Chidiebere Eleazar Ukachuwku
Department of Philosophy,
Olabisi Onabanjo University,
PMB 2002 Ago-Iwoye, Nigeria.
chidiukachukwu@hotmail.com
Abstract: Hegel’s dialectical idealism takes the mental phenomena as the genesis and basis of reality. Hence, for Hegel, material existence is nothing but the physical manifestation of the Absolute Spirit. Marx’s dialectical materialism on the other hand, takes the material phenomena as the basis of existence. Similarly, for Marx, whatever cannot be interpreted in materialistic terms is illusory. It is the case that in the system of each of these thinkers, the urge to depreciate other aspects of reality that do not fit into their schema is rife. This is where the notion of resistance and the attendant denialism replete in their systems is unveiled. In an attempt to bring a resolution to the metaphysical resistance to the admission of other realities, this study forays into the process metaphysics of Alfred North Whitehead. Here, it is revealed that rather than boasting of a dialectic approach to phenomena, a binary complementary alternative is more appropriate. It is precisely through this principle of binary as it presents itself in process metaphysics that resistance through the exaggeration of one aspect of reality over the other(s), is overcome.
PDF Keywords: Hegel, Marx, Whitehead, Resistance, Metaphysics.
Introduction
The principle of dialectics albeit differently applied to phenomena, is very central to the philosophy of each of Friedrich Georg Wilhelm Hegel and Karl Marx. However, it is not to be denied, the exaggeration of one aspect of reality over the other in the schema provided by each of these intellectuals. This exactly parades that tendency to depreciate what is not comprehensible to a knowing subject. And what is the consequence of this? What is the output of an exaggeration of one aspect of reality over the other? In a nutshell, the result of this neglect of one aspect of reality for the exaggeration of the other is resistance. Resistance, because when a thorough-going Marxist confronts realities that imply state of affairs that are beyond the material, there is the propensity to resist this admission. Further on, this resistance necessarily leads to denialism. Moreover, denialism implies a situation where individuals refuse to accept an empirically verifiable reality.[1] In the same vein, O’Shea articulates that denialism is “essentially an irrational action that withholds the validation of a historical experience or even.”[2]
Obviously, there is a closely-knit interface between denialism and resistance. This is the case one it is admitted that resistance also connotes “opposition.”[3] Peter Hanks is even more forthcoming as he chronicles that resistance is “the act or power of resisting, opposing, or withstanding.”[4] With this brief exercise in conceptual clarification, it is not unwise to pose: What kind of resistance is present in the dialectics of each of Hegel and Marx? Does the denialism that comes with the resistance reveal that these scholars have a biased and non-holistic notion of reality? Does resistance through the glorification of one aspect of reality and the relegation of another to the gorge of illusion not lead to metaphysical incoherence? In the face of these, further posers are derivable: Is there any metaphysical framework that is able to overcome this ideological resistance? Is it not possible that reality is not steeped in the pool of dialectic but of binary?
Through the method of analysis, this essay explores the response to the foregoing queries in four parts, the first being this introduction. In the second part, an exposition of the idea and application of the principle of dialectics to reality by Hegel and Marx is tersely exposed. This part also reveals the tendency latent in each of these scholars to resist, oppose, deny and then expunge, that which does not conform to their schema. In the third section, this study discusses a metaphysical groundwork that accommodates both aspects of phenomena by dispatching the resistance that comes with the dialectics in the thoughts of Hegel and Marx. In mind is the process metaphysics of Alfred North Whitehead, which deals in binary and complementarity. The fourth divide concludes this intellectual drudgery.
Hegel and Marx on Dialectics: Deducing the Metaphysics of Resistance
In this section, the concern is to provide the inner kernel of dialectics as portrayed in the thoughts of each of Hegel and Marx. Afterwards, how the mechanism of resistance works to diminish the originality, coherence and corpulence work in the ideas of these scholars will be attempted. Hegel’s dialectical idealism will now be the subject of exploration.
The principle of dialectics is one of the astounding developments and achievements of Hegel. Dialectics originally refers to the process of thesis, anti-thesis and synthesis.[5] Ideas are formed and classified in the course of intellectual debate. Such debates normally with a proposition or thesis and then challenged by a counter proposition (anti-thesis). Since both are partly true and partly untrue, the normal outcome of the debate is a revised proposition or synthesis which combines the valid elements of each of the thesis and anti-thesis. In spite of this, the synthesis is not always the whole truth. It therefore, takes the place of a new thesis and undergoes the same process against an anti-thesis to beget another synthesis. Elsewhere, it is gleaned that for Hegel, “separateness had to be ended by a theory of unity of totality within the ambit of reason.”[6]
Apparently, philosophical systems before Hegel have either overstressed the existence of matter at the detriment of ideas, or vice versa. Hegel’s idealism is therefore directed at reconciling the divide between these conflicting thoughts concerning reality since he believes that only the reconciliation of contradiction can bring about development. Hence, Ezekiel K. Ogundowole notes that, for Hegel, “the world is a totality which is progressing; or conversely, progress is of the very essence of the totality, not simply an attribute of some part of it, or of some segment of its history…”[7] To substantiate this point of view, Hegel’s idealism is structured on his idea of the Absolute Spirit.
This thesis explains reality as one entity with many-sided angles. Things, to him, have different nature when viewed from their contradicting features. However, the underlying content among these things unify them all. Apparently, all existing entities (thought and matter inclusive) are one and the same reality: the absolute. Accordingly, Hegel writes:
…spirit itself as a whole, and the self-differentiated moments within it, fall within the sphere of picture-thinking and in the form of objectivity. The content of this picture- thinking is absolute spirit; and all that now remains to be done is to supersede this mere form, or rather, since this belongs to consciousness as such, its truth must already have yielded itself in the shape of consciousness.[8]
While describing the nature of his system, Hegel puts it thus: “Consciousness must now grope forward to an understanding of objects in the form of self. But it does so by gradual stages, and directs itself into a number of distinct mental postures in which separate sides of the object are gradually brought together.”[9] Therefore, Hegel maintains that thought is always in its own sphere its relations are with itself, and it is its own object. In having a thought for object, I am at home with myself. The thinking power, the ‘I’, is therefore infinite, because, when it thinks, it is in relation to an object which is itself.[10]
Hegel recognizes the impact of this logic and imports it into his thoughts on Absolute Spirit. This is where Hegel’s dialectical idealism is fully expressed. Hegel maintains that social institutions reflect the ideas behind them and it is the movement of ideas through the dialectical process which is responsible for social change. One of these is the state. For Hegel, the Absolute Spirit, externalizes itself in and through the material universe. This implies that all changes that occur in the universe are traced to the Absolute Spirit.[11] This is where Marx disagreed. In what ways do these disagreements appear? What arguments did Marx employ to disagree with this thesis?
For Marx, being a materialist, there is no reason to suppose that the idealism of Hegel is correct. The material universe is all there is and Marx was fascinated by developments in the sciences which are also a purely empirically discipline explaining the universe without recourse to spirits as Hegel would have him believe. This is the main reason why those who followed Hegel’s teaching dogmatically where called the Right Hegelians while those who followed another path such as Ludwig Feuerbach and Karl Marx are called the Young Hegelians. In his own words, Karl Marx informs that:
My dialectical method is not only different from the Hegelian, but is its direct opposite. To Hegel, the life process of the human brain, i.e., the process of thinking, which, under the name of ‘the Idea’ he even transforms into an independent subject, is the demiurgos of the real world, and the real world is only the external, phenomenal form of the ‘Idea’. With me, on the contrary, ‘the Idea’ is nothing else than the material world reflected by the human mind, and translated into forms of thought.[12]
Even when Friedrich Engels was writing about the transition from Hegelianism to Marxism, Feuerbach was mentioned and also criticized. For Engels, the Hegelian system merely represents “materialism idealistically turned upside down in method and content.”[13] The concept of dialectical materialism emerges from statements by Marx in the preface to his magnum opus, Capital. There Marx says he intends to use Hegelian dialectics but in revised form. He defends Hegel against those who view him as a ‘dead dog’ and then says, “I openly avowed myself as the pupil of that mighty thinker Hegel.”[14] Marx credits Hegel with “being the first to present its dialectic’s form of working in a comprehensive and conscious manner.” But he then criticizes Hegel for turning dialectics upside down: “With him it is standing on its head. It must be turned right side up again, if you would discover the rational kernel within the mystical shell.”[15] In a nutshell, Samuel Stumpf and James Fieser admit that:
Of course, Marx rejected Hegel’s idealism, but he accepted the general theory of the dialectic movement of history, which Hegel proposed. Hegel argued that ideas develop in a dialectic way, through the action and reaction of thought. He described this dialectic process as a movement from thesis to antithesis and then to synthesis, where the synthesis becomes a new thesis, and the process goes on and on.[16]
With the distinction between Hegel’s dialectical idealism and Marx’s dialectical materialism succinctly articulated, it is not important to turn to the main thesis of dialectical materialism at this juncture. Dialectical materialism has three main inner kernels. These have been called the three laws of dialectical materialism. They are:
The law of change from quantity to quality;
The law of clash or interpenetration of opposites; and
The law of negation of the negation.
These three laws form the metaphysical underpinning that Marx and Engels derived after a departure from the inner kernels of materialism of Feuerbach and the dialectical idealism of Hegel. The first law talks about the movement from a lower level of development to a higher level or state of development. The movement from traditional communalistic lifestyle to the slave era is a direct instance of such law. The law of interpenetration of opposite is talking about class conflicts. For every society, there are class distinctions. In the slave era, there is the master and the slave as the feudal era boasts of the lord and the serf. David McLellan notices that “classes are obviously of immense importance in Marx’s view of history.”[17] This is a true assessment of Marx because Marx himself had announced that “the history of all hitherto existing classes is the history of class struggle.”[18] These opposites play a crucial role in the movement from quantity to quality. The third law has to do with the fact that during the course of struggle between the classes there is a negation or removal of impediments to social change. This dialectical process repeats itself over and over again and is the history of people, economics, and society. To put this in another way, history is the result of productive activity in interplay with social relationships. According to Marx, this interplay accounts not only for all socioeconomic–political situations but also for morality, law, religion, and, to a greater or lesser extent, even philosophy and art.[19]
The whole gamut of Marxist philosophy centres on the call for social change. This is captured in Theses on Feuerbach where it is explicitly hinted that “philosophers have interpreted the world in various ways. The point however, is to change it.”[20] The need to understand the forces of production and distribution of social wealth and the urgency to see a higher society brought to bearing is the message of Marx and Engels. With dialectical materialism applied to history, they showed that the history of societies is that of class struggle. Marxist Philosophy also calls for social change. The need to understand the inner contradictions in capitalism and the movement to another realm of socialism is well underscored, but this is one the onus of this work.
From the excursion into the dialectics and its application in the thoughts of Hegel and Marx, it is the case that when the former favours the idealistic division of reality, the latter upholds the materialistic division. Furthermore, one notices that there is opposition, resistance to accommodate that which does not fall squarely into their schemes. The case of Hegel is trivial but needs meager elaboration.
Hegel will resist all things that are material as nothing but the physical manifestation of the Absolute Spirit. This Absolute Spirit is the all in all. It is the case that Hegel’s system will not pass gamut in providing an answer to the question of Being, the age long metaphysical question, inaugurated by Aristotle but regurgitated in the last century, out of neglect by Martin Heidegger. Of course, Hegel is willing to trade the Absolute Spirit as Being. But this will be insufficient precisely because “the Being that Heidegger speaks of is not any particular being, it is not this or that being. Unlike Aristotle, Augustine and Aquinas, by Being, Heidegger does not refer to God who incidentally is regarded as being of beings. Heidegger is rather talking of a most primordial ground that sustains all other grounds, including God.”[21] One will realize that Hegel’s resistance to physical reality as illusion and its lopsidedness, necessarily fails to answer the question of Being. It is in the light of metaphysical schemes as Hegel’s that Heidegger concludes that the entire of the Western metaphysical tradition is nothing but onto-theology.[22] In other words, the history of metaphysics and religion has followed the track of what Heidegger would later call onto-theology, the forgetting of the ontological difference between Being as it is in itself and God.[23] The problems deducible from resistance in Marx’s dialectics are not trivial but colossal.
Firstly, Marx’s dialectical materialism is, as the name implies, strictly materialistic. The implication of this parochial world view is that it leaves a lot of realities untouched. It resists these other realities because they cannot be admitted into its explanatory pool. In other words, dialectical materialism cannot explain many realities apart from those that are physical. Africans believe not only in the physical aspect of reality but also in the spiritual side to reality. For an African to be a Marxist is therefore problematic because it will be difficult for such an individual to see reality holistically from such angle. Realities such as telepathy, astral projection are some realities that a philosophical framework that embraces a materialistic approach to life would either fail to acknowledge openly or pretend they are non-existents. This is the aspect where the bifurcation of nature is regurgitated in the discourse on dialectical materialism. Marxist philosophy simply divided existence into the material and idea but took the former more seriously, thus failing to bring into its schema, the reality of things that are non-materialistic.
Another problem, a consequence of resistance present in Marxist dialectical materialism and its philosophy in general is that of its humanistic tendencies. In other words, Marxist philosophy is built around man and all other aspects of have been reduced to objects for man. The reason why today we have climate problem is not farfetched. Humanism, according to Godwin Azenarbo “is a philosophy in which man, his nature and problem are the central focus.”[24] This is also substantiated by Diana Abasi Ibanga that “in humanism, man alone is the subject of significant discussion every other being is relegated.”[25] The orientation that the human species alone is significant and that every other species is subject to his whims and caprices leads to climate and environmental degradations.
Due to the resistance and the attendant problems that find their ways into the dialectics of Hegel and Marx, could there be a better and broader scheme capable of overcoming these loops? Is there a metaphysical approach that takes cognizance of the approaches to reality in Hegel and Marx’s depiction of reality and does not resist but accommodates other explanations to reality? The attempt to respond to these posers will be found in the section that follows.
Overcoming Resistance through Binaries: Introducing Whitehead’s Reformed Metaphysics
In this section, focus will be on the thoughts of Alfred N. Whitehead, a foremost process metaphysician. Though most are wont to hold that process metaphysics derives from the thoughts of Alfred North Whitehead alone, a perusal of philosophy in the ancient periods reveals that “process-relational thinking has a long history stretching back at least to the Buddha and the ancient Greek philosopher Heraclitus in the sixth century BCE.”[26] However, it should be noted that the revival of the metaphysics in the 20th century is indisputably credited to Alfred North Whitehead who harps that the goal of philosophy is “…the endeavour to frame a coherent, logical, necessary system of general ideas in terms of which every element of our experience can be interpreted.”[27] This implies that the sole aim of philosophy is to interpret or understand our experiences. He continues that “the elucidation of immediate experience is the sole justification for any thought.”[28] In the words of Emmanuel Ofuasia:
Alfred North Whitehead was a proponent of process philosophy, which identifies metaphysical reality with dynamism and change as opposed to Aristotelian views where reality is based on permanent, timeless substances. He rejected the idea that an object has a simple temporal or spatial location and instead claimed that objects should be understood as having spatial and temporal extensions.[29]
In the words of Whitehead: “philosophy of organism is the inversion of Immanuel Kant’s philosophy … For Immanuel Kant, the world emerges from the subject; for the philosophy of organism, the subject emerges from the world.”[30] Given that Whitehead sees a serious need to build a system that would be able to assist in the comprehension of our experience; two demands for him must be met by such a system: rational demand and empirical demand. The rational demand implies coherence and logicality. Coherence and logicality in this context means the parts form a whole rather than entities standing in isolation from each other. Incoherence as holds here is being deployed against scholars like Rene Descartes who divided reality into mind and matter, failing to explain how they ‘fit’. This is what Whitehead calls ‘the bifurcation of nature.’[31] It is also echoed by Keiji Nishitani as the depersonalization of the human person and the denaturalization of nature.[32] Whitehead debunks the metaphysical and philosophical systems of scholars like Rene Descartes, David Hume, Gottfried Leibniz and a host of others on the ground that they failed to give a picture of experience that is coherent and logical (rational demand) on the one hand and on the other hand, applicable and adequate (empirical demand).
To be coherent and logical could also connote that no entity lies outside the system. It is obvious that the systems of Hegel and Marx could not accommodate but only resist some aspects of reality that are not in tune with their systems.
For instance, when Hegelians may interpret the Absolute Spirit as God/Being who is exempted, above and beyond physical manifestations, Whitehead insists that “God is not to be treated as an exception to all metaphysical principles, invoked to save their collapse. He is their chief exemplification.”[33] It is evident that for Whitehead, “in seeking to understand God, one must use the same principles that are used to understand everything else. He may exemplify the principles in a unique way, but he must not be an exception to them, otherwise the system would have two parts, leaving a dichotomy. This underlines the necessity for coherence.”[34] In process metaphysics, everything is in a state of flux, a state of continuous change, a state of perishing and being transformed into other modes of existence.[35] This is what happens to all categories of being from inanimate beings to man and even God himself, who is part of the organic system.[36] It is therefore of great necessity to build a system that would take cognizance of these anomalies.
The empirical demand on the other hand insists, for Whitehead that a system of general ideas must also be applicable and adequate. “It is not enough, however, for our ideas to be rational—coherent and logical; they must be applicable. In other words, to be of value they must tell us about the world we experience and live in. They must tell us about something in particular, not just everything in general.”[37] It is correct to say that Whitehead moves beyond mere speculation. He seeks for a metaphysics that would explain reality in the simplest of ways. So far as ideas explain particular situations, they can be said to be applicable. Applicability seems as obvious as the criteria of being coherent and logical. But it is precisely the failure to apply to anything concrete that has made so many metaphysical systems seem foolish and worthless. Philosophy that is not applicable to anything is what leads people to make fun of “mere metaphysics” and to dismiss it as illogical nonsense. This is why in the early 20th century metaphysics was a candidate for elimination in the hands of the logical positivists and some analytic scholars[38].
Whitehead thereby affirms that process, event, change are the basis for reality, contra Substance metaphysics. This affirms that “process is fundamental…to be actual is to be a process.”[39] The primary actualities that Whitehead terms ‘actual entities’ are in his own words, “the final real things of which the world is made. There is no going behind actual entities to find anything more real.”[40] It is evident that actual entities replace substance in substance metaphysics. Thus, Whitehead may be interpreted in this excerpt to be doing away with the traditional notion of substance, which maintains identity in the face of flux.
To be an actual entity, in Whitehead’s cognition is to be in process. William Lawhead confirms the thesis that for Whitehead, event, change, process is the fundamental feature of all reality in the following words: “Things that appear permanent and unmoving are really abstractions from the basic reality.”[41] The tendency to think that what is permanent is actually the case leads to what Whitehead calls the “fallacy of misplaced concreteness.”[42] It is this fallacy that is applicable to the principle of resistance that presents itself in the dialectics of Hegel and Marx. But for Whitehead, all things in the universe including ourselves falls under actual occasion, with physical and mental poles. This is his ‘ontological principles’. He articulates thus: “actual entities are the only reasons; so that to search for a reason is to search for one or more actual entities.”[43] Actual occasions are not ‘things’ in the substance sense of traditional metaphysics that we are used to. They are “drops of existence, complex and interdependent.”[44] He is however, quick to note that actual entities differ among themselves in gradations of importance. In his words:
They differ among themselves: God is an actual entity, and so is the trivial puff of existence in far-off empty space. But, though there are gradations of importance, and diversities of function, yet in the principles which actuality exemplifies all are on the same level.[45]
In the philosophy of organism as codified by Whitehead, resistance is not present. This is the case because instead of bifurcating and depersonalizing nature, Whitehead posits the principle of binary. By this principle, Whitehead offers that all things irrespective of species are actual occasions/entities with physical and mental poles. Now this idea of a physical and mental pole is also presented in the explanation of God who is also subject to these metaphysical principles. With the admission of all things in possession of physical and mental poles, Whitehead is able to overcome the resistance and confrontations on metaphysical issues like idealism and materialism, mind and body, spirit and physical. Hence, scholars are tempted to interpret reality as the dialectical interchange between these two forces. Usually, one is even given more priority as the other is relegated as illusion. Philosophic schemes like Hegel’s and Marx’s have fallen into this straitjacketing given the forceful, dominant but inadequate metaphysics of substance of which they are familiar. However, due to space-time limitation, this study will not be able to explore all the key components of process philosophy. Nevertheless, for the purpose of this study, it is important to admit that in process philosophy:
Nothing is life-less, as all things from simple cell, thoughts, volitions, rocks and stones up to God fall under the notion of ‘actual occasions’ and form an interconnected whole constantly and persistently prehending one another. This being together of actual occasions is called ‘nexus’;
Secondly, dualism is non-existence. Rather duality is underscored (more on this in the next section). This is implied in the dipolar structure of all actual occasions, including God; and
Thirdly, process metaphysics is excused from the objections cited against Substance Metaphysics by Heidegger as the neglect of the question of Being in pursuit of God.
Conclusion
In this essay, it has been established that the principle of dialectics in the thoughts of Hegel and Marx is an unfair representation of reality. This is because in the thoughts of each of these scholars, the exaggeration of one aspect of reality not only depicts an erroneous and/or incomplete view of the universe and its modus operandi, it also underscores intellectual resistance. Intellectual resistance surfaces when effort is made to become malicious by relegating as unreal aspects of reality that do not fit or conform to one’s conception of reality. This is the charge this study found against the dialectical idealism of Hegel and the dialectical materialism of Marx. For when the former thrives on idealism, the latter admits only the material aspect of existence. In reaction, this essay argued that a metaphysical approach in Whitehead is able to overcome the conundrum generated by the inadequate dialectics, through the notion of binaries in all cadres of existence.
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[1]See J. Maslin “Michael Specter Fires Bullets of Cozy Antiscience in ‘Denialisn’. New York Times. 2009; Dan Brown. Inferno. (New York: Double Day 2013).
[2]P. O’Shea. A Cross to Heaven: Eugenio Pacelli, Politics and the Jews of Europe. (New York: Rosenberg Publishing 2008), p. 20.
[3], B.S. Cayne (ed.) The New Webster’s Dictionary of the English Language. (New York: Lexicon 1992), p. 847.
[4]P. Hanks. Encyclopedic World Dictionary. (London: Hamlyn 1976), p. 1335.
[5]S.E. Stumpf. Elements of Philosophy: An Introduction. (New York: McGraw Hill 1979).
[6]S. Mukhajee, S. Ramaswamy. Substance of Political Philosophy. (New Delhi: Shambhala. 2008), p. 249.
[7]E.K. Ogundowole. Self-Reliancism: Philosophy of a New World Order. (Lagos: Correct Counsels Ltd. 2011), p. 20.
[8]G.W.F. Hegel. Phenomenology of Spirit. (Oxford: Oxford University Press 1977), p. 479.
[9]Ibid., p. 530.
[10]Ibid.,p. 530.
[11]Op. Cit., Stumpf p. 319.
[12]K. Marx. Capital: A Critique of Political Economy. Friedrick Engels. (ed). (New York: Modern Library 1906), 181.
[13]F. Engels. Ludwig Feuerbach and the End of German Classical Philosophy. In Selected Woks of Marx and Engels. (New York: International Publishers 1972), p. 218.
[14]Op. Cit., Marx, p. 25.
[15]Ibid., p. 25.
[16]S. Stumpf., J. Fieser. Philosophy, History and Readings. (New York: McGraw Hill 2008), p. 73.
[17]D. MacLellan. Dialectical Materialism. (New York: St. Martins’ Press 1995), p. 182.
[18]K. Marx., F. Engels. The Manifestoe of the Communist Party. In Selected Woks of Marx and Engels. (New York: International Publishers 1972), p. 207.
[19]B.N. Moore., K. Bruder. Philosophy: The Power of Ideas. (New York: McGraw Hill 2011), p. 338.
[20]K. Marx. Theses on Feuerbach. In Selected Woks of Marx and Engels. (New York: International Publishers 1972), p. 132.
[21]C.B. Okoro. “Problems of Metaphysical Philosophy”. African Nebula. 2011 Issue 3, June, p. 117.
[22]E. Ofuasia. “On the Dearth of God in Aristotle’s Substance Metaphysics: A Process-Relational Riposte.” Philosophia: E-Journal of Philosophy and Culture. 15, p. 149.
[23]M. Heidegger. “The Onto-theo-logical Constitution of Metaphysics.” In Identity and Difference. trans Joan Stambaugh. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press 2002), p. 42.
[24]G. Azenarbo. Modern Theories in African Philosophy. (Lagos: Byolah Publishers 2010), p. 112.
[25]D.A. Ibanga. “Climate Change and Igbo Thought: A Philosophical Analysis”. M. Asiegbu, J.D. Chukwuokolo (eds.). Frontiers of Knowledge in Philosophy: Cutting Edge Issues. (Enugu: Jones Communication Publishers 2014), p. 183.
[26] R. Mesle. Process-Relational Philosophy: An Introduction to Alfred North Whitehead. (Pennsylvania, Templeton: Foundation Press 2008), p. 4.
[27]A.N. Whitehead. Process and Reality. D.R. Griffin and Sherburne (eds.) (New York: The Free Press 1978), p. 3.
[28]Ibid., p. 3.
[29]E. Ofuasia. A.N. Whitehead on the Relation between Religion and Science. (Saarbrucken: LAP. 2015), p. 27.
[30]Whitehead, Op. Cit., p. xiv.
[31]A.N. Whitehead. The Concept of Nature. (New York: Prometheus Books 200), pp. 26-48.
[32]K. Nishitani. The Self-Overcoming of Nihilism, trans Graham Parkes and Setsuko Aihara, (New York: State University of New York Press 1990).
[33]Op. Cit, Whitehead 1978, p. 343.
[34] F.J. Wood. Whiteheadian Thought as a Basis for Philosophy of Religion. (USA: University of America Inc. 1986).
[35]Op. Cit, Ofuasia 2015, p. 29.
[36]J.I. Omeregbe. Metaphysics Without Tears. (Lagos: JOJA 2011), p. 213.
[37]Op. Cit., Mesle, p. 15.
[38]Op CIt., Ofuasia 2015, p. 30.
[39]Op Cit., Whitehead 2004, p. 1.
[40]Op Cit., Whitehead 1978, p. 18.
[41]W. Lawhead. The Voyage of Discovery: A Historical Introduction to Philosophy. (Stamford: Wordsworth Thomas Learning 2002), p. 490.
[42]A.N. Whitehead. Science and the Modern World. (New York: Pelican Mentor Books 1948), p. 51.
[43]Op. Cit., Whitehead 1978, p. 18.
[44]Ibid., p. 18.
[45]Ibid., p. 18.
Philosophia 22/2019, pp. 3-16
Philosophia 