The Baha'i Studies Listserv
However, there are a lot of parallels between Whitehead and Bahai ontology. See
my article "Process Philosophy and the Bahai Writings" in Lights of Irfan Vol
5.
This article got me an invitation to the Center for Process Studies in
Calremont and a day with John Cobb who praised by succinct summary of
Whitehead.
Best,
Ian
----- Original Message -----
From: Mark A. Foster
To: Baha'i Studies
Sent: Saturday, November 26, 2011 12:42 AM
Subject: Re: Critical Realism
The Baha'i Studies ListservOn 11/26/2011 1:04 AM, Gary Selchert wrote:
I'm unfamiliar with Bhaskar, but quite familiar with Whitehead. How would
you say Bhaskar differs from Whitehead and why do you prefer his descriptions
of reality over Whitehead's?
Whitehead's views are, IMO, too speculative. I refer to them in one of my
books:
------------------
On the other hand, in process philosophy, as developed by Alfred North
Whitehead and others, essences of being are considered to be essences of
becoming. Although the substances or objects around us appear, from our
perspectives, to be tangible or concrete, they are, to process philosophers,
the products of human experience. Only God is permanent and eternal. Process
thought, an umbrella term, adds all or part of: process theology, constructive
postmodernism, theopoetics, Anisa, symbolic interactionist theory, process New
Thought, elisionism, the holomovement, and so forth.
Process philosophy is, from one point of view, the polar opposite of
nominalism. The reality of essences has generally been denied by nominalists.
To them, essences are no more than names, conventional categories, or
classification systems. Although the medieval founders of Western nominalism
were devout Roman Catholics, secularism is partially rooted in nominalist
disconnectedness. Process thought, however, lies on the other end of the
philosophical spectrum. Essences not only exist. They are in constant motion.
Because creativity is the rule of existence, reality is forever in flux.
Since essences are unknowable and depend upon the Will of God, their state of
change or permanence is unrevealed. Although the divine Essence is, of course,
a Being, whether any other essences are beings is a mystery. Speculations on
these subjects, while interesting, are of little use. In my opinion, since we
are agnostic about essences, the Best Beloved discussed them with a beautiful
critical, or representational, realism, not nominalism. Essences are not, as in
nominalism, just names. They are inner realities which are experienced,
indirectly, by feeling, or inwardly touching, their attributes.
-----------------
In sociology, the main impact of process philosophy has been on the theory of
symbolic interactionism. One of the first symbolic interactionists, Charles
Horton Cooley (University of Michigan) was an objective idealist (not a
realist). He felt that society was a process which existed entirely in the
minds of its members.
---
Regards, Mark A. Foster, Ph.D.
29 domains: http://markfoster.net
Two books: http://bahaifaith.info
Clinical: http://fosterservices.com
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