Just some quick remarks on materialism as I’m in the midst of completing paperwork today. One of the fault lines among the OOO theorists is the divide between the materialists and the realists. Harman describes his position as a realism, while I describe mine as a materialism. I take it that materialism is necessarily a realism insofar as it begins from the premise of human-independent entities that are not dependent on thought. In certain respects, materialism is ontologically a more restrictive position than the sort of realism that Harman advocates. On the one hand, Harman’s object-oriented philosophy wishes to hold open the possibility that while there are material entities, it’s possible that other non-material objects exist such as, for example, numbers. On the other hand, Harman contends that materialism is one way in which objects are undermined or erased. As he remarked at the CUNY round-table in New York with me, Jane Bennett, and Patricia Clough, the New York Stock Exchange cannot be accounted for in materialist terms as it cannot be reduced or properly understood in terms of the brick and mortar of the building, the windows, fiber optic cables, etc. If I understand Harman’s critique of materialism correctly, the point is that the New York Stock Exchange has an organization that is greater than the sum of these parts. Indeed, many of these parts can be removed, while the New York Stock Exchange will, within reason, continue to exist. Computers break down and are removed, yet the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) endures. New phones are added and the NYSE continues. Buildings are changed, yet it’s still the NYSE. To ignore this is to miss what is proper to the NYSE as an object and to undermine this object by absurdly reducing it to its material parts. It is something over and above these parts that constitutes the NYSE, not those parts as such.
In addition to the label “onticology”, my position could be called “object-oriented materialism” (OOM); and, were we specifying “Bryant’s object-oriented materialism” we could call it BOOM! I generally share Harman’s critique of reductive materialism, agreeing that we cannot reduce objects to their material parts. The cat that walks around my living room and the cat that some cruel bastard has blown up in a microwave both have the same material parts, yet clearly they are two distinct objects. In other words, it is not just the parts that matter, but how those parts are organized or related. However, here I don’t see why this observation should lead one to reject materialism. The materialist need only claim that all entities are materially embodied, not that all entities are reducible to elementary parts. In other words, there’s no inconsistency between materialism and theories of emergence. And, of course, emergence pertains to the organization, the relations, among those parts and not simply the parts simpliciter.
read on!
This leaves the problem of changing parts and persisting or enduring entities. When I get a haircut or grow new hair am I the same person? Harman seems to argue that for the materialist, if the parts change then the entity is no longer the same entity. Yet this would only hold if the being of the entity were individuated solely by the parts of which the entity is composed. If, by contrast, entities are individuated by both their parts and organization, then so long as that organization is maintained, the entity persists. All that’s required is that that organization be embodied in some way.
Materialism is sometimes criticized on the grounds that we don’t have a well developed concept of matter. In my view, far from being a black mark against materialism, this is a point in its favor. In this connection, I’ve been increasingly influenced by Katerina Kolozova’s discussions and deployment of the thought of Laruelle. Among all that I’ve read on and by Laruelle, Kolozova’s treatments are the first that have helped me to see the importance and significance of his form of critique. Among other things, Laruelle locates a sort of circularity internal to philosophical thought wherein that concepts of that thought end up determining the real. Here the problem is that philosophy structurally becomes locked in a circularity that far from reaching the real, determines the real by thought. Viewed in light of this thesis, the absence of a concept of matter is a strength of materialism rather than a weakness. Were we to have a well developed concept of matter we would find ourselves locked in the correlationist circle, such that we end up claiming that thought and being are identical. The absence of a well-defined concept of matter indicates that while thought, like anything else, is material, matter is nonetheless radically alterior and foreign to thought. The concept of matter is not– as per Plato’s requirements in the Meno –something that we possess in advance, but is rather a moving target that grows with our exploration of matter over the course of history. It is not something that we have already, but rather something that we must discover. Off to finish my syllabi.
Larval Subjects . 
January 17, 2012 at 10:02 pm
[…] them than are often apparent (e.g., on the existence of non-material entities such as numbers (here))). This makes the ‘Object-Oriented’ label somewhat useful. I’m sure other useful […]
January 19, 2012 at 4:38 am
Would these ‘non-material’ objects be similar to Deleuze’s concept of the ‘virtual’?
January 19, 2012 at 5:25 am
[…] in the confrontation between philosophical realism and philosophical materialism. Levi Bryant (Larval Subjects) and Michael (Archive-Fire) place their bets on materialism, while Graham Harman (Object-Oriented […]
January 19, 2012 at 8:04 pm
[…] insofar as OOO theorists themselves are changing positions and refining arguments. In his most recent post, Bryant argues: Just some quick remarks on materialism as I’m in the midst of completing […]
January 20, 2012 at 12:56 am
Is it helpful to consider the replacing-phones-at-the-NYSE thought experiment equivalent to the classical Ship-of-Theseus problem (and therefore the many possible materialist answers to it), or is this something different?
January 20, 2012 at 7:14 am
I love this part: “Materialism is sometimes criticized on the grounds that we don’t have a well developed concept of matter. In my view, far from being a black mark against materialism, this is a point in its favor.”
Had a fantastic conversation with Protevi yesterday about this very post and how you (and he) might be an Object Oriented Ontologists but not Speculative Realists because of these very issues. [This is somewhat merely semantic, as it just comes down to what is packed in to “speculative” here.]
While defending materialist construals of emergent properties- John at one point said, “look, it’s not like anybody is invoking the supernatural here. I mean, that’s not what this is all about.”
And I responded that he might be underestimating the extent to which some of the non-materialist Speculative Realists here (me included) resonate with Lovecraft.
But this is all complicated by Meillassoux’s terming his own view “speculative materialism” and then the differences between you and him on theology (which I would love to teach a class on some day, since my soul resonates both with your atheology as well as what I understand of his view).
Will be really cool to read Harman’s Lovecraft book in this light too.
January 20, 2012 at 9:23 pm
I’m guessing that you are using organization as M&V do. The thing here is that org. starts to look like an unchanging essence….? The parts/structure changes and the org remains ‘invariant’ – like the toilet example in M&V’s ‘The Tree of Knowledge’.
As you say ‘the org. is maintained’…
There seems also to be some ambiguity with the term ‘person’. In what way would a ‘person’ be equated with the organization of a body? And how would a person’s org differ from the org of a rock?.
Well in a flat ontology they don’t?
And how would one person differ from another (not be exchangeable – unlike a rock)? OOO and OOM seem to be blind to this distinction – but I might well be wrong.
Just writing out aloud on this Sat morn in auckland. Not trying to be combatative or anything.
January 21, 2012 at 4:27 pm
Paul,
In my view, organization can change and evolve as in the case of a transition from a caterpillar to a butterfly. So historical continuity is relevant to. I’m not sure why you would claim that all organizations are the same. The way rocks are organized is different than plants and different from corporations. The project of metaphysics is to articulate those features common to all entities. From there you can then introduce specific differences for distinct types of entities. Flat ontology doesn’t mean that everything is the same, but that there are no transcendent entities outside of cause and effect interactions such as essences, Platonic forms, God, etc. It means that there’s only worlds and things interacting in those worlds.
January 21, 2012 at 8:29 pm
You mention the transition of caterpillar to butterfly. Are the caterpillar and the butterfly the same being? Is this transition similar to your example of cutting hair? It would seem that we perceive them as the same being, but physically, apparently, they have drastically changed. I’m sure you’ve addressed this issue/topic/idea before, and I’ll search for it (I’m thinking of seeds/saplings/trees/seeds…).
January 21, 2012 at 9:54 pm
My lack of clarity – I didn’t mean to claim that all orgs. are the same. Quite the contrary! Travelling now so can’t develop this but the diff btwn empsyched and non-empsyched beings seems quite particular. Not just a difference btwn say a rock and a caterpillar…..I’m not even sure that the concept of organization is sufficient altho it does have some value….
January 22, 2012 at 2:06 am
Paul:
You write:
“And how would one person differ from another (not be exchangeable – unlike a rock)? OOO and OOM seem to be blind to this distinction – but I might well be wrong.”
Okay, when I read this, I think: what have you been reading? I mean, really? Even a rock isn’t simply exchangeable with any other rock because in Levi, Graham, Tim and Ian’s philosophy (though they account for it differently) each rock is THIS particular rock—not a rock-signifier in a larger differential system, not an ephemeral manifestation of a cosmic virtuality or power, not an ontic superfluity caused by deeper or more universal or transcendental ontological structures. No, each entity itself is split by its own manifestations and its *own* interior particularity, of which is never exchangeable or replaceable by anything else. So much of Levi’s work is dedicated to investigating just these kinds of particularities and their own environments, how each entity encounters and translates the world around them in a way that can never be replaced or exchanged by another’s environment or translations.
Really, I don’t understand how someone can read any of this stuff and come away with saying it’s “blind to this distinction – but I might well be wrong,” as if it’s ambiguous in the philosophy somehow.
January 22, 2012 at 2:28 am
I mean, the whole point of Levi’s excursion, it seems to me, into object-oriented ontology is to account for qualities and their genesis, transformation and possible alteration: that objects are engines of local manifestations, and as such are not whatever they are manifesting at any one time or with any particular set of attractors. Also, if we don’t understand the nature of how these engines work—and that means investigating their particularity and their alliances—then we can’t explain how it is the world is as it is (or how it can become other than it is).
January 22, 2012 at 5:39 am
Paul, sorry about my rather quick and emotional response. You clarified in another post, but I hadn’t read it yet. I was just surprised by the idea that OOO is blind to the distinction between organizations of objects or systems.
January 23, 2012 at 5:54 am
well i did reply but it disappeared….next time
January 23, 2012 at 4:40 pm
http://terenceblake.wordpress.com/2012/01/22/babich-on-schroedinger-and-nietzsche/
January 23, 2012 at 8:22 pm
I tried to reply in a post that disappeared – the main thing is the diff between psyches and that which is ‘mindless’. This is not pansychism! It requires the concept of cadacualtez which is a kind of objective jemeinigkeit (my own ownness).
http://knol.google.com/k/cadacualtez-or-why-one-is-not-another#
I will try and address this again when I stop travelling…..
January 25, 2012 at 3:49 am
Paul:
You quote:
“Yet, do they also differ intrinsically, before starting to distinguish knowledges, i.e. before beginning to learn?”
I would think absolutely, yes. But this can be said for any entity or object, yes? Consciousness would be a particular subset for certain entities capable of producing it, but also that no consciousness would be identical to any other, not just because of its previous experiences, as if they are just being put into an indifferent container. Levi has some great posts on Bergson and memory that seem to go into this idea—that the cone of memory and experience changes the nature of consciousness itself, so that, I would think, no consciousness is really identical to any other. I think it would also imply that, therefore, no *experience* of something is identical, either, but this is not just true of conscious entities or animals for OOO—though certainly conscious entities like humans or primates or other such animals might have capabilities that other entities don’t. But the OOO point is more fundamental: every relation is a translation, and every translation is an active work and not something that is simply dropped into the lap of an entity. I don’t see why this would only apply to psyches and not also to “mindless” entities, too.
Of course, I may be missing the target of your quotation. I look forward to more when you have the time.
January 27, 2012 at 3:13 am
Yes joseph, you’re on target and give an accurate account of OOO. I will try and reply to your valuable question. I will write in word and then paste to the comment box!
I am following the argentine tradition of neurobiology/philosophy (AGNT) in this…
Btw ‘Deleuze; a philosophy of the event’ by Zourabichvili, gives one of the best accounts of Deleuze and a good account of his use of hecceity. It makes it clear why OOO could not be ‘deleuzian’ (altho maybe it is compatible with the guattari of chaosmosis and his use of autopoiesis. Deleuze’s events interpenetrate too much.
It may be that empsyched beings or existentialities have a kind of difference that non empsyched entities, e.g. electrons, do not have between them. I’ll work on it (smile). It’s something to do with ‘the circumstances of circumstantiation’ which may be constitutive for mindful existentialities and not for mindless ones…I’ll spell it out for myself as much as anyone else – been on my mind for a while.
January 27, 2012 at 5:25 pm
@Paul
Well there’s more than one way to posit fundamental simularities in consciousness! For example, if you take the shapable substance analogy for conciousness, then individual bias and perspective is just the experiences that got there first imparing or adjusting the absorbtion of later experiences: Instead of a blank tablet, imagine an empty room, with those who enter first acting as door guards or encouraging certain social mores on those who enter in the future etc.
Or if you consider consciousness as a certain kind of activity, a way of grasping the world, then bias can become inherent to the very mechanism by which we perceive, without any requirement for the involvement of memory. In this way perspectives can be performing the same task but in different ways, which is something that fits a lot better our experience of spatially situated observers; we have different perspectives on the same object because we have different relationships to it.
In this view consciousness becomes less like a sea and more like a picasso painting, but overlapping in multiple dimensions. There is unity in the activity; viewing, but the result is, considered as a whole, fractured and inherently complex.
Of course, combine the above two, and add in self reference, and you have three layers of individuation; unique spatial and perceptual-configuration-space location, different paths through history brought into the present, and the unique operations of those memories on themselves and that perceptual position, further diverging similar individuals.
@Levi,
Your definition of matter is impressive, because it actually seems to be backwards, at least in terms of the normal rules of creating a definition:
If the problem is reductionism, and the primary objective should be a word that avoids rigorous definition, because the definition could then substitute for the actual experience of this stuff, then for you presumably, materialism is a perfect expression of this, because I imagine your focus on matter is largely human scale and conventional rather than conceptual. So talking about materialism focuses you on actual experience with “rocks you stub your toe on” and intuitive craft experience.
Of course, for certain kids of physicist or particularly engineer, materialism is very much the opposite, as “matter” is the focus of their modelling, definitions, and the majority of their conceptual formulations. For such people, focusing on the spiritual or animist or ideal is a way past this reductionism, re-infusing reality with potential and mystery.
Following this along, it might be reasonable to say that your position is not at all materialist in those senses, but about stuff. Stuff that interacts according to the ways we recognise and also ones that we don’t. Stuff because it’s not necessarily just “matter” in the sense of “stuff that behaves according to this small set of equations”, it is the broader sense of things that can be made of other things and interact without our awareness.
To stop that expanding into meaninglessness, I imagine you have criteria for what is an acceptable object to declare that another object is composed from, mostly focused on atoms?
January 28, 2012 at 1:09 pm
Actually I’ll step back from that, I don’t think you need to have that last bit at all, you could instead have the assumption that every object can interact with other objects via physical means. Or in other words that the laws of physics, touch, etc connect all objects to some degree. Comes close to being equivalent in many ways, but allows you to focus on the powers of objects rather than their components.
February 10, 2012 at 4:17 pm
[…] also really like that he refers to his own position as an object oriented materialism. Now materialism often is taken as an other term for physicalism or the idea that all reality is […]