Towards a philosophical underpinning of the holistic concept of integrity of organisms within organic agriculture; Theme: Values in Organic Agriculture

The concept of naturalness can be used to characterize organic agriculture and to distinguish it from conventional agriculture, provided naturalness not only refers to the non-use of synthesized chemicals, but also to the ecological and systemic principles, and to a respect for the integrity of living organisms. Examples of the implicit use of the integrity concept in agriculture will be described to show its practical aspects and implications. The (non-atomistic) holistic concept of integrity of organisms has been the subject of severe scientific criticism – specially from in essence ontological reductionists. In their view, an organism is essentially no more than a complex set of atoms and molecules and its integrity a non-concept. In order to reach scientific acceptance of the integri..........

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