Whitehead at Harvard, 1924-1925

by Brian G. Henning (Editor), Joseph Petek (Editor)

Overview

In these newly commissioned essays, leading Whitehead scholars ask a range of important questions about Whitehead's first year of philosophy lectures. Do these lectures challenge or confirm previous understandings of Whitehead's published works? What is revealed about the development of Whitehead's thought in the crucial period after London but before the publication of Science and the Modern World? What should we make of concepts and terms that were introduced in these lectures but were never incorporated into subsequent publications?

Also included in this volume is the text of Whitehead's first lecture at Harvard, recently gifted to the Critical Edition of Whitehead, allowing for a clearer understanding of Whitehead's plans and goals for his first course of lectures in philosophy than has previously been possible.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781474461351
Publisher:	Edinburgh University Press
Publication date:	01/07/2020
Pages:	400
Product dimensions:	6.14(w) x 9.21(h) x (d)

About the Author

Brian G. Henning is Professor of Philosophy and of Environmental Studies and Sciences at Gonzaga Universityand Executive Director of the Whitehead Research Project. Dr. Henning holds a M.A., M.Phil., and Ph.D. in philosophy from Fordham University. He is author or editor of fifteen books and more than thirty-five articles and chapters. His 2005 book, The Ethics of Creativity (University of Pittsburgh Press), won the 2007 Findlay Book Prize from the Metaphysical Society of America for the best work of metaphysics published between 2001 and 2006. He is the Founder and General Editor of The Edinburgh Critical Edition of the Complete Works of Alfred North Whitehead.

Joseph Petek is the Director of Research and Publication of the Whitehead Research Project of Gonzaga Universityand Executive Editor of The Edinburgh Critical Edition of the Complete Works of Alfred North Whitehead. He has co-edited three books on Whitehead: Rethinking Whitehead’s Symbolism (2017), Whitehead at Harvard, 1924–1925 (2020), and The Harvard Lectures of Alfred North Whitehead, 1925–1927: General Metaphysical Problems of Science (2021). His latest book is Unearthing the Unknown Whitehead (2022), which examines the significance of Whitehead's Harvard lectures and other previously unknown archival materials.

Table of Contents

Abbreviations

Acknowledgements

PrefaceA Brief History of the Critical Edition of WhiteheadBrian G. Henning

Introduction

Tales from the Whitehead Mines: On Whitehead, His Students, and the challenges of Editing the Critical EditionJoseph Petek

Part I: The First Lecture

1. First lecture: September, 1924Alfred North Whitehead

2. Examining Whitehead’s ‘First lecture: September, 1924’Paul A. Bogaard

Part II: The Fitness of the Environment

3. Whitehead and his Philosophy of EvolutionPaul A. Bogaard

4. Some Clarifications on Evolution and TimeMaria-Teresa Teixeira

5. Whitehead’s Biological TurnDennis Sölch

Part III: Physics and Relativity

6. Quanta and Corpuscles: The Influence of Quantum Mechanical Ideas on Whitehead's Transitional Philosophy in Light of The Harvard LecturesGary L. Herstein

7. From Physics to Philosophy, and from Continuity to AtomicityRonny Desmet

8. Whitehead’s Highly Speculative Lectures on Quantum TheoryRonny Desmet

9. On Herstein’s ‘Quanta and Corpuscles’Ronny Desmet

10. Reply to DesmetGary L. Herstein

Part IV: Whitehead’s Philosophical Context

11. Whitehead and Kant at CopenhagenJason Bell, Seshu Iyengar

12. Whitehead’s Early Harvard Period, Hartshorne, and the Transcendental ProjectGeorge W. Shields

13. Footnotes to PlatoAljoscha Berve

Part V: Metaphysical Reflections

14. Diagrams and MythsGeorge Allan

15. How ‘Eternity’ got ‘Thrown Forward’ into ‘Perishing’Jude Jones

Part VI: Reinterpreting Whitehead

16. Uncovering a ‘New’ WhiteheadGeorge R. Lucas, Jr.

17. Whitehead in Class: Do the Harvard-Radcliffe Course Notes Change How we Understand Whitehead’s Thought?Brian G. Henning

Notes on ContributorsIndex