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Article

The mismeasure of machine: Synthetic biology and the trouble with engineering metaphors.

Studies in history and philosophy of biological and biomedical sciences - 1 Dec 2013

Boudry Maarten, Pigliucci Massimo

Abstract excerpt

The scientific study of living organisms is permeated by machine and design metaphors. Genes are thought of as the "blueprint" of an organism, organisms are "reverse engineered" to discover their functionality, and living cells are compared to biochemical factories, complete with assembly lines, transport systems, messenger circuits, etc. Although the notion of design is indispensable to think about adaptations,...

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PMID: 23790452
DOI: 10.1016/j.shpsc.2013.05.013

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PubMed metadata and Literature Corpus relationships. Corpus snapshot updated 7 Sept 2026. Manifest publication-graph-cohort-2026-09-07.1.

Source receipt: pubmed, retrieved 7 Sept 2026.

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