Leverhulme Lecture 'The Life of Rocks: An Anthropological Approach to Research in Astrobiology'

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The Life of Rocks:
An Anthropological Approach to Research in Astrobiology

To account for phenomena such as procreation, growth, reproduction, ageing and death, human societies develop “theories of life” that allow them to exert a degree of power over living beings. In building this practical knowledge, people do not simply observe the animals and plants in which these processes are most visible. They also forge "synthetic theories" that combine several kinds of inference, examining how elements dispersed throughout the environment, such as air, water, earth and fire, contribute to the formation of milieus favourable to the emergence and maintenance of life. In tracing the ecological connections woven around living beings, these theories pay particular attention to the role of celestial bodies: the sun, the moon, the stars and the planets. To illustrate this synthetic character, the lecture will examine how mineral elements are scrutinised in order to better understand the power attributed to life. After presenting a few examples of theories from Indigenous societies, the lecture will consider the contribution of mineralogy and geology to an interdisciplinary definition of life within astrobiology.

Perig Pitrou is a Senior Researcher at the CNRS, based at the Maison Française d'Oxford and at the Collège de France, Université PSL, where he leads the research group ‘Anthropology of Life’. He is the author of Ce que les humains font avec la vie (2024) and Comment habiter notre planète. Une lecture d'Avatar (2025), both published by Presses Universitaires de France. He has also co-edited Otherwhere Ethnography: An Introduction to Outer Space Studies (Oxford University Press, 2025) and Off Earth Atlas: A Guide to the Social Study of Outer Space (Intellect, forthcoming 2027).

Browse the line-up of all four Leverhulme Lectures by Perig Pitrou, including their abstracts: