LatourTurinTomatoes

A quick response from the 'Continent'!

"Greatest" theory ever...

What else? Latour's **Theory of Circulating Reference**! What other theory(s) can, in one pleasurable swoop, a) side-step both the Two Cultures and the Science Wars, b) leave modern Correspondence Theory of Truth in a steaming pile of rubbish, and c) leave both the modernists and the postmodernists twiddling their thumbs, staring blankly at one other, pausing in the discomfort, and then saying, "So, do ya wanna go and get some coffee?"

"Coolest" theory ever...

1. Luca Turin's **Vibration Theory of Olfaction:** The idea that smell may have //less// to do with the lock-and-key model based on molecular shape and //more// to do with the vibration of molecules is one of modern life's great ideas.

2. Do you guys remember the Adam Gopnik article we read in Critical Studies a few years back? In it, Gopnik described a restaurant in Paris (Arpege) that created a "braised tomato" dessert--the //tomate confite farcie aux douze saveurs//. "Normally," Gopnik notes, "a braised tomato becomes tomato sauce"--but the hands of chef Alain Passard, it becomes a menu item that requires classification as a "dessert." Gopnik attributes this extraordinary action to Passards "insight" that tomatoes are not vegetables; they are fruit. There is an underlying theory for the classification of fruits vs. vegetables here. Thus, I would like to recognize this botanical theory (and its subsequent potential for practical applications) as inherently 'cool.'

Ciao,