Deleuze and Guattari are daring modern philosophers who question fixed thought systems. Among the most notable of their ideas is the rhizome, which denies any form of linear organization, celebrates multiplicity, and claims that unity is always lacunae. Instead of plain beginnings or derivations with separate independent growths, we now have interwoven thickets. Such kinds of webs spread out and unite in very unforeseen manners. This is a contradiction to the authority. It changes our perspective on structures. It encourages innovation. But what does this term mean—rhizome?

The Origin of the Rhizome: Deleuze and Guattari’s “A Thousand Plateaus”

The concept of rhizome was first presented by Deleuze and Guattari in the book A Thousand Plateaus. This term was taken from botany. The rhizome is a kind of root system that extends sideways. It grows in unexpected directions and does not fit into any neat category. That’s what they meant.

In the late 20th century, philosophy underwent many debates on structuralism and post-structuralism. Foucault, among others, had ideas on power and order. Deleuze and Guattari also took part in this discussion. They tried to avoid being tied down by normal ways of thinking, which are found in traditional philosophy, which is characterized by the use of certain hierarchies.

For example, Plato positioned his theory of forms higher than the world people see every day, while Aristotle divided knowledge into different groups, with each group being more general than those below it. These kinds of models draw distinct lines separating one thing from another, thus giving rise to authoritarian systems.

A New Way of Thinking

Deleuze and Guattari criticized this approach. According to them, knowledge is not fixed; it is fluid. They also saw that information does not have a linear point of origin but rather links together like the rhizome, which can be seen as an illustration of this concept.

It follows then that everything can be linked to everything else. There is no one ruling center, and every connection is important because of this lack.

The book A Thousand Plateaus symbolizes their rebellion. They do not agree with the multiplicity of truths. Instead, they promote an evolving philosophy. Just as in a rhizome, new linkages may develop from any point while the old ones change their position again and again. Everything keeps on moving and developing all the time.

By going against the grain with their use of rhizome, Deleuze and Guattari attacked the inflexibility inherent in Occidental logic. They require us to think about different ways in which we can reason. In simple terms, they teach us to look at all options open to us today.

The Rhizome vs. the Tree: A Metaphor for Knowledge and Structure

The authors Deleuze and Guattari compare the rhizome and the tree, which are very expressive. To them, the tree is a representation of the conventional type of reasoning that is arborescent. It can be seen as follows: there is one main trunk with branches emerging from it.

The tree can also symbolize a hierarchy, such as Aristotelian classification, in which every step follows logically from previous ones. This system is clear and understandable. In this kind of arrangement, one part or stage naturally brings about the other part or stage.

On its part, a rhizome does not resemble this kind of structure. A rhizome grows uncontrollably and irrationally. It propagates sideways, laterally sending off shoots everywhere but without any specific point of origin or culmination—multiple connections across space!

This has nothing to do with linearity or regular arrangement. Rather than being linear, it’s just like what we call a “network.”

The distinction between a tree and a rhizome is very important. A tree is used to represent the view that there is a definite way in which knowledge and society are organized.

In this case, knowledge is believed to originate from one point before spreading outwards, just as in a tree trunk. On its part, the rhizome contradicts this perspective. It promotes variety and complexity. Knowledge is not stagnant; rather, it keeps on growing, joining, and changing itself with other knowledge unexpectedly.

This leads to the conclusion that by adopting rhizomatic thought, Deleuze and Guattari provide cultural and social options. Viewing knowledge as a web helps us understand that not everything makes sense all the time, and that’s fine, too. The rhizome calls for inventiveness and continuous change of mind.

Key Characteristics of the Rhizome: Connection, Heterogeneity, and Atemporality

The rhizome is not only a figure of speech but an important concept that changes our perception of knowledge and life because of some unique features. These characteristics include connection, heterogeneity, and atemporality.

To start with, connection. A rhizome is all about interconnection. Every part links to others. There’s no central point or hierarchy. Think of the internet. It’s decentralized. Information can travel all over, forming links in a chain. Rhizomatic thinking mirrors this—everything is connected, but there’s no single origin or authority.

The next principle is heterogeneity. The rhizome resists homogeneity. It accommodates distinction and variety. A rhizome differs from a tree because a tree has branches that follow one way from the trunk, while the former can go in any direction at all. There is nothing like another shoot. This non-compliance with one personality is very important.

To finish with, atemporality. The rhizome goes against time linearity. It doesn’t follow a straight, chronological path. Events or ideas don’t go in order from past to future, but maybe all over the place at once—this seems clearer.

Such an idea helps us break free from our normal view of chronology so that we can see history, development, and advancement differently than before.

The Rhizome and Social Theory: Disrupting Traditional Power Structures

The rhizome not only disrupts our conventional perception of knowledge but also interferes with the concepts of power and organization. The highest rank usually holds power in a normal setup.

Think about governments or corporations. There is a clear chain of command where leaders make decisions and pass them on to lower-level employees. However, this is not the case with rhizome because it is organized in a manner that does not have one person in control at any point.

This concept can well be applied in sociology. Rhizomatic thinking is resistant to oppressive forms of authority as it contests stable orders. Many times, social movements act just like rhizomes, for instance, feminism and Black Lives Matter.

These are characterized by their resistance against being controlled by one party or included in one story. Such movements are capable of growing and adjusting themselves before linking up with additional causes.

Everywhere in the world today, there are rhizomatic networks. Again, a good example is the internet. Information, ideas, and activism move across easily on various social media platforms that have no central leadership.

There is potential for movement growth even when there is no single leader or organization. Similar is a case of grassroots activism. Through a larger rhizomatic connection, many small local societies join together, and thus, they become influential, thereby bringing about changes in society.

From the rhizome, we learn that power may not emanate mainly from one point, as it was traditionally thought. On the contrary, this kind of power can give rise to unique modes of resistance and organization.

The Rhizome and Art: Aesthetic Implications in Creativity and Expression

Artists are often limit breakers. They experiment with forms and meanings. The rhizome allows them to push the limits even further: it offers a model without a central trunk, without a single point of origin. It thrives on unexpected connections.

This freedom speaks for itself in postmodernism in art and literature. Authors like Jorge Luis Borges played around with labyrinthine stories against all linearity of the plot. There is John Cage, whose musical compositions embraced chance rather than being set in fixed arrangement—a very rhizomatic approach.

Rhizomatic thinking is against strict categorization. It stands for fragmentation, multiplicity, and permanent reinvention, which is probably the reason why so many contemporary artists find this type of thinking so attractive.

They break free from traditional genres: they mix photography with performance and digital art, weaving sound, text, and movement into one piece, and all those can be interconnected with each other very often, surprisingly.

Rhizomatic creativity is also evident in online platforms, whereby you can find some collaborative projects carried out by great minds globally who change and add to the work of others.

The center of such collaborative art cannot be said to belong to any single author. Rather than being authored individually, it is said to be composed through the collaboration of numerous individuals. These networks mirror the decentralized nature of the rhizome.

Art, as we embrace the rhizome, turns into a process that evolves continuously and forever since there is no fixed endpoint. This view goes against the traditional understanding of authorship and originality.

It creates space for new means of creativity. In this perspective, art is better seen as a mesh with endless possibilities than otherwise.

Criticisms and Limitations of the Rhizome Concept

The rhizome is a very interesting and innovative idea, but it also has been critiqued. One such criticism is the tendency of the rhizome to generalize too much. It seems hard to put into practice the concept of unlimited associations because such connections are so abstract that they cannot be pinned down.

Opponents posit that one cannot straightforwardly apply rhizome in day-to-day life affairs, such as studying political systems or managing some organizations, due to inherent complexity.

A number of scholars have raised concerns as to whether rhizome is really non-hierarchical. Although it disobeys normal forms of rule, some see it as simply exchanging one kind of order with another kind.

For instance, even within a network where power is evenly spread out on paper, certain people or factions will still be more influential than others. The rhizome does not completely eliminate problems related to unequal distribution of power.

The rhizome is not clearly understood in academic circles. Due to its non-hierarchical and flowing nature, it becomes a challenge to determine its extent or measure. Determining how a rhizomatic structure actually appears can be very tricky.

Nonetheless, rhizomatic thought continues to be important. This is because it provides new perspectives on issues of knowledge, culture, and socio-political matters that need to be taken into consideration today.

Future development in rhizomatic theory is expected to focus on improving how it is used, with some attention paid to changing this issue, which may have become too theoretical.

So, What Is Rhizome?

Rhizome is a dynamic concept developed by Deleuze and Guattari. It denies the idea of one single trunk or root. It grows laterally, connecting everything at once. Think of it like a web, not a ladder.

In a rhizome, there is no central authority. Power is not forced from top to bottom. Rather, different points link up in surprising ways. This allows for flexibility and room for new ideas. It also invites multiple perspectives.

The rhizome is philosophically opposed to the notion of fixed truth, as it is a philosophy of constant movement and reinvention. No path is privileged; any node can become the center.

Socially, too, the rhizome challenges hierarchy and promotes bottom-up innovation, feeding new forms of activism. Online networks can assume this form, supporting rapid idea travel.

Of course, critics say it can be too broad or even vague. Yet the rhizome remains inspiring. It hints at a world in which things are fluid and interrelated with one another. That is an act of the rhizome: it keeps growing, reaching out, connecting.

Much of Albert Camus’s literary output was written as a way for him to work through complex ideas. These were never dry or abstract exercises in philosophical thought, but real-world problems faced by himself and others around him. In his first novel, A Happy Death, Camus tackles the competing drives for self-sufficiency and approval. Written at the time of extreme emotional turmoil and anxiety following the breakdown of his first marriage, the text is both dark and raw.

The Drug-Fueled Romance That Nearly Destroyed Camus

Camus first met Simone Hié at the University of Algiers in 1933. Known as “S,” she was popular and moved within the same social circles as Camus. The attraction was mutual (with the minor complication that Simone was already in a relationship with one of Camus’s friends). They were married a year later, on June 16. He was twenty, and she was nineteen.

Although the couple was married and living together, they were financially dependent on help from relatives. Camus’s uncle gave him pocket money and the use of his car, while Simone’s mother, Dr. Marthe Sogler, paid the 450 francs for their rent every month. Simone was unemployed, hoping to study dance at some point in the future. Camus earned money from giving private tuition to high school students.

The relationship between the two of them was tempestuous. Simone was a drug addict, addicted to morphine. Already a free spirit, her behavior while under the influence of her addiction often embarrassed Camus. Sometimes, when things got bad, Simone would go and stay with her mother. When things were worse, she would be admitted to the hospital.

They also shared romantic times. Camus would often leave little love notes for his wife to find, in which he poetically expressed his love and hopes for the future.

But their relationship was doomed. The breakdown of the marriage occurred during a period in Camus’s life when his writing talent and voice were just emerging. As we shall see, the effect Camus’s failed relationship with Simone had on his work is clear.

The Heartbreaking Discovery That Ended Their Marriage

In 1936, Camus and Simone decided to embark upon a long canoeing trip through Europe with a mutual friend, Yves Bourgeois. Camus thought the trip would do them good and keep Simone away from the drug dealers back in Algiers.

Unfortunately for Camus, the physical exertion of paddling the canoe proved too much for him. Diagnosed with tuberculosis when he was seventeen, his lungs were already too damaged for him to complete the trip on the water. While Simone and Yves paddled their canoes, Camus had to take buses to meet them at rendezvous points along the route. Already a proud man, he took this as a huge blow to his self-esteem.

But things on that trip were going to get a lot worse for Camus. While the thought of himself being an invalid was deeply upsetting for him, he also felt responsible for his wife’s failure to kick her drug addiction. Many of Camus’s friends at the time believed he thought of himself in some way as his wife’s savior. However, not only did Camus fail to keep Simone away from the drug dealers, but, as he was about to find out, she was sleeping with them too.

During the trip, the three of them had arranged for their mail to be delivered to post offices along the route. One day, Camus accidentally opened an envelope addressed to Simone. It was from her doctor. Reading the letter inside, he discovered not only that his wife was being supplied with drugs by this doctor but that she was sleeping with him too.

The couple split up. After they returned to Algiers in September, Camus went to live with his brother, and Simone went to stay with her mother.

Death in the Soul

We saw that Camus had to travel separately from his wife and his friend. This meant enduring long periods alone in strange places while he waited for them to catch up. On one occasion, he ended up in Prague with six days to kill before the arrival of Simone and Yves. Camus later used this experience as material for his essay “Death in the Soul” and his first novel, A Happy Death.

Published in his first collection of essays, The Wrong Side and the Right Side (1937), ‘Death in the Soul’ compares and contrasts Camus’s experiences alone in Prague with time spent in Vicenza, Italy, with his friends.

The essay begins with Camus’s arrival in the city by train at six in the evening. He checks his luggage and takes himself off to find a hotel. He has only a small amount of money, so any hotel he finds must be cheap. Alone in a crowded city full of indifferent people whose language he does not understand, Camus soon feels overwhelmed. To make matters worse, when he finds a hotel, he discovers the room he has been given is much more expensive than he expected.

Not wanting to remain alone in his hotel room, Camus goes out to find a cheap restaurant. He manages to find one but cannot understand the menu or the server. Helped, a little, by a prostitute who sits at his table and translates the menu in return for a drink, he manages to order food. What comes back is some kind of cumin-covered stew. The meal is disgusting, but Camus eats it.

In the days that follow, Camus returns to the same restaurant and orders the same dish, even though it makes him physically sick. At least it is something familiar.

A Happy Death

Camus worked on A Happy Death between 1936 and 1938 but abandoned the novel. Many of the ideas were repurposed for The Stranger (1942). The protagonist of A Happy Death is a young man living an unsatisfactory life in Algiers, a life very similar to the author’s own. He is called Patrice Mersault, and Camus tells his story in the third person.

Camus eventually chose not to release A Happy Death. The novel exists today because it was published posthumously in 1971. It would also be a mistake to conflate the character of Patrice (or Meursault) with Camus himself. They all share similar backgrounds, but are not the same person. As we shall see, Patrice is a pretty dark character.

After Patrice commits a murder that makes him rich, he travels to Europe and finds himself in Prague. Like Camus, he ends up at a cheap hotel (but, unlike Camus, he negotiates the price of the room) and must endure his time in the city alone.

Let us compare how Camus uses his experiences in Prague in both texts.

Camus and Patrice Alone in Prague

Both Camus in ‘Death in the Soul’ and Patrice in A Happy Death spend their first nights in Prague in similar cheap hotels. Patrice is also a rich man, whereas Camus had very little money. Patrice goes to an almost identical restaurant to Camus, but instead of ordering a stew too heavily seasoned with cumin, he has an overly sweet compote. After his first meal, Camus feels physically sick. Patrice is actually sick. They both go back to their hotels and fall instantly asleep. They keep frequenting their restaurants while in Prague because, although the food is bad, the places are familiar.

In the essay, Camus encounters death when the body of a deceased man is found in one of the rooms near his. In the novel, Patrice is on his way to his restaurant when he encounters the dead body of a man lying in the street. This man has a deep wound in his head and is lying in a pool of blood. Another man is dancing manically around the body.

Patrice and Camus both attempt to distract themselves from isolation and anxiety by visiting various art galleries, historical buildings, and museums. This works to an extent, but they always end up back alone with only themselves for company. A question they both ask themselves is how to live happily in isolation without needing others.

Camus does not get to answer this question because, after six days, he is reunited with his wife and friend. Patrice, on the other hand, leaves Prague but continues alone.

All That Is Left: Self-Sufficient Solitude

What do we mean by self-sufficient solitude? It is not a phrase Camus used himself, but it captures the idea of being alone yet able to provide for all one’s needs.

For solitude, some distance from people is required, though it may or may not induce a feeling of loneliness. Both Camus and Patrice were separated from others during their stays in Prague. They were not completely isolated. There were, for example, patrons in the restaurants they frequented, and the city was crowded. However, the mere presence of others did not break the solitude of either of them. The primary reason for this was the language barrier. What of other forms of human connection?

In “Death in the Soul” and A Happy Death, Camus explores the idea of human sexuality as a connection with others. Camus and Patrice think that sexual relations with someone would bring a brief respite from solitude. However, the only opportunity for this was with prostitutes, and neither wanted this.

Here, using prostitutes is not considered undesirable for moral reasons, as vice, or in terms of exploitation. It is rejected due to its reliance on others and its mere distraction. If either Camus or his character Patrice hires a prostitute, it is a “failing” of self-sufficiency because they need someone else to entertain them. In addition, the sex would only be a temporary distraction and not something worthwhile in itself.

The same kind of thing happens when they visit art galleries. Looking at the art and artifacts is a distraction that relies on others (artists and gallery owners). To be self-sufficient in solitude, one cannot be reliant on anyone else.

We can see from this brief overview of Camus’s view of self-sufficiency that other people can pose a problem for someone seeking self-sufficient solitude.

In his collection of aphorisms, The Gay Science, Nietzsche offers us three inter-related ideas that are the key to his philosophy as a whole: the death of God, amor fati, and the eternal recurrence. Here, we will pay particular attention to aphorism #341—Nietzsche’s best known aphorism on eternal recurrence and how it relates to Thus Spoke Zarathustra, which he considered his masterpiece. Using aphorism #341 as our central guide, we can see Nietzsche’s most radical idea—the revaluation of all our values.

The Gay Science

Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900) published the first edition of The Gay Science in 1882. It consisted of four sections (or books, as they are sometimes known). A second edition was published five years later in 1887, which included a brand new section of material and songs he had written in a new appendix.

Between the publication of the two editions of The Gay Science, Nietzsche published two other very important works: Thus Spoke Zarathustra (1883-1885) and Beyond Good and Evil (1886). Zarathustra was extremely important to Nietzsche. He felt that this long poem, written in a style reminiscent of the Old Testament, was his greatest achievement. Nietzsche believed that understanding Zarathustra was the key to understanding his entire philosophy.

In German, the title of the work is Die fröhliche Wissenschaft. This is most often translated into English as The Gay Science but is sometimes also rendered as The Joyful Wisdom. ‘Gay’ refers to a sense of happiness or joy, but ‘Science’ is slightly misleading. Nietzsche is not referring to what we today might think of as science but rather a seeking out of knowledge more compatible with the arts. His book is best thought of as a joyful quest for wisdom.

The Gay Science is a book of aphorisms, split into four (and later, into five) sections. An aphorism is a short piece of writing that typically seeks to capture a single idea. The author usually offers this idea as some general truth to consider. However, these ‘truths’ are not expressed as facts to be received and understood but something to be pondered and reflected upon. The reader must tease out the meaning for themselves. Within the pages of The Gay Science, Nietzsche introduces us to three of his most important ideas: amor fati (love of fate), the death of God, and the eternal recurrence.

Gay Science’s Ties to Zarathustra

Nietzsche’s best-known aphorism on the eternal recurrence (sometimes referred to as eternal return) is aphorism #341 of The Gay Science.

In the aphorism immediately following, we find Nietzsche’s first mention of Zarathustra. These two aphorisms, 341 and 342, are the last two of book four. This was originally where The Gay Science ended. As we saw above, after the publication of Thus Spoke Zarathustra, Nietzsche felt the need to go back and add a fifth book to The Gay Science. Indeed, after the publication of Zarathustra, Nietzsche said that all his subsequent works were aimed at making it more comprehensible.

Zarathustra is an extremely difficult text to understand. Nietzsche wrote it in a matter of days, and it is presented in the style of a religious text somewhat similar to that of the Old Testament. The book is full of strange imagery and characters. It is a fascinating and very confusing read. One critic at the time commented that he had read the text but failed to understand a single word. Nietzsche replied that if this man had comprehended just six sentences, he would have been raised to a higher level of existence than most people can achieve!

The section of Zarathustra that concerns us is in the third part under the title “On the Vision and the Riddle.” Zarathustra is a hermit, loosely based on Zoroaster, who has spent many years in the company of his two friends, an eagle and a serpent. One day he decides to go down and share his wisdom with the world. After a few adventures, he finds himself recounting the story of a strange life or death experience he had on a mountaintop. It is here that Nietzsche vividly depicts the idea of the eternal recurrence.

“On the Vision and the Riddle”

In “On the Vision and the Riddle,” in book III of Thus Spake Zarathustra, the titular hero climbs a mountain when attacked by a bizarre dwarf-like creature resembling a gruesome mole. Zarathustra refers to this creature as “the spirit of heaviness.”

The creature jumps onto Zarathustra’s shoulders and whispers demoralizing thoughts into his ears. Zarathustra describes himself, as he trudges the mountain path under the weight of this creature, as “the loneliest one.” As we shall see, in aphorism #341 of The Gay Science, Nietzsche asks us to imagine ourselves in our “loneliest of loneliness.” Zarathustra realises that he will succumb to his dispiriting words if he does not fight the creature off his shoulders. It is a life-or-death moment and only Zarathustra or the creature can be the victor. What the creature is telling Zarathustra is that life is not worth having. He said that he was at the end of his life and that it was not worth the effort. Everything is pointless.

Zarathustra hurls the creature from his shoulders. As it lies at his feet, Zarathustra cries “Was that life? Well then! One More Time!” With this declaration, Zarathustra joyfully affirms life. Far from being meaningless suffering, life is something Zarathustra would willingly live, over and over again.

At this point in the story, a mysterious gateway appears. Two paths lead off in both directions. At the gateway where Zarathustra and the creature are standing, a sign reads “Moment.” These paths continue eternally. When Zarathustra asks the creature if someone could walk down one path forever, the creature replies that time is a circle. If someone entered the gate at this “moment” and kept on walking, they would eventually end up circling back to the gate.

Aphorism #341: “The Heaviest Weight”

Standing at the gateway, Zarathustra says to the creature:

“And this slow spider that creeps in the moonlight, and this moonlight itself, and I and you in the gateway whispering together, whispering of eternal things—must not all of us have been here before?—And return and run in that other lane, outward, before us, in this long, eerie lane—must we not return eternally?” (Z, III, ‘Vision and Riddle’ 2)

As we turn now to aphorism #341, notice the similar imagery:

“What if a demon crept after thee into thy loneliest loneliness some day or night, and said to thee: ‘This life, as thou livest it at present, and hast lived it, thou must live it once more, and also innumerable times… and all in the same series and sequence—and similarly this spider and this moonlight among the trees, and similarly this moment, and I myself…’ Wouldst thou not throw thyself down and gnash thy teeth, and curse the demon that so spake? Or hast thou once experienced a tremendous moment in which thou wouldst answer him: ‘Thou art a God, and never did I hear anything so divine!’” (Nietzsche, GS 341)

The demon is asking: would we be devastated by this news or overcome with joy? A very important detail, often missed in the commentaries, is that the demon is most interested in knowing “how well disposed would you have to become to yourself to long for nothing more fervently than for this ultimate confirmation and seal?”

There are many ideas to unpack here. As we do, we will see that Nietzsche’s idea of the eternal recurrence is intimately related to two other ideas found in The Gay Science: the death of God and amor fati.

Nietzsche’s Demon

We should not think of Nietzsche’s demon as some monstrous creature, similar to that experienced by Zarathustra. It is not supposed to be an evil entity but rather something closer to the daimon that supposedly guided Socrates. Ancient Greek daimons were intermediaries between human beings and the gods. Their role was to interpret and transport information from the latter to the former. Seen this way, the “demon” that Nietzsche refers to in aphorism #341 is a messenger with supernatural knowledge. This is similar to an angel bringing word from God. This idea will become key to understanding the aphorism. For now, we can understand Nietzsche’s use of the demon imagery as a way of saying “suppose you found out for certain, that…”

Remember, Nietzsche is interested in our reaction to the Demon’s revelation. He wants to know if we would be devastated or overcome with joy at the idea of the eternal recurrence. With his use of a daimon delivering the news, Nietzsche takes away the option of responding with disbelief. That is, we must imagine ourselves finding out for certain that everything in the universe recurs eternally.

Although it is easy enough to understand why Nietzsche would want his audience, for the sake of the aphorism, to accept that eternal recurrence is a fact of the universe, it does seem odd that he only offers two choices regarding our response. Someone might react very badly to the news and another person might be overcome with joy, but is there not a third possibility? Would there not be some people who simply do not care all that much? Indeed, many commentators have wondered why Nietzsche would not have considered this the most common reaction to the demon’s revelation.

Possible Responses to Nietzsche’s Demon

It is a puzzle, given what Nietzsche’s demon has to say about eternal recurrence and why anyone would react in the ways described in the aphorism. However, aphorisms are supposed to be puzzling! Many commentators have pointed out what seems obvious: it would not matter if everything repeated exactly the same way. This is because we would be entirely unaware of it happening. Indeed, everything we did today and yesterday, and will do tomorrow, and on all the days of our lives might have already happened an infinite number of times. And we would never know.

The reason why this would be the case is simple. Currently, we have no memory of everything repeating in life. This means that if life repeats exactly the same way each time, we cannot remember the previous go-around. If we do, the time we remember will be different from when we do not. In addition, there is nothing useful we can do with the news of eternal recurrence. Why? Because of everything we could possibly choose to do, we have already done it infinite times and will do it again for all time.

One philosopher has asked us to imagine the demon telling us that there are infinite parallel universes, all identical to this one. This means that there exist unlimited versions of ourselves, all identical. If we discovered this was actually the case, would we really care all that much? There’s nothing we can do with the information. It is hard to see how this scenario is significantly different in impact from the idea of eternal recurrence.

This approach has two problems stemming from a failure to consider the religious aspect of Nietzsche’s aphorism.

Christian Responses to Nietzsche’s Demon

For Christians time is linear: there is a beginning and an end. In Genesis 1:1 we read: “In the beginning God created the heavens and the Earth.” In the last book of the Bible, we read that a time will come when there will be a new heaven and earth [Revelation 21:1]. This idea is completely incompatible with the idea of eternal recurrence. Further, the fundamental belief for Christians, the kerygma, or proclamation of the good news of Jesus’s life, death and resurrection, rests on a sequence of events unfolding on a single and one-time only sequence of events. If we were to wonder who would be dismayed by Nietzsche’s demon telling them that time repeats eternally, the answer would be Christians.

For them, a significant consequence of the demon’s revelation is that their faith is undermined to destruction. In aphorism #341, Nietzsche refers to the “gnashing of teeth” in response to the demon. Teeth gnashing occurs eleven times in the Bible. Each time, it is either a response to a challenge to or from the kerygma. When Nietzsche asks if you would gnash your teeth and curse the demon, he is asking you to imagine the devastating loss of your religious belief.

The key to unravelling the mysteries of aphorism #341 comes in the final part. Nietzsche asks how well disposed towards ourselves would we have to be to “long for nothing more fervently” than the demon to be correct. We can understand why a Christian would fervently long for time to be linear and for God to exist and his promises to be true. But why would someone fervently long for time to be otherwise, and what does this have to do with being well disposed to yourself?

The Death of God and Amor Fati

The Christian faith rests on the concept of time with a beginning and end. Nietzsche’s emphasis here is not on the destruction of a religion but something closer to the foundation of a new one. His idea of eternal recurrence, the joyous news spread by a divine being, is a kind of creation myth for a new set of ideas.

For Nietzsche, all mythology is an attempt to overcome the wisdom of Silenus. Silenus was a companion to Dionysus and an intermediary between humans and the gods. His terrible wisdom is that what is best for humans is to have never been born with the second best thing being to die as soon as possible. Nietzsche’s demon offers (to some) a new wisdom—a joyous wisdom (or ‘Gay Science’).

In aphorism #125, Nietzsche introduces the idea of the death of God. Here a madman proclaims to atheists that because they have ‘killed God’ all meaning in the universe is lost. His awe-inspiring news is that it is up to atheists to create a new meaning; one that in generations to come will see them worshiped by their descendants as gods. Unfortunately, the atheists fail to appreciate the task ahead of them. Nietzsche’s point here is that atheists believe they have ‘killed belief in God’ but they persist in seeing the world through the lens of Christianity. They are unaware that new ideas must replace the old.

For Nietzsche, the burden of revaluing our values should be met with joy. But most of us are simply not up to the task. Returning to aphorism #341, only those who are overjoyed at the demon’s news and wishing as fervently for it to be true as Christians who wish for the opposite can seize this opportunity.

What Is Amor Fati?

A question we must now ask ourselves concerns the relationship between longing for eternal recurrence and how well-disposed we would have to be towards ourselves to do so. Remember, Nietzsche ends aphorism #341 by asking, “how well disposed would you have to become to yourself to long for nothing more fervently than for this ultimate confirmation and seal?”

Nietzsche’s reference to the confirmation and seal can be understood as a reference to Ephesians 1:13, which states that God approves human beings and justifies their faith. Nietzsche’s eternal recurrence promises a different, but no less mysterious, approval and justification for believers’ lives.

Being “well disposed” to yourself means being okay with everything in your life—good and bad—happening an infinite number of times. To fervently long for this, you must not only approve of absolutely everything in your life but love it too. Of course, this includes not only terrible things you have experienced—and have done yourself—but all the terrible things that have ever happened. In other words, you must love your fate. Something Nietzsche calls amor fati.

In aphorism #276, Nietzsche writes: “I want to learn more and more how to see what is necessary in things as what is beautiful in them – thus I will be one of those who makes things beautiful. Amor fati: let that be my love from now on!”

Having now seen the link between GS 124 (Death of God) and GS 276 (amor fati) we can appreciate how aphorism #341 is not just a call to action but Nietzsche’s appeal for a radical new way of life.

William James is one of the most renowned intellectuals of the 20th century, who left an enduring legacy, especially in psychology and philosophy. James was a pragmatist who popularized that particular way of doing philosophy. But as is common in the history of philosophy, his work is not without its critics, especially in the domain of epistemology. His essay “The Will to Believe” is one of his best-known and most-read works, in which he expounds upon the view that one can reasonably believe something before having evidence for doing so.

Biography of William James

William James lived from 1842 until 1910. Growing up, his family was relatively financially secure, providing him with opportunities to explore his interests, despite moving around frequently. William James was born into quite an illustrious family. His brother, the author Henry James Jr., is considered one of the greatest novelists of the English language. He was one of five siblings.

James himself was quite interdisciplinary in his pursuits. One of his first passions was painting, but he later studied chemistry and anatomy, as well as physiology and medicine. Upon being recruited to work at Harvard in 1872, he moved into psychology and became a principal impetus behind establishing the Psychology department there. The department was joined with philosophy at the time, and James thought of the two as inseparable. By the end of his career, he focused almost entirely on philosophy. This is partially explained by the fact that he was plagued by several mental, emotional, and physical ailments that inspired subsequent philosophical conclusions. He had periods of intense depression, for example, which he fought his way out of through his proclamation of radical freedom: within each of us is the will to cure what may ail us. This directly impacted his views on the will to believe.

The Will to Believe

Is it reasonable to believe a hypothesis before one has evidence for it? This is a question that has divided some philosophers for centuries. Perhaps today most reside on the stern answer of “no” given the dominant lean toward analytic philosophy. But William James argued “yes,” citing as the most relevant example the belief in God. Briefly summarized, his reasoning for this is based on the impact that believing (or not believing) has on one’s life. If the belief yields a positive impact, then it is reasonable and thus good for one to believe it, especially when talking about things which cannot be demonstrated by logical and empirical argument. In other words, by definition “faith” is not demonstrable by argument, rather it is something we must assume to be possible. As James so eloquently described it: “Faith is synonymous with working hypothesis.”

Thus, it is reasonable to believe a hypothesis before having evidence to do so, and the belief in God is one such example of this. Where there are positive, constructive, and desirable outcomes, then believing—even without evidence—is good for us. The impact of this view was widespread, even influencing the development of the self-help movement, including such programs as Alcoholics Anonymous. In James’ other work, The Varieties of Religious Experience, he argued that help exists, and we can get it.

Critiques of James’ Philosophy

It is a common misconception to read James’ work as strict anti-evidentialism. This view is best summarized by William Clifford who said “It is wrong always, everywhere, and for everyone, to believe anything upon insufficient evidence.” But James is not arguing for no use of evidence, rather he is lowering the standards regarding how much and what type of evidence is required for reasonable belief. His standards are less rigorous and more prudential, as he focuses on the practical and beneficial bearing that beliefs may have on one’s life.

In fact, James explicitly addresses the position of Clifford in his landmark essay “The Will to Believe”: “I myself find it impossible to go with Clifford. We must remember that these feelings of our duty about either truth or error are in any case only expressions of our passional life. […] In a world where we are so certain to incur them in spite of all our caution, a certain lightness of heart seems healthier than this excessive nervousness on their behalf.”

Still, many today consider this view to be dangerous and irresponsible, assuming too much of an anything-goes mentality. But this is indeed a misconception. Again, the idea here is to emphasize how what we believe must have practical consequences to make a difference and thus have value, and that those repercussions should be positive and beneficial.

James is a “radical empiricist”—i.e. all beliefs must be verified—but he has expanded that verification and considers how a belief “plays out in one’s life.” It is also important, argued James, that we consider how beliefs impact us emotionally and psychologically, not just via measurable consequences. After all, there is much in life that simply cannot be reasoned out via logical structure. Sometimes we can only work with probabilities. Perhaps one can balance finances to reach certain goals in how to live one’s life, but there is much that is simply unmeasurable when it comes to choosing a career. Being religious, or not being religious, is one such individual and immeasurable belief.

James’ Philosophy on Religion

James is, after all, a “radical empiricist”—he believes that all hypotheses must be verified, not just based on wishful thinking. Again, it is the form of verification where James takes a different direction in his pragmatist position. Verification is rooted in how a belief impacts one’s life. In lowering the standards for empirical verification, he includes so-called “passional evidence,” especially on the topic of religious belief—not on the question of God’s existence, but rather on the role of God’s presumed existence in one’s life.

So, the possibility for a complete conversion and absorption into religious belief exemplifies how pragmatism is not meant to be an “anything-goes” philosophy where nothing seems founded. James’ views on religion demonstrate that we can have very solid and influential foundations in our lives.

James’ approach to religion is individualist. He considers religion to be a matter of personal concern. What matters when approaching the philosophy of religion is the impact it has on an individual’s life. It is not about studying institutions or specific creeds. Certainly, we can each individually determine what effect being religious or not has on our personal lives. And that is indeed what we should focus on. Thus, even in the absence of evidence, we have a “passional nature” that illuminates how our needs can be met. Moreover, beliefs that are particularly in need of justification are when such beliefs encroach upon those of others in negative ways.

William James and the History of Philosophy

With the dominance today of analytic philosophy in the English-speaking world, James is not as widely read as he once was. But true to the emphasis on analysis in doing philosophy, we must consider other such opposing perspectives. Even when one does not see eye to eye with a particular view, as critical thinkers we must always address other ideas that have relevance. At times in the history of philosophy, it is the contrast that spurs continued development, and certainly, James’ voice is an important one in philosophical circles. While there were even stark differences between those thinkers labeled as “pragmatists,” what they generally shared was an emphasis on contemplating a kind of method that helps us to navigate our place in the world. To better understand our place in the world, also key among the pragmatists was to consider the meaning of experience.

James differed from other thinkers labeled pragmatists in how his views on experience were more individualized; meaning in the world comes from the practical implications and effects of our own experiences. James was more concerned than some other thinkers with the potentially harmful effects of too much reliance on science to provide answers to what are fundamentally human questions. But many philosophers have critiqued this view and believe it was too focused on individual verification and not enough on tangible evidence and the confirmation of a community. James’ intentions with this view were to help us to live better, though this idea continues to clash with the strict evidentialist position. And yet, these clashes and arguments are all critical parts of the long dialogue that is the history of philosophy.

Mankind has debated since time immemorial what it means to be “good,” encompassing the philosophy of fundamental morality and social conditioning. But does seeking a good person presuppose that we lack the goodness we seek, rendering moral striving an excruciating act of self-loathing? Exploring morality, starting with Carl Rogers’ idea of conditional positive regard, should we move away from ideas of morality as altruistic self-sacrifice to one of self-interest?

Good Person vs Good Acts

While definitions of morality differ drastically according to each philosophical school of thought, what is obvious, yet often overlooked, is that morality is a matter of action, not identity. Philosophical discussions and debates on ethics concern what constitutes a good action rather than what constitutes a “good person.” Where, then, does the quest to be good come from, and how does it relate to moral action?

Conditional Positive Regard

Prominent American psychologist Carl Rogers has extensively researched the impact of “conditional positive regard” on the development of one’s self-concept. He discovered that an upbringing involving reward and punishment leads to conditional self-worth. As children, when certain behaviors are rewarded and others rebuked, we tend to conflate our inherent worth with actions.

The plague of modern society is the constant pursuit of being “good enough.” Rogers argues that conditional positive regard leads us to internalize a sense of inherent worthlessness, for self-worth becomes conditional on certain actions.

A gap is created between the real, authentic self and the “ideal” self, denoting the imaginary self, which seeks to meet the social conditions of positive regard. Thus, a schism is established between the “I am” and the “I should,” resulting in a dissonance that can be a source of great suffering.

Doing Good

Rogers advocated for the practice of unconditional positive regard, which effectively delineates the overlooked distinction between action and self-concept. With a view of our inherent unconditional worth, the question of morality takes a different light when we no longer attach our self-worth to it. Morality doesn’t involve being good but doing good. Nevertheless, perhaps even more than before, we may still wonder why we should concern ourselves with moral acts. If it’s not for being good, what for?

A Universal Spring

Widely celebrated within international diplomacy, lines from Saadi Shirazi’s poem Bani Adam are featured on a magnificent carpet gifted to the United Nations in 2005, which is displayed inside the UN headquarters in New York.

All human beings are members of one frame
Since all, at first, from the same essence came.
When time afflicts a limb with pain
The other limbs cannot at rest remain.
If thou feel not for other’s misery
A human being is no name for thee

Saadi was a famous Persian poet from Shiraz. At first glance, the poem seems a rather hyperbolic discussion of the importance of having empathy towards other human beings. A closer inspection shows that Saadi is talking about something much deeper. The poem starts by defining human beings as parts of a whole, springing from the same ontological source, expressions of the same principle or essence.  It follows from that first clause that whenever a part of the whole is afflicted, the other parts cannot remain undisturbed.

Universal Good

From Saadi’s perspective, unless we experience a real connection beyond the false self-isolation of our individuality, we have yet to embrace our humanity. When we are connected to the whole, we experience ourselves and others as different parts of the same “body,” as it were. Consider your two hands. They are apparently distinct, and they can each be grasping completely different things, but they are part of your body. Your right hand can easily hurt your left hand, or vice versa. While the inflicted hand is the one injured, your entire body will be affected.

While Saadi’s ideas may seem strange, they are evident in our ordinary experience. It certainly feels horrible to harm another person, as our experience shows and as a plethora of psychological and neurological studies prove. Further, the relation of personal morality to collective morality is not new in philosophy, discussed from as early as Socrates to Immanuel Kant’s categorical imperative, albeit in different ways.

What Saadi is proposing as a motivation for morality is far from an ideal utopic case of selflessness. Rather, it is a selfish motivation grounded in an awareness of the ontological connection of our intersubjectivity: an awareness of the selfless whole of which every human self is a part. Under this perspective, every act of harm is essentially an act of self-harm. We care about morality not for others but for ourselves.

Morality as Self-Interest

While the question of what constitutes a moral act is beyond the scope of this piece, what is important is to separate moral striving from emotional identifications and attachments and abstract romanticism. When we view ethics as a matter of self-interest, interwoven with the best interest of our collective humanity, our concerns take a different and lighter form, grounded in common sense.

No longer hindered by the desire of “being good” nor by abstract idealistic notions of “doing the right thing,” we can come to view morality as the simple practice of preserving our individual well-being. We can care about others because we care about ourselves, aware that the pain we inflict on them is one that we simultaneously inflict upon ourselves.

We can love others, not because we are awfully nice people, but because we love ourselves enough not to want to experience hate. From this perspective, we can understand the difference between morality and immorality as one between acts of self-destruction and self-preservation.

In Camus’s philosophy and literature, we often witness characters embark upon intellectual quests. Existing ideas about how life ought to be lived are put on hold for testing. However, these quests take place in solitude, and the discoveries made are personal. This contrasts with Camus’s political life, where all of his pursuits were carried out in the name of solidarity. There is a tension here to explore between Camus’s desire for solitude and solidarity.

Solitary or Solidarity? Albert Camus and the Artist’s Ultimate Dilemma

In 1953, Albert Camus wrote a story that was later published as “Jonas or The Artist at Work” in the collection Exile and the Kingdom (1957). It concerns an artist, Jonas, who becomes suffocated by the fame he achieves as a painter. We read about the pressure of fame and how others’ expectations impinge on the artist’s life and work. Quite clearly, although a satire, it is based upon Camus’s own experiences as a famous writer.

Driven almost mad by the demands and expectations of others, many of whom crowd his home studio, making it almost impossible to work, Jonas constructs a kind of indoor treehouse where he retreats to paint. At the end of the story (after Jonas falls out of his treehouse), his friend Rateau looks at the painting being worked on. The canvas is almost entirely white except for something written in black paint in the center. Rateau tries to make out what Jonas has written, but cannot. The word is either “solitary” or “solidarity.”

In the story, the artist is pleased with the painting. But he alone knows what the writing on the canvas says. That is, Jonas has discovered what he was looking for. But was it solitary or solidarity? Does he need and want to be alone, responsible only for himself, or is he seeking the mutual support and shared responsibility of living within a group of others? We will never know the answer. And importantly, neither will Camus.

The conflicting desires for self-sufficiency and isolation—to be solely responsible for one’s own life—and the desire to be part of a group and responsible for others were something Camus never managed to resolve in his life. We can trace his struggle with these competing desires throughout all his work, both personal, literary, and philosophical.

How Camus’s Childhood Shaped His Solitude

Camus was brought up in Belcourt, a poor district of Algiers. Camus’s father had been killed in the First World War, and his mother lived on his war pension and the few francs she earned as a cleaner. The household consisted of Camus, his brother, and his domineering grandmother. Money was extremely scarce.

In his unfinished semi-autobiographical novel The First Man, Camus recounts a childhood incident in which he stole a two-franc coin from his grandmother. Returning home from shopping, he claimed the coin had fallen from his pocket and gone down the communal toilet in the housing block where they lived. To his horror, his grandmother pulled up her sleeve and went to the toilet (little more than a hole in the ground) to try and retrieve the coin. It was at this moment that the young Camus realized the value of money when one has very little.

The plan for the young Camus was to leave school as soon as possible and go to work to provide for the family. However, a teacher recognized the boy’s precocious talent and persuaded Camus’s family to allow him to accept a scholarship to attend a good high school. This was a huge financial risk for the family. The gamble they were taking was to forgo Camus’s wages now so he could become a teacher later and earn much more money.

At school, Camus was a confident and good soccer player. He was respected and well-liked by the other boys, but he always felt like an outsider because of his impoverished background. Going to school brought home the differences between Camus and his classmates, but also between Camus and the other children in his district who were not educated and went to work as soon as possible.

The Outsider’s Dilemma: Camus’s Early Struggle to Belong

Being different from the other children gave Camus a strong sense of his own identity. As a teenager, he would dress in a particular way, in white pants and a bow tie, and speak with his friends using the formal “vous” form of address. For those that did not know Camus well, he could seem aloof or even pretentious, but to his close friends, they saw a fiercely funny and loyal friend with—even at this age—literary pursuits in mind.

Something that fascinated the young Camus was the relationship between human beings and the world. Or to be precise, the human longing to fit in and be a part of the world. He would spend long hours hiking in the countryside and swimming in the sea. Sunbathing, Camus would attempt to align the beating of his heart with the pulsation of the North African sun bearing down upon him.

In his early essays, published when he was twenty-three years old under the title The Wrong Side and the Right Side (1937), we read of Camus longing for some kind of union with the world. A friend of his, Jean Maisonseul (who would go on to become a renowned architect and artist), noted that Camus used the first-person singular in his work. Camus, in fact, agreed with his friend, but each of them reveals the personal quest the author was on to discover something about his relationship with the world for himself. It is a solitary quest.

In Camus’s first attempted novel, A Happy Death (written 1936-1938), we see the protagonist, Mersault, undergo a quest to harmonize his body and mind with the world. “Other people’s feelings,” he says ominously, “have no hold over me.” This novel was shelved so that Camus could concentrate on The Stranger (1942).

A Happy Death

A Happy Death clearly was not working for Camus. The central character, Patrice Mersault, is so self-centered that he shows almost no care or concern for others. Other people are just means to an end on his quest for happiness. This happiness he sought turns out to be an attempt to lose all desire except to match his body to the rhythms of the Earth.

His ultimate aim is to fall asleep at night when he is tired and wake in the morning, repeating the same each day, without thinking, without attempting to understand the world intellectually, and without caring about what others think of him (or what he thinks of them).

In the end, the reader is left feeling that Mersault’s “happiness” is simply a kind of sterile nothingness. His lack of caring for others does not come across as independence or self-sufficiency but rather as some kind of psychopathy. After all, to get to the position where he can even attempt to live this life, Mersault murders a disabled man and steals all his money. Of this murder, Mersault surprisingly manages to convince himself that he killed the man “in the innocence of his heart.”

Meursault, the narrator of The Stranger, who shares many biographical details with Mersault, is a far more agreeable and likable character. Yet he, too, is on a solitary quest. When we compare what these characters are attempting to do with their lives, we can see what Camus is working through in these novels: how he outright failed with A Happy Death and came closer with The Stranger.

Unpacking The Stranger’s Real Purpose

There has been a lot written about Meursault, the narrator of The Stranger, and his supposed “strangeness.” However, many commentaries that seek to characterize him as an oddball (or even a psychopath) fail to account for the Meursault we encounter in the text.

In some of the more extreme accounts, Meursault is so weird that he can barely think about his own life, let alone others. What views such as this miss is that Meursault is not only extremely well-liked by those around him but also considered intelligent and worldly-wise.

To list just a few examples: his boss offers him a promotion to a coveted position in Paris; both his neighbors, Salamano and Raymond, come to him for help and advice; the owner of the café he regularly frequents thinks he is a man of the world; and his girlfriend Marie is keen to marry him after knowing him for less than a fortnight.

Unlike his precursor from A Happy Death, Meursault does not treat others as a means to an end. He spends time thinking about their problems and helps them when he can. Yet there is, of course, still something strange about Meursault. After all, he seems to have absolutely no ambition and zero philosophical interest in the world. Not least, he shows entirely no remorse for accidentally killing a man.

Solidarity vs. Isolation: The Conflict Camus Could Never Resolve

Camus tried to link his work on the absurd to his genealogy of revolt and rebellion in his 1951 book-length essay The Rebel. In a short chapter, he argues that, because we all experience the absurd, we share a goal and a duty to refrain from acts that jeopardize it. Most commentators agree that his argument is not very convincing and seems “tacked on” to the essay.

The fact that Camus had difficulty using his ideas on the absurd to promote solidarity is probably due to the intensely personal way he discovered and explored the concept. As we saw, Camus was always something of an outsider, despite often being well-liked and respected, and had a strong disposition toward independent thought.

In his literature and philosophy, we most often see individuals pursuing their own quests to find personal meaning in the world. In the cases of Patrice in A Happy Death and Meursault in The Stranger, their quests lead to decidedly anti-social behavior.

It is curious to compare Camus’s philosophy, which tends toward the solitary, to his political life. As a young journalist, he focuses on social justice. He joined the Communist Party and was expelled from it to fight for Arab rights in Algiers. During the war, he was in the Resistance. Later, he campaigned against atrocities (on both sides) during the Algerian war. Camus pursued all of these in the name of solidarity with others.

When we think of the two sides of Camus, the philosophical and the political, we see an interesting tension between the desires for solitude and solidarity. And just like with Jonas’s painting, when we look at Camus’s life, we cannot see which of the two he most desired.

Friedrich Nietzsche is one of those philosophers who gets dragged into every political debate. The right-wingers say he was against socialism and democracy, and thus is one of them. The left-wingers say he detested nationalism and authoritarianism and thus could not be right-wing. The truth? Nietzsche would probably be laughing at both sides trying to claim him. He did not want to be associated with any political label. Instead, he was all about questioning the very systems that govern us—power, morality, society.

Rejection of Egalitarianism and Herd Morality

Picture being in a talent show, and every individual receives a trophy no matter what. This is something that Nietzsche would despise for sure. Life, to him, is about the study of human potential and not ensuring that every person is okay with themselves.

He also felt that socialism and democracy promoted a slave morality, where individuals become despisers of the strong, powerful, or excellent and fail to become great themselves.

Nietzsche felt that ideals of equality and justice in society were nothing more than narcotic drugs, which made man weaker and less brave, more submissive and fearful.

Can this, then, be used to state that he leaned toward right-wing politics and that he was an elitist? Not necessarily. Although there are conservatives who like to use Nietzsche’s philosophy to denounce socialism, he wasn’t a supporter of a ruling elite made up of wealthy politicians.

He preferred people who could push themselves to do better, rather than just accepting being average. This applied to everything, not just politics. He liked those rare types who could move outside normal social boundaries—or even break them completely.

People like this didn’t just keep hold of power because their family had it or they had been born into privilege.

If Nietzsche were alive today and looked at a world where lots of individuals were given awards for taking part (no matter how well they did), then he would say something like: “This is why we can’t have nice things.” And there is a good chance he would walk off shaking his head, muttering about Übermenschen under his breath.

Nietzsche and the Will to Power: Beyond Left and Right

Nietzsche had many big ideas, but one of the most misunderstood is the concept of the Will to Power. People sometimes think this means wanting to be in charge, like a politician or dictator.

But it really means something else: having lots of energy for growth, creativity, and overcoming difficulties. For example, an artist who always wants to improve their painting or a sportsman who goes further than before every time.

Some conservative thinkers have taken up this idea. They say it shows that there naturally have to be winners and losers; also, competition is good.

But when Nietzsche said survival of the fittest, he wasn’t thinking about politics—at least not directly! Nor did he want a state run by brute strength alone (where the weak are squashed by the strong). He thought of power as more personal than that.

Here’s an example: two individuals at the gym. One is at the gym every day, progressively lifting more weights and pushing themselves to their highest capability. The other individual uses the time between sets to lazily browse through TikTok.

The first individual, for Nietzsche, is acting out their Will to Power—they are striving for greatness (and are not being held back by moral rules invented by society’s “herd”).

Does this mean, then, that Nietzsche would have been an admirer of the far-right leaders of today, who also extolled the virtues of strength and ambition? Not necessarily. For one, he hoped everyone would transcend traditional concepts of good and evil, becoming “superhuman” rather than just exceptional types.

Critique of German Nationalism and Anti-Semitism

If Nietzsche were alive today, he would probably have some thoughts about internet trolls who claim he liked nationalism. He really didn’t!

Nietzsche hated German nationalism. He thought it was bad, just like all other kinds of following the herd (even when people act like this on their own).

This was also true for anti-Semitism, a bad movement during Nietzsche’s life that some of his family liked. For example, his sister Elisabeth married an anti-Semitic nationalist! And she tried to make it seem in her own writing as if Nietzsche agreed with her husband, but he did not.

Nietzsche valued personal greatness over patriotism, arguing that it is our cultural achievements, rather than race or nationality, that make us exceptional.

Would he not have despaired of seeing how many present-day nationalists proudly assert their superiority on no stronger grounds than having been born in the same country? It is likely he would have.

So, does that mean he was right-wing? Perhaps, after all, he believed collectivism was bad and that there was no time for men who flocked together. But then again (big sigh here), isn’t a proud nationalist an unlikely right-winger according to today’s definitions?

Was Nietzsche an Elitist or an Anti-Democrat?

In short, Nietzsche wasn’t a fan of democracy. But before you label him a wannabe dictator, let’s take a closer look.

He didn’t dislike democracy because he was pro-monarchy or wanted a fascist leader. He opposed it because he felt most individuals weren’t thinking for themselves. Democracy to him meant the masses, whom he thought were often driven by fear and resentment, having too much sway.

In Nietzsche’s ideal world, there would be no government. He envisaged a society where outstanding people could flourish and encourage others.

Think of your favorite innovator—filmmaker, scientist, musician—someone who revolutionized their field through sheer brilliance. Nietzsche wanted a culture that produced lots more of them and then wholeheartedly supported these trailblazers, not a culture obsessed with whether everything is fair.

So, was he saying only an elite few ought to guide the world? In a way, yes—but not via conventional power structures.

He believed that those capable of moving mankind forward should lead this charge, which means that being ruled by political systems is out of the question if human creativity and intelligence are what truly count.

How the Nazis Misused Nietzsche

Picture this: you pick up a book by your favorite author, only to learn later on that somebody else has gone through and altered it to fit their own twisted agenda. Well, that’s more or less what happened with Nietzsche.

After his death, Nietzsche’s sister, Elisabeth Förster-Nietzsche, took the philosopher’s unpublished writings and doctored them so she could hawk her own nationalist and anti-Semitic ideas.

She excised passages where her brother condemned German nationalism and instead presented him as having foreseen and endorsed Aryan supremacy.

When Nazi officials in the 1930s and 1940s read these edited collections of Nietzsche’s works, they saw things that weren’t really there (like an endorsement of genocide) and overlooked themes (such as the philosopher’s loathing of anti-semitism).

Nietzsche did not have a high opinion of collective thinking (herd mentality). He might have seen Nazism as the sort of regime likely to appeal to non-thinkers who simply wanted to be told what to do—people whom he would urge in some of his books not to trust or admire too much.

The philosopher highly valued originality, creativity, and heroism, going beyond conventional limits. He assessed a person’s greatness by their achievements, not by their birth or background. Yet the Nazis took his idea of self-improvement and twisted it to justify their brutal dominance.

If you read Nietzsche’s books, you will see he would have been horrified by the Nazis’ attitude. But his reputation has suffered because people have borrowed his ideas for dark reasons and then pretended they didn’t mean something else entirely.

Nietzsche and Modern Right-Wing Thought

In present-day politics, some conservative scholars use Nietzsche’s criticisms of democracy and equality to support their own beliefs against liberal policies. They highlight his rejection of herd morality and promotion of individual greatness as signs that he was more right-wing than not.

Yet Nietzsche did not neatly fit into either camp; he also criticized conservatives for adhering to traditional values without questioning whether those moral systems were effective.

What the German philosopher sought was more than mere political labels, such as “left” or “right,” however. It was about breaking down all fixed ways of thinking, whether socialist or aristocratic.

Central to this effort is what he called “the will to power”: people’s creation of themselves rather than adopting identities given at birth or conforming rigidly in group settings with rules meant to be followed from top to bottom in a hierarchy.

Argument: real change starts at the individual’s core principles, not by altering rules or forcing certain behaviors. So, calling Nietzsche a supporter of any lone belief system oversimplifies matters.

Nietzsche goes beyond today’s left and right. Some on the right see him as an ally in their critique of mass society. However, his thoughts on religion, tradition, and morality can also deeply unsettle conservatives.

Rather than slotting neatly into left- or right-wing arguments, Nietzsche wants us to query every supposition, defy every normal practice, and try to be something better than we are, no matter where this takes us politically.

So, Was Nietzsche Right-Wing?

Nietzsche had issues with both democracy and socialism. He also detested nationalism and authoritarianism. While he admired strong individuals who pursued power and success (qualities he associated with great artists), no existing party or system met with his approval.

If you are wondering how to plot his views on today’s left-right spectrum, the simple answer is: don’t try. The 19th-century German thinker defies classification; radical and unpredictable, he loved human beings more than any doctrine. Indeed, in some ways, it might be fairer to see Nietzsche as advocating egoism rather than the politics of left or right.

Do not put Friedrich Nietzsche into the box marked “Left” or “Right” because it simply won’t fit.

Egyptian art does not always get its due credit. It often gets overshadowed by its Greek successor. The classical Western narrative and the history of ideas tend to favor Greek cultures as the wellspring of civilization. Late twentieth-century French philosopher Gilles Deleuze offers a brand new way to think about Egyptian art; he invents a concept of the crystal. You might remember the images with flat two-dimensional surfaces. If you stare long enough at these cartoonish figures, you might feel an overwhelming sense of permanence. They refuse to budge even in our imagination.

Deleuze’s Conceptual Apparatus

Preservation is perhaps the defining term for Egyptian painting. Over three millennia later, the eyes of a scribe or an Egyptian pharaoh still stare at us at the same exact angle. Undamaged by centuries of dust and strata between them and us. Some tend to read this stillness as a flaw, or a limitation: it is often interpreted as a failure to master perspective. It is a limitation that would be corrected, developed by the Greeks and later by Renaissance artists.

In contrast, Deleuze reads this as a triumph of the Egyptian crystalline technique, the attempt to immortalize the present. The purpose of Egyptian art is to identify and codify the essences, the invariable elements of reality and human experience. Deleuze refers to the process as molding.

I find that the easiest way into the Deleuzian ontology of painting is precisely through the notion of the mold. To mold something is to press it in from the outside, via some external source, a shape, a premade frame. The way a brickmaster forces wet clay into a wooden structure. Deleuze claims Egyptian artists were attempting to do something similar with the human body. Unlike some periods in the history of art that attempt to capture actions, processes, the dynamism of nature, like a person or animal mid-motion, Egyptians were instead trying to “press” the person or animal into an eternal form. The technique reflects their unique cosmological worldview.

Now Deleuze contrasts this with the Greek approach. In his 1981 Lectures on Painting, Deleuze draws on the work of the eighteenth-century French naturalist Buffon. Deleuze associates Greek forms of expression with the model rather than the mold.

Visual Mummification as Permanent Modulation

It is interesting how Deleuze employs a metaphor that is at once obvious, literal, and unexpected. It is quite characteristic of Deleuzian discourse to remain at the surface while manipulating it in novel and creative ways. The metaphor here is that of mummification. We are all familiar with the ancient ritual, but to take that idea and use it as a creative diagram to make sense of other aspects of Egyptian culture is a genius minimalist intervention.

Egyptian civilization treated time as a serious threat, a danger. Change implies decay and eventually, death. The purpose of art was to act as a protective measure. To rescue experience from the corroding effects of time. Flat contours, rigid postures, hieroglyphic stillness, these are tools for preserving people, things, rituals, for preserving essences.

Mold and model are but two elements of the tripartite diagram offered by Deleuze. The third element is modulation. Deleuze borrows these concepts from the French philosopher Simondon. To illustrate the structure, we can think of mold and modulation (with modeling in the middle) as two extremes that characterize different painting styles. If Egyptian art rests at one end, the side of the mold, with hieroglyphs being an example, a painter like Van Gogh would reside on the other end, the side of modulation.

Modulation refers to a process of endless reshaping that never quite settles into a determinate form. It is, in a way, a technique of endless and continuous molding. Whereas a mold is just modulation frozen in time. A mold is a shape that was modulated only once. Conceptually, this is quite sophisticated, because the definition of each of the three elements in Simondon’s formula is dependent on the definition of the other two.

Egyptian Art as An Alternative Space of Touch

Another important term introduced by Deleuze is hapticity. Deleuze borrows the term haptic from the Greek word for touch. He uses the term to describe a way of looking that behaves like touching.

The eye can allegedly move through a painting as if it were a felt surface. This contrasts sharply with the idea of the canvas operating as a window. Classical representation tends to assume this position. A painting is typically understood as a window onto another world that it only mirrors or represents.

Hapticity offers an alternative interpretation. Instead of seeing Egyptian art as a stage of development that only later culminates in the model of classical representation, it carves out a unique place for it as an expression of flattened haptic sensibility. The distinction between foreground and background is eliminated, nothing recedes, and nothing protrudes. Deleuze refers to this as a “skin-deep” operation; it represents a new kind of depth that remains on the surface.

The contours that confine various gods, queens, servants, and deities have an important sacred function. They shelter their memory, their essence; indeed, they mummify them.

This is a different signal-space, as Deleuze refers to it. A signal-space that attempts to capture the force of permanence. The contour, the border, the outline, the straight line, this simple feature is the defining element of Egyptian art. The contour that shields and protects essences, the essences of man, woman, god, animal, king from dissipation and forgetting.

Essence Beyond Imitation

So the paradox that holds me captive whenever I contemplate the Deleuzian take on Egypt is the following. To achieve the truest resemblance, Egyptian artists had to abandon resemblance in the ordinary sense.

The true resemblance of man, for instance, offers the least actual resemblance to the human figure. Monochrome skin tones, rigid profiles, impossible postures, these are not human beings as we encounter them in everyday life. Nonetheless, no one has any trouble recognizing the figures exactly for what they are. Deleuze refers to this as resemblance through non-resembling means. This idea is another central concept in his seminars.

A body in motion is a body that is dying, dissipating, giving in to the temporal flux of becoming. It ages, sickens, falls apart. These dynamic features of experience are the enemy. The enemy is the world of turbulent change that needs to be kept at bay by the contour. This is the crystal.

Crystals grow only on surfaces; hence the choice of metaphor. The collapse of the foreground and the background is best captured by the idea of the crystalline law. Hence, the boundary, the separating line, is what brings the metaphors of crystallization and mummification together. The crystalline mold mummifies aspects of reality and thereby extracts immortal essences from them, preserving memory once and for all.

What Egyptian Art Teaches Us About Modern Space

Even when writing about and discussing modern painters, Deleuze kept returning to the Egyptian signal-space. The same vocabulary of mold, model, modulation, crystal was redeployed in the analysis of, for instance, Francis Bacon’s work, Turner’s paintings, and Baroque art including Rubens. Egypt offers Deleuze the starting point for a genealogy that runs all the way to the present. In fact, there is no obvious chronology to the Deleuzian history of painting. During the lectures he often leaps from one epoch to another.

Our era is defined by the notion of modulation. We are modulatory subjects, so to speak, with creative modulatory forms of artistic expression. Speed and reinvention drive our perception and understanding of the world around us. The contrast with Egypt is obvious. Any depiction of stillness and permanence sounds like naive nostalgia or simple failure in our age.

Up until the publication of The Rebel in 1951, Albert Camus was firmly established as a member of the French left-wing intelligentsia. However, he was not a member of the Communist Party at a time when most people on the Left believed this to be the only effective means of left-wing activism. Camus refused to ignore the oppression and purges taking place in the USSR. In this article, we look at how Camus’ philosophy of the absurd influenced his beliefs that led to his falling out with the Left.

Was Camus a Communist?

Albert Camus joined the Communist Party of Algeria in 1935, when he was twenty-one. He had friends who were already members of the party, but his decision to sign up was heavily influenced by his mentor, Jean Grenier.

Grenier was a French philosopher and writer who taught philosophy at the University of Algiers, where Camus was a student. Camus’ teacher believed that if his student was to pursue philosophy seriously, then he must also pursue politics. The Algerian Communist Party was seeking youth leaders, and Grenier believed this would be a good opportunity for Camus.

Camus became a Communist activist and leader, delivering several speeches to large audiences. Some of what he spoke about is known because undercover police agents took notes on the events.

Camus was not a Marxist; indeed, he’d read very little Marx (whose books were not easily found in Algiers). His speeches were mostly concerned with combating fascism and avoiding war.

Fascism was spreading throughout Europe in the 1930s and becoming a major threat to democracy and freedom. For the young Camus, the fascists were representative of the worst elements of capitalism and a byproduct of the bourgeois system. His position on war was that it should be avoided, as it only served the interests of the capitalists, pitting workers against workers.

A major concern of Camus as a young Communist was the unequal treatment of the Algerian Arab population. Much of the political activity carried out by Camus and his comrades sought equality for the Arabs.

Camus was never really convinced by Communism, which he saw as ultimately flawed, but for a while he considered the party the best way to get things done politically and secure freedom. He was soon to be disillusioned.

Camus Kicked Out of the Communist Party of Algeria

Camus was expelled by the Communist Party of Algeria in 1937. It was shortly before the publication of his first collection of essays, The Wrong Side and the Right Side, which he dedicated to Jean Grenier. The reason for his expulsion was Camus’ continued support for the Algerian People’s Party.

As we saw above, one of Camus’ major concerns was the struggle for equal rights for the Arab population in Algeria. This was, for a time, in accordance with the Communist Party view on the matter. However, things changed after Stalin decreed that a united front against fascism was more important.

The French government was opposed to Hitler’s Germany, and Stalin did not want anything to hinder the French. This meant that the pro-Arab activism in Algiers carried out by Camus and his comrades had to stop. To be pro-Arab in Algeria, then still a French colony, was seen to be anti-France. However, Camus refused to stop.

Because of this, he was branded a traitor and a Trotskyist by members of the Communist Party. Several of Camus’ friends quietly handed in their membership cards and left the party voluntarily. Camus waited to be thrown out. Afterward, he claimed not to feel bitter as he had done what he thought to be right. But the incident clearly sowed the seeds of dissent against the Communist Party in Camus’ mind.

Later, in 1939, the Soviet Union signed a non-aggression pact with Nazi Germany. For Camus, this was a huge betrayal. Fighting fascism was for him one of the main reasons for becoming a communist.

Camus’ disillusionment would only grow as news of Communist oppression began to become a major concern for the Left.

Communism Versus Capitalism: Pick a Side

By 1940, the world was at war for a second time, and Camus was living in Paris, working as a layout editor for the Paris-Soir newspaper. He had left Algeria after the leftist newspaper he worked for, the Alger républicain, was shut down.

Following the German invasion, he left Paris for Lyon, where he married Francine Faure. The two of them moved back to Algeria and settled in Oran for a while. At this time, Camus was working on his “absurd cycle” that included his novel The Stranger and essay The Myth of Sisyphus.

In 1943, Camus, now known in Paris for his writing, relocated to the French capital and joined the Resistance. Here he would meet Jean-Paul Sartre, Simone de Beauvoir and other left-wing intellectuals and become part of their circle.

As part of his Resistance work, Camus was a journalist and editor for the underground newspaper Combat. After the war, the newspaper could be published openly, and Camus remained on as editor, writing most of the daily editorials.

At the time in France, the Left typically viewed the world as divided into two forces: capitalism, personified by the United States, and communism, personified by the Soviet Union and the Communist Party. For many, it seemed like a simple either-or situation, and one had to pick a side. And, for them, if you were left-wing, you had to choose the USSR.

A big problem, however, came when news of Soviet oppression of intellectuals and the horrific gulag system of forced-labor camps became widely known. Was it possible to be on the Left but against the Communist Party?

A Possible Third Way?

The Second World War had taken a devastating toll on Europe, and France found herself in severe financial difficulties. Both the United States and the USSR seemed willing to assist in restoring order and security. The question was what this would look like.

The French people were divided about what they were actually looking for: a return to how things used to be before the devastation of the war, or something different?

A key idea during the Occupation had been liberation. There were many, particularly those on the Left, who saw liberation not just as freedom from fascism but as an ongoing process of securing freedom. For them, this was freedom from capitalist forces that they saw as having worked hand-in-glove with the fascists. Albert Camus was someone who definitely considered liberation as an ongoing project.

Lots of people on the Left, as well as others from different political backgrounds, were suspicious of American involvement in European and French affairs. They saw it as some kind of backdoor attempt to Americanize or even colonize post-war Europe. In the minds of the people, this was often reduced to a choice between the USSR and Communism, or the United States and capitalism.

However, some thinkers, including Camus – and, for a short while, Sartre – believed there could be a non-Communist Left. The problem with this position was that, for many on the Left, to be non-Communist was considered the same thing as being anti-Communist (another way of saying pro-capitalist, even fascist). Accordingly, proposals for a third-way alternative to Soviet Communism and American capitalism were most often met with suspicion.

Camus and Sartre

We have already mentioned Jean-Paul Sartre, a left-wing philosopher with whom Camus was once good friends. When people think about Camus’ falling out with the Left, it is often seen as part and parcel of his infamous falling out with Sartre.

There is plenty of common ground between Camus and Sartre, although a lot of it is superficial. Both men were part of the left-wing Parisian literary scene. However, neither of them was a member of the Communist Party. Both had an interest in politics and philosophy, as well as in the absurd and the potential meaninglessness of life. Both sought to express themselves not only through essays but also with plays and novels. Indeed, some of their works can be – and often are – taken as responses to one another.

For example, we can compare Camus’ novel of the absurd, The Stranger (1942), with Sartre’s absurdist novel, Nausea (1938). It is also philosophically interesting to compare the approach to political violence in Sartre’s play Dirty Hands (1948) and Camus’ play Just Assassins (1949).

However, there are major differences between the two philosophers once we scratch the surface.

It is true that at the time neither Camus nor Sartre was a member of the Communist Party. But whereas Camus once was, he deeply opposed the party when he knew Sartre. Sartre, on the other hand, was never a member but was publicly very supportive of the party (despite the Communist Party frequently being very critical of him).

How the Concept of the Absurd Relates to Communism

Both Camus and Sartre were interested in the idea of the absurd. However, they have different conceptions of what the absurd meant. To make a complicated philosophical problem simple for this article, we can understand their views on the subject in the following ways.

Camus believed that getting to the bottom of the absurd, truly understanding it and any truths it might reveal about the human condition, was of vital importance and perhaps the primary task of human beings.

Sartre, on the other hand, believed that while the absurd was part of life, it was something we ought to get over and live in spite of.

We can already see what we might consider a problem caused by the absurd in Camus’ and Sartre’s political positions. If everything is meaningless, then politics must be meaningless. If this is so, why advocate for any political position?

Capitalism, Communism, or even a third way – are they not all equally meaningless in an absurd world?

Sartre and the Search for Efficacy

At the time of Camus and Sartre’s falling out, left-wing intellectuals were well aware of Soviet oppression. They knew about the suppression of free thought in the Soviet Union, as well as the gulags and political executions. None held any illusions about how they, as public thinkers, would be treated if the Communists came to power in France. However, they considered the Communist Party the only effective force on the Left.

Camus refused to accept that murder could ever be considered morally justified. Note that Camus is not objecting to taking a life no matter the reason. He would not condemn, for example, a soldier killing another soldier in battle or a Resistance sniper taking out a Gestapo officer.

What he vehemently rejected was any attempt to justify sending innocent people to be worked to death in labor camps or executing them to make a political point. The idea that Soviet repression ought to be tacitly accepted by the French Left, with no heed paid to it, was revolting to Camus (hence the title of his essay The Rebel, in French L’Homme révolté).

While Camus argued that treating people as means to an end was always wrong, thinkers like Sartre disagreed. Some argued that if oppression was necessary in the fight against capitalism, then it was justified if it led to victory.

Others, while deeply opposed to oppression, believed paying no heed to injustice in the short term was necessary to achieve long-term goals. Real politics, they all argued, involves real sacrifice, and to be effective activists they must be prepared to get their hands dirty (hence the title of Sartre’s play).

Camus’ Definitive Split With the Left

It was well known that Camus was not a Communist. But he was considered a fellow traveler on the Left. That he sought a third way that was neither capitalist nor Communist was never a secret. For those who read his philosophy, it was also clear that his conception of the absurd and the human condition differed markedly from that of Sartre.

Camus and Sartre had very different ideas of rebellion. For Sartre, rebellion was simply the activity of rebels. For him, a rebel practices revolutionary justice in which a future revolution can justify all actions.

For Camus, rebellion was constant lucid awareness of the absurd. A rebel, therefore, is a person who refuses to be tempted by any political discourse that denies or rejects the idea of universal human dignity revealed by the absurd.

In 1951, Camus published The Rebel, laying out his political position on rebellion. It was taken (unfairly) by almost everyone as an explicit rejection of the Left. Sartre tried to ignore it, but Camus insisted upon a review. He expected the book to ruffle some feathers but was unprepared for the outrage and fallout. Camus never got over it.

From his early twenties in the 1930s to the publication of The Rebel, he had grown further and further away from Communism but always considered himself left-wing.

This book and its reception revealed and made clear Camus’ definitive split with the Left.

In his book, The Fold (1988), as well as the lectures on Leibniz, French philosopher Deleuze puts forward a radical reframing of Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz’s philosophy. While traditional scholarship views the Leibnizian monad as a windowless, isolated, and strictly hierarchical substance ordered by divine decree, Deleuze introduces a more dynamic account. By viewing the monad through the mathematical and aesthetic concept of the fold, Deleuze transforms substance from a fixed essence into a continuous manner of becoming. This provocative reinterpretation reframes perception, subjectivity, and interiority, entirely shifting our understanding of substance.

The Standard Monad Is Windowless, Self-Sufficient, and Ranked by God

The monad, as it comes down through the standard reading and philosophical tradition, is already quite peculiar in its own way. Leibniz synthesizes this concept in the Monadology (1714). The monad is understood as a simple substance: it possesses no parts, no extension, nor any internal complexity of the classical divisible kind.

Each monad is without “windows by which anything could come in or go out.” Nothing enters the monad from outside; nothing escapes it. The world it perceives is not received from without but generated entirely from within.

The conventional interpretation of Leibniz’s philosophy holds that the monad’s windowless condition results from its metaphysical self-sufficiency. Every monad contains a complete concept of itself. It already includes every predicate that will ever belong to it, every event it will undergo across all of time.

The entire history of the monad is already, deterministically inscribed into its notion. There is no causal interaction between monads. Each monad only unfolds its internal states according to the pre-established harmony of the universe. Monads are coordinated, but they are not connected.

The standard picture offered by classical Leibnizian scholarship is also hierarchical.

Leibniz distinguishes between monads that merely perceive without apperception (bare monads), those that have memory and feeling (souls), and those capable of reason (spirits). God is naturally at the top of the hierarchy, since Leibniz was still a theologian. God is the supreme monad, the one substance that grounds and shapes the rest. Monads are ranked by the level of clarity in perception: some express the world dimly, others brightly. The hierarchy is vertical and fixed. Substance is individuated, closed, and ordered from on high.

This is the Leibniz one finds in most textbooks; a thinker whose world is held together by divine decree. Deleuze’s task in The Fold is to show that this picture misses the most original Leibnizian interventions.

Deleuze Reframes the Monad as an Outside Folded Into an Interior

Deleuze does not reject the standard account of the monad. One might say he folds it in his own way: Deleuze demonstrates how the surface of the monad’s features (closure, windowlessness, individuation) are themselves derived outcomes of a more fundamental genetic process. The Fold.

Deleuze argues that the monad is not a metaphysical enclosure. It is rather an exterior that is folded into an interior: a region of space turned in upon itself, producing interiority as a product of mathematical inflection.

In the book, Deleuze begins by contemplating inflection. Deleuze explains that this is “the ideal genetic element of the variable curve or fold.” Strictly, inflection is, therefore, an event of pure variation, not any fixed point on the page, that Deleuze treats as genetic. Accordingly, the fold is the curve caught in the act of varying, before it is pinned to a coordinate.

Deleuze is offering an ontological foundation for Leibniz’s calculus: the world is a series of inflections, endlessly varying curves. The aesthetic tapestry of the Baroque, endless curves, folds, and bulges, it is all interrelated: Mathematics, Art, and Philosophy.

It is precisely from the process of inflection that we arrive at the notion of monadic interiority. What is folded is, in the movement of folding, enclosed: it passes from the virtual state of a pure curve to the actual state of something enveloped within a subject. The monad is an envelope. It is a universe folded inward. The enclosure is a result of a genetic movement. Not unlike subjectivity; “the soul is what has folds and is full of folds.”

For Deleuze, Perception Builds the Subject From Tiny Folds Called Petites Perceptions

Where the monad is interiority as a result of the folding process, perception is the operation by which the inside is constituted.

For Leibniz via Deleuze, perception is not representation. And it is not reducible to the Subject-Object dichotomy. It is, rather, the differential integration of infinitely small folds. Leibniz calls these petites perceptions, small or minute perceptions. Perception is a process of folding and unfolding. It is fundamentally interactive; the subject is constituted together with the object through perception.

The micro-perceptions that shape the monad are, in the first instance, entirely obscure. They are not representations of distinct objects but folds within folds: “a lapping of waves, a rumor, a fog, or a mass of dancing particles of dust.” Conscious perception emerges from the initial obscurity through differential relations among the minute perceptions.

Deleuze once again emphasizes the mathematical nature of these operations: when two heterogeneous micro-perceptions enter into a differential relation, they produce a singularity. Singularity is defined as a conscious perception that “excels” over other perceptions and rises to the threshold of clarity.

The example from The Fold is the perception of green, which is produced not by the addition of yellow and blue, but through differential relations between vanishing perceptions of yellow and blue.

A perspective, or point of view, is what organizes the perceptual process spatially. Every monad perceives the entire world from a particular point of view. It is a specific subdivision of the infinite series that together see the world in its entirety. This is not subjective limitation or a perspectival distortion. It is the condition of perception. The soul does not occupy a point of view as a pre-existing subject. Rather, it is constituted by the point of view it inhabits.

Deleuze’s Leibniz Redefines Substance as an Event, Not an Essence

The most philosophically consequential aspect of Deleuze’s rereading is its effect on how the nature of substance is understood.

In the standard tradition, from Aristotle through Descartes to Spinoza, substance was defined by essential attributes: thinking substance, extended substance; substance was normally identified with what it essentially and permanently is. Predication, on this model, is attribution. A quality or attribute is assigned to a subject based on that quality or attribute being the subject’s defining characteristic.

The Deleuzian reading of Leibniz’s philosophy breaks with the classical model in a drastic way. Deleuze identifies five criteria that Leibniz uses to define substance: metaphysical, logical, physical, psychological, and epistemological. And none of them amounts to the definition of substance by an essential attribute.

The logical criterion of inclusion (the predicate being contained in the subject) is key, but it is reinterpreted: inclusion does not mean that the subject possesses a quality. It means that the subject is the unity of an event. “The predicate is a verb,” says Deleuze, “and the verb is irreducible to the copula and to the attribute.”

Monads are not made up of attributes, they are made of events: Caesar crosses the Rubicon, Adam commits sin, these are events that comprise the interior and perceptual cross-spaces of monads. The event, as an incorporeal predicate, is what constitutes the inner unity of the substance. Substance is accordingly defined not by what it is but by what happens inside of it. Not essence but a manner of becoming.

Deleuze gestures at this as a kind of Mannerism. Mannerism is opposed to the essentialism of Descartes and Aristotle and presumes that substance is defined by manner rather than essence. It is important to note here, however, that in The Fold this term stays subordinate to the Baroque rather than standing as a finished concept of its own. Deleuze only later, in the final Vincennes course, wonders whether Mannerism can be given philosophical consistency.

If substance is constituted by events and not attributes, then substance becomes inherently temporal, dynamic; it becomes a unique, infinite series of events folded into the history of every monad. No two substances can share the same series because each monad expresses the same world from a different point of view, with a different zone of clarity.

The Fold Gives Us a Subject That Is Made, Not Given

Deleuze uses Leibniz’s work as an inspiration for his own philosophical creation: Deleuze extracts a concept, the fold, and adds it to his collection. The monad, reread through the notion of the fold, undergoes a kind of metaphysical opening. It becomes a dynamic interior produced by the operation of folding.

The new Deleuzian model of interiority makes this reading particularly philosophically potent and novel. The fold provides an account of how the inside is constituted and produced without reference to an original, fundamental splitting, as is the case for many substance dualists. The monad’s closure is itself an event. Thereby interiority becomes a relational concept, a product of a specific operation on material that exceeds it. The soul does not precede the world it envelops; it is produced in and through the act of envelopment.

All of this holds broader implications for subjectivity as such.

The Deleuzian monad serves as a model for a subject that is neither the Cartesian res cogitans (a thinking thing defined by a single essential attribute) nor the Kantian transcendental ego (a formal condition of possible experience). The subject becomes a dynamic zone of differential integration, expressing a world of interactive codependence.

Instead of the dark ground of the monad, the obscure, teeming infinity of micro-perceptions being defined as an obstacle to be overcome, it in truth is what the subject cannot escape: a fold in the world that opens, momentarily, into a point of view. The event of life.