Simondon – Fractal Ontology

All posts filed under: Simondon

Simondon in English: “Two Lessons on Animal and Man”

Thursday, January 19, 2012

It is my great delight to help announce the publication of one of the first book-length English translations available of the writings of French philosopher of technology Gilbert Simondon (1924-1989), published by Univocal. The volume is available under the title Two Lessons on Animal and Man and was translated by Drew Burk. The work is composed of a series of lectures intended for undergraduates interested in the humanities, especially philosophy, sociology and psychology. As the translator […]

Translations and Schema Upgraded: Now with PDFs

Thursday, November 29, 2007

by Taylor Adkins

comments 3

French Translations / Laruelle / notes / schema / Simondon

I have recently added links to the translations and the schema page to PDF files for those that are interested. I would imagine that this would be a much more useful way to orient this resource towards a wider public, or simply to ease the work of having to read text online. I still have yet to fully introduce the translations or the notes that we have on this site. I hope this can become […]

A Short List of Gilbert Simondon’s Vocabulary

Wednesday, November 28, 2007

by Taylor Adkins

comments 17

affectivity / allagmatic / becoming / Disparation / emotivity / ensemble / form / hylemorphism / individualization / individuation / information / metastability / milieu / model / modularity / ontogenesis / potential / preindividual / signal / signification / Simondon / subject / system / Transduction / transindividual

1. Affectivity -This term designates a relation between an individualized being and the pre-individual milieu; it is thus heterogeneous to individualized reality. This is why Simondon claims that affectivity, more than perception, indicates a spirituality that is greater than the individualized being (the Sublime) because perception is merely the functions of the structures interior to this being (L’Individuation psychique et collective, p. 108–hereafter cited as IPC). Simondon writes that affectivity is the ground of emotion, […]

Simondon and the Machine: Technology, Individuation, Reality

Tuesday, November 20, 2007

by Joseph Weissman

comments 4

biology / crystal / cybernetics / form / individuation / knowledge / machine / physics / psychology / Science / Mathematics / Technology / Simondon / structure / technology / tension

Fractal Effervescence (2006), David April Simondon and the Theory of Individuation There is something eternal in a technical scheme… and it is that which is always present, and can be conserved in a thing. Gilbert Simondon Gilbert Simondon’s reformulation of information theory on the basis of a new philosophy of technology has, in comparison to earlier attempts, at least the following major advantages to its credit: – His thought introduces us to an entirely […]

Translation: Jean-Hugues Barthélémy on Simondon, Bergson and Teilhard de Chardin

Monday, October 22, 2007

by Taylor Adkins

comments 8

Bachelard / Barthélémy / becoming / bergson / communication / complexity / French Translation / individuation / ontogenesis / ontology / philosophy of science / physiology / Simondon / singularities / Teildhard de Chardin / transindividual / Untranslated Theory

The following is the first half of chapter 1 from Jean-Hugues Barthélémy’s book Penser l’individuation: Simondon et la philosophie de la nature. Paris: L’Harmattan, 2005. p. 37-48. Original translation by Taylor Adkins on 10/22/07. Chapter 1 The concept of object and the concept of subject, in the same virtue of their origin, are limits that philosophical thought must overcome. –Gilbert Simondon 1. Ontology and ontogenesis: from Bergson to Simondon The philosophically fundamental watchword of all […]

Translation: Simondon, Completion of Section I, Chapter 1, The Individual and Its Physico-Biological Genesis

Friday, October 19, 2007

by Taylor Adkins

comments 8

abstract machine / assemblage / autopoeisis / becoming / being / change / communication / complexity / differentiation / Disparation / formalization / French Translation / individuation / information / materiality / metastability / model / modularity / morphogenesis / morphology / ontogenesis / ontology / philosophy of science / production / self-actualization / Simondon / singularities / structure / system / technology / Untranslated Theory

In the first place, singularities-events correspond to heterogeneous series which are organized into a system which is neither stable nor unstable, but rather ‘metastable,’ endowed with a potential energy wherein the differences between series are distributed. (Potential energy is the energy of the pure event, whereas forms of actualization correspond to the realization of the event). In the second place, singularities posses a process of auto-unification, always mobile and displaced to the extent that a […]

Paper Proposal: Information, Disparation, Transformation: Simondon, Ruyer, Deleuze and the Affective Pre-Individual Field of Singularities

Wednesday, October 17, 2007

by Taylor Adkins

comment 1

Deleuze / Difference and Repetition / Disparation / individuation / information / philosophy of science / potentiality / pre-individual milieu / Ruyer / Simondon / singularities / Transduction

Paper Proposal : Philosophy of Science Information, Disparation and Affectivity: the Pre-Individual Field of Singularities in Simondon, Ruyer and Deleuze On the importance of disparate series and their internal resonance in the constitution of systems, see Gilbert Simondon, L’individu et sa genese physico-biologique, Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1964, p. 20. (However, Simondon maintains as a condition the requirement of resemblance between series, or the smallness of the differences in play: pp. 254-7). [Gilles Deleuze. […]

French Translations: Works in Progress

Wednesday, October 3, 2007

by Taylor Adkins

comments 23

Bachelard / badiou / Boudot / Deleuze / French Translation / guattari / Laruelle / Lautman / Lyotard / Ruyer / Serres / Simondon / Stengers / Untranslated Theory / Whitehead

My last six posts have all been translations; they range from philosophy of science to paradigms for approaching and studying Nietzsche. I plan to continue working on translating Boudot’s work (including sections from three of his books on Nietzsche, featuring comparisons of Nietzsche with Bataille, Camus, and Bachelard); Ruyer’s work (Genesis of Living Forms, Cybernetics and the Origin of Information, and The Paradoxes of Consciousness and the Limits of Automatism); Guattari’s work (Schizoanalytic Cartographies; The […]

Translation: Simondon and the Physico-Biological Genesis of the Individual

Wednesday, October 3, 2007

by Taylor Adkins

comments 6

abstraction / French Translation / individuation / metastability / morphology / ontogenesis / ontology / Simondon

Simondon, Gilbert. L’individu et sa genèse physico-biologique. Paris : Presses Universitaires de France, 1964. Original Translation by Taylor Adkins. Chapter One: Form and Matter Section I—Foundations of the Hylemorphic Model: Technology of the Capture of Form 1. The Conditions of Individuation: pp. 27-39. The notions of form and matter can help solve the problem of individuation only if they are first compared to its position. So if by the contrast it was discovered that the […]

A Sketch of Gilbert Simondon

Wednesday, September 19, 2007

by Taylor Adkins

comment 1

becoming / being / biology / equilibrium / flux / individuation / metastability / ontogenesis / ontology / Simondon / singularities

Simondon, Gilbert. “The Genesis of the Individual.” Trans. Mark Cohen and Sanford Kwinter. Incorporations. Ed. Jonathan Crary. New York: Zone, 1992. 296-319. At the same time that a quantity of potential energy (the necessary condition for a higher order of magnitude) is actualized, a portion of matter is organized and distributed (the necessary condition for a lower order of magnitude) into structured individuals of a middle order of magnitude, developing by a mediate process of […]