Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-t7fkt Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-30T14:51:28.393Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Snapshots from the Development of the Natural Sciences

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2024

Gérard Toulouse
Gérard Toulouse*
Affiliation:
Ecole Normale Supérieure, Paris
Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Core share and HTML view are not available for this content. However, as you have access to this content, a full PDF is available via the ‘Save PDF’ action button.

This paper focuses on how the practitioners of the exact and natural sciences can make a contribution to the project of the social sciences to break free of a reductive Eurocentrism in order to achieve a renewed universalism. Focusing in particular on the last 50 years, the paper: a) describes the 1955–60 turning point that can be perceived in techno-scientific development and its relationship with society; b) analyzes technical developments under the two modes of gigantism and miniaturization, putting them in close relation with the political evolution of the world (Cold War and post-Cold War era) as well as with the phenomena of divergence/convergence among disciplines; c) explains the ‘ethical movement in science' namely by introducing the idea of moral revaluation defined by similarity/contrast with the older and now well-accepted concept of scientific revolution; and d) sketches a typology of the scientific community's varied responses to the growing social protests around topics such as nuclear installations, health crises, genetically modified organisms, nanotechnologies and so on.

Type
Articles
Information
Diogenes , Volume 55 , Issue 3 , August 2008 , pp. 77 - 84
Copyright
Copyright © ICPHS 2008

References

Arendt, H. (1958) The Human Condition. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Eisenhower, D.D. (1961) ‘Farewell radio and television address to the American people’ January 17. Available online at: http://www.eisenhower.archives.gov/speeches/farewell_address.htmlGoogle Scholar
Feynman, R. (1960) ‘There's plenty of room at the bottom. An invitation to enter a new field of physics’, Engineering and Science Mag 23(5): 22–36. Available online at: http://nanoparticles.org/pdf/Feynman.pdfGoogle Scholar
Koch-Miramond, L. and Toulouse, G. (2003) Les Scientifiques et les droits de l'homme. Paris: Editions de la Maison des Sciences de l'Homme.Google Scholar
Kuhn, Th. S. (1962) The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Lévi-Strauss, C. (2007) ‘Unesco at 60’, Diogenes 54(3): 5–10.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Snow, C.P. (1959) The Two Cultures and the Scientific Revolution. New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Steiner, G. (1971) In Bluebeard's Castle: Some Notes Towards the Redefinition of Culture. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Toulouse, G. (2004) ‘Le movement éthique dans les sciences: pourquoi maintenant? pourquoi si tard?’, in Les Origines de la creation. Paris: Editions de l'UNESCO.Google Scholar
Toulouse, G. (2006) ‘Scientific revolutions and moral revaluations’, in Science and Society. New Ethical Interactions. Milan: Fondazione Carlo Erba.Google Scholar
Toulouse, G. (2007) ‘Ouvrir des espaces de bonne foi’, Recueil Dalloz 26 (5 July).Google Scholar
Valéry, P. (1957[1919]) ‘La Crise de l'esprit’, pp. 988–1014 in Œuvres, I, Hytier, Jean, ed. Paris: Gallimard.Google Scholar
von Neumann, J. (1955) ‘Can we survive technology?’, Fortune June: 33–48.Google Scholar