Introduction

A new description of knowledge: reintroducing the taboo of passion

5When you are passionate about football, whether or not you are a member of a supporters’ club, there comes a time when the spectacle alone of the football match is not sufficient to “cultivate” your passion. The latter requires the construction and calibration of profane expertise, whereby you seek out information, memorise key facts about the team you support and study in finest detail the ins and outs of a given match, a given player, a given club or a given competition. Passion becomes inseparable from familiarisation, a love of knowledge that grows out of the intensity of this passion. And so the process gathers pace and grows. From this point of view, “cognitive passions” are trivially interpreted as this love of knowledge that accompanies a passion as a sort of “cognitive test” of the affective experience.

6Symmetrically speaking, in an investigation into the conditions of exercising a knowledge activity (whether it is amateur or professional, expert or profane), there is a place for interpretation in terms of the commitment of that passion. For example, the researcher in his laboratory, but just as much a self-employed contractor in doing his job or the father or mother looking after a newborn baby, are situations of theoretical or empirical knowledge which can result in a real and deep involvement and a desire to know more, to know better and to become an expert of sorts, a specialist, and in a way, a master exponent. The moment of knowledge taken hold of by this movement of mutual commitment to “good action and good knowledge” can be documented here as an “affective test” of the cognitive approach.

7Herein lies a paradigm of the first way of conjugating passion and knowledge through the lines of enquiry explored. On the one hand, a passion could not be exercised without a knowledge activity, because passion demands a higher knowledge of the cherished subject, and this higher knowledge in turn reinforces the passion; on the other hand, any knowledge activity will, to different degrees, result in a passionate commitment to the knowing individual, assuming that we get a feel and a liking for discovery, exploration, truth (P. Nouvel); a passion which would mobilise the knowing individual alongside the activity of knowing.

8We should say straight away, fairly directly, that the “cognitive passions” perspective as we see it only partially finds a serene to-ing and fro-ing which is consistent, on the one hand with exercising a passion, and on the other, with the activity of knowing. This is so because in this model, everything seems to be maintained in its given state. Even though the emphasis is placed on what passes from one register to another, the places, functions, roles and rules seem unaffected in their two colliding “worlds”. And yet, precisely, what we think should be documented, by accepting to work on this phrase “cognitive passions”, is not what remains in place and in its place, but what moves, what shifts and what, precisely, refuses to stay put.

9Here we should admit a strong bias. We do not intend to look at the two sides of the expression “cognitive passions” in a symmetrical manner. On the contrary, we would seek to emphasise the rebel, radical force of passion in order to see it at work in the different cognitive and knowing schemes. What is it doing there? What is it causing to change? Why does it cause disorder? What does it put in place? We shall attempt to process this unreasonable, improbable burst of passion in the cognitive universe. We should not be surprised to find along our way everything that a tradition of thought has thrown up as barrages and dykes to protect the reason, reasoning, the work of knowledge of unfettered passion. If knowledge without passion represents the norm, we want to work on the side of deviance, where passionate knowledge is snagged on pitfalls and produces contrast. And so, methodological pitfalls will be turned into virtues of “cognitive passions” that we shall follow throughout our enquiry. To give some examples, we should refer here to some of the qualities of the forms of attachment habitually associated with “passion”.

10Becoming attached to something over time. Contrary to emotion, although partly linked to it, passion occurs over time, over the long term. Emotion surges in an instant, in an event that creates its appearance. Passion is cultivated over time; it develops, enriches and grows. We are dealing with the careers of passionate people, those who become passionate and who stay with their passion over time. This durability results in attachments, chains that hold you back, captivate you, envelop you and never let you go. It is often difficult to undo those links, to index them to the passionate subject, to the “fascinating subject” or the passion itself as a coupling link between the two subjects. Passion inaugurates and gives rise to a specific space of formal narrative which is autonomous, with founding events, stages, ups and downs, suspensions and backtracking. Passion is a sort of dramaturgy of interest, with its moments of intensity, moments of respite and calls to order. They say that passion can be dictatorial and imperious…

13“Passionate” knowledge is also a form of knowledge under domination. The relationship of domination here is not synonymous with decline, abandon or loss of reason. On the contrary, knowledge through or with passion is a strong form of commitment to knowledge. Knowledge is not exercised in a peaceful relationship in which the knowing being contemplates the subject to be understood and establishes and remotely exposes laws that he sees in action. With the drive and energy needed to move the passion forward, as a discoverer of the object of his passion, the subject experiences the overflow which becomes part of the passionate relationship itself. The act of knowledge is not denied therein, but on the contrary is carried and stimulated by the excitement of passion. Martin de la Soudière shows, for example, how the “lightning adept” attentively follows the weather forecast to be as often as possible in places where big storms occur to take photographs of an illuminated sky and learn more and more about these phenomena that so fascinate him. As a result, it is the very essence of knowing which is being nourished. The enrolment of the impassioned/subject of passion does not occur against the subject of passion/impassioned individual, but with him, with his cognitive consent (he goes into it knowingly).

14Entering into a community. However, this experience of passion (or the subject of passion) does not occur in isolation, independently of an involvement in communities, groups of passionate individuals or counter‑passionate individuals. A solitary passion is often the beginning of the road to depression. Passion in a normal social experience socialises and becomes socialised in the networks of influence, sharing or repulsion it instigates. It is around this sharing and the passion becoming a subject of conversation, in words, that the impassioned experience is constructed, takes shape and becomes legitimate. A shared passion can lead to happiness, to the development of a community of recognition, a “fraternity”. This contagious nature of passion – driven by imitation, emulation and cooperation between members of the same impassioned community – broadens the circle of experiences joined up by a “single” passion and tends to lend them contrast, comparison and coordination. The shared experience of passion can now become the arena for testing rules, roles and jobs which are associated with the passionate members through their own social history. Exercising a passion can be the arena for a mixing of origins, personalities, references, ages and sexes. In the extreme, a shared passion can lead to the creation of a sort of “mini-society” or community.

A principle of compatibility between the subject of passion and the subject of knowledge

17In their empirical dimension, “cognitive passions” appear then as passions in which specific and original forms of gaining knowledge, of enquiry and of creation of knowledge are tested. It is these forms, these configurations of knowledge, these practical epistemes that give cognitive passions their original consistency. From there on in, examining the impact of passion on the practice of knowledge will not be reflected in causes and effects. It is more in the morphology of the practices of knowledge in the passion scheme, the way they are developed, their layout and their implementation that need to be distinguished from the qualities of passion.

18Ultimately, it is the attributes of knowledge, or better still of knowing, in the passion scheme whose attributes shift away from passion. It is the latter which gives knowing its specific qualities. We could talk here about the subject of knowledge with two facets, which are part of the relationship of impassioned knowledge itself, which would fit as an alternative model to conventional dualistic one: the subject who masters his topic versus the subject who is transported by passion. This model of “cognitive passions”, which is taken from the “Jamesian” model of radical empiricism, allows us to make the subtle exercise of reason and mobilising energy of passion compatible. The irreconcilable elements would here work together, not in the name of a lessened form of consensus (a little bit of both) but in the name of a strong logic of the included third party (a lot of both at once).

Passion as a creator of epistemology: the jizz, or unaligned alignment

20Thinking about, thinking with. We will look first of all at the posture of the knowing subject and his relation with the subject to be known. In passion, we have seen that the relationship of knowledge is not established “dispassionately” between an external point of view and a domain to be understood, set before the observer, but that it is established between two terms of the relationship of impassioned knowledge, a relationship of familiarity, commitment and attachment, which is experienced over time and snowballs. In this respect, we have talked about the distinction proposed by William James between knowledge about and knowledge with. We can advance the hypothesis that, within the framework of an activity of knowledge in the passion scheme, there is compatibility between two schemes which are distinguished by W. James as “antinomic”.

21Pierre Floux, for example, shows how morel mushroom researchers whom he calls mycologues-morilleurs (morel mycologists) are just as interested in hunting morel mushrooms (knowing the hotspots, the right times of year, etc.) as in a scientific understanding of the species, and field knowledge allowing them to validate or even question the taxonomies of laboratory mycology. In the same way, Anne-Sophie Haeringer shows how the organisers at the Maison du Conte are just as much practitioners of storytelling as specialists in its history, techniques and issues. It is in this capacity that they organise veritable laboratory sessions with practising amateurs as their audience. Adopting a posture of knowledge by acquaintance here cohabits with a posture of remote knowledge. Not only do these two forms of knowledge coexist in the same relationship of impassioned knowledge, but they mutually reinforce each other. It is by discovering new species of morel mushrooms that the mycologues‑morilleurs contribute to an objective science on morel mushrooms. And this discovery enhances the impassioned relationship that the mushroom hunter maintains with hunting mushrooms. It is by practising storytelling in laboratories that the master storytellers of the Maison du Conte cultivate their passion and reinforce their storytelling expertise.

22Reading the subject in situ. This way of creating knowledge leads the knowing subject to enter into an intimate relationship with the element to be understood, where in sensitive contact with the advent of a desired occurrence of the subject of the passion (a discovered mushroom, a match attended, a fish caught in fly fishing, a storm witnessed), it is about reading the phenomenon at the very moment in which it occurs. Reading the river to adjust the cast of the fly, interpreting the movements of the storyteller, intimately understanding how the morel mushroom behaves and observing weather variations by watching the sky and the clouds, noting all these transformations in a notebook, are all ways of setting up the object of the passion as a grand text whose formula is to be discovered as we progressively test the content.

24Indeed, it is on the basis of hitherto unknown profane knowledge immersed in the environment that public data collection policies on biodiversity in Great Britain engage “amateur” forces to update databases. In the same way, Martin de la Soudière shows how professionals from the county‑level public works agency of the Ardèche (DDE) use the profane competences of locals to take accurate measurements of heavy snowfalls. This profane knowledge, held by impassioned people, is increasingly considered as complementary to academic knowledge, in that it precisely concerns the relationship with the event and the environment, whilst the “objects of science” are extracted from the site where they occur through investigation within the academic framework.

25The jizz or the quest for alignment. In this cognitive relationship between the impassioned subject and the world of the passion, Rebecca Ellis introduces the notion of ‘jizz’ as the time and place of abstract knowledge of categories, species, figures and meetings, in observation, the example which in some way fulfils the model which was present latently in the categorised space. This figure of jizz which, according to certain sources, comes from RAF pilot training during the Second World War to learn to distinguish immediately between friendly and enemy planes, characterises the perceptive and emotional state which results from the alignment between what we perceive, what we know and what we recognise. Aesthetic emotion of recognition therefore translates into a “It works, it’s that, it’s him, it’s her, eureka!” What we presuppose is subsequently verified. It is a moment of happiness produced by the illuminating burst of recognisable, concordant appearance. The brilliance of recognition is accompanied by a feeling of being in the right place, allowing us to adopt the right point of view and ask the right questions. This joy is also what can happen when it does not work: we are waiting for it to work, hoping it is going to work, and will even stubbornly pursue it through to a successful outcome. And our emotion is equal to our expectation.

27Cognitive mutualisation or case-by-case thinking. The way of knowing under the influence of passion promotes a sensitive and direct relationship between the knowing subject and the subject to be known. As a result, it is the phenomenon in its epiphany hic et nunc which is on the doorstep of the impassioned individual and not a body of general totality (a category or a law). And yet, what studies show, for example that of Christelle Gramaglia in this issue, is that it would be wrong to restrict the intellectual horizon of impassioned individuals simply to a local area of what they see around them. Their co‑presence, which is sensitive to the subject of the passion, is not antinomic to the engagement of a higher order of intelligibility frameworks; they foster links with abstract knowledge. On the contrary, it is a comparison between cases (the test of their compatibility) which produces an intensification of the passionate experience and which leads to the rehabilitation of a form of knowledge which is based on a sharing of exemplarities.

28Cumulative or proliferative thought. A final aspect, which can be identified in these forms of knowing in a passion scheme, is a non-reticence to access adjacent and complementary knowledge if they can be articulated around and serve the aims of the passion. Here again, the examples given to us show how those who are passionate about an object or a domain become real experts in their speciality, can initiate themselves in new associated areas and transfer their experience and expertise in favour of their cause. Thus, according to C. Gramaglia’s survey, fly fishermen in the ANPER‑TOS association receive legal training from the association’s lawyers in order to support and accompany cases of river pollution before the courts. It is also the case of groups of football supporters who, according to Bérangère Ginhoux, equip themselves with a legal and knowledge background on police strategies in order to be able to continue to publicly demonstrate their passion in stadia and in towns, in spite of heightened police control measures.

The common passion for knowledge : amateurs and “grand amateurs”

29Pascal Nouvel shows how scientific investigation digs into what he calls the “passion for truth” or the “love of truth”. The search for the right formula which will correctly illustrate a clue hidden in the observation of a phenomenon is the source of a form of excitement which literally grabs hold of the researcher or team looking to solve the enigma. In the same way as a passion which takes hold of an individual or a group of individuals, scientific work is empowered by this passionate investment in the subject of the research.

30This theme was investigated within the framework of our seminar through the conference of Isabelle Kalinowski concerning her interpretation of Max Weber’s work and in particular the notion of Beruf (the vocation) of the scholar. Contrary to the “dispassionate” version of the knowing activity conventionally attributed to the Weberian approach to science, and in particular in its reception in France, I. Kalinowski insists on the contrary on the sections of Weber’s work where he refers to the researcher’s commitment to the subject of knowledge, a commitment which, according to him, can be compared to a sort of light-headedness. He warns his student audience against those who seek to derive benefit from this situation to pursue their careers, in their own name. The passionate commitment of the scholar here must go hand-in-hand with a sort of dispassionate disinterest, a depersonalisation which must be identified right down to the actual writing style.

31It would be appropriate to broaden the scope of what is announced here amongst scholars and laboratories. Study firms, applied research centres, architects and planning firms would undoubtedly show how these domains harbour situations of strong personal engagement from their members, both individually and collectively, in the running of research or innovation programmes and reflexion on strategies to adopt, choices to operate and decisions to make. These passionate investments come from a description in terms of initiation, rites of passage, integration of young researchers and the setting up of a collective body. It is in these test crucibles that new hypotheses, new demonstrations, new theories and new policies are formed.

32But what is interesting to note, if we follow the example of Antoine Hennion, is that what happens in these professional research circles is very similar to the observations made of amateur fans. Here again, we see that members of groups who are passionate about a certain domain are to some extent enrolled by the object of their passions, to which they can dedicate their lives, resulting in individuals coming together as groups, and feeding off existing literature, and in a cognitive relationship, managing to breathe life into the very thing to which they are attached.

33Hence, on the basis of the passion which mobilises members of collective knowledge groups, it is possible to bring together what a “dispassionate” approach can distinguish categorically. For example, the discovery that many amateurs who are passionately committed to a process of familiarisation and mastery of an area (such as storytelling) enter into a working and connivance relationship with professional researchers and models of interpretation taken from the academic world of science. In these instances of collaborative work, the shared passion which directs these exchanges serves as a backdrop, shedding light on the contrast of different experiences.

34In this perspective, professional scientists may be described as “grand amateurs”, i.e. having the same qualities as impassioned amateurs, only differentiated from the latter’s by degrees. Degrees, for example, of training, of time that they can dedicate to their passion, of continuity of investment, of regularity of committed work. Different in degree, but not different in nature.

35In this perspective where scientists are considered as “grand amateurs”, it may be worth dedicating some investment to looking at trivial issues such as the relationship that a researcher has with the subject of his research: how did he come to be a specialist in a given field? (through choice of disciplines, thesis topics), how did he become attached to it? How did he become dedicated to it? How did he become enlisted? Given that these processes are not (only) to describe what happens between an individual and his subject, but are largely marked by a collective dimension, through the meeting of passionate people around the same subject who feel a shared passion for a particular field of research, particularly theoretical questioning or observation, and that they mutually encourage each other to cultivate it together. From this point of view, controversies are far from being only opportunities to oppose different points of view; they are also (or even especially) to verify a shared belonging to a single area of passion.

Knowledge and public passion: the affected community

36In this final section, we shall return to the situation in which the exercising of passions comes into contact with the public space. Passion takes the form of what Michel Peroni describes as “public passion”. What is at stake here, therefore, is not positioned solely at the level of an individual or a group, but in society as a whole which is drawn into a hybrid exercise, combining all the features of knowing and all the characters involved in the subject of passion. How is the cognitive dimension of these public passions implicated in these situations? Are we witnessing the development of new knowledge which will allow us to reinforce the public exercise of passion? Several cases have been presented during our seminar which show how passion can be felt on this public level.

37A first example, also present in this issue, is the passion for football. Michel Peroni quite rightly shows how football, and in particular its contemporary, highly media‑orientated form, becomes part of the public agenda. By sequencing seasons by series of matches, providing a ranking and changes in ranking, organising major events on a regular basis, the pacing of the sporting event leads to a real uptake of the passion for football in public time and space. In the same way, when supporters, before or after the match, demonstrate their passion in the towns, it is the public place which is used as the place where this passion is fulfilled. Football knowledge of the passionate supporter gains public legitimacy but also faces tests of recognition, or even community antagonism, when we see the public disorder that certain elements of these groups engage in through their shared passion.

38It is the case also of fly fishermen studied by Christelle Gramaglia. On account of the pollution of rivers and therefore the rarefaction of sites in which these fly fishing enthusiasts can fulfil their passion, C. Gramaglia notes a transformation within the national association initially set up to represent anglers’ interests. Whilst, at the beginning, their purpose was to create links between practitioners of the same sport (exchange of information, technique and knowledge), more and more cases of river pollution adjusted the content of the association’s activities (which also changed its name) and also the nature of its members. Thus, beside anglers, we find legal specialists unwinding the complexities of a new topic: the law of natural elements. Engaged anglers become profane experts in the laws of nature. As part of a thwarted passion, these anglers see a metamorphosis of their passion into a militant activity to defend the quality of river water. Hence, they are involved alongside professional legal specialists in representing cases in the courts.