On Resetting the Direction of Research

2019/11/21

I studied philosophy in France from 1992 to 2003. In 2006, I became a full-time faculty member at the Faculty of Science and Technology of this Juku, and at the same time, I was put in charge of a course called "Science and Philosophy." Originally, I wrote my doctoral dissertation on the French philosopher Jacques Derrida's interpretation of Hegel, and since I was conducting research in a field within contemporary Western philosophy that has a relatively high interest in the history of philosophy, "science" was not necessarily a major theme for me until then.

"Science and Philosophy" is a general education course for third- and fourth-year students in the Faculty of Science and Technology. I went through a process of trial and error with the hope that students who will be active in fields related to science and technology in the future would gain a broad perspective by being exposed to profound ideas that discuss science from a philosophical standpoint. However, there was a problem: even if I gave lectures on large-scale, deep thoughts like those provided by the philosopher Heidegger, and the vision of science and technology that emerges from those thoughts, it was difficult to connect them to concrete guidelines for action for scientists and engineers.

In the midst of this, I had the opportunity to study in France again for two years starting in the spring of 2012, which allowed me to not only re-examine the content of the "Science and Philosophy" course but also, more fundamentally, to have time to reset the direction of my future research. I felt that I was able to find a body of thought in the work of the philosopher Bruno Latour that I could deeply empathize with philosophically and find rewarding as a research subject, while at the same time containing somewhat concrete considerations of modern science and technology that could capture the interest of students in the Faculty of Science and Technology. Thus, I decided to set his thought as my new research subject.

Because of this background, in "Science and Philosophy" since the 2014 academic year, I have been giving lectures centered on Latour's philosophy and philosophy of science, and the direction of my own research has been readjusted accordingly. Since such an adjustment involves a change in specialization, it entails a certain amount of sacrifice in terms of both time and effort, but I believe it was necessary. I think any researcher may face a change in the direction of their research, but in my case, it was related to my commitment to a single course.