Living Metaphysics: Process Thought, Buddhist Philosophy, and the Impact of Ontology

In this contribution, I explore the idea that reality is best understood as fundamentally dynamic and interdependent, i.e., processual, bringing together resources from process thought, phenomenology and the Madhyamaka school of Buddhism. I furthermore explore how this view shapes the ways we speak about, investigate, and understand the natural world. What is novel in my approach is that I bring a phenomenological reading of process in dialogue with Buddhist thought. My paper unfolds in two stages: first, I map key points of convergence between phenomenologically clarified process philosophy and Madhyamaka; second, I consider the broader epistemological and practical consequences of viewing reality as impermanent and dependently arising by looking at Whitehead’s and Nāgārjuna’s views in dialogue. Engaging with Buddhist philosophy alongside phenomenological process thought enables a deeper investigation into the ethical, and lived dimensions of metaphysical inquiry, which are dimensions often sidelined both in Western metaphysics and in some versions of phenomenology, because metaphysical and phenomenological analysis can remain stuck on the conceptual level, detached from both lived experience and practice. By contrast, Buddhist traditions explicitly link philosophical reflection with lived experience and embodied practice throughout. For this reason, sustained dialogue with Buddhist views and practices can expand Western methodology as such and can enrich process-based phenomenological approaches in particular by showing ways to reconnect speculative metaphysics, observation, and the concrete in practical ways.