Deleuze is talking about 'life' in an ontological sense. It does not
correspond to a transcendental category like 'spirit', but to a specific
instance or disturbance with its own identity or 'haecceity'. The 'life'
invoked by F's conception of resistance to disciplinary power is, for D., a
discrete capacity or potential which arrises in response to the structure of
biopower itself. That it is extrinsic, or endogenous, confirms its
ontological status. This conception should not be confused with Life in any
humanist sense, wherein a certain moral imperative is tacitly implied, nor
should it be confused with 'life-force' or spirit in any phenomenological
sense. The 'life' Deleuze deduces in Foucault is beyond 'good and evil' in
any Maneachean sense, just as F's notion of resistance is simmilarly devoid
of any implicit ethics or morality. (In F, ethics come from specific
practices of resistance to forms of subjectification; in a disciplinary
society, for example, they might arrise in response to methods of
self-fashioning which attempt to circumvent the prescription of fascistic
power relations [the patriarchal family, the school, etc.]) One should also
be aware that D's take on vitalism is more D than Bergson or indeed Spinoza.
One should also be aware that D is an ultra-materialist, a position within
which he tries to include F as well.
correspond to a transcendental category like 'spirit', but to a specific
instance or disturbance with its own identity or 'haecceity'. The 'life'
invoked by F's conception of resistance to disciplinary power is, for D., a
discrete capacity or potential which arrises in response to the structure of
biopower itself. That it is extrinsic, or endogenous, confirms its
ontological status. This conception should not be confused with Life in any
humanist sense, wherein a certain moral imperative is tacitly implied, nor
should it be confused with 'life-force' or spirit in any phenomenological
sense. The 'life' Deleuze deduces in Foucault is beyond 'good and evil' in
any Maneachean sense, just as F's notion of resistance is simmilarly devoid
of any implicit ethics or morality. (In F, ethics come from specific
practices of resistance to forms of subjectification; in a disciplinary
society, for example, they might arrise in response to methods of
self-fashioning which attempt to circumvent the prescription of fascistic
power relations [the patriarchal family, the school, etc.]) One should also
be aware that D's take on vitalism is more D than Bergson or indeed Spinoza.
One should also be aware that D is an ultra-materialist, a position within
which he tries to include F as well.