Sunday, October 28, 2012

Bryant on the Whole, the One and Totality

Sometimes I wonder if he reads IPS forum and/or my blog. And/or perhaps what we've said is just an obvious logical extension of what he and other OOOers have already said. Some points from the post akin to my recent ruminations:

"Everything is actual.  This is the meaning of totality."

"It is difference that is primary, not identity defined by forms, essences, or concepts.  No two entities are ever exactly alike and no thing ever exactly repeats by virtue of the infinity of atoms.  For this reason, no whole forms a totality because every whole is only a local arrangement of atoms that actualizes some possible combinations and not others.  As a result, every whole is an open and creative whole. There is no combination that could totalize the combinatorial possibilities."


"In cosmology, for example, we learn that natural laws themselves were formed in the initial, infinitesimal seconds of the big bang...and that there are good reasons to suppose that there are universes with very different physical laws."

"Theological orientations perpetually strive to transform logoi (contingent and open pluralism) into logos (theological necessitarianism)."

1 comment:

  1. Also see his post yesterday on naturalism.* In one part he talks about memes, also discussed earlier in this thread is similar fashion:**

    "There are a number of problems with meme theory, but one thing I think it does underline well is that there are replicators besides genes– cultural units –that contribute every bit as much to why humans are as they are and these replicators have 'aims' other than biological reproduction and survival. Here, for example, we might think of soldiers facing almost certain death as they storm the beach at Normandy. They are acting on behalf of memes not genes."

    This would apply to class or capitalism as a hyperobject/meme.

    He also discussed Andy Clark and the extended mind, also discussed earlier in the thread. Although I made the connection with Clark and assemblage-hyperobjects like thought (ideology) memes that I have yet to read in Bryant. Which doesn't mean he hasn't addressed it, just that I haven't seen it yet. I haven't read everything he's written.**

    * http://larvalsubjects.wordpress.com/2012/10/27/some-thoughts-on-naturalism/
    ** Like this post and what precedes and follows: http://integralpostmetaphysics.ning.com/forum/topics/object-oriented-ontology?commentId=5301756:Comment:43828

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