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Everybody hates parasites. All they do is cause discom-

fort, disease and death. So everybody agrees it would be

best to just wipe them out. Everybody except Michel

Serres, the French philosopher. Serres believes parasites

are the very change agents driving progress, in part

because they force their environment to respond. He says

parasites are intelligent organisms that attack and then

adapt to their host, bringing unexpected change. And

this change is quite often positive, a new symbiosis.

Professor Serres, what is a parasite?SERRES: The word “parasite” is of Greek origin and

means “one who eats next to you.” “Sitos” means food,

“para” means next to. The parasite is like a guest who

turns up without an invitation. Someone who has forced

their way in and now sits at your table. There is also a sec-

ond definition. There are many different types of living

organisms—insects, bacteria, viruses, microbes—that set-

tle in the body of an animal to feed, stay warm and repro-

duce, and in the process devour their chosen host.

The parasite’s bad reputation has to do with the fact

that they cause the host to become ill or even die—giving

the word parasite negative connotations. The initial reac-

tion to a parasite is disgust, flight or waging a massive at-

tack against them. A third definition exists in some other

languages. Parasitic can refer to radio interference, excess

“Parasites are the agents of progress.”Interview with Michel SerresBy Johannes Wiek

noise, static in the connection or background noise—in-

terfering sounds that disrupt a clear signal. It is parasitic

noise that interferes with or devours the conveyed message.

Does this mean that there are also parasitesthat affect our social and economic interaction?SERRES: I am not an economist, but I believe that

the economy is fascinated by the idea of maintaining bal-

ance. Parasites on the other hand are responsible for an

unequal exchange—the disruption of that balance. In any

case, the parasite takes something without giving some-

thing back in return. And the host gives without receiving

something in return. The consequence is a completely

unjust situation. Why are there such unfair players? Why

does the principle of complete injustice exist? The answer

to this concerns not only economic exchange, but also the

fundamental question about life as such. It all revolves

around an interesting natural law.

There are cells in our intestines that facilitate digestion.

All of these cells originate from parasites—the same para-

sites that killed our ancestors, and that have learned from

this to become symbionts. This is evolution.

This means that parasites inflict a high price onthemselves and on their host.SERRES: A very high price; the price of evolution.

Are parasites driving progress?SERRES: They are the driving forces. They are the

agents of change. The parasite is more often than not the

very force that makes a change necessary and possible at

all. The logic of parasites in systems that I discovered

showed that a parasite has two different methods for a

solution. On the one hand it causes illnesses, epidemics

and death—in other words, it causes chaos. On the other

hand, however, it causes unbelievable changes. It is basi-

cally a logic that is both negative and positive.

Can you give us examples of the effect of para-sitic logic in our economy and society?SERRES: Imagine an orchestra, shortly before the

beginning of a concert. You hear random noises and

chaos in search for the right note. Without this mix-up,

there would otherwise be no perfection that follows when

everybody then plays together. Before one can play

together as a team, there has to be white noise. It is exact-

ly this random noise that is parasitic, the din of disturb-

ing sounds that precede order. Take the example of the

Internet. Within the network, parasites compete against

parasites. Parasites are necessary to translate the white

noise of new circumstances into a system of relationships.

The white noise attracts them, driven by their goals to

profit, to collect information or to manipulate, and they

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can create a meaning, a usable and implementable mean-

ing, where previously one didn’t exist.

Parasites with such profit-oriented goals compete with

those who follow political, scientific or cultural aims.

Without the parasites’ work, the system would lack struc-

tures and motives, and could not develop itself further.

Initially invention originated from the first mover—

whether from a military establishment like the Pentagon

or a scientific one like CERN. However, ever since the

World Wide Web developed a user-friendly interface, sec-

ond, third and fourth movers have sprung to life using

this innovative technology completely for their own ends,

although it was developed with other aims in mind. This

draws in competition not only from the parasites with

their contrary intentions and aims, but also from others

who have the same aims. Business models from one side

hinder those from the other. Each one copies, irritates, se-

duces and manipulates the other—because it is only out

of this white noise of uncertainty that new interfaces can

be developed and from which parasites can profit. Out of

the resulting chaos new forms of organization can grow.

After all, would you say that parasites are thecatalyst and driving force of intelligence?SERRES: It is highly probable that parasites are the

highest living form of intelligence that we know. The

more one studies the living form of parasites, the clearer

it becomes how creative and highly productive they are.

Generally one is heard talking about extreme oppo-

sites, like masters and servants, winners and losers,

hunters and the hunted, principal-agent relationships, or

about all kinds of opponents to war. These are but trivial

archetypes. With parasites it revolves around strategies

that are far more refined and far more thought out.

Nowadays our economic networks, conditions of ex-

change and communication channels are getting more

and more complex—and hereby more susceptible to par-

asitic dysfunction. Parasites are docking onto all inter-

faces to profit themselves. The stronger the parasitic

white noise, the quicker the more traditional thinkers

and players are challenged to their limits.

Does this mean we have to change our way ofthinking and to start to learn from parasites?SERRES: Parasites are in operation everywhere—in

production, in communication, in the transfer of knowl-

edge and in every form of exchange and networking. We

have to learn that parasitism is a normal condition. It is a

question of accepting to a certain extent the destructive

power of our “enemy” the parasites. The enemy has come

to me because it found something interesting. This there-

fore means I have got something interesting on offer.

MICHEL SERRES

Michel Serres is considered one of the most signifi-

cant communication theorists, mathematicians,

and cultural and scientific philosophers today in

France, as well as in Europe and the United States.

He has had a major influence on not only postmod-

ern philosophy, but also later on system theories

and communication and network theories.

Born in 1930 in Agen, he attended the École Navale

—the French naval academy—in 1949. In 1952 he

attended the École Normale Supérieure (ENS

Paris), the most renowned training center in the

French state education system. He studied math-

ematics and philosophy there, and in the 1960s

taught together with Michel Foucault at the

Clermont-Ferrand and Vincennes universities, then

became a professor of scientific history at the

Sorbonne. He has also been a professor at Stanford

University since 1984. In 1990 he was made a mem-

ber of the circle of “Immortels” of the Académie

française, where he replaced Edgar Faure in Seat

18—a sign of Serres’ position as one of France’s

most prominent intellectuals.

JOHANNES WIEK is a science writer and specialist on system theory, cognitive science and collective in-telligence. He writes for Harvard Businessmanager,McKinsey Wissen and brand eins, among others.

Parasites are as a rule intelligent, and it is therefore worth

waiting before one tries to fight them off, because then

you might find out what they are all about. Every inter-

ference provides an opportunity to collect new informa-

tion. This creates the possibility to form an intelligent

alliance from which both can unexpectedly profit. By

associating cleverly with the presence of my enemy—

the parasite—I can discover something completely new.

What kind of new strategies do you recommendto deal with parasites and parasitic structures?SERRES: I think it is bad advice for anybody to fight to

their death against the opposition. If we attempt to wipe

out the parasites, it is then that they strike back at their

wildest and hungriest. The cleverer strategy—whether in

the fields of medicine, technology or economics—is to

get the potentially deadly resistance under control and to

work out an alliance from which both sides can profit. z