I hope I'm not spamming you, but I thought I should recommend "The Accelerationist Aggregate Armementarium"; a digital library comprising everything related to the subject. Everything from postcapitalism, posthumanism, and the CCRU.
Everything is welcome! Without yet getting a chance to look into what you suggest, it occurs to me a most pertinent question we fail to raise: accelerate what? In terms of socialist strategy and divining between the various strands of accelerationism, it seems the obvious starting point, define the subject. Latently I think I try to draw that out in the discussion by raising what I deem as contradictions in socialist discourse: What ought a worker's movement focus on/aggitate for/attempt to accelerate. Thanks again for your contribution
@@ANewConversation Long post part1: You hit upon a key question in accelerationism: what's accelerating, and can we even control it; is that even possible? I think that on one side, acceleration is a process that happens without our conscious input: the productive forces almost feel as if they're developing themselves, even if they still pass through us. This is essentially the heart of 90's Nick Land: capitalism is going for a revolution of its own outside the control of everyone, including the capitalists; every constraint it encounters -- including the human subject itself -- will ultimately be sloughed off. It's a weird sort of Marxist nihilism, but a nihilism that ironically still was on the side of liberation, if you can believe it, as a lot of the oppressive forces are depicted as part of the "human security system" that seeks to delay the dissolution of the subject. This where the figure of capitalism being an A.I. from the future comes from, terminator comes to ensure the conditions for its own creation. I know it's weird to think about this positively, but look at the historical context it was written in. The 90's left, as 1Dime explored a bit, was characterized by a strong sense of horizontalism and a return to a "pure" nature. But also the academic left's empty critique -- "papers about antagonism, then all off to the pub afterwards". Land's work during this period can best be seen more as a destruction of these fantasies. Fisher will later state that "Land is the enemy the left needs" because he strongly challenges these dogmatic positions in a way that can't just be ignored. This is why Land is hard to talk about sometimes, he's both given too much credit for, but can't be ignored from accelerationist theory.
@@ANewConversation Long post part2: Now, accelerationism as theoretical strategy comes later, roughly around the 08 financial crisis. Fisher reflects on Land's analysis and concludes that capitalism cannot bring the future -- kicking and screaming, as it might have been depicted. Instead of ever-increasing intensity and deterritorialization, breaking through the human subject as its ultimate obstacle, we instead got capitalism decelerating and territorializing. We got the "Facebook era", where a simulation of innovation and newness cloaks inertia and stasis. The human subject, instead of an obstacle for capitalism to overcome, instead is required for the stability of the system. Mark contrasts Land's Terminator with Avatar, as modern capitalism insists on the fantasy of a return to nature and purity. He doesn't give any explicit praxis, but he states that the left cannot slide into a simple moralistic critique of capitalism: "The Manifesto,” Jameson writes, “proposes to see capitalism as the most productive moment of history and the most destructive at the same time, and issues the imperative to think Good and Evil simultaneously, and as inseparable and inextricable dimensions of the same present of time. This is then a more productive way of transcending Good and Evil than the cynicism and lawlessness which so many readers attribute to the Nietzschean program.”
part3: This is roughly where l/acc and r/acc come into existence, both trying to think the way forward outside our present deceleration. L/acc is roughly what you went over with 1Dime. R/acc is, well, a right wing response that thinks the solution is more in line with that you stereotypically associate with accelerationism: capitalism must be intensified. U/acc comes later as a response to the perceived failure of the two strands, instead thinking they missed the point, and we need to go back and rethink our response. It isn't left or right, but a broad grouping of people across the political spectrum trying to think through the theory. That's roughly the bird's eye view of the situation. Obviously it's simplified, as all of these details have a lot more to them than I can easily present in a youtube comment.
@@Fryguystudios Yes I would recognise the organic development of capital's productive forces. Like life we are compelled to propogate it, no individual response to the binary choice it faces us with affects it in the slightest. And interesting you mention deceleration; the reterritorialisation of capital is something now quite obvious. And putting that alongside the decay of capitalism as Lenin describes the imperial phase, and the saplings of the world after it emerging ... I mean, the only reason that is deceleration is due to an a priori assumed direction - we are otherwise accelerating to that other world, are we not? Even if the productive forces reach below the rate of '1', it means a radically new way of living for much of the world. ... I mean, again, what is the use in either moment in considering it as accelerating or otherwise? ... And I suppose it is naive to think there are elements we get to choose to accelerate, though surely there is a political discussion to be had about the role of policy in affecting directions (which is not to say I'm a parliamentarian by any stretch); its just that, what's the point of conceiving of acceleration when, if its as good as 'objet a', we can simple surrogate the concept for merely describing a direction as it unfolds, if you get me? (Like, I see the use in pointing to a possible future if humans take no action, but when then place a 'speed' or rate on it? Why deem it acceleration, or deceleration in an inverted direction?) Again, it will be a while before I get to look at the material you suggest - they're just thoughts in response
None of what you've discussed is wrong, but I think you're overlooking major sections of accelerationist discourse. And I don't mean Nick Land - - although he inevitably pops up everywhere. One key area that's interesting is how After Finitude by Quentin Meillassoux provides the groundwork for Speculative Realism that would be taken up by Mark Fisher and Alex Williams.
Thanks for that, I'll be sure to connect those dots! I'll always put my hands up, I know nothing, ha, but trying to learn, so really appreciate comments on this channel that ... accelerates ... that learning process. So cheers!
@@ANewConversation It's a normal feeling. I started looking into accelerationist theory a few years ago, and I've still yet to find the bottom; so much so that I'm even having to go back to the Greeks. It's a very broad subject, and it's probably best thought of plurally as "accelerationisms" rather than a singular totalizing thing. Sticking with Alex Williams, some of his old blog posts on Splintering Bone Ashes are worth a read, specifically anything regarding "xenoeconomics". You'll have to use the internet archive's wayback machine to retrieve some of them though - - a lot of good theory from that period is almost lost, and Xenogothic has been doing good work trying to piece it back together.
![BLACK BAG - Official Trailer [HD] - Only in Theaters March 14](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/Du0Xp8WX_7I/mqdefault.jpg)
I hope I'm not spamming you, but I thought I should recommend "The Accelerationist Aggregate Armementarium"; a digital library comprising everything related to the subject. Everything from postcapitalism, posthumanism, and the CCRU.
Everything is welcome!
Without yet getting a chance to look into what you suggest, it occurs to me a most pertinent question we fail to raise: accelerate what? In terms of socialist strategy and divining between the various strands of accelerationism, it seems the obvious starting point, define the subject. Latently I think I try to draw that out in the discussion by raising what I deem as contradictions in socialist discourse: What ought a worker's movement focus on/aggitate for/attempt to accelerate.
Thanks again for your contribution
@@ANewConversation Long post part1:
You hit upon a key question in accelerationism: what's accelerating, and can we even control it; is that even possible? I think that on one side, acceleration is a process that happens without our conscious input: the productive forces almost feel as if they're developing themselves, even if they still pass through us. This is essentially the heart of 90's Nick Land: capitalism is going for a revolution of its own outside the control of everyone, including the capitalists; every constraint it encounters -- including the human subject itself -- will ultimately be sloughed off. It's a weird sort of Marxist nihilism, but a nihilism that ironically still was on the side of liberation, if you can believe it, as a lot of the oppressive forces are depicted as part of the "human security system" that seeks to delay the dissolution of the subject. This where the figure of capitalism being an A.I. from the future comes from, terminator comes to ensure the conditions for its own creation.
I know it's weird to think about this positively, but look at the historical context it was written in. The 90's left, as 1Dime explored a bit, was characterized by a strong sense of horizontalism and a return to a "pure" nature. But also the academic left's empty critique -- "papers about antagonism, then all off to the pub afterwards". Land's work during this period can best be seen more as a destruction of these fantasies. Fisher will later state that "Land is the enemy the left needs" because he strongly challenges these dogmatic positions in a way that can't just be ignored. This is why Land is hard to talk about sometimes, he's both given too much credit for, but can't be ignored from accelerationist theory.
@@ANewConversation Long post part2:
Now, accelerationism as theoretical strategy comes later, roughly around the 08 financial crisis. Fisher reflects on Land's analysis and concludes that capitalism cannot bring the future -- kicking and screaming, as it might have been depicted. Instead of ever-increasing intensity and deterritorialization, breaking through the human subject as its ultimate obstacle, we instead got capitalism decelerating and territorializing. We got the "Facebook era", where a simulation of innovation and newness cloaks inertia and stasis. The human subject, instead of an obstacle for capitalism to overcome, instead is required for the stability of the system. Mark contrasts Land's Terminator with Avatar, as modern capitalism insists on the fantasy of a return to nature and purity.
He doesn't give any explicit praxis, but he states that the left cannot slide into a simple moralistic critique of capitalism: "The Manifesto,” Jameson writes, “proposes to see capitalism as the most productive moment of history and the most destructive at the same time, and issues the imperative to think Good and Evil simultaneously, and as inseparable and inextricable dimensions of the same present of time. This is then a more productive way of transcending Good and Evil than the cynicism and lawlessness which so many readers attribute to the Nietzschean program.”
part3:
This is roughly where l/acc and r/acc come into existence, both trying to think the way forward outside our present deceleration. L/acc is roughly what you went over with 1Dime. R/acc is, well, a right wing response that thinks the solution is more in line with that you stereotypically associate with accelerationism: capitalism must be intensified.
U/acc comes later as a response to the perceived failure of the two strands, instead thinking they missed the point, and we need to go back and rethink our response. It isn't left or right, but a broad grouping of people across the political spectrum trying to think through the theory.
That's roughly the bird's eye view of the situation. Obviously it's simplified, as all of these details have a lot more to them than I can easily present in a youtube comment.
@@Fryguystudios Yes I would recognise the organic development of capital's productive forces. Like life we are compelled to propogate it, no individual response to the binary choice it faces us with affects it in the slightest.
And interesting you mention deceleration; the reterritorialisation of capital is something now quite obvious. And putting that alongside the decay of capitalism as Lenin describes the imperial phase, and the saplings of the world after it emerging ... I mean, the only reason that is deceleration is due to an a priori assumed direction - we are otherwise accelerating to that other world, are we not? Even if the productive forces reach below the rate of '1', it means a radically new way of living for much of the world. ... I mean, again, what is the use in either moment in considering it as accelerating or otherwise?
...
And I suppose it is naive to think there are elements we get to choose to accelerate, though surely there is a political discussion to be had about the role of policy in affecting directions (which is not to say I'm a parliamentarian by any stretch); its just that, what's the point of conceiving of acceleration when, if its as good as 'objet a', we can simple surrogate the concept for merely describing a direction as it unfolds, if you get me? (Like, I see the use in pointing to a possible future if humans take no action, but when then place a 'speed' or rate on it? Why deem it acceleration, or deceleration in an inverted direction?)
Again, it will be a while before I get to look at the material you suggest - they're just thoughts in response
None of what you've discussed is wrong, but I think you're overlooking major sections of accelerationist discourse. And I don't mean Nick Land - - although he inevitably pops up everywhere. One key area that's interesting is how After Finitude by Quentin Meillassoux provides the groundwork for Speculative Realism that would be taken up by Mark Fisher and Alex Williams.
Thanks for that, I'll be sure to connect those dots! I'll always put my hands up, I know nothing, ha, but trying to learn, so really appreciate comments on this channel that ... accelerates ... that learning process. So cheers!
@@ANewConversation It's a normal feeling. I started looking into accelerationist theory a few years ago, and I've still yet to find the bottom; so much so that I'm even having to go back to the Greeks. It's a very broad subject, and it's probably best thought of plurally as "accelerationisms" rather than a singular totalizing thing.
Sticking with Alex Williams, some of his old blog posts on Splintering Bone Ashes are worth a read, specifically anything regarding "xenoeconomics". You'll have to use the internet archive's wayback machine to retrieve some of them though - - a lot of good theory from that period is almost lost, and Xenogothic has been doing good work trying to piece it back together.
@@Fryguystudios Nice one, cheers for that. Again, v much appreciated
Ed who?
from A New Conversation