This post is a mere documentation of a conversation between me and a stranger I met on the internet. All topical messages are included as they were in the chatbox, with some irrelevant messages omitted. Only minimal grammar correction is done with Grammarly. This conversation started right after the encounter. Both of us only knew about each other from limited self-introductions in the Bio. X stands for me, and L stands for the interlocutor. X: “I’m a Strauss admirer but involuntary Deleuzian” (In Bio) L: Why do you want to resist (Deleuze)? X: The resistance comes from a rather tedious personal journey. In a nutshell, I was (or thought myself) a complete Deleuzian for a couple of years (due to…). Then, I started to sense a somewhat inevitability of myself’s falling into lunacy and nihilism if genuinely following some postmodern theories, especially Deleuzian. Consequently, I’m still agreeing with him positively on many matters regarding our so-be-it modern-postmodern world, but emotionally and normatively more clinging to Leo Strauss. L: I feel like both are valid and kind of complete each other, in a way that we could probably accept the fact that nothing is certain and still have goals to achieve and a reason to wake up. I join Deleuze, as science has proven that our brain changes every day and that how we think is constantly influenced by our surroundings. I think it is a curse that we humans want to put ourselves in a box because we want to know who we are, why, our astrology sign, our MBTI; it's all boxes that we read to get some hint about our personality, while being comforted in the idea that we are not alone. Every individual is different, and some days you feel closer to one or another concept, I guess. X: I was pondering since last night how I should possibly respond to your ideas. As I dare not claim my own understanding of Deleuze is “correct” (or maybe, in fact, to my understanding, there is no such standard for “correctness” for a complete Deleuzian), I dare not claim that I have “correctly” understood your stance. I feel like this is not the right place for rambling on and on. Hopefully, you would agree that the discussion here has its own disclaimer. On balance, my first impression reading your ideas was “this is exactly what I thought (previously and currently),” only that my current stance starts to wobble. My reason for positively agreeing with many Deleuzian concepts is also mostly rooted in the actual (in Deleuzian terms). Honestly, I believe it would be even impossible for someone like myself who has been infiltrated by modern cognitive science, Web 3, math, machine learning, etc., during the early ages of forming a worldview to deny that Deleuzian systems, or more precisely, systems that in a sense pertain to Deleuzian philosophy, have already dwelled in numerous aspects of our reality. To name-drop just a few examples other than the brain you mentioned, I would claim that “math” by itself is ontologically the exact Deleuzian body without organs; and from basic neural networks to the more and more complex LLMs, together with the decentralized web infrastructure, we are also positively getting closer and closer to what a Deleuzian rhizome could be. From a progressive perspective, we may even claim that Deleuzian philosophy is somehow a pragmatic guide to our human practice. However, despite that my worldview itself is largely Deleuzian, the inevitability and banes I reckon lie within the radical extent his philosophy implies. To our practice in reality for now, it’s perfectly fine; and in fact, we are still way too far from a complete Deleuzian society—but that mere potential frightens me. I would wish that I’m wrong about this, but it seems to me that, in simplest words, the Deleuzian understanding of “becoming,” “difference,” and “repetition” implies a complete deconstruction of being (which is indeed what he tried to achieve?). In that case, using your words, accepting “the fact that nothing is certain” is still not enough for a complete/radical Deleuzian—as the premise for “nothing is certain” is admitting there is “something,” some being, which could be constantly changing (or not, depending on different beliefs). Of course, this radical extent that equivalently leads to nihilism probably won’t really befall upon our reality on a large scale, but it’s the implication itself that disturbs me so much. That deconstruction of an ideological being, a transcendental notion, unfortunately, is also secretly present in our daily life—from morals to beliefs, from opinions to stances, etc. Personally speaking, from an individual perspective, I’m all for the idea of “there’s no conflict between Deleuze and Strauss (or premodern/modern/postmodern in general) and we can go along with them”—and I do believe that is all what we can choose to be as modern humans who cannot escape from the modern-postmodern world. But from a normative perspective, our “reconciliation” efforts to keep our poise are within the Deleuzian (or modern-postmodern) framework (or maybe I should not use the term framework as in the Deleuzian universe it should have been already deconstructed lol). And that being said, I found myself having no choice but to admit Strauss’ idea that the problem of modernity (not to mention postmodernism) cannot be solved internally, as we can always claim that “there’s no conflict” (again, it’s a problem of overdosing). YOLO is “good,” until everyone uses it as an excuse for everything; “There’s no conflict” is “good,” until values, identities, opinions, and everything start to be diluted into relativism and nihilism. Anyhow, with all these whimsies laid, from an individual-level and practical standpoint, I’m not against what you said, by all means. It’s already very tedious, and I don’t want to bother you with personal anecdotes that imbued me with these notions. (But I do believe personal experience is highly related to one’s philosophical views—with respect to Deleuze’s death and condemnation to Schopenhauer.) After all, I’m still a modern person practicing modern life, only that emotionally admiring some premodern values and using postmodern gibberish as medicines. I got disturbed by a concert tonight, and my words also tend to diverge a lot. Sorry for that. (I was planning to write some reflection on this matter a while ago. Thanks for prompting me to start! May I have your consent to anonymously include this conversation as a part of the reflection?) L: Don't worry + I appreciate the depth and honesty of your reflection! Of course! You fear that Deleuze's philosophy might lead to a "complete deconstruction of being" (dissolving stable truth and moral foundations), which could eventually lead to Nihilism, but I would say that what Deleuze offers isn't destruction for its own sake. It's an opening, a space for creating life and genuine freedom within ourselves. Living in China, we see firsthand what "being" means when it's strictly defined by the state: being a good citizen, a patriot, a good person. These transcendental ideals that Strauss might see as anchors are also the very things that can possibly justify oppression, censorship, and the silencing of difference. In that context, I would say that Deleuze's radical emphasis on "becoming," "difference," and "multiplicity" is not a path to madness, but a vital antidote. Instead of thinking that deconstruction inevitably leads to nihilism, we might see it as a way to keep life alive, to prevent any single dogma (even the comforting ones) from freezing into tyranny. It's by rejecting one transcendent idea of "truth" that we protect the dignity of individual perspectives, creative thinking, and minority voices. You worry about relativism "diluting" values, but maybe what we need isn't a return to timeless universal values, but rather a practice of creating and negotiating values together (which Deleuze's philosophy actually encourages). After all, fixed universal truths have often justified terrible violence while ethical life grows through dialogue, difference, and adaptation. And yes, it's true, taken to an extreme, Deleuze's thoughts could dissolve everything. But he doesn't say "destroy everything and float in chaos." His idea of the body without organs is not having no organs at all; it's about resisting rigid hierarchy and creating new, more open forms of organization. Likewise, the "rhizome" isn't anarchy; it's a different, more networked, dynamic kind of order. Where centralization and ideological rigidity are powerful forces (like in China), Deleuzian philosophy isn't just abstract; it can be profoundly liberating. It invites us to imagine social forms and technologies that don't revolve around a single center of power. Even the decentralized nature of blockchain, open-source communities, or creative subcultures here can be seen as living Deleuzian experiments. Finally, about Strauss, his call for timeless truths can feel safe, but history proves that timeless truths are often interpreted by those in power. And they easily become tools for exclusion. In contrast, Deleuze doesn't deny ethics or meaning; he rethinks them as processes, as things we build, not inherit. Maybe that's the flexibility we need to live in the global, digital, plural world we actually have. Rather than fearing Deleuze's radicalism, we could embrace it as a method of permanent critique, a way to keep questioning power, keep inventing, and keep life open, especially living inside systems that always want to close it down. X: Just as you did, I’d like to express my appreciation for your responses, too. Where in the world could we possibly encounter some internet strangers to engage in such a conversation? As I’m thinking of maybe bringing in Kojève later on, I found this conversation, also, to some extent, resonating with the basis of the famous debate between Strauss and Kojève that such a conversation is necessitated to be rooted in fundamental mutual respect and willingness, which is something I only experienced with a very few of my friends. That being said, as you may have already noticed, I tend to interject my writing with disclaimers and rationales. While I’m actively learning to contain this habit in some scenarios, I feel like it’s still necessary in this particular case. To my confession, I’m not a classics or philosophy student (yet), and I’ve mostly read mostly second or third-hand literature and a limited amount of originals. On the matter of Strauss, most of my understanding comes from a close friend of mine who studies classics and is, much more than I am, a “real” Strauss practitioner. Therefore, it seems inevitable that “the Strauss” in my mind is a relatively idealized version. While this should be less ideal for a typical academic context, I do think it’s actually suitable for this conversation, as we are both using the understanding of those others to establish our own stances. I don’t want to sound arrogant, but again, I sensed a common ground we share. And I wish I’ll be able to “convince” you (or ideally my words will do for themselves) on this. A couple of weeks ago, I had a three-day seminar/symposium with two of my friends (including the one I mentioned and another who studies math but has experienced some philosophical training, reading Descartes, Wittgenstein, and Heidegger). In fact, back then, I was somehow in your position, mostly defending Deleuze. I would say it’s not that much my stance has radically changed (although it did wiggle here and there), but rather the context and angles have changed. And that is also my reasoning perspective and scaffolding approach, both Deleuzian and Straussian (or any other) philosophy, as well as reading your writing. To what extent Deleuzian or Straussian or Kojèvian (or any other -ian) are we talking about? Personal, communal, social, national, cultural… Heard, learned, understood, agreed, recognized, practiced, spread, enforced… Just to name a few. Although these and their combinations are definitely intertwined with each other, I assert that at least Deleuze would (also, to some extent) agree that it’s still necessary to see the context and angles. (As for Strauss, I’m not sure if this would seem like relativism to him.) Building upon the (if-exists) common ground, I guess we are simply choosing to demonstrate ourselves from two angles. And this makes me feel like I can use some more of my personal history of thoughts—maybe then I’ll be able to show you a more comprehensive pipeline that leads to my current stance. There mustn’t be a “starting point” for one’s history of thoughts. To my knowledge, mine was probably initiated when I unofficially quit school. There were six years in my early education that I attended only around 10% of the collective social life in the Chinese public school. I believe it was precisely during that period that I started to develop the so-called worldview, a liberal-Deleuzian worldview (let’s coin it like this for now). As you may imagine, the last thing a strayed kid would agree with is single-voiced storytelling. Naturally, thanks to not attending school and surfing the web intensely and immensely, I “learned too much” of the other side and became too liberal, in a sense. This liberal I’m speaking of now is not exactly what a grownup would consider in the political context, but rather the denotation of the “liberal.” At the end of the day, expecting such a kid to have an actual political understanding is kind of unrealistic. Anyhow, liberals’ denotation itself inevitably contains some of the “politically liberal,” and I was indeed very much in agreement on the basics of liberal thoughts ever since then. Honestly, no matter how I’m talking about Strauss and Deleuze here, and no matter how the stances may differ from each other, from a practical perspective, I’m already and will continue to be a modern person who believes in the basic liberal ideas and uses them to navigate their personal life. As a matter of fact, Strauss himself would also probably admit that there is no way to actually get back to premodern or to the classic, ancient values—he is also a person living in the modern world, trying his best to offer some alternatives to tackle the problems of modernity. For your information, Strauss himself is a German-Jewish émigré to the US who knows best how demonic oppression could happen. Therefore, his appeal to “getting back to the classics” is more or less addressing the people, the modern citizens, who he believes are susceptible to the manipulation of extremist authorities, and expects the people to regain some strength to distinguish the “good and evil” and defend themselves by re-pondering the “big questions” in one’s own history. Getting back to my little history, as I mentioned a bit, it was the scientific and technological realms that transformed me towards Deleuzian. During those times out of school, computer science, machine learning, and blockchain were my time killers. Although I had no idea of philosophy nor Deleuze at that time, what I learned and practiced from the first place was Deleuzian, in hindsight. Believe it or not, I was even trading cryptos as a kid, knowing nothing about “traditional finance” but haphazardly dived into the ideology of decentralization. In that sense, I was a hundred percent with you… until reality shifted me into an “international” high school, and I became “too liberal,” denotatively and connotatively. It must be the influence of the environment plus my own notions. Nonetheless, the result was… there was a time that I truly believed in relativism and believed everything, every value, every being, every stance, every… has a place and is worth respecting. But it’s simply not true—how can I “respect” Nazi, Holocaust, discrimination, injustice, oppression, etc.? How can I live with what I, and the stance I hold against, simply because my “stance” itself also orders me to be “open and polite and respectful”? Though when I finally bumped into Deleuze, I realized that the disciplines I learned had automatically morphed into a rhizome-like structure in my mind, I have to refuse the ultimate rhizomization of my values and our society. It may seem very childish to be unable to balance what’s “in general” and what’s “outliers,” what’s the difference between some value in their ideal scenario and their practice, what’s the point and necessity of avoiding extremism, especially when it comes to ideology, etc., but somehow, in a pure ideological sense, I was struggling to reconcile with it, even if rationally understanding. Unfortunately or fortunately, on this very level, I may still haven’t “grown up” completely—what I worried about Deleuze and postmodern’s -isms are still the “extreme potentials.” But this time, at least for now, I still believe it’s worth worrying—at least for me—and that I haven’t even started to ramble on the needless-to-say “magic” of neoliberalism and capitalism to turn even Deleuzian into commodities. In fact, from a more tangible perspective, I had a lot of confusion as complications of this central issue (although they can always be attributed to other more “common” reasons as well). As a person learning to code growing up and once leading a national representative in a robotic Olympiad, I lost the purpose of continuing doing so. As a person who refused piano early on but picked up music once again, I struggled to find myself a decent place facing music. As a youth basketball professional who was forced to quit sports for years due to an accident, I was once reluctant to swing on courts. And as a person who once wrote poems on a daily basis, I refused that I “loved it” as an art form, but only “used it” to encode my messages. So on and so forth. I suffered from these “commitment issues,” suffered from constantly becoming without a direction, and suffered from acting as a body without organs—at least the “bad” type of BwO. It must be difficult for many to get what exactly was torturing me, and a part of me also thinks it was too stubborn for me not to be willing to go ease with myself. Nevertheless, from an ideological standpoint, I guess my experience is a perfect demonstration of how things may go wrong when the values (or simply the core) are missing. Back then, when I felt like I could do anything and everything, it also meant I could do nothing; and when I felt like I could be anybody, I was actually feeling like nobody. Of course, we shouldn’t put limits on ourselves or others, and we can do “anything” at large—only if we still do have a core. As only a half-Straussian, that’s all I’m asking for. Frankly speaking, the mere capability of recognizing I was suffering then is already something I “relearned” in this process. For a couple of years, I was always feeling haunted but could never grasp what exactly was the bane. My own words back then were “I’m in pain because I cannot feel my pain.” Therefore, while I totally understand why Strauss may seem to you a “safe choice,” for me, facing Strauss was an absolutely dangerous move. Using Strauss’ term, the state I was in and in general the syndrome of modernity, was like the second cave—we stepped out of Plato’s first allegorical cave and then built ourselves a new one. As a result, naturally being criticized by Strauss brought me the pain but also the sense of living. Painful is delightful, if it’s not too weird. To “wrap this up,” I may start to sneak in a bit more of my idealized Strauss (while I am certain that he meant most of them). It is true that he calls for the comeback of the ultimate values, morals, standards, etc., but it also seems that he doesn’t claim the being to be “the only.” On the contrary, he seems to tempt us to go back to our own culture and find our own answers to the big questions—as long as we are still willing to question. In terms of the protection of philosophers from potential censorship, suppression, and persecution by modern regimes, he also acknowledged the conditional esotericism in which only the “dangerous” content was concealed, and the rest is expected to promote better “enlightenment.” One of the last two things I’d like to share that almost “converted” me into a Straussian was a black swan event that happened on the last day of our three-day seminar. In fact, just before that, on the second night, I was still defending my “complete” Deleuzian stance, based on the “no conflict” notion and a premise that the “complete/extreme Deleuzian dilution won’t take place in reality.” And the goddess of chance proved me wrong. (While I’d love to make my narrative more reasonable and, if not ironically, more respectful, but I have to admit it’s such a mission impossible to use reasonable language to fully capture a lunatic phenomenon.) It was a random encounter between the three of us and a person, a person who seemed “normal” in the first three minutes of the conversation, and who once shared the same international baccalaureate diploma program with us and is in the same college year as we are. But out of the blue, the next half an hour we spent together demonstrated to me what if someone physically, mentally, and ideologically fell into what an extreme Deleuzian would be. If I, from nowhere, have the capability of reciting any three or four minutes of his “discourse,” nothing wrong would be noticed. But if we zoom out the timeline (or maybe the timeline was already broken), we would probably see a literal rhizome with every plausibly reasonable point chaotically connecting to each other. That alone may still seem fine—many people use the vomiting method to write and speak for brainstorming purposes, as long as there is a central message, or even just a snippet of a message or character. But what we witnessed was also a literal BwO—a physical body producing familiar sounds in front of us, but has none of its own message or narrative or identity or being or self other than a body delivered—not even as negative as hypocritical, arrogant, condescending, conceited, aggrandizing, vindictive, and so on (I would be really pleased if these words could apply, that’s at least better than “no being”). And the least thing we realized, after recovering from the encounter, was their physical state, perfectly resembling a substance-abused condition with eyes dribbling, tongue twisting, muscles shivering, and attention seeping—to some extent that we seriously discussed the necessity to call the police. I understand these may be our false attribution out of the shamanic mindset after discussing Deleuze, Strauss, and other modern-postmodern thinkers for three days, understand this section of my writing may appear to be too untenable and even weakens the validity of the rest, and I understand I myself may seem culpable and contemptible making such an “accusation,” but the shock I received was indeed overwhelmingly overwhelming and perfectly matched with this context of discussion, convincing me to include the story. It was just then that I realized that “the extreme Deleuzian state is really impending and may really befall individuals,” and we shouldn’t let it happen. I hope you are not too disturbed as I was back then. The actual last thing I want to share was simply Strauss’ personal being. While we seem (or are forced) to accept that philosophers may not practice their own philosophy and wonderful artists may be notorious persons, I still find those who practice their philosophy the most reputable and favorable. And Strauss is such a person who is very close to the embodiment of his philosophy. At least he tried his very best in this modern world—recommending his favorite student to study with his debate opponent Kojève, open-sourcing all his lectures and lessons to promote the studies, establishing the liberal arts curriculum, practicing his philosophy, and so on and so forth. At the end of the day, our practices in reality may never be “pure,” or to completely realize any one of them, and I personally, to be very honest, can’t live without Deleuze. Looking back, I may say it’s the cause of my pain in a sense, but it’s also part of the basis of my worldview and my cure to modern psychological diseases in my lowest days. We can and can only live in the present, and we should. On the other hand, how we are going to do so is quite an individual matter; mine would be akin to Brahms’ Symphony No. 4, using the past to enter the future.