Virtuality in the understanding of Gilles Deleuze and Henri Bergson and its role for modern philosophy of information science

The French philosopher Gilles Deleuze (1925–1995) wrote many original works, but one short article, “The Actual and the Virtual,” is, in our opinion, one of the most important. Deleuze’s virtual appears in almost every work, and its influence can be felt everywhere from the idea of singularity to the concepts of differentiation and individuation. That is why the virtual, for Deleuze, is the real, which forms the basis of his philosophical strategy, and where this virtual is opposed not to the real, but to the actual. In other words, Deleuze’s virtual objects are created in perception as memory objects that constitute the object of perception (the actual object). Moreover, according to Deleuze, the unconscious character of his virtual images is probably the greatest obstacle in adapting his theory to the problem of computer-generated virtual worlds. Using the comparative method, virtuality is studied in Deleuze's discussion with Henri Bergson (1859-1941), which is revealed precisely as a process of creative actualization. Unlike the actualization of the possible, which is equivalent to a sudden entry into reality, the actualization of the virtual in Deleuze's sense always occurs through difference, divergence or differentiation. Moreover, for Deleuze, the virtual has the reality of a task that must be accomplished or a problem that must be solved. Therefore, in this article, the author, for the first time, tries to answer the question of whether Deleuze's idea of virtuality can be applied in the philosophy of information science, including for the study of computer virtual worlds. In this case, the main result of the study is the substantiation of the fact that virtuality, both in Deleuze and in Bergson, is an epistemological and not an ontological concept.

Gilles Deleuze, Henri Bergson, virtual, real, current, possible, differentiation, individuation, vital impulse, computer science