Deleuze’s project is usually presented as developing a radical immanentism. It wants to get rid of the classical distinction between two orders of being - the order of the essences and the order of the things in which these essences are incarnated - and it is very critical towards any attempt to re-introduce a (hidden) transcendent element into the immanent order. The "virtual" can be considered Deleuze's answer to the question how to conceive of a ground or foundation that does not break the immanent ontology. Deleuze describes the virtual as that which is not actual although it is real, as something that does not belong to the domain of the possible, as complication, etc. One could ask oneself if these descriptions are not philosophical constructions, that is, rather forced attempts to stay within the immanent order of being. How can we think the non-actuality of the virtual? Is not the virtual transcendent in some sense? Does it make sense to speak of an immanent transcendence in Deleuze’s philosophy, and if so, of what would it consist? Explorations of the historical roots of this topic in Deleuze (Spinoza, Leibniz, etc.) are also welcome.

The department of philosophy and moral sciences, Ghent university (Belgium), is organizing an international workshop, ‘Immanence and Transcendence in Deleuzean Metaphysics’ (11&12 April 2013)

Please register with Judith.Wambacq@UGent.be before April, 1st.

Programme

Thursday 11th April

9-9.30am: registration + coffee

• 9.30-10.45am: Patrice Haynes (Liverpool Hope University) - The Problem of Reciprocal Determination in Deleuze’s Immanentism
• 10.45-12am: Florian Vermeiren (Ghent University)- Deleuze's Two Planes: Two Ontologies Evaluated with an Ethical Criterion for Immanence

12-1.30pm: lunch

• 1.30-3pm: Keynote lecture: Véronique Bergen - Virtuality as the Limit of Immanence. An Examination of the Deleuzian Choice for Continuity.
• 3-4.15pm: Piotrek Swiatkowski (Radboud University Nijmegen/ Avans University for Applied Sciences, Den Bosch) - Quasi-cause: Transcendence or Immanence?

4.15-4.45pm: coffee break

• 4.45-6pm: David Allen (Warwick University) - Immanence and Transcendence in Deleuze’s Early Metaphilosophy

7pm: conference dinner

Friday 12th April

9-9.30am: coffee

• 9.30-11am: Invited Speaker: Jeff Bell (Southeastern Louisiana University) - The Far End of the Particular: Deleuzian Metaphysics and the Transcendental Illusion
• 11-12.15am: Jackson Reese Faust (University of Kentucky College of Law) - Skepticism and the Virtual: Humean Epistemology as Framework for Deleuzean Immanence

12.15-1.45pm: lunch

• 1.45-3pm: Mary-Beth Mader (University of Memphis) - Whence Intensity?: Deleuze and the Revival of a Concept
• 3-4.15pm: Kyla Bruff (Université de Toulouse) - The Communication of Haecceities: The Transcendental Fields of Deleuze, Duns Scotus and Simondon

4.15-4.45pm: coffee break

• 4.45-6pm: Virgil Brower (Northwestern University/ Chicago State University) - Surface, Sense, Spirit: Deleuze & Doctrines of Trinity

Organizing committee

• Eric Schliesser
• Judith Wambacq
• Annelies Monseré

Scientific committee

• Judith Wambacq
• Sjoerd van Tuinen