Subject, Are You There? / Sujet, es-tu là ?

Neuroscientist and neurologist Lionel Naccache is a tireless finder of novel ideas. The question of subjectivity, its powers, and the threats it faces, is the matter at the heart of this book.

Starting with consciousness, Naccache explores a variety of themes that all lead us back to the subject: from empathy to mental maps, from Alzheimer's to sleep exploration, from neurochips to ChatGPT, from cinema to its links with the workings of our mental life, and so on.

How can subjectivity make its way between social determinism and neurobiological constraints? What weight does it carry in collective life against the political, economic, social, and environmental challenges we face?

In this book, Naccache compiles chronicles broadcast on France Culture in 2023 and 2024, enriching them with previously unpublished commentaries combining science, philosophy, and literature. Subject, Are You There? offers a fascinating blend of different disciplines and fields of knowledge, tracing the features of the landscape of subjectivity as we experience it today.

In these matinal thoughts, we rediscover Lionel Naccache's pleasure in thinking and his art of focused digression.