Contents

Preface

Introduction: For a Planetary Thinking

§1. On the Planetary Condition

§2. Planetary Thinking as Political Epistemologies

§3. Search for a Planetary Politics beyond the Nation-State

§4. Toward a Tractatus Politico-Technologicus of the Planetary

1. World Spirit as Planetary Thinking

§5. Individuation of the Spirit as Historical Process

§6. World Spirit as Planetary Thinking and the Place of Reason in History

§7. Freedom as the Drive of the Transitions of Political Forms

§8. Recursivity of Reason and Freedom in the Modern State

2. The Organism of the State and Its Limit

§9. Spirit and the Organic Becoming of the Externalized

§10. Organism of the State versus Organism of the Animal

§11. The Impasse from the State to Planetary Freedom

3. From Noetic Reflection to Planetary Reflection

§12. Noetic Reflection: Consciousness and Life

§13. Bioeconomical Reflection: Georgescu-Roegen Reads Hegel

§14. Cybernetic Reflection: Toward the Consciousness of Machines

§15. Noospheric Reflection: In Search of a Planetary Freedom?

4. Mechanism, Organism, or Decisionism

§16. From Political Theology to Political Epistemology

§17. Machine and Organism in The Leviathan in the State Theory of Thomas Hobbes

§18. Political Epistemology in Hobbes’s Leviathan

§19. Catholicism and the Logic of Complexio Oppositorum

§20. The Death of Hegel and the Triumph of Political Vitalism

5. Nomos of the Digital Earth

§21. First Deconstruction on the Contingency of Sovereignty

§22. Second Deconstruction on the Contingency of Friend and Enemy

§23. Sovereignty and the Elementary Philosophy of Space

§24. Großräume as Post-Static Political Form and the Problem of Pluralism

§25. Giving Colonialism, New Großräume, and Digital Sovereignty

6. An Organology of Wars

§26. The Disproportion of Organs and the Hubris of Wars

§27. From a Cybernetics of Freedom to an Organology of Differences

§28. The Conflict of Tendencies and the Recurrence of Mysticism

§29. The Dynamics of the Technical Tendency and Technical Fact

§30. On the Organological Relation between Technology and Democracy

§31. Biodiversity, Noodiversity, and Technodiversity

7. Toward an Epistemological Diplomacy

§32. Acceleration, Automation, and the Prosthetic Future

§33. Universality Seen from the Perspective of Technodiversity

§34. Sovereignty Seen from the Perspective of Technodiversity

§35. Technodiversity Analyzed via an Anatomy of Technical Objects

§36. Technodiversity as Epistemological Diplomacy

Notes

Bibliography

Index

Author Biography
Preface

In August 2022, I invited Professor Carl Mitcham to deliver the Bernard Stiegler memorial
lecture; Carl asked if it would be possible to develop a Tractatus Politco-Technologicus after
Leo Strauss. This question was driven by the belief that Strauss did not explicitly address the
question of technology in his political philosophy and that philosophy of technology hasn’t yet
engaged with political philosophy in a profound way. Today, it has become both inevitable and
necessary to take technology into consideration in political philosophy; however, this
relationship has yet to be thoroughly examined and comprehensively contemplated.
Coincidently, I had been working on a similar project since I finished the manuscript of
Recursivity and Contingency in summer 2018. I was tempted to explore the implication of the
epistemological questions raised in the book in political thought, especially in view of the
process of technological planetarization. However, due to various reasons, I was not ready to
pursue the project right after Recursivity and Contingency (2019). Therefore, the current work
is preceded by Art and Cosmotechnics (2021), which I consider the second volume of
Recursivity and Contingency. Machine and Sovereignty is the third and the last volume of this
series that has taken me more than a decade. It will be also my initial response to Carl’s
question.

A large part of this book was written during the Covid-19 pandemic when the geopolitical drift
became overwhelming: the upsurge of nationalism and identity politics, the intensification of
border control, the increasing tension of wars and the worsening climate crisis. These shocks
were existential especially when I had just relocated from Europe to the unrestful Hong Kong.
Reading Hegel and Schmitt became equally an uncanny experience: abstract concepts became
not only concrete but also intimate, and at the same time intimidating and disturbing. The
thinking of Hegel and Schmitt embody two modern political forms—the nation-state and the
Großraum—and a future planetary thinking will have to surpass both. We will have to
forcefully open new perspectives for planetary thinking and a new concept of history to come.
In order to do so, one cannot avoid respecting them as philosophical adversaries, meticulously
engaging with their thinking while seeking moments to break through and take leaps. Not
being trained as a specialist in political and legal thought, this study was more than laborious;
meanwhile, I had to develop my own method of reading the classics of political philosophy,
which I term political epistemology. Political epistemology is central to the megamachine of
Lewis Mumford, as it legitimates and guides the operation of the megamachine. It is our
Ariadne’s thread for exploring the planetary. The first parts of this study endeavor to lay down
the epistemological foundation of Hegel’s and Schmitt’s political thought and the two political
forms they wanted to justify. The later part of the book elaborates on the agenda of
technodiversity, a concept that I developed in Recursivity and Contingency. This historical-
epistemological study is, however, far from being complete. Despite its obvious limitations, I
hope that it can still provide some insights to conceive a planetary thinking capable of
addressing some of the current impasses.
This project would not be possible without the support of various institutions: the City
University of Hong Kong, especially Professor Richard William Allen from its School of Creative
Media; the Hong Kong Research Grant Council, for its Social Sciences and Humanities
Prestigious Fellowship (2023), which allowed me to take time off from teaching and focus on
completing the book and sponsored this book to be open access; the Berggruen Institute’s
support of my research on the planetary between 2021 and 2022.

I want to thank the following friends and colleagues who have engaged with this writing
process. Pieter Lemmens and Anders Dunker have given feedback on several chapters.
Colleagues from the Centre for Critical Thought and the Law School, University of Kent,
including Jose Bellido, Alex Damianos, Maria Drakopoulou, Gian-Giacomo Fusco, Conor
Heaney, Philipp Kender, and Connal Parsley, have organized reading groups to comment on
various chapters and gave critical feedback regarding legal thought and international relations.
Milan Stürmer spent more than a year with me reading Hegel’s Grundlinien der Philosophie
des Rechts sentence by sentence every week online. I want to equally thank Pieter Martin
from the University of Minnesota Press for finding this project a home, the two anonymous
reviewers for their constructive comments, and Joel White for copyediting and commenting on
the manuscript.

Yuk Hui

Summer 2024, Rotterdam/Tokyo

Introduction
For a Planetary Thinking

The current work immodestly calls for a planetary thinking—a thinking that Kostas Axelos
already announced in view of the domination of planetary technology and the threshold of a
new epoch to come during the 1960s. The rationale behind this call is simple: we do not yet
think planetarily and must learn to think planetarily, even though this may well take a
considerable amount of time to come. The planetary is viewed as such, but it remains the
unthought.1 To think planetarily doesn’t necessarily mean proclaiming or defining the
sovereignty of outer space, or delving into terraforming and geoengineering, even though such
topics might be anticipated in a book dedicated to planetary thinking. To think planetarily, first
of all, means thinking beyond the configuration of modern nation-states, which have not been
able to move away from vicious economic and military competition; second, it means
formulating a language of coexistence that will allow diverse people and species to live on the
same planet; and third, developing a new framework that will enable us to go beyond the
question of territory, respond to the current ecological crisis, and reverse the accelerated
entropic process of the Anthropocene. The task of planetary thinking resonates with the idea
of perpetual peace as proposed by Abbé de Saint-Pierre and then later by Kant, Fichte, and
others. One must note that when these authors were writing, modern nation-states were still
young in Europe, and thus the nation-state could be considered the most appropriate political
form. Industrial capitalism was still in its infancy, and the damage of planetarization was not
yet foreseeable.2 Organic nature, captured by two key concepts, community and reciprocity,
stands as the model for perpetual peace because different parts constitute the whole, and
every part will be conditioned by each other and the whole. Therefore, Kant enthusiastically
claims that perpetual peace will be “guaranteed by an equilibrium of forces and a most
vigorous rivalry” between the states.3 This is why, instead of looking at the world from the
lens of the nation-state and nature, we demand a new framework for the planetary.
Considering there have been many excellent studies on the planetary from philosophers,4
historians, designers, and Marxist scholars,5 we propose to take a different path to carry out
this inquiry.

Following my previous works, this treatise will attempt to bring technology to the forefront of
political thought. For planetary thinking to be possible, we cannot avoid and ignore the long
tradition of political philosophy, but we must likewise read the history of political thought
through a new lens: the question of technology. We might again, immodestly, call this attempt
a search for a Tractatus Politico-Technologicus. A Tractatus Politico-Technologicus means that
our inquiry no longer sees politics and technology as separate spheres; instead, we have a
rather urgent task before us: bringing technology to the centrality of political philosophy, or, in
other words, to ground a political philosophy in technology. This underlines our intention of
reading political thought and its history. However, this task is both trivial and enormous. It is
trivial because one could hardly fail to recognize that today technology is the main battlefield
where different nation-states enter into conflict. Indeed, military offenses have now been
transformed into information warfare. It is an enormous philosophical task because to achieve
it successfully, one must laboriously retrieve the concept and the role of technology from Plato
to contemporary political philosophers, as was the task of deconstruction, especially Jacques
Derrida’s and Bernard Stiegler’s work. Deconstruction shows that philosophy, since the
beginning, repressed (verdrängt)—in the Freudian sense—the question of technology.
Therefore, it is necessary to make visible the centrality of technology in philosophy as the
unthought that is, nonetheless, indispensable to thinking. Therefore, from the point of view of
deconstruction, a political philosophy that ignores technology is defective and has to be
rethought anew through the lens of technology. A Tractatus Politico-Technologicus would be
necessary for political philosophy if we follow the school of deconstruction.

However, what does it mean to say that technology is central to political thought? Do we mean
that technology is a necessary tool of governance or that politics must respond to any
technological development that brings new dynamics to communities? Or do we need an
ethics of technology for every apparatus or application—for example, to make Amazon Alexa’s
way of addressing children more ethical? This way of posing the question still takes technology
and politics as two spheres: one sphere acts or reacts to another. A Tractatus Politico-
Technologicus suggests that the political and the technical are not two separate spheres.
Nomos is, first of all, a technical activity before being jurisprudential. Moreover, one could
conceive the political as a technological phenomenon—a phenomenon in the sense that
political forms such as the polis, empire, the modern state, and the Großraum are particular
manifestations of technological progress and its imagination while, at the same time,
technology is contained and constrained by these different political forms. These forms are
manifestations of what Lewis Mumford called megamachines. The first megamachine emerged
from the end of the fourth millennium, which we see in Egypt, Mesopotamia, India, China, and
Peru, where various components—political, economic, military, bureaucratic, and royal—
assembled into a gigantic machine according to the division of labor.6 Mumford provided us
with a grand history of the megamachine, passing by absolute monarchy, which, in his view,
aligns with the megamachine sustained by a mechanistic epistemology. With the idea of a
Tractatus Politico-Technologicus in mind, we start our journey.

§1. On the Planetary Condition

Technology has brought about a new human condition that exceeds Hannah Arendt’s
observation from 1958, when the launch of Sputnik struck the political theorist with a new
form of alienation of man from Earth. On the first page of The Human Condition, Arendt wrote
that the launch of Sputnik was “second in importance to no other, not even to the splitting of
the atom.”7 We should also remind ourselves of the shock that Heidegger received when he
saw the image of the Earth taken from the moon in 1966, which confirmed his analysis in the
lecture “The Age of the World Picture” (1938) and led to his lament of a technological
catastrophe in the interview “Only a God Can Save Us” (1966).8 The Earth being grasped as an
image of the globe symbolizes the zeitgeist of the second half of the twentieth century. One
could consider it a spatial revolution in various senses; first, it constitutes the first time that
the Earth was observed from outer space, not the other way around, and before human beings
even observed it. This observation of observation, so to speak, reverses how outer space was
perceived in everyday experience: the Earth is no longer the ground upon which we stand and
look into the sky since now it exists in the form of an artifact available for manipulation. It
resonates with what Marshall McLuhan said about Sputnik during an interview in the 1970s:
“Sputnik created a new environment for the planet. . . . Nature ended, and Ecology was born.
‘Ecological’ thinking became inevitable as soon as the planet moved up into the status of a
work of art.”9 Nature disappears since it is no longer enchanted and mysterious but only part
of a much larger artifact. This artifact is not static. Instead, it is understood as a dynamic
system. Ecology, a term coined by the biologist and zoologist Ernst Haeckel (1834–1919) to
describe “the entire science of the relationships of the organism to its surrounding external
world,”10 hence acquired a technological and political meaning.

Space is no longer a geometrical representation; instead, space, thus conceived, is now a

dynamic system in which different forces and factors reciprocally act on each other. James
Lovelock was one of the first to have studied the dynamic between the geosphere, biosphere,
and atmosphere. His early Gaia theory (before the collaboration with Lynn Margulis) tells us
that the Earth is a cybernetic system capable of homeostatic functions.11 One of the most
provocative caricatures of the Earth as a machine comes from Richard Buckminster Fuller’s
description of it as a spaceship. Earth is a spaceship, and we, the Earth’s inhabitants, are only
its passengers. This image of the spaceship was illuminated in the novella The Wandering Earth
written by the science-fiction writer Liu Cixin, which was made into a film in 2019, the sequel
of which, in 2022, was infiltrated with a “patriotic cosmopolitanism.”12 The passengers must
anticipate the wreckage one day in the future. For a few decades now, we have already heard
the alarm of climate change and ecological crisis, and this alarm is getting louder and more
frequent. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change constantly warned us about the
necessity of immediate action: it’s “now or never!”13 In response, entrepreneurs such as Elon
Musk have been exploring the possibility of emigrating to Mars or escaping to another
galaxy—although in the name of humanity and its dream of “being among the stars”; of
course, this would be only for the ultrarich who could afford it.

Besides Plan B, that is, to escape to the other planets, Plan A is to steer the spacecraft to a
safer place. If the Earth is a spaceship, this also means that one can modify its structure,
improve its speed, and energize it. Terraforming is a manifestation of the power of modern
technologies capable of engineering the planet’s atmosphere, biosphere, and geosphere.
Similar voices are also heard, for example, in the “Ecomodernist Manifesto” signed by people
such as Stewart Brand and his colleagues from the Breakthrough Institute, who claim that
more advanced technologies can repair the damage caused by technology on Earth. As such,
the key to the survival of planet Earth is the further advancement of technology. The same
wish can be seen at work for the transhumanists who see the possibility of endless
enhancement of the human body and intelligence in technology. Eco-modernism,
transhumanism, and prometheanism join hand in hand in this technological epoch, where
anthropocentrism has surged to a historical height. Both Plan A and B are an objectification of
the Earth as artifact, as something subject to engineering and design. These forms of
planetarization are a consequence of modernity, yet they are not the planetary thinking that
we are aspiring to.

Retrospectively we could identify the process of planetarization with that of technological

globalization—in the sense that modern Western technology becomes a global phenomenon
and the common aim of human development. That is to say, science and technology have
detached themselves from the scientific community of the West and become the foundation
of global communities consisting of researchers from everywhere. This resonates with
Heidegger’s 1964 article “The End of Philosophy and the Task of Thinking,” in which he
famously indicates two meanings of the end of philosophy. First, it means “the triumph of the
manipulable arrangement [steuerbare Einrichtung] of a scientific-technological world and of
the social order proper to this world”—in other words, society will be grasped as a cybernetic
model because the term steuerbare Einrichtung refers explicitly to cybernetics. Second, the
“beginning of the world-civilization will be based on Western European thinking.”14 Heidegger
did not mean that Western European thinking is superior than other forms of thinking and
that, as such, it will become the base of world civilization. What he means is that Western
European thinking finds its completion in cybernetics, and that cybernetics, the synonym of
modern technology for him, will be a planetary phenomenon. Therefore, it is because of and
through cybernetics that the progress of the world civilization is now based on Western
European thinking. This verdict of Heidegger’s became even more evident after the fall of the
Berlin Wall and the collapse of the Soviet Union, when a thermodynamic ideology started
ruling the globe. By thermodynamic ideology we mean an epistemology that originated from
physics and then penetrated the economic and political sphere, becoming its operating
principle.15 A thermodynamic ideology is closely associated with the free market, open
society, economic freedom, and so forth. It also indicates a new form of individualism whose
freedom is defined by the market. An open system is often described in neoliberal principles
and a closed system as authoritarian communist regimes. The East lost any resistance in the
face of the demand for an open society and a free market. Today the East has returned with
fierce technological competition and, most significantly, an ideological war.

Yet, we must ask, what could non-Western thought’s role in the planetarization process be?
The contest between the West and East brought about reactionary and nationalist politics in
the past century and will continue to grow. However, what remains to be asked is if non-
Western thought could contribute something more and even negate such an ideological
manipulation. Searching for a ready-made theory of the planetary in various philosophical
traditions would end in vain since no one in history has already anticipated our current
situation. Thinking is epochal in that it belongs to a particular epoch, and even when a system
of thought is passed to us, it can only gain its relevance through radical reinterpretation.
Therefore, it is not my aim to claim that Western thinking failed and Eastern thinking will
triumph, because such opposition is merely ideological and against thinking itself. While
postcolonialism has been trying to pin down the relation between planetarization and
colonization—that is to say, the relation between colonization and capitalism that exploited
the planet to its extreme in the form of farming, mining, hunting, and fishing, etc.—it has
almost always been silent on the issue of technology and the possibility of non-Western
thought’s contribution to a planetary thinking of technology and politics given the coming
global catastrophes. On the other hand, Marxism tends to reduce all causes to capitalism, for
capitalism is the synonym for the economic activities that exhaust the planet and create
consecutive ecological mutations associated with climate change and the Anthropocene.
However, today’s crisis is economic, technological, and political. Therefore, postcolonialism
and Marxism should also be reevaluated in the development of a planetary thinking. Before
directly addressing planetary thinking, let us look into the phenomenon of planetarization to
understand its essence.

Planetarization as a modern project is, first of all, the synchronization of time. First, through
the convergence of transportation and communication technology, it can create a
synchronicity between different geographical territories and machines;16 second, through the
advancement of science and technology, it constitutes a global time axis, a common mode of
existence of humanity. Nomos, as Carl Schmitt claims in The Nomos of the Earth, is “the
measure by which the ground and soil of the earth [Grund und Boden der Erde] in a particular
order is divided and situated; it is also the form of political, social, and religious order
determined by this process.”17 In Schmitt’s thought, we see that the history of the nomos of
the earth is fundamentally a history of the revolution of space—that is, the constant conquest
of space, or what he calls the elements (land, sea, and air), via technological means.
Ultimately, we see that the conquest of the elementary form of space finally arrives at a
qualitative change: the suppression of space and its conversion to time. Before the Covid-19
pandemic, the global financial industry and logistics functioned according to a synchronicity
that ensured the circulation of money and goods. This does not mean that space is without
importance; on the contrary, borders still function regularly, but territories are made into
smooth planes via global logistics, the standardization of commodities, and the artificialization
of food (such as animal farming and greenhouse agriculture), which allow these products to be
detachable from any fixed locality. During the pandemic, the smooth plane was suspended,
and suddenly, the experience of time was no longer the same as it was. Regarding global
logistics, one now expects a longer wait time for mail and goods to arrive. In the summer of
2021, I sent a postcard from Berlin to Japan, which took more than two months to arrive. This
is longer than it took for Mori Ōgai to send mail from Berlin to Tokyo more than a century ago.
The interruption of global logistics reveals the true meaning of globalization: an increase in
synchronicity that constantly compresses space to the shortest distance. This synchronicity is
fragile because it depends on machinery, which relies on the energy market and is also
vulnerable to the state power’s intervention into the spatial order.
This synchronicity also expresses itself in the synchronization of history; that is to say, it is only
through technology that humanity could be said to follow a linearity that goes from Homo
faber to Homo deus via Homo sapiens. The human is, first of all, a technical being, and
therefore the evolution of the human has to be conceived as the continuation of technical
activities. In anthropology of technology, André Leroi-Gourhan affirms the fundamental role of
technics in the process of evolution. He rejects the commonsense saying that human beings
descend from apes because, for him, this claim ignores the fact that the invention and use of
tools conditions human evolution. Leroi-Gourhan and his contemporaries, such as Édouard Le
Roy and Henri Bergson, accepted that there is a discontinuity between Homo faber and Homo
sapiens.18 Like Georges Bataille, who in Lascaux ou la naissance de l’art (1955) associates the
birth of art with Homo sapiens,19 Leroi-Gourhan considers that there is a break between the
technical, which characterizes Homo faber, and the intellect, which characterizes Homo
sapiens. The former is associated with the hand and the latter with the brain. However, this
assumed rupture is problematic or even contradictory because, if the human is first of all
Homo faber, then that which defines it—namely, technology—became nonessential for Homo
sapiens.20 And if technology is nonessential, then we have difficulty in understanding the
evolution of Homo sapiens. As Leroi-Gourhan defines it in Gesture and Speech and other
works, technics could be understood as an anthropological universal, namely, the
externalization of memory and the liberation of organs. The flints used in ancient times should
be understood as the crystallization of body gestures, which was only possible after a long
process of biological evolution when complex motor nervous systems were developed. Or, as
per the example of Lascaux, these paintings are the externalization of the memory and
imagination of Homo sapiens, which we inherit today and represent in various technical
means. That is to say, the intellect is not separable from technics. On the contrary, the
technical is at the same time its externalization and its support. Thus, the criticism that
Bernard Stiegler levied against Leroi-Gourhan in his Technics and Time 1: The Fault of
Epimetheus concerned the emphasis that was put on the opposition between the technical
and the intellect, arguing that it is merely a repetition of Bataille’s thesis and, as such, risks
being self-contradictory.21 This rejection of the rupture between Homo sapiens and Homo
faber in terms of the separation of the intellect from technics also refuses the infamous fall
that Jean-Jacques Rousseau described in his Discourse on the Origin and Basis of Inequality
Among Men (1755).

Thus, we can understand that anthropogenesis is grounded on technical activities and that the
human is, thus, no longer the master who creates technology but rather the human who is
made possible by technology; in other words, the human is a technological phenomenon. The
anthropological understanding of technology unifies the history of the human species, and
civilizations are synchronized to the same global axis of time by technological convergence—a
world history is present to us at the same time as a history of the anthropogenetic excess,
namely, technology, or more precisely Western technology. Thus, as was claimed earlier, the
second meaning of synchronicity completes human history that moves from Homo faber to the
highly evolved Homo sapiens and now toward a new possibility. This possibility is exploited by
science fiction as the Homo deus, the realization of the human as God. It is also the end of
Feuerbach’s famous critique of God as the projection of human desire because Homo deus is
no longer a projection but the realization of such a projection. Science fiction reigns in this
epoch of planetarization and takes philosophy to the Schwärmerei, where everyone could be
called a philosopher of technology.

§2. Planetary Thinking as Political Epistemologies

The objectification of the planet in the twentieth century on all levels ranging from abstract
representation to scientific exploration, including mining, earth system science, automated
agriculture, hydroengineering, and geoengineering, as well as to the preparation for space
war, has presented us in the twenty-first century with an urgent task to conceive a new
political form, one that allows us to imagine a future for peace and coexistence between
different peoples, between humans and nonhumans. Planetary thinking will have to firmly
grasp the process of planetarization and develop a language of coexistence. Planetary thinking
here has to be strictly distinguished from global thinking. Globalization started during the Age
of Exploration toward the end of the fifteenth century, together with colonization; culminated
after the fall of the Berlin Wall, celebrating the thermodynamic ideology; and while debatable,
is claimed to have ended with the Covid-19 pandemic. In this sense, globalization is
planetarization. Planetary thinking should be oriented toward the future with a new
conceptual framework. The obstacle is that today we still think primarily from the perspective
of the nation-state and its economic and military interests. The planetary should not be
confused with a new configuration of power between the states, such as a bipolar or
multipolar configuration, because this does not change the nature of politics. For this would be
the mere continuation of the politics of the nation-state, the difference would only be related
to who has more power and more control over resources and the world market.

It is also the objectivation of the planet that urges us to take it as a subject and think
planetarily. This is also why Bruno Latour suggests formulating his planetary agenda on two
premises. The first premise claims that all humans confront the same ecological mutations.
Because these mutations are planetary, and we are this planet’s habitants, we must think
planetarily. This premise might remind us of Kant’s premise of the Weltbürgertum from his
“Perpetual Peace,” where Kant states that the surface of the Earth is communally possessed by
everyone (das Recht des gemeinschaftlichen Besitzes der Oberfläche der Erde) and that it
follows that the right of visiting a foreign country should be recognized as a natural law
because borders are only artificial.22 Therefore, the planet as a common object everyone
shares is imperative to imagine, constituting a collectivity beyond artificial boundaries. The
second premise of Latour’s project states that since Europeans have never been modern,
Europeans and non-Europeans should, therefore, find a way to collaborate to overcome the
impasse of modernity.23 It is an impasse because the system of knowledge that originates
from European modernity has spread its wings through new transportation and
communication technologies, pervading the world and at times seeming irreversible—this was
a subject closely examined in The Question Concerning Technology in China: An Essay in
Cosmotechnics (2016). The title of Latour’s exhibition at the Taipei Biennale 2020, “You and I
Don’t Live on the Same Planet,” concisely summarizes his effort to think planetarily. Latour
hence calls for a new diplomacy; in response, we will endeavor to address it as an
epistemological diplomacy.

Therefore, we will have to understand planetary thinking historically, that is to say, to

reconstruct planetary thinking to expose its limits and conceive of other possible political
forms. Planetary thinking means more than just developing thinking capable of dealing with
larger scales and sizes. There is no doubt that scale is an important element, but at the same
time, when the scale is too large, one ignores the question of locality, which is equally essential
to a planetary thinking. Hence, our objective here is not to propose a grand politics of dividing
and transforming the planet Earth. Instead, we seek to revisit the fundamental question of
technology and its implications for the twenty-first century.

Kojin Karatani, in his book The Structure of World History, suggests that the current political
form, which he formulates in terms of the trinity of capital-nation-state, must be surpassed or
sublated since it has already attained its limit. Even though the work critiques Marx and the
Marxians, who reduce economy to its modes of production, the inspiration is Kantian since he
is attracted to Kant’s notion of the “world republic” as the political form that might transcend
the nation-state. His main target is, thus, Hegel. Because Hegel, instead of Marx, is the
philosopher who truly grasped the unity of capital-nation-state. Marxians still consider the
nation and the state as superstructures separated from the economic base. Instead of the
mode of production, Karatani analyzes world history from the perspective of modes of
exchange. World history is conceived in terms of three dominant modes of exchange: the
exchange of gifts, state-enforced distribution, and the world market, each corresponding to
three dominant modes of power: the gift, the state, and money. Karatani thus proposed to
conceive a mode D that would sublate the nation-state; Mode D is the return of Mode A (the
gift economy) in a higher form.

Karatani sees very clearly that to carry out the task of overcoming the nation-state, it is
necessary to develop a thorough critique of Hegel’s Outlines of the Philosophy of Right.24
However, instead of further pursuing Karatani’s analysis of the history of the economy, I wish
to start with the notion of unity in what Karatani calls the “unity of capital-nation-state.”
Karatani, through his reading of Kant, compares the capitalist economy with the sensibility, the
state with the understanding, and the nation with the imagination. If, in Kant, it is the
imagination that synthesizes the sensibility and the understanding, then likewise, the nation
synthesizes capital and the state. Therefore, Karatani claims, “The capitalist economy
(sensibility) and state (understanding) are held together by the nation (imagination). Together
they form Borromean rings, where the whole collapses if any of the three rings is removed.”25
We contend that this unity cannot be grasped topologically by Borromean rings—this also
differentiates our reading of Kant and Hegel from Karatani’s. Karatani also recognizes that
Hegel’s dialectics is key to understanding the unity, as he writes, “This Borromean knot cannot
be grasped through a one-dimensional approach: this was why Hegel adopted the dialectical
explanation.”26 However, this grasp remains too underdeveloped.

This unity has to be approached from the perspective of a political epistemology instead of a
Borromean diagram. By political epistemology, I mean the epistemology transposed from
science to politics, economy, and technology, which consequently constitutes a new
paradigmatic shift in the modes of knowing, organization, and operation of society. Or in other
words, there is such an epistemology behind every megamachine. We do not see only one
megamachine and one epistemology, but rather the evolution of the megamachine alongside
epistemologies that adequately justify its existence and specific forms of organization. The
history of planetary thinking could then be studied through an examination of various political
epistemologies. This book will depart from two major epistemologies, mechanism and
organism. The organism, or its analytically and mathematically deduced model, organicism,
presents an epistemology radically distinguished from the mechanism that fashioned the
seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries. The culmination of mechanism could be read in
correlation with the emergence of political absolutism and regimentation, which Mumford
endeavored to evidence in his reading of Descartes and Hobbes in the second volume of The
Myth of the Machine. The shift from mechanism to organism characterizes a crucial
epistemological rupture toward the end of the eighteenth century. Kant’s Critique of Judgment
stands out as the major work that placed organism at the top of philosophy in Germany and
constitutes one of the most profound treatises on organism understood as a proto-model of
the philosophical system.27 We could even claim that Kant imposed the organic condition of
philosophizing, which has continued until our time—notably, the last chapter of Mumford’s
The Myth of the Machine is titled “The New Organum.” It is dedicated to the “organic world
view” seen as the antidote to the “mechanical world view” that has dominated since the
seventeenth century. This analysis of the history of organicism was one of the main tasks
undertaken in Recursivity and Contingency (2019) and Art and Cosmotechnics (2021), and we
will continue in the current work by extending it to political philosophy.

Importantly, a critique of the nation-state does not mean that the state is the opposite of
planetary thinking. Instead, we have to recognize the state as a stage in the history of such
thinking, that which has yet to be rendered explicit, and we will attempt to do so in the current
work. This unfolding of a planetary thinking will start with a critique of Hegel’s Outlines of the
Philosophy of Right, focusing on the concept of the organic form. What makes Hegel’s political
philosophy significant is his justification of the modern state as the culmination of reason and
the political form under which freedom and the ethical life are possible.28 Hegel’s justification
(Berechtigung) is logically deduced from his dialectical method. Dialectics will arrive at an
organic form, which is also its principle. Thus, the political form of the modern state is organic,
in contrast to the state machine that was seriously criticized for its positive and mechanistic
nature in his earlier writings, such as the “German Constitution.”29 The organism of the state
in Hegel’s Outlines of the Philosophy of Right points to an imaginary organic machine.30 That
is to say, it is not yet an organism because an organism is already organized (or already
concrete in the sense of Simondon), it is a fact; for the state, it is a goal31 because the state is
a form of organization that assimilates the organism under the principle of reason and
effectiveness.

The projection of an emerging epistemology into politics often encounters problems because it
remains speculative and, therefore, always ahead of its time. In his Critique of Hegel’s
Philosophy of Right, the young Marx challenged Hegel’s organic state, asking what the
difference would be between the organism of the state and the organism of the animal. Marx
criticized Hegel, arguing that he could not explain the specificity of the organic state, and as
such, his theorization remained only formal and empty. This criticism is important, however,
not because Marx was right (Marx nonetheless recognized Hegel’s theorization as a “great
advance”) but because Marx did not manage to comprehend its central role in Hegel’s
philosophy.32 The opposition between materialism and idealism, which the Marxians
employed against Hegel, comes from an intended misreading of Hegel, and it fails to see that
the genesis of the spirit already implies a becoming organic that cannot do without a history of
externalization. That is why a nuanced reading of Hegel’s political philosophy is fundamental to
a Tractatus Politico-Technologicus, and why earlier we called the Hegelian state an imaginary
organic machine. The question that concerns us is what the limit might be of Hegel’s political
epistemology as a planetary thinking, and what succeeded it in the twentieth century.

Two limits have pushed us to develop a planetary thinking further. First, Hegel only applied
organicity to the interiority of the state, never pushing it toward its exteriority. To put it
plainly, Hegel refuses what Kant did to conceive of an organicity of international relations and
stops at a straightforward friend–enemy relation, which echoes that of Carl Schmitt. Second,
the imaginary machine that Hegel conceptualized seems to have been realized by cybernetics,
as Hegel scholar Gotthard Günther famously argues in his The Unconsciousness of Machines: A
Metaphysics of Cybernetics.33 Günther’s conclusion comes from his dedicated studies on
Hegel’s logic and his turn toward cybernetics after immigrating to the United States. Norbert
Wiener, the founder of cybernetics, had already announced that cybernetics overcomes the
dichotomy between vitalism and mechanism because, through the notion of feedback,
cybernetic machines are capable of assimilating the behavior of organisms. Retrospectively, we
can also understand why Heidegger claims that cybernetics marks the completion or the end
of philosophy. Today, when we look at the development of artificial intelligence and machine
learning, we cannot ignore their origin in cybernetics, no matter how fast they have evolved in
the past decades. This organic machine could be identified as belonging to various domains
other than technology—for example, economy, ecology, and the earth sciences.

Continuing this line of investigation, we might want to ask if the completion of philosophy in
cybernetics also means the completion of Hegel’s philosophy of right? Or does this completion
also transcend the first limit mentioned above that the cybernetic system can extend from the
interiority of the nation-state toward the exteriority, forming a gigantic organic machine that
marks the milestone of the World Spirit in the coming centuries in the name of the “omega
point” (Teilhard de Chardin) or the singularity (Kurzweil)? These questions, as speculative as
they are, are nonetheless important for us to reflect on a political form adequate to future
planetary thinking.

§3. Search for a Planetary Politics beyond the Nation-State

Is the state still relevant today? There have been many rumors that the state is dead and that
the sovereign has already been dissolved by global capitalism.34 Antonio Negri and Michael
Hardt’s trilogy could be considered the most systematic exposition on the lost cause of the
nation-state and the guidebook for the new revolutionary subject, the multitude. According to
the authors, as an empire, global capitalism has “taken sovereignty out of the way” because
the sovereign has weakened its ability to decide on monetary and military matters.35 In other
words, globalization has incorporated every outside into its inside.36 However, during a
debate in 2016, Roberto Esposito challenged Negri that the opposite was, in fact, true because,
in the past decade, due to the global financial crisis, it was in the end the national
governments that saved the banks.37 To borrow Esposito’s words, “The nomos of the earth (to
use Carl Schmitt’s formula), along with production and distribution, goes back to being a kind
of sharing out in a new geopolitical order of the world.”38

Negri retorted that what Esposito’s thinking lacks is precisely political.39 Our task is not here
to defend Esposito, the political immunologist, against Negri, the Marxist revolutionary.
However, since the pandemic, it might be clear that the state was never withering away.
Indeed, the trinity of nation-state-capital has become more exposed; fascism and nationalism
have prevailed in many countries, including Italy, and all announcements of the end of
sovereignty and capitalism are simply misdiagnoses that take the immediate as the ultimate
truth. In hindsight, the discourse of the multitude gained momentum during the
antiglobalization movements towards the end of the millennium. However, over the past
decade, the antiglobalization movement has become relatively quiet. Instead, we observe
seemingly perplexing anarchist gestures, exemplified by figures such as the conservative
anarchist Audrey Tang (the minister of digital affairs of the Taiwan government), the utopian
anarchist Elon Musk (as he claimed on X), and the ultimate anarchist Donald Trump (named by
the New Statesman40).

There are other more profound challenges to project onto political epistemology, which were
outlined earlier: the reading of modern political thought through the lens of the opposition
between mechanism and organism, as well as the framework of the nation-state. Carl
Schmitt’s work should be carefully studied in this context. Carl Schmitt, a professor of
constitutional and international law and a legal theorist of the Third Reich, stands out as one of
the most profound thinkers of planetary thinking after Hegel. Schmitt is not Hegelian; instead,
what we find in Schmitt’s writings concerning Hegel is a mix of admiration and discontent.
Schmitt distinguished three types of legal thought specific to his time: decisionism,
normativism, and “concrete order and form thinking [konkretes Ordnungs-und
Gestaltungsdenken].” We can understand the normativism Schmitt speaks of as corresponding
to the mechanism, or the positivism of Hans Kelsen (notably, Schmitt’s intellectual rival), and
the “concrete order and form thinking” as corresponding to organism, which is exemplified in
the political thought of Hegel since Hegel’s state is “the concrete order of orders, the
institution of institutions.”41 Schmitt’s position, as we all know, is decisionism, which we will
formulate as a political vitalism.

The political, according to Schmitt, is based neither on mechanism nor organism but rather on
decisionism. In his Political Theology, Schmitt concisely defined the sovereign as “he who
decides on the exception.”42 This power to decide on the exception and the friend-enemy
distinction gives soul to the nation-state. The word soul here is not merely to be understood in
its literal sense. Indeed, we can find in Schmitt’s treatise on Hobbes a comparison of Hobbes’s
mechanization of the state with Descartes’s mechanization of the human.43 Schmitt’s
characterization of the sovereign as the power to declare the state of exception returns us not
to an absolute power but rather to a legal framework that allows the sovereign to override all
legalities, for the sovereign is the ultimate ground of legitimacy.

This definition partially resolves the ontological problem of sovereignty. But the most puzzling
question remains: What exactly is sovereignty? We are still looking for a satisfactory answer in
both positive and natural law traditions. Positive law returns us to a presupposed basic norm,
while natural law has been ceaselessly challenged by historicism in the past centuries, arguing
that its foundation is only historically valid.44 Schmitt’s vitalism may be intrinsically a
liberalism, as Martin Heidegger remarked in his seminars on Hegel’s Outlines of the Philosophy
of Right, where we read, “Carl Schmitt thinks liberally: 1. because politics is ‘also’ a sphere; 2.
because he thinks in terms of the individual and his bearing.”45 This comment may sound
ironic because Carl Schmitt ceaselessly criticized liberalism as the seed of the collapse of the
sovereign, which he finds in Hobbes and modern liberal democracy.

This political vitalism pushes Schmitt to reflect on the future of sovereignty given the world
wars and the new international order that emerged due to these new dynamics. Schmitt saw
the limit of the nation-state and its decline in light of American imperialism (after the
distortion of the Monroe Doctrine) and the collapse of the Jus Publicum Europaeum, which
once defined the global order. In other words, when the Jus Publicum Europaeum reigned over
the global spatial order, it was intrinsically Eurocentric; its obsolescence suggests a new global
spatial order that ought to appear, which, however, insists on the independence of sovereigns.

Schmitt’s development of the nomos of the Earth attempts to provide a new political form
after the nation-state and a history of planetary thinking. This history is equally a history of
space conquests and spatial revolutions. Schmitt develops an elemental philosophy of
geopolitics by neatly, and probably too neatly, plotting a trajectory from the nomos of the land
to that of the sea and finally to the air. What is fundamental in Schmitt’s rationale, though he
only implicitly acknowledged it, is the question of technology. Again, this is how we could read
Schmitt’s political thought as a Tractatus Politico-Technologicus. In his “The Age of
Neutralizations and Depoliticizations” (1929), Schmitt already suggests that one shouldn’t
understand technology as anything neutral in the twentieth century. Spatial revolutions would
not be possible without technological advancement. The development of sea power would not
be possible without the Industrial Revolution, without which there would not be an opposition
between the Behemoth (Continental Europe) and the Leviathan (England). The same goes for
air power, which was only possible with the invention of aircraft, making it possible to fly
across several sovereignties within a couple of hours.

In “The New Nomos of the Earth” (1955), Schmitt proposed three scenarios to conceive future
planetary politics.46 First, the configuration based on individual nation-states remains
unchanged; second, the unification between the West and the East (in the East, he includes
the Soviet Union and China). However, Schmitt does not see unification as necessarily
desirable; thus the third scenario, the development into a new political form, which he calls
the Großraum, or the big space. The Großraum is that which Schmitt wants to justify, as Hegel
did with his political state. The Großraum—a term that, according to Schmitt, has its origin in
the “technological-industrial-economical-organizational domain [Bereich]” during the turn of
the century when energy and electricity supply unified the Kleinräume into a
Großraumwirtschaft.47 More precisely, it is an imagination enabled by the spatial revolution
brought about by air succeeding land and sea. The geographers Geoff Mann and Joel
Wainwright, in their book Climate Leviathan: A Political Theory of Our Planetary Future,
suggest that climate change will lead to the emergence of planetary sovereignty, which they
call the climate Leviathan. The planetary sovereignty will decide on the state of emergency for
the sake of the security of lives on Earth.48 Though referring to Schmitt, they do not seem to
have grasped that Schmitt might be the exact person who would immediately reject such a
planetary sovereignty because he is precisely skeptical of any political institutions speaking in
the name of humanity. If there is an “advancement” of planetary thinking in Schmitt, it is not a
planetary sovereignty but the Großraum.

The Großraum is that which aims to resist the universalism of American imperialism.
Universalism here should mean universalization, the promotion and homogenization of a set
of values and knowledge regarded as the exclusive truth. Could the political vitalism and the
Großraum of Schmitt succeed Hegel’s organism and the nation-state, becoming the blueprint
of future planetary politics? It is, nonetheless, necessary to bear in mind Schmitt’s involvement
in National Socialism and his justification of the Third Reich. However, one should not discredit
all of his thought, rejecting it outright, as many so-called intellectuals do today with Heidegger
and others. Like Schmitt, Heidegger wanted to justify National Socialism as a philosophical
project, and Alexander Dugin, the right-wing and traditionalist thinker, who picked up
Schmitt’s Großraum, integrated it into his Eurasian project—which has subsequently been
used to justify the “special military operation” in Ukraine. This does not mean that any
discussion on Schmitt can only appear as a depreciation of his thought, which occupies the
moral high ground. This is for sure politically correct, but it is philosophically insufficient.
Instead, we should expose the limit of Schmitt’s theory and, through this exhaustion, shed new
light on a planetary thinking that defends both democracy and freedom. Again, we want to ask
what the limits of Schmitt’s theory of sovereignty and the Großraum might be in view of the
new challenge of the ecological crisis and the intensified competition of digital technologies.

§4. Toward a Tractatus Politico-Technologicus of the Planetary

Hegel and Schmitt are the two key thinkers we will be addressing in detail in this work. Their
works provide us some of the most fundamental analysis of the state and planetary thinking,
which we cannot overlook or simply adopt. Our reading of Hegel’s philosophy of right and
Schmitt’s nomos of the Earth aims to construct a historical trajectory of a philosophy of the
planetary, as well as to reintegrate technology into political philosophy to a Tractatus Politico-
Technologicus. Such a Tractatus Politico-Technologicus does not employ a geometrical method
as per Spinoza but an algebraic one, or, more precisely, the concept of recursivity that we have
laid down in the previous work. However, a project exploring a “planetary thinking” that sets
to expose Hegel’s political state and Schmitt’s Großraum to their limits immediately
encounters its own limits imposed by its interrogators and academic disciplines to which they
belong. We must acknowledge and keep in mind this limitation throughout our exploration.
Indeed, a planetary thinking could include anything like political economy, earth science,
ecology, and so on. One could equally speculate on the ontogenesis of the planet49 or the
intrusion of Gaia50 or even developing a fiction-theory of the meltdown of the planet as some
authors have done. These are not the paths that we will pursue here. We must acknowledge
the challenge of defining planetary thinking in a concrete manner, akin to a policy report.
While narrowing our investigative focus, we also generalize it as a unified methodology. The
relationship between technology and political epistemology, or epistemology at large, serves
as our Ariadne’s thread.

How could planetary thinking develop beyond what Hegel and Schmitt have laid down without
recourse to a transcendent figure of the Earth? Even though we agree with Isabelle Stengers
on the necessity to counter the rationalists by bringing into light the transcendence of Gaia, it
is doubtful if the technological and economic activities will restrain themselves because of any
fear of the intrusion of Gaia. The current ecological mutation and the extreme climatic change
associated with it do not seem to have awakened those who live in the game of capital. We
hope to develop another line of inquiry while at the same time keeping in mind any possible
dialogues with these authors in the various chapters. Indeed, we do not suggest an
emancipation from transcendence, as readers will find out, the different positions of
transcendence in the political forms which we will unfold throughout the book. The seemingly
logical sequence underlined by the spatial revolution from the nation-state, Großraum, and
finally the planet itself must not ignore the fact that these apparent stages are actually
contemporary to each other. In other words, we will not be able to eliminate the state since
the disappearance of the state is not yet foreseeable; nor could we escape the Großraum
because we are now living in the epoch of the Großraum. Instead, we must recognize that the
political state represents one stage in the development of planetary thinking, such as the
family and civil society were stepping stones to the modern state. The completion of the
modern state did not lead to the elimination of the family and civil society. Therefore, it is
reasonable that Karatani proposes a federation of states, mode D, as succeeding mode B
(state-enforced distribution) and mode C (capitalism). Mode D will be the return of mode A
(gift economy) in a higher form, where sovereignty becomes a gift—for when sovereignty
becomes a gift, the sovereign state would be naturally dissolved. The mode of exchange D
remains as an idea. That is, since a regulative principle guides it, it may never be realized. The
technical difficulty is that of synchronicity. Because even if a revolution were to happen in one
country or even two, it would be soon extinguished by the neighboring countries that do not
desire such changes. Revolution is either a world revolution or it is nothing. Therefore, a world
revolution can only happen when every state is synchronized; however, because the possibility
of such an event is so low, a federation of states can only be a semblance (Schein).51

Whether a world republic could come into being remains uncertain because, like in all political
theologies, when the Second Coming of Christ will happen is never clear. In a perplexing turn,
Karatani asserts that what Kant called a world republic is what Schmitt calls a world state;
Moreover, he contends that Schmitt implies the possibility of abolishing the state through
exchange.52 However, as we commented earlier, Schmitt would outright reject the idea of a
world state, because such a world state would mean for him an absolute depolitization and
homogenization, leaving behind only consumerism and entertainment. The difficulty of
conceiving a planetary politics of coexistence is that first of all, it has to recognize differences
and maintain the heterogeneity of different forms of life, and a single bureaucratic system can
hardly achieve this; on the contrary, it could and most likely would be manipulated by the
most powerful states. Heterogeneity and plurality cannot be supposed; they must be
maintained and cultivated.

A Tractatus Politico-Technologicus must bring technology to the forefront to emphasize a

technological consciousness. Juxtaposing organicism, mechanism, and vitalism, it looks into the
possibility of an organology in the sphere of politics. The term general organology was used
first by Georges Canguilhem53 to characterize Henri Bergson’s Creative Evolution (1907).54
Organology (originally the study of musical instruments) is a study of the relation between
technology and the other parts of the body, in which technical tools could be considered
artificial organs. Organology has to be distinguished strictly from technological determinism,
which is fundamental to Marxist analysis. Marx famously claimed in the Poverty of Philosophy,
“The hand-mill gives you society with the feudal lord; the ssteam-mill, society with the
industrial capitalist.”55 In contrast to technological determinism, organology suggests that all
new organs produce conflicts. Thus, new programs or studies are required to resolve these
conflicts. As we will argue, technological acceleration is a fundamental cause of war because it
tends to produce a negative organology. Therefore, a technology-oriented program should
first consider what we call technodiversity.56 Technodiversity, noodiversity, and biodiversity
comprise a matrix through which we can systematically conceive a new language of
coexistence beyond the nation-state and the Anthropocene. In the following chapters, we will
address the concerns outlined here.

Chapter 1, “World Spirit as Planetary Thinking,” reads Hegel’s theory of the world spirit as a
planetary thinking and interprets the relation between freedom and political forms. Chapter 2,
“The Organism of the State and Its Limit,” engages with Hegel’s demonstration of the state as
an organism and the young Marx’s critique. We will equally look into the limit of Hegel’s
organismic thinking by reading Mou Zongsan and Zhao Tingyang. Chapter 3, “From Noetic
Reflection to Planetary Reflection,” sketches a human-earth relation departing from Hegel’s
anthropology. The chapter looks at how this Hegelian motive could be further traced in the
domain of bioeconomy and cybernetics, and to what extent it could be considered as a future.
Chapter 4, “Mechanism, Organism, or Decisionism,” looks into Schmitt’s negative response to
the question raised in chapter 3 and Schmitt’s political vitalism as a refusal of the mechanistic
and organismic epistemology of the state. Chapter 5, “Nomos of the Digital Earth,” examines
Schmitt’s concept of sovereignty and the Großraum and evaluates his theories against the
current debate on digital sovereignty and planetary governance. Finally, chapter 6, “An
Organology of Wars,” turns toward organology to understand the source of war, to conceive a
new language of coexistence through a close engagement with Bergson’s critique of war and
his influence on André Leroi-Gourhan, as well as to articulate the meaning of democracy and
diversity from the perspective of organology. Chapter 7, “Toward an Epistemological
Diplomacy,” elaborates on a framework of biodiversity, noodiversity, and technodiversity.
1

World Spirit as Planetary Thinking

World History only shows us how the World Spirit comes gradually to the consciousness of
truth and the willing of it. This consciousness and will dawns in the Spirit; Spirit finds its main
points, and in the end it arrives at full consciousness.

—G. W. F. Hegel, Outlines of the Philosophy of Right

This sublation of externality that belongs to the concept of spirit is what we have called the
ideality of spirit. All activities of spirit are nothing but different ways of driving what is external
back into the inwardness that spirit itself is, and it is only through this driving back, through
this idealization or assimilation of what is external, that spirit becomes and exists.

—G. W. F. Hegel, Philosophy of Mind

Where should we embark on the journey of planetary thinking? We commence with Hegel, the
philosopher who delineates a planetary perspective in the name of the Weltgeist and justifies
the political state as the condition for freedom. For this reason, it is essential to navigate
through Hegel, not only comprehending his logical arguments but also acknowledging their
confines. Engaging with Hegel’s planetary thinking demands an intellectual exercise, a
speculative endeavor. For our purpose, we start with the question of political epistemology
outlined in the Introduction. Since Recursivity and Contingency, we have investigated the
historical significance of the opposition between mechanism and organism and argued that
the rupture of organism from mechanism characterizes a paradigmatical shift in modern
Western thought. To put it simply, mechanism is characterized by a linear causality that could
be traced to a first cause. For example, imagine a mechanical watch: one can trace the cause
to the spring; the mechanism is fragile when one part of it is accidentally broken, and the
whole causal chain will fail. On the contrary, organism is characterized by a nonlinear causality:
a first cause is not self-evident, and the whole always recursively adjusts itself in case of an
accident arriving at any part. Recursivity and Contingency started with the claim that Kant,
especially in the Critique of Judgment, imposed the organic condition of philosophizing; that is
to say, for philosophy to be, it has to be organic. Today, the opposition between mechanism
and organism might seem banal, even to the eyes of a layperson, since it remains completely
doubtful whether one can reduce a living being to a mechanical one—not to mention that it is
still not possible to make a perfect humanoid robot.
The courage of speculative reason in mechanism unveils its own immaturity because it took
the essential as unnecessary and identified linear causality as the truth of nature. But it is only
through recognizing its immaturity that reason progresses toward its maturity or the Absolute.
This essential, which we might call a historical truth, is only valid for one time.1 After that, it
will be posited as a question or a challenge to be answered according to the “journey of the
consciousness” or the “odyssey of the spirit proper.”2 This division between organism and
mechanism has its significance only when the organism is understood as a nonlinear form of
organization and reasoning, which has an affinity to the living world—something that
mechanism lacks, it being governed by repetitive operations with linear causality. The
identification of reason with an organic form is a recognition of the nontriviality of reason.
Nontriviality in the sense that it is not linearly derivable. Instead, it is always paradoxical and
resists simplification. This division is nothing banal, but rather it is the leading thread that we
use to reconstruct histories of ideas and to expose reason to its limit in light of our
contemporary situation. Mechanism and organism also represent two kinds of political
epistemology, reflected as two modes of governance, two imaginations of the megamachine,
or two concepts of the state. We can find it, for example, in the political writing of Edmund
Burke, where he claims that the whole cannot be reduced to parts; in the Hegelian Ernst Kapp,
who characterizes despotism as mechanism and freedom as organism;3 as well as in more
recent political theory inspired by cybernetics.4 We can also think of Herder, Novalis, and the
Schlegels, who each proposed different versions of organic communitarianism5 as a response
and critique of the state machine—in a very literal sense meaning the mechanization of the
state as a top-down and linear operation.

Hegel’s treatise on the relation between reason and the state, between spirit and the world
history, stands out as one of the most sophisticated treatises of political philosophy. Hegel’s
project should not be considered in the same category as Herder’s nor that of the romantics,
including his collaborator and competitor, Schelling;6 on the contrary, Hegel’s philosophy of
right should be seen as an effort to overcome, on the one hand, mechanism, and on the other
hand, an uncritical reception of organism or teleology. This overcoming is also a sublation
(Aufhebung) because it doesn’t only overcome both but also preserves what is necessary for
them. By uncritical reception we mean that the concept of the organism is taken from and is
made equivalent to nature; therefore, it prioritizes nature over the artificial. That is to say, in
the dogmatic reception of organism, nature is not only the source of inspiration but also the
ground of politics. Furthermore, the realization of humanity (such as it is said by Kant, Schiller,
and Herder7), thus posed as a task of the human species, is an assimilation of the qualities one
finds in nature. The priority of the organic nature over the artificial, often taken as mechanism,
is also grounded on two presuppositions: on the one hand, on the theology of creation, and on
the other hand, on the scientific concept of organism irreducible to mechanical explanation.
For Kant, one of the early philosophers of organism, this realization of humanity is a hidden
project of nature (Vollziehung eines verborgenen Plans der Natur).8 It is hidden because it is
not given as such; this destination is unknown to the human species, but the progress of
humanity is also progress toward the maturity of reason. However, Kant stopped at nature; he
proposed a political philosophy at most but never a philosophy of history proper. As Leo
Strauss noted, the philosophy of history plays little to no role in Kant’s three Critiques.9 Strauss
also noted that Kant would have had to confront Herder if he were to develop a philosophy of
history—as we know, Kant published two reviews of Herder’s philosophy of history
(Philosophy of the History of Mankind, 1784–91 and Junctures on the Beginning of Human
History, 1786), where Herder was named a poet and his work that of poetry.10 Kant’s solution
was simply not “permitting its [philosophy of history] entrance into the system proper.”11 Our
rationale is, however, different from Strauss’s, as we will show later, that is, a philosophy of
history is only possible in Hegel, who, influenced by Herder, exposed the genesis of second
nature (customs, habits) as the condition of the spirit.

We claimed earlier that Kant imposed the organic condition of philosophizing, meaning that he
extends the concept of the organism to almost all domains of philosophy. The formulation of
the organismic nature of reason by way of reflective judgment, which we find in the Critique of
Judgment, clarifies the operation concerning purposiveness and morality that Kant couldn’t
fully elaborate in Critique of Pure Reason and Critique of Practical Reason. Indeed, Kant, in §64
of the Critique of Judgment, a paragraph dedicated to the explanation of an organism, draws
an analogy between the organism and the state:

We may make use of an analogy to the above mentioned immediate physical ends to throw
light on a certain union, which, however, is to be found more often in idea than in fact. Thus in
the case of a complete transformation, recently undertaken, of a great people into a state, the
word organization has frequently, and with much propriety, been used for the constitution of
the legal authorities and even of the entire body politic. For in a whole of this kind certainly no
member should be a mere means, but should also be an end, and, seeing that he contributes
to the possibility of the entire body, should have his position and function in turn defined by
the idea of the whole.12

It is often said that the “transformation . . . of a great people into a state” refers to the
establishment of the United States,13 that is, not only to the sociality of the people but also
the federal system, and its relation to the state is compared analogically to an organism.
However, this relation between the state and organism is still an analogy; that is to say, Kant
was unable to talk about the “organism of the state” as Hegel would do later in Outlines of the
Philosophy of Right. In other words, Hegel takes the idea of the organic not simply as an
analogy but also as having an “objective reality.”14 Or, as we will claim, the organic, as a
political epistemology of freedom, only came to a full force in the thinking of Hegel,
manifesting itself as a kind of mechano-organicism. However, first of all, one has to bear in
mind that these oppositions between nature and artifice, organism and mechanism, are not
irreconcilable in the philosophy of Hegel because such opposition is only the beginning of
dialectical logic. The dialectical logic will finally sublate the opposition between organism and
mechanism, meaning to preserve the necessary and to overcome contingency. Dialectics is
neither 0 + 1 = 1 nor 1 + 1 = 2, but rather it aims at a unity that encompasses both thesis and
antithesis. In contrast, such unity is thought through in most concrete terms instead of mere
abstraction or categorization. Therefore, the universal, which is opposed to the particular, is
not truly universal. The universal that Hegel is aiming at is not a universal form that could be
applied to all individuals, but rather it is the possibility of the particulars; only when
universality is attained can rationality and effectiveness coincide. The universal is the desire of
reason and its self-identity. Likewise, necessity for Hegel is not that which is opposed to
contingency, but rather the spirit recognizes that contingency is its own possibility toward
absolute necessity.15

Dialectics, as an organismic logic, functions like a monster capable of engulfing every form of
existence. This dialectical logic implies ontogenesis and autogenesis (though Hegel did not use
this word),16 which could be applied in different domains to understand the movement of
concepts. In the domain of ontology, it is the sublation of the opposition between being and
nothing as becoming (Introduction to Logik); in the domain of politics, it is the sublation of the
individual (defined according to desires) and the communal into the concrete, rational, and
universal state; in the domain of international politics, it is the Weltgeist’s sublation of the
opposition between the West and East and the progress toward planetary freedom.
Contradiction is not that which is to be avoided, but rather it is the prerequisite of the
dialectical movement. Dialectics unveils the world behind its phenomenon. However, unlike
Plato’s Idea, Hegel’s Idee is not transmundane but rather a world of movement in which the
phenomenon, or even historical truth, is ephemeral, being only a mere appearance. Therefore,
it might be more justified to call dialectics a theory of individuation.

§5. Individuation of the Spirit as Historical Process

Hegel’s theory of individuation is a game of triads (or syllogisms), where each element of the
triad is, in turn, composed of another triad. The world, or even the cosmos itself, could be seen
as the rhythmic generation and cancellation of these triads. One difficulty of reading Hegel is
that one needs to loop back to the previous triads constantly, but since each of these elements
refers to other triads, the looping goes on and on. Similar to when one wants to trace a
complex recursive algorithm, one gets lost in the numerous and laborious listing of triads. In
each triad, there is a tendency to arrive at the self-consciousness of the concept; such a
tendency is desire (Begierde). Each dialectical movement of the concept contributes to
another dialectical movement. Hegel’s cosmos is sublime, like a psychedelic becoming, where
everything is generated and transformed recursively in the form of triads. The world neither
moves mechanically nor is it vulnerably exposed to contingency; it individuates dialectically,
meaning recursively. Hegel did not have recourse to the word recursivity, nor did Deleuze in
Difference and Repetition; they had to, therefore, either reuse existing terms, such as circular,
or search elsewhere. However, circular can also mean mere repetition, whereas visually, there
is no difference between beginning and end—for example, a closed automaton, in which every
part repeats the same procedure in every cycle. Recursion is different: it is circular, but it never
repeats itself; like Heraclitus’s river, one cannot step in it twice.
The soul individuates in time and as time. The soul, the first form of subjective spirit,17 is that
which returns to itself recursively instead of repetitively, as we see in Plato’s Phaedrus.
Aristotle criticized that the soul cannot be circular since the soul is as capable of not thinking as
it is capable of thinking. If thinking can be interrupted, then it is not circular.18 Retrospectively,
we might say that Aristotle is a thinker of linearity in this respect since he is unable to think of
a circular form that is not repetitive, in other words, that is, recursivity. All thinkers of linearity,
when confronting the question of the absolute beginning, be it temporal or causal, are
haunted by infinite regression. Aristotle emphasized this in Book Α of Metaphysics, “those who
maintain the infinite series destroy the good without knowing it. Yet no one would try to do
anything if he were not going to come to a limit.”19 If the series is infinite, then there is no
telos, and insofar as there is no telos, there is no Good. Therefore, Aristotle demands a prime
mover—an unconditional cause, a cause that is not the effect of another cause, namely, the
Absolute. Hegel’s dialectics is not linear; it is eternally circular—the Absolute is not at the
beginning. At the beginning, it is only the immediate and abstract existant. Therefore, nous for
Hegel consists of constant returning to itself in order to self-differentiate and attain self-
consciousness. Hegel’s interpretation of πάσχειν and ένεργεῖν in nous of Aristotle’s De Anima
in Philosophy of Mind and Lectures on the History of Philosophy is criticized as a misreading,
one of scandalous nature.20 In Lectures on the History of Philosophy, Hegel commented on
the prime mover: “God is pure activity [reine Tätigkeit]. . . . [He is] the substance which in its
potentiality also has its actuality, the substance whose essence [potentia] is itself activity and
in which the two are not separable; in it, possibility cannot be distinguished from form [Form],
and it is that which itself produces [produziert] its own content, its own determinations.”21
God is no longer the original and ultimate point that emanates but rather a circle, a pure
activity. It also holds true for the subject, which ceases to be a substance, but rather becomes
pure activity. This circular image of thinking is attributed to Hegel’s “misreading” of Aristotle’s
De Anima since he superimposed his own theory of individuation on the Aristotelian text.22 Or
perhaps more precisely, as Catherine Malabou has claimed, Hegel sets up a “speculative
relation between teleological circularity and representational linearity.”23 Dialectics is
fundamentally a theory of individuation: everything individuates, and therefore, everything is
in becoming as a result of a syllogism: being—nothing—becoming. The spirit is no exception; it
moves from childhood to adulthood in a triadic sequence. Individuation does not aim for a
philosophy of nature, or perhaps more accurately, the philosophy of nature is only an instance
of a dialectics that is not yet able to fully overcome contingency. And in this sense, Hegel
moves beyond the philosophers that were before him because, for most of them, individuation
was thought of from the perspective of nature or of God. Spinoza, for example, provided a
point of departure for philosophy with his concept of causa sui, namely, the inseparability of
the concept from being, as well as the immanent causation of the process. However, for Hegel,
Spinoza falls prey to an oriental view that affirms the unity of substance and lacks an
occidental principle of individuality.24 That is to say, Spinoza’s substance remains a totality,
namely, God, which is close to the metaphor of the dark night in the preface of the
Phenomenology. Even though causa sui already means a self-causation and, therefore,
movement, this process lacks a dialectical method; Spinoza’s method is geometric, therefore,
mathematical and formal. The attributes are for Hegel only forms and representations, which
reflect the substance from outside, and the substance is incapable of “immanent reflection.”25
The famous dictum attributed to Spinoza’s theory of individuation, omnis determinatio est
negatio, is for Hegel only a determination of a negativity (coming from outside), but not yet
the negation of the negation. In Hegel, the individuation of the spirit is dialectical, teleological,
and, therefore, historical. The spirit individuates in time and as time. Or maybe we can say that
the Spirit is time as per the last paragraph of the Phenomenology of Spirit, “Die Zeit ist der
Begriff selbst, der da ist”:

Time is the concept itself that is there and which presents itself to consciousness as empty
intuition; for this reason Spirit necessarily appears in time, and it appears in time just as long as
it has not grasped its pure concept, i.e. has not annulled time. It is the outer, intuited pure self
which is not grasped by the self, the merely intuited concept; when this latter grasps itself it
sublates its time-form [hebt seine Zeitform auf], comprehends this intuiting, and is a
comprehended and comprehending intuiting. Time, therefore, appears as the destiny and
necessity of spirit that is not yet complete within itself [der nicht in sich vollendet ist].26

The Concept does not have a pregiven form; the Concept is not a mold that imposes itself on
raw material in order to realize itself; the Concept realizes itself as time and in time. In this
sense, time is the Concept itself, while the Concept is not time but rather a time with its time-
form sublated. The separation between Concept and time does not allow us to grasp either
Concept or time fully. The Concept actualizes itself through externalization and internalization.
Therefore, it demands time, but it is also precisely time itself. For without such movement,
then time would be nothing other than pure becoming (or Zeitform, as Hegel terms it).
Instead, this becoming is not in itself contingent, but it cannot proceed without contingency.
Contingency is what enables it and what it has to overcome with its logic27 until it arrives at
the Absolute. It is worth looking at this concluding paragraph of Hegel’s Phenomenology of
Spirit in detail:

As its fulfilment consists in perfectly knowing what it is, in knowing its substance, this
knowing is its withdrawal into itself [Insichgehen] in which it abandons its outer existence and
gives its existential shape over to recollection [Erinnerung]. Thus, absorbed in itself, it is sunk in
the night of its self-consciousness; but in that night its vanished outer existence is preserved,
and this transformed existence—the former one, but now reborn of the Spirit’s knowledge—is
the new existence, a new world and a new shape of Spirit. In the immediacy of this new
existence the Spirit has to start afresh to bring itself to maturity as if, for it, all that preceded
were lost and it had learned nothing from the experience of the earlier Spirits. But recollection
[Er-innerung], the inwardizing, of that experience, has preserved it and is the inner being, and
in fact the higher form of the substance. So although this Spirit starts afresh and apparently
from its own resources to bring itself to maturity, it is none the less on a higher level that it
starts. The realm of Spirits which is formed in this way in the outer world constitutes a
succession in Time in which one Spirit relieved another of its charge and each took over the
empire of the world from its predecessor. Their goal is the revelation of the depth of Spirit,
and this is the absolute Notion.28
History, we are told, is the self-knowing of the Spirit. This knowing involves an externalization
of the Idea (the living Concept or the life of the Concept). This externalization is not an imprint
of the idea on matter, like the instantiation of the Platonic form or the Aristotelian
hylomorphism, but rather a constant self-realization of the idea, augmenting its capacity for
self-determination. This process of externalization is technical in the sense that it produces
technical apparatus, writings, infrastructures, and institutions. This process of externalization is
a tendency—if we can follow Henri Bergson and André Leroi-Gourhan’s use of this term. For
Bergson, the élan vital is the most fundamental tendency that expresses itself in two other
tendencies, namely, instinct and intellect, and the intellect is that which produces tools and
produces tools with tools; for Leroi-Gourhan, this fundamental tendency is the externalization
of memory qua the liberation of bodily organs. In Kapp, a student of Hegel and the first
philosopher who produced a book on the philosophy of technology, externalization is
considered as the projection of organs, which will be internalized, and this circular form is that
which conditions self-consciousness:

Self-consciousness proves to be the result of a process in which knowledge of an exterior is

transformed into knowledge of an interior. This knowledge, turning back toward the exterior
and expanding our understanding of it, in turn provides new information about our interior,
ultimately producing, in this endless complication of our orientation in the world and of our
self-orientation generally, the content of all knowledge [Wissen]—in short, the sciences
[Wissenschaften].29

It is, therefore, hard to say that Hegel’s is an idealist dialectics in contradistinction to a

materialist dialectics because the idea cannot develop without the material other.30 The
negativity in the process of individuation comes not only from the outside but also from the
act of the spirit itself, an act that is the potential source of both contingency and negativity.
When returning to itself, Spirit has to recollect (erinnern) but also to internalize (er-innern), to
organize. The recollection and internalization of that which is externalized partakes of the
same act. This act of returning to itself is endless. Like sinking into the night of self-
consciousness, it has no end; it is “desire in general.” Desire, for Hegel, is less psychological
than it is rational. To desire is to enter into a laborious activity because the object of desire,
that is to say, the Absolute, is never given as such and will not be given as such at any moment.
Therefore, we see that this returning act of self-consciousness is also endless. Every return to
the inner self via the outer actuality is the only beginning of another act starting anew (A → B
→ C → A′). But this new beginning is one that is richer than the previous one since it is based
on a higher degree of self-consciousness (A → B → C → A′ → B′ → C′ → A″).31 The aim of
individuation is the absolute concept or absolute knowing.

§6. World Spirit as Planetary Thinking and the Place of Reason in History
It is worth recalling that the Phenomenology of Spirit starts with the question of immediate
experience (the here and now of sense sensation) as the abstract universal, and the task of the
phenomenology is to clarify how this abstract universal can pass into the concrete universal.
Phenomenology is, therefore, the description of the individuation of self-consciousness from
the private person to the social class, to a people, and finally to world history. Through a
ceaseless return to the self as well as the historical sedimentation of its externalization, world
history emerges as the horizon of self-consciousness. The individuation of the Spirit is the
becoming of the world, namely, human history. It is “a journey of consciousness,” “a
pilgrimage of reason,” or “an odyssey of spirit proper.”32 Hegel’s Weltgeist is, therefore,
planetary thinking, asserting its foundation entirely on reason. It is a Geist that moves
dialectically. It is one that is able to comprehend not only the human world but also cosmic
existence. World history is, therefore, nothing but proof of dialectical reason. Reason plays a
fundamental role in Hegel’s philosophy of history because reason is, at the same time, the
cause, the effect, and the solution. World history is also known and made visible by
dialectics—in the sense that dialectics is central to the political epistemology that is capable of
knowing the Absolute. While the planetary did not appear to be a major problem or concern in
the nineteenth century, since the twentieth century, it has become a key question and one
that must be revisited.

In Alexander Kojève’s infamous reading of the Phenomenology of Spirit, he takes the lord and
bondsman dialectics and understands it as the motive of history: history could be seen as a
constant struggle for recognition. This struggle for recognition also follows the logic of
dialectics; that is, it always begins with a historically constructed, priorly given contradiction
that then, in turn, sublates it. The lord and the bondsman represent an inequality in which the
self-consciousness of the lord is the being in itself and for itself, while that of the bondsman is
being in itself as bondsman and being for the lord out of the fear of death. The fear of death
for the bondsman maintains the unequal relation between them. However, the bondsman,
through his work (the negation of the thing), gains a self-consciousness of being independent,
while the lord recognizes that he depends completely on the bondsman, who has been serving
the mediation between him and the thing. Mutual recognition is now demanded since the
bondsman likewise has to be recognized, and the lord also wants to be recognized by a similar
or higher social class. Work here is that which transforms the relation: work is also presented
as a tendency of negation, that is, the motor of the dialectics.

The Spirit’s individuation follows dialectics and culminates in the self-consciousness of

different historical protagonists. After the section on the lord and bondsman, Hegel continues
with the world spirit of stoicism, skepticism, and unhappy consciousness. Stoicism, we are told,
“as a universal form of the World-Spirit” is principally a phenomenon born of a time of
“universal fear and bondage” because it sees the truth in thinking itself and therefore refrains
from the otherness. It is also precisely because of this that it was also “a time” when “universal
culture . . . had raised itself to the level of thought.”33 Freedom of thought is itself an abstract
freedom because it escapes the other (i.e., external reality) and withdraws into itself. It is an
“incomplete negation of otherness [unvollendete Negation des Andersseins].” Therefore, we
see that for Hegel, skepticism redirects the stoic, independent consciousness to confront the
other and imposes negativity on it. Skepticism gains its self-consciousness by causing
otherness, which appears in the first instance and claims to be real, to vanish. In comparison
with stoicism, which withdraws into thought itself, skepticism negates the otherness in order
to be self-content. In the Phenomenology of Spirit, consciousness progresses according to its
degree of maturity and independence. In comparison with stoicism and skepticism, the
unhappy consciousness advances beyond the confinement in thinking itself, characteristic of
stoicism and the renouncement of the externality of skepticism. It arrives at a moment of
consciousness where it affirms the other without recognizing the other as the other of the self
or itself as the unity of both. This is also, for Hegel, the passage to Jewish consciousness. In
Judaism, a proto-model of the dialectics of the lord and the bondsman plays out,34 where a
duality of extremes develops in which essence is beyond existence and God outside humanity
(the immutable); this is said to leave humanity stranded in the inessential. In Christianity, a
unity between the immutable and the particular is called forth through the figure of Christ as
God incarnate, namely, that in this experience, the immutable is unified in the particular and
the particular with the immutable; however, such unity pretending to be a happy union is, in
fact, another unhappy consciousness, because both the immutable and the particular still
remain an “other.” For this reason, Jean Wahl claims that Jesus is still a Jew, and his effort to
reunite is, first of all, an act of separation:35“Hegel strove to describe this unhappy
consciousness that is the Christian and romantic soul . . . since the Jew does not have the
privilege of unhappiness or that he shares it with the soul who is most completely opposed to
him.”36

In general, we could probably say the unhappy consciousness is tragic in the sense that it is a
necessary stage toward freedom, a stage where the contradiction between the self and the
other, the law of the family and the law of the state, the mortal and God come to the fore.37
The tragic nature of Judaism and its continuation in Christianism is not the same as that of
Greek tragedy, not only because, as Hegel says, Christianism is a religion of pain,38 but also
because it is not able to overcome the contradiction and to reunite each half: every attempt at
reunification is only a step toward separation. The unhappy consciousness is a decisive
moment for the subsequent formation of a community because it constitutes the unity of the
split, and for Hölderlin and Hegel, such a reunion was precisely the desire of the Germanic
nation.39 This phenomenon, or rather this tendency, repeated itself on the eve of the second
world war and continues to be repeated today among the extreme Right and the
neoreactionary by figures such as Peter Thiel and Nick Land.40 The unhappy consciousness
feels without understanding the participation of the universal in the particular, leaving this
contradictory duality insurmountable since it is still only a feeling, not a concept:

The object of unhappy consciousness . . . is the unity of the immutable and the specific. But
unhappy consciousness does not relate to its essence through thought, it is the feeling of this
unity and not yet its concept. For this reason, its essence remains alien to it. . . . The feeling of
the divine which this consciousness has is a shattered feeling, precisely because it is only a
feeling.41

We may follow Wahl that “abstraction is the synonym of unhappiness,” and for the spirit in
order to have true joy, it has to move toward the concrete universal. This consists of Hegel’s
historical analysis but also the aim of his own project—to search for a true union beyond the
unhappy consciousness that continued into modern times and that expresses itself in the
separation between the church and state, and the state and civil society. Empty abstraction, or
semblance (Schein), like all immediate phenomena, must be put to the test as an initial
movement of the Concept. The test, dialectics, leads to the self-consciousness of the Concept,
the Idea. Self-consciousness means reason is aware of itself, not only in an abstract way, like
when one is conscious of oneself without which one could not even think and speak (in itself),
for to speak is to be conscious of what one spoke and going to pronounce next; but also that
reason is able to know and determine itself in the most concrete form (for itself), namely, that
the progress of reason (or the journey of Geist) is at the same time rational (vernünftig) and
effective (wirklich):42 rational because it is not contingent or arbitrary, effective because it
actualizes (verwirken) itself in reality, both as movement and as externalization:43 “It [reason]
lives on itself, and it is itself the material upon which it works. Just as Reason is its own
presupposition and absolute goal, so it is the activation of that goal in world history—bringing
it forth from the inner source to external manifestation, not only in the natural universe but
also in the spiritual.”44 If there were no discourse of reason, there would not be any
philosophy of history in the West, including a philosophy of world history, because a
philosophy of history already presupposes reason instead of utopia as its end. This explains
why a philosophy of history only appears after the Enlightenment, the Age of Reason. World
history is the unfolding of reason’s self-searching and becoming self-consciousness; in order to
do so, it has to act in reality, and through acting (wirken), it returns to itself in order to set off
again. Reality (the Other) is the being of the externalization of the spirit, but it is, at the same
time, the world in which the spirit is necessarily situated (the Other without which the Spirit is
nothing). The world complexifies and concretizes as and through the actualization of spirit,
through its self-knowledge and self-willing. Thus, we may say that reality is one aspect of
actuality insofar as reality is its externalized part, and actuality is the possibility of reality
insofar as actuality is conditioned by a pregiven setting—be that a concrete situation or a
historical context. The spirit seen in this way is negentropic in the sense that it creates order
through the “extraordinary force of the negative.”45 This order is not arbitrary. Namely, it is
not whatever order, but rather rational order. This doesn’t mean that every act is rational
since, as is apparent, we encounter all kinds of stupidity every day. However, insofar as the
process of actualization is a recursive movement, it is capable of self-correction in the next
cycle of actualization. Therefore, what is rational is preserved, and the passive part of actuality,
or that which is not considered rational, is dissolved (löst sich auf) in the next movement.46

The world civilization, one may say, is the technical retention of the spirit’s memory of this
world, which allows it to act on it recursively. We may follow Hegel and call it second nature.
Second nature is not limited to habits, for habits are mostly sustained by technical objects—for
example, writing or dining equipment. The world civilization as second nature is that which
allows the spirit to progress since the spirit inherits it, and it is that which the spirit has to fight
against in order to be free—not to be incarcerated in a mere in-itself, and never an achieving
self-consciousness.47 There is no definite goal that can indicate the end of history since such a
goal is always only a stepping stone toward the Absolute. The Absolute is not a road sign which
indicates a definite destination; instead, it is only an indication of the culmination of the self-
knowledge of the “infinite actual spirit.”48 We might say that the Absolute is, therefore, a
threshold beyond which the spirit sets off on a new journey, indicated by a new direction and
desire for higher spiritual achievement. In the Philosophy of Mind, the Absolute is the moment
when the Other no longer poses as a limitation to the Spirit but rather presents itself as the
means toward the absolute being-for-itself of the Spirit, which we could find in art, religion,
and philosophy.49 The Absolute spirit is distinguished from the subjective spirit (anthropology,
phenomenology, and psychology) and the objective spirit (right, morality, ethics), being a
distinct moment of the development of the Idea. I emphasize a “distinct moment” instead of
saying a “later moment,” as is the first impression when reading Hegel, where one might think
that the absolute spirit is what succeeds the subjective and objective spirit. However, in terms
of temporality, both successiveness and simultaneity coexist; otherwise, Hegel’s own recursive
logic would be only in service of linearity. The absolute spirit is always already at work
(energein) with both subjective and objective spirit; only its culmination is not yet experienced.
It is called absolute because it is the moment when the spirit is no longer dependent on
anything other than itself, namely, that the spirit is able to grasp itself as what it is:

The absolute Spirit is the identity, of the being eternally in itself, as the returning and
returned into itself [ebenso ewig in sich seiende als in sich zurückkehrende und
zurückgekehrte Identität]: the one and universal substance as spiritual [geistige], the
judgement in itself and in a knowing [in sich und in ein Wissen], for which the substance is
(known) as such [für welches sie als solche ist].50

Independence also means that the spirit is able to free itself from the world and in the
world.51 This act of freeing (Befreiung) is the freedom of the spirit but also its capacity to free
contingency as contingency, that contingency is no longer arbitrary but rather rational. The
absolute Spirit is the manifestation of the recursive movement of the subjective spirit
(characterized by Erinnerung) and the objective spirit (characterized by Entäusserung), and it
appears as the last moment of the development of the Idea. In the three absolute spirits,
philosophy (concept) is the unity of the previous two, art (sensation, intuition) and religion
(representation). According to Hegel, the life of the spirit is only known retrospectively since
philosophy is always a latecomer. For Hegel, the Absolute, however, is not the end as it is often
read after Kojève. Since for Hegel, world history—the becoming self-consciousness of the
planetary—holds no particular consciousness as its goal:
 World history does not begin with any conscious goal, such as we find in the particular
spheres of human life. The simple social instinct of human beings already involves the
conscious goal of securing life and property and insofar as this life in common has already
come into being, that goal is extended further. . . . That goal is the inner, indeed the innermost,
unconscious drive; and the entire business of world history is (as we said) the work of bringing
it to consciousness.52

There is something uncanny here since history, the actualization of the human spirit as time in
space, is driven by something unconscious, something that we thought we had grasped, but it
might be only partial, for self-consciousness is a process without a quantifiable endpoint.
However, this self-knowing is far from aleatory; it is rational, namely, logical. For example, the
formation and development of a Volk could be read as the self-knowing process of its spirit
whose archē is already inscribed in the oracle of Delphi; it is also thanks to this self-knowing,
that the Volk develops a program that preserves its people and continues to survive. In this
process, only what is necessary will be preserved; those that are merely contingent and
dangerous for the preservation of the people will be eliminated—for example, the irrational
demand of the king, the unethical exploitation of one class over the other, or the unjust
appropriation of private property. By the same token, when we consider the world civilization,
there must be, so postulated by Hegel, a spirit that will be common to all cultures and realizes
itself by unifying them. The world spirit is in itself a rational force which constantly actualizes
itself in its own self-knowing and in the world: “Reason recognizes that which is true, which is
in and for itself, that which has no limits. The concept of the spirit is returned into itself. In this
movement spirit makes itself its own object. In this way progress does not proceed into
infinity. There is rather a purpose, namely, the turn into itself.”53

The diversity of the world civilizations will finally subsume themselves to reason because those
who are left behind will not be admitted; the irrational will not be able to survive in world
history. The movement toward the concrete universal also means the subsumption of
planetary diversity to a logic that governs the synchronization and the unification of all
different civilizations. The world spirit is time itself; it conquers space via synchronization. The
synchronization process is made possible by technology and assured by reason—namely,
reason is the necessary measure of progress. Certain particularities might stay, but they still
have to follow the dialectical logic. Contingency can only have a place in history after it has
become necessary. A civilization that wishes to resist reason will only be conquered and then
dismantled. Places that have nothing to contribute to the spirit will be eliminated—for
example, Siberia, if one is to recall what Hegel writes about it: “First, the northern slope,
Siberia, must be eliminated. This slope, from the Altai chain, with its fine streams that pour
their waters into the northern Ocean, does not at all concern us here; because the Northern
Zone, already stated, lies out of the pale of History.”54 Who is this “us” that bears the interests
of the spirit? Europe, or more exactly, Western Europe or the Prussian state? Indeed, Hegel
excludes both the Poles and the Slavs from the spirit’s journey toward the Absolute even
though he noted that the former liberated Vienna from the Turks and the latter had been
drawn into the sphere of occidental reason.55 Instead, both Poles and Slavs, not regarded
exactly as belonging to the West, were only contingent to world history. The same goes for
both Asian and African civilizations. We read in Philosophy of History, “the History of the
World travels from East to West, for Europe is absolutely the end of History, Asia the
beginning.”56 §393 of Hegel’s Philosophy of Mind remains a controversy regarding Hegel’s
racism and the privilege he gave to the Caucasian race: “It is in the Caucasian race that mind
first attains to absolute unity with itself; here for the first time mind [Geist] enters into
complete opposition to naturalness, apprehends itself in its absolute independence, breaks
free from the oscillation between one extreme and the other, achieves self-determination,
self-development, and thereby produces world-history.”57

It is beyond our intention to criticize Hegel’s analysis of the African spirit as childish and the
Asian spirit as being stuck in post-childhood because the intention is to interpret Hegel’s texts
philosophically, as they deserve, though it does expose the fundamental question concerning
the place of reason in Hegel’s philosophy, for reason is universal but also homogeneous.58
Reason will have to expand itself when it wants to become truly planetary. What Hegel insists
is that European rationality will one day reign the world because it will be proven to be the
most rational and mature spirit in and of the entire human history. The European spirit, not
through its geography but its rationality, is destined to be the universal spirit, and it will
synchronize those “local spirits” (Lokalgeister) which struggle to be in history and to be part of
history.59

The principles of the spirits of peoples [Volksgeister] are in general restricted on account of
their particularity, for it is in this particularity that, as existent individuals, they have their
objective actuality and their self-consciousness. Their deeds and destinies in their relations to
one another are the manifest [erscheinende] dialectic of the finitude of these spirits, and out
of it arises the universal spirit, the spirit of the world, free from all restriction, producing itself
as that which exercises its right—and its right is the highest right of all—over these finite spirits
in world history as the world’s court of judgement.60

World history does not belong to a particular people, but rather its subject, the world spirit,
emerged in the dialectical movement of particular and finite civilizations. The world spirit is the
self-legitimating juridical body that justifies the progress of world history. This was the ending
paragraph before Hegel entered into the last pages of the Outlines of the Philosophy of Right
dedicated to the question of world history, also a transition from his critique of right in 1821 to
his lectures in the next years on the philosophy of history. Today we might question if this
Weltgeist, which Hegel sees in Napoleon mounted on his white horse in Jena in 1806 just
before he sent off his manuscript for Phenomenology of Spirit to his publisher, is not simply a
bias or even an illusion. As Nietzsche wrote in the Untimely Meditations, for Hegel, “the
summit and end point of the world process coincided with his own individual existence in
Berlin.”61 The Prussian Volksgeist is the world spirit observed by Hegel at the University of
Berlin and now, perhaps, from the Dorotheenstadt Cemetery. Alexander Kojève once thought
that Hegel’s identification of Napoleon with the end of history was a mistake; it wasn’t Hegel
but Kojève himself who saw the end of history, and it wasn’t Napoleon but Stalin who
indicated the completion of the universal and homogenous state.62 However, Kojève is much
more sympathetic to Hegel, asking why it was Hegel and not the others who recognized
Napoleon: “Why then is it Hegel who attains it, and not some other of his contemporaries, all
of whom know that there is a man named Napoleon? But how do they know him? Do they
truly know him? Do they know what Napoleon is? Do they understand him?”63

It was only Hegel who recognized Napoleon, not as a Frenchman who conquered Jena or a
short general riding a white horse, but rather as world soul, which proves his philosophy of
history. It was later the Franco-Russian Hegelian Kojève who would claim to be the only
philosopher after Hegel capable of recognizing the Absolute through Stalin. The history that we
know is a past that belongs to the human being. For sure, there is time and space before
human beings, but it is not a history of the spirit; as Hegel writes, “World-history is not
connected with revolutions in the solar system, any more than the destinies of individuals are
tied to the positions of the planets.”64 The movement of the spirit is guided by reason and
realizes itself through the collective actions of the human species; the reverse is also true, that
human actions emerge from the becoming self-consciousness of the spirit. Contra Nietzsche,
this historical process, thus conceived by Hegel and realized at the same time through
European colonization, is but another proof of the dialectical logic and carries Hegel’s world
process beyond Berlin.

Thus, in The Concept of the Political (1932), Schmitt defended Hegel against Nietzsche: “The
question is how long the spirit of Hegel has actually resided in Berlin. In any event, the new
political tendency which dominated Prussia after 1840 preferred to avail itself of a
conservative philosophy of the state, especially one furnished by Friedrich Julius Stahl,
whereas Hegel wandered to Moscow via Karl Marx and Lenin.”65 The world spirit and the
Western philosophy of history are inseparable. We may even say that Hegel’s spirit has
reached far beyond his own imagination. We mentioned earlier what Hegel had to say about
Siberia. Siberia, however, was not really eliminated; for it maintained its vitality through
Moscow. And after Schmitt’s writing, the world spirit traveled further, this time from Moscow
to Beijing, the world’s second-largest economic force and probably the only force that can
resist the USA in the 21st century. The German writer Moritz Rudolph wittily described Hegel’s
Weltgeist as salmon. Salmons go back to the same stream from where they were born to,
spawn and die. Hegel said that the Weltgeist began in the East, voyaged to Greece, and then to
the Roman Empire. And in Hegel’s time, it traveled to the Germanic people. This journey is, at
the same time, a becoming self-consciousness as well as a liberation—a moving toward
concrete freedom. Like salmon, it is now going back to where it began, where it will probably
end. Hegel’s Weltgeist has traveled through the entire world, from the East to the West, and
back again, having briefly visited the USA after Hegel’s death (Hegel had already anticipated
the triumph of the New World).
This rhetoric risks being a cliché, fitting the typical discourse of the “decline of the West” as
was claimed a hundred years ago by conservatives such as Oswald Spengler. More recently, we
also often hear political slogans such as “decline of the west and rise of the East” claimed by
Eastern nationalists, self-fulfilling the history of the world spirit or encounter science fiction
novels such as The Collapse of Western Civilization: A View from The Future, where the
destruction of the West occurs due to climate change.66 But maybe one could say, later with
astonishment, that by the cunning of reason, the Weltgeist’s tour to the East was actually only
a disguise, because the West is its true home! Was not Marx already a forerunner when he
saw the realization of the Hegelian world spirit as a world market, which “chases the
bourgeoisie over the whole terrestrial globe.”67 Today one could equally argue that the world
market is a necessary stage of dialectics. Philosophy is always a latecomer; its understanding of
history is always only an après coup or a Nachträglichkeit, as Hegel writes in the introduction
to the Outlines of the Philosophy of Right, that the owl of Minerva only spreads its wings when
the dusk falls. But one thing is at least clear, the thinking of the Weltgeist, be it a traveller or a
synchronizer, is a planetary thinking. This does not mean that all historicist discourses are
planetary thinking; for if the Weltgeist is a planetary thinking, this is because it considers the
world not as a passive being to be conquered, but rather it understands the world as an
organism that will finally arrive at its own completion: self-consciousness.

The question of self-consciousness was never posed in China, according to Hegel, since in
China, the spirit and nature still needed to be clearly distinguished, one from the other.
Religion and state did not have the same sense in the West as they did in China since the
individual’s true faith, Hegel claims, “can exist . . . independently of any external compulsory
power,” while this was not the case in China.68 Therefore, one can also claim by following
Hegel that a political state is not possible in China. Hegel’s explanation of Chinese philosophy
in his lectures on the history of philosophy remains the most superficial of understandings,
something we would not find today from any Westerner interested in eastern thought. This is
partly due to the lack of literature available in Hegel’s time, as well as the turn against a
hyperbolic admiration of Chinese culture that occurred in the eighteenth century, especially
after the Macartney Mission—the first British envoy to China and whose trade proposal was
arrogantly declined by Emperor Qianlong. The description of the Gua in the Iching (Hegel calls
the speculative philosophy of the Chinese)69 as the “most abstract,” and “most superficial
categories of understanding”70 could also be seen as a retort against the romantic perception
of China in the past century in Europe, especially in the work of Leibniz.

Today, it is probably too easy to prove that Hegel is fundamentally Eurocentric—for clearly, he
was. And it is also not at all difficult to renounce Hegel’s concept of history as being
Eurocentric—for it patently was. However, this is not what makes Hegel relevant, and it is also
not what makes Hegel less interesting today. On the contrary, what is intriguing in Hegel’s
political philosophy and philosophy of history is this primordial form of planetary thinking,
which is not simply an ideology like those culturalist slogans we see today in the mass media
but rather a systematic discourse on the self-consciousness and self-determination of the
world and how it is driven and determined by reason.

§7. Freedom as the Drive of the Transitions of Political Forms

Why should we pay attention to Hegel’s planetary thinking today if it is true that the Geist is no
longer in Berlin and that European thinking, from the perspective of today’s geopolitics, might
be considered provincial? If there is a Weltgeist, and if world history is the pursuit of freedom
and reason, then should one be an optimist about the future of humankind and the future of
the planet? Or is such faith in Weltgeist fundamentally just a theology with a secularized
camouflage, as Rudolf Haym reproached Hegel of doing in his influential Hegel und seine Zeit,
that Hegel’s Weltgeist is merely an ideological trick?71 Or, as Marx argued, that it is clearly just
pantheist mysticism?72 Hegel’s planetary thinking—his concept of the Weltgeist and its
relation to world history, is still pertinent, even today, and we could argue that it is becoming
even more so. In this faith, planetary freedom is promised: “This is one of the truths of
speculative philosophy: that freedom is the only truth of Spirit.”73 The individuation of the
Spirit will lead to freedom as something necessary—namely, without which there is no
individuation. Contrary to Kant’s nature that guarantees perpetual peace, Hegel’s reason
intends to be the guarantee of planetary freedom. Philosophical contemplation of history is
only valid when history is seen as the history of reason: “It is only fitting and proper to
philosophic contemplation for us to take up history at the point where rationality begins to
enter into worldly existence, not where it is still merely an unrealized possibility; that is to say,
history must begin where rationality makes its appearance in consciousness, will, and
action.”74 However, this faith in reason is by nature like the faith in God; that is to say, such a
theory of planetary freedom is also a theodicy. History is eschatological in the sense that the
endpoint—if it exists, is the moment when the spirit realizes its promise of freedom. We have
to step back by asking what is meant by freedom for Hegel and what planetary freedom might
look like if we were to follow and prolong Hegel’s analysis of the world spirit. Without
answering these questions, we are still far from justifying that Hegel is one of our
contemporaries.

For Hegel, the fundamental question of right is freedom, as he wrote in §29 of Outlines of the
Philosophy of Right, “Right [Recht] is any existence at all which is the existence [Dasein] of the
free will. Right is, therefore, by definition, freedom as Idea.” We might even generalize Hegel’s
claim that the presupposition of freedom in right is fundamental for all European
constitutions, including those of ancient Greece, while the association of right and individual
freedom only came after the Enlightenment and the French Revolution. Hegel lived in modern
times when individual freedom gained unprecedented significance in politics. For the Greeks,
freedom was the cornerstone of the polis, and vice versa, the polis being the condition of
freedom; thus, the political thought of Plato and Aristotle are philosophies of the polis, and for
the latter, a man without a polis is like a hand without a body.75 However, what the Greeks
meant by freedom is not the individual freedom that we understand today as that which is
granted to every citizen as a right, but rather the freedom of settlements, the slave trade, and
participation in popular assemblies, as is revealed by Socrates’s response to the challenge of
Glaucon and his brother Adeimantus in the Republic, where Socrates imagines the founding of
a city governed by the aristocracy, starting from a group of five people, and gradually adding
populations with different craftsmanship. The polis, in Socrates’s speech, consists of different
technai, each of which defines the role of the citizen as well as demands his excellence or
virtue. Socrates’s rhetoric against Thrasymachus’s challenge on the value of justice is very
much based on his analytic definition of the polis according to technai—for example, wage
earnings and money making is a technē that should be distinguished from the technē of
shepherding. By confusing shepherding and money making, farming and guarding, the city fails
to understand that each individual citizen can only be good at one technē, and excellence or
virtue is an expression of the mastery of a particular technē.76 When every citizen performs
the technē that defines their identities, e.g., a carpenter achieves the excellence of his own
skill, then it is justice. However, the meddling and exchange between different technai—for
example, a carpenter who does the job of a shoemaker—is considered injustice.77

For sure, one should distinguish the philosophy of the polis in Plato’s Republic and Aristotle’s
Politics, for the latter consists of a series of attacks against the former. Aristotle also gives a
lower status to mechanical laborers by questioning if they could be counted as citizens78
because a citizen is strictly defined as a person who “shares in the administration of justice and
in the holding of office.”79 It is beyond our purpose here to investigate Aristotle’s
Nicomachean Ethics and his writings on the classification and ranking of knowledge into
theory, praxis, or technics as well as its relation to the classification of goods in the Politics;80
however, we might still be able to claim, as Joachim Ritter does, that for Aristotle, a citizen
who is able to be self-dependent is free, namely, to realize the purpose of nature in his own
praxis; that is to say, he is able to realize the humanness of being a human (i.e. the human
ergon or ergon in general).81 In other words, the question of justice is modeled on
appropriateness, exemplified by the realization of one’s own nature and one’s individuality in
the polis through habits and reason. The three elements, nature, habits, and reason, are the
means by which individuals become good and virtuous.82

Greek freedom as a political right is fundamental to the polis since it is preventative to the
formation of tyranny.83 The political right introduced by Solon spread out to the poleis,
followed by the reorganization of the phylai by Cleisthenes after getting rid of the tyranny of
Peisistratus.84 We know that Cleisthenes divided Attica into three regions (Athens and its
surrounding, coastal areas, and hinterland), each having ten groups of demes; he then selected
each deme from three regions to be linked together to form a phyle. That is to say, each phyle
is a mixture of demes from three different regions. This reorganization, first of all, broke the
synetheiai hai proteron (customary and familiar connections), and it, at the same time, also
destroyed the foundation of aristocratic influences (Areopagos).85 This institutionalization
reintroduced the civic right or equality of male adult citizens and created a civic time and civic
space. This is also the moment of the emergence of isonomy, namely, the equality of citizens
(notably except enslaved people, foreigners, children, and women)86 be that nobles or middle
class, as well as the conviction that the government of the city belongs to the citizens, as is
claimed by Lévêque and Vidal-Naquet, in order “to establish isonomy is to place arche es to
meson.”87

This emphasis on individual freedom also brought about a crisis of individualism—or in the
words of Nietzsche, an extreme Apollinarism—and disrupted collective and communal life. The
conflict between individualism and collectivism become a thematic of the tragedy. We are also
told that it is during the governance of Cleisthenes that a theatre in honor of Dionysus was
built at the base of the hill of the Acropolis, and the choruses were reinstituted of having fifty
men and fifty boys from the ten demes (to sing songs in honor of Dionysus).88 The birth of
individualism in ancient Greece expressed in the art and affirmation of the individual right was
countered by the communal life of the polis.89 The polis assumes an identification between
private individuals and citizens, but it also indirectly undermines the degree of individual
freedom; as Hegel found in Plato, there is an exclusion of particularity from the state.90 This
parochial nature of the polis was also cause of the instability of the universal that it attempted
to establish.91

From Aristotle’s Athenian Constitution, we know that at least around 400 BC, the selection of
the civil servants (boule, court juries, etc.) was made through a machine known as kleroterion,
a simple mechanical random generator, which chooses members of the council randomly from
the pool of applicants. The destiny of the polis fell on the shoulder of the citizens and
conditions the ethical life of the Greeks. If, for the Greeks and the Romans, individual freedom
was still limited to privileged individuals, Christianity opened a path to the universal, to the
equality of everyone to be beloved by God.92 It is only since the French Revolution that
freedom has become the right of every individual. The French revolution was a monumental
event for Hegel where its new individualism couldn’t be countered by the political form of the
polis or that of Christian religion. The scientific revolution and industrialization also meant that
philosophy became detached from theology and metaphysics, and the private individual from
the citizens of the polis. Hegel’s Outlines of the Philosophy of Right could be read as a
response to this event, asserting the new task of philosophy.93 Industrialization brought
Aristotle’s definition of the freeman to an end. Because the free citizen, for Aristotle, is one
who is able to develop their talent, to realize themselves. However, in the industrial epoch, as
it was later more clearly pointed out by Marx, the workers had to alienate their labor time in
order to make a living—such alienation led to the rise of the most dangerous class for Hegel,
the rabbles (Pöbel), the unorganized or inorganic mass. Therefore, for Hegel, in modern
society, the concept of freedom is no longer the same. In the past, self-restriction was largely
due to the moral pressure of the collective and the communitarian norms (especially as a
member of the church); this is now fading into the background.

It would, for sure, be incorrect to argue that individual freedom only appeared in modern
times in the West; instead, what is meant here is that the history of political thought in the
West is tantamount to a history of individual freedom and the political form associated with it.
That is why Hegel claims that subjective freedom and individual conscience did not appear in
China, while it was a mode of freedom that advanced in India. In the Philosophy of History, we
read Hegel’s distinction between substantial freedom and subjective freedom:

substantial freedom must be distinguished from subjective freedom. Substantial freedom is

the abstract undeveloped Reason implicit in volition, proceeding to develop itself in the State.
But in this phase of Reason there is still wanting personal insight and will, that is, subjective
freedom, which is realized only in the Individual, and which constitutes the reflection of the
Individual in his own conscience. Where there is merely substantial freedom, commands and
laws are regarded as something fixed and abstract, to which the subject holds himself in
absolute servitude.94

Subjective freedom and individual conscience could be characterized as the right to will—one
that is promised in the social, economic, and juristic domains. Such right to will is also the
beginning of the multiplication of arbitrary demands, an entropic expansion of individual
desire, which leads to a new social and economic structure beyond the family, namely, civil
society. In ancient Greece, civil society was a slave to political society;95 in the Middle Ages,
the two converged and identified with each other; the Reformation introduced private
judgment of the reading of the Bible as a form of individual freedom, which was succeeded by
the Enlightenment—in this sense Protestantism for Hegel preceded the Enlightenment.
Thereafter, reason instead of virtue becomes the cornerstone of modernity;96 the separations
between the state and religion and civil society and the state constitute the condition of a new
political thought.97 Civil society has to be overcome by the state because, although it is based
on rights, it aims at nothing concrete because it is driven and maintained by the interests of
certain individuals and social groups. Hegel’s Outlines of the Philosophy of Right is not a
defense of right, but rather a critique of right (or the idea of right), a critique against the
arbitrariness of individualism and the domination of self-interest in civil society. Thus, Hegel,
throughout the book, clearly distinguishes freedom (Freiheit) from arbitrariness (Willkür), an
entropic becoming, in order to, step by step, redefine freedom in the modern state:

We can recall that in the Philosophy of Right a similar progression has to take place. In this
science too, we begin with something abstract, namely with the concept of the will; we then
proceed to the ensuing actualization of the still abstract will in an external reality, to the
sphere of formal right; from there we go on to the will reflected into itself out of external
reality, to the realm of morality, and thirdly and lastly we come to the will that unites within
itself these two abstract moments and is therefore concrete, ethical will. In the sphere of
ethics itself we then begin again from an immediacy, from the natural undeveloped hope that
the ethical mind has in the family; then we come to the rupture of the ethical substance in civil
society; and finally we reach the unity and truth, present in the political state, of those two
one-sided forms of the ethical mind.98
This order from family to civil society and to the political state is nothing temporal but logical.
This transition also does not mean that family and civil society are canceled, but rather they
are sublated in the sense that they are unified into the political state. Kojin Karatani was right
to have pointed out that it was Hegel and not Marx who grasped the unity of the Capital-
Nation-State.99 We will have to confront Karatani’s reading of Kant and Hegel later; here, we
want to raise the question concerning what is meant by unity.

Karatani uses Borromean rings to demonstrate this unity; however, this is not sufficient
because not only are Borromean rings too static but also the relation between each ring
depends on an overlap. This defect of describing the trinity in terms of the Borromean ring is
precise because Karatani’s readings of Kant and Hegel miss the organicity that already
concerned Kant in “The Architectonic of Pure Reason” regarding purposiveness and that Hegel
developed beyond the three Critiques in his own philosophical project. We recall that in “The
Architectonic of Pure Reason,” Kant distinguishes understanding from reason and concepts
from ideas. The task of the architectonic was to search for a systemic unity of reason, which
couldn’t be resolved by the technical unity applied in the schematization of the understanding.
Kant relies on the notion of purposiveness, i.e., teleology, to arrive at the a priori “systematic
unity” instead of empirical “technical unity.”100 The search for purposiveness could be
achieved by the reflection internal to the organic form. To some extent, we can say that Hegel
took up Kant’s task and demonstrated how unity could be performed by dialectics.101 In
Hegel’s Outlines of the Philosophy of Right, unity is exemplified in the idea of freedom. One
tends to think that freedom means the liberty to choose, to speak, to write, to act, and its
political form is what has been known as a liberal democracy. For Hegel, if freedom is thought
of in this way, it remains arbitrary. While I have the right to say whatever I like, this right is still
abstract and formal, and the act that is permitted by this right likewise remains arbitrary.
Opposed to this arbitrary willing of right are laws and customs, those which forbid certain acts.
For example, national security laws criminalize those opinions that are considered harmful and
dangerous to the state. Laws are often considered to be necessary because, without them,
chaos would reign. Without the laws of nature, nature would be completely opaque, and there
would be no natural science since the sciences are built on laws that are, in principle,
necessary; thus analogically, without social laws, society might fall into chaos, what Hobbes
called the “war of all against all.” That is also to say, the determination of the will is only
brought into objective existence through the state and its juridical system.102

Therefore, the definition of sovereignty is not a question of territories and borders since it
doesn’t yet touch the core of the concept; borders or boundaries only set limits to the
applicability of the juridical system concerning rights. When a law is imposed, it means that a
space is defined beyond which this law will no longer be applicable; and within this defined
space, certain acts are not permitted. Otherwise, they will be criminalized and punished.
Therefore, the question of space is twofold since, on the one hand, there is the spatial and
territorial limit (i.e., land, sea, and air), and on the other hand, there is the limit on the
actualization of the will. The superficial opposition between freedom and laws (of nature)
persists and presents itself as a paradox: for if freedom means arbitrary (because it depends
on individual will) and law means necessary (because it is grounded), then should individual
freedom subordinate itself to the laws of nature? This contradiction or tension between
freedom and law is an eternal subject in Western thought, and it once again gained
momentum around the French Revolution. Rousseau’s Social Contract was one of the key
efforts to reconcile the opposition between law and freedom, which we can also find in
Kant.103 If, in Hegel’s Outlines of the Philosophy of Right, one finds on the one hand that the
modern state promises a concept of right that implies individual freedom as historical
progress, then on the other hand we see that this right is at risk of becoming merely arbitrary
(abstract right) and therefore harmful to the political state. If this is the case, then we can read
the Outlines of the Philosophy of Right as an attempt to resolve this contradiction
systematically.

§8. Recursivity of Reason and Freedom in the Modern State

Before we see how this contradiction is potentially resolved by Hegel, we might want to
understand how the opposition between law and freedom was phrased by Kant in the famous
third antinomy of the Critique of Pure Reason. We know that the antinomies arise out of
cosmological inquiries. Kant formulates it in this way “if the conditioned is given, then the
whole sum of conditions, and hence the absolutely unconditioned, is also given” (A409/B436).
This touches each antinomy, but in particular, the third antinomy, which concerns freedom
and the laws of nature. Given an event, one can trace its causes infinitely because there is
always a preceding cause to every conditioned event. And if the absolutely unconditioned
exists (searching for it is the task of reason), then is it independent from causal laws or nature?
If there is such a being beyond all causal laws, is it the source of freedom whilst being at the
same time absolutely necessary (the question of necessity is that of the fourth antinomy)? Let
us look at the thesis and the antithesis more closely:

Thesis: The causality according to laws of nature is not the only causality, from which the
appearances of the world can thus one and all be derived. In order to explain these
appearances, it is necessary to assume also a causality through freedom.

Antithesis: There is no freedom, but everything in the world occurs solely according to laws
of nature.104

Here Kant didn’t yet deal with the question of freedom from the perspective of practical
reason, but from theoretical reason. Kant resolves the antinomy through his transcendental
idealism by associating the thesis with the thing-in-itself and the antithesis with the
phenomenon. While the thing-in-itself might be free from the causalities of nature, all
appearances nonetheless must follow the laws of nature. Therefore, according to Kant, both
thesis and antithesis are to some degree correct. Kant’s resolution of the antinomies in the
Critique of Pure Reason is not yet satisfactory because Kant is only attempting to bypass
mechanism, and not overcoming it. In order to avoid contradiction within linear reasoning,
Kant has to separate two realms so that even though both thesis and antithesis violate the
principle of contradiction, insofar as they are limited into two completely separate realms, this
contradiction is only one by appearance, that is, not a real contradiction. That is to say, Kant
resolves it by drawing boundaries but not going beyond the boundary. This is one of the
principal reasons why Hegel criticizes Kant’s study of the four antinomies as suffering from a
lack of depth. It is only in the Critique of Practical Reason and more specifically later in the
Critique of Judgment that Kant brings in recursive reasoning, which resolves the antinomy in a
more sophisticated manner—namely, the categorical imperative and reflective judgment.105
However, for Hegel, this decisive act in Kant’s later philosophy still suffers from the incapability
to go beyond subjective representation: “If, in the concept of the faculty of reflective
judgement, it does get to the Idea of mind, subjectivity-objectivity, an intuitive intellect, etc.,
and even the Idea of nature, still this Idea itself is again demoted to an appearance, namely to
a subjective maxim.”106

This statement, on the one hand, affirms the significance of the reflective judgment in the
concept of freedom; on the other hand, it reproaches Kant (as well as Fichte) for not having
yet reached the concept, and the spirit, as being in and for itself.107 In other words, Kant’s
concept of freedom (which is equivalent to morality and to the categorical imperative108)
remains too formal and subjective, and therefore not historically and objectively grounded. At
the same time, Hegel sees that the antinomy shouldn’t be limited to the four cosmological
themes that Kant listed; rather, it should be generalized as a philosophical method.109 We
know that Hegel replaces the antinomy with his dialectical method, for dialectics is the
Hegelian logic par excellence.

For Hegel, logic is distinguished from nature according to its capacity to handle contingency.
Nature demonstrates the weakness of the Concept since it is not able to resist contingency;
logic is Concept in its full capacity of reflection, which unifies the in-itself and for-itself. History
is contingent, but historicity, the movement of history as Concept, is the opposite. Since a
historical event can arrive, be it a war out of the greediness and jealousy of a people, or a
natural catastrophe, the logic according to which history unfolds itself is nothing random
because such contingency is always subsumed to a necessity based on the reflection of this
accidental and immediate event. Dialectics is a logical operation based on recursiveness. It
aims to resolve the antinomy not by exposing the limit of pure reason—for it still leaves the
unconditioned as unknown, but rather to demonstrate the possibility of reconciliation—by
making disappear those that are contingent and retaining those that are necessary: “Here, as
elsewhere, the point of view from which things seem pure contingencies vanishes if we look at
them in the light of the concept and philosophy because philosophy knows contingency to be
semblance and sees in it its essence, necessity.”110
Dialectics is fueled by contingency (or, more precisely, the necessity of contingency) since
without which, it will not move forward—thinking only becomes more concrete when it is
tested against contingencies; while moving forward, it will have to sublate these contingencies,
so that only necessity subsists. Dialectics is prohairesis (volition) in the sense that it moves
from the irrational toward the rational. The passage from arbitrary to freedom is the passage
from irrationality and contingency to rationality and necessity, from subjective mediation to
restitution of reality. Necessity has two meanings here; firstly, it means that contingency is
recognized as that which is opposed to the necessary, and secondly, that the act (Handlung)
overcomes contingency by either eliminating it or rendering it necessary, like the hero does. A
hero is driven by his hubris, which leads to crimes and guilt while at the same time it is
recognized as being necessary and as honorable.111 Freedom is necessary as it is in
Spinoza;112 arbitrariness is contingent. For sure, not all acts of will are arbitrary, but they have
the potential to be so. Therefore, a critique of right is proof of reason and necessity. Freedom,
in this sense, has little to do with having more choices. Even the right to vote, for example, can
also be arbitrary. One is given two candidates, and one votes one against another, just as if
one were choosing among bags in a shop. Again, elections do not have to be arbitrary, but the
act of voting can be purely arbitrary. The right to vote does not necessarily mean freedom;
though, without the right to participate, one is definitely deprived of the possibility of
freedom. True democracy and the tyranny of the majority refer to the same term. There are
ambiguities when one comes to defining these political concepts, and it is precisely because of
their ambiguity that reason is put to the test by contingency. The exercise of reason, or self-
consciousness, is a tirelessly recursive process. It is certainly not a moment of enlightenment.
This tirelessly recursive process characterizes the movement of the spirit through its contact
with and acting on the outer world, what Hegel calls the objective spirit. Consciousness is not
to be understood as a substantial entity that has its reality internalized—for example, a
microchip, which sits somewhere in the body or like the pineal gland, the soul’s seat, in
Descartes’s mechanized being. Consciousness is a totality of dynamic relations—both internal
and external:

Necessity does not become freedom by vanishing, but only because its still inner identity is
manifested, . . . Conversely, at the same time, contingency becomes freedom, for the sides of
necessity, which have the shape of independent, free actualities . . . are now posited as self-
identical, so that these totalities of reflection-into-self in their difference are now also
reflected as identical, or are posited as only one and the same reflection.113

Everything can be contingent, going out for a coffee, losing money, winning the lottery, or
even a certain well-respected law of physics, but not everything can be necessary. Especially in
the realm of thinking, why would one thought be necessary but not the other? Hesitation
means defeat since it indirectly admits the contingency of such a necessity: the decision can
also be otherwise. One is often confronted with choices—for example, going to study abroad,
emigrating to another country, and so on. These options can be merely contingent when
nothing is proven to be rational and necessary. Even the will to freedom can also be arbitrary
since it could also be the demand of arbitrariness—for example, to do whatever one wills.
What is given by right turns out to be nothing but consumerism, just as Adorno and
Horkheimer described in Dialectics of Enlightenment. Therefore, Hegel’s concept of freedom is
not what we understand today as the freedom of speech or the freedom to vote. In fact,
today, the opposition between liberalism and authoritarianism becomes an obstacle to
understanding freedom. The degree of freedom thus defined tends to treat freedom as
quantifiable properties, just like consumer products. Indeed, the demarcation used to
characterize authoritarianism and liberalism becomes, at times, arbitrary and dangerous. What
is more important is not the capacity to consume but the capacity to decide, that is to say, to
think rationally (vernünftig).

Hegel’s freedom means independence from the Other. However, this independence is not a
fleeing from the Other but the overcoming of the Other.114 Freedom is situated between
arbitrariness and unconditional obedience; it denotes rational self-determination. Freedom is
the possibility of reason since reason can go astray and fall victim to arbitrariness or its
opposite. Freedom is necessity because, insofar that it is not arbitrary, it must have a reason to
be. Absolute obedience is not the opposite of arbitrariness but is its conceptual twin since both
are dogmatic and hence not conscious of their own conditions. Planetary freedom means, first
of all, the triumph of reason since when every individual and group is able to exercise their
own reason without violating the other’s freedom to reason, we move toward the realization
of freedom. However, this exercise of reason does not simply subjectively conform to moral
laws; rather, it is ethical (sittlich) in the sense that it is also made possible by and through its
own externalization, namely, objectification and institutionalization.

If we understand freedom in terms of choice (or varieties of choice), we are still lingering
between intentional participation and pure consumption—and it is precisely in this context
that mass media has its great influence today. And if we understand democracy as the
freedom to choose our representatives, then such democracy is only valid when it is seen from
the perspective of civil society, in which the individual’s interest and preference are prioritized.
The fundamental quest in Hegel’s Outlines of the Philosophy of Right is to reconcile the
universal and the particular, the communal and the individual, duty and right. It performs a
logical demonstration of the organic structure and legitimacy of the state as the necessary and
logical development beyond family and civil society. Families are private units, while in civil
society, they have to engage with each other in different forms of association. That is to say,
though the private reason tends to withdraw to itself, in civil society, it is involuntarily
redirected to the public since it cannot avoid the other. Each acts according to its own interest
in the form of an individual, family, and/or corporation, which characterizes civil society, a
distinctive social force that has emerged in modern times. However, civil society remains
arbitrary, therefore, particular, and here comes Hegel’s decisive claim that it is only in the state
that a unification of the universal and freedom can be attained.115 Hegel’s method is neither
deduction nor induction but dialectics. This reconciliation finally leads, therefore, to the
concept of the modern state as the most concrete outcome of the dialectical movement,
which goes beyond the individual, family, and civil society. That is to say, freedom has to be
realized through the modern state: “In the ethical essence, the state, nature is robbed of this
power, and necessity is elevated to the work of freedom, to something ethical.”116

Civil society is still too influenced by the interests of different groups and individuals;
therefore, it remains arbitrary. Arbitrariness or contingency is precisely that which dialectics
takes as an object of operation and that which it wants to overcome. Therefore, the ideal
political system should be one that is able to maintain necessities. Family and civil societies are
both moments of the Idea. They appear at the same time as semblance and abstract actuality.
It is in the political state, through its institution and constitution, that duty and right are
unified. To function, such a state cannot be a top-down system because a top-down system is
still too mechanical, and it only organizes the upper layers of the system and leaves the
bottom unorganized. Likewise, when politics is driven solely from the bottom up, it runs the
risk of producing mere rabbles. The ideal state will be able to reconcile top-down and bottom-
up organically. That is why we have claimed that the organic model is fundamental to Hegel’s
political epistemology.

The organism is not only a metaphor here because, as a philosopher, Hegel also develops a
dialectical logic to clarify the operation of such organicity. If what characterizes organicity in
Kant’s writing is the parts-parts (reciprocity) and parts-whole (community) relation (see
Critique of Judgment, §64), then in Hegel, we might say that it is characterized by self-
consciousness, the constant movement to return to oneself and to rationalize oneself.
Becoming self-conscious is a recursive movement that unifies structure and operation, self and
Other. Dialectics is also a totalizing process: through its contact with the Other, the self
develops a strategy that effectively integrates this relation to the Other within itself. In the
process of totalizing, only necessity is preserved. The state is considered here the necessary
development of the spirit, and the history leading toward the state is also nothing contingent
because, while dialectics might allow for the cunning of reason, it will surely not tolerate
contingency: “Spirit does not toss itself about in the external play of chance occurrences; on
the contrary, it is that which determines history absolutely, and it stands firm against the
chance occurrences which it dominates and exploits for its own purpose.”117

The ethical life that is only possible in the state is the promise of freedom. Here, ethical life is
distinguished from the moral, as we have shown above. Morality insofar as it has its source in
subjective feeling risks being arbitrary because not all subjects are accustomed to self-
reflection; morality is the possibility of internality, and it may not pass into actuality
(Wirklichkeit). The ethical has its primary source in the Greek ethos (customs, habits), which is
grounded in the polis—the ethical community (sittliches Gemeinwesen).118 The moral is an
enterprise of Christianity that gives agency to the innerness of the individual. Throughout the
history of philosophy, Joachim Ritter claims, especially via Christian Wolff, ethics is dissolved in
the discourse of morality, which in turn becomes a discourse of human nature.119 Kant
inherited the Wolffian theory of morality and developed a subjective reflection in order to
arrive at universal laws.120 Hegel’s concept of the ethical is not a return to the Greek polis
because the city-state is no longer adequate to accommodate the modern principle of
individual freedom.121 Instead, it is the political state that has become the dominant political
form of modern times. The ethical is the sublation of the Greek ethos and Kantian morality, for
although Hegel criticizes Kant’s practical philosophy, he nevertheless recognizes the
importance of the reflective operation of morality. That is to say, Hegel was searching for a
more articulated political form that is able to facilitate an objective reflection. On the contrary,
the ethical life can only be fully realized in the state: it is neither moral sentiments nor codified
rules, but rather it is their unity, like in Sophocles’s Antigone. The state is not an entity that
gives orders from top down, the way that, in mechanism, the spring is the prime mover. The
state is a machine that is able to function like an organism constantly striving for a unity; the
state is the externalization of the spirit, and it is also the place where the Spirit has traveled
across a threshold. Individuation has taken place, and the state indicates metastability in which
an organismic operation is attained.
2

The Organism of the State and Its Limit

Now, if the state is the greatest thing the human being is capable of creating, but only insofar
as the state is an organism, then the idea of the state is in effect the idea of the organism,
which ultimately means that the idea of the state is the greatest thing that human thought
actually can attain. It should also be evident that we are not talking about the concept of the
individual organic being as the norm. Rather, we are talking only of the organic idea, the being-
organism, organicity—the supreme, divine life-source of every single organic structure.

—Ernst Kapp, Elements of a Philosophy of Technology

In the previous chapter, we suggested reading the philosophy of the spirit as a planetary
thinking by analyzing the recursive and dialectical movement of the spirit. We ended with
Hegel’s claim that the political state is the culmination of the spirit and that only in the political
state is freedom possible. What is this claim grounded on? At the beginning of the previous
chapter, we started with the distinction between mechanism and organism, and following
what was initially carried out in Recursivity and Contingency, we showed that the organic
condition of philosophizing has, since Kant, become the paradigm of modern philosophy and
that Hegel is probably the most systematic thinker in this line of thought.1 If Hegel was able to
make the claim about the political state, it is precisely because the development of the
modern state demonstrates its organicity, and such organicity presents a superior form of
organization. The state, as a political form, in this sense, is the organic projection of the
community where reason and effectivity coincide.

In comparison, J. G. Fichte’s concept of the state remains totalitarian in the sense that Fichte
idealizes a police state in which “every citizen has his own determinate status, and the police
know fairly well where each one is at every hour of the day, and what he is doing. . . . In such a
state where everything is ordered and runs according to plan, the police will observe any
unusual activity and take notice immediately.”2 The Fichtean state seems intolerable for Hegel
because it is fundamentally mechanical—in the sense that everything runs according to plan,
and that which deviates will be considered unusual and suspicious, very much in the same vein
as the surveillance societies in which we are living. The mechanical nature of the state does
not allow anything arbitrary to take place, and in this sense, it is not dialectical because
dialectics do not start with pregiven rules but rather with the contingent. In an unpublished
fragment on the German constitution dated from 1802–3, we can read Hegel’s clear critique of
the mechanism of the state:
 It is . . . a basic prejudice of those recent theories which have been partially translated into
practice that a state is a machine with a single spring which imparts movement to all the rest
of its infinite mechanism, and that all the institutions which the essential nature of a society
brings with it should emanate from the supreme political authority and be regulated,
commanded, supervised, and directed by it.3

The “single spring,” the authority, is that which “regulates, commands, supervises, and
directs.” This mechanistic principle was shared by both Frederickian Prussia and Jacobin
France, in the eyes of Hegel.4 In this mechanical model, any deviation from the norms and
rules will lead to chaos in the mechanical system, like in a mechanical clock: when one part
fails, the whole clock stops. Organicity, as demonstrated in Recursivity and Contingency,
demands, contains, and eliminates contingency—without which there would be no movement
and, therefore, no difference. Organicity redistributes the powers of the state and tames its
tendency to subordinate everything to a single authority.5 Organism as the antidote of
mechanism not only is the means by which Hegel reproaches his contemporaries but also
takes up a prominent place in his philosophy of history. This is also why Hegel could claim that
the idea of the state found in Europe was, in fact, absent in China: “What China lacks is the
feature according to which the idea of the state is concrete in subdivisions internally
determined and organically articulated as distinct domains. . . . The entirety of the state is
something substantial; however, in particularizing itself it divides itself into multiple particular
occupations that constitute the organic branches of the state.”6 As we can see from this
quote, that which distinguishes the state in China from that in Europe is its organicity—
whether Hegel is correct is another debate.7 In the next section following the above quote,
Hegel writes about the caste system in India, where, again, according to Hegel, it is possible to
see the emergence of organicity. In this chapter, we direct our inquiry toward Hegel’s political
epistemology and its implication in his state theory. The young Marx, in his critique of Hegel’s
philosophy of right, was relentless with Hegel’s formulation, for it seemed to Marx that Hegel’s
concept of organicity is ambiguous, and Hegel also failed to articulate the difference between
the organicity of the political state and that of the animal. This confrontation between Hegel
and Marx will be our entry point into clarifying Hegel’s concept of organicity, however, it must
be kept in mind that such an elaboration of his thought is, at the same time, the exposition of
its limits. To expose Hegel’s limits, we have to respect his theory and read him carefully. This
limit, as we will show, is also the limit of the postulation of the political state as the
culmination of the spirit, since for the spirit to progress, the state will have to be sublated.

§9. Spirit and the Organic Becoming of the Externalized

In the introduction to his Lectures on the Philosophy of World History, Hegel states, “The state
is the Idea of Spirit in the externalized form of human will and its freedom.”8 The Idea is
distinguished from the Concept, for the former is the life of the latter. A living (lebendig)
concept is one that is able to reflect into itself, to be conscious of itself. How can the Concept
of State be conscious of itself? Or, in general, what does it mean when a concept is conscious
of itself? We might say that the concept, when reflecting on itself, complexifies and
concretizes itself while at the same time eliminates what is merely contingent. However, not
all concepts concretize in time; it is only possible when the concept is dialectical in nature. The
state as an idea of the spirit is modeled on an organicity or an organismic logic. There are two
key terms here that we need to explore in order to shed light on the notion of planetary
freedom: externalization and organicity. As Hegel writes in Philosophy of Mind: “In the
philosophical vision of spirit as such, spirit is studied as self-instruction and self-cultivation in
its very essence, and its exteriorizations [seine Äußerungen] are stages in the process which
brings it forward to itself [seines Sich-zu-sich-selbst-Hervorbringens], links it to unity with itself
[seines Zusammenschließens mit sich], and so makes it actual spirit.”9 Externalization is the
essence of the objective spirit, in which the spirit no longer maintains an intimate relation to
nature in terms of dependence in all aspects, but rather the spirit is able to intervene in and
transform nature. Spirit is objectifying nature, but at the same time, it is also objectified as the
externalized being, and it is only under this condition that the spirit marches toward its
historical moment of being Absolute. Here, we shall focus on the question of externalization
rather than that of normalization, as Hegel scholars Robert Pippin10 and Christoph Menke
have done excellently. In their way of dealing with normalities and normalization, they see
praxis or social participation as the fundamental medium that articulates the historicity of
freedom. The reason why we take externalization as our point of departure is that the
discussion concerning praxis often undermines the question of technology, without
underlining that social participation as a phenomenon is constantly produced by technological
advancement. In contrast to Karatani’s reading of Hegel through the concept of exchange,
which was based on his critique of Marx since Marxists tend to reduce economy to modes of
production and consequently ignore the modes of exchange,11 we aim to show that there is a
much more sophisticated concept of externalization in Hegel’s theory of the state. If Hegel was
able to grasp the trinity of capital-nation-state through the dialectical method, it is precisely
because, first, organicity is the aim of dialectics, and second, the modern state as the logical
consequence of the development of family and civil society sublates both sentiment and
interest, both of which are not yet objective and rational.

For Alexandre Kojève, the concept of work is at the core of Hegel’s dialectics. But Kojève did
not use the word externalization; instead, he uses travail, a word that can mean both labor and
work. Travail is a technical activity since it externalizes through negation (for example, in
cooking, one negates the raw materials) and, at the same time, exercises through tools (which
is also a product of externalization). For Kojève, work also means Bildung in a double sense:

Work [travail] is Bildung, in the double meaning of the word: on the one hand, it forms,
transforms the World, humanizes it by making it more adapted [plus conforme] to Man; on the
other, it transforms, forms, educates man, it humanizes him by bringing him into greater
conformity with the idea that he has of himself [l’idée qu’il se fait de lui-même], an idea that—
in the beginning—is only an abstract idea, an ideal.12
The key to the dialectics between the lord and the bondsman is externalization. Though it
must be said that one can read it in many different ways—for example, as a type of
psychological play. As a play, it starts with extreme intensity, which Hegel calls absolute fear
(absolute Furcht).13 While Hegel only discusses absolute fear in the last paragraph of the
section on the lord and bondsman, it nonetheless constitutes the ultimate condition of the
becoming independent of the self-consciousness of the bondsman. There is a necessity for this
extremity to trigger a transformation within the self-consciousness of the bondsman. What
exactly does this mean? This absolute fear is directly associated with the Bildung of the
bondsman, who is the true laborer. The bondsman was able to transform his fear of the lord
into the love of the object. The object is that which establishes a link between the lord and the
bondsman, and outside of this setting—for example, in the form of a commodity—it is also
that which relates the factory worker and the consumer. Through the perfection of his own
creation, the bondsman transforms the relation between him and the lord. The lord’s relation
to the object is only one of satisfaction, in which the object is merely consumed, purely
negated. The bondsman is able to establish a fundamentally different relation to the object: to
make use of that which is externalized (organon) and to externalize, to produce ergon (work).
This relation between work in the form of product and reason was clearly stated in his early
lectures, the so-called Jenaer Realphilosophie (1803–4) or the Jena Writings: “Reason, after all,
can exist only in its work; it comes into being only in its product, apprehends itself immediately
as another as well as itself.”14

Externalization (as both negation and production) and Internalization (as both recollection and
integration), travail and Bildung, consist of the recursive process of the spirit and the possibility
of progress. In the words of Kojève, it is due to the “creative education of Man by work
(Bildung)” that history is created.15 Modern states correspond to a particular moment of
externalization (e.g., institutionalization) and internalization of the spirit (e.g., education).16
That is to say, it is a historical-social accumulation of the Idea’s externalization and the Idea’s
self-knowledge. The state is one of the most advanced forms of externalization of the spirit,
following the perpetual dialectical movement of the Idea. The state, for Hegel, stands as the
highest form of the realization of the objective spirit after its basic constituent components,
such as family and civil society:

The transition from a family, a horde, a clan, a multitude, etc., to political conditions is the
formal realization of the Idea as such in that people. Without this form, a people, as an ethical
substance—which is what it is in itself—lacks the objectivity of possessing for itself and for
others a universal and universally valid existence in laws, i.e., in determinate thoughts, and as
a result it fails to secure recognition from others. So long as it lacks objective law and a firm
rationality for itself, its independence is formal only and is not sovereignty.17

The formal corresponds to the objective spirit, which could only come into being through
externalization. The political form exists as an externalization qua objectification without
which there is no sovereignty; for example, the polis would not be possible without the nomos
in its written form and without institutions. We might want to consider it as a first criteria of
Hegel’s concept of sovereignty. Hegel uses the word Entäusserung, normally rendered as
“alienation”; it is sometimes confused with the term Entfremdung, which is often translated as
“alienation” in Marx’s writings. Entäusserung is a term that has been used in the German
language since the fourteenth century to translate the Latin legal term alientio, the right to
transfer (übertragen) a property from one person to another. It is also translated, for example,
by Roger Garaudy, as “externalization,” understood as the actualization of the Idea as a
material being, an objective spirit.18 The meaning of the term Entäusserung, therefore, falls
into two different, converging domains: alienation in relation to labor and private property,
and technical objects that are the other of the Idea and which give objectiveness to the Idea
understood as a necessary element of the dialectics. Externalization is part of the life of the
Idea, without which the Idea cannot be realized and cannot maintain its liveliness
(Lebendigkeit). Through its externalization, which could also be interpreted as the cunning of
reason, the Idea dialectically moves toward the Absolute, the true universal. Truth for Hegel
means the identification of concept and existence—that is to say, when the concept of the
Idea (as Marx writes, the Idea to the concept is like the father to son) is proved to be effective
in outer reality.

The theory of externalization in Hegel’s thought allows the development of a theory of

technology and civilization.19 The externalization in the form of different institutions and
powers (executive, legislating, and the Crown) would not give rise to the modern state if they
did not exhibit the maturity of the Spirit, namely, an organic mode of organization. This is what
Mumford missed in his The Myth of the Machine, where the megamachine of the state is only
seen from the lens of mechanism and absolutism. That is also why it is necessary to look at
different political forms from the perspective of political epistemology. In comparison with the
polis that Aristotle talks about in Politics, which consists of a population of 10,000 people, by
1816, the Prussian state already had a population of 10,349,031 people, which then doubled
by 1871.20 This means that the political form of the Greek polis is no longer applicable to the
organization of the Prussian state. Hegel’s concept of the state is the realization of an
organization that is able to effectively correct itself and resolve polar conflicts, which,
following Catherine Malabou, could be called speculative automatism.21 In Hegel, the term
organization functions as the synonym of organism. Mechanism is immediate since it lacks
reflection. It is like a given phenomenon—one accepts it as it is; we take the here and now as
the universal since the here and now remains always the same, no matter which moment it
refers to. In this sense, the here and now is only an abstract universal, without content.
Speculative reason sets off from the doubt of sense perception, but unlike the Cartesian
reason, which retreats to the ego itself and finds the absolute there, the Hegelian reason
confronts the immediacy in order to make it conscious of itself as Concept. Reason, the other
name for self-consciousness, is here open to contingency and contradiction. Organism
provides a model for explicating self-consciousness, but it is not any old living being one may
find in nature; it is a mechano-organism, which Hegel also calls “absolute mechanism.” The
section titled “Observing the Organic” in Phenomenology of Spirit reveals the “astonishing”
similarity between self-consciousness and organism. Hegel writes: “This is just how self-
consciousness is constituted; it likewise distinguishes itself from itself without producing any
distinction. Hence it finds in the observation of organic Nature nothing else than a being of this
kind.”22

§10. Organism of the State versus Organism of the Animal

If freedom is realized in the state, it is because the state is compatible with freedom, that it
possesses an organic form instead of a mechanical force that merely enforces laws and
dominates the people. Axel Honneth calls it “social freedom,” in the sense that for such
freedom to be possible, it has to be based on a mutual recognition (wechselseitige
Anerkennung) between the self and the other via an institutionalized medium, be that a family
or a market.23 This means that my purpose and the other’s purpose could be mutually
compatible through the mediation of our social status (or estates [Stände], in Hegel’s terms,
meaning “particular systems of needs”) as well as institutional constraints. Here lies the
fundamental difference between Hegel and Kant, in the sense that in Kant, we do not see the
significance of institutions,24 namely, the externalization of the spirit, while in Hegel,
institutions are indispensable. However, not all institutions are equal. For example, the prison
as an institution is different from a family (though in certain cases, they might be similar);
therefore, not all institutions can serve the purpose of mutual recognition. The question that
then arises is: What kind of institution could be considered ethical according to this logic?
Honneth speculates that in an ethical institution, its relation to its participants moves in the
form of a spiral, which has no point of rest: “[That] the moral institutions first make individual
autonomy possible, whose activities can then, in turn, lead to a revision of these institutions, in
such a prefigured spiral movement, it is no longer possible to find the point of rest which
should exist in a firmly established system of ethical institutions.”25 Honneth admits that he is
uncertain whether this is the precise image that Hegel had in his mind when discussing
institutions.26 We would also agree that both reciprocity and the spiral movement are, to a
certain degree, essential properties of the organic form that we have been attempting to
sketch and that we take to be fundamental to Hegel’s conceptualization of an ethical
institution, especially in the case of the political state. However, the “negative feedback” that
Honneth describes sounds rather simplistic from today’s perspective, especially when we
consider that most public services provide feedback channels for citizens. The essential
question to be raised, then, is, How did Hegel demonstrate that the state is the ultimate
ethical institution?

When we enter the third part of Hegel’s Outlines of the Philosophy of Right on the state, we
have already sublated the arbitrariness of the individual will, of the self-interest of the family,
and of civil society (in which, as Hegel rightly observes, the free market will lead to social
injustice); in the end, the only nonarbitrary entity left to consider is the state. If freedom is
only realized in the Hegelian state, it is because the state presents an organo-mechanism that
effectively undermines arbitrariness and allows a mode of civic participation that prioritizes
self-consciousness over self-interest. The state is spiritual in the sense that its own operative
reflection is inseparable from that of the individuals. In an Aristotelian language, such
operative reflection is phronesis, a virtue that is distinguished from the self-actualization of the
individual citizen.27 At first glance, one might think that Hegel is rejecting all forms of
contingency since he wants to overcome the arbitrariness of the individual, the family, and civil
society; the truth is, however, that contingency functions as the test (épreuve) for necessity.
Because the organism is a living being, insofar as it is vigorous (lebendig), it demands
contingencies, without which life would be no different from a mechanical machine. If Hegel’s
philosophy is characterized by a conceptual organicism, it is because the Idea is lebendig; it is
the concept in dialectical movement. The dialectical movement involves contingency—
otherwise, it would be preprogrammed and therefore repetitive. The concept, when it sets
itself into movement, actively engages with contingency, be it out of its will or from the
external environment, to make contingency a stepping stone toward the concrete universal,
the necessity. It is also this organicity present in the state that differentiates the moral and the
ethical, as Ernst Cassirer summarizes: “‘The State,’ says Hegel in his System der Sittlichkeit, in
which he first introduces his sharp distinction between Moralität and Sittlichkeit, ‘is the self-
certain absolute mind which acknowledges no abstract rules of good and bad, shameful and
mean, craft and deception.’”28 This is because, in the state, abstract rights and abstract rules
are not only insufficient but also problematic because they are mechanical and, therefore,
vulnerable to contingency. The state presents a different dynamic of self-consciousness, which
is no longer mechanical but rather an organo-mechanism. This organicity can be identified
with the following: first, the consciousness’s movement toward being in itself and for itself is
modeled as an organic process, in the sense that the organic is posed as opposite to the
mechanic; second, the universal, insofar as it exists, exists not as a static substance, as that
which doesn’t change throughout eternity, but rather as that which is always in a state of
permanent reflection, such as is the form of thinking; third, the reflective form does not exist
only in mind alone, but rather the reflective structure is at the same time an exteriorization
(Entäusserung) and an internalization (Er-innerung). It is through this organic form that the
Spirit actualizes itself in laws and institutions as it moves toward a higher sphere. The political
state is, therefore, the historical product and a milestone of this movement. It is a culmination
because it presents itself as an objective and effective organic unity and totality:

The state in and for itself is the ethical whole, the actualization of freedom; and it is an
absolute end of reason that freedom should be actual. The state is spirit on earth and
consciously realizing itself there. In nature, on the other hand, spirit actualizes itself only as its
own other, as spirit asleep. Only when it is present in consciousness, when it knows itself as a
really existent object, is it the state.29

As I have tried to show in Recursivity and Contingency, Hegelian philosophy is an affirmation of

an organic logic, which is intimate to nature, but at the same time, it overcomes nature since
nature is its other while it sleeps! The state, which is the actualization of ethical life, is a
different realm from nature; it is culture, the self-realization of the spirit, though the word
culture only appears twice in Outlines of the Philosophy of Right. What does the organicity of
the state consist of, and what might guarantee freedom in such an organicity? Below is the
most direct and obvious passage from the Outlines of the Philosophy of Right, where Hegel
explicitly describes the state as an organism:

The state is an organism, i.e., the development of the Idea into its differences [Der Staat ist
Organismus, das heißt Entwicklung der Idee zu ihren Unterschieden]. Thus these different
sides of the state are its various powers with their functions and spheres of action, by means
of which the universal continually engenders itself in a necessary way; in this process it
maintains its identity since it is presupposed even in its own production. This organism is the
political constitution; it is produced perpetually by the state, while it is through it that the state
maintains itself [Dieser Organismus ist die politische Verfassung; sie geht ewig aus dem Staate
hervor, wie er sich durch sie erhält]. If the state and its constitution fall apart, if the different
aspects of the organism break free, then the unity produced by the constitution is no longer
established. . . . The nature of an organism is such that unless each of its parts is brought into
identity with the others, unless each of them is prevented from achieving independence, the
whole must perish.30

The state is an organism in the sense that all its parts form an organic whole; all parts are
identified with the state as a unity; no part is independent from each other. This may sound
rather vague today, and Hegel is not the first to have made such a claim. Rousseau before him
had already made similar statements in a text published in the Encyclopedia with the title
“Discours sur l’économie politique (1755).”31 The difference is that for Rousseau, this
comparison remains a rhetorical metaphor, but for Hegel, it is a philosophical method. As an
organism, the state is also a living being, but also more than a living being, because it is where
“the universal continually engenders itself in a necessary way.” In other words, it does not
generate “the particular,” like an animal that might grow a bit day by day, with more hair one
day or darker skin the next; it is the self-generation of the universal in the sense that it is the
actualization and concretization of reason. This organism is the political constitution: the
various powers of the state are regulated and brought together into an organic unity by the
political constitution. In his commentary on this paragraph, the young Marx made the
following remark: “It is a great advance to consider the political state as an organism, and
hence no longer to consider the diversity of powers as [in]organic. . . . Accordingly, the bridge
to the political constitution does not go from the organism of the Idea and its differences, etc.,
but from the presupposed concept of the various powers or the organism of the state.”32
While “organic” is written in the manuscript available to us, this is most likely a typo, that is,
the opposite of what Marx wanted to write, namely, inorganic. In what sense is it an
advantage to consider the political state as an organism? Didn’t Adam Müller and many others
also frame the state in terms of organisms? After his praise of this theoretical advancement,
Marx asks what the differences are between the organism of the state and the organism of the
animal (tierischer Organismus). If Hegel could not explain the differentia specifica between the
organicity of a state and that of an animal, then such a difference would be without meaning.
Marx further asks why then did Hegel not claim “This organism is a solar system”?33 Marx’s
attack raises many questions regarding his own take on it, but his explanation certainly is not
more satisfactory than Hegel’s: “In truth, Hegel has done nothing but resolve the constitution
of the state into the universal, abstract idea of the organism; but in appearance and in his own
opinion he has developed the determinate reality out of the universal Idea.”34

Marx reproached Hegel for presenting a formalization without being able to give any concrete
content—Hegel’s speculative thinking ended in a preformed schema.35 The reproach is harsh
because it is difficult, if not impossible, for a philosopher to outline a complete theory of the
state or of a revolution; not even Marx himself managed this. What Hegel claims about the
organism of the state has to be further interpreted. Retrospectively, the work of Ernst Kapp
seems to have responded to Marx’s question of Hegel’s claim regarding the organism of the
state.36 Kapp was a geographer who was influenced by both Carl Ritter and Hegel. Kapp, in his
Elements of a Philosophy of Technology (1877), developed what he calls “organ projections.”
The subtitle of the treatise is “for the history of development of culture from a new point of
view.” This new point of view that Kapp proposed suggests that all the tools, instruments, and
even institutions are projections of organs. This projection constitutes one of the most
important parts of the self-consciousness of the human being. Human beings, through organ
projection, transform and conquer nature.

There is an organology at play in Kapp’s concept of the tool, meaning that this or that tool or
machine, no matter how mechanistic it is, presupposes an organicity without which it would
not be invented and used. In other words, tools are the organized inorganic. Kapp uses the
concept of organ projections to understand the emergence of technology and civilization,
which range from simple tools to steam engines, railway systems, and finally, the state. In the
spirit of Hegel, Kapp treats the state in the last chapter of the book as if it constitutes the
highest form of organ projections. According to Kapp, the political state is “an organism
unconsciously proceeding from the work of the human hand and the human spirit,” and “the
bodily organism is the natural state.”37 In a sense, just as Schelling claims that the Geist is the
invisible nature and nature is the visible Geist, Kapp suggests that the bodily organism is the
visible state, and the state is the invisible bodily organism. In other words, the human body is
the archetypal image of the state.38 In his Der konstituierte Despotismus und die
konstitutionelle Freiheit (Constituted despotism and constitutional liberty, 1849), a volume
that led to his exile in Texas, Kapp compared despotism with mechanism and freedom with
organism: “The more mechanically a state becomes governed, the more despotically it is
governed; the more organically a state governs itself, the freer it is.”39 In his Elements of a
Philosophy of Technology (published twenty-eight years later), the state is opposed again to
mechanism, and mechanism is described as the obstacle or even an illness to be overcome:

It is therefore the task of the state to ward off mechanical disruptions and to maintain
overall organic activity in an uninhibited flux. Mechanism is a drain on the organism, just as
illness is a drain on health; mechanical deterioration and organic revitalization exist in inverse
proportion. In the state, healing is achieved through work, but only through the kind of work
that preserves and enhances vital powers, just as medicaments that are at the same time
nutriments promise to do the most for the ailing body.40

The preservation of the organic being of the state is where work is valued. The health of the
state is measured by its resistance against mechanism. Though the bureaucracy of the modern
state is often compared to a machine, thus the word state machine is contrasted to state
reason, the state, according to Kapp, “no matter if it is still imperfect or even deteriorating,
remains an organism and is never a machine.”41 Kapp’s characterization of the state as an
organism from the point of view of anthropogeny is a justification of the state as the highest
form of externalization. Kapp significantly developed the technological and the organological
dimension implicit in Hegel’s thought. While Kapp’s speculative theory of the state affirms the
superiority of organism over mechanism, he did not explain, at least not satisfactorily, the
difference between the organism of the state and the organism of the animal.

In a sense, the Hegelian state still remains a mysticism and an abstraction. We will, therefore,
have to go further into what Hegel was really aiming at when arguing that the state is an
organism. This organism is the product of the Idea, and in the case of the organism of the
state, it is the reciprocity between differentiated powers within the state and the individuals.
However, these features could also be found in a mechanical state, in the differentiation of
powers in different institutions regulated by the constitution. Organism, for Hegel, is the
concept that passes syllogistically through three determinations: sensibility, irritability, and
reproduction.42 But to what extent, then, is the organism of the state different from the
organism of the animal? One can try to make analogies between the animal and the state in
terms of these three determinations, but such an analogy will remain a mere metaphor and
thus futile. Hegel had already made a comparison between the animal and the human in the
Phenomenology of Spirit:

The animal finishes up with the feeling of self. The instinct of Reason, on the other hand, is
at the same time self-consciousness; but because it is only instinct it is put on one side over
against consciousness, in which it has its anti-thesis. Its satisfaction is, therefore, shattered by
this antithesis; it does indeed find itself, viz. the End, and likewise this End as a Thing. . . . The
organism shows itself to be a being that preserves itself, that returns and has returned into
itself. But this observing consciousness does not recognize in this being the Notion of End, or
that the Notion of End exists just here and in the form of a Thing, and not elsewhere in some
other intelligence.43

The distinction between the organism of the state and the organism of the animal consists in
the fact that the organism of the state contains the Notion of End not in the thing (for
example, in its institutions) but rather in an End as the realization of freedom, which cannot
exist as a thing. Marx was very clear that Hegel’s real interest was not the philosophy of right
but rather logic. Hegel’s theory of the state is nothing but proof (Beweis) of the realization of
his logic instead of the other way around.44 It is precisely the question of logic that
distinguishes Hegel’s organism of the state from the organism of an animal, namely, the
difference between logic and nature. This must be strictly distinguished from the analogy
between the state and organism discussed by Kant and later explored by Ernst Haeckel from a
biological perspective, since, for the latter, the complex multicellular organism was also
compared to the federal states.45

As we pointed out earlier, in the Phenomenology of Spirit, Hegel identifies a similarity between
self-consciousness and an organic structure and operation,46 for self-consciousness is itself a
logical form of life. However, self-consciousness is not the same as organic nature. Nature, as
we know in the Encyclopaedia, is contrasted with the spirit in terms of their strength of
Concept. The Concept in nature is feeble in general since it gives rise to monstrosities and fails
to incorporate and rationalize contingencies. Therefore, it mutates into varieties of
irregularities. The Concept in spirit is also alive; however, it is logical, and therefore it resists
mutations: “Nature in itself, in its idea, is divine; but in its existence it does not conform to its
Concept. . . . Nature has, therefore, been described as the defection of the Idea from itself—
the idea being in this shape of externality inadequate to itself. . . . It gives away to accidentality
and chance; it cannot in all its particular determination be penetrated by reason.”47 As we
read here, the Idea and its externalization are different. Instead, we find in its externalization
defects that deviate from the realization of the Idea. This discrepancy is due to the fact that
nature, insofar as it is not logic, is vulnerable to contingency. Two paragraphs later in the
Encyclopaedia, Hegel names this discrepancy the “feebleness of the Concept in nature”: “The
feebleness of the Concept in nature in general, not only subjects the formation of individuals
to external accidents, which in the developed animal, and particularly in man, give rise to
monstrosities, but also makes the genera themselves completely subservient to the changes of
the external universal life of nature.”48

In the Encyclopaedia, the Philosophy of Nature ends with the question of the soul, and then it
proceeds to the Philosophy of Mind, which starts with the subject. That is to say, as Malabou
proposes, Hegel’s Philosophy of Mind is a treatise on second nature.49 The opening
paragraphs of the Philosophy of Mind set off by clarifying the relation between spirit, nature,
idea, and concept. Hegel writes: “External nature too, like the Spirit, is rational, divine, a
presentation of the Idea. But in nature the Idea appears in the element of asunderness [im
Elemente des Außereinander], is external not only to the Spirit but also to itself, precisely
because it is external to the inwardness [Innerlichkeit] that is in and for itself and which
constitutes the essence of the Spirit.”50 Nature is “the self-externality of the Idea” (das
Außersichsein der Idee),51 while the essence of the spirit is the inwardness, tirelessly returning
to itself, an Er-Innerung, that is, as both remembrance and internalization. The animal body, in
comparison with plants, exhibits a higher potency of organization, a higher level of
interdependence of different members of the body; it is still maintained by necessity but not
freedom. The animal organism exhibits an ideal determinacy, and “nothing in it appears as
independent.”52 This is to say, the organization of the animal is maintained by a necessity,
while it is not capable of rendering this necessity contingent—for example, seasonal changes
or mutation of the environment—because only the Spirit alone can do it; for example, instead
of adapting itself to the environment and climate as animals do, it adopts them by building
houses and farms. The spirit that responds too sensitively to the cosmic movement only
exhibits a kind of illness: “Differences of climate involve a more solid and vigorous
determinacy. But the response to changes of the seasons and hours of the day is found only in
feeble moods, which can become especially prominent only in illnesses (including
derangement) and in the depression of self-conscious life.”53 The Spirit is in time and space in
a cosmic sense, but it is also above them. The Spirit is a rational being that is not disturbed by
thunder and lightning since the latter only appears to be something contingent. Nature is the
Other, or a test, a detour, through which the Spirit returns to itself. It is now perhaps possible
to answer Marx’s question regarding the difference between what Hegel calls organism of the
state and organism of the animal. Taking into account the transition from the philosophy of
nature to the philosophy of spirit, we might say that Hegel’s state is a development of logic out
of an inner necessity via its externalization. The state did not come out of nowhere, and
neither is it a mutation of civil society; instead, the state arises out of the infinite actual spirit
as necessity. Therefore, when Hegel claims that the state is an organism, he specifically means
the organismic logic identified in the spirit. To return to the Outlines of the Philosophy of Right,
what then does it mean that “this organism is the constitution”? If this organism is the
constitution, then it is not only because the constitution exhibits the reciprocal relations
between different powers but also that the constitution is conscious of itself. But how is the
constitution conscious of itself? Hegel’s statement seems to be even more mysterious than
Marx had first thought.54

Hegel writes that the constitution is always already presupposed.55 Not only is the
constitution presupposed, but the state is too—it is not that the state comes out as a product,
but rather the state as an idea is already at work during the stage of the family and civil
society.56 Family, civil society, and the political state are the three moments of the Idea, but it
is only in the political state that the idea attains both in itself and for itself, and where we can
conceive of an “organic unity of political life.”57 The state and its constitution cannot be
separable. The constitution is, however, not something made by a modern state. Instead, the
constitution has existed since the beginning. In §273, Hegel claims that questions such as who
should have made the constitution (wer die Verfassung machen soll) are not valid. The
realization of the state is the expression of the self-consciousness of the constitution. The
constitution is the definition of the sovereign of the state and the relation between the
different powers of the state and its people in a written (externalized) form: “In any case,
however, it is absolutely essential that the constitution should not be regarded as something
made, even though it has come into being in time. It must be treated rather as something
simply existent in and for itself, as divine, therefore, and constant, and so as exalted above the
sphere of things that are made.”58 The self-consciousness of the constitution first indicates
the consistency between the “character and development of self-consciousness” and the
constitution; second, it indicates the path toward the realization of the state as organism. In
other words, the sovereignty doesn’t refer to any persona, but rather it is the organic unity
that is limited to the modern state (or more precisely, in Hegel’s constitutional monarchy); we
might consider this another criterion of Hegel’s sovereignty. When there is a change to a
constitution, it is not that someone modifies it from without, but rather the constitution
demands to update itself. We can understand why Hegel insisted that it is inappropriate to ask
who invented the constitution, since the constitution came into being without birth. The state
is organic because, with its constitution, it moves toward self-consciousness. Thus, Hegel
claims in the Addition to §276, “Much the same thing as this ideality of the moments in the
state occurs with life in the organic body.”

One might wonder if the state is really organic since this claim seems to be at odds with
Hegel’s endorsement of the crown as the sovereignty of the monarchy. The constitutional
monarchy that Hegel endorsed may be the Achilles heel of the self-consciousness of the
constitution. One might consider that there is a hiatus between his political epistemology and
the megamachine of his time, namely, the megamachine still retains some essential
mechanistic features. Marx was relentless on this point in his critique of Hegel because the
crown is the arbitrary will that is above the executive and legislative powers.59 In his
commentary to §302, Marx pointed out sharply that “the power of the crown exists only as an
extreme, a one-sidedness because it is not an organic principle.”60

It might be interesting to recall Jacques Derrida’s interpretation of the circularity of

sovereignty in Alexis de Tocqueville’s Democracy in America. We have been calling this
circularity recursivity since we have been emphasizing that recursivity has to be distinguished
from the circularity of pure repetition. This recursivity is the operation of the organicity of the
state—though both the terms recursivity and organicity are not employed by Derrida or
Tocqueville. Instead, Tocqueville emphasizes a circularity he identified in the people, who are
the “cause and the end of all things.”61 Derrida claimed that Tocqueville “presents this
circularity as the effective fulfilment of a democracy that, up until then, had been presented
only as a project, an opinion, a claim or allegation, a deferral to later, a utopia, indeed the
fiction of a democracy to come.”62 It is not our intention to equate the Hegelian state and the
Tocquevillian sovereignty of the people; it serves here as an example of how the question of
recursivity is fundamental to the concept of sovereignty that we will look into in more detail in
the following chapters.

Finally, we may say that freedom is realized in Hegel’s state because the state is organic, and
freedom here doesn’t mean whatever might be allowed by law since, in this sense, it is still an
abstract right—one follows mechanistically rules and instructions, just as is described in John
Searle’s Chinese Room experiment.63 Freedom is what sustains the organicity and reflectivity
of the state. It is also that which allows the individual to act according to reason and the
internal necessity of reason. Reciprocally, the different powers (the crown, legislating power,
and executive power) are what allow such a freedom to flourish by politicizing the estates
(Stände). It is in this sense that we can understand that Hegel is called a philosopher of
freedom as Klaus Vieweg claimed; however, such claim is conditional.64 Hegel provided an
updated concept of freedom, and like the Greek’s freedom, which was inseparable from the
polis and was considered an apparatus preventative to the formation of tyranny, Hegel’s
freedom also has to be strictly contextualized in the modern state. The crown is not the real
sovereign; the real sovereign constitutes the overlap between the organic unity of the
governing and the governed as experienced from the inside and the territorial unity seen from
the outside. In other words, when the political form exceeds that of the political state, the
notion of freedom has to be revaluated.

§11. The Impasse from the State to Planetary Freedom

After the construction of a theory of the state, Hegel had to confront a world that consisted of
different states; that is to say, he had to confront the exteriority of the state. This
confrontation can be seen at work in the last paragraphs of his Outlines of the Philosophy of
Right. Given the different interests of states, states enter into conflicts, wars, and coalitions.
Does, then, the planet need a global governing body like the League of Nations or the United
Nations? For Hegel, the answer is no, and he rejects such a governing body. This raises the
rather interesting question regarding why Hegel might have rejected and, further, how
different states might maintain stable international relations without falling into such disasters
as the two world wars, tragedies the size of which Hegel did not see. In Addition to §259, “The
Idea of the State,” Hegel states:

The state in its actuality is essentially an individual state, and beyond that a particular state.
Individuality [Individualität] is to be distinguished from particularity [Besonderheit]. The
former is a moment in the very Idea of the state, while the latter belongs to history. States as
such are independent of one another, and therefore their relation to one another can only be
an external one, so that there must be a third thing standing above them to bind them
together. Now this third thing is the spirit which gives itself actuality in world-history and is the
absolute judge of states. Several states may form an alliance to be a sort of court with
jurisdiction over others, and there may be confederations of states, like the Holy Alliance for
example, but these are always relative only and restricted, like any “perpetual peace.” The one
and only absolute judge, which makes itself authoritative against the particular and at all
times, is the spirit in and for itself which manifests itself in the history of the world as the
universal and as the genus there operative.

Hegel makes a difference between individuality and particularity (and this is probably also the
misunderstanding of Marx, but unfortunately, Marx didn’t leave us his commentaries on the
passages before §260). The state’s individuality—becoming an individual, an adult, departing
from the infancy of the Greek polis founded by the hero—is the temporal and logical
consequence of the Idea of the state. A particular state, such as Prussia and France, is only one
particular case belonging to history. Hegel rejected any international governing body, such as
the Holy Alliance created in 1815 after the defeat of Napoleon to maintain peace in Europe,
but more fundamentally, its target was Kantian cosmopolitanism.65 Hegel affirms the
independence of the state and that its relation to other states can only be external. This means
that, for Hegel, there is an organicity of the state but no organicity among the states.
Therefore, the relation between the states risks being purely unorganized. Why does Hegel
insist on this point?

Kant sees establishing universal and lasting peace as the “entire final end of the doctrine of
right within the limits of mere reason.”66 In order to achieve this goal, there is only one way,
and that is when the states leave the “lawless condition,” as individuals did by adapting
themselves to public laws, and “so form an (always growing) state of nations (civitas gentium)
that would finally encompass all the nations of the earth.”67 Kant is not proposing a universal
international law, such as mechanical laws that all members have to subsume themselves to,
but rather we have to recognize that Kantian cosmopolitanism is based essentially on two
concepts, both of which are fundamental to any form of organicity: community (Gemeinschaft)
and reciprocity (Wechselwirkung). First, the surface of the earth is communally possessed by
everyone (des Rechts des gemeinschaftlichen Besitzes der Oberfläche der Erde), and since this
limited surface is owned by everyone, it follows that the rights of visiting a foreign country
should be recognized as a natural law because the borders are only artificial.68 Kant’s
argument resonates with some contemporary thinkers, such as Bruno Latour, who proposed to
think of the planet as that which is shared by everyone and that everyone has to take care of.
The ecological crisis is a call for such consciousness, one that should transcend the interests of
individual states, especially in view of politicians like Donald Trump and their denial of the
urgency of climate change. Second, in contrast to those who tend to make the above-
mentioned call a moral necessity, Kant suggests a pragmatic and concrete algorithm:
international trade. Trading establishes interactions between different people, and those
people who behave poorly will be discredited and refused commercial activities, just as China
and Japan did against the colonizers.69 Since it would be highly surprising that Hegel didn’t
detect this political organicism in Kant’s 1795 “Treatise on Perpetual Peace” or his 1797
Metaphysics of Morality, why then did Hegel ignore or reject the potential of developing it
further?

Hegel has recourse to the world spirit and reason as the authority that could make juridical
decisions upon the states. The aspiration to reason as the “highest court of appeal” is already
something we find in Kant and Fichte in regard to the possibility of perpetual peace.70 The
world spirit is not a hidden spirit observing from behind and intervening whenever injustice
happens. The world spirit is not a substance, and it is also not something to which one can
pray. Is not naming the World Spirit the ultimate judge the same type of mysticism that Marx
had already accused Hegel of? Toward the end of the third part on the state, Hegel writes of
“the spirit of the world, free from all restriction, producing itself as that which exercises its
right—and its right is the highest right of all—over these finite spirits in world history as the
world’s court of judgement.”71 If all states should be considered independent, and if all states
claim to embody the world spirit, who is going to sit on the court other than time itself? Again,
we read in §324:

With that end in view, Kant proposed a league of monarchs to settle differences between
states, and the Holy Alliance was meant to be an institution of much the same kind. But the
state is an individual, and individuality essentially implies negation. Hence even if a number of
states make themselves into a family, this group as an individual must engender an opposite
and create an enemy. As a result of war, peoples are strengthened, but nations involved in civil
strife also acquire peace at home through making wars abroad. To be sure, war produces
insecurity of property, but this real insecurity is nothing other than a necessary movement.

It seems that here Hegel cannot think of world peace, or more decisively, Hegel rejects the
possibility of perpetual peace, not only because, as a true Heraclitean, wars are necessary, but
also because Hegel’s political thought was born as individualism awakened: Hegel wants to
overcome individualism through the state, but he also endowed the state with individualism,
in the sense that each state is firmly considered as an individual or a persona. Kant
understands universal international law as the desire of reason, while Hegel sees confrontation
or conflict as inevitable between individual states. On the one hand, one can say that Hegel is
drawn to political realism, in which the play of friend and enemy is inevitable. The state as an
individual must have its enemy, and a group of states forming an alliance must also have their
enemies. Therefore, to speak about perpetual peace is only an alluring moral abstraction, if
not an illusion, which Hegel refuses.72 Here Hegel anticipates Schmitt since his refusal of an
international governing body is later mirrored by Schmitt’s own rejection of the League of
Nations. Schmitt rejects any planetary governance that is said to exist in the name of humanity
because, for Schmitt, whoever talks about humanity essentially cheats73 since humanity is
abstract and empty, and as he mocks, since it is empty, it is able to fill itself with hypocrisy.

Having said this, one could argue that Hegel is, in fact, proposing an idealism through and
through since instead of an international governing body, Hegel has recourse to the world
spirit as the guarantee of justice and not nature, as is the case in Kant.74 The world spirit is not
present in the same way as an institution like the League of Nations or the United Nations
because the world spirit is always in becoming. And indeed, it is only reason that can judge the
progress of history, not history as seen by an individual. Historians provide factual evidence,
which then allows the philosopher to reconstruct a history of reason, but not all historians
would see the world spirit as Hegel did. In this sense, we encounter an epistemological
problem because the world spirit is always known afterward, as an après coup; it is for this
reason that we always risk being late, sometimes perhaps too late, namely, as a catastrophe.
How could we address this ontological dilemma, one where the judge is absent or appears only
after the suspects are already sentenced? More significantly, does not the refusal of a world
organization equally contain a contradiction since, according to Hegel, reason cannot be
separated from its externalization? Here, there seems to be a logical defect that must be
addressed. The way to resolve this defect is to rethink the concept of externalization beyond
the forms of state institutions, which we will address again in the later chapters of this work.
For now, we will stick to Hegel’s arguments.

The world spirit is not God, nor is it the mandate of heaven that oversees the world, punishing
the injustices. We can only give authority to the world spirit when the past epochs of theology
and metaphysics are already behind us. We should read here in parallel the historicism of
Hegel and Auguste Comte.75 It is not without interest to note—though we cannot deal with it
here—that, like Hegel, Comte’s philosophy also contains a strong organismic element. Comte
tried to show how history passes from theology (fictitious state) to metaphysics (abstract
state) and then arrives at positivism (positive state). Hegel suggests understanding the passage
of the spirit as moving from art to religion and finally to philosophy. Modernity is characterized
by this secular and positivist desire to get rid of theology and metaphysics. The world spirit,
insofar as it merits the name of reason, can only be the reflection of the planet as an organized
totality of which states are its members. This reflection is also a synchronization in which the
externalization of the spirit becomes organically connected and balanced. These
externalizations are institutions, but largely technologies and megamachines, which is often
hidden in the discourse regarding institutions among Hegel scholars (for example, in Axel
Honneth’s effort to emphasize the cruciality of institutions in mutual recognition). We may
speculate that for Hegel, the question of technology is still obscured in the discourse of
national economy. Therefore, institutions stand out as the most effective social, economic, and
political units; in civil societies, these institutions—for example, functioning representatives of
interest groups—have to be limited and balanced. The state, then, is the institution of
institutions: it is able to construct an organic unity through its constitution. However, this
raises the question: If the world spirit is not an institution, then how can it intervene in the
cases of injustice among different individual states? We read in §331 regarding the relation
between states:

A state is as little an actual individual without relations to other states (see §322) as an
individual is actually a person without a relationship with other persons (see §71 and
elsewhere). The legitimacy of a state and, more particularly, so far as its external relations are
concerned, of its monarch also, is partly a purely internal matter (one state should not meddle
with the domestic affairs of another). On the other hand, however, it is no less essential that
this legitimacy should be rendered complete through its recognition by other states, although
this recognition requires a guarantee that where a state is to be recognized by others, it shall
likewise recognize them, i.e., respect their independence; and so it comes about that they
cannot be indifferent to each other’s internal affairs.76

Here Hegel suggests not mixing up with the internal affairs of the other states because these
other states are also individuals, and one shouldn’t intervene in the affair of another
individual. One may want to ask: Should one recognize a terrorist regime once it has seized
power in a country? Even though, in the name of tradition, and despite its promise to become
respectable, it still maintains the death penalty, as well as unacceptable measures against
females? Once it has been named as a tradition, it is then a part of its culture, part of its
particularity. Should not the other states respect its particularity in the name of cultural
diversity and sovereignty? While Hegel emphasizes the necessity of recognition—this also
indicates the difficulty of the Monroe doctrine, which is regarded as the principle of
noninterventionism77—if each state remains totally indifferent to each other’s internal affairs,
values, and judgments, then there is only a set of Volksgeister. The court of world history
would then be full of suspects while being without any judge. If one state were to seemingly go
against reason, as in the case of the regime mentioned above, now for reason to claim its
universality, something ought to happen. There is a necessity for intervention that justifies
labeling oneself as a “just enemy.” The just enemy has morally already won since whoever
fights against it is deemed unjust:

The European nations form a family in accordance with the universal principle underlying
their legislation, their customs, and their civilization. Accordingly, this principle has modified
their conduct under international law in a state of affairs [i.e., war] otherwise dominated by
the mutual infliction of evils. The relations of state to state are uncertain, and there is no
praetor available to adjust them. The only higher judge is the universal spirit in and for itself,
the world spirit.78

According to Hegel, then, the world spirit is functioning behind the scenes, and so the process
of colonization and modernization is precisely the world spirit at work. Nothing is more
cunning than the cunning of reason! The planetary thinking of Hegel is a perpetual war of
reason, insofar as reason is conceived as being universal and objective, in the sense that it
perpetually transcends the constraints of internal milieus (for example, traditions and
customs) precisely in the name of reason. The Hegelian planetary thinking reveals a politics of
externalization. That is, what if the external reality that the local spirit confronts does not
come from the spirit itself but from other spirits? Will this imported reality elevate the local
spirit toward a concrete universal? Or, on the contrary, will it only produce an unhappy
consciousness insofar as the self and the other always remain separable—as is the case with
Western technology and Eastern thought? It is not easy to ignore Hegel’s aspiration to reason,
which, we have to acknowledge, is the cornerstone of Western thought; after all, though
Eurocentric, it is a theoretical advancement that renders the West necessary and the rest of
the world contingent. However, the question of whether the reason that Hegel saw in Jena and
Berlin is still sufficient for today is another matter. Hegel stands as a thinker of the planetary;
however, this planetary thinking stopped tragically at the nation-state—the state as the limit
of the reason, as seen from Berlin during the nineteenth century.79 Hegel’s philosophical
construction of the modern state is a logical exercise that demonstrates its own necessity;
however, history also seems to have ended in modern political states as per Hegel’s logic.
Maybe we can blame those who came after Hegel for not being capable of pushing his
dialectics any further. Though one may also argue that Marx, Lenin, and other historical
materialists did precisely achieve this. If we look back at where we are today, historical
materialism only realized Hegel’s Idea by criticizing it. Perhaps Marx and Lenin are, thus, only
individual historical figures who followed the dialectical logic of Hegel. Thinking in this way,
one may conclude that there is nothing new after Hegel, that Hegel culminates philosophical
and historical thinking. This is precisely why Kojève claims that what Hegel saw in 1806 was
already the end of history:

The end of the story was not Napoleon, it was Stalin and it was me who would be in charge
of announcing it with the difference that I would not have the chance to see Stalin on
horseback from my windows, but anyway. . . . Afterwards, there was the war and I understood.
No, Hegel has not mistaken, he had given the exact date of the end of history, 1806. Since that
date, what has happened? Nothing at all, the alignment of provinces [of the empire].80

Planetary freedom sets off in Hegel’s Outlines of the Philosophy of Right and finds its
realization in the modern state, seen as a milestone of the Spirit. If we can say, therefore, that
the modern state is the limit of reason, it is equally the limit of freedom. It was among the
Greeks that freedom became the constitutive force of the poleis; however, the poleis are also
the limit of freedom since beyond that, it is the Persians, the Asians, and the barbarians. That
is why history ends in the nation-state, and the quarrel concerning freedom becomes a pure
postcolonial narrative. Kojève claims that after 1806, nothing happened. Is it not an
exaggeration? He continues: “The Chinese revolution is only the introduction of the
Napoleonian Code in China. The famous acceleration of history that we talk about so much,
have you noticed that as it accelerates more and more, the historical movement advances less
and less?”81

After the world revolutions, the immediate act of the anticolonial combatants was to establish
a nation-state. Paradoxically, the most anticolonial act is also the most colonial one. Hegel’s
theory of the state extends to the planetary scale through wars and antagonism. History and
freedom end in the universal states. The strength of Hegel’s theory of the state is that it is
grounded on reason and the dialectical nature of history intrinsic to reason’s own existence. In
other words, the history of reason and the philosophy of history are unified. Hegel’s discourse
on freedom and the state is not only the culmination of modern political philosophy but also
the justification of the necessity and rationality of the modern state. It also threw other
political theories into the shade. The New Confucian philosopher Mou Zongsan recalled that
when he first read Hegel’s Philosophy of History, where Hegel says that “subjective freedom”
and “individual consciousness” didn’t appear in China, he was rather upset. On the one hand,
he wanted to disagree with Hegel, while on the other hand, he also felt that Hegel was right.82
In his own Philosophy of History, Mou agreed with Hegel’s critique and showed in his own
reading how the lack of “subjective freedom” and “individual consciousness” didn’t produce
the Hegelian state in China:
 The state must be reorganized into an organic unity through the self-consciousness of each
individual before it can be said to be an organic unity. The unification of China in the past was
only achieved by conquering, and the individual didn’t attain self-consciousness, so it did not
become a static unit. And that unity is also unstable and not solid. The state is a cultural
concept, a rational product formed by individuals through self-consciousness. It is not a natural
object, nor can it be obtained by force.83

Another Chinese philosopher, Zhao Tingyang, proposed to revive the ancient Chinese concept
of tianxia (literally “all under the heaven”) as a system based on “oneness a priori,” or what he
calls an “integrated world system” in contrast to “a dominating world system” characterized by
imperialism.84 This model is inspired by the Zhou Dynasty (West Zhou 1100–777 BC, East Zhou
770–256 BC). Given the fact that its history is remote and what is left of its history is
fragmentary, it is difficult to judge the claim of Zhao adequately. One rather interesting thing is
that, like Karatani, Zhao raises the concept of world sovereignty in contrast to state
sovereignty; that is to say, on top of the sovereign state, there is another political unit that
maintains the dynamics of the diverse sovereign states.85 Should we consider tianxia as the
possibility of the world spirit returning to the East to spawn and die there? After all, tianxia, in
order for it to avoid becoming a sino-imperialism, should instead be regarded as an attempt to
reinvent a new language to articulate a planetary thinking. However, the difficulty of
overriding sovereign states with tianxia is that there was no concept of a sovereign state or
nation-state in the history of China; or as Mou clearly demonstrated, China, as well as tianxia,
was not a state unit but a cultural unit.86 Therefore, it isn’t easy to justify that tianxia should
be the successor of the nation-state according to dialectical logic. Furthermore, if one cannot
demonstrate how tianxia triumphs over Kantian cosmopolitanism, then tianxia as an answer
remains theoretically underelaborated.87 By claiming that tianxia is organic in contrast to
Kantian cosmopolitanism, one regrettably overlooks the central role of organism in Kant’s
political philosophy and perpetuates the myth that Eastern thinking is organic while Western
thinking is mechanic. Nonetheless, the merit of returning to tianxia is due to the fact that the
current geopolitical configuration based on nation-states is at an impasse, something that has
already been affirmed by many philosophers.

Mou affirms Hegel’s critique, while at the same time, he contests the end of Hegel’s Outlines
of the Philosophy of Right, that is, the fact that Hegel stopped at the political state. Hegel did
not only leave the conflicts between the states as inevitable, but he also affirmed the
domination of some states over others. Hegel’s refusal of world sovereignty and his discourse
on reason indirectly confirm the domination of the rational over the not-yet-rational or the
less rational.88 Thus, Mou suggests to think beyond Hegel: “If the sacred idea of ‘existing
separately on the earth’ must go further beyond the juxtaposition of various nation states and
‘exist on the earth in a complete and harmonious way,’ this is the goal of the ‘da tong’ (great
unity or great harmony). How would this be possible?”89
Mou did not identify a philosophy of history in China that was able to be the counterpart of
Hegel’s history of reason or that which was possible to respond to the above question; on the
contrary, what he exposed was a historical process in which reason was absent as the
protagonist. Instead of reason, what drove the historical process in China was either the
personal charisma of the hero as the founder of the dynasty or the technique of
governance.90 This was also how historiography was written and discussed in the Chinese
tradition. If we can take what Mou says as an exemplary of the East, then the East–West divide
lies not only on the question of reason but also on the very possibility of reason beyond the
modern state.

This is a question left to us: How is it possible to conceive of a new planetary framework of
politics, since planetary politics based on nation-states is only the continuation of the same
game? That is to say, if either the United States or China takes the lead, then there is no
change in the nature of geopolitics; what changes is only the configuration of power. What,
then, could emerge after the nation-state if we are to follow Hegelian dialectics? If we follow
Kojève’s claims concerning the end of history, we might say that reason vacillates after the
victory of Napoleon. If reason has not yet come to its end after the political state, then it must
become planetary, namely, it will have to be expanded in accordance with a planetary aim.
Can it finally arrive at a “great unity” or “great harmony” as the Chinese thinkers aspire to? Is
the nation-state a stepping stone toward such a unity? If our interpretation of Hegel is correct,
then it is clear that such a harmonious whole is not possible. Hegel was not able to transcend
the nation-state; or, the fact is that Hegel did not transcend the nation-state because the
German state was still in its formation. Hegel justified the logical and historical necessity of the
nation-state by way of a political organicism. But what comes after the organic state was
beyond Hegel. That is why we had to penetrate into the heart of Hegel’s Outlines of the
Philosophy of Right, resituating it into the history of thought and exposing its limits. We will
continue pursuing the Hegelian thread in the next chapter, examining diverse reflections on
the planetary.
3

From Noetic Reflection to Planetary Reflection

We can imagine the human of the near future as being determined by a new awareness and
the will to remain sapiens. In such an event the problem of the individual’s relationship with
society will have to be completely rethought: We must face up squarely to the question of our
numerical density and our relations with the animal and plant worlds; we must stop miming
the behavior of a microbic culture and come to grips with the management of our planet in
terms other than those of a game of chance.

—André Leroi-Gourhan, Gesture and Speech

In the last two chapters, we elaborated on the philosophical foundation of the state as
outlined by Hegel through the lens of an organismic epistemology. The justification of the
political state is human freedom, and the justification of the state as realization of freedom is
its particular organic form. In short, if the state is recognized as a milestone on the spirit’s
journey, where the rational (vernünftig) and the effective (wirklich) are unified, it is because
the organic form of the state overcomes the self-interest of both family and civil society.
Compared with Kant’s postulation of reason and nature as the guarantee of perpetual peace,
Hegel grounds his politics on reason and its externalization in the form of artificiality. Even
though the later thinkers of geopolitics such as Friedrich Ratzel and Rudolf Kjellén have further
developed nuanced versions of the organic state, such elaboration does not guarantee peace;
on the contrary, it presupposes enmity and war. Therefore, if perpetual peace is to be one of
human progress’s goals, then the state has to be overcome; that is to say, reason must go
further than the state, and new political forms should be presented as the next milestone of
reason after Hegel’s philosophy of right.

The reason why Hegel’s philosophy of history is so powerful is that it is not a collection of
historical instances according to a single principle, be that the principle of heaven or the
divine, but rather it is the self-grounding and self-unfolding of reason—and if there is a
teleology in Hegel’s philosophy of history, it is driven by the self-perfection of reason and not
the realization of a particular goal. It seems, though, that the state is where Hegel stopped on
the spirit’s journey. For a philosopher of history, what one sees in Hegel’s state is only the
truth of his or her time; that is to say, it is not an eternal truth.1 Thus, the truth that Hegel saw
in Jena and later in Berlin is the truth of history, in which the political state presents itself as a
necessity and the guarantee of human freedom.
We have already seen in chapter 2 how, in Hegel, the concept of the modern state is precisely
that which limits us from formulating a planetary freedom. The state as the condition of
freedom—or more precisely human freedom—is only a historical truth and, according to
dialectics, will become and might have already become the condition of unfreedom. This
unfreedom appears when the state is no longer the guardian of reason but rather its abuser.
This unreason results from the suppression of reason for various grounds, notably the
competition for interest and superiority between different nation-states and the desire for
total control over its subjects. Consequently, reason regresses to particularity instead of
moving toward universality. Inside the state, the freedom of the upper class means the
unfreedom of the lower class; between the states, the freedom of a superstate means the
unfreedom of other states. Intuitively, the only possibility of a planetary freedom is that the
planet is governed as a whole; that is to say, when the planet is seen as a unity instead of a
composition of nation-states. In other words, for a planetary freedom to be possible, politics
must become planetary. What does it mean for politics to become planetary—does
globalization not already imply planetarization?

To think about the planet is to think beyond or circumvent the nation-state, but also, at the
same time, to think collectively about the becoming of the human as well as the freedom that
defines the very struggle of politics. This planetary freedom has yet to be addressed, since to
do so we first have to think through the notion of a planetary right and the application of this
planetary right to both humans and nonhumans. This inquiry has to be distinguished from that
which has been raised broadly in ecology. There is already a wealth of literature dealing with
ecology and the ontogenesis of the Earth, which differs from our focus here. Ecological
concerns are important responses to the current and coming disasters associated with climate
change; and the ontogenesis of the Earth demonstrates that the human history is virtually
nothing in comparison to that of the planet. However, it seems that the crucial issue is not only
one of enforcing the ecological responsibilities of industry and the state as well as undermining
the humanism at play, but also, and probably more fundamentally, of questioning current
global politics as being based on the European concept of the nation-state culminating in the
eighteenth century during the time of the Enlightenment, of the Industrial Revolution and
European domination. The concept of the state is grounded first on the concept of the
Volksgeist, as we have already seen in chapter 1, and second on a concept of freedom that
functions as the synonym for reason. Hegel’s freedom has little to do with liberalism, for
freedom is nothing arbitrary but rational (vernünftig) in the sense that it is conditioned by both
the organic whole of the state and the other members of the state.

Hegel’s philosophy of the state sets a limit for us today, not because of its weakness but due to
its theoretical strength. One way of recognizing its strength and, as such, pushing Hegel’s
argument further, would be to wonder if we cannot go beyond Hegel, arriving at an organism
of the planet instead of stopping at the organism of the state. Let us push Hegel’s organismic
philosophy to its extreme and render the question of technology more explicit: Is it possible to
understand planetary politics as a megamachine (in the sense of Mumford) that is tantamount
to a superorganism? Is this not precisely the technological tendency that is at present playing
out, where a superintelligence will finally outdo human intelligence? Could this postsingularity
future be the one that arises out of the Hegelian dream?

These questions are too speculative to be either affirmatively answered or negatively rejected.
We will start with the concept of reflection and step by step induce its implication in the
definition of the human, the relation between human and environment, the relation between
human and technology, and finally its planetary becoming against the backdrop of the rise of
the “thermodynamic ideology.” Thus, the title of this chapter is “From Noetic Reflection to
Planetary Reflection.” Reflection is fundamental to the spirit; in other words, had it no
reflection, there would be no spirit. We begin with Hegel’s question of reflection in his
anthropology. The noetic reflection of the human is also the departing point where we can
identify three currents of thinking that deal directly with technology and converge in the
notion of the planetary: an anthropologically and biologically inspired bioeconomic reflection
developed by Nicholas Georgescu-Roegen, the psychologically and physiologically inspired
cybernetic reflection, and the anthropologically and geologically inspired noospheric reflection
proposed by Pierre Teilhard de Chardin. These discourses may seem to be quite distinct from
each other, and we don’t pretend to claim that they form a coherent whole. But all of them,
with more or less Hegelian motives, represent different threads of planetary thinking. They will
allow us to reflect on the potential and limit of a post-Hegelian planetary thinking.

§12. Noetic Reflection: Consciousness and Life

In chapter 2, we looked at Hegel’s concept of the organic state and Marx’s questioning of the
difference between the state organism and the animal organism, and we tried to show that
Hegel’s organicism is not “organic” in the sense of living matter, but rather it is fundamentally
a logic. Marx could have already understood this since he rightly pointed out that Hegel’s
Outlines of the Philosophy of Right is not a treatise on right per se, but rather a demonstration
of his philosophical logic. Indeed, the concept of organicism had a much wider application by
the end of the nineteenth century than in Hegel’s time, where the organism remained a
regulative idea for political institutions, that is to say, yet to be realized. Therefore, in the
introduction, we called it an imaginary organic machine. Even though, in philosophy since the
eighteenth century, mechanism had already been criticized and opposed by a proto-organic
philosophy, throughout the nineteenth century, mechanism still functioned as a dominant
epistemology through the trope of automats.

Retrospectively, we might say that Hegel’s organic logic could not be entirely recognized either
in animals, because they are vulnerable to contingency, or in the state, since the
implementation of the organic state was still hindered by some mechanistic features present
in Hegel’s Outlines of the Philosophy of Right, as Marx criticized.2 Toward the twentieth
century, organicism gained its significance given the rampant industrialization and mobilization
of natural resources and energies. We risk simplifying such a significance by listing the
following areas that deserve our attention: first, in biology, after the failure of the mechanical
development theory (Entwickelungsmechanik), identified accidentally by Hans Driesch, and
which was later confirmed by the Spemann-Mangold experiment; second, in philosophy,
especially in the work of Bergson and Alfred North Whitehead, whose organismic philosophy
(though the former has been regarded as vitalist) became the theoretical ground for other
biologists and sociologists—for example, the Gestalt theorists, Joseph Needham, Lewis
Mumford, Georges Friedmann, and Niklas Luhmann; third, in economics, especially the
economics inspired by biology—for example, Georgescu-Roegen and Alfred Lotka (though, it
was already present in the work of François Quesnay), and that was further developed by the
neoliberal thinkers such as Fredrick Hayek; fourth, in politics—for example, to some extent we
could even say that communism is first of all the realization of an organismic Hegelian Marxian
philosophy, where the Crown and Beamten are replaced with the proletariat, and therefore it
is not surprising to recognize an affinity between communism and anarchism, sometimes
anarchism and neoliberalism. Although the influence of organicism in the twentieth century is
beyond our capacity to document in this book, we suggest that to understand the twentieth
century, one cannot avoid analyzing this organismic paradigm, which has already extended
into the twenty-first century.

Hegel’s organicism does not derive from a romantic concept of nature, but rather it is
grounded in a logical analysis of the organism. Hegel’s logic also provides a path toward a
mechano-organicism that could be realized through artificial intelligence. The central theme of
Hegel’s logic is reflection, a reflection that does not aim at separation (since when the subject
reflects on the object, it divides, the way judgment [Urteil] in German means an original divide)
but at integration.3 The original divide (Ur-teil) is present between nature and the spirit, for it
is only through reflection that nature can become and transit into the realm of the spirit. In
effect, it is through reflection that the Concept, when present in nature and thus being fragile
and vulnerable to contingency, is constantly tested by contingency, what Bernard Mabille calls
l’épreuve de la contingence, so that it may move toward the concrete and universal realm of
the spirit. Therefore, philosophy, which Hegel presents as the absolute spirit after Greek art
and the religion of revelation, is a form of reflection: “This concept of philosophy is the self-
thinking Idea, the knowing truth (§236), the logical with the meaning that it is the universality
verified in the concrete content as in its actuality.”4 The concept of reflection is fundamental
to the emergence of consciousness that Hegel analyzed thoroughly, probably even more
thoroughly than many paleontologists. Hegel opens his Philosophy of Mind with anthropology
(along with phenomenology and psychology, as what he calls subjective spirit), attempting to
understand the evolution of the reflective structure and operation of self-consciousness
before he moves to the objective spirit, which is consciousness externalized. Hegel’s triadic
formulation at times seems problematic. However, Hegel reminds his readers that the triadic
scheme does not imply a temporal order, that the second element succeed the first element
followed by the third, but rather it is a logical order. Likewise, in the Outlines of the Philosophy
of Right, the transition from private property to family, which is followed by civil society, is not
historical but only logical.
Regardless of the above logical and temporal problem, which we do well to bear in mind, it is
still worth asking if the phenomenon of reflection is only limited to the human mind. We know
that other animals have some form of consciousness—for example, that an animal is conscious
of its prey. When a cat encounters a mouse, the cat knows how to predict the movements of
the mouse, which clearly demands a calibrated system of feedback. In the phenomenon of life,
reflection exists as a primordial mode of operation in all living organisms, and maybe as well as
in inorganic beings (for example, we also often see what seem like recursively generated
patterns on shells and rocks). It might be true that for the eyes of some animals, there is no
distinction between subject and object (like Rilke described in his elegies: “All other creatures
look into the Open with their whole eyes. But our eyes, turned inward, are set all around it like
snares, trapping its way out to freedom”5). At the same time, this original division comes out
of an epistemological necessity to the human mind, as Descartes demonstrated in the
Discourse on the Method. For Hegel, the subjective and objective spirit will also have to be
overcome through the identification between the Idea and its reflection into nature as
existence. This test by contingency, in the sense of Mabille, is essential for arriving at the
universal as universal. For living beings who are capable of reflection, it is possible to talk
about different “souls” as Aristotle did: for example, a vegetable soul, an animal soul, and the
noetic soul. The noetic soul stands out as a special kind of soul: it is that which is above the
animal soul and the vegetable soul. This should not be understood in a moral sense, but rather
it has a different operation and organization of reflection, and therefore it possesses different
complexities and structures. An octopus might have organs that are biologically more complex
than those of a human being, but the animal soul of the octopus might not have as many levels
of reflection as the noetic soul of the human being. We see a similar passage in Hegel’s
Philosophy of Mind:

Spirit has come into being as the truth of nature. In the Idea in general this result has the
meaning of the truth and of what is prior, rather than posterior, as compared with what
precedes it [des Ersten gegen das Vorhergehende]. But, besides this, becoming or transition
has, in the concept, the more determinate meaning of free judgement. The Spirit that has
come into being means, therefore, that nature self-sublates over against itself [an ihr selbst],
and Spirit thus presupposes itself as this universality that is no longer self-externalized in
bodily individuality, but simple in its concretion and totality. In this universality it is not yet
Spirit, but soul [Seele, noch nicht Geist].6

This paragraph deserves our attention since the truth of nature is to be found in the spirit
instead of just in nature. Nature that precedes spirit does not show its truth because its
existence as a phenomenon is vulnerable to contingency. The soul is mere consciousness and
thus subject to error; the spirit is the rational substance in becoming. In nature, we find
nuances of patterns on the leaves of the same plant, we find human beings with eleven toes,
and so forth. Instead, it is in the spirit that we find the Idea that is prior to nature. This is no
longer a temporal sequence but rather a logical sequence: that which comes after is prior to
what precedes it.7 It is because through reflection, which characterizes the free judgement or
divide, nature sublates the self that is not yet adequate of being true—and here, being true
means the identity between actuality and the Concept. The self-sublation of nature is a
reflective or recursive movement assimilating the Concept prior to it. This reflection is a
movement from A to B, but also from A to A'. That is to say, it does not change substantially
from A to B; instead, it returns to itself, as Hegel says, “only a coming-to-itself of the spirit that
is outside itself in nature.”8

One of the lowest levels of reflection found in living beings is between the living being and its
milieu. In the case of an amoeba, a single-celled organism, reflection occurs via osmosis by
which the amount of liquid in the amoeba’s body is maintained. Laurentiis in his book Hegel’s
Anthropology uses the same example, claiming that the “amoeba is this struggle of nature
against itself,” and quotes Xavier Bichat (whom Hegel admired) to support this argument: “Life
is the totality of functions that resist death.”9 However, the case of the amoeba is only a
rather basic form of reflection while the claim of Bichat is a general definition of life, which
retrospectively resonates with Erwin Schrödinger’s proposal in What Is Life? The Physical
Aspect of the Living Cell (1944), where he characterizes life as a process that resists entropy,
namely, death. This general claim has to be qualified since from the single-cell amoeba to the
Homo sapiens, we are talking about a difference of billions of years of evolution,
complexification, and concretization. This increasing complexification could be understood as a
struggle against death.

This complexification is not only endosomatic but also exosomatic in the sense that it demands
a reflective process between the spirit and its externalization, which we have already discussed
in the first two chapters, especially in chapter 2, where we tried to show how such a process
gives rise to the concept of the state as organism. Hegel’s theory of externalization did not yet
systematically address what later came to be known in paleontology as anthropogenesis. Ernst
Kapp’s philosophy of technology made Hegel’s thesis explicit by putting the noetic reflectivity
as the absolute beginning of human exosomatic activities:

Here is the actual threshold of our study: the human being, who, with the first equipment,
the work of his own hands, discards his historical test piece to become the altogether historical
human being, situated within the progress of self-consciousness. The human being is the only
secure starting point for thoughtful reflection and for orientation in the world. This is because
the human being is absolutely certain first and foremost of himself.10

We would like to connect Kapp’s philosophy of technology with the work of André Leroi-
Gourhan who, in Gesture and Speech as well as other works, showed how the process of
hominization could be interpreted as series of invention and use of technical tools. Technical
activities could be further understood as exosomatic activities, namely, the exteriorization of
memory and the liberation of organs. This process does not only happen at the level of the
individual but also at the level of the species and culture. The formation of the city and later
larger administrative units belong to the same phenomenon of exosomatization. The
exosomatic process also demands an endosomatic process that is no longer limited to bodily
organs.11 In paleontology, externalization plays a central role that conditions the development
of the spirit, and where technology gradually occupies a more and more important role in the
phenomenon of consciousness, something that we will see later in Teilhard de Chardin’s
noospheric reflection. In what follows we will consider the bioeconomic reflection of
Georgescu-Roegen, followed by cybernetic reflection, before finally arriving at Teilhard’s
noospheric reflection. Through these forms of reflection, we will see how a planetary thinking
beyond the nation-state is constructed in the name of humanity, of the human as a species—a
test we would like to do by pushing Hegel’s organicism to its extreme.

§13. Bioeconomical Reflection: Georgescu-Roegen Reads Hegel

It is now appropriate to turn to the work of Georgescu-Roegen since he is central to

understanding the role of exosomatization in economic activities. Georgescu-Roegen shifted
our understanding of economic activities as quantitative exchanges understood by neoclassical
economics to bioeconomics based on thermodynamics. Georgescu-Roegen is often credited as
a great reader of Marx and Schumpeter. It is uncommon for Georgescu-Roegen to be
considered a reader of Hegel,12 even though Georgescu-Roegen takes Hegel’s concept of
dialectics as a driving force of his own theory; however, this dialectic is not analyzed explicitly
as an operation of reflections, but rather it is implicitly associated with the possibility of an
organic form that already presupposes reflection as such. I say implicitly because the transition
from dialectics to the organic form was not fully elaborated by Georgescu-Roegen, but rather
was only presupposed. Like Hegel before him, Georgescu-Roegen opposes mechanism to
organism because mechanism fails to grasp reality due to the limit of its representation. The
attempt to apply a mechanistic representation to reality fails because it constitutes precisely
what Whitehead might have called the “fallacy of misplaced concreteness.”

Georgescu-Roegen saw the limit of an economy theory built upon a dominant mechanistic
epistemology. Although the mechanistic epistemology had been challenged by biology in the
eighteenth century, such as we have already seen in Kant, Schelling, Hegel, the Romantics, and
the naturalists, it continued to exert its power in domains other than science, such as industry,
politics, and economy. Georgescu-Roegen’s bioeconomics can be seen as an attempt to
challenge the neoclassical theory of economy (which he identified with classical mechanics)
through new discoveries in physics, namely, thermodynamics. If in Marx we see that the
accent was put on a moralist critique against the exploitation of the worker, in Georgescu-
Roegen we see that it ceases to be a moralist critique, but more explicitly a critique of
economic theory itself.
The grounding concept of Georgescu-Roegen’s bioeconomy is, however, dialectics. Georgescu-
Roegen mobilizes dialectics as a counterpart to what he calls arithmomorphism, the belief that
all economic activities could be reduced to numbers, calculation, and logical positivism.
Georgescu-Roegen identifies the epistemological foundation of neoclassical economic theory
as that of Newtonian mechanics. Neoclassical economic theory is founded on the
presupposition of a rational Homo economicus whose actions are based on rational and
mechanistic calculations. Mechanism in general implies a linear causality, that, following
classical physical laws, a movement leads to another like a cause to an effect. In mechanism,
the movement of all bodies in space is predictable since they obey these laws and thus, given
enough data, could be determined. The best image of mechanism in physics is Laplace’s
demon, according to which the whole universe could be predicted given enough data13—a
belief that triumphs in data science today. The domination of mechanism was also made
possible and reinforced by the technologies of its time, especially mechanical machines,
ranging from clocks to industrial machinery. Even when technology changed from the “cold
machine” to the “heat machine” via thermodynamics, mechanism continued enjoying its reign
for a certain period before being displaced by thermodynamics.14 Following the Carnotian
revolution, thermodynamics takes physics to a new terrain, one where physics is reconnected
to biology. An epistemology based on thermodynamics provides Georgescu-Roegen with a
new lens to look at the economy and develop his theory of bioeconomics—a genuine
reflection on economy from the prospect of the living. Georgescu-Roegen’s bioeconomic
attack on the foundations of rationalist economic theory surprisingly relies on Hegel’s
dialectics:

It goes without saying that to the category of concepts just illustrated we cannot apply the
fundamental law of Logic, the Principle of Contradiction: “B cannot be both A and non-A.” On
the contrary, we must accept that, in certain instances at least, “B is both A and non-A” is the
case. Since the latter principle is one cornerstone of Hegel’s Dialectics, I propose to refer to the
concepts that may violate the Principle of Contradiction as dialectical.15

Hegel’s dialectics is not a theory of the excluded middle but rather a theory of operations. In a
dialectical process, A and non-A are two instances coexisting at certain moments. What is at
stake, however, is not ambiguity but complexity; that is to say, reality embodies a complexity
that cannot be reduced to numerical positivism or simple logicism based on the principle of
contradiction. Georgescu-Roegen is not claiming that arithematization has no value; indeed, he
even affirms that its “merits are above all words of praise.” What he is instead arguing is that
“wholesale arithematization is impossible.”16 The fact that Georgescu-Roegen aligns himself
with Hegel is not, as already emphasized, due to the law of the excluded middle; but rather
because Hegelian philosophy is primarily a logic of reflection and movement. In the
movement, the seemingly contradictory facts become necessary while also being contingent.
As we have seen in chapter 1, Ideas are living (lebendig) concepts, and philosophy is in itself
considered to be living. Therefore, we can say that for Georgescu-Roegen, the Hegelian
inspiration lies in the living nature of Hegel’s philosophy—as he writes, quoting Hegel’s Logic,
“Wherever there is movement, wherever there is life, wherever anything is carried into effect
in the actual world, there Dialectic is at work.”17 A theory based on life and movement is that
which attracts Georgescu-Roegen, though he immediately distances himself from Hegel, as can
be determined from the footnote to the above quote:

The connection between dialectical concepts thus defined and Hegelian logic is not confined
to this principle. However, even though Hegel’s logic inspires the line followed by the present
argument, it does not follow Hegel in all respects. We have been warned, and on good
reasons, that one may ignore Hegel at tremendous risks. To follow Hegel only in part might
very well be the greatest risk of all; yet I have no choice but to take this risk.18

Georgescu-Roegen’s dialectics, therefore, is not a direct application of Hegelian philosophy in

economy, but rather, through Hegel who he cannot ignore, the intention is to reground a
bioeconomy that is based on movement and life. In Hegel’s philosophy, economy is
subordinated to politics in the manner that civil society, which is the totality of economic
activities, conforms to that of the political state. Georgescu-Roegen’s bioeconomy starts with
dialectics, continues with thermodynamics, and has its telos in the enjoyment of life.
Georgescu-Roegen’s economy is an economy of the living and of life. It is also from this
perspective that he sees a similarity between Hegel’s and Whitehead’s organicism:

With regard to the opposition between Change and arithmomorphic structure, Whitehead’s
position is essentially the same as Hegel’s. Perhaps in no other place does Hegel state his
thought on the matter more clearly than in the following passage: “Number is just that entirely
inactive, inert, and indifferent characteristic in which every movement and relational process is
extinguished [Denn die Zahl ist eben die gänzlich ruhende, tote und gleichgültige
Bestimmtheit, an welcher alle Bewegung und Beziehung erloschen ist].” The statement has
generally been criticized as Hegelian obscurantism and anti-scientism. Yet, as I have already
intimated, Hegel did not intend to prove anything more than Whitehead, who maintained that
no science can “claim to be founded upon observation” if it insists that the ultimate facts of
nature “are to be found at durationless instants of time.” Whitehead only had the benefit of a
far greater knowledge in mathematics and science of fact than was available in Hegel’s time.19

Georgescu-Roegen thus first identifies Hegel and Whitehead as thinkers in favor of change
over static numerical representations. The Hegel quote in the above citation is from §286 of
Hegel’s Phenomenology of Spirit. Georgescu-Roegen decontextualizes this sentence from
Hegel’s Phenomenology by making it explicitly a critique of numbers. §286, which belongs to
the section “Observation of Organism [Organischen],” is part of Hegel’s explanation of the
organic form. The organic stands in contrast to the inorganic insofar as the former, due to its
absolute fluidity, can absorb external disturbances and maintains a relation with the Other
through its organic unity. Hegel started the analysis of the organic substance from two sides:
the inner and the outer. The inner is the “simple soul,” the “pure Concept of end,” whose
being is observed as the movement of a vanishing actuality; the outer on the contrary subsists
in the “quiescent being of the organism.”20 The inner refers to the universal organism, and the
outer refers to the inorganic nature; however, since it is never precise in these passages if
Hegel means the structured body (Gestaltung) or the natural environment, it remains difficult
to say whether Hegel is offering a retake on the mind-body problem or organism-milieu
interactivity. Hegel claims that the effective or actual organic essence is neither the inner nor
the outer, but the middle, which unites the being-in-itself (inner) and the being-for-itself
(outer).21 In the paragraph that Georgescu-Roegen quotes, Hegel starts with a conceptual
experiment of imagining that both inner and outer also have, for their own part, an inner and
an outer; let us label them as I(i) and I(o) and O(i) and O(o). I(i), defined according to the
movement of the Concept, is the “unrest of abstraction” (Unruhe der Abstraktion) and O(i) the
“quiescent determination” (ruhende Bestimmtheit), namely, number, since the outer is at
times considered inorganic as it only has magnitude and is devoid of movement. I(i) and O(i)
form a pair that consists of the dynamic of the organic law. For Hegel, the point is not to
criticize or demonize number per se but rather to show that the static and lifeless nature of
number is always dialectically related to its other. Now we can see that Georgescu-Roegen’s
take on Hegel does not do perfect justice to what Hegel was trying to say; nonetheless, he
came to the same conclusion as Hegel: he arrives at the fundamental logic of the organic form.
This is why we said earlier that Georgescu-Roegen’s take on dialectics, though it does not
depart from reflection, does nevertheless aim at an organic form. For this reason, he also
friends Whitehead with Hegel as thinkers of organicism and critics of arithmomorphism.

It is precisely here that the question of organism and life defines the bioeconomy and a
planetary thinking that attempts to articulate a new program of economy, not based on
arithmetic but on thermodynamics. Unlike Hegel, who arrived at the organism of the state as a
culmination of the spirit, Georgescu-Roegen takes the organism of economy as a planetary
phenomenon determined by the laws of thermodynamics. The human species is privileged
here as one that can directly participate in the environment to slow down or speed up the
entropic process. We should remind ourselves of the two laws of thermodynamics that we
learned in high school physics: the first concerns the conservation of energy; the second
concerns the universal tendency toward the dissipation of energy and toward disorder, i.e.,
becoming entropic. Disorder here does not mean complex order but rather the homogeneity
of order: it fails to produce differences or diversity. One might find various definitions of
entropy today, but here we want to list the three definitions that Georgescu-Roegen himself
summarized. According to Clausius, the first definition of entropy is understood as a physical
system state variable that divides temperature change over the transfer of internal energy
across two systems. Boltzmann then provides a second definition that understands entropy as
the degree of disorder. The third definition, a statistical mechanical definition, was derived
from Boltzmann’s fascination with Maxwell’s work in particle distributions and concerns the
relation between micro- and macrophysics, which Georgescu-Roegen states as “how to derive
one opaque fact of nature, the Entropy Law, from the opaque facts of nature expressed by the
laws of mechanics.”22 That is to say, in the third definition, entropy is defined by Georgescu-
Roegen himself as “the thermodynamic probability that the corresponding disorder shall
occur.”23 Human beings are, therefore, considered to be like Maxwell’s demon, who, capable
of anticipating the thermodynamic probability of disorder, can manipulate the second law of
thermodynamics by transmitting heat from low temperature to high temperature:

The point is no mystical vitalism, but a matter of brute facts. Some organisms slow down the
entropic degradation. Green plants store part of the solar radiation, which in their absence
would immediately go into dissipated heat, into high entropy. That is why we can now burn
the solar energy saved from degradation millions of years ago in the form of coal or a few
years ago in the form of a tree. All other organisms, on the contrary, speed up the march of
entropy. Man occupies the highest position on this scale, and this is all that environmental
issues are about.24

The human being, as we read above, “occupies the highest position” in the manipulation of the
second law of thermodynamics to slow down the entropic becoming of the ecosystem. As we
recall, according to the second law of thermodynamics, the universe is becoming more
entropic: it is in the process of becoming disorder (through the dissipation of energy, i.e.,
becoming homogenous qua a lack of order).25 To resist such an entropic becoming, the
organism must maintain order within the body (psychosomatic functions and metabolism) and
the environment. We can say that Georgescu-Roegen departs from the concept of an organism
to propose a new understanding of economic activities not from the perspective of rationalist
calculation on gain and loss but rather considering the value of economic activities as
negentropic processes. This negentropic process has its aim in the enjoyment of life—a noetic
culmination, we might say. In this formulation, Georgescu-Roegen has already presupposed a
concept of the human, in which the human is not a moral being but a being capable of and
largely dependent on exosomatization for its own survival. Therefore, the question of morality
should be considered from an exosomatic point of view. Georgescu-Roegen did not coin the
term exosomatization but took it from the biologist Alfred Lotka, who uses it to describe the
externalization of the spirit, that is to say, the invention of tools:

Apart from a few insignificant exceptions, all species other than man use only endosomatic
instruments—as Alfred Lotka proposed to call those instruments (legs, claws, wings, etc.)
which belong to the individual organism by birth. Man alone came, in time, to use a club,
which does not belong to him by birth, but which extended his endosomatic arm and increased
its power. At that point in time, man’s evolution transcended the biological limits to include
also (and primarily) the evolution of exosomatic instruments, i.e., of instruments produced by
man but not belonging to his body. That is why man can now fly in the sky or swim under
water even though his body has no wings, no fins, and no gills.26

Why is it necessary to consider them as exosomatic instruments when they could quite easily
just be called instruments, and why exosomatic as opposed to endosomatic? It is also because
exosomatization is the necessary product of noetic reflection and vice versa; these instruments
are external to the soma but are nonetheless part of the soma precisely through reflection.
The organic unity refers not only to the organic body but rather an organic totality between
the organic body and the inorganic instruments. In this respect, Georgescu-Roegen joins
organologists such as Bergson and anthropologists like Leroi-Gourhan in understanding the
human as a prosthetic being; its evolution is precisely an exosomatic evolution.27 The
exosomatic evolution helps the human being to adapt to the environment and adopt the
environment more efficiently—for example, extracting energy and raw material to construct
new amenities. Georgescu-Roegen’s reconceptualization of economy starts not only from a
new epistemology (organismic instead of mechanistic) but also from a new way of
understanding economic activities that are in contrast to and in tension with real politics that
are constrained by a strategy of survival and victory according to numerical values such as
GDP. This new epistemology also necessitates a return to anthropology, in which the human
ceases to be a Homo economicus and is distinguished from other living beings due to its
capacity to produce exosomatic instruments. In contrast, other animals are only capable of
producing endosomatic instruments closely related to their instincts. This anthropological
foundation of Georgescu-Roegen’s bioeconomy bears a significant Hegelian inspiration. It
postulates that human economy should be viewed from the perspective of reflective
movement instead of mechanistic determinations. This reflective movement has to be
captured as a process of exosomatization, distinguishing human beings from other animals.
The dialectics continues when the exosomatic activities produced an excess, a hubris, which
submits the human being to, first, perpetual conflicts—a thesis that we can find in the modern
political theories of Montesquieu and Rousseau, and second, to the human addiction to
exosomatic instruments—“a phenomenon analogous to that of the flying fish which became
addicted to the atmosphere and mutated into birds forever. . . . It is through this addiction that
mankind’s survival presents a problem entirely different from that of all other species. . . . It is
neither only biological nor only economic. It is bioeconomic.”28

To concretize his theory in realizable terms, Georgescu-Roegen in “Energy and Economic

Myths” suggests a minimal bioeconomic program29 consisting of eight rules that mitigate
conflicts and addictions. The first rule concerns the prohibition of the production of all
instruments of war; the second suggests financial aid to underdeveloped nations to attain a
good (nonluxurious) life; the third concerns the degrowth of populations adequately fed by
organic agriculture only; the fourth suggests that the waste of all energy should be avoided
before solar energy can be fully put to use; the fifth and sixth concern a decrease in the
abundance of luxury goods such as extravagant gadgetry and fashion; the seventh suggests the
production of repairable goods; the last concerns the “the circumdrome of the shaving
machine,” a neologism created by Georgescu-Roegen himself. This circumdrome is illustrated
by a looping that characterizes infinite empty progress, where one invents an efficient, faster
shaving machine to save more time that can then be dedicated to inventing an even faster
shaving machine.30 But, of course, these are all rules we have been violating and will continue
to violate in the coming decades. We will come back to Georgescu-Roegen’s rules in chapter 6.
Georgescu-Roegen repeats the opposition between mechanism and organism in his critique of
economy, and we must revisit this debate to understand Georgescu-Roegen’s program.
§14. Cybernetic Reflection: Toward the Consciousness of Machines

When the planet is observed from the perspective of thermodynamics, we can see that global
warming and ecological crises are just outcomes of an economy that is not understood
bioeconomically but rather as development. Development is colonialism from a European
perspective (later, in chapter 5, we will discuss this thesis of Kojève); though, of course, such a
pursuit is now no longer only European: certain Asian countries such as China have been aiding
infrastructural development in other Asian countries and most notably in African countries.
Nevertheless, developmentalism as a colonial discourse is not to be dismissed so quickly since
it also belongs to the process of globalization, which is preparing itself for a new phase to
appear following the end of the first phase marked by the recent pandemic and geopolitical
drift. Can we, therefore, govern the whole planet according to the principles of
thermodynamics? The concept of entropy perhaps remains too abstract to understand
economic activities because what determines something as entropic depends largely on time
and space. A short-sighted development project might bring about well-being for the people in
the short term, but it might cause long-term negative effects and suffering in the future. After
stating his minimal bioeconomic program, Georgescu-Roegen asks:

Will mankind listen to any program that implies a constriction of its addiction to exosomatic
comfort? Perhaps, the destiny of man is to have a short, but fiery, exciting and extravagant life
rather than a long, uneventful and vegetative existence. Let other species—the amoebas, for
example—which have no spiritual ambitions inherit an earth still bathed in plenty of
sunshine.31

In the end, maybe only the most basic reflection will stay, for higher levels of reflection will
lead to the system’s saturation, which might only be resolved through self-destruction.
Georgescu-Roegen’s bioeconomy is concerned more with the question of tendency than
numerical values, such as calculating how entropic the industrial world is becoming or
determining when a critical threshold in the amount of entropy will be attained. If we focus on
a numerical definition of entropy, giving it a value or situating it within a value scale, then it
paradoxically becomes an equivalence of GDP. The importance of Georgescu-Roegen’s
bioeconomy does not lie exactly in the calculation of the entropic value but rather in his
capacity to reverse the tendency of economic development to construct a new framework
based on biology and thermodynamics.

Philip Mirowski reproached Georgescu-Roegen for the latter’s exclusion of the use of entropy
in information theory: “Georgescu’s gloss on entropy was misleading in at least one
idiosyncratic sense: he was implacably opposed to the extensions of the entropy concept in
the direction of its interpretation as a measure of ‘information,’ and therefore he missed out
on one of the most consequential aspects of the cyborg genealogy in the late twentieth
century.”32 Here Mirowski referred to an entry on entropy written by Georgescu-Roegen for
The New Palgrave Dictionary for Economics, in which Georgescu-Roegen, after introducing the
concept of entropy in thermodynamics and his theory of economics, reproached the use of this
concept by Claude Shannon in his information theory. Georgescu-Roegen writes, “A real
imbroglio involving the entropy concept grew from the seminal work of Claude H. Shannon
(1948) on the purely technical problem of communication, which is to find out how many
distinct sequences (messages) of a given length can be formed by a code, a set of different
signal signals.”33 The reason for which Georgescu-Roegen calls it an imbroglio is that
Shannon’s use of the term creates confusions, that “the concept of entropy started travelling
from one domain to another with hardly any discrimination.”34 Mirowski’s critique of
Georgescu-Roegen is that because he dismisses the use of entropy in information theory, he
missed out on being a figure of the genealogy of cyborg science, which Mirowski outlined in
Machine Dreams: Economics Becomes a Cyborg Science. Mirowski’s reproach is more a regret
than a criticism, considering that his first book was dedicated to Georgescu-Roegen.35

Should we reconcile these two concepts of entropy, one in thermodynamics and one used by
Shannon in information theory, into a singular notion? It may seem no urgent need to do so.
Indeed, as Georgescu-Roegen writes, the use of entropy in these two domains should instead
be further discriminated. The problem with this, however, is that it is impossible to think about
the transmission of information without energy.36 For example, Maxwell’s demon would not
be able to detect the speed of the particles, obtain information about them, and sort them
according to their kinetic energy without itself consuming energy. The existence of a living
being depends on material, energetic, and informational conditions. For our purpose here,
instead of defining information, albeit an urgent task, we want to look into the similarity
between the reflective models of cybernetics and the organismic model of economics,
elaborations of which can be found more in the work of F. A. Hayek than Georgescu-Roegen.

Hayek as we know, like his friend Karl Popper, was very critical of Hegel though in a more
serious manner than Popper. Hayek’s reading of Hegel appeared mainly in his younger
writings, especially The Counter Revolution of Science, in which a chapter titled “Hegel and
Comte” is dedicated to a comprehensive comparison between Comte and Hegel from various
perspectives. Nevertheless, Hayek already showed interest in a spontaneous interaction model
between individuals. He refused to conceive an organismic model of the state but rather an
organismic model of the market, or perhaps we can say, a rebirth of civil society. On the
contrary, Hayek found in both Hegel and Comte a tendency to grasp the whole as the real
while undermining individuals:

The concern with the movement of Reason as a whole not only prevented them from
understanding the process through which the interaction of individuals produced structures of
relationships which performed actions no individual reason could fully comprehend, but it also
made them blind to the fact that the attempt of conscious reason to control its own
development could only have the effect of limiting this very growth to what the individual
directing mind could foresee.37

This spontaneity that we find in the interaction among individuals is for Hayek something more
fundamental than the concept of the whole grasped a priori. In an article published in 1945
titled “The Use of Knowledge in Society,” Hayek was already interested in how local
information or knowledge functioned in the market because the market (versus the state)
cannot be managed and controlled by a single mind. The market without a king’s head acting
as the sovereign has a different order and dynamics. In the more current language, we might
say that Hayek’s ideal market is decentralized to the extent that a central force cannot
command it; it is the synthesis of different actors in the market each intervening according to
their local knowledge or information:

The peculiar character of the problem of a rational economic order is determined precisely
by the fact that the knowledge of the circumstances of which we must make use never exists
in concentrated or integrated form, but solely as the dispersed bits of incomplete and
frequently contradictory knowledge which all the separate individuals possess. The economic
problem of society is thus not merely a problem of how to allocate “given” resources—if
“given” is taken to mean given to a single mind which deliberately solves the problem set by
these “data.” It is rather a problem of how to secure the best use of resources known to any of
the members of society, for ends whose relative importance only these individuals know. Or,
to put it briefly, it is a problem of the utilization of knowledge not given to anyone in its
totality.38

Hayek wants to apply the biological model to the market, but conceptually this might commit
the same mistake that he thought Hegel and Comte committed: explaining the market with a
“mysterious teleological force.”39 It is only later through cybernetics, as well as through
Ludwig von Bertalanffy’s General System Theory, that Hayek finds a new language to explain
his theory, which he stated in the preface to his three volumes of Law, Legislation and Liberty:
“It was largely the growth of cybernetics and the related subjects of information and system
theory which persuaded me that expression other than those which I habitually used may be
more readily comprehensible to the contemporary reader.”40 What he means by the language
of cybernetics consists in several key concepts such as “negative feedback” and “self-
organizing system,” terms that he associates with the mechanism of the market.41 We have
already explored the philosophical foundation and the historical development of cybernetics in
Recursivity and Contingency; readers might want to refer to this treatise for a more detailed
exploration of the subject, but for the purpose of this work, we will briefly reiterate how we
conceive cybernetics as a mechano-organicism, a term we also assigned to Hegel.
In Recursivity and Contingency, I attempted to show that cybernetics presents itself as a
rupture with seventeenth-century mechanism, and in the words of its founder Norbert
Wiener, that in cybernetics, one finds the reconciliation of Bergson’s vitalism and Newton’s
classical mechanics. The first chapter of Wiener’s Cybernetics was titled “Newtonian and
Bergsonian Time.” Newtonian motion is mechanist and time-symmetric, hence reversible,
whereas Bergsonian time is biological, creative, and irreversible (as per thermodynamics).
Indeed, it was not until 1824 that the French medical engineer and physicist Sadi Carnot
(almost a century after Newton’s death in 1727) demonstrated the irreversibility of heat
engine cycles, essentially showing that time flows in a unidirectional manner, what then
become known as the “arrow of time.” Already in his first book, Essai sur les données
immédiates de la conscience (1889), Bergson launched a fierce attack on the way time was
conceptualized in Western science and philosophy: that is, time is understood in terms of
space (for example, as intervals), and this conceptualization is, therefore, itself timeless. It is
homogenous, like the intervals marked on a clock. In contrast to this view of time as an
extension ordered in spatial terms, Bergson argues that time contains heterogeneity or
qualitative multiplicity in organic forms. Time is a force that is singular in every instant, like the
Heraclitean river; it does not repeat itself twice as does a mechanical clock. Indeed, mechanical
or linear causality does not exist in duration. Bergsonian time provides a new way of
understanding human consciousness and experience.

These differences between Newtonian time and Bergsonian time define the boundary
between physics and biology, machine and organism. The task of cybernetics was to show that,
with the advancements in physics—especially statistical mechanics and quantum mechanics—
it is possible to employ notions of feedback and information to construct a cybernetic machine
that breaks the boundary between machine and organism. Therefore, toward the end of the
chapter, Wiener claims that “modern automation exists in the same sort of Bergsonian time as
the living organism; and hence there is no reason in Bergson’s considerations why the essential
mode of functioning of the living organism should not be the same as that of the automation
of this type. . . . In fact, the whole mechanist-vitalist controversy has been relegated to the
limbo of badly posed questions.”42

Vitalism, as we know, was often associated with Hans Driesch, Bergson, and others, but it was
often reproached by biologists and mathematicians of the organismic school on the grounds
that notions such as entelechy and élan vital are mystifying and unscientific. The overcoming
of the mechanist-vitalist controversy does not mean that a machine is now vitalist, but rather
that this duality has been overcome by an organicism of which cybernetics is its mechanical
realization. In Wiener’s conceptualization, when we grasp a glass of water and bring it toward
our mouth, this involves multiple feedback loops and adjustments according to the
information evaluated, which measures the level of organization. Or in other words, Wiener
claims that Bergson’s vitalist definition of organism can no longer differentiate itself from the
design of a cybernetic machine. This claim could produce misunderstandings. The machine will
not be the same as an organism, for an organism is already concrete, while a machine is always
in the process of becoming more and more concrete. In this sense, a machine can only be
“becoming organic.” However, it is also because of its “becoming organic” that opposition
between mechanism and organism cannot be absolute. Wiener’s claim inaugurates what we
may call digital vitalism today. It holds the view that all forms of being could be reduced to
digital algorithms and that it is possible to produce an algorithm that knows us better than we
know ourselves.

Feedback here means reflection, a circularity between a being and its environment, a
nonlinear movement of self-adjustment toward a purpose or telos that defines the whole. This
association between feedback and reflection is more than analogical. Although we related this
to Kant earlier, we should also recall, as Gilbert Simondon already remarked in his article
“Epistemology of Cybernetics (1953),” that “Kant could only deal with cybernetics by situating
it in the Critique of Judgment.”43 Simondon’s insight is profound and illuminating, enabling us
to retrace the history of modern European philosophy through the prism of technology.
Wiener refers to the first feedback system as the “governor”—a design used to automatically
open and close a valve according to the speed of the centrifugal movement of a pendulum—in
James Watt’s steam engine (Hayek saw this at work in the invisible hand of Adam Smith). A
more contemporary example is homeostasis, a concept described by the physiologist Claude
Bernard and later coined by W. B. Cannon. Bernard, in his 1865 Introduction à l’étude de la
médecine expérimentale, writes that “all the vital mechanisms, however varied they may be,
have only one object, that of preserving constant the conditions of life in the internal
environment [milieu intérieur].”44 Homeostasis is a mechanism that can keep a system within
a certain range of constants: for example, temperature or the amount of potassium in the
bodily liquid. Homeostasis is also used by the British cybernetician W. Ross Ashby to
characterize life. Feedback here replaces the reflection of the monads and prompts Wiener to
reject notions such as “life,” “vitalism,” and “soul”: “It is my thesis that the physical functioning
of the living individual and the operation of some of the newer communication machines are
precisely parallel in their analogous attempts to control entropy through feedback.”45

Earlier on we suggested that for Hegel, the fundamental element in his philosophy is
reflection. To be conscious is to be conscious of something, but to be conscious of something,
we need to be conscious of our consciousness of something. Consciousness in its general term
is the reflection of consciousness on itself. Therefore, we understand that Hegel’s
interpretation of Aristotle’s De Anima deviates from the classical interpretation because, for
Hegel, it is impossible to talk about the soul without dealing with the circularity of reflection.
Consciousness is that which reflects. Perhaps in the twentieth century, the question of
whether Hegelian logic is realized in the state will be replaced by another, namely, whether
Hegel’s logic is realized in cybernetics. The Hegelian scholar Gotthard Günther claims that
cybernetics realizes the Hegelian logic: “In cybernetics, finally, the idea of Hegel, that reflection
is essentially a real process, is made serious when we systematically attempt to transfer
processes of consciousness in analogy to machines.”46 In Recursivity and Contingency, we
endeavored to demonstrate a philosophical history of cybernetics. We tried to show that
Kant’s Critique of Judgment imposes an organic condition of philosophizing; that is to say, for
philosophy to be, it has to become organic. In chapter 2, titled “Logic and Contingency,” we
discussed the question of recursivity in Hegel’s Phenomenology of Spirit, and via Gotthard
Günther demonstrated an affinity between cybernetics and Hegel’s logic, thereby positioning
cybernetics in the history of philosophy, especially in relation to German idealism or, as
Heidegger termed it, as the end of Western philosophy or metaphysics. In other words, the
imaginary organic machine ceases to be imaginary. The megamachine metamorphosed from
its seventeenth-century mechanistic image to that of an organic one.

Perhaps we can even argue that cybernetics, and its manifestation in modern digital
technology, theoretically foretold the end of Hegel’s philosophy—end in the sense of
realization. Not only is Hegel’s organismic thinking realized in bioeconomy and governance,
but also because the cybernetization of bioeconomy and governance surpasses the Hegelian
logic, with the spirit progressing toward another milestone. We must, however, be fair to
Hegel because we cannot just see Hegel as a cybernetician. Hegel is more than a cybernetician
because Hegel had no intention of simulating organisms; rather Hegel was aiming to grasp an
“organic unity” that could be realized in all spiritual domains. Therefore, on the question of
consciousness, Hegel treated the externalized seriously and beyond the process of
hominization. This is not to say that cyberneticians overlook the prosthetic nature of
technology, which the late Wiener frequently discussed, but rather that Hegel went further
than the cybernetician in applying his logic to the state, art, and history. It might be possible to
consider Hegel’s dialectics as “universal cybernetics” in the sense of Simondon,47 though
Hegel’s concept of reflection departs from an anthropological understanding, while
cyberneticians take it from the perspective of behaviorism and functionalism. Cybernetics is a
functionalist proof of Hegel’s concept of reflection but not yet an anthropological one. Only in
the work of Pierre Teilhard de Chardin and James Lovelock can we find a more profound
anthropo-political understanding.

§15. Noospheric Reflection: In Search of a Planetary Freedom?

Bioeconomy and cybernetics have converged on a planetary scale. If for the cyberneticians,
feedback (Günther rendered it compatible with reflection) is fundamental to a new type of
intelligent machine, in Teilhard de Chardin, reflection is fundamental to life as a whole.
Therefore, Teilhard de Chardin often refers to an “organic totality” (totalité organique) in
contrast to Hegel’s “organic unity” (Organische Einheit). We can envision the world being
enveloped with a layer of life, known as the biosphere, a phrase coined by E. Suess and later
developed by Vladimir Vernadsky together with synergy from Édouard Le Roy and Henri
Bergson. The biosphere is a layer of “living matter” that effectively transforms the sun’s
radiations into various chemical activities, such as photosynthesis.48 The biosphere is not an
extra layer as something separable from the crust of the earth; on the contrary, Vernadsky
suggests that the biosphere is essential to it since without the biosphere “the crustal
mechanism of the earth will not exist.”49 At certain moments in history, the earth witnesses
the emergence of thinking, namely, a reflective matter, together with the living beings.
According to Teilhard de Chardin, evolution could be understood as the development of this
thinking layer at the planetary scale. The human being has, therefore, a special role in the
formation of a new layer above the geosphere and the biosphere: the noosphere. The prefix
noo- comes from the Greek word nous, noesis, thinking as per our use of the term noetic.
Teilhard de Chardin claims, “The animal knows, of course, but certainly it does not know that it
knows.”50 We do not really know how animals “think,” therefore, we cannot verify this
statement; however, at least, from our observation, it is fair to claim that in comparison with
other living beings, human beings have a richer symbolic world since they are capable of
producing tools—an ability that Bergson used to define intelligence and distinguish it from the
instinct.51 The symbolic world of the human has expanded and complexified exponentially in
the past fifty thousand years.

Following the paleontologists, we know that the evolution of the human, or hominization in
general, could be understood in terms of a long history of technical fabrication. One could
understand it in terms of two dimensions, the externalization of memory—for example,
through tools (the flint corresponds to a gesture of making fire that was developed throughout
millions of years) and writing—and a liberation of bodily organs, that is to say, the human
being could liberate their hands and their other organs that had to be in direct contact with
the object of treatment: “Thanks to the bipedalism freeing the hands the brain could enlarge;
and thanks to it at the same time the eyes, drawing near to each other on the diminished face,
could begin to converge and fix their gaze on what the hands took hold of, brought near, and,
in every sense of the word; presented: the very act of reflection, exteriorized.”52 The technical
objects are exteriorized reflection in the sense of the objective spirit described by Hegel.
Exteriorization is essential to reflection; it is that which extends reflection from the immediate
object to an object that is not readily available. The formation of the noosphere is the
historical accumulation of human intelligence through artifacts. However, these technical
objects are not dead, inorganic matter; rather, they are also capable of reflection, as the
objective spirit. Teilhard de Chardin was not discussing artificial intelligence or machine
learning because these technologies did not exist at the time. Instead, he was hinting at the
possibility of producing a thinking layer made possible by technical objects.53 Thinking
converges thanks to these technical objects because they function as a channel of
communication (for example, writing) but also facilitate thinking to evolve through the
accumulation of knowledge exteriorized in the technical objects. A reflective center is formed
on the noosphere, and once it is formed, Teilhard de Chardin argues in a rather Hegelian tone,
“it can change only by sinking deeper into itself.”54 This might remind us of our discussion in
chapter 1 that concerned the last paragraph of Hegel’s Phenomenology of Spirit, where the
consciousness returns to itself as if sinking into the infinite dark night. This capacity of
reflection belongs to life on Earth in general, and it is also through life that the Earth has
gained this important capacity. Therefore, for Teilhard de Chardin, the noosphere is not simply
a new skin, but rather it is that which gives soul to the earth: “Over and beyond the biosphere
there is a noosphere. . . . The earth ‘makes a new skin.’ Better still, it finds its soul.”55 The
biosphere is a skin above the geosphere, but the noosphere is rather its soul, one that results
from the convergence of technologies. The development of the noosphere for Teilhard de
Chardin is no longer about survival because in the Holocene, with reasonably constant
geological activity and the technologies humans have developed, survival does not appear to
be an imminent problem. Instead, for Teilhard de Chardin, the noosphere aims for a “super
life.”56 The noosphere is not simply biological, nor is it only tied to the human species,
because we cannot assert that humans created technology, for the opposite is equally true:
technology created the human. Unfortunately, technology is often misunderstood as merely a
human affair that blocks us from understanding technology itself. However, one must clearly
distinguish his thesis from this type of humanism, which is becoming more and more confident
that one day it will be able to reinvent the human anew, propaganda closely associated with
the transhumanists: “The change of the biological state ending up in the awakening of thought
does not simply correspond to a vertical point passed through by the individual, or even by the
species. Vaster than that, it reflects life itself, in its organic totality, and consequently it marks
a transformation that affects the state of the whole planet.”57

Teilhard de Chardin provides a theological and mystic perspective on technological

possibilities. Moreover, Teilhard rejects that technology is only an affair of any individual or
species. Instead, technology is planetary in the sense that it is already beyond the human
phenomenon. It is via the technospheric reflection, that we see “a noogenesis rising upstream
against the flow of entropy,”58 which resonates with the general thesis of Georgescu-Roegen
and Norbert Wiener. The future of humanity does not lie in a return to the original human but
rather in becoming more than human. Progress is here something material, scientific, and
rational—a feature that Teilhard de Chardin identified with Western religion. However, it must
be added that for Teilhard de Chardin the rational is not on the other side of the mystical; on
the contrary, the rational can also function as the possibility of the mystical and vice versa.
Humans are only the “midwife” who takes care of technology, but they are not the masters of
technology. The noosphere has been developing the ability to reflect on itself, and at some
point, it will arrive at an omega point, a “supremely autonomous focal point of union.”59 What
will happen when the noosphere reaches the omega point? Teilhard de Chardin provides us
with a theological meaning, a “‘parousiac’ establishment of the Kingdom of God.”60 However,
Teilhard de Chardin’s determination of the driving force of the noosphere must be debated,
namely, that the progress of the noosphere is advanced by the West, with the East understood
as struggling in an almost opposed direction. The West progresses and the East regresses.61
We can get a glimpse of this position by considering what Teilhard said about China (and also
India):

A civilization that was certainly incredibly refined, but just like the writing in which it so
ingenuously reveals itself, one that had never changed its methods from the beginning. It was
Neolithic, right in the midst of the nineteenth century, not a rejuvenated Neolithic as
elsewhere, but only endlessly and increasingly complicated in itself—and not merely along the
same lines, but on the same level—as though it had never been able to wrest itself free from
the soil in which it had been formed.62
Like Hegel and many other Western thinkers, Teilhard de Chardin sees the West as the
synchronizing power of planetarization. However, he is also a step ahead of Hegel in terms of
thinking planetarily—not that Teilhard de Chardin would not also have claimed that Siberia has
no value of existence on the earth, but rather Hegel’s planetary thinking stopped at the nation-
state, while Teilhard’s thinking, as Stafford Beer proposed in his essay “Recursion of Powers,”
goes beyond the individual, communal, and national level.63 As a Jesuit, Teilhard de Chardin
does not see the border of territories as an obstacle to realizing the noosphere, but rather the
development of the noosphere will finally transcend the limitations of the nation-states,
anticipating the arrival of the kingdom of God. The advancement and acceleration of the
noosphere in the past four hundred years is led by the West through its technological
advancement, colonization, and scientific revolution. However, we must not forget that
Teilhard de Chardin lived in China for more than two decades between 1923 and 1946 during
which the war in Europe prevented him from returning to France, and as a paleontologist, he
has more insight than most of the scholars regarding this civilization. Is not the change in China
today astounding in retrospect? In 150 years, China’s technical acceleration has caught up with
the West, and currently appears to be accelerating faster than the West in many sectors.
Teilhard might be surprised that today China contributes much more than many Western
countries toward the omega reflection. However, does this mean that modernization in China
and its technological acceleration is, in fact, only the triumph of Western rationality?

The question of a planetary reflection is taken further by Lovelock in his Gaia theory in which
he describes the awakening of Gaia through the stimulation of satellites and new
telecommunication technologies. Lovelock’s theory of Gaia originates from his task at NASA to
investigate the possibilities of life on Mars. His research into the atmosphere reveals that the
atmosphere, noosphere, biosphere, and geosphere all create feedback loops and are linked
into a self-regulating system. Gaia as a gigantic cybernetic system provides a new way of
understanding the relation between humans and the Earth. However, the ecological
movements associated with Gaia theory missed Lovelock’s main point that the ultimate goal is
not to protect mother earth but rather to arrive at the reflection of Gaia. Such a reflection is an
awakening, and humanity has not yet fulfilled its role to facilitate the taking place of this
extraordinary reflection. In this sense, Lovelock’s Gaia could be seen as a continuation of
Teilhard de Chardin’s conceptualization of the noosphere, the difference being that Gaia
theory starts with the atmosphere and takes cybernetics as a departing point to conceive Gaia
as a homeostatic system. Later, with the joint force of Lynn Margulis, we know that Gaia is no
longer considered as a single organism, but rather a system made of multiple species, or of
multispecies symbiosis. In short, Gaia is conceived as a giant nonequilibrium thermodynamic
system, or more precisely a planetary life form.64 The noospheric reflection or the awakening
of Gaia for Lovelock is a task of technological development, and it is not a return to some form
of philosophy of nature. The only thing that one can relate in this to a philosophy of nature is
that it attempts to reconcile the rational and the mystical,65 in the sense that the
technological that has the rational as its ground doesn’t point toward the disappearance of the
mystical, but rather the very possibility of the mystical—a theme we will return to in chapter 6.
Is this omega reflection, understood as the destiny of humanity, similar in form to the
apocalypse? Today we can easily associate it with the technological singularity; we can imagine
that artificial intelligence will be joined together to create a noospheric reflection beyond all
territories, and beyond attempts that have been carried out to link all computers in the world
to produce a supercomputer. Maybe one day we will witness planetary unification through
technology, and it is up to Silicon Valley to tell us how fast and how far it can go. In 1995,
Wired magazine rediscovered Teilhard de Chardin and named him the founder of a
“philosophical framework for planetary, Net-based consciousness” fifty years prior to the birth
of the internet.66 Let us not forget that in 2018, Ray Kurzweil argued that by 2045 it might be
possible to attain immortality.67 “The singularity is near” is like the prophecy of the second
coming of Jesus Christ, and Kurzweil is John the Baptist.68 Politics starts with anthropology, an
understanding of human nature and humans’ relation to the other beings in the world. This
future of humanity is fictional; at the same time, it is a prophecy that is more relevant to us
today than any previous epoch because technological acceleration has blurred the fictive and
the actual.

The question of anthropology, which we have tried to sketch here, is no longer concerned with
ethnology and ethnography but rather the future of the Anthropos itself. The anthropological
question takes humanity as a whole and attempts to go beyond racial and ethnic differences.
Such an anthropology is, however, inseparable from the Christian religion. As a result,
noospheric reflection is not a human achievement alone but rather the possibility of Christian
universal love. Moreover, the anthropological reflection provides a different path to think
about the universal history of humanity; unlike Kant, who sees the realization of history as the
hidden project of nature, we see here nature being englobed in a reflection that originates
from it but at the same time exceeds it:

Once formed, a reflective centre can no longer change except by involution upon itself. To
outward appearance, admittedly, man is integrated just like any animal. But here and there we
find an inverse function of the phenomenon. By death, in the animal, the radial is reabsorbed
into the tangential, while in man it escapes and is liberated from it. It escapes from entropy by
turning back to Omega: the hominization of death itself.69

This image of the “hominization of death” is a return to the center, to the omega, contributing
to the memory of the human species as well as to the future of this memory. The human being
will be unified in the planetary process in the eyes of Teilhard de Chardin, in the sense that the
noosphere will englobe the geosphere and the biosphere and form a cybernetic feedback loop
with the atmosphere. Such a view takes the idea of the planetary as the a priori, the same way
Hegel sees the idea of the state. In this process of convergence, human time is identified with
geological time, just as how Dipesh Chakrabarty has analyzed the notion of the
Anthropocene.70 However, does this identification give us a new framework of politics—a
politics beyond the nation-state as well as the human species? Or, on the contrary, does it only
mean the end of the human and the end of freedom?

We have to confront the Kantian question regarding how far philosophical speculations can go
without falling prey to the Schwärmerei. In the second volume of his The Myth of the Machine,
Mumford launched a fierce attack on Teilhard de Chardin and ventured a “tentative but
reassuring prediction: that planetary supermechanism will disintegrate long before ‘the
phenomenon of Man’ reaches the Omega point.”71 Mumford’s attack is somewhat based on
his strict definition of mechanism and his distinction between mechanism and organism. We
will have to elaborate on this point. On the one hand, Mumford sees Teilhard de Chardin’s
technological thought as a mere continuation of the mechanical world picture under the
disguise of Christian fulfilment. The megamachine, since the beginning, presupposes what
Mumford calls the “organization man,” that is to say, an artifact of the human that is deprived
of any organic feature unconformable to mechanical organization. The planetary
supermechanism for him will only produce a “depersonalized servo-mechanism in the
megamachine.”72 Mumford alluded to an organicism that would be an antidote to such
mechanization. On the other hand, even though he invokes Norbert Wiener and cybernetics
on several occasions, he seems to have ignored that the cybernetic machine is no longer the
same kind of mechanical machine he was reproaching. To be fair, Mumford saw the cybernetic
machines as a technological improvement (which he calls “cybernation”), but he understands
them as “the most ancient of organic devices, rather than the most modern: equivalent to the
reflexes, not the cerebral cortex.”73 Paradoxically when he refers to Cannon’s homeostasis, he
then claims that he wouldn’t call it a “mechanism.”74 Mumford’s analysis and diagnosis could
hardly hold following the trajectory of political epistemology we have outlined so far;
therefore, his theory of the megamachine in relation to political forms has to be updated. On
the other hand, and this seems to be more solid as a criticism, is that for Mumford, Teilhard de
Chardin’s theory of the development of consciousness toward the omega point is not science
but risks being mere mythology and eschatology; its only merit is that it “made explicit the
underlying dogmatic premises of the metaphysics and theology of the megamachine.”75

It is worth noting that, near the end of Gesture and Speech, André Leroi-Gourhan mentioned
Teilhard’s omega point and speculated that it is most likely another word for the apocalypse.
And before the apocalypse arrives, one will have to wait indefinitely because, as we know, the
katechon delays the coming of the anti-Christ, and the length of this delay remains unknown:
“We should be inclined to regard the Teilhardian vision as a powerful mystical approach that
bears, however, the hallmark of all apocalypses. Humankind may well have to wait thousands
of years for ‘point omega’ and, while waiting, it will have to organize itself and carry on living,
just as it did in the year 1000.”76 Planetary reflection is a messianic event in the sense that it is
an event that ends the limit of the human being. This planetary reflection is also the moment
when the nation-states will lose all meanings and values, and through technology the kingdom
of God will be brought to the earth. However, as Mumford and Leroi-Gourhan have remarked,
this is but “mythology and eschatology” and thus bears “the hallmark of all apocalypses,” a
trope that continues for today’s transhumanists.

However, unlike Teilhard, whose noble idea of planetary reflection aims at reconciling science
and theology, transhumanists perceive it more in terms of market value. One shouldn’t
categorize Teilhard as a transhumanist by any means, even though one could identify an
apocalyptic end in both. The transhumanists propose the technological singularity as the
ultimate possibility of the posthuman, where the human will no longer be and will remain a
past; instead, we will all become Homo deus. Logically one cannot refuse such an
anthropogenetic possibility since we do not know enough about how technology might
advance in the coming decades. At the same time, this uncertainty leads to a constant
confrontation between technology and politics within a certain epistemological paradigm, for
in this paradigm technology wants to overcome politics and politics wants to constrain
technology. The biological attributes of humans could be gradually substituted by artificial
organs available for purchase at a certain price. Elements such as gender and human
phenotypical differences become subject to engineering principles: they could be eliminated
by technological means. One may anticipate that this will first be done in private clinics before
becoming normal practice in public hospitals. This is the promise as well as the poverty of the
present technological imagination, while it equally marks the end of the human and the end of
politics—or perhaps an absolute depolitization.
4

Mechanism, Organism, or Decisionism

The symbol of the Leviathan . . . at first represented an externally driven lifeless “mechanism”
and then an animate “organism” of a political contrast, an organism driven from within. When
a widespread romantic feeling began to perceive in the image of the “state,” a plant, a growing
tree, or even a flower, the image generated by Hobbes began to be perceived as downright
grotesque.

—Carl Schmitt, The Leviathan in the State Theory of Thomas Hobbes

After exploring Hegel’s planetary thinking within and beyond the political form of the state, we
now turn to tackle the state theory of Carl Schmitt, a thinker who concretizes technology,
sovereignty, and the planetary into tangible manifestations. We engage with Schmitt because
he offers a different political epistemology to tackle rising tensions between the state and
technological progress, as well as tensions among states due to spatial revolutions. This
centers on what he terms “the political.” Similar to our exploration of Hegel, we will
commence by examining the question of political epistemology. The concluding sentence of
chapter 5 of Carl Schmitt’s monograph on Hobbes, cited above, is both intriguing and
profound. The two images of the state he refers to, a machine and an organism, indicate two
political epistemologies. The former is the mechanical and lifeless existence that one can find
in Descartes’s mechanization of being and Hobbes’s mechanization of the state; the latter
emphasizes an organicity, a livingness (Lebendigkeit), which was prescribed as an
antimechanist philosophy by the Romantics. For the Romantics, mechanism is a corrupted
enterprise: it is a mistake that leads toward self-destruction. As Novalis stated in Glauben und
Lieben: “However necessary perhaps such machine-like administration might be for the health,
strength, and vigilance of the state, if the state is solely treated as such, then it is essentially
ruined by this.”1 Hegel’s philosophy of right, though not falling into the category of
Romanticism, stands as the most sophisticated and systematic treatise on the organicity of the
state as the condition of freedom. In the previous chapters, we repeatedly returned to this
contrast between mechanism and organism that characterizes a rupture in the history of
modern European philosophy and remains effective today when we talk about communities,
interdependences, coexistences, and so on.

Schmitt’s Hobbes book contains his defense of Hobbes against the German Romantics’
criticism of Hobbes’s mechanism. Furthermore, Schmitt’s reading of Hobbes moves beyond
this mechanistic characterization. As we will show, in Hobbes’s mechanization of the state,
there is something even “mystical” about the Leviathan since it is God, persona, and machine
endowed with a soul. In this chapter, we will read Schmitt’s decisionism as a political
epistemology, or more precisely a political vitalism, by showing how Schmitt considered
decisionism a theoretical advancement beyond the opposition between mechanism and
organism. This does not mean endorsing Schmitt’s state theory; on the contrary, this reading
of Schmitt allows us to understand (also in the next chapters) the epistemological assumptions
and limits of Schmitt’s attempt to go beyond Hegel and the organicist paradigm. This chapter
sets out to, first, contrast our political, epistemological reading with that from political
theology, which is often associated with Schmitt in contemporary discussions, and second, to
reconstruct Schmitt’s vitalist epistemology by analyzing his defense against the mechanist
perception of Hobbes’s state theory and the organicist perception of the Romantic’s state
theory—and for this purpose, we will return to a close reading of Hobbes’s Leviathan as well as
Schmitt’s commentary.

§16. From Political Theology to Political Epistemology

Retrospectively, one may say that Hegel’s state, as an organic unity, did not turn the Prussian
state into an organic whole, nor did it produce an organic and holistic economy—something
that might only appear as a slogan at the dawn of the Second World War when holism became
the science of National Socialism. The First World War was probably only a preparation for the
Second World War. In 1914, when Henri Bergson gave his inaugural speech as the newly
elected president of the Académie des Sciences Morales et Politiques, Bergson addressed the
outbreak of the First World War by accusing Germany of being machinist and mechanist.2
After several centuries of achievement in poetry, art, and metaphysics, by the end of the
nineteenth century, Germany turned itself into a mechanical machine in industry,
administration, and military. Bergson saw a fundamental mechanism in Germany’s mentality,
one that not only was metaphorical but also reflected itself in the machines then produced in
Germany: “diabolical artifice,” which, instead of producing “a spiritualization of matter,”
ended in a “mechanization of the spirit.”3 We will return to this statement in chapter 6 by
investigating Bergson’s organology of war. In this short speech of 1914, terms such as
mechanism, mechanic, and mechanization appear nineteen times. One could associate this
accusation with Bergson’s critique of mechanism and his own vitalist position or a quasi-
organicism. Indeed, almost a century had passed between Hegel’s Outlines of the Philosophy
of Right (1821) and Bergson’s speech on the First World War (1914), and Prussia had turned
Germany into a “scientific barbary” or a “systematic barbary” through mechanization.

Did Hegel then fail? His theory of the state was supposed to guarantee planetary freedom
without inciting wars of diverse nature and scale. Furthermore, not only did the individuality
and the substance of the state not make “the nullity of these finite things [life, property, and
their rights] as an accomplished fact,”4 but also the organism of the state became
unachievable—just as the young Marx criticized, that the organic state remains ultimately a
myth.5 We know that after Hegel’s death, his name gradually faded from view, but Germany
itself, more than ever, continued “Hegelianizing from top to bottom.”6 In the previous
chapters, we attempted to show how Hegel, in his doctrine of the state, identifies the spirit
with philosophy and the state with freedom. This identification is also an identification of
philosophy with the necessity of organicity. The question might be asked again about the
requirement of understanding the state through the two images of the machine and organism.
What does it contribute to political philosophy today?

Indeed, one might answer such a question by recognizing that the machine and organism are
not just metaphors but rather function as aspirations to ideal models of human society; they
are, therefore, also fundamental to the perception and imagination of all domains of human
existence. The art of governance, which, in general, we now call politics, is nothing accidental,
nor is it simply the collection of wisdom passed down from previous generations. It is a science
that presupposes a certain epistemology as its way of investigating the organization within a
particular human society and the latter’s relation with other societies, an epistemology
without which it would be completely doomed. By giving validity to rules, the legal system can
legitimate certain norms that are shared and respected by all the members of society—be that
via the school of natural law or that of positive law. Natural law seeks its foundation in human
nature, especially rationality and morality, while an authoritative communal will constitutes
positive law.7 In Hans Kelsen’s positivism, a Grundnorm is presupposed in a legal community
as validifying other norms. By their efficiency, norms also affirm or discredit the validity of
rules. In international relations, norms are described as protocols and international laws,
establish order between nations that do not share the same values and beliefs, and
presuppose a basic norm, sovereignty, the common will that possesses the greatest power of
legislation.8 We will look more closely at the ontological question of sovereignty in the next
chapter, reserving this chapter for discussing Schmitt’s political epistemology.

Any political science presupposes a specific political epistemology that departs from a
presupposed foundation. Indeed, this is precisely what Karl Deutsch shows in his seminal work
on cybernetics and governance, The Nerves of Government: Models of Political
Communication and Control. Deutsch surveyed the images of political thought, ranging from
the wheel and the scale to the modern models of mechanism and organism.9 Deutsch did not
exhaust all images of political thought, and we should not reproach him for this; instead, we
would like to point out that what Deutsch demonstrated is that epistemological frameworks
coincide with modes of legitimation. For example, since the pre-Socratics embraced an
epistemology of elements, the formation of their societies was based on the complexification
of elements, be that water, fire, or more abstract entities like the apeiron (the unbounded and
infinite from which the universe arose), while in Plato, we find an epistemology based on
Form, according to which, each individual, be it a human being or social institute, participates
in an ideal Form, eidos, with neither tyranny nor democracy being able to access the eidos
since this is only possible through a philosopher-king, once the ruler of the polis.10 In the
modern age, we see a parallel process of secularization and the emergence of modern science,
which had significant implications for political thought. The question of legitimacy underlines
the relation between epistemology and politics, for epistemological models do not alter from
one to another without being given the legitimacy to do so. The question of legitimacy also
highlights the contrast between political theology and political epistemology. Indeed, do
political epistemology and political theology converge in the process of secularization?
Epistemology as a category of science is opposed to theology. To understand this opposition,
we must first go through Schmitt’s concept of political theology.

In Political Theology (1922), Schmitt claims that

all significant concepts of modern theory of the state are resulted from the secularization of
theological concepts not only because of their historical development—in which they were
transferred from theology to the theory of the state . . . but also because of their systematic
structure. . . . The state of exception in jurisprudence is analogous to the miracle in theology.
Only by being aware of this analogy can we appreciate the manner in which the philosophical
idea of the state developed over the last few centuries.11

In other words, there is a “systematic structural kinship” between theological and juridical
concepts.12 How can we judge Schmitt’s assertion? Hans Blumenberg mocked and reproached
the credibility of this notion of secularization in the first edition of his Legitimacy of the
Modern Age,13 and the theologist Erik Peterson denied the possibility of any political theology
in Der Monotheismus als politisches Problem (1935). Going into depth on Peterson’s debate
with Schmitt about church history is beyond the scope of this work; Blumenberg’s criticism,
however, is more relevant since it reveals the problematic of historicization. In The Legitimacy
of the Modern Age, Blumenberg’s main target was not Schmitt but Karl Löwith’s Meaning in
History (1949).14 Löwith contends that several important modern concepts, such as progress,
are secularized Christian concepts. The concept of infinite progress, and its underlying
philosophy of history, is the secularization of a linear time established by Christianity by
turning away from the cyclic time found in the antique pagan cosmos. Once associated with
biblical times, progress is seen as the secularization of the eschatological model, which
anticipates an ultimate event like the Last Judgment as the fulfilment of history.15 According
to this view, Hegel’s philosophy of history is no exception from this paradigm: “For Löwith,
Hegel’s theory of the ‘suspension and carrying forward’ (Aufhebung) of the Christian and
Reformation phase of history in the underlying structure of the modern spiritual and political
world, especially in its constitutive consciousness of subjective freedom, degraded ‘sacred
history to the level of secular history and exalt[ed] the latter to the level of the first.’”16

Schmitt’s review of Löwith’s book affirms Löwith’s claim that paganism (Heidentum) is
incapable of historical thinking because it is cyclic.17 Blumenberg defends the concept of
progress for various reasons, most notably because Löwith’s view is taken to be questionable,
if not unhistorical.18 According to Blumenberg, Löwith’s interpretation of the philosophy of
history was already shaped in his earlier work on Nietzsche, where he set up the eternal return
as the renaissance of cyclic time.19 For Blumenberg, modernity should not be seen as the
continuation and transposition of a set of concepts A from the past to the set of concepts B
found in the present, since this view undermines the legitimacy of the modern. In such a
transposition, the legitimacy of the modern depends completely on the past. Modernity, for
Blumenberg, stands as a self-assertion (Selbstbehauptung), similar to Hannah Arendt’s
argument, which he quoted: “Modern man, when he lost the certainty of a world to come, was
thrown back upon himself and not upon this world.”20 Modernity could be seen as a
discontinuity, where both the becoming worldlessness (Entweltlichung) and detheolization
(Enttheologisierung) take place.21 Unlike the eschatological view of history, the modern
concept of progress does not necessarily await a transcendent intervention, like a revolution.
Instead, it consists of an immanent process of self-justification. Science and technology behind
the idea of infinite progress constitute neither the negativity nor the residue of religion. In the
same vein, despite largely agreeing with Schmitt, Blumenberg rejects Schmitt’s claim that “all
significant concepts of modern theory of the state are resulted from the secularization of
theological concepts.” This does not mean that Blumenberg refuses to recognize that there is a
historical relation between theology and the modern state (indeed, for him, the modern age is
“unthinkable without” Christianity, as he intended to show in the second part of The
Legitimacy of the Modern Age); but rather he rejects secularization as a transfer of concepts
from one realm to another. As a method, it is not legitimate but merely romantic,22 because
analogy does not imply transformation. In this sense, Schmitt’s political theology could be
reduced to a set of metaphorical relations: “Is ‘Political Theology’ only the sum of a set of
metaphors, whose selection reveals more about the character of the situations in which use is
made of them than about the origin of the ideas and concepts that are employed in dealing
with such situations?”23

The essential difference between Schmitt and Blumenberg, which Blumenberg also recognized
after Schmitt’s publication of Political Theology II, is that secularization is a category of
legitimacy for Schmitt; while for Blumenberg, it belongs to the category of historical justice.24
Schmitt wants to identify the systemic structural kinship between the modern doctrine of the
state and theology. In contrast, Blumenberg wants to show that the modern is irreducible to
theological categories, even if they are closely related. Jean-Claude Monod distinguishes two
meanings (sens, or more precisely, two phases) of secularization: secularization-transfer and
secularization-liquidation. These two senses seem to respectively characterize Schmitt and
Blumenberg’s positions. According to Monod, secularization-transfer sees secularization as a
transfer of concepts from theology to the state, which characterizes Schmitt’s political
theology; secularization-liquidation is a second phase that leads to the emancipation, not only
from Christian theology but also from all substitutions of theology.25 Schmitt focuses on
transfer but fears liquidation, which he considered neutralization; Blumenberg is critical of
secularization-transfer but is not completely in favor of liquidation either.

We do not intend to prolong the debate between Blumenberg and Schmitt here. The
confrontation between Blumenberg, Schmitt, and Löwith that we staged above highlights the
problem of political theology. Furthermore, it serves as an invitation to pursue a different line
of inquiry: political epistemology. Even if we step back and follow Löwith’s interpretation of
Hegel’s philosophy of history as a form of eschatology, it remains insufficient to understand
Hegel’s organic state. This is also why political epistemology is essential to understanding
modern political thought. We do not mean to reject political theology and its importance in
the history of the Occident. Indeed, it is not possible to understand the West without
understanding Christianity. However, from the perspective of planetary politics, it makes little
sense today to claim that Xi Jinping is the secular transfer of the Christian God or that the
Covid-19 vaccines are a Christian miracle. This is because modernization is secularization as
both Sekularisierung and Verweltlichung, that is, in the process of mondialization, certain
senses of secularization are no longer recognizable, while at the same time a set of more
universal categories have to be adopted. For example, Marxism, which according to Löwith
and Jacob Taubes is an instance of the eschatological model, nevertheless took a
nontheological and quasi-scientific meaning in the Eastern communist countries.

Suppose political theology is based on divine revelation emphasizing the transposition of

theological concepts to political concepts. In that case, political epistemology has its source in
science, understanding the implication of scientific categories in forming political
organizations. When we look at history from the perspective of political epistemology, it might
then be possible to identify a more sophisticated and open future than that of an eschatology;
it also returns political agency to the human and value to knowledge. For example, if we follow
Gilbert Simondon, the concept of progress is characteristic of the eighteenth century in which
technical and scientific improvement was conceived without limit, this techno-scientific
optimism being the belief of the epoch of mechanism.26 We could then also see how
mechanist epistemology ended following industrialization and mechanization, and why an
organismic epistemology is conceived as a rescuing force.

Political epistemology is not a replacement for political theology. Modern epistemology is too
constrained to replace theology because it is only limited to what is knowable. In Schmitt’s
political theology, the secularization of Christian concepts produces new forms of legitimacy
that cannot be reduced to science—and indeed, science has legality as the form of the “laws of
nature” but not yet an absolute legitimacy, therefore any scientific inquiry into the emergence
of life or the birth of the cosmos is always haunted by the necessity of the divine power. Our
interest in political epistemology hopes, however, to expose, at the same time, the
metaphysical-cum-scientific sources of political thought as well as their limits—which we have
already performed in our reading of Hegel. With Blumenberg’s criticism in mind, we would like
to read Schmitt’s theory of the state, not from the perspective of political theology but rather
from political epistemology. Schmitt’s remark in The Leviathan in the State Theory of Thomas
Hobbes is, therefore, significant since, first, it is an invitation to evaluate the two images of the
state and to reflect on this historical debate given our situation, and second, it is also key to
identifying a new concept, or a new image of the state that Schmitt himself wants to sketch.

§17. Machine and Organism in The Leviathan in the State Theory of Thomas Hobbes
Schmitt is, however, not satisfied with the shift from mechanism to organism. This
displacement of mechanism and the replacement with organism is not only unsatisfactory, but
also it brutally slashes something even more important in political theory, leading to the
consequence that “the image generated by Hobbes began to be perceived as downright
grotesque.”27 Does Schmitt want to defend and return to the Hobbesian mechanization of the
state? He was very critical and skeptical of a certain “organismic” concept of politics, which he
named “political romanticism,” in which he included various political structures such as liberal
democracy and parliamentary democracy. The Romantics see the organic in everything, even a
stone. Schmitt sometimes caricatures Romanticism as a certain form of animism, which is a
mere abstraction and aestheticization of reality, failing to historicize and seize the
concreteness of history.28 The emphasis on spontaneity and organicity of politics implies, first
of all, endless discussions without arriving at the right political decision, as he argues at the
opening of chapter 4 of Political Theology, “On the Counter Revolutionary Philosophy of the
State (de Maistre, Bonald, Donosco Cortés”: “German romantics possess an odd trait:
everlasting conversation. Novalis and Adam Müller feel at home with it; to them, it constitutes
the true realization of their spirits.”29 Donosco Cortés, during the crisis of 1848, undermined
discussion and prioritized the decision; he called the bourgeoisie a clasa discutidora—Schmitt
later carried this criticism against parliamentarians.30 Schmitt’s attraction to the Hobbesian
theory of the state is not a return to a mechanist or a rigidly rational and linear model. Schmitt
also understands the problem of the lifeless and repetitive mechanism, which he identifies in
liberalism, especially the “mechanical formalism” of Kelsenian liberalism.31 He also associated
this formalism with what Montesquieu claimed of the judge being “la bouche qui pronounce
les paroles de la loi” (the mouth that pronounces the speech of the law), as well as with what
Rousseau said about executive power being no more than a radical mechanical application of
legislative norms.32 As a historical fact, the difference between organism and mechanism had
not yet been clearly made in Hobbes’s time; Hobbes, like his contemporary Descartes, was a
thinker of mechanism. Hobbes’s mechanism remains mystical,33 rendering the classification of
whether the Hobbesian state is mechanism or organism, animal or machine, superfluous.34
Retrospectively, we would like to claim—and this constitutes the major difference between
our reading of Schmitt and most others—that what Schmitt was looking for is a theory of the
state beyond mechanism and organism.35

We will start where Schmitt ended, in the appendix to his book on Hobbes entitled “The State
as Mechanism in Descartes and Hobbes,” an article published in 1936 in the journal Archiv für
Rechts- und Sozialphilosophie, two years before the publication of his monograph on Hobbes.
Regarding mechanical philosophy, Hobbes’s philosophical project was a step further than, or
even a leap beyond, that of Descartes. Descartes, the great thinker of mechanism, was able to
sketch a mechanization of the anthropological image of man, best demonstrated in his shorter
treatises such as “Description of the Human Body” (1648), posthumously published together
with “Treatise on Man” in 1664, in which Descartes compares different parts of the human
body with various components of the church organ, the animal spirit being passed by the
blood, and a soul dwelling in the pineal gland:
 The air which comes from the bellows

The spirits which come from the heart

The pipes which make sound

The pores of the brain through which they pass

The distribution of the air in the pipes

The way in which the spirits are distributed in these pores

Hobbes furthered Descartes’s project of mechanization, transporting it from the image of man
to the image of the state, with the sovereign dwelling in the brain of the leviathan, itself
composed of individuals. In Schmitt’s own words, Hobbes’s philosophy was an advancement of
Descartes’s: “The mechanization of the concept of a state thus completed the mechanization
of the anthropological image of man.”36 In the first paragraph of his introduction to the
Leviathan, Hobbes starts with a mechanical metaphor of the human being with the human
heart as the spring, nerves as strings, and joints as wheels. Hobbes extends this mechanical
metaphor to the commonwealth by claiming that more than this image of the automata, “art
goes yet further, imitating that rational and most excellent work of nature, man. For by art is
created that great Leviathan called a commonwealth.”37 Just as with Descartes’s comparison
of automata and human beings, Hobbes gave a long list of equivalent features:

Sovereignty

Artificial soul

Magistrates/officers

Artificial joints
Reward/punishment

Nerves

Wealth/riches

Strength

Salus populi

Business

Counsellors

Memory

Equity/law

Reason/will

Concord

Health

Sedition
 Sickness

Civil war

Death

Pacts/covenants

Fiat

Hobbes’s mechanization of the state is not only a metaphor: it also explores in detail the
structure and operation of the state from the perspective of mechanism. Hobbes valued
mechanism as a superior form of thinking that reveals the organization of the body politic and
the functioning of the commonwealth.38 In addition to the mechanical body, the sovereign
representative to the state is understood as the soul dwelling in the body, or, as in Schmitt’s
1919 lecture on Jean Bodin’s concept of sovereignty, Schmitt also compared this soul to the
keel of a ship.39 In his Six Livres de la République, Bodin developed the sovereign as a legal
concept defined as the state’s representative in opposition to “feudal, patrimonial, corporate
and confessional pluralism.”40 Bodin’s definition of the sovereign has been understood since
the seventeenth century as an absolutist and indivisible power, not conditioned by any other
power except God.41 To offer a contemporary description, we might compare this image of
the soul with mecha, those robots from Japanese animations, where a human being sits inside
the heart or the brain of the robot, driving it with a control panel; indeed, this is not far from
how Schmitt describes Hobbes’s state theory: “Hobbes transfers—and that seems to me to be
the gist of his philosophy of state—the Cartesian conception of man as a mechanism with a
soul onto the ‘human man,’ the state, made by him into a machine animated by the sovereign-
representative person.”42

The mechanization of the state is unlikely to be found in Bodin, mostly since he lived and
wrote at a period when mechanism was not yet a dominant epistemology. Indeed, Schmitt
thinks that Bodin could not grasp the modern Leviathan as Hobbes did, that is, understand its
fourfold combination of God, animal, person, and machine.43 What, then, is the problem of
mechanism in Hobbes’s theory, and to what extent did it fail—as the subtitle of Schmitt’s book
Meaning and Failure of a Political Symbol suggests? Furthermore, how is “mechanism”—a
term immediately associated with machines—related to Schmitt’s take on technology, which
plays a decisive role in his distinction between his political project and that of the communists
and the liberals? The answers to these questions are not self-evident, not only because the
text is open to different readings but also because Schmitt’s political involvement with
National Socialism invites readings that identify his philosophy with the ideology of Nazism. It
is beyond our intention to repeat what has been plausibly analyzed regarding Schmitt’s theory
and his involvement with National Socialism, but rather we would like to situate our readings
in the antithesis of mechanism and organism—an antithesis we have been using to read the
history of modern European philosophy. To understand Schmitt’s reading, we must go back to
Hobbes’s political epistemology of the Leviathan.

§18. Political Epistemology in Hobbes’s Leviathan

For historians of science, Hobbes’s mechanism is not entirely the same as that of Descartes. As
we know, Hobbes entered into a critical correspondence with Descartes during the former’s
self-exile in Paris during the 1640s, just after the publication of The Elements of Law. The
debates were around the interpretation of optics and Descartes’s meditation, and Hobbes’s
objections were also listed as an appendix in Descartes’s Meditations on First Philosophy.44
We will have to leave the details of this debate to historians of science; here, we only want to
highlight one observation. We might say that dualism, which is at the same time a cause but
also a result of Descartes’s mechanism, is not treated in the same manner in the philosophy of
Hobbes. As a reminder: mechanism is characterized by a linear causality: one cause leads to an
effect, as is demonstrated by a mechanical machine. If observers chose to trace the cause of a
machine’s movement, they might well arrive at what they think is the single mechanical cause,
such as a coiled spring inside the machine. However, the spring was itself coiled by a human
being external to the machine, and the coiling action would also have to have a cause. Through
such reasoning, one continues ad infinitum until, in the end, one is very likely to arrive at God
as the first cause. This is not yet a logical conclusion since it is still a postulate. For Descartes,
the proof of the existence of God must be mediated via the res cogitans because the res
cogitans is that which thinks and wills, while insofar that the res cogitans is limited in both
representation and reasoning, namely, it is always far away from perfection, a higher form of
existence or a perfect being must exist that makes such a perfection possible. This, as we
know, is Descartes’s proof of the existence of God.45 Hobbes, like Descartes, assumes God as
the first cause. However, he does not mediate it through the res cogitans; instead, Hobbes
considers being from the perspective of local motion. Whether that is the imagination or
passions of the human being or the movement of an object, both could be interpreted as
motion. In other words, there is a conflation of the physical and the sensual, an ontological
homogeneity governing both physical beings and living beings46—in this sense, we may be
able to say that Hobbes pushes mechanism further than Descartes. This is also the foundation
of Hobbes’s body politics, as we can see in De Motu, where Hobbes compares the river with
the commonwealth:

Since the motion and the flow are one and the same, the river will also be one and the same.
Likewise if one asks: “Is a man, when old and young, the same being, ens, or matter, in
number?” it is clear that, because of the continual casting of [existing] body-tissue and the
acquisition of new, it is not the same material [that endures], and hence not the same body;
yet because of the unbroken nature of the flux by which matter decays and is replaced, he is
always the same man. The same must be said of the commonwealth. When any citizen dies,
the material of the state is not the same, i.e. the state is not the same ens. Yet the
uninterrupted degree [ordo] and motion of government that signalise a state ensure, while
they remain as one, that the state is the same in number.47

The commonwealth is not simply an assembly of bodies; rather, it has a vitality, which Hobbes
borrows from the metaphor of the flow or man’s ageing. That which goes away is replaced by
something new; nothing remains the same. One observes it in an inorganic matter, such as the
river, or organic matter, such as the human being. Likewise, when the commonwealth is well
regulated, it is maintained by flows of matter and energy as the river is by the flow of water.
This means the mechanical or civil laws must supplement the moral laws (what Hobbes calls
laws of nature) and enforce the latter. The civil laws are constitutive of a body politics that
defines the obligations and interdictions of the subjects of the commonwealth:

The making of union consisteth in this, that every man by covenant oblige himself to some
one and the same man, or to some one and the same council, by them all named and
determined, to do those actions, which the said man or council shall command them to do;
and to do no action which he or they shall forbid, or command them not to do. . . . This union
so made, is that which men call now-a-days a BODY POLITIC or civil society; and the Greeks call
it πόλισ; that is to say, a city; which may be defined to be a multitude of men, united as one
person by a common power, for their common peace, defence, and benefit.48

Civil laws are thus like the laws of mechanics that govern the movements of the bodies in a
common space, such as the civil society or polis. The multitude as an assembly of bodies is
devoid of organization. Like the rabbles in Hegel’s Outlines of the Philosophy of Right, they
have to be organized. However, as we can see, Hegel’s organic unity of the state greatly
contrasts with Hobbes’s mechanical unity of the commonwealth, which interests us here. But
if Schmitt is well aware of this opposition and the organic advancements of Hegel’s political
philosophy, why did he still long for Hobbes’s mechanism? In doing so, does he not risk
returning to an obsolete political epistemology? The answer to such a question can be found in
Schmitt’s nuanced reading of the Leviathan as not purely a mechanical being but rather a
mythical one; this mythical origin of the Leviathan has to be firstly approached from Hobbes’s
anthropology.

Toward the end of the Introduction of Leviathan, Hobbes tells us that wisdom is acquired not
through reading books but through studying human beings.49 That is to say, one must start
with anthropology, the study of the human and its tendencies. In chapter XIII, titled “Of the
Natural Condition of Mankind, as Concerning Their Felicity and Misery,” Hobbes suggests three
principal causes of conflict between humans: competition, diffidence, and glory, each
corresponding to invasion for gain, safety, and reputation.50 The war of all against all is a
natural tendency in human beings. It is nothing sinful, provided that each person preserves
themselves until a law forbids them. However, Hobbes clarifies that such a situation never
really existed: “It may peradventure be thought, there was never such a time nor condition of
war as this; and I believe it was never generally so, over all the world.”51

What, then would be the use of giving such an imaginary scenario? It is due to the fact that he
must demonstrate the genesis of politics and that his formulation of the political order is
nothing more than the necessary result of such a genesis. As we know, Hobbes’s fictional state
of nature contrasts with that of both Montesquieu and Jean-Jacques Rousseau. In Book I of his
Spirit of the Laws,52 Montesquieu claimed that the state of nature is harmonious rather than
being a war of all against all; conflicts arose due to the growth of intelligence, and laws were
enacted to ensure harmonious interactions between people. It became clearer in Rousseau’s
Second Discourse (Discourse on the Origin and Foundations of Inequality Among Mankind)
that Hobbes’s state of nature is no longer the “first state of nature.” For simplicity, we might
call Hobbes’s a second state of nature. The first state of nature is characterized by the natural
state of men’s idleness and self-satisfaction with natural resources. The second state of nature
is already one where artificiality introduces itself into the nature of man, and inequality is said
to emerge due to competition—“some improved or impaired their condition or acquired good
or bad qualities not inherent in their nature, the rest continued a longer time in their primitive
state.”53 This artificiality is subject to perfection in the sense of the constant improvement of
tools; Rousseau therefore often used the word perfectibilité to characterize the fall qua
departure of the original man toward sociability. Instead of competition and war, Rousseau
points out that Hobbes ignored pity, which is fundamental to self-love and self-preservation.

Both Rousseau and Hobbes provide us with two imaginary stories, which compete with each
other to be anthropological qua ontological because both submit the human to a genesis that
is always conditioned by the ontological postulate of human nature. Though Hobbes could not
illustrate such a story according to European history, he claimed it might have happened
elsewhere. The contact with the New World invokes strong interest in anthropology, but it also
provides anthropology with the “other” understood as the “primitive self.” This encounter
reconstructs the genesis of human society, or political anthropology, by starting with the
lawless primitive, bestial, barbarous savages,54 whom Hobbes gives the example of those “in
many places of America”: “But there are many places where they live so now. For the savage
people in many places in America (except the government of small families, the concord where
of dependeth on natural lust) have no government at all, and live at this day in that brutish
manner as I said before.”55 Contemporary anthropologists have criticized Hobbes’s evidence,
but we find no better with Rousseau, who identified the supporting evidence with the
Caribbeans. Throughout the Second Discourse, we can find three places where the Caribbeans
are used as an example to demonstrate the nature of the original man.56 Rousseau’s discourse
is not fundamentally different from that of Hobbes. However, each takes himself to be the
authority on the discourse of the “original man”—which remains imaginary if not purely
fictional.57 Both Hobbes and Rousseau, as Leo Strauss points out, rejected the assumption of
traditional political philosophy that man is by nature a political and social animal and produced
a genesis of right departing from man as an apolitical and asocial animal.58 The state of nature
(status naturalis) is a tabula rasa, yet to be filled with culture (status civilis). Hobbes constructs
a historical transition from nature to culture as the necessity of the commonwealth for these
wolf-like animals, called human beings. Human nature implies a tendency, be that vanity, evil,
or sympathy, and politics manages such a tendency. The anthropological explanation also
becomes here the science of the moral.59 The logical inference from the nature of man to the
nature of the state is very “natural” for Hobbes, since man is dangerous, like a wild animal,
driven by desire and passion; men are therefore always in conflict, whether that be through
rivalry, distrust, or vanity. If such passions are not regulated, it will lead to war, like a cluster of
moving bodies that may collide by chance.

At first glance, one may consider Rousseau’s anthropology in The Discourse on the Origin of
Inequality as being opposed to that of Hobbes, but the truth is that even though they have
different beginnings, they both end with the same need for law and the state; this is also the
same with Montesquieu, who, in the Spirit of the Laws describes how the development of
intelligence led to conflict, thus instigating the need of law for security. Anthropologies of law
thus presuppose a chaotic and conflictual state that demands an impersonal force to
intervene. They have varied ways to describe the function of social institutions as means to
resolve conflicts and construct a community. In contrast to Rousseau’s organic tendency,
Hobbes provides a mechanist solution. Indeed, we might say that in addition to anthropology,
Hobbes’s mechanist philosophy allows him to legitimate the state as an antidote to the state
of nature and avoid the war of all against all. This new morality targets vanity and fear. Vanity
necessitates an acknowledgement of one’s wealth and possessions. Possession, desire, and
vanity are thus related and all can be prolonged indefinitely. One is scared of dying violently, as
when animals fight over their dead prey because every neighbor could be a potential
competitor or the wolf behind your back. Humans are more complicated because they can
anticipate and calculate, and a violent death can be skillfully planned and handled. Vanity is
unjust because it is the shadow of human desire; fear of violent death is just because it is
unjust to cause violent death to anyone; and, most importantly, everyone should have the
liberty to pursue his or her interests and preserve himself or herself, and everyone in this
regard is equal because they all have the same capacity to kill each other, like an “arrant wolf.”
Self-preservation thus underlies and defines rights, hence why Strauss (by way of Dilthey)
argues that Hobbes was greatly influenced by the Stoics:60

Not the naturalistic antithesis of morally indifferent animal appetite (or of morally
indifferent human striving after power) on the one hand, and morally different striving after
self-preservation on the other, but the moral and humanist antithesis of fundamentally unjust
vanity and fundamentally just fear of violent death is the basis of Hobbes’ political
philosophy.61
In the state of nature, namely, in the absence of law, under the condition of self-preservation,
killing another human being is not unjust; as Hobbes writes, “By the right of nature, we
destroy, without being unjust, all that is noxious, including beasts and men.”62 In the state of
nature, there is the right of nature (jus naturale), which is the liberty of each human being to
preserve itself, and the law of nature (lex naturalis), which forbids the human being from doing
that which is destructive to his life or that which may take away its means of preservation. To
preserve oneself, one has to enter into contract with each other—a mutual transference of
rights. However, wars are still unavoidable because either a community or commonwealth is
still absent. Laws, enforced by the commonwealth, function as the mechanical rules that
coordinate the people’s desires and fear. Laws and covenants of the commonwealth are not
merely laws of nature, since the latter are moral laws, words, while the former are swords.63
Here we may want to ask why other animals do not need a government like humans. Aristotle
also named two other political animals, bees and ants. Hobbes in the Leviathan answers this
question. His answer could also be read as the triumph of the mechanical over the biological—
for the biological or the organic is not on the same level of rationality as the mechanical.
Hobbes gave five reasons, which we paraphrase here:

Men are continually in competition for honor and dignity (which ants and bees are not).

Among these creatures (bees and ants) the common good does not differ from private
good.

These creatures, deprived of the same reason that humans have, do not see, nor think
they see, any fault in the administration of their common business, whereas among men there
are very many that think themselves wiser and abler to govern the public than others; and
they strive to reform and innovate, one this way, another that way; and thereby bring society
into distraction and civil war.

These creatures, though they have some use of voice, yet they want that art of words by
which some men can represent to others that which is good in the likeness of evil, and evil in
the likeness of good.

Irrational creatures cannot distinguish between injury and damage, and therefore, as long
as they be at ease, they are not offended with their fellows, whereas man is then most
troublesome, when he is most at ease, for then it is that he loves to show his wisdom and
control the actions of them that govern the commonwealth.

The agreement of these creatures is natural, that of men is by covenant only, which is
artificial; and therefore, it is no wonder if there be somewhat else required (besides covenant)
to make their agreement constant and lasting.64

Later in the Leviathan, we see that point two is not entirely valid because the common good of
the monarchy has to become the good of every subject. If we boil down the other points to
two features that distinguish humans from other political creatures, they are reason (or what
Hobbes refers to as that which makes natural laws conceivable) and artificiality (more
precisely, writing and printing technologies). Of course, this understanding of reason is also a
form of artificiality that could only come into being through other forms of artificiality such as
writing and tools. The leap from the natural state to the artificial state is the formation of
civilization. It also gradually leads to the formation of the modern state from family to clans
and large institutions. However, living as small families does not resolve the problem of
security and the possibility of violent death. Therefore, there is still a tendency that incites
war. The sovereign is the third party that resolves the situation of infinite war. The sovereign
exchanges its protection of the individuals with obedience from its subjects; this interrelation
between protection and obedience is what makes the state a state.65 This is Hobbes’s concept
of the social contract; it is not so much based on the desire of a community but on the
preservation of individual liberty and the suppression of infinite vanity: “Men—the individuals,
not the fathers—at the founding of the artificial state delegate the highest power to a man or
an assembly from mutual fear, the feat of violent death, and fear, in itself compulsive, is
consistent with freedom. . . . In other words, they voluntarily replace compulsive mutual fear
by the again compulsive fear of a neutral third power, the government.”66

The “body politics” that Hobbes proposes is a “unity,” without which the community is
dissolved into a multitude, like the savages in America that he read or imagined. Schmitt’s
reading of Hobbes focuses on Hobbes as both a philosopher of mechanism and philosopher of
sovereignty,67 while Strauss has Hobbes as an anthropologist and a philosopher of liberalism.
This difference, which has its root in their readings of Hobbes, also underlies the difference of
their politics, demonstrable in Strauss’s “Note on the Concept of the Political.”68 Whereas
Schmitt opposes Spinoza and Hobbes by claiming that Spinoza inverted Hobbes69 since the
former imposes liberalism against the domination of the public as was advocated by the latter,
Strauss, on the contrary, shows that Hobbes is the founder of liberalism in an unliberal world
while Schmitt’s use of Hobbes to attack liberalism in a liberal world is dramatic.70 The
anthropological foundation of Hobbes’s morality and the maintenance of such morality
through the mechanistic state is clear. In humanity’s leap from the natural state to the artificial
state, its order is maintained by social contracts and laws, and the monarchy is the best
governing body. This status civilis, or what Strauss calls culture, is primarily mechanism in
Hobbes, which demands a soul to guarantee the balance of the body politics. Both mechanism
and the soul are indispensable for the reading of Schmitt, which we can generalize as machine
and sovereignty in retrospect, not only because technology in the time of Hobbes is
mechanical but also because the history of the state is also a history of the megamachine.

§19. Catholicism and the Logic of Complexio Oppositorum

If, for Schmitt, Hobbes’s theory of the state was the completion of the mechanization of the
anthropological image of man, then what happens to the theory of the state when mechanism
ceased to be the dominant philosophical thought, as occurred already in the eighteenth
century? The rise of Romantic and organismic thinking naturally presented an enormous
challenge to the Hobbesian theory of the state. Schmitt is aware of the criticism from the
Romantics, who regard the state as a plant, an animal, whereas Hobbes’s mechanical state
“began to be perceived as downright grotesque.”71

Schmitt is familiar with the classical opposition between mechanism and organism that began
in the eighteenth century and the importance of Otto von Gierke’s organic state theory that
dates from the second half of the nineteenth century.72 Indeed, for him, it would only be
possible to understand the nineteenth-century German state and constitutional history by
referring to the opposition between organism and mechanism.73 How, then did Schmitt deal
with this oppositional logic? As we have seen, Romantic organicism is caricatured as
“discussion,” and “dictatorship is the opposite of discussion.”74 Schematically, we are tempted
to say that organism is discussion and mechanism is dictatorship. Gemeinschaft is organic, and
Gesellschaft is mechanic, just as one finds in the classical sociological work of Ferdinand
Tönnies. Or is this opposition itself too simplistic? Hobbes and Descartes did not make such a
distinction; otherwise, there would be no mechanist philosophy, and modernity would be
rewritten. Mechanism was not presented as mere analogy or reduction; it was the founding
principle of all existence. For Hobbes and for his time (we also see the use of the term human
machine in Rousseau’s Second Discourse75), machines have “thoroughly mythical meaning.”76
The Leviathan is a mixture of God, man, animal, and machine. It is like a machine endowed
with the soul, but the soul is not situated in the pineal gland but rather in the sovereign power
or the monarch.

Critiques against Schmitt’s concept of the political and the sovereign suffer from the fact that
even though they correctly see Schmitt’s political theory as a justification of dictatorship and a
rejection of liberalism, they undermine the epistemological question present in Schmitt’s
thought. One exception is the work of William Rasch, who identifies in Schmitt’s earlier work
Law and Judgment (Gesetz und Urteil) an antimechanist tendency.77 Schmitt’s 1912 book
addresses the question: When is a legal judgment correct? He considers the practicing judge
who makes judgments based on the subsumption of the particular rules as merely
Subsumtionsmaschine and Gesetzesautomat. Schmitt does not deny the possibility of
subsumption, but he understands that the act of subsumption cannot be simply a
consequence of another subsumption. That is to say, legality (Gesetzmässigkeit) does not
imply legitimacy, and the decision of legitimacy is something other than subsumption. Rasch
identifies subsumption with what Kant calls “determinative judgment” and Schmitt’s
nonsubsumptive approach with Kant’s “reflective judgment.”78 In the previous chapters, we
have already endeavored to show that Kant’s Critique of Judgment grounds the organic
condition of philosophizing. Rasch’s thesis is interesting and demonstrates a sensitivity toward
epistemology; however, this thesis also bypasses Schmitt’s consistent criticism against the
opposition between mechanism and organism, and indeed, it unconsciously, via the reference
to Kant’s Critique of Judgment, places Schmitt on the side of organism, which he would refuse,
as he wrote in The Concept of the Political:
 It may be left open what the state is in its essence—a machine or an organism, a person or
an institution, a society or a community, an enterprise or a beehive, or perhaps even a basic
procedural order. These definitions and images anticipate too much meaning, interpretation,
illustration, and construction, and therefore cannot constitute any appropriate point of
departure for a simple and elementary statement.79

Note that Schmitt was looking for a “simple and elementary statement,” which both
mechanism and organism, with their overloaded historical and philosophical meaning, failed to
elucidate.80 The failure of the symbol in Hobbes’s Leviathan is partly because the strong
connotation with mechanism failed to reveal the true meaning of the Hobbesian theory of the
state. Instead, when mechanism is reproached for its insufficiency as a true epistemology and
when organism stands as a new condition of philosophizing, then Hobbes’s doctrine of the
state appears obsolete, if not “grotesque.” Retrieval of the concept of the political has to
bypass and surpass the opposition between the mechanic and organic. Schmitt wants to
circumscribe this opposition between mechanism and organism in favor of a simple statement:
decisionism. This conflict between mechanism and organism is clearly spelled out in Schmitt’s
earlier essays. For example, in Roman Catholicism and Political Form (1923), we can find
criticisms against the post-Kantian idealists and the Romantics who characterize Catholicism as
either mechanism or organism. In this text, Schmitt expounds on the particular political form
of Catholicism, which he argues is neither mechanism nor organism but rather what he calls
complexio oppositorum, or the complex of opposites. This complexio oppositorum is not a
synthesis that results from an opposition between thesis and antithesis; instead, it is a logic
that contains and nurtures oppositions (one might want to associate it with Nicholas of Cusa’s
coincidentia oppositorum). The complexio Schmitt identifies in Catholicism is the logic that
lasts throughout his work and justifies his “entire intellectual and journalistic existence.”81
How exactly is it different from the organic form? In Roman Catholicism, Schmitt reproaches
the Hegelian and Romantic misinterpretation of the Church:

Out of a spiritual promiscuity which seeks a Romantic or Hegelian brotherhood with

Catholicism, as with so many other ideas and individuals, a person could make the Catholic
complexio into one of many syntheses and rashly conclude that he had thereby construed the
essence of Catholicism. The metaphysician of speculative post-Kantian philosophy conceives
organic and historical life as eternal process of antitheses and synthesis, assigning the
respective role at will.82

For Schmitt, taking the church as either organism or mechanism is a misunderstanding,

consequently undermining the significance of Catholic rationalism. It is not sure if this criticism
of Hegel stays in Schmitt’s latter writing, because there are occasions when the “great Hegel”
is mentioned and whose logic was considered superior to the complexio or coincidentia
oppositorum.83 But in this 1923 text, the Hegelian brotherhood is at least contested. The
constructs of the Hegelian and Romantic brotherhood are “more than fantasies out of the
blue” because they nevertheless correspond to the reality of the modern industrial world,
namely, the opposition between a “rationalistic–mechanistic world of human labour” and a
“romantic–virginal state of nature.” However, according to Schmitt, this dichotomy is “totally
foreign to the Roman Catholic concept of nature.”84 The Catholics are not immigrants, as are
the Protestants. The latter are businesspeople who establish their enterprises everywhere
without necessarily settling down to live. In contrast, the former are agricultural workers with
a different relation or attachment to the soil. Nature for the Catholics is not the antithesis of
spirit, intellect, art, or machine as the moderns see it today.85 The idealists and the Romantics
have diagnosed the crisis of modernity and therefore search for a point of “indifference”
between the two polarities as a synthesis of the opposing antitheses. To Schmitt, such
indifference implies equally a “profound indecision.” In contrast, the Catholic Church, claims
Schmitt, is “categorically something other than the (in any case, always absent) ‘higher third’
of the German philosophy of nature and history.”86 This is because instead of seeking an
indifferent point between the two poles, it embraces all antitheses; it can do so because it is
the absolute realization of authority.87 Michael Marder has a concise summary of this activity:
“Instead of neutralizing the antagonisms it houses, the complex of opposites nurtures and
accentuates them; instead of totalizing or inserting the particulars under the umbrella of a
single concept, it permits them to clash and derives its political energy from this enduring
standoff.”88 The pope, as Schmitt tells us, exemplifies the “most astounding complexio
oppositorum” because the pope is the Vicar of Christ, elected by an aristocracy of cardinals.
But unlike the modern official, he is not impersonal: the pope is the culmination of the most
precise dogmatism and the will to decide.89

The complexio oppositorum is a nondialectical polar logic, but it is also an existential strategy.
It does not resolve contradictions, and it does not allow any self-destruction. Therefore, the
logic of the complexio oppositorum also holds both friend and enemy—the essential political
criteria for Schmitt. The key to the complexio oppositorum is the question of authority, the
authority to hold the contradictions and to decide. The decisions are oriented according to
Catholic rationalism. Economic and technological rationality is not recognizable in it; on the
contrary, they produce a “Catholic anxiety.” Economic and technological rationality is based on
a calculation and mechanization that neutralizes the antagonism by satisfying all kinds of
needs without questioning the rationality and the purpose of technical and economic
activities.90 Commenting on Schmitt’s interpretation of the complexio oppositorum, Marder
suggests that there is a “living form” at play which “internalizes the antinomy of form and
content . . . [that] sheds its identity as pure living, and, thus, paves the way for the vent of
politics.”91 However, it would seem as though Marder’s notion of life to comprehend
Schmitt’s complexio is precisely the organic form that Schmitt criticizes.

The notion of life or living form may appear to be too general here. It is more precisely a
vitalism. Vitalism is a term charged with various meanings in the history of science; here, we
can follow Georges Canguilhem and understand it as a practical attitude, an orientation of
biological thought, and a cautious positivist way of understanding life without reducing it to
mechanism.92 In Schmitt’s case, it is a refusal to reduce legal thought to positivism and politics
to economic calculation and technological manipulation.93 A vitalism is often distinguished
from an organicism, for the latter reproaches the former for relying on mystical forces.
Vitalism, however, does not necessarily have to rely on an unexplainable force. We can
understand Marder’s characterization because in “The Age of Neutralizations and
Depolitizations (1929)” we find again a criticism of the antithesis between the organic and the
mechanic without this time referring to Catholicism and Hegel, but to the “romantic lament”:

The comfortable antithesis of the organic and the mechanistic is itself something crudely
mechanistic. A grouping which sees on the one side only spirit and life and on the other only
death and mechanism signifies nothing more than a renunciation of the struggle and amounts
to nothing more than a romantic lament. For life struggles not with death, spirit not with
spiritlessness; spirit struggles with spirit, life with life, and out of the power of an integral
understanding of this arises the order of human things. Ab integro nascitur ordo.94

Schmitt notes here that the antithesis between machine and organism is “comfortable.”
Comfortable suggests that it is too easy to choose sides. Schmitt strives to break away from
binary logic, such as life against death or spirit versus spiritlessness. However, Schmitt’s
tautological logic, life over life and spirit with spirit, is closer to the organic than the mechanic
because he emphasizes the whole (integro): Ab integro nascitur ordo (Order is born from the
whole). The notion of the whole is central to the teachings of organicism and holism. This
reference to the whole does not mean that he is now on the side of the Hegelians or the
Romantics; instead, it constitutes only one component of his vitalism. Schmitt’s vitalism
suspends any dialectical movement, refusing synthesis; on the contrary, it contains and
nurtures contradictions, that is, until the moment (e.g., the real possibility of war) arrives
where it has to look at its situation and decide who are friend and enemy.95 It is clearer now
that Schmitt’s state is not the lifeless mechanical state in the sense we understand it today,
but rather mythical as per Hobbes’s conception. The interpretation of Catholicism (1923) and
the interpretation of Hobbes (1938) are not without relations; instead, they show the
continuity and consistency of Schmitt’s thinking. Both allow Schmitt to abandon the reference
to the organic and conceptually overcome the opposition between mechanism and organism
in favor of decisionism. Decisionism is a political vitalism in its essence, neither based on the
strict implementation of laws as in the mechanical machine, in which when one part is broken,
the whole machine collapses, nor based on an organic image, in which everyone must
participate and a decision is always at risk of being postponed, i.e., a “metaphysics of
indecision.”96 This rediscovery in Hobbes’s doctrine of the state is the notion of the
sovereign—a God, a fictitious persona, a soul in the machine, which can break the mechanical
and the organic image of the state.
The impulse to move beyond mechanism is fundamental to Schmitt’s critique of the formalism
of positive law and the neutralization of politics. State administration is the most fundamental
part for Schmitt, according to whom “the starting point of all state activity is
administration.”97 However, modern state administration functions as a machine and has
been increasingly replaced by machines. This is increasingly the case in our time, with the
digitalization of administrative processes—for example, when artificial intelligence is used in
the place of judges to deal with the so-called logical cases.98 This neutralization is, at the same
time, a depoliticization, and it has to be interrupted and vitalized; otherwise, it remains
lifeless. However, one must not misunderstand that Schmitt is criticizing technology in general
as neutralization, because no one can deny that machines have become the central political
question of today. It is often remarked that Schmitt made a distinction between Technik and
Technizität, the former being “dead” and the latter being spiritual (geistig) and “alive,”
resembling or at least resonating with Heidegger’s analysis of the essence of modern
technology as enframing or Gestell. Heidegger, in The Question Concerning Technology
(1949/1953), claims that the essence of modern technology is nothing technical. This claim is
comparable to when Schmitt (albeit twenty years earlier than Heidegger) asserts that the spirit
of technology is “not itself technical and mechanical”:99

The spirit of technicity that has led to the mass belief of an antireligious this-worldly
activism, is nevertheless spirit, perhaps a more evil and demonic spirit, but not to be dismissed
as mechanistic and not to be attributed to technology as such. It is perhaps something
terrifying, but is not itself technical or machinelike. It is the belief of an activist metaphysics,
the belief in a limitless power and domination of man over nature, even over human
nature.100

Technology is not regarded as purely mechanical and machinic but rather as an active
metaphysical force that is more harmful than the dead mechanical parts moving alone on the
planet’s surface. It is a metaphysical force, which, having become autonomous, seizes the total
control of the planet Earth and beyond. Heidegger’s Gestell means that every being could be
treated and mobilized as a resource. In contrast to Prometheanism, symbolizing progress,
Schmitt calls himself a Christian Epimetheus.101 Unlike Prometheus, the Titan of foresight,
Epimetheus means hindsight, who knows only once the mistake is committed. For example, he
forgets to give skills to the human, opens Pandora’s box, and so on. Epimetheus is he who
withholds, like the Katechon.102

Schmitt’s resonance with Heidegger’s analysis is not superficial. If, in the early twentieth
century, the call for organicism, which we find in thinkers such as Alfred North Whitehead and
Lewis Mumford, was intended as resistance against mechanism qua industrialism, then this
organicism no longer poses itself as a solution for both Heidegger and Schmitt. Heidegger
views organism and the opposition between organism and mechanism as a product of
modernity. He clearly stated it in the Black Notebooks written during the 1930s: “It might very
well still take a considerable time to recognize that the ‘organism’ and the ‘organic’ present
themselves as the mechanistic-technological ‘triumph’ of modernity over the domain of
growth, ‘nature.’”103 Even once technology begins to increasingly resemble organic beings (as
Simondon rightly pointed out in his 1958 On the Mode of Existence of Technical Objects
concerning his interpretation of cybernetics, which we have also discussed in chapter 3), this
will not resolve the devastation caused by industrialism; it might well only found the basis of a
different form of domination, though one that might perhaps give the appearance of being
less threatening. The organic as an antidote to mechanization was considered a
communitarian political model. Max Weber, once Schmitt’s mentor, already refused the
biological metaphor of the state by saying that “All analogies with the ‘organism’ and similar
biological concepts are doomed to remain sterile.”104 Today we may see that the organic
critique of the mechanical is already surpassed by cybernetics, not the least that all machines
are in the process of becoming “organic.”

Schmitt was aware of cybernetics; indeed, a copy of Wiener’s cybernetics could be found in his
library’s stock list.105 However, Schmitt made no explicit comment on cybernetics as
Heidegger did. It is difficult to say whether he perceived the mechanism in the organism, but
he does see the binary logic between mechanism and organism as nothing more than
mechanical. Formalism, both in the form of liberal democracy and parliamentary democracy, is
highly inefficient in addressing political urgencies; often, the solution endorsed by the majority
may not appear to be the best political decision. The separation between judicial, executive,
and legislative power and the mechanization of each part only leads to the indecisiveness of
the state. It therefore renders the state vulnerable in the time of crisis. Schmitt’s reproach
against Hobbes for his attempt to absorb private freedom into the state follows a similar logic:
“[Hobbes underscores] the importance of absorbing this right of private freedom of thought
and belief into the political system. This contained the seed of death that destroyed the mighty
leviathan from within and brought about the end of the mortal god.”106 Hobbes’s
liberalism107 destroys the Leviathan from within since it spreads the seeds of destruction—
privately held belief is separated from, and therefore resists against, the public confession of
faith submitted to the sovereign’s authority.108 This symptom of modern democracy in its
popular or parliamentarian form contributes to the ineffectiveness and indecision of the state.
Strauss criticized Schmitt’s presupposition of liberalism as homogeneity because “The
heterogeneity of . . . interests is as crucial as a certain kind of homogeneity.”109 However, it is
unlikely that Schmitt would make such a foolish assumption; his attack against liberalism
targets both its homogeneity and its incapability to overcome civil war. Its mechanical
formalism (in terms of procedure) and organic aspiration (in terms of consensus) render a
concrete decision impossible. Schmitt finds brotherhood with Bodin and Hobbes here, both
thinkers of the concept of the sovereign as a response and solution to civil wars they
experienced; but it might be the case, as Koselleck diagnosed, that for Hobbes, who
experienced history as the history of civil war, sacrificed reason to political morality without
realizing that reason has a “gravitation of its own.”110 Given the triumph of Hitler, Schmitt
claims, “In the one-party state of National Socialist Germany, the danger of a pluralistic
dismemberment of Germany . . . has been vanquished.”111
A dynamic that goes beyond mechanism and organism is required as a new model of
politicization, or more precisely, vitalization. The question of the soul, here presented as
sovereignty, distinguishes Schmitt’s Hobbesian state from the later technocratic state, which
for him, is a form of neutralization and depoliticization. What Schmitt means by neutralization
and depoliticization is the move from the conflictual status to a neutral zone where the
political defined by the friend-foe distinction disappears. The neutral zone is historical in that
in different historical epochs different central scientific domains are established to resolve
problems that do not belong to that domain.112 In the article “The Age of Neutralization and
Depoliticizations,” Schmitt outlines different central domains of neutralization that were
established during different periods throughout Western history, these being theology in the
sixteenth century, metaphysics in the seventeenth century, moralism and humanitarianism in
the eighteenth century, economics in the nineteenth century and technology in the twentieth
century. Schmitt’s reading of Hobbes should be also contextualized according to both history
of thought and the history of technology. The domination of mechanist philosophy in Hobbes’s
time was accompanied by the triumph of mechanism: maritime power superseded land
power; in other words, the Leviathan dominated the Behemoth. Indeed, it was maritime
technology that allowed Britain to develop its marine power and conquer the world, as is
clearly shown in Schmitt’s Land and Sea, but even more explicitly said in his Dialogues on
Power and Space:

Already the modern, thoroughly well-organised, European state of the sixteenth and
seventeenth centuries was a technological and artistic product, a Super-Human [Über-Mensch]
created by humans out of humans set together with one another, which in the image of the
Leviathan as the large human, the μάκρος ἅνθρωπος, and the little humans producing it, the
isolated individual, the μίκρος ἅνθρωπος, confronted with a Super-Power [Über-Macht]. In this
sense the well-functioning European state of early modern period was the first modern
machine and simultaneously the concrete presupposition of all further technological machines.
It was the machine of machines, the machina machinarum, a Super-Human [Über-Mensch]
compiled of humans gathered together, which comes into existence via human consensus and
yet, in the moment that it is present, exceeds all human consensus. It is precisely because this
issue concerns a power organised by humans that Burckhardt feels that this power is evil in
itself.113

This could be understood as one of the significances of Schmitt’s reading of Hobbes, for
Hobbes’s contribution is not only metaphysical, according to Schmitt, but rather his image of
the state corresponds to the technological development of his time. The European state at this
time was a “technological and artistic product,” the machine of machines or a vital machine.
The Hobbesian state is, therefore, the first modern megamachine. Maybe we can also read
Schmitt’s vitalism as an attempt to take advantage of the Technizität that he described as a
metaphysical force; the soul is that which can actively direct the metaphysical force of
machines and gives it life through politics. Technology in Hobbes’s time was not the central
domain if we follow Schmitt’s periodization here. Instead, metaphysics functioned as the
central domain or the neutral zone for resolving conflict. However, what truly became
politicized was the subsequent technological development, which converted the state into a
machine while equipping it with the mechanical power and warships necessary for
appropriating territories. Metaphysics always forgets the question of technology because
technology seems to appear as only one instance of the metaphysical idea or a mere question
of logic. The Leviathan is neither a natural state nor a metaphysical state, but an artificial state,
as Leo Strauss also emphasized; the former is characterized by fear and monarchy, the latter
by hope and democracy.114 The mechanical state is animated by the soul, the sovereign,
symbolized by a person or an assembly:

Men—the individuals, not the fathers—at the founding of the artificial state delegate the
highest power to a man or an assembly from mutual fear, the fear of violent death, and fear, in
itself compulsive, is consistent with freedom. . . . In other words, they voluntarily replace
compulsive mutual fear by the again compulsive fear of a neutral third power, the
government.115

The sovereign is the soul that dwells in the mechanical body of the state. The soul is the
authority: Autoritas non veritas facit legem (Authority, not truth, makes law). The soul is that
which can determine the body instead of being that which is imprisoned by the body. The
mechanization of the state, though it completed the Cartesian project, also led to the
possibility of the neutralization of politics in the twentieth century, when mechanism, the
symbol of order and progress, is generalized as a technical state-administrative
(staatsverwaltungstechnische) rationalization.116 Schmitt hinted at a temporal gap between
the epoch when mechanism was a philosophy and when mechanism was realized in material
terms and pervaded the world through industrialization and colonization. The occidental
rationalism Schmitt criticized thus belongs to the development of the industrial society.117
However, in the same article, we are told that technology as neutralization is only something
transitory, temporary. It was only a “religious belief in technology,” and such belief is an effect
of the shift of the neutral zone from economy to technology.118 In reality, we have not yet
really understood the question of technology. Furthermore, technology in the twentieth
century is no longer neutral, but rather “every strong politics will make use of it . . . the present
century can only be understood provisionally as the century of technology.”119 This remark of
Schmitt’s brings Hobbes’s word “mechanization” to a concrete historical situation, which
Hobbes himself did not anticipate. The state ceases to be an imaginary megamachine of
mechanics, but it is a machine realized before us. If Schmitt could say that the twentieth
century was the century of technology, this is even more true in the twenty-first century: 5G,
microchips, and AI are no longer neutral, as we read in the newspaper every day.

However, such a techno-utopian dream of better governing states through full automation
(with artificial intelligence, big data, and machine learning) will not be endorsed by Schmitt.
This is because, in the case of full automation, the state would already be dead. This appears
as a paradox because it may lead to two consequences. First, it may lead to a neutralization in
Schmitt’s sense, that all decisions will be based on facts and formal procedures (as in legal
positivism). Second, the battlefield will become the competition of realizing a technological
singularity, as Putin said in 2017 to the Russian schoolchildren, “Whoever leads in AI will
dominate the world.”120 Indeed, such technological competition will lead to a total
domination of one state over the rest, a techno-imperialism. The competition for techno-
imperialism means the empowerment of the metaphysical force that nurtures modern
technology and its capacity to bring about more catastrophes. Therefore, technology serves
both as a neutral zone and a battlefield.

§20. The Death of Hegel and the Triumph of Political Vitalism

Considering the discussions in the previous chapters, it is possible to conclude that the debate
between mechanism and organism no longer determines the state’s imagination. This does not
mean that Schmitt provides us with a satisfactory solution, though he saw the limit of such an
opposition and the need for a different political epistemology. Retrospectively, Mumford’s
“New Organum”—the antimechanistic imagination—must be put in question, not to discredit
him but to think together with and beyond him. The mechanical and the organic were
presented as two ideals of political governance, two forms of automatization par excellence.
But all forms of automation tend to neutralize the sovereign power and depoliticize it into
routine machinic operations. This lies at the center of Schmitt’s decisionism, for “the decision
alone is capable of bridging the gap between the abstractness of law and the fullness of
life.”121 And for decisionism to function, it will need the absoluteness of the sovereign, which
is constantly conscious of its vulnerability. Both vulnerability and immunity repose on the
ontological categories of friend and enemy, but more significantly, in terms of political
theology, an identification of the satanic force and the katechon. Enemies signal
vulnerabilities, and friends reinforce the capacity for war and immunity against external
attacks. Therefore, the question of the state as mechanism or organism is left open insofar as
the sovereign decides. The sovereign decides internally by suspending any legal norm and
invoking the state of emergency or externally by waging war against another state. Schmitt’s
political vitalism is, therefore, also an existentialism:122 “The exception is more interesting
than the rule . . . The rule proves nothing, the exception proves everything: It confirms not only
the rule but also its existence, which derives only from the exception. In the exception the
power of real life breaks through the crust of a mechanism that has become torpid by
repetition.”123 A political vitalism was, for Schmitt, a way out of the two paradigms that
characterize modern European philosophy. Schmitt’s real politics is, first of all, geopolitics that
sees the state as the final realization of Western philosophy, as Hegel did. Therefore, Schmitt is
not in tension or disagreement with Hegel on what concerns the role of the state in the history
of the spirit but rather on the ideality of the organic unity of the state. The state is only an
incarnated form of the political in history.
The figure of the sovereign in Hegel remains symbolic because Hegel aims for the organic unity
(unlike Louis XIV, who said “L’état c’est moi,” Frederick the Great said that the prince is the
first servant of the state),124 but in Schmitt, it is realized as the soul in the machine. The state
of exception is the soul’s vitality because the soul can suspend rules, namely deciding the state
of emergency. Even if certain courts declare exceptions regularly, unlike sovereignty, it does
not reveal itself as an absolute or unconditional power.125 This is also probably why the
opening line of “The Concept of the Political” starts with the claim that “the concept of the
state presupposes the concept of the political.”126 This may remind us of Sartre’s infamous
statement, “Existence precedes essence.”127 The political is grounded in decisions and
exceptions. Decisionism is the dynamic of the sovereign as the soul of a living being, as Schmitt
writes in “Reich, Staat, Bund” (1933) that “politics means intensive life [intensives Leben].”128
This intensity is opposed to homogeneity in the same way Hans Kelsen describes
democracy.129 In this sense, Schmitt is on the side of the Hobbesian mechanism. Ironically,
Schmitt’s doctrine of the state is also a vitalism, and Schmitt is a political vitalist. Maybe this is
how we should interpret what Schmitt, in Staat, Bewegung, Volk, claims: that on the day Hitler
seized power, “Hegel died.”130

The relation between the death of Hegel and Hitler’s seizing of power contains several
meanings. First, if we follow Schmitt’s statement closely, then it was only on January 30, 1933,
with the appointment of Hitler as chancellor, that “the Hegelian state of civil servants of the
nineteenth century, characterized by the identity of the civil service and the stratum in charge
of the State, was replaced by another State construction.”131 This new state construction
allows the Reich to recover a political leadership, namely, the capacity to identify and
annihilate its enemy, communism. Let us remind ourselves that the election on July 31, 1932,
put the National Socialist Party (37.3%) and the German Communist Party (14.4%) as the
majority of the Reichstag.132 In this sense, we can understand why only on this day “Hegel
died.” Second, Schmitt also finds the germ of the Reich in Hegel’s state theory, which is not a
“neutral concept of the state” but that of the “political-historical concrete Prussian state of the
first half of the nineteenth century.”133 That is to say, January 30 is, in fact, the culmination of
Hegel’s state theory instead of a judgment on its failure; Schmitt’s comment on the death of
Hegel is, in this sense, not a farewell, a Grabrede, but rather a comment that marks the
completion and continuation of Hegel’s state theory, as Schmitt himself admitted.134 Last, we
could also interpret it as the end of the organismic ideal of the state and the triumph of a
political vitalism that led to the emergence of fascist states and total war. The political unity
(politische Einheit) of the state is still based on the constitution; however, it is no longer an
organicity of the state as Hegel aspired to as the desirable model; the organicity of the state
stands opposed to the mechanical operation of the civil service that Schmitt discredited,
because instead of blindly applying norms, reason “itself requires us to recognize that
contingency, contradiction, and semblance have a sphere and a right of their own”;135 law, as
Hegel argues, only indicates the maximum and minimum to the judge, but it does not
determine the case a priori. Schmitt not only sought his alliance with Hegel,136 but rather he
completed Hegel, as he thought that Hobbes had done after Descartes. The state as a persona
is no longer a mechanical being but rather that which has the vitality (or, more precisely, in
Schmitt’s own words, “intensity”) to render the heterogenous political opinions ineffective and
to decide on exceptions.137

The ontological categories of friend and enemy are the condition of the political vitality of the
state. Without danger, the state will sink into oblivion and depoliticize itself as an
administrative machine. The struggle between the spirit with spirit, life with life, is the self-
assertion of the state as a vital being. This vital being does not lie so much in the democratic
form of society but rather in the capacity of the sovereign to act in response to an emergency.
Schmitt opened a new path that moves away from mechanism and organism, and his
fundamental move is a return to vitalism. We say “return” here because, during this time
(when writing his book on Hobbes), biologists were trying to undermine vitalism, which relies
on a mystic force (be that Bergson’s élan vital or Driesch’s entelechy) to explain life, and to
overcome the historical opposition between vitalism and mechanism by providing a third path:
organicism. In this sense, Schmitt takes a rather different turn by taking recourse to political
vitalism. It remains circular to ask if this political vitalism is the source of the political or if the
political is the source of such a political vitalism.

This political vitalism is present in dictators and “partisans.” In his later writing, Theory of the
Partisan (1963), which bears the subtitle Intermediate Commentary on the Concept of the
Political, a sequel to his 1929 essay, Schmitt granted a historical role to the partisans. Partisans
are characterized by their irregularity in contrast to the regularity of state armies, but also by
their increasing mobility of combat and increasing intensity of political engagement.138 The
partisan, exemplified in General Salan’s example, is beyond legality or illegality. The partisan
instead seeks legitimacy, which is higher than legality. In the case of revolution or resistance,
legitimacy is identified with the nation instead of the state. In other words, the partisan as a
historical figure, like the dictator, is a commander of the state of exception. The partisan is
political, whereas a figure such as Michael Kohlhaas, who administers personal justice to
robbers and murderers, is not partisan since he is not politically motivated and “did not fight
against a foreign invader or for a revolutionary cause, but rather for his offended private
right.”139 The partisan is political precisely because he identifies a real enemy, and war would
not exist without an enemy. The negativity of the enemy, and its death-threatening presence,
like the master to the slave, is fundamental to the war of survival. The key question now is how
to identify the enemy. In this reading, the biopolitical foundation of the Homo sacer qua the
most elementary form of exception, namely, that neither belongs to zoe or bio, shares the
same logic as the partisan, though the former is passive and the latter active. The partisan
transcends the categories of legality and illegality, such as the state transcends the opposition
between mechanism and organism. The partisan is, in this way, the one who risks their own
life because they will have to fight, but also the one whom the binary logic of legality could not
contain: “The partisan has an enemy and risks something completely different from blockade
runners and contraband leaders. He risks not only his life, as does every regular combatant; he
knows and accepts that he is an enemy outside of right, law, and honor.”140 Schmitt traces
the theory of the partisan to the early nineteenth-century Prussian state but focuses more on
twentieth-century Spain, Algeria, China, and Vietnam. In Schmitt’s reading of Clausewitz’s
analysis of irregular warfare, he describes Clausewitz as having unleased “a new, formerly
unrecognized figure of the world-spirit [Figur des Weltgeistes].”141 On this question, Schmitt
showed his respect to Mao Zedong, the most sophisticated and radical theorist of guerrilla
warfare and the most accomplished practitioner.142 Mao’s victory over the Japanese invader,
the national opponent (the Kuomintang), and the colonial West define a new nomos:

The question is only whether enmity can be bracketed and regulated, i.e., whether it is
relative or absolute. That can be decided only by the belligerents at their own risk. For Mao,
who thinks as a partisan, peace today is only a manifestation of real enmity. Enmity also does
not cease in so-called Cold War, which is not half war and half peace, but rather a situation of
enmity with other than open violent means.143

We could follow Clausewitz by saying peace is the continuation of war by other means. The
state and the partisan confront the same question, namely, its existence in relation to
technology.144 Could the partisan sustain itself “in the age of atomic weapons of mass
destruction?” The Cold War was maintained largely by threat of atomic bombs, meaning total
annihilation. Technology ceased to be a neutral zone; on the contrary, technology became the
means of politicization. We might say that Schmitt was tempted to read political philosophy
according to the history of technology. In this case, the political vitalism Schmitt outlines is
inseparable from technology since technology allows life to struggle with life. The nomos of
the Earth, defined in the Jus Publicum Europaeum, is inseparable from technology since it is
the laws of space appropriation and division that could not do without technological
advancement. Thus, the progressive appropriation of the three spatial elements, land, sea, and
air, is determined by improving marine technology and, later, air technology. In the same
book, we find a footnote: “I would like to develop fully and hermeneutically sections 247–48 of
Hegel’s Philosophy of Right as a historico-intellectual nucleus [geistesgeschichtliche Keimzelle]
for understanding the contemporary techno-industrial world, just as the Marxist interpretation
developed the preceding sections 243–46 for an understanding of bourgeois society.”145

As a reminder, in the Outlines of the Philosophy of Right, §247 discusses the emergence of sea
power in modern industrial society; §278 discusses the distinction between the sporadic and
systematic mode of colonization. Schmitt not only further elaborated on Hegel’s discussion on
sea power but also extended beyond sea power to the concern of air power. Today, we know
that the nomos extends beyond the earth toward outer space, as Schmitt had already
anticipated, where “these immeasurable spaces also become potential battlefields.”146
However, he was not able to anticipate the emergence of cyberspace. As Peter Thiel has
pointed out, after the three spatial elements of land, sea, and air, the future appropriation of
space will be outer space, the deep ocean, and cyberspace.147 New technologies will
challenge the sovereign and enforce it to respond to the ambiguities and hiatus made visible
by technological changes. It is the same with the partisan, who might disappear in the
technological world by being dissolved into technological apparatus and platforms (a
consequence of technological neutralization). In reaction to these changes, the state of
exception could become a regularity, similar to what Agamben has been warning. The state
becomes a vital megamachine, vital in that it has to actively interrupt its own routine and
suspend its protocols to preserve itself recursively. Simultaneously, we can expect that, a new
nomos of the Earth will emerge in the planetary condition driven by the exigency of “real
politics.”
5

Nomos of the Digital Earth

“O my friends, there is no friend.” . . . If there is “no friend,” then how could I call you my
friends, my friends? By what right? How could you take me seriously? If I call you my friends,
my friends, if I tell you, my friends, how dare I add, to you, that there is no friend?

—Jacques Derrida, The Politics of Friendship

Technology is no longer neutral ground in the sense of the process of neutralization; every
strong politics will make use of it. For this reason, the present century can only be understood
provisionally as the century of technology. How ultimately it should be understood will be
revealed only when it is known which type of politics is strong enough to master the new
technology and which type of genuine friend-enemy groupings can develop on this new
ground.

—Carl Schmitt, The Age of Neutralizations

To inquire into the nomos of the digital Earth, we will have to revisit the foundational question
of sovereignty. Without this, there is a risk of persistently applying Hegel and Schmitt’s state
theory. In the last chapter, we tried to read Schmitt’s treatise on Hobbes as an attempt to go
beyond the opposition between mechanism and organism, and unveil the epistemological
foundation of his political thought. Schmitt’s vitalism consists of the Complexio Oppositorum
withholding opposition and the decision that suspends all norms to respond to a political crisis,
whether civil war or foreign invasion. The sovereign is the power that decides on exceptions.
This, on the one hand, opens a path toward dictatorship and justifies the state of exception as
the very condition of survival; on the other hand, it also answers the metaphysical problem
concerning the origin of sovereignty or the law itself, a problem that we can identify in the
debate between scholars of positive law and natural law. In this chapter, we will first revisit
the problem of contingency of the foundation of law and how Schmitt’s vitalism conceptually
resolves this problem; second, we will examine Schmitt’s proposal of the Großraum as a new
political form, and a successor to Hegel’s political state. With the advancement of space
technology and digital technology, one could, following Schmitt, envision a new political form
emerging in response to the spatial revolutions. Yet, does contemplation on such a large scale
truly lead us to genuine planetary thinking? The deconstruction to be carried out here is not an
attempt to either discredit or endorse Schmitt’s thought, but rather it paves the way to
reformulate Schmitt’s analysis of the relation between sovereignty and technology, and to
expose its limits in light of the digital earth.

§21. First Deconstruction on the Contingency of Sovereignty

Earlier, we saw how the natural law tradition was challenged. For example, in the case of
Hobbes and Rousseau, natural rights presented as ontological truths in the definition of the
human were seen as derivatives of a fictional human, one that lives in the imagination of its
authors. The imaginary state of nature finally leads to another fictional figure, the sovereign,
which in Hobbes exchanges protection with its subjects for obedience and in Rousseau leads to
the general will, which is presupposed in all forms of communal existence. For Rousseau, the
sovereign is not the same as the general will; rather, the sovereign is the power controlled by
the general will. The “general will” does not mean the majority but rather the “common
interest that unites” the people,1 or sensus communis in the Kantian sense. Natural law under
the siege of historicism2 and Neo-Kantianism is discredited as ahistorical rationalism that does
violence to empirical reality.3 Does this mean the triumph of positive law, that man makes
laws out of practical grounds, and positive rights have no ontological foundation? While this
may sound paradoxical, it is precisely because the authority of positive law is exposed to
constant doubt that we see the quest for the natural law as appeals to “that which is good
intrinsically, to that which is good by nature.”4 We see a circular argument, insofar as because
the ontological qua anthropological in natural law is questioned, one then seeks in positive
laws the answer to the political and social life of human beings; however, since the foundation
of positive law is an authority that does not have ontological truth, one returns to natural law
to find a solid foundation from which all laws should be derived.

For Leo Strauss, this unresolvable problem stands as the crisis of modernity—the introduction
of historicism and positivism have challenged the natural law tradition he traces from Socrates
to Edmund Burke. In his Natural Right and History, Strauss argued against historicism,
positivism, and conventionalism to show that they all risk becoming nihilism since they reject
human access to ontological truths, especially history. Strauss targeted Max Weber to show
that Weber is self-contradictory because he does not want a sociology loaded with value but
one that sticks to facts. However, if sociology aims at a causal explanation of a social
phenomenon, it should “see it as what it is.”5 Weber wants to see things from facts, a
positivist epistemology, but he does not prioritize the ontological question. Strauss, on the
contrary, believes in the philosophical tradition, which claims that the ontological is accessible
to the human, and it is also the ontological that gives humans the legitimacy and power to
revolt against ancestral authorities. However, the argument becomes circular again; the
ancestors could also claim they know the ontological! Plato is portrayed as a premodern
thinker of natural right; insofar as Plato’s Republic is perfect, it is based on natural right; it is
“the city according to nature.”6 But did not Plato, in the words of Socrates in Book III of
Republic, suggest multiple techniques for censoring Homer’s poetry and “brainwashing” the
selected children who have the potential to become guardians of the city? Strauss’s criticism
against historicism and positivism does not effectively resolve the objection that natural right
is also historical, and indeed his recourse to Hobbes and Rousseau only shows that human
nature is merely imaginary. The search for the foundation of law is also a quest for
sovereignty. The questions then arise: What exactly is sovereignty? Where and who exactly is
the sovereign? Is the sovereign the king or the people? Or maybe it is none of them? Political
theorist Jens Bartelson in his Genealogy of Sovereignty suggests that sovereignty is, in fact,
contingent: “To say that sovereignty is contingent is to say that it is not necessary or essential,
but that its central and ambiguous place in modern political discourse is the outcome of prior
accidents.”7

We often associate the term sovereignty with the Westphalian treatise; however, as Nicholas
Onuf has noted, the word only appears six times in the treaties of Münster and Onasbrück, and
the adjective sovereign, four times. And indeed, the term was already defined and discussed
earlier by Bodin in 1576,8 the father of sovereignty. While Bodin is famous for arguing that
sovereignty has to be unitary, the so-called Westphalian state arising from the Treaty of
Westphalia is the idea that the state has a monopoly over its territory and the exclusive right
to declare war.9 In this sense, we can understand the contingency of the concept of
sovereignty since it emerged historically and was only theorized much later. The other
meaning of the contingency of sovereignty is more philosophical, namely, that it is not
necessary but was rendered necessary due to the demand for a power that maintains the
consistency of political life, such as in Hobbes’s Leviathan, where the sovereign is demanded to
exchange protection with the people for the latter’s obedience. The sovereign is, in this sense,
mythical, as Schmitt claims. In the previous chapter, we presupposed the existence of the
sovereign as a persona moralis, which we compared with the soul in the machine, an image we
find in Schmitt’s reading of Hobbes, who, in turn, also characterizes the sovereign as a fictional
person. We know there is no soul in the machine, there is no individual behind the curtain of
sovereignty. Suppose one tries to open the curtain; one would be highly disappointed to find
precisely nothing behind it. Schmitt calls sovereignty a borderline concept (Grenzbegriff), one
pertaining to the outermost sphere (die äusserste Sphäre).10 William Rasch suggests
translating it as boundary concept in the sense of Kant.11 Rasch’s formulation is more
stimulating because what Kant means by the boundary concept is one that cannot be known
but exerts on the knowable as a limit. In this sense, the boundary concept is first of all a
negative concept. For example, the noumenon is a boundary concept because it constitutes
the realm that sensible intuition cannot reach. Sensible intuition is limited to the realm of the
phenomenon, which is the object of scientific knowledge. The thing-in-itself, which was a
synonym for the noumenon in the A Edition of the Critique of Pure Reason, is that which lies
behind the phenomenon: “Appearances, insofar as they are thought as objects according to
the unity of the categories, are called phenomenon. But if I assumed things that are objects
merely of the understanding and that, as such, can nonetheless be given to an intuition—even
if not to sensible intuition (but hence coram intuitu intellectuali)—then such things would be
called noumena (intelligibilia).”12
As we know, the noumenon only ceases to be a negative concept if intellectual intuition is
affirmed; since humans do not possess the capacity for intellectual intuition, such a boundary
concept both constrains and establishes the foundation for knowledge.13 The same could also
be said about the inexponible representation of the imagination (e.g., the beautiful) and the
indemonstrable concept of reason (e.g., freedom).14 For example, the concept of freedom is
demanded from a practical aim, without which morality would be inconceivable. Here we
encounter a paradox: the sovereign is supposed to be the foundation of law, but it is almost
impossible to identify what it is. It is a phantom. Laws are often compared to geometry, for
example, in Grotius and Hobbes, the law carries a strong geometrical spirit; the former claims
that “just as mathematicians treat geometrical figures as abstracted from material objects, so I
have conceived of law in the absence of all particular circumstances,” and the latter states that
geometry was the “only science that it hath hitherto pleased God to bestow on mankind.”15 In
light of this comparison, one might question how geometry addresses this issue and whether it
could offer insights into the phantom. We may want to refer to a relevant discussion in David
Hume’s Treatise of Human Nature, where the Scottish philosopher clearly distinguished
between definition and demonstration concerning geometry. Hume’s incentive was to refuse
the mathematical objection against the indivisibility of extension. If one defines a surface “to
be length and breadth without depth, a line to be length without breadth or depth and point
to be what has neither length, breadth nor depth,” and there is no corresponding
demonstration, does it imply that they don’t exist at all? One of the objections that Hume
wanted to refute runs like the following, and although Hume found it unsatisfactory, it is very
relevant to our discussion here:

The objects of geometry, those surfaces, lines and points, whose proportions and positions it
examines, are mere ideas in the mind; and not only never did, but never can exist in nature.
They never did exist; for no one will pretend to draw a line or make a surface entirely
conformable to the definition: They never can exist; for we may produce demonstrations from
these very ideas to prove, that they are impossible.16

Hume finds this objection unsatisfactory and contradictory because every idea must have its
correspondence in existence; the mathematician who claims that a point does not exist
already has the idea of a point in his mind. If he already has an idea of the point and that which
implies the existence of a point, the objection that a point does not exist is not valid. Before
we move on, we will have to clarify several concepts. Definition, existence, and demonstration
are not the same, for such definitions in geometry refer to the existence of idealities, which
may not be demonstratable in a phenomenal world; however, it doesn’t, as such, imply that
they do not exist, as without assuming their existence, no geometrical demonstration is
possible. We can understand this by referring to the example of a point. Thus, a point has no
dimension; when we imagine a point in front of us, it is no longer a point, but already a
surface. These points “. . .” I am typing and you are reading are not points, but surfaces.17 The
ideality of a point cannot be perceived as an existence like a glass of water, but this does not
mean that it does not exist; it only means that it cannot be demonstrated as what it is.
However, for ideality to be possible, idealization is necessary. This idealization is also
externalization, meaning projecting the point as a figure on paper. Here, we encounter the first
deconstruction: though ideality cannot be demonstrated, it can nonetheless be grasped
through diagrammatical technical supplements—for example, drawing and writing.
Commenting on a similar paradox (though without referring to Hume but rather to Plato and
Husserl), Bernard Stiegler convincingly clarifies the logical cycle between definition, existence,
and demonstration:

It is however required to figure the point in order to conceptualise it as a mathematical

ideality, it is required to intuitively project it to project reasonings, and it is also in this sense
that externalising is necessary to the figure: this figure is an image that allows the projection of
what Kant calls a schema, what allows the unification of the understanding and intuition. The
thought of space as this a priori form supposes this capacity of projection that represents the
figure. What is crucial for us is to note that this projection is an externalisation: it allows a
projection for intuition, but more importantly it constitutes a retentional space. This space is a
medium of memory that supports progressively the reasoning of the temporal flow (what
reason is when it thinks).18

In this statement, Stiegler refers to the transcendental condition of schematization in Kant’s

Critique of Pure Reason and deconstructs it by showing that transcendental apprehension
depends on the technological supplement. If it is true that even geometry cannot demonstrate
its foundation (line, point, and surface as defined in Euclidean geometry), then we may ask if it
is also the case in law. If point, line, and surface, albeit their indemonstrability, are the
foundation of geometry, the sovereign or any other juridical concept may occupy a similar
position in law. In this sense, that authority was, from the beginning, ultimately
unauthorized.19 The default of origin will have to be replaced with a fictional being, similar to
Quentin Skinner’s argument in “The Sovereign State: A Genealogy”: “We scarcely hope to talk
coherently about the nature of public power without making some reference to the idea of the
state as a fictional or moral person distinct from both rulers and ruled.”20

In the General Theory of the State (Allgemeine Staatslehre), the public lawyer and legal
positivist Georg Jellinek made a similar observation. Jellinek rejected that there is a
sovereignty of the Rechtstaat. Instead, he suggests that the state is sovereignty.21 The people
are fictional because we see only individuals, just as the “general will” is not the same as the
assembly of all the individuals. Therefore, even though one might be tempted to claim that the
people or the king is the de facto sovereign, none of them are the sovereign. However, the
sovereign is not purely inexistent, not purely fictional, having no touch with reality; instead, its
existence cannot be demonstrated as such, like how the definition of a point is not the same as
its demonstration on paper. The juridical concept, as Schmitt says, is the “reaching from within
the incomprehensible into the ungraspable [der Griff aus dem Unbegreifbaren in das
Ungreifbare].”22 This definition is of an ultimate mystery, though it also shattered the illusory
that attempts to grasp the juridical concept as substance. Unbegreifbar means something that
cannot be grasped as a concept that possesses a certain autonomy in reality; by reducing it to
a concept, one needs to impose a kind of violence on it, but it also actively overflows any
container trying to seize it.

We may look into the implication of the Unbegreifbar in the debate on the question of
sovereignty in Hans Kelsen and Carl Schmitt. In Hans Kelsen’s legal positivism, the basic norm
(Grundnorm) is the most fundamental norm of any given legal system. In the legal system, a
norm is validified by another norm, and so on and so forth. They constitute a chain of validity.
For example, criminal law is authorized by constitutional law. By validity (Geltung), Kelsen
means the binding power that obliges everyone to obey the norm.23 Among all the norms, the
basic norm is the ground that validifies the rest of the norms. The basic norm is the only
nonpositive law that is presupposed (and not created) and logically necessary.24 What is this
presupposed basic norm that functions as the legal system’s transcendental logical condition?
In Pure Theory of Law, Kelsen compares his inquiry with Kant’s. If Kant asks, “How is it possible
to interpret without a metaphysical hypothesis, the facts perceived by our senses, in the laws
of nature formulated by natural science?,” he asks, “How is it possible to interpret without
recourse to meta-legal authorities, like God or nature, the subjective meaning of certain facts
as a system of objectively valid legal norms?”25 In Kelsen’s neo-Kantian legal theory, the
validity of a law is derived from a higher level, and the validity of all the laws has the origin in
the basic norm; however, the basic norm does not exist as such, but it is presupposed “as if” it
exists. Hermann Heller reproaches Kelsen in the same way that Hume refutes the
mathematician:

It is the original norm that “is applied by the constituent authority”; the constitution gets its
“legally relevant validity from the presupposed original norm, but its content from the
constituent authority’s empirical act of will.” Thus, we first have a “constitution” that already
has legally relevant validity, and only then a “constituent” authority—a feat of logic that I
cannot follow!26

Validity grounded by the basic norm is analogical to the ideality of the geometrical elements;
validity, like ideality, is already presupposed, while it can only be illuminated by means other
than itself, such as through diagrams. The basic norm is not the constitution but something
that is presupposed with validity. Where does this something with binding power originate?
There is a default of origin in law when it is thought linearly. The logical formalism of positivism
suffers from the fact that once linear reasoning is presupposed, it easily loses its legitimacy,
because, in so doing, the basic norm thus presupposed cannot be positively found in the world
as might an individual or an object.27 In his Constitutional Theory (1928), Schmitt targeted
Kelsen’s basic norm and renounced it as tautology:
 With Kelsen, by contrast, only positive norms are valid, in other words, those which are
actually valid. Norms are not valid because they should properly be valid. They are valid,
rather, without regard to qualities like reasonableness, justice, etc., only, therefore, because
they are positive norms. The imperative abruptly ends here, and the normative element breaks
down. In its place appears the tautology of a raw factualness: something is valid when it is
valid and because it is valid.28

In Political Theology, Schmitt once again ridiculed Kelsen’s positivism, stating, “looked at
normatively, the decision emanates from nothingness.”29 Schmitt replaces Kelsen’s basic
norm with the power to decide upon exceptions. This single statement renews the broken
links between the secular state and religion by equating sovereignty with divine power.
Instead of pretending that there is a foundation, be that presupposed or demonstratable,
Schmitt has recourse to the power of decision on exceptions or emergencies as the ultimate
source of legitimacy. It is no longer a fact or a rule that defines the foundation of law but
rather a power that suspends all norms for the sake of vitality. Sovereignty is thus the total
power of decision. As we have seen in the previous chapter, Schmitt rejects mechanism and
organism in favor of a vitalism, opening an immunology of sovereignty. This rejection is
restaged here as the renouncement of the mechanist tendency and the organist origin of
positivism. On the one hand, Kelsenian normativism functions as a mechanical formalism that
must be rejected. On the other hand, the self-position of the basic norm and its genesis must
also be rejected because it is a “fanciful [phantastisch] way of speaking.”30

§22. Second Deconstruction on the Contingency of Friend and Enemy

In Rogues: Two Essays on Reason, Jacques Derrida follows Schmitt’s definition of sovereignty,
but instead of fully embracing Schmitt’s definition, Derrida points out that the Schmittean
definition is self-evident.31 Sovereignty, according to Derrida, is unconditional or absolute at
the moment when it suspends all laws. It is paradoxical since that which prohibits the law is
made possible by the law. This play between unconditionality and sovereignty is based on the
logic that the limit always presupposes the unlimited, the calculable, the incalculable, and vice
versa. Insofar as it is limited, calculative reason presupposes an unconditionality that always
exceeds it; however, the conditional and the unconditional are only conceived as mere
negations of one another. The sovereign is unconditional, or the absolute, because it exceeds
or overflows any limit imposed by laws:

Calculative reason (ratio, intellect, understanding) would thus have to ally itself and submit
itself to the principle of unconditionality that tends to exceed the calculation it founds. This
inseparability or this alliance between sovereignty and unconditionality appears forever
irreducible. Its resistance appears absolute and any separation impossible: for isn’t
sovereignty, especially in its modern political forms, as understood by Bodin, Rousseau, or
Schmitt, precisely unconditional, absolute, and especially, as a result, indivisible? Is it not
exceptionally sovereign insofar as it retains the right to the exception? The right to decide on
the exception and the right to suspend rights and law [le droit]?32

This brings us back to Rasch’s characterization of sovereignty as a boundary concept in the

Kantian sense. Like the noumenon, the unconditionality of sovereignty sets the limit for the
legal system; at the same time, it makes the legal system possible. Sovereignty, for Schmitt, is
an unconditionality in the sense that, like divine power, it transcends all laws. It is the same
way God, through providence, can perform miracles; sovereignty can decide upon the state of
exception. The Virgin Mary is the incarnation of such a miracle, and as a miracle, she is central
to Schmitt’s interpretation of Christian history and political theology. If we assert that
sovereignty is unconditional, it does not follow that all instances of sovereignty are
unconditional. By affirming the unconditionality of sovereignty, Derrida invites us to reflect on
other unconditionalities, such as the incalculable. The unconditionality of the incalculable is
that which opens a breach for thinking beyond sheer rationality. It is also the Unreachable, in
the sense of philosopher and former mayor of Venice Massimo Cacciari. It is that which forces
us to go beyond the “easily computable space of practical-economic action,”33 or in other
words, beyond the “real politics” based on economic and military competition. The
unconditionality of reason, as Derrida points out, and to which we will come back in the next
chapters, demands the following condition: “It will have to require or postulate a universal
beyond all relativism, culturalism, ethnocentrism, and especially nationalism, beyond what I
propose naming, to refer to all the modern risks that these relativisms make reason run,
irratio-nationalism or irratio-nation-state-ism—spell them as you will.”34

This breach to a new universal also exceeds the friend and enemy dichotomy. It moves toward
another figure of the unconditionality Derrida elaborated on in Politics of Friendship, the
unconditionality of hospitality without sovereignty.35 This juxtaposition, as well as the
interplay between unconditionality and sovereignty, opens up new avenues outside Schmitt’s
notion of the political. In other words, Derrida did not reject Schmitt, but, on the contrary, in
“The Force of Law” he maintains the unconditionality of the sovereign that Bodin, Hobbes, and
Schmitt assert, as well as the necessity of exception as a phenomenological epochē.36 This,
however, should not be interpreted as Derrida’s admiration for Schmitt because he also seeks
to find other figures of unconditionality as those that exceed sovereignty. Unconditional
hospitality is that which “exposes itself without limit to the coming of the other, beyond rights
and laws, beyond a hospitality conditioned by the right of asylum, by the right to immigration,
by citizenship, and even by the right to universal hospitality”; it also “exceeds juridical,
political, or economic calculation. But no thing and no one happens or arrives without it.”37
However, even though sovereignty is deconstructed, it is not yet overcome. Deconstruction is
also a deconstruction of linearity, but it does not yet, at least not fully, elucidate the question
of recursivity. As a result, the unconditionality that results from deconstruction remained to be
thought of according to the history of the supplement, namely, the history of technology—this
encapsulates Stiegler’s critique of Derrida.38
The above analysis shows that sovereignty is contingent and arbitrary; however, as the legal
system’s foundation and guarantee, it is simultaneously necessary. The sovereign or the state
can declare states of exception at any moment. Once an exception becomes the norm, it
ceases to be an exception, or, to put it another way, the only exception would be the absence
of an exception. Given the instability of the political system or an enemy’s threat of attack, a
state of exception is justifiable. The irreducibility of enmity is the basis of Schmitt’s ontological
argument regarding the political and justifies the necessity of sovereignty. Therefore, political
vitalism also implies political immunology. Ignoring enmity is neutralizing, depoliticizing, and
making oneself vulnerable to the Other. In this perspective, we could probably say that Schmitt
goes further than Hegel in the understanding of sovereignty because, for Schmitt, sovereignty
coexists with various sovereignties capable of destroying one another.

The question of enmity is central to political theology, and we can see the persistence of it in
European psychology. Schmitt wrote, “Europe was lost without the idea of a katechon,”39 for
the katechon presupposes the anti-Christ, the enemy; the katechon is that which withholds the
arrival of the anti-Christ. Those who don’t notice the enemy are exposed to the danger of
annihilation. This returns us to the necessity of enmity, which conditions the vitalist or
existentialist reading developed in the last chapter. In his excellent article “Europe and New
World Order,” Robert Howse suggests that “Schmitt’s problem was that he stuck to a faith in,
and hope for, a new division of the world that would allow the kind of enmity that for him
constituted the ‘political.’”40 It is probably incorrect that there is no question of enmity under
economic imperialism, but rather the question of enmity is undermined in favor of the
circulation of capital, energy, and commercial products. However, such imperialism is also the
condition of enmity and reaction since imperialism is an expression of the state form that
seeks to turn what was partial into universal; it thus necessarily elicits resistance and pleas for
pluralism.41 Many on the left may welcome this argument for pluralism,42 though it remains
to be examined what kind of pluralism Schmitt was proposing. However, instead of showing
the impossibility of undermining enmity, Schmitt starts with enmity as the absolute beginning,
the archē of politics.

Stepping back, we should ask what the essence of an enemy consists of. In juridical terms,
especially post–Second World War, the enemy has been equated with the aggressor. An
aggressor “declares war, transgresses a limit, does not follow a certain procedure and
deadlines, etc.”43 Schmitt disputes this definition since it is overly mechanical. The original
meaning of the German term for friend, Freund, was related to blood relationships, such as
family. Feind, the term for an enemy, has a less clear etymological meaning, referring to
someone despised and against whom a feud is started. Derrida deconstructed the opposition
between friend and enemy by demonstrating that there is no such thing as pure friendship and
enmity. This is because enmity is an existential question. We find a rather interesting remark in
Schmitt’s “Wisdom of the Cell” (Weisheit der Zellen), written during his imprisonment during
1945–1947:
 Whom in the world can I acknowledge as my enemy? Clearly only him who can call me into
question. By recognizing him as enemy I acknowledge that he can call me into question. And
who can really call me into question? Only I myself. Or my brother. The other proves to be my
brother, and the brother proves to be my enemy. . . . One categorizes oneself through one’s
enemy. One grades oneself through what one recognizes as hostility.44

An enemy is someone who calls “me” into question. This enemy is either me or the other, who
is a brother. The “I” here is a person and an individual. In the Theory of the Partisan (1963), we
find a similar statement: “The enemy is the configuration of our own question” (Der Feind ist
unsere eigene Frage als Gestalt).45 The definition of an enemy is existential and fundamentally
different from the definition of an aggressor cited above. But to what extent is this enemy not
arbitrary? The enemy could be an aggressor, it could be someone who looks down on me, it
could be my brother, and it could also be myself! Who, then, is not an enemy?

The question of enmity opens two cases: one is an immune resistance against an intruder who
is threatening my life, and the other is an autoimmune event, which, though intending to
protect me, actually destroys me from the inside. It is autoimmune because it is not the Other
outside of me that calls me into question, but the Other in me that calls me into question. Who
is this Other in me? Toward the end of the Outlines of the Philosophy of Right, Hegel suggests
respecting other sovereign states and not intervening in their internal affairs. However, this
respect is subject to mutual recognition; therefore, paradoxically, they cannot be indifferent to
each other’s internal affairs.46 Mutual recognition implies interfering in another state’s
internal affairs and involves not only imposing a particular order but also calling oneself into
question. Following 9/11, which Derrida called an autoimmune event of global capitalism,47
the state of emergency became applicable to anything labelled terrorism. In chapter 6, we will
see further how the problem of autoimmunity constitutes the major problem of planetary
politics today. Autoimmunity is not strictly a symptom of globalization; globalization only
renders it more visible. Autoimmunity is fundamental to politics because the enemy is the
Other in me; globalization escalates the body and integrates the Other outside of me as the
Other in me. Today the United States cannot treat China as the Other just as China cannot
treat the United States as the Other; the exaggeration of the immune system will lead to the
destruction of individuality.

Returning to where we ended in the previous section, we see that the manifestation of
sovereignty depends on the supplement. Like geometry, which depends on the diagram
(drawing and sketching), sovereignty is demonstrated by something other than itself, first by
territorial borders and second by its power to offend and destroy its enemy—in this sense,
enmity is essential when sovereignty is identified with the individuality of a state. Derrida
makes a very powerful remark when he says, “There is no sovereignty without force, without
the force of the strongest, whose reason—the reason of the strongest—is to win out over
[avoir raison de] everything.”48 This translation does not fully reflect Derrida’s meaning
because avoir raison also means to be right about something. Similar in German, to be right is
Recht haben, literally to have right. Recht and raison are identifiable in the claim of being right
or correct. Moreover, to have reason also means to have the right over something. How can
one be right about something and have the right over something without it being an act of
power? Indeed, what exactly is this power—a power about or over life and death?

Before we proceed, we summarize the above discussions in three rubrics:

Sovereignty as boundary concept limits but also makes possible what is limited; the
sovereign as he who decides on the exception resolves the metaphysical problem of the
foundation of law by recourse to an immanent vital force. However, insofar as it is a boundary
concept, it is nondemonstratable; like geometric idealities, though nondemonstratable, it can
be made sensible through the externalization of the idea. The externalized is the supplement
that is essential to the process of idealization (in contrast to ideation).

Sovereignty, conceived as the power that decides on the exception, is contingent; albeit
being contingent in nature, it becomes necessary by choosing its friend and enemy. This
necessity is conditioned by the absolute fear against its own annihilation, without which it
would be nothing; the sovereign resists neutralization through politicization, that is to say, by
identifying friend and enemy. This vital aspect of sovereignty forces itself to constantly identify
enemies.

The concept of the enemy in Schmitt is more nuanced than what has been understood. The
enemy is the result of an existential and psychological crisis. The planetary condition makes
explicit the problematic of the concept of the enemy. The enemy as the Other in myself shifts
from the individual state’s self to the planetary self. Global confrontations are increasingly
autoimmune attacks.

Sovereignty as a vital force does not exist as such; law, in its written form, makes sovereignty
visible; but what makes it powerful is technology. Schmitt, the true Christian Epimetheus, the
modern Abel, made the concept of sovereignty explicit by turning the default into what is
necessary.49 After all, Schmitt’s elucidation of sovereignty is indeed not “self-evident,” as
Derrida contends. Even though the term sovereignty only became popular after Jean Bodin, it
was already presupposed in the development of the nomos. The nomos that underlies all
political forms is not only subject to history, nations, and people, as the historicists believe, but
is also more fundamentally subject to technological conditions. Therefore, Schmitt’s project is
to understand sovereignty by thinking with the Other and to conceive the history of law by
placing Europe in the history of technology. We should deviate from the uncritical formulation
of Schmitt’s thinking as that which identifies technology with liberalism. Instead, we will
attempt to show that technology is fundamental to Schmitt’s thought and necessary to
understand where we are, and where we could and should go.
§23. Sovereignty and the Elementary Philosophy of Space

Perhaps we can say, and this is precisely what we are attempting to demonstrate, that
sovereignty is tantamount to the history of the nomos of the Earth, which becomes visible in
its technological mode of existence. Schmitt’s The Nomos of the Earth was a historical account
of how a Eurocentric nomos of the Earth came to pass and of the possible new configuration of
the Earth’s nomos given the planetary becoming of the Earth and the then antagonistic
confrontation of the two world powers, the United States and the Soviet Union. Schmitt used a
rather different typology to understand space compared to geopolitics textbooks. Instead of
dividing lands into functional spaces such as national territories, colonies, dependencies, and
protectorates, Schmitt aimed to develop a new understanding of sovereignty as spatial
order.50 This specific way of analyzing space allows Schmitt to formulate a genetic notion of
sovereignty. The earth, the soil, was first a subject of division. Nomos, for Schmitt, means not
only to take (nehmen) but also to divide or distribute (teilen) space. Man is the animal of land,
and therefore the primary implication of the nomos is the measure and division of land and
wars between lands. Politics and its juridical systems are grounded on the division of land. The
question of the division of soil immediately implies the question of allocation and possession,
and, later, what is called sovereignty.51 The nomos is at once Ordnung (order) and Ortung
(place or orientation).52 Space is situated in the world; in other words, it is the world that
gives meaning to space. Without the world, space would only be geometrical dimensions.
Schmitt’s interpretation of space is largely Heideggerian in meaning; indeed, he obscurely
refers to a “German philosopher” in Land and Sea:

Today, by space we no longer understand a mere dimension of depth, empty of every

conceivable content. For us, space has become a force field of human energy, activity, and
achievement. Today, a thought first becomes possible for us that would have been impossible
in any other epoch and which a contemporary German philosopher has articulated: The world
is not in space, rather space is in the world.53

Space belongs to the world, and the world is nothing other than that of the spiritual Volk.
When the Ortung changes, then the Ordnung will also have to change. The change in Ortung is
not only due to the discovery of new spaces but also the transformation of the vital energy of
the people following a new Ortung. For example, both the discovery of the Americas and the
Moon landing renewed European and global spatial consciousness, respectively, and
therefore, an order that could adequately address this new configuration emerged. The
Eurocentric nomos originating from the Ortung of Europe confronts its limit as Ordnung under
the planetary condition of Schmitt’s time. This Eurocentric nomos, as Schmitt defended in
various places, is not unilateral or hegemonic, rather he argues that it is fundamentally
heterogeneous: “In the Jus Publicum Europaeum there was also a unity of the world. It was
Eurocentric, but it was not the central power of a single master of the world. Its structure was
pluralistic and allowed for the coexistence of several political greats who could regard each
other not as criminals but as bearers of autonomous orders.”54

The Eurocentric nomos of the Earth allows coexistence between different sovereign states, in
the sense that it maintains a strict separation between its interiority and exteriority: each state
is autonomous and does not intervene in the affairs of another sovereign state, thus also the
contemporary understanding of sovereignty. It is Eurocentric because it affirms the agency of
the state, namely, the state as the basic unit of internal and external politics. This political
concept is foreign to non-European territories: “Continental European international law since
the sixteenth century, the jus publicum Europaeum originally and essentially was a law among
states, among European sovereigns. This European core determined the nomos of the rest of
the earth. ‘Statehood’ is not a universal concept, valid for all times and all peoples.”55 Here
Schmitt also affirms Hegel’s state “as a ‘realm of objective reason and morality’” and that
“Hegel’s high-flown metaphysical formulations signify that the state was the spatially concrete,
historical, organizational form of this epoch which, at least on European soil, had become the
agency.”56 However, this monadology of sovereign states remains a beautiful fiction. States
are not monads if we understand what Hegel is saying here, because they have windows that
allow them to aim and shoot the enemy. Instead, there is also a demand for mutual
recognition between states, and such mutual recognition does not happen automatically;
rather, it is the consequence of power struggles and wars.

We do not intend to show that Schmitt’s defense of the European system as heterogeneous is
hypocritical, though one should certainly question him on this point. Rather, we want to point
out that the question of heterogeneity still haunts us today. Technological advancement
implies a difference in political power, and heterogeneity results from a constant negotiation
between the technological difference of the sovereign states. What we have been trying to do
is to show how the concept of sovereignty has been technological since its origin, in the same
way that we attempted to demonstrate in chapter 1 through Hegel that the sovereign state is
a technological phenomenon. If in Hegel we find the justification of the political state, then in
the postwar Schmitt we find the attempt of a justification of the Großraum—a term, according
to Schmitt, that has its origin in the “technological-industrial-economical-organizational
domain [Bereich]” during the turn of the century when energy and electricity supply unified
the Kleinräume into a Großraumwirtschaft.57 From this perspective, we can also say that
Schmitt’s philosophy of the state is also a philosophy of technology. Schmitt was reluctant to
reduce the concept of the Großraum to a “techno-industry-economic” one because he is more
concerned with the significance of this concept for international law.58 He was too cautious to
allow this point to expand. Thus, he also missed it; and as a result, his interpretation of
technology is incomplete.

According to Schmitt, the spatial order based on land was radically changed about six hundred
years ago when the sea was added to the subject of international laws. This may appear
absurd because Greece is made up of several islands and is surrounded by the Aegean and
Mediterranean seas, but Schmitt answers that, for the Greeks, the “sea has no character, in
the original sense of the word, which comes from the Greek charassein, meaning to engrave,
to scratch, to imprint.”59 Therefore, territorial order, instead of an oceanic order, was central
to their understanding of spatial order in general. The Ortung implies the Ordung. Land and
sea demand two different international laws. This periodization is crucial for Schmitt because
the sea is also the way to discover the earth as a globe, and it also exposes the limit of the
European international laws, which were valid only on land. The shift of domination from one
element to another indicates a spatial revolution, which fundamentally changes the
consciousness of space:

Every time when new lands and seas enter the field of vision of human collective
consciousness by a new thrust of historical forces, by an unleashing of new energies, the
spaces of historical existence also change. Then there emerge new measures and directions of
political-historical activity, new sciences, new orders, new life for new or reborn peoples. The
expansion can be so deep and so surprising that not only quantities and measurements, not
only the outermost human horizon, but even the structure of the concept of space itself is
altered. Then one may speak of a spatial revolution.60

Ernst Kapp’s geographical thinking influenced Schmitt’s elementary philosophy of international

order. Kapp suggested a reading of the evolution of empires according to the element of
water. As we have already seen, Kapp was a Hegelian who read the history of civilization from
a specific point of view, most notably from the perspective of organ projection. According to
Kapp, the Middle East’s initial Potamian or river cultures (Tigris, Euphrates, and Nile) were
followed by the thalassic age (closed sea and Mediterranean basin). These were, in turn, then
followed by what he calls “oceanic civilizations.”61 As an element, water stood out as the lens
through which the history of civilization could be reconstructed. Schmitt adopts this strategy
by making the sea element a middle term between land and air. At the same time, Schmitt
twisted Kapp’s first two stages by emphasizing that, despite the thalassic culture’s close
contact with the water, it is nevertheless defined by the concept of the coast as a limit. Schmitt
gave the example of Venice: though a medieval thalassic culture, “all of the ceremonial and
symbolic acts of Venetian life point toward a culture of coasts and camps, rather than a
maritime existence.”62 The elements, land, sea, and air, constitute the foundation of planetary
politics—something that Schmitt wanted to systematize after writing Land and Sea.63 Since
the end of the seventeenth century, whoever led in sea navigation dominated the world. And
it was England, after transforming from a country of shepherds to a country of mariners, that
became the dominant force on the sea. The Scientific Revolution occurred in Europe, in both
the continent and British Isles, but the Industrial Revolution only occurred first in England.
Schmitt argued that seafaring was inextricably linked to and fueled technological and scientific
advancement. The rise of sea power and the international laws that regulate sea wars and
piracy, such as rayas (Spanish-Portuguese) and amity lines (French-English), reconfigured the
nomos of the Earth: “The change that affected the nature of the leviathan was, however, the
consequence of the industrial revolution. It had begun in England, in the eighteenth century.
The first blast furnace in 1735; cast iron in 1740; steam engine in 1768; spinning mill in 1770,
and mechanical loom in 1786. All saw the light of day in Britain.”64

The revival of the sea monster first saw its light in England, allowing England to develop its sea
power against the land power of continental European states. This was the second milestone
of reestablishing the spatial order, succeeding the end of the first spatial order based on land.
Technology, as nomos (appropriation and division), corresponds to a legitimacy that is prior to
legality65 in the sense that rationality is thus strongly tied to science and technology. It
violates legality in its clash with the church, but it also transcends legality because it embodies
legitimacy: “The second nomos of the earth arose from such discoveries of land and sea. The
discoveries were not invited. They were made without visas issued by the discovered
people.”66 The second nomos of the Earth remains Eurocentric because the form of power
and the laws of spatial division come from Europe, maintaining the continuation of the res
publica Christiana.67 First and foremost, it is unilateral in the name of a universality based on
the universalization of European values, which allowed the European forces to appropriate the
“free soil” inhabited by the indigenous people. The colonizers did not have to apply for visas.
Instead, their legitimacy derives not directly from their religion and aesthetics but from their
technological strength. This second nomos of the Earth is also the extension of the European
nomos of the land to the nomos of the sea, which integrates the more recently discovered
land into its juridical system: “The Eurocentric nomos of the earth lasted until World War I
(1914–18). It was based on a dual balance; first, the balance of land and sea. England alone
dominated the sea and allowed no balance of sea power. By contrast, on the European
continent there existed a balance of land power.”68

The collapse of the Eurocentric nomos was largely because the jus publicum Europaeum failed
to keep the balance of the planetary order. At the turn of the twentieth century, a rather
paradoxical situation occurred. On the one hand, the sovereign state or, more precisely, the
nation-state became a fundamental political concept beyond Europe (though Schmitt
lamented the failure of the jus publicum Europaeum); on the other hand, the rise of the United
States and the Soviet Union and their international politics displaced European empires as the
guarantee of the spatial division. The sea power of the British Empire gave way to U.S. Marine
power; the land power of the continental European countries gave way to the army of Soviet
tanks. This antagonistic duality appears to call for a sublation that allows history to progress
toward a certain rational unity. However, hidden in this unity is imperialism posing as a
universalism. Such imperialism can be found in twentieth-century American foreign policy,
which in Schmitt’s eyes, destroyed the novelty of the United States as the new Europe:

Equally profound as this world-historical shift from West to East was the fact that the old
belief in the New World was changed from within—from internal American development.
When the United States embarked upon a foreign policy of imperialism, its domestic situation
changed, as the era of its newness ended. The presupposition and foundation of everything
that one could call the novelty of the Western Hemisphere disappeared both ideologically and
in reality.69

Schmitt referred to Theodore Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson’s reframing (Umdeutung) of the
Monroe Doctrine (1823) as tools for imperialism and universalism.70 The Monroe Doctrine
affirms the independence of the American states, and rejects colonization and intervention of
foreign countries in the internal affairs of the United States (especially Russia and the Holy
Alliance) and vice versa. The Monroe Doctrine, for Schmitt, stands as the counter doctrine of
the “monarchic-Christian-dynastic” principle of legitimacy.71 Wilson replaced the Monroe
Doctrine with a “suprastatic and supranational world ideology” (überstaatliche und
übervölkische Weltideologie).72 Imperialism is accompanied by a global universalism, which
undermines the complexity of space, or more precisely, its domination of space eliminates all
heterogeneities; in other words, spatial conquest ensures frictionless movements of capital,
which overcome spatial rigidities. Schmitt saw Roosevelt’s proposal to Japan to construct what
is now known as the Asian Monroe Doctrine to avoid European colonization in the Far East as a
pretext to aid the economic development of Anglo-Saxon capital in East Asia, particularly in
China, by making it a colony.73 We might say that what Schmitt calls global universalism or
hegemonic liberalism is what we know today as globalization. Globalization has transgressed
all boundaries by establishing free channels of circulation and exchange. It is, however, difficult
to solely associate the United States with imperialism, as if European colonialism were not
imperialism. Since the Enlightenment, European imperialism was already at work through its
technological advancement. The universalism of the Enlightenment was also a homogenization
of space, one that enforced a homogeneity as the possibility of plurality, or a monism as the
foundation of a pseudo-pluralism in the sense that differences are based on the same. In the
nineteenth century, British marine power was the guarantee of this smooth plane of the free
world trade and free world market, as Schmitt remarked:

The prevailing concept of a global universalism lacking any spatial sense certainly expressed
a reality in the economy distinct from the state—an economy of free world trade and a free
world market, with the free movement of money, capital and labor. . . . A strong guarantee for
such a worldview lay in the dominant position of English and in the English interest in global
free trade and freedom of the sea.74

Today we see the continuation of this order via American marine power, from the Gulf War to
the war in Iraq and now the current intervention in the Indo-Pacific Ocean.75 In an article
titled “The New Nomos of the Earth,” as one of three world-political scenarios, Schmitt saw
that American strength would replace British power as the guarantee of world order. This is
precisely what took place during globalization in the twentieth century. Space has become
something less significant today, both domestically and globally, largely due to the well-
developed logistic systems. But it was not until the global pandemic that we began to
understand that global logistics cannot be taken for granted; it is rather fragile. A port can
delay the supply of one element, leading to the shortage of many products throughout the
globe. At the same time, we also observe the rapid growth of domestic logistics in some parts
of the world; for example, in China, fresh lychee can be transported from the southern part of
the country to the northern within one day. Though we may argue that globalization, or more
precisely the current phase of globalization, has ended due to rising tensions between
antagonistic countries, the mastery of elemental power has also expanded rapidly, which may
provide the means to conceive a different phase of planetarization. In Hegelian terms, we may
argue that globalization remains an abstract universal and that the contradiction revealed over
the previous century prepares us for a concrete universal.

§24. Großräume as Post-Static Political Form and the Problem of Pluralism

We can conclude that for Schmitt, the divide between East and West is a matter of technology
rather than culture. In “Die Einheit der Welt (1952),” Schmitt questioned the political trend in
favor of the unity of the world, pleading for pluralism. The political conflict between the East
and the West is the primary cause of global unity. This consists of one of the three scenarios of
the “New Nomos of the Earth,” in contrast to the preservation of the present order by
American imperialism and the construction of the Großraum, which we will discuss later.
Second, the unity of the world is also brought about by technological advancement, especially
the electric and telecommunication networks. However, this form of unity remains abstract
and homogenous. Schmitt mocked the fact that industrial capitalism and Lenin’s communism
both sought to build an electrified earth.76 Communist countries ironically seem to have had
the same goal as the capitalist West: “The East, in particular, took hold of Hegel’s philosophy of
history in the same way it took hold of the atomic bomb and other products of the Western
intelligentsia in order to realize the unity of the world in accordance with its plans.”77

World history appears to be moving in the direction predicted by Hegel: technical rationality,
masquerading as the world spirit, is the driving force of world history, from which no country
within the planetary schema can escape. Schmitt already saw that the East took Hegel’s
philosophy of history and Western intelligentsia to develop its own world plan. When we look
at the competition between the United States and China today, it is not astonishing to see that
Schmitt had already anticipated it, though he was referring more to the Soviet Union than
China in his writings. The competition between China or Russia and the Western world, at least
at the moment, is situated on the ground of Western technology, but whether it is moving
toward the Hegelian absolute is a difficult question to answer. The United States’ most
effective strategy to weaken Chinese sovereign power is not its defense of Taiwan but to block
China’s access to certain technologies for national security reasons. The antagonism between
the West and the East, seen from the perspective of technology, is only one form of
homogenization.
As historian Arnold Toynbee pointed out in his Reith Lecture, which Schmitt read and
commented with fierce criticism, technology is the key to the new world order of the East and
West. We recall that in his Reith Lecture, Toynbee raised why in the sixteenth century, the
people of the Far East had closed their doors to European visitors after first contact but, in the
nineteenth century, opened their doors to them. Toynbee explains that in the sixteenth and
seventeenth centuries, the Europeans wanted to export religion and technology to the Far
East. Thus, immediately recognizing that the Europeans wanted to change their beliefs and
ways of life, the people of the Far East threw the visitors out of their lands. Toward the end of
the seventeenth century, an important event happened in Europe. According to Toynbee,
technology is detached from religion. In the nineteenth century, the Europeans would only
export technology instead of religion to the Far East. Consequently, the people of the Far East
believed that technology was instrumental and that they could master the technology with
their own thought. In China, we find the slogan “Chinese thought as mind and Western
thought as instrument,” in Japan “Japanese soul and Western instrument,” and in Korea
“Eastern Dao and Western Qi [utensil].” Referring to Toynbee’s lecture, Schmitt claims, “But
today’s communist revolution in the East consists in the East taking possession of a European
technique that has been detached from Christian religiosity.”78 Even though later Schmitt
added that what happened toward the end of the seventeenth century was not necessarily the
detachment of technology from religion, but rather the detachment of the British Isles from
the European continent that created opposition and balance between sea power and land
power.79 Schmitt does not deny the centrality of technology; on the contrary, he
acknowledges it. However, he fails to understand how technology was perceived in the East
because Toynbee was not mistaken, and as evidenced by the slogans stated in China, Japan,
and Korea, technology is seen to be divorced from religion and regarded as one of the most
secular of knowledges due to its rationality and universality.

Furthermore, Lenin’s electrified earth here does not only represent a communist dream but
also the homogenizing tendency of technology, which in turn defines the order of
globalization. The human being is primarily a technical being. Thus, technology is fundamental
to the evolution of humanity. The evolutionary process initially manifested as divergence, and
then battles and conquests brought about varying degrees of convergence of space and time.
The conquest of space is also the reorganization of a spatial order regulated by technological
means ranging from transportation networks to telecommunication networks, which in turn
become a medium of time synchronization. The current industrialized world was not the
utopia that Saint Simon dreamed of. The increase in productivity and the development of
transportation networks did not lead to a more even distribution of goods and wealth or the
realization of socialism. Instead, the spatial order became integrated into smooth planes,
which only facilitated the circulation of all forms of energy (fossil fuels, libidinal, sexual, etc.)
for capitalism’s profit making. Sovereignty, defined by boundaries and opposition to foreign
intervention gradually, gave way to new protocols developed by the industrial world and
capitalist market; therefore, we find the nation-state-capital trinity.
Schmitt did not live in the time of the internet, nor did he have the chance to observe how the
unity of the world was virtually realized after the fall of the Berlin Wall; Francis Fukuyama was
able to write his The End of History and the Last Man, which honored Kojève’s “universal
homogeneous state” and the free market.80 The digitalized world replaced the electrified
world and became the reality that we are now living in. However, as we know, digitization
does not bring about global unity; like the “free market,” it is fragmented according to
different commercial interests and ideological manipulations. Today, countries are increasingly
realizing the necessity to resist the planetarization of platforms such as Google, Amazon, and
Facebook, ranging from standard court proceedings for invasion of privacy and monopoly to
extreme measures such as barring them from the market and users. The homogenization of
technology also defines a new form of universality: access to technologies. Unlike Teilhard de
Chardin or the transhumanists discussed in chapter 3, Schmitt was not fascinated by the
electrified earth, nor would the digital earth absorb him if he were still alive today. For
Schmitt, such unity is more of a problem than a solution. An electrified earth or digital earth
can be used to maintain the hegemony of a neoliberal economy, but they do not necessarily
enable pluralism.

In Derrida’s reading, Schmitt’s attempt to retrieve pluralism through the redefinition of

sovereignty becomes pharmacological. For readers familiar with Derrida’s theory on Plato’s
pharmacy or the pharmakon, writing—or technology in general—is neither good nor bad, but
remedy and poison at the same time. Writing is that which allows humans to remember
everything. Yet, it is also that which makes them forget, for they no longer need to remember
anymore, their memory now being externalized in and through technology. The pharmacology
of sovereignty could be interpreted in two ways. First, nation-state-sovereignty, on the one
hand, can lead to absolute power, namely, the suspension of all laws, including international
laws—the sovereign is that which enables a state to become a rogue state. On the other hand,
the sovereign is also that which resists certain unilateral “universal” forces because, in certain
circumstances, it can “become an indispensable bulwark against certain international powers,
certain ideological, religious, or capitalist, indeed linguistic, hegemonies that, under the cover
of liberalism or universalism, would still represent, in a world that would be little more than a
marketplace, a rationalization in the service of particular interests.”81 It is not surprising that
the “rogue states,” which are named as such by the U.S. government, speak about resistance
against American imperialism. The unity of the East and the West through the realization of
technology and the suppression of sovereignty in the eyes of Schmitt is no less the triumph of
imperial universalism. For Schmitt, a true unity exists in the form of the spirit, but not
necessarily in the material form like an electrified earth; in other words, technology demands
an orientation (Ortung) so that it will not be a blind force. Schmitt distinguished spiritual unity
from material unity, claiming that, in Hegel, one can also find a unity of the world spirit, an
idea we already explored in chapter 1. Schmitt recognized that Hegel did not mean material
unity; in other words, a material unity does not mean a spiritual unity in the Hegelian sense:
“Now this Hegelian philosophy is apparently idealistic; it sees the goal of humanity in the unity
of the self-returning spirit and the absolute idea, not in the material unity of an electrified
earth.”82
While it is certainly too polemical to claim that Hegel separated the spiritual from the material,
it is not less polemical to claim that there is no relation between Hegel’s concept of unity and
an electrified earth. As we have tried to show, the spirit does not purely exist in the mind; the
spirit is at the same time externalization (alienation) and internalization (recollection)—it is the
recursive process of externalization and internalization that defines the “self-returning spirit.”
Hegel’s indecisiveness toward the end of the Outlines of the Philosophy of Right concerning a
world order based on nation-states does not mean that Hegel already saw the end of history,
as Kojève and Fukuyama claim after him. The unification of the East and the West has not
happened yet, but perhaps it will come into being once another world war breaks out; such a
war is also something we should hope for the least. Schmitt is not in favor of unity; he
condemned it as being loaded with the ideology of imperialism, as he had questioned in “The
Unity of the World” why “unity” is necessary good.83 What Schmitt pleads for is pluralism.
This pluralism is no longer limited to individual nation-states, which he saw as having already
failed after the Second World War. Rather, it finds its new political form in what he calls the
Großraum. In this sense, we may understand that technological strategy underpins the
Großraum, and its coalition depends on it: “Which type of politics is strong enough to master
the new technology and which type of genuine friend-enemy groupings can develop on this
new ground.”84 After the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, it was the atomic bomb that
created the postwar grouping; today, this scenario is best illustrated by the groupings that
center on artificial intelligence.

This is the last scenario out of the three that Schmitt described in “The New Nomos of the
Earth,” namely, the coalition or grouping of different territories forming clusters of
administrative units that extend the Monroe Doctrine from one state to a cluster of states.
Due to the new planetary condition, the decline of the sovereign state has become inevitable,
according to Schmitt: on the one hand, American imperialism has abandoned the Monroe
Doctrine and is ceaselessly opening new markets for its capital; on the other hand, the East
due to its technological acceleration is imposing new plans within the same logic of the game.
The Großraum is Schmitt’s response to the new nomos of the Earth as a resistance against
Anglo-Saxon economic imperialism, and at the same time, as an attempt to rescue the Monroe
Doctrine and to reactivate the European order of the planet in the name of heterogeneity and
autonomy. The Großraum could be said to be a compromise between the planetarization,
which undermines individual states’ sovereignty, and the heterogeneity Schmitt believes to be
the foundation of European public law.

Like the political state, the Großraum is a historical and technological product. Schmitt wants
to theorize it as such, similar to what Hegel did to the state in his Outlines of the Philosophy of
Right. If it is true that toward the seventeenth century, the division between sea power and
land power was tantamount to a confrontation between ships and farms, meaning two forms
of existence exemplified by England and Continental Europe, then the confrontation between
land and sea explains the European international politics of that time. However, this
configuration nevertheless came to be challenged when the electrified earth progressed
toward its concretization (in the sense of Gilbert Simondon). The Second World War made
another element even more dominant, that of air. Air is the third element after land and sea; it
introduced different types of warfare, including the dropping of atomic bombs, and now more
and more drones.85 It englobes both the land and sea and enables the imagination of the
Großraum. Schmitt repeatedly talked about the air, the new element, in The Nomos of the
Earth, Land and Sea and other texts. Today, the air element is expressed not so much by the air
force and its military domination but also in the possibility of destroying the enemy from outer
space and more long-term goals, such as creating new territorial sovereignty through the
colonization of Mars and the Moon. This exploration of outer space is still beyond the
imagination of ordinary people because the earth, despite its wear, is still the only place to
live:

The invention of the airplane marked the conquest of the third element, after those of land
and sea. Man was lifting himself high above the plains and the waves, and in the process,
acquired a new means of transportation, as well as a new weapon. Standards and criteria
undertook further changes. Hence, man’s possibilities to dominate nature and his fellow man
were given the widest scope.86

Land, sea, and air correspond to three different kinds of technology that aim to control each
element. It would be incorrect to think that the elements are discovered chronologically. It was
technology that allowed these elements to become dominant in the understanding of the
spatial order of the planet—in the sense that they are no longer elements to be governed but
rather spaces of “human domination and effective power expansion” (menschlicher Herrschaft
und effektiver Machtentfaltung).87 Every spatial revolution indicates the Ordnung’s
interruption and the Ortung’s reconfiguration. Suppose we read Schmitt’s theory of spatial
revolution systematically. In that case, technology is that which defines the sovereign as well
as that which transforms the sovereign’s power—always exceeding it and empowering. At the
same time, in order not to be fully determined by technology, the sovereign has to reinvent
itself as a vital force, a force that could suspend other norms, including technological ones.

Schmitt’s theory of sovereignty does not set its priority on economic domination but rather on
autonomy and decision, a political vitalism that we have already explored. Schmitt’s theory
covered the deep sea and outer space in terms of sea and air, but due to his death in 1985, the
subject of cyberspace was obviously beyond his conception. Schmitt never ceases to mock the
unity of an electrified world;88 however, it is also evident to him, or he would be contradicting
himself, that technology is crucial to comprehending spatial order and that technological
progress renders past political and legal doctrines obsolete. The electrified earth has become
the digital earth today. As Peter Thiel claims, the future spaces in the Schmittean sense are the
deep sea, outer space, and cyberspace. If we follow Schmitt’s philosophy of space, as many
theorists have attempted, it is crucial to add cyberspace and outer space as new elements
after land, sea, and air.89 Cyberspace has already become a battlefield between the states,
and outer space is being prepared as such under the name of scientific research.

It is worth repeating that the attractive idea behind Schmitt’s criticism of unity is his aspiration
for pluralism. The new orientation (Ortung), the planetary viewed from three spatial elements,
has interrupted the order (Ordnung). Is the Großraum a real response to the spatial revolution
of the twenty-first century? The image of the blue marble (1972) and those lower-quality
photographs of the earth taken from outer space in the 1960s have already conferred a
completely new spatial consciousness to the planet, namely, the ability to grasp the earth as a
whole from above. Hannah Arendt, in The Human Condition, considered the launch of Sputnik
(1957) as an event not second to any other scientific events, including the splitting of the
atom.90 The Großraum, often presented as the late Schmitt’s planetary thinking, is in tension
with the planetary we intend to propose concerning plurality, democracy, and liberty. To
understand this, we will need to go further into Schmitt’s concept of the Großraum. Before the
Second World War, the Großraum was justified as a response to the decline of the sovereign
state and the threat of American imperialism and Soviet technological acceleration and as a
necessity for the Reich. The Reich is that which unifies different people in the Großraum. Is
then the Reich an enlarged state and the Großraum an enlarged Kleinraum? Schmitt answers:
“The Reich is not simply an enlarged state, just as little as the Großraum is an enlarged
Kleinraum. Nor is the Reich identical with the Großraum, but every Reich has a Großraum and
thereby rises as much above the state spatially characterized by the exclusiveness of its
national territory as it does above the national soil of an individual people.”91

The Reich and the Großraum, as concepts similar to the state, are both historical and concrete.
The Reich extends beyond the border of the individual states and the soil of a particular
people. One could see that Schmitt was pleading for the German Reich as the only option for
the post-Westphalian international order. The Reich does not negate the people and the state;
instead, it pretends to provide a new framework to conceive an international political order
under the planetary condition:

In it [the concept of the Reich] we have the core of a new way of thinking in international
law, which starts from the concept of the people and allows the elements of order contained
in the concept of the state to remain, but which at the same time is able to do justice to
today’s spatial concepts and the real political vital forces; that can be “planetary,” i.e. earthy
[erdraumhaft], without destroying the peoples and the states and without, like the imperialist
international law of Western democracies, steering out of the inevitable overcoming of the old
concept of the state into a universalistic-imperialistic world law.92

We can observe here that the Reich and the Großraum remain volkliche concepts and are
contemporary to the new planetary representation of space, i.e., air. For Schmitt, only the
Reich, and not the state, is sufficient to be a political vital force after the new space revolution.
Großraum and Reich are positioned as a quest for heterogeneity and plurality—a strategy that
resists the imperialist international law of Western liberal democracy. We can see that this
quest for plurality resonates with the sentiment today from the left and the right, making
Schmitt’s theory appealing again. However, we have yet to ask what kind of pluralism is at
stake and if it is not just a camouflage for domination. Pluralism shouldn’t only mean plurality
or multipolarity of power, as it can simply be a pluralism based on monism. In the imagination
of Schmitt, the new order could be schematically analyzed as first inter-Großräume relations,
second inter-Reich relations of different Großräume, and last, both inside and outside the
Großraum, international relations (zwischen-völkische Beziehungen).93 Hooker in his Schmitt’s
International Thought, much like how Marx reproached Hegel on the organic state, argued
that Schmitt’s idea of the Großraum is nothing substantial:

The idea of Großraum is almost totally without substance beyond its status as a critique of
the status quo. Whilst certainly of interest in its assertion of the need for a new basis for
political uniqueness, the conclusions it reaches are inadequate. Why is a continental form of
politics better as an assertion of a thorough and anti-universal appreciation of territory? Why
can’t the state-form be revived as genuinely particular? What distinguished the “political idea”
of a Großraum from the bare sense of existential collectivity that defined the political
community in The Concept of the Political? Schmitt wholly fails to address these foundational
questions, and offers no thorough justification of his position.94

This comment is valid in many senses. Hooker argues, after 1945, Schmitt’s eulogy of the Reich
present in his earlier writings became almost taboo. However, the Großraum remains in
Nomos of the Earth as a proposal for future geopolitics—or, in other words, the geopolitics of
the Großraum after Reich. Again, according to Schmitt, what makes the Großraum more
preferable to the sovereign state is that the Großräume are internally homogenous but
externally differentiated from each other. Heterogeneity is maintained as inter-Großräume
relations, but internally, the Großraum could be homogenous like a state. The Großräume
means also a new kind of grouping, which is not necessarily the same as the nation-state.
Technology, for example, becomes the basis of the grouping of the people: according to the
Schmitt of 1929, it will be the new ground of politics in the coming century, all depending on
which “type of politics is strong enough to master the new technology” and “which type of
genuine friend-enemy groupings [Freund- und Feind-Gruppierungen] can develop on this new
ground [Boden].”

§25. Giving Colonialism, New Großräume, and Digital Sovereignty

We may wonder whether the Großraum, after the state, constitutes a higher degree of
reconciliation between the universal and the particular, and if so, in what way? For example,
suppose a certain ethnic group dominates the political state, defining the official language,
calendar, and rhythm of life; the other ethnic groups can maintain their obvious differences,
but they must submit to the state administrative machine defined by the dominant people. Is
this already the pluralist logic of the Großraum? The Kyoto School philosophers were troubled
by the same problem when they had to justify the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere.
They also called the Co-Prosperity Sphere a Großraum by following Schmitt.95 Their
justification is that all different Asian people could be united by the Japanese moralische
Energie, and it was only the Japanese who were capable of demonstrating such a moralische
Energie that overcomes the decadence of Western modernity.96 If the Großraum possesses
some theoretical advancements since Hegel’s philosophical justification of the political state,
then one should expect that it resolves the Volk Staat correlation and the domination of the
Germanic people that Hegel concluded at the end of his Outlines of the Philosophy of Right.

Schmitt left no clear answer to these questions. The pluralism he proposes at times seems to
paradoxically align with the technological and economic rationality that he aims to undermine.
Schmitt’s anticipation that technology is the new ground on which friend and enemy grouping
can develop seems obvious today when microchips became a watershed separating the U.S.-
led coalition (including Japan, the Netherlands, and other members of the coalition) and China.
Any non-Chinese enterprise that violates the U.S. sanction is an indicator of enmity, and vice
versa. This principle is also applied in the use of software and online platforms. Those
countries that censor American platforms are often considered to belong to the same group:
North Korea, China, and Russia. However, when we look at the substitutes of these Western
platforms, we see that they are actually very similar services, using similar or exactly the same
technology.

The grouping of friends and enemies based on technology is therefore dynamic, but the most
significant development has been cross-state and cross-continental infrastructures. It is not
simply an exercise of hegemony, which belongs to the so-called colonialism of taking.97 Such
colonialism of taking has dominated since the beginning of the history of colonization itself.
Indeed, the constitutive act of taking is the European nomos. The enmity of Schmitt supposes
appropriation of land and sea in both civil wars and wars against other countries, which also
operates as the justification of colonization from the perspective of the European nomos. After
the Second World War, colonialism takes a different form since we have entered a post-
European era. The Eurocentric nomos has to be largely modified in the planetary condition, or
in Kojève’s words, it can no longer be a taking (nehmen) but becomes a giving (geben). In
1957, Carl Schmitt invited Kojève to give a lecture in the private Rhein-Ruhr-Club in Cologne;
the talk was titled “Colonialism from a European Perspective.” Contrary to Schmitt’s notion of
nomos as taking and appropriation, Kojève proposed considering giving as a new form of
colonialism. Instead of taking from the colonized countries, Europe now gave to these
countries in the form of financial, material, and technological support and more than they
were taking. Kojève’s rationale is that for a business to remain good, it should have good
clients, not poor and bad ones. The giving colonialism (gebender Kolonialismus) is compatible
with the new form of capitalism. In Marx’s analysis of industrial capitalism of the nineteenth
century, capitalists take the maximum from the workers without improving the latter’s quality
of life—this remains an error of Marxists when they essentialize capitalism in the form Marx
described, for, according to them, capitalists are unbelievably naive and blind.98 Post-Marxian
capitalism, exemplified by Henry Ford, changed the strategy by redistributing what they took
from the workers. Since Ford, there has been a general improvement in employees’ working
conditions and quality of life, as documented by sociologists such as Georges Friedman in
France and Daniel Bell in the United States. According to Kojève, the new type of colonialism
should not merely take whatever it wants as in the past, but rather provide the emerging and
underdeveloped nations more than it has taken. Kojève named France and the UK as the only
Western countries with a politics of giving at that time. Today, we see that many of the
developed countries, but also developing countries, are giving in this sense. The United States,
Germany, and Japan have topped France in donations in the past years.

This seemly “anticolonialist” act is, for Kojève, a new form of colonialism that Europe should
exercise,99 such as the “anti-imperialist” act of Schmitt was a justification for the German
Reich. Writing in 1957, Kojève had to avoid the Reich in favor of a less hegemonic coalition.
Insofar as the territories of land, sea, and air are defined, market and infrastructure become
the other means through which the Reich’s sovereignty can extend to other countries so that
the internal affairs of other countries can become part of foreign policy. Market and
infrastructure consist of two major components for assuring capital and commercial goods
circulation. Or, maybe we can say, they are means of creating postwar Großräume. In 1957,
Kojève saw China as the receiving country of the giving colonialism of the Soviet Union;
however, he also noticed the “spectacular” transformation of China’s technological ground.
Sixty-five years have passed, and Kojève’s proposal of a “giving colonialism” has spread beyond
the West and takes a much more materialist gesture. The giving colonialism is key to the
formation of Großräume. China stands as one of the leading countries in this regard. To recall:
China’s One Belt One Road Initiative (BRI) in the past decade (up to 2022) has signed more
than 170 cooperation agreements with 125 countries and 29 international organizations across
Asia and Europe, Africa, Latin America, and the South Pacific. China constructed a Großraum by
imposing not only its economic protocols but also its technological ones. As a response, in the
summer of 2022, the G7 launched the Partnership for Global Infrastructure and Investment
with US$600 billion, claiming to be the “true alternative” to China’s BRI. We can anticipate that
there will be more and more of such initiatives in the future.

The gift of investment, offered as a gesture of friendship, can easily become that of enmity;
giving and taking are two sides of the same coin. The investing country can legally drive
another country into bankruptcy or illegally, in the case of conflicts, disrupt the daily operation
of other countries through the control of technology and resources, similar to how Russia cut
the gas supply to Europe. The friend and enemy demarcation line becomes blurred in these
cases through market creation and infrastructure construction because the development of
market and infrastructure is a new form of colonialism, as Kojève attempted to clarify. The
decision of friend and enemy is nakedly Machiavellian. Today, this is no longer an insight but
almost a truism. However, the most ironic thing lies in the denial of this truism when
articulated by diplomats. It is also due to this mutual penetration that it is nearly impossible to
adhere to the Monroe Doctrine because the interests of each state readily clash with those of
the others, even though they are connected on several levels. Since the fall of the Berlin Wall
and the collapse of the Soviet Union, there have been some thirty years of happy mutual
penetration, though in almost all cases, from developed countries to developing countries and
from developing countries to underdeveloped countries, in the name of globalization. It has
come to the point that globalization, which might equally be termed American imperialism,
produces an autoimmune effect, similar to what Derrida announced after the 9/11 event and
what Peter Thiel describes as the West’s Achilles’s heel since the Enlightenment.100 China,
Russia, and the Middle East could all be understood as symptoms of the autoimmune attack of
American imperialism. Hearing the United States, the very imperialist driving force behind
globalization, suddenly turn against it under Donald Trump’s presidency was almost
unbelievable, and China, the world’s so-called strongest communist country, defended
globalization and free markets.

This gift, however, is not restricted to international aid. International aid remains only one of
the three gift forms, alongside soft power and digital platforms. Soft power belongs to the
realm of culture, which can directly affect the psychosocial life of the people of another
country. For example, American consumerism has popularized the world and brought about a
“liquidation of regional and national culture,” as described by authors such as Jonathan
Crary.101 Or, as Stiegler puts it, consumerism induces disindividuation, as its addictive nature
creates psychic obstacles that impede the pursuit of a higher meaning of existence.102 In a
certain sense, one may say that the United States has already won because it has succeeded in
spreading consumerist culture globally. In other words, the United States has already prevailed
in its rivalry with China since the Chinese economy is highly dependent on the consumerism of
both cheap and luxury goods. This could be said to be the triumph of the thermodynamic
ideology—according to which economic freedom is more fundamental than political freedom;
in this case, a citizen is first of all a consumer. The thermodynamic ideology has been
challenged in the past decades, especially after the financial crisis in 2008, but it continues to
exert its power. Trade wars happen when rules of the thermodynamic ideology are violated;
for example, we often read in the newspaper that a state is accused by others of having
subsidized a particular industry to participate in the global market. This same rhetoric is now
used by both capitalist and communist countries.

We have witnessed the formation of a global “community” via technological globalization, and
within this community, immunological attacks and autoimmune attacks are the new norm—
the ecological mutations (in the sense of Latour) and trade wars could also be seen as these
kinds. Concerning the digital earth in process, we see that the sovereign extends its power
beyond territories via digital platforms; paradoxically, it also means that the sovereign may
lose control, that it fails to suspend the law completely and that the state of exception is only
localized. Despite what many diplomats say, it is naive today to ask other states not to
intervene in their internal affairs since they are under their sovereignty. It is equally naive
when European countries expected Russia to not respond to their sanctions by cutting the
energy supply. We can take censorship as an example. When the state censors a platform, it
only blocks its people from accessing the server; other people outside of the territory can still
access it. The server is not within the legal territory of the former, and according to the latter’s
law, its existence is illegal. The centralized form of power, analogical to monotheism, risks
failing in a world of decentralized infrastructure. In this sense, decentralization and
decentralized technology are often opposed to sovereignty, or even considered as a form of
anarchism, because the state of exception can only be executed when the territory can be
effectively enclosed.

As Benjamin Bratton has rightly pointed out, digital platforms are a part of sovereign power,
and for this reason, he claims that “clouds” are a new element. Clouds do not have a fixed
location because the server could be in any of the countries that provide the service; clouds
store data, mostly personal data, which is supposed to be the private property of the
individuals. Since Edward Snowdon revealed the gigantic surveillance program of the NSA in
June 2013, many countries have started different attempts to localize data: the Russian State
Duma in 2014 adopted the legislation of data localization to retain the data of Russian users
within the Russian territory;103 the European Union introduced General Data Protection
Regulation (GDPR) in 2018 and revealed in 2019 the European cloud project GAIA-X.104 This
might correspond to what Bratton characterizes as the Monroe Doctrine of the cloud, which
defines the digital territories and protocols of access, which he calls Stacks.105 A more
detailed historical account of the socioeconomic development of cloud computing is beyond
our scope here; what interests us is how platforms, with their decentralized infrastructure,
constitute an extension of sovereign power, which inevitably comes into conflict with other
sovereign powers. The recent conflicts between the United States and China over digital
platforms, especially the case of TikTok, made it visible how the control of user data is vital for
political power. TikTok is a company based in the United States, but it is owned by ByteDance,
a Chinese company, of which the Chinese state is a shareholder, and the state, by right, has
the ultimate power to access the data of the foreign users of the platform. It underscores the
Schmittian concept of the sovereign, as evidenced by Chinese digital giants like the ride-hailing
behemoth Didi Global, along with other high-tech and energy companies, voluntarily
withdrawing from the New York Stock Exchange.106 It is further exemplified by the recently
approved “Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act,” which
empowers the U.S. government to compel ByteDance to either shut down or sell TikTok.107

Google is a more important illustration compared to TikTok since it provides far more
comprehensive services than the latter. It is presented as a gift, a free service if one remains in
the limited amounts of cloud storage, which ensures that no matter how rich or poor, whoever
has an internet connection can access such services. For this reason, the volume of user data
that Google retains is huge and increases constantly. Imagine Google deleting this information
one day (for example, due to an accident), the level to which people would suffer involves not
only specific memories but also how lives are organized. Digital platforms have created a new
scenario of the operation of sovereign power, which theoretically has no territorial limits. Even
though platforms comply to local legal systems, they parallelly extend sovereign power in the
way that Google extends American sovereign power. In other words, a Monroe Doctrine of the
cloud is in itself contradictory. The future competition will be based on the speed and
robustness of computational power and its infrastructure, as well as strategies to block others
from having access to advanced technologies and from entering into one’s digital territories.
Therefore we will see more and more regulations imposed within both domestic and
international frameworks.

However, the discourse of digital sovereignty doesn’t take us beyond that of the nation-state,
as it primarily indicates new forms of governmentality and information warfare. The global
pandemic that began in 2020 and the shift of geopolitical center toward the Asia Pacific have
triggered a global immunological defense. States of emergency were declared in most
countries and forced the reorganization of logistics inside and outside the individual countries
as well as the surveillance society through data collection, such as reporting on infection and
vaccination. During the pandemic, the imposition of border control reversed the spatial
consciousness of globalization—the possibility of flying from Asia to Europe for a meeting in
the morning and the next day from Europe to North America for a conference. Such a
consciousness of borders was also reflected in the discourse of digital sovereignty. Digital
sovereignty shrinks to a virtual border sustained by firewalls and ideologies. It risks becoming
reactionary and banal; it pretends to find new planetary configurations by subordinating to
“real politics” in the name of national security. It falls back to a state-authorized digital
extractivism, which now gains more value after the recent success of large language models.
Schmitt’s idea of the Großraum as a new spatial order was intended to overcome individual
sovereign states’ vulnerability and create a multipolar international order. Is it conceivable to
envision a Großraum in the context of the digital realm? The problem is, Schmitt’s Großraum
appears to have only extended the political form of the state, even though his quest for
pluralist politics remains a central question to twenty-first-century politics. Given the intimate
relationship between sovereignty and technology, one is tempted to ponder whether a
nuanced concept of technology could provide new insights into the future of political
thought—a task we aim to explore in the remaining chapters.

Digital technology was meant to be the means of deterritorialization. This new spatial
revolution did not give us a new order but rather returned us to an intuitive immunology often
referred to as the Second Cold War. The discourse on digital sovereignty reinforces the
surveillance society and politics of data harvesting. That is to say, the state wants to have a
monopoly over the data of its people and use it effectively against them and the intervention
of foreign powers. It is also in this sense that the media has been talking about a digital
Leviathan, which is composed of the data of its people. This remains one of the most
superficial images read in newspapers almost daily. If we return to our discussion on the
Leviathan in chapter 4, we might see that a Leviathan is not only that which maintains the
automation of its algorithm as part of the state administration but also that which is capable of
suspending the megamachine, interrupting the recursive computational process and starting a
program anew. Maybe we can conclude here with a Derridian question: Could this power—as
power of epoch opening—give us a true pluralism in the age of the planetary?108
6

An Organology of Wars

Each new machine being for man a new organ—an artificial organ which merely prolongs the
natural organs—his body became suddenly and prodigiously increased in size, without his soul
being able at the same time to dilate to the dimensions of his new body. From this
disproportion there issued the problems, moral, social, international, which most of the
nations endeavoured to solve by filling up the soulless void in the body politic by creating more
liberty, more fraternity, more justice than the world had ever seen.

—Henri Bergson, The Meaning of the War: Life and Matter in Conflict

It may have come to pass, now and then in world history, that entire civilizations were
eradicated. European intellectual history does not know many such cases. The spirit of western
rationalism has until now, even in dire cases of political terror, awakened mental and
intellectual forces that did not come to the surface; at least initially it did not wish to do so.

—Carl Schmitt, Ex Captivitate Salus

In chapter 4, we began with Bergson’s criticism of Germany’s involvement in the First World
War, understood as a consequence of the triumph of mechanism or mechanization. We
contrasted Bergson’s criticism of the mechanical state at the turn of the twentieth century
(1914) and Hegel’s aspiration for the organic state at the turn of the nineteenth century
(1820). Instead of realizing an organic state, Bergson claims that Prussia had turned Germany
into a “scientific barbarity” or a “systematic barbarity.”1 As of yet, no study has connected
Schmitt and Bergson, owing to the fact that their fields of competence appear to be rather
diverse, with one being a legal theorist and the other a philosopher of life—though it is worth
noting that there is a 1913 version of Bergson’s Creative Evolution in Schmitt’s library.2
However, as we tried to show in chapter 4, in Schmitt’s thought, there is a political vitalism
that resists both mechanism and organicism as models of state organization. This vitalism is
found in the discourse of the sovereign as that which decides on exceptions as well as in his
later proposal of the Großraum, which intends to resist the homogenization inherent to
universalism. In this chapter, we would like to move away from the usual interpretation of
Bergson’s vitalism to propose what we might call political organology, offering this as an
alternative way to understand the relation between the state and technology that is likewise in
contrast to Hegel’s political organicism and Schmitt’s concept of political vitalism. This
exposition on Bergson’s organological critique of war aims to introduce a nuanced concept of
technology, exemplified in what I call technodiversity. It continues our endeavor to call the
philosophical foundations of the state into question and our attempt to elaborate on the
relevance of political epistemology. Hence, our focus is less on the use of drones, artificial
intelligence, and nuclear and biochemical weapons in warfare, though these remain crucial
considerations amidst escalating conflicts. Indeed, as we will try to demonstrate in more detail,
we can identify two critiques in Bergson’s address “The Meaning of the War”: one is an
organicist or vitalist critique against mechanism, which is consistent with his writings, namely,
that mechanism failed to explain life because it wants to explain life without life; the other is
an organological critique, which states that machines are precisely artificial organs and that
wars arise from the disjunction or malaise produced by these organs. This organological
critique of war and the state is missing in any existing research on Bergson. The term general
organology was credited to Bergson’s Creative Evolution by the epistemologist Georges
Canguilhem in an article titled “Machine and Organism (1947).”3 Organology is originally a
term used in music and defines the study of musical organs; in this context, it means the study
of the relation between human and technology.

The organological line of thought in French epistemology and philosophy more broadly could
be traced from Bergson’s 1907 Creative Evolution via Canguilhem and Simondon to, more
recently, the thought of Bernard Stiegler. The late Stiegler proposed to understand the
formation of the state as an exosomatic process, which complexifies over time, and that the
state could be considered as an ex-organism. Indeed, what might be the theoretical advantage
of conceptualizing the state in terms of an ex-organism and not an organism? We might first
cast doubt on its theoretical pertinence if, as a theory for understanding the state, it does not
help us to build alternative forms of knowledge and, as such, open new paths of intervention.
For Stiegler, understanding human activities as exosomatic activities, as already discussed in
chapter 3 regarding the bioeconomy of Lotka and Georgescu-Roegen, allows him to mobilize
the concept of entropy as a critical tool to analyze the Anthropocene as an Entropocene. From
Stiegler’s perspective, politics should mean a negentropic war against entropic capitalism.
However, Stiegler said few words about the nation-state, maintaining a more or less Hegelian
position that neoliberalism desires to liquidate the state, so the state’s task is to defend order
and public institutions against this form of destruction; he is also confrontational to anarchism,
particularly in the French context, where he considers anarchists to be manipulated by the
mass media. This, nevertheless, leaves us the space to enquire into the organology of the
state. To attain a certain clarity of inquiry, we will have to go back to Bergson’s organological
critique of war.

§26. The Disproportion of Organs and the Hubris of Wars

Bergson considered that the First World War resulted from the problem inherent to the
development of mechanical science. This might, on first appearance, seem like a strange
argument for many contemporary readers since, according to well-known historical
explanations, if the cause of the First World War was at once economic and political, how then
could mechanical science, which was a part of industrialism, be the true source of war?
Bergson observed that in the nineteenth century, there was an organological expansion that
gave “a wholly unforeseen extension to the mechanical arts and had equipped man in less
than fifty years with more tools than he had made during the past thousands of years he had
lived on the earth.”4 Put into the terminology of Mumford, this development replaced the
human parts in the megamachine with mechanical art and consequently transformed the
mentality of the megamachine. This abrupt expansion of the megamachine is, for Bergson, the
source of war. The mechanization of the nineteenth century caused an unexpected effect on
humanity: “his body became suddenly and prodigiously increased in size, without his soul
being able at the same time to dilate to the dimensions of his new body.” In The Two Sources
of Morality and Religion, published in 1932, Bergson repeated his analysis:

Now, in this body, distended out of all proportion, the soul remains what it was, too small to
fill it, too weak to guide it. Hence the gap between the two. Hence the tremendous social,
political and international problems which are just so many definitions of this gap, and which
provoke so many chaotic and ineffectual efforts to fill it. What we need are new reserves of
potential energy—moral energy this time.5

Bergson considers tools and instruments to be artificial organs, arguing that in the nineteenth
century, mechanical artifices progressed at such a rate to cause a disruption between
inorganic and organic organs. Technological acceleration occurred not only in industry but was
also felt everywhere in society. It also presented a new opportunity for politics, just as Filippo
Tommaso Marinetti claimed in “The Futurist Manifesto” (1909), published five years prior to
Bergson’s speech: “Why should we look back, when what we want is to break down the
mysterious doors of the Impossible?”6 Human society was hence disrupted by a form of
negative organology: through the expansion in exosomatic organs, a new hubris is produced,
which then expressed itself as moral, social, and international problems. Such a conflict of
organs could not be pacified; instead, it produced violence and destruction. This hubris is
considered the origin of war in Bergson’s analysis; it demands moral energy as its counterpart,
which can transform it or give it a new direction. While the world was trying to spiritualize
machines, an “inferior force,” by which Bergson means mechanical thinking, was taking a
rather opposite direction. This “inferior force,” as we mentioned earlier, fails to explain life,
and therefore, when it comes to dominate the tendency of society, it reverses the relation
between life and technology: technology is no longer in service of life, but rather it destroys
life from within. Bergson expressed his anger in a series of questions in his 1914 speech:

What kind of a world would it be if this mechanism should seize the human race entirely,
and if the peoples, instead of raising themselves to a richer and more harmonious diversity, as
persons may do, were to fall into the uniformity of things? What kind of a society would that
be which should mechanically obey a word of command mechanically transmitted; which
should rule its science and its conscience in accordance therewith; and which should lose,
along with the sense of justice, the power to discern between truth and falsehood? What
would mankind be when brute force should hold the place of moral force? What new
barbarism, this time final, would arise from these conditions to stifle feeling, ideas, and the
whole civilization of which the old barbarism contained the germ? What would happen, in
short, if the moral effort of humanity should turn in its tracks at the moment of attaining its
goal, and if some diabolical contrivance should cause it to produce the mechanization of spirit
instead of the spiritualization of matter?7

Bergson’s criticism, spoken more than one hundred years ago, is still valid today, especially if
we keep in mind that predictions and prophecies of an imminent Third World War have
proliferated since the pandemic started. War as a possibility is that which stabilizes the
relation between different lands, but war as an actual event doesn’t possesses this stabilizing
effect, if not exactly its opposite; instead, it necessarily leads to total military mobilization and
destruction. In the Hegelian sense, the spirit progresses in history, and such a progression
takes a recursive form; the spirit externalizes in order to internalize, without which there is no
progress. However, in Bergson’s speech on war, he indicates that there has been a failure to
respond to technological acceleration; that is, the spirit failed to internalize what it
externalized. Such a failure is due to the spirit’s lack of strength to spiritualize matter; it
remains trapped in materiality from which it is no longer capable of leaping. We may say that
war, in general, according to Bergson’s analysis, is an organological problem that occurs when
the spirit fails to render artificial external organs compatible. This failure shows that
conceptualizing the state as either mechanism or organism is insufficient for understanding the
state’s organological nature. For Hegel and his students—for example, Ernst Kapp, whom we
discussed in chapter 2—the organism stands as a counterforce of mechanism and, therefore, a
possible exodus, as Kapp wrote when comparing the despotic state and the liberal state: “The
more mechanically a state becomes governed, the more despotically it is governed; the more
organically a state governs itself, the freer it is.”8 However, these two images of the state,
mechanism and organism, despotism and liberalism, actually share the same fate.

When mechanism is identified not only with technology but also with the mentality of a
nation, that is to say, a nation looks at the world from the view of mechanical rationality, then
this hubris may lead to a violence that wants to render the whole world according to such
principles. This could be applied to the German nation of the First World War, Japan (as well as
Germany and Italy) of the Second World War, and, more recently, the Russian war in Ukraine.
For the Kyoto School thinkers, modern science and technology (or more precisely “civilization
of mechanism”) are symbols of the decadence of the West, which the East was forced to
adopt, while the only way to overcome this decadence was to return to the absolute
nothingness that is the core of the Eastern thought.9 For Russian right-wing thinkers such as
Maxim Kalashnikov10 and Alexander Dugin, Western technology is the synonym of the anti-
Christ, which represses the Russian truth; such a Russian truth will be revealed, once Western
oppression is negated and annihilated. Dugin adopted Schmitt’s concept of the Großraum (a
term also appropriated by Kyoto School thinkers to conceptualize the Greater East Asia Co-
Prosperity Sphere during the Second World War) seeing it as a countermovement against
Western imperialism (here, not only American imperialism, though it stands as the most
confrontational). A multipolar world that includes Eurasia is, indeed, an intuitive solution to
the current geopolitical problem; however, we should also ask if this is not merely an ideology,
an ideology that opposes positions such as the liberal and the authoritarian as seen from the
Western perspective or the imperialist and the repressed as seen from the non-Western
perspective. For we know ideologies reduce the complexity of the actual world to simplified
categories through constructed contexts, settings, and antagonistic emotions, but they are not
yet reason grounded in concrete historical conditions, simultaneously aspiring to elevate
above them. In this sense, Schmitt’s Großraum remains an anti-imperialist ideology; what
maintains its diversity and heterogeneity is beyond the question of ideology, something that
Schmitt failed to address.

Technology has pervaded everyday social and political life, and organological mutation
intensifies when technology accelerates exponentially, as it has in the past hundred years. The
failure to spiritualize the expansion of the new organs leads to hubris, which expresses itself as
conflict and war. Indeed, we can say that this organological problem has appeared in every
epoch—in a phenomenological sense, it suspends the previous epoch. This process of
suspension becomes more and more intensified when industrialization enters new phases,
particularly the disruptive phase that we are currently witnessing. Bergson concludes,
therefore, “The last war, together with those future ones which we can dimly foresee, if we
are indeed doomed to have more wars, is bound up with the industrial character of our
civilization.”11 War is bound up with the industrial character, not only because of the
competition for resources and goods but also because of something almost tragically produced
as internal to civilization’s technological progress.

§27. From a Cybernetics of Freedom to an Organology of Differences

If the problem were simply about whether technology was mechanistic or organismic, then it
would be possible to conclude that, by the twenty-first century and after cybernetics,
Bergson’s critique of machines is no longer valid since, as cybernetics claims, and as we
discussed in chapter 3 and detailed in Recursivity and Contingency, the cybernetic machine can
no longer be subsumed under the eighteenth-century category of mechanism, being in the
constant process of becoming organic. As such, cybernetic models have their ground more in
biology than physics because they are recursive machines, namely, nonlinear machines,
instead of mechanical and linear machines. In chapter 3, we also examined how the Hegelian
reflective logic could be extended into different domains and converge into a planetary
reflection. Should not this program be the best projection of the future of human beings?

If Hegel’s imagination of the organic unity of the state could be gradually assimilated by a
cybernetic operation, then we might be able to claim that, more than ever before in history,
we are on the verge of realizing such an ideal. However, in chapters 1 and 2, we also saw how
Geist, as a planetary thinking, encountered its own limit. We are currently seeing that the
world powers in the East and the West are incisively engaging with each other in economic
competition and military expansion; the song of war has already been heard. At the same
time, as we have already seen in chapter 3, cybernetics goes beyond cultural differences and
attempts to grasp humanity and the earth as a whole. We see that cybernetics presents us
with two paths. The first is the perfection of the nation-state via a global network of artificial
intelligence systems, which could take over state administration and planning—a replacement
of the Hegelian middle (thinking) class and public servants with robotics and artificial
intelligence; the second path is the construction of a digital earth that transcends the nation-
state, one that perhaps provides us with a new humanity, similar to how Beer interpreted
Teilhard de Chardin. These two paths are apparently in conflict with each other, and
retrospectively, we can see that the second path is obscured and rendered almost unpractical
by the first path—so far, the twenty-first century seems to be still a century of nationalism.

Cybernetics today is falsely associated with surveillance capitalism or societies of control; the
association of the cybernetic movement with military or state-related think tanks may
contribute to this image. Nevertheless, the importance of cybernetics shouldn’t be obscured
by this kind of journalism. The pandemic has already demonstrated the centrality of digital
technology in population control. A disciplinary society in the sense of Michel Foucault does
not fade into the background but rises to the fore during such occasions. The cybernetic
system that we are witnessing today, be that social credit system or state administration, is a
closed system in the sense that it aims to perfect the predictability of the system as
anticipated by Laplace’s demon. Or, in other words, in societies of control, all systems are
becoming—or at least want to be—comparable to Laplace’s demon, possessing the ability to
determine every future event. These demons have become ubiquitous; as it is frequently put,
“Algorithms know you better than you know yourself.” Preemptive technologies are applied at
the personal level for the purpose of maintaining consumerism. At the political level, they
imply preemptive wars, as has become particularly true post 9/11: antiterrorism, anti–
potential threats such as the war in Iraq and recently in Ukraine.

Humans desire the ability to predict, yet acquiring this ability has proven challenging. Fortune
tellers in different cultures have used different methods to predict an individual’s future, be
that through divination or cartomancy. Ancient divination is also based on patterns or
statistics—for example, in palm reading or horoscopes. If we consider all of these forms of
divination to be an intuitive understanding of statistics, then it is clear that today’s recursive
algorithms integrated with ubiquitous censors ranging from smartphones to all detective
devices on every corner of the street are capable of not only better predictions but also
recommendations related to an individual’s next move. This is perhaps not the only possible
destiny for cybernetics; indeed, it is highly problematic to impose such a moral verdict on it
simply because of a particular use of it in society. In an article titled “Steps to a Cybernetics of
Autonomy,” Francisco Varela distinguished two paths for cybernetics; one is that of John von
Neumann, the other Wiener’s:
 Norbert Wiener by emphasizing the quality of independence, autonomy, creativity, the
quality of living beings to create their meaning, to create their world. John von Neumann by
emphasizing the quality of specifying decision rules, procedures for exact computation,
control. During those early days, it was unclear what was going to be the dominant trend of
those two sides of the issue—whether control, autonomy or both. It seems to me that it is
quite clear—looking back from the 1980ies—that von Neumann actually prevailed.12

Francisco Varela suggests further developing Wiener’s cybernetic approach, which the von
Neumann model has thus far only undermined. However, Varela’s solution does not seem to
address the question of freedom. He appears to have made the error I call the dualism of
critique. That is to say, Varela contrasts the lineage of Descartes, Von Neumann, and Turing
with that of the autonomous system. The autonomous system is capable of self-determination
(the so-called eigen-behavior), and meanings emerge in the operation (the so-called
operational closure, which is maintained by internal regularities). I call it a dualism of critique
because, in pretending to go beyond dualism, it falls prey to a dualism that is itself the
“operational closure” of the critique. Therefore, the opposition between mechanism, which he
associated with Descartes, von Neumann, and Turing (this association is controversial in the
eyes of historians of science, as contested in Recursivity and Contingency) and organism, which
he describes as an autonomous system, in fact continues the legacy of modern philosophy. The
path Varela wants to explore only confirms the becoming organic of the cybernetic systems
described in Recursivity and Contingency. When it becomes “autonomous,” it only means that
the system is subsequently more powerful in handling contingency and modelling normativity.
In Recursivity and Contingency, I tried to show how the formation of the organizing inorganic
(technological systems such as platforms, in contrast to organized inorganic, such as tools and
instruments) imposes a problem that we are forced to answer: the question of human
freedom in the technological epoch. If Kant’s third antinomy was based on an opposition
between the laws of nature and freedom (which we discussed in chapter 1 together with
Hegel’s criticism of it), then today, this antinomy has returned, only now with new clothing, as
the opposition between the autonomy of technological systems and freedom—this was the
central theme of Recursivity and Contingency. Given the organic becoming of technological
systems that possess a higher degree of flexibility and predictability, freedom becomes a
question of calculating probabilities.

If Hegel could claim that the political state was a milestone of human reason since it is only in
the political state that freedom could be realized, it is because, in Hegel’s time, the organic
constitutes an ideal yet to be achieved. The state remained a cybernetic idea that found its
concrete existence in human flesh. Cybernetic machines in the twentieth century have
concretized into a digital form that now have the full potential to replace almost all tedious
administrative tasks. We may even see within a given time the obsolescence of politicians, as
Günther Anders said about the human being. In the end, the engineers will be the guardians of
the state. Later, no guardians will be required because machines will be capable of moral
judgments and self-maintenance. This image may still sound futuristic if not fictional, but it is
nonetheless already foreseeable in the current technological tendency. Predicting the future
has become a common task in all disciplines: literature, art, natural science, technology
studies, and so on. This development is not without its price to pay; as Bergson pointed out,
one has to smoothen its organological rupture. The political state in the age of autonomous
technological systems has to transform itself in a seemingly contradictory way. First, it is
forced to turn itself into a political vital force by renewing a decisionism in the Schmittian
sense, as has been seen in the normalization of states of exceptions occurring in both the so-
called democratic and authoritarian states. The sovereign exhibits itself as the authority of
exception, overriding all kinds of law, including programming codes. Second, it is forced to
make the state administration fully compatible with technological systems, in other words, to
integrate them into the executive and judiciary operations to increase efficiency and reduce
cost.

However, once the technological systems attain a certain degree of autonomy, they no longer
follow the subjective will of the political leaders since they are driven by both the tendency to
rationalization (what makes the evolution of technical objects possible) and the logic of
accumulation (the socioeconomical motivation of technological innovations). The tendency of
rationalization is difficult to alter because it requires specialist knowledge, which bureaucrats
typically lack. Furthermore, their attempts to alter the tendency frequently result in absurd
scenarios. For example, censorship based on keywords often ends up censoring the opinions of
politicians themselves. This process of technological deterritorialization weakens the power of
the state because it means there are more processes of negotiation, and negotiation often
leads to a compromise of power. Therefore, we might say that it is not globalization itself that
undermines the nation-states, as theorists such as Antonio Negri believe,13 but rather the
technological system and its power of rationalization forces the state to interrupt the
economic order to maintain its vitality and retain its power, thus the twilight of globalization
that we see today is the consequence of the transformation of the megamachine.

It is unclear how the nation-state can maintain its vitality without going to war and succumbing
to self-destruction, just as Russia has been doing since February 2022 with its “special military
operation” in Ukraine and more recently the war between Israel and Hamas. However, the
Russia–Ukraine war is merely one example of how the current paradigm of technical
rationalization is challenging a world order founded on nation-states. This process of
rationalization is characterized first by the complexification and materialization of causal
relations in digital or maybe later in quantic representations, and second by the increasing
capacity of determination of correlations and normalizations. As long as humanity persists,
another even more aggressive paradigm will emerge, and technological rationalization will
proceed in such a way that the world spirit will be able to develop toward the most actual and
rational configuration of the world. However, when one no longer believes in the world
spirit14 and dismisses it as a false fiction used to justify the West’s colonization of the world,
as Marx does by reducing the world spirit to the world market, the world spirit becomes
nothing more than a joke of Hegel’s fantasy in Jena. It might take a long time to recognize that
the world spirit does not, in fact, belong to the West or the East; it lived neither in Jena nor in
Moscow, for the spirit belongs to the world and the world ought to become spiritual. Hegel’s
world spirit, a synonym for human collective intelligence or reason, could still be expanded to
respond to the current planetary condition.

Maybe it is worth returning to Wiener’s cybernetics of autonomy, a path Varela proposed to

deepen. It is perhaps pertinent to add to Varela that this autonomy is not innocent for Wiener.
In a 1960 article titled “Some Moral and Technical Consequences of Automation,” Wiener
rejected the stereotype that machines cannot have any originality; instead, he sees, and we
can now confirm some sixty years after his observation, that machines are more than ever able
to assimilate the behavior of living beings. And it was precisely because of this that Wiener
pointed out the following problem: “One of the chief causes of the danger of disastrous
consequences in the use of the learning machine is that man and machine operate on two
distinct time scales so that the machine is much faster than man and the two do not gear
together without serious difficulties.”15

We could say that Wiener’s warning is twofold. First, artificial organs override organic organs,
and the latter is rendered obsolete and helpless. However, it is not limited to the conflict
between bodily organs and prostheses but also institutions that largely rely on human factors
and technological systems. Second, human planners, including scientists and political leaders,
must think on a much longer time scale—for example, fifty years ahead of their time to
anticipate the worst scenarios that might arise due to the speed of automation. However, who
in the world besides dictators, with a brain composed of organic cells, can make such a
prediction, not to mention that a fifty-year plan might only apply to machines of the early
1960s (when Wiener expressed his warning) and no longer for our time? The only way to
predict would be to build models continuously collecting large amounts of data and constantly
updating their predictions. But such models are often closed, meaning that they can only
analyze the future development of a narrow domain by excluding most of the external factors
that remain unknown, and that could contingently become significant factors. In other words,
data extractionism, which pretends to show us probabilities, leads to an exhaustion of
possibilities by excluding the improbable.

If we put aside this dispute between mechanism and vitalism, Bergson’s organological critique
becomes more significant than ever. This call for an organological critique could also be
identified in the late Wiener, though he did not go any further than highlighting the
significance of prosthesis. Wiener proposed to go beyond the typical approach of rendering
“unto man the things which are man’s and unto the computer the things which are the
computer’s”: “What we now need is an independent study of systems involving both human
and mechanical elements. This system should not be prejudiced either by a mechanical or
antimechanical bias. I think that such a study is already under way and that it will promise a
much better comprehension of automatization.”16 Wiener is probably right in insisting on the
study of technological systems, and for this reason, Simondon also considers cybernetics an
“organology.”17 Such studies should abandon the mechanism and organism opposition from
the outset to understand the profound impact of the technological systems that no longer
seem to maintain symmetry between humans and machines. This is the task of what became
known as general organology, which may already be found in Bergson and continues via
Canguilhem and Simondon to Stiegler. Today, following Wiener’s warning, there are growing
disparities between artificial organs and the soul for two key reasons. First, on the individual
level, the transhumanist ideology continues to promote human enhancement as a future,
namely, the desire to directly modify the organs via either DNA technologies or
nanotechnologies in order to augment senses and bodies. Thus, the body becomes a new field
of competition, achieved not through training but through consumerism. When human
enhancement is legalized, we will enter a process of artificial selection subsumed to
consumerism, inevitably creating new political classes distinguished by enhanced and not-yet-
enhanced. Second, the technological systems, which I have termed organizing organics, such
as Google, Facebook, Tencent, or Alibaba, far exceed the capacity of human faculties. They
impose challenges to the finitude of the individual faculties and to the power structure of
institutions, including the political state. This is not only because they transgress territorial
limits and inevitably also transgress legal frameworks but also because they produce an
extraordinary “extra-state” power, which we will discuss more in chapter 7.

§28. The Conflict of Tendencies and the Recurrence of Mysticism

How shall we take up Wiener’s task, namely, to understand technological systems but also to
intervene in their development and take care of the hubris they produce? Before we address
the question of the state, we might want to go back to Bergson’s organological critique.
Because if our framing of the above problem as an organological one is valid, then it might be
possible to identify some potential answers in Bergson’s accounts. Toward the end of The Two
Sources of Morality and Religion, in a section titled “The True Vocation of Machines,” Bergson
provided some thoughts on how to place machines into their appropriate place. If Bergson
calls this their true vocation, it is because machines have thus far been used incorrectly,
producing a mechanization of spirit instead of a spiritualization of matter. For Bergson, the
mechanization of spirit does not mean turning the human being into a mechanized being, but
rather it promotes a life based on material comfort, amenities, and luxuries. Industrialization,
since the nineteenth century, has been largely about the mobilization of machines and
assigning them an important role in the production and distribution process. Industrialization
depends on a generalized mechanization process, one that enables mass production and can
also lead to overproduction, the immanent crisis of capitalism. Overproduction is resolved by
the thermodynamic ideology, according to which the market is capable of self-regulation. The
WTO, IMF, and World Bank are the trinity of power that pushes forward deregulations and
consolidates the rules of the thermodynamic ideology. Bergson did not have the word
consumerism in his time, so he often uses phrases such as “taste for luxuries” or “mere
comfort” to describe this consequence of industrialization and the emergence of
consumerism. The mechanization of the spirit resulted in a conclusion involving “exaggerated
comfort and luxury for the few, rather than liberation for all.”18 This tendency presents a
positive feedback loop, similar to Georgescu-Roegen’s “circumdrome” of the electric razor,
discussed in chapter 3. David Lapoujade formulates it in the following way:

This is because human experience is a prisoner of circles, of all the innumerable circles that
the intelligence imposes on thought and that make the human species turn around on itself.
Man is literally surrounded by his intelligence. If there is something that Bergson didn’t stop
combatting, it is these circles, precisely because they make it impossible for us to carry out the
necessary leaps to change the level of reality.19

To resolve the problem of mechanization is not to abandon machines and go back to simple
tools, as Bergson himself implied.20 Instead, and as a counterproposal, he suggests returning
to a simple life with the help of science. Bergson understands mechanization as a “natural gift”
(don naturel) that the human possesses.21 And indeed, the emergence of mechanical science
belongs to the tendency of the intellect.22 Mechanization should be situated as a historical
moment where artificial organs complexified and reached an organization that allowed them
to become autonomous, or what Simondon calls “technical individuals.” For Simondon,
technical individuals are those technical objects that possess an associated milieu. The
associated milieu allows the machines to stabilize themselves and resist external disturbances;
or in more cybernetic language, it is the negative feedback loop between the machine and its
environment.23 The machine is not only able to resist the disturbance of the environment by
distinguishing the validity of the inputs, such as between a meaningful input and noise, but
also to integrate the environment as part of its operation. For example, the current of the river
is used to set the Guimbal turbine into movement, but if the current is too fast and the turbine
produces too much heat due to the joule effect, then the river can act as a cooling agent to
carry away the heat and prevent the turbine from self-destruction, which is often the case for
turbines that use air cooling. It is precisely with the emergence of an associated milieu that
machines possess the capacity of becoming organic or “holistic.”24 Before the emergence of
the industrial technical individual such as automatic machines, the craftsmen were at the
center of the tools and created the tools’ associated milieu by using their own bodies—in
other words, the craftsmen were themselves technical individuals; since industrialization, with
the development of technical individuals in factories, human beings have lost their status,
being expelled from the center of production.

The twentieth century was the epoch of the technical ensemble, which refers to the grouping
of technical individuals that form a working environment, such as the installation of machines
in laboratories and factories. Simondon suggests finding a new role for the human being in this
ensemble: like a conductor who resonates with musicians, the human being has to become the
coordinator of machines through the feedback loop provided by the new theory of
cybernetics.25 The formulation of a lineage from the technical element, technical individuals,
and finally, technical ensemble is illuminating because it outlines not only a history of
technological concretization but also a subtle relation between society and technology that
Marxism failed to understand. At the same time, it also invites us to think the fate of this
lineage in the twenty-first century, when technical ensembles such as laboratories and
factories cease to be the major form of technological organization—we can already see quite
clearly that in developed countries most of the factories are today fully automatized, hence,
what we are experiencing are technological systems such as platforms, not individual
machines. That is to say, the orchestra no longer exists, and the conductor has no difficulty
finding virtual musicians that resonate perfectly with him or her. Contrary to Simondon’s
proposal of identifying a new role for human beings, Bergson suggests giving machines a new
vocation. Bergson’s suggestion could even seem paradoxical: go beyond mechanization
through machines.26

What does it mean to go beyond mechanization through machines? This tautological and, to
some extent, tragist gesture is not without significance,27 and here lies one of the most
important messages of Bergson’s The Two Sources of Morality and Religion. Mechanization is a
tendency that opposes another tendency, as static religion does to dynamic religion,
intelligence to instinct. The concept of tendency is fundamental to Bergson’s analysis of the
evolution of society. We may say that there is a fundamental tendency that is the impetus of
life, the élan vital. When encountering an obstacle (in the form of material and external
conditions), this original tendency bifurcates into two opposed tendencies, which Bergson calls
the law of dichotomy.28 During the concurrence of the two tendencies, one has the upper
hand and undermines the other. The dominant tendency will manifest and grow until it
reaches a tipping point (or frenzy), beyond which a civilizational tragedy will occur. This is
known as the law of the twofold frenzy.29 The dynamic of the two tendencies could be
visualized as the movement of a pendulum: once it swings to one extreme, it will then fall and
swing to another. The law of dichotomy does not depend on the internal status of the system,
but rather it is a response to the external exigence.30 In this sense, we can also understand
why Bergson rejected teleology in history, and, indeed, for him, “Finality is external, or it is
nothing at all.”31 There is no predefined plot for evolution nor for history; rather, history is
another recursive process moving from a closed society to an open society and back again, or
from one tendency to its opposite, which, in turn, then swings to another opposed tendency.
Bergson describes it in the following terms:

Man loves the dramatic; he is strongly inclined to pick out from a whole more or less
extended period of history those characteristics which make of it a struggle between two
parties, two societies or two principles, each of them in turn coming off victorious. But the
struggle is here only the superficial aspect of an advance. The truth is that a tendency on which
two different views are possible can only put forth its maximum, in quantity or quality, if it
materializes these two possibilities into moving realities, each one of which leaps forward and
monopolizes the available space, while the other is on the watch unceasingly for its own turn
to come.32
Suppose mechanization is one of these two tendencies coming out of the impetus of life, then
spiritualization is another which has been waiting for its time to come and take over as the
dominating tendency. The struggle between tendency and its countertendency might define
what Bergson means by life in contradistinction to Darwinism.33 What is particular in this
“struggle” is not one cancelling the other, but rather one taking the lead by integrating and
preserving the other.34 These two competing tendencies have to be materialized; in other
words, even the tendency of spiritualization is not simply something that happens in the mind
alone; it has to present itself in material form and possesses its agency. For Bergson, this
process of spiritualization should be understood as a type of mysticism. What Bergson means
by mysticism is not entirely consistent with the conventional concept of the mystical as that
which describes contact with a transmundane superior power. Instead, the mystical life
means, first and foremost, the capacity to see the limit of a civilization dominated by one
tendency and the capacity to use intuition to envelop it or to resituate it into a larger reality,
i.e., the impetus of life. This form of mystic experience is present in everyday life; for example,
when confronting a fatal accident or disease, the everyday routine is suspended, and a new
path is opened. A closed society, when it comes to its end, has exhausted the impetus that
motivated the dominant tendency of that society—for example, mechanization. In view of this
impasse, certain privileged individuals who are conscious of this problem might be able to
redirect the impetus toward another tendency: “If the individual is fully conscious of this, if the
fringe of intuition surrounding his intelligence is capable of expanding sufficiently to envelop
its object, that is the mystic life.”35

Here, Bergson’s method comes into full light. The mystical life is a countertendency, and the
possibility of such a countertendency belongs to the capacity of certain individuals who are
capable of seeing the limit of the current tendency, i.e., mechanism in the case of Bergson.
Being aware of this limit, and through intuition, the tendency is countered by another
tendency so as to return it to the impetus of life (this is very different from introducing more
regulations). As Gilles Deleuze claims, intuition, here, is an exact philosophical method.36
Intuition does not mean simply grasping the silhouette of things; on the contrary, it is that
which allows one to reach the thing in itself. In contrast to deduction and induction, which give
rise to concepts and ideas, intuition allows the perception of a genetic process. This is also
Simondon’s debt, or maybe more accurately, a homage to Bergson in Part III of On the Mode
of Existence of Technical Objects, where philosophical intuition is granted a higher status than
induction and deduction, namely, the operation of idea and concept. Intuition reveals a larger
reality, resituating the dominating tendency as merely one part of reality, balanced by other
parts. A closer reading of Simondon reveals that the term tendency often appears in On the
Mode of Existence of Technical Objects and roughly twenty-one times in Part III of the book,
the section where Simondon outlines a genesis of technicity. Here, the genesis of technicity
starts with two tendencies, one that departs from the magic unity, namely, the tendency
toward religion, and a countertendency toward technics, each producing two other
tendencies, one toward theory and the other toward practice. However, we have to note some
fundamental differences. In contrast to Bergson’s theory of tendency, bifurcation in
Simondon’s theory does not take place due to the obstacle of an external and material
condition, but rather it occurs when the system itself attains saturation, namely, the moment
when the unity and identity of the system is exceeded, and it is forced to bifurcate so as to
resolve internal tensions or incompatibility. In Simondon, the two tendencies, religion and
technics, search for a unification between ground and figure analogical to that of the magic
unity. In Bergson, the tendencies do not search for unity. Instead, the opposed tendencies
function like a pendulum that swings between two extremes. Bergson defines opposition as
the antithesis of two tendencies, such as open and closed societies, which are not absolute
opposites but two ends of a pendulum’s movement. As a result, the dualism between the
mystical and the technological dissolves, and we perceive the need for something new:

So let us not merely say, as we did above, that the mystical summons up the mechanical. We
must add that the body, now larger, calls for a bigger soul, and that mechanism should mean
mysticism. The origins of the process of mechanization body, proportion, are indeed more
mystical than we might imagine. Machinery will find its true vocation again, it will render
services in proportion to its power, only if mankind, which it has bowed still lower to the earth,
can succeed, through it, in standing erect and looking heavenwards.37

This is not to say that mechanism is something mysterious, but rather is mechanism, first of all,
the materialization of one of the tendencies of the élan vital. In other words, mechanism has
its origin not in an alien power, not in any errant thinking, but in the impetus of life. Second,
mechanization, insofar it is a natural gift, as well as the irrefutable organs, have to be allocated
with the right vocation so that they can return humanity to the openness of the élan vital
instead of ceaselessly producing hubris. It remains to be asked how to understand such a
notion of tendency in today’s context, almost one hundred years after Bergson’s organological
critique of wars.

§29. The Dynamics of the Technical Tendency and Technical Fact

Today, we should consider what the conditions might be to shift away from such a negative
organology. The call for deceleration resonates among sociologists, scientists, and
technologists. There is, of course, the warning from Stephen Hawking, who claimed, “The
development of full artificial intelligence could spell the end of the human race. . . . It could
take off on its own and re-design itself at an ever-increasing rate. Humans, who are limited by
slow biological evolution, couldn’t compete and would be superseded,”38 as well as, though
ironically, from Elon Musk, who calls for an AI slowdown. In April 2023, Elon Musk, alongside
more than a thousand entrepreneurs and AI researchers, called for a six-month suspension of
giant AI experiments in order to formulate its dangers and ethical uses. It is not that AI will
rebel against humans, as seen in popular science-fiction films, but rather, as we have been
attempting to demonstrate, it is more a question of how a negative organology might arise
from there.
Is mysticism a way out of this modernity? One can find traces in Bergson’s 1932 book of the
call for a mystic genius or an “Enlightenment ideal of humanity.”39 However, this would miss
the significance of why Bergson ends the book with a call for the true vocation of machines,
not humanity. When Bergson says that “mechanism should mean mysticism,” he no longer
opposes mechanism to mysticism. Instead, he sees mechanism and mysticism as two
tendencies of his epoch and that mysticism has to make mechanism its very possibility. As we
saw earlier, a mystic life does not mean a religious life, a life led by dogma. Like all religions, a
mystic life contains the primordial act of believing.40 A mystic life is one in which the
nonrational (to be distinguished from the irrational) is rationalized on the horizon of belief and
in the consistency of living, like Heidegger’s last God.41 A mystic life starts when one sees the
limit of the dominating tendency, just as Bergson saw the limit of the constant materialization
of spirit, that which turns humanity into barbarians. In Bergson’s writing, the universality of
mechanism is counteracted by the particularity of mystic life. There is no single mystic life,
since recognizing the limit is one thing and responding to it is another. We are not suggesting
waiting for the intervention of a mystical force from without; instead, we are following
Bergson’s insistence on overcoming mechanism through machines. Cybernetic machines are
much more powerful than mechanical machines. They could provide more flexibility and
possibilities to deal with the current crisis instead of being regarded as a permanent threat.
Mysticism thus refers to a much larger and more powerful force capable of deploying
mechanism for its own service. Instead of being bound to mechanism, it establishes a new
space that encompasses it. If we generalize what has been said here, then mysticism stands
symbolically for that which can envelop mechanism and bring it back to life. In this sense,
mysticism comes to mean what Bergson calls the attachment to life. The attachment to life is a
deviation from the homogeneity of mechanization and a movement toward the new vocation
of machines.

To understand the implication of Bergson’s analysis in relation to technological development,

we will have to turn to André Leroi-Gourhan’s reading of Bergson. Leroi-Gourhan, in Milieu et
Technique, took up Bergson’s concept of tendency and formulated what he calls the technical
tendency,42 which is a tendency that is accepted and materially realized in all environments;
the laws of nature are such a tendency. However, this does not mean that the laws of physics
are just tendencies. Instead, it means that laws of nature are part of an evolutionary impetus
in constant externalization. This tendency is illustrated by the fact that we never see a square
or triangular wheel in any civilization, only round. However, the technical tendency alone
cannot explain the diversity of artifacts. The knife that the Inuit use for dissecting a whale is
very different from that for a caribou and is also different from those used in Japan. Leroi-
Gourhan developed a different concept that he calls technical facts. These facts are
contingently produced as a result of the encounter between the technical tendency and its
particular environment and can be understood as a kind of locality:

The tendency which, by its universal nature, is loaded with all the possibilities that can be
expressed in general laws, traverses the internal milieu, bathes in the mental traditions of each
human group; it acquires particular properties, just as a light ray acquires various properties by
passing through different bodies, it encounters the external milieu which offers these acquired
properties an irregular penetration, and at the point of contact between the internal milieu
and the external milieu materializes this layer [pellicule] of objects which constitute the
furniture of men.43

The technical tendency and technical facts constitute a pair that determines the development
of a technical milieu that varies between ethnic groups. Leroi-Gourhan offers a more
schematic way of defining their difference, arguing that technical tendencies “can be
materialized anytime and anywhere,” whereas technical facts “will only be born identical
insofar as a certain identity of environment is offered to them.”44 However, Leroi-Gourhan
also suggests that technical facts are not only contingent products of the tendency’s encounter
with the exterior milieu (such as natural resources, wind, mountains, water, and so on) but are
also selected and altered by the internal milieu. For example, in almost every civilization, we
find the use of swords; however, it is not only the material that varies between these swords,
but also their forms, use, and aesthetics are different too: “But the simple observation of an
animal or a technique demonstrates that the general trend does not contain all the
characteristics: the sword, which achieves a harmonious whole in all its types, nevertheless
offers extremely numerous forms, each conditioned by the material, others by the particular
use of the weapon, local fencing customs, aesthetic traditions, etc.”45

We might deduce through readings of Bergson and Leroi-Gourhan that the technical tendency
and technical facts are, in fact, two distinct tendencies, whereas one universalizes, the other
particularizes. I tried to argue in The Question Concerning Technology in China that technical
facts are not only limited by their material environment but also by the cosmology of a locality.
Cosmology, in this context, serves as a synonym for a reality that surpasses the confines of
technology; instead, technology is encompassed and balanced by other kinds of thinking. The
concept of locality or place is one of the resources that allow us to think further about the
question of diversification and pluralization. Locality is not in opposition to the planetary; on
the contrary, the planetary has to be first of all contemplated from the perspective of locality.
Otherwise, we might risk getting lost “among the stars.” However, it is not limited to what
Leroi-Gourhan calls the external milieu (namely, the natural environment) but also the internal
milieu, which is defined by customs and traditions. Returning to a locality means two things:
first, it means giving technology an appropriate place (such as a new vocation), since modern
technology recognizes space but not place, insofar as space for technology means dimensions
and their numerical values; to give technology a place means resituating it in a broader reality
instead of being determined by it. Second, it means to rediscover and reinvent a
technodiversity that is compatible with the place, which respects the locality. However, this
compatibility is never given at the beginning. I do not see this as a disagreement with Leroi-
Gourhan, though it is clear that Leroi-Gourhan did not formulate it in terms of cosmology, but
rather religion and aesthetics, as he writes:
 The interior milieu traversed by this tendency has therefore left a general imprint on each
object, which is briefly analyzed by saying that the handle of such a Lappish spoon is influenced
by religious tradition, that the cavity of such a Japanese spoon is inspired by the former use of
a bivalve shell tied to a handle: for each example one can thus find technical, religious and
decorative explanations.46

Leroi-Gourhan, being largely influenced by Jean Przyluski’s L’Évolution humaine (1926), sees
technical facts as being dominated by both the technical tendency and the external milieu.47
Therefore, technical facts should not be excluded from being understood as a tendency, an
evolutionary force, but instead as the tendency central to diversification. Furthermore, if we
adhere to Bergson’s definition of tendency, that is, a tendency is always accompanied by a
countertendency, then technical facts fulfil this criterion as well, providing an understanding of
technodiversity. This is also how I proposed the concept of cosmotechnics as a way to
“reconcile” the difference between Lévi-Strauss and Leroi-Gourhan, the former having a prime
interest in cosmology and the latter on technology.48 I propose comprehending the two
tendencies, technical tendency and technical fact, by constructing an antinomy of
technological universality:

Thesis: Technology is an anthropological universal, understood as an exteriorization of

memory and the liberation of organs, as some anthropologists and philosophers of technology
have formulated it;

Antithesis: Technology is not anthropologically universal; it is enabled and constrained by

particular cosmologies, which go beyond mere functionality or utility. Therefore, there is no
one single technology, but rather multiple cosmotechnics.

Because two tendencies coexist and interact, Leroi-Gourhan could talk about the permeability
of the technical milieu, that is to say, how certain technologies may permeate an ethnic group
while others do not and how they may take diverse forms in accordance with the internal
milieu. The permeability of the technical milieu was largely destroyed by the process of
modernization and globalization; already in the above-mentioned 1945 book, Leroi-Gourhan
observed that it “delivers by trial and error an increasingly direct passage to the technical
tendency.”49 Since modernity, we have seen how the universalizing tendency overrides the
particularizing tendency, just as Leroi-Gourhan himself lamented in the second volume of
Gesture and Speech that a synchronization of rhythm will lead to a homogenization of
temporality. Industrial and military technology is the universal force that breaks all technical
milieus and unifies all localities under the banner of an economic program. As discussed in
chapter 5 regarding Toynbee, in the nineteenth century, there was a marked increase in the
importation of technologies to the Far East; without it, these “ethnic groups” would not be
able to compete, thus being doomed to defeat and colonization.50
Efficiency and speed override all other values inherent to the internal milieu. The introduction
of the railway in the nineteenth century served as an earlier example of this tendency; on the
one hand, it introduced the compression of time and space, which significantly influenced
economic change; on the other hand, it created a homogeneity of products, aesthetics, and
values. The universalizing tendency seems to have triumphed. The advancement in technical
reproducibility in the twentieth century further created a culture of standardization. The
question of indifference or homogeneity constituted the main target of critique in the
twentieth century,51 which we find most notably in thinkers of the Frankfurt School who
criticized the standardization of commodities. Commodity in the twenty-first century is said to
be no longer about standardization but rather about individuality and difference. In other
words, we have moved from a technology of indifference (mechanistic) to a technology of
difference (organismic), starkly contrasting with what Adorno and Horkheimer described. This
increase in the variety of taste (and its social and symbolic meaning) does not alter the
fundamental nature of capital and by no means signifies the emancipation of human beings
from it. It simply means an increase in the choice of consumption, which gives the appearance
of heterogeneity, but it is, in fact, just a multiplication based on homogeneity—the
homogeneity of values and technologies.

However, we should approach this sociological observation with caution, as it is less

straightforward than it might initially seem. In his celebrated “Work of Art in the Age of
Technical Reproducibility,” Walter Benjamin argued that standardization opens a democratic
and revolutionary possibility. The standardization of objects and the reproducibility of the
artwork free it from what Benjamin called “the aura”—the absolute individuality of any work
of art. The aura came into being when the technology of reproduction was very limited; for
example, as we are told at the beginning of Benjamin’s essay, for the ancient Greeks, it was
limited to founding and stamping.52 Therefore, aura negatively means the limit of the
technology of reproduction and positively means that which cannot be reproduced, something
that could be aligned with tradition and religious ritual—both of which were effectively
mobilized by fascism. The liberation of the work of art from the aura, therefore, opens a new
form of participation and produces a revolutionary consciousness. A similar view was held by
Stiegler, who, instead of seeing the appearance of alphabetic writing in ancient Greece and the
disappearance of dialects as a sign of homogeneity, rightly observes that without alphabetic
writing, Greek literature would not exist—we would not be able to read Homer or Plato today.
It is the Promethean spirit at work combatting the melancholia of man—melancholia in the
sense that man’s fate as Homo faber consists of the constant displacement of his identity by
technological inventions. In the work of Benjamin and Stiegler, we see that technology is a
standardizing medium. But it is precisely because of its standardization that democracy is
made possible, functioning as the condition of access to the sensus communis. The seemingly
contradictory evaluation of universalization/standardization will compel us to reflect on a
deeper relationship between technodiversity and democracy.

§30. On the Organological Relation between Technology and Democracy

Historically speaking, democracy is about self-determination. There is no democracy without
self-determination; otherwise, it would be autocracy or aristocracy. Self-determination means
that a community (and here also a locality) can develop protocols and tools that facilitate the
community’s communication and operation, enabling each community member to develop his
or her potential as a citizen. Democracy was said to be invented in Greece, and it assumes that
reason, like Smith’s invisible hand, will be at work. We should not romanticize Greek
democracy because it was fundamentally an autochthon and the polis as political form is no
longer applicable in our time. However, there are still some important elements that we can
draw from it.

The selection of the council members with the use of a randomization device, the Kleroterion,
is indeed a test by contingency. In addition to contingency, there is a protocol that prevents
contingency from moving toward unreason: if the person chosen is not appropriate, then he
will be expelled from the title, with the community being able to regain the control of
organization. Contingency only becomes a necessity when it no longer violates reason and
becomes compatible with it; reason, we suggest, instead of emotion, should be that which
unites the community. As already claimed in chapter 1, reason is the most powerful discourse
of Western thought—it is through reason that secular society finds its common ground and the
openness of transformation.

Modern democracy, as seen in the previous chapters, is a response to the proliferation of

individual rights that followed the emergence of bourgeois society, in which the middle and
elite classes became the dominant force in society and the government. Hegel’s Outlines of
the Philosophy of Right could be read as a response to this social change (following the
Reformation and the French Revolution) and his philosophical justification of the state as the
crystallization of reason. The state could unite the individuals by guaranteeing their rights
through the constitution and maintaining the social and political order through state
institutions. In contemporary society, individualism takes a different form, moving from the
right to freedom to the right to consume or from citizen to consumer.

The concept of democracy being associated with liberal democracy is an event that took place
at the end of the nineteenth and beginning of the twentieth century. In other words, if there
was democracy before liberalism,53 then there will be a democracy after liberalism. Even if we
have engaged closely with Hegel and Schmitt, this does not imply that we are following their
specific antiliberal and antidemocratic paths. The critique of Hegel and Schmitt remains valid
when liberalism is turned into the justification of arbitrariness. This arbitrariness makes
modern individuals vulnerable to political and economic manipulation. While liberal
democracy has been used as a mechanism to keep legislation from becoming irrational, it does
not guarantee reason; instead, it is vulnerable to manipulation and can turn into populism. The
problem of liberal democracy is less its inability for political decision, as Carl Schmitt
reproached them of being ineffective and indecisive, than its compatibility with consumerism;
in liberal democracies, choice risks becoming arbitrary. On the other hand, hatred toward
liberalism has led to powerful but ultimately closed governments, which claim to be
deliberated democracies. The term deliberated democracy could be simply a play of words
since it often only means toy parliaments. Governments in liberal democracies might
occasionally make correct decisions based on the intelligence of the leader, but they will never
move toward reason; this is not just because vitam brevem esse, longam artem (life is short,
art is long), but also because decisions are frequently dictated by interest rather than reason
and the decision process is often opaque and intolerant of any criticism.

In a democratic or authoritarian state (the either-or label the mass media tends to use), the
concept of democracy is still limited to the nation-state—a modern form of autochthony
compared to the Athenian one. There is a general silence on any notion of democracy that
extends beyond the state’s limit, save for the notables, such as Marx, Lenin, and Mao, who
argued that true democracy would necessitate the abolition of the state and the party. In State
and Revolution, Lenin claimed that whereas the demolition of the bourgeois state demands
revolution, the overcoming of the democratic state will not be achieved through revolution but
rather by the “withering away” of the state itself: “It is ‘incomprehensible’ only to those who
have not thought that democracy is also a state and that, consequently, democracy will also
disappear when the state disappears. Revolution alone can ‘abolish’ the bourgeois state. The
state in general, i.e., the most complete democracy, can only ‘wither away.’”54 The term
“withering away” of the state is borrowed from Engels.55 The bourgeois state does not wither
away; it has to be abolished by the proletariats; what withers away is the proletariat state or
the semistate.56 What does Lenin mean by this? Does it mean that there will be no
democracy? Lenin affirms that communism makes the state “absolutely unnecessary.”57 The
withering away of the state means that the dictatorship of the proletariat following the violent
revolution will finally dissolve, giving way to a new, free world. Democracy would no longer be
the right vocabulary to describe this new world. But what sort of world it is, then? This might
be the most difficult of the above questions since it challenges both our imagination and our
ability to put it in concrete words. Or, instead of condemning democracy to an always fated
relation with the state, the other approach would be to enlarge the concept of democracy
beyond the state.

Put another way, will the withering away of the state provide us with a planetary democracy?
Furthermore, does planetary democracy mean the participation of all citizens of the world in
all decision-making processes? How could this be possible? Would everyone now vote on
global issues by pressing a button on their smartphone? Today, this is in principle possible
considering that most of the population in developed countries own smartphones. But there
are two fundamental problems. First, reducing democracy to the pressing of buttons would
most likely pull us back to a kind of arbitrariness (a Hegelian problem we discussed in chapter
1); second, this form of democracy eliminates options—for example, choosing either A or B,
but not maximizing possibilities and diversities for the future (a Luhmannian problem).58 In
other words, if democracy leads to the exhaustion of future possibilities, it raises fundamental
questions about the viability and legitimacy of such a democratic system. These two problems
are the major ones that liberal democracy has to overcome, without which it will continue to
be discredited.

This returns us to the question of what democracy could mean beyond the state, if it is not to
be just a planetary voting mechanism that involves all populations. We might want to refer to
what Derrida calls “the democracy to come”59 before addressing the Hegelian and
Luhmannian problems. A “democracy to come” means at least two things for Derrida. First, it
means a detachment of the secular from the theocratic and the theological;60 second, it is not
based on an autochthony as much as it “is not connected to a nation-state, which is not
connected to citizenship, to territoriality.”61 The secularization of politics could be interpreted
as the pursuit of reason, as ridding politics of the irrational forces inherent to religion so that
reason, instead of God, may lead. However, secularizing the state does not guarantee a
democracy beyond the state since it presupposes a different political form. The question today
is not what such a democracy to come is, but how might it come to be possible.

The procedures that culminate in the collapse of the party and state and that follow a violent
revolution and the establishment of the dictatorship of the proletariat do not appear to be
repeatable or even attainable today. However, a new democratic process beyond the state is
not only relevant but also urgent. When everything stays within the realm of state interests,
planetary politics remain reduced to international politics. Could internet technology facilitate
such a democracy to come, overcoming many of the barriers that Derrida named? As we know,
this was the dream of the internet activists and anarchists of the 1990s. However, today we
also know that the possibility to connect beyond territories does not necessarily mean
democracy; it could also mean the opposite, platform capitalism that dominates our everyday
life, as analyzed in the previous chapters. In any case, this does not mean that future politics
should oppose itself to technology, regardless of the fact that technology has become the
synonym for calculation and control.

Technology has only ever really been thought of as a tool for democracy, be that the Greek
Kleroterion, the modern postal and ballot system, or even now digital platforms that could be
used for voting or decision making (for example, the direct digital democracy of the Five Star
Movement in Italy) as well as social media that is used to influence other voters. However, this
appears to be a rather limited way of understanding freedom and democracy and fails to
respond to the Hegelian and Luhmannian criticism. Let us then step back and clarify what is
meant by the possibility of democracy beyond the state. First, saying beyond the state does
not mean that it has to be larger than the nation-state, something like Schmitt’s Großraum or
Dugin’s Eurasia (which for Dugin extends from Siberia to Taiwan); instead, it could mean a
political form that is attached to a locality, be that a city, a town, or a village. Second,
technology would not serve only as a means toward democracy (for example, voting systems)
but instead the democratization of technology will become fundamental to the future of such
a democracy to come—a task that we should take up as a response to Hegel and Luhmann, as
well as to Derrida’s “democracy to come.” Because without directly addressing the question of
technology, such a democracy to come will never come.62 Modern democracy is susceptible
to technology precisely because technology has become a dominant force of “democracy,”
especially since social media has been used to predict and influence municipal and national
elections. In the twentieth century, democracy was vulnerable to analogue technologies of
marketing, such as television and radio, which used broadcasting technologies to create and
transmit patterns of information in the form of propaganda. Compared to information in its
textual form, information in visual and audio forms opens up an intuitive form of
communication—more direct and efficient because it can synchronize the audience’s
consciousness. In the twenty-first century, the proliferation of digital technology challenged
the broadcasting model of the mass media and reconstituted our sensual relation to the
surroundings. Information is not only transmitted via successions of images and sound but
rather via direct processing of user data, as we have already discussed in the previous
chapters. Modern citizens are becoming increasingly more users and consumers in the sense
that they adapt themselves to new interfaces and new algorithms over which they have no
control or influence. This is the common experience of social media users in the past decade.
The “democratization of technology” only took a very limited form in the name of the free and
open-source software movement. While open-source software has been appropriated by large
corporations such as Google, for example, when Android was an open-source project, it
attracted many programmers to contribute to its development. Still, in the end, it is Google
that decides which applications remain and which phones can install the updated version of
Android. Can we call this the democratization of technology, or is it simply one strategy among
others to absorb the creativity of individuals?

Finally, we must acknowledge that all types of subjection to the environment, whether natural
or artificial, can be classified as adaptation. As per Darwin’s theory of evolution, animals either
adapt to the environment or they fail and disappear. Adaptation stands on the opposite side of
democracy since democracy means primarily collective determination, while adaptation
means subordination to imposed rules or systems. If, with Derrida, we want to talk about some
form of “democracy to come,” then we have to understand that the question of technology is
fundamental to this task. Not that a particular technology can solve the problem, but rather to
create a new environment and new possibilities of adoption, or a new game with new rules,
that may enlarge the possibility of engagements and producing changes. In other words, it is
not only about challenging existing powers, but also changing the nature of powers. If we want
to overcome the hegemony of the big corporations, which are constantly changing the digital
environment so that users have to adapt to new interfaces and new rules, as well as the
control of the state, which sees every subject as a set of data, nothing is more effective than
creating new environments that allow individuals and collectives to become autonomous
agents, in the sense that, instead of adapting to the environment, they could adopt it as a
means of self-realization. In classical liberal democracy, one accepts the environment and then
each individual acts against it according to one’s preference in order to make it preferable for
most people; in this nuanced form, we radically interpret and adopt the conditions that allow
an individual to develop and experiment with new ideas and community practices.

It is not clear, as Lenin claimed, that the democratic state will wither away; however, it is at
least clear that in order to move beyond that which limits democracy to the state, new
infrastructures of democracy will have to be made available that move beyond the monopoly
of a few individuals or enterprises. The new game, on the one hand, reflects the locality’s or
community’s diversity and singularity because they also represent the differentiated
relationship between inhabitants and the environment. But, on the other hand, it will also be a
less consumerist economy and more a knowledge-based economy that will allow users to
transform into citizens and provide an alternative to Luddite sabotage. This is why we would
like to put forward the claim that technodiversity is central to such a future democracy in the
planetary condition, having the potential to address the question of locality beyond identity.
Hence counter to the technological tendency that homogenizes and totalizes, technodiversity
diverges and fragments.

§31. Biodiversity, Noodiversity, and Technodiversity

I suggest considering technodiversity as a program that explores alternatives to the current

impasse of innovation and development in the consumerist society and the geopolitical
concurrence between nation-states. I call it an impasse because it is promoting a
homogenization of technology instead of allowing a heterogenization, hence also a
democratization of technology. The homogenization of technology has not only limited our
understanding of the possibilities of technology and its future, but it also creates a form of
competition that only leads to an apocalyptic sentiment, a desperation that is shared by many
people on the earth today. It was not the machine itself, but the homogenization generated by
mechanist thinking that Bergson explicitly denounced.

It goes without saying that new technologies bring turbulences to the social and economic
system of each epoch (what Bertrand Gille calls, in general, “the human system”63) and trigger
resistance from the economic system. For example, certain technologies such as p2p sharing
(e.g., Napster in 1999) or cloning (Dolly the sheep in 1996) were suppressed to maintain the
coherence of the human system. However, when the resistance of the human system becomes
futile, we experience profound desperation, such as the young climate activists who, no longer
being heard, employ the not-so-wise strategies of throwing tomato juice or mashed potatoes
at the paintings of Van Gogh and Monet. When one fails to act or fails to know how to act, as a
consequence, the soul looks inward for a solution without being able to maintain its
consistency with the uncertain external milieu; it easily leads to reactionary acts, such as
localism and nationalism, which blind us to the planetary condition. Localism and nationalism
under the guise of democracy constitute some of the most dangerous games to have ruined
the twentieth century.
If we return to our previous dilemma concerning the two paths that cybernetics promises us,
the first one is the realization of the political state via advanced technological systems, which
opens a new terrain of competition and destruction similar to what we are witnessing now;
the second one being the realization of the digital earth that slowly undermines the legitimacy
of the nation-state by reducing it to one administrative power among the others. This dilemma
presents itself as a problem to be resolved regarding the inquiry into planetary thinking after
Hegel’s theory of the state and Schmitt’s theory of the Großraum. It will have to take the
question of diversity and pluralism as central. Since the eighteenth century, the nation-state
has stood for difference because the state represents the nation, and each nation differs in
terms of languages, customs, and cultures. However, the nation-state as a symbol of difference
is no more symbolic in our time than earlier, not only because the cultural industry has
become global but also because technological acceleration and economic competition have
brought the centrality of language, customs, and culture to a rather fragile status (one just has
to consider the recent launch of ChatGPT, which exhibits the potential to liberate human
beings from learning foreign languages). While the concept of the Großraum saw the nation-
state’s limit, it fails, nonetheless, to go beyond the idea of it being an enlarged state. This does
not mean that they are not important, but rather what we call culture today can no longer
effectively respond to the organological expansion. The question of technology in Hegel is
omnipresent though implicit. It was perceived as a constant process of externalization and
reflection; however, it remains formal. The question of technology in Schmitt is more explicit
in terms of its centrality in the development of the nomos, and its content was described in
terms of land, sea, and air; however, technological power is conceived as a homogeneous
metaphysical force that resonates with Heidegger’s analysis.

Because the current technological development desires to digitize everything, heritage will
become singularly digital heritage, while those traditions that cannot be digitalized will
gradually die away. The problem of modernity, that is to say, the acceleration of the
obsolescence of concepts and cultures, rouses melancholia in the Freudian sense of the term,
that the lost object cannot be overcome by mourning. Melancholia happens when the lost
object haunts the psychic apparatus since the latter cannot maintain consistency without the
former’s presence. The question central to planetary politics is that of diversity. The
multiculturalism of the last decades never really solved modernity’s problems; at most, it was
a continuance of the Enlightenment idea of tolerance, which always waits for the moment of
intolerance—because when the solution is moral, it is susceptible to emotional manipulation.
As we have tried to show, the fundamental question is a technological one. The question of
diversity has to be thought of fundamentally from the perspective of technology.

This distinguishes our position from the various paths of “returning to nature” that we can find
among the current debates in view of the climate change. We could name a few here without
being able to exhaust the list. There is a call to return to romantic nature, where the
countryside, the forest, the emerging crops and waking meadows are a negation of the
modern technological life, but this “last resort” is now disappearing, especially when digital
farming will be fully implemented, one will probably see more machines in the countryside
than in the city. There are philosophically more subtle calls to nature—for example, the so-
called ontological turn movement associated with anthropologists such as Eduardo Viveiros de
Castro, Philippe Descola, and others, which proposes a multinaturalism in contrast to
multiculturalism, namely, “one culture and multiple natures.” In parallel to the
anthropologists, we also have the school of multispecies, which endeavors to show from the
perspective of biology the heterogeneity of species and the necessity of coexistence between
them—for example, in the work of Donna Haraway and her reading of Lynn Margulis. These
two schools of thought, however, constitute a mutual criticism: the former is considered by
the latter as culturalism (the concept of nature is culturally constructed), while the latter is
seen by the former as naturalism (a political thought inspired by biology). The difficulty of
returning to “nature” is that it tends to undermine the fact that concepts don’t exist alone;
singling out the concept of nature without resituating it in the system of concepts and in
history doesn’t effectively resolve the problem of modernity. In contrast to the discourse on
nature, and therefore also an ontogenesis of the earth, we suggest a new matrix of diversity:
biodiversity, noodiversity, and technodiversity.64

Biodiversity, as we understand it, is central to the ecology of the biosphere, and the
diminishment of biodiversity is a consequence and the cause of the current ecological crisis.
Biodiversity doesn’t only mean the number of species but also the constitution of the
environments on the planet that allows coexistence between species. The past two centuries
marked a significant decrease in biodiversity and the intensification of environmental
disasters. The speed of change in the environment gives little space for different species to
adjust themselves in order to adapt to the living milieu. The extreme weather that we have
been experiencing will continue getting more and more extreme if the economy and the
technological developments associated with it continue accelerating. This dilemma of
modernity could be seen, for example, in E. O. Wilson’s reading of Leo Marx: due to the
environmental disasters, the moderns found in the natural world a refuge of the spirit, which is
“remote, static, richer even than human imagination”; however, this “refuge” is produced by
the acceleration toward the machine antipole, namely, “We cannot exist in this paradise
without the machine that tears it apart.”65 In other words, the “return to nature” is a reaction
against the inevitable path of modernity. One could speculate that when humans stop using
technology, then biodiversity will increase as consequence. We now know what happened
after those disasters such as that of Krakatoa (1883), Chernobyl (1986), and Fukushima (2011),
that there was a sharp increase in biodiversity, plants and animals rapidly occupying the
abandoned buildings. We could imagine that after the extinction of the human being, the
planet may become even more vibrant; however, we don’t even have to talk about
biodiversity in this case, since it already loses meaning. In other words, we can only talk about
biodiversity in a meaningful way when we are searching for a coexistence between humans
and nonhumans in the process of planetarization. Otherwise, we will only live in a constant
denial of the crisis and a nihilism that is nonetheless politically correct.
Given that the human species still exist and continue to dominate the planet, then the concept
of biodiversity or that of the “intrusion of Gaia” should take the humans beyond a nihilism to
reconsider the possibility of coexistence between different political institutions and different
species. This, however, also makes any simple solution of abandoning human civilization to
nonhumans suspicious, as Wilson also observed that “the number of species in islands might
go down when they become smaller and further away from the mainland.”66 In other words,
we should abandon dichotomy between nature and technology, spiritualism and materialism,
as Bergson suggests. Still, Wilson’s solution to strike an “equilibrium” is less sophisticated at
first glance. His solution outlined in Half-Earth: Our Planet’s Fight for Life claims that “only by
setting aside half the planet in reserve, or more, can we save the living part of the
environment and achieve the stabilization required for our own survival.”67 Wilson’s solution
is plausible; however, its simplicity also exposes a philosophical and political naivety. The
preservation of species in the way Wilson suggests is not wrong, only insufficient.

Biodiversity bears an intimacy with noodiversity and technodiversity, because biodiversity is

always local. Bringing animals and plants from one locality to another may cause disastrous
effects to the net of life one finds in that specific locality. The maintenance and cultivation of
biodiversity correlates to the form of life that one finds in the locality, namely noodiversity and
technodiversity. Biological knowledge could also be situated within such localities. This is also
why Wilson could talk about an Ecuadoran biology, Kenyan biology, that is also to say a
noodiversity: “Can there be an Ecuadorian biology, a Kenyan biology? Yes, if they focus on the
uniqueness of indigenous life. Will such efforts be important to international science? Yes,
because evolutionary biology is a discipline of special cases woven into global patterns.
Nothing makes sense except in the light of the histories of local faunas and floras.”68 In
chapter 3, we saw that Teilhard de Chardin considered Vernadsky’s biosphere as the
foundation of the noosphere and that the noosphere was that which finally covers the
biosphere like a skin over the earth. This is, however, not merely a skin since it also contributes
to the growth of the biosphere and the interaction between the biosphere and the
atmosphere. Teilhard’s noosphere is not purely nous either; it is a technological triumph and a
spiritual realization in which a thinking layer is realized external to the cranium. A
technological convergence characterizes the noosphere’s development, with the noosphere
consisting of both noodiversity and technodiversity. Noodiversity here refers to different
knowledge that originates from specific localities—for example, different cosmologies,
customs, values, and so forth. Today, we talk of cultural differences, or to be more striking,
clashes of civilizations, because it is assumed that noodiversities cannot be reduced to and are
always incompatible with one another. In Teilhard’s theory, noodiversity was somewhat
hierarchized, especially in his prioritization of Western thought over Eastern thought. This
prioritization is also an identification of Western intelligentsia with technological progress. The
progress of the noosphere, however, does not produce a diversification but rather a
convergence toward a superbrain. The noospheric reflection or the omega point is also the
moment of apocalypse. Technodiversity opposes the technological apocalypse, and instead of
convergence, it proposes a divergence or bifurcation.
Suppose we follow our previous analysis on the role of technics as the support of memory and,
therefore, also as the support of noiesis. In that case, we can see that technodiversity is
fundamental to noodiversity. Because noodiversity belongs to second nature, such a second
nature can only be maintained by technization in everyday life. Noodiversity and
technodiversity contribute directly to biodiversity since, on the one hand, noodiversity
incorporates the relationship between humans and nonhumans. In turn, these relations have
to be maintained and enhanced by technologies that facilitate the realization of both human
and nonhuman. The consequences of pesticides are universal in that they universally target
various biological and chemical properties of insects, yet the use of pesticides in different
locations will result in varying outcomes, ranging from beneficial to disastrous. In reality, what
Vandana Shiva called the “monoculture of the mind” is omnipresent in the capitalist logic of
globalization; we, therefore, end up having monotechnology, which recklessly views itself as
the only option.69 Monotechnology appears to give democracy a new opportunity by
providing it with global digital platforms that take the guise of empowerment and
mobilization, but they eliminate democracy itself. The “monoculture of the mind,” which
endangers both biodiversity and noodiversity, suggests that the key to resolving this problem
is to return to the discourse of technodiversity. Therefore, the matrix of biodiversity,
noodiversity, and technodiversity form a more comprehensive framework than the dialectics
between nature and technology for understanding the planetary condition. The question of
bifurcation is central since, without differentiation and diversification, it is impossible to talk
about difference and diversity. Diversity is not only to be maintained, but it also has to be
constantly created.

If today we have to read Bergson’s analysis of war seriously, it is because we are confronting
another series of crises, which unfortunately is often analyzed from the perspective of “real
politics” and whose solution is limited to the matrix consisting of techno-economic factors.
That is to say, analysis beyond economic and military causes is considered ineffective. One may
ask, if a locality wants to develop technodiversity, does it also have to develop military
technologies not to be defeated? Since, as a locality, particularly a nation competing with
other nations, military technology is the most necessary to develop. Without it, one might well
be dominated, even annihilated, by opponents. The logic could be also applied to the question
of revolution since once a revolution in a locality takes place; it will soon be destroyed by the
neighboring localities, similar to how the Paris Commune was destroyed by the French army
assisted by Bismarck’s Prussian state. However, if we continue to think this way, it will be
impossible to imagine a future other than mankind’s self-destruction.70 In this scenario, the
epoch-making power of the sovereign ceases to exist. Perhaps this is the fate of humanity, and
such an event would have little impact on the planet, similar to casting a stone into the ocean.
The seduction of a profound nihilism appears as a consolation, but it also limits human actions.
The impossibility of action is precisely the opposite of human freedom. Human beings have the
agency to adopt technology and should also have the agency to renounce certain technologies.
This is also why, as we can read from Kant’s Treatise on Perpetual Peace to Georgescu-
Roegen’s minimal bioeconomic program, ecology cannot be developed without renouncing
militarism, without giving up military acts of aggression. Instead of military competition, Kant
appeals to trade or commerce as a possibility of perpetual peace because, based on
community and reciprocity, international commerce could form an organicity that enforces
each member to autoregulate their behavior.

War, insofar as it is a territorial problem, is, fundamentally, an organological problem.

Territorial conflicts appear when trading or exchange no longer stands as a sufficient solution.
The inspiration of organic nature ceases to be effective when organological hubris cannot be
pacified. However, we could also transpose this argument from an ecology of nature to an
ecology of machines (i.e., from biodiversity to technodiversity),71 similar to what we
suggested earlier, that is, transposing the opposition between the laws of nature and freedom
to that between autonomous technical systems and freedom. As a result, we might say that
war is the triumph of the homogeneity of machines because as Mumford pointed out, the
megamachine must “destroy all the alternatives, historical, traditional, or perspective” to
maintain its autonomy and the status of its manipulators.72 And if there is still value in
Bergson’s analysis of war, it is not due to his vitalism, which, as we have shown, is already
surpassed by cybernetics, but rather his organological critique of the source of war. Today,
given that technological acceleration has surpassed the precedent eras, we will have to
conceive different programs that will allow us to overcome the dichotomy of machine and
antimachine. With the organological framework, we hope to analyze the epistemological
problems from a new perspective and address possible responses to the long-lasting crisis of
civilization. However, such organology has to go beyond the common wisdom of
understanding technology as an extension of the body or nerves and to understand
technodiversity as an imperative for planetary thinking.
7

Toward an Epistemological Diplomacy

Can Europeans reinvent new forms of communication beyond the form of the state? Can there
be politics beyond the state? This is the great challenge that awaits the European people
today.

—Massimo Cacciari, Europe and Empire

The fact that metaphysics, as mere speculation, serves more to prevent errors than to expand
cognition does not impair its value, but rather gives to metaphysics dignity and authority
through the censor’s office that it operates. This office secures the general order and the
concord and indeed the prosperity of the scientific community, and keeps that community’s
daring and fertile works from deviating from the main purpose, viz., the general happiness.

—Immanuel Kant, Critique of Pure Reason

After a long exposition of the political epistemologies of Hegel and Schmitt, and the political
implication of Bergson’s organology, we ended the previous chapter by suggesting a matrix
composed of biodiversity, noodiversity, and technodiversity as an alternative framework for
thinking the planetary. We might now be able to address the question cited above and raised
by Massimo Cacciari, philosopher and former mayor of Venice, regarding whether new forms
of communication beyond the state can be reinvented. Throughout this book, Hegel and
Schmitt have taken the position of two political forms as well as two “problems” that have to
be overcome—and such an overcoming of them cannot occur through a mere renunciation of
their positions; instead, it has to occur via a historical-epistemological exposition of their limits:
Hegel, the thinker of the modern state and political organicism, and Schmitt, the thinker of the
Großraum and political vitalism. In a certain way, we have restaged the investigations of
Recursivity and Contingency, namely, an inquiry into the epistemologies of mechanism,
organism, vitalism, and organology, but in a social-political context. This is what we promised
to deliver in the Introduction, that is, addressing planetary thinking as political epistemologies.
We will now delve deeper into the question of epistemology, as the title of this chapter
indicates. An epistemological diplomacy is one that allows us to reconsider our planetary
situation from the perspective of locality and facilitates communication beyond the confines of
states. While aiming for perpetual peace is overly ambitious, it is crucial to emphasize the
significance of the extrastatic element, as highlighted by Kant in his treatise, which, in his case,
is trade. In this concluding chapter, we hope to clarify further the concept of technodiversity to
address Cacciari’s quest for a “new communication,” emphasizing its relevance to the
Tractatus Politico-Technologicus that we suggested in the Introduction.

§32. Acceleration, Automation, and the Prosthetic Future

We have thus far drafted a “dramaturgy” that starts with Hegel’s state as the vernunftige
construction of the historical progress and its justification in the organism of the state, which,
however, could hardly confront the problem that we are facing today regarding climate
change, ecological crisis, and the imminent threat of wars. In our exposition of Hegelian
political philosophy, we showed that the state is the projection of an organismic structure and
operation, which Ernst Kapp later described. This ideality of the state as an organism is not
simply a metaphor but is also logical and historical, as Hegel demonstrated in the Outlines of
the Philosophy of Right. The public servant system plus the division of the powers in the state
allowed Hegel to think of a machine that functions like an organism so that every part could be
organized and interact with the other parts of the organism, such as the organs of the body.
The state completed what civil society failed to achieve. Civil society produces inequality and
poverty because it is an interest-oriented society. The rabbles represent the failure of civil
society since they are the disorganized part of it, which, for Hegel, represents the most
dangerous group and, therefore, must be organized or subject to organization. Because
organization is central to the state as a technological phenomenon, rather than understanding
the state as a legal or theological concept, we attempt to analyze the state from the
standpoint of political epistemology. Therefore, what we have been trying to demonstrate is
that, since early European modernity, during the quarrel between mechanism and organism,
organism was simply the projection of an ideal state, and it was only in Hegel that such an
organism is developed logically and distinguished from an unanalytic concept based on animal
organisms. In chapter 3, we turned both with and against Hegel; we looked into bioeconomy,
cybernetics, and noosphere for the traces of Hegelian reflective logic in order to speculate on a
post-Hegelian imagination of a planetary organism and its limit.

By pushing the Hegelian problem to the extreme to search for a solution, at this extreme, we
also precisely encountered the Schmittean problem. Schmitt relentlessly attacked the vision of
the “unity of the world” or the “unity of the East and West” by showing the imperialist
hypocrisy that lays behind it. We identified Schmitt’s deliberate endeavor to separate himself
from the antagonism between organism and mechanism and establish a political vitalism that
is characterized by the decision on exceptions. This political vitalism at the same time seeks
another political form that is more adequate than the nation-state in view of the new
technological condition. Schmitt thus proposed Großraum as a political form that would
succeed the nation-state, one that is inspired by the element of air, after land and sea. In
chapter 6, we turned against Schmitt’s political vitalism through a close reading of Bergson’s
speech on war and his The Two Sources of Morality and Religion. We distinguish two Bergsons:
the vitalist who opposes vitalism and mechanism, and the organologist who gives a new
vocation to mechanism.
Political epistemology corresponds to a fundamental operating principle of the megamachine.
With the development of cybernetics in the 1940s, the dream of a mechano-organism is ever
closer to becoming a reality, and technological advancements now mean that one can do even
more than what was originally imagined in the nineteenth century. In other words, with
current technologies, one can postulate that it is possible to sublate the state and move
toward a new political organization empowered by automation—considering that the number
of active users of Facebook or Google is probably more than the population of any existing
country and that they have been actively delegating the management to AI. Many
governmental services that can be determined by facts (de facto) have already been
automatized, ranging from the application for passports and ID cards to the payments of bills
and juridical judgments. Automation could improve the efficiency of the government and
eliminate the defects due to human error and malmanagement. We are witnessing something
Simondon already observed in the 1950s—that machines are becoming organic. Contemporary
digital technologies such as artificial intelligence and machine learning are completing this
epistemological paradigm, and the development of biotechnology and neurotechnology is also
progressing toward a more and more intimate integration with biological organs. The
completion of metaphysics is becoming more and more self-evident, while philosophy is still
either falling prey to the opposition between organism and mechanism, thinking matter and
mechanical matter, or naively leaning to the other side by equating machines and humans. As
we have tried to show throughout the book, all these oppositions have ended since the second
half of the twentieth century.

Fichte’s imagination of the police state is already actualized, and the organic state that Hegel
deduced from his dialectical logic is becoming a technological reality. We sought to show that
the state could be realized as a mechano-organism; this demonstrates Hegel’s prediction and
illustrates how the exteriorization of reason has reached a new stage, where reason must
reinvent itself in the face of contradiction. In other words: if reason continues to progress, it
will have to go beyond the organic state, the Großraum and the identification of it with sheer
rationalism now increasingly reduced to the calculation of machines. The automatic society we
live in will only advance toward higher efficiency and faster speeds over time. People fear
whether machines will replace them, wondering what human tasks will and cannot be
replaced. However, this is not a productive way of thinking about the future of society,
because to think in such a manner is to simply fulfill industry’s self-prophecy. Industry
reproduces this myth of the machine constantly while at the same time fulfilling its prophecy
by producing machines that imitate the way humans complete tasks. This industrial self-
fulfilling prophecy not only produces the exhaustion of the imagination but also incites
constant anxiety.

More than a century ago, when trains and automobiles were invented, people were shocked
and frightened by the metallic monsters and their speed, but today most people are not
discouraged from taking them simply because cars move faster than humans; instead, humans
have become themselves faster through the use of such machines. Technology must become a
stepping stone for humans to develop an ethical life in the sense of Hegel. Future planetary
thinking has to start with an organological motif. For this purpose, we have to cultivate and
ameliorate a culture of prosthesis and not a culture of replacement. A culture of replacement
sees machines as competition for the human being and that the human will be gradually
replaced by machines in all domains; a culture of prosthesis recognizes the organological value
of machines and goes beyond the instrumentality of machines; that is to say, to go beyond
both productivity and creativity in its calculative form. As Bergson proposed, the new vocation
of machines will have to deviate from the materialization of the spirit and search for the
spiritualization of matter.

This indicates that expecting the economy to be fully automated does not inevitably result in
human emancipation. Marx responded to a similar question in his time by citing John Stuart
Mill’s statement: “It is questionable if all the mechanical inventions yet made have lightened
the day’s toil of any human being.”1 On the contrary, it may intensify the process of
proletarianization, and by that we mean the loss of knowledge of the workers. Today it is not
limited to workers but also to the farmers. If we look at the countryside in the near future,
which has been considered to be the resort of burned-out urban dwellers, we will be
overwhelmed by the application of digital farming, which succeeded mechanized farming and
precision farming. Automation pervades and will continue pervading every aspect of individual
and collective life. There is no certainty that it will lead to happiness though, as it gives rise to
many low-level and not-yet-automatable tasks, such as those in food delivery and car-hailing
services, where troops of workers are commanded by algorithms. It is extremely likely that the
majority will become mere consumers, as Hannah Arendt anticipated in The Human Condition.
Arendt speculated that the artists might well be the last Homo faber, still making things after
the event of mass automation.2 Today, applications such as Midjourney, TensorFlow, and
ChatGPT have already made many artists question their own existence. We have yet to ask
how, in an automatic society, reason might continue to progress without being stuck in
calculation, or how machines, the essential part of reason, could facilitate the latter’s progress.

Maybe we should return to the concept of acceleration itself. Acceleration does not
necessarily mean an increase in speed, since this would still be too linear a conception. Speed,
as we know in physics, is a scalar quantity, which measures how fast an object moves; velocity,
however, is a vector quantity, measuring the rate at which the object changes its position. A
scalar quantity has mere magnitude, and a vector quantity has direction. Acceleration is also a
vector quantity, defined as the rate at which an object changes its velocity (and not speed).
Therefore, the acceleration produced by a car making a U-turn could have a much higher value
than the linear increase in speed. The automation of society does not always provoke the
greatest increase in acceleration, though it may cause significant increase in speed. However, a
change of perspective in political economy and politics might do so by providing automation
with a new purpose, in the sense of Bergson; it is also a way to change the nature of power
instead of merely modifying its configuration. This is, however, not necessarily a call to degrow
by reducing population, food production, and so on, but rather to redirect the progress of our
civilization. Therefore, reason is not that which is waiting to be replaced by automation
technology but rather that which will be able to make such a significant turn toward
rationalization of the machine beyond rationality.3 This consists of the fundamental question
of spirit: since the spirit is neither virtual nor symbolic, the spirit is always at the same time
within and beyond any form of externalization.

§33. Universality Seen from the Perspective of Technodiversity

Our habit of viewing technology as an abstract entity and as a metaphysical force fails to grasp
the concrete role it plays; conversely, when we see it as just a concrete object, we also fail to
grasp the fundamental role that it plays in politics (beyond, that is, sociological studies of
phenomena such as the use of Facebook or Airbnb). The concept of technodiversity that was
raised in the previous chapter consists of two dimensions. The first dimension is cultural (or
culturally constrained ontological, epistemological, and cosmological knowledge). As we tried
to show, we can find different technological thinking in different cultures, which is not
exclusively techno-logos. This is not to say that technologies guided by this thought have
nothing to do with mechanical causality. For sure, all machines have to follow the laws of
physics in order to set themselves into motion. Still, we also have to recognize that technology
is not defined only by its working principles but also by its place of use, its way of use, and its
maintenance and improvement, to name a few. The working principles or the techno-logos
understood in a strict sense as logic must be resituated in a broader reality and in a genesis of
which it takes part.

This might be one of the great contributions of Simondon: by exposing the limits of a Marxist
economic analysis of technical objects, he insisted that a technical object should be considered
as that which possesses a life, entailed by its birth, maintenance, prolongment of life, and
evolution (however, this doesn’t mean that a technical object is a living being). The problem of
alienation stems from the fact that the life of technical objects is not prolonged because
workers do not comprehend the operating principles of these machines—the automatic
machine presents itself as an abstract being to them, consisting of mere inputs and outputs.
Therefore, they are unable to maintain and hence prolong the life of technical objects.4 We
see here the fundamental question of technical knowledge, that is to say, proletarianization is
primarily a deprivation of knowledge: it renders the workers’ knowledge useless and reduces
them to laborers who merely handle inputs and outputs without being able to engage with the
machines on other levels—a phenomenon that has been well documented and described by
nineteenth-century writers such as Marx and William Morris. Technical knowledge became the
monopoly of technicians, and the state is handed over to technocracy. This does not mean that
workers do not or could not develop an intimate relationship with the machines they use, but,
as Simondon argues, they only understand the machine from the perspective of its technical
elements but not as a technical individual and beyond.
In the 1920s, during his sojourn in Positano, the economist and philosopher Alfred Sohn-Rethel
observed a rather astonishing phenomenon: every technical apparatus in Naples failed. His
observation was published in a 1926 newspaper article titled “Das Ideal des Kaputten. Über
neapolitanische Technik” (The ideal of the broken down: On the Neapolitan approach to things
technical).5 Sohn-Rethel described a rather anti-intuitive phenomenon in Naples: technical
objects only work when broken down. This phenomenon did not paralyze the Neapolitans.
However, instead of being able to repair or maintain machines, and transform their internal
structure and operation, they invented some nontechnical solutions to making machines work
in one way or another, as in Sohn-Rethel’s description of a Neapolitan igniting the engine of a
car: “In a display of matchless mastery, he succeeds in restarting his broken-down car by, in
some impossible manner, attaching a small piece of wood which just happened to be lying in
the street—only, that is, until it soon, and this much is certain, once again breaks down.”6

This form of knowledge that Sohn-Rethel describes is different from the technical knowledge
of engineers and technicians.7 A machine cannot be reduced, in a strict sense, to techno-logos;
a machine is not only the result of a set of prefigured causal relations between materials.
Following Simondon, we would like to understand a technical object by situating it in a reality
beyond techno-logos. As is often the case, this reality could be social, economic, and political,
but it could be broader, namely, moral and cosmological—it is in this sense that Simondon was
able to talk about the co-naturality between technical objects and their milieux and I develop
into what I call cosmotechnics. A philosophical intuition—and there he explicitly refers to
Bergson—is central to the search for co-naturality because it first allows a nonlogical
schematic understanding of beings, for example, how he distinguishes what he calls the
minority (childhood) from the majority (adulthood). Adults learn technologies through abstract
logical schemas, as how engineering is taught in university textbooks today, while children
learn technologies through intuition and embodiment. Today, many children are capable of
using an iPhone or an iPad without any pregiven instructions. They interact with the device like
running into an old friend—immediate strangeness is soon overcome after exchanging a few
gestures. However, what is at stake is more than just designing better human-computer
interfaces. Instead, it is about another way of understanding technology. Moreover, intuition
provides access to the genesis of technicity: it allows us to understand the relation between
technological thinking and other forms of thinking, such as religious, aesthetic, and
philosophical.

In Simondon’s speculative genesis of technicity, we see how science and religion were born
after the bifurcation of the original magic unity. As mentioned in chapter 6, Simondon’s theory
of bifurcation retains the traces of Bergson’s analysis of the laws of the dichotomy of
tendencies. In the magic unity, there is yet to emerge any distinction between subject and
object, but ground and figure (terms he borrows from Gestalt psychology) are already
distinguished though not separated (i.e., the figure is the figure of the ground and the ground,
the ground of the figure).8 The bifurcation into technics and religion means the separation of
the figure from the ground. In this separation, technics carries the figure characters (below
unity), and religion carries the ground character (above unity). Technics and religion will then
each bifurcate into a theoretical and a practical part, while all bifurcations also call for a unity
of the ground and figure. Aesthetic thinking, and later philosophical thinking, was born as a
unifying force for ground and figure. Technological thinking is seen within the constellation of
other forms of thinking and always in interaction with them; however, technological thinking
tends to dominate since it is the most materialist thinking among all, and materiality, in
comparison with thinking, has a much stronger immediate agency in the world, which means
that it can effectively undermine other forms of thinking. Therefore, to resituate technology in
a broader reality is precisely to reverse this tendency and make other forms of thinking explicit
so that they can intervene and shape technology. Simondon’s philosophical and
anthropological analysis of the genesis of technicity is based on the separation and unification
between ground and figure. It stands analogically to the genesis of sacrality formulated by
Mircea Eliade. The return to a unity, akin to that of the magic unity, was a response to Eliade’s
thesis on the disappearance of sacrality in the modern age.9 In this sense, Simondon’s work
could be read as an elaboration of Bergson’s thesis on mechanism and mysticism discussed in
chapter 6, a discussion that we extend here.

Social and political thought was also born at some point in the genesis, and like religion, it
carries the background character. However, social and political thought’s moment of birth
remains obscure in the genesis outlined by Simondon; moreover, Simondon refuses to
elaborate on it, stating that “this study does not propose to deal with the problem of
establishing continuity between the religious and social and political forms of thought.”10
Nevertheless, we can understand the religious character of social and political thought, aiming
to reconcile the ruptures caused by technological and economic development. Ground and
figure are always waiting to be symbolically unified; however, when the figure becomes the
ground, we see a perversion where evil emerges. Perhaps the greenhouse example Simondon
also uses will help us understand this better. A greenhouse plant always grows apart from the
ground since it is fully dependent on the greenhouse’s environment; as Simondon writes, “The
artificialized plant can only exist in a laboratory for plants, the greenhouse, with its complex
system of thermal and hydraulic regulations.”11 Now paradoxically, we can also say that the
plant becomes independent from the environment. The plant with the greenhouse is portable,
no matter whether it is in India or Germany. The greenhouse is the figure; in this setting, the
original ground, the combination of soul, climate, and relations to other organisms, such as
birds and worms, is lost. When the ground is lost, the plant “can no longer reproduce except
through procedures such as grafting, requiring human intervention.”12 The co-naturality
between the technical object and its milieu is like that between the figure and the ground; the
ground is its place, the cosmo-geographical specificity. This is why the question of
technodiversity can be partially grasped from the perspective of locality and not identity.

Given that we would like to understand the planetary from the perspective of technodiversity,
how can we resolve the question concerning unity? Unity is understood in two dimensions: the
unity of the spirit, or the Weltgeist, and the unity of technologies, how they communicate
without being reduced to certain closed and incompatible standards. Here we must avoid a
superficial misunderstanding of technodiversity, namely, technodiversity means something like
the difference between electrical sockets that are without standards across countries, or the
suggestion that, one day, China might invent a superchip with Chinese, non-Western logic. We
will address the first dimension here and the second dimension later in the section dedicated
to the anatomy of technical objects. The Weltgeist, as a synonym of reason, if it exists, does
not necessarily mean a unification in the sense of homogenization, and this is precisely the
ambiguity in Hegel’s thought insofar as a concept such as the concrete universal is concerned.
If the universal is supposed to mean something vernünftig, then it should allow differences to
emerge and flourish. Reason has to be expanded in situations of incompatibility, as
demonstrated by Kant in the confrontation between theoretical reason and practical reason
concerning the existence of God (and the immortal soul). Theoretical reason cannot recognize
the existence of God as it is not a phenomenon, while practical reason must postulate the
existence of God, without which the highest good is not thinkable.

The universal is a dimension of existence such as the particular, the individual, or the singular.
Every one of us is singular; for example, we differ from each other in terms of talents, family
background, and temperaments. This, however, does not mean that we cannot talk about the
universal. The universal is not the common feature of all the individuals that one can induce
empirically—for example, all individual human beings have eyes and noses—because this is
only universal in its mechanical sense. Universal is what we do not have but ought to have—it
is an object of desire. In other words, the universal is rational because it presupposes
differences; and as far as it is desirable, it does not exist in the form of reduction but
projection. We might want to recall here a passage from the historian Paul Hazard’s The Crisis
of the European Mind 1680–1715, where Hazard describes a group of French missionaries sent
to Siam in 1685. The missionaries were trying to exhort the king of Siam to become a convert
to Christianity, and the king’s answer completely blew them away:

Had it been the will of Divine Providence that a single religion should prevail in the world,
nothing could have been easier for Divine Providence than to execute its design. Inasmuch,
however, as it had pleased the Almighty to suffer a host of dissimilar religions to flourish
simultaneously, it was obvious that he preferred to be glorified by a prodigious number of his
creatures, each worshipping him in his own way.13

What astonished the missionaries was that the universal, thus understood as homogenous—
everyone has to be converted to Christianity—is too simple, and this could not have been the
idea of God. God would not prefer the world to be simple and homogenous. The universal is
neither European nor Chinese but rather the possibility of coexistence without contradiction.
However, without contradiction does not mean without differences or conflicts; reason is
precisely called to act by the seemingly contradictory situations, such as antinomy or aporia.
Coexistence without contradiction is fundamental for planetary morality, which is
simultaneously logical and axiological. Considering that, for Kant, the universal cannot be
found in any specific deed or specific object but rather as a maxim without contradiction, Kant
was acutely aware of this. Thus in Kant we find a universal that functions mechanically by
imposing the universal onto the particulars; at the same time, we also find another universal,
which is not given a priori and cannot be known in the discursive mode of truth, but only in the
mode of “as if.”14 Therefore, the opposition between the universal and the particular or the
universal and the relative risks being too simple to be true. We know that this was an
important issue during the Enlightenment, after what Hazard called the “crisis of the European
mind,” and that it has been debated by everyone from Voltaire to Frederick the Great.
However, tolerance becomes problematic when exceptions break certain legal and social
norms. If we follow Esposito, this constitutes an immunological phenomenon. Because if the
community can absorb the disturbance (i.e., the exception) to prevent a larger and more
serious interruption, similar to how immunity to disease is generated when the body is
attacked by antigens present in vaccines, then tolerance itself may be a proper immunological
response. However, it is also possible that such a disturbance constitutes a strong dose of
poison or can trigger organ failure, as Covid-19 vaccines sometimes do. Tolerance is not a
language of coexistence; it is that which is exploited or will explode when pushed toward an
extreme. Nonetheless, this does not prevent us from seeing differences as fundamental to the
universal or the current philosophical task as the search for a logic of coexistence that breaks
away from the techno-economic competition. This was fundamental to Cacciari’s questioning.
The consequential problem that Cacciari had to address is that if Europe is to restructure itself
beyond the nation-state, how could it maintain its relation to the non-European lands without
becoming completely vulnerable?

If the techno-economic game has dominated the terrain of politics, then it is very unlikely that
any state will withdraw, since doing so will render itself vulnerable. If so, are we not in a
vicious circle where either no one can ever quit, or everyone has to quit simultaneously? What
kind of power can one aspire to? It has to be something beyond all values crucial to the
military and economic competition that maintains the current humancentric world and its sets
of polar conflicts.15 In this sense, we can understand Derrida’s unconditional and Cacciari’s
unreachable not as an irrational force but as a different way of rationalization, one in which
the incalculable is presupposed and becomes the point of orientation. However, reintroducing
the incalculable in the age of calculability is like reintroducing God to atheists. That is also the
reason why we had to explore different understandings of technology and resituate
technology within a broader reality.

Technodiversity aims at reflecting on such a possibility, as well as radicalizing the concept of

difference or heterogeneity, which, at present, only bears a market value, and encouraging the
renewal of the relations between human beings and technologies as well as our living milieux.
Therefore, we need not a unification that effaces differences but rather a unification based on
fragmentation; however, it is important to note that fragmentation does not mean decoupling
or disconnecting, as it has now come to mean in the mass media, especially regarding
international relations. On the contrary, fragmentation means developing new rules or new
games to exit the impasse of the old game. Here we can refer to the concept of the fragment
among the Jena Romantics. Each fragment is an individual that recursively produces a small
system and joins with other fragments to create an organic whole. The system is not a closed
system since, unlike the dialectical method, fragments join each other through resonances but
not through borders or doors. The fragment constitutes a literary genre of the early Romantics,
like Novalis and the Schlegels; it is not an idea opposed to an organic totality, but organicity is
made possible through fragments. Rudolph Gaché, in his foreword to the English translation of
Friedrich Schlegel’s Philosophical Fragments, gives us a synthesis:

If fragmentation is thus the specifically Romantic thought of the system, it is . . . a self-

jointure of what makes up a whole. In contradistinction from the Idealist position strictly
speaking—Hegel, for instance—according to which the system consists of an ordering totally
transparent to itself, the early Romantics think the system through fragmentation, that is, as
presenting itself, not in a pure medium of thought and in absolute figureless, but as always an
individuality, and hence, in principle, multiple.16

Gaché’s words capture the similarities and differences between the organic totality that
dialectics search for and the unity that fragments want to achieve. Therefore, we see that
fragments do not necessarily mean the destruction of unity or segregation but rather that they
provide another way to search for unity, another way to understand the commons that will be
fundamental to future communities. If we are able to understand that technology means
primarily a form of life, and if alternative forms of life are more desirable than the current
consumerism, then it seems that fragmentation in the form of technodiversity might reopen
different forms of life. This is why, with China as a primary example, we suggest rediscovering
multiple cosmotechnics and reflecting on their implications in the technological imagination
and development. In The Question Concerning Technology in China: An Essay in
Cosmotechnics and Art and Cosmotechnics we tried to show the varieties of experience of
technology and art by using China as an example, that one could reconstruct a technological
thought in China through a reading of the two fundamental categories Dao and Qi (utensil).
China is a resource for rethinking the relationship between locality and technology, such as
Greece, Japan, Germany, and Brazil. The universality of technology has to be fundamentally
questioned from the perspective of technodiversity. We did not intend to claim that a
particular Chinese thought could or should succeed European philosophy to rescue the planet;
this is anything but philosophical argument. Philosophical thought derives its strength by
responding to a particular problem of its epoch, and another will necessarily succeed it in a
different time. The reconstruction of a Chinese or Japanese thought of technology does not
pretend to claim that ancient philosophy is adequate to address contemporary issues; rather,
it signifies a reinvention of philosophy in light of the planetary technological condition. This is
the contribution of non-European thought, not in any form of the ready-made or mystification,
but as individuation qua reinvention of thinking.
If reason progresses throughout the course of world history, then it must not progress into an
endpoint qua a dead end, where it will become unreason. This is why the eschatological
thinking of our time should be challenged, not just because it is a particular temporal concept
but also because it dominates the imagination of technological development: a technological
apocalypse awaits us in the near future. When reason marches planetarily, it must allow and
facilitate a diversity to manifest as the universal and simultaneously sublate the contradictions
without imposing domination, namely, to turn a particularity into a universality. The
universalization of diversity should be strictly distinguished from the universalization of
homogeneity, for the latter does not mean becoming negentropic; on the contrary, it could
mean becoming highly entropic, in the sense that it disrupts the whole milieu. For example, if a
pesticide is used universally without respect for the specifics of the ecosystem, the devastating
result could be far more costly than the problem it was intended to cure. The universalization
of pesticides is a counterexample of technodiversity, albeit a simplistic one as it doesn’t
encompass the spiritual dimension.

§34. Sovereignty Seen from the Perspective of Technodiversity

Where could we identify sovereignty in this fragmented world? Will it wither away, or will it
take a different form? Throughout this work, we have emphasized that sovereignty is that
which dwells in the megamachine and that which attempts to take control of it from within.
When the sovereign loses control of the megamachine, there is no longer sovereignty—this is
the lesson Schmitt derived from his reading of Hobbes’s Leviathan. The megamachine evolves,
and sovereignty has to renew itself in order to catch up with new types of machinery. The
sovereign is always in tension with the megamachine while, at the same time, it cannot do
without the megamachine. A third party that tries to unify all the nation-states without paying
attention to the nation-states’ specific relation to their own megamachines will also fail to
understand the dynamics of these states. Therefore, it can only try to mitigate the tensions
through negotiation and administration; however, it does not eliminate the problem. The
competition of the megamachines becomes increasingly synchronized in the process of
planetarization so that a country can only show the power of its sovereignty through
technological means, directly reflected in military power, and indirectly through the
implication of techno-science in the economy. In this sense, we live in the epoch of the
planetary enframing in the sense of Heidegger.

Today the relationship between sovereignty and the megamachine is in full tension, and
indeed, a gap seems to be enlarging further and further. Because the megamachine cannot be
tamed by the legal, social, and political system, the decisionist approach is intuitively adopted
to allow the sovereignty to attain its highest power by suspending laws that used to maintain
the functioning of the megamachine. While the megamachine is growing planetarily,
sovereignty is losing its power to intervene in the operation of the megamachine. In this case,
a state of exception is likely to be declared. Cryptocurrency could be a good example here
when we see that its extrastatic property—in the sense that it does not fall completely within
the legal system of a particular state—tends to subvert the existing financial system under the
control of the state. Extrastatic entities have increased significantly in the past decade mostly
because of the rapid development of digital technological systems, which is moving faster than
that of the human system. Therefore, it is not surprising to see that the manifestation of
sovereignty as that which decides on exception is becoming more and more normalized today.
In other words, it is not only that the state becomes more and more abusive with power, but
also because it is no longer in control of the planetary situation, and in order to maintain its
internal stability, it has to frequently suspend laws or establish new laws in order to restore
the stability of the society; this endows itself with more and more power to intervene into the
everyday life of citizens. The second approach could be achieved by using surveillance
technologies in all aspects of every life so that no accidents will be allowed, or all accidents
could be normalized.

We are not attempting to defend the state, but rather we want to illustrate the idea according
to which the tensions between the sovereign power and the megamachine constitute the drive
of its individuation. Technological competition, together with its economic implication, will
continue enlarging the megamachine and its organs. At the same time, state sovereignty will
struggle to increase its power through surveillance technologies and declaring states of
exception. As a result, we might observe two extreme situations: first, the state will become
increasingly vulnerable to social media, as already observed in some presidential elections, and
it will continue to become so, while liberals will continue to speak about the freedom of
speech and at the same time contradictorily attempt to limit technological innovation; second,
the state will dominate the innovation of technology, which also means that innovation will be
largely limited. The first extreme case today is likely found in the so-called liberal states, and
the second extreme case is in the so-called authoritarian states. In other words, neither
liberalism nor authoritarianism can answer today’s technological question.

Therefore, the immunological analysis of Esposito and, to some extent, that of Giorgio
Agamben is witness to the disjunction between the state and the megamachine, even though
the root of this disjunction for them was never formulated as a technological question but
rather analyzed as a philological problem by tracing the history of political concepts in
European thought. This is also the limit of the immunological analysis, even though Esposito is
aware of the challenge of technological globalization, and his philological work is more than
plausible. The limit is not so much due to the immunological analysis since the logical
operations such as self–other, inclusive–exclusion (or exclusive–inclusion) are still effective
today. Instead, the limit comes from the fact that the megamachine has been largely
undermined in the immunological analysis—it only appears at the end of Esposito’s genealogy.
Legislation was once an effective approach to regulating the development of the machine by
defining its range of use. However, globalization has intensified the possibility of autoimmune
attacks, so the attack against the other could easily become an attack against oneself. During
the preceding unilateral globalization, it was still possible to distinguish between self and
other, friend and foe. After the Covid-19 pandemic and especially since the Sino-American
conflict, the return to state sovereignty as the affirmation of a multipolar world—hence why
Emmanuel Macron after his visit to China in 2023 declared that “Strategic autonomy should be
the combat of Europe”17—does not resolve the immunological problem, but only affirms it.
This return risks being a demonstration of the Schmittian discourse and the failure to avoid the
same destiny, but more fundamentally, the question of technology is reduced again to an
economic one.

We demonstrated in chapter 6, via our reading of Bergson, that this immunological problem is
precisely an organological one. Today’s hubris, produced by an organological expansion far
beyond Bergson’s imagination, cannot be resolved by adding new laws or producing more
surveillance machines. On the one hand, we see how the spatial revolution (in the sense of
Carl Schmitt) has imposed a new challenge to the international order and its legal framework;
on the other hand, we are not dealing with one or two technologies but rather a new industrial
revolution based on artificial intelligence. AI is the new industrial revolution’s equivalent to the
steam engine and electrical power. In the same way that the steam engine constituted a
mastery over the thermodynamic process, AI constitutes mastery over the information
process. Here we will have to understand information in two senses: first, in-formation, that
which implies the autopoietic process of the system (in the sense of Varela, as seen in chapter
3), which we call self-organization or unsupervised learning; second, in-formation, that which
gives form to things, and we should probably add that not only forms but also that which gives
commands and permissions. The nomos of the Earth will cease to be of human affairs; it will
be determined more and more by the power of machines—as we have been trying to point
out through our reading of Schmitt’s elementary philosophy. The evolution of AI is driven by
data and the increasing computational power of microchips (there are, of course, many other
factors behind the evolution of AI since a planetary network of technologies virtually sustains
it); in other words, whoever has more structured data is likely to develop a stronger AI in the
long run, because empiricism and pattern recognition are still the basic principles of the
“intelligence” in question, which has already unleashed a tremendous amount of power.

Currently, ethicists are worried that the race toward AGI (artificial general intelligence) will
become destructive because there is not enough time to enact new regulations, and artificial
intelligence’s strong competitiveness will unleash evil. The technologists are the modern
equivalent to Epimetheus, those who will finally open Pandora’s box. When the box is opened,
we may imagine that if legislation cannot totally limit the development and use of AI, a state of
emergency would most likely be declared to suspend certain access to technologies or the
operation of certain technical systems. Should we then open Pandora’s box? If Epimetheus
knew what would happen upon opening the box, would he still have opened it? However,
could we then still pose this question? Massimo Cacciari suggests that the age of Prometheus
came to pass, and it is now succeeded by the age of Epimetheus. Cacciari goes back to the
meaning of Prometheus as foresight and Epimetheus as hindsight and identifies Prometheus
with the Christian katechon, which is not reduced to technē but rather understood as
sophia.18 The age of Epimetheus marks the dissolution of political wisdom and the reduction
of the world to a system, where all conflicts could be reduced to calculation.19 Thus Cacciari
announces that “Prometheus has withdrawn—or has once again been crucified on his rock,
and Epimetheus is at large and in our world opening ever newer Pandora’s boxes.”20 By this
he means that the age of Epimetheus will be the age of insecurity and permanent crisis, in
contrast to great wars and revolutions that belonged to the age of the Christian katechon.

Cacciari’s analysis of the Christian katechon, however, ends in a despair, a position that is
shared by many others who identify technology with calculation. It is also on this point that we
could recognize the value of Cacciari’s analysis and at the same time the weakness of it due to
a conventional interpretation of technology. One thing is clear, Epimetheus has no other
option but to open Pandora’s box, since it is a gift. Bergson recognized this “natural gift”
clearly when he commented on what was to be machines’ new vocation. The decision is not to
reject mechanism outright but rather to recognize mechanism itself as a gift, with the
responsibility of incorporating it into an opposing tendency: Elpis in Pandora’s box.21 What is
urgently demanded is a social-political thought capable of interrupting the stereotype of
technology and formulating a political economy of the spirit that incorporates such a
countertendency. It is not our intention to reconstruct a political theology by identifying this
countertendency with Cacciari’s definition of the katechon—in this sense the project of
Cacciari remains a political theology, and we could understand both of them as an epoch-
making power. However, this social-political thought can only arrive from a thorough analysis
of the genesis of technicity—and this is precisely the unfinished project of Simondon.

Indeed, the purpose of the current work has been to analyze the megamachine from the
perspectives of political epistemology.22 And it is through this analysis that we would like to
outline a political thought that addresses the impasse we are currently confronting. We must
conceive a new interpretation of sovereignty along this line of inquiry. But, given that many
authors have declared the end of sovereignty, stating that sovereignty is a mere fiction, should
we still keep the concept of sovereignty? In chapter 5, following Derrida, we considered
sovereignty as an unconditional power, and this is the pharmacological nature of sovereignty:
it could impose a totalizing tendency, and it could equally use this power to shield off from
external influences such as imperialism. For example, today the European political leaders, in
the wake of the Sino-American conflict, want to return to state sovereignty and autonomy.
However, our reading will inevitably impose a new task on sovereignty if we want to preserve
it—a question that we raised at the end of chapter 5. This new task will require sovereignty to
open a new epistemological condition that transforms the megamachine and radically renews
its relation to it. We have been trying to address this with the cosmopolitical question through
the lens of technodiversity and cosmotechnics.

§35. Technodiversity Analyzed via an Anatomy of Technical Objects

The description of technodiversity that we introduced in the previous chapters might reveal its
limits since it could be deliberately reduced to ethos, which is often associated with a people;
as a result, it risks reverting to localism or nationalism that, in turn, leads to mutual isolation.
By defending itself based on cultural specificity and historicity, in the name of antiuniversalism,
localism often undermines reason and develops into unreason, which is itself unhistorical. It is
unhistorical because it claims culture to be static and permanent and thus refuses to act in
accordance with the progress of reason. It produces a misunderstanding or even hatred
toward locality because it confuses locality with a closed and exclusive localism; indeed, what
we mean by locality has nothing to do with localism. The cultural dimension of technodiversity
provides a source for us to reflect on the contingency of modern technologies and on ways of
resituating them into a locality. To distinguish locality from localism, we will need another
element, which I proposed in Art and Cosmotechnics as the individuation of thinking.23 The
philosophical task today is not to replicate Heidegger’s inquiry into “what is called thinking”
but to explore “what is individuation of thinking.” It is also where non-European philosophy
could contribute. The individuation of thinking is pivotal to the vitality of locality, because it
challenges both essentialism and arbitrariness. We define individuation in the Simondonian
sense, emphasizing incompatibility rather than hybridity. We recall here that individuation
only occurs when an incompatibility emerges and attains a threshold in a saturated system.
These incompatibilities will be resolved in individuation, and a new structure will take shape
once the system reaches metastability. The process of individuation presupposes
incompatibility, and therefore difference and antagonism.

We would like to distinguish between individuation and cross-breeding or métissage as

Édouard Glissant attempts to do with what he calls creolization. Creolization normally means
that elements of different cultures are blended to create a new culture, but for Glissant, it
means something more. Creolization is like a rhizome that creates multiple roots. For him,
creolization is a diversification, “one of the poetic dreams of the expanding West,” but at the
same time, an “antidote to the universal empire that this expansion subsumed.”24 This
diversification through language, literature, and technology is essential for our imagination of
a world to come; as Glissant asks, “How is it possible to come out of seclusion if only two or
three languages continue to monopolise the irrefutable powers of technology and their
manipulation, which are imposed as the sole path to salvation and energised by their actual
effects?”25 For example, during the colonization of Hong Kong, the locals invented a drink
called yuenyeung (literally, “mandarin duck”), which is a mixture of milk tea (a strong black tea
with condensed milk) and coffee. This might stand as an example of métissage, which might
well become important for one’s everyday life once developed into a habit, but it does not
take thinking further; it is simply a mixture of coffee and tea. On the contrary, thinking is not a
patchwork; it actualizes itself not through collage but by individuating itself. It is not certain
that creolization is entirely equivalent to what we call the individuation of thinking. However,
they can both be seen as efforts to think through the difference between simply mixing and
diversifying. If creolization is to be understood as a historical process, then perhaps the
individuation of thinking could be understood as an analytic model, offering hints concerning
future diversification strategies.
In contrast to localism, which is associated with statism and nationalism, we may really only
speak of a locality when said locality is capable of transformation. Such a transformation is not
motivated by a search for a permanent identity but by individuation. We can see that when
the development of a locality is only in the hands of a few patriots and nationalists, then that
locality is already doomed. The individuation of thinking does not only take place in the mind
of an intellectual; it may occur through intellectual exchange but may also, perhaps more
importantly, be realized in the invention and use of technology—this is also the moment when
technology becomes philosophical and philosophy becomes technological.

Besides reflecting on the role and meaning of technology in different cultural contexts and
thoughts, we have to return to the technical objects themselves to understand their
operations and structures anatomically. This anatomical study should extend beyond the
understanding of technical objects as a materialized causal complex (what Simondon calls
concretization). Following Simondon, we could call this approach mechanology. We should
emphasize that Simondon’s understanding of technology tends to be universal, that it is
limited by Western tradition and anthropological imagination.26 Simondon’s is an attempt to
reflect on the contemporaneity of technology from the perspective of a very generalized
notion of “culture.” While the term culture appears often in Simondon’s work and he
distinguishes culture (in a narrow sense, meaning upper culture) from Culture (in a general
sense),27 his examples predominantly originate from European contexts. This generalized
notion of culture is modern since all cultures converge toward the modern industrial culture.
According to Simondon, mechanology is the discipline capable of taking technology seriously,
not only in understanding the development and evolution of technical objects but also in
integrating technology into culture. What he means by the integration of technology into
culture is related to the fact that culture has so far only represented technology or technical
objects as alien to humanity; for example, we can find in popular literature the depiction of
robot revolts and technological apocalypses. Culture (in its narrow sense) is, therefore, not
able to do justice to technology and consequently fails to understand the significance of it and
its impact. The development of cybernetics for Simondon opens an epoch for a new
encyclopedism that might finally make the integration of technology into culture possible. This
is also why in the previous section, we called for a prosthetic culture; it is because culture still
does not see technical objects as prostheses but only as replacements or as commodities, a
problem frequently observed within Marxist analyses. A mechanologist is not an engineer but
more a philosophical engineer or an artist who is able to analyze technical objects both
technically and philosophically.

Mechanology is a term that Simondon proposed in On the Mode of Existence of Technical

Objects, but it is yet to be systematically developed. We should carry his task further in order
to formulate a systematic methodology for the study of contemporary technical objects. This
task will involve an “anatomy” of technical objects, and in so doing, we will have to show how
such an anatomy will open a new field of investigations and actions for us. The task,
reminiscent of Simondon’s endeavors, warrants multiple monographs; here we will focus on
three layers (from an engineering perspective, we can speak about different levels of
abstraction). The first layer is hardware, namely, the material support of technical objects; the
second is software, which drives the hardware to execute certain commands; and the third is
usage. We should note that this division only became possible in the twentieth century when
software and hardware were developed separately. This would not have been possible in the
eighteenth and nineteenth centuries when software and hardware could not be completely
separated. In the twenty-first century, with the development of cloud computing, the
separation between hardware and software from the user’s perspective is completed. This
dualism (software versus hardware) is a true demonstration of the false philosophical
assumption of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. The third layer concerns the use of
technical objects at different scales, from the individual to the regional and global application
of technical objects. The present problem, however, is that technology has been abstractly
thought of as an entity that is simultaneously necessary and universal. Therefore, the space of
imagination concerning technical objects is reduced to the constant attempt to catch up with
the so-called most advanced technologies. We will have to look into each layer from new
perspectives.

First, the potential of separating software and hardware has to be taken as a new possibility.
The separation between software and hardware liberated a more speculative form of
knowledge from the logical and material constraints of hardware. This epistemological
realization in machines may be difficult for many to accept since it appears to be an
affirmation of a certain classical dualism; yet, this distinction in machines between hardware
and software opens a new approach that is profoundly different from a knowledge of
cognition modelled on the human. The human is one whose body and soul cannot be
separated; however, the separation between soul and body is precisely the feature of the
machine. To be more precise, this does not mean that software can function without
hardware, but rather that the software could run on any hardware of the same model or those
compatible. Even Simondon did not notice this radical change in his analysis of technical
objects, since, for him, living in the time of electronic components such as the diode, triode,
and transistors, the individualization of technical objects was still very much limited to
hardware, while a modern portable, pocket-sized computer only belonged to fictional
scenarios.

Second, the use of technical objects has been dominated by the economic rationality of profit
making; in other words, the participation of technical objects is more concerned with
economic activities than technical activities. For example, the duration between launches of
new products within the same series has shortened, with the new products showing minimal
or insignificant technical progress. In this sense, the development of technical objects is
conditioned by economic considerations, and it often sacrifices the technological possibilities
in favor of some decorative functions. The economic reason that dominates the development
of technology in the name of innovation blinds people from understanding the potential of
technology in liberating human beings from social and political constraints, which were often
unwisely and unreasonably imposed from without. This argument conflicts with historical
materialism because the latter implies technological determinism by amplifying the relation
between technology and economic activities. The reduction of the technological to the
economical obscures the complexity of the structure and operation of technical objects.

For sure, each of these layers carries its own significance. However, it appears that the second
layer is increasing in importance because it is only recently that a complete separation of
software and hardware has become achievable (we stress and confine the debate to
technology without extending to that between the body and the mind). We will, therefore,
focus on this layer in the following section and discuss the other layers in the later part of this
chapter. Indeed, software opens a new form of participation, or we might say a new form of
democracy. That is, software should not merely be understood as operation or execution;
instead, we would like to push forward the claim that every software contains a set of
assumptions. These assumptions are, at the same time, epistemological, ontological, and
cosmological. We will use three examples to elaborate on this claim and suggest some entry
points where interventions could be carried out.

First, let us consider Chinese medicine. In Chinese medicine, there are a set of ontological
assumptions, for example, ch’i, yin, and yang, and these entities are not to be found in physical
forms; they are instead adopted from cosmology, with the body considered a microcosmos.
These ontological entities—ontological in the sense that it concerns what there is—greatly
contrast with modern medicine, where ontological categories are proved either by
demonstration or induction. Besides these ontological and cosmological assumptions, in
Chinese medicine, we also find epistemological assumptions such as those that might
assimilate to the modern notion of “holism,” that is, there is an emphasis on the harmony
between the yin and the yang. In the above example, we could say that all these assumptions
are grounded in a cosmological and noetic specificity. It is possible, as many researchers do
today, to analyze the biochemical compositions of the herbs used in Chinese medicine and
evaluate them by confirming if they match those used in Western medicine; however, this
reductionism is a restricted scientism that destroys conceptual distinctions.

Second, epistemological assumptions are not only limited to cultural differences; sometimes,
they stem from sociological stereotypes. Generally, we can question the assumptions in a
contemporary application, such as a social network. A social network assumes different
entities, such as an individual, a friend, a group, or a community; a social relation is a line
between two dots, and a group is known as an assemblage of atoms. These assumptions are
already present in the design process foreran by the social psychologist Jacob Moreno’s
sociometry, and today they are applied in graph analysis by computer scientists.28 We can also
extend the concept of the social network to that of the modern state, in which each individual
is considered a social atom, and the society is a cluster of collective social atoms; the state is,
therefore, that which organizes these atoms and groups of atoms. And it remains to be seen if
these assumptions can be generally accepted or whether they are merely contingent or even
problematic in the sense that they could be otherwise. From an anthropological point of view,
there has been no society that started with a bunch of random individuals; instead, we see
that the collective is always presupposed, be that a family or a tribe. The contemporary social
network reflects the individualism of our society; however, it also amplifies this individualism
to a greater extent than what Hegel observed in his time. Today, the state lacks the necessary
capacity to counteract this individualism effectively. Over a decade ago, I worked with a group
of computer scientists on a social network based on collectives rather than individuals, and this
might serve as an example of how to carry out research on technodiversity. While all
technologies claim to be universal, they are all predicated on certain epistemological,
ontological, and cosmological assumptions. Unfortunately, the ability to question these
assumptions is not fostered in engineering courses, at least not in present university curricula.

Third, this methodology could be extended to studying the most advanced technologies we are
confronting today. Historian Slava Gerovitch did an excellent job showing that even though
most AI scientists claim to have developed a universal human intelligence model, such models
always incorporated different social, cultural, and political considerations. This difference was
reflected in the distinctive paths of Soviet cybernetics and American cybernetics. For example,
the Simon-Newell model assumes that “search” is the most fundamental intelligent activity.
However, Soviet scientists rejected this approach by criticizing that the “search model” already
assumed a given problem, whereas the point is to define a problem, something that was then
developed as the Pospelov/Pushkin reflection (soobrazhenie) model. The same goes for the
Von Neumann model, which is based on competition and the understanding of the rules of the
game. In contrast, the Soviet Gelfand/Tsetlin Model emphasizes expedient, minimum
interactions and fundamental uncertainty.29 Indeed, Gerovitch convincingly showed how
these differences were shaped by their social, cultural, and political environment. He gave two
metaphors to understand the difference between American AI and Soviet AI: American AI
could be symbolized as a rat race in the labyrinth, and the Soviet AI as a bat hunting a moth in
turbulence. Gerovitch’s historical work allows us to understand how a locality determines
contemporary technology without being aware, since the researcher or inventor might simply
regard it as universal. In other words, we require an epistemological reconstruction of major
technological paradigms, such as cybernetics and artificial intelligence.30

This line of thinking has not been taken seriously enough, and the approach toward
technodiversity has not been adequately analyzed; instead, capitalism in its abstract form
often haunts the dream of any alternative since all alternatives risk either fading away into
obscurity or being absorbed by capital itself. The truth is that the operation of capitalism is
also based on a set of ontological, epistemological, and cosmological assumptions. Capitalism
is neither an object nor a persona but rather a dominant system of knowledge that effectively
mobilizes all forms of energy to obtain optimal and long-lasting profit. Such a system must
evolve to overcome antiquated ontological, epistemological, and cosmological assumptions,
such as how neoclassical economic theory was criticized due to its outdated epistemology
based on Newtonian mechanics, as discussed in chapter 3. The separation of society into base
and superstructure completely misses the epistemological question because it is still based on
a mechanical model; disregarding its epistemological foundation could lead to conceptual
mistakes. Instead, we suggest that resistance emerges from questioning and challenging these
assumptions and the finality of the system. Even when one stands on the opposite side of
capitalism to criticize every aspect of it, one might not be producing anything new, that is,
other than changing some conditions to make it more “ethical” and “humanitarian”—for
example, allowing a longer lunch break or improving operational equipment and the working
environment. The overcoming of capitalism will not occur through the technological
development of full automation; instead, it has to be done through an epistemological shift.
One cannot also reduce machines to purely economic terms, such as fixed capital; it is
precisely on this point that Simondon reproached Marx. Simondon did not formulate it as we
do here. Still, he clearly showed how the epistemological paradigm brought about by
cybernetics must be taken as a critical occasion to reconsider a new social, technological
program, or a third encyclopedism, as he calls it. Therefore, accelerating toward full
automation or not is a false response to capitalism because it does not necessarily produce an
epistemological change. It is true that by accelerating something to an extreme, it may turn
toward a different direction, but this is only possible when a strong vitality is already assumed
in the system, such as in dialectics. Technodiversity should be thematized and consciously
integrated into the thinking and making of technology instead of being only a subject of
historical reflection. If we are going to imagine planetary politics, then a conscious take on the
question of technodiversity will be necessary.

What we have done so far is to show, first, how the concept of universality and sovereignty
could be reinterpreted from the perspective of technodiversity. Second, through the anatomy
of technical objects, we have tried to reopen the question of technology that has thus far been
methodologically closed both in the humanities and the engineering disciplines. Furthermore,
since we can claim that there has been a technodiversity and that this technodiversity has
been undermined in the process of modernization, then the question is not only how to
preserve nonmodern technologies as if they are dead specimens to be displayed in a museum
of technology, but also, and more importantly, how to reflect on the future of technodiversity
through these traditions and beyond them. The question of the matrix between
technodiversity, noodiversity, and biodiversity constitutes what I call epistemological
diplomacy. It is also a framework we would like to advance for the future of planetary politics.
This epistemological diplomacy also responds to what Boaventura de Sousa Santos calls
epistemicide, meaning the displacement and disappearance of local and indigenous knowledge
due to modernization.31

§36. Technodiversity as Epistemological Diplomacy

Epistemicide leads to homogeneity, the entropic becoming of nonmodern society—the subject

of an entropology à la Lévi-Strauss.32 Epistemological diplomacy diversifies and surpasses the
limit of diplomacy based on economic and military negotiations. We want to emphasize that
we are not opposing philosophy to technology. On the contrary, we are more tempted to say
that the future of philosophy is technology, and the future of technology is philosophy. This is
also the condition for developing a Tractatus Politico-Technologicus. If we follow Heidegger
that Western philosophy is already completed by and in cybernetics, then to avoid the self-
destruction of the human being in the age of the Gestell, Heidegger proposes to think what is
called thinking, for he distinguishes thinking from philosophy. Thinking, in contrast to
philosophy, is the other beginning of the Western civilization. The other beginning is the one
that negates the tendency of mere calculation. But does this mean that one should abandon
technology in favor of thinking? Certainly, if everyone decides to abandon technology
simultaneously, then a negation of the tendency of mere calculation would be conceivable;
however, even if this were to happen, it wouldn’t reduce the destructive potential of modern
technology, nor would it bring reason to a new terrain. Technology should once again become
philosophical (or vernünftig), in the sense that it will have to become reflective of itself, not
only constructing reflective models to execute certain functions. This reflectivity of technology
does not imply either the superbrain envisioned by Teilhard de Chardin, or the singularity
envisioned by transhumanists, but rather an organology capable of producing differences. If
we suggest technodiversity as a challenge that reason has to take up, it is because for us,
fundamentally, the organic totality—which is the aim of the superbrain and the singularity—
has to be fragmented into different orders and the spiritualization of matter has to take place
by contesting the homogenization of digital technology that has been solely guided by speed
and efficiency.

How can technodiversity be developed when all states compete on a homogeneous

technological platform judged by speed, efficiency, and volume? The Großraum Schmitt
aspired to realize did not take us much further than the nation-state promised in the
eighteenth century. The multipolar world is no other than the redistribution of world power to
the major geopolitical players; the nature of politics will remain the same as that of the nation-
states if technodiversity is not considered. Beyond the rhetorical façade, the Großraum is
nothing other than a military and economic program of the superstates that establishes
military bases and economic centers beyond the sovereign territories and expands military
influence through space exploration. Outer space is integrated into the Großraum as well as
being a battlefield for future warfare.

Can philosophers still dream of perpetual peace, or is the pursuit of perpetual peace
something that should no longer be aspired to? Maybe here we can return to Kant’s treatise,
in which the philosopher confronts the inevitability of war and the desire for perpetual peace.
Kant suggests free trade as a candidate to investigate the possibility of perpetual peace. Trade
could be considered an extrastatic element here since it exceeds the state as an enclosure of
people and natural resources. Trade is necessary to any society but produces something
external to the state. We are aware that what was once external to the state through trade
may be reabsorbed or reintegrated by the market, the “invisible hand,” or the cunning of
reason, but, in Kant’s political thinking, trade also generates extrastatic ties and cosmopolitan
rights. Trade builds a community between different parties, and those who want to abuse the
system will be condemned by the whole network. The unity of the network and the reciprocity
between different members will create an equilibrium. However, we know that Kant does not
presuppose a preestablished harmony. Instead, Kant is more a Hobbesian in the sense that, for
him, asocial sociality is what characterizes human existence. Nature desires discord, and no
matter how much humans desire harmony and comfort, nature understands what is best for
humans, inflicting them with conflicts.33 However, in Kant, we find a Rousseauist solution
counters the Hobbesian presupposition, for the conflicts have to be balanced by an organic
dynamism—international trade.34 Trade is that which can realize the unity of reason at the
international level, as Kant expresses so beautifully:

The peoples of the earth have thus entered in varying degrees into a universal community,
and it has developed to the point where a violation of rights in one part of the world is felt
everywhere. The idea of a cosmopolitan right is therefore not fantastic and overstrained; it is a
necessary complement to the unwritten code of political and international right, transforming
it into a universal right of humanity.35

Kant emphasizes one and everywhere to express the part–whole relation in the organic
system: every state has to behave correctly, otherwise they would acquire a negative
reputation and be denied entry into other nations. Kant gave us the example of China and
Japan and praised their wisdom: when confronted with Western colonizers, China resisted,
while Japan only opened to the Dutch. Kant’s development of commerce or trade into a
political program is consistent with his major philosophical projects laid down in the three
Critiques. The systematic unity of reason could not be completed by mechanical rules alone,
which linearly infer effects from causes; instead, the systematic unity can only rely on a
purposiveness without purpose—namely, a purposiveness that cannot be reduced to empirical
need. For example, when we ask about the purposiveness of vegetables, it cannot be reduced
to providing food for humans or animals. As we mentioned in the previous chapters, in the
“Architectonic of Pure Reason” of the Critique of Pure Reason, Kant’s ambition was to
articulate the systematic unity of reason by inquiring into the schematism of ideas as he had
done with the schematism of concepts in the Analytic.36 For Kant, architectonics means the
“art of systems,” and system, here, implies an organic relation between the parts and the
whole:

By a system, however, I mean the unity of the manifold cognitions under an idea. This idea is
reason’s concept of the form of a whole insofar as this concept determines a priori both the
range of the manifold and the relative position that the parts have among one another. Hence
reason’s scientific concept contains the whole’s purpose and the form of the whole congruent
with this purpose.37
In other words, systematicity implies purposiveness, and purposiveness implies an organicity
that cannot be reduced to a linear causality. “The Architectonic of Pure Reason” is an
unsatisfactory attempt to search for unity between the theoretical-speculative use of reason (a
metaphysics of nature) and the practical-moral use of reason (a metaphysics of morals), and
the term purposiveness only analogically mediated such a unification. This is because the
Critique of Pure Reason was largely a treatise on the apodictic use of reason, and the
hypothetical use of reason only came to its centrality in the Critique of Practical Reason with
its clarity determined in the Critique of Judgment. The difference between the apodictic and
hypothetical use of reason lies in the fact that the former derives the particular from the given
universal in the act of subsumption, while for the latter, the universal is only postulated, and it
has to be recursively reflected through experience.38 In this sense, the hypothetical use of
reason is often regarded as a precursor to reflective judgment.39 It is also why, for Kant, the
third Critique is the bridge between the first and second Critiques. The third, as a bridge
between the first two, means that the first two Critiques did not yet satisfactorily attain a
systematic unity. Purposiveness is not only a structure but also an operation that constantly
searches for the universal through reflection. It recursively negates empirical inclinations and
immediate interests, exemplified in the aesthetic judgment of the beautiful as pleasure
without interest and purposiveness without purpose. This purposiveness without purpose,
when transformed into the language of international politics, is perpetual peace; this,
however, also implies the impossibility of arriving at perpetual peace. The possibility to think
about the end of morality and the end of nature demands two further assumptions. First is the
existence of a higher intelligence, such as the divine being, that makes the a priori nature of
purposiveness possible—an argument we find in metaphysics before Kant.40 Second, since the
universal a priori is absent, the end remains hypothetical, and the searching heuristic and
recursive, this searching could be infinite; therefore, the moral law has to postulate the
existence of the immortal soul, as only such a duration is adequate.41 Despite its
indefiniteness, we are interested in such a model of operation, one that allows us to grasp how
the hypothetical use of reason (or reflective judgment) works and how it might contribute to
both the moral end of the individual and the cosmopolitan end of the species.

In the Introduction, we attempted to establish a dialogue with Karatani’s The Structure of

World History by showing that Karatani does not sufficiently discuss the question of unity, and
therefore from this point of view, his project undermines the question of political
epistemology, which is central to the current work. Karatani’s project attempts to renew Kant’s
proposal for perpetual peace by speculating about a “world republic” or a federation of states.
Karatani takes Kant’s speculative use of reason seriously. The world state, the hypothetical
end, would be a renewal of the gift economy; at the same time, it sublates both capital and
state. The world state would be something unrealizable while remaining desirable; even
though we might never arrive at it, without such an idea of the world state, we would “lapse
into schizophrenia.”42 The world republic is founded on universal religion, and in this sense, it
must become a faith, one that permits us to build a plane of consistency:
 Kant’s world republic is a regulative idea: it is an index toward which people should gradually
attempt to draw close. It is of course only a semblance, but because it is something we cannot
do without, it has the status of a transcendental illusion. . . . World republic would be a society
in which mode of exchange D has been realized. In fact, this can never be fully realized.
Nonetheless, it will persist as an index toward which we gradually move.43

The world republic remains a moral end, analogical to a natural end. As we know, the moral
end has legitimacy in this natural end. It is also the reason why Karatani calls it a “cunning of
nature,” paraphrasing Hegel’s “cunning of reason.” Here, we are tempted to deconstruct
Karatani’s interpretation of Kant by showing that the cunning of nature does not exist, that in
Kant there is no philosophy of history, and therefore, a structure of world history would not be
possible. However, our aim is not to deconstruct Karatani and his Kantian inspiration.
Karatani’s insight is that if there is a world republic in the future, it will be based on exchange.
Therefore, one has to approach it from the exteriority of the state. This is, however, a blind
spot to many European thinkers because they believe that once Europe changes, the whole
world should change in good course. Karatani chose Jürgen Habermas as his straw man;
however, there are far too many who think solely from the perspective of interiority. The key
questions are: What is to be given as a gift, and how is it to be exchanged? Karatani gave us an
imaginary scenario at the end of the book:

Suppose, for example, one country has a revolution that ends with the country making a gift
of its military sovereignty to the United Nations. This would of course be a revolution in a
single nation. But it wouldn’t necessarily result in external interference or international
isolation. No weapon can resist the power of the gift. It has the power to attract the support of
many states and to fundamentally change the structure of the United Nations. For these
reasons, such a revolution in one country could in fact lead to simultaneous world revolution.

Karatani did not argue that this would necessarily occur; on the contrary, as a moral end, this
may never transpire. Whether a country can truly relinquish sovereignty to the UN, which is
ruled by a few superpowers, is one concern, but whether this might lead to a simultaneous
global revolution is another. As we already saw in the introduction, Geoff Mann and Joel
Wainwright in Climate Leviathan followed Karatani’s approach, sketching a quadratic scheme
of climate international politics: Climate Leviathan, Climate Behemoth, Climate Mao, and
Climate X. Climate X is analogical to the Mode of Exchange D in the sense that it is not yet
realizable and probably will not be realized. Climate X is a refusal of sovereignty in general, as
the authors write, “Must we have sovereignty? Is a nonsovereign entity impossible? Even if it is
a utopian gesture, the answer must be no.”44 Both refusing sovereignty and giving sovereignty
as gifts are direct refusals of the nation-state-capital, which would certainly open a new
planetary situation. Unfortunately, the recent Covid-19 pandemic and geopolitical drift have
further postponed such a possibility. Even though Karatani argued that the growth of India and
China would not impose a new hegemony because capitalism would have ended by then,45 he
seems to have ignored Carl Schmitt’s work on the Großraum and the epistemological
foundation of reciprocity and community in Kant. This is not to discredit Karatani’s analysis. On
the contrary, his insight on exchange should be taken further. And for this reason, we should
return to Kant and his contemporaries.

International trade establishes relationships between different states that are not solely the
property of any one state but rather form a whole and are governed by the whole. In this
sense, trading is the assimilation of the regulative principle in which Kant sees the possibility of
a balance of power based on reciprocity. Trading is, of course, not possible without the use of
transportation tools—an essential part of the megamachine, and it was during Kant’s time that
marine power became the dominant power in economic and military domains. Königsberg was
an important port of the Baltic Sea, and Kant observed the importance of the economic value
of trading and the knowledge it brought. However, all technologies that rely on dominant
technologies, and trade is no exception, are pharmacological. Any technology that might
appear as a remedy could quite as easily become toxic, and a new configuration of the various
pharmaka has to be attempted in order to make use of the toxicity by turning it into something
beneficial. Reason goes astray when trading is no longer guided by the purposiveness of
cosmopolitan right and perpetual peace, but rather its end is reduced to the economic desire
of colonialism and the desire to dominate others.

This extrastatic entity was later problematized by Fichte in his The Closed Commercial State
(1800). Fichte’s treatise picked up what Hume called the “jealousy of trade” and showed that
economic rivalry between the European states will not lead to perpetual peace but its
opposite. In our contemporary language, we might say that trade is war by other means; as we
read in the news almost every day, the trade war between the United States and China is
exemplary of this fact. Trading does not necessarily imitate nature so as to become the
guarantee of perpetual peace. Fichte cites the Dutch as a prime example, who uprooted spice
plants and dumped spices overboard to raise the price of spices in the European market.46
International trade as an algorithm of peace fails, but instead, we observe the hubris
engendered in its advancement, which may eventually lead to a return to Hobbes’s state of
nature:

This war will become ever more fierce and unjust and dangerous in its consequences as the
world’s population increases, the commercial state grows through additional acquisitions,
production and the arts advance, and finally, as a result, the quantity of goods coming into
circulation, and with this the needs of the population, increase and multiply. When the way of
life among the nations was simpler, this had gone on without great injustice or oppression, but
now that needs have grown greater, it has turned into the most screaming injustice, a source
of great misery.47
Fichte suggests isolating commerce by building a national financial system based on its own
currency. In this vision, the closure of the commercial state will mitigate the jealousy of trade
and eliminate the rivalry from economic competition. Fichte, however, does not intend to
prevent people from contacting those from different territories. Instead of trade, he proposes
knowledge or science (Wissenschaft) as the universal subject that might bind all people
together. Science, therefore, replaces trade as the extrastatic entity that, better than the
economy, will promote reason among the peoples. Fichte suggests a decoupling of politics
from economy and economy from science. Science alone will be the candidate that unites all
the people on Earth:

The only thing that entirely eliminates all differences between peoples and their
circumstances and that belongs merely and solely to the human being as such and not to the
citizen, is science. Through science, and through this alone, men will and should continue to be
connected to one another once their separation into peoples is, in every other respect,
complete. This alone will remain their common possession when they have divided up
everything else among themselves. No closed state will eliminate this connection. Instead it
will encourage it, since the enrichment of science through the unified force of the human race
will even advance the state’s own isolated earthly ends. Academies financed by the state will
introduce the treasures of foreign literature into the country, with the treasures of domestic
literature offered in exchange.48

Of course, we remain skeptical when we consider Fichte’s suggestion that science, as the
incarnation of reason, shall stand outside human affairs and replace the transcendent that
unites the human species. We might also add to Fichte’s observation that, nowadays, it is not
just trade, as it was at the turn of the nineteenth century, but also techno-science, which has
become more than ever a battlefield between nation-states. On the one hand, international
trade becomes a means of warfare—for example, the United States’ relentless effort to block
China from accessing microchip technologies and prevent China’s technological products from
entering the Western market.49 War, on the other hand, now takes the shape of cyberattacks
and the purposeful spread of disinformation, misinformation, and so on. Could we, of course,
imitate Fichte by suggesting a treatise on the Closed Technological State, in which not only
commerce but also technology would be fully isolated and where only fixed, small amounts of
import and export of necessities remain possible? If this were to occur, it might multiply the
products that would be restricted beyond commerce and technology, and we might end up
with isolated tribes. Unfortunately, this seems to be the tendency now regarding the
technological war, in which the competition is centered on transfer of technological
knowledge.

Extending Fichte’s question, we might want to ask whether epistemological diplomacy in the
twenty-first century is at all possible for us. If there is diplomacy in Fichte’s closed commercial
state, then it is a diplomacy of knowledge or, more precisely, scientific knowledge. It was,
therefore, knowledge, instead of trade, that should become the guarantee of perpetual peace
for Fichte. However, the Enlightenment, as we know it, in the name of reason, promotes a
particular type of knowledge (i.e., philosophy) with its advanced technologies. In his 2018
article “How the Enlightenment Ends,” Henry Kissinger made a rather controversial claim that
the Enlightenment, as a movement of the universalization of philosophy, was put to an end by
artificial intelligence because the latter completed the age of reason. He suggests that today’s
task is no longer how the use of technology might spread Enlightenment philosophy but is to
find a guiding philosophy for AI technology.50 In other words, the relation between
Enlightenment philosophy and technology is reversed. Technology is no longer in the service of
philosophy, and Fichte’s thesis that science or philosophy is that which maintains the
connection of humanity no longer holds. Consequently, philosophy has to reinvent itself, given
this reversion.

We have no intention to negate the Enlightenment if the Enlightenment entails the planetary
reason discussed throughout this book and not the homogenization of knowledge and
thought.51 Today, it might be too easy to claim that the West manipulates reason because
that would imply that reason is homogeneous and substantial, which we know is not the case.
The progress of reason should be the opposite of homogenization: it should enable diversity
and renew the language of coexistence. In this sense, Kant’s most profound comment on the
Enlightenment is probably not his “An Answer to the Question: ‘What Is Enlightenment’” but
rather “The Architectonic of Pure Reason.” However, today we need new diplomacy to exploit
the new extrastatic relations other than what Kant speculated regarding trade, which in its
modern form includes logistic and economic transactions, tourism, and so forth. This
epistemological diplomacy must go beyond the current economic and military competition. It
is not only about building scientific communities, as universities have been doing for centuries,
but also the development of programs that might facilitate the development of
technodiversity, noodiversity, and biodiversity. This is the path we intended to take, beginning
with Hegel’s political state and Schmitt’s Großraum to demonstrate how the philosophical
justifications of political forms could be viewed through the lens of political epistemologies
and technologies. The debate on mechanism and organism has been fundamental to European
thought and the inquiry concerning humanity. The epistemological diplomacy that we envision
should be seen as a program that allows for the development of technodiversity, noodiversity,
and biodiversity under the guidance of reason but also allows for reason to move beyond
territorial boundaries and toward the planetary. Technodiversity does not mean that we will
have to abandon Western technological inventions such as the internet simply because they
are Western; this would be both impossible and foolish. However, it has become necessary to
produce bifurcations in the current technological tendencies by inquiring into technodiversity
and, consequently, formulating a new critique of political economy, as Stiegler proposed.

Like Kant’s Perpetual Peace and Karatani’s World Republic, we do not know the end; we can
only hypothesize and speak “as if” an end is imaginable and attainable. The telos of history
remains unknown when the organic condition of philosophizing is surpassed or transcended by
the new technological condition, which we suggested in Recursivity and Contingency and
continued in Art and Cosmotechnics. A planetary thinking has to respond to the new condition
of philosophizing, seeing it as a beginning rather than an end. However, we are not aspiring to
the intervention of a force from without that changes the situation, be that a world war, a
climate collapse, or an alien intrusion. This does not mean that it is impossible, but it inevitably
regresses into a form of nihilism, and worse, cynicism. A radical transformation of society has
to be at the same time material and spiritual. This is also the reason why we have been trying
to articulate the possibility of approaching our planetary impasse from the framework of
biodiversity, noodiversity, and technodiversity. Readers will certainly find limits in any
discourse addressing the planetary, and probably will find any planetary thinking not expansive
enough. A philosopher can only show under what conditions a planetary thinking shall not be
possible, and he or she can only attempt to search for it like one crossing the river by feeling
for the stones; but what if these stones are unstable under force or are monsters in disguise? It
is the task of reason to limit the philosopher’s speculation and the task of the philosopher to
expand reason, so as to move toward “planetary happiness.”52
Notes
Introduction

1. Axelos, Vers la pensée planétaire, 19. Toward the end of the introduction, Axelos states
clearly an impasse: “Y aurait-il des nouveautés possibles, plus ou moins radicales? Pour le
moment, aucun prophétisme, aucune rêverie et aucune utopie ne parviennent à dépasser cet
état mouvant des choses. Ils restent muets et creux” (42). Axelos thinks that we are perhaps
marching toward a planetary thinking that will be a retake (reprise) of the past and a
preparation of the future.

2. For Heidegger, writing in the 1930s, planetarization implies a planetary lack of sense-
making (Besinnungslosigkeit), which is not limited to Europe but is also, for example,
applicable to the United States and Japan. This lack of sense-making is even more obvious
today. Even if European philosophy completely reinvents itself, disruptive technologies will
continue throughout the globe; see Heidegger, GA66 Besinnung (1938/39), 74.

3. Kant, “Perpetual Peace,” in Political Writings, 114.

4. Bruno Latour’s effort is the most remarkable in the past decade. Latour achieved this not
only via writings but also through exhibitions and workshops.

5. Among all the outstanding works, just to mention a few, see Chakrabarty, The Climate of
History in a Planetary Age; Moore, Capitalism in the Web of Life; Connolly, Facing the
Planetary; Mickey, Whole Earth Thinking and Planetary Coexistence; Yusoff, A Billion Black
Anthropocenes or None.

6. Mumford, The Myth of the Machine, Vol. 1, 188.

7. Arendt, The Human Condition, 1.

8. Caygill, “Heidegger and the Automatic Earth Image.”

 9. McLuhan, “At the Moment of Sputnik,” 49.

10. Haeckel, Generelle Morphologie der Organismen, vol. 2, 286–87; also quoted by
Richards, The Tragic Sense of Life, 8, footnote 28.

11. Lovelock, Gaia: A New Look at Life on Earth.

12. The film, on the one hand, has a strong emphasis on national pride and, on the other
hand, sets a cosmopolitan mission to save the whole of humanity.

13. United Nations, “UN Climate Report: It’s ‘Now or Never’ to Limit Global Warming to 1.5
Degrees,” https://news.un.org/en/story/2022/04/1115452.

14. Heidegger, “The End of Philosophy and the Task of Thinking,” 59.

15. For elaboration on thermodynamic ideology and its relation to the postmodern
discourse, see Hui, “Lyotard after Us,” 125–37.

16. Before the synchronization in modern logistics, we saw already the synchronizing effect
of clocks used in production. As Marx correctly observed in a letter to Engels, “the clock is the
first automatic machine applied to practical purpose; the whole theory of production and
regular motion was developed through it,” quoted by Mumford, The Myth of the Machine, Vol.
1, 286.

17. Schmitt, The Nomos of the Earth, 70.

18. Soulier, André Leroi-Gourhan, 287–88.

19. Bataille, Lascaux ou la naissance de l’art.

20. Leroi-Gourhan, Gesture and Speech.

 21. Stiegler, Technics and Time, 1, 159. “Neglecting the crucial nature of these questions,
Leroi-Gourhan reintroduces the very metaphysical notion of Homo faber, in a movement that
can be found again, for example, in George Bataille . . . a notion opposed to that of Homo
sapiens. This opposition between technicity and intellect is, however, contradicted by the role
given later to writing, as technics, in the constitution of thought.”

22. Kant, Political Writings, 106.

23. Bruno Latour with his team worked on this project for many years until his death in
2022. I had the occasion to participate in Latour’s project in Shanghai in 2018, and to act as an
advisor to the Taipei Biennale 2020, which Latour curated.

24. Karatani, The Structure of World History, 1. In a very different vein, Axelos also considers
Hegel as the philosopher who systematized and historicized the becoming thinking of the
world and the becoming world of thinking in the nineteenth century, therefore Axelos declares
that Hegel’s thinking remains unsurpassed, “sa logique n’est pas même comprise et sa
philosophie de l’historie qui en découle n’aura qu’à se radicaliser et se généraliser advantage.”
See Axelos, Vers la pensée planétaire, 35.

25. Karatani, The Structure of World History, 220.

26. Karatani, The Structure of World History, 224.

27. See Canguilhem, A Vital Rationalist, 82.

28. Hegel, Outlines of the Philosophy of Right.

29. Hegel, “The German Constitution,” in Political Writings.

30. This concept of the “organic machine” is taken from Claude Bernard, who distinguishes a
mechanical machine from an organic machine that is animal, See Canguilhem, A Vital
Rationalist, 86. This imaginary organic machine could also be identified in Adam Smith’s
concept of the market and its invisible hand. Heinz Dieter Kittsteiner compared Adam Smith’s
invisible hand with Hegel’s cunning of reason, but it might be more appropriate to say that
they were both influenced by the political epistemology of organism. For Kittsteiner’s
comment, see Listen der Vernunft.

31. Canguilhem, A Vital Rationalist, 302.

32. Marx, “Kritik der Hegelschen Staatsrechts,” 206.

33. Günther, Das Bewußtsein der Maschinen.

34. For a summary of these statements and criticism of them, see Skinner, “The Sovereign
State: A Genealogy,” 26–46.

35. Negri, The End of Sovereignty, 79.

36. Negri, The End of Sovereignty, 72; this summary was pronounced by Roberto Esposito
and not Negri himself.

37. Esposito responds by saying “My impression is that the processes triggered in America,
Europe, and Asia in the early years of the new century have been going in the opposite
direction, as all the latest events have shown most manifestly.” Negri, The End of Sovereignty,
72.

38. Negri, The End of Sovereignty, 73.

39. Negri, The End of Sovereignty, 83.

40. Lane, “Why Donald Trump Was the Ultimate Anarchist.”

41. Schmitt, Die drei Arten rechtswissenschaftlichen Denkens, 46–47.

 42. Schmitt, Political Theology, 5.

43. Schmitt, The Leviathan in the State Theory of Thomas Hobbes, 99.

44. See Strauss, Leo Strauss on Political Philosophy.

45. Heidegger, On Hegel’s Philosophy of Right, 186.

46. Schmitt, Nomos of the Earth, 351–55.

47. Schmitt, “Raum und Großraum im Völkerrecht,” in Staat, Großraum, Nomos, 235–36.

48. Mann and Wainwright, Climate Leviathan. “Climate Leviathan is a direct descendant
from Hobbes’ original to Schmitt’s sovereign: when it comes to climate, Leviathan will decide
and is constituted precisely in the act of decision. It expresses a desire for, and the recognition
of, the necessity of a planetary sovereign to seize command, declare an emergency, and bring
order to the Earth, all in the name of saving life.” This also seems to be something that
preoccupies Axelos and which remains problematic if not overstated, when he says in Vers la
pensée planétaire, 302, that “la souveraineté n’est plus celle d’une cité, d’un empire, d’une
nation, d’une classe: la souveraineté atteint son caractère suprême, sa pleine puissance, en
cessant d’être souveraineté particulière et en devenant puissance et autorité suprême,
pouvoir mondial déferlant sur les—plus qu’échouant aux—citoyens du cosmos dans leur
totalité. Aucune personne et aucune institution ne portent plus ce pouvoir.”

49. See Nail, Theory of the Earth.

50. See Stengers, In Catastrophic Times, chapter 4, where Stengers considers the naming of
Gaia as a continuation of the legacy of the twentieth century, especially the work of Lovelock
and Margulis, as well as a refusal of the sheer rationality that undermines the figure of Gaia as
irrationality. Along the same line, I distinguish rational, irrational, and nonrational in
Recursivity and Contingency (2019) and Art and Cosmotechnics (2021), where the nonrational
cannot be equated with either rational or irrational. A true rationalism is not that which
excludes the nonrational, but one that rationalizes the nonrational. This distinction is applied
in this book for what concerns the question of reason, since reason, when it proceeds toward
the absolute (or the true universal), is not only pursuing the rational and eliminating the
irrational but will also have to incorporate the nonrational.

51. Mann and Wainwright in their Climate Leviathan followed Karatani’s approach and gave
us a quadratic scheme of a “Climate Leviathan,” “Climate Mao,” “Climate Behemoth,” and a
“Climate X.” The “Climate X,” like the Mode D, is undetermined.

52. Karatani, The Structure of World History, 305; what Karatani writes about Schmitt is
rather confusing: while Schmitt claims that the world state only means the end of the political
state, since it means unity and homogeneity, i.e. consumerism, Karatani commented that
Schmitt means the state could be abolished via exchange.

53. Canguilhem, “Machine and Organism,” in Knowledge of Life; the trajectory of a general
organology from Bergson to Canguilhem, Simondon, and Stiegler is further pursued in
Recursivity and Contingency, chapters 3 and 4.

54. Bergson, Creative Evolution.

55. Marx, The Poverty of Philosophy, 119.

56. Hui, “For a Planetary Thinking.”

1. World Spirit as Planetary Thinking

1. Carl Schmitt reproached historians such as Arnold Toynbee for offering only historical
truth, see Schmitt, Staat, Großraum, Nomos, 531.

2. H. S. Harris’s word, cited by De Laurentiis, Hegel’s Anthropology, 11

3. Kapp, Der konstituierte Despotismus und die konstitutionelle Freiheit, 85. “Je
mechanischer ein Staat regie wird, desto despotischer wird er regiert, je organischer ein Staat
sich regiert, des freier ist er. Also Mechanismus gleich Despotismus, Organismus gleich
Freiheit”; also cited by Hans-Martin Sass, “Die philosophische Erdkunde des Hegelianers Ernst
Kapp,” 168–69n2.

4. Deutsch, The Nerves of Government, 30.

5. Ross, On Mechanism in Hegel’s Social and Political Philosophy, 3.

6. Cassirer, The Myth of the State, 266–67. “The very term ‘organic unity’ cannot be used by
him in the same sense as it was used by Schelling, the real philosopher of romanticism. Hegel’s
unity is a dialectical unity, a unity of contraries. It not only allows but even requires forceful
tensions and oppositions. From this point of view, Hegel had to reject the aesthetic ideals of
Schelling and Novalis. Novalis had spoken of the state as a ‘beautiful individual.’ In his essay on
Christianity or Europe, Novalis dreamed of a unity of all Christian nations under [266] the
guidance and authority of a universal, a real ‘catholic’ church. This ideal of political and
religious peace was not that of Hegel’s. According to him, it is necessary to introduce into
political thought what he calls ‘the seriousness, the suffering, the patience, and the labour of
the negative.’”

7. Ross, On Mechanism in Hegel’s Social and Political Philosophy, 15.

8. Kant, “Idea for a Universal History of a Cosmopolitan Purpose,” in Political Writings, 50.

9. Strauss, On Hegel, 303.

10. Kant, Political Writings, 201–36.

11. Strauss, On Hegel, 305.

12. Kant, Critique of Judgment, §64, “organization” is my italicization.

 13. See Sedgwick, “The State as Organism,” 172. In Kant, “explanatory notes,” Critique of
Judgment, 361, the editor notes, “It is unclear whether Kant is alluding here to the American
Revolution of 1776–83 or revolutionary developments that had begun in France in 1789.”

14. Sedgwick, “The State as Organism,” 173.

15. In the Science of Logic, “Doctrine of Essence,” chapter 2 “Actuality,” Hegel shows how to
understand the necessity of contingency in three movements: formal necessity, real necessity,
and absolute necessity. I examined Hegel’s argument in Recursivity and Contingency, 99–101;
please refer there for a more detailed account of this argument.

16. To my knowledge, Bernard Mabille seems to be the only scholar who uses ontogenesis
and autogenesis to describe the individuation of the spirit; see Mabille, Hegel, 306: “fonde la
nécessité de l’Absolu. La genèse est une ontogenèse et l’ontogenèse une autogenèse.”
Concerning whether Hegel’s ontogenesis is a preformism, an idea that was popular during
Hegel’s time, Hegel refused it, arguing that preformism implies that there is no development.
Ontogenesis or autogenesis reintroduces contingency into its development. For a more
detailed discussion see Harris, “How Final Is Hegel’s Rejection of Evolution?” and Hui,
Recursivity and Contingency, 92–93.

17. Hegel, Philosophy of Mind, §387. The three main forms of the subject spirit are soul,
consciousness, and Spirit as such. The soul is not yet spirit, as Hegel explains in the following
paragraph §388: “Spirit that has become has . . . the meaning that nature self-sublates over
against itself [an ihr selbst] as the untrue, so that spirit presupposes itself as this universality,
yet no longer a self-external one of bodily singularity, but one that is, in its concreteness and
totality, simple universality in which spirit is soul, not yet spirit.” (The Encyclopaedia Logic
§388) The German original: “Der gewordene Geist hat daher den Sinn, daß die Natur an ihr
selbst als das Unwahre sich aufhebt und der Geist so sich als diese nicht mehr in leiblicher
Einzelheit außer sich seiende, sondern in ihrer Konkretion und Totalität einfache Allgemeinheit
voraussetzt, in welcher er Seele, noch nicht Geist ist.”

18. Witt, “Dialectic, Motion, and Perception: De Anima Book 1,” 177.

19. Aristotle, Metaphysics, 994b10–15.

 20. See Aubenque, “Hegel et Aristote,” 103–4. The Hegel passages are in the Lectures on the
History of Philosophy, vol. 2, 163–64; also quoted by Malabou, The Future of Hegel, 43–44:
“We may be astonished that Hegel, translating ἐνέργεια by Tätigkeit and assimilating activity
to movement, misunderstands several Aristotelian texts, beginning with those which define
movement as an ‘incomplete act’ (thus prohibiting any assimilation of the pure Act to
movement in general), and also those in which Aristotle clarifies the divine act as an act of
immobility (ἐνέργεια ἀκινησίας). If Hegel considers himself authorized to posit the identity of
the divine act and that of movement, it is because he interprets the immobility expressly
attributed by Aristotle to the Prime Mover as ‘self-generating motion’ (Selbstbewegung) or
circular motion (Kreisbewegung).”

21. Hegel, Lectures on the History of Philosophy, 143–44; Vorlesungen über die Geschichte
der Philosophie II, 158–59; also cited by Malabou, Future of Hegel, 52.

22. Malabou, Future of Hegel, 53, quoting Dominique Janicaud, we might also find a similar
interpretation in Derrida’s reading of Aristotle where God, the prime mover is considered as a
circular movement; see Derrida, Rogues, 15: “Neither moving itself nor being itself moved, the
actuality of this pure energy sets everything in motion, a motion of return to self, a circular
motion, Aristotle specifies, because the first motion is always cyclical. And what induces or
inspires this is a desire. God, the pure actuality of the Prime Mover, is at once erogenous and
thinkable.”

23. Malabou, Future of Hegel, 17.

24. Macherey, Hegel or Spinoza, 18–19; see Hegel, Lectures on the History of Philosophy,
“this profound unity of his [Spinoza’s] philosophy such as it is expressed in Europe, his
manifestation of Spirit, the identity of the infinite and the finite in God, a God that does not
appear as a Third, is an echo of the Orient.”

25. Macherey, Hegel or Spinoza, 28. Throughout the book, Macherey plays the role of a
Spinozist, who against Hegel, shows how Hegel, in fact, misread Spinoza precisely without
knowing that Spinozism already contains the elements of his own dialectics.

26. Hegel, Phenomenology of Spirit, 487; also quoted by Malabou, The Future of Hegel, 1–2.
 27. In this sense we can talk about the end of history, meaning when the Spirit overcomes
what motivates it; it doesn’t mean there is no longer any contingency, but rather that these
contingent events no longer have their previous roles. For example, the end of history does
not mean there are no human beings, but rather human beings are no longer different from
animals. This end also means no end, because it assumes that individuation has exhausted
itself.

28. Hegel, Phenomenology of Spirit, 492.

29. Kapp, Elements of a Philosophy of Technology, 22.

30. See Macherey, Hegel or Spinoza.

31. Kojève also recognized that in order to understand the absolute, one has to develop a
nuanced understanding of the circular movement, namely, a spiral movement. Kojève was
forced to justify Stalin succeeding Napoleon as the world soul. This possibility is only granted
when the circular movement doesn’t finish in itself, but rather its completion only leads to
another beginning. In a note from Kojève we read: “Marx : travail /lutte, c’est-à-dire
Befriedung (= satisfaction) en Napoléon/Philosophie hégélienne, mais Staline/moi, c’est-à-dire
non pas, mais –〉 (Geist ist Zeit),” which he explained further, “à la fin de la Phénoménologie,
Geist retourne à Begierde. Mais en fait, non pas à la Begierde de IV Int. (désir naturel en
général) mais comme la Begierde réele, c’est-à-dire comme une nouvelle action. Ce n’est pas
le Welt-Geist mais le Geist qui retourne à cette Begierde de IV Introduction. Le Welt-Geist va à
la Begierde d’où naît Staline.” See Auffret, Alexandre Kojève, 246.

32. De Laurentiis, Hegel’s Anthropology, 11. These words are borrowed from H. S. Harris.

33. Hegel, Phenomenology of Spirit, §199, 201.

34. Wahl, Le malheur de la conscience, 27.

35. Wahl, Le malheur de la conscience, 36.

 36. Wahl, Le malheur de la conscience, 37. “Hegel s’est efforcé de décrire cette conscience
malheureuse qu’est l’âme chrétienne et romantique (Rosenkranz, p. 88), puisque le Juif n’a pas
le privilège du malheur ou qu’il le partage avec l’âme qui s’oppose le plus complètement à lui.”

37. For the remark on Rousseau, see Wahl, Le malheur de la conscience, 12.

38. Wahl, Le malheur de la conscience, 44.

39. Wahl, Le malheur de la conscience, 17; see also Marx, “Kritik der Hegelschen
Staatsrechts,” 285.

40. Hui, “On the Unhappy Consciousness of the Neo-reactionaries.”

41. Hyppolite, Genesis and Structure of Hegel’s Phenomenology of Spirit, 207.

42. The famous quote from Hegel toward the end of the introduction to the Outlines of the
Philosophy of Right, “Was vernünftig ist, ist wirklich, was wirklich ist, ist vernünftig.”

43. Here we might want to associate Wirklichkeit with energeia, in the sense that energeia
means both actualization and production, i.e., it brings out [en]ergon; see Marder, Hegel’s
Energy, 12.

44. Hegel, Introduction to the Philosophy of History, 12.

45. Hegel, Phenomenology of Spirit, §32.

46. Hegel, Phenomenology of Spirit, §221.

47. Menke, Autonomie und Befreiung, 45–47.

 48. Hegel, Outlines of the Philosophy of Right, §262.

49. Hegel, Philosophy of Mind, §385, 22.

50. Hegel, Philosophy of Mind, §554, 257. Translation modified; Hegel, Enzyklopädie der
philosophischen Wissenschaften III (Werke 10), 366, “Der absolute Geist ist ebenso ewig in
sich seiende als in sich zurückkehrende und zurückgekehrte Identität; die eine und allgemeine
Substanz als geistige, das Urteil in sich und in ein Wissen, fürwelches sie als solche ist.”

51. Mabille, Hegel, 291.

52. Hegel, Introduction to The Philosophy of History, 27.

53. Hegel, Vorlesungen über die Philosophie der Weltgeschichte, 181; cited also by Ahlers,
“The Dialectic in Hegel’s Philosophy of History,” 160.

54. Hegel, Philosophy of History, 118, italics mine.

55. Hegel, Philosophy of History, 367.

56. Hegel, Philosophy of History, 121.

57. Hegel, Philosophy of Mind, §393, 42.

58. It would be hyperbolic and even ironic to say, as some authors did, that Hegel rescued
the East from its marginality. See Avineri, Hegel’s Theory of the Modern State, 223: “For Hegel,
history starts in the East; not in the conventional Eastern Mediterranean, but in China and
India. Hegel is one of the first European thinkers to incorporate the Asian world into his
scheme of history and emancipate the non-European world from its historiosophical
marginality” (italics mine). This is not to discredit Avineri’s book, which is beyond admirable.
 59. Hegel, Philosophy of Mind, §391: “The universal soul as world-soul must not be labeled
at once as a subject because it is only universal substance, which only has its actual truth as
singularity, subjectivity.”

60. Hegel, Outlines of the Philosophy of Right, §340, 315.

61. Nietzsche, Untimely Meditations, 104.

62. Lapouge, “‘Les philosophes ne m’intéressent pas, je cherche des sages,’ une
conversation avec Alexandre Kojève,” Le Grand Continent, December 25, 2020,
https://legrandcontinent.eu/fr/2020/12/25/conversation-alexandre-kojeve/.“La fin de
l’histoire, ce n’était pas Napoléon, c’était Staline et c’était moi qui serais chargé de l’annoncer
avec la différence que je n’aurais pas la chance de voir passer Staline à cheval sous mes
fenêtres, mais enfin.”

63. Kojève, Introduction to the Reading of Hegel, 34.

64. Hegel, Philosophy of Mind, §392, 36.

65. Schmitt, The Concept of the Political, 63.

66. Oreskes and Conway, The Collapse of Western Civilization.

67. Marx and Engels, Manifesto of the Communist Party.

68. Hegel, Philosophy of History, 149.

69. Hegel, Lectures on the Philosophy of World History, Vol. 1, 218.

70. Hegel, Lectures on the History of Philosophy 1825–26, Vol. 1.

 71. Ritter, Metaphysik und Politik, 188.

72. Marx, “Kritik der Hegelschen Staatsrechts,” 205.

73. Hegel, Introduction to The Philosophy of History, 20.

74. Hegel, Introduction to The Philosophy of History, 62–63.

75. Aristotle, Politics, 1253a18–23.

76. Plato, Republic, especially see 345a, 374a, and 397e.

77. Plato, Republic, 434a.

78. Aristotle, Politics, 1278a8.

79. Aristotle, Politics, 1275a19.

80. Readers can refer to C. D. C. Reeve’s introduction to his new translation of Aristotle’s
Politics; since Reeve also translated the Nicomachean Ethics, the introduction presents some
comparisons on the subject. See also, Angier, Technē in Aristotle’s Ethics.

81. Ritter, “Das Bürgerliche Leben zur aristotelischen Theorie des Glücks,” in Metaphysik und
Politik, 60; Angier, Technē in Aristotle’s Ethics, 74.

82. Aristotle, Politics, 1332a38.

83. Meier, The Greek Discovery of Politics, 45–47.

 84. Rabinowitz, Greek Tragedy, 36–37.

85. Meier, The Greek Discovery of Politics, 60–61. See also Schaefer, Probleme der Alten
Geschichte. Aristotle would most likely not agree with this statement, as he said that Solon
“refrained from abolishing them” (i.e., the council of the Areopagus and the election of office
holders); what Solon did was introduce democracy to the law courts, which also leads to the
accusation that Solon “destroyed the other elements by making these popular law courts, with
their members appointed by lot, supreme in every case.” See Aristotle, Politics, 1273b35–40.

86. Rabinowitz, Greek Tragedy, 38.

87. Lévêque and Vidal-Naquet, Clisthéne l’Athénien, 32, cited also by Meier, The Greek
Discovery of Politics, 66.

88. Rabinowitz, Greek Tragedy, 37.

89. In “The Birth of Greek Individualism: A Turning-Point in the History of Political Thought,”
Isaiah Berlin commented on the birth of individualism in the fifth century BC, which one could
find in both Greek tragedy and comedy, the institutionalized life of the polis was naturalized in
the writing of Herodotus and Thucydides. One could speculate that the birth of individualism
already appeared earlier, expressed in the birth of monumental sculpture, whose realism
demonstrates the pursuit of a perfect individuality and personality; the fifth century BC was
the moment when both affirmation and negation of individualism took place; see Berlin,
Liberty.

90. Hegel, Outlines of the Philosophy of Right, §185, 184: “Plato wished to exclude
particularity from his state, but this is no help, since help on these lines would contravene the
infinite right of the Idea to allow freedom to the particular.”

91. Taylor, Hegel and Modern Society, 63.

92. We might want to pay attention to Hannah Arendt’s analysis on the history of freedom:
according to her, before Augustine, there was a “conscious attempt to divorce the notion of
freedom from politics,” and this is the prioritization of the vita contemplativa over vita activa.
Since the stoics (Arendt gives Epictetus as an example), there has been a strong discourse on
inner freedom, according to which “one may be a slave in the world and still be free.” See
Arendt, “What Is Freedom?,” in Between Past and Future, 147.

93. Ritter, “Hegel und die französische Revolution,” in Metaphysik und Politik. On this point,
we might also be able to read Auguste Comte and Hegel in parallel; though Comte declares
positivism as what succeeds theology and metaphysics, Hegel did not see positivism as
sufficient. We will see this in chapter 3, regarding Georgescu-Roegen’s reading of Hegel.

94. Hegel, Philosophy of History, 122.

95. Marx, “Kritik der Hegelschen Staatsrechts,” 256.

96. See Strauss, On Hegel, 238.

97. Hegel, Outlines of the Philosophy of Right, §302; see also Arendt, “The Public and the
Private Realm,” in The Human Condition. Arendt pointed out how the condition of politics in
ancient Greece, namely, the separation between the public and private life in the polis, and
during the modern time, the search for intimacy in Jean-Jacques Rousseau and the Romantics,
both emphasize individual autonomy as resistance against the conformity of the social. We
might want to compare it with what Berlin calls “negative freedom.”

98. Hegel, Philosophy of Mind, §408, 121.

99. Karatani, The Structure of World History, xvi.

100. Kant, Critique of Pure Reason, A833, B861.

101. Kojève, Kant, 59–61.

102. Sedgwick, “The State as Organism,” 184.

 103. In Autonomie und Befreiung, 22–23, Menke highlights a significant difference between
Rousseau and Kant. For Rousseau, autonomy means self-legislation, or more precisely
“obedience to the law one has prescribed to oneself,” while Kant, remarks Menke, though he
almost “repeats Rousseau word by word,” doesn’t use the word “self” (selbst) but rather eigen
(to make it one’s own): “Kant redet nicht von Selbstgesetzgebung, sondern von der ‘eigenen
Gesetzgebung.’” This difference can be read as Kant’s new interpretation of autonomy, which,
continues Menke, “Kant ergänzt nicht nur die Idee der Selbsgesetzgebung durch den Anspruch,
daß sie aus einem guten Grund efolgen muß; er stellt vielmehr die Definition von Autonomie
als Selbstgesetzgebung als solche in Frage” (23).

104. Kant, Critique of Pure Reason, A445, B473.

105. This is also the argument that I put forward in Recursivity and Contingency. The
reflective operation of the categorical imperative and aesthetic judgment recursively negates
the empirical inclinations in searching for the universal, and it must be strictly distinguished
from empirical induction.

106. Hegel, Philosophy of Mind, §415, 144.

107. Hegel, Philosophy of Mind, §415, 145.

108. Kant, Critique of Practical Reason, 49.

109. “It may also be remarked that, as a result of his failure to study the antinomy in more
depth, Kant brings forward only four antinomies. . . . The main point that has to be made is
that antinomy is found not only in the four particular objects taken from cosmology, but rather
in all objects of all kinds, in all representations, concepts and ideas. To know this, and to be
cognizant of this property of objects, belongs to what is essential in philosophical study; this is
the property that constitutes what will determine itself in due course as the dialectical
moment of logical thinking”; Hegel, Encyclopaedia Logic, §48R, 92–93; also quoted by Alan
Wood, “Antinomies of Pure Reason,” 247f3.

110. Hegel, Outlines of the Philosophy of Right, §324, 306.

 111. Mabille, Hegel, 132.

112. For this reason, Leo Strauss claimed that Hegel reconciles Spinoza and Kant, by
identifying the subject as Spinozist substance and the Kantian thing-in-itself, see Strauss, On
Hegel, 21–22.

113. See Hegel, Science of Logic, 554.

114. Hegel, Philosophy of Mind, §381, 16.

115. Hegel, Outlines of the Philosophy of Right, §201, Addition.

116. Hegel, Outlines of the Philosophy of Right, §324, 306.

117. Hegel, Introduction to the Philosophy of History, 58.

118. Ritter, Metaphysik und Politik, 293.

119. Ritter, Metaphysik und Politik, 298.

120. Ritter, Metaphysik und Politik, 299.

121. Taylor, Hegel and Modern Society, 116.

2. The Organism of the State and Its Limit

1. The critique against mechanism is consistent from Hegel’s early writings such as “Die
Positivität der christlichen Religion” (1795/1796), where positivity is another name for
mechanism, to his Outlines of the Philosophy of Right (1821); see also Weil, Hegel and the
State.

2. Fichte, Foundations of Natural Right, 262–63; also quoted by Žižek, Hegel in a Wired Brain,
27.

3. Hegel, “The German Constitution,” in Political Writings, 22.

4. Avineri, Hegel’s Theory of the Modern State, 48.

5. Avineri, Hegel’s Theory of the Modern State, 49.

6. Hegel, Lectures on the Philosophy of World History, 257. My emphasis.

7. Ironically, when we look at some of the twentieth-century literature on Chinese thought,

it has been considered organic: as Joseph Needham claims, “The philosophia perennis of China
was an organic materialism. This can be illustrated by the pronouncements of philosophers
and scientific thinkers of every epoch. The mechanical view of the world simply didn’t develop
in Chinese thought, and the organicist view in which every phenomenon was connected with
every other according to hierarchical order was universal among Chinese thinkers,” see
Needham, The Grand Titration, 21. For a prolonged discussion on this subject, see Hui,
Recursivity and Contingency and Art and Cosmotechnics.

8. Hegel, Introduction to The Philosophy of History, 50.

9. Hegel, Philosophy of Mind, §405, Addition.

10. Pippin, Hegel’s Practical Philosophy.

11. Karatani’s critique of Marx is more sophisticated than what is stated in this sentence. For
him, Marx put the capitalist economy as the base, while the state and the nation as ideological
superstructures failed to grasp the unity of the capital-nation-state. Through the concept of
exchange, he wants to show how the three concepts could be unified; see Karatani, The
Structure of World History, 3: “Such claims for the relative autonomy of the superstructure led
to the belief that state and nation were simply representations that had been created
historically and that they could be dissolved through enlightenment.”

12. Kojève, Introduction to the Reading of Hegel, 52.

13. Hegel, Phenomenology of Spirit, 119. “Since the entire contents of its natural
consciousness have not been jeopardized, determinate being still in principle attaches to it;
having a ‘mind of one’s own’ is self-will, a freedom which is still enmeshed in servitude.”

14. Hegel, Jenaer Realphilosophie I, 233; also cited by Avineri, Hegel’s Theory of the Modern
State, 89.

15. Kojève, Introduction to the Reading of Hegel, 53.

16. In Realphilosophie II, commenting on the general will, Hegel explictly says that “the
individuals have to make themselves into a universal through negation of themselves, through
externalization and education [Entäusserung und Bildung],” see Hegel, Jenaer Realphilosophie
II, 244–45; also cited by Avineri, Hegel’s Theory of the Modern State, 102.

17. Hegel, Outlines of the Philosophy of Right, §349, italics mine.

18. Historisches Wörterbuch der Philosophie. “Entäußerung ist (zusammen mit

Entfremdung) die Übersetzung von lateinisch alienatio und seinen neusprachlichen
Nachfolgern. In der römischen Rechtssprache etwa seit der Zeit Ciceros bedeutet alienatio die
Übertragung von Eigentum. In dieser Bedeutung ist entäußern seit 1322 im Deutschen
nachweisbar. Schon in römischer Zeit bildete sich ein reiches Spektrum metaphorischer
Redeweisen aus, das sich bei der Übernahme in die neuen Sprachen erhielt, z.B. die
Entäußerung der Menschlichkeit. . . . Ein neuerer Versuch der Abgrenzung von Entäußerung,
Entfremdung und Vergegenständlichung findet sich bei GARAUDY, der Entäußerung
(extériorisation) als wertneutral, Vergegenständlichung (objectivation) als positiv und
Entfremdung (aliénation) als negativ ansieht.”

19. Sass, “Die philosophische Erdkunde des Hegelianers Ernst Kapp,” 172.
 20. https://deutsche-schutzgebiete.de/wordpress/projekte/kaiserreich/koenigreich-
preussen/.

21. Malabou, The Future of Hegel, 166.

22. Hegel, Phenomenology of Spirit, §258, 157. “Ebenso ist aber das Selbstbewußtsein
beschaffen, sich auf eine solche Weise von sich zu unterscheiden, worin zugleich kein
Unterschied herauskommt.”

23. Honneth, Das Recht der Freiheit, 85.

24. Honneth calls it a “kantianische, institutionenvergessene Gerechtigkeitstheorie,” see Das

Recht der Freiheit, 16.

25. Honneth, Das Recht der Freiheit, 116. “[Daß] die sittlichen Institutionen erst eine
individuelle Autonomie ermöglichen, deren Betätigung dann wiederum zu einer Revision
dieser Institutionen führen kann, dann läßt sich in der damit vorbestellen Spiralbewegung gar
nicht mehr der Ruhepunkt finden, der in einem festgefügten System sittlicher Institutionen
bestehen soll.”

26. Honneth, Das Recht der Freiheit, 116.

27. Malabou, Au voleur!, 63.

28. Cassirer, The Myth of the State, 264.

29. Hegel, Outlines of the Philosophy of Right, §258, Addition.

30. Hegel, Outlines of the Philosophy of Right, §269, Addition.

 31. Rousseau, Œuvres complètes, 244. “Le corps politique, pris individuellement, peut être
considéré comme un corps organisé, vivant, et semblable à celui de l’homme. Le pouvoir
souverain représente la tête; les lois et les coutumes sont le cerveau, principe des nerfs et
siège de 1’entendement, de la volonté et des sens, dont les juges et magistrats sont les
organes; le commerce, l’industrie et l’agriculture, sont la bouche et l’estomac, qui préparent la
substance commune; les finances publiques sont le sang, qu’une sage économie, en faisant les
fonctions du cœur, renvoie distribuer par tout le corps la nourriture et la vie; les citoyens sont
le corps et les membres qui font mouvoir, vivre et travailler la machine, et qu’on ne saurait
blesser en aucune partie qu’aussitôt l’impression douloureuse ne s’en porte au cerveau, si
l’animal est dans un état de santé.”

32. Marx, “Kritik,” 206.

33. Marx, “Kritik,” 212.

34. Marx, “Kritik,” 213.

35. Hyppolite, “La Conception Hégélienne de l’État et sa Critique,” 149.

36. The other work that is influenced by Hegel and important for the theory of a living form
(Lebensform) of the state and geopolitics is Rudolf Kjellén’s, Der Staat als Lebensform (1917).
Kjellén’s teacher Friedrich Ratzel, a geographer and political thinker who developed the
concept of the organic space or living space (Lebensraum), like Kapp, was also influenced by
Ernst Haeckel. The fact that we cannot extend our analysis to all thinkers of the organic theory
of the state here doesn’t mean that their works are ignored. For the history along this line of
geopolitical thinking, please see Kristof, “The Origins and Evolution of Geopolitics.”

37. Kapp, Elements of a Philosophy of Technology, 226.

38. Kapp, Elements of a Philosophy of Technology, 244.

39. Kapp, Der konstituierte Despotismus und die konstitutionelle Freiheit, 85.
 40. Kapp, Elements of a Philosophy of Technology, 234.

41. Kapp, Elements of a Philosophy of Technology, 245.

42. Hegel, Hegel’s Philosophy of Nature, §352. “As living universality, the animal organism is
the concept which passes syllogistically through its three determinations . . . (a) as the
individual idea, which is simply self-related in its process, and which inwardly coalesces with
itself, i.e. shape (Gestalt); (b) as idea which relates itself to its other (ihrem Anderen), its
inorganic nature, and posits the ideal nature of this other within itself, i.e. assimilation; (c) as
the idea relating to an other which is itself a living individual, and thereby relating itself to
itself in the other, i.e. the generic process.”

43. Hegel, Phenomenology of Spirit, §258, 157–58. My emphasis.

44. Marx, “Kritik,” 216.

45. Kapp, Elements of a Philosophy of Technology, 225.

46. Hegel, Phenomenology of Spirit, §258, 157. “Ebenso ist aber das Selbstbewußtsein
beschaffen, sich auf eine solche Weise von sich zu unterscheiden, worin zugleich kein
Unterschied herauskommt.”

47. Hegel, Encyclopaedia, §248. Cited by Cassirer, The Myth of the State, 262.

48. Hegel, Hegel’s Philosophy of Nature, §250, 215.

49. Malabou, The Future of Hegel, 26.

50. Hegel, Philosophy of Mind, §381, 10. I changed “mind” back to “the Spirit.”

51. Hegel, Philosophy of Mind, §381, 10.

 52. Hegel, Philosophy of Mind, 11.

53. Hegel, Philosophy of Mind, §392, 36.

54. This might also resonate with Marx’s critique of Hegel concerning the birth of the
monarchy, Marx argued that “Hegel has shown that the monarchy must be born, which no one
doubts, but he didn’t show, that birth brings about the monarchy,” which for Marx, carries as
little metaphysical truth as the Immaculate Conception of Mary; see Marx, “Kritik,” 235.

55. Hegel, Outlines of the Philosophy of Right, §272.

56. Hegel, Philosophy of Mind, §408.

57. Hyppolite, “La Conception Hégélienne de l’État et sa Critique,” 145.

58. Hegel, Outlines of the Philosophy of Right, §273.

59. Marx, “Kritik,” 153–56.

60. Marx, “Kritik,” 272.

61. Tocqueville, Democracy in America, 53, also quoted by Derrida, Rogues, 15.

62. Derrida, Rogues, 14.

63. The Chinese Room Experiment runs like this: a black box (the Chinese room) is presented
as a Chinese speaker. However, we don’t know if there really is a Chinese person inside; now,
when we feed input to the black box, the black box will respond to the input according to the
written instructions; however, this person doesn’t have to know Chinese, he or she only needs
to follow the instructions correctly.

64. See Vieweg, Hegel: Der Philosoph der Freiheit.

65. For the debate on Kant’s cosmopolitanism outlined in the perpetual peace during Kant’s
time, including Fichte’s review of the essay, see Nakhimovsky, The Closed Commercial State,
chapter 2.

66. Kant, “The Metaphysics of Morals,” in Practical Philosophy, 491.

67. Kant, “The Metaphysics of Morals,” in Practical Philosophy, 328.

68. Kant, “Perpetual Peace,” in Political Writings, 106.

69. Kant, “Perpetual Peace,” in Political Writings, 106–7.

70. Fichte, Early Philosophical Writings, 156.

71. Hegel, Outlines of the Philosophy of Right, §340, 315.

72. See Kervégan, Hegel, Carl Schmitt, 143.

73. Schmitt, The Concept of the Political, 54.

74. There is a similarity between Hegel’s critique of Kant’s perpetual peace and Schmitt’s
critique of the League of Nations; see Hegel, Outlines of the Philosophy of Right, §324 and
§333.
 75. See Hayek, “Hegel and Comte,” in Counter-Revolution of Science.

76. Hegel, Outlines of the Philosophy of Right, §331.

77. We will discuss this in chapter 5, concerning Schmitt’s criticism of American imperialism
and his own attempt to “rescue” the Monroe doctrine.

78. Hegel, Outlines of the Philosophy of Right, §339 Zusatz.

79. Nietzsche, Untimely Meditations, 104.

80. Lapouge, “‘Les philosophes ne m’intéressent pas, je cherche des sages,’” “Moi, j’ai
expliqué que Hegel l’avait dit et personne ne veut l’admettre, que l’histoire est close, personne
ne le digère. À vrai dire, moi aussi, j’ai d’abord pensé que c’était une billevesée mais, ensuite,
j’ai réfléchi et vu que c’était génial. Simplement, Hegel s’était trompé de cent cinquante ans.
La fin de l’histoire, ce n’était pas Napoléon, c’était Staline et c’était moi qui serais chargé de
l’annoncer avec la différence que je n’aurais pas la chance de voir passer Staline à cheval sous
mes fenêtres, mais enfin . . . Après, il y a eu la guerre et j’ai compris. Non, Hegel ne s’était pas
trompé, il avait bien donné la date juste de la fin de l’histoire, 1806. Depuis cette date, qu’est-
ce qui se passe? Rien du tout, l’alignement des provinces.”

81. Lapouge, “‘Les philosophes ne m’intéressent pas, je cherche des sages,’” “La révolution
chinoise n’est que l’introduction du Code Napoléon en Chine. La fameuse accélération de
l’histoire dont on parle tant, avez-vous remarqué qu’en s’accélérant de plus en plus le
mouvement historique avance de moins en moins?” Kojève said similar things to Schmitt in a
communication dated May 16, 1955: “Now I believe that Hegel was completely right and that
history was already over after the historical Napoleon. For, in the end, Hitler was only a ‘new
enlarged and improved edition’ of Napoleon [“La Republique une et indivisible” {“The single
and indivisible Republic”} = “Ein Land, ein Volk, ein Fuhrer” {“One country, one people, one
leader”}]. Hitler committed the errors which you characterize so well on p. 166 (toward the
middle): now, if Nap. in his time had done it as well as Hitler, it would certainly have been
enough. But unfortunately Hitler did it 150 years too late! Thus the second world war brought
nothing essentially new. And the first one was just an intermission.”

82. Mou, Philosophy of History, 457, “遠在二十年前, 弟讀黑格爾(歷史哲學)論及中國方面

無 「主觀自由」，無 個體性之自覺」，即悚然而驚。當時對於黑氏書自不能懂，即所觸
及之此一點，當時亦不解其所以。心中頗不服。一方面覺其說的甚對，一方面亦覺其不
甚對。”

83. Mou, Philosophy of History, 217, “國家必須通過各個體的自覺而重新組織起來成爲一

個有機的統一體，才可以說是近代化的國家。中國以前的統一只是打天下打來的，個體
並末起作用，所以不成一個國家單位。而那統一亦是虛浮不實的。國家是一個文化上的
觀念，是由各個體通過自覺而成的一個理性上的產物。不是一個自然物，更不是武力所
能硬打得來的。”

84. Zhao, A Possible World of All-Under-Heaven System, 130.

85. Zhao, A Possible World of All-Under-Heaven System, 2.

86. Mou, Philosophy of History, 216, “中國以往不是一個國家單位，而是一個文化單位，

只有天下觀念，而無國家觀念。”

87. When we look at the new interpretation of tianxia, one will be surprised how it
resembles such an organic structure, which Kant already systematically formulated. See
Debray and Zhao, “Tianxia: All Under Heaven.”

88. In a letter from Kojève to Schmitt dated August 1, 1955, Kojève claims to add to the
meaning of Nomos as “Nahme” “with Hegel” the sense of “privilege” when such “Nahme” is
considered a political act. “And you will certainly agree, if I add, with Hegel, that taking is only
political insofar as it takes place on the grounds of prestige and for prestigious ends.
Otherwise, surely even animals could wage war and the slave capture in Africa in the 19th
century was also a war? On the other hand, Athens certainly did not have much to ‘take’ from
Sparta (and vice versa) except for ‘hegemony,’ i.e., precisely prestige.”

89. Mou, Philosophy of History, 417, “如是由神聖理念之「分離地存在於地球上」必須進

一步超越各民族國家之齊頭並列而「整全地諧一地存在於地球上」，此即是「大同」一
層之目標。此將如何而可能？”

90. This analysis is elaborated in Mou, Dao of Politics and Dao of Governance.
3. From Noetic Reflection to Planetary Reflection

1. This was also Schmitt’s contest against Arnold Toynbee and other Anglo-Saxon historians
since the latter are presented as the authority of an eternal truth.

2. See Marx, “Kritik,” 251–61.

3. Hölderlin, “Urtheil und Seyn”: “Urtheil ist im höchsten und strengsten Sinne die
ursprüngliche Trennung des in der intellectualen Anschauung innigst vereinigten Objects und
Subjects, diejenige Trennung, wodurch erst Object und Subject möglich wird, die Ur =
Theilung.”

4. Hegel, Philosophy of Mind, §574, 275.

5. Rilke, Duino Elegies, 55.

6. Hegel, Philosophy of Mind, §388, 29; also cited by De Laurentiis, Hegel’s Anthropology, 32.
I used the translation of Wallace and Miller, with modification from Laurentiis, who reproaches
the former for having rendered “an ihr selbst” as “in ihr selbst.” However, this might be hair-
splitting a bit, since nature will not sublate itself as being externalized, but rather it can only
sublate itself in itself as being.

7. Here we can understand the three syllogisms concerning logic, nature, and spirit: (1)
Logic-Nature-Spirit (syllogism of existence, Dasein) the logical becomes nature and nature
become spirit; (2) Nature-Spirit-Logic (syllogism of reflection) presupposes nature and joins it
with the logical; (3) Spirit-Logic-Nature (syllogism of necessity). This syllogism expresses the
fact that nature or the Idea in-itself, and spirit or the Idea for-itself, are held together by “the
logical” or, as it is called elsewhere, “the logical Idea” (Encyclopaedia Logic §187 Zusatz); see
De Laurentiis, Hegel’s Anthropology, 53.

8. Hegel, Philosophy of Mind, §381 Zusatz, 15.

 9. Cited by De Laurentiis, Hegel’s Anthropology, 50. Italics in original.

10. Kapp, Elements of a Philosophy of Technology, 33.

11. Kapp, Elements of a Philosophy of Technology, 48: “The human being maintains an inner
relation with the artifacts belonging to the outside world that are produced in accord with the
normative organs inside of him.”

12. See Maneschi, “The Filiation of Economic Ideas,” 105–25.

13. Laplace, A Philosophical Essay on Probabilities, 4. “We may regard the present state of
the universe as the effect of its past and the cause of its future. An intellect which at a certain
moment would know all forces that set nature in motion, and all positions of all items of which
nature is composed, if this intellect were also vast enough to submit these data to analysis, it
would embrace in a single formula the movements of the greatest bodies of the universe and
those of the tiniest atom; for such an intellect nothing would be uncertain and the future just
like the past would be present before its eyes.”

14. Grenivald, “Le sens bioéconomique du développement humain,” 63.

15. Georgescu-Roegen, The Entropy Law, 46.

16. Georgescu-Roegen, The Entropy Law, 15.

17. Georgescu-Roegen, The Entropy Law, 63, footnote 13.

18. Georgescu-Roegen, The Entropy Law, 46, footnote 27.

19. Georgescu-Roegen, The Entropy Law, 72, italics mine.

20. Hegel, Phenomenology of Spirit, 160.

 21. Hegel, Phänomenologie des Geistes, 215. “Das wirkliche organische Wesen ist die Mitte,
welche das Fürsichsein des Lebens mit dem Äußeren überhaupt oder dem Ansich sein
zusammen-schließt.”

22. Georgescu-Roegen, The Entropy Law, 159.

23. Georgescu-Roegen, The Entropy Law, 159; in the same paragraph, Georgescu-Roegen
immediately states, “I have already pointed out, the equivalence of this third definition with
the other two has not been established to the satisfaction of all.”

24. Georgescu-Roegen, “Energy and Economic Myths,” 64.

25. It may be effective here to remind that disorder does not mean lack of tidiness. Our
everyday concept of order tells us that when the room is tidied up, it has order, and when a
desk is messy it means disorder; in this case, the concept of order we use here is anti-intuitive:
disorder means lack of the complexity of order, namely, becoming homogeneous.

26. Georgescu-Roegen, “Energy and Economic Myths,” 81.

27. Lotka, “The Law of Evolution as a Maximal Principle,” 188: “In place of slow adaptation of
anatomical structure and physiological function in successive generations by selective survival,
increased adaptation has been achieved by the incomparably more rapid development of
‘artificial’ aids to our native receptor–effector apparatus, in a process that might be termed
exosomatic evolution.”

28. Georgescu-Roegen, “Energy and Economic Myths,” 25, 81.

29. Georgescu-Roegen, “Energy and Economy Myths,” 32.

30. Georgescu-Roegen, “Energy and Economy Myths,” 91.

 31. Georgescu-Roegen, “Energy and Economy Myths,” 92.

32. Mirowski, Machine Dreams, 46.

33. Georgescu-Roegen, “Entropy,” 146.

34. Georgescu-Roegen, “Entropy,” 146.

35. Mirowski, More Heat than Light.

36. It is already clearly stated in Wiener, The Human Use of Human Beings, 39: “The transfer
of information cannot take place without a certain expenditure of energy, so that there is no
sharp boundary between energetic coupling and informational coupling.”

37. Hayek, “Hegel and Comte,” in Counter-Revolution of Science, 203.

38. Hayek, Individualism and Economic Order, 77–78.

39. Hayek, “Hegel and Comte,” in Counter-Revolution of Science, 203.

40. Hayek, Law, Legislation and Liberty, xviii.

41. Hayek, Law, Legislation and Liberty, 158: “This foundation of modern civilization was first
understood by Adam Smith in terms of the operation of feedback mechanism by which he
anticipated what we now know as cybernetics.”

42. Wiener, Cybernetics, 44.

 43. Simondon, Sur la Philosophie, 180. “Kant n’aurait pu traiter de la Cybernétique qu’en la
situant dans la Critique du jugement.”

44. Quoted in Cannon, The Wisdom of the Body, 38.

45. Wiener, The Human Use of Human Beings, 26.

46. Günther, Das Bewußtsein der Maschinen, 95.

47. See Hui, Recursivity and Contingency.

48. Vernadsky, The Biosphere, 50–51.

49. Vernadsky, The Biosphere, 58.

50. Teilhard, The Human Phenomenon, 111

51. Bergson, Creative Evolution, 155: “Instinct perfected is a faculty of using and even of
constructing organized instruments; intelligence perfected is the faculty of making and using
unorganized instruments.”

52. Teilhard, The Human Phenomenon, 115.

53. Teilhard’s noosphere was later rediscovered in the 1990s with the rise of the internet.
Wired magazine in 1995 dedicated an article on Teilhard, praising an “obscure Jesuit priest . . .
[who] set down the philosophical framework for planetary, Net-based consciousness 50 years
ago.” See Kreisberg, “A Globe, Clothing Itself with a Brain (June 1st 1995).”

54. Teilhard, The Human Phenomenon, 194.

 55. Teilhard, The Human Phenomenon, 134.

56. Teilhard, The Human Phenomenon, 163.

57. Teilhard, The Human Phenomenon, 132

58. Teilhard, The Phenomenon of Man, 290.

59. Teilhard, The Human Phenomenon, 187.

60. Teilhard, The Future of Man, 235.

61. King’s Towards New Mysticism: Teilhard de Chardin and the Eastern Religions remains
one of the best books to document Teilhard’s experience in the far East and his inspirations.

62. Teilhard, The Human Phenomenon, 145.

63. Beer, “Recursion of Powers,” 13.

64. See Sagan, “James Lovelock, Gaia, and the Remembering of Biological Being (2023).”
Sagan elaborated on the difference between Lovelock and Margulis’s conception of Gaia:
“Whereas Lovelock characterized Gaia as an organism, Margulis differed, pointing to the
datum that no organism consumes its own material wastes. Gaia is better characterized as
planetary life form—a body, yes, but subtler than an organism, it produces waste mostly as
heat, the end product of metabolism that cannot be used by any living organisms.”

65. Cited by King, Towards New Mysticism, 218. “I believe the mystical is less different, less
separated from the rational than one says, but I also believe that the whole problem which the
world, and we in particular, are presently facing is a problem of faith.”

66. Kreisberg, “A Globe, Clothing Itself with a Brain.”

 67. 2045 Initiative, “Ray Kurzweil—Immortality by 2045,”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f28LPwR8BdY; see also Tipler, The Physics of Immortality,
which refers frequently to Teilhard de Chardin.

68. Žižek, Hegel in a Wired Brain, 14.

69. Teilhard, The Human Phenomenon, 272.

70. Chakrabarty, “The Climate of History: Four Theses,” 197–222

71. Mumford, The Myth of the Machine, Vol. 2, 276.

72. Mumford, The Myth of the Machine, Vol. 2, 278.

73. Mumford, The Myth of the Machine, Vol. 2, 385.

74. Mumford, The Myth of the Machine, Vol. 2, 398.

75. Mumford, The Myth of the Machine, Vol. 2, 317.

76. Leroi-Gourhan, Gesture and Speech, 407.

4. Mechanism, Organism, or Decisionism

1. Novalis, Schriften, 587.

2. Bergson, The Meaning of the War.

 3. Bergson, The Meaning of the War, 36.

4. Hegel, Outlines of the Philosophy of Right, §323.

5. See Lefebvre, Hegel, Marx, Nietzsche, 73. “Does not the identification presupposed
between the ardent life of a symphony, the animal life of an organism and the internal life of
the state, abuse this metaphor?”

6. Lefebvre, Hegel, Marx, Nietzsche, 147.

7. Heller, Sovereignty, 91.

8. Heller, Sovereignty, 91.

9. See Deutsch, “Chapter 2. Some Classical Models in the History of Thought,” in The Nerves
of Government. One could also find a similar discourse on international relations in
Morgenthau’s magisterial work Politics among Nations (1967), where he spelled out the
implication of mechanism to international relations in the sixteenth, seventeenth, and
eighteenth century: “The idea of a balance among a number of nations for the purpose of
preventing any one of them from becoming strong enough to threaten the independence of
the others is a metaphor taken from the field of mechanics. It was appropriate to the way of
thinking of the sixteenth, seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, which liked to picture society
and the whole universe as a gigantic mechanism, a machine or a clockwork, created and kept
in motion by a divine watchmaker.” (167)

10. Ritter, Metaphysik und Politik, 33.

11. Schmitt, Political Theology, 36.

12. Schmitt, Political Theology II, 42.

 13. Schmitt responded to Blumenberg in Political Theology II, where he accused Blumenberg
of generalizing his notion of secularization with that of others, such as religion and
eschatology, and gave rise to misunderstandings; see Political Theology II, 117. In an expanded
version of The Legitimacy of the Modern Age, 98, Blumenberg acknowledged Schmitt’s
reproach: “This reproach is justified. It was the second (1970) Politische Theologie’s working
out of the conceptual difference in relation to ‘legitimacy’ that makes clear for the first time
what had been the basis of the preference of the concept of secularization in the first (1922)
Politische Theologie.”

14. Blumenberg, The Legitimacy of the Modern Age, Part I, chapter 3.

15. Löwith, Meaning in History, 54: “This occidental conception of history, implying an
irreversible direction toward a future goal, is not merely occidental. It is essentially a Hebrew
and Christian assumption that history is directed toward an ultimate purpose and governed by
the providence of a supreme insight and will—in Hegel’s terms, by spirit or reason as ‘the
absolutely powerful essence.’”

16. Blumenberg, The Legitimacy of the Modern Age, 27.

17. See Schmitt, “Drei Möglichkeiten eines christlichen Geschichtsbildes” 162. Whether
Schmitt’s claim is valid would be another debate.

18. What is presented above is Blumenberg’s reading of Löwith; however, Jean-François

Kervégan contested Blumenberg’s reading for several reasons. First, Löwith more often uses
the word Verweltlichung instead of Secularisierung; second, what Löwith presents was far
more complex (it is plurivocal or equivocal) than what Blumenberg and Schmitt read. See
Kervégan, “Les ambiguïtés d’un théorème.”

19. Blumenberg, The Legitimacy of the Modern Age, 28.

20. Blumenberg, The Legitimacy of the Modern Age, 8.

21. See Blumenberg and Schmitt, Briefwechsel 1971–1978, 33.

 22. See Blumenberg, The Legitimacy of the Modern Age, 93, reflecting on Schmitt’s
interpretation of De Maistre’s political philosophy as reduction of the state to the element of
decision and his comparison of it with creatio ex nihilo, Blumenberg asks if “it is possible for
men to use the gesture of a creatio ex nihilo ‘Romantically’ and in such a way as to establish
historical continuity.”

23. Blumenberg, The Legitimacy of the Modern Age, 94.

24. Schmitt, Political Theology II, 118.

25. Monod, “La sécularisation et ses limites.”

26. Simondon, On the Mode of Existence of Technical Objects, 21.

27. Schmitt, The Leviathan in the State Theory of Thomas Hobbes, 63.

28. See Schmitt, Political Romanticism, 5: “Its defect is that, as a result of a dogmatic and
moralistic abstraction, it fails to recognize the historical distinctiveness of the movement.”

29. Schmitt, Political Theology, 53.

30. Taubes, To Carl Schmitt, 6.

31. McCormick, Carl Schmitt’s Critique of Liberalism, 207; this is also McCormick’s main
thesis in the book, where he states on page 4, “My claim is that Schmitt’s critique of
liberalism—particularly as it is directed at modern parlimentarism and constitutional law—is
based on a broader criticism of modern thought that he sees as having been infiltrated by the
technological, which he often equates with the economic and the positivistic.” Scheuerman
criticized that Schmitt “too readily assumes that liberalism necessarily entails a commitment to
legal formalism,” see Scheuerman, The End of Law, 9.

32. Scheuerman, The End of Law, 31.

 33. In Schmitt’s Hobbes book, he refers to French professor of public law René Capitant’s
characterization of Hobbes as a “mystic totalist”; see Schmitt, The Leviathan in the State
Theory of Thomas Hobbes, 77.

34. Schmitt, The Leviathan in the State Theory of Thomas Hobbes, 63.

35. McCormick’s book provides a very detailed and rich assessment of the question of
technology in Schmitt’s criticism of liberalism; it also contextualizes Schmitt’s theory of
technology in his time, namely, the opposition between Naturwissenschaft and
Geistwissenschaft, and the triumph of the former over the latter. See McCormick, Carl
Schmitt’s Critique of Liberalism, 104.

36. Schmitt, The Leviathan in the State Theory of Thomas Hobbes, 99.

37. Hobbes, Leviathan, 3.

38. In contrast to Hobbes, we find in Rousseau the comparison of power to the body instead
of mechanics; see Rousseau, The Social Contract and the First and Second Discourses, 217:
“The principle of political life is in the sovereign authority. The legislative power is the heart of
the State; the executive power is its brain, giving movement in all the parts. The brain might be
paralyzed and yet the individual can still live. A man might be an imbecile but still live; but as
soon as the heart stops, the animal died.” A similar (but more detailed) comparison can also be
found in Rousseau’s earlier text Discours sur l’economie politique, published in the fifth
volume of the Encyclopaedia in November 1755.

39. Voigt, Denken in Widersprüchen, 309: “Die Souveränität gibt dem Staat einen Halt und
fügt ihn aus seinen verschiedenen Bestandteilen zusammen, wie die Seele den Körper, oder,
wie er mit einem anderen Bild sagt, wie der Kiel das Schiff.”

40. Schmitt, Staat, Großraum, Nomos, 200.

 41. Note that Richard Tuck and others pointed out that according to Bodin, princes are also
civilly bounded by their contract; Tuck concluded that “Bodin is not treated as a theorist of
‘absolutism’ until well into the seventeenth century.” See Tuck, The Sleeping Sovereign, 48.

42. Schmitt, The Leviathan in the State Theory of Thomas Hobbes, 32.

43. Schmitt, Ex Captivitate Salus, 54. If we understand Schmitt’s remark correctly, then, first,
the sovereign in Hobbes cannot be reduced to one single image, but rather should be
understood as a combination of these four beings; second, Bodin did not associate the state
with mechanism, and neither did he take geometry into account in his political thought (which
is closely associated with geometric reasoning), as did latecomers such as Grotius and Hobbes.
In other words, the question of machine is fundamental in Hobbes’s theory of the state, and
that is also central to his difference from Bodin.

44. See Descartes, Philosophical Writings, vol. 2.

45. See Part IV of Discourse on Method, in Descartes, Philosophical Writings, vol. 1, 126–30;
as well as in the third Meditation of Meditations on First Philosophy, in Philosophical Writings,
vol. 2, 24–36.

46. This also points to a materialism in Hobbes. For the reading of Hobbes as materialist, see
Frost, Lessons from a Materialist Thinker; see also Bardin, “Liberty and Representation in
Hobbes: A Materialist Theory of Conatus.”

47. Hobbes, De motu, XII.4—see Hobbes, Thomas White’s De Mundo Examined; also cited
by Andrea Bardin, Mechanicism as Science and Ideology, 124.

48. Hobbes, Elements of Law, XIX.7, in Three-Text Edition of Thomas Hobbes’s Political
Theory, 202.

49. Hobbes, Leviathan, 4.

50. Hobbes, Leviathan, 76.

 51. Hobbes, Leviathan, 77.

52. Montesquieu, Spirit of the Laws, “Book I: Of Law in General.”

53. Rousseau, The Social Contract and the First and Second Discourses, 82.

54. Ashcraft, “Hobbes’s Natural Man,” 1092.

55. Hobbes, Leviathan, chapter 13, 77.

56. Rousseau, The Social Contract and the First and Second Discourses, “Such is, even at
present, the degree of foresight in the Caribbean: he sells his cotton bed in the morning, and
comes in the evening, with tears in his eyes, to buy it back, not having foreseen that he should
want it again the next night,” 98; “The Caribbeans, the people in the world who have as yet
deviated least from the state of nature, are to all intents and purposes the most peaceable in
their amours, and the least subject to jealousy, though they live in a burning climate which
seems always to add considerably to the activity of these passions,” 110; “What a spectacle
must the painful and envied labors of a European minister of state form in the eyes of a
Caribbean!” 137.

57. Already at the beginning of Rousseau’s second discourse, we read, “The researches, in
which we may engage on this occasion, are not to be taken for historical truths, but merely as
hypothetical and conditional reasonings, fitter to illustrate the nature of things, than to show
their true origin.” See Rousseau, Second Discourse, in The Social Contract and the First and
Second Discourses, 88.

58. Strauss, Natural Right and History, 168–69.

59. Strauss, positioning his interpretation as contra Cassirer’s reading of Hobbes, argues that
it is not only his mechanism (including his dependence on euclidean geometry) but also his
anthropology that defines his politics, see Pelluchon, Leo Strauss and the Crisis of Rationalism,
153; see also Strauss, The Political Philosophy of Hobbes, 10.
 60. Strauss, The Political Philosophy of Hobbes, 4.

61. Strauss, The Political Philosophy of Hobbes, 27.

62. Hobbes, “Treatise ‘Of Liberty and Necessity,’” in Hobbes and Bramhall, Hobbes and
Bramhall on Liberty and Necessity, 24.

63. Hobbes, Leviathan, chapter XVII, 106.

64. Hobbes, Leviathan, chapter XVII, 108.

65. Koselleck, Critique and Crisis, 33.

66. Strauss, The Political Philosophy of Hobbes, 67.

67. There is a rather interesting misreading that the postwar Schmitt turned against the
prewar Schmitt’s reading of Hobbes. See Guilhot, “Automatic Leviathan,” 135: “Schmitt’s
discussion of Hobbes now departed radically from his earlier interpretation. In 1938, he had
faulted Hobbes for his choice of a mechanical symbol for the state and for the resulting failure
to produce a political myth commanding obedience beyond mere rational argumentation. . . .
In 1965, in a complete reversal, Schmitt saw in Hobbes a political theologian who saved the
political by locating the soul of the state outside and above its technical, machine-like body.”
The reason is, I believe, that the author didn’t really understand the question of mechanism in
Hobbes and Schmitt’s reading of Hobbes.

68. Strauss’s main critique of Schmitt’s concept of the political is that it remains within the
framework of liberalism, and Schmitt being a liberal moralist. Schmitt’s concept of the political
targets liberalism for liberalism is the negation of the political. In so doing, Schmitt affirms a
morality, which is opposed to pacifism—for him pacifism means reducing politics to
entertainment. Schmitt’s affirmation of the political is also the affirmation of the state of
nature, the affirmation of the individualistic liberal society; see Strauss, “Note on the Concept
of the Political,” Note 30, 119. “Schmitt is tying himself to his opponents’ view of morality
instead of questioning the claim of humanitarian-pacifist morals to be morals; he remains
trapped in the view that he is attacking.”

69. Schmitt, The Leviathan in the State Theory of Thomas Hobbes, 58. Hobbes focused on
public peace and the right of sovereign power; individual freedom of thought was an implicit
right open only as long as it remained private. Now, it is the inverse: individual freedom of
thought is the form-giving principle, the necessities of public peace as well as the right of the
sovereign power having been transformed into mere processes.

70. Strauss, “Note on the Concept of the Political,” Note 14, 108. “If it is true that the final
self-awareness of liberalism is the philosophy of culture, we may say in summary that
liberalism, sheltered by and engrossed in a world of culture, forgets the foundation of culture,
the state of nature, that is, human nature in its dangerousness and endangeredness. Schmitt
returns, contrary to liberalism, to its author, Hobbes, in order to strike at the root of liberalism
in Hobbes’s express negation of the state of nature. Whereas Hobbes in an unliberal world
accomplishes the founding of liberalism, Schmitt in a liberal world undertakes the critique of
liberalism.”

71. Schmitt, The Leviathan in the State Theory of Thomas Hobbes, 63.

72. Schmitt’s most explicit comment on the mechanism and organism opposition is to be
found in a much later article “Der Gegensatz von Gemeinschaft und Gesellschaft,” 165–78.

73. Schmitt, “Der Gegensatz von Gemeinschaft und Gesellschaft,” 168.

74. Schmitt, Political Theology, 63.

75. Rousseau, The Social Contract and the First and Second Discourses, 95.

76. Schmitt, The Leviathan in the State Theory of Thomas Hobbes, 41.

77. Rasch, “The Emergence of Legal Norms,” 93–103.

 78. Rasch, “The Emergence of Legal Norms,” 100: “The practicing judge, in other words,
engages in a form of reflective judgment, ascending from the particular to the universal, or
rather, constructing the universal in response to the particular, by means of a mechanism that
bears, not surprisingly, a striking resemblance to aspects of Kantian aesthetic judgment.”

79. Schmitt, The Concept of the Political, 19.

80. In “Der Gegensatz von Gemeinschaft und Gesellschaft,” 169–70, Schmitt listed seven
meanings of the word organic: (1) not mechanical, (2) not from outside, (3) not from above, (4)
not violent, (5) not atomic and not individualistic, (6) not particular, (7) opposite to all that is
active and conscious.

81. Schmitt, Glossarium, 124–25: “Das ist das geheime Schlüsselwort meiner gesamten
geistigen und publizistischen Existenz: das Ringen um die eigentlich katholische Verschärfung
(gegen die Neutralisierer, die ästhetischen Schlaraffen, gegen Fruchtabtreiber,
Leichenverbrenner und Pazifisten).”

82. Schmitt, Roman Catholicism, 9.

83. Schmitt, Glossarium, 159: “Es gibt in der ganzen Weltgeschichte nichts, was so frei von
jedem Erlösungsbedürfnis wäre, so völlig immun gegen jede Anwandlung eines solchen
Bedürfnisses wie Hegels Philosophie der Identität des Seins und des Nicht-Seins zu einer
Verbindung, die nicht etwa nur Verbindung, complexio oder coincidentia oppositorum ist,
sondern Verbindung der Verbindung und der Nicht-Verbindung, Identität der Identität und der
Nicht-Identität, ewiger Prozeß, ewige Unruhe; wer das begreift, braucht keine Erlösung mehr.”

84. Schmitt, Roman Catholicism, 10.

85. Schmitt, Roman Catholicism, 11.

86. Schmitt, Roman Catholicism, 11.

87. Schmitt, Roman Catholicism, 18.

 88. Marder, Groundless Existence, 149.

89. Stark, “Complexio Oppositorum: Hugo Ball and Carl Schmitt,” 59.

90. Schmitt, Roman Catholicism, 15.

91. Marder, Groundless Existence, 159.

92. See Schmidgen, “The Life of Concepts,” 240, where Schmidgen also cited Canguilhem’s
comment in La formation du concept de réflexe aux XVIIe et XVIII siècles, 123: “Perhaps
vitalism is merely the sentiment of an ontological, i.e., chronologically irreducible anticipation
of life with respect to mechanical theory and technology, to intelligence and the simulation of
life.”

93. See Hohendahl, Perilous Futures, 42.

94. Schmitt, “The Age of Neutralizations and Depoliticizations,” in The Concept of the
Political, 95.

95. See Meier, The Lesson of Carl Schmitt.

96. Delacroix, “Schmitt’s Critique of Kelsenian Normativism,” 30.

97. Schmitt, “Diktatur und Belagerungszustand,” 157, quoted in Scheuerman, The End of
Law, 32.

98. See UNESCO, “AI and the Rule of Law: Capacity Building for Judicial Systems,”
https://www.unesco.org/en/artificial-intelligence/rule-law/mooc-judges.
 99. Schmitt, “Neutralization,” in Concept of the Political, 94; also cited by Hooker, Carl
Schmitt’s International Thought, 113.

100. Schmitt, “Neutralization,” 140; also cited by McCormick, Carl Schmitt’s Critique of
Liberalism, 44.

101. See Falk, “The Modern Epimetheus,” 4

102. Schmitt, “Drei Möglichkeiten eines christlichen Geschichtsbildes,” 166. This reading of
Epimetheus is contrary to Massimo Cacciari’s reading, to which we will return in chapter 7.

103. Heidegger, Ponderings XII–XV, 143.

104. Anter, “The State as Machine,” 209.

105. See Die Bibliothek Carl Schmitt, edited by the Carl-Schmitt-Gesellschaft,

https://www.carl-schmitt.de/forschung/privatbibliothek-carl-schmitts/.

106. Schmitt, The Leviathan in the State Theory of Thomas Hobbes, 57.

107. One could also see its continuation in the liberal tradition, notably John Locke’s
juxtaposition of the “Law of Opinion or Reputation” (or the Law of Private Censure) to “Devine
and Civil Law” in his celebrated An Essay Concerning Human Understanding.

108. Hooker, Carl Schmitt’s International Thought, 46.

109. Strauss, “Letter to Hoffman,” January 27, 1965, Strauss Archive, Regenstein Library,
University of Chicago, cited by Howse, Leo Strauss, 61.

110. Koselleck, Critique and Crisis, 34.

 111. Schmitt, Staat, Bewegung, Volk, 11.

112. Schmitt, “The Age of Neutralization and Depoliticizations,” in The Concept of the
Political, 86: “If a domain of thought becomes central, then the problems of other domains are
solved in terms of the central domains—they are considered secondary problems, whose
solution follows as a matter of course only if the problems of the central domain are solved.”

113. Schmitt, Dialogues on Power and New Space, 46.

114. Strauss, The Political Philosophy of Hobbes, 64.

115. Strauss, The Political Philosophy of Hobbes, 67.

116. Schmitt, The Political Philosophy of Hobbes, 44.

117. Schmitt, “Hegel and Marx,” 391.

118. Schmitt, “The Age of Neutralization and Depoliticizations,” in The Concept of the
Political, 85.

119. Schmitt, “The Age of Neutralization and Depoliticizations,” in The Concept of the
Political, 95.

120. AP News, “Putin: Leader in Artificial Intelligence Will Rule World,”

https://apnews.com/article/bb5628f2a7424a10b3e38b07f4eb90d4.

121. Wolin, “Carl Schmitt, Political Existentialism, and the Total State,” 395.
 122. See Schmitt, Der Begriff des Politischen, 49: “War, the readiness for death of fighting
men, the physical annihilation of other men who stand on the side of the enemy, all that has
no normative, rather an existential meaning, indeed, in the reality of a situation of real
struggle against a real enemy, and not in whatever ideals, programs, or normative concepts.”

123. Schmitt, Political Theology, 15.

124. Strauss, On Hegel, 356.

125. I want to thank Conor Heaney for pointing out to me, “Indeed, the development of the
Courts of Equity in England and Wales are partially developed from this idea: that sometimes
justice is only served via the suspension of the rule. This has developed into an entire body of
law and doctrines to which English and Welsh courts have access to: doctrines which allow
courts discretion to decide beyond the contours of certain ordinary rules precisely so that
justice can be seen to be served. This sort of ‘routine’ form of exceptionalism (routine insofar
as it is now built into the functioning of legal institutions) seems like an interesting form of
exceptionalism which, at first glance, is not obviously grasped by the Schmittean exception:
the exception can itself become a normalised part of institutional-administrative practice.” The
above comment implies two questions: whether the power that makes exceptions is absolute,
and if exceptionalism is necessary and under what condition. We will discuss these questions
in chapter 5 by reading Derrida.

126. Schmitt, The Concept of the Political, 19.

127. Sartre, “Existentialism Is a Humanism.”

128. Schmitt, “Reich, Staat, Bund,” in Positionen und Begriffe, 198.

129. Voigt, Denken in Widersprüchen, 50.

130. Schmitt, Staat, Bewegung, Volk, 32.

131. Schmitt, State, Movement, People, 35.

 132. Voigt, Denken in Widersprüchen, 46.

133. Schmitt, Positionen und Begriffe, 292. “Für Hegel aber ist schon dieser preußische Staat
ein Reich, und zwar ein Reich der objektiven Vernunft und der Sittlichkeit, und es ist
selbstverständlich, daß mit diesem Staat nicht ein beliebiges Gemeinwesen im Sinne des
neutralen Staatsbegriffs einer allgemeinen Staatslehre, sondern der politisch-geschichtlich
konkrete preußische Staat der ersten Hälfte des 19. Jahrhunderts gemeint ist.”

134. See Ottmann, “Hegel und Carl Schmitt,” 234. In State, Movement, People, Schmitt
wrote “Was an Hegels mächtigem Geisterbau überzeitlich groß und deutsch ist, bleibt auch in
der neuen Gestalt weiter wirksam.”

135. Hegel, Outlines of the Philosophy of Right, §216, 203.

136. See Scheuerman, The End of Law, 40–41n21.

137. For a more elaborated account of the question of monism and pluralism of state ethics
and Schmitt’s critique of William James’s pluralism, see Schmitt, “Staatsethik und
pluralistischer Staat (1930)” in Positionen und Begriffe.

138. Schmitt, Theory of the Partisan, 20.

139. Schmitt, Theory of the Partisan, 90–91.

140. Schmitt, Theory of the Partisan, 30.

141. Schmitt, Theory of the Partisan, 47; also cited by Hohendahl, Perilous Futures, 162.

142. Hohendahl, Perilous Futures, 128.

 143. Schmitt, Theory of the Partisan, 60.

144. Schmitt, Theory of the Partisan, 77: “Only revolutionary war made him a key figure of
world history. However, what is one to make of him in the age of atomic weapons of mass
destruction? In a thoroughly organized technical world, the old, feudal-agrarian forms and
concepts of combat, war, and enmity disappear. That is obvious. But do combat, war, and
enmity thereby also disappear and become nothing more than harmless social conflicts?”

145. Schmitt, Theory of the Partisan, 21n32. §243–46 of Hegel’s Outlines of the Philosophy
of Right is on civil society and poverty; Schmitt refers to Marxist interpretation, not Marx’s
commentary on Hegel’s Outlines of the Philosophy of Right, because the commentaries that
Marx left us only started from §261.

146. See Schmitt, Theory of the Partisan, 80.

147. Thiel, “The Education of a Libertarian.”

5. Nomos of the Digital Earth

1. Rousseau, Social Contract, 175.

2. Notably Carl von Savigny’s 1814 Concerning the Vocation of Legislation and Jurisprudence,
where Savigny rejected the ahistorical validity of natural law regardless of time and nation; he
also proposed to understand the nature of law in terms of historical deduction from Roman
Law. See Ulmen, “The Sociology of the State,” 14–15.

3. Rasch, “The Emergence of Legal Norms,” 97. Rasch quoted the criticism of the neo-
Kantian philosopher Emil Lask in his “Rechtsphilosophie” (1905): “The criterion of communal
authority is thereby eliminated altogether, and in its place appears reason (Vernunft) as a
higher formal source of law, from which ‘law’ emanates without and against human positing,
so that law that is not in conformity with reason becomes formally nullified and no longer
deserves to be called law, but rather only brutal arbitrariness and violence.”
 4. Strauss, Natural Right and History, 91.

5. Strauss, Natural Right and History, 50.

6. Strauss, Natural Right and History, 119.

7. Bartelson, in his Sovereign as Symbolic Form, after exposing the multiple definitions of
sovereignty, turns to Ernst Cassirer’s concept of the symbolic form for help. Cassirer’s symbolic
form, in a broader sense, refers to various meaning systems where one can identify the
symbol’s mythical, representative, and significative function; in a narrow sense, it refers to an
organic whole (like in Gestalt theory) without which the meaning of the symbol cannot be fully
understood. I am not very sure if Bartelson’s application of Cassirer’s symbolic form is a
satisfactory way of elucidating the nature of the sovereignty.

8. Onuf, The Mightie Frame, 95.

9. Thanks to colleagues from the law school of the University of Kent for emphasizing this
difference.

10. Schmitt, Political Theology, 5.

11. Rasch, Carl Schmitt, 53–54.

12. Kant, Critique of Pure Reason, A249, 312.

13. Kant, Critique of Pure Reason, B 308, 318: “Such an intuition—viz., intellectual
intuition—lies absolutely outside our cognitive power, and hence the use of the categories can
likewise in no way extend beyond the boundary containing the objects of experience.”

14. Kant, Critique of Judgment, 170.

 15. Quoted by Bartelson, Sovereignty as Symbolic Form, 22.

16. Hume, Treatise of Human Nature, 1.2.4., 33.

17. Stiegler, Philosophising by Accident, 52. Italics in original.

18. Stiegler, Philosophising by Accident, 53.

19. Suganami, “Understanding Sovereignty through Kelsen/Schmitt,” 522.

20. Skinner, “The Sovereign State: A Genealogy,” 45.

21. Rasch, Carl Schmitt, 56.

22. Schmitt, Glossarium, 388.

23. Kelsen, Pure Theory of Law, 193.

24. Raz, The Authority of Law, 95; see also Kelsen, General Theory of Law and State, 116: “To
interpret these acts of human beings as legal acts and their products as binding norms, and
that means to interpret the empirical material which presents itself as law as such, is possible
only on the condition that the basic norm is presupposed as a valid norm. The basic norm is
only the necessary presupposition of any positivistic interpretation of the legal material.”

25. Kelsen, Pure Theory of Law, 202.

26. Heller, Sovereignty, 92.

 27. Suganami, “Understanding Sovereignty through Kelsen/Schmitt,” 521: “But the whole
intellectual enterprise of seeking the origins of positive legal norms in the so-called basic norm
is doomed. All it achieves is a redundant circular reassurance.”

28. Schmitt, Constitutional Theory, Part I §9.1, 64.

29. Schmitt, Political Theology, 21.

30. Schmitt, Constitutional Theory, Part I §9.2, 64, translation modified; Eine Norm setzt
niemals sich selbst, which literally means “a norm doesn’t posit itself,” is translated as “a norm
doesn’t establish itself.” We may miss the meaning of Selbstsetzung (self-positing), which is
the principle of organism; in this sense Schmitt’s criticism of positivism as merely mechanical is
brought into problem by himself.

31. Derrida, Rogues, 154: “We did not have to wait for Schmitt to learn that the sovereign is
the one who decides exceptionally and performatively about the exception, the one who
keeps or grants himself the right to suspend rights or law; nor did we need him to know that
this politico-juridical concept, like all the others, secularizes a theological heritage.”

32. Derrida, Rogues, 141.

33. Cacciari, Europe and Empire, 55.

34. Derrida, Rogues, 149. Italics in original.

35. Derrida, Rogues, 149.

36. See also Derrida, “The Force of Law,” 971.

37. Derrida, Rogues, 149.

 38. It might be interesting to note that Stiegler’s rupture with Derrida can be seen as an
effort to shift from the transcendental or the quasi-transcendental to an immanent historical
analysis of technicity, inspired both by Leroi-Gourhan and Gilbert Simondon. Despite the
crucial role played by the supplement in Derrida’s work, Stiegler reproaches the philosopher of
deconstruction for being unconcerned with its history; see Stiegler, “Discrétiser le temps,”
footnote 6.

39. Schmitt, Ex Captivitate Salus, 29.

40. Howse, “Europe and the New World Order,” 101–2.

41. See Cacciari, Europe and Empire.

42. See Rasch, “A Just War or Just a War,?” 1683: “Schmitt the nationalist, might also be
Schmitt, the international multiculturalist, who offers those who ‘obstinately’ wish to resist the
‘West’ a theoretical foothold.” The same thing could also be said about Herder.

43. Schmitt, “Über das Verhältnis der Begriffe Krieg und Feind,” in Positionen und Begriffe,
245.

44. Schmitt, “Wisdom of the Cell,” in Ex Captivitate Salus, 71.

45. Schmitt, Theory of the Partisan, 85.

46. Hegel, Outlines of the Philosophy of Right, §331: “It is no less essential that this
legitimacy should be rendered complete through its recognition by other states, although this
recognition requires a guarantee that where a state is to be recognized by others, it shall
likewise recognize them, i.e. respect their independence; and so it comes about that they
cannot be indifferent to each other’s internal affairs.”

47. Derrida, “Autoimmunity,” 94.

 48. Derrida, Rogues, 101.

49. We recall that in Greek mythology, Epimetheus committed the fault for not giving the
gift to the human being but only animals, and he also opened Pandora’s box; Schmitt
compared Epimetheus with Abel in Glossarium, 180; Hjalmar Falk opposes Schmitt, the
Christian Epimetheus, to the Christian Prometheanism, namely, the “anti-religion of
technicity,” “the religion of technical progress,” “a religion of technical miracles,” etc. See Falk,
“The Modern Epimetheus.”

50. Schmitt, “Raum und Großraum im Völkerrecht,” in Staat, Großraum, Nomos, 239.

51. See Heaney, Rhythm.

52. Hooker’s emphasis on this relation between Ortung and Ordnung in his Carl Schmitt’s
International Thought is significant, because it also points to the question of locality, the
necessity to orient, to erörtern.

53. Schmitt, Land and Sea, 92.

54. Schmitt, “Die Einheit der Welt,” in Staat, Großraum, Nomos, 500: “Auch im Jus Publicum
Europaeum gab es eine Einheit der Welt. Sie war europazentrisch, aber sie war nicht die
zentrale Macht eines einzigen Herrn der Welt. Ihr Gefüge war pluralistisch und ermöglichte
eine Koexistenz mehrerer politischer Größen, die sich gegenseitig nicht als Verbrecher,
sondern als Träger autonomer Ordnungen betrachten konnten.”

55. Schmitt, Nomos of the Earth, 126–27.

56. Schmitt, Nomos of the Earth, 149.

57. Schmitt, “Raum und Großraum im Völkerrecht,” in Staat, Großraum, Nomos, 235–36.

58. Schmitt, “Völkerrechtliche Großraumordnung,” in Staat, Großraum, Nomos, 271.

 59. Schmitt, Nomos of the Earth, 43.

60. Schmitt, Land and Sea, 49.

61. Schmitt, Land and Sea, 9–10.

62. Hooker, Carl Schmitt’s International Thought, 75.

63. Schmitt, “Welt großartigster Spannung,” in Staat, Großraum, Nomos, 514: “Durch die
kleine Schrift Land und Meer gewann ich zum erstenmal einen Begriff von der Bedeutung der
Elemente als Kräfte weltgeschichtlicher Auseinandersetzungen.”

64. Schmitt, Land and Sea, 53, italics are mine.

65. Schmitt, Nomos of the Earth, 73, “In its original sense, however, nomos is precisely the
full immediacy of a legal power not mediated by laws; it is a constitutive historical event—an
act of legitimacy, whereby the legality of a mere law first is made meaningful.”

66. Schmitt, “The New Nomos of the Earth,” in Nomo sof the Earth, 352.

67. Schmitt, “The New Nomos of the Earth,” in Nomos of the Earth, 352.

68. Schmitt, “The New Nomos of the Earth,” in Nomos of the Earth, 352.

69. Schmitt, Nomos of the Earth, 293

70. Schmitt, “Großraum gegen Universalismus,” in Positionen und Begriffe, 295;

“Völkerrechtliche Großraumordnung,” in Staat, Großraum, Nomos, 290.
 71. Schmitt, “Völkerrechtliche Großraumordnung,” in Staat, Großraum, Nomos, 282

72. Schmitt, “Großraum gegen Universalismus,” 297.

73. Schmitt, “Großraum gegen Universalismus,” 299.

74. Schmitt, Nomos of the Earth, 235.

75. It is not without interest to observe that the Kyoto School philosopher Keiji Nishitani
made a similar analysis that resonates with Schmitt’s analysis of sea power. Nishitani analyzed
three civilizations: Mediterranean (Roman world), Atlantic (Anglo-American world), and Pacific,
and claimed that the Pacific has become a hegemonic center of the globe; he also saw that
Japan, being on the edge of the Atlantic civilization, had the historical duty to explore the
Pacific. See Goto-Jones, Political Philosophy in Japan, 107.

76. Schmitt, “Die Einheit der Welt,” in Staat, Großraum, Nomos, 503; see also Schmitt,
Political Romanticism, 13.

77. Schmitt, “Die Einheit der Welt,” in Staat, Großraum, Nomos, 505: “Der Osten
insbesondere hat sich der Geschichtsphilosophie Hegels nicht anders bemächtigt, wie er sich
der Atombombe und anderer Erzeugnisse der westlichen Intelligenz bemächtigt hat, um die
Einheit der Welt im Sinne seiner Planungen zu verwirklichen.”

78. Schmitt, “Die geschichtliche Struktur des heutigen Welt-Gegensatzes von Ost und West,”
in Staat, Großraum, Nomos, 537: “Die heutige kommunistische Revolution des Ostens aber
besteht darin, daß sich der Osten eine von der christlichen Religiosität abgelösten
europäischen Technik bemächtigt.”

79. Schmitt, “Die geschichtliche Struktur des heutigen Welt,” in Staat, Großraum, Nomos,
540, “Was sich gegen Ende des 17. Jahrhunderts abgelöst hat, ist also nicht, wie Arnold
Toynbee meint, ein ‘technischer Splitter,’ sondern etwas anderes. Eine europäische Insel löste
sich vom europäischen Kontinent ab und eine neue, von der Insel getragene maritime Welt
stellte sich der Welt des festen Landes gegenüber.”
 80. Fukuyama, The End of History and the Last Man.

81. Derrida, Rogues, 158. A similar argument was made in Habermas and Derrida’s cosigned
article on Europe’s responsibility and its autonomy against the U.S. unilateral policy in the
wake of the United States’ war in Iraq and the European political leaders’ call for European
unity with the United States. See Habermas and Derrida, “February 15.”

82. Schmitt, “Die Einheit der Welt,” in Staat, Großraum, Nomos, 501. “Nun ist diese
Hegelsche Philosophie scheinbar idealistisch; sie erblickt das Ziel der Menschheit in der Einheit
des zu sich selbst zurückkehrenden Geistes und der absoluten Idee, nicht in der materiellen
Einheit einer elektrifizierten Erde.”

83. Schmitt, “Die Einheit der Welt,” in Staat, Großraum, Nomos, 496.

84. Schmitt, “The Age of Neutralization and Depoliticizations,” in The Concept of the
Political, 95.

85. Schmitt, Nomos of the Earth, 178.

86. Schmitt, Land and Sea, 57. Land and Sea was published in 1942; in an earlier essay
“Völkerrechtliche Großraumordnung” (republished in 1941 in Staat, Großraum, Nomos),
Schmitt did not fail to disclose his disappointment of the “spatial consciousness” of air, which
he expected to be analogical to that which is brought about by the sea. Instead Schmitt
mocked, “im Gegenteil, der Gedanke der territorialen Souveränität des Staates im
atmosphärischen Raum in besonders betonter Weise die Grundlage aller bisherigen
vertraglichen und sonstigen Regelungen des internationalen Flug- und Funkwesens geworden.
Vom technischen Standpunkt aus ist das sonderbar und geradezu grotesk, besondersbei
territorial kleinen Staaten, wenn man bedenkt, wie viel ‘Souveränitäten’ ein modernes
Flugzeug unterstehen soll, wenn es in wenigen Stunden über viele kleine Staaten hinwegfliegt,
oder gar was aus den vielen Staatshoheiten über alle die elektrische Wellen wird, die
ununterbrochen mit Sekundenschnelle durch den atmosphärischen Raum über den Erdball
kreisen,” in Staat, Großraum, Nomos, 304.

87. Schmitt, “Völkerrechtliche Großraumordnung,” in Staat, Großraum, Nomos, 308.

 88. In “Grossraum gegen Universalismus” Schmitt discussed the Asian Monroe Doctrine and
referred to a book by Johnson Long titled La Mandchourie et la doctrine de la porte ouverte
(1933), in which the author outlined the problematic of the Asian Monroe Doctrine. Schmitt
summarized this in three points; the third point says that Monroe Doctrine is obsolete due to
the development of the modern transportation system. During Monroe’s time, the United
States was isolated—that being the background of the doctrine, but in 1933 transportation
technology had already created a globalized world. Schmitt criticized the author as being
contradictory and wrote that it only shows that modern transportation technology allows
American imperialism to intervene in others’ internal affairs more effectively.

89. Bratton, The Stack.

90. Arendt, The Human Condition, 1.

91. Schmitt, “Völkerrechtliche Großraumordnung,” in Staat, Großraum, Nomos, 309. “Das

Reich ist nicht einfach ein vergrößerter Staat, so wenig wie der Großraum ein vergrößerter
Kleinraum ist. Das Reich ist auch nicht identisch mit dem Großraum, aber jedes Reich hat einen
Großraum und erhebt sich dadurch so wohl über den durch die Ausschließlichkeit seines
Staatsgebietes räumlich gekennzeichneten Staat wie über den Volksboden eines einzelnen
Volkes.”

92. Schmitt, “Der Reichsbegriff im Völkerrecht,” in Positionen und Begriffen, 312. “In ihm
[Begriff des Reiches] haben wir den Kern einer neuen völkerrechtlichen Denkweise, die vom
Volksbegriff ausgeht und die im Staatsbegriff enthaltenen Ordnungselemente durchaus
bestehen läßt, die aber zugleich den heutigen Raumvorstellungen und den wirklichen
politischen Lebenskräften gerecht zu werden vermag; die ‘planetarisch,’ d. h. erdraumhaft sein
kann, ohne die Völker und die Staaten zu vernichten und ohne, wie das imperialistische
Völkerrecht der westlichen Demokratien, aus der unvermeidlichen Überwindung des alten
Staatsbegriffs in ein universalistisch-imperialistisches Weltrecht zu steuern.”

93. Schmitt, “Völkerrechtliche Großraumordnung,” in Staat, Großraum, Nomos, 305.

94. Hooker, Carl Schmitt’s International Thought, 147.

 95. See Williams, The Philosophy of Japanese Wartime Resistance, 211–13; the term
Großraum is transcribed in katakana as グロース・ラウム and translated into kanji as 広域圈
(kōikiken, literally, “sphere of wide territories”), which is then identified as the Greater East
Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere.

96. Williams, The Philosophy of Japanese Wartime Resistance, 247. Nishitani claimed that
“Moralische Energie is the essential ingredient of any such transformation. To restate the
argument, the ethical foundations (konpon) of Greater East Asia are to be secured by the
dissemination of Japanese moralische Energie to the various peoples of the region, and this
process will help in a substantial way to enhance their respective levels of subjectivity.”

97. See Parsley, “Seasons in the Abyss.”

98. Kojève, “Colonialism from a European Perspective,” 117: “Marx and the Marxists really
erred in only one way. They assumed that capitalists were exactly as naive and shortsighted,
exactly as unwise and blind, as the bourgeois political economists and intellectuals generally,
who believed themselves to have ‘refuted’ Marxist theory in books of varying thickness.”

99. Kojève, “Colonialism from a European Perspective,” 122: “Now, if such a country really
invests the entire surplus value, or even more than that, in this way, one can, to be sure, no
longer speak of colonialism in the conventional sense. For then one is certainly, de facto, no
longer taking anything, and is even giving something. And when the country in question
spends far more than is collected by it, then it must even really be called anticolonialist.”

100. Thiel, “The Straussian Moment,” 207: “The modern West has lost faith in itself. In the
Enlightenment and post-Enlightenment period, this loss of faith liberated enormous
commercial and creative forces. At the same time, this loss has rendered the West vulnerable.
Is there a way to fortify the modern West without destroying it altogether, a way of not
throwing the baby out with the bathwater?”

101. Crary, Scorched Earth.

102. Stiegler, For a New Critique of Political Economy.

103. Glasze et al., “Contested Spatialities of Digital Sovereignty,” 6.

 104. Glasze et al., “Contested Spatialities of Digital Sovereignty,” 14.

105. Bratton, The Stack, 35.

106. Reuters, “Majority Shareholders Vote in Favor of Delisting Didi from New York,”
https://www.reuters.com/markets/europe/majority-shareholders-vote-favor-delisting-didi-
new-york-2022-05-23/.

107. Chris Rufo, “US House Energy and Commerce Committee Approves Bill that Would
Force China-Based Company ByteDance to Sell TikTok,”
https://www.jurist.org/news/2024/03/us-house-energy-and-commerce-committee-approves-
bill-that-would-force-china-based-company-bytedance-to-sell-tiktok.

108. Probably only in this sense is it productive to talk about a politics of katechon, as a
power of epoch making, which Massimo Cacciari explored in The Withholding Power. The
imperial power considered as a katechontic one makes both a new epoch and an epoch of its
own death, as Cacciari says, “Only this self-consciousness allows power to assume an
eschatological character” (28); in a later passage, Cacciari also states that “by containing within
itself the coming apostasy, even presaging it, the katechon works for its own death. Through
the heterogenesis of ends he finds he has been ‘nurturing’ that seed that will sweep him
away” (76).

6. An Organology of Wars

1. Bergson’s The Meaning of the War was published in English in 1915; the French text is
available at: http://14-18.institut-de-france.fr/1914-discours-henri-bergson.php; English
translation is also available on Project Gutenberg:
https://www.gutenberg.org/files/17111/17111-h/17111-h.htm.

2. See Die Bibliothek Carl Schmitt, edited by the Carl-Schmitt-Gesellschaft, https://www.carl-

schmitt.de/forschung/privatbibliothek-carl-schmitts/.
 3. Canguilhem, “Machine and Organism,” in The Knowledge of Life; In Recursivity and
Contingency, I tried to reconstruct Bergson’s general organology through a reading of Creative
Evolution and Canguilhem’s commentary on Part III of Bergson’s Creative Evolution; this
chapter constitutes the further interrogation of this subject.

4. Bergson, The Meaning of the War, 34.

5. Bergson, The Two Sources, 268.

6. Marinetti, “The Futurist Manifesto (1909),”

https://www.arthistoryproject.com/artists/filippo-tommaso-marinetti/the-futurist-manifesto/.

7. Bergson, The Meaning of the War, 36.

8. Kapp, Der konstituierte Despotismus und die konstitutionelle Freiheit, 85.

9. See Kawakami and Takeuchi (ed), Overcoming Modernity (近代の超克); On the discussion
of war and the Kyoto School, please see the second part of Hui, The Question Concerning
Technology in China.

10. I was made aware by the Russian editor of one of my books, Eugene Kuchinov, that a
book published by the nationalist agitator Maxim Kalashnikov was entitled Robot and Cross:
Technosense of the Russian Idea.

11. Bergson, The Two Sources, 249.

12. Varela, “Steps to a Cybernetics of Autonomy,” 117.

13. Negri, The End of Sovereignty; see also my discussion in the Introduction.
 14. As Charles Taylor said, today Hegel’s ontology of Geist is “close to incredible,” but at the
same time highly relevant, see Taylor, Hegel and Modern Society, 69, 72.

15. Wiener, “Some Moral and Technical Consequences of Automation,” 1358.

16. Wiener, God and Golem, 73

17. Simondon, “Cybernétique et philosophie,” in Sur la Philosophie.

18. Bergson, The Two Sources, 268.

19. Lapoujade, Powers of Time, 81.

20. Bergson, The Two Sources, 265.

21. Bergson, The Two Sources, 263.

22. Lapoujade, Powers of Time, 63: “The intelligence is precisely what distracts man from life
itself; it is a form of inattention to life. The pure intelligence is in effect characterized by a
‘natural inability to comprehend life’ insofar as it always perceives life from the outside. The
intelligence is life having become external to itself.”

23. Simondon, On the Mode of Existence of Technical Objects, 59–62.

24. Simondon, “Cybernétique et philosophie,” in Sur la Philosophie, 43. Simondon used the
term holistic (holique) to describe this form of organization of cybernetics.

25. Simondon, On the Mode of Existence of Technical Objects, 17.

 26. Bergson in The Two Sources proposed what he calls “attachment to life”; however, this
attachment to life is not about abandoning technology. Instead, this attachment to life is an
act of overcoming. For the discussion between the tension of “attention to life” in his Matter
and Memory and “attachment to life” in The Two Sources, please see Lapoujade, Powers of
Time, 65–67.

27. On the concept of tragist, see Hui, Art and Cosmotechnics.

28. Schure, Bergson and History, 199.

29. Schure, Bergson and History, 200.

30. It could be equally interesting to compare Bergson’s interpretation of the external

obstacle in evolution and the Hemmung in Schelling’s recursive form of nature.

31. Bergson, Creative Evolution, 47–48.

32. Bergson, The Two Sources, 257.

33. See Miquel, “Bergson and Darwin.”

34. Even though Bergson never mentioned the name Hegel, and he rejected any telos of
history, one wonders how far this is from Hegel’s own dialectics and the concept of sublation
not as cancellation but as reconciliation.

35. Bergson, The Two Sources, 234.

36. Deleuze, Bergsonism, 13.

37. Bergson, The Two Sources, 268. “Ne nous bornons donc pas à dire, comme nous le
faisions plus haut, que la mystique appelle la mécanique. Ajoutons que le corps agrandi attend
un supplément d’âme, et que la mécanique exigerait une mystique. Les origines de cette
mécanique sont peut-être plus mystiques qu’on ne le croirait; elle ne retrouvera sa direction
vraie, elle ne rendra des services proportionnés à sa puissance, que si l’humanité qu’elle a
courbée encore davantage vers la terre arrive par elle à se redresser, et à regarder le ciel.”

38. Hawking, “Artificial Intelligence Could Spell the End of the Human Race.”

39. Schure, Bergson and History, 204.

40. Lapoujade, Powers of Time, 66. Lapoujade sees the paradox between delusion (délire)
and believing, for delusion can only become vital when it is believed.

41. On the nonrational, see Hui, Art and Cosmotechnics, where we elaborated what we call
“epistemology of the unknown.” The nonrational is distinguished from the irrational, because
the nonrational is that which remains unknown and unknowable, however essential to the
plane of consistence of a spiritual life.

42. Leroi-Gourhan, Milieu et Technique, 338–39.

43. Leroi-Gourhan, Milieu et Technique, 339.

44. Leroi-Gourhan, Milieu et Technique, 95.

45. Leroi-Gourhan, Milieu et Technique, 338. “Mais la simple observation d’un animal ou
d’une technique démontre que la tendance générale ne contient pas toutes les
caractéristiques: le sabre, qui réalise dans tous ses types un ensemble harmonieux, offre
pourtant des formes extrêmement nombreuses conditionnes les unes par la matière, les
autres par l’usage particulier de l’arme, les coutumes de l’escrime locale, les traditions
esthétiques, etc.”

46. Leroi-Gourhan, Milieu et Technique, 342.

 47. Leroi-Gourhan, Milieu et Technique, 396. “Nous avons fait la part de deux notions qui
semblent dominer les faits, parce qu’elles fournissent une vue primordiale sur l’Évolution: la
tendance et le milieu extérieur.”

48. See Hui, The Question Concerning Technology in China.

49. Leroi-Gourhan, Milieu et Technique, 344.

50. This leads to the association of modernization and resistance, in the sense that the
history of modernization of the non-West is a history of resistance against the West. See
Takeuchi, What Is Modernity?.

51. Lefebvre, Le manifeste différentialiste.

52. Benjamin, “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction,” 218.

53. See Ober, Demopolis.

54. Lenin, State and Revolution, 54, italic original; also cited by Lefebvre, State, Space,
World, 85.

55. Lenin, State and Revolution, 51.

56. Lenin, State and Revolution, 53–54.

57. Lenin, State and Revolution, 129.

58. Democracy as an act that allows the system to differentiate is a key argument of Niklas
Luhmann against the classical concept of democracy, which means eliminating other options,
such as choosing between A and B. Luhmann believes that systems theory provides a concept
of democracy more appropriate to our time. See Luhmann, “Komplexität und Demokratie,” 36.
 59. Chérif, Islam and the West, 43: “Democracy is always to come, it is a promise, and it is in
the name of that promise that one can always criticize, question that which is proposed as the
facto democracy. Consequently, I believe that there doesn’t exist in the world a democracy
suitable for the concept of the democracy to come.”

60. Chérif, Islam and the West, 50.

61. Chérif, Islam and the West, 44.

62. However, to be noted is that Derrida’s democracy to come is neither a Kantian idea such
as the world republic of Karatani nor is it a messianic politics like that of Walter Benjamin. See
Derrida, “The Force of Law,” 965: commenting on the idea of justice, Derrida said, “I would
hesitate to assimilate too quickly this ‘idea of justice’ to a regulative idea (in the Kantian
sense), to a messianic promise or to other horizons of the same type” (italics in original).

63. See Gille, Histoire des techniques.

64. Hui, “For a Planetary Thinking.”

65. Wilson, Biophilia, 11.

66. Wilson, Biophilia, 71.

67. Wilson, Half-Earth, Prologue.

68. Wilson, Biophilia, 138.

69. Shiva, “Monocultures of the Mind,” 237–48.

 70. Günther Anders made an interesting remark when he said that even if one stops
experimenting on the atomic bomb, and destroys all the existing bombs physically, the risk of
the atomic catastrophe still exists; see Anders, “Commandments in the Atomic Age, 1957.”

71. Hui, “Machine and Ecology.”

72. Mumford, The Myth of the Machine. Vol. 2., 271; Mumford reflects on the American
megamachine after the Second World War.

7. Toward an Epistemological Diplomacy

1. Marx, Capital, 492.

2. Arendt, The Human Condition, 127.

3. This is the subject of Hui, Art and Cosmotechnics.

4. Simondon, On the Mode of Existence of Technical Objects.

5. Sohn-Rethel, “Das Ideal des Kaputten: Über neapolitanische Technik,” 41–48; the English
translation by John Garvey, “The Ideal of the Broken Down,” is available at
https://hardcrackers.com/ideal-broken-neapolitan-approach-things-technical/.

6. Sohn-Rethel, “The Ideal of the Broken Down.”

7. For a discussion on Sohn-Rethel and Simondon on the question of technical knowledge,

see Hui, “Notes on Technical Normativity.”

8. Simondon, On the Mode of Existence of Technical Objects, 176–77.

 9. Hui, “Apropos Technophany.”

10. Simondon, On the Mode of Existence of Technical Objects, 234.

11. Simondon, On the Mode of Existence of Technical Objects, 49.

12. Simondon, On the Mode of Existence of Technical Objects, 49.

13. Hazard, The Crisis of the European Mind, 20.

14. Kojève, Kant, 70; Kojève argues in the book that Kant’s Critique of Judgment marks a
turn from the discursive mode of truth to the mode of “as if” by eliminating the thing-in-itself;
by doing so, Kojève also claims that the Kantian system is transformed quasi-automatically into
a Hegelian system of knowledge (103).

15. Achilles Skordas defines these sets of conflicts as that which characterizes a neo-
Hobbesian age; see Skordas, “The Rise of the Neo-Hobbesian Age.”

16. Gaché, “Foreword,” xiii.

17. Macron, “L’autonomie stratégique.” A similar proposal was made by Habermas in 2003,
arguing that Europe should maintain distance from the unilateral policy of the United States;
see Habermas and Derrida, “February 15, or What Binds Europeans Together.”

18. Cacciari, The Withholding Power, 110. This reading of Epimetheus seems almost
opposite to Schmitt’s; see discussion in chapter 5.

19. Cacciari, The Withholding Power, 114.

20. Cacciari, The Withholding Power, 118.

 21. Elpis, meaning hope or expectation, according to Hesiod’s Works and Days, is the last
object in Pandora’s box. As expectation, it is also a form of anticipation, and in this sense, it
complicates Cacciari’s metaphorical and oppositional play of the collapse of the Promethean
foresight and the replacement by the Epimethean calculation.

22. In the history of philosophy, the philosophical epistēme and the sophistic technē were
opposed, and technē was devaluated in face of epistēme. Since the Second Industrial
Revolution, we observe a transformation of the relation between them, that they have been
integrated through the idea of constant innovation. See Stiegler, Technics and Time, Vol. 1, 1,
40–43.

23. For an elaboration on the individuation of thinking, see Hui, Post-Europe (forthcoming
2024)

24. Glissant, “Creolization in the Making of the Americas,” 82.

25. Glissant, Poetics of Relation, 108.

26. Simondon’s anthropological analysis of the genesis of technicity in the third part of On
the Mode of Existence of Technical Objects was influenced by James Fraser, Bergson, Leroi-
Gourhan, and others.

27. Simondon, “Psychosociologie de la technicité,” in Sur la Technique, 33.

28. See Hui and Halpin, “Collective Individuation,” 103–16, for an analysis of the history of
social networks, its ontological and epistemological assumptions.

29. Gerovitch, “Artificial Intelligence with a National Face.”

30. See Hui, Cybernetics for the 21st Century Vol. 1, which aims at an epistemological
reconstruction of cybernetics in the twentieth century across various regions, including the
United States, Soviet Union, Poland, France, China, Japan, and Latin American countries.
 31. Santos, Epistemologies of the South.

32. Lévi-Strauss in Tristes Tropiques coined the term “entropology,” which suggests
renaming his own discipline of anthropology. Entropology describes the disintegration of
cultures under assault from Western expansion. See Lévi-Strauss, Tristes Tropiques, 414:
“Anthropology could with advantage be changed into ‘entropology,’ as the name of the
discipline concerned with the study of the highest manifestations of this process of
disintegration.” For the question of entropy and ecology, also see White, “Outline to an
Architectonics of Thermodynamics.”

33. Kant, “Idea for a Universal History with Cosmopolitan Aim,” in Political Writings, 45.

34. Zammito, The Genesis of Kant’s Critique of Judgment, 328.

35. Kant, “Perpetual Peace,” in Political Writings, 107–8. Italics in original.

36. Kant, Critique of Pure Reason, A833, B861.

37. Kant, Critique of Pure Reason, A832 B860.

38. Kant, Critique of Pure Reason, A646–47, B674–75.

39. Rajiva, “Is Hypothetical Reason a Precursor to Reflective Judgment?”

40. Kant, Critique of Judgment (KU 438, 305), cited by Ypi, The Architectonic of Reason, 117:
“There actually lies in us a priori an idea of a highest being, resting on a very different use of
reason (its practical use), which drives us to amplify physical teleology’s defective
representation of the original ground of the ends of nature into the concept of a deity.”

41. Kant, Critique of Practical Reason, 168.

 42. Karatani, The Structure of World History, 232.

43. Karatani, The Structure of World History, 233.

44. Mann and Wainwright, Climate Leviathan.

45. Karatani, The Structure of World History, 283–84. Karatani’s optimism is based on a set
of seemingly mistaken observations, which he states further on the next page: “The growth of
industrial capitalism required three preconditions: first, that nature supply unlimited resources
from outside the industrial structure; second, that human nature be available in an unlimited
supply outside the capitalist economy; and, third, that technological innovation continue
without limit. These three conditions have been rapidly disappearing since 1990.”

46. Nakhimovsky, The Closed Commercial State, 80.

47. Fichte, The Closed Commercial State, 145; also quoted by Nakhimovsky, The Closed
Commercial State, 77. (Here I used the official translation published by SUNY Press.)

48. Fichte, The Closed Commercial State, 198–99.

49. The launch of Huawei’s Mate 60 Pro in September 2023 has created polar responses: on
the one hand, the national pride of Chinese citizens who celebrated the breakthrough against
the U.S. sanction on microchips; on the other hand, an even more fierce restriction might be
imposed on Chinese firms from the U.S. side to weaken China’s capacity of producing 7
nanometer microchips on a large scale.

50. Henry Kissinger, “How the Enlightenment Ends”: “The Enlightenment started with
essentially philosophical insights spread by a new technology. Our period is moving in the
opposite direction. It has generated a potentially dominating technology in search of a guiding
philosophy.”
 51. There are many wonderful works on the intellectual history of the Enlightenment and its
plead for nonpartisan reason. One of the outstanding works on this account is Koselleck,
Critique and Crisis, especially chapter 8, “The Process of Criticism (Schiller, Simon, Bayle,
Voltaire, Diderot and the Encyclopédie, Kant).”

52. Zammito suggests an “ethical turn” in Kant’s Critique of Judgment, as he writes that
“Kant is really concerned with the kind of world which would exist were everyone to be fully
moral. In a world of full worthiness, everyone should also be proportionately happy. What is
required to compel the natural order to make happiness for man as a species a real possibility
is nothing less than God.” Zammito, The Genesis of Kant’s Critique of Judgment, 339. We know
that the pursuit of the systematic unity of reason has its main aim (Hauptzwecke) in what Kant
called a general happiness (allgemeine Glückseligkeit), which ended his section on “The
Architectonic of Pure Reason” in the Critique of Pure Reason, A851 B879. The possibility of
general happiness is taken up as the “highest good” in the Critique of Practical Reason, a moral
world in which actions are guided by moral laws defined according to the categorical
imperative, and happiness is proportional to virtue.
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Index

Abbé de Saint-Pierre, 1

Absolute, 15, 24, 28, 33, 36–37, 39–40, 60, 63, 162

absolute depolitization, 20, 115

absolute fear, 61, 166

absolute idea, 177

absolute knowing, 32

absolutism, 63, 287

acceleration, 81, 111, 222–23, 230, 233–34; technical, 111

accumulation, historical, 109

actuality, 29, 36, 56, 75, 89, 91, 269–70; abstract, 55; objective, 39; outer, 32; pure, 270;
vanishing, 96

actualization, 36, 38, 48–49, 62, 66–67, 271

actualization and concretization, 67

adaptation, 99, 219–20, 223

Adorno, Theodor W., 53, 214

aesthetics, 171, 211–13

Agamben, Giorgio, 152, 244

AGI, 245

air power, 17, 151

Alexis de Tocqueville, 73–74, 279; Democracy in America, 73

algorithms, 106, 189, 198, 233; complex recursive, 27; concrete, 76; digital, 106; recursive,
198

alienation, 3, 46, 62, 178

American imperialism, 16–17, 174, 177–78, 180, 185–86, 196, 279, 298

anarchism, 89, 187, 193

 anatomy, 250; of technical objects, 238, 247, 254

Anders, Günther, 200, 303

animals, 13, 59, 63, 67, 69–72, 85, 88, 90, 100, 108, 113, 125, 127, 132–33, 136, 167, 211,
219, 224, 257, 266, 271, 277, 280, 286, 295, 302

animal soul, 90

Anthropocene, 1, 6, 20, 114, 193

anthropocentrism, 5

anthropogenesis, 8, 92

anthropology, 7, 36, 87, 89, 100, 113, 130–32, 288, 305

anti-Christ, 115, 163, 196

antiglobalization movements, 15

Antigone, 56

antinomy, third, 50, 199

antithesis, 27, 50–51, 70, 128, 138–40, 208, 213; of mechanism and organism, 128; of spirit,
139

apocalypses, 112, 115, 225; See also technological acceleration

apparatus; psychic, 222; technical, 31, 235; technological, 152

Arendt, Hannah, 3, 180, 233, 265, 274, 298, 303; Between Past and Future, 274; Human
Condition, 3, 180, 233, 265, 274, 298, 303

Ariadne’s thread, 18

Aristotle, 28–29, 44–46, 63, 90, 107, 133, 270, 273; Athenian Constitution, 46; De Anima,
28–29, 107; and hylomorphism, 31; Metaphysics, 28, 270; Nicomachean Ethics, 45, 273;
Politics, 45, 63, 273

art, 4, 8, 36–37, 46, 78, 108, 118–19, 126, 134, 139, 200, 214, 216, 241, 261, 266, 307

artifacts, 4–5, 109, 114, 210, 281

artificial intelligence, 14, 89, 109, 112, 141, 146, 178, 192, 197, 209, 232, 245, 253, 263, 291,
302, 305

Ashby, Ross, 106

Asia, 39, 185, 188, 267

atomic bomb, 151, 174, 178–79, 293, 303

 atmosphere, 4, 100, 112–13, 225

Augustine, 274

authoritarianism, 6, 53, 196, 200, 216, 244

authority, 58, 76, 78, 132, 139, 146, 154, 159, 200, 229, 269, 281; sovereign’s, 143; supreme
political, 58

autogenesis, 27, 269

Autoimmunity, 165–66, 185–86, 244, 295

automata, 28, 126

automatic machines, 205, 235

automation, 105, 146–47, 189, 201–2, 230–31, 234, 254; mass, 233; modern, 105

automation of society, 234

autonomy, 159, 178, 180, 198–201, 227, 247, 274, 297, 300; individual, 64, 274; relative, 276

autonomy of technological systems, 199

Axelos, Kostas, 1, 265–67

Bardin, Andrea, 287

Bartelson, Jens, 155, 293–94; Genealogy of Sovereignty, 155

basic norm, 16, 120, 159–61, 194

Bataille, George, 8, 266; Lascaux ou la naissance de l’art, 8, 266

becoming organic, 13, 106, 143, 197, 199, 200, 205

Begriff, 29, 292, 295–96, 298

Begriede, 28, 271

Behemoth, 16, 144

being-for-itself, 36, 97

Bell, Daniel, 184

Benjamin, Walter, 214, 302–3

Bergson, Henri, 8, 20, 31, 88, 99, 105, 108–9, 118–19, 149, 191–96, 200, 203–4, 206–11, 221,
224, 231, 233–34, 236, 245–46, 268, 283–84, 300–302, 305; analysis of war, 226–27; concept
of tendency, 210; Creative Evolution, 20, 191–92, 268, 283, 300–301; critique of machines,
119, 197; on élan vital, 31, 105, 149, 216, 219; Essai sur les données immédiates de la
conscience, 105; and Leroi-Gourhan, 211; Matter and Memory, 301; “The Meaning of the
War,” 21, 119, 191–95, 202–3, 209, 229, 231, 284, 300; on time, 104–5; The Two Sources of
Morality and Religion, 193, 203, 206, 231, 301; on vitalism, 104–5, 192; and Wiener, 104–5

Beer, Stafford, 111, 197

Berlin, Isaiah, 273

Bernard, Claude, 106, 266; Introduction à l’étude de la médecine expérimentale, 106

Bertalanffy, Ludwig von, 104

Bible, 47

Bichat, Xavier, 91

bifurcation, 208, 225–26, 236, 264

Bildung, 60–61, 276

biodiversity, 20, 220, 223–27, 229, 255, 263–64

biosphere, 4, 108–10, 112–13, 223, 225

Blumenberg, Hans, 121–23, 285–86; The Legitimacy of the Modern Age, 121–22, 285–86;
and Schmitt, 123, 285

bodily organism, 68

Bodin, Jean, 127, 143, 155, 162–63, 167, 287; Six Livres de la République, 127

body politics, 26, 127, 129–30, 135, 191

Boltzmann, Ludwig, 98

Brand, Stewart, 4–5

Bratton, Benjamin, 187, 298–99

Buckminster Fuller, Richard, 4

Burke, Edmund, 24, 155

Cacciari, Massimo, 162, 229–30, 240, 246, 290, 295, 300, 304; Europe and Empire, 229; The
Withholding Power, 300, 304

Canguilhem, Georges, 20, 140, 192, 203, 266–68, 300; “Machine and Organism,” 192, 300; A
Vital Rationalist, 266–67

Cannon, Walter B., 106, 114, 283

 capital-nation-state, 10–11, 48, 60, 276

Carnot, Sadi, 94, 105

Cassirer, Ernst, 65, 268, 277–78, 293; The Myth of the State, 268, 277–78

catastrophe, 3, 6, 51, 78, 147, 303

Catholicism, 138, 140–41

Chakrabarty, Dipesh, 114

ChatGPT, 222, 233

Chérif, Mustapha, 303

China, 3, 10, 17, 42, 47, 58–59, 76, 81–84, 101, 111–12, 150, 165, 173–76, 183, 185–87, 211,
238, 241, 244, 257, 260–62, 272, 276, 300, 302, 305

Chinese medicine, 251–52

Christ, 19, 34, 113, 139

Christianity, 34, 46, 56, 121–23

civil society, 19, 35, 47–48, 54–55, 62, 64–65, 72, 79, 85, 90, 95, 103, 130, 230, 293

Clausewitz, Carl von, 150–51

Clausius, Rudolf, 97

Cleisthenes, 45–46

Climate of History, 284

clocks, mechanical, 58, 105

coexistence, 1, 9, 20–21, 168, 223–24, 239–40, 263, 265

colonialism, new form of, 184–85

communism, 89, 148, 217

community, 1, 34, 55–57, 76, 132–33, 135, 137, 182, 186, 215, 220, 227, 239, 252, 256, 260

complexio oppositorum, 136, 138–39, 153, 290

Comte, Auguste, 78, 103–4, 274

concept, 23–31, 35, 37–38, 41, 43, 46, 48–52, 54, 59–60, 62–63, 65, 68–71, 74, 82–83, 86–
89, 91–92, 94–95, 97–99, 101–3, 121–24, 137, 148, 156–57, 159, 166, 169–70, 181–82, 192–
93, 206–8, 212, 216–17, 222–24, 233–34, 240, 257, 275–76, 278–79, 289–93, 301, 303;
boundary, 156, 162, 166; juridical, 121, 159
 concrete universal. See Universal

consciousness; individual, 82; unhappy, 33–35, 80

constitution, political, 66–67

contingency, 26–30, 32, 37–38, 51–53, 55, 58, 63, 65, 70–71, 88–91, 149, 154, 156, 166, 215,
247, 269–70; of sovereignty, 154, 156

Cosmotechnics, 10, 12, 212, 241, 247, 264, 268, 276, 301–3

Crary, Jonathan, 186, 299

cybernetic reflection, 87, 93, 101

cybernetics, 5, 13–14, 21, 24, 103–8, 112, 114, 120, 142–43, 197–98, 200, 202, 205, 221,
227, 231, 249, 253–55, 283, 301, 305

cybernetic system, 4, 14, 198–99

dao, 175, 241

Decisionism, 15, 21, 117–52, 200, 284

deconstruction, 2, 154, 163, 295

de Cusa, Nicholas, 138

de Laurentiis, Allegra, 91, 268, 271, 281

Deleuze, Gilles, 28, 207, 301; Bergsonism, 301; Difference and Repetition, 28

de Maistre, Joseph, 285

democracy, 18, 21, 54, 73–74, 120, 145, 148, 180, 215–21, 226, 251, 273, 279, 302–3;
planetary, 217

democracy to come, 217, 219

depoliticization, 16, 141, 144, 290–91, 297

Derrida, Jacques, 2, 73–74, 153, 161–65, 167, 177, 185, 189, 217–19, 240, 247, 270, 279,
294–95, 297, 303–4; “The Force of Law,” 163; The Politics of Friendship, 153, 162; Rogues: Two
Essays on Reason, 161, 270, 279, 294–95, 297

Descartes, René, 12, 53, 90, 125–26, 128–29, 136, 149, 199, 287; “Description of the Human
Body,” 126; Discourse on the Method, 90, 287; on mechanization, 15, 117; Mediations on
Philosophy, 128, 287; “Treatise on Man,” 126

Descola, Philippe, 223

 determinative judgment, 137

Deutsch, Karl, 120; The Nerves of Government: Models of Political Communication and
Control, 120

dialectical movement, 27–28, 40, 54, 57, 65, 140

dialectics, 12, 26–27, 29, 32–35, 40, 42, 49, 51–52, 54–55, 58, 60–62, 81, 86, 93–95, 97, 100,
226, 254, 270, 301

Dieter, Heinz, 266

digital Earth, 153–89, 197, 221, 293

digital platforms, 186–88, 218

digital sovereignty, 21, 182, 188–89, 299

digital technology, 18, 154, 189, 198, 219, 255

Dilthey, Wilhelm, 133

Dionysus, 46

Driesch, Hans, 88, 105, 149

Dugin, Alexander, 17, 196, 218

Earth, 3–5, 7, 10, 14, 16–18, 66, 76, 83, 86, 101, 108–12, 115, 151–52, 167–68, 170–71, 173–
74, 178–80, 182, 193, 197, 209, 221, 223, 225, 245, 256, 262, 265–66

ecology, 4, 14, 18, 86, 223, 226–27, 305

Economic and technological rationality, 139

economics, 89, 102–3, 144; activities, 6, 19, 93–95, 98–99, 101, 139, 251; theory, 94, 102,
253

economy, 10–11, 14, 60, 93–97, 99–101, 146, 173, 223, 233, 243, 259, 262; capitalist, 11,
276, 306

electrified earth, 174, 176–77, 179–80

Eliade, Mircea, 237

end of philosophy, 5, 14, 107

end of politics, 115

enemy, 77, 80, 139, 141, 147–50, 161, 163–66, 169, 179, 183, 185, 291
 ένέργει, 28, 270

Engels, Friedrich, 217, 266, 272

Enlightenment, 87, 173, 186, 209, 222, 239, 263, 299, 306

enmity, 85, 151, 163–65, 183, 185, 293

Entäusserung, 37, 62, 65, 276–77

entropocene, 193

entropy, 1, 48, 92, 97–98, 101–2, 110, 113, 193, 242, 255, 282, 305

Epimetheus, 8, 142, 245–46, 290, 295, 304; Christian, 142, 166, 295

epistemological diplomacy, 10, 21, 229–64, 303

epistemological paradigm, 115, 232, 254

epistemological questions, 136, 254

epistemological reconstruction, 253, 305

Esposito, Roberto, 14, 239, 244, 267

Europe, 1, 39, 42, 58–59, 75, 111, 163, 167–68, 171–72, 175, 184–85, 188, 229, 240, 244,
265, 267, 270, 295, 304; and Empire, 229, 295

European state, 144–45, 261

evolution of technical objects, 200, 249

existence, human, 119, 256

existence of God, 128–29, 238

exosomatization, 92, 93, 99–100; exosomatic activities, 92, 100, 193; exosomatic evolution,
99, 282; exosomatic instrument, 99–100

family and civil society, 19, 48, 54, 62, 72, 85

Far East, 173, 175, 213

Feuerbach, Ludwig, 9

Fichte, Johann Gottlieb, 1, 51, 57, 76, 232, 261–63, 275, 279, 306; Closed Commercial State,
261, 263, 279, 306; Early Philosophical Writings, 279

First World War, 118–19, 191, 193, 196

Five Star Movement, 218

 Ford, Henry, 184

formalism, mechanical, 125, 143, 161

Foucault, Michel, 198

foundation of law, 154–55, 157, 161, 166

Frederick the Great, 239

freedom, 6, 12, 18, 20, 23–24, 26, 34, 37, 43–44, 46–55, 57, 59–60, 63–64, 66, 68, 71, 74,
81–82, 86–87, 90, 114, 119, 157, 197, 199–200, 227, 274, 276; economic, 6, 186; human, 85–
86, 199, 226; individual, 44–47, 49–50, 56; and laws, 49–50; limit of, 81; private, 143;
realization of, 54, 70, 85; subjective, 47, 82, 121

French Revolution, 44, 46, 49, 215

Freud, Sigmund, 2, 222

Friedmann, Georges, 89, 184

friend and enemy, 77, 139, 141, 164, 166, 185

Fukuyama, Francis, 176, 178, 297; End of History and the Last Man, 176, 297

Gaché, Rodolphe, 241, 304

Gaia, 4, 19, 112, 265, 267, 284

Geist, 32, 35, 39, 43, 68, 91, 197, 269–71, 300; See also spirit

general organology, 20, 192, 203, 268, 300

General Salan, 150

genesis of technicity, 208, 236–37, 246, 304

geoengineering, 1, 9

geopolitical drift, 101, 260

geopolitics, 16, 43, 84–85, 147, 182, 278

Georgescu-Roegen, Nicholas, 87, 89, 93–103, 110, 193, 204, 226, 274, 282; on bioeconomy,
94–95, 100–101; “Energy and Economic Myths,” 100, 282; The Entropy Law and the Economic
Process, 98, 282

geosphere, 4, 108, 110, 112–13

Gerovitch, Slava, 253

 Gestell, 141–42, 255

Gille, Bertrand, 221

Glissant, Edouard, 248, 304

globalization, technological, 5, 186, 244

God, 9, 28–29, 34, 43, 46, 78, 111, 115, 118, 127–29, 136, 141, 160, 162, 210, 218, 238–39,
270, 301, 306

Gotthard, Günther, 13, 107; The Unconsciousness of Machines: A Metaphysics of

Cybernetics, 13

Großraum, 3, 17–19, 21, 154, 169, 174, 178–83, 185, 189, 192, 196, 218, 221–22, 229, 231–
32, 256, 260, 263, 287, 295–96, 298

Grotius, Hugo, 157, 287

ground and figure, 236–37

Gua, 42

Habermas, Jürgen, 259, 297, 304

Haeckel, Ernst, 4, 70, 265, 278

Halpin, Harry, 305

Haraway, Donna, 223

Hawking, Stephen, 209

Hayek, Friedrich, 89, 103–4, 106, 279, 283; The Counter-Revolution of Science, 103;
Individualism and Economic Order, 283; Law, Legislation and Liberty, 104, 283; “The Use of
Knowledge in Society,” 103

Haym, Rudolf, 43; Hegel und seine Zeit, 43

Hazard, Paul, 238–39, 304; The Crisis of the European Mind 1680–1715, 238

Hegel, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich, 10–13, 15–17, 20, 23, 25–44, 46–51, 53–91, 93, 95–97, 103–
4, 106–9, 111, 113, 117–19, 121, 123–24, 130, 138, 140, 147–49, 151, 154, 163, 165, 169, 174,
177–79, 183, 192, 195, 200, 215–16, 219, 221–22, 229–32, 241, 252, 259, 263, 266, 268–82,
284, 292–93, 295; on the Absolute Spirit, 36–37, 89; on Aufhebung, 25, 121; and Comte, 103,
279, 283; on the concept, 56, 62–63, 88; on the concept of organicity, 59; on the concept of
reflection, 108; death of, 147–49; on dialectics, 11, 28, 60, 94–95, 108; The Encyclopaedia
Logic, 269, 70–71, 278; on freedom, 53, 74, 87; Hegel’s Philosophy of Nature, 278; Introduction
to the Philosophy of History, 271, 273, 275–76; Jenaer Realphilosophie, 61, 276; “Jena
Writings,” 61; Lectures on the History of Philosophy, 28, 270, 273; Lectures on Philosophy of
History, 59, 276; Lectures on the Philosophy of World History Vol. 1, 273; on logic, 13, 51, 81,
89, 95, 107; Logik, 27, 95, 269, 275; on organicism, 88–89; on organismic thinking, 20, 107;
Outlines of the Philosophy of Right, 11–13, 16, 23, 26, 40, 42, 44, 46–50, 54, 64, 66, 72, 74, 76,
81, 83–84, 88, 90, 119, 130, 133, 151, 163, 165, 178–79, 183, 215, 230, 257, 266–67, 271–79,
284, 292–93, 295; Phenomenology of Spirit, 23, 28–30, 32–34, 40, 63, 70, 96, 107, 109, 270–
72, 276–78, 282; Philosophy of History, 28, 39, 47, 272, 274; Philosophy of Mind, 39, 59, 71,
90, 269, 272, 274–76, 278, 281; Philosophy of Nature, 71; Realphilosophie II, 276; and Schmitt,
18, 229; state theory of, 15, 72, 74, 86, 118, 148–49, 169, 230; System der Sittlichkeit, 65; on
time, 41–42, 88, 96, 200, 269

Hegelian state, 13, 64, 69, 74

hegemony, 168, 173, 177, 183, 260, 280

Heidegger, Martin, 3, 5, 13, 16–17, 107, 141–43, 210, 243, 255, 265, 267, 291; Black
Notebooks, 142; “The End of Philosophy and the Task of Thinking,” 5, 265; essence of modern
technology, 141; On Hegel’s Philosophy of Right, 16, 267; “Only a God Can Save Us,” 3;
Ponderings XII–XV, 291; The Question Concerning Technology, 141; “The Age of the World
Picture,” 3

Heller, Hermann, 160, 284, 294

Heraclitus, 28

Herder, Johann Gottfried, 24–25, 295; Junctures on the Beginning of Human History, 25;
Philosophy of the History of Mankind, 25

historical materialism, 81, 251

historical progress, 50, 230

historicism, 16, 78, 154–55

history, 2, 6–8, 11–13, 16, 24–25, 28, 31–33, 35–36, 38–43, 47, 51, 55–56, 58–59, 61, 75, 78,
81–86, 106–8, 121–25, 135, 139–40, 143–44, 148, 155, 167, 170, 172, 174, 176, 178, 195, 197,
205–6, 223, 225, 264–66, 280–81, 284–85, 301–2, 304–5

history of planetary thinking, 11, 16

history of reason, 43, 78, 82

history of technology, 144, 151, 163, 167

Hitler, Adolf, 144, 148, 280

Hobbes, Thomas, 12, 15–16, 49, 117–18, 124–37, 141, 143–46, 149, 153, 156–57, 163, 242,
267, 286–89, 291; De Motu, 129, 287; The Elements of Law, 128, 287; Leviathan, 118, 126, 130,
133–34, 137, 156, 171, 242, 286–88; on mechanism, 118, 125, 128, 130; on mechanization, 15,
117–18, 127; and Rousseau, 132, 154–55; state of nature, 131, 261; state theory, 118, 125,
127, 145; Treatise “Of Liberty and Necessity,” 288
 hospitality, 162–63

Hölderlin, Friedrich, 34, 281

Homo deus, 7, 9, 115

Homo faber, 7–9, 214, 233, 266

homogenization of technology, 176, 221

Homo sacer, 150

Homo sapiens, 7–9, 92, 266

Honneth, Axel, 64, 78, 277

Hooker, William, 182, 290–91, 296, 299

Horkheimer, Max, 53, 214

Howse, Robert, 164, 291, 295

hubris, 52, 100, 193–96, 203, 209, 227, 245, 261

Hui, Yuk, 266, 268–69, 271, 276, 283, 300–305; Art and Cosmotechnics, 12, 241, 247, 264,
268, 276, 301–3; “For a Planetary Thinking,” 268; “Lyotard after Us,” 266; “On the Unhappy
Consciousness of the Neo-reactionaries,” 271; Question Concerning Technology in China, 10,
211, 241, 300, 302; Recursivity and Contingency, 12, 23–24, 57–58, 66, 104, 107, 197, 199–
200, 229, 264, 268–69, 275–76, 283, 300

human beings, 3, 7, 37, 40, 68, 91, 98, 100, 108, 126, 130, 132, 154, 197, 205–6, 214, 222,
226, 240, 251, 270–71, 282, 294; and nonhumans, 9, 86, 224–25

human body, 5, 68, 126

human history, 9, 25, 32, 39, 86

human nature, 56, 113, 120, 131–32, 142, 155, 157, 289, 306

human society, 119, 131, 194

humanity, 7, 25, 34, 77, 110, 112–13, 176–77, 193, 195, 197, 201, 209–10, 226, 249, 254,
257, 263–65

Hume, David, 157–58, 160, 261, 294; Treatise of Human Nature, 157, 294

Husserl, Edmund, 158

Hyppolite, Jean; “La Conception Hégélienne,” 277, 279; Genesis and Structure of Hegel’s
Phenomenology of Spirit, 271
 Iching, 42

Idee, 27

images; anthropological, 126, 136; organic, 141; of political thought, 120

impetus of life, 206–7, 209

India, 3, 47, 59, 111, 237, 260, 272

individualism, 6, 45–47, 77, 216, 252, 273

individuation, 32, 43, 56, 242–43, 247–48, 269, 271; theory of, 27, 29; of thinking, 247–48,
304

Industrial Revolution, 16, 171; new, 245

information theory, 102–3, 219, 245

institutions, political, 17, 88, 224

intellect, 8, 31, 139, 161, 204, 266, 281–82

intention, 2, 39, 74, 95, 107, 128, 246, 263

interfaces, new, 219–20

interiority, 13–14, 168, 259

internalization, 30, 32, 61, 65, 71; See also recollection

international laws, 15, 80, 120, 168–71, 177, 181; universal, 76–77

international order, 170, 181, 189, 245

international problems, 194

international relations, 13, 120, 182, 240, 284–85

intuition, 30, 37, 158, 207–8; and Bergson, 207–8, 236; and Bergson, 207–8, 236;
intellectual, 156, 294; philosophical, 208, 236; sensible, 156

James, William, 292

Japan, 7, 76, 173, 175–76, 183–84, 196, 210, 241, 257, 265, 297

Jellinek, Georg, 159; General Theory of the State, 159

Julius Stahl, Friedrich, 41

Jus Publicum Europaeum, 16, 151, 168, 172, 296

 Kalashnikov, Maxim, 196

Kant, Immanuel, 1, 10–13, 19, 24–26, 48, 50–51, 55–57, 64, 70, 76–78, 83, 93, 106–7, 113,
137, 156, 158–59, 199, 226, 229–30, 238–39, 256–60, 263, 265–66, 269, 274–75, 279–80, 283,
294, 304–6; “An Answer to the Question: ‘What Is Enlightenment,’” 263; antinomy, 50–52,
139, 199, 213, 239, 275; “Architectonic of Pure Reason,” 48, 257, 263, 275, 306;
cosmopolitanism, 75–76, 83; Critique of Judgment, 12, 24, 26, 51, 55, 106–7, 137, 258, 269,
294, 304–6; Critique of Practical Reason, 26, 51, 258, 275, 305–6; Critique of Pure Reason, 26,
48, 50–52, 156, 158, 229, 257–58, 263, 274, 294, 305–6; and Hegel, 11, 48; Metaphysics of
Morality, 76; Political Writings, 265–66, 269, 275, 279, 305; Practical Philosophy, 279; “Treatise
on Perpetual Peace,” 76, 226, 264, 279

Kapp, Ernst, 24, 31, 57, 68–69, 92, 170, 195, 230, 268, 271, 278, 281, 300; Elements of a
Philosophy of Technology, 68–69, 271, 278, 281; Der konstituierte Despotismus und die
konstitutionelle Freiheit, 68; on the organic state, 24, 57, 68–69, 195

Karatani, Kōjin, 10–11, 19, 48, 60, 82, 258–60, 266, 268, 274, 276, 303, 305; and Schmitt, 19–
20; Structure of World History, 10, 258, 266, 268, 274, 276, 305

katechon, 115, 142, 147, 163, 246, 300

Kelsen, Hans, 15, 148, 159–61, 294

Kelsenian liberalism, 125

Kervégan, Jean-François, 285

Kissinger, Henry, 263, 306; “How the Enlightenment Ends,” 263

Kjellén, Rudolf, 85, 278

kleroterion, 46, 215, 218

Kohlhaas, Michael, 150

Kojève, Alexander, 33, 37, 40, 60–61, 101, 176, 178, 184–85, 271–72, 274, 276, 280, 299,
304; on the colonialism of taking, 182–85; on the colonialism of giving, 182–85; on the end of
history, 81, 84, 176, 179; Introduction to the Reading of Hegel, 272, 276; on Kant and Hegel,
304

Koselleck, Reinhart, 143, 288, 291, 306

Kurzweil, Ray, 14, 113, 284; on singularity, 14, 112, 115, 146

Kyoto School, 183, 196, 296, 300

Land, Nick, 34
 land, sea, and air power, 7, 16–17, 49, 144, 151–52, 167–72, 175, 179–80, 183–84, 195, 222,
231, 296–97

Laplace, Pierre Simon, 94, 198

Lapoujade, David, 204, 301–2

Latour, Bruno, 9–10, 76, 186, 265–66; “You and I Don’t Live on the Same Planet,” 10

laws; civil, 129–30; and freedom, 49–50; natural, 10, 16, 76, 120, 134, 153–54, 293; positive,
16, 120, 141, 153–54

laws of mechanics, 98, 130

laws of nature, 49–51, 124, 129, 133, 160, 199, 210, 227

League of Nations, 74, 77–78, 279

Levêque, Pierre, and Pierre Vidal-Naquet, 45, 273

Lefebvre, Henri, 284, 302; Hegel, Marx, Nietzsche, 284; Le manifeste différentialiste, 302;
State, Space, World, 302

Leibniz, Gottfried Wilhelm, 42

Lenin, Vladimir, 41, 81, 176, 216–17, 220, 302; State and Revolution, 216, 302

Leroi-Gourhan, André, 8, 210–13, 295, 302, 305; Gesture and Speech, 8, 213, 266; Milieu et
Technique, 210, 302

Le Roy, Édouard, 8, 108

Leviathan, 17, 117–18, 126, 128, 130, 136, 143–45, 171, 189, 267

Lévi-Strauss, Claude, 212, 255, 305

liberal democracy, 49, 125, 143, 216–17

liberalism, 16, 53, 87, 125, 135–36, 143, 167, 177, 195, 216, 244, 286, 288–90

life, 37, 59, 62, 65, 70, 73, 88, 90–92, 95–98, 100, 106, 108–10, 112, 119, 124, 139–40, 145,
147, 149–51, 165–66, 183–84, 191–92, 194, 204, 206–7, 209–10, 224, 234, 241, 243, 261, 265,
290, 301; ethical, 12, 46, 55–56, 66, 232

life of technical objects, 235

Liu Cixin, 4; The Wandering Earth, 4

localism and nationalism, 221

Locke, John, 219; Essay Concerning Human Understanding, 291

Lotka, Alfred, 89, 99, 193, 282

 Louis XIV, 148

Lovelock, James, 4, 108, 112, 265, 267, 284

Löwith, Karl, 121–23, 285

Luhmann, Niklas, 89, 217–18, 219, 303

Mabille, Bernard, 89–90, 269, 272, 275

Macartney Mission, 42

Macherey, Pierre, 270–71; Hegel or Spinoza, 270–71

machine and ecology, 303

machine and organism, 105, 119, 124, 140, 268

machine learning, 14, 109, 146, 202, 232

machine of machines, 145

machines, 4, 6, 12–13, 56, 58, 63, 68–69, 101, 105–7, 114, 117–19, 125, 127–28, 135–37,
139, 141, 143, 145–46, 148, 156, 197, 200–206, 209–10, 221–23, 227, 230, 232–35, 244–46,
250, 254, 265–66, 284–85, 287, 291; administrative, 149, 183; cybernetic, 13, 105–6, 114, 197,
200, 210; mechanical, 65, 94, 114, 118, 128, 141, 210, 266; organic, 12–14, 88, 107, 232, 266

Macron, Emmanuel, 244, 304

magic unity; See under unity

Malabou, Catherine, 29, 63, 71, 270, 277–78; Au voleur!, 277; The Future of Hegel, 270,
277–78

Mann, Geoff, and Joel Wainwright, 17, 260, 267–68, 305

Mao Zedong, 150–51, 216

Marder, Michael, 139, 271, 290; Groundless Existence, 139; Hegel’s Energy, 271

Margulis, Lynn, 4, 112, 223, 267, 284

Marinetti, Filippo Tommaso, 194, 300; “Futurist Manifesto,” 194

market and infrastructure, 184–85

Mars, 4, 112, 179

Marx, Karl, 10, 13, 20, 41–43, 46, 48, 59–60, 62, 67–68, 70, 72–73, 75–76, 81, 88, 93, 182,
184, 201, 216, 233, 235, 266–68, 271–74, 276–79, 281, 293, 299, 303; Critique of Hegel’s
Philosophy of Right, 13, 59, 267, 271, 273–74; Poverty of Philosophy, 20, 268
 Marx and Engels, Manifesto of the Communist Party, 272

Marxism, 6, 123, 205

Maxwell, James Clerk, 98

Maxwell’s demon, 98, 102

McLuhan, Marshall, 4, 265

mechanical arts, 193

mechanical science, 193, 204

mechanics, 65, 83, 98, 119, 130, 136–37, 140, 146, 285–86; classical, 93, 104

mechanism, 12–13, 15, 20–21, 23–26, 56, 58, 63, 68–69, 88, 93–94, 104, 106, 114, 117–52,
191–92, 194–95, 197, 199, 202–3, 207–10, 216, 230–32, 237, 246, 275, 284–85, 287–89;
absolute, 63; and freedom, 24, 68; in Hobbes, 135, 288; and organism, 12, 15, 23–24, 57, 100,
106, 114, 118, 120, 125, 128, 136–37, 141, 143–44, 147, 149–50, 153, 161, 195, 231, 264; to
organism, 12, 93, 124; and organism opposition, 203, 289

mechanistic epistemology, 3, 93

mechanization, 24, 114, 119, 124, 126–27, 136, 139, 142–43, 146, 191, 193, 204, 206–7,
209–10; of spirit, 195, 203

mechano-organicism, 26, 89, 104

megamachine, 3, 11, 24, 63, 73, 78, 87, 107, 114, 135, 145, 189, 193, 201, 227, 231, 242–44,
246–47, 260

Mesopotamia, 3

metaphysical force, 142, 145, 147, 222, 234

metaphysics, 28, 46, 78, 107, 114, 118, 144–45, 229, 232, 257–58, 274

milieu; associated, 204–5; external, 211–12, 221; internal, 80, 211–13; technical, 211, 213

Mill, John Stuart, 233

Mirowski, Philip, 102, 282

models; mechanical, 58, 254; organismic, 103

modern European philosophy, 106, 118, 128, 147

modern nation-states, 1

modern state, 3, 12, 19, 48, 50, 54, 57, 60–61, 63, 69, 72–74, 80–83, 86, 122, 134, 229, 252,
272, 275–76
 modern technology, 4–5, 147, 212, 247, 255

monism, 173, 181, 292

Monod, Jean-Claude, 123, 286

Monroe Doctrine, 16, 79, 172, 178, 185, 187–88, 279, 298

Montesquieu, Charles de, 100, 125, 131–32, 287

Moreno, Jacob, 252

Morris, William, 235

Mou Zongsan, 20, 82–83, 280–81

Müller, Adam, 67, 125

multitude, 14–15, 62, 130, 135

Mumford, Lewis, 3, 12, 63, 87, 89, 114–15, 142, 147, 193, 227, 265–66, 284, 303; attack on
Teilhard, 114; The Myth of the Machine, 12, 63, 114, 265–66, 284, 303; “New Organum,” 12,
147

Musk, Elon, 4, 209

mysticism, 69, 76, 203, 207–10, 237; pantheist, 43

mystic life, 207, 209–10

Nachträglichkeit, 42

Nagasaki, 178

Nail, Thomas, 267

Napoleon, 40, 75, 81, 84, 271–72, 279–80

nationalism, 162, 198, 221, 247–48

National Socialism, 17, 118, 128, 144, 148

nation-state, 1–2, 9–12, 14–17, 19–20, 80–81, 83–84, 86–87, 93, 111, 114–15, 172, 178, 188,
193, 197, 201, 216, 218, 220–21, 231, 240, 242–43, 256, 262; individual, 17, 178; limits of, 222;
and nature, 2

nation-state-capital, 14, 176, 260

nation-state-sovereignty, 177

natural law; See under laws

 natural law traditions, 16, 154–55

nature, 2, 4, 24–26, 29, 42–43, 45, 49–51, 54, 59–60, 63, 66, 68, 70–72, 84–85, 89–91, 96,
98, 112–13, 126, 129, 131–33, 138–39, 142, 154–55, 157, 159–60, 210, 220, 223–24, 226–27,
256–57, 278, 281–82, 288–89, 293; first state of, 131; inorganic, 96, 278; organic, 1, 25, 70,
227; second, 25, 36, 71, 225

nature and technology, 224, 226

necessity, 4, 19, 27, 30, 50, 52–55, 61, 65, 71–72, 79–82, 86, 119, 124, 132, 163, 166, 176,
180, 215, 223, 262, 267, 281, 289, 296; absolute, 27, 269; epistemological, 90; formal, 269;
historical, 84; inner, 72; internal, 74; moral, 76; of contingency, 52, 269; of organicity, 119;
real, 269; of sovereignty, 163; of spirit, 30

Needham, Joseph, 89, 276

negation, 29, 33, 60–61, 77, 161, 222, 255, 273, 276, 288–89

negativity, 29, 32–33, 122, 150

negentropic, 36, 242

Negri, Antonio, 14, 201, 267, 300; The End of Sovereignty, 267, 300

network, 256; global, 197; planetary, 245

neoliberalism, 6, 89, 177, 193

neutralization, 16, 123, 140–41, 144, 146, 153, 166, 290–91, 297; and depoliticization, 144;
of politics, 141, 146; technological, 152

Newton, Sir Issac, 104

Newtonian mechanics, 94, 254

Newtonian time, 105

new vocation of machines, 210, 233

Nietzsche, Friedrich, 40–41, 45, 122, 272, 279; Untimely Meditations, 40, 272, 279

nihilism, 224, 226, 264

Nishitani, Keiji, 297, 299

noesis, 108

Noetic Reflection, 21, 85–115, 281

noetic soul, 90

nomos, 3, 7, 14, 16, 18, 62, 150–84, 222, 245, 266, 280, 287, 293, 295–96
 noodiversity, 20–21, 220, 223–26, 229, 255, 263–64; and technodiversity, 224–25

noosphere, 108–13, 225, 231, 283

noospheric reflection, 87, 93, 108, 112–13, 225

norms, 57–58, 120, 153, 159–61, 163, 180, 294; communitarian, 46; legislative, 125; positive
legal, 294

nothingness, 161; absolute, 196

noumenon, 156, 162

nous, 28, 108, 225

Novalis, 24, 117, 125, 241, 269, 284; Christianity or Europe, 269; Glauben und Lieben, 117;
Schriften, 284

object, 32, 35, 38, 55, 61, 89–90, 106, 109, 129, 156–57, 160, 207, 211–12, 214, 233, 236,
238–39, 253, 275, 294, 304; concrete, 234; natural, 82

objective spirit, 36–37, 53, 60, 62, 90, 109

objectivity, 51, 62

Ōgai, Mori, 7

ontogenesis, 18, 27, 269

Onuf, Nicholas, 155, 293

operation, 11, 26, 55, 70, 73, 90, 93, 95, 106, 127, 188, 199, 205, 208, 215, 230, 235, 243,
245, 249, 251, 253, 258, 283; cybernetic, 197; linear, 24; logical, 52, 244; mechanical, 149;
organismic, 56; reflective, 56, 275

order, 15, 36, 45, 48, 56, 97–98, 103, 120, 135, 140, 146, 158, 167–68, 173, 176, 180–81,
193, 255, 282; autonomous, 168; complex, 97; concrete, 15; new geopolitical, 14; oceanic, 170;
planetary, 172; religious, 7; social, 5; temporal, 90

Ordnung, 167–68, 179–80, 296

organ projection, 31, 68, 170

organic, 58, 67, 88, 143, 203, 261, 289; condition, 12, 24, 26, 57, 107, 137, 264; form, 12, 24,
49, 63–65, 85, 93, 96–97, 105, 138–39; state, 13, 84–85, 88, 119, 123, 182, 191, 232; structure,
54, 70, 280; totality, 99, 108, 110, 241, 255; unity, 67, 73–74, 79, 82, 96, 99, 107–8, 118, 130,
148, 197, 268

organicism, 12, 88–89, 97, 105, 114, 140, 142, 149, 192, 294; political, 76, 84, 192, 229;
romantic, 136
 organicity, 13, 48, 55, 57–60, 65–68, 73–76, 117–19, 125, 149, 227, 241, 257; of
international relations, 13; and reflectivity, 74

organic organs, 194, 202

organic state theory, 136

organic unity, effective, 66

organism, 4, 12–13, 15, 20–21, 23–26, 42, 55–84, 87–89, 92–93, 96–98, 100, 105–6, 114,
117–53, 161, 192, 195, 199, 230–31, 237, 264, 266, 269, 274–75, 284; animal, 71, 88, 231, 278;
living, 90, 105, 284; and mechanism, 24, 26, 125, 136, 142, 231–32; planetary, 231; universal,
96

organismic epistemology, 21, 85, 124

organismic paradigm, 89

organismic philosophy, 88

organization, 11, 13, 24, 26, 57, 63, 71, 90, 105, 119, 127, 130, 204, 215, 230, 269, 301

organized inorganic, 68, 199

organizing inorganic, 199

organological critique, 192, 202, 227

organological expansion, 193, 222, 245

organological problem, 195–96, 227

Organology, 20–21, 68, 192–93, 202, 227, 230, 255; negative, 20, 194, 209; of Wars, 21,
191–227, 300

organs, 8, 31, 68, 90, 92, 109, 192–94, 203, 213, 230, 244; artificial, 20, 115, 191–92, 194,
202–4; artificial external, 195; exosomatic, 194

Ortung, 167–68, 170, 177, 179–80, 296

paganism, 121–22

paleontology, 89, 92, 109

Pandora’s box, 142, 246, 304

Paris Commune, 226

participation, 34, 44, 217, 251; civic, 65; intentional, 54; social, 60

particularity, 38–39, 46, 75, 79, 86, 210, 242, 274

πάσχειν, 28
 peace, 9, 75–77, 151

Peisistratus, 45

perception, 63, 119, 208

perpetual peace, 1, 10, 75–77, 85, 226–27, 230, 256, 258, 261, 263, 265, 279, 305. See also
Kant, Immanuel

Peru, 3

Peterson, Erik, 121

pharmacology, 177

pharmacology of sovereignty, 177

phenomenon, 3, 6, 27, 33–35, 50, 60, 90–92, 100, 113–14, 156, 234–35, 238, 276, 283; of
exosomatization, 92; immunological, 239; of planetarization, 6; planetary, 5, 97; of reflection,
90; social, 155; technological, 3, 8, 169, 230

philosophy; elementary, 170, 245; mechanist, 136, 144; modern, 57, 199; of nature, 29, 72,
112; speculative, 42–43; of technology, 31, 57, 68, 92, 169, 278; of world history, 35

planet, 1, 4, 6, 9–10, 18–19, 41, 43, 74, 76, 78, 85–87, 101, 110, 178–80, 223–24, 226, 241

planetarization, 1, 5–6, 9, 86, 111, 174, 176, 178, 224, 243, 265

planetary condition, 3, 152, 166, 168, 181, 184, 220–21, 226

planetary freedom, 27, 43–44, 54, 59, 74, 86, 108, 119

planetary life form, 112, 284

planetary politics, 14, 17, 20, 83, 87, 123, 165, 170, 218, 222, 254–55

planetary scale, 81, 108

planetary supermechanism, 114

planetary thinking, 1–2, 5–6, 9–20, 23–57, 80, 83, 88, 93, 97, 111, 117, 154, 180, 197, 221,
227, 232, 264–65, 303; addressing, 6, 230

Plato, 2, 28, 44–46, 120, 155, 158, 214, 273; Phaedrus, 28; Republic, 44–45, 155, 273

Platonic form, 31

pluralism, 127, 164, 173–74, 177–78, 180–81, 183, 189, 221, 292

political economy, 18, 234, 246, 264

political epistemology, x, 9, 11–13, 15, 18, 23–24, 26, 33, 55, 59, 63, 73, 114, 117–18, 120,
123–24, 128, 130, 147, 192, 229–31, 246, 258, 266
 political forms, 1, 3, 10, 12, 14, 20, 43, 46–47, 49, 57, 62–63, 74, 114, 117, 138, 167, 189,
215, 218, 229, 231, 237, 263

political life, 156, 196, 286

political philosophy, 2, 12–13, 18, 25, 43, 82–83, 119, 130, 132–33, 230, 285

political state, 17–19, 23, 42, 48, 50, 55, 57, 59, 64–65, 67–68, 72, 74, 83–86, 95, 154, 169,
179, 183, 200, 203, 221, 263, 268

political vital force, 181, 200

political vitalism, 15–17, 21, 118, 141, 147, 149, 163, 180, 192, 229, 231

postcolonialism, 6

postmodern, 266

Popper, Karl, 103

power, 4, 9, 11, 15–16, 55, 58, 63, 66–67, 69, 72–74, 93, 140, 144–45, 147–48, 153–56, 161,
165–66, 171, 181, 186–87, 189, 201, 204, 208, 220, 230, 234, 240, 243–45, 247, 259–60, 286,
291–92, 300–302; political, 169, 187; soft, 186

practical reason; See under reason

problem; epistemological, 78, 227; immunological, 244–45

process of externalization, 31

Prometheus, 142, 246

Prussian state, 39, 63, 118

Przyluski, Jean, 212

Putin, Vladimir, 146, 291

Quesnay, François, 89

qi, 175, 241

Qianlong, 42

Rasch, William, 136–37, 156, 289, 293–95

Ratzel, Friedrich, 85
 reason, 12–13, 24–27, 32, 35, 38–39, 41, 43, 45, 47–48, 50, 52, 54, 57, 61, 63, 66–67, 70–71,
74, 76–78, 80–86, 134, 157–58, 162, 215–16, 218, 232–34, 238–39, 242, 247, 255–58, 261–64,
266, 268, 293, 305–6; expansion of, 39, 94, 238, 264; practical, 50, 238; speculative, 24, 63;
theoretical, 50, 238; See also use of reason

reciprocity, 1, 4, 55, 64, 69, 72, 74, 76, 227

recognition, mutual, 33, 64, 79, 165, 169

recollection, 30, 32, 61, 178; See also internalization

recursivity, 18–19, 28, 36–37, 51–52, 55, 57, 73–74, 61, 91, 107, 163, 178, 189, 195, 197,
198, 206, 258, 301

reflective judgment, 51, 138, 258, 289

Reich, 148, 180–82, 184, 292, 298

Rilke, Rainer Maria, 90, 281

Ritter, Carl, 68,

Ritter, Joachim, 45, 56, 273–75, 285; Metaphysik und Politik, 273–75, 285

Romantics, 25, 93, 117, 122, 125, 136, 138–40, 240–41, 274

Roosevelt, Theodore, 172

Rousseau, Jean-Jacques, 8, 49, 67, 100, 125, 131–32, 136, 154–55, 162, 271, 274, 277, 286–
89, 293; Discourse on the Origin and Foundations of Inequality Among Mankind, 8, 131–32,
136, 287–89; “Discours sur l’économie politique,” 67; and Hobbes, 131; and Kant, 274; Œuvres
complètes, 277; The Social Contract and the First and Second Discourses, 286–89

Rousseauist solution, 256

Rudolph, Moritz, 41

Sagan, Dorion, 284

Saint Simon, Henri de, 176

Santos, Boaventura de Sousa, 255

Sartre, Jean-Paul, 292; “Existentialism Is a Humanism,” 292

Schein, 19, 35

Schelling, Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph, 25, 68, 93, 268, 301

Schiller, Friedrich, 25
 Schlegels, 24, 241

Schmitt, Carl, 7, 13–21, 41, 49, 77, 117–18, 120–28, 130, 135–54, 156, 159–64, 166–84, 189,
191, 196, 216, 218, 221–22, 229, 231, 245, 256, 263, 266–68, 272, 279–80, 285–99, 304; “Age
of Neutralization and Depoliticizations,” 16, 140, 144, 290–91, 297; The Concept of the
Political, 41, 137, 148, 150, 153, 182, 272, 279, 289–92, 297; Constitutional Theory, 160, 294;
on decisionism, 118, 147; Der Begriff des Politischen, 291; Dialogues on Power and Space, 144,
291; Die drei Arten rechtswissenschaftlichen Denkens, 267; “Die Einheit der Welt,” 174; Ex
Captivitate Salus, 191, 287, 295; Glossarium, 289–90, 294–95; Land and Sea, 179; Law and
Judgment, 136; The Leviathan in State Theory of Thomas Hobbes, 117–18, 124, 267, 286–87,
289, 291; Meaning and Failure of a Political Symbol, 127; Moralische Energie, 183, 299; “The
New Nomos of the Earth,” 17, 173, 178, 296; The Nomos of the Earth, 7, 167, 179, 266–67,
296–97; Political Romanticism, 125, 286, 297; Political Theology, 15, 19, 118, 120–25, 147,
161–63, 246, 267, 285–86, 289, 291, 293–94; Political Theology II, 122, 285–86; Politische
Theologie, 285; Positionen und Begriffen, 298; “Reich, Staat, Bund,” 148; Roman Catholicism
and Political Form, 138, 290; Staat, Bewegung, Volk, 148; Staat, Großraum, Nomos, 267–68,
297–99; on the state of exception, 15, 121, 148, 150, 152–53, 162–63, 186–87, 200, 243–44;
Theory of the Partisan, 149, 165, 292–93; “The Unity of the World,” 178; on vitalism, 16, 145,
153–54; “Völkerrechtliche Großraumordnung,” 296–99; “Wisdom of the Cell,” 164

Schrödinger, Erwin, 92; What Is Life? The Physical Aspect of the Living Cell, 92

Schumpeter, Joseph, 93

science and technology, 5, 7, 122, 171

sea power, 7, 16–17, 49, 144, 151–52, 168–73, 175, 179–80, 183–84, 222, 231, 296–98; See
also land, sea, and air power

Searle, John; Chinese Room experiment, 74

Second World War, 34, 118, 164, 178–80, 184, 196, 280, 303

secularization of theological concepts, 121–23, 230

self-consciousness, 28, 30–33, 35–36, 38–39, 42–43, 52, 55, 61, 63, 65, 68, 70, 72–73, 82, 90,
92, 300; becoming, 35, 37, 41

Shannon, Claude, 102

Shiva, Vandana, 225

Simondon, Gilbert, 13, 106, 108, 124, 142, 179, 192, 202–5, 208, 232, 234–37, 246, 249–50,
254, 268, 283, 286, 295, 301, 303–5; Cybernétique et philosophie, 301; “Epistemology of
Cybernetics,” 106; On the Mode of Existence of Technical Objects, 142, 208, 249, 286, 301,
303–5; Sur la Philosophie, 283

Skinner, Quentin, 159, 267, 294

Skordas, Achilles, 304

 Smith, Adam, 106, 215, 266, 283

smooth planes, 7, 173, 176

Snowdon, Edward, 187

social contract, 49, 135, 286–89, 293

social network, 252, 305

Socrates, 44, 155

Sohn-Rethel, Alfred, 235, 303–4; “Das Ideal des Kaputten. Über neapolitanische Technik,”
235

Solon, 45

soul, 15, 28, 34, 71, 90–91, 106–7, 109–10, 118, 127, 135–36, 141, 144–46, 148, 156, 191,
193–94, 203, 208, 221, 237, 250, 269, 288

sovereign, 14–16, 72, 103, 127, 135–36, 141, 143, 145–49, 152–59, 161–63, 166, 177, 180,
186–87, 192, 200, 226, 242, 287, 293–94

sovereign power, 136, 147, 187–88, 243, 289

sovereign states, 19, 82–83, 165, 168–69, 172, 178, 180, 182, 294

sovereignty, 1, 15–19, 21, 49, 62, 73–74, 79, 117, 120, 126–27, 135, 144, 148, 153–56, 159,
161–63, 165–69, 176–78, 180, 186–87, 189, 242–43, 247, 254, 260, 284, 293–94; planetary,
17; world, 82–83

Soviet Union, 5, 167, 172, 175, 185, 305

spatial revolutions, 3, 16–17, 19, 117, 154, 170, 179–80, 245

Spemann-Mangold Experiment, 88

Spengler, Oswald, 41

Spinoza, Benedict de, 18, 29, 52, 135, 270–71, 275

spirit, 23, 25, 27, 29–33, 35–43, 51, 53, 55–57, 59–61, 63–64, 66, 70–72, 75, 77–78, 80–81,
87, 89, 91–92, 96–97, 99, 107, 109, 125–26, 139–42, 148–49, 177–78, 195, 201, 203–4, 233–
34, 269–72, 276–78, 281–82, 285; See also Geist

Sputnik, 3–4, 180, 265

Stalin, Joseph, 40, 81, 271

state, 1–2, 9, 11–15, 17–21, 24–26, 34–35, 41–42, 46–47, 49, 54–88, 103, 107–8, 117–19,
121–27, 129–30, 132, 135–37, 141, 143, 145–52, 159, 165, 168–69, 177–83, 185–89, 192–93,
195, 200–201, 215–18, 220–21, 229–32, 243–45, 252, 256–60, 262, 268–69, 274–78, 286–88,
291–95, 302; administration, 141, 189, 192, 197–98, 200; individual, 75–77, 79, 178, 181;
machine, 12, 24, 69; mechanical, 69, 136, 141, 145, 191; sovereignty, 82, 244, 247, world, 19–
20, 258–59, 268

state of nature, 131–33, 138–39, 154, 261, 288–89

Stengers, Isabelle, 19, 267

Stiegler, Bernard, 2, 8, 158, 186, 192–93, 203, 214, 264, 266, 268, 294–95, 299, 304;
Technics and Time 1: The Fault of Epimetheus, 8, 266, 304

Strauss, Leo, 25, 133, 135, 143, 145, 155, 267, 269, 274–75, 288–89, 291, 293; Natural Right
and History, 155, 288, 293; “Note on the Concept of the Political,” 135; On Hegel, 274, 291;
Political Philosophy of Hobbes, 288, 291

Suess, Eduard, 108

Suganami, Hidemi, 294

syllogisms, 27, 29, 281

synchronization, 6–8, 19, 111, 243, 266

systematic unity of reason, 257, 306

Tang, Audrey, 15

Taubes, Jacob, 123, 286

Taylor, Charles, 274–75, 300–301

technē, 44, 246, 304

technical element, 205

technical ensemble, 205

technical fact, 209–12

technical knowledge, 235, 304

technical individuals, 204–5

technical objects, 36, 62, 109, 142, 200, 204, 208, 234–38, 247, 249–51, 254, 286, 301, 303–
5

technical tendency, 210–13; See also tendency

technics, 7–8, 45, 208, 225, 236, 266, 304

technodiversity, 20–21, 212, 215, 220, 223–27, 229–30, 234, 238, 240–42, 247, 252–56, 264
 technological acceleration, 20, 112–13, 178, 180, 194–95, 222, 227

technological advancement, 16, 60, 111, 151, 169, 173–74, 231

technological apocalypses, 225, 242, 249

technological development, 2, 112, 145, 210, 223, 242, 254

technological determinism, 20, 251

technological epoch, 1, 5–6, 9, 46, 113, 124, 146, 189, 196, 199, 205, 209, 221, 226, 243–43,
246, 249, 300

technological innovations, 200, 244, 306

technological progress, 3, 117, 180, 197, 225

technological systems, 199–203, 205

technological thinking, 234, 236

technology, 2–3, 5–11, 14, 16, 18, 20, 68–69, 78–79, 87, 92, 94, 106–7, 109–10, 115, 141–42,
144–47, 151, 153–54, 166–67, 169, 171, 174–77, 179–80, 182–83, 189, 192, 194–97, 211–15,
218–19, 221–26, 234, 236–38, 240–42, 244–46, 248–51, 254–55, 260–64, 278, 281, 286;
democratization of, 218–19, 221; military, 213, 226; planetary, 1; and politics, 3, 6, 115

Teilhard de Chardin, Pierre, 14, 88, 93, 108–15, 176, 197, 225, 255, 283–84; The Future of
Man, 283; Human Phenomenon, 110, 283–84; omega point, 14, 110, 114, 225

tendency, 97, 101–3, 130, 132, 135–36, 161, 176, 194, 200, 207–20, 246–47, 255, 262; See
also technical tendency

terraforming, 1, 4

thermodynamic ideology, 5, 9, 87, 186, 204, 266

Thiel, Peter, 34, 151, 185, 293, 299

tianxia, 82–83, 280

time, 1, 3, 6–8, 10, 12–13, 15, 28–33, 35–36, 38, 40–41, 50–53, 55, 59–60, 65–66, 72–73,
86–87, 94, 96, 99–101,105, 109, 113, 115, 123–24, 128, 130, 135–36, 140–43, 145, 170, 174,
176–81, 191–95, 202, 204–5, 231–34, 242, 244–46, 251–52, 301–4

Tönnies, Ferdinand, 136

Toynbee, Arnold, 175, 213, 268, 281, 297

Tractatus Politico-Technologicus, 2–3, 16, 18, 20, 230, 255

transhumanists, 5, 110, 115, 176, 255

travail, 60–61, 271

 Trump, Donald, 76, 186

Turing, Alan, 199

unhappy consciousness, 33–35, 80

United Nations, 74, 78, 259–60, 265

United States, 13, 26, 84, 165, 167, 172–73, 175, 184, 186–87, 262, 297–98, 304–5

unity, 11, 27, 29, 34–35, 37, 48–49, 56, 60, 66–67, 82, 84, 86, 135, 156, 168, 172, 174, 176–
78, 180, 208, 236–38, 241, 256–58, 268–70, 276; magic, 208, 236, 237

universal, the, 27, 46, 63, 65–67, 90, 182, 213, 238–40, 242, 258, 275, 289; and freedom, 54;
concrete, 32, 35, 38, 65, 80, 174, 238

universalism, 17, 172, 173, 177, 192

universalization, 17, 171, 215, 242, 263

use of reason, 257–58, 305; apodictic, 258; hypothetic, 258; theoretical-speculative, 257;
practical-moral, 257

Van Gogh, Vincent, 221

Varela, Francisco, 198–99, 201, 245, 300; “Steps to a Cybernetics of Autonomy,” 198

Vernadsky, Vladimir, 108, 225, 283; The Biosphere, 283

Vernünftig, 35, 53, 85, 87, 238, 255, 271

Vieweg, Klaus, 74, 279

vitalism, 13, 20, 105–6, 140, 148–49, 161, 192, 202, 227, 230–31, 290

Viveiros de Castro, Eduardo, 223

Volksgeist, 40, 87

Voltaire, 239

von Gierke, Otti, 136

von Neumann, John, 198–99, 253

Wahl, Jean, 34–35, 271; Le malheur de la conscience, 34–35, 271

 war, 20–21, 74, 77, 80–81, 85, 111, 119, 130–33, 141, 147, 150–51, 156, 164, 167, 169, 173,
178, 183, 191–227, 230–31, 256, 261–62, 280, 284, 291, 293, 295–96, 300; civil, 127, 134, 143,
153, 183

Watt, James, 106

Weber, Max, 142, 155

Weltgeist, 23, 27, 32, 40–43, 238

Western philosophy, 41, 107, 148, 255

Western technology, 9, 80, 175, 196

Whitehead, Alfred North, 88, 93, 96, 97, 142

Wiener, Norbert, 13, 104, 106, 110, 114, 198–99, 201–2, 282–83, 301; Cybernetics, 104; God
and Golem, 301; Human Use of Human Beings, 282; “Newtonian and Bergsonian Time.,” 104;
“Some Moral and Technical Consequences of Automation,” 201, 301

Wirklichkeit, 56, 271

work, 61, 68–69, 72

world civilization, 5, 36, 38

world history, 8, 10–11, 23, 25, 32, 35, 37–40, 43, 77, 80, 174, 191, 242, 258–59, 266, 268,
273–74, 276, 292, 305

world market, 9, 11, 42, 201

world powers, 167, 197, 256

world republic, 10, 19, 258–59, 303

world revolutions, 19, 81

world spirit, 14, 20, 23–56, 76–80, 82, 174, 177, 201, 268

World War I. See First World War

World War II. See Second World War

Xi Jinping, 123

Zhao Tingyang, 20, 82, 280; A Possible World of All-Under-Heaven System, 280

Žižek, Slavoj, 275, 284; Hegel in a Wired Brain, 275

zoe; and bio, 150