Alfred North Whitehead

ALFRED NORTH \VHITEHEAD A. H. JoHNSON THE-twentieth century has produced few men whose achievements in the fields of mathematics and philosophy can surpass those of Alfred North Whitehead. His is not a mere technical excellence. It is a competence which, on occasion, is adorned by an unexcelled brilliance of vivid -expression. Learning sits lightly-on his firm shoulders. A sparkling, somewhat ironic, humour shines through his discourse. The profound humility of the truly wise dignifies his utterances. To persons in all walks of life he is a rare exemplification of cultured charm and dignity. The first sixty-three years ·of Whitehead's life were spent in England. At Cambridge and later at the University of London he was famous as a mathematician and as a leader in the practical phases of education.. Gradually a life-long interest in philosophy became his major concern. In 1924 he accepted the offer of a post in philosophy at Harvard University and gave distinguished service there, becoming Professor Emeritus in 1937. He is now residing in Cambridge, Massachusetts. This yea,~ marks the eighty-fifth anniversary of Whitehead's birth (February 15). \iVhitehead's great and .ever increasi_ ng influence .flows through two channels: his numerous books and articles, and his direct personal association with colleagues and students in the university environment. I The list of Whitehead's books is an impressive one. The very titles indicat.e the wide range of mind: Principia Mathematica (in collaboration with Bertrand Russell); Tlze Concept of Nature; The Principle of Relativity; Science and the Modern World; Religion in the Making; The Aims of Education ; Process and Reality; Adventures of Ideas; Modes of Thought. Whitehead's purpose as a· mathematician is stated in the Preface of his first book in this field, A Treatise on Universal Algebra. . "The ideal of mathem~tics should be to erect a calculus to facilitate reasoning in con- . nection with every province of thought, or of external experience, in which the succe$sion oJ thoughts, or of events can be definitely ascertained and precisely stated. So that all serious thought which is not philosophy, or inductive reasoning; or imaginative literature, shall be mathematics developed by means of a calculus., It is, of course, impossible to deal with the contents of Principia Mathematica in brief scope. However, it may be noted in passing that, in Whitehead's opinion, this book undermines the usual mathematical procedure of employing special indefinable mathematical concepts.· It also attacks the traditional defin_~tion which states that mathematics is the science of mn the New England coast indicate that there has been a storm on the Atlantic. The books written during \Vhitehead's period of concentration on th~ problems of speculative physics ~nvolve many technicalities which are very difficult for the lay mind to grasp, for example, the examination of relativity. There is also a complicated discussion of the meaning of the geometrical entitie'"s such as points, straight lines, and volumes. This involves a thorough-going consideration of the ideas of extension in time and extension in space. There is, in addition, an analysis of the process by which knowledge is obtained. However, underlying these technicalities is a fundamental Whiteheadian purpose, "to exhibit the interconnections of nature, and to show that one set of ingredients in nature requires for the exhibition of its character the presence of other sets of ingred~ents!'1 The material in Whitehead's recent books involves a dramatic widening of intellectual horizons. We find him discussing the nature of ultimate reality, religion, human personality; value, social organization, industry, education, art. The problems of mathematics and speculative physics are not completely shelved, nor are the "new" problems really new in \iVhitehead 's thinking. He had been "mulling them over, for a life-time. He waited until the years of full maturity had been reached before giving detailed expression to his views on these important matters. In the twenties and thirties of this century, many keen minds were indulging in cynicism and scepticism, or, suffer~ng from loss· of nerve, climbing on some authoritarian band wagon. At such a time, Whitehead set himself to "frame a coherent, logical, necessary system of general ideas in terms of...