Machine and Organism

Canguilhem inverts the normal scientific question–what is the mechanism underlying this organic process?–and asks how machines are organic. He traces the history of the relationships between organism and machine from the ancient Greek political sense, in which a slave was an animated machine, through the Enlightenment, which took up the concept of machine as a scientific model only after machines began to resemble organisms, i.e. automata moving themselves from internally stored energy. He argues that for a universe to be mechanical is not for it to be purposeless but for it precisely to be dominated by a purpose, while by contrast natural beings are multi-purposive and multi-directional.

Canguilhem, Georges

In Canguilhem. La connaissance de la vie. Paris: Hachette, 1952. 124-159.

Sentesy, Mark

French

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