Abstract

LECOURT, Dominique. Progress and precaution. Hist. Soc. [online]. 2012, n.22, pp.17-24. ISSN 0121-8417.

How to reconcile precaution and progress? With the irruption of the precaution principle in public debate, we face an intellectual revolution that has to do with the statute of science and the limits of its applications. The terms of the debate are cleared by Dominique Lecourt. He explains why the positivist point of view, suggested by the French philosophical tradition, should be revised. Thus, he also invites us not to abandon progress by resigning ourselves to immobility. Whether we want it or not –the philosopher tells us- man transforms the world, and the only valid question is to know up to what point man gives himself the means to control such transformation, before releasing a sort of warning in the shape of an intimate conviction: the ''cautious man'' could not be the future of man!

Keywords : certainty; positivism; precaution; progress; foresight; technique.

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