2023-07-06 12:00:30
Henri Broch presents a shroud in his zetetic laboratory at the University of Nice, September 7, 2006. VALERY HACHE / AFP
To celebrate the 50th anniversary of the first articles by his thesis director, Henri Broch, Richard Monvoisin decided to interview him to come back to a discipline that is not very academic but very scientific: zetetics. This scholarly name, which Henri Broch, born in Nice in 1950, disseminated in France, does not designate the study of particular natural phenomena, but rather describes a method, a way of apprehending the problems, a “methodological compass” as summarized by the two authors.
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Armed with this critical spirit, another way of summing up zetetics, Henri Broch became famous by dismantling a good number of paranormal phenomena, such as the liquefaction of Saint January’s blood, preserved in a vial in Naples, archaeological myths, such as the Shroud of Turin, or various spectacular claims, especially the memory of water.
He is also famous for having launched, in 1986, with the magician Gérard Majax, a challenge to the alleged holders of paranormal powers (telepaths, seers, dowsers, etc.) who would agree to show their qualities by respecting a protocol discussed with his team. The initial reward was 500,000 francs then, failing success, one million francs, and finally 200,000 euros, never obtained. That same year, 1986, he created a Minitel service, 36 15 ZET, which offered literature demystifying the paranormal and gave some methodological keys.
HENRI BROCH/PASCAL MONVOISIN
Bestseller with Charpak
About ten years later, Henri Broch officially brought zetetics to the University of Nice through courses and the creation of a laboratory, which will disappear, without ceremony, on his retirement in 2014. With the physicist Georges Charpak , Nobel Prize in 1992, he published a bestseller, Become a wizard, become a scholar (Odile Jacob, 2002), who mocks paranormal charlatans and shares some of their secrets.
The long interview conducted by Richard Monvoisin scans these significant episodes, without omitting the existing tensions between different zetetic circles in France or even in the world. The reader will savor Henri Broch’s humor and rigor in his view of these controversies.
Read our archive (2015): The University of Grenoble rehabilitates the art of doubt
The exchange is also valid for the illustration it gives of the evolution of one of the branches of the rationalist current, well described by the sociologist Sylvain Laurens in Advocate for science (Editions de l’EHESS, 2019). The journey, which began as a teenager with an interest in a cave in his region, continues with scientific studies and a dual commitment, political (communist) and citizen (for scientific culture), in order to disseminate knowledge. Henri Broch, on the other hand, says little about the attitude of certain rationalists or zeteticians who, from criticizing the paranormal, have moved on to the not very subtle defense of any technoscientific advance (GMOs, nuclear, pesticides, etc.), without showing a lot of open-mindedness towards other sciences (human, social, etc.).
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