Bruno Latour, Aramis, or the Love of Technology, PDF - Dss-edit.com

when we talked about it. The elected officials didn't want it, the economicstudies were bad, operation was becoming impossible, technologically it wasdifficult-but all that was after the codicil. From 1984 to 1987, as far as Icould tell, there were no obvious problems except some delays, but that'snormal " [no. 38]M. Antoine, at the RATp, on the executive floor:"If I understand correctly you supported the CET but not Aramis?""Yes, you could put it that way. For me, as an engineer, getting the rotarymotor to exceed 30 kilowatts, that's terrific. If it worked, there'd be no morereduction gears, no more elasticity-it'd be great. For the time being, we don'tknow how to do it, but maybe someday we will."And electronic coupling is the same story. If we'd done the development,in the eET, it would be colossal, on the European scale, and we'd have said,'Here's the development, now we have to keep going' . ."I always told Matra : 'There's just one thing that interests me, and that'selectronic coupling, if it's cheaper than the mechanical version.' Aramis wouldhave made its contribution to the research on lowering materials costs; that'swhat I was hoping for from the eEl"If it had been up to me, I would have preferred to spend 100 million francswith all the builders working together. I would have said: 'We've made VAL,the first generation, now we have to shift over to the second-generation VAL,which should have the same capabilities but cost 30 percent less.' That's whatI would have done in 1984, but they didn't ask my advice."There was some useful fallout, though-otherwise it wouldn't bear thinkingabout."Automated mechanisms ought to evolve according to modular concepts,like Lego, in the early stages, and then in standardized black boxes. I wasexpecting they'd be able to pull a speed-control module out of Aramis, forexample. For the time being, they're bringing a specific solution to everyspecific problem.""But why not tum the CET into an R&D proiect, then? The modular approachis entirely different from trying to build a complete system.""Because it's impossible. The industrial milieu is a battleground. They pickaway at each other, they're like roosters on a pile of manure pulling out eachother's feathers, and pretty soon they won't have any feathers left!"I still don 't understand: since it is research, why not say s02""Because the eET was tied up with the hope of constructing a line and with