QUENTIN MEILLASSOUX a NEW FRENCH PHILOSOPHER Graham Harman

QUENTIN MEILLASSOUX A NEW FRENCH PHILOSOPHER Graham Harman

This article is a review of Après la finitude, by Heidegger and Derrida. Neither of these the remarkable debut book of Quentin figures will soon disappear from radar, and Meillassoux.1 In my estimation, this work is Heidegger is now celebrated as a classic for the one of the most important to appear in conti- ages even by mainstream analytic thinkers. nental philosophy in recent years, and de- But since the mid-1990s, the Heideggero- serves a wide readership at the earliest possible Derridean brand of continental thought has date. An English translation by Ray Brassier faced increasing competition from new trends: will be published by Continuum in the near fu- initially from the books of Gilles Deleuze, and ture.2 more recently from the heterodox tag team of Meillassoux’s book is written in a lucid and Alain Badiou and a resurgent Slavoj ±Zi¡zek. economical style, covering abundant terrain in While major works by these “new” authors just 165 pages. It offers bold readings of the have been available for many years, what is history of philosophy—Aristotle is not realist more recent is their increased momentum enough, Hume not skeptical enough. It shows among the younger generation of continental bursts of scathing wit, as when drawing wry philosophers. In terms of background and ori- parallels between the anti-Darwinian reveries entation, Meillassoux is not difficult to place of creationism and major schools of present- among these currents. He was a student of day philosophy. Most importantly, Après la Badiou, and the preface to the book is written finitude offers a ruthless attack on virtually all by Badiou himself, who can barely find suffi- of post-Kantian philosophy, now labeled as cient words to praise it—by fusing absolute “correlationism,” and proposes an original logical necessity with a radical contingency of “speculative” solution (though not in Hegel’s the laws of nature, Meillassoux is said to “open sense) to the Kantian impasse. Meillassoux in the history of philosophy ...anewpath for- proposes nothing less than a return of philoso- eign to Kant’s canonical distribution between phy to the absolute, which for him means real- ‘dogmatism,’ ‘scepticism,’ and ‘critique.’”3 ity in itself apart from any relation to humans. Furthermore, despite the absence of set-theory The critical portions of the book strike me as notation and other known Badiouian flour- definitive: much of what we know as analytic ishes, there are obvious points of similarity be- and continental philosophy looks rather differ- tween teacher and student: the major role for ent following his assault on correlationism. mathematics, including the anointment of Meillassoux’s own ideas, plausibly described Georg Cantor as a pivotal figure for philoso- as the mere antechamber to a larger and still phy; the fondness for step-by-step logical ar- unpublished system, lie open to possible ob- gumentation; the absence of any especial in- jections. Nonetheless, his appeal to an “ances- terest in Heidegger or the phenomenological tral” realm prior to all human access succeeds tradition. Both authors also display grand sys- in defining an unexpected new battlefield for tematic ambitions of a kind that seemed un- continental thought. Barely forty years old, he thinkable in our field a short time ago. None- seems likely to emerge as one of the important theless, Meillassoux’s vision of the world is names in European philosophy in the decades not Badiou’s, and certain aspects of the former to come. even cut against the grain of the latter. Accord- We should begin by situating Meillassoux ing to published information, Meillassoux was among the more established contemporary born in 1967 in Paris, son of the economic an- thinkers. For many years, continental philoso- thropologist Claude Meillassoux (1925– phy in the Anglophone world was dominated 2005), an intellectual maverick in his own PHILOSOPHY TODAY 104 © DePaul University 2007 right. He is a graduate of the Ecole Normale philosophy revolve around humans at the pre- Supérieure, and has been employed at that in- cise moment when modern science had stitution for the past decade. Although Après plunged into the world itself. In the wake of la finitude is Quentin Meillassoux’s first book, Kant’s genius, we are too clever to believe in anecdotal evidence suggests that he was gener- direct access to things in themselves, but also ally known and highly regarded in Paris well too sober to construct wild solipsistic theories beyond Badiou’s circle even before the book that reduce the world to nothing but our own appeared. production. The favored middle-ground posi- The very title After Finitude will be enough tion for philosophers has been what to startle present-day continental thought, Meillassoux calls “correlationism” (18). The since human finitude has been perhaps the cen- correlationist holds that we can neither con- tral credo of the field from the time of its birth. ceive of humans without world, nor of world The book consists of two opening critical without humans, but must root all philosophy chapters followed by two longer and more sys- in a correlation or rapport between the two. tematic chapters, closing with a short fifth The term “correlationism” strikes me as a chapter that harks back to the opening critique. devastating summary of post-Kantian thought. Since Meillassoux himself agrees that Chap- On the continental side, we find Husserl plead- ters 1, 2, and 5 can be taken as a unit,4 quite ing for objectivity against psychologism while apart from whether the reader accepts the also defending ideality against the natural sci- philosophical standpoint outlined in Chapters ences; we have Heidegger claiming that reality 3 and 4, the present review is organized ac- neither exists nor fails to exist in the absence of cording to this schema. Beginning with Dasein; more recently, we see ±Zi¡zek describe Meillassoux’s onslaught against the Coperni- the Real as solely a gap in the world posited by can Revolution of Kant, I will move to his the mad human subject, even while denying more challenging attempt to establish a mathe- that he is an idealist. On the analytic side, there matical ontology that abandons the principle is the “as if” of Blackburn’s quasi-realism; the of sufficient reason, before closing with a brief internal exile of Putnam’s internal realism; and assessment of the book as a whole. Davidson’s refusal to take the realism/anti-realism dispute seriously. All these positions, Against Correlationism and countless others, join in allegiance to what Meillassoux calls the “correlational circle” One of the typical features of recent conti- (19). As he wonderfully puts it: “we will nental thought is its contempt for so-called henceforth term correlationism every current “naïve realism.” The human being is now of thought that upholds the uncircumventible firmly established as the point of entry for all character of the correlation understood in this serious philosophy, even if redefined as a pure way. Thus, we can say that every philosophy ego, linguistic agent, embodied animal, sub- that claims not to be a naïve realism has be- ject of power-plays, or historically rooted come a variant of correlationism” (18). The Dasein. The notion of an objective world-in-it- correlationist argument, often left vague or en- self seems to elude our grasp. Nonetheless, tirely unstated, holds that any attempt to think few authors have faced this predicament with reality-in-itself automatically turns it into full-blown absolute idealism à la Berkeley—if something not in-itself—since, after all, we not quite “naïve,” such extreme idealism are now thinking about it (17). On this basis, strikes most of us as gratuitous and bizarre there is supposedly no way to reach the world amidst the undeniable blows of the world. This an sich, but only a global correlation of human leaves philosophy in an ambiguous position, and world. Philosophy has lost what neither realist nor idealist. The obvious roots Meillassoux calls le Grand Dehors, “the Great of this ambiguity lie in the Copernican Revolu- Outside.” In its place, we find that “this space tion of Kant, still the basic philosophical hori- of the outside is hence only the space of that zon of both the analytics and the continentals. which faces us, of that which exists only on the Meillassoux’s book ends with the daring claim basis of a vis-à-vis with our own existence. . . . that Kant’s Revolution is in fact “a Ptolemaic We do not transcend very far beyond ourselves Counter-Revolution (163),”5 one that makes when diving into such a world: we are content A NEW FRENCH PHILOSOPHER 105 © DePaul University 2007 to explore the two faces of something that re- correlationist will not admit that a being actu- mains a face-to-face” (21). This correlate need ally exists prior to being given to humans, but not take the form of the old subject/object du- only that it is given to humans as existing prior alism. Indeed, most present-day philosophers to such givenness (32). They will say that “the unite in heaping scorn upon the antiquated physical universe is not really known to pre- model of subject and object. But this does not cede the existence of humans, or at least the ex- prevent them from remaining locked in the istence of living creatures; the world has modern dance-step of correlationism. In par- meaning only as given to a living or thinking ticular, Meillassoux cites Heidegger’s suppos- being” (33). They will try to reduce scientific edly “more originary” correlation of being and statements about ancestral stellar explosions thought in Ereignis as an example of how the and mudslides to the means of scientific rejection of subject and object does not quite givenness of these events, just as in positivism get us off the correlationist hook (22). As or verificationism. “We can therefore say that Meillassoux sees it, all postcritical philosophy the statement is true . . . without naively believ- is correlationism (23)—or else a relapse into ing that its truth results from an adequation metaphysics, as with Whitehead and perhaps with the actual reality of its referent (a world even the vitalism of Deleuze.6 Before Kant, without givenness of world)” (ibid.). philosophers dueled over who had the best This correlationist attitude toward science model of substance: was it perfect forms, indi- is at the same time both modest and conde- vidual beings, prime matter, atoms, or God? scending. For on the one hand it leaves nature Since Kant, these “naïve” disputes have been entirely to the sciences, laying no claim to the replaced by combat over who has the best objective world for philosophy at all. But si- model of the human-world correlate: is it sub- multaneously, it holds that there is something ject-object, noesis-noema, Dasein-Sein, or more in the world that science cannot grasp (cf. language-referent? In Meillassoux’s eyes, Heidegger’s “science does not think”)—a “co” has become the dominant particle of the “logical” priority of statements about the philosopher’s lexicon (19), just as “always al- world over the “chronological” priority of an- ready” (21) has become the beloved phrase of cestral events themselves (32). In so doing, those who grant extra-human reality only correlationists play the game of pretending when we ourselves posit it retroactively. Yes, that they do not interfere with the content of they tell us, the world exists in itself—but only scientific statements. Yet interfere they do. For for us (26). if scientific statements about the archifossil are The work of Quentin Meillassoux is meant not taken literally, they lose meaning alto- as a clean break with all forms of correlation- gether. The statement that the earth was ism, and he approaches the task with unusual formed 4.5 billion years ago means exactly boldness. He begins by drawing up a table of what it says. It does mean what the actual scientific dates (known to correlationists claim, namely that “it is not Heideggerians as “mere ontic information”): ancestrality that precedes givenness, it is the 13.5 billion years since the Big Bang, 4.45 bil- present given that retroactively projects a past lion since the formation of the earth, 3.5 billion that seems ancestral” (34). For this is no longer since life began on our planet, and just two mil- the same statement as that of the scientists, and lion years since the appearance of homo its supposedly agnostic attitude toward the real habilis (24). He asks us to consider the status world cannot hide a form of crypto-idealism, of statements about ancient events predating since it tacitly dismisses all forms of realism as the relatively recent appearance of human be- naïve. Although Meillassoux’s book does not ings, those pampered tyrants of correlational openly equate correlationism with idealism, philosophy. For those entities that exist prior to he does give an important hint along these all human life, Meillassoux coins the term lines: “faced with the archifossil, all idealisms “archifossil,” and describes them as having converge and become equally extraordinary” “ancestrality” (24–26). In his view, the (36). Insofar as Berkeley, Hegel, Heidegger, correlationists will always be at a loss when and Derrida all have equally little to tell us trying to deal with the ancestral archifossil. about events on the moon fifty million years Their likely maneuver is a predictable one: the ago, they all look like extreme idealists as soon PHILOSOPHY TODAY 106 © DePaul University 2007 as the archifossil rears its head. Just as some be necessary. The Leibnizian principle of suf- creationists claim that God planted pseudo-an- ficient reason goes even further, entailing that cient fossils in the ground to test the Biblical all beings are necessary. But for Meillassoux, faith of scientists, Meillassoux suggests acidly “the rejection of dogmatic metaphysics means that his notion of the archifossil may serve to the rejection of all real necessity: and a fortiori “test the philosopher’s faith in the correlates, the rejection of the principle of reason, as well even in the presence of data that indicate an as the ontological proof” (46). What disap- abyssal gap between that which exists and that pears in his argument is the Heideggerian ap- which appears” (ibid.). For this reason, the peal to the limits of finitude, or the problem of ancestrality is capable of overturn- postmodernist’s agnostic uncertainty as to ing everything in philosophy since Kant (37). whether there is any necessity out there or not. Moreover, as Meillassoux states at the close of As we will see below, Meillassoux holds that his book, this problem would not disappear the laws of nature must be absolutely contin- even if humans and the world had been created gent. In this manner, without relapsing into the simultaneously—for in this case it still might dogmatic tradition he loathes, Meillassoux re- have been otherwise, and hence the archifossil stores a style of absolutist argument to could still be reflected upon as a possibility continental philosophy that has been absent (156–57). In passing, it should be said that this for decades, if not centuries. reformulation is perhaps too limited. It seems Setting the table for his own position, to me that the correlationist circle would be Meillassoux draws a convincing distinction threatened not just by archifossils dating to be- between “weak” and “strong” versions of fore the emergence of the human species, but correlationism. A good example of a weak equally so by “extrafossils” lying outside cur- correlationist is Kant, for whom the things rent human access, such as objects locked in themselves cannot be known, but can at least hidden vaults or refrigerators, or unknown oil be thought. Kant’s critical position “does not reserves trapped beneath the ocean floor. After forbid all connection of thought with the abso- all, events unfolding right now in the core of lute” (48). By contrast, strong correlationism Alpha Centauri actually happen inside that (which includes most continental thinkers of star, and not in the core of Alpha Centauri “for the present day), holds that “it is equally ille- us.” gitimate to claim that we are able, at least, to In any case, Meillassoux holds that think [the in-itself]” (ibid.). The strong correlationism and naïve realism are two sepa- correlationist and the full-blown idealist agree rate ways of dodging the question of that things themselves are not even thinkable. ancestrality (38). By contrast with his detailed But whereas the hyper-idealist holds that we analysis of correlationism, his arguments gain the absolute through the very conditions against naïve realism are somewhat sketchy of all human thought, the strong correlationist throughout the book, though this can perhaps refusestofollow,andisresignedtothe be explained by the limited number of naïve facticity or finitude of human experience, de- realists practicing philosophy today. void of all reference to the absolute. In other Meillassoux insists that philosophy must seek words, strong correlationism abandons Kant nothing less than the absolute, abandoning its by holding that “just as we can only describe fixation on the transcendental conditions of the a priori forms of sensibility and under- human experience (39). Nonetheless, “we can standing, we can only describe the logical no longer be metaphysicians, we can no longer principles inherent in any thinkable proposi- be dogmatists. On this point, we can only be tion, but not deduce their absolute truth” (53). the heirs of Kantianism” (40). The result is a philosophy of facticity, which The great failing of metaphysics, for Meill- “is concerned with the supposed structural assoux, is that it always seeks some particular invariants of the world—invariants that can necessary being; in this respect, he seems in differ from one correlationism to another, but accord with the Heidegger/Derrida critique of which play in each case the role of a minimal ontotheology. As can be seen from the history prescriptive order for thought: the principle of of ontological proofs for the existence of God, causality, the forms of perception, logical metaphysics holds that at least one being must laws” (54). These invariant forms are taken as A NEW FRENCH PHILOSOPHER 107 © DePaul University 2007 a purely given fact of which no change is ever Against this empty fideism (which is found experienced, but they are not thereby taken as even in self-proclaimed atheists), and against something absolute. They are merely found violent fanaticism as its key historical symp- and described—the basic Kantian method still tom, “it is important to rediscover in philoso- used by strong correlationism in our own time, phy a touch of the absolute” (68). This appeal as in Heidegger’s existential analytic of to the absolute has not been heard in continen- Dasein. Breaking with this tradition of factical tal philosophy for a good long time, but description, Meillassoux wants to turn Meillassoux is serious. Despite his obvious ad- facticity into absolute contingency: “contin- miration for Kant, he refers to “the Kantian ca- gency signifies the fact that physical laws tastrophe” (171) in philosophy, by which he indifferently permit an event either to occur or means the correlationist catastrophe. The great not to occur—permit a being to arise, endure, hope of Meillassoux’s book, as proclaimed in or perish” (ibid.). its final sentences, is that the theme of ances- Meillassoux notes a close link between tral things themselves might awaken us from facticity and the postmodern brand of philo- our “correlational slumber” (178). Against the sophical religiosity. Stripped of all access to post-Kantian assumption that philosophers the absolute, the philosophy of finitude seems must “content [themselves] with showing the impeccably modest in its claims about the general conditions of givenness of phenom- world. But this attitude is by no means harm- ena” (174), ancestral events must be regarded less, since it really allows us to make any state- as existing in themselves, not just as events for ments about the absolute that we please. As he us. Instead of the transcendental idealism that puts it, “the end of metaphysics conceived as a silently dominates philosophy in our time, ‘de-absolutization of thought’ thus consists in Meillassoux advocates a “speculative materi- the legitimation by reason of any religious (or alism” (169). While this phrase is little devel- ‘poetico-religious’) belief in the absolute oped in the present book, it is sufficiently apt as a description of his standpoint that I would whatever” (64), on the sole condition that no expect it to return in force in his future works. one claim to give rational grounds for such be- But Meillassoux does not leave us hanging lief. The end of metaphysics, in banishing all with these critical arguments against traces of the absolute from philosophy, has in correlationism. He also gives us a considerable fact opened philosophy to the dominance of an taste of his own philosophy, in which “it is a exacerbated form of religiosity—in which phi- matter of holding firmly to the Cartesian thesis losophy becomes the handmaid of a that whatever can be mathematized can be correlationist theology of the shapeless Be- absolutized, without reviving the principle of yond, unfettered by even the barest logical reason. And this strikes us as a task that is not constraints. Whereas a Christian disciple of only possible, but urgent” (175). The essential Kant at least needed to demonstrate that the criteria of all mathematical statements will be Trinity is not logically contradictory (60), even transformed into necessary conditions of the this minimal obligation has now vanished. contingency of every being. This notion harks Strong correlationism’s apparent modesty to- back to the opening words of Meillassoux’s ward the absolute has in fact opened the gates book, deliberately unmentioned until now: to every possible form of arbitrary belief. As “The theory of primary and secondary quali- Meillassoux puts it, in what may prove to be ties seems to belong to a hopelessly out-of- the most popular phrase of his book: “the date philosophical past. It is time to rehabili- better armed thought is against dogmatism, the tate it” (13). Secondary qualities, of course, are more powerless it seems to be against fanati- thoseheldtoexistonlyinrelationtoa cism” (67). Stripped of all logical armament perceiver, whereas primary qualities are those thanks to the strong correlationists, we are left that exist outside of all perception. While with nothing but meager critiques of fanati- strong correlationism gives a de facto endorse- cism in purely moral terms, reduced to ment of Berkeley’s view that all qualities exist complaining about the arrogance or bad onlyintheirrelationtoaperceiver, practical effects of whichever fanatics we Meillassoux restores to the world “a touch of happen to dislike (65). the absolute” by arguing that “for anything in PHILOSOPHY TODAY 108 © DePaul University 2007 the object that can be formulated in mathemat- wise” (73). In place of the famous Leibnizian ical terms, it is meaningful to speak of it as a principle, Meillassoux offers a new principle property of the object in-itself” (16). In short, of absolute unreason in the things. The Meillassoux’s speculative materialism is an at- correlationist will respond, of course, that we tempt to fuse absolute mathematical necessity cannot be sure that things themselves are con- with an equally absolute contingency of tingent, but only that they are contingent inso- beings in the natural world. We will now far as we know them. Against this predictable examine the way that he reaches this strange objection, Meillassoux demonstrates that hybrid position. correlationism itself already presupposes the very principle that he advocates. “To oppose Meillassoux’s Speculative Position [the correlationist], there is only one way to proceed: we need to show that the correlational Chapters3and4giveustheheartof circle ...ifitisthinkable, itself presupposes Meillassoux’s argument, and presumably the the tacit concession that contingency is seeds of his future work as well. We have seen absolute” (74). that correlationist philosophy undercuts naïve Throughout the book, Meillassoux displays realism by holding that humans and the world an almost Hegelian gift for counterposing mul- (or their more sophisticated variants) make tiple arguments, turning them around from sense only as codependent terms. Yet by re- various dizzying angles, and finally selecting a ducing ancestral reality to reality-for-us, winner for the clearest and subtlest of reasons. correlationism fails to do it justice. One ap- Hence, it is no wonder that the central argu- proach to this impasse would be a kind of sub- ment of his book hinges on an imaginary dis- jective idealism. Namely, we could decide that cussion between five separate philosophical the facticity of the human/world correlate characters. As if he were setting up a dirty joke gives us a new kind of absolute, one that com- or a Brunoesque dialogue between philoso- prises a novel form of the an sich. We would phers and clowns, Meillassoux relates the fol- then have an actual new form of knowledge, lowing scenario: two dogmatists—a Christian not just a limitation on knowledge; the an sich and an atheist—are arguing about the afterlife, would no longer lie in some inaccessible be- and along comes a correlationist. Each of the yond, but would be unveiled from the dogmatists (I like to imagine them as wearing, structural features of the correlate itself (72). respectively, a bishop’s outfit and a Jacobin Meillassoux rejects this option, since it is liberty cap) is absolutely sure of his views. Ei- no better suited than strong correlationism to ther there is a God who preserves the soul after describing the ancestral independence of the death, or there is not. The correlationist now world. Instead, in the key maneuver of the walks up and counters both dogmatists with a book, he shifts our focus from the conditions strict form of agnosticism: for how can either of the correlate back to the things of the world: character be so sure of reality-in-itself, given “the supreme necessity of the correlational cir- that we are limited to our own human access to cle is going to appear to us as the contrary of the world, unable to penetrate to a world-in-it- what it seems: facticity will be revealed as a self lying beyond (75)? But along comes yet knowledge of the absolute, because we are go- another character: a “subjective idealist,” who ing to put back into the things that which we “declares that [the correlationist] upholds a have mistaken for an incapacity of thought” position just as inconsistent as those of the (72). What Meillassoux intends is to transform [dogmatists]. For all three think that there the disavowal of sufficient reason from a poi- could be an in-itself radically different from gnant limitation on finite human knowledge our present state: a God inaccessible to natural into a positive principle of contingency in the reason, or a pure nothingness” (ibid., my ital- things themselves. As he boldly puts it: “the ics). Since the subjective idealist makes the hu- failure of the principle of reason, from this per- man-world correlate utterly absolute, he re- spective, thus results quite simply from the fal- gards it as impossible even to conceive of its sity (the absolute falsity, even) of such a princi- destruction by death: “since an in-itself differ- ple. For in truth, nothing has a reason for being ent from the for-us is unthinkable, the idealist and for remaining as it is rather than other- proclaims it to be impossible” (ibid.). Of all A NEW FRENCH PHILOSOPHER 109 © DePaul University 2007 four characters, Meillassoux holds that the ag- emphasize the contingent facticity of the cor- nostic correlationist is closest to the truth, relate and thereby remove its absolute status, since it is only he who realizes that things or we disavow this contingent facticity in order might well be otherwise than we think. After to turn the correlate itself into absolute reality, all, each of the dogmatists is trapped in a par- and thereby become subjective idealists. No ticular positive doctrine, and the subjective middle ground is possible. Meillassoux idealist is trapped in an undogmatic but still chooses the former path, arriving at his specu- prison-like correlate. Only the agnostic ac- lative position by simply radicalizing what the knowledges that death and the afterlife are correlationists already presuppose—namely, both thinkable without turning them into dog- the possibility that there might be something matic proclamations. in-itself different from what appears to us. If With the field reduced to a sole survivor, a we fail to accept this possible difference, then new rival appears: the speculative philosopher we either absolutize subjective experience (i.e., Meillassoux himself). This novel figure (like the subjective idealist) or plunge into our proceeds to dethrone the correlationist by preferred dogma (like the Christian and the showing that our possible destruction by death atheist). The irony is that Meillassoux goes be- reflects not just the agnostic’s limited knowl- yond correlationism by radicalizing its own in- edge, but rather an absolute possibility. How ternal conditions; this has possible implica- so? The argument runs as follows. Note that tions worth considering at the end of this the correlationist’s agnosticism has to allow review. But for anyone who concludes too for the possibility that one of the two quickly that this leads him to a metaphysics dogmatisms may well be correct. For if he dis- privileging human being, Meillassoux has a allows the possible truth of any dogmatism, ready counterargument: “we do not contend then he is effectively stating that the correlate that it is necessary that some specific being ex- is an absolutely unsurpassable horizon—and ist, but rather that it is absolutely necessary the subjective idealist wins. Put differently, that any being is capable of not exisiting” (82, each of the three other characters allows for my italics). If it were otherwise, we would only one absolute solution: for the Christian it have metaphysics in the bad sense, a human- is the afterlife; for the atheist it is annihilation; ized ontotheology, whereas “[my] thesis is for the subjective idealist it is the rather speculative—one thinks an absolute— unsurpassable correlate itself. Initially, it is without being metaphysical—one thinks noth- only the agnostic correlationist who leaves ing (no specific being) which would be abso- open the possibility that any of these three ab- lute. The absolute is the absolute impossibility solutes may be correct. The speculative philos- of a necessary being” (ibid). The principle of opher merely adds an additional twist: namely, sufficient reason is replaced by a global unrea- if the correlationist is to avoid becoming a sub- son, an inherently negative term later replaced jective idealist, he cannot allow the openness by the more positive “factuality.” Whereas the of possibilities to be just one possible option facticity of a situation points to its sheer among others. The agnostic correlationist’s contingency, the very structure of facticity is entire argument hinges on replacing absolute not itself contingent, and this non-facticity of Christianity, atheism, or subjective idealism facticity itself is what is given the name with an absolute openness. And for this reason, “factual” (107). he is forced to throw in his lot with Since everything is contingent, it is only the Meillassoux’s speculative position. After all, principle of unreason that can be regarded as the very possibility of distinguishing between eternal, absolute, and “anhypothetical” in Ar- a for-us and an in-itself at all requires that it be istotle’s sense (i.e., one of those things for absolutely possible that there is more to reality which no demonstration can or needs to be than is currently visible in the correlational cir- provided) (84).7 Absolute contingency does cle. In short, the agnostic is not an agnostic not mean that “all must perish,” since this when it comes to agnosticism, but must be ab- would entail a metaphysics of permanent flux, solutely agnostic. whereas Meillassoux’s principle remains neu- Another way to view the situation is that tral on the question of flux versus stasis. His there are really only two options. Either we notion of contingency applies equally well to a PHILOSOPHY TODAY 110 © DePaul University 2007 Heraclitean universe of fiery flow and an icy ciple refers only to the unthinkability of con- Parmenidean cosmos locked in a single perma- tradiction, whereas the contradiction nent form. What his position rejects is the Meillassoux is thinking of should be truly im- strong correlationist’s lingering belief in a possible in its own right. He follows an intrigu- cryptic, unknown ground of things: “This being line of argument to the effect that if contra- lief in the ultimate Reason reveals the true na- dictory beings existed, they would be ture of strong correlationism: it is not an aban- necessary—after all, a contradictory being donment of the principle of reason, but rather would lack true determinacy, and hence would the apology for a belief in this very principle, a face no alterity that would render it contingent belief that has [simply] become disconnected and limited. Hence they must be impossible, from reason.” By contrast, “speculation con- since we have already established an absolute sists ...inaccentuating the extraction of contingency of beings, such that necessary be- thought from the principle of reason, even to ings are ipso facto impossible (92ff.). At this the point of conferring upon this extraction a point Meillassoux offers a useful historical principial form, the sole form permitting us to comparison that situates his views more grasp that that there is absolutely no ultimate clearly. Leibniz upheld the principles of non- Reason—whether thinkable or unthinkable.” contradiction and sufficient reason. On the And even more succinctly, “there is nothing other side of the coin, we could say that beneath or beyond the manifest gratuity of the Heidegger and Wittgenstein rejected both given—nothing, except for the limitless and principles, since both are strong correlationists lawless power of its destruction, emergence, who reject any absolute statements about the and preservation” (86). beyond. Then there is Hegel, who kept the Many readers will at first reject this menac- principle of sufficient reason while abandoning vision of hyper-chaos, with its apparently ing non-contradiction. Finally, Meillassoux monstrous consequences. Compared to our emerges as a kind of inverse Hegel: defending usual model of nature, it seems to be such a di- non-contradiction while abolishing sufficient saster as to leave no hope of approaching the reason (97). ancestral realm of science. Indeed, The second step is to justify Kant’s other Meillassoux is aware of the possible objection principle: namely, that there must be an in-it- that he has achieved very little—whereas the self. This hinges for Meillassoux on the real- skeptic already says that the in-itself might be ization that our facticity is not itself just a fact, anything at all without our knowing it, specu- but is something necessary. To doubt the ne- lative thought merely adds that we do know it cessity of my facticity and thereby turn it into (88). But this apparently meager addition con- something merely contingent and susceptible tains the germ of Meillassoux’s entire philoso- of mere description, I have to presuppose that phy. Since he knows that contingency is neces- my facticity might be otherwise, but this state- sary and eternal, and that only contingency is ment contradicts itself. “In order to doubt the such, his basic philosophical method will con- necessity of something, I ought in fact to ad- sist in deducing all those conditions that a mit, as we have seen, that its facticity is think- thing must fulfill in order to be contingent able as absolute. For in order that the world in (90). As a first step, Meillassoux tries to use his its entirety should be capable of being thought principle of unreason to verify Kant’s views as not being, or not being such as it is, I ought that: (a) the in-itself is never contradictory, and to admit that its possible non-being, its (b) that there must be an in-itself. He does this facticity, is thinkable for me as an absolute (in over the course of fifteen subtle pages which such a way that it is more than a correlate of are a pleasure to read, but whose exact argu- thought)” (100). In short, while everything in mentation cannot be reproduced in a short re- the world has an absolute facticity, this is not view like this one. A brief summary of his re- true of facticity itself, which cannot merely be sults will have to suffice. Meillassoux first tries something given and described. Instead, to establish that the in-itself can never be con- facticity is something that must be deduced, tradictory. He makes the fascinating claim that something with a logical necessity that I see no this goes even beyond Aristotle’s principle of reason not to call a priori. This step into a non-contradiction, since the Aristotelian prin- sphere of logical deductions beyond the con- A NEW FRENCH PHILOSOPHER 111 © DePaul University 2007 tingent finitude of Kantian or phenomeno- If we gaze through the crack that is thereby logical description, “far from leading to some- opened on the absolute, we discover a rather thing irrational, allows for the constitution of a menacing power . . . able to destroy both things space of rather precise problems, in which a lo- and worlds; able to give rise to monsters of gos is progressively able to unfold the axes of illogicism; able just as well never to come about its argumentation” (107). With the downfall of at all; surely able to produce every dream, but finitude, we enter a space where philosophy every nightmare as well; able to undergo fre- gains renewed confidence in the power of rea- netic and disordered changes or, alternatively, son and the logical deducibility of numerous to produce a universe immobile down to its in- truths. Meillassoux, ostensibly an advocate of nermost recesses. Like a cloud bearing the most unreason, is in fact a champion of mathemati- fearful tempests, the most unfamiliar lightning- cal reason in the high Cartesian style. Indeed, flashes. ...AnOmnipotence equal to that of he seeks a “passage of truth from the Kantian Descartes’ God, capable of everything, includ- in-itself to a Cartesian in-itself” that would ing the inconceivable. But an Omnipotence that take us beyond the logical principle of non- would be disordered, blind, divorced from other contradiction to an absolutization of mathe- divine perfections, and rendered autonomous. matical discourse (109). With a tantalizing hint at his future work, Meillassoux concedes A power with neither goodness nor wisdom, un- that he “cannot present here the full solution to able to guarantee to thought that its distinct this problem” (ibid.). ideas are true. (87–88) In a striking interlude on the nature of philosophy, he states that “philosophy is the in- In other words, the quickest objection to vention of strange arguments, necessarily bor- Meillassoux’s position would be that he al- dering on sophistry—which remains its dark lows the laws of nature to change wildly and structural double. In fact, philosophizing al- without notice. Many readers will continue to ways consists in deploying an idea that im- insist that the laws of nature must be neces- poses an original argumentative regime in or- sary—but in a mysterious physical sense that der to be defended or explored” (103). The undercuts Meillassoux’s absolute contin- backbone of Meillassoux’s new way of think- gency, since he dares to speak of an absolute unreason in the world rather than just a limita- ing appears earlier on the same page, in the fol- tion on knowledge. But Meillassoux counters lowing lucid summary: “non-metaphysical “that we can sincerely accept that objects are speculation consists, in the first place, in stat- capable, actually and without any reason,of ing that the thing in itself is nothing other than displaying the most capricious behavior, with- the facticity of transcendental forms of repre- out thereby modifying the usual everyday rela- sentation. It consists, in the second place, in tion that we have with things” (114–15). As he deducing from the absolute status of this sees it, dogmatists, skeptics, and transcenden- facticity the properties that Kant himself was tal philosophers all share a belief in causation, content to accept as evident” (ibid.). In this with some of them merely doubting that the way, Meillassoux sketches a world in which causal sources of things can be known. He each thing is contingent and self-contained, states that the same is true of Hume, who con- capable of being utterly different from what it tinues to “[believe] blindly in the world that is, and absolutely unconnected to anything the metaphysicians believed themselves capa- else by any ground or reason. This leads him ble of demonstrating” (124). Whether or not into a confrontation with David Hume in one accepts this reading of Hume, it is cer- Chapter 4, since Meillassoux like Hume seems tainly true that he did not advocate a flat-out faced with a world of chaos-without-cause. absolute contingency of the kind found in the But whereas Hume was concerned only with book now being reviewed. our inability to know any causal sources of For Meillassoux, the real problem is not the things, Meillassoux faces a more difficult necessity of laws of nature, but their stability, predicament—for he has gone so far as to two themes that are easily confused. He refor- declare absolutely that there is, in reality itself, mulate Hume’s problem as follows: “if laws no reason. are regarded as contingent and not necessary, PHILOSOPHY TODAY 112 © DePaul University 2007 how does it happen that their contingency is ble that permits us to establish a calculus or not manifest in the form of radical and continu- probability or frequency of an event when we ous change?” (125). It is often believed that the play a game of chance” (132). But if we find to apparent constancy of the physical world re- our surprise that a die continues to fall on the futes contingency. After all, if the laws of na- same face after an hour’s worth of throws, we ture could change, it is assumed that they will surely begin to suspect a secret cause for would have to change frequently. Evidently, this result—perhaps a piece of lead hidden in- they do not; hence, the laws of nature must not side it. Our suspicions will surely increase if be contingent (128–29). To fully overturn this we learn that the die has fallen on the same face usual line of reasoning, which Meillassoux for our entire lifetimes, or in all of human calls “the frequential implication,” he will memory: especially if we are playing with a need to show how stability emerges from out die having millions or trillions of faces rather of chaos. In the present book, he confines him- than the usual six. What impels our belief in a self to the negative first step of showing that secret cause is the apparent contrast between the frequentialist argument does not work. He the countless possible results of the dice-throw takes as his target a book that he greatly ad- and the single outcome that recurs repeatedly. mires, written in the early 1980s by one Jean- Like our imaginary gambler, Hume and Kant René Vernes.8 assume that if there were true contingency in Vernes’book, “written in a concise manner the dice-throw, it ought to be manifest in the worthy of the philosophers of the seventeenth form of wildly varying results. Essentially, century” (130) (as is equally true of they take the probabilistic reasoning with Meillassoux’s own book) tries to render more which a gambler concludes that a die is loaded, explicit the reasons that Hume and Kant be- and transfer it to the universe as a whole. Out of lieve in necessary laws. Vernes himself de- an immense total of thinkable (i.e., non-con- fends the frequentialist argument, but by mak- tradictory) universes, the familiar conditions ing it more explicit than his forerunners, of our own universe always seem to be re- Meillassoux thinks he exposes its weaknesses peated. Even when cutting-edge physics un- all the more. As Vernes sees it, we are able to covers some bizarre new phenomenon, this pass from the apparent stability of physical merely gives unexpected insight into our exist- laws to their necessity by following a probabil- ing universe; no one thinks that it marks a cha- istic line of reasoning. If we imagine the colli- otic transformation in the very laws of our uni- sion of Hume’s proverbial billiard balls, we verse. From all of this, one concludes that there notice a contrast between the countless a priori must be some extra-logical, extra-mathemati- possibilities of things that could occur when cal force governing the “universe-die” so as to the balls strike one another, and the limited give it the constant conditions that we witness. number of repeated deflections that do in fact Vernes calls this secret force “matter,” but seem to occur. Posing a strange but fascinating Meillassoux finds it so vague and mysterious question, Vernes asks why we trust our senses that we might just as well call it “providence” in this case, rather than dismissing the repeti- (134). In any case, the inference of Hume and tion as illusory and trusting instead in the infi- Kant runs as follows: “if the laws are actually nite possibilities offered by our reason. The an- capable of being modified without reason,it swer, as he sees it, lies in the same principle would be ‘infinitely’ improbable that they are “which . . . allows a dice-player to suspect . . . not modified frequently” (ibid.). that a die that always lands on the same face is Meillassoux’s critique of this inference is most probably loaded” (131). We begin by highly inventive, though not as immediately imagining a perfectly fair set of gambler’s convincing (to me, at least) as some of the dice, symmetrical and homogeneous, with no other arguments in his book. As he sees it, the evident reason for one side to turn up more of- basic presupposition of the “frequentialist” ten than any other. We now calculate the prob- standpoint is that it equates the being of the abilities of various dice-throws by means of possible with the being of a total conceivable the following principle: “that which is equally numerical sum of possibilities—even if this thinkable is equally possible. It is this quanti- sum is regarded as infinite. And “this line of tative equality of the thinkable and the possi- probabilist reasoning is valid only on the con- A NEW FRENCH PHILOSOPHER 113 © DePaul University 2007 dition that what is possible a priori is thinkable pose the very issue under dispute. In this way, in the manner of a numerical totality” (139). In stripped of its framework of necessity, true order for Vernes’defense of Hume and Kant to chance even becomes impossible. work, he needs to assume that the sum total of As I read it, Meillassoux’s present book conceivable events is greater than the total merely tries to show that the apparent stability stock of experimental results. The larger the of physical events in no way implies their ne- total of possible events, or the larger the num- cessity. As he himself admits, what is needed ber of faces on the universe-die, all the greater to make his unorthodox stance on nature fully is the probability that the stable universe of our convincing is to show a way for stability to experience results from a cryptic physical ne- arise despite absolute contingency. This would cessity lying hidden from view. It is here that then allow us to apply Ockham’s Razor to any Meillassoux invokes Cantor, and Badiou’s fruitless appeal to cryptic physical mecha- philosophical appropriation of him, in an ef- nisms (148). But Après la finitude only lays the fort to undercut the supposition that we can groundwork for such a tactic, since it does not speak of a totality of possible events at all firmly establish the needed resolution to (139–42). The quantity of quantities is not just Hume’s problem: “for a . . . proposed resolu- too big to think about—it actually does not ex- tion of Hume’s problem would be obliged to ist in light of the endless series of transfinite derive the non-totalizability of the possible numbers, none of them ever the greatest possi- from the principle of factuality itself” (152). ble one (144). In other words, there is no sum Yetthere is little cause for complaint, since this of possibilities, and hence the basically statis- short book already achieves so much that most tical argument of the frequentialists collapses. readers will gladly wait a few more years for a Or at least this is true under at least one axiom- fuller treatment of contingency. atic system (Meillassoux, like Badiou, cites In closing these middle sections of the book Zermelo-Fraenkel [142]), and this is enough to (we have dealt with the final chapter above), suspend any overwhelming discrepancy be- Meillassoux insists that the famous problems tween a limited pattern of recurring physical of metaphysics are real, and deserve to be events and a mighty ocean of total possible treated with respect. It is no longer a true philo- conceivable events. Moreover, any theory of sophical attitude to smirk ironically at ques- chance always relies on the deeper assumption tions from beginners such as “who are we?” or of an underlying physical law within which “where do we come from?” (151). In his view chance plays out: (as in my own), the recent tendency by philosophers to smirk at supposed “pseudo-prob- an aleatory series can be constituted only on lems” is merely a result of the correlational cir- condition that the die preserves its structure cle—which confines itself to an increasingly from one throw to the next, and that the laws that decrepit citadel of human access to the world, permit the throws to take place are not modified and regards as “naïve” any attempt to venture from one roll to the next. If the die were to im- into a supposed wasteland-in-itself beyond the plode, become spherical or flat, multiply its fortress. But while Meillassoux does not find faces by a thousandfold, etc., from one throw to metaphysical questions naïve or meaningless, the next; or if gravity ceased to act and the die he also does not find them mysterious: “there flew off into the air, or were projected instead is no longer any mystery, not because there is beneath the surface of the earth, etc., from one no longer any problem, but because there is no throw to the next; if this were so, no aleatory se- longer any reason” (152). In his eyes, what phi- ries, no calculus of probabilities, could ever losophy most needs is an absolute and take place. (135–56) mathematized Cartesian version of the an sich, not just a mysteriously withdrawn Kantian That is to say, even the wildest games of one: a “mathematical and not merely logical chance unfold only within a field defined by restoration of a reality regarded as independent certain unvarying laws. But Meillassoux’s of the existence of thought” (153). This views on absolute contingency prevent us mathematized absolute will provide the key from taking refuge in any final ground of nec- for bridging what Meillassoux regards as the essary physical laws, since this would presup- two central themes of his book, and perhaps of PHILOSOPHY TODAY 114 © DePaul University 2007 his thinking in general: (1) the ancestral claim will sound as strange to the reader as to archifossil, and (2) the problem of how Meillassoux himself, it calls for a bit of stability emerges from absolute contingency explanation. (ibid.). Occasionalism is generally remembered as a minor, dusty, and gratuitous theological doc- Hyper-Occasionalism trine in which God intervenes at every moment to link mind and body, and more generally to Anyone familiar with recent continental link any objects at all. It is often restricted to philosophy is likely to find Meillassoux’s book Malebranche and a small number of his intel- refreshing. He abandons the more or less cau- lectual cousins. Indeed, specialists in modern tious hermeneutics of human finitude that philosophy often strike down all efforts to ap- Heidegger established as a basic philosophical ply this term even to Descartes, let alone to method, replacing it with remorseless logical Spinoza, Leibniz, and Berkeley. In my view, deduction. Stylistically, he prefers rational ar- this restriction is unjustified, and the term gumentation to the “close reading” exegesis of should be given a far broader scope than is nor- classic texts, and in this respect he has much in mally the case. For what is most pivotal about common with mainstream analytic thought. occasionalism is not any particular theology, He captures the reader’s attention by minutely but rather the idea that entities in the world ex- describing the contours of any philosophical ist only side by side, without any connection position, depicting it from numerous angles by with one another. This model is obviously means of variant and contrary positions, em- found not only in Islamic figures such as al- ploying a wealth of brilliant counterarguments Ash‘ari and al-Ghazali, and full-blown Chris- that often flood the reader’s mind even before tian occasionalists such as Malebranche, but in the initial position has been mastered. In this a broad range of modern philosophers. As Ste- sense, Meillassoux shows both a Hegelian tal- ven Nadler has shown,9 precisely the same ar- ent for dialectical variation and a Cartesian gift gument about the side-by-side character of for lucid, step-by-step inference. And while things is even what guides Hume and his medi- his faith in reason and contempt for obscuran- eval forerunner Nicolas d’Autrécourt. Strictly tism may strike some readers as too confident speaking, occasionalism in its purest form in our power to fathom the depths of the world, would be impossible, since we would be left this style of thinking is a badly needed counter- with a multitude of side-by-side micro-uni- point to the dominant music of infinite other- verses, none of them communicating with the ness and withdrawn grounds beneath grounds others in even the least fashion. This is why that has become the near-ubiquitous sound- each form of occasionalism has had to allow it- track of continental philosophy. Best of all, self a single hypocritical exception to the usual Meillassoux never passes the buck to dead ban on interaction. For the theological occa- mentors or hedges his bets behind meandering sionalists, this exception is obviously God, prose; he sticks his neck out in every section of who is granted the unique ability to affect the the book, and most available knives are too things in the world: even fire cannot burn cot- dull to place him in any danger. For this reader ton, but God can make it burn. In “skeptical oc- at least, Après la finitude opens unheard-of casionalists” such as Hume, the hypocritical possibilities for the future of French philoso- exception is found in the human mind, which phy, and tends to restore a good deal of links fire and cotton through the force of optimism concerning the power of human custom (even if nothing in the outside world reason to know the world. Challenges of this corresponds to such a link). order come only from works of the highest Meillassoux’s philosophy can be read as a intellectual caliber. more extreme form of occasionalism than ei- Meillassoux is an explicit champion of ther of these schools. In his system there is no what he calls hyper-chaos, or perhaps hyper- God able to do what inherent causal power contingency. Only while writing this review cannot accomplish, since he excludes all nec- did it occur to me that this actually makes him a essary beings. Nor does he merely say, with hyper-occasionalist, perhaps the most extreme Hume, that we “cannot know” whether causal occasionalist who has ever lived. Since this powers exist—after all, Meillassoux states ab- A NEW FRENCH PHILOSOPHER 115 © DePaul University 2007 solutely that there is no reason, no cause for any connection between these two entities. In anything to happen. His occasionalism is not other words, causation is not just an apparent merely a de-linking of distinct entities viewed phenomenon that arises in human awareness from the standpoint of human knowledge, but without reason, but something that actually an explicit decree about the ancestral things unfolds between entities themselves without themselves. He leaves us with a cosmos of ut- reason. In the current version of Meillassoux’s terly isolated entities, none capable of exerting project, there remains the possible objection determinative forces against the others. that, even though the archifossil is something It remains to be seen how Meillassoux’s fu- existing entirely in itself, independently of all ture work will explain the emergence of appar- correlation or rapport, it is still invoked only as ent stability in nature from the hyper-contin- the dark excess or underbelly of the correlate gency to which he feels bound. For the itself. An analogous problem is found in moment, however, there is a possible objection Badiou’s “inconsistent multiplicity,”10 which to his manner of stating the problem. He argues seems to do nothing other than constantly un- convincingly that philosophy is capable of ab- dercut the human count-as-one and occasion- solute statements about things themselves, and ally surprise us in various novel truth-events. If is in no way confined to the correlationist’s inconsistent multiplicity merely remains be- things themselves “for us.” Even so, the ances- yond all counts as a non-totalizable excess, tral realm in his work still functions solely as a and no part of it ever acts against any other mechanism for absolutizing the correlational part, it thereby effectively functions as a one circle; indeed, his method of obtaining the ab- despite Badiou’s claims to the contrary. More solute arises directly from a radicalization of importantly, it will have no structure in its own the correlational predicament itself. In this re- right, and we will find ourselves saying almost spect, he seems more concerned with the abso- nothing about the nature of the world itself. A lute status of scientific knowledge of the things true hyper-occasionalism would have to avoid themselves than with the ontological structure relapse into human knowledge as the single ul- of these things apart from all knowledge. If this timate arbiter of a world without sufficient rea- objection seems too subtle, it becomes more son. This can happen only if we deal explicitly vivid if we ask about the relation of ancestral with the interaction of separate inanimate enti- things with each other rather than just their in- ties outside the scope of human awareness— ability to be reduced to a human-world corre- including ancestral scientific knowledge. late. Nowhere in the present book do we find a Although I would not call this difficulty discussion of how the ancestral structure of fire “minor,” it is still a specific and limited issue, exceeds its relation to cotton; for Meillassoux and one fully open to debate. Après la finitude it is only human knowledge, not relationality is an important book of philosophy by an au- in general, that finds itself perplexed by the thor who is clearly one of the most talented archifossil. Stated differently, the problem is emerging voices in continental thought. not just why it seems to us that fire always Quentin Meillassoux deserves our close atten- burns cotton even though there is absolutely no tion in the years to come, and his book de- reason for this to happen. The real problem is serves rapid translation and widespread dis- why fire and cotton themselves are able to give cussion in the English-speaking world. There rise to an event even though there is no longer is nothing quite like it.

ENDNOTES

1. Quentin, Meillassoux, Après la finitude: Essai sur la my attention to Meillassoux in the first place. nécessité de la contingence, with a Preface by Alain 2. This information comes from Brassier himself, e- Badiou (Paris: Seuil, 2006.) All translations from mail to the author on August 21, 2006. the French are my own. Thanks are due to Ray 3. From page 11 of Badiou’s Preface. Meillassoux also Brassier of Middlesex University for numerous receives five respectful citations in Badiou’s new stimulating discussions of the book, and for drawing major work Logiques des mondes (Paris: Editions de PHILOSOPHY TODAY 116 © DePaul University 2007 Seuil, 2006), on pages 129, 534, 577, 589, and 624. 6. From an e-mail to the author on July 6, 2006. 4. “I propose one path, but the interest of Après la fini- 7. Cf. Aristotle, Metaphysics, Book Gamma, section 4. tude is that the reader can agree with the three criti- 8. Jean-René Vernes, Critique de la raison aléatoire, ou cal chapters on correlationism (1, 2, 5) without be- Descartes contra Kant, with a Preface by Paul ing obliged to accept my own solution for escaping Ricoeur (Paris: Aubier, 1982). it. It remains for each reader to see if he can experi- 9. Steven Nadler, “‘No Necessary Connection’: The ment with other paths.” From Meillassoux’s e-mail Medieval Roots of the Occasionalist Roots of to the author on June 9, 2006. Hume,” The Monist 79 (1996): 448–66. 5. Analogous sentiments can be found throughout 10. Alain Badiou, Being and Event,trans.Oliver Bruno Latour’s We Have Never Been Modern, trans. Feltham (London: Continuum, 2005). C. Porter (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1993).

American University in Cairo, Egypt