Organism

Abstract

Since antiquity, living beings have been defined as organic bodies able to perform certain complex activities, including nourishment, growth, and reproduction. These activities, or basic organic functions, were attributed to the soul and its parts. According to ancient physiological theory, the soul is linked to the organization of the body, but is not a direct cause or result of it. Renaissance authors adopted this view of the soul as the principle of life. In various instances they emphasized the interaction and interdependence of the organic parts as the precondition for the performance of typical activities. Such an explanation was often achieved by comparing the body of a living being with the cosmic order, complex artifacts, man-made constructions, or the interaction between individuals in social groups. By stressing the interdependence of parts as well as the resulting functional closure as the scientific foundation of understanding and explaining organic systems, Renaissance conceptual models have paved the way for a materialistic and at the same time holistic understanding of living beings as organisms, which was then consolidated during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.