In his seminal monograph on teleology and mechanics in nineteenth German biology Timothy Lenoir considers his study of the “Kantian” teleomechanistic tradition as an answer to those who wrongly believe that early nineteenth-century German biology was dominated by Schelling’s Naturphilosophie. My goal is to argue that this is an arbitrary assumption based on a historiographical bias and that Sch...

These studies explore the scope of young children’s teleological tendency to view entities as ‘designed for purposes’. One view (‘Selective Teleology’) argues that teleology is an innate, basic mode of thinking that, throughout development, is selectively applied by children and adults to artifacts and biological properties. An alternative proposal (‘Promiscuous Teleology’) argues that teleolog...

Prospection (Gilbert & Wilson, 2007), the representation of possible futures, is a ubiquitous feature of the human mind. Much psychological theory and practice, in contrast, has understood human action as determined by the past and viewed any such teleology (selection of action in light of goals) as a violation of natural law because the future cannot act on the present. Prospection involves no...

Although many believe that modern evolutionary biology renders teleology superfluous, this article explores the recent resurgence of attempts to locate teleology, functions, and purpose in nature organisms. This essay further relevance within Catholic, Protestant, Eastern Orthodox traditions, ways which some theological doctrines have been construed against a teleological conception both humani...

All new developments in biology deal with the issue of the complexity of organisms, often pointing out the necessity to update our current understanding. However, it is impossible to think about a change of paradigm in biology without introducing new explanatory mechanisms. I shall introduce the mechanisms of teleonomy and teleology as viable explanatory tools. Teleonomy is the ability of organ...