Paris (AFP)

Bernard Stiegler, a very critical philosopher of the capitalist system who had devoted his research to the changes caused in society by digital technology, died Thursday at the age of 68, announced the International College of Philosophy.

A committed thinker on the left, who took a stand against the liberal excesses of society, Bernard Stiegler focused his reflection on the challenges of changes - social, political, economic, psychological - brought about by technological development.

In particular, he analyzed the risks posed by these changes on traditional employment, predicting its disappearance.

He was director of the Institute for Research and Innovation (IRI) created at the Center Pompidou to imagine the changes in cultural practices brought about by digital technologies, and was the founder and president of a philosophical think tank, Ars industrialis.

Born in Villebon-sur-Yvette (Essonne) in 1952, he had a very unusual career since he had studied philosophy at a distance in prison, where he remained five years after several armed robberies.

Supported by Jacques Derrida, Bernard Stiegler defended his thesis at the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales in 1993.

Among his many essays, he had published in January "What do we call heal? The Lesson of Greta Thunberg", in which he questioned the inability of States and companies to meet ecological demands, by estimating that the sciences must be autonomous from capitalism.

He was also the author of "L'emploi est mort. Vive le travail!", "States of shock: stupidity and knowledge in the 21st century" and co-author, with Denis Kambouchner and Philippe Meirieu, of "The school, the digital and the society that comes ".

He was to participate at the end of August in Arles in a new festival on the relationship of man to nature, "Agir pour le vivant".

His daughter Barbara Stiegler is a recognized philosopher, teaching political philosophy at the University of Bordeaux-Montaigne.

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