The distrust of speculative philosophy established by logical positivism early in the century and the sheer difficulty of understanding his thought have, however, combined to keep Whitehead outside the mainstream of contemporary philosophy. His influence has been greatest on the disciplines of process philosophy and process theology, both of which he is regarded as having founded. Renegade physicists and biologists have also advanced his ideas as alternatives to prevailing orthodoxy.
The Latin inscription in commemoration of Whitehead's life in the Trinity College Chapel, University of Cambridge, says in part, "just as he was a citizen of two countries, so he seems to have lived three lifespans: first as an authority in mathematics, second in physics, and third in metaphysics." Rather than a succession of interests, however, Whitehead's thought is best characterized as a developing unity. In each of the three phases he refutes a traditional notion--the quantitative conception of mathematics, scientific materialism, and the British empiricist notion of experience--and then advances his own novel contribution. Whitehead's thought radiated outward to ever increasing generalities from his initial concerns in mathematics and logic; ideas developed in an earlier phase carry over into a later one in which their significance is fully realized.
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