is there any method to the madness? I stumbled upon some stuff and its horrifying, but could be understood from a very neutral perspective. Is it entirely full of racists and reactionaries?
is there any method to the madness? I stumbled upon some stuff and its horrifying, but could be understood from a very neutral perspective. Is it entirely full of racists and reactionaries?
Early Nick Land is 100% worth a read for the prose alone, the same goes for the other CCRU folks (Sadie Plant and Mark Fisher especially.) Deleuze and Guattari notably inspired much of the acc theory and they were very based imo. Make of that what you will.
Can you point me to anything specific? I tried reading 'How to kill Oedipus in Cyberspace' and I don't think I really got anything out of that. Might be my fault though, dunno.
He's not an easy writer to get into in all fairness.. In order for your reading to bear fruit a foundational knowledge in Kant, Nietzche, Bataille, Marx, Deleuze/Guattari, and even some Lovecraft is very helpful.
Also, just because Land is a full fledged reactionary these days, doesn't mean he's like one of these pseudo-intellectual figures of the alt right a la Peterson or Molyneux. Land isn't so easily dismissed in my opinion. He has an incredibly exhaustive background in continental philosophy/ critical theory which he consistently draws from and purposefully subverts at any opportunity.
His most important essays are probably:
“Kant, Capital, and the Prohibition of Incest”
“Machinic Desire”
“Meltdown”
I would reccomend reading them in that order. As they get progressively unhinged as they go.
I would also reccomend reading a bit on his concept of Teleoplexy and his theory of time, which is...fucking wild lol.
This is article is a good primer for that:
https://onscenes.weebly.com/philosophy/nick-land-on-time-teleoplexy-templexity
Edit:
I would also reccomend the Lemurian Time War, and the Origins of the Cthuhlu Club to get a hint of the pulp horror theory-fiction he had been trying to make as well.
First off, thanks for that. I have read your linked primer, and I think I'm getting somewhere. Made me think of roko's basilisk a whole lot, that. I'm planning to make my way through those essays over the next days - do you mind me messaging you, if I do manage to formulate a coherent question regarding the material?
Not at all! Although keep in mind I'm still working on formulating my own understanding haha. Nick Land and the CCRU stuff is a fairly recent hyperfixation of mine so I've amassed a ton of resources though.
I've been fascinated by all things cybernetics since reading a whiff of Stafford Beer a while ago, so this is really getting interesting. I've been getting into the first pages of 'Kant, Capital, and the Prohibition of Incest', and there's already been a few sentences that... maybe not exactly blew my mind, but certainly were a pleasure to read and re-read. What he said about the ideal of bourgeois politics being the absence of politics; that was just chef's kiss. Anyways, I'll be logging off soon - see ya, and thanks again <3