Totality

ماتریالیسم دیالکتیکی
استفان کیپفِر
برگردان: آیدین ترکمه
پس از گذشتِ دو سال، ترجمه‌ی کتاب ماتریالیسم دیالکتیکی نوشته‌ی آنری لوفور به چاپ دوم رسید. به همین بهانه، این متن، که پیشگفتاری است که استفان کیپفر بر ترجمه‌ی انگلیسی کتاب ماتریالیسم دیالکتیکی نوشته است برای معرفیِ بیشترِ کتاب منتشر می‌شود.
«لوفور می‌گويد ماركس در اين زمان هنوز برداشتی منفی از علم منطق هگل دارد. ماركس در فقر فلسفه (1847) و مانيفست كمونيست (1848) منطق ديالكتيكی هگل را بسان منطقی يكسره انتزاعی، صرفاً صوری، و كاملاً ناسازگار با برداشتی ماترياليستی از انسان بی‌اهميت جلوه می‌دهد. همانطور كه خود مارکس در سال ۱۸۵۸ در نامه‌ای به انگلس اعلان می‌كند، او فقط هنگامی به منطق ديالكتيكی هگل برمی‌گردد كه روی مقدمه‌ای برکوششی در نقد اقتصاد سياسی (1859) و سرمايه(1867) كار می‌كند. تنها آن‌جا بود كه بنا به گفته‌ی لوفور، ماركس به طور شایسته از منطق هگل فراروی می‌كند. در اين كارهای متاخرتر، «ايده‌آليسم و ماترياليسم نه تنها از نو به هم می‌پيوندند، بلكه دگرگون می‌شوند و از آن‌ها فراروی می‌شود». اين به ماترياليسمی ديالكتيكی می‌انجامد كه آن طور كه در صورت‌بندی استالين فرض می‌شد ضدِ بيرونیِ ايده‌آليسم باقی نمی‌ماند.»

By tracing the function of totality in French post-structuralist thought, particularly that of Jacques Derrida and Jean-François Lyotard, this study will demonstrate how in the postmodern era a new stability has been found within the absolute repudiation of consensus.  It will be argued that the undialectical dualistic tendencies in this thought constitutes a new totality, counterposing progress and stasis, heterogeneity and homogeniety, homology and paralogy, as if they were not mutually constitutive. Frustrating though it may be that the search for a non-totalizing consensus has proven to be so elusive and at times so dangerous, the absolute opposition to all forms of totality does not provide a solution to this problem, offering, as it does, a new form of stability. It is, however, precisely this negation of totality which can be seen as the primary project of postmodernism.  Implcit throughout this study is a defence of Marxist dialectics over the absolute heterogeneity of postmodernism.

This book argues that, in the wake of the postmodern, contemporary culture becomes once again concerned with totality, the main focal point of expression for this being concepts of the global. It uncovers predominant ways of conceptualising the global in contemporary literature, film and theory. In so doing, it offers a fresh approach to the study of globalisation and culture, identifying four main categories under which concepts of the global can be placed: the immanent, the transcendent, the contingent and the beyond-measure. Alongside this, it discovers a confrontation between two predominant ways of figuring human relations on a global scale. Conceptualising the Global in the Wake of the Postmodern examines the works of various authors and filmmakers, such as Margaret Atwood, Don DeLillo, Kazuo Ishiguro, Douglas Coupland, David Cronenberg, Charlie Kaufman, and David Lynch, to show how the idea of totality has returned in contemporary culture.

Einleitung: Thema, Fragestellung, Gliederung der Arbeit
Die Untersuchung der Kombinationen von Schrift und Bild eröffnet ein vielschichtiges Themengebiet und ein sehr weitreichendes Forschungsfeld. Trotz der langen Tradition stellt die gemeinsame Erscheinung und wechselseitige Durchdringung von Literatur und bildender Kunst noch heute ein aktuelles Forschungsfeld für Sprachphilosophie, -wissenschaft und Kunst dar.  Eine weitgehende Übereinstimmung ist in der Literatur wahrzunehmen: „Die Literatur gelangt dabei in der visuellen Poesie zum sprachlosen Bild, in Wort-Bild-Texten bezieht sie Fotos und Grafik mit ein, in multi-medialen Aktionen wird sie zum Bestandteil eines optischen und akustischen Environments“[1].  Gegenstand der vorliegenden Arbeit ist vornehmlich die Betrachtung des Phänomens der Ikonisierung von Sprache[2]bzw. der Eingliederung von der bildenden Kunst in schriftliche Werke und insbesondere der Verbildlichung literarisch-typographischer Materialien bei den Parole in libertà [= befreiten Worten/ Wörtern – befreiter Sprache[3] des italienischen Futurismus.

Die Komplexität der futuristischen Bildsprache[4] stellt heutige Leser vor eine doppelte Herausforderung: Einerseits setzen die futuristischen Bildtexte[5] ein geeignetes kulturgeschichtliches Kontextwissen voraus, das die in den einzelnen Werken jeweils vorausgesetzten Wissens- und Verstehenshorizonte eröffnet, andererseits stellen sie eine Verbindung zu späteren bild- und zeichentheoretischen Debatten bis in die Gegenwart her: Dabei sind sie unter medientheoretischen und semiotischen Gesichtspunkten als hybride Gattung zu erschließen, als Medien-Kunst, und zwar als ‚Medien’ für die Vermittlung einer Mitteilung und als ‚Kunst’ auf der (selbstreferentiellen) ästhetisch-semiotischen Ebene.  Hier setze ich mir zum Ziel, herauszuarbeiten, inwieweit visuelle (graphische) und verbale Elemente in der futuristischen Bildsprache ineinander greifen, und inwiefern diese ‚Vernetzung’ von Schrift und Bild als „Antwort der Literatur“ auf das veränderte Wahrnehmungsvermögen des Menschen in der Zeit der Technik und der revolutionierenden wissenschaftlichen Erkenntnisse der Physik und Mathematik – hundert Jahre vor dem "Global Denken“ – sowie auf die zunehmende Komplexität der zwischenmenschlichen Kommunikation angesehen werden darf. Die aus der futuristischen Sprachbefreiung (Manfred Kohrt) entstandene Bildsprache soll dabei auf seine Relevanz für unser Verständnis des Menschen in der „schnellen Zeit der Maschinen“ und seiner Weise, sich literarisch auszudrücken, überprüft werden.

Was die Struktur und Vorgehensweise betrifft,  ist die vorliegende Arbeit in zwei Hauptteile gegliedert. Der erste, aus vier Kapitel bestehende Hauptteil, behandelt die theoretischen Grundlagenfür die Entstehung der italienischen futuristischen Bewegung und insbesondere ihrer künstlerischen Revolution der “Befreiung des Wortes” und der daraus entstandenen Literatur des sogenannten Paroliberismus, der nach Faust „den wichtigsten Beitrag“ darstellt, „den der Futurismus in die Entwicklung der modernen Literatur und insbesondere der Visuellen Poesie einbrachte“.[6] Diesem einführenden Kapitel mit der Präsentation des Vorhabens folgt ein knapper kulturhistorischer Abriss, der das literarische Phänomen in seinen kultur-historischen Kontext setzt. Das 3. Kapitel bietet eine Einführung in die Geschichte und Entwicklung des Konzeptes von Bildsprache an, wobei historische Vorläufer des Paroliberismus sowiedurch ihn – mit Bezug auf die Kombination von Schrift und Bild – beeinflusste spätere literarische und intermediale Phänomene überblickend dargestellt werden. Daran anschließend werden im 4. Kapitel anhand von Manifesten und theoretischen Schriften die programmatischen Elemente der futuristischen Bewegung erläutert bzw. die Kernthesen von Filippo Tommaso Marinetti, die besondere Bedeutung für die Bearbeitung und Gestaltung einer literarischen Sprache haben, kritisch dargestellt.

Um das theoretische Wissen mit der „Praxis“ (= den konkreten Werken) zu vergleichen und die Merkmale der futuristischen Bildsprache exemplarisch zu veranschaulichen, sollen im zweiten Teil der Arbeit einige um das „künstlerisch hektische“ Jahr 1914 entstandene Arbeiten italienischer Futuristen in Betracht gezogen und deren ästhetische Faktur angesichts der besprochenen Theorien und der bestehenden Schrift-Bild-Relationen verdeutlicht werden. Ziel ist hier zu untersuchen, inwieweit einzelne Bildtexte, deren Sprache auf unterschiedlicher Weise entziffert werden muss, das ästhetische Ideal der futuristischen Bewegung widerspiegeln. Die Auseinandersetzung mit der Besonderheit der jeweiligen Texte soll ermöglichen, die Singularität der in direktem Zusammenhang mit dem Schaffensprozess stehenden Varianten, den Spielraum der jeweiligen Techniken und künstlerischen Intentionen und die Radikalität der Problemstellungen bei den Literaten des italienischen Futurismus nachzuvollziehen. Die Auswahl wurde in Anbetracht der Vielzahl künstlerischer Positionen, Intentionen, Arbeitsmethoden, Konzepte bzw. formaler und inhaltlicher Anliegen exemplarisch getroffen. Das 6. abschließende Kapitel fasst thesenartig eine Reihe von weitergehenden Überlegungen zusammen.

Im vorliegenden Artikel wird dem Vorwurf des Essentialismus der Marxschen Entfremdungstheorie nachgegangen und dafür die paradigmatischen Marx-Kritiken von Heinrich, Jaeggi und Rosa nachgezeichnet (1). Ausgehend davon wird gezeigt, dass Marx’ Entfremdungstheorie entgegen den gängigen Deutungen ohne essentialistische Prämissen vom Wesen oder der Natur des Menschen auskommt (2). Der Marx der Ökonomisch-philosophischen Manuskripte wird gegen den Vorwurf des Essentialismus verteidigt und damit der Versuch unternommen, seine frühe Entfremdungstheorie zu retten, indem sie nicht‑essentialistisch rekonstruiert wird. Anschließend wird diskutiert, wie sinnvollerweise an den Entfremdungsbegriff vor dem Hintergrund von Marx’ Erkenntnissen aus dem Kapital angeknüpft werden kann und in diesem Zusammenhang auf Schwächen der Theorien von Jaeggi und Rosa eingegangen (3 und 4). Zum Schluss wird kurz angedeutet, warum die Entfremdungstheorie weiterhin von Bedeutung sein kann (5).

This paper sets out the implicit and explicit theories of "totality" in the work of György Lukács and Fredric Jameson. It begins by asking to which problem the proletariat is a solution in the work of the early Lukács. It suggests that this problem is not only historical, but also literary in nature. In the second section, I offer a brief explanation of Lukács' theory of realism, as found in the Marxist aesthetic debates of the 1930s, and as it relates to his concept of totality. Finally, I outline Fredric Jameson's problematisation of Lukács' theory of totality and spell out two key innovations in his use of the term.

El concepto de totalidad tal como lo concibe Spinoza nos enfrenta a una suerte de tensión o paradoja. Por un lado, su filosofía se centra en la Substancia única, causa de todo y en la cual todo está contenido, aquello fuera de lo cual no hay nada, o mejor dicho, aquello que no tiene propiamente un afuera. Por otro lado, cuando debe referirse a lo que entiende por totalidad, Spinoza enfatiza sin embargo el carácter negativo e imaginario de dicho concepto: llamamos “totalidad” a lo que se define por un punto de vista exteriorizante, un recorte artificial mediante el cual, fundando imaginarias relaciones de oposición, distinguimos un individuo de otro al precio de arrancarlos a la infinitud que es su verdadera razón y esencia. Así, la paradoja puede formularse como sigue: la Substancia, que sabemos el “Todo” por excelencia, es por eso mismo lo que menos puede llamarse una totalidad – en su absoluta indeterminación no puede ser construida como tal, ni pensada por nosotros como individuo “cerrado”. Hay Todo, pero no es totalizable. ¿Cómo aprehenderlo entonces, si es justamente su carácter de Todo lo que nos veda la aplicación del concepto de totalidad?
Paradoja-tensión sobre la que intentaremos arrojar luz, no tanto para resolverla como para patentizar su perplejidad. Perplejidad fecunda que se refleja en otros dos pensadores, amigo declarado del spinozismo el uno, secreto aliado el otro, enemigos ambos de las ficciones de totalización en el conocimiento y en la vida: me refiero a Lao Tsé y el pensamiento metafísico del Tao Te King, y a Deleuze y su propuesta ontológica en Diferencia y repetición. Entre los tres, una impresión compartida: la del eco de un Todo que se (nos) escapa, pero que sigue siempre ahí, sosteniendo incluso lo que pretende negarlo.

Goffmanowska koncepcja instytucji totalnych stępiła się i rodzi dziś więcej py-tań, niż udziela odpowiedzi. Z perspektywy ponad pięćdziesięciu lat od wydania Asylums, narosło wokół pracy wiele nieporozumień, a defi nicja stała się rozmyta i niejasna, umożliwiając używanie jej do opisu nieomal każdej instytucji społecznej. Artykuł ma na celu zmianę tej sytuacji i zaproponowanie skorygowanej, wyostrzo-nej i dostosowanej do zmieniającej się rzeczywistości społecznej defi nicji koncepcji instytucji totalnych. Tok argumentacji rozpoczyna ulokowanie koncepcji w historii badań społecznych oraz w kontekstach jej aplikowalności. Kolejny krok stanowi rekonstrukcja krytycznych stanowisk na przestrzeni lat, pozwalająca zidentyfi kować słabe i mocne punkty Goffmanowskiej propozycji. Następnie artykuł podąża za in-telektualnymi dłużnikami Goffmana, którzy udoskonalają lub budują konkurencyjne propozycje teoretyczne na bazie przemyśleń dotyczących instytucji totalnych. Na końcu, korzystając z prezentowanych wcześniej w artykule uwag oraz pomysłów innych badaczy, zostaje przedstawiona autorska rekonfi guracja koncepcji instytucji totalnych. Główne pojęcia: Goffman; instytucja totalna; organizacja totalna; instytucja za-chłanna; instytucja przenikalna; instytucja reformująca.

In what way was there a "Hippie Modernism," as the Walker Art Center thought-provokingly framed its 2015 exhibition? Modernism implied that human actions can create a better world, and this demanded an understanding of the whole in which actions take place—better, a critical understanding, which reconsidered the world-changing impact of industrial capitalism. That does indeed make the hippies into firm candidates for accession to the modernist canon, if as this essay contends their ethos was profoundly holistic.

But the hippies avoided the sort of programmatic or antagonistic reform that we could also regard as typically modernist, preferring an equilibrium balanced around the self. To illustrate the difference, this essay contrasts hippie holism with the then better-recognized models of totality stemming from the political left. Specifically, it juxtaposes two neighbors in California’s Bay Area activist scene, the hippies of the Whole Earth Catalog and the revolutionaries of the Black Panther Party. The two overlap one another rather like a Venn diagram, each committed to a deep, bottom-up reorganization of the world through self-reliance, yet doing so with subtly dissimilar conceptions of the whole, one radically liberal, the other radically leftist and identity-based, which likely originate in unlike cultural, economic, and racial circumstances. The shape of the whole depended upon the position of the viewer.

One of the main purposes of architecture lies in finding ‘place’ where humans can inhabit. Although the human being is the principal place, they need a home where they can shelter their soul and body, protect themselves from weather, which offers peaceful sleep, a place in time, which in turn lead to other forms of action. A place of habitual return: to dwell in, to keep collected items and keep oneself. Place as the center and background where life flows and one is. Therefore the question about the significance and importance of the concept of place and its relationship with architecture arises. This is presented through
a dialogue between different authors from different disciplines such as philosophy, anthropology, literature and architecture. This work reviews relevant concepts such as the human being, totality, limits and identity which produce profound resonances which are intertwined.

[...] The Differenzschrift might be read as an announcement of there being a difference between the philosophies of Fichte and Schelling. That such a difference would have to be announced suggests that a difference between the two was as-yet unrecognized, which is a claim that can be supported on two fronts. On the one hand, there is correspondence between Fichte and Schelling from before and after Hegel’s publication in which the two struggle to reconcile their differences, or, in less optimistic moments, bemoan the fact that the one has only just recently understood that their thought differs on some specific matter. So, the first support for the claim is that Fichte and Schelling were themselves not thoroughly aware at any given time what the differences between them were. [...]

What is space? Why is it important? So much has been written about space from such diverse points of view that it is impossible here to be comprehensive or even representative, if I may borrow Neil Smith’s words (Smith, 2008). However, I will try to present a range of critical approaches to space in a compact manner. To be approached to a more comprehensive survey, one needs to cover at least anarchistic thoughts in Geography (Kristin Ross’s Communal Luxury: The Political Imaginary of the Paris Commune, for instance), and literary geography in Marshall Berman (1988), Raymond Williams (1973) and also in Bertrand Westphal’s Geocriticism: Real and Fictional Spaces (2007) and Robert T. Tally Jr.’s Spatiality (2013)). There are lots of other areas of study which are not discussed in this paper: theories of imperialism, uneven and combined development, broader debates on Eurocentrism, and more importantly, theories of nationalism remain to be examined in the future. It should be also noted that a systematic study of critical theories of space cannot resist a thorough analysis of critical theories of time/temporality. To talk about space is inseparable from talking about time. The wider and deeper the study of theories of space, the more urgent will be the need to address theories of time. In addition, any comprehensive study of critical theories of space-time should take all scientific (notably physicist) approaches to space into account as well.
There is always an issue with a survey paper like this, which is a highly selective review. It seems thus necessary here to highlight those criteria that guide me through emphasizing some aspects of the reviewed texts at the expense of the others. As it is noticeable in my paper, there is a disparity between the first and second half; between non-Marxist and Marxist approaches. At the most basic level, I aim to deal with the question ‘what is space’ to underline different conceptions of space. So, I review a range of perspectives first and foremost in order to see how different authors define space. Sections 0 to 5 are explicit attempts to achieve this goal. The tentative title of my dissertation proposal; “Production of Iran as a National Islamic State Space” adds another layer to my criteria. Some crucial methodological questions come to the fore: first of all, my research begins with particular historical geography of Iran. As a result, the historical and geographical specificity of conceptualization comes out. Hence is my justification to devote a sub-section (in the introduction) to a conceptual history of space. However, regarding Marxist approaches, the question ‘what is space’ is not the primary criterion. Here, I have two principles in my mind: on the one hand, a focus on the urban question, and on the other hand, concentration on the interrelated questions of scale and levels of analysis. These two aspects, in my view, are the most distinctive features of Marxist contributions to geography. Most Marxist approaches discuss urbanization or urban form as a mediation between different levels of reality and/or between geographical scales. Consequently, I have started the Marxist section with Benjamin’s argument on the interconnection between urban changes in Paris and the rise of France as an empire; and Jameson’s focus on the interrelatedness of the private and the global levels under the postmodern era. In my research, I am planning to study a range of social forces (including colonialization, capitalism, Islamism, nationalism, and urbanization) with distinct temporalities operating at different spatial scales. The selected Marxist approaches to space seem to provide me with the most relevant and suitable insights towards the interrelated questions of levels of analysis, abstraction, scale, and urbanization.

During the 20th century the theme of fragmentation, symbol of modernity, is linked with the transformation of the concept of totality that has started since romanticism. Out of this reflection new strategies of figurations are generated. Stated in her absence, the utopia of totality originates in the perception of the deconstruction of  any organic, total hypothesis. This perception is hidden in the signs of disintegration, dynamic enagrams of a world in dissolution. In this sense, the fragment becomes an autonomous unit, part of a dissolved totality. The close-reading of works, where we can find the broken unity of the form and the onset of fragmentation (from Adalbert Stifter, Hugo von Hofmannsthal, Georg Trakl and Franz Janowitz to Arnold Schönberg and Wassily Kandinsky), highlights the onset of new figures and images. Even though they represent the wound of fragmentation, they also manage to rebuilt a new space for the man who lives in a precarious and torn modernity.

The paper aims to restitute the movement made by Louis Althusser for the purpose of thinking a non-Hegelian Marxism. This bet, not only theoretic, but political, means a detour by Baruch Spinoza, in order to rescue his thought. For this, considering studies of different commentators, we have proceeded to give an account of how those eminently spinozist topics, epistemology and totality, are specially fruitful to perform this althusserian task.

Der Ausbruch aus dem Bestehenden kann nur gelingen, indem man aus der Gesellschaft, wie sie ist, das ganz andere entwickelt, sie also immanent kritisiert und bestimmt negiert. Dafür braucht es jedoch den Anstoß, dass das Gegebene überhaupt anders sein könnte: ein Moment der Metaphysik, die den Immanenzzusammenhang ideell zu durchbrechen vermag. Es handelt sich dabei um die Idee, dass es anders sein müsste, um gut zu sein. Dieser Idee von Überwindung geht die Erfahrung von versagtem Glück oder erfahrenem Leid voraus. Negativ ist in ihr die Vorstellung einer befreiten Gesellschaft enthalten und damit der Anstoß, das Andere aus dem Bestehenden zu denken.

Dans ce texte je prends en compte les critiques que Deschamps adresse à l'idée spinozienne d'une substance unique. En un premier moment, j'analyse la "Réfutation simple et courte du système de Spinoza" et les occurrences du Vrai système où Deschamps polémique explicitement avec le philosophe hollandais. Dans un second temps, je considère la construction deschampsienne des concepts de partie, Du Tout et de Tout. Enfin, je montre les opérations complexes à travers lesquelles il a pu attribuer à Spinoza les concepts de "substance infinie" et de "substance modifiée", les interpréter comme les équivalents de ses concepts de Tout et Du Tout, et conclure que l'immanentisme de Spinoza est un immanentisme manqué.

I take this opportunity to address the imaginative-power of
“Another Materialist Rhetoric,” by Ronald W. Greene, to set aside, as much as possible, the usual sense-making grids within which its impact is typically understood, and read it fresh. As I
will show, my reading discloses a novel imagination of cause and totality that remains mostly unaddressed in the stated intentions of the essay and in the powerful uptake of Michel Foucault that followed it. It is thus by extracting Foucault that
the singular imaginative-power of “Another Materialist Rhetoric” is called forth, that the essay speaks difference into its own repetition, and that we are compelled to ask ourselves, once again, what it means to read.

"Tabla de contenidos
1. Poder, orden político y la cuestión democrática.
2. Expansividad de lo social, recodificación de lo político.
3. Algo sobre heterodoxia e incertidumbre en el debate
democrático (a propósito de una intervención de Albert O.
Hirschman).
4. Intelectuales y política.
5. El concepto de "crisis".
6. La totalidad como archipiélago. El diagrama de puntos nodales.
7. El debilitamiento de las certezas. Las encrucijadas
epistemológicas del racionalismo ante el desfondamiento del
fundamento.
8. Lo cotidiano como registro de lo metafórico"

Readers are advised that an up-to-date discussion of the author's fundamental thesis (’The Idea’), on the origin, operation, and destiny of the World, is now found at the top of the main page under the rubric, Thematic Evolution and Prospect of 'The Idea.'

A substantial part of our work attempts to construct an adequate Theory of the Face. See 'The Soul of Life' (below) and other studies on the page, some of which remain in draft and others merely projected. (Five papers on this difficult subject are planned.)

Progressive and substantial concretion of the thesis has been recently demonstrated through focused studies (2018-2020), whose URLs are conveniently grouped below:

'The Spirit of War'
https://www.academia.edu/36536128/The_Spirit_of_War

'Carlyle and the Idea'
(https://www.academia.edu/37362600/Carlyle_and_the_Idea)

'The Last Day (Illustrated Essay)'
(https://www.academia.edu/41144933/The_Last_Day_Illustrated_Essay_)

'How the German Spirit Died (A History)'
(https://www.academia.edu/41745763/How_the_German_Spirit_Died_A_History_)

'How the Human Spirit Died (Meta-Analysis)'
(https://www.academia.edu/41985864/How_the_Human_Spirit_Died_Meta-Analysis_)

'Three Malefactors of the Communist Idea (Meta-Analytical Note)'
(https://www.academia.edu/42052811/Three_Malefactors_of_the_Communist_Idea_Meta-Analytical_Note_)

Our gradual (and still incomplete) conceptualization of absolute cosmogony, cosmology, and eschatology in its modern (often microphysical) aspects, which has arisen quite organically over several years of detailed study, may be briefly encapsulated and characterized (A-T) for the reader as follows:

A. The Idea is the fundamental reality of the World, whose existence was clearly intuited (as “hypodoche”) by Plato, operationally defined by Boehme (first as “das Rad Gottes” and subsequently as “Eternal Nature”), organically articulated by Hegel (as “the Idea”), and finally discovered to be the locus of proto-being and foundation of living motion by means of 20th century microphysics (and accurately named by it “the color vacuum”). The electron is its projection into the finite. Field theory is its "physical" basis.

B. This definition of “substance” as a completely immaterial and literally infinite, self-related, hebdomadic-triadic system of actuality within the Idea at the fundament or basis of reality constitutes the greatest discovery of the human mind which, before the end of the 21st century, upon full comprehension, will completely revolutionize religion and therefore geopolitics, as well as pedagogy, paleontology, and biophysics.  The seat of the animating principle in organisms can now be described and explained.

C. Briefly, the research for this book involves the cosmology, cosmogony, and eschatology (destiny) of the world as the finite projection of the Eternal Idea. The Idea itself was created by the Triune Absolute Spirit as a finite-infinite field to manifest, reward, and punish moral, aesthetic, and intellectual performances in a Living Matrix.

D. Through the vast and distributed powers of its microphysical basis, the Idea as the created conduit of Absolute Power has autonomously generated a pseudo-history in geology and astronomy. The powers of Light and Darkness guided by Eternal Life deep within the fundament sustain the finite living motion of which we are aware through biology and empower conscious awareness in animals. Biopsychological functioning and all positive intellectual achievement in Mankind have their roots in the Idea.

E. Moreover, though unseen, the silent workings of a vast cosmological Absolute Hebdomad (deduced through study of the Idea in the 17th century) mercifully overarch and limit the Inchoate Life of the Sinister Itself--a Cosmic Disruptor also previously unsuspected that is responsible for the nocturnal Dream Life of animals. Is this a conceptual solution to the mysterious phenomena of telepathy and clairvoyance?

F. Biological and psychic life thus have always been suspended between two great cosmological powers representing a generalized War Between Infinite and Finite Life that began with King Lucifer, and which in its present form continually tests, through Contention, War, and Worldly Contrariety, the whole of Living Being as it follows a tortured and fateful course between Life and Death according to the much-lamented plan chosen by the Mind ("Gemüt") of Adam.

G. Finally, the hidden existence of the Idea necessarily implies a universal negative unity as the ideal origin of all gravitational and inertial phenomena, offering to science a solution at last to storied and continuing, completely beguiling conundrums (e.g., "Dark Matter" and "Dark Energy") involving the ultimate structure of the cosmos.

H. By tracing the Idea's manifold determinations of physical, biological, and psychic being, then, the present study seeks to explicate the final, and heretofore unsuspected, links in the fabled Great Chain of Being for the edification of Mankind. Inherently opposing it, pathetically and even insanely, is guileless materialism.

I. The war of materialism against idealism eventually culminated in the death of the German Spirit (1918). The main intellectual cause of German spiritual morbidity, however, is traceable to events within the Reformation (1517-1546). This did not prevent a period of optimism within Prussian education and science (1800-1840).

J. The theft of Silesia (1946) was an intentionally demoralizing spiritual crime against Germany with major consequences for the spiritual life of the world. The German Spirit's whole turbulent career constituted a vacillation on renunciation of self-will, and this latter always was the essential content of the Absolute Mind in Germany.

K. Germany's fatal spiritual debility can be considered to be a world "contagion" that spread centrifugally from the center of Europe to the whole Human Race which, therefore, is itself now in the throes of an analogous spiritual death, self-contemplation, and deliverance from the finite. The Zero-Hour is imminent.

L. Each of the Six Days (in Moses) is now fundamentally understood to mean a thousand-year period. Thus, Creation has all along been continuous and--after 6,000 years--will soon be completed (the argument proposes a means to confirm or deny the asserted beginning of 3,970 B.C.). Thus, the Day of Rest (for the Community of Heaven) will soon arrive for the self-elect of Mankind.

M. This tortured path was, of course, divinely foreseen but nevertheless represents an accommodative posture which was not at first understood. The Creator's response achieves a wise and just outcome despite the wreck and pain arising from myopic creatural assertion and pathetic gratification, as recounted in the mosaic story of old.

N. In fact, Talmudic commentators reached this conclusion in the 2nd or 3rd century A.D.--amending (in 'Sanhedrin 97a') the original mosaic interpretation of once-and-for-all Creation in favor of Continuous Creation with a clear Limit or End, specified as 6,000 years (each "day of creation," as mentioned above, being 1,000 years).

O. Thus, Moses (properly cogitated) was right but his dicta were for a long period taken wrongly--perforce leading the Christians astray through an accident of church history that remains a stumbling block up to the present day. See the author's 'The Last Day (Illustrated Essay).'

P. We know from modern physics that the "physical" world at the fundament is sustained by completely immaterial field relations that never cease, or else creation-in-process would not maintain itself. The creative motion is mathematically and physically infinite but disguises its own infinity--the chief insight, credited to Dirac, supporting Absolute Physics.

Q. Hence, it is now clear that the Creation--continuous since the beginning--is approaching its End and Goal. The Last Day is thus imminent and will arrive within the present decade, according to the wisest Christian view, this actually having been announced four centuries ago in German idealism.

R. The Eternal Word's role has always been to Shine Divinely (inwardly) in the gloom and darkness of the outward finite (the "Field of the Reprehensible") for salvation's sake (see 'Carlyle and the Idea'). It is this that Jesus of Nazareth spoke of, and it is this his followers embody, when they speak of the "true bread from heaven," etc..

S. This is why Christians can claim that the finalized ("Third") Temple of God is already in existence and is composed of living stones (minus the winnowed Condemned and Damned) whose essence will endure forever in God.

T. Our thesis is only now emerging in its final form. This is because the horizon of knowledge keeps receding as the true depth is revealed--the world is a set of nested dolls and the innermost doll is God, who is unknowably deep (but friendly, since we are Him in disguise when we abandon our finite wills).

Este artigo é resultado, inicialmente, de uma classificação temática da Geografia brasileira. A diversidade temática revelada nesse levantamento inicial permitiu na continuidade uma reflexão sobre fragmentação e totalidade/totalização em Geografia como dimensões presentes no debate contemporâneo deste campo do conhecimento. A fragmentação geográfica se expressa em diferentes temas e no conceito de espaço geográfico. A análise é direcionada para a necessidade de avançar a discussão e a busca da unidade na Geografia.

Geographies or Geography? Fragmentation or totalization? Abstract: This article is the result of a thematic classification of Brazilian Geography. The thematic diversity revealed in this initial survey allowed a reflection on fragmentation and totality/totalization in Geography as dimensions presents in the contemporary debate of this field of knowledge. Geographical fragmentation is expressed in different themes and in the concept of geographic space. The analysis is directed to the need to advance the discussion and the search for unity in Geography.

Geografías o Geografía? Fragmentación o totalização? Resumen: Se trata de este artículo de un estudio preliminar sobre la diversidad de la Geografía brasileña. La diversidad temática revelada en ese levantamiento inicial, permitió en la continuidad una reflexión sobre fragmentación y totalización en Geografía como dimensiones presentes en el debate contemporáneo, en este campo del conocimiento. La fragmentación geográfica se expresa en diferentes temas y en el concepto de espacio geográfico. El análisis exprime la necesidad de avanzar la discusión y la búsqueda de la unidad en la Geografía.

A "critique of power" has become necessary—not simply in order to determine power’s distribution, or work out its implications for subjects or nations, agents or patients; but because power seems to have taken on a new face, the face of the other. What then is this power of the other? The otherness of the other? The necessary impossibility of any experience thereof, as well as the otherness of the other beyond all possible experience? Lévinas answers: the essence of the other, of the impossibility of the other, is infinity. But what is infinity? The Greco-Roman tradition answers: infinity is neither simply physical or mathematical; it is a properly philosophical concept, a totalizing logos. But for Lévinas, this would not be infinity—a finite infinity is no infinity at all. An experience of infinity qua finite is merely an experience of the possible, and an experience of infinite infinity would be necessary for an experience of the other as impossible. But how is an experience of the infinite, of the infinity of the other, itself an impossible experience or experience of impossibility, how is this possible? Or impossible? And how is this critique of power,  the critique of infinity?

Hegel saw modern philosophy as internally divided between its metaphysics and epistemology, on the one hand, and its political philosophy, on the other. Descartes had developed a metaphysics of totality to ground the epistemological certainty of the cogito, treating true unity as a unity of opposites (a totality). But political philosophy, in its empiricist and formalist forms, relied on an impoverished conception of unity—treating it, respectively, as a mere aggregation of parts or as formal consistency. The Philosophy of Right thus attempted to rectify the deficiencies of political philosophy by grounding it on the Cartesian concept of totality.

The essay analyses the paradigm shift in the geopolitical and geographical imagination at the beginning of the 20th century. In particular, developing some suggestions from Focault, it reconstructs throught the main geopolitical workd ans aricles the interactions between new concepts of State and territory and a original form of governmentality. The concept of totality is used here as a device that reveals the dramatical changes in the ideas of government and population.

This article presents a theoretical discussion about the heuristic value of the descriptive instruments of the city in the research on situated ambiances, which is based on a reflection on the urban section and the epistemological model that Carlo Ginzburg named “evidential”. This reflection was carried out in the context of an interdisciplinary field research on the issue of domestic waste collection in the city of São Paulo, Brazil. First, we characterize the disperse and heterogeneous elements – related to subjects and the built space – that the section permits gathering as “clues”, which allows the visualization of an ambiance, conceived as a unity. Following that, we discuss the theoretical status of that unity, conceived as a structure. For this purpose, we introduce the distinction between real object and object of knowledge, as proposed in the beginning of the 20th century by the founder of modern linguistics, Ferdinand de Saussure. Through such a distinction, we seek to avoid a conception of space that is founded on a substantialist idea of “totality”. Based on such considerations, the urban section will not be defined as a “representation of the space” (a real object), but rather as a “registry of a view” on it (a theoretical object). Lastly, as a writing technology, the urban section will be characterized as a tool for fabricating a shared view on the city. In this sense, it could contribute to establish a common ground of debate for the various and heterogeneous disciplinary fields and registries of knowledge about the sensory experience summoned by the notion of ambiance.

El artículo aborda el concepto filosófico de mundo a partir de su determinación como totalidad y objeto de experiencia en la fenomenología de Husserl. El análisis gira en torno a la posibilidad de sostener estas caracterizaciones que, según la interpretación anticartesiana, dañan la estructura fenomenológico-trascendental del mundo. Se empieza exponiendo brevemente ciertos aspectos del pensamiento de Husserl desde donde se abre la posibilidad de trazar una comparación entre los objetos y el mundo y luego se seleccionan algunas descripciones que marcan un alto a la comparación y la ponen incluso en tela de juicio. Seguidamente, se presenta la postura anticartesiana a partir de las críticas de Held, Brand, Steinbock, Welton y Claesges. Finalmente, se toma distancia de este enfoque a partir de las consideraciones críticas de Aguirre y Walton que evitan un quiebre entre las diversas etapas del pensamiento husserliano.

The article deals with the philosophical concept of the world from its determination as a totality and object of experience in Husserl’s phenomenology. The analysis revolves around the possibility of sustaining these characterizations that, according to the anti-Cartesian interpretation, damage the phenomenological-transcendental structure of the world. It begins by briefly exposing certain aspects of Husserl’s thought from which the possibility of drawing a comparison between objects and the world is opened and then some descriptions are selected that mark a halt to the comparison and even put it into question. The anti-Cartesian position is then presented on the basis of criticisms by Held, Brand, Steinbock, Welton and Claesges. Finally, a distance is taken from this approach on the basis of the critical considerations of Aguirre and Walton, which avoid a break between the various stages of Husserlian thought.

As long as we will continue to live in a capitalist society, the thought of Georg Lukács will continue to be fertilizing. It may be integrated, extended, dialectically overcome (i.e., overcome in the maintaining of it), but it cannot be forgotten, being it and its legacy a continuous source of inspiration.
In my talk, I would like briefly to: i) show that his thought is interpretable without using possible turns or breaks in it, but as a unique and single line of development, where gradually it takes form a particular vision of the work of art; ii) show how his idea of art (directly or indirectly influencing many authors of the Critical Theory such as, among the others, Adorno, Benjamin and Marcuse) is (still) the base of a critique of the capitalist world and culture, that is primarily neither a romantic nor a political critique, but a philosophical one, which aim is indeed describable not as a reaching of an alternative, but of an otherness.