5

I'm currently reading through Nicholas Rescher's Process Philosophy: A Survey of Basic Issues and early in it, he says:

The work of actually developing the process doctrine to the point where it can be compared with other major philosophical projects like materialism or absolute idealism still remains to be done.

I'd not yet heard of absolute idealism so I do a quick internet search and find out that (if I can be so clumsy in summary) essentially the idea is that the entire universe is a single mind that is working towards self realization.

I quickly remembered an earlier part of the survey of process philosophy where Rescher overviews philosophy of mind within a process philosophy metaphysics. The idea (again, summary) is that the experience of a mind arises from a process (as do all things in process philosophy) and according to my additional research some process-minded philosophers think this can even lead to panexperientialism or the idea that all being has mind in some capacity just as we humans do (although likely very different for very different things).

If process is the most fundamental ontological entity and necessarily gives rise to mind in the panexperientialist way, then would it be valid operation to try to cheat process philosophy into a "major philosophical project" by saying that this whole being of the universe gives rise to a mind, namely, the one referenced in absolute idealism? What kind of issues might you run into while doing that and have I interpreted either discipline in an egregious way?

I ran these thoughts through a chatbot to try to pick out any obvious issues and the objection it gave me was that process philosophers tend to believe in the need for process to continue forever whereas absolute idealists believe that there's a self realization goal that must be met in some end state. I don't know enough about either discipline at this stage to speak definitively about any of this, but it feels like at the very least you can fit the entire act of self-realization in absolute idealism into the definition of a process and at worst you have to come up with an idea for how the process ends. Or maybe you can reference the mathematical concept of limits where there is both an ongoing "approach" and a fixed "goal" that is never actually reached.

Improve this question
6
  • 1
    "Process philosophy" is a vague label and classical absolute idealism (Hegel's especially) already was a variant of "process philosophy" (speculative process metaphysics), or at least a precursor to it. Having/not having 'final goal' is not particularly central to the process conception, it is a tangential metaphysical preference. See SEP's historical overview for comparisons of absolute idealism with other variants of process metaphysics.
    – Conifold
    Commented Sep 20 at 0:11
  • 1
    He just uses the label more narrowly, with more recent and more analytic variants of it in mind. SEP discusses their distinctive features.
    – Conifold
    Commented Sep 20 at 0:26
  • 2
    Contemporary "process philosophy" often refers to Whitehead's school of thought ("Process and Reality"). It can, in some way, be viewed as a major modification of an absolute idealistic framework (in my personal opinion, mainly Schellingian rather than Hegelian), but that might hinder a bit from the understanding of both philosophies. This is actually being done by modern philosophers like Matthew Segal and most of the Center for Process Studies people (Andrew Davis, John Cobb Jr., David Ray Griffin). But as stated, both philosophies contain more nuances.
    – Yechiam Weiss
    Commented Sep 21 at 13:27
  • 1
    BTW iirc Whitehead himself offers a sort of absolute idealistic version in the last few chapters of Process and Reality (a bit more "naturalized" than the 18-19th century versions).
    – Yechiam Weiss
    Commented Sep 21 at 13:29
  • 1
    Oh and BTW 2: there's an interesting talk between Matthew Segall and Bernardo Katsrup that represents almost exactly this discussion.
    – Yechiam Weiss
    Commented Sep 21 at 13:40

1 Answer 1

Reset to default
3

The distinction here is between something that exists in principle and something that exists in potential. In other words, if we are given an acorn, there are two possible ways of looking at it:

  • There is a theoretical, idealized oak tree that the acorn strives (and to some extent always fails) to achieve, or…
  • there is a set of potentials extant within the acorn that are developed over time, without any specific, pre-ordained goal.

What we're wrestling with is the seeming paradox that things can grow and change over time yet still maintain a consistent identity. The first position asserts that identity is pre-given. This covers the continuity of identity over time, but creates some metaphysical quandaries about what these 'theoretical, idealized' templates are and where they might exist, and what the rational for change might be. The second position holds that identity is merely a matter of process continuity: that a thing is identified as itself, no matter how it changes, because the changes are smooth and continuous. This accounts for change well, but has a harder time explaining why (say) as acorn always develops into an oak, and not sometimes into an elm, or a carrot, or a horse.

If we take this to a universal level, we end up with the difference between brahman and dao. Brahman is universal consciousness: the consciousness of the universe seeking to know itself through the consciousness of its elements. Dao is pure process: the universe moving through its ineffable patterns without conscious effort. They are largely incommensurate worldviews; honestly, worldviews split over the question of whether identity matters at all. It's not something that will be easily rectified.

Improve this answer
13
  • This is maybe what I'm failing to understand: "without any specific, pre-ordained goal". What is inherent to process philosophy that a process cannot have or perhaps imply a goal? Can we not give an acorn continuous change but say that it changes "oakly" as compared to a carrot seed which changes "carrotly"?
    – Matt Hauff
    Commented Sep 21 at 23:29
  • A goal is only given in hindsight (?) "It ain't over till it's over" as Yogi Berra said.
    – mudskipper
    Commented Sep 22 at 0:42
  • I'm sorry @mudskipper I don't understand the point (or was it just color commentary?)
    – Matt Hauff
    Commented Sep 22 at 0:44
  • Np - Of course you can say that the acorn changes "oakly", but then it seems you're reverting back to goals as fixed given (ideal principle). There is nothing wrong with that as such, except that it might make you forget that the actual process may veer "off course". From a daoist "point of view" you can only say something like: "Everything is just so" or rather "Every happening happens just so". (Don't know if this makes sense.) The poetic meme (for the self) is an empty boat drifting aimlessly over the water.
    – mudskipper
    Commented Sep 22 at 1:01
  • 1
    @MattHauff: Think of Platonic idealism or Abrahamic theology. In both cases 'human' is an ideal — one a Platonic form, the other an image of God — towards which individual humans are meant to strive. The thought that 'human' might eventually change to something different (much less superior) is antithetical to the concept of such an ideal. I won't say it's impossible, but it is difficult to conceptualize something which is both ideal (ostensibly perfect) and malleable (subject to change).
    – Ted Wrigley
    Commented Sep 22 at 5:33

You must log in to answer this question.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged .