Date: Thu, 21 Jan 1999 10:25:07 -0800 (PST)
From: Paul Bryant <levi_bryant-AT-yahoo.com>
Subject: RE: Dialectics


Maybe I'm going out on a limb here, but maybe the biggest problem with
the Deleuze/Hegel debate is that there is no debate.  As far as I can
tell, Deleuze nowhere presents an argument against Hegel, but instead
levels uses Hegel as a lynchpin for a critique.  How does this work? 
As far back as his review of _Logic and Existence_, Deleuze can be
seen as pointing out a form of difference in the dialectic that is not
dialectical or based on contradiction.  This difference is the
difference between the Phenomenology and the Greater Logic that does
not resolve itself through the sublation of a contradiction.  On these
grounds, Deleuze then claims that contradiction is not more than
difference, but less.  That is, he claims that difference must precede
contradiction and that contradiction must be a shadow of difference. 
With this point in mind, he then claims that western philosophy has
been without a concept of difference, but has instead been content to
inscribe it in the concept and identity.  Thus, through this critique
Deleuze offers himself the opportunity to develop a concept of
difference that isn't subservient to the four shackles of
representation and the concept, thereby opening up the possibility of
a new way of looking at things.

So why isn't this an argument?  How does critique differ from
argument?  In the first place, it appears that Deleuze is committed to
the thesis that there is representation, possibility, the concept,
etc..  In fact, it's not too difficult to discern a genetic account of
how representation is actualized in the pages of D&R.  If this is the
case, we cannot say that Deleuze's engagement with Hegel is an attempt
to show that Hegel is somehow false or wrong...  If it were, that
would be an argument.  Rather, Deleuze uses Hegel to show that there
is something more, difference and repetition, and that that something
more changes the way we look at things.  This would explain why
Deleuze claims that philosophy is at its best as critique.  Critique
isn't the negative task of destroying something, but the positive task
of making room for something else.

If there's a grain of truth in the foregoing, it seems to me that a
lot of the secondary literature surrounding the Deleuze/Hegel
encounter becomes ridiculous.  On the one hand you have the Hegelians
crying out ad nauseum that Hegel has been misread and that he already
anticipates Deleuze here or there.  *Bleck*  This only indicates that
they are reading Deleuze as standing in a position of opposition to
Hegel, thus opening himself up to a dialectical sublation.  As a
student of Hyppolite's, it's highly unlikely that Deleuze would have
lacked the dialectical sophistication not to have foreseen the
deadlock that would occur from opposing Hegel.  On the other hand you
have the disciples of Deleuze that endlessly repeat the legends of
Deleuze's overturning of Hegel, unconsciously placing themselves right
back into Hegel. Under a more Lacanian reading, this endless
repetition could be seen as a symptom born out of a trauma, or a
primary ambiguity in Deleuze's *non*philosophy where a failure to
depass a blockage perpetually returns in the form of the Real. 
Neither side of the confrontation is very palatable insofar as the
first is entirely too scholarly, while the second reveals a certain
insidious dogmatism in the hearts of some Deleuzian spirits...  A
fundamentalism, on might say, that fetishizes Deleuzian concepts,
critiques, and language and gives up on the project of creating
concepts to bypass problems in the socius.

As far as I can tell, the only two ways of bypassing this deadlock
consist in either (a) placing stress on the critical aspects of
Deleuze's project and discerning how he used it to create new concepts
that help to undermine representational structures that have become
too rigid, or (b) finding a way to rhizomatically reread Hegel that
makes him into a thinker of affirmation and non-concentric and
non-oppositional difference that would depass the Hegelian
totalization of Spirit in the form of Protestant Germany.  Either
alternative strikes me as strong and interesting, but the endless
debate surrounding whether or not Deleuze's *argument* works seems to
be a dead end.

Paul






---"B. Metcalf" <bmetcalf-AT-ultranet.com> wrote:
>
> Nathan,
> 
> >	A typically ignorant and dogmatic answer from a thoughtless person.
> >Since you remain ignorant of Hegel, you don't even know ones that
you could
> >mention, regardless of whether they were important enough to
mention or not.
> >Since you have not read my many explanations, you have not even
adequately
> >responded to the important similarities I have outlined.
> 
> Nathan, I have tried my best throughout this exchange to try to see
things
> from your point of view.  Now I must say, I don't know why you can't
be
> more patient with such an "ignorant" and "thoughtless" person.  I
don't
> know why, if you really think Hegel is so similar to Deleuze, that you
> can't be more tolerant of someone who sees folds of perspective
which are
> different from yours.  Why must there be a homogeneous way of
looking at
> Hegel?  Why is it so important that I agree with you?
> 
> I have learned something about Hegel from our exchange.  I thought
it was a
> worthwhile exchange.  But I still think there is room for different
ways of
> looking at this.  
> 
> Beth
> 
> P.S.  I still don't understand how your description avoids the
category of
> the possible, in that there is still repetition of forces in the
form of
> the identity of the concept.  I don't understand how H can escape
merely
> conceptual possiblity.  But I guess I am just too ignorant to
understand.
> So I won't ask you to explain it a twelfth time.
> 
> >	To repeat yet again (why are you forcing me through an eternal
> >repetition of the same?):  The realm of relational forces that
Hegel posits
> >presents a movement which is not a possibility that may or may not
be but is
> >fully real.  It is also not an actual movement because it does not
actually
> >appear in immediate experience, but immediate experience is led to
it as the
> >condition of this experience having sense or meaning.  That this
movement of
> >forces in Hegel is one of being-in-itself to being-for-another to
> >being-for-self THROUGH being-for-another, of course, means that it is
> >ultimately a movment of identity.  But that does not mean it is an
actual
> >movement, nor a merely possible one, in his thinking.  Thus, it has a
> >structural similarity to the virtual in Deleuze's philosophy,
insofar as its
> >relation to given experience is concerned, and the role it plays in
> >establishing sense and meaning.  It is also similar to Deleuze in
the way it
> >follows from a critique of atomism.  Now, that does not make it
identical to
> >Deleuze's virtual, only similar in certain respects -- respects
which are
> >bypassed in certain ways by Deleuze and in every way by your Hegel
you have
> >dreamt up for yourself.  But it is also an important set of
similarities
> >because it indicates how Hegelian thought, when stripped of its
commitments
> >to identity and to the spatialization of difference, becomes
something more
> >like a Deleuzean thought of difference.  This last aspect is
important not
> >only because it helps establish helpful linkages with other
thinking -- so
> >that, say, some Heidegger disciples might actually come to
recognize what
> >Deleuze is doing and won't be so apt to dismiss him -- but also
because it
> >helps strip Hegel of the aura of being the "enemy", which is
precisely the
> >way he is so often characterized by Deleuzean disciples, as well as
by
> >Deleuze in some unfortunate passages, especially those found in
N&P.  These
> >passages are unfortunate because they lead to ridiculous
caricatures of
> >Hegel like the one you have been parading across the list for the
last
> >couple of weeks.
> >
> >	Explanation done.
> 
> 
> 

_________________________________________________________
DO YOU YAHOO!?
Get your free -AT-yahoo.com address at http://mail.yahoo.com