As machines have become increasingly smart and have entangled human thinking with artificial intelligences, it seems no longer possible to distinguish among levels of decision-making that occur in the newly formed space between critical reasoning, logical inference and sheer calculation. Since the 1980s, computational systems of information processing have evolved to include not only deductive methods of decision, whereby results are already implicated in their premises, but have crucially shifted towards an adaptive practice of learning from data, an inductive method (...) of retrieving information from the environment and establishing general premises. This shift in logical methods of decision-making does not simply concern technical apparatuses, but is a symptom of a transformation in logical thinking activated with and through machines. This article discusses the pioneering work of Katherine Hayles, whose study of the cybernetic and computational infrastructures of our culture particularly clarifies this epistemological transformation of thinking in relation to machines. (shrink)

Well-being depends not only on _what_ happens but also on _when_ it happens. There are temporal aspects of well-being, and to a large extent those aspects are about relative timing—about being “in-tact.” On the one hand, there is a perspectival aspect about being in-tact with one’s past, present, and future or, in a less involved sense, with one’s life as a whole. On the other hand, there is a synchronization aspect of being in-tact; and this aspect occurs on different levels: (...) It might be about the alignment between different temporal domains—such as time as individually perceived and physical or intersubjective time. Or it might be about a single domain, especially the inner dynamics of individual time. The danger of not experiencing and acknowledging the relational character of these different timings likely leads to a substantial loss in the variety of human experience. Important aspects of subjective and intersubjective experience might fade away. The present paper discusses these aspects of well-being along the lines of distinctions and concepts prominently used in the metaphysics and the phenomenology of time. Thus, the paper also aims to complement the existing literature by bringing together important strands of current philosophical research. (shrink)

This interview with the philosopher Bernard Stiegler was conducted in Paris on 28 January 2015, and first appeared in Dutch translation in the journal De uil van Minerva. The conversation begins by discussing the fundamental place occupied by the concept of ‘technics’ in Stiegler’s work, and how the ‘constitutivity’ of technics does and does not relate to Kant and Husserl. Stiegler is then asked about his relationship with Deleuze, and he responds by focusing on the concept of quasi-causality, but also (...) by arguing that there is a certain trajectory in Deleuze’s thought, situating his own philosophy in relation to its various moments. Stiegler is then asked to respond to the Charlie Hebdo terrorist attacks carried out three weeks prior to the interview. After making a couple of precautionary remarks, Stiegler relates such occurrences to the problem of what he calls ‘spiritual poverty’, to the intensification of ‘negative sublimation’ that can occur when there is a disconnection between the generations, and more generally to the growth of nihilism. All of these phenomena relate to the exploitation of technology by a virulent capitalism that irrationally believes that only the market is rational. After consideration of the complex historical relationship between Islam and modernization, and of both of these to Nietzsche’s ‘death of God’, and after recalling the destructive role played by the West in the rise of fundamentalism and jihadism, Stiegler concludes by reflecting on the fact that, ultimately, ‘intellectuals’ have failed to use technologies in ways that produce alternatives to consumerism. (shrink)

In recent years, the relation between studying and learning has been a topic of debate. This article is mainly interested in a concept of study practices, conceived of as practices that are strongly engaged with issues of living together in a superdiverse city. Such practices firstly require to think the relation between studying and learning in other-than-oppositional terms, and secondly, to raise questions concerning the political role of education. The aim of the article is double in that it wants to (...) further elaborate the concept of study practices in relation to a concrete practice on the one hand, and, on the other, that it has the objective to rethink in educational terms the notion of solidarity—deeply entwined with matters of living together in superdiversity. These aims are pursued based on an analysis of the study practice of System_D, a film festival in the disadvantaged neighborhoods of Brussels, drawing on the work of Isabelle Stengers and Donna Haraway. (shrink)

In this interview, Brian Massumi discusses the possibility of a collective practice of experimentation beyond the infernal alternatives between the state authoritarianism and a narrow and exclusionary notion of freedom based on the individual, reinforced by the Covid-19 pandemic. This requires diagnosing the mix of forces at play, in other words, examining the interlinkages of various modes of power. Analysis of the ecology of powers then invokes a positive project that is inventing an aesthetics of the earth. An aesthetics of (...) the earth is a call for a more-than-human relational ethics, which takes place in intricate co-composition with the earth and its emergent strata of all kinds: viral, bacterial, vegetal, animal, human, technological. Thus, from the ecology of powers to an aesthetics of the earth, Massumi proposes a politics of potential that is diagnostic rather than prescriptive yet encourages experimentation towards a postcapitalist future at this critical juncture of our epoch. (shrink)

It has often been noticed that Plato's metaphysical view of being is dipolar. The purpose of the present article is to detail what it means to say that being is dipolar in Plato. Further, I will explore the extent to which dipolarity in Whitehead is indebted to Plato and the extent to which Whitehead's dipolarity is different from Plato's. In this regard I will concentrate on Whitehead's recently published Harvard Lectures.

The concept of biological mimicry is viewed as a ‘process of life’ theory rather than a ‘process of change’ theory—regardless of the historical interest and heuristic value of the subject for the study of evolution. Mimicry is a dynamic ecological system reflecting the possibilities for mutualism and parasitism created by a pre-established bipartite signal-based relationship between two organisms – a potential model and its signal receiver (potential operator). In a mimicry system agency and perception play essential, interconnected roles. Mimicry thus (...) describes emergent biologically meaningful relationships based on synergy, and is not an object-based theory. Biosemiotics offers a particularly valuable discipline for analysing the dynamics and nuances of mimicry systems, and can thus pave the way for a better and more complete understanding of how mimicry has evolved in the past, and how it might evolve in the future—presented here with special reference to the need for an integrated, ‘third way of evolution’ approach to biological relativity. A revised definition of mimicry is proposed. (shrink)

It is common for social theorists to utilize the metaphors of ‘flow’, ‘fluidity’, and ‘liquidity’ in order to substantiate the ways in which speed and mobility form the basis for a new kind of information or network society. Yet rarely have these concepts been sufficiently theorized in order to establish their relevance or appropriateness. This article contends that the notion of flow as utilized in social theory is profoundly metaphysical in nature, and needs to be judged as such. Beginning with (...) a discussion of the accelerating timescape that characterizes the network society, it will then move on to examine three main issues with this ‘metaphysics of flux’. First, that the concept of flows unjustly privileges the process of becoming and, as a result, is unable to account for the materiality, substantiality, and agency of the objects being mobilized, and the contingency of their mediation. Second, that it posits the accelerating tendencies of capital as an ontological inevitability, thus discounting resistance to such forces. Finally, that it ignores the human faculty for reason and speculative thought in developing alternative means of political praxis. The solution, it will be argued, is not to abandon metaphysical accounts of the network society, but rather to challenge those accounts that, in exhibiting a crude empiricism, work to justify the status quo. (shrink)

In Taking Care of Youth and the Generations, Bernard Stiegler develops an account of the pedagogical responsibilities which follow from rhythmic intergenerational flows, involving the creation of milieus which care for and pay attention to the future, toward the creation of nootechnical milieus. Such milieus are defined by their objects of attention: intellectual life, spiritual life, and political life; taken together: noetic life. Such is the claim Alfred North Whitehead makes when arguing that the sole object of education is life (...) and the creation of an art of life which is itself a rhythmic adventure.The purpose of this paper is three-fold. First, to clarify the importance of Stiegler’s reading of Aristotle’s notion of the noetic soul in our thinking about the role, purpose, and function of educational institutions in relation to intellective, spiritual, and political life. In this paper, I will fuse this discussion with a Whiteheadian approach to rhythm, developing what I call a ‘rhythmic nootechnics’ in the service of ‘nootechnical evolution’ as, I argue, Whitehead’s approach to rhythm allows to clarify and enrich Stiegler’s reading of Aristotle. Second, and as indicated, to explore the relationship between Whitehead and Stiegler, insofar as the former has become an increasing reference point for the latter, but this relationship remains unexplored in the literature. Third, to apply this concept of ‘rhythmic nootechnics’ to think about what transformations at the level of pedagogy and politics are necessary to reinvent the university from this Stieglerian and Whiteheadian perspective. (shrink)

To examine Heidegger's pedagogy is to be invited into a particular era and cultural reality—starting in Weimar Germany and progressing into the rise and fall of the Third Reich. In his attempt to reform the German university in a strictly hierarchical, authoritarian and nationalistic mold, Heidegger addressed one group of students and professors and not another. The petit‐bourgeois student and the future philosophers he invited with his ‘logic of recruitment’ into the corps of instructors, would share his coded language with (...) its built‐in taboos and censorship. The result was a rhetoric of absolute self‐reference and a semiotic of pure propaganda, based on the evocation of the ancient Greeks in which the philosopher meant to project all that was properly Germanic. Heidegger's rhetoric is exclusionary; its politics and its philosophy are interpenetrating. His lecture courses grew increasingly poeticized, and thus mired in ambiguity, evasion, elision, avoidance, grandiloquence. Parallels are drawn in this essay between Heidegger and our time. Is Heidegger's insistence on autocratic controls within the German university comparable to the corporate positions taken today by some educators? How does the shifting relation between disciplines affect the role of the specialist? How might the sciences morales or humanities, along with the much maligned ‘humanism’, be redefined morally and holistically? (shrink)

‘Speculation’ originally meant ‘reflective observation’. It came to mean ‘conjecture’ or ‘mere conjecture’ as philosophers strove for certainty, consecrating science as rigorously acquired knowledge accumulated through application of the scientific method and devalued the cognitive status of other discourses. The present conventional meaning of speculation, where the place of observation has disappeared, is a by-product of this consecration. In this entry I show how through efforts to defend the status of these other discourses, the original meaning of ‘speculation’ was not (...) only revived but built upon by speculative philosophers. They showed that speculation is primordial to all experience and thinking, with past speculations embodied in language as ‘dead’ metaphors. Revealing the possibility of elaborating alternative metaphors frees us not only from these dead metaphors to overcome the dead-ends of current science, opening up new possibilities for enquiry, but the possibility of reconceiving ourselves and our place in nature. In this way, speculation makes it possible to transform ourselves, creating radically new ways of living and new forms of life. On this view, speculation, by opening new possibilities, could free us from the destructive trajectories of current civilization. (shrink)

A summary is provided of Ruyer's important contribution, also a reversal from some conclusions held in his secondary doctoral dissertation, about the limits inherent in technological progress, and an attempt is made to show the coherence of this position to Ruyer's metaphysics. Simondon's response is also presented, and subsequently analyzed especially as it culminates in a concept of concretizations. As Simondon indicated, and with a displacement in Ruyer's limitating framework on unconditional growth, we end up searching for what represents the (...) category of the ultimate for those two philosophers of the cyberworld. (shrink)

This article seeks to clarify the role of the notion of rhythm in Whitehead’s philosophy, considering the mediating character it has between the order of events and that of objects. Deleuze and Harman, when commenting on Whitehead’s ontological system, have highlighted the value of events and objects, respectively. Here, we pretend to elucidate the limits of these readings and give relevance to the category between both planes, which is rhythm. This concepts evolve from a naturalistic view to a more metaphysical (...) conception in Whitehead’s later work, and its applications go from science to education and aesthetics. Thus, rhythm can be understood as a complex that has an eventual face and an objectual face, internally defining itself as a system of contrasts that mobilizes creation and intensity through time. This rhythmic process of creation leads us to think a poetics of experience, considering its aesthetic and compositional nature. (shrink)

Physicist Sean Carroll has developed a new theory of the fundamental nature of reality, which he calls “Poetic Naturalism,” with the stated goal of developing a theory of what is real that is consistent with the findings of natural science. Carroll claims to prove that morality cannot be seen as objectively true. This essay argues that Carroll's conclusion is not convincing; there is no good reason to reject moral objectivity within a purely naturalistic worldview.

Whitehead's system may be interpreted as a majestic attempt at recasting Leibniz's theory of monads in terms of sounder ontological categories. After a brief introductory section on the sources of Whitehead's knowledge of Leibniz's philosophy, the paper explains why Whitehead turned to Leibniz for metaphysical inspiration. Attention then shifts to Whitehead's understanding of the problems involved with Leibniz's theory of monads and his alternative explanation of monadic causation. Whitehead's endeavour to install windows in Leibniz's monads may not be entirely convincing, (...) but there are philosophical gems scattered here and there in his analyses – true moments of insight that repay close examination. (shrink)

Nowadays creativity is fashionable. Writers on management and organisation, for example, mention creativity as vital to entrepreneurship.1 They consider it to be as important as land, labour and capital, which form the traditional factors of production.2 And related terms such as ‘genius’ are in use again. An example of this is the widely read book Built to Last.3 Moreover, creativity and rationality are presented as alternatives. To be creative, managers are urged to put rationality aside: ‘being reasonable does not win (...) the day’ they are assured4 and ‘all progress depends on the unreasonable man’.5 This view that rationality and creativity oppose each other is, however, unsatisfactory involving, as it does, a form of epistemological schizophrenia. One excludes the other only if we adopt a simplistic concept of rationality and an esoteric view of creativity. This article, therefore, sets out to clarify the relationship between the concepts of creativity and rationality. Three ideal-type concepts of rationality will be introduced (algorithmic, judgemental, reflective) and their tolerance of novelty discussed. Then two modes of creativity (explorative and transcendentive) are distinguished, followed by a discussion of whether rationality can enhance creativity. I conclude by reviewing some factors involved in creativity, such as tolerance for ambiguity, playfulness and attentiveness, and with a short discussion of the relationship of creativity to power.6. (shrink)

The 20th century philosophy of science began on a positivistic note. Its focal point was scientific explanation and the hypothetico-deductive (HD) framework of explanation was proposed as the standard of what is meant by “science.” HD framework, its inductive and statistical variants, and other logic-based approaches to modeling scientific explanation were developed long before the dawn of the information age. Since that time, the volume of observational data and power of high performance computing have increased by several orders of magnitude (...) and reshaped the practice and concept of science, and indeed, the philosophy of science. A new observational-inductive (OI) framework for scientific research is emerging due to recent developments in sensors, data systems, computers, and knowledge discovery techniques. We examine the nature of these changes and their impact on the question of what is meant by “science” after discussing five examples of the OI framework, and conclude that the HD and OI frameworks are complementary and synergistic. (shrink)

A. N. Whitehead's approach to physical theorizing contrasts with that of mainstream or official physics in being centrally concerned with articulating a background explanation of physical facts and phenomena in general that would take the place of the “ether” of classical physics, a project otherwise unpursued by the science in its modern period. Unlike Einstein's, Whitehead's approach to relativity primarily seeks explanation rather than utility ; also, it avoids the philosophical problems with Einstein's theory alleged by Whitehead and a range (...) of other philosophers. This stops short of a finding as to the comparative worth of Whitehead's alternative basis for quantitative formulations. (shrink)

Perspectives on the difficult topic of the evolution of language can be differentiated to a large extent based on how much relevant continuity or discontinuity they see between humans and nonhuman animals. In general, biologists and psychologists tend to have a broad definition of “language” that highlights significant continuities, whereas linguists tend to define “language” more narrowly, in accord with their emphasis on the uniqueness of human capacities. This article examines the value of Whitehead's innovative theory of language, which is (...) grounded in his account of the fundamental symbolic element in basic perceptual processes, mainly for understanding the continuities between animal and human perceptual and symbolic activity but also for accommodating the discontinuity, or at least the pivotal difference, evident in the full flowering of human language. It will focus particularly on applying Whitehead's approach to gain a new understanding of the emergence, with the rise of amphibians, of the first vocalization in the history of life. (shrink)

This article treats religion as a central concern in Whitehead. His view of rational religion relies primarily on rational inference, not direct intuition. Taking seriously in religion the nonreflective elements in human cognition would not jeopardize, but would strengthen, his treatment of the reflective ones. While religion can certainly include vestiges of human savagery, it also promotes the ascent of humanity beyond social decay and enhances the art of life.

Hayek's oft-neglected cognitive theory, articulated in The Sensory Order, provides a foundation for a theory of innovation that integrates cognition, experience, and the importance of freedom for the creation of entirely new conceptual categories and fundamentally innovative entrepreneurial endeavors. For Hayek, one sees only what one is prepared to see; that is, we can notice sensory and other phenomena only after we have classified the data into often-implicit abstract categories that are mediated to us physiologically. Learning takes places by using (...) received categories while innovation takes place by creating new categories or moving data from one category to another, which is often an attempt to resolve anomalies. The new perceptual awareness required for discovery leads, in turn, to new categorizing and new perceptual horizons. Such innovation often requires not just freedom of imagination, but freedom of action, for one has to be able to try out many different perceptual possibilities. (shrink)

The relationship between James and Whitehead has been underlined from the very outset by the critical scholarship on Whitehead, as is testified by the presence of articles that appeared before the author’s death. By dissociating myself from the radical interpretation that frames Whitehead’s speculative opus as a systematization of James’s ideas, I survey that confrontation which has been advanced in the last years (Weber 2002, 2003, 2011, Sinclair 2009) in order to provide further contribution, by tackle the problem of novelty. (...) Precisely, I concentrate on those instances, especially the methodological ones, which are not simply akin, but rather properly shared by the authors. In other words, I focus on those grounding ideas from which they endorse a pluralistic universe, conceived in connection with the problem of novelty. Properly, 1) I analyze the way Whitehead refers to James in his books; 2) I compare the roles they acknowledge to reason, in the nexus with the concept of experience; 3) I show the importance both authors ascribe to the problem of novelty, the main topic involved in their efforts to build up new cosmologies. (shrink)

Isabelle Stengers anchors the major stake in Whiteheadian philosophy in the notion of constructivism. In doing so, the relation of this philosophy of becoming — the first anti-substantialist principle of which is stated as `principle of process' — to the ideas of vitalist intuition as the self-expression of the world is announced as eminently problematic. This problematizing opening to Whitehead obliges us to think about the constructivist nature of his concepts because of their irreducibility to the expression of facts of (...) experience since they must necessarily function as a machinic articulation of how things become implied in the `ontological principle' of reason; by the same token, it poses at the heart of the analysis the question of the pragmatic-speculative alterity in Whiteheadian constructivism. (shrink)

The late 19th-century Ignorabimus controversy over the limits of scientific knowledge has often been characterized as proclaiming the end of intellectual progress, and by implication, as plunging Germany into a crisis of pessimism from which Liberalism never recovered. My research supports the opposite interpretation. The initiator of the Ignorabimus controversy, Emil du Bois-Reymond, was a physiologist who worked his whole life against the forces of obscurantism, whether they came from the Catholic and Conservative Right or the scientistic and millenarian Left. (...) Du Bois-Reymond’s doubt that scientists would ever elucidate consciousness must therefore be seen as an endorsement, and not a rejection, of his faith in reason. (shrink)

As we begin to witness a new phase in the integration of digital social media platforms with educational institutions, we ought to ask how learning exchanges may be altered as a result. Looking to transformations in knowledge exchanges outside of formal education, we find that these technologies have already modified the ways in which communities engage with each other. Gerlitz and Helmond explain that the Like Economy built into all major social media platforms flattens exchanges between users to engagement metrics. (...) With online communities increasingly isolated from each other thanks to inscrutable recommendation algorithms, the most frequent cross-community exchanges manifest in outbursts of rage, producing a so-called ‘Dislike Society’. Practitioners would rather briefly unite to tear down other ways of living than to build new ones. Within the Dislike Society, any form of knowledge that could shape new communities is lost to the governance of algorithms in what Bernard Stiegler calls ‘proletarianisation’. To re-apply knowledge to the improvement of life, as suggested by Whitehead, the attention of learners needs to be shaped in response to new technological conditions. This is best achieved within the educational institutions that now face a reorganisation by the same companies that brought us the Dislike Society. (shrink)

This essay sets forth the decisive notions and postulates of process philosophy in Process Philosophy and Social Thought, edited by John B. Cobb, Jr. and W. Widick Schroeder. After commenting on the circumstances in which process philosophy came to be a major option among philosophical theologians, I provide some amplification of those notions and postulates. Then, selecting material from the eighteen articles in the volume, I offer several critical assessments of the process viewpoint and its relation to science and to (...) the contemporary call for liberation. (shrink)

Constructivism is at the heart of a pedagogical philosophy going back to Vico, whose view of the interrelationship of the arts and sciences sought to reconstitute the classical paideia. The Vichian idea that human beings can only know the truth of what they themselves have made has theoretical and practical consequences for Vico's pedagogy and view of the university. Vico's ideas on education are extended in the modern period by such thinkers as Cassirer, Piaget and Bateson. At the basis of (...) Cassirer's pedagogical philosophy is his theory of the symbol, the symbol being a universal and transcendent modality in culture. The result of this unifying theory is that symbolism, which is pervasive across the disciplines, provides a moral and ethical means for integrating communication about teaching. Cassirer's thought is compatible with Piaget's, which emphasizes the pluralism of experience and the role of dynamic learning in the construction of meaningful order. Piaget's constructivism assumes that an operational bridge exists to link together the hard sciences, the human sciences, and the historical disciplines. This systems view of epistemological matters is similar in many respects to the one advanced by Gregory Bateson, which is explored in the paper's final section. (shrink)

In this article I present the extracts and summary of heuristic and speculative observations on various aspects I feel are problematic in the practice of modern physics, the definitions and methods of which are the premise for the whole of Science. The illustrations will be fully developed in a later, more extensive and in-depth work in which some theoretical solutions will also be put forward; therefore in the interests of brevity all assertions will not be demonstrated fully in this article. (...) I will initially discuss the problem with thinking of Reality as basically being made up of ontologically autonomous “parts”; I will recall how the existence of the vacuum is demonstrated through the thermodynamic experiments about heat capacities run by W. Nernst and the experiments of W. Lamb and H. Casimir ; the vacuum will be defined as an object that precedes matter and space, and actually illustrated as an evolving singularity, which all existence draws from; the non-isolability... (shrink)

The human adventure in education is one of imperfect expression, punctuated by moments of insight. Education cultivates these epiphanies and nurtures their possible continuation. But even without major or minor insights, education cultivates the appreciation of the good, the beautiful, and the true. An experimentalist's sensibility lies amid the humanist's grasp of the myriad ways of trying to understand our existence. To bridge discourse is to appreciate the languages of other cultures, which reveal the nuances of life and experience.

The question of how the university can relate to the world is centuries old. The poles of the debate can be characterized by the plea for an increasing instrumentalization of the university as a producer and provider of useful knowledge on the one hand (cf. the knowledge factory), and the defense of the university as an autonomous space for free inquiry and the pursuit of knowledge for knowledge’s sake on the other hand (cf. the ivory tower). Our current global predicament, (...) however, forces us to rethink the relation between university and world. Indeed, an easy nstrumentalization of the university for the purposes of society is no longer possible in troubled times when the future of society itself seems to be at stake. Nevertheless, urgent societal concerns do need to be addressed by the university. Hence, the disinterested position seems a highly irresponsible option. The aim of this dissertation is to reconsider the relation between the university and the world from an educational perspective by addressing the question “How to situate study in the relation between university and society?” The dissertation consists of three parts. In Part One, the existing literature on the relation between university and society will be discussed. The first chapter discerns two main approaches to this issue, namely the transcendental-philosophical approach (cf. the idea of the university) and the critical-sociological approach (cf. academic capitalism) that conceive of the university, respectively, as an idea and as an organization. By means of an excursus on the emergence of the university in the Middle Ages, the case is made for an ecological approach to the university. In the second chapter, the work of two authors who have recently adopted such an ecological approach is briefly presented. Whereas Ronald Barnett’s theory of the ecological university is situated more in the transcendental-philosophical tradition, Susan Wright’s investigations of the university in the knowledge ecology can be placed in the critical-sociological tradition. Both conceptions, however, are hinged on an institutional understanding of the university. In line with recent developments in social theory, namely the focus on practices, it is proposed to work towards an ecology of study practices. Part Two presents Isabelle Stengers’ idea of the ecology of practices. The third chapter elucidates Stengers’ work on scientific practices by first situating it within the so-called Science Wars, which provided the impetus to elaborate a theoretical framework for a civilized dialogue between scientists and the broader public. The basic tenets and concepts of her approach, such as the understanding of practice as a set of requirements and obligations, are presented, explained, and discussed. In the fourth chapter, the focus shifts from scientific practices to study practices. Assisted by Stengers’ writings on Whitehead’s speculative philosophy, this chapter aims to flesh out Whitehead’s description of the university as a ‘home of adventures’ in order to come to an educational understanding of the study practices of the university. A conceptual inquiry into how study practices activate certain worldly problems and turn them into matters of study is presented. Part Three develops the conceptual work on study practices further in relation to the activities of the Palestinian experimental university Campus in Camps. Chapter Five presents the work of Campus in Camps and explains how it relates to the theoretical discussion offered in the second part. On the basis of Stengers’ conception of practice, which discerns requirements and obligations as vital ingredients, this chapter argues that life in exile is what drives the study practices of Campus in Camps, and hence, that it is the issue of life in exile that participants are obligated to when they study. Whereas Chapter Five is focused on what is being studied in Campus in Camps, Chapter Six inquires in to the specific requirements its activities need to fulfill in order to be study practices; in other words, how the participants study. Four requirements are discerned that, taken together, seem indispensable to understand the study practices of Campus in Camps; namely, storytelling, comparing, mapmaking, and using. The concluding chapter returns to the research question and again takes up the main ideas developed in the dissertation, such as the adventure of study and the cohabitation of scientific and study practices in the university. The last two sections of the conclusion deal with two remaining issues of a more practical nature; namely, how to relate to institutionalization when working from a practice-theoretical point of view, and lastly the question of what can be done. In all, and returning to the initial problem, the dissertation asks what it means to conceive of the university as situated by and engaged with worldly questions. (shrink)

This paper contributes to a growing body of philosophical and psychological work that draws parallels between the writings of William James and Alfred North Whitehead1. In Part One I introduce Whitehead’s distinction between assemblage and systematization (section 1) and suggest that Whitehead’s philosophy was in part a systematization of James’ psychological and philosophical assemblage (section 2). The systematization is based on a rethinking of the entity/function contrast (section 3) by way of Whitehead’s concept of the actual entity/occasion (section 4). This (...) permits a process- oriented ontological extension and James’ notion of pure experience (sections 5 & 6), which yields a deepened version of radical empiricism (section 7). The four sections of Part Two build a more specific argument that James’ often implicit distinctions between energetic, perceptual, conceptual and discursive modes of experience can be systematized by way of Whitehead’s concepts of causal efficacy, presentational immediacy and symbolic reference. Following the suggestion of Magritte’s famous Ceci n’est pas une Pipe artwork, this yields an analysis of the sum of human experience into four progressively integrated factors: power, image, proposition and enunciation. (shrink)

Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Hawaii at Manoa, 2008.

ABSTRACT Approaching Cognitive-Behavioral and Existential Therapy Through Neo-Confucianism (December 1984). Joffre Denis Meyer, B. A. Texas A&M University Chairman of Graduate Committee: Dr. William R. Nash -/- The thesis is an effort to bring Neo-Confucian insights to modern cognitive- behavioral and existential therapy. The adaptability of Neo-Confucianism is illustrated through the growth-system inherent in its concepts. Frequently, Neo-Confucian sages and modern psychologists used virtually identical statements. Moreover, humanity faces the same basic issues while the particularizations vary. The importance of reason, (...) manners, appropriate behavior and self-actualization remains constant. However, the methods of their attainment change with time. The history of the Confucian/Neo-Confucian tradition is filled with such conceptual modifications. -/- Neo-Confucianism is a syncretic philosophy that utilized elements of Zen, Taoism, and Legalism within Confucian teachings. This adaptation increased the sages' ability to communicate with a wider range of people. In effect, the Neo-Confucian movement was perhaps the earliest practice of eclectic counseling. Neo-Confucianism itself has undergone development from its eleventh-century origins to the present-day scholarly journals. -/- The researcher does not believe the key issue in inter- disciplinary studies is whether psychology is being applied to philosophy or vice-versa. Neo-Confucianism pragmatically asserts that the true test of a philosophy rests in its ability to help the individual. Mere intellectual exercise contradicts the unity of knowledge and action. The thesis has five chapters. The existential therapy chapter uses a predominantly Western psychology format while the cognitive-behavioral therapy chapter uses Wang Yang-ming's Four Axiom Teaching as an outline. -/- The thesis also includes Neo-Confucian cognitive-moral development observations reminiscent of Lawrence Kohlberg's stage theories. Neo-Confucianism could be described as an education in evolving from preconventional to principled reasoning. Occasional parallels are drawn between process philosophy and Neo-Confucianism as well. -/- There is also a chapter in which Confucian commentaries are provided to actual case studies faced by Albert Ellis and Maxie Maultsby. A Chinese glossary is provided at the end of the introduction. There are five figures in the text, two of which are summarizing models in the conclusion. -/- . (shrink)

Koopman’s book revolves around the notion of transition, which he proposes is one of the central ideas of the pragmatist tradition but one which had not previously been fully articulated yet nevertheless shapes the pragmatist attitude in philosophy. Transition, according to Koopman, denotes “those temporal structures and historical shapes in virtue of which we get from here to there”. One of the consequences of transitionalism is the understanding of critique and inquiry as historical pro...

For many years, biology was largely descriptive (natural history), but with its emergence as a scientific discipline in its own right, a reductionist approach began, which has failed to be matched by adequate understanding of function of cells, organisms and species as whole entities. Every effort was made to explain biological phenomena in physico-chemical terms.It is argued that there is and always has been a clear distinction between life sciences and physical sciences, explicit in the use of the word biology. (...) If this distinction is real, it implies that biological phenomena can never be entirely satisfactorily explained in terms of extant physicochemical laws. One notable manifestation of this is that living organisms appear to -- actually do -- behave in purposeful ways, and the inanimate universe does not. While this fundamental difference continues to be suppressed, the purposiveness (or teleology) which pervades biology remains anathema to almost all scientists (including most biologists) even to the present day. We argue here that it can, however, become a perfectly tenable position when the Theory of Natural Selection is accepted as the main foundation, the essential tenet, of biology that distinguishes it from the realm of physical sciences. In accepting this position, it remains quite legitimate to expect that in many but not all circumstances, extant physical laws (and presumably others still to be discovered) are in no way breached by biological systems, which cannot be otherwise since all organisms are composed of physical material. (shrink)