One of my goals is to find a synthesis between my love of French concepts and my love of the American propensity towards straight-forward exposition.
Like Prometheus, I want to to bring the fire of the esoteric to the people while leaving them subject to the subtle, the sublime, and the real.
If I offer them the first, or even the second, steppingstone to it, I will consider myself successful.
Been recently reading Ian Buchanan’s reader’s guide to The Anti-Oedipus, which is a little less obscure than some of the other text I’ve been reading in my present fixation on Deleuze. And I’m starting to find some connections between his later work with Guattari and Difference and Repetition. As Buchanan points out, one of the central concerns of many French (and continental in general –i.e. the Frankfurt school.) was how power worked in social systems in ways that were a little more subtle than the traditional notion of one group of people exerting power over another. And the one of the catalysts of this movement was the question what it was about people that seem to seek their own oppression through cooperation with it. As one thinker put it (I believe it was Marcuse):
The question isn’t why people steal food when they’re hungry or strike when they feel exploited; it’s why they don’t do it on a regular basis.
In Deleuze and Guattarri, this evolved into the question of how desire turns on itself and seeks its own repression. This, in turn, goes to D & G’s agenda of seeking out all forms of fascism including (and most importantly) those within ourselves.
And one connection here might be found in their distinction between the molar and molecular or, more importantly, the inherent territorialization of the molar and its potential for fascism. We see this, for instance, in the racist view of The Other: a constructed whole that completely neglects the molecular aspect of the group that the racist seeks to contain in a molar order. And we can see as much in a more active way in which popular culture has sought to assimilate The Other. For instance, as blacks were assimilated, what we tended to see in TV commercials were not so much black people, but rather yuppies that happened to have dark skin. And the same can be said for the sitcom Will and Grace. In it, we’re weaned into accepting homosexuality through an attractive male who also happens to be some kind of professional. In other words, if we look through the semiology at work, the process of assimilating The Other, whether they be minority or homosexual, is a matter of their being compatible with the molar territorialization of our general role as producer/consumers. It was as if they could not accepted on their own merits, but had to be accepted strictly within perimeters of producer/consumer Capitalism.
And it is in Difference and Repetition that we see an ontological/phenomenological foundation for this in Deleuze’s aversion to representation. Once again, we return to the virtual nature of the static object. In a Molar sense, the object does seem to be standing still. And that is how we, in some sense, need to see it. And in this sense, we have a natural tendency towards territorialization. And this, through the passive synthesis, comes natural to us and lies at the heart of our potential for fascistic responses. But in order to get beyond it, we have to take the active effort of diving into the molecular in order to see that the static object, because of subjective time, can never be the same object it was only split seconds ago. The universe is always in motion. It is only through the human tendency towards the molar, territorial, and fascistic that we can hold it still long enough to control it.
Whether it has come from my study of Deleuze, or Deleuze and Guattarri, or not, it could be coincidence that I have suddenly realized that one (among many) legitimate descriptions of philosophy is that it studies the mechanics of reality. But I think not. Of course, that would seem to focus on the metaphysical aspect of it. But let’s look at it in terms of my revised version of Durrant’s list of the concerns of philosophy:
Metaphysics/ontology/>phenomenology>epistemology/logic>ethic/aesthetics>social structures/politics
which, in turn, given the back and forth aspect of the spectrum, can be written as:
Metaphysics/ontology/<phenomenology<epistemology/logic<ethic/aesthetics<social structures/politics
Now the question is does the mechanics of reality apply throughout the back and forth cycle of the spectrum? I would argue that it does. I have already pointed out how it applies to metaphysics and, by proxy, ontology. But isn’t phenomenology also an underlying mechanic in that it describes how consciousness interacts with reality? And given that there is no other way for us to interact with reality, doesn’t that make consciousness as much an aspect of the mechanics of reality as what is “out there”? Epistemology/logic applies to the mechanics of how we organize reality. And the ethical/ aesthetic is how we establish the mechanics of the very real social/political.
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Nothing could be more essential to our philosophical process than being able to actually experience the abstractions we are being presented with. For me, in Kantian terms, philosophy has always worked when pure reason meets with practical reason. And I am lately getting a sense of what Deleuze is hinting at when he refers to the mind as a kind of machine (or system) interacting with all the other machines (or systems) in its universe. For me, it has been this endless process of input and output: I read, or just experience reality in itself, then I write. Sometimes, it begins to feel like this endless process of input, output, input, output, and so on and so on.
I begin to feel as Warhol must have when he described himself as a machine that produced art.
It gets to a point where I feel like I’m just pumping it out.
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One of the main points of the Anti-Oedipus is to undermine is the over coding of the Oedipal model on our natural experiences. And one has to give credibility to the project since the oedipal complex does make any resistance we engage in to the powers that be seem like little more than a reenactment of some issue with our fathers. It turns all resistance into a form neurosis or even madness. Take, for instance, what happened to Francis Farmer. In the TV version (or corporate one) she was presented as a drug and alcohol addicted deviant. In the movie version, we were given the bigger issue of her being thought she was deviant because of her participation in socialist causes. In other words, even with strong (almost men-like) women the Oedipal model can be coded on to the reality.
Still, the Oedipal model works. I can apply it in all kinds of ways in my own personal narrative. For instance, the reason I can’t stand intellectual arrogance is because I dealt with it all the time with my father, that is while being a synthesis of his intellectual and creative ambition and the alcoholic simplicity and compassion of my mother.
But then, maybe that is why we have to be careful of narratives. Even more important, for our purposes, it may be why we have to be careful about the imposition of the Oedipal model.
Actually, Matt, Sartre had some interesting shit to say on this as concerns what he called The Vertigo of the Possible. As he described it in Being and Nothingness:
“The vertigo of the possible, then, is not so much a fear of falling into the abyss as throwing oneself in.”
It ties in with his notion of being confronted with a “monstrous freedom” in that, given the kind of nothingness (the open space) between the person we are now and the person we might be 2 seconds down the line, we have no real way of assuring that we’ll be the same person then as we are now. We experience this in very real ways when we find ourselves looking over a high ledge and suddenly imagine ourselves leaping over. This isn’t because we have some subconscious desire to do so as Freud would describe it. It is, rather, the natural tendency of the mind (or even brain) to consider the options available to it.
And we see the same thing at work in the reverse in that when we second guess ourselves, we see a different person in our memory than the sentient being looking back. Once again: remembering having done something and actually being there doing it are two different things.
And I was warned about it. In a book I once read about reading existentialism, in the section on phenomenology, it was explicitly pointed out to me that part of the process was a loss of faith in reality. And why wouldn’t that be since, as phenomenology points out, for every external event (noema) there is a corresponding internal event (event). Whether there is a real world out there or not, for us still happens in our minds and brains.
The upswing though, is that the vertigo of the possible stands up against Freud’s wish fulfillment when it comes to dreams. Regardless of where we find ourselves in dream (robbing a bank, killing someone we love, or sitting naked in a bathtub with our mothers) there is no longer any reason to assume that it we have some deep desire to do so. With the vertigo of the possible, all it becomes is the brain’s perfectly natural tendency to know all the options embedded on it -a kind of inventory.
In a sense, this makes sense of the literature I have been reading on Deleuze in that the Oedipus Complex may not be so much a matter of the natural productions of the brain and mind as a product of society being imposed on the mind and brain.
My study of Deleuze has been a kind of confession in that it has revealed that my love of philosophy has come out of seeing it as a stand in for the psychedelic experience.
I love seeing what the mind can do: art, poetry, philosophy, science, mathematics, acid, or mushrooms (mechanics:
It all can justify a point A to point B.
If I get Deleuze right, philosophy is the study of the mechanics of reality:
as we experience it.
Deleuze makes philosophy rock-n-roll.
All French philosophers are rockstars. You have to have a sense of poetry and life-is-goodness to appreciate them.
I drive to the molecular:
which lies below the molar terms of liberal and conservative.
I drive to the chaos from which we extract our personal sense of identity.
I drive to that which is beyond the language we might use to describe it.
I drive to the pure chaos
which becomes
everything
we r.
That fucking Frenchman, anyway.
Are you typing this as you are driving?
In a figurative sense, yes.
I tend to live and embrace D&G’s mandate to the nomad:
Always keep moving, even while standing still.
In Deleuze’s Negotiations, he makes a distinction between 2 ways of approaching a book. The first one involves approaching it like a box that holds a meaning in it, a meaning that one must merely open the box to get to. The second involves approaching it like a machine or system (I believe the 2 terms in this case are interchangeable (interacting with a universe of other machines interacting with and encompassing and folding into other machines: systems interacting with other systems either in isolation from each other as two distinct intensities or sub or supra systems. We see as much in the point made in The Anti-Oedipus:
That book does not mirror the world as much as form a rhizome with it.
And this is clearly the approach that Deleuze prefers for his writings and the reason his process gravitated towards free indirect discourse, or what Barthes referred to as writerly text: that which is created for the pure purpose of creating an event from which the reader can extract their own meaning –like a dream or a work of abstract art. And it is the primary argument against those who would dismiss postmodern thought as esoteric and elitist obscurantism.
And think about how it applies to what we do here: the d63 machine, through the language sub-machine, interacting with the Stuart and Obe machines under the supra-machine of our common ground equally interacting with the Ucci machine, and always under the watchful eye of the moderator machine which interacts with the protocol sub-machine that, in turn, interacts with the theoretical proper discourse sub-machine, all of it working under the supra-machine of the message board that, in turn, works under the supra-machine of the general discourse that, in turn, is sub-machine to the reality machine.
And given this Brownian universe of ontological and epistemological swirl, how seriously can we take our attempts at territorializing it into concepts that we can use like tools to fix it? It’s just too big and too far beyond us. Nor does it, in its indifference, do anything to justify the paranoid/fascist position of exerting and wasting our will to power on controlling it. If anything, it directs our will to power to what our mind machine is best equipped to do: interact. And interaction, in a sense, implies Play. It, of course, can imply control. But given our situation, that seems like a doomed project. So why not turn to Play? The history of atrocities has been that of those who didn’t know how, who failed to see themselves as one kind of machine interacting with a universe of other machines and who could not settle for the play of interacting with it but chose, rather, to secure it within the territorialization of the fascist machine that turned to paranoia when anything threatened it.
Unfortunately, desire is desire (the desiring machine) and goes where it goes: in far too many directions. Is it any wonder that the fascist/paranoid seeks to contain it?
But, at the same time, doesn’t this make it seem like the only real place that philosophy can truly happen is in the Sandbox?
Once again: I refuse to be taken seriously.
Pandora’s box?
Honestly, Heland, if the full measure of your intellectual process is heckling me, knock yourself out, brother.
The more I say it, the more pride I take in doing so:
I refuse to be taken seriously.
All I do, or care to, is let the words of a book (or any text in the postmodern sense) flow through me, see what sticks, and,if for nothing else, see what words flow out in return. And I could easily spend and justify the rest of my life doing so. I accept my place as a mind machine interacting (directly or indirectly) with all other machines that constitute my universe.
There are those, of course, who will penalize me for turning philosophy into some kind of joke. But, first of all, I refuse to think of myself as a philosopher. I haven’t time for the reading list. I’m more of a writer who happens to enjoy what philosophy offers. If anything, I have turned intellectual and creative curiosity into a joke. But isn’t that exactly what it all is (intellect, creativity, writing, and philosophy): a joke? Little more than a pastime with some perhaps serious consequences? A language game in terms of the general discourse machine? Perhaps the indignant should turn to truly serious (in other words: functional) pursuits such as science, engineering, business, or medicine –or even computers. There would be a far greater material reward in it. Even a dedicated janitor does better in that sense.
And who hasn’t laughed at a good joke?
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Forgive me, the temptation to parody Deleuze’s writing style is just too overwhelming.
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I think one of the main things that draws me to French thought is its tendency to look at philosophy more like an abstract form of literature. It’s as much about the writing as it is getting a point across. You tend to see this most when you compare it to American philosophy which focuses more on clear and logical exposition. And you have to wonder if this isn’t a result of a hierarchical tendency in American philosophy closely connected to its unquestioning embrace of Capitalism. As compared to the writerly approach of French philosophy, American philosophy tends towards the readerly approach of imposing meaning on the reader.
Still, I find myself as drawn to the American form of exposition as I do French concepts. I even miss it throughout my present study. It just seems more user friendly and less alienating in its tendency to offer up more you can use because it seems more relevant.
And it is this conflict of interest, and impulse (or “crisis” as Deleuze ascribes to Foucault), that may define my process and get me beyond the next creative hymen. Perhaps it is a matter of finding the right hybrid that satisfies the American propensity towards clarity of exposition while staying loyal to the French propensity towards depth, intensity, and lightness of touch –that is without dominating the discourse.
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John Lithgow, in an interview, once brought up a concept attached to ballet that translated as literally lifting one’s self into thin air. It was a French word that one can easily associate with pirouettes and has a subtle application to all other intellectual and creative endeavors.
I mean doesn’t the pirouette seem to be a matter of building up an energy and momentum that can take one, seemingly, beyond physical law? And can’t we see as much in witchcraft?
And given that, how can we see creativity as anything less than a form of witchcraft: that which takes natural elements and creates a whole that is more than the sum of its parts?
All you have to do is make reality a little more beautiful than it would be without you.
Eh what? 
“How does a human interpret itself and the world it perceives? Relative to its drives.
How many different drives does a person bear?
How compatible with one another are a person’s drives?
What are the relative strengths of a person’s drives?
How thoroughly have a person’s drives been synthesized with one another?”
I may or may not be staying on topic here. But I’ll give it a shot anyway:
First of all, we have to look at drives as expressions of the Will to Power which is not just attributed to human will, but all aspects of the universe. The law of thermodynamics, for instance, states that a concentration of energy in one area (Ex. heat units or BTUs), if unobstructed, will tend to flow to areas of lesser concentration until equilibrium is achieved. It is this very dynamic that makes electricity work since it is always working its way to ground. In that sense, we can pretty much think of all electronic components as little more than a very complex form of waterwheels.
And we see as much in human desire which is a molar effect of the molecular multiplicity of drives that underlie it. In this sense, we could see the self, as we experience it, as a non-linear feedback loop between the physical brain and its environment which is the result of drives which, being the attributes of the physical brain, are expressions of the Will to Power that, in turn, are subject to the law of thermodynamics. In other words, the relationship between our individual multiplicity of drives and our environment is what creates us as experiencing and conscious individuals.
Consequently, our relationship with our environment, via our drives (or individual expressions of the Will to Power) gets some shine from a distinction made by Gilles Deleuze in his book on Spinoza. First of all, we need to recognize that all encounters between our drives and the objects of their environment (which includes the objects of the individual’s mind) are ultimately power relationships that can come in one of two forms: the sadness of not having the power to affect or the joy of having that power. Now remember, the individual is always a multiplicity of drives interacting with the objects of their given environment. Hence: the complexity of our experiences as molar selves.
This kind of plays into Lacan’s point concerning Jouissance –which is a French term for sexual ecstasy or what Zizek refers to as the unbearable. According to Lacan, what we experience during sex is pleasure at a conscious level, while at a subconscious one, we experience discomfort. His argument is that if you cut a man off right at climax, he experiences extreme discomfort. We call it “blue-balls” in America. But it goes deeper than that. If you think about it, sex is a process of working your way to a thresh-hold that will take you out of a room that you’re really enjoying at the time. You’re pulling in 2 directions. And this experience may well be a result of the molecular multiplicity of drives in all these individual power relationships with the objects of their environments. I mean have you ever heard a song that gave you so much pleasure it made you want to fold into yourself? And wouldn’t this be the result of a complex interaction between the multiplicity of sad and joyful affects (the varied power relationships) that constitute the molar self?
To give you a full sense of how Jouissance works:
There was scene in one of the Hell-raiser series in which an individual was walking through Hell. In one chamber, there was a couple that were condemned to fucking with no hope of sexual release.
Now imagine the Hell it would be to do that for eternity.