at least two

The strata are judgements of God; stratification in general is the entire system of the judgement of God (but the earth, or the body without organs, constantly eludes that judgement, flees and becomes destratified, decoded, deterritorialized. (ATP,40)

Both articulations establish binary relations between their respective segments. But between the segments of one articulation and the segments of the other there are biunivocal relationships obeying far more complex laws. The word "structure" may be used to designate the sum of these relations and relationships, but it is an illusion to believe that structure is the earth's last word. Moreover, it cannot be taken for granted that the distinction between the two articulations is always that of the molecular and the molar. (ATP, 41)

But the distribution of these two articulations is not constant, even within the same stratum. (ATP, 42)

I'd like to use the quotes above to think through Deleuze&Guattari and the notion of difference. Difference is often considered within dichotomies, in oppositional forms. We find a problem in this way of thinking though, in that it fundamentally inserts identity as "mediating" structure between differences. This creates in the objects or Ideas that are being posited aside one another a transcendental stability. This is also the problem with the Socratic question of "What is...?" and why D&G propose questions of intensity, questions that rupture and open up the potentials of a given Idea through pure differentiation. Therefore, when thinking about the relation of different to different, there must be a push towards the "differential limit" of the actual and virtual. This push prevents difference from being "subordinated to identity".

In "The Geology of Morals", D&G begin by thinking of God or more specifically "judgements of God" as the "stratifications" that prevent intensities in favor of rigid organizational structure. In ATP, stratifications function similarly to identity and the Earth to immanence or pure difference. Integral to understanding the difference at hand in the discussion of stratifications and the Earth, is an adoption of a differential understanding of dualisms. "In mechanics, molar properties are those of a mass of matter, as opposed to its parts -- atoms or molecules." However, both molecular and molar properties are naturally occuring. There are two, the molecular and the molar and while their function, their result is at different intensities, one should not be abandoned for the other, nothing is suggested rather they function independently from what you or I may identify them as.

We can see the potentials of differential thought as conceived by D&G in the very potent example of Darwin. Darwinian thought or a kind of "molecular Darwinism" places all animals on a plane of consistency "with differential coefficients or variations of relations" (ATP, 49). Feminists and zoontologists responding to D&G have posited that our conception of the human or humanism is constructed from differentiating humans from animals, acceptable human behavior from "barbaric", animalistic behavior. Because this differentiation resulted in identity, "human" and "animal" were both trapped in a dualism that limited the potentials for how each could be understood. For Darwin then to say that, essentially, that all animals are interconnected, resulting from and for one another, totally changes the way we identify human and animal unearthing difference from beneath identity. It makes it harder to say "I am better than a monkey" or even, "I am not a monkey", relinquishing certainty for immanence.

Luce Irigaray, in conceiving an ontology of difference in sexes stated that there are always "at least two" sexes. Similarly, the double articulation at play in this chapter that I've briefly delved into must be considered in difference, as "at least two". But the distribution of these two articulations is not constant, even within the same stratum.