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Jacques Camatte​

The core. From the Index and some pages of presentation of the Revue Invariance website​

 Index.​

This site is a place of emergence whe­re one both testifies and listens. ¶ The magazine Invariance has been in existence since 1968. As it now exists on the Internet it might be better suited to speak of it as Radiant Invariance.​

We first referred the concept of Invariance to a theory, and then to a project. We now refer to it as a process of life, which includes theory and project, as well as activity. The invariance we look to formulates and expresses itself in relation to the manifestation of enjoyment.​

To enjoy is to integrate what occurs, what manifests itself in the spontaneity of men and women, of nature, and of the cosmos. It is to fill oneself with what is to come, both the foreseen and the unforeseen, while remaining oneself, both at the level of individuality and of the species.​

Enjoyment is asserted in the joy of living the invariance within becoming.​

What is it that prevents men and women from living this enjoyment and which delivers them into dependence ?​

It is the shutting-in in an out-of-nature becoming that is foun­ded in the break in continuity with nature and with the cosmos, to escape a threat whose reason and fundaments have long been lost, forgotten, scotomized and repressed.​

It is the shutting-in inside a domestication linked to the abandonment of all na­turalness, to a détournement into the artificial — fundaments of parental repression.​

It is the shutting-in in a mode of knowing that primarily seeks to find justification for the wandering that began with the separation from nature.​

It is the shutting-in in a supernature populated with hypostases, entities, in a virtual world, which is a profane form of supernature.​

It is the infernal mechanism which, at the level of the individual (ontosis), as well as that of the species (speciosis), relentlessly ushers in a replay (re-actualization) of the threat along with the terror and fascination generated by the break in continuity.​

Only another dynamic of living, which necessitates a setting in continuity at all levels of reality, can enable access to enjoyment, to invariance in becoming.​

The setting in continuity places us outside of time and space, which are the a priori forms of shutting-in, and brings us to eternity, which is a mode of the manifestation of the totality/cosmos.​

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I have no enemies: the shutting-in is abolished.​

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 Pathway.​

 Point of Departure.​

The starting point of this journey, which is not only unique to me, lies within the deep disarray to be found in the revolutionary movement after World War II, a period considered as one of counter-revolution. Marxism, as expounded by A. Bordiga, appeared to us as the only theory that could explain the future of the species and point to the possibility of putting an end to the oppositions between clas­ses, to exploitation, and therefore to the capitalist mode of production. This possibility was the communist revolution that would end the phase of struggles within the species and allow a reconciliation with nature.​

Thus, the revolution was posited as a human revolution and the party that would, according to theory, have the task of leading it, was to operate in anticipation of communist society by actualising the social brain. This meant that every member of this emerging party had to behave as if the revolution were a fait accompli.​

Following A. Bordiga, we affirmed the invariance of Marxist theory since its emergence in 1848 — the theory of the proletariat — and from there we could attempt to develop all the possible content of the theory.​

Part of the power of the theory lay in its predictive capacity. A revolutionary phase was expected around 1975. The protest movement, the apex of which occurred in May-June 1968, both confirmed and invalidated the forecast and induced a discontinuity. Subsequent events made it possible to highlight the end of the revolutionary process. It became clear that one had to leave this world and enter into another dynamic of life. Then, at the end of the 1970s, into the early 1980s, the potential death of capital was revealed.​

From then on, an historical-theoretical investigation of the human phenomenon became necessary in order to situate the wandering of the species, to understand how the separation from nature and the dynamics that followed from it had come about. In particular, it was necessary to grasp how the development of the dynamic of value and then capital was set in motion, firstly in the West, and then elsewhere. At the same time, it was necessary to make an investigation of the contributions of other geosocial areas to the species’ future. This led to an investigation into the various traumas of the species across different areas. From all this, the emergence of Homo gemeinwesen — the species that will succeed Homo sapiens — could be revealed. It will be in continuity with nature and the cosmos. Its process of knowledge will no longer include a justifying function but will operate solely within the dynamics of enjoyment.​

Initially we operated in a dynamic of struggle and opposition, which aimed at the negation of this world and its replacement with a society that affirmed the true Gemeinwesen of Man (K. Marx). We abandoned it because it was ineffective, and we sought another dynamic of life. This led us to locating the point of departure, the origin of Homo sapiens, and then to perceiving the emergence of another species.​

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 Point of Arrival.​

To put it simply, this is where we have arrived following an examination of developments in the species and a questioning of what lies on the horizon, while also recognising the fact that the individuality of every man and woman has been persistently denied in a process of immense repression.​

The unveiling of ontose-speciosis is essentially characterised by a shutting-in of every form. In this way, the species aims to enclose the entire planet in a complex of concrete, steel, glass, and plastic, in order to shut itself in, to protect itself. But this has only served to set in motion a huge catastrophe and the risk of extinction.​

With this unveiling comes the simultaneous realisation that humans have failed to leave nature. The species has not found safety from nature and has been unable to annul the anguish induced by the threat, which, in its most extreme form, is that of its extinction.​

Ontose-speciosis and the failure to actually escape nature are increasingly revealed by the bankruptcy of the coverings-over, the most powerful of which is capital, which has been potentially dead since the late seventies.​

With virtuality — which is both an autonomous form of capital and its dissolution — the species tries to avoid the threat by plunging into denial.​

The bankruptcy of the coverings-over has also been expressed through theorisations concerning the weakness of God and of nature. The weakness of God, signals the increasing difficulty of carrying out the process of repression induced by the exit from nature. The failure to accomplish the exit from nature, along with the evanescence of men and women — who have been expropriated from their reality — has therefore also expropriated their power. It also expresses itself with the end of production (poiesis) which, spectacularly, was revealed at the beginning of the last century with the readymades.​

To forget and escape the threat, the species launched itself, first in the West, then in the rest of the world, into the exaltation of production (the phenomenon of capital). Subsequently it resorted to consumption, which was finally supposed to appease its anguish by giving it access to enjoyment. But the ‘consumer society’ turns out to be a society marked by the accumulation of waste, delirium, and dissatisfaction — a society in which enjoyment is impossible and where the risk of extinction reimposes itself due to the total asphyxiation of the process of life under the accumulation of all kinds of rubbish.​

To reach the real, and avoid the traps of projection, the species developed experimental science. The goal was ‘disenchantment,’ that is, the demonstration that nature and the cosmos exist in themselves even though they have been the medium for various fantasies, whose hypostases were gods, demons, etc... With experimental science the project was to attain reality. However, at present, scientists are becoming aware of the inaccessibility of ‘reality.’ From then on there tends to develop a rise in various spiritualist and occultist theoristations which are now influencing science itself. As the physicist, Lucio Russo, points out, we are witnessing a phenomenon similar to that which took place at the end of the Hellenistic period with the triumph of the Pax Romana.​

The failure of experimental science or, more exactly, of scientists, is in their wanting to confine reality within an ultimate and unitary explanation: a mo­no­theorism analogous to mono­thei­sm.​

The current state of affairs bears witness to the fact that science itself — like art and literature — has, above all, a covering-over function which often leads back to a shutting-in, even though it is an attempt to break free from the hold of the infernal mechanism, which gave it a liberating character.​

Because reality is inaccessible the species finds itself in a situation comparable to that experienced thousands of years ago: the real is only accessible with the help of invisible beings.​

In other words, the species is now reliving its original dereliction, hence the obsessive affirmation of the mystical moment that allows the blossoming of various mysticisms, the resurgence of shamanism, various cults, etc.​

Through magic, religion, philosophy (or various forms of thought), and then with experimental science, the species has tried to rationalise an irrational that haunts it. The whole pro­cess of knowledge has, in fact, aimed at this goal, along with finding justification and exculpation.​

This irrational was established as a consequence of leaving (cutting off-from) nature and the subsequent, pa­rental repression, which leads everyone to undergo this irrational in the form of lived experience: parents love their children yet, in order to adapt them to a world outside of nature they must harm them by restricting them, harm them and prevent them from accessing enjoyment.​

The re-establishment of the mystical moment indicates that the species — after a long wandering which endorses its failure — finds itself in dereliction with the risk of extinction.​

The process of knowledge, that fundamentally characterizes Homo sapiens has not made it possible to evade the threat to its existence or to heal (to think is to heal) the wound of separation. It is therefore necessary to relive the threat fully, while resuming continuity with the whole phenomenon of life in order to free oneself from it and emerge from it.​

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 Prospect.​

The prospect we have before us involves attaining a way of life where enjoyment is possible and actual thanks to a continuity with the whole process of life, with the cosmos.​

Here is a glimpse of what this entails:​

The manifestation of every man, of every woman, will emerge from an affirmation which is, ultimately, a placing of oneself within eternity. The disappearance of all struggle-against reshapes the domain of negation into one of questioning.​

The disappearance of the threat makes it possible to welcome the unforeseen without being called into que­stion and therefore to be open to what is happening. Astonishment can be considered as the ability to perceive the unforeseen, the new, the not-yet-happened. With ontosed being, stupor, and even fear, are linked to astonishment which is why it almost inevitably generates the question of suffering. In this respect, the coming prospect is to enjoy the unforeseen, the spontaneous, because it fills individuality with a content that gives it ample plenitude.​

Parents accept their child's spontaneity, immediacy and uniqueness, which reinforces an ability to be open to the unforeseen. Repression has disappeared, which was a great source of questioning.​

The acceptance of spontaneity involves the capacity to perceive the obvious which means to live in certainty, and to no longer be mystified by mysteries.​

Men and women participate in the cosmos. They no longer position themselves in a confrontation that results in either the dynamics of domination or that of dependence and which exacerbates a theorizing based on subject and object. If there is participation we no longer pose duality, separability, pa­rochialism; we find ourselves in a mode of listening and openness, with the ever-renewed capacity to under­stand what is happening.​

The mode of manifestion is no longer dominated by adaptation, which implies reaction, but by activity that has the dimension of creation.​

Due to openness, the process of knowledge is characterized by a radiant thought: the exudation of the complete individual-gemeinwesen, which is able to perceive either the immediacy of the (unforeseen) prospect or that which is only accessible after an intense reflective process. Such openness makes it possible to be present at all levels of reality and to overcome obstacles and difficulties.​

The setting in continuity induces the possibility of love in affirming its power of life, a source of joy, enjoyment, and fullness. Now living is to move in the being-having of enjoyment and plenitude.​

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fin 2003 ​

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 Wending.​

 Unfolding.​

From the outset — perhaps — huma­ni­ty has been wandering, leading it to separate itself completely from the rest of nature, which it is destroying; which, synchronized with changes of a cosmic order, as evidenced by climatic fluctuations, leads to the risk of extinction of a large number of species and Homo sapiens itself, and to the realization of a threat it has always felt.​

In the course of this becoming the most horrible aspect has been the devastation of the naturalness both within the species and in the individual — and this is the basis of the present terrible catastrophe: an event that is much more decisive than the previous one, which was out of our hands, because it is possible to stop this extinction, and to reverse the phenomenon, only if a certain naturalness persists within us.​

It is essential to take a different path in order to fully rediscover our naturalness and allow it to flourish.​

To abandon wandering is to place oneself back in eternity and no longer be shut-in within space and time.​

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The photograph indicates the place I am from — a remnant of nature — but each one of us starts from their own position, in order to reach-out and meet others, to walk with them, so as to best realise the inversion necessary for the full and subsequent affirmation of liberation-emergence. The first step along this path leads rightly to our perception of the need for it.​

This journey starts from a man, a wo­man, who can only realize their individuality by rediscovering their communal dimension, which only blossoms in the community, the Gemeinwesen. The individual and the collective are not separated. This is the fundamental inversion that allows us to wend our way.​

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☞ Translator’s notes​

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Traditionally, Camatte's writings have always been copyright free, so many translations of his texts are also copyright free and offered to the world for a process of successive correction and reworking by others, in order to make them more and more faithful to the original French text. This is a process that has already happened, and continues, in the Italian and English translations to be found at Il Covile. This particular translation is offered in the same spirit of collaboration and assistance and to this end we can offer in-process translations of “De La Vie” and “Le Devenir à L’inversion” for anyone interested in contributing to making the post 80s works of Camatte more widely known.​

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1 shutting-in. Camatte’s word is enfermement, which can be translated as confinement, imprisonment, locking-up, or shutting-in. Camatte decided on ‘shutting-in’ as the most appropriate term to use in English.​

2 coverings-over. From the Glossaire: “Recouvrement: Conscious activity which, unconsciously, aims to mask the whole traumatic experience, to cause it to fall into total oblivion.”​

3 prospect. From the Glossaire: “Advenir: The process by which one accesses the fullness of what one wished to reach.”​

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