Methods and equations for analysing the kinetics of enzyme-catalysed reactions were developed at the beginning of the 20th century in two centres in particular; in Paris, by Victor Henri, and, in Berlin, by Leonor Michaelis and Maud Menten. Henri made a detailed analysis of the work in this area that had preceded him, and arrived at a correct equation for the initial rate of reaction. However, his approach was open to the important objection that he took no account of the (...) hydrogen-ion concentration (a subject largely undeveloped in his time). In addition, although he wrote down an expression for the initial rate of reaction and described the hyperbolic form of its dependence on the substrate concentration, he did not appreciate the great advantages that would come from analysis in terms of initial rates rather than time courses. Michaelis and Menten not only placed Henri's analysis on a firm experimental foundation, but also defined the experimental protocol that remains standard today. Here, we review this development, and discuss other scientific contributions of these individuals. The three parts have different authors, as indicated, and do not necessarily agree on all details, in particular about the relative importance of the contributions of Michaelis and Menten on the one hand and of Henri on the other. Rather than force the review into an unrealistic consensus, we consider it appropriate to leave the disagreements visible. (shrink)

Zeven mensen die door hun werkzaamheden met zieken en stervenden in aanraking komen, schrijven over hun ervaringen met de dood.

1 Hesiod's Myth of the Races: An Essay in Structural Analysis Hesiod's poem ' Works and Days' begins with the telling of two myths. ...

Jean-Pierre Vernant delineates a compelling new vision of ancient Greece that takesus far from the calm and familiar images of Polykleitos and the Parthenon, and reveals a culture ofslavery, of blood sacrifice, of perpetual and ritualized warfare, of ceremonial hunting andecstasies.In his provocative discussions of various institutions and practices including war,marriage, and the city state, Vernant unveils a complex and previously unexplored intersection ofthe religious, social, and political structures of ancient Greece. He concludes with a genealogy ofthe study (...) of myth from antiquity to the present, and offers a critique of structuralism.Jean-PierreVernant is Professor Emeritus of Comparative Study of Ancient Religions at the College de France inParis. (shrink)

In this work, published here as a single volume, the authors present a disturbing and decidedly non-classical reading of Greek tragedy that insists on its radical discontinuity with our own outlook and with our social, aesthetic, and psychological categories.

Here Jean-Pierre Changeux elucidates our current knowledge of the human brain, taking an interdisciplinary approach and explaining in layman's terms the complex theories and scientific breakthroughs that have significantly improved our ...

Structuralism has recently moved center stage in philosophy of mathematics. One of the issues discussed is the underlying logic of mathematical structuralism. In this paper, I want to look at the dual question, namely the underlying structures of logic. Indeed, from a mathematical structuralist standpoint, it makes perfect sense to try to identify the abstract structures underlying logic. We claim that one answer to this question is provided by categorical logic. In fact, we claim that the latter can be seen—and (...) probably should be seen—as being a structuralist approach to logic and it is from this angle that categorical logic is best understood. (shrink)

How do chemists assign numbers to chemicals properties? What do these numbers refer to? To answer these questions, we will first point out both the context-dependence of chemicals and the epistemic limitations of chemistry. We will then investigate how chemists use various procedures to stabilize measurements and how they use mixtures of samples as “references” in order to determine the amount of different chemicals in a sample. This study will enable us to query how it is possible for chemists to (...) change one factor while holding others constant at each step of the measurement procedure. This part of our work which will lead us to query the meaning of the ceteris paribus clause and the very possibility of making holistic inferences in the domain of chemistry. To conclude, we will highlight how methodological pluralism developed by chemists makes it possible for a relational type of consistency to emerge. (shrink)

Le réalisme scientifique occupe une place centrale dans le système philosophique de Mario Bunge. Au cœur de cette thèse, on trouve l’affirmation selon laquelle nous pouvons connaître le monde partiellement. Il s’ensuit que les théories scientifiques ne sont pas totalement vraies ou totalement fausses, mais plutôt partiellement vraies et partiellement fausses. Ces énoncés sur la connaissance scientifique, à première vue plausible pour quiconque est familier avec la pratique scientifique, demandent néanmoins à être clarifiés, précisés et, ultimement, à être inclus dans (...) un cadre théorique plus large et rigoureux. Depuis ses toutes premières publications sur ces questions et jusqu’à récemment, Mario Bunge n’a cessé d’interpeller les philosophes afin qu’ils développent une théorie, au sens propre du terme, de la vérité partielle afin de clarifier les enjeux épistémologiques liés au réalisme scientifique. Bunge a lui-même proposé plusieurs parties de cette théorie au fil des années, mais aucune de ces propositions ne l’a satisfait pleinement et la construction de cette théorie demeure un problème entier. Dans ce texte, nous passerons rapidement en revue certaines des approches proposées par Bunge dans ses publications et nous esquisserons certaines pistes qui devraient servir à tout le moins de desiderata pour la construction d’une théorie de la vérité partielle. (shrink)

Jean-Pierre Dupuy, prophet of what he calls "enlightened doomsaying," has long warned that modern society is on a path to self-destruction. In this book, he pleads for a subversion of this crisis from within, arguing that it is our lopsided view of religion and reason that has set us on this course. In denial of our sacred origins and hubristically convinced of the powers of human reason, we cease to know our own limits: our disenchanted world leaves us (...) defenseless against a headlong rush into the abyss of global warming, nuclear holocaust, and the other catastrophes that loom on our horizon. Reviving the religious anthropology of Max Weber, Emile Durkheim, and Marcel Mauss and in dialogue with the work of René Girard, Dupuy shows that we must remember the world's sacredness in order to keep human violence in check. A metaphysical and theological detective, he tracks the sacred in the very fields where human reason considers itself most free from everything it judges irrational: science, technology, economics, political and strategic thought. In making such claims, The Mark of the Sacred takes on religion bashers, secularists, and fundamentalists at once. Written by one of the deepest and most versatile thinkers of our time, it militates for a world where reason is no longer an enemy of faith. (shrink)

In this paper, we look at Bourbaki’s work as a case study for the notion of mathematical style. We argue that indeed Bourbaki exemplifies a mathematical style, namely the structuralist style.

This paper first queries what type of concept of emergence, if any, could be connected with the different chemical activities subsumed under the label ‘quantum chemistry’. In line with Roald Hoffmann, we propose a ‘rotation to research laboratory’ in order to point out how practitioners hold a molecular whole, its parts, and the surroundings together within their various methods when exploring chemical transformation. We then identify some requisite contents that a concept of emergence must incorporate in order to be coherent (...) from the standpoint of the scientific practices involved. In this respect, we finally propose a relational form of emergence which pays attention to the constitutive role of the modes of intervention and to the co-definition of the levels of organization. No metaphysical distinction between the higher and basic levels of organization is supposed, but only a plurality of modes of access. Moreover, these modes of access are not construed as mere ways of revealing intrinsic patterns of organization but, on the contrary, are considered to be active elements on which the constitution of those patterns depends. What is at stake in this paper is therefore not an ontological form of emergence but an agnostic one which fits what chemists do in their daily work. (shrink)

In a remarkable exchange between neuroscientist Jean-Pierre Changeux and philosopher Paul Ricoeur, this book explores the vexed territory between these...

Starting from a nonlinear relativistic Klein-Gordon equation derived from the stochastic interpretation of quantum mechanics (proposed by Bohm-Vigier, (1) Nelson, (2) de Broglie, (3) Guerra et al. (4) ), one can construct joint wave and particle, soliton-like solutions, which follow the average de Broglie-Bohm (5) real trajectories associated with linear solutions of the usual Schrödinger and Klein-Gordon equations.

A Study of the History and Philosophy of Category Theory Jean-Pierre Marquis. to say that objects are dispensable in geometry. What is claimed is that the specific nature of the objects used is irrelevant. To use the terminology already ...

In this paper, I introduce and examine the notion of “mathematical engineering” and its impact on mathematical change. Mathematical engineering is an important part of contemporary mathematics and it roughly consists of the “construction” and development of various machines, probes and instruments used in numerous mathematical fields. As an example of such constructions, I briefly present the basic steps and properties of homology theory. I then try to show that this aspect of contemporary mathematics has important consequences on our conception (...) of mathematical knowledge, in particular mathematical growth. (shrink)

Evaluative Semantics proposes a strongly postmodernist theory of cognition, ideology and discourse in which the structure and internal consistency of ideology resemble those of evaluative knowledge of the mind. The strength of this book is that it goes beyond purely theoretical claims to propose an original connectionist model of evaluative interpretation. Malrieu's new semantics makes a unique contribution to the literature of cognitive science, linguistics, and discourse analysis.

La théorie du Contróle du Métabolisme décrit comment un réseau métabolique répond à de petites perturbations au voisinage d'un état stationnaire. Deux types de coefficients sont définis: les coefficients d'élaslicité qui quantifient les variations des vitesses des étapes isolées et les coefficients de contrôle qui expriment la réponse globale du réseau aux perturbations d'une étape donnée. Des relations entre ces coefficients existent ).On ne fait pas toujours la distinction entre Contrôle et Régulation. En fait, il apparait que la notion de (...) régulation, si elle est trés claire lorsqu'il s'agit de la régulation de l'activité d'un enzyme, West plus du tout définie lorsqu'il s'agit d'un réseau métabolique dans son ensemble.Le but de l'exposé est de proposer une définition de la régulation d'un réseau métabolique et de montrer quelles relations peuvent exister entre lee phénomènes de régulation et la théorie du contrôle du métabolisme.Quelques exemples seront donnés pour illustration. (shrink)

Jean-Pierre Dupuy a tenu pendant la pandémie un « journal de pensée » d'un genre spécial : il réagit moins aux événements que nous avons tous vécus depuis le mois de mars 2020 qu'à la manière dont ces événements ont été analysés, discutés. Il le fait à la lumière de sa contribution majeure à la pensée de la catastrophe développée dans un livre fameux et souvent mal compris, Pour un catastrophisme éclairé. Quand l'impossible est certain (Seuil, 2002 ; (...) 2004). Voici un livre de combat mû par la colère. La colère de voir des intellectuels relativiser la gravité de la pandémie en cours, s'engager dans une critique virulente de sociétés et de gouvernants qu'ils jugent obsédés par la « protection de la vie », au point de sacrifier l'avenir du monde, de l'économie et des libertés publiques. Avec rigueur et détermination, Jean-Pierre Dupuy leur répond et met au jour les erreurs logiques - et scientifiques - qui sous-tendent ces raisonnements, et propose par là même une réflexion passionnante et passionnée sur la mort et la vie au temps de la pandémie."--Page 4 of cover. (shrink)

Tradução do livro: Sociologias da alimentação: os comedores e o espaço social alimentar. Florianópolis, Editora da UFSC, 2004, 311 páginas. Obra traduzida juntamente com Rossana Pacheco da Costa Proença e Carmen Silvia Rial. ISBN 85.328.0290-7. [Título original: Sociologies de l'alimentation: Les mangeurs et l'espace social alimentair. Obra publicada originalmente pela PUF, Paris, 2002. Edição original 288 páginas. ISBN: 213050643. Janeiro 2003, 2e édition. Etnologia-Antropologia].

Chemists do not aim at testing preconceptions or theoretical hypotheses only; they first and foremost produce and determine the object of chemical investigation: they learn through making. They never cease to create and stabilize heterogeneous devices, methods, models, and theories in order to act upon the world. Chemical bodies cannot be studied in isolation; their properties constitutively depend on what surrounds and acts upon them. Starting from the specificity of chemical practices, this paper investigates the meaning of consistency, inconsistency, and (...) that of the ceteris paribus clause, in this domain of science. In so doing, it defends the idea that studying what we call ‘a lack of consistency’ should always include the scrutiny of: the way a particular scientific practice is stabilized, and the ontological or pragmatic assumptions about the entities and processes upon which this practice revolves. (shrink)

An examination of the fundamental role cybernetics played in the birth of cognitive science and the light this sheds on current controversies. The conceptual history of cognitive science remains for the most part unwritten. In this groundbreaking book, Jean-Pierre Dupuy—one of the principal architects of cognitive science in France—provides an important chapter: the legacy of cybernetics. Contrary to popular belief, Dupuy argues, cybernetics represented not the anthropomorphization of the machine but the mechanization of the human. The founding fathers (...) of cybernetics—some of the greatest minds of the twentieth century, including John von Neumann, Norbert Wiener, Warren McCulloch, and Walter Pitts—intended to construct a materialist and mechanistic science of mental behavior that would make it possible at last to resolve the ancient philosophical problem of mind and matter. The importance of cybernetics to cognitive science, Dupuy argues, lies not in its daring conception of the human mind in terms of the functioning of a machine but in the way the strengths and weaknesses of the cybernetics approach can illuminate controversies that rage today—between cognitivists and connectionists, eliminative materialists and Wittgensteinians, functionalists and anti-reductionists. Dupuy brings to life the intellectual excitement that attended the birth of cognitive science sixty years ago. He separates the promise of cybernetic ideas from the disappointment that followed as cybernetics was rejected and consigned to intellectual oblivion. The mechanization of the mind has reemerged today as an all-encompassing paradigm in the convergence of nanotechnology, biotechnology, information technology, and cognitive science. The tensions, contradictions, paradoxes, and confusions Dupuy discerns in cybernetics offer a cautionary tale for future developments in cognitive science. (shrink)

One of the key features of modern mathematics is the adoption of the abstract method. Our goal in this paper is to propose an explication of that method that is rooted in the history of the subject.

In this paper, we argue that, contrary to the view held by most philosophers of mathematics, Bourbaki’s technical conception of mathematical structuralism is relevant to philosophy of mathematics. In fact, we believe that Bourbaki has captured the core of any mathematical structuralism.

Categorical foundations and set-theoretical foundations are sometimes presented as alternative foundational schemes. So far, the literature has mostly focused on the weaknesses of the categorical foundations. We want here to concentrate on what we take to be one of its strengths: the explicit identification of so-called canonical maps and their role in mathematics. Canonical maps play a central role in contemporary mathematics and although some are easily defined by set-theoretical tools, they all appear systematically in a categorical framework. The key (...) element here is the systematic nature of these maps in a categorical framework and I suggest that, from that point of view, one can see an architectonic of mathematics emerging clearly. Moreover, they force us to reconsider the nature of mathematical knowledge itself. Thus, to understand certain fundamental aspects of mathematics, category theory is necessary (at least, in the present state of mathematics). (shrink)

In this paper, I explore Bunge’s fictionism in philosophy of mathematics. After an overview of Bunge’s views, in particular his mathematical structuralism, I argue that the comparison between mathematical objects and fictions ultimately fails. I then sketch a different ontology for mathematics, based on Thomasson’s metaphysical work. I conclude that mathematics deserves its own ontology, and that, in the end, much work remains to be done to clarify the various forms of dependence that are involved in mathematical knowledge, in particular (...) its dependence on mental/brain states and material objects. (shrink)

In this paper, following the claims made by various mathematicians, I try to construct a theory of levels of abstraction. I first try to clarify the basic components of the abstract method as it developed in the first quarter of the 20th century. I then submit an explication of the notion of levels of abstraction. In the final section, I briefly explore some of main philosophical consequences of the theory.

Scientists use models to know the world. It i susually assumed that mathematicians doing pure mathematics do not. Mathematicians doing pure mathematics prove theorems about mathematical entities like sets, numbers, geometric figures, spaces, etc., they compute various functions and solve equations. In this paper, I want to exhibit models build by mathematicians to study the fundamental components of spaces and, more generally, of mathematical forms. I focus on one area of mathematics where models occupy a central role, namely homotopy theory. (...) I argue that mathematicians introduce genuine models and I offer a rough classification of these models. (shrink)

There were three such assumptions required, one explicitly stated, and two not made explicit until Bayle. The explicit one was a certain commonly accepted double understanding of ‘destruction’: a ‘natural’ version, which made it no more than a change in a particular arrangement or ‘organization’ of particles through which an aggregate was destroyed by losing its identity, and a metaphysical version, which entailed the actual annihilation of a substance. It was assumed that the latter could be accomplished only by miraculous (...) supra-natural means available only to God. Thus, if it could be shown that the soul was ‘without parts,’ it followed that the soul was ‘naturally’ indestructible and thus immortal. Bayle summarized the Cartesian argument to immortality as follows. (shrink)

The development of a scientific theory of mind was thus significantly delayed."--BOOK JACKET.

« Toute activité se laisse discerner et définir dans la mesure où elle prend forme, où elle inscrit sa courbe dans l’espace et le temps. La vie agit essentiellement comme créatrice de formes. La vie est forme, et la forme est le mode de la vie » (Henri Focillon). Formes de la géométrie et du cosmos, formes de la vie et de la pensée, formes architecturales, musicales et littéraires, formes fixes ou métamorphoses : le concept de forme est omniprésent dans (...) les sciences et dans les arts. C’est à une exploration de cette notion de forme que le Collège de France a consacré en octobre 2011 son colloque multidisciplinaire de rentrée : sa définition en philosophie chez Platon et Aristote, ses applications en mathématiques et en astrophysique, en chimie et en biologie, ses conséquences en psychologie et en linguistique, en anthropologie, en droit et dans les arts. Ces débats ont été aussi l’occasion de se tourner vers des pensées où elle joue un rôle particulièrement important, comme le structuralisme de Claude Lévi-Strauss ou l’histoire de l’art d’André Chastel. Jean-Pierre Changeux est professeur honoraire au Collège de France, chaire de Communications cellulaires. Il a dirigé la publication de trois colloques précédents du Collège de France : La Vérité dans les sciences (2003), Gènes et culture (2003) et L’Homme artificiel(2007). Contributions de Antoine Compagnon, Claude Debru, Stanislas Dehaene, Mireille Delmas-Marty, Philippe Descola, Anne Fagot-Largeault, Marcel Hénaff, Michel Hochmann, Jean-Jacques Hublin, François-Bernard Mâche, Jean-François Mangin, Jean-Claude Pecker, Jacques Reisse, John Scheid, Jesper Svenbro. (shrink)

Dans cette longue lettre à Benoît Peeters, Jean-Pierre Faye revient sur les péripéties de la fondation du Collège international de philosophie, sous l’égide de Jean-Pierre Chevènement alors ministre de la recherche, dans les années 1981-1982. Il laisse entendre quel rôle ambigu – et relativement peu élégant - a joué Derrida dans cette affaire de fondation. Mais la lettre pousse plus loin. Ces circonstances relatives à la création du Collège international de philosophie ne sont qu’un cadre narratif. (...) Il s’agit en fait de questionner l’origine des fameux concepts derridiens de « déconstruction » et de « logocentrisme ». En ce qui concerne « déconstruction », qui traduit l’usage du mot « Abbau » chez Heidegger, Jean-Pierre Faye en montre le contexte inquiétant : la pensée féroce de la « race » sous le Reich nazi. Quant au « logocentrisme », le nom et l’idée d’un combat à mener contre les prétentions de la raison (« logos ») naissent dans les feuilles d’un certain Ludwig Klages, psychiatre désigné par Goering lui-même comme « Reichsführer der Psychotherapie ». Führer de la psychothérapie... (shrink)

Sous l'Ancien Regime, les champs semantiques de la preuve sont aussi complexes et plastiques que ses usages. La notion circule et innerve des pratiques tres diverses, parfois de maniere inattendue. La plaidoirie ou le requisitoire reorganisent les faits, creant des fables qui s'eloignent quelquefois de la realite et qui tendent a transformer la verite en mensonge et le mensonge en verite. Ces ressorts sont aussi ceux de la fiction qui exploite toutes les ressources de la probation ou preuve et signe (...) viennent a se confondre. Dans d'autres domaines, pour assurer le passage de liaisons necessaires entre des elements divers qui conduisent a la certitude, a l'analyse morale qui s'appuie sur des relations probables pour etablir l'innocence ou la culpabilite, il faut s'etre approprie un art de la demonstration qui, ayant traverse la metaphysique et les mathematiques, parvient au droit. Ce passage-la marque le role historiquement grandissant de la probabilite dans la prise de decision et dans la conception de la verite. Le present volume interroge les lineaments semantiques et les usages de la notion de preuve, du XVIe au XVIIIe siecle, essentiellement en France et en Grande-Bretagne. Les etudes qui le composent suggerent que ces divers usages constituent l'un des aspects du long processus de division des savoirs. Jean-Pierre Schandeler est charge de recherche CNRS a l'IRCL. Ses travaux portent sur les rapports entre l'histoire et les sciences morales et politiques au XVIIIe siecle. Nathalie Vienne-Guerrin est professeur a l'universite Paul-Valery Montpellier 3, specialiste de Shakespeare. Elle dirige l'Institut de Recherche sur la Renaissance, l'age Classique et les Lumieres (UMR 5186 du CNRS). (shrink)

Depuis la pensée des Lumières, on pouvait croire que la raison triomphante avait définitivement dévalorisé la pensée mythique, renvoyée du côté "des fables et des superstitions" : il importait donc de la considérer comme un âge révolu de la pensée humaine. Or, depuis l'époque romantique et surtout depuis les acquis des sciences humaines du 20e siècle, nous avons assisté à une redécouverte de l'importance et de la pérennité de cette pensée mythique à l'oeuvre depuis les âges les plus reculés de (...) l'humanité. C'est à cette redécouverte que Jean-Pierre Sironneau a voulu contribuer en évoquant quelques auteurs qui en avaient été les principaux artisans et en proposant, à l'occasion, ses propres interprétations. Si on peut parler à ce propos d'herméneutique, c'est que les mythes ont toujours donné lieu à de multiples interprétations, que ce soit en art, en littérature, en histoire, en philosophie ou en anthropologie."--Page 4 of cover. (shrink)

In an age of nationalisation of international educational policy, or vice versa, the politics and conflicts behind such policies often take centre stage to the detriment of professional expertise. In response, this article develops a nuanced critical realism to propose a practice-based development and implementation of educational policy reforms. Based on empirical reports of head teachers’ subversive practice, the article concludes by highlighting that professional expertise is a central component, dubbed ‘formless capability’, that all stakeholders use to turn policy intentions (...) into policy actions. Actuality consists of the three traditional domains of critical realism – the real, the actual and the empirical – whose importance is derived from whether it is a means to or an end in itself. It is argued here that empirical experiences of leading schools are the stage of actuality that is directly... (shrink)

Que se passe-t-il dans le cerveau de l'artiste lorsque celui-ci crée? Quels mécanismes régissent l'activité cérébrale au moment de la contemplation d'un tableau? D'où vient cette étrange et si puissante émotion, le plaisir esthétique? Peut-on l'expliquer? Longtemps la création artistique est demeurée un mystère. Depuis une vingtaine d'années, cependant, grâce à l'apport des neurosciences et de la psychologie cognitive, loin de s'épaissir, le mystère peu à peu se dissipe. Explorateur du cerveau et grand collectionneur, c'est à une fantastique « aventure (...) philosophique» au cœur du processus créatif que nous convie Jean-Pierre Changeux, dans ce livre illustré par des chefs-d'œuvre peu connus de l'art français et étranger. (shrink)