Hypnosis Between Science and Magic

What if judgment returned to the craft of magic? How would that relieve the burdens of critique and realign its priorities? These questions regarding the value of magic to thinking are at the very heart of the acclaimed philosopher of science Isabelle Stengers' political and philosophical thought and her insistence that ‘the smoke of the burned witches still hangs in our nostrils’. Now, in the first English translation of this classic text, Hypnosis Between Science and Magic provides an entry point to the work of Isabelle Stengers, who has so originally and forcefully shifted how we think about the history of ideas. The book focuses in on an area of her thought that has recurred throughout her career: the presumed antagonism between magic and science, and especially the evacuation of magic from all that is thought to be scientifically valid.

What if judgment returned to the craft of magic? How would that relieve the burdens of critique and realign its priorities? These questions regarding the value of magic to thinking are at the very heart of the acclaimed philosopher of science Isabelle Stengers' political and philosophical thought and her insistence that ‘the smoke of the burned witches still hangs in our nostrils’. Now, in the first English translation of this classic text, Hypnosis Between Science and Magic provides an entry point to the work of Isabelle Stengers, who has so originally and forcefully shifted how we think about the history of ideas. The book focuses in on an area of her thought that has recurred throughout her career: the presumed antagonism between magic and science, and especially the evacuation of magic from all that is thought to be scientifically valid.