Complex Philosophy

As science, knowledge, and ideas evolve and are increased and refined, the branches of philosophy in charge of describing them should also be increased and refined. In this work we try to expand some ideas as a response to the recent approach from several sciences to complex systems. Because of their novelty, some of these ideas might require further refinement and may seem unfinished, but we need to start with something. Only with their propagation and feedback from critics they might be improved. We make a brief introduction to complex systems, for then defining <em>abstraction levels</em>. Abstraction levels represent simplicities and regularities in nature. We make an ontological distinction of absolute being and relative being, and then discuss issues on causality, metaphysics, and determinism

The Origins of Phenomenology in Austro-German Philosophy. Brentano, Husserl

The development of phenomenology in nineteenth‐century German philosophy is that of a particular stream within the larger historical‐philosophical complex of Austro‐German philosophy. As the “grandfather of phenomenology” resp. the “disgusted grandfather of phenomenology,” but also as the key figure on the “Anglo‐Austrian Analytic Axis”, Brentano is at the source of the two main philosophical traditions in twentieth‐century philosophy. This chapter focuses mainly on his place in nineteenth‐century European philosophy and on the central themes and concepts in his philosophy that were determinant in the development of the philosophy of his most gifted student: Edmund Husserl. Despite the variety of stances which Brentano expressed on ontology, metaphysics, and psychology over the course of his career, the five general principles remain central to his whole philosophy throughout: they have an important place in what could be called Brentano's philosophical worldview or system. By extension, they also are essential to his conception of phenomenology

The differential point of view of the infinitesimal calculus in Spinoza, Leibniz and Deleuze

In Hegel ou Spinoza,1 Pierre Macherey challenges the influence of Hegel’s reading of Spinoza by stressing the degree to which Spinoza eludes the grasp of the Hegelian dialectical progression of the history of philosophy. He argues that Hegel provides a defensive misreading of Spinoza, and that he had to “misread him” in order to maintain his subjective idealism. The suggestion being that Spinoza’s philosophy represents, not a moment that can simply be sublated and subsumed within the dialectical progression of the history of philosophy, but rather an alternative point of view for the development of a philosophy that overcomes Hegelian idealism. Gilles Deleuze also considers Spinoza’s philosophy to resist the totalising effects of the dialectic. Indeed, Deleuze demonstrates, by means of Spinoza, that a more complex philosophy antedates Hegel’s, which cannot be supplanted by it. Spinoza therefore becomes a significant figure in Deleuze’s project of tracing an alternative lineage in the history of philosophy, which, by distancing itself from Hegelian idealism, culminates in the construction of a philosophy of difference. It is Spinoza’s role in this project that will be demonstrated in this paper by differentiating Deleuze’s interpretation of the geometrical example of Spinoza’s Letter XII (on the problem of the infinite) in Expressionism in Philosophy, Spinoza,2 from that which Hegel presents in the Science of Logic.

The Excellency of Theology: A Critique of Robert K. Merton\'s \"Puritan Thesis,\" with Reference to the Works of Robert Boyle

Robert K. Merton's "Puritan Thesis" asserts a direct correlation between Puritan theological beliefs and participation in natural philosophy (what today would be known as science). This essay corrects the misleading assumptions and conclusions brought about by Merton's argument, by using the writings of Robert Boyle. Boyle, whom Merton designated a "Puritan scientist," wrote extensively on the connection between natural philosophy and theology; and his writings demonstrate that the relationship between the two was far more complex than the simplicity of Merton's thesis suggests

'Visibility brings with it responsibility': Using a pragmatic performance approach to explore a political philosophy of technology

With the emergence, suspicion and social acceptance of ubiquitous communications technology thoroughly plumbed and the digital age already wondering what it is going to rename itself in light of ever more fluid and complex technologies, this paper asks: what can theatre and performance provide to the production of a political philosophy of technology? Using the work of Maurice Merleau-Ponty, Michel Foucault and an analysis of a recent inter-cultural adaptation of Jean Genet's The Maids, this study examines the politics of visible theatre technologies in performance and offers a pragmatic, or instrumentalist, approach to developing a political philosophy of technology

How Philosophy of Mind Needs Philosophy of Chemistry

By the 1960s many (perhaps most) philosophers had adopted ‘physicalism’ ─ the view that physical causes fully account for mental activities. However, controversy persists about what count as ‘physical causes’. ‘Reductive’ physicalists recognize only microphysical (elementary-particle-level) causality. Many (perhaps most) physicalists are ‘non-reductive’ ─ they hold that entities considered by other (‘special’) sciences have causal powers. Philosophy of chemistry can help resolve main issues in philosophy of mind in three ways: developing an extended mereology applicable to chemical combination, testing whether ‘singularities’ prevent reduction of chemistry to microphysics, and demonstrating ‘downward causation’ in complex networks of chemical reactions

How Philosophy of Mind Needs Philosophy of Chemistry

By the 1960s many (perhaps most) philosophers had adopted ‘physicalism’ ─ the view that physical causes fully account for mental activities. However, controversy persists about what count as ‘physical causes’. ‘Reductive’ physicalists recognize only microphysical (elementary-particle-level) causality. Many (perhaps most) physicalists are ‘non-reductive’ ─ they hold that entities considered by other (‘special’) sciences have causal powers. Philosophy of chemistry can help resolve main issues in philosophy of mind in three ways: developing an extended mereology applicable to chemical combination, testing whether ‘singularities’ prevent reduction of chemistry to microphysics, and demonstrating ‘downward causation’ in complex networks of chemical reactions

Networks: open, closed or complex. Connecting philosophy, design and innovation, part 3

This is the third and final paper of a series bringing a philosophical investigation to matters of design and innovation. With the others examining: first, the urges to reconsider innovation from a creative, specifically design, direction (‘Beyond Success’); and second, the type of dynamic innovation that may be thus reconsidered (‘Ecstatic Innovation’); this paper will investigate a way of constructing this type of design-driven innovation. It will begin by looking at the networks that can be created to deliver a dynamic, continually innovative innovation and will start by considering two concepts of network: the open and the closed. While there seems to be an easy distinction to be made between open and closed, and its mapping onto similarly convenient ideas of good and bad, I hope to show that this is not the case. The complexity of networked forms of organisation demand that we bring to them a complexity of thought that comes from philosophy. Nevertheless, such an account will also need to engage with discourses from other disciplinary areas: notably organisational theory, innovation management and design. The outcome is of importance to thinking the organisational structures in which innovation is managed

The Artistic Turn

We are living in an increasingly complex world. How are we able to cope with this complexity and the difficulties that arise from it? Can philosophy and art, classified as the two utmost useless and pointless disciplines, have any (positive) influence on the urgent and pressing problems at hand? And, related to this, if the two have more than just their uselessness in common, how, then, are philosophy and art related? In this article, I will argue that although ‘useless’ disciplines such as philosophy and art have no direct influence on our complex world, they are nonetheless the most important ones, because those working within them practice their insights in an indirect way. Indirect influence may take a little longer, but the impact is much stronger, affecting our thinking and our attitudes from within, as it were. This indirect approach has everything to do with the sort of questions philosophers and artists occupy themselves with. I will show how both address, albeit each in their own way, fundamental questions, and thereby make use of thought experiments. Intuition and imagination play a decisive part in the creative processes that are involved in thought experiments and thinking. It is argued that we all are able to learn a ‘delayed unconscious thinking’ that leads to an artistic attitude; one that will activate an artistic turn