Friday, July 11, 2008

the human limit/l’expérience-limite



Before I had ever read the phrase “l’expérience-limite”, I had felt it. In the rather peculiar way one gropes around a hole in the dark, gaining a hand understanding which is, of course, difficult to put into words that belong to the world of light. The feeling, which was especially strong in me in the eighties, was that the norms of success, success as I had imbibed it in the burbs where I grew up, encoded, at a deep level, a ghastly defeat. The term of success were simply the terms of a dishonorable surrender, a betrayal of the forces one’s ego could muster, just so as to retire to a lifetime of being able to purchase enough stupifiants to help one forget the treason, that failed slave revolt. This is, of course, a child’s view of that artificial paradise, our life now. On the other hand, our criteria are determined by our situation – I have no overall vision of this time in which to judge it absolutely.

So, when I encountered the phrase in Blanchot, who I read after reading Bataille (and Bataille has always been closer to my heart) – I was magically caught up in it. In fact, in the early nineties, under the banner of l’expérience-limite, I fucked up in a number of ways that I’m not going to go into – some of them I am still paying for.

Since, at the moment, I am using the “human limit” to help me define that way of being in the world which was eclipsed by the happiness culture, I thought I’d go back and see what Foucault said about l’expérience-limite – he whose life was, according to his biographer, James Miller, so enthralled by that notion. Actually, Foucault doesn’t say much about it directly. But he does make one of his flashing, gnostic remarks in an interview with Duccio Trombadori in 1978:


“ The phenomenologist's experience is basically a way of organizing
the conscious perception (_regard reflexif_) of any aspect of daily,
lived experience in its transitory form, in order to grasp its meaning.
Nietzsche, Bataille, and Blanchot, on the contrary, try through
experience to reach that point of life which lies as close as possible to
the impossibility of living, which lies at the limit or extreme. They
attempt to gather the maximum amount of intensity and impossibility at
the same time. The work of the phenomenologist, however, essentially
consists of unfolding the entire field of possibilities connected to
daily experience.

Moreover, phenomenology tries to grasp the significance of daily
experience in order to reaffirm the fundamental chracter of the subject,
of the self, of its transcendental functions. On the contrary,
experience according to Nietzsche, Blanchot, and Bataille has rather the
task of "tearing" the subject from itself in such a way that it is no
longer the subject as such, or that it is completely "other" than itself
so that it may arrive at its annihilation, its dissociation.

It is this de-subjectifying undertaking, the idea of a "limit-experience"
that tears the subject from itself, which is the fundamental lesson that
I've learned from these authors. And no matter how boring and erudite my
resulting books have been, this lesson has always allowed me to conceive
them as direct experiences to "tear" me from myself, to prevent me from
always being the same."


This way of looking at the experience limit has, unfortunately, only been applied to Foucault’s own biography. I think, however, it contains the seed of an experience of reading and writing, of the third life, which brings together the adventurer and the book. The book, the use of which becomes the sign that separates the savage from the civilized, would, it seems, not have a savage use – useless to the savage who can’t read it, and transforming the savage who does read it – into the civilized. Perhaps, however, there is a savage literacy, a way of taking the book too seriously, of being driven mad by it, or of going through it – writing it and reading it – as an experience of de-subjectification.

5 comments:

northanger said...

AO 72 = LIMIT-EXPERIENCE (Contrary to the self-satisfied notions of those who raise the separation of church and state (from its history of ameliorating problems particular to European history) to the status of a universal principle, I will argue that modernity has solved nothing in the relationship between spirituality and public life. If anything, when compared with a wide range of practices—of which syewen is one of the most immediately present to (and hidden from) us—modernity's outlook on spirituality subtracts from the beauty of which humanity is capable. In this connection, I will highlight intercultural parallels, or affinities, in a variety of forms of human practice that can be described as limit-experience. p134, AO-98 CHAPTER 7: LIMIT-EXPERIENCE, AO-168 WE ARE NOT YOU: FIRST NATIONS AND CANADIAN MODERNITY) = 100. I AM SOMEBODY = 16 MINUTES MAXIMUM (AO-62 PARALLELS OF LATITUDE) = 4 PRIVILEGE LEVELS (AO-31 SYSTEM CALL) = A TREASURE YOU CANNOT FRAME = ABEER QASSIM HAMZA AL-JANABI = AETHYR OF THE WHEEL (AO-10 KHR) = ALPHA RHO CHI ETA IOTA (GRK-719 αρχηι; AO-18 ARCHI-) = ANSELMO INFINITO [+] = ARTICULATION POINT = BEST AND WORST OF DAYTONA = COLOUR OPPONENCY (AO-29 OCTARINE) = COMMAND LINE SWITCH (AO-71 COMMAND-LINE_ARGUMENT) = CURSE OF LIMITATION (AO-34 ACE OF DISKS) = CUTS OR SUBTRACTIVE SPELLS (AO-111 ERRATIC FLUCTUATIONS OF POTENTIA) = DEFINITE RELATIONS (AO-24 MARXALOT) = DIVINE KNOWLEDGE = EASYSPIRIT FITNESS = EFFECT OF FLUXING (AO-95 EXTRACTING THE SEED OF GOLD) = ELOS [KRONOS], BAETYLOS, ATLAS (AO-50 DAGON RISING) = EMPIRICAL EVIDENCE (AO-82 FROM FIRST PRINCIPLES) = ENOCH LABOURED 50 DAYS (AO-70 THE PRAYER OF ENOCH) = ESTIMATE: TRUE VALUE FOR E (AO-82 FROM FIRST PRINCIPLES) = EXPECT REQUEST-HEADER (AO-56 14.20 EXPECT) = FOUR GREAT DIRECTIONS (AO-68 NAGUALISM AND ALCHEMY) = GUARDING THE VIRTUE (AO-30 KAPI AGHA) = GUIDING METAPHOR (AO-44 NEW ORGANON) = GWR METROPOLITAN CLASS (AO-124 GREAT WESTERN RAILWAY METROPOLITAN CLASS) = HONEY ENCHANTMENT = HOOP THAT NEVER ENDS (AO-71 COLOURS OF THE WIND) = HUMAN EMANCIPATION (AO-78 THE GERMAN IDEOLOGY) = HYPOCOGNIZABLE = INNER/OUTER HARMONY (AO-68 NAGUALISM AND ALCHEMY) = INTROSPECTIVE SELF (AO-68 NAGUALISM AND ALCHEMY) = KEY TO THE SACRED PATTERN (AO-189 KEY TO THE SACRED PATTERN: THE UNTOLD STORY OF RENNES-LE-CHATEAU) = KNOWLEDGE AND VIRTUE (AO-62 SCIENTIA ET VIRTUS) = LADY COLUMBIA QUADRIGA (AO-47 GRAND ARMY PLAZA) = LONG DIPHTHONG = MEDICAL PRACTITIONER (AO-34 HANS SLOANE) = MOVEMENT MAGNITUDE (AO-68 NAGUALISM AND ALCHEMY) = NASA AUTHORIZATION ACT = NUMERICAL PALINDROME (AO-82 FROM FIRST PRINCIPLES) = OBJECTIVE HIERARCHY (AO-96 DIFFERENTIAL DEPLOYMENT) = ON THE URANIAN PLANETS = POSTHUMOUS RENOWN (AO-44 THE REAL ELITE) = [Q = 1 + 1/Q = 1.618034] (AO-14 265, AO-76 TALES OF A NEGLECTED NUMBER) = RELIGIOUS REFERENCE (AO-6 MARJA, AO-14 ARROW, AO-31 MARJA TAQLID) = RESURRECT THE DREAM OF ACADIA (AO-49 JE ME SOUVIENS) = SCIENTIA MANU ET MENTE (AO-91 KNOWLEDGE BY HAND AND MIND; University of New South Wales) = SEMPER FI OF MARXISM (AO-24 MARXALOT) = SHIFT PERCEPTION (AO-68 NAGUALISM AND ALCHEMY) = SHOW ME THE MONKEY! = SIEGE OF YORKTOWN (AO-40 THE END GAME) = SORROW ~ THREE OF SWORDS (AO-50 THREE OF SWORDS) = SQUARE PYRAMIDAL NUMBER = STRIFE ~ FIVE OF WANDS (AO-49 FIVE OF WANDS) = SYSTEM OF ANGEL MAGIC (AO-228 ENOCHIAN MAGIC FOR BEGINNERS: THE ORIGINAL SYSTEM OF ANGEL MAGIC) = TAKING ON THE SYSTEM = TAKING THE LONG WAY (AO-53 DIXIE CHICKS) = TEMPORIS NATURA FILIA = TETRAGRAMMATON DOCTRINE (AO-34 ACE OF DISKS) = THAT MIGHTY DEVIL (AO-16 ZAX) = THE ABSENCE OF CHIRON = THE BITCH MANIFESTO [+] = THE CELESTIAL DIAMOND (AO-43 GREAT DIAMOND) = THE COMMODITY MARKET = THE DEATH OF THE EGO = THE EGO AND HIS OWN = THE EXCHANGE PARTNERS (AO-230 IF WOMEN ARE THE GIFTS, THEN IT IS MEN WHO ARE THE EXCHANGE PARTNERS) = THE FORCES OF ETHÏOCLÉS (AO-114 THE MEDIEVAL TRADITION OF THEBES) = THE LADY AND THE LION = THE LILY OF HEAVEN (AO-95 ROSA MUNDI EST LILIUM COELI ) = THE LITANY OF DAGON (AO-50 DAGON RISING, AO-122 DAGON RISING: THE LITANY OF DAGON) = THE PATH OF KAPH (ATU X) (AO-10 KHR) = THE PHOENIX WAND = THE SIGN OF VIRGO = THE SPIRIT OF TROY = THE STUDY OF THE KABALAH = THE SULPHUROUS HAIL = THE WORDS OF JEREMIAH = TROPIC OF CANCER LINE (AO-52 TROPIC OF CANCER) = UNFORGIVINGNESS (AO-28 ANAIDEIA) = VERNER EMIL HOGGATT, JR. (AO-37 FIBONACCI) = VISION OF THE ROSE (AO-19 OXO, AO-16 LIN) = WHERE ART THOU FRIEND (AO-76 GERARD MANLEY HOPKINS) = WINSTON MILLION = ZECKENDORF'S THEOREM (AO-37 FIBONACCI).

AO 75 = L'EXPÉRIENCE-LIMITE (39. To situate this kind of affirmation in terms of limit experience, we might turn to Blanchot's other essay on the event of Bataille's death, originally titled "L'Expérience-limite" and reprinted in AO-107 THE INFINITE CONVERSATION: "AO-724 THUS THE LIMIT EXPERIENCE IS EXPERIENCE ITSELF: THOUGHT THINKING THAT WHICH WILL NOT LET ITSELF BE THOUGHT, THOUGHT THINKING MORE THAN IT IS ABLE BY AN AFFIRMATION THAT AFFIRMS MORE THAN CAN BE AFFIRMED!" (209) ["AO-666 L'EXPÉRIENCE-LIMITE EST AINSI L'EXPÉRIENCE MÊME: LA PENSÉE PENSE CELA QUI NE SE LAISSE PAS PENSER, LA PENSÉE PENSE PLUS QU'ELLE NE PEUT PENSER, DANS UNE AFFIRMATION QUI AFFIRME PLUS QUE CE QUI PEUT S'AFFIRMER!" (310)]. p154, AO-82 THE DELIRIUM OF PRAISE, AO-146 BATAILLE, BLANCHOT, DELEUZE, FOUCAULT, KLOSSOWSKI, AO-228 THE DELIRIUM OF PRAISE: BATAILLE, BLANCHOT, DELEUZE, FOUCAULT, KLOSSOWSKI, Eleanor Kaufman) = THE TRIPARTITE SYSTEM.

AO 135 = THE HUMAN LIMIT/L'EXPÉRIENCE-LIMITE = 2008 50TH ANNIVERSARY DAYTONA 500 (AO-47 DAYTONA 500) = ALTERED TREES AND THE PROCESSION OF THE ÆONS (AO-6 AKM) = BEGINNING OF AUGUST 1881 IN SIL-MARIA (AO-48 ETERNAL RECURRENCE, AO-332 ANFANG AUGUST 1881 IN SILS-MARIA, 6000 FUSS ÜBER DEM MEERE UND VIEL HÖHER ÜBER ALLEN MENSCHLICHEN DINGEN!, AO-332 THIS WORD IS THEREFORE, A COMPLETE FORMULA OF THE GNOSTIC AND TEMPLAR MYSTERIES, IN ONE OF ITS ASPECTS) = BURN THE GOLDEN TEARS OF FRESH FRANKINCENSE (AO-17 118, AO-35 PEITHO) = COLLECTION OF DYNAMIC ASSOCIATIVE ARRAYS (AO-82 PICK OPERATING SYSTEM) = DAPPLE-DAWN-DRAWN FALCON, IN HIS RIDING ({2}; AO-59 THE WINDHOVER) = EVOKE… RESPONSES THAT READ THE EXPRESSION (AO-89 THE 'LANGUAGE' OF EMOTION) = GIANT TEXAS SINKHOLE SWALLOWS TRACTORS, TRUCKS (AO-25 SALT DOME) = HAVING TROUBLE GETTING TO THE REGULUS (AO-95 EXTRACTING THE SEED OF GOLD) = HYPERTEXT TRANSFER PROTOCOL -- HTTP/1.1 (AO-29 RFC 2616) = KALI, THE DESTRUCTIVE ASPECT OF THE GODDESS (AO-85 KUNDALINI & THE BLACK QUEEN) = MOBILIZES THE PROFOUND SYNCRETISM (AO-111 ERRATIC FLUCTUATIONS OF POTENTIA) = NAMES FROM THE ENOCHIAN TABLET OF UNION = ONE MUST READ IN ORDER TO LEAVE AN EMPTY SPACE (AO-82 MESSIANIC ESCHATOLOGY) = ONION SPORTS: AMERICA'S FINEST NEWS SOURCE = PHILOSOPHICAL PHYSIOGNOMIK (AO-89 THE 'LANGUAGE' OF EMOTION) = SONG OF SOLOMON IS AN ALCHEMICAL TREATISE (AO-11 358) = THE EAGLE BECOMES CHANTICLEER TRIUMPHANT (AO-52 SAGITTARIUS 12°) = THE ROYAL MARRIAGE OF THE QUEEN AND KING (AO-62 TRANSMUTING BASE METAL) = THE SEA SALT IS WASHED WITH DISTILLED WATER (AO-95 EXTRACTING THE SEED OF GOLD) = THE TETRAGRAMMATON OF THE MAGICAL OFFICERS (AO-71 THE AMALANTRAH WORKING) = THE WILD BULL WITH MULTICOLOURED LEGS = THEIR FRICTION WITH THE TWO WORLDS (AO-111 ERRATIC FLUCTUATIONS OF POTENTIA) = THESE POSSESS REFLECTIVE FACTORISATIONS (AO-82 FROM FIRST PRINCIPLES) = THIS PRECIOUS BIBLIOGRAPHIC HINT = VERY CAREFUL MAN, AND NOT OF AN ANCIENT STRUCTURE (AO-95 EXTRACTING THE SEED OF GOLD) = YELLOWING (FOURTH STAGE): WHITE TO RED (AO-62 TRANSMUTING BASE METAL).

AO 230 = THE MOST RADICAL LESSON THAT ABORIGINALITY HAS IN STORE FOR MODERNITY (AO-47 WE ARE NOT YOU) = 12 / (1 + 1/2 + 1/4 + 1/5 + 1/7 + 1/10 + 1/14 + 1/20 + 1/28 + 1/35 + 1/70 + 1/140 = 5 (AO-22 140, AO-85 HARMONIC DIVISOR NUMBER) = APPROACHING THE KABBALAH OF MAAT: ALTERED TREES AND THE PROCESSION OF THE ÆONS = ENABLING THE CONSTRUCTION OF TEXT USER INTERFACE (TUI) APPLICATIONS = HIGH THERE, HOW HE RUNG UPON THE REIN OF A WIMPLING WING ({4}; AO-59 THE WINDHOVER) = IF WOMEN ARE THE GIFTS, THEN IT IS MEN WHO ARE THE EXCHANGE PARTNERS (If it is women who are being transacted, then it is the men who give and take them who are linked, the woman being a conduit of a relationship rather than a partner to it. The exchange of women does not necessarily imply that women are objectified, in the modern sense, since objects in the primitive world are imbued with highly personal qualities. But it does imply a distinction between gift and giver. If women are the gifts, then it is men who are the exchange partners. And it is the partners, not the presents, upon whom reciprocal exchange confers its quasi-mystical power of social linkage. The relations of such a system are such that women are in no position to realize the benefits of their own circulation. As long as the relations specify that men exchange women, it is men who are the beneficiaries of the product of such exchanges—social organization. -p92 {Gayle Rubin}; AO-228 THE DELIRIUM OF PRAISE: BATAILLE, BLANCHOT, DELEUZE, FOUCAULT, KLOSSOWSKI; AO-75 L'EXPÉRIENCE-LIMITE) = I'VE BEEN FORTY YEARS DISCOVERING THAT THE QUEEN OF ALL COLOURS IS BLACK! (AO-73 PIERRE AUGUSTE RENOIR) = OBTAINED THROUGH INVESTIGATIONS INTO GROUP PSYCHOLOGY (AO-44 THE REAL ELITE) = PRODUCED VIA COLLISIONS OF CALIFORNIUM-249 ATOMS AND CALCIUM-48 IONS (AO-17 118, AO-45 UNUNOCTIUM) = RIPS AND CUTS SIGNAL HOLES TO MOVE THROUGH, NEW TERRITORIES TO TRAVERSE (AO-111 ERRATIC FLUCTUATIONS OF POTENTIA) = SHIFT OF PERCEPTION RESULTS IN A MOVEMENT OF THE ASSEMBLAGE POINT (AO-68 NAGUALISM AND ALCHEMY) = THE ESSENCE OF THE ARI'S MEDITATITVE SYSTEM CONSISTS OF YICHIDIM = WITHOUT MONEY, WITHOUT INCOME, THERE IS NO SOCIAL EXISTENCE (AO-88 THE ENIGMA OF THE GIFT).

AO 240 = 3.1415926535 8979323846 2643383279 5028841971 6939937510 5820974 = 3.1415926535 8979323846 2643383279 5028841971 6939937510 58209749 = AT STAKE IS A DIZZYING LIMIT-EXPERIENCE THAT DEFIES DESCRIPTION (AO-75 L'EXPÉRIENCE-LIMITE) = BE MY WITNESS O ALLAH, THAT I HAVE CONVEYED YOUR MESSAGE TO YOUR PEOPLE (AO-62 THE FAREWELL SERMON) = BLIND AND BARREN CROSS OF EQUAL ARMS, TETRAGRAMMATON IN HIS FATAL ASPECT OF FINALITY (AO-34 ACE OF DISKS) = MODERNITY HAS BANNED LIMIT-EXPERIENCE AS A TRANSGRESSIVE FORM OF PRACTICE (AO-47 WE ARE NOT YOU) = SPELLS WHICH SHOULD BE DESCRIBED NEGATIVELY RATHER THAN POSITIVELY (AO-111 ERRATIC FLUCTUATIONS OF POTENTIA) = THE APPARENT POSITION OF THE SUN OSCILLATES BETWEEN THE TWO TROPICS (AO-29 TROPICS; AQ-30 TROPICAL) = WE HAVE TO BE PRODUCED AS LIVING SUBSTANTIAL BEINGS BEFORE WE CAN BEGIN TO ACT (AO-78 THE GERMAN IDEOLOGY, AO-120 MAN PRODUCES HIMSELF THROUGH LABOUR).

AO 323 = A SATYROS SAW THE BOY, AND ENCHANTED WITH HIS DIVINE BEAUTY HE WHISPERED, CONCEALING HIS WORDS = ALLFRIENDLY PEITHO, MANAGER OF THE HUMAN HEART! GRANT ONLY THAT THIS LOVELY BOY BE GRACIOUS TO ME! = LAMBDA CONTROLS THE SHAPE OF THE PROFILE WHILE EPSILON DETERMINES THE DEGREE OF SPIRALLING = THE NAVAJO BELIEF THAT REALITY IS WHAT WE MAKE IT THROUGH THE SYMBIOSIS OF THOUGHT AND SPEECH = THEREFORE, SET THY FACE TOWARDS THE ULTIMATE GOAL AND STRIVE EVER ONWARD TO THE FURTHEST REACHES OF THE STARS = YOUNG HEGELIANS: THE EXISTING STATE IS NOT YET IN ACCORDANCE WITH ITS "IDEA". IT MUST BE REFORMED.

AO 403 = BECOMES THE CATALYST BY WHICH THE CLANDESTINE BONDS, CONFLICTS AND CONJUNCTIONS INHERENT TO EACH CHADOR BEGIN TO LOOM OUT (AO-111 ERRATIC FLUCTUATIONS OF POTENTIA) = HE(HEBREW) IS THE EMPEROR, AND THE TZADDI THE EMPRESS, OR HIGH PRIESTESS, VIDE SECRET ATTRIBUTIONS INDICATED IN LIBER CCXX (AO-62 III. THE EMPRESS).

AO 475 = 1 CHRONICLES 7:16 AND MAACHAH THE WIFE OF MACHIR BARE A SON, AND SHE CALLED HIS NAME AO-25 PERESH; AND THE NAME OF HIS BROTHER WAS SHERESH; AND HIS SONS WERE ULAM AND RAKEM = HEAR, O ISRAEL: THE LORD OUR GOD IS ONE LORD: AND THOU SHALT LOVE THE LORD THY GOD WITH ALL THINE HEART, AND WITH ALL THY SOUL, AND WITH ALL THY MIGHT (475 is a 49-gonal number, member of the AO-74 MIAN-CHOWLA SEQUENCE; AO-13 554, AZ-554) = THE ESSENCE OF THE ARI'S MEDITATITVE SYSTEM CONSISTS OF YICHIDIM (UNIFICATIONS), WHERE ONE MANIPULATES THE LETTERS OF VARIOUS NAMES OF GOD = UNITY UTTERMOST SHOWED! I ADORE THE MIGHT OF THY BREATH, SUPREME AND TERRIBLE GOD, WHO MAKEST THE GODS AND DEATH TO TREMBLE BEFORE THEE: -I, I ADORE THEE!

Roger Gathmann said...

Wow, North, that is a lot of matter!

Can you connect Pabilsang with
the cow with the crumpled horn,
That tossed the dog,
That worried the cat,
That killed the rat,
That ate the malt
That lay in the house that Jack built
which, if Ruskin is right, lies in Knossos, Daedelus' mansion?

Of course, they straightened out the labyrinth and made it a circle at Daytona. If the race was properly conducted, it would never end. Although such is my femme fatale besotted heart that the only race I've ever been interested in was that between Atalanta and Hippomenes.
Obviously, this is what happened to Atalanta next. In space!

Anonymous said...

Roger, the end-thought of this post reminds me of Deleuze and Guatarri's concept, in a Thousand Plateaus, of the book not as an arboreal structure but as a line of flight escaping segmentation, or the book as a rhizome that escapes codification and significance. They conceive of reading not as an interior experience but a radically de-subjectifying, nomadic attack on self-identify and meaning.

Might there be a possible similarity between the line of flight that seeks to escape molar identities and what you have written about as the adventurer's escape from the positional economy? And of course this decoding and recoding of flows is radicalized, yet conserved, most fully in capitalism itself.

I don't get the sense though that D and G have any use for the notion of happiness which seems to be a bourgeois concept: that of the self-contained, self-assured subject able to subsist contentedly in its own satisfaction. No, rather, one thinks of the insurance bureaucrat Kafka who writes about horses, steppes, jackals and arabs at three o'clock in the morning...Well not sure where I'm going with any of this, which is perhaps the point.

Cheers,
PL

northanger said...

messed this bit up.........

AO 251 = AVARICE, AMBITION, HOLLOW RELIANCE ON OUTWARD WORKS, AND AFFECTION OF PIETY (AO-41 PHARISAIOS) = ABSTRACTION IS MADE FROM A FACT; THEN IT IS DECLARED THAT THE FACT IS BASED ON THE ABSTRACTION (AO-78 THE GERMAN IDEOLOGY) = AN EAGLE AND A LARGE WHITE DOVE ARE REVEALED CONSTANTLY CHANGING INTO EACH OTHER (AO-23 LIBRA 26°) = AND THEN WE HAVE AN X RAY OF THE FORCES ENGAGED AND WHAT THEY SHOULD BE DOING (AO-62 THE FORCES ENGAGED) = F(N)= \BEGIN{CASES} 0 & \MBOX{IF } N = 0; \\ 1 & \MBOX{IF } N = 1; \\ F(N-1)+F(N-2) & \MBOX{IF } N > 1. \\ \END{CASES} (AO-56 FIBONACCI NUMBER) = HUMANITY PUSH FORWARD IN FRANTIC EFFORT TO CROSS THE BLACK CHASM OF KNOWLEDGE (AO-20 LIBRA 29°) = SECRET CODES, WHICH NOWADAYS OFTEN HINGE ON PROPERTIES OF LARGE PRIMES (AO-14 265, AO-76 TALES OF A NEGLECTED NUMBER) = TROPIC OF CAPRICORN IN THE SOUTHERN HEMISPHERE AT 23°26' (23.4°) S LATITUDE.

northanger said...

interesting Claude Denis (review) doesn't try to define AO-29 SYEWEN

AO 205 = THE "DISENCHANTING" NATURE OF ETHNOGRAPHIC DESCRIPTION (p43, I cannot be certain that my own account will entirely avoid this pitfall. I have tried to describe syewen as little as possible, and when I have done so it is with the specific intent of challenging derogatory whitestream notions of aboriginal cultures. ~ p133, ...i did not want to describe syewen in any more detail than was necessary, because many members of First Nations are not only reluctant to discuss such spiritual practices, but are very unhappy with descriptions of their cultures by outsiders who, it seems, generally misunderstand what they are seeing and what they are told; AO-168 WE ARE NOT YOU: FIRST NATIONS AND CANADIAN MODERNITY) = AS OBJECTIVE SPIRITS HAVING FOR PEOPLE THE CHARACTER OF OBJECTS = BINOCULAR ACUITY IS SUFFICIENT TO GUIDE STRAIGHT-LINE ATTACK = ENTERED THE DELICATE BED OF PEITHO WHO BRINGS MARRIAGE TO PASS = HE' FINAL, THE DAUGHTER, IS SET UPON THE THRONE OF THE MOTHER = INTO A LETTER IS POURED VITAL AND CONFIDENTIAL INFORMATION = MADE AND ACTIVATED IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE LOGIC OF PERFORATION = MOVING THE ASSEMBLAGE POINT BY THE OPERATION OF INTENT = MULTIPLYING THE NTH PRONIC NUMBER BY THE NTH ODD NUMBER = SCHADENFREUDE: LIVE BLOGGING THE RULES COMMITTEE MEETING = THE TERRORIST MYSTIQUE AND THE HERO LEGEND HAVE THE SAME ROOT = THE VISION OF THE INTERPLAY AND IDENTITY OF EARTH AND AIR = TRUTH IS FORCED TO FLY LIKE A SCARED WHITE DOE IN THE WOODLANDS = WIDELY, DEEPLY, FREE-RANGING, VISUALIZATION, I UNDERSTAND.

AO 239 = A BATTLE AGAINST THE BEWITCHMENT OF OUR INTELLIGENCE BY MEANS OF LANGUAGE (And Wittgenstein defined philosophy as "a battle against the bewitchment of our intelligence by means of language" (1968: § 109). Coming after Wittgenstein, poststructuralist theory also distrusts language. This is one reason why language/discourse is made its chief object of interest: language does not transparently express ultimate reality, and we are fools to think it does. But AO-114 LANGUAGE PRODUCES ITS OWN REALITY, which structures the social world: social reality is, in other words, essentially discursive. This theoretical agenda is indeed at work in Drucilla Cornell's reformulation of deconstruction as "the philosophy of the limit," stemming from that perspective's work of exposing "AO-228 THE QUASI-TRANSCENDENTAL CONDITIONS THAT ESTABLISH ANY SYSTEM… AS A SYSTEM"; this results, in Jacques Derrida's work, in "continually point[ing] to the failure of idealism to capture the real" (Cornell, 1992: I). Hence the insistent association of Derrida's work with the tradition of negative theology which, "as practised by an Eckhart or a John of the Cross, is a prohibition against *any* thematizing of divine presence, any ultimate return to an analogy of being between God and the subject" (Rowan Williams, 1992: 72). —pp24-25, AO-168 WE ARE NOT YOU: FIRST NATIONS AND CANADIAN MODERNITY) = BITOM, GREAT SPIRIT OF FIRE WHO RULES THE ENTIRE ELEMENTAL TABLET OF FIRE = BYCAUSE SHE IS THE BED OF A HARLOT, AND THE DWELLING PLACE OF HIM THAT IS FALN = MODULATIONS OF THE CATEGORIES APPERTAINING TO BOURGEOIS SOCIETY = SINCE WITH GAS I.E. PROPANE, YOU HAVE THE PROBLEM OF OXYGEN SOLVED = THE PRESENCE OR ABSENCE OF OXYGEN IN THE GAS (AERATION OF THE TORCH TIP) = WORKERS… CONTINUALLY REPRODUCE THE CONDITIONS OF THEIR SUBSERVIENCE.

AO 218 = EXARP, GREAT SPIRIT OF AIR WHO RULES THE ENTIRE ELEMENTAL TABLET OF AIR = 6,000 FEET ABOVE SEA LEVEL AND MUCH HIGHER ABOVE ALL HUMAN THINGS = COOKING WITH GREASE: STIRRING THE POTS IN AMERICAN POLITICS = DAGON HAD FALLEN ON HIS FACE TO THE GROUND BEFORE THE ARK OF YAHWEH = IN THE COURT OF THE CRIMSON KING ~ THE RETURN OF THE FIRE WITCH = LET KNOWLEDGE GROW FROM MORE TO MORE; AND SO BE HUMAN LIFE ENRICHED (AO-92 CRESCAT SCIENTIA; VITA EXCOLATUR) = NATURAL RIGHT OF THE JEWISH PEOPLE TO BE MASTERS OF THEIR OWN FATE = THE TRAFFIC OF WOMEN: NOTES ON THE POLITICAL ECONOMY OF SEX (Gayle Rubin; AO-59 MAGNUM OPUSCULUM) = WIDESPREAD MOVEMENT AFFIRMING A RADICAL AND MYSTICAL PROTESTANTISM (AO-100 ANTINOMIAN BREAKING POINT).

AO 224 = NANTA, GREAT SPIRIT OF EARTH WHO RULES THE ENTIRE ELEMENTAL TABLET OF EARTH = 3.1415926535 8979323846 2643383279 5028841971 6939937510 582 = HOW THAT TEMPERAMENT IS IMPRINTED ON THE FACE IS THE QUESTION = IN THE NAME OF GOD LET THERE BE LIGHT UNTO THE VOID A RESTRICTION = IT IS CLEAR THAT THE ARM OF CRITICISM CANNOT REPLACE THE CRITICISM OF ARMS = ONE REACHES THE OTHER SIDE WITHOUT TRAVERSING THE SUGGESTED PATH (AO-111 ERRATIC FLUCTUATIONS OF POTENTIA) = THE CONCOURSE OF THE FOURCES: THE FORTY-EIGHT ANGELICAL KEYS OR CALLS = THE FACE IS CENTRAL TO EMOTION AND HAS PRIORITY OVER VISCERAL CHANGES = THE FILM-MAKER'S ETHIC IN THE FACE OF THE INÉVIDENCE OF THE TIMES = WE HAVE AN X RAY OF THE FORCES ENGAGED AND WHAT THEY SHOULD BE DOING (AO-62 THE FORCES ENGAGED).

Asking

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