Download or read book Organism and the Origins of Self written by A.I. Tauber and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2012-12-06 with total page 506 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "De la vaporisation et de la centralisation du Moi. Tout est la. " Charles Baudelaire (journal entry) This anthology is my visit to Oz. On sabbatical in 1988, I chose to reeducate myself in general biology, first broadening my erudition as an immunologist, and then extending that horizon into evolutionary biology and embryology. I was particularly attracted to reflections on the nature of the self as an organ ismic concept. I went in search of reorientation as a confused physician scientist, and came back with this book. Baum's Wizard of Oz presented opportunities for growth, and herein lies the purpose of this volume: in providing updated statements concerning the nature of the organism from both scientific and metaphysical perspectives, we might ponder the philo sophical basis of our research in the hope of gaining insight into our endeavor, not to mention the possibility of its enrichment; it is this contem plative view of our research which offers a unique dimension to this anthology. To that end, the project follows my idiosyncratic prejudices. The anthology derives in large measure from the symposium, "Organism and the Origin of Self' held at Boston University, April 3-4, 1990, under the auspices of the Boston University Center for the Philosophy and History of Science, with generous support of Robert Cohen and Jon Westling, and the organizational skills of Deborah Wilkes. The Symposium presented three ver sions of the Self from the vantages of embryology, evolution and medicine.
Download or read book Organism and the Origins of Self written by A. I. Tauber and published by . This book was released on 1991-10-31 with total page 408 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The Origins of Self written by Martin P. J. Edwardes and published by UCL Press. This book was released on 2019-07-22 with total page 250 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Origins of Self explores the role that selfhood plays in defining human society, and each human individual in that society. It considers the genetic and cultural origins of self, the role that self plays in socialisation and language, and the types of self we generate in our individual journeys to and through adulthood. Edwardes argues that other awareness is a relatively early evolutionary development, present throughout the primate clade and perhaps beyond, but self-awareness is a product of the sharing of social models, something only humans appear to do. The self of which we are aware is not something innate within us, it is a model of our self produced as a response to the models of us offered to us by other people. Edwardes proposes that human construction of selfhood involves seven different types of self. All but one of them are internally generated models, and the only non-model, the actual self, is completely hidden from conscious awareness. We rely on others to tell us about our self, and even to let us know we are a self.
Download or read book The Origins of Self written by Stephen J Brewer and published by Stephen J Brewer. This book was released on 2014-03-05 with total page 164 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “I will show you fear in a handful of dust” (T. S. Eliot: The Wasteland) How can dust and water become a conscious living person capable of fear? The way these elements are transformed into life is sketched out, but it's our conscious minds, our intensity of being in a flood of emotions; this is the big problem that science has so far failed to explain. Freya, a biologist, is dissatisfied with the way evolution has no explanation for her own self. Instead, science treats people as robots with any self-awareness considered an illusion. In this way, it destroys our humanity. Max explains that given the chemical basis of life, this is the only possible conclusion. On the brink of accepting this unpalatable fact, she meets with Orin. Together they explore the unthinkable, that the basis of consciousness and self is present in the underlying operations of the universe. These skillfully constructed dialogues explain how the process philosophy of Alfred North Whitehead and panpsychism (primordial universal consciousness) can explain the evolution of not only bodies but also of life, self and consciousness.
Download or read book Minimal Selfhood and the Origins of Consciousness written by Rupert Glasgow and published by BoD – Books on Demand. This book was released on 2018-07-10 with total page 262 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Minimal Selfhood and the Origins of Consciousness, R.D.V. Glasgow seeks to ground the logical roots of consciousness in what he has previously called the 'minimal self'. The idea is that elementary forms of consciousness are logically dependent not, as is commonly assumed, on ownership of an anatomical brain or nervous system, but on the intrinsic reflexivity that defines minimal selfhood. The aim of the book is to trace the logical pathway by which minimal selfhood gives rise to the possible appearance of consciousness. It is argued that in specific circumstances it thus makes sense to ascribe elementary consciousness to certain predatory single-celled organisms such as amoebae and dinoflagellates as well as to some of the simpler animals. Such an argument involves establishing exactly what those specific circumstances are and determining how elementary consciousness differs in nature and scope from its more complex manifestations.
Download or read book The Limits of the Self written by Thomas Pradeu and published by OUP USA. This book was released on 2012-02-27 with total page 313 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Immunology asserts that an individual can be defined through self and nonself. Thomas Pradeu argues that this theory is inadequate, because immune responses to self constituents and immune tolerance of foreign entities are the rule, not the exception.
Download or read book The Selfish Gene written by Richard Dawkins and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 1989 with total page 372 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Science need not be dull and bogged down by jargon, as Richard Dawkins proves in this entertaining look at evolution. The themes he takes up are the concepts of altruistic and selfish behaviour; the genetical definition of selfish interest; the evolution of aggressive behaviour; kinshiptheory; sex ratio theory; reciprocal altruism; deceit; and the natural selection of sex differences. 'Should be read, can be read by almost anyone. It describes with great skill a new face of the theory of evolution.' W.D. Hamilton, Science
Download or read book The Origin of Individuals written by Jean-Jacques Kupiec and published by World Scientific. This book was released on 2009 with total page 274 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the 17th century, Descartes put forth the metaphor of the machine to explain the functioning of living beings. In the 18th century, La Mettrie extended the metaphor to man. The clock was then used as the paradigm of the machine. In the 20th century, this metaphor still held but the clock was replaced by a computer. Nowadays, the organism is viewed as a robot obeying signals emanating from a computer program controlled by genetic information. This book shows that such a conception leads to contradictions not only in the theory of biology but also in its experimental research program, thereby impeding its development. The analysis of this problem is based on the most recent experimental data obtained in molecular biology as well as the history and philosophy of biology. It shows that the machine theory did not succeed in breaking with Aristotle's finalism. The book presents a new approach to biological systems based on cellular Darwinism. Genes are ruled by probabilistic mechanisms allowing cells to differentiate stochastically. Embryo development is not governed by a determinist genetic program but by natural selection occurring among cell populations inside the organism. This theory has considerable philosophical consequences. Man may be a machine but he is a random one.
Download or read book Darwin s Doubt written by Stephen C. Meyer and published by Harper Collins. This book was released on 2013-06-18 with total page 560 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: When Charles Darwin finished The Origin of Species, he thought that he had explained every clue, but one. Though his theory could explain many facts, Darwin knew that there was a significant event in the history of life that his theory did not explain. During this event, the “Cambrian explosion,” many animals suddenly appeared in the fossil record without apparent ancestors in earlier layers of rock. In Darwin’s Doubt, Stephen C. Meyer tells the story of the mystery surrounding this explosion of animal life—a mystery that has intensified, not only because the expected ancestors of these animals have not been found, but because scientists have learned more about what it takes to construct an animal. During the last half century, biologists have come to appreciate the central importance of biological information—stored in DNA and elsewhere in cells—to building animal forms. Expanding on the compelling case he presented in his last book, Signature in the Cell, Meyer argues that the origin of this information, as well as other mysterious features of the Cambrian event, are best explained by intelligent design, rather than purely undirected evolutionary processes.
Download or read book The Vital Question written by Nick Lane and published by . This book was released on 2016 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A game-changing book on the origins of life, called the most important scientific discovery 'since the Copernican revolution' in The Observer.
Download or read book The Origins of Life written by John Maynard Smith and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 2000 with total page 191 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Presents, for the general readership, the novel picture of evolution proposed in the 1995 book, The major transitions in evolution.
Download or read book Francisco J Varela 1946 2001 written by Jeanette Bopry and published by Imprint Academic. This book was released on 2004 with total page 102 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A volume dedicated to the life and work of Francisco Varela, this is an issue of the journal "Cybernetics and Human Knowing".
Download or read book From Cells to Organisms written by Sherrie L. Lyons and published by University of Toronto Press. This book was released on 2020 with total page 291 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book uses the history of cell theory to explore the emergence of biology as a distinct field in its own right--separate from anatomy, physiology, and natural history. It also explores nineteenth- and twentieth-century ideas about heredity and development and the progress that was made at the turn of the century when they began to be studied on their own--leading to new understandings of a variety of biological problems, from evolution to cancer. Investigating this story will help readers gain an appreciation of the historical development of scientific ideas. It beautifully illustrates that the process of science is not as straightforward as it is usually portrayed. One of the important lessons of this intriguing story is that "facts" do not necessarily speak for themselves, and observations always need to be interpreted.
Download or read book Organism written by and published by PediaPress. This book was released on with total page 93 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The Origins of Order written by Stuart A. Kauffman and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 1993-06-10 with total page 734 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Stuart Kauffman here presents a brilliant new paradigm for evolutionary biology, one that extends the basic concepts of Darwinian evolution to accommodate recent findings and perspectives from the fields of biology, physics, chemistry and mathematics. The book drives to the heart of the exciting debate on the origins of life and maintenance of order in complex biological systems. It focuses on the concept of self-organization: the spontaneous emergence of order that is widely observed throughout nature Kauffman argues that self-organization plays an important role in the Darwinian process of natural selection. Yet until now no systematic effort has been made to incorporate the concept of self-organization into evolutionary theory. The construction requirements which permit complex systems to adapt are poorly understood, as is the extent to which selection itself can yield systems able to adapt more successfully. This book explores these themes. It shows how complex systems, contrary to expectations, can spontaneously exhibit stunning degrees of order, and how this order, in turn, is essential for understanding the emergence and development of life on Earth. Topics include the new biotechnology of applied molecular evolution, with its important implications for developing new drugs and vaccines; the balance between order and chaos observed in many naturally occurring systems; new insights concerning the predictive power of statistical mechanics in biology; and other major issues. Indeed, the approaches investigated here may prove to be the new center around which biological science itself will evolve. The work is written for all those interested in the cutting edge of research in the life sciences.
Download or read book The Search for Life s Origins written by National Research Council and published by National Academies Press. This book was released on 1990-02-01 with total page 161 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The field of planetary biology and chemical evolution draws together experts in astronomy, paleobiology, biochemistry, and space science who work together to understand the evolution of living systems. This field has made exciting discoveries that shed light on how organic compounds came together to form self-replicating molecules-the origin of life. This volume updates that progress and offers recommendations on research programs-including an ambitious effort centered on Mars-to advance the field over the next 10 to 15 years. The book presents a wide range of data and research results on these and other issues: The biogenic elements and their interaction in the interstellar clouds and in solar nebulae. Early planetary environments and the conditions that lead to the origin of life. The evolution of cellular and multicellular life. The search for life outside the solar system. This volume will become required reading for anyone involved in the search for life's beginnings-including exobiologists, geoscientists, planetary scientists, and U.S. space and science policymakers.
Download or read book The Deep History of Ourselves written by Joseph LeDoux and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2020-08-25 with total page 434 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Longlisted for the PEN/E.O. Wilson Literary Science Writing Award A leading neuroscientist offers a history of the evolution of the brain from unicellular organisms to the complexity of animals and human beings today Renowned neuroscientist Joseph LeDoux digs into the natural history of life on earth to provide a new perspective on the similarities between us and our ancestors in deep time. This page-turning survey of the whole of terrestrial evolution sheds new light on how nervous systems evolved in animals, how the brain developed, and what it means to be human. In The Deep History of Ourselves, LeDoux argues that the key to understanding human behavior lies in viewing evolution through the prism of the first living organisms. By tracking the chain of the evolutionary timeline he shows how even the earliest single-cell organisms had to solve the same problems we and our cells have to solve each day. Along the way, LeDoux explores our place in nature, how the evolution of nervous systems enhanced the ability of organisms to survive and thrive, and how the emergence of what we humans understand as consciousness made our greatest and most horrendous achievements as a species possible.
