From the harmony to the tension: Helmuth Plessner and Kurt Goldstein's readings of Jakob von Uexküll.

This paper investigates the reception and discussion of Jakob von Uexküll's biological theory by two German thinkers of his time, Helmuth Plessner and Kurt Goldstein. It demonstrates how their bio-philosophical perspectives are on the one hand indebted to Uexküll's theory and, on the other, critical of its tendency to excessively harmonize the relationship between living beings and their environment. This original critical reading of the Umweltlehre is rooted in ambiguities within Uexküll's own thought - between a dynamic conception of the organism-environment relationship and the idea of "conformity to a plan" -, , which is here examined in the second section.