Politics of Nature: How to Bring the Sciences into Democracy

something that the new separation of powers is precisely designed to
prohibit.
If we look at Figure 3.1, we see that we have substituted a new form
of bicameralism* for the two houses of the old Constitution.^21 There
are still two houses, as in the old Constitution, but they do not have
the same characteristics. By imposing a ninety-degree shift on the im-
portant difference that previously divided fact from value, we have
modified not only the composition of the compartments, which are
grouped in rows instead of lined up in columns, but also thefunction-
ingof this difference.^22
The distinction between facts and values was at once absolute and
impossible, as we saw above, since it refused to be construed as a sepa-
ration of powers and claimed to be inscribed in the nature of things,
distinguishing ontology on the one hand from politics and its repre-
sentations on the other. The second difference between the question
of taking into account and that of ordering has nothing absolute about
it,but nothing impossible, either.On the contrary, it corresponds to the
two complementary requirements of collective life: How many of you

A NEW SEPARATION OF POWERS

115

First house: taking into

account

Second house: arranging

in rank order

NEW BICAMERALISM

OLD BICAMERALISM

House of nature House of society

Facts Values

Perplexity

Institution

Consultation

Hierarchy

12

43

Figure 3.1 After a ninety-degree reversal, the fact-value distinction becomes the dis-
tinction between the powers of taking into account and the powers of arranging in
rank order.