What is Philosophy?

What is Philosophy
The French edition
Author	Gilles Deleuze, Félix Guattari
Original title	Qu'est-ce que la philosophie?
Translator	Hugh Tomlinson, Graham Burchell
Country	France
Language	French
Subject	Philosophy
Published	1991 (Les éditions de Minuit, in French) 1994 (Columbia University Press, in English)
Media type	Print (Hardback & Paperback)

What is Philosophy? (French: Qu'est-ce que la philosophie?) is a 1991 book by philosopher Gilles Deleuze and psychoanalyst Félix Guattari.

Background

Deleuze commented in a letter to one of his translators that in What is Philosophy? he was trying to return to "the problem of absolute immanence" and to say why for him Baruch Spinoza is the "prince of philosophers."^[1]

Summary

Deleuze and Guattari deal with the distinction between philosophy and science, arguing that the former deals with concepts and the latter with functions. They discuss the philosophy of science and the philosophy of mathematics.^[2]

Reception

What is Philosophy? became a best-seller in France in 1991. Physicists Alan Sokal and Jean Bricmont write in Fashionable Nonsense (1997) that Deleuze and Guattari's attempt to show how philosophy and science are distinct uses scientific terms such as "chaos" in incorrect or misleading ways. They argue that while some passages of the book seem to discuss serious problems in the philosophy of science and mathematics, they prove to be largely meaningless on close inspection.^[2]

References

Footnotes

Bibliography

Books

Deleuze, Gilles; Joughin, Martin (1990). Expressionism in Philosophy: Spinoza. New York: Zone Books. ISBN 0-942299-51-5.
Sokal, Alan; Bricmont, Jean (1999). Fashionable Nonsense: Postmodern Intellectuals' Abuse of Science. New York: Picador. ISBN 0-312-20407-8.

Gilles Deleuze – Félix Guattari

Category:Gilles Deleuze Category:Félix Guattari

Concepts and theories	Affect Arborescent Assemblage Body without organs Conceptual character Desiring-production Deterritorialization Difference Haecceity Immanent evaluation Individuation Line of flight Minority Molar and molecular Multiplicity Noosphere Plane of immanence Reterritorialization Rhizome Schizoanalysis Society of control Subjectification Transcendental empiricism Virtual

Works by Deleuze and Guattari	Capitalism and Schizophrenia Anti-Oedipus A Thousand Plateaus Kafka: Towards a Minor Literature Rhizome Nomadology: The War Machine What is Philosophy?

Works by Deleuze	Empiricism and Subjectivity Nietzsche and Philosophy Kant's Critical Philosophy Proust and Signs Nietzsche Bergsonism Masochism: Coldness and Cruelty Difference and Repetition Expressionism in Philosophy: Spinoza The Logic of Sense Spinoza: Practical Philosophy The Intellectuals and Power: A Discussion Between Gilles Deleuze and Michel Foucault¹ Dialogues² Superpositions³ Francis Bacon: The Logic of Sensation Cinema 1: The Movement Image Cinema 2: The Time-Image Foucault The Fold: Leibniz and the Baroque Périclès et Verdi: La philosophie de Francois Châtelet Negotiations Essays Critical and Clinical Bartleby, la formula della creazione⁴ Pure Immanence Desert Islands and Other Texts 1953-1974 Two Regimes of Madness

Works by Guattari	Psychanalyse et transversalité Molecular Revolution Desire and Revolution⁵ L'inconscient machinique. Essais de Schizoanalyse L’intervention institutionnelle⁶ Les années d'hiver Pratique de l'institutionnel et politique⁷ Communists Like Us⁸ Molecular Revolution in Brazil⁹ The Three Ecologies Cartographies schizoanalytiques Chaosmose Chaosophy Soft Subversions The Guattari Reader The Anti-Œdipus Papers Chaos and Complexity

Related topics	L'Abécédaire de Gilles Deleuze La Borde clinic A New Philosophy of Society: Assemblage Theory and Social Complexity

¹ with Michel Foucault ² with Claire Parnet ³ with Carmelo Bene ⁴ with Giorgio Agamben ⁵ with Franco Berardi and Paolo Beretto ⁶ with Jacques Arodino, Georges Lapassade, Gérard Mendel and René Lourau ⁷ with Jean Oury and François Tosquelles ⁸ with Antonio Negri ⁹ with Suley Rolnik