Bruno Latour Quotes
Bruno Latour was a French philosopher, anthropologist, and sociologist of science, and one of the principal architects of actor-network theory and the field of science and technology studies. After early fieldwork at the Salk Institute he developed in Laboratory Life and Science in Action an account of how scientific facts are stabilized through the alignment of human and non-human actors. The quotes below are attributed to Bruno Latour, organized by topic.
Bruno Latour on God
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“No one knows any longer whether the reintroduction of the bear in Pyrenees, kolkhozes, aerosols, the Green Revolution, the anti-smallpox vaccine, Star Wars, the Muslim religion, partridge hunting, the French Revolution, service industries, labour unions, cold fusion, Bolshevism, relativity, Slovak nationalism, commercial sailboats, and so on, are outmoded, up to date, futuristic, atemporal, nonexistent, or permanent.”
Bruno Latour (1973; p.74), cited in: Ronald Schleifer, Modernism and Time: The Logic of Abundance in Literature, Science, and Culture, 1880–1930. 2000. p. 174 -
“The only shibboleth the West has is science . It is the premise of modernity and it defines itself as a rationality capable of, indeed requiring separation from politics , religion and reality, society . Modernisation is to work towards this.”
Bruno Latour in: The only shibboleth the West has is science , The Times of India , 4 April 2011. -
“There is no control and no all-powerful creator , either – no more ' God ' than man – but there is care, scruple, cautiousness, attention, contemplation, hesitation and revival. To understand each other, all we have is what comes from our hands, but that does not mean our hands have to be taken for the origin.”
Bruno Latour, Rejoicing: Or the Torments of Religious Speech. 2018, p. 144
Bruno Latour on Knowledge
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Attributed to Bruno Latour:
“Nothing is by itself either knowable or unknowable; everything is translated.”
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Attributed to Bruno Latour:
“The fate of facts and machines is in later users' hands; their qualities are a consequence, not a cause, of collective action.”
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“Bruno Latour, “Why Has Critique Run out of Steam? From Matters of Fact to Matters of Concern” Critical Inquiry 30 , (Winter 2004)”
What has happened to those who, like Heidegger , have tried to find their ways in immediacy, in intuition, in nature, would be too sad to retell—and is well known anyway. What is certain is that those pathmarks off the beaten track led indeed nowhere. -
“Bruno Latour in: The only shibboleth the West has is science , The Times of India , 4 April 2011.”
The only shibboleth the West has is science . It is the premise of modernity and it defines itself as a rationality capable of, indeed requiring separation from politics , religion and reality, society . Modernisation is to work towards this. -
“Philosophy is not in the business of explaining anything. Actual occasions explain what happened, not philosophy. If there is one thing which philosophy should not do, it is to try to explain anything.”
Bruno Latour, Graham Harman, Peter Erdelyi. The Prince and the Wolf: Latour and Harman at the LSE. 2011. p.67 -
“Bruno Latour, Graham Harman, Peter Erdelyi. The Prince and the Wolf: Latour and Harman at the LSE. 2011. p.67”
Philosophy is not in the business of explaining anything. Actual occasions explain what happened, not philosophy. If there is one thing which philosophy should not do, it is to try to explain anything. -
“Bruno Latour, Rejoicing: Or the Torments of Religious Speech. 2018, p. 144”
There is no control and no all-powerful creator , either – no more ' God ' than man – but there is care, scruple, cautiousness, attention, contemplation, hesitation and revival. To understand each other, all we have is what comes from our hands, but that does not mean our hands have to be taken for the origin.
Bruno Latour on Nature
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Attributed to Bruno Latour:
“Nature and society are not two distinct poles, but one and the same production.”
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“What has happened to those who, like Heidegger , have tried to find their ways in immediacy, in intuition, in nature, would be too sad to retell—and is well known anyway. What is certain is that those pathmarks off the beaten track led indeed nowhere.”
Bruno Latour, “Why Has Critique Run out of Steam? From Matters of Fact to Matters of Concern” Critical Inquiry 30 , (Winter 2004)
Bruno Latour on Politics
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Attributed to Bruno Latour:
“An actor is what is made to act by many others.”
Bruno Latour on Time
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“Bruno Latour (1973; p.74), cited in: Ronald Schleifer, Modernism and Time: The Logic of Abundance in Literature, Science, and Culture, 1880–1930. 2000. p. 174”
No one knows any longer whether the reintroduction of the bear in Pyrenees, kolkhozes, aerosols, the Green Revolution, the anti-smallpox vaccine, Star Wars, the Muslim religion, partridge hunting, the French Revolution, service industries, labour unions, cold fusion, Bolshevism, relativity, Slovak nationalism, commercial sailboats, and so on, are outmoded, up to date, futuristic, atemporal, nonexi
Bruno Latour on Truth
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Attributed to Bruno Latour:
“We have never been modern.”