Progress in Biophysics and Molecular Biology 119 (2015) 522e529

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Progress in Biophysics and Molecular Biology

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/pbiomolbio

From creativity to perception: The conditions of possibility

for a true biology
Roland Cazalis
SPS/URBV, Cognivege, Faculty of Sciences, University of Namur, 61 rue de Bruxelles, 5000 Namur, Belgium

a r t i c l e i n f o

a b s t r a c t

Article history:
Available online 2 July 2015

The phenomenologist Renaud Barbaras defends an alternative conception of life against the well-known
proposals that view life as self-preserving or seeking to replicate its own means of replication in the form
of repetition instead of creation or accomplishment as Barbaras proposes. Indeed, he criticizes the
reductive nature of scientic inquiry which tries to dene life solely on the basis of the internal constraints, which leads to an impossible true biology. Barbaras' conception is rooted in Husserl and
Merleau-Ponty who conceives perception as a subjective act by which the subject enters a relationship
with the world. This leads the subject to overcome the Husserlian resources to reach the originary link of
the organism with itself and the exteriority. This originary link is expressed in the ambiguity of the verb
to live in French which designates both being alive and the experience of something. According to
Barbaras, desire as life is the innite exploration of the external world. The movement is due to the
nature of perception itself, inasmuch as innite exploration is in the very nature of the perceptive
movement itself, which opens an unfulllable absence within the exterior world. Then, life as desire is
the desire of the world. Life is accomplished only as an unfolding of the world. Then, Barbaras' model
seems to preserve the unity of the organism that allows the phenomenal level or the lived experience,
the indenite engagement with exteriority and the positivity of absence created by the movement
through its activity. From this, we propose to complement Barbaras' insights on negativity and the expressions of desire with our approach concerning three main points. In the rst place, we interpret
Barbaras' notion of life as accomplishment within the Whiteheadian framework of creativity, thereby
granting the thermodynamic reality of living systems. Secondly, we clarify the meaning of the couple
movement/manifestation so that these concepts are as fully applicable to the plant world as Barbaras
accords to the animal world. Finally, our theoretical approach uses category theory to give scalability to
the model.
2015 Published by Elsevier Ltd.

Keywords:
Barbaras
Category theory
Life
Phenomenology
Whitehead

1. Introduction
The demand of knowledge that brings Francisco Valera to the
encounter with phenomenology, for instance, and incentivises him
to work out his interrogations and hypotheses also urges the
encounter between science and phenomenology to pursue the aim
of sketching out the conditions for a true biology. Biophysical and
biochemical approaches retain their relevance and their functions.
Nevertheless, the aim is to approach life and living as they are
clearly displayed at least in the so-called higher organisms, namely
by taking into account both their objective and subjective dimensions. In other words, it comes to the apprehension of living in

E-mail address: roland.cazalis@unamur.be.

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.pbiomolbio.2015.06.012
0079-6107/ 2015 Published by Elsevier Ltd.

its unity as it becomes self-evident once reductionism is put into

brackets. However, the task is far from simple, because one does not
come to biology free from the cultural determinations, ideas and
ideologies that pervade in the dominant schools of thought of the
moment. In order to give a chance for the living to be grasped in its
entirety, and despite previously mentioned lters, the intercultural
approach is a rst initiative to reach a fresh look as it disables
certain prejudices and helps to nd concepts which are really
universal and structuring. The other initiative is the interdisciplinary approach within an intra-cultural context that leads to a
different perspective and to the requirements associated with it. In
the last paradigm, the encounter of biology with phenomenology
presents a certain mutuality for at least two reasons. The rst is that
according to Barbaras, phenomenology treats the way things
appear as a stand-alone problem. Therefore it aims to update

R. Cazalis / Progress in Biophysics and Molecular Biology 119 (2015) 522e529

appearance as such (Barbaras, 2002, 109). More precisely, it purports to apprehend life as an appearance, avoiding any form of
extinction of some parts of it by cultural and methodological lters.
The second reason is that phenomenology has always been turned
towards life, because life is the centre of concerns in phenomenology, as reported by Husserl (Lebenswelt), Heidegger (life as
facticity), Merleau-Ponty (the structure of behaviour), and Michel
Henry (life as self-affection). Nevertheless, Barbaras argues that
with these approaches, life is not thought to itself; rather, it is an
operative concept, or incantation, including in Michel Henry's
concept of self-affection.
In this paper, we work within the intra-cultural interdisciplinary
paradigm to stress the insights and limits of Barbaras' approach to
the manifestation of the living, with respect to its internal constraints and heterogeneity. Subsequently, we show that this
approach may be revised and completed by the notion of creativity
provided by the Whiteheadian philosophy of organism, which
takes into account the architectural and thermo-dynamical dimensions of the living and its openness to the world. Finally, all
these concepts can be articulated into a single representation of the
unity of the living in the language of category theory.
2. Barbaras' insights
The unity of life is ush with language itself, says Barbaras, and
this is perceived in the fundamental ambiguity of the verb to live
in French, which designates both being alive (leben) and the
experience of something (erleben) (Barbaras, 2008, 3; 2008b, 367).
The original unity, which is expressed in the language, shows that
living is deeper than the bifurcation of transitivity (erleben) and
intransitivity (leben). The unity of life is apprehensible in the expressions of an organic totality displaying the unity of the somatic
and the psychic which are not constituent parts of the whole, but
modalities of being alive (Barbaras, 2008, 88). Upon this, Barbaras
criticizes the classical approach to biology that takes living organism as its object. The paradox is that biology should distinguish in
nature what is living from what is not, in other words, develop a
phenomenal knowledge of it, so as to be able to penetrate the object and discover its highly complex physical and chemical processes. However, with these data, biology may not re-enter the
phenomenological level that gave access to what is the living
(Barbaras, 2008, 4). Therefore, Barbaras' conclusion is unappealing.
Biology does not speak about life, but rather refers to a functioning
of an organism recognized as such. Therefore, life must not be
looking on the side of biology, since life is not biology's object
(Barbaras, 2008, 5). Barbaras argues that there is no knowledge of
the living that is not already a phenomenology of life. As a result,
the living that would be mostly and simply living and to which
biology would have access remains unfounded. Such biology is then
impossible (Barbaras, 2011, 127e128). In the same paradigm, Barbaras rejects the phenomenological approach to life provided by
Hans Jonas, although he nevertheless recognizes the latter's merits.
In Jonas' approach, life is apprehended, not on the basis of itself, but
from the point of view of what is without life, that is, the material
world. Life is viewed under the scope of preservation of itself, under
the scope of metabolism, which justies the necessity of movement
toward the external. The living then refers to the ght to remain
alive in order to escape from its own negation. Life is thus grasped,
not through itself, but through an ontology of death (Barbaras,
2008, 11). Therefore, it is necessary to perform an 
epoch
e of death
to think life from itself. It is necessary, by this 
epoch
e in the double
sense, to achieve a suspension of death to which life is exposed, and
a suspension of the naturalistic ontology from which the denition
of life proceeds (Barbaras, 2008b, 230; Barbaras et al., 2011, 165).
In Barbaras' paradigm, the approach to the unity of life is

523

articulated around essential couples, whose relation is each time

particular. They are desire/life, movement/manifestation, incompleteness/alterity, accomplishment/creation, etc. Life is characterized by its volubility that reveals a fundamental incompleteness at
the heart of the living being. The absence is not the absence of
something that could be lled by Jonas' notion of satisfaction, but
rather, a decit of being. Absence does not represent a lack in the
negative sense of the term, but has a positive meaning. Therefore
incompleteness, that is desire, is the very essence of being alive.
This vital tension is not psychological but represents an ontological
concept. The vital being is therefore desire and this is evident
through the movement toward the different and toward otherness.
From the start, life is turned towards the world. Movement that
characterizes the living being exceeds the circle of needs, and
shows that it is not directed to the satisfaction of the needs, but to
manifestation. Similarly, life is not the metabolic repetition or
 la Dawkins (Dawkins, 2006), but rather, it is creation.
replication a
Life is not so closed in on itself. Its original incompleteness determines its opening and its relationship with the world through its
mobility. From these benchmarks, one can acknowledge the unity
of life dened from itself, and one can portray it through categories
such as desire, movement, incompleteness, manifestation, etc. Thus,
movement is neither material nor conscious, neither external, nor
internal, because it is another mode of being (Barbaras, 2008,
12e15; 2006, 108e127).
Barbaras appeals to other philosophies of life, such as those
advocated by Bergson, Goldstein or that of Hans Jonas that contrast
with his own, and overcomes their positions (Barbaras et al., 2011,
169e170). Thus, his approach enables him to specify that life is
existence as embodied, i.e. as a mode of being-in-the-world,
helping to overcome the corporeality for the benet of life. According to Barbaras, Merleau-Ponty's approach ends with a phenomenology of the body and does not lead to a phenomenology of
life, i.e. the existence from which it arises. Similarly, and probably
prisoner of a decient concept of the body, Heidegger fails to
integrate the esh into existence which then proves to be deprived
of life (Barbaras, 2008, 84e85; 2006, 142). This dimension, which
is incomplete in Merleau-Ponty (Barbaras, 2008b, 103), remains to
be integrated into the Dasein, according to Jan Patocka (Pato
cka,
1988, 97).
By introducing the concepts of desire, originary1 movement in
phenomenological terms, these notions open to transcendence.
Barbaras makes sure to specify that it is a transcendence of the
world given in the form of a dissatisfaction opened at the heart of
the world. However, in Levinas's work, transcendence is given in
the form of the desire for otherness, i.e., referring to a metaphysical
desire. With Michel Henry, the archi-life or the originary becomes
metaphysical, even theological. Notwithstanding, in the case of
Barbaras, it is a desire of the world, therefore a desire for the same,
and not a desire for otherness (Barbaras et al., 2011, 168e169).
3. On movement
The originality of Barbaras' approach is to take the denition of
living being seriously. These concepts are almost exclusively part of
the qualia order such as desire, incompleteness, or manifestation.
Movement itself is to be understood as an originary feature of life.
Movement is a third and irreducible mode of being. Thus, life becomes a modality of the originary movement (Barbaras, 2008, 14).
As a result, the four terms belong to the world of qualia. Manifestation itself could be apprehended under this view as far as what

1
Originary is a typical term found in phenomenology and means what is primordial and radically irreplaceable, and remains beyond our calculation or control.

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R. Cazalis / Progress in Biophysics and Molecular Biology 119 (2015) 522e529

appears is solely the apperception of the very desire of

manifestation.
The part retained by Barbaras is what is normally left aside in
the physical and chemical approaches, because they are not within
the scope of their competence. However, it is the very part that
specically denes the living being. In fact, one couple is sufcient
to establish the tension that characterizes the living being, such as
desire/manifestation, when the terms are considered in their
ontological sense. The tension between desire and manifestation
recalls that living is not only the fact to be-in-life (intransitivity),
because being-in-life is just the threshold for manifestation. Such
an approach to the living being could very well illustrate the human
journey when Man rst ventured out of Africa about 60,000 and
70,000 years ago. There are certainly objective reasons of this
exodus, such as climatic shift as it has been hypothesized. But there
are also subjective reasons that refer to the simple fact of being
human. The exodus turns into exile when there is no more space to
browse. Probably, the opening of the space road will allow the
resumption of such an exodus.
However, some adjustments must be made for the concept of
movement so that it is more adequately compatible with the living
kingdom as a whole. The type of living referred to by Barbaras is the
human being or the transitive living of consciousness. Consciousness proceeds from a limitation of intentionality that is a vital activity, i.e. life separated from a dimension of itself. It is an approach
to life rooted in the negativity that characterizes the latter
(Barbaras et al., 2011, 171e172). The animal world can agree with
this model, but to a lesser degree. Indeed, following Rilke's arguments (Rilke, 1977, 54e55), Barbaras posits that animals are fully
present in the world and are intertwined with their own movement
of progress within the mundane totality, while human beings are
characterized by the limitation of their pure progress. Indeed, distance emerges between the human being and the world from
which a face-to-face relationship arises: the human being is faced
to the world, while the animal slides within the world. From this
face-to-face relationship, two elements appear jointly: the object,
on the one hand, and the consciousness that apprehends this object
on the other hand (Barbaras, 2008b, 237ss; Barbaras et al., 2011,
172). The difference in degree is expressed through the difference of
strength of the originary movement, also called archi-movement or
archi-life.
Barbaras advocates that existence can embody movement since
the body refers to the ability to move (Barbaras, 2008, 116). The
movement has an existential meaning for human beings. The
walking machines of the Dutch artist, Theo Jansen, could be a
metaphor of such reality. Indeed, Jansen's Strandbeest, that simulates an animal moving on the sand of the beach, eventually gives
the illusion that these entities are alive, while this performance can
be described as movement without life. These entities have yet
corporeality and existence, not for themselves, but for both the
artist and the audience. The Strandbeest's movement leads to a grey
zone of the phenomenological denition of life when intersubjectivity compensates and provides machines with a sudden vital
movement, or as if it was possible to transfer a feeling of existence,
at least temporarily, from an organic corporeality to a polymeric
one. Then the question of the issue of simple localization/relocation
of the vital movement arises. Thus, since the Strandbeest, as a team
of horses, seems to cross the beach and to go its way, the denition
of life seems broader and more subtle than the one Barbaras offers.
Barbaras' concepts are then very suggestive to apprehend the
living being as it is introduced in the rst analysis; nevertheless, the
separation that he proposes between the human world and the
animal world is too sharp. The notion of degree must be understood
within a range of values rather than through such a breach. Likewise, his limited use of the notion of movement articially

discriminates against the living world, which constitutes a rst

aporia in the conditions of possibility for a true biology.
4. A full notion of movement
Starting from the suggestive notion of originary movement or
archi-movement resulting in different types of concrete movements in the animal world, a question arises regarding the universal applicability of this concept insofar as the plant world is
devoid of mobility. What is the status of the plant world and that of
microorganisms? Barbaras acknowledges that each living being has
an ipseity, however rough as it may be (Barbaras, 2008, 174).
Nevertheless, he describes plant in terms of default with regard to
the animal or as an animal minus something. He describes the
plants existence in terms of a simple and immediate satisfaction of
needs, a degraded desire, and depicts the plant's movement as
inchoative or hindered. In sum, plant life represents some sort of
movement's outline, of which the spatial animal movement is the
accomplishment (Barbaras, 2008b, 220e222).
Taking Barbaras' assumption seriously, i.e., that the movement
does not emerge with the living, but rather that the living is its
embodiment, we must now draw the consequences that apply. In
the rst place, we must acknowledge a given living from itself and
secondly, we must open the notion of movement to the whole
living kingdom. We will thus avoid establishing any patterns of
equality between the concrete movement and the immediately
perceptible animal movement. Indeed, the restrictions underpinned by Barbaras appear to contradict his own premise by
operative choices within the movement of manifestation.
In reality, the limitation he supports regarding the plant can also
be applied to the animal, even if the concrete movement hides it.
Indeed, Barbaras presents the living that is turned, from the start,
towards a world which is not a pre-given one but with which it
enters in a relation of co-determination. As a matter of fact, Barbaras agrees with some aspects of Valera's notion of enactment on
the cognitive plan that could also be applied to the evolutionary
plan (Barbaras, 2002b, 129e130). While remembering the four
concepts or the four functional circles of the world proposed by von
Uexkll (von Uexkll, 1928, 100), we must face the facts: in the
commutative relationship between the living and the world, the
satisfaction of immediate needs is part of the manifestation and the
movement, yet without being limited to these aspects. Similarly, if
concrete movement is understood in its basic sense, the concrete
movement is, by denition, relative to coordinates. In the world of
animals, movement is relative to a xed coordinate system, while in
the case of the plant, movement concerns its immediate environment (Fig. 1). There is movement due to the plant. In other words,
the plant projects the movement in the realm of evapotranspiration, inasmuch as subjectivity is projected in perception. As a result,
movement is correlated with the nature of life and with the part of
the world that it co-determines. Thus, by integrating what seems
trivial in Barbaras' phenomenological framework, a consistency is
established in the assumption of the archi-movement and in the
specic movements applicable to the entire living kingdom,
including microorganisms, and this, in correlation with the part of
the world that each living being co-determines. As a consequence,
there is heterogeneity of living and heterogeneity of the world.
Without pretending to reify the approach to the living being, we
can propose a representation that integrates the living world in its
heterogeneity and that is based on Barbaras' very concepts, namely
the different degree of the archi-life strength that gives rise to the
diversity of the living world, in a commutative relation with the
heterogeneity of the world. From there, it is possible to dene a
genuine unity of the world of life, where each living being is
thought from itself and for itself.

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525

Fig. 1. A full notion of movement. The animal (A) moves relative to a xed coordinate system, while the plant (B) projects the movement in the immediate environment in the
evapotranspiration realm. Each kind of living being from the microorganisms up to the human co-determines the part of the world with which it is in commutative relation.

From the originary negativity affecting life or Barbaras'

negative approach, let us take the scale of negativity varying
from 0 to 1, 0 being the archi-life or archi-movement digit. A
given living being's digit will be closer to 0 since the archi-life
strength is important in it. The closer the number is to zero,
the more important the manifestation becomes, i.e. the higher
the co-determination of the manifestation of the part of the
world with which it is in commutative relation, and also the
higher the desire. Take the accomplishment as the theoretical
limit of the manifestation, i.e. when its movement equals the
value of desire, then their ratio reaches the 1 value. This last
event would be the end of transitivity. From these parameters, a
graph of a world of life (Fig. 2) could be drawn, showing the
transitive trajectory in its negative tense according to a resized
Barbaras' paradigm, and a scale of negativity allowing comparison of the organisms. The transitive trajectory exhibits a shift to
accomplishment when it reaches the region of the internal value
of its negativity.

Fig. 2. Transitive trajectory. A unity of the world of life by integrating the living beings
on the basis of the archi-movement strength in each of them. This scale allows to
compare the organisms. The transitive trajectory has a negative tense according to a
resized Barbaras' paradigm. For a given organism, the lowest point it could reach
during its trajectory remains in its negativity value surroundings, in so far as the
attainment of the full value would correspond to its accomplishment or the manifestation/desire ratio of 1 that is the end of its transitivity.

5. Scale and thermodynamics again

The prospect of a real biology cannot stand without including
aspects of life that appear essential. To the contrary, it should seek
to integrate them. Barbaras' approach strives to avoid both biological reductionism and the naive prejudices of science followed
by the philosophies of life. Nevertheless, Barbaras' proposal is
neither incompatible nor far away from some scientic current
perspectives. The nature of life, such as the non-equilibrium
subcritical system of Stuart Kauffman (Simpson, 2011) has this
pretention. More generally, recent advances in relational biology
(Simeonov et al. 2012) pursue the same objective. In contrast, as
far as the architecture and the internal thermodynamical aspects
remain unfounded in Barbaras' proposal, life that is described is an
ideal view of life rather than life itself as it moves, and this constitutes the second limit of his proposal. Without thermodynamics, there is no temporality, and therefore there is no more
transitivity nor any organic life that is the very condition of possibility of consciousness. An authentic biology must be able to
integrate the low-level operations and those of high level,
including dimensions related to the cultural sphere. Otherwise,
we induce a counter-bifurcation of nature equivalent to that
denounced by Whitehead. However, taking into account the architecture and the thermo-dynamical aspects in the phenomenological approach triggers a problem related to the compatibility
of language. The concept of creativity, as stated in the Whiteheadian philosophy of organism, recognized as a philosophical
category of the ultimate (Whitehead, 1978, 7), enables the
expressing of this conceptual difculty, while conferring a global
creativity to the living being from the atomic levels up to the levels
of consciousness and culture. Then, we can propose that it is by
means of creativity that the archi-movement reaches the manifestation under its qualitative and quantitative modes.
Creativity does not operate in a stochastic manner; otherwise,
the movement of manifestation would be very limited or engaged
in futile cycles. As such, it could never take the form of the human
conscience. Rather, creativity is expressed under the direction that
the archi-movement confers. In addition, it is expressed through
strata. These steps stress the hierarchical organic architecture,
which has a multiplier effect. Indeed, the work of creativity of the
lower level is grasped and augmented by the top level, and this
entails that the higher hierarchical organism equiped with a deeper

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negativity achieves the highest performance in terms of power of

manifestation. The advent of the levels is also the work of creativity
under the direction of the archi-movement. Accordingly, the
manifestation and the perception of a given living are correlated to
a specic relation between movement, creativity and architecture.
In Barbaras' perspective, the originary or the archi-movement
fullls a function parallel to that of the Whiteheadian principle of
limitation. Thus, one could consider the archi-movement as a
theoretical notion that serves as a point of departure to project
oneself, just as subjectivity is projected into perception. The archimovement becomes even less speculative if it is understood as
archi-activity, i.e. as a conuence of local creative work at the basic
level and reaching a critical point to form a proto-plateau from
which the followings are built. The overow, the excess that characterize the living being, is already inscribed in the vectorial character of the creativity that is amplied in climbing the scale of the
architecture. In this case, the archi-movement is materially encoded in the very hierarchical architecture of the living being.
6. Categorial representation
Barbaras reminds that heterogeneity of the living signies that
otherness is intrinsic to the living. Heterogeneousness is thus also
expressed in terms of qualia and quanta and, having each one a
causal power on the trajectory of the entity so that it be sustainable
and resilient. The bifurcation of nature denounced by Whitehead
appears from then on as an epistemic ease that reduces the
apprehension of the living solely on the basis of its quantitative
features. The bifurcation is not at work only in science, but also in
philosophy, in what Michel Foucault (2005) calls the Cartesian
moment of philosophy inherited from the Greeks.
Notwithstanding, the challenge thrown to the perception is to
nd the integrity of the living articulating its components anew.
From this perspective, the theory of the categories2 can contribute
to overcome the bifurcation, precisely because it enables to articulate heterogeneous notions. Category theory facilitates the
apprehension of what is universal in a system (Ellerman, 1988,
409e429). In this paradigm, the principal way to manage the
mathematical structures that have universality is provided by
universal mapping properties, and particularly, the arrangement of
two universal mapping properties given by a pair of adjoint functors. In view of achieving adequately this formalization, i.e. to
determinate through universals, we follow the heteromorphic
theory of adjunction developed by David Ellerman and applied to
life sciences (Ellerman, 2006, 2007).
Since the notion of adjoint functor was introduced by Kan
(1958) in category theory, it appears as one of the most profound
contributions of category to the history of general mathematical
ideas (Goldblat, 2006). The canonical denition of adjointness according to Mac Lane (1971) is a natural isomorphism between the
two sets of homomorphism or hom-set. Let A and X be categories
and F: X / A and G: A / X functors between them. An adjunction
from X to A is a triple <F, G, 4>, if for any (x) in X and (a) in A, there
is an isomorphism 4 natural in (x) and in (a), such as: 4x,a: HomA
(Fx, a) y HomX (x, Ga). F and G are said to be a pair of adjoint
functors or an adjunction, noted F x G. F is the left adjoint and G is
the right adjoint. Maps associated across the isomorphism are
adjoint correlates of one another.
Nevertheless, while keeping mathematics at a minimal conceptual level for the diagram representation, a trivial way to

2
For a more technical presentation of categories, the reader can consult reference books such as Goldblat (2006), Ehresmann and Vanbremeersch (2007),
Lawvere and Schanuel (2009).

approach adjunction in this study is to focus on the way in which

objects in one category are affected by objects in another category.
The determining relation between the objects or morphisms, when
it occurs between objects of the same category, is called homomorphism or hom. The object-to-object morphism between objects
of different categories is called heteromorphism or het (Ellerman,
2007). The reformulation of adjunction using hets enables an
adjunction to be split into two semiadjunctions. Then, let be two
categories, the sending X, and the receiving A. the semiadjunctions
can be represented as follows:
With the left semiadjunction (Fig. 3A), with each sending
object (a), there is an associated receiving Fx, and there is an universal chimera morphism hX: x / Fx. Then, the universal property
follows: there is a one-to-one correspondence or isomorphism
between the het c: x / a and the hom g: Fx / a and can be represented as HomA (Fx, a) y Het (x, a).
Similarly, with the dual case of the right semiadjunction
(Fig. 3B), for each (a) of A, there is an associated Ga and a sending
morphism eA: Ga / a. The isomorphism between the het c: Ga / a,
and the hom f: x / Ga can be represented by Het(x, a) y HomX (x,
Ga). The full adjunction is obtained combining the left and right
semiadjunctions (Fig. 3C) and can be represented by the commutative square. The diagonal map (c) is in fact a pair of adjoint correlates: HomA (Fx, a) y Het (x, a) y HomX (x, Ga). The removal of
the middle term gives the classical notion of adjunction within a
context of homomorphism. The notion of semiadjunction disappears in the same occasion.
What follows next shall be based on Barbaras' insights and on
the criticisms that were made against some aspects and proposals
for remediation in order to account for the heterogeneity of the
living. As such, it is possible to organize the set of concepts
departing from the notion of adjunction retrieved from the theory
of categories, so as to suggest a generic idea of the unity of the living
being. This would help reach a representation that highlights and
articulates the essential otherness inside of the living alongside the
concept of feedback.
From these categorial basics, the notions previously stressed
can now be organized in a unique frame. An adjunctive square
diagram is obtained (Fig. 4) replacing each object and map in
Fig. 3C by the object and map it represents in the unity of the
living being. Considering rst the causes or determiners, such as
(Ac) or (Am) and (D) belonging to the sending category of qualia,
while the determinees, (Cm) and (M), belong to the receiving
category of quanta. Within each category and between them, the
whiteheadian generic notion of creativity (Ci), under its different
phenomenalities, maps the internal determinations within one
category, and implements specic information from one category
to another.
The commutative square (Fig. 4) can be read as follows.
Considering, on the one hand, the sending category (I) as the sphere
of origin, where universal properties are in full way, and on the
other hand, the receiving category (II) as the sphere of manifestation, where properties are incomplete and seeking completeness.
The archi-creativity (Ac) is the very original source but remains
hidden. It features only under the gure of desire (D). The latter is
also ineffable by nature, and that is the reason why it belongs to the
originary sphere. Creativity (C) is the functor under its various
functions that connects the two spheres by the chimerical links (C),
(C2) and (C3). The functors retain and carry the directionality given
by (Ac) that ensures a coherent creativity from basic levels to the
more complex levels of the living, to the extent that it is subject to
development and to alteration by internal turnover, by virtue of its
organic nature. It is also subject to alteration in its commutative
relation with the world. The receiving category is characterized by
concrete movements (Cm) and by manifestation (M) itself,

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527

Fig. 3. Schemes for determination through universal according to Ellerman (2006, 2007). The sending domain (I) represents the originary realm; the receiving domain (II) is where
properties are incomplete and seeking completeness. A. Determination by a receiving universal Fx. (
) is the sending object, hx a universal het, (c) a specic het, (g) a specic hom.
B. Determination by a sending universal Ga. The elements are symmetrical to those described in Fig. 3A. C. The adjunctive square diagram.

Fig. 4. Adjunctive square diagram replacing each object and map in Fig. 3C by the
object and map it represents in the unity of the living being from a revised version of
the Barbaras' paradigm showing the complementary union of information and energy
in the living system. In the sending domain (I), (Ac) and (D) illustrate archi-creativity
and desire. In the receiving domain (II), (Cm) and (M) are, concrete movements and
manifestation respectively, while (Cx) are the different expressions of creativity.

perceived as a projection of the subjectivity and as co-condition of

the world, in the case of the human world.
On the basis of the properties of semiadjunctions, this diagram
provides a representation of part of the intrinsic otherness of a
living system. Furthermore, it helps to think of the articulation of
these heterogeneous and nevertheless linked concepts. It highlights what we know by experience, i.e. causation is not only
quantitative but qualitative as well. At the same time, it enables to
discriminate between various aspects of the creativity, which ensures the movement of entailment within the organism.
The problem of feedback remains, which is an important one in
a living system. To emphasize this important feature, we must
switch from the categorial representation to a pedagogical one. To
this end, an inverted duplicate (dash lines) or copy of the former
one, representing the reexive aspect of the affectation between
both domains, is combined with the former at the (Ac) object,

which is the main determiner. Within this new construction

(Fig. 5A), the receiving domain is related to the sending domain
without interruption as a feedback to (Ac), and underlines the
circularity from qualia to quanta, and back in a coherent order. In
this case, (Ac) successively becomes a determiner and a determinee
in a general movement of entailment. In Barbaras' paradigm, the
feedback movement ensures the rst intransitivity in such a way
that intransitivity becomes the rst level of transitivity, and yet
includes temporality too. Manifestation in the world involves an
interaction with external otherness, so that feedback amounts to a
process of readjustment of (M) to the characteristics of (Ac). This
enables taking into account the living being's persistency alongside
its characteristics, while manifestation incorporates alteration and
relates to otherness. The feedback shows that the living being is not
an output without a return. Similarly, if the manifestation is a
modality of the archi-creativity, it also impacts on the archicreativity in return.
The aim of this representation is to evince that the living being is
the result of a continuous pulsation of a back and forth movement.
The manifestation (M) is the result of this pulsation that is translated into the expression of the excess of an originary. In the human
case, it is expressed as subjectivity projected into perception and as
object perceived by and perceiving in the world, capable of creativity and subject to alteration.
To give the previous construction a more realistic representation,
a folding of this previous construction (Fig. 5A) is established in two
stages (Fig. 5 B and C) through the connection of the two faces of a
same objet belonging to the realm of qualia, so that it gets hidden
into the structure. As a consequence, only objects belonging to the
realm of quanta remain apparent. Then, what belongs to the originary domain remains hidden in the background, while objects of the
receiving domain (Cm) and (M) are positioned at the forefront and
are immediately perceptible. There is a converging conclusion from
a different approach based on knot theory and Temperley Lieb

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R. Cazalis / Progress in Biophysics and Molecular Biology 119 (2015) 522e529

Fig. 5. Pedagogical representation of the unity of the organism from the adjunctive diagram. A. To represent the reexive aspect of the affectation between both domains, an
inverted duplicate (dash lines) of the former one (plain line) is combined with it at the (Ac) object. Within this construction, the receiving domain is related to the sending domain
without interruption. To give a more realistic turn to the topologic representation, a folding of this previous construction is established in two stages. B. The rst folding allows to
connect (M) in the foreground while (Ac) remains in the background. C. The second folding connects (D) between the plan of (Ac) and that of (M).

algebra concerning what we could name a triptych formed by

incompleteness, self-reference and circularity of organism (Louis H.
Kauffman, this issue). The author points out the contrast of the
circular nature of organism, circularity, which we avoid in mathematics. Indeed, where incompleteness prevents any self-referencing
of arithmetic, it becomes the very driving force of a dynamic selfreference that characterized the living system and which could be
understood as well as movement in Barbaras' paradigm.

7. Conclusion
Barbaras declares that there is no knowledge of the living that
is not already a phenomenology of life; consequently, any understanding of the living resulting from a strictly scientic construction will remain unfounded. In effect, life limits itself. It is affected
by an originary negation related to the archi-life, to the archimovement, of which our movement is only one modality.

R. Cazalis / Progress in Biophysics and Molecular Biology 119 (2015) 522e529

Barbaras' approach refers rst to the human world that is the

culmination of the concept and second to the animal world. Our
position is that the comprehensive approach to the living must be
able to include the reign of living as a whole in its heterogeneity. It
must also account for the transitivity of the actual living; otherwise
we deal with an ideal concept of the living, and not with an
effective life. Our proposal aims to achieve a universal notion of
living, particularly through the extension of the concept of movement. We then aim to integrate the architecture as well as the
energy aspect involving Whitehead's concept of creativity, which
enables staying within a phenomenological framework. On this
basis, the different concepts can come on the scene in a consistent
manner through the concept of adjunction from category theory.
The unity of the living thus seems to appear as a rhythmic to-andfro pulsation uctuating between the originary and the manifestation. In other words, we suggest that a true biology is one that
does not induce bifurcation of nature into irreconcilable quanta and
qualia aspects. Thus, when the archi-creativity is at work in a hierarchical organic architecture through creativity, then the movement of manifestation becomes intelligible as an objective content
in a subjective form. Finally, by connecting the Whiteheadian
notion of creativity with Barbaras' insights, we remind the complementary union of information and energy in the living system.
Furthermore, a categorial presentation of this complementary
union suggests that category theory appears as the theory of the
primary objects generated by creativity, or even as the grammar
that allows for composing them.
Acknowledgements
This work was supported by the Cotylens ASBL.
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