On Heidegger on logic

Continental Philosophy Review

Volumn 34, Issue 4, 2001, Pages 455-476

  Käufer, Stephan ^a  

^a FRANKLIN AND MARSHALL COLLEGE   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 52549083511     PISSN: 13872842     EISSN: 15731103     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1023/A:1013110920041     Document Type: Review

References (37)

1. Badiou, Alain, Deleuze: The Clamor of Being, trans. Louise Burchill (Minneapolis and London: University of Minnesota Press, 2000). Translator's Preface, p. xii. Cited hereafter as DCB.
2. Deleuze, Gilles, Difference and Repetition, trans. Paul Patton (New York and London: The Athlone Press, 1994), p. 304, quoted in Badiou, p. 11. Cited hereafter as DR.
3. "The One is not here the one of identity or of number, and thought has already abdicated if it supposes that there is a single and same Being. The power of the One is much rather that 'beings are multiple and different, they are always produced by a disjunctive synthesis, and they themselves are disjoined and divergent, membra disjoncta' " (DCB, p. 24).
4. "One wonders whether this Event with a capital 'E' might not be Deleuze's Good" (DCB, p. 27).
5. "[I]f the only way to think a political revolution, an amorous encounter, an invention of the sciences, or a creation of art as distinct infinities ... is by sacrificing immanence (which I do not actually believe is the case, but that is not what matters here) and the univocity of Being, then I would sacrifice them" (DCB, pp. 91-92).
6. Indeed, Deleuze's theme of immanent causality, worked out through Spinoza, in which effects are no less real than their causes, should be enough to dismiss this idea. See Deleuze, Gilles, Expressionism in Philosophy: Spinoza, trans. Martin Joughin (New York: Zone Books, 1992), pp. 169-174.
7. See, for example, the reference to "the chaotic interference of all the virtualities in the One" (DCB, p. 71), and the description of the diagram of outside forces, which "causes the disjointed objects ... to enter into a formal composition, which rests characterized by exteriority, but now activated by its 'forceful' seizure" (p. 87).
8. See, for example, reference to the virtual as "the deployment of the One in its immanent differentiation" whereby it is its own "process of actualization" (DCB, p. 49).
9. Badiou acknowledges Deleuze's claim that "there is neither one nor multiple" only to declare: "But, as always with Deleuze, going beyond a static (quantitative) opposition always turns out to involve the qualitative raising up of one of its terms" (DCB, p. 10).
10. Todd May ("Difference and Unity in Gilles Deleuze" in Boundas, Constantin V and Olkowski, Dorothea, eds., Gilles Deleuze and the Theater of Philosophy (New York and London: Routledge, 1994), pp. 33-50) argues that while Deleuze opposes transcendental principles of unity he is not opposed to an underlying unity or sameness per se, and that he articulates such a unity through the concept of a surface organizing diverse singularities.
11. Indeed, May says, Deleuze becomes incoherent at those times in which he posits differences as prior to this unitary surface, which is to say when he gives primacy to difference over identity. Rather, May contends, unity and multiplicity must be considered equiprimordial. Peter Hallward ("Gilles Deleuze and the redemption from interest", Radical Philosophy, 81 (Jan/Feb, 1997), pp. 6-21) argues that Deleuze's philosophy is one of redemption structurally similar to St. Paul's, seeking an escape from this world to a Real beyond all representation and finitude, and understanding this Real not as a multiplicity but rather the self-differentiation of the One: "Invariably, 'multiplicity' with Deleuze is the predicate of a radical, self-differing singularity. His multiple is not the plural, but the internal consequence of univocity ... With Deleuze, we know that everything is Real, that all inheres on the same plane. Yet the redemptive movement remains. The enabling conclusion follows necessarily: everything is Real -but some things are more Real than others. Univocity guarantees the integrity of a single quantitative scale of reality, a single matrix of salvation (the more or less redeemed). In a way, this matrix is more 'damming', more 'inclusive', than Paul's dualism. Deleuze's redemptive philosophy, coupled with his ontological univocity, ensures a hierarchy of beings every bit as dizzying as the vertical layering of Lights in Suhrawardi's cosmology" (p. 18). Both May and Hallward severely distort the theme of univocity, and May in particular forces on Deleuze the spurious alternative of affirming either a co-relation of unity and difference or some sort of oxymoronic "pure difference" in which differences are merely indifferent to one another.
12. The very reference of Heidegger should serve notice that this sameness is not to be understood in terms of any unity. For in Identity and Difference Heidegger conceives the sameness between thought and being proclaimed by Parmenides as a 'belonging together' of differences that exceeds any synthesis of identity: "If we think of belonging together in the customary way, the meaning of belonging is determined by the word together, that is, by its unity. In that case, 'to belong' means as much as: to be assigned and placed into the order of a 'together,' established in the unity of a manifold, combined into the unity of a system, mediated by the unifying center of an authoritative synthesis... However, belonging together can also be thought of as belonging together. This means: the 'together' is now determined by the belonging. Of course, we must still ask here what 'belong' means in that case, and how its peculiar 'together' is determined only in its terms... Enough for now that this reference makes us note the possibility of no longer representing belonging in terms of the unity of the together, but rather of experiencing this together in terms of belonging" (Heidegger, Martin, Identity and Difference, trans. Joan Stambaugh (New York, Evanston and London: Harper & Row, Publishers, 1969), p. 29).
13. This text figures prominently in one of Deleuze's most focused and affirmative engagements with Heidegger; see DR, pp. 64-66.
14. As Aristotle says of any definition, "[T]he reality of a thing is the last such predication to hold of these atoms", but these predicates must belong further than the subject predicated, even though "all 〈of them together〉 will not 〈belong〉 further" (Posterior Analytics, trans. Jonathan Barnes (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1975), 11.13).
15. "But when we come to the concrete thing, e.g. this circle -which is a particular individual, either sensible or intelligible... -of these individuals there is no definition; we apprehend them by intelligence or perception; and when they have passed from the sphere of actuality it is uncertain whether they exist or not, but they are always spoken of and apprehended by the universal formula. But the matter is in itself unknowable" (Aristotle, Metaphysics, 1 vols., trans. Hugh Tredennick (Cambridge, MA and London: Loeb Classics, 1933-1935), 7.10, pp. 361-363).
16. Aristotle, Metaphysics, op cit, 3.3, p. 119. See also 11.1, p. 57. Cited hereafter as MP.
17. See Plato, The Republic, trans. GMA. Grube (Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Company, 1974), 506d-511.
18. As Aristotle writes: "The term 'being' is used in various senses, but with reference to the one central idea and one definite characteristic, and not as merely a common epithet" (MP, 4.2, p. 147).
19. Aquinas, St. Thomas, Summa Theologiae: A Concise Translation, edited by Timothy McDermot (Westminster, MD: Christian Classics, 1989), 1.1.13.5, p. 32. Cited hereafter as ST.
20. The analogy of divine attributes, however, is commonly differentiated from that of 'health' as being a metaphysical analogy, meaning that the attributes are not intrinsically held only by one thing and then attributed to others by act of intellect alone - what is termed an analogy of attribution. It also differs from a physical analogy in which several beings intrinsically share the same trait in the same manner or more, but according to different degrees of perfection, so that man and dog, for example, are both animals, but one is a more perfect animal than the other. Against this standard reading of the analogy of being, see McInerny, Ralph, The Logic of Analogy: An Interpretation of St. Thomas (The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1961).
21. "Now, if we ask what is the instance capable of proportioning the concept to the terms or to the subjects of which it is affirmed, it is clear that it is judgment" (DR, p. 33).
22. Aquinas accepts equivocity here as the limit to human knowledge of God, holding that reason can demonstrate God's existence, and a set of predicates that can be analogically attributed to him, but that the divine essence remains opaque (on this point see Gildon, Etienne, The Christian Philosophy of St. Thomas Aquinas, trans. L.K. Shook, CSB (Notre Dame: The University of Notre Dame Press, 1956), pp. 107-110).
23. However, it is unclear that this distinction can be sustained. It functions on the Thomist division between essence (ens) and existence of act-of-being (esse), whereby only the latter can be demonstrated by the rationalist arguments for the first mover. But as a result, the famous five proofs of God's existence violate Aristotle's rule that demonstrative proof requires a definition of the thing in question (that is, its essence) as a middle term in its syllogism. Aquinas maintains that Aristotle's requirement is applicable only when arguing from cause to effect, not effect back to cause, where "the central link is not what the cause is (since we cannot even ask what a thing is until we know that it exists) but what the name of the cause is used to mean" (ST, 1.1.2.2., p. 12). To this, Duns Scotus replies: "There is no point in distinguishing between a knowledge of His essence and a knowledge of His existence... For I never know anything to exist unless I first have some concept of that of which existence is affirmed" and therefore being must be a univocal concept with "sufficient unity to serve as the middle term of a syllogism" (Duns Scotus, John, Philosophical Writings, trans. Allan Wolter, OFM (Indianapolis and Cambridge: Hackett Publishing Company, 1987), pp. 16, 20. Cited hereafter as PW).
24. "According to [Henry of Ghent], by conceiving 'wise' we grasp a property or quasi-property which perfects the nature after the manner of a secondary act. In order to conceive 'wise', therefore, it is necessary to have a conception of some prior subject, because I understand this property to be verified existentially. And so we must look beyond all our ideas of attributes or quasi-attributes, in order to find a quidditative concept to which the former may be attributed. This other concept will be a quidditative notion of God, for our quest for a quasi-subject will not cease with any other kind of concept" (PW, p. 19).
25. On the significance of these attacks being directed at Henry rather than Aquinas, see Wolter, Allan B., The Transcendentals and Their Function in the Metaphysics of Duns Scotus (New York: The Franciscan Institute, 1946), pp. 32-33;
26. Prentice, Robert P., The Basic Quidditative Metaphysics of Duns Scotus as Seen in His De Primo Principio (Antonianum, 1970), pp. 21-23.
27. "Hence the Philosopher, in III Metaphysics [ch. 3, 998b 22-27] does not show that being is not a genus because of any equivocation, but because it has a greater commonness and univocation than the commonness of a genus"
28. (Scotus, Lectura, I, d. 3, p. 1, q. 1-2,
29. quoted in Prentice, Scotus, Lectura, I, d. 3, op cit., p. 54).
30. See Gilson, Etienne, History of Christian Philosophy in the Middle Ages (London: Sheed & Ward, 1955), pp. 456-457.
31. "Hence, all to which 'being' is not univocal in quid are included in those to which 'being' is univocal in this way. And so it is clear that 'being' has a primacy of commonness in regard to the primary intelligibles, that is, to the quidditative concepts of the genera, species, individuals, and all their essential parts, and to the Uncreated Being. It has a virtual primacy in regard to the intelligible elements included in the first intelligibles, that is, in regard to the qualifying concepts of the ultimate differences and proper attributes" (PW, p. 4).
32. The criticisms of other theories and the argument for the theory of haecceity are found in Duns Scotus, John, "Six Questions on Individuation from His Ordinatio, II. d. 3, part 1, qq. 1-6" in Spade, Vincent, editor/translator, Five Texts on the Medieval Problem of Universals (Indianapolis and Cambridge: Hackett Publishing Company, Inc., 1994), pp. 57-113. Cited hereafter as SQ.
33. As an essence, it is still characteristic of quiddity that it can be predicated of several things: quiddity marks a thing as a thing, but does not make it this thing. See SQ, nn. 181-182, pp. 104-105.
34. "Every quidditative entity (whether partial or total) in some genus is of itself indifferent as a quidditative entity to this individual entity and that one, in such a way that as a quidditative entity it is naturally prior to this individual entity insofar as it is a 'this' " (SQ, n. 187, pp. 106-107).
35. "In Nietzsche the essential relation of one force to another is never conceived of as a negative element in the essence. In its relation with the other the force which makes itself obeyed does not deny the other or that which it is not, it affirms its own difference and enjoys this difference" (Deleuze, Gilles, Nietzsche and Philosophy, trans. Hugh Tomlinson (London: The Athlone Press, 1983), 1.4, pp. 8-9).
36. Deleuze, Gilles, "Plato and the Simulacrum" in The Logic of Sense, trans. Mark Lester with Charles Stivale, ed. Constantin V. Boundas (New York: Columbia University Press, 1990), pp. 253-266, p. 253. Cited hereafter as PS.1
37. "Was it not inevitable that Plato should be the first to overturn Platonism, or at least to show the direction such an overturning should take?" (DR, p. 68).