Ive always felt that accelerationism parallels Christian revelation. Where we just wait for the rapture and then following that event we can finally begin to exist in a better place
This was an amazing overview of the accelerationist landscape as we're going through in the interminable future. I'd really like to see more nuanced takes on Land and Fisher in your future videos
U/Acc is not in the middle, it's a rejection of the political conditions (utopian humanism & anxiety of control) of both L/Acc and R/Acc. Also it's not about letting capitalism get destroyed by its own contradictions (as D&G,Fisher and even Zizek have said, it won't), its about accepting that we have no control and instead embrace the tearing apart of the human subject as we know it.
Cool. I still think the strongest L/Acc response to the more Landian (and IMO, more convincing) accelerationisms lies within Mark Fisher's Terminator Vs. Avatar essay. Fisher's main idea being thus Land fails to account for Capital's necessary reterritorializing potentials. IE: Capitalism without a human face could not function as such. I've stewed over this for about a year now, but I think it's likely you reach a sort of limit point in this line of thinking, where the human mask of capitalism changes with the perception of the human (quickly accelerating towards the post-) towards it. Why would capital need to continually service a subject position that is rapidly and insidiously obsolescing? Regardless, Accelerationism is best framed as an unfolding, something that happens around and directly TO you. Of courser some are going to be more privileged in this respect than others (The Wealthy), but the entire idea and appeal of U/Acc is that it can help one to feel the lines of de/reterritorialization flowing around, beside, behind, beyond you and harness the more alienating aspects of capital towards one's own purposes. This is very vague, of course, but also exciting! We still haven't seen anything yet >:^}
how do you think the pandemic has impacted accelerationist thought as in what trends has it brought out? large variation in nations and cultures responses
I've honestly never had a successful conversation with a leftist who is sympathetic to some kind of accelerationism. The attitude is problematically similar to that of most anarchists I've talked to, which is that they simply are optimistic but have no plan or idea how immensely complex the world is. Even things like 'who is going to do mining and why?' are usually unanswered questions. In the event of a collapse of capitalism, I don't see leftist communities emerging very successfully as I don't think they'd have any chance of major economic success compared to the tyrants that would emerge. Maybe there would be small agrarian leftist communes but they would eventually get overrun by the neo-corporate post-states.
Thank you so much for this channel, I love your appetite-whetting and mind-expanding introductions to these schools of thought. You make me want to read everything.
Problem is, that capitalism is currently coercing us to race ahead on an environmental course which will ultimately render our homeworld uninhabitable to us, ultimately leading to the extinction of humankind. That should be resisted rather than accelerated.
Just a fun fact : in Star Trek humanity didn't become so fast the "utopia" presented in the show. In some episodes, it was explained to viewers that in the Star Trek universe there was conflict, rebellions and even ww3 that almost destroyed humanity and the planet. And after the invention of warp technology (that technology that makes the space-ships run almost at the speed of light) and after humans were contacted by the Vulcan race that helped the rest of the humanity to restore society based upon logical and secular ideas ... (yeah I know the last part it's a bit superficial). What I am trying to say is that Star Trek presented a future that in which capitalism destroys itself there is still hope for future even if at first it looks dystopian.
Since you started me on looking into accelerationism, I might as well add my thoughts. The idea that capital is this huge untameable beast with a mind and end of it's own seems given our modern world. I also agree with it that capitalism probably won't be truly dead until it just can't perpetuate itself anymore. However, I'm very much against the idea that we should just succumb to this inevitabliity, where these forces are the ones in control, and we can't do anything ourselves. I belive that even if there is a set destination for these forces, how we get there is just as important, and that we should be organizing to reduce the harm and accelerate certain positive aspects ahead of others. I'm very much of the mind of limiting the damage of climate change as much as possible, even if we can't fully overcome capitalism in the near future. Stuff like this is why I'm still pro-bernie or green new deal, or even full on revolution in certain circumstances. If acc is true in that we can't stop capitalism, and that it must play out, we must also make it as painless as possible.
I completely agree with you but with an emphasis on AI and Robotics as the end goal of humanity the quicker we get there the better for I perceive it to be the quickest way we can resolve most World issues and it will be the end of humankind as we know it
@@thefluffychild4619 not a end a medicine and cure to the sick practice of liberal capitalism such as massive waste and delusion of infinite growth in favor of chasing of profits.
Yeah, 45 years ago this very discussion was occurring in my class rooms. It is certainly a legitiment debate. In my debate classes, each side had debate winning moments, which certainly is more like a simulation. Simulations is another big debate topic. But for me, at my age, I'll be staying 100% human, for the good and bad of it. The main thing is we are inherently flawed. So as you point out, a "perfect system" is unattainable. What are we left with? Cycles... And at some point, there will be an End Cycle. Meanwhile, be grateful and humble about the good things that come your way. Great video, you are a very sharp young man!
The only comfort i have in future technologies not falling into this dark, is through decentralization models like blockchain. Already we see decentralized systems working better and better in certain ways, but honestly I want to learn it deeper, but decentralizing all these mammoth centralized power structures through capable automation sounds at least a possibility worth considering. As well as incentivizing certain positive action through tokenization (a new system of propagating value that isn't top down or getting paid from a boss but distributed automatically through contributing. I dont know if this ends up being both more egalitarian and perhaps more controlling, difficult to say. But like I said it's at least worth exploring in-depth.
But the internet is still so centralized. What blockchain platform will compete with FAANG? We cannot even get net neutrality passed. And I say this as someone who loves blockchain and hodls crypto. But the idea that blockchain will allow us to separate from central governments is not gunna happen anytime soon (at least not before our useable energy runs out from destroying the earth ecosystem). I man take RU-vid for example…is any video platform going to compete with RU-vid. Fat chance. Unless we make the internet a public square literally I just don’t see a way out. It’s all privatized corporate power. This is why the internet in the 90s was so insane because you didn’t have these huge platforms and the ad model everywhere. Not to rain on your thoughts friend.
Maybe we’ll end up with both accelerationist futures? I can see enclaves of left accelerationist communities, but with a world / solar system dominated by right accelerationism.
The irony of "accelerationism" is that speed is the hallmark of our so-called "modernity" - we've been used for centuries now to everything accelerating: transport, productivity, communication, and exponentially so. Our relationship with time is warped. Accelerationism is not just a symptom but the very manifestation of mature capitalism. Capitalism is based on the principle of exponential growth. And just like a balloon, the faster it grows, the sooner it will explode. The new generations are born accelerationist. All they know is speed, and all they expect is MORE speed. The fundamental flaw of the longevity fantasy (one of the principal obsessions of the transhumanist movement) is that the longer we live, the faster time goes by [I could elaborate more on this subject], which ultimately means humans have reached their "optimal" lifespan. Yes, we might live longer (let's say if we could somehow preserve or transfer our "identity"), but it will not quench our desire to live yet longer. Time is basically like an addictive drug: the more we have, the more "tolerance" we build up, and the more we need. It just won't change our capacity to be unhappy, unsatisfied, frustrated and anxious. Immortality is only relative to the extent to which we can preserve or protect our identity, for as long as it requires a receptacle, vehicle, body, hardware, it is susceptible to destruction. And even in the event of identity-replication (isn't that a contradiction?), it is the source of power that becomes the key to survival and that, too, can disappear. Even stars eventually die. What we really want/need is neither everlasting life nor cyber-superpowers. Neither will bring us peace or freedom. Ideologically, I remain a socialist. Yet I have also become painfully aware that the world as it today is just not "evolved enough" for socialism. It will need to go through global (eco?)fascism first. Something Marx didn't quite expect. He was a far-sighted visionary, but caught in the cultural limitations of his time, just as we are. Every century thinks of itself as more advanced or more "modern" than its predecessor. Ever since the Antiquity, the theme of an impending Apocalypse (a "cleansing of humanity", "end of times" and "final judgment") has been a recurring trope of human history. When our ancestors believed that too much immorality was about to "immanentize the Eschaton", we now believe that the culprit is too much technology. And this phenomenon too, seems to accelerate (doomsday scenarios becoming more and more diverse and emerging more and more often). The only truth is that nothing ever stays the same. We are only limited by our imagination. How on Earth could a 19th century individual conceptualise something like the Internet when they could hardly get to grasps with the concept (and therefore potential) of electricity. If you're in a hurry, do not despair! The NWO (the so-called “great reset”) is upon us, and radical change will happen sooner than you may think. WWW stands for World Web War or WW3 - a world where barricades are made of pixels and trenches are lines of code. Perhaps the key to transhumanism doesn't lie in the machine, but in the "ghost" in the machine. But for as long as mysticism is perceived as "psychosis", and as long as non-Western philosophies such as the Advaita Vedanta (even in the guise of Neo Vedanta) or esoteric Taoism keep being perceived a "spiritualities", or worse “religions" by the Western-centrist mind, don't be surprised if we keep hitting a philosophical dead-end! The emergence of quantum physics has opened a new door to a new kind of perception/comprehension of reality and the universe, where intuition could replace knowledge as a reliable source of information, and where the intellect/rationality becomes superseded by wisdom as the official organ of judgment. Once a new paradigm has emerged, only then can it be applied to technology and society at large. On a final note: why do we keep obsessing about changing the world when we can't even change ourselves? Let's all individuate and the world will individuate itself as a result.
Sorry but your wrong, peception of time speaks up because as you age your body clock slows down. If you acheive biogical immortality this ptoblem is automatically fixed
I think a more suitable way to classify this would be in two axis: left/right and optimistic/pessimistic. Where It would have a commune heaven/corporate hell for the left, and a free market heaven/super state hell for the right
For a more in-depth overview of the topic consult the video(" A quick rundown of accelerationism) by Aldous Huxley, his channel has a focus in the thought of both Mark Fisher and Nick Land.
I love your commentaries, they're class. One small criticism is the bleeping out of expletives. Your use of expletives, in my opinion, is very well timed only to be trivialized by the censorial bleep. It diminishes the integrity of what is usually a terrifically honest and entertaining discourse. Either curse and don't bleep(I dare say anyone listening to your videos can handle it) or don't curse.
This guy isn't unbiased by any means but clearly biased to left.
4 года назад
Theorizing is one part of realizing your targets, the other part is acting on it. I didn't read these books but from what I learned from this video these people do not contemplate a lot about what to do now actually to achieve their goals but defer it to an imagined future if you leave out the digital space maybe. Even in digital space, say cryptocurrency, affluent people have advantage to adapt themselves compared to regular people who struggle to make ends meet everyday. Returning to my point about practicality, even if capitalism will end some day, the ones that have a network of power will be able to shape the new system. You can see it in the collapse of Western Rome and the rise of the Catholic church, or the collapse of the Russian Empire and the rise of Bolshevism. Occupy Wallstreet is very weak when you consider the vast networks of capitalist companies, but probably Paul the Apostle was seen very weak in his time, too. In summary, without practicing even in an imperfect way what you think is a good idea, making bonds with people, establishing some institutions that will stabilize extremes, helping institutions that you think are beneficial, I doubt that the future will come out to be like you wish. But this of course needs much more personal commitment than just accelerating the end of the current system.
I think you're missing the point of accelerationism.The idea is that capital has so much momentum and power behind it that there is no meaningful praxis to be had. Instead, it's more about speculation on where the system is ultimately headed, with the different tendencies being different interpretations. For instance, unconditional accelerationism says the system is so chaotic and unknowable that we can't know until we get there, and that we're getting there whether we like it or not. As such, praxis isn't abandoned, but deferred to some unknown point in the future.
The whole point of Accelerationism is that no matter what you do it will be appropriated by the capitalist machine. For Land, time itself is simply the unravelling of this "destiny" of history. Read Psychopolitics if you're interested in finding out the mechanism by which any form of resistance feeds into capitalism and simply causes it to become a more complicated version of itself to accommodate for the resisting principle or action.
With little knowledge of accellerationism, I keep finding the key arguments for it as explained in videos like this as very similar nihilistic thought. Cybernetics seems to completely disregard the free will, as in the case of accelerationistic thought.
Nice video. I see words like capitalism and neo-liberalism are usually used in such a sloppy way that the analysis at the end is just shallow and out of touch with reality.
Neoliberalism is a canard. The people that left associate with neoliberalism never identified as Neoliberals. Plus economic left just blames everything they dislike on capitalism. Which is kinda obvious here. Claiming capitalism will crash one day and not work has been said since the inception of socialist thinkers, since they all want it to happen so socialism can takeover. It's basically a cop out answer to explain Complex problems of today. Sadly it's not gonna happen.
@@gabbar51ngh what cop out? Capitalism wastes enormous amounts and piles trash all around the world, puts 3rd world countries in debt instead of helping them which creates poverty, starvation and disease. Your definitely blindly taking the "right" unironically by trying to make your statement seem apolitical. The left or socialism isn't a "cop out" or "lazy analysis". It just people like you are so bent into conformist tradition and under the elites boot. Defending Capitalism because well "its been a here a long time, so it must work right?". Almost every problem today such health and food and resource shortages are due to capitalism and just saying socialism being a "cop out" or too lazy to even confront real problems which ARE real saying all problems stem from one side because they "complain too much" and not yours is the most BS ignorance ever and I don't think your as smart as you think you are on the subject. Try reading a book and doing research on non biased material sometime. It'll clear up a lot of misconceptions.
@@gabbar51ngh its the right that has copped out. Anytime they meet genuine criticism they just say "well, your complaining too much and the bad stuff that happens in the world is all your fault." They don't want to confront problems with logic or even handle them like grown ass adults that are part of the human race. They just want to blame, blame, blame and blame the other side like 2nd graders who are to afraid to admit they lied or that they were ever wrong in the first place. I'm a futurist and avid socialist and I strongly dislike "doomers" or people that just think the "end" is coming. That were headed towards apocalypse and there's nothing we can do but let it take its toll and NO, I don't wish for society to get nuked or fall apart because I want a huge socialist take over. What would there be to handout and help people if EVERYTHING is destroyed? You should definitely should do some research sometime buddy.
Quick question, don't you think that there is more to the post/trans humanism than technologically extending our bodies? Like, from the things I have read is more like a challenging of the fixed notion of what 'human' has been into a more vital, fluid, complex view on the matter.... no?
@@PlasticPills Yes! I will re-watch it, probably I missed something, but maybe its interesting to think further about the notion of nomad subjectivities, because in a way it's central to this and present to both Deleuze and Braidotti? Like affect theory is quit a node! Have you read Erik Massumi? He is more in art philosophy and quite contemporary but maybe you will find him interesting! Xx!
It's not really about left/right in this case - we aren't choosing the future, we're walking into it and these 'philosophers' are just using the topic to promote their own politics. We have the same amount of foresight as the creators of The Jetsons - and I'm still waiting for my flying cars and robot dogs.
I don't know. It sound like accelerationism is really just a bunch of fancy excuses for plain old greediness. However, if they're correct, then it doesn't seem like humanity has much hope. I'm becoming surprised how often philosophy seems to point towards an inevitable and total futility of life itself for which death is the only answer. That's not a very encouraging thought.
@@MK_ULTRA420 Cares enough to reply to RU-vid comments lmao Jokes aside, I love one thing about nihilists; they don't reproduce or they can't. (as nihilism is mostly a cope for weak drive)
Thanks man! I was "kind of" freaked out before about this world, not having a future and all of that, now, I've been "blown out" of the water to where my future used to swim and any reality that comes with even the slightest bit of a happily-ever-after-ending-type-of-future, you know, the ones that the Golden Girls have every episode, with no colon cancer and no strokes and nice old ladies like my Grandma live forever and ever and ever......................,whelp! not no more baby, that's for humans that watch dust bunnies grow while waiting for "MeTV" to run the next Cosby re-run and we all know what kind of future Bill has in-store lying wasting away in the penitentiary, doing impressions of himself like................oh, what's his name? The guy of set himself on fire smoking coke used to? Richard Prior! Yep! that guy! Nevertheless, and as sad as this seems, Accelerationism has the best odds of being true to life if we don't do like a ton of work, which my money say's "we won't do", because capitalism is so entrenched within all of the minds in our society, just as greed is and the Capitalist motto; "I've got to get mine before you get yours", but at all cost, public health, the environment, democracy...etc. One of the thinker you've mentioned has coined a name for it, Mark Fisher called it "Capitalist realism", along with some sort of green goo, whatever the hell that is. Wonder why Mark offed himself? Sad and dark humans also have great philosophy's at times. Check out Emil C. and his dark stuff, the French hate life but love cheese and wine, what kind of sense is that?
@PlasticPills can you list some of the films you sampled for the making of the video? Or make any recommendations for sci-fi films that put into play accelerationist ideas? Thanks!
I’m curious how Donna Haraway’s Cyborg Manifesto fits into this? I think any resistance to transhumanism is meaningless as we are already integrated with technology in so many ways... in how we interact, in how we see each other/are seen, in how we construct self.
Yo Pate, the cyborg manifesto is not about cyborgs as they are usually depicted, rather that everyone is already a cyborg and has always been. It's part of the feminist critique of philosophy which claims that philosophers have naturalized traditionally masculine traits as the features of subjectivity, universally.
thanks for an amazing video! what i like about Acc is that it kinda feels like a post-political mindframe. it , among other things, clearly show why "left vs right" and even "4-axis political compass" notions of political ideology is inadequate, in the sense that they do not encompass the whole of human paradigm (paradigmical??) potential. so far tho, when it comes to R/Acc, i haven't yet gotten the impression that followers of this ideology care about human rights or have the opinion that oppressive hierarchies are BAD. they WANT a shitty future where humans are divided into factions of "worthy" and "unworthy". in that sense, they are still firmly rightist. and yeah clearly, Acc is also kind of a coping mechanism for depressoid post/transhumanist sci-fi nerds. hence the vocabulary and the 90s cyberpunk aesthetic.
well, star trek is also a consequence of the dark side, it is not representing a smooth policy based transition from capitalism to utopia.... even in star trek world war 3 happened where we almost annihilated ourselves and then after we started rebuilding based on cooperation and so on and so on....
For most of the Right-wing their concept of accelerationism and it's end-goal are very different from Land's concept. Just pointing it out. For most of them, Land's "prediction" is the worst possible scenario imaginable, the very thing they oppose and want to stop from happening.
i thought that was Land's take too? he's just describing a dystopia but somehow at the same time espousing how rightist ideology is still good for humanity. or something?
Great overview of the scope of accelerationism. Again you've given me a label I didn't know I even had (something akin to Unconditional Accelerationism that bends right wing means to left wing ends).
Super late to this, and maybe there's another video on your channel, but it's a shame you didn't touch on how much right wing terrorism has used accelerationist theory in their manifestos.
Prefiguration seems to respond appropriately to neoliberalism ( building dual power ), lost futures ( generating new futures in the now ), and accelerationism ( preparing society for major shifts ).
minor problem with your oversimplification: at our level, perfectly correct. it's correct right up until the people with the resources start believing in accelerationism then convince one another that it's good for them and start building survivalist compounds in places like hawaii and new zealand (and that hasn't happened yet, right). when it does you, like the rest of us, can look forward to their foolishness...
That's what it is - hopeless and a little lazy. It makes sense as an academic theory; a prediction of what happens if we don't change anything. It doesn't really make sense as a political position.
I know this is being super pedantic; but I think the United Nations Earth from the Expanse, although on the surface is seemingly a more hopeful outlook on future Earth. In reality when you really delve into it, it's more of a neo-neo liberal hellscape with the right wing version of UBI as a crutch for controlling the ultimate result of capitalism's contradicts. Honestly it would be interesting to do a Marxist analysis of the geo-.... well, system-political situation in that show.
Sure here goes: Marxist analysis: Society is actually a competition, not that far off from the laws of the wild. Our greatest threats are no longer the beasts beyond the walls, but our fellow humans. Even within societies of Marxist ideology, this behavior persists. Therefore, Socialism cannot work if wielded by the hands of people. A benevolent AI would be needed to prevent any corruption within government and industry. Otherwise Socialism, Communism and any other forms of Marxist economy will be Capitalism wearing a red mask.
This video - and several others on the channel - is not accessible. I've never seen this problem before on youtube so I don't know if there's something wrong with the Plastic Pills videos or it's a new youtube problem.
@@luxxy209 so, I just got this video recommended by the algorithm again (after a year). I don't know what the problem was before, but now it is finally visible for me. Thank you, algorithm :)
Capitalism may lack mechanisms to prevent climate change, but what political system could sustain a population this size without a similar consumption of resources?
I could only agree with accelerationism (rather, i could only agree to give up on everything else and believe accelerationism by default) if it could make sure the ppl on the bottoms of hierarchies weren't collateral damage. That seems to be seen as naive from a right-accelerationist standpoint, and merely the last hope from a left-accelerationist standpoint. But i still feel like i should fight against it, and if i ever stopped fighting against it, i think I'd have to reject left-accelerationism and learn to cope with the inevitable.
From what I've read while waiting for this video, accelerationism doesn't say anything about what we or you should do. Instead, it's basis is more about discussing what's actually happening. The doing part is an entirely different thing which can t be built off of accelerationism.
It seems to me we can slow it down by refusing to give in to temptations to use technology to better the superficial aspects of ourselves, say. In other words, and more specifically, we should stop trying to better our lives through testerone pills, protein powder, hair transplants, and e-cigarettes. And certainly we shouldn’t try to alter the genomes of our potential children using new technology. Rather than embracing change, we should work on appreciating what we already have. Like you I don’t imagine this would be a popular idea among people now. And I’m afraid it may be hard-wired into the human organism to want to move past...and transcend. It’s not an animal’s nature, but it’s the human’s, as man is, in so many ways, divorced from nature.
@@jayburkett2859 I don't know if this is possible. Bio manipulation being one example is already happening, and we haven't even been able to address it. In order to completely stop it you'd have to have a global governmental regulatory group with enough teeth and oversight to prevent even the smallest of projects forming under our noses.
It is only a few months later and now we are in the middle of the pandemic, people just can not accept human knowedge is limited, the humble attitude is always the one we should take, what l would say to Land and Fisher is "There are more things in heaven and Earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosopy"
Interesting video, I didn't know that transhumanists were recycling the accelerationist topic. I would say that Marxists use "accelerationism" not as a guiding principle but more like a tactic (i.e. in a case-by-case approach). Marx and those who followed never developed a fully theory on accelerationism. Russian and Chinese revolutions put a break on the linear accelerationist view of history as these peripherical and overwhelmingly peasant countries managed to have socialist governments in place (not going to discuss here how "pure" the socialism was - this would be a longer discussion). We have to take into account that contradiction (internal and external, or primary and secondary) is also a good chunk of Marxism-Leninism, so a one-size fits all approach to accelerationism would hardly reach a consensus within the Marxist movement (I believe it would depend if we are talking about a country with weak or low socialist movement, if the country is a central or peripherical in economic and geo-political terms, etc.). I personally tend to oppose accelerationism as this tactic or principle relies too much on futurology and passivity.
Block chain is not from Silicon Valley, BTW. It's originator Satoshi Nakamoto is mythical. And it seems at least worth a try... e.g. process culminating in block chain based global UBI, where money is created and distributed directly as UBI, a self-governed as a co-op of money creation. Decentralized and socially owned peer-to-peer ledger replacing class society based on centralized rule by the class of scribes, aka professional managerial class aka the 20%.
I'm not sure left-accelerationism, at least as Srnicek and Williams talk about it, can be defined as "allowing capitalism to run its course". In Inventing the Future (great book, btw), they argue more for a decades-long counter-hegemonic struggle against whatever the next stage of capitalism will be.
I've had a few comments contesting the words "allowing" and "letting", which is fair, but the point I was hoping to make was that accelerationists don't see a future within current models of political action. So the "allowing" does not mean doing nothing, it just means that inherited forms of protest or even electoral change are not a goal. Poor articulation on my part. I now have a block of cheese to get to
@@PlasticPills I'm unsure of how I missed this response! It seems like our current economic situation is rapidly pushing humanity to a point where we'll be forced into geoengineering and human augmentation. If we don't change then we're going to attempt (and fail) to replicate 'natural' modes of being while the world more rapidly changes around us. This is basically the singularity plus climate change. Staying the same isn't an option.
yes but what about the dynamics of the images that will be processed eventually ,generating of image of future could be a singular desire ,as you imagine ,or wait for the time and the whole globe to agree with you , you are a unique bodiment of the universe who can imagine the images in its own particular way and It shall not be extended to every various bodies .
In my opinion Nick Land has been a nutcase since his dark enlightenment stuff. His twitter is indistinguishable from a typical Maga guy. I feel like Fisher actually gives a shit about accelerationism as an ideology that can further humanity.
While entertaining, this video doesn't really capture what the (admittedly often changing) heart of accelerationism is. The video is focused on Nick Land (right accelerationist), Noys (the chief critic of accelerationism) and pre-accelerationist Fisher. Communes are in no way left accelerationist, they are what Williams and Srnicek call "folk politics". For Fisher the modern world's acceleration has paradoxically constrained our sense of the possible and increased what we take as given. Accelerationism is about raising awareness of this process and "remaking the given" (Brassier). Check out "The Labour of the Inhuman" by Reza Negaristani.
If you'd made this vid before Star Trek: Picard dropped, you could've just cut in a scene from that garbage as the modern view of a SciFi future after the Data and Riker clip. Makes me unbearably sad that even Trek is now an accelerationist garbage fire.
Accelerationism has many good ideas, and it’s perfect for some people. But I think it’s pathetic. They realise where we are and some trends happening. But they have neither the intelligence nor political capacity to act on the course of history. It’s perfect for people sitting at home in nihilism. It’s pathetic and ineffectual, just waiting for it to end. I intend to actually act with my life.
Yeah I sold my soul to a soul less money machine and yeah I'm living in an apocalyptic hell scape, but LOOK AT THESE SICK CYBORG EYES! Transhumanism is oversold on the augmentation, I believe the better questions lie in changing human nature itself, cyborg augmentations sound cool as hell though.
"I believe the better questions lie in changing human nature itself" If the ruling class doesn't intend to purge the masses, they intend to breed aggression out of them. Basically they want to do to humanity what humanity did to wolves; either kill them or turn them into dogs. All the strong and aggressive dogs will be used for security, law enforcement or war.
The problem today as I see it is that our corpocratic gerontocracy is either, or both, too corrupt and too old to understand the technological trends and where they will eventually end up. The modern suburbs will turn into the left-leaning versions of the accelerationist philosophy while the urban sprawl will turn into the right-leaning version.
This video is a good introduction, but lacks in nuance (if people are interested: Aldous Huxley has a much deeper look at what accelerionism is/was for farther research ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-lrOVKHg_PJQ.html ) . I do think with Nick Land its important to clearly distinguish between early and late stages in his work, which is interesting because you can use young NL to deconstruct old NL (which maybe the reason why he so fiercely disavowed his early work). Rightwing accelerationism is nothing more than a transcendental relapse, a worship of capitalism as a technodeity. Leftwing-Accelerationism never gained much ground politically, while rightwing/libertarian accelerationism is alive and well within silicon valley. The accelerationist critique of classical marxism however is vital, because it exposes the major flaws in centemporary political thought. We are so sure we want to achieve change, but how do we achieve change vom A in the present to B, C, D in the future? Look at all those little enclosed bubble churches in the contemporary left ... Capitalism has long figured out, how to integrate classical revolutionary thought into the commodity-complex, which in no way contributes to a better society but satisfies mere spectacle to gain points in a subculture as any other fandom. The problem is that marxism really has become a ghost and has become useless in the actual present. You can buy Marxposters, Guevara cigarette etuis, ticket for Jordan Peterson vs. Slavoj Zizek etc. And there is the endless pointless infighting. Theory has become tradition, better defend those corrupt politicians in fringe marxist countrys by flags of aesthetic resemblence. Most marxists today are more bourgois than the liberals and conservatives they attack. And what little exists of a "postmodern" progressivism is hollow, polishing the makeup of neoliberal politics and mistake a change of words for progress. A revolution can only happen, when the grandwork is already there. It is not, because of a sleeping left. Contemporary accelerationist thought no longer is an ideology in itself, but a toolbox for the left to modernize itself. Not accelerionism has given in, my friend, everyone else has. Accelerionist critique was a first, (flawed) step out of the circuit of the system itself.
