Artificial Life as a bridge between Science and Philosophy

Artificial Life is developing into a peculiar type of discipline, claiming the principle of computational construction a ihe main avenue to explore and produce a new science of life “as it could be”. In this research program, the generation of complex virtual systems may become the actual object of the theories, somehow substituting the usual empirical domain. This brings along not only a deep change in the traditional relationship between the ontological, epistemological and methodological levels, but also the appearance of a new relationship between the theoretical and technical realms, in what constitutes a relevant epistemic problem. Such a state of affairs forces us to reconsider the solid differences apparently established between science and philosophy. Even if the frontiers between these two kinds of knowledge do not completely disappear, new, very dynamic and complex, technologically mediated ways of interaction are being developed between them