Massimiliano Simons

In this article, two different claims about nature are discussed. On the one hand, environmental philosophy has forced us to reflect on our position within nature. We are not the masters of nature as was claimed before. On the other hand there are the recent developments within synthetic biology. It claims that, now at last, we can be the masters of nature we have never been before. The question is then raised how these two claims must be related to one another. Rather than stating that they are completely irreconcilable, I will argue for a dialogue aimed to discuss the differences and similarities. The claim is that we should not see it as two successive temporal phases of our relation to nature, but two tendencies that can coexist.

The central claim of this article is that post-truth requires a political and socio-economical perspective, rather than a moral or epistemological one. The article consists of two parts. The first part offers a critical examination of the dominant analyses of post-truth in terms of shifting standards of the origin and the evaluation of facts. Moreover, the claim that postmodernism is the cause of post-truth is examined and refuted. In the second part an alternative perspective is developed, centring around the notion of gatekeepers. Rather than linking post-truth to bullshit and postmodernism, it should be understood as a symptom of a contemporary shift in the gatekeepers of truth and knowledge. Knowledge and truth are always mediated in society through the hands of gatekeeping institutions such as journalism or science. Post-truth is a symptom of a broader transformation of the gatekeeping institutions of our current society. It therefore requires a political philosophy of these institutional shifts and the new risks they involve.

This article argues that pseudoscience lacks an adequate philosophical analysis. Using conspiracy theories as a case study, it is claimed that such an analysis needs to go beyond a mere epistemological approach. In the first part, it is shown that the existing philosophical literature shares the assumption that conspiracy theories are primarily deficient scientific hypotheses. This claim is contested, because such an approach can only understand what conspiracy theories fail to be, but not what they are and why people tend to endorse them. To develop an alternative, the second part starts from recent sociology of science, applied to conspiracy theories, that claims that both true and false theories are in need of a symmetrical social explanation. However, this opens the path to relativism because it does not allow for a significant distinction between scientific and conspiracy theories. In the third section an alternative analysis of conspiracy theories is offered, which does not abandon this distinction. Moreover, it is claimed that the most important element of conspiracy theories is not their truth value but rather their symbolic structures of meaning. The aim of conspiracy theories, and perhaps of pseudoscience in general, is then not to know facts about the world, but rather to offer a meaningful framework within which to live.

The aim of this chapter is to show how Francophone PS, or what is called French (historical) epistemology, embodies this interconnectedness. Moreover, a novel approach to what constitutes French epistemology will be developed here, going beyond a purely historical survey or a reevaluation of a range of concepts found in this tradition.7 The aim is instead to highlight two methodological principles at work in French epistemology that are often in tension with one another, but are not recognized as such in the literature.

The starting point of this PhD project is a constructivist interpretation of scientific practices: science does not study independent and pre-given phenomena, but constructs them in an active way. Although this topic has already been argued for in general, this project wants to focus on recent emerging life sciences, such as systems biology, Artificial Life and synthetic biology. These disciplines bring forth an extreme form of this constructivist aspect: they actively and explicitly produce biological phenomena, such as synthetic cells that do not exist outside of the laboratories. It is, however, unclear what this ‘construction’ of nature entails. There are multiple interpretations of how to understand these technical mediations and how this constructive element either shows the uniqueness of scientific practices or precisely shows how there is nothing special about scientific practices in relation to other practices. On the one hand this project wants to identify the different interpretations of constructivism in science: what does it in fact mean to claim that science constructs its object? Secondly, it wants to differentiate the notion of constructivism itself, by abandoning it as a general claim to more local, historical claims. This allows us to differentiate how a discipline, such as synthetic biology, is constructive in a unique sense, rather than being classified merely as one illustration of constructivism. This allows us to make room for the singularity of synthetic biology: in what specific way is synthetic biology a constructive practice?

Although Michel Foucault is often discussed as a political philosopher, his work can also be place within the tradition of French historical epistemology. However, in contrast to Gaston Bachelard or Georges Canguilhem, his work has been more open to the critique of relativism. The question that will be raised here is in what way one can understand his seemingly relativist conclusions about science, while being part of a science admiring tradition. Different models will be proposed, ranging from a total break, a total identification, to a radicalization of historical epistemology by Foucault.

That scientific practices can be interpreted as constructive practices that create their own objects rather than describing objects out there is a spreading idea within philosophy of science. But while normally the claim is that this is being done behind the scenes, in the case of synthetic biology it seems to be right in the open. To really comprehend what is going within synthetic biology, the idea of constructivism within philosophy must therefore be revised and differentiated in particular types of what it means to construct nature.

The emerging field of synthetic biology aims to design biological entities by engineering methods. Nature is explicitly no longer something ‘out there’, but instead as whatever is actively made in scientific laboratories. Although apparently unrelated to the Anthropocene, interesting discussions arise once confronted with each other. On the one hand, authors such as Bruno Latour have forced us to reflect on how we are not the masters of nature as was claimed before. We can even speak of ‘the end of nature’. On the other hand, synthetic biology claims that we can now be the masters of nature we have never been before. Nature exists indeed, namely the nature that we have created in the laboratory. How to relate these two perspectives? Their simultaneous emergence appears paradoxical, but must not too hastily result in the conclusion that synthetic biology is merely the latest shape of our childish, modern dreams. Rather synthetic biology can be a critical interrogator of the ‘end of nature’. Can we really endorse that it is impossible to “return to a pre-modern notion of nature” and this “take-offpoint is irretrievably lost”? Or must we make the more modest claim, that modern projects often fail, but that success is not excluded? I argue that Latour mix up two possible conclusions: starting from the correct conclusion that we are uncertain that we are certain they jump to stating that we are certain that we are uncertain, which does not follow. We can never be certain again that we can reduce things to passive nature, although it might work for some cases, perhaps even synthetic biology.

The work of Michel Serres, if considered at all, is often presented as a radical break with or criticism of the work of Gaston Bachelard. The aim of this paper is to correct this image, by focusing on the early Hermes series by Serres. In these studies Serres still portrays himself as a follower of Bachelard, rather than an adversary. This is exemplarily shown in his neologism, i.e. the new new scientific spirit, referring to the attempt to update Bachelard in the light of more recent scientific developments. This shows how the roots of Serres’ philosophy lie not in a radical break with Bachelard, but must be understood rather as a Bachelardian criticism of Bachelard himself. This Bachelardian criticism consists in what could be called his surrationalism: the sciences do not follow the categories imposed by philosophers, but are always more flexible and open than these categories allow. The philosopher should follow this scientific flexibility, rather than trying to contain it in his or her categories. Instead of abandoning Bachelard’s perspective, Serres’ criticisms can therefore be understood as a radicalisation of Bachelard’s thought. Specific critiques of Serres, such as those concerning the novelty of Bachelard’s thought, the role of epistemology, the role of normativity, and finally the role of politics, and their consequences will be evaluated through a reappraisal of this Bachelardian move that underlies Serres’ criticism. Finally, this can also open a path to reassess the relation between Bachelard and Bruno Latour or Isabelle Stengers, who can be considered as followers of Serres.

What is ‘biohacking’? In fact, it refers to multiple things. Firstly, it refers to ‘hacking the body’, artificially enhancing one’s own body by technology and tinkering. A good example is the ‘grinder’ movement. Secondly, it also refers to ‘hacking the biology’, aiming to appropriate the methods and objects of the life sciences for our own benefit. This is at work in ‘Do-It-Yourself Biology’, inspired by synthetic biology. Both strands, however, share the same ambition to emancipate ourselves from traditional constraints of biology and evolution – but they might also share the same problems.

Do-It-Yourself biology or DIYbio aims to open the field of molecular biology to all who are interested by showing that it can be done within one’s own garage or by opening community labs. In this sense it can be considered as one of the contemporary shapes of citizen or ‘amateur’ science. A great part of the existing literature focuses on how these cases can be seen as the sign of a democratization of science. However, within these studies it is often forgotten that many of the members of the movements such as DIYbio are well-trained scientists with PhDs and other official credentials. Not only can this fact problematize the claims made by these studies, but it is also something that they cannot explain. Why do certified rocket scientists feel the need to design rockets outside of the official institutions? Why do biologists with a PhD stop their training and start tinkering in their basements? Beyond a general introduction to DIYbio, this paper aims to do three things. First of all it aims to analyze the phenomenon at the level of discourse, mainly focusing on the anti-institutional element of DIYbio. Rather than seeing this citizen science as merely a form of the democratization of the sciences, its origins lay within a deep-rooted critique on existing institutions such as the universities and the biotech industry. Secondly, these discourses are contrasted conceptually with the possible historical origins of the movement, ranging from synthetic biology, hackerspaces to the biotech industry itself. The central question will be: even if at a discourse level they present themselves as the renaissance of biology, are there other tendencies, histories and origins present in their practices? Thirdly, an attempt will be made to sketch possible future scenarios of DIYbio, based on personal experiences of setting up and maintaining a DIYbio lab and community, insights as a member of the global DIYbio movement and experience in implementing professional services in the DIYbio and maker sphere. Three observations will be at the core of this discourse. Firstly, DIYbio today encompasses many different kinds of initiatives that practise biosciences in new ways, all as a mutation on its initial conception in 2008. Local groups that started out similarly, diversified over the years according the intentions of the local communities. Secondly, more and more attempts at professionalising are being made in older communities. An anti-institutional element is often kept and used as a competitive advantage against the establishment. Finally, DIYbio benefits from developments in the sharing economy and growing freelance culture. How do these factors work together and do they have the potential for systemic change?

This paper aims to evaluate the different approaches to history within contemporary French philosophy of science, especially related to the benefits and necessity of normative judging. Within the French tradition of historical epistemology, there has always been a combination between a historical and philosophical perspective. This has resulted in numerous methodological reflections on this topic still relevant for contemporary debates within IHPS. Generally this centered around the question to what extent clear philosophical starting points where a merit and necessity, or rather a bias and obstacle. In recent French philosophy of science this tension let to the search for a third approach. Inspired by developments within sociology of science, they criticize the overemphasis on judging history from the present. But rather than abandoning all philosophical perspective, their claim is that history of science itself produces philosophical norms or ‘obligations’ within particular sciences. This, however, does not result in abandoning the earlier approaches, but rather their reappraisal. Earlier internal criticisms within HEP can be reread as claiming that the opponent fails to live up to this requirement, i.e. to follow history’s own obligations, rather than imposing them. The claim defended in this paper is that the merit of certain philosophical approaches must be tested linked to obligations within specific disciplines. Concretely, this will be evaluated through examples from recent history of molecular biology, especially synthetic biology and metagenomics. The specific obligations of these disciplines will be analysed and evaluated according to the different frameworks within French philosophy of science.

Within French epistemology the question is central whether the present can be a reference point for the history of science or whether scientific practices should be understood within their own historical context. Both positions are linked with problems: either it results in a ‘whig history’ written from the perspective of the victors or it leads to the accusation of relativism and to resistance from the scientists themselves. Isabelle Stengers claims that this resistance by scientists must be considered as an essential element in the historiography of the sciences. She is part of a more recent generation of French philosophers of science, who build on the work of the earlier generation but with significant differences. Stengers interprets the scientist’s work as ‘in the service of history’: everyone must be forced to recognize their work not as the product of personal construction but as a necessary discovery in the history of science. The work of the historian of science is in conflict with the aims of the scientists themselves, who want to be seen as the norm of the present by which one should read the history of science. This service of history is not some external ideological factor, but an internal part of the scientific practice itself. The construction of the difference between the discovery of a pre-given fact and the construction of a fiction is for Stengers the core of the scientific practices. This use of history will be illustrated by the case of synthetic biology, as described by Bernadette Bensaude-Vincent. Synthetic biologists are invoking specific past or future scenario’s, such as that of synthetic chemistry or computer engineering, to legitimatize their current research projects and ambitions. From this perspective, the problematic tension between the past and the present is so hard to cope with because it is not merely a struggle among historians and philosophers of science, but also among the scientists themselves.

In recent philosophy of science constructivist perspectives have gained prominence. Science is increasingly seen as ‘technoscience’, meaning that rather than consisting of a mere observation of a passive nature out there, it is argued that science is also always intervening due to the use of scientific instruments and techniques. In this sense, science ‘constructs’ the object it studies, rather than merely observe it. There are, however, different varieties of constructivism that are often confused with one another and are in need of conceptual differentiation. These different forms will be examined using the case of synthetic biology, a new discipline in biology which aims to create or redesign novel biological systems using engineering methods. Synthetic biology, thus, seems to be a more radical case of constructivism than previous disciplines in the life sciences. This radicalization demands, however, a more elaborate conceptualization of what constructivism can mean. Using a historical epistemological approach three claims will be made. Firstly, I will argue that the constructivist aspect of synthetic biology must be understood by confronting it with other disciplines within the history of biology, such as molecular biology or metagenomics. Secondly, the claim will be made that the notion of constructivism must be historicized or regionalized: rather than stating that ‘science in general is constructive’, the extent to which science is constructive depends on the specific period and discipline under consideration. Thirdly, I will claim that a specific science or discipline can be constructivist in different ways at the same time and that the dominance of one form of constructivism can significantly shift within the history of science.

A recurrent theme in the characterization of synthetic biology is the role of engineering. This theme is widespread in the accounts of scholars studying this field and the biologists working in it, in those of the biologists themselves, as well as in policy documents. The aim of this article is to open this black-box of engineering that is supposed to influence and change contemporary life sciences. Too often, both synthetic biologists and their critics assume a very narrow understanding of what engineering is about, resulting in an unfruitful debate about whether synthetic biology possesses genuine engineering methodologies or not. By looking in more detail to the diversity of engineering conceptions in debates concerning synthetic biology, a richer perspective can be developed. In this article, I will examine five influential ways in which engineering is understood in these debates, namely engineering as applied science, as rational methodology, context-sensitive practice, cunning activity or design. The claim is first of all thus to argue that engineering must not be seen as something stable or characterized by a fixed essence. It rather has multiple meanings and interpretations. Secondly, the claim is that most of the debates on synthetic biology cannot be indifferent towards the question which conception of engineering is at play, since the specific questions and concerns that pop up depend to a great extent on the precise conception of engineering one has in account. Many of the existing debates around synthetic biology can thus be reinterpreted and readdressed once one is aware of which conception of engineering is at play.

Many young dreamers who want to be modern up to the tips of their toes, and who think they have gotten rid of these barely imaginable old-fashioned ideas, are, without realizing it, mystics in search of a spiritual experience. (Gauchet 2003, p. 311)Several sociologists of science have mobilized secularization metaphors to describe developments in the study of science. Similar to how secularization refers to a decreasing status of religion and God as a transcendent factor in society, the secularization of science refers to an abandonment of Science as something “sacred” and Nature as transcendent. This article aims to explore these secularization metaphors, by arguing for a parallel between how sociologists and philosophers of religion differ and how similar disagreements between sociologists of science and the work of Bruno Latour exist, whose work should rather be linked with that of other philosophers, such as Michel Serres and Isabelle Stengers.

This special issue aims to redress the balance and to open up Gaston Bachelard's work beyond a small in-crowd of experts and aficionado’s in France. It aims to stimulate the discovery of new and understudied aspects of Bachelard’s work, including aspects of the intellectual milieu he was working in. Fortunately, for this purpose we were able to rely both on renowned Bachelard specialists, such as Hans-Jörg Rheinberg-er, Cristina Chimisso and Dominique Lecourt, as well as on a number of younger scholars who are discovering their work in a different intellectual context. At the same time we also want to reassess the value of this oeuvre, which also entails examining the reasons and causes of the relative neglect of Bachelard’s work in recent times. Has it exhausted its possibilities? Does it have intrinsic limitations that have contributed to the eclipse, as some influential, mainly French, philoso-phers have more or less explicitly suggested?

The work of Michel Serres is often presented as a radical break with the work of Gaston Bachelard. The aim of this paper is to partly correct this image, by focusing on Serres’s early Hermes series (1969-1980). In these books Serres portrays himself as a follower of Bachelard, exemplarily shown in his neologism of the ‘new new scientific spirit’ (le nouveau nouvel esprit scientifique), updating Bachelard in the light of more recent scientific developments. This allows a reinterpretation of the relation between both authors, one where there is room to acknowledge how the roots of Serres’s philosophy lie not in a radical break with Bachelard, but can be partly understood as a Bachelardian criticism of Bachelard himself. This Bachelardian criticism consists in what could be called his ‘surrationalism’: the sciences do not follow the categories imposed by philosophers, but are always more flexible and open than these categories allow. Specific critiques of Serres, such as those concerning the novelty of Bachelard’s thought, the role of epistemology and finally the political dimension of science will be evaluated through a reappraisal of this Bachelardian move that underlies Serres’s criticism.

The work of Gaston Bachelard is known for two crucial concepts, that of the epistemological rupture and that of phenomenotechnique. A crucial question is, however, how these two concepts relate to one another. Are they in fact essentially connected or must they be seen as two separate elements of Bachelard’s thinking? This paper aims to analyse the relation between these two Bachelardian moments and the significance of the concept of phenomenotechnique for today. This will be done by examining how the concepts of Bachelard have been used from the 1960s on. From this historical perspective, one gets the impression that these two concepts are relatively independent from each other. The Althusserian school has exclusively focused on the concept of ‘epistemological break’, while scholars from Science & Technology Studies, such as Bruno Latour, seem to have only taken up the concept of phenomenotechnique. It in fact leads to two different models of how to think about science, namely the model of purification and the model of proliferation. The former starts from the idea that sciences are rational to the extent that they are purified and free from obstacles. Scientific objectivity, within this later model, is not achieved by eradicating all intermediaries, obstacles and distortions, but rather exactly by introducing as many relevant technical mediators as possible. Finally, such a strong distinction will be criticized and the argument will be made that both in Bachelard’s and Latour's thought both concepts are combined. This leads to a janus-headed view on science, where both the element of purification and the element of proliferation are combined.

Among the contemporary philosophers using the concept of the Anthropocene, Bruno Latour and Isabelle Stengers are prominent examples. The way they use this concept, however, diverts from the most common understanding of the Anthropocene. In fact, their use of this notion is a continuation of their earlier work around the concept of a ‘parliament of things.’ Although mainly seen as a sociology or philosophy of science, their work can be read as philosophy of technology as well. Similar to Latour’s claim that science is Janus-headed, technology has two faces. Faced with the Anthropocene, we need to shift from technologies of control to technologies of negotiations, i.e., a parliament of things. What, however, does a ‘parliament of things’ mean? This paper wants to clarify what is conceptually at stake by framing Latour’s work within the philosophy of Michel Serres and Isabelle Stengers. Their philosophy implies a ‘postlinguistic turn,’ where one can ‘let things speak in their own name,’ without claiming knowledge of the thing in itself. The distinction between object and subject is abolished to go back to the world of ‘quasi-objects’ (Serres). Based on the philosophy of science of Latour and Stengers the possibility for a politics of quasi-objects or a ‘cosmopolitics’ (Stengers) is opened. It is in this framework that their use of the notion of the Anthropocene must be understood and a different view of technology can be conceptualized.

The philosophy of Louis Althusser is often contrasted with the ideas of Michel Foucault. At first sight, the disagreement seems to be about the concept of ideology: while Althusser seem to be huge advocate of the use of the concept, Foucault apparently dislikes and avoids the concept altogether. However, I argue in this article that this reading is only superficial and that it obscures the real debate between these two authors. Althusser, especially in his recently posthumously published Sur la reproduction (1995), appears to agree on many points with Foucault. The real dispute lies not in the concept of ideology, but in its connection with its counterpart ‘science’. Both Althusser and Foucault were in a way epistemologists, focusing on the question on how sciences develop and how scientific practice works. Focussing on their shared background in the French epistemology, with authors such as Gaston Bachelard and Jean Cavaillès, the real discussion appears to be about whether science can really be opposed to ideology or not. Focusing on these aspects of their works can shed new lights on their oeuvre as well as on the nature of scientific practice.

In this article, two different claims about nature are discussed. On the one hand, environmental philosophy has forced us to reflect on our position within nature. We are not the masters of nature as was claimed before. On the other hand there are the recent developments within synthetic biology. It claims that, now at last, we can be the masters of nature we have never been before. The question is then raised how these two claims must be related to one another. Rather than stating that they are completely irreconcilable, I will argue for a dialogue aimed to discuss the differences and similarities. The claim is that we should not see it as two successive temporal phases of our relation to nature, but two tendencies that can coexist.