Deleuze’s Relay and Extension of McLuhan: An Ethical Exploration

This article highlights under-articulated resonances between McLuhan and Deleuze—two philosophers of communication. It illustrates how Deleuze actively used McLuhan as a mediator for his philosophical speculation, how he picked up a whole volley of McLuhan's probes and relaunched them in a new direction, giving them a distinct Spinozian ethical undertone. The article indicates with its very texture that bringing the two philosophers together creates a resonating interval in between and serves to shed new light on both philosophers' work. An ethical preoccupation runs through the entire article. After affirmatively critiquing select vectors of influence and extension, the essay also points to directions for further research.I am an intellectual thug who has been slowly accumulating a private arsenal with every intention of using it. In a mindless age every insight takes on the character of a lethal weapon. Every man of good will is the enemy of society. Marshall McLuhan (1987, p. 227)The key thing, as Nietzsche said, is that thinkers are always shooting arrows into the air, and other thinkers pick them up and shoot them in another direction. Gilles Deleuze (1995, p. 118)