Why has Michel Serres’ philosophy remained neglected in the academic world and invisible in the public domain?
He wrote and gave interviews in French, and he avoided promotional branding. In the academic world, Serres did not fit into any niche and his transdisciplinary approach initially caused consternation. Paradoxically however, as time went on, he still became lumped...
Orbital Image
As part of a course I am undertaking, we have been asked to produce an image of hope for the future. This is my attempt The image was produced through using ChatGPT to keep reshuffling an image of the planet and some of my own photos. The text is adapted from Samantha...
Conversation Avec Michel Serres
The magazine Zadig (no 2 June 2019) published a conversation with Serres. This was conducted shortly before his death. He discusses everything from his childhood, his time at Stanford University to the election of Macron as President of France and the fire at...
Greta Thunberg and Thumbelina
In Times of Crisis, Serres asks: “Who will speak out” and engage with the destruction of the earth and the abuse of each other? In Thumbelina he provides a provocative answer: our hope must be a radical shift promoted by young people through their use of advanced...
The call for new stories
In the conclusion to The Nutmeg’s Curse: Parables for a Planet in Crisis, the writer Amitav Ghosh (2021) remarks that that the ‘first step is to find a common idiom and a shared story’. Above all we need a ‘narrative of humility’. The French philosopher Bruno Latour...
Michel Serres Will Not Save the Planet
Can we save the world, earth, planet? Many books promote the idea. A few examples: How Economics Will Save the World (2024) Garden to Save the World (2024) Six Energy Projects to Save the Planet (2024) Earthshot: How to Save the Planet (2021) How Degrowth Will Save...
Revolutionary Thinking
I was intrigued to find on the very first page of Robert Macfarlane's introduction to his wonderful Is A River Alive? a reference to Michel Serres. He says the three landscapes that he explores in his book: become a focus for revolutionary thinking about what the...
The question of a new relationship ‘with’ nature.
In Serres’ The Natural Contract published initially in 1990, there was a tendency to think in terms of a contract with nature. His later writing avoids this. Why? In many ecology movements, it is common to talk about finding a new relationship ‘with’ nature, or as a...
Slavoj Žižek: Time: Catastrophe
The philosopher Slavoj Žižek is always interesting. Verbose in his academic books but frequently provocative and inspirational in short treatises, articles and interviews. An example is in this article published through the online journal Jacobin in January 2023. He...
Is A River Alive?
Robert Macfarlane’s book Is A River Alive (2025) is thoroughly stimulating. As well as his observations of, and encounters with, three distinct landscapes and rivers in Ecuador, India and Canada, he raises many questions about how the law could be transformed to...
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