About
History is always written from the sedentary point of view and in the name of a unitary State apparatus, at least a possible one, even when the topic is nomads.
What is lacking is a Nomadology, the opposite of a history…
What is important is not whether the flows are “one or multiple” — we’re past that point:
[T]here is a collective assemblage of enunciation, a machinic assemblage of desire, one inside the other and both plugged into an immense outside that is a multiplicity in any case…
Writing weds a war machine and lines of flight, abandoning the strata, segmentarities, sedentarity, the State apparatus.
Felix Guattari and Gilles Deleuze, A Thousand Plateaus
Welcome! You’ve found Fractal Ontology, a weblog representing the work of Joseph Weissman and Taylor Adkins (click to see all articles by author.) We are undergraduate students from Georgia, currently seeking degrees in philosophy, mathematics and science at Georgia College and State University. The blog in one form or another has enjoyed a run of a little more than two years now, and we remain excited about using this medium to explore new lines of inquiry.
So, basically, our idea is this: it is possible to plot a complex path, tracing connections through both clinical and critical theory, towards a new kind of science — a de-centered, non-hierarchical science, capable of grasping and bridging the ruptures between cybernetics, language and society.
What we’ve been doing: mapping out connections between psychoanalysis and philosophy to other fields and disciplines, including theoretical biology, cultural studies and artificial intelligence. We also provide notes, outlines, translations, video commentary and textual analysis on important contemporary theoretical questions, works and writers.
We are especially grateful for all the support we’ve received! The comments alone have really made this enterprise worth it for us. Please, don’t be shy; we would love to hear what you have to say!
Joseph Weissman
Taylor Adkins
This blog is cool. Quite prolific this month. Keep writing, guys.
I Have to admit this is different. Very postmodern.
Damn.
*Undergraduates*?
Where does one get an undergraduate education of this calibre, anyways?
God, I feel underinformed.
Back to poring over Difference and Repetition for me I guess…
If I were really Post-modern, I would leave a comment that consists of a series of ones and zeroes. But you lot would undoubtedly find that achingly primitive.
Thanks for the link!
Taylor -you may want to see here http://www.re-press.org/
email me with any questions…
best,
adam
Holy crap! Did you help edit the Praxis of Alain Badiou with Justin Clemens? Wow, I’m really honored to have you send me this website. When the most recent volume of Badiou scholarship (the Praxis) came out, I was really excited, and its work strongly complements the Hallward and Riera collections. I definitely will email you with questions soon, because I’ve been brainstorming about where to send the translations I’ve been working on. Again, thank you so much for the referral. I hope we talk again soon.
Taylor Adkins
Undergraduates. Wow. I’m impressed. Your blog is, from what I can tell so far, smart and visually stunning.
Wow.. Awe inspiring blog ..
i’m finding the idea that you’re undergrads somewhat disheartening…
like i should hang up my pen/laptop/glasses/skis/whatever…
and give up… ho hum…
One day I’ll get round to some more reading…
Does anyone know if Sylvain Lazarus’s work is being translated into English?
I’m aware of his essay in _Lenin Reloaded_, but I wonder if there is more in the works?
Nice site.
Thanks.
you’ve created a very intriguing blog — i shall add it to the blogroll. congratulations. but i have a critique for you: by aiming for ‘unified synthesis’ you’ve recreated metaphysics. don’t mistake D&G for metaphysicians. one cannot ’synthesize’ critical theory as it is exactly that: critique of theoria (in this case: the manufacture of ‘truth’). as you show interest in psychoanalysis, perhaps a self-refractive question, then: with what desire is the search for ‘unified theory’? though the apparatus of synthesis suits the institutional framework for philosophy, it weakens the force of D&G’s thought. Deleuze especially will shudder at the thought of synthesis, insofar as it curiously dredges up a Hegel who would master all thought under an abstract totality. does not the movement of Geist guide your desire? but then perhaps this is, in part, unavoidable — and Hegel lurks in Deleuze too. perhaps unwittingly, unconsciously, synthesis has been wrought from D&G as primary desire. how intriguing. but i would question this ’synthetic’ desire — and the questioning missing from the list is that of de-construction. if forgetting deconstruction reconstitutes Hegel in Deleuze, then metaphysics — or rather the metaphysical reappropriation or ‘reterritorialization’ of Deleuze — has returned indeed. and that is thought worth critiquing if it comes to shape the ’spirit’ of the 21C. and this is a most ontotheotechnological century…. i.e., a ‘Deleuzean’ one.
As far as I know John, no one is working on Lazarus at the moment. Ironically, the most extensive discussion of Lazarus in English appears in Alain Badiou’s Metapolitics, translated by Jason Barker. The two works that I have by him right now are Anthropologie du nom and his essay from Politique et philosophie dans l’ouevre de Louis Althusser called “Althusser, la politique et la histoire.”
Now this is a very interesting question that you have raised: Lazarus falls in the cracks between disciplines–he spans politics, anthropology, sociology, history, and, of course, philosophy. I could probably translate sections from the book, or even his essay (trust me, I’ve considered it), but I’m not so sure about publishers wanting it or considering it worth publishing (because it doesn’t have a ‘market’–absurd, but that’s the reality principle I guess).
For an essay by Badiou, Lazarus, and Natasha Michel, check out the essay called “What Is To Be Thought? What Is To Be Done?” at http://www.counterpunch.org/badiou0501.html. This article was translated by Norman Madarasz, who has translated the Briefings on Existence: A Short Treatise on Transitory Ontology and Manifesto for Philosophy by Alain Badiou: he also was Badiou’s student. He might possibly be working on Lazarus, though I’m not sure. As far as I can tell, David Fernbach translated Lenin Reloaded, so it’s possible that he would be the best one to turn to.
Thanks for your comment,
Taylor Adkins
Nice blog.
BD
Vive le Viva la Voila!
Guys:
From Georgia? So am I but considerably older in human time.
I am about to release a new way of using the web for knowledge
management that uses many of the post-modern theories, and seems
to work. Maybe think of it as an artificially intelligent blog.
It may actually be on the boundary of a form of reall intelligence
in fact.
Would love you guys to play with it, and let me know what you
think.
Please let me know your email address, or some other
way to contact you.
Sincerely,
Steve Kohler
Hello! Your website is really rather impressive.
I go to Mercer and we’re trying to get our own Philosophy Society started. I was invited to drop by a meeting by a couple of your members I met randomly in a coffeeshop.
I’d enjoy joining you all at your next meeting. If the offer still stands, please email me at: kristin.tyndall@gmail.com
Thanks!
Kristin
hey,
just found out about the site, and you guys put together a really impressive effort. Needless to say, this website is a goldmine in terms of resources and ideas, and do an excellent job in circulating “french theory” ideas and more.
ok, i had a lot of things to comment on, and since I didn’t know where to put the whole thing, I picked the “about” page.
- on bibliography, why is there not Deleuze’s Nietzsche and Philosophy under Nietzsche column + deleuze’s “nomad thought”, his short essay where he exposed at the end the concept of nomadity.
- on translation, well, if you seek help I’m here. here’s why, I’m French (which helps I agree) studying in Montreal, bi-lingual, and very much into all the authors you list. My field is more political philosophy but I share plenty of references with what has been listed. So, I’d be ready to help you out or edit/check some translations you made. I could even do some by myself, I’d be glad to translate anything you judge particularly important and that has been missed out. I’ve read NIetzsche aujourd’hui and this is not too hard to translate although I didn’t find it very interesting (except Deleuze’s essay, but I think this one has been translated)…
alright, i’d love to collaborate with you, if you think I can be of any help…
anyway, great job and all the best for your studies and projects…
anarkali
Hey anarkali,
Taylor Adkins here. I have to distinguish myself first off because Joe and I both have radically divergent yet mutually stimulating projects. I think my love for translation has even rubbed off on him a bit (note his translation of a selection of Deleuze’s abecedaire), while his theoretical fecundity shames me for not producing as much (stop making me look bad Joe!!).
But, on a serious note, I would love to say thank you so much for your interest. In fact, I have translated about half of Guattari’s L’Inconscient Machinique, and I have been looking for readers to check it for me and ensure its quality. If this sounds like something that would interest you, I can send you copies of my work along with pdf files of the Guattari.
Let me know what you think,
Taylor Adkins
Also, you’re right about the Deleuze-Nietzsche connection. In fact, I used both of those texts though I’m not sure why I didn’t cite them in the bibliography. Good call.
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