
An All-Too-Human Virus
Jean-Luc Nancy(Author)
Polity Press
1st Edition
Published on 4. November 2021
Book
Paperback/Softback
100 pages
978-1-5095-5022-7 (ISBN)
Description
In the past, pandemics were considered divine punishment, but we now understand the biological characteristics of viruses and we know they are spread by social interaction and the movement of people. What used to be divine has become human - all too human, as Nietzsche would say.
But while the virus dispels the divine, we are discovering that living beings are much more complex and harder to define than we had previously thought, and also discovering that the nature and exercise of political power are more complex than we may have thought. And this, argues Nancy, helps us to see why the term 'biopolitics' fails to grasp the conditions in which we now find ourselves. Life and politics challenge us together. Our scientific knowledge tells us that we are dependent only on our own technical power, but can we rely on technologies when knowledge itself includes uncertainties? If this is the case for technical power, it is much more so for political power, even as it presents itself as guided by objective data and responding to legitimate expectations.
The virus is a magnifying glass that reveals the contradictions, limitations and frailties of the human condition, calling into question as never before our stubborn belief in progress and our hubristic sense of our own indestructibility as a species.
But while the virus dispels the divine, we are discovering that living beings are much more complex and harder to define than we had previously thought, and also discovering that the nature and exercise of political power are more complex than we may have thought. And this, argues Nancy, helps us to see why the term 'biopolitics' fails to grasp the conditions in which we now find ourselves. Life and politics challenge us together. Our scientific knowledge tells us that we are dependent only on our own technical power, but can we rely on technologies when knowledge itself includes uncertainties? If this is the case for technical power, it is much more so for political power, even as it presents itself as guided by objective data and responding to legitimate expectations.
The virus is a magnifying glass that reveals the contradictions, limitations and frailties of the human condition, calling into question as never before our stubborn belief in progress and our hubristic sense of our own indestructibility as a species.
More details
Language
English
Place of publication
Oxford
United Kingdom
Target group
Professional and scholarly
Dimensions
Height: 188 mm
Width: 122 mm
Thickness: 10 mm
Weight
142 gr
ISBN-13
978-1-5095-5022-7 (9781509550227)
Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions

Jean-Luc Nancy
An All-Too-Human Virus
Book
11/2021
1st Edition
Polity Press
€42.50
Shipment within 15-20 days


Jean-Luc Nancy
An All-Too-Human Virus
E-Book
10/2021
1st Edition
Wiley-Scrivener
€10.99
Available for download
Persons
Jean-Luc Nancy is Professor Emeritus of Philosophy at the University of Strasbourg and teaches Political Philosophy and Media Aesthetics at the European Graduate School in Saas-Fee.
Content
Publisher's Note
Preface
Prologue
I. An All-Too-Human Virus
II. "Communovirus"
III. Let Us Be Infants
IV. Evil and Power
V. Freedom
VI. Neo-Viralism
VII. To Free Freedom
VIII. The Useful and the Useless
IX. Still All Too Human
Appendix 1: Interview with Nicolas Dutent
Appendix 2: From the Future to the Time to Come: The Revolution of the Virus (with Jean-François Bouthors)
Sources of the Texts
Preface
Prologue
I. An All-Too-Human Virus
II. "Communovirus"
III. Let Us Be Infants
IV. Evil and Power
V. Freedom
VI. Neo-Viralism
VII. To Free Freedom
VIII. The Useful and the Useless
IX. Still All Too Human
Appendix 1: Interview with Nicolas Dutent
Appendix 2: From the Future to the Time to Come: The Revolution of the Virus (with Jean-François Bouthors)
Sources of the Texts