Mysticism Without Transcendence? Laruelle’s 'Vision-in-One' with Jeremy R. Smith

Key Points

• The episode is a crossover introducing the host's other project, "Left Hand," which explores philosophy, politics, and mysticism, and promotes an upcoming artistic residency called "Vintagia."
• The discussion focuses on François Laruelle's concept of "unlearned knowing" from his work "Vision in One," presenting a radical, immanent mysticism that rejects transcendence, doctrine, and representation.
• Guest Jeremy R. Smith explains Laruelle's "non-philosophy" as a democratic practice that uses philosophy as a material for human needs, rather than subordinating human experience to philosophical systems.
• The conversation explores how Laruelle's thought breaks from traditional mysticism and post-structuralism, emphasizing a direct, solitary human experience foreclosed to conceptual relation and dialectics.

Summary

This special crossover episode of "Acid Horizon" introduces the host's other project, "Left Hand," a platform for conversations at the intersection of philosophy, politics, psyche, and imagination. The host promotes supporter benefits, including early access to content and involvement in a new psychogeographic project, "Vintagia," culminating in an artist residency. The core of the episode is a philosophical discussion with returning guest Jeremy R. Smith, a translator and theorist, focusing on François Laruelle's work "Vision in One" and its central concept of "unlearned knowing."

Laruelle's project proposes a radically immanent mysticism, stripped of transcendence, theological doctrine, and reflective "mirrors." This "unlearned knowing" is a form of knowledge that is foreclosed to relational or conceptual thought, lived immediately without representation. Smith contextualizes this within Laruelle's broader "non-philosophy," which he defines as the use of philosophy as a material for human practices, inverting the traditional hierarchy to insist that "philosophy is made for man." This approach seeks to democratize thought, allowing individuals to utilize philosophical tools without being determined by philosophical systems or universals like History or Power.

The discussion contrasts Laruelle's thought with classical philosophy, Marxism, and post-structuralists like Deleuze and Derrida. Unlike dialectical traditions, Laruelle posits a unilateral relationship where the human "Real" determines thought "in the last instance," remaining fundamentally separate from the circuits of philosophical mediation. Smith and the host trace the personal and intellectual appeal of this project, connecting it to an initial, pre-philosophical intuition of a "secret" or sacred interiority opaque to the world. They examine how Laruelle's mysticism, while rigorous, attempts to theorize access to this experience without requiring scholarly or religious mediation. The conversation also touches on Laruelle's influence on secondary scholars and related concepts in his work, such as his critique of pedagogical reason and his equation of the "world" with "hell," framing human experience as a direct, rigorous science of the real.