Reading the Paper with Latour

Reading the New York Times this morning was a different experience after having read Latour’s, We Have Never Been Modern. Instead of enjoying the lack of political campaign discussion and the once again captivating and relevant stories, such as the political turmoil in the Congo, I was assaulted with the need to validate Latour’s theory of our lack of modernity.

As I clicked on my favorite tab, Health, I silently rejoiced in thinking that Latour was wrong: that we had not merged nature with humanism (although I don’t see what’s wrong with that). However, as I looked deeper into the headlines  realized that it was a foolish idea to think that the health page would be devoid of “nature”. Instead I was bombarded with the Quasi-Object and the many poles (51). One title on the page “A New Tooth, Made to Order in Under an Hour,” screamed modernity as it implies that the tooth is made without divine or natural intervention.

 However, as I scanned through the article my stomach sank as I noticed trends that Latour laments throughout his book. Not only did the author seem to propose a ‘modern’ concept, he also referred to past methods as the ‘dark ages’. Similar to the discussion of how humans always believe they are modern, the author is hailing the greater sophistication of our society today and how it no longer needs nature- despite the fact that the tooth he has the cavity in is from a natural occurrence. At one point the author receives a scan which tells a machine how to duplicate the tooth. It reminded me of the discussion of accusation and causation (although not quite the same context) but the “Copernican counter-revolution amounts to modifying the place of the object to remove it from things-in-themselves…” In a way, the construction of the tooth is an attempt to separate our society from its original state. “How does the object come to what is human?” (82)

In an attempt to recover from over-analyzing a petty story about an authors cavity, I move back to the main page and begin reading about the revolution in Congo only to be assaulted with Latour's “Impossible Modernization.”

“Modernization, although it destroyed the near-totality of cultures and natures by force and bloodshed, had a clear objective. Modernizing finally made it possible to distinguish between the laws of external nature and the conventions of society. The conquerors undertook this partition everywhere, consigning hybrids either to the domain of objects of to that of society….” (130)

And it goes on. 

The article about Congo describes the reinstating of new laws and regulations through violence and through it there will be new constraints born through this revolution. While not explicit with its relationship with nature, the article magnifies several of Latour’s arguments.  The society will define the importance of the relationship between society, power, and technology as the country recovers or continues to be in the throes of turmoil.

Thanks, Latour, for messing with my morning paper.