stankovic, sasa thesis.pdf - Atrium - University of Guelph

something else, a kind of paradoxical non-object object. In chapter 6 I explain in what sense this
Copernican Counter-Revolution forms the basis for Deleuze’s Difference and Repetition.
The Cogito synthesizes the manifold under concepts. The Cogito does so independently
of the manifold. In this way, the Cogito produces objects. For this reason, that is, because the
Cogito produces objects by synthesizing the manifold independently of it, the Cogito is
spontaneous. However, that the Copernican Counter-Revolution is characterized by the interest
of reason in according contingently with the productive aspect of the object in order to develop
itself means that something other than the Cogito forms the beginning of Deleuze’s philosophical
inquiry. The self must be immersed in the object of its inquiry. However, that this is the case
means that the object of its inquiry cannot be what the Cogito conceptualizes. In other words, the
object of the Cogito is not the object of this immersed self. Deleuze calls this self, which is
immersed in its object of inquiry that is not the object of the Cogito, the passive self. However,
this self is not passive in the sense that it is a tabula rasa. Instead, it is important to remember
that it is precisely the Cogito that the passive self is supposed to replace. And just as much as the
Cogito synthesizes, so does the passive self. In other words, the passive self too brings a
synthesis to the table. The difference however is that this synthesis is not conceptual. In fact, the
synthesis of the passive self is qualitatively different than the conceptual synthesis of the Cogito.
That the self is passive means that it does not have the privilege of independence from its object
that the Cogito has. The passive self synthesizes within that which it synthesizes. This means that
the passive self synthesizes sensibly, and even more, Deleuze argues, organically. In this sense,
Deleuze argues, before there can be the spontaneous Cogito that synthesizes conceptually, there
must be some kind of minimal self, if we can even call that a self, that synthesizes sensibly and
organically and in that way gives birth to the Cogito as well as the concept. This grounding of
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