Creative Evolution, one hundred years on: Biology, Ecology, Complexity

 

 A conference on Henri Bergson’s seminal text Creative Evolution to celebrate its centennial anniversary

 Saturday the 10th of November 2007, University of Warwick 

 

Room MS.01 Maths Building

 

>>>CHANGE OF PROGRAMME!<<<

 

 

 

Bergson envisaged “creative evolution” as a collaborative research project between science and philosophy, with the common aim of understanding life. He wrote that creative evolutionism “will only be built up by the collective and progressive effort of many thinkers, of many observers also, completing, correcting and improving one another.” The conference will further this “collective and progressive effort.”

 

 

 

NEW Programme

 

10.00 – 10.30 Doors open, registration and coffee

 

10.30 - 12.30 Session 1: Biology

 Keith Ansell Pearson (University of Warwick) Introductory Address

Paul-Antoine Miquel (University of Nice) "A Great Deal of Slop Along the Way: The Problem of Natural Selection"

 

12.30 – 2.00 Lunch (included in conference fee)

 

2.00 – 4.00 Session 2: Ecology

Pete Gunter (University of North Texas) "Bergson and the Environment"

John Pickering (University of Warwick) - "Bergson, Whitehead and environmentalism"

 

4.00 – 4.30 Coffee Break

 

 

4.30 – 6.00 Session 3: Complexity

 Robin Durie (University of Exeter)

 

6.00

Wine Reception for the launch of Palgrave Macmillan’s Bergson Centennial Series

 

Copies of the three new editions of An Introduction to Metaphysics, Creative Evolution and Mind-Energy by Palgrave Macmillan will be for sale at a special discount price during the conference only. To assure a copy please email the organisers indicating the desired number of each book before the end of October. Order forms will also be available during the conference. For more information on the Bergson Centennial Series please click on the link at the top right of this page

Prices are: An Introduction to Metaphysics (paperback only): £8.75 (normally £10.99); Creative Evolution (hardback only) £32.50 (normally £65.00); Mind-Energy (hardback only) £25.00 (normally £50.00)

 

 

For abstracts and information on speakers please click on this link

 

There will be workshop on Creative Evolution on the day prior to the conference. Numbers to this are limited and so attendence is only possible after explicit agreement with the organisers. The workshop will be composed of four parts, following the four chapters of the book. The following people will each chair one session: Paul- Antoine Miquel (ch 1), Pete Gunter (ch 2), Robin Durie (ch 3) and John Mullarkey (ch 4). The workshop is intended for people already familiar with the book and who have a strong interest in Bergson. For more information please email the organisers.

 

Organisers: Michael Vaughan and Michael Kolkman, Department of Philosophy

 

Email the organisers:

M. Kolkman at warwick.ac.uk M.J. Vaughan at warwick.ac.uk

click here for M.Kolkman's webpage

 

sponsored by:

 

- HUMANITIES RESEARCH CENTRE

- DEPARTMENT OF PHILOSOPHY

- PALGRAVE MACMILLAN

 

 

Directions to University of Warwick main campus 

Campus map -the Maths building is no. 35 on the map

 

For abstracts and information on speakers please click on this link

 

Click on this link to download the registration form

 

Other activities by the same organisers:

Bergson Centennial Series

(Includes new editions of An Introduction to Metaphysics, Mind-Energy and Creative Evolution)

Special issue of SubStance journal devoted to Creative Evolution

(To appear this December)