symb(i/o)sis

In 1980, at their symbiotic volume called A Thousand Plateaus: Capitalism & Schizophrenia Deleuze and Guattari argued that "transversal communications between different lines scramble the genealogical trees. Always look for the molecular, or even sub-molecular , particle with which we are allied. We evolve and die more from our polymorphous and rhizomatic flus than from hereditary diseases, or diseases that have their own line of descent. The rhizome is an anti-genealogy". An argument based on the science by a minor - minor as opposed to Royal in a Deleuzoguattarian sense- scientist called Lynn Marguilis. It is in 2010 that this polyphonic, melodic and democratic approach to evolution attempts to re-emerge by avoiding the reductionism of Gene Centric approaches like Evo-Devo. Seedmagazine has an excellent article on the latest scientific developments on the science of meta-genomics, that places the notion of symbiosis, not at the center, but on a flat plane to able express, still partially though, the complexity of life.

"Symbiosis goes a step further by showing us how species are linked by more than history; they are living together in a continuous. interconnected now."

David Relman says "we put a lot of weight on a life form's ability to think independently" but microbes have achieved fantastic evolutionary success by operating on a very different principle. Microbial communities are filled with examples of self-sacrifice for the benefit of the larger colony. They form physically close communities in which some cells exist solely to provide structural support or protection for others. "This Intertwining of fate" is maybe a lesson of how human could potentially start to think and work with the dynamics of their own societies. The century of the self might be coming to a critical point of transformation where a new century might arise. The century of the assemblages, the multitudes the collectives. It is about time to focus on cooperative and collaborative practices, practices of the common. It is about time to abolish the identity thinking of success and wealth.

rap off!

"I like DeLanda’s basic argument: which is to insist on the exteriority of relations. Traditionally, positivist, atomistic thought has pretty much denied the importance of relations between entities: the entities themselves are the absolutes, and all relations between them are merely accidental. Thus neoclassical economics adopts a “methodological individualism” according to which “all that matters are rational decisions made by individual persons in isolation from one another” . On the other hand, what DeLanda calls the “organismic metaphor” asserts that entities are entirely defined by the totality to which they belong, entirely constituted by their relations: “the basic concept in this theory is what we may call relations of interiority: the component parts are constituted by the very relations they have to other parts in the whole”. Hegelian thought is the most powerful example of this tendency, thought Saussurean linguistics and the “structuralism” influenced by it could also be mentioned."

extracted from Shaviro's Post on: DeLanda, A New Philosophy of Society

I would like to focus on two rather interesting points of this short quote:

the relations of exteriority and methodological individualism

The concept of relations of exteriority is what gives to an assemblage its machinic character. Those relations are coming to repose Autopoiesis as a machinic autopoiesis that is open both organizational and informational.

At the same time this short quote raises another issue that has to do with "methodological individualism" and Hayek's opposition on collectivism. Delanda's attempt to move obliquely from Hayek's individualism and Keynes' collectivism with a very insightful way will be extended to a project that he will call A New Philosophy of Society. it is not annoying for my understanding the use of the world new, since the last 50 years we tend to believe that nothing new and novel can be produced.

Beyond Autopoiesis II

"the key innovation effected by autopoiesis is to grant to living systems a dynamical capacity for change through self-maintenance, which means, at least in part, that such systems must function as open systems (only relatively). the functioning of the autopoietic organism or machine is not reducible to its particular genetic structure or composition. In other words, what are inportant are not the component of the system but the dynamic relations between them. Autopoietic entities engender and specify their own organization and limits/boundaries, functioning as unitary, individuated, and closed to relations input and out put. Such entities are understood as being 'organizationaly closed', which does not mean that they do not interact with an environment but rather that such interaction is always informed and determined by the organization of the particula autopoietic entity. An autopoietic organism evolves by engaging in an endless turnover of components under conditions of continuous petrubations and compesation of these petrubations. Any inference with their operation outside their domain of compensations will result in disintegration ( see Maturana and Varela in Autopoiesis and Cognition: the Realization of the Living, 1980).

We see here that the theory of autopoiesis equates change that does not conform to the internal and self-directed organization of the entity in question with destruction, dissolution, and abolition.

For a machinic thinking autopoiesis fails to appreciate the extent to which all living systems and their boundaries are caught up in machinic assemblages that involve modes of transversal becoming."

Germinal life: the difference and repetition of Deleuze

By Keith Ansell-Pearson

Co-existence

it's been couple of days now that I wanted to write few things about the installation at the Welcome Trust here in london entitled "CO-EXISTENCE" which has been designed by Julia Lohman.

The installation rediscovers the boundarys of the human body.

"Only one in ten of our cells is human - the rest are microbes. The human body can therefore be considered as an ecosystem that supports and is supported by millions of 'other' living things" .

that brings again into the forefront that whole discussion about the constituion of the organism, the subject, the self. it reveals a rhizomatic understanding that moves the autopoietic theory towards machinic heterogenesis and the theory of assemblage.

anyway it is worth passing by the Wellcome Trust center at Euston road to see the installation and to realise that you are everywhere not only informationaly but also structuraly... you form a rhizome within a braoder ecosystem.

this whole discussion resonates with my research about the symbiosis of a meshwork of systems in the build environment... you will argue that this is not so novel however I will state the opposite... more soon hopefully!

since then, few things on the installation here

"the important thing is to understand life, each living individuality, not as a form, or a development of form, but as a complex relation between different velocities, between deceleration and acceleration of particles"

Deleuze, G.(1988) Spinoza: Practical Philosophy. Trans. Robert Hurley. City lights Books, San Francisco, p.123

here is another article from wired

Beyond Autopoiesis

updated 03/08/2009

"In Deleuze and Guattari's model there is no center which is formally contolling the behaviour: that is, there is not a top-down subject or agent of evolution (whethere a CNS or a homunculus), but only a distributed intelligence that encompasses brains, bodies , molecules and worlds, all of which exist in terms of overlapping territories. It is on this point that they can be seen to depart from the figuration of autocatalysis in the theory of autopoiesis or self-organization."

Keith Ansell Pearson Germinal Life p.176

while autopoiesis has done some imprtant theoretical work, it is unsuitable for modeling 'real systems' because its emphasis on closed, stable systems provides an adequate understanding of virtual change, in which an autogenetic cycle components can get closed out, new components can enter, certain components can mutate, and so on"

Csnyi, V.(1996) Organization, Function and Creativity in bilogical and Social Systems. In Evolution, Order and Complexity, London and New York, Routledge, 146-81,