---
title: "Generalized Biomimesis"
description: "Cavalli, Chang, Milne & Morgan's name for the default paradigm of human technics: not just copying a particular organism (biodesign) but treating \"nature\" as design's telos and moral guarantor."
type: "glossary-term"
canonical_url: "https://antikythera.wiki/terms/generalized-biomimesis"
md_url: "https://antikythera.wiki/md/terms/generalized-biomimesis"
last_updated: "2026-09-06"
site: "Antikythera Wiki"
---

# Generalized Biomimesis

> A working definition written for this wiki from the reading notes; not Antikythera's own wording. From Antikythera Wiki (https://antikythera.wiki/terms/generalized-biomimesis), an independent guide to Antikythera's published work.

Cavalli, Chang, Milne & Morgan's name for the default paradigm of human technics: not just copying a particular organism (biodesign) but treating "nature" as design's telos and moral guarantor. Rooted in the Girardian/Tardean thesis that humans are innately mimetic, it makes nature a *mediating model* (Daedalus and Leonardo copying birds) rather than a blueprint, and carries an ethical surplus — the naturalistic fallacy turned into a design ethic, visible in the late-1990s fusion of biomimicry with sustainability. Nature here is a Castoriadian "imaginary signification," defined negatively as everything not artificial. The authors grant its real engineering successes and ask only whether it should remain the *exclusive* prototype for design.

## Appears in

- [Substrates Unbound](https://antikythera.wiki/work/journal/substrates) (2025-11-21)
- [Xenophylum: Toward a Synthetic Cambrian Explosion](https://antikythera.wiki/work/journal/coginfra/xenophylum) (2025-05-10)

_Glossary generated 2026-09-06._