REGAINING THE RICHES OF A LOST HERITAGE; DEVELOPMENTAL SYSTEMS THEORY AND NATURAL PHILOSOPHY

摘要

Natural Philosophy is a systematizing mode of thought. It can synthesize information from the specialized sciences, just as indications from our natural senses are used to corroborate each other, gaining robustness of knowledge. Its aim is to make knowledge intelligible, and it is developmental in format. The specification hierarchy of integrative levels, revealing intensional complexity, provides a model, modeling change as stages of development. Development is epigenetic -- previous stages form the framework for the next, which will make refinements on them. This theory implies that there was a preferred directional tendency toward human properties in the history of the world, thus integrating humans with the rest of the world in an intelligible way. There has never been a culture without an origination myth; ours should be rooted in a scientific perspective, taking the form of a whole systems description. Unlike others before it, it will have to be self-referential.