The illusion that it [philosophy] could captivate the essence in the finitude of its determinations must be given up.

... would have its content in the polyvalence of objects not organized into a scheme, which impinge on it or which it seeks out; it would truly deliver itself over to them, would not employ them as a mirror, out of which it rereads itself, confusing its mirror-image with the concretion. It would be nothing other than the full, unreduced experience in the medium of conceptual reflection; even the “science of the experience of consciousness” would degrade the content of such experiences to examples of categories.

What spurs philosophy to the risky exertion of its own infinity is the unwarranted expectation that every individual and particular which it decodes would represent, as in Leibniz’s monad, that whole in itself, which as such always and again eludes it

Cognition holds none of its objects completely.

It is not supposed to prepare the fantasm of a whole.

Thus it cannot be the task of a philosophical interpretation of works of art to establish their identity with the concept, to gobble them up in this; the work however develops itself through this in its truth.

What may be glimpsed in this, be it the formal process of abstraction, be it the application of concepts to what is grasped under their definitions, may be of use as technics in the broadest sense: for philosophy, which refuses to suborn itself, it is irrelevant. In principle it can always go astray; solely for that reason, achieve something. Skepticism and pragmatism, latest of all Dewey’s strikingly humane version of the latter, recognized this; this is however to be added into the ferment of an emphatic philosophy, not renounced in advance for the sake of its test of validity.

Against the total domination of method, philosophy retains, correctively, the moment of play, which the tradition of its scientifization would like to drive out of it.

The non-naïve thought knows how little it encompasses what is thought, and yet must always hold forth as if it had such completely in hand. It thereby approximates clowning.

What aims for what is not already a priori and what it would have no statutory power over, belongs, according to its own concept, simultaneously to a sphere of the unconstrained, which was rendered taboo by the conceptual essence.

The concept cannot otherwise represent the thing which it repressed, namely mimesis, than by appropriating something of this latter in its own mode of conduct, without losing itself to it.

Thinking by no means protects sources, whose freshness
would emancipate it from thought; no type of cognition is at our
disposal, which would be absolutely divergent from that which disposes
over things, before which intuitionism flees panic-stricken and in vain.

What is incumbent on it, is the effort to go beyond the concept, by
means of the concept.

Then Adorno describes what spurs philosophy in the direction of infinity in the first place:

What spurs philosophy to the risky exertion of its own infinity is the unwarranted expectation that every individual and particular which it decodes would represent, as in Leibniz’s monad, that whole in itself, which as such always and again eludes it — Jamal

To me, Adorno misrepresents the concept of "infinity", and misrepresents philosophy, in general — Metaphysician Undercover

The point is just that the infinite can play a role suggestively, referring to philosophy's inconclusiveness and the endless variety of experience. — Jamal

The concept cannot otherwise represent the thing
which it repressed, namely mimesis, than by appropriating something
of this latter in its own mode of conduct, without losing itself to it.

That would explain the part about canceling itself out, and "pseudo-morphosis". A quick Google search tells me that this is a concept proposed by Oswald Spengler in "The Decline of the West". — Metaphysician Undercover

To this extent the aesthetic moment is, albeit for totally different reasons than in Schelling, not accidental to philosophy. Not the least of its tasks is to sublate this in the committalness [Verbindlichkeit] of its insights into what is real. This latter and play are its poles. The affinity of philosophy to art does not justify the borrowing of this by the former, least of all by virtue of the intuitions which barbarians consider the prerogative of art. Even in aesthetic labor they hardly ever strike in isolation, as lightning-bolts from above. They grow out of the formal law of the construction; if one wished to titrate them out, they would melt away. Thinking by no means protects sources, whose freshness would emancipate it from thought; no type of cognition is at our disposal, which would be absolutely divergent from that which disposes over things, before which intuitionism flees panic-stricken and in vain.

The philosophy which imitated art, which wanted to become a work of art, would cancel itself out. It would postulate the identity-claim: that its objects vanish into it, indeed that they grant their mode of procedure a supremacy which disposes over the heterogenous as a priori material, while the relationship of philosophy to the heterogenous is virtually thematic. What art and philosophy have in common is not form or patterning procedures, but a mode of conduct which forbids pseudo-morphosis. Both keep faith with their own content through their opposition; art, by making itself obdurate against its meaning; philosophy, by not clinging to anything immediate. The philosophical concept does not dispense with the longing which animates art as something non-conceptual and whose fulfillment flees from its immediacy as appearance [Schein]. The concept, the organon of thought and nevertheless the wall [Mauer: external wall] between this and what is to be thought through, negates that longing. Philosophy can neither circumvent such negation nor submit itself to it. What is incumbent on it, is the effort to go beyond the concept, by means of the concept.

The original geological concept makes more sense to me: it’s when a mineral replaces another mineral but takes the first one’s shape. — Jamal

By the term ‘historical pseudomorphosis’ I propose to designate those cases in which an older alien Culture lies so massively over the land that a young Culture, born in this land, cannot get its breath and fails not only to achieve pure and specific expression-forms, but even to develop fully its own self-consciousness. All that wells up from the depths of the young soul is cast in the old moulds, young feelings stiffen in senile works, and instead of rearing itself up in its own creative power, it can only hate the distant power with a hate that grows to be monstrous.

The power of the existent constructs the facades into which the
consciousness crashes. It must try to break through them. This alone
would snatch away the postulate from the profundity of ideology. The
speculative moment survives in such resistance: what does not allow
itself to be governed by the given facts, transcends them even in the
closest contact with objects and in the renunciation of sacrosanct
transcendence. What in thought goes beyond that to which it is bound
in its resistance is its freedom. It follows the expressive urge of the
subject. The need to give voice to suffering is the condition of all truth.
For suffering is the objectivity which weighs on the subject; what it
experiences as most subjective, its expression, is objectively mediated.

. It is not an end in itself at the latter’s expense, but carries it
off out of the thingly bad state of affairs, for its part an object of
philosophical critique

What in thought goes beyond that to which it is bound
in its resistance is its freedom. It follows the expressive urge of the
subject. The need to give voice to suffering is the condition of all truth.
For suffering is the objectivity which weighs on the subject; what it
experiences as most subjective, its expression, is objectively mediated.

Great
philosophy was always accompanied by the paranoid zeal to tolerate
nothing but itself, and to pursue this with all the ruses of its reason,
while this constantly withdraws further and further from the pursuit.

If the moment of expression tries to be anything more, it
degenerates into a point of view; were it to relinquish the moment of
expression and the obligation of portrayal, it would converge with
science.

This may help to explain why portrayal [Darstellung] is not a matter of
indifference or external to philosophy, but immanent to its idea. Its
integral moment of expression, non-conceptually-mimetic, becomes
objectified only through portrayal – language. The freedom of
philosophy is nothing other than the capacity of giving voice to this
unfreedom. If the moment of expression tries to be anything more, it
degenerates into a point of view; were it to relinquish the moment of
expression and the obligation of portrayal, it would converge with
science.

Dialectics is the consistent consciousness of non-identity. It is not related in advance to a standpoint. Thought is driven, out of its unavoidable insufficiency, its guilt for what it thinks, towards it.

Though Adorno notes that the responses have been obscure, he wants to speak up in favor of this speculative thinking, or a moment within thinking, whereby the facts, on their face or as read, do not determine thought, but rather produce a facade through his thought must push towards and outward from in order to get closer to the things themselves. — Moliere

The speculative moment survives in such resistance: what does not allow itself to be governed by the given facts.

The philosophical concept does not dispense with the longing which animates art as something non-conceptual and whose fulfilment flees from its immediacy as appearance [Schein]. The concept, the organon of thought and nevertheless the wall [Mauer: external wall] between this and what is to be thought through, negates that longing. Philosophy can neither circumvent such negation nor submit itself to it. What is incumbent on it, is the effort to go beyond the concept, by means of the concept.

I'm wondering if anyone has thoughts on what "thingly bad state of affairs" means. I was wondering if it's supposed to say "thinly" just as a first guess? — Moliere

Expression and stringency are not dichotomous possibilities for it. They need each other, neither is without the other. The expression is relieved of its contingency by thought, on which it works just as thought works on it. Thinking becomes, as something which is expressed, conclusive only through linguistic portrayal; what is laxly said, is badly thought. Through expression, stringency is compelled from what is expressed. It is not an end in itself at the latter’s expense, but carries it off out of the thingly bad state of affairs, for its part an object of philosophical critique.

As mediated as being is by the concept and therein by the subject, so mediated is, in the reverse case, the subject by the world in which it lives, so powerless and merely internalized too is its decision. Such powerlessness permits the victory of the thingly bad state of affairs [dinghafte Unwesen] over the subject. — section: Function of the Concept of the Existent

Abstract (thesis)
        ↓
Negative (antithesis)
        ↓
Speculative/Concrete (synthesis)

Understanding (thesis)
        ↓
Dialectic (antithesis)
        ↓
Speculation (synthesis)

The power of the existent constructs the facades into which the consciousness crashes. It must try to break through them. This alone would snatch away the postulate from the profundity of ideology. The speculative moment survives in such resistance: what does not allow itself to be governed by the given facts, transcends them even in the closest contact with objects and in the renunciation of sacrosanct transcendence. What in thought goes beyond that to which it is bound in its resistance is its freedom. It follows the expressive urge of the subject. The need to give voice to suffering is the condition of all truth. For suffering is the objectivity which weighs on the subject; what it experiences as most subjective, its expression, is objectively mediated.

The speculative moment survives in such resistance: what does not allow itself to be governed by the given facts, transcends them even in the closest contact with objects and in the renunciation of sacrosanct transcendence.

What in thought goes beyond that to which it is bound in its resistance is its freedom. It follows the expressive urge of the subject.

The need to give voice to suffering is the condition of all truth. For suffering is the objectivity which weighs on the subject; what it experiences as most subjective, its expression, is objectively mediated.

Though Adorno notes that the responses have been obscure, he wants to speak up in favor of this speculative thinking, or a moment within thinking, whereby the facts, on their face or as read, do not determine thought, but rather produce a facade through his thought must push towards and outward from in order to get closer to the things themselves.

Only, without a category that determines the thing -- it's non-conceptual. In a way I think I can see the fantasm as the appearance, whereas negative dialectics wishes to get beyond the appearance of facts (themselves conceptual) to the thing. — Moliere

EDIT2: Also I'm finding myself scratching my head in the first paragraph of Portrayal (Darstellung) -- Darstellung contrasts with Vorstellung, which is what I'm gathering to be the difference between the importance of Portrayal in philosophy, at the beginning, and how it is not just science at the end.

Vorstellung is usually translated as "Representation", and in Kant is important to scientific knowledge. So I understand that much. Darstellung is the "portrayal" -- expression, language -- of the representation. But I'm struggling to see how Darstellung, in Adorno, differentiates philosophy from science at the end somehow and that's what I'm puzzling over:

"If the moment of expression tries to be anything more, it degenerates into a point of view; were it to relinquish the moment of expression and the obligation of portrayal, it would converge with science." — Moliere

The freedom of philosophy is nothing other than the capacity of giving voice to this unfreedom. If the moment of expression tries to be anything more, it degenerates into a point of view; were it to relinquish the moment of expression and the obligation of portrayal, it would converge with science.

But this section goes deeper than that, since he is talking about his own mode of expression, i.e., it's meta. Expression in language that aims to uncover reality in the way described above should itself enact dialectics in its mode of expression. Thus, we get Adorno's way of writing: style as substance, form as content (I'm glad we've finally got back to this topic, which I think I mentioned on the first page of this thread). Rather than obscurantism, this is the fullest stringency (EDIT: or maybe better put, the best balance between expression and stringency). He does not want to explain and describe, but to performatively expose. The same applies to negative dialectics as applies to screenwriting: show don't tell. — Jamal

The speculative moment survives in such resistance: what does not allow itself to be governed by the given facts, transcends them even in the closest contact with objects and in the renunciation of sacrosanct transcendence.

The speculative moment, which does not allow itself to be governed by the given facts, survives in such resistance. It goes beyond the facts while remaining in the closest contact with objects. Furthermore, it does so while renouncing the sacrosanct transcendence of dogmatic metaphysics.