Epilogue and the way ahead

Previous articleNext article FreeSpecial IssueEpilogue and the way aheadGeoffrey E. R. Lloyd and Aparecida VilaçaGeoffrey E. R. LloydCambridge University Search for more articles by this author and Aparecida VilaçaPPGAS/Museu Nacional, Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro Search for more articles by this author Cambridge UniversityPPGAS/Museu Nacional, Universidade Federal do Rio de JaneiroPDFPDF PLUSFull Text Add to favoritesDownload CitationTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints Share onFacebookTwitterLinked InRedditEmailQR Code SectionsMoreThe contributions to this volume range over a vast variety of topics. To some readers this may seem somewhat bewildering, but we consider it to be one of its great strengths, for our explorations are limited neither in time nor space nor intellectual discipline. The topics in question relate to many different kinds of practices, knowledge systems, interactions, issues of understanding and misunderstanding, whether between different language communities or within a single one, all separated in time or place or both. However, one obvious consequence of our wide-ranging discussions is that there can be no question of trying to draw up a neat balance sheet of concrete conclusions. Rather, it is more useful to highlight certain recurrent themes that can yield some guidelines for future work.Each study exemplifies one or another mode of the problem of making sense of what is often represented as the radically other. All raise, to a greater or lesser degree, the question of the evidence available to us, the source material we are dealing with, with all of its limitations and possible biases, exhibiting the risk of prejudicing from the outset any interpretation we might propose. Even more fundamentally we have to question the very conceptual framework in which we conduct our inquiries. Given that a totally neutral framework is an impossibility, we have to probe the presuppositions we bring to the task with particular determination, especially when, as so often, these reflect typical preoccupations of Western modernity or even postmodernity. Such a critical examination of some fashionable current assumptions—concerning both ontology and science in particular—is, indeed, we would like to claim, one of the achievements of our project.Let us focus here on three recurrent questions of special importance: (1) the issue of the diversity of ontologies, (2) the problems of translation and mutual intelligibility, and (3) the political ramifications of the issues that our studies raise.(1) It soon became abundantly evident in our discussions and explorations that however fashionable the idea of ontologies has recently become in social anthropology and in science and technology studies, quite what that term implies is far from clear. Some contributions underline the difficulty of assigning a single coherent ontology to any given group, and how indeed is any relevant “group” to be defined (Cuomo)? Are ontologies a matter of certain beliefs or of certain practices or of both, where problems of scale are deeply implicated (Strathern)? Where ontology corresponds to nothing in the actors’ own explicit categories, who or what is to be taken to be its spokesperson (the question of evidence, stressed by Hugh-Jones in particular)? What kind of ontological commitment is implied by the actors’ understandings and lived experiences of such other fundamental concepts as person (Vilaça), or law, or time (Strathern)? Do such commitments extend across the entire lived experience of the population concerned—a point pressed by Stephen Hugh-Jones in his exploration of the similarities, and the similar complexities, in the lives, attitudes, and practices of NW Amazonians and Welsh sheep farmers. Where “time” is concerned, Marilyn Strathern spells out the ontological implications of the contrast between an evolutionary and an episodic apprehension of it—where, however, those ontological differences may not be perceived as such by the actors concerned. That would mean that in such instances, ontology is as it were below the radar of an investigation of so-called cultural divergences—with corresponding consequences for the universal viability of the concept of “culture” itself.Several contributors do not just issue something in the nature of a health warning concerning the use of “ontology” so much as implicitly recommend bypassing it altogether (Carneiro da Cunha). Thus, Serafina Cuomo, having examined the pluralism in the ways of doing mathematics in the Greco-Roman world raises problems for any view that would treat them as hermetically sealed entities, emphasizing the risks of framing the analysis in terms of “cultures,” “traditions,” or indeed “ontologies.” She mounts a strong case for an alternative framework in terms of situated learning and the possibility of code-switching. Nicholas Jardine, in turn, while not rejecting “ontologies” in toto, argues for a refinement of their use, to focus on practices rather than on objects. Mauro Almeida’s tactic is different again. Accepting plural ontologies in mathematics still leaves room, in his view, for intertranslatability between them if one concentrates on the pragmatics of their application.Surprisingly, perhaps, one context in which it is comparatively unproblematic to say that we are dealing with a plurality of “ontologies” relates to the world of computing, where, as Alan Blackwell shows, it is the job of artificial intelligence engineers not to discover ontologies but rather to invent new ones. To be sure, the assessment of those innovations poses plenty of issues for the present and more especially the future. Pursuing that question and taking his cue from the pluralism of the anthropologists, Willard McCarty engages in deeply suggestive explorations for the differences that may be in train in modes of reasoning and in our understanding of intelligence. What, for instance, might be the price that has to be paid to meet the demands of what McCarty calls “complete consistency and absolute explicitness”?(2) Several contributions, including those of AI specialists, give startling examples of the problems of translation and of mutual intelligibility that arise. There can, of course, be no perfect translation from one language to another, nor indeed a perfect rendition of the sense of any given speech act in other terms in the same “natural language.” Aparecida Vilaça’s Wari’ assimilate what they are taught by missionaries and educators, but, in ways that those outsiders may themselves not be aware of, contrive to preserve their own Wari’ understandings alongside those extraneous lessons. Agathe Keller’s Tamil and Sanskrit practitioners can be brought into communication with one another and yet may have or have had very different views on the substance of the problems they in some sense share. Strathern, too, suggests that local indigenous peoples may have been more aware of their divergent understanding of key parts of experience that we gloss as “time” and “law” than the original Australian officials and settlers when they first arrived. Pressing the relationship between intelligibility and ontology, Strathern argues forcefully that mutual interaction and interchanges are possible without mutual intelligibility, where the divergence—indeed, clash—between ontologies is not necessarily visible to the actors themselves. The challenging conclusion, in her own words, is that “the world plays back to people what they apprehend about it through the supports it gives to their ideas.”But examples of potential misunderstandings are not limited to those that involve more than one natural language. Cuomo illustrates such tensions by different mathematical practitioners who all share Greek. Karine Chemla, too, discusses the variety of mathematical practices in different texts that all use the Chinese language, and concludes that in that case ontology cannot be said to be determined by language. Blackwell explores the ambiguities of “objective function” used by computer engineers and the ways in which they and nonspecialists (or specialists in other disciplines such as philosophy) may be radically at cross-purposes in their use of the same terms in the English language. McCarty examines how, in order to use the calculating capacities of computers, the problems have to be reformulated in their language—with a consequent loss of elements of text through the process of digitalization.Over and over again our contributors have challenged the terms in which we talk of what we assume to be well-defined intellectual disciplines. What we should understand by “mathematics” and what by “science” has to be radically problematized if we are to do justice to the variety of practices, experiences, and knowledge that we encounter in the field and in history. Making the most of developments in modern mathematics, Almeida shows the pervasiveness of mathematical structures and pragmatic applications across widely divergent domains, including indigenous kinship systems. As Jardine points out, a narrow view of “science” excludes much of what has been accepted as knowledge by other peoples and at other times. We work, therefore, toward a broader conception of “science,” a pluralist one that avoids the twin pitfalls of universal relativism and of a narrow strong realism. Joining forces with Strathern, he argues for a “foreignization” of our analytic framework to accommodate a principle of responsibility to the peoples we investigate. Manuela Carneiro da Cunha probes the underlying assumptions at work in what might seem the relatively unproblematic term agriculture, both challenging in particular our current dominant models that assume an evolution from foraging to domestication, and in the process restoring the claims that can be made on behalf of indigenous knowledge practices.(3) As that last remark already indicates, the political repercussions of our investigations underlie most of them and come to the fore in several. Carneiro da Cunha reveals the narrow-mindedness of many of our common assumptions about agricultural practices and shows how mistaken the policies of governments and NGOs have often been, even when their aims have been ecological conservation and sustainable productivity. Strathern and Vilaça, too, point to the threats that the imposition of Western concepts and practices poses to the groups they study. Keller charts the interference of nationalist agenda in the representation of the varieties of mathematical pluralism in India. A different but still very tangible danger is present in the current, often overhyped debates about the future of artificial intelligence, where, as both McCarty and Blackwell point out, it is not just an understanding of rationality that is at stake but even some assumptions about what makes humans human.Every contributor stresses the amount of further research that needs to be done to make the most of the opening up of study to which they bear witness. Our efforts here are avowedly provisional and preliminary. But the way ahead we envision involves not just individual disciplines but also their joining forces. We believe Science in the Forest, Science in the Past offers a model for fruitful cross-disciplinary exchanges on some fundamental problems that we face today.***The present volume stems from a workshop that the editors organized at the Needham Research Institute in Cambridge from May 31–June 2, 2017. Not all of those who gave papers to the workshop were able to contribute essays to this volume. But in rewriting our papers, we have all been able to draw on the valuable points that were made in our wide-ranging discussions. We include below the full list of participants:Professor Mauro William Barbosa de Almeida (Social Anthropology, Universidade Estadual de Campinas, São Paulo, Brazil); Professor Alan Blackwell (Computer Sciences, Cambridge); Dr. Matei Candea (Social Anthropology, Cambridge); Professor Manuela Carneiro da Cunha (Social Anthropology, University of Chicago and Universidade de São Paulo/USP); Professor Karine Chemla (Sinology, University of Paris Diderot); Dr. Serafina Cuomo (Ancient History, Durham); Giovanni da Col; Dr. Marina Frasca-Spada (History and Philosophy of Science, Cambridge); Professor Simon Goldhill (Classics, CRASSH, Centre for Research in the Arts, Social Sciences and Humanities, Cambridge); Dr. Christine Hugh-Jones (Social Anthropology, Cambridge); Professor Stephen Hugh-Jones (Social Anthropology, Cambridge); Professor Dame Caroline Humphrey (Social Anthropology, Cambridge); Professor Nicholas Jardine (History and Philosophy of Science, Cambridge); Dr. Agathe Keller (Indology, University of Paris Diderot); Professor Tim Lewens (History and Philosophy of Science, Cambridge); Professor Sir Geoffrey Lloyd (Comparative History of Science, Needham Research Institute, Cambridge); Professor Willard McCarty (Digital Humanities, King’s College, London); Dr. Anthony Pickles (Social Anthropology, Cambridge); Professor Joel Robbins (Social Anthropology, Cambridge); Dr. Lena Springer (Sinology, Needham Research Institute, Cambridge); Dr. Richard Staley (History and Philosophy of Science, Cambridge); Professor Dame Marilyn Strathern (Social Anthropology, Cambridge); Professor Tang Quan (Sinology, Needham Research Institute, Cambridge); Professor Liba Taub (History and Philosophy of Science, Cambridge); Professor Aparecida Vilaça (Social Anthropology, Museu Nacional, Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro); Dr. Wu Huiyi (Sinology, Needham Research Institute, Cambridge); Dr. Jenny Zhao (Classics and Sinology, Needham Research Institute, Cambridge).***AcknowledgmentsIt is our pleasant duty to express our deepest gratitude to those persons and institutions without whom the workshop could not have taken place. First, we would like to thank the Chiang Ching Kuo Foundation in Taiwan for the generous financial support. Our thanks go next to the Director of the Needham Research Institute, Professor Mei Jianjun, who allowed us to hold our meetings in the friendly and intimate environment of the Institute, and to the Administrative Manager of the Institute, Ms. Sue Bennett, who oversaw all the complex detailed arrangements with impeccable efficiency. We are grateful, too, for the support—both financial and intellectual—that we received from the Departments of Classics, and of History and Philosophy of Science, from the Division of Social Anthropology of the University of Cambridge, and from Darwin College.Sir Geoffrey E. R. Lloyd is Emeritus Professor of Ancient Philosophy and Science at the University of Cambridge, where from 1989 to 2000 he was Master of Darwin College. He has held Visiting Professorships in North and South America, Europe, the Far East, and Australasia, and holds Honorary Doctorates from Athens, Oxford, and St Andrews. He is the author of twenty-three books, including Demystifying mentalities (1990) and Cognitive variations (2007); the subject of a book symposium in Interdisciplinary Science Reviews 35 (2010) and Being, humanity and understanding (2013); the subject of extended reviews in Hau 3 (1); and he has edited a further four volumes. He has been a Fellow of the Royal Anthropological Society since 1970, of the British Academy since 1983, of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences since 1995. He was awarded the Sarton Medal in 1987, the Kenyon Medal in 2007, the Dan David Prize in 2013, and the Fyssen Prize in 2014. He was knighted for “services to the history of thought” in 1997.Geoffrey E. R. LloydEmeritus Professor Ancient Philosophy and Science University of Cambridge[email protected]Aparecida Vilaça is Professor in the Postgraduate Program in Social Anthropology, Museu Nacional/Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro, and a researcher for the National Science Research Council (CNPq). Since 1986 she has worked among the Wari’ Indians of Southwestern Amazonia, Brazil. She is the author of Strange enemies: Indigenous agency and scenes of encounters in Amazonia (2010), Praying and preying: Christianity in indigenous Amazonia (2016), and Paletó e eu (2018), a biography of her indigenous adoptive father, among other books.Aparecida Vilaça PPGAS/Museu Nacional/Universidade Federal do Rio de JaneiroQuinta da Boa Vista, s/n - São CristóvãoRio de JaneiroBrazil[email protected] Previous articleNext article DetailsFiguresReferencesCited by HAU: Journal of Ethnographic Theory Volume 9, Number 1Spring 2019 Published on behalf of the Society for Ethnographic Theory Article DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1086/703885 © 2019 The Society for Ethnographic Theory. All rights reserved.PDF download Crossref reports no articles citing this article.