Evolutionism was introduced to Mexico through the adoption of positivist philosophy brought from France by Gabino Barreda, who founded the National Preparatory School in 1868. The school's curriculum initially used natural history (zoology and botany) before biology became a formalized discipline. Key figures like Alonso Fernández taught evolutionary concepts based on Darwin and Wallace, and in 1904, Fernández published 'Fundamentals of Biology,' considered the first biology textbook in Mexico. The introduction of evolutionism sparked debates between Darwinists and anti-Darwinists, with the 1877 debate at the Gabino Barreda Association marking the official presentation of Darwin's 'Origin of Species' in Mexico.
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6th Franco-Mexican Seminar in the History and Philosophy of ScienceAdded:
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Uh good morning. We are going to start uh the first session of today. Um so first take >> Okay. Uh our first speaker which is from the area of biological sciences is Brian Bera Brezan from the faculty of science in Vietnam.
>> Well thank you. Um thanks everyone for being here. Um this is our third day and first first of all I would like to thank to Anna Valona Car Martinez and of course the Franco Mexican Seminar for the opportunity to present some of my research and as you have already seen uh to be part of the team behind this event. Um now it's my turn to take the role as an academic rather than a streamer.
And well that's the title of my presentation. Evolutionism in Mexico the first contents in the national preparatory school and other educational institutions from 1867 to uh 1897. Well maybe less maybe more. So I would like to point out that this Richard it's only just uh beginning it for part of my post dog project. So much of the much of the information I'm about to present it's um just uh but the purpose of understanding this of this work and what might be helpful to do in this area the introduction of the evolutionism in Mexico please uh next so to begin with I'll talk about what the term evolutionism uh means without actually arriving at a fully satisfactory definition but one that is at the very least uh useful. Uh I will then briefly discuss how and when the theory of evolution was introduced in Mexico and how certain authors have addressed this introduction. I will then turn to the national preparator national preparatory school which is the first preparatory school located in Mexico City and provide a brief overview of its curriculum and its relationship with the natural sciences and the theory of evolution.
And in the section four, I would like to make a brief distinction between Darwinism and evolutionism. They are not synonymous. And the first Mexicans to read about evolution were aware of this, maybe even more so than people are today.
And finally uh just a concluding remarks and future research and possibilities of investigations. So next please. So let's start with the evolutionism. uh in the in the 17th century a number of naturalists especially French ones began to discuss the concept of change in organisms they didn't speak of evolution in the modern sense but they discuss change in organisms which is very very important for example sorry for the French bon in his extensive work natural history discusses the term degeneration of a species or the well-known case of j baptisla Mark who in the late 18th and early 19th centuries particularly in his book solological philosophy provided a masterful explanation of the concept of transformation which is already very very important.
Next please. Um but it was really in the mid 18th century with the various ideas put forward by different naturalists that the concept of evolutionism began to take shape.
This included the ideas of naturalists such as Herbert Spencer, er, Wallace and of course Charles Darwin amongst many other. In other words, it's not just about Darwin's theory of natural evolution which was actually developed by Darwin and Wallace though this is almost never mentioned.
Uh, next. Thank you. So what is evolutionism? The term evolutionism became firmly established during later half of the 19th century thanks to the publication of the origin of the species and the Spencer various work which already explain the phenomenon in the modern sense. Those the historical trajectory of evolutionism goes goes from the 17th century referring to the life um sciences through the preformation theories 18th century and early 19th centuries to the evolutionary explanations made by naturalists such as Darwin and Spencer in the second half of the 19th century.
Thus we can define evolutionism as a phenomenon that became established in the second half of 19th century covering various ideas of biological evolution and not just of Darwin and Spencer. Next one please. So the introduction of evolutionism uh took place in Mexico thanks to the country's adoptation of positivism philosophy brought from France by Gabinora a deed student of sorry for the French Aust. Yeah, hope so. Uh, in 1867, the physician pronounced physician pronounced the civic discourse or in Spanish in which he used a persuasive speech to establish and promote the positivist philosophy. A year later in 1868 with the founding of the National Preparatory School and Gabino Veda as express director the curricula and educational programs to be implemented in educational institutions gained scientific authority. Almost 10 years later in 1877 with the founding of the Gabino Metal Association discussions surrounding positivism and evolutionism intensified. These early debates marked the beginning of a series of controversies regarding evolutionary theory and in that same year 1877 with the publication of the annals of the metal association uh recording beginning of everything discussed by the members of the Gabino Metal Association among other subjects.
So in a general view these moments help to understand the framework that existed during the introduction of positivism in Mexico. Uh, next please.
Um, well, these are are just some of the earliest authors and the stories that mention exactly what I've seen. Next, please.
Right. I just mentioned two debates. The debate of 1877 that began when the next when the text's consideration on Darwin superior written by medical student Pedro Nora was discussed at the Gabinoa Metal Association.
It has been noted that this was the official presentation of Darwin superior which surprised everyone who was presenting that moment with a great pmic that divided the participants in two factions.
Um that of who opposed the methodology and had little confidence in the English naturalist evidence Darwin and that of the young Mexican intellectuals who were in favor of Darwin's ideas. It was in overwhelms a controversy between the so-called Darwinist and anti-darvinist as historioggraphy usually describes it.
Var did not argue strongly against Darwin ideas but rather against the method used considering it arbitrary and irrational for the fish for Vida.
Darwin's theory known as a theory of transformation of the species, gender and so on has yet to satisfy the conditions required by the scientific method and therefore could be most not accepted as a proven fact but rather as hypothesis that has still not been proven and which is contradicted by powerful evidence. this perspective the lack of scientific evidence and justification for Darwin's theory left him to regard of revolutionary theories such as Lamar as superior and the young positivist would reply to Vida had failed to understand the analogies and concept of the struggle for existence natural selection explained by Dar uh spreading controversy between teacher and students regarding the future nature of the evolutionary content that would be thoughts in schools and disseminated in social educational and even political spheres Next one. The second debate, which is the one that really matters to me, took place in 1868 and was about the use of textbooks containing evolutionary content in classes at the National Preparatory School. A topic that generated important discussions among liberal and religious newspapers.
And the most provocative book on this subject is titled companion of the history of antiquity compendio de written by.
This is the only section that discuss evolution. The one on the right and the zoom is barely visible due to the poor quality of the scan produced by the national newspaper archive. But the section is called live men and what the text says is next please. Um there is a theory that seeks to explain the origin of life through the simple transformation of physical and chemical elements into a rudimentary organisms from which the vast variety of plant and animals life originated. Scholars agreed that not a single case of the spontaneous generation has been proven.
Uh next please. Darwin and his followers maintain that the scientific explanation for the origin of man lies in what is called the transformation of the species. This implies that simpler species have gradually transformed into more complex ones by the process of natural selection which consists in the fact that the strongest individuals have survived. The weaker ones in the struggle for existence and from the union of the strongest have been forb born individuals who have inherited the qualities of their parents qualities that have continually adapted to the environment. On this basis, dragonist have decided to claim despite the objections of many scientists that humans and orangutans are descendants of a common ancestors.
Next one, please. Um, well, it's clear that Sierra does not regard the theory as definitive. The author refers to it to provide context for the international scientific panorama on the origin of man. This section does not include any creationist explanations and even though there are few references to the topic.
Therefore, it's likely that Sierra was inclined to present more scientific content being careful due to the controversy such information might cause in schools.
All right. Um, no, this is not the right one. Maybe one before. Okay. Various authors have noted that this is how evolutionary ideas entered the official education system in Mexico beginning in 1878.
But the interesting thing here is that it's not just about how evolution is presented in textbooks like I said before with just two or three paragraphs.
I mean the date is 1878 and the national preparatory school was founded in 1878.
1868 sorry. So what happened to the content on evolution during that decade?
Does it existed and what is proposed?
There are research these are my research questions and I will explore in my pos.
And to try to answer them I am immersed myself in a review of what happened during the decade during that decade at the national preparatory school regarding the curriculum and who was responsible for selecting the topics.
Now, yes, here appears the names of Alonso Rena Fernandez and Alonso Lisera, Father Anson, who were some of the people responsible for deciding when and how this content was incorporated, not only in the early days of the National School in 1868, but over a period of almost 30 years. So nestic slides are just exactly as my script and part of my first steps on this topic and which is also part of a paper that I'm writing right now.
Okay. The ergonic law on public education was promulgated by Benito Huarees on December 2, 1867 as an institutional missure. The law established the national preparatory school prioritizing the teaching of the sciences and eliminating religious education. The organic globe also stipulated that education must be obligatory, secular and free. Education in an effort to promote learning through positivism and scientific knowledge included the natural sciences in the scope of knowledge that should be present in the first curriculum without making it very clear how the teaching of evolution and topics related to biology discipline did not yet exist would be covered. Although the word biology appeared in the Mexican press as early as 1867 during discussions about the curriculum to be implemented at the school national preparatory in a brand new educational institution. It would not be formally established as a science in the country until years later.
This is already said by Qua Roberto Rafael among others not just for me. Uh you can also find the text little bit different in my PhD thesis. All right.
However, next one please. However, given that biology was not yet a formalized discipline and was managed in a confusing manner, the subject chosen for teaching at the preparatory school was natural history which was divided into the subjects of zology and botany in 1872.
Okay. Apart from these minor changes in the natural history occurs, the original curriculum remained unchanged for nearly 30 years, a period that included the second director of the school, the aforementioned Alonso Fernandez who served from 1878 to 1884, the third director, Vid Castan who served from 1885 to 1901, and the fourth director Josees under whom the academia biology was founded.
Next one please. So Alonso uh played a very important role because he taught the history the natural history cruise for a long period per period from 1874 to 1884 and from that position he greatly encouraged the students naturalist interest basing his teaching on authors such as Darwin and Wallace.
Among the many topics he covered in his cruise, those related to the constant change of species, embionic development, gravel processes in organisms and the geographic distributions of animals are particularly noteworthy. These topics reflect evolutionary concepts along with the topics in biology and physiology.
There was a specialized language that apart from turning students into experts in life sciences revealed the 19th century eos of evolution as well as an early awareness that living beings depend on one another during the change uh next please during the change of directions of the national preparatory school mentioned a vote and Alonsora's administration as professor and director along with the work activities and publications of the Mexican society of natural history, the life sciences, sology and botany courses were promoted and the establishment of conferences and academics in the field whose main subjects focused on naturally such as lineos the candle darwin or the varation of a species the struggle for existing natural selection adaptation and inheritance concept discussed by the authors on the origin of the species.
So uh in addition, Alonso is the son uh played a key role in the field of education because he proposed the study of living organisms from an evolutionary perspective.
The year of 1899 is particularly significant because the naturalist Alonso and the John Daniel and the John Galope research assistant at the National Medical Institute were awarded the Copkins medal granted by the Smithsonian Institution for exceptional research focusing on the properties of atmospheric air and its therapeutic applications for improving human health.
The winning work by the John Mexicans was titled Life on the Highlands, I'm not going to pronounce in French, which was initially published in French and focused on explaining the various beneficial conditions provided by the highlands and how a species adapt to these environments as well as refuting the idea that the racial and physiological characteristics of Mexicans implied a certain inferiority compared to other populations. Next one, please. Another significant moment in Eera's evolutionism was the publication in 1904 his book noia fundamentals of biology which he wrote to teach curses to faculty members at the school public school of higher public education in what is considered the first general biology curse founded in 1902.
In the book, era discussed the origin uh and evolution of living beings as well as various phenomena on earth and in the universe. He also focused on the evolutionary ideas of Arasmos Darwin, Charles's grandfather, John Baptist Mark, Jopra Santilla, Charles and others to explain the evolutionary journey of humanity.
Okay. This work by the Mexican naturalist. It's considered the first biology textbooks in Mexico. continuing information that referred to scientific advances in Europe from an evolutionary perspective. Furthermore, in this work it present his first proposal on the origin of life known as plasma plasma another theory to explain life forms arising from inorganic matter in the laboratory and protoplasm the essential substance of organisms.
Okay. As the studies by uh Alonso Fernandez and Alonso Risera, father and son point out, the content covered not only Darwin but also other naturalists who put forward evolutionary ideas.
There was a spatialized language which far from turning students into experts in life sciences reveals the 19th century eos of evolutions. I like that that site as well as an early awareness that living beings depend on one another. Even the intellectual elite of the time identified and recognized pion revolutionist beond Darwin or Lamar escaping discussions discussions in the 19th century press. I'm not going to about the I'm not going to talk about the press because I have no time but maybe later. And finally um to examine the curricula and study materials of the national preparatory school it's necessary to do it particularly the natural history course uh solology and botany with the aim of identifying evolutionary content. It's necessary to examine the press and publication from that period related to the Mexican society of natural history and the introduction of evolutionism in Mexico. It's necessary to analyze the textbooks for the biology curves which covers specialized topics in evolution.
And finally, evolutionism is not synonymous of as evidenced by the language used by the Mexican naturalist of the time in this case Alonso Fernandez Alonso or by intellectuals the key sess in the present liberal papers newspapers particularly when they insist they were abolitionist.
They say abolition is to be for Lamar and Dar. And I think that's it.
Thanks so much, Brian. So, we have enough time for some questions.
>> Well, thank you very much, Brian. I'm going to make a question which in some somehow is directed with your lecture and somehow it comes with beside and it deals with uh the institution where everybody when all of this happens the square because uh well they influence the of the positivist philosophy in the development of the evol theory of evolution.
It's very it's it's quite interesting you given that but what puzzles me a little bit as a Mexican I underline this is trying to understand because the national the national is an institution that still exists and it has it's exactly u to make a translation It's that is all it's a high school. Okay. Of course, it is clear that it was not conceived as such when it was founded at the in the 19th century.
We all know that during the 19th century in Mexico, there is a long debate because liberal governments and conservative governments opened and closed the university.
It's hard to understand for those who are not Mexicans, but the liberal government governments closed the university and the conservative governments open the university.
Now that means that what is officially there was no university but uh there were there remained all along the 19th century and even they were created as far as I know during the 18th century the national schools I don't know if they were named like that I The school of medicine, the school of minds that that the those institution remained open and there were the institutions where medical medicines were engineers were formed all along the 19th century.
Now my question is what exactly was the role of the Isqua National Preparatoria in all these uh mixture of university which sometimes existed sometimes did not exist uh the different schools of medicine of engineer of etc. What exactly was the role of the national preparator? It's just an very naive question I'd like to know and therein trying to understand exactly what was the role of the introduction of evolution the theory evolution within the square because I've never heard since many years ago I've heard about this history where I know you work I know Anna works a lot etc. And that I know but I don't know for for instance if by the same time and at the same institution there were other disciplines scientific disciplines that were developing or the square which I still don't know what exactly was its role its educational role I'm sure it was not the high schooling but that is for sure exactly what was it that was that is my question and so in order to understand the relevance of the introduction of the theory evolution there if it's possible and I thank you thank you Carlos for for the for the question and for the comment which is very interesting and I don't know exactly what's the what's the situation between the national school but in that moment I'm sure that there is a lot of the students that because he the first education is in national school and it's the place where they get sort of a specialization just a little bit then they can incorporate to the institutions in the pediat there's a scientific institutionalization of the science I mean um geography statistic astronomy I don't remember the others this is very very very good uh has been studed by and there's a a lot of students from national preparatory school who incorporate to uh these institutions. So it's looks like the bridge maybe like the bridge between the uh high school and education toization in the institutions that's for sure the rest I don't really know it's one of my topic research so maybe in a month I will tell you something.
Thank you.
>> Thank you very much for your talk. Um I had a question about um the conceptual relationship with in relation with the institutional relationships uh between um uh natural history courses and biology courses because you show that uh in uh natural history courses there were a lot of about evolution and blah blah and I think that maybe even today it's quite difficult to make a specific lines. So uh in your case studies uh did you study about it or not? Oh, that's a really good question because even today it's a controversy. what are we going to teach for example in the faculty of sciences it's very complicated and in that moment in 19th century there is a discussion about the formalization of the biology as a discipline there is no really exactly descriptions how that happened it's very complicated because it's abstraction because it's a formalized because come from Europe because I mean there's a lot of explanations but um the the only thing that It's super secure. It's that natural history, the crystal natural history were really established since the beginning to maybe 19 century I mean 1902 1904 century which is established the biology as a formalized discipline. That's the only thing that I really know.
>> If your references about Thank you very much for your presentation. Just one very brief comment. I'm a little bit push you stress a lot the role of Darwin and Lamar but not of Heck and and Spencer especially because works for example were framed around evolutionary explanation by Spencer for example. And it seems to me at least that maybe if you follow Spencer and Heckle as the key authors, the key evolutionary authors in Mexican late 19th century, it can be much more sense than Lamar or Darwin for example because obviously they're quoted in all these works. But I think that Spencer is much more important than Heckle than Darwin and Lamar in that sense. Just thank you.
Thank you. Yes, I agree with you. Yes, totally. You I mean you have a very good paper which talk about the translation Spencer from Yucatan, a paper from Yucatan to the Spanish and how the how the Mexicans related with his own words the the the paper which is very interesting.
>> Yeah.
Well, thanks. Just maybe two comments on what Carlos said.
one um bar was a direct start with com with K and he was a staunch positivist. If you see the hierarchy of sciences proposed by K bio biology is not at the top. M and physics are at the top. Uh Mara was a key a key played a key role on the of the general educational law onto and founder of there is a letter a the answer of to a letter sent to him by Palasio who was a general a very important general who was then governor of uh estab Mexico in which pretended to to replicate in Mexico. And Mara answered a very long letter justifying and explaining what was the meaning of the school preparatory. And it was certainly to provide a very wide formation based on the sciences mainly math and physics not necessarily biology. I think that that might have marked the role that would be played by biology in the beginning of the education.
Verda emphasizes in the logical aspects of mathematics thinking that argumentation based on logic will be a very fine common base for Mexican.
I think that that letter is it's quite >> I I will I will search for the for the letter. It sounds interesting. And just in relation to the Carlo's comments and your comment actually maybe the national preparatory school could be like the press school which is going to be copied in different state of Mexico. So that's great.
>> Okay just one last question >> very short one just to compare on an inst I'm Yes. to compare on an institutional point of view uh with the situation in France concerning natural history. In fact, uh the denomination at the end of the of the regime and afterwards uh the dominations for domains was decided by the academy of the academic uh not by the university not by the government. Well, uh you may say in a way that the academ of sciences is part of the revolutionary uh government in the form of the institute France, but that's not true. The word biology uh was not used even at the academic of sciences or at the first class of the institute of France uh for the first uh years. Then things changed. I mean the idea uh for the academic sciences is was essential that scientists themselves recognize scientists where they want to design for the world curriculum even for the school and so on and at the museum museum museum of natural history not museum biology and so on. Uh there prophecies were free at least after 1794 during the terror uh to choose they were the one to choose names cur and so on. This was changed only with uh uh in France with the coming back of monarchy in 1815.
So what we more or le you you you must see also that there was a move coming from the French revolution that professors have or could I say that uh epistemological power at least an individuality.
So I think perhaps things similar of that kind could be deciphered or understood like whichever.
>> Yeah, thank you. Yeah, sounds great.
I'll take a comment. Thanks.
>> Thanks Ryan. So our next speakers are Juan Manuel Rodriguez.
Um, our next speakers are Juan Manuel Rodriguez and Erica Torres. Juan Rodriguez Manuel comes from Juano and Erica is from here from from >> Thank you very much for the presentation. Thank you everyone for being here this morning. Uh, well, as already mentioned, this is a joint presentation between Erica and myself.
Erica sends her regards. I'm afraid that she is on a research trip on her here at this moment and uh I'm in charge of the presentation. Uh what we are what are we sorry that we are going to present today is this paper entitled Darwinism withoutlogical eterity and the limits of scientific narratives in evolutionary biology. Just as a general background, this is part of a discussions that we have been having in the last years, Annabona, Erica and myself. And this is now part of two research projects that we are currently having at this moment. One of them founded by you and the other one by the ministry of science at this time in which what we want to do thank you is to criticize this the current way in which evolutionary biology history has been presented in general terms most of the of the things that we have been discussing this is not working am I Yes. Is that most of the times basically the history of evolutionary biology has been presented around one person that is Charles Darwin, one okay on the origin of species and one theory that is natural selection. But uh that in in many ways implies that we have this idea of some kind of progressive narrative in which from the moment the species was published there's some kind of progressive history in which you can find this moments or something like that like the moment synthesis for example in the in the mid 20th century as as some kind of relation strict and linear linear relation with Darwin's ideas all in the in the sense that promote a unifying explanation of biology but let me our argument is that first of all Darwinism is not an stable category that is there are a lot of ways to understand what Darwinism is and especially if you consider this in historical terms Even in 19th century, even in Darwin in Charles Darwin's times, Darwinism it was not necessarily referred for example to Charles Darwin's ideas. It can be also referred to Arasmos Darwin's ideas for example the Charles grandfather for example or even can be referred to Wallace's ideas for example the pure Darwinism promoted by Wallace in late 19th century. It was also one of the ways to understand this idea. That's those are just three examples of so many others that we can found not just in Britain but also in other parts of Europe or even the world for example in which Darwinism has been understood in different way. Uh what we are following here is uh the reticulate model of science promoted by Canadian historian Richard Bile in some of his recent books in which above all what we want to do is to try to criticize and to try to deconstruct that's the word deconstruct all these historaphical categories such as Darwinism the Darwinian revolution the eclipse of Darwinism the modern scientists, the extended scientists among others because we consider that most of the times these are not the full explanation of what evolution really is. It's more uh part of a narrative a narrative proposed by some historians or some philosophers or some biologists depends because in that sense that's also part of our discussion. It's not necessarily the same Darwin the same for a historian or for a philosopher or for a for a biologist. Those are those can be three different ways to understand some similar but necessarily the same at some point. And uh finally we want to illustrate some of the consequences at least in the historical sense of this diagnosis through some study cases.
Okay. Okay. First of all, one of the first questions we have been we have been discussing is what is the construction? because we are not following necessarily the the reader's proposal in that sense because the reader's proposal is much more interested in the language especially what we are trying to follow here is uh how can this be applied to historiographical understanding especially know what we can do in order first of all not to refute a theory because we are not trying to say that we was wrong or something like that. That's not the idea. The idea in the end is to show that Darwin is one among many authors promoting defending what evolution is in many different ways. The history in many ways is not showing this. Most of the times especially now that we were been talking about textbooks for example or the preparatory school etc. Most of the times the history of biology that is being teached to all the students is all about Darwin. It's not about the rest of the people or women in this case that can also contributing to the history of evolutionary biology in that sense. And most of this is happening because the history of of evolutionary biology is presented as a some kind of dominant narrative.
In that sense that dominant narrative means imposing on one hand some other alternatives if you want as a compatible or simply non-existent that is maybe the problem here so first of all as I already said what is Darwinis at least in historical sense it's quite complicated to try to understand that there is one Darwinis even in the case of Darwin to try just to focus on a book such as on the origin of species. It's a little bit complicated at least if you consider that it's a book with six different editions. For example, there are some changes maybe are not so big in many cases, but there are changes among all the six editions. And this implies in some ways how Darwin changed his own views about evolution, variation, natural selection, struggle for existence among other things, for example. But the other thing is the rest of the people what he said what they said about Darwin's ideas people such as Huxley for example such as Wallace such as all the Darwinian the Darwinian apostles or disciples in the Victorian way of of saying for example what they said about Darwinian it was totally different among all these people even in the 20th century ideas such as the those associated with neodyarwinism of the population genetic framework of the modern scientists. This is much more part of the interest of the biologist of the 20th century than Darwin itself for example and this at least this instability points toward two distinct but at the same time related problems.
One, as it has been showed in the work of Richard the line especially all these categories such as the W revolution, modern scientists etc. uh they are not necessarily neutral descriptions of theoretical facts but they are more like rhetorical constructions.
They are more like narratives promoted by the historians and their own interests in that sense. Their own feelings, their own ideas about what biology is or can be or must be depends on what on the people in that sense. And this is has been imposed in many ways as the only one history of evolutionary biology.
Now if we are considering then that Darwinism is not a unifying concept is not uh there is not a unity effect but the world that is only produced by a dominant narrative then what is happening with the rest of the proposals ideas theories critics that are around in the history and some of the overall is well known stories. Some others are basically not known. What is happening with all this?
For example, if you we are reading Darwin and in the sense of the book that is a Victorian book written in the mid-9th century breaking for example, we need to consider that maybe the interest of Darwin was not necessarily to promote an auto for example. Maybe there were some people around Darwin that were interested in disruptors to Darwin himself for example that that's an idea that you can follow for example if you not just read I'm not just reading on the origin of species you need to consider the rest of the books that Darwin published in that at that time and Darwin was not necessarily just interested in promoting evolution and especially in this sense of some kind of revolution that's in following this uh the way in in the poly center has been understood for example this also implies as the as I said here marginalization of some other ideas for example one of these cases that we want to present very quickly is the one uh about and Stephen J Steven Gold is a very well-known biologist in the 20th century. One very well known for his works especially on the dissemination of science, of biology, natural history etc etc. And for so many people the account presented by both is the in some way an extension of Darwin himself. Especially if you consider the last book of B, the structure of evolutionary biology, this some kind of very big bible that he wrote by the end of his life in which he tried and at many levels to put Darwin in the center of the explanation despite the fact that many years ago in the 1970s, Golden Aldrich tried to promote a different and alternative explanation of evolution in the equilibria in a totally different sense in in a Darwinian sense. But by the end of his life, apparently Wolves tried to uh to recover some of these feelings about Darwin as the center of explanation. But this is not necessarily true. It's especially interesting the way in which Google incorporates some ideas that he considered that part of this Darwinian framework. they're not necessarily part of Darwin's that is different in that sense for example in following again the line Darwin's model of evolutionary history can be described as a cone of increasing diversity for example especially if you follow this image but what Google is presenting is a totally different model is what we can be named as a decimation model. In that sense, this is much more related with the knowledge of biology in the 20th century than the knowledge of natural history in the 19th century. For example, the one that Darwin had for for example. In that sense, there are two different ontologies. There are not necessarily the same kind of explanation. This is not a continuation in at many levels. There are two different of ontologies in the sense that in the way how they are structured and what kind of explanation requires every one of these.
Another example for example now it's quite prominent in especially if people for example there is some kind of reverse for so many people of the organismal tradition for example the role of organism instead of individuals of populations or some that are evolutionary levels in evolutionary biology for example this case for example it's it's all about the limit which is systemic level in which we are trying to discuss evolution and this is not necessarily something that can be explained easily.
Uh this is more a tradition that is as being reputated especially all these new imposed by the by the Darwinian revolution for example in which all these people who were involved in the development of the modern scientist is at 19 20th century constructed their own way to explore evolution and in that sense refuted and excluded some other explanations that can be considered not necessarily useful for their own purposes in that sense.
Uh it's important to note here that there's a distinction between what is or can be a reputation and can be a suppression. In some ways there are a lot of stories people in evolutionary biology that can be still there but maybe they're not as important as they have to be but in other cases they're simply they're not there. They're certainly erased from history and maybe this is one of the main problems that we have with this process of the construction in that sense. This case for example, southern buff troop, a Danish roarist nowadays is maybe not very well known especially because at least in the United States or the Anglo world especially is a very well known people the critics he established against the Darwin theory especially with this we called Darwinism the reputation of a published in 1987 for example and nowadays is part of all the disclosures promoted by creationist movements in the United States against evolution.
Dr. was not a creationist was an biologist was a biologist and nowadays it's quite important to recover his work because nowadays we are trying to re to re understand to understand in some other way what evolutionary biology is especially if we consider now the role of evolutionary development for example epigenetis for example this is one of the first people in the world who established the basics of these kind of explanations for epigenetics and evolutionary development. There's a lot of experimental work behind most of the publications of doctor for example but the problem is that most of the times he didn't publish in English maybe is best well-known scientist in in countries such as France for example he was involved with some of the of the mid 17 mid 20th century in France such as for example they were influenced in so many ways by this guy but doctor he maybe the main issue with him is that as he became involved not just in experimental works but also he became interested in history and philosophy of biology and in that sense is when he became a huge critic of Darwinism and from a longer defender many levels of experienced anarchism for example is that at least for some of these people much more involved with modern scientists people such as L was not necessarily a very well a very good paper to follow sample But we now are interested in to try to understand the origins of this research program such as evolutionary development or epigenesis. We're going to check the work of this guy lo I'm going to try to finish. Uh this is part also of trying to consider the history need to avoid as much as possible. This kind of mechanisms of anacronization especially from the historical point of view for those true in history is not a problem. But maybe for those people who are not trained necessarily in history more in philosophy more in science biology etc. It's quite common to find this kind of an acromistic or present presentist interpretations of the history of science and sometimes it's not it's part of a still a discussion that we're still having about how to conceive what history of science is or must be.
who who who can say it. And this is why we are trying to uh put the focus on this idea of the reticulate model in which no more we are not trying to follow this idea of a progressive narrative about the history more like it says like a calidoscope of research programs that are intentioned and in at many levels there are many histories that are happening at the same time in parallel that we need to try to focus in all of these in order to try to understand the complexity of the history with this case of evolutionary biology. So we still have this question what is there within reason? Maybe this is not something that I'm not going to try to answer now because we are part of this discussion. As I said this is a discussion among philosophers, biologists, historians many people involved in this. But what is true for us is that we need to be clear about the role of narratives in this kind of presentation of what science is. The history of science is full of narratives and we need to try to focus on how these narratives are constructed every time. What are the reasons? What are the uh the ideas that are around all these constructions?
And well the case of blood troop is as I said is just one instances just one example that of what can in this sense and these are some of the publications that Richard are promoting at this moment that we flex for example this one that is French Darwinism that is done by an Italian historian and philosopher David for example and there's some others coming in which both Anna Nica and myself were involved in trying to discuss this with more organ with other historians biologist etc etc what what is our most urgent task well to trying to face what history is I already said we we need to have this kind of meetings we still have to have normal kind this kind of meetings with people who are not necessarily on our same branch of study. We need to try to have this ample discussions in order to try to well to try to have different answers. I know saying best or worse or whatever. I'm just trying to say different.
Thank you very much.
>> Thank some questions.
>> Thank you.
for sure particularly interested what we have to say about historian point of view but also uh in different way but the idea of neglect uh in mathematics uh neglect exist for sure as in many of the science but there is a trick I mean uh you see uh people who are proving nowadays it's simple things pagor Pythagora I mean in in mathematics very often or remons everybody is using only integral but called still called women and so there is history and uh it has a it is also it gives you as you were saying there were discussions and so but it it gave discussions I mean uh with cars We studied systematically something which for good reasons of neglect was called the fundamental theorem of algebra. But in fact uh the discussion during the 19th century was should we call it Gausen Germany?
We call it the both proved the theory.
Oh, in a way a French a philosopher and aist by the way. Uh so the English more or less the English in the idea well more or less decided okay forget about all that and forget about about your whole history. I would like just so and people were discussing uh I'm not speaking of the usual where you know that there is also any theorem proved anywhere now can be called the munyakovski theorem I mean there is a popoff which I say the pop of history of science and so on nowadays you should pronounce pop off in the Chinese way don't forget that but but On a philosophical point of view, what you are saying is we have narratives.
Are you going up to the point as Michelle Fuku which says that all the narratives are necessary? That is in a way there is no I mean history of science is just a sort of encyclopedia of everything which has been certainly not I don't know perhaps this isn't my question at all and I thank you for the talk >> thank you very much for your for your comment for your for your question and we are still discussing it because we are still don't know exactly for example we are speaking about the construction for example example, we're not entirely sure for example how we can do this kind of historical analysis at least at an historical level. What are the elements we need to consider to do this kind of deconstruction? Because uh just uh remembering what Vansant mentioned at the first day for example the role of for example of sociological elements in in the history of science we need to include them we need to remove them for example we need to try to consider uh some kind of pure science in that sense and what is pure science in that sense we need to look at just of the evidence at the evidences of the moment or the way we are trying to interpret this evidence. We are still struggling a lot with this idea. I'm not entirely sure we are trying to follow what Fuko said. I we're not entirely I think that in that in that path because in the end we need to try to consider this idea of a narrative with with care because in the end we we we can promote at some point this kind of an an archic view of science in which everything is valid or something like that or not and this is not the idea it's more like to try to focus in the context especially as I said in the historical sense if we include also all these philosophical or theoretical discussions but this is a little bit more more complex but what we at least are trying is just to try to focus in the context of the moment that implies geography that implies all the things that are involved but we are still struggling a lot with that I I I don't have a very straight answer I'm afraid in that sense Uh thank you very much for your talk.
I'm very enthusiastic about it. Um I was wondering about the case studies of uh the guy I already forgot his name uh lrop uh and the relationship between the neglect in historioggraphy and the main major narratives. uh you know there's uh this uh expression of Bman the return of organisms and I was wondering um is love trap is used in this now major narrative or is it you know excluded because it helps this narrative or do you have ideas about that it's by curiosity >> thank you very much for the question uh I'm afraid that uh lock is quite strange has many levels. He was Danish but he worked for many years in Sweden. He well he also worked in in Denmark especially he worked for for this brewery industry for many time. He is one of the first who was involved at some point with biotechnology of G yeast for example especially Carlsburg is the the place he he used to work and after that he spent a lot of time working in places such as France uh Italy for example and he was very close to to very different research traditions in that sense he at least until I know he was very metroial especially in central Europe and East Europe also especially in places like Estonia for example I'm not sure Germany but uh in his apparently he was considering uh the importance of all these research programs such as the one by theoretical biology developed especially in places such as Germany but he mixed a lot of these ideas with his own interests. But if you can track some of his very early ideas, you can find even references to him in journals or books related to theoretical biology at least in the sense of this the German tradition for example the romantic tradition you can find some examples of of them especially of the of his early works for example but depends of the moment it's quite interesting the way he was incorporating different research tradition not just those from the theoretical biologist of the idea of organism but some others that's one of the main issues with love that is it's a very complicated answer to follow I'm afraid I I hope that I answering >> interesting thank you and I I just wanted to say that it's a moment of auto self-promotion but never mind we did with a colleague special issues about the notion of uh disr in in sciences that is not the same than observations because it's still useful but at the margin and with this special issue we had a paper from Vin who um wrote about uh the collegate concept in history like uh cold war or things like that that try to unify unify many narratives to you know point out something but it's very fussy and so maybe this uh tool this conceptual tool of collicate concepts uh would be useful for your work about Darwinisense.
>> Thank you very much for your reference.
>> Yes.
>> Thank you.
>> Just one question.
Um I don't I don't know if I'm right to to with my question because it's complicated and I don't understand everything you know but really no I remember something about Stephen G in the the structure of the evolution theory very big book you know I just I remember different things but what I was very impressed about that spent maybe two 100 pages discussing to know if he Stephan J continue to be Darwinism or not you know because he was there way I propon a lot of change so am I I continue or not to be Darwinism I to accept the paradigm if you want the conclusion say okay I we can consider where and for me it's important because I think that the question probably is not to know in science in general and in this case D if Darwin was wrong or not that's clearly not the good question to understand what happened in science it's because of that maybe maybe I'm wrong because I But not very easy with the concept of deconstruction. The point is not to take remember we have to remember Einstein telling about Newton. Oh, Newton forgive me. You know, it is I spend a lot a lot of time not understand to explain to students. No, with the with the relativity it doesn't show Newton was wrong. It's nonsense. I can't tell you Newton was wrong. The question is for Darwinist if Darwin is uh what is the effort? what what is produced in the field the general general field of the science the science of living that that is the question to okay that's very interesting question thank you very much for your comment as I said we are still struggling at many levels because for example the very own idea of Darwinism it's at least for me it's quite complicated because Darwinism is not necessarily a scientific theory is it's not a scientific theory.
It's more much more like a world view is a way to imply that there are science but there are also some other ways to understand the world that that can be more related to philosophy or whatever.
I'm not really happy with the idea to speak about Darwinism for example. I prefer to to focus on the Darwin ideas presented on the origin of a species of the first tradition. Maybe it's too long, but it's much more concrete and to say something that is quite abstract in many ways because Darwinism in that sense we are not saying that is we're not trying to criticize.
Yeah. Because Yeah. Because at least in historical sense you can check for example there's a very very good paper by Cambridge historian James Moore in the 1991 something it's a a paper called the politics of evolution in the 1860s and he's showing for example just in that decade how many way different ways to conceive Darwin's ideas were called Darwinism just in that period for example and it's a nonsense because there are people who are saying Darwinism is natural selection on the one hand and there is people saying Darwin Darwinism is the inheritance of acquired characters because Darwin mentioned that on the origin of the species so for many people can be also that so the decision to show that Darwinism is natural selection for example there is some kind of history behind of that and that's what we are interested in in that sense that's as as said we are struggling with the idea of how to consider considered scientific ideas with or without this social influence or cultural influences for example that can imply so many other things that not necessarily a scientific theory but a world view and if we're talking about a world view we're talking about philosophy maybe maybe it's not science what are we are talking about then we are still struggling a lot with this and I share with you my concerns about the role of the construction that's a word that has been used in many works about this. But this is I think >> we still more about it.
>> We we have we have no more time. So thank you so much for your The next speaker is Solange Has uh she comes from University.
And now in my post talk I take a step further by examining the predictions that are used to inform decision making about biodiversity.
Before moving on to the introduction, let me break the suspense about the word quantorenia which is actually not as mysterious as it sounds. Uh its meaning is actually quite transparent. So it combines frenia from the Greek referring to a pathological mental state or disorder and from quanto referring to the expression of a value in a numerical form. So the idea is simple quantia refers to the pathological tendency to want to quantify everything.
So uh introduction please ecological ecology emerged so at the end of the 19th century grounded on the epistemological requirement to study living beings through the analysis of the relationships organism maintain with their environment and ecology then became instit institutionally uh structured uh during the first half of this 20th century and later in the 80s conservation biology gave rise to a new branch that you can see on the screen structured around the concept of biodiversity that was constructed at the same time as the conservation biology.
Scientificology has for several decades now been at the forefront of global environmental change playing a key role in making explicit the processes affecting biodiversity by anthrop anthropocentric activities. Since the 80s, international reports have multiplied across the various scientific fields concerned with the environmental change in general. In fact, the first major report dates back to 72 with the limits of growth report led by Donella Meadows and her colleagues at MIT. And this report has not uh was not a spontaneous initiative from the researchers. It was commissioned by the club of Rome um which brought together industrials and high level international officials concerned about global trends. In 88 the IPCC the entire environmental panel on climate change the in French was established during the opaces of the United Nations and its first report published in 1990.
conservation biology emerged within the broader movement aimed at informing decision making. Uh and so the seminal 1895 article what is conservation biology? In this article, Michael Suli defined this as a crisis discipline. So conservation biology is a crisis discipline comparing to oncology in medicine and to war for example for social sciences. um is illustrated in the diagram from the article and this reflects a profound shift in the values underpinning scientific disciplines. So for example, neutrality or precision are no longer a particular value in this discipline and because uh they are not placed about the about the urgent need to address practical conservation issues. The term biodiversity itself reflects the interplay between scientific and political issues.
Much later, the uh EQPS, the intergovernmental science policy platform on biodiversity and ecosystem services was established in 2012 following a model similar to that of the IPCC and its first global assessment report was published in 19 in 2019, sorry, and most specialized reports are now published every two or four years by the IPB. is this development institutionalizes a key channel through which biodiversity sciences communicate their findings to inform decision making. It also reflects how ecology and conservation biology help for part of the scientific community entered a new area of the relationship between science. So science is about biodiversity and society.
one in which contributing to international reports assessment about biodiversity has become an inte integral part of how research is conceived in those disciplines.
As you know reconfigurations of the relationship between science and society have an impact of how scientific activity is conceived. Among this transformation I will today focus on what I call so quantrenic pressure. uh that is the requirement for biodiversity sciences to produce and communicate quantified data. So this is for the reconfiguration of the so science social relationship and one consequence of this transformation concern how uncertainty is conceived and managed in scientific work. So uncertainty is no longer purely scientific that is calibrated solely for internal development of the discipline research but it acquires a social dimension in so far it becomes relevant for collective decision making. So as an illustration here you can see the framework presented in the analysis of the IPCC and later adopted by the IPBS which is intended to guide scientists in how they express uncertainty for decision makers.
Thus the question I will attempt to address at least partially is the following. What is the impact of contrrenic pressures related to anticipatory predictions in biodiversity sciences on the management of uncertainty? Before presenting the outline of my argument, I just like to pl clarify that I will not distinguish today between ecology and conservation biology and I will just speak about science about biodiversity biodiversity sciences because otherwise I would have to dig into details that I don't have the time to do today. So uh presentation overview. So first I will revisit the measurement strategy. of biodiversity since the 80s, showing that they tend toward a highly quantified perspective that plays limited attention to social and political issues. Second, I will examine the notion of quantia in greater detail and argue that descriptions of biodiversity show quantic tendencies that obscure normative and ethical uncertainty. And finally in the last part I will focus on the effect of quantia on the management of scientific uncertainty. And more specifically I'll suggest that quantinia is more closely linked to the concealing of ignorance even rather than of uncertainty actually.
So first of all what is biodiversity? So very briefly to begin with biodiversity can be understood across multiple spatial and temporal scales and at different levels of integration. So for ecologists it is measured at various levels. So from gene species, structural function, ecosystem, populations depending on their specialty. In the context of biodiversity crisis, a quantitive narrative uh seeking objectivity has gradually taken shape.
Yet its foundations have always been a source of confusion. One of the first questions ecologists and environmental scientists sought to answer particularly Wilson has uh was how to count the total number of species on earth. So that was the problem in the 18 1980s by Wilson. It quickly became clear that biodiversity cannot be reduced to a simple count of the species. Rather it must be understood at the diverse the as the diversity of life expressed across all levels and integration from genes to ecosystem. Moreover, what matters is not merely the diverse state but also the underlying dynamics. So processes and interactions and in other words biodiversity refers both to the diversity of living beings and what makes diversification possible.
The definition of biodiversity cannot be understood without taking into account the social political context that shaped at the beginning the word biodiversity.
It was formally defined 1992 by the convention of biological diversity which immediately endowed it with an ethical dimension speaking about the intrinsic value of biodiversity.
As such, biodiversity is an overdetermined concept. That is, it carries multiple layers of meaning that are independent and sometimes intention.
It is therefore more than a simple case of omiy between a scientific and political meaning. Since these meanings constantly interact, as Vans Victor puts it, I read from the screen, the term biodiversity is conoted. The term itself is loaded.
Biodiversity is not merely the diversity of life. It is the diversity of life in crisis. I continue the notion of a biodiversity crisis thus has two faces, a scientific one and an ethical one which have a relative autonomy but are never entirely separate. To say biodiversity is to say the loss of biological diversity is morally and ecologically serious. The reality of this crisis is gradually crystallized through research aimed at naming, measuring and monitoring the fate of living beings.
We now come to the second stage of the first part of the argument. Here we will show that social and political dimensions are obscured in anticipatory predictions that is in particular in scientific outputs directed toward decision making because they are less easily quantifiable. To do so, we must distinguish between cooperative prediction and anticipatory prediction briefly. So, corroborative predictions aim to validate or invalidate a scientific hypothesis whereas anticipatory predictions uh aim at informing decision making.
In public debates, we can observe that anticipatory predictions about biodiversity are regularly criticized for their lack of numerical robustness.
So here for example as an illustration I have included a video from the US Congress hearing in 19 in 2019 4th of June um for the IPBES report where it is clearly stated that the results in the IPBS won't be taken seriously because of this lack of this weakness the supposed weakness in numerical forms what we observe is a focus whose origin can be traced back to the decision making sphere uh on the functional and quantifiable aspects of biodiversity. In this sense, one can speak of pressure from the decision making sphere for quantified results from the sciences of biodiversity so that findings are taken seriously and can have an impact on decisions in favor of biodiversity protection. Of course there are also internal pressures uh that over an overlapping interest between the scientific and political interests.
We can observe this tendency to privilege a purely numerical view on biodiversity in the scientific history of biodiversity measurement. So in four steps I will go very briefly into the evolution of the measurements of biodiversity. So first step in the 70s ecosystem ecology initiated by the Odong brothers became a major branch of ecology. In this approach ecosystems are represented as networks composed of subst substituable nodes. So describing and managing an ecosystem is thus reduced to managing the mechanism of resource production. These systems are assumed for self-regulate and maximize the energy production. So human intervention is therefore limited to directing production in the desired direction.
In the 80s, biodiversity concerns instead emphasized the vulnerability of living entities and the stability assumed by Ud's theory was rejected. In order to make this chaotic and unpredictable ecosystem intelligible, the abandonment of the ecosystem as a productive machine was replaced by the optimization of managing living beings as elements of a stock of resources. A major issue of the 80s was the minimum viable population MVP the minimum number of individual required to maintain a species. So the minimum number of individual that is sufficient so that the species doesn't collapse.
Um as pressure on ecosystems identified so did pressure on scientific communities leading ecologists to prioritize saving species from extinction under constraints of environmental degradation in limited resources.
In the 80s now a new theoretical shift occurred. uh it is the functionalization of living systems. So more specifically Walker proposed crossbenefit calculations of ecosystem destruction and protection based on the functions performed by the species as in the MVP remember the minimum viable population and hotspot approaches. This framework is driven by a certain scientific pragmatism even fatalism. In a way, each organism becomes the bearer of a function is ex protected before because of the value of this function. The controversial notion of ecosystem services that is has been broadly spoken of by the philosopher and environmental philosophers like for example Bji Maris comes from this period.
We arrive at the most recent stage associated with the idea of ecological compensation. The idea is to substitute elsewhere a form of biodiversity equivalent to that destroyed. So in France this is formalized in the legal sequence avoid reduce compensate ERC. Uh when measuring ecosystem destruction does not pose major conceptual problems.
Establishing equivalence between destruction and restoration does. As restoration ecology develops methods to monitor ecological parameters, a fundamental difficulty remains relating a given destruction to a given restoration.
Establishing equivalencies between destruction and restoration would require ignoring the entire historical dynamics of the ecosystem and presuming knowledge about its future dynamics.
Victor captures the situation with the evocative. I will read it to to you just now. So my hypothesis then is that biodiversity policy has succeeded in dispensing with biodiversity itself.
Either it is approached to inventories in which case protection is limited to corpses the sort of living or it claims to protect functions and processes without regard for entities thereby protecting ghosts. functionalization or else it's it it establishes rules that relativize any destruction as subject to exemptions and compensation thus protecting zombies that come back to life after the destruction substitution.
We will now move to the second part of the argument. Our aim is to show that the pressures described earlier can be understood as form of quant quantremia.
to do so I will first return in more details to what control actually is. So the term in sociology and also it remained relatively marginal. It had been used to explicit social phenomena.
I will take the liberty of skipping.
Yes. So quantified statement are often acquire in public debate an aura or an aura of scientific authority. So that makes them appear indisputable and effectively shuts down discussion. So for example while vertebrates population have de declined by 33% we are told by the WWF or 1 million species are threatened with its extinction can be read in French government website. So such numerical assertions carry an appearance of unquestionable validity which can hinder their critical examination and more broadly limit public debate.
The predominance of quantified data often at the expense of non-quantifiable forms of knowledge has been the subject of sociological research for several decades. So here we can read uh Edah who's for instance who criticized the un the inability of quantified models to incorporate institutional and social dimensions. So I read what cannot be counted simply does not count if we therefore systematically ignore large and important areas of concern. On the other hand we sometimes generate numbers for assumptions in order to carry out calculations. Once included is normally found concrete data which can easily be mistaken for facts.
Two sociologists we who although they they did not use the term of contraia but they extensively examined the impact of government government by numbers. So I speak of importer.
So from the 18th century onward in Europe, probabilistic and statistical methods underwent significant devel development. And at the same time, an optimistic idea emerged that a form of rationality grounded on probabilistic and statistical method combined with empirical observation could make possible an objectivity uh and thus a transparency both in description and in decision making for the political issues. Here we find again the idea that quantified statements appear indisputable because they acquire an independent reality. So to quantify is to measure of course but it is also to decide and in this sense quantifying is a mean to producing an agreement.
So okay I skipped the conclusion. So the conclusion is that the evolution of biodiversity measurement is in connection with public policy. uh can be understood as a form of controphia.
Uh the second subjection of this part addresses precisely the aspects that are obscured by quantineia and biodiversity prediction. So I will go through this part fairly quickly by highlighting the distinction between scientific uncertainty and normative uncertainty.
So this idea can be found for example in the work of Pin Maris who explains how ethical norms give way to ethical uncertainty when in practice you need to protect biodiversity. And so pontrophenia has the effect of concealing this sort of uncertainties because of its focus on the quantified part and solely the quantified part of biodiversity.
Here is skip.
Yeah. So now we come to the third and final part of my presentation. So we have seen that the controphenic pressures stemming from the decision making sphere affect biodiversity predictions the form of biod diversity prediction and we will now turn to their consequence for the management of a sentence.
So first of all I'd like to emphasize the distinction between uncertainty and ignorance I talked a bit earlier. While scientific uncertainties have received considerable attention from philosophers and of science and from scientists themselves, ignorance is often associated with the field of agnotology as defined by Robert Proctor. I call agnogenesis the deliberate production of ignorance or doubt. The proper study of which is agnotology, a key complement to any exploration of the state of the art.
Thus, ignorance is primarily studied in order to describe phenomena related to the use of scientific results by nonacademic by a nonacademic sphere. As an illustration, one may also refer to the ores and conway book and the study of tobacco and oil production.
Jer defines ignorance as follow.
Ignorance carries a normative dimension which relates to the epistemic and practical ends that can be pursued on the basis of a given state of knowledge.
It makes possible to characterize the state of the knowing agent in light of these ends. In a paper co-authored with Goier Fonten um in revision we thought to show on the basis of two case studies that ignorance can also have a heristic value for epistemology and not only uncertainty. Ignorance emerges from the interaction between a situation of scientific uncertainty and a st standard of normative action.
Thus, aspects of biodiversity that go beyond the disciplinary framework and in particular those that include normative uncertainty and interdisciplinary phenomena precisely set aside by chrontorenic approach fall within the domain of ignorance more than uncertainty.
To finally answer the question raised in the outset, I would argue that quantrophenic pressure uh that is the reduction to a phenomenon to quantitative aspect on anticipatory prediction in biodiversity science result from the concealment of a form of ignorance which is precisely important to take into account in order to protect biodiversity understood in his in its full concept.
I'll move quickly. So as a sort of second conclusion, I'd like to offline uh one line of inquiry I would like to pursue concerning the role of predictive ecology movement in this context of control. The arguments put forward by ecologists advocating for a methodical methodological reconfiguration of ecology as a discipline uh are also internal to their practice and not only external and often draw and paparian arguments particularly regarding the level of precision required for the falsification of hypothesis. This would make it possible to examine how these quantrophenic tendencies affect different disciplines and internal discipines concerned with biodiversity in distinct ways. To do so, it would of course be necessary to engage more thoroughly in the history of predictive ecology since the beginning of the 21st century. And as I know that there are many historians in this room um and in this seminar I'd like to take this opportunity to extend an invitation if this topic interest someone about predictive ecology. So here is the indicative and I thank him for your attention.
>> Thanks so much Solange. We have time just for two very short questions or one question. So, >> thank you so much for your presentation and um it's really um awesome how you intend to apply this uh science of uh ignorance and I think it's really important because um there are uh these things about measuring everything it depends where you apply it on No, this questioning I think is more for Europeans but if you try to apply it in uh developed uh undeveloped countries is really difficult because uh a lot of people doesn't know even how to measure things right and it happens a lot here in in uh Mexico about agriculture when the government try to give uh subsidizing materials or resources for the peasants they don't know how to deal with the fertilizers for example. So how you can measure have it measure a well first and then try to apply it good first and then uh you have then in the next level the the technicians or the extensionist who try to measure uh I don't know the the rural development and they also doesn't know all everything because they are not really specialist on that and then you have another level in the government that they say oh yes uh let's try to make this but they don't even understand sometimes the the consequences of of these measurements. So on your way uh have you ever think about it or is just uh um how to say it's just applied to developed countries?
Well yeah question is really interesting actually the roer and porter speak about it's not even Europe it's really France Germany and UK in the explicitation of history of probalistic and and and and so it is also recuperated by the in the US so it's you're completely right it's really US and west Europe western Europe um the so I would have to think about what you just said. And the the second thing is um that I'm I'm not sure that comprehension is really a part of the problem in contraic pressure. It's really an argument to say that the the margin of uncertainties are too large so that the decision can be uh made. But for for me it's it's really what it is described in the agntology researches that it is really a sort of methodological argumentary uh to be able to refute or to uh in to put doubt in in actually quite certain scientific assertions and show that the yeah the comprehension is really plays a key role here.
>> Okay. Uh thanks so much Solange. So our uh the last speakers of this session are Paola Hernandez Chavez and Jonathan Garcia Campos both from one.
Chemist.
Mr. Thank you very much to the organizer for allowing me to speak here in this nice audience.
Well, this is a project I have been working on only this year. So, and be please bear with me if you have any any any insight it will be very welcome. So, uh the main question of this presentation is uh deals about this question about the main question we have about artificial intelligence. Uh if or whether the changes AI introduces are categorically different from ancient problems uh as in such old times when people used to say if you watch TV it will make you dumber than we are. So, but I think this is a a very open debate for philosophers that maybe we're not addressing correctly or we are not engaging enough. So, the main question is if we are losing capacities for overusing artificial intelligence or not and so I I put it as a very genuine open debate.
Uh so two provocations or two quotes from from Minsky uh who who claims that today no computer has been designed uh or is aware of what what it is doing. Um but most of the times we are we are always not aware of it. So we humans are not aware of where what we are doing on on the on the dayto-day routine.
We cannot we have no capacity to to be reasoning about every step we do in our regular day and the less who claims that it is not a matter of bringing or hopping but just finding new weapons. So my claim um our claim is that we are not really we are not really focusing properly the discussion thus far but hopefully we can contribute to focus the discussion in a better way. So these are the main points. I think that those are the the borders of the discussion. Uh and we we don't rush to claim that we are losing capacities. We are just proposing a way to put to frame the debate in a in a more uh comprehensive and productive fashion.
So uh the first thing is to understand what we really get from artificial intelligence. uh we used to mix we don't distinguish easily between generative artificial intelligence autonomous intelligence and what the clouds all this political debate about the data extraction in current literature.
So uh so in the first part generative AI is something we have to really really understand properly uh so not to fear what students do or how students use it in contrast to how we use it as as professors for for example. So um what generative AI does is just to generate information in different formats audio um images and prod produce a result in a very touring fashion stepbystep process. So uh what algorith algorithms do is just to emulate human intelligence but we cannot claim that they are really producing as you all know. So uh it's a quite different matter what autonomous artificial intelligence does and what are the scopes of this because uh autonomous artificial intelligence is just managing to to instruct robots to have to do uh to do just automatic responses and task and the crowd and the database is just like as as we use on everyday basis in regular courses. So so that they can allocate the information in just one resource. So it is important first of all that we distinguish what we're talking about and we what we are afraid about.
So what we what we do actually get is just data information with which is already processed. It's just a like a very fast Wikipedia and and that's quite different for from what philosophy refers to knowledge. It is not justified through beliefs or not more than what authors have published in regards to this kind of subjects but it's it's just a tantamount to what exist. So it is not a what is being discussed nowadays just if you prompt correctly and you ask the the generator to give you give me the last 10 best articles or most cited articles about this kind of debate. But we don't use it regularly as in that way. So information is already structured and the conflation of databases with knowledge is one of the most consequential epistemic errors we we have. Um so the database is just telling us what is in there. It is not giving us an information about how real false and complete or bias it is.
So u um another issue that is quite uh quite quite important to know is that um I I see these large lingual models as the really the ancestors of of really artificial intelligence because those are the same old questions that Turin was raising when we when he was expecting to uh to to teach Arab. robot how to think that like how to teach a machine h how to think as humans. So um so we have all these considerations we we have no time in here to to timeline the key progresses in in every large language models. But what we have now is that this one we just before the pandemics and just after the pandemics in which uh for example open AI with the GPT1 uh in 2023 just launched the launch the app and so we we immersally and very slowly were were starting using these kind of of of processors and we are just in the this 52 version. I don't know if you use it but it's just they are really really progressing about the simulating the conversation when the um as if you were able to discuss with it. So I think this is very basic for for all of you but it is important to to to start distinguishing between all these elements. So um because you know all these debates at the at the campus of the metropolitan university they we philosophers were called to contribute to a new program in artificial intelligence a newer so that's the reason why we had to start all this because they used to call you an an ethicist of how good or bad is it to use artificial intelligence without going deeper in a very real analysis. So but that those are the main questions they they are discussing even engineers they say okay it is ethics is just uh it's just a debate of how good or bad it is to use it without all these um framework or distinctions that are what we do as philosophers.
So uh >> so machine learning is another very big issue. Um but just to just to summarize I use with I use go with the with the prophet himself to to claim that in in touring classic writing it was discussed and we have been just adapting the new conversation into those old aims.
So um can we so uh what do we really need about to to address properly this kind of controversies about how good or bad is to use artificial intelligence? I think we need of of course rigorous data about like experiments and just assessing for example in in our population the decay the the the estimated decay that has been that has been shown in these last years after the use of massive uh massive processors of like JPT in in a population of high school first grade to third grade the followup of all of this and not just claiming that they are just thinking less than they used to be. So first of all the the very serious and critical criteria but also adapted to our to our market to our population of students. So uh not just claiming that oh no we are not there's no consequences of using artificial intelligence. If you ask if you if you make a a a white sample an interview, you will see that students students they deeply believe that they are using correctly the these kind of tools and also that they have no controversy about this and they just see the advantages of using these technologies as in our times where we were using the the calculator. So that's very interesting because if you if you just assume they know or they are aware of the lack of of capabilities they are not using we will be wrong.
So I think as philosophers we just have to start distinguishing all this the low benefit the high benefit. This is something we just drafted. Um in the one side they claim that AI degrades cognition. In the other one, this one that I just mentioning that it extends your intelligence that is just a tool like in this um in these claims in these claims that we are just empowering our capabilities that it is an extension of our intelligence just to use tools as in the old fashioned way. And uh on the other side you have the open questions of of what are the criteria to to uh or which are the main question we should be discussing and also the nuance of views in in which you you only say okay if you're if you're trained you're trained to to become a a physician then you really need to do how to do the things because otherwise you cannot use the robotic assistance of of uh the the second type of artic artificial intelligence as when you do robotics. Uh and the these ones are the low concern ones.
Uh so uh the first thing I think we just can distinguish between these three three views. uh a series response will require to distinguish between dependent from independent variables in the in the experiments we are assessing or we are approaching as as not the ones performing the experiments. Also examining multiple and broad aspects of of memory, for example, versus the degradation of the capabilities in the population of the the ones using massively artificial intelligence in terms of the generators and also reviewing the best available literature.
But for sure is I think is very very um unusful just to claim that it is not being affected as well as as if we claim that that it is being affected. So we have the first step is just to really put it as a serious debate without rushing to to make conclusions as philosophy many times do. So this I I will I will consider this this distinction bit as kind of useful because one is this these kind of debates where where they see it as a threat of intellectual or just intellectual supplementations so to speak. Also the the very specific cognitive impact it has on this these cases. I just presented something similar like three weeks ago about the implication or consequences and what literature says about about the the consequences in the in visual aspects and also in deep learning and memory processing. So uh another aspect is um I think we should just separate all the political and philosophical dimensions, the ethical dimensions just to focus in separatedly in in in this specific ones and I think the the the focus now should be like the second one from a very neurological perspective and also evolutionary perspective. So maybe another way to put it is just this how how human cognitive structure adapt because of course as we know adaptation is the main force of evolution not any kind of progress. So if even since from the beginning if we claim that we are degradating our cognitive capabilities we're just losing the focus that natural seleation best strategy is to adapt and we should adapt to those kind of progresses what we have now instead of saying like we're just degrading our our cognition.
So um so one of the main points or the most interesting controversies is that it has been uh documented like two months ago that large language models they just emerge they have supervenient properties.
So like in the old debates of philosophy of mind um and not a mechanistic uh not as a mechanistic process but as a but as a in indirect consequence of just teaching on and training the artificial networks to produce a very specific response. So this is not my claim. Of course, this is something that has been documented in in this work from 19 from 2025 cognitive reserve architecture in artificial neural networks and he is it it is receiving a lot of attention. So uh we can of course wonder how they do it and try to loate how they are uh giving giving place to these emerging properties instead of just claiming that that that is not possible provided that in philosophy of mind supervenis is not solved anyways so that's a very fascinating point I think for the future that is being discussed already Um so there's another this one the fun functional hierarchy of needs and also the substrate not the category and it was also been documented consciousness is an event rather than a state and that's it something that has been published by um so it is it is also as if as if if as as we use artificial intelligence we started having the same problems we used to have use for human philosophy of mind.
So uh I I made a work with these cases.
Well, not me but but just like with uh with our colleagues, our team this the changes in vision and ocular morphology.
I will only mention them. The memory processes that we suppress when we use the when we surrogate our capabilities.
We just we we claim we feel like epistemologically we feel like we have that knowledge even if we don't have it and we just store it in our mobile phone and the consequences of deep learning the lack of attention we are kind of perceiving we all have as long as we sugate also this memory process.
So this is a very classic one of the I I just mention it because of the link with evolution with adaptation that we humans are supposed to have developed this white part of the eye this because it has a social function um the cooperative eye hypothesis and in which we can see or we can perceive or anticipate others behavior because we are looking at their eyes and this is something we're we are supposedly losing because we now act more similar to great tapes because they don't focus on the white part of the eye. They don't have a white square as us not not as big as us at least. So they they focus the attention in the direction of the head instead of in the white part of the eye.
So that's something we're doing and we have to remember the last the last year when when we are not just seeing even watching a video and we are just reading instead of looking through the through the to the fully in or the action. So we are trained not to pay attention to the movements or the white part of the eye which is more complicated even and instead just reading the information even evoking even if we if I'm right we can of course anticipate we don't have to do it which parts of the brain are activated just to see through this scene and trying to make a deduction instead of anticipating a an dangerous scene when you have to just run. They they they cannot tell you. Evolutionarily speaking, we are not we cannot be told that just run. Believe me, just run and you read it and go away. So that's something we are just like open. So uh I don't have time to mention all these kind of evidence of the visual system consolidation, but it's it's quite dependable of the context, environment and so on. Uh so um but it has been documented with this kind of work. Some people think they are very bad evidence but they have many many thousands of quotations. So I would read this message so easily that as long as we are expo overexposure to the screening ms ring incredibly in in this in the few studies or the databases they have in in bigger population because they are over they are talking about hundreds of cases.
Um so also the it's documented the visual fatigue on the computer vision syndrome also and um from an evolutionary perspective I think we have to frame the debate including evolutionary perspective on and also what neurobiology tell us about it next one and the memory expression is another case and next one so I think we can I I'll try to summarize it in case I had didn't that time the memory of loading memory overload and how LMS are not are not human working memory. So, so this this is also documented.
And of course the cognitive of loading and how we are just estimating all these this um cognitive reserve opportunities that as you know as we age we start losing all these cognitive reserve and of course it will more complicated as we stop using all these old activities and I won't say brain areas but just not uh consolidating for example learning a language which had been instrumented so well which are the most recommended to to conserve cognitive capabilities. So uh so I I think I will try to stop in here.
What can philosophers do? Just this concept of clarification of course distinguishing between intelligence, knowledge, storing information. What do what do they utterly mean? what we are what LLMs are simulating all these all ethical and political analysis because we mix everything when we start talking about this this debate about losing capabilities also this epistemological critic but because even when it seemed that epistemology was the just in this kind of debates it it comes again very strongly and this inter interdisciplinary bridge that in in a as we know from a very specific field you cannot solve this very huge debate about AI um also you have to include neuro anatomy because it's very very important for this and it's quite um intermix I won't have time to mention but that's thanks So we have time for two questions.
>> Um thank you for your presentation. Um I think we can all agree that the implementation of AI has been like massively faster and our ability to actually analyze the risks a bit. So I I was wondering what would you consider to be like the best precautionary idea for at least us as individuals to like um avoid the most harm but also maybe like not get behind the the curve as much.
>> Yeah. I think in in in recovery training it's very visible what the consequences are but I think they the experts recommend this like kind of fasting from technology and also like we were just talking about that yesterday the the break that you get rid of the of your mobile phone at least for two hours and then you start training doing it but yourself because yeah as long as we as we keep and like just s surrogating we are losing our capabilities. We all know that we cannot memorize our relatives phone numbers and so so that's what they recommend and also as you know in the best schools in the I believe they just prohibit the use of mobile phones and I think we cannot do it we're not hiring he does three books a year and he and he claims that you have to rest like two months a year for or from your devices but he has a lot of people working from here taking emails and so on. We cannot do it. But I think you have to answer like what it is not that I say it that's what they recommend as as long as we are sure that we are not losing capabilities.
I I like your presentation a lot. just off the top of my head in 1950s article by Turing he predicted that in the future uh machines will trick us 30% of the time that we will not be able to identify a machine 30% of the time is there any idea what the rate is now I I I suspect it's a lot a lot uh lotier Yeah, I think he underestimated it because it is claimed that you in population of kids they say that you they just cannot go to bed without having an an a device image in their mind or the lights and I suppose that only when we sleep but so it is just a maybe 30% of the time we are not watching our devices over the computer screen but most of of One of these works mentioned that only when we sleep. So I think it's most of the time and just because we sleep we don't use it. But they claim that it is all the time like 100 95% of the time unless they're sleeping.
>> Absolutely.
>> Some other question.
>> So we have a break of 10 minutes.
One Get it.
Thank you everyone. We're going to begin our last session. If you can take seat please.
Uh so Ryan you is everything ready? Okie dokie. Well, uh our uh next presentation, the first one of this last uh of last term is uh in charge of Topil Rishard who is going to present the incommensurability of concepts between the history of science and developmental psychology. Thank you very much.
Hello everyone. First of all, I would like to say thank you to the organizer of the seminar, for the setup, for the conferences, for the warm warm welcome at Dunam and for the opportunity to present today a part of my work. Just to give a few element of context, um I've been spending the three last years working on a French philosopher of science called Vimma under the supervision of David Rab. And this talk today is in a sense a sequel of my PhD and a work in progress.
So here is the plan of my presentation.
I will first go back to what I call an old problem in the tradition of historical epistemology namely the problem of conceptual change and I will present the terms of the problem coming back to the formulation given by Julim.
So in a sense I will come back to my PhD thesis. Then I will try to uh return to the main text in which the argument was initially developed by Thomas and then on a special reading made by Risha because I think this reading is quite eloquent of what can be said of the notion or what can be made of the notion of incommensurability and then I will try to criticize the reading made by Visha and to develop some kind of way out.
So the first part of my talk, an old problem in the tradition of historical epistemology. Just to situate my talk, I will just say a few words about Julima.
Julima was a teacher at the college of France from 1962 to 19 yes 190 where he has been well known especially for three things. He's first a historian of philosophy.
He's a historian, a philosopher of science, but he's also one of the few first readers of analytic philosophy in France, and this is why he is studied today.
His main works consist of assault on the nature of philosophy. His main problem was to try to explain the existence of perennial debates in the history of philosophy. Why do we have sentiment when we read also from antiquity, from the middle ages, from modern era that there is always some kind of option that we can find back of problems. But this is not the object of my talk because he also had a huge interest in historical uh epistemology and he left a lot of manuscripts on these questions. Here I just show you an extract from the site the website of his archives in Nori in France where you can read uh the titles of the manuscript and the one highlighted is a book on encom ensurability of theories in history of mathematics and physics and it's really interesting because he did not published a lot on this question but when we go to the archive we find a lot of manuscripts and notably a huge history of astronomy, more of than 400 pages in English taken from conferences he gave at Print at Princeton in the 80s.
And so I can say that a part of my presentation is some kind of commentary of this manuscript.
And it was a really important problem for him mainly I think for two reason. The one was that the first one was that was really influential and the second is that he had the sentiment that the position advocated by threatened an old understanding of what physical theory was. and he traced back the arguments by Kun to another historian of science Pierre Juven and I will read the first paragraph of the extract taken from the history of astronomy from 1985.
For a long time until the beginning of the present century, it has been believed that empirical science and mathematics follow the same path of history. At least as soon as an empirical science had reached its positive stage, the domain of its law was preserved and extended at each step of its development. In both disciplines, innovation meant progress. And this the last sentence was in the eye of Juda what Thomas Kun threaten with his book on the structure of scientific revolution. the very idea of a progress of scientific thought or in history and that's why it was so important for him to criticize this point of view since the problem of incommensurability has been widely discussed in general philosophy of science I will try to present the things in another way and that's why Um okay okay no maybe the other way will be just after this slide.
This is an extract from the summary of the history of astronomy by of the history of astronomy by Julim when you can already guess what kind of strategy he will try to develop. In the first chapter he defied the notion of empirical truth but then just after he tried to analyze the way by in which in history of mathematics the truth of theorem is preserved from one theory to another and the idea is really classical. It's the idea that mathematics develops mainly by developing larger and larger frameworks in which you can always find back the old theorems demonstrated in different way but the truth of them in the end are the same.
And his goal is to show that when you have mathematical physical theory, since you use mathematics in physics, you can find the same kind of phenomenon, the same kind of coincidences between the results and between two physical theories. And that's why he's talking about the point two empirical structural embedding. the idea that earth physical theory can be embedded in a new theory more comprehensive. And so the strategy is to show the analogy between history of physics and history of mathematics.
And then you will have to take into account the element of a physical theory that seems not to be reducible to the mathematical parts. namely for example the cinematic dynamics or the cosmological part of a physical theory.
So he goes from the simple ca the simpler case case of mathematics and then go deeper and deeper into the element of the physical theory that seems to be not reducible to the mathematical part and this way we can hope to save the continuity of progress in the history of physics. Okay. But since this problem has already been widely discussed by historian of physics and of mathematics, I will just try to give another view on this problem. And here I gave you a quote taken from an introduction written by Lima to the physical theory by in which he stresses the moral part than we have in every scientific activity.
Experimental criticism of hypothesis subordinate to moral condition and just after the impartiality of loyalty necessary for judging hypothesis make men citizens of another world. At first sight, it's hard to even understand what Pima means by these formulas and it's not evident to to link this formula, the idea of a moral component of scientific progress to the problem stressed by Kun and Den and that's why I just give you two other quotes for the context in order to explain the sense of this text.
The first is byru and you find the same idea namely that there is something highly specific in scientific activity and the second by which with mystical accents in which in which he say that the physician do not choose his hypothesis they are imposed upon him by some kind of force we don't know what some kind of exision exisions intellectual existence so it's a widely shared idea idea at the beginning of the 20th century, the idea that scientific activity is highly specific to human being and human mind. And you find the same idea in the text of of Bimon more than 50 years after the realosition between imaginative knowledge and scientific knowledge signify for the subject two different modes of being whose opposition is characteristic of the life of the mind.
And so in a way um human mind can become independent from nature from psychology when he thinks scientifically and historically I think it's an important line of thought sometimes ignored today but my uh main interest in this argument is the idea that um there is something specific to scientific activity and we may lose sight of it when we develop a too broad fra philosophical framework in order to interpret it and this will be let's say my perspective on Kun's work I think he developed some kind of linguistic arguments that in a sense may be too far away from the specificity of philosophy of history of science sorry which leads me to my second part I will try to demonstrate why I just what I just announced Here I will only focus on one aspect of Kasis and here is an extract of an article you you will find in the roads in structure an article from 1982 called commensurability comparability and communicability and the aim of the text is to clarify the consequences of his famous thesis and here I would like to highlight only one point the fact that the framework designed by is really comprehensive. This is I think the the four fifth slide. Historians, anthropologists and perhaps small children engage in them any process of production in every day. Which mean that when developed the notion of paradigm, notion of incommenurability, he develops concept that you will find back in the history of mathematics or physics in the case of small children.
So in develop de developmental psychology and so we have the impression that we have a very very broad framework and the question is what become the specificity of the history of each science from this point of view and I think this is why um and I think this is not at all surprising Ilun's work because here is another text from the roads in structure and I would like to highlight the line fifth. If I were now rewriting the structure of scientific revolution, I would emphasize the language change more and the normal revolutionary distinction less. But I would still discuss the special difficulties the science experience with holistic language change. And I think when you read every text of Hun, there is some kind of a cast or a contrast between the first books more focused on history of science on concrete historical examples and the last book in which he's more concerned or concerned of developing let's say the linguistic philosophical theory that fit to his practice as a historian. And so in the structure of scientific revolution you have more question like how to explain simultaneous discovery.
Why do scientists stick to theory while there are already plenty of counter example known?
While in the last uh text by co the question are more how to understand the way in which scientific language can refer to an extra linguistic reality and so it give rise to a general philosophical problem that can be in my opinion detached from the historical basis from which it's originated at the very beginning and I think uh this really become a problem with certain reading of kun And here I would like to make a small detour by Risha.
For those who don't know Risha at all, he's an American pragmatist, a contemporary, a self uh and a self-proclaimed proclaimed sorry pragmatist. already said it and he especially defend the idea in his master work philosophy and the mirror of nature that the metaphor of philosophy or science at the mirror of nature is profoundly illconceived because in no way we can understand this idea of correspondence between our theory and reality. and he based his criticism of the of the metaphor on a reading of contemporarius philosopher and on especially the idea in this text is that the notion of linguistic holism is not really defended defendable when you are talking about small sentences. If I only say that my phone is on the table there is no kind of holism in that kind of affirmation. But as soon as you switch from punctual sentences from large theories for example the moral vocabulary of St. Paul versus Freud the jagon of Newton versus that of Aristotle begin to be confronted with problem of tradition and comraability and that's why the notion of a mirror of nature can be can't be applied to that large vocabulary.
So here is the first example and here is the second not the example the the second one. According to Kun the history of science shows that the structure of controversy that have tied physical science bears a much more closer resemblance to an ordinary conversation that was believed during the enlightenment. And you can see every quote that you have that you have the same schema. You go from history of science to discourse in general to conversation taken as a notion that can regroup as well general conversation we have today and scientific controversy for example and I think it's not accidental because when we try to analyze the arguments made by Kun and we observe that they are linguistic and philosophy ical arguments and so it's just natural for them to be this general um and which lead to this kind of consequences. It seems seems it seems safe to say that almost everybody who tries to resolve rather than dissolve the issue of realism versus instrumentalism takes for granted that we can find something like an inferential principle which can be called addictive and which is more prevalent in modern science than you say theology or transcendental philosophy and then you can see the consequences of the perspective taken by Roi on the history of science since you are looking for an abductive for a scientific principle that can be used in every science in the end you will find that it's impossible to find anyone and so science will be on par with ome theology will be only a kind of discourse in the rest of culture and that's why has been accused of being a famous relativist because of this close analogy he advocates between science and the other types of discourse because the last consequences is the idea that we could only dispose with science only as a kind of historical discourse. We have no obligation to science to its rules than we have to homeic theology for example they are on the par. This sort of philosophy does not work piece by piece analyzing concept after concept or testing thesis after thesis. Rather it will it works holistically and pragmatically. It say things it say things like try thinking of this way or more specifically try to ignore the apparently futile traditional questions by substituting the following new and possible interesting question.
And one of these futile question is the question of the rationality of science.
the question of realism.
Um, and I think there is something really counterintuitive. But I think it's if we want to discuss what is counterintuitive, we have to discuss the notion of generality that is that is part of philosophical discourse on language itself. And which brings me to the last part of my talk what I in entitled a way out. Here is the main argument of my presentation. Let the core and it relies on three premises.
First if science is considered as a language on par with the rest of culture then all we can say of language in general can def facto be applied to science. Then conversely, the specificity of the history of science or of every science is irrelevant to philosophy because your conclusion is only based on what you can say on the abstract notion of language. Which lead me to the famous proverb that say that all cats are gray in the dark. When you adopt a linguistic perspective on every science, then you are you are in the dark and you can only take into account a very general feature of language and not the specificity of each science you would like to take into account or if I may use a visual metaphor you are looking things for too from too far away. And now I would like to end this presentation with two example in order to illustrate these specificities I've been strating from the very beginning.
And uh for this I would like to come back to the history of astronomy by Vimma.
The question of historical comparison between two theories or two different stages of a theory makes sense only if one theory of one or one stage of a theory may be regarded as an extension or a progressive development of the other. Now mathematics have the peculiarity that the latest theory is always expressed in a language within which it is possible to to express sorry the theorems of the former theory without having to resort to extrinsic linguistic means and this kind of correspondence is something that you will never find in ordinary language. So I will give give sorry a specific example here is a theorem taken from the book three of the alma majest by and the aim of this theorem or more precisely the theory of theorem is to show the equivalence between two kind of hypothesis when you want to explain let's say an anomaly in the movement of the sun or of a planet you can as well use an eccentric or a NP cycle and the theorem is showing that the two option are equivalent but if I'm interested by this theorem it's for another reason it's because you can find him find it verbatim in the derivation books by copernic the you find exactly the same theories this is the first point so you can recycle an element of a physical theory something you will never have in ordinary language because you cannot specify a part divide a part of a language. And second, because Copernicus made another interpretation of this theorem because he interprets the the epic cycle as the movement of the earth projected by the observator. Since the earth is moving, the epicycle is not a movement of the planet, but the movement of the earth projected by the observator.
So here we have a specificity taken from the history of mathematics that is totally ignored if we stick to a linguistic explanation of the notion of incomability or of scientific progress.
The second example is taken from a totally different area and here I will have to be really quick. It's taken from de developmental psychology just to give the context of these experiments. The idea is the experiments were designed in order to discuss a famous thesis advocated as well by Y by William James or by P. The idea that the notion of object is not spontaneous for a children. It's only developed through experiences.
And this is a study by Karen win in order to challenge this idea. It's really simple. You have a first object playing placed on stage. Then you cover up the object with a screen and a second object is added and the land leaves empty. And the question is what will be the reaction of the children when the screen will drop. And then we have two different cases. In one cases it's the probable outcome. The children will see two objects and the second possibility is an impossible outcome. there will be only one object behind the screen and the methodology here rely on on what is called time looking method. It's a way to analyze what the children is waiting for and we can conclude from this experiment that the children is waiting for two object behind the screen because he can know that if you have one object another one you will have two at the end. And here is another one in which there is a screen A duck is showing at the right side of the screen and then a truck at the left side and in the end there is only one object and the children is not puzzled at all. Why?
Because at this age namely six months he doesn't rely on specific characteristic of the object but only on movement and so it could be the same object. He's not puzzled at all.
And okay and I just gave you this example for two reason. um the let's say just one the the reason is that uh develop developmental psychologists are really interested by the notion of incomability but I think the notion as you understood is in my mind too broad but I think that developmental psychology give tools in order to specify pre-linguistic beliefs and so in a way you have tools experimental experimental tools in order to isolate ate things from more broader vocabulary. And so I think instead of sticking to the notion generally of incommensurability, we should give more attention to the specificity of each of each field in which we could be tempted to use the concept.
And for this I gave you three types of conceptual system or concept in which the notion could be used. But in which I think we should more sticks to the specificity and I think I will give up my conclusion to just say thank you for your attention for your presentation. We have some time for questions.
>> Yes. Thank you very very much because uh for me your presentation was really a very interesting and first because one reason is because I think that the use of den and is a ch a choice one excellent very very rich. So, but one question more precise about about DM because maybe the quotation according to DM the scientist has no choice in his about phenomen is the theory scientific object there is one chapter I think maybe a double chapter the title is the choice of hypothesis so it seems to be contradictory >> but what is really interesting that for it's it's it's correct that scientific has no choice front of the phenomena You know but the freedom is complete in one step very precise and important in the the physical theory the mathematical one. So and this step the choice is complete and that for your example in the end is excellent of course but it is it is an old truth you know with your example the history of the wheel. So that is the first verse.
It's not really a question but in the maybe the second that is a question I wonder maybe some of the critics uh the critics from um yeah the critics are too to the critic maybe are more relevant the critic to the state could and maybe not to the cool of the structures so scientific.
Are you agree on that or for instance for me I see I think I I learn a lot of things of the and maybe not less on the land crew.
>> Thank you very much for the question. uh first the first one I think it's only a question of scale maybe that you have liberty at the individual scale in the choice of hypothesis because between the phenomena and the logic you have the space of mathematics where you can find the more useful the more beautiful hypothesis for DM but at the scale of history we can say that you have a movement for DM that cannot be really explained a movement of more and more rationality that can only explained from mystical point of view. It's when we can it's when we can see in the text that conclude the the the origin of statics from which the text was taken. And as for the second question, yes, I think I would totally agree. But the problem is that um I think that the second queen is trying to do something totally legitimate. Maybe draw the philosophical theory of his practice as a historian. He tried to generalize but I think the question is how to do this without losing the the importance of history of complete history of world work he did the structure I don't know if it's a good answer >> right thank you very much and well we're a little bit distracted with the time thank you very much for your presentation and our next presenter is who is going to give us a talk about entitled does the kora of the time of the timos make sense in contemporary cosmology.
Yeah.
Okay.
characteristics.
materialist compromis etc. Contosibility.
material percept.
electromagnetic or contemporary.
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for simply.
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for omnipotent divina.
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as contradict relativistary.
electromagnetic relativity.
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concept unosp Scientific estadena.
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contempor.
quotation.
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philosopher.
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constant conceptual Okay.
Relativity.
Grandpotis.
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investig systematina different vacuum.
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Phenomenis.
Fundamentas, astronom Gravitos characterist.
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The transmutual gravitational Thank you very much for your presentation. Perfect timing. Uh we have five minutes for some comments, questions from anyone.
>> No.
That's perfectly clear apparently perfectly >> nothing no >> uh thank you very much for your talk actually very timecon so I was wondering because I had a thing that during all your talk the idea of dynamic was here but uh it's not at all the same in plat newton and so on. So um do you think um this um this there is a kind ofation of a kind of platonian platonian dunamis later up to today cosmology or I will answer you but not directly more live. This presentation is in a way not reasonable and I choose to to do it too the same the chance of of concept you know and I talk concept universal in plateau and pretend to conduce here until until now you know so it's not completely reasonable but I I can't explain because of course your question is obvious you know and there is other how can we concede you know something continuity something relevant than that that is the rest of a project I had when I was young when I maybe 20 years ago I wanted to organize of you know project of of research with other group of specialist of different period and and to build something a big project about the continuity of the sensia of ed you know so to answer your question it needs many more work this all those conceptual modifications.
every time you can find in each others some specific uh relationship between different kinds of concept that are very permanent in particular matter and dynamic for instance and so maybe in all those different authors the concept the concepts change a lot but the there is a kind of maybe necessity of linking the same kind of concepts meaning for instance matter and dynamics or I don't know what do you think about No, I I think I think in fact it exist the nucleus because in the spaceing you know uh it's impossible that some philosophical phenomenon exist you know and that is very difficult for us and I think that is universal Maybe that isn't coming from plateau until now that it's really difficult for us human being to understand something without measures and without producing physical effect you know that that is that is something strong from the beginning to the end that is dynamic of course there is some dynamic and the answer by Okay. Well, I have here one more question, please.
>> Yeah. I was wondering if uh it is possible to think that uh the electromagnetic field is sort of a new conception of nonmaterial ether. No. And if the quantization of this field destroys that equivalence, >> no, it's not equivalent.
>> Okay.
they may but you know I think now in the modern cosmology the with the the production of concept which has not really are not really realistic.
They are not on on purity you know but they are they have theoretical mathematical necessity something like that. So there way to exist you know which so but the subject is too big for me to be able to to answer proper to your question.
Thank you very much again for your presentation.
And we're going to have the last presentation not just of the date but of the seminar in fact in charge of Gautier Debu who is going to present a very current title from quantum electronamics to quantum optics example of a transfer of knowledge in light of the modular structure of physical theories. Please go ahead. Thank you very much and thank you very much for the invitation. It's a great pleasure and a great honor to be part of this from Mexican seminar and actually as you can notice I have changed a little bit my title uh because I have to say I was a little bit annoyed at the beginning because I knew that I would be in front of mostly historians and philosophers of mathematics and biology and I'm a historian of physics. So uh I don't want actually to bother you today with my main uh object which is the history of quantum optics and actually I would like to present you to introduce to you um what a concept introduced by my PhD one of my PhD advisors called Darol who is also an historian of physics. uh because when I saw the the the topic of the conference, the evolution of theories, I immediately thought about Oliv theory, which is a new vision of the the evolution and the structure of physical theories and it was actually very inspiring for me because it helped me to rethink in a new way the history of quantum optics and so I hope that it will be maybe even if it's closely related to history of physics that I hope that it will be inspiring also for you and so uh okay sorry so here is Olivier and uh if you are interested in it so he here here here is his article published in 2008 um it's called the structure of the modular structure of physical theories and uh Olivia I I I know was a little bit disappointed because this conception uh was quite unnoticed by the community and I hope that today I will make this ideas well known to you. So I give you before explaining the theory some motivations.
So um this modular theory um is made to understand how physical theories are built also to understand more to the point the connections between formalism experiments and interpretations.
Uh it's also very useful to compare and apply physical theories. I will give some some examples from my own research and it offer a new perspective on incommen incompensability.
So and we make maybe the link with T's presentation.
Um and it's mainly it's very abstract as you will see but actually paradoxically it's also very close to the practice of physicist olig is very close to this idea and so it's important to to mention it. It's also important for me to mention that Ori is not a philosopher of science at least originally and that uh this contribution he made to the philosophy of physics um is based on his own experience as an historian and so um I think it's important when you know that Olivier is one of the best maybe historians of physics specialized in the 19th and the 20th century. So uh that's a that's a a good thing. So here is my secret dream is to build a new school maybe the new school of modules. So uh if you like uh this series, if you feel inspired by this, you could join me, you could join our school and uh it's actually not completely a joke because I hope that someday um I hope to gather to enough people to make a collective book on this idea of modules. So um a module is itself defined as a physical theory but it's a physical theory of a special kind because it relates to another physical theory I will explain that clearly right after that since it is first first of all since a module is defined as a physical theory I have to explain to you what is a physical theory as it is defined in Olivia's article. So first of all, you have a symbolic universe. So it's from the mathematicians in the room. Uh it's it's simply a set of symbols uh that lives in traditional spaces, ma mathematical spaces that allow you to define quantities um in the theory. uh the states the states of the systems you are interested in and the transformations of these systems. So it's uh the symbolic universe and in addition to this universe you have fundamental laws. So uh it's um laws acting on all the symbols of the univer the symbolic universe uh and this symbolic universe plus these fundamental laws um constitutes the what we call the formalism and this is purely mathematical for the moment we don't have any link with any experiment in the real world and this link with experiment is made at the next level of the interpretive schemes. So as you can see the physical theory it's that there is this mathematical part this formalism and um this interpretive schemes which allow you to define quantities measurable quantities and to conceive ex experiments uh that allow you to measure these quantities and an important thing to say is that it's it's again very mathematical it's very abstract I mean you can manipul ulate these interpretive schemes in a purely mathematical way. So of course it's intended at some point to have a link between real experiments but uh in this interpretive scans you conceive this experiment as idealized experiments that you can treat mathematically and then you have a four ingredients fourth ingredient which are applic approximation methods that allow you to simplify some problems. Um, for example, you can think about participative method um that allow you to to to to to make some predictions on on conceivable experiments by making some assumptions like for example small forces etc. Okay.
So this is the definition of a physical theory. I give you an example for things to be very clear and it's a very simple example classical mechanics new Newtonian mechanics. So in Newton mechanics the symbolic universe is simply the definition of a system s with masses so with many masses m uh mi positions x i speeds vy vi etc time t and force acting on these bodies. So that's the symbolic universe with continuous variables living in r3 etc. Okay. Then you have the fundamental laws. So it's the Newton laws that you know well and laws associated with forces like for example the universal gravitation and it's universal. So it's in in this case a good fundamental law because it applies to all the uh elements of the symbolic universe and then you have the the so it's fully mathematical and then you have the interpretive schemes so conceivable experiments in this framework. So you can for example imagine a first ideal experiment det which consists determining the final position of a moving object given its mass, its initial positions, its initial velocity as well as the forcings acting of it.
And you can imagine the reverse experiment which is that you know you you observe the motion of your object and you deduce from the motion the forces acting on it. and was the initial conditions etc. And uh if you have too many bodies in your problem, you can use some approximation example of uh a physical uh theories. But I didn't talk about modules yet. So now I will come to the module and the big idea uh in Olivia's article in that this theory is not complete. You have to add to to have a real physical theory, you have to add a modular structure. That is to say that you call other theories to help you to uh build the formalism or to conceive experiments in your interpretive schemes. So you in in your theory you have some modules which are other theories that helps you either to uh define quantities in your formalism or in your interpretive schemes or to design possible experiments or to uh delineate some specific regimes of application of the theory. I will give an example of that later. And um so the point is that the as you can see the phys the definition of the physical theory it's essentially mathematical but because it includes uh physical interpretations that you have in your interpretive schemes and this modular structures which is a network a set of other theories that you use uh for different purposes in your new theory. I give you some examples again.
So before sorry before exper before the example I just want to expose you a misconception of the modular structure because I fell in this trap in my childhood uh and I don't want you to think uh that the physical theory contains like that some modules and that if you consider each module as a physical theory you could imagine that you have other modules in the modules and and the physical physics resembles uh Russian dolls. Okay. And actually that's not the idea. You have to see this modular structure as a network. So you have your physical theory, you have another beautiful physical theory, a third incredible physical theory and you can see you can consider uh one theory acting as a module of your theory. Okay.
and it can act on different parts of your theory etc. And so I don't know if the metaphor is really great but it's more like a legal game. Okay. And of course this is not frozen in stone. It evolves in time and it depends also on the conception you can have of your theory on the type of experiments that you can conceive at a given period of time and on the degree of elaboration of the theory. So of course when you have your theory you can improve it, add some symbols, add some new experiments etc. So I give you example so maybe you will be uh maybe it's a bit debatable but in Olivia's vision geometry can be considered as a module of classical mechanics. So you can read idian geometry is a module of classical mechanics because the objects of mechanics are defined within ukidian space and because geometry itself is a physical theory which can be used to predict the metric relations to among rigid bodies. It means that if you see a clitian geometry, if if you bring physical interpretation to Aidian geometry, you can make you can make it a physical theory which begins to be a module of classical mechanics. But it's not the only time you can see this kind of of example. For example, much later you have Romanian mathematics and at some point there were with the the advent of general relativity a physical meaning to this remaining geometry which became a physical theory in this sense. I mean in the context of general relativity and so you can consider that a mathematical theory can become a physical theory. Okay. And of course classical mechanics is a module of many many many theories but I give you just one example. It can be considered as a module of special relativity to define quantities but also to imagine some some experiments uh within the framework of special relativity and then you can see special relativity as a module of a general relativity and that you have your network of of physical theories.
Uh so I just want to so I mentioned it's I mentioned that there are different kinds of module different ways of acting on a theory. So I just give you the different it's not exhaustive but I give you some examples of the different kind of modules you can uh meet. So very simply you have defining modules that is theories that allow you to define quantities in your new theory to define the for example to to to build that help you to build build the symbolic universe you have reduction modules it's kind of defining modules but the point is that in with the reduction modules you sorry you define all the quantities all the symbolic universe for example if to refer to uh optics at the beginning of the 8 the 19th century in France in the Llassian program. You had the idea that all the optical phenomena could be explained in a in a mechanical way. That is you can consider the light light is made of corpus curves and there are forces acting on this corpus curve and then you can explain all the optical phenomena with this mechanical vision. And so in this period of time in the Llassian program classical mechanics can be considered as a module of optics. Okay. Then you have schematic modules. So the name refers to the interpretive scheme. So that that's module that helps you to build your interpretive SC interpretive scheme. So to that helps you to um to conceive uh to define experiments uh in your theory.
So I skip because I have five minutes left. You have approximating modules. So for example um in the case of special relativity and general relativity you have this approximating module because uh if you if you just look at phenomena in a small location of spacetime then you you can recover uh special relativity from general relativity etc. And you have the specializing modules and that's in my in my case what is of interest because I consider I will explain to you right after that. Uh so it's the idea that you you restrict the class of phenomena you're interested in in your interpretive schemes. Uh so it resembles the approximating modules but the difference is that there is no approximation. I give you an example it will be very clear. uh electrostatics is a is a specially specializing module of electronamics because in the case of electrostatics you consider only phenomena with charges that doesn't that don't move. Uh so there is no approximation. It's it's just a choice of phenomena you are interested in.
And uh my claim is that quantum optics in my case is a spe can be regarded as a specializing module of QED that is quantum electronamics. So since I have three minutes I just very quickly explain the idea quantum electronamics it's a theory that was built from the 20s onwards and the idea roughly said is to make a quantum version of the Maxwell electromagnetism. Okay. And um actually it's um dealing with very specific kind of phenomena uh at high energies. Um and uh there there is nothing to do with optics uh in the 20s and quantum optics.
It's the the moment in the 50s 60s rel related to the invention of the laser etc. when some physicists decide to apply this theory quantum electronamics to specific kinds of phenomena in optics. So um I in the article I'm preparing I tried to uh to prove this statement by showing that that there were two at the at the birth of quantum optics two transfers of knowledge from quantum electronamics to optics. the first one made by GLE. So I I I don't have time to explain deeply but the idea is that um he tried to give um a quantum explanation of the light emitted by a laser and that led him to build a new theory which is uh the the foundations of quantum optics theoretical foundations. The second example is another guy called Edwin James which was in a completely different way. He he he want he thought that control electronamics was a bad theory with mathematical absurdities etc. And so he tried to find the situation to um uh to to test quantum electronamics and this situation was the invention of the measor in 54. So it's like a laser but it's a microwave domain. That's why there is a M and he used this invention to find a new situation to test quantum electronamics. Um so it's a it's another transfer of knowledge because he used transfer he apply quantum electronics in the case of the measure and uh the the the thing really important is that quantum electron dynamics was made by people like fine man to finger and these people were not interested in optics. Um actually you have to to to quote other physicists like Lber Edwin James in my previous slides these physicists applied electron dynamic to optics but it was a very it was not the main physicist if you if you want of QED and so um my point is that uh quantum optics is not a merely a branch of quantum electronamics uh it's a very a new field of research and that's why you can consider it as a module of QED because uh it's it it was linked to the formation of a new community of people that actually can forget about QED but uh that that are interested in phenomena uh linked to optics uh and um and coming from at the origin coming from QED but then you can forget about QED and then work on your specific kinds of phenomena. So you you that's why it's a specializing module you specialize quantum optics to restricted class of phenomena linked to optics and so there are I recommend you to read Olivia's article but there are many very interesting implications consequences of this modular theory the the the fact very quickly that uh the construction the construction of a new theory is made of modular constraints for example you have at some point to make a link between with former theories that have pro proven effective. So that was an example with with special relativity you can find recover classical mechanics if you consider small speeds for example compared to the speed of light. So you you have to you you you didn't start from scratch the idea another and in the history of quantum optics before this quantum theory of glober there was a classical theory of optics and of course people like new quantum theory and the former classical theory of light which have proven effective in many ways and then uh you can compare also theories thanks to this modular structure uh and that's one of the main punch line of Ali Oliv's article radical in common similarity only is a philosophical fiction and this is because uh since all physical theory are interconnected with this modular relations then you can compare tool theories and their predictions on the basis of their modules that are common languages and so in the history of quantum optics you can you can see thank you uh some experiments as crucial experiments so it's interesting because crucial experiment are well debated in the community but if you uh in previous theory you can consider push experiments and I skip this part but there was this experiment led by a physicist in Rochester showing that in some cases these specific cases you you are forced to use the quantum theory of light to explain some phenomena and the the classical theory was at that time disproved and you can have this kind of statement because of the modular structure of physical theory because you can consider quantum optics as a module of or in this case you can consider classical optics as a module of quantum optics. And then last example uh if you consider modules as common languages you can um have some communication between different communities working with different physical theories and there is a great example in the history of quantum optics because you may know Quentanuji and Sjaros they are atomic physicist but let's say quantum optics physicist and they developed this idea of the model this model of dress states This is a model very important in quantum optics. But they wanted at some point to prove to QED physicist that it was interesting and useful. And so they published at the same time two articles dealing with inter matter light interaction phenomena. and they they dealt with this phenomena with QED and with their idea of the Datum and they prove that they can have the same results with in a simple simpler way and of course it's allowed by the modular structure because quantumics is a specializing module of QED that allows this communication. So that was very fast. I'm sorry for that but uh I would like uh to I would be very happy to answer your question and of course if you want to join my school I would be happy. Thank you.
>> Thank you very much for your presentation. We have some time for a few questions first here and there.
So thank you very much for your talk and your presentation but I just didn't get it. What is the advantage of considering this aspect of modules? What is the advantages in our in our knowledge or what I didn't get right here?
>> That's an embarrassing question, but I would say that it's all it's a personal answer. But uh to me it's always difficult to have a good account of the structure and and the evolution of physical theories because you you always have this balance between uh historical insights and more logical insights and sometimes it's difficult to combine logical evolution of physical theory with historical matters and um I think that um and it's Olivia presents theory like that it's a it's a good balance this theory between history and logic. So um to me um and and there is another important aspect which is a module as you can see is there is a mathematical structure and uh interpretations physical interpretations and you cannot separate uh in this modular vision you cannot separate this formalism um of from the physical interpretations and so sometimes we have In this in the philosophy of science, we try to have this distinction between formalism or mathematical structure that you can follow in the history of physics and physical interpretation that can change whereas structure mathematical structures can be the same. Okay. And it's so it's it's a different vision than the the the frontier is not between mathematics and physical interpretation.
The frontiers is between modules between physical theories but that grab at the same time uh mathematics and interpretations. So I I don't know it's it's I didn't prepare the answer but I think that's some point that was of interest for me.
Thank you very much for your talk. Um I was wondering you said that there were different kinds of models. Uh but I it it seems to me that they are all of the same nature namely epistemological model models. Uh so would you consider all the ontological kinds of models first and secondly do you think that every kind of science would be read via this modularity events? I think for instance of Juan Manuel talks just before do you think that any kinds of Dism can be read with models?
>> So about about the the first question.
So I mean maybe the word is a bit strong but ontologically a module is a physical theory. the the the various kinds of modules appear from the fact that they can act uh differently on a theory. But even on the same theory you can have diff the same module can act differently on the same theory because for example you can use a physical theory as a module to define some elements in your symbolic universe and to define some experiments or sometimes it will be only to define experiments and it there are many many possible situations and explained for example in Mik's article but uh in itself F it's a physical theory but the originality is that you you don't have a complete final physical theory if you don't consider the modular substructure of this theory that is the connections with mainly the former theories and for the about the second question so that's why I decided to make this presentation here it's you you have to answer this question to me it's a very no to to me it's very relevant for the history and philosophy of physics but uh I wanted to to make this talk today to to see if there is a niko in the community of historian of mathematics of biologist maybe the most important thing for me that to to inspire you okay if you feel inspired by this talk and by this theory I mean it's perfect then if you want to apply it to math mathematics or biology. Uh feel free.
We have one last question. Sorry.
Thank you. Uh I was wondering since you are ultimately working with an evolutionary theory if you have considered reviewing the structure or ideas of modular biological evolution.
uh because for example here you have the concept of eterocrony that is the different uh parts of attributes of the body evolving at different stages. So I I just think it of that as an analogy of the models you you presented. I think it would be interesting. So as I said, I'm not at all a biologist and so I mean I don't know I think it's very relevant for the history of physics but I think it can have some it can resonate with other fields of of knowledge like biology. Um this is very close to mathematics as you can see. So uh I think the connection between mathematics and physics it's is easier um to to to make in this case of this modular theory but I would be very happy if you find a good example in the history of biology to to to apply it in theory.
But I think the the main difference is that as you can see the mathemat mathematical structure is very important in the case of modules.
I I'm not sure you can have the same kind of theory in in the history of biology. I will tell you all right thank you very much for your presentation.
So this was the last one uh the last one presentation of the day and of the seminar. I don't know if there are some final remarks by the organizers something maybe you want to comment or >> thank you very much I just wanted to thank you all um for your talks I think we've had a very successful seminar with lots of questions and um I'm very glad to see a full room and um just following up on what was said in the opening ceremony. I guess we'll all see each other again in Paris in 2028 when Bansan, the head of the organization, invites us. Um, but well, thank you very much. And there's the lunch as usual and then a visit to the museum and dinner for the speakers. Thank you very much.
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