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

evolutionary system of transportation for the year 2000. Just the momentfor a mishap to occur, as so often happens in projects, although not sooften in fairy tales: in no time at all, the coach turns back into a pumpkin,hesitates, turns into a coach again, then a pumpkin, and when it finallyturns back into a coach again it's too late. The Big Interests gathered roundare always in a hurry; they're tired of waiting, they disappear ... The horsd' oeuvres are still there; as for the transportation system, sorry ...The problem is, the innovator has to count on assemblages of thingsthat often have the same uncertain nature as groups of people. To getAramis past the paper phase into the prototype phase, you have to get awhole list of things interested in the proiect: a motor, an ultrasound sensor,assorted software, electric currents, concrete-and-steel sandwiches, switchingarms. Some of these actors and actuators, are docile, loyal, disciplinedold servants; they don't cause any trouble. "I say 'come: and here theyare; I say 'go: and they leave." This is the case with electric-power supplies,buildings, and tracks, even if the bolts do have an unfortunate tendency topop out. But other elements have to be recruited, seduced, modified,transformed, developed, brought on board. The same sort of involvementthat has to be solicited from DATAR, RATP, Aeroport de Paris, and Matranow has to be solicited from motors, activators, doors, cabins, software,and sensors. They, too, have their conditions; they allow or forbid otheralliances. They require; they constrain; they provide. For example, in creatingthe cab, we can't follow the usual patterns of mass transit: the chassiswould be enormous, and too heavy. We have to go see the manufacturerfrom Matra's automotive branch. But those people have never built a caron rails, or a car without a driver. So we have to get them interested, startfrom scratch: we keep the door, and add an in-transit switching mechanismto the cab. The motors, sensors, chips, and of course the software-noneof these things is available commercially. We have to tie them in withAramis: that's right, recruit them, sign them up, bring them on board. I mayas well say it: we have to negotiate with them.Nothing says that an ordinary electric motor, for example, waspredestined to be used by Aramis, just as nothing says that Aeroport deParis was predestined to use Aramis. Of course, standard electric motorscan activate wheels, but not always under the very special constraints ofnonmaterial coupling. Of course, Aeroport de Paris needs small-scalemeans of transportation, but not necessarily those particular means. TheseIS ARAMIS FEASIBLE?