dietotzeit

This is an economics of everday life. "[W]hat does an alcoholic call the last glass? the alcoholic makes a subjective evaluation of how much he or she can tolerate. What can be tolerated is precisely the limit at which, as the alcoholic sees it, he or she will be able to start over again (after a rest, a pause . . .). But beyond that limit there lies a threshold that would cause the alcoholic to change assemblage: it would change either the nature of the drinks or the customary places and hours of the drinking. Or worse yet, the alcoholic would enter a suicidal assemblage, or a medical, hospital assemblage" (Deleuze and Guattari).

Today, I am interested in the difference between endings and beginnings, limits and thresholds. We often assume there is no difference between limits and thresholds, we confuse them under the idea of extremes. But extremes are lived at thresholds, they are prepared to cross boundaries and become something else. That is rather different than a limit, which simply says "Here, you will go no futher."

Any thoughts?