Abstract
Abstract
‘Life’ is manifest in autonomous being in a contingent world and ‘natural life’ is life that has developed autonomously in that its becoming has not depended on prior agency. Autonomous being requires the capacity of autopoiesis and the maintenance of autonomous being in a contingent world requires the capacity of intentional agency. Also, autonomous and diverse becoming requires the capacities of accidental creation and reproductive evolution in an environment of contingent events. These capacities may be explained in theories of functional organization, each of which may be variously realized in the physical domain. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.