Chen Bohang
Department of Philosophy and Moral Sciences, Ghent University, Blandijnberg 2, 9000, Ghent, Belgium.
Hist Philos Life Sci. 2018 Aug 22;40(3):50. doi: 10.1007/s40656-018-0221-2.
In biology the term "vitalism" is usually associated with Hans Driesch's doctrine of the entelechy: entelechies were nonmaterial, bio-specific agents responsible for governing a few peculiar biological phenomena. Since vitalism defined as such violates metaphysical materialism (or physicalism), the received view refutes the doctrine of the entelechy as a metaphysical heresy. But in the early twentieth century, a different, non-metaphysical evaluation of vitalism was endorsed by some biologists and philosophers, which finally led to a logical refutation of the doctrine of the entelechy. In this non-metaphysical evaluation, first, vitalism was not treated as a metaphysical heresy but a legitimate response to the inadequacy of mechanistic explanations in biology. Second, the refutation of vitalism was logically rather than metaphysically supported by contemporary biological knowledge. The entelechy was not a valid concept, because vitalists could neither formulate vital laws (to attribute determinate consequences to the entelechy), nor offer convincing examples of experimental indeterminism (to confirm the perpetual inadequacy of mechanistic explanations).
在生物学中，“活力论”一词通常与汉斯·德里施的隐德来希学说相关联：隐德来希是非物质的、具有生物特异性的因子，负责支配一些特殊的生物现象。由于这样定义的活力论违背了形而上学的唯物主义（或物理主义），传统观点将隐德来希学说视为一种形而上学的异端邪说而加以驳斥。但在20世纪早期，一些生物学家和哲学家对活力论进行了不同的、非形而上学的评价，这最终导致了对隐德来希学说的逻辑驳斥。在这种非形而上学的评价中，首先，活力论并未被视为一种形而上学的异端邪说，而是对生物学中机械论解释不足的一种合理回应。其次，对活力论的驳斥在逻辑上而非形而上学上得到了当代生物学知识的支持。隐德来希不是一个有效的概念，因为活力论者既无法制定出生机法则（将确定的结果归因于隐德来希），也无法提供令人信服的实验不确定性的例子（以证实机械论解释的持续不足）。
