FROM SCIENCE TO PHILOSOPHY: ALFRED NORTH WHITHEAD AND THE NOTION OF PROCESS
FROM SCIENCE TO PHILOSOPHY: ALFRED NORTH WHITHEAD AND THE NOTION OF PROCESS

Author(s): Francesco Maria Ferrari
Subject(s): History, Philosophy, Philosophy of Science
Published by: Scientia Socialis, UAB
Keywords: Asymmetries; Complexity; Modus ponendo ponens; Non–linear thermodynamics; Prigogine; Processes; Whitehead;
Summary/Abstract: Ilya Prigogine (1913–2003) discovered that importation and dissipation of energy into complex systems could reverse the maximization of entropy rule imposed by the second law of thermodynamics. Beginning from a sketch of what a complex system consists of and some epistemological consequences, I will show which instances of process approach are able to give some preliminary ontological basis for a more adequate understanding of nature with its own indeterminacy, surfaced as empirical evidence inner non–linearthermodynamics. The idea is to connect these issues for reinterpreting the verification principle in experimental method, avoiding Popper’s criticism to it and in agreement with falsification procedure.

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