






































From anthropomimetic to biomimetic 
cities - The place of humans in “cities 
like forests”
Henry Dicks

INTRODUCTION

In Biomimicry: Innovation Inspired by Nature, 
Janine Benyus argued that the key to sustainability 
is to learn from the 3.8 billion years of  “research 
and development” already carried out by nature.1 
Since the publication of  her book, biomimicry 
has been heralded as “the mantra for Silicon 
Valley and other regions of  the techno-sphere”2 
and as a “revolutionary concept” capable of  
underpinning a “Second Industrial Revolution.”3 
In keeping with this, biomimicry is also attracting 
increasing attention from architects and urbanists. 
The famous architecture critic, Charles Jencks, has 
noted that “the basic trend of  the time [is] towards 
biomimesis,”4 and there is a growing tendency 
amongst both architects and urban theorists to see 
natural ecosystems—especially forests—as models 
for the city.5

Perhaps the most significant limitation of  current 
thinking in and around biomimicry is that it focuses 
almost exclusively on technological innovation. 
Turned resolutely towards the future via the concept 
of  sustainability, biomimicry practitioners—usually 
engineers, designers, architects, or urbanists—
typically focus on how basing artificial entities or 
systems on natural models can provide a coherent 
response to the ecological destruction wrought 
by conventional technologies. If  biomimicry is as 
important as its advocates believe, however, then it 
also raises important questions for the humanities, 

throughout 
Western 

history the 
dominant 

model for 
the polis, 
qua both 
city and 

State, has 
been the 

human being

“

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including such disciplines as urban and architectural history, anthropology, 
political theory, sociology, and philosophy. If  buildings and cities are 
henceforth to be based on “natural models,” then how is this different 
from what went on in the past? Did architects and urbanists previously 
design things without reference to models or did they just use different 
models? If  the cities of  the future are to be based on natural ecosystems, 
then what place might humans occupy in these cities and how might the 
emergence of  these cities affect human self-understanding? And, given 
the important but often overlooked relation between the polis qua city 
and the polis qua state, what implications might the rise of  biomimetic 
urbanism have for political theory?

With a view to responding to these questions, this article will be split 
into three parts. In the first two parts, I will argue that the traditional model 
for both the state (Part 1) and the city (Part 2) is the human being. Then, 
in the third part, I will briefly examine the emerging model of  the natural 
ecosystem, and in particular the forest, before going on to consider—via 
an articulation of  Heidegger’s thinking of  the clearing with some recent 
theoretical insights into human evolution—how this new model calls for a 
radical shift in human self-understanding.

1 Anthropomimicry in Political and Social Philosophy

The polis of  the ancient Greeks was both city and state. This is not 
to say, however, that there was not a certain distinction between the two. 
For thinkers like Plato and Aristotle, the community of  citizens that made 
up the state was far more important than the buildings and streets that 
made up the city; politics was far more important than urbanism. This 
split between politics and urbanism has been exacerbated in more recent 
times as the geographical coincidence between city and state eroded 
and the nation-state became the primary political unity. The result is the 
almost complete divorce between political philosophy, on the one hand, 
and architecture and urbanism, on the other. This is not to say, however, 
that political philosophy and urbanism have followed totally different 
paths. Indeed, ever since the ancient Greeks, thinking about the state and 
thinking about the city have evolved in parallel, conceiving their object in 
very similar terms: both the state and the city have been conceived via the 
same foundational model—the human being.

The first major manifestation of  “anthropomimetic” political 
philosophy occurs in Plato’s Republic.6 Seeking a response to the question of  
the nature of  justice, Plato argues that the ideal state would be composed 
of  three classes—philosophers, auxiliaries, and businessmen—each 



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of  which corresponds to a “part” of  the human 
soul—reason, courage, and moderation. Justice, he 
goes on to argue, results from each class “minding 
its own affairs,” for doing so gives rise to that state 
of  harmony and balance between the different 
parts of  the state that Plato sees as the essence of  
justice. Harmony and balance between the different 
parts of  the human soul thus constitute a model 
for the organization of  the state and therewith also 
an answer to the question of  the nature of  justice.

A similarly “anthropomimetic” approach to 
political philosophy was also common in the Middle 
Ages, a famous example being John of  Salisbury’s 
Policraticus, which drew an extensive analogy 
between the organs of  the body and the organs 
of  the state.7 Modern political philosophy was 
also strongly marked by this approach. Hobbes’s 
Leviathan famously opens with the description of  
the state as an “artificial man,”8 and Rousseau’s 
1755 article in the Encyclopédie on political economy 
likewise contains an extended analogy between the 
organs of  the state and the organs of  the human 
body.9 Moreover, it is also important to note the 
role played by speculative anthropology in modern 
political philosophy. The state was conceived in 
analogous terms to the human individual in the 
state of  nature. As individuals entered the social 
contract, thus leaving the state of  nature behind, 
the state of  nature did not completely disappear but 
was instead elevated to the international level; the 
war of  all against all would henceforth take place 
between nations, not individuals.

In the wake of  the French Revolution, as 
representative democracy fitfully emerged as the 
dominant form of  politics in the West, an important 
shift occurred in political philosophy away from 
the nature and role of  government towards what 
Hegel and Marx called “civil society.” Indeed, for 
Marx, all traditional history had focused on the 
“super-structural” issues of  religion, politics, and 

Harmony 
and balance 
between the 

different parts 
of the human soul 

thus constitute 
a model for the 
organization of 

the State

“

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ideology, thus overlooking the relations and forces of  production that 
make up the economic “base.” The separation of  civil society from the 
state, and therewith also the shift from the “political question” to the 
“social question,”10 in turn made possible the emergence of  sociology. 
From its very inception, sociology supposed a specific model for society: 
the physiological one of  the organism. Grappling with the newfound 
separation between state and society, Saint-Simon developed a theoretical 
understanding of  the latter via the concept of  “social physiology” (la 
physiologie sociale).11 In order to understand society scientifically, he 
thought, it was necessary to use concepts drawn from physiology, an 
approach which led him to inquire into the various “organs” of  the “social 
body,” while at the same time seeing political economy, law, and public 
morality as the basic “rules of  hygiene” of  this same social body. Strongly 
influenced by Saint-Simon, Auguste Comte may have abandoned the 
expression “social physiology” in favour of  the neologism “sociology,” 
thus founding the latter as a stand-alone discipline, but he did not abandon 
the organismic model.12 For Comte, the very possibility of  sociology 
as a positive science depended on seeing society as an “organism,” an 
approach that led him to import a wide number of  key operational 
concepts—organs, illnesses, etc.—from physiology. Likewise, in De la 
Division du Travail Social, Durkheim also took up this physiological view 
of  society, arguing that the division of  labour in the “social organism” 
corresponds to the functional division of  the “biological organism” into 
different members and organs.13

For our purposes, there are three key points to underline regarding 
anthropomimetic political and social philosophy. The first is that 
specifically in political philosophy, one finds a strong tendency to focus 
on the soul or mind of  the human individual and its mimetic counterpart 
at the level of  the state. Plato, for example, focuses on what he sees as 
the three different parts of  the soul and their mimetic counterparts in 
the state. Likewise, while Rousseau’s article on political economy draws 
an extensive analogy between the parts of  the human body and the parts 
of  the state, his political philosophy—as developed most notably in Du 
Contrat Social—focuses rather on analogies between the mental faculties of  
human individuals and their corresponding attributes in the state, the most 
notable example being his invocation of  the individual will as a model 
for the “general will.” The second is that the emergence of  sociology 
in the nineteenth century did not amount to a change of  model—away 
from the “anthropological” one favoured by political philosophers from 
Plato to Rousseau and towards a new and different “physiological” or 
“biological” one—but rather a shift in focus within the same basic model, 



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such that the traditional emphasis on the mind, 
and therewith also on the activities of  government 
and science, was replaced by a focus on the body, 
and therewith also on socio-economic activity, 
particularly the work. The third key point is that all 
the political and social philosophy discussed above 
sees the political or social community as composed 
solely of  human beings. Plato’s state is composed 
of  people, not things. The parts of  Hobbes’s state 
that correspond to the different parts or attributes 
of  the human individual (the soul, memory, joints, 
nerves, strength, etc.) are all people (the sovereign, 
counsellors, magistrates, etc.),14 hence the famous 
depiction of  the state on the frontispiece of  
Leviathan as a composite of  human individuals. 
Similarly, in Comte and Durkheim’s work, the parts 
of  the social organism that they think correspond 
to the parts of  the biological organism are all 
different categories of  people. In short, human 
beings provide not just the form but also the matter 
of  the traditional view of  the state.

 

2. Anthropomimicry in Urban Theory 

     The first key manifestation of  anthropomimicry 
in architecture and urban theory occurred in early 
Renaissance Italy in the work of  such important and 
influential figures as Leon Battista Alberti, Filarete, 
and Francesco di Giorgio Martini.15 According to 
the French urban historian Françoise Choay, the 
fundamental explanation for this phenomenon lies 
in what she calls the “scandal of  homo artifex.”16 
Unlike other species, whose constructions follow 
paths determined by their nature, humans are free to 
build things however they choose. So, whereas the 
laws that govern the construction of  beehives or ant 
nests are determined by the nature of  the species, 
humans, as uniquely autonomous agents, must give 
themselves their own laws of  construction. This in 
turn raises the question of  what laws and guidelines 
they should give themselves. The response, Choay 



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explains, was that the construction of  artefacts should follow the form 
of  the human body, for the human body was considered the most perfect 
form in all of  nature, primarily on the grounds that it combined the 
fundamental attributes of  all the various different spheres of  creation, 
from the growth of  plants and the sentience of  animals to the rationality 
and spirituality of  bodiless angels.17 The result was an approach to the 
planning and design of  cities that would dominate Western architecture 
for hundreds of  years: the form of  the city should follow the form of  the 
human body.

There was, however, a complication with this “anthropomimetic” 
approach to urban planning and design. Unlike Vitruvius, who saw 
the human body as a purely formal or aesthetic architectural model, 
the architects and urban theorists of  the early Italian Renaissance also 
looked for functional equivalents to the different parts of  the human 
body.18 The complication was that it was not easy to find meaningful 
points of  comparison between internal organs of  the human body and 
corresponding functional parts of  the city. There was, as Choay notes, a 
“blank” in the city where the internal organs should be.19

Four hundred years later, this blank was eventually filled in. The 
moment of  transition is most clearly visible in the contest between Antoni 
Rovira i Tras and Ildefonso Cerda for the renovation of  Barcelona in the 
mid-nineteenth century. Rovira’s project accepted the basic methodology 
of  the early Italian Renaissance: the renovation of  Barcelona was to follow 
the ideal aesthetic form of  the human body. As Antonio Lopez de Aberasturi 
explains: “[f]rom the head – the forum  to the peripheral members, the 
proportions of  its [the proposed city’s] elements are modelled on the 
proportions of  the human body, in conformity with the teachings of  the 
great treatises of  classical architecture.”20 (my translation) Cerda, on the 
other hand, introduced a functionalist approach. The city should not have 
the aesthetic form of  the human body, but rather the functional efficacy 
of  the biological organism. The urbanist, in this new framework, takes 
on the role of  both “anatomist” and “doctor” of  the “urban organism.” 
His role is first to dissect the city, to analyse its biological functions—its 
systems of  consumption, digestion, circulation, evacuation of  waste, and 
so on—and then, in the case of  pathology, to intervene in such a way 
that the city may be cured of  any “illness.” So, just as Auguste Comte’s 
founding of  sociology as a positive science required society to be seen as 
an organism, so the emergence of  urbanism as a positive science—which 
Choay traces back to Cerda’s Teoría General de l’Urbanización—likewise 
required the city to be seen in this same physiological way.21



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But the city, as theorized by the nascent science 
of  urbanism, was not just any old organism. Indeed, 
as the development of  urban infrastructures over the 
course of  the nineteenth and twentieth centuries has 
testified, the principal technological developments 
in the thinking and practice of  urban planning and 
design typically evoked the model of  the specifically 
human or animal organism. For example, the 
mid-nineteenth century British hygienists, and 
Frederick Ward in particular, proposed new forms 
of  centralized urban water systems whose pipes 
were based on the model of  “arteries,” “veins,” and 
“capillaries,” whose steam-powered pumps used to 
transport water uphill were based on the “heart,” 
and whose impermeable paving, which was thought 
to protect the city from disease, was modelled on 
the “skin.”22 Perhaps the greatest example of  this 
way of  thinking, however, is to be found in Le 
Corbusier’s Urbanisme, which describes the city as a 
“human organism,” its buildings as “cells,” its roads 
as “arteries,” its parks as “lungs,” and the urbanist 
as its “doctor” or “surgeon,” depending on the 
severity of  the treatment required. In the book’s 
appendix, Le Corbusier even provides various 
diagrams of  the internal organs of  the human body, 
explicitly referencing them as models on which his 
practice as an urbanist is grounded.23

In view of  the above analyses, it is clear that 
the evolution of  Western thinking about both 
states and cities has followed a similar path. Indeed, 
while some moments in history have given rise to 
particularly intense moments of  activity for the 
former (e.g., the Enlightenment) and others for 
the latter (e.g., the Renaissance), it is also true that 
there have been periods of  strong convergence, 
most notably the mid-nineteenth century, which 
saw the simultaneous emergence of  both sociology 
and urbanism, viewed as positive sciences, thanks in 
large part to a shared grounding in the physiological 
model of  the organism. This is not to say, however, 
that history does not also reveal significant 

 Unlike 
other species, 

whose 
constructions 
follow paths 
determined by 

their nature, 
humans are 

free to build 
things however 

they choose

“

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theoretical differences between the polis qua city and the polis qua state. 
We have already seen that the mid-nineteenth century marked a change 
in focus from the Enlightenment vision of  the human soul or mind as 
model for the workings of  government to the sociological vision of  the 
functional differentiation of  the biological body or organism as model 
for the social division of  labour. In the case of  urban theory, by contrast, 
the shift is not from mind to body, but rather from the outward, aesthetic 
form of  the human body to its internal, functional organization. A second 
major difference concerns the composition of  the anthropomimetic state 
in contrast to that of  the anthropomimetic city. Whereas the former 
is composed solely of  human beings, the latter is composed rather of  
houses, temples, fortresses, city walls, market places, and other artificial 
constructions, though later also infrastructure, most of  which was 
inanimate, as in the case of  transport, water, and energy networks, though 
some of  which was composed of  living beings, as in the case of  the new 
urban parks, whose creation was justified throughout the Western world 
on the grounds that they constituted the “lungs of  the city.”24

3 The Biomimetic Polis and the Question of the Human

It is not hard to see that modelling cities and states on human 
individuals is ecologically problematic. Viewed ecologically, humans are 
“consumers.” To base cities and states on the model of  human individuals 
is thus to create urban and socio-political systems whose continued 
existence depends on the extraction and consumption of  vast quantities 
of  energy and materials from their environment and which also generate 
huge quantities of  waste and pollution. Conversely, to base cities and 
states on natural ecosystems would be to create urban and socio-political 
systems which generate their own usable energies and materials while also 
recycling their wastes in processes analogous to natural nutrient cycling.

To get a brief  idea of  the power of  this new model, let us briefly 
consider the potential implications of  Braungart and McDonough’s motto, 
“[i]magine a building like a tree, a city like a forest,”25 for sustainable energy 
systems. According to this model, every building would capture all or 
almost all of  the energy it requires using solar panels, whether photovoltaic 
or, in the future, using techniques closer to natural photosynthesis. As 
for distribution, just as in the forest the rhizosphere connects the trees 
together such that excess sugars may be passed on to mycelium in the 
soil and thereby also on to other trees, so “energy positive” buildings 
would pass on their excess energy to buildings that do not meet their 
own energy requirements via a distributed underground grid. And finally, 



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just as in the forest the mobile 
organisms—the insects and 
animals—obtain their energy 
in the first instance from 
the plants, so in a city like a 
forest, the mobile elements—
cars, trams, drones, etc.—
could also obtain their energy 
directly from the buildings.

While it would in theory 
be possible to develop all 
sorts of  other examples of  
how forest ecosystems could help us re-think the 
technological foundations of  our cities and states, 
the key question that the remainder of  this article will 
seek to address is rather the anthropological one of  
the “place” humans might occupy in the biomimetic 
polis, and therewith also the issue of  how basing the 
polis on forest ecosystems calls on us to re-think our 
self-understanding. Before developing a response 
to these questions, it is important to recall two 
key features of  the basic anthropology supposed 
by modern political philosophers: first, the key 
opposition that structures this anthropology is that 
of  a body shared with the rest of  nature and a mind 
unique to humans; second, human individuals—
qua syntheses of  bodies and minds—provide both 
the form on which the state is modelled and the 
matter of  which it is composed. In this manner, the 
state provides a place where these dual aspects of  
the human may find fulfilment: bodily fulfilment 
may be attained via the activity of  consumption 
we share with animals and mental fulfilment by 
the intellectual activities—politics, science, art, 
etc.—that humans alone possess. In view of  this, 
it could perhaps be thought that the biomimetic 
polis runs the risk of  going to the opposite extreme 
of  the anthropomimetic polis (i.e., of  excluding 
the human altogether). If  the basic models for 
the different elements of  the state are provided by 
nature—plants, animals, fungi, etc.—and not by the 

Figure 1: the construc-

tion of the city of 

Savannah, Georgia in 

an area of cleared 

forest



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human, then what place might the biomimetic polis accord to humans? In 
response to this question, the key argument sketched out in the remainder 
of  the article is that it is possible to think the place of  the human in 
“cities like forests” via the development of  a speculative philosophical 
anthropology that combines Heidegger’s ontological thinking of  the 
“clearing” with various anthropological insights that have emerged from 
the study of  human evolution and pre-history.

4 The Clearing in Anthropology and Philosophy

In “The End of  Philosophy and the Task of  Thinking,” Heidegger 
describes the clearing as “the open region for everything that becomes 
present and absent.”26 This becoming present, he thinks, depends on 
humans’ unique ability to understand Being (i.e., the “as”), for it is “as” 
things—as tools, as other humans, as animals, as Gods, etc.—that beings 
show up in the clearing. It is widely assumed in the secondary literature on 
the subject that the clearing in the forest is ultimately just a “metaphor” 
for this uniquely human ability to understand the “as.”27 On this reading, 
the clearing in the forest is simply a figurative representation of  being-
in-the-world, and in particular of  its spatiality. In what follows, we will 
see that it is possible to draw on contemporary interpretations of  human 
evolution and pre-history in order to interpret the clearing not as mere 
metaphor, but rather as a literal and insightful description of  the “there,” 
understood as the space where the “as” reveals itself.

For the first four or five million years since our hominid predecessors 
separated from the common ancestor they shared with chimpanzees, the 
driving force behind human evolution was the thinning out of  the tropical 
forests of  Africa and therewith also the transition from an arboreal lifestyle 
to one which increasingly took place in open environments.28 According 
to the French paleo-anthropologist Pascal Picq, it was precisely the 
completion of  this transition to open environments—and not an increase 
in brain size, the generalization of  tool-use, bipedalism, language, or any 
other single factor—that defines the genre homo,29 and therewith also 
what are widely referred to as “early humans.” The emergence of  “modern 
humans,” approximately 1.5 million years later, again marked a significant 
shift in our ancestors’ relation to the environment. If  “anatomically 
modern humans” emerged approximately 200,000 years ago, it was not 
until approximately 50,000 years ago—during the depths of  the last Ice 
Age—that so-called “modern behaviour” emerged. Then, as soon as the 
glaciers receded some 12,000 years ago, a dramatic increase in the human 
population came about thanks largely to the widespread practice of  



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deforestation, whether to create space in which to 
dwell, hunt, and gather or to adopt the agriculture 
and architectural techniques characteristic of  the 
Neolithic Revolution.30 The clearing, on this view, is 
not a metaphor for the space where humans dwell, 
for the genre homo is not only biologically adapted 
to living in the clearings or open environments 
opened up several million years ago by climate 
change, but also, and largely because of  this 
adaptation, has in its most recent incarnation—
behaviourally modern humans—constantly sought 
to clear forests, a practice that has now spread so far 
and wide that human habitation of  clearings goes 
largely unnoticed.31

But the clearing is not just a physical habitat, 
an open environment to which members of  the 
species homo sapiens are biologically and culturally 
adapted, for it must also be seen in Heideggerian 
terms as the space where Being “reveals itself,” 
thus “opening itself ” to understanding. In what 
follows we will not seek to understand the complex 
philosophical issue of  the “self-disclosure” of  
Being in its entirety, but rather to analyse one 
important feature of  this process that is particularly 
important for the present inquiry: concomitant 
with the self-disclosure of  the “as” there emerges 
the possibility of  seeing one being “as” or “like” 
another being. This feature of  the self-disclosure 
of  Being resonates with the argument put forward 
by the cognitive anthropologist Steven Mithen that 
what ultimately distinguishes modern humans from 
early humans is “cognitive fluidity.” By cognitive 
fluidity, Mithen means the ability to combine the 
various different categories of  thought and forms 
of  intelligence so as to produce original syntheses.32 
So, whereas Mithen thinks that the Neanderthals 
had what he calls a “natural history intelligence,” a 
“technical intelligence,” and a “social intelligence,” 
each of  which was more or less as fully developed 
as that of  modern humans, he also thinks they were 
unable to combine these various different forms 

what 
place might 

the biomimetic 
polis accord 

to humans?

“
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of  intelligence and the categories of  thought on which they depend to 
produce novel syntheses.

It is not hard to see that it is this openness of  the “as,” this cognitive 
fluidity, which gives humans the unique ability to blend together their 
understandings of  nature, of  technology, and of  humanity, that constitutes 
the ontological ground for the creation of  both the anthropomimetic 
and the biomimetic polis. It is what makes it possible to conceive cities 
and states based on the model of  the human individual, understood as 
a composite of  an animal body and a human mind, just as it is also the 
ontological ground that allows humans to conceive cities and states based 
on the model of  the forest, understood not just as a natural ecosystem, 
but also as containing clearings and therewith also the open relationship 
to the “as” that is unique to humans. With this in mind, it would seem 
that the transition from an anthropomimietic to a biomimetic model of  
the polis makes possible a new way of  thinking about what distinguishes 
humans from nature: in contrast to the traditional distinction between the 
mind and the body, the new distinction would be based instead on the 
opposition between the forest and the clearing. After the “mind/body” 
dualism of  modernity, which identifies the human with the mental and 
the natural with the bodily, there may thus emerge what I propose to 
call an “enlightened naturalism” (naturalisme éclairé), which, as the word 
“naturalism” suggests, seeks to explain the emergence of  the human in 
naturalistic terms via the study of  human evolution, while at the same 
time also making it possible to think about what is ontologically distinctive 
about the human—the open relation to Being—via the concept of  the 
“clearing” (clairière).

Conclusion

Whereas the traditional model for the polis was the “anthropomimetic” 
one of  the human being, the emergence of  biomimicry has led to the 
possibility not only of  taking the forest as a model for the polis, but also 
of  understanding the genesis of  this model from out of  the clearing, 
understood not only as an open environment, but also as the space where 
the “as” discloses itself, thereby making it possible to see one thing “as” 
or “like” another thing. This in turn calls for a radical shift in human 
self-understanding: rather than seeing ourselves as composites of  an 
animal body and a human mind, we may henceforth see ourselves as 
former forest-dwellers who have come to dwell in open environments 
and who, in doing so, have ultimately acquired an open relation to Being, 
hence the possibility of  conceiving states as “artificial men,” societies as 



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“organisms,” cities like “forests,” and so on and so 
forth. From this perspective, rather than trying to 
overcome the much-maligned mind-body dualism 
of  modernity in the name of  either reductionist 
monism (e.g., scientific naturalism) or postmodern 
pluralism, the task we face is rather to theorize 
an “enlightened naturalism” (naturalisme éclairé), 
which articulates naturalistic explanations of  
human evolution with ontological thinking about 
the “clearing” (clairière). Moreover, as far as the 
relation between architecture and philosophy is 
concerned, although Heidegger’s significance for 
architecture has been much discussed,33 the idea 
that building takes place in clearings and that there 
may be an important link between clearings in 
the naturalistic and ontological senses has, to my 
knowledge, yet to be explored. From Vitruvius34 
to Le Corbusier,35 it has commonly been assumed 
that the first ever buildings were constructed in 
forest clearings, but this has not been linked to 
the ontological sense of  the clearing, and thereby 
also to the question of  the being of  buildings, and 
in particular to their openness to being seen “as” 
imitations of  the perfect human form, “as” cells in 
an urban organism, or “as” habitable imitations of  
the trees that made way for them in the first place. 
Lastly, it is of  course also important to consider 
how the model of  the forest may allow us to rethink 
not just architecture and urbanism, but also the 
polis in the political sense. Could the model of  the 
forest biome help provide a model for the political 
economy of  entire nation states and in particular 
for their agricultural and industrial production? 
And, if  the forest is the model for the polis, could 
the clearing perhaps provide a model for the agora, 
understood as the economic and political space of  
markets, parliaments, tribunals, and so on, where 
the essential discussions and decisions of  its human 
inhabitants take place?

 

the 
emergence 

of biomimicry 
has led to the 
possibility not 
only of taking 

the forest as a 
model for the 

polis, but also 
of according 

humans a place 
within this 

model

“

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Endnotes

[1] Janine Benyus, Biomimicry: Innovation Inspired by Nature (New York: 
Harper Perennial, 1997).

[2] Dickson Despommier, The Vertical Farm: Feeding the World in the 21st 
Century (New York: Picador, 2011), 34.

[3] Freya Mathews, “Towards a Deeper Philosophy of  Biomimicry,” 
Organization & Environment 24, no. 4 (2011): 364-387.

[4] Charles Jencks, The Story of  Postmodernism (Chichester: John Wiley, 
2011), 225.

[5] See Michael Braungart and William McDonough, Cradle to Cradle: 
Re-Making the Way We Make Things (London: Vintage, 2009); Luc Schuiten 
and Pierre Loze, Vers une Cité Végétale (Wavre: Madraga, 2010); Vincent 
Callebaut, Paris 2050: Les Cités Fertiles Faces Aux Enjeux du XX siècle (Paris: 
Michel Lafon, 2015); and Maibritt Pedersen Zari, “Ecosystem Services 
Analysis: Mimicking Ecosystem Services for Regenerative Urban Design,” 
International Journal of  Sustainable Built Environment 4, no. 1 (2015): 145–157.

[6] Plato, The Republic, trans. Desmond Lee (London: Penguin Classics, 
1974).

[7] John of  Salisbury, Policraticus: of  the Frivolties of  Courtiers and the Footprints 
of  Philosophers, trans. Cary J. Nederman (Cambridge: Cambridge University 
Press, 1990).

[8] Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan or the Matter, Form & Power of  a Commonwealth 
Ecclesiastical and Civill (London: Andrew Cooke, 1651).

[9] Jean-Jacques Rousseau, “Discours sur l’Economie Politique,” in Du 
Contrat Social, ed. Robert Derathé (Paris: Gallimard, 2007), 66. 

[10] Serge Moscovici, Essai sur l’Histoire Humaine de la Nature (Paris: 
Flammarion, 1977).

[11] Claude Henri Saint-Simon, De la Physiologie Sociale: Œuvres Choisies 
(extraits 1803-1825), ed. Georges Gurvitch (Paris: Presses Universitaires 
de France, 1965).

[12] Auguste Comte, Leçons de Sociologie: Cours de Philosophie Positive (Paris: 
Flammarion, 1995), 47-51.

[13] Emile Durkheim, De la Division du Travail Social, (Paris: Editions 
Norph-Nop, 2011).

[14] The only significant exceptions to this are money and goods, which 
Hobbes depicts as the “blood” of  the “artificial man.”

[15] Jütte has documented how in late medieval Europe houses were often 



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conceived by analogy with human beings, but he 
also notes that it was only with the Renaissance that 
the “boom” in anthropomorphic architecture truly 
began. See Daniel Jütte, “Living Stones: The House 
as Actor in Early Modern Europe,” Journal of  Urban 
History, 42, no. 4 (2015): 659-687.

[16] Françoise Choay, “La ville et le domaine 
bâti comme corps dans les textes des architectes-
théoriciens de la première renaissance italienne,” 
Nouvelle Revue de Psychanalyse  9 (1974): 239-251.

[17] Ibid., 247.

[18] Ibid., 244.

[19] Ibid., 246.

[20] Antonio Lopez de Aberasturi, “Introduction,” 
in La Théorie Générale de L’Urbanisation d’Ildefonso 
Cerdà, trans. Antonio Lopez de Aberasturi (Paris: 
Editions du Seuil, 1979), 22.

[21] Françoise Choay, La Règle et le Modèle: Sur 
la Théorie de l’Architecture et de l’Urbanisme (Paris: 
Editions du Seuil, 1996).

[22] Frederick Ward, Discours Prononcé à la Séance 
d’Ouverture du Congrès International de Bienfaisance, 
(Bruxelles: Librairie Européenne, C. Muquardt, 
1856), 9-31.

[23] Le Corbusier, Urbanisme (Paris: Flammarion, 
1994).

[24] Catherine Ward Thompson, “Linking 
Landscape and Health: The Recurring Theme,” 
Landscape and Urban Planning 99 (2011): 191.

[25] Michael Braungart and William McDonough, 
Cradle to Cradle, 139.

[26] Martin Heidegger, “The End of  Philosophy 
and the Task of  Thinking,” in Basic Writings, ed. 
David F. Krell (Oxford: Routledge, 1993), 442.

[27] See Richard Capobianco, Engaging Heidegger 
(Toronto: University of  Toronto Press, 2010), 89; 
Thomas Sheehan, Making Sense of  Heidegger: A 
Paradigm Shift (London: Rowman and Littlefield, 



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2015), 20-21.

[28] Jean-Jacques Hublin, Quand d’Uutres Hommes Peuplaient la Terre (Paris: 
Flammarion, 2008).

[29] Pascal Picq, Au Commencement était l’Homme (Paris: Odile Jacob, 2009), 
99-100.

[30] Michael Williams, Deforesting the Earth: From Prehistory to Global Crisis 
(Chicago: University of  Chicago Press, 2002).

[31] Robert Harrison, Forests: The Shadow of  Civilization (Chicago: University 
of  Chicago Press, 1992), 245.

[32] Steven Mithen, The Prehistory of  the Mind: A Search for the Origins of  Art, 
Religion and Science (London: Thames and Hudson, 1996), 203.

[33] See Miguel De Beistegui, Thinking with Heidegger (Indianapolis: Indiana 
University Press, 2003); Adam Sharr, Heidegger for Architects (Oxford: 
Routledge, 2007).

[34] Choay, “La ville et le domaine,” 239-251.

[35] Le Corbusier, Vers une Architecture (Paris: Flammarion, 1995).


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	3-Pedragosa
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