A useful distinction that Deleuze (and Guattari) make with respect to thinking about this is the one between interest and desire. For Deleuze, interests are defined by lack: I have an interest in this or that romantic partner, in this or that social position, and I make moves to attain it. But to have an interest presupposes a libidinal investment in the very structures by which something becomes of interest: an interest in a romantic partner presupposes a prior investment in the social institution of amorous monogamy; the interest in attaining a certain social position presupposes an investment in a society in which such and such a position might be held to be valuable or esteemed or powerful. These investments are investments of desire and they are productive of interests.

"Beneath the conscious investments of economic, political, religious, etc., formations, there are unconscious sexual investments, microinvestments that attest to the way in which desire is present in a social field, and joins this field to itself as the statistically determined domain that is bound to it." AO183

"It is doubtless true that interests predispose us to a given libidinal investment, but they are not identical with this investment. Moreover, the unconscious libidinal investment is what causes us to look for our interest in one place rather than another, to fix our aims on a given path, convinced that this is where our chances lie." AO345

If interest accounts for what one wants, desire accounts for the fact that one wants such and such in the first place. Check out Daniel Smith's Deleuze and the Question of Desire [PDF] for a fuller account of this.

Thanks for answering Streetlight, I really enjoy reading your posts. This helps explain a lot. So is what you're saying is that any interest in attaining x is motivated by a prior engagement with whatever structure x belongs to? It's complicated stuff, and I look forward to reading that PDF

So is what you're saying is that any interest in attaining x is motivated by a prior engagement with whatever structure x belongs to? — Albero

Yes, I think this is a good way to put it!

"It is doubtless true that interests predispose us to a given libidinal investment, but they are not identical with this investment. Moreover, the unconscious libidinal investment is what causes us to look for our interest in one place rather than another, to fix our aims on a given path, convinced that this is where our chances lie." AO345 — Streetlight

I wonder if the distinction between desire and interest is comparable to that between the virtual and the actual , or perhaps between the intensive and the extensive.

Deleuze on the other hand posits that desire is rather “productive” and has no lacking involved-it is instead an interplay between positive forces. How can this be? — Albero

any interest in attaining x is motivated by a prior engagement with whatever structure x belongs to — Albero

I think there is a larger point to be made about the positivity of desire for Deleuze. This goes to the heart of his critique of concepts like opposition, contradiction and negation, which are central to Hegelian and Marxist dialectic. These forms or relation are attempts to cancel difference by equalizing it in the form of a dialectical reconciliation or synthesis. The equal and the unified are assumed to cancel the negativity of the lack. But for Deleuze difference , as the irreducible basis of reality, is not a problem to be solved, a lack to be compensated, but an endlessly repeated fecundity (productivity), an eternal recurrence of the same absolute difference.

But for Deleuze difference , as the irreducible basis of reality, is not a problem to be solved, a lack to be compensated, but an endlessly repeated fecundity (productivity). — Joshs

And so the whole project of putting a positive spin on things. Deleuze difference ad nauseum the same as Whitehead's creativity ad nauseum?

And so the whole project of putting a positive spin on things. Deleuze difference ad nauseum the same as Whitehead's creativity ad nauseum? — schopenhauer1

Good question. I’m not familiar enough with Whitehead to answer that, but I don’t see how his theism, as unconventional as it is, is compatible with Deleuze’s immanentism.

I understand Deleuze's "positive desire" as a post-Freudian (etc) translation of conatus, specifically Spinoza's conception

... each thing, as far as it lies in itself, strives to persevere in its being — Ethics IIIP6

that, like inertia or current, is harnessed – by modern technocapital(?) – in various productive modalities which, IIRC, D & G call "desiring-machines" ...

also Will to Power, eh?

↪180 Proof also Will to Power, eh? — Albero

And eternal recurrence of the same.

↪180 Proof also Will to Power, eh? — Albero

I think Schop's inexorable, blind 'Will-to-survive-and-devour' instead.

... each thing, as far as it lies in itself, strives to persevere in its being
— Ethics IIIP6
that, like inertia or current, is harnessed – by modern technocapital(?) – in various productive modalities which, IIRC, D & G call "desiring-machines" ... — 180 Proof

Except that for Deleuze , there is no identity , no in-itself, no essence, even temporarily. Desiring -machines are self-differentiating.

Yeah, okay. I didn't say otherwise.

And so the whole project of putting a positive spin on things. — schopenhauer1

No. It's where the emphasis is made: A wanting or a craving is a psychological need that one has no control over, like thirst. Deleuze, on the other hand, seems to have defined it as inspiration ("an inter play between positive forces). When one is inspired by a great writer, one desires to write a great book someday, like his idol.

A wanting or a craving is a psychological need that one has no control over, like thirst. — L'éléphant

Is this correct? Can cravings or needs not be engineered by socialization or marketing which generate needs where naturally, there might not be any, or only a bud of interest that never sprouts?

Is this correct? Can cravings or needs not be engineered by socialization or marketing which generate needs where naturally, there might not be any, or only a bud of interest that never sprouts? — Tom Storm

Are you talking about indoctrination? Like "subliminal message"? Then, no, I'm not talking about that, nor am I talking about brainwashing. And I think I misspoke when I said "psychological". Let me correct that -- I meant physiological need, like thirst.

I hear you. I wasn't talking about subminimal messages or indoctrination, just advertising or socialization as part of life. We tend to value the things culture tells us to value (unless we fancy ourselves as outliers).

There's that nice quote by Francois de La Rochefoucauld - People would never fall in love if they hadn't heard love talked about.

The Buddhist notion of "desire" is to be understood as a shackle/fetter/chain; something that imprisons an individual in what it calls samsara (one poster mentions eternal recurrence), an endless cycle of birth-death-rebirth. If liberation/moksha/nirvana is your goal, you can immediately see that "desire", more accurately clinging/craving, is your enemy no. 1; think of a bird with one foot tied to something - it may wish to fly away, but it simply can't. The rope around the bird's foot is probably what negative desire is in Eastern philosophy.

What's positive desire?

Any and all forms of want that contributes to enlightenment, sensu lato.

We tend to value the things culture tells us to value (unless we fancy ourselves as outliers).

There's that nice quote by Francois de La Rochefoucauld - People would never fall in love if they hadn't heard love talked about. — Tom Storm

This is good! But yes, there are outliers. I tend to be one. It's actually sort of empowering when you desire something that no one, or very few people would pay attention to. And don't get me started with attraction. I assure you that my taste is not your taste, or anyone here in the forum.

I wonder if the distinction between desire and interest is comparable to that between the virtual and the actual , or perhaps between the intensive and the extensive. — Joshs

Yes, desire belongs to the order of the intensive: "We say that there is assemblage of desire each time that there are produced, in a field of immanence, or on a plane of consistence, continuums of intensities, combinations of fluxes, emissions of particles at variable speeds". (Dialogues). As it happens, in the works in which desire becomes a concern - from Anti-Oedipus onwards, basically - 'the virtual' more or less disappears as a category, and becomes more or less collapsed into the intensive.

"It is doubtless true that interests predispose us to a given libidinal investment, but they are not identical with this investment. Moreover, the unconscious libidinal investment is what causes us to look for our interest in one place rather than another, to fix our aims on a given path, convinced that this is where our chances lie." AO345 — Streetlight

For Deleuze and Guattari, there is not an I that produces but a process of production of which the I is a kind of product. Or, to put this in terms of Anti-Oedipus, there is no subject before the syntheses of the unconscious, there are no libidinal investments without desiring machines.
This perspective is from the ‘outside’ that comes before and indeed determines the subject of interests. The difficulty here is that we should access this outside through experimentation or just speculate about the productive unconscious process. For D & G, it is the crucial ethical point, the opportunity to find out "where our chances lie."

This perspective is from the ‘outside’ that comes before and indeed determines the subject of interests. The difficulty here is that we should access this outside through experimentation or just speculate about the productive unconscious process. For D & G, it is the crucial ethical point, the opportunity to find out "where our chances lie." — Number2018

As an ethics , intensive difference is also irreducibly violent, the basis of blame.

As an ethics , intensive difference is also irreducibly violent, the basis of blame. — Joshs

Likely, what is implied here is the improper identification of drives and desire.
It does not matter whether drives are directly referred to as instincts or whether they are defined much more elaborate. “In any of these cases, we always return to the same idea: necessarily setting this raw world of desire against a universe of social order, a universe of reason, judgement, ego, and so on” (Guattari “Molecular revolution in Brazil”). Anti-Oedipus’s entire project was to overcome the negative connotations of the common notion of desire and to conceptualize it as not simply the expression of libido but primarily as a flow and one of the parts of social infrastructure. Therefore, for D & G the ethical task is to disclose and identify one’s desiring machines so that “we can fix our aims on a given path.”

for D & G the ethical task is to disclose and identify one’s desiring machines so that “we can fix our aims on a given path.” — Number2018

Would you agree that a desiring machine , with its aim and path , is already internally differentiated, so that this flow is never a matter of the repetition of the identical aim and path?

Would you agree that a desiring machine , with its aim and path , is already internally differentiated, so that this flow is never a matter of the repetition of the identical aim and path? — Joshs

Let's go back to the original quote: "the unconscious libidinal investment is what causes us to look for our interest in one place rather than another, to fix our aims on a given path, convinced that this is where our chances lie." A desiring machine is described here as "the unconscious libidinal investment." And, in principle, it cannot have "an aim and path." A machine cannot have an origin, identity, telos, or a concrete path; it is in the process of continuous becoming other than itself. So, it is internally differentiated. Yet, in the quote,
D & G mean that we can have "an aim and path" in our conscious spiritual life to a certain extent. They imply a vague and complicated relationship between our desire, which is a part of the unconscious and blind social machine, and our conscious intentions and aims. D & G, together and separately, on numerous occasions, had endeavoured to clarify their concept of the machinic unconscious. I found that it is essential but very challenging. What about you? Would you agree to replace, for example, the notion of individual sexual drives with the concept of the impersonal collective machinic desire?

Do you agree to replace, for example, the notion of individual sexual drives with the concept of the impersonal collective machinic desire? — Number2018

Only if it makes my orgies more enjoyable. Seriously though, I think D &G have done a brilliant job of integrating the conscious and the unconscious, the cognitive and the bodily-affective, and these with the social and the empirical-material, without giving preference to any particular of these domains. I do wonder, though if Merleau-Ponty’s phenomenological approach to time might not offer a more intimate understanding of the site of difference.