The book ”Intensive Science & Virtual
Philosophy” by
materialist philosopher Manuel De Landa is an attempt to shed
light on French
philosopher Gilles Deleuze’s (1925-1995) ontology within a scientific context. As a student struggling with the ontological universe of this great post-structuralist philosopher, one is bound to encounter difficulties when handling the philosopher’s malleable and transmogrifying terminology. Central to Deleuze’s concept is that
philosophy only “works” in a relationship with other disciplines (art, science, politics etc.). One important challenge in understanding Deleuze’s multi-disciplinary, multivalent approach is the use of terms and concepts from science. Examples and concepts are developed from disparate fields like quantum-physics and evolution theory and combined into new expressions. Since his philosophy has had an immense influence on a number of disciplines (besides contemporary philosophy); film-studies, literature-studies, the visuals arts, technology-studies, the media etc. there are numerous works on Deleuze’s theories, and their influence on each respective category. What makes this particular book especially important is that no matter what field of study one is working with Deleuzian ideas, DeLanda’s incisive and clear-sighted voyage into Deleuze’s world will illuminate the philosopher’s terminology in new ways. Philosophers of science and scientists/students of science might be targeted as the main audiences for this book, but the unfolding of Deleuze’s
processual ontology – that is the break with
essentialism to an exploration of the dynamic processes involved in
creation (of subjects, of art, of society-structures/institutions etc.)- is of great value to any student of Deleuze. DeLanda utilizes examples from differential geometry, group theory and complexity theory to investigate Deleuze’s application of the concepts of;
the virtual,
the intensive and
the actual. The first chapter “The Mathematics of the Virtual.” deals with how Deleuze disposes of the ancient philosophical notion of
essence through the concept of
multiplicity.In short, it explains how Deleuze sees a species being defined, not by a transcendent essence, but by the
morphogenetic process that forms the individual/the multiple. DeLanda links this process to the differential geometry of Friedrich Gauss and Bernhard Riemann.The basic fundament of their theories concerns how there is no
supplementary dimension to the many dimensions an entity (multiplicity) has. Spaces could be studied without relation to a higher-dimensional space. The following chapter, “The Actualization of the Virtual in Space” picks up the thread from the introduction to
virtual multiplicities by exploring the notion of
intensive and
extensive properties. The main pillars of intensive thinking;
population and
rates of change replace the essentialist concepts of
fixed types and
ideal norms. Seeing the world (nature) as defined by pre-existing archetypes (
fixed and
ideal) is contrasted to approaching
the type (the average) as abstract and variation (
multiplicities) as the only norm. Deleuze takes the clue from evolution theorists and biologists like Darwin and Arthur Winfree, Gerald Edelman and Stuart Kauffman to show that everything that happens happens as a result of
differentiation (not uniformity). Every change/development results from intensive processes (tension, temperature, pressure etc.), and the
actual/extensive represents the entity actualised in a certain space embodying said intensive properties.The topic of the third chapter, “The Actualization of the Virtual in Time” is the conflict between the general theories of relativity and classical thermodynamics-A strategy to further investigate the Deleuzian non-essentialist stance and the overlapping concepts of
the intensive,
the virtual and
the actual. Non-linear physicist Arthur Iberall and non-linear biologist Arthur Winfree contribute understanding regarding how time is a product of quantifiable instants (Iberall) and how the instances that govern the oscillations that form metric time are of
intensive origin and never identical (Winfree).Time is not the invariable entity described in classical physics, but under the influence of the processes taking place within - A
virtual theory of time. The final chapter “Virtuality and the Laws of Physics” is dedicated to replacing
fundamental law statements with a
problematic approach for science. This approach is based on posing the relevant questions/problems rather than searching for universal laws. DeLanda turns to the field of mathematics as Deleuze (in
Logic of Sense) credited the mathematician Niels Abel with the method of reversing the problem-solution relation by emphasizing the
conditions of the problem before the theorem. Deleuze sees every individual as a specific solution to a
virtual problem, and the author shows how this approach (as employed in philosophy and physics as well as in mathematics) demands a need to view the entity of ‘science’ itself as organic dependent on isolation from other fields (a ‘closing of the gene pool’) and a level of internal homogeneity to emerge as an
individual scientific field. Finally, the appendix
Deleuze’s Words offers insight into the complexities of Deleuzian terminology. The reader learns how different concepts are interlinked, and assume different “guises” in different contexts. Each term is tracked to its origin from the body of works Deleuze has produced (often in tandem with Felix Guattari who was instrumental in shaping concepts.).There is a case for criticizing the book for not being a very extensive account of Deleuzian philosophy as the aspect of Deleuze’s position within a philosophical lineage (his relationship with Bergsonian and Nietzschean concepts etc. ) is not scrutinized. Nevertheless, the book is a truly
practical interaction with Deleuzian ontology. Whereas post-structionalist philosophy in general, and Deleuze’s in particular, might
appear vague and labyrinthine, “Intensive Science & Virtual Philosophy” goes a long way in refuting the notion that his
intensive philosophy has no validity
outside the philosophy-faculty.