Preceded by an introduction by Noortje Marres and Patrice Riemens that stresses the reconstitution of a national communitarianism around the elections, the article analyses the assassination of Pim Fortyn and the rise of a populism of the extreme-right. It is based upon an analysis of the media and of the relative backwardness of Dutch society with regard to the question of technology. According to the author, Pint Fortyn is essentially a media phenomenon made possible through the complicity of (...) TV journalists. The populist demonstrated the crisis of democracy and how out of touch traditional politicians are in the Netherlands, but with a project that brought about political regression and social division. (shrink)

Autonomous bearers of technical know-how, the Hackers have constituted themselves as the first social movement tied to information technology. Here, Patrice Riemens examines the forms taken by this activism and its relationships with political militancy. Whilst the Internet is the site of the convergence/confrontation where technical facts are combined with socio-political battles, Riemens is sceptical about the value of confusing the two movements, and warns of the dangers of mystification which lie in merging both in the vague (...) concept of ’Hacker culture’. Whilst freedom of expression and the free pursuit of knowledge mark the specificity of the Hacker movement, the y are by no means entirely committed to the all of the ideals of the anti-globalisation movement. (shrink)

In this paper, I evaluate recently defended mechanistic accounts of the unity of neuroscience from a metaphysical point of view. Considering the mechanistic framework in general , I argue that explanations of this kind are essentially reductive . The reductive character of mechanistic explanations provides a sufficiency criterion, according to which the mechanism underlying a certain phenomenon is sufficient for the latter. Thus, the concept of supervenience can be used in order to describe the relation between mechanisms and phenomena . (...) Against this background, I show that the mechanistic framework is subject to the causal exclusion problem and faces the classical metaphysical options when it comes to the relations obtaining between different levels of mechanisms . Finally, an attempt to improve the metaphysics of mechanisms is made and further difficulties are pointed out. (shrink)

The paper argues that a functional reduction of ordinary psychology to neuropsychology is possible by means of constructing fine-grained functional, mental sub-types that are coextensive with neuropsychological types. We establish this claim by means of considering as examples the cases of the disconnection syndrome and schizophrenia. We point out that the result is a conservative reduction, vindicating the scientific quality of the mental types of ordinary psychology by systematically linking them with neuroscience. That procedure of conservative reduction by means of (...) functional sub-types is in principle repeatable down to molecular neuroscience. (shrink)

The paper argues that a functional reduction of ordinary psychology to neuropsychology is possible by means of constructing fine-grained functional, mental sub-types that are coextensive with neuropsychological types. We establish this claim by means of considering as examples the cases of the disconnection syndrome and schizophrenia. We point out that the result is a conservative reduction, vindicating the scientific quality of the mental types of ordinary psychology by systematically linking them with neuroscience. That procedure of conservative reduction by means of (...) functional sub-types is in principle repeatable down to molecular neuroscience. (shrink)

International relations are made up of thick layers of meaning and big streams of data. How can we capture the nuances and scales of increasingly digitalised world politics, taking advantage of the possibilities that come with ‘big data’ and ‘digital methods’ in our discipline of International Relations? What is needed, we argue, is a methodological twin-move of making big data thick and thick data big. Taking diplomacy, one of IR's core practices as our case, we illustrate how anthropological and computational (...) approaches can be merged in IR research. We report from our experiences with the project DIPLOFACE: Diplomatic Face-Work between Confidential Negotiations and Public Display, investigating how digital communication technologies influence both the study and conduct of age-old and traditionally analogue practices of inter-state diplomacy. (shrink)

Authors sometimes treat the promise of de-extinction as a forgone conclusion. But if we take Kasperbauer’s approach and assess the moral acceptability of de-extinction by weighting benefits to species against the suffering of individuals, the promise of de-extinction deserves greater critical attention. Accepting de-extinct individuals as replacements for extinct predecessors assumes species are separate from environment and can be reduced to DNA. In this response to Kasperbauer’s essay, I examine how the acceptability of de-extinction might shift if we instead view (...) species as the persistence of processes—the successful know-how of living in relation to other unfolding processes. (shrink)

This book explores the mind-body issue from both the perspectives of philosophy of mind and philosophy of science. Starting from the problem of mental causation, it provides an overview of the contemporary metaphysical discussion and argues in favour of the token-identity thesis, as the only position that can account for the causal efficacy of the mental. Showing furthermore that this ontological reductionism is not dissociable from epistemological reductionism, the author applies a new strategy of inter-theoretic reduction, which is compatible with (...) the multiple realizability of mental properties. Using functionally defined sub-types, this account establishes a conservative reduction of psychology to neuroscience, which vindicates both the scientific legitimacy and the theoretical indispensability of psychology. This account is illustrated by several empirical examples borrowed from contemporary neuroscience. (shrink)

La période est à la transgression. Transgresser est en effet la nécessité même de l'ordre. Tel est le principe de base de tout pouvoir dès lors qu'il se proclame souverain. Autrement dit, il n'est de pouvoir que transgresseur. Telle est aussi l'énigme de la puissance attribuée à l'État depuis son élaboration principielle par Jean Bodin jusqu'aux énoncés de Carl Schmitt dont la formule "est souverain celui qui décide de la situation exceptionnelle", a permis au XXe siècle de donner un autre (...) contenu, dictatorial, à la question de la souveraineté. L'évolution récente de cette notion prise au piège de la fondation des grands ensembles plurinationaux telle l'Union européenne, réactualise la question de l'adéquation de la souveraineté avec la nation. C'est dans cette logique qu'une archéologie de cette notion paraît indispensable pour évaluer sa double évolution dont la première, transcendante et de type vertical, la fait descendre de la toute-puissance divine jusqu'à son incarnation populaire à travers ses séquences ecclésiales (le souverain pontife), royales, nationales et populaires. Une seconde évolution à partir de la Révolution française, que l'on peut qualifier d'horizontale, l'instaure sur le versant de son incarnation imaginée au sein de la nation, souveraineté nationale, ou au plan de l'universalité des citoyens, souveraineté populaire. Qu'elle soit fondée sur une représentation imaginée collective de soi, la nation, ou sur une identité citoyenne étendue à tous, le peuple, la question de la souverainetén'est soluble que dans cette double identité, nationale et populaire à travers la question de la démocratie qui apparaît ici fondamentale pour restituer au souverain-peuple la légitimité des choix qu'il opère au travers de la délégation de ses compétences aux représentants qu'il se donne. En fin de compte, la souveraineté est avant tout toute-puissante, et ainsi, il n'y a de puissance politique que découlant d'elle. (shrink)

An adequate analysis of experiences and situations specific to women, especially mothering, requires consideration of women's difference. A focus on women's difference, however, jeopardizes feminism's claims of women's equal individualist subjectivity, and risks recuperating the inequality and oppression of women, especially the view that all women should be mothers, want to be mothers, and are most happy being mothers. This book considers how thinkers including Simone de Beauvoir, Julia Kristeva, Nancy Choderow and Adrienne Rich struggle to negotiate this dilemma of (...) difference in analyzing mothering, encompassing the paradoxes concerning embodiment, gender and representation they encounter. Patrice Di Quinzio shows that mothering has been and will continue to be an intractable problem for feminist theory itself, and suggests the political usefulness of an explicitly paradoxical politics of mothering. (shrink)

Critics often take conservationists to task for delivering a constant barrage of bad news without offering a compelling vision of the future. Could recent advances in synthetic biology—an optimistic, forward‐looking field with a can‐do attitude—let conservationists develop a new vision and generate some better news? Synthetic biology and related gene‐editing applications could be used to address threats to species. Genetic interventions might also be used in plants to better protect biodiversity in U.S. rangelands and forests. One possibility has stood out (...) in its ability to capture media attention and the public imagination—recreating extinct species. And perhaps a de‐extinction story could counter the seemingly relentless negativity in biodiversity talk. De‐extinction proponent Stewart Brand writes that resurrecting species could shift the “conservation story … from negative to positive, from constant whining and guilt‐tripping to high fives and new excitement.” So, why do many people in conservation oppose the de‐extinction narrative? This essay is an inquiry into whether there are intrinsic social reactions to these types of conservation solutions that might offset their potential benefits. If genetic tools are to be applied to address conservation issues in a realistic and responsible way, their broader social‐cultural implications deserve far more attention than they have so far received. (shrink)

Cet ouvrage se présente comme une introduction d'histoire littéraire et doctrinale au premier volume de l'édition critique des oeuvres de Hugues de Saint-Victor. Il exploite les données fournies par l'étude de la tradition manuscrite du De archa Noe et du Libellus de formatione arche, qui aboutissent à une perception et à une reception renouvellées de ces traîtés. Du premier ouvrage on a tenté, non seulement une histoire, mais une préhistoire: car il a connu un stade oral, celui de collationes dont (...) on aura pu cerner au plus près le contenu avant de reconstituer les procédés rédactionnels du maître victorin. Au cours de ces entretiens du cloître une pédagogie de l'image avait été mise en oeuvre, utilisée conjointement avec la parole. Et de même que la parole donna naissance à une oeuvre écrite (le De archa Noe), de même le dessin qui l'accompagnait est donné sous une forme littéraire, par un écrit qui en livre les modalités concrètes de réalisation (le Libellus). Le statut de cet écrit, longtemps incertain ou atypique, fut originellement celui d'un appendice, distinct mais non disjoint du De archa. Le Libellus est transmis par la tradition manuscrite en deux états: une version brève et une version longue. Le réviseur en fut le victorin lui-même, dont la psychologie d'auteur est ainsi pour une part dévoilée. Un chapitre propose des compléments ou des précisions touchant la datation relative des oeuvres du victorin. L'image employée par maitre Hugues avait été support de ce que l'on pourrait appeler exégèse visuelle. L'histoire du salut, telle qu'elle est représentée dans la figuration de l'arche de Noé, est méditée selon les trois sens scriptuaires médiévaux, qui correspondent en outre à une série d'exercices spirituels, selon la séquence lectio-meditatio-speculatio-contemplatio. Des considérations d'herméneutique (l'image. (shrink)

An adequate analysis of experiences and situations specific to women, especially mothering, requires consideration of women's difference. A focus on women's difference, however, jeopardizes feminism's claims of women's equal individualist subjectivity, and risks recuperating the inequality and oppression of women, especially the view that all women should be mothers, want to be mothers, and are most happy being mothers. This book considers how thinkers including Simone de Beauvoir, Julia Kristeva, Nancy Choderow and Adrienne Rich struggle to negotiate this dilemma of (...) difference in analyzing mothering, encompassing the paradoxes concerning embodiment, gender and representation they encounter. Patrice Di Quinzio shows that mothering has been and will continue to be an intractable problem for feminist theory itself, and suggests the political usefulness of an explicitly paradoxical politics of mothering. (shrink)

L’épreuve projective intitulée « spatiographie projective familiale » a pour objectif de comprendre l’image inconsciente du corps familial à travers l’analyse du dessin groupal de la « maison de rêve ». Par cette méthodologie, les auteurs peuvent établir un diagnostic de la structure des liens inconscients de la famille et en faire un objet médiateur pour la prise en charge psychothérapique et une épreuve projective groupale familiale pour le diagnostic. Le dessin de la « maison de rêve » est un (...) outil original qui investigue les dimensions diachronique et synchronique permettant une approche complète de la structuration de l’image du corps familial. (shrink)

On an internalist account of logical inference, we are warranted in drawing conclusions from accepted premises on the basis of our knowledge of logical laws. Lewis Carroll's regress challenges internalism by purporting to show that this kind of warrant cannot ground the move from premises to conclusion. Carroll's regress vindicates a repudiation of internalism and leads to the espousal of a standpoint that regards our inferential practice as not being grounded on our knowledge of logical laws. Such a standpoint can (...) take two forms. One can adopt either a broadly externalist model of inference or a sceptical stance. I will attempt, in what follows, to defend a version of internalism which is not affected by the regress. The main strategy will be to show that externalism and scepticism are not satisfying standpoints to adopt with regard to our inferential practice, and then to suggest an internalist alternative. (shrink)

Malgré sa proximité avec le courant cypherpunk, le secteur des cryptomonnaies n’a pas toujours été fidèle à ses valeurs anarchistes, la finance capitaliste investissant toujours davantage dans les cryptomonnaies pour s’approprier ces nouveaux produits financiers. Cette ambiguïté se retrouve dans les DAO, cette nouvelle forme de gouvernance créée par la technologie blockchain. Cette gouvernance décentralisée est en effet tout à la fois l’expérimentation d’une démocratie radicale, bien qu’asociale, et un retour à une ploutocratie qui peut cacher la violence de ses (...) décisions par l’automatisme des mécanismes informatiques. (shrink)

Accounts of mothering have both contributed to feminist theory's development and depended on certain of its central concepts. Some of its critics, however, argue that feminist theory is undermined by the problems of exclusion and essentialism. Here I distinguish between these two problems and consider their implications for questions about mothering. I conclude that exclusion and essentialism do not present insurmountable obstacles to theorizing motherhood, but do suggest new directions for such theorizing.

On an internalist account of logical inference, we are warranted in drawing conclusions from accepted premises on the basis of our knowledge of logical laws. Lewis Carroll’s regress challenges internalism by purporting to show that this kind of warrant cannot ground the move from premises to conclusion. Carroll’s regress vindicates a repudiation of internalism and leads to the espousal of a standpoint that regards our inferential practice as not being grounded on our knowledge of logical laws. Such a standpoint can (...) take two forms. One can adopt either a broadly externalist model of inference or a sceptical stance. I will attempt, in what follows, to defend a version of internalism which is not affected by the regress. The main strategy will be to show that externalism and scepticism are not satisfying standpoints to adopt with regard to our inferential practice, and then to suggest an internalist alternative. (shrink)

Cet ouvrage est une réédition numérique d’un livre paru au XXe siècle, désormais indisponible dans son format d’origine.

Despite the important role of the consistency concept in various theoretical frameworks of memory research and its influence on practical investigations it remains unclear as to whether consistency has been firmly grounded as a explanatory factor. Consistency does not determine either a cognitive load or the development of automaticity. However, it does explain the nature of empirical facts that are subsumed by these terms. Consistency is not a psychological factor involved in many important and highly related topics of consciousness research (...) including, implicit learning, and implicit memory. Rather it is the way human beings relate their various mental experiences. (shrink)

The centrality of death rituals has in anthropologically informed studies of Buddhism been little documented. The current volume brings together a range of perspectives on Buddhist death rituals including ethnographic, textual, historical and theoretically informed accounts, and presents the diversity of the Buddhist funeral cultures of mainland Southeast Asia and China. It arises out of the University of Bristol's Centre for Buddhist Studies research project Buddhist Death Rituals in Southeast Asia and China, funded by the United Kingdom's Arts and Humanities (...) Research Council. This project involved extensive new research in Thailand, Laos and China. Other items from that project included several public exhibitions, extensive stills photographs, and several video films. The project-team produced two 30 minutes films on the ghost festival in Laos and China, one on urban funerals in Chiang Mai (Thailand) and several shorter clips dealing with funeral cultures in Laos, Thailand and China. Most of this material (and an extensive bibliography on the topic) is available free of charge from the project website located at the webpage of the Department of Theology and Religious Studies (Centre for Buddhist Studies) at the University of Bristol. (shrink)

Patrice Bergeron,Fabrice Blée,Marc Dumas,Raymond Lemieux,Jean Richard,Gérard Siegwalt.

This essay investigates the linguistic, artistic, and typographical dimensions of Anne Carson’s H of H Playbook and Trojan Women by Euripides: A Comedy. I argue that graphic design and design-thinking principles provide a useful and unexplored theoretical framework for deciphering these books, given the often-complex relationship in them between image and words, and sometimes even words presented in different typeface and handwriting. Carson worked in graphic design for a time, and as a poet, words – and metaphor, specifically – are (...) her primary design tool. Language works in tandem with image and form to create broader artistic meaning. (shrink)

So-called ‘new materialism’ enables feminist theorists to emphasize the agential quality of matter, thereby challenging the notion that matter, particularly the biological body, is passive and inert – a notion that is gendered given the traditional association of passive matter with the feminine. While appreciating the materialist turn increasingly evident in feminist theory, Claire Colebrook warns feminist thinkers against an uncritical appeal to the vitalist tradition, which continues to privilege action, creativity and productivity over that materiality which remains unactualized potential. (...) After outlining the new materialist re-conception of matter, this paper considers the idea of a ‘passive vitalism’, which Colebrook develops in light of Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari's co-authored works. This paper shares Colebrook's contention that the new materialist emphasis on the agency of matter simply extends the model of the human person to the rest of nature. However, the final part of this paper begins to indicate how a theological materialism is able to affirm both the agency and patiency of matter in ways that challenge the view that the avowal of divine transcendence is inevitably opposed to the integrity of material immanence. (shrink)

This paper aims at specifying the complex links which two major and polemically related 18th-century linguistic theories James Harris' universal grammar in Hermes (1751) and John Horne Tooke's system of etymology in the Diversions of Purley (1786, 1804) bear to empiricism. It describes both the ideologicalethical determining factors of the theories and the epistemological consequences dependent upon their respective philosophical orientation (Harris using classical Greek philosophy against empiricism, Tooke criticizing Locke's semantics along Hobbesian lines). The effects within the linguistic theories (...) are examined through a comparison of the theories of determination which follow from divergent theses concerning abstraction. The analysis proposed in this paper exemplifies once more the historical question of the exact location of the compatibility/incompatibility between empiricist and non-empiricist linguistic theories. (shrink)

Louis-Marie Chauvet a élaboré sa théorie du symbolique durant les années structuralistes. Après avoir montré comment la manière dont le théologien des sacrements théorise prête flanc à des critiques pouvant venir de toutes parts, l’article se penche sur l’hypothèse d’un resserrement théorique autour de l’anthropologie culturelle et sociale et du concept d’échange symbolique, afin de prolonger la théologie de l’alliance et de la grâce qu’il développe à partir de la ritualité chrétienne. L’itinéraire de Chauvet témoigne aussi à sa façon des (...) défis que rencontre tout théologien tentant de dialoguer avec les sciences humaines et sociales ; il se retrouve rapidement à la croisée de chemins qui, bien qu’ils se croisent, ne conduisent pas tous au même endroit. (shrink)

Le processus industriel, qui introduit dans le monde naturel des choses d'un genre nouveau, les exemplaires, parfaitement identiques et interchangeables, est le signe et l'instrument d'une reconfiguration radicale de la nature, qui tend à la soumettre au principe du Même. Ainsi, l'évolution naturelle, comme source de nouveauté imprévisible, se trouve progressivement remplacée par l'innovation comme mode de devenir contrôlé.

The concept of ‘problem’ has been recently promoted by the official academic institutions and put at the centre of a new field of research, self-styled ‘transdisciplinary studies’, in order to provide a foundation to a resolutely transdisciplinary approach to research and thought in general. The paper notes that the same move can be found in Deleuze’s philosophy, which provides us with what the technocratic image of thought advocated by transdisciplinary studies ultimately cannot provide: a positive concept of problems where those (...) are not negative moments but originary and active matrices of thought. It then argues that Deleuze owes this concept to the French epistemological tradition, and more specifically to Bachelard, where it is nothing other than the concept of structure. It ends by explicating what particular version of structuralism Deleuze was thus led to construct in order to account for the role of problems in a radically transdisciplinary account of thought: it is the fact that all structures are multi-structured that grounds the essentially transdisciplinary nature of thought. The fact that we could think differently is precisely what makes us think. (shrink)