Levi R. Bryant

Bio: Levi R. Bryant is an academic researcher. The author has contributed to research in topics: Ontology & Materialism. The author has an hindex of 6, co-authored 7 publications receiving 1047 citations.

The Democracy of Objects

Abstract: In The Democracy of Objects Bryant proposes that we break with the epistemological tradition and once again initiate the project of ontology as first philosophy. Bryant develops a realist ontology, called -onticology-, which argues that being is composed entirely of objects, properties, and relations. Bryant proposes that objects are dynamic systems that relate to the world under conditions of operational closure.

Difference and Givenness: Deleuze's Transcendental Empiricism and the Ontology of Immanence

Abstract: INTRODUCTION 1. EMPIRICISM AND THE SEARCH FOR THE CONDITIONS OF REAL EXPERIENCE 2. BERGSONIAN INTUITION AND INTERNAL DIFFERENCE 3. TRANSCENDENTAL EMPIRICISM: THE IMAGE OF THOUGHT AND THE PHENOMENOLOGY OF THE ENCOUNTER 4. FIRST MOMENT OF THE ENCOUNTER: THE SENTIENDUM 5. SECOND MOMENT OF THE ENCOUNTER: THE MEMORANDIUM 6. THIRD MOMEMENT OF THE ENCOUNTER: THE COGITANDUM 7. OVERCOMING SPECULATIVE DOGMATISM: TIME AND THE TRANSCENDENTAL FIELD 8. INDIVIDUATION: THE GENESIS OF EXTENSITIES AND THE STRUCTURE-OTHER CONCLUSION REFERENCE MATTER.

Onto-Cartography: An Ontology of Machines and Media

Abstract: This is a study of how space and time create objects, and how these objects interact. Using real-world examples, Bryant shows how a networked concept of space and time is at the heart of our central political concerns. What sort of interaction is there between, for example, slow-moving objects like climate and comparatively fast-moving objects like governments? How can they interact with each other given their very different lifespans? How do the Amish interact with the members of the stock market, and vice versa? How do members of congress, who always exist, interact with the temporally discontinuous objects of Congressional sessions that only meet during a certain session each year - flitting in and out of existence? It proposes a new form of social and political analysis - 'onto-cartography' - that looks at how relations between objects are forged by communication and causation. It draws on the social sciences, geography, new materialist thought and object-oriented ontology.

On Imagined Communities

Abstract: Benedict Anderson’s deservedly famous thesis about the origins and nature of modern nationalism turns around the central notion of an “imagined community.” This category provides him with a matrix out of which one can apprehend-theoretically and historically-the different variants of nationalist discourse formulated over the last two hundred years. We will refer, in the brief comments that follow, to three basic dimensions structuring the fabric of Anderson’s argument: 1) the presuppositions implicit in the notion of an “imagined” community; 2) the kind of substitutability or solidarity which is required to be a member of such a community; 3) the kind of relationship that is established between such a community-which is by definition finite or limited-and its outside. Before that, however, let us describe the main features of Anderson’s thesis.

Process and Reality

Abstract: In discussing the philosophical system put forward in PR, we need to point out that not only does Whitehead introduce a novel terminology, but the work itself is somewhat amorphous in character, and this despite his attempt to state a categoreal scheme — a general scheme of ideas in terms of which all our experience is to be described. There is also a considerable amount of overlap between the various parts of this book. It might have been a clearer and more effective work if Whitehead had engaged in some judicious pruning before publication.

The Democracy of Objects

Abstract: In The Democracy of Objects Bryant proposes that we break with the epistemological tradition and once again initiate the project of ontology as first philosophy. Bryant develops a realist ontology, called -onticology-, which argues that being is composed entirely of objects, properties, and relations. Bryant proposes that objects are dynamic systems that relate to the world under conditions of operational closure.

On assemblages and geography

Abstract: In this paper we explore what assemblage thinking offers social-spatial theory by asking what questions or problems assemblage responds to or opens up. Used variously as a concept, ethos and descri...