Bioengineering: the advent of metabiology (part I)

The ability to modify or replace organs or functions and to intervene in the transmission of hereditary characteristics is a fundamental turning point in the development of living organisms and of bioengineering. The history of bioengineering leading to this stage is briefly reviewed and reinterpreted. The view is proposed that bioengineering is the instrument by which metabiology - the continuance of biology with other means - is brought about. Metabiology deals with the study of living organisms as they can be modified by outside interventions on their functions, organs or sub-organs. Some of the fundamental questions raised by interventions from the outside on the organism - such as the loss of validity of the concept of homeostasis and the destruction of any vestige of orthogenesis - are briefly explored. Part II of this paper will appear in the next issue of this Journal.