Process philosophy

Process philosophy is a name for metaphysical concepts that represent events and processes as the basic elements of reality. Related to this is usually the rejection of a metaphysics that leads stable substances as basic elements. The latter so-called substance metaphysics dominated since the Greeks, the discussion in the Western philosophy and to some extent in other disciplines.

History

The first process philosopher in Western history is likely to be Heraclitus, even if his approach still stands on the border between myth and theory ( in the modern sense ). His famous dictum " Panta Rhei " ( "Everything flows " ) but is already making an essential and fundamental decision of the assertion of the primacy of becoming before the static being.

Among the great philosophical writers, Aristotle, Friedrich Nietzsche, Leibniz, Hegel and Spinoza are associated with the process philosophy partially.

The Aristotelian philosophy has so far strongly process philosophical elements - and even in this it differs significantly from its Platonic roots - as she claims in a reversal of the so-called Platonic doctrine of ideas that evolve all things on a metaphysical predetermined goal ( telos ) toward. Its development therefore does not run randomly but on a form as their goal, that is their defined full- finiteness ( entelecheia ), predetermined path. On the way, each object is moving to the extent as its entelechy is not yet implemented, in a kind way connection, the so-called dynamis. The realized each state is its energeia, which literally means " The work will ", so the Realized already on him. Process Philosophically, this approach is extremely developed, because he already creates a consistent relationship between becoming and being.

A big jump in the process philosophical thought triggered the philosophers of romanticism and German idealism, which - inspired by the emerging chemical knowledge in the 18th century - developed a conception of the world as an organism. For example, Friedrich Schlegel, who characterized the process as a central concept of science, and especially Schelling, for the process and organization mutually refer to each other and finally the " absolute process," said In this thinking takes Hegel special significance a. His conception of dialectic is not only a method of thinking, but claimed explicitly ontological validity. This leads Hegel closed out in his Science of Logic. The world is therefore a huge development process. However, Hegel sees an object of this development, at which point the development process described by him, at least in theory, ends. This goal he represents as the one's self - awareness of the objective spirit, the germ already manifests itself in every term. The aim of the Hegelian world process is still the same - similar to Aristotle and his conception of entelecheia - a certain extent ideal end state of any development. The process is only a means to metaphysical purpose also with him.

Karl Marx transferred the thought processes on social relations, saying of " life processes ". " The totality of these relations of production constitutes the economic structure of society, the real foundation, on which rises a legal and political superstructure and to which correspond definite forms of social consciousness. The mode of production of material life conditions the social, political and intellectual life process in general. It is not the consciousness of men that determines their existence, but their social existence that determines their consciousness. " Of these the economic processes of production, distribution, exchange and consumption account for a substantial part, as " in every organic whole " are later on.

In his early work The Use and Abuse of History for Life Friedrich Nietzsche strongly opposed the idea of Eduard von Hartmann ( and indirectly also against Hegel) of a "world- process," which man is inferior. Man is not the "power of story" delivered.

On the other hand, Nietzsche later brought his idea of ​​an organic ontology of the world clearly. He interpreted the processual becoming as cycle events, as the eternal return. He looked at the view of the organic processes as an interpretation and values ​​, in which the will to power is expressed.

This also applies to the rejection of the scientific ideas of substances:

In the twentieth century, particularly the Philosophy of Organism of the English mathematician and philosopher Alfred North Whitehead and his student Charles Hartshorne has influenced today's characterization of process philosophy. In a process- philosophical tradition of thought but are also Henri Bergson, Charles Peirce, John Dewey, William James, Nicholas Rescher.

Nicholas Rescher

In the present, Philosophy Nicholas Rescher is the most prominent representatives of process philosophy. He describes the process philosophy as a general metaphysical theory about reality and human knowledge about it. The fundamental ontological category of process philosophy is the process that is the thesis that nature primarily consists of processes and changes and that things are already abstractions derived in the course of knowledge. Things are not more than a limited stable order of processes. Rescher emphasizes three main characteristics of processes shown:

• A process is a complex - a unit consisting of several stages or phases
• This complex has a certain temporal link and unity, so that correspondingly indispensable processes have a temporal dimension.
• A process has a structure, its own generic form receives a certain order or form by any specific process.

Important categories are therefore time to change, emergence, flow, activity or innovation. Compared with the traditional shaped by substance thinking philosophy Rescher calls the following hypotheses that are to be connected with the process philosophy:

• Substance can not be conceived without reference to a process.
• A rigorous substance metaphysics has no explanation for action and change.
• Processes have a natural momentum that leads to new processes.
• A process approach can be successfully combined with a theory of substances.
• The identity and the identification of substances is dependent on the presence of irrefutably processes.
• The process approach avoids or minimizes the problem of universals.
• The process approach can be easily connected with the modern empirical sciences (physics, biology, social science ).
• The process approach provides a more natural view of persons and personality.
• The process approach provides a superior explanation of the origin, development and management of information.
• The process approach provides a more effective framework for understanding of the procedure and the results of rational inquiry.
• Process theology avoids a number of contradictions that arise with the idea of ​​God as substance.
• With the process approach results in a lighter approach to philosophy and philosophizing.