Biological Relativity: Evolution for the 21st Century

CfP: Biological Relativity, Evolution for the 21st Century | 7-9 January, 2026 | Balliol College | University of Oxford
 
https://oxford2025evolutionconference.com/
 
The Third Way of Evolution, in collaboration with the University of Oxford, Balliol College, and Voices from Oxford, will host a three-day International Conference titled Biological Relativity: Evolution for the 21st Century. 

Renowned leaders will assess the current state-of-the-art in evolution research and propose future directions for innovation in and outside of the academic sciences. The conference will address themes and topics within the evolutionary, biomedical, epigenetic, philosophical, systems-theoretical, and technological sciences. 

Conference attendance is open to everyone, and participation is possible onsite and online after registration.
Lectures are by invitation only. Scholars interested in presenting a poster presentation can submit their abstracts here:
 
https://oxford2025evolutionconference.com/registration-poster-submission/
 
The conference committee is happy to announce it will be awarding ten travel awards to junior poster presenters, each worth £1,000.

We look forward to welcoming you to this pathbreaking conference!
 
Program
 
January 7th, 2026
 
THEME: Biological Relativity and the Biomedical Sciences
* Denis Noble - Biological Relativity and its Implementation in Theories of Evolution
* Benedikt Hallgrímsson - The Polygenic Basis for Mendelian Disease and the Attribution of Cause
* Azra Raza - The Unpredictable Trajectory of Clonal Evolution in Cancer and the Imperative of Early Detection
* Laura Weyrich - Forthcoming
 
THEME: Natural Genetic Engineering, Biogenesis, and Reticulate Evolution
* James A. Shapiro - How Life Changes Itself in Evolution Organically
* Joana C. Xavier - Causality at the Root: Metabolism, Cooperation, and the Making of Life
* Marilyn J. Roossinck - Viruses, Fungi, and Plants: Intimate Relationships
* Predrag Slijepcevic - Biocivilisations: A New Look at the Science of Life
 
Evening Activity: Recital by Denis Noble and the Oxford Trobadors
 
 
January 8th, 2026
 
THEME: Epigenetics and Directed Evolution of Complex Systems
* Raju Pookottil - BEEM: Biological Emergence-based Evolutionary Mechanism: How Species Direct Their Own Evolution
* John Mattick - Kuhnian Revolutions in Molecular Biology and Evolution
* Abir U. (Andrei) Igamberdiev - Evolutionary Complexification as a Generation and Novel Interpretation of Coding Systems in the Process of Natural Computation
* David Obon - Creative Overcome Theory: A Systems-Theoretical Approach to How Innovation Drives Evolution
 
THEME: Paradigms and Narratives of Evolution
* Nathalie Gontier - From the Flower of Evolution to the 7E Cognition Approach for Understanding Symbolic Evolution
* Johann Peter Gogarten - Reticulate Evolution and the Units and Levels of Selection and Evolution
* Laura Nuño de la Rosa - Reproduction and Evolvability
* Athena Aktipis (forthcoming)
 
Evening Lecture by Blaise Agüera y Arcas -  A Cooperative, Computational Theory of Evolution
 
 
January 9th, 2026
 
THEME:
Cognition, Teleonomy, Agency, and Consciousness
* Eva Jablonka - Evolving Evolutionary Theory: Towards a New Unification of the Life-Sciences?
* Pamela Lyon - Cellular Learning and Its Possible Role in Embedding Behavioural Sequences in the Genome
* Peter A. Corning - Teleonomy and Synergy: How Living Systems Shaped Biological Evolution
* Kristin Andrews - The Social Origins of Consciousness
 
THEME: Learning and Intelligence Across and Beyond Life
* Michael Levin - Origin of cognition and its impact on biomedicine and bioengineering
* Oded Rechavi - Transgenerational small RNA inheritance
* Richard Watson - Cognition-First Evolution
* Henry H. Heng - Correcting Darwinism: Macroevolution Precedes Microevolution in Two-Phased Cycles of Information Innovation, Preservation, Mutual Selection, Population Growth, and Carrier Replacement