Metaphysical Primitives: Machines and Assemblages in Deleuze, DeLanda, and Bryant

Arjen Kleinherenbrink

doi:10.1515/opphil-2020-0103

Abstract

AbstractSome variants of Object-Oriented Ontology define entities in terms of their powers. Such variants are rooted in Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari’s theory of “machinic assemblages”. This article asks whether such entities can be metaphysical primitives with regard to similarity and change. This is the case if no further existents are needed to account for these two features of reality. According to Levi Bryant’s machine-oriented ontology, entities defined in terms of powers are such primitives. According to Manuel DeLanda’s assemblage theory, they are not. DeLanda therefore holds that further metaphysical primitives must exist. After reconstructing the key features of the theories involved, I argue that Bryant’s position is ultimately more parsimonious, and that DeLanda’s theory confuses epistemological models with ontological realities.

Highlights

Object-Oriented Ontology (OOO) holds that individual entities at numerous levels of existence are irreducible realities
According to Levi Bryant’s machine-oriented ontology, entities defined in terms of powers are such primitives
Bryant holds, are always in excess over the sum of a machine’s manifestations: “it is of crucial importance to note that the power of an operation always has a greater range than the manifestations it happens to produce when operating”

Summary

Introduction

Object-Oriented Ontology (OOO) holds that individual entities at numerous levels of existence are irreducible realities. A strong indicator for the existence of such additional primitives would be if we find that the kinds of entities central to an OOO turn out to have salient features that cannot be explained in terms of precisely such entities. This is a rather broad question that cannot be answered in a single paper. Similarity as well as change can be explained in terms of assemblages alone.[5] In Section 6, I conclude that virtual diagrams are epistemological tools rather than ontological realities and that powers may not require positing further metaphysical primitives

Deleuze and virtuality

Bryant and machines

DeLanda and assemblages

Against virtual diagrams

The unnecessary duplication of reality