Chapitre 10. Le normativisme pour la vertébrothérapie japonaise

Abstract

According to Michel Foucault, French philosophy can be divided into two categories, one, the philosophy of consciousness, the other that of the concept. This dichotomy is linked to the terminology of Jean Cavaillès in his work entitled "On the logic and the theory of science". (Cavaillès J, PUF, 1947). In France, as this, there is a long tradition of epistemology whose project is to retrace the history of science by continuing the development of concepts that animate it and by analyzing their evolution. This tradition has long been interested in philosophy of medicine and biology. Its most important representative in this domain is Georges Canguilhem whose influence has spread widely. In this article, we will focus on one of the most representative of Canguilhem: «The normal and the pathological». (Canguilhem G, PUF, 1966). The reading of Canguilhem that we will propose here, focusing on some key concepts of his book, highlights in this author three fundamental points: the impossibility of objectivable pathology, the central role of individuality and the preeminence of normativism. We are aware of limits of this reading, which cannot fundamentally explore all of Canguilhem's thought or the tradition of French vitalism. On the other hand, it should help us in our effort, in terms of building an epistemology of vertebrotherapy, by carefully analyzing Canguilhem's work and the notebooks of a great Japanese vertebrotherapist in Shōwa's time, Fujimori Sr.