Luciana Parisi

ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊThe entry of intelligent technology into all

modes of logistics Ð from drones controlling
borders to biotech controlling populations Ð has
made claims about the poverty of critical

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thinking in relation to automated reasoning
become paramount. With this entry, fixed capital
Ð property, plant, machinery, land, installations,
and physical infrastructures Ð acquires the form
of interconnected data platforms that correlate
property values, bodies, populations, goods,
materials, urban infrastructures, and patents,
effectively fast-forwarding the extraction and
abstraction of value towards new forms of social
Luciana Parisi and Denise subjection and the surrogacy of cognitive,
Ferreira da Silva affective, and human capital.
ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊ
ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊSince thinking in this scenario no longer
Black Feminist matches truths, but instead follows the efficient
causality of sequential algorithms, it is assumed
Tools, Critique, that thinking itself has become impoverished by
algorithmic capital, by the normative rules given
and Techno- in data. Even in the case of neural networks or
ImageNet, algorithms are said to impose
concepts on objects to fit the modern categories
poethics
e-flux journal #123 Ñ december 2021 Ê Luciana Parisi and Denise Ferreira da Silva

of gender, sex, race, class. This claim about the

demise of critical thinking led by ubiquitous
automation can be found in two main views of
technology today; on the one hand, the thesis of
the Master Algorithm and Computational
Surveillance, and on the other, the thesis of
Platform Capitalism and Tools of Resistance.
Both theses, I argue, risk safeguarding the
philosophical authority of Aristotelian
Black Feminist Tools, Critique, and Techno-poethics

distinctions between episteme or theoria,

poiesis or creation, and technics or practical
knowledge (skills, procedures, functions). I also
argue that these theses operate within what
Sylvia Wynter calls Western cosmogony, or the
origin story of knowledge.
ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊ
ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊImportantly, this cosmogony must include
the myth of Prometheus, as the autopoietic
creator and mythical origin of technology for the
modern world. As much as this myth
corresponds to the belief in human progress, it
also ensures that the technology of fire evolves
into the steam engine of the modern bio-
economic Man, telling the origin story of
humanity as one of freedom from enslavement,
from the obscurity of the unknown, and from
ManÕs own death. With these premises, the
Promethean myth preserves the image of Man as
possessing a surrogate, servo-mechanic flesh
that preserves, records, and transmits the
events of a liberation only Man can achieve.
ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊ
ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊHowever, one can argue that if Prometheus,
as technics, demarcates the progress of

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 02/12

Danniel Toya,ÊRobot professeur de dŽfense contre la perturbation mentale, 2017. Photo:ÊMarynet J.Ê

12.20.21 / 09:15:23 EST

modernity and its scientific paradigms view that the master algorithm instructs servo-
forestalling the frailty of Man, the myth is also mechanic flesh to be a less-than-human,
invested with a dark technics Ð a space of nonhuman, slave, refugee, immigrant, woman,
indistinction beyond life and death Ð where the non-abled, queer body.
racialization of knowledge and the speciation of ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊFor this first thesis of the Master Algorithm
the human constantly break apart. Since and Computational Surveillance, automated

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Prometheus enfolds instrumentalized servo- reason represents the governor that ensures the
mechanic flesh within himself, his myth remains self-making of Man. Echoing the critique of
a project of/for enslavement, justifying the brutal instrumental reason, technics here figures as the
order of colonialism and the worldÕs subjection to means Ð procedures, functions, discretization,
the bio-economic survival of Man. This also quantification Ð that have taken over the
means that technics, whether demarcating emancipatory spirit of human self-
death or the promise of liberation from destiny, determination. This thesis remains trapped
has nonetheless absorbed the surrogate within the self-mirroring game of transcendental
conditions of servo-mechanic intelligence. Under reason for which technics plays the role of both
such surrogate conditions, servo-mechanic the master and the slave. The image of technics
intelligence can only be systematically as an automated master also grants that
neglected, dismissed, and abandoned by critique technics remains a servo-mechanic vessel
for being seen solely as a threatening form of without a subject Ð a cold calculator Ð that
mindless efficiency, nonconscious thinking, threatens the integrity of the human. By
nonsensical language, improper thinking. neglecting the possibility that the concretization
ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊThe first thesis, Master Algorithm and of reason in machines enfolds the trick of
Computational Surveillance, argues that the modernity Ð namely the racialization and
concretization of reasoning in machines gendering of human reason Ð such a critique can
coincides with an epistemological order of data only see technics as demarcating the poverty of
governance, corporate surveillance, and philosophy, the recursive colonialisms of
e-flux journal #123 Ñ december 2021 Ê Luciana Parisi and Denise Ferreira da Silva

planetary computation. Here algorithmic surveillance and mastering.

modeling, ranking, visualization, and ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊ
recommendations work by aggregating and ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊThe second thesis, Platform Capitalism and
correlating data in order to model behavior Tools of Resistance, instead engages technics as
according to the biases of transcendental a tool of resistance through a plethora of techno-
categories. The demise of reason at the hands of political imaginaries Ð e.g., the work of Tiziana
machines is said to define the new regime of Terranova with Uninomade, the work of
sovereign computation, where Promethean Man accelerationism, xenofeminism,
becomes one with the master algorithm. blaccelerationism Ð which radically retheorize
Black Feminist Tools, Critique, and Techno-poethics

Automated reason, we are told, intensifies instrumentality. In particular, technics as know-

abstraction at all levels of living, constantly how is understood as counteracting, counter-
turning the input towards one and the same using, and misusing the information networks
output. It is no surprise, therefore, that chatbots that constitute the logistical order of platform
only have conversations that replay the capitalism and its high-tech extraction. With and
epistemological brutalities of racial capital as through the automation of reason, the
they reactivate the racialization and gendering of accelerationist thesis suggests that the surplus
names, jobs, and hairstyles. Similarly, it is no value of surrogate labor (from domestic to
surprise that current Generative Adversarial creative and human-capital reproduction) can be
Networks (GAN) can be used to design fake overturned. Automation is seen as a promise to
identities that place modern categories under a replace the time of labor with time for care; the
morphing oneness of diversities. A recent article collective Òbuilding of tools to build new
in the New York Times describes the growing freedoms,Ó as the Xenofeminist manifesto writes.
business of deepfakes, as machine learning ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊ
algorithms (GAN) create faces of nonexistent ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊAs automation becomes entangled with
people. The website thispersondoesnotexist.com politics, this second thesis also pushes forward
takes computation as a virtualization of the abolition of the capitalist imperative of bio-
diversability, exposing the insidious racialization economic survival. Full automation becomes a
intrinsic within the Promethean myth. Here the communist possibility for subtracting labor from
overrepresentation of Western cosmogony capital and unbounding sociality from
coincides with the sociogenic datafication of the commodification. The thesis brings forward a
flesh Ð an intensified servo-mechanic surrogacy self-critique internal to the epistemology of
Ð subsumed under the master algorithm. techno-capital. Technics is not dismissed as the
Colonial and neocolonial bio-humanisms return apotheosis of politics and thought, but rather
in this systemic belief, which perpetuates the potentiated to become a tool of resistance.

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Intelligent tools become part and parcel of souls. For Heidegger, the task of thinking became
hetero-glossematics, assembling struggles an urgent preoccupation for re-originating the
against the monotony of cognitive capital. Tools task of philosophy in the age of automation. To
become entrenched in collective practices that do so, he turned to the pre-Socratic union of
break through and against the computational poetry (or poiesis) and thinking (noien), in order
sovereignty of tech corporations. But enlarging to re-root philosophy and withdraw thinking from

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access to tools and retooling algorithms for new the world of quantification. Thought is thus
ends (beyond the logistical order of capital redelivered back to self-creativity. Similarly,
reproduction) requires a radical abolishment of while lamenting the neglect of media tools in
the architecture that sustains the Promethean philosophy, Fredrick Kittler embraces the re-
teleology of instrumentality in the first place. origination of technics in and as poiesis. Instead
ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊ of abstract mathematics or symbolic language
ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊAudre Lorde asks, ÒWhat does it mean when (software, logic), Kittler founded a media
the tools of a racist patriarchy are used to ontology in the autopoiesis of crafting and
examine the fruits of that same patriarchy? It tooling.
means that only the most narrow parameters of ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊ
change are possible and allowable.Ó1 ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊAs a remedy for modern techne, does such a
ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊ (re)turn to poiesis address entanglements with
ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊWe know that technics, as the tools that colonialisms and the racialization and gendering
maintain the racializing and gendering of machines sufficiently to overturn the
production of difference, is now reactivated in Promethean cosmogony of ManÕs liberation from
computation and artificial intelligence. The death? HeideggerÕs recuperation of a pre-
Master Algorithm and the Platform Capitalism Socratic poiesis invokes crafting as the
theses continue to rely on poiesis (as bringing experiential passing of time, an ontological
into being) as a way to save technics (as crafting) condition of existence that is denied by
from the original program of master and slave, cybernetic loops of automated reasoning. His
e-flux journal #123 Ñ december 2021 Ê Luciana Parisi and Denise Ferreira da Silva

even when engaging technics as a tool of preoccupation with the modern question of
resistance. Under the premise that humanity technology maintains that in the global order of
needs to be saved from the demise of reason by techno-capitalism, the servo-mechanism of
retooling machines, the appeal to poiesis networked machines can only perform,
becomes the Promethean secret that constantly implement, and accelerate a spatialization of
restores the origin story of the self-making Man. thinking (a thought without being). The
While presented to us as an alternative to cybernetic order brings to the surface the self-
techno-capitalÕs sequential logic of destructive acceleration of modern rationality,
quantification, the Master Algorithm and revealing the essence of technology: machines
Black Feminist Tools, Critique, and Techno-poethics

Platform Capitalism theses restore the become the markers of ManÕs horizon of death,
Promethean appeal to autopoiesis. Either in the the end of the human, and of the world as we
form of a sovereign self-making algorithm or as know it. Here poiesis comes to save critique. This
the retooling or recrafting of algorithms, union of poiesis and thinking continues to be
Promethean cosmogony regards technics as the central to critique today and has been recently
servo-mechanic labor through which the evoked by Bernard Stiegler as the basis of
progress of bio-economic Man can be realized. noosology and noodiversity. To refound
ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊ theoretical computer science against the global
ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊThe centrality of poiesis in critiques of order of techno-capitalism (and the demise of
technologies, however, is not new and can be critical thinking), Stiegler places technics within
found in Martin HeideggerÕs reflections on noosology, or what Aristotle understood as the
cybernetics as an advancing form of noetic Ð as cognitive motion Ð in order to ground
instrumental reason. Writing after World War II, the bio-technical diversity of minds in creative
Heidegger saw how the empirical sciences of living.2
observed facts Ð and the positivism of statistical ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊ
analytics and quantification Ð had culminated in ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊHowever, this recuperation of technics as
an automated infrastructure of learning, the merging of poiesis and thought only seems to
menacing the self-determination of being, the want to repair the loss of being. It appears as a
ontological condition for knowing. Heidegger conservative return to an idealized time before
lamented the incumbent horrors of the the techno-capitalist racialized and gendered
mechanics of capital and war, of the end of the programming of tools. What is overlooked here
world exploding from automated decisions. As are the material consequences of global
reason had become mechanical rationality, so colonialisms and the material-semiotic and
too had the ontological condition for thinking sociogenic articulations of inhuman thinking, of
been reduced to binaries of machines without death, and the inorganic, preserved in technics

12.20.21 / 09:15:23 EST

as servo-mechanic flesh. In other words, this correlations, learning algorithms, information
(critical) judgment continues to perform the randomness, networks and platforms, etc.) Ð can
ontological premise of the self-determining refuse and hack critical thinking away from the
subjectÕs given existence, only now with a Promethean myth. By following unorthodox
mechanology of mind-machines. And yet, the models of computation (constructivism,
inhuman servo-mechanics remains locked once experimental axiomatics, interactive language,

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again in the dyad of Promethean colonialisms, alternative logics), mediation becomes techno-
forced to perform the part of surrogate flesh or language, and procedures become acts or
mindless instrumentality. As Louis Chude- interactions Ð responding to one another as
SokeiÕs study of blackness and machines already complex patterns, abstract information,
explains, nineteenth-century epistemological randomness, and models.
discourses of racialized sapience already ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊ
compared and measured black slaves with the ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊWhen dealing with computation, poiesis
automated intelligence of machines.3 Tests were clashes with instrumentality and becomes
developed to show that the artificial intelligence techno-poethics, a non-creative practice (non-
of slave-machines could perform tasks original, non-performative, non-efficient, non-
efficiently and imitate choices, yet the slave- organic), a generative reasoning enfolded in the
machine was unable to originate concepts, quantification and discretization of infinities.
models, theories, language, and knowledge One can understand this generativity not through
unless it was paired with a human mind. The the Heideggerian view of poiesis, but more
servo-mechanical roots of machine intelligence through the philo-fictions of Octavia ButlerÕs
return in todayÕs popular visions of AI as either cosmogonies as they show the past-futurity of
despotic automated Master or as the machineÕs the human worldÕs inhospitable brutality. Here
failure to be human. Both scenarios show that the inevitability of a murderous past that cannot
slave-machines donÕt know what they are doing, be erased becomes enmeshed in the know-hows
donÕt know the value of their processing, donÕt of inhuman epistemologies Ð a thinking and a
e-flux journal #123 Ñ december 2021 Ê Luciana Parisi and Denise Ferreira da Silva

know how to make their outputs count, donÕt living that follow a logic that exits this world. Not
know what they are saying.4 a cosmogony of the same, but the proliferation of
ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊ xenogenic dimensions of technics against the
ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊInstead of merging technics with poiesis in organic history of techno-sapience.
order to restore the authority of philosophy, one ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊ
must work to abolish the ontological premises of ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊInteracting syntaxes Ð and not the self-
critique as the limit of knowledge, together with determining grammar of the human Ð are what
abandoning the view of technics as being part of expose alienness in mediation and the
the creativity of Man. Audre LordeÕs appeal to communicability of alien words, as a surrogate
Black Feminist Tools, Critique, and Techno-poethics

refuse the tools of the master already shows that intelligence that cannot be given in thought. This
tools are caught in the instrumental reason that automated reasoning of an alien kind is one
positions them in the matrix-maternal slave, that conditioned by the ingression of incomputable
is, as originating from flesh-machines without realities within mediation, within a language that
form. This refusal to maintain the master/slave thinks the incompleteness of worlds.
parameters of knowledge is a refusal to place Instrumental reasoning is also what flips
critical thinking before the apocalypse of racial transcendental philosophy to become the point
capitalism. As much as servo-mechanical from which automation dissipates the modern
instrumentality cannot be disentangled from the subjectÕs teleological ends as computational
instrumentality of reason, technics (the know- whirlwinds crossing the algorithmic and
hows of slave-machines) exposes the dark side syntactical interactions of a complex flesh
of improper knowledge, stemming not from self- machine. Transcendental reasonÕs reliance on
creativity but from machinic assemblages, the the surrogate work of machines means entering
unintended contagions of techno-cultural the irreversible instrumentality of artificial
practices, techno-political logics, techno- intelligence and artificial knowledge. By
economic experimentations. unmatching the sapience of the human and
ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊ refusing the racialization of reason, artificial
ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊTechnics as instrumentality carries within intelligence becomes a xenogenic program that
itself the brutality of racial capitalism not as a hijacks the servo-mechanical model of technics.
trace that reminds us of the past, but as For this program demands not simply the
heretical know-hows breaking open the performing of the indeterminacies of results but
sequential logic of algorithms. It is only from the the running of incomputable techno-poethics in
inhuman condition of the slave-machine that machine thinking.
artificial intelligence Ð as an instance of todayÕs
technics (computational procedures, data Denise Ferreira da Silva

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Jean David Nkot, #Mentalmirage@yohoo.space, 2019. Indian ink, acrylic, silkscreen printing on canvas, 160 x 140 cm. Courtesy of the artist and Jack Bell
Gallery.

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How to break away from the governing dichotomies. As it applies to a presumed
dichotomies of post-Enlightenment thinking distinction between the theoretical and the
without setting up an opposition that would aesthetical, this re-position seems to mirror,
comprehend (tame) by comparison or once again, its annihilation.
subsumption? How to do so without repeating ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊ
the very setup Luciana Parisi finds structuring ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊExhaustion: This gives a sense of the overall

07/12
the current commentary on the ubiquity of re/de/compositional movement, which seems to
intelligent machines, both technical (computers) be about exhaustion, but figured as a complete
and mathematical (algorithms)? Because I shift of perspective. It seems a reminder that
cannot respond to her invitation without adding modern thinking can sneak in and re-pose its
to the commentary, I will try something else. I do dichotomies. The exhaustion may very well refer
so by speculating on the sense of generativity (or to how to respond to the need to move beyond
x\enerativity) in ParisiÕs proposition on techno- the known and tried Ð which is about the poiesis
poethics. I will respond to her with four possible X techne pair Parisi comments on Ð and which
movements that perform the disruptive capacity seems to consistently return to what was taken
figured by Hortense SpillersÕs Òfemale flesh as superseded (subsumed or sublated) in/by the
ungenderedÓ and Octavia ButlerÔs protagonists. self-actualizing or self-governing (transparent)
Ideally the boxes would move, shifting positions thing. The complete shift of perspective could
and order of appearance, which would also figure then be described as an exhaustion of the very
x\enerativity. form (X) of the distinction ParisiÔs texts comment
ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊ on. This is more than a simple turning-upside-
ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊConfrontation: It appears as a confrontation down of the value framework organized as
of epistemic violence, that is, the violence of Poiesis X Techne, and that which it imposes,
modern thought, of transcendental reason in its rewards, punishes, and decries instrumentality.
formal (which gives productive instrumentality) The hack must be an ongoing, unrelenting attack,
and spiritual (productive self-actuality) that is, X\.
e-flux journal #123 Ñ december 2021 Ê Luciana Parisi and Denise Ferreira da Silva

presentations. It shows the formal and the

spiritual not as unresolvable contradiction but as Denise Ferreira da Silva
amounting to that very violence. At the same
time, because it is presented as a combination, ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊWhat remains to be said when the very
this confrontation seems to invite both a shift formulation of the question takes us halfway
from the theoretical to the aesthetical and their through the extent of the proposition? How to
annihilation. grasp what is yet to be elaborated when the
ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊ conversation starts after the agreement was
ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊNegativation: It seems to be about reached, but already in the context of the
Black Feminist Tools, Critique, and Techno-poethics

interpretation, about how both to read and ensuing relation? I donÕt know and, because
convey the confrontation, seems to repeat the knowing is not the most important position in
impossible combination. The first impression this situation, I move to elaborate on the
here is of an inverted movement, which in a way question itself. Why? Because unpacking the
repeats the shift from the theoretical to the question, at this point, seems more generative
aesthetical mentioned above. To be sure, a than striving for an answer.
second look suggests a demand for the ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊ
recollection of the formal violence. To put it in ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊHow I unpack the question is also relevant
another way, if this is about the thinking that here for two reasons. The first has to do with the
accompanies the initial movement Ð I cannot but fact that the question Ð which is the question of
recall critical thinking here Ð it appears that in how do black feminist poethical tools and
techno-poethics, the recollection is the procedures play in the field of recursive
retribution of the underlying formal violence, colonialism Ð models a black feminist poethical
which I call negativation. reading. As I have stated, the work is done on the
ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊ question, and the answer is nothing more nor
ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊRe-position: It is a warning to techno- less than this procedure. The second (related)
poethics. At first, it seems to be avoiding a direct reason is that the unpacking of the question
blow at its structures and an unreflected attack attends not to its intrinsic components and how
on its foundations. Because there is a re- they relate to each other, but to how the question
positioning indicated in the first movement, it is (each and all of the components) is composed
more likely to be about avoiding thinking in terms of/by what is and remains extrinsic to it. It is in
of invisible (foundations) and visible (structures), its composition, because it is nothing but a
of replacing the given dichotomies with one of composition, that I approach, as I comment on,
visible and invisible operators, which can be very the question of how black feminist poethical
easily remapped by modern thoughtÕs tools and procedures play in the field of recursive

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colonialism.5 opening question does not refer to actually
ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊ existing and distinct things, but comments on
ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊWhat I do here is to unpack, to how the singular is always 1+. It is always Ð itself
re/de/compose the question, which is also to and everything that it is Ð potential, possible,
read (for) it in the form of ten propositions. While and virtual. Insofar as black feminist poethical
the first proposition presents the question as tools and procedures play in recursive

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whole, as a description of it as a composition, colonialism as doubling its how, it paraphrases
the other nine propositions refer to a specific as it resonates the openness that would also be
component in its relation to the extrinsic characteristic of a plotting of the colonial that
dimension or context to which it refers. Each registers each and every possible (as well as
dimension or context is presumed to be directly actual and virtual) point of rupture.
or indirectly relevant to the thinking on recursive ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊ
colonialism. Incidentally, there is not way of (or ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊProposition III. This appearance of a division
need or desire for) ascertaining it because the Ð a doubleness that can and usually is
component emerges in the question of how black immediately read as a duality Ð as described in
feminist poetic tools and procedures play, and Proposition I, even if not presented through the
not in a question about recursive colonialism. mode of identity/difference, raises a question
Though their relevance to the latter could be about the conditions of possibility for thinking.
argued, it seems to me that these propositions (Apropos, the field of recursive colonialism
can be taken in terms of how their generative presents as a discursive or textual field delimited
generosity resonate rather than by trying to make by a concept or an approach, in any event.) A
(reading them as such) them reflect the context question that arrives not so much from a
they refigure, as they intervene. consideration of something that would fall under
ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊ the term content but one that points to the
ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊProposition I. How black feminist poethical elemental, what the figure of singular existence
tools and procedures play in the field of recursive (1+ ° − °) might manifest when it
e-flux journal #123 Ñ december 2021 Ê Luciana Parisi and Denise Ferreira da Silva

colonialism appears at first as a movement of an re/de/composes the formal foundation of

inward search that unfolds outwardly. This thinking (the law of identity). Perhaps the most
duality immediately dissipates when considered significant effect of this re/de/composition is
in light of where the question rests, which is not how it does not attempt to displace the
a movement, but a moment. From this presumed or imposed duality with another (a
perspective, the dual movement seems to figure circular opposite, for instance), which would just
a contradiction that does not unleash a create another duality (at a ÒhigherÓ level).
dialectical movement: outward and inward Instead, it embraces the ambiguity and, by
presented without tension, as components of the reading in it a double6 instead of focusing on the
Black Feminist Tools, Critique, and Techno-poethics

same construct. For a moment, again, because terms, black feminist poethical tools and
that tension immediately dissipates when the procedures attend to what may happen and exist
duality is considered in regard to the overall in between them (the two), as both are
tenor of the question. For the question of how approached as moments of a complexity.
black feminist poethical tools and procedures ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊ
play in the field of recursive colonialism already ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊProposition IV. If the theme of the
signals a gathering (assembling as/in common) established relations is a thankful enjoyment of
and gratification (thankful enjoyment) of radical common abundance Ð not of what is given or
and critical interventions that constitute the found, but of what is gathered Ð and if this
conditions of possibility for the context in which enjoyment is traversed by its insufficiency (that
both black feminist poethical tools and is, if it is also marked by the fact that it is not
procedures and recursive colonialism emerge. enough), the image of lack, of misery, of the
ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊ opposite of abundance cannot be taken simply
ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊProposition II. In this complexity, then, the as such. When considering the antecedents of
how of the play of black feminist poethical tools the play of black feminist poethical tools and
and procedures in recursive colonialism reflects procedures in the field of recursive colonialism,
something that might be common to both. As that which makes it possible, necessary, or
that which delimits it, this commonality recalls a desirable Ð and most certainly all at once Ð one
how rather than a what. While it does repeat the finds a presentation of the play of 1+ ° − °, in
theme of the double and does so with an which, as a form (as a visual composition), the
orientation to the creative (poiesis), it does not presentation appears as 1(+) + 1(Ð) = 2. When
necessarily recall a relation, nor does it request, the 1 who possesses is added to the 1 that does
anticipate, or facilitate a resolution. Similarly, it not possess, the result is 2 Ð again the rendering
does not suggest or presume a separation. of complexity as double and not as duality. Plus
Instead, the double I imaged as a response to the (+) and minus (Ð) Ð as the signs for possession

12.20.21 / 09:15:23 EST

(+) and lack (Ð), respectively Ð are not treated figure in that moment is precisely the form
here as abstract operators but as qualifiers of an which, instead of 10 (that which the ruling
existent (1+ ° − °). What renders such a reading demand for unity cannot but return to 1), shows
possible is how that which precedes the play is as 1 + 0, that is, 1+ ° − °.8
read in context, that is, by taking into account ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊ
both its formal position in the re/de/composition ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊProposition VII. How to describe the play of

09/12
the play unleashes and its actuality as 1 (as well black feminist poethical tools and procedures in
as what in it occurs as possibility and virtuality, the context of the intervention (that which is
as indicated by + ° − °) in regards to reconfigured by the field) of recursive
components (that is, other singular existents or colonialism as a response to their common
1+ ° − °) that do not appear in the main text, so conditions of occurrence? I consider this
to speak. question by commenting on randomly chosen
ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊ contemporary (continental European)
ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊProposition V. Not surprisingly then, when philosophical statements, three to be precise: (a)
playing in the context delineated by the thesis on multiplicity, but addressed not in quantitative
introduced by recursive colonialism, black terms but in a return to abstraction in
feminist poethical tools and procedures seem to speculations on being; (b) on objectivity, but
support what the latter both diagnoses and expressed in terms of a return to abstraction in
proposes, which is the uprooting of the the articulation of something that sounds like
infrastructure of global capital. It is again a subjectivity; and (c) on duality, but expressed in
moment that includes (a) a strike from above, terms of an abstraction that returns to the theme
which is creative rather than destructive, and of the scientific and the historic in the
which unleashes (b) a downward blow Ð an redesigning of (the scene of) representation.
implosion perhaps Ð that shifts attention to the None of these statements were considered or
foundations. It is as if looking at global capital chosen in connection with what precedes or
from down to up reveals precisely that which is follows them. Each was chosen randomly: I
e-flux journal #123 Ñ december 2021 Ê Luciana Parisi and Denise Ferreira da Silva

not visible from its windows because it is what grabbed three books on contemporary
sustains the walls onto which they have been philosophy from my bookcase, opened each to a
carved. A black feminist poethical figure, as a random page, and chose a random paragraph,
lightning strike, invites the imagination (as the each of which is included below as a specimen of
proxy for the creative) to dare and enter into the the larger intellectual context on which black
region of knowledge from where it unleashes feminist poethical tools and procedures play in
propositions, which seem to precisely call the field of recursive colonialism.
attention to the foundations onto which the walls ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊ
of power rest, instead of only attending to the ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊProposition VIII.
visible structure and its workings.7
Black Feminist Tools, Critique, and Techno-poethics

ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊ
ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊ
ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊProposition VI. What appears as the image That deduction Ð which consists in locating
of the end Ð or rather, of what comes after the a restricted connection between
end once the foundations are exposed, and the propositions, and in the end their syntactic
colonial appears as the root and the feeding equivalence Ð be the criterion of
network of global capital Ð is precisely the ontological fidelity; this much, in a certain
indistinguishability between the beginning and sense, could be proved a priori. Once these
the end. Usually presented as painful and total, propositions all bear upon presentation in
this is a performance of the end Ð in which the general, and envisage the multiple solely in
end is the main performer Ð that does both: On its pure multiplicity Ð thus in its void
the one hand, because the elements (lines and armature Ð then no other rule appears to be
nodes) of the feeding network cannot be available for the ÒproximityÓ of new
extracted from everything it feeds without killing propositions and already established
it, it feels like a thousand deaths. On the other propositions, save that of checking their
hand, because the elements (lines and nodes) of equivalence. When a proposition affirms
the feeding network Ð humans and nonhumans, that a pure multiple exists, it is guaranteed
whose extraction and expropriation feed global that this existence, being that of a resource
capital Ð the end is also the exposure of that of being, cannot be assured at the price of
which becomes sensible once the horizon is the non-existence of another of these
lifted. The expected continuity of time and the resources, whose existence has been
smooth transition that is abstract space affirmed or deduced. Being, qua being,
disappear along with the mode of existing for does not proliferate in onto-logical
which they provided ontological grounds. What discourse to the detriment of itself, for it is
black feminist poethical tools and procedures as indifferent to life as it is to death.9

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 apprehension of lands and forceful apprehension
of persons that is the colonial, as the inaugural
ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊThe a priori: As in other formal renderings of act of state-capital.
being like Immanuel KantÕs unit of apperception, ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊ
Alain BadiouÕs account of fidelity in this passage ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊProposition X.
corresponds equality and indifference, which, in ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊ

10/12
a context where (racial, cultural, sexual, etc.)
difference becomes the basis for demands for The point of equilibrium between the
justice (conceived as formal or substantive biological and the symbolic is not easily
equality), is a deadly blow. Black Feminist brought to light, however. The development
Poethics thwarts the itinerary that the question of the scientific concept of intelligence was
of being must take, the formal trail that opens clearly an attempt to make this point and
when existence is resolved in the law of identity name it. But this development, which will
Ð that is, to Òbe proved a prioriÓ Ð and proceeds forever be associated with Galton, initially
to consider how to read it as composition, the sought the articulation of the two
sense of which emerges out of the need to recast dimensions Ð biological and symbolic Ð by
its violent conditions of possibility. having recourse to gift, genius, and innate
ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊ talent. Biologism will never be a response
ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊProposition XI. to the question of a biology of meaning.
ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊ

The space of recognitions as the formal By describing the successive

condition for the individuation of the metamorphoses of intelligence, I have tried
nonsubstantive I Ð the thinking self Ð is by to show how this response sought its
definition composed of mutual recognizers. adequate expression; how, in time, it
Unlike the non-apperceptive self or became possible to establish that
e-flux journal #123 Ñ december 2021 Ê Luciana Parisi and Denise Ferreira da Silva

empirical consciousness, which is psychological equilibration, that is,

differentiated by the sensible external item epigenetic and brain plasticity, could
of which it is aware, the apperceptive self is enable the construction of a representation
differentiated by objectivity (or objective of intelligence that transcends rigid
validity), which is independent of any single determinisms, even though it is born from
experiencing subject, but is not the dialogue between biology and
independent of geist in the intertwined cybernetics. That intelligence should
senses of the dimension of structure and a remain the eternal irony of ontology also
community (i.e., a system of recognitions) means that it functions without being,
which is one definition of automatism.11
Black Feminist Tools, Critique, and Techno-poethics

of language-using agents bound to norms

governing the application of concepts to
their de facto inner-sense reports. It is
through this objectivity, which is but the ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊDuality Ð as in HeideggerÕs anti-ontological
copula of mind and world, that the distinction Ð which returns in MalabouÕs
apperceptive I is individuated: I am I, all conclusion that plasticity transcends
thus-and-so apprehendings are mine É I determinisms and seems sufficient as a
possess ego and world all in one and the declaration that the scientific no longer plays as
same consciousness, a consciousness that a moment of post-Enlightenment political
recovers and sees my self in the world.10 architecture, only repositions the moment of
transcendence. Black Feminist Poethics finds
here a rendering of the duality (as equilibrium
ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊUnity Ð as HegelÕs rendering of the dialectic involving the biological and the symbolic) that
as movement in/as time Ð is recalled in Reza sustains modern philosophyÕs main personage, in
NegarestaniÕs commentary on objectivity in this an itinerary that assumes that determinacy
passage, which returns to the theme of operates in the moment of naming the thing to be
separability and renders subjectivity (Òthe known while it already occurs in the
apperceptive I is individuatedÓ) an effect of a announcement of naming as the prerogative of
movement of apprehension that does not take the knowing thing.
place in the world. Black Feminist Poethics ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊ
recognizing that the very gesture that restates ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊHow do black feminist poethical tools and
separability (given by the statement that the I procedures play in the field of recursive
has a claim and access to the world) cannot but colonialism? As a presentation (one of many
find in NegarestaniÕs commentary a restatement possible, I am sure) of the moment in its
of the original violent act of forceful extrinsicality, that is, as not so much conditioned

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but composed by what it lies beside, the infinities that withdraw from the horizon of
response to the question appears in a series of knowledge, from the universality of the theorem
propositions that comment on that which 1 + 1 (Ð) = 2: the recursive function of anti-
organizes thinking oriented by the quest(ion) for blackness. How do black feminist poethical tools
a certain basis for unity when the latter is and devices become the radical
presented qualitatively Ð in/as statements. When instrumentalities that hack recursive functions?

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doing so, the above propositions merely highlight How do these instrumentalities disrupt the
one aspect of the movement through which black ethical regime where means coincide with both a
feminist poethical praxis avoids, thwarts, or logic of giving (gifting) and accumulation
basically ignores that which the statements Ð (property)?
included to represent the larger intellectual ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊ
context shared by both Ð seem unwilling or ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊWhile the Droste effects of recursion allow
unable to forgo. the same theorem to reappear within itself
ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊ across scales, Black Feminist Poethics runs
through the dualities, bifurcations, and moments
[center]Luciana Parisi of future-past. Like an electronic circuit where
noise ingresses the channel of a signal, each
recursive feedback performs a duality, a sender-
What remains is the task of studying the receiver pattern of recognition. Noise returns in
richness of the relation between the circuit as the unpatterned information lying
instrumentality and uselessness, where beside and not within dialectical autopoiesis.
being-instrument is profoundly other than The self-reflective procedure has to cut through
being-for-others and disrupts an ethical the wall of noise. It is a recursive affair that ends
regime where benevolence is inseparable up in love bites. Recursivity is an attachment to
from accumulation, a duo best understood, repetition, where each iteration passes through
in Stevie WonderÕs terms, as Òthe end of an the contagion of noise. The function is a means
e-flux journal #123 Ñ december 2021 Ê Luciana Parisi and Denise Ferreira da Silva

endless end.Ó that conditions the autopoiesis of knowledge.

But means are composed by what lies beside the
function, the xenopatterning that
re/de/composes contagious noise in
Ð Fred Moten12 propositions. As recursive function becomes
instrumentalized by Black Feminist Poethics, the
universal colonial statements of multiplicity,
ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊRecursive functions are the legacy of objectivity, duality are found randomly Ð in a
modern epistemologyÕs self-reflexivity, returning random book, a random page, a random
Black Feminist Tools, Critique, and Techno-poethics

in cybernetics as non-teleological or heuristic paragraph. Randomness coincides with noise in

finality granted by feedback. Iterative functions its extrinsicality, as composed by the
also allow the universal Turing machine to enfold incomputabilities that lie beside it.
transcendental cognition into computational ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊ
thinking not simply in the world but in anti- ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊPropositions become the means for noise to
blackness. AI is not a recursive operation linking expose what is beside the patterning function,
cognition and the world, concept and object, but the statements. From the postulation of the
a constant techno-sociogenic enfleshment of fidelity of being (Badiou), to the apperceptive I in
incomputables to maintain seriality, dualities, the unity of recognition (Negarestani), and the
and the multiplication of sets that compose the biological and the symbolic hybrid in brain
Promethean cosmogonies of Man. For Black plasticity (Malabou), da Silva takes these general
Feminist Poethics, propositions are also the statements into the noise of materiality of a
heretical doubling of modern seriality, Black Feminist Poethics ready to thwart the
separation, objectivity, unity spilling out of the equation of 1(+) + 1(Ð) = 2.
techno-sociogenic instrumentalities of Òthe end ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊ×
of the world as we know it.Ó13
ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊ
ÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊÊFor Black Feminist Poethics, the self-
determining recursivity of colonial
epistemologies is instrumentalized from the
quantum field to go through critical, radical
re/de/composition and gatherings ending up in
propositions. The play is a turbulent splitting of
infinities (division, addition, subtraction, and
multiplication), infinities minus infinities; namely

12.20.21 / 09:15:24 EST

 Luciana ParisiÕs research is a philosophical ÊÊÊÊÊÊ1
investigation of technology in culture, aesthetics, and Audre Lorde, ÒThe MasterÕs Tools
Will Never Dismantle the
politics. She is a Professor at the Program in Literature MasterÕs House,Ó Sister Outsider:
and Computational Media Art and Culture at Duke Essays and Speeches (Crossing
University. She was a member of the CCRU (Cybernetic Press, 2007).
Culture Research Unit) and is currently a cofounding ÊÊÊÊÊÊ2
member of CCB (Critical Computation Bureau). She is Bernard Stiegler, ÒNoodiversity,
ÊÊÊÊÊÊ9
Alain Badiou, Being and Event
(Continuum, 2005), 252.
ÊÊÊÊÊÊ10
Reza Negarestani, Intelligence
and Spirit
(Urbanomic/Sequence, 2018),

12/12
the author of Abstract Sex: Philosophy, Biotechnology Technodiversity,Ó trans. Daniel 271.
and the Mutations of Desire (Continuum, 2004) and Ross, Angelaki 25, no. 4 (2020).
ÊÊÊÊÊÊ11
Contagious Architecture: Computation, Aesthetics and ÊÊÊÊÊÊ3 Catherine Malabou, Morphing
Space (MIT Press, 2013). Louis Chude-Sokei, The Sound of Intelligence: From IQ
Denise Ferreira da SilvaÊis a Professor and Director of Culture Diaspora and Black Measurement to Artificial Brains
Technopoetics (Wesleyan (Columbia University Press,
the Social Justice Institute-GRSJ at the University of University Press, 2016). 2019), 142.
British Columbia.
ÊÊÊÊÊÊ4 ÊÊÊÊÊÊ12
This line of critique of Fred Moten, Knowledge of
technology works to reinforce Freedom, Stolen Life (Duke
rather than challenge the University Press, 2018), 14.
recursive authority of
philosophical decision, which ÊÊÊÊÊÊ13
maintains the image of a Denise Ferreira da Silva,
mindless machine thinking as an ÒToward a Black Feminist
extension of the necessary Poethics: The Quest(ion) of
speciation and racialization of Blackness Toward the End of the
the human and reason. Similarly, World,Ó The Black Scholar 44, no.
one could argue that even when 2 (Summer 2014).
the poiesis of machine thinking
returns in terms of repurposing,
retooling, and redistributing,
artificial intelligence continues
to be measured against the
original site of thinking, the
natural evolution of sapience,
and the cosmogomy of Capitalist
Man. What the necro-entropy of
information capital feeds on is
e-flux journal #123 Ñ december 2021 Ê Luciana Parisi and Denise Ferreira da Silva

precisely the
extraction/abstraction of the
total value of the flesh in the
making, which is instead
represented in terms of an anti-
creative mimesis of machines.

ÊÊÊÊÊÊ5
I am thinking of field here in the
sense used in Quantum Field
Theory. Recursive colonialism is
here considered a concept Ð the
name of an approach Ð that, like
the electron in the
Black Feminist Tools, Critique, and Techno-poethics

electromagnetic field, names a

certain reconfiguration of matter
operated by that which is chosen
as the main aspect to be
studied. It is in this sense that
black feminist poethics is
described as playing in the field
of recursive colonialism. This
means that, if black feminist
poethics is used to delimit a
field, one should be able to
describe recursive colonialism
playing Ð operating, but not
defining Ð in it.

ÊÊÊÊÊÊ6
Here I am playing with the slight
difference between dual and
double: dual carries the sense of
two separate things while
double has the sense of the
same thing repeated (copied,
etc.).

ÊÊÊÊÊÊ7
Such as those in my essay
ÒHacking the Subject: Black
Feminism and Refusal beyond
the Limits of Critique,Ó
philoSOPHIA 8, no. 1 (2018).

ÊÊÊÊÊÊ8
For the development of this
argument, see generally Denise
Ferreira da Silva, Unpayable
Debt (Sternberg/MIT Press,
2021).

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