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Outline of Gilles Deleuze The Fold PDF
Outline of Gilles Deleuze The Fold PDF
I. The Fold
3. What is Baroque?
(A) The room without windows
1. That Monads have no windows replaces the image of painting &
model with a line of ∞ inflection holding for a surface – an opaque
grid of inscription – a tabulation of information.
2. The monad’s dark background is essential to it – a room covered
with lines of variable inflection.
3. The Baroque invests in places where what is seen is inside. Like
camera obscura the light comes from openings that are hidden, &
trompe l’oeil cover the walls. Baroque architecture: a cell w/o
windows or doors where everything happens inside.
4. The monad is an inside w/o an outside. In contrast the façade is an
outside w/o an inside & full of holes. Organic matter sketches a
relative interiorization, always unfinished. A fold passes through
living material allotting the metaphysical principle of life to the
absolute interiority of the monad & makes the ∞ exteriority of
matter into the physical law of phenomena.
(B) The inside and the outside, the high and the low
1. The Baroque severs the façade from the inside, while each pushes
the other to the fore. A new kind of link is needed between the
independent determined outside & the autonomous spontaneous
inside.
2. The link is possible because of the division into an elongated lower
floor of ∞ receptivity formed by heavy matter w/holes & an upper
floor as pure inside w/walls hung w/folds of the soul. Leibniz
makes these coexist via a tendency towards lowest equilibrium
states & a tendency toward a system of weightlessness in which
souls become reasonable. These are distributed as a function of an
ideal line actualized on one side, realized on the other.
3. Platonic division of two worlds is of an ∞ staircases from the
multiple to the One. But the Baroque is characterized by two floors
separated by a fold that echoes itself.
4. In painting Tintoretto & El Greco paint this two floor theme.
(C) Heidegger, Mallarmé, and the fold
1. Severing the inside from the outside along the Fold that actualized
in the folds of the soul & effected along the creases of matter.
Heidegger differentiator of difference does not refer to a pre-given
undifferentiated, but to an endlessly folds/unfolds Difference from
each of its two sides unfolding one (unconcealing) while folding
the other (concealing) relating one to the other by distinguishing
them.
2. Mallarmé’s fan reveals withdrawal on its sensitive side & finds
inclusion on its closed side.
3. Every fold of matter which we see becomes included in the folds of
the soul which we read. These are not two worlds but
correspondence through the Event – the unity which creates being.
4. For Leibniz, these were the veins in marble: on one side living
matter, on the other side inclusion in the soul. “To read” for
Leibniz is the inner act in the monad.
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II. Inclusions
4. Sufficient Reason
(A) Events or predicates
1. Everything that happens (including causations) has a reason.
Sufficient reason includes the event as one of its predicates.
2. Inflection is the event that happens to a line. Inclusion is the
predication that places inflection in the concept of the line – in a
metaphysical point. The seen on the thing is read in its concept
(signature/enclosure). Sufficient reason is inclusion: event =
predicate – every predicate is grounded in the nature of things in
the subject/concept of the thing.
3. For Leibniz, the concept is a metaphysical not merely a logical
being, it is individual (not general) defined by predicates-as-events.
4. Analysis discovers predicates in a notion taken as a subject or a
subject for an event-as-predicate. Re: necessary truths the predicate
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22. Essences are always in an infinity. Re: essences, we can stop & use
a definition as if it were an Identical, a Requisite as if it were a
definition, of a Limit as if it were reached. But re: existences we
cannot stop since series can be extended & inclusion cannot be
localized.
23. All analysis is ∞ (whether of essences or existences). The entire
world is included in an existent, the virtual is the character of an
inclusion that cannot be localized. The world is virtually 1st, while
the monad is actually 1st. Inclusion is virtual since it has to be
extracted, & the predicate is included in the subject only “under a
certain power.”
24. E.g. irrational numbers: roots to be extracted, or differential
relations involving quantities not of the same power. Analysis of
things = determination of predicates as requisites by extracting
roots or depotentializing magnitudes (re: intrinsic limits). Analysis
of existents = determination of predicates as world by prolonging
series of powers (re: extrinsic limits). Objective incertitude re:
whether the fold passes between essences & existents, or between
essences of God & consequences, or between essences of things &
existents.
(C) Leibniz’s mannerism – The predicate is not an attribute
1. Predicates are only attributes in the case of absolute forms which
are like conditions of possibilities for the notion of God,
nonrelations as conditions of all possible relations. Predicates are
relations or events. Events are relations to existence & time. The
notion or subject is an event marked by a verb or a relation marked
by a preposition. Unilateral inclusion ≠ proposition as attribution.
2. Attributes express qualities & designate essences. For Leibniz
predicates are not defined by qualities or an existing subject. The
subject is defined by its unity, the predicate = a verb expressing
action/passion. Leibnizian inclusion has the scheme subject-verb-
object not that of attribution subject-copula-attribute. Predication is
a change/movement/act, not the state of travel. The predicate is
the proposition itself. “I travel.”/”I think.” ≠ “I am a traveling
being.”/”I am thinking being.” Thought is not a stable attribute,
but a predicate passing from one thought to another.
3. The predicate as verb is the basis of the conception of the event
(neither attribute nor quality), but an incorporeal (Stoics) predicate
of a proposition’s subject (e.g. “The tree greens.”). The proposition
state a manner (aspect) of being. The Stoics substitute “to follow”
for Aristotle’s “to be” substituting manner for essence. For Leibniz,
the world is an event, & as incorporeal/virtual predicate must be
included in every subject, from which a manner (point of view is
extracted. The world is predication & the subject what goes from
one predicate (aspect of the world) to another. Basis-manners
displaces essence.
4. Leibniz is always concerned w/relations. That predicates are
internal relations cannot easily be extracted from sentences. The
predicate or subject may not be given (e.g.s in text p. 54). The
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God foresees & preordains the degrees of a soul’s amplitude, & that
another degree would be another soul does not hinder liberty. The
soul is free because every time it constitutes the motive of the event
it produces – it is programmed by motivation where material
things are programmed for mechanical acts.
(I) Leibniz and Bergson: movement as it happens
1. Leibniz & Bergson have the same: (a) critique of illusion re: motives
(b) conception of inflections of the soul (c) inherence/inclusion as
condition of free acts (d) free act as what expresses the self (e) the
problem of God’s foreknowledge which Leibniz resolves by appeal
to God the reader who unfolds all pleats developed sensorily over
time. The present seems to lose its privilege via predestination.
2. To say that God is omnipresent is to sate that God passes through
all conditions of the monad & coincides w/it at the instant of
action. Reading consists in grasping the tendency by which the
following condition arises from the preceding.
3. The point of view of each monad results from God’s reading which
traverses & coincides w/the monad. The monad is free since its
action results from what passes through & happens within it.
Eternity consists of this coincidence w/all the passages.
(J) Baroque damnation
1. The system of inclusion threatens morality rather than liberty. The
amplitude of the reasonable soul is its clear area (its living present).
Amplitude can vary statistically re: child/adult/aged – good/bad
health… & re; amplitude’s limits. Morality = trying to expand
amplitude to produce a free act expressing the most possible in a
monad’s condition.
2. This is a morality of progress: Q: have I chosen that where
amplitude is maximal. Adam was too lazy to explore enough. A
soul’s progress = extending its clear region (prolonging God’s
passage to the max), actualizing all singularities in focus, &
winning over to new singularities = imitating God, an
intensification (amplification) of an elevation of power, growth in
dimensions, & gain in distinction.
3. This seems limited by the totality of progress in the world
(convergence of all areas – compossible monads. However, this
fails to note that monads are not simultaneous, they must await
their time of clarity. In death we fold infinitely on ourselves.
Resurrection brings a final elevation. The damned only enclose
their hatred of God – the maximum of rage/minimum of
amplitude of reason. The dramatic order of time: rise, descent, rise.
4. The monad comes to live, its task, more when called to reason, i.e.,
unfolds its clear zone – to develop all its perceptions. Yet, at the
same time (a) an ∞ of monads remains folded (b) an ∞ fold onto
themselves (c) an ∞ is damned, hardened in a single fold that will
not unfold. These three allow a monad to amplify the area
unfolded during its reasonable life, bringing development,
distinction, & reflection to its region, & hence exceed statistical
variations. This is not a zero sum game, only the damned cannot so
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6. What Is an Event?
(A) Whitehead the successor
1. Whitehead raises the Q: What is an event? Like Leibniz he accepts
the play of principles, multiplication of categories, conciliates
universals & individual examples, transforms the concept into a
subject, & critiques attributes. Events are produced in chaos only if
a sort of screen intervenes.
2. Chaos does not exist, since a screen intervenes that makes
something emerge from chaos. Chaos would be a purely
disjunctive diversity (Many), something is a One, a singularity.
Something emerges from Chaos because a screen intervenes, e.g. all
possibles (chaos) get screened allowing only compossibles & the
best.
3. Chaos would be a depthless shadow, but the screen splits off the
fuscum subnigrum (containing all colors). Psychically chaos would
be the sum of all possible perceptions, while the screen extracts
differentials integrated in ordered perceptions. The screen
comprises infinite series of wholes & parts appearing chaotic
because we cannot follow them.
(B) Extension, intensity, the individual
1. Three conditions of the event: (a) Extension: one element stretched
as a whole over following elements, its parts – forming an ∞ series
w/o end or limit. The event is a vibration w/∞ harmonics (space &
time = abstract coordinates of all series that are in extension ≠
limits. (b) extensive series have intrinsic properties (intensity,
timbre, a tint, a value…) Matter offers characters determining its
texture – intensities [cf. Kant].
2. (c) the individual: for Whitehead = creation of the new. Element =
everything that is a part & that has parts + intrinsic features. The
individual = a concrescence of elements, i.e., a prehension =
individual unity of elements. Everything prehends its antecedents
& concomitants &, by degrees, the world. Prehension moves from
the world to the subject (from prehended datum to prehending
one, from public to private, potential & real, the subject of its own
becoming & the belonging to the becoming of another event. The
event is a nexus of prehensions, always the objectification of one
prehension & subjectification of another.
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3. Because of this fold over folds, the unfolded surface is never the
opposite of the fold but moves from some perceptions to others.
Unfolding: (a) drawing a great fold over ∞ tiny folds (b) undoing
tiny folds that pass through all thresholds unveiling their dark
depth. Always unfolding between two folds & so always
perceiving in the folds.
(G) Second stage: from perception to the organic body
1. No perception has an object: conscious perception refers only to the
physical mechanism of differential relations among unconscious
perceptions, & these are related only to the metaphysical
mechanism of the world existing solely in the monads –
unconscious perceptions are representatives not representations of
the world.
2. We grasp figures w/o objects that arise from the depths & fall back.
I see into the folds – the situation of perception is the event & which
is always collective.
3. Deduction stage 1: monad what is perceived (phenomena). But,
then, only phenomena exist. The perceived is not a given, but is
generated by differential relations among microperceptions. This
does not justify the conclusion that our body exists nor that other
bodies affect it.
4. The collection of unconscious perceptions has no unity; it receives
unity from differential relations carried out by thought.
(H) What does perception look like?
1. Q: Why go beyond phenomena to bodies? W/o bodies there
would be less variety in perceivers (no animals, e.g.). More
important, the perceived resembles something that forces reflection
on it, e.g., pain resembles the movement of something digging into
my flesh.
2. Perception resembles, not an object, but by evoking a vibration
gathered by a receptive organ, e.g., pain resembles a multiplicity of
tiny movements (throbs) in the flesh. Resemblance is like a
projection, pain projected on the material vibrations. Projection is
an analogy: minute perceptions/conscious perceptions = vibrations
of matter/the organ.
3. That the perceived resembles something does not mean perception
represents an object. Affective qualities, confused or obscure
perceptions resembles as projective or natural signs resembling
matter in extension (vibrations, tendencies in motion). Geometry
plunges into obscurity. Resemblance = what resembles not what is
resembled – matter is necessarily produced in conformity w/this
relation – the likeness is itself the model making matter be that
which it resembles.
4. Q: How does the material side of the analogy presented? Here the
Q re: differential calculus is that of obscure perceptions.
(I) Organs and vibrations: the physical mechanism of excitation
1. Differential calculus is not adequate for infinitesimal things, since
the existing ∞ is not whole/part nor does it tend towards a limit.
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that now arises is the animal & all animalcules inseparable from the
fluid parts of my body.
3. Animals in nature are enlargements of animalcules, an animal
monadology. These are temporary appurtenances, since my sphere
of appurtenances discovers me. It is therefore difficult to know
what belongs to me (e.g. Beckett’s Malone). A metaphysical
vinculum is needed to sort out what belongs to me.
4. This is philosophically important in that Having come to replace
Being. It is new that species, degrees, relations & variables of
possession are used to analyze the content & development of Being.
5. Since perceptions as included predicates replace attributes,
predication is a having. Likewise, the body, an extrinsic property,
introduces temporalization, precariousness into having. There
cannot, then, be having once & for all. Havings are continuously
reshuffled relations between monads (both re: harmony & union).
Monads have other monads (cells, atoms…) as their properties.
These are phenomena of domination/subjugation & appropriation
under a certain power – to have is to convey what one contains w/
a certain power, & so is associated w/capitalism.
(G) Domination and vinculum
1. Expression as a code of correspondences as domination as a
reading of appurtenances & possessions. A specific body belongs
to my monad as long as my monad dominates its monads. A body
always belongs to me since its parts are continuously replaced like
Theseus' ship. But, domination would be vague w/o being defined
by a substantial vinculum – a complex relation of variable terms &
a constant term.
2. The constant term = the dominant monad. Dominating other
monads (variable terms) cannot be a predicate contained in a
subject. The dominant monad is a subject of adhesion of the
vinculum.
3. This seems paradoxical since monads are absolute interiorities
(inner surfaces w/only one side), yet re: the vinculum this surface
as an outside. But, the condition of closure is an ∞ fold that can be
unfolded only by recovering the outside of its own interiority, the
vinculum, membrane coextensive w/everything inside, an
unlocalizable link bordering the absolute interior.
4. Variables enter into a relation exterior to them, an outside of the
constant dominating ∞ variables under this relation. This relation
presupposes the individuality of the monads & their perceptions,
for it neither depends on them nor they on it. The relation extracts
a common modification, an Echo, they all have together when
reflected on the surface of a wall.
5. The vinculum is this reflecting wall, the form of the outside.
Variable monads are emitters, the echo is the modification of the
whole. The vinculum dominates its variables as a mass effect (not
in their individuality) – it acquires monad en masse inverting
appurtenance. The monads, then, belong to ∞ material parts
inseparable from them. They make up the specificity of these parts
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