生命体是一架复杂的机器——雅克·莫诺的分子生物学哲学

Life-Form as a Complex Machine:The Philosophical Implications of Jacques Monod's Molecular Biology

分子生物学是20世纪中期逐渐成形的生物学学科,旨在从分子层面对生命体进行研究,并涉及到对生命本质的哲学理解。在巴斯德研究所的微生物学传统、新拉马克主义在法国生物学界的支配地位、遗传学和胚胎学之间的断裂等背景下,法国分子生物学家雅克·莫诺的工作从早期的酶适应研究逐渐转向了关于基因调控机制的研究,并最终将生命体看作一台既非纯粹的机械决定论,又非目的论的控制论机器,这一观点在今天对于理解生命本身以及分子生物学都具有丰富的启发意义。

Molecular biology is a biological discipline that took shape in the mid-20th century and aims to study living organisms from the molecular lev-el.Therefore it involves a philosophical view of the nature of life.Against the background of the microbiological tradition of the Pasteur Institute,the dom-inance of neo-Lamarckism in French biology,and the rupture between genetics and embryology,the work of French molecular biologist Jacques Monod evolved from his early studies of enzymatic adaptations to later ones of gene regulation mechanisms,and ultimately to a view of the life-form as a cyber-netic machine that is neither purely mechanistic deterministic nor teleological.This view has rich philosophical implications today for understanding life-form itself,as well as molecular biology.