Divining the World with Joshua Ramey

Episode 22 · August 1st, 2018 · 1 hr 9 mins

About this Episode

American philosopher Joshua Ramey, author of The Hermetic Deleuze: Philosophy and the Spiritual Ordeal, and Politics of Divination: Neoliberal Endgame and the Religion of Contingency, joins Phil and JF to discuss a philosophical project whose implications go deep and weird. In his books and articles, Joshua proffers the vision of a world where divination -- whether or not it is recognized as such -- isn't just possible, but necessary for advancing knowledge, creating art, and forming communities. And his research has revealed that the wardens of our neoliberal order know this all too well. As he writes in an essay discussed in this episode, the mandate of a weird age ought to be clear: "Occupy, and practice divination."

**REFERENCES

Joshua Ramey, The Hermetic Deleuze: Philosophy and the Spiritual Ordeal
Joshua Ramey, Politics of DIvination: Neoliberal Endgame and the Religion of Contingency
Joshua Ramey, "Contingency Without Unreason: Speculation After Meillassoux" (abstract)
Vanessa de Oliveira Andreotti, University of British Columbia, at academia.edu
Fred Moten and Stefano Harney, The Undercommons: Fugitive Planning and Black Study
Deleuze, Nietzsche and Philosophy, Difference and Repetition, and The Logic of Sense
Quentin Meillassoux, After Finitude: An Essay on Contingency
Elie Ayache, The Blank Swan: The End of Probability
Weird Studies, "Does Consciousness Exist?" Parts One and Two