Problems with this section; for Frank (Agnosticism)

by David Turell , Thursday, November 19, 2009, 00:16 (5483 days ago) @ Frank Paris

I prefer to think that the fundamentals are not "programmed" in any way. By the very nature of their being tiny reflections of the divine essence, they have an inherent ability to react with each other in any number of ways. -
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> If chance is involved (which nobody knows for sure), it is the specific values of constants that define the nature of the fundamentals. In our universe at least, there are at most a finite number of fundamental "types". Every fundamental of a given type is exactly like every other fundamental of that type. In our universe, we don't know how many types there are. But in the standard model of particle physics, some of the fundamental types are electrons, quarks, gluons, photons, and their anti-particles. The theory of supersymmetry says there are "supersymmetric" versions of each of these. String theory says all these are species of something even more basic. Whatever the basic particles are, that's what I'm calling a fundamental.-You have given me a very clear pictue of fundamentals. They are the particles of supersymmetry that we know and the ones we are hunting for , i.e., Higgs Boson and whatever else is missing in matter and anti-matter.
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> "I need further definition of the concept of 'processes'."
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> Unfortunately (but unsurprisingly), that gets into the very heart of what process philosophy is all about. It is far beyond my ability to explicate the concept of process in this philosophy. The best you can hope for from me is an intuitive notion of what process is. For more, I refer you to Whitehead himself (God help you) or one of his highly respected interpreters (also, God help you). But for an intuitive discussion of the concept, read John A. Jungerman's World in Process: Creativity and Interconnection in the New Physics. For a more formal exposition, start with Griffin's Reenchantment without Supernaturalism. If you really want to go whole hog, Read the first chapter of Stephen T. Franklin's Speaking from the Depths. If you can penetrate that, you should be teaching philosophy at the graduate level.
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> All I'll do here is give you a couple quotes from Jungerman's book, pp. 4-5:-And all I can say from that quote is, no thanks. I can follow Adler, Leslie, Del Ratzsch, etc. But Jungerman's quote is a dense fog. With my medical education I've only had Philosohpy 101, and as I have noted here before the one professorial quote I remember and use is "matter is energy on the outside and mind is energy on the inside." From that I think God is a universal intelligence of which we humans have a small piece.In that way the Bible is correct in saying we are made in the image of God. I am content with my view, as you are with yours. I am very pleased that you have shared it with me in the way you have. I can understand from what I have read of other posts by you and dhw how the concepts could be confusing and seemingly contradictory. What process philosophy presents to me is vague. With my science education I like to go from a to b and know why and how I got there. So I don't plan to do any deeper reading. I will innocently ask this of all folks here (Matt and you, Frank) with philosophic knowledge: how mainstream is Whitehead? Or is he a side channel? I'd heard about him and process theology, but is as far as I ever went.
It doesn't open up any vistas for me, now that i have had a slight exposure.