Anti-Oedipus 1.2: The Body without Organs

In this section, Deleuze and Guattari explain the second synthesis of the unconscious.

Figure One: The Human Heart. Image Link.

In my previous blog post detailing Chapter 1.1 of Deleuze and Guattari’s Anti-Oedipus, we analyzed the first synthesis of the unconscious. The first synthesis is known by two interchangeable names: the connective synthesis and the production of production. Within the connective synthesis, we discover that desiring-machines function as binary machines, both emitting and interrupting flows. Deleuze and Guattari make clear that the schizophrenic is guided by the “and …” “and then…” of the first synthesis.

Furthermore, in Chapter 1.1, we understand that the distinction between production and product blurs, making them identical to one another. This interplay between producing and product gives rise to a third term — an identity: the body without organs.

Thus, it is fitting that the next section is titled “The Body without Organs”.

Note 1: Although Deleuze and Guattari describe these syntheses in somewhat of a sequential order (i.e., first, second, third), each synthesis is happening simultaneously. They are positing three ways of looking at the same process

Note 2: I have always found it interesting that this section is labeled “The Body without Organs” because the body without organs is not solely produced by the second synthesis. As we noted in 1.1, the body without organs is produced as an identity of the coupling of desiring-machines.

Note 3: I will constantly be revising this blog post in order to do a line-by-line interpretation of the text.

**Citation Note: The citation for this text is at the bottom of the blog post.

Figure Two: Body as Machine I. Image Link.

Chapter 1.2: The Body without Organs

As should be evident by now, the body without organs constantly evolves, and resists being organized. Consequently, a tension arises between desiring-machines and the body without organs as desiring-machines attempt to structure and organize the BwO in a precise, rigid manner.

An apparent conflict arises between desiring-machines and the body without organs. Every coupling of machines, every production of a machine, every sound of a machine running, becomes unbearable to the body without organs. (AO, 9)

Desiring-machines become the body without organs’ nemesis as they relentlessly endeavor to penetrate the body without organs’ unstructured nature. We must note that Deleuze and Guattari are not indicating that individual organs are problematic; rather, the body without organs resists the intense organization of these organs and the belief that these organs are rigid (incapable of evolution). They continue:

Beneath its organs it senses there are larvae and loathsome worms, and a God at work messing it all up or strangling it by organizing it. (AO, 9)

Here, when Deleuze and Guattari refer to God, they are referring to the religious concept of God — specifically, the transcendent God discussed earlier in Chapter 1.1. The God of transcendence aims to establish a definitive body by meticulously organizing the organs in a rigid manner. This stands in contrast to the immanent God — known as God = Nature — where organs perpetually undergo change and flux.

Figure Three: Michelangelo, “The Creation of Adam”, 1508–1512. Image Link.

At any rate, Deleuze and Guattari continue by citing Antonin Artaud, the French artist who inspired Deleuze and Guattari’s concept of the body without organs:

“The body is the body/it is all by itself/and has no need of organs/the body is never an organism/ organisms are the enemies of the body.” (AO, 9; emphasis mine)

Again, organs are not innately the problem — the organism is. Being turned into an organism equates to being completely organized, whereas the body without organs refuses organization. No matter how hard desiring-machines attempt to penetrate the body without organs, in an attempt to organize the body without organs, the body without organs resists these desiring-machines by presenting itself as a surface:

Merely so many nails piercing the flesh, so many forms of torture. In order to resist organ-machines, the body without organs presents its smooth, slippery, opaque, taut surface as a barrier. (AO, 9)

Figure Four: Slippery Barrier. Image Link.

As the body without organs is imageless, there is an impossibility of referencing what this surface looks like, so Figure Four is a bit ironic. But we know that the body without organs presenting itself as a surface resists the connections, emissions, and interruptions, of desiring-machines due to its fluid nature:

In order to resist linked, connected, and interrupted flows, it sets up a counterflow of amorphous, undifferentiated fluid. In order to resist using words composed of articulated phonetic units, it utters only gasps and cries that are sheer unarticulated blocks of sound. (AO, 9)

It is crucial to recognize that the organized flows of desiring-machines (whether they are emitted or interrupted) are met with the shapeless and formless fluid of the body without organs. Even phonetic units (i.e., pronounceable sounds) produced by desiring-machines are foreign to the body without organs. This is because the body without organs is imageless and nonproductive.

Deleuze and Guattari continue:

We are of the opinion that what is ordinarily referred to as “primary repression” means precisely that: it is not a “countercathexis,” but rather this repulsion of desiring-machines by the body without organs. (AO, 9)

Here, Deleuze and Guattari are utilizing the repulsion of desiring-machines by the body without organs to criticize psychoanalysis and its concept of primary repression. In psychoanalysis, primary repression is linked with the concept of anticathexis, also known as “countercathexis”. Essentially, anticathexis states that instinctual impulses of the id must be suppressed; anticathexis results in the primary repression of the instinctual desires of the id. For example, one might really want to take someone else’s lunch out of their hands and eat it, but this impulse is repressed. However, rather than adhering to this simplistic, tripartite conceptualization of the unconscious (id, ego, superego), Deleuze and Guattari isolate that primary repression must be taken literally without equating primary repression to an id, ego, or superego: the desiring-machines are primarily repressed by the body without organs. (No tripartite view of the unconscious is needed.)

Figure Five: Sigmund Freud and Anticathexis. Image Link.

It is through this process that we encounter what Deleuze and Guattari term the “paranoiac machine”:

This is the real meaning of the paranoiac machine: the desiring-machines attempt to break into the body without organs, and the body without organs repels them, since it experiences them as an over-all persecution apparatus. (AO, 9; emphasis mine)

On this matter, Deleuze and Guattari cite Victor Tausk, a student and colleague of Freud, and his unsuccessful attempt to interpret the paranoiac machine; here, Deleuze and Guattari are specifically criticizing Tausk’s On the Origin of the Influencing Machine in Schizophrenia published in 1918:

Thus we cannot agree with Victor Tausk when he regards the paranoiac machine as a mere projection of “a person’s own body” and the genital organs. (AO, 9)

Essentially, Tausk equated the paranoiac machine with projection, to which he linked projection to one’s genitals. This critique of Tausk will become clearer when we discuss the topic of projection shortly.

Figure Six: Victor Tausk. Image Link.

In any case, Deleuze and Guattari explain that the origin of the paranoiac machine:

The genesis of the [paranoiac] machine lies precisely here: in the opposition of the process of production of the desiring-machines and the nonproductive stasis of the body without organs. (AO, 9)

The paranoiac machine emerges from a pre-subjective interaction between desiring-machines and the body without organs. In this way:

The anonymous nature of the machine and the nondifferentiated nature of its surface are proof of this [genesis]. (AO, 9)

The paranoiac machine remains anonymous because it doesn’t identify with the body without organs and it doesn’t identify with the desiring-machines; additionally, the paranoiac machine’s surface is nondifferentiated, indicating that it doesn’t exclusively adhere to the body without organs or the desiring-machines. Instead, the paranoiac machine is produced precisely where the desiring-machines attempt to penetrate the surface of the body without organs.

Figure Seven: Daniel Miller, Untitled, Between 1992 and 2005. Image Link.

Deleuze and Guattari continue:

Projection enters the picture only secondarily, as does counter-investment, as the body without organs invests a counterinside or a counteroutside, in the form of a persecuting organ or some exterior agent of persecution. (AO, 9; emphasis mine)

In this context, Deleuze and Guattari appear to be offering a nuanced critique of the psychoanalytical concepts of projection and counter-investment. (It is here that the criticism of Tausk is well explained). But first, we must define these terms:

• Definition of Projection:

[Projection is] a type of defense mechanism in psychoanalytic theory, whereby unacceptable feelings and self-attributes within an individual are disavowed and attributed to someone else. (Encyclopedia of Critical Psychology)

• Definition of Counter-Investment:

Counter-investment — translated as anticathexis in the Standard Edition — is a particular mode of investment used by the ego for defensive purposes. (Encyclopedia.com)

Figure Eight. Projection. Image Link.

Projection occurs when an individual displaces unacceptable feelings of themselves onto another. In psychoanalysis, projection and counter-investment are deemed as natural givens or innate human attributes. This perspective aligns with Tausk’s analysis, where he equated projection to one’s relationship with their genitals, a notion particularly Freudian in nature. However, Deleuze and Guattari suggest that the concept of projection and counter-investment are produced as secondary responses. The paranoiac machine precedes projection and counter-investment. Before such projection occurs, the body without organs must first protect itself from the desiring-machines by investing in a “counterinside” or “counteroutside.” This investment manifests as a “persecuting organ” or an “external agent of persecution.”

To clarify, the paranoiac machine is produced where the desiring-machines attempt to organize the body without organs. Though psychoanalysis argues that projection and counter-investment are innate from the very start, we must remember that the body without organs first repels the desiring-machines. Thus, prior to one projecting their feelings onto another, there needs to exist a paranoiac machine that allows for the differentiation between two groups in the first place.

Figure Eight: Paranoia. Image Link.

Deleuze and Guattari conclude the first paragraph with a one-sentence summary of the paranoiac machine:

But in and of itself the paranoiac machine is merely an avatar of the desiring-machines: it is a result of the relationship between the desiring-machines and the body without organs, and occurs when the latter can no longer tolerate these machines. (AO, 9)

• I find it interesting that Deleuze and Guattari define the paranoiac machine as “an avatar of the desiring-machines” because they previously stated it was anonymous in nature.

Figure Nine: Edvard Munch, “The Scream”, 1983. Image Link.

Paragraph Two

Let’s continue:

If we wish to have some idea of the forces that the body without organs exerts later on in the uninterrupted process, we must first establish a parallel between desiring-production and social production. (AO, 10)

Deleuze and Guattari initiate the analysis of social production, essentially arguing that we must first understand the relationship between desiring-production and social production (if we are to conceptualize the full effects of the body without organs). However, prior to the establishment of the parallel between desiring-production and social production, Deleuze and Guattari discuss the terms of their analysis:

We intend such a parallel to be regarded as merely phenomenological: we are here drawing no conclusions whatsoever as to the nature and the relationship of the two productions, nor does the parallel we are about to establish provide any sort of a priori answer to the question whether desiring-production and social production are really two separate and distinct productions. (AO, 10; emphasis mine)

To clarify, Deleuze and Guattari emphasize that their comparison of desiring-production and social production relies exclusively on observable and experiential aspects of these phenomena (“merely phenomenological”). Deleuze and Guattari are not making any pre-conceived, a priori claims about the relationship between the two; instead, they focus solely on analyzing what can be directly observed.

Figure Ten: Social Cartography I. Image Link.

What is the purpose of drawing a parallel between desiring-production and social production? Deleuze and Guattari write:

Its one purpose is to point out the fact that the forms of social production, like those of desiring-production, involve an unengendered nonproductive attitude, an element of antiproduction coupled with the process, a full body that functions as a socius. (AO, 10)

Similar to the unengendered and nonproductive body without organs that serves as a surface for desiring-machines to inscribe upon, social production also necessitates this unengendered and nonproductive characteristic. Social production requires a surface, described as “a full body that functions as a socius.” Simply put, desiring-machines require a surface to inscribe upon (this surface is referred to as the body without organs); social production requires a surface to inscribe upon (this surface is referred to as the socius).

Deleuze and Guattari identify three possible bodies that the socius can assume:

This socius may be the body of the earth, that of the tyrant, or capital. (AO, 10; emphasis mine)

• Chapter Three will describe these socii in great detail.

Figure Eleven: Social Cartography II. Image Link.

In particular, Deleuze and Guattari refer to Karl Marx as the social production constituting capitalism necessitates the socius of capital.

This is the body that Marx is referring to when he says that it is not the product of labor, but rather appears as its natural or divine presupposition. (AO, 10)

Here, when Marx refers to the body of capital, he is not referring to “the product of labor” (i.e., profit). Instead, he is referring to capital as a full body that appears divine. In this manner, capital functions as a body that extends itself across the surface of the earth and out into cosmos. This enables social production to inscribe points on capital’s surface.

Deleuze and Guattari further elaborate:

In fact, [the socius] does not restrict itself merely to opposing productive forces in and of themselves. It falls back on (il se rabat sur) all production, constituting a surface over which the forces and agents of production are distributed, thereby appropriating for itself all surplus production and arrogating to itself both the whole and the parts of the process, which now seem to emanate from it as a quasi cause. (AO, 10)

• “Se rabat sur” (falls back on) is a term employed by Deleuze and Guattari to refer to the socius falling back on social production; this term equally applies to the body without organs falling back on desiring-production.

The socius does not solely oppose forces. In fact, the socius falls back on social production, appropriating all surplus production for itself.

Let’s clarify: the socius serves as a surface upon which social production attempts to penetrate. Social production records points on this surface and generates a surplus of production/energy. The socius falls back on this production and appropriates it for itself. This appropriation entails the socius claiming ownership over the entire production process. Therefore, when the socius falls back on social production, it constitutes a ‘new’ surface available for further inscription by social production.

Figure Twelve: Social Cartography III. Image Link.

As the socius falls back on social production and appropriates all production for itself …

[…] Forces and agents come to represent a miraculous form of its own power: they appear to be “miraculated” (miracules) by it. In a word, the socius as a full body forms a surface where all production is recorded, whereupon the entire process appears to emanate from this recording surface. (AO, 10)

In this context, Deleuze and Guattari describe how the forces and agents involved in social production appear to be “miraculated,” as if they emanate from the recording surface. Let’s go back to the body without organs and desiring-machines for reference: the mouth-machine, the breast-machine, and the heart-machine are appropriated by the body without organs, appearing to emanate from the body without organs’ surface — it appears that it’s always only been the desiring-machines! However, these desiring-machines to not originate from the body without organs’ surface.

The same applies to the socius and social production. The forces and agents of social production do not actually originate from the socius. Instead, these forces only seem to emanate from these surfaces because the socius appropriates the surplus energy from social production in order to claim ownership over the entire process. But we must not forget that the socius underlies this recording surface.

• Let’s use an example: In Chapter 2, we will learn that the family serves as an agent of social production. In this context, the family is perceived as an essential part of the socius because it appears to emanate from the socius’s surface. Yet, the socius appropriates social production, making it appear that the family emanates from the surface. In reality, the forces and agents — in this case, the family — are merely responsible for the recording on the surface, not for their origin. The family is not innate — it’s just produced by social production.

Figure Thirteen: The (Nuclear) Family. Image Link.

Start of Recording … Memoirs of My Nervous Illness

Before continuing, it’s important to emphasize that Deleuze and Guattari’s discussion of the second synthesis as a “production of recording,” where desiring-machines inscribe points on the surface of the body without organs, directly cites Schreber’s Memoirs of My Nervous Illness, published in 1903.

Here’s a direct excerpt from Schreber’s memoir:

The way this examination takes place is very peculiar and hardly understandable for anybody who knows human nature. People around me are made to say certain words by stimulating their nerves; for instance madmen throw in a certain learned term possibly in a foreign language) which they perhaps remember from the past; these come to my ears and simultaneously the words “has been recorded” (scilicet into awareness or comprehension) are spoken into my nerves: for example a madman says without any connection “rationalism” or “social democracy” and the voices say “has been recorded,” thereby attempting to find out whether the terms “rationalism” and “social democracy” still have a meaning for me, in other words whether I have enough reason left to comprehend these words. (Memoirs of My Mental Illness, 220; emphasis mine)

Here, Schreber is explaining how he hears voices telling him the phrase “has been recorded” and how these words are “spoken into [his] nerves.” Here’s another excerpt that will clarify:

The phrase “has been recorded” with which I was examined, follows when my gaze has been directed towards certain things and I have seen them; they are then registered on my nerves with this phrase. For example when I saw the doctor my nerves immediately resounded with “has been recorded,” or “the senior attendant has been recorded,” or, “a joint of pork — has been recorded,” “railway — has been recorded” and especially the phrase “Senats·prasident — has been recorded,” etc. And all this goes on in endless repetition day after day, hour after hour. (Memoirs of My Nervous Illness, 221; emphasis mine)

The voices telling Schreber “(X) has been recorded” essentially confirms his perception of reality and mental cognition. When Deleuze and Guattari discuss the production of recording, they are citing Schreber to describe how desiring-machines distribute themselves as points across the body without organs, recording their particular functioning and positioning. Meanwhile, the production of production appropriates this energy — by miraculating these desiring-machines — which persistently redistributes these points on the surface of the body without organs.

To utilize an example, the heart “knows” that it beats through recordings on the surface of the body without organs; its functions are recorded on the surface of the body without organs. However, the heart is also in a perpetual state of evolution due to the body without organs anti-productive nature, seeking to dismantle organization.

Another example (in the context of social production) would be the way society records points on the surface of the socius. Within a capitalist socius, it’s us who mark these points, sustaining the capitalist socius; however, capital then redistributes these points of recording, constantly necessitating new points of inscription. Why? Because if social production remained static, without change, no surplus would be generated. And if no surplus were generated, capitalism would cease to exist.

I want to add one additional excerpt from Schreber’s memoirs (because I enjoyed this part the most):

The system of examining me is similarly practiced in the case of the miraculously created insects. For instance, at the present season (early September) there are many butterflies about when I walk in the garden. Whenever a butterfly appears my gaze is first directed to it as to a being newly created that very moment, and secondly the word “butterfly — has been recorded” is spoken into my nerves by the voices; this shows that one thought I could possibly no longer recognize a butterfly and one therefore examines me to find out whether I still know the meaning of the word “butterfly.” (Memoirs of My Nervous Illness, 221; emphasis mine)

End of Recording … Memoirs of My Nervous Illness

Figure Fourteen: Butterfly — has been recorded. Image Link.

Anti-Oedipus Continued:

As the socius continuously falls back on social production and appropriates it for itself, social production rigorously records points on the ‘new’ surface of the socius. Deleuze and Guattari explicate:

Society constructs its own delirium by recording the process of production; but it is not a conscious delirium, or rather is a true consciousness of a false movement, a true perception of an apparent objective movement, a true perception of the movement that is produced on the recording surface. (AO, 10)

When Deleuze and Guattari refer to ‘delirium,’ they are using the term in a way that deviates from how delirium is normatively understood. For example, when one says, “I am American,” this notion of Americanness is rooted in delirium. As the socius falls back on social production, disorganizing the points recorded on its surface, while appropriating the surplus energy for itself, the categorization of what constitutes Americanness exists in a state of flux. However, despite this fluidity, the strict recording of points on the surface constitutes a delirium. It’s important to note that this delirium is not necessarily conscious; rather, it represents a genuine perception of a movement or recording that appears to be objective and real.

• The concept of “America” as a distinct geographical entity serves as an example of delirium. The arbitrary lines drawn to designate the boundary of America is treated by society as possessing a genuine existence or objective reality.

Figure Fifteen: Defining America by the Flag. Image Link.

Paragraph Three

Notably, in the second paragraph, it was stated that the socius can take form of the earth, the tyrant, or capital. Deleuze and Guattari state:

Capital is indeed the body without organs of the capitalist, or rather of the capitalist being. (AO, 10)

Capital operates as a fluid and expansive body that extends itself across the body of the earth and into the cosmos. It is not merely a tangible resource or form of money, but something that inculcates everything within it; everything has a price tag. Everything is inculcated under capital; and, everything appears to be produced by capital.

In Chapter 1.1, we noted that the body without organs was exactly that: a body without organs. No mouth, no breast, no heart. Not figuratively. Literally. The mouth-machine has never existed independently; it’s always been connected to another machine. The collection of organ-machines is what we refer to as the human body. And yet again — the human body has never existed independently; it’s always been connected to the earth. And the earth connected to the cosmos. So on and so forth. And, these machines are in a state of flux, so there is no organ to latch onto. This is the body without organs of the schizophrenic.

Figure Sixteen: (Ironic) Body of the Earth. Image Link.

Now, let’s parallel this to capital as the body without organs of the capitalist being.

In the context of capital, we have the same interconnected machines described above, but they are capitalized upon. For example, there exists a mouth-machine, a breast-machine, and a heart-machine, but these machines are equated to capital. What about the collection of organ-machines we call the human body? That has a price tag. What about the earth? That’s a commodity. The cosmos? That’s profit. But we must remember: all of these machines are interconnected; they exist as one body that is constantly changing. Thus, capital is a full body in a state of flux — just like the body without organs for the schizophrenic.

To reiterate: everything is in a state of flux. This includes capital. For the capitalist being, the drive to maximize capital entails the fluidity of capital being central to their project. Thus, the project for the capitalist is never a finished one.

Deleuze and Guattari continue:

But as such, [capital] is not only the fluid and petrified substance of money, for [capital] will give to the sterility of money the form whereby money produces money. (AO, 10)

At this juncture, Deleuze and Guattari isolate that capital does not solely pertain to the fluidity of money through exchange and circulation (buying and selling). Capital, in reality, effects money even when money isn’t actively being used (like when it’s saved, invested, hoarded, or accumulated). This reminds of me money being invested in the S&P 500, money sitting in a bank and earning dividends, and money being kept in a certificate of deposit. In these cases, the money appears idle, yet it continues to generate a surplus. Thus, capital was never just about money or having money; capital gives money the ability to create more money, no matter how that money is being used.

Figure Seventeen: Jamie Enriquez, “Abstract Money”, 2019. Image Link.

To sum up:

[Capital] produces surplus value, just as the body without organs reproduces itself, puts forth shoots, and branches out to the farthest corners of the universe. (AO, 10)

Just like the body without organs falling back on desiring-production, appropriating this production process for itself in order to reproduce itself, capital produces surplus value which allows it do to the same thing.Here, I will examine how capital produces surplus value; but first, let’s posit some questions: What purpose does the inscription of social production upon the socius serve? How does social production effectuate this surplus value? Deleuze and Guattari write:

[Capital] makes [social production] responsible for producing a relative surplus value, while embodying itself in the machine as fixed capital.

Akin to desiring-machines recording points on the surface of the body without organs, social production records points on the surface of the socius (in this case, a socius whose body is that of capital). Social production is held responsible for generating a surplus value. For example, we find various methods that society uses to create this surplus value: think tanks, innovations, technological advancements, labor practices, and so on. Companies will always come up with clever ways to make more this year compared to the previous year. However, just as the body without organs falls back on desiring-production and appropriates the surplus value for itself, capital falls back on social production and appropriates the surplus value for itself, taking credit for the process. In this manner:

Machines and agents cling so closely to capital that their very functioning appears to be miraculated by it. (AO, 10–11)

Not to repeat the classic Marxist cliché, but because capital appropriates all surplus value for itself, social production seemingly emanates from the surface of the socius; individuals believe themselves to be mere cogs.

Figure Eighteen: Cogs in the Machine. Image Link.

To clarify, social production itself appears to be produced by capital:

Everything seems objectively to be produced by capital as quasi cause. (AO, 11)

(More will be analyzed on this shortly.) Deleuze and Guattari continue their analysis by examining Marx’s work on the dichotomy between capital and labor:

As Marx observes, in the beginning capitalists are necessarily conscious of the opposition between capital and labor, and of the use of capital as a means of extorting surplus labor. (AO, 11)

It appears that — “in the beginning” — the distinction between capital and labor was a simple one where capital was utilized as a means to generate profits by paying workers less than the true value of their labor. For individuals to make profit, they must pay their workers less than what the product is worth; in Marxist theory, this concept is known as surplus labor.

Figure Nineteen: Surplus Labor. Image Link.

Yet, the distinction between capital and labor is no longer simple:

But a perverted, bewitched world quickly comes into being, as capital increasingly plays the role of a recording surface that falls back on (se rabat sur) all of production. (Furnishing or realizing surplus value is what establishes recording rights.) (AO, 11)

When capital appropriates all forms of production, capital presents itself as the driving force behind the creation of surplus. To put simply, individuals believe that capitalism unilaterally produces social production; when in reality, we are the ones that produce capitalism. My immediate thought here goes to money. Rationally, we are all aware that money is a piece of paper or a small, metallic object. Yet, money is also something more. There appears to be this divine, innate quality to money that represents a transformative power beyond its physical form. There is a mystical aura embedded within the dollar, reinforcing the belief that capital generates this surplus all on its own. However, this belief is an illusion. Capital does not autonomously craft a powerful mystique to money. This mystique is derived from the work of social production.

Let’s use an example or two of this idea. For instance, when a capitalist claims, “I created this product,” with this product hoping to be exchanged for monetary compensation, we often perceive the product as if it magically originated from capital itself. Similarly, when discussing a factory’s production, we overlook its complex assembly of components: workers, machinery, labor regulations, and more. Capital did not create anything — we did. But capital takes credit for the process.

As Marx states in Das Kapital Volume III:

“With the development of relative surplus-value in the actual specifically capitalist mode of production, whereby the productive powers of social labour are developed, these productive powers and the social interrelations of labour in the direct labour-process seem transferred from labour to capital. Capital thus becomes a very mystic being since all of labour’s social productive forces appear to be due to capital, rather than labour as such, and seem to issue from the womb of capital itself.” (AO, 11)

Figure Twenty: Karl Marx. Image Link.

This quote from Marx isolates that capital is “a very mystic being”. This perception arises from the notion that all labor is considered a product of capital, which capital exploits to produce surplus. However, this perspective overlooks the fact that, in actuality, the labor force is inherently intertwined with social production; the labor force generates surplus value. Capital does not generate surplus value — it only claims to. Society generates surplus value by recording points on the surface of capital.

Deleuze and Guattari conclude the third paragraph by emphasizing that capital serves as a surface of recording:

What is specifically capitalist here is the role of money and the use of capital as a full body to constitute the recording or inscribing surface. But some kind of full body, that of the earth or the despot, a recording surface, an apparent objective movement, a fetishistic, perverted, bewitched world are characteristic of all types of society as a constant of social reproduction. (AO, 11)

• The term “bewitched” (ensorcelement) is used here to highlight society’s mistaken belief that the surface of recording is responsible for the entire production process. In this context, capital is perceived as an “apparent objective movement,” creating a mystique where people believe capital is the sole producer of everything.

Figure Twenty-One. Everything is Capital. Dall E 2. Image Link.

Paragraph Four

In the third paragraph, Deleuze and Guattari explained the concept of the socius and social production (which I’ve previously related to the body without organs and desiring-machines). Now, the focus will be more explicit in regards to the body without organs and desiring-machines. They write:

The body without organs now falls back on (se rabat sur) desiring-production, attracts it, and appropriates it for its own. (AO, 11)

Just as the socius falls back on social production and appropriates all surplus production for itself, the body without organs does the same thing to desiring-production. The key word in this sentence is ‘attracts’ as Deleuze and Guattari will soon describe the components of some type of ‘attraction-machine.’

Deleuze and Guattari continue:

The organ-machines now cling to the body without organs as though it were a fencer’s padded jacket, or as though these organ-machines were medals pinned onto the jersey of a wrestler who makes them jingle as he starts toward his opponent. (AO, 11)

Figure Twenty-Two: Fencers’ Padded Jackets. Image Link.

Earlier, we noted that body without organs repels desiring-machines from penetrating its surface; additionally, the body without organs engages with this production through attraction. The body without organs falls back on all production, appropriating all production for itself. In this manner:

An attraction-machine now takes the place, or may take the place, of a repulsion-machine: a miraculating-machine succeeding the paranoiac machine. (AO, 11; emphasis mine)

However, we must not assume that one machine precedes the other in a linear fashion:

But what is meant here by “succeeding”? The two coexist, rather, and black humor does not attempt to resolve contradictions, but to make it so that there are none, and never were any. (AO, 11)

The paranoiac-machine and the miraculating-machine coexist without being fundamentally opposed. Deleuze and Guattari mention the concept of black humor as an example of how one might address the coexistence of the paranoiac- and miraculating- machines. Black humor allows one to laugh at tragedy — something seemingly contradictory. Yet, these jokes suggest that there was never a true contradiction to begin with.

Figure Twenty-Three: Not-So-Dark Humor. Image Link.

To sum up this process of attraction, Deleuze and Guattari write:

The body without organs, the unproductive, the unconsumable, serves as a surface for the recording of the entire process of production of desire, so that desiring-machines seem to emanate from it in the apparent objective movement that establishes a relationship between the machines and the body without organs. (AO, 11)

When desiring-machines connect, energy is produced: the breast-machine and mouth-machine couple to form the breast-mouth-machine. But when desiring-machines connect — in totality — we not only find the body without organs serving as the identity of this formation, but we also note that surplus energy is produced. The body without organs appropriates this surplus energy by falling back on production. This action of falling back on the production process entails that a ‘new’ surface is formed, ready for further inscription or organization by desiring-machines. Thus, we ought not view the body without organs and desiring-machines as completely separate.

Regardless, Deleuze and Guattari further their discussion of Daniel Paul Schreber which was initiated in Chapter 1.1:

The organs are regenerated, “miraculated” on the body of Judge Schreber, who attracts God’s rays to himself. (AO, 11)

In Chapter 1.1, Deleuze and Guattari explored the account of Daniel Paul Schreber — a patient of Dr. Paul Flechsig — and Schreber’s experience of God’s divine rays, specifically focusing on the description of these rays emanating from his anus. Schreber was deemed as mentally ill (as the rays emanating from his body were deemed as deleusional manifestations rather than physical phenomena).

Figure Twenty-Four: Judge Schreber I. Image Link.

Though the miraculation machine attracts these rays to Schreber’s body, the paranoiac machine is still at work:

Doubtless the former paranoiac machine continues to exist in the form of mocking voices that attempt to “de-miraculate” (demiracu-ler) the organs, the Judge’s anus in particular. (AO, 11)

Regardless, Deleuze and Guattari conclude this paragraph by summing up this process:

But the essential thing is the establishment of an enchanted recording or inscribing surface that arrogates to itself all the productive forces and all the organs of production, and that acts as a quasi cause by communicating the apparent movement (the fetish) to them. (AO, 11–12; emphasis mine)

This conclusion is emphasizing Marx’s theory of commodity fetishism (hence, why I emphasized ‘fetish’). Commodity fetishism is what we have been discussing this entire time. Essentially, commodity fetishism is the erroneous belief that commodities contain or occupy an intrinsic value. With this belief in mind, we inevitably organize production and consumption around these representations. A good example I was given by a friend was the statue of Mother Mary; many Catholics believe these statues possess some type of mystical power. This logic extends itself across all commodities (for both producers and consumers). In this sense, it is believed that the production process, the labor force, the consumption, and the commodities themselves have some intrinsic value or power to them. However, in reality, the values of the commodities are socially constructed.

Finally, they state:

So true is it that the schizo practices political economy, and that all sexuality is a matter of economy.

Here, Deleuze and Guattari are arguing what they’ve been saying all along: the political economy and the libidinal economy are dissociated from one another.

Figure Twenty-Five: Judge Schreber II. Image Link.

Paragraph Five

Deleuze and Guattari begin this paragraph by describing how the first and second syntheses of the unconscious are not produced in the same manner:

Production is not recorded in the same way it is produced, however. Or rather, it is not reproduced within the apparent objective movement in the same way in which it is produced within the process of constitution. (AO, 12)

Nothing should come as a surprise here — the production of production operates differently than the production of recording. As noted at the top of this blog post in Note 1, the three syntheses are three different ways of interpolating the same process. However, these three perspectives are unique in their examination of the interplay between the body without organs and desiring-machines.

In any case, production of production immediately becomes production of recording:

In fact, we have passed imperceptibly into a domain of the production of recording, whose law is not the same as that of the production of production. (AO, 12; emphasis mine)

Figure Twenty-Six: Production/Recording. Image Link.

This raises the question as to what law governs the production of production (?) and what law governs the production of recording (?) . Deleuze and Guattari explicate:

The law governing the [production of production] was connective synthesis or coupling. But when the productive connections pass from machines to the body without organs (as from labor to capital), it would seem that they then come under another law that expresses a distribution in relation to the nonproductive element as a “natural or divine presupposition” (the disjunctions of capital). (AO, 12; emphasis mine)

To clarify, the law governing the production of production is coupling as desiring-machines connect to one another in a binary fashion; desiring-machines connect while emitting or interrupting flows. This production is immediately the recording process whereby the connections and couplings of desiring-machines serve as points of recording on the surface of the body without organs. Thus, the law governing the production of recording is distribution as desiring-machines are distributed across the surface of the body without organs (with this distribution serving as a recording).

Deleuze and Guattari continue by describing the attachment of desiring-machines to surface of the body without organs as a “grid”:

Machines attach themselves to the body without organs as so many points of disjunction, between which an entire network of new syntheses is now woven, marking the surface off into co-ordinates, like a grid. (AO, 12; emphasis mine)

Deleuze and Guattari illustrate how desiring-machines become connected to the surface of the body without organs as points of disjunction. These recorded points, in turn, give rise to a network of new syntheses, effectively mapping the body without organs’ surface like a grid. (We will soon learn why this grid-like fashioning of the body without organs serves of importance.)

Figure Twenty-Seven: Recorded Points on a Grid. Image Link.

Notably in Chapter 1.1, the schizophrenic was guided by the “and then” of the first synthesis. Here, Deleuze and Guattari isolate the terms by which the schizophrenic is guided in the second synthesis:

The “either … or . . . or” of the schizophrenic takes over from the “and then”: no matter what two organs are involved, the way in which they are attached to the body without organs must be such that all the disjunctive syntheses between the two amount to the same on the slippery surface. (AO, 12; emphasis mine)

“Either … or … or …” is linked with the disjunctive synthesis because the disjunctive synthesis records points that result in the differentiation of desiring-machines. Simply put, organ-machines have various functions. And, regardless of the two organs involved, all organs are interconnected and attached to the body without organs. However, each individual organ not only differs from every other organ, but it also forms connections with every other organ in unique ways. Desiring-machines (such as the mouth-machine, breast-machine, and heart-machine) are organized through these points of disjunction. And these organ-machines are interconnected — no matter the proximity. The gridding of the body without organs highlights the distinct couplings and configurations of desiring-machines forwarded by recorded points of disjunction. Each recorded point of disjunction on the body without organs represents a unique functionalism of an organ and a synthesis between various desiring-machines.

Whereas the “either/or” claims to mark decisive choices between immutable terms (the alternative: either this or that), the schizophrenic “either . . . or . . . or” refers to the system of possible permutations between differences that always amount to the same as they shift and slide about. (AO, 12)

Figure Twenty-Eight: Various Permutations. Image Link.

The alternative to “either … or … or” is the exclusive disjunction: “either/or.” However, this exclusive disjunction restricts the range of recording possibilities by simplifying them to binary choices. The exclusive disjunction suggests that the mouth-machine cannot directly connect with the heart-machine. Clearly, the mouth-machine, breast-machine, and heart-machine are organized by way of disjunction; these organ-machines are structured in very particularized ways. Yet, these organ-machines are in a perpetual state of evolution. The schizophrenic is guided by an inclusive disjunction: “either … or … or …” . This allows for limitless variations, permutations, and combinations. Even if the schizophrenic explores various permutations, they all lead to the same outcome. The schizophrenic does not fear the possibility of the mouth-machine taking place of the heart-machine — or having no mouth or heart at all. This reminds me of the concept of bricolage explained in Chapter 1.1.

Deleuze and Guattari reference an example from Samuel Beckett’s Enough, which is found in Beckett’s collection of short stories titled First Love and Other Shorts, published in 1974:

As in the case of Beckett’s mouth that speaks and feet that walk: “He sometimes halted without saying anything. Either he had finally nothing to say, or while having something to say he finally decided not to say it. . . . Other main examples suggest themselves to the mind. Immediate continuous communication with immediate redeparture. Same thing with delayed redeparture. Delayed continuous communication with immediate redeparture. Same thing with delayed redeparture. Immediate discontinuous communication with immediate redeparture. Same thing with delayed redeparture. Delayed discontinuous communication with immediate redeparture. Same thing with delayed redeparture.” (AO, 12)

The essential point being made here is that there are a litany of permutations to be made between Beckett’s mouth and feet.

• From my understanding, Deleuze and Guattari are describing the body without organs as possessing infinite potentiality, with the desiring-machines’ inscription effectuating finite actualizations. Essentially, there is infinite potentiality (due to the body without organs) and finite actualizations (due to desiring-machines). Inscription facilitates the differentiation among desiring-machines, with organ-machines assuming varied functions. Because of this, something like arm-machines cannot be flapped by humans in order to fly across the world. (Though, it would be neat to flap your arms and immediately start flying). Nonetheless, even though this capability does not exist now, the smooth surface of the body without organs scatters points recorded on its surface, allowing desiring-machines to craft new points of recording; this allows desiring-machines to evolve. Thus, it could be conceivable, in the future, for a human to achieve flight by flapping their arms, owing to the evolution of desiring-machines. However, the concern of the schizophrenic does not revolve around flight; whether the schizophrenic flies, crawls, or remains stationary holds no significance. The schizophrenic finds contentment in all conceivable permutations.

Figure Twenty-Nine: Walk It Like I Talk It. Image Link.

Paragraph Six

Deleuze and Guattari continue by describing the relationship between the schizophrenic and the disjunctive synthesis:

Thus the schizophrenic, the possessor of the most touchingly meager capital — Malone’s belongings, for instance — inscribes on his own body the litany of disjunctions, and creates for himself a world of parries where the most minute of permutations is supposed to be a response to the new situation or a reply to the indiscreet questioner. (AO, 12)

On this point, Deleuze and Guattari reference Beckett’s novel Malone Dies, published in 1951. This novel is the second in the Molloy trilogy. In Malone Dies, the narrator, Malone, is dying (Who could’ve seen that coming?).

Figure Thirty: Malone Dies. Image Link.

According to a quick search on Wikipedia:

Malone is an old man who lies naked in bed in either asylum or hospital — he is not sure which. Most of [Malone’s] personal effects have been taken from him, though he has retained some: his exercise book, brimless hat, and pencil.

At any rate, in the Anti-Oedipus quote above, we find that the schizophrenic is not innately invested in the accumulation of vast amount of capital; rather, the schizophrenic is “the possessor of the most touchingly meager capital.” To put simply, the schizophrenic is not concerned with the accumulation of capital, but instead is concerned with how they are oriented amidst their environment. Any change within the schizophrenic’s environment constitutes a change within themselves. Regardless of the circumstances, the schizophrenic crafts permutations and adapts to difference situations. The use of the word “parries” indicates that each situation the schizophrenic encounters is met with a defensive response akin to how a fencer parries offensive moves.

Figure Thirty-One: Parries. Image Link.

As mentioned earlier, the syntheses fall back on (se rabat sur) one another. In this case:

The disjunctive synthesis of recording therefore comes to overlap the connective syntheses of production. The process as process of production extends into the method as method of inscription. (AO, 12–13)

The recorded points on the surface of the BwO are not mere marks but serve as loci of potential connections and articulations. The critical aspect here is that the disjunctive synthesis does not passively document these points — it actively transforms the surplus energy from the first synthesis into the second synthesis. They write:

Or rather, if what we term libido is the connective “labor” of desiring-production, it should be said that a part of this energy is transformed into the energy of disjunctive inscription (Numen). A transformation of energy. (AO, 13; emphasis mine)

Deleuze and Guattari employ the term “libido” to denote the energy of desiring-machines connecting to one another in the first synthesis. This energy undergoes a transformation in the second synthesis, referred to as “Numen”, characterizing the energy of desiring-machines as they inscribe points on the surface of the body without organs.

• It’s crucial to recognize that Deleuze and Guattari provide a profound reinterpretation of desire, departing from the Freudian framework. While Freud’s conception of libido confines desire to sexual relations, Deleuze and Guattari find libido to be the energy produced as desiring-machines connect to one another. Thus, they conceive of desire as comprehensive, extending beyond solely sexual relations.

Figure Thirty-Two: Libido. Image Link.

Let’s continue by defining Numen. According to Oxford Languages, Numen is defined as:

The spirit or divine power presiding over a thing or place.

Deleuze and Guattari continue by proceed by raising a question concerning their labeling of the energy in the second synthesis as Numen:

But why call this new form of energy divine, why label it Numen, in view of all the ambiguities caused by a problem of the unconscious that is only apparently religious? (AO, 13)

It should be abundantly clear by now that Deleuze and Guattari are criticizing a transcendent conceptualization of God. Yet, the energy in the second synthesis ought to be understood as divine as the recordings on the surface of the body without organs appear to emanate from its surface. For example, we find surplus value to emanate from the surface of capital, finding capital to have this mystique property that generates surplus by itself; but in reality, we are the ones recording points onto its surface which generates surplus. In a similar vein, we find organ-machines to emanate from the surface of the body without organs; but in reality, these organ-machines serve as desiring-machines’ recorded points on the surface of the body without organs. There only appears to be an emanation from the surface because the body without organs appropriates all surplus energy for itself. In the process, the body without organs continuous disorganizes organ-machines.

In any case, Deleuze and Guattari answer their question above by stating:

The body without organs is not God, quite the contrary. But the energy that sweeps through it is divine, when it attracts to itself the entire process of production and server as its miraculate, enchanted surface, inscribing it in each and every one of its disjunctions. (AO, 13)

Undoubtedly, our bodies exhibit a distinct organization, which is perceived as inherently divine due to its meticulous arrangement. This reminds me of being a child in church where I remember hearing from religious individuals about the perfection of natural phenomena, such as the intricacies of the eye or heart, which was interpreted as evidence of a grand design — an architect called God. Deleuze and Guattari acknowledge the divine energy that sweeps over the surface of the body without organs, akin to a plan, that permeates the entire process of production. Yet, Deleuze and Guattari recognize that a transcendent God isn’t needed for this process; rather, this divinity exists immanently. (More of this will be explained in the following sentence.)

Figure Thirty-Three: Enchanted Surface (Divine Energy). Image Link.

Deleuze and Guattari proceed by referencing Judge Schreber and Immanuel Kant. They explicate:

Hence the strange relationship that Schreber has with God. To anyone who asks: “Do you believe in God?” we should reply in strictly Kantian or Schreberian terms: “Of course, but only as the master of the disjunctive syllogism, or as its a priori principle (God defined as the Omnitudo realitatis, from which all secondary realities are derived by a process of division).” (AO, 13)

Evidently, Deleuze and Guattari are not discarding the notion of God, but rather (re)defining God in an immanent manner. Deleuze and Guattari find that God exists, “but only as the master of the disjunctive syllogism”. To understand this point, we must first acquaint ourselves with what a syllogism is. Essentially, a syllogism is deductive reasoning. An example of a syllogism would be:

• Premise One: All humans are mortal.
• Premise Two: Deleuze and Guattari are humans.
• Conclusion: Deleuze and Guattari are mortal.

However, a disjunctive syllogism involves deductive reasoning with disjunctions. For example:

• Premise One: Either Deleuze wrote Difference and Repetition or Guattari wrote Difference and Repetition or Freud wrote Difference and Repetition … (*Note: either … or … or)
• Premise Two: Guattari and Freud didn’t write Difference and Repetition …
• Conclusion: Deleuze wrote Difference and Repetition.

The continuous mapping and recording of points on the surface of the body without organs is constituted by either … or … or … In this manner, particular connections are made between desiring-machines, allowing for differentiation. This differentiation is responsible to organ-machines taking on different roles and functions. This inscription is responsible for the intricacies of the eye and the heart. Thus, we can conclude that God exists, but God as the master of the disjunctive syllogism. Amidst all premises that present alternatives and choices (see the disjunctive syllogism example), God is the master of this reasoning as God underlies the process of division and differentiation within our reality.

• Deleuze and Guattari are very much positing an immanent metaphysics. It seems that there is a metaphysical plane that organizes (desiring-machines) and a metaphysical plane that disorganizes (the body without organs). I’m touching on A Thousand Plateaus here, so I digress …

Figure Thirty-Four: Disjunctive Syllogism. Image Link.

Paragraph Seven

To clarify the preceding paragraph, Deleuze and Guattari write:

Hence the sole thing that is divine is the nature of an energy of disjunctions. (AO, 13)

As mentioned previously, Schreber has a complex relationship with God because the rays that emanate from his body are legitimately divine. Deleuze and Guattari explain:

Schreber’s divine is inseparable from the disjunctions he employs to divide himself up into parts: earlier empires, later empires; later empires of a superior God, and those of an inferior God. (AO, 13; emphasis mine)

This part is a bit confusing if we don’t consider the first part of the sentence in French, the way it was originally written:

Le divin de Schreber est inséparable des disjonctions dans lesquelles il se divise en lui-même: …

In English, this translates to:

Schreber’s divine is inseparable of the disjunctions through which he’s dividing himself in himself: …

I’m partial to the original French because it explicitly delineates Schreber’s divison of himself in himself, emphasizing that Schreber is constituted by multiple parts (a “litany of disjunctions”), all amalgamating to form his being. His self is consistently segmented and dispersed across the surface of the body without organs; Schreber epitomizes a plethora of disjunctions.

Figure Thirty-Five: Schreber’s Disjunctions. Image Link.

Deleuze and Guattari’s reference Schreber’s self-divisions of himself being that of “earlier” and “later” empires of God is a direct reference to Schreber’s Memoirs of My Nervous Illness. Schreber writes:

These miracles are mostly started by the lower God (Ariman); but I have the impression that these relatively harmless miracles have lately also been practiced by the upper God (Ormuzd); the reason, as mentioned earlier, is that even his hostile attitude towards me has greatly decreased since the steady increase of soul-voluptuousness. (Memoirs of My Nervous Illness, 218)

These Zoroastrian Gods play a role in recording points of disjunction upon Schreber’s body. What is important here is that Schreber finds Ariman, akin to something like the devil in Christianity, to be responsible for certain miracles while finding Ormuzd, akin to God, as being responsible for other miracles. This is important because Schreber’s conceptualization of divinity plays a role in how his reality is perceived. For Schreber, these Gods are very much real — and these Gods reaffirm Schreber’s perception of reality.

Figure Thirty-Six: Ariman. Image Link.

Evidently, Freud studied the case of Schreber, to which Deleuze and Guattari note:

Freud stresses the importance of these disjunctive syntheses in Schreber’s delirium in particular, but also in delirium as a general phenomenon. (AO, 13; emphasis mine)

To best understand this point, we must read the following sentence. Deleuze and Guattari refer to Freud’s 1911 publication Psycho-Analytic Notes on an Autobiographical Account of a Case of Paranoia (Dementia Paranoides), in which Freud states:

A process of decomposition of this kind is very characteristic of paranoia. Paranoia decomposes just as hysteria condenses. Or rather, paranoia resolves once more into their elements the products of the condensations and identifications which are effected in the unconscious. (AO, 13; emphasis mine)

In this section, Deleuze and Guattari are examining how Freud’s analysis examines the disjunctive synthesis and its role in the unconscious. In Freud’s writing, it is evident that Freud is highlighting a distinction between paranoia and hysteria. However, he seems to conclude that paranoia is the result or product of hysteria in some manner. Initially, he defined paranoia and hysteria in this manner:

• Paranoia: Paranoia involves individuals breaking down (decomposing) their experiences into smaller elements, leading to a fragmented perception of reality. This fragmentation results in a distorted perception of reality; thus, resulting in paranoia.
• Hysteria: Hysteria involves the process of condensation and identification. Essentially, individuals experiencing hysteria combine or identify various feelings, thoughts, and experiences with one another, resulting in intense emotions.

However, Freud’s concluding sentence (“Or rather …”) is criticized by Deleuze and Guattari:

But why does Freud thus add that, on second thought, hysterical neurosis comes first, and that disjunctions appear only as a result of the projection of a more basic, primordial condensed material? (AO, 13)

Here, Deleuze and Guattari critique Freud for his prioritization of hysterical neurosis as the primary or standard form of neurosis, from which paranoia (and disjunctions) is seen as a deviation. Rather than adhering to Freud’s rigid interpretation of the unconscious, Deleuze and Guattari find fragmentation of disjunctions as inherent aspects of the unconscious rather than deviations from a unified totality or norm.

Figure Thirty-Seven: Hysteria. Image Link.

Freud’s reductive conceptualization of the unconscious is of concern for Deleuze and Guattari:

Doubtless this is a way of maintaining intact the rights of Oedipus in the God of delirium and the schizoparanoiac recording process. (AO, 13)

The notion of a ‘normal’ unconscious propagated by Freud exists solely in relation to Oedipus. Freud arbitrarily dictates that hysterical neurosis precedes paranoia, thus allowing him to isolate individuals experiencing paranoia as a deviation from the Oedipal model.

At this juncture, Deleuze and Guattari posit some questions:

And for that very reason we must pose the most far-reaching question in this regard: does the recording of desire go by way of the various stages in the formation of the Oedipus complex? Disjunctions are the form that the genealogy of desire assumes; but is this genealogy Oedipal, is it recorded in the Oedipal triangulation? Is it not more likely that Oedipus is a requirement or a consequence of social reproduction, insofar as this latter aims at domesticating a genealogical form and content that are in every way intractable? (AO, 13)

I appreciate how Deleuze and Guattari characterize these disjunctions as “the form that the genealogy of desire assumes,” highlighting that these disjunctions are in a constant state of distributing coordinates in a divine, genealogical manner. However, the challenge lies in examining whether this genealogy aligns with the Oedipal structure. When Deleuze and Guattari mention “Oedipal triangulation,” they are referring to the Mommy-Daddy-Me triangle imposed by Freud’s Oedipus complex. Their final inquiry is somewhat rhetorical, questioning whether Oedipus is the genealogy that desire assumes or socially constructed (they clearly lean towards the latter; I mean, the book is called Anti-Oedipus).

Figure Thirty-Eight: Oedipal Triangulation. Image Link.

Deleuze and Guattari conclude this paragraph by explaining that the schizo is constantly policed by the psychoanalyst because the schizo is not confined to a specific pole that psychoanalysis imposes. They write:

For there is no doubting the fact that the schizo is constantly subjected to interrogation, constantly cross-examined. Precisely because [their] relationship with nature does not constitute a specific pole, the questions put to [the schizo] are formulated in terms of the existing social code: your name, your father, your mother? (AO, 13–14; emphasis mine)

They reference Beckett’s Molloy, where Molloy undergoes interrogation by a policeman who imposes a fixed identity onto him through a series of questions:

“In the course of his exercises in desiring-production, Beckett’s Molloy is cross-examined by a policeman: “Your name is Molloy, said the sergeant. Yes, I said, now I remember. And your mother? said the sergeant. I didn’t follow. Is your mother’s name Molloy too? said the sergeant. I thought it over. Your mother, said the sergeant, is your mother’s — Let me think! I cried. At least I imagine that’s how it was. Take your time, said the sergeant. Was mother’s name Molloy? Very likely. Her name must be Molloy too, I said. They took me away, to the guardroom I suppose, and there I was told to sit down. I must have tried to explain.” (AO, 14)

Figure Thirty-Nine: Policing the Schizo. Image Link.

Paragraph Eight

Psychoanalysis is repetitive. It proceeds by way of Oedipus and crafts interpretations that will always align with Oedipus. Though many contemporary psychoanalysts understand that the Oedipal triangle is not fully adequate to explain the unconscious, they still utilize Freud’s outdated and reductive model. Deleuze and Guattari state:

We cannot say that psychoanalysis is very innovative in this respect: it continues to ask its questions and develop its interpretations from the depths of the Oedipal triangle as its basic perspective, even though today it is acutely aware that this frame of reference is not at all adequate to explain so-called psychotic phenomena. (AO, 14)

In the case of Schreber, they psychoanalyst discards Schreber’s perception of reality and reduces his hallucinations and delirium to dominant representations found in the Oedipal framework:

The psychoanalyst says that we must necessarily discover Schreber’s daddy beneath his superior God, and doubtless also his elder brother beneath his inferior God. (AO, 14)

The psychoanalyst always finds some familial representation behind Schreber’s hallucination — specifically, in this context, his hallucinations of Zoroastrian Gods. The Gods must represent mommy and daddy, brother and sister.

Figure Forty: Zarathustra. Image Link.

Yet, the schizophrenic struggles being confined with the psychoanalyst; by being reduced to the Oedipal triangulation, the schizophrenic acts out. At other times, the schizophrenic follows along while adding their own elements to the game of Oedipus:

At times the schizophrenic loses his patience and demands to be left alone. Other times he goes along with the whole game and even invents a few tricks of his own, introducing his own reference points in the model put before him and undermining it from within (“Yes, that’s my mother, all right, but my mother’s the Virgin Mary, you know”). (AO, 14)

This reference to the Virgin Mary is quite complex. It isolates that the schizophrenic has the capacity to undermine and subvert the structural foundation of Oedipus by equating one’s mother to that of the Virgin Mary. The schizophrenic is able to present other figures into the psychoanalytic discourse (outside of Mommy-Daddy-Me). Nowhere does this imply that being Catholic saves one from Oedipus because Catholicism utilizes the model of Oedipus: God the Father, Mary the Mother. However, the introduction of the Virgin Mary is Deleuze and Guattari’s not-so-subtle hint that psychoanalysis is limited.

Figure Forty-One: Virgin Mary. Image Link.

So … if the schizophrenic is able to subvert the oedipal framework from within, how might Schreber respond?

One can easily imagine Schreber answering Freud: “Yes, I quite agree, naturally the talking birds are young girls, and the superior God is my daddy and the inferior God my brother.” (AO, 14; emphasis mine)

Over time, Schreber (the schizophrenic), gradually assigns multiple meanings to the “symbols” presented in the discourse with the psychoanalyst. This undermines the reduction of everything to Oedipus. Why do the talking birds have to represent young girls? Why does the superior Zoroastrian God have to be my daddy. Why does the inferior Zoroastrian God have to be my brother?

But little by little [Schreber] will surreptitiously “reimpregnate” the series of young girls with all talking birds, his father with the superior God, and his brother with the inferior God, all of them divine forms that become complicated, or rather “desimplified,” as they break through the simplistic terms and functions of the Oedipal triangle. (AO, 14)

The term “reimpregnate” used to describe how Schreber’s initial perception is reintroduced and embedded into the psychoanalysts interpretation is brilliant; because Freud reduces desire to sexual relations, to reimpregnate the psychoanalysts interpretation is a fantastic way to describe this phenomenon.

They end this paragraph with a quote from Artaud:

As Artaud put it:

“I don’t believe in father

in mother,

got no papamummy”

(AO, 14)

Figure Forty-Two: Antonin Artaud. Image Link.

Paragraph Nine

Deleuze and Guattari begin this paragraph by restating what we’ve already known:

Desiring-production forms a binary-linear system. The full body is introduced as a third term in the series, without destroying, however, the essential binary-linear nature of this series: 2, 1, 2, 1. . . . (AO, 14)

In Chapter 1.1, we learned that desiring-production operated in a binary-linear manner. Desiring-machines connect while emitting and interrupting flows. At the ‘end’ of this series, an identity is produced: the full body = the body without organs. Yet, this full body does not disrupt the nature of the binary-linear series. Deleuze and Guattari continue:

The series is completely refractory to a transcription that would transform and mold it into a specifically ternary and triangular schema such as Oedipus. (AO, 14–15)

Here, Deleuze and Guattari are explaining the impossibility of this binary-linear series succumbing to a third term that triangulates this series. This leads us to the question: why does the full body without organs not triangualte the series? Deleuze and Guattari answer:

The full body without organs is produced as antiproduction, that is to say it intervenes within the process as such for the sole purpose of rejecting any attempt to impose on it any sort of triangulation implying that it was produced by parents. (AO, 15)

Figure Forty-Three: Antinéa, “Triangle of truth”, 1948. Image Link.

The antiproductive nature of the body without organs posits the body without organs as fluid and unorganized, perpetually disrupting any form of organization. Consequently, the body without organs cannot be produced by parents since it undermines and dismantles parental structures from the outset.

Deleuze and Guattari (rhetorically) ask:

How could this body have been produced by parents, when by its very nature it is such eloquent witness of its own self-production, of its own engendering of itself? (AO, 15)

The body without organs is the only “witness of its own self-production,” being produced as an identity of this binary-linear series while simultaneously serving as the foundation for this series.

Deleuze and Guattari continue:

And it is precisely here on this body, right where it is, that the Numen is distributed and disjunctions are established, independent of any sort of projection. Yes, I have been my father and I have been my son. (AO, 15; emphasis mine)

As previously mentioned, the energy produced in the first synthesis — known as Libido — gets transformed into Numen in the second synthesis. In quote above, Deleuze and Guattari explain that points recorded on the body without organs are “independent of any sort of projection.” It’s important to note that we haven’t yet reached the subject. At this stage, everything remains pre-personal: pre-subjective and a-subjective. Consequently, the schizo does not differentiate between themselves, their father, and their son. The schizo is all of these individuals at once. The classifications of father and son are projections; the points recorded are independent. (More of this will be explained in Chapter 1.3).

The last sentence of the quote above is a reference to Artaud’s poem Here Lies, written in the late 1940’s, which Deleuze and Guattari cite in the following sentence:

“I, Antonin Artaud, am my son, my father, my mother, and myself.” (AO, 15)

Figure Forty-Four: Maria Wnek, untitled, between 1990 and 1996. Image Link.

At this juncture, Deleuze and Guattari describe how the schizo is situated in relation to the coordinates recorded on the surface of the body without organs. They write:

The schizo has [their] own system of co-ordinates for situating [themselves] at [their] disposal, because, first of all, [they have] at [their] disposal [their] very own recording code, which does not coincide with the social code, or coincides with it only in order to parody it. (AO, 15)

Here, it is demonstrated that the schizophrenic diverges from societal norms by not adhering to the social code. For example, the schizo doesn’t feel compelled to maximize their accumulation of capital simply because society says so. Even if the schizo conforms outwardly, Deleuze and Guattari emphasize that this is only done in a satirical manner. This reminds me of acting; the schizo might mimic capitalist behaviors for the same of amusement rather than genuine belief.

Deleuze and Guattari continue by highlighting the fluid nature of desire and how the schizophrenic disassembles strict codes in favor of fluidity, constantly questioning dominant social structures and challenging their arbitrariness. They write:

The code of delirium or of desire proves to have an extraordinary fluidity. It might be said that the schizophrenic passes from one code to the other, that he deliberately scrambles all the codes, by quickly shifting from one to another, according to the questions asked him, never giving the same explanation from one day to the next, never invoking the same genealogy, never recording the same event in the same way. (AO, 15)

In the final sentence of this paragraph, Deleuze and Guattari explain how the schizophrenic, at times, is forced to adhere to the Oedpial framework. However, throughout this process, the schizophrenic inherently confronts and contests this framework from within. Deleuze and Guattari elaborate on this point by stating:

When [the schizophrenic] is more or less forced into it and is not in a touchy mood, [the schizophrenic] may even accept the banal Oedipal code, so long as [the schizophrenic] can stuff it full of all the disjunctions that this code was designed to eliminate. (AO, 15)

Figure Forty-Five: Maria Wnek, untitled, between 1990 and 1996. Image Link.

Paragraph Ten

Deleuze and Guattari open the concluding paragraph of Chapter 1.2 with a discussion on the artworks of Swiss artist Adolf Wölfli:

Adolf Wolfli’s drawings reveal the workings of all sorts of clocks, turbines, dynamos, celestial machines, house-machines, and so on. And these machines work in a connective fashion, from the perimeter to the center, in successive layers or segments. (AO, 15)

Figure Forty-Six: Adolf Wölfli, “Bangali Firework”, 1926. Image Link.

Figure Forty-Seven: Adolf Wölfli, (find name), No Date. Image Link.

Wölfli’s drawings are eccentric. They are experimental and lack any defined structure. Deleuze and Guattari note that Wölfli’s drawings change as often as Wölfli’s mood changes; and they explain how the drawings are born from recorded points on the surface of the canvas. Deleuze and Guattari explain:

But the “explanations” that [Wölfli] provides for [the drawings], which he changes as often as the mood strikes him, are based on genealogical series that constitute the recording of each of his drawings. (AO, 15)

Furthermore, Deleuze and Guattari highlight the importance of the recording process in Wölfli’s drawings. The recording process is responsible for contours that indicate different meanings or interpretations for the drawings at hand. They state:

What is even more important, the recording process affects the drawings themselves, showing up in the form of lines standing for “catastrophe” or “collapse” that are so many disjunctions surrounded by spirals. (AO, 15)

In this quote, Deleuze and Guattari reference Walter Morgenthaler, a Swiss psychiatrist captivated by Wölfli’s atristry. Morgenthaler extensively explored Wölfli’s works, and in a text titled Adolf Worm, Morgenthaler examined the lines within Wölfli’s drawings, interpreting them as symbols of catastrophe and collapse.

Figure Forty-Eight: Adolf Wölfli, untitled, 1919–1921. Image Link.

Deleuze and Guattari continue:

The schizo maintains a shaky balance for the simple reason that the result is always the same, no matter what the disjunctions. Although the organ-machines attach themselves to the body without organs, the latter continues nonetheless to be without organs and does not become an organism in the ordinary sense of the word. [The body without organs] remains fluid and slippery. (AO, 15)

The portrayal of the schizo struggling to maintain a strict balance illustrates their perpetual state of instability, always challenging the notion of rigidity. Despite attempts to impose order upon the schizophrenic, the schizo consistently resists such organization. This resistance parallels the conceopt of desiring-machines and the body without organs. While desiring-machines seek to organize the body without organs, desiring-machines encounter a counter-fluidity from the body without organs; the body without organs will never be an organism.

When taking a look at the case of Schreber, Deleuze and Guattari note that “agents of production” cling to Schreber’s body”

Agents of production likewise alight on Schreber’s body and cling to it — the sunbeams, for instance, that he attracts, which contain thousands of tiny spermatozoids. Sunbeams, birds, voices, nerves enter into changeable and genealogically complex relationships with God and forms of God derived from the godhead by division. (AO, 15–16)

Within these disjunctions, there exists a divine energy. This divinity is responsible for Schreber’s complex relationship with God. Or rather, society’s complex relationship with a transcendent God. Schreber experiences the attraction of sunbeams to his body, various auditory hallucinations, and sensory disturbances in his nerves. Schreber feels it; Schreber experiences it. Because of this divine energy, it may seem that a transcendent God is involved, but this is inaccurate. This is why it is crucial to remember that the production of recording is not the entire process. Beneath it lies the body without organs:

But all this happens and is all recorded on the surface of the body without organs: even the copulations of the agents, even the divisions of God, even the genealogies marking it off into squares like a grid, and their permutations. The surface of this uncreated body swarms with them, as a lion’s mane swarms with fleas. (AO, 16; emphasis mine)

This concludes Chapter 1.2 of Anti-Oedipus.

Figure Forty-Nine: Lion’s Mane with Fleas. Image Link.

Citation:

• Deleuze, Gilles and Guattari, Félix. (1972). Anti-Oedipus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia. University of Minnesota Press.
• Schreber, Daniel. (1903). Memoirs of My Nervous Illness. New York Review Books.