Le prix de l'individualité. Maine de Brian, Samuel Taylor Coleridge et la volonté: Deux postétités distinctes

This thesis is concerned with Maine de Biran’s and Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s conceptions of will, and the way in which both thinkers’ posterities have been affected by the central role of these very conceptions in their respective bodies of thought. The research question that animates this work can therefore be divided into two main parts, one of which deals with will, while the other deals with its effects on posterity. In the first pages of the Introduction, I make the case for a comparison between two philosophers, and show how this comparison can bring one closer to truth, understood not in objective, but in subjective terms. I then justify my choice by underlining that, in spite of their many differences, Maine de Biran and Samuel Taylor Coleridge followed comparable paths, intellectually and spiritually, and came to similar conclusions concerning the essential activity of the human mind. Finally, I ask whether it is possible that this very focus on the human will may have contributed to the state of both thinkers’ works and of the reception of those works. This prologue is followed by five parts. In the first part, the similarities and differences between the two thinkers are explored further. In the second part, the connections between philosophy and singularity are examined, in order to show the ambivalence of the will as a foundation for truth. The third part is dedicated to the traditional division between subject and object in psychology, and its relevance in history and in moral philosophy. The fourth part tackles the complexity of the question of influence, with respect to both Maine de Biran’s and Coleridge’s cases, both thinkers being indebted to many philosophers of all times and places, and having to rely heavily on others for the publication, or the interpretation of their own works. The fifth part is concerned with the different aspects of the faculty of will, and primarily its relationship with interiority, as incommensurability, and actual, conditioned existence in a certain historical and spatial context. It ends with a return to the question of will and posterity and an announcement of what will be covered in the main body of the thesis. The main body is divided into three parts:‘L’émancipation’, ‘L’affirmation, and ‘La projection’. The first part is devoted to the way Maine de Biran and Samuel Taylor Coleridge extricated themselves from one epistemological paradigm to contribute to the foundation of another. It is divided in four chapters. The first chapter deals with the aforementioned change of paradigm, as corresponding to the emergence of two separate but associated movements, Romanticism and what the French philosopher refers to as ‘The Age of History’. The second chapter concerns the movement that preceded them, i.e. the Enlightenment, its main features according to both of our thinkers, and the two epistemological models that prevailed under it and influenced them heavily in their early years: Sensationism (Maine de Biran) and Associationism (Coleridge). The third chapter is about the probable influence of Immanuel Kant and his followers on Maine de Biran and Coleridge, and the various facts that allow us to claim originality for both thinkers’ works. In the fourth chapter, I contrast Maine de Biran and Coleridge with other movements and thinkers of their time, showing that, contrary to their respective thoughts, Maine de Biran and Coleridge could not but break free from the then prevailing systematic approach to truth. The second part of the thesis is concerned with the first part of its research question, namely, Maine de Biran’s and Coleridge’s conceptions of the will. It is divided into four chapters. The first chapter is a reflection on the will as a paradox: on the one hand, the will cannot be caused by any other phenomenon, or it is no longer a will; but it cannot be left purely undetermined, as if it is, it is then not different from chance. It thus needs, in order to be, to be contradictorily already moral. The second chapter is a comparison between Maine de Biran’s and Coleridge’s accounts of the origin of the will, where it is found that the French philosopher only observes that he has a will, whereas the English philosopher postulates the existence of this will. The comparison between Maine de Biran’s and Coleridge’s conceptions of the will is pursued in the third chapter, which tackles the question of the coincidence between the will and the self, in both thinkers’ works. It ends with the fourth chapter, which deals with the question of the relationship between the will and what is other to it, i.e. bodily sensations, passions and desires. The third part of the thesis focuses on the second part of its research question, namely the posterity of Maine de Biran’s and Coleridge’s works. It is divided into four chapters. The first chapter constitutes a continuation of the last chapter of the preceding part, in that that it deals with Maine de Biran’s and Coleridge’s relations to the ‘other’, and particularly their potential and actual audience, and with the way these relations may have affected their writing and publishing practices. The second chapter is a survey of both thinkers’ general reception, where it is found that, while Maine de Biran has been claimed by two important movements of thoughts as their initiator, Coleridge has been neglected by the only real movement he could have, or may indeed have pioneered. The third chapter is more directly concerned with the posterities of Maine de Biran’s and Coleridge’s conceptions of will, and attempts to show that the approach to, and the meaning of the will have evolved throughout the nineteenth century, and in the French Spiritualist and the British Idealist movements, from an essentially personal one to a more impersonal one. The fourth chapter is a partial conclusion, whose aim is to give a precise idea of where Maine de Biran and Coleridge stand, in relation to their century and to the philosophical movements and matters we are concerned with. The conclusion is a recapitulation of what has been found, with a particular emphasis on the dialogue initiated between Maine de Biran and Coleridge on the will, and the relation between will and posterity. It suggests that both thinkers have to pay the price of a problematic reception for the individuality that pervades their respective works, and goes further in suggesting that s/he who chooses to found his individuality on the will is bound to feel this incompleteness in his/her own personal life more acutely than s/he who does not. It ends with a reflection on fixedness and movement, as the two antagonistic states that the theoretician of the will paradoxically aspires to.

A systems approach to public sector budgeting: the case of the planning, programming, budgeting system for the health and personal social services

The aim of this thesis is to examine the specific contextual factors affecting the applicability and development of the planning, programming, budgeting system (P.P.B.S.) as a systems approach to public sector budgeting. The concept of P.P.B.S. as a systems approach to public sector budgeting will first be developed and the preliminary hypothesis that general contextual factors may be classified under political, structural and cognitive headings will be put forward. This preliminary hypothesis will be developed and refined using American and early British experience. The refined hypothesis will then be tested in detail in the case of the English health and personal social services (H.P.S.S.), The reasons for this focus are that it is the most recent, the sole remaining, and the most significant example in British central government outside of defence, and is fairly representative of non-defence government programme areas. The method of data collection relies on the examination of unpublished and difficult to obtain central government, health and local authority documents, and interviews with senior civil servants and public officials. The conclusion will be that the political constraints on, or factors affecting P.P.B.S., vary with product characteristics and cultural imperatives on pluralistic decision-making; that structural constraints vary with the degree of coincidence of programme and organisation structure and with the degree of controllability of the organisation; and finally, that cognitive constraints vary according to product characteristics, organisational responsibilities, and analytical effort.

Relationships between fundus image quantification and visual field status in age-related macular degeneration

Presentation Purpose:To relate structural change to functional change in age-related macular degeneration (AMD) in a cross-sectional population using fundus imaging and the visual field status. Methods:10 degree standard and SWAP visual fields and other standard functional clinical measures were acquired in 44 eyes of 27 patients at various stages of AMD, as well as fundus photographs. Retro-mode SLO images were captured in a subset of 29 eyes of 19 of the patients. Drusen area, measured by automated drusen segmentation software (Smith et al. 2005) was correlated with visual field data. Visual field defect position was compared to the position of the imaged drusen and deposits using custom software. Results:The effect of AMD stage on drusen area within the 6000µm was significant (One-way ANOVA: F = 17.231, p < 0.001), however the trend was not strong across all stages. There were significant linear relationships between visual field parameters and drusen area. The mean deviation (MD) declined by 3.00dB and 3.92dB for each log % drusen area for standard perimetry and SWAP, respectively. The visual field parameters of focal loss displayed the strongest correlations with drusen area. The number of pattern deviation (PD) defects increased by 9.30 and 9.68 defects per log % drusen area for standard perimetry and SWAP, respectively. Weaker correlations were found between drusen area and visual acuity, contrast sensitivity, colour vision and reading speed. 72.6% of standard PD defects and 65.2% of SWAP PD defects coincided with retinal signs of AMD on fundus photography. 67.5% of standard PD defects and 69.7% of SWAP PD defects coincided with deposits on retro-mode images. Conclusions:Perimetry exhibited a stronger relationship with drusen area than other measures of visual function. The structure-function relationship between visual field parameters and drusen area was linear. Overall the indices of focal loss had a stronger correlation with drusen area in SWAP than in standard perimetry. Visual field defects had a high coincidence proportion with retinal manifestations of AMD.Smith R.T. et al. (2005) Arch Ophthalmol 123:200-206.

Low-loss waveguides fabricated by femtosecond chirped-pulse oscillator

Recent results on direct femtosecond inscription of straight low-loss waveguides in borosilicate glass are presented. We also demonstrate lowest ever losses in curvilinear waveguides, which we use as main building blocks for integrated photonics circuits. Low-loss waveguides are of great importance to a variety of applications of integrated optics. We report on recent results of direct femtosecond fabrication of smooth low-loss waveguides in standard optical glass by means of femtosecond chirped-pulse oscillator only (Scientific XL, Femtolasers), operating at the repetition rate of 11 MHz, at the wavelength of 800 nm, with FWHM pulse duration of about 50 fs, and a spectral widths of 30 nm. The pulse energy on target was up to 70 nJ. In transverse inscription geometry, we inscribed waveguides at the depth from 10 to 300 micrometers beneath the surface in the samples of 50 x 50 x 1 mm dimensions made of pure BK7 borosilicate glass. The translation of the samples accomplished by 2D air-bearing stage (Aerotech) with sub-micrometer precision at a speed of up to 100 mm per second (hardware limit). Third direction of translation (Z-, along the inscribing beam or perpendicular to sample plane) allows truly 3D structures to be fabricated. The waveguides were characterized in terms of induced refractive index contrast, their dimensions and cross-sections, mode-field profiles, total insertion losses at both 633 nm and 1550 nm. There was almost no dependence on polarization for the laser inscription. The experimental conditions – depth, laser polarization, pulse energy, translation speed and others, were optimized for minimum insertion losses when coupled to a standard optical fibre SMF-28. We found coincidence of our optimal inscription conditions with recently published by other groups [1, 3] despite significant difference in practically all experimental parameters. Using optimum regime for straight waveguides fabrication, we inscribed a set of curvilinear tracks, which were arranged in a way to ensure the same propagation length (and thus losses) and coupling conditions, while radii of curvature varied from 3 to 10 mm. This allowed us to measure bend-losses – they less than or about 1 dB/cm at R=10 mm radius of curvature. We also demonstrate a possibility to fabricate periodical perturbations of the refractive index in such waveguides with the periods using the same set-up. We demonstrated periods of about 520 nm, which allowed us to fabricate wavelength-selective devices using the same set-up. This diversity as well as very short time for inscription (the optimum translation speed was found to be 40 mm/sec) makes our approach attractive for industrial applications, for example, in next generation high-speed telecom networks.

Low-loss waveguides fabricated by femtosecond chirped-pulse oscillator

Recent results on direct femtosecond inscription of straight low-loss waveguides in borosilicate glass are presented. We also demonstrate lowest ever losses in curvilinear waveguides, which we use as main building blocks for integrated photonics circuits. Low-loss waveguides are of great importance to a variety of applications of integrated optics. We report on recent results of direct femtosecond fabrication of smooth low-loss waveguides in standard optical glass by means of femtosecond chirped-pulse oscillator only (Scientific XL, Femtolasers), operating at the repetition rate of 11 MHz, at the wavelength of 800 nm, with FWHM pulse duration of about 50 fs, and a spectral widths of 30 nm. The pulse energy on target was up to 70 nJ. In transverse inscription geometry, we inscribed waveguides at the depth from 10 to 300 micrometers beneath the surface in the samples of 50 x 50 x 1 mm dimensions made of pure BK7 borosilicate glass. The translation of the samples accomplished by 2D air-bearing stage (Aerotech) with sub-micrometer precision at a speed of up to 100 mm per second (hardware limit). Third direction of translation (Z-, along the inscribing beam or perpendicular to sample plane) allows truly 3D structures to be fabricated. The waveguides were characterized in terms of induced refractive index contrast, their dimensions and cross-sections, mode-field profiles, total insertion losses at both 633 nm and 1550 nm. There was almost no dependence on polarization for the laser inscription. The experimental conditions – depth, laser polarization, pulse energy, translation speed and others, were optimized for minimum insertion losses when coupled to a standard optical fibre SMF-28. We found coincidence of our optimal inscription conditions with recently published by other groups [1, 3] despite significant difference in practically all experimental parameters. Using optimum regime for straight waveguides fabrication, we inscribed a set of curvilinear tracks, which were arranged in a way to ensure the same propagation length (and thus losses) and coupling conditions, while radii of curvature varied from 3 to 10 mm. This allowed us to measure bend-losses – they less than or about 1 dB/cm at R=10 mm radius of curvature. We also demonstrate a possibility to fabricate periodical perturbations of the refractive index in such waveguides with the periods using the same set-up. We demonstrated periods of about 520 nm, which allowed us to fabricate wavelength-selective devices using the same set-up. This diversity as well as very short time for inscription (the optimum translation speed was found to be 40 mm/sec) makes our approach attractive for industrial applications, for example, in next generation high-speed telecom networks.