jon roffe-badiou_s deleuze-mcgill queens univ pr (2012)

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© Jon Roe, 2012

ISBN 978-0-7735-40071 (cloth)

ISB 978-0-7735-40088 (paper)

Legal deposit rst quarter 2012

Bibliothque nationale du Qubec

his book is copyright under the Berne Convention.

No reproduction without permission. All rights reserved

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by Acumen Publishing Limited

McGillQueen's University Press acknowledges the nancial support of the

Government of Canada through the Canada Book Fund for its activities.

Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

Roe Jon

Badious Deleuze Jon Roe.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 978077354007 -1 (bound).--ISBN 9780773540088 (pbk.)

1. Badiou Alain. Deleuze. 2. Deleuze Gilles. 3. Philosophy

Modern20th century. Title.

B2430.D454R64 2011 194 C2011-9068648

Printed and bound in the UK by MPG Books Group.



Lhistoire es hommes est la lonue succession es snonymesun mme ocable. Y contreire est un eoi Ren Char



Abbreiations ix

l. The history o a disjunctive synhesis 1

2 Is Deleuze a philosopher o the One? 6

3 Mehod 24

4. The virual 43

5. ruth and time 80

6 Te event in Deleuze 104

7 Tought and the subject 128

8 singular palimpsest 160Notes 163Biblioraph 189Inex 195

vii



BBR

Te ollowing abbreviations are used throughout here two page numbers are listed they reer to the English and French respectively; any deviation rom the published translation will be noted by the appendage o tm'here no English translation is reerred to the translations rom the Frenchare my own. In addition reerences to Spinoza's Ethics will ollow the standard usage o indicating book proposition ollowed by any required speci

cation Likewise reerence to Kants Critique of Pure Reason ill be made tothe respective pagination o the and B editions.

ES BY DEEUZE

AntiOeipusB Bersonism

DR Derence an RepetitionDRF Deux Rimes e Fous extes et entretiens 975-95

EPS Expressionism in Philosophy SpinozaES Empiricism an Subjectiity

F FoucaultFLB e Fol Leibniz an the Baroque

KCP Kant Critical PhilosophyLS Te Loic of SenseID L le Dserte et Autres extes asochism

MI Cinema e Moement ImaN eotiations

NP etzsche an PhilosophPS Proust an SisI Cinema e ime Imae

ix



BBREVITIONS

P A ousan PlateausP at s Phlosophy?

ES BY BADIOU

x

BE Beng an EentCM e Conept of oelC Court t 'Ontologe ranstore

DCB Deleuze e Clamor of Beng

DVO O Lie as a ame o Being,Of

Deleuze's Vitalist Ontology"LM Logcs of WorlsNN Number an NumbersS eory of the Sbject

eoretcal Wrtngs



F

Over what were to be te nal years of his life, Gilles Deleuze engaged in along written correspondence with Alain Badiou Badiou, in the light of hismanum opus Ben an Eent (L' tre et lnement), published in 1988,had come to see Deleuzes philosophical project as the closest among thoseof his contemporaries to his own, and in turn saw Deleuze as his key rivalin the attempt to present a philosophy of multiplicity and immanent being

Tis correspondence, unfortunately never publ ished owing to Deleuzes dissatisfaction with its abstract tone (DB / 14), concluded at the end of 1994,shortly before the latters death In 1997, Badiou published Deleuze TeClamor of Ben (Deleuze Le clameur e l' tre), which was a nal letter toDeleuze, a summary of their epistolary disagreements and a restatement ofthe critical appraisal of Deleuzes thought rst expressed directly to Deleuzehimsel

Te Clamor of Ben is presented as a work of demystication, an attempt

to reinstate a classical image of the latters philosophy in the face of a pervasive attempt to cast him as a thinker of the heterogeneous multiplicityof desires (DB 8 /17) in place of the caricature, A faithful portrait of themaster (DB xii) Te central claim of this work is infamous that Deleuze,far from being a philosopher dedicated to propounding the fundamentalstatus of multiplicity and dierence, is rather concerned with the ultimatestatus of ontological unity Deleuzes fundamental problem is most certainlynot to liberate the multiple but to submit thinking to a renewed concept ofthe One (DB 10 /1 9) Ranging across a number of Deleuzes works - aboveall his two key monographs from the late 190s, Derence an Repettonand Te Loc of Sense - Badiou presents a surprising and, for some, shockingaccount of a philosopher who was often thought to be already understood

Badious portrait of Deleuze was (and remains) particularly confrontingfor many who considered themselves part isans of his thought he responseof Arnauld Villani, who declared that this is a false book, the falsest book

imaginable is characteristic in the place of the most beautiful movement of

1



BDIOU S DELEUE

life, [B adiou] has only proposed an abstrat eld, he only manages to strikeup a dirge" ( 1998). And, while illani himself, along with many others, s idedwith Deleuze, yet others again manned the barriades on behalf of Badioue Clamor of Ben thus beame the epientre of onlit in thought

e epistolary sequene onluded by e Clamor of Ben is rooted in anengagement with Deleuzes thought that begins muh earlier. Its rst inarnation is entirely polemial in nature, and is manifested in ore e la con-tracton, published in 1975, and two texts from 197, all of whih diretlyattak the aspet of Deleuzes philosophy that Badiou will later delare to b einessential, namely, the aount of desire and mutipliity found i n that gri

moire,AntOepus ( 1972) and the text Rhizomes" ( 197) , whih would latertake the form of the infamous rst hapter ofA ousan Plateaus (1980)ore e la contracton a thoroughly Maoist presentaion of on

tradition and the dialeti, adds saint Gilles (Deleuze), saint Flix (Guattari)" and saint JeanFran<ois (Lyotard)" to Marxs Saint ax (Stirner) ForBadiou, their philosophies, ommitted as they are to propulsive desire, evasive ux to the heterogeneous and to the ritique of all organization" andtotalitarian Marxistleninism merely repeat word for word" the kind of

laims that Marx and Engels German eolo needed to tear to piees" inorder to present a ogent revolutionary program (Badiou 1 975 1 )

The same ritial rejetion is registered in De l'eoloe a presentationof a fasinating Maoist local ommunism, written with Fran<ois Balmsand published in 197 There, after iting Deleuze and Guattaris praise ofthe Reihian theme, aording to whih fasism must not be explained byreourse to misreognition or illusion but rather in terms of what the massesin fat desired, B adiou writes:

Tis opposition between an argument on the basis of illusion"and an argument on the basis of desire" is itself argued on thebasis of a rejetion of reali The realit is that the masses , underthe general eet of the great physial" defeats of the proletariat have seen their organi apaity for resistane in no wayannulled, but rather weakened, and in a profound way

(Badiou & Balms 197 38)

Finally, Te Flux and the Party the single most substantial text dediated by Badiou to Deleuze before e Clamor of Ben osillates betweena rhetorially wideranging promotion of MarxistLeninism, a mokery ofAntOepus and what border on a homnem attaks on Deleuze himself Badious key ontention here is that the politial etaphysis of AntiOepus is eetively a renewed form of Kantian philosophy in its most

traditional sense e are presented, Badiou loudly inveighs, with nothing

2



THE HISTORY OF DISJUNCTIVE SYNTHESIS

more than the Kantian notions of freedom, the autonomous subjet and theGood one the rhetorial fog is waved o Deleuze and Guattari dont oneal this very well return to Kant , thats what they ame up with to exorisethe Hegelian ghost" (2004a 79tm) And, as in Tori la contaiction,Badiou presents this approah as entirely irreleant to ontemporary pol itial struggle, onluding by writing Look at them, these old Kantians whopretend theyre playing at sattering the trinkets of Culture Look at themthe time is nigh, and theyre already overed in dust" (ibi.: 84). A text published by B adiou in the following year under the pseudonym Georges Peyrol,unfortunately entitled e Fasism of the Potato" puts the point even more

bluntly Deleuze and Guattari are protofasist ideologues" (Badiou [Peyrol]1977 51) .ile the initial overt moments ofthis debate - Badiou notes that related

sentiments were expressed verbally around this period (DCB 2/89)revolved around politis and polemi, the next disussion takes the form ofa onsidered philosophial ritique, found in the 1 982 or of th Subjct.

Badiou laims here that Deleuze adopts one of the two theses harateristi of materialism (there is only matter the thesis of the One) at the

expense of the other ( matter is primary in relat ion to thought the thesis ofthe wo) Moreover, antiipating the entral line of argument of Clamorof Bing Badiou argues that thi s ommitment neessarily involves the demotion of multipliity Tere are others , like Deleuze, who posi t the Multiple,whih is never more than a semblane sine positing the multiple amountsto presupposing the One" (S 22) Interestingly, Badiou nesses this bylaiming something that Clamor of Bing and the texts that follow itwould fundamentally rejet he haraterizes Deleuzes materialism as an

ultraleftism stating that the leftist deiation adopts the perspetive oflight It is a radialism of novelty that breaks all mirrors" (S 207) .

is sequene, whih poses Deleuze as a ombatant entirely external toand distant from Badious own programme, is to a signiant degree resolvedin Badious interesting reiew of Deleuzes Fol (Badiou 1994), and in Clamor of Bing itself Tese texts, while remaining ritial, proeed onthe bas is of the reognition that he and D eleuze share a number of fundamental tenets In partiular, Badiou notes the following points as indiativeof a ommon ground of sorts

the rejetion of the idea that philosophy and metaphysis are exhaustedor have ome to their natural end; the elaboration of a philosophy of the multiple; and in partiular the importane of the onept of multipliity; the thesis of ontologial immanene; and

the armation that thought is bound up with singularity

3



BDIOU'S DELEUE

The ritique that Badiou oers , then, is made possible by the assessmentthat, in fat, he and Deleuze onstituted ... a paradoxal tandem" (DCB412 ). o be more preise, the possibility ofa mor r an xact isagrmntbeame possible for Badiou as a result of an eerging loseness betweenhis work and Deleuzes with respet to fundamental philosophial questions,an opening for a new kind of debate, one that woud ut straight to the snsi-tipoint at whih dierent oneptual reations separate" (DCB 13).

hether or not this mode o f engagement is i n fat put into play in TClamor of Bing is the subjet of the pages to follow, but what is striking i sthat the texts published on Deleuze after this tend inreasingly to emphasize

the dierenes between the two projets, rather than their loseness, and thegoal of obtaining the sensitive point of divergene is graduall replaed withan external opposition of two blos of thought. And, while the genre of thesesubsequent statements remains philosophial, so e of the rhetorial lavourof e Flux and the Part" begins to return. One, Multiple, Multipliit"( 67 -80) , Badious somewhat bewildered defene and restatement of TClamor of Bing while beginning "at th point of gratst proximity (68), depits Deleuzes philosophy as a natural mstiism" ( 80), whih

impoverishes ( 70) and metaphorizes ( 75) matheatis, and neutralizes formal thinking as suh by subordinating it to empirial sensibility.Many of the same notes are sounded in Deleuzes Vitalist Ontology a textfrom the same immediately postClamor of Bing period.

In the hapte devoted to Deleuze in Badious 2006 Logics of Worls entitled e Event in Deleuze the inreasingly disjuntive quality of the latters approah is even more evident. Badiou lais there that a quite goodaxiomati of what I all event (LM 384/406) an be arrived at by inverting

Deleuzes philosoph of the event. Most reentl of all, in the notes that losehis Pockt Panthon Badiou is to be found presenting the two respetivepositions in starkly opposing terms: Finally: Platonism and antiPlatonism"(2008b: 17 5) . is is in keeping with the laim found in Logics of Worls thathere are in et only three ruial philosophers in my eyes: Plato, Desartes and Hegel. Note that these are preisely the three that Deleuze ouldnever manage to love" (LM 527 /552) .

Thus, at the end of this lengthy engagement, the theoretial proximit whose reognition underpinned the epistolary sequene at the end oDeleuzes life, replaing the rhetorial hostility of Flux and the Party isnally disassembled, to be replaed with an unbroahable stando. enonrapport" (BE 16tm) is made omplete.

Despite these reent developments, and this potted lengthy polemi, there

is no question that Clamor of Bing is at the very entre of Badious

4



HE HISORY OF A DISJ UNCIVE SY NHESIS

engagement with Deleuze. It is not only the single longest moment of thishistory, but it unfolds in a systemati fashion that is muh less pronounedelsewhere. As Badiou's works on aesthetis and politis are to Bein anEent, so are One, Multiple, Multipliity" and Deleuze's Vitalist Ontology"to Te Clamor of Bein

he goal of this study is to arefully and ritially examine the aount ofDeleuzes philosophy presented by Badiou in this sequene. It will argue withrespet to eah signiant point made by Badiou in e Clamor of Bein thathe misunderstands and misrepresents Deleuze's philosophy. More importantly, however, it argues that Badious thesis

aording to whih eleuze

mounts and defends a metaphysis of the One, funtons not as a onlusion drawn on the basis of a areful study of the latters texts , but as an initial axiom

a lter or lens through whih the material under onsideration

is examined. It is prinipally this mode of approah that leads Badiou astrayfrom the very beginning, and the divergene between the aount in eClamor of Bein only inreases as B adiou s reading moves on to the diultterrain of Deleuz es work at the end of the 1 960s .

o this point

examinations of Badious reading of Dleuze have been

either spei to ertain onepts, insuient with respet to the breadthof their treatments of both philosophial positions, or prohibitively partisan.hat follows aims to present a fully edged reading and ritique of Badiou saount of Deleuzes philosophy, and a defene of the latters metaphysison the points of ontention. his is to say that I am not onerned to defendDeleuze s entire work

a projet whose possibility and desirability remain to

be demonstrated.I hope to show that the sensitive points at whih Deleuze and Badiou part

ways are not themselves revealed in adiou s ritique of Deleuze. e s earhfor these, a laborious endeavour given the degree and variety of misreognition at work, is a task that remains to be omprehensively undertaken,despite its signiane for a number of key debates in ontemporary thought.his book, then, is presented as a prolegomena of this more demanding andinvolved work of arhae oogy.

5



I S EE E p P ER F E

e laim that orients Badious entire reading of eleuze is infaous: Tisphilosophy is organized around a metaphysis of the One" (B 17/30) . Asphilosopher of the One, Badiou laims that eleuze has for the most partbeen remarkably suessful. e are dealing therefore not with a failed orimpossible philosophial projet, but one that eleuze has more or less suessfully exeuted on behalf of ontemporary thought. Te losing lines of

Te Clamo of Being invoke eleuze as truly a most eminent apostle" ( B102/ 1 50) of the Spinoza for who Being is radially unary in nature. If, as Ishall ome to argue, Badious argument on this point fails, then the veraityof the rest of his reading of eleuze is profoundly hallenged.

Te next few pages endeavour not themselves to argue for this onlusion, but to initiate a proedure of testing in whih Badious laims about eleuze are brought into ontat with the eleuzean text As we proeed,an inreasingly rih piture of eleuze will allow us to make a progres

sively more rened set of determinations about both Badious eleuze and eleuzes thought itself.

PORRAI OF DEEUZE AS A NEOPOINIAN

e argumentative hain by whih Badiou asserts this fundamental laimof his reading of eleuze is founded upon what the former desribes as akind of preontologial move or deision on eleuzes part, and is elaborated aording to what Badiou haraterizes as the two abstrat theses inwhih this priniple is unfolded" ( B 24/39).

Badiou begins the rst hapter of Te Clamor of Being by noting a laimthat eleuze makes throughout his work, from his artiles on B ergson in the1950s onward: that the One-Many dyad is insuient for thinking eitherdierene or being However, Badiou laims that eleuzes renuniation of

this dyad is not radial, and that, rather than moving to another onept

6



IS DELEUE PHIOSOPHER OF THE ONE

to replae it, Deleuze in fat deploys the dyad hierarhially, asserting thesuperveniene of the One over the Many. He writes that, as always withDeleuze, going beyond a stati (quantitative) opposition always turns outto involve the qualitatie raising up of one of its terms (DB 10/ 19 ). us,in ontrast to his reeption as one of the bearded militants of 1968" (D B12/22), a serious and philosophial reading of Deleuze reveals that it is theOne rather than the many that is raised to the superior position .

On the basis of this deision in thought, Badiou laims, we an identifyin Deleuzes philosophy two orrelative theses. e rst of these onernsthe superior side of the dyad, the One. Aording to Badiou, Deleuze does

not think that Being is One in either a numerial sense (thought has alreadyabdiated if it supposes that there is a single and same Being" [DB 24/39 ] )or as a quasimystial tautologial thought (the One is the One" [DB24/39] ) . Rather, the ipseity of Being is formulated through the laim that theunity of Being is not broken by the existene of multiple forms of B eing"(DB 24/39). e philosopher that Badiou evokes in ompanionship withDeleuze at this point is Spinoza: this is true of Spinozas Substane, whih isimmediately expressed by an innity of attributes" (DB 25/40). us Badi

ous rst thesis is that, for Deleuze, the multiple aeptations of being mustbe understood as a formal multiple, while the One alone is real (DB 25/40,emphasis added). Not numerial, logially tautologial or formal, the unityof being is fundamentally substantial or quidditative.

The assertion of the merely formal nature of the multiple is Badiousseond thesis. Badiou writes that In eah form of Being, there are to befound individuating dierenes that may well be named beings ... beingsare loal degrees of intensity or inletions of power that are in onstant

movement and entirely singular" (DB 25/40).Badiou indeed goes on to strengthen this laim: given that there is, den

itively, only the OneAll" ( DB 25/40) , the ontologial status of the multipleis eetively nothin in itse Badiou notes, in terms that will be brought intoquestion later:

[ ]he prie one must pay for inlexibly maintaining the thesis ofunivoity is lear : given that the multiple (of be ings, of signia

tions) is arrayed in the universe by way of a numerial dierenethat is purely formal as regards the forms of being to whih it refers(thought, extension, time, et.) and purely modal as regards itsindividuation, it follows that , ultimately, the multiple an only be ofthe order of simulara. And if one lasses - as one should - everydierene without a real status, every multipliity whose ontologial status is that of the One , as a simularum, then the world of

beings is the theater of the simulara of Being. (DB 26/41)

7



BADIOU'S DELEUZE

In short given that Being falls on the side of the One the multiple (orbeings) have no being of their own: the are ghosts epiphenomena ForBadiou Deleuzes philosoph relentlessl plunges the apparent realit ofbeings into the more fundamental realm of the OneAll and as a result theformer appear essentiall and inreasingl irreal indetermined and nallnonobjetive" (DCB 53/8 1 )

N ow this haraterization bears the greatest similarit to a n ontologialposition rst found in the Neoplatonists and whih is identied b Deleuzeas the emanatie shema Emanative ontologies assert preisel these otheses aording to whih the apparent rihness of the material world is but

a seondar and inessential manifestation of a superior realit is essentiall Plotinian - view is quite legible in Badious aount of Deleuze Theprevious passage nishes with the following thought:

Strangel this onsequene as a Platoni or even Neoplatoni air to it It is as though the paradoxial or supereminent Oneimmanentl engenders a proession of beings whose univoalsense it distr ibutes while the refer to i ts power and have onl a

semblane of being (DCB 26/41-2 )

The rst pages of Number an Numbers also attest to this partiular foof onnetion between the One and the Multiple from Badious point ofview:

The G reek thinkers of number related it bak to the One whihas we an still see in Eulids Elements, was onsidered not to

be a number From the supranumeri being of the One unitis derived And a number is a olletion of units an additionUnderling this oneption is a problemati that strethes fromthe Eleatis through to the Neoplatonists: that of a proession ofthe Multiple from the One (NN 7)

In keeping with this view the role of the philosopher i s that of the seerin the literal sense of the word: the one who sees through the ephemera ofapparent realit to the profunus of the One

A PHIOSOPHER O F HE ONE?

In order to onsider the strength of Badious presentation of the OneMan relation in Deleuze it is not enough to simpl ite the man passages

in Deleuzes work that would seem to depart from it a proedure that is

8



IS DEEUZE PHIOSOPHER OF THE ONE?

neessary but not suient hat is required is the examination of the consequences of this entral laim as it is unfolded alongside Deleuze's philosophy It is by measuring the gap between these trajetories that the delityof Badiou's reading will be revealed As I noted above these onsequenesare elaborated throughout the entire ourse of Badiou's engagement withDeleuze A nal judgement must be withheld until all the key issues havebeen examined Here I shall seek in an introdutory mode to examine ertain spei texts found throughout Deleuze's philosophy that depart fromthis opening sketh of Badiou's reading Eah presents more or less starkly aphilosophial investment that deviates from the presentation of Deleuze as

a philosopher of the One : the theme of substantie multipliity the dotrineof univoity simulara and the theme of rowned anarhy and the theme ofexpression Tis opening examination must not be oneived as an outrightrejetion but seeks rather to introdue n ne a dissonane into the refrainof the One

FROM ONE-MANY TO SUBSANIVE MULIPICIY

Te rst remark to be made here onerns in a diret fashion the allegedprimay of the One: ontrary to Badiou's assertion Deleuze's rejetion ofthe One-Many spost never followed by the qualtate raising up ofone of its terms' In fat this ritial rejetion is always (DB 9/19) followed by a very dierent move: the replaement of the entire dyad with anew onept that of substantive multipliity irreduibly plural in natureIn Badiou's aount of Deleuze's ontology the word multplct only ever

appears in plaes where it is learly interhangeable with the word multiple (eg DB 26/41), whih erases at the level of terminology a deisiveDeleuzean theme

It is all the more peuliar that Badiou does not reognize the perennialnature of this move of Deleuze's beause he time and again asserts that thefundamental onlit between his thought and that of Deleuze onerns thestatus of multipliities (e g D B 47-8/71 -2). And in Deleuze's philosophythe theme of multipliity is eerwhere premse b a crtque not of the relate subornaton of the One to the Man but b rejectng ths a outrghthile many examples might be alled on I shall present only two: the rstis from Bergsonsm the text in whih Deleuze rst introdues his interestin the onept of multipliity the seond is an example that Badiou himselfintrodues in disussing this topi found in Deleuze's later work Foucault.Tese texts published twenty years apart show no divergene at all in theirharaterization of multipliity something that annot be said for many of

Deleuze's other onepts as we shall see in what follows

9



BDIOU S DELEUZE

hile the seond hapter of Beroism egins by situating itself in relatioin to the psyhopersonal theory of duration elaborated by Bergson earlyin his work it is in fat largely dediated to elaboraing Bergson's theory ofmultipliity itself drawn from G. B R Reimann Deleuze who puts greatstore on this theme in his reading of Bergson writes :

oo little importane has been attahed to the use of this wordmultipliity' It is not a part of the traditional voabulary at all The word multipliity" i s not there as a vague noun orresponding to the wellknown philosophial notion of the Multiple in

general (B 38-9)

Later in the same hapter he adds:

A very important aspet of the notion of multipliity is the wayin whih it is distinguished from a theory of the One and theMultiple The notion of multipliity saves us from thinking interms of One and Multiple' (B 44)

In fat it is the ategory of multipliity whih enables us toondemn the mystiation of a thought that operates in terms ofthe On e and the Multiple (B 47)

Despite the fat that this aount of multipliity is embedded in a disussionof Bergsonian ure in Foucault we nd similar points in an entirely dierent(if not antithetial) ontext Speaking of Fouault's onept of the statemen

(oc) as i t is found in e Archaeoloy of Kowlee Deleuze laims:

10

They are multipliities It was Riemann in the eld of physisand mathematis who dreamt up the notion of multipliity"and dierent kinds of multipliities The philosophial importane of this notion then appeared in Husserls Formal arasceetal Loic, and in Bergson's ime a Free Will Butthe notion died out in these two areas either beause it beameobsured by a newly restored simple dualism arising from a distintion made between genres or beause it tended to assumethe status of an axiomati system onetheless the ore of thenotion is the onstitution of a substantive in whih multiple"eased to be a prediate opposed to the One Multipliityremains ompletely indierent to the traditional problems of themultiple and the one ere is either oe or multiple.

(F 13 -14tm ephasis added)




In both cases, two points are evident: on the one hand, in no way doesDeleuze proceed from a rejection or critique of the One-Many dyad to anassertion of the qualitative supersession of the One In fact, to the contrary,Deleuze in both cases claims that the One-Many dyad as such must be surpassed by a new or renovated concept of substantive ultiplicity hat isalso remarkable about these passages is how keenly they address themselvesto Badious presentation of Deleuze as a thinker of the One It seems implausible to maintain this claim of Deleuze in the face of his direct rejections ofthe alternatives and misunderstandings that the concept has been subjectto It is, of course, possible that Deleuzes theory of multiplicity may in itself

be insucient This point, though, in no way should distract us from therepetition sometimes almost a nauseam - by Deleuze of the claim thatmultiplicity overthrows the entirety of the One-Many dyad for Deleuze, apoint that e Clamor of Bein never registers

HE UNIVOCIY OF BEING

Despite the concept of univocity being one of the more wellknown tropesin Deleuzes philosophy, its sense and specic role are not grasped as well asthey might be Te following passage, which contains the subtitle of BadiousDeleuze, is exemplary:

ere has only ever been one ontological proposition: Being isunivocal There has only ever been one ontology, that of DunsScotus, which gave being a single voice e say Duns Scotus

because he was the one who elevated univocal being to the highest point of subtlety, albeit at the price of abstraction However,from Parenides to Heidegger it is the same voice which is takenup, in an echo which itself forms the whole deployment of theunivocal A single voice raises the c amor of being (DR 35/52)

e can begin our explication of the meaning of univocity for Deleuzeby noting this surprising reference to Scotus In a series of pieces, Nathandder (2001; 2002: ch 5; 2008: 27-43) demonstrates four fundamental aspects of Scotist univocity that ust be kept in mind when readingDeleuzes treatment of the concept, found for the most part in importantmoments of both Derence an Repetition and e Loic of Sense.

First, the concept originates with and nds its preier champion in (asa part of the pantheon of gures that Deleuze discusses ) the work of Scotushimself ile in Derence an Repetition Deleuze also lists Spinoza and

Nietzsche as thinkers of univocal being , neither of these philosophers speak

1 1



IOU'S ELEUZE

of univoity as suh. Seond, the ke resoure for Sotus is the philosophy ofAristotle in fat, for Sotus, it is Aristotle who is the rst thinker of univoit Te sense of the famous Aristotelian ditum aording to whih Beingis not a genus' on Sotus's aount, is that the various genres or primarysenses in whih being is said ( substane, mo dalit, time, e t. ) are said equallyHe writes it is lear that being' has a prima of ommonness in regard tothe primar intelligibles, that is, to the quidditative onepts of the genera,speies , individuals, and all their essential parts , and to the Unreated Being"(1 987 4)

This leads us in turn to the third point hile ever being is equal in this

quidditative sense, partcular beings annot be thought exlusively aording to or from the point of view of univoal being For Sotus, somethingexeeds univoit, namel, partiular beings, or what he alls haeccetesTus ontology and individuation ome to be treated separatel for essential reasons . In other words, it is onl realit qua being that is univoal theexamination of the realit of partiular haeeities exeeds this onsideration, is unintelligible to human reason, thus falling beond the ambit ofarmation. It is for this reason that Deleuze desribes Sotus's thought

of univoit as neutral in nature (DR 39/57), merel asserting as it does aommon Being in general while being unable to arm the univoal statusof beings as suh

Finall, Deleuze's aount of univoit on his own terms denitivelbreaks with the Sotist position, and in two respets (both of them related toSotus's Aristotelian heritage) At the level of greatest generalit, he rejetsthe use of ategories in thinking being in so far as the multiply the senses ofbeing Tus for Deleuze, Aristotle's aount onl manages a quasi univoity,

deployed aross the ategories, whih is to sa that the univoit Sotusnds in Aristotle is there subordinate to an ontologial equivoation thatrelativizes its sope On the other hand, Deleuze wants to extend univoit to singular individuals, whih Sotus's aount of univoity rules out Inpartiular, the ultimate goal for D eleuzean univoity is the armation of theunivoal being for preisely haeeities as suh, the anomalous, diereneinitself Te lous of Deleuzean univoit is thus an inversion of Sotus'srather than providing an ontolog apable of inluding be ings of the greatestextrinsi dierene in the sae quidditative sense of being, it is the rights ofsuboneptual dierenes that are at issue

As these points already make apparent, it seems that Deleuze's use of univoit - and partiularl his deviation from the Aristotelianism of Sotus is a poor t for Badiou's reading Te fourth point is partiularl instrutive,for Badiou laims in passing that it is Duns Sotus who is perhaps the mostradial" (D B 24/39) thinker of univoit for Deleuze, a laim expliitly on

tradited b the Deleuzean text, as we shall see

12



DELEUZE PHLOOPHER OF THE ONE?

o reapitulate Badious aount of univoity in Deleuze is presentedas two omplementary theses. hen we examine Deleuzes own orulatio of the theme we nd the same form but a ontent that deviates fromBadious presentation. The rst of these propositions we have already seen:being is said in a single manner. Tere is in no way a division within Beingor plurality of ontologial senses" (DR 303/387) e have also seen how thisorresponds to the posit of the One prior to all beings on Badious aount.Deleuzes seond thesis though is provoked by the reognition that this rstlaim leaves itself open to a ertain potential misinterpretation: It is true thatsuh a point of view is not suient to prevent us from onsidering thesesenses [of being] as analogues and this unity of being as an analogy" (DR35/52) e an add in light of Badious reading that Deleuzes rst thesis isnot suient to prevent us from onsidering the unity of being in questionas the substantive reality from whih all other be ings proeed as simularaor emanations . Tis is beause the rst thesis says nothing about the mannerin whih this univoity relates to beings as suh: that is to say several possibilities exist for resolving this question. Beings may be expressed analogially (Aristotle Augustine Aquinas) nonanalogially but still equivoally

(Desartes Leibniz) emanatively (Plotinus Prolus Maimonides) or univoally. Tus Deleuze adds the following ruial thesi s whih is repeated as aorretive to the rst at a number of plaes in both Derence and Repetitionand Te Logc of Sense:

In eet the essential in univoity is not that Being is said in asingle and sae sense but that it is said in a sinle and samesense of all its individuating derences or intrinsic modalities

Being is the same for all these modalities but these modalitiesare not the same. It is equal" for all but they themselves are notequal. It is said of all in a s ingle sense but they themselves do nothave the same sense . Te essene of univoal being is to inludeindividuating dierenes while these dierenes do not have thesame essene and do not hange the essene of being . . it is saidof dierene itself. (DR 36/53, emphasis added)

hile for Deleuze what is deisive in this formulation is that what is univoally expressed is dierene (keeping in mind one of the harges ofDerence and Repetition ), for us here it is the fat that what is armed by univoalbeing is not itself as One but beings in themselves. Tis seond thesis is supplemented by the laims of Te Logc of Sense: it is not just beings but alsoevents and sense that are said in the same way. Tere is no division in Beingbetween beings the sense whih are their attributes or the events whihinhere in hanges in states of aairs (LS 18021 1 ) .

13



BDIOU S DEEUZE

hat, then, ultimately does the uni of univoit refer us to, if not asubstantive unit as Badiou would have it? Finally it omes to this univoity signies the unity of the manner in which bein are expresse ere isno Substane behind beings, a point that will be rearmed when we laterexamine Deleuzes theory of time. Beings all express being in the same way,although the themselves arise on the basis of, and ultimately onstitute,irreduible dierenes.

In this respet, it is interesting to note that in his review of e Fol,Badiou asserts of Deleuzes ontology that it is, like Leibnizs, a mannerism.This text, published several ears before e Clamor of Bein, diers from

the latter on the topi of univoity, tuhing something essential in Deleuze sprojet. Indeed, mannerism is a ne term to desribe Deleuzes ontology.The two theses of univoit in Deleuze an be rephrased aordingly beingsare all expressed in the same manner, even though they dier from eahother and, more fundamentally, are syntheti produts of dierene initsel.

In sum then, and ontrar to Badious reading, Deleuzes ontolog seemsto have no plae for B eing as suh, Being as the supreme Ens, radiant in itssplendid isolation. Substantive unity is here ompletely dissolved in favour

of a modali or a manner ofbeing. o use the Bergsonianinleted terminology found in the onlusion of Derence an Repetition, the ground ofbeings, when followed around the bend beyond whih experiene an nolonger grasp it, ompletely dissolves in both form and ontent, beomingpure dierene . This is why Deleuzes disussion of univoity turns nally toa reformation of the Nietzshean theme of the eternal return, in so far as,for Deleuze, what the eternal return ategorially exludes from being is anyunity, fundamental or otherwise. Thus he writes

[E ] ternal return is the univoit of being, the eetive realisationof that univoity. In the eternal return, univoal being i s not onlythought and even armed, but eetivel realised. Being is saidin a single and same sense, but this sense is that of eternal returnas the return or repetition of that of whih it is said. e wheel inthe eternal return is at one both the prodution of repetition onthe basis of dierene and the seletion of dierene on the bas isof repetition. (DR 41-2/60-61)

In other words, the manner in whih being is unied exludes in priniple an settling out of identity, uniity or the One. Indeed, the eternal returninvolves the inverse of a entrifugal movement instead of everthing solidonsolidating itself at the foundation, it is ast out in favour of what is fortuitous or dierent. Antiipating disussions to follow in later hapters, for

Deleuze, univoity only sueeds in so far as beings rest not on any xed

14



IS DUZ PHIOSOPHR OF H ON?

ground but are subject to an ultimate ungrounding. It is only when dierence itself is the object of armation that being bec es uniocal, irrevocabl unmoored from any unied oundation.

SIMUACRUM

If we turn now to Badious treatment of the second half of the OneManydyad, we know that the Man are gured - on hi account - as lackingin an being of their own They are emanations of the One, which Badiou

denes with one of Deleuzes most wellknown terms, simulacra. A beingis a s imulacrum of Being It is far from certain, however, that Deleuzes ownconcept of simulacra can be squared with Badious use of the term in hisaccount of Deleuzes ontology

Despite Deleuzes claim to JeanClet Martin that it seems to me that Ihave totally abandoned the notion of simulacra, which was never of greatimportance" (DRF 339), there is no question that this concept plaed a keyrole in both Derence an Repetition (where it is dealt with in a number

of dierent contexts) and Te Loic of Sense (where it organizes four of theve appendices at the close of that work, and is used as a term for the bodilydepths that constitute states of aairs [ see LS 187 -8/218-19] ) .

hat role does i t play there? In the rst instance, the concept o fthe simulacrum appears in Deleuze in the context of his version of the overturningof Platonism at is in question is the structure that Deleuze takes tobe at the heart of Platos philosophy, namely, the relationship between theForms, material or empirical copies of these Forms (Platos icnes) and the

perverse copies of these copies (Deleuzes Latin simulacra translates the Platonic term pantasmata) hat matters for Plato, on Deleuzes account, isthe capacit to distinguish between the rst order copies of the Forms (thejust man in accordance with the Form of Justice) on the one hand, and whatappear to be secondorder copies of copies , those semblants that dier internally from that which they appear to cop, the simulacra, on the other usthe ultimate sense of the tripartite division of model/copy/simulacrum is toscreen the claims and to distinguish the true pretender from the false one"(LS 254/293). For it is only the rst that bear the mark of the Forms withpropriety; the latter merel appear to be legitimate copies, while lacking aninterior or essential relation with the Forms at al

Deleuze draws from this the point central to his championing of the concept of simulacrum:

If we say of the simulacrum that it is a copy of a copy, an in

nitel degraded icon, and innitel loose resemblance, we then

15



BDIU'S DELEUZE

miss the essential, tht is, the dierene in nature between simularum and opy The opy is an image endowed with resemblane, the simularum is an image without r€semblane

(LS 257/297)

at lies at the heart of the Platoni eort to distinguish the good opyfrom the bad is the fat that the simulara ontains a genuine reative powerthat Deleuze will later go on to all the power of the false the apaity to integrally prouce reality without any reourse to a transendent model, ratherthan represent what are apparently the most profound elements that pre

exist in reality. This apaity (errant, ungrounded reation), the dangerousdeparture from the model/opy shema, i s, for Plato, what is most troublingand subversive about them, and preisely what Deleuze o siders to be theirprofound value for any serious ontology For the onept of the simulara,produtive and untethered, aounts for being itself Rather than guring asfallen and seondhand opies of things and Forms, The thing is the simularum itself, the simulara are the superior forms" (DR 67tm/93)

The key point in all this is the following rather than expressing on e half of

the One-Many dyad, the onept of simulara is meant to onvey somethingabout beins in eneral, namely, that the struture of being as suh in noway involves a division between the regime of the ideal, self idential, superior, supereminent and that of inferior material, ephemeral produts Rather,beings must be thought solely as simulara By simularum we should notunderstand a simple imitation but rather the at by whih the very idea ofa model or privileged position is hallenged and overturned" (DR 69/95)It would be exeedingly diult, at a minimum, to understand the an

ity Deleuze feels with the ontology of images espoused by Bergson, nor thephilosophy of the inema that is related to it, if this is not understood, not tomention Deleuzes reformation of the Platoni notion of the Idea

This point is itself only intelligible one Badious radial division betweenthe One and simulara is left to one side However, one part of this aountis orret here simulara are indeed beings, singular existents, for DeleuzeThey are iages without any orresponding model This does not mean,though, that they are but ontologial epiphenomena, likers rossing thesynapses of Being they are the expressions of being as suh The One appearsin turn as an epiphenomena of the play of simulara, and not the reerse

CRWNED ANARCHY AND HE DISJUNCIVE SYNHESIS

In the ourse of the rst hapter of Te Clamor of Bein, Badiou touhes

on one of the more evoative images found in Deleuzes Derence an

1 6




Repetition, that of rowned anarh' whih is introdued in the disussionof univoit that we have seen above here Deleuze writes

The words everthing is equal" ma therefore resound jofullon ondition that the are said of that whih is not equal in thisequal univoal Being Univoit of being thus signies equalit of being. Univoal Being is at one and the same time nomadidistribution and rowned anarh (DR 37/55)

o this Badiou responds One should not be misled b the use of the word

anarh to designate the nomadism of singularities for Deleuze speiesrowned anarh and it is ruial to think also indeed to think above all the rown" (DB 13 /23) . For Badiou the rown is the sign of the One themark manifest in eah individual being that indiates its foundation in the O ne.

One more however Badiou's reading of this moment proeeds b substantializing the moment of univoit rather than grasping it as manner.Ultimatel the role of the rown" here is the role of univoal armation ofwhat is rowned namel the inpriniple nonhierarhial nature of being.

In other words what is ruial to think is the manner in whih the anarhof beings (DR 37/55) is rowned and how this allows us to distinguish itfrom the hierarh involved in analogial aounts of being.

is point an also be used to grasp in an initial manner although athorough assessment awaits a more detailed disussion of Te Logic of Sense the use to whih Deleuze puts the term disjuntive snthesis' On Badi ou's aount of entral importane here is the moment of snthesis whereeah of the disjuntive singularities or simulara are thought aording to

their origin in the supreme realit of the One. However this is ver muh tothe ontrar of the D eleuzean text If we turn our attention to the ke entralhapters of Te Logic of Sense (notabl those devoted to ausal it singularigenesis and the ompossibilit of events) a dierent aount an be found Itis ertainl the ase that Deleuze laims a unit of all events in a single Event.hat is in question however is preisel the nature of the unit involved. Itis this that haraterizes what Deleuze alls "Eentum tantum (LS 176/207),and here Badiou's error seem s to involve foring the gure of the One on thenature of the internal relations harateristi of this Event

Divergene and disjuntion are armed as suh (LS 172/201). ButDeleuze ontinues

[]hat does it mean to make divergene and disjuntion theobjets of armation? As a general rule two things are simultaneousl armed onl to the extent that their dierene is

denied suppressing from within even if the level of this sup

17



BDIOU'S DELEUZE

pression is supposed to regulate the production of dierenc asmuch as its disappearance o be sure, the identity here is nothat of indierence, but it is generally throu ietity that opposites are armed at the same time, whether we accentuate oneof the opposites in order to nd the other, or hether we createa synthesis of the two e speak, on the contrary, of an operation according to which two things or two determinations arearmed through their dierence, that is to say, that they are theobjects of simultaneous armation oly isofar as their erece is itsearme. (LS 172/201 2, latter emphasis added)

Te import of this statement is clear: that the disjunctive syntesis thatcharacterizes the relations between events, and thus describes the structureof the single Event, can be grasped only once the theme of identity is superseded in the direction of a unilateral and immanent account of dierenceas positive distance hat is at stake, then, in disjunctive synthesis, is themanner by which dierences co exist as such. e synthesis in question doesnot go beyond this manner of coexistence: it is this manner Te synthesis

has no higher moment, or, rather, in the spirit of Deleuzes account of disjunctive synthesis itself, this synthesis is in fact the highest form of synthesis,because it involves no subordination to a nality beyond what is engaged inthe synthesis itself

Tis quote is revealing in two other respects as well, rst in so far as it challenges a key aspect of Badious central claim about Deleuze Here D eleuze isinsisting that it is dierence that inhabits identity, rather than being - as inBadious account excluded from it It is dierence that is superior, interior

and supereminent (in a certain genetic if not ontological respect) to the OneIn addition, Deleuze describes and repudiates the very mechanism that Badioulocates at the heart of the assertion of the primacy of the One o quote again,

As always with Deleuze, [this] going beyond a static (quantitative opposition) always turns out to involve the qualitative raisingup of one of its terms And, contrary to the commonly acceptedimage it is the occurrence of the One renamed by Deleuzethe OneAll - that forms the supreme destination of thought

(DB 10-1 119)

If this wa s indeed Deleuzes central mous operai it would serve himpoorly In the place of such a movement, in which the reconciliation ofopposites is achieved by realizing them within a unity that accentuates oneterm in relation to another, to the other, D eleuze seeks to secure dierence

in relation to dierece, and, more profoundly, dierenceinitself

1 8



IS ELEUZE A PHILOSOPHER OF HE ONE?

EMAA TIO AD EXPRESSIO

Now as we have already seen Badious laim about the status of the One inDeleuzes philosophy also inludes a orrelative thesis onerning diereneor the man namely that beings are simulara or emanations of this Oneepiphenomenal eets whose being is at best ephemeral Thus his entralproposition onerning Deleuzes ontolog is that it is emanative in natureBadious laim that for Deleuze the univoal real of Being that supports dierene within itself and distributes to it a single sense" (DCB 26/42), isan exellent formulation of the emanative shema where B eing is a unique

OneAgent irreduible and distant from its produtions and yet their ativesoure It is worth insisting on this point beause Deleuze himself engagesdiretly with emanative ontologial positions and rejets them in favour ofan expressivist aount

e main text in question is found in his long stud of Spinoza Expressionism in Philosoph entitled Immanene and the Historial Componentsof Expression This hapter is devoted to a onsideration of the development of ertain philosophial themes found in Spinozas immanent theor

of being Deleuzes essential laim i s that postPlatoni philosophy elaboratesa new ontology in order to resolve erta in tensions within Platoni thoughtaround the theme of partiipation is eoplatoni ontolog posits a higherunit or One from whih partiular beings p roeed and in relation to whihthese beings have no ausal eay nor any omparable degree of realityis postPlatoni emanative ontology mutates in ontat with Christianity on the side of philosophy but it also gives rise to or makes room for analternative shema with whih it has muh in ommon namely expressive

ontology aording to whih (taking Spinoza as an example) Substaneexpresses itself to itself" (EPS 18 5)

The history of this strain of ontologial onsideration arries us onDeleuzes aount from Plotinus to Spinoza unfolding through a variety of omplex formations of the two positions Expressive immanene isgrafted onto the theme of emanation whih in part enourages it and inpart represses it" (EPS 17 8) It is with Spinozas philosophy that expressiveontology makes a omplete break with its emanative travelling ompanionIn turn it is this feature of Spinozism relative to the histor of ontology sinePlato that Deleuze wishes to hampion

The signiane of Spinozism seems to me this it asserts immanene as a priniple and frees expression from an subordinationto emanative or exemplary ausality Expression itself no longeremanates no longer resembles anything And suh a result an

be obtained only within a perspetive of univoity (EPS 1 80)

19



BADIOU'S DEEUZE

Nonetheless as has already been well remarked Badiou laim an emanative teory of being for eleuze. n keeping with his aount though itis less Spinoza than Augustine who must be aonted the primary point ofreferene. For the latter as Deleuze presents him: God expresses himselfin his ord or in an exemplary dea but the exemplary dea expresses themultipliity of reatable and reated things ... Expression is like a radiationthat leads us from God who expresses himself to the things expressed" (EPS179) . Radiation (a term Deleuze uses a number of times here) is a term thatts well within Badious aount. Being or God would be the pure ausalorigin of these l ikers of radiation playing themselves out on the surfae of

this immaulate Sphere .There are a number of key dierenes between emanative ontologial aounts and what Deleuze takes to be the stritly expressivist positionadopted by Spinoza. n the urrent ontext however it is the issue of ausality that presents itself as the most signiant. This is beause for Badiouthe One is the sole ausal fore being after all all that exists in the nalanalysis. \hat haraterizes Deleuzes ontology on Badious aount is alaim about the ausal origins of atual beings in relation to the One. On

this point D eleuze will agree: the issue of ausality is here fundamental Deleuze writes :

While an emanative cause remains in itse the eect it prouceis not in it an os not remain in it Plotinus says of the One asrst priniple or ause of auses: t is beause there is nothing init that all things ome from i n reminding us that an eet isinseparable from its ause he is thinking of a ontinuity of low

or radiation. (EPS 171-2)

n Spinoza the alternative to this aount of emanative ausality (andthe poverty of existents that it implies) is the famous causa sui: God is theause of all things in the same way that he is the ause of himself" (EP25 S) Reeting the stritly external nature of the relationship between being andits expressions Spinoza is for Deleuze the philosopher for whom eientausality is the deisive ausal modality. There is no ultimate telos of beingnor an order of formal reality that has any diret ausal eay on existingbeings (the modes). There is no ontologial gap in Spinoza between auseand eet and every power is always an at or at least in ation" (EPS 93 ) .

Let me insist one more that Deleuze onsiders Spinozas riposte to theomplex tradition of emanative ontology a omplete suess ust as he onsiders hmself a Spinozist in this sense. o repeat: The signiane of Spinozism seems to me this: it asserts immanene as a priniple and frees expression

from any subordination to emanative or exemplary ausality" (EPS 180) .

20



I DEE ZE PHIOOPHER OF HE ONE?

is point an also be put in relation to the Platoni theme of partiipation, onerning whih, Deleuze says, everything may, it seems be traedbak to" (EPS 169) . In eet, emanative and expressive ontologies proposeinverse aounts of the nature of the relationship between being and itsmodalities. he emanative sheme inverts (EPS 170) the Platoni aountby onerning itself no longer with partiular bings (when it asks how theymanage to partiipate in the Ideas), but with that whih beings partiipate in

e partiipated does not in fat enter into what partiipates init. hat is partiipated remains in itself; it is partiipated insofar

as it produes, and produes insofar as it gives, but has no needto leave itself to give or produe. Plotinus formulates the programof starting at the highest point, subordinating imitation to genesis or produtio, and substituting the idea of a gift for that ofa violene. hat is partiipated is not divided, is not imitatedfrom outside, or onstrained by intermediaries whih would doviolene to its nature. Partiipation is neither material, nor imitative, nor demoni it is emanative. Emanation is at one ause

ad gift ausality by donation, but by produtive donation. rueativity omes from what is partiipated; what partiipates is onlyan eet , reeiving what it is given by its ause . (EPS 170)

Despite the originality of this view, Deleuze one more aligns himself withSpinoza, for whom

to partiipate is to have a part in, to be a part of, something

Attributes are so to speak dynami qualities to whih orresponds the absolute power of God. A mode is, in its essene,always a ertain degree, a ertain quantity, of a quality. Preiselythereby it is, within the attriute ontaining it, a part so to speakof God's power. (EPS 183)

As we have already seen, on the expressivist aount, ubstane expressesitself to itself" (EPS 185). e might say in sum that, for emanative ontologies, partiipation ultimately tends towards insigniane, sine the beingsthat partiipate in he One do so at an irremediable dvide; for expressiveontologies, it is partiipation as suh that denes the unity of being (thereis no One as suh, but only the universal fact of partiipation) , exept thatthe last barriers betwee partiipant and what is partiipated in have beentorn down

Or, indeed, all but one of them. e must add that Deleuze, despite nom

inating himself on many oasions as a Spinozist, ulimately onsiders the

21



BDIOU S DELEUZE

Spinozist philosophy of expression to have a profound weakness his weakness onerns preisely the priority and primay of substane in Spinozasthought After praising Spinoza as the thinker wo harged the priniple ofunivoity with an armation (the armation of expressions as suh ratherthan of a prinipled being in general) that Sotus ould or did not Deleuzeturns to the third in his trini of thinkers of univoity Nietzshe in orderto supplement or radialize Spinoza himself On what grounds In Spinozathere still remains a dierene between substane and the modes:

Spinozas substane appears independent of the modes while

the modes are dependent on substane but as though on something other than themselves Substane must itself be said of themodes and o nly of the modes Suh a ondition an be satisedonly at the prie of a more general ategorial reversal aording to whih being is said of beoming identity of that whih isdierent the one of the multiple et at identity not be rstthat it exist as a priniple but as a seond priniple as a priniple beome that it revolve around the Dierent suh would be

the nature of a Copernian revolution whih opens up the possibility of dierene having its own onept rather than beingmaintained under the domination of a onept in general alreadyunderstood as idential (DR 40-41/95)

Tis striking passage whih seems to ontain the kernel of a Deleuzeanphilosophy of being irreduible to Badious aount ould not be learer: theproblem with Spinoza is the way in whih his aount of substane enats

a subordination of singular and singularized expressions of dierene (themodes) to identity The nal page of Derence an Repetition is equally tothe point: All that Spinozism needed to do for the univoal to beome anobjet of pure armation was to make substane turn around the modes

in other wors to realise un i cit in the form of repetition in the eternalreturn (DR 304/388). The expressive manner of being must no longer besubjet to a substantive unity

So when Badiou asks of Deleuzes allegiane to Spinoza at else woulda selfprolaimed disiple of Spinoza be onerned with but the One ( 78) the response is of ourse as follows:

22

hat interested me most in Spinoza wasnt his Substane butthe omposition of nite modes I onsider this one of the mostoriginal aspets of my book Tat is: the hope of making substane turn on nite modes or at least of seeing in substane a

plane of immanene in whih nite modes operate (EPS 1 1)



I DE LEUZE PHILPHER F THE NE?

In other words, what is deisie in Spinoza's philosophy is that it assertsimmanene as a priniple and frees expression from any subordination toemanatie or exemplary ausality" (EPS 180), and what remains problematiis its ontinuing subordination of the priniple of immanene to a primordial substantie unity.

AN ONOOGICA MANNRISM

It seems, then, in an initial sense, that Badious diret laims of Deleuze

appear to a large extent mistaken. ere is ertainly a preoupation withontologial unity in Deleuze, but this unity is the unity of manner ratherthan the unity of substance. e uniocity of beings, the bein of the simularum, crowne anarhy, and disjuntive synthesis refer us not to a substantial unity or ontologial priority of unity (or the One) over diversit (or theMany), but to the manner b whih dierene an be thought on its ownterms . e might even say that what makes Deleuze unique as a philosopheris the extent to whih he provides a rational means of thinking dierenes

(e. multipliity) and the nature of the relations that hold between them.Certainly this is what the onepts examined in this hapter are testaentto, whether or not we judge them suessful.

However signiant this divergene may seem at this juntion, what hasbeen indiated here must be taken as preliminar. is is true for Badiou aswell. In Te Clamor of Bein, the laim that Deleuze is a philosopher of theOne is not supported entirely, or even for the most part, at the level of thelatter's various diret laims about ontology. Rather, Deleuze demonstrates

his ommitment to suh a philosophy on Badiou's aount in the ery wayin whih his philosophy unfolds: it is as muh a methodologial ommitment or orientation as a dotrine . It is to the methodologial substrate of eClamor of Bein that we now turn.

23



As we ave seen briely in the previous hapter, Badious entral laimregarding Deleuze - that his philosophy is oriented around the thesis thatBeing is One - deviates substantially from a number of important omentsin the latters work. However, the strength of Badious argument is thatthe elaboration of this thesis takes plae aross a range of key onepts inDeleuze. In fat, these onepts mirror the four key onepts in Badious

Bein an Eent: being (the One, the virtual), the event, truth and subjet(thought) . In other words, Badiou's laim is not simply that Deleuze's philosophy is expliitly a meditation on the single question of the One; indeed, heinsists from the beginning of his text that the surfae of the Deleuzean textis onstituted by a massive profusion of partiularities (inema, Kafka, Kant,Carmelo Bene, mathematis , et . ). Badiou will even laim, orretly to mymind, that the word Being" i s one that Deleuze only uses in a preliminaryand limited anner" (DCB 28/45). Rather, Deleuze proeeds on Badiou's

aount by examining a vast array of partiular simulara" qua equivoaland ephemeral emanations of the One) in order to establish in thought theirommon being in the One

In a onsiderable part of his work, Deleuze adopts a proedure that, starting from the onstraint exerised by a partiularaseofthought it does not matter if it onerns Fouault oraherMasoh onsists in trying out a name of Being and inonstruting a protool of thought (that is to be as automati aspossible) by whih the pertinene of this name an be evaluatedwith respet to the essential property that one expets it to preserve (or even to reinfore in thought) : namely, univoi.

(DCB 28/45)

Thus the fruit of Badious reading of Deleuze should be judged not just on

the basis of expliit endorsements of the emanative theme of the One, but

24



MTHOD

rather with respet to the way that it maniests itself in the partiular asesthat traverse and onstitute Deleuze's thought

he key to suh a reading of Deleuze is presented by Badiou in tes ofthe former's metho. at is, on Badiou's aount, we an identify a ertain struture in Deleuze's treatment of partiular ases that engage themin the gure of the One, a struture that is ommon to all of Deleuze's textsfrom beginning to end: a virtuoso series of monotonous produtions" (D B14/25). It is this insistene on method that forms the hinge around whihBadiou's aount turns, and on whih, more than the thesis of the One, hisreading of Deleuze turns his hapter will thus be devoted to an examina

tion of Badiou's aount of Deleuze's method in e Clamor of Ben, relativeto Deleuze's thought.

(METHODOOGICA) THESES THRE AND FOUR: NOMINATION AND

INTUITION

ith the emanative struture in mind, B adiou's aount of Deleuze's method

is expliated in two moments, or, by adding them to the two ontologialtheses of the previous hapter, by presenting two additional theses to theentral laims of e Clamor of Ben

Double nomina tion

e rst of these (third tesis) is the following: that in order to think the

ontologial grounding of a partiular simularum in the One, one must thinkaording to a pair of names, the rst for the One itself, and the seond forthe simularum that emanates from it in order to say hat there is a singlesense, two naes are neessary" (DB 28/45). Or, more strongly, it is byexperimentation with as many nominal doublets as is neessary that the veriation, under onstraint, of the absolute unity of sense is wrought" (DB29/46) . us ontologial thought is essentially a form of test, an essay. hetest operates on the ore of the multiple in order to render the pure matter ofthe One, or, rather, like Desartes' meditator who examines the idea of theinnite he possesses for that whih, beyond his nitude, has marked hi,Deleuze would on this aount examine eah eusive instane of the multiple for what, beyond it, makes its being possible

At issue, aording to Badiou, is a profound problem - whih he takesthe methodologial establishment of double nomination to solve - onerning the relationship between ontologial disourse and being, a problem, as

we have seen, that Badiou is keenly aware of, and deals with diretly in the

M0797325



BDIOU'S DELEUZE

rst Meditation of Beig a Eet. In e Clamor of Beig, and n aordane with Badious onstrual of Deleuzes proet, the problem is presented

as follows :

What, indeed, would be the appropriate name for that whih isunivoal And if Being is sa id in a single sense, how is the senseof this single sense" to be determined? Or, yet again: is it possible to experiment, to test, whether a name of Being makes senseof univoal sense? (DCB 27tm/44)

his is the question underlying the third of Badious key theses onDeleuzes philosophy: if the sense of being is unied, how an disourse adequately grasp it, sine disourse (being disourse about) seems prima facieto split the unity of sense? Let us reognize here a demand in an invertedform that plays an important role at the start ofBeig a Eet, namely, thedemand to think being in a fashion appropriate to its harater For Badiou,it is the inexpliable multipliity of being that alls for an appropriatelyimpliit and axiomati method: on Badious aount, Deleuzes investment

in the philosopheme of the One that demands a novel method involvingdouble nomination

Badious answer to this question posed on Deleuzes behalf is - in lightof what we have already seen not diult to antiipate: for Deleuze, theseond nae is but a means to disover the super iority of the rst, and thusits own inessential harater Like Wittgensteins ladder, their use is provisional: Clearly, this emphasis on the wo is purely introdutory" (DCB34/54) Certainly, the name hosen for simulara relative to the One must

not be arbitrary; it must provide support to thinking Its use is nished, however, one the simularum in question is adequately artiulated to the OneDeleuzes thought would thus operate in a fashion somewhat analogous tothe Jewish mystial tradition, in whih the use of various names for Godsubstitutes for the use of the original and Ineable ame, whose orretpronuniation has been lost

o haraterize Deleuzes methodology in this way is, however, prema

ture In fat, double nomination furnishes us only with a strutural aount,one that is more or less derivative of Badious fundamental thesis In hapter three of e Clamor of Bei, Badiou turns to an aount of how suha thought in fat works: the dynamism at the heart of the struture IfDeleuze perennially proeeds by invoking nominal pairs, it is to desribethe terminal moments of a moemet of thikig, only one of whih isessential

26



METHOD

Intuition

On the basis of this fundamental thess, Badou laims that Deleuze'smethod for thinking the One and the multiple together annot involve anyof the three preeminent methods found in the histor of philosophy Therst is Aristotelian in nature, and proeeds by thinking Being aording toand on the basis of the ategories that are proper to B eng itself Given thatDeleuze is above all a thinker of the One, Badiou argues, suh a methodould never be assented to:

Te true philosophial method must absolutely refrain from anydividing up of the sense of Being by ategorial dstributions , orfrom any approximation of its movement by preliminary formaldivisions, however rened these may be e univoity of Beingand the equivoity of beings (the latter being nothing otherthan the immanent prodution of the former) must be thoughttogether" without the mediation of genera or speies, types oremblems in short, without ategories, without generalities

(DB 32/51)

Now, in turn, and for related reasons , a seond andidate must b e rejeted,namely, ialectics, whih relies above all on the ategory of mediation ease that Badiou realls here is Hegel, for who mediation is embedded in themovement of determinate negation For Deleuze, insofar as Being is armation through and through, the negative is totally impossible" (DB 32/5 1 ) e third possibility that Badiou rules out for Deleuze is what might be har

aterized as external intellectual intuition, whereby thought, independent andaording to its own apaities , grasps being diretly and without mediationHere, B adiou realls the Desartes of the Meitations, who thinks his ownbeing in the ambient ontext of a natural light proper to it In sum, Badiouasserts, on the basis of his fundamental ontologial ommitents, Deleuze 'smethod in thought must be acateorical, antiialectical, intrinsic to bein andonly possible uner its manate Tus we are led to the fourth entral thesispresented by Badiou, that Deleuzes method is an intuitive method:

A thought without mediation, a thought onstruting its movement beyond all the ategorial divisions that it has rst beentempted to use as a means of proteting itself from the inhumanneutrality of Being, an only be as Bergson so sovereignly setdown - an intuitie thouht Deleuze's method is the transposition in writing of a singular form of intuition

(DB 35/54-5 emphasis added)

27



BDIOU S DELEUZE

Deleuze's method, for Badiou is must be intuitive in natue.ere are four signiant harateristis of Deleuze's method of intuition

on Badiou's aount. e rst is that, ontrary o Desartes' approah, theintuition in question is what might be haraterized as intrinsic intuitionThought proeeds within the movement of univoal Being, and does notexamine it from without aording to any kind of natural light e do notexamine Being and its emanations from a point of view extrinsi to theirrelation, but rather from within the geneti movement of Being itself. Thispresents thought as intuition with a primary harateristi, namely, thatwhile it begins in what seems to be the regime of the leardistint, the world

of beingssimulara, it must plune into what grounds these, namely, theonfusedobsure One Thought has to plunge into the lear intensity tograsp its onfusedbeing, and revive the deadened' dist intness of the separated being by unovering what of it remains obsure: namely, the livinimmersion that is preisely dissimulated by its isolation" (DCB 356/56) .

e might note in passing that this reonstrution of a ertain Leibnizianmoment in Deleuze by Badiou proeeds aording to a veritable sramblingof the terms in question At issue in Leibniz (and, following him, Deleuze) ,

is never an opposition between the leardistint, on the one hand, and theonfusedobsure, on the other, but rather a distintion between the learonfused (pertaining in Deleuze to the atual) and the distintobsure ( pertaining to the virtual) Despite quoting passages from the same setion ofDerence an Repetition, Badiou seems to have ompletely overlooked thefollowing remarks: e annot overemphasize the iportane of a remarkthat Leibniz onstantly makes in his logi of ideas: a lear idea is in itselfonfused it is onfused insofar as it is clear (DR 213/275) And, a little

later, e nature of the [virtual] Idea is to be distint and obsure" (DR214/276) As we shall see in the next hapter, at issue here for Deleuze isin no way the task of rendering either the onfused distint or the obsurelear: these haraterizations are ontologial in nature, pertaining to ideasand atualized, extended and qualied reality as suh. e might even saythat to task thought with suh ativity is to make a meaningless laim in relation to Deleuze's philosophy: above all beause this struture is, as we shall

see, at one the ondition of subjetive' onsious thought, and thoughtitself, essentially unonsious in nature In Chapter 7, where the topi ofthought is disussed in detail, we shall further see that the gure of the individual, ompletely overlooked in Badiou's aount, is of deisive signianefor Deleuze, but a peuliar oneption of the individual, one that plays therole of a mutable foal lens , rather than that of a onsious agent

Te seond harateristi of Deleuzean intuition on Badiou's aountonerns preisely its ative nature, the manner in whih it moves between

the double nomination of simularumbeing and Be ingOne Tis athleti

28



METHOD

trajetory of thought" (DCB 36/56) proeeds in the rst instane under theimpulsion of a partiular ase a partiular being or simularum of Being.As we shall disuss in more detail below these ases in Deleuze are moreoften than not partiular gures or bodies of work that answer to theirproper naes - Fouault Bergson Nietzshe Proust and so forth - butalso onepts or praties suh as literature inema repet ition or essene.hat though is the fore of this impulsion? Or rather aording to Badiouthe question is: what do suh impulsions fore us to think? The answer asno doubt will be expeted is the univoity of Being. In partiular what themethod of intuition thinks i s the fat of the univoity of Being in so far as its

sense is unboken by its expression in the ase in queston.us ntuition begins under suh an impulsion and proeeds to armunivoity with respet to a partiular ase; in turn aording to the neessity of this impulsion thought arms the univoity of Being as suh. Tis iswhat separates it from the Cartesian model of intuition replaing the intelletual Auenblickwith a progressive yet unied desription of the whole"(DCB 35/56) .

Tird and as a result of this trajetory of intuition and it s internal nature

we must realize that thought annot be onsidered to be a regime apartfrom Being. In fat Badiou asserts "when we have raspe the ouble movement of escent an ascent, from beins to Bein, then from Bein to beins,we have in fact thouht the movement of Bein itsel (DCB 40/63). Or ashe later states the power of the One qua thought is . . preisely this: thereis only one intuition" (DCB 69/105-6). Here we are only one step awayfro what Badiou will oe to suggest in the nal hapter of Te Clamorof Bein, namely that Deleuze everywhere tr iumphantly asserts the famous

Parmenidean laim: e Same is at one thinking and being" (quoted atDC B 78/ 1 17) . Thought truly takes plae when this laim is asserted on thebasis of an impulsion of a partiular ase of every beingiularum thatemanates from the One.

Finally intuition as method is haraterized as a restrained movementor movement of restraint. It does not ontrary to the iage of Deleuzethat Badiou evokes as the opening of his text - support the view of Deleuzeas the thinker who arms the mess of the world. Instead we are to seeDeleuze as the thinker for who the abandonment of empirial variety isessential to the ommeneent of genuine ontologial thought. This is ultimately why Badiou in one of the more wellknown moves in Te Clamor ofBein, attributes to D eleuzean philosophy an ethis of thought that requiresdispossession and asetiism" (DCB 17/30). e goal of philosophy here isonly ahieved by way of a ertain kind of intelletual redution more radial and farreahing than its Husserlian ounterpart. Everything aidental

to the partiular ase must be progressively stripped away aording to a

29



BDIOU DELEUZE

rigorously methodologial asesis one that suspends everyhing inessential" in order to return to wha is primary and indestrutible" (Badiou 1 995 :19), that whih gives the ase in question its sse its being: namely teOne. us the iruitous trajetory of intuition proeeds by the disposal ordenigration of the seondary features that allow one beingsimularum to bedistinguished from another in favour of returning thought to the ommonground of every atual thing.

So in sum Badiou laims:

[] hen thought sueeds in onstruting without ategories

the looped path that leads on the surfae of what i s from a aseto the One then from the One to the ase it intuits the movement of the One itself nd beause the One is its own movement(beause it is life or innite virtuality) thought intuits the One.

(DB 40/63)

Now aross a number of interpretive registers the Deleuzean text itselfseems to be in some tension with the aount that Badiou provides of it In

what follows three of these points will be disussed in some detail. Te rstonerns the nature of Deleuzes expliit engagement with the theme of intuition whih as Badiou himself notes is in the ontext of his reading of Bergson Te seond point onerns Deleuzes aount of the theme of methodas suh in Derence an Repetition. Tird there reains the possibility thateven should Badiou present an inaurate view of the expliit aount ofmethod in Deleuze there exists an impliit method that although at oddswith the surfae of Deleuzes text properly aounts for its movement. In

all three ases I shall argue that Badious aount is not only false but doesmore to obsure what is really at stake than larify it. In sum I shall alsosuggest that the aount of Deleuzes method in Te Clamor of Bein fails tosupport Badious reading of Deleuze as a philosopher of the One

INTUITION IN DEEUZE'S BERGSON

s I have just indiated for Badiou the method of intuition in Deleuze isbest aounted for on the basis of his Bergsonian liation. Indeed it is inthis part of his text that Badiou asserts that Deleuze is a marvelous readerof Bergson who in my opinion is his real master" (DB 39/62) and thatit is the amalgam BergsonDeleuze" (DB 40/63) who onsiders intuitionas an intrinsi thought of Being as vital proess Tus in analysing Badiouslaim we are fully justied in looking towards Deleuzes readings of Bergson

for proof of his support of intuition as method indeed in Deleuzes work

30



METOD

it is only in this ontext that suh a method is disussed. Can we draw onthis idea of method in haraterizing Deleuze's own philosophy as Badioulaims?

Departing from the aount of intuition as it appears in both modernrationalism, where intelletual intuition of various kinds is the soure oftruth in thought (Spinoza's third kind of knowledge, for example, or in theparadigmati form given to it by Desartes in the seond Meitation) andin Kantian ritial phi losophy (where the role of intuition is relativized andaounted for on the basis of the passive reeptivity of the faulty of sensibility), Deleuze takes Bergsonian intuition to be a ritial and rigorous philo

sophial metho As Deleuze isolates it (B 13-35) there are three aspets ofBergson's aount of intuition as method it is problematizing, dierentiatingand temporalizing. In the rst ase, intuition as a method devotes itself tothe ritiism of poorly formed onepts . o take the example of the oneptof possibility (not just any example for Deleuze, as we shall see in the nexthapter) , we an say with Bergson that the possible is not a more basi onept than the real, but rather a more omplex one, in whih the onept of areal state of aairs has added to it a lak of reality. As a result, it is a mistake

to onsider the possible to be the more primordial of the two, and a groundfor the onditioning of the real. It is, rather, an extrapolation that obfusatesthat whih it is extrapolated from. The goal of the method of intuition is,in eah ase, to divide onepts into their onstitutive elements in order tounover illiit strutures , suh as we nd in the ase of possibility, but alsononbeing, negation, unity and so forth.

In the seond ase, we an haraterize intuition as a dierential method.is is already the ase with respet to the rst harateristi. Bergson

extends this point, however, to laim that intuition as method is essentiallyonerned with dierenes in kind, as opposed to dierenes in number ordegree. It aims to establish profound or fundamental division rather thanremaining aught up in superial or merely apparent divisions .

e key example in this regard that Deleuze onsiders is the division, entral for Bergson, between spatiality and temporality. In one of the essentialmoves in his reading of Bergson, D eleuze extrats from him a rigorous ontologial treatment of temporality, irreduible to any laim for the primordiality of extended spatiality. hat the ethod of intuition reveals is thedierene in kind between these two posits on the nature of being. Bergson goes even further though, on Deleuze's aount, sine the method alsoreveals beyond the dierene in kind between matter and duration - thefat that within extended matter itself there are only dierenes in degree,and duration is itself harater ized as intrinsially dierene in kind.

e must also add the following observation, whih is ruial. Bergson's

method of intuition, for Deleuze, does not insist on a radial ontologial

3 1



BADIOU' DEEUZE

dualism in the manner of Plato or D escartes , where the sensible or extendedworlds are considered to have less being, or to be less essential. Rather, theclaim is that only by proceeding from dierences n degree at the level of spatiality to dierences in kind (both between space and duration, and withinduration itself) are we able to provide an account of how it s that the differences in kind come about In this sense, it springs from a methodologicalorientaion that is indeed Platonic, but which refutes the orienting dualismthat dominates the lions share of Platos metaphysics: Intuiton as methodis a mehod of division, Platonic in inspiration. Bergson is aware that thingsare mixed together in reality; in fact, experience itself oers us nothing but

composites But that is not where the diculty lies" (B 22) Te diculty lies rather in explaining composite being itself on the basisof more fundamental dierences. As Deleuze notes on a number of occasions, this is what gives Bergsons method something of the character oftranscendental philosophy, something that Deleuzes own theory of thetranscendental will extend some way towards a more Kantian framework,as we shall see in the next chapter: Intuition leads us to go beyond the stateof experiene towards the conditions of experience But these conditions are

neither general nor abstract. ey are no broader than the conditioned: theyare the conditions of real experience" (B 27)

In the third case, Deleuze understands the method of intuition as foundedon the primordiali of duration. Intuition takes duration as its element, andgrasps problems and concepts from this point of view. As in the case of thesecond characteristic with respect to the rst, this temporalizing aspect tointuition encompasses the rst two characteristics also In the rst case, it isa matter of seeing that he spatial or extensive conception of being is what

grounds the poss ibility of many of the poorly formed concepts found in phi losophy (Space only ever presents, and the intelligence only ever discovers ,composites, e g the closed and the open" [ID 47] ) in the second, the goalis to produce an account of dierences in kind that ultimately turn aroundthe dierences of kind between matter and duration, on the one hand, and,on the other, the role that dierences in kind play within the constitution ofduration itself. In short, what this third characteristic states is, on the onehand, that duration is the proper medium of thinking, and on the other,that duration itself is characterized by a primordial multiplicity. Deleuzeargues that it is the method of intuition that motivates the unfolding of Bergsons thought. At the same time, however, as the third characteristic of thismethod asserts, it is only on the basis of an adequate account of being asduration that thought can grasp being itself. Tus the possibility of ontologyis grounded in being itself in a certain sense.

In light of this brief characterization, a number of points deserve to be

emphasized in contrast with Badious account. ere Badiou asserts of

32



METHOD

intuition in Deleuze that it proeeds by thinking aordng to the movementof being itself, this is learly at odds with the crtcal aspet of the aountthat we nd in Deleuzes text itself. Tat is, rather than eing aseti, redutive or minimalist in nature, Bergsonian intuition multples the terms of theanalysis, loating a given objet in the ontext of more omplex relationalstrutures. Tis is what allowed us above to haraterize it as a dierentialmethod. Furthermore, it is fundamentally oneptual in nature. Its objet asmethod is not Being itself, even if it is oriented by ontologial ommitments,but onepts.

Nonetheless, something like the dualterm struture that Badiou elabo

rates does seem to be at work here, between dierenes in kind and differenes in degree. Furthermore, one of these terms (dierenes in kind) isproided with a more profound ontologial sense than the other. Both ofthese similarities, however, are less telling than they rst appear. On the onehand, for Bergson on Deleuzes reading, the ultimate telos of the method ofinuition is to show that both dierenes in degree (and spatial ategories)and dierenes in kind (and temporal ategories, along with the strutureof the relationship between them) are together onstitutive of being. On the

other hand, while duration is without a doubt ontologially primary in a ertain sense, this primay is not exlusive aording to the manner in whihBadiou wishes to desribe it. In fat, as I have already noted, D eleuze thinkswe nd the kernels of something like a properly transendental philosophyin this aount, whereby duration is the ondition for both dierenes indegree and dierenes in kind, and their mixture. In sum, we would be mistaken in thinking that this priority is an exlusive one reserved for duration,diereneinkind as suh, alone. If the third aspet of the method, whih

insists on proeeding aording to temporal rather than spatial ategories,is so important, i t is beause only suh a temporal view an aount for theoexistene of spae an time, whereas other methodologial approahespreisely exlude a onsideration of duration in advane, by onstruing iton the basis of spatial ategories and thereby reduing its dierene in kindfrom spatiality rather than highlighting it. Rather than proeeding extrinsially fro ases of the order of spatiality to the supereminene of a supremeand foundational temporality, intuition proeeds by insisting on the genetiand integralperchoress or interpenetration of spatial ategories within temporal ones, and of the transendental rather than supereminent status ofbeing as duration.

Finally, we annot overlook the fat that duration itself, even haraterized in Badious terms, is, for Bergson, on Deleuzes aount wthout anyfunamental unty is is the entral laim, for example, of Deleuzes eConeption of Dierene in Bergson" (ID 43-72) one that is nonetheless

repeated in Derence an Repetton, namely, that the pure past, duration

33



M ETHOD

For Deleuze we must presuppose a fundamental inability to think onethat an be fored into ativit onl on the basis of something happening toit Something in the world fores us to think. is something is an objetnot of reognition but of a fundamental ncountr (DR 139 182) . e samepoint is expressed (in a magnient text) in relation to philosoph

Thought is primaril trespass and violene the enemy and nothing presupposes phi losoph everthing begins with misoph. onot ount upon thought to ensure the relative neessit of what itthinks. Rather ount upon the ontingen of an enounter with

that whih fores thought to raise up and eduate the absoluteneessity of an at of thought or a passion to think.(DR 139181-2)

Thus we ar e led in the rst instane to rejet the arguably dominant tradition in estern philosophy pertaining to the relationship between thoughtand its objet . e an haraterize the entral thesis of this view in the following way thought is an atiit apable of reognizing and on this basis

ognizing whatever objet is presented to it. Deleuze's inverse laim as wehave seen is that thought is not innate and must be engendered in thinkingitself in rspons to an enounter for whih there is no preexisting shema.o use Artaud's ore olourful phrase thought is not an innate apaitbut one that emerges upon the whipping of innateness (DR 1 481 92 ).

hat is required then is an aount of how thought beomes apableof thinking its objet. e are fored and here we ome upon a themefound throughout Deleuze's mature work one that is indexed primarily to

the names of Leibniz and Solomon Maimon (whose relation to Deleuze weshall touh on in the next hapter) - to move beyond the Kantian aount offaulties as the agents of external onditioning and in their plae to founda theory of the faulties onerned with the internal genesis of thought assuh. It is a fault of thought that arises on the basis of an enounter andwhih renders thought possible in this regard on subsequent oasions.Deleuze's own theory of the faulties thus revolves around the laim that itis the faulties themselves that are generated in thought in the rst instane.An enounter raises a singular at of thought up to its level elaborates orfouses a apaity to think this Tin, whose own powers and dimensionsare radiall unknown but whih nonetheless addresses itself only to it .

Deleuze will also oppose the view that faulties are by their nature harmonious in operation. This is related to the previous point sine the genesis ofa fault in thought relies on a moment that in priniple annot be graspedby another: hene the need for suh a genesis. Rather than all the faulties

onverging and ontributing to a ommon projet of reognising an objet

35



BDIOU DELEUZE

we see divergent projets in whih, with regard to what onerns it essentially, eah faulty is in the presene of that whih is its own (DR 141/184) .

e an haraterize faulties in thought - n their primary sense asmonomanacal in operation. at onerns eah faulty onerns it alone,and it operates as if its objet is the sole moment in being and thought.Thought engages no fundamental ommon sense, but a disparate and disjunt ensemble of operations that annot ommuniate with one anotherthrough any ideal form of the objet that they all share.

e ask, for example hat fores sensibility to sense? at is

it that an only be sensed, yet is impereptible at the same time?e must pose this question not only for memory and thought,but also the imagination - is there an mananum, a phan-tasteon, whih would also be the limit, that whih is impossible to imagine?; for language is there a loquenum, that whihwould be silene at the same time?; and for the other faultieswhih would nd their plae in a omplete dotrine - vitality,the transendent objet of whih would inlude monstrosity; and

so iability, the transendent objet of whih would inlude anarhy - and even for faulties yet to be disovered, whose existeneis not yet suspeted. For nothing an be said in advane.

(DR 143/186-7)

Finally, for Deleuze, thought only beomes the familiar, habitual struture,the operation of faulties in harmony in the almness of an uninterruptedinteriority, on the basis of these more fundamental harrowing and monoma

niaal torsions in thought. In Derence an Repetton, this is formulated interms of two manners of the operation of faulties: transendent in the rstinstane, with respet to that whih only the newly engendered faulty is (orather, strives to beome) equal to, and transendental, when it settles into

general and quasihypothetial mode.How does method relate to this problemati? e postulate of method,

for Deleuze, formalizes the dogmati image of thought with respet to thepresuppositions made about the operation of thinking as it relies on theother doxologial features we have already seen (reognition, the omonexerise of the faulties on an objet supposed selfsame, the innate apaitof thought with respet to its objet, and so forth). A method for thinkingproeeds on the basis of these assumptions; it onerns the alm possessionf a rule enabling solutions" (DR 1 64/214) Deleuze writes :

3

e never know in advane how someone will learn: by means

of what loves soeone beomes good at Latin , what enounters



M ETHOD

mae them a philosopher, or in what dictionares they learn tothink. ... here is no more a method for learning than there is a

method for nding treasures , but a violent training, a culture orpaiea which aects the entire individual ... Method is ... themanifestation of a common sense or the realisation of a Cogitationatura, and presupposes a good will as though this were a premeditated decision" of the thinker. (DR 1 16/215)

In sum, method in thought is precisely what formally doubles the natural movement of thinking. Method, indeed, characterizes thought as ascetic

in nature, as Badiou has claimed, since it renounces any need for articethought moves appropriately of its own nature. Method formalizes this supposedly native capacity.

ree points by way of summary. First, the account of thought thatDeleuze elaborates here seems particularly ill suited to the account of hismethod proposed by Badiou. On Badious presentation of Deleuze, let usrecall, a true thought of the One takes place when thought divests itself ofwhat is extraneous in a particular case , and engages itself in the very ove

ment of the expression of this One in the case. For Deleuze, though, what isfundamental in thought is an incapacity, and an incapacity in each new enreof encounter. hat is key, though, is that any given case that we become capable of thinking i s thought only as such The kind of generality that Badiouascribes to the method of intuition could only ever belong to a secondary,placid and established thought, one that remains within the structures developed under earlier, traumatic and indeed repressed, conditions.

Second, if we recall one of Badious preliminary points regarding the

method of intuition - namely that it must not be confused with a certainCartesian intuition according to the clear and distinct an extrinsic intuition- a certain fairly problematic disjunction appears. For to insist that Deleuzehas a xed method in thought is, on Deleuzes account, to insist that he hassubmitted thought to precisely the representational model he is so bent oncriticizing. Indeed , Deleuze suggests in his preface to the English translationof Derence an Repetition that this chapter now seems to me the mostnecessary and the most concrete, and which serves to introduce subsequentbooks" (DR ii). o misunderstand the critique of mehod, then, is to (at thevery least) misunderstand what Deleuze took to b e central to a reading of hiswork after its publication.

Finally, it is strange to assert of Deleuze that he has a clear, establishedand everywhere repeated method, given his critical reappraisal of the veryidea of method itself. e must either claim that Badiou has misunderstoodthe nature of Deleuzes method, or that Deleuze does not have a fundamen

tal method. Both of these options seem to undermine Badious analysis. e

37



BADIOU' DELEUZE

an aso admit a third option: that Badiou has reognized in Deeuzes phiosophy a method that the atter did not or oud not admit was at orkthere. is is ertainy a possibiity, and one that nothing so far has ruedout. Its onsequenes, however, woud seem to be as probemati for Badiouas for Deeuze himsef, sine it woud impy that Deeuzes thought is quiteinoherent, rent in two by an irreduibe and unreonstruted onit.

THE D FACTO QUESION O MEHOD

Nonetheess, suh a hypothesis deserves onsideration is there not perhapsa method depoyed by Deeuze that is neither some anaogue of the doxoogia one ritiized in Derence an Repetton nor a Bergsonian one? DoesDeeuze have a de fato method on whih neither his in prinipe objetionsto the very notion of method nor his broader ommitments ome to bear?

Given that a ompete answer to this question woud take us we beyondthe sope of the urrent study, three exampes wi have to sue, hosensomewhat arbitrariy but with an eye to the (at east apparent) variety of

Deeuzes work. In any ase, the point here is that shoud notabe exeptionsto Badious thesis be disovered in partiuar ases, the appiabiity of thegenera aim espeiay in ight of what has aready been presented in thishapter - oses a signiant measure of its vaidity. After a, if Deeuzes phiosophy is monotonous" (DB 14/25) in nature, we shoud be abe to ndevidene of Badious aim about method everywhere.

The rst exampe I sha take is Deeuzes eary study etzsche an Phlos-ophy How does this work proeed? Deeuzes method here has two notabe

features, features that are arguaby shared with his other studies of individuathinkers. On the one hand, and in opposition to a ommon view that takesNietzshe to be above a a poeti ruminator who expresses himse in disonneted aphoristi works, Deeuzes Nietzshe is a systemati metaphysia thinker of the highest order, whose work omprises a hoisti theory ofbeing and ethis, time and subje tivity. As Graham Jones argues in his masterfu treatment of Deeuzes Derence an Repetton, The key to Deeuzesapproah . . . is the fat that he invariaby seeks a nasent systematiity in thework of other thinkers" (2001 : 34), nding in Nietzshe a systemati phiosophy that others have, for whatever reason, been unabe or unwiing to nd

The surprising opening ines of the work aready present us with thisoherent systematiity: Nietzshes most genera projet is the introdutionof the onepts of sense and vaue into phiosophy" (NP 1 ) This notion ofNietzshes genera projet" is arried through the study from beginning toend. e study not ony presents this projet aording to the attainment of

a farreahing and systematiay oherent metaphysis, but aso reies on a

38



METHOD

belief in the diahroni unity of Nietzshe's work. is systemati readingnds its lous in the detailed analysis of the series of onepts onerningfore, power and will, ulminating in a tabular ontrast (NP 146) betweenthe ative and reative types , aording to the ategories of variety, mehanism, priniple, produt and quality of the willto power.

On the other hand, Deleuze's presentation of Nietzshe foregrounds onepts not normally onsidered to be at the heart of te latters projet. Anotable ase here is the onept of dierene, whih he installs at the veryheart of Nietzshe's system as he presents it, in terms of irreduible dierenes in fore that have no ommon measure or ground. This emphasis , like

the drive to systematiity, an be found in all of Deleuzes studies of othergures, even in plaes where it seems at least initially at odds with the philosopher in question, for example Bergson.

e seond example is Derence an Repetition arguably Deleuzes keywork. Tis book is strutured around an approah that is so obvious as tobe often overlooked. Certainly, it is Deleuzes mature statement of his ownphilosophy, no longer presented from within the thought of another writer.However, this own philosophy" emerges out of an immense series of on

frontations and negotiations with other gures in the history of esternthought. One would be hard pressed to nd a signiant thinker betweenPlato and Heidegger that Deleuze does not meaningfully engage with, not tomention the array of nonlassial or less wellknown philosophers . Here, ifwe an speak of a method, it would be haraterized primarily as a methoof reain. Deleuze's own philosophy emerges pieemeal: a harlequin's loakstithed out of the fabri of the whole history of estern thought.

But the more meaningful dierene from his earlier work is to be found in

the onepts that orient this large sale reonstrution of philosophy sinePlato. hile the book proposes a thorough and thoroughly novel genetiontology, it onnets at every point of its traj etory with the twinned theesof dierene and repetition. hatever else it manages to aomplish, it isertainly an expliation of these themes. Deleuze's prefae is both lear andperfetly summary with respet to the argument that follows:

wo lines of researh lie at the origin of this book: one onerns a onept of dierene without negation, preise ly beauseunless it is subordinated to the idential, dierene would notextend or would not have to extend" as far as opposition andontration; the other onerns a onept of repetition in whihphysial, mehanial or bare repetitions ( repetition of the Same)would nd their raison tre in the more profound strutures ofa hidden repetition in whih a dirential" is disguised and dis

plaed (DR xix-xx)

39



BDIOU'S DEEUZE

In light of these points, it would seem that Badious assertions aboutDeleuzes method are also misplaed in this ase It might, however, beobjeted that the general goals of

Derence an Repetitionare besides the

point, in so far as it still presents numerous laims about the univoity ofbeing But this is not at issue here Even should one agree with Badiou aboutthe ore of Deleuzes philosophy, it seems mistaken to assert that Derencean Repetition manifests the double trajetory of a method of intuition, awork that is onstituted of a omplex series of engagements with the historyof philosophy that make ontat with the onepts of dierene and repetition, on the way to proposing a geneti ontology - not a paean to the multi

ple produtions of the OneI turn nally to the Cinema volumes , on whih Badiou draws frequentlyin Te Clamor of Bein While paked with disussions of ases" partiular lms or bodies of inemati work by partiular diretors - two methodologial features are disernible e rst bears on the inema as suDespite the fat that both volumes are paked with disussions of speilms (whih might perhaps be onsidered ases" in B adiou's sense), not tomention the elebrated ommentaries on Bergson, Deleuze is not interested

in bringing all of these ases in line with any aount of the One Rather, andthis is a point that even a ursory examination reveals, both Cinema boospresent a omplex and ramied taxonomy of inemati signs Indeed, theoriginal prefae of Te Moement Imae begins with the following words is study is not a history of the inema It is a taxonomy, an attempt at thelassiation of images and s igns" (MI xix) e ategories of movementimage and timeimage are themselves general ategories in this taxonomy,whih the respetive books deal with in terms of the many subsidiary at

egories beneath them and their interrelations and transformations he seond feature onerns the relationship between philosophy and

inema, and thus more diretly engages with Badiou's laims about Deleuzesmethod In wellknown passages at the lose of Te ime Imae, Deleuzemakes expliit the relationship he thinks holds between inema and philosophial thought

40

For many people, philosophy is something whih is not madebut is preexistent, readymade in a prefabriated sky However,philosophial theory is itself a pratie, just as muh as its objetIt is no more abstrat than its objet. It is a pratie of onepts ,and it must be judged in light of the other praties with whihit interferes A theory of inema is not about" inema, but aboutthe onepts that inema gives rise to and whih are themselvesrelated to other onepts orresponding to other praties, the

pratie of onepts in general having no privilege over others,



METOD

an more than one objet has over others. It is at he level of theinterferene of man praties that man things happen, beings,images, onepts, ever kind of event. (I 280tm)

A ke term here is interfere It desribes the manner in whih Deleuzeenvisages the relationship between philosoph and inema, and presages thetreatment of the interrelations between philosoph, siene and art in Whatis Philosoph? and in a dierent wa, Te Fol Philosoph qua thought -is not inferior, subsequent and onsequent (as it is for Badiou himself) norsuperior to the artisti pratie of the inema, but is engaged in a omplex

relationship through whih the two disourses trouble eah other. Beauseof this, there is no question that inema and more speiall inematiimages ould be grist for the mill of a Deleuzean philosoph oriented aroundthe One, where philosoph would depart from ertain images as a ase: theinterferene between the two is irreduible and perennial.

Considering these three examples all of them signiant works inDeleuzes oeure, as Badiou himself aknowledges we thus note that noneof them onform to Badious general piture of the double trajetor of

the movement of intuition between the Man and the One, the ase andBeing. Not onl do the dier from eah other, a not insigniant point thatannot be pursued here, but the all present modes of thought that dwell onthe matter at hand - perhaps from an unusual or biased perspetive - andelaborate on that matter from within. e lous of the thought at work inNetzsche an Philosoph, in Derence an Repetition and in the Cinemaworks is to be found within Nietzshe, within the omplex histor of estern thought, within inema, and not beond it in a supereminent unit of

being.

A CONFICT BETWEEN FORM AND CONTENT IN THE CLAMOR O BING

Before passing to the rst of the nominal pairs that Badiou takes to be exemplar of Deleuzes thought, one nal point must be emphasized. hateverthe extent to whih Badious aount of Deleuzes method seems a poor t ,the intuitive method, as Badiou presents it, is both of a piee with the fundamental thesis of his reading ( the suprema of the philosop heme of Being asOne), and quite oherent. However, when we examine Te Clamor of Beinitself, it is not aording to his assertions about this method that Badiouproeeds . Of the four hapters that omplete the bod of the book after theaount of method, onl the rst deals with a nominal pair arraed aross thesupposedl fundamental division of Being (fundamental One)Simulara

(tional Multiple), whih deals with the famous Deleuzean ouplet of the

41



BDIOU'S DELEUZE

vrtual and the atual. The subsequent hapters onsder only half of eahpar, the half devoted to the One Te Clamor of Being s thus somewhatparadoxal n struture: more gven to a repetton of Badous entral thessthan to readng Deleuze aordng to the method that the former lams tohave found there. Tat s, whle the vrtual-atual dvson lnes up qutewell wth Badous thrd thess, the three subsequent pars (tme-truth, eternal return-hane, the fold-thought) all pertan to the One and not ts multple smularul eervesene on Badous own aount.

However, even n the lght of ths pont, and the devatons that markthe gap between Deleuzes explt aounts of ntuton and method and

Badous haraterzaton of them, t s poss ble that Badous analyss aurately aounts for Deleuzes projet on the level of ts operatve onepts . Inother words, whle nothng n Deleuze seems to expltly arm the superemnene of the One, nor the use of a global method for the armaton ofths One, t s possble that the key onepts that anmate the Deleuzeanorpus are nonetheless marked by the gure of an ultmate uned Beng.Te valdty of Badous analyss must therefore be tested wth respet topartular ases . he ases n queston are the objets of the four hapters of

Te Clamor of Being, whh form ts most detaled readngs of the Deleuzeancorpus, and whh are devoted, as we have seen, to four pars of onepts. Its thus nall only on the areful onsderaton of these analyses that a nalassessment an be made of Badous Deleuze.

42



E L

Te heart of Badious reading of Deleuze is found in his reconstruction andcritique of Deleuzes virtual-actual distinction Indeed the assertion thatVirtual is without any doubt the principal name of Being in Deleuzeswork" (DCB 43/65) makes clear an important touchstone of Badious reading namely that while he thinks that Deleuzes philosophy unfolds by wayof a series of hierarchical pairs these pairs are organized hierarchically As a

result it is no surprise to nd numerous repetitions of the claims about thevirtual-actual distinction throughout e Clamor of Bein, even when it isnot this distinction as such that is at issue

There is no doubt that the concept of the virtual is an important conceptin Deleuze Should we try to oer a preliminary denition of the virtualhowever we nd ourselves within a thicket of problems one of which seemsparticularly pressing The term virtual" can be found at numerous pointsin Deleuzes work beginning with the early texts on Bergson in the 1950s

through Derence an Repetition, and up to and including his nal articleImmanence: A Life Between these various presentations of the virtualhowever there are diplacements in the sense of the term its precise rolein the given text and the conceptual terrain within which it is located Insome cases these displacements seem minor but in others the dierencesare striking and even puzzling As with many of Deleuzes key concepts itwould seem that we should no longer speak of a general and homogenousdenition but rather to borrow an apt turn of phrase that Joe Hughes(2009a 75) uses in relation to the concept of the body without organs - akind of narrative or life story of the virtual

Nonetheless Badiou adopts the global approach to the concept in TeClamor of Bein, dening the virtual by including elements from a numberof disparate presentations of the concept in particular those in Derencean Repetition, e ime mae and at is Philosophy, but without inany way distinguishing them Such a homogenizing reading is in keeping

with his view that Deleuzes metaphysics is monotonous" (DCB 14/25 ) in

43



BDIOU S DELEUZE

nature. And yet in approahing the onept of the virtual on the basis of thisassumption muh is obsured. It would seem that Badiou makes an interpretive deision before examining the material in question. Here at least Deleuzes putative monoton is a prorustean bed providing the means tolop o those laims that do not t the interpretive shema.

is hapter will not attempt a thorough genealogial approah to the virtual in Deleuzes philosoph. Instead I would like primarily to examine whatis a deisive text in Deleuzes various eluidations of the virtual hapter fourof Derence an Repetition This text is not only the lengthiest expliit treatment but also provides the most omprehensive set of onnetions between

one of Deleuzes aounts of the virtual and what he onsiders to be its preursors in other writers and it forms a part of what i s one of the ke worksin Deleuzes oeuvre other aspets of whih we shall engage with later in relation to time and thought Suh an approah also avoids egregious redutivetendenies suh as Badiou puts in play

BADIOU'S R CONSRUCION O F HE VIRUA-ACUA DISINCION

Let me begin by presenting a summary of Badious argument on this pointwhih for all its brevity is not alwas lear He begins by asserting thatDeleuzes philosophy like his own is not a ritial projet in the Kantiansense (and is therefore lassial [DB 45/69] ) , being instead a metaphysis of the ground where the term ground an legitimately be given tothat whih is determined as the real basis of singular beings" (DB 45/68) Badiou then asserts that the virtual on Deleuzes aount is the ground

of the atual. Reling on the haraterization of the plane of immanenein What is Philosophy? - and on the disussions of this topi in his orrespondene with Deleuze - Badiou goes on to assert the absolute preprediative givenness" (DB 46/70) of the virtual its priority not just inrelation to being but also in relation to thought the virtual here is theground as the there is preeding all thought" (DB 46/70). And in turnand on the basis of this analysis Badiou proeeds to oer a ritial summary of the virtual thus grasped as primordial rrun of the atual onethat reapitulates many of his broader laims about the OneMultiplestruture

(i) The virtual as ground is the Being of beings or its immanent power. Assuh the atual atual beings or existents are produts or reations -indeed they are simulara" (DB 49/74)

(ii ) The virtual must not be onfused with the possible beause it is fully

real - its reality resides in its dnami ageny

44



TE VIRTUL

(iii) Te virtual is in no way indeterminate; it is fully determined, and alsodetermining, once with respect to the actual, and once with respect toitself Virtualities probleatize other virtualities

(iv) Te virtual and the actual cannot be radically separated they are twohalves of every object, but also the two composite images of eachimage Here Badiou sees the stumbling block for the theory of the virtual" (DB 5 1 /78 ) : the virtual cannot be an image, since it is the productive power that brings images about (the virtual cannot itself bean image" [DB 52/78] ) .

(v) e virtual and the actual are in fact indiscernible Te fact, conse

quently, that the virtual is completely determined means that the actualis essentially indetermined Te more Deleuze attempts to wrest thevirtual from irreality, indetermination, and nonobjectivity, the oreirreal, indeterminate, and nally nonobjective the actual (or beins)becomes" (DB 53/81 ) .

In conclusion, Badiou argues that the heroic eort" (DB 53 /80) constitutedby Deleuze 's attempt to unfold an ontology of the virtual is doomed to failure

In this trajectory of thought, the wo is established in the placeof the One And when the only way of saving - despite everything - the One, is by resorting to an unthinkable wo, the indiscernibility is beyond remedy, and the reconciling and obscuremetaphor of the mutual imae' one says to oneself that, mostdecidedly, the virtual is no better than the nalit of which it is aversion (DB 53/81)

Before returnin to these characterizations more thoroughly and, indeed,more critically, one cannot help but notice something peculiar about Badiou's line of argument in this nal statement it comes to the conclusion that,all things considered, Deleuze's philosophy of the One is in fact a philosophy of the wo Te claim that Deleuze is a philosopher of the One seemsto lose traction at the point considered as essential by Badiou himself Ifthe theory of the virtual commits Deleuze to an irremediable split in his

ontology, surely an assiduous reading of his philosophy ought take this intoaccount, and present it as an unreconstructed dualis?

KAN, AION AND HE EAPHYSICS OF HE CACUUS

I turn now to Derence an Repetition in order to briely present a number

of orientating points for the discussion to follow As I have noted above, it is

45



BDOU' DEEUE

in chapter four, Te Ideal Synthesis of Dierence' that the most importantand concentrated presentation of the virtual is to be found

hile Deleuze draws on many references in his notorious chapter, thereare arguably three principal articulations with other thinkers Kant's Critiqueof Pure Reason the philosophy of Maimon (Kant's important contemporaryand critic); and mathematics, specically the dierential calculus Here I shalladdress, in outline and with an eye to Badiou's reading, each of these three

Kan

Kant's presence in Deleuze's work is profound and longstanding, extendingwell beyond his excellent summary Kant Critical Philosophy Even AntiOeipus, that supposed grimoire of anarchy, includes an important if heavilymodied use of synthesis in the Kantian mode, to the extent that Deleuzehimself encourages us to read this work as a sort of Critique of Pure Reasonfor the unconscious" (DRF 28) In the fourth chapter of Derence anRepetition, however, Deleuze lays out the central rafts of his critical reap

propriation of Kant, which is focused on the Kantian theory of Ideas (whileelsewhere in Derence an Repetition also engaging with the doctrine ofthe faculties and the schemata in Kant's philosophy) Tis theory is a centralaspect of the rst Critique in so far as this work involves reassessing the roleof reason and its capacity to engage with objects of thought that have noexperiental correlate For Kant, the goal of such a reassessent is to properlylocate the activity of reason by, on the one hand, establishing the boundaryof reason's activity isis experience, and, on the other, to maintain that

reason does play a positive, if nonconstitutive, role Deleuze's goal, in turn,will be to take up and radicalize this already radical Kantian theory of Ideasin order to provide a theory of what he will call the virtual

Te central characteristic of Kant's conception of Ideas for Deleuze is theirproblematic status The opening passage of the rst edition preface of theCritique of Pure Reason is exemplary Human reason has this peculiar fatethat in one species of its knowledge it is burdened by questions which, as prescribed by the very nature of reason itself, it is not able to ignore, but which,as transcending all its powers, it is also not able to answer" (PR Avii)

Tis passage already indicates the nature of reason itself, which is, asDeleuze puts it, the faculty of posing problems in general (DR 168/218)Later, we read i n the ranscendental Dialectic that a concept of Reason mustbe considered as a "problem to which there is no solution" (PR A328/B38;cf A646/B64) What do these characterizations mean for Kant himselUnlike the concepts of the understanding, which, along with the spatiotem

poralized manifold of sensation provided by sensibility, constitutes experience

46



THE VIRTUA

in the womb of the magination on Kant's account, the oncepts of reasonwhat Kant calls Ideas - are regulative in nature.6 They provide the means by

which accumulated knowledge can be structured, a means that sensibility andthe understanding cannot themselves engineer.Now, in what sense are Ideas, for Kant, problems without solutions , that

is, intrinsically problematic? Ideas, taken as regulative concepts, in posinghorizons or orientations for the systematization of knowledge, are not themselves part of experience . G od, totality and the soul never receive the stampof the real. Like Gatsby's green light, they serve as a focal point towards whicexperience gestures or accumulates for example, the Idea of the world, or

totality, s erves to organize or orient the multiplicity of scientic endeavour)the various particular epistemic claims that arise through experience, whiletotality as such remains beyond the reach of scientic investigation. hatever advances take place with respect to the growth of knowledge, the Ideaof totality is always gesturing for more, repeating its question, always luringthe investigator on towards the next experiment.

Thus and this is a point I shall return to below) Ideas have an irreduciblyindeterminate aspect, like an object that is missing a part that can never be

ultimately replaced except by a series of surrogates, each in turn superseded.It is also why Kant, and then Deleuze, will insist that Ideas are intrinsicallyproblematic in nature. It is also the basic means by which the latter will characterize the virtual as the regime of problematic Ideas .

Problematic" must therefore be understood in this case in a way thatdeviates from its common acceptation. There is nothing negative in the Ideathat makes it problematic . Problematicity is an object ive feature of Ideas, astructural or formal determination. Rather than being problems that do not

yet have solutions, the problem of the receptivity of light, for example, issolved or rather resolved in various contexts eyes of arious kinds, antennae, etc . ), but is never solved once and for all.

Problematic" does not only mean a particularly important species of subjective acts, but a dimension of objectivity as suchwhich is occupied by these acts. An object outside experiencecan be represented only in problematic form; this does not meanthat Ideas have no real object, but that problems qua problemsare the real objects of Ideas . DR 1 6tm21)

As we shall later see, in the process of actualization or the advent of solutions, in this context), the virtual problematic Idea tends to b e obscured, atheme discussed throughout our examination of the virtual. Tat is, actualization is attended by a transcendental illusion, in which the instance of the

solution obscures the being and the role of the problem in its constitution.

4



BDU' DE EUZE

Maimon

These schemaic remarks alread lead us he hough of SolomonMaimon. hile working wihin he broadly undersood framework ofcriical ranscendenal philosophy, Maimon subjecs he Kanian sysem oa number of severe criiques. e shall focus here on he criical aiudehe adops owards he regulaive accoun of Ideas Te Kanian accoun ofranscendenal philosophy proceeds on he basis of wha Deleuze calls ahypoheical mode of reasoning, since i aims o esablish he condiionsfor possible experience. Maimon (in his Humean mode, according o which

he idenies himself as an empirical scepic' in conradisincion wih heempirical realism Kan aliaes himself wih in he Refuaion of Idealism[PR B24]) objeced ha, even should he Kanian sysem be inernallycoheren, we sill have no way of esablishing wheher or no i in facapplies; i may be, indeed, ha he enire apparaus of he Criique is nohing bu a casle loaing midair. ha ranscendenal philosophy ough oaspire o do, for Maimon, is provide an accoun of he real condiions ofacual experience Tis is why Deleuze insiss ha Maimon's genius lies in

showing how inadequae he poin of view of condiioning is for a ranscendenal philosophy" (DR 13225 )

Now, Maimon's remarkable - neoLeibnizian - soluion o he defacoquesion of genesis involves arguing ha experience is generaed wihinhough nd he geneic elemens a he roo of his process are Ideas, heprinciples for he explanaion of he genesis of objecs" (Beiser 18 28 )I f we ake Leibniz's example of he sound of he sea , a n example ofenreurned o by Deleuze, we can say ha he wave as an objec of experience

is not given as such, bu is raher a sum or composiion of he many inniesimally small peies percepions, he noise of each drople crashing on hebeach, and ha his composiion akes p lace in hinking isel. Furhermore- and he sense and signicance of his claim will become clear laer in hischaper hese Ideas mus be hough of as dierenial in naure. Everyobjec of experience is generaed according o he inegraion of he dierenial relaions ha hold among hese many inniesimal ideal elemens.

How do es his accoun of Ideas as geneic dierenial principles explain hegenesis of objecs in hough? For Maimon, Ideas are no ideals' no formsin he Plaonic sense , bu raher ranscendenal rules for he consiuion ofidealies in hinking In he words of Samuel Alas, hey are he ulimaelawful relaions of obje cs" ( 164 62) Te genesis of a cerain experience ofhe colour red, for example, involves he synheic inegraion of he dierenial reaions in he regime of colour, producing he experience a s a resul.

In sum, hen, Maimon's criical reassembly of he Kanian paradigm as we

have very briey and parially presened i here leads o wo consequences

48



HE VIRU

for the theory of Ideas that Deleuze will take up i Ideas are elements in theprodution of experiene, and not merely the regulation of these produts they are genetic in nature; and ii Ideas are neither thoughts nor ideal andxed forms, but transendental dierential strutures

e need only add two deviations from Maimon instituted by Deleuzebefore mentioning the latter's use of the alulus e rst takes i ssue withMaimon's theory of the faulties In solving another of the problems posedby Kant's philosophy the se eming impossibility of aounting for the muniation of the two radially dierent faulties of the sensibility and theunderstanding, Maimon in his Leibniz ian mode ollapses the wo into the

understanding, grasping sensation as a degraded or inferior at of intelletion Likewise, he does away with the faulty of reason, loating Ideas thegeneti instanes of experiene within the understanding For Deleuze , thisis an unaeptable solution ot only does it bring its own problems withit, we a n also see how it reinstates a ertain peuliar form o f ommonsense, in so far as it assures the internal harmony of all thought, whih wouldtake plae within the single ordered regime of an innite understandingAs Deleuze forefully argues in hapter three of Derence and Repetition,

one we disard the unquestioned assumption of native faulties in thinking,and ask ourselves about the advent of spei apait ies, we are led to onlude that this advent has no relationship to other existing faulties, beingthe produt of a violent and irreduible enounter, and onsequently mustmaintain a disjuntive and nonharmoniously violent relationship with otherfaulties o loate the geneti elements of experiene within a single faultyis to one and for all exlude hange from the world, imagining a peaeful ifpenumbral and mournful, for Maimon silene at the heart of being

e seond dierene between Deleuze and Maimon is more signiant, even if it is not as well marked on the surfae of the Deleuzean textMaimon, following Kant, is onerned prinipally with the twinned issuesof experiene and knowledge His Essay thus begins with a reformulation ofthe question of a priori knowledge, whih Kant also introdues in the opening pages of the rst ritique the famous syntheti a priori)Y For Deleuze,however, muh more is at stake e goals of a geneti transendental philosophy extend further than aounting for knowledge and experiene, butfor reality as suh, inluding knowledge and experiene but no longer limited to them Now, it is true that suh a projet is not entirely anathea toMaimon, but this is beause of his Leibnizian idealism, whereby the experiene-knowledge pair exhausts the fundamental range of being, reali ty be ingentirely ideal in harater Deleuze, though, is not an idealist in the Maimonian mould, and is fored therefore in the diretion of a transendental empiriism apable of explaining not just phenomenal manifestation but

sensible reality itself

49



BDIO S DELEUZE

Dierential calclu

Finally, let us turn to Deleuzes use of dierential calculusB e status of thecalculus in his work can be summed up in the following fashion it providesa decisive, rigorous and structurally complex means to adequately think andrichly detail the nature of the constitutive problematic ideas espoused anddeveloped through the encounter with Kant and Maimon's metaphysics, butbeyond the connes of both Kant's subjectoriented thought calculus provides a means to think problems as such, without reference to any surfaceof experience) and Maimons error at the level of the doctrine of the facul

ties calculus provides a way to think problems as such, without any need tohave recourse to a preexistent facultative framework) Te introduction of this branch of mathematics into the discussion i s, in

the rst instance, provided with reference to three earlier thinkers Maimonhimself, Hone ronski and Jean BordasDesmoulin Furthermore, they areintroduced not as mathematicians, but as members of what Deleuze callsan esoteric history of dierential philosophy" DR 10/221) In the samepassage, he will indicate that a great deal of heart and a great deal of truly

philosophical naivety is needed in order to take the symbol dx seriously"DR 10/22 1 ) Both remarks call for comment by way of introduction

ith respect to a dierential philosophy, framed by reference to thisobscure trinity, it is clear that in comparison with Badiou's use of set theory,Deleuze's use of the innitesimal calculus will be marked by a greater distance from a strictly intramathematical deployment Indeed, we would beright in characterizing it as a kind of creative and critical reconstruction ofthe history of the calculus, one that highlights features of this history that

will be of particular use in his own dierential philosophy, and in part icularin his construction of the concept of the virtual as we nd it in Derenceand Repetition .

ith respect to the second citation, we nd here the reference to the keyelement of Deleuzes reconstruction of the calculus dx itself Let us recallthat dierential calculus is, to adopt for a moment its elementary geometrical formulation, that mathematical method used to derive the function ofthe tangent of a prior function at a given point on the graph of that function, which is to say the gradient of a tangent at any point of the function inquestion As is well known, both Newton and Leibniz introduced independent formulations of this method nonetheless , for both thinkers, and for thequotidian understanding of the calculus, the process of dierentiation movesrom the function to the derivative or dierential relation, which is to say thatthe dierential is subsequent indeed, literally derived) from the function

Departing from these early modern points of origin, the history of math

ematics has considered dierential calculus in a series of more complex

50



THE VITU

ways In particular, this history departed from the belief, held by bothewton and Leibniz in dierent ways, that the calculus is inextricably boundup with innitesimal quantities his was, in short, because the calculationof the gradient of a tangent for a variable function (ie a function that is notitse lf a straight line) involved for them the approximation of the derivativee can already see why this is so with reference to the crude case introduced above hat is being sought is eectively the rate or ratio of change,which the calculus supplies through the dierentiation of a function at apoint hence the intuitively paradoxical yet mathematically rigorous foulation sometimes used to characterize the goal of dierentiation with respect

to changes in speed the measure of an instntneous rate of change Thefact that dierential calculus was inextricably bound up with innitesimalquantities for Leibniz in particular is due to the fact that what dierentiationactually produces is the rate of change, not of an instant or a xed point ona curve, but of an innitely small portion of the curve, or an innitely shortperiod of time Tese innitesimals were dened as smaller than any givennumber, without being equal to zero

Now, while Leibniz had no trouble invoking strange, intriguing and

apparently paradoxical notions in his philosophy, the postulation of suchinnitely small quantities sat uncomfortably with many of the early readers of his work on dierential and integral calculus , the most wellknownexample being, of course, George Berkeley, whose empiricist repudiationof the innitesimal in Te Anlyst includes the famous rhetorical question May we not call them the Ghosts of departed Quantities? (1345). In the nineteenth century, mathematicians worked to nd an alternative way of formulating the method of dierential calculus while dispos

ing of these problematic quantities, a movement that began with BernardBolzano and Augustin auchy and reached its terminus in the work ofKarl eierstrass, the key gure in the e limination of the innitesimal fromanalysis eierstrass's means of excluding the innitesimal from the calculus involved replacing the implied dynaic movement of approximationwith the postulation of a static limit He did this by eecting a shift in theterrain on which dierential calculus operated In Simon Du's words , foreierstrass

[I ] t was necessary for the idea of a function, as a curve in theartesian plane dened in terms of the motion of a point, to becompletely replaced with the idea of a function that is, rather,a set of ordered pairs of real numbers e geometric idea ofapproaching a limit had to be replaced by an arithmetised concept of limit that relied on static logical constraints on numbers

alone (2004 202)

5 1



BDIOU S DEEUZE

In other words, eierstrass's reformulation did away at one with thenecessity to refer to any ambient eometrical framework, any movementor dynamism, and any reliance on the notion f innitesimals Instead, thefunction and the tanent both are ured entirely in terms of ordered setsof real numbers, entirely static a method, borrowin terminoloy fromauchy, that eierstrass called the epsilondelta method is methodprovided the foundation for all formal accounts of the nature and functionof the dierential calculus up until the work of Abraham Robinson, whosework on nonstandard analysis provided an alternative riorous (althouhnot uncontroversial method

Deleuze takes on board a number of these developments in his metaphysical account of the calculus, and enaes in a double inversion of thecommon interpretatin of the calculus in accordance with them In therst case, he will aree with the elimination of the innitesimal qua innitely small quantity from the thouht of the dierential calculus, but withan important caveat On this he is explicit it is a mistake to tie the valueof the symbol dx to the existence of innitesimals" (DR 10/221 Laterhe writes, in reconition of this series of historical developments, that t]

he interpretation of the dierential calculus has indeed taken the form ofaskin whether innitesimals are real or ctive From the beinnin, however, other issues were also involved" (DR 16/228 In sum, Deleuze areeswith eierstrass that innitesimal quantities , indeed, have no part to play ina riorous formulation of the calculus, nor by extension in his metaphysicsof the calculus or a dierential philosophy

This does not mean in turn that the dierential itself has no ontoloical status at all for Deleuze Rather, it is by insistin on the dierential as a

decis ive ontoloical cateory that we becoe able to arrive at an acceptablealternative formulation of the relationship between the dierential and quantiy (the rlationship that is explicitly marked by Deleuze [DR 244/3 14]and whch, in broad terms, is the concern of the nal two decisive chaptersof Derece ad Repetitio ) In relation to the material we have just seen onKant and Maimon, it is easy to see exactly where this ontoloical status ofthe calculus wll be located Neither real nor ctive, dierentials express thenature of a problematic as such" (DR 18 /23 1

Te second key move Deleuze will make is aain indebted to eierstrass,who reoriented or rather inverted the relationship between the dierentialand the function Tis is to say, a point once more emphasized by Duy,that Deleuze adopts a dierential point of view of the calculus, rather thanthe point of view aorded by the function As Duy puts it, [accordinto D eleuze's readin of the innitesimal calculus from the dierential pointof view, a function does not precede the dierential relation, but rather

is determined by the dierential relation" (2004 204 onsequently, [t]

52



HE VIRUL

he dierential relation is used to determine the overall shape of the curveof a function primarily by determining the number and distribution of itsdistinctive points, which are points of articulation where the nature of thecurve changes or the function alters its behaviour" (ibid 203-4)

Beyond these two very schematic points, Deleuze adds a third, whichbears on the nature of relations between dierentials hile formulatedin terms of a fraction, the relation dydx does not gure a ratio or quotient the understanding of the relation held by Leibniz, for example In onesense, this follows from the antiquantitative reading of the calculus indicated above Deleuze writes e relation dydx is not like a fraction estab

lished between particular quanta in intuitin, but neither is it a generalrelation between variable algebraic magnitudes or quantities Each termexists exclusively in relation to the other" (DR 172tm/223)Y The upshot ofthis point is that the being of dx or dy is in itself indeterminate, requiring relations with other dierentials to obtain a minimal level of determination In other words, we must speak of dierentials not as ideal objects ,but as relational all the way down' and indeed as elements in a relationalmultiplicity

It is worth pausing to note the irony, therefore, contained in one ofDeleuze's famous denitions, according to which the elementary principle of empiricism is that relations are external to their terms, since this isprecisely what this reading of the dierential relation presents us with emost signicant theoretical resource that is marshalled in he support of thisthesis anywhere in Deleuze's work is not a reference to A reatise of Humanature to the empiricisms of Bertrand Russell (who is often invoked alongside this thesis) or illia James It is rather the dierential calculus, and its

metaphysical extrapolation, that lies at the root of the most rigorous formulation of Deleuze's transcendental empiricism

In sum, then, Deleuze considers dierential calculus to provide, inDaniel Smith's words the primar mathematical tool we have at ourdisposal to explain the nature of reality, the nature of the real - the conditions of the rea (2007 14) This is the case in so far as (i) we conceiveof the dierential, in the wake of eierstrass, as the logically prior geneticinstance, rather than a derivative product; (ii) we conceive of the dierential without any intrinsic reference to quantity, including the innitely smallquantities of the Leibnizian innitesimal; and (iii) that we conceive dierentials as irreducibly relational in nature, which is to say individuated onlyin relation to one another All these points will be replayed in a numberof ways in the nal two chapters of Derence and Repetition evidence ofwhich we shall see in what follows And it is this way of thinking dierential calculus that will lead to one of the more striking passages in Derence

and Repetition :

53



BD/OUS DELEUZE

If Ideas are the dierentials of thought, there is a dierential alulus orresponding to eah Idea, an alphabet of what it meansto think Dierential alulus is not th unimaginative alulusof the utilitarian, the rude arithmeti of alulus whih subordinates thought to other things or to other ends, but the algebraof pure thought, the superior irony of problems themselves - theonly alulus beyond good and eil (DR 181-2/236)

These points p resent us with some basi elements that Deleuze wil l transform into his theory of the virtual in Derence and Repetition, and whih

will form important touhpoints in what follows In sum, the irtual is thetransendental regime of dierential Ideas, whih operate as problematimoments - ideal grains of sand in the shells of oysters - in the onstitutionof material reality and the experiene of it is onstitutive ision is underpinned not by referene to a fundamental subjetivity, whether that of a rescogitans, an idealist self in the mode of either Kant or Fihte, but rather to aframework provided by a metaphysial reading of the alulus from the differential point of iew

With this preliminary expliation in hand, we an turn to Badiou's ownvepart haraterization of the virtual

THE VIRTUA AND HE GROUND

We start with Badiou's openin laim, that despite Deleuze's philosophialpunning" on the onept of ground, there is a oneption of the ground in

Deleuze, and this ground is the virtual an the virtual be dened as theground of the atual" (DB 42/65 )?

The theme of the ground is an often overlooked but in fat very importantpart of the argument of Derence and Repetition, even if its most expliitdisussion on its own terms is to be found in the onlusion Tere are,Deleuze argues, two harateristis of the ground On the one hand, teground, properly understood, rises to the surfae" (DR 28/44) Somethingof the ground rises to the surfae, without assuming any form but, rather,insinuating itself between the forms a formless base, an autonomous andfaeless existene Te ground whih is now on the surfae is alled depthor groundlessness" (DR 25/352) Tere are a number of aspets of thisharaterization that I shall leave as ide, but we must at the very least assertthat the ground learly annot be haraterized as a transendene, but mustrather be thought of as the regie of immanent determination In plae ofthe insistene that there must be a ground that is substantial (Spinoza) , ideal

(Plato) or takes the form of a subjetie at (Desartes in one respet, Fihte

54



TE VIRTU

in another), Deleuze will insist that we only grasp the ground in its fundamental operation when we realize that it precisely undoes all of these unities,unmooring them from any xed reference point, casting them adrift in themost profound way

On the other hand, the ground must not only be able to provide sucientreason as such - that is, an account of the nature of determination in sofar as it makes the dierence" (DR 2/3) but also provide the sucientreason for that which obscures it, namely the regime of identity or the actualis is what characterizes D eleuze's project in Derence and Repeiion as agenetic philosophy, in so far as critique is extended to the point where even

what is subject to critique can still be accounted for on the genetic level, apoint that is emphasized in relation to the way Deleuze thins the relationship between ground and ungrounding in his theory of time, as we shal l see

Tis is why Deleuze claims that, while something of the ground" isaligned with groundlessness or determination, the ground per se is caughtup in a much more complex torsion In a striking passage, Deleuze presentsthe topology of the ground in the following terms

ucien reason or he round is sranel ben: on the onehand, it leans towards what it grounds, towards the forms ofrepresentation on the other hand, it turns and plunges into agroundlessness beyond the ground which resists all forms andcannot be represented If dierence is the ance, Ariadne, thenit passes from Teseus to Dionysus, from the grounding principle to the universal ungrounding' (DR 25/3)

at is, the ground as such, the regime of determination is bivalen In onerespect it nds itse lf attracted by the representation that it grounds' tending towards a fall into the grounded' but in another it constitutes an originary groundlessness (DR 2/351). Thus, to employ a famous Leibnizianphilosopheme, identity and dierence are both grounded, where the latter isgrounded in being itself (or rather, is be g itself) while the former is a wellgrounded illusion or ction, what Kant ould come to call a transcendentalillusion Or, rather, dierence itself is the ground of identity, the multiplicitous fog on which islands are grounded, whose clarity mistakes the nature ofthe fog to which it owes its raio exisendi

Ground, understood as both immanent and bivalent, is th a keyDeleuzean concept, or rather Deleuze's formulation of the ground is whatexpresses central set of convictions it is only when the ground is considered as immanent, and as that which grounds both representation and whatis beyond all representation, that an adequate metaphysics is possible Al l of

Deleuze's critical remarks found in Derence and Repeiion in particular

55



BiOU S EEUZE

an be phrased in relation to this double requirement Neither Hegel (intrinsially) nor Leibni (extrinsially, thanks to his theologial ommitments,

what Badiou alls his popish theology") mange to make the ground immanet, even though they both aount for the ground as the ground of bothrepresentation and what exeeds it Aristotle makes the opposite error, forin his thought the ground is indeed immanent (the immanene of form tomatter), but the oneptual nature of the ground here only aounts forrepresentation (what is grasped by onepts) and not what exeeds themPlato fails on both ounts the ground is transendent (the Ideas as selfidentil moments of transendene, or what Gilles htelet [25 263]

alled oups de transendane"), and annot aount for what exeedsrepresentation (the simulara) e ase of Kant is, however, the most striking his philosophy is an inredible mixture of bold new attempts to raisethe ground to the surfae, whih is to say banish transendene ( Kant is theone who disovers the prodigious domain of the transendental He is theanalogue of a great explorer - not of another world, but of the upper andlower reahes of this one" [DR 1 35 16] ) , whih is nonetheless distorted byremnants of transendene (the ategories, the thinginitself, the unques

tioned status of geometrial extension visvis sensible experiene, andin general the derivation of the soalled transendental aspets of experiene from the empirial) In turn, while representations dominate Kant'saount of the pos sibility of experiene, Ideas as problemati instanes thatgive sense to this experiene are irreduible to this shema, themselves nonrepresentational and anempirial

me as gund

Having arrived at an outline o f Deleue's theory of the ground as immanentand bivalent determination, we already seem at a distane from Badiou'ssomewhat anaemi aount At the very least we see that the grund annotbe oneived n terms of a substantial dept or height However, a moreimportant point should be registered ithout moving too far into the teritory of a later hapter, we should ask ourselves to what Deleue i s referringwhile making these points what answers to the name of ground in Deleue?e answer is ime. It is time that, or Deleue, is bivalent, lending its syntheses to the establishment of an order of good and ommon sense, and atthe same time subjeting his order to a radial overturning or ungrounding e synheses of habit and memory work to reate and onserve astable surfae, while the disjuntive synthesis onstituted by the eternalreturn undermines this stability us we an reall wellknown passages

suh as the following

56



THE VIRTU

The rst synthesis, that of habit, is truly the foundation on-ation] of time, but we must distinguish the foundation fromthe ground onement] Habit is the foundation of time, themoving soil occupied by the passing present The clai of thepresent is precisely that it passes However, it is hat causesthe present to pass, that to which the present and abit belong,which must be considered the ground onement] of time Teground of time is Memory DR tm 08)

In turn, it would be hard to avoid noticing that Deleuze's punning" on

the theme of ungrounding (eonement) , as Badiou calls it, is always andonly ever undertaken in the name of the eternal return the ground has beensuperseded by a groundlessness, a universal ungrouning which turns uponitself and causes only the yettocome to return" DR 1tm23)

All these points will need to be supplemented in what follows, but weare certainly in a position to assess Badiou's claim that the virtual plays therole of the ground in D eleuze and the implications of this claim First of all,this assertion nds no support in the text, where the posting of foundation

and ground, their interrelation, and their concomitant ungrounding" areall concepts relative to the temporal orde It may be objected that, sinceBadiou equates both the virtual and time with the One, this is a distinctionwithout a dierence Perhaps But while the equation of time and the Onein Deleuze will be examined in the next chapter, the least that can be said isthat Deleuze himself never assert s that the virtual is the ground of the actual

Second, we can see against the backdrop of this analysis the peculiarity ofBadiou's series of claims about the theory of the ground in Deleuze

) that the ground is repudiated by Deleuze due to its moral character;ii) that this restricted" or stereotypical conception of ground is an insuf

cient one;iii) that further, Deleuze himself has a more substantal though esoteric

view of the ground, which is the virtual

As we have just seen, the theory of the ground is in no way repudiatedby Deleuze in any form Nor is it fair to say that, thanks to its moral characte� it is repugnant to Deleuze Indeed, the very strength of Deleuzesgenetic theory of the ground is that it can account for the advent of conservative or moral structures themselves the bivalence of the ground) Thisis why Deleuze insists that to ground is always to ground representation"DR 24/351) o consider this theory of the ground hidden or esoteric isalso clearly mistaken, since the discussion of the ground relatie to time

is explicit and to be found throughout Derence an Repetition If it is a

57



DIOU'S DEEUZE

secret at all, it can only be a seet de Pohnee, a purloined letter thaBadiou, playing the role of the authorities, cannot see right in front of him,looking as he is for soething that is necessrily hidden All one can sa isthat, should D eleuze have an even more esoteric account of the ground, it iswell hidden indeed

VIRTUA POSSIBE REA DYNAMIC

The theme of the ground as Badiou accounts for it is not very revealing

e second of Badiou's claims, on the other hand, takes us to the heart ofthe Deleuzean text is claim has eectively two aspects Te rst remindsus of a perennial theme in Deleuze's discussions of the virtual, namely thedistinction between the virtual and the possible, and the dangers of confusing them Te second is that the virtual has in Deleuze a full reality unlikepossibility) , a reality that is manifest as dynamic agency e shall treat eachof these points in turn

The virtual and the possible

It is indeed decisive to grasp the distinction etween the virtual and the pos sible for Deleuze He is at pains to insist that this dierence, found alreadyin the two early pieces on Bergson in the 150s, [is not] a verbal disputeDR 211/23), but concerns two very dierent ontological pictures I havealready mentioned the critique of the possible as it is found at the start

of Begsonsm in the course of the elaboration of the method of intuitionTere, Deleuze argues that the problem with the category of the possibleis that it invokes a preexistent reality waiting in the wings' entirely realand yet lacking the singular quality of reality or rather supplemented bythis lack) One way to extract the ontological consequences of this is to saythat the category of possibility, of a possible world, for example, does notattain an ontological point of view, but only presumes in a hypothetical fashion that poss ibles have some relation to the world without explaining whatthis relation is Furthermore, the root of this presumption lies in the viewthat nonexistent realities resemble our own, submitting the thought of thevariety of being once more to an unjustied assumption of a fundamental regime of identity e might also invoke here the Maimonian or whatDeleuze, also thinking of Schelling, often simply refers to as postKantian)critique of the Kantian metaphysics of possible experience we may conceptualize alternative possibilities, but why should we dignify them with any

fundamental role in organizing actual reality?

58



THE VIRTU

This is why Deleuze will say, in a wellknown passage, that the onlydanger in all this is that the virtual could be confused with the possible" (D R11 /) It is also why Deleuze will always insist on the reality of the virtual;in the same passage, he writes that the virtual is not opposed to the real; itpossesses a full reality by itself" (DR 113)

However, Deleuze does not stop here, introducing the consequences ofdistinguishing virtual from possible, consequences that are decisive in thecurrent discussion He rites e possible and the virtual are further distinguished by the fact that one refers to the form of identity in the concept,whereas the other des ignates a pure multiplicity in the Idea which radically

excludes the identical as a prior condition" (D R 1 1- 1/3)

The vitual and multiplicity

Tis passage indicates a characteristic of the virtual that we have yet to introduce directly (although it was the point around which the earlier summariesof Deleuze's use of Maimon and the calculus revolve): its intrinsic multi

plicity Before I explain this, note the location of the virtual in this passagewith respect to the identity-multiplicity distinction Rather than falling onthe side of identity, which is what one would expect should Badiou's centralthesis be correct, it is identity that is associated with the po ssible insteadTus, for all his insistence on the importance of distinguishing the virtualand the possible in Deleuze, Badiou refuses and indeed contradicts thisimportant rule every ime he equates the virtual and a fundamental identity

hat exactly is the relationship between the virtual and multiplicity for

Deleuze? e following three points must be notedFirst, as is the case with every use of the term multiplicity to be found in

Deleuze's work (as we have already seen above) , its supposiion is meant as aradical foil to any return to identity, any gure of the One Indeed, Derenceand Repetition includes many wellknown passages to this eect, precisely inits discussion of the virtual:

Ideas are multiplicities every idea is a multiplicity or a varietyIn this Reimannian usage of the word multiplicity (taken up byHusser, and again by Bergson) the utmost importance must beattached to the substantive form: multiplicity must not designatea combination of the many and the one, but rather an organization belonging to the many as such, which has no need whatsoever of unity in order to form a system The one and the manyare concepts of the understanding which make up the overly

loose mesh of a distorted dialectic which proceeds by opposition

5



BOuts DELEUZE

e biggest sh pass through at the one is a multiplicity asBergson and Husserl showed) is enough to reject backtobackadjectival propositions of the oneman and the manyone type

DR 182/236)

And , since we know that the Idea being referred to here is nothing otherthan the gure of the virtual e virtual is the characteristic state ofIdeas" [DR 2 1 1 /23] ), it should be clear that Deleuze in Derence and Repetition will brook no equation of the virtual with the One. is is, of course,directly counter to Badiou's reading

e second and third points are both also indicated in the above citation,and concern structure or organization) and the dialectic roughout theaccount of the virtual in Derence and Repetition, Deleuze puts into play thelanguage of structure and, indeed, structuralism to account for the nature ofthe virtual From this structural point of view, we must, for Deleuze, see thevirtual as an irreducibly complex multiplicity of coexisting Ideas, themselvesirreducibly multiple in nature and distinguished from one another according to a set of determinations that we shall examine next)

e Idea is dened as a structure A structure or an Idea isa complex theme' an internal multiplicity - in other words, asystem of multiple, nonocalisable connections between dierential elements which is incarnated in real relations and actualterms DR 183 /23)

Furthermore, this structure can be locally characterized according to

detailed criteria, criteria that pertain not just to individual" Ideas but theirvarious ways of relating to one another

It may seem surprising to nd D eleuze invoking the thee of the dialecticin relation to the virtual Everyone knows' after all, that Deleuze 's thoughthas nothing in common with Hegel, and it would seem, therefore, that dialectics would be the enemy of Deleuze's theory of multiplicity on this basis;certainly, Badiou takes this approach in his discussion of the dialectic in TeClamor of Being, going so far as to begin his treatment of Deleuzean methodology under the heading n AntiDialectic" DB 3 1/4)

at the acceptance of this wrongheaded view marks even Badiou's textis a testament to the power of clich, for while it is certain that much inHegel's project is critiqued by Deleuze, he is unwilling to allow the concept ofdialectic to be discarded along with the teleology of innite representation atplay in the Hegelian form of dialectical holism Indeed a brief examinationofDerence and Repetition on the topic denstrates that it is the Platonic

dialectic that Deleuze is most concerned to refute and reappropriate see eg

60



HE VIRUA L

R -/1-5) is reappropriaion goes by way of an aemp o enirelyresiuae he scope of dialecics wihin he regime of he virual Deleuzeris: dialecic is he ar of problems and quesions, he combinaory orcalculus of problems as such" (DR 15/204), according o which Ideas areindividued by he dialecic relaions ha consiue hem: by dialecic'e do no mean any kind of circulaion of opposing represenaions whichould make hem coincide in he ideniy of a concep [as in Hegel ] , bu heproblem elemen insofar as his may be disinguished from he elemenof soluions" (DR 18/23 1 ) - which is o say, disinguished from he acual

aking hese ideas of srucure, sysem and dialecic ogeher wih he

noion of radical mulipliciy, we ge he following deniion of he virualIdea, which is helpful despie he fac ha i awais laer discussions for a fullexplicaion: The problemaic or dialecical Idea is a sysem of connecionsbeween dierenial elemens, a sysem of direnial relaions beweengeneic elemens" (DR 181 /23 5) e virual Idea mus, herefore, be characerized as an irreducible mulipliciy, a dierenial dialecical sysem

ow, he value of his discussion of hese hemes is ha i cal ls aeniono he abundance of srucural characerisics within the regime of the vir

tual, for Deleuze, far in excess of Badiou's accoun of he virual as a unaryemanaive One In fac, o mainain such a view involves overlooking aloshe enire accoun of he virual in Derence and Repetiton, which so heavily revolves around hese kinds of inernal complexiies I should add hawhile hese poins by hemselves are srong grounds for rejecing he ruhof Badiou's reading, he use of dierenial calculus by Deleuze o furhercharacerize he virual no o menion he accoun of deerminaionwihin he virual o which we shall shorly urn - also poins srongly in he

same direcion

e virtual and dynamic ageny

We are lef wih a erm ha Badiou adds o he virual-real pair, hich isha of agency He wries, in a ex ha echoes many ha we have alreadyseen in he previous chapers: e may sae ha he virual is (formally)

opposed o he acual, as long as we remember ha boh are real theformer as the dynamic agency of the One, he laer as simulacrum" (DB4/4, emphasis added)

Is he virual acive in his way for Deleuze? Le us noe rs ha he acivepassive pair plays an imporan role in Badiou's reading of Deleuze, one owhch I shall reurn direcly in he penulimae chaper below The issue here,hough, is more specic, since i concerns he deniion of he virual iself

e mus, herefore, also separae i from he quesion of acualizaion, which

61



BIOU'S ELEUZE

wll also be pursued below, s nce what we need to dscover s f Deleuze thnksthat the vrtual s actve on its own terms , or n other words whether the termactual" adds anythng meanngful to the dsusson of the dynamsm of thevrtual as Badou pos ts Is the vrtual in itseproductve?

We turn once more to the text ofDerence n Repetition. Wat mmedately becomes clear, above all n the crucal chapter four, whch we havebeen examnng here, s that the vrtual tself has no mmedate causal roleattrbuted to t whatsoever Page after page devoted to artculatng thestructure of vrtual Ideas wth respect to Kant, to Mamon, and to varousbranches of mathematcs, above all derental calculus, but at no pont does

Deleuze ever present the vrtual as an agency on ts own termsthout ntroducng the dscussons of the complex process of actualzaton n the nal chapter of the book, whch also attrbute no drect causalrole to the vrtual, the two themes that come closest to the topc of agencyhere are those ofenesis and ctuliztion whch we shall address n turn

Deleuze presents hs account of the vrtual as a rejonder to th nsstenceon two classcal oppostons , those that hold between event and structure -accordng to the dea that the event s what ruptures structure, as t does n

Badou - and between structure and geness, where geness poses the sameproblem as the noton of event, even f t mantans a less radcal prole (DR24/1 1 ) . On the bass of Badou's readng, we mght suppose that the apparent opposton between the latter two categores s resolved by realzng thatthe (vrtual) structure s also the (genetc) agency responsble for the producton of the actual

Such an approach s mmedately ruled out by Deleuze hmself The followng text s emblematc of the path that D eleuze hmself pursues

[G]eness takes place between the vrtual and ts actualzaton - n other words, t goes from the structure to ts ncarnaton, from the condtons of a problem to the cases of soluton,from the derental elements and ther deal connectons toactual terms and dverse real relatons whch consttute at eachmoment the actualty of tme s s a geness wthout dynamsm, evolvng necessarly n the element of a suprahstorcty, asttic enesis (DR 183/238)

In other words, the vrtual has no genetc power but rather forms the problematc nexus n relaton to whch processes of geness take place Ths swhy t lacks all dynamsm, contrary to Badou's cla m that the vrtual s thedynamc agency of the One" (DB 4/4)

urnng to the closely related theme of actualzaton, we nd precsely the

same state of aars At no pont n Derence n Repetition does Deleuze

62



HE VIUA

invoke the virtual as the ausal agent in the proesses of atualization. eseproesses, whih are omplex and multiple individuation, dramatization,diereniation) will be dealt with in what follows, but it is enough here as a

way in to the issue to present Deleuze's own diret answer to the questionHow is the Idea determined to inarnate itself? ... The answer lies ... inintensive quantities" DR 245/ 316 It is at the level of inensity whih mustnot be onfused with the virtual in any sense for Deleuze - that atualizationtakes plae.

The essential in all of this is the following Deleuze's aount of both genesis ad atualization in Derence and Repetition gives the virtual absolutely

no ative role in the prodution of the atual. e virtual is atualized, butit is not the agent of atualization . e therefore have no grounds for agreeing with Badiou's laim of a profound, indeed unique, ageny for the virtual.

Bdiou' rhetoric

Before proeeding, let me note that Badiou shores up his invoation of

the ativity of the virtual by referring to Bergson, and he ites both TeMovement mae - the only text he presents in defene of hi s theory of adynami virtual - and its itation of Creative Evolution in the following paragraph, whih 1 in turn, quote in full

That the virtual is real - and indeed, that fae of the real whihis the One - amounts onsequently [ e . on the basis of the dynamis of the virtual] to thinking the spei manner in whih the

One, as the pure power of ourrene of its simulara, is nevergiven in its totality. This is impossible, beause its real onsistspreisely in the perpetual atualizing of new virtualities . So thearmation that the virtual is real beomes, in its turn - withDeleuze writing here under the inluene of Bergson - a hymn toreation if the whole is not giveable, i is beause it is the Open,and beause its nature is to hange onstantly, or to give rise tosomething new, in short, to endure. The duration of the universemust therefore be one with the latitude of reation whih annd plae in it" DB 4/4-5; quoting MI

This passage is partiularly signiant sine it very learly manifests therhetorial strategy that an be found throughout Te Clamor of Being Thisstrategy involves the systemati ollapse of all Deleuze's work into a proposed single and monotonous philosophial paradigm, where terms suh

as virtual" have the same meaning aross every text, however dierent in

63



BDIOU'S DEEUZE

appearance here, the dierence between the use of the irtual in Derencen Repetition and the Cinema works is erased, a poit I shall return tobelow e latter is to likewise collapse Deleue's reading of other philosophers into the sae paradigm as well Here, we hae the erasure of any difference between Deleuze and Bergson The correlatie consequence of thesetwo erasures is that the theoretical aature of Bergson's thought, increasingly indistinguishable from Deeuze's own, becomes a resource from whichBadiou can draw support for his reading of the irual in Deleuze Third, andthis is perhaps the most telling point in the current context, while the paragraph begins with the irtual, the passage cited from e Movement Imagdoes not include any reference to it This kind of text, so prealent in eClamor of Being, deries rhetorical force on behalf of its conclusions (or presuppositions) on the basis of a slippage between terms Here, the irtual islinked to the One, and both are linked to the idea of dynamism, which allowsBadiou to conclude from his citation of Deleuze that all three can be yokedin turn to the latitude of creation' In place of argument, here as elsewhere,the force of Badiou's reading is amplied by a coup de force harnessing ofsigniers

one of this is meant to challenge the idea that B ergson is of profoundimportance to Deleuze Rather, in order to determine the (perhaps shifting)relationship of Deleuze to Bergson's work, we must do more than trade onthe material identity of signiers if we would be worthy of these two intricatebodies of philosophical work

HE VIRUA AND DEERMINAION

Badiou's third claim regarding the irtual concerns its status visvis determination, and is twofold On the one hand, he insists that we must neerconsider the irtual as radically indeterminate, a formless reseroir of possibilities that only actual beings identify" (DB 50/ 6) ; on the other, he willinsist that a irtuality" (DB 50/5) is determined by other irtualities,and in turn determines the actual

64

e are therefore to understand that the irtual is a ground as afunction of a double determination For while it is determined asa problem, or a s the irtuality of an inented solution, it i s equallydetermined by the circulation in the irtual of the multiplicityof problems, or seeds of actualization, because eery irtualityinterferes with all the others, j ust as a problem is only constitutedas a problematic locus in the proximity of other problems

(DB 50/6)



TH VIRTUL

Once again, as ith the discussion of the virtual-possible distinction, Badiou isdrawing on points made in Deene and Repeiin, and once ore he seemsto adopt the language of determination in a ay that ill suits the text itsel

Deleuze's on introduction of the issue of determination goes by way ofthe Kantian account of Ideas, which has three correlative aspects DR 16-0/21-20 First, for Kant, Ideas are objectively indeterminate e Ideas ofReason, such as freedom or totality, are indeterminate ecause their objectscan never be given in intuition However, and this is the second point, theyare also deeminable in relation to objects of experience This is how the Ideaof totality, hile indeterminate with respect to a single object of experience,

can nonetheless ork in a regulative fashion to gather the various moments ofknowledge in scientic experimentation for example) around a locus , goal orhorizon In eect, the undetermined object, or object as it exists in the Idea,allos us to represent other objects those of experience) which it endowswith a maximum of systematic unity DR 16/21 Finally, and in light of thissecond point, there is a sense in which an innite determination is proper toIdeas also, this time ith respect to the rules for cognition that provide objectsto reason, namely the understanding hile particular objects of experience

ork to determine the Ideas in a progressive fashion, it is with respect to thefaculty of the understanding in the rst Ciique that the objectively problematic concepts of Reason nd their locus or purposive end

Deleuze's account of the virtual adopts all three of these aspects of determination in his own account of virtual Ideas , ith some important changesthat borro heavily from both Maimon and his reading of the dierentialcalculus e already kno that the name virtual designates an ideal differential eld is eld, for Deleuze, is in one sense radically indeterinate

This follows precisely from the fact that it is a dierential structure, not astructure based around any given nodes which would be like ideal identities ,and manifests one part of Deleuze's commitment to the radical nature ofdierence virtual Ideas imply no prior identity, no pos iting of a somethingwhich could be called one or the same On the contrary, their indetermination renders possible the manifestation of dierence freed from all subordination" DR 183/23

But the virtual dierential eld is not only indeterminate for Deleuze,

since it is also subject to a mode of determination that does not eradicate itsproper indeterminacy e determination in question is not opposed to theindeterminate and does not limit it" DR 25/352 This face of determination Deleuze calls eipal deeminain . Thus the virtual is not just anindeterminate dierential eld, but internally determined by way of relationsbetween dierential elements It is important to see that this approach meansthat the virtual can be grasped in the mode of its determination but wih

u impsing any fm f ideniy If there were necessary or transcendent

65



BDIOUS DELEUZE

modes of structuration that pertained to the virtual as such, then Deleuzesattempt to provide an immanent phlosophy would entirely collapse inthe same way that Kants did, relying as it dos on the importation of theclassicalAristotelian table of judgement into the immanent eld of experience, thereby forfeiting the right to the name critical idealism

e third aspect or face of the determination proper to the virtual departseven further from the Kantian account This is because of the role that theunderstanding plays in Kants philosophy, the faculty that provides the rulesfor cognition, namely the categories For Kant, these rules are necessaryconditions for the possibility of experience For Deleuze however (for rea

sons that we have not examined here and which are treated at length inchapter three of Derence and Repetition), there are no globally necessaryrules for the constitution of thought even if each Idea brings with it asavage necessity in its role as problematic in so far as it is dramatized by thetemporal syntheses - and, furthermore, we know that the Kantian modeof the transcendental is unsatisfactory in so far as it anchors itself withinthe modality of the possible rather than that of the real In any case, wehave already seen Deleuzes alternative view of what constitutes a rule for

thought virtual Ideas This is , once again, a thoroughly Maimonian viewhat, nally, plays the role lled by the innite or complete determina

tion of an Idea in Deleuzes scheme? The answer is to be found in the category of singularity, or what Deleuze also calls the element of potentiality"(DR 15 /22 ) Simply put, every dierential relation that constitutes the differential determination proper to the Idea has a corresponding singularity,or, better, for every such relation a singularity exists that expresses it

aking these three moments of deterination together, which Deleuze at

one point denes as the gure of sucient reason" (DR 16/228) , we arriveat the following denition the reality of the virtual consists of the dierental elements and relations along with the singular points which crrespondto them" (DR 20/26-0). Or, to recapitulate all three points in the terminology of dierential calculus that I presented briely above

(i) dx is, in relation to x, completely undetermined" (DR 12/223) andlikewise dy in relation to y;

(ii ) however, both dx and dy are reciprocally determined in relation to oneanother (dy/dx); further,

(iii) there are specic values of dy/dx that are the singularities or distinctive points of the dierentiated equation, and which determine the distribution of points in their neighborhood

Thus Deleuzes summary claim "dx is the Idea the problem and its

being" (DR 1 1222)

66



THE VIRTUAL

ith these points in mind, we can return to the quetion how does Badiou's presentation of the role of determination in Deleuze stack up againstths account? e rst thing to notice is that Badiou's claim on behalf of theirtual that it is perfectly dierentiated and determined' and in no way akind of indetermination" (D B 50 5 ), is not precisely orrect In fact, as wehae just seen, the irtual is at nc indeterminate and reciprocally determined for Deleuze

But it is the second half of Badiou's thesis on this point that - in the lightofDrnc and Rptitin appears particularly strange He rst adds theclaim that the irtual determines the actual One cannot help but notice,

though, that determination, as Deleuze refers to it in relation to the irtual, ispertinent to the irtual and nly t th virtual. e triple strata of the determination - as we hae just seen - is described by Deleuze without any mention of the actual Readers of Drnc and Rptitin hae to wait for thenal chapter of that work to see the full story of the irtual-actual relationunfold Deleuze is very clear on this point For example, discussing the statusof the third moment of determination, he writes that omplete determination carries out the dierentiation of singularities, but it bears only upon

their existence and their distribution" (DR 210/21). In other words, thedetermination of the virtual with respect to singular points does not carryus beyond their ideal location with respect to dierential relations Likewise,for Deleuze, reciprocal determination (as he accounts for it in Drnc andRptitin) is a relation proper to the virtual, and constitutes the elementarymoment of structure, but does not require or imply anything at all on itsown terms for the actual

Even more peculiar is the assertion that virtual Ideas determine one

another hen Badiou writes that the irtual is also the ground for itself,for it is the being of virtualities, insofar as it dierentiates, or problemtises,them" (DB 506) one is struck by the apparently paradoxical nature ofsuch a claim How is the virtual to be the ground (or being") of the irtual?Is it that the irtual (qua name for being) is the Being of the actual, and alsothe Being of virtualities? On Deleuze's account, irtual Ideas are problematic,but, as in Kant, they are problematic not for themselves but with respectto the matter on which they come to bear As in Maimon, they are rules,not for themseles , but for the construction of objects It is false to claim,as B adiou does, that a problem ( a virtuality) is determined as the dierentiation of another problem (another irtuality) (DB 506). Deleuze willrather insist that Ideas are complexes of coexistence" (DR 1 86/241 ) with(as I have already noted) a complex set of criteria for distinguishing themfrom one another (DR 18/242)

Once more, then, Badiou's characterization of the irtual appears as a

construction standing at some distance from Deleuze's work itself And in

6



BADIOU S DELEUZE

the case of determination, we should be clear that it is only in Derene anRepetition that this issue is addressed in any more than passing fashin

HE VIRUAL IMAGE

As I have already noted above, Badiou's treatment of the concept of thevirtual in Deleuze disregards the intertextual (not to mention intratextual)dierences in its deployment us, when Badiou introduces the terminology of images into his examination, we are forced to move beyond the text

of Derene and Repetition - which only uses this terminology once andin passing (DR 20/20-1 ) - and towards the two Cnema books Tisis particularly signicant because with the concept of the virtual imageBadiou's account turns in the direction of explicit critique us, a priori,it is not clear that this critique is relevant to Deleuze's treatment of thecategory of the virtual as a whole - even should the critique be a tellingone since it presupposes, without argument or demonstration, the unityof this category across two texts that dier in a great many respects e

might, in other words, take seriously Badiou's critique of the virtual as itappears in the Cinema works without in any way nding the argumentsof Derene and Repetition (or Bergsonism, or What is Philosophy?, etc)challenged

Tis said, let e rst recall and elaborate to some extent the fourth ofBadiou's summary remarks concerning the virtual He begins by noting acharacteristic of Deleuze's account that is, indeed, to be found in a numberof the discussions of the virtual, which is the presentation of the object as

having two halves, one actual and one virtual For instance, in the passagein Derene and Repetition where the notion of the possible is critiquedin favour of the virtual, Deleuze writes that the virtual must be dened asstrictly a part of the real object - as though the object had one part of itselfin the virtual into which it plunged as though into an obective dimension"(DR 20/20) , and asserts later that every object is double without it beingthe case that the two halves resemble one another ey are unequalodd halves" (DR 20-10/20) Badiou notes this argument with approval,

since it seems to him that were we to separate the virtual from theactual object, univocity would be ruined, for Being would be said according to the division of the objective actual and the nonobjective virtual(DB 51 /8)

However, he says, such doctrine brings with it the problem of articulatingthese two apparently dissimilar faces of the object It is in response to thisquestion that Badiou writes, and I quote at length in order to present the key

moment of the argument:

68



HE VIRTUAL

In my opinion, he answer [D eleuze] gives is far from saisfacoryand i is here ha I see he sumbling block for he heor of he

virual is answer sipulaes ha Every objec is doble wihou i being he case ha he wo halves resemble one anoher,one being a virual image and he oher an acal image Theyare unequal odd halves' e can see clearly how Deleuze akesadvanage here of he fac ha every objec , o r every being, i amere simulacrum; for his allows he imely injecon of an immanen heory of he double, backed up by an opical meaphor hepossible double saus of images) Bu i is exremely dicul

undersand how he virual can be ranked as an image, for hiswould seem o be he saus proper o he acual, whereas i isimpossible for he virual, as he power proper o he One, o bea simulacrum DB 50-51/8)

In oher words, for Badiou, he invocaion of he wo halves of he objec,and he suppor of a meaphor of he double image, is and can only be a dis racion from an abyssal gap beween he wo orders of being ha Deleuze

alks abou bu does no have he means o explicily ariculaeUnforunaely, his paragraph, raher han saing a fundamenal objec

ion o Deleuze, manifess a ramifying series of false asserions ha lead usvery far from he Deleuzean heory of he virual as we nd i in eiher ference and Repetition or Te ime mae In response o Badiou, we musinsis on hree imporan claims Firs, he nal suggesion ha here cannobe, for Deleuze, an accoun of he image ha is virual in characer mus bedispensed wih If Badiou was correc in suggesing ha Deleuze's under

sanding of he virual could be idenied wih he power proer o heOne' such a poin would be elling indeed However, as we have seen in heearlier pars of his chaper, he virual fo Deleuze does no play he role of adynamic agency, and nor can we hink he virual as i appears in Derenceand Repetition a leas in erms of a unary aspec of Beng, given is coplexinernal characerisics

Moreover, o asser ha he virual is an image is no o say ha i is asimulacrum As I have already noed, he simulacrum is a concep of a paricular provenance ha plays an acive par only in cerain of Deleuze's exs is kind of ermiological conlaion is, as a resul, an exremely unforunae ac on Badiou's behalf This is he case per se, of course, bu should wenoe he ex in which he noion of he simulacrum lays he greaes role,Te Loic of Sense, one canno help bu noice ha Dleuze is very carefulhere o give he noions of image and simulacrum ver dieren meanings

Second, i should be clear ha if Deleuze's only response o he naure of

he relaionship beween he virual and acual had been - as Badiou assers

69



BDIU'S DEEUZE

- simply to state that the two halves are unequal, then it seems unlikely thaBadiou would have been the rst person to have mounted an attempt at a fundamental critique Indeed, it beggars belief tha

Badiou would devote a book

to Deleuzean thought if it was brought to ruin by a theoretical inadequacy ofsuch gross character In fact, Deleuze's answer to the question concerning therelation between the virtual and the actual is extensive and rigorous, concerning what he calls the intensive imliction and exliction of the relations andsingular points proper to the erlicted regime of dierential Ideas, a discusson of which will be pursued towards the end of this book Here, though,we can begin by reminding ourselves in a preliminary manner that Deleuze

espouses an expressivist ontology, where the relationship between events andstates of aairs , sense and bodies , the virtual and the actual is not conceivedon causal grounds, but in terms of the capacity for the former terms to maintain an exressive relationship with the latter

The third point turns on the virtual-image relationship Let us note rightaway that Badiou's objection to this possibility has the air of a rhetoricalforeclosure the virtual simply cnnot be an image If such a proposal seemsimpossible to Badiou, it is because, it would seem, he has already decided in

an riori fashion on the nature of the virtual in Deleuze In any case , we areleft to ask ourselves, in light of this passage, about this relation as it appearsin Deleuze's work

The irtual in The Tme Image

As I have already noted, the treatment of the virtual as image is present in

Derence nd Reetition only very briely and in passing, nding its locuselsewhere, principally in Bergsonism and the Cinem works e key citations in Te Clmor of Being are, however, from Te ime mge, and it isthe doctrine of what D eleuze calls the small circuit of the virtual image andits actual double that we shall examine here is will also allow us to question Badiou's equation - found throughout his engagement with Deleuze,but particularly in One, Multile, Multiplicity" of the virtualactual distinction with that of the large circuit and small circuit

Although the term virtual" emerges at a number of points in both Teovement mge and Te ime mge, it does so for the most part somewhatdidently, as if the term on its own is not entirely signicant Short texts(e g MI 106) introduce the virtual only to immediately subsume the contentsof the claim under other categories The exception is the chapter dedicatedto e rystals of ime" in Te ime mge (I 68-)

Deleuze's goal in this chapter is to make sense of the underlying schema of

a range of images that break from the sensorimotor schema that provide the

0



BDOut DELEUZE

Note that for Deleuze the small circuit is not contrary to Badiou's reading another name for the actua Rather both the small circuit and the

large circuit both include the virtual and the actual e dierence i s one ofspecicity or generality Each actual image is indeed in relation to the virtual hole the world or the cosmos (this is the large circuit) but is locallyintertwined with its own enigmatic double (the small circuit) In place of thestructural account of the virtual in Derence and Repetition, we nd in Teime Ima that th e dierence between virtual and actual is itself a matter ofa location or specicity within a broader tructure constituted by the ensemble of images

We should also note that should we examine e ime Imae for moreinformation about the nature of the large circuit which is for Badiou a namefor the OneAll we nd the following text "the dream repreent the laretviible circuit or the outermot envelope' of all the circuit (I 56) Initially itwould seem then that the large circuit is dealt with in terms of the relationship between perception and recollection in dreams essentially followingBergson's analyses of these phenomena in Matter and Memory: dreams- not the One and not the virtualinitself - in so far as they represent the

most relaxed form of the contraction of the recollection perception matrixLater though Deleuze goes on to extend his analysis in the direction of theontological e key passage reads as follows

2

[E arlier we were able to assimilat virtual images to mentalimages recollectionmages drea or dreaming these were somany incomplete solutions but on the track of the right solution The more or less broad always relative circuits between

the present and the past refer back on the one hand to a smallinternal circuit between a present and it own past betweenan actual image and it virtual image; on the other hand theyrefer to deeper and deeper circuits which are themselves virtualwhich each time mobilize the whole of the past but in whicthe relative circuits bathe or plunge to trace an actual shape andbring in their provisional harvest The crystalimage has these

two aspects internal limit of all the relative circuits but alsooutermost variable and reshapable envelope at the edges ofthe world beyond even moments of world e little crystallineseed and the vast crystallizable universe everything is includedin the capacity for expansion of the collection constituted bythe seed and the universe Memories dreams even worlds areonly apparent relative circuits which depend on the variationsof this hole Tey are degrees or modes of actualization whic

are spread out between these two extremes of the actual and the



THE VIRTU

virtual the atual and its virtual on the small circuit, expandingvirtualities in the deep circuits And it is from the inside that the

small internal circuit makes contact with the deep ones, directly,through the merely relative iruits (I 8081)

hat is perhaps most s ignicant about this thesis in the current ontext

is that the hole is not the source or origin of the atual, but rather the deure projection of the expanse of the virtual (reminiscent of the refrain of

the osmos celebrated in A Tousad Plateaus), which is never presentedor presentable in total, not the insistence on a de facto substantial ground

In e ime mae Deleuze is clear we need not go as far as the positedhole (which is, to repeat, not crystallized but only ever loally crstallizable) in order to encounter the virtual, since this latter doubles the present,and permeates every image with its capacity to emerge anew in the worldOmnipresent in the smallest of details, the virtual resonates with its atualdouble It is this capacity for novelty that is out of this world, indeed butnot beyod it - and to which cinema provides us access

o summarize then, we can see that ( i) Deleuze certainly do es account for

the virtual as image but ( ii ) only in a specic context that cannot be extrapolated to others, particularly not to Derece ad Repetiti and (iii) the smallcircuitlarge circuit distinction in e ime mae bears no resemblance tothe distinction between the virtual and the actual in Derece ad Repetitio.

These three points are sucient to show that both Badiou's way of framing the issue of the doublesided object and the objections that he mountson the basis of this are of no real pertinence to Deleuze's philosophy

NOTE ON KEITH ANSEPEARSONS DEFENCE OF THE VIRTUA

Before proceeding, I should like to consider an alternative defence of theDeleuzean theme of the virtual proposed by Keith AnsellPearson in hisPhilosophy ad the Adveture of the Virtual. For AnsellPearson, it is legitimate to describe [Deleuze] as a thinker of the One" (2002 8) Later he

asserts that [w] e agree with Badiou Deleuze is a thinker of the One Buthe is also a pluralist and an immanently qualied one There are [however]good reasons for positively hesitating in describing Deleuze as a Platonist ofthe virtual" (ibid.: 114)

The grounds for this agreement are to be found in a common basic assumption on the part of both Badiou and AnsellPearson that Deleuze's project isbasically a restatement in dierent terms of Bergson's metaphysis

Thus, in keeping with Badiou's assertion that Deleuze is a marvelous

reader of Bergson, who, in my opinion, is his real master" (DB 3/62),

3



BDIOU'S DELEUZE

AnsellPearson frequently asserts their eective unity The following text semblematic In order to demonstrate in more precise terms the nature of

Deleuzes dual commitment to the One an to pluralis (the One of pluralism) I want to give a fairly close and exacting reading of the 156 and166 essays on Bergsonism (AnsellPearson 2002 105) In order to defendDeleuze, then, AnsellPearson insists on a derent reading of Bergson onthe virtual, the central claim of which is that In Bergsnism it is neither accidental nor incidental that Deleuze should repeatedly speak of the virtual asa simpe virtual (ibid )

Before proceeding, let e note that the invocation of a simple virtual

in Bergsnism is less than straightforward in four senses First, it is clearlya claim made on behalf of Bergson, and the appearance of this theme isframed in terms of an interpretive question put to B ergson's philosophy, and(for Deleuze) resolved therein

But this [the emergence of divergent lines of actualization] leadsto the question of how the Simple or the One, the original identity has the power to be dierentiated. e answer is already

contained in Matter and Memr And the linkage [encanement] between Creative Evutin and Matter and Memry isperfectly rigorous (B 100)

Second , to claim that Deleuze repeatedly speaks of the virtual as simple i ssomething of an exaggeration There are only four such uses of this idea inBergsnism all of them nominal indexes of the problem of actualization ordierentiation rather than the title of a doctrine, all of them found within

the space of half a dozen pages ird, the reference to simplicity at this general level is immediately com

plicated at every point of Bergnism principally because the very idea of asiple ime or Virtual is the manifestation of a unity that is fundamentallymore complex than simple i ts simplicity, that is to say, does not tell us muchabout its nature, which is amply attested to at each point in Deleuzes treatment of Bergson The following sentiment is a prps What, then, is duration? Everything Bergson ever says about it comes down to this duration

iswat ders frm itse (ID 51) Te following from the closing passage ofBergsnism emphasizes the same point

4

At the outset we asked what is the relationship between thethree fundamental concepts of Duration, Memory and the EanVita What progress do they indicate in Bergsons philosophy? Itseems to us that Duration essentially denes a virtual multiplicity

(wat ders in nature Memory then appears as the coexistence



THE VIRTU

of all the degrees of derence in this multiplicity, in this virtualityThe n vit, nally, designates the actualization of this virtualaccording to the ines of derentition that correspond to thedegrees (B 1 12-13)

All things considered, we might simply translate simple" as coexistent in thesense that this passage indicates, a passage that moreover leaves no doubtabout the founding role of dierence in Deleuze's interpretation of Bergson,a notinsignicant point with respect to Badiou's reading of Deleuze

Fourth, the use of simple" in this strong sense to characterize the virtual

is immediately connected to a range of other terms, all likewise capitalized,and all likewise articulated in terms of the movement of actualization (ethe movement of the n vit: Duration (B 3-4), Dierence (B 3) , ime(B 3, 100), Whole (B 3, 100, 103-), One (B 3, 100), Life (B 4, 106),Simple (B 6, 100), Pure (B 6), Virtual (B 6), Unity (B 100), Simplicity(B 100) and Nature (B 10) Even such a crude analysis of the surface of thetext in the passages of signicance for AnsellPearson's interpretation revealthe relative insignicance of simplicity in the chain of concepts found there

The gure of the hole [Ie out] dominates to a signicant degree Deleuze'srhetoric there

Beyond these textual points, a rst question with respect to the substanceof this interpretation of Deleuze (and no longer simply of Deleuze's B ergson)would concern what exactly this simplicity entails how can simplicity be distinguished from the ipseity that Badiou's account supposes? AnsellPearsonstates its signicance as follows In Deleuze, by contrast [with Plotinus] , thesimplicity of the virtual denotes the pure positivity of being as a power of

selfdierentiating" (2002 )This statement, however, arguably raises more problems than it solves

On the one hand, i t is no t clear that this distinguishes AnsellPearson's position from Badiou's numerous nearidentical claims that we have examinedin this chapter, claims that also come attached to an obligatory reference toBergson the armation that the virtual is rea l becomes, in its turn - withDeleuze writing here under the inluence of Bergson - a hymn to creation"(DB 4/5) On the other hand, what justies this restriction of consid

eration to Bergsonism and the early writings of Bergson from the 150s whenthe virtual is considered? For when we ask what meaning the alleged simicity of the virtual could have for the Deleuze of Derence nd Reetition, ort is Phiosohy?, we nd Ansell Pearson in precisely the same positionas Badiou, that is, lacking any textual means to extend the analysis beyondvery specic contexts

This question becomes particularly pressing when we turn to examine

Derence nd Reetition There, the status of the virtual past and the unit

5



BDIOU'S DELEUZE

proper to it are confronted with the theme of the eternal return, on the onehand, which Deleuze sees as exceeding the puriew and import of the purepast (as we shall see in some detail in the net chapter) , and we also encounter, on the other, the gure of a complex set of structural determinationsproper to the irtual as such.

In other words, we see that the past itself as integral selfdierentiatingirtuality is exceeded by the eternal return as the pure form of time assuch, a point that is as telling with respect to Badiou as it is to AnsellPearson, and one that we shall turn to later. In brief, were we to claim thattime has only two fundamental tenses (the passing present and the irtual

past), a loop would be established whose ultimate ontological consequenceis the circulation of a specular identity, bringing us close in an interestingway to the psychoanalytic theory of fantasy (including its role in traumabut also memory as such). here Bergsonism presents the irtual past asthe source of the new, Derence and Repetition demands that the past besuperseded by a further time, one that tears temporaity as such in two,and which guarantees absolute dierence as fundamental. In addition, aswe hae just seen, the irtual is a complex of coexisting and reciprocally

(in)dierentiated Ideas, each marked by their own proper ideal singularities. It is this point that eludes Badiou as AnsellPearson has it, he fails tocomprehend" the profundity of pluralism in Deleuze's thought (2002 114)But the danger of the recourse to, and overemphasis of, the Bergsonianmotif of simplicity in accounting for the nature of the irtual in D eleuze isthat it seems unequal to the pluralism of the virtual that it is supposed tochampion.

THE VIR TUA AS THE RUIN OF THE ACTUA

e come now to the ultimate moment of Badiou's characterization andcritique of the irtual in Deleuze, in which he presents a critique of theDeleuzean theory of the virtual such that, on his account, Deleuze's heroiceort ... seems incapable of succeeding (DB 53/80) He rounds out hisargument by making the following claims

0 The two sides of the object are isomorphic and indeed identical to thetwo halves of time (the imageobject is time" [DB 52/79]) as theyare formulated according to the famous Bergsonian motif of the twojets .

(ii) This splitting, in both the register of the object and that of time,reintroduces a dualism into Deleuze's thought.

(iii) The spectre of dualism thus conjured is dealt with by insisting on

76



HE VIRUL

he indiscernibiliy of he virual and he acual (or he pas and hepresen, o he wo halves of he objec) he ony way of savingdespie everyhing - he One, is by resoring o an unhinkable wo,

and indiscernibiliy wihou remedy" (DB 3/81 (iv) Finally, such an insisence means ha here i s an impoverishmen o f

he acual o he degree ha he virual is deermined he compleedeerminaion of he ground as virual implies an essential indetermination o thator which it seres as a ground (DB 3/80.

For he ime being (once more ), we mus delay in considering hese asser

ions wih respec o he emporal regiser, since a grea deal more back

ground will be required in order o esablish he validiy of he pas-virualconnecion Noneheless , he charge of an obfuscaed dualism can be examined here in relaion o he docrine of he doublesided objec discussedover he pas few pages The rs quesion is hus wheher or no he doubleobjec is a manifesaion of an onological dualism

Whenever his kind of quesion emerges wih respec o Deleuze, he rshing ha mus be recalled is ha Deleuze's explici claims on his maer

rejec in he sronges erms any form of onological dualism The concepsof univociy and expression, he lenghy criique of emanaive, analogical orequivocal onological posiions found in almos all of Deleuze's work fromhe early exs on Bergson hrough o Immanence A Life " mus no beoverlooked is means ha all aemps o argue ha Deleuze is a dualismus begin by assering ha Deleuze did no or could no recognize hisfundamenal realiy abou his own hough - or ha he mainained an esoeric dualis philosophy parallel o his explici rejecions of he same view -

and hen subsaniae he claimThe real conen, however, of Badiou's nal remark abou he virual

concerns no dualism bu he quesion of discernibiliy The problem wihhe Deleuzean heory of he virual, for Badiou, is ha i forces us ino anincreasingly severe evacuaion of he acual in our aemps o specify iMore precisely, by aemping o mainain a philosophy like he one haBadiou aribues o Deleuze, we nd ourselves ulimaely wihou anymeans o disinguish beween he virual and he acual e nd ourselves

lacking a mark or crierion by which o disinguish hem" (DB 3/80Once again, he reference poins ha Badiou pus ino use in order o

esablish his indiscernibiliy as a par of Deleuze's hough is a single passage wo pages, o be precise - of Te ime Image. The exrapolaion ofhese wo pages o inlec he res of Deleuze's hough follows As we haveseen above, however, he heory of he virual image and is inerchangeabledouble is paricular o Te ime Image and has no signican counerpar inDerence and Repetition .

77



BDIOU'S DEEUZE

Nonetheless, we are presented wth the queston how s the vrtual dstngushed from the actual more generally? It s not dcult to dspel suchquestons wth reference to Derence an Repetitin and I shall mentonhere only the most mportant such means of dstncton, whch returns usto the category of determnaton ontrary to Badou's account of ths topc,Deleuze s at pans here to nsst that the vrtual must be dened, n contradstncton from the actual, as lacing determinatin n a way that the actuals not onsder, for example, ths account of the derence between the vrtual and the actual, where Deleuze puts hs dstncton between derenaton nto play

The queston of the ens mni md determinatum must be posedas follows somethng whch exsts only n the Idea may be completely determned (derentated) and yet lack thse determinatins which cnstitute actual existence (t s underencated, notyet even ndvduated) (DR 280/358, emphass added)

It s for ths reason that Deleuze assgns a certan psitive nonbeng to the

vrtual n relaton to the actual n order to desgnate ts problematc character nonB eng s Derence hetern, not enantin. For ths reason nonbeng should rather be wrtten (non)beng, or, better stll, ?beng" (DR64/89) at the vrtual exsts n the mode of beng of the problematc meansthat t lacks the forms of determnaton that gve the actual ther actualty the form of object and subject, the entre grd of dentty mposed byrepresentaton

But what s even stranger s the fact that Badou hmself oers numerous

dstngushng trats; ndeed, hs whole readng of Deleuze s p redcated onradcal dvsons of ths knd In the same chapter where he argues for theultmate ndstncton of the vrtual from the actual, he oers many suchdecs ve (f false, as I have tred to show) crtera the vrtual s the Beng ofbengs, where the actual s ts product; the vrtual s dynamc power whlethe actual s created smulacrum; the vrtual s the process whereby the actualcomes about; the vrtual s fully determned whle the actual s ndetermnate

Further, t s puzzlng to nd Badou assertng that the actual s n dangerof dssolvng nto a lckerng lght refracted by an actve and completelydeterned vrtual After relectng on such clams for a moment, we mghtsmply note that, n many cases, Deleuze presents the vrtual rather than theactual as the category n need of an actve programme of advocacy hat s,rather than seemng lke the exemplary obvous moment n hs ontology,Deleuze frequently goes out of hs way to lend t argumentatve resources norder to substantate ts role We must ask , n the end, why t s that Deleuze

s so concerned to establsh the category of the vrtual n the face of the

78



THE VIRT

actual if, in the order of being, things stand in the inverse relationship? hyexactly is it that we nd Deleuze insisting as always on the reality of the virtual" (DB 670) It is as though each denition of the virtual in Deleuzecarries with it a certain combative quality, as though this is what will be necessary to assert it as a category in its own right, in the face of the hegemonyof the possible and the rea the actual and the material

In sum, it is very strange to see Badiou's entire chain of argumentationisis the virtual which is for him, as we have seen, the principle nameof Being in Deleuze's work" (DB 3/65) come down to the invocatioof two pages in Te me Imae and the dubious extraction of generalized

consequences from them. It is as if the other commentaries on this themefound throughout his work, including the most substantial such discussions ,did not exist alter Benjamin once wrote of polemics that they mean todestroy a book in a few of its sentences. e less it has been studied thebetter" 1 979: 78), which is, of course, to say that the ultimate asylum inontiae is nothing but ignorance as such

Badiou begins his chapter by noting the important ole the virtual playsin Deleuze's philosophy, and in this he is undoubtedly correct. However, in

detailing the examination of Badiou's interpretation, it becomes clear thatvery little is reminiscent of the Deleuzean texts we have examined, principally the text of Derence and Repetition, but also moments of Te meImae

Badiou's anaemic presentation of the virtual in Deleuze, an account thattreats all of Deleuze's work on the topic as unied while, as I have argued,failing to engage in a proper examination, leaves everything still to be saide entire adventurous character of Ideas remains to be described" (DR

182/236)

79



5. E

Badious discussion of the tees of time and trut costitutes the mostpeculiar moment in his study of Deleuze is discussion found in chapterve of Te Clamor of Being, is structured around a surprising string of equations such that, by the end of the chapter, the following terms have all beenposited a s synonymous time, truth, the virtual, atemporal eternity, Relationand the One Here, my concern will be less to argue against this bold string

of equations, but rather to deal with the central link the equation of time andtruth We must then discover, at least schematically, what role time and truthpla in D eleuze's philosophy, and the manner in which they are articulated

It is easy to see why Badiou takes this theme to be such an importantaspect of Deleuzes philosophy his own thought gives a decisive importantrole to truth as the created foundation of change in situations Likewise,when Badiou writes - in order to distinguish hiself from Deleuze - thatruths are actual multiplicities with a much higher Dionysian value than

that accruing to any sort of phenomenological salvaging of time" (DB60/1) the force of hi s point is once moe derived from his own account ofthe novelty inherent in truth

Rather, though, than seeing Deleuze as the enemy of truth as such, chapter ve of Te Clamor of Being goes out of its way to argue that Deleuze isthe champion of an obscure or esoteric theory of truth irreducible to thefamiliar representational or analogical" account

80

This other idea of truth, I would suggest, is one that Deleuze,with the violent courtesy that I discern in his style and thought,was to implacably defend an idea that is all the more deviousfor giving to truth the name f the false the power of the false- and for the fact that the process of this truth is no longer judgment, but (in conformity with the requisites of the intuition,which, as we have seen, is always a looped trajectory) a sort of

narration. (DB 57/86)



TRUTH ND TIME

For Deleuze, on Badou's account, then, truth s narraton Immedately,

thouh, he connects ths thess wth hs more basc clams n Te Clamor of

eing, deployn the truth-falsty dstncton across the space of the vrtualand the actual

For those for whom the unvocty of Ben requres that t beessentall virtual, the theme of truth s necessarl ven asower From the vewpont of ths power, the actual forms ofbens can ndeed be consdered as smulacra, or anarchc aences of the false For truth s coextensve wth the productve

capact of the Onevrtual, and does not resde as such n anypartcular actual outcome, n solaton from the rest Accordnly,the dculty n ths nstance s no loner that of solatn formsof thetrue n the actual, but of lnkn the anarch of the smulacra to an mmanent armatonofthetrue However, thsarmaton exsts nowhere else than n ts actualzatons and thepower s really the power of the false (DB 59/)

I could contnue ths quotaton at lenth, but the nterpretve or expressvetechnque that Badou s employn s clear the case n queston (here, tme)s posed by Badou aanst the backround of the nterpretve structure thathas already been put n place Once more, we see the famlar reference tosmulacra qua actualzed emanatons of the Onevrtual

In any case, t s n the context of assnn to D eleuze the equaton of thevalue of truth to the power of the false that Badou ntroduces hs dscussonof tme the royal road' of Deleuze's dea of the true s hs theory of tme"

(DB 59/9) It s D eleuze's theory of te that wll provde the rounds onwhch to elaborate ths theory of truth

hat, for Badou, s ths theory of te? Badou's answer s surprsnlylmted surprsn because tme s a cateory that Deleuze returns to aanand aan throuhout hs work The answer, such as t s, s once more statedn terms of the vrtual-actual dstncton (or, as Badou wrtes, t strctlyconforms to the loc of the One" [DB 61/9] ) On the one hand, theres sensble tme - concrete tme (D B

61/9),and, on the other, tme as

the One qua nteral vrtualty" and "the ower of the alse (DB 61/91) :Ben and round Ts dvson s also presented n quasBersonan terms the present s, n fact, a pont where the One opens up (but the One s theOpen), and there s an ntermnln of a varaton of the One (of pure duraton) and supercal moblty" (DB 6/93).

th these two dentons, we can easly see why Badou mht be led toassert that truth s tme for Deleuze they both fall back on the reat medat

n ure of the One that oranzes the entre course of e Clamor of eing

1



BIOUS DELEUZE

Questions remain, though, about the accuracy of such an assessment howappropriate is this interpretive apprach with respect to the categories oftime and truth in Deleuze?

H DEEUAN CAEGORY OF RUH

Before examining how closely the time-truth-virtual complex ts withDeleuze's work, the status of truth as such should be elucidated on its ownterms hat is striking is that it is not just in late texts that the categry of

truth is put to use by Deleuze as Badiou claims (It is in his Foucault thatthe most appeased texts on truth written by Deleuze are to be found" [DB65/] ) In fact, in some of Deleuze's earliest works, the concept of truth isgiven sustained and detailed attention, which is in each case at least minimally positive Furthermore, the concept of truth is given several sustainedtreatments in the mature works of the late 160s, which, although they allinclude strongly critical remarks, certainly do not discard the concept oftruth as such, but rather deploy it in a new register.

Truth in Deleuze' reading of Nietzsche

Te category of truth is rst sustantially engaged with by Deleuze inNetsche and Phlosophy hat is striking about this presentation is that,while including elements of the critique of the category of truth as presentedby Badiou, it does not foreclose the category as such In Netsche and

Phlosophy and then later in Proust and Sgns what could be called a derental theory of truth is discernible Te critical aspect of the argument willbe familiar to readers of Nietzsche the central question concerning truthis not hat is true?" but rather ho wants the truth? and what (in theone who wants the truth) wants it? Deleuze rmly upholds the Nietzscheandiagnosis that the category of truth frequently masks values superior to life"(NP 5) , and thereby denigrates life itself

is is not only the negative or critical moment of the argument, however,for it contains the kernel of a broader assessment, even a transvaluation Tepoint of view that Deleuze adopts is well expressed in the following text

82

ere are truths of baseness, truths that are those of the slaveonversely, our highest thoughts take falsehood into accontmoreover, they never stop turning falsehood into a higher power,an armative and artistic power that is brought into eect, veri

ed and becomestrue in the work of art (NP 104-5)



BADIOU S DELEUZE

wonderful phrase, Deleuze likens the beinnin of thouht to the spur ofjealousy: ho searches for truth? he jealous man, under the pressure of

the beloved's lies" PS 16) The jealous lovermoves in thouht under theimpetus of sins : a short delay in a phone conversation, an overlon lance,

the sudden sense of a new distance, the missin keys Here, the reme osins in question is that of love, but it is equally the other kinds of sins thatDeleuze uncovers in Proust - wordly sins , sensuous sins and the sins ofart - which spur thouht at each point alon the path of apprenticeship

ow, in this text, we nd Deleuze explicitly positin one of Badiou'sclaims about truth truth has an essential relation to time" PS 15) Despite

the apparent similarities between the Deleuzean text and Badiou's accountin of it on this theme, there is a more complex set of issues at stakehis claim is made in the context of a chapter dedicated to Sins and

ruth' and the status of the cateory of truth will be posed in accordancewith the temporal status of each domain of sins In other words, the senseof the cateory of truth chanes with each kind of sin, and the apprenticeship of the sin that Deleuze identies in Proust's novel is at the same timethe elaboration of truth in a manner that suits the sin in question this is,

onc more, the dierential aspect of Deleuze's position) is is why Deleuzewrites that The Search for lost time is in fact a search for truth" PS 15) , buta search that must be recommenced each time the searcher enters the orbitof a new reime of sins: o seek truth is to interpret, decipher, explicateBut this explication' is identied with the develoment of the sin in itself"PS 17)

In sum, rather than yin the cateory of truth to the analysis of existenial investments, and ultimately the drives and the willtopower of particu

lar individuals and societies, as he does in the case of Nietzsche, in Proustand Signs it is the reimes of sins themselves that enender the sense inwhich truth is to be understood, each sin ivin rise to an order of truthproper to it is is to say, once more, that the interpretation of each reimeof sins involves the pursuit each time of truth from the beinnin, withoutany preordained course or oal Likewise, to return to the theme of time,relative to each reime of sins, the search for truth involves the subordination of thouht to a unique temporal structure, and the discovery in thouhtof a new experience of time In the case of the reime of worldly sins, it isa time wasted; sins of love, time lost; sensuous sins, time rediscovered;and nally, in the reime of the sins of art, time reained In each case , it isnot that the same time is lost, wasted, rediscovered and reained, but thatbeinreained, beinasted and so on are proper and unique modalitiesof time as such

e thus arrive at a unique dierential sin-time-truth complex: the

sins do not develop, are not to be explained accordin to the lines of time

4



TRUTH AND TIME

without corresponding or symbolizing, without intersecting, without enter

ing into complex combinations that constitute the system of truth" (PS 2)

is statement includes two of the elements that we nd later in Deleuze'sheory of time, to which I shall return shortly, and which problematize Badiou's interpretation. ime is at once irreducibly complex in nature, and alsoengaged in a series of dierent interrelations, which, in roust and Snsengender the various manners in which signs are produced and grasped inthe world TtUS, wen we read that truth has an essential relation to time"(PS 1) , we must understand that, for Deleuze, this relationship does not

take the form of a unity, and nor does it fall under the category of an ulti

mate One

Truth in t he dogmtic imge of tho ught

Now, this dierential account of truth gives way, in Derence and Repettonto the resituation of the category of truth no longer with respect to signs ortime in a direct way, but rather to the category of the problem It is here that

we nd the most signicant use of the concept of truth in Deleuze's philosophy e discussion of the truth and falsity of problems, and the relationship between truth and sense , in one of Deleuze's most important texts is ,however, a much better indication of the vew held by Deleuze himself

In chapter three of Derence and Repetton Deleuze presents two interrelated assertions about the nature of truth in the context of his critiqueof the dogmatic image of thought In particular, he devotes the sixth andseventh postulates of his account of this image to its status and nature The

rst of these claims is that, predominantly, truth has been understood as acharacteristic pertaining to language qua designation, an assertion that hewill develop at greater length in Te Loc of Sense In other words, it is at thelevel of the proposition that the qestion of truth and falsity arises designation is taken to be the locus of truth, sense being no mre than the neutralized double or the innite doubling of the proposition" (DR 167/217) Inother words, it is propositions that are subject to the judgement concerningtheir truth and falsity This is the view of truth that Badiou notes is foundedon the Same of the model and the Similar of the copy' and of which herather implausibly claims it has never been advanced by any philosopherother than as a mediatory image that the philosopher's entire thougt willsubsequently be devoted to dismantling" (D B 7/8) In contrast, Deleuzewill argue that it is sense that is prior to designation, rather than being itsphantom double, and that the issue of truth arises in the rst instance inrelation to sense and not designation sense is the genesis or the production

of the true, and truth is only the empirical result of sense" (DR 14200)

8



BDIOU'S DEEUZE

In turn, we are led to ask about the specic nature of the truth-senserelationship, which is the topic of the seventh postulate Again, accordingto the common view, a problem is a simple eformulation of a proposition:we move from is is a cat" to Is this a cat?' where the problem is copiedor traced from the propositions themselves" (DR 15825) It is only withrespect to the solution or anser to the question that truth and falsity comeinto play, once more subordinating the entirety of the problemtruth-sensecomplex to the ultimate form of the proposition ere is, therefore, a sev enth postulate to add to the others: the postulate of responses and solutions according to which truth and falsehood only begin with solutions or

only qualify responses" (DR 158/26) Or, in the case of the philosophicalextension of this natural prejudice, problems are thought in terms of thepossibility of their solution Deleuze's intent is once more to critique thisprimacy of the proposition and the view of the problem that it brings witit is involves, rst, insisting on the fundamental and irreducible characterof problems Problems are (as we have already seen in the previous chapter) objective transcendental instances, or what Deleuze here calls objecticities" (DR 159/26; see also 164/213), whose solution neither is brought

about by the activity of judgement, nor results in the dissolution of the problem, which insists and persists in [its] solutions" (DR 163212) Second,and most importantly here, it means that truth and falsity, having been dis connected from the proposition, are conceived as qualications for probles as such In what sense? What exactly is a true problem as opposed toa false one? e fundamental dierence lies in whether or not the problemis taken as a genuinely transcendental structure, as opposed to a secondorder result of the process of ontogenesis that this structure plays a central

role in Wenever thought is content to trace probles from propositions,it loses it s true power and falls under the sway of the p ower of the negative,necessarily substituting for the ideal objecticity of the problematic a simpleconfrontation between opposing, contrary or contradictory, propositions"(DR 164213)

Tus the distinction between true and false problems i s a critical distinction, in Kant's sense A false problem is a problem illegitimately extractedor traced from particular empirical instances A true proble, on the otherhand, is the problematic as such, that is, instances of the dierential structure of the virtual I would even hazard a stronger formulation: if we think ofproblems in terms of solvable formulations derived from prior propositions,then we are not thinking of problems at al l in Deleuze's terms

Te primary point of interest in these points from Derence and Repetition, given our current concerns, is that truth here maintains, on the onehand, an adectival character Deleuze's concern is not with the being of

truth, but rather with true and false problems, where, to repeat, their truth

86



RUH AND IME

depends not on correspo ndence with reality, the mutual coherence of truthclaims, nor (as in Badiou on the construction of a ruptre in the order ofknowledge, but uniquely on the nature of the problem in question On thether hand, truth (as a substantive is subject to a more fundaental regime

that of senseIn sum, then, Deleuzes philosophy already includes a rich and interesting

editation on the category of truth, one that supersedes any simple pseudoietzschean rejection of it on genealogical grounds ertainly, this account

is in one part critical, since it liquidates the category of truth in any substantive sense It does so, though, only to relocate truth in a new adjec ival sense

with respect to problems, and subordinating it to the ontological register ofsense

THE TWO DELEUAN SHEMATA OF TIME

We are still left with the question of whether truth and time come to thesame thing in Deleuzes philosophy, or, in other words, whether even this

richer understanding of the category of truth in Deleuze does not in anycase conrm Badious account In order to resolve these matters, I wouldlike to discuss two aspects that are central to Deleuzes philosophy of time,namely the omplexty of time (which refutes Badious insistence on the simplicity of the temporal order in Deleuze, and the passvty involved in thisaccount (which complicates the link between temporality and activity orproductive power

Before doing so, however, it is necessary to note that across his work

Deleuze does not oer a single coherent theory of time, but rather, broadlyspeaking, presents two dierent temporal schemata, one dyad in nature,and the other trad

The dyadic schema presents time under two aspects On the one hand,there is lived time, the time of the present On the other, Deleuze insists ona more fundamental sense of time that accompanies and indeed groundsthe other (taking the word ground" in the complex sense we saw in theprevious chapter This dyadic schema is found in all of his early work,including Emprsm and Subjetvty Bergsonsm (both of which operatewith reference to a disjunction between the passing present and memoryand then later, and most importantly, Te Log of Sense An and Chronos)

The triadic schema - which is to be found in Proust and Sgns eme Image Fouault and, above all, in Derene and Repetton - invokesboth the past and the present as odalities of time, and, in keeping withthe dyadic schema, the past is associated with a much more fundamen

tal transcendental moment However, the third temporal aspect, which is

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BDIOU S DLUZ

aociated with a moment of ungrounding, appear a more fundamentalyet again

Due to thee two tendencie in Deleuze' own text on ime, any claimabout the Deleuzan approach to temporality i confronted with a perhapirreducible diculty at the outet, a notinignicant problem for Badioucorrelative to the problem poed by the divere account of the virtual inDeleuze However, the very leat that can be aid, in conformity with thetext, i that the triadic chema play the abolutely central role in the textin which it appear ime a the formal ungrounding of both equentialtime (an image of time abtraced fom the movementimage and in accord

ance with the enorimotor chema) and memory (the recollectionimage ornemoign) in Te ime Imae could not be more central; the crytalimage(hyaloign), an image that enure an exchange and connection betweenvirtual and actual, till relie on being freed from the ubordination of theenorimoto chema (or the primacy of movement over time), and thifreedom i in the end guaranteed not by another time image, but by the irrational cut, which unhackle time from movement Proust and ins, a wehave jut een, contain an elaborate dicriminatory apparatu that applie

to ign , regime of truth and time There, the time of eence (fourth time,time regained) give u an image of eternity it i alo an abolutely original time" (PS 6) i ultimate form of time i incarnated a involuntarymemory (proper to the third time) at the cot of introducing a minimumof genrality" (PS 6), uch that eence i realized in involuntary memoryto a leer degree than in art; it i incarnated in a more opaque manner"(PS 61 ) Thi i why Deleuze give a key chapter of thi book the title TheSecondary Role of emory' In turn, however, involuntary emory i vatly

uperior to the baic habitual or enible reality of time (rt time, watedtime, and the econd time, lot time, which pertain to the regime of theign of love) Finally, and mot importantly, the category of the eternalreturn in Derence and Repetition i the heart, however enigmatic, of thatbook e hall turn to thi text again in what follow

Now, the ignicance of the triadic chema in the work where theyappear i one reaon to take it a more important than the dyadic chemae do not need to take thi a the deciive point, however, ince the veryfact that the dyadic poition i itelf a part of the triadic account i enoughto lead u to the concluion that the latter are to a greater degree denitiveof a Deleuzean philoophy of time A third, heuritic reaon for their ignicance might alo be conidered the fact that Badiou overlook thi thirddimenion A we have already een, Badiou' account of time in Deleuze iorganized around a reading and preentation of the dyadic account In orderto ae the accuracy of hi reading, ignicant weight ret on the extent to

which the third apect of time enriche the dyadic chema

8



UH AND IME

MPORA PURAIY

nwat follows, would like to explicate the account of time oered in

erence and Repetition particularly in its second chapter, which is

devoted to the theme of repetition is account has several features thatake it central in the consideration of Badiou's claims on the status of tie

in Deleuze First, it is the most detailed and extended account of time foundanywhere in Deleuze's work, with the poss ible exceptions of Bergsonism ande Logic o Sense both of which, as noted, only make use of the dyadic

account Furthermore, given that Badiou approaches Deleuze principally

as a philosopher, and reads him in terms of a fundamental metaphysicalproject, it would be dicult to maintain that a work other than Derenceand Repetition is the locus of this project in Deleuze with respect to timethis point does not hold universally - the theory of the event provided inerence and Repetition for example, is only a minial rehearsal for thefullblown account in e Logic o Sense)

ere are three features of this account that shall not dwell on here,although they are in and of themselves decisive the broader links Deleuze

establishes between time and repetition and, in turn, the relationshipbetween dierence and repetition that is made through Deleuze's meditation on time, between time and biopsychical life, and the characterizationof time as intrinsically synthetic in nature shall mention all of these aspectsin passing is makes the summary here incomplete in a variety of ways,should it be taken as denitive However, the goal is to examine three facetsof Deleuze's account that suce to severely trouble B adiou's reading i theplural nature of time on Deleuze's account; ii the iportance and charac

terization of the third modality of time concerned with the future and withthe gure of the eternal return; and iii the role played in all three temporalmodalities by passivity

Habit and the time of the present

hat is striking about the account of time in e Clamor o Being is thatit revolves around a unied picture of temporality e equations of time,truth, the One, productive power and memory revolve around a monolithic and undierentiated posit of time as the pure past an enormous totalmemory which is the being of time as pure duration - that permanentqualitative change where all the past is operative, just like all the virtual"DB 2/93) At once glacially still and red with the essence of change,time emerges as a selfsucient and unied ultimate metaphysical quiddi

tas t is striking because even cursory attention to the account of time in

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BDIOU'S DELEUZE

Derence an Repetition would demonstrate that it is irreducibly plural andcomplex in nature.

Deleuze begins with what he characterizes as the lived, or living, present"DR 0/9) This rst sense of time is intrinsically tied to habituation - thisliving present is brought about through the synthesis or contraction of sensible impressions, but also matter as such hat we call wheat is a contraction of the earth and humidity" DR 5/102) Te word living" in thephrase living present" thus extends the purview of time well beyond thephenomenological experience of human beings Deleuze'spaean to habituation opens wide arms to the entire world of the living and to the universe of

the inanimate beyond and beneath it

at organism is not made of elements and cases of repetition,of contemplated and contracted water, nitrogen, carbon, chlorides and sulphats , thereby intertwining all the habits of whichit is composed? Organisms awake to the sublime words of thethird Ennea: all is contemplation! DR 5/102)

Now, this lived, habituated present is not meant to be thought of as onepart of a threepart puzzle, along with distinct but equal instances of thepast and the future On the one hand, as we are about to see, the dierencesbetween each of the modalities of time are strictly irreducible, renderingthem nequal at root; on the other, the living present has its own past andfuture, in the form of a protentive and retentive reach or shading o'Tis is why Deleuze writes in an important and overlooked passage thatIt is not that the present is a dimension of time the present alone exists

Rather, synthesis constitutes time as a living present, and the past and thefuture as dimensions of this present" DR 6/105) Speaking of empiricalreality, of actuality, there is only the present in time, the lived present, therich fullness of hunger and satiety As I shall discuss later in this chapter,it is the case that derivative senses of the future and the past as projectedand retained instants) lank the passing present, but also a derivative senseof the present as constituted as the experience of instants . However, in sofar a s the pas t and the future are each accorded a distinct status, it is noton the basis of either lived experience or the habitual foundation of thepresent

e geometric gure we might align with the living present is the circleHabitual temporality is conservative and cyclical in nature e already seeboth of these aspects in Hume's philosophy, where habit is the foundationfor the expectation of the return of the same the sun will rise tomorrow")

S o time must b e thought in the rst instance a s the habitual and contrac

tile time of the present, and, as such, we already nd ourselves at the border

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RUTH ND TIME

f a dispute with Badiou's portrayal of Deleuze, which entirely focuses onemory, something that Deleuze certainly does not do

Nonetheless, memory does play an absolutely decisive role in Deleuze's

ccount of time He introduces it by noting that, should we consider time aslely habitual, we would have no explanation for the pssing of time

Although it is originary, the rst synthesis of time is no lessintratemporal It constitutes time as a present, but a presentwhich passes ime does not escape the present, but the presentdoes not stop moving by leaps and bounds which encroach upon

one another is is the paradox of the present to constitute timewhile passing in the time constituted The claim of the presentis precisely that it passes However, it is what causes the presentto pass, that to which the present and habit belong, which mustbe considered the ground of time It is memory which groundstime (DR 108)

Before saying anything else, let us note a few features of Deleue's position

that, even in this short passage, problematize Badiou's reading there areintratemporal relations within time (there is little sense in simply claimingthat time is not temporal [DB 6 1 1 ] ); in turn, time is not a simple vitalEternity, but constituted by a more complex set of dierentiations (whichwill only multiply as we continue here) ; also, once we take into account thediscussion of Deleuze's own notion of ground (elaborated in the previouschapter), it is not clear that this relationship of grounding between the pastand the present can be reduced to the opposition of a virtual and active

Memory and an actual and inanimate productFor Deleuze, then, the habitual time of the lived present requires a ground,

which is memory He claims that, without it, there would be no experienceof the present the present without a past as such is not phically possible(DR 6 105) We should recognize here that this claim is quite clearly analogous to the Kantian procedure of transcendental deduction Whereas therst time is empiricl in nature, and is embedded in the regime of the actual

it is psychological, physical, visceral the second time of memory is trn-scendentl (DR 81 1 10)

Memory and the time of the past

In accounting for memory in this transcendental sense, it is to B ergson thatDeleuze turns, and it is here that Badiou's account of time in Deleuze most

closely resembles Deleuze's own claims The passing present is constituted

1



BDIOU S DELEUZE

on the basis of an enormous and integral virtual memory This memory isnot the active preconscious) memory of a human subject, but memory i

an independent ontological senseThe geometrical gure to associate with memory is that of the cone, asn the famous Bergsonian example rst used in Mattr and mory thatDeleuze frequently invokes Each level of this cone must be considered ashe entirety of this pure past, contracted or, conversely, relaxed) to a certaindegree The tip of the cone is the point at which the past is most contracted,and makes contact with the present itself

Now we must again assert , with Deleuze, that the past thus understood is

not just one aspect of time

e past does not cause one present to pass without calling fortanother, but itself neither passes nor comes forth For this reasonthe past, far from being a dimension of time, is the synthesis ofall time of which the present and the future are only dimensionse cannot say that it was It no longer exists, it does not exist,but it insists, it consists, it is It insists with the former present, i t

consists with the new or present present It is the initself of timeas the nal ground of the passage of time In this sense it forms apure, general, a priori element of all time DR 82/111)

e are able to square this with the claim that the living present is theentirety of time only by understanding Deleuze as talking here about thepast as transcendental in an important if not entirely Kantian) sense It isnot that we now notice the real nature of time, and must discard the claimsabout the status of the present Rather, the argument moves from establishing the global nature of habitual time to noting that it requires a transcendental ground, and to the elaboration of this ground, without which theglobal habitual present would not be possible Te past is indeed the a priorielement of all time, and it is a priori in relation to a global lived time whoserhythms and routines mark time for all of nature hile the living presenthas its own conservative synthesis, it requires a more fundamental synthesis

in turn in order to be provided with the continued production of the presentto synthesizeLet me repeat that Badiou's account of memory in T Clamor of Bing,

at least at the points that are irreducible to the general framework of hisaccount, is a more or less faithful presentation of Deleuze's own positionHowever, beyond this point there is a sharp break For Badiou, the Deleuzeantreatment of time begins and ends with the posit of virtual Memory Forthe Deleuze of Drnc and Rptition, though, memory and habit are

together insucint to account for time hy? Deleuze's answer, in relation

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TRUTH ND TIME

o he posiion mapped ou in Te Clamor of Being, could hardly be moreisrucive. In an absoluely crucial ex, oo ofen overlooked, he wries

e pure pas . . . is iself . . . necessarily expressed in erms of apresent, as an ancien mthical presen. This equvocaion, allhe ambiguity of Mnemosyne, [is] already implici in he secondsynhesis of ime. For the laer, from he height of s pure pas,surpassed and dominaed he world of represenaion i is theground, he iniself, noumenon and Form. Hoever, it sillremains relaive to the represenaion that it grounds. I elevaes

he principles of represenaion namely, identity, which it treasas an iemorial model, and resemblance, which i reats as apresent image he Same and the Similar. I is irreducible to thepresent and superior o represenation, yet i serves only o renderhe representation of presens circular or innie ... The shorcoming of the ground is to remain relative o wha i grounds, ando be proved by hese. I is in this sense ha i creaes a circle iinroduces movement into he soul rather han time ino hough.

Jus as the ground is in a sense ben" and mus lead us owards abeyond, so the second synhesis of ime points beyond itself in hedirection of a third which denounces he illusion of he initselfwhich remains a correlate of represenaion. DR 88tm/ 1 1 )

The problem with he rst wo temporal modaliies is hat by hemselveshey form a circle, oriented around identity, the Same and the Similar However dierenial he virtual past is in sructure, it is nonetheless structured

according to the supercial values of identity ha are in fac nothing buta kind of eect like an optical eec DR 88/ 1 1) , erected on the basis ofhabi, which memory, as the ground of habi, is relaive to

The eterl retu d the time of the future

The story so far is hus he following since the present passes only in so faras there is another time in which it passes, we mus posit a second time,memory. Memory and habi, through heir very operaion, revolve arounda specular image of idenity that arises on the basis of their operation. isrevolution is thus centripetal, and turns around he axis of identity hepassing presen, thanks to memory, never ceases to enrich the well of eterniy, he pure pas, bu nothing new ever comes abou. Habit and memory,then, are no only embedded in the false apparition of unity, but are also

inrinsically conservative in operaion. This s not initially meant in a moral

3



BDIOUS DELEUZE

sense although that is a consequence), but rather presents a problem forthe theor of time. Simpl put, this problem is that if the rst two snthesesrevolve around the same, it becomes impssible, on these grounds alone,to explain how anthing new can come about. We are confronted with aproblem analogous to that which confronted the selfsucienc of the livingpresent how can we account for the adnt of th nw if all of time worksaround the alread? As Deleuze will note in his discussion of SacherMasoch, transcendental reasoning - here, an investigation into grounding- cannot be stopped whenever one wishes M 4.

Deleuze's answer to this question is infamous he introduces a wide

ranging set of claims about the time of the future, a third time, inspired bthe Nietzschean eternal return. It is surprising, then, to see that Badiou givesno attention in his discussion of tie to this pivotal moment in Drncand Rtition. hen the eternal return enters into his account, it is solelas a gure of chance with no rlationshi to tim: Ultimatel, the eternalreturn is the One as the armation of chance, or armation of the factthat chance is armed in a single throw, which returns as the active beingof all casts, of all fortuitous events DB 74/3 Here, the interpretive

gamble constituted b Badiou's OneAll is stretched to near breaking point.For it is certainl the case that the eternal return and chance have an intrinsic relationship for Deleuze, but this relationship is inexplicable unless onesees that it is plaed out in ntirly tmoral trms.

If we can characterize Deleuze's recourse to the eternal return as infamous rather than famous , it is because its renown pales in comparison withthe dicult of its elaboration . In the context of this minimalist account ofthe Deleuzean theor of time, though, much can be said without plunging

into the obscure. hereas the passing present provides the rich empiricalcontent in temporalit, and virtual memor both the transcendental groundfor the passing of the present and its virtual depth as past that has neverbeen present), the future, or the time of the eternal return, is the formalcondition for time as such. In other words, this third time is a ur formimposed on the other two, which cracks open the recuperative and conservative circle that the establish in order that something new can come aboutthe third snthesis unites all the dimensions of time ... and causes them tobe plaed out in the pure form DR 5 ) .

Deleuze uses three geometric gures in order to elucidate the nature ofthe eternal return, which can serve as our guides here. The rst is the gureof the line, which supersedes that of the circle I know of a Greek labrinth that is but one straight line. So man philosophers have been lost uponthat line that a mere detective might be pardoned if he became lo st as wellBorges 999: 49 o return to the conservative gure of the present-past

centripetal complex, Deleuze claims that the eternal return, rather than

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TRUTH AND TIME

providing the nal stamp of approval, knocks time from its orbit around thegure of identity In some memorable passages, he evokes the decentring

quality of the advent of the future:

e Northern Prince says time is out of jo int' Can it be thatthe Northern philosopher says the same thing: that he shouldbe Hamletian because he is Oedipal? The joint, car is whatensures the subordination of time to those properly cardinalpoints through which pass the periodic movements which itmeasures (time, number of the movement, for the soul as much

as for the world) By contrast , time out of joint means dementedtime or time outside the curve which gave it a god, liberatedfrom its overly simple circular gure, freed from the eventswhich made up its contents , its relation to movement overturned ime itself unfolds (that is, apparently ceases to be a circle)instead of things unfolding within it (following the overly simplecircular gure) (DR 88/11920)

It might seem odd to claim that the image of time as a ine (time as ordinal)is a radical overthrow of the idea of time as circle (time subordinate to preestablished points : the seasons , the revolution of a day, the passing of hoursor other metrics of time) Of the two images , the former seems innitely simpler than the latter This peculiarity evaporates the moment we rec all whatsuch a change involves for the axis of the ci rcle, namely identity Let us recallDeleuze's claim identity is not original, but is rather a product of the waythe living present and the pure past come to grips with their proper con

tents hat the eternal return imposes on time is an impassive and inlexible NET which breaks open the circle and arrays it in the form of a beoreand an after e line, in contrast to the circle, has no centre The postulate ofidentity that the form of the circle maintains is replaced n turn by the necessity of a series, an always and then is is why Deleuze also speaks of theeternal return (more closely following the letter of the ietzschean text) asa torturous decentred circle (DR 115/151 ) , which, like a centrifuge, casts outeverything of the same to throw time out of jo int, to make the sun explode,to throw oneself into the volcano, to kill God or the father" (DR 89/120); and,again, why the gure of the caesura or break, the image of time torn in two,equally well summarizes the import of the third synthesis of time (DR 89/120).

Once more, we are led by Deleuze to pose the absolute or universalimport of a synthesis of time, here the eternal return It is the ungrounding of all time If habitfouns the possibility of the active synthesis of time,and memory is the groun of habit and its active syntheses alike, the eter

nal return is the nal ground, but one that, rather than making possible or

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ADIU S DELEUZE

providing the sucient reason or unity and identity as they are manifest inthe other syntheses, undoes this unity. e can see, then, why Deleuze canclaim that the eternal return is the return of ierence and not identity, sinceit is identity, the product of the passive syntheses of habit and memory, thatis undone by it.

In the nal analysis, it seems somewhat amazing that Badiou was able tooverlook the fundamental claim at the heart of the theory of time in not justchapter two ofDerence and Repetition (and, in dierent ways, in the otherworks that espouse a triadic theory of time) , but in fact this whole work, relative to the signicance of the eternal return with respect not to unity or the

One, but derence One misses everything if one disregards such explicitdeclarations as" (DB 20/32):

Te eternal return is a force of armation, but it arms everything of the multiple, everything of the dierent, everythingof chance except what subordinates them to the One, to theSame, to necessity, everything except the One, the Same and theNecessary. (DR 11/12)

This oversight is also what allows for claims such as the following thegreat total past that is one with the virtual, cannot be qualied as temporal because it is the being of time, its univocal designation according tothe One" (DB 62/94) But this is not true for Deleuze, at least in Derence and Repetition. In the rst instance, the virtual past is itself subjectto another temporal instance, namely the eternal return, so it is integrallyintratemporal. Second, given the Deleuzean temporal matrix as we nd

it in Derence and Repetition it is dicult to see what would answer tothe name the being of tie If (as Badiou does with respect to the virtual), we understand this as a reference to the ground of time, we are oncemore thrown on to the cruel and impassive eternal return, which is theungrounding of every ground, and specically the ground provided for livedtime by the virtual past. If it is a question of determination then the eternalreturn has the nal say once more, since every determination of identity,being subject to time, is undone. Tere is no profound being, no ground, noessence, that is not subject to time in Deleuzes philosophy as it appears inDerence and Repetition

MPORA PASSIVI

But this is not all that Badiou overlooks. Te account of time in Te Clamor of

Being also ties together temporality and productive activity. As we have already

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TRUT AND TIME

seen in he case of he virual Badious Deleuze is one for whom aciviy andrealiy are on he side of wha is essenial: he One and virualiy. Likewise

aciviy and power are associaed wih ime. ow when we look a his complex riparie emporal srucure presened in Derene and Reetition, wecanno help bu noe an essenial feaure of his accoun namely a discrimi

naing and producive disincion beween acive and passive.

The passive synthesis of habi

n fac he skeleal accoun of ie in Derene and Reetition ha havepresened above is only a fracion of he oal picure. Deleuzes presenaion of he rs ime or he ime of he presen characerizes i no jus asa habiual ime of he living presen bu as a assive synthesis of ime. issynhesis consiues our habi of living our expecaion ha i' will coniue" (DR 74101) raher han any acive capaciy of an agen wheherhuman or oherwise. Underneah he self which acs are he lile selveswhich conemplae and which render possible boh he acion and he acive

subjec" (DR 75/103). f he evocaion of a world of conemplaion provides D eleuze wih an opporuniy for poeic expression he world of passive synheses is no less compelling:

ese housands of habis of which we are composed heseconracions conemplaions preensions presumpions saisfacions faigues hese variable presens hus form he bas icdomain of passive synheses. e passive sense is no dened

simply by recep iviy ha is by means of he capaciy o experience sensaions bu by virue of he conracile conemplaionwhich consiues he organism iself before i consiues he sensaions. (DR 78 107)

No only is experience conracile and habiual in naure bu for Deleuzehe very subjecs of experience emerge on he basis of he same passiviy.

Beneah he habis ha we acquire we ourselves are nohing bu a issue ofhabis: We speak of our self only in virue of hese housands of lile winesses which conemplae wihin us: i is always a hird pary who says me'"(DR 75103). Now Deleuze exends his analysis of ime in he followingway: he rs order of ime he passive synhesis of habi is lierally fundamenal o hree active emporal modaliies nanely he acive synhesesof he presen pas and fuure. ese are derivaive synheses of ime hand heir foundaion in habi: hese organic synheses are redeployed in he

acive synheses of a psycho organic memory and inelligence (insinc and

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BDIOU'S DELEUZE

learning) (DR 7 3/ 100). A his acive level ime is experienced consciouslyin erms of he acive faculies [of] relecive represenaion memory and

inelligence" (DR 77/106) . his is he regime f he clear and disinc of heparade of insans and heir imparial inerrogaion he regime of pariculariy" (DR 80/109).

e mos serious error of inerpreaion ha one can make of Deleuzesposiion on ime herefore is o inver he passiveacive dyad and insallaciviy a is hear. A key heme of Deece ad Repeiio reamen ofime is hus a series of reminders of he fundamenal naure of passiviy (e .g Given ha conemplaion never appears a any momen during he acion

snce i is always hidden . i is easy o forge i" [DR 756/1 03] ) andcriiques of various ways of undersanding hings he oher way around emos signican case here is Freud bu Deleuze also nds psychology in amore general sense guily of his error:

he illusions of psychology [have] made a feish of aciviy. sunreasonable fear of inrospecion allowed i o observe only hawhich moved asks how we acquire habis in acing bu he

enire heory of learning risks being misdireced so long as heprior quesion is no posed namely wheher i is hrough aciviy ha we acquire habis . or wheher on he conrary i ishrough conemplaing? Psychology regards i as esablished hahe self canno conemplae i self is however is no he quesion. e quesion is wheher or no he self iself i s a conemplaion wheher i is no in iself a conemplaion and wheherwe can learn from behaviour and from ourselves oher han

hrough conemplaion. (DR 73/100)

As we have seen however above and in he previous chaper D eleuze alsoprovides a more iporan reason why we ake aciviy as basic by arguingha he ground in one aspec ends owards wha i grounds he more profound issue is hus ha ranscendenal illusion is an unavoidable byproducof grounding relaionship And again as we have seen in he previous chaper a common philosophical error Deleuze calls racing" works back in heoher direcion: by aking aciviy as pr imary a secondary and enirely derivaive pseudoground is posulaed in he image of he acive iself

Wih he disincion beween acive and passive synheses of he presenin hand we can also criically assess anoher of Badiou's claims his imeabou wha he akes as he eeing acual correlae of virual memory:

98

An objec is never anyhing else han an immobile secion o

duraion or insananeous dimension of he presen. canno



UTH ND TIME

herefore, in itse bear a relaion o oher objecs because nopure presen can communicae direcly wih any oher Presensare simple, ransien coexisences (DB 62/93)

Wha his cla im demonsraes aside from a srange heory of he objec

ha o my mind has no correlae in Deleuzes work, no even in he Cinemabooks o which i gesures is ha Badiou idenies he presen wih heacive synhesis of he presen, he analyic and calculaive regime of represenaional consciousness, raher han wha is clearly he more imporansense of he presen in Deleuze, namely, he passive synhesis of habi, he

foundaion of all ime. is consiues a clear shorcircuiing of Deleuze'scaegories

The passive synthesis of memory

urn now o he second synhes is : memory As in he case of abi, Deleuzeinsiss ha he pure pas is engaged in passive synhesis, and, once more, i

is conracion ha is involved; we have already seen he gure of he cone, inwhich he enirey of he pas coexiss a dieren levels of conracion andrelaxaion e dierence , however, concerns wha is conraced: on he onehand, successive elemens or insans which are in hemselves independenof one anoher' in he habiual synhesis, and on he oher, in memory, heenire pas, which is iself like a coexising oaliy" (DR 82 1 1 1)

is second passive synhesis also has a special relaionship o he activesynhesis of he pas prosecued on he basis of he living presen us

Deleuze wries:

We have seen how memory, as a derived acive synhesis, dependedupon habi: in eec, everyhing depends upon a foundaion Buhis does no ell us wha consiues memory A he momenwhen i grounds iself upon habi, memory mus be grounded byanoher passive synhesis disinc from habi he passive synhesis of habi in urn refers o his more profound passive synhesisof memory: Habitus and Mnemosyne. (DR 7980/108)

n oher words, he pas involves he synhesis of wha was rs synhesizedby habi Each presen consiues one level in he giganic cone, more or lessconraced in relaion o he presen presen

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BDIOU S DELEUZE

he impassive orm of the future

Finally we arrive once more a he eernal rern Again Deleuze claims hisas a passive synhesis in he same fashion as hose p eraining o he presenand he pas. However in his case we mus insis on a furher poin: esynhesis [of he fuure] is necessarily saic since ime is no longer subordinaed o movemen; ime is he mos radical form of change bu he form ofchange does no change" (DR 89/ 120) .

So no only is he eernal reurn a passive synhesis ha subordinaes allime o he before and he afer o he cenr ifuge ha arms only dierence

bu i is also saic and we have already seen why nlike he rs wo passive synheses he eernal reurn is purely formal wihou any conen isa pure and then, a NET o which he passing of ime necessarily submis aformal and empy order" (DR 89/ 120) Supercially we seem o be close oBadious claim of wha is essenial in ime for Deleuze: he profound beingof ime is ruh is immobile" (DB 6 1 /92) s his immoile" no Deleuzessaic"? On Badious accoun ime is essenially immobile in so far as i ishe being of all mobiliy he power of he false incarnae I is wha provides

movemen is sucien reason For Deleuze hough he fuure has no subsance uniy or eecive causal force; i is empy impassive neural

Critical cnsequences

e foundaion of ime is habi on he basis of which a secondary se ofsynheses comes abou ese are eecively lived absracions ha neces

sarily obscure he order of foundaionsgrounds which make hem po ssiblesubordinaing hem o he gure of agency n urn he passive synhesis of habi is grounded in he pure pas an inegral virual memory haalso serves as he ground for he acive synhesis of he pas (recollecion)Finally all synheses of ime are subjec o he groundless ground of heeernal reurn a pure saic form ha breaks open he concenric movemenof he presen and he pas in order o inroduce he fuure

ere are four general poins o be aken away from his summaryaccoun of Deleuzes heory of ime e rs is ha conrary o B adiousfundamenal clais ime for Deleuze is irreducible o he virual pasin Bergsons sense ranges across boh passive and acive synhesesand engages wih he rich lived presen of habiual ime and he impassive formal imposiion of he eernal reurn as well as he innie dephsof memory Second as a resul he ulimae ground of ime is no hevirual pas bu he eernal reurn which is he groundless ground from

which nohing (no being of ime for example) is exemped ird and

100



TRUTH ND TIME

given he ungrounding form of he hird modaliy of ime, ime canno be

equaed wih he One, nor wih any oher form of uniy since i is prcisely

his uniy ha is eviced from being by ime. Finally, here is an imporansense in which ime is allied no wih producive power bu wih a fundaenal passiviy Or raher, and his would be he mos proound poin, heproducive power of ime is passive in naure. es, ime creaes i creaesuniies of many kinds, boh maerial and spiriual, ideal and organic, illusory and real bu he mode hrough which i does his is irreducible oany kind of emanaive causaliy.

TH CURAS

opened his chaper by noing ha i is organized around he elaboraion of a serial equaion, which claims ha ime ruh he virual heOne power. While hese erms were reaed independenly here in relaion o he Deleuzean ex, one should noe he inernal problems wih hisequaion. Consider he following quoaions, which are he mos imporan

momens in Badiou's ex in suppor of he equaliy of hese conceps nDeleuze:

his oher idea of ruh .. is all he more devious for giving oruh he name of he false hepowe of he false.

(DCB 57/86)

is quie possible erefore ha he processes of he power of

he false" are sricly indiscernible from he reperoire composedby he processes of he power of he rue. (DCB 58/87)

For ruh is coexensive wih he producive capacy of he Onevirual. (DCB 59/88)

All in al l, power of he false" is exacly he Deleuzean name, borrowed from Niezsche, for ruh. (DCB 59/89)

ime is ruh iself. (DCB 6161)

As ruh, ime is no emporal: i is inegral virualiy.(DCB 6191)

{Je tempoal powe of te false i s tougt as one and te

same ting as te etenity of te tue (DCB 61 /91)

101



BADOU DELEUZE

[] he profound being of ime, is ruh, is immobile .(DB 61/92)

[S ]pliing is he operation of ime as a conguraion of he powerof he One. (DB 62/93)

[] f ime is ruh, hen he being of ime , as he being of ruh, haso be able o be hough under a concep from which all emporaldimension has been eliminaed. (DB 63/945)

ruh is ulimaely memory. (DB 64/97)

[]ruh is he immanen preservaion (as virualiy, or as concep) of wha, inheren o he One, has esied o is power.

(DB 64/97)

e rs hing o noe is he equivocal characer of many of hese asserions. Raher han assering claims abou he naure of ruh as such, hey

del in he name of ruh in Deleuze, on he one hand (bringing o mind heanalysis of he name and he referen in Te Logic oSense), and, on he oher,an indiscernibiliy" or coexensiviy" of he aciviy of ruh wih he aciviy of he false . Boh rheorical feaures of Badious analysis raise quesionsabou he saus wih respec o accuracy of wha Badiou claims for Deleuzeon he opic of ime

Second, while we can sring ogeher hese equaions, i seems diculo see how hey could all be muually inclusive. From wihin he framework

Badiou provides in Te Clamor o Being, how should we undersand, forexample, he equaion of memory and he power of he false? Or he claimha he power of he rue mus be hough under a concep from which allemporal dimension has been eliminaed"? Or ha which allies immanenpreservaion" alongside producive capaciy"? Similarly, how is i ha animmobile ime" can perform he operaion of spliing ha is proper o i?

ird, given in paricular he decisive and rigid disincion esablishedin Being and Event beween he being of a ruh and ruh as such, whichis sricly indiscernible, i would seem misaken o see claims here abouhe being of ie" and he being of ruh" as being assimilable ino claimsabou ime and ruh as such, even hough, in one of he claims above (D B63/95) , Badiou makes his shif immediaely, as if i were perfecly ransparen. n he same vein, wha can Badiou possibly mean by inroducing hehough ha he profound being of ime, is ruh, is imobile"? Wha is heruh of ime when ime is ruh? And if he being of ime is immobile, wha

is is relaion o process?

102



RUH AND IME

Unforunaely, he argumenaive backbone of his chaper, hen subjec

o any sor of scruiny, begins o appear a b i like he proverbial dog's dinneru ha of hese individual claims? have argued here ha Badiou's

appreciaion of he concep of ime in Deleuze is limied in hree crucialays Firs, i assimilaes he hole reamen of his concep ino a Bergsonian frameork ha ill suis i, and second (and mos imporanly), i

enirely ignores he modaliy of he fuure, hich is a he very hear of hemos deliberae and exended discussions of ime in Deleuze's maure orkven ere one o assume ha Deleuze is a roo a Bergsonian hinker, herole of he eernal reurn in Derence and Repetition presens a clear and

unambiguous deviaion from, if no Bergson's philosophy as such hichdoes no concern us here hen cerainly from he Bergson e nd presened in Deleuze's philosophy, and cerainly from Badiou's Deleuze hird,Badiou fails o grasp he imporan relaionship beeen ime and passiviy in Deleuze, a relaionship ha usurps he equaion of he virual pas ormmory ih ulimae producive aciviy

is lack of apprec iaion is mirrored ih respec o he caegory of ruhRaher han advancing ruh (ua adequaion or analogy) as a sra man,

behind hich is hidden a more profound ase" for a producive and eporally oriened accoun, D eleuze's philosophy in he 1960s conains a longsring of ineresing and posiive discussions of ruh, culminaing in hehird chaper of Derence and Repetition . his picure of ruh is dierenial (here is no single ruh, only ruhs relaive o perspecives, regimes ofsigns or problems), and nonsubsanive in naure, hereby deparing fromBadiou's presenaion a is signal momens

All hese poins ork agains he cenral conenion e are concerned

ih here, namely, he equaion of ime and ruh Neiher Badiou's accounof ruh in Deleuze, nor his accoun of Deleuze's heory of ime, resemblesDeleuze's on claims Furhermore, neiher of Deleuze's acual posiions onime and ruh could in any feasible ay be idenied; ho, afer all, aree o equae a complex srucure of passive and acive emporal synhesesih he consideraion of he proper regime and promnence of signs, perspecives and problems? Like all speculaive equaions, he claim ha imeis ruh for Deleuze promises revelaion, bu i is, all hings considered, apromise ha is no delivered on

103



E D E L E E

EEN AND ESSENCE

n a late intervie Deleuze claims that ve tried in all my books to discoverthe nature of events; its a philosophical concept the only one capable ofousting the verb to be and its attributes" (N 141) . As e have seen hoever Badiou is manifestly correct in asserting that Deleuzes philosophy is

edded to ontology primarily ith respect to to themes as e have seen:those of the univocity of being and of the virtual e have also seen a greatdeal of evidence in Deleuzes on ork to support this. Furthermore it isnot until Te Loic o Sense that the theme of the event is treated in anysubstntial manner Even in Derence and Repetition the discussion is limited to a fe pages that rehearse in a limited ay the key points of the laterbook but ithout granting the event as such pride of place here he is concerned to specify further the nature of virtual deas: deas are by no eans

essences n so far as they are the objects of deas problems belong on theside of events aections or accidents rather than on that of theorematicessences" (DR 187/2423).

A much better characterization o f Deleuzes thought of the event hichthis quotation already indicates is that it forms one half of a dyad ith theconcept of essence Hoever the notion of essence in question must be distinguished from its orthodox acceptation. As e read in Te Loic o Sensethe to errors ith respect to the event errors that erase its singular character by equating it to other concepts by ay of external correlations are toconfuse it ith essence on the one hand and accident on the other: A doublestruggle has as its object the reje ction of every dogmatic confusion beteenevent and essence and also every empiricist confusion beteen event andaccident" (LS 534tm/69)

n the case o f essence hoever e must not overlook the assignationof dogmatism t is not essence per se that Deleuze ants to question in

its relation to the event but essence conceived as ideal purity ipseity and

104



VNT IN DUZ

ranscendence according o he long radiion ha comes o us from Par

enides by way of Plao. o claim hen ha Deleuze's philosophy is disribued along a line ha proceeds from essence o even is no o say hahe comes o esablish an auocriique. Wha we in fac nd is he elaboraion of a ne concep of essence one ha Deleuze opposes o essence inhe dogmaic sense (in his wriings in he lae 1950s and 1960s) and hiscomes o be boh idenied wih essence in his new sense in some cases

and simply proposed as a replacemen o he orhodox accoun of essence

in ohers.Pu dierenly we can say ha a leas unil Te Logic of Sense, Deleuze's

philosophy is inended as a philosophy of dierence undersood as a philosophy ha is devoed o providing dierence wih he onological digniyha i has ofen been denied. We can even formulae his poin by sayingha Deleuze wishes o e sablish ha dierence is wha is essenial and noideniy. While such a formulaion is clearly paradoxical in naure dierence being wih respec o he orhodox accoun of essence wha cannobe essenial his is precisely wha he comes o claim. Consider for example he imporan role ha he concep of essence has in Proust and Signs

where no qualms are expressed abou his erm a all. ndeed Deleuze evengoes so far as o claim ha essence is always dierence" (PS 75). n ProusDeleuze claims essence is he ulimae ground or reason for all signs subjecive experience language iself and he meaning ha perains o i . us [b] eyond he sign and he meaning here is Essence like he ucienreason for he oher wo erms and for heir relaion" (PS 91). is is hereason for he ulimae privilege of ar (or of he fourh kind of sign he signsof ar) in Prous which provide a means of hinking ogeher all he lesser

signforms (worldly signs he signs of love and sensuous signs). Once morehowever his is no essence as pure ideal ideniy bu somehing alogeherdieren dierence as such Wha is essence as revealed in he work of ar? is a dierence he absolue and ulimae Dierence. Dierence is whaconsiues being wha makes us conceive being" (PS 41)

he following senien in Derence and Repetition signals a once henominal value of he erm essence ' and he reason why he concep of heeven would come o ake a more signican role in wha follows

e evens and singulariies of he dea do no allow any posiing of an essence as wha he hing is' No doub if one insisshe word essence" migh be preserved bu only on condiion ofsaying ha he essence is precisely he acciden he even sense;no simply he conrary of he conrary mulipliciy is no moreappearance han essence no more muliple han one.

(DR 1 91 m248)

105



IOU S EEUZE

ile he nal phrase is of ourse apposie o our onerns here i islear ha D eleuze's issue ih he onep of essene is bound o he modelof essene based around ideniy xi and ransendene. is is hy ine Logc of Sense, e read boh ha a superior aoun of essene involvesgrasping i as sense essene as expressed" (LS 34/48) and a he same imeha sense is is superior subsiue: is rue ha sense is he haraerisidisovery of ransendenal philosophy and ha i replaes he old meaphysial Essenes" (LS 105128)

hen e moe pas hese orks e begin o see an inreasing emphasis on he heme of he even as suh. his endeny in Deleuze reahes

is apoheosis in e Fold, here Deleuze devoes a hole haper o heeven in Leibniz and Whiehead (FLB 7682 /1 03 12 haper six Wha isan even?") . ndeed hile many exs rien afer e Logc of Sense invokehe onep of even ih he exepion of e Fold Deleuze does no elaborae ha ould properly be alled a heory of he een and erainly noan alernaive heory. n sum and onrary o he laim of Deleuze's ha ebegan he haper ih raher han seeing in his ork a philosophy of evenha overurns any possible philosophy of being i is raher ha he onep

of he even in replaing essene undersood as sai ideniy energiseshe philosophy of being providing i ih he means o go b eyond he dogmaiempiriis dyad and asser he digniy of he even in he order ofonology iself. e seemingly paradoxial goal is o broaden our onepionof being suh ha i inludes or reinsaes evens as what s essental nbeng is no he overhro of onology ha Deleuze aemps o engineerbu is expansion and orreion.

n onras o Deleuzes on inermien aenion o his heme Badi

ous ineres in Deleuzes posiion in his regard spans he enirey of heengagemen and i is no hard o see hy. For Badiou himself he heme ofhe even is of absoluely irreduible signiane sine i marks he singlepossible lous for he adven of hange and indeed never has any oheralibis no oher names or alernaive formulaions: i is Badious philosophyha ough o deserve he name philosophy of he even' and no Deleuzes .Badiou is hus perhaps led o he aegory of he even in e Clamor ofBeng more on he basis of his on onviions han on he signiane ofhe aegory in Deleuze.

On one side in his revie of e Fold, Badiou does no hesiae o seehe heory of he even heavily indebed o Leibniz bu also hiehead ashe enre of ha book. On he oher side e have he haper of Logcsof Worlds devoed o e Even in Deleuze ese engagemens spanning almos eny years in he end ome o onlude ha Deleuzes vieexludes every imporan feaure of he even in he erms of Badiou's on

aoun above all is exessive saus ih respe o being and as a resul

106



TE EVENT IN DEEUZE

is apaiy o rupure in he mos fundamenal sense wih wha is ndeed,Badiou even goes so far as o insis ha he Deleuzean rope of he even

ends up presupposing he infamous Leibnizian heme of preesablishedharmony (Deleuze ofen adops he Leibnizian priniple of Harmony" [LM

408] ) , even hough he aalogue of Deleuze's mos memorable laims abouLeibniz inlde he admission ha, while [w] e remain Leibnizian aordsno longer express our world or our ex" (FLB 1 37m189 For Deleuze, henoion of preesablished harmony is exeplary of he kind of approah odierene ha has dominaed Wesern hough, aording o whih ideniy

is invoked as a neessary exernal and ransenden rieria

n ligh of all of hese poins, i is surprising o nd ha no susaineddisussion of he even is o be found in Te Clamor of Bein despie hefa ha Badiou somewha srangely subordinaes his disussion of he virual and he aual o he heme of he dorine of he even" (DCB 29/46) However, we do onfron a frequenly repeaed laim ha exends he bas iheses of he book ha he even is an avaar for he One suppored byhis reading of one of Deleuzes formulaions of he univoiy of Being: Beingis he unique even in whih all evens ommuniae wih one anoher" (LS

10; D CB 1 120) his lak of dire and exended reamen, however, doesno mean ha Badiou's ex is absen of al l disussion on his maer, for infa i is engaged wih by Badiou under he join rubri of he eernal reurnand hane

n wha follows, hen, shall use he brief ex found in Loi of orldas a means o explore B adious laims abou he aniy of he even and heOne sine his shor ex on Deleuze also proeeds under he auspie ofhe enral hesis of Te Clamor of Bein before assessing i in he ligh

of Deleuze's own ex n onluding, shall urn wih a riial eye o herelaionship ha Badiou presens beween he eernal reurn and he even

BADIOUS ACCOUN OF HE EVEN IN LOGICS OF WORLDS

Badious e Even Aording o Deleuze" oers wha i alls he four

Deleuzean axioms of he even" (LM 382/404) hen moves on o ounerpose four axioms of is own, before sumarizing on he basis of hesea onservaive Deleuzean religion of he One, in whih he even does noaain he radialiy asribed o i by Badiou n all essenial respes, heargumen here is of a piee wih ha provided in Te Clamor of Bein:he even is, for Badiou, exrabeing (wihou insaniaing an onologial ransendene), a radial rupure wih everyhing ha is, and impossible o hink from wihin he urren nework provided by language and

knowledge

107



BIOU'S ELEUZE

e r of he axiom of he even ha Badiou acribe o Deleuze concern he relaionhip beween he even and he One: he even i e

onological realiaion of he eernal ruh ofhe One of he innie poweruissnce] of Life" (LM 382/404) . n oher word i i he even ha name

he capaciy of he One o produce i emanaive eec ha i being . hii why he wrie ha he even immanenly expoe he One of becoming i make hi One be come. e even i he becoming o f becoming: hebecoming(One) of (unlimied) becoming" (LM 382/404) and why he exof Deleuze' ha Badiou ue a an exemplar of hi axiom i: Unlimiedbecoming become he even ielf'

e econd and hird axiom peak o he relaionhip beween he evenon he one hand and emporaliy and acualiy on he oher. u of he r(e even i alway ha which ha ju happened and ha which i abouo happen bu never ha which i happening" [LS 8/16; cf. LS 63/7980])Badiou wrie:

he even i a ynhei of pa and fuure. n ruh a heexpreion of he One wihin becoming i i he eernal ideniy

of he fuure a a dimenion of he pa. For Deleuze ju a forBergon he onology of ime doe no accep any gure of eparaion. Furhermore he even canno be wha lie beween" apa and a fuure beween he end of one world and he beginnig of anoher. Raher i i encroachmen and connecion: irealie he indiviible coninuum of Virualiy. exhibi heuniy of he paage ha bind he onejuafer o he onejubefore. (LM 382m/4045)

hi claim of coure reonae rongly wih he preenaion of imein Te Clmor of Being, a dicued in he previou chaper. he even ihe emanaive power of he One (ax iom one) bu hi power i a power ofunicaion or connecion wih repec o ime. e even i wha ariculaeone momen ono he nex hereby excluding any poibiliy of emporaleparaion" (LM 38 3/405) . e hird axiom draw on one of Deleuze mo

riking formulaion in Te Logic of Sense wih repec o he even ha heeven i an eec: he even aec bodie becaue i i wha hey make oruppor a an expoed ynhei . i he adven wihin hem of he One hahey are a diinc naure (virual raher han acual) and an homogenoureul" (LM 383m/405).

For Badiou hen he fac ha even are in a cerain ene ects coniue hem a o many ignaure of he ulimae onological uniy in whichacual bodie (or ae of aair) paricipae. n urn he nal axiom alo

emphaize he role ha he even ha in unifying paricular ae of aair.

108



THE EENT IN DELEUZE

iing Deleuze's laim ha a life is composed of a single and same Even, lack

ing all he variey of wha happens o i" (LS 170m/1 99) , Badiou wries ha:

Amids he disparae maerial of a life, he Even is he EernalReurn of he idenical, he undiereniaed power uiance] ofhe Same . . . Regardless of which mulipliciy is engaged by i, iis of he essence of he Even o compose hem ino he One hahey are, and o exhibi his unique composiion in poeniallyinnie variaions . (LM 384m/406)

We have already seen he exen o which such a reading of he eernalreurn is misplaced e general poin is, however, quie clear: he Even(and no longer evens plural) has as is raion dtre he unicaion of disparaes n mehodological erms, he Even is he movemen of Being as such,which he singular mehod of inuiion submerges iself in. We arrive, hais o say, a he negaion of he enire programme of Being and Event sinceDeleuze, for Badiou, has se ou everywhere o wrie Being as Event

Here, however, we are sill engaged wih Deleuze. From hese axioms,

and he poins hey asser or rely on, would like o exrac wha couldbe characerized as he hree key asserions ha Badiou formulaes wihrespec o he concep of he even in Deleuze, which shall examine inwha follows:

(i ) he Even mus be aligned wih he gure of he One, and hus considered as unary, and also onologically primary wih respec o saes ofaairs;

(ii ) evens are eect and no causes; and,(iii) as such, hey are incapable of providing he basis for he irrupion of

he new in a given siuaion.

HE EVEN IN DEEUZE

We have already seen a key aribue of he even for Deleuze: ha i musbe hough as replacing he dogmaic or heoremaic view of essence ahe hear of a meaphysics of being wih a concep of even a eence. ispoin already works agains Badiou's reading, specically he rs claim, inso far as i srives o do away wih any gure of primary uniy ( a he levelof essenial being) in favour of muliple changes (or wha we migh call heinessenial movemens of becoming) . n wha follows, he hree claims haorganize Badiou's reading of he Deleuzean even will be deal wih. n shor,

would like o show

109



BADIOU S DELEUZE

0 ha while in one sense, evens are cerainly eecs for Deleuze, eyalso inhabi a regime ha is quascausal in naure; ha is, hey are no

merely producs, bu play a key role in e producion of saes of aairs ;(ii ) ha evens are essenially plural for Deleuze, and he gure of he Even(or Evetum atum) is no a gure of he One, bu of univociy; and

(ii i) ha, on he one hand, evens hus underso od can be aken o descr ibehe inroducion of novely ino a given sae of aairs and, on he oher,evens are irreducible o heir acualizaion, and his evenal excess isprecisely wha allows for he kind of deviaion from normaliy haBadiou sees a work in he even as excessive undecidable mulipliciy.

n esablishing each of hese poins we are also able o demonsrae somesriking aspecs of he Deleuzean projec wih respec o he caegory of heeven. n he rs case, wha emerges is a properly ranscendenal accoun,whose role is o consider evens as he geneic condiions for he emergenceof new saes of aairs. Wih respec o (ii), Deleuze provides a remarkableaccoun of he naure of he communicaion beween evens ha providesnew grounds o asser ha he univociy of being mus no be reduced o

any promoion of a quiddiaive uniy. n he case of (iii), sehing like aDeleuzean version of Badious subjec of deliy o an even emerges.

Badiou is cerainly righ o asser ha "Te Logc of Sese is he mosconsiderable er on he par of Gilles Deleuze o clarify his concep of heeven" (LM 404) While he concep is addressed hroughou his laer work,as we have seen, i is here ha i is reaed direcly and in he mos susainedfashion. Even he chaper of Te Fold dedicaed o he quesion Wa is aneven? addressed hrough a discussion of Leibniz and Whiehead, is in he

end less signican, illusraing he earlier posiions wihou exceeding hemin any signican direcion.

he accoun of evens for Deleuze begins by radically disinguishingbeween wo orders , hose of cause and eec, following in he rs insancehe Soics, while drawing heavily on Lewis Carroll. On he one side, wehave he order of causes, which operaes beween bodies: ere are nocauses ad eecs among bodies. Raher, all bodies are causes causes inrelaion o each oher and for each oher" (LS 4/1 3 ) Here, bodies are no jusmediumsized objecs, bu raher everyhing ha migh fall under he caegory of maerial beings , hus including bodies as hey are normally undersood, bu also speech, wriing or marks in general as he maerial aspecof language (as opposed o is meaning) . hus he exclamaion found in ATousad Plateaus in he conex of a laer discussion of he Soics Represenaions are bodies oo!" (TP 86) Deleuze will also call bodies in hisexended sense states of aars, and here we mus cerainly undersand hese

o be equivalen o he exended and qualied regime of he acual as i i s

110



THE EVENT IN DEEUZE

presened in Derence an Repetition n fac Deleuze will come o speakof he relaionship beween evens and saes of aairs in erms of aualizaion. On he oher side we have he regime of eecs :

all bodies are causes . . . of cerain hings of an enirely dierennaure. hese eecs are no bodies bu properly speaking incorporeal" eniies . hey are no physical qualiies and properies buraher logical or dialecical aribues . he are no hings or facsbu evens. We canno say ha hey exis bu raher ha hey subsis or insis having his minimum of being which is approprae o

ha which is no a hing bu a nonexising eniy. (LS 45m /13)

n oher words he causal ineracion beween bodies produces eecsha are no bodies hemselves bu ideal attributes of hese bo dies . o refero one of Deleuzes favoured examples when am cu he being cu" musbe seen no as an eec rendered on one body by anoher bu as an idealiy produced on he incorporeal level or wha he also calls he meaphysicalsurface. is a pure o cu" ha is aribued o a body or bodies and which

is neural wih respec o he various modaliies in which i is acualized(here he one who is cu and he one who wields he knife are acualizing hesame even from he passive and acive pos iions respecively) . Likewise i isno he case ha a ree grows shrinks be comes green in spring and so on.Raher each of hese is an incorporeal eec ha inheres in he ree: o growo shrink and even o green (he ree greens . . [LS 6/15] ) .

is new dualism" (LS 6/15) is sriking: while bodies aken ogeherform an ingral causal whole (a uniy called Desiny" [LS 4/13]) i is he

regime ha Deleuze will come o idenify as sense in which eecs come oexis (or raher as indicaed above subsist) in heir own righ. I is no a allhe dualism of he inelligible and he sensible of Idea and maer or of Ideasand bodies . is a more profound and secre dualism hidden in sensible andmaerial bodies hemselves" (LS 2/1 0) . is his laer level ha characerizeshe regime proper o evens: an even is precisel an incorporeal aribueha cerain bodies express as a resul of heir causal ineracions. is us iis irreducible o he order of causes hemselves: he even is no wha happens (an acciden) i is raher he pure expressed within wha happens" (LS149m175; emphasis added).

VNT AS F FCT, V NT AS QUASICAUS

Le us admi he rs consequence of his: ha Badiou is cerainly righ o

asser ha for Deleuze he even is an eect However his is only half of

1 1 1



BDIU'S DELEUZE

he full accoun ha Deleuze presens in Te ogic o Sense. We have alreadyseen he spli imposed beween causes a he level of bodies, and evens assuch Now, o consider evens as eecs of bodily ineracion or producsof saes of aairs i s, as i were, o consider hem fr he poin of view ofbodies For Deleuze, hough, we mus also ake ino accoun he poin ofview of he even iself. a is, we mus consider he even in so far as iforms a par of a ranscendenal eld: e idea of singulariies , and hus ofanigeneraliies, which are however impersonal and preindividual, musnow serve as our hypohesis for he deerminaion of his domain and isgeneic power" (LS 99/ 121 ) Or, correlaively, Only when he world, eaming

wih anonymous and nomadic, impersonal and preindividual singulariies,opens up, do we read a las on he eld of he ranscendenal" (LS 103 /1 25 )For Deleuze, his second aspec of he even i s par in a ranscendenaleld is accouned for in relaion o ve characerisics

(i) evens (qua singulariies) are a par of heerogenous series endowedwih a poenial energy";

(ii) evens parake in a process of auounicaion (forming a single Even

in which evens are ariculaed);(iii) he ranscendenal eld, upon which evens are arrayed, mus be

grasped as a surface ha is, as lacking dimensions, immediaely inconac wih, inhering in, or surveying [survole (LS 104m/127)saes of aairs;

(iv) he ranscendenal eld hus consiued is he locus of sense; and(v) singulariiesevens are problemaic in naure; his eld of problemaic

singulariies and senses hus provides he condiions of rue genesis"

(LS 105m/1 27)

he cenral issue, however, is how hese wo aspecs of he even areinerrelaed: how can we eec he passage from seriliy o genesis" (LS97/11)? Or again, How can we mainain boh ha sense [or he even]produces even he saes of aairs in which i is embodied, and ha i is iselfproduced by hese saes of aairs or he acions and passions of bodies ( animmaculae concepion) (LS 124/149) ? e rs move ha Deleuze makesin response o hese concerns is o sipulae ha we really do have wo differen modaliies of he even

1 1 2

When we say ha bodies and heir mixures produce sense [orcause evens] , i is no by virue of an individuaion which wouldpresuppose i ndividuaion in bodies, he measure in heirmixures, he play of persons and conceps in heir variaions

his enire order presupposes he neural, preindividual and



TH V NT IN D Z

impersonal eld wihin which i is deployed. is herefore in adieren way ha sense [and evens are] produced by bo dies .

(LS 124m/149)

n oher words Being a pure eec i is neverheless he locus lieu] of aquasicause" (LS 12410) which is o say ha no direc causal relaionshipholds even hough he even plays an irreducible role in he consiuion ofparicular saes of aairs. n urn we mus disinguish beween he evenaken as causal produc and he even as problemaic insance bu only inorder o hereby reariculae hem in a new way. Evens or sense provide

he problemaic loci around which he regime of bodies or saes of aairs isorganized. e very individuaion ha brings abou a sae of aairs a reefor example is a srucure of singulariiesevens and i is he poenialenergy expressed by his srucure ha is acualized in he causal relaionsof bodies. When he same ree is engaged in causal relaions such ha igrows or becomes green his even is inscribed or included in his srucure in urn redisribuing he dierenial relaions beween evens andhe poenial energy bound up by hem wih respec o he singulariies in

quesion. Evens as eecs ener ino he disribuion of singulariies in heranscendenal eld hus parak[ing] of he quasicause aachd o i" (LS12/11 ) .

is accoun and he opology ha i presens i s one i n which he impassiviy and neuraliy of evens from he poin of view of he iniial causalchain (causal bodies produce immaerial evens) becomes from he poin ofview of he ranscendenal regime of evens hemselves engaged in a coplex asymmerical circui of ineracions. n urn he apparen blind aciviy

found in he dephs of bodies mus be seen in a second sense oo as an aciviy ha for all is blindness displaces and complicaes he prolems haprovided i wih is geneic bas is . Or as Deleuze pus i he deph acs in anoriginal way by means of its power to orgnize suaces and to envelop itsewithin suaces (LS 124/10). Any paricular sae of aairs ha is orienshe ranscendenal eld around he ineracions ha govern is local causalnework embodying or even inhaling he problemaic such ha i fos aninner lining or layer across which is aciviies are played ou.

From a more general poin of view his peculiar double srucure of causaliy reurns us o he heme of expression ha was discussed in Chaper2. is only his caegory ha can adequaely describe he disjuncive circuiof evens above all because no direc causal mechanism could ever accounfor i . Beween evens and saes of aairs here is a rue expressive relaionship in which evens (eecs) express he consequences of he causal ineracions of bodies and in which evens (geneic singulariies) are expressive

problems in relaion o which saes of aairs array hemselves : he even of

1 1 3



BADOU S DELEUZE

bale in whic relaions of enemies, pied agains each ohe o he deahin he acual, wihdraw, and in which here is no direc anagonism, bu acomplex muliplicious relaion wih he bal isel is no from he bone

sha lie in he dephs of bodies ha an avenger arises; he even iself provides he geneic kernel ha every revenge, every ac of war, expresses isha cerain aliquid, ha someng ha, like he grain of sand in an oyser,engenders he producion of novely in hese dephs

EVENTUM TANTUM AND VNTS PURAL

We mus add ha evens are inernally engaged in expressive relaions wiheach oher (hey are, Deleuze says, inerexpressive" [LS 177/208]); onceagain, no sandard causal or logical mechanism can be used o accoun forhem, even if heir relaions are irreducibly imporan in he consiuion ofrealiy Like he reciprocal and dierenial srucure of he virual oulined inDerence and Repeiion, he regime of evens in Te Logic of Sense involvesa complex serial organizaion irreducible o a uniy Even afer resoring o

he even is primacy wih respec o he regime of causaliy, he mos formidable of Badious criical poins remains ndeed, if here is any momen inDeleuzes work ha provides real evidence ha he is elaboraing a heory ofhe One, i i in Te Logic of Sense, and i perains o wha Deleuze names, aswe have een, he Even e following passage i s exemplary: Nohing oherhan he Even subsiss, he Even alone, Evenum anum for all conraries, which communicaes wih iself hrough is own disance and resonaesacross all of is disjuncions" (LS 176m/207) And he following, which

Badiou himself parially quoes (LM 383/405):

Wha makes a n even compaible or incompaible wi anoher?We canno appeal o causaliy, since i i s a quesion of a relaionof eecs among hemselves Wha brings desiny abou a helevel of evens , wha brings an even o repea anoher in spie ofall is dierence, wha makes i possible ha a life is composedof a single and same Even, despie he variey of wha mighhappen, ha i be raversed by a single and same ssure, ha iplay one and he same air over all possible unes and all possibleworlds (LS 170m199)

Clearly, hese momens suppor somehing like Badious wo basic proposiions abou Deleuze: ha a unied onological momen (he Even, Evenumanum) is primary in relaion o is muliplicious and leeing emana

ions (evens, plural, qua saes of aairs) However, Deleuzes use of hese

114



TH VNT IN DUZ

expressions are hemselves embedded less in such a srucure han in anaemp o grasp he naure of relaions beween evens in heir own erms

(e. asideal singulariies) .

is poin is already indicaed by he second quoaon above, which isoriened by he quesion: wha makes an even compaible or incompaibleih anoher? More speically, wha are he relaions beween evens suchha a given body or sae of aairs can express or acualize a number ofevens? We know ha he ree becomes green, grows larger or smaller, andso on ha he ree is a locus of acualizaions bu how are o green" ando grow" or o shrink" ariculaed in and of hemselves? is in answer

ing his quesion ha Deleuze is led o posi he Even" as a caegory haaccouns for he unique manner of he inerrelaion of evenshe key passages in his regard are o be found in he wo chapers of Te

Logic of Sense (series wenyfour and wenyve) dedicaed o he comunicaion of evens and univociy respecively. n elaboraing an answer ohis quesin, Deleuze proceeds much as he did in Derence and Repetitionwih respec o he hesis of univoci. Once more, hree key momens areelaboraed, each going furher han he previous. n Derence and Repeti-

tion, he series in quesion is Duns Scous-SpinozaNiezsche Here, hehree posiions can b e aligned wih he nominal chain of Soic, Leibnizianand properly Deleuzean heories, alhough he laer involves reference omany oher gures, Niezsche included

The Stoic opening

Deleuzes mehod, as he raverses his series, is eecively subtractive innaure He is ineresed in discovering he naure of he communicaionbeween evens by sripping away any srucures or values ha are in facnaive o he regime of saes of aairs and which, when imposed on hecommunicaion of evens, obscure is naure. n oher words, o approachan adequae hough of he inerrelaion of evens, we mus subrac everyexplanaory heme ha arises exernal o he regime of evens hemselves.e rs momen is he Soics Deleuze, as we have seen, draws heavily onhe Soic heory of sense in order o elaborae a disincion beween idealsenseevens and heir acualizaion in bodies And, in he course of heirhough, hey come o be he rs hinkers o aemp o accoun for hecompaibiliy or incompaibiliy beween evens in nonconcepual or alogical erms o use he example provided by Deleuze, we can oppose wo species of buerlies hose ha are black and vigorous and hose ha aregrey and weak bu only in erms of he pure evens o urn grey and o

urn black' boh of which are equally posiive. f a grey vigorous buerly is

115



BDIOU'S DEEUZE

an incoheren concep, i is no because of a logical incompaibiliy a helevel of conceps o impose his cr ierion would be o ascribe o he evenshemselves characerisics ha do no peran o hem

Neverheless, he Soics do no elaborae an alernaive o dyadic logic inorder o accoun or he relaionship beween evens o asser ha hesewo evens (o urn grey" and o urn black) are equally posiive is no yeo accoun for heir ideal coexisence Hence, Deleuze claims he Soicsmay no have been able o resis he double empaion of reurning osimple physical causaliy or o logical compaibiliies" (LS 171m/200)

Leibniz, heoreician of he even

us he rs heoreician of alogical incompaibiliies , and for his reasonhe rs imporan heoreician of he even, was Leibniz" (LS 171/200)Leibniz's genius in his regard is he elaboraion of he original caegoryof compossibiliy Whereas conradicion is concerned wih logical claims(and hus falls on he side of saes of aairs) and which canno accoun

fo he coexisence of conrary evens (o grow larger' o grow smaller"),compossibiliy is proposed by Leibniz as a crieria belonging o evens assuch

ndeed, Leibniz goes even furher, resrucuring he enire subjecpredicae relaionship in keeping wih his insigh i is no longer predicaesas logical ( and hence nonconradicory) aribuions ha perain o or characerize he subjec, bu raher events themselves in so far as hey are compossible wih he enire eld of evens in he world in which he course of

he subjec unfolds is is why Deleuze insiss on he claim ha for LeibnizGod does no creae Adam who s ins bu raher he world in which Adamwhosins exiss (eg LS 111/135; FLB 25/35) Alernaively he world inquesion is one in which he evenpredicae o sin" is an aribue of Adam,in compossibiliy wih he enirey of he innie number of oher sequencesof evenaribues in Adam and in every oher monad

Compossibiliy herefore assers ha wha logical compaibiliy wouldconsider conrary evens migh subsis ogeher a he same ime in so far ashey are a par of a series ha s ino he general regime in quesion Here,in keeping wih he maheaical heory of singulariies elaborad in heconex of he calculus, D eleuze wries Compossibiliy mus be dened inan original manner, a a preindividual level, by he convergence of serieswhich singulariies of evens form as hey exend hemselves ou over linesof ordinary poins" (LS 171m/201) Equally original is he counerpar ofcompossibiliy incompossibiliy Raher han being a simple conradicion

(as in bivalen logic, and consequenly as in any orhodox undersanding of

116



HE EVEN N DEEUZE

he subjecpredicae relaionship), incompossibiliy concerns wo series ofevens ha diverge from each oher

ncompossibiliy mus be dened by he divergence of suchseries : if anoher Sexus han he one we know is incompossiblewih our world, i is because he would correspond o a singulariy whose series would diverge from he series of our world,clusered abou he Adam, he Judas, he Chris, and he Leibnizwe know wo evens are compossible when he series are organized around heir singulariies exend in all direcions; hey are

incompossible when he series diverge in he viciniy of consiuive singulariies Convergence and divergence are enirelyoriginal relaions which cover he rich domain of alogical conpaibiliies and incompaibiliies (LS 17 12m/201 )

owever, Deleuze nds he Leibnizian scheme waning While providing a sriking heory of he relaionships beween evens ha would beconsidered o b e conradicory on he dyadic schema of conradicion, one

ha was lacking in he Soics, Leibnizs accoun remains bound o cerainheological exigencies" (LS 172/201) ha ruin his ulimae value for heheory of evens A issue here is he famous heme of he bes of all possible worlds On Leibnizs accoun, God is he one who chooses beweenall he possible worlds, according o he win crieria of he greaes varieyand he fewes laws However, here is a more primary crieria han hese,and ha is compossibiliy iself Of he possible worlds ha God choosesbeween, hose ha conain incompossible series or disjuncive evens are

ruled ou in advance hus, Leibniz arms evens in heir alogical incompossibiliy only afer a pioi excluding he possibiliy ha hese disjuncseries migh unfold in he same world n oher words, i is only in so faras incompossibiliy is brough under he regime of he One (of inegralcompossibiliy) ha Leibniz will admi i o being Or, as Deleuze pus i,Leibniz pus ino use he heme of disjuncion bu only in a negaive orexclusive manner

Beyond Leibniz: inclusive disjuncion

For Deleuze, his is once more unaccepable: like he Soics, Leibniz hasreinroduced crieria peraining o a regime exernal o ha of evens hemselves in order o accoun for he relaions beween evens For Deleuze, hekey poin hus appears o be he following: ha we mus arm evens in

heir dierence as such if we are o have any heory of he even a all Raher

117



BADOU'S DEEUZE

han arming evens wih respec o some ideniy we mus concern ourselves wih an operaion according o which wo hings or wo deermina

ions are armed through heir dierenceha is o say ha hey are heobjecs of simulaneous armaion only insofar as heir dierence is iself

armed and is armaive' He coninues wriing:

e are no longer in any way dealing wih an ideniy of conraries which would sill be inseparable as such from a emenof he negaive and of exclusion. We are raher faced wih a posiive disance of dierens [drents] : faced no longer wih he

idenicaion of wo conraries wih he same bu he armaion of disance as ha which relaes he one o he oher insofaras hey are dierens (LS 1723m/202)

Here we see he kernel of he hird momen he properly Deleuzeanheory of he relaions beween evens is incompossibiliy iself as disjuncion or as inrinsic dierence ha mus found such a heory. Deleuzesheory nally posis herefore ha evens are relaed o one anoher in heir

ideal coexisence according o a synhesis ha brings all dierences ogeherwihou eradicaing hese dierences in any gure of ideniy. his is heheme of he disjunctive snthesis

n a cerain way he enire debae around Badious reading of Deleuzecould enre on he explicaion of his phrase as we have already seen inChaper 2. For Badiou i is he snthesis ha is decisive and which (a hevery leas) implies a resulan synheic uniy. For Deleuze however wha isabove all o be hough is he role of disjuncs or dierens as the subject of

snthesis:

is no ha he disjuncion has become a simple conjuncion . . .e whole quesion and righly so is o know under wha condiions he disjuncion is a veriable synhesis insead of beinga procedure of analysis which is saised wih he exclusion ofpredicaes from one hing in virue of he ideniy of is concep.

(LS 174/2034)

n oher words e disjuncion is no a all reduced o a conjuncion; iis lef as a disjuncion since i bears and coninues o bear upon a divergence as such" (LS 174204) . o summarize any criique of Badious readingof Deleuze herefore we migh simply sae ha he has subordinaed disjuncion o a supposed conjuncion one ha Deleuze rejecs ourigh. healleged uniy of all evens in a single Even is no he subordinaion of dier

ences o an ulimae ideniy bu he armaion of evenaliy as such.

1 1 8



THE EVENT IN DELEUZE

e t

hythen do es Deleuze so often seem to invoke the very opposite claim?

e passage we have been discuss ing here nishes with the following claim

one we have already seen: Nothing other than the Event subsists the Eventalone Eventum antum for all contraries which communicates with itselfthrough its own distance and resonates across all of its disjunctions" (LS16tm/207) Deleuze's answer which is double as we shall see passes againby way of the concept of univocity argued earlier that on the basis of

eleuze's presentation of this theme he should be characterized as an

ontological mannerist e key to grasping the theme of the single EventEventum antum, in e Logic of Sense, would contend relies on adoptingthis point of view he key passage reads as follows:

A position in the void of all events in one an expression in thenonsense of all senses in one univocal Being is the pure form ofthe Ain the form of exteriority which relates things and propositions n short the univocity of Being has three determina

tions: one single event for all events; one and the same aliquidfor that which happens and that which is said; and one and thesame Being for the impossible the poss ible and the real

(LS 180/21 1)

Let us remark the radicality of this claim: i t is i n no way a monism andcertainly no materialism Events impossible idealities (the square circle petuum mobile), physical bodies sonorous matter: these all are in the same

manner e thesis of the univocity of being thus not only does away withsingularized substantive Being in any sense but also demolishes or ratherdemotes any logical or formal distinction of the order of modality Whatever the being materia subsistent impossible or evental . the manner oftheir being is the sae

n other words the key term in this formulation is form: to speak of theunivocity of Being is to speak of the unity of the manner in which beingsexist theirformal unity and not their substantive ground What then is theEent the single and same Event? t is the formal unity of all events: in otherwords it is disjunctive synthesis as such Or we might even answer in a Badiouian fashion: Eventum tantum, rather than being a substantive of any kindis the D eleuzean term for eventality for the properly evental character of theeventY n so far as an event is grasped in its ideal sense as a subsistent singularity it i s thought eventally us Badiou is certainly right to state that Event"is another term for the univocity of being on the condition that we treat uni

vocity in its properly Deleuzean sense divorced from the gure of the O ne

1 1 9



BDIOU S DELEUZE

VNTS AND NOVTY: COUNTRACTUAIZATION

As have noed chaper enyve of e Loic of Sense entyFifSeries of nivocity" provides o ansers o he saus of the Even as such.he chaper opens relecing on he heme of disjunctive synhesis ih heords: seems hat our problem in he course of our invesigaion haschanged alogeher" LS 177208). And i is on he folloing page that heredened problem is posed:

e problem is therefore one of knoing ho he individual

ould be able o ranscend his form and his syntacical link iha orld in order o atain to he universal communication ofevens that is o he armaion of a disjuncive synhesis beyondlogical conradicions and even beyond alogical incompaibiliies ould be necessary for he individual o grasp herselfas even; and hat she grasp he even actualized ithin her asanoher individual grafed onto her. n his case she ould notunderstand an or represen his event ihou also under

sanding and aning all other evens as individuals and ihoutrepresening all oher individuals as evens. LS 17 8 2089)

he erm individual has a technical deniion in Te Loic of Sense thate have not discussed here as he correlate o he order of denoaion inlanguage and as innie analytic proposiion) hich is very close to theindividual found in Derence nd Repetition discussed in he next chaperhile deparing from i in a variey of respecs; likeise the noion of rep

resentation hich here is synonymous ith bodies or saes of aairs in sofar as hey acualize events) . Nonetheless o consider all evens as individuals has an imediae sense it is o direcly arm evens as events and in sofar as they are or could be acualized. o arm oneself as event is to armhe Event as such hich means o arm the evenality proper o being ase have seen he opening of sates of aairs on o he disjuncive eventualchains) to arm the irruption of problems ino states of aairs .

Hoever ha Deleuze has in mind is more specic han e kind ofilling of being as becoming What is couneracualizaion? With referenceto he gure of he Soic sage he rites :

120

the sage ais for the event ha is o say undersands he pureevent in is eernal ruth independently of is spaioemporalactualizaion as somehing eernally yeocome and alaysalready passed ... Bu a he same ime the sage also ills he

embodimen and he acualizaion of he pure incorporeal



E EVEN IN DEEUZE

event in a state of aairs and in his or her own body and lesh.dentifying with the quasi cause the sage wishes to give a body"

to the incorporeal eect since the eect inherits the cause.(LS 1467172)

So we initially see two aspects in play in Deleuzes analysis. e rst consists in a certain orientation towards events that grasps them as excessiveith respect to their actualization and also therefore wih respect to theiraterial cause ts obverse is described by Deleuze as a certain essenti-ent o grasp whatever happens as unjust and unwarranted (i is always

someone elses fault) is on the contrary what renders our sores repugnant essentiment in person essentiment of the event" (LS 149m174) n other words the primary ethical gesture is to consider the event asirreducible to the order of causes which is also the order of blame andthe source of moral terminology (of which Deleuze writes Wat is reallyimmoral is the use of moral notions like just or unjust merit or fault" [LS14917] ) .

e second aspect o f counteractualization concerns perhaps surpris

ingly an act of the will according to Deleuze and consists in inverting theview have of myself as an agent. Counteractualization is an act whereby leap in place" (LS 14917) identifying with myself no longer as simply abody subject to the causal nexus but instead as the event that is my geneticcondition: sidestep my place in the causal order and begin miming oracting ( becoe a humouractor Deleuze says referring to Jo Bousquet)of the event no longer invested in what is here and now but instead withwhat in what is here and now that could be the locus of an otherwise. o

counteractualize is to traverse the path of actualization diagonally with aneye to how the event could be actualized otherwise n other words it is amatter of changing the locus of my actions from immediate (we might evensay eient) causality to the quasicausal event or from a causal agent to anagent of potential energy is in turn furnishes an entire panoply of motivations orientations: in short an entirely new natue.

he ethical import of this position provides an illuminating point of viewon the enigmatic Nietzschean demand to become what one is (Nietzsche2001 : §33) n fact this is ultimately the single ethical maxim of e Lgi Sense, provided that we grasp this oneself" (in a now familiar and paradoxical way) as the dierence that inhabits me in the form of the event.t is not an esoteric doctrine of action but a doctrine of action accordingto which what is esoteric or occult within nese namely the event thatone embodies provides the means to assert what has not been embodiedin you as a principle of change (and beyond this the decisive signicance

of other events in the same way). n turn ethics in e Lgi Sense is

1 2 1



BDIOU'S DELEUZE

irreducible o an ac of represenaional hough bu concerns raher onesmos inimae relaionship wih wha one is some oher thng wihin me

ha is like my specular double bu also he means by which can grasp hecapaciy for change as such

Counter-atuaization, beoming and the eventa subet in Badiou

Can we no recognize o an imporan exen somehing like he subjec inBadiou's sense in he gure of couneracualizaion? For Badiou he subjec

is uniquely oriened by an even ha canno be an objec of knowledge orof language (as an objec of represenaion) And as for Badiou his subjecis no (or is no longer) simply a naive inhabian saes of aairs (represened siuaions) bu emerges in response o an even As for Badiou i isonly hrough he subjec ha novely in he srong sense is c apable of beinginroduced ino saes of aairs and in accordance once more wih he even

However he dierences are jus as sriking Whereas he subjecevenrelaionship is sricly exerior in Badiou for Deleuze he even or sricly

speaking evens ha embo dy as a couneracualizing subjec is wha isprimary in wha am' And whereas for Badiou he even is characerizedby is (dis)appariion for Deleuze he even eernally (or beer aeporally he ime of he even An being wha evades he presen) subsissogeher wih all oher evens in a complex serial srucure Perhaps mossignicanly while Badiou considers ha he course of he subjec can beaccouned for in is being in a compleely formal anner Deleuze is ledo include deerminans such as he body and he will as deniive for an

accoun of couneracualizaionConrary o cerain characerizaions of he even in Deleuze including

Badiou's which consider he even iself as he locus of novely in Deleuze'sphilosophy bringing wih i he idea of a selfelaboraing and selfchangingbeing wha we nd a he hear of Deleuze's heory of he even in is mossusained presenaion is somehing very dieren Cerainly being mus begrasped as irreducible o eiher he saic noion of essence or he ideal ipse iy of he Plaonic Forms Bu i is no on he basi s of evens ha he mosdecisive sense of novely is inroduced Raher he inroducion of novely inhe srong sense rel ies on an inervenion

Even he grea DeleuzoGuaarian heme of becomingoher can behough in he conex of he heory of couneracualizaion o engage in abecoming would be o couner acualize oneself in relaion o an even hais beyond wha conspired in my consiuion as a body or sae of aairsis would also iply a doubling of he movemen of becoing iself in

accordance wih he wo relaionships ha hold beween he even and he

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TE EVENT IN DEEUZE

individuals that incarnate it. ere would be two becoings: one ordained

by nature understood as the vast interlocking motions of an inorganic life,

and the other practised behind natures back. e relationship of becomingthat holds between the wasp and the orchid concerns actualization as such,the constitution of reality according to the dierenciation of a problematicevent; the human being , however, engaged in becominganimal, is involved

in the shadowy double of this fundamental relationship. n becominghorse ,in the manner of Little Hans for example, the subject attempts to extractfrom the event that constitutes them an armation of the event in its difference as such. o enter into a becoming would be to exceed the ndividual

that one is in favour of other events, other problems, whose existence we canonly sense, like a glimmer or an apprehension of a movement beyond ourline of sight (glimmers to which Deleuze will give the name phantasms in theclosing chapters of Te Logic of Sense)

THE ETERNA R TURN, CHANCE AND THE EVENT

We have already seen Badiou's conclusion that since, for Deleuze, all chanceis made subject to the eternal return as such, it stands unied and thusessentially forecloses o n chance t is by critically evaluating this claim that shall conclude here n fact, it is precisely the same logic that is problematically imposed on the disjunctive synthesis as the characteristic of theEventum tantum that Badiou also mobilizes with respect to the eternalreturn in relation to chance

Badiou begins by outlining what he characterizes as the three misunder

standings that are liable to befall the doctrine of the eternal return. ese heterms the Parmenidean (the eternal return signals the permanence of theOne as static Being [DB 68/ 1023] ) the cosmological (the return as universal law of the Same imposed on Being) and the statistical or regulatory(the eternal return regulates or organizes chaos) n each case, we are confronted with a way of defaulting on Deleuzes reading of Nietzsche's doctrineby returning it to the closure of a fundamental unit o these three misreadings, he presents what he takes to be the result of Deleuze's delity to theeternal return" (DB 67/101) namely a fourth alternative: that the eternalreturn is essentially the aration of all chances in a single gesture.

Badiou's response to this presentation is to reject all four options thus outlined (critiquing in passing Deleuze's reading of Mallarms Un Coup de ds)and, beyond these, all possible senses of the eternal return of the Same" ( DB76/ 1 15 ) on the grounds that it is an inadequate thought of chanceper se.

n other words, what is at stake in the thought of the event, for Badiou,

is the status of chance itself, visvis being As we have already seen, the

123



BDIOU'S DELEUZE

caegory of chance is cenral for Badious own philosophy no only is eadven of he even radically disjunc from any capaciy for predicion bu he

very srucure and movemen of he subjec is diagonal or ransversal o anycaegory of knowledge in he siuaion o which i belongs and hus irreducible o regulariy or any hough of order. n oher words chance is he verymark of he even and everyhing conneced o i all of which are in imporansenses disjunc o he ordered regulariy of represened being. we canundersand one of he cenral passages in his chaper of Te Clamor of Bein.Drawing on Deleuze's use of he meaphor of he dice hrow Badiou wries

limaely he eernal reurn is he One as he armaion ofchance or armaion of he fac ha chance is armed in asingle hrow which reurns as he acive being of all cass orall foruious evens. Bu one can jus as well say ha chance ishe One as eernal reurn for wha makes an even foruious isha i has as is unique acive power as is generic virualiy hawhich reurns namely he original Grea Cas .

(DCB 745/1 13)

n sum he Deleuzean hemaizaion of chance in he gure of he eernal reurn (even released from is various misundersandings) does no adequaely accoun for chance on is own erms raher suuring i o beingWhile each chance is armed by he eernal reurn i is only in so far as heeernal reurn iself he guaranor of chance is synonymous wih Being andis emanaive power. Or o use Badious own phrase he eernal reurn in isDeleuzean manifesaion excludes he Chance of chances

is by chance ha a paricular chance happens All in all heconingency of Being is only compleely realized if here is alsohe Chance of chances Bu for Deleuze insofar as coningencfalls under he law of he One i is realized in a single sroke. eChance of chances does no exis and his is he price paid forBeing o be full. (DCB 76/1 15 16)

us he eernal reurn for Badiou can only amoun o anoher namefor Being anoher momen in he armaion of he One in he serial exercise of a single inuiion Or in erms of he even he eernal reurn is hesingle Even of being whose being is iself absolue and necessary bu whichexpresses iself in plural evens each of which is subjec o chance. As suchhe armaion of chance (jus like he claied onological ground of allevens in an Even) is of a dieren regime han chance iself he regime of

he eernal eecive One.

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THE EVENT IN DELEUZE

ow, Badious summary of he poenial misundersandings of he eernal reurn is insrucive and helpful, no jus for is que correc grasp ofeleuzes concerns abou he misinerpreaions ha his concep is liableo, bu also because Badious own criique parakes in all hree errors. He,

in fac, claims ha he eernal reurn on D eleuzes accoun evics Chance

because i insiss on he One; i is he One ha organizes all coningenbeing; and ha he Being of beings is he One. And such claims are precisely he noions ha he docrine of he eernal reurn, for Deleuze, a prioriexcludes from an onology of dierence.

ndeed, no only are hese he claims ha Badiou makes of he eernal

reurn, chance and he even, bu hey are of he genre of claims ha governhis reading quie explicily, as we have seen of Deleuze as a whole . healeaory, he simulacra, disjuncion, evens in heir pluraliy and beings inheirs: all of hese posulaes are made subordinae o he One. he One (orhe eernal reurn, or he Even) is he ideal and singular real apex of a pyramid from which is emanaive resuls emerge and owards which hey areoriened: Deleuze becomes, all in all, a kind of hyperinformed weniehcenur Gnosic.

The eternl return s empty form nd dierentil rmtion

We have already seen in he previous chaper ha Badiou equaes ime andbeing in Deleuze, and we have seen some reasons o quesion his equaion.Badious reading of he eernal reurn is anoher such reason. Here, we needonly recall wo qualiies of he eernal reurn, as Deleuze presens i, o pu

ino quesion he Badiouian accoun have jus elaboraed.he rs of hese is he formal naure of he eernal reurn for Deleuze.

As we have seen in he previous chaper, raher han being he One as hearmaion of chance" (D CB 74/ 1 13 ), he eernal reurn signals ime as formwihou conen: he empy form of ime" (DR 88 /1 19 ). is he ulimaeform of ime imposed a once on he pas and he presen (wha Deleuzecalls he condiion and he agen of ime, respecively [DR 90/122]), buwhich equally ears apar ha which is made subjec o i. As form, i cannobe considered as eiher subsanial or quiddiaive ground (he One) , nor asa power of expression (he emanaive power of he O ne). While, as we haveseen in he previous chaper, boh he presen and he pas are wedded ospecic conen (habiuaed corpus in he rs case and virual pas as suchin he second) , he eernal reurn signals ime nally freed from any subordinaion o space or objec: ime iself unfolds ... i ceases o be cardinaland becomes ordinal, a pure order of ime" (DR 88/ 120 ). he eernal reurn

causes neiher he condiion [he pas] nor he agn [he presen] o reurn:

125



BADIOU S DELEUZE

on he conrary, i repudiaes hese and expels hem wih all is cenrifugaforce is iself he new, complee novely" (DR 90 1212) .

We could also pu his poin more direcl, dispensing wih he esoericchicanes of he Deleuzean accoun: wha he eernal reurn signies is hanohng rurns e reurn is simply he expulsion of every possible conenof ime Or, again, wha reurns is simply he form of ime iself, pure andempy, and i reurns o once again fall on he presen and he pas and disurb he inegriy of beings besowed on hem by he synheses of he pasand he presen

We migh also objec o Badiou's claim abou he radicaliy of chance in

relaion o he even on his own accoun For here is one aspec of he evenin Bng n Evn ha is in no way subjec o chance, and ha is is srucure as discerned by onology n oher words, here are only evens in sofar as hey are he eernal repeiion of he same is his sm ha rendershe even hinkable As Badiou himself noes in Cmor of Bng, on hisaccoun, he form of all evens is he same" (DB 756/114). is meansha onology provides he hough of he Same in every even, even houghis adven evades every means available o grasp i oher han in he form of

a rerospecive subjecive deliySecond, for Deleuze, he eernal reurn is rn in naure: i is he

reurn of dirence iself Badiou elides every emphasis placed by Deleuze onhe inrinsic link beween he eernal reurn and rnc s such direclyariculaing he eernal reurn wih he hesis of he One is is a remarkable fea, since Deleuzes discussions of his opic insss on few if any oher aspecs so heavily he hough of he eernal reurn, he hough andhe producion of he absoluely dieren; making i so ha repeiion is , for

iself, dierence in iself" (DR 94/ 12 6) Once more we are presened wih he primacy of dierence in Deleuze

wih respec o any and all uniy Bu Badiou, on he conrary, aemps oachieve he ariculaion of he One and he eernal reurn, hereby bypassing he hough of dierence in iself, by way of he heme of armaion ForDeleuze, hough, i is precisely he dierenial naure of he eernal reurnha provides i wih is armaive mandae e eernal reurn is a force ofarmaion, bu i arms everyhing of he muliple, everyhing of he dieren, everyhing of chance excep wha subordinaes hem o he One, o heSame and he Necessary" (DR 115151) n an earlier passage ha complemens his, Deleuze wries :

126

As for he hird ime in which he fuure appears, his signies ha he even and he ac possess a secre coherence whichexcludes ha of he self; ha hey urn back agains he self

which has become heir equal and smash i o pieces, as hough



HE EVEN N DEEUZE

he bearer of he new world were carried away and dispersed byhe shock of he mulipliciy o which i gives birh.

(DR 8990/1 21 )

is passage signals he rupure i n he regime o f he subjec, ha doubles

he inerrupion of every gure of uni in he regime of being according ohe empy form of he fuure. he mulipliciy ha gives birh o uniies ofevery kind is vouchsafed by he ulimae ruh of ime ime is he armaion of dierence as such; is is how he sory of ime ends" (DR 1 14/ 151 ) .

127



E S

ACIVE AND PASSIVE HOUGH AND BEING

n he mehodological passages near he sar of Te lamor o Being Badiouargues ha any familiariy wih Deleuzes hough will reveal ha one coulddraw up an endless lis of he concepual couples ha are organized according o his paramoun formal opposiion of he acive and he pass ive and

claims ha his dualiy clearly runs hroughou Deleuzes enire work"(DCB 33/52 ) For Badiou hough his level of organizaion of he Deleuzeanex mus however only be reaed as rheorical or preliminary in naurehus he adds ha e acive/passive dualiy indispuably exercises a sronginluence on Deleuze's philosophical language or les say his sponaneousrheoric Noneheless i is jus as unquesionable ha Deleuze does everyhing in his power o escape from his inluence" (DCB 334/53) eheror no his is rue of Deleuzes rheoric , wha is cerain is ha Badiou raher

han following wha he considers Deleuzes lead on his fron persiss inorganizing his reading around his opposiion no on a rheorical level buraher on he level of conceps hemselves

Being and powe

his is perhaps mos noable wih respec o he caegories of he virual andhe acual where Badiou's principle hesis abou Deleuze (he primacy ofhe One) leads him o asser ha he virual is as we have already seen hesupreme nae for Being in Deleuzes work associaed wih pleniude ulimae onological saus and aciviy. n comparison he acual is he regimeof passive producs us we read

128

For Deleuze beings are local degrees of inensiy or inlecions

of power ha are in consan movemen and enirely singular.



THOUGHT AND TH UBJCT

And as power is bu a name of Being beings are only expressivemodaliies of he O ne (DCB 25/40)

e One is life or producion (DCB 3961 )

Such claims also underpin Badiou's more general characerizaion ofDeleuze a s a vialis: Wha i s i in Deleuze ha xes he hough of beingo is Niezschean name life? is: ha being mus be evaluaed as power"

(DVO 193)n conras o his claim argued in Chaper 3 ha he virual as i is

presened in Derence an Repetition is o be associaed wih a cerain profound passiviy of is own (i does no ac i is) Raher han being he regimeof producion he virual here is gured as a ranscendenal srucure inrelaion o which he acua l is organized How his passage from he virualo he acual is eecuaed is in par he objec of he curren chaper for weshall see here ha sricly speaking i is no he virual (problemaic differenial deas) ha brings abou he acual bu ha his dynamic genesisinvolves a complex process on he side of he acual

e same srucure as we have seen was also in play wih respec oime n his case Badiou aligns memory wih aciviy on he one handand sensible ime wih passiviy on he oher Once more hough as argued here his way of grasping he work on ime in Deleuze overlooks anumber of decisive facors including he ascripion of a fundamenal passivity o he emporal synheses. Deleuze's analysis in Derence an Repetition indeed culminaes by referring he rs wo modaliies of ime o hehird passive synhesis he ime of he fuure or he eernal reurn which is

nohing bu a pure form a purely formal and empy ime which neiher acsnor reacs

Finally as we saw in he previous chaper Badious analysis of he evenin Deleuze (and he eernal reurn Ulimaely he eernal reurn is heOne as he armaion of chance or armaion of he fac ha chance isarmed in a single hrow which reurns as he acive being of all cass ofall foruious evens" [DCB 745 /113 ] ) enirely collapses i ino he proposedDeleuzean One of being On he oher hand he muliple producs of hesupreme Being=Even" (DVO 198) he dispensed simulacra are inero claim his hough Badiou has o ignore he many prominen passages inTe Logic of Sense devoed o he impassiviy and seriliy of he even N oonly are relaions beween evens irreducible o he mechanism of eciencausaliy ha governs saes of aairs he relaionship beween evens andheir acualizaion is on he one hand causally invered (saes of aairs causeevens) ad on he oher engaged in an alogeher nonacive relaion (ha

of serial inerlacemen) of quasicausaliy

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BDIOU'S DELEUZE

e other signicant moment of this theme in Badious reading comesin the context of his presentation of Deleuzes account of the suject andthought, in the chapter of Te Clamo of Bein entitled e Outside and theFold While the details will e examined in what follows, Badious centralcontention is that the names ought, Fold and Suject are also names forthe One in Deleuze, and thus also name the productive capacity of this One.

Now, Badiou recognizes immediately that D eleuze aandons the gureof the classical autonomous suject: this suject esults from a topologicaloperation that can e situated in the outside, and that it is thus in no wayconstitutive, nor autonomous, nor spontaneous" (DCB 90tm/133). Here,

Badiou is certainly correct. At issue, though, is not whether the suject inDeleuze is foundational in a Cartesian, Kantian or crude phenomenologicalsense Deleuze, as much as Badiou, is opposed to such a view ut ratherconcerns the relationship etween thought and sujectivity.

Being and thought

Badious reconstruction of the category thought in Deleuze proceeds in thefollowing fashion He egins y asserting the primordial signicance of threeParmenidean questions for philosophy tout cout. What is thinking? Whatis eing? And in hat sense do we assert that e Same is at once thinkingand Being" (DCB 79/117) urning to Deleuze, Badiou insists that, havingalready estalished answers to the rst two questions Being is One, virtual, inorganic life, imanence [etc . ] and thought isjunctive synthesis andintuition, the casting of dice, the ascetic constraint of a case, and the force of

memory" ( DCB 791 17 -18) we must examine in greater depth the theoryof [their] interlacement" (DCB 79/ 1 18) .

o take these questions as primary is central for Badiou the overturningof the Parmenidean equation of eing and the One founds for him the pos siility of a nally adequate ontology. Badious own account of this interlacement concerns the gure of the null set, the single (empty) point at whichthe tangent of ontological discourse makes contact with eing qua eing.For Badiou, though, such a sutractive solution is not availale to Deleuze,owing to his alleged accounts of thinking and eing, which rest so heavilyon the virtues of plenitude and activity. nstead, he claims, Deleuze thinksan aspect of the productive activity of eing itself as thought: hought i sthe fold of eing" (DCB 87/130). Wat, though, is specic aout this activity of folding that would allow us to distinguish it from the more generalactivity of the production of inert simulacra? e answer, Badiou tells us,concerns the suject. inking is folding, and the activity of folding creates

an internal pocket" ( DCB 89133), which is nothing ut the suject as such:

130



THOUGHT ND THE UBJECT

we can say ha the ubect (the nde) the dentty of thnng and ben

(DCB 90/133 .So, on Badiou's inerpreaion, he producive momen of he One operaes

in wo disinc ways. On he one hand, i produces and coninually remakeshe regime of he acual. On he oher, hrough a opological densicaion ofhe ouside" (DCB 86 130 i provides he ground for he adven of houghhus hinking coincides wih Being when i is a fold (he consrucion of alimi as a fold) whose living essence is he fold of Being" (DCB 89/1 33

ese claims clearly depend in many respecs on feaures of Badiou'sreading of Deleuze ha have been calling ino quesion. Noneheless , as we

have hroughou, we shall ake Badiou's claims a face value. n wha follows,hen, hree quesions will be addressed, in order o once more es Badiou'saccoun agains he Deleuzean ex: wha role is played in Deleuze's workby he concep of he fold? Wha is he relaionship beween hough andbeing in Deleuze? And, nally, wha is he relaionship beween hough andsubjeciviy? e rs of hese quesions direcs us, of course, owards TeFold bu also o Foucault, while he second and hird lead back o Derenceand Repetton , where hey are resolved in a somewha surprising way. Once

again, shall argue ha Badiou's reading here does lile jusice o Deleuze'sown posiion.

HE FOD

Le us begin by examining he heme of he fold in Deleuze. Aside froma shor ex on Heidegger in Derence and Repetton, he heme is o be

found mos a work in wo of Deleuze's laer books, namely Foucault andTe Fold iself We shall examine each of hese in urn, wih an eye o hequesion: wha relaionship does he concep of he fold have o ha of hesubjec in Deleuze?

Heidegger and the fold

e use of he heme of he fold in Derence and Repetton, which appe arsin he conex of he noe on Heidegger's philosophy of dierence in hers chaper (DR 8991646 is unusual in a number of respecs. isis he case no leas because Deleuze invokes MerleauPony raher hanHeidegger direcly and he wo names will appear ogeher again on hispoin, as we shall see who, in conras o arre, undoubedly followed amore horoughly Heideggerian inspira ion in speaking of he fold l] or of

pleaing lement] (DR 64m/90.

131



BDIOU S DELEUZE

e relevan passage runs as follos:

seems ha he principal misundersndings hih Heideggerdenounced as misreadings of his philosophy afer Being andme and Wha is Meaphysics?" have o do ih he folloing: he Heideggerian ot refers o Being as dierence raherhan he negaive in Being o quesioning raher han o negaion. Wen Sarre analysed inerrogaion a he beginning ofBeing and Nothingness he made i a preliminary o he discovery of he negaive and negaiviy . . . MerleauPony on he oher

hand undoubedly folloed a more horoughly Heideggerianinspiraion in speaking of he fold" or pleaing" (by conras ih Sarrean holes" and lakes of nonbeing") from Phenomenology o Perception onards and in reurning o anonology of dierence and quesioning in he poshumous booke Visible and the nvisible. (D 64/89)

is passage is unambiguously concerned ih onological quesions

sricly speaking alhough he fold is invoked in relaion o he Sarreanconcepion of he nohingness ha comes ino being" hrough he radicalfreedom of hepoursoi or subjeciviy. When he fold is once more evokedhoever his possibiliy is clearly no a issue:

is dierence [he onological dierence in Heidegger] is nobeeen" in he ordinary sense of he ord. is he Fol heZwiealt [ofold]. is consiuive of Being and of he manner

in hich Being consiues beings in he double movemen ofclearing" and veiling' (DR 65m/90)

e fold is gured here in such a ay ha i has no inrinsic relaion o subj eciviy as such bu raher descr ibes for Deleuze he fundamenal onological srucure according o Heideggerian hough.

ouaut ad the fold

f e urn our aenion o Foucault e nd as in Derence and Repetitionha he invocaion of boh Merleau Pony and Heidegger o ccurs once morebu his ime in ha amouns o an idenicaion a leas ih respeco he docrine of he fold. We pass from he in Heidegger and hen inMerleauPony" of Derence and Repetition o Heidegger and Merleau

Pony" (F 110 Ill) 132



THOUGHT ND THE UBET

One of he pecular characerscs of Deleuzes readng of Foucaul s he

fac ha much of hs readng s consruced whn he framework of er

nlogy drawn from only one of he laers books e Brth o the Cln

ndeed somemes almos seems as f Deleuze nds Foucauls work anaed no by a Nezschean ga avor bu by Xaver Bchas 1827 rate ebrane he relaonshp beween lfe and deah he mporanceof Bcha for hs relaonshp he pseudodynamc of he seen and hesad emphases ha repea hemselves me and e agan n Fouault all derve from hs early work a work ha moreove Foucaul hmselfpresens serous crcsms of. us he nvoaon of he fold even f we

ake n he erms of he Zwealt or wofold only descrbes Deleuzes read

ng n Fouault n a supercal way snce he par of wofold conceps ofgreaes neres for Deleuze are lfe and deah (va Bcha and he seen andhe sad above all n he chaper ha nomnally s addressed o he hemeof he fold (le me noe ha he concep of he fold appears only n hs nalchaper One canno help bu be sruck by he almos unbelevable movemen of Deleuzes argumen n hs chaper whch begns by askng abouhe lacuna n Foucauls wrng afer La Volont du avor only o move

almos mmedaely back o Bchas formulaon of lfe as a sruggle whdeah before reurnng us o e Htory o adne Rayond Rouel ande Arhaeolog o Knowledge n ha order (he predomnance of Blanchohere s equally srkng

n he nal chaper of Fouault Deleuze pursues a complex and no alogeher clear exposon of he nal perod of Foucauls hough o be foundn s explc form n he second and hrd volumes of e tory o Sexu-alty namely he supplemenaon of he analyses of knowledge and power

wh ha of ehcs as an aeshec and ascec selffashonng. he laer sexplcly cas by Deleuze as a procedure of foldng

Deleuze emphaszes wo aspecs of hs foldng acvy ha nally seema odds wh one anoher. e rs s he dea ha foldng as a selfrelexveehcal pracce s subsequen o he emergence of subjecvy a readngha s arguably a he hear of Foucauls own undersandng of wha hswork s concerned wh durng hs perod. e are already subjecs whrespec o boh he regme of knowledge whch Deleuze wll characerze

n erms of wha provdes us wh an epsemologcal and hsorcal locaon and also wh respec o power whch he characerzes n erms ofhose relaons wh ohers ha provde us wh a socal and polcal locaon (F 100) Deleuze wll presen he folded relaon o oneself as dervaveof hese wo regmes bu noneheless ndependen from hem s s evenfor Deleuze Foucauls fundamenal dea" ha here s a dmenson of subjecvy derved from power and knowledge whou beng dependen onhem" (F 101)

133



BADIO 'S DELEE

Furher, Deleuze ill insis ha he adven of his relexive possibiliy hasa sociohisorical speciciy. is, in he rs insance, marked by is specically Greek origins. He saes on o occasions ha he G reeks do a lo

less, or a lo more, depending on your choice" (F 1 13 100) hn Heidegger'reamen of he hisory of he forgeing of Being claims. Raher hanuncovering he more general movemen of he fold of Being and beings,hey discover ha i is possible o bend he ouside, hrough a series opracical exercises" (F 100) . According o Deleuze, his discovery also endso emerge in a paricular pracical conex: he self relaion is desined oencouner sexualiy" (F 105) Despie his, Deleuze ill insis ha foldingaciviy of he self ih respec o he self is irreducibly

strategiin naure

for Foucaul.e rs ay in hich he fold appears in Fouault is hus in he form of

an ehical relaion of selfashioning, a relaion ha goes o ork on an exising subjeciviy according o he agency of ha subjeciviy: an agency hais, moreover, bound by very specic condiions , and hich does no seem oconform o Badiou's much broader onological accoun of he gure of hesubjec in Deleuze. is broader poin of vie is, hoever, embodied in he

second modaliy of he fold ha Deleuze discusses o only is he aciviy offolding a specic form of selffashioning (undersood as he modicaion ofhe exising self) , bu i is also he formal possibiliy according o hich hepresen , undergirded by he pas , is open o he fuure, he formal possibiliof hough and subjeciviy as such.

n ha sense? is second, onological, reamen of he fold in Fouaultemphasizes he dynamic relaionship beeen he ouside and he inside(he specic form of he fold ha Badiou himself invokes), here he inside

is gured hroughou as a reciprocal doubling of he ouside. Deleuze illinsis heavily on his doubling, referring no jus o MerleauPony andHeidegger, bu also Roussel and Alfred Jarry: e heme hich has alayshauned Foucaul is ha of he double" (F 978) . is ouside is aached o avariey of dieren names by Deleuze including absolue memory" (F 99),chance (F 1 17 ) and he unhough" (F 1 18) bu he o mos frequen andimporan are hose of he past andforce . ese in urn correspond o heregimes of knoledge and p oer.

From he poin of vie of his onological accoun of he fold, houghbecomes he acivi ha consiues he subjec ihin he regime of poerknoledge is subjec is no, hough, he inenional subjec of phenomenology, bu a kind of fugiive and aleaory poin: ere never remainsanyhing of he subjec, since he is o be creaed on each occasion, like afocal poin of resisance, on he basis of he folds hich subjecivize knoledge and bend each poer" (F 10 5) . Earlier, D eleuze ill describe he ousideas a moving maer animaed by perisalic movemens, folds and foldings

134



THOUG HT A ND THE SU BJ ECT

ha ogeher make up an inside: hey are no somehing oher han he ou

side u precisely he inside ohe ouside" (F 967).ese wo momens he ehical and he onological are rough

ogeher y Deleuze iniially hrough he asserion of a homology eween

he wo regisers efore insising on heir uniy:

f he inside is consiued y he folding of he ouside eweenhem here is a opological relaion: he relaion o oneself ishomologous o he relaion wih he ouside and he wo are inconac hrough he inermediary of he sraa which are rela

ively exernal environmens (and herefore relaivel inernal).(F 119)

Deleuze will hen capialize on he idea of relaive exernaliy o descriehe selfrelaion pu o work y he already consiued sujec as a localengagemen ha eecs he same kind of relexive srucure ha holds moregenerally eween he ouside and he inside (or he pas and he presen)u wih he goal of modicaion raher han insiuion. e see in shor a

kind of generalizaion of he gure of he fold across orders of magniude ageneralizaion ha will aain is greaes scope in Te Fold, as we shall seeelow. e also see here a cerain move ha also appears in Derence andRepetition, which involves reforulaing he relaionship eween de jureand de facto condiions. Raher han opposing hem in he way we nd infor example Kan hey form wo momens in he fracured coninuum ofhe genesis of eings.

Bu his reamen al so nds a doule of is own in he accoun of couner

acualizaion in Te Logic o Sense, where he relaionship eween sense andevens on he one hand and he inermixure of odies on he oher is lierally pervered in he name of an alernaive movemen of acualizaion.And in accordance wih he oservaions made in he discussion of couneracualizaion in he previous chaper here is also somehing reminiscen ofBadiou's own heory of he sujec a work here. n paricular le us recallha he movemen of deliy for Badiou he unconscious consrucion ofa generic ruh is in fac he consiuion of a counersae an alernaiveordering of exisen muliples . Wile he geomeric characer of he fold isa odds wih he saic se heoreic rheorical universe ha Badiou inhaishere is a remarkale similariy eween his heory of sujecive aer saeconsrucion and he selfrelexive work of he fold ha creaes new ways ofhinking ad living. n oh cases changes are made in he presen in ordero open up a dieren fuure and in oh cases his fuure wil l iself ecomenormal once more ca lling for a permanen revoluion in sujeciviy a he

hands of he sujec. Finally oh views are ulimaely rooed in an ehical

135



BADIU' DELEUZE

frameork ha lacks any deerminae mtier relying insead on he oninuaion of a devian forard momenum

Wha can we ake from his omplex accoun wih respe o Badious reading of he fold in Deleuze? We mus agree ha in he conex ofFouult he fold is indeed aliaed wih boh he idea of he consiuionof subjeciviy and ih hough Wha is misplaced in Badious acoun ofhese connecions is be found in erms of he orienaion ha is providedfor hem in boh Fouult and in Foucauls on hough We can index hiso a cerain disorion in he use of he ord hough f Deleuzes book onFouult is one of he mos faihful o is subjec on his poin i is beause

i emphasizes ha hinking is never an asceic subordinaion of he subje o he movemen of being bu a kind of localized displaemen of onesposiion within being as i currenly exiss Raher han looking up owardsprinciple s or don oards foundaions hough in Foucaul looks round,i examines he conemporary for poins of lexibiliy Wha is a issue is nohe fold of Being and b eings or of he virual and he aual on Badious emanaive reading bu wih (and here Deleuze recalls ichaux): "le whin thefolds (F 12 3, emphasis added) Like he dynamic of he relaionship beeen

he virual and he acual in e ime mg, he gure of a generalized onologial Ouside (in he large circui) is in fac only presen in erms of a localized otherwise (in he crysalimage)

ibniz and h old

he nal ex devoed o e heme of he old is of course Te Fold iself

Recalling ha for Badiou he fold is he gure of subjeciviy in Deleuzee migh again noe ha one canno unproblemaic ally exrac docrines ofDeleuzes on hough from his orks on oher hinkers o fuher observaions abou he gure of he fold are worh making

e rs very general poin is as follows: if e are illing o exend subjeciviy in some sense o every monad (as Leibniz himself does) hen emigh very ell agree ih Badious analysis is is because for Deleuze hegure of he old is used o explain he elemenary relaions of ompossibiliy harmony and he correlaive appercepions and appeies ha srucurehe inerior" life of every fundamenal subsance: fold is alays foldedwihin a fold like a cavern in a cavern he uni of maer he smalles elemen of he labyrinh is he fold Unfolding is hus no he conrary offolding bu follows he fold up o he following fold" (FLB 6/9). n oherords he general heory of he fold in he Leibniz book is no a heoryof subjeciviy bu an onological acoun peraining o exisence as such

including he leas expressive monads hose of brue maer his is hy

136



HOUGH ND HE UBJEC

laer on he same page, Deleuze will wrie ha e model for he science

f aer is he origami as he Japanese philosopher migh say, or he ar of

flding paper" (FLB 6m/9).

Because Badiou does no , however, wan o exen subjeciviy o al l ofeing in his reading of Deleuze (Badiou will no insis, wih Leibniz, haeen he smalles par of maer is he expression of a monad he dis

incion beween human and animal being as profound and problemaic forBadiou as i is for Heidegger), hen his reading of he gure of he fold isinappropriae here. n oher words, precisely in so far as he heme of he

fold is Leibnizian, i is irreducible o he subjec as a specic regional modal

iy of being Also, les we forge, Deleuze himself in works as dieren aserence and Repetition and A Tousand Plateaus will no hesiae o goas far as Leibniz in he exension of idealiy o everyhing ha exiss , a poinha Badiou manifesly overlooks .

Deleuzes commenary oves, as i were, in he direcion diamericallyopposed o he Badiouian reading . Raher han exending he reach of subjeciviy o everyhing in he syle of Leibniz , D eleuze exends he heme ofhe fold iself beyond he closure of he relaionship beween hough an

being. e Fold is indeed a book abou (among oher hings) he Baroque, bui is also one in pursui of wha Deleuze will call a modern neoBaroque. henal chaper, which closes wih is famous invocaion of a nomadology hawould overurn he principle of closure ha governs Leibnizs meaphysics , isno devoed o a new heory of subjeciviy, bu o a reamen of music andpaining, as hese wo move from he Baroque iself forwards ino our ownime (from e closed, inniely folded world o he open, decenred universe)

Second, i is imporan o emphasize he mulidirecional naure of he

fold in Deleuzes reamen of Leibniz. does no simply mark he liia which subjeciviy (Leibnizs kingdom of grace) emerges from objeciviy(he kingdom of naure), which would be he hinge beween wha Deleuzewill call he upper and lower loors of he monad, bu forms he operaionalmomen a every poin in he analysis : animals are wihin animals, he rsly conains all lies ye o come" (FLB 8m/ 13) , he exure of gold is foldedwihin gold (FLB 47/63), each eec is folded ino is cause, and each eecwill iself play he role of he cause for anoher eec (he principle of sufcien reason)

n general erms and his is he way in which he Heideggerian Ziefaltwill appear in e Fold he fold is he generalized entredeux (FLB 10/16)of Leibnizs philosophy for Deleuze, he elemenary form of he relaion assuch, he primiive nonlocalizable connecion" (FLB 1 20m/1 62) :

Many dieren answers can be made o he quesion, here is

the old to be found? As we have seen, i runs no only beween

137



BADO 'S DELEZE

essences and existences. Of course, it passes between the bodyand the soul, but it is already to be found between the inorganicand the organic with respect to bodes, and between the species" of monads with respec t to souls. It is an extremely sinuousfold, a zigzag. (FLB 1 20tm/162)

As a result, it would be dicult to imagine how the mobile and ubiquitous form of connection that Deleuze sees in the fold could be reduced to asingle articulation of thought and being, in the way Badiou presents it : just asdicult, in fact, as it would be to take this ubiquity of the fold and assert it as

the virtual itself, the power of articulation . Here, we make contact again withthe thesis presented in the second chapter, according to which Deleuze mustbe conceived of as an ontological mannerist. It is not that there is Relatio,which constitutes the vital force of connection, manifesting unied things atthe level of the actual, but relations plural throughout: the rejection of theuniversal in favour of the ubiquitous . e need only recall one of the moststriking passages of Te Fold in which Deleuze is contrasting the organiand the inorganic in Leibniz: Not everything is sh, but sh are teeming

everywhere ... Tere is no universality, but rather a ubiquity of the living(FLB 9tm/14). In turn, it is not that the fold constitutes the universal rootof all beings, but that it is everywhere. In an interview on the occasion ofthe publication of Te Fold Deleuze insists on this point: Folds are in thiseverywhere, without the fold being a universal. It's a dierentiator a dierential' (N 156).

Deleuze a nd he fol

From these schematic remarks, we can draw the following conclusionsabout the concept of the fold in Deleuze with respect to Badiou's reading.e three signicant moments in which the concept is formulated can besaid to arm the same concept only in extremely broad terms. While thereference to Heidegger and MerleauPonty and the invocation of a fundamental ontological register is found in all three cases, many other important elements change. Consequently and in turn, it is incorrect to assertthat the fold is the primary gure that accounts for the relationship betweenbeing and thought in Deleuze. here this theme is present in the strongestterms, in Foucault it must be read not only n terms of the constitutionof the subject, but also as the relexive activity of the subject, an activitymoreover that s couched in terms of a (however tentative) historical andgeographical specicity.

138



THOUHT D HE S UB ECT

OUGH AND ACUAIAION

In any ase despite Badiou's laims there is an alternative soure for auh more robust theor of subjetivity and thought in Deleuze The mostdeveloped aount is to be found one again in the pages of Derence andepetition It is true that at is Philosophy? develops a thoroughgoing andnuaned aount of thinking as the reation of idealities of various kindsand that this aount is artiulated to a theory of order and haos with avery real ontologial sense However this work does not elaborate an onto

logial aount of the subjet who thinks whih is a ke issue here e

urther benet of turning one more to Derence and Repetition is that ingrasping the theories of thought individuation and subjetivity found theree are able to rene and omplete the points made in hapter 3 about therole of the virtual in Deleuze Te interpretive strategy at work here is thusone more to present an important part of Deleuze's oeure, rather than toattempt to traverse the whole: a diult if not impossible task (or all itsSireni attration) and ertainly something that Badiou does not sueed indoing

In question is the nal hapter oDerence and Repetition, smmetrialSynthesis of the Sensible' Here D eleuze answers a umber of (quite pressing) remaining questions about the role of the virtual in relation to the atualspeiall onerning the genesis of atuality I might add that the onernso the e Fold are not entirely absent from this moment in Deleuze's philosophy It is the philosophy o Leibniz and partiularly his aount o thegure of the monad as an expressive individual that underpins a number ofthe points that follow Despite the predominane of referenes to biolog in

this hapter of Derence and Repetition, it is a monadology however heavilymodied that is key For Deleuze it is only Leibniz [who] approahed theonditions of a logi of thought inspired by his theory o individuation andexpression" (DR 253/325 ) Indeed these pages are among the most beautiful in Deleuze; e nd here a veritable paean to express ion

The virtual and the atual

Let me ver quikly sketh what has already been estabished of Deleuzesmature ontology in Derence and Repetition and elsewhere e have seenon the one hand an insistene on the univoity of being: bodies and language the virtual and the atual events and states of aairs all are expressions of being that do not introdue any divisions into being as suh On theother hand we have seen the aount of the virtual in Deleuze understood

as the dierential regime of problemati Ideas laking any priary ipseity

139



BADOU'S DELEUZE

correlaively, he worl o he acual appear a he regime o oluion hee virual problem

Prima acie, hi brue oppoiion o he virual an he acual provieBaiou' inerpreaion wih ome o i orce How coul hee wo apeco being, o ieren rom one anoher, ener ino communicaion? i nohar o ee why omeone (like Baiou, or Hallwar, or example, woulbe le o claim ha one can hae only he virual or he acual, bu noboh in any ull ene i likewie no har o ee he raionale or omeo he claim we have alreay icue here: The more Deleuze aempo wre he virual rom irrealiy, ineerminaion, an nonobjeciviy, he

more irreal, uneermine an nally nonobjecive he acual (or beingbecome" (DB 3/81). Eiher he virual, in i impaive inepenence,creae i own worl o ieal being' incribing hem on he inie o aninprincipleunbreachable limi (hi i, or example, aimon' oluion, orhe virual i een a an abracion, a e o (perhap unavoiable illuoryobjec ha are a be regulaive ieal (Hume, Alhuer, Lacan, ec ana wor he kernel o pychopahology Deleuze ha preene only heewo rucurally iinc elemen, i i har o ee how he kin o prob

lem ha haun Plao (paricipaion, Decare (min-boy ineracionan Kan (aculaive exrinicim o name only he mo imporan vicim - coul be reolve a all e woul be in he preence o anoherirreucible ualim, whoe appeal o univociy woul be no more han acholaic winow reing or a regreive meaphyic Even he aerionha he virual i rancenenal rucure or empirical acualiy woul bele han convincing n ac, i hi i all ha Deleuze' philoophy ha ooer, wha woul be range woul be he rariy o accuaion o ualim

Bu hi i no all ha Deleuze' philoophy claim a he aying goe, ihing were ha imple, wor woul have go aroun n ac, a one o hemo philoophically avance momen in all o hi work, he nal chaperoDerence an Repetition, builing on he rucural accoun o he virualDeleuze preen a heory o he ynamic relaionhip beween he virualan he acual, an in oing o preen hi heory o hough, which i ourconcern here

Intensity

Deleuze i ully aware o hi problem (or beer, requiremen or a meaphyic o he kin he elaborae Aer reieraing, a have ju one,he baic virual-acualizaion-acual rucure, he ak : How i he eaeermine o incarnae iel?" (DR 24/316). How i i ha hi com

plex ieal ierenial rucure can be expree in he xe an orere

140



HOUG H ND HE S UBEC

orld of he acual? The anser o his quesion aes us o ha should bedescribed I hin ihou any exaggeraion - as he furhes exension ofeleuzes novel meaphysics, a heory of inensiy. In response o his onuesion, he ries The anser lies precisely in inensive quaniies" (DR

2/316).The rs par of chaper ve of Derence and Repetition is devoed o

elaboraing his heor, principally in relaion o hermodynamics. Foreleuze, he search for dierencein iself ends hen e arrive a he cncep of inensiy. He argues ha e mus give his concep is rue impor ,arguing agains claims originaing boh from science and philosophy (Plao,an and Bergson) ha i is ubordinae o a more fundamenal qualiy orexensi. IS Inensiy for Deleuze has hree principle characerisics . I is , sof all, irreducibly unequal in naure i includes he unequal in iself" (DR232/299) . o pu his anoher (and perhaps more explicable) ay, inensiy isha hich is irreducible in exended quaniy and quali and ha is irreducible is herefore no subordinae o any regime in hch equaliy couldbe esablished. I is hus uncancellable" (DR 233/300), boh in he senseha i is necessary for qualiy and quaniy, and in so far as i is no subjec

o an superior principle hrough hich i can be explicaed. Tis mode ofargumenaion is clearly ranscendenal in naure. Deleuzes claim is ha,in order o undersand quaniy and qualiy, e are necessarily led o posiinensiy as he elemen ha brings hem abou (he maes his p oin himself[DR 20-1/310-11]). ihou posiing he realiy of inensiy, Deleuzeargues, e ould be unable o explain he adven of qualiaive and quaniaive dierences, hich belong o a regime of equanimiy and homogeneiyrespecively.

Te second feaure of inensiy, his irreducibly unequal insance in quaniy and quali, is ha i arms dierence since i is alread dierencein iself and comprises inequaliy as such, inensiy . . . maes dierence anobjec of armaion" (DR 23/301 ) is essenially means ha i is absolue;here is no limiing insance ihin inensiy, no naive onological disincion ha ould deermine i in erms exernal o is proper regime. Finall,he hird poin, hich, according o Deleuze includes he oher o" (DR237/30), is ha inensiy mus be hough iself as quaniy, bu as impli

caed quaniy. hy? Tis is because, unlie qualiy, hich is indivisible,inensiy can be divided ha, in urn, disinguishes i from exended quanity is ha, in being divided, i changes in naure Deleuze gives he examplesof emperaure and speed here: neiher is composed of qualiaively idenicalquaniies of hemselves (50°C is no composed of fy unis of 1°C; he sameis rue of he speed 50 m h), and hus neiher is irreducible o quaniy,hile being divisible (unlie qualiies) noneheless, even if his division nec

essarily produces heerogeneous resuls.

11



BADIOU' DELEUZE

aking these points together we are presente with the fundamentalunequal being of intensity diereneinitself impliated quantity hih isexpliated in extended quantity and in quaty Intensity is thus the foundational and produtive moment in a system that moves from impliatioto expliation

An example of this impliation-expliation double that is as exellent asit is pertinent (given Badiou's position on the nature of number) is Deleuze'sdisussion of the ordinalardinal pair in number theory (and in fat muof the presentation of intensity is framed in numbertheoreti terms) Othe one hand ordinals - Deleuze refers to the natural numbers here (D

232/300) - are taken to be fundamentally intensive in nature relying on anirreduible sense of distane (beteen two and three for example there isa positive distane but one that has no sale of measurement) In order toassemble the basi number line as a pure order we annot have any reourseto a xed metri array a pregiven set of points ardinal moments or evena set distane between the numbers sine to do so would be to immediatelysubordinate ordinality to ardinali Ordinal onstrution does not implya supposed same unit but only an irreduible notion of distane" (DR

232/300) It is only on the basis of this ordinal distribution Deleuze laimsthat the notion of ardinality (the institution of key points) an be insistedon: points or hinges at hih a quantitative hange in the sequene takesplae The obvious example here is the rst innite number wO' the rst innite ardinal whose size is unattainable simply through the proess of suession of nite numbers That is to say that there is a quantitative dierenemarked by the leap in ardinality between the rst and the seond orders othe innite between and

•

e should ask ourselves hat ontologial status espeially in relationto the virtual intensity holds for Deleuze The answer and this is the fundamental point - is that intensity is the actual: it is atual being For all his(important) remarks about the reality of the virtual and even taking intoaount the struturing role of virtual Ideas it is intensity that haraterizesthe being of the atual both as impliated intensive quantity and as expliated quality and extensity

is is a point that is to my mind unjustly overlooked in the sholarshipon Derence and Repetition, although there are indiations at a number oflevels in Deleuze's argumentation that this is the ase For instane disussing the order of logial priority between the elaboration of speies and individuation (to whih I shall briely turn in more detail ) Deleuze warns againstthe subordination of the latter to the former with the following words :

142

In fat any onfusion between the two proesses any redution

of individuation to a limit or ompliation of diereniation



THOUGHT ND THE UBEC

compromises the whole of the philosophy of ierence iswoul be to commit n error, this time in the actual, nlogousto tht me in confusing the virtul with the possible .

(DR 247/38 emphsis e)

Moreover, tht the ctul is intensity is implicit in the very ccount ofintensity supplie by Deleuze. e lrey know tht the ctul in its mostgeneric sense is, for Deleuze, the regime of qulie extension. If we sk ourselves wht ontologicl sttus this regime hs, on Deleuze's terms , we mustnswer tht it must be ccounte for s the expliction of intensity, since this

is, ccoring to the logic we hve just seen , the only bsis on which sensibleierence cn rise.Now, the eqution of the ctul n intensity hs further consequence:

tht the ctul, for Deleuze, is not xe stte of irs, but lui nchrge relity, where the movement of expliction grouns n bringsbout ever new sttes of irs. It is certinly hr to reconcile this withBiou's ccount, in which the ctul is but series of e letters sent bythe ne. Nor cn we ccept tht the virtul is chrcterize by the process

of ctuliztion' or tht the virtul is this process" (DB 4974) since theentire process of ctuliztion (or ierencition) necessrily lies on the sieof the ctul itself: it is movement belonging entirely to the explictivecourse of intensive ierence.

HE INDIVIDUA

It is this conception of intensity tht llows Deleuze to ccount for the reltionship between the virtul n the ctul in quite rene mnner, n, inturn, it provies us with the mteril to nswer the question of the reltionship between thought n being. is is ccomplishe by grsping intensitys the determinative context and content of actualization But, s we hvejust seen, intensity is not, for Deleuze, hongenous, but rther hs kinof structurtion or etermintion proper to it, to which Deleuze gives thenme individual

e concept of the iniviul in question must be crefully specie, sinceit is irreucible to self or n I, n is not the humn subject in nythinglike its tritionl ccepttion. or Deleuze, the iniviul is n ontologicl n expressive concept tht provies us with wy of properly thinkingintensity n its reltion to the virtul. At this point in our iscussion, thectegory of intensity lcks etermintive form. If there is ynmic movement between impliction n explicte intensity, it is hr to see how it

shoul tke plce.

43



BDIOUS DELEUZE

We must rst grasp, wth Deleuze, that ntensty does not exst n somefree and natural state, but s always present as ndvdual ntensve derence. o paraphrase the wellknown clams oAntiOedipus about machnc

desre, ntenst s always ndvdua and ndvdualty s ntensve n nature.Or, as Deleuze explctly puts t ll ndvdualty s ntensve, and ntensvequanttes are ndvduatng factors" (DR 246/3 17). s gure of the ndvdual s closely related to Lebnzan monad, as I noted earler. Lke the monad,Deleuze's ndvdual s expressve n nature ndvduals express vrtual Ideas,ther derental relatons and sngular ponts. ese relatons and pontsare not mmedately expressed by ndvduals n an explcated form, whch

woud be to take ndvduals as the termnus of the process of actualzaton.Instead, they are mplcated only, nascent formatons that awat extensonand qualcaton, spatalzaton and temporalzaton.

hch vrtual Ideas are expressed by partcular ndvduals? Te answers once more Lebnzan as James Wllams puts t, the ndvdual s alwaysan expresson of the whole of Ideas" (200a 18). For Deleuze, every ntensve ndvdual expresses the entrety (a term of whch I shall have more tosay below) of the vrtual eld, but only a certan fracton of ths eld clearly.

Just as each monad has a zone of clarty that consttutes ts perspectve orexpressve scope, each ndvdua for Deleuze, expresses certan reatonsand sngular ponts but not others. Ths s n part the case because of thenature of the vrtual as such. e have already seen that Ideas do not haveany natve dentty or unty, but that the determnaton of an Idea as an Ideanvolves the mechansm of recprocal determnaton; ths s Deleuze's renovated theory of the dalectc. As a result , we cannot speak of the mplcatonof an Idea n anythng but a metaphorcal manner, but only of a regon of the

whole vrtual eld, even f most of ths eld s expressed obscurely, and evenf the set of relatons and ponts that are expressed clearly are also ntrnscally confused n so far as ther derental determnaton visvis the rest ofthe vrtual multplcty s not expressed n the ndvdual n queston.

Te smlarty wth the monad must not be exaggerated, however, for thederences are also decsve. In partcuar, Deleuze's theory of the ndvdualcasts o the demand for harmony that so heavly characterzes Lebnz's phlosophy, and lkewse the commtment to the compossbl of ndvduals

(the prncple of closure). In place of the symphony of perfectly tuned andtmed monads, the vertable panola of beng, ntensve ndvduals expressa cacophony, a rot of rreducbly derent motfs or refrans. If we lose theharmony of Lebnz a loss that has not been wthout ts attendant suerng - we manage to nally arrve at sound as such: n p lace of the ranbow,an abyssal white light

It s also mportant to note that the ndvdua for Deleuze, s not an ndvsble and fundamentally unchangng entty. Indeed the opposte s the case

144



HOUGH AND HE SUBJEC

Indiviuation is mobile, strangely supple, fortuitous and endowedwith fringes and margins all because the intensities which contribute to it communicate with each other, envelop other intensities and are in turn enveloped. e individual is far fromindivisible, never ceasing to divide and change its nature.

(DR 257/331 )

Te ndvdul tnker

ow we can address the question that has led us to this point concerningthe relationship between being and thought. or Deleuze in Drnc andRptition, thought takes place at th lvl of th individual: e thinker isthe individual" (DR 23/325). But what does the individual think exactl?Once we grasp that thinking is, at this fundamental level, to be equated withexpress ion or determination as such, we can state that he individual thinksvirtual as And, in keeping with the a and presubjective sense of thisconcept, Deleuze is clearl right to assert that [e]very body, ever thing,

thinks and is a thought to the extent that, reduced to its intensive reasons,it expresses an Idea the actualization of which it determines" (DR 254/327)

But Deleuze goes further, and provides the means to incorporate this denition of the individual into the broader movement of actualization. Tethinker, undoubtedl the thinker of the eternal return, is the individual, theuniversal individual" (DR 24/327) This interesting stateent provokestwo further questions. e rst is: what are we to make of this universality? In fact, at a point very far from anything discussed in Badiou's analysis,

it points us towards a meaningful sense in which we can speak of the unityof the virtual. In and of itself (as we have seen) the virtual has no unity,homogeneity or simplicity of any kind Given that no pertinent set of criter ia exists by which to speak of the virtual as a unied entit, any attemptto do so would necessarily involve the imposition of an external framework.here the whol of the virtual can be legitimately thought is through thecategory of the individual. Each individual expresses the entirety of the virtual eld, but, in each case, it is a dierent aspect" or face" of the virtual;dierent dierential relations and singular points are actualized in each case.It is as though the virtual were an intricate spherical lattice, which is eachtime and with each individual oriented dierently, thereby exposing dierentrelations and singularities. Tis is the ultimate dierence between Deleuzeand Leibniz: the nonexistence of God. In Leibniz, it is God who clearlyconceives the totality, whose zone of clarity is coextensive with the universeas such. or Deleuze, there is no preestablished harmony between indi

viduals, no nal cause in the Aristotelian sense adopted by Leibniz, and no

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IOU'S ELEUZE

reference o he principle of indiscernibili ( les in he heologicl ermsin hich Leibniz frmes i). In plce of hese, e hve disjuncive snhesis, virulrnscendenl Ides, nd hreshld beond which no idenicl beings exis in order o fcilie comprison, bu onl he swrming ofdierenceiniself.

The second quesion i s in wh sense is he individul he hinker of heeernl reurn?

I is becuse nohing is equl, becuse everhing bhes in isdierence, is diss imilri nd is inequli, even wih isel h

everhing reurns or rher, everhing does no reurn. hdoes no reurn is h which denies eernl reurn, h whicdoes no pss he es. I is quli nd exensi which do noreurn, in so fr s ihin hem dierence, he condiion of heeernl reurn, is cncelled. (DR 243/31 3)

his is decisive pssge h properl loces he eernl reurn in hessem expounded in Derence and Repetition Dierence is he meril

for e eernl reurn. If he orld ws nll grounded on n ideni or uni, he snheses of ime could onl rm wh is nd will lws be .Dierences, lef in second plce, would pper onl in order o be ersed bhe pssge of ime, pssge of ime which would become for dierencesnohing bu rce o he grve" (DR 23 8/307) .

Hoever, if we esblish dierence s he ulime principle, hen he snheses of ime insed opere s Deleuze presens hem s esblishing once eporr hbiul sbiliies (he conrcion of disnces , he rs sn

hesis) nd coinciden deph of memor ( second snhesis) in he fce of heeernl reurn, hich subjecs everhing o he hrd" lw of being wh isexpliced is eplicated once andfor all (DR 244/314) nd ever culizedbeing, ever qulied nd exended rel , will necessril be reurned ime ndime gin o he inensive melsrom from which i ws born.

So, wheres he snheses of hbi nd emor bring bou boh heregime in which individuion is expressed in culiy nd is conen(ccording o he process of drmizion, of which more belo), he hirdsnhesis of ime, of he fuure, plunges exension nd quli bck ino heimpliced order of individuli, where he re onl nscen soluions ohe virul problems expressed b he individul. This is wh he individulhinks he eernl reurn becuse he individul is nohing bu he expression of dierence iniself, resrined b neiher he I nor he self, neiher heform of ideni nor he lw of conrdicion.

I is c ler, hen, h Deleuze's concepion of hough hus fr hs nohing

in common wih he nhropocenric ccoun embrced so profoundl b

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THOUGHT A ND TH SUBJCT

te individualist tradition tat runs from Descartes troug Kant to existentialism. In is own way Badious subject - owever irrelexive and nonfoundational - is a part of tis tradition too in so far as i is only the huansubject who thin Thougt may be rare and its capaciy dependent on teadvent of te event and its faitful pursuit from incoate promise to situational cange but tere is no question tat witout a subject tere is notougt. For Deleuze tis is simply not te case. It is an individual quastructural element of being - wo tinks not a subject. It is in te rstinstance being tat tinks not te subject . It tinks principally by implicating virtual Ideas and tus engendering te process of actualization.

e Parmenidean equation of tinking and being wit wic we beganis as a result far more appropriate for Deleuzes pilosopy tan it is forBadious. In te latter tougt touces being at a single material point inte former te contact is ric and complex an interlacing wic sustains teprodction of being as suc.

NOE: INDIDRAADIFFERENCIAION

e now ave at and all te key pieces (if in outline) of te complex ontological picture tat Deleuze presents in Derence and Repetition Beforeturning to examine te relationsip between subjectivity and tougt inmore detail it is wort grasping tis p icture as a wole since it will allow usto nis working troug te content of tis part of Deleuzes pilosopy byproperly situating te virtual and te actual in relation to one anoter andtereby demonstrating te quite signicant gap on tis point between Te

Claor of Being and Derence and Repetition Certainly te virtual-actual division is decisive for Deleuze but it is sub

stantially more complicated tan Badiou would ave us believe. The virtual itself is to be understood as te regime of perplicated Ideas a structureconstituted by dierential relations and teir corresponding singularitieslacking any unity or extrinsic orientation. e actual if anyting is a morecomplex structure or set of structures. As te nal two capters ofDerenceand Repetition make clear troug teir gradual explication of te processesof actualization it as a number o f eleents or distinct regimes. In te rstinstance and against te background of te fundamental reality of intensity- te actual is caracterized as te regime of te individual. Individuals aswe ave just seen are an implicated expression of te entiret of te virtual;tey are individuated ensembles of dierences eac singular and dierentfrom eac oter. (wo intensities are never identical except abstractly" [DR254/32] a tougt wose tension wit te Leibnizian principle of indis

cernibles invoked above would be wort grasping.) o te perplication of

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BDIOU S DELEUZE

Ideas eah folded into the others, just as the whole world is in eah monadfor Leibniz) orresponds the impliation of Ideas in intensity

ese intensive dierenes or individuas are in turn dramatizedexpressed through spatiotemporal dynamisms. While Deleuze is less thanforthoming in his aount of the spatial dimensio , we have seen in somedetail the nature of the temporal dynamisms in question, namely the threesyntheses of tie. In partiular, it is the intensive diereneinitsel, thebeing of the atual or the sensible DR 236/304), that is armed by the thirdsynthesis of the eternal return: or, to use Deleuze's great turn of phrase,intensity is the only landsape of the eternal return" DR 242/3 12 )

The produt o f this omplex movement is , of ourse, expliated quantied and qualied atuality, the amiliar representational world of middlesized dry goods" and lihd onsiousness . This proess is very lear in oneof Deleuze's favourite examples , the egg:

e egg, in eet , provides us with a model for the order of reasons: organi and speies related) dierentiation-individuationdramatization-diereniation. e think that dierene o

intensity, as this is impliated in the egg, expresses rst the dierential relations or virtual matter to be organized This intensiveeld of individuation determines the relations that it expresses tobe inarnated in spatiotemporal dynamisms dramatization), inspeies whih orrespond to these relations spei diereniation), and in organi parts whih orrespond to the distintivepoints in these relations organi diereniation) DR 21 /323)

It is al so of real importane to note that the virtualatual relationship is notan immediate one. It is the dierentiation-individuationdramatizationexpliation stuture that is fundamental in the aount oered in Dereneand Repetition not the virtual-atual. hile the nominal pair virtualatual exhausts the deployment of univoal Being" DB 43/6 ), it is not thease that the simpliity of this opposition exposes the whole of the mehanism at work.

th these points in hand, we an also address the issue of Deleuzesvitalism, a term that Badiou uses above all in Deleuze's Vitalist Ontology")to drive a wedge between his own materialist mathematial ontology andwhat he takes to be the hampioning of the osmi animal in Deleuze. ehave seen that Badiou takes the virtual to be the lous of this vital ore,the soul of this Animal. On the basis o Deleuze's aount in Dereneand Repetition we must assert a very dierent piture, in whih it is theatual that is haraterized by dynami ativity In the nal hapter o D

ferene and Repetition Deleuze often repeats the laim that it is intensity

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OUG ND TE UBJEC

that creates the extensities and the qualities in which it is explicated' andthat creation is always the production o lines and gures o dierenciation" (DR 255/328) diereniation and not diereniation the activity ocreation and production is engendered by intensity and not the virtua. Itis the plenitude" (DR 252/324) o intensity that is the productive orce inbeing, and this is resolutely actual in Deleuze. He is indeed a vitalist but,at the height o his philosophical endeavour, this vitaism is presented asa vitalism o unequal productive actuality, and not the impassive virtual,whose idealities direct their blind gazes within. The virtual is unawareo the individual' which brings its problematic orce into the heart o te

movement in being. The virtual poses problems, but it is the actual whichactively resolves them.

NOTE ON JAMES WILL IAMS'S READING OF DELEUZE'S ONTOLOGY

The reading o Deleuze on the relationship between the virtual and theactual proposed here is, in many respects, at odds with the strong reading

based around the idea that the virtual and the actual are in mutual interaction with one another. The oremost contemporary proponent o this position is James Williams, whose impressive, orceul and original recent worksare all oriented by it. G iven the limited scope o our treatment o Deleuzehere, it wil not be possible to ully address this reading, although it is central. ere are our points, though, that I should like to touch on.

First, Williams gives great weight to two terms , ound almost exclusivelyin Derene and Repetition in his interpretation o Deleuze reciprocal

determination and dierentiation. We have already seen these terms above,in Chapter 4, in relation to te virtual in Derene and Repetition In therst case , Deleuze presents the virtual as in itsel" undeteined, but reciprocally determined through the dierential relations that characterize Ideas(once we add the third moment, the constitution o singularities). It is thisregime o determination proper to the virtual that is urther described bythe ter dierentiation The key point here is that, in Drene and Repetition both reciprocal determination and dierentiation are, as I have arguedabove, concepts specically applied to the virtual they are horizontaldeterminations o te virtual. In contrast, illiams uses both terms to characterize the relation etween the virtual and the atual: Deleuzes dialecticalphilosophy, rooted in the problematic, i s or illiams the reciprocal searchor actual and virtual conditions" (2003: 19 ) Indeed, or Williams, there isa process o reciprocal determination between th virtual and he actual,and the determinations o the virtual by the actual (upward" determina

tion, again speaking metaphorically) are called dierentiation the search

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BDIOU S DELEUE

for onditions takes plae in bot diretions of te onstrution of reality:from te virtual to te atual (wat Deleuze alls diereniation' an fromte atual to te virtual (dierentiation (ibid: 21 )

Tis renovated ategory o f reiproal determination, and te idea o f differentiation tat aompanies it, is given te greatest extension by illiamsin is reading of Deleuze. He will not esitate to laim tat Tis reiproalquasiausal relation between te ondition and te onditioned is perapsDeleuze's greatest metapysial innovation and te key to understanding tepower of is pilosopy" (ibid: 176)

Seond, and in ontrast wit te reading proposed ere, for iliams

intensity is virtual rater tan atual. Near te beginning of is book on Dference and Repetition, e uses te following example: te oonut is botan atual oonut and te intensities or pure beomings it expresses in teenounter wit te sensations of individuals (to beome ard, to beomegrainy, to beome airy, to quen, to nouris (ibid: 7) . On tis reading,te relationsip between te virtual and intensity is no relation at all butrater an identity: virtual intensit" (ibid.: 184) Tus, rater tan seeingte nal apter ofDerence and Repetition as an explanation for te way in

wi te impassive virtual is expressed troug atual intensive individuals, illiams will loate te individual on te side of te virtual, and laimtat tis apter explains and argues for te way in wi individuals aresynteses of virtual deas and intensities troug a reiproal determinationof te atual and te virtual" (ibid.: 14)

Now, tird, do not tink tese laims an be made good on te basis ofte text of Derence and Repetition alone, by wi mean to say tat teategories of reiproal determination and intensity do not seem to read

ily aord wit te denitions illiams oers. Certainly, te maintenaneof te use of tenial terms must always be p ut at te servie of a broaderpilosopial agenda, and tere is no sense in poliing terminologial dierenes witout onsidering te latter, espeially given Deleuze's very elastipratie on tis front imself. And, in fat, tere is a broader agenda at workin tese interpretive deisions . illiamss reading, unlike tat proposed ere(te urrent treatment of Deleuze following less te ontours of Deleuzeswork itself as mu as it does Badiou's reading of it, is itself a syntetiendeavour. His various works on Deleuze, inluding te ommentaries onDerence and Repetition and Te Loic of Sene, ar e attempts to illuminatepartiular strutural features of Deleuzean metapysis as su (witout, ofourse, erasing obvious anges of epasis and presentation - illiamsis a superior reader of Deleuze, and is attention to very spei torsions inargument and terminology present a model of areful solarsip . Furtermore, te ground and orientation of tis synteti reading is anifestly to

be found in Te Logic of Sene Evidene of tis is ubiquitous . For example,

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THOUHT ND THE SUBJECT

illiams's commentary on Deence and Repetitin frequently turns to theelucidation of concepts

that either do not appear in that work, or are rst and most substantially to be found in Te Lgic f Sense for example, the theme ofthe expressive nature of innitives (to green' to ound"). he category of reciprocal determination that, as I have argued here, is notto be found in Deence and Repetitin, and the interactionist reading of Deleuze more generally, also nds its strongest and most elaborated form in e Lgic f Sense, a point Williams himself makes this

double reciprocal determination is the basic form for processes inLgic f Sense (2008: 89);• that appear in only very minimal form and will be subject to massive

expansion in e Lgic f Sense, the most important example beingthe concept of the event, which appears for barely more than a pagein Deence and Repetitin (DR 18 89/2445) hile being one of thecentral themes of the later work; or that take on a new and more systematically important role in

e Lgic f Sense for example, the important theme of vicediction(illiams 2008: 1 558 ) a term whose use is almost entirely limited tothe approving review of the Leibnizian alternative to Hegelian contradiction elsewhere (eg. DR 46/68 D R 50 /71 ) and hich plays a mchmore signicant role in Te Lgic f Sense.

It is also because of this orientation towards e Lgic f Sense, I believe,that the concept of counteractualization, once more found in any detail only

in e Lgic f Sense, is given such a prominent role by illiams. As wehave already seen, Deleuze presents counteractualization as the means bywhich we are able to modify our relationship to the events we are involvedin actualizing, thereby modifying ourselves as a result. his creative act isthe basis in e Lgic f Sense for Deleuze's ethics of the event, so admirablytreated by Williams in his stdy. is is why, in the nal analysis , I think thatwhat illiams's reading of Deleuze oers us is a systematic reformulation ofDeleuze's philosophy from an ethical pint f view

Finally, illiams's approach leads to the more general problem of thecoherence of Deleuze's philosophy as a whole, and one of the greatest problems it poses : what broader relationship holds beteen Deence and Repetitin and Te Lgic f Sense It seems to me that Williams's solution tothis vexed issue is to attempt an original synthesis of the to (and, indeed,many other aspects of Deleuze 's philosophy). In this regard, his approach isakin to Badio's, hile succeeding where the latter fails, above all because

of its much greater concern for both the letter and the spirit of Deleuze's

1 5 1



BDIOU'S DELEUZE

philosophy. It would perhaps be etter to say that Wlliams forcefully deonstrates the range of mobile poss ibilities aorded by Deleuze's philosophy

when it is extended along lines implicated i Deleuze rather than orientedtowards concepts of external provenance

PASSIVE SYNHESIS AND HE HINKING SUBJEC

If for Deleuze it is the individual who thinks when we understand thisthought as the opening movement in the process of engendering of reality

we are still left with questions about the status of conscious representationalthinking. is is however less of a problem than it may at rst appear forthe account of the intensive individual does not replace the classical philosophical interest in the subject as re oitan as much as provide a thoroughgoing account of what this conception of the subject presupposes . isis a complex moment in Deleuzes thought here I will restrict myself to asmall number of points bearing on the issues at stake.

me and the split subjet

We have already seen that the syntheses of habit and memory found andground the possibility of representational thinking and the active synthesesthat it involves is is the rst part of the characterization of the nature ofconscious thought. What it does not explain however is what relationshipthis active thought has to the theory of individuated intensities on whic

the process of actualization hinges. o proceed we can consider Deleuze'sclaim made frequently in Derene and Repetition that Kant inaugurateda new era in philosophy by subjecting the thinking subject to a split constituted by tie.

Now like Kant and in his wake Deleuze wedges time into thought cracking it into two unequal halves. The dierence lies in what it is that timesplits In Kant it is the thinking self which is divided between passive receptivity (the empirical self on the side of sensible intuition) and the unifying ground of active synthesis (the transcendental unity of apperception onthe side of the formal conditions for the poss ibility of experience the staticmachinery of sense) For Deleuze on the one hand and as we have just seenthe thinker is not a self but rather the individual qua expressive intensivedetermination and thinking is conceived of as the movement of progressive determination of expreive enei Tis is the rst (according to theorder of reasons) half of the picture where the intensive implicated indi

vidual takes the place of Kant's formal transcendental unity of apperception.

52



HOUGH N HE S UEC

n the ther hand, we have the self whse genesis is funded n the passive

syntheses .Ultimately, then, time d es n t split the subject as much as it is an irre

ducible determinant r mment f passage in the mvement f actualizatin. Indeed, cunter t the letter f Deleuze's tet, we might even say thatfar frm splitting the thinking subject, time is the bridge that carries theimplicated Ideas f the intensive individual int the realm f eplicatin.

syhi sytem and the a prior i Other

Tis is the rst f fur pints that allw us t appreciate hw Deleuze'saccunt f the individual as thinker can be articulated with the cnsciuscapacity fr thinking that has been taken as the key feature f humannature e secnd cncerns the internal structure f the intensive individual in relatin t the self. In the nal pages f chapter ve f Derence andRepetition, Deleuze turns his attentin t ne case f eplicated systems r, rather, ne structure acrss which the path frm iplicatin t epli

catin runs - which he dubs the psychic system. Nw Deleuze has alreadygranted that cnsciusness is a characteristic f all emergent r actualized systems, s the psychic systems that he speaks f are nt in the rstinstance characterized by the cnscius-uncnscius split. Instead, whatcharacterizes psychic systems, fr Deleuze, is the nature f the reainingcnnectins t the intensive precursr f the subject that still remain manifest within it.

On the face f things, we are presented with tw qualities f psychic sys

tems that Deleuze calls the I and the self, where the frmer indicates a certain unity and the latter a cntinuatin f reseblances . e have seen frma number f pints f view nw the grunds fr the advent f the I and theself, which might prperly be cnsidered indentities rather than identities:serial and stable systems f impressin that are the ultimate prduct in thepsychic regime f the mvement f actualizatin. If the thinking subject ischaracterized by the frm f the I and the habituated cntent, which we cancall self, it is nnetheless still an articulatin f a cmple individual, which,ntgenetically, precedes it, and structural features that pertain t it, whatDeleuze calls centers f envelpment which testify t the presence f individuating factrs" DR 260/334) Tese factrs are present within the subjectthe term I am using here t accunt fr the psychic system, including thequalicatins prvided by the I and the self ) n Deleuze's accunt as the apriori Other Autrui DR 260/334)

Deleuze immediately distinguishes his apprach fr thse that assign

the ther t the status f either a subject r an bject, mentining Sartre

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BDIOU'S DELEUZE

by name In place of hese o alernaives Deleuze charace izes he ohein his sense in erms of eleens of he prior inensive individual hicremain implici in he subjec as a sarm of possibiliies around reali. . . possibles [ha] are alays Ohers" (DR 260/334). We mus immediaelnoe ha by possible Deleuze is no invoking he caegory of possibiliha he had previously discarded in favour of he virual. Raher possibilihere mus be aken o indicae he implicaed saus of hese Ohers hacrod our hinkng lives. These implicaed elemens like he res of hegures in Deleuze's onological cas of conceps are expressive in naureand Ohers express oher possible orlds ha our on individuaion

remains marked by. e oher in his sense is consiued of he elemensof variey in hough ha he self and he I ould end o exclude oering alernaive direcions for expression no a he forefron of he unfurling subjec.

The subjet and tnsendental iusion

e hird elemen of Deleuze's accoun of he hinking subjec concernsha he ould laer (in Francis Bacon and hen at is Philosophy?) comeo call clich and ha Derence and Repetition calls he dogmaic imageof hough. e have already seen ha an ineviable ranscendenal illusion accompanies all dierenciaion in so far as he inensive dierencesexpressed by individuals end o be cancelled ou in heir explicaion difference is he sucien reason of change only o he exen ha he changeends o negae dierence" (DR 222/286). In he case of hermodynamics

his leads o he posiing of he primacy of enropy; in biology he heoriesof preformism and hylomorphism. In each case he mechanism for genesisis explicaed on he basis of he resul an explanaory endency ha repeashe same misake Deleuze diagnoses in Kan's racing of he ranscendenalfrom he empirical .

I is a his level he orld of qualied exension and clich ha he gureof he auonomous hinking subjec is o be locaed. Te dogmaic imageof hough is ulimaely a se of claims abou he naure of he place of hehinker (he I and Self of psychic sysems ha considers he exended andqualied result of acualizaion o be is foundaion he ground zero of realiy. o ake he subjec as auonomous as a roo he agen of an inernallycoheren and naive represenaional process and o heorize hinking onhis basis is o misundersand everyhing fundamenal abou hough. Inurn ha srikes us as odd abou Deleuze's accoun of hinking - in paricular is nonsubjecive and anerepresenaional characer - is he disance i

sands a from he clichs ha e inhabi.

14



THOUG HT A ND THE SUBJECT

anscendenl empiicism

gin, this clichd view is, for Deleuze, entirely inevitble, but given tht it

is, how do we come to think the ne tht is perpetull emerging, which were indeed immersed in despite ourselves his brings us to the fourth ndnl point I should like to mke with respect to thought, nd it concernsprecisely this queston of the origin of thought in the conscious subect forDeleuze Its nswer returns us once more to the min concepts of this chpter intensity, time, dierence

s we hve seen lredy in Chpter 3, the clim tht thought is lwys

engendered by violent encounter tht we re unprepred for is n importnt one in Deleuzes philosophy, nd nohere more thn in Derence andRepetition, which includes some of the most memorble pssges nywherein Deleuze's work on this very point

Certinties force us to think no more thn doubts Conceptsonly ever designte possibilities ey lck the cls of bsolutenecessit in other words, of n originl violence inlicted upon

thought; the clws of strngeness or n enmity which lonewould wken thought fro its nturl stupor or eternl possibility there is only involuntry thought, roused but constrinedwithin thought, nd ll the more bsolutely necessry for beingborn, illegitimtely, of fortuitousness in the world houghtis primrily trespss nd violence, the enemy, nd nothingpresupposes philosophy everything begins with misophy Donot count upon thought to ensure the reltive necessity of wht

it thinks Rther, count upon the contingency of n encounter with tht hich forces thought to rise up nd educte thebsolute necessity of n ct of thought or pssion to think Something i n the world forces u s to think his something is nobect not of recognition but of fundmentl encounter

(DR 139181-2)

his reds s mnifesto, nd ought to be considered s one I f the nture ofthought is one of the ke issues in Derence and Repetition, we must tke sfundmentl Deleuzes clim tht thought is not the ctive product of subect, construed however one wishes, but the p roduct of n encounter withsomething extrsubective - or rther pre subective tht we re fundmentlly unprepred for

How re we to ssimilte these clims into the frmework elborted inthis chpter thus fr Simply b noting the source of the encounters tht

spur on thought for Deleuze problemtic Ides expressed in intensive

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BDIOU S DELEUZE

individuals . It is in short the enounter between the individual and the subjet that engenders thought in the subjet. Let us also note the iporta ntfat that it is beause suh enounters are intensive that Deence and Repetition gives suh priay to sensibility: intensity is for Deleuze experienedin the rst instane through a coup a shok of sensation. This is why the itation above ontinues with the words : What is enountered ay be Soratesa teple or a deon. I t ay be grasped in a range of aetive tones : wonderlove hatred suering. In whihever tone its priary harateristi is that itcan only be sensed (DR 1 39/1 81 ephasis added)

Our initial ontat with the world is through sensation and it is this on

tat that engenders thought and the partiular faulties that arise in responseto this shok. This is the key reason why Deleuze alls his position in Dference and Repetition a transendental epiriis. It also arks one of thefundaental deviations of Deleuze fro Maion. ere Maion solvesthe issue of the ouniation of sensib ility and the understanding by ollapsing the forer into the latter Deleuze aintains the irreduibility of sensation. And to the Maionian objetion to suh a anoeuvre (how ouldwhat is unintelligible i.e. sensation beoe so?) Deleuze's response is to

elaborate in hapter three of Derence and Repetition a theory of the genesis of diverse faulties eah proper to its own objet rather than aintaining Kant's representational aount of the struture of thought. We are alsofored to reognize the neessarily indiret role that virtual Ideas play in thegenesis of thinking. As subjets we do not think Ideas . Should we have suhdiret ontat with the virtual Deleuze's ontinual ephasis on sensibilityand sensation would be beside the point sine a relation between thoughtand Ideas would take soething like the for of intelletual intuition. It is

beause our ontat with probleati Ideas is always in the for of ontatwith intensive individuals that sensibility ust be priary for Deleuze: it isonly through a sensible enounter that the fuse an b e lit that runs fro thesensation to the Idea.

Finally we an onnet this fourth point with the teporal synthesesone ore. e syntheses of habit and eory have an inherently onservative tendeny ounterated by the foral tie of the eternal return whihsubjets the to the entrifugal explusion of any rystallization of unity. ehave also just seen the sense in whih the intensive individual is the thinker"of the eternal return the third synthesis of tie in so far as it legislatesthe easelessly repeated subersion of qualied extension in its intensiveorigins. With these points in ind we an haraterize the sensible shokthat inaugurates all thought as the iplaable onsequene of the allianebetween intensit and the future between the willtopower and the eternalreturn. All thought begins in ontat with intensity and this ontat oes

about owing to the teporal nature of atualization.

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BDIOU'S DELEUZE

to the heteroeneit in the production mechanism (DR 212/274, empassadded).

e have seen that Deleuze does not siply assert a dyadic oppositionbetween the present and the past, between an active virtual and a passive oresidual actualit. Instead, the roles are reversed It is the actual that is teveritable motor of being, whose activit engages with the neutral problematic dierential structure of the virtual, actualizing it without being causeto do so by it And, further, this movement of actualization is not simpleexteriorization but an elaborate, even baroue, movement that engages theintensive individual with the radical dynamisms in which times and spaces

emerge without ommon ratio or transcendent orientation e world of theactual, although irreducibly engaged with genetic instances of the virtualseethes with its own determinations, its own productive capacities, its ownpower for novelty. Even more important, I would argue, is the introductioof a third moment into his most developed temporal schema provided Derence and epetition: that of the eternal return As we have alread seen,it is only on pain of ignoring this absolutely central emphasis that we couldpresent Deleuze as an orthodox Bergsonian, for whom memory is the nal

word in the convoluted tempest of time.I should like to add one nal remark on Deleuzes theory of thought as we

have canvassed it here Badiou is certainly right to claim that thought, foDeleuze, begins in a generalized outside, and that the inside is consttuted, aproduct It is not correct, however, to say that the fold is the ke concept inDeleuzes arsenal for coming to grips with this procedure More importantly,by identifying thinking with the constitution of the self, we are provided withat most only half of the picture. e might attribute this additional aspect of

Deleuzes work to his transcendental bent Unlike Badiou, whose subtractivemethodology orients his work in the direction of a minimal ontology, on theone hand, and a reductive account of the irreducible variety of being, on theother, Deleuze takes as his goal the search for the sucient reasonfor thisvariety of being here Badiou presents a minimal ontology, Deleuzes ismaximal in scope

Badious limited understanding of Deleuzes account of thought is moreprofound than just overlooking the secondary subjective capacity of thinking hat his account in no wa indicates is a familiari with the nature ofthe genetic activt to which Deleuze gives the name of thought in its fullestextension e invocation of the fold, taken in Badious limited sense, doeslittle more in this regard than schematize the result of the genesis of thought;it does not explain it This is an important point because, should Badiou havegrasped the entire gamut of concepts and processes involved in the genesisof thinking, the simple dualism that his reading of Deleuze relies on would

be voided in advance

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THOUGHT ND HE S UBJEC

It is clear that thought, or Badiou, is an absolutely central category Thisis also true or Deleuze . However, Badious treatment o Deleuzes theory othought makes little progress , other than repeating the brie narrative o theOne and its emanative cinders, a narrative that, by the end o Te ClamorofBeng has become nothing more than a hollow ormula, repeated at anincreasingly large distance rom Deleuzes philosophy itsel.

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S I

is book has been prosecuted in the vein of an adversarial tria At issuehas been neither the correctness of Deleuze's philosoph, nor indeed thatof adiou, but ather the evidence in Deleuze's philosoph to support thereading ored of his work b adiou in Te lamor o Being and the textsrelated to it Or, better, since it has no recourse to the moral and imperialtone of the ideal of judgement, what has been pursued is a partial set of

enquiries or queries ese queries have concerned a list of issues and oncepts, a set of cases : being, method , the virtual, time, truth, the event, subjectivit and thought I have attempted, relative to each case, an assessmentof adiou's assertions about Deleuze in the light of specic moments inDeleuze's ork, and against the background of adiou's own account of theissues that he takes up again in Deleuze

It ma be objected that such an approach to august philosophical texts i sfar from philosophical Perhaps e should, though, recall that decisive law,

one that is alwas put into pla when we turn to the explication of another'sthought, expressed b Nietzsche in Ecce Homo in an exclamation that takeson a tragic colour in the light of histor: "Abov all, do not mistake me forsoeone else!" (Nietzsche 1992: 73) Of course, the reasons b which onewriter might mistake another in this fashion are not necessaril simple Tefact that such an ensemble of misinterpretations is indeed prosecuted badiou has nonetheless been demonstrated in each of these cases

is will have been the rst of three general conclusions established here,namel that adiou's reading of Deleuze is marked throughout b errorSimpl put, adiou is wrong about man aspects of Deleuze's thought adiou's interpretive lnchpin in Te lamor o Being is, as we have repeatedlseen, the idea that Deleuze's work revolves around the fundamental positf an ultimate ontological unit hat the multiple investigations pursuedhere evince s a reversal of the role that the posit of the One plas in adiou'sreading Rather than being the ke element in Deleuze's thought, it is rather

the a priori assertion on adiou's part that he imposes on Deleuze's work

1



A SNGUAR PAMPSEST

he hesis of he One is hus used by Badiou as a lens hrough which heexamines Deleuze; i is no a claim of Deleuzean hough ha he has uncovered. I is even perhaps he case ha he various posiions ha he aribueso Deleuze are presened in ways characerisic of and derived from his ownphilosophy as if in order o read Deleuzes philosophy i had o be drawnnear o his own illuminaed by his own ligh. Arguably some of Badiousasserions abou Deleuze are really descripions of he shadows cas from iby he ligh of Being and Event

Now he querulous approach pursued here has ineviably led o a quiewidespread agnosicism abou Deleuzes philosophy an aosicism con

cerning he general saus and claims of his hough on many poins. heclaims advanced in his book consiue a defence of Deleuzean meaphysics only parially and via negative e parial approach adped has however provided he means o accoun in some deail for one of Deleuzes keyworks namely Derence and Repetition owing o he fac ha a number ofhe conceps invesigaed by Badiou nd heir mos exensive and complexexpression in ha work. he locus of he defence of Deleuze presened hereis hus o be found in Derence and Repetition, in so far as i resiss Badious

accoun. Arguably wih respec o a number of conceps in par icularime hough and he virual - he meaphysics proposed by Deleuze inhis work is irreducible o a monoonous onology of he One displayingas i does boh an unwavering commimen o he heme of a fundamenaldierence (in he winned forms of he virual and inensiy) and he radical ungrounding naure of ime. Derence and Repetition can be read as hemos alien philosophical work imaginable o Parmenides inaugural paeano he One. If he sakes of his book - and is aemp o defend Deleuze

agains he Badiouian schema - are o be locaed in one paricular se ofclaims hey are o b e found in my proposed inerpreaion ofDerence andRepetition

Surveying his more or less enirely enaive and negaive orienaion iwould be possible o arrive a he conclusion ha my argumen here concludes ha Badious reading of Deleuze has no value a all. is is no quiehe case . For if Badious conclusions abou Deleuze are in a number of waysincorrec and someimes profoundly so he manner of his approach oDeleuze his resoluely principled and philosophical mode of engagemenhave provided one of he mos signican inciemens ye o Deleuzes readers an inciemen ha is a once philosophical vigorous and profound. esingulari of he palipses ha is Te Clamor of Beig is revealed no byconsidering he accuracy of his represenaion of Deleuze bu by aending o he renovaed force ha i has brough o he reading of ha work.Alhough Badious aiude owards Deleuze has in recen years increasingly

aken he form of a saic opposiion (as I noed in Chaper 1), he genuine

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BIOU'S ELEUZE

engagemen wih Deleuzean meaphysics consiued by e Claor oBeing is irreducible o any of he previous ambien or sudied aiudeswheher criical or laudaory hile oriening his reading aound he fallacious asserion of he primacy of he One Badiou inroduced a new way oener ino Deleuzes work one ha has no ceased o invigorae he recepion of his work iself e are led herefore o he asserion of a rule ofhough (perhaps a correlae o he Niezschean demand cied above) ha isno inconsequenial one should always srive o have ore than one asterThis relaion however mus ake he form of a submission no o he levelof human exisence bu o wha in hose we ake as our masers is exces

sive and inhumanAs Foucaul ofen remarked in a senimen ha is also profoundlyDeleuzean i is he adven of problems ha provokes change in he recepion of an idea a hough a pracice is good o be forced o reread; iis good o lisen again o familiar words when hey are spoken in a foreignongue in a novel idiolec While we mus judge Badious Deleuze on hegrounds of deliy o he ex we mus also reasser ha here is a greaerdeliy in quesion and ha is a deliy o philosophy iself

A deliy o philosophy as b oh Badiou and Deleuze argue so forcefullyis always a deliy o he adven of somehing new of a becoming whose lawis irreducible o he exhausive mappings of wha exiss in he sonnambulanand elasic hiaus of he presen is a deliy o an even in hough whoseunexpeced grace a grace ha is as cruel as i is swee cruel in he measureof is sweeness - comes o overurn acceped cerainies ways of living andfeeling modes of hough

This is wha we are reminded of by a moving passage in e Claor o

Being Breaking o a criical discussion of he relaionship he perceivedbeween chance and he eernal reurn in Deleuze Badiou wries:

On his paricular poin Deleuze did no pursue he discussionin deail ake i up here bu nd he fac ha he is no longerhere o rejoin somewha disconcering How would so likehim o poin ou o me once again as he did wih grea relish inso many dieren passages o wha exen my philosophy has arelexive negaive or analogical value (DB 116 )

Beyond heic disagreemen regarding his or ha philosopy is nohing if no he coninuaion of he movemen of a odaliy of hough o f acerain haggard consciousness engendered by problems We do no desirehe coninuaion of dispues of challenges of he endless process of rening disincions and he rigidicaion of boundaries bu raher somehing in

hese acs ha moves us forwards in hough

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THE HISTORY OF A DISJUNCTIVE SYNTHESIS

1 . Quoted b y Louise Burchill translator of Badious Deleue e phrase i s Badiousspoken to JeanClet Martin on presenting the latter with a copy of the book.

2. A brief somewhat partisan but nonetheless informative summary of the DeleuzeBadiou relationship can be found in Fran<ois Dosses biography of Deleuze andGuattari see Dosse (2010 36572) .

3 . e nal sentence of this tet reads e proletariat is not the invntor of ideological resistance it is its principal logician Badiou Balms (1 976 123). On Delideoloie see Bosteels (2005 esp. 7558 ).

4. Deleuze would like to be to Kant what Mar is to Hegel Deleuze stands Kant on hishead the categorical imperative but a desiring one the unconditional but materialist the autonomy of the subject but the subject as a luid lu. Sadly if you invertKant you nd Hume which is the same thing and Deleuzes rst academic crush On the toboggan of Desire the head bobs down and up again until it doesntknow one side from the other object from subject any more. All in all that this bethe Good or that Evil is just a reversible matter of mood with not much conse

quence always act so that the maim of your action does not strictly concern anybody (Badiou 2004a 79tm).

5. The irony of Badious early critique of AniOedipu is that this work i Kantian in asignicant respect overlooked by Badious brash attack Deeuze even states that ithad a Kantian ambition it should be read as a kind of Criique of ure Reaon at thelevel of the unconscious (DRF 289). However Badious critique lands wide of themark in so far as it presents the Kant of AniOedipu as an unmodied version ofthe Kant of the Criique of racical Reaon overlooking the important transformations of the Kantian project that are undertaken there and more signicantly in

Derence and Repeiion

IS DELEU ZE A PH I LOSOP HE R OF THE ON E?

1. ndeed Badiou claims to have been among the rst if not the rst to have treatedDeleuze as a philosopher (W 69). n the nal chapter below the question of therelationship between quality and quantity in Deeuze is directly addressed.

2. n fact B 3847 presents a lengthy and etremely sharp critique of the OneManydyad as concepts that like baggy clothes are much too big (B 44) lacking in the

13



NOTES

precision necessary for a thoroughgoing ontology capable of thinking the import ofduration for the theoy of being

3 e translator of Foucaul Sen Hand, provides his own translation of the title of

Bergsons Ea ur le donne mmdae de la concence (Essay on the immediatgiven of awareness) The standard English version of the tet, however, is entitled

Tme and Free Wll, which have substituted here4 On Deleuzes account of univocity, see the deitive presentation in Smith 2001

16783)5 Aristotle (2004 57) For an unusually clear reading of this tet, see the remarks from

Heidegger's 1931 lecture course, Oneness of Being Not as Genus but as Analogy(Heidegger 1995 2734)

6 They are, though, in principle intelligible grant that the singular is per e intelligible a far as it itself goes But . it is not per e intelligible to some intellect say, toours (Duns Scous 1994 112 n192)

7 Deleuze's critique of Aristotle that opens Chapter 1 of Derence and Repeonalready outlines the locus of these critiques at both ends of the spectrum of dierence (the categories and individuation), Aristotle's philosophy constitutes a failure ofnerve On the one hand, the most precise that the conceptual thought of dierencecan become on Aristotles account is the level of species (dierences between individuals are inessential or beneath intelligible distinction), and thus no ro eendin the Leibnizian sense and here is one reason for Leibniz's manifest superiorityv--v Aristotle could ever be provided for individuals (why this singular being

here and now?) On the other hand, Being as such can just as little be subject tothought, since it is only intelligible through the categories. n other words, the quasiunivocity of the categories actually forecloses any capacity to think the univocity ofBeing.

8 Of course, as Dleuze is quite aware, Scotus's decisions in this regard are wedded tohis teological commitments. The following tet from Epreonm n hloophyis emblematic univocity in Scotus seems compromised by a concern to avoid pantheism. For his theological, that is to say creationist; perspective forced him to conceive univocal Being as a neualed nderen concept . . With Spinoza univocitybecomes the object of a pure armation (EPS 67) This passage echoes and epandson the tet mentioned above (hat is why he only hou univocal being DR39/59)

9. This is not to say that ere is no Deleuzean ontology; as Fran<ois Zourabchviliclaims The key stake in Deleuze's most important works is that ontology mustbecome an ontology of dierence, an ontology of multipliciy, and no longer anontology of the one the same claim, let us note, that opens Ben and Even t isZourabichvillis assent to the necessity of this connection that motivates his rejection of ontology f Deleuze's philosophy has an orientation, it is certainly thisthe etinction of the name of being; and, as a result, that of ontology (1996 67).

Likewise, think it an eaggeration to claim that t is not ontology in itself thatinterests Deleuze, but rather ... the moment of its history in which the thesis ofunivocity emerges (bd 9), since Deleuze clearly an d in numerous tets engageswith clear relish n discussions of nonunivocal ontological positions, from whch hedraws more than merely negative conclusions.

10 See Daniel Smiths superlative and ehaustive article he Concept ofthe Simulacrum(2006), which presents the entire course of this concept in Deleuze's thought.

1 1 t is worth noting that this much cited appendi (rst published in 1967) to Te Locof ene is in fact a very close rehearsal of the end of the rst chapter of Drenceand Repeton

64



NOTES

12 . The concept of the simulacrum is, of course, pursued by other thinkers too,most famously perhaps by Jean Baudrillard: the locus classcus is without a doubtmulaons (Baudrillard 1983) Closer to Deleuze, however, is Pierre Klossowski,

to whom Deleuze devotes key passages in Drence and Repeon, along with anappendi (Klossowki, or BodiesLanguages) On Deleuzes use f, and interestin, Klossowksi, see James (2009) on Klossowskis thought more generally, see anJamess ne study Te erssence of a Name (2001) See also Ashley WoodwardsKlossowskis Nietzsche (2011 ) , on Klossowskis reading of ietzsche, which had animportant impact on Deleuze.

13 Now, Deleuze also notes that, at least in the ophs there is a moment at which theentire edice begins to lose its structural integrity: Plato discovers, in the lash ofan instant as he leans over its abyss , that the simulacrum is not simply a false copy,but that it calls into question the very notion o the copy and of the model (LS94/305). is is the reason why Deleuze notes in Derence and Repeon (DR128 168) that the overturning of Platonism begins in Plato himself On this point,see Flaman (2009: 1824).

14. And, indeed, to the formulatio of the theme of nomadic distribution; introducedat the same time as that of crowned anarchy Of course, the former suits Badiouspurposes less well, since it is dicult to abstract a moment of substantial unity inthis case (the proposed crown in crowned anarchy) n any case, nomadic distribution (a theme that can be found in a number of key tets, including both Derenceand Repeon and A Tousand laeaus) signies a distribution lacking any eter

nl principle of ordering beings are arrayed according to their relations with eachother, lacking any ultimate ro or loos

15 . Badious assertion that this Event with a capital E is in all likel ihood the DeleuzesGo od (DCB 27/44) can indeed be agreed with here, but only on the condition thatthe tree central characteristics of the Goo in Plato are repudiated its ontologicalstatus as beyond being its structural status as selfidentical or as ideal ipseity andits moral characteristic. The Event in Deleuze is certainly that which ruptures theorder of material causality, or, rather, is the champion of a sense that is irreducible tomaterial reality.

16. This idea is riely discussed in the contet of Deleuzes treatment of intensity in thenal chapter of Drence and Repeon (DR 23/3012), a tet shall return tobelow

17 A number of the points made here nd their compacted form in Deleuzes short butpowerful essay on Maurice de Gandillac, Les Plages dimmanence (DRF 2446)We read, for eample, the following without a doubt the theory [the Neoplatonisttheory of emanation] never ceased to subordinate immanence to transcendence,to measure immanent Being according to transcendent Unity (DRF 2445) ndeed,it would be possible for the current work to be entirely structured around this article, which moves from a general consideration of the gures of transcendence and

immanence in ontology, to the history of philosophy, and then to the decisions thatmark a philosophical life.

18 . Daniel W. Smits summary of Deleuzes engagement with the thesis of univocity noted above includes the same recognition of the emanative scheme inBadious interpretation as have tried to elicit here. He notes, for eample, thatBadiou wrongly presents Deleuzes univocal ontology as if it were a neoplatonicphilosophy of the One For instance, when Badiou writes that, in Deleuze, the paradoical or supereminent One engenders, in an immanent manner, a processionof beings, whose univocal sense it distributes; he is giving an eact description ofan emanave ontology, not a univocal one n general, Badiou combines transitive,

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NOES

emanative and mmanent elements in his treatment of univocity (Smith 20011812 n.19) .

Th e closest Deleuze ever gets to such a view is in the nal chapter of Beronim,

in which he draws attention to a rough analogy etween Bergsons virtual and thOne of the Platonists (B 93) which is indeed not very close.19 . At least this is e account that is presented in Epreionim in hiloophy The

other half of Deleuzes doctoral work Drence and Repeiion diers in an important respect as we shall see shortly.

20. t is therefore strange to read Keith AnsellPearsons assertion to the contrary whenhe writes that n his major study of Spinoza ... Deleuzes innovaton was to paycareful attention to the notion of epression and to show that ... there are traces ofemanationist thinking in Spinoza (AnsellPearson 2002 1 12 ).

21. is point is strongly argued in Hardt (1 993) where caua ui assumes a central rolein his reading of Deleuzes philosophy.

22. This is not to say that other noncaual formal elements are not in play. n factDeleuzes account of modal essence in Spinoza holds that it maintains an epreiverelation with the world of modal eistence in the same way that virtual deas relateto the world of actuality in Derence and Repeiion For an account of this parallelin Deleuzes work see Simon Duys our de force Albert Lautman (2009) .

23. This is also Deleuzes point in relation to Gilles Chtelets Aristotelianismmmanence the eld of immanence consists of a PowerAct relation. The twonotions are inseparable only eisting in correlation. t is this which makes Chtelet

an Aristotelian Deleuze 1 988c 8) .24 . t is at this point that the ontology pursued by the late Maurice Merleau Ponty tendstowards contact with Deleuze. For an argument in this direction see Reynolds Roe (2006).

25. Deleuze seems to say precisely the opposite in the original French the passagecited above in fact begins with the claim Nevertheless there still remains an indference between substance and modes [ouran ubie encore une inderenceenre la ubance e le mode (DR 40tm/59 emphasis added). There is nonetheless a justication for the inversion in the English translation however deliberate oraccidental o f dierence for indierence. he indierence Deleuze is speaking of isrelative to the indierence manifested by Scotus with respect to the univoca armation of singularity which despite Spinozas advances returns in the form of ashortchanging of the independent ontological status of the mode. n other wordsit is precisely in so far as there is a radical ontological drence between substanceand modes in Spinoza that the modes themselves can only be a matter of inderence from the point of view of the armation of univocal being.

3. METHOD

1 . JorgeLuis Borges e Writing of th e God (1 999 25054) reveals th e underlyingstructure of this lost name that it is rather than being lost in fact hidden requiing the most dedicated and ascetic search in order to discover it . The narrator in thistale indeed nds the name of God but written on the skin of the tiger who will behis eecutioner. n pursuing the ascesis of nomination in search of the absolute wearrive at the meeting point of mysticism and death so well epounded in the work ofGeo rges Bataille. See for eample Bataille ( 1986 25264) . At some distance fromBataille although nonetheless close to a certain mysticism we nd here a parallel

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NOTES

once more between Badiou's Deleuze and Plotinus. In the s ixth Ennead, Plotinus

argues that we cannot really address the One properly in language, and that even thename "the One itself remains preliminary and external. See in particular Plotinus

(1991 §6 9 5 ), where we read that strictly no name is apt to it but since name it wemust there is a certain rough tness in designating it as unity with the understanding that it is not the unity of some other thing

2 In fact far from rejecting the gure of the dialectic Deleuze wishes to rehabilitateit stripping from it both its investment by Plato in the ultimate nature of unity andthe Hegelian emphasis on negativity thereby returning it to the regime of the problematic. We shall see this movement in the net chapter given over to a discussionof the virtual in Deleuze. It is also worth noting that for no thinker of any importance is the dialectic simply a methodological trope certainly for neither Plato norHegel.

3 is structure although evident in all Descartes' methodogical tets is nowhereclearer than in he discovery of truth according to the natural light (Descartes1985 267)

4 his common Leibnizian theme is to be found in even his very early published workfor eample Meditations on Knowledge ruth and Ideas (Leibniz [1684] 1989237)

5 See also W 778 on the empirical as the regime of cases and the transcendental asthe regime of the One.

6 In the opening chapter of Bronim Deleuze is clear that the illusory problems

that populate thought are not simple errors that can be done away with and inthis sense we never arrive at a truth freed from all ction. is is as Deleuze notesa Kantian theme Although Bergson determines the nature of false problems in acompletely dierent way and although the Kantian critique itself seems to him to bea collect ion of badly stated problems he treats the illusion in a similar way to Kant.The illusion is based in the deepest part of the intelligence it is not strictly speakingdispelled or dispellable rather it can only be rprd" (B 21)

7 ese claims as we shall see are retooled in a somewhat counterBergsonianfashion by Deleuze in the nal chapter of Drnc and Rpiion in order tocharacterize intensity. On this concept see Chapter 6

8 See for eample the discussions at B 23, 27 and 29 with respect to the transcendental. See also the following sentiment from Deleuzes earlier piece Bergson'sConception of Dierence This method is something other than a spatial analysismore than a description of eperience and less (so it seems) than a transcendentalanalysis (ID 49)

9 Deleuze makes this point very strongly i n Bergson 1 8591941 see in particular ID346 a passage that begins with the telling words Do we not . . . see that dualism isa moment already surpassed in Bergson's philosophy?

10 In his short but vast treatment of the Kantian system Kan' Criical hiloophy

Deleuze will go as far as to claim that the doctrine of the faculties forms the realnetwork which constitutes the transcendental method (KCP 10 )

11 It is in these pages that Deleuze introduces the memorable trope of a philosophermonkey who opens up to truth himself producing the true but only to the etentthat he begins to penetrate the coloured thickness of a problem (DR 1645/2 14)

12 e interview Portrait du philosophe en spectateur (DRF 197203 ) is particularly clear on this point. There Deleuze presents his (perhaps somewhat surprising)attitude towards taonomies There is nothing more amusing than classicationstables. hey are like the skeleton of a book its vocabulary its dictionary . . . Nothing

is more beautiful than the classications of natural history (DRF 266)

167



OTES

4. H E VI RUA

1 Le t me note that Deleuze indeed indicates tht he is a classical philosopher but

unlike Badiou does not consider this nomination to mean non or anticritica inthe Kantian sense Consider the following tet which also speaks to Badious reading on a number of registers: believe in philosophy as system e idea of systemis compromised when it is related to the coordinates of dentity Resemblance andAnalogy t is Leibniz believe who was the rst to identify system and philosophyin a manner to which too adhere Thus questions concerning the overcoming ofphilosophy o r the death of philosophy' do not concern me feel myself to be a veryclassical philosopher System for me must not only be in perpetual heterogeneitybut must be a heeroene, something it seems to me which has never been trie d(DRF 338) Deleuzes claims about philosophy and system can be found both eplicitly and in the manner in which he presents his work throughout

Alberto oscano (2000) epresses a smilar puzzlement in his j oint review of TeClamor of Ben and Badiou's Maneo for hloophy

3 As has often been noed Paul Patton's translation has this title as deas and theSynthesis of Dierence for Deleuze's Synthse idele de la dirence While themoive of this choice is certainly justiable given that the phrase ideal synthesisis prey to an obvious misunderstanding to my mind its most problematic consequence is that it has the potenial to mislead the reader into thinking that thesynthesis of derence for Deleuze is entirely treated in this chapter in relation to

the virtual that is that the synthesis of dierence occurs entirely at the ideal level.However there is a concomitant synthesis of dierence that pertains to intensitypresented in Derence and Repeon whose role in the metaphysics presentedthere is already overlooked

4 The most incisive works considering the chicanes that characterize Deleuze'srelationship with Kantian metaphysics published thus far have been by ChristianKerslake (2002 2004 2007) See also James Williams's (2005a ch 2) treatment ofthis relationship specically as it pertains to the transcendental and recent worksby both Levi Bryant (2008) and Joe Hughes (2009a)

5 On this point once again see Hughes (2009a 557 )6 Of course the problem for Kant is that this regulative function is frequentlyeceeded hence the need for a critique ofpure reason that is a use of reason that isdisjunct from the matter provided through sensibility and the structure provided bythe understanding As Deleuze notes however we make a mistake if we think this isthe mst important aspect o f Kants account of deas even if it is his startingpointif accoring to Kant reason does pose false problems and therefore itself gives riseto illusion this is because in the rst place it is the faculty of posing problems in general (DR 168218) This is characteristic of Deleuzes approach to antian reasonmore generally While he will not hesitate to insist that [i] n many ways understand

ing and reason are deeply tormented by the ambition to make things in themselvesknown to us (KCP 21) a theme that is discussed and admired in Drence andRepeon (1 3-6/1789) on balance he spends much more time emphasizing thepositive character of reason

7. t is on this precise point that Deleuze's reading of the Kant dea departs fromthe approach ursued by the Lacanin position of Slavoj iek and which morebroadly distinguishes Deleuze and Jacques Lacan who are in many respects (at leastin the orks of te 1 960s) incredibly close

8. Such is the result of the mistake of taking problems to be derived from propositions

that have no clear or decidedon designation which Deleuze critiques in chpter

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NOTES

three D{erence and Repreentation under the title o the ostulate of modality orsolutions

9 A roer assessment in the English literature of Maimons role in Deleuzes thought

is roblematized by the fact that until quite recently very little has been availablein translation The ublication in 2010 of his Eay on ancendental hiloophy iscertain to rectify this situation A number of imortant secondary tets eist however (Atlas 1965 Beiser 1987 285323 Buzaglo 2002) of which think the Beisertet is the most helful certainly with regard to situating Maimon within the crit ical contet ets on the role of Maimon in Deleuze have also been aearing moreregularly in the last decade Graham Jones's (2009) survey iece is to my mind themost comrehensive of these but see also Smith (2000 2007) Bryant (2008) andVoss (2011 )

10 Leibniz uses this eamle in numerous laces which Deleuze enumerates in TeFold (FLB 154 n9/ 1 16 n.9) . An eamlar though is certainly to be found in the reface of his ew Eay on Human ndertandin (Leibniz 1981 54).

1 1 ccording to an object ion often made against Maimon deas understood as thedierentials of thought themselves introduce a minimum of given' which cannotbe thought they restore the duality of innite and nite understanding which function resectively as the conditions of eistence and the conditions of knowledge andwhich the entire Kantian Critique nevertheless roosed to eliminate (DR 1923249) Deleuze's solution to these issues discussed above is stated in the sentencesthat follow this indictment This objection however alies only to the etent that

the faculty of deas according to Maimon is the understanding just as it was reasonaccording to Kant that is in either case a faculty which constitutes a common senseand cannot tolerate the resence within itself of a keel o n which the emiricaleercise of the conjoint faculties would break ... This is no longer so when deasare related to the transcendent eercise of a articular faculty liberated from anycommon sense (DR 193/249).

12. See Kant (C PR ntroduction es . B 1924 The General Problem of Pure Reason).At the start of Maimon's Eay we read the question is ho w is hilosohy as a urea priori cognition ossible? The great Kant osed this question in his Critique ofure Reaon

. . The roositions of transcendental hilosohy are [like the roositions of the hysical sciences] indeed also synthetic but their rincile is not eerience (ercetion) it is rather the reverse they are the rinciles of the necessaryconditions of eerience by means of which what in ercetion merely is must be(Maimon 2010 67)

13 . Joe Hughes resents a strong counter to this osition in his Deleue and the Geneiof Repreentation in which he argues that Deleuze is at root a genetic henomenologist in search recisely of the genetic rules for subjective eerience. A roerconsideration of Hughess reading cannot be rovided here. However the following oint can at least be noted Deleuze insists throughout his work and indeed in

the ages of Drence and Repetition itself that it is not just human beings but allthings that are contractile in nature which inhabit the time of the resent Hughesis forced by his aroach to Deleuze to neglect this claim which would oen uhis account at its very startingoint (the startingoint of the dynamic genesis ofreresentation) to the nonhuman and indeed nonorganic (the stalks of wheat andthe embryonic turtles of Drence and Repetition give way to the social codication o f all lows in AntiOedipu and then the slow symhony of the earth itself inA uand lateau) An imortant misste in his argument seems to be an overlynarrow reading of the category of reresentation in Derence and Repetition (on

this see in articular Hughes [2009a 1 1718 ] )

19



NOTES

In recent and contemporary work on Deleuze there have been eectively four einvestigations into he role of mathematics in his thought e rst and most widelknown of these is provided by Manuel DeLaa's various accounts of Deleuze on

the basis of a thoroughgoing account of compleity theory (I refer in particular toDeLanda [2002]) e problem with DeLanda's work in the current contet i te(not necessarily problematic) lack of discussion of Deleuzes own use of mathematics in favour of etending the framework of A ouand laeau in the directioof the formal sciences Secondly Smith has published a number of related interventions on the matter of the BadiouDeleuze opposition on the status of matematics particularly as it relates to the former's aiomatic approach in comparis onwith the latters problematics Smith clearly demonstrates that at issue here is quitea pround derend whereb from Deleuze's point of view aiomatic se theoris understood as a rigidication and calcication of creative movements in mathematical thought while from Badiou's vantage point Deleuze demonstrates whaRussell Grigg elsewhere amusingly calls a Canutelike reluctance to accept oneof the most magnicent achievements of mode mathematics (Grigg i speaking of Badious critique of Jacqueslain Miller and the late Lacans use of matematics and logic [Grigg 2005 8]). e strength of Smith's intervention is that itpresents an entirely adequate and fullbodied account of Deleuze's point of viewon the matter. us in this case my claim that adopting Badious points of emphasis in reading Deleuze is certainly vindicated for what Smith provides in defendingDeleuze against Badiou may not have been required before the problematic status

of mathematics in Deleuze being previously obscure in nature. ird we arrive atthe very revealing historical reconstructions currently being undertaken by Kerslakearound Deleuze's relationship to esoteric accounts of mathematics particularly inrelation to Hone Wronski and his champion in twentiethcentury France FrancisWarrain (see Kerslake 2007 in particular). The strength of Kerslakes approach onthis topic and indeed many others is double (i) to note that the letter of Deleuzestet often does not provide enough material to make nal determinations about thesense of its own fundamental claims (e.g. when we see Deleuze returning to thenotion of mathesis in Derence and Repeiion eplicitly appealing to ideas from

Wronski and making a clear statement that he is concerned with an esoteric useof the calculus we need to take a step back and ask whether we have at ur immediate disposal all the necessary means to understand what is going on in Deleuzesphilosophy of dierence [Kerslake 200 68]) ; and (ii) to be as thorough as possible when attempting to assemble the necessary means which is to say to proceedwithout discarding material that crosses the boundaries of respectable philosophyinto more murky intellectual regions. Kerslake (2007) is a tetbook case of such amethod which yields many profound and valuable results. Finally Simon Du isengaged in an ongoing attempt to articulate Deleuzes philosophy within the contetof more general movements in mathematics logic and their philosophical avatars I

refer in particular to Duy (2006) which presents a profound account of the role ofdierential calculus i n the thought of Hegel and Deleuze in the general contet ofSpinozas metaphysics. Hi s central achievement is to present a much richer accountof the mathematics invoked by Deleuze sometimes only tangentially. It is at presenttherefore the highwater mark with respect to our understanding of the role of thecalculus in D eleuze.

5 Beyond this Deleuze here departs from Maimon who is dubbed the Leibniz ofthe calculus in another sense. he former will reject (as we shall see below) anyrole for the innitesimal (qua unthought quantity in the understanding) in favour

of dierential Ideas thought in a strictly structural sense. e irony here is as we

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shall also see shortly, that this aligns him less with the funding gures of a dynamicgeometrical theorization of the calculus, and more with gures such as AugustinCauchy and Karl Weierstrass is is not to say that Deleuzes reading of the calculus

divorces it entirely from the gure of genesis: to the contrary, it rather embraces boththe mode reading, which "dissociated calculus from any phoonomic or dynamicconsiderations (DR 183), while remaining commited to a connection between thedirential and genesis in the form of a static genesis, a "genesis without dynamism(DR 183) e s ignicance of this static nature of ideal genesis will become apparentand even decisive once more in Chapter 8.

16 . It is owing to this creative and complex relationship to calculus that I considerDuys frequent recourse to the developments in Abraham Robinsons NonStandard Analysis - which provide a rigorous, if indeed nonstandad; formalmeans to include innitesimals within axiomatic number theory and analysis - isin a certain fashion beside the point, although it is clear that Deleuze was familiarwith this work, which he cites with respect to Robinsons analysis of the gure ofthe monad (see FLB 129-30177-8) Neither the reductive approach of nineteenthcentury mathematicians (above all, perhaps, Weierstrass) nor the recuperation ofthe innitesimal by Robinson (or equally in the theory of surreal numbers pioneeredby John Conway, on which Badious Number and Numbers rests see NN 107-8 fora thumbnail sketch) are signicant here, simply because Deleuzes treatment of thecalculus involves a complex movement of metaphorical extraction and amplication In fact, the discussions of the calculus in the fourth chapter of Drence and

Repetition are marked by an oscillation between two possible roles of this theory- as revealing instance, on the one hand, and as general theory of the virtual, onthe other - in Deleuzes work, an oscillation that Deleuze does not (to my mind)adequately manage to master He makes reference to these two faces of his accounton a number of occasions, but the nal and key passage can be found at DR 18 1/23,around the theme of a diaphora proper to Ideas. i s issue, which goes well beyondthe scope of my arguent here, is worthy of attention, above all perhaps withrespect to Badious critical claims about Deleuzes metaphorical use of the calculus.

17. Badiou himself published a striking and insightful intervention on the topic of theinnitesimal and its relation to the innite and the limit (Badiou 1969a) As is typicalin the work from this period, all of Badious inluences are on display at once: Cantor,Lenin, Lacan and Hegel all jostle together around a detailed analysis of the treatment of the innitesimal by Weierstrass and Robinson. And, as with other piecesof this period too, it closes with a sentiment that is at once as heavily marked byBadious Althusserian heritage as it is with Badiou s own abrupt and powerful rhetoric: Quality, continuity, temporality and negation: categories subordinate to theobjectives of an ideology Number, the discrete, space and armation: or, better,Mark, Punctuation, Gap [Blanc; a term that will, by Being and Event, be denitivelyreplaced with Vide] and Cause: categories of scientic processes (ibid. 136)

18 . On Cauchys treatment of the calculus visvis, in particular, the status of innitesimal quantities, see Boyer ( 1949: 27)

19 Again, Du marks this peculiarity, both in Te Logic oExpression, and also in Du(2004) ere we read the following: Ironically, one of the mathematicians who contributed to the development of the dierential po int of view of the innitesimal calculus is Karl Weierstrass, who cons iders the dierential relation to be logically priorto the function in the process of determination assoc iated with the innitesimal calculus that is, rather than determining the dierential relation from a given function,the kinds of mathematical problems that Weirstrass dealt with involved investigating

how to generate a function from a given dierential relation(ibid.

204)

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20 Indeed, the key poin of Deleuzes departure from Maimon, who is dubbed te"Leibniz of the calculus in Derence and Repeon (DR 170-71 /222) is the rejetion of the place of the innitesimal (qua unthought quantity in the understanding)

in favour of dirential Ideas (divorced from ay reference to innitesimals presentacross all faculties See DR 192-3/249- 2 Maimon himself makes this claim early i n his Essay "These dierentials o f objects

are the socalled noumena but the objects themselves arising from them are tephenomena. ith respect to intuition = 0, the dierential of any such object in its elfis dx =0, dy = 0 etc, however, their relations are not = 0, but can rather be givendeterminately in the intuitions arising rom them (Maimon 2010 : 21 )

22 is citation recalls the lengthy and complicated theory of the metaphysical surfacein e Logc of Sense, which unfortunately must be left aside here Hughes presentssome of the key elements in a short and helpful passage (2009a: 3-8) See alsoidder (2008: 121-42)

23 Kant, however, by maintaining that the transcendental is to be thought at the levelof the conditioning of possible experience, does not manage to see either the general scope of this genetic form of illusion or its variety of (nonepistemologicalforms This is ectively the substance of the charge against Kant that Deleuzepresents in his discussion of the fth postulate of the dogmatic image of thought(DR 13-4/198-200)

24 Of this dyad, D eleuze writes that "the form-matter couple is not sucient todescribe the mechanism of determination: matter is already informed, rm is not

separable from the model of the speces or that of the morph, and the whole isunder the protection of the categories In fact, this couple is completely internal torepresentation (DR 27/32-3) Later, in A ousand Plaeaus this critica attitudeblossoms into an entire ontological schema, by way of Louis Hjelmslevs semiology,in the third plateau "The Geology of Morals There, Deleuze and Guattari arguefor a complex quadripartite scheme involving not just form and content but alsomatter and expression, where forms and matters each must be further determinedin terms of the matter and expression proper to them Using this structure, Deleuzeand Guattari theorize a whole range of states of aairs from materiality to subjectivity For a somewhat convoluted account of this structure, see Genosko (1998)Hjelmslev also appears on a number of occasions in the books on Cnema.

2 This passage in which this formulation (which surely pleased Deleuze) is to be foundis quoted by Deleuze in his short book on Chtelet (Deleuze 1988c: 8) The entirevery interesting passage, which has a bearing on the current discussion, reads as follows: "In philosophical terminology, we call any principle posed at once as a sourceof all explanation and as a superior reality transcendent The word is pleasng, and Ind it convenient Impertinence, however great or small, from the leader of a smallgroup to the president of the United States, from psychiatrist to managing director,functions through leaps of transcendence [coups de anscendance] as the drunk

does with hits of red wine [coups de vn rouge] he medieval God has been splintered, but without losing its force and profound formal unity: Science, the orkingClass, the Party, Progress, Health, Security, Democracy, Socialism - the list wouldbe too long - are some of its avatars These transcendents have taken Gods place(which is to say that it is still there, omnipresent), exercising with a greater ferocitheir tasks of organization and extermination

26 An interesting and useful discussion of time as ground in Deleuzes philosophy is tobe found in Vronique B ergens LOnologe de Glles Deleuze (2001 : 203-9) Bergensbook is characterized by an admirable attempt to draw Deleuze closer to Hegel, anattempt that is worthwhile even if in this case the result happens to obscure the rea l

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dieences (and attibute the key eatues o Deleuzes philosophy diectly to Hegel),athe than bing about an eective rapprochement Thee ae cetainly many "secetanities between Hegel and Deleuze (ibid 664) wothy o examination

27 illiams (200a: ch 6 ) stages a useul extapolation o Deleuzes citique o the possib le in elation to the theoy o possible wolds ound in the wok o David Lewis 28 Conside the ollowing, among numeous examples: "they imply no pio iden

tity, no positing o something that could be called one o the same (DR 183/237)"Multiplicity toleates no dependence on the identical (DR 9247) "Ideas [ae]the dieentials o thought (DR 192/249)

29 is is why Deleuze is both engaged in an ovecoming o the stuctualist paadigmin the name o time and the evet, but is also a stuctualist in his own ashion, pomoting - at least in Drence and Repetition - a philosophical view that GahamJones has ca lled a chrono-structuralism. Deleuzes complex elationship to stuctualism is pehaps nowhee bette exhibited than in his ascinating "How Can eRecognize Stuctualism (ID 238-69) Fo a helpul and detailed teatment o thispiece, see illiams (200b 3-77)

30 See DR 186-7/241 -2 o Deleuzes sketch o what might be called a taxonomy odieentiations within an ideal stuctue

3 Deleuzes discussion o Hegel in Drence and Repetiton is to be ound o the mostpat at DR 42-/64- (and in a paallel, summay text at DR 262-3 /338-40), in thecontext o a compaison with Leibniz on the topic o innite epesentation, but inthe couse o pesenting his own vesion o the dialectic, Deleuze makes equent

eeence to the schema o deteminative negation, mostly wihout invoking Hegelby name (see eg DR 20-6/26-6) 32 he passage in which Badiou uses thi s non begins with the ollowing: "Vitualities,

like poblems, ae peectly dieentiated and detemined (DCB 0/7) It is as dicult to know what Badiou means hee by "vitualities as it is o detemine the pecise status o this "like

33 Pehaps the wod "inteees hee is meant to invoke the omulation o th elationship between philosophy and cinema as Deleuze pesents it at the end o Teime Image "A theoy o cinema is not about cinema, but about the concepts thatcinema gives ise to and which ae themselves elated to othe concepts coesponding to othe pactices, the pactice o concepts in geneal having no pivilege oveothes, any moe than one object has ove othes It is at the level o the inteeence o many pactices that things happen, beings, images, concepts, all the kinds oevents (I 280tm)

34 e status o the undestanding in this espect is, as Deleuze so clealy pesents inKant Critical Philosophy, modied in the second and thid Critiques, elative to theothe aculties See in paticula KCP 16- 18, whee the agument in Derence andRepetition glos sed above is also ound, at times verbatim

3 his otenmade point tuns on the act that, in the Analytic o Concepts, Kant takes

as the amewok o the concepts o the undestanding a set o claims that ae notdeduced om within expeience itsel, but ae athe those o classical logic Putanothe way, the distinction that he maintains between what he calls "geneal and"tanscendental logic (CPR A76-7/ B1 02) is not igoously maintained is lattemanne o pesenting the issue is taken up by Badiou in Logics of Wods, see in paticula book two, section ou, "Gand Logique et logique odinaie (LM 18-94)

36 "he Idea as a concete univesal stands opposed to concepts o the undestanding, and possesss a compehension all the moe vast as its extension is geat (DR173/224)

37 In e Logic of Sense, "simulacum is the name given by Deleuze to the agmented

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bodies of the depths, whie images are the phantasmatic projections that peope thesexua surface that resuts from the resoution of the Oedipus compex On this distinction, see in particuar the twentyeighth series of e Logic of Sense, where the

foowing text can be found: "It is important, oce again, to distinguish, for exampe,between the ora stage of the depths and the ora zone of the surface between theintrojected and projected interna partia object (simuacrum) and the object of thesurface, projected over a zone through an entirey dierent mechanism (image) (LS199231-2)

38 Badiou makes a simiar error in hi s interpretation of Spinoza in Being and vent, infabricating a probem for Spinozas metaphysics in the form of a supposed causa gapbetween innite and nite modes On this reading, aong with a critique based inDeeuzes expressivist reading of Spinoza, see Roe (2007 )

39 Kersake (200) presents a hepfu account of the reation between the metaphysica aspects of the works on cinema and the project of Drence and Repetition Ofperennia import in reation to the specicay phiosophica aspect of the Deeuzeanengagement with cinema, see Bogue (2003) and Marrati (2008)

40 Deeuzes exampes incude frequent reference to the gure of the mirror in ms(e.g. I 98), introducing a probematic (and ironic) mis-en-abme into his anaysis,in so far as it appears he moves from the forma anaysis of the images in m to theanaysis of the content of the m.

41 For exampe: "Te stakes of phiosophy consist in adequatey thinking the greatestpossibe numer of particuar things (this is the empiricist aspect in Deeuze - the

disjunctive synthesis or the sma circuit), in order to adequatey think Substance,or the One (which is the transcendenta aspect, Reation or the great circut) (69)

42 Chapter three, "Of the Surviva of Images: Memory and the Mind (Bergson 1 991 :133-78) passes through the same main stages as Deeuze does in this passage fromTe me Image. This chapter aso incudes the famous cone diagram of the virtuapast, which we sha discuss in Chapter , and which Deeuze himsef returns to onmany occasions.

43 It is interesting to note that the account of dreaming oered in Derence andRepetition is presented not in the context of the virtua at a, but in the form ofDeeuzes enigmatic theory of the Other at the co se of the na chapter. See Chapter7 for a short discussion o f the status of the Other in this work of Deeuzes.

44 For strong arguments for moderating the tendency to identify the respective projectsof Deeuze and Bergson, see Widder (2008: 40-49, 86-99 )

4 "This is why Bergson is not contradicting himsef when he speaks of dierent intensities or degrees in a virtua coexistence, in a singe ime, in a simpe otaity (B 94) "a vision of the word is crit icized [by Bergson] for ony taking into account of dierences in degree where, more profoundy, there are dierences in kind a duaism isestabished between dierences in kind . . In the second type it is a genetic duaism,

the result of the derentiation ofa Simple or a Pue" (B 96) "One question becomespressing: what is the nature of this one and simpe Virtua (B 96) "But this eads tothe question of how the Simpe or the One, the origina identity has the power to bedierentiated (B 100)

46 Bergsonism is thus entirey within the spirit of Deeuzes 196 summary of Bergsonsthought pubished in the coection Les philosophes clbres, edited by MereauPonty,in which we read: "We nd the entire movement of Bergsons thought concentratedin Matter and Memory, in the tripe form of dierence i n nature, coexisting degreesof dierence, and dierenciation (ID 42), an emphasis that wi be repeated in the

very tite of the other piece on Bergson from the same year - "Bergsons conception

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TES

of dirence (ID 43-78 ) Both text (not to mention Begsonism itef) demontratethe extent to which B ergon i, for Deeuze, a thinker of dierence and it mutipeprovenance Again, one fee a though one coud cite interminaby on thi point,

from Begonism the other text on Bergon, and from Deence and Repetition47 See DB 52/79 : " [Deeuze] i guided in a the noda point of hi ytem, by

Bergon·8 e paage in which thi caim i made provide another exampe of the equivo

cation that mark Badiou argument at many point: "e rea object i thereforeexacty ike time: it i a pitting or dupicity. We can ay that the imageobject istime (DB 52/79) Badiou reader woud be jutied in aking how thee twocaim are reated

49 In Te Logic of Sense Deeuze make ue of the theme of a "ecre duaim toaccount for the dierence between tate of aair (bodie and their intermixture)and eneevent (the idea eve that, in Deence and Repetition i popuated bythe virtua) He i very cear, however, to reject any excuive ditinction uch a wend in Pato or Decarte, emphaizing, on the one hand, that the idea ha the tatuof an eect (in a manner we ha examine in a ater chapter), and, on the other, thatthi doe not impy any diviion in the ene of being After expicity rejecting theequivoca ontoogy that pertained to uch a view in Aritote, Deeuze write ( idingwith the Stoic) that "tate of aair, quantitie, and quaitie are no e being (orbodie) than ubtance i they are a part of ubtance, and in thi ene they arecontrated with an extaBeing which contitute the incorporea a a nonexiting

entity e highet term therefore i not Being, but Something (aliquid), inofar a itubume being and nonbeing, what exit and what init (LS 7tm16) A thicaim make cear, the duaim in no way ead to the ontoogica pit that we nd inthinker uch a Pato, Aritote, Decarte and o on ere i a duaim, Deeuze iiniting, but it doe not invove a ditinction in being A Wiiam (2008: 5) pointout, Deeuze i here drawing heaviy on the dicuion of expreion in Spinozamounted by Deeuze in Spinoza and the Poblem of Expession

50. Simiar quetion coud be eaborated with regard to the materiait reading ofDeeuze : if he i o concerned to do away with the order of ideaity, then why doe hego to uch eort to reinvet thi category with a new and urpriing ignicance

5 TRUH AND T IM E

1. One trange quaity o f thi acription i the manner i n which Badiou immediateyconate truth a narration with truth expreed though narration For exampe:"The theme of narration a the lexibe and paradoxica vector of truth i a oda phioophy itef ( DB 58/87) i i tricty irreevant to the rt caim, andconideraby weaken it vaue after a, narrative a a vecto of truth return u

traight away to the repreentationa notion of truth, even if "the reource of narration (DB 58/87) are required r the expreion of a truth Moreover, in o far aBadiou argument reie on reference to the work on cinema, one cannot hep betruck by the fact that Deeuze demotion of narrative (by way of ituating it a aneect of th e enorimotor chema) i entirey overooked here.

2 Shoud we not ak oureve about the equivocation introduced into thi formuation (and many other) with the phrae "coextenive with Why not a denitivecaim I ha return to thi kind of probem in the concuion to thi chapter.

3. Jame Wiiam i, to my knowedge, the ony Deeuze choar to devote ignicant

attention to the importantpositive

vaence of truth in Deeuze thought, and the

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irreducible import of truth for Deleuze See in particular his study of Drence andRepeon (Williams 2003) which opens with an invocation of the importanc ofthe distinction between true and false problems for Deleuze but also his discussion

of the role of truth in Drence and Repeon in te context of a comparison withGilbert Harman that have already mentioned above (Williams 200a: 142-) Seealso Williams (2008: 289-90)

4 This is obviously connected to the concept of the image of thought examined inDeleuzes books on Nietzsche and Proust principally in Drence and Repeon,and in a somewhat dierent fashion in Wha s Phlosophy? (where Deleuze movesfrom an examination of the dogmtic image as a transcendental illusion to the positing of a tension mediated in thought between chaos and clich pregured inFrancs Bacon . Indeed the category of truth consistently emerges in Deleuzes workn he conex of a dscusson of he mage of hough.

It is in a related sense that we should understand Deleuzes claim of the cinema ofLuchino isconti: that in it the toolate is a proper dimension of time - "The oolate is not a accident that takes place in time but a dimension of time itself ( I96)

6 Badious claim that it is in Foucaul that we nd the most appeased texts on truth(DCB 6/97) is a peculiar one since the topic of truth is barely touched on therecertainly in a much less signicant manner than the early works discussed here

7 I shall return to this sentiment when the issue of the relationship between time andproduction emerges We need also to take account of related claims such as the fol

lowing: "What is essential is that there occurs at the hear t of problems a genesis oftruth a production of the true in thought Problems are the dierential elements inthought the geneti elements in the true (DR 1 62210 )

8 As in the case of Kant (DR 161 /209) See also Deleuzes discussion of the history ofgeometry on this point (DR 160-61 /209-10 )

9 A partial exception to this is the brief discussion of th e future in the nal chapter ofFoucaul, where it is linked to the important Foucauldian not ion of thinking otherwise I shall treat this text in particular in Chapter 8

10 On the signicance ad counterBergsonian nature of this cut see Widder (2008:48-9)

1 1 Involuntary memory is another of th e points on which Deleuze explicitly divergesfrom Bergson both in Prous and Sgns (Bergson does not ask essentially how thepast as it is in itself could also be saved for us Prousts problem is indeed: howto save for ourselves the past as it is preserved in itself as it survives in itsel It isto this question that involuntary Memory oers its answer [PS 9]) and Derenceand Repeon (DR 84-/11) which also makes this point

12 I should note that as these remarks indicate Deleuze in fact distinguishes four registers of time in Prous and Sgns, although these four are broken into two aspects oflost time (time wasted and time lost) and time regained (time rediscovered at the

heart of lost time [PS 26] and time regained as the time proper to art and essence)thereby maintaining a complex form of the triadic schema Th is is particularly clearwhen one considers the Proustian doctrine of the faculties that Deleuze pursuesthere which considers the rst two times in terms of the (ultimately inadequate) faculties of voluntary memory and intelligence In contrast the second and third timesof the sensuous signs and the signs of art evoke the faculty of involuntary memoryand the faculty of thought resp ectively

13 This aspect of Deleuze has in recent times been the subject of a number of signicant and helpful studies of which I shall mention four in particular The rstis Faulkner (2006) The great strength of this volume is the extent to which it

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incorporate Deleuze long dicuion of Freud and Lacan into it preentation oftime Bryant (2008) ytematically treat thee three ynthee in detail, and i n thecontext o the entirety ofDrence and Repetition Third, in Widder (2008), a erie

of text that I have already mentioned, Nathan Widder devote a number o f paage to thee ynthee, principally in the eighth chapter (Dierence and the ThreeSynthee of ime). What mark thee brief page out from many other tudie ihow clearly they manage to account for the complex connection between dierence, repetition, ynthei and time in Deleuze. Finally, perhap the mot characteritic element of the treatment of Deleuze work in Hughe (2009a) i the dominantrole that the account of the three paive ynthee play. Indeed, in thi tour de force,Hughe make thee three ynthee lynchpin of hi attempt to unify apparentlydiparate moment in Deleuze work

14. It i triking to contrat thi quaimytical naturalim with the account of the contitution of the phyical and biological world found in A ousand Plateaus, notablyin the plateau devoted to The Geology of Moral Of the two, I am not convincedthat the latter preentation i more appealing, or a well founded.

1 Here Deleuze i clearly following Huer On thi point, ee Hughe (2009a: 8-16 ).16. Thi paage i more obcure than many in Deleuze account of time in Drence

and Repetition e explanation for the need of a econd time in which the time ofthe preent can pa i much better gloed in e ime Imae, ee in particular I78.

17. See once more William very helpful dicu ion of thi iue (William 200a: ch.

2).18. Thi claim, in fact, can be traced back to Empiricism and Subjectivity, where Deleuze

i at pain to aert the uniquely empirical character of habiual ynthei at the rootof Humean ubjectivity: we dened the empirica l problem in oppoition to a trancendental deduction and alo to a pychological genei (ES 119). The principaldierence between thi account and that provided in Drence and Repetition, orrather the development that mark the paage between thee work, i that Deleuzecome to ee that empirical ynthei by itelf i inadequate to account for either theubject or an account of temporality. It i alo clear that the regiter of the pychological become, for Deleuze, not external to habitual ubjectivity but a part of itThu the attack on pychologim found in Empiricism and Subjectivity give way toa omewhat ambiguou appreciation of the inight of pychoanalyi.

Kerlake ha, in peronal correpondence, expreed reervation about thi wayof relating the trancendental and the empirical with repect to the ynthee oftime . For Kerlake, given that (a we hall ee hortly) the ynthei of the preentfound the more upercial modalitie of experiencing time a pat, preent andfuture a the ucceion o f intant, we mut ee even thi rt ynthei a trancendental in nature. Referr ing to the quite remarkable et of lecture entitled Quetceque fonder (Deleuze 196/7), he write: I ... think that the paive ynthei of

habit i trancendental from the beginning. It ha to be , for methodological reaon(to do with the tructure of trancendental argumentation) if nothing ele Now,it i true that, in Quetce que fonder Deleuze preent thi rt ynthei a itappear in Hume a a de jure rather than de facto quetion, that i, a a foundationaland trancendental quetion rather than a merely caual or empirical one. Thi icertainly the cae, on Deleuze reading of Hume. Nonethele, a h e claim in bothEmpiricism and Subjectivity and Quetce que fonder the iue i not poed atthe ame level a in the Kantian critique. In the latter, Deleuze even claim (contraryto the tatement in the former we have jut een) that, n term of the founda

tion of knowledge, he princ iple itelf eem pychological and that while without

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Hume "there would be no Kan Hume himself only "posed the problem, but did notanswer it All these points, taken together with the specic (if parenthetical) claimthat the rst synthesis of time is empirical in nature i Derence and Repetition lead

me to conclude that Deleuze did not want to think of this synthesis in transcendental terms

19 In a number of places, Jack Reynolds has argued that the structure of the presentfuture relationship in Deleuze in fact undersells the extent to which a habitual relationship to the world is already open to change and adaptation without the needto posit the ultimate status of a rupture in the gure of the eternal return. See, inparticular, Reynolds (2006) , where, adopting a MerleauPontian position on the livedbody, Reynolds claims that we should take habit as the ultimate ground of temporality, and see the ruptures introduced into habituation as secondary, that is, as material for the modicat ion of habit I think that the way of posing the question I haveadvanced here (What accounts for the advent of the present?) partly evades his concerns by posing the issue in more formal terms, rather than dealing with the ruptureof the future as a traumatic content of phenomenal experience. However, the issue isalso more complex, since Deleuze certainly does want to insist on the problematic(or, ultimately, and to be more specic, the problematizin) consequences for thehabituated self of theform of time as such he same movement of time that introduces material for habituation is also responsible for irremediably breaking openthe habitual circ le and forcing anew a confrontation between thought and problem.ime becomes trauma as such for Deleuze: hence the connection he draws between

the Kantian renovation of the theory of time and the Holderlinean thesis of the caesura. On the role of Holderlins work in Deleuze, see the extremely helpful discussion of the theme of betrayal in A ousand Plateaus by Ron Bogue, "he Betrayalof God (2004: 143-60). Widder demonstrates as clearly as one could hope the waythis also provides for a rapprochement between Deleuze and psychoanalysis (hencethe extended treatment of psychic systems and the syntheses of time in Derenceand Repetition) "e Oedipal story refers not to a trauma occurring in time butto the traumatic organization of time itself (Widder 2008: 94)

20. I leave aside here the wellknown diculties concerning the felicity of Deleuzesinterpretation of Nietzsches various presentations of the eternal return (in Te GayScience Tus Spoe Zarathustra and the Will to Power notebooks). o my mind (aview that is hardly controversial), it is the work of Pierre Klossowski, an d in particular Nietzsche and the Vicious Circle (200), that plays the mediating role.

21 It is in relation to this point that I feel I depart ways with Williamss excellent text onthe issue of the transcendental in Kant and Deleuze, where he claims that Deleuzesversion of the transcendental "cannot admit a pure form (Williams 200a 16)Certainly, as Williams argues, the idea of a xed a priori structure that revolvesaround the mutual gures of the object and the formal subject has no place inDeleuze he eternal return, however, is the pure form of what i s, although it i s a

form whose purity is deployed in a diametrically opposed way, as the groundlessform of dierence as such (which is to say that it is the pure form of what is, in so faras what is is thought as what becomes)

22 In the nal chapter, I shall address in some detail the role of the active-passive distinction in Badiou s reading of Deleuze. he formulation of three passive synthesesalso plays an important role in AntiOedipus (although in this context they are notarticulated with respect to time, but unite the notion o f passive synthesis with thenotion of disjunction discovered in e Loic of Sense). For a striking account of thisrole, see once again Hughes (2009a: 66-78)

23. his assertion, among others, is what indicates that Deleuze does no t mean to assert

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that these syntheses of time are passive on one level (that of the subject for example)but active on another more primordial stage. Even the presubjective is included inthis passive modality of synthesis which should lead us to conclude (again there are

certainly echoes of Husserl here) that these syntheses are intrinsically passive, andnot passive in relation to an activity located elsewhere.

24. his is so in much the same way as the movementimage obscures and falsies timeas Deleuze accounts for it in his works on cinema or the way in which psychoanalysis mistakes the status of the Oedipus complex in relation to desire inverting therelation between production and lack. he gure of this inversion is the most characteristic way Deleuze presents transcendental illusion in Derence and Repetitionalways the candle in the bovine eye (DR 23) .

2. In hi s own way then th e Deleuze ofDerence a nd Repetition answers in th e armative the question posed in the nal sentence of Being and me Does time itselfmanifest itself as the horizon of Being" (Heidegger 1998: 488).

26. he reference to concepts here is part of th e discussion relating to Hegel notDeleuze.

6 THE ENT I N DELEUZE

1 . I n d this characterization like a number of Deleuzes other claims about thenature of his work (I am thinking of the opening lines of the sketch e Actual

and the Virtual; for example which read Philosophy is the theory of multiplicities [Deleuze Parnet 1987: 148] ) to be fairly inaccurate or at least incomplete ona strictly descriptive level for reasons that I address in this chapter. On the otherhand I do think these claims have a signicant value as approaches or points of viewon his work: somewhat like the role of the problematic Idea. We can in this wayread Deleuze according to the guiding light of a concept of the event or in terms offullling an adequate thought of multiplicity or in terms of the ideal of thought ascreative and so on. None of these are by themselves ehaustive such approachesfunction by ordering the various elemens of Deleuzes thought around diering

conceptual horizons.2. On the sense of Deleuzes agon with theorematics and his championing o f the problematic in its place see Smith (2004).

3. Etienne Gilson writes: When he made this discovery [of being as what is commonamongst be ings like water re etc. ] Parmenides of Elea at once carried metaphysical speculation to what was always to remain one of its utimate limits but at thesame time he entangled himself in what is still for us one of the worst metaphysicaldiculties (Gilson 1949: 6-7). It is hard not to agree and to continue to feel (asPlato did in the eatetus as G ilson reminds us) as much fear as reverence (ibid8) when confronted with the Parmenidean poem. However it is precisely this appar

ent ultimate limit of human thought that both Badiou and Deleuze wish to challenge. At issue here is the etent to which Badiou has been able to properly grasp theDeleuzean opening.

4. Note that Deleuze here uses the word accident in a sense other than the one he islater critical of (as the quotation above from Logic of Sense states). What is in question of course is a nonempiricist concept of accident: not a particular secondary manifestation o f something essential but an essence lacking a model i n otherwords a phantasm or simulacrum. This is why Deleuze accounts for the task ofoverturning Platonism in the following way: the abolition of the world of essences

and the world of appearances (LS 23292).

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For a discussion of this chapter, and its connection to Deleuzes more generalreading of Whitehead, see Williams (2008: 282-99 200c) I shall discuss brielyWilliamss account of reciprocal determination in § Note on James Williamss read

ing of Deleuzes ontology in Chapter 76 is is the case with the exception of the short critical remark about Deleuzes alleged

materialism that we nd in Teory of the Subject discussed in the Introduction7 In fact, Deleuze does not hesitate to claim that this is Leibnizs only error [viz ] ,

to have inked dierence to the negative of limitation, because he maintained thedominance of the old principle, because he linked the series to a principle of convergence, without seeing divergence itself was an object of armation, or that theincompossibles belonged to the same world and were armed as the greatest crimeand the greatest virtue of the one and only world, that of the eternal return (DR1/72-3) is point will be investigated in somewhat more detail below

8 James Williams has recently mounted a very strong critique of Badious reading ofthe Deleuzean event, which, though unfolding in a somewhat dierent manner tothe approach adopted here, arrives at the same conclusion: though Badious interpretation of Deleuze is without doubt of interest and value for the elucidation ofBadious work, it cannot be taken as the last word either on Deleuzes philosophyof the event, or of its relative worth with respect to Badious position It is simplytoo much of a reduction, too textually selective and liited, too far removed fromDeleuze s idiom and, from an interpretative po int of view, too lacking in selfcritiquein the imposition of an unsympathetic conceptual schema without questions con

cerning the possible costs of such an approach See Williams (2009: 98 )9 For a summary of the movement from Being and Event to Logics of Worlds on this

point and more generally, see Clemens (2006: 299-302) 10 is exact phrase, to my knowledge, does not appear in Te Logic of Sense. ere

are a number of passages reminiscent of it, however, for example: Pure becoming,the unlimited, is the matter of the simulacrum insofar as it e ludes the action of theIdea and insofar as it contests both model and copy (LS 2/10) the entire rst halfof Alice still seeks the secret of events and of the becoming unlimited which theyimply (LS 9/19)

11 e passage from which this phrase is extracted reads: What makes an event compatible or incompatible with another We cannot appeal to causality, since it is aquestion of a relation of eects among themselves What brings destiny about at thelevel of events, what brings an event to repeat another in spite of all its dierence,what makes it possible that a life is composed of a single and same Event, despitethe variety of what might happen, that it be traversed by a single and same ssure,that it play one and the same air over all possible tunes and all possible worlds - allthese are not due to relations between cause and eect it is rather an aggregateof noncausal correspondences with formal systems of echoes, of resumptions andresonances, a system of signs in short, an expressive quasicausality, and not at all

a necessitating causality (LS 170tm/1 99) Given that Badious account of the eventin Deleuze turns around an ascription of uni, the question of the communicatonbetween events is a crucial one, which I shall turn to address below Let me just noteat this point the tendency (exemplied here) for Badiou to quote Deleuze out of context, a tendency that does little to support his argument

12 As one might imagine, Badiou wishes to challenge each of these points quite radically Point by point, he will assert his own axioms of the event, which one can seeare entirely consonant with what was asserted in my earlier presentation of his philosophy in Being and Event that the event is extrabeing, irreducible to an expres

sion o f the power of being that the event breaks with temporal continuity, and oers

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the possibility of the elaboration of a new time that the event is in no way an eect,and rather than being attributable to bodies but dieent from them, it founds thepossibility of the construction of a new body (in Being and Event a generic truth

in Logics of Worlds a new subjectbody [LM book seven, hat is a Body] - andinterestingly, the formal presentation of this new theory falls under a title perhapsdeliberately chosen to be antagonistic to the Deleuzean perspective, "e Know hya Body Exists, hat it Can Do, and hat it Cant) and that the event is not a principle of unity

13 am also in agreement with Smith (2009: 44), when he asserts that it is Deleuzesreading of Leibniz in Drence and Repetition rather than e Fold wich is of primary signicance

14 However, as John Sellars has argued in a series of impressive articles, Deleuzes use

of the Stoics departs quite substantially from the Stoic texts, much more so thanwith most other thinkers he works with and among For example, as Sellars demonstrates, "he theory of an and chronos is an interesting element in Deleuzes philosophy that takes its nspiration from a speculative reading of the ancient Stoics, butis not an ancient Stoic theory (Sellars 2008: 204) See also Sellars (2006, 2007)

1 his schema, it must be noted, is profoundly similar to the account of the rlationship between modal essence and existece as Deleuze presents it in Expressionismin Philosophy: Spinoza he casual interaction at the level of existing modes ( bodies,but also thoughts, and on through the innite number of attributes) only results intemporary causal alliances between colonies of bodies However, each conguration

of bodies articulates, or rather expresses a preexisting (or, rather, eteral) modalessence e real point of dierence between the two schemas is yet to b e seen, andit turns around the complex theme of counteractualization, which plays no role inSpinozas metaphysics (the route of liberty concerning the armation of being assuch, rather than the attempt to exceed what is actualized in the name of the armation of an event in its excess)

16 As is made clear much later in Te Fold and then in at is Philosophy? (P 2 10),this operation of the survol ("survey or "overlight rather than the "hovering overindicated by the English translation of Te Logic of Sense) is draw from the work of

Raymond Ruyer (here, see B ogue 2009) . Deleuzes explicit use of this concept in TeFold (FLB 10231 37-9) is in the service of explicating the controversial theme ofthe substantial chain in the late work of Leibniz

17 he serial element of events is admirably accounted for in a variety of contexts inilliams (2008: esp 106-10).

18 A similar moment occurs in Drence and Repetition with reference to the replaying of the past in the present "is is what we call metempsychosis Each chooseshis pitch or his tone, perhaps even his lyrics, but the tune remains the same, andunderneath all the lyrics the same traaa, in all possible tones and pitches (DR84/114) his is perhaps the rst instance in Deleuzes wok of a metaphysical for

mulation of the refrain (or ritournelle) a concept found in great extension in ATousand Plateaus (P 3 10-0, 1837: Of the Refain)

19 . A characteistic statement by Leibniz of this theme, couched in the language ofnecessary and contingent truths, can be found in "On Contingency (Leibniz 1989:28-30)

20. his idea of dirence as positive dierence is already present in Drence andRepetition where Deleuze elaborates it in relation to a certain mathematicoogicalintuitionism (DR 234/301 -2)

21 An alternative reading of the Eventum tantum to that which propose here is pro

posed by Joe Hughes, who argues that it gures as the aleatory point that produces

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all the other ideal events as it circulates (Hughes 2009a: 136) My problem with sucha proposal is that the category of singularity is put to use extremely frequently ine Logic of Sense but the Eventum tantum only emrges in a single very specic

context.22. he more extreme claim presented in "Deleuzes Vitalist Ontology cannot be main

tained either: "Deleuze constructs an immense virtuosistic and ramied phenomenological apparatus in order to write the ontological equation: being = event(DVO 198). While we might assent to the idea that the unity of all events in theEventum tan tum is a form of the claim that all beings are univocally expressed toclaim that Being is Event goes one step further and this step takes us beyond theDeleuzean text.

23 . With respect to this famous claim Badiou produces a very ne explication:"Nietzsches become what you are must be understood as follows you are onlythat which you become (DVO 196) . Framing it in this way allows us to see exactlyDeleuzes point: that ethics cannot mean the striving to become equal to this or thatideal (become hones become wise become a philosopher . . . ) but the striving tobecome equal to becoming as such to the event as such.

24. Does Badious account also include such investments albeit implicitly? With respectto the will we must of course ask: why does someone become faithful to the event?Since there cannot be any necessity in delity it seems inevitable that the will isimplied in Badious account. his inevitability is treated by Sam Gillespie in termsof the Lacanian concept of anxiety which is posited to answer this question of

motivation which is not dealt with by Badiou himself See Gillespies fascinatingand incisive posthumous work Te Mathematics of Novelty: Badiou' Minimalistetaphysics (2008) and in particular "Giving Form to Its Own Existence: Anxietyand the Subject of ruth (ibid 9124).

2 . On the case of little Hans see P 264 and also "Linterpretation des noncs ; written with uattari Claire Paet and Andr Scala (DRF 80103 esp. 8192).

26. Cf Brassier (2000) which presents a strong argument in Badious favour on thispoint but one that like Badiou fails to grasp the sense of the dice throw in Deleuze although it should be noted in a much less egregious fashion.

27. I have already argued in the previous chapter that this is a serious oversight byBadiou since it is rst and foremost a temporal category in D eleuze.

THOUGHT AN D THE S UBEC

1 . his radical passivity is a consequence of two aspects of the event: its sterility withrespect to direct causal ecacy he splendid sterility of the expressed [LS 32] orwhat Deleuze will elsewhere call its impassibility) and its irreducibility as sense tological laws of compatibility and exclusion and to the order of signication mani

festation and denotation (contradiction is not a criteria with which to judge the relations between events even as they inhere in a particular state of aairs "to growand "to shrink pertain equally to Alice precisely because they do not relate to oneanother according to the requirements of standard twoposition logic) .

2. In the short homage to Sartre after he had refused the Nobel Prize in 1964 "I a tmon matre; Deleuze presents almost exactly the same description of Sartre andMerleauPonty but this time casts the latter as the philosopher further away from anideal: "However brilliant and profound the work of MerleauPonty was professorialand depended on Sartre's in many respects. Sartre willingly assimilates the existence

of human beings to the nonbeing of a hole in the world speaking of little lakes of

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NOTES

nothingness MerleauPonty on the other hand oneives of them as folds lis],simple lds and pleats lissements We an thus distinguish a tough and penetrating existentialism from a more tender and reserved existentialism (ID 109) he

gap therefore between this text and the omposition of Derence and Repetitionmarks a shift in among other things the relative value of the onept of the foldNotably absent from the earlier desription is any referene to Heidegger so wemight infer that this hange took plae as a result of ontat with Heideggerianthought and speially with the onept of the Zwiefalt One the superiority ofMerleauPonty over Sartre on this point is established it remains unhanged thuswe read in Foucault that Sartre remained at the level of intentionality beause hewas ontent to make holes in being without reahing the fold of Being (F 1 10 ).

3 Fouault will ome to think on the one hand that the emphasis on th e theme of themedial gaze illiitly invokes the unifying funtion of a subjet (Fouault 2002: 60),and on the other that it tras too heavily in the terminology of struture whihthreatened to bypass the speiity of the problem presented and the level properto arheology (ibid 18) Indeed a thoroughgoing ritique of Deleuzes reading ofFouault remains to be written and would require a broad and systemati groundingin Fouaults work as a whole It seems to me that Foucault, aording to a peuliartwist of fate resembles (in a formal manner) nothing as muh as Badious reading ofDeleuze in many respets: another problemati portrait of the master; produed inthe hollow that follows their death with the aveat that unlike Badiou Deleuze doesnot go out of his way to insist on the superior nature of his reading (eg I believe I

was among the rst i f not the rst to have treated Deleuze as a philosopher [ W69])

4 I t i s diult to agree with Deleuze when he writes that From e Bir of the Clinicon Fouault admired Bihat for having invented a new vitalism (F 93) for to makesuh a laim one would both have to obsure the speially arheologial level onwhih Fouaults disussion of Bihat ours and ignore the very important andfamous theme in this early period of Fouault: that of the desirability of the eradiation of the gure of the human around whih savoir in the modern period iswoven Bihats vitalism too would be washed away by the sea of the future thatFouault invokes with suh wistful power at the lose of Te Order of Ting It ishowever easy to agree when Deleuze wr tes of the passages on Bihat in Te Birth ofthe Clinic that Fouaults tone demonstrates suiently that he is onerned withsomething other than an epistemologial analysis: he is onerned with a oneption of death (F 9) What is at issue in this conception of death, for Fouault ndsits true lous not in Bihat but in the irruption of nitude that while it is ertainlymarked in morbid anatomy at one level nds its true foundation in the work ofthe Marquis de Sade who is perennially present throughout Te Birth of the ClinicEven the light of the medial gaze nds its ultimate parallel not in the being of truthmore generally whih would mark an emergene from the darkness o f superstition

of theories and himeras: it is the same light no doubt that illuminates the 0ournes de Sodome, uliette, and the Dsastres de Soya" (Fouault 2003 196) It isthe lash of a mad and abyssal lightning axed to the names of Nietzshe Sade andArtaud that intermittently illuminates the nal passages of Fouaults hapters notthe muted play of the obsure light of life found in a vitalist philosophy of the kindpresented by Bihat

Fouaults term here is in fat lnoable Deleuze frequently and problematiallysubstitutes this with le dire Not only are statements (noncs) in play in writingas muh as speeh but they annot be redued to the order of language in any

strit sense For a typial and typially subtrative treatment of the ategory of

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NOTES

the statement, see Te Archaeology of Knowledge, part 3 chapter 1 Dening theStatement (Foucault 2002: 8998) . On the evidence of this work, one could arguethat the statement in Foucault could be treated as h!s term for the virtual

6. Many texts could be referred to at this point, though a very clear presentation can befound in the interview On the Genealogy of Ethcs (Foucault 1997: 2380).

7. Deleuze will also entertain the idea that only Western culture as i t springs from theGreeks allows for this kind of relexive subjectication (F 106).

8. Deleuze will even say that Memory is the real name of the relation to oneself (F107) . If it is dicult to take this thesis at its word and extrapolate any specic consequences from the link to memory, this is because Deleuze equivocates with respectto whether memory is wha is folded (the Outside itself) or whether it is the activityof folding (time as subject or rather subjectivation is called memory [F 1 07] ) .

9. See, for exampleonadology,

§19 : all simple substances or created monads can becalled souls (Leibniz 1989: 2 1 ).10. I refer of course to the discussion of habituation and contemplation in Derence

and Repeiion (DR 739/1018) and the third chapter of A Tousand Plaeaus,dedicated to the presentation of the lineaments of a remarkable ontology in whichidealities in the form of abstract machines provide the openings and stimuli forchanges in the stratied forms of existence (an existence that itself ranges across thedivision between the material and ieal).

1 1 . It would be a crude reading of Wha is Philosophy? indeed that would present theaccount of conceptual personae as an account of the subject who thinks although

it is one that Badiou does on occasion irt with in Te Clamor of Being (eg DCB86/128 where FoucaultDeleuze is invoked as on e of Deleuzes conceptual personae)

12 . Likewise, the break with the xed interiority of the monad in favour of a nomadology that marks the nal pages of Te Fold is also decisive, although not heavily marked, in these pages of Derence and Repeiion. Unlike Leibnizs monadDeleuzes intensive individual is uid all the way down; without being locatedwithin a network of sucient reason bound to the twinned closure requirement ofcompossibility and preestablished harmony the individual is far from indivisiblenever ceasing to divide and change its nature (DR 27/331 ) . is is a point to which

we shall return below13 . It is important to see that Hallward despite his aliation with Badious project infact presents in Ou of his orld (Hallward 2006) a thesis that is the inverse of thecentral Badiouian trope of the One in Te Clamor of Being Whereas Badiou wantsto insist on the radicality of the virtual and the resulting impoverishment of theactual Hallward argues that for Deleuze the virtual is the ephemeral the perhapsunattainable source of change and freedom, however desultory the actual is in itselfUnderpinning this dierent thesis (which also supports a critique of Deleuze) isnonetheless the familiar spectre of a problematic interpretive strategy In Hallwardscase, this involves a continual movement of slippage that insinuates the claims of the

authors that Deleuze writes about into the latters own corpus.14. A particularly striking moment in the pages that open this chapter is the critique or

better a reconsideration of the status of the second law of thermodynamics whichmakes use of the analysis of the synthesis of habit from earlier in the book (which wesaw in Chapter 6) to show how such a claim about entropy rests on a wellfoundedillusion In short, the concept of entropy relies on the belief that energy is in itselfequal, subject only to exteal conguration rather than (as D eleuze would have it)internal change

1. e Bergsonian critique of intensity seems unconvincing (DR 239/308) While

he refuses a logical extension to space and time, Kants mistake is to maintain a

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NOTES

geometrial extenson for it, and to reserve intensive quantity for the matter whihlls a given extensity to some degree o r other (DR 23 1/298) of the God of Platosimaeus, Deleuze memorably writes "Never have so many, so diverse and suh

demented operations been multiplied in order to draw from the depths of an intensive spatium a serene and doile extensity (DR 234/301 ) It should be noted, however, that Deleuze takes something important from Plato: Patos greatness lies inhaving seen that the divisible formed a nature in itself only by inluding the unequal(DR 238/307 233/300-301).

16 "Only transendental enquiry an disover that intensity remains impliated initself; sine "the empirial exerise of sensibility . . a n grasp intensity only in orderof quality and extension (DR 240/309) Compare this to very similar laims madein his disussion of SaherMasoh: "For there is in short something that the pleas

ure priniple annot aount for and that neessarily falls outside it, namely its ownpartiular status, the fat that it has dominane over the whole of psyhi life. Invirtue of what higher onnetion . . . is pleasure a priniple, with the dominane thatit has? [Freuds] problem is a transendental one (M 113). In both ases, the needfor transendental argument is invoked beause reliane on the manifest evideneprovided by extended and qualied reality is at one unable to explain a range ofevents of the order of extended and qualied reality (the geneti point we annotexplain the dominane of the pleasure priniple solely by referene to the pleasurepriniple), and tends to reify or normalize part iular ases of extended and qualiedreality, illegitimately and mistakenly treating them as normatve and/or transend

ent in harater (the ritial point it is a mistake to take the pleasure prinipleas sovereign, the kind of mistake that led to ego psyhology beause it is indeedprovided with its harateristi relation to its eld aording to a dierent order ofdetermination).

17 . We might also note the following passage, given the entral ontentions of TeClamor of Being "e important point is that the divisible [intensity] is dened asthat whih bears in itsel f the unequal, whereas the indivisible (the Same or the One)seeks to impose an equality upon it, and thereby render it dole (DR 233/300).

18. Let me note the similarity of this shema with the presentation of Nietzshes

ontology in Nietzsche and Philosophy, but also the aount of Spinozas modes inExpressionism in Philosophy. In the rst we have a tripartite distintion: fore (whihis quantitative), quality (whih orresponds to dierenes in fores) and the wiltopower, whih is the geneti element that pertains to qualitative dierene andbrings them about. Clearly, the aount in Derence and Repetition splits the willto power in half, one side of whih falls to the virtual (qua ensemble of ideal genetielements) and one side to the atual (qua intensive quantity) In the latter, again atripartite sheme, we nd: atual modal existene (whih is solely quantitative) theharateristi relation that individuates the omplex shema of movement and restof the omposite existing mode and intrinsially dierentiated modal essenes, to

whih an existing mode orresponds or expresses given its relations. The big dierene between this shema and what we see in Derence and Repetition is the lakof diret relation between modal essene and existene. Modal essene learly orresponds to the virtual but, unlike the virtual, the fat that a given modal existeneexpresses an individuated modal essene has nothing to do with the essene, andeverything to do with, on the one hand, God as the eient ause of the existingmode and, on the other, the random enounters that haraterize modal existene.

19. On a number of oasions, Deleuze insists on the etymology of the word card(hinge) in this manner, perhaps most memorably in a powerful passage in Derence

and Repetition invoking the destrutive fae of the empty form of time (DR

185



NOTES

the relationship between the two books, namely that Derence and Repetition wascomposed under strict academic restraints that Te Logic ofSense was free from,for at least three reasons. he rst is that Deleuze himself, in discussing these two

works, treats them both as overly academic in nature ( know well enough thatthey're still full of academic elements [N 7] in the same paragraph, he notes that,at least with the concept of fatigue, Drence and Repetition distinguishes itself).Second, while many of Deleuzes earlier works are specically composed to respondto given guidelines, this never stopped Deleuze from presenting the work in hisown way: nobody would ever claim that even Deleuze 's most straitlaced works, likeKant' Critical Philosophy, are boring hird, in contrast to Deleuze's own claimson the matter, Derence and Repetition itself is written in a style that could hardlybe described as dusty and academic, containing, as it does, both some of Deleuzes

most poet ic writing and many tantalizing but unjustied philosophical moves.28 It is this "unequal that is evoked in the title of this chapter of Derence andRepetition the asymmetrical synthesis of the sensible is asymetrical in so far as theproduction of extended and qualied actuality proceeds on grounds that are foreignto it and do not resemble it.

29 Not to mention the famous essay on ournier's Robinson, A eory of the Other;rst published in 1967 and later included as one of the appendices in Te Logic ofSense.

30 "Every spatiotemporal dynamism is accompanied by an emergence of an elementary consciousness which itself traces directions, doubles movements and migra

tions, and is born on the threshold of the condensed singularities of the body orobject whose consciousness it is ( DR 220/284) is claim need be no surprise, atleast once we reca ll the Leibnizian terms in which this chapter (not to mention theaccount of habit earlier in Derence and Repetition) proceeds. Of course, Deleuzedoes not mean to say that rocks and trees are also res cogitans in the Cartesian sense,but rather that human thinkers are in fact lie rocs and trees and only secondarily res cogitans. Correlatively, the notion of the unconscious, for Deleuze, must bethought as common to all being, and only consequently a structure of human being.

31 "Values, morals, homelands, religions, and these private certitudes that our vanity

and complacency bestow generously on us, have as many deceptive sojourns as theworld arranges for those who think they are standing straight and at ease, amongstable things. ey know nothing o f this immense ight that transports them, ignorant of themselves, in the monotonous buzzing of their ever quickening steps thatlead them impersonally in a great immobile movement (Blanchot, Lmiti [quotedin AO 341] )

32 I t might be objected that Deleuze proposes what looks like a native faculty of purethought (It is nevertheless true that Ideas have a very special relationship to purethought [DR 194/21 ] ) and that it is through this faculty that we, as constitutedsubjects, have access to Ideas directly. he invocation of pure thought sets Deleuze

several problems revolving around the "origin of Ideas that the second half of chapter four ofDerence and Repetition is concerned with, and a number of complicatedfactors are involved that we do not have the means to deal with here. wo initialobservations ought to be made, though. First, immediately after proposing this faculty of pure thought, Deleuze insists that it must be thought in the same way as al lother faculties as they are presented in the chapter devoted to the image of thought,lacking the features of a given and natural capacity. Second, our capacity to thinkideas is already irreducibly bound up with sensibility. In Deleuzes somewhat enigmatic words "thought is determined in such a manner that it grasps its own cogitan

dum only at the extremity of the fuse of violence which, from one Idea to another,

18 7



NOES

188

rst sets i motio sesibility ad its sentiendum, ad so o (DR 1 94/2 1) . I otherwords pure thought as a aculty oly makes cotact with the subject who thiks atthe extreme poit where Idea commuicates sesato i other words i the form

of the ecouter with expressive itesity



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194



activity 35, 63, 103, 128, 133, 1489,158, 179 n23

and temporality 87, 96101, 129and the fold 1334, 138, 184 n8

AnsellPearson, Keith 736, 166 n20antiPlatonism see PlatonismAristotle 12 13, 56, 164 nn5, 7,

175n49Bein and Event 1 , 5, 24, 26, 1 02, 1 09,

126, 161, 164 n9, 174 n38, 180 n12Bergson, Henri 10 , 15, 2934, 39, 40,

58, 634, 72, 9 1 2, 1 00, 103, 1 41 ,1578, 166 n18, 176 n11

and Keith AnsellPearson 736Blanchot, Maurice 133, 187 n31Bogue, Ronald 178 n19

Borges, JorgeLuis 94, 166 n1

antor, Georg 1 71 n17arroll, Lewis 1 10chance 94, 107, 1237, 129, 134cinema 16, 4041, 68, 7073, 173 n33,

174 n39, 175 n, 179 n24consciousness 99, 148, 153, 187 n30

death 133, 166 n, 183 n4Descartes, Ren 13, 278, 312, 54,140, 147, 167 n3, 175 n49

desire 12, 144, 163 n4dialectic(s) 27, 59, 6061, 144, 167 n2,

173 n31Badiou on 2James Williams on 14950

disjunctive synthesis 161 8, 56,11820, 123, 174

Duy, Simon 512, 166 n22, 170 n14,171 n16

Duns Scotus 11 12, 1 15, 164 n6duration (dure) 10, 314, 745, 164 n2

eternal return 14, 567, 76, 935, 100,103, 109, 1237, 129, 1456, 148, 156,

158, 178 nn19, 21 , 186 n21force 356, 39, 100, 134, 138, 157, 18 5

n18oucault, Michel 10, 1326, 162reud, Sigmund 98, 177, 185 n16

ground 1415, 44, 548, 67, 81 , 878,916, 98, 100101, 1 19, 152, 172 n26,178 n19

Guattari, lix 2, 72 n24

habit 567, 83, 8793, 95, 100, 146, 152,156, 177 n18, 178 n19

Hegel, G . F. 4, 27, 56, 6061, 167 n2,172 n26

Heidegger, Martin 34, 1312, 134, 1 37,164 n5, 183 n2

Hughes, Joe 43, 169 n1 3, 177 n13, 181

n21Hume, David 90 , 177 n18

identity 14 , 18, 55, 59, 65, 76, 78 , 93 ,956 , 1057, 11 8, 146

immanence 3, 23, 56, 165 n17th e plane of 44

indidramadierenc/tiation 1479indiscernibility 45, 71, 77, 102

the principle of 146

19



INDEX

intentionality 18 3 n2

Kant, Immanuel 31, 34-5, 46-9, 54-6,

65� 8 13 135, 140-41, 152, 154,168 n6

Kerslake, Chrstian 168 n4, 170 n14, 177n18

Klossowski, Pierre 165 n1 2, 178 n20

Lacan, Jacques 140, 168 7, 182 n24language 85, 105, 107, 1 10, 120, 122, 139Leibniz, Gottfried 14, 28, 35, 48, 55-6,

116-17, 144-6, 148, 164 n7, 169 n,173 n31

an d dierential calculus 50-53and the fold 106-7, 136-9

Mallarm, Stephane 123

and the simulacrum 15-16, 165 n13Platonism 4, 15, 165 n13, 179 n4power 20, 44-5, 62, 78, 97, 101-2, 108,

124-5, 128-30, 158, 180 n 12of the false 16, 81, 83, 100in Foucault 133-4willopower see Nietzsche

Proust, Marcel 83-5, 105, 176 n4

quality 39, 141-2, 146, 171 n17 185nn16, 18

in Spinoza 21quantiy 141-2

and dierential calculus 52-3, 170 n1 5

repetition 14 , 39-40, 89 , 12 6Reynolds, Jack 17 8 n1 9

jon roffe-badiou_s deleuze-mcgill queens univ pr (2012)

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