On the naturalisation of teleology: self-organisation, autopoiesis and teleodynamics

In recent decades, several theories have claimed to explain the teleological causality of organisms as a function of self-organising and self-producing processes. The most widely cited theories of this sort are variations of autopoiesis, originally introduced by Maturana and Varela. More recent modifications of autopoietic theory have focused on system organisation, closure of constraints and autonomy to account for organism teleology. This article argues that the treatment of teleology in autopoiesis and other organisation theories is inconclusive for three reasons: First, non-living self-organising processes like autocatalysis meet the defining features of autopoiesis without being teleological; second, organisational approaches, whether defined in terms of the closure of constraints, self-determination or autonomy, are unable to specify teleological normativity, that is, the individuation of an ultimate beneficiary; third, all self-organised systems produce local order by maximising the throughput of energy and/or material (obeying the maximum entropy production (MEP) principle) and thereby are specifically organised to undermine their own critical boundary conditions. Despite these inadequacies, an alternative approach called teleodynamics accounts for teleology. This theory shows how multiple self-organising processes can be collectively linked so that they counter each other’s MEP principle tendencies to become codependent. Teleodynamics embraces – not ignoring – the difficulties of self-organisation, but reinstates teleology as a radical phase transition distinguishing systems embodying an orientation towards their own beneficial ends from those that lack normative character.

The Role of Languaging in Human Evolution

The notion of languaging provides a new understanding of the intimate relationship between sociality and language. In this paper, I address the evolutionary emergence of language by subscribing to the autopoietic theory of natural drift (Maturana and Varela 1987; Varela et al. 1993; Maturana and Mpdozis 2000) I show that this systemic approach to evolution can offer the ideal epistemological background to evaluate the role of languaging throughout hominization. The central idea is that the languaging-based way of living acted as an attractor for the evolutionary process. This claim relies on three interrelated assumptions: 1) behavioral and relational habits may channel the course of genetic and structural change; 2) recursive coordination and specific forms of sociality set the systemic conditions for coexistence-through-languaging to be conserved over generations; 3) the conservation of these systemic conditions gives rise to a spiraling, positive-feedback process that involves body, cognition, and culture.

Living beings as autopoietic bodies

In the target article, it was claimed that the enactive extended interpretation of the autopoietic theory (AT) of living beings is incorrect, and an embodied reformulation of AT (EAT) was put forward to remedy and prevent such an interpretation. In this general reply, I want to clarify the motivation, reach, philosophical commitments, and theoretical status of EAT. I do this, mainly, by explicating the notions of body and autopoiesis, and by reconstructing EAT, not as a conceptual definition of life but as a theoretical identity statement of living beings as a natural kind.

The broad scope of enactivism

Villalobos and Razeto-Barry suggest that extended enactivist interpretations of the autopoietic theory do not adequately address the bodily dimensions of living beings. In reply, we suggest that the extended enactivist view provides a richer account of living beings than a theory confined to autopoiesis, and therefore should not be supplanted by a modified autopoietic theory.

Systems or bodies? On how (not) to embody autopoiesis

Villalobos and Razeto-Barry’s embodied reformulation of the autopoietic theory (AT) replaces AT’s reference to autopoietic ‘systems’ with a reference to autopoietic ‘bodies’ so as to prevent an extended enactivist reading of AT. I argue that the specific notions of ‘body’ and ‘embodiment’ invoked by Villalobos and Razeto-Barry appear to be in tension with AT and are problematic as such.

Two challenges to the embodied version of the autopoietic theory

“In Are living beings extended autopoietic systems? An embodied reply”, Villalobos and Razeto-Barry offer an articulation of the embodied aspect of the autopoietic theory. Their aim is to block the extended interpretation of this theory. For them, living beings are, simply put, autopoietic bodies. In this commentary, I advance two concerns regarding the alleged cases of extended living beings. On the one hand, I argue that their proposal fails to account for the intuitive difference between these cases and living beings that are embedded in the environment. On the other hand, I argue that, from the perspective offered by the authors, there also seems to be a problem in the way the boundaries of a system are delineated.

Why do we build the wall?

I discuss the notion of bodies proposed by Villalobos and Razeto-Barry. I consider it a good move in a direction away from overly formal aspects of autopoietic theory, but in need of refinement. I suggest that because organismic boundaries are dialectical processes and not immanent walls, some autopoietic bodies can extend by incorporating parts of their environment as in the case of insects that use trapped air bubbles to breathe underwater.

Are living beings extended autopoietic systems? An embodied reply

Building on the original formulation of the autopoietic theory (AT), extended enactivism argues that living beings are autopoietic systems that extend beyond the spatial boundaries of the organism. In this article, we argue that extended enactivism, despite having some basis in AT’s original formulation, mistakes AT’s definition of living beings as autopoietic entities. We offer, as a reply to this interpretation, a more embodied reformulation of autopoiesis, which we think is necessary to counterbalance the (excessively) disembodied spirit of AT’s original formulation. The article aims to clarify and correct what we take to be a misinterpretation of AT as a research program. AT, contrary to what some enactivists seem to believe, did not (and does not) intend to motivate an extended conception of living beings. AT’s primary purpose, we argue, was (and is) to provide a universal individuation criterion for living beings, these understood as discrete bodies that are embedded in, but not constituted by, the environment that surrounds them. However, by giving a more explicitly embodied definition of living beings, AT can rectify and accommodate, so we argue, the enactive extended interpretation of autopoiesis, showing that although living beings do not extend beyond their boundaries as autopoietic unities, they do form part, in normal conditions, of broader autopoietic systems that include the environment.