A Conclusive Overview (Part III)
The End of The Map Is Indestructible
VI
If Jesus was a carpenter, a person who worked on buildings, then Jesus claiming in Mark 13:1–2 that the temple would be torn down can became more significant. Jesus is undermining and deconstructing his own field: after his followers comment on the beauty of the temple, Jesus claims it ultimately doesn’t matter. This strikes me as a Hegelian “negation” which opens up new possibilities: in Jesus denying the carpentry he inherited from his father and labored over, Jesus is “opening up” the possibility of his crucifixion and all that would bring about. Please note that what Jesus is doing isn’t “self-sabotage” but “negation,” which is different. There is also a difference between “negation” and “effacement,” two terms which sound similar but are critically distinct. In Hegel, “negation” is part of dialectical development, while “effacement” can result when we seek “Primordial Unity,” “Wholeness,” or the like (as say discussed in Freud). Jesus does not disown carpentry or claim he wasted his time in mastering the practice; rather, he “negates” the trophies, social status, and ego-boosts the position could have given him, while at the same time owning the lessons, skills, and training. Often, “negation” seems to involve a disowning of the social benefits of a practice while keeping the invisible and hidden benefits that society doesn’t value. “Effacement,” on the other hand, can be a sacrificing of “the invisible benefits” for the social acknowledgment, wish-fulfillment, idealization, and the like. “Negation” can give up “the ego” for “the skills,” while “effacement” can give up “the skills” for “the ego.”
This in mind, we must work hard to establish “the coherence” of our system and thinking precisely to unveil that our “map” doesn’t ultimately and completely “correspond” with reality: even if we know Gödel’s “Incompleteness Theorem,” we have to earn this knowledge by working diligently to achieve complete “coherence” of our worldview, beliefs, and the like (“Costly Gödel” versus “Cheap Gödel,” to allude to Bonhoeffer). This is the difference between “cheap incompleteness”—simply saying that “coherent systems are ultimately incomplete” without any work—and “costly incompleteness”—doing the work to personally, experientially, emotionally, and fully encounter “ultimate incompleteness.” Hegel demands work of us, to not say “we know what Hegel concludes” and therefore not do the work to experience “what Hegel concludes.” “Ideas are not experiences,” as Hegel understood, and Absolute Knowing ultimately cannot be an idea. It must be experienced or won’t be present at all.
“Indestructible maps” cannot be destroyed, only left (or “curved”), and that effort must be experienced, which means it must hurt. But—why would we ever challenge something in which we could be “invincible”? It’s irrational and absurd, yes? In a very real sense, yes, and yet “abandoning invincibility” is what Hegel (and Hume) would demand of us. Where Hegel leads us is to make a decision that cannot be understood easily in terms of “rationality or irrationality”: it transcends the dichotomy. This hints though at why “nonrationally leaving behind indestructible maps” can help “fill the gap” left behind by the collapse of religion, as Nietzsche saw: religion has traditionally entailed ascribing to “faith,” a (“nonrational”) category of understanding which transcends rational understanding. Faith can in this way be dangerous, and yet faith also seems necessary if we are to act “nonrationally,” as is necessary in Hegel. If we are to do the work Hegel would have us do, it will require “faith,” keeping our eyes “on the unseen,” for all we will see around us in our “invincible map” is extremely good reason to stay there and make ourselves at home. In the midst of “complete coherence,” we will not readily see reason to leave it behind: we will easily always see reason to stay where we are, which means we might never make it to Absolute Knowing. Faith is required for us to move from Spirit to Absolute Knowing, and Religion could train us in that faith. With Religion not doing so, we must find different sources for providing ourselves “reason to have faith in faith” (a hope of The True Isn’t the Rational has been to argue this “nonrational” case, to see such “reason” through Hegel, Hume, Gödel, and others).
Wait, doesn’t this mean seeking Absolute Knowing is somehow irrational? In a sense, yes, as it is irrational to “leave behind an indestructible map,” and yet this is what Hegel would demand of us. But once we carry out this “irrational act,” it can suddenly be unveiled to us as “nonrational”: the negation unveils and opens up a new possibility from which rationality could always keep us blinded. As Jesus “leaves behind” his carpentry to step into his destiny on the cross, so we must “leave behind” our invincibility so that we can continue on toward Absolute Knowing (A/B). But here is the million-dollar question: What makes some people willing to leave their “indestructible map” and not others? Note the motivation for this act must be intrinsic, because in an “indestructible map,” nothing external can force us to leave. We simply somehow must know better and find intrinsic motivation, in ourselves, to move on (as Hegel would have of us). Well, how do we know better? Where does this “intrinsic motivation” come from? It seems to have something to do with beauty, truth, goodness, all of which ultimately have something to do with pleasure, bliss, and libido. Encounterology? Surprise? Our new social coordination? Perhaps.
Anyway, Hegel would have us perpetually submit ourselves to a constant effort to work to establish complete coherence (“costly” versus “cheap,” to allude to Bonhoeffer again), an effort which succeeding at will unveil that our “coherent system” is unable to “correspond” with reality. “No map is its territory,” but we cannot simply know this: we must experience this by working as hard as we possibly can to make the map be the territory. Isn’t this absurd? Arguably, yes, which is why “rationality” will not readily guide us to engage in Hegel’s work toward Absolute Knowing — we must ascent to “nonrationality.” It is “rational” to not try to make a map that equals its territory when we know this is impossible, but it is actually not “irrational” to make this attempt — that is the revelation of Hegel that we can gain if we take seriously that “ideas are not experiences.” The work to establish “complete coherence,” while knowing that succeeding will be the act which unveils the impossibility of “complete coherence,” is nonrational.¹⁷
The great lesson of Gödel is that it is precisely because our “map is indestructible” that we should negate it, that we should declare it “empty” just like Jesus, the carpenter, declared such of the temple. Because our ideology and “map” is completely coherent, there will always be reason to occupy it, marry our identities to it, and fight for it “fundamentally,” but what Gödel would have us realize is that this very state of invincibility is itself evidence that we should choose to negate it and ourselves. Note the use of the word “choose” here, for if “a map is indestructible,” that means nothing can force us to leave it as everything: the identification must be chosen.¹⁸ And why would we do that? Is it rational (of people/corporations/x) to give up invincibility?
VII
‘By the end of The Crying of Lot 49,’ Edward Mendelson tells us, ‘the heroine has become almost saturated by her knowledge of coincidence and cohesiveness, but this knowledge only leaves her with the ‘binary choice’ of either the One of transcendent meaning or the Zero of chaos and paranoia.’¹⁹ ²⁰ The enjoyment of death could be the enjoyment that everything is connected, for to experience “everything as connected” would overwhelm and destroy us (bringing Ross Byrd to mind). It can feel like a transgression to see “everything as connected,” for this can seem absurd and “against nature” (as “full of things”), and there is enjoyment in transgression (as Žižek teaches). ‘Pynchon emphasizes that the fictional worlds exist because the Word is lacking,’ but that lack is easily a product of radical excess we cannot compute (as Ebert emphasizes).²¹ There is enjoyment in lack, as there is terror, and perhaps an enjoyment of lack we can enjoy is enjoyment of making connections beyond what we can comprehend (is this “an invention of God”?). ‘Pynchon’s subject, throughout his work, is not self-obsession but the connectedness and coherence of the minute particulars of the world,’ eventually generating an excess we cannot comprehend.²² We can enjoy being overwhelmed, of losing control (sexual) (and perhaps are habituated in this direction by “dream-equality,” discussed in II.2, at the heart of Rationality, Categories, Institutions, Capital, AI…) — ‘camping among telephone wires’ — ‘an invitation to the speaking animal to consider what he makes of the world into which he introduces his communication systems.’²³ ²⁴ Kafka? “Philosophical Ascent” (Livingston, Hume)? Or (re)turn (Hegel, T.S. Eliot)? In Plurality and Ambiguity, Tracy tells us ‘[t]here is only that interaction named conversation’: interaction is a feedback loop between us, others, and our worlds.²⁵ Will we make the Absolute Choice of this Absolute Situation? A “(re)turn to (in-)common life,” of “faithful presence,” modeled in the Liminal Web?²⁶ Perhaps.
If “the map is indestructible” is correct, we cannot necessarily overturn ideologies or basically anything by opposing it; we must operate “within it” and change the conditions of possibility within, or otherwise we will end up like say Oedipa or “Byron the Bulb.” Throughout O.G. Rose, we have emphasized “changing the conditions of possibility,” and a hope of this book (and The True Isn’t the Rational more generally) is to justify this strategy. The patience and “faithful presence” of this strategy is justified by this trilogy, or so is the hope. There are bad ideas which can be destroyed with logical argument, but then I would argue these were never really “maps,” just notions and passing inclinations. A real map is indestructible, and so it can only be altered within it. Hence, we must work to be “faithfully present” to change “conditions of possibility” within somehow. Nothing else is sufficient. “The map is indestructible.”
If thought is a room without an entrance, we might enter thought by pondering why there are no doors. Similarly, if “the map is indestructible,” we can look for a (nonrational) way to “rise over it” versus try to destroy it. And perhaps in knowing how to “rise over” a “map,” we choose all the same to stay in our “map,” but this itself would be a beneficial and qualitative change: it could be “a return to common life” like what we are encouraged in Hume to embark on, as described in The Conflict of Mind. To “stay in common life” is not the same as “returning to common life”; likewise, to “absorb a map” is not the same as “choosing a map,” and though the later requires facing anxiety (like “the loss of givens”), this difficulty is why a different quality is possible. And for me, learning to live according to this “different quality” is required of us today, given the problems described in Belonging Again (such as “the banality of evil”) — but that means we must consider The Absolute Choice. But if we do, there is no telling the ways we might change ourselves.
Alright, but when I claim, “the map is indestructible,” am I saying people can never change? Am I “essentializing difference”? No. I am saying that we have spent a lot of time trying to change maps when we should try to change people. Maps never have to change. They can be changed, but not necessarily, and that means there can ultimately be limits to how far efforts to change maps can go. At this point in history, I believe these efforts (of Reason) have yielded the fruits they should (of Spirit and Religion), and now it is time for a negation/sublation (to Absolute Knowing). It is time to focus on people. This doesn’t mean we ignore maps, but it means that instead of focusing on maps then people, we need to focus on people then maps: instead of focusing on the rational as if it was the nonrational, we need to keep them distinct. We’ve made institutions, schools, churches, etc. in the business of maps; we need to make them in the business of helping people encounter difference. We need to focus on “surprising encounters” and “faithful presence,” preparation instead of planning — topics taken up later and elsewhere in O.G. Rose. To say, “the map is indestructible,” is to say, “we need to focus on subjects.”
In the Introduction, we said the phrase “the map is indestructible” is meant to suggest that no one must necessarily change their views or ideology, but this doesn’t mean no one can. It was argued that because people have employed the wrong strategy, we have lost hope in debate, discussion, democracy, and the like, and that as a result we seem today to be falling back onto threat and force. Democracy is in decline, but in an odd way the hope of this book has been to argue that “the map is indestructible” precisely to save democracy and rationality. That might not make any sense, but it is to get us to stop employing strategies which don’t work, and to stop using rationality in a way that leads to its self-effacing totalization. Instead of argument, this book is pointing to a world of “attraction” and “encounter,” where we try to model and show ourselves and our worlds to one another in spaces of interaction (like the “Liminal Web” and other modern “silk roads”), and it is this “shinning” that is our means of democracy. “A Democracy of Changing Conditions of Possibility” — this is the hope, but this hope could be dim if we don’t first understand how “maps” work and operate. Isn’t knowing “the map isn’t the territory” enough? No, for the idea that “the map isn’t the territory” could actually keep us employing our map without question, precisely because we can always tell ourselves, “I know it’s not the territory” and/or “I could disregard it whenever I wanted” (it’s just that we “always happen not to”). Furthermore, knowing “the map isn’t the territory” can create the impression that some maps are false and will deconstruct themselves, when the argument of this book is that maps never deconstruct themselves precisely because they are “internally consistent.” We are not in a world of telling the difference between “true and false maps” — that is a logic of “versus” (A/A) that is very problematic. No, there not “true and false maps”: there are “notions and maps” and (indestructible) maps will always be with us. Deconstruction was historically necessary to help us do away with false notions, yes, but there are limits to what Deconstruction can accomplish. Deconstruction cannot help us “address” maps (“the problem of internally consistent systems”); if we continue to use that tool in our current moment, we shall overfit it and suffer autocannibalism.
VIII
There is Volume III left of our trilogy, (Re)constructing “A Is A,” but here we can point to why that work is still needed by providing an outline that will hopefully at the same time help elucidate this book, while also helping put it in further conversation with Belonging Again. In Volume I, we learned of “conflicts of mind” which could existentially overwhelm us. In the past, sociological “givens” could protect us from these “conflicts,” but once they fell away and we had to think about our worlds more than just “absorb” them, it became possible for us to encounter these “conflicts” and then suffer the resulting anxiety. To deal with this anxiety, we could turn to “maps,” which for most of history arose with “givens” (as “givens/maps,” per se), but “maps” were not the primary drive of human organization or activity. There has always been an “internally consistent system” latent in Christianity (for example), but most of history that (theological) “map” didn’t have to do “the majority of the lifting” for people or the sociological order, precisely because that work fell on “givens,” and that work was done with “thoughtlessness,” hence why the “givens” could handle the responsibility (they really didn’t have to “defend themselves” just “be themselves”). However, as Modernity developed into Postmodernity and now us, the “givens/maps” increasingly just became “maps,” and theology in Christianity had to do more work, as did every religion and ideology, and many of them were able to avoid deconstruction as “mere notions” and indeed establish themselves as “internally consistent systems.” These are “indestructible” and so could be “practically like” (“thoughtless”) “givens,” making them an adequate substitute (“maps” are like “the shadow of Buddha” of “givens,” alluding to Nietzsche). And ever since Postmodernity the acceptance of “maps as an address” of our situation has only increased—but our argument is that this is not enough, for it will easily just fragment the world into small fascist states. The more centralized order after World War II will fail, and though this could seem like a liberation, without “the spread of Childhood” to make people the kinds of subjects who can handle this liberation, we will suffer autocannibalism.
Joel Carini of The Natural Theologian discusses how he became a Christian Humanist versus a Christian Presuppositionalist, and what he means by “Presuppositionalist” could help us understand what it means to claim we have treated “maps as an address” in response to Modernity and what followed. Presuppositionalism is when we accept axioms of how the universe works, say we nonrationally choose to believe in the Christian Trinity, and then we build a worldview up from that foundation. It is “map-making,” but critically Presuppositionalism is a belief that “all we can hope for is maps”—map-making is the end of the line. Isn’t that true, though? Haven’t we said this whole time that everyone must have “maps” and so everyone must be a Presuppositionalist? Well, we must accept and have “maps,” yes, and in a way we are all Presuppositionalists in the sense that we must all have “views from somewhere” but the question is must we be stuck and limited by presuppositions? Yes, but now the key Hegelian move: the limits and presuppositions we cannot avoid are what we are to work to (intersuppositionally) “encounter,” and in that, something can emerge via negation/sublation. Limits then are (un)limited. The fact thought must be assumed is a condition thought can think and be changed by: the acceptance of limits can be “an (un)limited unfolding.”
This book has argued that Kurt Gödel helped usher in our Age of Presuppositionalism, for though not everyone has made the switch yet, many have come to understand that it is not possible for a worldview to exist that is entirely and completely provable, which means that all worldviews must ultimately rely on premises that cannot be confirmed; ergo, (nonrational) presuppositions. And so many people have chosen their beliefs, assumptions, axioms, etc. and come to see their lack of final confirmation and certainty not as evidence against them but as a necessary structural reality of all possible worldviews — no one, in this way, has an edge on anyone else. This is to acknowledge Gödel’s point and “The Gödel Point,” which all of us hopefully will acknowledge, but how we do so is very consequential: do we use it to make our map indestructible and a means of defending ourselves, or do we acknowledge it as the place where we need to “faithfully dwell,” forgoing the use of the indestructibility of our maps to protect ourselves from negativity? (An Absolute Choice?)
With “the loss of givens” we alternatively fell back onto “indestructible maps” to support us, but this is more existentially and mentally exhausting then “givens,” though nevertheless it is better than nothing, for otherwise we would have already been self-effaced by “The Real” and incomprehensibility. But this “pleasure of understanding/relief” comes with the price of generating the condition of map-pluralization, which includes the conditions of possibility for the making and spread of small fascist states. But what else can we do? We are stuck with “maps,” aren’t we? And so we all seem poised to be Presuppositionalists now, which, without us realizing it, means we are positioned to be fascists. What then? Abandon the project and end up overwhelmed by “conflicts of mind”? Isolate ourselves radically from Global Pluralism? That could work, but only if we radically limit our exposure to technology. Is that what we must do? Perhaps — but that would not be the “new address” like we seek.
The Map Is Indestructible is a critique of Presuppositionalism as a sufficient “address” for Global Pluralism, especially in light of Global Techno-Capital. This book acknowledges Presuppositionalism while at the same time looking for something beyond/in it, and what that is and its implications shall be a main concern of Volume III. Our hope to avoid the possible fascistic results of Presuppositionalism — which is an avoidance of a Totalized Rationality which concerned Fondane but not much of an improvement from — is for us all to commit to something within our “maps” that at the same time unbinds us from a fascistic fate. What is that? “The Gödel Point,” which will be elaborated on in Volume III — the point where “correspondence” and “coherence” trade-off and unveil they are not identical. It is the point where rationality unveils a need for nonrationality, nonrationality a need for rationality, as it is the point where thinking needs perception and perception thinking. It is the point of “passing over into otherness” (A/B), and it is the point that when faced with we can either confirm the indestructibility of our “map” or “step into it” ourselves, not using “the indestructibility of our map” to protect us from anxiety, subjectivity destitution, etc. Why would anyone do that? It’s irrational. Well, it’s nonrational, and “why” exactly would have to be based on faith and courage for something that cannot be guaranteed (or else it would be a rational act). And what would that be? (Beauty?)
Where there is an “indestructible map,” we have a way to defend ourselves with something indestructible: whatever comes our way, we can incorporate, dismiss, rationalize, etc. it with our map. We never have to face “real difference” and/or “the (truly) surprising,” for whatever we encounter can be integrated into our consistency. In this way, the “indestructible map” is an ultimate shield and means of protecting ourselves as subjects from “The Real” and possibility of “subjective destitution” (“givens” are a comparable means of protection) — why in the world would we not use it as such? Are we mad? And aren’t we justified to so use it, seeing as maps are unavoidable and necessary (given the inevitably of presuppositions)? Why would we risk destruction? Well, perhaps only if we thought that using maps to avoid negativity could paradoxically lead to destruction — and that is indeed what is being claimed in this book. But aren’t “maps indestructible”? Doesn’t that mean we will inevitably so use them? No, it means “maps will always be with us,” but that doesn’t mean we have to use their indestructibility to defend ourselves from negativity. That there are maps is necessary, but how we use maps, and how we posture ourselves toward them, is open.
Maps are indestructible because without them the Real destroys us, because map-making is part of the territory and so will always emerge (back) from the territory, and because maps are internally consistent and hence never have to be deconstructed (even if they can be left). If we realize “maps are indestructible,” that can give us a choice to think differently about them and what we do when we think. Is thinking just about confirming the indestructibility of our maps, helping protect us from negativity? Or is thinking about something else? What? Keeping itself from “enclosures” (A/A), perhaps, which is only possible in the Gödel Point. We only find our Gödel Point where our map is (realized as) indestructible though, and hence the temptation of instead defending ourselves. (Satan tempted Christ with his future.)
The “double move” this book has tried to argue is that “autonomous rationality” devours itself, meaning we require “the nonrational.” But that realization alone is not enough, because we could with “(non)rationality” just choose to end up in a Presuppositionalism that leads us toward a world of small fascist states — or we could choose to do something else. What? To dwell in the Gödel Point. “The Gödel Point” is where we choose either (tempting) confirmation of our indestructible map and protection, or a place of “dwelling” and “faithful presence” in our “subjective destitution” for a reason we cannot rationally justify or guarantee (“The Absolute (Defining) Choice” of “lack and/or the Gödel Point is nothing” (A/A) or “lack and/or Gödel Point is not nothing” (A/B)). It is only rational perhaps that we have not chosen this second option (A/B) up to this point in history, but I think now we must. Can we? Perhaps. Always perhaps.
IX
We require something stable, reliable, and constant if we are not to be destroyed by “The Real,” but what? We’ve gone through a historic period where it was “givens,” and we have gone through a period of “maps.” But now? Us. We must be the source of indestructibility, but of course we ourselves as subjects are very destructible. Are we doomed? No, because even if we can’t be “technically indestructible,” we can be “practically (in)destructible,” in the sense that we can withstand and maintain “a faithful presence” through negativity (as Cadell discusses, our “immortality drive,” “unstoppable,” can be addressed this way, I think — it must Cost). Only through this can we (re)construct that which isn’t so deconstructible — we must practically be “the still point” (“like Christ” and “appearing heretical”…).
(Re)constructing “A Is A” will say more, but the Gödel Point is where we are “with” the territory, for it generates the tradeoff between correspondence and coherence, which is part of the territory. We can access the territory then, on this point, as Hegel understood, looking at Kant. This then means we can have a shared territory with Others and Difference — the dream of addressing Pluralism through a shared territory is possible, and what is realized here is that this is not a territory of facts, science, or empiricism, but a territory of the Gödel Point generating the break/tradeoff/(un)veiling between correspondence and coherence, (nonrational) truth and rationality, perception and thinking. The Gödel Point is to be our “homebase,” per se (our “homelack” we “orbit”). Yes, we will still use our maps, going away from our “Gödel Homebase” to function, but always (re)turning. We don’t deconstruct “maps,” no, for we keep them to know where there is a Gödel Point — to find where we feel lost (so that we might be driven). A world of Global Pluralism where everyone shared a Gödel Homebase — “the spread of Childhood” — possible without denying Difference, however hard.
“The Gödel Point” is where we as subjects do not use the indestructibility of our maps to defend ourselves from negativity (a choice in making that itself brings us negativity that we choose to commit to suffering). An “address” of Global Pluralism could be found in a world of subjects (nonrationally) committed to dwelling in their (maps’) Gödel Point, which means they are committed to suffering a “subjective destitution” despite always having “at hand” an “indestructible map” which could defend them from this negativity (perhaps like Christ on the cross choosing not to summon the angels to aid him). The fact every map has a Gödel Point is why this global connection is possible, but it is not primarily based on the Gödel Point itself so much as it is based on the subjectivity which is formed in the Gödel Point (A/B) by people who Absolutely Choose to “dwell” there in “faithful presence.” Without us so formed, the Gödel Point is just something structurally odd…
We must do the work of finding in our map the Gödel Point, which paradoxically requires us to do the incredibly rational and hard work of realizing the “internal consistency” of our maps, which could take decades, only to ultimately forgo the “indestructibility” then at our fingertips in favor of the “subjective destitution” found in our map’s Gödel Point. If we don’t do the rational work of realizing consistency, we can’t find this Point, meaning we can’t “skip ahead”: we can’t just read what is written here and find the Gödel Point and “dwell there”; we still have to go through the (ultimately sacrificial and negative/sublative) work of making/realizing our map (and its “internal consistency”). Then, once we do that and realize our map’s Gödel Point, we are finally positioned to make our Absolute Choice: do we accept a trophy and crown for our hard work of “an indestructible map” that can always protect us and even give us a (problematic) sense of belonging? Or do we step into the Gödel Point and suffer for something not guaranteed? (Choose life.)
We can never destroy “maps” without destroying ourselves, but we can relate to them differently in choosing to relate to the Gödel Point differently, but the way we can relate differently is for us to suffer nonrationally. This opens up the possibility of (re)constructing logic and ontoepistemology in terms of A/B versus A/A — but why? Why not just protect ourselves with an indestructible map? Why do something so hard without any guarantee? (Matthew 4.) Are we fools? Also, is not the Gödel Point where there is no direction in our map? Just raw choice? Yes. So, it is where we can be lost, yes? Yes — the point of a map for Children is to find the Gödel Point where we can be lost and stay there: we want to find the hardest possible spot to find in order to be where we can be lost. “Costly (In)destructibility” is earned with the feeling of being lost and not being destroyed by that feeling. This is the test. In Christianity, the law is how we realize the sin which the law also makes us realize we cannot but by grace be redeemed from; likewise, the map is how we realize where we can find the place where there is no direction, just us. Christ, are we mad? Until this point in history, when the “plausible deniability” is running out that Global Pluralism isn’t heading toward autocannibalism, that is perhaps the only conclusion we can reach. But history is increasingly unveiling that “the mad” is actually “the nonrational.” (Take up the cross.) And might there be “glimmers” there of something else? (Beauty?)
As a note of hope, after Kurt Gödel, I don’t believe there are any Differences that necessarily can’t be worked with, for all Differences must entail Gödel Points unless they are mere notions, and then they will deconstruct themselves away on their own with time. That doesn’t mean notions can’t be problematic — they might attack us and require self-defense again — but it is to say that if they are submitted to “free speech” and democracy, they can eventually be deconstructed. That makes them a secondary concern: the deeper challenge is “maps,” Real Differences, and those I am arguing must entail Gödel Points. If that is so, there is the possibility of a shared connected between subjects across Real Differences in the Gödel Point, which is a place where the subject suffers anxiety, “subjective destitution,” etc. Who would choose to do such a thing? No one bound by “autonomous rationality,” but perhaps a subject who has faith that this Absolute Choice is worth it. Why? How? (Beauty?)
(Re)constructing “A Is A” will approach logic and thinking not in service of map-making primarily (A/A), but (re)constructing it from within the Gödel Point (A/B). It is a(n) (unstable and more temporal) logic and ontoepistemology primarily based on the “passing-over” of correspondence into coherence, perception into thinking, and vice-versa — and never shall “the passing-over” be finished. This suggests I am simply repeating Hegel, yes, but hopefully there is value in the (re)peat. If not, I apologize — I’m glad I did it all the same (every repeat is its own). Ultimately, there is the Cheap, Technical Indestructibility (of maps), and then there is the Costly, Practical (In)destructibility of subjects who reside and learn to handle the Gödel Point. Costly (In)destructibility is our hope for addressing Global Pluralism, which is a quality of Childhood. And so the question: “Can we spread Childhood?” Maps are “Cheaply and Technically Indestructible” — rational to employ — while we as subjects must be “Costly and Practically (In)destructible” — nonrational and possibly mad. Can we resist the temptation of maps for this Christ- and Child-likeness? Even if we wanted to, how? That is a question of Belonging Again, a question of our “medium condition,” and more.
‘Durkheim concluded that people need obligations and constraints to provide structure and meaning to their lives’ — can we commit ourselves to something to such a degree that we become “an unstoppable force” (like our “immortality drive”), which is another way to say “practically (in)destructible” — the fruit of Costly (In)destructibility versus Cheap Indestructibility?²⁷ That is ultimately the question, I think: if we are dealing with something indestructible, our hope might be found in, regardless the negativity or “subjective destitution,” becoming unstoppable (“a self-turning wheel”)? Can we Absolutely Choose a “faithful presence” (at the Gödel Point) and so prove unstoppable in our work, as I think both Hegel and Nietzsche teach is needed of us? If something is indestructible, there is perhaps only one way to address it: we change the entire world in which it is situated. How do we do that? Negating/sublating A/A into A/B and not stopping until the work is completed (which it never is). What is indestructible cannot necessarily stop us, and certainly “maps” (A/A) can’t stop us from seeing the world differently (A/B), especially since the resources for seeing the world differently are in “maps” themselves (in “maps not being the territory” — at the Gödel Point). What makes “maps” indestructible is what makes them contain ways for seeing the world anew, and seeing the indestructible differently is how that invincibility can be addressed. We can’t destroy the indestructible but the unstoppable can hit and slant it — “maps” can change without changing. Even if “the map is indestructible,” it can be curved.
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Notes
¹⁷To offer an image to help us understand how “complete coherence” unveils “ultimate incompleteness,” imagine that we are in a dungeon, as say explored in the Zelda videogame series. We have a torch, and whenever we explore a corner of the room, it lights up and stays lit up on our map (it is no longer covered in darkness). The dungeon is very big and it is difficult for us to explore all of it, but eventually we do. The entire dungeon is now illuminated and visible, and it is exactly when that occurs that a flute sound plays and a door opens in the wall. It is a stairway leading up to another dark dungeon where we can repeat the process.
The door in the wall wouldn’t open until every inch of the dark dungeon was explored and illuminated. Perhaps we knew ahead of time that such a door would open up, and perhaps we were tempted to stop exploring the dark dungeons because “what’s the point” — we’d just be led into another dungeon to repeat the process. We could never finish or complete our task: there would also be more to do. This would be to fall into “bad nihilism,” if I were to use Nietzsche’s language; instead, we must take Hegel seriously and continue the work. To cease exploring the dungeon and “just know” a door will open would be “cheap Gödel,” per se, while doing the work and having the door open would be “costly Gödel.” Both Hume and Hegel would have us take “the costly route,” but that will not be easy.
But if a “trap door” opens when we establish “complete coherence,” doesn’t that mean there is “reason to leave” the “indestructible map”? Wouldn’t this mean the act isn’t really “nonrational”? Fair point, but this only applies if we look at the opening (a perhaps “nonrational act” itself) — the door could open up and we never look at it, instead marveling at how great of a job we did to illuminate the whole dungeon. There is nothing in “the map” which would force us to “acknowledge the opening”: we simply have to know to look for it and that we should leave through the door. But even if we do “glimpse” the opening, we can simply tell ourselves that this opening is “an inescapable opening in every system” — we can use Gödel precisely to maintain our current “indestructible” position (as discussed in the paper “The Map Is Indestructible” by O.G. Rose), which is to say we can use “incompleteness” in favor of ideology preservation. Acknowledging the opening is not the same as “traveling into it,” which we will arguably never have “rational reason” to do, especially once we figure out that we can make “the opening” work in service of our ideology. Once we learn, for example, that all ideologies must ultimately fall back on axioms and assumptions, we can simply say that “the opening” is where our axioms are found, and since every system requires axioms, every ideology has such an “opening,” and thus we have “no reason” to think that the presence of “the opening” in our ideology means we should change, questions ourselves, or adjust our thinking. We can always say that “we’re just like everyone else” and so “rationally” give ourselves reason to stay in our “invincible map.” For this reason, choosing to enter “the opening” versus only acknowledge it in service of our ideology will prove to be a “nonrational act.” It will require believing in something we don’t see, something like faith. Faith and trust, as so described, seem to be the only way to Absolute Knowing.
¹⁸Faith is a way to choose what transcends rationality, and we generally lost faith when we lost religion. As a result, we cannot easily reach Absolute Knowing. Hume’s journey is also an act of faith, for there will always be “good reason” not to return to “common life” and to instead occupy “the Ivy Tower” Hume warns about. And how crazy it sounds to spend so much time learning philosophy and mastering rationality, only to ultimately make a “nonrational” choice to “negate” that work and “return” to common life (where we likely will not be appreciated) — it’s crazy. (Jesus was crazy.)
Religion was once to a degree about engaging in a “nonrational process” and “nonrational work” (to allude to Hegel). In losing religion, we basically lost the category of “nonrationality,” leaving us only with “irrational versus rational.” Now, everything is either “irrational” or “rational,” and stuck in this dichotomy, it basically becomes impossible for us to engage in the work Hegel would have us do. Work is being done to bring back “nonrationality” (as can be seen in the work of Lorenzo Barberis Canonico on neurodiversity), but there is still much work to be done. Funny enough, if the consequences of the dichotomy between “rational and irrational” become too pronounced and obvious, that too can “wake us up” into the need for “nonrationality” (and arguably make “nonrationality rational,” strangely), but at that point the consequences could be too dire for us to recover from. Hard to say.
¹⁹Mendelson, Edward. “Pynchon’s Gravity.” Thomas Pynchon. Edited by Harold Bloom. Edgemont, PA: Chelsea House Publishers, 1986: 21.
²⁰Every map seems like it must eventually lead us to this choice, and I would say it is here that we must Absolutely Choose to reside in “faithful presence” (and so “Absolute Letting,” as discussed in “The Net #135”).
²¹Hite, Molly. Ideas of Order in the Novels of Thomas Pynchon. New York, NY: Ohio State University Press, 1983: 89.
²²Mendelson, Edward. “Pynchon’s Gravity.” Thomas Pynchon. Edited by Harold Bloom. Edgemont, PA: Chelsea House Publishers, 1986: 15.
²³Kermode, Frank. “The Use of Codes in The Cry of Love 49.” Thomas Pynchon. Edited by Harold Bloom. Edgemont, PA: Chelsea House Publishers, 1986: 14.
²⁴Kermode, Frank. “The Use of Codes in The Cry of Love 49.” Thomas Pynchon. Edited by Harold Bloom. Edgemont, PA: Chelsea House Publishers, 1986: 14.
²⁵Tracy, David. Plurality and Ambiguity. New York, NY: First Harper & Row Paperback Edition, 1989: 19.
²⁶Coherence can be thought of as “relation without Otherness”; relationship, “relation with Otherness.” “Otherness” bind imaginations and life from ending up mad, and in this act make possible “freedom in” the Absolute.
²⁷Haidt, Jonathan. The Happiness Hypothesis. New York, NY: Basic Books, 2006: 133.
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