Importance and Understanding

Proposition and Relation

“==If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?”==

using chapter Understanding and Importance can answer:

Importance

Whitehead would argue that the sound of the falling tree possesses intrinsic importance, regardless of human presence. The tree’s fall and the vibrations it produces exist as part of the interconnected processes of nature. These processes, governed by physical laws, have their own importance within the larger ecological system, whether or not humans perceive them.

However, assigned importance also assigned the meanings: the meaning attributed to the tree’s sound—requires an observer, human or otherwise. If no one is present to interpret or feel the vibrations as sound, the event lacks subjective importance within the realm of human understanding. Yet, it remains significant to the tree, the forest, and the non-human entities affected by the fall (e.g., animals, soil, or other plants).

Lecture I of Section I in Alfred North Whitehead’s book Modes of Thought

“In this whole set of lectures my aim is to examine some of those general characterizations of our experience which are presupposed in the directed activities of mankind” (1)

Importance is a concept expressed by Alfred North Whitehead in his book Modes of Thought. As defined by Whitehead, Importance functions as part of the way humans observe and experience the world around them, termed by Whitehead as Process Philosophy.
Notes:

“All systematic thought must start from presuppositions”

System is important, and necessary in order to examine and utilize our thoughts “which throng into our experience” (2).

• But systems are inherently finite, and it is this finitude which we must avoid if we are to be good philosophers. “Philosophy can exclude nothing” (2)
  • Therefore we are after an assemblage, not a system per se. (but an assemblage is never ending). Big tasks to handle when pursuing this line of thought.

Whitehead’s definition of Importance directly relates to his definition of matter of fact, and is its ‘antithesis’. Importance relies on an abstraction from ‘matter of fact,’ it is a process of deciding what is ‘important’ from what is ‘actual’(?)

• A useful example from Garrett:

  ‘depression is being caught in the middle of importance and matter of fact’

Importance functions off “presuppositions”, or the concept/idea/event that exists prior from the main concept/idea/event. Ink must presuppose the pen. Importance is the basis for morality, logic, religion, and art. Humans must define what is ‘important’ in order to create systems of difference.

A nice quote:

“panic of error is the death of progress” (16)

The Interplay of Importance and Understanding

Whitehead would likely bridge the gap between the objective and subjective aspects of this question:

1. The Tree’s Fall as a Process of Importance

• The fall itself is part of a chain of processes (e.g., ecological cycles, gravity, energy transfer) that have intrinsic importance independent of human observation.

2. Sound as Relational Understanding

• Sound exists as vibrations in the air, a relational event that becomes “sound” only when it is prehended by a perceiver capable of assigning importance to it.

For Whitehead, the question highlights the interplay between reality and perception. The event of the tree falling does not depend on an observer to exist, but the experience of its sound—the subjective realization of those vibrations—requires a relational framework, involving a perceiver and their understanding of the event.

In Whitehead’s terms, the falling tree does make a sound, but its significance (or importance) as a “sound” depends on the presence of a perceiving entity. Without a perceiver, the event exists in its own relational and intrinsic importance, but the subjective interpretation of its “sound” remains unrealized. This distinction underscores Whitehead’s broader philosophy: reality is a process of relational events, but meaning emerges through interactions between those events and conscious entities capable of understanding them.