Research

09.-11. September 2025 * Deleuze and Maldiney, A Phenomenology of Becoming * Conference Deleuze and Phenomenology at Bergische University Wuppertal * Die phänomenologische Forschung an der BUW gehört seit über 50 Jahren zur strahlkräftigsten weltweit. Mit der Gründung der verschiedenen Forschungsarchive und -Bibliotheken seit 2019 hat die Sichtbarkeit dieser Forschung eine neue Stufe erreicht. Diese gelangte 2024 mit der Eröffnung des Archivs für phänomenologische Forschung an ihren bisherigen Höhepunkt. Die Tagung soll im Jubiläumsjahr 2025 dem noch völlig unterbelichteten Verhältnis eines der wichtigsten Philosophen des 20. Jahrhunderts – Gilles Deleuze (1925-1995) – und der Phänomenologie gewidmet werden

Wednesday 2 Jul 2025, 14:15 – 19:00 Campus Woudestein Sanders Building 0.12 * This Summer ESPhil Research Seminar on idealism gathers researchers who have been working on the concepts of nature, technology and politics in idealist thinkers such as Kant, Hegel, and Schelling, as well as the relevance of their thought to the contemporary world. It also marks the first event of the newly established Erasmus Institute for Philosophy and Technology.

Tilling the Ground: On the Creation of AI-Generated Images. * In this talk I explain the creative process of digital image production as a human/non-human interaction that resembles soil cultivation. One hypothesis is that digital technology has established itself as ground in the Kantian sense, as the earthly foundation on which we stand and from which we develop all our knowledge and skills. So, what is the nature of this ground, what is its surface like? Does it resemble a paved road with a fixed infrastructure or the cultivated soil from which something grows? My assumption is that interfaces for digital image production are more than a paved surface with permanently installed infrastructures, but rather resemble a ‘deep surface’. The digital programmes have to be cultivated, so that something new may emerge.

NATURE AND TECHNOLOGY IN IDEALISM * 23 July 2024 | 13:00-18:00 – Polak Building 1-23, Campus Woudestein * This summer seminar gathers researchers who have been working on the concepts of nature and technology in idealist thinkers such as Kant, Hegel, and Schelling, as well as the impact of these concepts beyond the European context, for example, in the Kyoto School. It aims to reflect on the implications of this historical discourse in light of contemporary discussions on the Anthropocene and Planetarization.

The 2024 Deleuze and Guattari Studies Camp will take place in TU Delft from 3-5 July. * The Camp will be devoted to the themes of Intelligence, Instituting and Archiving, allowing however significant room for broad interpretations and experimentation. To foster these experimentations, every day will be structured in four 90-minute plateus, each corresponding to Code, Flow and Stock respectively. The Code instructor will give a kick-off lecture under the broad topic of the day (Instituting/Intelligence/Archiving). The Flow instructors will curate their 90-minute plateau as they see fit (workshop, single long lecture, double short lectures, performance, screening, gaming, etc.). At the end of the day, the Stock instructor will moderate a 90-minute discussion between all the instructors and the participants.

Presentations and Panel with Sjoerd van Tuinen, Samo Tomšič, Claudia Blümle and Katharina D. Martin  * An event in the light of the recently published monograph by Katharina D. Martin »Technik als Problem des Ausdrucks, Über die naturphilosophischen Implikationen technikphilosophischer Theorien« (Bielefeld transcript, 2023)  * Form-taking, as a process of expression, is a technical dimension inherent in nature), this is one thesis on the connection between the philosophy of nature and the philosophy of technology. Accordingly, the theories of technology of Kapp, Deleuze/Guattari and Simondon are particularly convincing because they treat technology as a problem of expression.

Ein Streifzug durch die Abstraktionsebenen digitaler Formen by Katharina D. Martin * The binary system as presented by Leibniz owes its metaphysical appeal to a mathematical universality which is also often incorrectly attributed to digital operationality. The article draws on Friedrich Kittler and Umberto Eco to remind us that digital functionality is based on the conjunction of the binary system and mathematical logic. Strictly speaking, digital machines are part of a complex information technology, based on translation processes and dependent on a code (Joseph Weizenbaum). However, this essay not only explains the underlying operational principle of digital machines, but also introduces digital forms (Yuk Hui) that are existentially linked to our discourses, our way of thinking, and our modes of behaviour. The article does not answer the ontological question of whether the binary/logical machines develop creatively and intellectually –a notion that Dieter Mersch clearly contradicts –but gives us a form-theoretical investigation that visualises digital productivity.

Technik als Problem des Ausdrucks, Über die naturphilosophischen Implikationen technikphilosophischer Theorien by Katharina D. Martin * Formwerdung, als Vorgang des Ausdrückens, ist eine der Natur inhärente technische Dimension – so eine These über den Zusammenhang von Technik- und Naturphilosophie. Demnach überzeugen die techniktheoretischen Überlegungen von Kapp, Deleuze-Guattari und Simondon insbesondere, weil dort Technik als ein Problem des Ausdrucks behandelt wird. Um diesen Gedanken auszuführen, spannt Katharina D. Martin einen Bogen von Lamarck über Schelling und Uexküll bis zu Deleuze. Dabei gelingt es ihr nicht nur, die vielfältigen Diskurse transdisziplinär zu vermitteln, sie führt uns auch zu einem ökologischen und topologischen Denken, das in der Lage ist, die problematische Dimension der Technologisierung unserer Umwelt zu erfassen.

Doctoral exame and disputatio * 24. January 2023 14.00 – 17. 00 * Hochschule für Grafik und Buchkunst Leipzig I am proud and happy to announce that I obtained my doctoral degree in philosophy! My dissertation, an analysis of technology …

K. D. Martin: »Organisation und Konkretion: Technik als das Problem des Ausdrucks in der Philosophie« in Ladewig/Seppi (Eds.) Milieu Fragmente: Technologische und ästhetische Perspektiven, Leipzig.  S. 41-48. Siri, Big Data, affective computing, interconnected bodies—the plethora of heterogeneous fragments that our …

INSIDE OUTSIDE OTHER, THE BODY IN THE WORK OF GILLES DELEUZE AND MICHEL FOUCAULT * Nov 18 – Dec 01, 2013 International Conference organised by Ann-Cathrin Drews and Katharina D. Martin Both Gilles Deleuze and Michel Foucault were intensely engaged …