The strange temporality of the subject: Badiou and Deleuze between the finite and the infinite.

This paper stages an encounter between the philosophical systems of Alain Badiou and Gilles Deleuze specifically as these relate to the production of subjectivity, or what I call the finite/infinite relation. I attempt to demonstrate that for Badiou a bar of sorts between the finite and the infinite remains determining, whereas for Deleuze – and specifically with his actual/virtual couplet – this bar no longer operates. The paper is at times quite technical in its excavation of the systems in question; however, the introduction and conclusion foreground what is at stake in this confrontation: a certain militant orientation to that which is beyond the world versus an ethical and experimental attitude that is located firmly within the world.Subjectivity (2009) 27, 155–171. doi:10.1057/sub.2009.5 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]