The Panopticon: a place of surveillance
The place of surveillance par excellence was theorized by Jeremy Bentham in his book Panopticon, in 1791. The issue is to make observation the most important point of detention. Michel …
Category: Philosophy
Republics are not eternal
It is Plato who affirms it, as Jean Bodin relates it, in his IVth book of the Republic: Republics die, like all things. Republics suffer change by nature. So that …
Reading enlarges the soul, and an enlightened friend consoles it. – Voltaire
The characters of Voltaire’s philosophical tale use the word“Ingenious” in the sense of someone who“always says naively what he thinks”. In this tale, the one called the ingenue is a …
Machiavelli – Avoiding Revolutions
Machiavelli has a simple yet complex method for avoiding revolutions. Simple, because it can be obtained in two ways. Complex, because it is still necessary to be able to implement …
Machiavelli – The Stability of the State
In 1531, Machiavelli in his Discourses on the first decade of Titus Livius I, and II, compares Rome and Sparta. For Machiavelli, Rome won between the two because it showed …
Le jardin secret
A short history of gardens, to understand what the expression secret garden means. → General Knowledge: the Secret Genesis, of course, begins the importance of the garden. It is a …