CHAOS, DIFFERENCE, RITORNELLOFrancisco Jos Martnez (UNED, Madrid, Spain)

[endnoteRef:1] [1: Image: Magnum Chaos. Inlay in the chorus of the basilica of Santa Mara Maggiore, by Capoferri and Lotto (1522-1532).]

Before all things, at the beginning, was infinite Chaos1.- Chaos.The testimony of mythology places chaos at the origin of all things[endnoteRef:2] and Hegel himself says that this mythical chaos is represented as the amorphous foundation of the world. A chaos that Deleuze understands to be an undifferentiated abyss and an ocean of dissimilarity. It was, specifically, to ward off this lack of definition, this dissimilarity, this initial dispersion, that man introduced identity and stability. For Plato, chaos was a contradictory state that had to receive order and law from the exterior, it was a rebellious material that the demiurge had to unfold and structure. Man has always tried to order the world that surrounds him, to make a cosmos from chaos, in order to withstand the absolutism of reality (H. Blumenberg). To this end, philosophy has introduced identity into diversity and permanent elements to limit incessant transformation. To do this, it has had to dominate difference. Aristotle, Leibniz, and Hegel have thought about difference, but they have subjected it to the identity of the concept, the analogy of judgment, the opposition of predicates, and the similarity of that which is perceived. Based on Nietzsche, Deleuze faces the project of constructing an ontology of pure difference that is not subject to identity. [2: Hesiodo, Theogony, 116, Before all things, at the beginning, was infinite Chaos. Ovid, Metamorphoses, I, 7, chaos: a raw confused mass, nothing but inert matter, badly combined discordant atoms of things, confused in the one place. (Trans. by A.S. Kline http://ovid.lib.virginia.edu/trans/Metamorph.htm) ]

Chaos presents two complementary aspects: the undifferentiated, indeterminate abyss, in which everything that Parmenides tried to exorcize is dissolved, and the ocean of dissimilarity where the unlinked, fragmentary determinations mentioned by Empedocles float. In contrast to this indetermination, difference arises as determination, as a unilateral distinction that drags that from which it is distinguished along with it. Chaos is the background in which all forms are dissolved. Representation has tried to conjure this initial chaos and it has done so by means of four complementary procedures: identity in the form of an indeterminate concept, analogy in the relation between ultimate determinable concepts, opposition in the relation of determinations within the concept, and similarity in the determinate object of the concept itself (DR, 44-45). An attempt is made to overcome difference by representing it and this representation subjugates it to the requirements of the concept. 2.- Difference[endnoteRef:3] [3: I have dealt with the subject of difference in Deleuze in Chapter X Representacin y Diferencia in my book Ontologa y Diferencia: la Filosofia de Gilles Deleuze, Orgenes, Madrid, 1987, pp. 203-218.]

Aristotle distinguishes between the difference of diversity and the difference of otherness, referring this difference to the concept; this means that, far from establishing a concept of difference, difference is integrated into the concept, it is subjected to the identity of an indeterminate concept. The specific Aristotelian difference inscribes difference in the identity of an indeterminate concept, while generic difference inscribes difference in the quasi-identity of more general concepts, categories, thus subjecting it to the analogy of judgment (DR, 50). Both differences, specific and generic, are, then located in the framework of representation, becoming a reflexive concept and thus subjecting themselves to the demands of representation which Deleuze, in this case, calls organic representation. Difference, in this happy Greek moment which inaugurates the primacy of representation in the western tradition, determines the essence, gives shape to the shapeless, defines the undefined, and makes it possible to specify gender by means of specific difference. Difference remains a reflexive concept and only finds a real concept when it designates some catastrophe: either a break in continuity in the series of similarities or an insurmountable fault line between analogous structures. But, asks Deleuze, is this catastrophic capacity of difference not the indication that there is an implacable rebellious background that continues to act underneath the apparent balance of organic representation? (DR, 52). When difference faces the infinite and converges toward a foundation instead of being organic, it becomes orgic and then, under the apparent calm of that which is organized, the monster, the catastrophe, arises (DR, 61). If organic representation assumes the complementariness of two finite moments that can be assigned as specific difference and generic difference, for example, orgic representation is based on an alternative between two infinite processes that can be assigned and that no longer swing between the Great and the Small but between the infinitely great and the infinitely small, that is, between Hegel and Leibniz. This means a change in the notion of limit that, from referring to the extremes of finite representation, comes to define the framework in which finite determinations arise and disappear in orgic representation. The limit is no longer what limits a form but rather what converges toward a foundation, it is no longer what distinguishes forms but what correlates that which is based on its foundation, it is no longer the arresting of power but rather the element in which power takes place and is based (DR, 62). In orgic representation, there is a double reference to the limit: there is a constant overcoming of the limit toward that which is infinitely great in Hegel and a constant process of going beyond the limit in that which is infinitely small in Leibniz. For Hegel, in the framework of the essence as reflection, that is, insofar as the movement of the process of transformation and of going beyond, which remains in itself, that which is different is determined absolutely only as that which is negative in itself, that is, as appearance (CL, II, 21). Orgic representation makes difference, selecting it when it introduces the infinite that refers difference to the foundation. In Hegels The Science of Logic, in its treatment of the doctrine of essence, it is in the section devoted to essence as a reflection of itself where the movement from appearance to foundation occurs, passing through the essentialities or determinations of reflection. This is the moment in which the treatment of the relations between identity and difference, which concludes the analysis of contradiction, is located. For Hegel, according to Deleuze, contradiction resolves difference by referring it to the foundation. Deleuze takes up, once again, the following statements by Hegel (the translations have been modified): Difference in general is already contradiction in itself (CL, II, 62). Only after having been taken to the extreme of contradiction does that which is varied and multiform become active and alive in opposition to one another, achieving negativity, the immanent pulsation of autonomous, spontaneous, living movement, in contradiction (CL, I I, 75-76). It is only when difference is pushed far enough among realities, that diversity is seen to become opposition and, therefore, contradiction, so that the whole of all realities in general becomes, in turn, an absolute contradiction in itself (CL II, 76). As we see, for Hegel, difference becomes contradiction so that varied things thus obtain negativity, which is the key to movement and change. Difference is the movement of that which is negative. According to Hyppolites analysis of these Hegelian texts,[endnoteRef:4] it is necessary to start with the distinction among things in order to understand negation in being and in thought, as the immediate intuition of that which the senses perceive already contains negation in the form of pure becoming; negation and distinction imply one another mutually. Empirical thought believes in the privilege of that which is positive; it only captures exterior differences and considers them to be indifferent differences because it is not aware of the extent of negation. The distinction of things leads to the problem of the other. In the Sophist, Plato substituted the contrary of being for the other and wished to avoid contrariness and contradiction by not admitting negation. Plato acknowledges otherness but does not develop it in the direction of contradiction, in contrast to Hegel, who goes into opposition in depth until he reaches contradiction. Platonic dialectics is static while Hegelian dialectics is dynamic, unfolding the movement that goes from diversity to opposition and from opposition to contradiction. Empirical thought cannot overcome the separation between interiorness and exteriorness; it cannot achieve the speculative point of view according to which the object is the contrary of itself. The movement from diversity to opposition assumes that things are reflected in one another and this reflection is their opposition. Thus, external difference becomes internal, or difference in essence, and this means that it is necessary to start with that which is negative in order to understand that which is positive. Each determination must be understood as negation, which means that each determinate existent is not identical to itself but rather differs from itself. The motor of real oppositions is this difference from itself to itself. [4: Cf. J. Hyppolite, Lgica y Existencia, Ensayo sobre la Lgica de Hegel, Universidad Autnoma de Puebla, Puebla, 1987, pp. 131-167.]

As we can see, Hegel developed the existing exterior diversity among things first as opposition and later as contradiction in a process of gradual interiorization of the exterior of difference that culminates in the contradiction in which each thing contains itself and its opposite in its interior. Hegel starts with absolute difference or simple difference, which is the difference of reflection, goes through determinate difference in itself, which shows itself as the unity of difference and identity, and arrives at diversity that has in itself two moments, identity and difference itself. Starting with diversity, Hegel goes through opposition which is the unity of identity and diversity, of positive and negative, which present themselves as two moments of difference which are mutually exclusive. Finally, diversity and opposition are overcome by contradiction which is revealed as their ultimate truth. If Hegel leaps to the infinitely large, Leibniz leaps to the infinitely small, but this leap to infinite representation does not follow from the principle of identity as an assumption of representation. Both Hegel and Leibniz lead difference to the foundation, to sufficient reason, and in this way have the infinite lead the identical to exist in its own identity. In Hegel and Leibniz, it does not much matter that the negative of difference is considered to be a contradictory opposition or a limitation due to vice-diction, just as it does not matter that infinite identity is shown as analytic or synthetic; what is important is that, in both cases, difference remains subordinated to identity, reduced to the negative, imprisoned in similarity and analogy (DR, 71). Infinite, orgic representation shares the inability to establish an appropriate concept of difference with finite, organic representation because they limit themselves to inscribing difference in the identity of the concept. What an ontology of difference rejects is the false alternative of infinite representation: either it falls into that which is undifferentiated, that which is indeterminate, or a difference subjected to that which is negative, either the (Hegelian) negative of opposition or the (Leibnizian) negative of limitation, is stated. What allows Deleuze to think about a notion of pure difference is the genealogical, anti-dialectic thinking of Nietzsche who, in his analyses of forces, considers the origin to be difference, the hierarchical difference of forces that separates the dominant forces from the dominated forces. Our author opposes, according to Deleuze, the speculative element of negation, opposition, and contradiction, difference as a practical, empirical element, an object of assertion and pleasure, and proclaims differential assertion in contrast to dialectic negation (N, 10). The affirmation of difference is what characterizes the will to power that, in this way, shows difference to be the result of a practical assertion that is inseparable from the essence and that constitutes existence (N, 18). Dialectics ignores the real element from which the forces come, and so its basis, opposition, is only the law of the relation between abstract products, while difference is the only principle of genesis or production, the principle that produces opposition as simple appearance. Dialectics is a superficial movement that is based on mere external oppositions, without reaching the level of the subtle, subterranean differential mechanisms that constitute topological movements and typological variation (N, 181). Dialectics focuses on the differential element from the side of the reactive forces, from the point of view of nihilism, of resentment, and of a bad conscience and, because of this, sees it inverted, reduced to a mere opposition, incapable of generating new ways of thinking and new ways of feeling. Faced with dialectics, Nietzsche tries to raise a new image of thinking that breaks with its three main assumptions: 1) the power of that which is negative shows itself in opposition and contradiction, 2) the valuation of the sad passions, of suffering and sadness, and 3) the consideration of positiveness as derived from negation itself. Dialectics reflects on difference but does so in an inverted way by substituting the assertion of difference as such with the negation of that which differs. Dialectics is the thinking of the theoretical man who attempts to judge life, to limit it and measure it; it is the thinking of priests, of men who subject life to working that which is negative. It is the thinking of the slave who expresses a reactive transformation. Faced with dialectics, Nietzsche establishes his own method, which Deleuze follows, a dramatic, typological, differential method in which the will to power appears as a plastic, genealogical principle, less as force than as the differential element that determines, simultaneously, the relation of the forces (quantity) and the respective quality of the forces in relation (N, 225). The ontology of Deleuzian difference, with Nietzschean roots, has as its speculative postulate the assertion of multiplicity and, as its practical postulate, pleasure in diversity (N, 225). The ontology of difference is based on the will to power and on eternal recurrence as a radical statement of difference whose essential characteristics are the following: the lightness of that which is stated, against the weight of that which is negative; the games of the will to power, against the action of dialectics; the statement of statement, against the famous negation of negation (N, 225).3.-The ritornelloWe have seen how the ontology of pure, affirmative Deleuzian difference is an attempt to conjure the power of chaos, an attempt to shape a chaosmos that introduces some kind of order into a reality whose chaotic aspect is never completely eliminated. We shall now present the notion of ritornello as an example of this relative stabilization of chaos and as a concrete application of this ontology of difference. In the ritornello, which presents itself, in its musical form, as the chorus of lullabies, three moments can be distinguished: a) the constitution of a territory from the initial chaos by establishing a stable center and directional components that structure the forces of chaos in an infra-agency form, b) the organization of territorial agency in order to be able to inhabit it thanks to dimensional components that make up the terrestrial forces obtained by filtering the forces of chaos and that lead to an inter-agency, c) the opening up of a territory to other territories or even to the entire Cosmos, by means of the components of passage and flight that connect with cosmic forces and with the forces of the future and create an inter-agency by means of the de-territorialization of the already-constituted territory (MP, 383.384). Starting from a black hole where a stable center is marked as the beginning of an order, a circle is drawn that marks a territory as home, as the residence and, finally, the circle opens up to the cosmos. This process assumes that something is obtained from chaos thanks to the filtering by the territory as a lived space that produces telluric or terrestrial forces and that, later, this closed territory is opened up to the cosmic forces, exterior forces, and forces of the future. The ritornello seeks a territory starting from chaos, de-territorializes it by opening it up to the cosmos and, finally, returns to re-territorialize it once again, but the point of return is never the initial point; rather, it introduces a difference.[endnoteRef:5] It is necessary to take into account that the organized space of the territory is more an intensive space constituted by a movement that produces an active spacing, than a mere extensive space organized in a stable fashion. This dynamic character of constituted territory is what makes it possible to graft openings that project this closed territory toward the exterior onto the constituent movement. The territory that is thus constituted opens up in the form of errant centrifugal forces toward the sphere of the cosmos. The ritornello always refers to the earth, to a Natal, to a Native, producing a Nomos that distributes space, that is constituted as an ethos, as a dwelling (MP, 383-384). [5: Cf. F. Zourabichvili, Le vocabulaire de Deleuze, ellipses, Pars, 2003, pp. 74-75.]

The Halves and Rhythms are born from chaos. Each half is a time-space block made up of the repetition of its components, shaped by a code. The halves open up on chaos and the response that they give to the intrusion of chaos in their structures or to their own dilution in chaos is the shaping of a rhythm. A rhythm that produce an in-between that is located between two different halves, ensuring their communication, the coordination between two heterogeneous time-spaces. Each half exists only because of a periodic repetition, but this repetition is not always the same, but rather introduces a difference, an interval, a separation, that makes the half evolve toward the other half. A territory is not simply an environment or a rhythm but the product of the territorialization of the halves and the rhythms (MP, 386). A territory includes an exterior half, an interior half, an intermediate half, and an annexed half, that is, an exterior that is dominated, an interior that is inhabited, limits and membranes where the interior and the exterior connect, and annexed reserves that feed it. The territory is defined by the emergence of expressive materials or qualities, which can serve as a characteristic, singular signature. A territory is defined by its qualities, which mark its specificity, its property and identity, its style, its specific manner, and that make it a specific domain that is distant from other domains. Territories, even if they are provisional, as the organization of the earths forces, serve as a defense and refuge from the chaos that is always threatening with its exterior forces. In this sense, the ritornello is any set of materials of expression that draws a territory and that develops through territorial motifs, territorial landscapes (MP, 397). The ritornello is a form of differentiating repetition with two dimensions: a spatial and a temporal dimension. The ritornello, on one hand, produces an alternate movement of territorialization and de-territorialization, of closing and opening up space, and, on the other hand, constitutes a specific time that conjugates that which already exists with the opening up to novelty from infinitesimal variations. The ritornello is an invention that turns the singular universal in contrast to the particularities of memory and the generalities of custom, in the wake of Kierkegaards repetition and Nietzsches eternal recurrence. The ritornello, as a turning in on itself, is an immanent fold that opens up to the infinite as a there-and-back-again movement. The ritornello has a privileged relationship with the Earth, it is the song of the Earth: it appears as the exit from chaos toward a land, as the organization of this land and as the movement that comes from the land and goes elsewhere. The movement of the ritornello with respect to the land is triple: it goes toward a territory, it installs itself in this territory, and it leaves it (MP, 396). In its creative aspect, of opening up to the cosmos and to the future, a ritornello occurs when a territorial component starts to produce new shoots, to move, to change (MP, 401). The ritornello is a time-space crystal (MP, 418) that organizes a territory and creates a time, an involved time in Guillaumes sense, that is, a time that expresses the aspect of the verb and is inherent to it, which it interiorizes, it is the time of the event, the time the event contains, not the time that contains the event or universal time.

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