Human Sciences All books
Laurent Danon-Boileau
Children Without Language
I have been treating children [with language difficulties] for the past ten years, and making clinical observations from three theoretical points of view: I have used linguistics, psychoanalysis and recent finding in the cognitive sciences. By taking into account and examining the difficulties encountered when working with such children, and by paying attention to the specific character of their development, we will be able to provide essential information for anyone wishing to reflect seriously on a central issue for all of us: Why speak? writes Laurent Danon-Boileau. Laurent Danon-Boileau is a linguist, psychoanalyst and writer.
Daniel Pinto
The Clash of Capitalisms How we were deprived of our entrepreneurial genius and what we can do to reinvent it
Does capitalism still have a future? This book shows that it does, but only if it retrieves the formula that led to its success: the spirit of enterprise coupled with state support.
Georges Charpak, Roland Omnès
Becoming a Magician is Becoming Prophet
In a simple, accessible style the authors address questions that we all ask ourselves about science: Why hasn't science made human beings wiser? Hasn't it even had the opposite effect, rendering humans' criminal tendencies even more devastating? To answer these questions, the authors develop the idea that the advent and triumph of modern science have induced a profound change in humanity because science has given human beings the capacity to understand and master phenomena occurring on the microscopic level - a scale that is alien to them. Some of the fundamental elements of contemporary physics are presented here in game form. The authors argue that physics has left free human beings face to face with an equally free interplay of natural forces and that, without causality and finality, the world has become deprived of meaning. It is therefore hardly surprising that many have taken refuge in religion. But the authors propose an alternative to religion, arguing that we can fulfil our modernity by helping our children develop their love of experimentation so that they can discover the meaning of things for themselves - instead of embracing ideologies that can only be imposed through terror. Georges Charpak is a physicist and Nobel Prize Laureate in Physics. Roland Omnès is a physicist and Emeritus Professor at the University of Paris XI-Orsay.
Nathalie Blanc
Animals in an Urban Environment
Those of you who live in an urban centre, do you think the rightful place of the animal is in the countryside ? Do you think that dogs are simply kept at the whim of lonely citizens ? That cats should not be allowed to roam the streets ? That there should be no more cockroaches to invade homes ? Yet, do you really want a city without nature ? Without green areas, but also without animals ? A sterilised city in other words.. Nathalie Blanc analyses here the role of the animal, and thus the living, in our urban societies. Nathalie Blanc is a researcher specialising in urban geography, at the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique.
Jean-Pierre Changeux, Paul Ricœur
What Makes Us Think Nature and Rules
'The intention of this book was to put a scientist and a philosopher face to face and spark a dialogue between them on neuroscience, on their results and projects, and their ability to carry out a debate on ethics, its norms, and on peace. In France, ideas are rarely openly discussed. Serious debates are too often hindered by dogmatic statements, one-sided criticisms, incomprehensible discussions and glib mockery, with little or no thought for the solidity of the arguments, which aim only to appear plausible or worthy of being argued, rather than convincing. A totally free and open dialogue between a scientist and a philosopher is necessarily a highly unusual experience for both.' Paul Ricur and Jean-Pierre Changeux Paul Ricur is an honorary professor at the University of Paris-X and an emeritus professor at the University of Chicago. Jean-Pierre Changeux, a member of the French Academy of Science, teaches at the College of France and the Pasteur Institute.
Georges Charpak
Children, Researchers and Citizens
Georges Charpak has taken the initiative for a complete reform of our methods of science teaching. He proposes a teaching method based on creativity and problem-solving, instead of the old theoretical, book-based approach. This book recounts the experiences of two teams of French educators in a research institution created by Leon Lederman in Chicago, and the lessons which we can take from their experiences. Pollens shows that to learn is to discover, and that it is in discovering that one learns. Georges Charpak is a Nobel laureate in physics, and the author of La vie à fil tendu and Feux follets et champignons nucléaires, both published by Editions Odile Jacob.
Marcel Otte
At Humanity’s Spiritual Dawn A New Approach to Prehistory
How did our ancestors think? What did they feel? How did they live?
Jean-Paul Delahaye, Nicolas Gauvrit
Culturetech: Digital Culture
The development of electronic databases (and of Internet search engines to explore them) has given rise to such new behaviours as egosurfing...
Jacques Fournier
The Economics of Needs
France’s public service scrutinised by a high-ranking civil servant
Marylène Patou-Mathis
War in Prehistory
A fascinating journey to the origins of violence among humans
Yves-Alain Fontaine
Eels and Man
In this book, the author, an expert in his field, describes the most fascinating stages in the eels biological cycle, its migrations and the modifications it undergoes during its life. Eels interest us not only because of their life and breeding cycles, but also because of the questions they raise concerning our ideas about evolution. Does the notion of adaptation suffice to explain everything the eel has become? Doesnt a living creature maintain a certain amount of independence in relation to the world that surrounds it? Or is the relationship between a living creature and the environment which surrounds it more complex that we have generally realised ?
Philippe Kourilsky
The Manifesto Of Altruism
Only the duty of altruism, both personal and collective, will enable us to build a more just society
Karine Berger, Valérie Rabault
France Strikes Back For a More Competitive France
How can France recover its status as one of the world’s five most competitive nations?
Philippe Kourilsky
The Time of the altruism
An eminent scientist tells us how to alter our thinking so that we can finally face the present global challenges with effective common actions.
Justin Vaïsse
Barack Obama’s Foreign Policy (2008-2012)
In the run-up to the U.S. Presidential elections, an eminent specialist assesses the present administration
Anne Cadoret
Parents Like the Others Homosexuality and Parenting
There are numerous possible cases of homosexual parenting: How are these new types of family forged? What do homosexual parents seek? And what do they say about their experiences? Eschewing all ideological controversies, the author offers us an ethnological study of family structure which seriously calls into question the place of biology in parenthood and the identification of the parental with the conjugal couple. Anne Cadoret is a sociologist.
Jean-Marc Daniel
8 Lessons in Economic History
A masterly lesson in economics based on history and examples
