I think that

In the early 1930s Joseph Needham (Gonville and Caius College), Joseph Henry Woodger (I dont know his colledge at Cambridge, but he wrote the book "The Axiomatic Method in Biology" of 1937 at Cambridge, UK), C. H. Waddington (Sidney Sussex College) and Dorothy Wrinch (Girton College) formed the Theoretical Biology Club, to promote the organicist approach to biology. The club was in opposition to mechanism, reductionism and the gene-centric view of evolution. The items 4, 5' & 7' (added by me) in the list below and you will follow my thought immediately.

History of Theoretical Biology (http://www.visual-chaos.org/complexity/branches/thbio.html)

1. Von Bertalanffy's first book, subtitled An Introduction to Theoretical Biology, publ'd in German, 1928

2. Joseph Henry Woodger, Biological Principles, 1929

3. Von Bertalanffy's second book, Theoretical Biology publ'd in German, 1932

4. Theoretical Biology Club begun at Cambridge, UK by Waddington, 1930s

5. Von Bertalanffy's first book transl. German to English by Woodger, 1933

5'. Where he works in this time? (Cambridge, SSC or not?) Waddington, C. H. 1942. “The Epigenotype.” Endeavour 1: 18–20.

6. Concepts of theoretical biology developed in Waddington's book, Strategy of the Genes, 1957

7. Serbelloni conferences (Toward Theoretical Biology) under Waddington's coordination, 1966-70

7'. H. von Foerster and G.W. Zopf Jr. (eds). Principles of Self-Organization. Pergamon Press. (1962).

7''. From 1968 till 2014 Peter I Belobrov can explain why long time the tangled mixture of Theory of Self-Organization (TSO) and Theoretical Biology (TB) returns us to item 5' (70 years ago in first!). I think now that Waddington's landscape is first and main principle of TB is described by PIB's formula: "genetic information realizes under epigenetic control into collective physical processes occurring in condensed phases of the cell". Sure it is real renaissance of classical fundamental idea of Conrad Hal Waddington.

So I dream to visit Cambridge again (as decade ago) for the final step of this analysis.

NB. (' & '' -- added by PIB).