Deleuze Studies:

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d63
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Deleuze Studies:

Post by d63 »

The following will start with postcards from my reading of the Cambridge Companion to Deleuze. The main thing to remember is that reading the book is purely my obligation and the purpose of my postcards is strictly to inspire discourse. Your understanding of Deleuze (or the book I am reading (is irrelevant to the validity of anything you might have to contribute. In other words, this is not a competition based on who has the best interpretation of Deleuze. So feel free to respond to the points I make as if I was talking about the weather or something:

This is your mission, should you choose to accept it.
d63
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Re: Deleuze Studies:

Post by d63 »

“In What is Philosophy?, Deleuze and Guattari make the following provocative claim: “Plato said that Ideas must be contemplated, but first of all he had to create the concept of Idea” (WP 6). The assertion that Plato’s philosophy is fundamentally creative appears radically at odds with Socrates’ frequent claims, most notably in the Meno and Phaedo, that knowledge is attained through the reminiscence of our perception of real things prior to the soul inhabiting the body.” - (2012-09-27). The Cambridge Companion to Deleuze (Cambridge Companions to Philosophy) (p. 3). Cambridge University Press. Kindle Edition.

And here we have it: the dichotomy that has haunted philosophy since its very beginnings: the pragmatic/Rortian distinction between understanding as making and finding. And it is that which has culminated in the occasional animosity between continental and analytic approaches.

But then it’s not like there haven’t been overlaps. Rorty (w/ his continental sensibility spoken in his native tongue: the analytic (points to both Quine and Wittgenstein as heroes. And while I can tell you little about Quine, I get it as far as Wittgenstein in that he started with Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus (that which focused on philosophy as finding (which followed his adage:

“And whereof one cannot speak, one must be silent.”

:then evolved into his recognition of the import of language games: our tendency to engage in discourse purely for the sake of bringing the words we use to describe reality closer to reality itself: that which focused on philosophy as making.

And we can see a similar overlap in Russell when he describes philosophy as that which lays in that no man’s land between Science (the art of finding (and theology: the art of making. But if we (being in more secular times (replace the term Theology with literature, and replace “no man’s land” with spectrum, we find a domain (a multiplicity to match our multiplicity as molecular individuals (by which we can analyze our own place in the scheme of things as the intellectually and creatively curious.

And this is rooted in a problem the ancient philosophers were dealing with: how to establish stable truths in a universe that was constantly changing. Of course, Plato’s solution was to come up w/ (make as Deleuze points out (a metaphysical realm of ideal forms that all earthly efforts (nature, art, language ( are trying to immolate. And this could only lead to the ethical assertions of Plato’s Republic based on an analogical hierarchy based on mind, emotion, and body. In this lies the heart of the classicist disposition.

But after several generations of authoritarian social systems based on Plato’s model, we made the romantic break by reversing the early civilization notion of civilization good/ nature bad. This went on to the bridge provided by Nietzsche from romanticism to existentialism (with the neo-classicism of the analytic serving a reactionary role (on to modernism and then (via structuralism and post-structuralism: that which recognizes the futility of language in the face of the reality it is trying to reflect (on to postmodernism.

Against this background, we can see the import of philosopher’s like Deleuze and Rorty (and even Zizek despite his assertion that “the truth is out there” (in that they represent the diametrical opposite of Plato’s assertion that philosophy is a matter of gravitating towards the realm of ideal forms. They, rather, embrace the creative potential of language in the face of a reality that can never be ideal. They establish themselves as an endgame in the ancient dichotomy between making (the side they’re on (and finding.
d63
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Re: Deleuze Studies:

Post by d63 »

“The problem with this lies in a distinction made by the poet Coleridge: that between fancy and imagination. Fancy, of course, is that which taps into the domain of so-called ideal forms [the Platonic and classicist]. Imagination does the footwork of revising those ideal forms in the face of the world as is. And in this sense, it is the non-classicists (the postmodernists who embrace conceptual play over futile strivings for the truth (those who reject any loyalty to the ideal form (who are the true realists –despite the neo-classicist claim to the contrary.”

“Their difference is ultimately temporal: whereas the Platonic and Aristotelian distinctions aim to grasp the permanent and stable behind the fleeting and becoming, the Stoics understand the incorporeal as the eventful , which opens up a different modality of time.” - (2012-09-27). The Cambridge Companion to Deleuze (Cambridge Companions to Philosophy) (p. 68). Cambridge University Press. Kindle Edition.

First of all, at this point, I am doing a as Deleuze advises us in Difference and Repetition and writing at the edge of what I know. Therefore, I have to take each step with heavy consideration while treading lightly through the sublime and complex.

And I suppose the best place to start is my issue with the neo-Nietzschean gospel of the fearlessly fanciful. Now, on one hand, their approach would seem to fit the bill of the latter quote. They would seem to be the more stoic in their acceptance of things in a constant state of becoming. This is why a social democrat such as myself (through a half-assed interpretation of Nietzsche (would seem to them as weak since I am allegedly entertaining the bad faith of looking towards the ideal form of a perfect state: a kind of watered down socialism. But there are several problems with this:

First of all (and at the most superficial (is the notion that those (social democrats like myself (who want to make things better for people are necessarily trying to create an ideal state. There is a big difference between trying to improve things for people and seeking the ideal form of the perfect state.

Secondly, stoicism is not just a matter of accepting things as they are; it is equally a matter (as is implied all over Deleuze’s notion of desiring production (as well as the evolutionary relationship between the brain and its environment (of acting on it with the added courage involved in recognizing that one will always continue to have to act up upon it. And therein lays the true stoicism of the reformer.

Furthermore, the false stoicism of the Neo-Nietzschean lies in their claim to accept things as they are (the fashionable cynicism (while seeing an ideal form in those who are willing to suck it up in the fanciful hope that the Overman (or a half-assed understanding of them (will emerge. In other words, for all their raw edges and less than ideal forms, their appeal remains with a neo-classicist appeal to ideal forms.

Even less stoic is their appeal to fashionable cynicism which argues that things are what they are, therefore the best strategy is do as the Roman’s do and seek power through things like submitting their intellectual process to what is basically an in-crowd or player mentality -once again: expressions of yet another Platonic realm of ideal forms as we can see in many TV ads. Their fashionable cynicism claims to be dealing with reality as it is. But all it is really doing is succumbing to the fancy that marketers (and the Platonic realm of media (feeds into them everyday via the fantasies they are entertaining about themselves: the pro-Capitalist media version of the Will to Power. Think, for instance, of the ideal and mythological form of Rambo: the rugged individual who, regardless of what is thrown at them, can deal with it.

And we can apply the nonsense (the fancy and false stoicism (at work here to the nonsense and fancy at work in the fashionable cynicism of Republicans and Randheads.

The real stoicism lays in the ability to see things as they are, recognizing that what is is all there is, and seeing the suffering of it (due to exploitation: an expression of power (as a cause to act to make things a little better without entertaining the illusion of a final solution that will bring the struggle to an end. And I fail to see how simply arguing that the world is shit and the only solution is to look out for my interests fits the Deleuzian concept of stoicism and its related anti-classicism.
d63
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Re: Deleuze Studies:

Post by d63 »

One of the cool things about philosophy is that you will be going along and dealing with certain terms and concepts, and understanding them in an empathetic way. Then all it takes is some beer (American pisswater is my preference (and Jager (or maybe a tap off some adequate to really intense pot (and you suddenly finding yourself sympathizing: what Joyce referred to as an epiphany.

It happened tonight with the Deleuzian term: traverse. To traverse is to dance lightly (like a stone skipping across water (across the field of experience (the plane of immanence (or even the BwO (that allows you to…. that opens you up to the possibility of saying something profound: of producing something that can never completely represent the experience: the experimentation.
d63
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Re: Deleuze Studies:

Post by d63 »

Jakob wrote:
Secondly, stoicism is not just a matter of accepting things as they are;
To the psychologist that means: unquestioningly following ones disposition, instincts.
For what are things beyond our perception of them?
Perception is an encounter, interpretation is a response.
To let the natural response come out, is this the Stoa?

I find the Stoics of fame to be people of great tiredness. Marcus Aurelius the central figure; a point in the inflation of the empire where the inflator stopped blowing, and tied a knot into it. Aurelius made a point of accepting the way things were/are, but that is a friction encounter of the being with itself at a limit of its growth; it is essentially as fire turning to stone. A volcano only accepts the way things are when it ceases to do what makes it a volcano.
Let's follow this with the full quote:

"Secondly, stoicism is not just a matter of accepting things as they are; it is equally a matter (as is implied all over Deleuze’s notion of desiring production (as well as the evolutionary relationship between the brain and its environment (of acting on it with the added courage involved in recognizing that one will always continue to have to act up upon it. And therein lays the true stoicism of the reformer.”

It’s not just a matter of following one’s instincts. This assumes that one has some kind of fixed disposition. Or I should say, rather, that instincts have nothing to do with some fixed disposition. Our instincts are the expression of the physiological brain adapting to a constantly changing environment –which means that the physiological brain is changing as well.

Aurelius, as I remember my reading of his meditations, was fixated on the transcendent notion of virtue.

And as nice as your analogy sounds, you’re comparison doesn’t work since a volcano, as far as I know, doesn’t choose to do anything. Stone and dirt is passive in nature. It is shaped by changes external to it. At the same time, the analogy serves my purposes since a volcano remains a volcano by standing its ground while being flexible in the face of its transformation due to forces outside of it: it’s becoming.

Likewise, Stoicism (in Deleuzian terms: is a willingness to keep acting with no fixed criteria by which one must act. It defies the Sartrean Bad Faith of thinking it can find some all purpose system that will make everything work like some fine-tuned machine and embraces the novelty of its day to day existence.
d63
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Re: Deleuze Studies:

Post by d63 »

Rhizome 12/12/2014

I had, in a previous rhizome:

http://www.ilovephilosophy.com/viewtopi ... &start=175

:noted (in a kind of epiphany (a connection between Deleuze’s transcendental empiricism (closely connected to the plane of immanence (and his admiration for the stoic sensibility: what I can only summarize as the courage to face brute reality while not succumbing to the security of denying the reality of the less tangible expressions of our subjective reality: I’m thinking extreme forms of materialism and Randian appeals to brute facts while making assertions that are anything but.

And my take on it got some juice from my recent reading of Sean Bowden’s The Priority of Events: Deleuze’s Logic of Sense:

“He distinguishes three such images – the Platonic, the pre -Socratic and the Hellenic…” -Bowden, Sean (2011-08-16). The Priority of Events: Deleuze's Logic of Sense (Plateaus -- New Directions in Deleuze Studies) (p. 15). Edinburgh University Press. Kindle Edition.

Bowden starts with a distinction reminiscent of the rationalist/empiricist dichotomy in first pointing out the intellectual hierarchy described by Plato:

“In Plato, following Deleuze, the ‘philosopher’s work is always determined as an ascent and a conversion , that is, as the movement of turning toward the high principle (principe d’en haut) from which the movement proceeds, and also of being determined, fulfilled, and known in the guise of such a motion’ (LS, 127).” –Ibid.

He then compares these “heights” to the pre-Socratics who found their depths in the natural world:

“Here, Deleuze is no doubt referring to the pre-Socratic ‘physicists’ or ‘natural philosophers’, among whom we can count Thales, Anaximander, Anaximenes, Heraclitus, Empedocles and Anaxagoras. For these philosophers, the fundamental principles of all things must be sought in physical nature itself: Empedocles’ four elements and the forces of ‘Love and Strife’, for example. 4 Fundamental physical principles such as these were posited to provide an ‘immanent measure . . . capable of fixing the order and the progression of a mixture in the depths of Nature (Physis)’ (LS, 131).” –Ibid.

He then points to a kind of synthesis that Deleuze saw in the stoics who:

“….bring about ‘a reorientation of all thought and of what it means to think: there is no longer any depth or height’ (LS, 130).”

Philosophers that had the courage to see that it:

“is always a matter of unseating the Ideas, of showing that the incorporeal is not high above (en hauteur), but is rather at the surface, that it is not the highest cause but the superficial effect par excellence, and that it is not Essence but event. On the other front, it will be argued that depth is a digestive illusion which complements the ideal optical illusion (LS, 130).”

In this sense, we approach the same univocity of being that Rorty was getting at in Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature when he worked to undermine claims concerning ontological status. A thing either is or is not: it doesn’t matter if it’s something you feel or the rock that stubs your toe (which is, BTW, something you feel.

To give a more practical/pragmatic sense of what I’m at getting here, I received from this post/rhizome:

“Capitalism is control. We believe it is a choice. Yet everything we do is controlled by it. We soften the blow of this very truth by assuming that it is some kind of natural force in our lives. But it is not. It is the product of a human agreement. But then it’s kind of hard to not feel like it is a natural force on the internet.”

:a couple of what I assume to be sarcastic remarks:

“ I like bold empirical claims.”

“Wait, what?”

Now I would note here the use of the popular buzzword (which both Deleuze and Rorty are opposed to: empirical. What does that mean? Does it, for instance, mean that the thing we are perceiving has, somehow, more ontological status than the act of perceiving it or how we react to it? And since these 2 goons seems to think in terms of brute facts (or claim to (how does 1 + 1=2 or the fact that water boils 212 degrees at atmospheric pressure tell us anything about how we experience Capitalism? I quite sure they think they can. But most arguments from their likes end up being as non sequitor as:

1+1=2, Capitalism is the only legitimate economic system on the face of the earth.

Deleuze and Rorty, on the other hand, ask us to look beyond the appeal to the in-crowd (the socially programmed responses to socially programmed cues (of the above hecklers and recognize the import of what we’re experiencing as well as that of what we are experiencing.

Appeals to the Heights or the Depths (the tunnel vision (is for pussies. The courage of the stoic takes it all (the plane of immanence (into consideration. It does not flinch at the possibility of being wrong.

http://www.ilovephilosophy.com/posting. ... 49#preview
d63
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Re: Deleuze Studies:

Post by d63 »

Rhizome 12/17/14:

Anyway, as requested by Erik, I think it is time to explain the rhizomes. And I would note here that from the beginning, I always thought it best to bury this explanation in the process of rhizomes in that had I of explained it right from the start, that would have suggested that I was establishing a center to a process that must, by definition, have no center.

And it is this process of moving forward with no sense of a center that defines the rhizome. And I would argue it as my particular destiny. When I was young (particularly when I was in a class and taking notes (I had a natural propensity towards placing random dots in any free space I could find and connecting them with lines. And given that, it seems no surprise to me now that I would take to the rhizome like a duck to water even if I didn’t understand the rhizomatic implications (the epistemology (of what I was doing at the time.

Now the best way to explain the rhizomatic is to compare it to its diametric opposite: the arborescent. The arborescent epistemology can be thought of as the tree-like structure of thought represented by the tree-like graphs we use to see in K thru 12 in order to understand the body of knowledge we were dealing with. Think, for instance, of the graphs we used to break down a sentence or the tree given us by Francis Bacon that puts metaphysics at the roots then proceeds to describe the different branches of knowledge that, well, branch off from other branches. The problem with this approach, from a contemporary perspective, is that it tends to lead to a hierarchal approach that works its way up down to the roots of things.

The rhizomatic approach, on the other hand, refers to the roots of grass that have no such hierarchy. They, rather, connect in ways that have no such center. And because of that, there can be no real center: and no guru with access to that center: just processes working together.

However, what I have used to describe the rhizomatic process (as well as my natural propensity to drawing random dots and connecting them with lines (is superficial at best. Rhizomes are not just the discrete points in the network, but the lines between them (the Events as I am gathering from my study of the Logic of Sense (which makes the rhizome (that which enfolds (while enfolded within) the enfolding) more of a wave-function than the particle one described by my natural tendency to draw random dots and connect them.

And, yet again, I have run out my window before I had a chance to say everything I wanted to. I hope tomorrow to describe how all this plays into my rhizomes. To summarize it: it is mainly a technique (my Einstein’s Wardrobe (that spares me the angst of expending energy on deciding what I’m going to do or how I’m going to write.
d63
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Re: Deleuze Studies:

Post by d63 »

Rhizome 1/22/15:

When one has a routine (an Einstein’s wardrobe (every day is a repetition. You can almost feel the loop: felt it today as I walked into the Tobacco Hut to buy my 40 ounce and shooter. But such repetitions, by their very nature (the fact (and may the wrath of Professor Strunk rest in its grave (that they are always carried out at a different point in time (produces difference. And creative curiosity can only amplify it.
*
Reading James Williams’ critical introduction and guide to Deleuze’s Logic of Sense, I’m starting to feel like I’m also getting a technical manual to the Rhizome’s. And in my defense, I actually started the rhizomes before I got the book and was mainly working with my instincts (supplemented with my readings of Deleuze (concerning the rhizome which was the first concept (attributed to his work with Guattarri (that drew me to him. And I would attribute this to 2 things. First of all, I believe that there exists a kind of osmosis between reader and writer in that sometimes, even when the reader does not consciously understand what they are reading, there is still information slipping through, instinctive reactions to it that are later confirmed by either later readings of the text or interpretations offered by the secondary text.

Secondly, I would point to something I read about Lacan: that in order to understand him, you had to go into it already understanding him without having articulated him to the extent that he had. In other words, you would have to go into it with a common sensibility. And it is that common sensibility that draws us in to a certain philosopher or artist or writer or scientist or famous person for that matter. What is always being sold is a sensibility. What an individual produces are mainly sales pitches for that sensibility.
*
Anyway, Williams points to 4 things concerning how to read Logic of Sense: Order and Series, Series within Series, Humor, and Multidimensional Sentences (all of which I hope to get to in the context of the rhizomes (but then if I don’t, there is always the next one: the next rhizome (now let me check my notes:

Order and Series:

“At this stage, all that needs to be stressed is that the readers can bring their own elements to Deleuze’s series in order to move among them.” –James Williams, Gilles Deleuze’s Logic of Sense: a critical introduction and guide, pg. 15

I would first point out that the main point of this section is that Logic of Sense (consisting of series as compared to chapters (invites us to read them out of order. It’s pretty much like (books… way too many books…. here it is! (Brian Mussumi points out in the intro to a Thousand Plateaus: it should be jumped around on until one finds certain riffs that sticks with them then work from there. However, the main difference (as well as the connection (between Deleuze’s series and my rhizomes is that I give you no choice. Outside of ILP (http://www.ilovephilosophy.com/viewtopi ... 5&t=187249 (my primary launch pad, I tend to randomly post my rhizomes on whatever board I feel them most appropriate for. Beyond that, it is the mission of the reader (should they choose to take it (to trace the serial aspect back to its sources and (via the above quote: bring their own elements into it.

The main thing I want to point to here is that Deleuze’s use of a series (that which foreshadowed his turn to (w/ Guattarri (the rhizome is almost interchangeable with my use of the rhizome. I would offer as evidence:

Series within Series:

“Every portion matter can be thought of as a garden full of plants, or as a pond full of fish. But every branch of the plant, every part of the animal, and every drop of its vital fluids, is another such garden, or another such pond” –Leibniz

Now going back to Williams’ book:

“In his Difference and Repetition and later texts such as The Fold: Leibniz and the Baroque, Deleuze describes his internal connection as the folding of ideas and things within one another.”

Or as I like to put it:

The enfolded (enfolding within) enfolded.

(It's right: the logic: I thought about it hard.)

Humor:

I refuse to be taken seriously!

Multidimensional Sentences:

Now this I always feel like I (and the rhizomes (must be falling short on since, given the spontaneous nature of it, I never have that much time to put that much work into a sentence. I can only hope that it happens through the seemingly mystical power of spontaneity or the process of repeating certain phrases and making them different until I happen to stumble upon such a thing.

But the point is not that I am somehow Deleuze’s equal. I simply don’t have the time and resources he had. It’s to show that, through the rhizomes, with the limited time and resources I have (and through a common sensibility (I have the blessing of being able to approach what he had. It’s why the rhizomes won’t let me go. And I think he would have appreciated that.
d63
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Re: Deleuze Studies:

Post by d63 »

Rhizome 2/28/15:

“Whereas Hegel represents becoming, , Kierkegaard and Nietzsche bring to philosophy a new means of expression which produces becoming in the reader. In reading Nietzsche, one should experience the movement of thought. The writer no longer tries to represent the movement of thought, but to create that movement in the reader” –pg. 22 of Joe Hughes’ reader’s guide to Difference and Repetition

In other words, as Hughes interprets it, Deleuze appears to be working under the imperative driven into any student in a creative writing class. Deleuze’s primary issue with Hegel is that he tells rather than shows. Of course, the source of Hegel’s weakness would seem to be his attempt at academic detachment or “god’s-eye-view”, an issue that came up between me and Steven Orslini on a pragmatic forum.

This recognition, in turn, leads to a gut level recognition that one of Deleuze’s other issues with Hegel is that he made the dialectic seem too pat: something less than art or poetry (that which Frost describes as what gets lost in translation. I would also note here Hughes’ occasional use of the word “evanescent” which means: soon passing out of sight, memory, or existence. (Kind of cool, actually.) It, as I see it, reflects on the import of thinking of Deleuze as an artist as it is thinking of him as a philosopher. Without doing so, one risks failing to see or understand Deleuze’s use of free indirect discourse.

(And the same could apply to Guattarri.)

Hughes goes on to write:

“Two things, however, are clear. Direct discourse is discounted from the start. As soon as you directly represent thought in language, you have lost it.”

In other words, in order to even approach (that is since it can only be captured in an arbitrary manner (that evanescent quality of thought, you have to approach it in the oblique manner of poetry –or any art for that matter.

(And here we have a residual effect of the Lacanian Real: that which overflows the symbolic order and which the symbolic order struggles (the source of our cultural evolution (to pull it into the symbolic order.(

At the same time, this puts some shine on the struggle I have with Deleuze. And assuming that I don’t exist in a vacuum and that the reason that I’m having it is because it is external to me and, consequently, experienced by others, it may put a little shine on the experience of others. But things work best for me when I’m working project to project. But that assumes that in order to move on to the next project, the previous project must be finished. But when is reading Deleuze, or about him, ever a finished project?

I recently changed my approach to breaking each book down to about 100 page increments (that is starting from the beginning (and going over and over that part until I understand it fully, then move on. The problem is that even with Hughes’ book, I still find myself confused despite the fact that I have gone over the material 5+ times. It’s as if: if I were to take one section and read it to the point of memorizing it, there is still the possibility of not understanding it: that evanescent quality that we can only get when we’re constitutionally ready.

It’s like a ceiling that we come to when the extent of our previous experiences can take us no further into the experience of the given text. The best we can do is go elsewhere and gather more experiences until we have enough that the initial text will have more to work with.

The point is (as I’m confident Deleuze would appreciate (that what we read is, at best, supplemental to our individual process. At the same time, that individual process could never be what it becomes without that supplement. And much of the genius of Deleuze may well center around his recognition of that.
d63
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Re: Deleuze Studies:

Post by d63 »

Notes from an Investigation (Gilles Deleuze’s Logic of Sense:

Stakeout 1:

The bastard’s guilty! This is my sense of him. Not sure how or of what. But the fucking Frenchman is into something. I’ve seen pictures of him: dressed all casual and unassuming like a crime lord trying to hide his wealth. And that smirk! As if he knew something that I didn’t. But he’s up to something. I know this because even in translation he reads like another language in English. It’s as if he is talking while hiding something. And the same can be seen in his sometimes accomplice: Guattarri. It’s like a code or something. My rightwing friends bitch about the French, but clearly for the wrong reasons. They argue that the French are jealous of us. But I know better. They’re hiding something: perhaps a wealth beyond anything good old American Pragmatism could offer…. I mean it! Damn the French and their weird obscure philosophies anyway.

(At the same time, even if one does not understand the code, what he says and how he says it is not altogether unpleasing to the ear. But that can only make him more suspect.)

At one point, the suspect says:

“When I designate something, I always suppose that the sense is understood, that it is already there. As Bergson [yet another conspirator] said, one does not proceed from sounds to images and from images to sense; rather, one is established “from the outset” within sense. Sense is like the sphere in which I am already established in order to enact possible denotations, and even to think their conditions. Sense is always presupposed as soon as I begin to speak; I would not be able to begin without this presupposition.” -LOS: pg. 28

I cannot help but suspect that this, somehow, refers to Kant’s description of the initial subject/object engagement that starts with the sensible then moves through the imagination and on to apperception: the recognition of the object in question. Instinctively, I sense that the suspect’s main problem with Kant’s model is that it is a model and falls short of the actual experience it is trying to describe. And, suddenly, because of this, I feel uncertain of the ground beneath my feet. And that bastard is responsible! Suddenly it is not so linear as Kant (a good citizen (describes. And it suggests that all models we might use to describe reality as we encounter it are little more than red herrings throwing us off the trail.

All models that use to give me a sense of certainty are suddenly useless. And if there were real laws against such a thing, I would arrest, convict, and condemn the suspect on that alone. But this one is way too crafty and clever for that. In order to truly catch, convict, and condemn him, I will have to become a better detective by learning to think like him. And that should scare me, but actually draws me on….

But I mean it: damn the French and their weird obscure philosophies anyway.
*
Stakeout 2:

Lately, I’ve come to realize how much my process with philosophy (and the humanities in general (is like some serial crime drama. But instead of the case by case exposition we see in Law and Order (and all its sub-series, for me it is more about an overwhelming caseload that one can only approach by chipping away at it step by step. I should have listened Schopenhauer who argued that all any philosopher needs is one to three great books. I, unfortunately, could not stop. My library is full: cases which I have almost solved, cases I have scratched the surface of, and cases I have yet to touch yet nag myself about getting to. It’s likely a good thing I am not a real detective since I will likely die with a 100% of my cases unresolved.

The suspect (Deleuze, however, may have offered me some solace and advice on how to look at my predicament. If I am reading his actions right, I should look at my library as a heterogeneous complex of series from which, if I stay with it, will produce a series of events: those moments of change (the ethereal and elusive elements (that define the significance (the individuation (of a given complex of singularities for a given individual. In other words, given the precarious mediation of language, my process (my individuation (can only be my process alone. Now this might give the impression that individuation is purely a matter of subjective interpretations of events. But I have observed behaviors and dialogues in the suspect that suggests that there are forms of individuation that occur in reality outside of subjective observation. Perhaps change alone is that significant event. But significant to who? Or is that the wrong question to ask? Perhaps the suspect is pointing to aspects of supposedly non-subjective phenomena that underlie our subjective experience. What a diabolical bastard! Is he lowering us, and our experience of consciousness, to the level of a common rock?

Is he mocking me? Teasing me? I feel like I’m almost there; then he’s gone. It’s as if he is arguing that I should accept that I will die with a 100% of my cases unresolved. Wouldn’t that serve the purpose of the ultimate getaway? The bastard’s guilty of something: if of nothing else, of arranging his getaway in such a diabolical manner. Perhaps this is why there are so many on the case, so many reports and stakeouts to work with: Williams, Colebrook, Buchanan, Holland, etc., etc.. And thank God (whatever it is (for them. But how can one suspect elude so many?
d63
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Re: Deleuze Studies:

Post by d63 »

Stakeout 3:

“It is the characteristic of events to be expressed or expressible, uttered or utterable, in propositions which are at least possible. There are many relations inside a proposition. Which is the best suited to surface effects or events?” –LOS, pg. 13

Surface effects? Events? As compared to what? The old Freudian notion of depth that I grew up with? I’ve heard it said of Deleuze (the suspect (that he is opposed to internalization. And I’m finally starting to get it. Like a good detective, I am starting to think like him.

I use to think of things (art, poems, philosophy, etc. (as approaching a surface and digging in until I reached the “depth” of it. And the experience, from a knee-jerk perspective, felt that way. My motto use to be: depth, intensity, and lightness of touch. But intensity and lightness of touch are surface effects. And perhaps I was confusing them with depth. Perhaps my notion of depth was a free-rider on the other terms.

In my defense, I was working towards it when I recognized that the old 70’s dream dictionaries were questionable in that it became doubtful to me that the subconscious could be so (what is the word I’m looking for? (volitional or contriving: that it could sit around and construct this secret language for our conscious minds to decode. I finally came to the conclusion that when we talk about the subconscious, what we are primarily referring to is the peripheral consciousness: that which lies at the edge of our field of vision at any given time. I mean what would be the point of psychoanalysis if it wasn't a matter of bringing what was just outside of our field of vision into the center of it? Plus that, let’s face it: the brain is meat. It must talk in a language that is far more primal than the language we use to express our thoughts. It almost seems like a disconnect that we know cannot be there.

So what is it that I/we/whoever chooses to confess are confusing for depth? Perhaps it is the complex of events that erupt and expand around a thing –a dream or work of abstract art (or any art for that matter. Perhaps, as Rorty and Pragmatism would argue, the depth of a thing comes from expansiveness of the discourse that goes on around it. Perhaps I have confused depth with the relationship between the finite thing or event I am always limited to and the infinite rhizomatic network it is always a part of.

Once again: damn the French and their weird obscure philosophies anyway!!!!!!
d63
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Re: Deleuze Studies:

Post by d63 »

Stakeout 6:

“The answer lies in the disavowal the ironic figures of the individual in favor of an individuation. This is defined as a closed structure of singularities, where this relation is determined by a problematic structure and by an actual expression according to a dual and two-fold static genesis, and a counter dynamic genesis, that give genetic priority to singularities over individuals.” –James William’s critical introduction and guide to Logic of Sense, pg. 86…..

As always with this particular suspect (if not all suspects (I find myself working in the overlaps. On one hand, I’m thinking in terms of series, events, and the individuation of those events. At the same time, I can’t help but relate this to his work with Guattarri in the Anti-Oedipus and its machinic view of the individual’s (especially the individual philosopher’s (interaction with the world:

“It is at work everywhere, functioning smoothly at times, at other times in fits and starts. It breathes, it heats, it eats. It shits and fucks. What a mistake to have ever said the Id. Everywhere it is machines –real ones, not figurative ones: machines driving other machines, machines being driven by other ones, with all the necessary couplings and connections. An organ-machine is plugged into an energy-source-machine: the one produces a flow that the other interrupts. The breast is a machine that produces milk, and the mouth a machine coupled to it. The mouth of the anorexic wavers between several functions: its possessor is uncertain as to whether it is an eating machine, a talking machine, or a breathing machine (asthma attacks). Hence we are all handymen: each with his little machines. For every organ-machine, an energy machine: all the time, flows and interruptions.”

But I would first get at the distinction that the suspect SEEMS to be making between the individual and individuation. The individual is the subject or, rather, what results from the anthropocentric arrogance of centering on the human subject. Individuation, on the other hand, focuses on how we, as bodies with a pound or two of meat called a brain, individuate a universe full of series and events for our individual purposes as bodies occupying space. This is not to say, as Williams points out in another part of the book, that Deleuzes denies the possibility of Free Will. (In fact, his manifesto concerning our participation in the complex interaction of systems would suggest otherwise.) It is simply to recognize that what we are engaging in is a participation in reality as compared to Platonic insistence on control of reality. Focusing in on:

“This is defined as a closed structure of singularities, where this relation is determined by a problematic structure and by an actual expression according to a dual and two-fold static genesis, and a counter dynamic genesis, that give genetic priority to singularities over individuals.”

:we see ourselves as isolated system working between the dynamic genesis of the subconscious (sensibility, imagination, memory, and thought (and the static genesis of recognition. identity, and representation. In this sense, we (what we think of as ourselves (are an unstable entity that, having no solid foundation, engage with the world in acts of individuation. We participate while having no choice but to let it participate in us. This is why the suspect, in Difference and Repetition, argues (contrary to Kant (for the import of the dynamic synthesis: to put all import on the static genesis (as Kant did (is to submit to the Platonic hierarchy of mind having privilege over our bodily existence and its emotional/creative responses. The suspect, clearly, was just not down with that. He preferred the stoic emphasis on surfaces.

Remember:

“Identity and representation is for pussies.”
d63
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Re: Deleuze Studies:

Post by d63 »

“The philosophy of Deleuze/Guattari is highly neurological, based on the structures of the brain, among others, a widely accepted point of view, nowadays, in neuroscience. Deleuze is philosophical, scientific and psychological, also in respect to ethical and other "applications" or effects of a much bigger impact than the usual modern neuroscience based philosophers [Dennett, Searle, and, to some extent, Dawkins [who are engaging in a popular philosophy that is heavily influencing pedagogical theory as applied to the university classroom.” –Harald

First of all, Harald , I took some risky stretches in this particular translation (that is based on what I thought you were getting at, especially at the end concerning your point on the relationship between popular philosophy and pedagogical policy –which I want you to feel free to correct if I happen to be flying too far off the rails you have laid out here.

That said, this all makes perfect sense in the context of the universities increasing dependence on corporate financing and philosophy’s, as well other liberal and fine arts, long standing struggle against the tyranny of the functional –the inferiority complex they have always felt aware of in being pursuits that most people have no interest in. So why wouldn’t today’s philosophy departments turn to teaching students an approach to philosophy that (like the work of Dennett, Searle, Dawkins, and Pinker (stand a chance of selling. It comes out of the increasing pressure on philosophy, the arts (poetry, visual art, as well as fiction (and the sciences to compete with more marketable media such as pop music, TV, and Cinema.

And I’m not so caught up in the Heideggerian esoteric elitism of wanting the payoff of status through my effort that I would consider all it bad. It has produced some good things like the graphic guides I broke my teeth on and the philosophy and popular culture series. And pardon me if I shamelessly gloat on the fact that (and may the wrath of Strunk rest in its grave (these efforts are generally dominated by more continental approaches to philosophy. For me, this seems heroic in the Promethean sense of bringing the fire of the gods to the people: pretty much what Rorty seems to be doing in every word he writes.

(One time, the introducing graphic guides series (http://www.introducingbooks.com/ (had a kind of contest in which they asked everyone to suggest a topic for one of their books. I suggested one on analytic philosophy so I could get a quick shot understanding of it. I didn’t win. But what did come out shortly after was a book on Continental philosophy. I still wonder if my suggestion had anything to do with that.)

The move towards marketability would also explain why philosophy, if you listen to a lot of the podcasts, seems to be moving towards an issue based approach as compared to the abstraction of philosophers like Deleuze or Derrida, etc..Take, for instance, Pete Seeger’s animal rights or Sam Harris’ war against organized religion.

Now getting back to your former point: it is as if Deleuze is always aware of (perhaps even drawn to (the meat of the brain. As a book my son gave me, Ronald Bogue’s Deleuze on Music, Painting, and the Arts, crystallized for me, Deleuze is clearly more drawn to the biological (the earthy even (than he is the “music of the spheres”. In hindsight, it seemed kind of hard not to see: the rhizomes which were based on the structures of the brain, the amorphous imagery of Dali-like folds of skin with spikes of hair poking out of them, the BwO (Body without Organs (the ground zero of all intensities to the nth power, and the fact (and may the wrath of Strunk rest in its grave (that the one book he wrote about an artist was on Francis Bacon.

Granted, Deleuze did utilize calculus which has the purity of “the music of the spheres”. But secondary text advices me not to take that too seriously since…. well, Deleuze never did. I’m guessing his relationship to mathematics was a little like mine: you got to love the feel of it: e=mc². Couldn’t tell you what it means. It just looks pretty.
d63
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Re: Deleuze Studies:

Post by d63 »

"Here we can see two of the three characteristics of 'repetition' that Deleuze outlined in the introduction taking shape: repetition is unconscious; it unfolds in a latent subject; and repetition is before the law, essentially transgressive: it is not a rule-governed synthesis. As Heidegger puts it, synthesis 'underlies' the categories." -Joe Hughes, Deleuze's Difference and Repetition, pg. 97

What I mainly want to focus on here is the second proposition and how it relates to a point made in Difference and Repetition concerning Kant’s Categorical Imperative. As Kant sees it, Repetition is the desired order and therefore given privilege over Difference. And we can see in this the classicist leaning that Deleuze might have found distasteful in Kant: the desire to create an ethical system that can be perfectly repeated. Consequently, we can see the profound nature of the way that Deleuze follows by working to show how it is actually Difference that must be given privilege and how Repetition could not possibly serve Kant’s de-ontic appeal to duty (that is based on a revision of Kant’s model of the three syntheses by which we come to know an object : that which gives the needs of the community privilege over the needs of the individual. I would point again to Deleuze’s analytic metaphysic as I understand it:

A Repetition, at its purest, can only be different instances of the same thing at different points in time.

This, of course, hints at Deleuze’s understanding of time and the present that can never truly be present, only a vague transitional point that is always in the past while being equally in the future.
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I suppose this particular rhizome may be greatly influenced by an interview I was listening to on public radio in which a gay man was talking about his past as an advocate for family values and the importance of a father in a child’s life. Kind of hard to disagree with. But stranger still, for me, was how compelling I found his argument that when two people get married, they’re not just making a pact with each other, they’re making a pact with their community. Fair enough. It does appeal to my own point concerning the competitive model of the relationship between the base of the brain and its higher cognitive function and the cooperative one.

(And this may well point to an internal conflict and contradiction as concerns my agenda as concerns the competitive/cooperative model –something I will have to get to before someone uses it as a gotcha moment.)

But from that point on, it was a backslide into my own natural aversion to convention and dogma. My Marxist instincts kicked in first. This individual kept emphasizing statistics that pointed to the negative effects of not having two parents on children. But what he completely neglected was the statistics that clearly show the effect that poverty has on them as well. Nor did he seem to give any consideration to the negative effects of our present economy on marriage. The last I heard, statistics show that the biggest reason for conflict in a marriage is finances.

But the deeper implication and indictment comes from my session at the “library” which resulted in the above point on Deleuze and the recognition of the interviewee’s de-ontic appeal to duty which puts the interests of the “community” above the interests of the individual, perhaps even if it comes at the expense of the individual’s misery. And how could we possibly expect an individual to forbear misery for the sake of the higher principle of community?

Here the Deleuze/Kant conflict becomes personal.
d63
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Re: Deleuze Studies:

Post by d63 »

“Could someone help me articulate the exact difference between "sense" and "language" in The Logic of Sense? Deleuze seems to be saying that both operate at the boundary between proposition and thing, so could you almost say that sense is another word for language itself? Thanks” –Ed Graham: https://www.facebook.com/groups/2232336063/

“No. Language depends on the circular interaction of denotation (reference), manifestation (situation in relation to the speaker) and signification (position of words in relation to one another). These three dimensions of language are imbued with the fourth dimension of sense which breaks the circle.” Wayne Brooks: Ibid

“If I've understood it correctly I think nonsense is co-present with and produces sense inside of language?” –Ed Graham

Yeah, Wayne, that was the sense (excuse the pun (I got from Jame's Williams' book on Logic of Sense. It is also brought up in terms of impossible objects (ex. "round square") which still manage to have a sense or even meaning even though such a thing could not possibly exist. Kind of goes with your point, Ed.

I also believe that sense may hover above and within the relationship between series: the connection between singularities, events: the changes or becomings that occur between them, and individuation: that which extracts (via a kind of focus (import from the multiplicity of the infinite. It may be that sense is the resonance that results from the gravitational pull of the infinite on the finite instance of any given individuation.I gather this from multiple references, throughout my reading of and about Deleuze, to infinite regress which involves the fact (and may the wrath of Professor Strunk rest in its grave (that the meaning we get from any given thing always involves or refers to an infinite chain of other meaning instances -kind of like Derrida's Differance.

And Deleuze being the kind of guy who follows the writer's motto of: show, don't tell: seems to encourage us (via free indirect discourse (to settle for a sense of him as compared to a direct exchange of meaning. That, as I understand it, was the point of writing Logic of Sense in a series of series which the reader is invited to read through however fancy directs them and find their own individuation through those events that happen to occur. It was pretty much the approach he and Guattarri encouraged with A Thousand Plateaus.
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And, BTW, has anyone noticed that after a while of getting into Deleuze, you start to write like someone who has spent too much time in a sensory deprivation tank taking psychedelics? I still say my fixation with Deleuze (and philosophy in general (is a throwback to the good drugs we had back in the 70's.
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“I’ve also came to a Taoist realization with my studies of Deleuze. Given that there is no possibility of me truly knowing Deleuze (or a lot of other philosophers for that matter (there comes a point at which I need to show a little more confidence in my own process. But in order to do that, I need to let go of the hope that I will know another philosopher enough (that is even though I consider myself more of a writer writing about his experiences with philosophy (to feel confident enough (that is based on my understanding of that philosopher (to just strike out on my own.

Still, Raan: there’s my ego chirping away. And no matter what I do, I will always be that guy staring at his own reflection in a pool of water until it kills him. But I love my life and see no reason to change it. I just hope you won’t hold that against me. I just hope we can remain friends despite our different dispositions.” –me: https://www.facebook.com/groups/alt.philosophy.zen/

Once again, Deleuze is like some hot French Mademoiselle who will come off as approachable but, the minute you think you are almost there, walk away. At the same time, it plays with your ego in such a way that you find it hard to move on to other things that you should be doing. It never allows you to say you have done what you came to do.

Therefore, the only thing you can do is take the Taoist approach of letting go and living to fight, or interpret, another day.
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