English + french bellow<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Mathias de Lattre, Free-Thinker<\/strong><\/p>\n Perhaps it is time to rehabilitate the strong term of free thinker. Without doubt it should be removed from its violently anti-clerical meaning which is as ubiquitous as it is dated. The honest man is not vindictive.<\/p>\n Let us say that he likes to sit at the foot of his tree to try to consider a problem without preconceived ideas and to try, modestly, empirically, for his own use, to find a solution that suits him. Being neither doctrinaire nor an idiot, he will critically consider the solutions already proposed and will re-examine those that have been rejected. It is almost by chance, by making use of his freedom, that he will question dogma.<\/p>\n Mathias de Lattre has accomplished this free-thinking approach and traces it in Mother’s Therapy<\/em>. He invited me to write this text while the book existed only in his mind. It was March 2020, the first confinement was beginning, and any acute delirium was good to take. I remember, in my great lightness, synthesizing his explanations as follows: \u2018My mother is bipolar and I undertook to treat her with hallucinogenic mushrooms\u2019. I didn’t know anything about psychedelics or psilocybin at the time. Mathias added that to arrive at this therapy, he had passed through prehistory, the Native Americans and a few distinguished free-spirited scientists. \u2018Oh yeah, rock’n’roll, I’m in\u2019, was essentially how I replied to Mathias. I had no idea that I was going to spend several months figuring out what he had done.<\/p>\n He then only had to send me four or five series of heterogeneous photos (views of ornate caves, a Mixtec codex, portraits of researchers and images of his mother), and a few scattered texts. The subject matter was strong and iconoclastic, but I wondered how this boy was going to tell the story from these few series of images of which, for me, there was not much to connect them a priori. It seemed very clear to him.<\/p>\n Once we were released from our house arrest, I met Mathias, a tall young man with a laughing face and an unbridled intelligence. Neither a nutcase nor a hippie, he was a cool guy. That was seven months ago, and since then I have been trying to understand the intellectual construction behind this work. I was immediately intrigued by the way Mathias intended to tell his story and by what it said about him. This fascinated me more than the photographic work itself, which was professional, efficient, and without affect \u2013 apart from the maternal images of course \u2013 and about which there is not much to say (this is a compliment).<\/p>\n Working by successive approximations, I was at first tempted to think that Mother’s Therapy<\/em> was an intellectual self-portrait. This was not entirely satisfactory. Perhaps, then, a transcription of his way of thinking. A totally anti-academic way. No three-part hierarchical plan, no thesis, antithesis, and even less synthesis. But a plasticity of reflection, wherein the elements can fit together horizontally in different ways to lead to the same conclusion.<\/p>\n Having followed the design of the book from a distance, I observed and, on one or two occasions, suggested that the individual chapters could be moved around without detracting from the coherence of the whole. The whole point of the book’s elaboration, it seems to me, was to make clearly intelligible to the reader, in the fixed and closed form of the book, what had seduced and so disconcerted me when seen in the looser form of a pack of cards spread out on a table.<\/p>\n But I still couldn’t understand what Mathias de Lattre had done.<\/p>\n It was only recently that the pieces of the puzzle found a possible arrangement in my mind. And the image of the free-thinker sitting at the foot of his tree came to the fore.<\/p>\n Mathias’ mother, diagnosed bipolar at the approach of forty, is getting worse and worse, despite the shovelfuls of pills she is given. One can imagine the distress of a son looking for a solution. He then mobilizes all the tools at his disposal. Like many, he loves prehistory. In the distant past, he may have been interested in psychedelic mushrooms and shamanism. To solve the problem he faces, he looks for written sources. He goes to meet those whose approach interests him. Mathias de Lattre also happens to be a photographer, but photography is not the object of Mother’s Therapy<\/em>. It is a servant in the service of a purpose, one of the pieces of a dossier.<\/p>\n So, Mother’s Therapy<\/em> is not a photography book, at least, not only that. It can be easily stored in the photo-text book register because it contains photographs and text. But it exceeds any reductive categorization. It is the reflection of a thought that unfolds freely.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n The aporia of technical medicine<\/strong><\/p>\n But to understand the full force of Mother’s Therapy<\/em> it is also necessary to explain clearly what Mathias de Lattre opposes. Oh, it is not a question for him of waving black flags, but rather of conscientious objection, like a modern Bartleby. And this in-depth, non-violent criticism of a dominant model is the second reason why I wanted to write this text.<\/p>\n What Mathias de Lattre faces is the aporia of technical medicine. In other words, the impassable logical contradiction that pharmacology faces when its remedies unfortunately prove ineffective. It then has no other outcome than to increase the dose or enrich the cocktail at the risk of the patient dying cured. (Knock, Moli\u00e8re…) This seems absurd, but can be explained if we refer to Jacques Ellul, author of La Technique ou l’enjeu du si\u00e8cle<\/em> (1954). According to Ellul, technology has transformed from a tool to an autonomous process that enslaves Man. The person who created it, the technician (the researcher or the doctor in this case), as well as the person who benefits from it (here the patient).<\/p>\n According to the technical logic, the solution to a technique that does not work is a technological improvement. Or, if a technique creates a new problem, a new technique must be created to solve the previously created problem. We don’t think about this enough \u2013 but look around you, examples abound. Ellul was able to take a ferociously ironic example. Organ transplants are a tremendous medical advance, aren’t they? But to perform a transplant, you need young and healthy organs. Where are they to be found in abundance? In road accidents that kill far too many young people. This is a problem. But in order to have more organs for transplantation, there would have to be more road accidents…That’s another problem.<\/p>\n Another interesting point highlighted by Ellul is the coalescence of industrial, governmental and economic techniques. It is therefore useless to sink into conspiracy and to imagine an alliance of mad scientists, Big Pharma and prohibitionist politicians. No. They all share a common faith (because it is a matter of religion or ideology) in the progress and efficiency that will improve the human condition. The researcher hopes, via the technique, to improve the life of men; the leader hopes to keep power by the \u2018progress\u2019 that it allows for his citizens; and the financier hopes to be \u2018fairly\u2019 remunerated for his investment in it.<\/p>\n Let me make myself clear: it is not a question here of pleading for a return to the cave age, but of being able to think freely about what affects us, and to understand the approach accomplished by Mathias de Lattre. One may wish to have a fridge and want to treat oneself with plants!<\/p>\n The technological ideal has colonised the entire planet and, like any ideology, it refutes all knowledge outside of it. Mathias’ research, particularly in Latin America, shows that the immemorial knowledge about psychedelics has been sustained with care, like a small flame kept alive by a few groups, and rekindled in the modern era by scientific and curious minds trying to think outside the box. I am thinking of this American banker and mycologist and his wife escorted by Roger Heim, director of the Museum of Natural History (no less a hippie!) who set off to explore psychedelics in Mexico in the mid-1950s.<\/p>\n Mathias de Lattre is modest and \u00a0presents what he relates in Mother’s Therapy as a simple testimony. All the same, he has contributed to relieving his mother of her torments and to opening up encouraging perspectives. In hollow, however, is the revelation of the whole modernist technician mechanism and its blinkers. This is not insignificant. He and all the admirable researchers and practitioners he met, or whose memories he evokes, are indeed, each in their own field, free thinkers.<\/p>\n R\u00e9mi Coignet<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n FR:<\/p>\n Mathias de\u00a0<\/strong>Lattre, libre-penseur<\/strong><\/p>\n Il serait temps, peut-\u00eatre, de r\u00e9habiliter le fort vocable de libre-penseur. Sans doute faudrait-il l\u2019extirper de son acception violemment anti-cl\u00e9ricale aussi commune que dat\u00e9e. L\u2019honn\u00eate homme n\u2019est point vindicatif.<\/p>\n Disons qu\u2019il aime \u00e0 s\u2019asseoir au pied de son arbre pour tenter de consid\u00e9rer un probl\u00e8me sans id\u00e9e pr\u00e9con\u00e7ue et de tenter, modestement, empiriquement, pour son usage propre, d\u2019y apporter une solution qui lui convienne. N\u2019\u00e9tant ni doctrinaire, ni idiot, il envisagera de mani\u00e8re critique les solutions d\u00e9j\u00e0 propos\u00e9es, reviendra sur celles qui ont \u00e9t\u00e9 rejet\u00e9es et les r\u00e9examinera.\u00a0C\u2019est presque par hasard, en faisant usage de sa libert\u00e9, qu\u2019il remettra en cause le dogme.<\/p>\n Mathias de\u00a0Lattre a accompli cette d\u00e9marche de libre-penseur et la retrace dans Mother<\/em>\u2019<\/em>s Therapy<\/em>. Il m\u2019a propos\u00e9 d\u2019\u00e9crire ce texte tandis que ce livre n\u2019existait encore que dans son esprit. Nous \u00e9tions en mars 2020, le premier confinement d\u00e9butait et toute bouff\u00e9e d\u00e9lirante \u00e9tait bonne \u00e0 prendre. Je me souviens, dans ma grande l\u00e9g\u00e8ret\u00e9, avoir synth\u00e9tis\u00e9 ses explications ainsi : \u00ab\u00a0 ma m\u00e8re est bipolaire et j\u2019ai entrepris de la soigner aux champignons hallucinog\u00e8nes.\u00a0\u00bb Je ne savais rien alors des psych\u00e9d\u00e9liques ou de la psilocybine. Il avait encore ajout\u00e9 que pour en arriver \u00e0 cette th\u00e9rapie, il \u00e9tait pass\u00e9 par la pr\u00e9histoire, les Am\u00e9rindiens et quelques distingu\u00e9s scientifiques libres d’esprit. \u00ab\u00a0Oh yeah, rock\u2019n\u2019roll, j\u2019en suis.\u00a0\u00bb ai-je r\u00e9pondu en substance \u00e0 Mathias. Sans me douter que j\u2019allais passer plusieurs mois \u00e0 comprendre ce qu\u2019il avait fait<\/em>\u00a0.<\/p>\n Il n\u2019avait alors \u00e0 me transmettre que quatre ou cinq s\u00e9ries de photos h\u00e9t\u00e9rog\u00e8nes (des vues de grottes orn\u00e9es, un codex mixt\u00e8que, des portraits de chercheurs et des images de sa m\u00e8re) et quelques textes \u00e9pars. Le sujet \u00e9tait fort et iconoclaste, mais je me demandais bien comment ce gar\u00e7on allait raconter cette histoire \u00e0 partir de ces quelques s\u00e9ries d\u2019images que, pour moi, pas grand-chose ne reliait a priori<\/em>. Pour lui cela semblait tr\u00e8s clair.<\/p>\n Une fois lib\u00e9r\u00e9s de nos assignations \u00e0 r\u00e9sidence, j\u2019ai rencontr\u00e9 Mathias, grand jeune homme \u00e0 la mine rieuse et \u00e0 l\u2019intelligence d\u00e9li\u00e9e. Ni allum\u00e9 ni hippie, un mec \u00e0 la coule. C\u2019\u00e9tait il y a sept mois et depuis je tente de comprendre la construction intellectuelle qui sous-tend ce travail.<\/p>\n Tr\u00e8s vite en effet, plus que par le travail photographique, professionnel, efficace, sans affects \u2013 hormis les images maternelles \u00e9videmment \u2013 \u00e0 propos duquel il n\u2019y a pas grand-chose \u00e0 dire (c\u2019est un compliment) j\u2019ai \u00e9t\u00e9 intrigu\u00e9 par la mani\u00e8re dont Mathias entendait raconter son histoire et par ce que cela disait de lui.<\/p>\n Fonctionnant par approximations successives, j\u2019ai d\u2019abord \u00e9t\u00e9 tent\u00e9 de penser que Mother<\/em>\u2019<\/em>s Therapy<\/em>\u00a0\u00e9tait un autoportrait intellectuel. Cela n\u2019\u00e9tait pas enti\u00e8rement satisfaisant. Peut-\u00eatre alors la transcription de sa mani\u00e8re de penser. Une fa\u00e7on totalement anti-acad\u00e9mique. Pas de plan hi\u00e9rarchique en trois parties, pas de th\u00e8se, antith\u00e8se et encore moins de synth\u00e8se. Mais une plasticit\u00e9 de la r\u00e9flexion, o\u00f9 les \u00e9l\u00e9ments peuvent s\u2019embo\u00eeter horizontalement de diverses fa\u00e7ons pour conduire \u00e0 une m\u00eame conclusion.<\/p>\n Ayant suivi de loin la conception du livre, j\u2019ai observ\u00e9 et, \u00e0 une ou deux reprises sugg\u00e9r\u00e9, que les diff\u00e9rents chapitres pouvaient \u00eatre d\u00e9plac\u00e9s sans nuire \u00e0 la coh\u00e9rence de l\u2019ensemble. Tout l\u2019enjeu de l\u2019\u00e9laboration\u00a0de l\u2019ouvrage, \u00e9tant, me semble-t-il, de rendre clairement intelligible au lecteur, sous la forme fig\u00e9e et ferm\u00e9e du livre, ce qui m\u2019avait s\u00e9duit et tant d\u00e9concert\u00e9 sous celle plus l\u00e2che d\u2019un jeu de cartes \u00e9tal\u00e9 sur une table.<\/p>\n Mais je n\u2019arrivais toujours pas \u00e0 comprendre ce que Mathias de\u00a0Lattre avait fait<\/em>\u00a0.<\/p>\n Ce n\u2019est que tout r\u00e9cemment que les pi\u00e8ces du puzzle ont trouv\u00e9 dans mon esprit un agencement possible. Et l\u2019image du libre-penseur assis au pied de son arbre s\u2019est impos\u00e9e.<\/p>\n La m\u00e8re de Mathias, diagnostiqu\u00e9e bipolaire \u00e0 l\u2019approche de la quarantaine va de plus en plus mal malgr\u00e9 les pellet\u00e9es de comprim\u00e9s qu\u2019on lui administre. Et l\u2019on peut imaginer la d\u00e9tresse d\u2019un fils \u00e0 la recherche d\u2019une solution. Il mobilise alors l\u2019ensemble des outils \u00e0 sa disposition.<\/p>\n Comme beaucoup, il aime la pr\u00e9histoire. Il a pu, dans un lointain pass\u00e9 s\u2019int\u00e9resser aux champignons psych\u00e9d\u00e9liques, au chamanisme. Pour r\u00e9soudre le probl\u00e8me qui se pose \u00e0 lui, il recherche des sources \u00e9crites. Il va \u00e0 la rencontre de ceux dont la d\u00e9marche l\u2019int\u00e9resse. Il se trouve aussi que Mathias de\u00a0Lattre est photographe, mais la photographie n\u2019est pas l\u2019objet de Mother<\/em>\u2019<\/em>s Therapy<\/em>. Elle est une servante au service d\u2019un propos, l\u2019une des pi\u00e8ces d\u2019un dossier.<\/p>\n Aussi, Mother<\/em>\u2019<\/em>s Therapy<\/em>\u00a0n\u2019est-il pas un livre de photographie, du moins pas uniquement. On peut, par facilit\u00e9, le ranger dans le registre des livres photo-texte car il contient des photos et du texte. Mais il exc\u00e8de toute cat\u00e9gorisation r\u00e9ductrice. Il est le reflet d\u2019une pens\u00e9e qui se d\u00e9ploie librement.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n L<\/strong>\u2019<\/strong>aporie de la m\u00e9decine technicienne<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n Mais pour comprendre toute la force de Mother<\/em>\u2019<\/em>s Therapy<\/em>\u00a0il faut \u00e9galement exposer clairement ce \u00e0 quoi Mathias de\u00a0Lattre s\u2019oppose. Oh il ne s\u2019agit pas pour lui d\u2019agiter les drapeaux noirs, mais bien plut\u00f4t d\u2019objecter conscience, tel un Bartleby moderne. Et cette critique en creux, sans violence, d\u2019un mod\u00e8le dominant est la deuxi\u00e8me raison pour laquelle j\u2019ai voulu \u00e9crire ce texte.<\/p>\n Ce \u00e0 quoi Mathias de\u00a0Lattre fait face est l\u2019aporie de la m\u00e9decine technicienne. Autrement dit, la contradiction logique ind\u00e9passable \u00e0 laquelle elle se heurte lorsque ses rem\u00e8des s\u2019av\u00e8rent, h\u00e9las, inefficaces. Elle n\u2019a alors d\u2019autre issue que d\u2019augmenter la dose ou d\u2019enrichir le cocktail au risque que le patient ne meure gu\u00e9ri. (Knock, Moli\u00e8re\u2026) Cela semble absurde, mais s\u2019explique si l\u2019on se r\u00e9f\u00e8re \u00e0 Jacques Ellul, auteur notamment de La Technique ou l<\/em>\u2019<\/em>enjeu du si<\/em>\u00e8<\/em>cle <\/em>(1954). Selon lui, d\u2019outil celle-ci est devenue un processus autonome asservissant l\u2019Homme. Celui qui l\u2019a cr\u00e9e, le technicien (le chercheur ou le m\u00e9decin dans le cas qui nous int\u00e9resse) comme celui qui en b\u00e9n\u00e9ficie (ici le patient).<\/p>\n Dans la logique technicienne, la solution \u00e0 une technique qui ne fonctionne pas est une am\u00e9lioration technologique. Ou, si une technique engendre un probl\u00e8me nouveau, une nouvelle technique qui viendra r\u00e9soudre le probl\u00e8me pr\u00e9c\u00e9demment cr\u00e9\u00e9. On n\u2019y pense pas assez, mais regardez autour de vous les exemples abondent.<\/p>\n Ellul a pu prendre un exemple f\u00e9rocement ironique. Les transplantations d\u2019organes sont un formidable progr\u00e8s de la m\u00e9decine, n\u2019est-ce pas ? Mais pour cela il faut disposer d\u2019organes jeunes et en bonne sant\u00e9. Or o\u00f9 en trouve-t-on \u00e0 foison ? Lors d\u2019accidents de la route qui tuent bien trop de gens jeunes. C\u2019est un probl\u00e8me. Mais pour disposer de davantage d\u2019organes \u00e0 transplanter, il faudrait plus d\u2019accidents de la route\u2026 C\u2019est un autre probl\u00e8me.<\/p>\n Autre point int\u00e9ressant que met en \u00e9vidence Ellul, la coalescence des techniques industrielles, gouvernementales ou \u00e9conomiques. Inutile d\u00e8s lors de sombrer dans le complotisme et d\u2019imaginer une alliance de savants fous, de Big Pharma et de politiciens prohibitionnistes. Non. Tous communient dans la foi (car il s\u2019agit bien au choix de religion ou d\u2019id\u00e9ologie) du progr\u00e8s et du rendement qui am\u00e9lioreront la condition humaine. Le chercheur esp\u00e8re gr\u00e2ce \u00e0 la technique am\u00e9liorer la vie des hommes, le dirigeant, conserver le pouvoir par le \u00ab\u00a0progr\u00e8s\u00a0\u00bb qu\u2019elle permet pour ses administr\u00e9s et le financier, \u00eatre \u00ab\u00a0justement\u00a0\u00bb r\u00e9mun\u00e9r\u00e9 de son investissement dans celui-ci.<\/p>\n Que l\u2019on m\u2019entende bien, Il ne s\u2019agit point ici de plaider pour un retour \u00e0 l\u2019\u00e2ge des cavernes, mais de pouvoir penser librement ce qui nous affecte et de comprendre la d\u00e9marche accomplie par Mathias de Lattre. On peut souhaiter disposer d\u2019un frigo et vouloir se soigner par les plantes !<\/p>\n L\u2019id\u00e9al technologique a colonis\u00e9 la plan\u00e8te enti\u00e8re et comme toute id\u00e9ologie r\u00e9fute tout savoir qui lui est ext\u00e9rieur.\u00a0 Les recherches de Mathias en Am\u00e9rique latine notamment, montrent que les savoirs imm\u00e9moriaux sur les psych\u00e9d\u00e9liques ne se sont maintenus que comme une petite flamme entretenue par quelques groupes et raviv\u00e9e par des esprits scientifiques et curieux qui tentent de penser hors du canon. Je pense \u00e0 ce banquier et mycologue am\u00e9ricain et son \u00e9pouse escort\u00e9s par Roger Heim, directeur du Museum d\u2019histoire naturelle (on ne fait pas moins hippie !) partant explorer les psych\u00e9d\u00e9liques au Mexique au mitan des ann\u00e9es 1950.<\/p>\n Mathias de\u00a0Lattre est modeste et pr\u00e9sente ce qu\u2019il relate dans Mother<\/em>\u2019<\/em>s Therapy<\/em>\u00a0comme un simple t\u00e9moignage. Il a tout de m\u00eame contribu\u00e9 \u00e0 soulager sa m\u00e8re de ses tourments, et \u00e0 ouvrir des perspectives encourageantes. En creux, c\u2019est pourtant tout le m\u00e9canisme technicien moderniste et ses \u0153ill\u00e8res qui se r\u00e9v\u00e8le.\u00a0Cela n\u2019est pas rien. Lui et tous les admirables chercheurs et praticiens qu\u2019il a rencontr\u00e9s, o\u00f9 dont il \u00e9voque la m\u00e9moire sont bien, chacun dans sa partie, de libre-penseurs.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n R\u00e9mi Coignet<\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" English + french bellow Mathias de Lattre, Free-Thinker Perhaps it is time to rehabilitate the strong term of free thinker. Without doubt it should be removed from its violently anti-clerical meaning which is as ubiquitous as it is dated. The honest man is not vindictive. Let us say that he likes to sit at…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-1255","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mathiasdelattre.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1255","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mathiasdelattre.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mathiasdelattre.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mathiasdelattre.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mathiasdelattre.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1255"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/mathiasdelattre.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1255\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1260,"href":"https:\/\/mathiasdelattre.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1255\/revisions\/1260"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mathiasdelattre.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1255"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}