A Well-Articulated Primatology - Bruno Latour

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$Factures/fractures: de la notion de réseau à celle d ... - Bruno Latour$

i 7 4 to begin with, but by connecting propositions which r.night or nright nrrt be slightly foreign to one another. While the notion of statements I)rovides no possible avenue for the thing to be made relevant to rr-hat rve say about it-except through the perilous footbridge of a correspondence between words and world-the notion of propositions allon's things tcr be loaded into words. Whereas a statement implies the existence of a talkative human surrounded by rnute things, a proposition impiies that we are made to speak in this way by'what is talked about. To understand this very tricky point in a less abstract way, we need to turn to the third debate of the conference-the most fascinating and also the most diftcult to elaborate. Articulated or Inarticulate Propositions After having circumvented the false debate to decide if primatology is or is not "socially constructed," and after the rather sterile discussion on the role of method, theory, and gender in "shaping our views" of primates, the conference could have gotten stuck in the traditional opposition between "nature" and "r'rurture," and all the more so given the feelings for and against sociobiologv, u'hich were as intense as those triggered by science studies. This is rvhere, from my point of view, the meeting was most rervarding. lt seems that we avoided the usual pitfalls by exemplifying in practice a new set of criteria to distirrguish good frotn bad science that completely' cuts across the old tired distinction between biological and cultural determinism. It is this shibboleth that I want to render more exDlicit in the last section of this chapter. I hope that Thelma Rowell will forgive me for analyzing her assertion about her sheep in more detail, but it provides the essential clue for my demonstration. As I said above, statements are different from propositions. This is especially clear if we consider how we make judgments about their quality. Statements are true or false depending on whether or not there is a state of affairs corresponding to the statement-with all the difftculties outlined by the philosophy of language. I u'ill propose to say, howevel that propositions are good or bad depending on whether they are articulate or inarticulate. "Boring sheep are boring sheep" is an inarticulate proposition since it repeats tautologically what a sheep is, as if refusing to enter into a connection with anything else. "Sheep are intelligent chirnps" is an articulated proposition since it offers to establish a connection between two completely different entities that will give meaning to both: in the ftrst sentence, sheep "are not given a chance," as Thelma said; in the second, they "will be given an opportunity to behave differ-
A Well-Articulated Primatctlogy 37s ently." The first sentence is a repetition-A is A. The second is, to use a philosophical term, a predication-A is B-that is, something else, on which it now depends to gain its meaning. The difference between articulate and inarticulate is not the same as between true and false. It is more like the difference between a musrc made of one note that remains at the same pitch and another that modu- lates the tone by shifting from one note to the other. Contrary to popular beliefs about science, it is very difficult to capture with some precision what scientists mean when they say that one piece of science is ,,interesting" and another "rubbisl.r." If dictionarv science is made up of statements that are simply true or false, science on the run, that is, research, is made up of propositions that also have rhr.'tl.rm, color, temperature, and tempo. When a scientist says that a proposition is "interesting,,,she does not only mean that it is accurate, but that it has a lot of other qualities as well: it can be warm, hot, surprising, fecund, productive, e_xciting. . . . When we insist on the distinction between bad and good science, rl.e not only distinguish between truth and falsity, but also betn'een repetitrve and articulate sentences. When we say that "data are meaningful,,,we thus designate another type of circulation than the one between a refere.nt out there and a statement in the language (see top of ûgure 3). We seem to designate a very specific kind of movement among propositions that rearrange themselves into new and unexpected combinations (see bottom of figure 3). We now understand why the debate about ,,social construction,, or "biases" was so fruitless. It was still connected with the linguistic and optical metaphors. The rnore intermediaries there were between the eye of the observer and the object-or betr,veen the statements of the scientists and the thing in itself-the /ess direct, and thus, the less accurate was the correspondence and the quality of the ir.rformation produced. Ideallv, according to this view, if there r.l'ere no interntediart' at all, no cor-r-rplica- tion whatsoever, the knowledge would be r.nore cclntplete. The situatior-r is entirely different with propositions. The rnore activit\. there is, ancl tl-re more intermediaries there are, the betrer the chance to articulate meaningful propositions. The difference between settings is not betn'een those where the scientists are inactive, remote, detached, disinterestcd, ancj autonomous, and tl-rose wl-rere they are active, constructive, busv fabricat- ing, or being biased, and full of a prioris and presuppositions. Instead, the distinction is between tl.re settings where all the activitv ends up ltroclucing repetitive data and those where the activity produces iltteresting artic- ulations. Once again, Thelrna offers an excellent exar.nple tr.l.rcn she castigates the farmers for constantll' separating sheep frour one another as soon as they demonstrate behavior that is not sheepish and panurgian.
Page 1 and 2: s E c T t o N 1 I s E c T t o N 2 2
Page 3 and 4: t 9 20 2 1 lvlorphing in the Order:
Page 5 and 6: A Well-Articulttted Pritrntology 35
Page 7 and 8: A We II- Articuhte d Pr imatology P
Page 9 and 10: A \'{ell-Articuloted Prhnatologv 36
Page 11 and 12: A WeII- A r ti c ul ate d P r i t n
Page 13 and 14: A We I I -A rticul ate d P rimato I
Page 15 and 16: A Wel I - Artic ul ate d P ri mato
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A Well-Articulated Primatology - Bruno Latour

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