the turn to Nyarlathotep—bringing the void to birth

MG seems troubled by my last post, asking whether I am denying that there is a “‘thing’ which has physical powers and actions.” Controversy over the meaning of “hypostasis” aside, I think there is a further misunderstanding that was perhaps engendered by my lack of detail.

Of most portent to me in this discussion, then, is what we mean by “thing” or “object” (don’t get mad, Martin). The object, in my vocabulary, is somewhat similar to Leibniz, for whom any number of monads are unified by a dominant monad. Thus, chairs, dry erase markers, and human animals. My position, however, rejects monads (since they are substances, after all) in favor of a Leibnizism of forces. Following Deleuze in Nietzsche & Philosophy, I take it that “the object itself is force, expression of a force.” (1.3, pg. 6) This force that possesses is not the sole force at play in the formation of the object, Deleuze goes on to say, but it is the dominant one. The thing is this constellation of actualized “powers” (more on what that might mean to me some other time), not some hypostasis/particular-as-substance.

Then again, I might just be tired.