KANT'S CRITIQUE OF TELEOLOGY IN BIOLOGICAL EXPLANATION

16 Theory of the Organism
formation theory, which remained firmly entrenched in textbook
science up to the end of the 18th century. Albrecht von Haller, for
instance, who in many ways contributed significantly to the fall of
preformationism, returned to the fold after a brief phase of epigenesis.
There are a number of factors that undermined the theory of
preformation and made it possible for the phenomenon of regeneration
in the polyp — an otherwise insignificant invertebrate, which
would have remained simply an anomaly in the preformation
theory — to be advanced as the central explanatory problem of
biological theory and even to be seen by many as the quintessence of
the organic. There were I think four factors that decisively
contributed to this process: 1) developments in geological and
cosmological theory, 2) the development of a specifically biological
criterion of species membership, 3) the dominance of philosophical
atomism in natural and social philosophy, and 4) the development of
a general conception of self-reproduction of organic systems.
1) The theory of pre-existing germs in its original form presupposed
that the germs were as old as the material universe. A
later creation of animals and plants would have implied an extraordinary
intervention of God into the already existing world. In the
deistic view this would constitute a miracle, but natural science is
only possible if natural events, except for the first beginning of the
universe, have only natural causes. A later divine intervention into
the affairs of the world could only occur for the purposes of revelation,
to support faith and morals etc.; but if God has to repair his
clockwork for other reasons, this means that he was not capable of
shaping matter in such a way in the beginning that the clockwork
would function without repair. As Leibniz said: "When God works
miracles, he does not do it in order to supply the wants of nature, but
those of grace. Whoever thinks otherwise, must needs have a very
mean notion of the wisdom and power of God." 12 A philosophical
insight lies behind the theological façade: namely, that the appeal to
the supernatural to explain normal natural processes means the
end of all science.
However, as soon as serious theories about the origin of the
earth or the solar system could be presented, the encasement theory
began to have troubles. On the one hand, if the (extremely complex)
12 Leibniz, 1st letter to Clarke, §4.