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| 7719 | European philosophy consists of a series of footnotes to Plato |
| Full Idea: The safest general characterization of the European philosophical tradition is that it consists of a series of footnotes to Plato. | |||
| From: Alfred North Whitehead (Process and Reality [1929], p.39) | |||
| A reaction: Outsiders think this is a ridiculous remark, but readers of Plato can only be struck by what a wonderful tribute Whitehead has come up with. I would say that at least 80% of this database deals with problems which were discussed at length by Plato. |
| 10656 | With 'extensive connection', boundary elements are not included in domains |
| Full Idea: In Whitehead's theory of extensive connection, no boundary elements are included in the domain of quantification. ...His conception of space contains no parts of lower dimensions, such as points or boundary elements. | |||
| From: report of Alfred North Whitehead (Process and Reality [1929]) by Achille Varzi - Mereology 3.1 | |||
| A reaction: [Varzi says we should see B.L.Clarke 1981 for a rigorous formulation. Second half of the Idea is Varzi p.21] |
| 15389 | In Whitehead 'processes' consist of events beginning and ending |
| Full Idea: There are no items in Whitehead's ontology called 'processes'. Rather, the term 'process' refers to the way in which the basic things - which are still events - come into existence and cease to exist. Whitehead called this 'becoming'. | |||
| From: report of Alfred North Whitehead (Process and Reality [1929]) by Peter Simons - Whitehead: process and cosmology 'The mature' | |||
| A reaction: This comes as a surprise to anyone who assumed Whitehead is the guy who thinks reality consists of processes. (Me, for example). Can reality be basically composed of 'events'? What's an event? |
| 15247 | Whitehead held that perception was a necessary feature of all causation |
| Full Idea: On Whitehead's view, not only is a volitional sense of 'causal power' projected on to physical events, but 'perception in the causal mode' is literally ascribed to them. | |||
| From: report of Alfred North Whitehead (Process and Reality [1929]) by Harré,R./Madden,E.H. - Causal Powers 3.II | |||
| A reaction: This seems to be a close relative of Leibniz's monads. 'Perception' is a daft word for it, but in some way everything is 'responsive' to the things adjacent to it. |
| 16962 | Whitehead replaced points with extended regions |
| Full Idea: Whitehead tried to avoid points, and make do with extended regions and sets of regions. | |||
| From: report of Alfred North Whitehead (Process and Reality [1929]) by Willard Quine - Existence and Quantification p.93 |