Neoliberal Techniques of Social Suffering: Political Resistance and Critical Theory from Latin America and Spain is the result of the critical and political commitment of various Latin American and Spanish philosophers who share a critical approach to the global “stealth revolution” in recent decades, where neoliberalism has forced the well-being and reproduction of life to adapt to a system devastating for both humans and non-humans. The authors voice the shared concern of contemporary Spanish and Latin American societies to build new (...) conceptions of the public and the common through mobilizing affects usually disavowed in political theory. If, in Ancient Greece, the idea of strengthening the most vulnerable and weakest was deplored as the art of sophists, this collection edited by Laura Quintana and Nuria Sánchez Madrid explores the other side of our social world to revive grassroots strategies of resistance and emancipation, which are able to bring about new distributions of power, welfare, and discursive legitimation and to extend our goal of creating a radically democratic world. (shrink)

Proving academic plagiarism is difficult. This volume borrows principles from textual criticism to illustrate new techniques for demonstrating plagiarism. These techniques can be used to persuade others—colleagues, editors, publishers, and research integrity committees—when academic plagiarism has been committed.

There is considerable interest in the use of neuroimaging techniques for forensic purposes. Memory detection techniques, including the well-publicized Brain Fingerprinting technique (Brain Fingerprinting Laboratories, Inc., Seattle WA), exploit the fact that the brain responds differently to sensory stimuli to which it has been exposed before. When a stimulus is specifically associated with a crime, the resulting brain activity should differentiate between someone who was present at the crime and someone who was not. This article reviews the scientific literature (...) on three such techniques: priming, old/new, and P300 effects. The forensic potential of these techniques is evaluated based on four criteria: specificity, automaticity, encoding flexibility, and longevity. This article concludes that none of the techniques are devoid of forensic potential, although much research is yet to be done. Ethical issues, including rights to privacy and against self-incrimination, are discussed. A discussion of legal issues concludes that current memory detection techniques do not yet meet United States standards of legal admissibility. (shrink)

Heliodorus is known for his elaborate narrative technique. This effect is due to ekphrasis, a resource widely used by sophists and recommended in textbooks of rhetoric (Progymnasmata). In the first block of the work, Heliodorus uses this resource, but not randomly. There is an image, literally or metaphorically repeating itself: the labyrinth. Our intention is to demonstrate that the repetitions have a commonality, in addition to a strong hermeneutical appeal. Moreover, the labyrinths are introduced in the part where the (...) narrative is skillfully written in medias res. It is precisely in this passage that the reader, as in a labyrinth, is meanderingly led by several paths, until he reaches the understanding of the opening scene, at the mouth of the Nile. The analysis of the procedures used by Heliodorus leads to the conclusion that the succession of textual or imagethic labyrinths places the reader in a game, from which he can only emerge at the end of the fifth book. (shrink)

메를로-퐁티를 비롯한 현상학자들은 근대학문과 삶의 위기가 수학화된 자연과학에 있다고 말한다. 그들에 따르면 자연과학과 더불어 가속화된 기술은 인간 삶을 위기에 빠트리고 우리를 공포로 몰아간다. 그렇다면 기술은 우리에게 필요악인가? 이미 첨단기술의 영역은 돌이킬 수 없을 만큼 우리 삶 속에 깊이 개입하고 있다. 따라서 기술에 대한 근본적인 철학적 검토가 필요하다. 이러한 필요에 의해 이 글은 메를로-퐁티 철학의 관점에서 기술과 몸의 문제를 고찰하는 것을 목적으로 한다. 메를로-퐁티는 ‘기술’의 문제를 직접적으로 다루고 있지는 않다. 그러나 우리 삶이 기술 문제를 배제하고 이해될 수 없다는 점을 생각한다면 메를로-퐁티의 (...) 철학적 문제 속에 이미 기술 문제는 중요한 의미를 가지고 등장한다. 메를로-퐁티는 객관적인 몸으로부터 고유한 몸을 회복하려 하며, 객관적 세계로부터 생생한 원초적 세계를 복원하려한다. 우리는 메를로-퐁티의 이러한 작업이 후기 철학의 살 존재론에서 보다 구체적으로 펼쳐진다고 본다. 기술을 인간중심적이거나 도구주의적 관점에서 보게 된다면, 우리는 후설과 하이데거 등의 현상학자들이 우려한 상황 속에서 벗어날 수 없게 된다. 그러나 도구주의적 관점에서 벗어나 현상학적 존재론의 입장에서 이해한다면 근대과학이 만들어놓은 문제로부터 벗어날 수 있다. 다시 말하자면 기술의 시대가 살존재론 또는 사이세계로 이해될 때, 우리는 기술의 도구적 관점에서 벗어나 존재론적 방식을 회복할 수 있다. (shrink)

Logic: Techniques of Formal Reasoning, 2/e is an introductory volume that teaches students to recognize and construct correct deductions. It takes students through all logical steps--from premise to conclusion--and presents appropriate symbols and terms, while giving examples to clarify principles. Logic, 2/e uses models to establish the invalidity of arguments, and includes exercise sets throughout, ranging from easy to challenging. Solutions are provided to selected exercises, and historical remarks discuss major contributions to the theories covered.

According to Karl Popper, who is the latest link in the chain of Western rationalist-empiricist debate, knowledge does not have any infallible base in either senses or reason. Taking modern science as the paradigm of human knowledge, he argues that the process of growth of scientic knowledge involves imaginative proposals of hypotheses or conjectures and their refutation on empirical grounds in a continuing series of steps. Thus, scientific knowledge continuously evolves in a series of revolutions whereby the accepted theoretic constructs (...) are falsified, therefore destroyed, and new ones accepted in their place. Experiment, as provoked and controlled stimulation of the senses, plays a critical role in this process of growth and so long as it fails to falsify the hypotheses these are provisionally accepted by the scientists. (shrink)

Il ne s'agit pas seulement ici de rendre compte de la philosophie de la technique que l'on trouve chez Platon et chez Simondon, et de quelques autres parmi les plus importantes, mais d'affronter véritablement la question : qu'est-ce que la technique? On voudrait faire apparaître d'abord le caractère exemplaire et décisif de Platon pour la compréhension de ce qu'a été la réalité technique de son temps aussi bien que pour la compréhension, aujourd'hui encore, de la réalité (...) class='Hi'>technique actuelle, des problèmes qui sont liés à son identification comme telle et à la démarche qui convient pour son étude. C'est aller contre la tradition qui en fait un ignorant et un ennemi de la technique, préoccupé avant tout d'un monde d'Idées 'coupées' du monde sensible. Cette tradition, quasiment aussi ancienne que Platon lui-même, est toujours vivante, fondée désormais sur une représentation de la technique qui se voudrait moderne (la technique comme 'application de la science'). C'est un des intérêts de la pensée de la technique de Gilbert Simondon (prolongeant et systématisant une tradition qui passe en France notamment par Henri Bergson et Georges Canguilhem), que de délivrer de l'idée précipitée selon laquelle l'essence de la technique serait d'être une application de la science, idée dont la faiblesse est la plus évidente quand il s'agit d'une époque où la science n'existait pas encore au sens actuel. La lecture de Platon n'est pas seulement libérée par la compréhension de la technique que propose Simondon, elle est elle-même une préparation très utile à la lecture de ce dernier, reposant sur des exemples plus simples. Ce qu'apprend une philosophie de la technique, on le voit exemplairement chez Platon et chez Simondon, n'est pas seulement comment organiser des concepts et des idées (dont l'importance politique et sociale est évidente), c'est comment regarder précisément le réel, penser son existence et son évolution."--Page 4 of cover. (shrink)

Nous commençons à le voir aujourd'hui : le règne de la technique a dévasté la nature et enfermé l'être humain dans un processus autodestructeur. Mais il ne trouve pas seulement son expression dans des appareils, des usines, des écrans, des réseaux. Il est ancré au plus profond de nous-mêmes, dans notre fascination pour tout ce qui relève de l'efficacité, de la nouveauté, de la rapidité. Mobilisant la notion de chair comme fil conducteur, ce livre explore le rapport de l'homme (...) moderne aux techniques, et montre comment il se fonde sur un imaginaire composé autant de mythes sensibles que d'idées abstraites. Cet imaginaire conduit ainsi nos contemporains à considérer comme un sacrifice le renoncement à la puissance que nous procurent les machines. Pourtant, c'est aussi parce que nous sommes des êtres de chair que le déploiement foudroyant de la puissance technicienne a des effets désorganisateurs, voire déshumanisants. Il est donc vital d'imposer un rythme plus lent et de nouvelles orientations au changement technique. Tâche à laquelle nous sommes bien mal préparés, et dont une des premières conditions est de procéder à une démystification de notre imaginaire technique. (shrink)

Design and analysis of algorithms can be a difficult subject for students due to its sometimes-abstract nature and its use of a wide variety of mathematical tools. Here the author, an experienced and successful textbook writer, makes the subject as straightforward as possible in an up-to-date textbook incorporating various new developments appropriate for an introductory course. This text presents the main techniques of algorithm design, namely, divide-and-conquer algorithms, greedy algorithms, dynamic programming algorithms, and backtracking. Graph algorithms are studied in detail, (...) and a careful treatment of the theory of NP-completeness is presented. In addition, the text includes useful introductory material on mathematical background including order notation, algorithm analysis and reductions, and basic data structures. This will serve as a useful review and reference for students who have covered this material in a previous course. Features The first three chapters provide a mathematical review, basic algorithm analysis, and data structures. Detailed pseudocode descriptions of the algorithms along with illustrative algorithms are included. Proofs of correctness of algorithms are included when appropriate. The book presents a suitable amount of mathematical rigor. After reading and understanding the material in this book, students will be able to apply the basic design principles to various real-world problems that they may encounter in their future professional careers. (shrink)

Collecting data using an appropriate sampling technique is a challenging task for a researcher to do. The researchers will be unable to collect data from all possible situations, which will preclude them from answering the study’s research questions in their current form. In light of the enormous number and variety of sampling techniques/methods available, the researcher must be knowledgeable about the differences to select the most appropriate sampling technique/method for the specific study under consideration. In this context, this (...) study also looks into the basic concepts in probability sampling, kinds of probability sampling techniques with their advantages and disadvantages. Social science researchers will benefit from this study since it will assist them in choosing the most suitable probability sampling technique for completing their research smoothly and successfully. (shrink)

The author considers the model-theoretic character of proofs and disproofs by means of attempted counterexample constructions, distinguishes this proof format from formal derivations, then contrasts two approaches to semantic tableaux proposed by Beth and Lambert-van Fraassen. It is noted that Beth's original approach has not as yet been provided with a precisely formulated rule of closure for detecting tableau sequences terminating in contradiction. To remedy this deficiency, a technique is proposed to clarify tableau operations.

Research on perception without awareness has provoked strong emotional responses from individuals within and outside the scientific community, due in part to the perceived potential for abuse of subliminal techniques. In this paper, four basic issues regarding the use of subliminal techniques for propaganda purposes are discussed: whether exposure to subliminal stimuli can produce significant, predictable changes in affect, cognition and behavior; whether these effects are robust and powerful enough to make the use of subliminal techniques for propaganda purposes feasible; (...) whether the effects of subliminal stimulation are stable over time; and whether subliminal influences can be resisted by unwilling subjects. Research suggests that exposure to simple drive-or affect-related subliminal stimuli can produce ecologically significant, temporally stable changes in attitudes and behavior, and therefore may have potential for use as propaganda tools. Implications of these findings for our understanding of the mechanisms underlying subliminal perception are discussed. Technical problems which would need to be addressed before subliminal propaganda techniques could be employed are also discussed. Ethical issues raised by the use of covert attitude and behavior manipulation techniques are addressed. (shrink)

This article reevaluates the mystical techniques and experiences peculiar to Abraham Abulafia’s Kabbalah and attempts to offer an alternative approach to their dominant understanding, which largely depends on Moshe Idel’s work. Current scholars of Jewish mysticism have a habit of highlighting the “unique character” of Abulafia’s mystical practices while asserting that they cannot be compared with the induction techniques and the psychophysical phenomena typical of hypnosis. While generally agreeing with the scholars discussed that the hyperactivation of the mind found in (...) Abulafian Kabbalah contrasts sharply with the mental relaxation attained through the mystical practices of other religious traditions, the present study takes issue with the current view of Abulafian Kabbalah’s relation to hypnotic procedures, processes, and states. This work addresses the issues present with the current view and offers a more inclusive model for interpreting Abulafia’s Kabbalah, drawing from psychiatrist Roland Fischer. (shrink)

In accordance with societal norms and values, consumers readily indicate their positive attitudes toward sustainability. However, they hardly take sustainability into account when engaging in exchange relationships with companies. To shed light on this paradox, this paper investigates whether defense mechanisms and the more specific concept of neutralization techniques can explain the discrepancy between societal norms and actual behavior. A multi-method qualitative research design provides rich insights into consumers’ underlying cognitive processes and how they make sense of their attitude–behavior divergences. (...) Drawing on the Ways Model of account-taking, which is advanced to a Cycle Model, the findings illustrate how neutralization strategies are used to legitimize inconsistencies between norm-conforming attitudes and actual behavior. Furthermore, the paper discusses how the repetitive reinforcement of neutralizing patterns and feedback loops between individuals and society are linked to the rise of anomic consumer behavior. (shrink)

Humanity is made of technical objects. Despite of this fact, technique is not considered as a cultural matter especially in engineering schools where it should be taught. As teachers and searchers at the INSA Lyon, we have experienced the way and the difficulties to develop this technical culture.

These introductory remarks outline the German concept of Kulturtechniken by tracing its various overlapping meanings from the late 19th century to today and linking it to developments in recent German theory. Originally related to the agricultural domain, the notion of cultural techniques was later employed to describe the interactions between humans and media, and, most recently, to account for basic operations and differentiations that give rise to an array of conceptual and ontological entities which are said to constitute culture. In (...) the second part of the essay, cultural techniques are analyzed as a concept that allows theorists to overcome certain biases and impasses characteristic of that domain of German media theory associated with the work of the late Friedrich Kittler. (shrink)

This article tries to provide elements of discussion and reflection rather than answers to the following question: for many centuries or even millennia, man, at least in so far as prehistory and history have recorded it, made a close connection between the beautiful, the true and the useful and he sought an aesthetic response in the minute manifestations of his daily existence as well as of his intellectual life. Today, and even more so for just the past fifty or one (...) hundred years, art seems to be relegated to specific domains, expelled from the daily life of the average person. Yesterday, and for centuries and millennia, mankind was not satisfied with the fact that a house, a temple, a church, a fortification or a castle were lodgings, proper places to hold reunions, strong-holds built for a particular purpose, it was equally important that they be beautiful; a key did not only have to open a lock, a carriage had not only to run, a bit to control a horse, spurs to reassure the rider, a glass pane to close a window, a table to have a place setting, a chest of drawers to contain clothes, clothes to cover the body, a pen to write, a manuscript to transmit the signs of the alphabet—no, it was also necessary that these signs, that manuscript, the pen, the spurs, the bit, the key … be designed and decorated in such a way so as to evoke in the persons who merely saw them, without even using them, an affective emotion of beauty. Nor was it enough that science or a technique be true or useful, they had also to be beautiful. (shrink)

The concept of the future is re-emerging as an urgent topic on the academic agenda. In this article, we focus on the ‘politics of the future’: the social processes and practices that allow particular imagined futures to become socially performative. Acknowledging that the performativity of such imagined futures is well-understood, we argue that how particular visions come about and why they become performative is underexplained. Drawing on constructivist sociological theory, this article aims to fill this gap by exploring the question (...) ‘how do imagined futures become socially performative’? In doing so, the article has three aims to identify the leading social–theoretical work on the future; conceptualize the relationship of the imagination of the future with social practices and the performance of reality; provide a theoretical framework explaining how images of the future become performative, using the concepts ‘techniques of futuring’ and ‘dramaturgical regime’. (shrink)

This paper seeks to introduce cultural techniques to an Anglophone readership. Specifically geared towards an Anglophone readership, the paper relates the re-emergence of cultural techniques to the changing intellectual constellation of postwar Germany. More specifically, it traces how the concept evolved from – and reacted against – so-called German media theory, a decidedly anti-hermeneutic and anti-humanist current of thought frequently associated with the work of Friedrich Kittler. Post-hermeneutic rather than anti-hermeneutic in its outlook, the reconceptualization of cultural techniques aims at (...) presenting them as chains of operations that link humans, things, media and even animals. To investigate cultural techniques is to shift the analytic gaze from ontological distinctions to the ontic operations that gave rise to the former in the first place. As Siegert points out, this shift recalls certain concurrent developments within the North American posthumanities; the paper therefore also includes a discussion of the similarities and differences between German and North American posthumanism. (shrink)

La pensée technique peut-elle être l’occasion d’un renouveau de la réflexion transcendantale, ou bien est-elle vouée à demeurer tributaire du « préjugé anthropologique » dont Foucault a repéré la mise en place au XIXe siècle avec la formation des sciences humaines, et qui a eu pour conséquence précisément la dissolution du transcendantal dans l’empirique? Cet article opte résolument pour la première solution, et examine les approches qui vont dans ce sens en refusant de penser les techniques à partir de (...) la finitude anthropologique. (shrink)

First published in 2010, Cornelia Vismann’s article has already attained the status of a classic. In a formulation inspired by linguistic theory, the author argues that the relation between cultural techniques and media can be understood in analogy to grammatical operations. Thus, cultural techniques define the agency of media and execute the procedural rules which the latter set in place. Together, they articulate a critique of subjectivity and sovereignty that proceeds by re-examining the notion of ‘culture’ via its agricultural origins (...) to the current moment when the ‘preservation of cultural techniques’ has entered legal and academic discourse. Ultimately, despite their apparent separation from praxis, cultural techniques continue to proliferate through axes of substitution and displacement. (shrink)

Les réseaux socionumériques constituent des supports identitaires ambivalents pour leurs utilisateurs. À de nombreux égards, ils entretiennent des proximités avec les techniques de soi développées depuis l'antiquité dans la société occidentale. Cette similarité explique certainement leur adoption si enthousiaste. Cependant, ces plateformes possèdent des caractéristiques particulières qui les éloignent des objectifs usuels des techniques de soi, destinées au développement de l'autoréflexivité et au soin de soi. Elles constituent davantage des outils d'expression de soi que des techniques de soi. Leur compréhension (...) nécessite aussi de sortir d'une vision egocentrée de l'individu pour envisager la dimension fondamentalement co-construite de notre identité. (shrink)

Avec l’identification biométrique, nous passons imperceptiblement du contrôle à distance des populations pratiqué par les États modernes à des macro-systèmes techniques qui imposent de plus en plus leur propre logique. Du point de vue anthropologique ce déplacement de paradigme met en jeu la définition même de l’identité en renforçant le divorce entre l’identité civile et l’identité personnelle ou sociale. La frontière est désormais inscrite à même le corps biologique des individus au sein de l’espace géré depuis les terminaux du grand (...) réseau mondial de gestion des flux disséminés sur la planète. Elle tend donc à se confondre avec les limites fonctionnelles du Macro-Système technique. Du point de vue du droit, la mise en place par les États de dispositifs d’identification biométriques s’exprime principalement par la restriction de la liberté de circuler accordée aux individus. L’un des constats apporté par la revue des législations nationales montre pourtant que le droit s’adapte globalement à cette nouvelle situation. Cet article interroge en conclusion quelques-unes des raisons permettant d’expliquer ces reculs successifs et propose, parmi elles, la définition implicite de l’individu sur laquelle fait fond le droit moderne.With biometric identification we are imperceptibly moving from the remote control of the population practised by the modern States on to large technical systems which increasingly impose their own logic on people. From an anthropological viewpoint, this paradigm shift calls into question the very definition of « identity » by broadening the divide between civil identity and personal or social identity. The frontier is now inscribed on the biological body of the individual within the space that is managed from the terminals of the global flow management networks scattered the world over. The frontier thus tends increasingly to coincide with the functional limits of the large technical system. From a legal viewpoint, the introduction by States of biometric identification systems results primarily in a restriction of the freedom of circulation granted to individuals. One of the findings which emerge from a review of national legislations is however that law is globally adapting to this new situation. In the conclusion, the article considers some of the reasons behind these successive backward steps, and proposes, amongst them, an implicit definition of the individual on which modern law is founded. (shrink)

For Ricœur any study of Freud, or of psychoanalysis more generally, needs to take into account the crucial dimension of the analytic experience itself. Psychoanalysis, as a “mixed discourse,” aims to anticipate questions of meaning and explication alongside technical questions of energies, repression, displacement, and so on. The analytic experience is one which is practical and intersubjective, but which is also guided by various techniques or methods. These techniques, I will argue, should be understood as a type of techne, one (...) which is less concerned with hermeneutic questions of meaning than with quasi-scientific questions of force, feedback, struggle, and process. The practice of psychoanalysis, on the other hand, deals with the ways in which these forces or drives become meaningful for a particular subject, and within a singular context or history. This article will aim to draw out both the interrelationship between techniques and practical understanding, and also the productive incommensurability between the two. (shrink)

Les sciences et les techniques sont au coeur de nos vies quotidiennes et constituent les piliers de notre modernité. Elles ont transformé les modes de vie, les relations de pouvoir, nos identités et nos imaginaires. Controverses sur les OGM, enjeux du changement climatique et de sa prévision, nouveaux imaginaires véhiculés par Internet ou les jeux vidéo... Comment analyser dans ces cas qui font l'actualité les liens inextricables entre ce que l'on sait du monde, ce que l'on souhaite y faire et (...) la façon dont on le gouverne? Les théories et approches dominantes de l'économie, de la sociologie, de l'histoire ou de la science politique ont souvent ignoré ces enchevêtrements complexes. Cet ouvrage propose un panorama du champ "sciences, techniques et société", très interdisciplinaire, qui s'est justement donné pour objet l'étude des transformations récentes et conjointes des façons de savoir, des formes d'expertise, des marchés, des espaces publics et des formes de gouvernement. (shrink)

Unlike a great deal of research on expert/non-expert communication, most of which is based on written materials, this article focuses on face-to-face communication. The analysis is based on a large corpus of transcribed recordings of medical seminars in rehabilitation centres and of interviews with chronically ill patients suffering from heart conditions. The focus is on procedures of illustration, which are often combined with reformulation procedures. Four main types are described: metaphors, exemplification, `scenarios', concretization. Whatever the type of illustration used, participants (...) in face-to-face interaction show a marked preference for procedures which relate abstract medical information to everyday life and experience. After a brief outline of the theoretical approach adopted the analysis proceeds in two steps: first, the emphasis is on techniques employed by the `experts', then on those used by `non-experts', i.e. patients. This is followed by an examination of the question how the roles of expert and non-expert are constituted in and by interaction. (shrink)

Nous sommes dans une société où se multiplient les techniques de communication. Quelles sont-elles ? Quelles nouvelles formes de lien social accompagnent-elles ? Comment penser le rapport entre techniques et société ? Telles sont les interrogations avancées et qui s’appuient sur la demande sociale latente propre à nos sociétés et qui est à la source des progrès techniques, ceux-ci, ensuite, imposant leur propre logique.In our society, techniques of communication increase in number. What are they ? What new forms of social (...) link go with them ? How are we supposed to think the relationship between techniques and society ? Such are the questions we have to ask. They imply a social unconscious characteristic of modern societies and, in feed-back, the effects of the technical logic. (shrink)

The paper seeks to analyze children’s bodily vulnerability as grounded in generational order. The thesis is put forward, that the generational order is embodied via body techniques of vulnerability, deployed both by adults and children. In presenting results from research on professional responses to child maltreatment and neglect, three sets of age related body techniques of vulnerability are identified, concerning caregivers, professionals and the children itself.

This article demonstrates the possibilities and problems of the formation of a new type of human‐technique‐nature relationship ‐ the organic technique ‐ in modern civilization. It is a relationship in which neither human nor nature must adapt to the needs of technology; rather, the technique is embedded in nature and becomes 'human-sized'. We can find a model for building this new type of relationship in the construction of buildings from bamboo. The uniqueness of bamboo as a building (...) material manifests in two ways. The first relates to resources: bamboo is a very fast-growing plant, so cutting it's stem does not destroy the plant itself and in three to four years there is a new 'harvest'. This means bamboo has an extremely low cost, which is critical for developing countries with rapidly growing populations. Second, bamboo has a number of architectural advantages. Due to the flexibility and elasticity of this product, bamboo buildings are earthquake resistant. Such structures do not violate the natural landscape, but instead work with it; they are characterized by low cost and ease of construction, in a variety of forms. This has led to the widespread use of bamboo by leading architects and innovators from different countries. This article shows that the application of bamboo in architecture ‐ as opposed to artificial materials such as concrete, which exploit and destroy nature and impose their forms on cultures ‐ helps this building technique to integrate into the life of ecosystems and society, and thus to become a model of harmonizing human‐technique‐nature relations. (shrink)

In biology proteins are uniquely important. They are not to be classed with polysaccharides, for example, which by comparison play a very minor role. Their nearest rivals are the nucleic acids....The main function of proteins is to act as enzymes....In the protein molecule Nature has devised a unique instrument in which an underlying simplicity is used to express great subtlety and versatility; it is impossible to see molecular biology in proper perspective until this peculiar combination of virtues has been clearly (...) grasped. (shrink)

Le but de cet article est d'interroger les transformations culturelles qui accompagnent la commercialisation des inventions, phénomène majeur de l'essor marchand et consumériste au XVIIIe siècle. Les stratégies commerciales des inventeurs sont fondées sur une médiatisation croissante, mêlant rhétoriques visuelles (démonstrations, spectacles, expositions) et recours à l'imprimé: annonces de presse, affiches, prospectus, modes d'emploi, livrets d'utilisation. L'information et le savoir techniques jouent un rôle clef dans la construction de marchés pour les inventions. Cette dimension a rarement été prise en compte (...) dans l'histoire de la consommation et dans l'histoire des techniques. Pourtant, la littérature d'usage, qui postule l'autonomie et la capacité participative de l'acheteur comme argument de vente, exprime la montée en puissance des savoirs d'action, opératoires, prescriptifs, où priment le verbe et le geste, l'intention et le projet. Si la technologie des Lumières se déploie dans les traités et les dictionnaires, elle se manifeste aussi dans cette littérature éphémère, pratique et commerciale, source d'appropriations. (shrink)

[ENGLISH] This article discusses the potential of synthetic biology to address fundamental questions in the philosophy of biology regarding the nature of life and biological functions. Synthetic biology aims to reduce living organisms to their simplest forms by identifying the minimal components of a cell and also to create novel life forms through genetic reprogramming, biobrick assembly, or novel proteins. However, the technical success of these endeavors does not guarantee their conceptual success in defining life. There is a lack of (...) consensus among researchers on how to define and classify the entities produced in the lab, whether they should be considered living or categorized differently. The criteria for minimal cells and minimal life are subject to arbitrary choices and varying interpretations. The concept of function, crucial to synthetic biology, is also difficult to define. The article highlights the need to consider the minimal set of functions that characterize life before determining the smallest genomes that code for those functions. The arbitrary nature of defining both life and function complicates the understanding and classification of these entities. The article suggests that the traditional dichotomy between the living and the non-living may no longer be valid and that the concept of life itself may not require precise scientific definition. As synthetic biology advances, the article emphasizes the importance of redefining or constructing new categories to encompass the expanding possibilities and creations in the field. The ability to create new life forms raises questions about recognition, identification, and ethical implications, requiring a conceptual and philosophical engagement beyond the technical achievements of synthetic biology. -/- [FRENCH] L'article aborde le potentiel de la biologie synthétique pour répondre à des questions fondamentales de la philosophie de la biologie concernant la nature de la vie et des fonctions biologiques. La biologie synthétique vise à réduire les organismes vivants à leurs formes les plus simples en identifiant les composants minimaux d'une cellule et à créer de nouvelles formes de vie grâce à la reprogrammation génétique, à l'assemblage de biobriques ou à des protéines nouvelles. Cependant, le succès technique de ces approches ne garantit pas leur réussite conceptuelle dans la définition de la vie. Il n'y a pas de consensus parmi les chercheurs sur la façon de définir et de classer les entités produites en laboratoire, qu'elles doivent être considérées comme vivantes ou catégorisées différemment. Les critères des cellules minimales et de la vie minimale sont soumis à des choix arbitraires et à des interprétations variables. La notion de fonction, essentielle en biologie synthétique, est également difficile à définir. L'article met en évidence la nécessité de prendre en compte l'ensemble minimal de fonctions qui caractérisent la vie avant de déterminer les plus petits génomes qui codent ces fonctions. La nature arbitraire de la définition de la vie et de la fonction complique la compréhension et la classification de ces entités. L'article suggère que la dichotomie traditionnelle entre le vivant et le non-vivant pourrait ne plus être valable et que le concept même de vie ne nécessite pas une définition scientifique précise. À mesure que la biologie synthétique progresse, l'article souligne l'importance de redéfinir ou de construire de nouvelles catégories pour englober les possibilités et créations croissantes dans le domaine. La capacité à créer de nouvelles formes de vie soulève des questions de reconnaissance, d'identification et d'implications éthiques, nécessitant une réflexion conceptuelle et philosophique au-delà des avancées techniques de la biologie synthétique. (shrink)

The necessity for a clear understanding of the dual character of scientific method and of its applicability in social study as in the physical and biological sciences, can hardly receive too much emphasis at the present stage of development. Such an understanding, however, merely provides the proper beginning or orientation in the organization of any scientific discipline. That which is a common element in all scientific procedure can hardly serve to differentiate one science from another.

The Technique of Islamic Bookbinding: Methods, Materials and Regional Varieties. By Karin Scheper. Islamic Manuscripts and Books, vol 8. Leiden: Brill, 2015. Pp. xii + 428, illus. $181, €140.