Biography:Nick Land

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Short description: English philosopher (born 1962)
"Landian" redirects here. For a car brand, see Seres Automobile (Hubei).

Nick Land
Born (1962-03-14) 14 March 1962 (age 63)
NationalityBritish
EraContemporary philosophy
RegionWestern philosophy
InstitutionsUniversity of Warwick
Main interests
Notable ideas
Accelerationism

Nick Land (born 14 March 1962) is an English philosopher best known for popularising the ideology of accelerationism.[1] His work has been tied to the development of speculative realism,[2][3] and departs from the formal conventions of academic writing, incorporating unorthodox and esoteric influences.[4] Much of his writing was anthologized in the 2011 collection Fanged Noumena.

In the 1990s, Land was closely affiliated with the Cybernetic Culture Research Unit (CCRU), a "theory-fiction" collective co-founded by Land and cyberfeminist philosopher Sadie Plant at the University of Warwick.[2][5] During this era, Land drew inspiration from post-structuralist theory and leftist thinkers like Bataille, Marx, and Deleuze & Guattari as well as science fiction, rave culture, and the occult.[6] He also coined the term hyperstition to refer to memetic ideas that bring about their own reality.

Land resigned from Warwick in 1998. After a period of amphetamine abuse, he suffered a breakdown in the early 2000s and disappeared from public view.[7] Later, he moved to Shanghai and re-emerged as a figure on the political right, becoming a foundational thinker in the reactionary movement known as the Dark Enlightenment. His related writings have explored anti-egalitarian and anti-democratic ideas.

Biography

Land obtained a PhD in 1987 in the University of Essex under David Farrell Krell, with a thesis on Heidegger's 1953 essay Die Sprache im Gedicht (Language in the Poem), which is about Georg Trakl's work.[8] He began as a lecturer in continental philosophy at the University of Warwick from 1987 until his resignation in 1998.[4] In 1992, he published The Thirst for Annihilation: Georges Bataille and Virulent Nihilism.[9] Land published an abundance of shorter texts, many in the 1990s during his time with the CCRU.[2] Most of these articles are compiled in the retrospective collection Fanged Noumena, published in 2011.

At Warwick, Land and Sadie Plant co-founded the Cybernetic Culture Research Unit (CCRU), an interdisciplinary research group described by philosopher Graham Harman as "a diverse group of thinkers who experimented in conceptual production by welding together a wide variety of sources: futurism, technoscience, philosophy, mysticism, numerology, complexity theory, and science fiction, among others".[10] During his time at Warwick, Land participated in Virtual Futures, a series of cyber-culture conferences. Virtual Futures 96 was advertised as "an anti-disciplinary event" and "a conference in the post-humanities". One session involved Land "lying on the ground, croaking into a mic", recalls Robin Mackay, while Mackay played jungle records in the background.[1] He was also the thesis advisor of some PhD students.[11] After he resigned, the CCRU continued meeting under his leadership. In the early 2000s, Land suffered a breakdown after a period of "fanatical" amphetamine abuse, disappearing from public.[1]

Land taught at the New Centre for Research & Practice until March 2017, when the Centre ended its relationship with him "following several tweets by Land this year in which he espoused intolerant opinions about Muslims and immigrants".[12] As of 2017, Land resided in Shanghai.[1] During the COVID-19 pandemic, he experienced Shanghai's strict lockdown measures firsthand. After Xenosystems, his primary blog, was removed from the internet in 2022, he took an extended hiatus from social media before returning later that year. In October 2023, he launched a new social media account, Xenocosmography, marking a shift toward religious and numerological themes.[13]

Concepts

Early work

Land's work has been influential to the political philosophy of accelerationism. Land views capitalism as the driver of modernity[14][15] and deterritorialization,[16][17] advocating its use to dissolve existing social systems[14] and reach a technological singularity.[16][15] Along with the other members of CCRU, Land wove together ideas from the occult, cybernetics, science fiction, and poststructuralist philosophy to try to describe the phenomena of technocapitalist acceleration.[1]

Land coined the term hyperstition, a portmanteau of superstition and hyper, to describe something "equipoised between fiction and technology". According to Land, hyperstitions are ideas that, by their very existence as ideas, bring about their own reality.[18][19]

Later work

Land has contributed to the Dark Enlightenment—also known as the neo-reactionary movement (NRx)—which opposes egalitarianism and democracy. According to reporter Dylan Matthews, Land believes democracy restricts accountability and freedom.[20] His Dark Enlightenment work also contributes to his accelerationism; he views democratic and egalitarian policies as only delaying acceleration and the technocapital singularity. Thus, he prefers capitalist monarchies to pursue long-term technological progress, as he believes democracy focuses on short-term public interests.[15][21] Shuja Haider notes, "His sequence of essays setting out its principles [has] become the foundation of the NRx canon."[19]

His writing has also discussed themes of scientific racism and eugenics, or what he has called "hyper-racism".[22][23][24][25] Since 2016, he has increasingly been recognised as an inspiration for the alt-right.[26] Land disputes that the NRx movement is a movement, and defines the alt-right as distinct from the NRx.[27]

Reception and influence

Mark Fisher, a British cultural theorist and student of Land's, argued in 2011 that Land's greatest impact had been on music and art rather than philosophy. The musician Kode9, the artist Jake Chapman, and others have studied with or been influenced by Land, with Chapman highlighting Land's "technihilism".[2] Fisher underscores in particular how Land's personality during the 1990s could catalyze changes in those engaging with his work through what Kodwo Eshun called a manner "immediately open, egalitarian, and absolutely unaffected by academic protocol" that could dramatise "theory as a geopolitico-historical epic".[2] Fisher has also written that "Land was our Nietzsche" in baiting progressive tendencies, mixing the reactionary and futuristic, and his writing style. He also praised Land's attacks on left-wing academia while taking issue with his interpretation of Deleuze and Guattari's views on capitalism.[17]

Nihilist philosopher Ray Brassier, also formerly from the University of Warwick, said in 2017, "Land has gone from arguing 'Politics is dead', 20 years ago, to this completely old-fashioned, standard reactionary stuff."[1]

Books

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 1.5 Beckett, Andy (11 May 2017). "Accelerationism: How a fringe philosophy predicted the future we live in". The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/may/11/accelerationism-how-a-fringe-philosophy-predicted-the-future-we-live-in. 
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4 Fisher, Mark (1 June 2011). "Nick Land: Mind Games". Dazed and Confused. http://www.dazeddigital.com/artsandculture/article/10459/1/nick-land-mind-games. 
  3. ↑ de Cisneros, Roc Jiménez (2014-09-09). "The Accelerationist Vertigo" (in en-US). https://lab.cccb.org/en/the-accelerationist-vertigo/. 
  4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 Mackay, Robin (27 February 2013). "Nick Land – An Experiment in Inhumanism". Divus. http://divus.cc/london/en/article/nick-land-ein-experiment-im-inhumanismus. 
  5. ↑ Land, Nick (2011). Fanged Noumena: Collected Writings 1987–2007. Introduction by Ray Brassier and Robin Mackay. Falmouth: Urbanomic. ISBN 978-0955308789. 
  6. ↑ Wark, McKenzie. "On Nick Land". https://www.versobooks.com/blogs/news/3284-on-nick-land?srsltid=AfmBOorZol4tHY0cUSqa5US3lJfSuyzjupEhrmTKqQMfDL3vx66v8VCf. 
  7. ↑ Beckett, Andy (2017-05-11). "Accelerationism: how a fringe philosophy predicted the future we live in" (in en-GB). The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/may/11/accelerationism-how-a-fringe-philosophy-predicted-the-future-we-live-in. "Land himself, after what he later described as “perhaps a year of fanatical abuse” of “the sacred substance amphetamine”, and “prolonged artificial insomnia ... devoted to futile ‘writing’ practices”, suffered a breakdown in the early 2000s, and disappeared from public view." 
  8. ↑ Acknowledgement section of Heidegger's 'Die Sprache im Gedicht' and the Cultivation of the Grapheme (PhD Thesis, University of Essex, 1987)
  9. ↑ Wark, McKenzie (20 June 2017). "On Nick Land". Verso Books. https://www.versobooks.com/blogs/3284-on-nick-land. 
  10. ↑ Harman, Graham (2011) (in en). The Speculative Turn: Continental Materialism and Realism. re.press. ISBN 978-0980668346. https://books.google.com/books?id=coBDqJQeAQYC&q=%22a+diverse+group+of+thinkers+who+experimented+in+conceptual+production+by+welding+together+a+wide+variety+of+sources%3A+futurism%2C+technoscience%2C+philosophy%2C+mysticism%2C+numerology%2C+complexity+theory%2C+and+science+fiction%2C+among+others.%22&pg=PA6. 
  11. ↑ Sawhney, Deepak Narang (May 1996). Axiomatics: the apparatus of capitalism (Ph.D. dissertation). University of Warwick.
  12. ↑ "Statement on Nick Land". 29 March 2017. https://www.facebook.com/thenewcentre/posts/644026572465531. 
  13. ↑ Miller, Daniel (October 5, 2025). "Who Is Nick Land?". Tablet Magazine. https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/news/articles/who-is-nick-land. Retrieved October 7, 2025. 
  14. ↑ 14.0 14.1 Jiménez de Cisneros, Roc (5 November 2014). "The Accelerationist Vertigo (II): Interview with Robin Mackay". Centre de Cultura Contemporània de Barcelona. https://lab.cccb.org/en/the-accelerationist-vertigo-ii-interview-with-robin-mackay/. 
  15. ↑ 15.0 15.1 15.2 Beauchamp, Zack (18 November 2019). "Accelerationism: the obscure idea inspiring white supremacist killers around the world". Vox (Vox Media). https://www.vox.com/the-highlight/2019/11/11/20882005/accelerationism-white-supremacy-christchurch. 
  16. ↑ 16.0 16.1 Le, Vincent (March 23, 2018). ""These Violent Delights Have Violent Ends": Decrypting Westworld as Dual Coding and Corruption of Nick Land's Accelerationism.". Colloquy: Text Theory Critique. (34): 3–23. 
  17. ↑ 17.0 17.1 Fisher, Mark (2014). "Terminator vs Avatar". #Accelerate: The Accelerationist Reader. Urbanomic. pp. 335–46: 340, 342. ISBN 978-0957529557. 
  18. ↑ Carstens, Delphi; Land, Nick (2009). "Hyperstition: An Introduction: Delphi Carstens interviews Nick Land" (in en-US). https://www.orphandriftarchive.com/articles/hyperstition-an-introduction/. 
  19. ↑ 19.0 19.1 Haider, Shuja (28 March 2017). "The Darkness at the End of the Tunnel: Artificial Intelligence and Neoreaction". Viewpoint Magazine. https://www.viewpointmag.com/2017/03/28/the-darkness-at-the-end-of-the-tunnel-artificial-intelligence-and-neoreaction/. 
  20. ↑ Matthews, Dylan (25 August 2016). "Alt-right explained". Vox. https://www.vox.com/2016/4/18/11434098/alt-right-explained. 
  21. ↑ Le, Vincent (2018). "THE DECLINE OF POLITICS IN THE NAME OF SCIENCE? CONSTELLATIONS AND COLLISIONS BETWEEN NICK LAND AND RAY BRASSIER.". Cosmos & History 14 (3): 31-50. 
  22. ↑ Burrows, Roger (10 June 2020). "On Neoreaction". The Sociological Review. https://www.thesociologicalreview.com/on-neoreaction/. 
  23. ↑ Topinka, Robert (2019-10-14). ""Back to a Past that Was Futuristic": The Alt-Right and the Uncanny Form of Racism" (in en-US). http://www.boundary2.org/2019/10/robert-topinka-back-to-a-past-that-was-futuristic-the-alt-right-and-the-uncanny-form-of-racism/. "Land proposes an acceleration of the "explicitly superior" and already "genetically self-filtering elite" through a system of "assortative mating" that would offer a "class-structured mechanism for population diremption, on a vector toward neo-speciation"." 
  24. ↑ Burrows, Roger (2018). "Urban Futures and The Dark Enlightenment: A Brief Guide for the Perplexed". in Jacobs, Keith; Malpas, Jeff. Towards a Philosophy of the City: Interdisciplinary and Transcultural Perspectives. London: Rowman & Littlefield. 
  25. ↑ Land, Nick (4 October 2014). "HYPER-RACISM" (in en-GB). http://alternative-right.blogspot.com/2014/10/hyper-racism.html. 
  26. ↑ Bacharach, Jacob (23 November 2016). "I Was a Teenage Nazi Wannabe". The New Republic. https://newrepublic.com/article/138983/teenage-nazi-wannabe. Retrieved 12 November 2019. 
  27. ↑ Gray, Rosie (2017-02-10). "The Anti-Democracy Movement Influencing the Right" (in en-US). https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/02/behind-the-internets-dark-anti-democracy-movement/516243/. 



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