Timeline: Alfred North Whitehead

Period: Feb 15, 1861 to Dec 30, 1947

Life Span

Alfred North Whitehead was born in a town called Ramsgate, located in Kent, England and died at the age of 86 in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

1898

A Treatise of Universal Algebra and Applications

Unbeknownst to him, Alfred North Whitehead paved the way for computer technology with his book, A Treatise of Universal Algebra and Applications. Though this is one of his more obscure works, there are many principles that are synonymous to his later works Principia Mathematica. This has led many to believe that this book was intended to be the first in the series, but was never officially claimed as such.

1910

Principia Mathematica

Considered one of his most notable and famous works, Alfred North Whitehead collaborated with his student, Bertrand Russel, in order to create the three-volume series called Principia Mathematica. Though it created many controversies in the mathematic community (questioning whether math is reduced to logic or to set theory) the series popularized modern mathematical logic and re-affirmed connections between logic and traditional philosophy.

1925

Science and the Modern World

Still trying to define modern science, Whitehead created his book Science and the Modern World in attempts to understand scientific materialism. He would later produce his book Process and Reality which, in combination with Modern World, described the world as consisting entirely of becomings, “Each of them a process of appropriating and integrating the infinity of items,” (Lowe, 2022). Whitehead incorporates metaphysics and ethereal ideas in order to understand the finitude of humanity.

1929

Process and Reality

As mentioned previously, Whitehead’s book Process and Reality offers an explanation between entities and abstractions, leading to the creation of his ontological principle. Because of the attempt to reconcile intuitions in the human experience, the term “process philosophy” is mostly associated with Whitehead. Process philosophy allows for a more adaptive spirituality and a complete revisioning of the image of God that opposes the traditional western view.

2022