• Mistakes in Living Systems

    A New Conceptual Framework for the Study of Purpose in Biology
About us

  Principal Investigator: David S. Oderberg is Professor of Philosophy at the University of Reading  and current Head of Department....
The Project

Project title: Mistakes in Living Systems: A New Conceptual Framework for the Study of Purpose in Biology   Video Introduction...
Our Research

For decades, high-level philosophical terms such as teleology, agency, and purpose have generated intense debate among philosophers whilst rarely being...
Our Publications

'Biological Mistakes: What They Are and What They Mean for the Experimental Biologist' (D.S. Oderberg, J. Hill, C. Austin, I....
News and Events

Upcoming activities One for your calendar: The annual Ratio One-Day Conference on ‘Biological Teleology: New Directions’, to be held at...
Reflections on Biological Mistakes

Agency Directionality & FunctionWelcome to our three-year research project on Mistakes in Living Systems: A New Conceptual Framework for the Study of Purpose in Biology.

John Templeton Foundation

This project is funded by a generous grant from the John Templeton Foundation as part of a new global, multi-disciplinary research programme 'Agency, Directionality and Function', dedicated to the intensive re-evaluation of the place of goal-directedness in biology. This unique research effort is led by Prof. Alan Love at the University of Minnesota.

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Annual Ratio Conference - Purpose in Biology: New Directions

Watch David Oderberg’s public lecture on our research project