The Mathematics of Continuous Multiplicities: The Role of Riemann in Deleuze's Reading of Bergson

2019 ◽  
Vol 13 (3) ◽  
pp. 331-354 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nathan Widder
Keyword(s):  
Intrinsic Geometry ◽  
Foundations Of Geometry ◽  
Richard Dedekind ◽  
Hegelian Philosophy ◽  
Central Claim

A central claim of Deleuze's reading of Bergson is that Bergson's distinction between space as an extensive multiplicity and duration as an intensive multiplicity is inspired by the distinction between discrete and continuous manifolds found in Bernhard Riemann's 1854 thesis on the foundations of geometry. Yet there is no evidence from Bergson that Riemann influences his division, and the distinction between the discrete and continuous is hardly a Riemannian invention. Claiming Riemann's influence, however, allows Deleuze to argue that quantity, in the form of ‘virtual number’, still pertains to continuous multiplicities. This not only supports Deleuze's attempt to redeem Bergson's argument against Einstein in Duration and Simultaneity, but also allows Deleuze to position Bergson against Hegelian dialectics. The use of Riemann is thereby an important element of the incorporation of Bergson into Deleuze's larger early project of developing an anti-Hegelian philosophy of difference. This article first reviews the role of discrete and continuous multiplicities or manifolds in Riemann's Habilitationsschrift, and how Riemann uses them to establish the foundations of an intrinsic geometry. It then outlines how Deleuze reinterprets Riemann's thesis to make it a credible resource for Deleuze's Bergsonism. Finally, it explores the limits of this move, and how Deleuze's later move away from Bergson turns on the rejection of an assumption of Riemann's thesis, that of ‘flatness in smallest parts’, which Deleuze challenges with the idea, taken from Riemann's contemporary, Richard Dedekind, of the irrational cut.

scholarly journals How’s Life After the Collapse? Populism as a Representation Linkage and the Emergence of a Populist/Anti-Populist Political Divide in Italy (1994–2018)

2021 ◽  
Vol 3 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lisa Zanotti
Keyword(s):  
Party System ◽  
Basic Function ◽  
Coalition Building ◽  
Empirical Observation ◽  
The People ◽  
Moral Distinction ◽  
Partisan Competition ◽  
Political Divide ◽  
Central Claim

Populism is a hot topic in academia. The causes of this phenomenon have received much attention with many studies focusing on the role of the high levels of unresponsiveness of mainstream parties in triggering a populist response. In this respect, in many cases, populist parties have become a relevant electoral force in the concomitance with an electoral decline of mainstream political options, mostly in the last decades. This article considers a situation in which the whole party system’s unresponsiveness reaches its zenith, and the party system collapses. A collapse is the result of the incapacity of most of the parties in the system to fulfill their basic function, i.e., to represent voters’ interests. When this happens, none of the types of linkages—programmatic, clientelist, or personalist—that tie parties and voters are effective. Empirical observation shows that in those cases populism can perform as a sort of representation linkage to re-connect parti(es) and voters on the basis of the moral distinction between “the people” and “the elite.” Through a discursive strategy of blame attribution, populistm can attract a large portion of the vote. At this point, its opposing ideology—anti-populism—also arouses. In other words, populism/anti-populism may result in a political cleavage that structures the party system by itself or, more frequently, with other cleavages. To elucidate this argument, the paper explores the case of Italy between 1994 and 2018. The electoral relevance of populist parties translated first into a discursive cleavage, which, in turn, changed the space of competition with the emergence of a new political axis, namely populism/anti-populism. This paper's central claim is that the dynamics of partisan competition cannot be understood by overlooking the populism/anti-populism political divide. The conclusion touches on one implication of the emergence of this political cleavage, namely change of the incentives for coalition building. In fact, when populism and anti-populism structure, at least partially, the party system changing the space of interparty competition, this in turn may affect the determinants behind parties’ coalition-building choices.

Entrepreneurs, Profits, and Deserving Market Shares

1988 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-16 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Christman
Keyword(s):  
Distributive Justice ◽  
Supply And Demand ◽  
Competitive Markets ◽  
Market Interactions ◽  
Moral Desert ◽  
Market Shares ◽  
Competitive Forces ◽  
Central Claim

The question I wish to take up in this paper is whether competitive markets, as mechanisms that initiate the distribution of scarce goods, allocate those goods in accordance with what participants in those markets deserve. I want to argue that in general people do not in fact deserve what they get from market interactions, when “what they get” is determined by the competitive forces coming to bear on the market (the laws of supply and demand). This more general claim is meant to apply to all participants in the market (workers and their wages as well as capitalists and their profits). However, my strategy here is to focus on the particular case of the role of entrepreneurs, as I will define them, and whether they deserve the profits they reap in a competitive capitalist market. In particular, I will argue that the claim that entrepreneurs deserve their profits, when spelled out precisely, is indeed not plausible. Generalizing from this claim, I want to suggest how moral desert is inappropriate as a justification of market shares whenever competition determines the magnitude of those shares.I should stress, though, the particularity of my central claim: it is that “(strictly speaking) entrepreneurs do not (strictly speaking) deserve their (strictly speaking) profits.” This is not to say that, for other reasons (for example, reasons of entitlement or utility), people should not receive the rewards doled out by a market. My claim is only that desert has nothing directly to do with it.I am deviating significantly here from the usual strategy for denying the relevance of desert claims to principles of distributive justice.

scholarly journals Milton Friedman on Freedom and the Negative Income Tax

2015 ◽  
Vol 10 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Joshua Preiss
Keyword(s):  
Income Tax ◽  
Great Influence ◽  
Democratic Legitimacy ◽  
Role Of Government ◽  
Milton Friedman ◽  
Negative Income ◽  
Proposal A ◽  
Negative Income Tax ◽  
Central Claim

AbstractIn addition to his Noble Prize-winning work in economics, Milton Friedman produced some of the most influential philosophical work on the role of government in a free society. Despite his great influence, there remains a dearth of scholarship on Friedman’s social and political philosophy. This paper helps to fill this large void by providing a conceptual analysis of Friedman’s theory of freedom. In addition, I argue that a careful reading of his arguments for freedom ought to lead Friedman, and like-minded liberals and libertarians, to give absolute priority to his negative income tax proposal. A substantial basic income furthers effective economic freedom (on Friedman’s own understanding), redeems his central claim that markets enable cooperation without coercion, and enables him to address his lifelong interlocutors by mitigating concerns for the ways in which economic dependence and inequality undermine both freedom and democratic legitimacy.

scholarly journals Hilbert, Kant y el fundamento de las matemáticas

1999 ◽  
pp. 111-129
Author(s):  
Carlos Torres Alcaraz
Keyword(s):  
Final Analysis ◽  
Logical Analysis ◽  
Broad Sense ◽  
Consistency Proof ◽  
Foundations Of Geometry ◽  
Classical Mathematics

This paper looks into Hilbert’s thought about mathematics and explores its relation which the philosophy of Kant. The focus of the research is in the role of axiomatic thinking and logical analysis in foundational studies. The paper concentrates mainly in Hilbert’s research regarding the foundations of geometry, and follows his main lines of thought up to his programme, which revolves around a consistency proof for the axioms of classical mathematics. A final analysis allows us to conclude that for him mathematics is, in a broad sense, “the science of that which is possible” in this point, Hilbert diverges from Kant, even though he considers that classical mathematics has in its core a content, a view which separates him from the extreme formalism some times ascribed to him.

The Oxford Handbook of Schopenhauer

2020 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Visual Arts ◽  
Moral Theory ◽  
Aesthetic Experience ◽  
Scientific Explanation ◽  
The United States ◽  
Empirical Knowledge ◽  
The Sublime ◽  
Central Claim

This collection of thirty-one essays written by contemporary Schopenhauer scholars has six sections: (1) Influences on Schopenhauer, (2) Schopenhauer’s Metaphysics of Will and Empirical Knowledge, (3) Aesthetic Experience, Music, and the Sublime, (4) Human Meaning, Politics, and Morality, (5) Religion and Schopenhauer’s Philosophy, and (6) Schopenhauer’s Influence. Some of the issues addressed concern the extent to which Schopenhauer adopted ideas from his predecessors versus how much was original and visionary in his central claim that reality is a blind, senseless “will,” the effectiveness of his philosophy in the field of scientific explanation and extrasensory phenomena, the role of beauty and sublimity in his outlook, the fundamental role of compassion in his moral theory, the Hindu, Christian, and Buddhistic aspects of his philosophy, the importance of asceticism in his views on how best to live, how pessimism and optimism should be understood, and his impact on psychoanalysis, as well as upon music, the visual arts, and literature. The collection is an internationally constituted work that reflects upon Schopenhauer’s philosophy with authors from a variety of backgrounds, presently working in Australia, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Ecuador, England, France, Germany, Israel, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Scotland, Spain, and the United States.

Introduction

2020 ◽  
pp. 1-28
Author(s):  
Iain Crawford
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Essential Element ◽  
The United States ◽  
Democratic Society ◽  
Social Progress ◽  
Social Experiment ◽  
The Social ◽  
Long Read ◽  
Central Claim

Lays out the argument for the book and its central claim that the dynamic between Dickens and Martineau, which has been long read in the personalized terms of a quarrel that ended their professional connection, is more fully understood as the expression of incompatible visions of liberalism, the role of women in social progress, and the nature of democratic society. An essential element of their difference lay in their different experiences of and responses to the social experiment developing in the United States, and the book reconceptualizes their respective encounters with and writing about America.

Between Schelling and Marx: The Hegel of Slavoj Žižek

2016 ◽  
Vol 24 (2) ◽  
pp. 205-227 ◽  
Author(s):  
Giorgio Cesarale
Keyword(s):  
Dialectical Materialism ◽  
Review Article ◽  
Ultimate Reality ◽  
Slavoj Zizek ◽  
Slavoj Žižek ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Theoretical Proposal ◽  
Hegelian Philosophy

InLess Than Nothing: Hegel and the Shadow of Dialectical Materialism, Slavoj Žižek presents the results of his long meditation on the meaning and ultimate implications of Hegelian philosophy. In this review-article, I will first examine the stages of Žižek’s transformation of Hegelianism, and then analyse the main themes brought up inLess than Nothing. The development of a ‘polemological’ interpretation of the Hegelian concepts of ‘reconciliation’ and ‘absolute’ leads Žižek to emphasise the role of negativity and antagonism in the process of constitution of reality and subject as part of reality itself. This implies a reinterpretation of dialectical materialism: reality is not something that simply precedes the subject, but which contains just multiplicities of multiplicities, and thus the Void itself. Žižek’s assertion that the ultimate reality is the Void itself then renders unavoidable the critique of Hegelian Marxism based on the centrality of the category of alienation. The last part of the review-article surveys, instead, how Žižek’s re-reading of Hegel affects his relation with Marx and also examines the role played by ‘contradiction’ in his theoretical proposal.

scholarly journals Historical consciousness and existential awareness in Karl Barth’s hermeneutics

2007 ◽  
Vol 63 (4) ◽  
Author(s):  
G.M.M. Pelser ◽  
Andries G. Van Aarde
Keyword(s):  
Historical Consciousness ◽  
Philosophy Of History ◽  
Christian Tradition ◽  
Jürgen Habermas ◽  
Hermeneutic Circle ◽  
Historical Criticism ◽  
Preceding Article ◽  
The Enlightenment ◽  
Hegelian Philosophy

Karl Barth’s hermeneutic legacy prolonged Western Christian tradition, especially influenced by Hegelian philosophy of history. This led to Barth’s “theological exegesis” instead of a historic-critical exegesis. In a preceding article Barth’s understanding of the notion “hermeneutic circle” is discussed against the background of the Enlightenment and its counter-movement in Romanticism. In this article Barth’s attitude to the place and role of historical criticism is explained in light of his dialectic distinction between “scientific” and “practical” interpretation. The article aims to show that Barth, with his dialectics, continues Schleiermacher’s realism. In conclusion, the positivistic traits in the Barth legacy are raised once again, in order to open the door to Jürgen Habermas and other deconstructionist thinkers of the postmodern era in hermeneutics.

The Ideological Origins of “Stalinism” in Soviet Literature

Slavic Review ◽  
1992 ◽  
Vol 51 (3) ◽  
pp. 468-484 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joseph Schull
Keyword(s):  
Soviet History ◽  
Continuity Thesis ◽  
Soviet Literature ◽  
History Of ◽  
Revolutionary Period ◽  
Central Claim ◽  
The Revolution

More than anything else, ideology dominates in literatureLunacharskii, 1923Yes, we will stamp intellectuals, we will produce them, as in a factory.Bukharin, 1925The 1920s remain one of the most debated periods of Soviet history. Central to these debates is the issue of continuity between leninism and Stalinism, and the role of ideology under their respective leaderships. Supporters of “continuity” have usually emphasized the role of ideology as an intellectual bridge from the 1920s to the 1930s; conversely, those who question the continuity thesis usually point to major differences between leninism and Stalinism. I shall address this issue in relation to the history of attempts to organize writers in the early post-revolutionary period. My central claim is that Soviet discourse on writers and literature, articulated shortly after the revolution and elaborated during NEP, set a pattern which led to the absorption of writers into a unitary organizational apparatus and which culminated in the formation of the Writer's Union in April 1932. From 1917 to 1928, a clearly-articulated and largely consensual strategy of absorption of Soviet writers into a state-directed stream was spelt out well before Stalin was installed as the privileged speaker of “marxism-leninism.”

scholarly journals Agency and Choice in Evolution

Biosemiotics ◽  
2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jonathan Delafield-Butt
Keyword(s):  
Evolutionary Theory ◽  
Careful Consideration ◽  
Dual Role ◽  
Modern Synthesis ◽  
Social Worlds ◽  
The Social ◽  
Animal Agency ◽  
Central Claim

AbstractDenis Noble has produced a succinct analysis of the ‘Illusions of the Modern Synthesis’. At the heart of the matter is the place of agency in organisms. This paper examines the nature of conscious agent action in organisms, and the role of affects in shaping agent choice. It examines the dual role these have in shaping evolution, and in the social worlds of scientists that shape evolutionary theory. Its central claim follows Noble, that agency is central to the structure of organisms, and raises careful consideration for the role animal agency and affective evaluations in biology, and in biologists.

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