The Letter

5
of the Collège de France

N°5 Academic year 2009–2010

Teaching research in the making
The Collège de France was created in 1530 by François I
The Collège’s motto is “Docet omnia”: the vocation to teach
everything
The lectures are open to anyone, there are no registration fees,
no diplomas are awarded
The program is changed each year
Dissemination of knowledge
- Lectures, seminars, guest lecturers from abroad, international
and multidisciplinary conferences: attended by 120,000 people
annually
- Publications: abstracts of work under way (Yearbook),
Inaugural lectures, reopening symposiums and guest professors'
lectures, DVDs
Website in French and English (www.college-de-france.fr)
(4,500 visits/day), Podcasts (3,350,000 downloads/month),
audio and video retransmissions
- Lectures broadcast by France-Culture
(800,000 listeners/month)
57 chairs
- 52 Chairs + 5 Chairs renewed annually (Artistic Creation,
Information Technology and Digital Sciences, Knowledge against
Poverty, Sustainable Development–Environment, Energy and
Society, Technological Innovation Liliane Bettencourt)
- Promoting the emergence of new disciplines
- Multidisciplinary approach to cutting-edge research
- Creation of a new Chair in the scientific domain of every
nominated professor (Mathematics, Physics and Chemistry,
Biology and Medicine, Philosophy, Sociology, Economics,
Archaeology, History, Study of the great civilizations, Linguistics
and Literature)
International relations
- Lectures ans conferences delivered abroad
- The professors may deliver some of their lectures abroad
(Agreements with: Germany, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, China,
USA, Israel, Lebanon, Singapore, Sweden, Switzerland, Czech
Republic)
- Foreign professors invited
- Program of reception of post-doctoral researchers from abroad
Research at the Collège de France and training through
research
- 4 institutes (Institute of Biology, Institute of the Contemporary
World, Institute of Oriental Studies, Institute of Literary Studies)
- Center for Interdisciplinary Research in Biology–C.I.R.B.
- more than 300 researchers
- 148 PhD students and post-doctoral students
- 315 engineers, technicians and administrative staff
- 7 research teams hosted
- Affiliated organizations: Collège de France, CNRS, INSERM,
Universities, EPHE, EHESS, Pasteur Institute
The Collège de France libraries
A heritage of rare books and some of the best specialized
libraries in Europe
Open to a public of outside specialists
- General library: 120,000 books
- Social anthropology library: 28,000 books
- Libraries of the Oriental Studies Institute: Egyptology, Ancient
Near East, Byzantium, Arab, Turkish and Islamic Studies, Far East
(India, Tibet, China, Korea, Japan): 500,000 books
Budget
- Operating budget: 14.8 M€
State grant: 6.7 M€
Own income: 1.7 M€
Institutional contracts : 6.4 M€
- Total payroll: 15.1 M€
Sponsorship
- Collège de France Foundation
- Collège de France Hugot Foundation
Relations with the business world
- Contracts with industry
- Budé Committee, corporate managers club

“What the Collège de France is expected to bring to its

audiences is not established knowledge, but the idea of free
research.”
(Ce que le Collège de France, depuis sa fondation, est chargé de donner à ses
auditeurs, ce ne sont pas des vérités acquises, c’est l’idée d’une recherche libre.)
Maurice Merleau-Ponty
Editorial

by Pierre Corvol
Administrator
of the Collège de France
Professor,
chair of Experimental Medicine

A new audience for the Collège de France

Whether our elders like it or not, the Collège de past and is hardly more of one today. Rightly so, and
France’s motto, Docet Omnia, is incomplete. Docet there is nothing about that that should offend those
Omnes Omnia would be more accurate: it teaches audiences. As the Collège de France emphasizes, its
everything to everyone. No registration, no lectures are above all the fruit of personal work: the
constraint: whoever wishes to attend a lecture, demanding, concentrated and intellectual result of
symposium or seminar at the Collège de France can each Professor’s own research. That is what sets it
do so unconditionally, freely and at no charge. This apart: it is anything but a media exercise. The
custom is so rare that both in France and abroad it audiences present in its lecture halls witness the
tends to surprise even our fellow academics. The elaboration of an intellectual product, the
Collège is neither limited to an academic syllabus, nor development of arguments structuring a theory, the
delivers qualifications, nor requires its audiences to disclosure of new discoveries and their interpretation.
undergo any test of the knowledge acquired through Very often the lectures lead to the publication of
its teaching. This has been so since 1530, at least in scientific articles or books. The audiences are thus
principle, since we are not entirely sure of where and both necessary and contingent: on the one hand they
under what conditions the first royal lectors taught. It are the indispensable and privileged witnesses of a
seems that the earliest audiences were students, thought process taking shape and being expressed in
scholars from the Latin Quarter and the Montagne vivo before them; on the other, the nature and
Sainte Geneviève, a campus before the term existed. composition of the audience is of no relevance to the
At the Collège they sought knowledge not dispensed lecture itself.
by the universities.
One has to bear in mind, however, that this
Often, when I am presenting the Collège de France and knowledge is ultimately intended for the public, and
its teaching missions, people ask me what types of that the public shows a strong demand for knowledge
audiences attend the lectures. Who comes to the Collège’s in all scientific disciplines. To teach everyone, the
lectures, what is their level of education, their regularity, Collège and its lecture halls would be hopelessly
their assiduity? What is their motivation? What do they insufficient, but the Internet has broadened them to
derive from the lectures? Until now there were as many the scale of our planet. And the audiences have
answers to these questions as chairs at the Collège, for followed suit. Statistics on visits to the Collège’s
each of the professors had some idea of his or her website and its multimedia platforms (Daily Motion,
audiences. However, no overall answer could be given iTunes U) have revealed the existence of virtual
because no study had been carried out on the subject. audiences outnumbering the ones on campus.
Some of the more highly specialized lectures were
faithfully attended by small numbers of the initiated. In To find out who these audiences are and what they
contrast, well-to-do crowds thronged to Bergson’s hope to get out of the Collège’s lectures, we ran a
lectures, for example, and photos of the time show survey on the attendees of Collège de France lectures
people clinging to the windows, avidly listening to the in early 2010. In parallel, a survey was also run on
master’s words. Today, video recordings of the most well- the Collège’s online audiences, in 2009 and in 2010.
attended lectures are broadcast live in several lecture The results are presented in detail by Henri Leridon in
halls. the present issue (p. 57). To sum up those of the
survey carried out at the Collège, a profile of the
We can assume that the question of their audiences average attendee can be drawn: man or woman, aged
was of little concern to the Collège professors in the over 55, living in or around Paris (Ile de France), with
a high cultural level, usually unemployed or retired, and currently putting online the texts of certain lectures, as
who say they attend the lectures for their personal well as other types of content: inaugural lectures, the
interest. Over half of them say they attend at least two Collège de France yearly report, the Letter of the
lecture series. The picture is however not quite as clear- Collège de France, and other text documents (notably
cut when it comes to the hard sciences: mathematics, on the site revues.org).
physics and the natural sciences. This public is younger
and includes far more students and researchers. 5. The survey revealed that 14% of the Internet users
do not live in France. This is a strong encouragement to
The profile of the average respondent to the Web make the Collège known beyond our borders, both in
questionnaire differs considerably from the one above. French-speaking countries and beyond. The next step
Most are men, they live in Ile de France (51%), would therefore be to have certain lectures and
elsewhere in France (35%) or abroad (14%), and the seminars translated into English so that they can be
majority are in the 25–34 age-group and are students, disseminated throughout the world. In this way the
teachers or researchers. They follow the lectures for Collège will actively contribute to promoting French
their own interest (63%), for their studies or for science and culture internationally.
professional reasons (37%). Fewer of them have or had
positions at a senior managerial level (46%) than in the 6. The surveys on the Collège’s different audiences
audiences who attend lectures at the Collège (70%). enabled us obtain the first overview on the subject in
2010. It would be useful to carry out such surveys
These surveys, which were short and therefore partial regularly so that we can see how these audiences evolve
and imperfect, nevertheless had the merit of producing over time, and evaluate the services that we deliver.
an outline of the Collège de France’s virtual audiences
for the first time, and of enabling us to compare them The digital dissemination of knowledge has multiplied
to its traditional audiences who attend lectures on the Collège de France’s audiences by a factor of 10 to
campus. This calls for several comments: 100. The public concerned corresponds precisely to the
target that the Collège wanted to attain: those listeners
1. First, by making its lectures available on its website, whose presence is “virtual” yet very real, and who want
the Collège de France has met an expectation. In less to acquire more in-depth knowledge in various research
than three years, large new audiences have discovered fields.
the institution, subscribed to its podcasts, and started to
use the published versions of its lectures (in text, audio The survey on Internet users is an encouragement to
and video format) for their personal interest or for perpetuate and amplify this approach, by maintaining
learning, teaching and research purposes. The Collège’s the same high standards of teaching which make the
teaching is no longer reserved only for a few fortunate Collège’s lectures so valuable and interesting, both
inhabitants of Paris and surrounding areas, as we wrote online and on campus. For the Collège’s aim is not only
in the editorial of the Lettre du Collège de France in to teach everyone, but also to give them the best. 
June 2006; it is now accessible to all.

2. The Collège’s new online audiences are younger and

are mostly students or employed. In addition there are
the PhD students who are hosted by the Collège for
their research, essentially in the mathematical, physical
and natural sciences (320 students in 2010). These
young people will in turn impart the knowledge that
they acquired at the Collège.

3. The answers to the survey questionnaires as well as

free comments show that Internet users are loyal and
are satisfied with the Collège’s lectures on the Web, as
are the audiences that attend lectures on campus.

4. The diversity of the Collège’s offer in terms of

content and educational media is a valuable asset that
should be preserved. The survey shows that all types of
media interest Internet users and that we should not
favour any particular one. In this spirit, the Collège is
TA B L E OF CONTENTS

Selected papers pages

The papers included in this issue of the Letter of the Collège de France in English were originally published in the
Lettre du Collège de France n° 27, 28 and 29 (academic year 2009–2010).

 Opening of the chair of Information Technology and Digital Sciences 8

 Inaugural lectures (extracts)

- Gérard BERRY—Information technology and Digital Sciences, Academic Year 2009–2010 9
- Patrick COUVREUR—Technological Innovation Liliane Bettencourt, Academic Year 2009–2010 10
- Antoine GEORGES—Physics of Condensed Matter 11
- Jacques NICHET—Artistic Creation, Academic Year 2009–2010 12
- Peter PIOT—Knowledge against Poverty, Academic Year 2009–2010 13
- Nicholas STERN—Sustainable Development - Environment, Energy and Society,
Academic Year 2009–2010 14

 News of the chairs

- Tahiti’s sea level and corals, Édouard Bard—Climate and Ocean Evolution 15
- A new Chinese “Budé” collection, Anne Cheng—Intellectual History of China 16
- The Making of Images (exhibition), Philippe Descola—Anthropology of Nature 17
- Bioinspired chemistry and nanosciences, Marc Fontecave—Chemistry of Biological Processes 18
- Funeral rites in Lugdunum (exhibition), Christian Goudineau—National Antiquities 19

 Guest lecturers
- Democracy in American: conditions and conflicts in Tocqueville, Arthur Goldhammer 21
- The first translation of the Analects in Europe, Thierry Meynard 22
- Cognition, attention and consciousness: Synchrony in mind, Lawrence Ward 23

 Prizes and Distinctions

- Ian HACKING, Holberg Prize 2009 (acceptance speech) 25
- Serge HAROCHE, CNRS Gold Metal 2009 27

 Collège de France autumn symposium 2009:

Darwins’s bicentenary, Profs Jean-Pierre Changeux, Mireille Delmas-Marty, Alain Prochiantz 28

 Other symposia and seminars

- The Days of Jean Dausset, Profs Pierre Corvol, Philippe Kourilsky, Mr Laurent Degos 32
- Rationality, Truth and Democracy: Bertrand Russell, George Orwell, Noam Chomsky
Profs Jacques Bouveresse, Noam Chomsky, Mr Jean-Jacques Rosat 36
- Managing Climate Change, Professor Roger Guesnerie 39

 The Tragedy of the Haiti Earthquake, Professor Xavier le Pichon 42

 Obituary
- Jean DAUSSET, Professor Philippe Kourilsky 44
- Claude LÉVI-STRAUSS, Professor Philippe Descola 46
- Jean YOYOTTE, Professor Nicolas Grimal 49

 Léon Brillouin, From waves to information, Rémy Mosseri 51

Institutional News

 The General Library of the Collège de France

Marie-Renée Cazabon, curator of the Library 54

 Paris Science and Humanities–Latin Quarter 56

 Who are the audiences of the Collège de France’s lectures?

Professor Henri Leridon 57

Facts and Data

 Collège de France organization chart 62

 Lectures given by the Professors abroad 64

 Lectures and lecture series by foreign Professors 66

 Events at the Collège de France 2009–2010 71

 Research teams hosted 72

 Temporary positions at the Collège de France 2010–2011

(Maîtres de conférences and ATER) 72

 The Collège de France Institutes 73

 C.I.R.B. 75

 Publications 2009–2010 76

 Collège de France autumn symposium 2010–2011 77

SELECTED
PA P E R S
 OPENING OF THE CHAIR OF I NFORMATION TECHNOLOGY AND
DIGITAL SCIENCES
On 10 November 2009 the Collège de France and the French
national institute for research in computer science and control
(INRIA, Institut national de recherche en informatique et automa-
tique) presented the press with their objectives in creating a chair
devoted to computer and digital science.

From left to right : Professors Pierre-Louis Lions, Gérard Berry, Pierre Corvol and Mr Michel
Cosnard

The importance of computer science ’think digital’. Very few objects and From this point of view, explaining
in our society is unquestionable. Our complex procedures today are not the the digitization of the world and
world is becoming increasingly product of computer-aided design. giving our fellow citizens the keys
digital; that is obvious. Not a day goes needed to further their understanding
by that each of us does not use a Apart from digital engineering, digital of this new society become fully
device or service attesting to that, modelling, simulation and meaningful. It is essential if they are
whether in our private or professional visualization have transformed to make sense of the environment in
lives. We live in a world of computers practically all scientific domains. The which they live, to accept it and to
or, more precisely, electronic circuits. digital sciences are at the heart of become actors in their own right and
Apart from our personal or office most of the challenges requiring even creators. I am convinced that the
computer, we are surrounded by interdisciplinary answers today. ‘digital divide’ is more than simply a
machines that are part of this big question of equipment; it is also a
family: household appliances, cars, The implications of the digital matter of thought patterns, of a divide
aeroplanes, mobile phones, etc., are revolution are huge, from both an in the capacity to adopt a different
all related to our computers. All have economic and a societal point of view. way of grasping the world.
electronic chips that function on the In France, first the announcement in
basis of software to perform a series early April 2008 of a plan to develop By creating a chair for Computer and
of predefined tasks. the digital economy, with a view to Digital Science at the Collège de
ranking France among the leading France, we are moving a step closer to
To the long list of objects with ‘digital nations’ by 2012, and then, acknowledging computer science as a
integrated computer programs, we more recently, the controversy around discipline in its own right, and are
naturally have to add the increasing the drafting of the HADOPI law, are thus highlighting the importance of
number of services from which we emblematic of the phenomenon. These devoting more attention to it in the
benefit. After the introduction of the two events highlight the economic academic world. It is no longer
personal computer in the 1980s, the weight associated with digital legitimate to have to wait to specialize
appearance of the Internet in the mid- technologies, on the one hand, and with in one’s post-school education to
90s triggered the most visible evolving uses and the need to regulate receive an explanation of the
upheaval by enabling hundreds of that evolution, on the other. An foundations of computing. This
millions of machines to be connected. estimated 28% of global research and teaching should be imparted to people
This constantly expanding development is devoted to information from a younger age. Starting this year,
networking has been attended by a and communication science and the mathematics programme in the
digitization of data and of products technologies (ICST). Whether the aim first year of senior high school (lycée)
that are potentially transferable on is to create value with the leading firms in France will include one of the key
Internet. Data and medium are now or to regulate new uses related to new concepts in computing: algorithms.
inseparable and, as such, have technologies, in order to ensure their This is a first step, which I salute, but
revolutionized certain sectors like the acceptance, the same condition applies: we need to go further in the same
record industry. the need to understand the bases of direction. 
computing and to identify the principles Mr Michel Cosnard
These are examples from our daily governing this digital world in which we CEO of INRIA
lives, which reflect profound change live. Ignorance spawns the impossibility
in our society, for while we ‘consume of creating, as well as dependence or
digital’, including our entertainment, even fear and mistrust of an unfamiliar
we also ’produce digital’ and even world.

8 THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE - N° 5

 I NAUGURAL LECTURES

CHAIR : I NFORMATION T ECHNOLOGY AND D IGITAL S CIENCES

A CADEMIC Y EAR 2009–2010

Gérard BERRY take great care in linking these principles

to their practical impacts. In the digital
gave his inaugural lecture on industries as elsewhere, pragmatics reign,
19 November 2009. and engineers are often reluctant to change
His course entitled “To think, model and their methods unless they are obliged to by
control calculation” project failures or costs escalations. Thus,
began on 25 November 2009. the use of the advanced notions presented
in the course remains quite slow in many
Extracts from the inaugural lecture: places. However, it is becoming
The current digital revolution is rooted in indispensable because of a sharp increase
automatic computation on digitally of the cost of bugs and security problems,
encoded information. Since it deals with itself due to the explosion of the number,
information instead of matter and energy, variety, and criticality of applications in a
it is more comparable to the ancient context where machines and networks
Researcher, French revolutions of writing and printing than to become more and more complex.
National Institute the more recent industrial revolution.
These former revolutions were Informatics-based applications must
for Research in comprehensible by everybody since they all become more reliable. This requires
Computer Science had a directly visible material impact. modeling and mastering the core notion of
and Control Being mostly invisible, the digital automatic computation, object of this
revolution is much less comprehensible to course. But this is clearly not sufficient.
(INRIA) the public. In particular, the underlying One must also master many other subjects,
notions of information digitization and ranging from theoretical algorithmics to
Head of INRIA's
automatic computation remain either practical software engineering. Indeed,
Evaluation unknown or mysterious to most people. many important recent innovations are due
Commission. Who realizes that printing a document, to the better design of programming
giving a phone call, or piloting an airplane languages through data structures,
are now based on the well-ordered modules, objects, aspects, etc. These will
execution of billions or trillions of not be considered here, since they change
elementary computations, the very same the architecture and writing of programs
for such different applications? Who without deeply changing what concerns us
knows that mastering automatic here, the way they compute at run-time.
computation is fundamentally difficult and
requires verifying in great details that the Why did we mention several computation
aforementioned myriads of elementary principles and models, while all computers
computations fully and faithfully look alike and seem to differ only by their
implement their designer’s intention? brand, their speed, and their cost? Because
we need to distinguish between two highly
In this year at Collège de France, I will different levels: the human level, where we
concentrate on automatic computation as think about computation with our slow,
an object of scientific and technical semi-rigorous, but intuitive brains, and the
reflection. I will describe the different execution level, performed by computers
principles at work, how they differentiate that are superfast and superexact but
from each other, how to make them totally deprived of intuition. Mastering the
cooperate, and why it is necessary to path between these two opposite ends is
recursively compute on computations to difficult and requires understanding the
The inaugural lecture is make systems reliable. The basic principles variety of conceptual and technical models
available from Editions
Fayard. The video is are of a theoretical nature: abstract we present here. 
available on the machines, programming concepts and
College de France website. languages, verification logics, etc. I will

N° 5 - THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE 9

 C HAIR : T ECHNOLOGICAL I NNOVATION L ILIANE B ETTENCOURT
A CADEMIC Y EAR 2009–2010

Patrick COUVREUR ‘intelligent’ nanotechnologies, for we now

have a wide variety of materials and
delivered his inaugural lecture on biomaterials that can be implemented
21 January 2010. cleverly.
His lecture series entitled
“Nanomedicines” started on 25 January […] The core of nanocarriers makes it
2010. possible to encapsulate biologically active
molecules in order to make them ‘invisi-
Extracts from the inaugural lecture: ble’ to detoxification mechanisms such as
Nanotechnologies have appeared and the those employed by cancer cells to resist to
world of the infinitely small has chemotherapy. The resistance mechanisms
revolutionized the way of administering developed by these cells can indeed result
medicine. Because they are on a nanometric in the expression of efflux proteins (PgP,
scale (1nm = 10–9m), nanotechnologies are MRP, etc.) which expel medicines from
Professor of not simply miniaturized larger objects; they the cell. This so-called ‘multidrug resis-
Pharmacotechnique have properties found only on a scale of tance’ (MDR) neutralizes most classical
that size. Medicines are no exception. Until chemotherapeutic treatments. We had the
at Paris-South the early 1970s it was considered idea of trying to circumvent this resistance
University. Senior impossible to administer pharmaceutical mechanism by encapsulating doxorubicin
member of the suspensions (dispersion of solid particles in (an anti-cancer intercalating agent of
a liquid) by intravenous means, due to the DNA) in nanoparticles prepared from a
Institut Universitaire obvious risks of embolism. Today, the biodegradable polymer, polyalkylcyanoa-
de France. In 2000, conception of nanoparticles suspensions crylate. In this form, the efflux proteins
set up the PhD containing medicines (‘nanomedicines’) has can no longer recognize the doxorubicin
made it possible to increase the therapeutic and the cancer cells become sensitive to it
school for index of many components (improvement again. This concept has been applied to
“Therapeutic of the activity, reduction of toxicity) by the experimental treatment of resistant
Innovation”. directing them selectively towards the hepatocarcinoma because these nanopar-
diseased tissues and cells (‘drug targeting’). ticles, like all colloids, are recognized by
The shift in size from tens of microns to the liver (via Kupffer cells) after intrave-
tens or hundreds of nanometres has thus nous administration. The company
been a significant technological and BIOALLIANCE has been developping this
medical breakthrough. technology and a multicentric trial of
Phase II/III is currently underway.
In this inaugural lecture I wish to show
that the concepts of physico-chemistry, the […] The core of nanotechnologies also
development of new materials (synthesis of allows for the encapsulation of fragile
new polymers and new lipids, for molecules. ‘Biomimetic’ or stemming from
example), and better knowledge of biotechnologies, macromolecules like
biological targets enable us to conceive of DNA, siRNA or antisense oligonucleo-
sub-micronic systems of administration tides, peptides and proteins offer signifi-
endowed with numerous functions and cant therapeutic prospects. They may be
properties; in short, to develop ‘intelligent’ the basis of tomorrow’s therapeutic tech-
nanotechnologies which can contribute to niques (non-viral gene therapy, inhibition
diversifying our therapeutic arsenal in the of oncogenes or viral genes, targeted
treatment of severe diseases. therapeutics using antibodies, etc.), but
because they are fragile, they need to be
Applied to drug targeting, these encapsulated into nanocarriers. 
The inaugural lecture is nanotechnologies have a diameter
available from Editions
Fayard. The video is
midway between that of viruses and
available on the bacteria, thus resembling natural
College de France website. particles. It is moreover possible to create

10 THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE - N° 5

C HAIR : P HYSICS OF C ONDENSED MATTER

Antoine GEORGES geodesic domes, can consist of up to 60

carbon molecules and have the form of a
gave his inaugural lesson on football. These carbon nanotubes, small,
8 October 2009. very narrow and long tubes—their diameter
His lecture series entitled is only a few nanometers, that is, a millionth
“From supra-conductor oxides to cold of a millimetre—are obtained when a single
atoms: matter with strong quantum sheet of carbon atoms rolls itself up. Five
correlations” started on 5 May 2010. years ago, Geim and Novoselov isolated a
sheet of this kind, formed by a single layer of
Extracts from the inaugural lecture carbon atoms organized like a network of
(translated transcription): hexagonal cells. This is graphene, the subject
Since the Collège de France is a locus of of abundant research today.
knowledge production, where the
Head of the Physics professors teach their own original And all these examples are of materials
Department of the research, I would prefer this talk not to formed by just one type of atom! What an
seem too much like a lecture . immense playing field lies before us if we
École Polytechnique consider the countless possibilities of
(2006–2009). I would therefore like you to listen to me as combining the elements on Mendeleev’s
though you were listening to someone periodic table. One example is an oxide
CNRS Silver recounting their travels: a journey starting composed of four different atoms—
Medal (2007). out from the extraordinary diversity of copper, oxygen, lanthanum and
organized forms of matter on a macroscopic strontium—which can occupy the same
scale, to its most minute components on an sites . It has the remarkable property of
atomic scale. becoming a supra-conductor above a
certain temperature, which means that it
[...] This journey starts in awe before the can convey an electric current without
diversity of material that nature presents us any resistance or dissipation. Another
with or that chemists and physicists are able example is cobalt oxide, in which small
to create. The carbon atom, with its six alkaline lithium ions circulate between
electrons around a core, is one of the sheets of cobalt oxide atoms, and which
simplest of all atoms but also one of the is essential to the batteries of our mobile
most essential elements of the living phones and laptop computers.
world. When a large number of these
atoms combine, they can form crystal There is not only perfect crystal—that
structures: the three-dimensional structure which in a sense is more like
architecture of diamonds or structures matter as it should be than matter as it is.
consisting of bi-dimensional layers of The organized matter that nature presents
graphite. What an amazing difference us with or that is born in the laboratories
there is between the physical of chemists adopts extraordinarily diverse
properties of these two structures, forms: gels, mousses, liquid crystals, and
even though both consist of the same many more. […] As the term solid state
element: on the one hand, the physics proved to be too limited to
diamond, transparent, extremely hard encompass all these forms, condensed
and providing good electrical matter physics is the term that took
isolation; on the other, graphite, a prevalence in the 1970s to denote the field
black, flaky, layered composite that is used of physics that studies the structure and
in crayons and is almost metallic. Carbon properties of the organized forms of
can form even more remarkable structures, matter. I chose to keep this title for the
The inaugural lecture is recently discovered or synthesized. The large chair, to show my interest in this
available from Editions
Fayard. The video is molecules, for example, called extraordinary variety of forms. 
available on the Buckminsterfullerenes in homage to the
College de France website. architect Buckminsterfuller, the inventor of

N° 5 - THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE 11

 CHAIR : A RTISTIC C REATION
A CADEMIC Y EAR 2009–2010

Jacques NICHET disruptions and fragmentation of a world

that is defying our references, plays are
delivered his inaugural lecture on proliferating and becoming increasingly
11 March 2010. differentiated. They endeavour to echo
His lecture series entitled “Theatre does our painful impressions of disorientation
not exist” started on 18 March 2010. and uncertainty. The artists, each in their
own way, try to react through different
Presentation of the series: practices, alliances and modes of
Over the past four decades we have production.
witnessed numerous singular
metamorphoses of theatre, which have We witnessed large numbers of unusual
shaken and boldly overturned the creations that sought to mark their
traditions of the dramatic arts. What difference from the productions of the
explains such changes? What are the established institutions.
Founder of the different ways in which these unforeseen
Théâtre de forms, these unknown visions, have been By asserting their originality, these
invented? Luca Ronconi, Ariane experiments have shown other ways of
l’Aquarium and the Mnouchkine, Peter Schumann, Robert inventing theatre.
company Wilson, François Tanguy, Tadeusz Kantor,
l’Inattendu. Denis Marleau, Valère Novarina, Pina My greatest pleasure would be to relive the
Bausch and many others wrenched me shock of a surprise, the upsurge of emotion
Director of the from my usual self with my certainties, like the first time, the evening when we saw
Théâtre National filled me with enthusiasm, shook, moved Orlando Furioso by Luca Ronconi,
de Toulouse and astounded me, sometimes irritated 1789–1793 by Ariane Mnouchkine and the
me. It is hardly surprising that in the Théâtre du Soleil, A Man says Goodbye to
1998–2007. midst of so many divergent models, the his Mother and Fire by Peter Schumann
public sometimes feels lost. What is it and the Bread and Puppet Theatre,
seeing? Is this still theatre? Sometimes a Deafman Glance by Robert Wilson, Dead
play triggers controversy amongst both Class by Tadeusz Kantor, The Blind de
the public and critics: while some criticize Maeterlinck in the phantasmagoria of
the director in the name of murdered art, Denis Marleau, The Unknown Act by
others acclaim him/her in the name of Valère Novarina, and Café Müller and
revived art. Barbe-Bleue by Pina Bausch. Forty years
ago all these shows were unimaginable, but
Over a century ago, Zola advised the ‘if you can imagine it, you can do it’ said
artists caught in the controversies of the the sculptor Calder. All it took was an artist
day: ‘Every time someone wants to to imagine it one day. 
confine you to a code by saying: this is
theatre, this is not theatre, reply outright:
theatre [as such] does not exist. There are
theatres and I’m looking for mine’.

This type of approach does indeed spawn

only singular, dissimilar, temporary forms.
And Zola firmly emphasizes: ‘There is no
absolute, ever, in any art whatsoever! If
there is theatre, a fashion has created it
today and a fashion will destroy it
The inaugural lecture will tomorrow!’
be available from Editions
Fayard. The video is
available on the Zola’s claims have never been as relevant
College de France website. as they are today. In response to the

12 THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE - N° 5

 CHAIR : K NOWLEDGE A GAINST P OVERTY
A CADEMIC Y EAR 2009–2010

Peter PIOT was the campaign against the H1N1 flu. We

can legitimately wonder how many millions
delivered his inaugural lecture on of infections by the HIV and how many
7 January 2010. deaths could have been avoided, had health
His lecture series entitled “The Aids authorities and policy-makers applied this
epidemic and the globalization of risks” precautionary principle on a global scale
started on 5 February 2010. from the beginning of the Aids epidemic,
and implemented all the means deployed in
Extracts from his inaugural lecture: recent years.
A virus that was totally unknown less than
30 years ago has overturned schemas on […] It has been in the field of access to
progress in health and socio-economic treatment that progress has been the most
development in many countries, especially in spectacular. At the end of 2008, four million
sub-Saharan Africa. In three decades, some people in low- and medium-income
Professor of Global sixty million people have been infected by countries benefited from antiretroviral
Health and Director the HIV—the human immunodeficiency treatment. Although this accounts for only
virus—of which some twenty-five million 42% of the needs, a lot of ground has been
of the Institute for have died so far. These tens of millions of covered: in the year 2000, fewer than
Global Health at people were linked to one another via sexual 200,000 people were receiving antiretroviral
the Imperial College relations, exposure to contaminated blood treatment in developing countries. The
products or needles, or because their mother majority were in Brazil, the first developing
in London. was infected with the HIV. Genetic and country to offer free care to HIV-infected
epidemiological studies have moreover people. […] When it comes to prevention,
Executive Director
shown that everything probably started with progress has been less spectacular, even
of the Joint United only one person and a single virus. All this though many countries have experienced a
Nations Programme highlights another side of globalization— drop in the number of new HIV infections.
and a new dimension of the concept of Globally, for each new patient put under
on HIV/Aids
blood relatives! treatment, almost three new HIV infections
(1995–2008. occur somewhere in the world, as though we
[…] The Aids epidemic has pursued its were constantly losing the race against the
global expansion for three decades. Today, virus.
33.4 million people are living with the HIV;
The Chair receives support from the
Agence Francaise de Développement (AFD)
in 2008, 2.7 million new infections were […] Once again, ‘scientific evidence’ does
contracted and there were two million not automatically mean ‘acceptance’ and
deaths. Who could have predicted the worst ‘action’. A great deal of science is lost in
pandemic in modern history since the translation. We have found this in many
Spanish Flu when, in June 1981, the Weekly sectors of health. For instance, the
Morbidity Mortality Report of the Atlanta international convention on tobacco control
Center for Disease Control published a short was approved by the member states of the
article on a syndrome of unknown origin, WHO more than fifty years after the
characterized by a rare form of pneumonia correlation between tobacco smoking and
caused by pneumocystis carinii in five black lung cancer was proved by Doll and Hill.
homosexual men in the United States? This failure to act has resulted and continues
to result in millions of deaths. To eliminate
This is a classical dilemma in public health: poverty, the world probably needs the
when a few cases of a new disease are application of science even more than it
detected, will these cases remain isolated or needs knowledge against poverty! 
are they the beginning of an epidemic? The
The inaugural lecture is
experiences of Aids, SARS and bovine
available from Editions
Fayard. The video is spongiform encephalopathy, in particular,
available on the introduced the precautionary principle into
College de France website. public health. Its most recent application

N° 5 - THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE 13

 CHAIR : S USTAINABLE D EVELOPMENT - E NVIRONMENT, E NERGY
AND S OCIETY
A CADEMIC Y EAR 2009–2010
Nicholas STERN topic of section 2. The challenge now is
creating the political will. We saw in
delivered his inaugural lecture on Copenhagen in December 2009 just how
4 february 2010. difficult that can be. We will not create, or
His lecture series entitled “manage deserve to create, the necessary political will
climate change, promote growth, and collaboration, unless we recognise that
development and equity” there are two defining problems of this
started on 5 February 2010. century: managing climate change and
overcoming world poverty. We will succeed
Extracts from his inaugural lecture: or fail on these two together. Creating an
The world, the planet, is at a crossroads. If we international agreement will be the topic of
fail to act strongly now to reduce emissions of section 3. The sequence of these sections
greenhouse gases, if we continue with the reflects the structure of the course.
pattern of high-carbon growth of the last
Doctor in century, we incur grave risks of a catastrophic Analysis and the making of policy on climate
Economics, destruction of the physical geography of the change must start with an examination of
planet. The implications would likely be the re- the consequences of various forms of action
Oxford University, drawing of where people could live and how and indeed of inaction. The problem starts
professor at the they could live their lives: thus we risk with the actions of people in their daily lives
London School of movements of population on a massive scale, and their consequences influence directly the
with the probable consequence of severe, capability of people to live their lives. The
Economics and extended and global conflict. Inaction is the chain of causation is the following. Step 1:
member of the most pernicious of policies. But it is all too easy through their activities, in production and
British Academy. a path in a world dominated by the politics of consumption, people cause the emissions of
the short term, narrow self-interest and a greenhouse gases. The emissions have, for
suspicion of others. much of the last century or more, been
above the level that the planet can absorb via
There is another, and very attractive route. If ‘the carbon cycle’. Step 2: the flows therefore
we act together as a world, strongly, result in an increase in the stock or
collaboratively, creatively, justly, we can concentrations of greenhouse gases in the
create a new era of low-carbon growth and atmosphere. Step 3: the increased concentrations
The chair receives support from TOTAL.
development. It will be more energy- of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere imply
efficient, more energy-secure, more that more heat radiating from the earth is
equitable, safer, quieter, cleaner and more trapped in the atmosphere and temperature
bio-diverse. We can create a new definition rises. The magnitude of the increase is
of, criteria for, and approach to development shaped by the ‘climate sensitivity’. This is
that will be far more attractive than what global warming. Step 4: global warming
has gone before. Further, the transition to causes climate change. This manifests itself
low-carbon growth could be the most in large measure through water in some
dynamic and innovative period in world shape or form: storms and hurricanes; floods
history. On the other hand, high-carbon and inundations; droughts and
growth will kill itself: first on high prices for desertification; sea-level rise and changing
hydro-carbons and second, and more flows and courses of rivers. Step 5: these
fundamentally, on the very hostile physical climate changes have an impact on peoples’
environment it would create. lives and livelihoods to which they will have
to adapt in some way or another. In many
The choice is ours and it is urgent. We can cases, the impacts will re-define where
identify the scale of action necessary—the people can live and thus adaptation, for
The inaugural lecture is topic of the next section—the areas of action many, will involve dislocation and
available from Editions
Fayard. The video is and the necessary technologies. We migration. 
available on the understand the basic economic policies to
College de France website. encourage the reduction of emissions—the

14 THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE - N° 5

 N EWS OF THE C HAIRS
CLIMATE AND OCEAN EVOLUTION

Tahiti's sea level and corals

About a study published in the journal Science on 5 March 2010
We are currently studying in detail the Bering Strait and of the straits of the Sea of
variations of the sea level during the last Japan, immersion of the Black Sea and of
deglaciation which led to a massive rise in the Persian Gulf (and the legends
global sea levels of about 120 meters. associated with the Flood), the closing of
During this period, many other climatic the Cosquer cave, etc.
and oceanographic parameters underwent
consequential change: a global warming of Several authors have established semi-
around 5° C, a rise of approximately 40% empirical relations between the sea level
Professor Édouard Bard in the levels of greenhouse gases (carbon rise and the global temperature for
dioxide and methane) in the atmosphere, a different time scales ranging from the last
fall in wind speeds, a reorganisation of century to several millennia. This kind of
ocean currents, etc. statistical relation was even used to
reassess the IPCC (Intergovernmental
Our new study focuses on the core of this Panel on Climate Change) projections for
Bard E., Hamelin B.,
Delanghe-Sabatier D. period (from 14,000 to 9,000 years ago), the next centuries. There is however some
“Deglacial melt water pulse using the uranium-thorium dating scientific debate concerning the
1B and Younger Dryas sea- technique on many fossilised corals from uncertainties of this kind of approach.
levels revisited with new Tahiti’s barrier reef. During those five Our finding of a correlation between the
onshore boreholes at Tahiti”, millennia the sea level rose by more than sea level and temperatures will be used in
Science 327, 50 m, that is, the equivalent of all of that context and in real models simulating
1235–1237 (2010). Antarctica’s ice today pouring into the icecaps.
Contact:
ocean. The average pace of rising sea levels
Édouard Bard
was approximately one centimetre every Our data on Tahiti’s sea level will also be
[email protected]
year, which is three times more than is integrated into numerical models
currently measured by satellite. simulating the glacio-hydro-isostatic
postglacial readjustment, which alters the
With an unprecedented number of shape of the earth. An ice sheet several
samples, we have been able to kilometres thick creates a depression of the
demonstrate that this rate of increase is earth’s crust of about a kilometre, which
correlated with global climatic leads to movements of mass on a large
phenomena, notably the succession of scale and even to a variation in the
warm and cold phases. In particular, we moment of inertia of our planet and as
observe a slowing down in the rise of sea- such in the length of day. These variations
levels during the Younger Dryas cold event produce a similar effect to that of an ice
and a subsequent acceleration during the skater spinning and spreading his or her
Holocene warm period. arms out or drawing them back in.

These studies have many implications for This geophysical aspect is also crucial for
several domains of climatology, correcting the recent data provided by tide
geophysics and other disciplines. The gauges and by altimetry and gravimetry
exact chronology of the core of the satellites. The parameters of these models
deglaciation is essential in order to are adjusted to correspond to long time
estimate the phase shift between the series of sea level, notably what we are
climate forcing and the variations of the producing by dating corals. Studies
global average temperature and sea level. reaching until the middle of the
It is also crucial for estimating the dates at deglaciation are very rare (half a dozen in
which coastal areas and certain important the world) and the Tahiti record is the only
© IRD J. Orempüller basins were submerged: creation of the one for the Pacific. 

N° 5 - THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE 15

 INTELLECTUAL HISTORY OF CHINA

A new Chinese “Budé” collection enters the Belles Lettres

The “Bibliothèque chinoise” (Chinese Library), This project has already elicited an enthusiastic
inaugurated by the Belles Lettres in March response from numerous colleagues of all
2010, was born from a long-standing dream, generations, from the masters who trained us to
that of creating a Chinese equivalent to the the young researchers who will replace us. It
famous “Budé” collection of Greek and Latin will draw on every competence available and
texts. It was also the result of the meeting that make accessible to the wider audience the
took place in 2007 between two representatives wealth and diversity not only of Far Eastern
of the Belles Lettres publishing house, its sources, but also of the disciplinary methods
director Caroline Noirot and its coordinator enacted to approach them in the French-
Professor Anne Cheng Marie-José d’Hoop, and two sinologists, Anne speaking context (let us not forget that modern
Cheng who holds the chair of Intellectual European sinology was born with the creation
history of China at the Collège de France and in 1814 of a chair in Chinese and Tartar-
Marc Kalinowski who teaches ancient and Manchu at the Collège de France).
medieval Chinese cultural history at the École
Pratique des Hautes Études. The first two titles of the collection are
representative of the Han dynasty which lasted
The prime ambition of the “Bibliothèque four centuries (from the 2nd century B.C. to the
chinoise” is to bring forward in scholarly French 2nd century A.D.) and established the institutions
translations a wide range of texts written in of the first centralized empire together with the
classical Chinese in every field of the arts and pax sinica, parallel to the pax romana at the
sciences without any restriction (be it other end of the Eurasian continent. Rendered in
philosophy, history, literature, poetry, political Jean Levi’s translation, the Debate on salt and
and military treatises, but also medicine, iron (Yantielun) vividly records the discussions
astronomy, mathematics, etc.). The texts will be held at the imperial court in 81 BC on state
selected both for their stylistic quality and for monopolies and the art of rulership. As to the
their impact on the Chinese cultural world, thus Fayan (Masterly words) written by the great
offering the non-specialized readership a direct thinker Yang Xiong (53 BC–18 AD) and
access to the most representative works of that translated by Béatrice L’Haridon, it is conceived
vast written literature, ranging from the times as a brilliant pastiche of Confucius’s Analects. It
of Confucius in the 6th–5th centuries B.C. down is worth noting that these two titles were first
to the modern era in the early 20th century. presented to the public at the Fondation Hugot
and benefited from a subsidy granted by the
The collection will not be limited to Chinese Collège de France which thus manifests its
texts, but will be open to other cultural areas support to an undertaking so obviously faithful
such as Korea, Japan or Vietnam, that have to its motto Docet omnia: it endeavours to
made use of classical Chinese as a language introduce the sources in classical Chinese into the
common to literati elites, just as European humanities, thereby making them accessible to
scholars have used Latin as a lingua franca both students and open-minded spirits and,
from the Middle Ages down to the eventually, extracting them from their
Enlightenment period. supposedly irreducible “otherness”. 

Following the model of the Greek and Latin

“Budé”, the texts will be presented in a
bilingual edition, with the Chinese original
facing its French translation, preceded by a
detailed introduction and assorted with a
substantial critical apparatus (explanatory and
philological footnotes, chronologies, glossaries,
indexes), not with the aim of showing off
The two first books of the
pedantic erudition, but of guiding and
collection. facilitating the task of the reader.

16 THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE - N° 5

 ANTHROPOLOGY OF NATURE

The Making of Images

Exhibition at the Musée du quai Branly
16 February 2010 - 11 July 2011
Philippe Descola, curator of the exhibition
The purpose of this exhibition is to present
what is not directly apparent in an image, that
is, the effects that the creators wished to convey
to their intended audience. In some cases, these
effects are perceptible through the ages and
despite cultural diversity: as long as what they
Professor Philippe Descola
represent is recognisable, images that are either
extremely old or come from afar can awaken in
us desire, fear, disgust, pity, amusement or even,
quite simply, curiosity. Most often these effects
are overlooked, however, as the conventions
guiding their representation are unfamiliar to
the 21st century museum-goer whose an interiority (a mind, soul and subjectivity),
perception has been shaped, mostly, by the even though they share with non-humans
traditions of Western art. certain material characteristics (the physical-
chemical processes of their bodies).
The hypothesis underlying this exhibition is that
the representation of such effects relates to four In the tradition of animist ontology (in the
major figurative strategies. These correspond to Amazon, the northern parts of North America,
four ways of rendering evident in these images certain parts of South-east Asia and of
a particular set of qualities associated with the Melanesia), the opposite is true: many animals,
objects of the world. Traditionally known as plants and objects are thought to have an
‘ontologies’, these specific sets of qualities serve interior depth similar to that of human beings,
the purpose of identifying different groups of while differences between one another arise
beings distinguished from one another by from differences in the physical form.
differences in their common characteristics.
However, not all cultures have the same In the totemic ontology (found amongst
ontology. For example, sheep, cars or transgenic Australian Aborigines for example), certain
soya beans are not legal entities in Europe and humans and non-humans within a particular
in the United States (they are not represented in class share the same physical and moral
parliament, do not have any inalienable rights, qualities that arise from a prototype, while still
cannot be taken to court, etc.) because they are differing from other similar classes.
considered to be utterly different from human
beings. On the other hand, in other regions of Finally, in analogist ontologies, all the
the world it is considered normal to ask of a inhabitants of the world—and this includes
hunted animal not to seek revenge (Amazonia) their elementary components—are said to be
or to whip a mountain to punish it for its different from one another, which explains why
misbehaviour (Mongolia). we seek corresponding links between them
(China, Europe during the Renaissance,
There are four main ontologies in the world, so western Africa, the Andes, Mesoamerica, etc.).
four different ways of perceiving the continuity The aim of this exhibition is to convey how
and discontinuity that exist between things. each of these four ontologies is able to represent,
in other words to highlight and activate in these
In our own ontology—the naturalist images, the kinds of entities that they focus on
ontology that has prevailed in the West since in the world, the relations that these entities
Acrylic painting the classical era—humans are distinguished establish between one another, and the
“Dream of the two Men”
© Musée du quai Branly, from all other beings and things because proprieties that are associated with them. 
photo Thierry Ollivier, Michel Urtado. they are believed to be the only ones to have

N° 5 - THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE 17

 CHEMISTRY OF BIOLOGICAL PROCESSES

Bioinspired chemistry and nanosciences: towards new catalysts for

production and oxidation of hydrogen
There is no doubt that the most abundant These enzymes are, for the chemists, a
renewable energy source, far superior to fascinating source of inspiration and it is
the potential contributions of wind energy, within our reach to “copy” them and
geothermal energy or hydroelectric power, invent new catalysts displaying some of
is solar energy. A way to exploit this energy the remarkable structural and functional
is to convert it into chemical energy, to properties of the enzyme active sites. This
store it in the form of a chemical fuel, unique approach is called bio-inspired
hydrogen for example. Hydrogen is a very chemistry. It has been developped with
Professor Marc Fontecave attractive alternative to oil, because of the great success in the Laboratoire de Chimie
large amount of energy it releases during et biologie des métaux (CEA-CNRS-
its oxidation (fuel cells) and because the Université J. Fourier, CEA Grenoble), in
only by-product of this oxidation is water. collaboration with a group of the
Laboratoire de Chimie des surfaces et
The conversion of solar energy into fuel is interfaces (CEA Saclay) and a group of
in fact carried out wonderfully by the the Laboratoire d’Innovation pour les
living world, which continuously uses the technologies des énergies nouvelles et les
sun to transform water and carbon nanomatériaux (CEA Grenoble). By
dioxide into molecules with a high energy combining the bioinspired chemistry
value, found in biomass. Certain living approach and nanosciences, we were able
organisms, like micro-algae or to design an original material capable, in
cyanobacteria, even have the capacity to electrochemical devices, to catalyze, like
carry out simple water photolysis. They platinum, both the production of
use solar energy to transform water into hydrogen from water (for use in
oxygen and hydrogen. Because water does electrolysers) and its oxidation (for use in
not absorb the sun’s photons and because fuel cells). This material is based on a
the processes used in this photolysis are small nickel complex, sharing some
complex multi-electronic processes, structural characteristics with the active
microorganisms achieve this amazing feat site of hydrogenases, which has been
thanks to the incredibly sophisticated and grafted on carbon nanotubes, selected for
efficient enzymatic systems they possess their great potential bonding surface and
for collecting these photons, converting for their remarkable electrical conductivity.
the light absorption into chemical energy Adsorbed on an electrode, these
and catalysing the electron transfer functionalized nanotubes are very stable
reactions, namely the photosystem for the and efficient catalysts, working without
oxidation of water into oxygen and the overpotential, in acidic medium, and thus
hydrogenases for the reduction of water compatible with the proton exchange
into hydrogen. What is remarkable is that membrane technology extensively used in
these systems use abundant metals like fuel cells. Even though the achieved
manganese, nickel and iron for catalysis current densities are still too small, but
while today water electrolysis devices or improvable, this type of electrode material
fuel cells function exclusively with noble might open new possibilities for the
In the centre a nickel complex, grafted metals, like platinum, which are expensive development of the future hydrogen
at the surface of a carbon nanotube,
reproduces some characteristics of and not very abundant in the earth’s crust. economy. 
Ni-Fe (left) and Fe-Fe (right) hydrogenases We often forget to point out that a Professor Marc Fontecave, Vincent Artero
and catalyses the proton-hydrogen
interconversion,
hydrogen economy has no future if we do
liplatinum. not resolve these major catalysis issues.

Référence: From hydrogenases to noblemetal-free catalytic nanomaterial for H2 production and uptake, Le Goff A., Artero V., Jousselme B.,
Tran P. D., Guillet N., Métayé R., Fihri A., Palacin S., Fontecave M., (2009), Science, 326, p. 1384–1387.

18 THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE - N° 5

 NATIONAL ANTIQUITIES

Post mortem
Funeral rites in Lugdunum,
An exhibition at the Gallo-Roman Museum
in Lyon
27 November 2009–30 May 2010
Professor Christian Goudineau, high
commissioner for the exhibition.
Professor Christian Goudineau has been
given responsibility for planning an
Professor Christian Goudineau exhibition organized at the Lyon-Fourvière
Gallo-Roman museum and entitled
“Funeral Rites in Lugdunum”. It was
accompanied by a book, a visitor’s booklet
and several audio-visual documents.
The book published for the exhibition.
Not only has the city of Lyon, thanks to the
persistent efforts of scholars and
antiquarians, preserved many remarkable from death to burial. The deceased
monuments, such as mausoleums, steles, belonged to the Roman colony’s high
and large inscribed altars, but in the last society. He was an important merchant and
twenty years, before major urban a member of the municipal government. In
development work could be authorized, a the atrium of his house we have staged the
number of archeological digs were set up, funeral wake, with the ceremonial couch,
and they have brought to light thousands lights, floral decoration and relatives in
of tombs of the Roman period. It was attendance. Then a series of life-size panels
therefore possible to present the results of painted by Jean-Claude Golvin, research
recent research together with older director at the CNRS, picture the
discoveries. procession which accompanies the hearse
to the necropolis.
Thanks to a lavish use of space and
resources, seldom found in an archeological Coming after jugglers, mime artists,
museum, we have opted for a musicians, professional mourning
reconstitution of the complete procedure women, the hearse was followed by the

The funeral pyre, with the deceased and the offerings. Next to the pyre, a table for the frugal banquet which accompanies the cremation.
In the background, reproduction of a mausoleum. In the background, on the left, an oven.

N° 5 - THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE 19

 family, the local officials, the “clients” This is not due to Christianity, but
and associates. because, from the time of Antoninus, the
imperial family spread this new fashion.
The funeral pyre stood at the entrance to Some remarkable finds include tombs
the necropolis. It was adorned with drapes, with shelves for placing offerings, burial
flowers, all sorts of offerings, especially of places for dogs and conduits for libations
food, and beside it was a table set for the to the dead, which prove that ceremonies
banquet, with an oven to warm up or cook in memory of the dead were taking place
some of the food. After that display, the regularly.
After the cremation, what is left of visitor sees what is left of the pyre after the
the bones and offerings is gathered fire has gone out. He is told how the The last section of the exhibition presents
together (here into a glass urn) and
will be placed in the tomb with other
remains of the bones and the burnt-out the scientific evidence which supports the
offerings. offerings are now sorted and transferred to reconstructions, together with some
a lead, glass or ceramic urn which will be exceptional finds such as those of Martres-
placed in the definitive tomb and again de-Veyre, near Clermont-Ferrand, with a
surrounded by new offerings. The form of coffin in perfect condition, the hair and the
that tomb will depend on the social clothes of a dead woman.
standing of the deceased: on top of it would
be a simple mark, an altar, an inscribed Audio-visual presentations explain the
stele which may weigh several tons, and archeological methods, the anthropological
possibly a sumptuous mausoleum. analyses and the study of the material. A
documentary film presents the practice of
It has been our intention that the visitor cremation in India today and another
would feel he is walking through a summarises all the data. Sarah Rey,
necropolis of the second century A. D. research fellow seconded to the
Cremation is practically the only rite. department, has collected the most relevant
Burial is only for new-born babies and for texts about funeral rites in classical
a few families observing their own time- antiquity. 
honoured tradition. The number of
burials will increase gradually from the
end of the second century, to become the Picture credits: gallo-romain museum,
Infant buried in a vase. most frequent rite in the third century. Lyon-Fourvière.

Funeral altar bearing a greeting to Offerings placed in the

the passer-by in Greek on the top tomb: a representation of Funeral furnishings (personal belongings): golden bulla, ring and
belt-course: “Hail and good health”. Venus in white clay. pendant, wooden comb and shoes.

20 THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE - N° 5

 G UEST L ECTURERS

Arthur GOLDHAMMER
Professor at Harvard University (United States)
invited by the Assembly of the Professors
on the proposition of Professor Pierre Rosanvallon.
He gave in May 2010 one lecture entitled:
Democracy in American: conditions and conflicts in Tocqueville.

Our starting point is a reflection on The institutions and orders of the of equity becomes the main driver
two Tocquivillian phrases that are Ancien Regime served as a of democratic political life. 
easy to translate but come up foundation for an edifice of
against cultural obstacles to their ambitions, desires and rivalries that
full understanding: the ‘equality of spawned discord in many respects.
conditions’ and ‘the greatest Tocqueville endeavoured to analyse
number’ which, for Tocqueville, the mechanisms of this discord in
sometimes meant ‘the majority’ but detail and to explain how the royal
sometimes also ‘the people’ as powers used it. But when he turned
opposed to ‘the elite’. Here we to democratic society, he saw
catch Tocqueville red-handed: he nothing but an undifferentiated
freely uses ‘these abstract terms mass: ‘the greatest numbers’ was
which abound in democratic nothing but ‘dust’, as he put it. It
languages, and which are used on was consequently difficult for him
every occasion without attaching to reflect on real political conflict or
them to any particular fact, enlarge even to grant an appropriate place
and obscure the thoughts they are to those parties that were becoming
intended to convey; they render the both its symbols and its agents.
mode of speech more succinct and
the idea contained in it less clear’. This shortcoming in Tocqueville’s
sociology of democracy is found in
The translator is fully aware that other thinkers of the ‘egalitarian
the apparent simplicity of these liberal’ tradition, notably American
expressions can indeed ‘blur philosopher John Rawls. It
thinking’. In fact, they are the therefore seems that the blind spot
source of what we take to be a blind of liberal political philosophy is the
spot in Tocqueville’s thinking. The origin both of social discord and of
problem is however that these the power that takes advantage of
expressions are actually less it. Finally, a concrete example from
abstract than they seem to be. They US history shows us that the real
are linked to particular facts, but root of social discord in democracy
surreptitiously, so to speak, and is not the contradiction between
unknown to Tocqueville himself. equality in principle and actual
Moreover, these particular facts inequality, which is impregnable,
concern non-democratic societies. but rather the appearance of what
This confusion in Tocqueville’s we call the feeling of inequity
mind prevented him from seeing in within a balance that may have
democratic society what he clearly seemed temporarily equitable. But
discerned in the society of orders this feeling is neither stable nor
that preceded it, i.e. the roots of objective. It depends on norms
social discord and the use that which evolve over time, and we see
power made of it. how the introduction of new norms

N° 5 - THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE 21

 Thierry MEYNARD
Associate Professor at the Sun Yat-Sen University (Canton, China)
invited by the Assembly of the Professors
on the proposition of Professor Anne Cheng.
He gave in February 2010 one lecture entitled:
Confucius Sinarum Philosophus,
The first translation of the Analects in Europe.

The publication in Paris of together with its interlinear Finally, the conception of political
Confucius, Philosopher of the commentaries in the Sinarum power found in the translation, even if
Chinese (Confucius Sinarum Philosophus. We showed that this rooted in the imperial order of the
Philosophus, 1687) marked the method of combining a classical Ming dynasty, can also be read
beginning of European sinology. text with its commentaries was according to the political ideals of the
This work, which may truly be supported by a long hermeneutical Jesuits. In the three areas of morality,
called an encyclopedia of Chinese tradition in China. We asked how transformation of the self and politics,
thought, was the result of one this method was different from the this translation of the Analects shows
hundred years of collective efforts way in which the Classics were read Confucius to be a potent and
by Jesuit missionaries in China. in Europe, and what kind of emblematic figure, who enabled a
Notably, it presented the Analects relationship it may have produced dialogue between Neo-Confucianism
of Confucius, translated into Latin with the text. and Classical European thought to
and presented with commentaries take place. This was the first attempt
from the Song and Ming dynasties, Moving from form to content, we to provide this dialogue with a
in Europe for the first time. The analyzed the image of Confucius as philosophical foundation, and was
book spread the name of found in the translation, and made possible by the identification of
Confucius, a Latin transliteration of compared it with that found in the the Neo-Confucian li (or principle of
Master Kong, throughout Europe. classical text and its Chinese coherence) with the European ratio. 
It subsequently had a great commentaries. In particular, we
influence on intellectuals such as raised the following question: is the
Pierre Bayle, Malebranche, Leibniz, presentation of Confucius as a
and Voltaire, imposing upon them philosopher grounded in the classical
the image of a philosophical text, or is it a pure construction,
China—an image which remained deprived of any basis? At the same
until the beginning of the time, Confucius is qualified as holy
nineteenth century. (sanctus) in the translation. How
may we understand the meaning of
First, we examined earlier translations this denomination, related both to
of Confucian texts into Western the Chinese interpretative tradition
languages, such as the Sapientia Sinica and to Christian dogma?
(1662) and the Sinarum Scientia
Politico-moralis (1668–1669). These Continuing our comparison of the Latin
translations were initially used as translation with the Chinese texts, we
manuals for teaching language and then investigated its presentation of
culture, then as documentary evidence certain core Confucian ideas. For
in support of the missionary policy of example, the cardinal virtue of Ren is
inculturation. The decision to provide essentially described from the
literal, word for word, translations perspective of its Neo-Confucian
allowed Jesuits to remain close to the universalistic interpretation, suggesting
original meaning of the texts, even if a correspondence with Christian charity.
there were, at times, some inflections Similarly, the interpretation of the notion
in those meanings. of will, central to the Confucian project
of moral transformation, suggests strong
We then examined the editorial similarities with the theme, both Stoic
decision to present the classical text and Christian, of victory over the self.

22 THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE - N° 5

Lawrence WARD
Professor at British Columbia University (Vancouver, Canada)
invited by the Assembly of the Professors
on the proposition of Profs Alain Berthoz and Stanislas Dehaene.
He gave in May 2010 four lectures entitled:
Cognition, attention, and consciousness: Synchrony in mind.

1. Neural synchronization and result from my own laboratory different, complementary, roles in this
cognition involving detection of changes in task. Finally, I will present preliminary
the ongoing stimulus environment. evidence from auditory attention
Arguably the preeminent task of orienting that theta synchronization
cognitive neuroscience is to explain 2. Neural synchronization and maintains orienting networks
how the brain implements cognitive attention whereas gamma synchronization
processes such as perception, indexes communication within them,
attention, memory, decision-making, The brain networks involved in based on within- and across-
and consciousness. It is becoming orienting spatial attention have been frequency coupling analyses.
commonplace to propose that such elucidated to some extent. Just how
cognitive processes are implemented these networks accomplish orienting, 3. Neural synchronization and
through the activity of networks of however, is still under investigation. consciousness
functionally specialized brain It is proposed that neural
regions, forming and dissolving on synchronization plays an important Consciousness has been proposed
a time scale of tens to hundreds of role in the organization and function to emerge from functionally
milliseconds. In this first lecture I of these networks. I will describe integrated large-scale ensembles
will review some of the current some recent results from my of gamma-synchronous neural
knowledge about one mechanism laboratory that begin to describe the populations that form and
that is likely to be deeply involved temporal dynamics within the dorsal dissolve at a frequency in the
in forming and dissolving these network of brain regions that orients theta band. I will discuss the
networks, and in the communication voluntary attention. Presentation of a proposal that discrete moments of
within them: neural synchronization. cue as to where in space a target perceptual experience are
Neural synchronization refers to stimulus will occur begins a cascade implemented by transient gamma-
the idea that oscillations of activity, of processes that involves band synchronization of relevant
within a particular narrow band of synchronization of frontal and cortical regions, and that
frequencies, of one group of parietal regions with each other, and disintegration and reintegration
neurons can become transiently of parietal regions with sensory of these assemblies is time-locked
phase-locked with that in another cortex, as well as changes in to ongoing theta oscillations. In
group of neurons. Such transient synchronization within those areas. support of this hypothesis I will
phase locking can play a number of Several of these changes happen provide evidence that (1)
roles, including facilitating regardless of target modality except perceptual switching during
communication of information for the substitution of the relevant binocular rivalry is time-locked to
between the neural groups and even sensory region. In particular, in visual gamma-band synchronizations
performing computational functions. orienting, a lateralized increase in that recur at a theta rate,
Modulations of theta (4–7 Hz), synchronization in the gamma band indicating that the onset of new
alpha (8–15 Hz), and gamma occurs transiently around 250–300 conscious percepts coincides with
(30–50 Hz) synchronization in the ms after cue onset, and an increase in the emergence of a new gamma-
EEG and MEG, both within and alpha band synchronization begins synchronous assembly that is
between brain regions, have all around that time and continues until locked to an ongoing theta
been shown to be associated with target onset. Moreover, local alpha- rhythm; (2) localization of the
cognitive function, including band synchronization increases in generators of these gamma
perception, memory, attention, and occipital cortex ipsilateral to the rhythms reveals recurrent prefrontal
consciousness. I will review a few of target location and decreases and parietal sources; (3) theta
the most important of these results, contralateral to it, indicating that local modulation of gamma band
and then discuss in detail one such and long-distance synchronization play synchronization is observed

N° 5 - THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE 23

 between and within the activated activity in the nucleus reticularis
brain regions. These results of the thalamus selects some of
suggest that ongoing theta- these potential contents to include
modulated-gamma synchronization in a thalamic dynamic core of
mechanisms periodically reintegrate synchronous (and thus integrated)
a large-scale prefrontal parietal neural activity that gives rise to
network critical for perceptual phenomenal experience of those
experience. Moreover, activation contents. Destruction of the
and network inclusion of inferior thalamus thus abolishes conscious
temporal cortex and motor cortex experience itself, whereas
uniquely occurs on the cycle destruction of a particular
immediately preceding a response cortical area abolishes only the
signaling perceptual switching. experience of contents computed
This suggests that the essential by that area. The implications of
prefrontal-parietal oscillatory this theory, and others that
network is expanded to include implicate critical roles for
additional cortical regions subcortical areas of the brain in
relevant to tasks and perceptions consciousness, for the concept of
furnishing consciousness at that brain death are significant. In
moment, in this case image particular, the theory agrees with
processing and response initiation. positions such as that of
Shewmon that absence of cortex
4. The role of the thalamus in or cortical activity does not mean
human consciousness absence of consciousness. If
permanent lack of consciousness
Currently human consciousness is is a criterion for “death,” then
considered to arise from activity both neocortex and diencephalon
in the neocortex or in thalamo- must be shown to be non-
cortical loops. A compelling case functional for the criterion to be
can be made, however, that some satisfied. 
subcortical areas, in particular
the diencephalon, are also
critical. I will describe a theory in
which phenomenal consciousness
depends on synchronous neural
activity in the dorsal thalamus, a
major component of the
diencephalon. The theory of the
thalamic dynamic core depends
on four empirical pillars:
anatomy and physiology of the
brain, particularly of the dorsal
thalamus and associated cortical
areas; brain lesion and anesthetic
studies; studies of neural
synchronization, particularly in
binocular rivalry; and results
from the experimental psychology
of cognition, in particular that we
experience results of cortical
computations and not the
processes that produce them. The
four empirical pillars support the
idea that the neocortex computes
potential contents of consciousness,
and competitive laterally-inhibitory

24 THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE - N° 5

 P RIZES AND D ISTINCTIONS

I AN H ACKING
H OLBERG P RIZE AWARD 2009

His Royal Highness the Princess Mette-Marit presents the Holberg Prize 2009
to Professor Ian Hacking (Bergen, Norvège)
© Marit Hommedal/Holberg Prize.

prizes. The most important is the Now for a theme of current research.
Ian Hacking, holder of the chair of most junior: the research competition The best three-sentence summary of
Philosophy and History of Scientific for senior students in secondary my life, intellectual and other, is ‘I am
Concepts at the Collège de France schools. Those who have competed, curious’, not meaning, but not
(2000–2006), was awarded the Ludwig and the three who have won, are the altogether excluding, the sense of the
Holberg Memorial Prize in Bergen, future. It was a brilliant idea to famous 1967/8 Swedish soft porn
Norway, on 25 November. There are include young people in the structure films I am Curious (Yellow) and I am
three parts to the Holberg prizes. The of the Holberg Prize. Next most Curious (Blue). My curiosity gets me
Holberg Prize School Project is a important is the Nils Klim prize for into a lot of trouble, not the least of
research competition for pupils in upper young Nordic researchers. These are which is that I follow up more
secondary schools. The Nils Klim Prize the nearer future. Such a prize can different types of topic than I have
is awarded to young Nordic researchers make a real contribution to the time and energy to devote to them.
under 35 years within the academic winner, both financially and in terms
fields of the Holberg Prize. The Holberg of international recognition. The least The Holberg Symposium yesterday
International Memorial Prize is awarded important is the senior award, for no was about social questions, and in
annually for outstanding scholarly work matter how active we old men and particular, my ideas about making up
in the fields of the arts and humanities, women continue to be, we have done people and the ‘looping effects’ of
social sciences, law and theology. The most of our life’s work. classification. But the issue I find most
prize amount is NOK 4.5 million. pressing right now is curiosity about
I am of course grateful for the curiosity itself.
largesse, but sad too. I got a serious
Words of acceptance 15 minutes of fame which I would not There is a wonderful children’s story,
Holberg Prize Awards Ceremony, have had without a large cash award. called ME!, by the American Marxist
25th November 2009 I best liked the headline in the novelist, William Saroyan. In the
Ian Hacking conservative London newspaper, The beginning, there was only one word,
Daily Telegraph, “Canadian ‘me’, and people went around saying
Your Royal Highness, Officers of the Philosopher wins 500,000 Euros and ‘me me me’ and nothing else. But then
Ludwig Holberg Memorial Fund, and Buys New Sheets.” It is a shame that they discovered ‘you’. If there could
Guests: there cannot be extended public be two, there could be more, ‘yes’ and
recognition for a humanist unless ‘no, ‘green’ and ‘blue’. And then,
It has been the custom in past years there is a lot of money involved. Saroyan tells us, people started
for the winner of the Holberg Prize to Money is not to be despised, however. finding out. On the last page of this
express, in a few words, thanks and Like many other winners of large beautiful book: ‘They are still finding
respectful comments on the Prize, the prizes, my wife and I will give quite a out.’ Yes we are.
organizers, and Baron Holberg. This lot of it away. We were struck that our
year I have been asked for a slightly own choice of beneficiaries, aside The fable teaches this: We had to find
longer talk on some theme of current from contributions to educational out how to find out. That is a series
work and/or scientific research. institutions, is remarkably similar to of cultural discoveries in historical
those listed for the Crown Prince and time. But it is not only the history of
But I cannot omit the thanks. I would Crown Princess’s Humanitarian civilizations. People had to have
like to speak for the entire triad of Fund. various sorts of latent abilities that

N° 5 - THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE 25

 they learned how to use. Finding out we would now say Eudoxus rather be uncovered and cultivated. When ‘a
how to find out is an intricate than Thales, but in the course of new light flashed’ on Thales,
interplay between innate faculties and about eighty years a small group of Eudoxus, and their colleagues,
human history. It has had more eccentrics discovered mathematical something in the human mind clicked,
impact on our planet than anything demonstration, an entirely new way the realization of a potential already
else we have done. to find out. And we have gone on there. Within a very few years there
finding out: Proof ideas and was a prodigious upwelling of
We have found out how to do techniques of proof continue to be an geometrical creativity. The Israeli
innumerable things, how to sculpt the evolving part of social history. historian of mathematics, Reviel
human body in marble, how to paint Netz, has made a marvellous start on
it in oils, and we are finding out how Crombie’s next two styles of scientific that ‘cognitive history’, as he calls it.
to modify its genome. We not only thinking are, using his labels, (1) But let us not overemphasize
find out how to do, but also what is hypothetical modelling of the world, cognition. The laboratory style
true. We have found out endless facts an ancient technique that crystallized demands not only cognitive skills of
in love and, alas, in war, but it is with Galileo, and (2) experimental modelling and exploration, but also
finding out in the sciences that has exploration, even more antique and finding out how to do things with the
made our species dominant. Perhaps universal. The really decisive human body, hands and eye. It is an
too dominant. A philosophical conceptual step, which enabled the embodied art.
anthropology of the sciences is an so-called scientific revolution to take
inquiry into those aspects of human off in 17th century Europe, was the A more purely philosophical twist has
nature that have changed the face of merging of both into the laboratory to do with truth itself. The styles of
the earth and all that dwells thereon. style. Once again, Kant spoke of ‘the thinking are not ways of finding out
sudden outcome of an intellectual truths that are just there, waiting to be
All finding out is particular, but there revolution’. He singled out Galileo on discovered. The styles are self-
are a few broad lines to draw. I call the one hand and Torricelli on the authenticating, in that they generate
them styles of scientific thinking. I other. Theory and exploration had to new criteria for what is true. This is
adapted the label from an Australian combine in order to change the world. not some kind of relativism; it is an
historian of the sciences, the late I use Robert Boyle and his Air Pump explanation of where our sense of
Alistair Crombie. I turn his historical as an emblem of a new crystallization objectivity comes from. It may sound
anthropology of scientific reason into into the laboratory style. At its core is like wild historicism, but it is close to
a philosophical anthropology the building of apparatus not only to the verification principle of the Vienna
probe the world but also to create Circle positivists.
Crombie distinguished some six new phenomena. Crombie has three
fundamentally different methods of more styles, of which I shall mention I shall stop there, at a tantalizing
argument that have evolved in what only the fourth, the taxonomic style, beginning. We are now in the
he called ‘The European Tradition’, found in all cultures, but crystallizing heartland of philosophy. We are in
but which have become part of the in the work of Linnaeus. Kant-land, yes, but I see it as the home
human heritage, and whose epicenter of the philosopher of the modern
today might well be the brand new It is the philosophical twists that epoch who had the greatest curiosity,
metropolis of Shenzen in the south of intrigue me. I start with an erudite namely Leibniz. He is my role model,
China, adjacent to Hong Kong. Or is version of popular history of the curious about everything, including
it Bangalore in India? But the sciences, but canonical historical curiosity itself. I am encouraged by
originating cultural history of what events get new meanings. There must the Holberg prize to carry on with
we call the sciences evolved in the also be a cognitive side to the story, these reflections on scientific reason,
Mediterranean and then in Europe. although at the moment it is more a and perhaps to bring them to fruition
priori than empirical. One school of in the nearish future. So once again, I
The first style to flourish, as Kant well cognitive science uses a modular express my thanks. 
saw, was mathematics. He had a approach. It holds, for example, that
magical passage in the second edition there is a universal structure to the
of his Critique of Pure Reason, where ways in which human beings the
he speaks of a revolution: ‘A new light world over classify living things. The
flashed upon the mind of the first man taxonomic style of thinking builds on Ian Hacking’s last cours, in 2005,
(be he Thales or some other) who that. In truth I am not much of a about scientific reason (2006) is
demonstrated the properties of the modularist, but one can see each style available online at www.college-de-
isosceles triangle.’ Of course it is not a of thinking as deploying a specific france.fr
single man but a tiny community, and group of human abilities that have to

26 THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE - N° 5

 SERGE HAROCHE
CNRS GOLD METAL 2009
quantum laws and for demonstrating phases at the same time. The
quantum logic operations that held researchers have monitored the
promise for quantum information temporal evolution of this field and
processing. have been able to observe the
disappearance of the quantum
Serge Haroche started to do research in superposition state, which rapidly
1965, when atomic physics and turned into a state described by the
quantum optics were undergoing laws of classical physics. By
profound change following the experimentally studying this
discovery of lasers and the development phenomenon called ‘decoherence’, they
Serge Haroche, holder of the chair of of new methods of manipulating atoms have furthered understanding of why
Quantum Physics at the Collège de by means of light. He is a pioneer in the macroscopic systems can generally be
France since 2001, received the field of quantum optics, observing understood with classical concepts,
CNRS Gold Medal in 2009. atom-light interaction at the most basic even though they are made up of
This distinction is awarded to a level. His research enabled him to particles which, on microscopic scales,
scientific personality whose work has isolate an atom in a cavity with almost obey the counter-intuitive laws of
provided an exceptional contribution ideally reflective walls, and to force it quantum theory.
to the vitality and influence of French to interact with an elementary field
research. consisting of a few photons at the most. Apart from these fundamental
implications, these manipulations of
Serge Haroche’s work made it possible photons and atoms are used to create
Serge Haroche is a specialist in atomic to study and demonstrate prototypes which demonstrate general
physics and quantum optics. In the experimentally a number of postulates methods of information storage and
1970s–80s, after completing his PhD on in quantum mechanics that defy quantum calculation. Whereas in
dressed atoms under the supervision of intuition. His results contributed to normal computers and communication
Claude Cohen-Tannoudji (1967–71), he explaining the difference in behaviour circuits, information is coded in
developed new laser spectroscopy between the quantum world and the electrical or light signals in the form of
methods based on his research on classical macroscopic world. His classical ‘bits’ with two mutually-
quantum beats experiments also made it possible to exclusive values, 0 and 1, quantum
and super- study the history of a single photon in information proposes the use of
radiance. His an electromagnetic cavity by ‘seeing’ it ‘quantum bits’ or ‘qubits’ carried by
interest then several hundred times, and have shown quantum systems that can exist in a
turned to its sudden and unpredictable superposition of 0 and 1 states. The
Rydberg atoms, disappearance in what is called a principle of superposition thus
giant atomic quantum jump. For the first time it was considerably enhances the possibilities
states sensitive shown that it is not necessary to destroy of calculation and communication.
to microwaves a single photon in order to observe it. Theoreticians have shown that
and therefore machines making use of such qubits
suited to Serge Haroche and his team illustrated would be able to perform certain
fundamental the ‘Schrödinger’s cat’ paradox, which calculations far more swiftly than
research on refers to a thought experiment in which current computers. They would also
matter-radiation a macroscopic system placed in contact make it impossible to violate the
interaction. He with a single atom is put in a privacy of information transfers, in
showed that superposition of two classically contrast with current methods based
these atoms, different states. In the experiment on classical cryptographic protocols,
coupled with carried out by the ENS team, an atom which have not proved to be absolutely
super-conducting prepared in two superposed energy secure. Serge Haroche’s cavity quantum
cavities con- states is coupled in a cavity to a electrodynamics experiments are
Serge Haroche, Loïc de La
Mornay (journalist) and Arnold taining a few microwave field containing several making a major contribution to the
Migus (Director of the CNRS) at photons, were photons. Under the effect of this development of this new physics. 
the ceremony for the presentation
of the Gold Medal at the
ideal systems coupling, the field is put into a state of (source: CNRS)
Sorbonne, 16 December 2009. for testing basic quantum superposition, acquiring two

N° 5 - THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE 27

 DARWIN’S BICENTENARY
COLLÈGE DE FRANCE AUTUMN SYMPOSIUM
15 AND 16 OCTOBER 2009

Variations on a human theme This unique nature of sapiens, this

Alain Prochiantz attachment to a history or histories, to
cultures, is particularly relevant when
2009 can unquestionably be called we talk of Darwin. He constantly
Darwin Year since we celebrated both humiliated sapiens by reminding him
the 200th anniversary of the naturalist’s of his humble origins, and questioned
birth and the 150th anniversary of the the strangeness of a species which
publication of On the Origin of might have inherited mental faculties—
Species. To some extent, this has and therefore also psychological and
contributed to eclipsing another great moral ones—from its evolving history,
evolutionist, Jean-Baptiste Lamarck, but which had pushed them to such an Professor Alain Prochiantz
who published La Philosophie extreme that it could be referred to as a
zoologique in the year of Darwin’s tragic animal. It was biological France, we have given pride of place to
birth. Larmarck ended his life blind; his hominization, an evolving process, that the question of man—or rather, of
daughter would lead him to the led to the cultural possibilities of humans, Françoise Héritier would say,
amphitheatre where he gave lectures to humanization. correcting me. In this respect we have
a few loyal followers, including Etienne followed Darwin, whose The Descent
Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire. He was called The symposium left little room for of Man is a long series of thoughts not
Lamarck the Red by Napoleon and by ‘pure’ biology. After so many only on the evolution of humans but
the English Tories who had little gatherings of various kinds devoted to also on humans as social animals. This
interest in importing the French the event, it seemed there was nothing reflection encompasses hominization,
Revolution and the latest decapitation left to add. Yet, despite its limitations, our evolving history, and humanization
technologies. We wish to take this that small space did make it possible to as a construction of societies and of the
opportunity to salute a scholar who is give an idea of the current state of a evidently contingent rules that govern
never far away when we talk about theory which is itself evolving. The least our ways of living together. It is
evolution and whose work is gradually one can expect from a living theory is moreover interesting to note that
being rediscovered through the new that it evolves; even if that indicates a Darwinism itself was influenced by the
importance granted to epigenesis. degree of imperfection, or rather social question—Malthus—and
incompleteness, which serves as an influenced it—social Darwinism.
In spite of its sometimes pompous—or angle of attack for the creationists who, Humanization is also the invention of
jingoistic—aspects, which may bring a on the contrary, have a perfect theory— cultures that enable us to recount
smile to some faces, the celebration of or so they think. Dogmas don’t evolve; histories and to endeavour to give
great men reminds us above all that homo they are dead and—often—deadly. meaning to, or find meaning in, the
sapiens is attached to his history. If I’m not Moreover, the creationists have reason fleeting moment that any organic life is.
mistaken—and the ethologists will to hate Darwin, an atheist scholar for
correct me here if I am—other animals do whom evolution had neither an end And even if our mortal destiny is
not have this type of cultural practice; not nor a goal, and for whom the great ensured (dare I say) at an individual
even chimpanzees, who are our closest book of nature was not written by a level, and perhaps even at the level of
cousins, or so the ethologists say. Had I divine being in mathematical terms. the species or of all life on earth, there
chosen to present a paper at the opening The history of this departure from a was a firm intention in the opening
symposium, it would probably have been Galilean conception of nature remains symposium not to overlook the future
to deflate the myth of a 1.23% difference to be written; just as its effects on the evolution of human beings. Some talk
between the genomes of homo sapiens very nature of science is still to be of post-human; I prefer simply talking
and those of pan troglodytes (or analysed. But that is another issue; of a technical evolution, because even if
paniscus), and to point out that while the perhaps the topic of a future sapiens are still evolving biologically,
chimpanzee is indeed the human being’s symposium. they are animals whose destiny is
closest cousin, saying that humans are above all technical—tools being the
98.77% chimpanzee (or 80% mouse) is Stimulated by the diversity of the fields extension not only of their arms but
meaningless. of knowledge present at the Collège de also, above all, of their brains. Without

28 THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE - N° 5

tools, which may also be our future part—this cerebral hominization questions were raised which enabled
downfall, our few thousand African projected homo sapiens outside of us to further reflect on the subject.
ancestors would not have close to nature (I daren’t mention a clearing). This letter to commemorate the
seven billion descendents now, The Darwin Bicentenary symposium commemoration is above all a note of
occupying virtually the entire surface was therefore an opportunity to gratitude extended to all those who,
of the earth, not to mention the moon. explore this highly topical subject of during those two days, shared their
In this respect, the post-human seems the future of humans, that is, the future knowledge with us and enabled us to
essentially human. of human cultures in all their learn and to discuss their subjects. I
dimensions, through all the fields of also wish to thank the attentive and
Indeed, tools are the extension of our knowledge, both present and yet to be cultured audiences. Everyone is now
brains, exceptional human brains that invented. looking forward to reading the
have reached a point of organic various contributions which will be
development bearing no comparison By looking back at those two days of published in a collective volume. Such
with that of our chimpanzee relatives. talks, it seems obvious that the is our custom. 
By opening the field of human speakers played the game, that we
cultures—of which techniques are learned a great deal, and that

The acts of this colloquium are published under the title Darwin: 200 ans, Paris, Odile Jacob, 2010.
Below is a summary of Professor Delmas-Marty’s conference (published in the newspaper Liberation,
19 November, 2009), followed by a summary of Professor Jean-Pierre Changeux’s conference.

Hominization and Humanization is part of the common heritage of

Mireille Delmas-Marty humanity (UNESCO, 2005), as if
humanization tended to eliminate
While biological evolution is the result of differences and unify cultures.
transformations creating a single human
species (hominization), social and It is therefore necessary to link the two
cultural evolution, which occurred later, processes. Jean-Pierre Changeux
is the result of cultural diversification and explained that epigenetic variability
the emergence of a normativity proper to (which is particularly strong in
each human group (humanization). The humans) fosters creativity, and thus
tension between these two process, humanization; and Stanislas Dehaene
which are studied separately, is not showed how “neuronal recycling,”
obvious because they share neither the which prolongs hominization,
Professor Mireille Delmas-Marty
same timescale (millions of years for the contributes to culture and thus to
former and thousands of years for the humanization. Law contributes to
latter) nor the same values (survival of the making this link in several ways. varied with the history of peoples, it’s
species/promotion of each human being’s because they are part of humanization.
dignity). Law Reveals Tensions
The right to life clearly benefits the Unlike the right to life, the right to equal
But Darwin himself noted that the species, and thus hominization: the dignity, which underlies the prohibitions
social and moral faculties limited the prohibition on killing seems quasi- of slavery and of torture and inhuman
effect of natural selection on human universal (as are its exceptions, such as or degrading treatment, is clearly tied to
beings. And we are entering a phase in war or self-defense). There is the process of humanization. But it also
which scientific knowledge enables us disagreement as to the death penalty, reveals tensions, for example when one
to change reproductive methods and/or however, and more broadly on life’s justifies torture by the need to save lives.
the characteristics of the human beginning and end (abortion and And when the Penal Code qualifies
species—even to manufacture hybrids, euthanasia). Hannah Arendt reproductive human cloning as a crime
whether human/animal or emphasized that birth and death “are against “the human species,” rather
human/machine. By diversifying the not natural occurrences, properly than “humanity,” it separates
human species, humanization may speaking”: human life seems limited by hominization from humanization, and
therefore end up modifying the course a beginning and an end, while nature, thus risks increasing tensions.
of hominization. Paradoxically, the non-human life, follows a cyclical
process of universalizing ethical norms movement with no birth or death as Disruptive Law
made it clear that a convention was these words are generally understood. Law is especially disruptive when it is
necessary to recall that cultural diversity If the forms of the right to life have directly related to the dehumanization

N° 5 - THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE 29

 of a human being, as when it legitimates declaration on animal rights qualifying that of human evolution, it would
slavery or bases certain forms of any act “compromising the survival of increase the danger of discriminatory
criminality on the continuity between a wild species and any decision leading treatment, and therefore of
animals and humans: Lombroso cited to such an act” as “genocide.” Such dehumanization. Such practices
Darwin to support his argument that excesses show that to regulate, law would also undermine the principle of
certain criminals were incomplete must transform tensions into indeterminateness characteristic of
human beings. And the eugenics interactions. both our biological species and our
movement legitimated not only the ethic of responsibility.
sterilization of criminals in both Europe Law as Regulator
and the United States, but also the Nazi For law to act as a regulator, each Rebuilding the “human/non-
policies of castration and extermination. pair’s relationship must be rebuilt. human” relationship without any
The 21st century is not devoid of The “human/inhuman” relationship anthromoporphism requires a
monsters either: from terrorists labeled is central to human rights’ texts and concept such as that of “duty” (as
“unlawful combatants” to sexual biomedicine, which requires respect enshrined in the 2005 French
perverts and other perpetrators of for both the human being as a constitutional charter on the
serious crimes, the concern is no longer member of the human species, and environment), which institutes a
to simply punish the guilty, but to the right to equal dignity. This should non-reciprocal relationship with
eliminate dangerous “monsters,” who lead to unifying crimes against nature or animals, as well as with
are thus dehumanized. humanity and crimes against the future generations. In this way,
human species. Indeed, if, “as part of ethical evolution would attain a
But disruption might also be caused by a widespread or systematic attack certain degree of universalization.
likening all or part of the non-human directed against any civilian Law would then have to reconcile
world to humans. Under the combined population, with knowledge of the such universalization with the
influence of scientific discoveries attack” (International Criminal Court cultural diversity that enabled our
(namely the small genetic difference Statute, art. 7), “dehominization” slow humanization, as incomplete
between man and chimpanzees) and produced new groups through as it may be. 
technological innovations, ecological biological changes (such as eugenics,
movements have become more cloning, or crossing species) on a
radicalized, as illustrated by the1978 timescale completely different from

In his seminal book, On the Origin of “variation under domestication and

Species, Darwin proposed a theory of under nature”. While Darwin saw
evolution which he applied to natural selection as an essential
hominization, that is, the origin of the mechanism leading to the divergence
Homo sapiens species. Then, in The of characteristics, variation is an
Descent of Man, he extended his equally important aspect of his theory.
reflection to humanization, that is, the In my opinion variation is the driving
origins of humanity, focusing on force of evolution.
“man’s mental faculties” and
comparing them to those of “inferior Variability comes in at least three
animals”, to the community of certain forms. The first is genetic variability.
instincts, and so on. Merely listing the In recent decades our knowledge on
topics covered in the book shows the the genome of living beings has
extent of Darwin’s thinking on the increased considerably. We now have
human brain and its capacities. a detailed picture of the tree of life,
magnificently illustrating Darwin’s
Professor Jean-Pierre Changeux I will therefore limit my introductory thinking, with the profusion and
comments to the human brain and to diversification of genomes. To the tree-
Introductory talk a fundamental concept of Darwin’s shaped and hierarchical view of the
Jean-Pierre Changeux thinking: the notion of variation. The evolution of genomes, contemporary
word is everywhere in The Origin of science adds horizontal gene transfers.
Darwin was born 200 years ago but Species. Darwin wrote that “species The representation of the evolution of
his ideas are as alive and ubiquitous had not been independently created, the species in the living world has thus
as ever; to the extent that they have but had descended, like varieties, from changed from Darwin’s original tree
become part and parcel of our other species”. He devoted the first to a complex network of genetic
definition of life. chapter of his book to the study of interactions.

30 THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE - N° 5

Will this progress in the knowledge on between genomic connectivity and brain, much like the acquisition of
genomes enable us to lift the veil cerebral connectivity. writing, for example.
shrouding ‘human nature’? We do
indeed know what all the molecules Variability is at work not only in genetic Finally, the last level of variability that I
composing the human body and evolution but also during development. wish to mention is that of the brain’s
especially the brain are, but is that The mass of the adult brain is roughly spontaneous activity, starting with the
enough? At this stage we are still far off five times larger than that of a neonate, embryonic period and contributing
the mark. The human genome and and connectional development eventually to the development of the
those of other related mammals have continues throughout the first fifteen brain itself. It is the source of the
been sequenced in their entirety, but years of life. This epigenetic dimension diversity of our actions on the world, of
whereas we know the number and is decisive in explaining the connectional our creativity. This time, the variability
identity of all the genes, the relationship variability resulting from this long of individuals’ behaviours and of their
between genomes and cerebral period of development in conditions of relations with others takes on a social
phenotypes remains an enigma. From profound interaction with the dimension.
the fly to the mouse, the number of environment. It leads to a new paradox
genes increases with the number of for the neurobiologist: how to reconcile Thus, to the genetic variability taking
neurons; yet we find the same number this connectional variability with the place at the level of the evolution of the
of genes in mice as in humans, and the constancy of the function? species, is added, at the ontogenetic level,
sequencing of these genes is very similar. connectional and epigenetic variability
What is the genetic origin of the Once again, we see the importance of and then, at yet another level, the
differences, especially in the size and the application of Darwinian thinking, variability of the brain’s spontaneous
complexity of the brain, which appeared for instance in understanding certain activity which participates in the
during the evolution of mammals, from brain pathologies. Several recent theories dynamics of thinking and continues in
the mouse to the human being? This establish a link between serious neuro- social and cultural interactions. At this
paradox, that molecular biologists still psychiatric diseases and epigenetic level we find the establishment of extra-
have to solve, is particularly difficult to developmental abnormalities. A recent cerebral memories using writing, works
understand, for the evolution is still very explanation for schizophrenia posits a of art and, more recently, electronic
recent: only a few million years separate disturbance in the epigenetic selection of computers which have paved the way to
us from the ancestors that we share with synapses during development. immense possibilities for processing
chimpanzees. Shifting from a linear information.
structure, that of genomes, to a three- In this respect Darwinian thinking
dimensional structure, like that of the enables us to further our understanding This stroll through the evolving history
brain, involves a series of intermediate of humanization. In humans, the phase of the human brain and its multiple levels
steps. That is where evolution can be of connectional evolution is a period of is an invitation to give up the ‘instructive’
grasped, for the jump in complexity is extended development and constant model of the brain - proceeding by input-
probably linked to the non-linearity of learning where the child is in close output—for a generalized Darwinian
the processes involved. Genetic interaction with his or her physical, schema—by variation and selection. We
modifications are likely to have social and cultural environment. This is therefore opt for a projective style of
interacted with one another and created probably decisive in the prodigious cerebral functioning. This model
a combinatory network, with a resulting development of culture in the human accounts better for the Darwinian
‘connectivity’ at the level of the genome. species and in the shift from evolutions embedded in our brain, which
Thus, small genetic variations can entail hominization to humanization. are on-going and contribute to the
substantial morphological ones. That is Epigenetic variability and the exceptional dynamic of humanization,
why seemingly insignificant variations multiplicity of sensitive periods with an evolving opening onto the
such as genetic duplications can explain contributed to creating stable imprints future, and no apparent limits! 
the non-linear character of the shift of cultural evolution in the developing

N° 5 - THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE 31

 THE DAYS OF JEAN DAUSSET
Symposium organized by the chair emphasized the marker’s precision and
of Experimental Medicine the extraordinary diversity that it
Professor Pierre Corvol allowed for: ‘apart from identical twins,
8–9 January 2010 no two individuals can be the same’.
Today, advances in epigenetics are
Jean Dausset left us in June 2009. showing that even in the case of
Holder of the chair of Experimental identical twins, there are differences.
Medicine at the Collège de France
from 1977 to 1987, he was not only In the inaugural lecture of his chair,
a great researcher but also an Jean Dausset pointed out that the
outstanding teacher. To provide us study of the HLA complex had not
with a glimpse of the man and his yet yielded all its secrets. He hoped
work, I have drawn on texts ‘that the increasingly precise
produced at the Collège de France, knowledge of the inner workings of
which have not all been published: the immune response will make it Professor Pierre Corvol
the presentation of the chair by possible to control that response at
François Jacob; Jean Dausset’s will, including both its positive side, known in 1992, countless thousands
inaugural lecture at the Collège de immunization, and its negative side, more have now been identified.
France; and his closing lecture in tolerance’.
1987. From 1955 to 1958 Jean Dausset
One of his experiments with skin grafts conducted the reform of the CHU
Jean Dausset was the author of one on healthy volunteers to demonstrate (university hospitals), loyal to the
of the most important discoveries in humans’ histocompatibility was a ideas of Claude Bernard who in 1865
immunology—the HLA system. superb case of clinical investigation of had written: ‘medicine does not end
Everything started with a finding in extreme simplicity, elegance and in hospitals, as is often believed, but
1952, as he observed the fecundity. It was a starting point that merely begins there.’ In fact, Bernard
agglutination of white globules in the made it possible to envisage the use of explained, ‘In leaving the hospital, a
presence of a polytransfused donor’s phenotyping and then of the HLA physician, jealous of the title in its
serum, he had the idea that it could genotyping to guarantee successful scientific sense, must go into his
be caused by antibodies in the serum. grafts. Jean Dausset subsequently laboratory; and there, by experiments
In 1958 he demonstrated the played an essential part in France on animals, he will seek to account for
existence of a leukocyte group, like Transplant and the search for what he has observed in his patients’.
the blood groups carried by red compatible donors for grafts. The This was an inspiration for the reform
globules. He posited that there were applications were numerous. One of achieved by Jean Dausset, which was
groups of tissue that in a sense those that he strongly promoted was seen as a model of well-designed and
marked an individual’s biological the use of the HLA genotype to implemented cooperation between
identity. Thus, between 1952 and monitor populations, their migration, government administration, scientists,
1958 the HLA system was born. their isolation, their merging, and so doctors and politicians.
on. The seeds of all these developments
In 1976 François Jacob nominated were in his inaugural lecture in 1977. In 1976 François Jacob had
Jean Dausset to the chair of emphasized the qualities of this
Experimental Medicine at the Jean Dausset was a builder. In 1984 prolific researcher gifted with
Assembly of Professors, pointing out he created the Centre d’Etude du immense curiosity for the most
that ‘all of his observations open an Polymorphisme Humain (now the diverse aspects of research. He noted
immense domain for immunology and Jean Dausset Foundation). He had that he was ‘one of the rare men
pathology. Far beyond the leukocyte the intuition of the importance of capable of putting formidable
groups originally studied, the HLA this polymorphism to characterize problems of medicine in biological
system of histocompatibility is a individuals’ uniqueness and thus to terms’. Indeed, as early as 1975, in
functional unit of prime importance. It promote predictive medicine. This his brochure at the Collège de
is the real command centre of the led to the creation of the human France, Jean Dausset had pointed
body’s defence system both against genetic map. In this respect his work out possible associations between
attacks from the outside and to was both crucial and fruitful: from HLA antigens and pathologies.
maintain the body’s integrity.’ He 2,000 human polymorphisms Today the number of applications of

32 THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE - N° 5

this principle is huge. In his inaugural Another sign of Jean Dausset’s and ethics were present, and
lecture he indicated that, for the first enlightened humanism, in his closing expressed his hopes regarding genetic
time, medicine could be oriented lecture in 1997, was his warning engineering: ‘any new knowledge is
from birth according to individuals’ against the risks that ‘knowledge a liberation, any ignorance is a
genetic predispositions. This opened about the workings of these genes limitation, for one should not
up the perspective of personalized that make people more susceptible to confuse knowledge, which is peculiar
preventive medicine that would be diseases’ could entail. He foresaw to and the pride of humankind, with
more effective and less expensive. He two stumbling blocks: violation of its beneficial or dangerous use’. 
said that he expected to see an attack individual and family privacy; and Professor Pierre Corvol
on, and even a reduction of, ‘one of opening the door to random and
the soundest and least shakeable abusive selection of genes, leading to
bastions of injustice among men: that a ‘semblance of eugenics’. An
of innate inequality in the face of optimist in spite of all, he called for
disease’. approaches in which both science

were concerned with the underlying also many other genes, which are
immunological reasons. often far less polymorphic. One of
them in particular, HLA-G, is studied
One relates to the primary function of because, as E. Carosella (CEA Paris)
histocompatibility antigens, which has shown, it encody several
consists in presenting T cells with molecules with suppressive properties.
fragments of protein (peptides) These genes play a key part in a wide
stemming from both outside and range of important situations such as
inside the cell. The polymorphisms pregnancy, successful transplants, and
affecting these molecules have a deep the immunological rejection of
impact on the range of peptides they tumours.
Minutes of the morning session present, and distinguish each
on cellular immunology individual’s immune system from all The immune system of some
HLA, self and non-self: a systemic others. Using state of the art individuals carrying mutations can be
perspective technology, M. Bonneville (Nantes) faulty, especially if these mutations
Philippe Kourilsky was able to study, with unmatched affect the expression of certain
precision, the impact of the HLA histocompatibility antigens. The
The discovery of the HLA system— phenotype on the range of T cells at correction of these often fatal
and of H-2, its equivalent in the level of several individual peptides deficiencies is theoretically possible
mice—has had immense repercussions and of the few T cells that recognize through gene therapy. A. Fisher
for immunology. Several were them. (Necker, Paris) has shown that this
mentioned during a first session on approach can yield outstanding
cellular immunology, chaired by M. In the case of transplants, the complex results, and that it now seems possible
Sasportes (Paris). The genes and powerful reactions that occur to control the negative side effects
responsible for coding the main when the graft carries an HLA that is which had caused its clinical trials to
histocompatibility antigens are highly different from that of the receiver be temporarily put on hold.
polymorphic. We now have most often lead to a rejection of the
knowledge of several thousand alleles graft, or else cause the graft to attack The role of the HLA is so central to
of genes responsible for coding the host. the immune system that it is useful to
“classical” class I and II antigens. Since seek to grasp it from a systemic
each human being possesses three It is now understood that these perspective. In view of this, P.
genes of each class, usually different in reactions involve not only T cells but Kourilsky (Collège de France) has
the two chromosomes, the millions of also NK cells (natural killers). pointed to the issues intrinsic to
combinations obtained by assorting A. Bensoussan (Créteil) shed light on complex systems. He has insisted on
them provide what could effectively be this important development by concepts such as robustness and
seen as a personal identity card for carrying out an in-depth analysis of quality control, which have seldom
each individual. This extreme one of their receptors, CD160. been used in immunology until now.
polymorphism, now studied in detail These could have a role to play in
with regard to gene sequences, is of The HLA gene family includes not many pathologies, especially those
prime importance for organ and bone only genes responsible for coding the linked to auto-immune disorders. 
marrow transplants. The presentations main histocompatibility antigens, but

N° 5 - THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE 33

 Homage to Jean Dausset Saint-Louis, director of National Institute artistic and literary centre where the
Laurent Degos of Health and Medical Research surrealists used to meet. His spirit of
Head of the Haute Autorité de Santé (INSERM) unit U 93, he was appointed discovery and creativity inspired his efforts
In 1952, while looking for an explanation professorat the Collège de France in1978, to build bridges between discoveries and
for the lack of white blood cells in certain while retaining a laboratory at the Hôpital applicationsfor patient care. He looked for
patients, Jean Dausset had the idea of Saint Louis. Elected to the Academy of means of bidging the gap between
mixing their white blood cells with serum Sciences and the Academy of Medicine, in molecules and genes, but also between
from a person who had received blood 1984 he founded the Human genes and applications beneficial to
transfusions. To his great surprise he saw, Polymorphism Study Centre (CEPH). patients, such as trans-plantation or
with his naked eye,agglutinated cells on the That same year he was appointed president detecting susceptibility to disease.
glass slide. This was the initial experiment of the Universal Movement For Scientific
that was to lead to the Nobel Prize. Responsibility (MURS). These functions To demonstrate the link between leucocyte
reveal the many facets of his personality. groups and transplant rejection, he called
Jean Dausset was always drawn to medical on the assistance of volunteer donors and
research. Intuitive and perceptive, on Jean Dausset was able to combinethe spirit the American surgeon Felix Rappaport.
occasion it was difficult for him to get his of discovery and genius. Discovering the The Czechoslovak Pavol Yvanyi and his
views across but time proved him right. He hidden secrets of nature was his passion. wife Dagmar assisted him in the first
was opinionated and afraid of no-one. No serum reacted the same as any other. description of this complex which they
There was no administrative or financial He adopted a researcher’s approach and a called Hu-1. Since 1964, international
obstacle that he could not overcome. He visionary’s reasoning: by giving a patient a workshops have been held every two years,
was passionate and able to communicate transfusion of blood from a single donor in Durham then in Leyden, Turin, Los
his passion. He was very unaffected and and repeating this principle, he obtained Angeles, Evian, etc.
inspired respect. He had an uncommon serums which agglutinated only 50% of
aura of nobility which was apparent on the series of white blood cells from his Jean Dausset worked with the great
first meeting him. He was enthusiastic blood donors, whom he called his white doctors of his era: Jean Hamburger on
about any original or creative idea. cell panel. He succeeded in determining the kidney transplantation, Jean Bernard on
However, anyone speaking to him had to first leucocyte group called MAC—the bone marrow transplants. Organ or tissue
weigh their words and keep to the point, initials of the three donors in the panel transplantation was at the heart of scientific
and not express utopian or outrageous whose blood was not agglutinated by advances in the XXth century, for the good
views. Although he did not want there to serums (HLA-A2 in the current of patients. He founded France Transplant
be any barriers between himself and others, nomenclature). He liked to cut up and and France Transplant Greffe de moelle
everyone would watch their words or their rearrange the columns and rows of tables [bone marrow transplant]—the main
attitude. He was as demanding of himself showing the reactions between serums and activities of which are now undertaken by
as he was of those around him. white blood cells, hoping to find order, an the French Transplant Establishment
order which would be called the leucocyte which became the Biomedicine Agency.
Before informing me in July 2007 that he group.
was moving permanently to the Balearic After discovering leucocyte groups, he set
Islands, Jean Dausset handed me a red This colloquium has revealed the about looking for links between the
spiral-bound notebook. On the first page extraordinary advance which the discovery presence of a group and susceptibility to a
he had written the four areas in which he of molecules of the human major disease. HLA groups provided a basis for
had made his main discoveries: histocompatibility complex represented. In recognizing susceptibility to diseases such
transplantation, predictive medicine, 1975, in his review article, Jean Dausset as diabetes, multiple sclerosis, narcolepsy
immune response and anthropology.These wrote: “the HLA complex[…] governsthe or Crohn’s disease: the best known is
words, so rich in meaning, three stages in the allogeneic response: ankylosing spondylitis, for which the
both for knowledge and for recognition, immunisationand destruction. presence of allele HLA B27 has become a
patient care, inspired the two- It is however probable that the mechanism diagnostic test. Why do these links
day scientific conference for involved in allograft rejection also acts as a between leucocyte group and
which we are gathered here. defence against somatic mutations, or susceptibility to disease exist? The
indeed tumoral or viral antigens”. This question has not been answered, but it
Jean Dausset chaired the seemed very strange then. Time has since prompted Jean Dausset to introduce the
international immunology shown him to be right. concept of “predictive medicine” which
conference in 1980, receiving has developed greatly since then. The
the Nobel Prize the same year. Jean Dausset had a passion for discovery terms used are prediction, personalised
Professor at the Paris-Denis and creation. An expert in modern prevention and personalised treatment—
Diderot university, head of painting, he ran a gallery in the Rue du right through to pharmacogenetics: the
department at the Hôpital Dragon, near Saint Germain des Prés, the Haute Autorité de santé has recently been

34 THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE - N° 5

asking that an HLA B5701 test be he even asked them to accompany him also in the sense of response ability, the
performed before an anti-AIDS drug is to Stockholm to collect his Nobel prize. ability to respond, to answer for what one
prescribed, to avoid adverse effects. does, particularly as a scientist, and being
Tomorrow, prevention or personalised The reform of the university hospitals was answerable to society and to
diagnosis will be on offer. another ambitious project into which Jean policymakers. That was one of his great
Dausset threw himself with the help of his concerns. He chaired the MURS from
The discovery of HLA polymorphism “young team” and with the support and 1984 to 2001. He opposed the sale of
applied to anthropology was the reason for unfailing friendship of Professor Robert human organs and the patenting of
the international workshop held at Evian in Debré. He is also the prime mover behind human genes, and advocated the defence
1972. Jean Dausset summed up its findings the research building which became the of human rights. He also drew attention
in this sentence, which in 2009 was University Institute of Haematology. At to the scarcity of freshwater resources,
engraved on the walls of the courtyard at that time, he was a member of the private organising two colloquiums with MURS
the Hôpital Saint Louis: “every person is office of René Billières, minister for national in 1987 and 1996. He chaired the
unique”. education and social affairs, who consulted Academy of Water from 1995.
him after reading, in Le Figaroon8 March
A discoverer and a genius, Jean Dausset 1957, an articleentitled“A moving appeal Dedicated, entrepreneurial and responsible:
was also a man who showed from Professor Jean Bernard: cancer and that is how we his collaboratorsknew him.
commitment, enterprise and responsibility. leukaemia can be conquered”. Since social His door was always open and we would
After the American landing in North conflicts led him to fear attacks in the come and show him our latest results, talk
Africa, he joined the French army as a National Assembly the next day, the to him about our ideas or the projects we
volunteer and took part in the Tunisian minister asked for a rapid response to this were planning. He would encourage us,
campaign. Following his work in appeal. Seizing his opportunity, Jean and criticism was always constructive. He
transfusions and intensive care during the Dausset urged Jean Bernard to ask for at would often invite eminent foreign
war, liberation saw him posted to the least a two-storey building. He ultimately researchers to give talks in his office with a
blood transfusion centre at the Hôpital sent the minister a proposal for four storeys. blackboard and chalk as their only aids.
Saint-Antoine. He carried out The building got built. We would listen, sitting anywhere we
exsanguination transfusions, i.e. blood could. It was a simple and rich life. The
exchanges, for women with septicaemia In 1984 he founded the Human annual meeting of donors which we used
after an abortion. With his teams of Polymorphism Study Centre, with to organise was a family celebration. We
voluntary donors, he carried out these arm assistance from an unexpected source. In would present our discoveries of the past
to armexchangesof blood (up to 15 litres) the post-war years, when he was running year, dressed in our impeccable white coats.
using many donors, one after the other, for his art gallery in the Rue du Dragon, he He was one of us, and we were at one with
the same patient. These women, facing gave advice on buying paintings to Mme him in this adventure.
death from septicaemia and consequent Anavi, a collector. 35 years later, she
renal failure, left the hospital cured. recognized him on television receiving the Everything had a cause, all was reason
Nobel prize and bequeathed him some for Jean Dausset. A fervent disciple of
Jean Dausset managed to recruit paintings for his research work. Claude Bernard from whom he
hundreds of volunteer donors. In 1962, inherited the chair of experimental
he launched the Royan appeal for Jean Dausset continued, with Daniel medicine at the Collège de France, he did
railway workers, then press campaigns Cohen, his research into human however say, at the end of his inaugural
calling on families to get involved in his polymorphism. It led to the description of lecture: “if there is a biochemical cause
scientific adventure. Thus, every the first maps of the human genome. for every action, every thought, if all
morning, about ten donors gave blood Calling upon many laboratories all over the behaviour is a necessary consequence of
for our experiments. These were mainly world, he demonstrated the effectiveness of the genetic make-up on which all past
railway workers, whose blood provided large-scale collaboration,while making the experience has been imprinted, must we
the white blood cell panel which was tools and results available to all. He was a conclude that the free agent of which
used to reveal the complex secrets of great entrepreneur who enjoyed the humans are so proud does not exist? We
leucocyte groups. He also called upon dedicated support of Robert Debré, Jean must remain in doubt until the
family members when performing skin Bernard, Jean Hamburger and René hypothesis has been tested because it is
grafts. At his office, his desk became an Billières, and of donors and sponsors. probably impossible to know”. He
operating table and Felix Rappaport leaves us with that question and that
went back and forth between New York Discovery, application and doubt.
and Paris. The loyalty of his donors— entrepreneurship are activities for
of blood, plasma and skin (“la bande à which there is one requirement, that of Jean Dausset has departed this world.
Dausset”) —never waivered. His responsibility, in the sense of He leaves behind the memory of his life
friendship with them was so deep that accountability, being answerable, but so that we can continue his work. 

N° 5 - THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE 35

 RATIONALITY, TRUTH AND DEMOCRACY:
BERTRAND RUSSELL, GEORGE ORWELL, NOAM CHOMSKY
Symposium organized by the everybody considers it de rigueur to addressed rationally, the answer could
chair of Philosophy of Language have a dogmatic opinion, to be backed but appear to be more or less obvious.
and Knowledge (Professor up by inflicting starvation, prison, and It was therefore essential, for those
Jacques Bouveresse) war, and to be carefully guarded from seeking at all costs to maintain the
28 May 2010 argumentative competition with any status quo, to ensure that things were
different opinion. If only men could be not expressed or envisaged in a rational
Videos of the papers can be brought into a tentatively agnostic spirit. One of the secrets of the success
consulted and downloaded at frame of mind about these matters, of totalitarian systems, he argued, lay in
www.college-de-france.fr nine-tenths of the evils of the modern the way in which they successfully
(Professor Bouveresse’s page, world would be cured.’1 persuaded a large number or even a
under audio/video) The solidarity that exists between majority of people that the most basic
The full proceedings of the science and democracy is reflected in the divergences of opinion had a source
symposium has been published in the fact that the principle of free research, causing them to defy all reason, so that
journal Agone n° 44 (October 2010). after being experimented in the their rational discussion was futile and
treatment of scientific questions, is likely derisory. On this point, Hannah Arendt
Excerpt of the talk by Professor Jacques to spread naturally to that of political made the following comment: ‘[The
Bouveresse on “Bertrand Russell, questions. [...] ‘The habit of basing Nazis] presented disagreements as
science, democracy and the pursuit of opinions on reason, when it has been invariably originating in deep natural,
truth”. acquired in the scientific sphere, is apt social, or psychological sources beyond
“In ‘Free thought and official to spread to the sphere of practical the control of the individual and
propaganda’, a talk delivered in 1922, politics. Why should a man enjoy therefore beyond the power of reason.
Russell argued: ‘The methods of exceptional power or wealth because he This would have been a shortcoming
increasing the degree of truth in our is the son of his father? Why should only if they had sincerely entered into
beliefs are well known; they consist in white men have privileges denied to competition with other parties; it was
hearing all sides, trying to ascertain all those with other complexions? Why not if they were sure of dealing with
the relevant facts, controlling our own should women be subject to men? As people who had reason to be equally
bias by discussion with people who soon as these questions are allowed to hostile to all parties.’3 For a convinced
have the opposite bias, and cultivating a come into the light of day and rationalist like Russel, the danger—that
readiness to discard any hypothesis examined in a rational spirit, it becomes could soon prove to be fatal—arose
which has proved inadequate. These very difficult to resist the claims of when, in a community that was still
methods are practiced in science, and justice, which demands an equal democratic in principle, one allowed the
have built the body of scientific distribution of ultimate political powers generalization of the feeling and soon
knowledge. […] In science, where alone among all adults, with the exception of the certainty that major disagreements
something approximating to genuine those who are insane or criminal. It is, and conflicts could and had to be
knowledge is to be found, men’s therefore, natural that the progress of treated in a way which, to be serious
attitude is tentative and full of doubt. In science and the progress toward and effective, had to start by excluding
religion and politics, on the contrary, democracy have gone hand in hand.’2 as completely as possible all reason and
though there is as yet nothing Russell believed that, when questions of rational argumentation.” 
approaching scientific knowledge, this nature were posed clearly and
1. Bertrand Russell, Sceptical Essays (1935), Allen & Unwin, 1960, p. 106.
2. Bertrand Russel, Fact and Fiction (1961), Routledge, 1994, p. 105.
3. Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism, Cleveland: The World Publishing Company, 1958, p 312.

36 THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE - N° 5

 framework of an anti-authoritarian mongst the POUM militia, was
socialism. In 1920 he declared: ‘I am obviously one of equality—an
one of those who, as a result of the equality understood not as an end in
war, have passed over from itself, a uniformization of individuals,
Liberalism to Socialism, not because I but as the condition for real freedom
have ceased to admire many of the and fraternity. ‘Many of the normal
Liberal ideals, but because I see little motives of civilized life—
scope for them, except after a snobbishness, money-grubbing, fear
complete transformation of the of the boss, etc.—had simply ceased
economic structure of society.’2 to exist. The ordinary class-division of
society had disappeared […] there
This rapid evolution in Russell’s was no one there except the peasants
thinking highlights the thread linking and ourselves, and no one owned
Excerpt from the talk by Jean- the original liberal mentality to anti- anyone else as his master.’4 This
Jacques Rosat (lecturer at the authoritarian socialism, and it is this experience was so decisive for Orwell
Collège de France) entitled: link that Noam Chomsky has because it mirrored his conviction
“Russell, Orwell, Chomsky: a constantly stressed. ‘Contrary to the that the various forms of top-down
family of thought and action contemporary version of it, classical socialism, driven by intellectuals—be
(From liberalism to anti- liberalism [...] focused on the right of it Fabian technocratic reformism or
authoritarian socialism)” people to control their own work, and the Leninist vanguard—could never
the need for free creative work under lead but to a change of masters. He
“Russell argued that ‘Political and social your own control—for human believed that authentic socialism was
institutions are to be judged by the good freedom and creativity. So to a bottom-up, based on the experience
or harm that they do to individuals. Do classical liberal, wage labor under of ordinary people and on the values
they encourage creativeness rather than capitalism would have been of common decency.” 
possessiveness? Do they embody or considered totally immoral, because it
promote a spirit of reverence between frustrates the fundamental need of
human beings? Do they preserve self- people to control their own work:
respect?’1 you’re a slave to someone else. [...] In
fact, there are no two points of view
It is noteworthy that this typically more antithetical than classical
liberal profession of faith opened a liberalism and capitalism [...]. If you
text that soon proved to be a take the basic classical liberal
manifesto for an anarchizing principles and apply them to the
socialism. This was in 1916. From the modern period, I think you actually
outbreak of the First World War, come pretty close to the principles
Russell battled for peace with the that animated revolutionary
energy of despair, and fought for the Barcelona in the late 1930s—to
right to conscientious objection—a what’s called ‘anarcho-syndicalism’.
struggle that soon landed him in jail [...] I think that’s about as high a level
for six months. That was where he as humans have yet achieved in trying
became aware that, in an to realize their libertarian principles,
industrialized world where there was which in my view are the right ones.’3
a prevailing force leading to the
concentration of economic and state The description of revolutionary
power that deprived individuals of Barcelona that Orwell discovered in
control over their own existence, the December 1936 is one of the most
liberal values underpinning his poignant pages of Homage to
education and in which he still Catalonia. This experience, and even
believed could be promoted only more so the one he lived for several
within the politico-economic months on the Aragonese front

1. Bertrand Russell, Political Ideals (1917), chap 1).

2. “Socialism and Liberal Ideals” (May-June 1920), Collected Papers, 15, p.144.
3. Noam Chomsky, Understanding power (2003), London: Vintage, pp. 216, 221, 222.
4. George Orwell, Homage to Catalonia (1989), London: Penguin Books (First edition 1938, Secker & Warburg, London).

N° 5 - THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE 37

 Excerpt from the talk by Noam generation before the crash, Alan before, preparing for the next and
Chomsky (Professor at MIT) Greenspan, in a rare moment of probably worse crisis. The bankers
entitled : “Power-hunger tempered departure from orthodoxy? That does can hardly be faulted for doing just
by self-deception”. not seem fair. When bankers are what they should do under the rules
‘greedy,’ they are pursuing their of the game.
“The doctrines of economic institutional commitment, which is to
rationalism that dominated maximize profits—in Anglo- After the current financial crisis
mainstream discourse in the advanced American corporate law, a legal erupted, a consensus developed
societies for a generation have shaped responsibility. If some reject this among economists that it is foolhardy
policy, though selectively: one recipe commitment, they will be removed to ignore systemic risk—that is, the
for the weak, a sharply different one and others will take their place. threat to the whole system if some
for the powerful, much as in the past. ‘Power hunger’ is an institutional transaction fails. But that is hardly a
It seems not unfair to say that their feature of a competitive system. new insight. An elementary feature of
dominance does not reflect either Furthermore, the exuberance of the markets is that transactions ignore
rationality or commitment to truth, necessarily greedy bankers was not externalities—effects on others. For
but rather service to privilege and irrational. The bigger banks knew financial transactions, that means
power. The consequences are that they were taking no serious risk ignoring systemic risk. It has long
unmistakeable. In the US, for with transactions that might well fail, been understood that the practice is
example, during these years the because they could rely on an implicit hazardous, and there have been
financial institutions that were the government insurance policy, called occasional warnings within the
main beneficiaries of the doctrines as ‘too big to fail.’ Its very existence gives profession. This market inefficiency
well as their most fervent advocates them substantial benefits as compared alone makes financial crash a highly
have vastly expanded their power, to rivals. And they regularly cash in likely contingency, and the risk is
with a comparable impact on political when necessary. Under Reagan, for amplified by the perverse incentives
life. Meanwhile, for the majority of example, one of the larger banks, that follow from the influence of
the population real wages have Continental Illinois, was rescued by a private power over the political
stagnated and family incomes have taxpayer bailout. Also under Reagan, system, among them the ‘too big to
been sustained by higher working the predecessor of the huge firm fail’ government insurance policy, but
hours, debt, and asset inflation, with Citigroup was rescued from disaster others as well.” 
regular collapse of the bubbles. While by the IMF—the ‘credit community’s
very rich by comparative standards, enforcer,’ as it was described
the US is taking on some of the accurately by its US executive director,
structural characteristics of the former returning to its traditional role today.
colonies, which typically have sectors As pointed out by Martin Wolf of the
of enormous wealth and privilege Financial Times, probably the most
amidst a sea of misery and suffering. respected economic correspondent
today, the current bailout ‘is overtly a
To turn to the title of these remarks, rescue of Greece, but covertly a bail-
can we say that these consequences out of banks.’
are the outcome of power hunger and
self-deception? In the terms that are The same has been true during the
current today, can we blame ‘greedy current financial crisis in the United
bankers’ who are guilty of ‘irrational States: the big banks were not only
exuberance,’ the famous phrase of the rescued by taxpayers, but ended up
most lauded economist of the past more profitable and larger than

38 THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE - N° 5

 MANAGING CLIMATE CHANGE

the economic logic and the

This colloquium was organized
sustainable development logic.
jointly by the ‘Sustainable
Development—Environment, Energy
and Society’ chair, held by Nicholas Some of the key figures in the
Stern in the 2009–2010 academic above-mentioned debate were
year, and the ‘Economic Theory and present. In his talk, Harvard
Social Organization’ chair held by University professor Martin
Roger Guesnerie. Weitzman again emphasized the
7–8 June 2010 distribution of the probability of
damage. This distribution has what
economists call ‘thick tails’, which
The symposium focused on the means that the density of the
economics of climate change and probability of extreme damage, Professor Roger Guesnerie
brought together speakers and seen as a function of the amount of
“discussants” who are internationally such damage, decreases ‘slowly’. As economic problematic is grasped,
reknowed for their contributions on the title of his paper indicates, from which also relate to uncertainty but
the subject. this point of view the targets of in a different way. ‘Ecological
Greenhouse Gas (GHG) intuition versus economic reason’,
The first day was devoted to the concentrations must be seen as a the title of Roger Guesnerie’s
economics of the long run. It sort of “insurance against paper,1 is about the rules of an
referred to the debate on the cost- catastrophic climate damages’. This ‘ecological’ economic evaluation of
benefit analysis of climate policies, argument, in which the avoidance an ‘irreversible damage to the
which has intensified over the past of catastrophe is crucial, was environment’. The text derives a
ten years and was revived by the challenged by William Nordhaus, ‘precautionary principle’ that
publication of the Stern Report, in professor at Yale University. In his clarifies the generally imprecise—to
particular. The costs of climate paper entitled ‘Economic policy in say the least—notion of ‘acceptable
policies are effective in the short the face of severe tail events’, economic cost’. The conclusions are
and medium term, whereas their Professor Nordhaus, one of the clearly established in a world
benefits, that is, the damage that most rigorous advocates of the reduced to four parameters briefly
they avoid, are manifested in the traditional theses, considered the describing: the productive capacity;
medium-long, the long and even the problems of statistical estimates the trade-off determining desired
very long term. But the discount and issues of measurement of timeless growth; ecological
rates applied in traditional cost- economic losses. His talk was ‘sensitivity? and, finally, the ‘ethical’
benefit analysis to transform the discussed by Partha Sen, professor dimension of the inter-generational
future values of benefits into at the Dehli School of Economics, trade-off. The discussion of the
present values (in technical terms, while Professor Weitzman’s paper latter dimension, that is, the ethical
to “discount” them) so that they was commented on by Nicholas dimension of the problem, was
can be compared to costs (also Stern. considered in greater depth by
“discounted”), crush the future. Professor Cameron Hepburn of
There are good reasons for this to The questioning of traditional Oxford University, who put the
be so, but these reasons, which economic logic with regard to entire debate of the discount rate
could be seen as a form of discount rates is thus based on the back into this perspective by
“economic reason’, seem to ‘extreme’ uncertainty that is emphasizing the compatibility as
contradict ecological intuition indisputably present in climate well as the differences with
which focuses on sustainability and change. A change in the earth’s traditional economic approaches.
the long-term preservation of the mean temperature of over five Roger Guesnerie’s paper was
environment. The papers delivered degrees plunges us into the commented on by Professor James
during the first day were primarily unknown, the probabilistic Mirrlees from Cambridge
on the economic relevance of description of which echoes the first University, winner of the Nobel
climate policies and, more two papers. There are other Prize for Economics in 1996.
generally, on the reconciliation of channels through which the

1. Based on a paper co-authored with O. Guéant and J.M. Lasry.

N° 5 - THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE 39

 Reverting to uncertainty, another to innovation. Professor Sterner In the morning Nicholas Stern
direction for potentially fruitful emphasized the relative merits of provided a systematic analysis of
confrontation between traditional emission reduction and research- the questions raised by growth with
calculation and calculation that development, depending on the a low level of carbon consumption.
stresses the ecological logic more, characteristics of the technologies First he considered innovation and
suggests the relevance of the and the uncertainty weighing on technical change, with a historical
concept of ‘ambiguity’. There is their results. His paper was perspective on the current problem.
ambiguity, in the technical sense, discussed by Antoine d’Autume, He then examined the redefinition
when hesitation on the uncertainty professor at Paris I University and of appropriate public policies and
of a particular situation challenges the Paris School of Economics. finally discussed the multiple facets
the construction of subjective of the political economy (as
probability and thus affects the The other papers delivered on the first opposed to the economy stricto
transposition, in the analysis, of the day were mainly selected from sensu) of a global agreement.
risky choices of the probabilistic proposals in response to a call put out
logic expressed in traditional by the French Economics Association
criteria. The earlier work of (Association française de sciences
Christian Gollier,2 professor at the économiques). All of them highlighted
Toulouse School of Economics, on the time dimension of environmental
risky timeless choices, is set in the problems. Michel de Lara from the
‘Bayesian’ tradition of using University of Paris Est examined the
expected utility. In the paper that he issue of the ‘Risk and sustainability: is
delivered at the symposium, viability that far from optimality?’.
Professor Gollier analyzed the Charles Figuières from the French
effects of the introduction of national agronomic research institute
ambiguity into the analysis of the (INRA) confronted the regular
‘socially effective discount rate’, interpretation of the Rawlsian view
and showed that the biases (that of philosopher John Rawls) of Professor Nicholas Stern
introduced are not systematic. inter-generational equity, with a so-
called ‘mixed’ criterion of The following contribution, by
The contribution of Thomas inter-temporal social choice (with Alberta University professor
Sterner 3 from Gothenburg reference to both Bentham and Ujjayant Chakravort, was entitled:
University considered ‘climate Rawls). Fabien Prieur from the ‘Can nuclear power supply clean
policy, prudence and the role of University of Savoie and his co- energy in the long run? A model
technological innovation’. In a authors discussed ‘the optimal control with endogenous substitution of
sense, his talk was equally relevant of pollution under uncertainty and resources.’5 In several contrasting
to the main theme of the first day irreversibility’, while Jean-Charles scenarios, this model simulates the
and that of the second day, where Hourcade from the International proportion of nuclear energy in the
the focus was on issues pertaining Centre for Research on the energy mix on the 2100 timeline.
Environment and Development The results were discussed by
examined the ‘determinants of the Professor Pierre Noel Giraud from
social cost of carbon: public economic the École des Mines de Paris.
principles in a controversial future.’4
The paper delivered by Harvard
On the second day the focus shifted University professor Philippe
to innovation and the stimulation Aghion was on ‘Climate change
of innovation for climate policy, and the role of directed
with issues of risk, uncertainty and innovation.’6 It was based on a
international cooperation either model of endogenous innovation in
directly present or in the which incentives to invest either in
Professor James Mirrlees background. ‘clean’ technologies or else in ‘dirty’

2. Paper co-authored with Johannes Gierlinger.

3. Co-authored with Carolyn Fischer.
4. The supporting papers were by the following authors: i) for the first paper, Michel de Lara, Vincent Martinet and Luc Doyen; ii) for the second paper,
Charles Figuières, Ngo Van Long and Mabel Tidball; iii) for the third paper, Alain Ayong Le Kama and Aude Pommeret, and Fabien Prieur; iv) for the fourth
paper, Jean-Charles Hourcade, Patrice Dumas and Baptiste Perrissin Fabert.
5. Paper by Ujjayant Chakravorty, Bertrand Magne and Michel Moreaux.
6 Co-authored with Daron Acemoglu, Leonardo Burstzyn and David Hemous.

40 THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE - N° 5

ones was affected by the form and presentation was commented on by
intensity of climate policy. Alex Jean-Pierre Ponssard, senior researcher
Bowen of the London School of at the École Polytechnique.
Economics commented on the
model and the qualitative results The last paper was by Humberto
derived from it. Llavador,7 professor at the
Universitat Pompeu Fabra, who
The afternoon’s papers focused not placed the two days’ discussions in
only on innovation but also on a general perspective. His
issues of institutions and presentation of a ‘dynamic analysis
negotiations that Nicholas Stern’s of human welfare on a warming
talk had introduced. planet’ was commented on by Jean
Philippe Nicolaï (Collège de France,
chair of Economic Theory and
Social Organization).

Finally, in addition to the scientific

papers, a round table on climate
policy issues was held on the second
day after the morning’s talks.
Presided by Roger Guesnerie, this
round table made it possible to
compare the views of Nicholas
Stern, Thomas Sterner, Jean Tirole
Professor Thomas Schelling and Henry Tulkens.

The talk by Maryland University To conclude, the organizers wish to

professor Thomas Schelling, winner thank those who contributed to
of the Nobel Prize for Economics, facilitating the two days, especially
emphasized the new institutions the chairpersons (excluding
required for international climate speakers), Guy Laroque (INSEE)
cooperation, and related issues of and Olivier Godard (École
governance. Based on historical Polytechnique).
precedents (Marshall Plan, Bretton-
Woods), he highlighted the With the exception of the round
necessity to provide developing table, the symposium was scientific
countries with substantial, and the papers were technical.
efficiently organized aid. This paper Despite its high level of
was discussed by another specialist specialization, the two-day event
on the subject, Professor Henry was attended by a large audience
Tulkens from the Catholic that was clearly familiar with the
University of Louvain. topics discussed. 

Jean Tirole, professor at the Toulouse

School of Economics, discussed
‘regional initiatives’ and the ‘cost of
delaying climate change agreements’.
His model emphasized what can be
called the ratchet effects affecting climate
negotiations when, paradoxically, the
good environmental performance of the The Sustainable Development—
first period weakens the position for Environment, Energy and Society chair
negotiating in the second period. His receives support from TOTAL.

7 Co-authored with John Roemer and Joaquim Silvestre.

N° 5 - THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE 41

 T HE TRAGEDY OF THE H AITI
EARTHQUAKE

Professor Xavier le Pichon

Chair of Geodynamics 1986–2008

On January 12 2010, at 4:53 p.m., the E/W Enriquillo located NW of the island of Puerto Rico. Further East,
fault started to yield at a depth of 13 km, 25 km SSW the plate boundary is unique and follows the Puerto
of Port-au-Prince. The rupture propagated toward the Rico trench. The eastward junction of the two
West during 35 seconds along a distance of about 50 boundaries produces compressive deformation within
km without ever reaching the surface. But most of the the central portion of Hispaniola, within NW/SE
mechanical energy was dissipated during the first ten mountains which form the core of the island. It is this
seconds with a fault displacement that reached a deformation that has created the present morphology
maximum of 4 m. The northern lip of the fault moved of the island.
to the West with respect to the southern lip. This is
what specialists call a strike-slip fault. Although the Thus there are three main sources of large earthquakes
resulting earthquake was a great earthquake with a in Haiti, the Septentrional fault to the N and NE of the
magnitude of 7, it was not a very great earthquake. For island, the Enriquillo fault to the SW and the
example the energy was 900 times less than the energy mountains in the central portion. This is verified by the
dissipated during the 2004 Sumatra earthquake. Many distribution of historical seismicity, although it is poorly
greater earthquakes have occurred in modern times. Yet localized, except for the relatively recent triple 1946
with about 300 000 human fatalities, the Haiti earthquake. Specialists have identified ten earthquakes
earthquake appears to have been the deadliest. Why? that appear to have reached or exceeded magnitude 7
As is often said: earthquakes do not kill... but human since the XVIth century, that is one about every fifty
buildings do. Haiti is the extreme illustration of years. Three of them could be along the southern fault,
problems coming from anarchic development without four along the northern one, and three would have
any consideration for the environment. resulted from shortening in the central mountains. The
last earthquakes that destroyed Port-au-Prince date
But let us go back to the tectonic context of this land from 1751 and 1770. The town had just been founded
that became home for the Haitian people. Haiti is by the French and Louis XV had chosen it as the
located on the E/W northern border of the Caribbean capital. Following the destructions of the earthquakes,
plate. North of the border, the American plate moves to it was forbidden to build there with anything except
the West at a velocity of 20 mm/yr. This border is not wood, which was quite reasonable. It is thus clear that
linear. It is rather a 200 km wide border zone, sometime no part of Haiti can escape destructive earthquakes.
called the Gonave plate, limited by two main great Actually specialists had announced in 2008 that the
faults, the Septentrional fault to the North and the Enriquillo fault could be affected by a 7.2 earthquake
Enriquillo fault to the South. The total 20 mm/yr strike- at any time and that the Septentrional fault could
slip motion is distributed between these two faults, similarly be struck by a 7.5 earthquake, still pending.
about 10 mm/yr on each. Actually it is difficult to
exactly define how the motion is partitioned because of But, what could have been done by the government of
the complex elastic interactions between the two faults. the 9 millions inhabitants of Haiti, a country where the
But, in a first approximation, each fault takes about density of the population exceeds 325/km2, 80% of
half of the motion. These two faults are the main which live below the level of poverty, to prevent this
elements of the structural framework of the island of disaster? Of course, technically, it is possible to build
Hispaniola, Haiti corresponding to the western portion in such a way that the danger of earthquakes is
of the island. However the tectonic system is actually minimized for the population. But with the desperate
even more complex, as the Septentrional fault veers to context of struggle for survival in this country, it was
the SE within the island and as, consequently, the probably illusory to expect a real politic of mitigation
Gonave plate tapers eastward, the eastern corner being of the destructive effects of earthquakes. One only has

42 THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE - N° 5

to consider the failure of the reforestation program in the Haitian people during this tragedy and from the
spite of the enormous cost of the generalized surge of international solidarity that it triggered. 
deforestation that cannot be stopped in Haiti. Yet the Xavier Le Pichon, Emeritus Professor
dramatic effects of this deforestation are experimented of the Collège de France
repeatedly during the yearly cyclones! It seems to me with the collaboration of Claude Rangin, Tiphaine Zitter
that this tragedy is an illustration of the challenges that and Agnès Crespy of the Egérie team of Collège de France
our society must confront to come out of the crisis in
which our humanity appears to progressively get
submerged. How can we facilitate a reasonable
implantation of the population within an environment More informations: the best source is the website of
under control when the context is one of extreme Eric Calais, professor at Purdue University:
poverty? In this somber outlook, the hope comes from http://web.ics.purdue.edu/~ecalais/haiti/
the remarkable qualities that have been manifested by

The rupture of the January

12 2010 earthquake of
Haiti. The yellow star
marks the localization of
the epicenter and the red
dots those of the main
aftershocks, after the
USGS. The wide band
identifies the probable zone
of rupture.

Tectonic context of the

January 12 earthquake. The
probable locations of the
main historical earthquakes
are identified by a red star.
The year of the earthquake
is next. The yellow point
marks the location of Port-
au-Prince. The black arrows
are the GPS velocity vectors
with respect to the
Caribbean plate. Les circles
with a black dot in the
center indicate where the
velocity vectors are small
with respect to the errors of
measurement. These points
are located on the southern
portion of Hispaniola and
consequently belong to the
Caribbean plate.
PR: Puerto Rico
RD: Dominican Republic
H: Haiti
Data from Éric Calais.

N° 5 - THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE 43

 O BITUARY

Jean Dausset 1916–2009

Chair of Experimental Medicine
1977–1987
by Philippe Kourilsky

Jean Dausset passed away on 6 June 2009, at the age of polymorphisms in human beings. This is what led Jean
93. He held the chair of Experimental Medicine from Dausset, in 1984, to create the Centre d’études des
1977 to 1987, and is to thank for one of the most polymorphismes humains (CEPH—Centre for the
important discoveries in the history of immunology: study of human polymorphisms), transformed into the
that of the HLA system. In 1952, he observed that the Fondation Jean Dausset in 1993, where the first
combination of a patient’s white blood cells with detailed genetic mapping of human beings was
another donor’s serum triggered an agglutination effect. developed—a prelude to sequencing the human
From this he deduced that anti-white blood cell genome. In 1980, along with Baruj Benacerraf and
antibodies existed in the patient’s body, and showed George D. Snell, Jean Dausset received the Nobel Prize
that these were the result of the many blood in Physiology and Medicine which honoured, along
transfusions that the patient had undergone. The with many other distinctions, his discovery of the HLA.
existence of blood groups for red blood cells was
already known; Dausset showed that the same went for This is the story that one finds in the textbooks. Yet
white blood cells, but with groups of a different nature, scientists often provide a formal reconstruction of the
that were far more complex. Years of work and the history of science that is very different from the actual
study of blood samples from large numbers of patients story, which they struggle to tell. Their reconstruction
and volunteer donors were necessary. In 1958, he sometimes provides a regrettable approximation of the
identified the first leukocyte group, speculated on its lived reality. In the case of Jean Dausset, it is simply
genetic origin and emphasized its probable importance erroneous.
for organ transplants. The HLA system was born, with
multiple implications: firstly medical ones, for Born in Toulouse in 1916, he studied medicine, but was
transplants. It also had immunological implications: interrupted by the war in 1939. Although drafted into
thousands of researchers in the world—myself the army, in 1940 he was able to get back to Paris to
included—set out to isolate genes, to determine the prepare for an internship, which he obtained in 1941.
molecular origins of transplantation antigens, and to In the following year, after reading a small poster
understand the cellular reactions associated with the displayed at the Saint-Louis hospital, he enrolled and
HLA. It had anthropological implications: the HLA can left for North Africa. Starting off as an ambulance
be used as a marker of individuals and therefore of the driver, he then became a blood transfuser and
migration and mixing of human populations. Lastly, it resuscitator. He found himself confronted with a
had genetic implications, since the polymorphism of the constant stream of wounded patients who, in difficult
HLA opened the way for the analysis of other and uncertain conditions, needed reanimation,

44 THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE - N° 5

operations, and transfusions. A transfuser he remained: this is the lens through which his scientific and medical
once back in Paris in 1945, he was appointed to the work should be seen, since they were largely
Centre for blood transfusion at the Saint-Antoine underpinned by this human bond.
hospital. In 1961 he joined the Centre Hayem at the
Saint-Louis hospital, alongside Jean Bernard. Jean Dausset would probably not have been able to
carry out his work and to make his important
To transfuse, blood is needed. Human beings are discoveries, had he not had access to patients, of course,
needed to give blood to other human beings. but also blood donors and later organ donors. He
Transfusion is the expression of a human bond, of respected donors, and donors respected him. At the
which Jean Dausset became an promoter. He expressed Nobel Prize ceremony he chose to be accompanied by
it in all his activities; not only scientific and medical, two of them. He received, but was driven by the desire
but also social and societal ones. For instance, he to give back, not only through individual medical
expressed it in his taste for art: in 1946 he opened a activity but also by organizing the pooling of
bookshop in Paris, rue du Dragon in the 6th knowledge and resources to benefit the community. The
arrondissement, that later became an avant-garde international conference and workshops on the HLA
gallery frequented by André Breton and many others. bear witness to this, as well as the creation of France-
Fernand Léger, Yves Tanguy, Pierre Alechinsky, etc., Transplant in 1969 and of France-Greffe de Moelle in
exhibited their work there. He also expressed it in his 1987. A particularly noteworthy application for this
desire to serve the community: from 1955 to 1958, Jean sharing culture was found in a strictly scientific sector
Dausset was a member of the cabinet of the Minister of from which it had previously been virtually absent. The
Education, where he defended and planned the creation of the CEPH in 1984 was made possible
“Debré” reforms of medical studies and of the thanks to the sale of a collection of paintings donated
university-hospital system, which allowed for full-time by a woman who had recognized him on television.
work in hospitals and for medical research to flourish. Jean Dausset used them in the simplest and best way
The importance of the human bond was also evidenced there was. He started to gather blood samples from 61
in his commitment to promoting responsibility among large donor families. Their DNA was extracted,
scientists: from 1984 to 2001, he chaired the Universal preserved and analysed, and many genetic
Movement for Scientific Responsibility (MURS). polymorphisms were mapped: close to 200 as early as
Finally, we witness it in his research activities: in fact 1992—several million today. His ties with the
Association française contre la myopathie (AFM—
French Muscular Dystrophy Association) and the
creation of the Généthon in 1991 brilliantly magnified
this effort that led to the growing precision of human
genome mapping and made its sequencing possible.
France thus opened the way to organized sharing in
biological experimentation, and Jean Dausset can be
considered as one of the founders of human molecular
genetics.

We will no longer see the slender, slightly hunched

silhouette of Jean Dausset, nor his warm gaze, full of
humour and even mischief. He has been honoured in
many ways, many times. But beyond the official story,
let us remember his humanity. Jean Dausset was
certainly a great scientist, but he was also and perhaps
first and foremost a human being, a great human being,
whose science was great because it was human. 
Professor Philippe Kourilsky
Chair of Molecular Immunology

N° 5 - THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE 45

 Claude Lévi-Strauss 1908–2009
Chair of Social Anthropology
1959–1982
by Philippe Descola

Claude Lévi-Strauss died on 30 October 2009, a few himself acknowledged his lack of patience needed for
days before his 101st birthday. He was born on 28 the painstaking work that the collection of
November 1908 into a family where the arts were ethnographic data required. Taking him literally, many
cultivated: painting, which was his father’s profession; commentators saw him exclusively as an armchair
music, in which his great-grandfather, composer and anthropologist. Yet his complementary thesis on the
conductor Isaac Strauss had won renown; and Nambikwara, as well as many articles that he wrote on
literature, at which he tried his hand at a very early age. various aspects of the life of the populations among
A good student, but a dabbler, he studied both which he sojourned, clearly show that nothing about
philosophy and law but devoted much of his energy to them remained foreign to him, from the symbolism of
activism in the SFIO,1 of which he saw himself at one the colours of their fletchings and the Bororos’ penile
stage becoming the official theoretician. Fortunately for sheaths, to those features of the Nambikwara language
science, fate decided otherwise. After his agrégation2 in that were comparable to Chibcha. Moreover, most of
philosophy and a brief period in secondary education, his analyses of the institutions of these people, with
of which he retained a gloomy memory, Claude Lévi- whom he actually spent relatively little time, were
Strauss’ life changed direction in the autumn of 1934 amply confirmed by the ethnographers who, 40 or 50
when Célestin Bouglé suggested he join the French years later, studied them in far greater depth. Finally,
university mission at Sao Paulo University to lecture in there is no doubt that his experience with the American
sociology. There he discovered a country that he would Indians, by enabling him to witness the functioning of
be particularly fond of for the rest of his life. Above all, institutions—albeit undermined—that had previously
he discovered ethnology in the field, for which he had seemed to him to exist in books only, contributed to
developed a taste by reading Robert Lowie, and which imprinting in him a philosophy of social life that never
he was able to practice during university holidays. His left him. Hence, the importance of the mutual
first mission was in 1935–1936 to study the Caduveo dependence that Bororo moieties fostered, where all the
and Bororo in the Mato Grosso do Sul. This was important acts in an individual’s life, from birth rites to
followed by an eight-month mission during which, funeral rites, were accomplished by the members of the
mandated by the Musée de l’Homme that Paul Rivet other moiety, could but consolidate in him the idea that
had just founded, he resided first among the reciprocity was the basis of any society. And it was
Nambikwara of the north of the Mato Grosso and then certainly also his fondness for the Nambikwara, that
with the Tupi-Monde and the Tupi-Kawahib on the static and crystalline island beaten by the waves of an
Bolivian border. unkind historical future, that fed the idea of the so-
called ‘cold’ societies which desperately tried to freeze
In this respect, allow me a few words on Claude Lévi- events to prevent their effects from snowballing out of
Strauss the ethnographer, so often overlooked. He control.

1. Precursor of the current Socialist Party. [Transl.]

2. State competitive examination to qualify for teaching posts at high-school and university level. [Transl.]

46 THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE - N° 5

Claude Lévi-Strauss returned to France on the eve of immediately saluted in the world as a revolution in the
the war, in which he participated as a liaison officer, way of addressing kinship phenomena. In it, Lévi-
but was struck after armistice by the anti-Semitic laws Strauss rejected the point of view of the sociology of
of the Vichy regime and managed to leave the country kinship groups and that of their conjectural historical
for the United States. There he taught at the New reconstruction, replacing it with a general theory of the
School for Social Research in New York. He joined the alliance of marriage which, in turn, elucidated the
Free French Forces, was assigned to the French nature and functioning of the social units at play in
scientific mission to the US, and founded the École kinship and situated them in a broader set. He also
Libre des Hautes Études de New York where he was established the generality of the rules ordering systems
appointed general secretary. It was during this period in of matrimonial exchange based on the structures of the
the US that Claude Lévi-Strauss became a full-fledged mind. He saw this as the only logical base for
anthropologist. The discipline was more established confirming the hypothesis of the unity of humans in the
and older there than in France. A network of Chairs, diversity of their cultural productions.
institutions and journals inspired him and, above all, a
long tradition of fieldwork had produced an Appointed by Lucien Febvre in 1948 to the new 6th
extraordinarily rich documentation on the Indians of Section of the École Pratique des Hautes Études, then
North America, on which he drew for many of his nominated in 1949 as Research Director to the 5th
subsequent studies. It was also in New York that Section of the same institution, Claude Lévi-Strauss
Claude Lévi-Strauss discovered the systematic study of gradually turned away from sociological studies to
kinship, a field that until then had been neglected in devote himself to the study of the various
France and to which he devoted all his efforts for manifestations of ‘savage’ thinking, an ideal way to
several years. Finally, New York was where he met understand the functioning of the mind. The systems of
another refugee, Roman Jakobson, who initiated him classification, myths and ritual operations of societies
into linguistics and became his friend. This was the rich without writing relate to the qualities of the objects of
melting pot that spawned structural anthropology, less the world and the connections that can be made
a new stream in an established science than a new between them. Their study is therefore an ideal way of
knowledge method, forged in the treatment of highlighting mental operations that do not differ
problems peculiar to a discipline. fundamentally from those of scientific thinking, even if
the phenomena to which they apply and the knowledge
From a very early stage Claude Lévi-Strauss was that they produce may make them seem very distant.
convinced that social science was built not on the basis Practised first on sensitive categories, savage thinking
of manifest reality but by elucidating the subconscious uncovers and orders the remarkable characters of
order where the rational correspondence between the natural objects to convert them into signs of their
properties of thought and those of the world are hidden properties. To be sure, these signs are still
revealed. In structural phonology he discovered an ideal partially submerged in the images from which they
model to apply his intuition, and in the abundant draw their existence, but they do nevertheless have a
ethnographic literature that he studied in New York, sufficient degree of autonomy compared to their
the material to substantiate it. This model had four referents to be able to be used, within their limited
noteworthy characteristics: it focused not on conscious category, for purposes other than those for which they
phenomena but rather on the subconscious were initially intended. The logic of the sensible is thus
infrastructure; it analysed not terms but relations an ‘intellectual bricolage’ exploiting a small repertoire
between them; it sought to show that these relations of permutating relations within a set that forms a
formed a system; and it aimed to discover general laws. system. Hence, structural analysis aims not only to
During this period Lévi-Strauss posited that, combined, elucidate the logic at play in mythical thinking, but
these four approaches could contribute to illuminating also, through the study of ‘the thinking of savages’, to
problems of kinship because of the formal analogy that illuminate the part of ‘the savage mind’ that each of us
it revealed between phonemes and the terms used to still has left over from before the great rational
denote relatives. Both are elements whose meaning domestication.
stems from their combination into systems, themselves
products of the subconscious functioning of the mind, In 1959 Claude Lévi-Strauss was elected Professor at
and whose recurrence in many places of the world the Collège de France, after two unsuccessful
suggests that they comply with universal laws. applications and thanks to the decisive support of
Maurice Merleau-Ponty. Although the title of his chair
Les Structures élémentaires de la parenté, the thesis for was ‘Social Anthropology’, most of his research and
his PhD obtained after his return to France in 1948, teaching was devoted to mythical thinking, leading to
was a masterly variation on this initial intuition, the publication from 1964 to 1971 of the four volumes

N° 5 - THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE 47

 of Mythologiques. Claude Lévi-Strauss argued that In 1963, with the publication of Anthropologie
myths, more so than other products of savage thinking, structurale in English,3 Susan Sontag published an
were the fruit of a creative liberty freed from the article on Claude Lévi-Strauss entitled ‘A Hero of our
constraints of the real. Shedding light on the laws of Time’. Above all, she was commending Tristes
their functioning should therefore make it possible to Tropiques, comparing it to Montaigne’s Essais and
further our understanding of a mind that takes itself as admiring the lucid heroism of this observer of humans,
an object, without talking subjects being aware of how whose pessimism never led him to discouragement. Yet
it does so. Taken separately, each myth is indeed an we can say that Claude Lévi-Strauss was heroic in
unreasonable story, without true signification apart another sense too, when he took the risk of building
from the moral lesson that those recounting it that which, in many respects, was a new science, and
sometimes feel entitled to infer from it. Meaning when, through his own practice, he set for it such a high
proceeds not from the content of a favoured myth, but standard of requirement and intellectual virtuosity that
from the resonance of thousands of myths which, over he was never sure of being followed or even
and above the apparent diversity of their content and understood. The future will tell whether his work—in
the distance between the peoples that invented them, my opinion the most significant of the 20th century in
weave a constantly-changing logical web around the its field—will continue for a long time to act as a
world. The multiple combinations of these myths define catalyst, as it has done in the past decades. The hundred
the closed field of the operations of the human mind. or so books devoted to him seem to indicate that this
Hence, the structural analysis of myths cannot claim to will be so. 
be exhaustive. Advancing in pace with the associations Professor Philippe Descola
of a syntagmatic chain starting from a randomly chosen Chair of Anthropology of Nature
reference myth, it can aspire only to carve out of this
immense web fragmented matrices of signification that
a different path might have disregarded.

Claude Lévi-Strauss’ abundant scientific work should

not make us forget the importance of his moral
thinking. Constantly denouncing the concurrent
impoverishment of the diversity of cultures and natural
species, he always saw anthropology as a tool for
criticizing prejudices, notably racial ones, as well as a
means for implementing a ‘generalized’ humanism. By
that he meant a humanism no longer limited, as in the
Renaissance, to Western societies only, but one that
took into account the experience and knowledge of all
human societies, both past and present. Far from
leading to an improbable global civilization that
abolished singularities, this type of humanism would,
on the contrary, take into account the fact that with
regard to aesthetics and spirituality, any true creation
requires both individuals and cultures to draw on their
particularisms in order to contrast them better with
other values. The question of aesthetics is a theme
running throughout Claude Lévi-Strauss’ thinking. Not
only did he consider forms of artistic expression—or
ones perceived as such—of non-Western societies both
as a challenge to the rationality of the West and a
legitimate subject of anthropological knowledge, he
also fed his work with in-depth reflection on the role of
music and art as mediations between the sensible and
the intelligible, which made it a crucial contribution to
aesthetic theory.

3. Structural Anthropology.

48 THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE - N° 5

 Jean Yoyotte 1927–2009
Chair of Egyptology
1991–1997
by Nicolas Grimal

Jean Yoyotte passed away on 1 July last year. He was After obtaining his baccalauréat in 1945, Jean Yoyotte
born on 4 August 1927 in Lyon, into a family from studied for a bachelor’s degree in history and in 1948
Martinique. His father was a chemical engineer with joined the CNRS as a trainee. He was assigned to the
a senior position in the company Rhône-Poulenc, chair of Pierre Montet at the Collège de France. Both
which soon led him to settle in Paris. Thus, in 1932, were to change his life: the Collège, which he never
at the age of five, Jean Yoyotte became a Parisian, and really left, even though he regularly crossed the Rue
remained so until his death. To be more exact, he Saint Jacques to the other pole of his career, the École
became a citizen of the 5th arrondissement and, even Pratique des Hautes Études; and Pierre Montet, from
more precisely, of the Montagne Sainte-Geneviève, whom he inherited his fascination with Tanis and of
for he studied at the Lycée Henri IV and his life ended whom he was to be one of the successors at the Collège.
in his flat in the Rue Monge. Yet behind this limited
topography lay the vast horizons of Jean Yoyotte’s Jean Yoyotte studied at the École Pratique des Hautes
career, fed by the prestigious institutions that he Études (4th Section) in 1951 and in the following year
frequented in that area. obtained a diplôme d’études supérieures in history. In
1953 this enabled him to join the Institut Français
His studies at Henri IV left Jean Yoyotte with two d’Archéologie Orientale in Cairo as a scientific member.
valuable assets: an insatiable curiosity, and a deep He remained in Egypt until 1957. Those were not easy
friendship with Serge Sauneron that developed in their times in a country that was challenging the foundations
youth through their discovery, together, of the of its society, but Jean Yoyotte managed to travel
pharaoh’s Egypt. This friendship lasted until the tragic extensively, often with Bernard Bothmer who remained
death of Serge Sauneron in 1976 at the age of 49, when a friend throughout his life. He visited the sites to which
he was head of the Institut Français d’Archéologie he would later devote many studies: Heliopolis, Kom
Orientale and the leader in his field. The loisirs dirigés Abou Billou, Saft el-Henna, Abusir Bana, el-Kom el-
made compulsory in 1936 by the Léon Blum Kebir, Samanoud, Mendes, Tell Rozan, Tell Abu Yasin,
government had the unexpected effect of binding the Horbeit, etc. Jean Yoyotte was fascinated above all by
members of the ‘Egyptian club’ founded by the two the sites of the delta, to which he devoted most of his
friends’ art teacher. They were joined by Gérard research. On the basis of this first experience in the
Godron who ended his career as professor of field, compared with the historical sources, he wrote an
Egyptology at Paul Valéry University. All three article in 1961 that was to be one of his main works:
gradually migrated from the Montagne Sainte- ‘Les principautés du delta au temps de l’anarchie
Geneviève to the École du Louvre and the École libyenne’. In this article he organized the complex
Pratique des Hautes Études. Jean Yoyotte followed the documentation of that period, providing a new
classes of the masters of those days: Jean Sainte Fare synthesis that was to serve as a basis for subsequent
Garnot, Jacques-Jean Clère, Michel Malinine, Jacques work on the same subject, primarily that of Farouk
Vandier, Gustave Lefebvre, and Georges Posener, of Gomàa and Kenneth A. Kitchen. The geography of the
whom he became a disciple. delta and, more particularly, its religious geography

N° 5 - THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE 49

 were to be the main theme of his teaching at the École contributing to the education of generations of
Pratique des Hautes Études from 1964, when he Egyptologists, both French and of other nationalities.
succeeded Jean Sainte-Fare Garnot who passed away For my generation, his classes, along with those of Jean
prematurely and who had been his director at the Leclant, Georges Posener, Jacques-Jean Clère and Paul
Institut Français d’Archéologie Oriental for four years. Barguet, were the main source of our training. His
Since his return from Egypt he had revived his ties with teaching ranged from Egyptian grammar to the various
the Collège and rediscovered the library of the Cabinet aspects of religion, through geography, priesthood, and
Champollion where he had formerly been a librarian funereal literature. We followed the virtuosity of the
for a short while. Master who readily studied original or unknown texts
with us.
In 1964 Jean Yoyotte took up the post of project
manager at Tanis, where the archaeological work had Jean Yoyotte’s scientific work reflects his constantly
been interrupted in 1956. There he conducted ten aroused curiosity. Historian above all, he was also a
campaigns, until 1984, and carried out painstaking geographer and a philologist. His studies encompass a
work recording and classifying, both in the field and wide range of subjects, including toponymy, royalty, the
on the archives of the Montet mission. He ordered a prosopography of private individuals, anthroponymy,
systematic review of the site and explored major institutions, economics, society, the pantheon and
sectors: the temple of Khonsu, the area of the Sacred religious conceptions. Each study was an opportunity
Lake, the south of the temple of Mout and, of course, for a dense and enriching framing from a new
the necropolis, one of Pierre Montet’s main discoveries perspective. The scope of this short article does not
during the Second World War. enable me to list his abundant and varied scientific
production. I simply wish to mention that all of his
At the same time, as part of the Centre de studies, even those devoted to what seemed like a detail
Documentation d’Histoire des Religions, he created before he examined them, still are and will always be
and ran the Vladimir Golenischeff Centre, which unavoidable sources for researchers.
currently still has the core scientific documentation of
the Montet archives and which further enriched Jean The general public is acquainted with Jean Yoyotte
Yoyotte’s personal library. through his collective books. The most famous is
probably Le Dictionnaire de la civilisation égyptienne,
A fine result of this patient collation and fieldwork was edited by Georges Posener and Serge Sauneron.
the exhibition on the treasures of Tanis, which opened Published in 1959, it was repeatedly reprinted and a
in 1987 at the Grand Palais in Paris and then moved new revised edition is forthcoming. Jean Yoyotte also
on to the Centre de la Vieille Charité in Marseille, contributed to L’Encyclopédie de la Pléiade, with three
before an international tour. In 1984 Philippe Brissaud articles on Egyptian history, art and mentalities. In
took over as director of this site of immense potential, 1968 he furthermore published Les Trésors des
as the discovery of the Sacred Lake at Mout in that year pharaons and, more recently, in 2005, with Pascal
evidenced. Vernus, a Bestiaire des pharaons.

Jean Yoyotte was elected professor at the Collège de As fate would have it, the major volume on Darius’
France on 30 June 1991. He lectured there from 1992 Palace at Susa, edited by Jean Perrot, was published just
up to his retirement in 1997, essentially on late Egypt, last week, and Chapter 3 is by Jean Yoyotte: the final
thus moving ever closer to the Greek period and the publication of the Egyptian statues of Darius,
role that the great cities of the delta played in it, namely discovered in 1973. This chapter is characterized not
Naucratis and, more recently, Heracleon-Thonis. His only by the erudition and precision of the historian, but
interest in the Greek presence dated back to his also by the vision and the sharp intelligence of the great
Egyptian years when he helped Father du Bourguet scholar who has left us. 
draw up an epigraphic inventory of Deir el-Medina and Professor Nicolas Grimal
Abydos. During that project he had started to record Chair of Pharaonic Civilization: Archaeology, Philology, History
Carian and Cypriot graffiti. Jean Yoyotte’s Greek
studies occupied the rest of his life, much of the time
with the scientific collaboration of Olivier Masson and
then, in recent years, with André Bernand.

For a quarter century at the École Pratique des Hautes

Études, and then for six years at the Collège de France,
Jean Yoyotte imparted rich and varied learning,

50 THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE - N° 5

 Léon BRILLOUIN
F ROM WAVES TO INFORMATION
by Rémy Mosseri
© AIP Emilio Segre Visual Archives

Léon Brillouin (1889–1969) taught physics theory at the scrambling, which earned him the Legion of Honour.
Collège de France from 1932 to 1948. Additionally, he was
heir to a great scientific legacy that strengthened his After the war he resumed his research on solids. By
attachment to this prestigious institution, for he followed in analysing the interaction between an incidental light wave
the footsteps of both his grandfather, Eleuthère Mascart, and vibration waves in a solid, he made his most original
chair of Experimental Physics from 1872 to 1908 (succeeded discovery: the prediction—which preceded its experimental
by Paul Langevin), and his father, Marcel Brillouin, chair of verification by nearly ten years—of a subtle coupling
Physics Theory and Mathematics from 1900 to 1931. between the two types of wave, and the fact that this
produced an exchange of energy and thus of wavelength
As the surname Brillouin was already associated with for the light escaping from the solid.
many breakthroughs in physics, the young Léon also had
to find a place for himself—and succeeded brilliantly in The Brillouin effect was to traverse the century, triggering
doing so. The work of this scientist, at the summit of increased interest from the 1960s when lasers became
French physics theory between the two World Wars, both common features in laboratories and made it possible to
witnessing and taking part in the quantum revolution and amplify measurements. Even today, it is still an essential tool
covering a vast range of subjects, illustrates a significant for highly accurate analysis of the elastic properties of solids.
part of modern physics. In this article we consider one of
the main themes underlying his scientific career, from the With the advent of quantum mechanics in the 1920s, Léon
physics of undulatory phenomena to information theory in Brillouin contributed to various aspects of the new theory,
the immediate post-WWII years. including magnetism, where the “Brillouin functions”
enhanced the classical “Langevin function”. In parallel he
The young Léon first worked on waves as early as 1913, also developed a famous method of approximation known
during a year spent training in Munich under the already by the names of Brillouin, Wentzel and Kramers.
famous physicist Arnold Sommerfeld, after graduating
from the École Normale Supérieure. His research there It was likewise in the field of wave propagation that Léon
won him renown, particularly his prediction of the Brillouin signed another famous study. He was seeking to
existence of a precursor signal—which since then has describe the behaviour of the wave, that is now associated
borne his name—that precedes electromagnetic waves with any material particle, and in particular with the
propagated in a dispersive environment. Back in France electron, when it interacts with the periodic arrangements
he started to work on his thesis, with the project of of atoms in crystals. Brillouin worked in so-called
building a solid state equation somewhat similar, for “reciprocal” space, where a vector represents a wave filling
matter, to the famous relationship between pressure, the entire space of the crystal. He showed how to divide
volume and temperature in gasses. But this difficult work, this space into planes forming a set of “Brillouin zones”,
which led him to clarify the notion of “radiation thus making it possible to unambiguously identify all the
pressure”, was soon interrupted by the outbreak of the waves, the planes themselves corresponding to those waves
war in 1914. Léon Brillouin was assigned to the whose propagation is impossible in the crystal. This work
Laboratoire Central de Radio-télégraphie under the paved the way to modern solid state physics and in
authority of the (future) General Ferrié. In that context he particular to understanding the differences between
investigated undulatory problems from a more concrete isolating and conducting materials.
angle, through antennae studies, radio-piloting and

N° 5 - THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE 51

 At that stage, in 1930, Léon Brillouin was the first physics radars that would contribute so much to the Allies’
professor of the brand new Institut Henri Poincaré, from supremacy. His participation was officially recognized by
which he resigned two years later to join the Collège de the US authorities, albeit at a late stage.
France. He was at the height of his scientific career and his
reputation stretched way beyond the French community. After the Liberation his return to France turned out to be
The effect that he had predicted several years earlier had somewhat complicated. Did he feel that there was little
clearly been observed in liquids and solids—an enthusiasm to have him back in Paris, or did he want to
achievement that he hoped would be recognized by the remain in the US because he sensed the tremendous
Nobel jury but never was. scientific interest of the first generation of computers that
he saw being developed at Harvard? He postponed his
His research in the 1930s at the Collège primarily return, content to make short visits to resume his lectures
concerned what is known as the quantum N-body at the Collège de France where he was eagerly awaited,
problem, and is too technical to summarize here. But he especially by those who, cut off from scientific progress
also opened his seminars to concrete problems (such as under the occupation, aspired to rapidly catching up. But
acoustics) and pluridisciplinary ones, and started to the Collège rules prohibited this intermittent presence, and
develop a growing taste for epistemological questions. Léon Brillouin finally chose to remain in the United States
and even to adopt US nationality in 1949. He already had
As the spectre of global conflict loomed once again, a place of choice among the American scientific elite,
political decisions were taken concerning radio sanctioned by his election to the National Academy of
broadcasting, with a view to creating a powerful and Sciences in 1953.
effective tool. In July 1939 Léon Brillouin was appointed
head of radio broadcasting, with the prime objective of In the immediate post-WWII years he developed a passion
reducing France’s technological backwardness in for the new Information theory spawned by the work of
comparison with Germany, and above all equipping the Shannon and Weaver. His book Science and Theory of
country with powerful short-wave transmitters, which it Information made Léon Brillouin one of the main vehicles
lacked. During France’s disastrous defeat of May-June of the success of this theory. In it he tackled the old
1940 he gave the order to destroy all the transmitters problem of Maxwell’s demon which continued to
before they fell into enemy hands. He then joined the undermine the bases of thermodynamics, and even thought
complex operation headed by biologist Louis Rapkine, that he had solved it, concluding that “the demon is old
which enabled tens of scientists to leave France for the now and it is time to retire it”. But his argumentation,
United States during the first two years of the war. This apparently very sound, was nevertheless refuted some
was how Léon Brillouin arrived in New York in May thirty years later by Charles Bennet.
1941. He became a member of the Free French Forces and
rapidly sought to participate in the US war effort, rightly It is difficult not to conclude that by returning to France,
believing that his recent research on magnetron theory Brillouin would surely have made a valuable contribution
would interest the engineers feverishly developing the on the country’s scientific scene. Merely listing some of his
last centres of interest, such as non-linear physics and
biophysics, unambiguously places him in the flow of
science in the making. In certain respects, he even seems to
have been a visionary. And there seems little doubt that his
passion for the philosophy of science would have led him
to involve himself more forcefully in France (as he was
already doing from the United States) in debates at the
1
frontiers and interfaces between disciplines. That is an area
where, even more so than within the various fields, the
migration of concepts requires a scholarly combination of
openness and rigour—qualities that Léon Brillouin
embodied so well. 
Rémy Mosseri
Senior Researcher, CNRS
Pierre and Marie Curie University

Further reading:
Fifth Solvay International Conference on Electrons and Photons, Brussels,
October 1927. Rémy Mosseri,
1. Léon Brillouin Léon Brillouin, à la croisée des ondes,
© Benjamin Couprie, International Solvay Institutes for Physics and Chemistry Éditions Belin, Paris 1999.

52 THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE - N° 5

INSTITUTIONAL
NEWS
 T HE G ENERAL L IBRARY OF
THE C OLLÈGE DE F RANCE
by Marie-Renée Cazabon
Curator

Library and Archive Services

The libraries of the Collège de France, including the specialized will unite all the different catalogues of the specialized libraries
collections on the Near East, the Far East, Byzantium and and of the General Library in a single catalogue. It will
Egyptology, are amongst the richest and most beautiful libraries moreover be enhanced with current tools for networked
in Europe. Their core components, the General Library and the research of online documents, using the library portal.
Archives, have now been moved back to the Marcelin-Berthelot  Join the national dynamic in this domain: for instance, the

campus. Two thousand square metres of space have been General Library of the Collège de France and the specialized
entirely renovated and are now ready to receive French and libraries currently take part in the main unifying higher
foreign researchers in the best possible conditions (access to the education projects, SUDOC (système universitaire de
network, large catalogues and databases, and eventually remote documentation—university library system), and will eventually
consultation of digitized volumes). participate in CALAMES (catalogue en ligne des archives et des
manuscrits de l’enseignement supérieur—online catalogue for
This is all coordinated by the Library and Archive Services, the higher education archives and manuscripts).
purpose of which is to:  Host researchers: the new space will allow for researchers

 Ensure coordination with all Collège de France libraries, to be hosted far more comfortably and for three essential
including: functions to be developed:
- expert advice in library science, standardization and - memory function: collecting, identifying, preserving and
unification of professional procedures, including in the domain disseminating publications by and about the professors and
of archives; their teachings, and about the history of the Collège de France,
- centralization of the acquisition, subscription and binding regardless of the format;
markets; - interdisciplinary function: updating and making available
- centralization of inter-library loans (ILL), and pooling of work tools of interest to several Chairs or several groups of
resources; Chairs;
- development of partnerships with libraries from outside the - external function: extending the use of its resources beyond
Collège de France. its own teams (hosting foreign researchers or researchers from
 Connect all these libraries through a single computerized partner institutions, searching for and providing material using
management system: ALEPH. This is an integrated library the ILL system, accessing external resources using the library
management system (ILMS) funded through patronage, which portal).

Collaboration and partnerships

With both scientific and economic objectives in mind, Orientales (INALCO—national institute of oriental
the specialized libraries and the General Library of the languages and civilizations); the Bibliothèque Inter-
Collège de France have developed ties, confirmed in universitaire de Médecine (BIUM—inter-university
some cases by agreements, with various partners: the medical library); the Institut Mémoire de l’Edition
Bibliothèque Universitaire des Langues et Civilisations Contemporaine (IMEC—institute for the memory of
(BULAC—university library of languages and contemporary publishing); the Institut de Recherche et
civilizations); the École Normale Supérieure, rue d’Ulm; d’Histoire des Textes (IRHT—institute for textual
the Institut National des Langues et Civilisations research and history) of the CNRS.

54 THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE - N° 5

The computerization of the libraries

Thanks to patronages, particularly that of Mr Michel Users have access to an electronic resource portal organized
David-Weill, the library service has developed and and catalogued by the libraries of the Collège de France.
implemented a common tool for all the libraries: a single The portal offers a complete display of the information
catalogue allowing access from anywhere to all of the sources offered by the institution’s libraries.
bibliographical descriptions of the collections available in
the various libraries of the Collège de France. The different For each item, users can choose the services offered by the
catalogues of the libraries have been uploaded to an libraries such as, for instance, access to the full text. A
integrated library management system (ILMS) known as personal page with a basket, a list of favourite resources,
ALEPH. Apart from the possibility of searching for the automatic alert management and a history of searches is
description of a publication as in any catalogue, the offered to any authenticated user.
numerous resources offered by this system make it a very
powerful reference tool. For computer searches, users are offered a number of
services and links that allow them, when consulting
ALEPH is used in a large number of higher education bibliographical references, to access complementary
libraries in France. It applies the most recent library science information systems. Another application concerns the
and computing standards, as well as the essential management of digital collections. It includes functionalities
functionalities required of a catalogue. ALEPH moreover specifically dedicated to the conservation of digital
includes the Unicode standard which allows for the original documents and to managing the registration of copyrights
language and edition of publications to be catalogued. It of and digital material. This application offers the guarantee of
course also offers the possibility of networking and long-term access to this material and uses technologies
exchanging data with the SUDOC (collective catalogue of included in ALEPH to catalogue and index the data. 
the higher education and research libraries).

The General and Scientific Library nominated for three years by the Assembly of Professors
Located in new premises, Place Marcelin-Berthelot, the of the Collège de France upon recommendation by the
General and Scientific Library has a collection of some Administrator of the Collège de France. Some institutes
120,000 publications (sciences of Antiquity, literature, publish collections and have scientific archives which are
history, history of art, various specialized collections, open to researchers, except when research on the
scientific publications) and a very wide range of scientific collections themselves is ongoing or planned. The
periodicals that can be accessed freely. institutes work closely with research teams that have
Its main aims are to preserve the publications of the access there to study and group meeting areas.
Professors and some of their archives, as well as the
written and audiovisual archives of the institution, to The Institutes of the Far East offer access to the very rich
provide a bibliographical search tool, and to manage material of the library of the Société Asiatique (Asian
electronic resources. The reading hall has 58 seats and six Society), when these are not otherwise accessible due to
carrels. a shortage of staff. The loan of books from the Société
Asiatique and consultation of its archives is for members
The Oriental libraries only.
The Oriental Institutes are situated at 52 rue du Cardinal-
Lemoine, and count five libraries and research units The Social Anthropology Library
(Institutes of Egyptology, of the Far East, of the Ancient The Social Anthropology Library is one of the three
Near East, of Byzantine Studies, and of Arabic, Turkish reference libraries in the Paris area for anthropology. It
and Islamic Studies). Each institute is directly managed works closely with the CNRS and the École des Hautes
by a Professor, when there is one in the relevant discipline, Études en Sciences Sociales (School of Advanced Studies
assisted by a scientific committee that is representative of in Social Science).
all researchers in the field. The committee members are

N° 5 - THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE 55

 PARIS SCIENCE ET LETTRES - Quartier Latin
PARIS SCIENCE AND HUMANITIES–Latin Quarter

The grouping together of five quality research, based on a method of journeys”, as illustrated on the map
institutions to form a campus of learning through research that is unique below.
international renown, at the heart of the in our country.
Latin Quarter, contributes to enhancing Paris Sciences et Lettres will also have a
the visibility and appeal of French Selection is in fact a founding rule, and policy of social and societal openness,
learning and research. top-level training and research are the especially through the dissemination of
The aim of Paris Sciences et Lettres - sole objectives. These two values are knowledge via a digital campus
Quartier Latin is to: essential to performing research and accessible to all.
 ensure that the Latin Quarter provide a sound guarantee of this
remains an exceptional site of higher group’s ability to rank among the best Within the framework of Operation
education and research, by coordinating research centres in France. Campus, Paris Sciences et Lettres has
investments in real estate and in applied for the financial support
literature and digital equipment; The motto of Paris Sciences et Lettres, essential to achieve its objectives. The
 increase synergies and the pooling of “Let us share what makes us unique”, legal status of Foundation for Scientific
teaching and research activities, by is fully meaningful here. Cooperation was chosen to ensure
developing multidisciplinary activities The ambition of Paris Sciences et tight-knit, reactive and collegial
and interfaces, and by working on Lettres is to create, on the Montagne governance that will respect the
common research projects; Sainte-Geneviève and in the identity of each institution. The
 undertake strategic reflection on and surrounding area, an urban campus statutes have been registered at the
adopt a common long-term approach to promoting the free movement of Ministry of Higher Education and
emerging themes; students and researchers. Prestigious Research. The Foundation is governed
 enhance France’s international Chairs, research units, and the hosting by a scientific steering committee and a
visibility and appeal by creating Chairs of international researchers, post- 16-member board of governors
of excellence, organizing calls for doctoral researchers and students will chaired by a distinguished scientific
proposals for post-doctoral researchers be shared on this campus, which will personality, a select steering committee,
and young teams, and implementing be concretely embedded in the urban and a general delegate for its
systems for hosting researchers and fabric through “researchers’ management. 
supporting international mobility.

The Paris Science and Humanities group

is made up of institutions which, for
centuries, have consistently contributed
to the advancement of French science
and humanities: the École Normale
Supérieure, the Collège de France, the
Observatoire de Paris, the École
Supérieure de Physique et de Chimie
Industrielles de la ville de
Paris–ParisTech, and the École
Nationale Supérieure de Chimie de
Paris–ParisTech. Together on the
Montagne Sainte-Genevieve, these
institutions form a continuum of higher
education and research that covers all
academic disciplines (from classical
humanities to most innovative sciences).

This grouping is defined by a common

commitment to achieving very high

56 THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE - N° 5

 S URVEY
WHO ARE THE AUDIENCES OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE’S LECTURES?
Since its creation in 1530, 691 know only from memory and by This survey was designed to
professors have taught at the Collège observing the entry into the lectures, supplement another one on a new
de France, and 42 have held Annual that certain lecture halls are audience category: users of the
Chairs. We know their names, their sometimes overflowing, forcing us to audio and video recordings that
specialties, their age when they were turn down certain attendees or to have been available for the past
first appointed to the chair, the offer them the possibility of three years on the Collège’s website.
period of time for which they taught, following a video broadcast in Our findings show that this
etc (1). But what of the people who another room. In order to know a population differs noticeably from
attended their lectures? One of the little more—and to our knowledge, the one present in the lecture halls,
Collège’s fundamental rules being for the first time—a survey was and substantially increases overall
freedom of access to all teaching, undertaken at the beginning of 2010, audience figures. The following is a
without any prior registration nor focused on the people who attended comparative presentation of some
examinations, no information is the lectures delivered during the of the results of both surveys.
available on this population. We observation period.

Audiences on campus and online: two very different populations

The fact that lectures at the Collège does not correspond to the Distribution by age of the respondents to the survey on
de France are held in the centre of characteristics of the whole of the audiences at the Collège, compared to the distribution in
the French population aged 15 and over (INSEE, 2006).
Paris, during regular teaching hours French population (over the age of
(therefore competing with 15), as the attached graph shows
professional or study-related with regard to age distribution, for
activities) and do not lead to any example. This difference is however
formal qualification, strongly smaller in the case of people
determines the profile of those who attending lectures in the
attend. A total of 95% live in Île- mathematical, physical or natural
de-France (i.e. Paris and sciences, where 43% are 55 or
surrounding areas), 83% are aged older, and 48% are unemployed or Age

55 or over, and 72% are either retired.  INSEE  Survey respondents

unemployed or retired. This clearly

The survey at the Collège de France took place from mid- which is acceptable for a survey of this kind (the real rate is
January to mid-February 2010, on all the individuals who moreover higher, since the same person may log on several
attended one of the 26 courses delivered during that period times but answer only once). It is however impossible to
(out of a total of 47 in 2009–2010). By indirect calculation know whether the individuals who agreed to participate in
we estimate the participation rate at roughly 75%, which the survey differ from the overall profile of the population
means that the 1,973 questionnaires returned are concerned as regards its specific characteristics, behaviours
representative of the audiences who attend lectures at the and degree of satisfaction.
Collège.
The survey was carried out by the Cultural Affairs Division
The online survey was carried out in two main waves of of the Collège de France, under the supervision of Professor
three weeks each, in June 2009 and February 2010 (to cover Henri Leridon, chair of Sustainable Development-
two different periods in the year). A total of 9,533 Environment, Energy & Society, and Research Director
exploitable answers were received. Compared to the total Emeritus at the INED (Institut national d’études
number of visits to the website during those same periods, démographiques).
this figure corresponds to a response rate of about 6%,

N° 5 - THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE 57

 Within this category, 18% of the France, while 35% live elsewhere in people in the 15–24 age-group
listeners are students or researchers France and 14% abroad. This (which is hardly surprising) and a
(41% in SMPN lectures - Physical, majority of inhabitants of Île-de- larger proportion in the 25–34 age-
Mathematical and Natural Sciences, France within the French audience group. The latter finding can be
and 9% in SHS - Humanities and has two explanations. First, the Île-de- ascribed to the interest shown by
Social Sciences), and the great France region is home to a high students, teachers and researchers.
majority said that they attended these proportion of students, teachers and Here this group accounts for 43%
lectures primarily for their own researchers (it accounts for 40% of of the total, against 18% of the
interest and culture (89%). Men and researchers in the country). Second, audiences of lectures on campus,
women are equally represented. The because the Collège de France is and unemployed/retired persons
cultural level is high: nearly 70% located in Paris, it is not nearly as account for only 23%, against 72%
belong to the category of “senior well-known in other regions where, (see Table below).
management or higher professionals”, before online access to lectures, it was
against 10% in the whole of the almost impossible to take advantage Within this population, which is
French population. of its teaching (with the noteworthy more representative of what can be
exception of broadcasts on the radio considered as the Collège’s natural
station France Culture, and a few “target”, 25% of respondents said
Reasons given by the web site users lectures scheduled every year in other that they listened to lectures as part
cities). The relatively high proportions of their study, research or teaching
of respondents in the provinces and activities. Note that 66% of these
especially abroad are therefore by no audiences are men (2).
means insignificant. In the latter case
the problem of language is an Finally, social bias is less marked in
additional obstacle. Web audiences: 46% are in the senior
management/higher professional
Another difference compared to category, against 70% of the
audiences on campus in Paris is the audiences at the Collège. Note also
Roughly two thirds of the survey respondents age distribution in the Web that the online questionnaire did not
use the website for their personal interest, and
the remaining 35% visit it either for professional audiences. The 55 and over age contain questions on the type of
purposes (10%) or for research (25%). group accounts for only a third, lecture listened to (by discipline).
which corresponds to the general
Those who took part in the online population, while the rest of the
study are not affected by the distribution differs from the French
geographical constraint. However, the population as a whole only in so far
majority (51%) still do live in Île-de- as there is a smaller proportion of

Occupational situation of respondents to the survey on campus

(by disciplinary field) and the online survey.

Sector affiliation Amphitheater survey Internet survey

SHS SMPN Together

Humanities and Physics, Mathematics
Social Sciences and Natural Science

Education, Research 5% 29% 11% 25%

Student 4% 12% 7% 18%

No occupation, retired 81% 48% 72% 23%

Other (working) 10% 11% 10% 34%

58 THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE - N° 5

Some findings on Web audiences’ practices

Although the online offer is fairly document available online. On category, 18% heard about this
recent, a large proportion of the average, each Internet user had possibility when they attended
audiences are already regular downloaded 5 documents over the lectures at the Collège, and the same
listeners: 20% of the respondents previous 12 months. “Heavy users” proportion by listening to lectures
first visited the website at least three (at least 15 files downloaded per broadcast on the radio station
years previously, and 33% first year) account for 14% of all those France Culture (30% of listeners in
visited it between one and three who downloaded at least once. The the provinces). Moreover, 33% of
years previously. Just under 23% main mode of listening is on the respondents who attended
said they visited the website at least computer (80%), either online or lectures on campus said they also
once a week, and 32% at least once after downloading the file. Mobile listened to lectures on the website,
a month. In contrast, another part devices follow, at 17%. This 15% said they also listened to audio
of the population is either new (one medium is preferred by younger podcasts, and 13% to video
quarter first visited the site less than audiences: 23% in the under-35 age recordings. Within that category,
three months earlier) or occasional group. Few Internet users (19%) 22% also listened to lectures
(34% log on no more than once or said they use podcasts, which would broadcast on France Culture.
twice every quarter). enable them to download audio or
video files in a format that can be Finally, on the whole the
It is noteworthy that Web audiences used on a mobile device. In contrast, respondents said they were very
are interested in all types of media: a majority of heavy users subscribe satisfied with the content of the
44% said they download texts, to podcasts (54%). lectures and with the technical
43% download audio files, and conditions of access to material on
33% download video files (multiple There are some points in common the website.
answers are of course possible). between these two types of audience
These proportions reflect roughly of Collège de France lectures (on
those of the various types of campus and distance). In the latter

To conclude

The online offer has substantially website for teaching or research certainly make a significant
increased the size and composition purposes. An obvious obstacle to difference to the Collège de France’s
of the population that can benefit better international dissemination is renown and reputation if this offer
from Collège de France lectures. language: for the moment only a could be expanded. 
New beneficiaries are on the whole minority of lectures and seminars Professor Henri Leridon
much younger and usually visit the are available in English. It would

Main motivation for listening to the lectures, of respondents to the survey on campus
(according to disciplinary field) and respondents to the online survey

Amphitheater survey* Web survey

SHS SMPN Together

Education, students,
research 8% 38% 16% 25%

General knowledge 95% 71% 89% 63%

* (possible double quotes)

SHS = Humanities and Social Sciences SMPN = Physics, Mathematics and Natural Science

1. A demographic analysis will be presented in a later issue of the Letter.

2. We also made comparisons with the entire French population who has Internet access. In 2008, 61% of French households had Internet access at home
(58% of whom had a high-speed connection). We found that the proportion of individuals aged 55 and over is lower in the population of Internet users (17%
against 33% in our survey), and that women are in the minority.

N° 5 - THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE 59

FA C T S A N D
D ATA
 C OLLÈGE DE F RANCE O RGANIZATION C HART
Administrator of the Collège de France: Pierre CORVOL
The Administrator is a Collège de France professor elected by his/her colleagues to direct the institution for 3 years.

Professors of the Collège de France

I – MATHEMATICAL, PHYSICAL AND NATURAL SCIENCES

Mathematics
 Analysis and Geometry — Alain CONNES

 Partial Differential Equations and Applications — Pierre-Louis LIONS

 Differential Equations and Dynamical Systems — Jean-Christophe YOCCOZ

 Number Theory — Don ZAGIER

Physics
 Mesoscopic Physics — Michel DEVORET

 Physics of Condensed Matter — Antoine GEORGES

 Quantum Physics — Serge HAROCHE

 Observational Astrophysics — Antoine LABEYRIE

 Elementary Particles, Gravitation and Cosmology — Gabriele VENEZIANO

Natural sciences
 Biology and Genetics of Development — Spyros ARTAVANIS-TSAKONAS

 Climate and Ocean Evolution — Édouard BARD

 Human Paleontology — Michel BRUNET

 Experimental Medicine — Pierre CORVOL

 Experimental Cognitive Psychology — Stanislas DEHAENE

 Chemistry of biological processes — Marc FONTECAVE

 Molecular Immunology — Philippe KOURILSKY

 Human Genetics — Jean-Louis MANDEL

 Genetics and Cellular Physiology — Christine PETIT

 Morphogenetic Processes — Alain PROCHIANTZ

 Microbiology and infectious diseases — Philippe SANSONETTI

II – HUMAN AND SOCIAL SCIENCES

Historical, Philological, Archaeological Sciences
 History and Civilization of the Achaemenid World and of the Empire of Alexander — Pierre BRIANT

 Intellectual History of China — Anne CHENG

 Modern and Contemporary French Literature: History, Criticism, Theory — Antoine COMPAGNON

 Assyriology — Jean-Marie DURAND

 History of India and Greater India — Gérard FUSSMAN

 Pharaonic Civilization: Archaeology, Philology, History — Nicolas GRIMAL

 Indo-Iranian Languages and Religions — Jean KELLENS

 Epigraphy and History of the Ancient Greek Cities — Denis KNOEPFLER

 Modern Literatures of Neo-Latin Europe — Carlo OSSOLA

 History of European Medieval and Modern Art — Roland RECHT

 The Hebrew Bible and/in its contexts — Thomas RÖMER

 Religion, Institutions and Society in Ancient Rome — John SCHEID

 Turkish and Ottoman History — Gilles VEINSTEIN

 History of Modern China — Pierre-Etienne WILL

 Literatures of Medieval France — Michel ZINK

Philosophy, sociology
 Writings and cultures in modern Europe — Roger CHARTIER

 Comparative Legal Studies and Internationalization of Law — Mireille DELMAS-MARTY

 Anthropology of Nature — Philippe DESCOLA

 Rationality and Social Science — Jon ELSTER

 Economic Theory and Social Organization — Roger GUESNERIE

62 THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE - N° 5

 Contemporary Arab History — Henry LAURENS
 Modern and Contemporary History of Politics — Pierre ROSANVALLON

III – ANNUAL CHAIRS 2010–2011

 Information Technology and Digital Sciences — Martin ABADI
 Artistic Creation — Anselm KIEFER

 Knowledge against Poverty — Ismail SERAGELDIN

 Sustainable Development—Environment, Energy and Society — Jean-Marie TARASCON

 Technological Innovation Liliane Bettencourt — Elias ZERHOUNI

Emeritus Professors of the Collège de France

 Anatole ABRAGAM — Nuclear Magnetism

 Maurice AGULHON — Contemporary French History
 Etienne-Emile BAULIEU — Bases and Principles of Human Reproduction
 Alain BERTHOZ — Physiology of Perception and Action
 Georges BLIN — Modern French Literature
 Yves BONNEFOY — Comparative Studies of the Poetic Function
 Pierre BOULEZ — Invention, Technique and Language in Music
 Jacques BOUVERESSE — Philosophy of Language and Knowledge
 Pierre CHAMBON — Molecular Genetics
 Jean-Pierre CHANGEUX — Cellular Communication
 Claude COHEN-TANNOUDJI — Atomic and Molecular Physics
 Yves COPPENS — Palaeontology and Prehistory
 François-Xavier COQUIN — Modern and Contemporary Russian History
 Gilbert DAGRON — Byzantine History and Civilization
 Jean DELUMEAU — History of Religious Mentalities
 Michael EDWARDS — Literary Creation in English
 Anne FAGOT-LARGEAULT — Philosophy of Life Science
 Marcel FROISSART — Corpuscular Physics
 Marc FUMAROLI — Rhetoric and Society in 16th and 17th century Europe
 Jacques GERNET — Social and Intellectual History of China
 Jacques GLOWINSKI — Neuropharmacology
 Christian GOUDINEAU — National Antiquities
 Gilles Gaston GRANGER — Comparative Epistemology
 François GROS — Cellular Biochemistry
 Jean GUILAINE — European Civilizations in the Neolithic and the Bronze Age
 Ian HACKING — Philosophy and History of Scientific Concepts
 Claude HAGÈGE — Linguistic Theory
 Françoise HÉRITIER — Comparative Studies of African Societies
 François JACOB — Cellular Genetics
 Pierre JOLIOT — Cellular Bioenergetics
 Yves LAPORTE — Neurophysiology
 Jean LECLANT — Egyptology
 Nicole LE DOUARIN — Molecular and Cellular Embryology
 Jean-Marie LEHN — Chemistry of Molecular Interactions
 Xavier LE PICHON — Geodynamics
 Georges LE RIDER — Economic and Monetary History of the Hellenistic Orient
 Emmanuel LE ROY LADURIE — History of Modern Civilization
 Jacques LIVAGE — Chemistry of Condensed Matter
 Edmond MALINVAUD — Economic Analysis
 André MIQUEL — Classical Arabic Language and Literature
 Philippe NOZIÈRES — Statistical Physics
 Jean-Claude PECKER — Theoretical Astrophysics
 Armand de RICQLÈS — Historical Biology and Evolutionism
 Daniel ROCHE — French History in the Age of the Enlightenment

N° 5 - THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE 63

  Jacqueline de ROMILLY — Greece and the Development of Moral and Political Thinking
 Jean-Pierre SERRE — Algebra and Geometry
 Michel TARDIEU — History of Syncretisms in Late Antiquity
 Javier TEIXIDOR — Semitic Antiquities
 Jacques THUILLIER — History of Artistic Creation in France
 Jacques TITS — Group Theory
 Pierre TOUBERT — Occidental History
 Paul-Marie VEYNE — History of Rome
 Nathan WACHTEL — History and Anthropology of Meso- and South American Societies
 Harald WEINRICH — Romance Languages and Literatures

L ECTURES G IVEN BY THE P ROFESSORS A BROAD

AUSTRALIA
 University of Melbourne

 Stanislas DEHAENE (Chair of Experimental Cognitive Psychology)

The Global Neuronal Workspace Model of Conscious Processing (2 lectures and seminars)

BELGIUM
 Free University of Brussels

 Pierre ROSANVALLON (Chair of Modern and Contemporary History of Politics)

Democratic equality: History and theory.

 Serge HAROCHE (Chair of Quantum Physics)

Non-destructive photon measurement: New insights (4 lectures)

CANADA
 University of Montreal

 Jean-Marie LEHN (Chair of Chemistry of Molecular Interactions)

From Supramolecular Chemistry towards Adaptative Chemistry (4 lectures)

CHAD
 University of N’Djamena

 Michel BRUNET (Chair of Human Paleontology)

Origin of the Hominids: Abel and Toumaï, two brilliant confirmations of Darwin’s prediction (1871)

CZECH REPUBLIC
 Academy of Sciences, Institute of Physiology

 Alain BERTHOZ (Chair of Physiology of Perception and Action)

Plasticity and vicariance: The brain as an emulator.

 Charles University, Prague

 Antoine COMPAGNON (Chair of Modern and Contemporary French Literature: History,

Criticism, Theory)
The Future of the French Culture

DENMARK
 University of Copenhagen

 Alain BERTHOZ (Chair of Physiology of Perception and Action)

Plasticity and vicariance: The brain as an emulator.

GERMANY
 University of Bonn (Ernst Robert Curtius chair)Germany

 Jacques BOUVERESSE (Chair of Philosophy of Language and Knowledge)

Literature, knowledge and moral philosophy

 Bauhaus-University Weimar

 Alain BERTHOZ (Chair of Physiology of Perception and Action)

Plasticity and vicariance: The brain as an emulator.

64 THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE - N° 5

INDIA
 Indian Academy of Sciences, Bangalore

 Marc FONTECAVE (Chair of Chemistry of Biological Processes)

Biological Chemistry: Enzymes and Metalloenzymes (3 lectures and seminars)

 National Centre for Biological Sciences, Bangalore

 Spyros ARTAVANIS-TSAKONAS (Chair of Developmental Biology and Genetics)

Tracing Biological thought from Aristotle to the Genome (3 lectures)

ITALY
 University of Macerata
 Anne Cheng (Chair of Intellectual History of China)

Reception of some European ideas in modern China: the category of philosophy.

Reception of some European ideas in modern China: the concept of freedom.

MEXICO
 Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México

 Philippe DESCOLA (Chair of Anthropology of Nature)

Cosmologia y ontologia: un enfoque antropológico. (4 lectures)

SWEDEN
 Uppsala University

 Jean-Marie LEHN (Chair of Chemistry of Molecular Interactions)

From Supramolecular Chemistry towards Adaptative Chemistry (4 lectures)

 Stockholm Brain Institute, Karolinska Institute

 Alain BERTHOZ (Chair of Physiology of Perception and Action)

Plasticity and vicariance: The brain as an emulator.

SWITZERLAND
 École polytechnique fédérale de Lausanne - University of Lausanne

 Alain PROCHIANTZ (Chair of Morphogenetic Processes)

Transduction proteins (9 seminars)

TAÏWAN
 French School of the Far East, Taipei

 Anne Cheng (Chair of Intellectual History of China)

Contemporary debates on the relationships between ethics and politics in reference to The Great
Learning—Daxue Confucean studies in France: an overview

UNITED KINGDOM
 University of Edinburgh

 Jean-Marie LEHN (Chair of Chemistry of Molecular Interactions)

From Supramolecular Chemistry towards Adaptative Chemistry (4 lectures)

UNITED STATES
 University of Chicago

 Thomas RÖMER (Chair of The Hebrew Bible and/in its Contexts)

Israel’s First History (3 lectures)

Current Research on the Pentateuch (3 seminars)
 Yale University, New Haven

 Michel DEVORET (Chair of Mesoscopic Physics)

Introduction to Mesoscopic Physics (3 lectures)

N° 5 - THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE 65

 L ECTURES AND L ECTURE S ERIES
BY F OREIGN P ROFESSORS
I NVITED BY THE A SSEMBLY OF THE P ROFESSORS

I. State chairs reserved for foreign scholars

 Eliezer RABINOVICI, Professor, Racah Institute of Physics, Jérusalem (Israel), Oct. 2009
1–2. Black Holes, String Theory and Phases of Gravity
3. Black Holes, String Theory and Gravitational Singularities
4. Black Holes, String Theory and Information Aspects.

 Stephen MANN, Professor, University of Bristol (Great Britain), Oct. 2009

Biomineralization. Principles and Concepts in Bioinorganic Materials Chemistry
1. Biominerals—Types and Functions
2. General Principles and Chemical Control
3. Matrix-mediated Biomineralization
4. Morphogenesis an Biomineral Tectonics.

 Tamar FLASH, Professor, Weizmann Institute of Sciences, Rehovot (Israel), Oct. 2009
Neural Control of Movement: Principles and Models
1. Human Trajectory Planning: Historical Perspectives and Current Research Directions
2. From Motion Plans to Motor Execution
3. On the Contruction and Perception of Complex Movements
4. Motor Learning and Adaptation of Motor Actions.

 Jack SASSON, Professor, Vanderbilt University (USA), Oct.–Nov. 2009

Extraits d’un commentaire au livre des juges : quatre lectures sur l’art et les techniques
narratologiques bibliques :
1. Fragments et cohérence : le livre des juges à la lumière des documents mésopotamiens ;
2. Otniel et Ehud : l’analyse générique de leurs récits ;
3. Les deux mères de Sisera et le poème didactique de Déborah ;
4. Jephté : portrait d’un héros manqué.

 Christian LETZ, Professor, University of Tübingen (Germany), Nov. 2009

1. Le grand Hymne athribite des noms de la déesse Répit
2. Le défilé des dieux des provinces à Dendara, Philae et Athribis
3. La décoration du temple de kom Ombo et la fonction de ses divers éléments.

 Mark GARRISON, Professor, University of San-Antonio (USA), Nov. 2009

New Light on Persepolis: The Glyptic Imagery from the persepolis Fortification and Treasury Archives
1. Seals and Archives at Persepolis: an introduction
2. Glyptic Imagery as Social Identity: The Seals of Zissawis
3. The Religous Landscape at Persepolis: New Glyptic Evidence for the So-Called « Fire Altars »
4. Glyptic imagery and Ideology: The Emergence of a Visual Language of Empire at Persepolis.

 Isabelle PERETZ, Professor, University of Montreal (Canada), Nov.–Dec. 2009

Cognitive Neuroscience of music.

 Roger HEACOCK, Professor, Birzeit University (Palestine), Nov. 2009

La Palestine, un kaleidoscope disciplinaire
1. Palestine et histoire : le temps perdu
2. Palestine et espace : le territoire éclaté
3. Palestine et identité : la société résistante
4. Palestine et discours : la perspective implosée.

66 THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE - N° 5

 Lodovica BRAIDA, Professor, University of Milano (Italy), Nov.–Dec. 2009
Pour une histoire de la culture écrite en Italie (XVIe-XVIIIe siècles)
1. Les lettres en typographie. Inquiétudes religieuses et modèles linguistiques dans les manuels
épistolaires du XVIe siècle
2. Les livres de lettres à l’Index. Censure et autocensure
3. Les genres de large circulation. Textes, formes et usages des livres
4. L’auteur absent. La réflexion sur la propriété littéraire au XVIIIe siècle.

 Yoshihito NAKAMURA, Professor, Tokyo University (Japan), Nov.–Dec. 2009

Challenges in Humanoid Robotics
1. Toward Humanoid Robots Accumulating Human Behaviors;
2. Toward Humanoid Robots Understanding Human Sensation
3. Toward Humanoid Robots Communicating with Humans.

 Souleymane Bachir DIAGNE, Professor, Columbia University (USA), Dec. 2009–Jan. 2010
1. Bergson et la pensée de L. S. Senghor
2. L.S. Senghor et la philosophie du socialisme africain
3. Bergson et la philosophie iqbalienne de l’ijtihad
4. Leibniz, Bergson, iqbal et le Fatum mahometanum.

 Daniel HELLER ROAZEN, Professor, Princeton University (USA), Jan. 2010

Harmonies et disharmonies du monde. Le son, le mètre et le nombre, de Pythagore à Nicole Oresme
1. Dans la forge. L’invention de la consonance
2. De l’arithmétique à l’art rythmique
3. « Musique naturelle » et langues vulgaires
4. Brisures du cosmos.

 Itzhak FRIED, Professor, University of California, Los Angeles (USA) and University of Tel-Aviv (Israel),
Feb. 2010
1. Matter and Memory: Stimulation and Recordings in the Human Temporal Lobe
2. Matter and Memory: Single Neurons and Human Recollections
3. Neuronal Mechanisms of Will and Action: Stimulation and Single Neuron Recordings in the
Human Frontal Lobe
4. Surgery of Epileptogenic and Functional Brain Networks: Plasticity and Functional Recovery.

 Jörg RÜPKE, Professor, University of Erfurt (Germany), Feb.–March 2010

1. Les déviances religieuses : concepts romains et modernes
2. Les superstitions : expériences religieuses interdites dans les temples
3. Le discours normatif de l’Antiquité tardive
4. L’individualisation religieuse dans le monde gréco-romain.

 Clifford ANDO, Professor, University of Chicago (USA), March 2010

L’empire du droit.

 Detlev GANTEN, Professor, La Charité University Clinic, Berlin (Germany), Mar.–June 2010
1. The New Concept of Evolutionary Medicine
2. Evolutionary Medicine: What Can we Learn for the Prevention and Treatment of Disease?
3. The Evolution of Cardiovascular Diseases: Practical Lessons Learned
4. Evolutionary Medicine—the Evolution of Medicine and Education.

 John E. JACKSON, Professor, University of Berne (Switzerland), Mar.–Apr. 2010

Paul Celan : contre-parole et absolu poétique
1. La contre-parole
2. Le principe dialogique
3. La poétique de la « Strette »
4. Le tournant des dernières années.

N° 5 - THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE 67

  Marc TESSIER-LAVIGNE, Executive Vice-President of Research and Chief Scientific officer of Genentech
Inc., California (USA), Mar.–Apr. 2010
Development, Degeneration and Regeneration of Neuronal Circuits.

 Markus ANTONIETTI, Professor, University of Postdam (Germany), Director of the Max-Planck-Institute

of Colloids and Interface, May 2010
1. Materials Chemistry in the Energy and Raw Material Change
2. Template Processes: Material Science Tool, Analysis of Self-Organization or Just Art
3. Hydrothermal Carbonization: A « chimie douce » Towards Carbon Structures and Carbon-negative
Product Styles
4. Carbon Nitrides and Metal Nitrides: Towards Artificial Photosynthesis.

 Susan TAYLOR, Professor, University of California, San Diego (USA), May 2010
Camp-dependent Protein Kinase and the Regulation of Cell Signaling by Protein Phosphorylation
1. Protein Kinase Structure and Function
2. Allosteric Regulation of PKA by cAMP
3. Assembly of Tetrameric Holoenzymes
4. Signaling in Time and Space: Localizing PKA to Macromolecular Signaling Complexes.

 Lawrence WARD, Professor, University of British Columbia, Vancouver (Canada), May 2010
1. Neural Synchronisation and Cognition
2. Neural Synchronisation and Attention
3. Neural Synchronisation and Consciousness
4. Role of the thalamus in Human consciousness.

 Marianne BRONNER-FRASER, Professor, California Institute of Technology (USA), May 2010

1. Gene Regulatory Network Underlying Neural Crest Formation
2. Evolution of the neural crest From a gene regulatory perspective
3. Ectodermal Placodes and their Contribution to the peripheral Nervous System
4. Analysis of Cranofacial Developement using a Novel Gene/Protein trap Strategy.

 Peter STALLYBRASS, Professor, University of Pennsylvania (USA), May 2010

1. Shakespeare’s Desk
2. Shakespeare n’a jamais écrit un livre
3. Authorship, Attribution and Anonimity
4. Montaigne, Shakespeare et le suicide.

 Oliver Jens SCHMITT, Professor, University of Vienna (Austria), May 2010

Entre Venise et les Turcs
I) Le miroir de la présence vénitienne en Méditerranée orientale : le cas de l’île de Korcula.
1. Le pouvoir ; 2. Les hommes et la terre ; 3. La mer.
II) Skanderbeg et le sultan : Anatomie d’une rébellion contre l’Empire ottoman.

 Douglas HOFSTADTER, Professor, Indiana University (USA), May–June 2010

La centralité de l’analogie dans le monde de l’esprit
1. L’analogie au cœur de la cognition
2. Les analogies extraordinaires d’Albert Einstein
3. Le rôle omniprésent des analogies dans la traduction
4. La place d’honneur de l’analogie dans la traduction de la poésie.

 Christopher BEARD, Carnegie Museum of Natural History, Pittsburgh (USA), May–June 2010
1. Primate Origins: A New Synthesis Based on Data from the Fossil Record and Mammalian
Genomics
2. Global Warming in the Beginning of the « Age of Mammals »
3. The Hunt for the Dawn Monkey: Unearthing the Origins of Monkey, Apes and Humans
4. Burmese Days: Primate Paleontology in the union of Myanmar.

68 THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE - N° 5

 Benjamin FOSTER, Professor, Yale University (USA), June 2010
1. De la mer supérieure à la mer inférieure : l’avènement et la chute de l’empire d’Akkad
2. Pays et peuples d’Akkad
3. Les travaux et les jours akkadiens
4. L’élu des dieux.

II. Others Invitations

 John NORTH, Professor, University College of London (Great Britain), Nov. 2009
Pompeius Festus et l’origine du dictionnaire latin.

 Betsy JOLAS, Honorary Professor, Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique de Paris, Nov. 2009
Je chante ce que je dis ; je dis ce que je chante.

 Juan CALATRAVA, Director, School of Architecture of Granada (Spain), Nov.–Dec. 2009

Le Corbusier :
1. « Il n’y a pas d’architectes seuls… » Le Corbusier et la synthèse des arts
2. Le poème de l’Angle Droit.

 Hans Ulrich GUMBRECHT, Professor, Stanford University (USA), March 2010

1. Peut-on éviter Heidegger ?
2. Pourquoi on n’a pas oublié Heidegger.

 Guillemette BOLENS, Professor, University of Geneva (Switzerland), March 2010

Les gestes et la perception du mouvement dans l’art et la littérature.

 Andrée HAYUM, Professor, Fordham University (USA), March 2010

1. L’idée de la Renaissance à l’aube du musée européen : les écoles primitives
2. The Migration of the Renaissance Primitives and the Early Public Museum in the Anglo-American
World.

 Antoine TOUZE, Assistant Professor, Paris 13 University, March–April 2010

Invariants, cohomologie et représentations fonctorielles des groupes algébriques.

 Oded LIPSCHITS, Professor, University of Tel Aviv (Israel), April 2010

How did the Babylonian Empire Rule in Judah? First Clues for Babylonian Administration in the
« Empty Land ».

 Thomas LECUIT, Directeur de Recherche, CNRS, Institut de Biologie du développement de Marseille

Luminy, CNRS/Université de la Méditerranée, May 2010
Contrôle génétique et contraintes physiques au cours de la morphogenèse.

 Laurent DUBOIS, Professor, Duke University, Durham, (USA), May 2010

Des lumières enchaînées : la révolution haïtienne et la pensée politique des esclaves.

 Arthur GOLDHAMMER, Professor, Harvard University (USA), May 2010

De la démocratie en américain : traduire Tocqueville.

 Martin HELLWIG, Professor, Max-Planck-Institute, Bonn (Germany), May 2010

Crise financière et réglementation bancaire.

 Noam CHOMSKY, Professor, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (USA), May 2010

Interpretation and understanding: language and beyond.

 Edward SLINGERLAND, Professor, Asian Centre, Vancouver (Canada), June 2010

Reverse Orientalism and the Figure of Confucius in the west.

N° 5 - THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE 69

  Stephen F. TEISER, Professor, Princeton University (USA), June 2010
Healing with merit: Buddhist Rituals of Curing in Medieval Chinese Liturgical Manuscripts
1. Logic and Language
2. Codicology and Sociology.

 Yordan PEEV, Professor, Sofia University (Bulgaria), June 2010

La porosité entre l’islam et le christianisme dans les Balkans. Le cas du crypto-christianisme.

 Leonard GUARENTE, Professor, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (USA), June 2010

Sirtuins, Aging and Disease.

 Sir Geoffrey LLOYD, Professor, Cambridge University (Great Britain), June 2010
1. La fabrique des disciplines
2. Pour un réexamen des sciences dans les sociétés anciennes : Grèce, Chine, Mésopotamie.

 Jayant NARLIKAR, Professor, University of Pune (India), June 2010

A Search for Micro-organisms in the Earth Atmosphere.

 Gregory SCHOPEN, Professor, University of Californie, Los Angeles (USA), June 2010
On Early Buddhist Monks and Nuns Protecting Children from Death and Demon for a Fee.

70 THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE - N° 5

 E VENTS AT THE C OLLÈGE DE F RANCE 2009–2010
September  Annual Colloquium of the Union rationaliste
 Atoms, Cavities and Photons (Chair of Quantum (Chair of History of India and Greater India)
Physics)
 The Sensual City (preparation for the Shanghai May
2010 World Expo, Jacques Ferrier Architectures  Billionaire Africa: Challenges and Opportunities
Agency) of the African Metamosphosis (Agence française de
 Translational Research in Alzheimer (France développement)
Alzheimer Association)  Five Years of Agence nationale de la recherche

 Launching of the IbiSA NGS network (Génoscope (ANR—National Research Agency)

and Institut de Génomique)  Rationality, Truth and Democracy: Bertrand

Russell, George Orwell, Noam Chomsky (Chair of

October Philosophy of Language and Knowledge)
 Contemporary Lebanon (Lebanese Jurists
Association) June
 Rhetoric and Arts (International Society for the  Frontiers in Neuromorphic Computation (Unité

History of Rhetoric) de Neurosciences, CNRS)

 Darwin’s Bicentenary (Collège de France Autumn  Managing Climate Change (Chair of Economic

Symposium 2009) Theory and Social Organization and Chair of

 Grotowski, the stage, France, and Counterculture Sustainable Development - Environment, Energy
(UNESCO and Paris-Sorbonne 4 University) and Society)
 Archéo-Nil 1990–2010, 20 Years of Predynastic

November Research (Archéo-Nil Society)

 Launching of the event « À l’école des écrivains »  Le Monde-La Recherche Forum (Le Monde

(Ministry of National Education) Newspaper and La Recherche Magazine)

 Open days of the Collège de France Biology  Insights on Vertebrate Evolution: Topics and

Institute Issues (Chair of Historical Biology and

 The Republic of Letters in Turmoil (Chair of Evolutionism)
Modern and Contemporary French Literature:  The Unexpected Anthology (Chair of Artistic

History, Criticism, Theory and Chair of Rhetoric Creation)

and Society in 16th and 17th century Europe)  Fault and Punishment (Chair of Assyriology and

Chair of The Hebrew Bible and/in its contexts)

December  Nanotechnology in Medicine (Multi-Organisms

 Dante at the Collège de France (Chair of Modern Thematic Institute (ITMO) and Chair of
Literatures of Neo-Latin Europe) Technological Innovation Liliane Bettencourt)
 The Technion takes up the Challenge of Growth  ITMO Neuroscience, Cognitive Science,

through Innovation (Technion Israel Institute of Neurology and Psychiatry (CNRS)

Technology, Technion France Association)
 Humanoids 09, 9th International conference on July
humanoid robots (Chair of Physiology of Perception  Body Development and Relations with Others
and Action) (Chair of Physiology of Perception and Action and
French Society of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry)
January  String Phenomenology (Chair of Elementary

 Jean Dausset Days (Chair of Experimental Medicine) Particles, Gravitation and Cosmology and École
Polytechnique)
March
French and Turks in the Ottoman Era. Five
Centuries of Relationships (Chair of Turkish and
Ottoman History)

April
 The Langages of Research in Human and Social
Sciences (CNRS—Unité au service de la recherche
des UMIFRE)

N° 5 - THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE 71

 R ESEARCH T EAMS HOSTED

The policy of hosting research teams was implemented  Catherine LLORENS-CORTES

on the basis of an Assembly vote dated 18 March Central neuropeptides and the regulation of body
2001 to contribute towards the training of young fluid homeostatis and cardiovascular functions
research teams and to enhance the Collège’s scientific (U 691)
potential. In some cases it was a temporary solution  Jean-Michel DENIAU

for teams directed by a professor about to retire. The dynamics and physiopathology of neuron
networks (U 667)
Space permitting, these teams, which have to obtain  Christian GIAUME

the approval of their parent institution and to receive Junctional communication and interaction
on-going funds from it, can be officially hosted by the between neuronal and glial networks (U840)
Collège de France team for a four-year contract,  Claude RANGIN and Pierre HENRY

renewable once. EGERIE (Team Geodynamics of Exchange

Research-Industry-Learning)
They receive a € 10,000 annual grant and may obtain  TRAN VAN NHIEU Guy

ATER and lecturing posts, on the same basis as the Intercellular communication and bacterial infections
laboratories of the Chairs. (U971)
 MANACORDA Stefano
The final decision to host these teams is taken by the Law Team is part of the ARPE (Association de
Assembly of Professors, after evaluation by a recherches pénales européennes) (UMR 8103 of
commission of professors. comparative law - University Paris I)

Teams currently hosted:

UMR: Unité mixte de recherche
 Lyne BANSAT-BOUDON (Combined Research Unit)
Institute for Indian Studies (EA 518) U: Unité (Unit)

TEMPORARY POSITIONS AT THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE 2010–2011

(MAÎTRES DE CONFÉRENCES AND ATER)

Temporary positions permit to receive yearly 29 Maîtres

de conférences (Assistant Professors) and 38 ATER
(Research Assistants and Post-Doctoral positions) in French 45
the chairs and research laboratories at the Collège de Foreign 11
France. Nationals of the U.E. 11

72 THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE - N° 5

 T HE C OLLÈGE DE F RANCE I NSTITUTES
The Collège de France has four Institutes: Biology; the Professor Anne Fagot-Largeault (emeritus, chair of
Contemporary World; Literary Studies; and the Far East. Philosophy of Life Science), and Professor Armand de
These are informal structures with no official status from Ricqlès (emeritus, chair of Historical Biology and
an administrative point of view. They group together Evolutionism), also participate in discussions
Chairs and hosted teams. concerning the Collège de France Institute of Biology.
The Institutes are created or closed on the initiative of
the professors concerned, after a formal decision by the The aim of the Institute is to promote the research
Assembly. being done within the Collège de France, via several
They promote and facilitate research by defining common actions defined by the professors of the Institute and
projects and by pooling technical staff, equipment applied by its Coordination Committee.
(technical facilities, libraries, etc.) and premises.
The modalities of these Institutes’ organization may vary. Shared resources:
- animal facilities: conventional and transgenic
Institute of Biology - technical platforms: confocal imaging and electron
microscopy, neural imaging
The Collège de France Institute of Biology, created in - equipment for studying behaviour in rodents
1983 on a decision of the Assembly of Professors, - document library
includes the Collège’s Professors of Biology (whether
their laboratory is located at the Collège itself or Institute of the Contemporary World
elsewhere) and the teams hosted by the Collège. The
incumbent President is Alain Prochiantz. The Institute of the Contemporary World was created in
2005.
Chairs whose laboratories are located at the Institute
of Biology: It groups together six Collège de France Chairs, five of
 Pierre Corvol, Experimental Medicine which are located on the Ulm site and one on the
(Inserm U833) Cardinal Lemoine site:
 Alain Prochiantz, Morphogenic Processes  Mireille Delmas-Marty, Comparative Legal Studies

and Internationalization of Law

Chairs whose laboratories are not located at the  Philippe Descola, Anthropology of Nature

Collège de France:  Jon Elster, Rationality and Social Sciences

 Spyros Artavanis-Tsakonas, Developmental  Roger Guesnerie, Economic Theory and Social

Biology and Genetics Organization

 Stanislas Dehaene, Experimental Cognitive  Henry Laurens, Contemporary Arab History

Psychology (Inserm-CEA 562)  Pierre Rosanvallon, Modern and Contemporary

 Philippe Kourilsky, Molecular Immunology History of Politics

 Jean-Louis Mandel, Human Genetics (Inserm

U596) The Institute is coordinated by a professor on the basis of

 Christine Petit, Genetics and Cell Physiology a two-year rotating system. Pierre Rosanvallon is the
(Inserm U587) current coordinator.

Hosted teams located within the Institute of Biology The members of the Institute are participating in a
(they benefit from all the Institute’s resources): multi-disciplinary study on globalization, focused on
 Laurent Venance, Inserm U667, Dynamics and the following three dimensions: democracy, the rule of
Pathophysiology of Neuronal Networks law, and the market.
 Catherine Llorens-Cortes, Inserm U691, Central

neuropeptides and the regulation of body fluids Three key topics are addressed:
 Christian Giaume, Inserm U840, Junctional - Management of global collective (public) goods
communication and interaction between neuronal - National sovereignty in question and the question of
and glial networks. governance
 Guy Tran Van Nhieu, INSERM U971, - Towards a global political society: law and politics
Intercellular communication and bacterial infections in the constitution of an international order.
 Sidney Wiener, CNRS UMR 7152, Physiology of

Perception and Action

N° 5 - THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE 73

74 THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE - N° 5
Institute of Literary Studies Ms. Odile Bombarde, senior lecturer associated with the
chair of Professor Michel Zink, coordinates the Institute’s
The Institute of Literary Studies combines the Collège de activities.
France Chairs devoted to literature studies and related
subjects (history of art, history of books): On the initiative of one or another of its professors, the
Institute organizes colloquia devoted to topics for
Professors: reflection common to the various comprising Chairs.
 Roger Chartier, Writing and cultures in modern Professors from the Institute as well as French and foreign
Europe researchers whom they wish to make partners in their
 Antoine Compagnon, Modern and contemporary work, participate in these meetings. They allow for a
literature: history, theory, critique confrontation between fields of thought that are related—
 Carlo Ossola, Modern literatures of neo-latin Europe literary criticism, history of ideas, art history, poetic
 Roland Recht, History of european medieval and creation—but different, owing to the periods concerned
modern art or the approaches and methods used.
 Michel Zink, Literatures of medieval France

Emeritus Professors: The Institute is closely associated to the works on the

 Yves Bonnefoy, History of the poetic function History of the College de France, a research and
 Michael Edwards, Literary creation in English publication project under the responsibility of Professor
 Marc Fumaroli, Rhetoric and society in Europe Marc Fumaroli. The first volume was published in 2006.
(16th–17th centuries)
 Harald Weinrich, Romance languages and The Collège de France’s Oriental Institutes
literatures.
The “Instituts d’Extrême-Orient” (IEO) are a
Michel Zink is currently the Director of the Institute of federation of five Institutes devoted to Chinese,
Literary Studies. Indian, Japanese, Korean, and Tibetan studies
respectively. Historically, the Institutes were

C.I.R.B.– Center for Interdisciplinary Research in Biology

The Center for Interdisciplinary Research in Biology The Nine Founding Teams
(CIRB) is a novel Collège de France/CNRS/INSERM  Dynamics and Pathophysiology of Neuronal

research structure located at the Collège de France in Networks

the Center of Paris. Nine teams from different Group Leaders: Jean-Michel Deniau, Laurent Venance
horizons have recently founded this structure with the  Molecular Control of Vascular Development

spirit to foster new collaborations within biological Group Leader: Anne Eichmann
domains and across the usual disciplinary divide. In  Role of Matrix Proteins in Hypoxia and

the long term the nine founding groups, specialized Angiogenesis

in the fields of infectious diseases, neurosciences and Group Leader: Stéphane Germain
cardio-vascular research, will be rejoined by a similar  Junctional Communication and Interactions

number of new groups, primarily junior groups, between Glial and Neuronal Networks
including chemists, physicists and mathematicians Group Leader: Christian Giaume
with a strong interest for biological sciences. The new  Cell Biology of Homeoproteins

Center will benefit from being in the vicinity of Group Leader: Alain Joliot
several other laboratories and from an extraordinary  Central Neuropeptides in Cardiovascular and

rich intellectual milieu, with conferences that cover Hydric Regulation

all aspects of knowledge. Outside of Collège de Group Leader: Catherine Llorens-Cortes
France, CIRB has developed strong interactions with  Early Development and Pathologies

high profile neighboring institutions, in particular the Group Leader: Geneviève Nguyen
École Normale Supérieure and the Curie Institute.   Homeoprotein Function in Morphogenesis and

Physiology
Group Leader: Alain Prochiantz
 Intercellular Communication and Microbial

Infections
Group Leader: Guy Tran Van Nhieu

N° 5 - THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE 75

 P UBLICATIONS 2009–2010
 BOOKS
The Collège de France has a partnership with the Éditions Fayard and the Éditions Odile Jacob for publishing the
inaugural lectures of the professors, some lectures of invited professors and the proceedings of some of the Collège’s
colloquiums.

Éditions Fayard - Collection “Leçons inaugurales”(Inaugural lectures)

 Gérard BERRY, Penser, modéliser et maîtriser le calcul informatique (2009), n° 208.
 Patrick COUVREUR, Les nanotechnologies peuvent-elles contribuer à traiter des maladies sévères (2010),
n° 211.
 Marc FONTECAVE, Chimie des processus biologiques : une introduction (2009), n° 207.

 Antoine GEORGES, De l’atome au matériau. Les phénomènes quantiques collectifs (2010), n° 209.

 Henri LERIDON, De la croissance zéro au développement durable (2009), n° 205.

 Peter PIOT, L’épidémie du sida. Mondialisation des risques, transformations de la santé publique et

développement (2010), n° 210.

 Thomas RÖMER, Les Cornes de Moïse. Faire entrer la Bible dans l’histoire (2009), n° 206.

 Nicholas STERN, Gérer les changements climatiques. Climat, croissance, développement et équité (2010),

n° 212.

Éditions Odile Jacob - symposia and conferences

 Stanislas DEHAENE et Christine PETIT (eds.), Parole et musique. Aux origines du dialogue humain, 2009.
 Pascal GRIENER, La République de l’oeil. L’Expérience de l’art au siècle des Lumières, 2010.
 Denis KNOEPFLER, La patrie de Narcisse, 2010.
 Pierre MAGISTRETTI et François ANSERMET (eds.), Neurosciences et psychanalyse, 2010.
 Alain PROCHIANTZ (ed.), Darwin : 200 ans, 2010.
 Michel ZINK (ed.), Livres anciens, lectures vivantes, 2010.

Yearbook
 Cours et travaux du Collège de France. Résumés 2008–09. Annuaire 109e année.

 OPEN EDITION/E-BOOKS
Since June 2010, 4 collections of the College de France have been published on Internet (open access):
 the Inaugural Lectures

 the Yearbook

 the Letter of the College de France

 the Conferences

The texts are published in partnership with the CLEO (Center for Open Electronic Publishing). They are available
on the College de France website (http://www.college-de-france.fr/default/EN/all/pub_elec/index.htm) and on
Revues.org (http://www.revues.org), a platform for journals in the humanities and social sciences run by the
CLEO.
Most texts are in French, some are translated in English (e.g. the inaugural lecture of Nicholas Stern), and some
will be published directly in English (e.g. the conference of Noam Chomsky).
Some of these texts are available as e-books on Apple Store and other platforms (inaugural lectures, The Letter
of the Collège de France).

 DVDS (Coproduction Collège de France / Docside / Éditions Montparnasse)

 Pierre BOULEZ, 2010.
 Pierre-Gilles de GENNES, 2010.
 François JACOB, 2010.

 Jacqueline de ROMILLY, 2010.

76 THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE - N° 5

 C OLLÈGE DE F RANCE A UTUMN S YMPOSIUM 2010–2011
The globalization of research
Competition, cooperation, restructuring
14–15 October 2010

The ‘campus plan’ and the creation of the PRES (centres the volume of the financial resources needed today, is the
for research and higher education), completing earlier use of new evaluation criteria: controversial international
reforms of the universities and the CNRS, triggered an classifications like those of the University of Shanghai;
unprecedented concentration of French research. The prizes, some of which, like the Nobel Prize, are granted
aim was to enable it to maintain its leading position in an years after the discoveries; quantified evaluations whose
environment of international competition that has now data and tools are challenged.
expanded to include the large emergent countries.
Competition demands secrecy until the result is sure.
International competition is not the only driver of The same applies to patents and to contracts with private
change. Basic research has undergone upheavals in the industry, which finance a large part of basic research. But
past ten years, leading to the creation of sufficiently large being a researcher implies making one’s results known
research centres to justify the purchase and very high as generously and widely as possible. Science has no
operating costs of the increasingly sophisticated boundaries. All laboratories, including in the social and
equipment required. All the disciplines are concerned, human sciences, have partnerships or fully-fledged
including the human and social sciences which have been members who are foreigners. Almost all of them use and
completely transformed by the introduction of contribute to developing tools that will be employed
computing and electronic publications. Heavy world-wide , large facilities or electronic databases. In
equipment, the use of which is now standard practice in these conditions, what does secrecy and international
biology and medicine (genome sequencing, imagery, competition mean? How should the researcher behave?
etc.), in physics (Large Hadron Collider in Geneva, etc.) Is there no risk of misuse, ethically speaking?
and in astronomy (Hubble space telescope, etc.), is
accessible only to those organizations able to finance it These are the questions that the opening symposium in
and to commit to using it intensively. 2010 is intended to explore. The role played by the
Collège de France yesterday and today in research and
Finding adequate funds is therefore a necessity. It the teaching of research, along with the fact that we are
involves both national and international competition, as ourselves confronted with these contradictions, affords
private and government grants go to the most renowned us the possibility and the duty to do so. 
laboratories. There is nothing fundamentally new about
this: research is the other side to discovery, and discovery The programme and lectures are available on
demands that one be first. What has changed, apart from www.college-de-france.fr

N° 5 - THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE 77

 Programme
Thursday 14 October 2010 Observatoire des Sciences et Techniques
Discussant: Serge Haroche, Professor at the Collège
 Opening by Pierre Corvol, Administrator of the de France
Collège de France
 Introduction by Gérard Fussman, Professor at the Friday 15 October 2010
Collège de France
The researcher’s ethics in the face of globalisation
2000–2010: Technical, institutional and behavioural  The research boom in developing countries and

upheavals international cooperation

 The digital revolution in the sciences Marc Fontecave, Professor at the Collège de France
Gérard Berry, Senior Researcher at INRIA, Professor (the example of India)
at the Collège de France (2008–2010) Discussant: Jacques Livage, Honorary professor at
Discussant: Jean-Louis Mandel, Professor at the the Collège de France (the example of North Africa)
Collège de France (biocomputing explosion)  Worldwide knowledge sharing on a global scale

 Academic research and biotechnology industry Gabriele Veneziano, Professor at the Collège de
Jean-Paul Clozel, C.E.O. of Actelion Pharmaceuticals France, Emeritus professor at the CERN (particle
Ltd, Professor at the Collège de France (2007–2008) physics)
Discussant: Pierre Joliot, Honorary professor at the Discussant: Xavier Le Pichon, Honorary professor at
Collège de France the Collège de France (geodynamics)
 The larges facilities of the cognitive sciences and  Changing scales and the worldwide cooperative

their results management of biological means

Denis Le Bihan, Senior researcher at CEA, Head and Philippe Kourilsky, Professor at the Collège de France
founder of Neurospin, physicist and Doctor of Discussant: Pierre Corvol, Professor at the Collège de
Medicine, Professor at the University of Kyoto France (medical and pharmaceutical research)
Discussant: Claudine Tiercelin, Professor of  Small and large scientific frauds: the weight of

philosophy at the University Paris XII, Institut competition

Universitaire de France Anne Fagot-Largeault, Honorary professor at the
 New means, new funding, new research questions in Collège de France
archeology Discussant: Alain Prochiantz, Professor at the Collège
Jean-Paul Demoule, Professor of archaeology at de France
University Paris I, former Director of the INRAP  The ‘disinterested’ role of researchers in promoting

(Institut national de recherches archéologiques a new global legal order

préventives) Mireille Delmas-Marty, Professor at the Collège de
Discussant: Michel Gras, Director of the École France
française de Rome Discussant: Peter Piot, Former chief executive of
 New tools and new controversies in demographics UNAIDS, Professor at Imperial College, London,
Hervé Le Bras, Senior researcher at the EHESS Professor at the Collège de France (2009–2010)
Discussant: Brigitte Dormont, Professor of Economics (international organisations)
at the University Paris-Dauphine, Head of the chair of
Health of the Fondation du Risque  Roundtable: restructurings and evaluation tools
 Restructuring ‘neighbourhoods’ , building new around the world
towns With the participation of:
Roland Castro, urban planner/architect - Stephan Leibfried, Professor of political science at
Discussant: Michel Lussault, Professor of geography the University of Bremen, a member of the Academy
at the ENS-Lyon, Director of the Urban Planning of Sciences of Berlin;
Institute at the ENS in Lyon - Jacob Palis, Professor at the Institute of Pure and
 Research libraries and scientific information. Applied Mathematics in Rio de Janeiro (Brazil);
Constance and transformation - Jean-François Sabouret, Senior researcher at the
Daniel Renoult, Dean of the Inspection Générale des CNRS, Director of Réseau-Asie;
bibliothèques - Pierre Veltz, Professor at the École des Sciences
Discussant: Roger Chartier, Professor at the Collège Politique and at the École des Ponts, Paris Tech;
de France - Elias Zerhouni, Former Director, National Institutes
 Estimating scientific productivity using databases of Health (USA), Professor at the Collège de France
Jacques Mairesse, Honorary senior researcher at the (2010–2011).
EHESS, Head of the scientific committee of the

78 THE LETTER OF THE COLLÈGE DE FRANCE - N° 5

 History, through time
As the Renaissance spread throughout Europe, great minds started
to explore subjects that had previously aroused no curiosity, and the
invention of printing meant that the wealth of philosophy contained in
the chefs-d’œuvre of Antiquity was becoming more widely available.
Teachers capable of interpreting and commenting on these matters
were in demand. Thus, the Collège Royal was set up, which later
became known as the Collège de France.
1530
King François I, on the advice of Guillaume Budé, his “master of the
library”, appointed six “royal readers”: three for Hebrew (François
Vatable, Agathias Guidacerius, Paul Paradis), two for Greek (Pierre
Danès, Jacques Toussaint) and one for mathematics (Oronce Finé).
Their lectures were free and open to anyone1551
1551
After requisitioning the Collèges de Tréguier and de Cambrai where he
installed “royal readers” in 1551, Henri II extended the range of subjects
taught by the Collège to philosophy. He created a chair for Ramus (Pierre
de la Ramée), a notorious and controversial anti-Aristotelian philosopher,
who then went on to teach mathematics from 1559 onwards.
1567
The Collège was mentioned for the first time in a document. It was a
diploma awarded to Nicolas Goulu, certifying that he was qualified to
teach Greek.
1610
On August 28, Louis XIII laid the first stone of a new building bearing
the following inscription: “In the first year of the Reign of Louis XIII
King of France and of Navarre, aged nine, and of the Regency of
Queen Marie de Médicis his mother MDCX” (En l’an premier du
Regne de Louis XIII Roy de France et de Navarre, agé de neuf ans,
et de la Regence de la Royne Marie de Médicis sa mère MDCX).
1699
On January 18, 1699, the Collège Royal was granted its coat of
arms: against a sky blue background there is a silver book lying open
in which are written the words Docet omnia. The book is surrounded
by three golden fleurs-de- lis, two at the top and one at the bottom.
1707
There were now twenty chairs: eleven for the arts, nine for scientific
subjects.
1772
Louis XV entrusted the architect Jean-François Chalgrin with the
construction of the Collège Royal. Chalgrin was a winner of the Grand
prix de Rome and a member of the Académie d'architecture. On May
16, the Collège was incorporated into the University of Paris. It regained
its independence in 1794. On March 22, 1774, the Duc de La Vrillière
laid the first stone of the new buildings, which were completed in 1778.
1824
A picture portraying the establishment of the “royal readers” by
François I (on display in the Assembly room). It was painted by
G. Guillon Lethière.
1870
The Collège Royal then the Collège Impérial became the Collège de
France. There were now forty professors.
1963
The creation of two new chairs brought to fifty-two the number of
professors.
1976
The professors were allowed to give some of their teaching outside
Paris.
1988
The professors were allowed to give some of their teaching abroad.
1989
Creation of the European chair.
1992
Creation of International chair.
1998
Inauguration of new Collège de France premises. The renovation
was carried out by the architects Bernard Huet and Jean-Michel
Wilmotte.
2005
Creation of the chair of Artistic Creation.
2006
Creation of the chair of
Technological Innovation Liliane Bettencourt.
2009
Creation of the chair of
Information Technology and Digital Sciences
 AGENDA
Academic Year 2010–2011

New Chairs Created

 Physics of the Earth's Interior
 Chemistry of Hybrid Materials
 Metaphysics and Philosophy of Knowledge

New Professors
 Ismail SERAGELDIN, Knowledge against Poverty, 2010–2011
Inaugural lecture: 18 November 2010
 Anselm KIEFER, Artistic Creation, 2010–2011
Inaugural lecture: 2 December 2010
 Jean-Marie TARASCON, Sustainable Development–Environment, Energy and
Society, 2010–2011
Inaugural lecture: 16 December 2010
 Elias ZERHOUNI, Chair of Technological Innovation Liliane Bettencourt 2010–2011
Inaugural lecture: 20 January 2011
 Martin ABADI, Chair of Information Technology and Digital Sciences, 2010–2011
Inaugural lecture: 10 March 2011

The Inaugural Lectures take place at 6 pm in the Marguerite de Navarre Lecture Hall.

Guest Conference Speakers

 Timothy BROOK, Professor, University of British Columbia, Vancouver (Canada)
 Anne-Laure DALIBARD, Chargée de recherche au CNRS
 Hans HELANDER, Emeritus Professor, University of Uppsala (Sweden)
 Lars LIND, Professor, University of Uppsala (Sweden)
 Agostino PARAVICINI BAGLIANI, Emeritus Professor, University of
Lausanne (Switzerland)
 Simon PRICE, Professor, Oxford University (Great Britain)
 Victor STOICHITA, Professor, University of Fribourg (Switzerland)

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The Letter of the Collège de France

Directeurs de la publication : Pierre CORVOL, Administrateur du Collège de France et
Florence TERRASSE-RIOU, Directrice des Affaires culturelles et des relations extérieures
Direction éditoriale : Marc KIRSCH - Patricia LLEGOU
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Traduction : Liz LIBBRECHT - Conception graphique : Patricia LLEGOU

Crédits photos : © Collège de France, PATRICK IMBERT - Reproduction autorisée avec mention d’origine.
ISSN 1958-1408 - Impression : ADVENCE

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