Let’s take Samuel L. Jackson’s question seriously. I worry that we’ve strayed from our mandate over the past several posts, and I’d like to write something about Eternal Return with less jargon.
I often think of ER when I’m on the top of a mountain looking at a nice view. I think about the circuitous path that led me there, literally of course, but also the path through life that led me to this moment of clarifying vision and reflection. In a sense, I am this path, really, and nothing else. I am those choices I have made, and experiences I have had, and contexts I was born into and traveled through. And then I think about the depth of that context, and the way it is interacting with me even now at the top of this mountain. For example, I think about the geology that has produced such inspiring shapes, and I ponder why some hairless chimp like myself finds them so beautiful. I think about the past and future of this planet, and wonder what other sorts of experiences that other beings (human and otherwise) have of it. To summarize, I think about everything, and all the possible variations are actually built right into my experience of this moment.
I won’t bore you by hunting for quotes, but I believe that Nietzsche had something like this moment of reflection on, and reconciliation to, life in mind with the Eternal Return. Deleuze is focusing much more on its metaphysical aspect. But the two are deeply related. What makes this moment this moment is the joining of its unique existence with the cloud of possibilities and associations it comes along with. The actual and the possible are present together at the same time. That conjunction is the secret of ER. For this moment to be what it is, everything had to be exactly what it is. And to think about this moment repeating, to ask the question of what it would mean to repeat it, and hence what it is to begin with, is to think about the whole process that led to it, and all the variations this process is capable of. So the doctrine of ER isn’t really aimed at asserting that this moment will in fact repeat indefinitely on some sort of loop. It just uses the idea of returning to uncover what this moment is to begin with, an utterly unrepeatable singularity in a process that stretches out to infinity. The ‘Eternal’ in ER should not make us think of passing the same point on the merry-go-round again and again. It should make us think about eternity as one unbroken line.
I often think of ER when I’m on the top of a mountain looking at a nice view. I think about the circuitous path that led me there, literally of course, but also the path through life that led me to this moment of clarifying vision and reflection. In a sense, I am this path, really, and nothing else. I am those choices I have made, and experiences I have had, and contexts I was born into and traveled through. And then I think about the depth of that context, and the way it is interacting with me even now at the top of this mountain. For example, I think about the geology that has produced such inspiring shapes, and I ponder why some hairless chimp like myself finds them so beautiful. I think about the past and future of this planet, and wonder what other sorts of experiences that other beings (human and otherwise) have of it. To summarize, I think about everything, and all the possible variations are actually built right into my experience of this moment.
I won’t bore you by hunting for quotes, but I believe that Nietzsche had something like this moment of reflection on, and reconciliation to, life in mind with the Eternal Return. Deleuze is focusing much more on its metaphysical aspect. But the two are deeply related. What makes this moment this moment is the joining of its unique existence with the cloud of possibilities and associations it comes along with. The actual and the possible are present together at the same time. That conjunction is the secret of ER. For this moment to be what it is, everything had to be exactly what it is. And to think about this moment repeating, to ask the question of what it would mean to repeat it, and hence what it is to begin with, is to think about the whole process that led to it, and all the variations this process is capable of. So the doctrine of ER isn’t really aimed at asserting that this moment will in fact repeat indefinitely on some sort of loop. It just uses the idea of returning to uncover what this moment is to begin with, an utterly unrepeatable singularity in a process that stretches out to infinity. The ‘Eternal’ in ER should not make us think of passing the same point on the merry-go-round again and again. It should make us think about eternity as one unbroken line.
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