Alain Badiou refers
to the term immanence in his latest book in the trilogy Being and Event,
entitled The Immanence of Truths. The challenge is to construct a system
defined by this term and, at the same time, introduce infinity into it. The
condition that makes this theory extremely difficult to achieve is the
impossibility of resorting to God and spiritual solutions, because it must
avoid straying from the immanent plane. For Badiou, transcendence, of whatever
kind, is excluded from the outset.
How can immanence and infinity be reconciled
without developing a system explained causally by transcendence? Badiou insists
on refusing to renounce either of the two aspects that make up reality.
Retaining only immanence will lead to some variant of empiricism and
relativism. Appealing to transcendence will be a return to theology.
The question of truth brings the two terms,
immanence and infinity, to their maximum tension. Badiou starts from a strong defense
of the universal character of truths, that is, their infinity, without which we
would fall into relativism. A truth must be valid for everyone to be such.
My starting point, which, as always
in philosophy, is also the point that must be demonstrated and justified, is
that, on the one hand, there are truths, i.e., existents that have universal
value and significance…
On the other hand, truths are collective and
individual products; they belong entirely to the public sphere and are subject
to all social and political constraints. Put this way, it seems to deny the
universal nature of truths.
Universal truths are immanent to
real worlds because they are created in them. Created by God, Descartes said.
Naturally, I will bring things back down to earth: truths are created by a
human subject—personal or impersonal, individual or collective —in particular
worlds, with particular materials…
The formulation of the dual requirement shows
the negative consequences that would arise if we chose to position ourselves at
either extreme: “Indeed, one must fight against the skeptical or relativist
stance, which is: “There are no universal truths; everything is relative,” but
also against the dogmatic stance, which is: “Truths have existed from time
immemorial in a transcendental, external form”.
In order to find a solution to the dual demands
of immanence and finitude, without resorting to transcendence, Badiou explores
three meanings of immanence and, in the end, demonstrates their full
articulation. First, truth as historical fact and paradigm of immanence. All
truth is a social product, determined by a here and now.
First of all —and this is the basic
sense that I just referred to—every truth is an immanent production within a
particular world, that is to say, within a historico-geographical world,
localized in time and space. “Immanence” is very classically opposed here to “transcendence.”
In the second type of immanence, Badiou begins
to outline a possible resolution to the tension between immanence and infinity.
Even though it arises from the world, truth is not imprisoned by historical
conditions. Truth is considered to be beyond the situation, and its exceptional
nature comes from its universality. Therefore, it comes from the immanent
sphere and from there reaches a type of infinity.
However, —and this is the second
sense—a truth is also an exception to the world in which it is created, quite
simply because it has a universal value. Indeed, even though it is produced in
a particular world, it retains its value when it is transported, transmitted,
translated, to other possible or actual worlds.
In this second type of immanence, Badiou
appeals to the immanence inherent in infinity, in truths with their absolute
character:
The second, which is my position and
the only one I know of that enables the continuity of philosophy, proposes a
concept of truths whereby their relationship to the absolute is based neither
on the One nor on some kind of transcendence. This, then, is the second sense
of immanence: truths are in an immanent relationship with the absolute significance
of their own value.
Having eliminated the resource of
transcendence, Badiou has no alternative but to discover within infinity
itself, in this case that of truth, its immanent character. The first type of
immanence lies in the social character of the production of truth; the second
type, on the other hand, enunciates an immanent relationship that is internal
to truth itself.
Once truth has been produced from the social
matrix, the value of truth belongs solely to truth itself, because truth, in
its infinity, transcends the first immanence. Absolute truth cannot be
contained within empirical immanence, because it would tear it apart; therefore,
it moves to the level of an immanence that is self-referential. The value of
truth is immanent only to the sphere of truth, even though its origin is
social; this allows it to have an "absolute meaning".
Badiou's central argument is in this part and
follows the following sequence: collective production of truth, excess of truth
with respect to the conditions of its production, constitution of the sphere of
immanence of truth, and realization of the relationship between finitude and
infinity.
The relationship between immanence and infinity
occurs between these two immanent spheres, even though the immanence of truth
has been produced by historical immanence. For this very reason, truth as
absolute and universal returns to the world and constitutes itself as the truth
of that world.
I will therefore show that the
evidence for this immanence of the absolute is provided by the infinite value
of a truth. A truth always testifies to the possibility of an immanent
relationship between the finite and the infinite.
The third type of immanence is the concretization
of the relationship between the two types mentioned above, which occurs through
a process of subjectification. The subject, both social and individual, becomes
an emergent property of the immanent spheres as the bearer of truth. Thus, to
be a subject is to be a subject of truth and, by this means, to access infinity
from finitude. Truth is not external to the subject but is also immanent to it.
One could speak of an inherence of truth in the subject.
Finally, the third use of the word
“immanence” stems from the fact that an individual’s or a group’s
becoming-subject depends on its ability to be immanent to a truth procedure. To
be a subject, to become a subject, is another form of immanence, the immanence
to a truth procedure and therefore also to the relationship with the absolute
underpinned by every truth.
Badiou summarizes this entire process as
follows:
“The immanence of truths” has this
threefold sense: the immanence of the production of truth to a particular
world; the immanence of a truth to a certain relationship between the finite
and the infinite as a sign that it touches the absolute; and the immanence of
any subject thus constituted, above and beyond its particular individuality, to
a truth procedure.
It is worth asking whether Badiou effectively
resolves the problem of immanence in its relationship with infinity. Although
he rejects the appeal to a transcendent God, the difficulty remains due to the
existence of universals that have an absolute character. It is difficult to
accept this thesis without further ado, because when another plane of immanence
is formed, that of infinity, it does not cease to be infinity as such, and
underlying it is a certain aroma of transcendence, even if it is in its secularized
form.
Furthermore, the processes by which the sphere
of historical immanence produce absolute universals that immediately expel them
from its world are left unexplained. How does this very special kind of product
arise from finitude and become infinite? How does finitude inherently contain
infinity?
The resolution of this difficult question does
not come from denying the problem as such. We are faced with the production of
universals, including truth, which, although they are historical products, are
surplus to the situation in which they were produced. Otherwise, we would be
faced with the triumph of relativism and skepticism. However, the mode of
existence of the sphere of universals, which are also immanent to their own
field, is not elucidated.
If we want to escape from such a
world, in which there are only relative beings or, as I put it in Logics of
Worlds, only bodies and languages, a thorough critique of the thesis of finitude
must be undertaken. Infinity must be shown to be a real and required resource,
as a guarantee of everything relating to truths having a universal value.
Badiou's text leaves the challenge open, and a
solution will have to be found while recognizing the validity of the way it is
formulated; that is, it is not enough to construct a totally immanent system,
because it leaves aside that other sphere, whose recognition is inevitable. In
this sense, attempts such as those of Deleuze and Guattari, and Manuel de Landa
fail in their endeavor.
Bibliography
Badiou, Alain. 2003. Being
and Event. London: Continuum.
—. 2009. Logic
of worlds. London: Continuum.
—. 2022. The
inmanence of Truths. London: Bloombsbury.
DeLanda, Manuel.
2006. A New Philosophy of Society: Assemblage Theory and Social
Complexity. London & New York: Continuum.
Deleuze, Gilles,
and Félix Guattari. 1994. What´s Philosophy? New York : Columbia
University Press.
