaced concreteness are the cardinal sins of mechanistic philosophy because they fail the test of empirical adequacy, as these abstractions are inadequate to concrete experience.

“there's nothing that could be said about you that's worse from Whitehead standpoint that you that you engage in the fallacy of simple location or the fallacy of misplaced abstraction those are the unpardonable sin philosophical yeah and his his reason for this is that they fail the test of empirical adequacy because abstractions of that sort of just not adequate to concrete experience”

The word 'perceive' in common usage carries connotations of cognitive apprehension, so Whitehead introduces the term 'prehension' to designate the non-cognitive form of apprehension that may or may not be cognitive.

“the word perceives in our common usage is shot through with the notion of cognitive apprehension so the word apprehension even with the adjective cognitive omitted so I use the word prehension for unn continent evaporation apprehension which may or may not be cognitive”

Chapters 7 and 8 of 'Science and the Modern World' (not assigned for reading) address electromagnetic field theory, quantum physics, and relativity theory as the scientific basis for Whitehead's metaphysical position, as modern physics reveals internal relationships, relativity of space-time, and events rather than mechanistic things.

“the two chapters I omitted seven and eight I have to do with electromagnetic field theory quantum physics relativity theory which are the scientific basis for the position he's taking you see because they talk of internal relationships they talk of relativity of space-time they talk of events rather than mechanistic things so the combination of the two concrete experience modern science”

God is the ultimate limitation—the principle of limitation that explains why certain actualities emerge from boundless possibilities; God's existence is the ultimate irrationality in the sense that no reason can be given for God's nature, as God's nature is itself the ground of rationality.

“God is the ultimate limitation his existence is the ultimate irrationality in the sense that you can't give reasons for God emerging it is the existence of God that is the reason for the actual entities emerging the to emerge and the activity of God God is the ultimate limitation for no reason can be given for just that limitation which it stands in his nature to impose God is not concrete he is the ground of concrete actuality no reason can be given for the nature of God because that nature is the ground of rationality”

Value is the intrinsic reality of an event, the outcome of the limitation of eternal possibilities to what is actually actualized; aesthetic attainment occurs through this limiting of boundless possibilities to concrete actuality.

“value is the word I use for the intrinsic reality of an event the satisfaction achieved value is an element which permeates through and through the poetic view of nature...value is the outcome of limitation that is to say of all the eternal possibilities value is achieved when those possibilities are narrowed down to what is actualized”

An event has a lifecycle: it begins with initial objective data that give rise to a new event, develops through to a final satisfaction (culmination), which then becomes the thesis for the next antithesis of further objective data precipitating another event, mirroring but with altered vocabulary Hegel's thesis-antithesis-synthesis dialectic.

“an event has a lifecycle from the initial objective data which give rise to a new event the through to the final satisfaction the culmination which then becomes the thesis for the next antithesis of further objective data which precipitate another event is he like in Hegel thesis antithesis synthesis and that synthesis then is the thesis for the next thesis antithesis synthesis”

The fixed scientific cosmology presupposes 'irreducible brute matter'—unconscious, valueless, purposeless stuff spread through space—following a fixed routine imposed by external relations (relations that do not spring from the essential nature of things).

“there persists throughout the whole period and he's talking about 16th 17th century the fixed scientific cosmology which presupposes the ultimate fact of an irreducible root matter irreducible brute matter that stuff something you know not what okay spread throughout space in a flux of configurations in itself such material is since less that is to say unconscious value purposeless it just does what it does following a fixed routine imposed by external relations which don't spring from the nature of its being”

John Locke's account of experience as composed of atomistic simple ideas—disconnectable, discrete units combined and separated by psychological association—mirrors the mechanistic atomism of the material world and shares the same philosophical problems: both reduce to atoms with no internal relationships and only incidental spatial relations.

“you'll find him talking about it in talking of John Locke's notion of simple ideas that is to say atomistic ideas so that those constituents of their so-called experience...we have to associate them with the psychological principles of association combining and separating ideas”