This Open Access book combines philosophical and historical analysis of various forms of
alternatives to mechanism and mechanistic explanation focusing on the 19th century to the
present. It addresses vitalism organicism and responses to materialism and its relevance to
current biological science. In doing so it promotes dialogue and discussion about the
historical and philosophical importance of vitalism and other non-mechanistic conceptions of
life. It points towards the integration of genomic science into the broader history of biology.
It details a broad engagement with a variety of nineteenth twentieth and twenty-first century
vitalisms and conceptions of life. In addition it discusses important threads in the history
of concepts in the United States and Europe including charting new reception histories in
eastern and south-eastern Europe. While vitalism organicism and similar epistemologies are
often the concern of specialists in the history and philosophy of biology and of historians of
ideas the range of the contributions as well as the geographical and temporal scope of the
volume allows for it to appeal to the historian of science and the historian of biology
generally.
