Thought as Modern Art or the Ethics of Perversion

Abstract

Van Gogh's is eye of a great genius, but seeing way in which he dissects me from deep end of canvas out of which he has sprung, it is no longer genius of a painter that I now feel throbbing in him, but genius of a certain philosopher whom I have never met in life. No, Socrates did not have this eye; perhaps only unfortunate Nietzsche, before him, had such a gaze that undresses soul, that delivers body from soul, that bares body of man, out of subterfuges of mind. Antonin Artaud, Van Gogh, le suicide de la societe.1 Alain Badiou's penetrating critique of Gilles Deleuze's philosophy concludes that latter's lifelong project of Reversal of Platonism fails to produce aline of flight out of sterile paradoxes that define modernity. On one hand, Badiou suggests, Deleuze's anti-Platonism is simply inscribed in and continuous with post-Nietzschean tradition that, in Badiou's view, characterizes twentieth century European thought. For Badiou, insofar as it defines itself against Platonic transcendence of Idea in relation to thing and calls for a return to immanence, this tradition does not escape Socratic/pre-Socratic opposition. Psychoanalysis has taught us that to define oneself in opposition to Master is really no different than to sacrifice oneself to him, as negation still betrays a process of identification in relation to him. In end, then, Deleuze's call for pure immanence would simply rejoin point where Platonic dialectic leads us, namely, point where thought of thing and intuition of Idea are inseparable.2 Moreover, Badiou argues, insofar as Deleuze's differential ontology is rooted in a renewed conception of Heidegger's ontological difference, it betrays an appeal to transcendence of the whole, the One (L'Un-toui) to guarantee ultimate systematicity of Transcendental Empiricism. According to Badiou, then, Deleuze's call for a return to immanence is no more than a turning of Platonism on its head, a simple which fails to effectively break free from Master. Alternatively, Badiou finds in Fernando Pessoa's literature true way out of this cul-de-sac de la pensee, this dead end of thought. He writes: Pessoa's modernity lies in revoking into question pertinence of Platonism/anti-Platonism opposition: task of thought-poem is neither allegiance to Platonism, nor its reversal (renversement). And this is what we, philosophers, have not yet fully understood. Hence we do not yet think on Pessoa's level. Which would mean: to admit to coextensiveness of sensible and Idea, but not to concede anything to transcendence of One. To think that there are only multiple singularities, but not to draw out from this anything that resembles empiricism.3 Those italicized buts are clearly intended as an implicit attack on Deleuze. Ultimately, it appears that what Badiou seeks for a true philosophy of modernity is : 1) a certain kind of monism rid of any dependence on transcendence; and connectedly 2) an immanent account of pre-individual difference or multiplicity liberated once and for all from all liability to phenomenological recuperation.4 Moreover, Badiou believes that within modernity, it is modern literature that creates possibility for departing from modernity's aporetic structure of thought, thereby showing way for philosophy. I will argue that Badiou is right in situating his hopes for a future of thought in art. But I will strive to show that his criticism of Deleuze reflects a profound misunderstanding of Deleuze's project, based in Badiou' s failure to see its radical novelty. For ultimately, I want to suggest that to understand Deleuze's transcendental empiricism (perhaps only thought which truly effects overthrowing, and not simply reversal of Platonism), we must read Deleuze as a modern artist. …