Aramis, Or The Love of TechnologyBruno Latour has written a unique and wonderful tale of a technological dream gone wrong. The story of the birth and death of Aramis—the guided-transportation system intended for Paris—is told in this thought-provoking and fictional account by several different parties: an engineer and his professor; company executives and elected officials; a sociologist; and finally Aramis itself, who delivers a passionate plea on behalf of technological innovations that risk being abandoned by their makers. As the young engineer and professor follow Aramis’s trail—conducting interviews, analyzing documents, assessing the evidence—perspectives keep shifting: the truth is revealed as multilayered, unascertainable, comprising an array of possibilities worthy of Rashomon. This charming and profound book, part novel and part sociological study, is Latour at his thought-provoking best. |
Contents
An Exciting Innovation | 12 |
Is Aramis Feasible? | 51 |
ShillyShallying in the Seventies | 74 |
Copyright | |
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abandoned actors Aéroport de Paris aerotrain Aramis project Aramis system automated automobile Bardet become boulevard Victor Budget Office calculations Charles Fiterman complicated cost DATAR DOCUMENT engineers Erewhon everything exist Fiterman Frèque functional Girard human idea Ile-de-France Ile-de-France Region innovation INRETS interest INTERVIEW EXCERPTS invented Jacques Chirac Lagardère Liévin Lille look Matra meters metro minister mobile unit Montpellier move negotiation never nonhumans nonmaterial couplings Norbert object Okay onboard operating Orly pairs of cars passengers perfected Personal Rapid Transit Petite Ceinture phase political possible problem prototype public transportation question RATP RATP's SACEM sector simplified SNCF sociology speaking speed stations stop story subway talk technicians technological project tell there's thing tion track train Transportation Ministry transportation system turn ultrasound vehicle whole World's Fair