Since Kant, philosophy has been obsessed with epistemological questions pertaining to the relationship between mind and world and human access to objects. In The Democracy of Objects Bryant proposes that we break with this tradition and once again initiate the project of ontology as first philosophy. Drawing on the object-oriented ontology of Graham Harman, as well as the thought Roy Bhaskar, Gilles Deleuze, Niklas Luhman, Aristotle, Jacques Lacan, Bruno Latour and the developmental systems theorists, Bryant develops a realist ontology that he calls “onticology”. This ontology argues that being is composed entirely of objects, properties, and relations such that subjects themselves are a variant of objects. By way of systems theory and cybernetics, Bryant argues that objects are dynamic systems that relate to the world under conditions of operational closure. In this way, he integrates the most vital discoveries of the anti-realists within a realist ontology that does justice to both the material and cultural. Onticology proposes a flat ontology where objects of all sorts and at different scales equally exist without being reducible to other objects and where there are no transcendent entities such as eternal essences outside of dynamic interactions among objects. This work will be of great interest to Continental philosophers, ecologists, cultural theorists, media theorists, and those following recent developments in the thought of speculative realists.
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About the Author
Levi R. Bryant is a former psychoanalyst and professor of philosophy at Collin College outside of Dallas, Texas. He is the author of Difference and Givenness: Deleuze’s Transcendental Empiricism and the Ontology of Immanence (Northwestern University Press, 2008) and co-editor, along with Nick Srnicek and Graham Harman of The Speculative Realism: Continental Materialism and Realism (Re.Press, 2010). He has written numerous articles on Deleuze, Badiou, Lacan, and Žižek, and has written widely on social and political thought, cultural theory, and media theory at his blog Larval Subjects.
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Levi R. Bryant is a professor of philosophy at Collin College outside of Dallas in Texas. His work focuses heavily on questions of ontology and he defends a realist conception of being that argues that the world is composed of objects that exist at a variety of different levels of scale. He has published widely on Deleuze, Lacan, Badiou, and a variety of other thinkers, and is heavily influenced by developmental systems theory, sociological systems theory, autopoietic theory, as well as thinkers such as Bruno Latour, Graham Harman, Isabella Stengers, Niklas Luhmann, and Roy Bhaskar. He is especially interested in science and technology studies, media studies, and digital humanities. Bryant can be reached at larval_subjects@yahoo.com.
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14 of 15 people found the following review helpful
By E. Rosenthal
Format:Paperback
This review generally attempts to give an outline of what this book aims to do and why it is generally done well. I am not an academic; I read most of this stuff for purely recreational purposes.
For those who are not familiar with the context of this book, it situates itself within the group of Object-Oriented Ontology (OOO) which makes it affiliated with the speculative realist "movement." While folks who fall under that umbrella often differ in more ways than they converge, they all share a rejection of 'correlationism': the idea that we humans can only ever have some access to the correlation of thinking and being. For Bryant and others in the OOO camp (other authors here include Timothy Morton, Ian Bogost, and Graham Harman)this manifests in the basic assertion that all things are objects. This may seem like a counter-intuitive (or out-right wrong) thesis, but in this book both the arguments against correlationism and for the primacy of objects are exceptionally clear and well-formed.
Bryant names his particular brand of OOO "onticology." While the book has to be read in full in order to understand what his ontology entails, a few things distinguish it from other formulations. The first is the use of Deleuze. Bryant has already written an excellent book on Deleuze (Difference and Givenness), and here he integrates Deleuze's concept of the virtual into an understanding of objects. Unlike other authors well-versed in Deleuze, Bryant accepts much of Peter Hallward's criticisms of Deleuze (see Out of This World) and thus re-positions the virtual into what he calls "virtual proper-being" which can be brutally summarized as the potentiality of an object to become other than its local manifestations (while still being that object). In this way, Bryant argues that some objects must be independent in order to have any causal efficacy of their own, and this requires the rejection of Deleuze's "monistic virtual continuum." As Bryant states "...the claim that the virtual is real is not the claim that the virtual is a potential being, but rather the claim that the virtual is always the virtuality or potentiality of a being or substance." Bryant's account of the virtual in Deleuze may be controversial, but the argument is coherent and persuasive (It should be noted that he doesn't spend a lot of time tearing down other's positions, this discussion is more used to differentiate his position in contrast with Deleuze's own).
The other influence that signifies a novel contribution is that of Luhmann. Using Luhmann (along with more familiar points of reference on these topics such as Maturana and Varela)Bryant adapts concepts of autopoiesis, allopoiesis and operational closure in a novel way to his ontology of objects. The way Bryant explores these concepts is original, and he has to make some serious changes to the aforementioned theories in order for them to work with onticology. All of this gives onticology the tools to be able to explain why and how objects can persist in their existences and structure through time as relatively independent dynamic systems. The chapters dealing with these issues were the most illuminating for me, and as someone who has read a little Luhmann, they are refreshingly concise in their presentation.
Other less prominent resources include Jacques Lacan (but not in the way one would think) and Bruno Latour along with Graham Harman. This does not mean, however, that this book is just a hodge-podge of different philosophical theories; this book is no Being and Time but it certainly makes several original contributions. Bryant's new articulation of "substance" was particularly salient in my opinion. If I had any gripes it would be that I thought his discussions of Badiou were a bit lacking. This is a small part of the book but I feel that any parallels Bryant draws are purely analogical; it seems he is partially aware of this but I still do not think it added very much.
Overall, this book is definitely worth reading. For me the real force of Bryant's project is the way it seams to take the most useful aspects of the "object-oriented" and "process" camps of speculative realism and synthesize them into what is a very robust ontology (though still very much part of OOO). I particularly recommend this book to people intrigued by Continental Philosophy but who assume that it spends too much time interpreting figures and not innovating in its own right and often falls short of the "clear writing/argument" criterion. I'm not saying these charges are always justified or applicable, but I certainly think that Bryant's book avoids them and provides readers with new concepts to use.
For those who are not familiar with the context of this book, it situates itself within the group of Object-Oriented Ontology (OOO) which makes it affiliated with the speculative realist "movement." While folks who fall under that umbrella often differ in more ways than they converge, they all share a rejection of 'correlationism': the idea that we humans can only ever have some access to the correlation of thinking and being. For Bryant and others in the OOO camp (other authors here include Timothy Morton, Ian Bogost, and Graham Harman)this manifests in the basic assertion that all things are objects. This may seem like a counter-intuitive (or out-right wrong) thesis, but in this book both the arguments against correlationism and for the primacy of objects are exceptionally clear and well-formed.
Bryant names his particular brand of OOO "onticology." While the book has to be read in full in order to understand what his ontology entails, a few things distinguish it from other formulations. The first is the use of Deleuze. Bryant has already written an excellent book on Deleuze (Difference and Givenness), and here he integrates Deleuze's concept of the virtual into an understanding of objects. Unlike other authors well-versed in Deleuze, Bryant accepts much of Peter Hallward's criticisms of Deleuze (see Out of This World) and thus re-positions the virtual into what he calls "virtual proper-being" which can be brutally summarized as the potentiality of an object to become other than its local manifestations (while still being that object). In this way, Bryant argues that some objects must be independent in order to have any causal efficacy of their own, and this requires the rejection of Deleuze's "monistic virtual continuum." As Bryant states "...the claim that the virtual is real is not the claim that the virtual is a potential being, but rather the claim that the virtual is always the virtuality or potentiality of a being or substance." Bryant's account of the virtual in Deleuze may be controversial, but the argument is coherent and persuasive (It should be noted that he doesn't spend a lot of time tearing down other's positions, this discussion is more used to differentiate his position in contrast with Deleuze's own).
The other influence that signifies a novel contribution is that of Luhmann. Using Luhmann (along with more familiar points of reference on these topics such as Maturana and Varela)Bryant adapts concepts of autopoiesis, allopoiesis and operational closure in a novel way to his ontology of objects. The way Bryant explores these concepts is original, and he has to make some serious changes to the aforementioned theories in order for them to work with onticology. All of this gives onticology the tools to be able to explain why and how objects can persist in their existences and structure through time as relatively independent dynamic systems. The chapters dealing with these issues were the most illuminating for me, and as someone who has read a little Luhmann, they are refreshingly concise in their presentation.
Other less prominent resources include Jacques Lacan (but not in the way one would think) and Bruno Latour along with Graham Harman. This does not mean, however, that this book is just a hodge-podge of different philosophical theories; this book is no Being and Time but it certainly makes several original contributions. Bryant's new articulation of "substance" was particularly salient in my opinion. If I had any gripes it would be that I thought his discussions of Badiou were a bit lacking. This is a small part of the book but I feel that any parallels Bryant draws are purely analogical; it seems he is partially aware of this but I still do not think it added very much.
Overall, this book is definitely worth reading. For me the real force of Bryant's project is the way it seams to take the most useful aspects of the "object-oriented" and "process" camps of speculative realism and synthesize them into what is a very robust ontology (though still very much part of OOO). I particularly recommend this book to people intrigued by Continental Philosophy but who assume that it spends too much time interpreting figures and not innovating in its own right and often falls short of the "clear writing/argument" criterion. I'm not saying these charges are always justified or applicable, but I certainly think that Bryant's book avoids them and provides readers with new concepts to use.
4 of 7 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
Bryant's version of an object-oriented ontology is sharp, clear, and lucid. The chapters on "Virtual Proper Being" and "The Interior of Objects" are especially compelling. Welcome to the future of philosophy.
5 of 12 people found the following review helpful
By J. Peacock
Format:Paperback
I'm still skeptical about several of the core premises (the ontology of objects does not handle boundedness well, imho) but the work itself is masterful and clear, even to philosophical novices. Highly recommended.
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