Aramis, or the Love of Technology by Bruno Latour,
Harvard
University Press, 拢12.50/$19.95, ISBN 0 674 04323 5
IN Samuel Butler鈥檚 satirical novel of 1872, Erewhon, a stranger passing
through the puritanical land of the title is imprisoned for possessing a
watch. The inhabitants have got rid of all but the simplest machines,
fearing a cataclysmic process of Darwinian evolution that might allow even
a simple timepiece to give birth to mechanical monsters that would
tyrannise humans.
For Bruno Latour, the iconoclastic French sociologist of science, Erewhon
is not a fantasy, but 鈥渙ur own intellectual universe, from which we have
in effect eradicated all technology鈥�. He refers to the intellectual
universe of the humanities, particularly the social sciences. In Aramis,
or the Love of Technology, he writes, 鈥減eople who are interested in the
souls of machines are severely punished by being isolated in their own
separate world, the world of engineers, technicians, and technocrats鈥�. It
is this world of machines that Latour sets out to rehabilitate in his
clever new work. For those who have found Latour鈥檚 sometimes inscrutably
dense prose daunting, here is an eminently readable book鈥攅ven on occasions
a ripping good yarn.
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This time round, the author of such seminal sociology of science texts
such as We Have Never Been Modern has set out to do something daring:
create a new genre, what he calls 鈥渟cientifiction鈥�. His aim is 鈥渢o bring
about a fusion of two separated universes, that of culture, and that of
technology鈥�, by fusing together the novel, the bureaucratic dossier and
the sociological commentary. The result is a hypertext, weaving real and
fictional characters together against the backdrop of an actual project
carried out by RATP, the public transport authority for Paris.
The backbone of Latour鈥檚 story is RATP鈥檚 attempt, between 1970 and 1987,
to create a radically new public transportation system for the Petite
Ceinture district of Paris. Known as Aramis, the project was the most
successful realisation so far of a so-called Personal Rapid Transport
system.
During the 1960s, PRTs were touted as the antidote to the car鈥檚 hegemony.
They were to deliver the personal convenience of cars in the context of a
public transport framework, and would consist of many small carriages,
each operating semi-autonomously, dispatched on demand, and picking people
up virtually at their doorsteps.
On paper it was a marvellous idea, but the technological hurdles were
enormous, as many private companies and government transportation agencies
would discover. Finally, after a billion and a half francs and 17 years of
research, the Aramis team had a working prototype. It was a technological
marvel.
Most impressively, even individual Aramis carriages could operate both as
autonomous units travelling alone, and together in a synchronised train,
achieved through the wonder of nonmechanical coupling. When travelling
together, the carriages were not physically linked; rather, each, through
its own on-board 鈥渋ntelligence鈥�, was constantly in dialogue with a
computerised control centre, and so could keep track of its neighbours,
and maintain its speed and place in the 鈥渢rain鈥�.
Yet at just that point when it seemed viable, the French government pulled
the plug. What went wrong? And who made that decision? Latour sets out to
illuminate these questions in this feisty sociotechnological whodunit.
The story is told simultaneously from several perspectives. Carrying the
weight of the 鈥渘ovel鈥� component is the fictional character of an unnamed
young engineer who has come to the famous French school, the Ecole des
Mines, to work as an intern for a sociologist, Norbert H., as he carries
out an 鈥渁utopsy鈥� of Aramis. While the name is a nod to the great champion
of technological innovation, Norbert Wiener, the character stands, in some
sense, for Latour, himself a sociologist at the Ecole des Mines.
We also hear the voices of the actual engineers and administrators who
worked on Aramis, quoted in transcripts from real interviews. Then we have
the 鈥渁uthor鈥�, who injects a voice-from-God sociological commentary on the
whole proceedings. Finally, as the story unfolds, Aramis increasingly
speaks on its own behalf.
Each voice鈥揺ach 鈥渞eality鈥� as Latour would have it鈥搃s identified by a
different typography. In this sense, the text parallels the technology it
chronicles: each of the different voices becomes like one of the Aramis
carriages. Each has an autonomous existence tracing its own path through
the book. Sometimes voices join in a 鈥渢rain鈥�, cohering in a subplot or a
narrative segment, but at other times they operate independently.
Just as Aramis was a postmodern dissolution of the very idea of a train
confined to its tracks, so too Latour鈥檚 narrative is a postmodern
dissolution of the idea of a fixed story. There is no absolute background
here against which readers can definitely locate themselves or the
characters. This is a 鈥渞elativistic鈥� tale in which all frames of reference
are equal. Anyone looking for a denouement will probably be disappointed,
for Latour refuses to pin blame on anyone. Aramis might be dead, he says,
鈥渂ut there was no murder鈥�, and hence no murderer. Everyone acted in good
conscience. The trouble is they all have different conceptions of what
happened. The fault for the Aramis cancellation, Norbert and prot茅g茅
conclude, lies with an intellectual omission.
What the Aramis engineers and administrators were guilty of, Norbert
concludes, is of not allowing 鈥渢he body and the soul鈥� of the technology to
come together. They refused to allow the technological aspects of the
project (its 鈥渂ody鈥�) to be informed by the sociological aspects (its
鈥渟辞耻濒鈥�).
Ultimately, Latour argues, 鈥渢echnicians cannot even conceive of a
technological object without taking into account the mass of human beings
with all their passions and politics and pitiful calculations鈥�. By
becoming good sociologists, he says, they become better engineers.
Equally, the book is a plea to humanists on behalf of engineering, and of
machines themselves. One of Latour鈥檚 aims was 鈥渢o offer humanists an
analysis of a technology sufficiently magnificent and spiritual to
convince them that the machines by which they are surrounded are cultural
objects worthy of their attention and respect鈥�. It is the machines that
are the real heroes of this tale鈥搉otably Aramis itself.
In this guise Aramis is conspicuously modelled on that other great
technological failure, the monster of Mary Shelley鈥檚 Frankenstein. Aramis
too is a tragic figure ultimately scorned by its makers, and our hearts go
out to this creature who simply wants to be loved by its creators. One of
the most charming aspects of this book is that you come to care what
happens to an automated train.
Yet curiously for such a postmodern work, there is something old-fashioned
here: the underlying tone of technological ra-ra-ra belongs more to the
19th than to the late 20th century. Stripping away the sociological
deconstruction, what we have here is a Boy鈥檚 Own adventure. At its core
this is the story of a bunch of boys playing trains, told with an almost
touchingly naive, macho enthusiasm. The only woman in the book is the
hypothetical nightmare passenger鈥揳 little old lady with a walking stick.
Unlike Mary Shelley, Latour seems to argue, without reservation, for
technological innovation. While he is right that the present isolation of
science and technology from the humanities is deplorable, his boosterism
on behalf of technology rings just a tad too loudly. Perhaps sociologists
need convincing of technology鈥檚 merits, but most other people understand
that it is marvellous and problematic.