Ce texte a déjà paru le 21/12/2018 sur le site EspacesTemps.net. Nous remercions les auteurs et la revue EspacesTemps de nous avoir autorisé à le reproduire ici. Sans rythme pas de vie Bernard Millet La ville? « Ne pas essayer trop vite de trouver une définition de la ville ; c'est beaucoup trop gros, on a toutes les chances de se tromper ». Le rythme? Comment réussir « à définir un seul et même signifiant qui véhicule tant de signifiés différents? (...) ». Et - Géographie – Nouvel article. (shrink)

In the Fall of 1977 I gave a paper at a conference organized by the Center for Twentieth Century Studies at the University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee. The title of the paper, published in 1980, was “The American Ideal of a Democratic Technology.” Reading it over now, some thirty-seven years later, I am excited all over again by the debate over the nature and role of technology which was so prominent a part of the 1970s, but actually had its roots in (...) the 19th century. But I am also profoundly dismayed by the ways in which America has squandered the insight and the momentum of that debate. Today there are issues with large components of technology and science on the political agenda; fracking and coal seam gas extraction, the spread of crops of genetically modified organisms and the vacuuming up of masses of private electronic data by the National Security Agency for example. By and large, however, they are not understood to be part of the same political issue of social inequality. And of course there is still the obfuscating, and therefore dangerous, insistence on using the terms “science” and “technology” strategically when discussing these topics, and still the Sacred Cows such as space exploration and the dream of unlimited energy through fusion which seem to float above any consideration of opportunity costs where real social needs are concerned. (shrink)

In this article, I draw on historical and conceptual arguments to show, first, that disenchantment and the influential view of the relationship between science and religion to which disenchantment gives rise are rooted in the metaphysics of theism. I then introduce the alternative metaphysical position of panentheism and identify Jungian psychology as an important, if implicit, mid-twentieth-century instance of panentheistic thought. Using the example of Jungian psychology, I demonstrate how the viewpoint of panentheism undoes the implications of disenchantment for the (...) relationship between science and religion, promoting greater opportunities for dialogue and reconciliation between science and religion. I note, however, that these closer relations may depend on understanding science and religion differently from how they are understood under disenchantment. While the original tension between science and religion is eased, another tension—between panentheistic and disenchanted understandings of science and religion—is exposed. I conclude by reflecting on some implications of this discussion for sociology. (shrink)

Many scholars in recent years have focused their efforts on revealing the connection of philosophy and authority. Basically, from Nietzsche onwards, philosophyhas witnessed ongoing efforts for “will to power” by some philosophers and of course this motivated many philosophers to take part in politics. Nonetheless, thismoot point engendered a serious risk and not only contrasted with the Socratic contributions, but also paved the way for the advent of a new way of making politics where philosophy and scientific prestige are being (...) manipulated following certain interests. By comparing the US and Argentinian climates, this paper explores to what extent philosophy can and must remain independent of politics. Even though one might think of Heidegger as a clear example of this relationship, there are many other philosophers who were interested in politics and committed to political parties. One of the aspects that characterizes this new way of politics is the theatrification of reality, and philosophers are part of this process. To some extent, the prestige given to scholars for their contribution to society is being conferred to some privileged groups to gain more legitimacy, precisely in a world where the classical institutions are gradually declining. (shrink)

In this paper we discuss how and whether moral adjectives fit a well-known semantics for gradable adjectives. We first test whether moral adjectives are relative or absolute adjectives. The preliminary results suggest that moral adjectives don’t fall neatly under either category. In the second part we tackle the question of the scale of moral adjectives in a more theoretical fashion, i.e. by investigating their possible scales with mathematically precise tools.