Bich L. (2006) Autopoiesis and emergence. In: Minati G., Pessa E. & Abram M. (eds.) Systemics of emergence: Research and development. Springer, Berlin: 281–292. Fulltext at https://cepa.info/2320
Autopoietic theory is more than a mere characterization of the living, as it can be applied to a wider class of systems and involves both organizational and epistemological aspects. In this paper we assert the necessity of considering the relation between autopoiesis and emergence, focusing on the crucial importance of the observer’s activity and demonstrating that autopoietic systems can be considered intrinsically emergent processes. From the attempts to conceptualize emergence, especially Rosen’s, autopoiesis stands out for its attention to the unitary character of systems and to emergent levels, both inseparable from the observer’s operations. These aspects are the basis of Varela’s approach to multiple level relationships, considered as descriptive complementarities.
Bich L. (2010) Biological Autonomy and Systemic Integration. Origins of Life and Evolution of the Biospheres 40: 480–484. Fulltext at https://cepa.info/2317
In this article I will outline the basic theoretical assumptions of two examples of the confederative and the integrative views of the living – respectively Ganti’s Chemoton theory and Maturana and Varela’s autopoietic theory – by showing that they are both consistent perspectives, but they differ in the accounts they make of the role of organization in biological systems. In doing so I will also put into evidence how the choice between these two theoretical frameworks is strictly connected to the problem of structure and function in living organisms and entails different strategies of investigation.
Bich L. & Arnellos A. (2012) Autopoiesis, Autonomy and Organizational Biology: Critical Remarks on “Life After Ashby”. Cybernetics & Human Knowing 19(4): 75–103. Fulltext at https://cepa.info/2315
In this paper we criticize the “Ashbyan interpretation” (Froese & Stewart, 2010) of autopoietic theory by showing that Ashby’s framework and the autopoietic one are based on distinct, often incompatible, assumptions and that they aim at addressing different issues. We also suggest that in order to better understand autopoiesis and its implications, a different and wider set of theoretical contributions, developed previously or at the time autopoiesis was formulated, needs to be taken into consideration: among the others, the works of Rosen, Weiss and Piaget. By analyzing the concepts of organization and closure, the idea of components, and the role of materiality in the theory proposed by Maturana and Varela, we advocate the view that autopoiesis necessarily entails selfproduction and intrinsic instability and can be realized only in domains characterized by the same transformative and processual properties exhibited by the molecular domain. From this theoretical standpoint it can be demonstrated that autopoietic theory neither commits to a sharp dualism between organization and structure nor to a reflexive view of downward causation, thus avoiding the respective strong criticisms.
Bich L. & Damiano L. (2007) Question 9: Theoretical and artificial construction of the living: Redefining the approach from an autopoietic point of view. Origins of Life and Evolution of Biospheres 37(4–5): 459–464. Fulltext at https://cepa.info/4560
In this article, we would like to discuss some aspects of a theoretical framework for Artificial Life, focusing on the problem of an explicit definition of living systems useful for an effective artificial construction of them. The limits of a descriptive approach will be critically discussed, and a constructive (synthetic) approach will be proposed on the basis of the autopoietic theory of Maturana and Varela.
Bich L. & Damiano L. (2008) Order in the nothing: Autopoiesis and the Organizational Characterization of the Living. Electronic Journal of Theoretical Physics 4(1): 343–373. Fulltext at https://cepa.info/2318
An approach which has the purpose to catch what characterizes the specificity of a living system, pointing out what makes it different with respect to physical and artificial systems, needs to find a new point of view – new descriptive modalities. In particular it needs to be able to describe not only the single processes which can be observed in an organism, but what integrates them in a unitary system. In order to do so, it is necessary to consider a higher level of description which takes into consideration the relations between these processes, that is the organization rather than the structure of the system. Once on this level of analysis we can focus on an abstract relational order that does not belong to the individual components and does not show itself as a pattern, but is realized and maintained in the continuous flux of processes of transformation of the constituents. Using Tibor Ganti’s words we call it “Order in the Nothing”. In order to explain this approach we analyse the historical path that generated the distinction between organization and structure and produced its most mature theoretical expression in the autopoietic biology of Humberto Maturana and Francisco Varela. We then briefly analyse Robert Rosen’s (M, R)-Systems, a formal model conceptually built with the aim to catch the organization of living beings, and which can be considered coherent with the autopoietic theory. In conclusion we will propose some remarks on these relational descriptions, pointing out their limits and their possible developments with respect to the structural thermodynamical description.
Bich L. & Damiano L. (2012) Life, Autonomy and Cognition: An Organizational Approach to the Definition of the Universal Properties of Life. Origins of Life and Evolution of Biospheres 42(5): 389–397. Fulltext at https://cepa.info/2316
This article addresses the issue of defining the universal properties of living systems through an organizational approach, according to which the distinctive properties of life lie in the functional organization which correlates its physicochemical components in living systems, and not in these components taken separately. Drawing on arguments grounded in this approach, this article identifies autonomy, with a set of related organizational properties, as universal properties of life, and includes cognition within this set.
Bich L. & Etxeberria A. (2013) Systems, autopoietic. In: Dubitzky W., Wolkenhauer O., Yokota H. & Cho K. H. (eds.) Encyclopedia of systems biology. Springer, New York: 2110–2113. Fulltext at https://cepa.info/2314
Bitbol M. & Luisi P. L. (2004) Autopoiesis with or without cognition: Defining life at its edge. Journal of the Social Society Interface 1: 99–107. Fulltext at https://cepa.info/2262
This paper examines two questions related to autopoiesis as a theory for minimal life: (i) the relation between autopoiesis and cognition; and (ii) the question as to whether autopoiesis is the necessary and sufficient condition for life. First, we consider the concept of cognition in the spirit of Maturana and Varela: in contradistinction to the representationalistic point of view, cognition is construed as interaction between and mutual definition of a living unit and its environment. The most direct form of cognition for a cell is thus metabolism itself, which necessarily implies exchange with the environment and therefore a simultaneous coming to being for the organism and for the environment. A second level of cognition is recognized in the adaptation of the living unit to new foreign molecules, by way of a change in its metabolic pattern. We draw here an analogy with the ideas developed by Piaget, who recognizes in cognition the two distinct steps of assimilation and accommodation. While assimilation is the equivalent of uptake and exchange of usual metabolites, accommodation corresponds to biological adaptation, which in turn is the basis for evolution. By comparing a micro-organism with a vesicle that uptakes a precursor for its own self-reproduction, we arrive at the conclusion that (a) the very lowest level of cognition is the condition for life, and (b) the lowest level of cognition does not reduce to the lowest level of autopoiesis. As a consequence, autopoiesis alone is only a necessary, but not sufficient, condition for life. The broader consequences of this analysis of cognition for minimal living systems are considered.
Boden M. A. (2009) Life and mind. Minds and Machines 19: 453–463. Fulltext at https://cepa.info/4548
It’s sometimes said, and even more often assumed, that life is necessary for mind. If so, and if A-Life promises to throw light on the nature of life as such, then A-Life is in principle highly relevant to the philosophy of mind and cognitive science. However, very few philosophers have attempted to argue for the relation between life and mind. It’s usually taken for granted. Even those (mostly in the Continental tradition, including some with a following in A-Life) who have insisted on the linkage have stated it rather than justified it. If an evolutionary account of intentionality is acceptable, then perhaps biological life ‘makes room’ for mind. But that claim is problematic, since it’s not clear that the type of self-organization involved in life-as-such must necessarily include evolution. Even if it does, it’s a further step to show that life is strictly necessary for mind.
This article revisits the concept of autopoiesis and examines its relation to cognition and life. We present a mathematical model of a 3D tesselation automaton, considered as a minimal example of autopoiesis. This leads us to a thesis T1: “An autopoietic system can be described as a random dynamical system, which is defined only within its organized autopoietic domain.” We propose a modified definition of autopoiesis: “An autopoietic system is a network of processes that produces the components that reproduce the network, and that also regulates the boundary conditions necessary for its ongoing existence as a network.” We also propose a definition of cognition: “A system is cognitive if and only if sensory inputs serve to trigger actions in a specific way, so as to satisfy a viability constraint.” It follows from these definitions that the concepts of autopoiesis and cognition, although deeply related in their connection with the regulation of the boundary conditions of the system, are not immediately identical: a system can be autopoietic without being cognitive, and cognitive without being autopoietic. Finally, we propose a thesis T2: “A system that is both autopoietic and cognitive is a living system.”