The Organization Of The Living And Teleonomy

As a complex system,the reason that life is different from other natural systems is that living system seems to have a certain purpose.With the development of naturalism movements in the fields of philosophy of biology and philosophy of cognitive science,biologists use the term “teleonomy” to describe the intrinsically end-oriented phenomena of living system,and endows with a new explanatory dimension—the organization of the living.From the perspective of relational biology,the organization of the living can be regarded as an intrinsically teleonomic causal regime.Around this point of view,this article is divided into six chapters to demonstrate.The first chapter puts forward the research question and thinking,and briefly reviews the domestic and foreign theoretical research on the organization of the living and teleonomy.The second chapter explains the empirical manifestation of teleonomy in living phenomena,and points out that the understanding of teleonomy is inseparable from the understanding of life.The metabolic closure of life indicate that life is a self-productive system,and selfproduction connects biological organization with teleonomy.The third chapter starts from the limitation of mechanistic explanation facing life,and realizes that it is necessary to re-awaken the discussion concerning teleonomy.Modern thought has opened the path of naturalization on the basis of Kant's philosophy.The two research approaches of phenomenology and self-organization of life used “naturalistic”descriptions to solve the problem of teleonomy,showing that life is a self-productive system with teleonomy.This is exactly the view expressed by Robert Rosen's Relational Biology.The fourth chapter points out that the difference between life and machine lies in the particularity of its organization,and the essence of the organization of the living,in Rosen's terminology,is “closure to efficient causation”.Relational biology proposes the(M,R)system from the perspective of organizational relation,which shows that the organization of the living have achieved a unique causal relation.The fifth chapter mainly demonstrates the closure to efficient causation entails teleonomy.Rosen explains intrinsic teleonomy in terms of a specific organization of efficient causes,and the organization of the living realizes self-production in the term of closure to efficient causation.Closure to efficient causation exists in the form of constraints in the organism,and forms a constrained closed network of interdependence and internal production in the biological organization.Teleonomy exclusively grounded by self-constraint.The sixth chapter summarizes the full text and expounds the research value of Rosen' theory.Relational biology attempts to overcome the main difficulties faced by biology in explaining teleonomy,provides a more rigorous basis for the study of complexity of life,and introduces a rigorous theoretical framework for the study of complex selforganizing system of life.