Pont de la Concorde, Montreal

Didier Debaise recently came to Montreal to present his current research, which Brian Massumi described as a speculative pragmatism. He explored the resurgence of speculative philosophy (philosophies?) of the past decade or so and is currently trying to put it to the test by asking if we can have a non-anthropocentric approach to the subject. Rather than do away with the notion of a subject, or extend what the human indicates, Didier would suggest that we retake all the categories of the subject and redistribute them across nature. In effect, he is asking: can we talk of subjectivity for non-humans? This refusal to begin with the human or, put differently, a development of propositions that are non-human, resonates with several philosophers whose work was largely ignored in the twentieth century: Tarde, Whitehead and James (in Europe).

In the second event, Didier went on to elaborate, making links between Whitehead and Simondon, outlining what sort of descriptions constructivism and speculative pragmatism do and explained his critique of anthropology (less a rejection, more a desire to highlight its limits). The conversation was lively and there was an interesting discussion on ‘distance’. Rather than create some kind of distance (“se mettre en distance”), Didier suggested that we need artifices, citing Deleuze’s claim that we need to make things resemble with methods which do not resemble one another (“faire ressemblant avec des moyens non ressemblants”). Unfortunately, I’ve been unable to find the original quotation… although there is something similar in What is Philosophy?

Conférence publique / séminaire
Didier Debaise, Institut Max Planck, Berlin

Conférence

“Métaphysique des sujets. Reconstruire la notion de subjectivité avec Tarde et Whitehead”

18 novembre 18h00
SenseLab, Pavillon EV, Université Concordia, local 11.625
1515, Ste-Catherine Ouest, métro Guy-Concordia

Séminaire

20 novembre 9h30 – 11h30
11h30 – 12h00 lunch léger
Pavillon Marie-Victorin, Université de Montréal, local B-427
90, Vincent d’Indy, métro Édouard-Montpetit

Lectures préparatoires :
—Didier Debaise, « Qu-est-ce qu’une pensée relationnelle ? » (sur Simondon)
—Didier Debaise, « Une philosophie des interstices. Whitehead et la question du vivant »
—Bruno Latour, « Tarde’s Idea of Quantification »

If anyone would like to listen to the lecture and/or the seminar, please get in touch.

My notes for the reading group with shadow of camera (Sony DSC T-700)

Last week I attended the monthly SenseLab reading group, where we were reading Guattari’s The Three Ecologies. As my copy of the book was still in transit (I fear it’s been lost in the post), I read a .pdf version from my computer screen which wasn’t ideal. There was just a small group of people, ten or so, and we all introduced ourselves as the composition is ever-changing. Erin asked us to try to do it in a way which we might not normally do, which made for an amusing opening to the session. It was interesting to see how the group would switch between French and English for discussion, and for the versions of the book read (plenty of time was spent trying to compare page numbers).

Erin had noticed an interesting parallel with Guattari’s idea of the individual as a terminal, and William James’ notion of the ‘terminus’: not as an end, but a force that activates a beginning. Here is the particular section of the text that we were looking at – it’s a really wonderful passage:

Rather than speak of the ‘subject’, we should perhaps speak of components of subiectfication, each working more or less on its own. This would lead us, necessarily, to re-examine the relation between concepts of the individual and subjectivity, and, above all, to make a clear distinction between the two. Vectors of subjectification do not necessarily pass through the individual, which in reality appears to be something like a ‘terminal’ (TE: 36)

Guattari’s use of another term, gentleness, stood out for me (and others) and I remember circling the word when he used it in both Chaosmosis and The Three Ecologies because it contrasts with his rather heroic style of writing:

It seems to me essential to organize new micropolitical and microsocial practices, new solidarities, a new gentleness, together with new aesthetic and new analytic practices (TE: 51)

It was suggested that gentleness might relate to questions of value (rather than evaluation) and with the techniques of creating an alternate political articulation. One way that the SenseLab is thinking about this is  in terms of generosity and Erin explained that they try to produce generous events. Other issues that we tried to talk/think through included the ‘habitable’, potential (as something which is not necessarily positive), phantasms and react-ability… Plenty to mull over.

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