Howard Pattee's Theoretical Biology

a Radical Epistemological Stance to Approach Life, Evolution and Complexity


Jon Umerez
University of the Basque Country
Philosophy
P.O. Box 1249
20080 Donostia, Spain

Umerez, J. [2001]. "Howard Pattee's theoretical biology: a radical epistemological stance to approach life, evolution and complexity".Biosystems. Vol 60, pp. 159-177.

This paper is available here in Adobe Acrobat (.pdf) format. It is also available from Elsevier's web site.

Abstract: This paper offers a short review of Pattee's main contributions to science and philosophy. With no intention of being exhaustive, an account of Pattee's work is presented which discusses some of his ideas and their reception. This is done through an analysis centered in what is thought to be his main contribution: the elaboration of an internal epistemic stance to better understand life, evolution and complexity. Having introduced this core idea as a sort of a posteriori cohesive element of a complex but highly coherent and complete system of thinking, further specific elements are also reviewed.

Keywords: Epistemological stance, epistemic cut, semantic closure, code, symbol.