The double look on complex dimension
Abstract: Many of our motivations are wrongly considered natural. I take 3 examples: staying healthy, protecting nature, upholding equal rights. Behind them lie artificial ideals: Eternal Life, the Natural History Museum, Democratic Equality. Confused with principles truly constitutive of human nature, these ideals crush with their weight many aspects of our lives. They flatten our … Read more
What is Nature? Two ways of seeing Nature: its own and ours. Among militant ecologists this way is an anthropomorphic idealism rather than Nature per se. Gaia is as much “Mother Nature” as the God with the big white beard sitting on His cloud is “Father of All Men”. And not so much women, by … Read more
The notion of the Anthropocene is at the heart of a brief by Pour la Science. What is its use? Has the Earth really changed era or is it an intellectual masturbation of the newest mosquitoes that inhabit it? The file contains 3 articles, 1 exciting framed by 2 fades. Canned land at the Academy … Read more
Dear Collective We tend to grant it a material existence, to endow it with a responsibility to us. A bit like Gaia, the mother planet. We gladly confuse the Collective with the government, or one of its ministries, or even with the imprecise sphere of people of power: their mission would be to make society … Read more
Gaia’s Ups and Downs The Gaia hypothesis, Earth as a living organism, dates back to the 70s (proposed by chemist James Lovelock and microbiologist Lynn Margulis). Initially treated as New Age delirium, Gaia eventually found scientific credit, as a vast system of interconnected lives. The natural sciences today are deeply imbued with this concept. But … Read more
A philosophical revival that founded the technological boom The Age of Enlightenment is synonymous with philosophical renewal. The eighteenth century saw the rise of rationalism and liberalism against religious obscurantism and noble conservatism. The Enlightenment is the one that great minds project on the world and the human condition. Humanity is getting rid of metaphysical … Read more