Preface: On Real Speculations
Preview from my latest book Real Speculations
The following article is the Preface of my latest book Real Speculations. To purchase a copy, check the link below:
If you have already purchased a copy, and appreciate the work, consider leaving a review on Amazon.
Whenever we speak on “speculations” we have a tendency to think in derogatory terms, i.e. “just speculations” in relation to “material reality”. And oftentimes speculative cognition is indeed just that. However, as those familiar with my work will know, I have been learning for sometime now to think in terms of a “materialist dialectic”. My claim in this work is not only that I have successfully learned how to think in terms of a materialist dialectic (embedding the unity of opposites into thought of my actual concrete historical relations and projects), but that this is actually the mode of cognition required to make speculations real. To make speculations real, one cannot simply represent an external antagonism and mobilise it towards one's own interests; rather, one has to embed oneself as self-repelling singularity in the real of antagonism itself, and live out these antagonisms to discover the result in their inner logic. In other words, one has to have one’s own spiritual skin and bones in the game, to let the contradictions of one’s actual life positively inform the cultivation of one’s thought.
In fact, this is indeed a claim that I think reflects Hegel’s own “idealism”: that dialectical thinking is necessary, not only because it reflects the movement of materiality in and for itself, but because it opens us to the positive potentials of speculative cognition. However, in this work, you will not only be learning the foundations of Hegelian philosophy (Section 1), as well as its excess in the existentialist works of Nietzsche (Section 2), or the psychoanalytic works of Lacan (Section 3), but also learning how these works have become embedded into real living work attempting to revive speculative philosophy for theopolitical problems today. In other words, the theoretical backbone of this book is neither being utilised at an academic distance from the real (like a textbook on Hegel, Nietzsche, Lacan), and nor is it being used to frame simplistic external oppositions (without implicating one’s own historical subjectivity); but is alive to and positively engaged with the real relations that I am actively working within (whether online, institutionally, or otherwise). It is part of an immanent critique and reconciliation — it is a “rosy cross” of a book.
Consequently, the content of this work is not its only import, but also its form, which teaches one how to combine fundamental theory with living works and relations. These living works and relations include reflections inspired by the courseworks, conferences, and anthologies at Philosophy Portal; but also active collaborations with theologians, philosophers, artists, theorists, and scientists that are in-themselves incomplete and open-ended. The courseworks at Philosophy Portal have included several investigations of the core texts by Hegel, including the Phenomenology of Spirit, Science of Logic, and the Philosophy of Right; one text by Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra, one text by Lacan, the Écrits; one text by Alenka Zupančič, What Is Sex?; as well as a course inspired by Slavoj Žižek’s Christian Atheism, which included a more in-depth examination of the historical concept through the works of modern philosophy, psychoanalysis, and theology. Each of these coursework processes has been connected to conference and anthology processes, some of which are as of the date of this writing complete, and some of which are as of the date of this writing, incomplete.
All of these processes, as well as the active collaborations with other creatives, represent the living works that are informing many of the chapters of this book. One will also find this core contained with an introduction and a conclusion that offers a real speculative perspective on our current social and historical situation as it relates to both theology and politics. The introduction offers a dialectical mediation of the moment of New Atheism, with reference to a lineage of thought that runs from Richard Dawkins’ reason, through Sam Harris’s spirituality, and Jordan B. Peterson’s religiosity. This popular intellectual lineage outlines the way the zeitgeist of our culture in the 21st century is literally attempting to re-process the phenomenological struggle embedded in Hegel’s Phenomenology (specifically: reason, spirit, religion). The conclusion offers what I think is the most important theopolitical framework for exiting that culture war, and entering into a new 21st century struggle for a socialist politics: Christian Atheism. I have come to learn that this position will be resisted by Christian fundamentalists and Marxist atheists alike, and at the same time, I think this resistance attests to its importance and even centrality. Christian atheism disorients Christians and atheists alike into the real of an object disoriented ontology required to weather the storm of subjective destitution and real spiritual dynamics. This notion of Christian Atheism is of course inspired by the works of philosopher Slavoj Žižek and the Slovenian School, including Alenka Zupančič and Mladen Dolar; but also the works of Peter Rollins’ and his extended pyrotheological work towards a Church of Contradiction, which also informs the work as a totality.
In reading this book from the perspective of both the introduction and the conclusion, what you are looking at is the very cultural body that I think exists on both the other side of the dialectic of New Atheism (introduction) as well as points towards grounding the necessity of Christian Atheism (conclusion). This cultural body itself includes the aforementioned foundational thought figures that structure the three major sections: Hegel’s “thought foundation”, Nietzsche’s “drive myths” and Lacan’s “social analysis”; but also the Philosophy Portal community projects, and the adjacent projects related to theology, philosophy, theory, art and science. In the first section, Hegel’s “thought foundation”, we explore the structure of the Phenomenology of Spirit, situate this work in terms of contemporary theory, personal development, and its historical context. We also extend this investigation with reflections on Hegel’s Science of Logic, and Philosophy of Right; before applying this work to more active investigations at Philosophy Portal (e.g. reflections on the “Logic for the Global Brain” conference, Systems and Subjects book, construction of new theory spaces in The Portal, and physical collaborations with both Theory Underground and Peter Rollins’ at Wake Festival).
In the second section, Nietzsche’s “drive myths”, we start with several reflections on the “core Nietzsche” as inspired by the coursework on Thus Spoke Zarathustra, as well as the “post-Nietzschean” field of interpretation that has structured much of 20th century philosophy. Here we think of Nietzsche as an “existentialist excess” of Hegel (and German Idealism more broadly) that has provided philosophy with an on-going challenge of its conceptual relationship to existence and life itself. We then use this tension to explore the dialectics of belonging and meaning inspired by the works of and collaborations with O.G. Rose, the contradictions of “Game A” and “Game B” as embedded in the context of active engagements with various liminal web communities (e.g. The Stoa, Dark Renaissance, Intellectual Deep Web, etc.), and the challenges implied by these contradictions. Finally, we think through “existential excess” in the questions of the role of psychedelics and philosophy, magic and religion, humanism and post-humanism, as well as education in a time of radical technological change (all inspired by real conversations with living collaborators, e.g. Layman Pascal, Bruce Alderman, Carl Hayden Smith, among many others).
In the third section, Lacan’s “social analysis”, we start with the centrality of both libido and its impossibility, its consequences for thinking sex or sexuality, and the necessity of psychoanalytic philosophy (inspired by both the coursework on Lacan’s Écrits, as well as Alenka Zupančič’s What Is Sex?). This leads to extended reflections on libidinal-economy, as well as importance of Lacanian theory for reflecting dimensions of religion and politics with ideas about the relations between Das Ding and objet petit a, loss and lack, as well as suffering and enjoyment. We furthermore explore themes in the underground theory scene related to David McKerracher’s notion of timenergy (its lack as well as the stakes for the theory), as well as disorienting notions of patriarchal civilisation in an age of Woke Left/Populist right-wing politics, as well as the status of modern sciences internal crisis of replication and also thought, and perhaps also its need to rethink itself in light of both psychoanalysis and quantum mechanics. All of these dimensions point towards the necessity of not only a psychoanalytic philosophy capable of thinking from the standpoint of libido and its impossibility, but the revenge of philosophy itself for thinking the social unconscious in a time between worlds, or a topsy-turvy world.
If there is a fundamental service that “real speculations” is trying to guide, stated very simply it is this: the sublation of the Petersonian moment of religion which leaves us in a psychological wrestling with traditional myths (and fails to engage modern philosophy on its own terms and towards its own aims); and the speculative affirmation of the Žižekian moment of absolute knowing, which forces us to re-think a socialist spirit for a renewed theopolitical-economy (and does so through a deep engagement with modern philosophy). Jordan B. Peterson rose to international fame in a precise gap: the disorienting relationship between the Christian religion and secular atheism in Western culture, as well as the political confusion that it produces. Peterson explores that gap through his mythological wrestling in a language that can be understood by a secular society, but he obfuscates (at best) and exploits (at worst) the political dimension itself (ultimately with his very explicit and open dismissal and caricaturization of socialist politics). Žižek, on the other hand, is not only the very spiritual embodiment of our philosophical age, but he is actively and courageously engaged in a political struggle for rethinking the foundations of socialist politics, often in a way that puts his own reputation and career on the line. This work is recognising this sacrifice and is both indebted to and inspired by the courage it requires. However, this work is not only a repetition of a Žižekian dialectical materialist perspective on our time (although it is that), but as mentioned, it is also a demonstration of the importance of dialectical materialism for the production of real speculations engaged with living thinkers and projects (and not merely a Žižekian textbook). In that sense, I want to claim that this book goes beyond any simplistic binary of materialism vs. idealism: the movement of matter real-ises the mind (speculative cognition), and the real-ising mind is needed to think the movement of matter (materialist dialectics).
Finally, this book would not be possible without those who have become the foundation for the works at Philosophy Portal. For all those who have helped me build Philosophy Portal, and who have become the core of the culture realising itself within its boundary, this book is primarily dedicated to you. I hope it serves as an additional resource, not only as an inspiration for the theoretical backbone that informs our work, but also demonstrates the continuation of a tradition which is very soon to fall into our hands and onto our shoulders. May we rise to the challenge that this tradition represents, as I believe it is the very frontier of philosophy itself. This philosophy is both the height of a liberal bourgeois dialectic, its institutions and sensibilities, but it is also the vulgar depths required for the sublation of liberal bourgeois society towards a new socialist coordinate. We all know that liberal bourgeois society is in-itself dying and falling apart (being crucified); but what is more difficult is knowing how to raise it (resurrection) towards a higher level on the basis of an immanent critique and reconciliation. From this perspective not only is it necessary to establish the “thought foundations” of that society, but it is also necessary to wrestle with the “existentialist excess” of the subjectivity it produces, and also the libidinal dimension of its “social unconscious” as implicated in its disorienting politics and theology. From the “existentialist excess” itself we must reprocess “theopolitical lack” in order to build something that can withstand a world in the midst of a social apocalypse.
To purchase a copy of Real Speculations, check the link below:
And if you have purchased a copy, and appreciate the text, consider leaving a review on Amazon.
Beautiful preface! Looking forward to getting myself a copy of the book soon!