Novel Togetherness
Whitehead's Non-Numerical Notion of Oneness
The Category of the Ultimate
Whitehead, Excerpt from Process and Reality, Part 1, Chapter 2
‘Creativity,’ ‘many,’ ‘one’ are the ultimate notions involved in the meaning of the synonymous terms ‘thing,’ ‘being,’ ‘entity.’ These three notions complete the Category of the Ultimate and are presupposed in all the more special categories.
The term ‘one’ does not stand for ‘the integral number one,’ which is a complex special notion. It stands for the general idea underlying alike the indefinite article ‘a or an,’ and the definite article ‘the,’ and the demonstratives ‘this or that,’ and the relatives ‘which or what or how.’ It stands for the singularity of an entity. The term ‘many’ presupposes the term ‘one,’ and the term ‘one’ presupposes the term ‘many.’ The term ‘many’ conveys the notion of ‘disjunctive diversity’; this notion is an essential* element in the concept of ‘being.’ There are many ‘beings’ in disjunctive diversity.
‘Creativity’ is the universal of universals characterizing ultimate matter of fact. It is that ultimate principle by which the many, which are the* universe disjunctively, become the one actual occasion, which is the universe conjunctively. It lies in the nature of things that the many enter into complex unity.
‘Creativity’ is the principle of novelty. An actual occasion is a novel entity diverse from any entity in the ‘many’ which it unifies. Thus ‘creativity’ introduces novelty into the content of the many, which are the [32] universe disjunctively. The ‘creative advance’ is the application of this ultimate principle of creativity to each novel situation which it originates.
‘Together’ is a generic term covering the various special ways in which various sorts of entities are ‘together’ in any one actual occasion. Thus ‘together’ presupposes the notions ‘creativity,’ ‘many,’ ‘one,’ ‘identity’ and ‘diversity.’ The ultimate metaphysical principle is the advance from disjunction to conjunction, creating a novel entity other than the entities given in disjunction. The novel entity is at once the togetherness of the ‘many’ which it finds, and also it is one among the disjunctive ‘many’ which it leaves; it is a novel entity, disjunctively among the many entities which it synthesizes. The many become one, and are increased by one. In their natures, entities are disjunctively ‘many’ in process of passage into conjunctive unity. This Category of the Ultimate replaces Aristotle’s category of ‘primary substance.’
Thus the ‘production of novel togetherness’ is the ultimate notion embodied in the term ‘concrescence.’ These ultimate notions of ‘production of novelty’ and of ‘concrete togetherness’ are inexplicable either in terms of higher universals or in terms of the components participating in the concrescence. The analysis of the components abstracts from the concrescence. The sole appeal is to intuition.
- Alfred North Whitehead, Process and Reality, 21-22.
The term ‘one’ does not stand for ‘the integral number one,’ which is a complex special notion. It stands for the general idea underlying alike the indefinite article ‘a or an,’ and the definite article ‘the,’ and the demonstratives ‘this or that,’ and the relatives ‘which or what or how.’ It stands for the singularity of an entity. The term ‘many’ presupposes the term ‘one,’ and the term ‘one’ presupposes the term ‘many.’ The term ‘many’ conveys the notion of ‘disjunctive diversity’; this notion is an essential* element in the concept of ‘being.’ There are many ‘beings’ in disjunctive diversity.
‘Creativity’ is the universal of universals characterizing ultimate matter of fact. It is that ultimate principle by which the many, which are the* universe disjunctively, become the one actual occasion, which is the universe conjunctively. It lies in the nature of things that the many enter into complex unity.
‘Creativity’ is the principle of novelty. An actual occasion is a novel entity diverse from any entity in the ‘many’ which it unifies. Thus ‘creativity’ introduces novelty into the content of the many, which are the [32] universe disjunctively. The ‘creative advance’ is the application of this ultimate principle of creativity to each novel situation which it originates.
‘Together’ is a generic term covering the various special ways in which various sorts of entities are ‘together’ in any one actual occasion. Thus ‘together’ presupposes the notions ‘creativity,’ ‘many,’ ‘one,’ ‘identity’ and ‘diversity.’ The ultimate metaphysical principle is the advance from disjunction to conjunction, creating a novel entity other than the entities given in disjunction. The novel entity is at once the togetherness of the ‘many’ which it finds, and also it is one among the disjunctive ‘many’ which it leaves; it is a novel entity, disjunctively among the many entities which it synthesizes. The many become one, and are increased by one. In their natures, entities are disjunctively ‘many’ in process of passage into conjunctive unity. This Category of the Ultimate replaces Aristotle’s category of ‘primary substance.’
Thus the ‘production of novel togetherness’ is the ultimate notion embodied in the term ‘concrescence.’ These ultimate notions of ‘production of novelty’ and of ‘concrete togetherness’ are inexplicable either in terms of higher universals or in terms of the components participating in the concrescence. The analysis of the components abstracts from the concrescence. The sole appeal is to intuition.
- Alfred North Whitehead, Process and Reality, 21-22.
Interpretation
Let a single moment of human experience illustrate what Whitehead means by "one." This moment is what he means by an "actual occasion" in the passage above. He also call it an "occasion of experience" and a "drop of experience." The occasion also includes what he calls "self-creativity" and "self-enjoyment" and a "subjective aim" at "satisfaction." It is not simply an object in the world, it is a subject of its own momentary life - a subject-in-the-making with a private side.
And yet it also has a public side. As it feels or "prehends" the past actual world, the many entities of the universe are together in the singularity—the oneness—of the experience itself. It is a concrescence of the universe. This means that the oneness is not a self-enclosed monad. It includes the many other "ones" that it synthesizes. Such oneness, then, is not the oneness of “the integral number one”; that numerical notion is, as Whitehead says, “a complex special notion.”
What kind of non-numerical oneness is this?
It is experiential oneness: an act of synthesis, a momentary “togethering” or gathering of many into one. This is the unity of subjectivity—the unity of a becoming subject who feels, integrates, and transforms its world.
What is the ontological status of numerical unity?
A suggestion: numerical oneness, along with the other integers, is an abstraction—one that may illuminate certain aspects of experiential unity but can also obscure the multiplicity and richness of lived singularities. Numbers are either (a) eternal objects—abstract potential forms available for conceptual realization—or (b) propositions, partly created and entertained by human beings in acts of counting, quantifying, and conceptualizing. In this view, numbers are possibilities which may or may not be actualized in the world but which are upon a deeper, more primordial experiential unity. They do not ground reality; they arise from it as abstractions that simplify, symbolize, and sometimes flatten the dynamic complexity of actual occasions.
What might it mean, then, to say that God is one?
A suggestion: God is one in the same sense that any act of subjective synthesis is one. God is an ongoing act of togethering—a gathering of the many into a living unity of feeling. Divine oneness is not numerical oneness but experiential unity: the unity of the primordial envisagement of possibilities and the consequent reception of the world. Like every actual occasion, God is “one” as the singular immediacy of a synthesizing act—yet unlike any finite occasion, this act is everlastingly renewed. God is one, but not 1: a unity of experience, not a unity of arithmetic.
What might this mean for the idea of pluralism?
A suggestion: it strengthens the case for a metaphysical pluralism in which the many are not dissolved into a single numerical unity, nor subordinated to an abstract “One” that overrides their distinctiveness. If numerical oneness is an abstraction, while experiential oneness is a concrete act of synthesis, then the ultimate facts of the universe are not solitary ones but the endlessly recurring multiplicity of singular acts of becoming. Each act achieves its own oneness, but this oneness is always derived—a gathered unity emerging from a prior plurality.
But it also undercuts monadic understandings of pluralism, in which singular entities are conceived on the analogy of numerical integers—self-contained units, self-sufficient, sealed off from one another except for occasional external contact. If experiential oneness is the unity achieved in a process of synthesis, then no actual entity is an isolated “one” in the manner of a numerical unit. Every actuality is a relational unity, internally constituted by its prehensions of others. Its oneness is the oneness of a gathering, not the oneness of a countable atom.
Process and Porosity
Thus pluralism, in a Whiteheadian sense, is not a plurality of independent monads lined up like beads on a string. It is a plurality of experiential subjects whose very existence consists in integrating the worlds they inherit. Their unity is porous, relational, and partly formed by the world—never self-enclosed.
This means:
- Plurality is real, because there are many subjects.
- Oneness is real, because each subject achieves a unity.
- But neither the plurality nor the oneness is numerical.
The “many” are not integers, and the “one” is not the number 1. Instead, the universe is a multiplicity of emergent unities whose individuality is achieved through relation, not separation. In this way, process metaphysics affirms pluralism while simultaneously rejecting the integer-based, monadic picture that often accompanies it.
Taken together, these reflections suggest a vision of reality in which neither unity nor plurality is conceived on the model of integers. The world is composed of many subjects, each achieving its own oneness through acts of synthesis; but these subjects are not monads, not solitary units set side by side like numbers on a line. Their individuality is relational and earned, not given in advance. Pluralism, therefore, is the recognition of a universe alive with innumerable centers of becoming, each internally shaped by others. Unity, meanwhile, is the recognition that each of those centers achieves a distinctive immediacy, a momentary wholeness of feeling. God, on this view, is “one” not as a supreme integer but as the unsurpassably comprehensive act of togethering: the primordial unity of possibilities and the consequent unity of the world’s feelings. Divine oneness gathers the many without negating their integrity, and the many, in turn, enrich the unity of God. In such a universe, the fundamental rhythm is neither the solitude of the One nor the scatter of the Many, but the creative pulse of the many becoming one, and being increased by one—again and again, forever.