Footnotes2Plato

“The safest general characterization of the European philosophical tradition is that it consists of a series of footnotes to Plato.”
–Alfred North Whitehead

Part 2 of my dialogue with Vervaeke and Henriques on Transcendent Naturalism

You can find part 1 of our conversation here.

We spoke about the sacred, which we can discover in our relationships with one another, in art, and in our encounter with nature. I shared my attempt to recognize interiority in the cosmos, which I’ve referred to (drawing on the neoplatonic term) as the world-soul.

I attempted to unpack Whitehead’s process theology, where God is seen not as a coercive power external to the world but as an integral participant within the world-process, embodying both Eros (desire for what finite creatures could be) and Agape (a responsive love for what finite creatures actually do).

I also discussed the process-relational conception of the soul or self, which is not a substance but a nexus of relationships that binds us to prior versions of ourself, but also opens us to the future and to ongoing cocreation with others.

I got into the way Whitehead’s novel processual approach to relations avoids both the analytic extreme of denying internal relations (as Russell did) and the idealistic extreme of affirming only internal relations (as F. H. Bradley is often interpreted to have done, though it is not quite so simple). Whitehead temporalizes the distinction such that we can have both: every entity is internally related to past actualities and externally related to future possibilities.

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Matthew David Segall

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6 responses to “Part 2 of my dialogue with Vervaeke and Henriques on Transcendent Naturalism”

  1. ptero9 Avatar
    ptero9

    Really enjoying the conversations with you, Vervaeke and Henriques alongside reading your new book.

    Although I’ve never formally studied philosophy, the ideas in your book are very accessible to me. Thanks!

    Reply
    1. Matthew David Segall Avatar
      Matthew David Segall

      So glad to hear that!

      Reply
  2. jeangiroux90 Avatar
    jeangiroux90

    Hey Matt, thanks again for this wonderful dialogue, and happy new year.

    I gather from the conversation that you see relations or relationality at the ground level ontologically, as God: would it be fair to say that you see Love as the character of this relationality? I was wondering if you might be able to provide a brief transliteration of what JV was referring to in regards to the propositional opaqueness of causation, which you seemed to be in accordance with…is he saying that causality itself is intelligible only in our participation in reality? If so, how does one have a relationship with such a God, or how does one worship it?

    Reply
    1. Matthew David Segall Avatar
      Matthew David Segall

      Love is a good word for relationality, but it comes in at least the two forms I mentioned: Erotic and Agapic. Putting it rather simply, but not, I think, incorrectly: the former, Eros, relates to possibilities, while the later, Agape, relates actualities. These are the two poles Whitehead distinguishes in the divine process.

      With regard to causation, I think the point is it is not something we understand by way of conceptual reflection, but rather something we directly intuit in our bodily feelings and, I’d add (JV didn’t go here), in our willing.

      I would say we worship this process God by doing as best we can to attune to what is most beautiful in ourselves, in others, and in the world.

      Reply
      1. jeangiroux90 Avatar
        jeangiroux90

        Thanks so much for this reply and your engagement, Matt, it’s very helpful. I appreciate what you were insinuating in your closing comment, namely, that the cosmos isn’t so barren in it’s love for its own creation as the New Atheists suggest, that agape might in fact go deeper than the clear manifestation of it at the level of primates: Can you point me to any of your work that develops this idea further?

      2. Matthew David Segall Avatar
        Matthew David Segall

        Click to access religion-in-human-and-cosmic-evolution-whiteheads-alternative-vision-publication-copy.pdf

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