Ontological Tools for the Process Turn in Biology

Abstract

Abstract The purpose of this chapter is to introduce an outline of general process theory (GPT), a non-Whiteheadian systematic process ontology, and to provide some pointers on how this framework could be applied in philosophy of biology to clarify questions of individuality, composition, and emergence. GPT is a mono-categorial framework based on the new category of more or less generic (non-particular) dynamic individuals called ‘general processes’ or ‘dynamics’. According to GPT, the world is the interaction of (more or less generic) dynamics. The chapter sets out some elements of a non-standard mereology (with non-transitive part relations) on processes and introduces the five-dimensional classification system of GPT. It is shown how the theoretical predicates of homeomereity and automereity can be used to distinguish between developments and ‘non-developmental’ or ‘dynamically stable’ temporally unbounded activities that persist in time by literal recurrence.

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