The central insight of the Santiago theory is the identification of cognition, the process of knowing, with the process of life. Cognition, according to Maturana and Varela, is the activity involved in the self-generation and self-perpetuation of living systems. In other words, cognition is the very process of life.
It is obvious that we are dealing here with a radical expansion of the concept of cognition and, implicitly, the concept of mind. In this new view, cognition involves the entire process of life - including perception, emotion, and behavior - and does not necessarily require a brain and a nervous system. At the human level, however, cognition includes language, conceptual thought, and all the other attributes of human consciousness.
The Santiago theory of cognition, in my view, is the first scientific theory that really overcomes the Cartesian division of mind and matter, and will thus have the most far-reaching implications. Mind and matter no longer appear to belong to two separate categories but are seen as representing two complementary aspects of the phenomenon of life - the process aspect and the structure aspect. At all levels of life, beginning with the simplest cell, mind and matter, process and structure are inseparably connected. Thus, for the first time, we have a scientific theory that unifies mind, matter and life.
Reference — Fritjof Capra in The Web of Life
Consider any living system as a self-organizing, self-perpetuating system. The living system is structurally coupled (Maturana and Varela) to its environment. And as the system responds to external factors and maintains its own suchness (eg equilibrium) that ongoing process is a essentially a process of knowing. Say a bacterium senses rising heat causing it to move away. Say a plant senses sunlight and grows towards it. Say a person sees food and pursues it.
Connections