Uncontainable Life: A Biophilosophy of Bioart investigates the ways in which thinking through the contemporary hybrid artistico-scientific practices of bioart is a biophilosophical practice, one that contributes to a more nuanced understanding of life than we encounter in mainstream academic discourse. When examined from a Deleuzian feminist perspective and in dialogue with contemporary bioscience, bioartistic projects reveal the inadequacy of asking about life’s essence. They expose the enmeshment between the living and non-living, organic and inorganic, and, ultimately, life and death. (...) Instead of examining the defining criteria of life, bioartistic practices explore and enact life as processual, differential, and always already uncontainable, thus transcending preconceived material and conceptual boundaries. In this way, this doctoral thesis concentrates on the ontology of life as it emerges through the selected bioartworks: “semi-living” sculptures created by The Tissue Culture and Art Project and the performance May the Horse Live in Me by L’Art Orienté Objet. The hope is that such an ontology can enable future conceptualisations of an ethico-politics that avoids the anthropocentric logic dominant in the humanities and social sciences. (shrink)

Pathological morphogenesis on leaves of Fraxinus ornus (ash) and Solanum lycopersicum (tomato) under the influence of mites (Aceria fraxinivora and Eriophyes cladophthirus respectively) leads to a range of structures whose morphology and development cannot be reduced to the classical categories of plant morphology, but present a heterogeneous continuum which links fundamental structural categories. These findings support the pyramid model of plant construction.

From the point of view of a dynamic morphology, form is not only the result of process(es) — it is process. This process may be analyzed in terms of two pairs of fundamental processes: growth and decay, differentiation and dedifferentiation. Each of these processes can be analyzed in terms of various modalities (parameters) and submodalities. This paper deals with those of growth (see Table 1). For the purpose of systematits and phylogenetic reconstruction the modalities and submodalities can be considered dynamic (...) characters that have states. Each state of such a dynamic character is a more detailed process, hence not static. For example, determinate growth represents a state of the dynamic character (or modality) of growth duration.The processes of Table 1 can be applied to the whole plant kingdom (although in certain cases only some processes of the whole set may be applicable). Thus, the diversity of plant form is seen as a diversity of process combinations. From this point of view, change in form implies change in the process combination(s). Questions that arise are, for example, the following: Which process combinations actually occur? Which of these are the most frequent? How and why have process combinations changed during ontogeny and phylogeny? (shrink)

In plant morphology, most structures of vascular plants can easily be assigned to pre-established organ categories. However, there are also intermediate structures that do not fit those categories associated with a classical approach to morphology. To integrate the diversity of forms in the same general framework, we constructed a theoretical morphospace based on a variety of modalities where it is possible to calculate the morphological distance between plant organs. This paper gives emphasis on shoot, leaf, leaflet and trichomes while ignoring (...) the root. This will allow us to test the hypothesis that classical morphology (typology) and dynamic morphology occupy the same theoretical morphospace and the relationship between the two approaches remains a question of weighting of criteria. Our approach considers the shoot (i.e. leafy stem) as the basic morphological structural unit. A theoretical data table consisting of as many lines as there are possible combinations between different modalities of characters of a typical shoot was generated. By applying a principal components analysis (PCA) to these data it is possible to define a theoretical morphospace of shoots. Typical morphological elements (shoots, leaves, trichomes) and atypical structures (phylloclades, cladodes) including particular cases representing ‘exotic’ structures such as the epiphyllous appendages of Begonia and ‘water shoot’ and ‘leaf’ of aquatic Utricularia were placed in the morphospace. The more an organ differs from a typical shoot, the further away it will be from the barycentre of shoots. By giving a higher weight to variables used in classical typology, the different organ categories appear to be separate, as expected. If we do not make any particular arbitrary choice in terms of character weighting, as it is the case in the context of dynamic morphology, the clear separation between organs is replaced by a continuum. Contrary to typical structures, “intermediate” structures are only compatible with a dynamic morphology approach whether they are placed in the morphospace based on a ponderation compatible with typology or dynamic morphology. The difference in points of view between typology and continuum leads to a particular mode of weighting. By using an equal weighting of characters, contradictions due to the ponderation of characters are avoided, and the morphological concepts of continuum’ and ‘typology’ appear as sub-classes of ‘process’ or ‘dynamic morphology’. (shrink)

Agnes Arber (1879-1960) was a British botanist who was a leading plant morphologist during the first half of the 20th century. She also wrote on the history and philosophy of botany. I argue in this article that her philosophical work on form and on how the work of the mind and the eye relate to each other in morphological research are relevant to the science of today. Arber's unusual blend of interests - in botany, history, philosophy, and art - put (...) her in a unique position to examine issues of form. Even her unorthodox ideas on evolution can now be seen as fitting in well with discussions of natural selection as the predominant engine of evolutionary change. Arber's views also throw light on present work dealing with developmental plant genetics and with the study of protein form. I will further argue that her marginal position relative to institutional science, while it may have left her vulnerable to criticism, also made possible her deep philosophical reflections on morphology. (shrink)

This is an essay about ethics and environmental responsibility. The thesis is that biologic species qua species--not only as collections of individuals or as elements of ecosystems--deserve moral regard. The argument establishes moral considerability on powers and freedoms of relative self-determination and autonomy. It is argued that species are living beings in their own right with their own projects and interests which deserve special regard. The essay draws from the arguments of Plato, Aristotle, Plotinus, Boethius, Avicenna, Maimonides, Leibniz, Spinoza, Kant, (...) and others, concerning the moral value of natural beings, but situates itself in the contemporary dialogue of environmental ethics. Lengthy consideration is given to species concepts defended by evolution theorists, biological systematists, and ecologists. ;The argument claims that natural beings, including species, have moral value because they have projects and interests which make a legitimate, but not universal, claim on the moral agent. Beings make moral claims when they are integral and integrating, individual, and concreative--conditions comparable to those with which we describe the moral status of a person. We may call such beings rational by analogy to the integration and singularity of intellect, and confer upon them analogous moral consideration. They are due regard in proportion to their projects in the same sense that moral subjects are due regard for having the projects of moral subjects. (shrink)