The philosopher ecologist

Vincent Devictor is an ecologist atMontpellier's Institut des sciences de l'évolution. A committed researcher working for enlightened science. He was aiming for the grandes écoles, but ended up in university. A failure? No, an encounter.
 "I was immediately seduced by this world, its freedom, its high level of teaching, the passionate people you meet there - it's anything but a dead-end street.". It was above all a vector of vocation for the young man of the time: very concerned by the protection of nature, he discovered conservation ecology and looked into the impact of human activities on the environment. "It's an involved, committed science, a science of urgency".. But it's not just a science... "The discipline blends ecology and ethics, and is a fairly recent approach that emerged in the 1980s.".
While Vincent Devictor devotes part of his work to understanding the impact of global change on birds, he feels it necessary to question the values involved in this work. "I wanted to take another look at ecology, one that would give meaning to scientific work.". This view is that of philosophy. "Science is riddled with philosophical problems: you can't understand anything without examining the history of values."emphasizes the ecologist, who is also working on a philosophy thesis at the Sorbonne.to better understand the world we live in. For enlightened science".

Giving meaning to science

"Investigating what has become of ʺnatureʺ in the representations, knowledge and politics of biodiversity allows us to discover how ethics, science and politics intertwine"Nature en crise "* sheds light on the major ecological crisis facing our society.
What avenues are open to us in this social challenge? Sustainable development and green growth? "These paths of consensus maintain the false but comforting idea that anything is possible", points out Vincent Devictor, who prefers to ask himself about incompatibilities and conflicts of values. So what are the prospects for a way out of the crisis? "We need to cultivate the search for new, humbler paths, with less excess, that resist the temptation to manage people and nature like we manage corporate profits.".
How can we fail to be concerned about biodiversity in the face of galloping urbanization and the disappearance of numerous species? For the philosophical ecologist, while there is cause for alarm, there are also reasons to be enthusiastic, particularly when we see that certain protection measures are working very well. Even if they're not enough...".Faced with this crisis, we have good recipes, but there is no ideal menu.".
* Nature en crise by Vincent Devictor, Editions du seuil, January 2015