Invitation : Deuxième Sci-Phi Café SHE à Paris

Deuxième Sci-Phi Café SHE à Paris


Date : vendredi 11 janvier 201918ｈ～20h

Sujet : Penser le problème de la cognition minimale

Nous allons discuter du problème de la cognition minimale (minimal cognition), qui concerne les exigences minimales pour la cognition. Il y a beaucoup de propositions pour la condition minimale, qui vont du centrisme cérébral aux réactions biochimiques, mais un consensus n'a pas été atteint. Cette fois, le Dr Marc Daëron de l’Institut Pasteur (ancien directeur du Département de l’immunologie) va participer à la discussion. En espérant vous y voir. Merci !

Conférencier : Hidetaka Yakura, MD, PhD, DPhil

Directeur, Institut pour la Science et l'Existence Humaine

 Tokyo, Japon

Lieu：Ozanne conseil

12, Rue du Bouquet de Longchamp, 75116 Paris

Métro : Boissière (ligne 6) ou Iéna (ligne 9)

Tarif : 10 €

 Contact : Hidetaka Yakura (she.yakura@gmail.com)

The logo of the ISHE

I made the logo of the Institute for Science & Human Existence (ISHE) yesterday. It was a quick job of about 15 minutes, because thinking too much makes matter more and more complicated. As I started to design it, the image of a lighthouse and an owl immediately came up. Perhaps because those images would perfectly match the spirit of the ISHE. I hope the message of the institute will spread as widely as possible.

The activities for this fall by the Institute for Science & Human Existence

It is our pleasure to announce the activities of our institute ISHE for the coming month. The list is shown below. We are looking forward to seeing people interested in these activities.

● The Fourth Sci-Phi Cafe SHE in Sapporo

Date: October 6, 2017 (18:30 - 20:30)  

Place: Sapporo Cafe, 5F Space

Think about what a desirable inner life is

Poster

● The Second Bergson Cafe

Date: October 14 & 21, 2017 (16:00 - 19:00)

Place: Ebisu Carrefour, Conference Room B

Text: Pierre Hadot, « Apprendre à vivre », Exercices spirituels et philosophie antique (Albin Michel, 2002)  p. 19-38

Poster

● The Sixth Cafe Philo PAWL

Date: October 20, 2017 (18:30 - 20:30)

Place: Renoir Iidabashi-Nishiguchi, Room 2

Read Platon's Phaedo

Poster

● The Twelfth Sci-Phi Cafe SHE

Date: October 27, 2017 (18:30 - 20:30)

Place: Renoir Iidabashi-Nishiguchi, Room 2

Think about minimal cognition

Poster

 

● The Second Sci-Phi Forum FPSS 　

Date: October 28, 2017 (13:40 - 16:25)

Place: Maison franco-japonaise, Salle 509

Discuss the topics presented by four members of the Forum

Poster

Le premier Sci-Phi Café à Paris

Nous avons eu le premier Paris Café le samedi dernier dans le Quartier Latin. Le sujet de cette rencontre était « Penser à la relation entre la science et la philosophie ». Le résumé se trouve sur cette page, malheureusement en japonais. 

Le premier Bergson Café à Tokyo

 
　　Participants du ler juillet 2017


J'ai décidé d'ouvrir une petite réunion dans laquelle nous lisons et discutons des textes philosophiques en français, et l'ai appelé Bergson Café. Le premier café a eu lieu le 24 juin et le ler juillet à Tokyo. Dans ces deux rencontres, nous avons lu le texte de Pierre Hadot, « La philosophie comme manière de vivre », Exercices spirituelles et philosophie antique, pp. 289-304 (Albin Michel, 2002). Le résumé en japonais se trouvve sur cette page.

The First Sci-Phi Forum FPSS was held

One of the two new projects for this year, Sci-Phi Forum FPSS, was held successfully yesterday in Tokyo. About twenty people in the field of science, philosophy, and science communication attended from Hokkaido, Tohoku, Kanto and Kansai areas to discuss future directions of this forum. The summary is found in this page.

Translation of La nouvelle microbiologie de Pascale Cossart

I have translated another book, La nouvelle microbiologie de Pascale Cossart (Odile Jacob, 2016) since the beginning of this year. It was requested by a Japanese publisher. I finished it yesterday. Compared with Kourilsky's book, this was easier to translate, probably because the text is scientific and fact-based. I am now waiting for the proofreading process, which should come after Kourilsky's book. I think it won't start until next year, unfortunately.

Deux nouveaux projets pour l'année prochaine

During my stay in Japan this fall, two new ideas occurred to me. As Montaigne already noticed, we think elsewhere. One is to open a new cafe for reading philosophical texts written in French and discussing them in Japanese. I named it "Bergson Cafe". According to a view (Alain Badiou), there are two schools of philosophy in the 20th century's French philosophy. One stresses theoretical aspects of philosophy, the founder being Léon Brunschvicg, and another is originated from Henri Bergson who pursued a philosophy of life. Before entering into philosophy, I had an impression that a goal of philosophy is to establish a theory or a concept. If that is the case, I thought philosophy did not suit me. However, I happened to read Pierre Hadot in a bookstore in Paris in 2006 and came to realize there is another aspect of philosophy, namely "philosophy as a way of life", as he called it. This experience changed my perception of philosophy. That is why I chose "Bergson" for the name of this cafe and we are planning to read the texts in this line of philosophy.

The second project is to organize a forum where scientists discuss with philosophers and researchers in the field of humanities problematics in science and medicine, and themes that are not explicitly clear to scientists and thus have not been discussed by scientists. I named it "Forum of philosophy of science for scientists (FPSS: pronounced fipsee)" and posted an announcement in the internet at the end of last month. I have received positive responses from more than 20 Japanese scientists.The aim of this activity is to recognize current situation of science and to make it publicly open, in the hope that it will make science much closer to non-scientists and that many (philosophical) themes hidden in scientific achievements will be revealed to scientists.  

Activities of the ISHE this fall

I went back to Japan last month to organize several small gatherings to discuss science from philosophical perspectives and philosophical matters with scientists and non-scientists. These are popularization activities of the ISHE. The gatherings were held in Sapporo and in Tokyo. The themes we talked about this time were as follows: "the gene" in Sapporo meeting, "Nicomachean Ethics"and "the plant" in Tokyo meetings. In these meetings, I first present the outline of the topics in about an hour and the discussion ensues for the next hour. Often the discussion time is not enough and we continue our discussion at a party after the session. I have benefited a lot from these activities. I hope the participants also enjoy these occasions. The followings are some of the photos taken before each session.

　The Second Sci-Phi Cafe SHE in Sapporo (2016.11.8)

 
　The Fourth Cafe-Philo PAWL in Tokyo (2016.11.11)



 
　The Tenth Sci-Phi Cafe SHE in Tokyo (2016.11.17)

 
　The Tenth Sci-Phi Cafe SHE in Tokyo (2016.11.18)

Translation of Kourilsky's book finished

I finally finished translation of this book yesterday, after long, struggling days. This was my first try to translate a French book and has been an irreplaceable experience for the future. I would like to express my appreciation to Pr Kourilsky who requested the translation. I will refine it during the course of proofreading. At this moment, I don't know when it will start.
 

Activites for the ISHE: organize two types of gatherings, Sci-phi SHE and PAWL

In this entry, I am going to briefly explain our activities for the first mission, namely to organize two types of gatherings: one is to discuss scientific topics from the perspectives of history and philosophy (Sci-phi SHE=Science & Human Existence) and the other is to discuss 'philosophy as a way of life' (PAWL) by focusing each time on a philosopher who developed this type of philosophy. Since 2011, we have organized 9 + 1 gatherings for the first type and 3 gatherings for the second. The followings are the hard data:

TYPE-1 (SHE)

Tokyo, Japan

(1) Science and philosophy: Overview (24-25.11.2011, Tokyo）

(2) Determinism and free will (17-18.4.2012, Tokyo)

(3) The Normal and the pathological (11-12.9.2012, Tokyo)

(4) Brain and mind, or consciousness (29-30.11.2012, Tokyo)

(5) Vitalism (26-27.3.2013, Tokyo) 

(6) Intestinal microbes (10-11.9.2013, Tokyo)

(7) Gene (3-4.4.2014, 2014, Tokyo)

(8) Intelligent design (27-28.11.2014, Tokyo)

(9) Science & religion: The case of Auguste Comte (10-11.3.2016, Tokyo）

Sapporo, Japan 

(1) Philosophy for science & science for philosophy (2.3.2016, Sapporo)

TYPE-2 (PAWL)

(1) Diogenes of Sinope (28.3.2014, Tokyo)

(2) Epicurus (21.11.2014, Tokyo)

(3) Epictetus (8.3.2016, Tokyo)

Mission ---- Institute for Science & Human Existence (ISHE)

In 2013, I established the Institute for Science & Human Existence (ISHE). My original intention was to bridge between science and philosophy and to reach understandings of human existence. One of the reasons was that I was amazed by enormous amounts of work on science accumulated in the field of philosophy but that most scientists are totally unaware of these facts. This is in stark contrast to the situation of philosophers who always look at science. I thought this unrequited love should be rectified.

Having reflected on 3 years of activities, the mission of the ISHE has become clearer to me. 

(1) to popularize science and philosophy by organizing gatherings to discuss scientific and philosophical matters.

(2) to study scientific problems from the philosophical and metaphysical point of view: the first theme is immunity.

(3) to research on the philosophy as a way of life: the first project is on the philosophy of Pierre Hadot (1922–2010).

(4) to promote cultural exchange between France and Japan: the first attempt is the translation of Philippe Kourilsky's book on new immunology, which was dealt in the previous articles.

(5) to reach an understanding of human existence and eventually to transform our own existence.

Translation is in progress

The book I am in the process of translating into Japanese is Le jeu du hasard et de la complexité (Odile Jacob, 2014) by Dr. Philippe Kourilsky, emeritus prof. of the Collège de France and the former president of the Institut Pasteur. English title would be The Game of the Chance and the Complexity. I have finished about two-thirds.

Novalis (1772–1801) left notes on translation. According to his notes, there are three types of translation: the first is literal, the second with interpretations and the third mythic. Novalis thought the third is of highest grade, for which there had been no models. However, one thing is clear: the translator has to be a true artist and the poet's poet. Translating acts are done everywhere and this principle is applied to all cases.

My own policy was to first complete the literal version of translation and then to proceed to the next step, hoping to climb up as high as possible. The visibility of the summit is hard to tell at this point.