Speculative Grace: Bruno Latour and Object-Oriented Theology

8. Methodology

8 Methodology Latour’s approach to metaphysics is shaped primarily by methodological concerns. If, he asks, we want to engage in an experimental metaphysics where networks of objects are responsible for explaining themselves, then what will we have to assume about the nature of the real? If we want to avoid smuggling in any a priori reductions, if all metaphysical out-sourcing of the real is banned, then what kind of objects are left to do the work? Latour’s basic assumptions about the real all flow from his attempt to give this particular kind of account. We’ve already indicated two of these assumptions: multiplicity and local responsibility. To proceed experimentally, Latour must take for granted that the world is an irreducible plurality because any axiom that implies an original unity or background compatibility will short-circuit, by way of conspiracy theory, an experimental approach. Similarly, Latour must ban any metaphysical, macro-accounts of change and 23 creativity in order to localize responsibility for them in the multitude of objects that do the actual work of producing and modifying the world’s provisionally stable concatenations . Taken together, these two assumptions are the methodological backbone of Latour’s project. Paraphrasing a terse formula borrowed from Alain Badiou, we might jointly summarize them as follows: though the One is not, there are unities (cf. BE 23–24). Or, in slightly expanded form: though the (substantial, preformatted) One is not, there are (locally and provisionally produced) unities. The first half of the formula (the One is not) summarizes Latour’s ban on reduction. The second half (there are unities) posits the production, by the multitude itself, of a plurality of loose, local, and transient networks. It follows from Latour’s position on the One that the multitude of objects must be uncountable. If it were possible to total the multitude, then it would no longer be true that ‘‘the One is not.’’ The One, as the All, would return. However, for us, ‘‘the great Pan is dead’’ (PF 173). If this were not so, ‘‘with respect to the Total, there is nothing to do except genuflect before it, or worse, to dream of occupying the place of complete power’’ (RS 252). Similarly, if it were possible to break the multitude down to a uniform, base layer of fundamental particles, then it would also no longer be the case that ‘‘the One is not.’’ For Latour, such a final reduction is not just pragmatically unreachable , it is axiomatically non-existent. If objects are fish, then ‘‘within each fish there are ponds full of fish’’ (PF 161). Every object is a multitude. And not only is it the case that ‘‘each of the parts inside the black box is itself a black box full of parts,’’ but each object is also part of what composes other objects (PH 185). But if each object is a 24 Methodology bee’s nest that is itself ‘‘made of another bee’s nest swarming in all directions’’ and this ‘‘goes on indefinitely, then when the hell are we supposed to stop?’’ (RS 121–122) In principle, never. In practice, we will, of course, only go as far as the available resources take us. In the end, swarming bee’s nests may be more apt as a metaphor for objects than sets of neatly nested boxes because ‘‘order’’ is not the default condition of the pluriverse. In Latour’s pluriverse, any simple and original compatibility of parts is untenable because it would allow objects to be reduced and collapsed without remainder. Instead, for Latour, connections must always be forged by way of concatenation , a method that preserves the errant singularity of each object even as it finds ways to provisionally string some aspects of them into directional networks. Having, then, banned the One (even if only for methodological reasons), Latour is committed to both the infinite divisibility and the infinite compoundability of the real. In principle, there can be neither an upper nor a lower limit to the multitude and no one scale, whether micro, macro, or median, can be privileged as more real or original than the others. Indeed, in Latour’s metaphysics, the very project of globally distributing objects into higher or lower strata fails because ‘‘there is no global’’ (PF 220). Strata have, instead , only local and conventional importance. For Latour, it is always true that ‘‘the small holds the...