Article ID: CBB000831765

Form---A Matter of Generation: The Relation of Generation, Form, and Function in the Epigenetic Theory of Caspar F. Wolff (2008)

unapi

Witt, Elke (Author)


Science in Context
Volume: 21
Pages: 649--664


Publication Date: 2008
Edition Details: Part of a special issue on “Medical Vitalism in the Enlightenment”
Language: English

The question, how organisms obtain their specific complex and functional forms, was widely discussed during the eighteenth century. The theory of preformation, which was the dominant theory of generation, was challenged by different alternative epigenetic theories. By the end of the century it was the vitalist approach most famously advocated by Johann Friedrich Blumenbach that prevailed. Yet the alternative theory of generation brought forward by Caspar Friedrich Wolff was an important contribution to the treatment of this question. He turned his attention from the properties of matter and the forces acting on it towards the level of the processes of generation in order to explain the constitution of organismic forms. By regarding organic structures and forms to be the result of the lawfulness of ongoing processes, he opened up the possibility of a functional but non-teleological explanation of generation, and thereby provided an important complement to materialist and vitalist approaches.

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Article Wolfe, Charles T. (2008) Introduction: Vitalism without Metaphysics? Medical Vitalism in the Enlightenment. Science in Context (p. 461). unapi

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Authors & Contributors
Wolfe, Charles T.
Zammito, John H.
Donohue, Christopher R.
Demarest, Boris
Wilson, Catherine
Williams, Elizabeth A.
Concepts
Vitalism
Biology
Materialism
Epigenesis
Mechanism; mechanical philosophy
Life sciences
Time Periods
18th century
19th century
Modern
Enlightenment
20th century, early
17th century
Places
France
Iceland
Institutions
Université de Montpellier
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