Georges Canguilhem

From substantival to functional vitalism and beyond, or from Stahlian animas to Canguilhemian attitudes

by Charles Wolfe

Eidos 14 (2011), pp. 212-235

I distinguish between what I call ‘substantival’ and ‘functional’ forms of vitalism in the eighteenth century.... more I distinguish between what I call ‘substantival’ and ‘functional’ forms of vitalism in the eighteenth century. Substantival vitalism presupposes the existence of something like a (substantive) vital force which either plays a causal role in the natural world as studied by scientific means, or remains a kind of hovering, extra-causal entity. Functional vitalism tends to operate ‘post facto’, from the existence of living bodies to the desire to find explanatory models that will do justice to their uniquely ‘vital’ properties in a way that fully mechanistic (Cartesian, Boerhaavian etc.) models cannot. I discuss some representative figures of the Montpellier school (Bordeu, Ménuret, Fouquet) as being functional rather than substantival vitalists. Time allowing, I will make an additional point regarding the reprisal of vitalism(s) in ‘late modernity’, as some call it; from Hans Driesch to Georges Canguilhem. I suggest that in addition to the substantival and functional varieties, we then encounter a third species of vitalism, which I term ‘attitudinal’, as it argues for vitalism as a kind of attitude.

La Théorie du réflexe comme enjeu philosophique

by Vincent Guillin

MA Thesis, Philosophy and History of Science, Université Paris 1, 1998 (supervisor: J.-F. Braunstein)

Review of Philippe Artières, Jean-François Bert, Philippe Chevallier, Pascal Michon, Mathieu Potte-Bonneville, Judith Revel and Jean-Claude Zancarini (textes choisis et présentés par), Les mots et les choses de Foucault. Regards critiques 1966-1968 (Caen: Presses Universitaires de Caen, 2009), ISBN: 978-2841333479

by Elisabetta Basso

Analyse d'ouvrage: Jean-François Braunstein, L’histoire des sciences, méthodes, styles et controverses. Paris. Vrin 2008. In Revue d’Histoire des Sciences 61-2, 2009, pp. 317-320 .

by Elisabetta Basso

Review of Guillaume Le Blanc's book, La Vie Humaine

by nicolas lechopier

Dialogue: Canadian Philosophical Review/Revue canadienne de philosophie – 2004 - Volume 43, Issue 02, p. 406-409

The Return of Vitalism: Canguilhem and French Biophilosophy in the 1960s

by Charles Wolfe

2009 version

The eminent French biologist and historian of biology, François Jacob, once notoriously declared “On n’interroge plus... more The eminent French biologist and historian of biology, François Jacob, once notoriously declared “On n’interroge plus la vie dans les laboratoires”: laboratory research no longer inquires into the notion of ‘Life’. Nowadays, as David Hull puts it, “both scientists and philosophers take ontological reduction for granted… Organisms are ‘nothing but’ atoms, and that is that.” In the mid-twentieth century, from the immediate post-war period to the late 1960s, French philosophers of science such as Georges Canguilhem, Raymond Ruyer and Gilbert Simondon returned to Jacob’s statement with an odd kind of pathos: they were determined to reverse course. Not by imposing a different kind of research program in laboratories, but by an unusual combination of historical and philosophical inquiry into the foundations of the life sciences (particularly medicine, physiology and the cluster of activities that were termed ‘biology’ in the early 1800s). Even in as straightforwardly scholarly a work as La formation du concept de réflexe aux XVIIe et XVIIIe siècles (1955), Canguilhem speaks oddly of “defending vitalist biology,” and declares that Life cannot be grasped by logic (or at least, “la vie déconcerte la logique”). Was all this historical and philosophical work merely a reassertion of ‘mysterian’, magical vitalism? In order to answer this question we need to achieve some perspective on Canguilhem’s ‘vitalism’, notably with respect to its philosophical influences such as Kurt Goldstein.

La teoría de la historia de las ciencias de Georges Canguilhem

by Francisco Vazquez Garcia

Se trata de mi tesis de licenciatura, defendida en la Universidad de Sevilla en diciembre de 1984 y parcialmente publicada en Lorenzo, A., Tasset, J.L. y Vázquez, F.: Estudios de Historia de las Ideas, Sevilla, A.M. Lorenzo Ed., 1987

Eksperimentalna in strukturalna kritika Festingerjevega koncepta kognitivne disonance

by Aljaž Jelenko

An Excess of the Deficient: Attempts to Normalize the Body of Frankenstein's “hideous progeny”

by Alice Dickinson

Organism, Normativity, Plasticity: Kant, Canguilhem, Malabou

by Sebastian Rand

Forthcoming in Continental Philosophy Review. Please cite published version when available.

Norma, normatività, normalizzazione. Un itinerario teorico tra Canguilhem e Foucault

by Giuseppe Campesi

Published in: “Sociologia del Diritto”, XXXV, 2, 2008, pp. 5-30

This essay aims at exploring the theoretical implications for the foucauldian research project of some key concepts... more This essay aims at exploring the theoretical implications for the foucauldian research project of some key concepts developed by Georges Canguilhem. Namely the concept of «norms», «normativity», and «normalization». I believe these concepts crucial for understanding the development of the genealogical project on which Michel Foucault embarked during the Seventies, and particularly for obtaining a deeper understanding of the idea of disciplinary power as part of the broader biopolitical project. This preliminary conceptual exploration between Canguilhem and Foucault, will also provide some useful theoretical tools to better understand the position of the legal phenomenon within the foucauldian genealogy of modern power. 

Les études cartésiennes de Georges Canguilhem

by Vincent Guillin

The tribunal of philosophy and its norms: history and philosophy in Georges Canguilhem's historical epistemology

by Cristina Chimisso

published in Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical Sciences, 2003

In this article I assess Georges Canguilhem’s historical epistemology with both theoretical and historical questions... more In this article I assess Georges Canguilhem’s historical epistemology with both theoretical and historical questions in mind. From a theoretical point of view, I am concerned with the relation between history and philosophy, and in particular with the philosophical assumptions and external norms that are involved in history writing. Moreover, I am concerned with the role that history can play in the understanding and evaluation of philosophical concepts. From a historical point of view, I regard historical epistemology, as developed by Gaston Bachelard and Georges Canguilhem, as a conception and practice which came out of the project, elaborated in France from the 1920s to the 1940s, of combining history of science and philosophy. I analyse in particular Canguilhem’s epistemology in his theory and practice of history of science. What he called ‘normative history’ is the focus of my analysis. I evaluate the question of the nature and provenience of the norm employed in normative history, and I compare it with the norm as discussed by Canguilhem in Le normal et le pathologique. While I am critical of Canguilhem’s treatment of history, I conclude that his philosophical suggestion to analyse the formation of scientific concepts ‘from below’ represents a useful model for history and philosophy of science, and that it can be very profitably extended to philosophical concepts

Aspects of current history of philosophy of science in the French tradition

by Cristina Chimisso

pubilshed in The Present Situation in the Philosophy of Science, ed. F. Stadler, Springer, 2010

Review of: Antonella Cutro, Il valore dei concetti. Filosofia e critica. Milano. Mimesis 2010. In: Revue d’Histoire des Sciences, 64-1 (2011), pp. 198-201

by Elisabetta Basso