Sousa Santos

Good evening. This video is about the text by Souza Santos. Here, the author analyzes a paradigm that has dominated for several centuries, a paradigm that presents a model of rationality. Then he presents the crisis of that paradigm, and how we find ourselves within that crisis, in a moment of transition. Finally, he presents the

characteristics of the new paradigm that is emerging. So let's begin with the characteristics of the paradigm that has been in effect for many centuries and that has been constituted from the contributions of scientists such as Copernicus, Galileo, and Newton. It was formed in the 16th century, reaching its peak in the 18th century. It is

precisely in this century that all epistemological confidence rests on science. So what does this paradigm offer us? It offers us a model of rationality. This idea of ​​the model of rationality is very important to us because, as we saw in Khan, the model of rationality is the subject. The subject in Khan is precisely that human reason which, through

its structures, is precisely what constitutes that model of rationality. Khan is an important representative of... This paradigm, which we said reached its peak in the 18th century, has two characteristics that Souza Santos points out. One is that this model of rationality is totalitarian because it denies rationality to any form of knowledge that does not

conform to its guidelines, to its methodological principles. Therefore, it is considered irrational. So, in this sense, it is a totalitarian model. The other feature is that it establishes a rather strong distinction between the natural order and the human order. We saw this in Cannes, where the natural order was presented as distinct from the human order. And this