One of the greatest charlatans of postmodernism
Being a charlatan and having a few interesting things to say are not mutually exclusive...
Gilles Deleuze – What is Philosophy? [audio]
41–50 of 89 posts
Re: Gilles Deleuze – What is Philosophy? [audio]
#42One may not like Deleuze's system, but I don't think it's fair to call him a charlatan. His work on other philosophers (e.g. Leibniz) is highly regarded, he provided valuable counterpoints to Freud, and Badiou accused him of being a secret platonist, which I think most hn-posters would appreciate. His one-off observations alone should be enough to grant him the benefit of the doubt. If you don't recognize sparks of brilliance in his lectures and conversations, well! See the abecediary, or his lecture on cinema as the creative act, or any of his readings of past philosophers.
Re: Gilles Deleuze – What is Philosophy? [audio]
#43As a teenager, I was enjoying Sciences classes, but not Philisophy at all at that time, I was really lagging behind in maturity, of course now 20 years later it's different. I don't think Philisophy is something you can only learn, I think you need enough life experience, maturity, wisdom so distance and time
> I don't think Philisophy is something you can only learn, I think you need enough life experience, maturity, wisdom so distance and time
ha ha only serious: the real philosophy is the one we found along the way
Re: Gilles Deleuze – What is Philosophy? [audio]
#44Earlier quoted context omitted.
The Stove essay (in truth it's a prolonged rant) supposedly extols the virtues of empirical thinking, and you invoked it to back up the sense you had that the description of Deleuze's philosophy is vacuous... And yet... Difference and multiplicity are core to empirical data and scientific & engineering modelling. To make a measurement you assume there is a scale to measure difference. To have a variable is to assume…
All of modern science is possible without philosophy. In fact, it is when what was called natural philosophy broke off into the natural sciences that philosophy per se devolved into a series of language games on metaphysics that became of little relevance aside from those in the philosophy profession itself. All our modern advances from hypersonic missiles, large language models, quantum physics and spaceflight and a…
To turn this around, is all of modern philosophy possible without science? And critically, do we want it to be?
Advances, musings and insights in one domain do not preclude those in others, just as the ethical and epistemological boundaries (and possible trajectories) of missiles, models and spacecraft do not suddenly disappear just because we invented them.
Even moreso, the surrounding language games can be just as impactful: doomsday clocks, Turing tests and space supremacy have informed many policies on the docket, well before any practical applications were feasible. In these instances, it would be (and has been) quite difficult to seperate the science from our language, just as the other way around.
Re: Gilles Deleuze – What is Philosophy? [audio]
#45If you want to have an idea of what Deleuze's philosophy is all about:
(Differential Ontology)
Re: Gilles Deleuze – What is Philosophy? [audio]
#46One of the greatest charlatans of postmodernism
For those interested in reading a great book exposing Deleuze and others like him, I recommend Fashionable Nonsense by Sokal & Bricmont.
In think Sokal is right. The postmodern academic left is a phenomenon of decay and is not helpful for traditional left-wing goals such as social justice.
On the other hand, I think Deleuze has a deep understanding of philosophy and, to some extent, mathematics. Deleuze always tries to make a transition from traditional theories to his extreme conception of difference and repetition.
It's crazy, but it has a certain genius.
Re: Gilles Deleuze – What is Philosophy? [audio]
#47Earlier quoted context omitted.
> To have a variable is to assume that something can vary. Tautology. > To be a cause is to assume something can make a difference. Tautology. > To have a process is to assume a system that can change and transform. Tautology. Vacuous is exactly how I'd describe the above. The only statement with potential depth is: > To make a measurement you assume there is a scale to measure difference. This invokes quantum mechan…
This is very strange.. Those are not what tautologies are. In order for something to be tautological, you need to be working within some formal system of proof. Proposing definitions to terms could never be tautological. I think you just want to say "I know that already!" Also, Deleuze would love this comment, precisely because of your confusion in the term. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Logic_of_Sense
> This is very strange.. Those are not what tautologies are.
> I think you just want to say "I know that already!"
> “All humans are mammals” is held to assert with regard to anything whatsoever that either it is not a human or it is a mammal. But that universal “truth” follows not from any facts noted about real humans but only from the actual use of human and mammal and is thus purely a matter of definition. [1]
Moving on.
I assumed parent was trying to make (non-vacuous) statements, firstly because he was replying to a comment, and secondly because he followed them up with "There's nothing vacuous about this."
> Proposing definitions to terms could never be tautological.
If you treat them as statements, the tautologies clearly appear by substituting the terms' definitions in:
* To have a (thing which can vary) is to assume that something can vary.
* To be a (something that can make a difference) is to assume something can make a difference.
But if parent was just defining his terms, then let's hear those terms used in non-vacuous statements.
Re: Gilles Deleuze – What is Philosophy? [audio]
#48I loved a book he wrote. Oeduous and capitalists or something.
Anyway, it was wordy and I think he was struggling to find words but it was a great read and helped me construct some useful models for myself when speaking to people across varying domains of science. Just gotta jump to their ribosome or whatever the hell and use their language to transfer data fast.
I could see an analyst mind reading this and having a mental break down though and then coming on hacker news to try and offer some quick wit to gain reputation about “wow, how wordy. Must be a charlatan”. Could be. Could be good stuff here.
No need to lecture me btw. I literally won’t care.
Re: Gilles Deleuze – What is Philosophy? [audio]
#49"Deleuze's work is characterized by his emphasis on difference and multiplicity, which he saw as fundamental to understanding the world. He developed a philosophy of becoming, which emphasizes the importance of change and transformation." Vacuous. Reminds me of David Stove's "What is wrong with our thoughts" [1]. [1] https://web.maths.unsw.edu.au/~jim/wrongthoughts.html
Do you consider Whitehead's philosophy also vacuous?
the most underrated comment on this thread; i cackled out loud, thank you.
Shaviro's "Without Criteria" which discusses this connection was an absolute delight.
Re: Gilles Deleuze – What is Philosophy? [audio]
#50I’m surprised nobody has mentioned Philosophy Talk on NPR.
Hosted by two Stanford professors.
“Known as ‘the program that questions everything—except your intelligence’ Philosophy Talk challenges listeners to question their assumptions and to think about things in new ways.“