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The Problem: the Theory of Ideas in Ancient Atomism and Gilles Deleuze

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The Problem: the Theory of Ideas in Ancient Atomism and Gilles Deleuze Duquesne University Duquesne Scholarship Collection Electronic Theses and Dissertations 2013 The rP oblem: The Theory of Ideas in Ancient Atomism and Gilles Deleuze Ryan J. Johnson Follow this and additional works at: https://dsc.duq.edu/etd Recommended Citation Johnson, R. (2013). The rP oblem: The Theory of Ideas in Ancient Atomism and Gilles Deleuze (Doctoral dissertation, Duquesne University). Retrieved from https://dsc.duq.edu/etd/706 This Immediate Access is brought to you for free and open access by Duquesne Scholarship Collection. It has been accepted for inclusion in Electronic Theses and Dissertations by an authorized administrator of Duquesne Scholarship Collection. For more information, please contact [email protected]. THE PROBLEM: THE THEORY OF IDEAS IN ANCIENT ATOMISM AND GILLES DELEUZE A Dissertation Submitted to the McAnulty College & Graduate School of Liberal Arts Duquesne University In partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy By Ryan J. Johnson May 2014 Copyright by Ryan J. Johnson 2014 ii THE PROBLEM: THE THEORY OF IDEAS IN ANCIENT ATOMISM AND GILLES DELEUZE By Ryan J. Johnson Approved December 6, 2013 _______________________________ ______________________________ Daniel Selcer, Ph.D Kelly Arenson, Ph.D Associate Professor of Philosophy Assistant Professor of Philosophy (Committee Chair) (Committee Member) ______________________________ John Protevi, Ph.D Professor of Philosophy (Committee Member) ______________________________ ______________________________ James Swindal, Ph.D. Ronald Polansky, Ph.D. Dean, McAnulty College & Graduate Chair, Department of Philosophy School of Liberal Arts Professor of Philosophy Professor of Philosophy iii ABSTRACT THE PROBLEM: THE THEORY OF IDEAS IN ANCIENT ATOMISM AND GILLES DELEUZE By Ryan J. Johnson May 2014 Dissertation supervised by Dr. Daniel Selcer Deleuze and Guattari famously defined philosophy as the “art of forming, inventing, and fabricating concepts.” This, however, is not the whole story of philosophy. For concepts, according to Deleuze, are formed or invented as solutions to problems. If concepts are the solutions to problems, then there is a philosophical task prior to the creation of concepts: the selection of true problems. The value of a philosophy is thus not located simply in the concepts it creates, but also in the problems that it selects. Deleuze values philosophies that focus on true problems and create interesting concepts. According to this criterion, one philosophy that Deleuze values particularly highly is Lucretian atomism. While Deleuze’s relationship to Lucretius has been almost completely ignored, De rerum natura homes in on at least one significant problem: to think of nature in the form of a problem. To be more exact, thinking of nature as a problem eventually sparks the emergence of thought itself as a product of the natural world. This insistence on thinking the world under the form of a problem, I claim, is the site of the Deleuze-Lucretius encounter. It is through this encounter that the particular selection of iv problems for philosophical and ethical thinking deployed in De rerum natura eventually came to reverberate through, and actually structure, many of Deleuze’s texts. I claim, in sum, that Lucretian atomism produced many essential features of Deleuzianism. v DEDICATION I dedicate this work to my mother, Claudia Johnson. She is the best person I have ever met. I am lucky to be her son. vi ACKNOWLEDGEMENT I would like to acknowledge the advice and encouragement given to me throughout this project by my dissertation advisor, Dan Selcer. It was his hard work and tolerance that allowed this dissertation to assume its current form. I cannot thank him enough. I would also like to acknowledge the helpful contributions offered by the two other members of my dissertation committee, Kelly Arenson and John Protevi. In addition, I must thank and acknowledge the entire philosophy department at Duquesne University. My years on the bluff in Pittsburgh were among the best of my life. Finally, I would like to acknowledge the assistance of some of my fellow Dukes – Clancy Smith, Matt Lovett, and Jacob Greenstine – who looked over drafts of certain chapters and offered dangerously facetious advice. vii TABLE OF CONTENTS Page Abstract…………………………………………………………………………………………...iv Dedication………………………………………………………………………………………...vi Acknowledgement……………………………………………………………………………….vii List of Images…………………………………………………………………………………….ix List of Abbreviations………………………………………………………………………….......x Introduction: The problem and the minor tradition……………………………………………….1 Chapter 1: Deleuze and the adventure of ideas…………………………………………………..20 Chapter 2: The atomic idea………………………………………………………………………71 Chapter 3: Differentiation, individuation, dramatization, and actualization…………………...138 Chapter 4: The encounter in sense and thought……………………………………………...…189 Chapter 5: Ethics in the Garden of Epicurus…………………………………………………...250 Conclusion: The encounter……………………………………………………………………..304 Bibliography……………………………………………………………………………………309 viii LIST OF IMAGES Page Democritus by Diego Velazquez, 1628, Musée des Beaux-Arts, Rouen, France…………………7 Graph of maximum and minimum turning points…………………………………………….…52 Three inscribed polygons Michael E. Mortenson, Mathematics for Computer Graphics Applications (Industrial Press, NY: 1999), 90-92…………………………………………….…83 Porphyry tree Edmund Pourchot, Institutiones philosophicae (1730)………………………….221 ix ABBREVIATIONS ATP Deleuze, Gilles and Félix Guattari. A Thousand Plateaus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia. Translated by Brian Massumi. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1987. Citations to this work will be accompanied by pagination to Deleuze, Gilles and Félix Guattari. Capitalisme et schizophrénie tome 2: Mille plateaux. Paris: Éditions de Minuit, 1980. DR Deleuze, Gilles. Difference and Repetition. Translated by Paul Patterson. New York: Columbia University Press, 1994. Citations to this work will be accompanied by pagination to Deleuze, Gilles. Différence et Répétition. Paris: PUF, 1968. DRN Lucretius, Titus Carus. De rerum natura. Edited and translated by Cyril Bailey. 3 Volumes. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1947. Citations to De rerum natura will be by book and line number. CPR Kant, Immanuel. Critique of Pure Reason. Translated by Paul Guyer and Allen W. Wood. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998. EH Epicurus. “Letter to Herodotus.” In Epicurus: The Extent Remains. Edited and translated by Cyril Bailey. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1926. EM Epicurus. “Letter to Menoeceus.” In Epicurus: The Extent Remains. Edited and translated by Cyril Bailey. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1926. LS Deleuze, Gilles. Logic of Sense. Translated by Mark Lester with Charles Stivale. Edited by Constantin Boundas. New York: Columbia University Press, 1990. Citations to this work will be accompanied by pagination to Deleuze, Gilles. Logique du sens. Paris: Les Éditions de Minuit, 1969. WP Deleuze, Gilles and Félix Guattari. What is Philosophy? Translated by. Citations to this work will be accompanied by pagination to Deleuze, Gilles and Félix Guattari. Qu’est-ce que la philosophie? Paris: Les Éditions de Minuit, 1991. x Introduction: The problem and the minor tradition Deleuze and Guattari famously defined philosophy as the “art of forming, inventing, and fabricating concepts” (WP, 2). This, however, is not the whole story of philosophy. Concepts, according to Deleuze, are formed or invented as solutions to problems (WP, 80). If concepts are the solutions to problems, then there is a philosophical task prior to the creation of concepts: the selection of true problems. The value of a philosophy is thus not located simply in the concepts it creates, but also in the problems that it selects. Deleuze values philosophies that select true problems and create interesting concepts. According to this criterion, one philosophy that Deleuze values particularly highly is ancient atomism. While Deleuze’s relationship to atomism has been almost completely ignored, De rerum natura, the central text of this tradition, selects at least one significant problem: to think of nature in the form of a problem. To think of nature in a problematic form means that thought emerges out of nature. To be more exact, thinking of nature as a problem eventually sparks the emergence of thought itself as a product of the natural world. In this dissertation, we will argue that this attempt to think the natural world under the form of a problem is the conceptual site of Deleuze’s encounter with atomism. As we will demonstrate, it is through this encounter that the particular selection of problems for philosophical and ethical thinking deployed in De rerum natura eventually came to reverberate through and actually structure many of Deleuze’s texts. Our claim, in sum, is that ancient atomism produced many essential features of Deleuzian philosophy. Our means for investigating this provocative encounter will be the Deleuzian theory of immanent problems or ideas. Deleuze characterizes ideas in many ways. In one sense, ideas are the problems structuring the world and the various actualized individuals of the natural world are the divergent solutions to these problems. In a more technical sense, ideas are the differentially 1 structured ontological fields of genetic relations and singularities that produce actual individuals in the world. While they are neither localizable in sensible intuition nor reducible to conceptual identity, Deleuzian ideas are not transcendent. Instead,
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