The Origin and Dissemination of Scientific Knowledge

André Leroi-Gourhan (1911-1986) was a French ethnologist, prehistorian and paleo-anthropologist who is today also appreciated for his influence on the philosophy of technology. His first publications on L'Homme et la matière and Milieu et techniques (1943, 1945) secured his reputation as a specialist in the study of material civilizations and in comparative technology. This perspective was enriched by evolutionary and anthropological considerations in his best known work, Le geste et la parole (1964, 1965). This book has appeared in English as Gesture and Speech in 1993, but not all of his relevant publications have been translated, and several aspects of his technological approach remain little known. The translation here of his March 1952 lecture at the Maison des Sciences in Paris, as part of a lecture series on “The structures of the universe and their scientific perception,” is an opportunity to highlight the interest and relevance of Leroi-Gourhan for contemporary reflections about technology. For example, a jointly haptic and cognitive “material engagement” is for Leroi-Gourhan characteristic of specifically human manufacture, of “materially creative activities” as undertaken by artisans of all times. We can recognize here Leroi-Gourhan's adhesion to Henri Bergson's philosophical tenet regarding the epistemological primacy of action over contemplation, and consequently the active, dynamic, vital origins of knowledge.