The extension of the organism into the environment, suggested by some interpretations of autopoiesis, can seem disconcerting. Yet we argue that Villalobos and Razeto-Barry’s attempt to reinscribe the organism inside the physical body, via the criterion of autopoietically produced material coherence, cannot account for the dynamical and highly changeable nature of life. A successful science of life must do justice not only to the life forms that enjoy clear boundaries but also to the squishy, the strange and the technologically modified.
