One to N: Girard's Philosophy of Innovation
Only God Goes from Zero to One
*This an adapted version of my essay published in the Journal Contagion
What does a theorist of imitation have to teach us about innovation? What could a thinker focused on the distant past have to offer us in building the immediate future? The answer to both questions, I hope to show, is a significant amount. I aim to rescue and develop a neglected strand of Girardian thought from one of his overlooked essays on a topic seemingly antithetical to imitation: innovation. This task will proceed in five steps. First, I will articulate two contemporary perspectives on innovation, one dominant and one in the minority. Second, I will reconstruct Girard’s historical argument from “Innovation and Repetition” in favor of the minority view and, third, his psychological argument against the dominant view. Fourth, I will show how Girard’s philosophy of innovation sublates crucial features of both poles and provides an alternative mode for conceiving the future.1 Lastly, I will wrestle with an immanent objection that threatens the prescriptive force of his entire argument and, even when reconciled, leads me to depart from Girard’s conclusions, albeit in the most Girardian of ways.
1. Innovation and Imitation
The dominant view of innovation is that it is opposed to imitation. The foundational type of opposition between the two is metaphysical: imitation and innovation are actions different in kind and must be conceived of such. Peter Thiel's famous formulation is representative: certain actions, companies, and countries are innovative, going from “zero to one,” while others are imitative, going from “one to N.”2 This distinction is mostly accepted without question in the social sciences, founding entire disciplines such as innovation studies.3 This near-universal consensus, however, is a modern phenomenon. The Latin innovatio, for example, described innovation as being inseparable from the imitation of the past: the Jews returning to Jerusalem, Job having his wealth restored, or the rebirth of a phoenix.4 The word itself reveals as much. Innovatio is derived by appending the prefix in- (within, from inside) to novitas (novelty). It meant novelty that preceded from within, or: renewal. Under this view, innovation was not about breaking free or starting from a blank slate, zero to one, but rather rescuing and developing an already formed foundation, one to N. Innovation was identical with the imitation and adaptation of that which is essential but has been obscured. Only beginning in the twentieth century is imitation so strongly demarcated from innovation.5
Built on top of this metaphysical opposition is a practical opposition. Not only are the two actions distinct, they are incompatible: the more one imitates, the more one risks eroding one’s ability to innovate. This stronger form of opposition is exemplified by the idea of the “untutored genius” whose source of creativity is solely internal: a fully formed natural endowment not requiring learning nor external inspiration from divinity or nature. This idea gained ascendancy in the 17th and 18th centuries, and proponents believed that imitation of tradition impeded the expression of one’s own innate genius.6 If one wants to write a great book, this idea goes, one ought not read great books for fear that they will crowd out one’s original ideas. Even in the 20th century, Wittgenstein expressed this exact sentiment when he proudly claimed not to have read any Aristotle or engaged deeply with the history of philosophy and considered those who have “academic and therefore unauthentic philosophers.”7 Of course, not all modern thinkers see innovation and imitation as practically opposed in such a strong way.8 But even for most who treat the two as harmonious, imitation tends to be relegated to a secondary afterthought as the mere mechanism by which innovation, the primary source of value creation, spreads. This, then, is the third form of opposition drawn out between the two concepts: a normative one. Imitation is, at best, of secondary value when compared to acts of innovation.
The practical and, to a lesser degree, normative oppositions appear so erroneous as to not warrant serious engagement and more contested (especially by theorists who study innovation) as to not require another rebuttal. What makes Girard’s response to them interesting, however, is their prevalence as the default modality by which practitioners—artists, entrepreneurs, inventors, activists, thinkers, etc.—conceive of innovation. And so, it is because and not despite their obvious unsoundness that makes them interesting to investigate: how could such mistaken ideas be so widely accepted, by the very people who engage in innovation every day nonetheless? Girard’s answer will be that there is a prevalent pathology in modernity that makes people attracted to precisely the exaggerated features of the dominant view. Under this light, the contribution of “Innovation and Repetition” is not just philosophical, rescuing an alternative conception of innovation against robust formulations of the dominant view; it is also cultural-critical, following the odd scent of its exaggerated formulations to uncover a deeper modern pathology.
Against this dominant view, a small minority of modern scholars treat imitation as existing on a continuum with innovation.9 They speak in terms of a dialectic between the two: tradition is made of past innovations, and innovation proceeds through the imitation of tradition. Imitation is harmonious with innovation, not just as an afterthought by which it spreads but as a necessary precondition. Even stronger, the dependency between the two is so constitutive to each that imitation and innovation can’t be delineated—one seamlessly morphs into the other without a clear boundary. For these scholars, we only ever go from one to N; the actions we end up labeling imitation or innovation differ only in degree and not kind. As a first stab, we shall place Girard among this rare minority of thinkers who argue that imitation and innovation exist on a continuum. The first thrust of Girard’s argument, which I will turn to now, is a historical-hermeneutical one. The convincingness of his philosophy of innovation is dependent on the sense it can make out of otherwise puzzling historical phenomena.
2. Industry and the Humanities
The historical backdrop of Girard’s argument is the transition from societies of external mediation, 17th century and prior, to internal mediation, 18th century and later.10 In external mediation, the models whom people imitate are distant. They are distant either because they are historical figures in the past (temporal distance) or because they are contemporaries considered different-in-essence, such as the relationship between lord and subject (social distance). In internal mediation, the models are proximate because they are contemporaries considered more or less equal. “Considered” is emphasized because the point is less about the reduction of real inequality than the expansion of the ideal of equality: the modern billionaire and worker may consider each other more equal than did the medieval lord and subject even if real inequality has not reduced. Another way to describe this transition is that the benchmark against which an individual’s value was measured had shifted: from proximity to a distant figure to distance from proximate peers. To start setting the stage for one of Girard’s central arguments: one particular distant figure whose withdrawal will play a crucial role is the Christian God. And so, this move from external to internal mediation can also be interpreted as the expansion of atheism. Of course, external mediation (in all its forms, religious or otherwise) existed after the 18th century, and internal mediation existed before the 17th. Girard’s point is simply that there has been a relative shift in the dominant mores: imitatio Christi giving way to “Keeping Up with the Kardashians.”
This shift was accompanied by three philosophical changes. First, our relationship towards time changed from being past-focused to present-and-future-oriented. Put differently, our respect for tradition—for past people, events, and accomplishments—waned. This idea flows naturally out of the shift from external mediation (past and present) to internal mediation (only present) which represents a decrease of historical imitation. To imitate someone, for Girard, is an implicit admission that their being is desirable, worthy of imitation. The decline of the imitation of the past, as cause and consequence, reveals the decreased value we attribute to it. Second, the connotations of innovation were rehabilitated from negative to positive. The principal cause of this is a change in the domain which we associate innovation with. Prior to the 17th century, theology and politics were the primary domains of innovation, where it became synonymous with “heresy” and “revolution” respectively.11 After the 18th, the primary domain of innovation was technology, where it called to mind useful inventions.12 The denotative meaning of the word didn’t change, but its connotative aura did and spilled over into domains outside where that aura was formed. This second philosophical change could also be explained through the shift from external to internal mediation. In the external paradigm, one’s value is judged by one’s proximity to a distant ideal (in the case of theology, Christ). Any innovation is, prima facie, deviation and, therefore, bad. In the internal paradigm, one’s value is judged by one’s relative standing against a fluctuating group of peers (in the case of technology, competitors). Any innovation from others is, prima facie, distinction and, therefore, good. This intuition—that there has been a shift from “be like” to “be different from”—sets up the third philosophical change Girard highlights: individualism. The idea here is that we now believe individuals are (or, at least, can be) self-sufficient: even though our value is shown through our difference against others, its source is solely internal. Like the untutored genius, we don’t need to rely on tradition or our proximity to great figures to grant us legitimacy. Self-sufficiency will go on to do much of the work in explaining why innovation becomes exaggerated in modernity, so it makes sense to start fleshing out the specific concept Girard has in mind. As a first pass, Girard is not describing the material self-sufficiency of, say, a homesteader but a social and ontological arrogance that believes oneself to be independent from everyone and everything.
Together, these cultural-philosophical changes accompanying internal mediation set up the modern historical moment with two competing forces on imitation: an increased possibility of imitation combined with a decreased willingness to imitate. The reason for the increase in possibility is straightforward: in external mediation, imitation is unidirectional and stable. One imitates Christ without provoking Christ to imitate. The subject imitates the lord often without even being noticed. In internal mediation, imitation is bidirectional and dynamic: a capitalist firm copying a rival only to have its advantages copied in turn ad infinitum.
The reason for the decrease in willingness stems from each of the three philosophical changes. First, because we aim to be self-sufficient individuals, we feel it shameful to admit any imitation, any dependence on another. In a less individualistically-minded time, it was never a question of whether to imitate but whom to imitate. What was shameful was not the fact of imitation but imitating poor models. Girard suggests that our popular telling of the Renaissance humanists and Protestant reformers as exemplars who broke free from the yoke of tradition to carve their own path betrays this modern myopia.13 Their self-conception was just the opposite. The Protestants hated innovation, which was their main accusation of the Catholics: imposing worldly, pagan elements upon the pure teachings of Christ. Their project is not one of progress but of return. And, of course, the humanists didn’t take issue with the imitation of tradition rather than the lapse from it, specifically from classical antiquity. Second, innovation is now a positive concept to be strived for rather than a negative concept to be avoided. This, in conjunction with the dominant view that imitation and innovation are opposed, compounds the distaste to be “mere imitators.” Third, our models have shifted from distant figures often in the past to proximate rivals exclusively in the present. We more readily imitate the former because their superiority to us is undeniable and the distance prevents the formation of petty rivalries. Imitation does not bring additional shame because, as Girard puts it, “in ‘external mediation,’ either the models have the advantage of being long-dead or of standing so far above their imitators.”14 Proximate contemporary rivals, on the other hand, are more on equal footing with us. Furthermore, whatever advantages they do have could be temporary and surpassable as our stories aren’t over. Open imitation would be an admission that they are superior to us—an admission, unlike in the case of external mediation, we wouldn’t have to make otherwise.15
With these backdrops in place—the transition from external to internal mediation, the three changes in philosophical attitudes, and the two competing forces on imitation—Girard poses the historical puzzle he aims to resolve: innovation is held in such high regard in both industry and the humanities, why has the former engendered such astounding breakthroughs while the latter seems to have stagnated? Even the staunchest critic of industry and defender of the humanities must concede that, relatively at least, the past century will be remembered for its entrepreneurial achievements (the personal computer, commercial space flight, artificial intelligence, consumer appliances, etc.) more so than its cultural ones. Girard’s answer is that different domains in modernity encourage the two competing forces, the increased possibility or the decreased willingness to imitate, in different proportions. If the former gains ascendency, real innovation—innovation that is meaningful beyond the fact that it is new—ensues. If the latter is dominant, fashion—innovations notable mostly for the sake of novelty—follows.
Industry has produced so many real innovations because it alleviates the unwillingness to imitate through the profit mechanism. For Girard, profit is a reality check, an objective way of determining victors and losers amongst competitive firms. This alleviates the unwillingness to imitate because if one is on the losing, less profitable side, one is forced to admit the superiority of the other. Much like external mediation, there’s not a lot of mental gymnastics to be done to convince oneself otherwise, and so there’s no additional shame to imitation. On the other hand, profit encourages imitation because one needs to catch up to competitors even for bare survival; those who don’t, don’t last. Industry is a sobering and ruthless arena where players are so thoroughly shamed that there is no additional shame in being a “mere imitator” for basic survival. This engenders a tremendous amount of brazen imitation and a culture that has normalized it, facilitating a rapid exchange of ideas, mastery, and, eventually, innovation.
In the humanities, Girard observes, such “universally acknowledged means of evaluation are lacking.”16 And so, the decrease in willingness overpowers the increase in possibility of imitation. For reasons we’ve described, “the humility of discipleship is experienced as humiliating” in modernity.17 Where the mechanism to decide between masters and disciples—those with something to teach and those in need of learning—is weak, disciples tend to pursue the obverse strategy to the type of brazen imitation described in industry: negative mimesis or, what Nietzsche termed, ressentiment. Girard explains: they “try to demonstrate their independence by systematically taking the course opposite to that of the” masters.18 The desires to be a self-sufficient individual, to be considered innovative, to not give one’s rivals the homage of imitation is so strong that if our status as “mere” disciple is at all disputable, we would rather renounce the domain of the master even if it goes against our own self-interest in order to preserve our pride. Not unlike Milton’s Satan, we would rather “reign in hell than serve in heaven.”19
What is ironic about this strategy of negative mimesis is that it fails at the very thing it aims to achieve: independence. Negative mimesis is derivative, first, because one is still dependent on the model by being exactly other than what they are. Originality is not independence. It is derivative, second, because there tend to be trends of negative mimesis. Often, one is simply imitating a model who is distancing from the primary model. Not only is negative mimesis not independent; often, it isn’t even original! Girard gives the example of the late-20th century continental intellectual climate which, infatuated with Jacques Lacan’s Écrits as an exemplar of rebellion from structure, “drove everyone to make himself more incomprehensible than his peers.”20 This example goes to show the other major problem of negative mimesis and fashion. Tradition, such as writing with clarity and structure, often exists for good reason. And so, Girard concludes: “the obligation always to rebel may be more destructive of [real innovation] than the obligation never to rebel.”21 We may say, then, that fashion is an immanent failure: conforming to contrarianism, slavishly rallying under the banner of rebellion, and faithfully regurgitating the dogmas of originality.
There are two potential objections one can make to Girard’s historical argument as I’ve reconstructed it. One could reject the premise of the historical puzzle (that industry has been relatively more innovative than the humanities). One may also charge Girard for stating the obvious: encouraging imitation is necessary for real innovation. Even if we grant both charges, the most important contribution to be rescued is the inverse of that obvious observation: the counterintuitive mechanism by which the encouragement of innovation threatens innovation. The surprising conclusion is that it is an excess of freedom and not constraint which thwarts innovation in modernity. This answer to the historical puzzle is Girard’s first argument for the minority view. If the dominant view is correct, we should expect the humanities to have generated more real innovations than industry given its relative lack of imitation. The fact that the opposite is true—the domain which systematically encourages imitation has also generated more innovation—refutes the practical opposition claimed by the dominant view. It also calls the metaphysical and, thus, normative oppositions strongly in doubt: if the two actions are so practically inseparable, are they really different in kind? If not, what would it even mean to prefer one over the other?
3. The Theology of Self
To make the latent premise behind this last question explicit: of the three oppositions, the metaphysical opposition is the foundational one. It is foundational in the sense that if it is shown to be false, the other two distinctions lose solid ground to make any strong claim. To set the ground for Girard’s second, psychological argument, then, I will begin by reconstructing Girard’s own views on this foundational opposition, on whether imitation and innovation are different in kind or just in degree.
Girard begins: “I am not denying the specificity of innovation.”22 That is to say, there’s no denying that certain actions are more innovative than others, that it's often meaningful to distinguish between innovation and imitation. He continues: “I am simply observing that, concretely, in a truly innovative process, it is often so continuous with imitation that its presence can be discovered only after the fact, through a process of abstraction.”23 Whatever distinctions we may draw, however, are just that: useful heuristics which don’t reflect an underlying metaphysical break. In other words, there’s nothing about the nature of the two actions that obliges us to draw this distinction even if it may be often helpful to do so. The actions which we end up labeling “innovative” or “imitative” differ only in degree. To think otherwise would be to fall prey to reification. Take technology as an example. It is apparent that some companies are radically more innovative than others, yet even these firms are mostly built on the technical, organizational, and financial best practices of predecessors. No innovation can be done from a vacuum and thus must involve some degree of imitation. The reverse is also true: no imitation can be adopted without being adapted and thus must involve a degree of innovation. What appears to be imitation in, say, the processes of globalization is never just mere copying; meaningful if initially imperceptible innovations are made by the very act of adapting an existing technology to a new environment. Girard gives examples of how the imitators of one generation become the innovators of the next: Germany to England, America to Europe, and Japan to America. He concludes: “the metamorphosis of imitators into innovators occurs repeatedly, but we always react to it with amazement. Perhaps we do not want to know about the role of imitation in innovation.”24
We are now ready to ask the central question animating Girard’s psychological argument: Why do we not want to know about the role of imitation in innovation? If they are really on a continuum differing only in degree and it's only sometimes a useful heuristic, why does the dominant view reify this binary? Framed positively: why is the modern mind so intent on insisting that true innovation has nothing to do with imitation and instead starts from nothing: ex nihilo, the untutored genius, zero to one?25 The answer is this: if one starts from nothing, then one can claim credit for everything. If the greatness of an innovation cannot be attributed to nature, tradition, tutorship, or divine inspiration, then the source of value must lie in the innovator. Girard concludes: “A complete break with the past is viewed as the sole achievement worthy of a ‘creator.’”26 The key insight here is that the dominant view became popular because and not despite its exaggerated features: “as the passion for innovation intensified, the definition of it became more and more radical, less and less tolerant of tradition, i.e. of imitation.”27
These exaggerated features appeal to a widespread modern pathology, what Girard calls the “theology of self.”28 This theology is nothing other than the prideful yearning for self-sufficiency inflamed in our era of internal mediation and its appearance is inexorably tied to both the ascendance of the dominant view and the retreat of Christianity. Innovation was first popularized in English in a theological context. Contrasted against divine creation, innovation was artificial and, thus, its power was much more limited with its connotations wholly negative. It described the ways man strayed away from divinity and was synonymous with heresy.29 As Christianity waned during the transition to internal mediation, both characteristics of innovation changed. Innovation was no longer the change that strayed away from the good but that which brought us closer to the good. And artificiality was celebrated as man became responsible for his own destiny. As a result, the strength of innovation also ballooned to biblical proportions; it became the motor which directs the course of history. Girard concludes: “the romantic historian puts innovation on a par with foundation and creation itself, the creation ex nihilo, no doubt, that up to that time, had been the exclusive monopoly of the biblical God.”30
The theology of self as well as the dominant view should be read as man’s attempt to usurp the place of God. The former appropriates God’s being of absolute self-sufficiency while the latter captures His ex nihilo creative powers into the artificial force of innovation. One can only understand the exaggerated conception of innovation under the light of an equally exaggerated self-conception that requires confirmation. The desire for innovation is the desire to be the capital-G God. Girard emphasizes what is theologically at stake: “to sin means to think that one can begin something oneself. We never start anything; we always respond.”31 The charge may be stronger than anticipated: to think one can start from nothing may be a sin but why is it equivalent with to sin, that is to say, sin itself? A popular line of theology considers pride to be at the root of all sin, and what is pride if not the belief that one is self-sufficient, with the ability to create ex nihilo? The dominant view of innovation, then, is none other than sin itself, because it is inseparable from the desire to actualize an astronomical, Satanic pride: ye shall be as gods.
This explanation—that modern innovation is motivated primarily by the spirited desire to have one’s self-conception confirmed—elucidates otherwise puzzling phenomena, for example, why some technologists are vocal spokespeople against their own technologies. Why, to pick a recent development, are many who have dedicated their lives to accelerating artificial intelligence also the loudest doomsayers of its apocalyptic consequences? It’s hard to understand this behavior as advancing their own materialistic interests of, say, profit because it cultivates a cultural and regulatory environment hostile to their enterprise. Under the light of pursuing a grandiose self-conception, the motivation becomes clear: the confession of guilt is to claim credit for the sin. To say that one’s life work has the potential to irrevocably alter the course of history (even if negatively) is, after all, to assert that one is powerful enough to bring about such changes.
In summary, Girard’s second argument identifies the psychological origins for why the dominant view is attractive and the minority view is threatening. Under the minority view, to engender real innovation, Girard elaborates, “you have to openly admire the model you're imitating, you have to acknowledge your imitation. You have to explicitly recognize the superiority of those who succeed better than you and set about learning from them.”32 Since this is threatening to our theology of self, the dominant view is a defensive ideology to repress this truth. By strongly demarcating innovation and imitation (metaphysical opposition), painting the two as incompatible (practical opposition), and elevating the former over the latter (normative opposition), not only do we not have to experience the humiliation of discipleship, we can proudly display the absence of imitation as proof that we are superior innovators. Girard shows that the dominant view and the theology of self are isomorphs (in the realm of action and self-conception respectively). That is to say, someone who takes themselves to be self-sufficient would also conceive of their actions as proceeding from zero to one. Conversely, the belief that one innovates ex nihilo reinforces a self-conception of being fully independent from others. To summarize all of this in Girard’s anthropological framework: the expulsion of imitation is the founding murder of modern innovation culture. Imitation is prohibited. Innovation is the ritual of worship. And we are the new gods.
4. Scylla and Charybdis
The two arguments presented so far, however, raise an immediate objection: evidently, imitation does not always lead to innovation. In fact, it often leads to sterile, lifeless reproduction. At best, Girard has shown it to be necessary, but what are the other sufficient prerequisites for real innovation?
The full formulation of Girard’s philosophy of innovation is encapsulated in this one utterance: “The main prerequisite for real innovation is a minimal respect of the past and a mastery of its achievements.”33 There are two points here to be unpacked. First, it is mastery and not imitation that is being prescribed. Why is this distinction important, especially since Girard sees imitation, mastery, and innovation as existing on a continuum? Is there anything notable other than that mastery connotes a stronger command than imitation? What he may additionally have in mind is that just as negative mimesis produces comical failures when one innovates for innovation’s sake, imitating for imitation’s sake produces equally sterile results. Opposites at first glance, both are really motivated by a similar pathology: a radical concern for the model in either seeking distance (innovation) or seeking proximity (imitation). Mastery, on the other hand, is concerned with the object: one masters things, one imitates people. Girard’s choice of language simply echoes the prescription found in his other works: “being rational—functioning properly—is a matter of having objects and being busy with them; being mad is a matter of letting oneself be taken over completely by the mimetic models.”34 Either a fetish or a resentment of the model is limiting, mastery—focusing on the object—gives one the freedom to pick and choose: imitating when expedient, innovating when necessary. Real innovation requires one to be focused with real objects and not with “being different from” nor “being like” people associated with those objects. The real innovator must be open to both discipleship or breaking away from tradition but not have either one as the primary goal. Innovation is a good which cannot be achieved by being aimed at, it must ensue and cannot be pursued.
What makes this orientation of being object-focused possible? The second point is encapsulated in “minimal respect”: minimal, as to not treat the past as unsurpassable; respect, as to see tradition as having something important to teach us. One way to conceive this attitude of “minimal respect” is as a correction of the exaggerated self-conception of the dominant view which can be described as “no respect” for the contributions of others in one’s creation. It also steers clear of the other extreme of “too much respect” that is apparent in examples of sterile, lifeless reproduction. “Minimal respect” reflects a self-conception that recognizes one’s necessary dependence on tradition but also the malleability of that tradition through original contributions of one’s own. This attitude is a middle way between the Scylla of reactionary idolatry and the Charybdis of progressive renunciation.
This full formulation of Girard’s philosophy of innovation reveals the blockers to real innovation in both historical epochs of mediation. During the era of external mediation, when we tend to think of ourselves as a mere function of a great figure, the danger was to veer too close to Scylla. These societies were flooded with sterile and superficial copies punctured by rare innovations whenever an individual—whether by arrogance, necessity, or lunacy—gained the courage to break from tradition. What prevented mastery was the pathology of excess imitation. The philosopher’s role was to delegitimize tradition so that more may feel license to break from it. During our era of internal mediation, when we tend to think of ourselves as self-sufficient individuals, the threat is to chart too close to Charybdis. Our societies are littered with derivative and groundless convulsions demarcated by rare masterpieces whenever an individual—whether through grace or necessity—gains the patience and humility to learn from tradition. What prevents mastery now is the pathology of excess innovation. The philosopher’s role is to elevate tradition to make it seem more worthy of emulation. In the final analysis, then, Girard spills most of his ink rehabilitating imitation only as a corrective measure addressed to our current historical moment. This implies, of course, that there also exist historical moments where even the exaggerated features of the dominant view can serve as a productive, corrective shock (perhaps this is the best way to interpret Zero to One).
In summary, the full formulation of Girard’s philosophy of innovation—to have a minimal respect of the past and a mastery of its achievements—is a balanced view that sublates two extremes. It absorbs the insight from the minority view that real innovation is inseparable from imitation without believing that the latter is enough to engender the former. It preserves the concern that tradition can stifle innovation from the dominant view without abandoning the past altogether.
5. The Force of Innovation
I have finished reconstructing Girard’s argument in “Innovation and Repetition,” that the, what we can call, “form” of real innovation proceeds via and not contra imitation: one to N. But in Girard’s psychological argument for this conclusion, he unknowingly sets up an immanent objection that, if left unreconciled, threatens to unravel the practical force of his entire argument. The objection has to do with the “force” of innovation: what psychological drives must fuel these actions. Recall, Girard believes that the minority view is suppressed despite its truth because the motivation for innovation is to confirm a prideful self-conception. This begs the question if one can so cleanly dispose of the dominant view despite its falsehood, in other words, whether pride is in some sense necessary to fuel innovation as force if not in form. Of course, great innovations have been motivated by simpler or nobler drives. But proponents of this objection can point to the countless empirical examples where an exaggerated self-conception is responsible for acts of world-historic innovation. All the conquerors—be it Alexander, Caesar, or Napoleon—had an innate grandiose self-conception even before accomplishing much. The contemplative life is not innocent of this coupling of innovation and pride either. In the modern period alone one can identify many of its most consequential thinkers—Rousseau and Nietzsche chief among them—as manifesting some form of the theology of self. It perhaps should come as no surprise that the world is shaped by those exact people who are obsessed with making a dent in it in order to confirm their own self-sufficiency. This line of objection would conclude that Girard’s success in showing how pride motivates innovation threatens at least the prescriptive force of his own work: even if innovation does not proceed from zero to one in form, it proceeds through it as force. And thus, we still need to preserve this necessary noble lie.
The first response to this objection is to disagree that it is necessary: just because the two are so often coupled does not mean they must be. After all, there do exist other motivators in the human repertoire, for example, a love of the craft itself or the desire to do good. But even if this is achievable for a lone innovator, the empirical fact alone that all innovative civilizations (be it political, artistic, technological, or commercial) have been marked by inflamed pride should make us highly suspicious that an innovative culture can be formed without it even if a lone innovative individual can.35
Because my departure from Girard will rely on this claim that pride is a necessary feature of innovative cultures, I wish to root it in firmer than empirical grounds, to turn this suspicion into a conviction if not a certainty. I will now show how the constitutive features of pride uniquely position it as a motor of innovation. The definition of pride that I will work with is intuitive: having a delusional conception of one’s place in the world. By place I mean both the causal and moral landscape. That is to say, the prideful person conceives of themselves as being more powerful (causal) and more deserving (moral) than reasonable. An example will flesh out this definition: during the civil war, Julius Caesar attempted a crossing of the Mediterranean on a civilian vessel disguised as one of his own messengers. As the sea and winds became increasingly violent, the captain dared not sail any further. Caesar revealed himself to the captain, and Plutarch records his response:
“Come, good man, be bold and fear naught; thou carryest Caesar and Caesar’s fortune in thy boat.” The sailors forgot the storm, and laying to their oars, tried with all alacrity to force their way down the river. But since it was impossible, after taking much water and running great hazard at the mouth of the river, Caesar very reluctantly suffered the captain to put about.36
Caesar demonstrates here both manifestations of pride. He believed himself destined to rule Rome (“Caesar’s fortune”), that he deserved this exalted and unlikely position. And he believed that by the mere fact that this vessel was carrying him it would make a safe voyage. That is to say, the causal power of Caesar’s destiny is so great that it trumps even the natural laws of the seas. Framed syllogistically: Caesar is destined to make this crossing and rule Rome; Caesar is on this boat; therefore, this boat is destined to make the crossing despite all evidence to the contrary. This exaggerated self-conception is the first and most obvious sense in which pride is delusional: pride minimizes the role of others, the natural world, and even plain luck and exaggerates one’s own agency and worth. The ending to this story reveals another sense in which pride is delusional: it resists falsification. The fact that Caesar failed to make his voyage did not make him question his destiny. But there’s a third sense of delusion that can be gleaned from Caesar’s life if not this particular example: pride resists confirmation. Obtaining the achievements that pride directs him to is never enough to satisfy it, as is the case with so many of these world-historic figures, the goalpost just keeps moving.
This understanding of pride as a delusional (in three senses) conception of one’s place (in two senses) in the world helps us situate Girard’s theology of self. The theology of self is the most exaggerated form of pride because it not only minimizes the role of others to exaggerate one’s own, it recognizes zero worth and contribution from others to attribute singular value and agency to oneself. Girard has shown how this most exaggerated form of pride is an isomorphism of the modern conception of innovation. I will now show how pride in general is uniquely suited to fuel innovation broadly conceived. First, pride is a tremendously strong drive because it relates to one’s social sense of self. Second, because pride is delusional, it is unsatisfiable and, thus, has the “desirable” quality of being infinite. In the case of failure, pride resists falsification and persists. In the case of success, pride resists confirmation and moves the goalpost. In both cases, pride remains the constant, tormenting impulse that spurs the prideful to action. The prideful always believe they deserve more. This mirage-like quality of pride stands in stark contrast to, say, the desire for food or shelter that has clear objects which can, if temporarily, satisfy them. These first two features describe the “force” of pride and render it suited to motivate innovation, especially in times of peace. Indeed, the base drive for self-preservation has been responsible for innovations, but the circumstance which inflames this drive on mass, war, is ill-suited to most species of innovation. Through this comparison, I am trying to tease out that there is a drive just as powerful as the concern for the physical existence of the self but much more consistent because it can be inflamed even outside the limited circumstances when one’s life is under threat and that is pride, the concern for the social existence of the self. The next three features of pride relate to its form. Third, pride is reductive: another way to describe an exaggerated belief in one’s own agency is a reductive view of the true causal factors of phenomena. In the case of Caesar, the role of the sailors, the sea, and luck itself is collapsed into a highly reductive causal story about his own destiny. Agreeing with the Nietzsche of the Untimely Meditations, I take this ability to repress and forget as crucial for world-historic activity because it infuses one with total conviction by blocking out all inconvenient counterfactuals: how rough the seas are, how tired the sailors look, or how mighty the winds blow. The contemplative corollary would be the ability to jam the world into one’s theory in a procrustean fashion. Like Caesar, such an intellectual downplays the inconvenient multicausal nature of phenomena in order to exaggerate the causes their theory holds to be essential. What results can be an illuminating, compelling, if ultimately incomplete picture. Hegel’s philosophy of history comes to mind; many have accused Girard of this as well. The urge towards a “theory of everything” is much closer to the prideful drive of the world-historic conqueror than many would like to admit, and it often leaves just as many ripples in history. The historian of ideas, Mark Lilla, observes: “[Intellectuals] who offer ‘multicausal explanations’—and use phrases like that—do not last, while those who discover the hidden wellspring of absolutely everything are imitated and attacked but never forgotten.”37 Perhaps because of pride’s ability to generate simple narratives, it is, fourth, contagious as the prideful can rope others into their delusions. Caesar making the sailors “forgot the storm” to help him fulfill his destiny would be one example. Steve Jobs’ famous “reality distortion field” through which he would convince himself and others of the feasibility of near-impossible tasks would be the modern equivalent. Belief in certain prideful people is much more contagious than, say, an innate love for philosophy which has to be delicately cultivated and groomed in each individual. This is important for innovation which often requires large-scale collaboration. Last and most importantly, what pride aims at is differentiation. Because the prideful conceive of themselves as inhabiting an exaggerated place in the world, they must confirm this self-conception by demarcating a large part of the world as “mine” in stark contrast to the rest which is “other.” In other words, a powerful causal agent must be able to point to unique effects in the world (actions, achievements, products, etc.) which it holds itself responsible for. Here’s an example. I’ve heard it declared many times in the technology industry: “I want to change the world.” Almost always, I suspect the declarant cares less about changing the world than being the one doing it. What is ultimately attractive about “making an impact” or “leaving a dent in the universe” is to confirm one’s self-conception as a powerful causal agent. I concede, this aim of differentiation does not always result in the novelty characteristic of innovation—I may, for example, mark my territory by doing the same thing as others but bigger/better/faster—but innovation is particularly attractive because novelty makes the process of demarcation easy and allows the prideful to think themselves more responsible for the effect than they really are, that is to say, exaggerate their place in the causal landscape. To summarize this last feature: pride, like innovation, is aimed at establishing oneself against others. While pride does not always aim at innovation, innovation is uniquely suited to the prideful.
Let me be clear on what I have not achieved with this line of argumentation. I have not shown that pride is sufficient for great innovation. Almost always, these exaggerated features of pride lead to comical failure (as it did in Caesar’s attempted crossing). Furthermore, I have not even shown that pride is necessary. Again, I fully concede that innovative individuals have been motivated by other drives. What I have shown are the numerous and unique structural affinities between pride and innovation that make them natural bedfellows. This is simply the more general form of the relationship between the theology of self (the most exaggerated form of pride) and the dominant view (the most exaggerated form of innovation) that Girard himself draws out. The fact that the synergies persist in the general case (albeit in slightly weaker form), combined with the lack of any empirical counterexamples, should give the reader conviction if not certainty that an innovative culture cannot be founded without pride at its core.38
But even if by sheer chance, through a combination of the most unlikely contingencies, an innovative culture were founded without pride, it would generate powerful forces to encourage it. I am embarking on a digression from pride as the force of innovation to its consequence to deepen the problematic. As I’ve discussed, innovation leads to novel differentiation; and an innovative culture, by definition, is one that esteems and celebrates these new differences. From this simple definition alone, we can identify at least three pathways through which such a culture encourages pride. First, differentiation makes the type of pride we have discussed possible. If one grows up in a medieval village only exposed to homogenous farmers, then pride would be limited even in imagining what an elevated place it could inhabit would look like. On the other hand, the vast spectrum of material difference in, say, a commercial society furnishes the imagination with building blocks capable of constructing exaggerated ambitions. Second, innovative cultures legitimize these exaggerated goals. Another way to say that a culture esteems novel differences is to say that it delights in subversion, or, it wants the current order to be disrupted. This legitimizes pride because its goal is nothing other than subversion: pride wants to arrive at a place that it is currently not and has no place in being. In stark contrast to most cultures that tell citizens to observe their place, usurpation is actively encouraged in innovative cultures (at least within the part of the citizenry it wants to be innovative). The fact that you are in a lowly place (zero) currently does not mean you can’t achieve a high place (one) someday, after all, we are told we can go from zero to one. In other words, innovative cultures legitimize dreams of radical transformation even (perhaps, especially) when they are exaggerated. Third, and closely related: because innovative cultures encourage subversion, one can never be sure that one’s exalted place is secure from disruption. Just as you came from nothing to your elevated position, someone who appears innocuous today might usurp your place tomorrow. This develops one of the key features of pride: its inability to be satisfied and tendency to keep moving the goalpost. These three pathways can be summarized as making possible, legitimizing, and developing delusional pursuits of an elevated place in the world. As both force and consequence, then, pride deeply embeds itself in innovative cultures.
This conclusion that I have developed out of Girard’s thinking seems directly opposed to the conclusion he reaches himself: a culture that follows the prideful, dominant conception of innovation will lead to nothing but fashion. This antinomy can be resolved by separating out the form and force of innovation: if one wants to develop an innovative culture, an exaggerated sense of pride must be encouraged (at least in the would-be innovators) as the force of innovation. However, this does not annul Girard’s conclusion that if they also refuse to imitate tradition in the form of their innovation, nothing but fashion and negative mimesis will result. What is required, then, is for innovators to be zero to one in their self-conception, but one to N in their actions. Forcing prideful entrepreneurs to imitate each other through the profit mechanism is one aforementioned example. Imposing a “great books” curriculum upon an arrogant, young intellectual would be the humanities corollary.
I will further flesh out my prescriptions with a hypothetical: if a talented and prideful entrepreneur asked for my mentorship in building a good company (and only if he made it clear he would rather build a good company than live a good life), then the first thing I would do is to further inflame his pride. I would repeat to him lies he has been hearing his entire life that innovation is the only driving motor of civilization, that innovators are different in kind from imitators, that they have something “special” about them: gods amongst mere mortals. I would read to him only idealized biographies of Elon Musk and Steve Jobs and, if he were historically inclined, white-washed apologetics of Caesar and Napoleon. I would make sure he touches no philosophy other than Nietzsche, and no literature other than Homer. I would prevent him from excessive introspection and meditation (almost any amount is excessive for the type of person he needs to become). Instead, I would turn his gaze outward and assure him that all his and the world’s problems will be fixed by his company. Should he ever find this essay, I would dismiss it as the confused musings of a young boy… and he would believe me, for he would have learnt not to ask too many questions about productive myths. Just as important, and much more difficult, is the second step: I would make sure that this pride does not take its natural course and develop into an aversion of imitation. I would ensure that he understands his competitors’ companies better than they do and predecessor technologies like the back of his hand. I would do so by teaching him that innovation precedes through imitation, and I would need to expend magnitudes more effort convincing him of this one uncomfortable truth than all the easily digestible lies combined. In fact, the only hope I would have of convincing such a prideful man to offer the flattery of his imitation would be if he were at his wits end. And so I would daily pray that he experiences failures that shame him enough where he feels no additional shame in being a brazen imitator, but not too much as to unravel his ego… All the while, I would be patiently but eagerly waiting for him to plead: “I am ready to live a good life.” If he does, I will teach him how to be a happy man; if he does not, I will channel his unhappiness into becoming a great one. In the end, I would count myself lucky if, for every world-historic entrepreneur, I only produce ten criminals, tyrants, and suicides. For no mentor could fully direct pride of this magnitude: the path to greatness winds perilously along the cliffs of madness.
What I hope to have teased out with this hypothetical is that the ideal innovator stews in the most uncomfortable of inconsistencies: believing himself to be a god with ex nihilo powers of creation yet existing as an ape (imitator) in his day-to-day lived experience. He is infected with the delusion that he stands above tradition while being fully immersed in it. Inconsistency of this sort is not just possible but common among the greats. The same Wittgenstein who looks down upon reading other philosophers, also confesses:
I don't believe I have ever invented a line of thinking, I have always taken one over from someone else. I have simply straight away seized on it with enthusiasm for my work of clarification. That is how Boltzmann, Hertz, Schopenhauer, Frege, Russell, Kraus, Loos, Weininger, Spengler, Sraffa have influenced me.39
The task for the social reformer intent on fostering an innovative culture, then, is delicate: encouraging the lie of the dominant view while building social mechanisms that ensure innovation never proceeds as such. The picture of the ideal innovator is equally ambivalent: driven by a delusional compulsion to the greatest peaks of human accomplishment; radically obsessed with oneself channeled into a radical focus on the object.40 An innovative culture, like all worldly cultures, needs to be founded on a lie (the dominant view) that covers up an expulsion (the role of imitation in innovation). I have departed from Girard, then, only in the most Girardian of ways.
6. Conclusion
Prima facie, the most obvious contribution of “Innovation and Repetition” is rescuing the minority view of innovation while showing the dominant view to be theoretically unsound and harmful to real innovation if followed practically (section two).
The even greater contribution, however, is to identify the pathology which renders this false view so seductive and motivating for the modern mind: the theology of self (section three). On one hand, this further problematizes the dominant view: not only is it theoretically false and practically self-defeating, it is also theologically sinful. On the other hand, it rehabilitates the dominant view by showing it to be a powerful force in fueling an innovative culture (section five). The dominant view is also acquitted in a different way: real innovation does not stem from just imitation but from having the right relationship with tradition. And so, in periods where tradition is fetishized, something like the dominant view is needed to bring about that balance (section four). Together, these two acquittals help us appreciate the worldly role which the dominant view and works like Zero to One play in changing the perspective of a stagnant culture and spurring that culture into action. Thiel himself is fully aware of both the uses and abuses of pride for innovation: “The single greatest danger for a founder is to become so certain of his own myth that he loses his mind. But an equally insidious danger for every business is to lose all sense of myth and mistake disenchantment for wisdom.”41 I have suggested that we can reconcile this tension by encouraging pride in innovators while enforcing imitation in the act of innovation: zero to one in force, one to N in form. Real innovation requires a delicate throttling of delusion, it requires a culture to be wrong in all the right ways. In other words, hubris manifested in the wrong way certainly thwarts innovation, but the optimal amount of pride is not zero. Thiel concludes: “we still need new technology, and we may even need some 1999-style hubris and exuberance to get it.”42 This is also the central, if implicit, insight of “Innovation and Repetition” that pride is at the root of worldly innovation. And it is one expression of Girard’s observation that Satan (pride) is the powers and principalities (worldly institutions and culture). And so, if we wish to build an innovative culture, we must be willing to enter into a deal with the Devil.
Once framed in this light, the most important contribution of this essay may be a question instead of an answer: should we pursue innovation at all? Ought we not abandon innovation instead of encouraging pride once we realize this dependence? Perhaps it is time to re-evaluate our value of innovation, to return to the negative connotations in the era of external mediation, to treat innovators as usurpers and startups as upstarts. After all, if innovation requires us to infect society with the usurpatious pride of Satan, for what shall we profit, if we gain the whole world, but lose our soul?43 This is the central question I aimed to have developed through Girard. Societies must choose between humility and innovation, or framed as their vices, between pride and stagnation. By making this choice explicit, I hope to encourage a more pessimistic view on the limits of the Good: valuable, maybe even necessary, goods of social life can be completely incompatible with each other. This pessimism towards potentiality, however, has a silver lining: reconciliation with actuality. It absolves the innovative powerhouse from faulting itself for the mere existence of megalomaniacs among its ranks. It consoles the humble community, insecure about its lack of innovation, that maybe an even greater good is protected by its absence.
Girard leaves us with a difficult tension between innovation’s form and force, and an even more urgent question, more relevant than ever, on the value of valuing innovation. But this much is settled: the two motivating questions which began this essay betray modern myopia. It is precisely the theorist of imitation that has the most to teach us about innovation. And we can not build the future without being rooted in the past any more than, in Girard’s own words, “a plant [can] grow with its roots up in the air.”44
Notes
1. “Conceive” is used here in both senses of the word: to understand one’s relationship to the future in thought and to engender (give birth) to the future in reality.
2. Peter Thiel and Blake Masters, Zero to one. 1st ed. (The Crown Publishing Group, 2014), Preface.
3. There are countless examples of this distinction being used in the social sciences. Just to name a few: Theodore Levitt, “Innovative Imitation,” Harvard Business Review, 1966, 63. Chris Freeman, Economics of Industrial Innovation. (Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, 1974), 257. Lester Frank Ward, Pure Sociology: A Treatise on the Origin and Spontaneous Development of Society (New York: Macmillan, 1903), 246.
4. Benoît Godin, Innovation Contested: the Idea of Innovation over the Centuries (Routledge, 2015), 42-50.
5. Godin, Innovation Contested, 226.
6. Edward Shils, Tradition (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1981), 154.
7. Ray Monk, Ludwig Wittgenstein: The Duty of Genius. (Penguin Books, 1991), Chapter 24: A Change of Aspect.
8. Some examples here are Joseph Schumpeter, Dennis Mueller, and John Tilton. See Godin, Innovation Contested, 228.
9. Some examples here are Edward Shils’ Tradition and Gabriel Tarde’s The Laws of Imitation.
10. René Girard, “Innovation and Repetition,” Substance 19, no. 63 (1990): 8.
11. Godin, Innovation Contested, 75–122.
12. Girard, “Innovation and Repetition,” 10.
13. Girard, “Innovation and Repetition,” 8.
14. Girard, “Innovation and Repetition,” 15.
15. Girard, “Innovation and Repetition,” 15-16.
16. Girard, “Innovation and Repetition,” 16.
17. Girard, “Innovation and Repetition,” 17.
18. Girard, “Innovation and Repetition,” 16.
19. John Milton, Paradise Lost (New York: Oxford University Press, 2005), 25.
20. René Girard, When These Things Begin (MSU Press, 2014), 44.
21. Girard, “Innovation and Repetition,” 19.
22. Girard, “Innovation and Repetition,” 14.
23. Girard, “Innovation and Repetition,” 14.
24. Girard, “Innovation and Repetition,” 14.
25. Another example is found in Bacon’s New Atlantis. He names the technological research institution The College of the Six Days’ Works which, of course, is an appropriation of Genesis and God’s ex nihilo creation.
26. Girard, “Innovation and Repetition,” 12.
27. Girard, “Innovation and Repetition,” 12.
28. Girard, “Innovation and Repetition,” 19.
29. Godin, Innovation Contested, 97.
30. Girard, “Innovation and Repetition,” 11.
31. René Girard and Benoît Chantre, Battling to the End: Conversations with Benoît Chantre (East Lansing: Michigan State University Press, 2010), 22.
32. Girard, When These Things Begin, 44.
33. Girard, “Innovation and Repetition,” 19.
34. René Girard, Jean-Michel Oughourlian, and Guy Lefort. Things Hidden since the Foundation of the World (Stanford, California, Stanford University Press, 1987), 311.
35. I have yet come across a culture responsible for world-historic innovations (in any domain) that is not also disproportionately infected with the type of pride I have described.
36. Plutarch. Life of Caesar. Translated by Bernadotte Perrin. Lexundria, n.d. https://lexundria.com/plut_caes/38/prr, 38.
37. Mark Lilla, The Shipwrecked Mind: On Political Reaction. (New York: New York Review Books, 2016), The Immanent Eschaton: Eric Voegelin.
38. The relationship between pride and innovation is a slightly weaker version of the relationship between the theology of self and the dominant view because Girard shows the latter to be isomorphic, whereas I only show the former to have unique affinities.
39. Monk, Ludwig Wittgenstein, Chapter 14: A New Beginning.
40. I’m trying to anticipate the concern raised in section four that pride would make us overly focused on the model and not enough on the object. Perhaps there is another way of staying focused on the object other than not being prideful and that is to seek confirmation of one’s pride in some imagined posterity. Such a model is both distant as well as ambiguous in their standards of judgment (in fact we can imagine what we want) such that we can be given a great degree of freedom to focus on the object.
41. Thiel, Zero to One, Chapter 14: The Founder’s Paradox.
42. Thiel, Zero to One, Chapter 2: Party Like It’s 1999.
43. This is a genuine rather than rhetorical question as there are many existential consequences in abandoning innovation. For example, a theological/political concern suggested by Thiel is that innovation is the only destabilizing force which prevents the Antichrist from taking over. The goal of my essay is to suggest that there are equally damning theological/political consequences in pursuing innovation, namely, Satan/pride. If Thiel and Girard are both right, the only choice we have in modernity is between Satan (accelerating innovation) and the Antichrist (abandoning innovation).
44. Girard, “Innovation and Repetition,” 19.