There is nothing immaterial in the endless breaking of bindings, clicking of pens, clattering of daisy wheels, and scratching of styli. There is nothing immaterial about this obsession with writing, inscription, diagrams, and spectra.

These bizarre texts, which are not sacred writings but inscriptions produced by rat viscera or the open hearts of dogs, are strangely alluring. They are all very beautiful, I agree. They represent a lot of work and much dexterity, but they are not miraculous.

It is fascinating to study, as I did for two years, the needles that scratch the drums of physiographs; to see how traps are set to make the things that are talked about write (3.1.5) and speak directly to those whom one wishes to convince.

It is stimulating to follow the Italian as he rewrites the book of nature in mathematical form in his *Dialogues* (Eisenstein: 1975).

It is interesting to see the Greek leaning over the blinding surface of the parchment and obsessively following the incisions of the stylus, even when these lead to sophisms.

Yet "thought" is really quite simple, for when we write about other inscriptions, we actually cover great distances in a few centimeters. Maps, diagrams, columns, photographs, spectrographs—these are the materials that are forgotten, the materials that are used to make "thought" intangible.

When we talk of "thought," even the most skeptical lose their critical faculties. Like vulgar sorcerers, they let "thought" travel like magic at high speed over great distances. I do not know anyone who is not credulous when it comes to ideas.

... an action that is practiced through *talking* to other people who likewise write, inscribe, talk, and live in similarly unusual places; an action that *convinces* or fails to convince with inscriptions which are made to speak, to write, and to be read (3.1.0, 3.1.9).

Nobody can separate the "internal" history of science from the "external" history of its allies. The former does not count as history at all. At best it is court historiography, at worst the Legends of the Saints. The latter is not the history of "science," it is history.

When we become agnostic, we have to admit that most places of scientific pilgrimage look much like Lourdes, but more gullible still, for they mock Lourdes!

Still others express amazement that the laws of physics "are universally applicable," that Newton discovered them, and that Einstein revolutionized them. "Science" becomes truly a circus sideshow with geniuses, revolutions, and dei ex machina. But no one talks of the chamber of horrors down below.

Some say that it is a miracle that "mathematics is applicable to physical reality." Others say that "the most incomprehensible thing about the universe is that it's at all comprehensible."

I am vulgar, but this is essential in a domain where injustice is so profound. They laugh at those who believe in levitation but claim, without being contradicted, that theories can raise the world.

But if "theories" rather than tables are moved, then people talk excitedly of a Kuhnian "paradigm shift."

If a young couple move a piece of furniture in their living room and conclude, little by little, that it does not look right and that all the furniture will have to be moved for everything to fit again, who finds this worthy of note?

If the most obscure Popperian zealot talks of "falsification," people are ready to see a profound mystery. But if a window cleaner moves his head to see whether the smear he wants to clean is on the inside or outside, no one marvels.

But if a famous philosopher in Amsterdam asserts that we must "divide up each of the difficulties into as many parts as possible," no greater admiration could be expressed for "a method of rightly conducting the reason and seeking for truth in the sciences."

If consumers cut their steak into small pieces to make it easier to chew, no one comments.