Re: Organicism

David Vogel (dvogel@dhhs.state.nh.us)
Fri, 19 Mar 1999 15:28:47 -0500

Have you read Stephen Pepper's "World Hypotheses"? This is the place
to start, as he was the philospher who put forward the idea that there were
four relatively adequate world hypotheses: formism, mechanism,
contextualism and organicism (he later added to the list in another book,
but everyone seems to ignore this).

I think it is important to read Pepper, because his concepts have
mutated in all directions as the terms have been passed along chains of
people who have not seriously consulted the original source (as in the game
"telephone").

Anyway, I would be happy to discuss my own (mis)understanding of
organicism, as I am fairly attached to that world hypothesis.

David

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