Digital networks: between specification and transindividual in the philosophy of Gilbert Simondon.

Sayapin Vladislav Olegovich ORCID: 0000-0002-6588-9192 PhD in Philosophy Associate Professor; Department of History and Philosophy; Tambov State University named after G.R. Derzhavin 392000, Russia, Tambov region, Tambov, Internatsionalnaya str., 33 vlad2015@yandex.ru Other publications by this author

In recent years, there has been a marked increase in interest in the work of Gilbert Simondon (1924-1989) in modern philosophy. If he was once considered one of the most underrated French philosophers of the second half of the 20th century, now his works are actively studied and used to analyze current problems in a wide variety of scientific fields: from the development of technology and the foundations of technical aesthetics to the creation of new ways of cognition and the development of socio-political approaches. In addition, it can be recognized that this original thinker, passionate about technology and possessing a philosophical mindset, left behind a significant and distinctive legacy ^[1,2,3,4]. In the spirit of the French enlightenment, Simondon sought to create a philosophical system capable of responding to the challenges posed by the development of technology and society, cultural change and the evolution of psychology. That is why the Simondonian legacy still serves as a kind of universal set of tools for researchers, allowing them to extract the necessary concepts as needed. Moreover, the main feature of Simondon's approach is the emphasis on individuation as a dynamic process of formation (or ontogenesis) of an individual through interaction with technical, social and material systems. Therefore, in the current digital age, when knowledge is increasingly fragmented and divided into separate areas, his philosophy offers a holistic worldview combining technology, science, psychology and philosophy. At the same time, he formulates the philosophy of emotions, trying to understand the impact of scientific and technological progress on the development of civilizations. His philosophical system, which draws inspiration from both ancient Greek physiology and cybernetics, is a philosophy of singularities. Like the encyclopedists who sought to define the limits of human knowledge, Simondon sees philosophical wonder as a kind of center of an ever-expanding circle of knowledge. This wonder at the mysteries of nature and technological advances prompted him to systematically study the processes underlying their origin and preservation. This article attempts to explore the theory of "digital networks" at the intersection of the concept of "concretization" (as the process of translating abstract structures into material practices) and the concept of "transindividual" (a collective dimension that goes beyond the individual), which opens up new perspectives for the analysis of modern technosocial systems.

It is worth noting that Simondon considered the problem of the individuation of unique beings ^{[5, p.112]}, based on the ideas formulated by such outstanding philosophers as Aristotle, Thomas Aquinas, Leibniz and others. Thus, Aristotle considered the problem of individuation within the framework of his hylomorphic theory (hyle – matter, morphe – form). He believed that this union of potential matter and actual form is able to explain how common forms (entities) are embodied in specific individual entities. For example, a copper statue consists of copper (matter) and the idea of a statue (form). But to explain why two statues made of the same material are different individuals, Aristotle also defines matter as the principle of individuation. That is, the general shape (for example, a copper sphere) can be embodied in a variety of statues, but each of them is unique due to copper, which marks the shape (occupies a different space, unique irregularities, inclusions, etc.). However, "This Aristotelian scheme has no correspondences in the real world: hyle (ὕλη) actually It is never passive (as the carpenter knows, but the philosopher ignores), just as it is wrong to talk about morphe, which simply overlaps with matter without encountering resistance"^{[6, p.47]}. Later, the medieval interpreters of Aristotle, Thomas Aquinas and Duns Scotus, also gained fame for their treatises on the original. Aquinas, following Aristotle, argued that matter is the principle of individuation for corporeal beings. In another case, the principle of individuation is different for disembodied beings (angels). Since they are devoid of matter, their individuation occurs through form. Later Scholastics, such as Duns Scotus, criticized Aquinas' idea of matter as the sole principle of individuation. Scott associated individuation not only with matter and form, but also with the existence of specific, unique and positive things – their "otherness" (haecceitas). "It is the "this" that makes a thing individual, different from other things of this kind"^{[7, p.24]}. In the Modern era, G.V. Leibniz was deeply interested in the problem of individuation. For Leibniz, the concept of "individuation" is associated with the metaphysical uniqueness of existence, expressed in his doctrine of monads and the principle of the identity of indistinguishable^[8]. In other words, individuation, as interpreted by Leibniz– is a metaphysical given, guaranteed by the uniqueness of monads and the divine order. In the 20th century, the founder of analytical psychology, Carl Gustav Jung, developed his own theory of individuation as the central process of the formation of a holistic personality. Unlike Sigmund Freud, who emphasized the role of unconscious drives and childhood traumas, Jung considered individuation as a path to self-realization (or to becoming a self) through the integration of conscious and unconscious aspects of the psyche^[9].

As a result, unlike classical theories, where the individual is considered a static entity. Simondon showed that individuation is a continuous movement in which man, technology and the collective mutually constitute each other. In this case, Simondon rejects the idea of the individual as a ready-made entity. For him, an individual is not only an unfinished process (permanent formation through interaction with the environment: nature, technology and society), but also a transductive transition (or phase shift) ^{[10, p.30]} between phases of existence, where each new phase arises from tension between previous states. In other words, any phases of individuation (physical, biological, mental, collective, technical, and psychosocial) are only temporary and limited realizations of a single cosmological singularity, devoid of subjectivity or a clear starting and ending point. But there is a certain inner energy and dynamics in these phases of the becoming of beings, which Simondon tries to comprehend theoretically^[11]. In addition, in the Simondonian theory of individuation: "... the concepts of substance, form and matter are replaced by more fundamental concepts of primary information, internal resonance, energy potential and orders of magnitude" ^{[10, p.42]}.

So, developing the idea of the functioning of modern digital networks at the intersection of the concepts of "concretization" and the concept of "transindividual", it can be noted, firstly, that concretization based on the theoretical provisions of Simondon^[1] plays an important role in their individuation processes. In this regard, considered as a technical aspect of the genesis of digital networks, concretization is a dynamic process through which these digital networks develop in a similar way to the individuation of a living individual who initially already possess concreteness. That is, in this context, concretization is a technical phase of individuation that seeks to overcome the socio–cultural alienation that has arisen between a person and technical objects of digital networks, such as, for example, big data, computer algorithms or digital platforms. In other words, the concept of "concretization" stands in contrast to critical approaches to scientific and technological progress, which is a factor leading to the alienation of a person from the digital networks created by him. Therefore, based on Simondon's logic, modern specification consists in involving humans in the technical process, while the development of digital networks should be considered as creating optimal conditions for their functioning, similar to the formation of a habitat for living organisms. As a result, digital networks should be viewed not as something complete and unchangeable, but as constantly evolving entities that are formed in the process of concretization. In this context, it is important to understand what distinguishes this concretization process. There are two key aspects. Firstly, in the process of technological development, digital networks show a desire for independence. Accordingly, this is not a cumulative increase in functions, but rather a process in which digital networks themselves are simplified, as the tasks performed by their components (big data, algorithms, and platforms) change. Secondly, digital networks adapt and change due to their compatibility and connectivity.

Here, the desire for specifics acts not only as an incentive for the concretization process, but also as the basis for the emergence of digital networks, which are never absolutely specific. Over time, interacting with the environment and acquiring qualities resembling living things, they gradually lose their artificiality. In this case, the interaction of people and algorithms of digital networks equipped with artificial intelligence takes on the character of mediation, connecting us to new areas and opportunities. In this situation, technical thinking permeates all activities related to digital networks and is itself a form of invention. In addition, this technical idea can be conveyed, and it allows for participation. Moreover, such a concretization of the digital network develops instantly, quantum, abruptly and definitively, leaving behind a duality: the individual and the techno-geographical environment (as in the case of the movement of individuation, which forms a crystal from an oversaturated liquid). As they develop, digital networks and teams create their own environment, which is most suitable when it is both technical and geographical, related to both the field of technology and the world. The term "world" should not be confused with "nature": it has already been comprehended by the inventive human psyche; it is a world perceived from the outside, where potentials have already been declared and linked to human actions. "This double creation of an object and an environment," writes Simondon, "can also be considered as the naturalization of a person; a technical and geographical environment is created between a person and a machine, which becomes possible only thanks to human intelligence"^{[1, p.56]}. That is, the concretizing invention implements a technical and geographical environment that was previously in a certain potency. However, in the future, such an associated environment has become a defining condition for the functioning of digital networks. Therefore, digital networks can exist in the form of elements, individuals, and ensembles.

Thus, digital networks not only appear as the highest stage of the development of technicality, the point at which "the world becomes technicalized"^[4,p.86], but also differ from living beings not through the prism of life impulse, duration and nature of creativity, as Bergson suggests ^[12], but by the degree of cohesion. A living individual never achieves the cohesion and unity of a technical object that "crystallizes" everything he needs from his pre-individual forces (a precondition for both individuation and concretization)^{[4, p.31-32]} and immediately (that is, it is specific from the very beginning). In other words, the genesis of digital networks can be compared with the genesis of living entities to the extent that their individuation represents a "recurrent causality" with the corresponding environment. It follows that digital networks are not just material objects, but all of them resemble humans. That is, what is inside digital networks is always a kind of human reality, a human gesture, fixed and crystallized into its working structures (big data, algorithms and platforms). Moreover, digital networks are delayed, fixed human gestures that have become stereotypes and opportunities for restarts. That's why digital networks are not duplicates of a human hand, but of actions performed by a hand. In addition, if you look at digital networks in the context of their counterparts, it becomes clear that they are connected to them through their origin history. Thus, digital networks themselves are not just specific technical objects, but rather the process of their emergence and development, their evolutionary path.

This story, like the scientific classification of species (phylogenetic systematics), traces the continuous formation of digital networks. It always begins with the appearance of their functional purpose, which initially arise not as some kind of elementary solution, but as a reaction to an important task. At the same time, based on Simondon's logic, it can be argued that invention is not just some kind of soulless act of man, but the ingenuity emanating from the digital networks themselves. From this moment on, the primitive and isolated technical object of digital networks begins to evolve and becomes the ancestor of the entire family, generating a fan of variants of the same principle or combining this principle into new combinations. For example, Big Data is the concrete traces of human activity, the transformation of abstract actions (thoughts, emotions, movements) into digital networks. Another example: a person's digital identity on social media is not static – it evolves through likes, comments, and algorithmic recommendations, forming new phases of their online presence. Such an evolution could be described as a natural technical evolution. However, in this technical evolutionary process, technical memory is more reliable than human memory ^{[13, 14, p.162-187]}. Technical memory stores and repeats everything that is recorded in it, while human memory forgets the content, but is able to restore forms and put into effect new codes. Meanwhile, current models and "ensembles" of digital networks equipped with artificial intelligence allow not only to receive new encodings from people, but are also able to produce them themselves. And this is not surprising, given the enormous scientific and technological progress in modern society in the field of creating artificial intelligence systems - computer algorithms and digital platforms with built–in deep "machine learning" mechanisms.

Secondly, digital networks are also spatial technical objects that are not only intermediaries (interfaces) between humans and the world, but are themselves in transindividual relationships with humans and other technical and natural objects. Therefore, digital networks cannot be considered in isolation from the part of the world that consists of people, natural objects, social contexts, economic conditions, etc. In other words, digital networks contribute to the discovery of a new technical and geographical environment that people share with other people and technical objects. In this regard, digital networks can not only adapt to the anthropological and material conditions of existence (production, consumption or mediation), but also adequately adapt to the task for which they are made. For example, digital network algorithms in the techno-geographical environment act as transindividual actors that form connectivity processes (new forms of sociality) that go beyond the individual, but are not reduced to the "collective" or "universal". In this context, digital networks and social systems not only create a technical and geographical environment for interaction in which energy, information and affects are exchanged, but also in this dynamic environment they develop together, that is, they adapt to each other. Social norms influence the dynamics of digital network design (for example, privacy regulation in social networks), and digital networks, in turn, transform human behavior and institutions. In this case, based on Simondon's ideas, "transindividual relationships" must be clearly distinguished from what we call "interindividual relationships." "The interindividual relationship goes from individual to individual; it does not penetrate into individuals; transindividual action is what makes individuals collectively exist as elements of a system that includes potentials and metastability, expectations and tensions, and then the discovery of a certain structure and functional organization that integrate and resolve this problem of incorporated immanence. The transindividual passes into the individual as from individual to individual; individual personalities are constituted through overlap, not through agglomeration or through specialized organization, just as the division of labor encompasses biological units that are physical individuals in their practical functions. The transindividual does not localize individuals: it forces them to coincide; it forces individuals to communicate with the help of significations; it is the relations of information that are primary, and not the relations of solidarity, functional differentiation" ^{[10, p.214]}.

As a result, transindividual relationships linking together preindividual zones of digital networks, people, and natural objects cannot be understood in accordance with existing representative patterns of thinking. But this is something that can only be experienced as an affect. Therefore, for example, in the description According to Simondon, "transindividual" affect is an embodied indicator of excessive preindividual reality, capable of pushing individuals and collectives beyond the phase threshold to new formations. In this regard, Simondon believes that affect is a disorienting or divisive event in which unfulfilled potentials surface in the techno–geographical environment to enhance the present^{[15, p.8]}. In other words, affects are preindividual forces that exist in a transindividual environment before they are appropriated by an individual. Therefore, for example, emotional collisions that make up the transductive formation of digital identities in social networks (machine-human hybrids) should be understood precisely as such an event of separation, leading to an instant weakening of the grip of the constituted individuality, which calls into question the anthropocentric fiction of a static and isolated human body. However, transindividuality here is nothing more than something that needs to be invented. Moreover, digital networks equipped with artificial intelligence can perform this operation. Because this operation contains something of human existence: unrecognized, materialized, enslaved, but nevertheless human. This "something human" is the digital network's own pre-individual reality, its boundary of uncertainty, including the forces and potentials that this technical object provides to the collective as seeds for future phases of individuation^[16].

So, based on Simondon's theoretical positions, it can be noted that pre-individual forces (or pre-technical forces) in digital networks themselves are always metastable. Such a metastable technical existence contains various voltages and incompatible potentials that have not become technical elements of digital networks. That is, a metastable state is always an incomplete or unstable equilibrium of digital networks that persists until the moment of an external or internal disturbance^[10]. For example, in a socio-technical context, this means, for example, that social networks never have final stability, but exist in a state of continuous formation. It follows that digital networks are metastable temporary technical objects, and their technical trajectories develop as a result of transductive events by integrating and transforming pre-individual elements into new digital networks. In addition, these technical elements (such as Big data, computer algorithms, or digital platforms) are not positive building blocks, but processes of disparity, that is, processes that repeat previous processes with minor differences, making it possible for new digital networks to arise. However, these new digital networks also remain as problematic, temporary, and changing as the previous ones. Therefore, the metastable nature of digital networks is always due to the preservation of a pre-individual load, that is, the presence of a certain potential energy charge exceeding their organizational structure. Here, disparity defines a type of transductive structuring that works by involving two disparate realities in a problematic tension, where the technical element and the digital network, the pre–individual environment and the singularity are all undergoing a similar restructuring.

As a result, a problematic voltage arises, which is resolved through the appearance of a new dimension in the formation of a digital network. Consequently, concretization is always revealed simultaneously as a solution to conflict, the discovery of incompatibility, and the invention of form. Therefore, all digital networks contain an asymmetric imbalance, which causes tension and requires new inventions to maintain their equilibrium. In this case, the technosocial activity of the evolutionary formation of digital networks is inscribed in a certain transductive relationship. The transduction of digital networks is a process in which their technical activities continue in the immediate vicinity by operating and organizing neighboring regions and thus creating new digital networks. These global networks are also temporary associations of heterogeneous technical elements (the Internet, Big Data, algorithms, digital platforms, 5G, artificial intelligence systems of the Internet of Things, etc.). Unlike induction and deduction, transduction is not a theoretical mastery of a situation, but a creative way to solve practical problems by transferring old technical elements to new digital networks and, consequently, changing the elements themselves. Therefore, a transduction is a relational operation whose conditions do not exist before it is performed.: they arise in the process itself.

It can be noted that the inclusion of technical reality in the concept of culture, along with science and the humanities, was one of Simondon's central tasks, since only by taking into account technical existence in thinking could one consider an attitude towards technology that is not alienating or destructive for both people and technical objects. That is why in his works Simondon distinguishes between technicality, that is, what makes technology technical, and utility, that is, what technologies do, which connects them to the needs of individuals and collectives. Technicality refers to the essential nature of technology, which corresponds to the "technical mentality" associated with the internal logic of technical relations. Technicality is manifested not only in every technical device and system, but has also shaped modern culture. Simondon believes that the full development of technicality will lead to the reconciliation of humans and machines in a higher form of society. While we usually consider technology to be useful, Simondon demands what needs to be called an era– the suspension of utility judgments. The explanation of technical functioning should not be confused with human goals, but should be based on the laws of development of an independent "mode of existence" of technology. These laws govern progressive development, culminating today in digital networks, the global technical objects of the digital age. Consequently, digital networks and the ubiquity of so-called "gadgets" bring the issue of technology to the fore. Our relationship to the modern world is not only completely mediated by technical devices, but also, for the most part, mediated by one large device – the Internet, which connects almost all types of human activity.

Thus, despite the fact that an important inspiration that we draw from Simondon is his way of thinking about transindividuality and technology combined, we need to outline some criticism of him. Because his technical mentality clearly underestimated the technical role of man himself and his surrounding natural world.

Firstly, Simondon is brilliant at opening the "black box" of a technical object, but does he see the prerequisites for some kind of technicality in the person himself? Of course, modern anthropotechnics (brain-computer interfaces, neocortical simulations, downloaded mind files, corporations as digital abstractions, etc.) are increasingly being considered only at the beginning of the 21st century. However, the point is not to dismiss Simondon's thinking along with the technologies he comprehended, but to ask if his philosophy of technology helps us understand modern digital technologies. If Zh. Hottois is right, noting that Simondon ultimately does not help modern anthropotechnology^[17]. And this is not because he was unaware of such technological innovations, but only because his theory of concretization of technology remains quite traditional. For example, in support of this, B. Stigler believes that when Simondon postulates the pre-technical origin of human civilization, there are good reasons to follow Leroy-Houran instead and define this civilization as inherently technical^[18].

Secondly, M. Combs also believes that Simondon failed to come up with effective methods that are aimed at certain forms of subjectification and transformation of oneself and the world ^{[19, p.98]}. The examples Combs cites to substantiate his criticism are aimed at ascetic and shamanic techniques of self-knowledge and self-improvement. In our opinion, in order to confirm such criticism, it is necessary to refer not only to self-improvement techniques in general, but also to the consciously constructed techniques described by M. Foucault, as well as to all habit-based skills, starting with walking and the ability to talk. For example, for A. Leroy-Guran, an instrument is the source of a person, and an instrument is possible due to a straight position and a short face, that is, as soon as a person walks and talks. Simondon knew and appreciated Leroy-Gour's earlier works. Perhaps the way subject techniques exist would be anthropologically richer if he could read his fundamental work "Gesture and Password"^[20], published only in 1964.

It can be assumed that from the very beginning of his life, a person is his first tool. And since he does not invent this instrument alone, but acquires it in a transindividual way, his attitude towards it can never be fully conscious, authentic, masterful. Musical or linguistic skills provide clear examples of this. For example, the transductive process of learning to speak a new language or play an instrument includes not only certain instincts formed in childhood, but also "adult" reflections on this process. As we can see, in the field of technical mentality, Simondon's idea of a techno-geographical environment is the most convincing and important idea. In this case, such an orientation to this dynamic environment and to the mediation of a technical facility allows it to overcome the rigid opposition between the natural site and the technological context. Indeed, in the modern technosocial reality, it seems increasingly difficult to draw a clear line between nature and technology, since they have merged into a single techno–natural environment in which nature is conditioned by technology to the same extent as technology is conditioned by nature. Therefore, Simondon provides a very useful description of our life with technical objects that are becoming important cultural amplifiers and regulators in the modern era of digital networks. However, he clearly does not take into account the evasive and uncontrollable aspect of technical facilities, because of which this technique will always be both a danger and a salvation. And it is here that Stigler reproaches Simondon for not considering a technical object to be a pharmacon: a medicine that can also be a poison.