Co-immunity: healing
24
Mar
We are waiting for a miracle, those who do not believe or ignore science, now
hope that scientists will find the vaccine, while vaccines for the old flu infections are beginning to be available at health centers in Brazil.
The lesson from the medical point of view is that this disease that has taken on aspects of the pandemic teaches us is already definitive, that people’s health is more important than the disease, that we can all help each other if each does our part well, and that no one will do our part for us, the government and health authorities can raise awareness, but depend on individual, cultural attitudes.
The philosopher Peter Sloterdijk worked in a broader sense on the idea of immonology and co-immunity, the idea that we cannot get rid of all the viruses and microorganisms that have always been part of life, and that now are attacked and worked on by society as a whole may have their effects reduced, although they seem more and more aggressive, influenza a few years ago looks like a common flu close to the corona virus and its range and aggressiveness.
Heir to phenomenology, but mixed with Nietzsche, and co-heir of Heidegger with Byung Chul Han, he created a surprising new anthropology beyond the human, by defining homo sapiens as the result of an unfinished and infinite autopoiesis (auto is self and poiesis, creation), so we go on each clash with nature, self “creating” and reviewing.
The revision of this moment is interesting and will be unfinished because the results for the economy and the future social structure itself will be undefined and dependent on decisions, but the joint fight of peoples and nations in the pandemic creates a new “joint action”, which Sloterdijk calls co-immunity, that is, creating joint defenses and an immunology beyond the human.
In relation to Heidegger, it goes beyond being-there to being-with, not only because it creates an anthropological view of the human relationship, but that shows the efficiency of joint action where each does its part, and the immunity of the whole, depends on the rearrangement network of each individual part.
In response to a question asked in 2018, he (from the frontiers of thought program) explains his immunology as follows: “Let’s not forget: the word “immunology ”is a metaphor borrowed by lawyers from biologists. I take it a step further, extending the concept of immunis (which in Latin means “free from duties”) to the religious dimension.
Comparing his system with Luhmann’s, he stated: “While for Niklas Luhmann the legal system would be the immune system of the social system, ballpoint states that religion is society’s original immune system”, and this would be anthropology beyond the human, entering a dimension of religious transcendence.
When relating the problem of immunology with ecology, he elaborates it in relation to nature:
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