In Gaudium et Spes and Dignitatis Humanae the Second Vatican Council not only presents the dignity of the human person as the parting point for its moral teaching but also grounds human dignity in natural teleology. Natural teleology is the view that the good of any thing corresponds to, and so can be discerned from, the ends to which it is directed by its nature, both that end which is proper to it and those ends that (...) it has as part of a wider order. As official Church teachings, these documents refrain from providing a philosophical justification of their account of human dignity. The existence of natural teleology, however, is generally contested in modern philosophy. For this reason, grounding human dignity in natural teleology constitutes a questionable approach to the issue. Of all major Catholic theologians, Thomas Aquinas is arguably the one who provides the most developed philosophical resources for articulating these views on natural teleology and its connection with human dignity. This paper examines and assesses the way in which he grounds human dignity in natural teleology. In his view, we see that human beings are the principle part of the universe and that the other parts of the universe are ordered towards the good of human beings. After surveying his general justification of how a thing is ordered to particular ends in virtue of its nature, the paper considers his explanation of how each part of the universe assumes further ends within the universe as a whole, and his main set of arguments on how we perceive human dignity against the backdrop of the natural teleology of the universe. (shrink)

This paper is the introduction to Function, Selection, and Design, consisting of the following sections: 1. Introduction 2. The Philosophical Problem 3. Recent Prehistory: The "State of the Art" in the 1960s 4. Wright and Cummins 5. Millikan 6. The Core Consensus and the Peripheral Disagreements 7. Unconclusion.

Historians have claimed that the two closely related concepts of animism and natural teleology were both decisively rejected in the Scientific Revolution. They tout Robert Boyle as an early modern warden against pre-modern animism. Discussing Avicenna, Aquinas, and Buridan, as well as Renaissance psychology, I instead suggest that teleology went through a slow and uneven process of rationalization. As Neoplatonic theology gained influence over Aristotelian natural philosophy, the meaning of animism likewise grew obscure. Boyle, as some (...) historians have shown, exemplifies this uneven process. There is an unresolved tension between his religious convictions and the implicit animism of his empirical practice. (shrink)

The rise of mechanistic science in the seventeenth century helped give rise to a heated debate about whether teleology—the appearance of purposive activity in life and in mind—could be naturalized. At issue here were both what is meant by “teleology” as well as what is meant “nature”. I shall examine a specific episode in the history of this debate in the twentieth century with the rise of cybernetics: the science of seemingly “self-controlled” systems. Against cybernetics, Hans Jonas argued (...) that cybernetics failed as a naturalistic theory of teleology and that the reality of teleology is grounded in phenomenology, not in scientific explanations. I shall argue that Jonas was correct to criticize cybernetics but that contemporary work in biological organization succeeds where cybernetics failed. I will then turn to contemporary uses of Jonas’s phenomenology in enactivism and argue that Jonas’s phenomenology should be avoided by enactivism as a scientific research program, but that it remains open whether enactivism as a philosophy of nature should also avoid Jonas. (shrink)

This essay examines one of the cornerstones of Leibniz's defense of teleology within the order of nature. The first section explores Leibniz's contributions to the study of geometrical optics, and argues that his "Most Determined Path Principle" or "MDPP" allows him to bring to the fore philosophical issues concerning the legitimacy of teleological explanations by addressing two technical objections raised by Cartesians to non-mechanistic derivations of the laws of optics. The second section argues that, by drawing on laws such (...) as the MDPP, Leibniz is able to introduce a thin notion of teleology that gives him the resources to respond to the most pressing charges of his day against teleological explanations within natural philosophy. Finally, the third section argues that contemporary philosophers have been overly hasty in their dismissal of Leibniz's account of natural teleology, and indeed that their own generally thin conceptions of teleology have left them with few well-motivated resources for resisting his elegant position. (shrink)

Contemporary Western moral philosophy in harmony with classical Chinese philosophy, especially Buddhism.

It is often believed that the only alternative to an idealist conception of natural phenomena excludes both the presence of objective universal forms and their progression towards higher forms as the finality of processes in the natural world. Realism regarding the universal and teleological approaches regarding processes are signs of idealism. Therefore, materialism, it would seem, must conform to a nominalist and mechanical view of nature. However, an intelligent materialist reading of idealism’s classics reveals a more complex scenario. (...) A real fact is expressed in a mystical fashion in idealism’s conceptions of objective universals and teleology. This article attempts to show such a real fact in its authentic (materialist) form. With that goal in mind, the present article discusses the notion of nature’s alienation, the distinction between abstract and concrete universals, and the concept of dialectical interaction. The natural-historical emergence of a higher form of matter’s organization assimilates, as its organs, the conditions that preceded it in time, transforming itself into an active producer of such conditions. That is the secret glimpsed but not correctly understood by idealism that a consistent materialist should not ignore. (shrink)

En la Teoría de la Selección Natural, el concepto de función biológica debe suponerse para delimitar el concepto de aptitud; y éste debe suponerse para delimitar el concepto de adaptación y también para explicar el fenómeno al que este último alude. Esos tres conceptos, por otra parte, son especificaciones de tres conceptos de aplicación más universal. El concepto de función biológica es un caso particular del concepto general de función; y el concepto de aptitud especifica el concepto de eficiencia. (...) El concepto de adaptación, mientras tanto, es una especificación del concepto de diseño. La visualización de esas articulaciones conceptuales permite entender la legitimidad de la naturalización de la teleología operada por el darwinismo.In Natural Selection Theory, the concept of biological function must be supposed to elucidate the concept of fitness; and this one must be supposed to elucidate the concept of adaptation and also to explain the phenomenon to which the last one alludes. These three concepts, on the other hand, are specificationsof three concepts of more universal application. The concept of biological function is a particular case of the general concept of function; and the concept of fitness is a specification of the concept of efficiency. The concept of adaptation, meanwhile, specifies the concept of design. The visualization of these conceptualjoints allows to understanding the legitimacy of the naturalization of the teleology produced by the Darwinism. (shrink)

En la Teoría de la Selección Natural, el concepto de función biológica debe suponerse para delimitar el concepto de aptitud; y éste debe suponerse para delimitar el concepto de adaptación y también para explicar el fenómeno al que este último alude. Esos tres conceptos, por otra parte, son especificaciones de tres conceptos de aplicación más universal. El concepto de función biológica es un caso particular del concepto general de función; y el concepto de aptitud especifica el concepto de eficiencia. (...) El concepto de adaptación, mientras tanto, es una especificación del concepto de diseño. La visualización de esas articulaciones conceptuales permite entender la legitimidad de la naturalización de la teleología operada por el darwinismo.In Natural Selection Theory, the concept of biological function must be supposed to elucidate the concept of fitness; and this one must be supposed to elucidate the concept of adaptation and also to explain the phenomenon to which the last one alludes. These three concepts, on the other hand, are specificationsof three concepts of more universal application. The concept of biological function is a particular case of the general concept of function; and the concept of fitness is a specification of the concept of efficiency. The concept of adaptation, meanwhile, specifies the concept of design. The visualization of these conceptualjoints allows to understanding the legitimacy of the naturalization of the teleology produced by the Darwinism. (shrink)

In recent years the account of natural law that has come to be known as the “new natural law theory” has come under criticism. Rebekah Johnston has engaged quite seriously with the NNL account of marriage and sexuality and has deemed it insufficient and internally inconsistent, going so far as to argue for the legitimacy of homosexual “marriage” based on the NNL’s own system. The author argues in this essay that the NNL does not fully realize the implications (...) of its position in this regard, and that Rebekah Johnston’s critique fails similarly in providing an account of marriage and sexuality. To remedy these errors, the role of normative, natural teleology must be investigated thoroughly. (shrink)

Name der Zeitschrift: Kant-Studien Jahrgang: 107 Heft: 2 Seiten: 314-342.

The Heythrop Journal, Volume 63, Issue 3, Page 401-413, May 2022.

Recent accounts of teleological naturalism hold that organisms are intrinsically goaldirected entities. We argue that supporters and critics of this view have ignored the ways in which it is used to address quite different problems. One problem is about biology and concerns whether an organism-centered account of teleological ascriptions would improve our descriptions and explanations of biological phenomena. This is different from the philosophical problem of how naturalized teleology would affect our conception of nature, and of ourselves as (...) class='Hi'>natural beings. The neglect of this metatheoretic distinction has made it difficult to understand the criteria we should use for evaluating proposals to naturalize teleology. We argue that a clearer distinction between scientific and philosophical contexts shows that we need more than one set of criteria for evaluating proposals to naturalize teleology, and that taking these into account might advance or dissolve recurring debates in the literature. (shrink)

A teleological explanation is an explanation in terms of an end or a purpose. So saying that ‘X came about for the sake of Y’ is a teleological account of X. It is a striking feature of ancient Greek philosophy that many thinkers accepted that the world should be explained in this way. However, before Aristotle, teleological explanations of the cosmos were generally based on the idea that it had been created by a divine intelligence. If an intelligent power made (...) the world, then it makes sense that it did so with a purpose in mind, so grasping this purpose will help us understand the world. This is the pattern of teleological explanation that we find in the Presocratics and in Plato. However, with Aristotle teleology underwent a change: instead of thinking that the ends were explanatory because a mind had sought to bring them about, Aristotle took the ends to operate in natural beings independently of the efforts of any creative intelligence. Indeed, he thought that his predecessors had failed to understand what was distinctive of nature, namely, that its ends work from the inside of natural beings themselves. (shrink)

This article discusses Hans Jonas’ argument for teleology in living organisms, in light of recently raised concerns over enactivism’s “Jonasian turn.” Drawing on textual resources rarely discussed in contemporary enactivist literature on Jonas’ philosophy, we reconstruct five core ideas of his thinking: 1) That natural science’s rejection of teleology is methodological rather than ontological, and thus not a proof of its non-existence; 2) that denial of the reality of teleology amounts to a performative self-contradiction; 3) that (...) the fact of evolution makes it implausible that only humans actualize purpose; 4) that the concept of metabolism delimits and gestures towards beings performing purposive activity; and 5) that concrete encounters with living organisms are indispensable for the judgment that they are purposive. Lastly, we draw attention to how Jonas’ understanding of teleology and inwardness in nonhuman life in terms of degrees of identity with human life poses a problem for his view. In this way, we hope to clarify what Jonas, as an important source of inspiration for the enactivist project, is proposing. (shrink)

According to a straightforward reading of Enn. 6.2.21, all principles (logoi) in nature have their origin in corresponding features of a divine Intellect. But interpreters have often advocated more restricted readings of Intellect’s contents. Restricted readings are based in part on other textual evidence, and in part on the grounds that a more expansive reading would seem to require Intellect to think objects of trivial value (‘the value problem’) or whose purposes depend upon facts about sensible reality to which it (...) has no access (‘the teleology problem’). This paper argues that restricted readings are not well founded, and that Plotinus is committed to a more expansive conception of Intellect’s contents by his understanding of Plato’s paradeigmatism. (shrink)

There’s a general assumption that teleology and function do not exist in inanimate nature. Throughout biology, it is generally taken as granted that teleology (or teleonomy) and functions are not only unique to life, but perhaps even a defining quality of life. For many, it’s obvious that rocks, water, and the like, are not teleological, nor could they possibly have stand-alone functions. This idea - that teleology and function are unique to life - is the target of (...) this paper. I begin with an overview of McShea’s field theoretic account of teleology. I start with the field theoretic account because it presents a promising analysis of teleological systems. It is promising because, in not making any assumptions about life’s special status in teleological systems, it avoids counterexamples that have problematized other accounts. I then consider some of the prominent efforts that have been made to attempt to avoid ascribing functions or teleology to some form of inanimate nature. In my assessment, none of the efforts are successful. I conclude by offering mineral evolution as a case study to show how inanimate nature can be both teleological and functional. The evolution of mineral species reveals that teleology and function extend to inanimate nature, and that teleology and function come in degrees. (shrink)

This work is an examination of teleological attributions i.e. ascriptions of proper functions and natural ends) to the features and behavior of living things with a view to understanding their application to human life.

This work is an examination of teleological attributions i.e. ascriptions of proper functions and natural ends) to the features and behavior of living things with a view to understanding their application to human life.

According to most interpreters, Aristotle explains death as the result of material processes of the body going against the nature of the living being. Yet, this description is incomplete, for it does not clarify the relationship between the process of decay and the teleological system in which it occurs: this makes it impossible to distinguish between natural and violent death. In this paper, I try to fill this gap by looking at his so-called ‘biological works’ and mainly at the (...) De Juventute. I first introduce the specific concept of life at play in this treatise and prove its complementarity with the framework of the De Anima. Then, I illustrate in detail the process of dying and the reasons why a merely material description is insufficient to account for the distinction between natural and violent death. Finally, I show that for Aristotle natural death is a by-product of teleologically directed life activities: only against the background of this teleological structure is natural death fully explained in terms of essence and causes. To support this claim, I compare death to two analogous cases in Aristotle’s biology, namely dreams and the features of GA V. (shrink)

In this paper, I consider Descartes’ Sixth Meditation dropsy passage on the difference between the human body considered in itself and the human composite of mind and body. I do so as a way of illuminating some features of Descartes’ broader thinking about teleology, including the role of teleological explanations in physiology. I use the writings on teleology of some ancient authors for the conceptual (but not historical) help they can provide in helping us to think about the (...) Sixth Meditation passage. From this, I draw several points, most notably that the Sixth Meditation passage is primarily concerned with the natures of body and composites, and that the issue of teleological explanation is derivative of this primary interest. So, we – and Descartes – must come to terms with what he takes the nature of the composite to be such that it has an intrinsic end-referred nature which grounds teleological explanations. I consider three possibilities: the human composite is a third type of substance – a hylomorphic substance; there is a sort of “satisfaction” relationship between mind and body (each of which retains its own distinct nature in the composite) such that the mind confers teleological value on the body; and there is a sort of “satisfaction” relationship between mind and body (each of which retains its own distinct nature in the composite) such that the mind recognizes teleological value in the body. None of these interpretations is without problems. So in the concluding section, I sketch a program for future research, specifically, trying to render Descartes’ teleological thinking consistent by distinguishing between the metaphysical natures of things (the concern of his Sixth Meditation passage) and the physical natures of things (his concern in his physiological writings). (shrink)

Aristotelian natures – internal principles of motion and rest – provide a rich account of the goal-directed behaviour of natural entities. What such natures cannot account for, on their own, are cases of teleology across natures, where an entity, due to its nature, furthers the goals of another entity. Nevertheless, Aristotle admits such teleological configurations among natures: most notably Politics I.8 1256b15-20 claims that plants are for the sake of animals and animals are for the sake of humans. (...) The paper first scrutinizes two recent attempts– by Mohan Matthen and David Sedley – at an explanation of such teleology across natures. The fundamental move these proposals make is that they claim that the universe has a nature of its own. Accordingly, teleology across natures could be explained as the operation of this single cosmic nature. But the introduction of a cosmic nature contravenes fundamental strictures of Aristotelian natural philosophy. Hence the third section of the paper formulates an alternative proposal, that the teleological interaction across different natures is underpinned by the self-benefittingactivityofindividualnaturalentities,whichareable to use the natural processes of their environment to their own advantage. (shrink)

In Aristotle's teleological view of the world, natural things come to be and are present for the sake of some function or end. Whereas much of recent scholarship has focused on uncovering the physical underpinnings of Aristotle's teleology and its contrasts with his notions of chance and necessity, this book examines Aristotle's use of the theory of natural teleology in producing explanations of natural phenomena. Close analyses of Aristotle's natural treatises and his Posterior Analytics (...) show what methods are used for the discovery of functions or ends that figure in teleological explanations, how these explanations are structured, and how well they work in making sense of phenomena. The book will be valuable for all who are interested in Aristotle's natural science, his philosophy of science, and his biology. (shrink)

_Nature and Normativity _argues that the problem of the place of norms in nature has been essentially misunderstood when it has been articulated in terms of the relation of human language and thought, on the one hand, and the world described by physics on the other. Rather, if we concentrate on the facts that speaking and thinking are activities of organic agents, then the problem of the place of the normative in nature becomes refocused on three related questions. First, is (...) there a sense in which biological processes and the behavior of organisms can be legitimately subject to normative evaluation? Second, is there some sense in which, in addition to having ordinary causal explanations, organic phenomena can also legitimately be seen to happen _because_ they _should_ happen in that way, in some naturalistically comprehensible sense of ‘should’, or that organic phenomena happen _in order to_ achieve some result, because that result should occur? And third, is it possible to naturalistically understand how human thought and language can be legitimately seen as the normatively evaluable behavior of a particular species of organism, behavior that occurs in order to satisfy some class of norms? This book develops, articulates, and defends positive answers to each of these questions. (shrink)

Human intentional action, including the design and use of artifacts, involves the prior mental representation of the goal (end) and the means to achieve that goal. This representation is part of the efficient cause of the action, and thus can be used to explain both the action and the achievement of the end. This is intentional teleological explanation. More generally, teleological explanation that depends on the real existence of a representation of the goal (and the means to achieve it) can (...) be called representational teleological explanation. Such explanations in biology can involve both external representations (e.g., ideas in the mind of God) and internal representations (souls, vital powers, entelechies, developmental programs, etc.). However, another type of explanation of intentional action (or any other process) is possible. Given that an action achieving a result occurs, the action can be explained as fulfilling the necessary conditions (means) for that result (end), and, reciprocally, the result explained by the occurrence of those necessary conditions. This is conditional teleological explanation. For organisms, natural selection is often understood metaphorically as the designer, intentionally constructing them for certain ends. Unfortunately, this metaphor is often taken rather too literally, because it has been difficult to conceive of another way to relate natural selection to the process of evolution. I argue that combining a conditional teleological explanation of organisms and of evolution provides such an alternative. This conditional teleology can be grounded in existence or survival. Given that an organism exists, we can explain its existence by the occurrence of the necessary conditions for that existence. This principle of the 'conditions for existence' was introduced by Georges Cuvier in 1800, and provides a valid, conditional teleological method for explaining organismal structure and behavior. From an evolutionary perspective, the conditions for existence are the range of boundary conditions within which the evolutionary process must occur. Moreover, evolutionary change itself can be subjected to conditional teleological explanation, because natural selection theory is primarily a theory about the relation between the conditions for the existence of organisms and the conditions for the existence of traits in populations. I show that failure to distinguish representational from conditional teleological explanation has confused previous attempts to clarify the relation of teleology to biology. (shrink)

I. An approach to the question of teleology in nature for Aristotle requires first of all a sufficiently clear understanding of the terms involved. In regard to the notion of teleology itself, there can hardly be any pertinent difficulty. The term is a modern one, and is quite definitely fixed in meaning by contemporary use. It seems to have been coined in eighteenth-century philosophical Latin to denote the study of final causes in nature. It became readily accepted in (...) modern philosophical vocabulary. Against this historical background it is commonly understood today to focus on “purposive or goal-directed activity.” In application to nature it assumes that purposive activity is present and asks how the activity is to be identified and described. The initial problem, accordingly, will lie not with the notion of teleology but rather with the other term, ‘nature’. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Teleology in Natural Theology and Theology of Nature:Classical Theism, Science-Oriented Panentheism, and Process TheismMariusz Tabaczek, O.P.IntroductionThe world is full of teleological dimensions. When we search for them, we can easily see that virtually any of the main aspects of our world can be taken as a particular case of teleology. Although this holds especially for living beings, the physicochemical world also exhibits many directional features that (...) acquire a special meaning when seen as necessary conditions for the existence of living beings. Directionality indicates the existence of tendencies toward goals, which is the hallmark of natural teleology.... It is not difficult to find examples of directionality and cooperativity. If we begin with the most elementary components of the world, we find out that subatomic particles and the four basic interactions behave according to well-known specific patterns and collaborate to build up successive levels of organization—atoms, molecules, macromolecules, and the bigger inorganic and organic beings. The entire construction of our world is the result of the deployment of tendencies that collaborate to make up unitary systems.1If Mariano Artigas is right in his assertion—and many seem to agree that he is2—it seems reasonable to ask about the ways in which the notion of [End Page 1179] teleology may inspire theology, especially in the context of the ongoing dialogue between science and theology. We may think about at least two possible answers to this question, in reference to two related, yet distinctive strategies pursued in theological reflection, (1) the approach of natural theology and (2) the approach of theology of nature. What brings them together is their close attention to nature and our attempts to understand it. Avoiding theological and spiritual escapism and dismissive detachment from nature and natural phenomena, both natural theology and theology of nature point toward their ultimate grounding in God. While doing so, both approaches strive to remain free from the errors of panpsychism, vitalism, and pantheism, thus enabling nature to be natural, available to a thorough and meaningful analysis and description at the level of the research pursued by natural sciences and philosophy of nature and of science. What differentiates these theological approaches are their starting and ending points.Natural theology departs from the observation of natural phenomena. In a search for their ultimate explanation, in reference to philosophy of nature and metaphysics, it arrives at the theological conclusion that only the existence of God offers a satisfying and conclusive answer to the human search for understanding and meaning of the reality that surrounds us. Consequently, one may say that natural phenomena, or at least some of their most fundamental aspects such as teleology, can be used as a basis for arguing in favor of the existence of God.The advantage of such an approach—notes Ian Barbour—is that "it starts from scientific data on which we might expect agreement despite cultural and religious differences."3 However, taken alone, it may reduce the notion of God to the God of philosophers, the unmoved mover, [End Page 1180] or even a deistic Creator, remote and not engaged in his relation to the created reality. Moreover, although we know many examples of people who actually did go through a conversion and discovered the existence of God following the path of natural theology, one might ask whether at least some of the arguments developed within it do not presuppose God's existence as rhetorical exercises for the expression of religious faith, compromising thus its principal commitment.In contrast to natural theology, theology of nature begins with a firm belief in God, based on historical revelation—codified in the Scriptures and reflected upon within theological Tradition—and religious experience (personal and communal). It applies this perspective as an explanatory tool, providing a definitive answer to the questions of origin and ultimate fulfillment of natural phenomena observed in the universe. Hence, while it would be rather strange to claim that the existence of God proves the existence of the natural world—which is better known to us (quoad nos) than the principles of theology—we may still argue that, from the point of view of theology of nature, our knowledge... (shrink)