Science And Reductionism

Science and Reductionism: Black Spectacles

Science cannot even start its investigation without presuming the existence of free will, in the same way in which the principles of mechanics cannot ignore all the meanings present in the term ‘force’ related to the human force exerted in our daily experiences. Thus what science does in the case of free will is only …

Knowledge as Power – And as Simplification

Like any other type of knowledge, science uses metaphors in its discourse. ‘Attraction,’ ‘repulsion,’ ‘force,’ ‘energy’ – all these fundamental scientific concepts are metaphors; that is to say, they are terms borrowed from other domains where they had a meaning related to human experience which is now translated into domains that are foreign to that …

Space and Negativity

Space and Negativity: Steps

In Hegel, self-externality of space is only a logical condition for everything that exists. As logical, it concerns pure possibility and not reality. Space is everywhere opening itself into other self-external spatial contents.  The difficulty of understanding Hegel in his explanations concerning nature is that we tend to understand the concepts about which he speaks …

Seeds, Plants and Free Will

Seeds, Plants and Free Will: Growing Plants

Having a property is, in fact, having the tendency, the potentiality to interact according to that property. Thus, in the same way in which the seed has within itself the tendency to become an oak (for example), the atom of hydrogen has within itself the tendency to fasten to an atom of oxygen. And, like …

Descriptive Generalization in Whitehead

Descriptive Generalization: Aerial view

Whitehead’s philosophical approach is based mainly on descriptive generalization. In this respect, he considers deduction as the method of mathematics, and the borrowing of this method by philosophy an error for the latter’s method of descriptive generalization (Whitehead 1978, p.10).  Indeed, philosophy starts with concrete situations and experiences which it attempts to explain. It sees …

Does Matter Evolve?

Does Matter Evolve: Deep space

When science assumes that there are only material bodies in the universe, or put more generally, only matter, it forgets something fundamental: matter (if we take the pure concept of matter) cannot evolve. Science wants to reduce every transformation to a causal relationship, that is, to an action of a previously given material body on …

Hegel and Non-Euclidean Geometry

Hegel and Non-Euclidian Geometry: Stereographic Projection

For Hegel, space is self-externality; that is to say, it is the embodiment of the idea of externality in what we call reality. However much I try to analyze space, to divide any distance or spatial structure, I will get another spatial distance or form. I will never be able to reach a level that …

The (Outer) World Is Not Enough

Inner World: Man watching through the window

We usually share inner experience with our fellow people: when someone tells me that he has pains in his foot, I understand him because I know and have often experienced the sensation of pain myself; when someone else tells me about how he spent his holiday, I immediately know that he is recounting a memory …

Principles, Logic, and Blunders

Principles, logic and blunders: Astonished Man

The previous part of this article can be read here. When scientists claim they have proven the non-existence of free will, they commit a blatant fallacy, which only they cannot see. What they do is pretend to prove what they have already assumed, even before the smallest first step of any demonstration. They say: ‘See …

Statistics and Free Will

Statistics and Free Will: Dice

The first part of this article can be read here. Someone who considers that humans are entirely determined by the activity of their neurons, might illustrate his idea by saying that real robots, created by human beings, also make decisions, despite the fact that they are lacking free will. ‘Do we not see, might he …