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

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"Obligation to use all appropriate means, not to produce results" -that'swhat the fine print says in all our standard contracts. And we certainlydidn't skimp on the means, I don't think. Confidentiality isn't a problem;I'm not denouncing anyone, I'm not laying any hlame, there 's no scandal,no wrongdoers. It's a collective drift, there were only good intentions.And I'd actually like to do a hook in which there's no metalanguage,no master discourse, where you wouldn't know which is strongest, thesociological theory or the documents or the interviews or the literatureor the fiction , where all these genres or regimes would be at the samelevel, each one interpreting the others vvithout anybody being able tosay which is judging what.""But that's impossible; and besides, it would be incredibly horing.And what good would it do?""Well, it would be good for training people like you. And it wouldbe good for educating the public, for getting people to understand ,getting them to love technologies. I'd like to turn the failure of Aramisinto a success, so it won't have died in vain, so . . ."You're funny, Norbert. You want to reeducate the whole worldand you want to produce a discourse that doesn't control anyone!Readers want a line, they want mass transit, not point-to-point, notpersonalized cabins. You want to know what I think? You're about toembark on another Aramis project, another wild-goose chase. As infeasibleas the first one. Rememher the lesson of Aramis: 'Don't innovatein every respect at once.' Your book is just one more rickety endeavor,ill-conceived from birth, a white elephant.""But if it were viable, at least it would be useful to others, tofuture engineers like yourself. To help them understand research."If I had indeed discovered the importance of research. . . I washardly convinced by Norbert's science, but since it was he, after all,who was to give me a grade on my internship, I grunted and fell silent.He continued."Never mind, I'll write one more report, another colorless text,an expert's audit; I'll follow the advice of the Times: 'Make it boring. "'After a few moments, he went on in a tone of feigned indifference(for I knew he wanted to keep me in his lab):"FPllOGUE
"And you, what arc you going to do now?""I hardly know how to tell you . . . Sociology is fascinating, butthink . . ." Then I took the plunge: "I'm going to be an engineeragain, a real one; I'm going to work for a big software company.""Too bad for me, but I suppose it's good for you, it surely paysbetter," Norbert said in a tone at once bitter and paternal. "At leastyou've learned some things you can use, haven't you?""Uh, yes, the glorious uncertainty of technological research; butto tell the truth, in fact, I think I'm going to work now more on realtechnological projects, trying, really, I mean, to forget, well, not toforget, but to set aside .way, a parenthesis.""Because Aramis . ?".; this was after all, don't take this the wrong"Yes, no, of course, but anyway, I'd like, I think, I hope to comeacross a technological project, purely technological , I'm not sure howto put this, but they've got a really well-conceived project, reallydoable.""Ah! ah!" Norbert interjected sarcastically. "So you haven't beenimmunized? You think Aramis is a special case? That they could havedone better? That it's pathological? I've never seen such a stubbornengineer. Aramis will have died in vain if you think it was a monster.Aramis gave you the best . . .""Stop, stop, no, I'm not abandoning Aramis, and you know why?On the contrary, I'm continuing it. The place where I'm going towork- you11 never guess what they're working on. A huge project todevelop an intelligent car. And you know what they talk about in theirdocumentation?" I went on proudly. "Adjustable mobile sectors, nonmaterialcouplings, reconfigurable trains, ultrasound devices, UGTs! Ye s,it's true-it's Aramis backward. Instead of starting with public transportationto end up making a car, they're starting with private cars andturning them into public transportation, into trains. You sec, now, I'mnot ungrateful! But there, at least, it's technologically perfected; they'respending billions on it."called?""More than on sociology, I understand. And what's your projectEPllOGUf
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ARAMISTHE LOVE OF ECHNOLOGY
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Copyright © 1996 by the President
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TO SIMON SCHAFFER 7/
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By publishing this hook, I would li
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exemplary meditation on the difficu
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PROLOGUE: WHO KILLED ARAMIS?The fir
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PROLOGUE•cember 1987. A promising
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[DOCUMENT: EXCERPTS FROM AN ARTICLE
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"You see," he went on during one of
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"But during that period I found out
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-"There's one small problem," I sai
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1973: Test site at Orly; three-vehi
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1985: Scale model of two-car Aramis
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in a mass transit network, with no
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come true. Since every study has to
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load fa ctor, Professor? Your isola
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if by magic. An electronic calculat
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to be invented, if we are to track
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---) TransporterTime IS . ; To Char
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assembly line? You said "transfer"?
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primly, without acknowledging my cl
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defensive about playing "amusing me
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curves: DATAR, the RATP, Paris, bef
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fellow. It's like the Galileo affai
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Time To-1 2 3 4 5CJIII __ _ Time T1
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fic off the roads , it improve s tr
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ter-who speaks in the name of the g
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are solemnly and eternally committe
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me, Aramis isn't a PRT Iype of tran
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Aeroport de Paris said. IF you map
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IS ARAMIS FEASIBLE?"Now we can go o
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workshop, a control post, a recepti
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the optical sensor so it will maint
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evolutionary system of transportati
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"For my part, " the motor declares,
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-otherwise, it instructs the car to
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not only determined the laws accord
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[INTERVIEW EXCERPTS]M. Lamoureux, r
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they have to change the motor, mult
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there would be a lot of new functio
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"The idea was that it was seductive
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know who, among the engineers, exec
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of admiring the architecture, the s
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control room, by Ferbeck (who is al
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has the massive dimensions it takes
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come back to print. The whole passa
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"Do you comprehend the crime, the u
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[INTERVIEW EXCERPTS)At Matra headqu
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[INTERVIEW EXCERPTS]M, Parlat, proi
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Stationl00o
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destinations: that's the idea that
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the network, all the problems of au
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[INTERVIEW EXCERPTS]M. Etienne, hea
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ody can commit himself; it's imposs
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configuration on the board. Besides
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to the real transportation system,
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As a young engineer, I refused to c
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[INTERVIEW EXCERPTS)In M. Hector's
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[INTERVIEW EXCERPTS]M. Parlat is sp
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did his field work in the Amazon ra
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What counts, in a technological pro
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"That's an interesting theory all r
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"With VAL, we moved gradually from
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hard; you'd need to build it into t
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also VAL; Ficheur, the contracting
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completely ignores economic conditi
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INTERPHASE :THRE E YEARS OF GRAC E"
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construction of the Center for Tech
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[INTERVIEW EXCERPTS]At the Ministry
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every year?* You could pay for Aram
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A "trashable explanation" ! The exa
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II est passe par iciII repassera pa
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uilding reliable, predictable, conv
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public funds vampire-fashion and th
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"Number 7 is incompatible with numb
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"Yes, we 've made a lot of progress
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Orly-Val], and then Montpellier. We
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Norbert's sociology, he respected m
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"In fact, I should have spent a cou
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The rationality of technologies wri
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Why not go see Ronald Reagan, or th
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"I called several meetings to verif
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the World's Fair; then they said it
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attaching to me dozens of poor devi
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3. In 1973, in a beet field near th
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7 The control room for VAL in Lille
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1 I. Aramis really does exist now;
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] 5. [n March 1987, seven months be
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19. Since no engineer could prove m
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we are often the first to see, in a
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"The RATP said to itself, 'I'm behi
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agree. "They're aiming at VA L in s
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"He agrees with me," I remarked mod
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viewpoints, goals, and desires, so
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If the actors in a project define n
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With a technological project, inter
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gers impatient to show up at Bercy
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allies. Thus, not only is the actor
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from one extreme to another. If you
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isn't the only one who doesn't know
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"Aramis has a lot of advantages bec
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hour. The human being in these scen
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the subway, by virtue of its access
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even includes direct quotes! A prot
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Regie Autonome des TransportsParisi
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etween us had evaporated with Norbe
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ITY OF THE INDIVIDUALS AND COMPANIE
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opinion of the capitalists had "per
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An accusation that's so watered dow
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epistemological; it talks and talks
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conception, which exists in fact on
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put it. If Aramis existed, you woul
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"So we had to increase the absolute
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[SUMMARY OF A GROUP INTERVIEW]The s
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engineering, all the ingenuity, all
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"We've found the hidden staircase,"
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dominated by, people. But there is
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-Vehicle110,000f-PCC spervisio Stat
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[INTERVIEW EXCERPTS]-M. Freque, pro
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problem. This task, for the project
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"What I think is that the Matra eng
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"As for the automation, I agree wit
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inappropriate, as if it were clear
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PIaorm 1X" StationI / Plaorm 2Subst
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"Level III: the fixed equipment, ea
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But since you're not human, I'd be
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--wheels, supply information about
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little I was becoming the Aramis mo
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the cars located in the sector, as
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So it givesa recalibration that'sre
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OrdinateViewpoint of mobile unit/I-
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Phonic wheelCoded equidistant cross
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"Here deceleration has to be factor
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Page 272 and 273: Norbert woke up terrified.The next
Page 274 and 275: This is the case for the Matra comp
Page 276 and 277: This figure, in the context of the
Page 278 and 279: short-term vision. 'As long as ther
Page 280 and 281: 1. What M. Brun needs; what hechoos
Page 282 and 283: ecause if someone says, 'After fift
Page 284 and 285: Well then, that's reassuring. I sta
Page 286 and 287: thing, give or take a nuance or two
Page 288 and 289: that's too bad Obviously, to go fro
Page 290 and 291: They sound awfully sure of themselv
Page 292 and 293: "Either they didn't put enough ener
Page 294 and 295: Phase 1: Concept development5phose
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Page 300 and 301: 7. Aramis has been perfected as a m
Page 302 and 303: of a network, to the extent that th
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Page 306 and 307: "But then why not say it was resear
Page 308 and 309: when we talked about it. The electe
Page 310 and 311: "No, no, not enough love! Love and
Page 312 and 313: ahout each other in strict confiden
Page 314 and 315: "Yet in spite of its fragility, its
Page 316 and 317: to be a line. What more could I ask
Page 318 and 319: things. That's not what brought my
Page 322 and 323: " Prometheus. ""Prometheus! The 'sm
Page 324 and 325: GLOSSARYA-320 An airplane built by
Page 326 and 327: BertinBienvenueBus DivisionCabinent
Page 328 and 329: tems to be controlled in the car (d
Page 330 and 331: E:'2the ministry's technical dossie
Page 332 and 333: Porno 2000PrometheusPRTQuinRofoleRa
Page 334 and 335: sniffer planeSOFRESSOFRETUSouth lin
Page 336: BIUND /ATOUI , 01"""of SOOoIogy, £
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