Thelivingbeingis a being in the making. The question guiding this second lesson is: how is knowledge of the living (i.e., of a being in the process of becoming) possible?
Let's set the scene: we're probably not the only living beings in the world. In 2006, the Cité des Sciences et de l'Industrie in Paris launched an exhibition entitled "Are we alone in the universe? There is every chance that there are living beings in the universe other than terrestrial beings. A little calculation then suggested that if our galaxy has three hundred billion stars, if there are a hundred billion galaxies in the universe, and if we estimate the number of planets attached to a star at around ten, we arrive at the (dizzying) hypothesis of several hundred billion planets, some of which would certainly resemble our Earth; given that our Earth is home to all kinds of living beings that have become accustomed to extreme environments, we can assume that, even if atmospheric and climatic conditions are different from our own, it's entirely possible that other planets are inhabited by living beings.
But let's not be too hasty: it's no longer a question of turning tables to make contact with spirits. Certainly, in the 19th century, the idea of the "plurality of inhabited worlds" inspired successful fictions, and meetings around a medium who entered into communication with the "inhabitants of the other world" (Flammarion, 1862). In 1970, however, Jacques Monod hailed the advent of an era in which we ceased to believe that up there, in the sky, gods manage our world, surrounded by angels, archangels and the souls of the blessed; he spoke of human anxiety "in a universe frozen with solitude", since no one is up there to watch over us: "The old alliance is broken; man knows at last that he is alone in the indifferent immensity of the universe from which he emerged by chance" (1970, pp. 224-225). A new alliance had to be forged, based on the hypothesis of nature's autonomy and self-organization (this is what Prigogine and Stengers, 1979).
