​Whitehead and Augustine:
Complementary Approaches to Freedom

María Guadalupe Llanes, PhD​
GIEM-UCV Central University of Venezuela​​

​"A person can be physically forced to perform a certain action—but he cannot be forced to want to want it. The movement of the will—this inner desire—is necessary, natural, or consubstantial, because it belongs to the very definition of what it means to be human.
Yet at this level, we are not yet speaking of an act. Free will is not the act itself but the power to want. It is, in its essence, a pure potentiality."

- Maria Lupe Llanes on Augustine

Original Title: "​Essential freedom or freedom as a choice between possibilities: two perspectives, the medieval Augustinian and the Whiteheadian processual.”

Note from Dr. Llanes: This lecture was part of the panel on Process Philosophy organized by PhD. Vesselin Petrov (European Society for Process Thought), during the International Conference "Philosophy Nowadays" -June 2-5, 2024- at the House of the Bulgarian Academy at the Black Sea. 

Abstract 
​
In this conference we will consider whether freedom consists in the possibility of choosing between a determined or indeterminate number of possibilities; or if it is a kind of essential quality typical of human nature that would have to be defined. In medieval cosmology both options fit, while in processual cosmology and, in general, in current thought, we find above all the first. “Life is a bid for freedom”, says Whitehead. The universe is constantly evolving towards the new by virtue of the impulse of creativity, where infinity sneaks in from all sides, offering innumerable possibilities of choice at all levels of existence. Furthermore, the laws are emergent. A world of endless originality that manifests from the smallest cells to the most distant stars. But not absolute freedom. We will see that there is not so much distance between both intensities of freedom, the Augustinian and the Whiteheadian, and that in fact they can complement each other.  
 
 
1-The universe according to Alfred North Whitehead 
 
“the universe exhibits a creativity with infinite freedom, and a realm of forms  
with infinite possibilities; but...this creativity and these forms are together  
impotent to achieve actuality apart from the completed ideal harmony, which is God”  
Religion in the making 
 
At the beginning of Process and Reality, Whitehead already warns us what the purpose of his research is: “to construct a system of ideas which brings the aesthetic, moral and religious interests into relation with those concepts of the world which have their origin in natural science” (PR, (1978) p. xii)1 As a crucial part of his system, he explains the Categories of Existence to understand a cosmos whose perennial creative evolution does not lead to chaos. A new vision of permanence in a flowing cosmos without depending on an ultimate immobile subject of change. The first existential category is that of actual entities. Whitehead says: 
 
‘Actual entities’ –also termed ‘actual occasions’- are the final real things of which the world is made up. There is no going behind actual entities to find anything more real. They differ among themselves: God is an actual entity, and so is the most trivial puff of existence in far-off empty space. 2. 
 
An actual entity is an event, according to Whitehead: "The event is what it is (its essence) because of the unification in itself of a multiplicity of relationships" (SMW, (1948) pp. 125,126) Unification responds to a Pattern3. But it is not the union of a certain number of characteristics to a fixed substantial nucleus. It is, rather, the construction of a structure that is more like the notion of substance thought of as a bundle of properties.4 
“Every actual entity, from the smallest atom to the most gigantic galaxy, comes into existence through a process called concrescence... Concrescence is the process of becoming concrete, that is, a completely actual occasion. Concrescence is the realization of relationships called prehensions”. Whitehead analyzes actual entities in 'prehensions', since “a prehension reproduces in itself the general characteristics of an actual entity: it refers to an external world, and in this sense it has a 'vector character'” (PR (1956), p. 37). In fact, he adds, it involves emotion, purpose, valuation, causation, in short "any characteristic of an actual entity is reproduced in a prehension" (PR (1978), p. 19), even if this is a subordinate element. 

The concrescence occurs in three phases: an initial one of conformation where the new entity prehends actual occasions of its own past. The second supplementary phase involves the entry into the new entity of the pure potentials or "eternal objects." And the third is the stage of satisfaction, in which the actual entity is complete. 

Eternal objects are infinite (in the sense of an indeterminate quantity) potentialities, models of real possibilities of being, "forms of definiteness" (PR), they do not keep any order, nor do they confer order on those who prehend them in their process of conjunction. For this reason, a superior and ordering actual entity is needed to lay the foundation of regularity, novelty and purpose in the conformation of the new actual entities. Such an actual entity is the Whiteheadian God who is immanent in the world, owner of all eternal Ideas, and by exercising his ordering function of eternal objects, the universe obtains the regularity of natural laws. Also in this ordering and selection, the novelty of the new individual is obtained, which is the actual occasion that takes place. But if we review the text of PR we find that the true engine of the advance towards novelty is creativity, "the universal of universals characterizing ultimate matter of fact".5 

Thus, creativity is an immanent ingredient in each actual entity (even the main one, God) that does not function as a substrate, but rather serves as a propeller, as a kind of energy, a force that promotes being (a being neither substantial nor actual), which stimulates the conjunction or concrescence of all the actors who participate in the new creation. God directs the orchestra, composes the notes of the melody and allows himself to be driven by the creativity, that is the sound before  music. God is there, potentially, being at the hand of the orchestra of entities, inviting its execution, its actualization. God joins as one more element in the conglomerate, an accident between accidents of the primordial creativity. Without God there would be no melody. God offers in concrescence his accumulation of possibilities in the form of eternal objects, the perfect notes entering individual structures in infinite ways, they are the version of Platonic Ideas that are expressed as universals, and the many become one by virtue of the movement that originates the creativity. Each note "cuts", structure, limits, the eternal sound "6.   

It’s right here, in all the phases of this complex universal concrescence process of actual entities driven by creativity and regulated by God, in this endless coming and going of disjunction and ever new conjunction, in this balance of newness, permanence and order, it is here that Infinite freedom of choice between possibilities of realization reigns. As Hartshorne said: “the ultimate freedom is not in ‘behavior’ but in experience, just how that particular experience prehends its past, including in that past God’s decision, already made for the particular occasion” 7 “The universe exhibits a creativity with infinite freedom”, said Whitehead. Each stage of realization involves a free choice between possibilities. Creativity drives the process by offering the necessary indeterminacy for free choice, while God preserves the total order of the universe so that it isn’t destroyed by chaos. 

Well then, the relationship between actual occasions creates nexuses and societies. 
Societies are the "actual and ordinary things that last." This stone, this planet or this man is a society. Societies can be more or less complex. A specialized structured society has the ability to freely decide which accidents, in the environment it inhabits, to exclude in order to improve its survival. A clear sign of self-sufficiency. Thus, a society as a complete existence and preserving its same metaphysical state, has a history that expresses its changing reactions to changing circumstances... The self-identity of a society is based on the self-identity of its defining characteristic and on the mutual immanence of its events. 8 The defining characteristic defines the society, the particular entity, and gives it coherence through its historical route.

The Whiteheadian defining characteristic is a common form exhibited by all members of a socially ordered nexus belonging to such a society. The members of this regnant nexus are actual entities whose mental pole prehends a complex of eternal objects. These are subjective prehensions shared by all members, which constitute the pattern that governs the entire society. It is the pattern that models the type of prehensions that will be characteristic of that society, making it unique and permanent as what it is, as what defines it, throughout its hole history. 

In this universal context of freedom there is a very complex society that is the human being. Each body is a structured society composed of other societies that are the different organs, and these organs are also composed by millions of millions of societies related to each other, which are the cells. But each single cell is made up of other inorganic societies that are molecules and these are also made up of electrons, protons, etc. This enormous complexity of structures of structures, all of which are dynamic, continues existing in the middle of the becoming, thanks to what Whitehead calls the regnant nexus. To this, Polanowski and Sherburne add that the regnant nexus “is analogous to the traditional notion of soul, or to the Cartesian notion of mental substance...The regnant nexus is often conscious and is experienced by each of us as the self that we most truly are”9 

Then, a regnant nexus is a chain of actual entities, whose connection is inherited from the preceding entity and from other subordinate societies. This is how continuity is established and the members who dominate in a society “guarantee stability in the midst of environmental developments.”.  

The human organism, taken as a whole that includes body and soul (or regnant nexus), existing as a constitutive part of the organic unity of the universal Whole, is also free from its intimate constitution to its relationship and its activities with its environment, and with its world. 

The freedom inherent to human beings is superior to that of animals, according to Whitehead, since the human mind with its superior power of abstraction is the only one capable of making inferential and intuitive judgments.10 The human being “reveals some analysis of the fact that is immediately understandable. And in doing so, he highlights the potentialities of alternative realizations, in the past, in the future and in the present. He tells us what can be and what can have been. He discovers diversities and analogies. Humanity enjoys the vision of form within the fact and the revelation of value as a consequence of their mutual play”.11 

Human self-determination occurs in the present but man chooses taking into account past experiences and possible future experiences. His conceptual power, which includes his imaginative capacity, empowers him to consciously introduce novelty into his existence and enables him to adapt himself to his changing environment.  
We can say that basic and natural human freedom consists of the possibility of choosing between possible alternative ways of thinking and acting. It is about the self-determination that corresponds to humans by virtue of being human. This ability to self-determine includes everything from personal fulfillment to political freedom. Self-determination is a creative act of choice that is also conscious. Not only do we choose freely but we know that we choose. It is something like the Augustinian natural “wanting to want” of the free human will.  

In short, all the complex levels that make up the incommensurable structure of the universe manifest some degree of freedom in their unstoppable continuous structuring that signifies their becoming way of existing. But in all cases freedom consists of the unconditioned possibility of choosing between possibilities, from the most insignificant particle to the most complex human performance. However, this continuous process of being between indeterminable sets of choices has a certain regulation that preserves the structural order at each level. The creativity that pushes towards novelty finds its balance thanks to the inclusion in each decision of God, eternal objects and objectified past actual entities. Understanding that God is neither the ultimate principle of the universe -that is creativity- nor a category of the categorical scheme. But He is “as metaphysically necessary for creativity as creativity is metaphysically necessary for God…God is not a unilateral cause of any actual occasion, much less of the world as a whole”12. Whitehead distances himself from the traditional Judeo-Christian God, a kind of anthropomorphic God who is a final, formal and efficient cause of everything that exist, because such a God seems to be responsible for all that is good but also for all that is bad.  
​
The Whiteheadian God provides a certain “character” to creativity that is totally essential for an actual occasion to come into existence, and without actual occasions there is no creativity; therefore, He is necessary but not sufficient to guarantee the being of all that exist. 

Let's now look at the perspective of Augustine of Hippo. 
 
2-Saint Augustine, freedom of the will: liberum arbitrio and libertas. 
 
The Augustinian metaphysical worldview is optimistic, order-based, and teleological. In a contingent world created from nothing, the origin from which it comes and the end to which it goes are the same: God, the Creator. 

Augustine proposes three main categories that guarantee stable structural organization in the changing universe: mode, form, and order, which correspond to the biblical trio: measure, number, and weight. By “mode,” Augustine means the constituent way of being of a created thing while it endures over time as a structural unit. There is only one simple unit in the universe and that is God Himself. 13 

The way of being of becoming entities is to always exist in process: in the process of being, gradually updating themselves to achieve the greatest possible perfection or completeness and, at the same time, in the process of not being, until passing away. But such an existential swing does not disorganize the universal whole. The mode has to do with perfection and also with the measure that is responsible for ensuring that nothing is left over or lacking in the entities to achieve their goal. All beings have their respective purposes that are part of the total divine plan, with a single final goal. This guarantees the dynamic order of the world as a whole. 

The finite being exists by participating in the infinite Being to a greater or lesser extent. The ontological distance between Being, God, and beings is also a distance from Good, from Truth, from reality. But, we said, finite beings are teleologically oriented towards the infinite Being, that is, the perfect Good, since final causality always points towards a good, or something considered good. Augustine calls the force that pushes entities to occupy their correct place and to realize their final causality, “weight.” He puts it this way: “Weight is a certain impulse or effort involved in each being, with which it strives to occupy its own place”. 14  

The desire of each created being to achieve its own good is its ontological weight, it is also a manifestation of its corresponding form or essence. The weight that moves animals towards their end is instinct, a sensitive appetite. The weight responsible for the activity of the inorganic elements is the set of physical and chemical forces of attraction or repulsion. 

As for man, he is an entity with a more complex dynamism. The human being is an open speech, in search of unity, of his own place, that is, of his humanity. His weight drives him there, like all things in the universe. Unlike other beings whose weight is summarized in natural forces, man's weight is delight, which satisfies the passions, and love, which summarizes the action of the will. The weight orders, impels each being towards its center of rest. And man also seeks peace and rest in the order that is appropriate to his nature, in God. 

So, human beings, in addition to that way of being within the universal order that constitutes their first level of reality, the necessary natural one; they have another level of reality which is their personal life, for which they are free. Man is a mortal rational animal due to his ontological constitution, but he becomes a person by making express the knowledge and love imprinted in his soul, and without this second formation he is not truly human, he is not a good and wise man. 

If weight is a law of the corporal and spiritual beings of this Universe, it is therefore also a law of man. The weight or love towards its center, God, moves the will of man. That is, the will is, by its nature, inclined towards the Good, towards happiness, and this is God. And in realizing his nature and following his weight, in realizing his love, free will is perfected to become freedom. In fact, Augustine distinguishes between free will and freedom, which are like two functions of the exercise of will. There is a weight that moves the deep dynamism of the will towards good, that is the natural, necessary longing for good-for-me. It is free will.  Because of his natural quality the subject will be able to make the choices that correspond to his or her natural way of being. For this reason, a person can be physically forced to perform a certain action, but he cannot be forced to want to want it. This movement of the will is necessary, natural, or consubstantial, because it enters in the definition of man. But this level is not yet about an act, free will is a power to want, it is a pure potentiality. 

Nowadays free will is understood strictly as actual freedom, but reduced to the concrete act of choosing between possibilities. On the other hand, Augustine adds to this necessary natural human condition a second information of the will, which consists of loving the Good-in-itself, that is, God. God is the absolute Good, the model used to measure any other good. Therefore, at this stage, the will is moved by its weight, love, towards good in itself in different degrees, depending on the intensity of that love. Here man actualizes the power of wanting by following his will more or less to his advantage, and he is not always right. 

The greatest intensity of this love would be reached in the third information of the will when it wants that Good-in-itself as a good-for-me. This third state of the will is perfection, thus the human wants real good all the time and since he wants it he cannot go wrong because he always chooses the good that will surely be good in itself and for him. That is why he will be truly and fully free. In fact, being able to choose something not so good does not make us freer. 

In other words, man is necessarily free with free will, with the capacity to want to want, that is, capable of self-determination, but only as a potency. To be actually free, man needs to recognize the true Good in itself and want it for himself and choose it actually, that is, be ordered to its true end, God. Whoever orders his will towards another's end is a slave. 
​
3-CONCLUSION 
 
The definitive question is: is choice the essence of freedom? Is the possibility of wanting good for oneself, one's own happiness, one's own evolution, sufficient to found freedom? Self-determination without coercion to choose a certain object among other possible ones, or perform a certain action among other possible ones, is true freedom? The freedom that chooses between infinite possibilities, chooses the good and also the bad. Saint Thomas, in harmony with Saint Augustine, tells us that the possibility of choice is not the essence of freedom but only its sign. There is a higher form of freedom that decides to always choose the Good, it is the free and necessary will that wants the Supreme Good, God. This is possible because God is transcendent, final cause and creator of the universe without being part of it. The Whiteheadian universe extends the notion of freedom as the possibility of choice to all corners of the universe and to each structural conjunction from the inorganic to complex organisms, including man. Whitehead's God intervenes in each concretion but is not the final cause to which all creation tends as the Supreme Good. In fact, God is not a Creator. The Augustinian universe, however, limits the ability to choose between possibilities in the inorganic realm but expands the idea of freedom in the human sphere, giving it a transcendental level. But, on the other hand, the Whiteheadian universe moved by creativity towards novelty with its infinite possibilities, seems freer than the Augustinian universe moved by its weight towards a fixed order, established by God. So, there is not so much distance between both intensities of freedom, the Augustinian and the Whiteheadian, and we can conclude that in fact they can complement each other.