Process Thought: A Very Basic Introduction

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Process Thought A Very Basic Introduction

• By Fr. Charles Allen, Ph.D.
• For a more detailed discussion of this topic, see
  Process Thought for Freethinkers Other
  Naturalists at
• www.therevdrcharleswallen.com/ProcessThoughtforFre
  ethinkers.doc

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What is process thought?

• Its a broad, mostly American philosophy of
  nature.
• It views the everyday world as, fundamentally,
  comprised of active processes (Ill call them
  activities), as opposed to inert substances.
• Some process thinkers call themselves theists
  (their critics dont believe them).
• Others are thoroughgoing naturalists.
• For more information (Stanford Encyclopedia of
  Philosophy) http//plato.stanford.edu/entries/pro
  cess-philosophy/

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Some Notable Process Thinkers
G. W. F. Hegel (?)
C. S. Peirce
Heraclitus
Karl Marx (?)
William James
John Dewey
George Herbert Mead
Bertrand Russell (?)
Alfred North Whitehead
Charles Hartshorne
Nicholas Rescher
Giles Deleuze
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Some Related Institutions
http//www.ctr4process.org/
http//www.csus.edu/cpns/
http//www.santafe.edu/
http//www.cscs.umich.edu/index.html
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Process thought in a nutshell

• 1. All things are activities or properties of
  activities.
• 2. All activities are interactiverelatively
  interrelated, yet relatively original.
• Different process thinkers add all sorts of
  details, but every time they do, they make the
  whole thing more debatable.
• So I suggest we stick to these two principles,
  and leave more detailed accounts for later.
• Inert things (e.g., particles, rocks, tables,
  chairs, etc.) are comprised of activities that
  interact to form relatively stable patterns.
• Some activities interact in ways that amplify
  their originality (e.g., people, animals, cells,
  genes, electrons, etc.).
• Interacting activities are the most concrete and
  influential realities anything else (particles,
  atoms, people, ideas, etc.) is somewhat abstract,
  though no less real, and not without influence.

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Is process thought empirical?

• Its as empirical as any worldview can be, and
  (arguably) more empirical than most.
• It claims to be experience-based.
• But it insists that experience always includes
  participation and interpretation, not just
  observation.
• It refuses to speculate about anything beyond
  conceivable experience.
• But it claims that there are certain principles
  found in everyday experience that turn out to be
  exemplified in any conceivable experience
  whatsoever.
• It cant be decisively proved or disproved by a
  crucial experiment.
• But neither can any other worldview like
  materialism, idealism, determinism, etc.
• Furthermore, many philosophers of science
  recognize that none of the central theories of
  any empirical science can be directly confirmed
  or refuted by any specific tests (on this, see
  the crucial discussion on Science and
  Pseudoscience by Imre Lakatos, available online
  at www.lse.ac.uk/collections/lakatos/scienceAndPse
  udoscienceTranscript.htm).
• But any ideas can still be critically assessed in
  terms of how readily they can describe an endless
  variety of situationsreal or imaginedand
  process thought welcomes that kind of assessment.

Central Theories
Peripheral Theories
Interpretive Observations
1. All things are activities or properties of
activities. 2. All activities are
interactiverelatively interrelated, yet
relatively original.
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What about materialism (or physicalism)?

• Some process thinkers are physicalists others,
  like Bertrand Russell, call themselves neutral
  monists others sound more idealistic.
• Obviously, a variety of interpretations are
  possible, and process materialism is one of them.
• There have been about as many different
  definitions of matter as there have been of
  God.
• Theres no good reason to assume matter cant be
  interactive.
• Hardly any physicist today thinks of matter as a
  bunch of inert billiard-ball-like particles.
• Under the right conditions, theres no reason to
  assume that interactive matter cant think or
  wonderthose are both interactive processes.
• So if your computer ever passes the Turing test,
  start treating it with more respect.

1. All things are activities or properties of
activities. 2. All activities are
interactiverelatively interrelated, yet
relatively original.
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What about reductionism?

• There are different kinds of reductionism.
• Process thought itself could be said to reduce
  everything to activities and their properties.
• Daniel Dennett makes a helpful distinction
  between good and greedy reductionism.
• Greedy reductionism confuses reducing with
  replacingas if you could understand an essay by
  simply looking up the meanings of each of its
  words.
• Good reductionism simply analyzes complex
  interactions in terms of simpler ones, without
  denying complexity, but without invoking any
  external agencies.
• Good reductionism and an informed holism dont
  have to compete, and process thought makes it
  easier to reconcile them.

1. All things are activities or properties of
activities. 2. All activities are
interactiverelatively interrelated, yet
relatively original.
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What about determinism?

• Obviously, process thought rejects extreme
  versions of determinismthe idea that an activity
  could be determined by other things in ways that
  would exclude any sort of originality.
• Some things may be exclusively determined by
  other things, but if thats the case, those
  things are not activities (though they still
  depend on activities).
• Granted, no matter how original an activity may
  be, it will also exemplify practically countless
  predictable and general properties originality
  is always relative.
• But every activity is more than the properties it
  exemplifies it exemplifies them in a relatively
  original, unrepeatable way.
• Process thinkers admit that originality is
  difficult to describedescriptions require
  abstractions, but originality, though relative,
  is never abstract.
• But we do experience originality in the novelty
  and unrepeatability of every momentto deny or
  exclude it would be anti-empirical.
• Maybe we need distinctions between good and
  greedy versions of determinism, as well as
  informed and fluffy versions of originality?

1. All things are activities or properties of
activities. 2. All activities are
interactiverelatively interrelated, yet
relatively original.
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What about natural selection?

• What other kind could there be?
• Varying traits survive only to the extent that
  they cohere with varying environments.
• There is no controlling external purpose (process
  naturalists and process theists agree on this).
• Many purposes do emerge in nature, but they are a
  result of everyday interactions, not external
  interventions.

1. All things are activities or properties of
activities. 2. All activities are
interactiverelatively interrelated, yet
relatively original.
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Why should naturalists care about process
thought?

• Process thought naturalizes the development of
  life, feelings, purposes, thoughts, rationality,
  artistic creativity, etc., more smoothly than
  mechanistic worldviews.
• In other words, it makes it easier to explain why
  life can have meaning and value without having to
  mention anything beyond the interactions of
  everyday existence.
• So it undercuts most of the arguments of popular
  theism.
• Many theists a) equate naturalism with greedy
  reductionism, and b) assume that theism is the
  only alternative to greedy reductionism.
• Process thought refutes both of these
  assumptions.
• Likewise, it helps to reconcile the aims of the
  natural sciences with the aims of the arts and
  humanities.
• It has successfully anticipated most of the novel
  developments in the sciences in the past century.
• There are process theists too (like me!), and
  their numbers are growing, but they may have more
  in common with process naturalism than with
  popular theism.

1. All things are activities or properties of
activities. 2. All activities are
interactiverelatively interrelated, yet
relatively original.
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The crucial point here

• Process thought REFRAMES most of the traditional
  debates about fundamental issues.
• If you accept the two principles of process
  thought, youll find that the meanings of terms
  like matter, mind, body, spirit, nature
  and God are all beginning to shift.
• They havent lost all continuity with their
  popular meanings, but theyre definitely
  shifting.
• And theres definitely room for conversation
  about when its OK to use them, and even about
  whether some of them have been rendered obsolete.

1. All things are activities or properties of
activities. 2. All activities are
interactiverelatively interrelated, yet
relatively original.
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Why Process Theists Process Naturalists Need
Each Other

• On the question of God, process naturalists, with
  Laplace, are convinced they have no need of that
  hypothesis.
• Process theists view God as the ultimate,
  all-interactive activity, not an hypothesis, nor
  an exception to process thoughts principles, but
  their ultimate integration.
• At this level of generality, there are no
  knock-down arguments or crucial experiments to
  settle which viewpoint is more reasonableboth
  can claim a kind of simplicity and adequacy to
  shared experience.
• But the reasonability of both views can still be
  critically and fruitfully debated.
• So far, whenever one group has produced an
  original argument to show the rational advantages
  of its own approach, the other has responded with
  a similarly original argument on behalf of its
  contrasting approach.
• In fact, at this level of generality, the ease
  with which proponents of related but contrasting
  worldviews can remain in critical conversation
  with one another is perhaps the most crucial test
  of their rational merits.

Laplace
Dewey
1. All things are activities or properties of
activities. 2. All activities are
interactiverelatively interrelated, yet
relatively original.
Whitehead