Events

David Bohm has been described as one of the most significant and original thinkers of the twentieth century whose interests and influence extend well beyond the field of physics to include philosophy, psychology, language, religion, art, creativity, thought, and education. Underlying his innovative approach to these many different issues was the fundamental idea that beyond the visible, tangible world there lies a deeper, implicate order of undivided wholeness.

It is well known that David Bohm’s causal interpretation of quantum mechanics and its development with Basil Hiley offers a realist ontological view of particles, waves, quantum potential, and active information (Bohm 1952, 1985, 1988, 1989, 1990; Bohm and Hiley 1975, 1987, 1993). However, the other epistemological and metaphysical underpinnings of the causal interpretation are still in need of detailed scrutiny. This presentation will explore two other realist components in Bohm’s thinking which bear some resemblance to Aristotle’s philosophy. The familiar argument from laws to the existence of the quantum objects and the reality of their properties will be only briefly mentioned. The focus will be on Bohm’s peculiar methodology of intuitive intelligibility (II), and his argument for the two metaphysical properties of causal powers, which bear clear similarities to Aristotle’s epistemology and metaphysics.