Mairie Maclean helps me is the best rhizomatic fashion with the
reference/citation from Deleuze's interview in _Pourparler_, "Les
Intercesseurs," that appears in English (trans. Martin Joughin) in
_Zone_ 6 "Incorporations" as "Mediators." I found therein a statement
by Deleuuze that speaks pertinently to the questions of *silences*: "
. . . The problem [today] is no longer getting people to express
themselves, but providing little gaps of solitude and silence in which
they might eventually find something to say. Repressive forces don't
stop people from expressing themselves, but rather, force them to
express themselves. What a relief to have nothing to say, the right to
say nothing, because only then is there a chance of framing the rare,
or ever rarer, thing that might be worth saying." (Zone 177/
Pourparlers 288-89)
Some other "lines" gleaned/extended from recent posts:
Re Erich Schneider's comments on modes of structuring space: the
excerpt that Mairie Maclean chose from _Pourparlers_ includes a
pertinent comment by Deleuze, that I think is useful in thinking
(through) "cyber"-rhizome connections:
"A concept is full of a critical, political and liberating force. It
is precisely the power of the systyem that alone can distinguish what
is good or bad, what is new or not, living or not, in a construction
of concepts. Nothing is absolutely good, eveything depends on
systematic use, and on discretion. In _Mille plateaux_ we are trying
to say: goodness is never certain (for example, a _smooth space_ is
not sufficiant to overcome stratification and constraints, nor is a
_body without organs_ necessarily adequate to overcome
organizations)." (Pourparlers 48)
Also, in Erich's post, the reference to De Landa's "interview" in
_Mondo 2000_ sent me to the issue itself (Davis, Erik, "DeLanda
Destratified" _Mondo 2000_ 8 (1992): 44-48):
"I don't believe there is such a thing as postmodernism. It's
exhausted. We truly need a complete new thing, and [Deleuze and
Guattari's] _ATP_ is the direction. Those guys are fifty or sixty
years ahead of everyone else. . . . They're already going into future
technology: how could you put together a bird song with a wind with an
Indian chant and make a machine of those three? I don't bother with
their disciples, who think all you have to do is repeat words like
'deterritorialization" and "binary machines" like little mantras,
without really understanding that those guys are _engineers_. Not
philosophers -- engineers of the year 2035. I have no heroes and no
one mystifies me except for those guys. I don't know how they derive
their knowledge. They must _trip_" (46).
I approach this list without feeling any need to apologize. "I have
nothing to admit," as it were, in working with/through D&G, D, and G,
so when I read Erich's post and reflections on IP-space, I did not at
all think of him as "one of the poseurs" to which De Landa seemed to
refer. But in fact, I think De Landa is a bit harsh. None of us on
this list "have [anything] to admit" or apologize for. If, in working
with/through the concepts that perplex/excite/propel us forward, one
happens to enunciate a term/concept without full confidence of the
"appropriate" use of it, so what? One works, nonetheless, and moves
forward along that line until/as it connects with yet another, so many
"bifurcations" that move the "rhizome" forward. After all, as De Landa
emphasizes at the end of the _Mondo 2000_ piece:
"As [D&G] say, the key word here is not wisdom, but caution. You don't
know what happens at bifurcations. You have absolutely no control. The
smallest fluctuation can make things go wrong. The predictive power of
humans and technology is nil near bifurcations. All you can do is
approach carefully, because the last thing you want to do is get
swallowed up by a chaotic attractor that's too huge in phase space. As
Deleuze says, 'Always keep a piece of fresh land with you at all
times.' Always keep a little spot where you can go back to sleep after
a day of destratification. Always keep a small piece of territory,
otherwise you'll go nuts" (48).
And as for our own intersections/extensions here, two more "cuttings"
from the "Les Intercesseurs"/"Mediators" interview with Deleuze may be
pertinent:
"Mediators are fundamental. Creation is all about mediators. Without
them, nothing happens. They can be people --artists or scientists for
a philosopher; philosophers or artists for a scientist -- but things
as well, even plants or animals, as in Carlos Castaneda. Whether
they're real or imaginary, animate or inanimate, one must form one's
mediators. It's a series: if you don't belong to a series, even a
completely imaginary one, you're lost. I need my mediators to express
myself, and they'd never express themselves without me: one is always
working in a group, even when it doesn't appear to be the case. And
all the more so when it's apparent -- F?lix Guattari and I are one
another's mediators." (Zone 285/ Pourparlers 170-171) . . .
"To say that 'truth is created' implies that the production of truth
involves a series of operations that amount to working on a material
-- strictly speaking, a series of falsifications. When I work with
Guattari, each of us falsifies each other -- which is to say, each of
us understands in his own way notions put forward by the other. A
reflective series with two terms takes shape. And there can be series
with several terms, or complicated branching series. This capacity of
falsity to produce truth is what mediators are all about" (Zone 286;
Pourparlers 172)
More anon. CJ Stivale
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