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Nomadography: the ‘early’ Deleuze and the history of philosophy.
Deleuze insists that empiricism not be confused with a theory of knowledge. Historians of philosophy tend to identify empiricism as the philosophical mode by which knowledge in the form of ideas is obtained through sensuous experience. But Deleuze argues that this epistemological view misses the point. Empiricism is, above all, a practical philosophy, in which questions of knowledge and truth are always ancillary to and activated by material concerns. Belief, which exerts its power in our lives whether we have true knowledge or not, thus becomes more significant. Through belief, the subject comes to constitute itself within the mind. Deleuze affirms, with Hume, that the mind is not all the same as the subject. The mind is a collection of sense impressions, a “given” without order, “a flux of perceptions” which must be organized in order for the subject to develop. Association allows the mind becomes systematized under the influence of its principles, such as contiguity, causality, and resemblance. For example, “the principle of resemblance designates certain ideas that are similar, and makes it possible to group them together under the same name.” The mind is thus affected by the principles, which give it a tendency or habit. As Deleuze puts it, “the mind is not a subject; it is subjected.” (38)
Once the mind becomes a system and the given has been organized, it is possible for subject to constitute itself as that which transcends the given. Deleuze explains that “I affirm more than I know; my judgment goes beyond the idea. In other words, I am a subject.” Through belief, we are able to transcend the given (“I believe in what I have never seen nor touched”), and this establishes a relation (which is not given) among ideas (which are given). For instance, we have ideas of the sun, of rising, and the temporality, yet the belief that the sun will rise tomorrow is a relation among these ideas.39 The basic function of the subject is to establish relations, which are in all cases external to their terms. Deleuze considers this the absolute fact of empiricism, Hume’s as well as his own. A given object or idea does not have an inherent relation to another. For example, since resemblance is a relation, two things that resemble one another might seem to have a property of resemblance, but Hume would say that resemblance is merely a relation entirely external to the things themselves, since resemblance only arises “from the comparison that the mind makes betwixt them.” (40) Hence, a relation-establishing subject is needed to create relations, since the ideas are not themselves endowed with a property which would establish an a priori relationship.
Empirical subjectivity is thus a dynamic process rather than a fixed identity. As Deleuze puts it, “subjectivity is essentially practical.” To ask whether the subject is active or passive, as the history of philosophy has traditionally done in characterizing an “active” subject of rationalism and a “passive” subject of empiricism, is to raise what Bergson would have called a “false question.” Deleuze explains that “the subject is an imprint, or an impression, left by the principles, that progressively turns into a machine capable of using this impression.” (41) The empirical, practical subject constitutes itself on the plane of immanence, and it is recognizable in its function rather than its discrete or abstract existence. Already in Empiricism and Subjectivity, the subject unfolds like some rhizomatic machine. Deleuze’s conclusion hints at the future directions of his thought even as it foregrounds Hume’s own theory: “Philosophy must constitute itself as the theory of what we are doing, not as a theory of what there is.” (42)
