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Living systems are units of interactions; they exist in an ambience. From a purely biological point of view they cannot be understood independently of that part of the ambience with which they interact: the niche; nor can the niche be defined independently of the living system that specifies it.

— Humberto Maturana Biology of Cognition (1970)

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More quotes by Humberto Maturana

Love is the grounding of our existence as humans, and is the basic emotioning in our systemic identity as human beings.

Humberto Maturana et al (1996)

The relations that define a system as a unity, and determine the dynamics of interaction and transformations which it may undergo as such a unity constitute the organization of the machine.

Autopoiesis and cognition: The realization of the living (1980)

By autopoietic organization, Maturana and Varela meant the] processes interlaced in the specific form of a network of productions of components which realizing the network that produced them constitutes it as a unity.

Autopoiesis and cognition: The realization of the living (1980)

Anything said is said by an observer.

to Maturana in: Heinz von Foerster (1979)

Man knows and his capacity to know depends on his biological integrity; furthermore, he knows that he knows. As a basic psychological and, hence, biological function cognition guides his handling of the universe and knowledge gives certainty to his acts; objective knowledge seems possible and through objective knowledge the universe appears systematic and predictable.

Biology of Cognition (1970)

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