z/acc
Zufi accelerationism. Maximizing culture, science and tech. Maximizing (dis)continuity and (a)symmetry.
What would be a Zoroastrian accelerationism or Zufi accelerationism? Zufism is a synthesis of Zoroastrianism, Zen and Sufism advocated by the Swedish philosopher Alexander Bard.
Zoroastrians are the oldest and tiny religious minority that is extremely successful. There are around 200,000 Zoroastrians globally, with 69,000 (Parsis) in India, but they own a significant portion of the county’s wealth. Their population in India peaked at 115,000 in 1941 and since then has decreased by almost half.
If you want to peek into the Parsi culture in Mumbai, you can watch this short DW documentary on their obsession with maintaining classic cars and bikes. Alexander Bard calls this trait imploitation, the opposite of exploitation. Z/acc would combine this obsession for continuity with radical tech innovation and putting as many industries as possible on the TV price curve.
Accelerationism is about maximizing asymmetry, the radical zero-to-one tech innovation, while Zufism is about maximizing continuity and balancing constructive production (Asha) with creative destruction (Druj). These two forces are in pragmatic antagonism, a kind of tensegrity, a tension combined with integrity, described by Buckminister Fuller.
Combining insights from Forrest Landry and Balaji Srinivasan, we can say that culture is about continuity, while science is about symmetry (independently reproducible research) and tech is about discontinuity and asymmetry - a creative disruption.
Science emerges from tech and vice versa. Tinkerers through practical experiments come up with novel insights that are later codified by scientists. Tech progress gives us asymmetrical advantages and creates zero-to-one products and services. These are later copied in 1-to-n mimetic fashion - going from asymmetry of tech to the symmetry of reproducible science and management. From a project, an event to a process.
Forrest Landry explains how you cannot maximize continuity and symmetry at the same time, but need to compromise a bit - trading some continuity for symmetry or vice versa. A MAGA vs tech culture war on high-skill immigration is a good illustration of this - there can’t be a full global meritocracy, the concerns of native population need to be taken into account.
This is indeed beneficial, because as philosophers Slavoj Žižek and Jean-Pierre Dupuy explain, pure meritocracy would create an explosion of envy, resentment and mimetic competition. Today if few people read my posts on X or FB I can console myself that shadow-banning or algorithmic discrimination against links to Substack might be part of the issue, not just my poor form or content.
This has to do with the concept of legibility or “seeing like a state” versus “learning like a machine” - to use Balaji’s idea. AI is a black box, and it has a potential to be a much smarter regulator than the state - but the opaqueness will always be a factor. Dark dynamism embraces this opaqueness and tech acceleration while preserving the continuity of culture.
Humanism is not enough, but contra Žižek, we had enough of universalism, Platonism and Eurocentrism. Alexander Bard explains how Zoroastrianism inspired Judaism and the Western culture, but our dominant religions today sacrifice quality for the pursuit of universalism and quantity. The ideas of abstract Kantian universalism and monolithic nationalism are the enemy of Taleb’s fractal localism.
Today we are experiencing a reversal to the mean - as Asia is rising to its historic dominance in trade and culture, after a very bad century for China and India, due to Western imports of communism and Fabian socialism.
The internet increases variance and retribalizes the world, says Balaji Srinivasan. But a decentralized high variance society is unstable in the long-term and needs a rebundling and recentralization into new “socionts”, new social ontologies.
Balaji’s notion of optimalism, as the opposite of maximalism is protopian - we can gradually arrive in a better and a more WAGMI world. By 10x tech improvements that compound over time, year by year.
Humanism/culture is not enough, but also science and tech are not enough. We can see tech founders as today’s renaissance men, a combination of artists, philosophers and entrepreneurs. Tech is about discontinuity and asymmetry, while culture is about continuity and science is about symmetry. Tech is also about zero-to-one, a kind of first-person “founder mode” view, a new kind of will to power, will to transcendence, will to intelligence and will to wisdom. Science is a third-person view and culture is a peer-to-peer second-person view.
Z/acc or Zufi accelerationism combines the continuity of culture with ancient wisdom practices going back millennia, with modern science that is about symmetry (independently replicable research) and the tech disruption that brings asymmetry and discontinuity. Zoroastrians meditate about Asha and Druj - constructive and chaotic forces. We need both, but in a proper dosage.
Think of Californian culture - where a tech founder meditates in the morning how to destroy legacy competition during the day, only to party in the evening (or go to bed early to improve his longevity prospects, as Bryan Johnson is watching). Z/acc would add a dimension of continuity and imploitation (an obsession with maintenance and withholding pleasure that is the opposite of exploitation), as well as accelerationist disruption and zero-to-one asymmetry.
The success of z/acc would be measured in reviving ancient cultures like Zoroastrianism and Sufism, (increasing quantity of z/acc members well beyond 100,000 and quality of their lives and interactions), but also in putting as many industries as possible on the TV price curve, while also making products that are repairable, durable and increase sovereignty and antifragility of individuals and collectives.
Dark dynamism, as a broader concept, lies “between charter schools and charter cities”. It is a movement towards network states that will try to succeed in the next frontier - moving from tech startups, startup hubs and incubators to startup villages. Z/acc can be one of spiritual fuels for such a movement.
Z/acc would try to ideologically unite the red, blue and grey tribes. Because it maximizes red’s continuity of culture, blue’s symmetry of science and grey’s discontinuity and asymmetry of tech. It also unites the West with the Rest, as both techno-optimism and z/acc mean Eurodecentrism.