Think It's A Game

Chapter 2 The Thanatosis of Enlightenment 2.1 Myth and enlightenment: Adorno and Horkheimer 2.2 The sacrifice of sacrifice 2.3 Commemorating reflection 2.4 The dispossession of space 2.5 The mimesis of death Chapter 3 The Enigma of Realism 3.1 The arche-fossil: Quentin Meillassoux 3.2 The correlationist response 3.2.1 The lacuna of manifestation 3.2.2 Instantiating the transcendental 3.2.3 Ancestrality and chronology 3.3 The two regimes of sense 3.4 The principle of factuality 3.5 The three figures of factuality 3.5.1 The impossibility of contradiction 3.5.2 The necessary existence of contingency 3.5.3 The inconstancy of nature 3.6The diachronicity of thinking and being 3.7The paradox of absolute contingency Part II The Anatomy of Negation Chapter 4 Unbinding the Void 4.1 The unbinding of being: Alain Badiou 4.2 The a priority of ontological discourse 4.3 The law of presentation 4.4 Structure, metastructure, representation 4.5 The suture to the unpresentable 4.6 Presentation as anti-phenomenon 4.7 The metaontological exception 4.8 The two regimes of presentation 4.9 Consequences of subtraction Contents ix Preface xiii Part I Destroying the Manifest Image Cover 1 Contents 8 Preface 11 Part I: Destroying the Manifest Image 15 Chapter 1 The Apoptosis of Belief 16 1.1 The manifest image and the myth of Jones: Wilfrid Sellars 16 1.2 The instrumentalization of the scientific image 19 1.3 Cognitive catastrophe: Paul Churchland 22 1.4 The neurocomputational alternative 24 1.5 The ‘paradox’ of eliminativism 27 1.6 From the superempirical to the metaphysical 31 1.7 The appearance of appearance 39 Chapter 2 The Thanatosis of Enlightenment 45 2.1 Myth and enlightenment: Adorno and Horkheimer 45 2.2 The sacrifice of sacrifice 47 2.3 Commemorating reflection 52 2.4 The dispossession of space 55 2.5 The mimesis of death 58 Chapter 3 The Enigma of Realism 62 3.1 The arche-fossil: Quentin Meillassoux 62 3.2 The correlationist response 66 3.3 The two regimes of sense 73 3.4 The principle of factuality 76 3.5 The three figures of factuality 82 3.6 The diachronicity of thinking and being 96 3.7 The paradox of absolute contingency 98 Part II: The Anatomy of Negation 108 Chapter 4 Unbinding the Void 109 4.1 The unbinding of being: Alain Badiou 109 4.2 The a priority of ontological discourse 110 4.3 The law of presentation 113 4.4 Structure, metastructure, representation 114 4.5 The suture to the unpresentable 116 4.6 Presentation as anti-phenomenon 118 4.7 The metaontological exception 119 4.8 The two regimes of presentation 123 4.9 Consequences of subtraction 127 Chapter 5 Being Nothing 130 5.1 Realism, constructivism, deconstruction: Françis Laruelle 130 5.2 The essence of philosophy 132 5.3 Philosophical decision as transcendental deduction 134 5.4 Naming the real 139 5.5 Ventriloquizing philosophy 143 5.6 The evacuation of the real 147 5.7 Determination in the last instance 150 5.8 The thinking object 152 5.9 Transcendental unbinding 153 5.10 Absolute and relative autonomy 155 5.11 Non dialectical negativity 158 5.12 The identity of space-time 160 Part III: The End of Time 162 Chapter 6 The Pure and Empty Form of Death 163 6.1 Who is time?: Heidegger 163 6.2 Ekstasis and ekstema 166 6.3 Finite possibility and actual infinity 168 6.4 Deleuze: time in and for itself 172 6.5 The intensive nature of difference 174 6.6 Individuation and the individual 181 6.7 The syntheses of space and time 184 6.8 The fracture of thinking 188 6.9 The caesura of the act 191 6.10 The two faces of death 195 6.11 The fusion of mind and nature 197 6.12 The expression of complexity 202 6.13 The life of the mind 205 Chapter 7 The Truth of Extinction 215 7.1 Nietzsche’s fable 215 7.2 The turning point 225 7.3 Solar catastrophe: Lyotard 233 7.4 The seizure of phenomenology: Levinas 240 7.5 The trauma of life: Freud 244 7.6 Binding extinction 248 Notes 250 Bibliography 272 Index of Names 279 A 279 B 279 C 279 D 279 E 279 F 279 G 279 H 279 J 280 K 280 L 280 M 280 N 280 O 280 P 280 R 280 S 280 T 280 V 280 W 280 Z 280 Index of Subjects 281 A 281 B 281 C 281 D 281 E 282 F 282 H 282 I 282 J 283 L 283 M 283 N 283 O 284 P 284 Q 284 R 284 S 284 T 285 U 285 V 285 W 285 Z 285

Where much contemporary philosophy seeks to stave off the "threat" of nihilism by safeguarding the experience of meaning—characterized as the defining feature of human existence—from the Enlightenment logic of disenchantment, this book attempts to push nihilism to its ultimate conclusion by forging a link between revisionary naturalism in Anglo-American philosophy and anti-phenomenological realism in recent French philosophy. Contrary to an emerging "post-analytic" consensus which would bridge the analytic-continental divide by uniting Heidegger and Wittgenstein against the twin perils of scientism and skepticism, this book short-circuits both traditions by plugging eliminative materialism directly into speculative realism.

Front Matter....Pages i-xiii Front Matter....Pages 1-1 The Apoptosis of Belief....Pages 3-31 The Thanatosis of Enlightenment....Pages 32-48 The Enigma of Realism....Pages 49-94 Front Matter....Pages 95-95 Unbinding the Void....Pages 97-117 Being Nothing....Pages 118-149 Front Matter....Pages 151-151 The Pure and Empty Form of Death....Pages 153-204 The Truth of Extinction....Pages 205-239 Back Matter....Pages 240-275 Nihilism is not an affliction to be overcome, but a vector of intellectual discovery which philosophy should try to push to its ultimate conclusion. Disregarding the orthodox division between analytic and continental traditions, this book tries to forge a link between revisionary naturalism in Anglo-American philosophy and speculative realism in contemporary French philosophy.
This book pushes nihilism to its ultimate conclusion by linking revisionary naturalism in Anglo-American philosophy with anti-phenomenological realism in French philosophy. Contrary to the 'post-analytic' consensus uniting Heidegger and Wittgenstein against scientism and scepticism, this book links eliminative materialism and speculative realism. Eliminative materialism and scientific realism -- The thanatosis of Enlightenment -- The enigma of realism -- The anti-phenomenon -- The enigma of realism -- Transcendental nihilism -- The thanatosis of Enlightenment -- The pure and empty form of death -- Solar catastrophe "Disregarding the orthodox division between analytic and continental traditions, this book tries to forge a link between revisionary naturalism in Anglo-American philosophy and speculative realism in contemporary French philosophy."--Back cover