Category: Descartes
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Introduction to German Idealism
My lecture in two parts introducing German Idealism (focusing on Kant, Fichte, Schelling, Goethe, Hegel)
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The Birth of Life & the Future of Consciousness
UPDATE. Here’s a video of our dialogue: Next Tuesday, October 22nd at 7pm, I’ll be in dialogue with astrobiologist Bruce Damer about his hot spring hypothesis of the origins of life. For Bay Area locals, the event will take place at the Mission Street campus of California Institute of Integral Studies and is free and…
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Sundays with Whitehead
Below are a couple of video sessions from my course on Whitehead’s Process & Reality.
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![Physicalism and Its Discontents: A Study in Whitehead’s Panexperientialist Alternative [draft]](https://footnotes2plato.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/09/fluorescence.jpg?w=1024)
Physicalism and Its Discontents: A Study in Whitehead’s Panexperientialist Alternative [draft]
UPDATE: Here is a PDF of the final draft accepted for publication under the revised title “The Varieties of Physicalist Ontology: A Study in Whitehead’s Process-Relational Alternative.” I’ve just finished drafting this article, which will hopefully be featured in a special issue of the Journal of Philosophy, Theology, and the Sciences focused on panpsychism. It still…
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Panpsychism: a brief reply to Massimo Pigliucci
The Side View recently published an essay by Massimo Pigliucci titled “The Stoic God is Untenable in Light of Modern Science.” Pigliucci is entering into a critical dialogue with a few other Side View authors, Brittany Polat and Kai Whiting, about how best to inherit from ancient Stoic philosophy. I don’t have a horse in the contemporary interpretations of…
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Lecture and notes on Part I of Whitehead’s “Process & Reality”
This Fall at CIIS.edu, I’m teaching an online advanced seminar on Whitehead’s magnum opus, Process & Reality. Here are my reflections on Part I of Process & Reality, “The Speculative Scheme.” Note that I discuss Richard Rorty’s conference presentation during a symposium on Whitehead at Stanford back in April 2006. Isabelle Stengers and Donna Haraway were…
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Whitehead and Marx: A Cosmopolitical Approach to Ecological Civilization
Below is a recording of my talk (a video first, then audio only that includes the discussion afterwards). I’ve also included an extended draft of some notes I took to prepare my talk. Finally, I’ve included my notes taken while listening to Jason Moore during yesterday’s opening lecture. Fifth annual conference of the World-Ecology Research…
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The Brain Initiative is right on schedule
Right on schedule: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/neurophilosophy/201904/five-years-how-fares-the-brain-initiative For more context, read my Speculations on Obama’s Brain Initiative from five years ago.
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On the Matter of Life: Towards an Integral Economics
I’m posting a revised version of a long essay I wrote a decade ago. It draws on thinkers including Sri Aurobindo, Jean Gebser, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, William Irwin Thompson, Francisco Varela, Alfred North Whitehead, and Alf Hornborg in search of a more integral approach to economics. I had not yet encountered the social ecology…
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Time and Experience in Physics and Philosophy [draft]
Below is the introduction of paper I presented at a conference in L’aquila, Italy in April 2019. The conference aimed to revisit important philosophical issues related to the famous 1922 debate between Einstein and Bergson. HERE is the conference site (it is in Italian, so you’ll need to ask Google to translate it for you).…
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An Evening with Alfred North Whitehead
Here are some clips from my video call with students earlier tonight wherein I discuss Whitehead’s cosmology, including his views of God, creativity, time, immortality, and education.
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Catherine Keller: The Cosmopolitical Entanglements of Process-Relational Theology
In what follows, I offer some reflections on the feminist process theologian Catherine Keller’s book Cloud of the Impossible: Negative Theology and Planetary Entanglement (2015). Keller poetically folds her refreshingly open theological orientation into an array of important planetary topics,—including the ethical implications of quantum entanglement (chapter 4), the poststructuralist dissolution of substance (chapter 5)…
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Spring online course at CIIS.edu – Whitehead’s Adventure in Cosmology
Auditors are welcome, though space is limited. Email me at msegall@ciis.edu for more information. One of our core texts in this course will be my Physics of the World-Soul (a new third edition soon to be published).
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Back to teach at Schumacher College in April 2019: “The Evolution of Consciousness and the Cosmological Imagination”
I’ll be teaching another short course at Schumacher College in the UK the week of April 22nd-26th, 2019. Here’s a link if you’re interested in registering: https://www.schumachercollege.org.uk/courses/short-courses/re-enchanting-the-cosmos Here’s what I’ll be teaching on: “The Evolution of Consciousness and the Cosmological Imagination” This week-long course will trace the evolution of consciousness in the West from ancient…
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Participatory Spirituality in an Evolving Cosmos
Here’s my talk from the INTERSECT: Science & Spirituality conference in Telluride, CO earlier this summer. It’s titled “Participatory Spirituality in an Evolving Cosmos”
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INTERSECT: Science & Spirituality (more conference reflections)
John Hausdoerffer Brian Thomas Swimme
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Physics of the World-Soul, a short course on Schelling and Whitehead at Schumacher College next week
>More information on this course<< Recommended Readings (PDF)
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Whitehead’s Way Beyond Postmodernism
Based on this paper delivered at the 2015 International Whitehead Conference.
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Schumacher College summer course update: “Physics of the World-Soul”
https://www.schumachercollege.org.uk/courses/short-courses/physics-of-the-world-soul Schumacher College has decided to make my week on Schelling and Whitehead a stand alone course called “Physics of the World-Soul.” It will take place June 18-22. More information available at the link above.
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Lectures on Timothy Morton’s “Humankind: Solidarity with Nonhuman People”
Process and Difference in the Pluriverse (opening lecture) My Spring course at CIIS.edu finishes up this week with a set of modules on Timothy Morton’s book Humankind: Solidarity with Nonhuman People (2017). Earlier in the semester, we read works by Plato, William James, Catherine Keller, William Connolly, Bruno Latour, Anne Pomeroy, and Donna Haraway. Below, I…
Footnotes2Plato 