6 Symposium: Speculations on Anonymous Materials - Reza Negarestani 

There are some plainly trollish comments and some genuine puzzled sentiments here. There is no point to respond to the trollish comments. For the puzzled ones: In the past decade or so, Reza has been trying to synthesize various elements of dynamic system analysis, naturalized phenomenology and conceptual engineering (late Carnap) to provide a picture of our technical and practical concepts which are at once informed by our novel inferences (like Peirce's method of abduction), our capacity to make concepts by intervening or manipulating things (philosophy of engineering from Archimedes to people like Hans Vaihinger and beyond) and the capacity to make evermore suitable concepts adequate for describing what is we are doing when we are doing something, successful or not, from a practical point of view. The point in this lecture which tends to get lost but is further developed in his other papers and talks is that concepts such as materiality, system, whole, part and scale should be understood in terms of triangulations between (1) our manipulative inferences (the reference to Peirce) where theoretical and practical commitments overlap and play with each other, (2) discovering a class of novel phenomena not by mere theoretical reasoning but by practical encounters / experience of the target phenomenon, (3) the enlightenment impulse to refine our concepts, moving in the Carnap sense of explication, from vague or otherwise clunky concepts to more exact concepts.

My take on what he's saying: we understand something by manipulating it (behaviors/sets of behaviors which are function), and we form hypotheses based on what will happen as a result of the manipulation. We take the result to tell us something about the pre-manipulated object. That theoretically enables us to dive to a deeper level of the pre-manipulated object to examine that next level. Hence all of our mental frameworks are built upon actions which don't necessarily speak to qualities which are invariate; we make the assumption that they do, which most of the time holds true. Philosophy works in the same way.

Summary @41:40

why is The Making of Jackass 3D a related video?

He's basically saying that we impose teleology ourselves, and that nothing in nature can be understood beyond this imposition? Hannah Arendt has signaled this pathway I think, in the field of ethics.

This guys is really interesting but I think he would really benefit from an intro with some definitions of terms, which is always boring and not a great way to start a discussion, but it’s clear that he is a unique thinker and to understand his definitions would certainly aid us in understanding his theory.

The comments on this page are really weird.

I have no job. No education. I want all of these functions for my own life, and you took those prospects from me the moment you pretended to grasp my brain as an child. So enjoy your success. You deserve it.

very interesting. also.. it sounds like a "fu_ _ around and find out" methodology. it is the longest explanation of w.s.burroughs' cutup method i have ever heard.

بهترین دوست من در دبیرستان توحید یک شیراز ...همیشه موفق و خوشبخت باشی رفیق

whats going on here

I like words. Do you? Well, hopefully your brain is okay, because I have a harder time with words, given the fact that doctors have been experimenting on my brain, through the word, and before I had reached puberty. Keep up the great work! No problem!

I’ve been trying to understand this guy for almost a year now. I don’t think he’s pretentious or anything but I can just never really figure out wtf he’s saying are there any good RU-vid videos out there or soemthing

This doesn't really make sense to me. Being able to explain doesn't require a hands on approach or control over the phenomena, only a skill in being able to articulate it's functions and reactions. For instance, I have no control over the Sun nor a mountain, yet I can explain to someone that the light from the sun will be blocked by a mountain, therefore casting a shadow. I did not move the mountain nor the sun. The only "control" I have over these things is waiting for the sun to rise, but to say I controlled time would be presumptuous and silly. Am I oversimplifying it?

I have a few questions to ask. I’m bored and my brain hurts all day everyday, so I like to keep my brain focused on learning to try and distract myself from the pain. Feel free to liberate me. Thanks.

can someone spell the name of the chinese philosopher mentioned at 12:00 xiang xi li?

Negarestani is not r/acc neither l/acc. He is compatible with both in part.

Make notes of all the speech, and read slowly, it makes sense to me, he is explaining a transdisciplinary methodology, Deleuze and Guattari applies these synthetic operators and construct an skizo methodology. Reza and the speculative realists are their orphans. Come on, make your own living hypotesis, play with those abstract machines kiddo!

Is the hate for Reza here coming from strict Hegelians or from Analytical philosophers? I wanted to be sure because some called his works reactionary naive realism. Is that take coming from Hegelians or the chicago boys?

Ignorance & Idiocy: how to discern when the Ghost is malfunctioning & the Machine does not understand.

Love this comment section

Now obviously I’m joking. Cosmically. All the best.

Oh, btw… can I get an invite to any events on this? I am dying to do something, but I can’t control my own nervous system. It hurts.

Anyone spot a point here?

I don’t know. I’m crazy. Just do as you please. You people at least appear to be nice. I trust. Even though your concepts are ruining my life because they have resulted in so much damage being done to my brain by the pharmaceutical industry, I hope that my brain can somehow adapt to its defunct matter and be of service.

YOLO, am Right? Was there an I in that question?

English please??

Because I’ve got nothing. I know nothing. It’s too much. It’s all too much.

Art approaches materiality differently from engineering.No?

unification between biology and physics - Quantum mechanics..? (biophysics)

Nope. Not me.

Oops, I meant “prophet.”

It's amazing this talent to talk for so long without saying anything apart from "look I am putting sentences together which sound cool", pity there aren't that many vacancies nowadays for alchemists and astrologists

You simply took advantage of your power. As you say, you manipulate.

But I imagine (and I have to take a leap of faith here when I think of doctors) that you all mean well. Probably not though.

I’m so uncertain about this guy. I want to believe he means well. I really do. I just can’t. He is too ignorant, which makes him evil.

RGH SIU though

It must be nice to fulfill prophecies when you are otherwise ignorant of your own field.

You guessed wrong.

What the fuck is going on here?

You saved me by tossing me into oblivion. Your pharmaceutical drugs are the cause of my poor fitness. I, the speaking soul, the holy of holies, want you to know that you have failed to live up to your expectations. You didn’t even scratch the surface of my truth.

What da?

Sounds like you are promulgating an ethics, which seems contrary to what you claim to be aiming at. I don’t know. It’s as if you aren’t making any sense. But who knows.

By you, I mean the guy who pretends to know that I am knowable, and therefore worthy of being drugged with pharmaceuticals before I reach puberty. My life has been a disaster. It is a disaster. But go ahead and keep pretending. I won’t fight, I’ll cooperate. I’ll be nice. But I just want you to know that you still don’t know me, and you never will, good sir…

Brain hurts.

Peak larping right here

what a boooooooooooooooooooooooring lecture!!!

Hi language.

I can look intelligent when I want to btw. I can shape shift and shit like an unethical fool too.

Keep up the good work. Maybe I’ll stand on the sidelines. I don’t know. It’s not so fun. I just wish I could have grown up with a normal brain, without having people apply their contracts to my holy of holies before I was beyond puberty… Feels, ethically speaking, like a crime.

A certain form of nonsense

Nananannsnrnensnannanans

Poooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooop

speak in simpler terms boss! and look at the audience when you present. horribly done.

Well, good thing he went extempore so that we could all listen in stuperously somnolent _awe_ as he rattled off a bunch of faux-systematic nonsense and bottom-shelf Deleuzian metaphors w/o substantive content. He has very good English though: credit where credit's due.

He needs far more artwork to cover for his uncommitted crimes, mind you. Someone let this guy know he needs to be careful.