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Reviewed by:
  • Philosophy at the Edge of Chaos: Gilles Deleuze and the Philosophy of Difference
  • Adrian Parr
Jeffrey A. Bell. Philosophy at the Edge of Chaos: Gilles Deleuze and the Philosophy of Difference. Toronto: Toronto UP, 2006. ix + 292

The criticism philosophers such as Heidegger, Nietzsche, Derrida, Foucault, and Deleuze have leveled against metaphysics is that any philosophical project attempting to institute an all-encompassing view of reality at the expense of everyday realities is implicitly misguided. Such a position obviously raises a few eyebrows amongst analytic philosophers, for it sparks the following methodological question: how can one actually "do" philosophy when the non-contradictory truth-value of the philosophical definition is suspended? And it is this question, one that is largely the consequence of philosophies of difference that Bell attends to. Using the Greek word paradoxa (para meaning contrary and doxa referring to common belief) to point to what he describes as thinking the "uncommon condition for the possibility of every common and identifiable system," Bell outlines the importance of encountering the paradoxa in philosophical thinking (13). In other words, stimulating thinking in thought entails initiating "aberration and movement" in thought, or what could otherwise be described as thinking the uncommon in the common (13). Bell goes onto to highlight, in meticulous detail, the way this encounter constitutes thinking creatively. Any practice of philosophy that does not use definitions in a hierarchical way, whereby a original or primary definition dominates subsequent definitions, but treats philosophical definitions as dynamic and constituting an interdependent system could be described as a philosophical activity that pushes stable thoughts to the edge of chaos. And it is this movement, Bell argues, that produces new thoughts. [End Page 388]

Bell primarily uses Deleuze and Guattari to extract the creative spirit of philosophical thinking. A project of this kind does not start out with the a priori and largely moral command to determine what thinking ought to be. He demonstrates the shared philosophical interests Deleuze has with the two other great philosophers of difference, Heidegger and Derrida, both of whom sought to think difference. For example, combining the verbs "to differ" and "to defer," Derrida develops a concept of différance to bring to light the difference at the heart of all identities and systems of thought. The implication being, identity is never complete in and of itself; its self-presence never actually comes to be. In what has commonly been the source of much debate and fiery criticism especially amongst philosophers from the analytic tradition, Derrida argues presence concomitantly inaugurates its antithesis—absence. It is here where many commentators have harshly and somewhat misguidedly criticized Derrida of being relativistic, because in his theory of deconstruction he insists meaning, or presence, continually defers identity formation.

Meanwhile, for Bell the important contribution Deleuze has made to the philosophical project of thinking difference is the idea, unlike Derrida, that the unstructured exists along with the structured. Purporting a dynamic system that is both stable and unstable, he clearly situates philosophy at the edge of chaos—hence the title of the book. It is here where Bell clearly shows how Deleuze learns and departs from the Kantian tradition. The categories of the understanding that Kant relied upon posit a predetermined framework for all understanding. Contrarily, Deleuze suggests concepts are tools whose function is to experiment with and problematize identity and other specific systems, such as language. As such, Deleuze extends the transcendental focus of Kant to produce concepts that are neither too abstract, nor abstract enough. This is because, as Bell cogently points out, concepts need to be concrete enough to account for material processes such as economic production, political life, and the social force of desire.

If concepts are not abstract enough, then we end up sacrificing their pragmatic potential, which is to say, the concept can no longer be used as a tool in the way that Deleuze was absolutely clear about how they need to be used. This is because a certain amount of conceptual flexibility is lost. A concept that is not abstract enough can only be used for one identifiable task or problem as opposed to many—a little like having a hammer that...

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