Iemand heeft Gilles
Deleuze’s Spinoza: Practical Philosophy
[vert. uit 1988; oorspr. Spinoza
- Philosophie pratique, 1970, 1981] als PDF op internet geplaatst.
Een ander heeft het eerste
hoofdstuk, “Life of Spinoza”, daaruit als tekst op internet gebracht [cf.]. Ik heb deze tekst
heden voor hier aangepast en breng deze in dit blog. Eigenlijk te lang voor een
blogtekst, maar ik doe het toch, gewoon omdat dit nog steeds een interessant
stuk is – heel anders dan hoe anderen Spinoza neerzetten.
Chapter One
LIFE OF SPINOZA
from Gilles Deleuze, "Life of
Spinoza", ch 1 in Deleuze, Spinoza: Practical Philosophy,
trans. Robert Hurley, 1988, pp 3-14.
Nietzsche
understood, having lived it himself, what constitutes the mystery of a
philosopher's life. The philosopher appropriates the ascetic virtues –
humility, poverty, chastity – and makes them serve ends completely his own,
extraordinary ends that are not very ascetic at all; in fact.[1] He makes
them the expression of his singularity. They are not moral ends in his case, or
religious means to another life, but rather the "effects" of
philosophy itself. For there is absolutely no other life for the philosopher.
Humility, poverty, and chastity become the effects of an especially rich and
superabundant life, sufficiently powerful to have conquered thought and
subordinated every other instinct to itself. This is what Spinoza calls Nature:
a life no longer lived on the basis of need, in terms of means and ends, but according
to a production, a productivity, a potency, in terms of causes and effects.
Humility, poverty, chastity are his (the philosopher's) way of being a grand
vivant, of making a temple of his own body, for a cause that is all too
proud, all too rich, all too sensual. So that by attacking the philosopher,
people know the shame of attacking a modest, poor, and chaste appearance, which
increases their impotent rage tenfold; and the philosopher offers no purchase,
although he takes every blow.
Here the full
meaning of the philosopher's solitude becomes apparent. For he cannot integrate
into any milieu; he is not suited to any of them. Doubtless it is in democratic
and liberal milieus that he finds the best living conditions, or rather the
best conditions for survival. But for him these milieus only guarantee that the
malicious will not be able to poison or mutilate life, that they will not be
able to separate it from the power of thinking that goes a little beyond the
ends of the state, of a society, beyond any milieu in general. In every
society, Spinoza will show, it is a matter of obeying and of nothing else. This
is why the notions of fault, of merit and demerit, of good and evil, are exclusively
social, having to do with obedience and disobedience. The best society, then,
will be one that exempts the power of thinking from the obligation to obey, and
takes care, in its own interest, not to subject thought to the rule of the
state, which only applies to actions. As long as thought is free, hence vital,
nothing is compromised. When it ceases being so, all the other oppressions are
also possible, and already realized, so that any action becomes culpable, every
life threatened. It is certain that the philosopher finds the most favorable
conditions in the democratic state and in liberal circles. But he never
confuses his purposes with those of a state, or with the aims of a milieu,
since he solicits forces in thought that elude obedience as well as blame, and
fashions the image of a life beyond good and evil, a rigorous innocence without
merit or culpability. The philosopher can reside in various states, he can
frequent various milieus, but he does so in the manner of a hermit, a shadow, a
traveler or boarding house lodger. That is why one should not imagine Spinoza
breaking with a supposedly closed Jewish milieu in order to enter supposedly
open liberal ones: liberal Christianity, Cartesianism, a bourgeoisie favorable
to the De Witt brothers, and so on. For, wherever he goes he only asks,
demands, with a greater or smaller chance of success, to be tolerated, himself
and his uncommon aims, and from this tolerance he judges concerning the degree
of democracy, the degree of truth, which a society can bear, or on the
contrary, concerning the danger that threatens all men.
Baruch
Spinoza is born in 1632 in the Jewish quarter of Amsterdam, into a family of
well-to-do merchants of Spanish or Portuguese extraction. At the Jewish school
he studies theology and commerce. From the age of thirteen he works in his
father's business firm while he pursues his studies (on the death of his father
in 1654 he will manage the business with his brother, until 1656). How does
the slow philosophical conversion come about that causes him to break with the
Jewish community, with business, and brings him to the excommunication of 1656?
We should not imagine that the Amsterdam community is homogeneous during this
period; it has as much diversity, as many interests and ideologies as the
Christian milieus. For the most part it is made up of former
"marranos," that is, of Jews who outwardly practiced Catholicism in
Spain and Portugal, and who were obliged to emigrate at the end of the
sixteenth century. Even those sincerely attached to their Jewish faith are
imbued with a philosophical, scientific, and medical culture that cannot easily
be reconciled with the traditional rabbinical Judaism. Spinoza's father is
apparently a skeptic himself, who nevertheless plays an important role in the
synagogue and the Jewish community. In Amsterdam some go so far as to
question, not merely the role of the rabbis and tradition, but the meaning of
the Scripture itself: Uriel da Costa will be condemned in 1647 for denying
the immortality of the soul and revealed law, recognizing natural law alone;
and, more important, Juan de Prado will be made to repent in 1656, then
excommunicated, accused of having held that the soul dies with the body, that
God only exists philosophically speaking, and that faith is unavailing.[2] Recently
published documents testify to Spinoza's close ties with Prado; one may suppose
that the two cases were linked together. If Spinoza was judged more severely,
excommunicated as early as 1656, this was because he refused to repent and
sought the break himself. The rabbis, as in many other cases, seem to have
hoped for an accommodation. But instead of repenting, Spinoza wrote an Apology
to Justify His Leaving the Synagogue, or at least a rough draft of the
future Theological-Political Treatise. The fact that Spinoza was born in
Amsterdam itself, a child of the community, must have made his case worse.
Life becomes
difficult for him in Amsterdam. Perhaps following an assassination attempt by a
fanatic, he goes to Leyden in order to continue his philosophical studies, and
installs himself in the suburb of Rijnsburg. It is said that Spinoza kept his
coat with a hole pierced by a knife thrust as a reminder that thought is not
always loved by men. While it sometimes happens that a philosopher ends up on
trial, rarely does a philosopher begin with an excommunication and an attempt
on his life.
Hence one
fails to consider the diversity of the Jewish community, and the destiny of a
philosopher, when one believes that liberal Christian influences must be
invoked to explain Spinoza's break, as if it were due to external causes.
Already in Amsterdam no doubt, and while his father was alive, he had followed
courses at the school of Van den Ende, which was attended by many young Jews
who learned Latin in it, along with the rudiments of Cartesian philosophy and
science, mathematics and physics. A former Jesuit, Francis Van den Ende quickly
acquired the reputation of being not only a Cartesian but also a freethinker
and an atheist, and even a political agitator (he was to be executed in
France, in 1674, following the revolt of the chevalier de Rohan).[3] No doubt
Spinoza also frequented liberal and anti-clerical Christians, Collegiants and
Mennonites, who were inspired by a certain pantheism and a pacifist communism.
He would encounter them again at Rijnsburg, which was one of their centers: he
becomes friends with Jarig Jelles, Pieter Balling, Simon de Vries, and the
"progressive" bookseller and publisher Jan Rieuwertz (a letter from
Spinoza to Oldenburg, in 1655, evokes the pacifism, and the communitarian theme
appears in a letter to Jelles, in 1671). However, it seems that Van den Ende
remained attached to a form of Catholicism, despite the difficulties of that
religion in Holland. As for the philosophy of the Mennonites and Collegiants,
it is completely surpassed by that of Spinoza, in religious criticism as well
as ethical conception and political concerns. Instead of thinking of an
influence by the Mennonites or even the Cartesians, one can think that Spinoza
was naturally drawn to the most tolerant circles, those most apt to welcome an
excommunicated Jew who rejected Christianity no less than the Judaism into
which he was born, and owed his break with the latter to himself alone.
Among its
many meanings, Jewish excommunication had a meaning that was political and
economic. It was a rather frequently applied, and often irreversible, measure.
Deprived of the power of a state, the notables of the community had no other
sanction for punishing those who refused financial contributions or even
political orthodoxies. The Jewish notables, like those of the Calvinist party,
had kept intact a hatred of Spain and Portugal, were politically attached to
the House of Orange, and had interests in the India companies (Rabbi Manasseh
ben Israel, one of Spinoza's professors, himself came close to being
excommunicated in 1640 for criticizing the East India Company; and the members
of the council that judged Spinoza were Orangist, pro-Calvinist, anti-Hispanic,
and for the most part, shareholders in the Company). Spinoza's ties with the
liberals, his sympathies for the republican party of Jan de Witt, which called
for the dissolution of the great monopolies–all this made Spinoza a rebel. In
any case, Spinoza broke not only with the religious milieu but with the
economic milieu at the same time. Abandoning the family business, he learned
lensmaking, he became a craftsman, a philosopher craftsman equipped with a
manual trade, capable of grasping and working with the laws of optics. He also
began to draw; his early biographer Colerus relates that he drew himself in
the attitude and costume of the Neapolitan revolutionary Masaniello.[4]
At Rijnsburg,
Spinoza gives his friends an exposition, in Latin, of the work that will become
the Short Treatise. They take notes; Jelles translates into Dutch;
perhaps Spinoza dictates certain texts that he has written previously. In about
1661, he composes the Treatise on the Emendation of the Intellect, which
opens with a kind of spiritual itinerary, in the Mennonite manner, centered on
a denunciation of wealth. This treatise, a splendid exposition of Spinoza's
method, will remain unfinished. Around 1663, for a young man who lived with him
and who both gave him hopes and irritated him a good deal, he presents The
Principles of Descartes' Philosophy, supplemented by a critical
examination of scholastic notions (Metaphysical Thoughts). Rieuwertz
publishes the book; Jelles finances it; Balling will translate it into Dutch.
Lewis Meyer, physician, poet, organizer of a new theater in Amsterdam, writes
the preface. With the Principles, the "professorial" work of
Spinoza comes to an end. Few thinkers avoid the brief temptation to become
professors of their own discoveries, the seminar temptation of a private
spiritual training. But Spinoza's planning and commencement of the Ethics,
as early as 1661, transport him to another dimension, a different element
which, as we shall see, no longer can be that of an "exposition,"
even a methodological one. Perhaps it is for this reason that Spinoza leaves
the Treatise on the Emendation of the Intellect unfinished, and despite
his later intentions does not manage to resume it.[5] One
should not think that in his quasi-professorial period Spinoza was ever a
Cartesian. The Short Treatise already exhibits a way of thinking that
uses Cartesianism as a means, not to eliminate, but to purify all of
scholasticism, Jewish thought, and Renaissance philosophy, in order to extract
from them something profoundly new which belongs only to Spinoza. The complex
relationship between the exposition of the Principles and the Metaphysical
Thoughts gives evidence of this double game in which Cartesianism is
handled like a sieve, but in such a way that a new and prodigious
scholasticism emerges which no longer has anything to do with the old
philosophy, nor with Cartesianism either. Cartesianism was never the thinking
of Spinoza; it was more like his rhetoric; he uses it as the rhetoric he needs.
But all this will receive its definitive form only in the Ethics.
In 1663,
Spinoza moves to Voorburg, a suburb of The Hague. He will later establish
himself in the capital. What defines Spinoza as a traveler is not the
distances he covers but rather his inclination to stay in boarding houses, his
lack of attachment, of possessions and property, after his renunciation of the
paternal inheritance. He continues to work on the Ethics. As early as
1661 the letters of Spinoza and his friends show that the latter are acquainted
with the themes of the first book, and in 1663 Simon de Vries mentions a study
group whose members read and discuss the texts sent by Spinoza. But at the same
time that he confides in a group of friends, he asks them to keep his ideas
secret, to be careful of strangers, as he himself will be, even with respect to
Leibniz in 1675. The reason for his settling near The Hague is probably
political: nearness to the capital is necessary if he is to draw close to the
active liberal circles and escape the political indifference of the Collegiant
group. As to the two major parties, Calvinist and republican, the situation is
as follows: the first remains committed to the themes of the struggle for
independence, to a politics of war, to the ambitions of the House of Orange, to
the formation of a centralized state; and the second, to a politics of peace, a
provincial organization, and the development of a liberal economy. To the
impassioned and bellicose behavior of the monarchy, Jan de Witt opposes the rational
behavior of a republic guided by a natural and geometric method. Now,
the mystery seems to be this: the people remain faithful to Calvinism and the
House of Orange, to intolerance and warmongering. Since 1653, Jan de Witt is
the Grand Pensionary of Holland. But the republic nevertheless remains a republic
by surprise and by accident, more for the lack of a king than by preference,
and it is poorly accepted by the people. When Spinoza speaks of the harmfulness
of revolutions, one must bear in mind that revolution is thought of in terms of
the disappointments that Cromwell's revolution inspired, or the anxieties
caused by a possible coup d'état by the House of Orange. During this period
"revolutionary" ideology is permeated with theology and is often, as
with the Calvinist party, in the service of a politics of reaction.
So it is not
surprising that Spinoza, in 1665, temporarily suspends work on the Ethics
and starts writing the Theological-Political Treatise, which will be
concerned with the questions: Why are the people so deeply irrational? Why are
they proud of their own enslavement? Why do they fight "for" their
bondage as if it were their freedom? Why is it so difficult not only to win but
to bear freedom? Why does a religion that invokes love and joy inspire war,
intolerance, hatred, malevolence, and remorse? In 1670 the Theological-Political
Treatise appears, without an author's name and credited to a fictitious
German publisher. But the author is soon identified; few books occasioned as
many refutations, anathemas, insults, and maledictions: Jews, Catholics,
Calvinists, and Lutherans–all the right-thinking circles, including the
Cartesians themselves–competed with one another in denouncing it. It was then
that the words "Spinozism" and "Spinozist" became insults
and threats. And even the critics of Spinoza who were suspected of not being
harsh enough were denounced. Doubtless among these critics there were some embarrassed
liberals and Cartesians who nonetheless gave proof of their orthodoxy by
participating in the attack. An explosive book always keeps its explosive
charge: one still cannot read the Treatise without discovering in it
philosophy's function as a radical enterprise of demystification, or as a
science of "effects." A recent commentator is able to say that the
true originality of the Treatise is in its considering religion as an effect.[6] Not only
in the causal sense but also in an optical sense, an effect whose process of
production will be sought by connecting it to its necessary rational causes as
they affect men who do not understand them (for example, the way in which
natural laws are necessarily perceived as "signs" by those who have
a strong imagination and a weak understanding). Even when dealing with
religion, Spinoza polishes glasses that reveal the effect produced and the laws
of its production.
It is his
ties with the republican party, and perhaps the protection of De Witt, that
save Spinoza from a more specific kind of worry. (As early as 1669, Koerbagh,
the author of a philosophical dictionary denounced for its Spinozist leanings,
had been arrested and had died in prison.) But Spinoza has to leave the
suburb, where his life is made difficult by the pastors, and take up residence
in The Hague. And, above all, this is at the cost of silence. The Netherlands
are at war. After the De Witt brothers are assassinated, in 1672, and the
Orangist party has returned to power, there can no longer be any question for
Spinoza of publishing the Ethics; a brief attempt in Amsterdam, in
1675, easily convinces him to give up the idea. "Certain theologians took
the occasion to complain of me before the prince and magistrates; moreover, the
stupid Cartesians, being suspected of favoring me, endeavored to remove the
aspersion by abusing everywhere my opinions and writings, a course which they
still pursue."[7]
For Spinoza, there is no question of leaving the country. But he is more and
more alone and ill. The only milieu in which he might have lived in peace fails
him. Yet he receives visits by enlightened men who want to know the Ethics,
even if this means joining with its critics subsequently, or even denying that
these visits were paid to him (as in the case of Leibniz in 1676). The professorship
of philosophy at Heidelberg, which the Elector Palatine offers him in 1673,
does not tempt him: Spinoza belongs to that line of "private
thinkers" who overturn values and construct their philosophy with hammer
blows; he is not one of the "public professors" (who, according to
Leibniz's approving words, do not disturb the established sentiments, the order
of Morality and the Police). "Since it has never been my wish to teach in
public, I have been unable to induce myself to accept this splendid opportunity,
though I have long deliberated about it."[8]
Spinoza's thinking is now taken up with the most recent problems: What are the
chances for a commercial aristocracy? Why has the liberal republic foundered?
Is it possible to change the multitude into a collectivity of free men instead
of a gathering of slaves? All these questions animate the Political Treatise,
which is left unfinished, symbolically, at the beginning of the chapter on
democracy. In February of 1677, Spinoza dies, probably of a pulmonary disease,
in the presence of his friend Meyer, who takes possession of the manuscripts.
By the end of the year, the Opera posthuma are published at the expense
of an anonymous donor.
This frugal,
propertyless life, undermined by illness, this thin, frail body, this brown,
oval face with its sparkling black eyes–how does one explain the impression
they give of being suffused with Life itself, of having a power identical to
Life? In his whole way of living and of thinking, Spinoza projects an image of
the positive, affirmative life, which stands in opposition to the semblances
that men are content with. Not only are they content with the latter, they feel
a hatred of life, they are ashamed of it; a humanity bent on self-destruction,
multiplying the cults of death, bringing about the union of the tyrant and the
slave, the priest, the judge, and the soldier, always busy running life into
the ground, mutilating it, killing it outright or by degrees, overlaying it or
suffocating it with laws, properties, duties, empires–this is what Spinoza
diagnoses in the world, this betrayal of the universe and of mankind. His
biographer Colerus reports that he was fond of spider fights: "He looked
for some spiders, and made them fight together, or he threw some flies into the
cobweb, and was so well-pleased with that battle, that he would sometimes break
into laughter."[9]
Animals at least teach us the irreducibly external character of death. They do
not carry it within, although they necessarily bring it to each other: an inevitable
bad encounter in the order of natural existences. But they have not yet
invented that internal death, the universal sadomasochism of the tyrant-slave.
In the reproach that Hegel will make to Spinoza, that he ignored the negative
and its power, lies the glory and innocence of Spinoza, his own discovery. In a
world consumed by the negative, he has enough confidence in life, in the power
of life, to challenge death, the murderous appetite of men, the rules of good
and evil, of the just and the unjust. Enough confidence in life to denounce
all the phantoms of the negative. Excommunication, war, tyranny, reaction, men
who fight for their enslavement as if it were their freedom–this forms the
world in which Spinoza lives. The assassination of the De Witt brothers is
exemplary for him. Ultimi barbarorum. In his view, all the ways of
humiliating and breaking life, all the forms of the negative have two sources,
one turned outward and the other inward, resentment and bad conscience, hatred
and guilt. "The two archenemies of the human race, Hatred and Remorse."[10] He
denounces these sources again and again as being linked to man's consciousness,
as being inexhaustible until there is a new consciousness, a new vision, a new
appetite for living. Spinoza feels, experiences, that he is eternal.
In Spinoza's
thought, life is not an idea, a matter of theory. It is a way of being, one and
the same eternal mode in all its attributes. And it is only from this
perspective that the geometric method is fully comprehensible. In the Ethics,
it is in opposition to what Spinoza calls satire; and satire is everything that
takes pleasure in the powerlessness and distress of men, everything that feeds
on accusations, on malice, on belittlement, on low interpretations, everything
that breaks men's spirits (the tyrant needs broken spirits, just as broken
spirits need a tyrant). The geometric method ceases to be a method of
intellectual exposition; it is no longer a means of professorial presentation
but rather a method of invention. It becomes a method of vital and
optical rectification. If man is somehow distorted, this torsion effect will be
rectified by connecting it to its causes more geometrico. This optical
geometry traverses the entire Ethics. People have asked whether the Ethics
should be read in terms of thought or in terms of power (for example, are the
attributes powers or concepts?). Actually, there is only one term, Life, that
encompasses thought, but conversely this term is encompassed only by thought.
Not that life is in thinking, but only the thinker has a potent life, free of
guilt and hatred; and only life explains the thinker. The geometric method, the
profession of polishing lenses, and the life of Spinoza should be understood as
constituting a whole. For Spinoza is one of the vivants-voyants. He expresses
this precisely when he says that demonstrations are "the eyes of the mind."[11] He is
referring to the third eye, which enables one to see life beyond all false
appearances, passions, and deaths. The virtues–humility, poverty, chastity,
frugality–are required for this kind of vision, no longer as virtues that mutilate
life, but as powers that penetrate it and become one with it. Spinoza did not
believe in hope or even in courage; he believed only in joy, and in vision. He
let others live, provided that others let him live. He wanted only to inspire,
to waken, to reveal. The purpose of demonstration functioning as the third eye
is not to command or even to convince, but only to shape the glass or polish
the lens for this inspired free vision. "You see, to me it seems as though
the artists, the scientists, the philosophers were grinding lenses. It' s all
a grand preparation for something that never comes off. Someday the lens is
going to be perfect and then we're all going to see clearly, see what a
staggering, wonderful, beautiful world it is. ..." (Henry Miller).
[1] Nietzsche, On
the Genealogy of Morals, III.
[2] Cf. I. S. Révah, Spinoza
et Juan de Prado, Mouton, 1959
[3] The novel by Eugène Sue, Lautréamont, depicts Van den Ende in his activities as a democratic
conspirator.
[4] An engraving preserved in Amsterdam (Print Collection
of the Rijksmuseum) is thought to be a reproduction of this portrait.
[5] The most precise reason for the abandonment of this
treatise is to be sought in the theory of the "common notions" as it
appears in the Ethics, a theory that makes some arguments of the Treatise
inoperative or unnecessary.
[6] Cf. J.-P. Osier, preface to L'Essence du christianisme by Feuerbach, "Ou Spinoza ou
Feuerbach," Maspero, Paris.
[7] Letter LXVIII, to Oldenburg.
[8] Letter XLVIII, to Fabritius. On the Spinozan
conception of teaching, cf. the Political
Treatise, chap. VIII, 49. "Everyone who asked permission would be
allowed to teach openly, at his own expense, and at the risk of his reputation.
..."
[9] This anecdote appears authentic because it has many
Spinozan resonances. Spider fights, or spider-fly fights, could have fascinated
Spinoza for several reasons: 1. from the standpoint of the exteriority of
necessary death; 2. from the standpoint of the composition of relations in
nature (how the web expresses a relationship of the spider with the world, one
which appropriates, as such, relations peculiar to the fly); 3. from the
standpoint of the relativity of perfections (how a state that marks an imperfection
of man, e.g., warfare, can on the contrary testify to a perfection if it is
related to a different essence such as that of in sects: cf. Letter XIX to
Blyenbergh).
[10] Short Treatise,
first dialogue.
[11] Theological-Political
Treatise, chap. 13; Ethics, V, 23, scholium.
H.
DE DIJN, KRONIEK VAN DE SPINOZA-LITERATUUR 1960-1970. In: Tijdschrift voor
Filosofie, 34ste Jaarg., Nr. 1 (MAART 1972), pp. 130-139
Bedankt Stan, ik was naar dit boek op zoek en nu heb ik het gratis!
BeantwoordenVerwijderenDe Dijn vindt Deleuzes boekje een merkwaardig soort inleiding op Spinoza's denken, eenzijdig maar toch boeiend, waarin Deleuze naar Spinoza zegt, dat we vanuit de werkelijke Rede kennis moeten opdoen en dus de werking van de natuur en onze eigen natuur de dingen moeten leren begrijpen. Maar mij lijkt dat Deleuze het kennisconcept van Spinoza naar de wetenschap of natuurkunde heel overtuigend volgt, want hij geeft veel betere verklaringen in dynamisch werkende zin dan de moralistische theologen of speculatieve filosofen deden.
BeantwoordenVerwijderenBas, wat heb je van Deleuze gelezen? En ik bedoel, niet over hem.
VerwijderenEd,
BeantwoordenVerwijderenHeel veel jaren geleden was ik een fan van zijn boeken. Daarnaast las ik ook over hem, dat hij ook de mist inging met zijn constructies en het gebruik van intellectueel jargon. De Franse filosofie in de SUN-uitgaves kenmerkte dat onleesbare toen ik nog studeerde. Alan Sokal en Jean Brimont tonen dat als een zwakpunt in zijn filosofie aan. M.a.w. erudiet gewauwel kan niet als bewijs dienen. Het bovenstaande boek heeft dat kenmerk gelukkig niet.
Bas, ik vroeg wat je gelezen hebt. Kan je daar op antwoorden. (Hopelijk meer dan Rizome.)
BeantwoordenVerwijderenEd ik heb geen zin om mijn boekenkasten na lopen. En wat je met () hopelijk meer dan Rizome suggereert bevalt me niet. Waarom ineens zo geïnteresseerd na in een eerder blog: "Ik lees je bijdragen snel en schuins zonder veel interesse".
BeantwoordenVerwijderenWaarom ga je niet op mijn opmerking in t.a.v. de Dijn en Deleuze. Misschien heb je daar zelf wat over te vertellen
Vanwaar mijn interesse? Omdat je aangaf dat je ooit ‘fan’ was van Deleuze. Je geeft zelfs aan dat Deleuze “het kennisconcept van Spinoza naar de wetenschap of natuurkunde heel overtuigend volgt…” maar ook dat hij “de mist inging met zijn constructies en het gebruik van intellectueel jargon.” Je spreekt zelfs van “erudiet gewauwel”
VerwijderenDus wou ik eens weten, wat heeft Bas nu eigenlijk gelezen van Deleuze zelf. Waar, in welk boek en waarom “ging Deleuze de mist in”. Dat kon ik je dan specifiek vragen.
Dan had je het over de “betere verklaringen in dynamisch werkende zin” die Deleuze inderdaad in heel zijn filosofie via Spinoza uitwerkt. Alleen is dat een uitwerking buiten natuurkunde en biologie om. Wat hij als kernpunt of kernveld noemt is het ‘Lichaam zonder organen’ en dat is, als het ware, een filosofisch axioma. Deleuze geeft inderdaad veel aandacht aan de affectiones, en bij een oppervlakkige lezing kan dit gezien worden als onze zintuiglijkheid. Maar, jij zal zeker ‘Logique du sens’ van hem gelezen hebben, en gezien hebben dat hij het heeft over het gebied tussen ‘du sens’ en ‘du non-sens’. Een filosofisch gebied zonder fysica.
Vandaar mijn interesse, want je andere teksten, in al haar gezwollen ‘niet erudiete taal’ met een oppervlakkige mix van natuurkunde en filosofie lees ik inderdaad nog ‘schuin en snel’. Maar, zoals ik al vroeger aangaf, geen probleem hoor. Ieder zijn eigen insteek bij Spinoza maar ik vind jou visie oppervlakkig banaal. Waarom zou ik ingaan op je opmerkingen zoals je vraagt.
Dus, ik vermoed dat je kennis van Deleuze vrij klein is en je toch zo brutaal bent hem “erudiet gewauwel’ toe te dichten. Tja, zo zijn er meer mensen.
Pseudo-wetenschap en "duister taalgebruik, verward denken en het verkeerd gebruik van wetenschappelijke concepten" dat was de intellectuele praktijk van een postmoderne stroming in Frankrijk. Ik heb dat zelf meegemaakt toen ik studeerde. Dat heb ik met gewauwel samengevat. Dat boek "Intelectueel Bedrog", van Alan Sokal en Jean Bricmont (1997) verwoord die kritiek overtuigend. Ja Ed een 'filosofisch gebied' zonder (kennis van) fysica Ed: Mystificatie. Een vage insteek waarbij je niet eenvoudig kan zeggen dat het niet uitmaakt bij Spinoza, waar hij God als de de concreet werkende Natuur verwoord en met zijn kennisleer onderzoekt. Kennelijk heb ik een gevoelige snaar geraak.
BeantwoordenVerwijderenGevoelige snaar, ach nee.
VerwijderenSockal en Brickmont zijn eerder een shiboleth. Een breuk tussen degene die het onderscheid kennen tussen het Reëele en de werkelijkheid.
Deleuze's "Practical Philosophy" dat ik positief beoordeelde is kennelijk geen onderwerp. I.p.d.v. wil je dat ik vragen beantwoord van wat ik van hem gelezen heb. Een zeer negatieve wantrouwende benadering.
BeantwoordenVerwijderenEd Deleuze kon niet om de fysica heen. Hij kon dat sinds Einstein-Bergson meningsverschil niet op zijn beloop laten. Zijn teksten bevatten dat als 'jargon'. Ik vraag je toch ook niet om dat uit te leggen.
Wantrouwend? Zeg gewoon wat je gelezen hebt. Alleen zal blijken dat dat weinig of niets is. Draai gewoon niet rond de pot!
VerwijderenEen filosoof niet gelezen of kennen maar wel omschrijven als 'gewauwel'. Dat is blijkbaar jouw niveau.
Antwoord gewoon op mijn vraag, wat heb je van Deleuze zelf gelezen. Dan kunnen we daar dieper op ingaan. Meer is het niet.
Ed,
BeantwoordenVerwijderenNogmaals. Ik laat me niet dwingen omdat jij iets graag wilt en dat daarbij niets te maken heeft met boekje van Deleuze waar mijn opmerking over ging. Je vraag is niet ter zake m.b.t. het onderwerp van dit blog.
Zo belangrijk is Deleuze niet meer voor mij. Daarnaast schijn je het antwoord op wat ik van Deleuze heb gelezen al te weten. Je hebt dus helemaal geen belangstelling voor mijn oppervlakkige banale visie, zoals je zelf zegt. Dat is jouw niveau.
Heren, we laten het hierbij - waar dit blog allemaal aanleiding toe geeft... - maar het is genoeg zo.
BeantwoordenVerwijderenMaar, goed, [na interventie van Ed op een later blog] ga toch maar rustig verder met elkaar in de haren te zitten.
BeantwoordenVerwijderenNou, in de haren zitten..
BeantwoordenVerwijderenToch zou ik graag weten wat Bas gelezen heeft van Gilles Deleuze.
Meer is het niet.
Ed,
BeantwoordenVerwijderenJe spreek jezelf tegen. Je wilde direct al weten wat ik van hem gelezen had. Zonder te motiveren waarom. Je was helemaal niet geïnteresseerd in wat ik opmerkte over wat de Dijn schreef over Deleuze's boekje. Al eerder heb je die desinteresse over mijn bijdragen laten blijken in een eerdere blog. Ook geef je niet aan waarom mijn visie oppervlakkig en banaal is. Dat dieper willen ingaan op Deleuze klopt niet met je eigen uitspraak dat je vermoed dat mijn kennis van Deleuze vrij klein is.
Toch twijfel je, want nu blijkt zie ik via een later blog dat je mijn boekenlijstje nodig hebt om zelf beter beslagen ten ijs te zijn. Dus dat "meer is het niet" heeft deze achtergrond? Ed Ik heb duidelijk aangegeven dat Deleuze me niet meer zo boeit en waarom. Ik kan je eigen onzekerheid dus slechts bevestigen.
Oké, bedankt voor je psychologie.
BeantwoordenVerwijderenIk weet genoeg. Nog een fijne dag.
Ed ik ben aan bovenstaand boekje begonnen, en het valt wel mee (veel minder zweverig dan ik gevreesd had). Zijn er andere werken van Deleuze ivm Spinoza die je kan aanbevelen?
BeantwoordenVerwijderenMark,
VerwijderenIn “Expressionism in Philosophy: Spinoza” gaat Deleuze zeer uitgebreid in op Spinoza met achteraan in het boek (in de Engelse editie toch die ik heb) concrete verwijzingen naar de Ethica en andere teksten.
Moet je zeker lezen!
Groeten
Mark,
Verwijderenmisschien interessant. Opgenomen en uitgeschreven tekst van Deleuze's lessen over Spinoza.
http://deleuzelectures.blogspot.pt/2007/02/on-spinoza.html
Over naar de inhoud van het blog en dan de verwijzing van De Dijn. Wanneer hij “ware” materialist tussen haakjes zet is dat goed gezien want als je Deleuze gelezen hebt zal je merken dat hij als zijn kernbegrip ‘Het Lichaam zonder Organen’ omschrijft. Hij gaat uitgebreid in op de affectiones en hun gelaagdheid en neemt in ‘Logique du sens’ het begrip ‘Lekta’ op eigenzinnige wijze over van de stoïcijnen. Datgene wat immaterieel tussen zin en niet-zien te horen is. Het materialisme van Deleuze is geen fysiek materialisme, kijk naar hoe hij de begrippen immanentieveld, consistentieveld en organisatieveld uitwerkt in ‘Anti-Oedipus’. Het immanentieveld (Spinoza’s substantie) is voor Deleuze dé drager van heel ons doen en laten dat consistentie of samenhang krijgt in het consistentieveld (te vergelijken met Spinoza’s attributen). Het organisatieveld zijn de modi.
BeantwoordenVerwijderenDeleuze omschrijft zijn denken als transcendent empirisme. Hoewel hij zeker geen ‘platonist’ is, schuwt hij terecht de ‘idee’ niet.
(Sla er Wikipedia niet op na want ook daar wordt Deleuze oppervlakkig als postmodernist neergezet. Dat doen alleen mensen die zeer oppervlakkig over het naoorlogse Franse denken spreken. Belangrijk bij die Franse denkers is het onderscheid te maken tussen het Reële en de werkelijkheid.)
Is er iemand anders op het blog die Deleuze gelezen heeft?