The metaphysical roots of physical inactivity and obesity in late-capitalism: toward a better understanding of major health problems through the application of process philosophy

The aim of this thesis is to comprehend the nature of an emergent major public health problem in Western developed societies; the increase in levels of physical inactivity and obesity. The position taken is that this problem is related to the defective ways of thinking underpinning the current period of late-capitalism. Supporting this position is a complex, philosophical argument that links multiple disciplines and levels of understanding within the human spatio-temporal domain. It is argued that such linking is only possible from a broader metaphysical perspective that examines underlying assumptions related to concepts of primary existence. The framework for this examination is an ongoing dialectic between two competing metaphysical traditions of thought, mechanistic materialism and process thought. Process metaphysics is put forward as a secular basis for re- integrating the human spatio-temporal domain left fragmented and nihilistic from centuries of dominance of the defective tradition of mechanistic materialism. It is this fragmentation and nihilism that has created the conditions for the problem of physical inactivity and obesity to emerge. This emergence is understood to be an aspect of the decaying process of a hegemonic culture that values extremes and is devoid of the ability to imagine alternatives. Drawing on the process tradition, and in particular the writings of contemporary philosophers coupled with less commonly studied older works, a more imaginative and encompassing definition of health, as compared with that enabled by the mechanistic materialist world-view, is conceived and developed. This is then contrasted with the way health is considered by those seeking to address public health issues. Through this approach, the key to the emergence and development of the physical inactivity and obesity problem is revealed in the beliefs and practices of those deemed to have the legitimacy to address it. It is suggested that this problem will not be adequately understood or addressed unless there is a major cultural change from one based in mechanistic materialism to one that is process based.