Life Beyond Human Boundaries: John Dupré’s Philosophy and the Interdisciplinary Study of the Life Sciences

Sabina Leonelli holds the Chair of Philosophy and History of Science and Technology at the Technical University of Munich, where she is also Research Director of the Ethical Data Initiative, Co-Director of the Public Science Lab and lead of the ERC Project PHIL_OS. Until 2024 she was the Director of the Exeter Centre for the Study of the Life Sciences at the University of Exeter, where she holds a Honorary Professorship. She is the president of the International Society for the History, Philosophy and Social Studies of Biology (ISHPSSB) and an elected Fellow of the Academia Europaea, the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), and the Académie Internationale de Philosophie de la Science. Her research concerns the role of technology and data in knowledge production, and especially how computing and digitalisation efforts are transforming research and its social dynamics and roles; and the institutionalisation of Open Science as a window on the methods, epistemology and political economy of contemporary forms of scientific inquiry, particularly in the life and environmental sciences. Her work aims to foster both understanding of these processes and strategies for interventions to support low-resourced environments as well as planetary health.Celso Neto is an associate professor in philosophy at the University of Exeter, where he is a member of the Centre for the Study of the Life Sciences and currently leads a large project on race and genomics funded by the European Research Council. Before joining Exeter, Celso held a postdoctoral fellowship at Dalhousie University, working across the philosophy and biochemistry and molecular biology departments. His main interest lies in understanding biological classification, as well as how biases and values influence methodologies and reasoning in science, with a particular focus on evolutionary biology and its intersection with societal issues.Stephan Guttinger is a lecturer in philosophy at the University of Exeter, UK. He is leading a 4-year project on AI in Science funded by a Leverhulme Research Leadership Award (start September 2026). He is also co-lead of the Data, Knowledge and AI research strand at the Egenis Centre for the Study of the Life Sciences and serves as the head of research for the Exeter branch of the Ethical Data Initiative, a project jointly hosted by the University of Exeter and the Technische Universität München (TUM). Stephan’s work focuses on knowledge production in the biological laboratory, with a particular focus on issues such as experimental control, reproducibility, and the increasing use of AI-driven automation.

• 1 Introduction: Delving Into Dupré’s Philosophy (Celso Neto, Stephan Guttinger, Sabina Leonelli).- Part I: Promiscuity and Disorder.- 2 Unearthing soil kinds: How values and practices affect soil classifications (Catherine Kendig).- 3 Economics and the Big Wide World Outside (Nancy Cartwright).- 4 “And the wine is bottled poetry”: Dupré on Reductionism and the Mental (Adrian Haddock).- Part II: Process Biology.- 5 “Thou hast taught me, Silent River, Many a lesson, deep and long:” Metabolism, Development, and Evolution as Team Sports (Scott F. Gilbert).- 6 Is ITSNTS just an instance of process epistemology? (François Papale, Ford Doolittle, Andrew Inkpew).- 7 Promiscuous mutualisms: John Dupré and the centrality of symbiosis in the living world (Thomas Pradeu).- 8 The Disorder of Processes: The Case of Human Nature (Tim Lewens).- Part III: Interdisciplinary Philosophy.- 9 From studies of to studies with the life sciences (Jane Calvert).- 10 Why do Philosophers Argue Like they do? (Jim Griesemer).- 11 Philosophy of Biology in an Interdisciplinary Key (Alan C. Love).- Part IV: Concluding Essays.- 12 The Mighty Worlds We Half Create (Philip Kitcher).- 13 Some Final Thoughts on This Volume (John Dupré).