20 THESES ON IMMANENCE AND TRANSCENDENCE
April 20th, 2013 by Darin Robbins
On Immanence:
1. Immanence is internal causality, in that any action or phenomenon in a structure occurs within that structure and each part has the potential to affect any other part. All things in reality can be defined as structures in that each thing can be made up of parts that are in relationships with each other.
2. This internal causality means that the structure in question has autonomy. Autonomy can be defined as “self law†or self-determination, and is a form of freedom that is independent of external forces.
3. Autonomy results in the formation of many cases of direct democracy and an abundance of the commons. Democracy is the method where individuals in groups are able to practice autonomy, while the commons is the resources that allow individuals and groups to make free choices and free actions because of their equality of access to those necessary resources.
4. The many cases of democracy and the abundance of the commons are used as an apparent tool by participants. Participants make use of democracy and the commons in a very self-aware way to further autonomy in the understanding that these tools are their own creation and are meant for this purpose.
5. The apparent tools of democracy and the commons are an expression of desire. Humans can either passively consume external things to fill the lack they have within themselves to fulfill their drive, or they can actively produce things in the world to fulfill their desire.
6. The expression of desire will result in the creation of structures that will in turn affect those who created them. The relationship between creators and their creations is one of immanence to the same degree that the parts within a structure are immanent to each other.
7. The creation of structures will have parts external to their relationships. Only one aspect of a part will be in relationship to other parts at any time, and there is always something of the part that is more than any relationship it could enter into.
8. With parts external to relationships, this results in the fact that reality is contingency rather than necessity. In other words, each part has the potential to enter into or leave any relationship with any other part at any time, and is therefore free from the determination of any one relationship or structure.
9. The contingency of reality is a disruption of transcendence. No transcendent order has the power to impose and maintain its relationships on to any part or group of parts without great effort, and these parts are free to create their own immanent relationships with each other if they are aware of their potential to do so.
10. The disruption of transcendence concludes with the process of resistance and creation of community. A community is formed when it first resists any external order and then creates its own internal order that includes autonomy and the expression of desire through democracy and the commons.
On Transcendence:
1. Transcendence is external causality, in that there is an external force that imposes order on a structure. Transcendence is an external determination on individuals or groups of individuals.
2. The external causality of transcendence results in hierarchy and the stratification of a power relationship. A transcendent order has those who are in control and those who are subjected to that control in a relationship of inequality.
3. Hierarchy will develop into one form of a republic and the scarcity of the market. A republic, as an alienation of the ability to make decisions, requires a centralization of authority in an elite and the scarcity of the market perpetuates the supposed necessity of inequality.
4. One unified republic and the scarcity of the market is a ubiquitous order that appears to be natural and operates behind the scenes of social activity. The determination of the unequal relationship reproduces the overall hierarchy while at the same time making it seem that there is no other alternative.
5. The ubiquitous order promotes the experience of drive as a replacement of the expression of desire. Drive, as opposed to desire, is motivated by an appearance of an inherent lack in humans that external things are presented to complete, thus making humans dependent upon the external source.
6. The experience of drive is the consumption of transcendent structures. Rather than an active production by humans to manifest desire, there is the passive consumption of prepackaged and predetermined options for humans in a society that allows for hierarchy to reproduce itself.
7. A consumption of predetermined and hierarchical structures means that the parts of the structure are internal to relationships. The parts, including human participants in a society, are produced by the relationships they find themselves in.
8. Parts internal to relationships present the structure as a necessity of reality. No other alternative seems possible because the structure appears as both natural and eternal.
9. The necessity of reality leads to the reproduction of transcendence itself. This reproduction is a structural trait that goes beyond the actions or choices of any one individual or group, making any participant a working component of the structure.
10. The reproduction of transcendence leads to the acceptance and consumption of the state and capitalism. Both the state and capitalism are transcendent structures, and will thrive on the maintenance of hierarchy, scarcity, and the inequality that is the foundation of both.
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