The Philosophy of Movement

Prof. Dr. Thomas Nail (University of Denver)

WE LIVE IN AN AGE OF MOVEMENT. The world has always been in motion, but it is only relatively recently that we have become aware of just how profoundly mobile it is. It is fascinating to me that something as simple as movement has posed such enormous difficulties for philosophers and scientists in the Western tradition. Why have the most remarkable minds dedicated their lives to discovering something genuinely immobile? Aristotle’s idea of an “unmoved mover,” Archimedes’ fixed “point,” Descartes’ “unmoveable” certainty, Newton’s divine clockmaker, and even Einstein’s idea of a block universe are all part of this great effort. But what motivated this critical pursuit, and what are the consequences of it for us today?

These have been guiding questions of my research for a decade. I have tried to understand their implications for politics, science, ontology, and the arts in my books. This lecture is an introduction to the philosophy of movement. It describes the contemporary motivations and goals of the project as well as its similarities and differences with the mobilities paradigm and other contemporary process and materialist philosophies. I argue that what is unique about the philosophy of movement is that it is the only philosophy that accepts the primacy of motion as its methodological starting point.

THOMAS NAIL is Professor of Philosophy at the University of Denver and author of numerous books, including The Figure of the Migrant, Theory of the Border, Marx in Motion, Theory of the Image, Theory of the Object, Theory of the Earth, Lucretius I, II, III, Returning to Revolution, and Being and Motion. His research focuses on the philosophy of movement and can be read at https://udenver.academia.edu/ThomasNail.

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