We are glad to give notice of the International Conference Cognizing Life, which will take place on July 16th-19th, at the Eberhard-Karls-Universität Tübingen (Tagungszentrum Westspitze, Eisenbahnstr. 1, 72072 Tübingen).
For further information please visit the website of the event.
Below you can find the description and the program of the event.
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Over the past 25 years, the recognition that genetics and Darwinism are not sufficient to fully explain organisms — since only living beings can contain genes and undergo evolution — has led to a renewed philosophical engagement with the question of life. The organism has drawn attention both as an ontological reality and as an epistemological category. This growing interest involves a reconsideration of the ideas of the German Romantics and Idealists — among them Kant, Goethe, Schelling, and Hegel — as well as of twentieth-century organicist thinkers. Whereas Kant and Schelling examined the epistemological preconditions for grasping the organic, Goethe developed a phenomenological method for understanding life. The Austrian philosopher Rudolf Steiner analyzed Goethe’s approach in depth and gave rise to a largely overlooked tradition of empirical research. The conference will explore the challenge of cognizing the organism from historical, ontological, metaphysical, epistemological, and Goethean perspectives.
Program
July 16, 2025
16:00 Opening
16:30-17:45 – Prof. Dr. Ulrich Schlösser: On Philosophy of Nature (Naturphilosophie)
17:45-19:00 – Prof. Dr. Denis Walsh: What is an Organism?
20:00-21:30 – Public Leture Prof. Dr. Joan Steigerwald: Tübingen’s Place in the Formation of Biology: Kielmeyer, Schelling, and German Contributions at the turn of the Nineteenth Century
July 17, 2025
09:00-10:15 – Prof. Dr. Philippe Huneman: The Unity of Kant’s Account of the Organism and its Dual Fate
10:45-12:00 – Dr. Andrea Gambarotto: Kant’s Controversial Legacy for Contemporary Biology
12:00-13:15 – Prof. Dr. Gertrudis Van de Vijver / Dr. Levi Haeck: Functional Accounts of Organisms: Divided Between Imaginary and Symbolic
14:45-16:00 – Dr. Bohang Chen: Aspects of Chronic Vitalism: A Historico-Critical Reflection
16:30-17:45 – Prof. Dr. Daniel Nicholson: The Failed Organicist Revolution During the First Half of the 20th Century
17:45-18:30 – Round-Table Discussion
20:00-21:30 – Dr. Luke Fischer: Public Reading of Poetry; Prof. Dr. Hong Yu Wong: Violin; Prof. Dr. Christoph Hueck: Exhibition on Goethe and Rudolf Steiner
July 18, 2025
09:00-10:15 – Prof. Dr. Dalia Nassar: Life and Death in Schelling’s Philosophy of Nature
10:45-12:00 – Prof. Dr. Matthew Segall: Revitalizing the Life Sciences: Whitehead’s Organic Realism and the Return of Romantic Science
12:00-13:15 – Dr. Gregory Rupik: Goethe and the Challenge of Representing Metamorphosis
16:30-17:45 – Prof. Dr. Benjamin Bembé: Mammalian Morphology in a Goethean Perspective – Polarity and the ‘Open Secret’ of the Middle
17:45-18:30 – Round-Table Discussion
20:00-21:30 – Public Lecture Dr. Craig Holdrege: Is the Earth Alive? A Goethean Exploration
July 19, 2025
09:00-10:15 – PD Dr. Jan Kerkmann: Metaphysical Implications of Goethe’s Philosophy of Nature
10:45-12:00 – Prof. Dr. Christoph Hueck: Rudolf Steiner on Goethe’s Morphology as Rational Organicism
12:00-13:15 – PD Dr. Georg Toepfer: Viewing in Thinking. On the Methodology of the Goethean Understanding of the Organism
13:15-14:00 – Round Table Closing
