This chapter explores the concept of biological autonomy as interpreted through Maturana and Varela’s autopoietic framework and the organisational account. It examines the type of functional integration necessary for a biological system to achieve autonomy and teleology. The chapter argues that autonomy requires the mechanistic integration of functions contributing to self-maintenance and agential capacities. This integration demands a specific organisation of the system’s components, allowing it to establish its own norms. Consequently, an autonomous system exhibits teleology determined by its internal organisation (internal teleology), rather than by an external agent (external teleology). This distinction between internal and external teleology differentiates organisms from machines. In organisms, functional integration fosters autonomy and internal teleology, whereas in machines, it results in a quasi-autonomous system whose structure and function depend on human social contexts.