Oedipus is a limit. But "limit" has many different meanings, since it can be
at the beginning as an inaugural event, in the role of a matrix; or in the middle as
a structural function ensuring the mediation of personages and the ground of their
relations; or at the end as an eschatological determination. Now we have seen
that it is only in this last sense that Oedipus is a limit. This is also the case for
desiring-production. But in fact this last sense itself can be understood in many
different ways. In the first place, desiring-production is situated at the
limits of social production; the decoded flows, at the limits of the codes
and the territorialities; the body without organs, at the limits of the
socius. We shall speak of an absolute limit every time the schizo-flows
pass through the wall, scramble all the codes, and deterritorialize the
socius: the body without organs is the deterritorialized socius, the
wilderness where the decoded flows run free, the end of the world, the
apocalypse. Secondly, however, the relative limit is no more nor less
than the capitalist social formation, because the latter engineers (ma-
chine) and mobilizes flows that are effectively decoded, but does so by
substituting for the codes a quantifying axiomatic (une axiomatique
comptable) that is even more oppressive. With the result that
capitalism—in conformity with the movement by which it counteracts
its own tendency—is continually drawing near the wall, while at the
same time pushing the wall further way. Schizophrenia is the absolute
limit, but capitalism is the relative limit. Thirdly, there is no social
formation that does not foresee, or experience a foreboding of, the real
form in which the limit threatens to arrive, and which it wards off with
all the strength it can command. Whence the obstinacy with which the
formations preceding capitalism encaste the merchant and the techni-
cian, preventing flows of money and flows of production from assuming
an autonomy that would destroy their codes. Such is the real limit.
at the beginning as an inaugural event, in the role of a matrix; or in the middle as
a structural function ensuring the mediation of personages and the ground of their
relations; or at the end as an eschatological determination. Now we have seen
that it is only in this last sense that Oedipus is a limit. This is also the case for
desiring-production. But in fact this last sense itself can be understood in many
different ways. In the first place, desiring-production is situated at the
limits of social production; the decoded flows, at the limits of the codes
and the territorialities; the body without organs, at the limits of the
socius. We shall speak of an absolute limit every time the schizo-flows
pass through the wall, scramble all the codes, and deterritorialize the
socius: the body without organs is the deterritorialized socius, the
wilderness where the decoded flows run free, the end of the world, the
apocalypse. Secondly, however, the relative limit is no more nor less
than the capitalist social formation, because the latter engineers (ma-
chine) and mobilizes flows that are effectively decoded, but does so by
substituting for the codes a quantifying axiomatic (une axiomatique
comptable) that is even more oppressive. With the result that
capitalism—in conformity with the movement by which it counteracts
its own tendency—is continually drawing near the wall, while at the
same time pushing the wall further way. Schizophrenia is the absolute
limit, but capitalism is the relative limit. Thirdly, there is no social
formation that does not foresee, or experience a foreboding of, the real
form in which the limit threatens to arrive, and which it wards off with
all the strength it can command. Whence the obstinacy with which the
formations preceding capitalism encaste the merchant and the techni-
cian, preventing flows of money and flows of production from assuming
an autonomy that would destroy their codes. Such is the real limit.