Mcdonald Phd Thesis 2015

University of Dundee DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY Sense, Understanding and Language A Genealogy of Sense in the Philosophy of Gilles Deleuze 1953-1969 McDonald, Andrew Award date: 2015 Link to publication General rights Copyright and moral rights for the publications made accessible in the public portal are retained by the authors and/or other copyright owners and it is a condition of accessing publications that users recognise and abide by the legal requirements associated with these rights. • Users may download and print one copy of any publication from the public portal for the purpose of private study or research. • You may not further distribute the material or use it for any profit-making activity or commercial gain • You may freely distribute the URL identifying the publication in the public portal Take down policy If you believe that this document breaches copyright please contact us providing details, and we will remove access to the work immediately and investigate your claim. Download date: 04. Oct. 2021 Sense, Understanding and Language: A Genealogy of Sense in the Philosophy of Gilles Deleuze 1953-1969 Andrew McDonald, MA (Hons.), Mlitt Thesis Submitted to the University of Dundee for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy May 2015 Primary Supervisor James Williams Secondary Supervisor Todd Mei Abstract This thesis analyses the concept of sense in Deleuze’s early philosophy. I claim sense is an empirical process of understanding before a settled meaning has been attained. My analysis of Deleuze’s early works Nietzsche and Philosophy and Proust and Signs draws upon the empirical and rationalist tension between sense and meaning. For empiricists, in order to attain meaning, we must first make sense of the world and thereby associate experiential qualities to our ideas. They argue that without this process our ideas remain blank. In contrast, for rationalists, meaning is attained through rational reflection. This enables us to attain clarity in our understanding and achieve consensus. Without this process of rational reflection, our ideas remain chaotic, based upon a multiplicity of different perspectives. We are then presented with an either/or choice. Either we must accept the necessity of making sense and face the problems of conflict of interest. Or, by adhering to deductive reasoning, individuals can arrive at clarity but face the problem of blank ideas. Deleuze confronts the empirical and rationalist tension through the concept of sense and its relation to an apprenticeship. This joins Deleuze’s work on Nietzsche and Proust to Logic of Sense. It is through his analysis of Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass that an alternative answer is given. For Deleuze, we must make sense of the world but, at the same time, enable our understanding to be guided through a structure and methodology. That is to say, different methodologies and structures enable us to attain knowledge and educate others. What Deleuze makes us attentive to is a process of an experimental apprenticeship where methodological structures are continually challenged and made sense of. By practically applying structures, we attain meaning. Yet this meaning is novel because its sense follows from novel apprenticeship and experimentation. Following this. I claim that Deleuze does not seek either a purely rationalist or empirical approach, but rather, one that affirms both positions. This enables us to affirm the necessity of the process of making sense and of the novel attainment of meaning. This also enables an epistemological depth to be uncovered in early Deleuze through an analysis of his early works as studies of sense. My analysis of sense and language then develops the importance of epistemology and language in the philosophy of Deleuze, which at present remains still new and embryonic. ii Table of Contents ABSTRACT i ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS v INTRODUCTION WHAT IS SENSE? 1 DELEUZE’S EARLY WORK ON EPISTEMOLOGY AND LANGUAGE 3 THE RECONSTRUCTION OF DELEUZE’S PHILOSOPHY BY ACADEMICS 10 A PHILOSOPHY OF PURE BECOMING 11 A REALIST PHILOSOPHY COMPATIBLE WITH SCIENCE 12 A PSEUDO-RATIONALIST PHILOSOPHY OF ONENESS 13 A TRANSCENDENTAL EMPIRICIST, POST-KANTIAN PHILOSOPHY 15 A PHILOSOPHY OF DISCOVERING PARADOXES AS THE CREATION OF STRUCTURES 16 LOCKE, SENSE AND LANGUAGE 25 LEIBNIZ, SINGULARITY AND LANGUAGE 32 CONCLUSION 41 1. NIETZSCHE, SENSE AND TRANSCENDENT SIGNS INTRODUCTION 44 PROBLEMS WITH A TRANSCENDENT FOUNDATION FOR KNOWLEDGE 51 A GENEALOGY OF LANGUAGE AND ITS VARIOUS ORIGINS 59 ROUSSEAU, SPEECH AND SIGNS AS AN EMPATHETIC GESTURE 62 DE BROSSES AND OUR NATURAL ASSOCIATION OF NAMES 65 LORD MONBODDO AND THE DIVINE IDEOGRAM AS A FOUNDATION FOR LANGUAGE 67 HERDER AND REFLECTION UPON EXPRESSION AS THE FOUNDATION FOR LANGUAGE 70 RHETORIC, METAPHOR, AND THE DENIAL OF A PURE ORIGIN 78 THE DETERMINATION SENSE BY SOCIAL CONVENTION AND ITS ABSURDITY 86 CONCLUSION 100 2. DELEUZE’S HEGEL: NEGATION AND THE REVALUATION OF DIALECTICS INTRODUCTION 104 HEGEL, SENSE AND NEGATION 110 DELEUZE’S PROBLEM WITH HEGEL’S NEGATION OF IMMEDIACY 118 HOULGATE ON DELEUZE: NEGATION IS INHERENT AND NOT EXTERNAL 121 ZIZEK’S DELEUZE: INHERENT NEGATION IS DIFFERENCE IN BOTH HEGEL AND DELEUZE 124 STIRNER: THE EGO, UNIQUENESS AND THE PROBLEM OF NAMES 129 DELEUZE ON STIRNER: THE PROBLEM OF NON-CONCEPTUAL DIFFERENCE 136 CONCLUSION 141 3. THE IMAGE OF THOUGHT AND A CARTESIAN APPRENTICESHIP TO SIGNS INTRODUCTION 146 DESCARTES’ DEDUCTIVE METHOD FOR MAKING SENSE 153 DESCARTES AND LANGUAGE: TOWARDS PURE CONCEPTS OF THE MIND 160 HOBBES’ OBJECTION: THE IMAGINATION AS AN EMPIRICAL PROCESS OF MAKING SENSE 166 CHOMSKY AND CARTESIAN LINGUISTICS: THE MIND AS A GRAMMATICAL FOUNDATION 170 WILLIAM LABOV AND SOCIOLINGUISTICS: AN IMMANENT FOUNDATION FOR LANGUAGE 177 DELEUZE AND GUATTARI ON CHOMSKY AND LABOV: LINGUISTIC VARIABLES AND AFRICAN AMERICAN ENGLISH 183 CONCLUSION 195 iii 4. IMMANENCE AND A LEIBNIZIAN APPRENTICESHIP TO SIGNS INTRODUCTION 199 DELEUZE’S PROUST: WORLDLY SIGNS AND GENERALITY 207 SIGNS OF LOVE AND A MULTIPLICITY OF POSSIBLE INTERPRETATIONS 215 CHALLENGING RESEMBLANCE AND GENERALITY IN LEIBNIZ 221 SINGULARITY AS MONADIC 226 SIGNS OF ART: SIGNS AS REFLECTIVE OF MONADIC SINGULARITY 234 CONCLUSION 239 5. LOGIC OF SENSE AND PLATO: TOWARDS A PURE METAPHYSICAL FOUNDATION FOR MEANING INTRODUCTION 246 SENSE AS A PROCESS AND KNOWLEDGE AS BECOMING 252 PLATO’S CRATYLUS: THE PROBLEM OF NAMING AND MAINTAINING UNIQUENESS 258 PLATO ON CRATYLUS’ VIEW: ETYMOLOGY AND PROBLEMS WITH A CAUSAL FOUNDATION FOR MEANING 267 PLATO’S VIEW: TOWARDS A METAPHYSICS OF LANGUAGE 272 CONCLUSION 277 6. LOGIC OF SENSE AND LEWIS CARROLL: CHALLENGING THE PURE FOUNDATION OF MEANING BY REDISCOVERING SENSE INTRODUCTION 280 DELEUZE MEETS HERMOGENES AND CRATYLUS: THE PARADOXES OF INDEFINITE PROLIFERATION AND DRY REITERATION 285 ALICE’S APPRENTICESHIP: A RETURN TO MAKING SENSE OF THE WORLD 294 NONSENSE AND ITS RELATION TO SENSE 299 IS A BLUEPRINT FOR MEANING REQUIRED? THE IDEAL GAME AND REDISCOVERING MEANING 304 ANTI-OEDIPUS, SCHIZOANALYSIS AND THE AFFIRMATION OF LANGUAGE GAMES 311 CONCLUSION 317 CONCLUSION WHAT IS IT TO KNOW? 320 WHAT IS A RATIONALIST APPRENTICESHIP? 321 WHAT IS AN EMPIRICAL APPRENTICESHIP? 323 DELEUZE AND THE TREE MODEL FOR KNOWLEDGE 326 FROM TREE MODELS TOWARDS A RHIZOMIC APPRENTICESHIP 333 BIBLIOGRAPHY 349 INDEX 364 iv Acknowledgements I would like to thank all those that have supported me. The continued support and advice of my supervisor James Williams. Also for the advice given me to over the years by current and previous staff members of the philosophy department at the University of Dundee, Rachel Jones, Nicholas Davey, Roger Young, Dominic Smith, Todd Mei, and Ashley Woodward. I was forever grateful for the financial assistance provided by Student Funding at the University of Dundee that was the only funding that I received throughout. It enabled me to get through some very tough times. I am grateful for the continued support and encouragement given by my father David McDonald and mother Yvonne McDonald. Lastly, it would not have been possible without the continued love and support of my partner, Lucy Jackson. v Declaration I declare that I, Andrew McDonald, am the sole author of this thesis and it has not been accepted previously for a higher degree. Signed For Regina, Jagger and their future selves. Thank you for the chaos and to your grown up selves have this serve as a reminder to never forget about the importance of our child-like experience. Introduction What is sense? When curiosity strikes and we seek to know, there are immediate answers waiting for us. In contemporary society, curiosity can be resolved within a few seconds after we look up a specific dictionary definition or a website entry in an encyclopedia. With this fast rate of accessible information, knowledge has become comparable to fast food. It appears that it is no longer required for an individual to read full-length studies or spend years on a given subject area. If we want to know the philosophical concepts corresponding to Descartes’ cogito, Nietzsche’s eternal return, or Plato’s theory of Ideal Forms we only need to look up a definition. It is, of course, not just philosopher’s concepts that can be easily digested. Everything in society has a ready-made meaning. Following this, we could say everything has been predefined and all that is required of us is to learn definitions. After that we can relax, put the kettle on and be content with what we have learned. The problem with this view is that we never arrive at an understanding of things for ourselves. In other words, meaning is defined according to another’s view. The meaning of a word for us remains blank. We have not gone through any process of learning, just simply typed in a definition. Without undergoing a process of education there is no clear understanding of things. By undergoing a process of learning, we can call into the question that we were content to believe was simply correct.

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