Philos-Sophia Initiative Foundation » Interviews Archives

What is the Quantum Enigma?

15 October 2020

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CGood TV Filmmaker Spotlight: Rick DeLano

21 August 2020

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Tag: PSIF News

An Invitation to Join the Initiative

28 July 2020

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Tag: PSIF News

Unmasking “AI”

22 February 2018

Artificial Intelligence

Bruno Bérard A (perhaps non-accidental) failure to distinguish linguistically between reason (dianoia, ratio) and intelligence (noûs, intellectus) has given rise to the term “artificial intelligence” which consequently engenders misunderstanding if not indeed fear. In keeping with the original meaning of the words in question, the term “artificial intelligence” should de jure be denominated “artificial reason,” …

2 February 2018

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The Distinction and the Priority of Philosophy

2 February 2018

Philosophy

John Trevor Berger A key element of Wolfgang Smith’s thought is his ontological distinction between the physical and the corporeal domains. This distinction proceeds from the observation that there are two ways of knowing the external world. The first and more manifest way is sense perception, by which we know the world in direct experience; …

11 September 2020

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Reflections on Top-Down Causation

11 September 2020

Quantum Theory

John Taylor Recently I penned an article for the Initiative on the phenomenon of “causal emergence” and its connection to vertical causation (VC). Now I would like to address the issue of a similar curiosity called “Top-Down Causation.” A term frequently employed by Dr. George Ellis, top-down causation is an effect where the higher or …

13 August 2020

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Causal Emergence and Vertical Causation

13 August 2020

Information Theory

John Taylor In reference to the then current scientific paradigm Nikola Tesla once said, “One can think deeply and be quite insane.” The spirit of this profound statement perhaps chimes most with the field of quantum mechanics (QM), and in particular the issue of how it should be understood. Ever since QM’s conception, in the …

29 June 2020

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Gnosticism Today

29 June 2020

Ideology

Wolfgang Smith Based upon the almost universally overlooked distinction between scientific fact and scientistic belief, I have had much to say in recent years concerning the contemporary worldview. It turns out that we have been collectively duped. So far, namely, from standing upon solid scientific ground as we are taught to believe, that Weltanschauung derives …

7 May 2020

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The Mystery of Visual Perception

7 May 2020

Metaphysics

Wolfgang Smith Editor’s Note: This article is also available in Portuguese language translation. Lord Kelvin made a crucially important point when he declared physics to be “the science of measurement”: it is this basis in measurement that proves definitive not only of physics and the physical sciences at large, but of the resultant Weltanschauung. Obviously …

25 March 2020

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Vertical Causation and Wholeness

25 March 2020

Philosophy of Physics

Wolfgang Smith Editor’s Note: This article is also available in Spanish and Portuguese. Vertical causality made its appearance in the context of the measuring problem in quantum mechanics, where it could be identified by the fact that it acts “instantaneously.”1See Physics and Vertical Causation: The End of Quantum Reality (Angelico Press, 2019), ch. 3. Whereas …

27 February 2020

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Preface to the Persian Edition of “Ancient Wisdom and Modern Misconceptions”

27 February 2020

Traditional Sciences

Wolfgang Smith Editor’s Note: The following is a reproduction of Prof. Smith’s preface to Sa’id Tehrani-Nasab’s translation of Ancient Wisdom and Modern Misconceptions: A Critique of Contemporary Scientism into Persian. It gives me great pleasure to preface this Persian edition of Ancient Wisdom and Modern Misconceptions, all the more inasmuch as Persia ranks high among the …

15 January 2020

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Four Ideas of Nature and the Vindication of Aristotle

15 January 2020

Philosophy

Ali Sebetci The late English philosopher R. G. Collingwood (1889-1943) argues in his influential book, The Idea of Nature, that there have been three periods of constructive cosmological thinking in the history of European thought. They are the periods “when the idea of nature has come into the focus of thought, become the subject of …

17 December 2019

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To Be or Not To Be an Apple

17 December 2019

Philosophy of Physics

Wolfgang Smith A Brief Response to Dr. Alec MacAndrew The title already of Dr. MacAndrew’s article — “When is an Apple Not an Apple?” — alludes to the precise point of contention in that it differentiates my interpretation of physics from the current: where the contemporary consensus affirms one “apple,” I affirm two. Let me …

26 November 2019

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Evolutionist Scientism: Darwinist, Theistic, and Einsteinian

26 November 2019

Evolution

Wolfgang Smith It may be well to begin by reminding ourselves that science is closely allied with a variety of credenda which are not “scientific” at all, and might consequently be dubbed “scientistic” by virtue of that association. But whereas the adjective may be a neologism, the corresponding substantive “scientism” has by now elicited a …

28 October 2019

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Astrology: The Science of Wholeness

28 October 2019

Traditional Sciences

Wolfgang Smith It needs first of all to be understood that the “wholeness” to which we allude is none other than the “tripartite wholeness” previously defined,1Cf. Physics and Vertical Causation: The End of Quantum Reality (Angelico Press, 2019). conceived in light of Platonist ontology. It can be depicted iconically in the form of a circle …

21 September 2019

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From Cosmos to Multiverse: The Ominous Descent

21 September 2019

Philosophy of Physics

Wolfgang Smith Editor’s Note: The Initiative wishes to express its deep gratitude to the Australian artist Betty Davies for her magnificent and profoundly expressive portrait of Dr. Smith featured in this article, which she has graciously donated to the Foundation. We have spoken at length of the “tripartite cosmos” as envisaged in the sapiential traditions …

15 August 2019

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The Tripartite Wholeness

15 August 2019

Philosophy of Physics

Wolfgang Smith The universe presents itself as extended in space and changing in time, and its spatio-temporal locus can be represented mathematically in terms of three spatial coordinates and one temporal: the familiar quadruple (x1, x2, x3, t). The “container” is thereby decomposed conceptually into an infinite aggregate of punctual loci, which define a corresponding …

3 July 2019

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Pondering Bohmian Mechanics

3 July 2019

Quantum Theory

Wolfgang Smith As if the bewilderment over quantum theory were not formidable enough in itself, the Bohmian Ansatz — which purportedly returns us almost to classical clarity — has added what may prove to be the most perplexing element of all to the mix. Let us start at the beginning: with a statement, namely, of …

3 June 2019

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Do We Perceive the Corporeal World?

3 June 2019

Philosophy

Wolfgang Smith From time immemorial mankind has presumed that we do look out upon the world: that the objects we perceive are not in fact “mental,” but “real.” One understands, of course, that it is possible to err: that a rope in semi-darkness may be mistaken for a snake; yet the very circumstance that perception …

6 May 2019

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Science, Scientism, and Spirituality

6 May 2019

Human Nature

Wolfgang Smith What distinguishes science from scientism, in my terminology, is the fact that scientific tenets are based upon empirical evidence — and are moreover falsifiable — whereas the claims of scientism, while pretending to be scientific, are actually founded upon ideological grounds. A textbook example would be the Darwinist claim, which proves to be …

10 April 2019

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Lost in Math: The Particle Physics Quandary

10 April 2019

Particle Physics

Wolfgang Smith A golden age of physics, one can see in retrospect, commenced around the year 1900: the dazzling era of quantum mechanics had begun. That golden age, however, has proved to be short-lived. It began, if you will, in the year 1897 with J. J. Thomson’s discovery of the electron, the first so-called quantum …

18 March 2019

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Does Physics Admit a Teleology?

18 March 2019

Cosmology

Wolfgang Smith Our question — “Does physics admit a teleology?” — proves, first of all, to be incurably philosophical inasmuch as it has no meaning whatsoever for the physicist as such. By its very modus operandi, physics has eyes for quantity alone, which entails that teleology is distinctly beyond its ken. This rather obvious fact …

25 February 2019

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Surveying the Integral Cosmos: A Review of Physics & Vertical Causation

25 February 2019

Book Review

John Trevor Berger According to the experts of standard cosmology, we live in a universe which is uniformly egalitarian — a meaningless homogeneous mass of subatomic particles — and this so-called “cosmological principle,” we are told, holds true from the furthest observable reaches of the universe to the ordinary moment of lived experience. For over …

23 January 2019

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Do We Know the Electron?

23 January 2019

Cosmology

Wolfgang Smith In August of last year, Eahab Ibrahim — a friend of the Initiative — posted a fascinating question, to which I would like to respond. It asks what an electron might be in its own right, apart from its mathematical descriptions as conceived by the physicist: “Does the physicist know the electron without residue” he …

29 October 2018

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“Progress” in Retrospect: Part III

29 October 2018

Human Nature

Wolfgang Smith Editor’s Note: The final installment of a three-part critique of modernity, the following was originally published in Cosmos & Transcendence: Breaking Through the Barrier of Scientistic Belief in 1984. While it is sociologically certain that science begets technology, it also cannot be denied that in its purest form science is simply the pursuit of …

20 September 2018

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“Progress” in Retrospect: Part II

20 September 2018

Technology

Wolfgang Smith Editor’s Note: The second installment of a three-part critique of modernity, the following was originally published in Cosmos & Transcendence: Breaking Through the Barrier of Scientistic Belief in 1984. Some reflections on the subject of art may not be inappropriate at this point. The first thing to be noted is that the very conception …

14 August 2018

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“Progress” in Retrospect: Part I

14 August 2018

Cosmology

Wolfgang Smith Editor’s Note: The first installment of a three-part critique of modernity, the following was originally published in Cosmos & Transcendence: Breaking Through the Barrier of Scientistic Belief in 1984. Every age, every civilization, has a spirit of its own. It is this that determines the habitual outlook, the typical way of looking at things, …

7 June 2018

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Ontological Dimensions of Causation

7 June 2018

Philosophy of Science

Ali Sebetci It is well known that the modern conception of science is fundamentally different from the traditional. What makes science modern, moreover, is its naturalistic methodology: “The philosophical doctrine of methodological naturalism,” writes Alvin Plantinga, “holds that, for any study to qualify as ‘scientific,’ it cannot refer to God’s creative activity or any sort …

18 April 2018

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Vertical Causation (III): Vertical Causality and the “Limit Theorems”

18 April 2018

Philosophy of Science

Raphael De Paola According to Wolfgang Smith, modern physics has discovered a unique, hitherto unknown ontological plane, namely the aforementioned “physical” universe. But in his researches he has also resolved a decades-old controversy concerning the interpretation of quantum mechanics. What quantum mechanics studies is akin, if not identical, to what the Scholastics called materia signata …

11 April 2018

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Vertical Causation (II): Corporeal Strata and The Distinction

11 April 2018

Philosophy of Physics

Raphael De Paola All corporeal beings can be classified in one of four levels of the following hierarchical order: mineral, vegetable, animal, and human (i.e., “rational animal”). Following the Scholastic adage that the operation of a being follows upon its nature (operari sequitur esse), it is not difficult to understand these levels in terms of their …

4 April 2018

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Vertical Causation (I): Matter and Form

4 April 2018

Greek Physics

Raphael De Paola The subject of change and motion has always baffled the human mind, arousing many seemingly unanswerable questions. Depending on the answers given, one may wind up faced with insurmountable aporias. Aristotle was well aware of the dangers posed to Greek thinking before him and strove to address them, appropriating the discoveries of …

12 March 2018

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On the Scientific Implications of Vertical Causality

12 March 2018

Philosophy of Science

Wolfgang Smith Following Galileo, Descartes and Newton, Western civilization succumbed to the spell of what I have termed horizontal causation. From the publication of Newton’s Principia, in 1687, to the discovery of quantum physics in the early twentieth century, scientists assumed without question that, at bottom, the universe constitutes but a gigantic “clockwork,” in which …

6 March 2018

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What is a “Proof” of God?

6 March 2018

Natural Theology

Wolfgang Smith Editor’s Note: In response to Richard Carrier’s recent review of Edward Feser’s Five Proofs for the Existence of God, Dr. Smith presents his own observations on this question, which represents an ongoing discussion of issues — first addressed last month by Professor Bruno Bérard in the context of artificial intelligence — in light of the …

1 February 2018

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From Schrödinger’s Cat to Thomistic Ontology

1 February 2018

Quantum Theory

Wolfgang Smith Editor’s Note: Originally presented as the Templeton Lecture on Christianity and the Natural Sciences at Gonzaga University in 1998, and subsequently published in Ancient Wisdom and Modern Misconceptions, the following sets forth in concise terms the basics of Dr. Smith’s ontological resolution to the quantum reality problem, the full treatment of which was first presented …

What is the Quantum Enigma?

CGood TV Filmmaker Spotlight: Rick DeLano

An Invitation to Join the Initiative

What is the Quantum Enigma?

CGood TV Filmmaker Spotlight: Rick DeLano

An Invitation to Join the Initiative

“The End of Quantum Reality” Now Available on Prime & iTunes

Rick DeLano Interview at Reason & Theology

Rick DeLano Interview at Finding Genius Podcast

An Interview with Wolfgang Smith at Sacred Web

This Weekend Only: 25% Off at EQR Store

On the Release of “The End of Quantum Reality”

The End of Quantum Reality: Now on Disc & Digital

The End of Quantum Reality: Theatrical Update

An Interview with Rick DeLano at Film Daily

Now Available: Physics and Vertical Causation

Philos-Sophia Essay Contest Results

An Interview with Wolfgang Smith

Inaugural Philos-Sophia Essay Contest

Welcome to Philos-Sophia

“The End of Quantum Reality” Now in Production

Philos-Sophia Initiative to Launch Youth Outreach

Unmasking “AI”

The Distinction and the Priority of Philosophy

Reflections on Top-Down Causation

Causal Emergence and Vertical Causation

Gnosticism Today

The Mystery of Visual Perception

Vertical Causation and Wholeness

Preface to the Persian Edition of “Ancient Wisdom and Modern Misconceptions”

Four Ideas of Nature and the Vindication of Aristotle

To Be or Not To Be an Apple

Evolutionist Scientism: Darwinist, Theistic, and Einsteinian

Astrology: The Science of Wholeness

From Cosmos to Multiverse: The Ominous Descent

The Tripartite Wholeness

Pondering Bohmian Mechanics

Do We Perceive the Corporeal World?

Science, Scientism, and Spirituality

Lost in Math: The Particle Physics Quandary

Does Physics Admit a Teleology?

Surveying the Integral Cosmos: A Review of Physics & Vertical Causation

Do We Know the Electron?

“Progress” in Retrospect: Part III

“Progress” in Retrospect: Part II

“Progress” in Retrospect: Part I

Ontological Dimensions of Causation

Vertical Causation (III): Vertical Causality and the “Limit Theorems”

Vertical Causation (II): Corporeal Strata and The Distinction

Vertical Causation (I): Matter and Form

On the Scientific Implications of Vertical Causality

What is a “Proof” of God?

From Schrödinger’s Cat to Thomistic Ontology