Commentary on Juval Portugali's ‘Bohm's theory of orders as a basis for a unified urban theory’

Abstract

Portugali's proposal to unify urban theory based on Bohm's theory of quantum phenomena is discussed. The propositions of complexity theory and phenomenology are compared, and it is argued that their ontologies and epistemologies cannot be easily reconciled. It is argued that Bohm's theory is compatible with complexity theory but does not help bridge the differences between complexity theory and phenomenology. A grand unification of urban theory, the way Portugali envisions it, does not seem to be possible.

I begin this critical commentary on Portugali's essay expressing profound respect for his work on complexity theory (CT) applications in urban research (Haken and Portugali, 2021; Portugali, 2000, 2011). His proposal to unify urban theory in this essay is valuable, and his theoretical propositions are insightful, but I am sceptical about whether urban theory, or theory in any social science field, can be unified and whether Bohm’ theory of implicate/generative is necessary and sufficient for this purpose.

Possibility of unifying urban theory (or social scientific theory in general)

Portugali's effort to unify urban theory is commendable but underestimates the challenges of doing so. He frames the argument to unify urban theory around the dichotomous ‘Two Cultures of Science’ thesis: On the one side, there is the quantitative revolution of the 1950s and complexity theories of cities of later decades, and on the other the ‘structuralist-Marxist-Humanistic paradigm of the 1970s’ and the phenomenological, hermeneutic, critical, post-modernist, post-structuralist and deconstructionist theories of the later decades. This dichotomous conflation of the theoretical traditions, in my view, misguides the rest his arguments in the article.

I will refrain from delving into the details of each theoretical tradition, and instead, offer another simplified dichotomy for his second group of theories: Marxism on one side, and phenomenology and its variations and extensions (hermeneutics, post-modernism, post-structuralism and deconstructionism) on the other. Marxism is reconcilable with CT, but phenomenology poses much bigger challenges. Even if phenomenology could be reconciled with CT metaphorically (as some tried; see below), it is questionable whether and how the implications of this could be translated into empirically testable and productive research agenda.

CT is ontologically realist (that there is reality to be known out there) and epistemologically objectivist (that reality can be known scientifically), even though it expands the scope of knowable reality to invisible realms (inner pattern/structures that can be observed/studied only though special scientific methods, such as chaotic attractors, network analyses and simulations) (Morçöl, 2012: 210–248). Marxists theorists from Karl Marx onwards claimed that theirs is a scientific theory (realist and objectivist) and aimed to detect the inner mechanisms of society/political economy (e.g. ‘mode of production’). There is a basis to reconcile these two theoretical traditions. Unifying them may still be an overly ambitious project though; that could be the topic of another essay.

Phenomenology and its extensions are based on very different ontologies and epistemologies than those of CT. They vary among themselves, but in general they pose challenges to the realist and objectivist assumptions, by taking nominalist and/or subjectivist/constructivist positions: that (social) reality does not exist independently; even if it does, it can only be constructed personally or socially. To better understand the challenges in reconciling phenomenology with CT, we need to look the roots of the former.

Phenomenology was a reaction to the rising applications of scientific thinking and methods in understanding/studying societies in the nineteenth century (e.g. Comte's positivism as the foundation of sociology). Husserl, founder of phenomenology, rejected these applications by criticising their mathematisation of nature, geometrisation of space-time, realist ontology and objectivist epistemology (he called all these the ‘Galilean science’ or ‘Cartesian science’). He argued that this science creates an artificial dichotomy between the ‘epistemological subject’ (consciousness) and the ‘objective world’ (reality) (Heelan, 1988). He further argued that the relation between consciousness and reality is constituted by consciousness (Madison, 1988), and ‘scientific knowledge’ is nothing but a product of the consciousness of the scientist (Van De Pitte, 1993). This nominalist/subjectivist view collapses ontological and epistemological questions into one and poses fundamental challenges to realist/objectivist scientists.

Husserl's propositions could be viewed as mere musing of an old-time philosopher, without his student Heidegger's reformulations of them as Dasein (Being there, or Being-in-the-World), which became the core concept of phenomenological hermeneutics, which in turn has influenced post-modernism, post-structuralism and deconstruction. All explanations and interpretations are rooted in Dasein's primary understanding (Mueller-Vollmer, 1994: 32), which is a circular way of knowing (the ‘hermeneutic circle’): Without fore-knowledge, there is no way of knowing, and the knower understands themselves while attempting to interpret others’ ‘texts’, which in later applications meant as all forms of human communications (video and audio messages, cultural artefacts, etc.).

Phenomenological hermeneutics and hermeneutic circle have been adopted at varying degrees by some later social theorists. Close followers of Heidegger do not see any way out of this circularity, which means that there is no independent reality (at least social reality) that could be observed objectively. Others proposed milder versions and found ways to reconcile hermeneutics with objective science (e.g. the narrative policy framework; Crow and Jones, 2018), which is based on objectivist hermeneutics (Hirsch, 1972). Post-modernist and post-structuralist theories have their roots in hermeneutics, and some in phenomenological hermeneutics. These theorists see all forms of human communication and their artefacts as texts (Rosenau, 1992: 8) and any form of social communication is a ‘language game’, in which there are no extra-linguistic referents, no one-to-one correspondence between the interpretation and the text (reality) (Sarup, 1989: 3).

The question is, can phenomenology and its extensions like phenomenological hermeneutics, post-modernism or post-structuralism, be reconciled with Marxism or CT? Maybe, but only as abstractions.

In the Marxist tradition, subjective interpretation, culture, etc. either did not play any roles or played only secondary roles. Very few Marxist theorists, like Lukács and Gramsci factored subjective ways of knowing, such as (class) ‘consciousness’ and ‘cultural hegemony’, into their theoretical frameworks. Critical theorists, like Habermas, whose roots are in Marxism but in many ways distanced themselves from it, adapted phenomenological hermeneutics by adding a critical twist to it. They argue that instead of merely interpreting the world of meanings people make, social scientists should try to emancipate them from the limits of their own worlds (Nielsen, 1993).

Some complexity theorists, including myself, explored its potential connections with phenomenology, but the results are aspirational and conjectural so far. Prigogine and Stengers (1984) and argue against the Newtonian hard separation of the object from the subject and propose a ‘new conception of objectivity’ in which the scientist is situated within the observed world (p. 218). Kauffman (1995) argues that advances in complexity sciences and self-organisation support the notion that the scientist can be ‘at home in the universe’. I explored the phenomenological implications of CT and proposed Lakoff and Johnson's (1999) ‘embodied realism’ as the ontological/epistemological basis of a new conception of objectivity. But, I pointed out, this is not a resolution; instead, it creates a tension in scientific knowledge (Morçöl, 2005).

Is Bohm's interpretation of quantum phenomena a good basis for unification?

Portugali points to Bohm's theory as a potential ontological/epistemological grounding for unifying urban theories. That is possible but would allow only a partial ‘unification’. Bohm's theory was an objection to the Copenhagen interpretation (CI), which has implications similar to phenomenology; by extension, Bohm's theory would not help unify with phenomenologically based theories.

The CI provides scientific grounding to the phenomenological hermeneutic circularity of knowledge, and Bohm argued against that. The CI challenges the realist/deterministic and objectivist view of Newtonian science by pointing to the complementarity of quantum phenomena (complementarity of the wave and particle theories of subatomic particles) and the inherent uncertainty in knowing the phenomena (uncertainty in measuring the position and the momentum of an electron); this uncertainty is ontological in the sense that quantum reality is probabilistic (indeterministic) (Morçöl, 2002: 122–126). Bohr (1983), one of the leaders of CI, argues that no ‘sharp distinction’ can be made ‘between the behavior of the objects themselves and their interaction with the measuring instruments’ (p. 42). Wheeler (1983) calls this ‘participatory collusion’ between reality and its observer and argues that it happens not only at the quantum level but in the entire universe. These observations and implications of CI are very much in line with Husserl's dissolution of the subject-object distinction and Heidegger's hermeneutic circle.

Bohm (1952) objection is that the uncertainties and circularities in CI could be resolved by referring to an implicate order of the universe. He theorises that the difficulties in measuring the positions and momentum of particles simultaneously are not ontological. There are ‘hidden variables’ behind them, which represent the ‘implicate order’ of nature, which is dynamic; hence he calls it ‘holomovement’ or ‘generative order’. His is a defense of a realist and objectivist science.

Conclusion

So, is a unification of urban theory, or any other social theory, possible? Could Bohm's implicate/generative order be the basis of this unification? My answer to the first question is no. The issue is not whether and how to reconcile qualitative urban studies with quantitative studies, as Portugali suggests. This can be done, as many social constructionist and/or interpretivist researchers who use qualitative methods are realists and objectivists, at least partly. But unifying with them would still leave out a wide range of phenomenological, post-modernist, post-structuralist, deconstructionist theories. It would be a much bigger challenge, perhaps an impossibility, to unify with these theories. The differences between CT and the ‘humanistic-phenomenological approach’ Portugali cites are deeper than his descriptions of them in the essay suggest. They are not merely about interplays between the city as an experiential place and its abstraction as urban space; post-modern ontology is not merely about people perceiving, talking, theorising and acting on urban reality from their specific locations, histories and traditions.

Some complexity theorists did find phenomenological positions like the situatedness of the observers in reality appealing at an abstract level, but would they be comfortable with the complete dissolution of the distinction between the ‘epistemological subject’ (consciousness) and the ‘objective world’ (reality) and the proposition that scientific knowledge is nothing but a product of the consciousness of the scientist? Would they accept the proposition that all forms of social communication are ‘language games’, with no external referents in an objective reality? Even if they did, how would these propositions be translated into empirical investigations of urban phenomena?

It is understandable that Portugali finds an affinity with Bohm's theory of implicate/generative order, because Bohm was ontologically realist and epistemologically objectivist. Like Bohm, complexity theorists aim to find out about inner and invisible structures, using tools like attractors, order parameters and simulations. It is possible that Bohm's view of the world was informed by his interest in Marxism, which also theorises the existence of invisible structures (e.g. mode of production). So, there are similarities among the theories in abstract.

Even then, is Bohm necessary for a unification? I do not think so, because quantum phenomena are so distant from the realities we experience in urban and other spheres that the debates in quantum mechanics cannot be easily translated into social sciences. Is Bohm sufficient for a unification? No, because he represents only a version of quantum mechanical theories, as noted above, and thus a unification through Bohm would leave out a range of theories.