The strong continuity thesis postulates that the properties of mind are an enriched version of the properties of life, and thus that life and mind differ in degree and not kind. A philosophical problem for this view is the ostensive discontinuity between humans and other animals in virtue of our use of symbols—particularly the presumption that the symbolic nature of human cognition bears no relation to the basic properties of life. In this paper, we make the case that a genuine (...) account of strong continuity requires the identification of some sort of correlate of symbol-use in basic life properties. Our strategy is three-fold: 1) we argue that examples of proto-symbolism in simple living systems would be consistent with an evolutionary trajectory that ultimately produced symbolic cognition in humans; 2) we introduce Gordon Tomkins’ biological notion of ‘symbol’ as something that represents to the organism a feature of its environment that is significant to its survival; and 3) we employ this biological understanding of symbol-use to suggest that the symbolic nature of human cognition can be understood as an enriched version of the basic symbolic properties of life, thus preserving life-mind continuity in this context. (shrink)

We argue that genuine biological autonomy, or described at human level as free will, requires taking into account quantum vacuum processes in the context of biological teleology. One faces at least three basic problems of genuine biological autonomy: (1) if biological autonomy is not physical, where does it come from? (2) Is there a room for biological causes? And (3) how to obtain a workable model of biological teleology? It is shown here that the solution of all these three problems (...) is related to the quantum vacuum. We present a short review of how this basic aspect of the fundamentals of quantum theory, although it had not been addressed for nearly 100 years, actually it was suggested by Bohr, Heisenberg, and others. Realizing that the quantum mechanical measurement problem associated with the “collapse” of the wave function is related, in the Copenhagen Interpretation of quantum mechanics, to a process between self-consciousness and the external physical environment, we are extending the issue for an explanation of the different processes occurring between living organisms and their internal environment. Definitions of genuine biological autonomy, biological aim, and biological spontaneity are presented. We propose to improve the popular two-stage model of decisions with a biological model suitable to obtain a deeper look at the nature of the mind-body problem. In the newly emerging picture biological autonomy emerges as a new, fundamental and inevitable element of the scientific worldview. (shrink)

Change and necessity is a statement of Darwinian natural selection as a process driven by chance necessity, devoid of purpose or intent.

Presents German physicist Werner Heisenberg's 1958 text in which he discusses the philosophical implications and social consequences of quantum mechanics and other physical theories.

This book, based on Jaegwon Kim's 1996 Townsend Lectures, presents the philosopher's current views on a variety of issues in the metaphysics of the mind...

p class="MsoNormal"span style="font-size: 11pt"The idea that life is based on signs and codes, i.e., that ldquo;Life is semiosisrdquo;, has been strongly suggested by the discovery of the genetic code, but so far it has made little impact, and is largely regarded as philosophy rather than science. The main reason for this is that there are at least three basic concepts in modern biology that keep semiosis squarely out of organic life./span/p p style="text-indent: 14.2pt; line-height: normal" class="Corpotesto"span style="font-family: quot;Times New Romanquot;" (...) The first is the classical model that describes the cell as a biological computer made of genotype and phenotype. A computer contains codes but is not a semiotic system, and this makes it possible to say that the cell too can have a genetic code without being a semiotic system. /span/p p style="text-indent: 14.2pt; line-height: normal" class="Corpotesto"span style="font-family: quot;Times New Romanquot;" The second idea/spanspan style="font-family: quot;Times New Romanquot;" is/spanspan style="font-family: quot;Times New Romanquot;" emphysicalism/em, the doctrine that everything in life must ultimately be accounted for by physical quantities. This/spanspan style="font-family: quot;Times New Romanquot;" amounts to saying that signs and codes do/spanspan style="font-family: quot;Times New Romanquot;" not exist at the molecular level and are but linguistic metaphors that biologists use simply because they are convenient./span/p p style="text-indent: 14.2pt; line-height: normal" class="Corpotesto"span style="font-family: quot;Times New Romanquot;" The third concept is the idea that all biological novelties have been brought into existence by natural selection, an idea which implies that semiotic processes did not have any creative role in evolution. /spanspan style="font-family: quot;Times New Romanquot;"/span/p p style="text-indent: 14.2pt; line-height: normal" class="Corpotesto"span style="font-family: quot;Times New Romanquot;"These arguments have effectively ruled out the existence of semiosis in the organic world, thus depriving the discovery of the genetic code of all its revolutionary potential, but here it will be shown that there are experimental facts against emall/em of them. More precisely, it will be shown that the cell is a true semiotic system, and that the genetic code has been the first of a long series of organic codes that have shaped the whole history of life on our planet. Biological semiosis, in other words, is a scientific reality because the organic codes are experimental realities. This paper intends to underline precisely the scientific nature of spannbsp;/spanbiosemiotics and argues that the time has come to acknowledge that semiosis not only is a fact of life but is spannbsp;/spanlsquo;thersquo; fact that allowed life to emerge from inanimate matter. /span/p. (shrink)

First, I offer a short overview on the classical occidental philosophy as propounded by the ancient Greeks and the natural philosophies of the last 2000 years until the dawn of the empiricist logic of science in the twentieth century, which wanted to delimitate classical metaphysics from empirical sciences. In contrast to metaphysical concepts which didn’t reflect on the language with which they tried to explain the whole realm of entities empiricist logic of science initiated the end of metaphysical theories by (...) reflecting on the preconditions for foundation and justification of sentences about objects of investigation, i.e. a coherent definition of language in general, which was not the aim of classical metaphysics. Unexpectedly empiricist logic of science in the linguistic turn failed in the physical and mathematical reductionism of language and its use in communication, as will be discussed below in further detail. Nevertheless, such reflection on language and communication also introduced this vocabulary into biology. Manfred Eigen and bioinformatics, later on biolinguistics, used ‘language’ applied linguistic turn thinking to biology coherent to the logic of science and its formalisable aims. This changed significantly with the birth of biosemiotics and biohermeneutics. At the end of this introduction it will be outlined why and how all these approaches reproduced the deficiencies of the logic of science and why the biocommunicative approach avoids their abstractive fallacies. (shrink)

The view of teleology sketched in the above remarks seems to me to offer a piece of candy to both the critics and guardians of teleology. The critics want to defend against a number of things: the importation of unverifiable theological or metaphysical doctrines into the sciences; the idea that goals somehow act in favor of their won realization; and the view that biological systems require for their study concepts and patterns of explanation unlike anything employed in the physical sciences. (...) An important part of their defense has been the contention that teleological language can be eliminated without loss from the sciences. I have argued that this is true: any phenomenon that can be described in teleological language can be described otherwise.On the other hand, eliminability does not mean translatability. I have suggested—I do not see how to prove it—that the teleological character of a sentence is so fundamental that it would be preserved under translation. Teleological character is conferred on a sentence by the manner in which it fits into a conceptual scheme designed for the description of certain classes of systems possessing net-like organization. The elimination of teleological language thus involves a conceptual shift, and involves a different method of classifying the elements of a system.The guardians of teleology—myself among them—have insisted that teleological language is perfectly legitimate. This conclusion is plain if my account of “appropriateness” is correct. Indeed, the development of conceptual schemes which render functional ascriptions appropriate is seen to be just a special case of a general scientific procedure: the designing of languages aimed at bringing to light those causal relations which are most interesting to us. (shrink)

The book Fundamentals of Life is a bold attempt at gathering all basic knowledge of Humanity regarding the 'Mother of all questions': the essence and origin of life. The Editors are aided by first-class prominence in realising these high-set goals, including Christian de Duve (NP Medicine/Biology, 1972), George A. Olah (NP Chemistry, 1994), Gustaf 0. Arrhenius (Origins-of-Life Science, San Diego, CA, USA), Günther von Kiedrowski (Biochemistry, Bochum, Germany), Brian Johnstone (moral Theology, Rome), Paul G. Mezey (Theoretical Chemistry, Saskatoon, Canada) or (...) Julius Rebek, Jr (Chemical Biology, La Jolla, CA, USA) and Kenso Soai (Autocatalysis, Tokyo) [only to name a few] and several others, together with will-be prominences of the youngest generation as Robert Szilagyi (Stereochemistry, Stanford, CA, USA), Massimo Nardello (Theology, Modena) or Alec A. Schaerer (Philosophy, Zurich). The spectrum of the scientific approach is unusually broad. The 48 Chapters are divided into four sections: 'Definitions of Life'; 'Origin(s) of Life', - 'Basic ('background') Research' as well as 'Moral, Religious and Philosophical Aspects'. The sections are of equilibrated size and joined together by an excellent introductory chapter of the Editors: 'Dimensions of Life'. A rich source of concentrated speculations is collected in the chapter 'Short Definitions of Life', where the answers of 81 excellent scientists, all creative in this field, offer unusual intellectual fireworks. The book will become a reference work for a very broad readership ranging from college students to highly specialised research scientists and even clergymen or philosophers. (shrink)

A biosemiotic view of living things is presented that supersedes the mechanistic view of life prevalent in biology today. Living things are active agents with autonomous subjectivity, whose structure is triadic, consisting of the individual organism, its Umwelt and the society. Sociality inheres in every living thing since the very origin of life on the earth. The temporality of living things is guided by the purpose to live, which works as the semantic boundary condition for the processes of embodiment of (...) the subjectivity. Freedom at the molecular and cellular levels allows autonomy and spontaneity to emerge even in single cell organisms, and the presence of the dimension of mind in every living thing is deduced. Living things transcend their individualness, as they live in historically formed higher order structure consisting of the lineage-species and the society. They also transcend materiality, having the dimension of mind. (shrink)

The ongoing revolution in molecular genetics has led many to speculate that one day we will be able to change the expression or phenotype of numerous complex traits to improve ourselves in many different ways. The prospect of genetic enhancements has generated heated controversy, with proponents advocating research and implementation, with caution advised for concerns about justice, and critics tending to see the prospect of genetic enhancements as an assault on human freedom and human nature. Both camps base their arguments (...) on the unquestioned assumption that the science will realize either their dreams or nightmares. In this paper, I show that their beliefs are based upon two fundamental mistakes. First, they are based upon an unwarranted reliance in a genetic determinism that takes for granted that the traits that we might most want to enhance, like intelligence, aggression, shyness, and even athletic ability, can be causally directed by specific genes. In so doing, character descriptions are reified to be concrete and discrete entities, in this case, genes. Second, they have accepted on faith that there is, or will be, a science to translate their hopes or worries into reality when, in fact, that is unlikely to occur because of the irreducible complexity of phenotypic expression. (shrink)

Fearful Symmetry brings the incredible discoveries of contemporary physics within everyone's grasp. A. Zee, a distinguished physicist and skillful expositor, tells the exciting story of how today's theoretical physicists are following Einstein in their search for the beauty and simplicity of Nature. Animated by a sense of reverence and whimsy, the book describes the majestic sweep and accomplishments of twentieth-century physics. In the end, we stand in awe before the grand vision of modern physics--one of the greatest chapters in the (...) intellectual history of humankind. (shrink)

In this dialogue, we discuss the contrast between inexorable physical laws and the semiotic freedom of life. We agree that material and symbolic structures require complementary descriptions, as do the many hierarchical levels of their organizations. We try to clarify our concepts of laws, constraints, rules, symbols, memory, interpreters, and semiotic control. We briefly describe our different personal backgrounds that led us to a biosemiotic approach, and we speculate on the future directions of biosemiotics.

To surmount the notorious difficulties of defining life, we should evaluate theories of life not by whether they provide necessary and sufficient conditions for our current preconceptions about life but by how well they explain living phenomena and how satisfactorily they resolve puzzles about life. On these grounds, the theory of life as supple adaptation (Bedau 1996) gets support from its natural and compelling resolutions of the following four puzzles: (1) How are different forms of life at different levels of (...) the vital hierarchy related? (2) Is there a continuum between life and non-life? (3) Does life essentially concern a living entity’s material composition or its form? (4) Are life and mind intrinsically connected? (shrink)

In this dialogue, we discuss the contrast between inexorable physical laws and the semiotic freedom of life. We agree that material and symbolic structures require complementary descriptions, as do the many hierarchical levels of their organizations. We try to clarify our concepts of laws, constraints, rules, symbols, memory, interpreters, and semiotic control. We briefly describe our different personal backgrounds that led us to a biosemiotic approach, and we speculate on the future directions of biosemiotics.

Today there are two major theoretical frameworks in biology. One is the ‘chemical paradigm’, the idea that life is an extremely complex form of chemistry. The other is the ‘information paradigm’, the view that life is not just ‘chemistry’ but ‘chemistry-plus-information’. This implies the existence of a fundamental difference between information and chemistry, a conclusion that is strongly supported by the fact that information and information-based-processes like heredity and natural selection simply do not exist in the world of chemistry. Against (...) this conclusion, the supporters of the chemical paradigm have pointed out that information processes are no different from chemical processes because they are both described by the same physical quantities. They may appear different, but this is only because they take place in extremely complex systems. According to the chemical paradigm, in other words, biological information is but a shortcut term that we use to avoid long descriptions of countless chemical reactions. It is intuitively appealing, but it does not represent a new ontological entity. It is merely a derived construct, a linguistic metaphor. The supporters of the information paradigm insist that information is a real and fundamental entity of Nature, but have not been able to prove this point. The result is that the chemical view has not been abandoned and the two paradigms are both coexisting today. Here it is shown that an alternative does exist and is a third theoretical framework that is referred to as the ‘code paradigm’. The key point is that we need to introduce in biology not only the concept of information but also that of meaning because any code is based on meaning and a genetic code does exist in every cell. The third paradigm is the view that organic information and organic meaning exist in every living system because they are the inevitable results of the processes of copying and coding that produce genes and proteins. Their true nature has eluded us for a long time because they are nominable entities, i.e., objective and reproducible observables that can be described only by naming their components in their natural order. They have also eluded us because nominable entities exist only in artifacts and biologists have not yet come to terms with the idea that life is artifact making. This is the idea that life arose from matter and yet it is fundamentally different from it because inanimate matter is made of spontaneous structures whereas life is made of manufactured objects. It will be shown, furthermore, that the existence of information and meaning in living systems is documented by the standard procedures of science. We do not have to abandon the scientific method in order to introduce meaning in biology. All we need is a science that becomes fully aware of the existence of organic codes in Nature. (shrink)