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Ode to Man
Tho’ many are the terrors,
not one more terrible than man goes.
This one beyond the grizzled sea
in winter storming to the south
He crosses, all-engulfed,
cutting through, up from under swells.
& of the gods She the Eldest, Earth
un-withering, un-toiling, is worn down,
As the Twisting Plough’s year
into Twisting Plough’s year,
Through the breeding of horse, he turns.
& the lighthearted race of birds
all-snaring he drives them
& savage beasts, their clan, & of the sea,
marine in kind
With tightly-wound meshes spun
from all-seeing is Man.
Yet too, he masters by means of pastoral
beast, mountain-trodding,
The unruly-maned horse holding fast,
‘round the neck yoked,
& the mountain’s
ceaseless bull.
& the voice & wind-fast thought
& the passion for civic ways
He has taught, so from crag’s poor court
from under the ether’s hard-tossed arrows
To flee, this all-crossing one. Blocked, he comes
upon nothing so fated.
From Hades alone escape he’ll not bring.
Tho’ from sickness impossible
Flight he has pondered.
A skilled one, devising of arts beyond hope,
Holding at times an evil,
But then to the noble he crawls,
honoring the laws of the Earth, &
Of gods the oath so just,
high-citied.
Citiless is the one who with the un-beautiful
dwells, boldly in grace.
Never for me a hearth-mate
may he have been, never equal in mind
He who offers this.
Ode to Man
A BwO is made in such a way that it can be occupied, populated only by intensities. Only intensities pass and circulate. Still, the BwO is not a scene, a place, or even a support upon which something comes to pass. It has nothing to do with phantasy, there is nothing to interpret. The BwO causes intensities to pass; it produces and distributes them in a spatium that is itself intensive, lacking extension. It is not space, nor is it in space; it is matter that occupies space to a given degree—to the degree corresponding to
the intensities produced. It is nonstratified, unformed, intense matter, the matrix of intensity, intensity = 0; but there is nothing negative about that zero, there are no negative or opposite intensities. Matter equals energy. Production of the real as an intensive magnitude starting at zero. That is why we treat the BwO as the full egg before the extension of the organism and the organization of the organs, before the formation of the strata; as the intense egg defined by axes and vectors, gradients and thresholds, by dynamic tendencies involving energy transformation and kinematic movements involving group displacement, by migrations: all independent
of accessory forms because the organs appear and function here only as pure intensities. The organ changes when it crosses a threshold, when it
changes gradient. "No organ is constant as regards either function or position, . . . sex organs sprout anywhere,... rectums open, defecate and close, . . . the entire organism changes color and consistency in split-second adjustments." The tantric egg. After all, is not Spinoza's Ethics the great book of the BwO?
Ode to Man
But human power is extremely limited, and is infinitely surpassed by the power of external causes; we have not, therefore, an absolute power of shaping to our use those things which are without us. Nevertheless, we shall bear with an equal mind all that happens to us in contravention to the claims of our own advantage, so long as we are conscious, that we have done our duty, and that the power which we possess is not sufficient to enable us to protect ourselves completely; remembering that we are a part of universal nature, and that we follow her order. If we have a clear and distinct understanding of this, that part of our nature which is defined by intelligence, in other words the better part of ourselves, will assuredly acquiesce in what befalls us, and in such acquiescence will endeavour to persist. For, in so far as we are intelligent beings, we cannot desire anything save that which is necessary, nor yield absolute acquiescence to anything, save to that which is true: wherefore, in so far as we have a right understanding of these things, the endeavour of the better part of ourselves is in harmony with the order of nature as a whole.
Thanks for these close readings, Kevin. I don’t have Massumi’s book to follow along, so I’ve been using the excellent set of interviews that Paul B pointed to at the online Oct.2009 INFLEXIONS; eg, “Of Microperception and Politics”.
My naive sense is that there’s a phenomenological temptation, when initially becoming critical of the stratified web in which we find ourself, to bracket some of the more macro aspects of conjoined semiosis (microfascisms swirling like snowflakes in tune to some Christmas musak) in order to focus on the general characteristics of memory and creativity for individuals-in-themselves. Of course, this only goes so far, and may lead one astray (the NOUGHTIES weren’t nice ; )
But, reading on to Brian and Erin’s interview with Isabelle Stengers, in the same INFLEXIONS, “History Through the Middle: Between Macro and Mesopolitics” http://www.sesnselab.ca/inflexions/volume_3/node_i3/PDF/Stengers_en_mesopolitique.pdf helps bring me back to a ‘proper’ level for conjoined semiosis. Stengers, here, is rather critical of the earlier focus on ‘micropolitics’ and ‘microperception’, in favor of a “Society of Molecules” in the mesosphere, which she discusses in her “last book”, LA SORCELLERIE CAPITALISTE: PRATIQUES DE DESENVOUTEMENT (CAPITALIST SORCERY: COUNTER-SPELLS — and I’m inclined to look, also, at some of Arnold Mindell’s incantations, as recently recommended by Amarilla..)
Anyway, maybe the Stengers interview would be a helpful holiday for bringing the earlier work of Massumi up to speed. If you recall my earlier comment about an ontology of resistors, capacitors, and conductors, Stengers gives a pretty good account of the semiosis involved (“participation in both these sense is indissociable from the induction of a capacity for resistance” 😉
For more insight into the electronic ontology I refer to above, check out the July 2009 NEW SCIENTIST article on “Memristor Minds: The Future of Artificial Intelligence”, which I found at http://postbiota.org/pipermail/tt/2009-October/006094.html
Best wishes for the new year.. Mark
Thanks for the references Mark, I shall have to check them out. I like this:
“My naive sense is that there’s a phenomenological temptation, when initially becoming critical of the stratified web in which we find ourself, to bracket some of the more macro aspects of conjoined semiosis”
The trouble I am having with Massumi, and I suspect it will continue, is that he intentional spatializes the philosophical dynamice of transcendence/immanence (my next post quote should bring this out), and as such cuts off a serious path of prescriptive development. I think that this is related to the phenomenological temptation you mention (not to mention the desire to make each person in a social system an epicenter of freedom and “difference”). I see the equation much more diversely, and fancy that human (and all objects, per se) as cut through with tides and currents and transpiercive effects, all of which erode the kind of essentialization Massumi finds to be proficient for his project. In a word, his project is still TOO “optical” (which is another wya of saying “idealist”).
And happy, happy holidays to you too.
p.s. Mark, these Massumi titles are available on AAAARG.ORG :
“Chaos in the Total Field of Vision” (ch. 6, Parables for the Virtual)
Fear (The Spectrum Said)
Parables For The Virtual (excerpt – The Bleed)
Shock To Thought: Expression After Deleuze and Guattari
Stelarc: The Evolutionary Alchemy of Reason
The Autonomy of Affect
What I have covered so far is the first essay on the book, “The Autonomy of Affect”. “The Bleed” will be next, and I suspect the title on Chaos theory will have some emphasis.
AAAARG.ORG is very easy to join, and painless. Much to be found there.
Hopefully Capitalist Sorcery: breaking the spell’ will be out next year (trans Andy Goffey).
Let’s hope we all make it thru with a little joy…
P.
Greetings Paul, I’m muddling around this morning trying to unwrap the distinction between Massumi’s translation, COUNTER-SPELLS, and the one you give, BREAKING THE SPELL.
My reading of the Stengers interview yesterday, on my commute into the heart of the beast, was interrupted by the loopy bus driver managing to get almost everyone singing along to THE 12 DAYS OF CHRISTMAS (I did not sing, but was the only one to clap at the end, which had a nearly miraculous timing to it ; )
And many thanks for the original pointer to INFLEXIONS.. Mark
I love the conceptual rub between “breaking the spell” and “counter-spells”. There is a lot in there.
And Mark, I love your bus ride.
I noticed that at Inflexions they are translating as ‘counter-spells’. Andy’s current trans is ‘breaking the spell.’
The French is: ‘pratiques de desenvoutement.’
Both trans work. Envoutement denotes bewitchment…or enchantment.
Thus literally ‘practices of debewitchment’ but that is a bit clumsy – so breaking the spell. ‘Counter spells also works because the book is about the fact that we need protective stategies – something that sorcery was v. aware of. Of course as you understand the book is not a list of ‘spells’ but an analysis of capitalism as a paralysing system (like sorcery can be). You are given ‘infernal alternatives’ like ‘if you demand a payrise there will be unemployment and the factory will close.’ So ‘sorcery’ is not a metaphor but a v. good description of the hold cap has on us…
The book is about counter stragegies following the slogan from Seattle ‘Another world is possible’ – rather than resignation……they do use the term ‘breaking the spell’ – ‘rompre le charme’.
So there….
Party pooper – you should have sung along.