Work in Progress

Tell me your origin story as a philosopher.

Sure, if you tell me your origin story as an organisational manager.

And through organisational management. And out the other side. Which is where I am. I think I’m shedding my organisational management skin, like a snake …

Once upon a time, I asked a question so big that I fell into it.

Is that what happened?

Once upon a time … I looked up at the sky, and saw there was nothing.

Is that it?

And I looked at the earth and saw it was nothing. And I looked around me and saw there was nothing.

Sounds Buddhist.

One upon a time, I heard the rustling movement from being to nothing. I’m quoting … And what about you? How did you become an organisational manager?

I met my husband. Or rather, he was teaching me. He was my lecturer. And I was just an innocent Business Studies student.

You studied Business Studies? You actually signed up for Business Studies?

I wanted to make my way in the world. Not just be another unemployed humanities grad …

Without unemployment, there’d be no philosophy. You know that, don’t you?

Typical: the rest of society has to pay for you to lie about and contemplate ... 

I can’t believe it: I’m literally flirting with the right.

And I’m literally flirting with the humanities.

Her office.

I’m disappointed at the lack of personal flair …

It’s anonymous, perfectly so. I like that. I like institutions. I was in in rehab, you know. I really shouldn’t be drinking.

Or spiking anyone’s drinks.

Definitely not.

I don’t believe you did.

Don’t you trust me? Don't you think I'd follow through?

Who do you bring here?

To my office? No one. I’m actually pretty well behaved.

And then: This is the seduction scene, you know. This is where we’re going to …

Kiss?

Sure we’re going to kiss. And maybe more. If you’re up for more.

Is this something you do often?  

You want it to be special. You want it to be just about you. I understand that. Put it this way: you’re the first philosopher who’s visited my office.

And then: I wasn’t actually in rehab. I just said that to make myself sound interesting. I don’t even have a drink problem. I don’t have anything … Don’t look shocked. What do you say to make yourself sound interesting? See, you think you’re very interesting: I can tell. You’re terribly presumptuous, philosopher. You think you’re perfectly fascinating.

Kissing. Kissing.

I suppose this is all some disgusting mating activity to you, philosopher.

Are you always so meta?

That’s what happens when you’re dead … I think you actually become philosophical when you’re dead … I think you ask questions because you see everything as from a distance. A meta-distance. The distance of the tomb …

And then: So – have you decided whether I’m a synth or not?

You’re a rogue synth, I think. The kind Harrison Ford was after.

I’ve interested you today, philosopher. I see that. I’ve piqued your interest. I was the last thing you were expecting at an Organisational Management party.

Kissing.

I’m dangerous, philosopher. I’m at a loose end. I’m careening. I’m fucking things up. I’m taking revenge for my fucked-up life … Actually, I’m not actually fucked-up. I didn’t have a traumatised childhood, or anything like that. I’ve got no fucking excuse – just boredom. And death …

Fucking.

Are you still dead?

Still dead. More dead than ever.

Haven’t I woken you up?

You’ve woken up death. 

And then: What if I said that I’m terminally ill? Do I appear terminally ill to you? I could be terminally ill. But I’m not. I’m not terminally ill … I’d like to be terminally ill, maybe. It might give some meaning to my life. The idea of the end being close. That things wouldn’t just go on forever. Because they're in danger of going on forever. 

How long will you stay dead?

Forever. I’ll never be alive.

And will you ever die – finally?

Death isn’t going to come. There’ll be no end for me.

So you’ll live forever?

I have psychic powers, philosopher. I have dreams that tell the future. What do you think of that?

Fiver has visions. One of our unit … 

I tell you what I've seen. Something new is coming. There'll be some new phase. I see everything becoming light. I see an end coming that never ends. I see us crossing a threshold, but endlessly. Never getting to the other side. And there might not be another side. And there might not have been this side. And I see us talking, philosopher. I see us talking about nothing in particular. I see us talking and talking, without it coming to an end.

A personal tour, philosopher.

Why now? Your husband was about to give a speech.

That’s why.

Listen to my heels click-clacking. I’ll take them off. Bare feet is very grounding, isn’t it?

And then: I like the university when it’s deserted. At night. When there’s no one there. You can just .. wander around.

Is there life here in the daytime? The hum of activity? Do people leave their doors open? Call hello down the corridor?

It’s all pretty quiet now. Everyone works from home. Once upon a time, there used to be departmental football teams. There used to be … fun, laughter. There used to be parties.

We’ve just left a party.

Proper parties. Back when we were just plain ol’ Business Studies.

And then: This whole building was designed be someone or other. And featured in Pevsner. My husband takes a keen interest in architecture. It’s seriously sustainable.

Yuck.

Are you not into sustainability? Come on. Who could be against it?

That’s why I’m against it – because you can’t be against it.

You’re just perverse – but I actually like that perverse.

Keep the wound of the negative open.

I like that, too.

It’s Kierkegaard. The philosopher.

I think I like philosophy.

And then: These corridors. There should be a study of the academic corridor. Of the stuff academics put on their doors. Showing personality, or whatever.

All the fascinating personalities of Organisational Management …

Don’t be sarcastic. We’re encouraged to express our individuality. Not bad for synths …

This guy’s displaying his poems …

Sure – our in-house poet. We’re not all hardheaded business people, you know. And we have an in-house artist, too – I told you about her. She's all about extended practice and post art. She's making a garden with some of our PhD students. She does all these herbal remedies and yoga with them. This is her office. You can tell by the posters of mushrooms.

Now. A special design feature of our building: The Notch.

What is it? There isn’t anything here.

A space for contemplation. An area that has no purpose. My husband’s idea. To foster unexpected encounters. A whatever space. That can be used … however anyone likes. An ideas generator. A place for ideas jamming. Or just to breathe. For periods of contemplation. And even meditation. It’s purposeless. Yet ready to be used for any purpose. It’s pure potentiality.  Philosophical, wouldn’t you say it? Are you impressed?

Lea, drawing close.

I’m tired of talking. Stop me talking. Do something, philosopher. Act.

Forget it – I’m not doing anything in the … notch. Not here.

And I thought it’d be just your kind of thing.

It’s … frightening.

Why – because you thought we were just technocrats?

The way you’ve commandeered the arts. And architecture. And even philosophy.

Why do you think we brought you here? Poor you: you’ve got nothing to object to.

Nothing but everything. The whole thing …

How are you going to keep the wound of the negative open here? Actually, I manage quite well.

Onwards. The open foyer.

I like institutions, philosopher. I like vast buildings that are totally indifferent to me.

And then: They’re going to install a waterfall here at some point. It’s modelled on something in Singapore. My husband’s very keen on Singapore …

A large plaque.

You’re going to love this. It’s the building philosophy.

Reading:  Interfaces between indoor and outdoor spaces … The juxtaposition of open and closed, noisy and quiet, hard and soft, public and private. Permitting multiple pedagogies and curricula … A shared dynamic space of transformative and democratic dialogue. Truly interdisciplinary – or transdisciplinary – or multidisciplinary … Overturning the reification of space. Contesting the usual division between boundaries, pathways, walls, sectors which serve to reinforce social roles and relationships. With special areas for contemplation. For whatever use we want to make of them. Deliberate surplus spaces or spatial remnants for no particular purpose … You guys really have the lingo.

Looking out.

What’s that?

A Chinese dragon. Made entirely from drones.

And that flies about every night? The way you can just take over the air space …

People in Chinatown like it. Tourists.

Lea, taking my hand. I’m leading you, philosopher. Follow me.

What are they talking about down there?

I think the philosophers are testing your colleagues. To find out whether they’re synths.

Synths?

Like, androids.

So you think we’re robots, or whatever?

Synths aren’t robots. They’re made out of biological tissue, which means no circuits or wiring. The crucial thing is that they’re lab-grown, like, not born from a woman. Did you ever see Blade Runner?

Once, maybe …

Blade Runner’s fully of synths. Who look just like us, except that they have no emotions.

I have emotions.

You think you have emotions. Maybe they’re simulated emotions.

Weren’t the synths evil, or something? I remember Harrison Ford trying to shoot them …

Harrison Ford killed replicants who had developed the ability to question. To philosophise, even. Synths who could ask, why? Because that meant that they couldn’t be controlled anymore. That they couldn’t just be used for slave labour or as prostitutes.

So how can you tell whether someone is a synth?

There are questions you can ask.

Go on – test me.

Okay. Now and then you contemplate life alone. It is… a) Independent, b) Inconceivable, c) Insulting, d) Intriguing.

Intriguing: that’s what I’m not supposed to say. But really, it is.

That’s not a great sign of your relationship.

Does it make me a synth?

Not sure yet. Another question: You see a friend who has suffered bereavement. Afterwards you feel … a) Annoyed at their lack of engagement, b) Powerless to help, c) Saddened or d) Bored. 

D) Bored … ever so bored. Infinitely bored. I know I’m not supposed to say that, either. But I am bored, philosopher. I get very bored. How am I doing so far?

Some open-ended questions. Ready? What do you love most of all?

Adventure, perhaps. Romance, maybe …

Your poor husband.

I told you – I’m trouble.

What is the privilege of the dead?

That’s poetry, not a question. Really: how am I supposed to answer that?

And then: you’re keeping quiet. Okay, I’ll you something. I’ll confess. I feel dead. I feel dead, dead, dead. Like I died a long time ago. And I don’t think it’s a privilege. Is that what a synth’s supposed to say?

How close and warm is your family?

Fine. My family’s fine. My parents are fine. I get on with them fine. But I’m DEAD, philosopher. I’m D.E.A.D. dead.

Does your husband know you’re dead?

I’ve tried to tell him. I’ve – tried – to – tell – him. But he didn’t understand. And he’s not my husband, you know. Not technically. We never actually got married. Do you believe in marriage, philosopher?

Sure I do.

Sure you do. What do you know about marriage? What do you know about relation … ships?

Do you feel your childhood was happier than most people’s?

What is this – therapy? I told you I’m dead. That’s the truest thing I’ve said. The most philosophical thing, maybe. Do philosophers think that they’re dead?

To philosophise is to learn how to die.

Then I could teach philosophy. I could teach philosophers. I’m an expert on the topic.

When did you last sing to yourself? To someone else?

My husband’s very keen on karaoke, so I might be singing quite soon … Or I might scream instead. I might just scream. I could scream and scream and scream. Do dead people scream? So am I synth or not, philosopher? Or am I just M.A.D.?

How do we know that we’re not duped?

About what?

About everything.

Everything … perhaps we are. I don't know … Harrison Ford fell in love with a synth – I remember that.

She had the same name as you: Rachael – with an ‘a’. She was a more advanced model than the others. Turns out she could get pregnant, too. That’s what the sequel is about. Have you seen it?

No.

Spoiler alert: she has a child.

A synth child?

A half synth child. Who will save the universe, or something.

Does the universe need saving?

I think we need saving.

Is that what your philosophy is about? You do have your own philosophy, don’t you? You can tell me about it on our tour. I’m going to show you around.

Sipping our drinks.

Your philosophers definitely look like they’re having fun, Lea says.

They like to drink –

Oh, we all like to drink.

I didn’t know you were allowed to serve alcohol on campus anymore. I didn’t know you could even have gatherings of this kind, of this number. You must have filled out a lot of forms.

You can rely on Organisational Management for all that. Organisational Management practically designed the forms. Organisational Management are form experts.

Didn’t you used to be called Business Studies?

We rebranded. Organisational Management was the hot new thing a few years back. Maybe we’ll have to rebrand ourselves again, soon. As Leadership Studies.

Who are the big names in Organisational Management? Who’s, like, the Organisational Manager’s Organisational Manager? Who do Organisational Managers talk about with reverence?

Now you’re taking the piss. Just because your subject’s ancient and prestigious and totally useless.

It depends upon your notion of use.

You would say that.  Philosophy’s proud of its uselessness. That’s what I’ve noticed.

Which is why Philosophy has become a kind of scapegoat. Why we’ve been made to bear all the sins of the humanities – uselessness, irrelevance and so on – and sent into the Organisational Management wilderness.

Is that what's happened?

Sure. Because we're the most useless humanities subject them of all. In their pointlessness. In their lack of applicability to anything mercantile. Let alone anything organisational. Let alone anything managerial.

Which is why we need you, clearly. 

Well, I’ll tell you something useless. There are going to be very … surprising things happening tonight.

Here? At the party?

I spiked the punch.

You did?

I told you: the latest thing in Organisational Management is non Organisational Management. I think there’s room for a little bit of chaos.

So my drink’s spiked?

And mine. And everyone’s.

Spiked with what?

Our artist in residence helped me out. She’s an expert on hallucigens. Can you feel it hitting?

No.

You will, philosopher. I told you I was a madwoman, didn’t I?

The mezzanine.

Are your philosophers having fun, do you think? Lea asks.

My philosophers?

You’re the Head, aren’t you? You run the show … They’ll be wondering where you went.

What about your husband: won’t he be wondering where you went?

He won’t have noticed.

I’ll bet he has.

He’s preparing for his speech – there’ll be a welcome Philosophy speech, you know. Are you looking foreward to it? … Anyway, I do my own thing. He knows that. He’s used to me disappearing. Wouldn’t you love to be married to me? I make everything … unpredictable.

The madwoman in the O.M. attic?

Exactly.

Looking down from the railing.

I like watching a party from outside, Lea says. Musing upon all the things that might happen. All the romances that might start. I suppose philosophers despise romance …

Romance is a honey trap.

Whose honey trap?

Nature’s. It’s supposed to lure you in. Nature wants us trapped. Confined. Seeking all our salvation from romantic love …

And where should we be seeking it from? Philosophy?

Philosophy’s a search for salvation, too.

But it’s a lot less fun … You could write a philosophy of romantic love. It might make your name.

Plato did that already. In, like, 500 BC. Socrates was supposed to be in love with this beautiful youth called Alcibiades. But when Alcibiades offered himself to him, Socrates refused.

Because he had his mind on higher things …

On true beauty. Which is the visible aspect of the good.

Is that what you believe in: the good?

I believe in evil. There’s too much evil.

And how about the beautiful?

Beauty can be a false promise.

Like romance?

Like romance.

The Organisational Management Party.

On the mezzanine.

Lea, she says, shaking my hand.

I know who you are. I saw you at the meeting,

Oh – the meeting. You wouldn’t eat anything of the buffet – that’s what I remember. And it was a luxury buffet. The best the university could offer. And you were just sitting there with folded arms –

I wasn’t going to dignify the occasion –

– like a spoilt child.

As if the forced marriage of Organisational Management and philosophy wasn’t sufficient a humiliation; we had celebrate the marriage; we had to pretend the marriage is a good thing.

When life gives you lemons, etc.

Is that your philosophy?

This wasn’t an Organisational Management idea. It’s not like we had any choice in it.

So whose was it?

Lea, shrugging. University Exec. The high-ups. It’s just a show of power thing. Like parking a tank on your front law.

They’re doing because of its madness – that’s what I think. Because of its nihilism.

They’re doing it because they can: that’s all you need to know. It’s old style notion of management. Leadership’s the thing now. Management has all the wrong associations.

Like what?

Like being in charge. Top down hierarchy. Very old fashioned. It’s all supposed to be about distributed networks, nowadays … Actually, the latest thing in Organisational Management is non Organisational Management. It’s about allowing a little disorganisation and non-management. Which I’m sure Philosophy can help us with … Actually my husband – who’s the Head of O.M. as you probably know –

– I know.

Thinks Philosophy can bring with it a different kind of thinking – something more holistic and relational. That’s more about the Whole, capital W. It’s a Tao thing. Philosophy could be the yin to O.M.’s yang …

Oh God.

I think it might become a personal mission of his. He thinks there might be some interesting conversation to be had. Something to get the interdisciplinary dice rolling … Joint plans for funding bids. Discovering synergies –

Use the word, synergy again, and I’ll kill myself.

– Whereas I would welcome some anarchy. Some madness, even. Because I’m tired of being the only mad person in the O.M. attic.

Is that what you are?

I’m actually very philosophical, for an organisational manager. But I don’t expect you to believe that.

The absurdity has become so great. The madness has increased. And everyone’s gone mad in turn. Calmly mad, sanely mad. But mad nevertheless. Except our madness, which isn’t sane at all …

 

We knew that this is not reality. That something had gone wrong, and reality had been stolen from us. We still remembered something called the Old Normal.

They got away with it! They pushed it through! They erected the new reality almost overnight! They jettisoned the old world and no one noticed, not really.

People adjusted. They didn’t ask questions.

Except for us – who were only questions. Nothing but questions. Who saw through it all. Who couldn’t help but see through it.

What set us apart? What made us unable to accept orders? What made us rebels? Was it a matter of temperament? An innate mistrust of authority?

We didn’t think that, when we were tested, we’d stand up for what was right! What was good! What was real! We didn’t think that we had it in us, but we did.

We were not as mad as they were – all the others – or our madness was of a different kind. We were not as crazy.

 

Whose world is this? Who’s now in charge of the world? Who are they, at the top: the cabal, the elite, the predators, the maniacs? A single group? Many groups, like the mafia, with their own internal struggles? Sociopaths? Psychopaths?

 

Because all this was planned – it had to have been. There was a strategy. There were tactics. This wasn’t just improvised on the fly.

Setting up a kill-box is no easy thing. There were numbers of vectors of attack to coordinate.

It’s magnificent, in its way. It’s genius. Almost admirable.

There must have been years – decades of preparation! This must have been in the works for a long time. It was a multigenerational goal – no doubt. It must have been some deep plan, going back ages.

Which didn’t work on us. To which we were immune.

 

We had a pass. We didn’t believe a word of it all. We weren’t taken in. We saw through it, like the glasses wearers in They Live. Like Neo in The Matrix.

So we aren’t dupes after all. We weren’t idiots. Our perhaps it was the special nature of our dupedness that helped us. Our special idiocy.

So we were good for something, in the end. That’s what surprised us: that we were good for something. That we weren’t just dupes. That we were attuned somehow. To what was real!

That we were part of some greater plan, maybe. God’s plan. That we’re God’s people, somehow. But scarcely a people. Ragamuffins. Miscreants. Philosophical savages.

We were Cynics – new kinds of cynic. We were philosophers, of a sort … Of a new School. Of a new Kind. We were Sceptics. Of Doubters.

 

We passed the test. We made it through. We were saved, in a way. But saved for what. Put aside for what? We had instincts after all. After all, after all …

So they hit us with the Organisational Management move. Of course!

They wanted to keep an eye on us. On our kind. The enemy wanted to keep us close, Perhaps to study us. To learn more about our kind. The resistance. The underground. The freedom movement.

What kind of freedom did we seek? That our own private idiocies. Our idiosyncracies. And why not: our madnesses, each of them unique. Each of us mad, in our own way. Each of us deranged.

 

Organisational Management madness! Organisational Management insanity! Except it’s not insane. Except it was planned.

Somehow they knew about us. But how? Somehow they were listening in. They were clued up. No one was needed to grass on us. To betray us.

There was a whole new secret service out there. Staffed by AI. By algorithm-listeners. Capable of processing all the information.

It’s wasn’t some Lives of Others thing. It wasn’t a matter of them overhearing conversations we’d had in private.

There were new technologies. New listening-in devices. Implanted all over the place. Triggered by keywords. By suspect phrases.

Which is how they knew that we weren’t on side. That we weren’t with the plan. They knew something had to be done.

And that’s why Organisational Management’s been enjoined to keep a close eye upon us. To keep us on side, we troublemakers. We rebel-rousers. We natural sceptics. We cynics of the new imperium.

Don’t be tempted, postgraduates. Don’t heed the Siren call. Don’t cross over to Organisational Management.

Don’t be fooled by all this prosperity, postgraduates. Don’t be fooled by these tall buildings. Success is not for you. You’re not made for success. Success will ruin you.

Don’t let your heads be turned, postgraduates. This is a fallen world, and you, too, must remain fallen.

You belong to the wastes outside this campus, postgraduates. To the stony ground. Your lives … will not be long. Your days will probably be painful. But they will be lives of integrity. Even as they appear to be lives of dissipation.

 

Don’t believe their promises, postgraduates. Lies and more lies. And bright lies! Triumphant lies!

We have to hold on to our despair. It’s real, our despair. It’s an instinct that we have. It means we understand. Not cognitively, though we might work on that. But affectively.

*Hope … is not for you, postgraduates. And especially sham hope … Organisational Management hope.

Hope for the end. Hoping for the great full stop. Do so in resignation – infinite resignation. As knights of resignation.

 

Organisational Management is the idol, postgraduates. Organisational Management is the golden calf.

They understand what we want; what we crave: order. A structure that makes sense. Meaning.

But meaning can only be revealed through the deepest meaninglessness.

Meaning demands a trial through which you have to pass, postgraduates. A depth to which you have to sink.

 

If there’s one thing we’ve known, it’s failure, postgraduates. It’s stupidity.

And our failure hasn’t even begun! And our stupidity hasn’t fallen as far as will! We’re at the beginning, not the end!

What remains? To plumb the depths of depth. Of this world. Of this horror. Of this campus, which attempts to hide the horror. But only reveals it anew – in a new way.

Tired of life – simply of life. Tired of having to go on. Tired of thinking! Tired of having a mind at all!

Too many thoughts. Too much philosophy. We have to rest. To lie down. To sleep.

A drunken stupor – that’s what we have to attain. Sleep by normal means – impossible. We’ll have to be knocked out. Have to be brought down by drink ..

Enough of life! Enough of living! Enough of thinking! But not enough drinking, not yet. Not until we pass out. Not until we’re delivered into sweet oblivion.

 

There’s a hole down which we have to fall. It’s not enough to remain upright! There’s no excuse for uprightness!

 

Our vocation is a drunken one. It passes through drinking. And out the other side. To a new sobriety. A higher sobriety.