This paper reconstructs the process by which intensity unfolds
itself from the perspective of modern science. For intensity to
unfold itself means to organize and develop autonomously,
without depending on other entities—for instance, without
presup...
This paper reconstructs the process by which intensity unfolds
itself from the perspective of modern science. For intensity to
unfold itself means to organize and develop autonomously,
without depending on other entities—for instance, without
presupposing idea. The primary objective of this reconstruction is
to clearly reveal the generative position intensity holds vis-à-vis
virtual idea and actualized representations. Specifically, based on
a rigorous examination of chaos theory concerning the
emergence of self-organizing order, it seeks to demonstrate that
intensity gives birth to idea and creatively actualizes the idea it
generates, thereby giving birth to representational elements.
However, this work is secondary and, in a broader sense, has
the following objective: to reveal the limit point that cannot be
answered when thinking strictly in the language of science, and
to reexamine Deleuze's philosophy as a corresponding
metaphysics. If science provides reliable statements about reality,
philosophy responds to science with a corresponding ontology.
Within Deleuze's philosophy, we seek to trace the process by
which science and philosophy function in their own ways, react
to each other, and elevate and edify thought.
Chaos theory refers to the unpredictable chaos arising from
sensitivity to initial conditions. However, as a branch of complex
systems theory studying intricate systems where multiple
elements interact, chaos theory models chaotic motion into
identifiable patterns. By mapping physical motion onto topological
spaces, certain types of dynamical system behavior were
discovered: specific basins of attraction, or distinct attractor
types. In this context, we note that these attractor types are
products generated during the self-organization process of
non-equilibrium systems. Furthermore, despite the stability
provided by the attractor, the entire system qualitatively leaps
within each bifurcation, either deepening or disintegrating.
First, the reason chaos theory focuses on non-equilibrium
states in relation to self-organization is that when a system
deviates from equilibrium for any reason, thereby disrupting its
internal structural stability, it is observed that instead of the
parts being entirely destroyed, they reorganize themselves in a
new direction. Unlike negative feedback, which maintains a
system's stability, positive feedback amplifies the effect of
feedback. For instance, autocatalytic positive feedback acts as
both product and catalyst, repeatedly self-producing and serially
amplifying the effect that can transform the entire system. This
repeated autocatalytic action drives a system toward the formation of a new structure. As a result, the system's parts
collectively create a new structure that is the product of
self-organizing order. Chaos theory terms the emergence of this
new order ‘emergence’. Unlike classical thermodynamics' law that
states systems statistically move from order to disorder when
effective energy is depleted, it clarifies that increasing entropy is
not synonymous with destruction; rather, it productively creates
a new order called a ‘dissipative structure’.
We argue that the conceptual tools presented here—
autocatalysis, positive feedback, self-organization, dissipative
structures, and emergence—form the critical link for rigorously
elucidating the process of forming the intensional system
described by Deleuze. Based on Chapter 5 of Difference and
Repetition, intensity is difference itself, possessing inequality,
disparate, and asymmetry as its very nature. That is, intensity is
a state of unequal difference; it infinitely bifurcates and
resonates according to immanent inequality, producing difference
in an autocatalytic manner. Furthermore, the differenciator—
named dark precursor, disparateness, etc.—not only gather the
produced difference to form a multi-dimensional series but also,
within the communication between series, re-produce new
differences that exceed the series. Intensity itself is both the
product and the catalyst, reproducing itself and spontaneously
bringing forth a system of difference by resonating and
amplifying its effects. We wish to clarify that this is the originary
moment where the system of difference, which Deleuze names
the differential system, is spontaneously constituted by
difference itself.
Second, the reason chaos theory focuses on this concept in relation to bifurcation is that it mathematically proved: within
bifurcations that appear superficially random, a
periodic-multiplicative regularity exists. Consequently, the number
of bifurcation branches can increase infinitely, allowing the point
of entry into the chaotic domain to be precisely determined. At
bifurcation points, the period during which a system returns to
its initial state increases geometrically—2, 4, 8, 16—and gradually
accelerates. Eventually, the branches proliferate to such an
extent that the entire graph is filled in black, marking the
transition into the chaos domain. This signifies that the
attractors guiding the system's motion increase exponentially—
from two to four, from four to eight—ultimately becoming
infinite. Like the swirling flow of turbulent currents, the system
transforms into complete chaos. Conversely, when the system
oscillates not among these multiple attractors but exclusively
selects one, it advances to a higher-dimensional, more profound
state, securing its own stability.
We argue that the possible developments a system can take at
a bifurcation—whether through an exclusive choice among
multiple options or through inclusive oscillation—corresponds
precisely to the choice between whether intensity will synthesize
multiple series exclusively to actualize the virtual, or whether it
will synthesize series inclusively to produce an idea.
On the one hand, actualizing a virtual idea means producing a
qualitative, extended object that occupies a specific time and
space. This requires the exclusive selection of one series from
among virtually coexisting ones. Through this, the intensional
system enters a stable, representational order—one that produces
representational elements by recognizing difference according to identity, opposition, analogy, or similarity. This signifies that, as
a result of the exclusionary synthesis of heterogeneous series,
the series originating from singularities converges into a series of
regular points. The exclusionary selection and convergence of
series elucidates one axis of genesis through which intensity
unfolds itself to produce representation.
On the other hand, producing a virtual idea means generating
new singularities by enabling multiple heterogeneous series to
communicate and resonate with each other. To achieve this, the
exclusionary selection of a single series is suspended. In contrast
to effectuation, which Deleuze uses synonymously with
actualization, the term counter-effectuation for the moment when
an idea is produced explicitly denotes this suspension. As a
result of halting exclusionary actualization or effectuation, the
intensity advances toward a phase of inclusive synthesis
encompassing all lines—a phase of inclusive use of the
assemblage. This clarifies another axis of genesis through which
intensity unfolds itself to produce the idea, precisely because the
lines of singularity diverge rather than converge toward a fixed
point, leading to the production of new singularities.
Through this, we confirm that in the process of intensity
producing and gathering difference to form and unfold a system,
it is determined whether it will proceed toward the convergence
and reproduction of series through exclusionary interconnection,
or toward the divergence of series and the production of the
idea through inclusive interconnection. Just as representational
elements are objects of genesis, the idea is not pre-existing or
presupposed prior to intensity; it is a strict object of genesis.
The moment of the idea's birth can be traced back to specific aspects of the synthesis through which intensity unfolds itself.
However, based on the above, intensity finds itself at a
crossroads where it must choose between advancing toward the
production of the idea or advancing toward the production of
representation.
Furthermore, recalling that chaos theory explicitly rests on the
Second Law of Thermodynamics, the above discussion must also
answer the following question: That is, even if it is true that in
Deleuze's philosophy, intensional difference unfolds within
qualitative and extensive representational elements and vanishes
outside them, intensity is also implied and preserved within itself.
Conversely, the second law of thermodynamics establishes as a
natural law the tendency toward thermal equilibrium—that is, the
nullification and averaging of difference—as effective energy is
depleted.
It is precisely at this point that we argue Deleuze's philosophy
diverges from science. Deleuze strongly emphasizes that the
transcendental principle, as a higher level grounding the natural
laws governing the empirical realm, is precisely intensity. If what
we strive to elucidate alongside science are qualitative and
extended things, then the reason for the fulfillment of such
phenomena, or the condition of their appearance, is precisely
intensity. This stands in contrast to chaos theory based on
thermodynamics, which posits that the spontaneous formation of
dissipative structures is driven by externally input (and over time
depleted) energy. For Deleuze, energy in general is intensity, and
intensity preserves itself according to the order it contains within
itself.
However, transcendental principles must not only specify the a priori conditions under which the empirical is produced, but also
clarify that experience is necessarily subordinate and subject to
this a priori nature. In this regard, Deleuze refers to an ontology
that transcends physical or astronomical natural laws and
subordinates them—an ontology established by primordial nature
dwelling within its own chaos, an ontology founded on the purely
intensional as its principle—as the ontology of eternal recurrence.
The ontology of eternal recurrence that Deleuze draws from
Nietzsche asserts that existence itself is the movement of
differing things eternally recurring. Accordingly, eternal
recurrence possesses as its own law a test of selection where
recurrence is permitted only for that which differs from itself.
For the same reason, the return of the identical is fundamentally
barred. The nullification of difference that grounds
thermodynamics, such a return to identity, is blocked by the
ontology of eternal recurrence.
By clarifying Deleuze's philosophy in light of chaos theory and
then distinguishing these combined elements from Deleuze's
ontology, we can confirm that Deleuze's philosophy and modern
science reflect and resonate with each other, leading to the
following redefinition. On the one hand, in Deleuze's philosophy,
the production of representation through intensity and the
production of the idea are not mutually exclusive but rather
mutually circulating and interlocked. If what eternally recurs is
only difference, then what remains after the production of
representation must be difference, not identity. For while identity
lacks the principle to sustain itself and thus vanishes, difference
eternally recurs through its own transformation. Similarly, the
difference produced after the production of the idea returns as the extreme form that transforms itself into difference. This
confirms that the dual status of intensity in Deleuze's philosophy —giving birth to the idea and also creatively actualizing it to
produce representation—does not stem from mutually exclusive
developments, but from the productive model of eternally
circulating intensity.
On the other hand, compared to neighboring catastrophe
theory, it re-emphasizes that the internal dynamism of the
dissipative structure is the core of chaos theory. While similarly
thematizing the concept of bifurcation, catastrophe theory
analyzes the transition to chaos as a degeneration. Here, the
primary object of analysis is the degenerative critical point of
departure from structural stability. The formation of dissipative
structures is also understood as passivity imposed from outside
the system. In contrast, chaos theory, emphasizing the
spontaneous productivity of dissipative structures, foregrounds
the emergence of order from within that very chaos. Here, the
primary focus of analysis is that the order thus spontaneously
emerging chooses its own unfolding within astonishingly rich
opportunities. Thus, unlike catastrophe theory, which
understands morphogenesis as externally imposed passivity,
chaos theory conceives organization as the active capacity of
dissipative structures to spontaneously determine their own
course. Following this distinction, what chaos theory must
underpin is the internal dynamism that forms and sustains
dissipative structures. If the energy possessed by the initial
non-equilibrium system is the driving force propelling
self-organization, then for that very energy to become a
genuinely intra-structural force, its self-preserving and productive intensity must be re-examined.
Reviewing the entire discussion above fully reveals the meaning
of Deleuze's statement: "Bergson says that modern science hasn't
found its metaphysics, the metaphysics it would need. It is this
metaphysics that interests me." If Deleuze sought to propose a
metaphysics compatible with modern science, it is neither
because science presents errors that philosophy must correct,
nor because science, grounded in facts, limits philosophical
thought. Rather, science provides meaningful resources and
reliable knowledge about the real. Therefore, philosophy respects
scientific inquiry into that reality and even radically accelerates
scientific discourse until it confronts questions unanswerable in
science's own vocabulary. When thought, having ultimately faced
these questions and reached its limits, reflects upon itself and
invents new language and concepts, the metaphysics elusive to
modern science is newly born. We seek to trace this creative
process as it unfolds in <Difference and Repetition>.