Edgar Morin

AI Artificial Intelligence natural bullshit

“Il y a l’intelligence artificielle, il y a aussi la connerie naturelle.”

(“There's artificial intelligence, there's also natural bullshit.”)

—Edgar Morin

global objective education progress survive ethics planetary

"Today, the fundamental global objective of all education aspiring not only to progress but to the survival of humanity is to Civilize and Unify the Earth and Transform the human species into genuine humanity the education of the future should teach an ethics of planetary understanding."

—Edgar Morin

uncertainty death hour grief life

"The certainty of death and the uncertainty of the hour of death is a source of grief throughout our life."

—Edgar Morin

anguish death human spirit existence destiny life world

"The anguish of death hangs over and leads the human spirit to wonder about the mysteries of existence, man's destiny, life, the world."

—Edgar Morin

lie deceptive language vocabulary triump force horrible

“Ce qui m’affecte au plus profond, c’est qu’un vocabulaire trompeur remporte la victoire sur le vocabulaire normal. Le triomphe de la force est terrible; le triomphe de la force dans et par le mensonge est horrible.”

(“What affects me the most is that deceptive vocabulary wins over normal vocabulary. The triumph of force is terrible; the triumph of force in and through lies is horrible. ”)

—Edgar Morin

thinking system complex unity part

"when thinking about systems, the first thing to note is that systems are complex. The system is a unity even though it is comprised of a diversity of parts."

—Edgar Morin

human mind create god idea life dominate

"Just as the human mind creates gods that end up exerting extraordinary power over it, the ideas it produces can take on a life of their own and eventually dominate us."

—Edgar Morin

complex problem more less

"When you look at a complex problem you immediately see the limits of classical logic, because we can see that the system is, at the same time, both more and less than the sum of its parts.

More: A system has certain qualities and properties that we cannot find in the parts by themselves. These qualities come from the organization of the system.

Less: The system is also less than the sum of its parts, in the sense that it imposes constraints on the behavior of the parts, so that some qualities or properties of the parts cannot be expressed. E.g. in social systems: as individuals we have many qualities and potentials that present us with many possibilities for behavior which we cannot exhibit because of constraints, due to socially determined laws or inhibitions due to group norms."

—Edgar Morin

pursue knowledge calculate blind human reality

“If we only pursue a type of knowledge based on what can be calculated, we will be turning a blind eye to human reality.”

—Edgar Morin