Miguel de Beistegui

Immanence : Deleuze and philosophy

mmanence - Deleuze and Philosophy identifies the original impetus and the driving force behind Deleuzes philosophy as a whole and the many concepts it creates. It seeks to extract the inner consistency of Deleuzes thought by returning to its source or to what, following Deleuzes own vocabulary, it calls the event of that thought. The source of Deleuzian thought, the book argues, is immanence. In five chapters dealing with the status of thought itself, ontology, logic, ethics, and aesthetics, Miguel de Beistegui reveals the manner in which immanence is realised in each and every one of those classical domains of philosophy. Ultimately, he argues, immanence turns out to be an infinite task, and transcendence the opposition with which philosophy will always need to reckon.

Science and Ontology

If philosophy today must, as I believe it does, posit itself as ontology again, it cannot do so without engaging in a close confrontation with the natural sciences. Why? First of all, becausemany of the questions and issues that traditionally fell under the authority of philosophy, and which helped clarify the fundamental meaning of that which is, now fall under that of science. More importantly, though, and as a result of the evolution of science itself, because such questions and issues have been radically transformed in the hands of science, especially in the last hundred years. Does this mean that, henceforth, philosophy must become philosophy of science, and let its own problems and methods be determined by those of science? Not at all. In the light of the event of science, philosophy must avoid a twofold trap: namely that of philosophising without taking into account the challenge of science for thought; and that of subordinating philosophical thought to scientific procedures and ‘‘facts.’’ In other words, it can be a question of neither blissfully ignoring such a challenge, nor turning it into the sole measure of thought and an unquestionable paradigm. The task, rather, consists in setting a new ambition for philosophical thought against the background of the event of contemporary science. It is a question, in short, of allowing thought to advance in and through a genuine dialogue with science. This ambition was already formulated by worthy predecessors, especially in France. This is perhaps no coincidence, as many French philosophers of the last century inherited a double tradition, which they treated with equal respect: the history of metaphysics and of metaphysical problems on the one hand, and the scientific rationalism and the philosophy of science of the last two centuries on the other. In what follows, I would like to isolate just two such philosophers, in order to show how they have helped to forge the terms of an encounter with science against the backdrop of a philosophical commitment to ontology. They are Merleau-Ponty and Simondon. Simondon was Merleau-Ponty’s doctoral student. Simondon’s monumental doctoral thesis, however, does not reveal any traces of influence on the part of Merleau-Ponty. And Merleau-Ponty’s comments on Simondon amount to virtually nothing. Does this mean that the two approaches are incompatible? Such would seem to be the case: where Merleau-Ponty insists that philosophical questioning be rooted in perception, and finds his impetus as well as his method in Husserlian phenomenology, Simondon says very little about perception, and simply ignores phenomenology. Yet a closer look at miguel de beistegui

Questioning Politics, or Beyond Power

The axiom at the heart of this article stipulates that everything that can be extracted from Heideggers thought by way of political contribution can be so extracted only from a position that is itself essentially non-political. This means that everything Heidegger says about politics, or that can be seen to resonate with our political situation, is articulated from a position or a space that is itself not political, a space that, furthermore, defines and decides the essence of politics. His contribution, then, is not to the political debate as such. Rather, it consists in asking whether what is historically at stake in politics and played out in political terms is itself political, and so a matter for political thought, or whether the questions and concepts of political thought are themselves shaped in response to a phenomenon, possibly an event, which it, as political thought, cannot interrogate, or even intimate. Following Heidegger, I envisage our political situation from a non-political perspective, ...The axiom at the heart of this article stipulates that everything that can be extracted from Heideggers thought by way of political contribution can be so extracted only from a position that is itself essentially non-political. This means that everything Heidegger says about politics, or that can be seen to resonate with our political situation, is articulated from a position or a space that is itself not political, a space that, furthermore, defines and decides the essence of politics. His contribution, then, is not to the political debate as such. Rather, it consists in asking whether what is historically at stake in politics and played out in political terms is itself political, and so a matter for political thought, or whether the questions and concepts of political thought are themselves shaped in response to a phenomenon, possibly an event, which it, as political thought, cannot interrogate, or even intimate. Following Heidegger, I envisage our political situation from a non-political perspective, and provide the measure for an evaluation of contemporary politics as an ontohistorical phenomenon. This, I do by following a lead Heidegger develops in the 1930s and 1940s, and by focusing on the concept of Macht, the translation of which will turn out to raise key philosophical issues. Despite its obvious political connotations and overtones, this concept will turn out to designate a phenomenon that is not so much political, as it is metaphysical: it is metaphysics itself, and metaphysics in its entirety, that is of power. This means that all metaphysics is metaphysics of power, and that power itself is through and through metaphysical. Politics, especially modern politics, turns out to be an effect of Macht understood as a metaphysical phenomenon. Having revealed the structure of power, its logic, imperatives and different regimes, I consider briefly the possibility of a politics that would not be governed by such a principle of power, the possibility of what I would call a politics of powerlessness, or a politics of the otherwise than power (Ohnmacht). Could that be ‘politics’ in the highest and ownmost sense? Could ‘Europe’ stand for such radical politics?

The Place of Place in Heidegger’s Topology

Jeff Malpas’ Heidegger’s Topology is a book about place, and about the place we ought to attribute to place. It is also, and above all, a book about the place we ought to attribute to place in the thought of Martin Heidegger. Written with passion and clarity, and informed by a deep knowledge of Heidegger’s texts, it is a book that should be read and discussed not only by Heideggerians, but also, and perhaps above all, by those who wonder about the difference between place and space, or between ontological locality and physical location. As Malpas emphasizes, by raising the question of being from the point of view of its meaning, then of its truth, and, finally, of its topos , Heidegger’s work provides great, indeed unsurpassable, resources for those wishing philosophically to think through the nature of place:

The government of desire : a genealogy of the liberal subject

Liberalism, Miguel de Beistegui argues in The Government of Desire, is best described as a technique of government directed towards the self, with desire as its central mechanism. Whether as economic interest, sexual drive, or the basic longing for recognition, desire is accepted as a core component of our modern self-identities, and something we ought to cultivate. But this has not been true in all times and all places. For centuries, as far back as late antiquity and early Christianity, philosophers believed that desire was an impulse that needed to be suppressed in order for the good life, whether personal or collective, ethical or political, to flourish. Though we now take it for granted, desire as a constitutive dimension of human nature and a positive force required a radical transformation, which coincided with the emergence of liberalism.

The Government of Desire: A Genealogical Perspective

Desire is everywhere – everywhere recognized, displayed, discussed, and drawn upon. It is so much part of our lives, so deeply entrenched in our bodies and minds – so “hard-wired” into our brains, some would say – that we cannot imagine a life without it, indeed cannot imagine what it could mean to live without experiencing its force and appeal, but also the conflicts and struggles it gives rise to. The Law of Desire, Almodóvar would say, is one by which we live. It seems to play a crucial part in understanding who we are, our sense of self, and our relations to others. Its ubiquity, we claim, is a sign of its rootedness in human nature. We readily admit that it is a force we need to reckon with, and governs us, often beyond our own will, but we do not question that we are creatures – and not just subjects – of desire. What, in that context, are we to make of the somewhat elliptical and puzzling remark that Michel Foucault made in the course of a discussion at The University of Berkeley in 1983, according to which western civilization is the civilization of desire? We might find this suggestion needlessly provocative. To the extent, as we tend to believe, that desire is a constitutive feature of human nature, aren’t all civilizations by definition civilizations of desire? Isn’t desire so bound up with who we are that the very suggestion that civilization itself – any civilization – not be its expression, that is, not recognize it, integrate it, organize it, in short, deal with it in some way, can only come across as fanciful? Yet I want to take my point of departure in that provocation and consider seriously the possibility that our culture of desire has an origin and a history, and a very western history at that. Following Foucault, and extending his thought where necessary, I want to take seriously his suggestion that desire, or, better said perhaps, the problem of desire, emerged at a particular time and under specific historical circumstances; that it had a particular and far-reaching history; that it defines who we are today in ways that we aren’t always aware of, and aren’t inevitable. In what follows, I will attempt to define the limits or contours of the various configurations or “regimes” of desire under which we live, trace their emergence, and measure their consequences. However, despite my wish – one could say my fantasy – to imagine a philosophical history of desire from Greek and Roman Antiquity to the present day, I will limit myself to exploring the roots and sketching the dominant features of the contemporary face of desire. The general question that, in my view, triggers Foucault’s interest in desire is the question that he claims to have been concerned with throughout his life, namely: who are we?Desire is everywhere – everywhere recognised, displayed, discussed, and drawn upon. It is so much part of our lives, so deeply entrenched in our bodies and minds – so “hard-wired” into our brains, some would say – that we cannot imagine a life without it, indeed cannot imagine what it could mean to live without experiencing its force and appeal, but also the conflicts and struggles it gives rise to. The Law of Desire, Almodovar would say, is one by which we live. It seems to play a crucial part in understanding who we are, our sense of self, and our relations to others. Its ubiquity, we claim, is a sign of its rootedness in human nature. We readily admit that it is a force we need to reckon with, and governs us, often beyond our own will, but we do not question that we are creatures – and not just subjects – of desire.