Center for Philosophy and the Natural Sciences - California State University Sacramento

Events Spotlight

January 29-30, 2010
Swiss Federal Institute of Technology
Zurich Switzerland

"Quantum Logical Causality, Complex Adaptive Systems, and the Philosophy of Whitehead: Exploring Biological Adaptive Complexity via the Logical-Causal Formalism of Quantum Relational Realism"

Workshop with Stuart Kauffman, Michael Epperson, Michael Hampe, Karim Bschir, Kelly Rose

Recent work in the natural sciences—most notably in the areas of theoretical physics and evolutionary biology—has demonstrated that the lines separating philosophy and science have all but vanished with respect to current explorations of ‘fundamental’ questions (e.g., string theory, multiverse cosmologies, complexity-emergence theories, the nature of mind, etc.). The centuries-old breakdown of ‘natural philosophy’ into the divorced partners ‘philosophy’ and ‘science,’ therefore, must be rigorously re-examined. To that end, much of today’s most groundbreaking scholarship in the natural sciences has begun to include explicit appeals to interdisciplinary collaboration among the fields of applied natural sciences, mathematics and philosophy. This workshop will be dedicated to the question of how a philosophical-metaphysical theory can be fruitfully applied to basic conceptualizations in the natural sciences.

More narrowly, we will explore the process oriented metaphysical scheme developed by philosopher and mathematician Alfred North Whitehead (1861-1947) and Michael Epperson's application of this scheme to recent work in quantum mechanics and evolutionary biology. Our aim is to give participants from various fields of expertise (see list below) the opportunity to exchange their specialized knowledge in the context of a collaborative exploration of the fundamental questions raised by recent scholarship in physics and biology.

The workshop will be open to a public audience and is aimed at students and academics from physics, biology and philosophy, both at ETH and other universities in Switzerland and abroad.

Click here for a complete schedule of recent and upcoming events.

Publications

New Book by CPNS Research Fellow
Stuart A. Kauffman

Stuart A. Kauffman is the founding director of the Institute for Biocomplexity and Informatics and a professor of biological sciences, physics, and astronomy at the University of Calgary.

He is Emeritus Professor of Biochemistry at the University of Pennsylvania, a MacArthur Fellow, and an external professor at the Santa Fe Institute, of which he was a founding member. His books include: The Origins of Order: Self-Organization and Selection in Evolution and At Home in the Universe: The Search for the Laws of Self-Organization and Complexity. Kauffman's notion of natural continuing creativity challenges conventional scientific assumptions that the biosphere's evolution and human activity can be reduced to physics and are fully governed by natural laws.

Research

CPNS Research Initiative on Logical Causality in Quantum Mechanics Receives $230,000
in Funding for 2008-2009

CPNS Principal Investigator and Philosophy Department professor Michael Epperson has organized a major research initiative exploring the philosophical implications of quantum mechanics. In January 2008, Epperson secured a $20,000 startup grant for the project from the CTNS/Templeton Foundation's 'Science and Transcendence Research Series' (STARS). With these funds, he and Project Manager Timothy Eastman, a plasma physicist at NASA-Goddard and CPNS Research Fellow, were able to assemble a research team of highly esteemed physicists and philosophers including David Ritz Finkelstein, Georgia Institute of Technology, and Henry P. Stapp, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.

Within two months, Epperson's project, entitled Logical Causality in Quantum Mechanics: Relational Realism and the Evolution of Ontology to Praxiology in the Philosophy of Nature received a $209,000 grant from the Fetzer-Franklin Fund of the Fetzer Institute. In addition to several forthcoming publications, including several journal articles and an edited volume, this research initiative will include a major international conference on quantum theory and neuroscience to be held at California State University, Sacramento.

Other News

Spacetime: From the Greeks to Gravity Probe B

What did the ancient Hellenic philosophers think about matter and its relationship to space and time? How were these views inherited and modified in the work of Newton, and later in the work of Einstein?

Gravity Probe B (GP-B) is a NASA physics mission that is currently investigating Einstein's 1916 general theory of relativity--his theory of gravity. It is hoped that the results will yield new understandings of the nature of

spacetime, and help physicists and philosophers better understand the longevolution of thought about the nature of the physical world.

The Center for Philosophy and the Natural Sciences
California State University, Sacramento
6000 J Street
Sacramento, CA 95819-6033

Click here for other publications by CPNS Research Fellows

Click here for a complete schedule of recent and upcoming events

Click here for a summary of our current research

Contact CPNS