Understanding Surimposium, the integral theory of reality

Abstract: The introduction sets the scene for a Theory of Everything (ToE): the observable, the provable, the root concepts, the limits, the author. Part 1 presents the transcendental thread, the TD principle (soliTary vs soliDary, whole vs part). From this principle is deduced the fundamental framework of reality, the complex variety, endowed with two dimensions, … Read more

Ken Wilber’s (too?) brief account of The Everything

Abstract: As Surimposium is a theory of everything presented on this site, I examine Ken Wilber’s earlier theory, which he expanded throughout his life. I separate the excellent start on Arthur Koestler’s holons, likely to win broad support, and the mystical veneer added by Wilber, which ends up erasing the initial coherence. I highlight Wilber’s … Read more

How can we restore substance to matter?

Abstract: Given the difficulty in demonstrating the ontological reality of emergence, some authors propose to make a non-substantialist conception of it. But classical reductionist ontology is already failing to say whether there is a fundamental substance of things. It simply associates an information structure with each observable phenomenon, without justifying or contradicting the existence of … Read more

The living under its own double look

Abstract: The double look offers an astonishing perspective on the living, capable of overturning our usual concepts about it, but above all of recognizing the origin of these two sets of concepts, the classic and the revolutionary, which are not contradictory but complementary. I describe an application to medical therapy and in particular to cancer. … Read more

A tree falls in the forest

Abstract: A tree falls in a forest, casting doubt on its existence despite the noise produced. Inseparable and unadjustable halves The double look, what is it exactly? Let’s start with a classic riddle: “If a tree falls in an uninhabited forest, does it make a sound?” The answer “Yes, of course!” is not suitable. The … Read more

Overwhelming ideals

Abstract: Many of our motivations are wrongly considered natural. I take 3 examples: staying healthy, protecting nature, upholding equal rights. Behind them lie artificial ideals: Eternal Life, the Natural History Museum, Democratic Equality. Confused with principles truly constitutive of human nature, these ideals crush with their weight many aspects of our lives. They flatten our … Read more

Do without hierarchy?

Abstract: The etymology of ‘hierarchy’, the sacred order, remains relevant: there are always laws to which one must submit, if only the natural, new sacraments. I show that the collapse of hierarchies is natural, too, but that this disappearance is disastrous. It is not the hierarchical principle that poses the problem but its dysfunctions, its … Read more

Around a universal philosophy

Abstract: I assume here that you have read the UniPhiM, a philosophical method with universal claims, and that you have reservations about it. I use a classic rhetoric, the prolepsis, to smash your criticisms before you’ve even said them, bad guy! Which are covered? The method’s lack of celebrity, in the first place. I modestly … Read more

A disturbance called ego…

From the Casimir effect and other properties of the quantum vacuum, Vlatko Vedral shows that everything that exists comes from this vacuum, from a Nothing that is Everything, with infinite energy. What I see as a great illustration of the T<>D principle and double look: From the point of view of an individual (Vlatko), Everything … Read more