Astronoms Eriks Elsts par Holbahu. Erika Elsta un Vilņa Zariņa saruna Rīgā
Astronomer Eric Elst on Holbach: Conversation of Eric Elst and Vilnis Zariņš

Summary/Abstract: On 6, February, 2008, in the premises of the University of Latvia took place a meeting between the well-known Belgian astronomer Eric W. Elst, his spouse, the professor of French and translator Cristine Elst and philosopher, the senior researcher of the Institute of Philosophy and Sociology, University of Latvia Vilnis Zariņš. Vilnis Zariņš has been a pedagogue in the course of many years, as well as researcher of philosophy of the 16th-18th centuries, he has accomplished a number of translations (he has translated the works of Denis Diderot, Volter, Rene Descartes, Fransua Le Rochefoucauld and other philosophers), he has written forewords and scholarly notes to translations of the books by Francis Bacon, George Berkeley, Denis Diderot, Charles-Louis Monesquieu, Baruch Spinoza, Fransua Le Rochefoucauld and others, he has been a scientific editor, as well as a member of the editorial board of book series in philosophy. The community of astronomers knows Eric Elst as a person who has discovered the largest number of small planets or asteroids. We remember the interesting information in 2007 that one of the asteroids was named after the Latvian composer Pēteris Vasks – Vasks. And not even a year later in response to E. Elst’s initiative the the Latvia related asteroids included also such asteroids as Düna, Mitau, Kurland, and Valmiera. Eric Elst is also a founder and president of the Holbach Society (see the homepage www.holbach-foundation.org/). The name of the Society was chosen in behalf of the German origin French Enlightenment philosopher Paul-Henri Holbach (1723–1789). His wife Christine Elst is an active member of the Society, she has accomplished translations of many works of French philosophers into Dutch. Information about the long going and systematic research work by the Holbach Society was novelty for Latvia. V. Zariņš commented on this stating that there are two serious obstacles to the Holbach research in Latvia. The first – Holbach is an absolute determinist, he doesn’t accept the accidental. Meanwhile in Latvia there is a strong tradition of German philosophy – Kant, Hegel and others, and because of it the philosophy of Holbach is not popular in Latvia. «The second reason is social in its nature. For instance, I also am an atheist, but not very active, because the Latvian nation is divided too much already. One part of it belongs to atheists, while another – to believers, and there are differences among believers as well. But we have great fights ahead of us, urging the sense of unity. "We have to build our state", admitted V. Zariņš.

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