DEUS EX MACHINA 2021 CONFERENCE PAPER
Step into the Pandemonium: On Breathing Life into the CCRU's Invented Magical
Traditions
By Bob Cluness (University of Iceland)
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The idea of tradition and myth is the backbone upon which modern esotericism derives
its power, authority, and legitimacy. Olav Hammer in his study Claiming Knowledge
points out that such mythmaking and appeals to tradition and perennialist knowledge are
strategies upon which various occult groups and individuals seek to base the truth of their
claims.1 Whether it be the “discovery” of arcane texts containing esoteric magic and
cosmological systems, or the telling of “hidden” histories going back to ancient times,
such rhetorical practices are seen as a strategy toward “legitimating authority and
establishing an aura of unique authenticity.”2
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However, research and discourse in Western esotericism studies has problematised the
idea and use of tradition, both from emic and etic viewpoints. This can be seen in the
way contemporary occult groups, from neo-paganism and druidism to new age systems
and radical traditionalism, all claim a link to ancient customs and traditions. However,
critical and historiographical study has shown that the traditions and practices espoused
by such groups have themselves been based on recent historical inventions or
innovations.3 Indeed, Olav Hammer has shown that the construction or invention of such
traditions ares not solely a contemporary phenomenon.4 Theosophy, Anthroposophy,
Thelema, The Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, all the way back to Rosicrucianism
in the 17th Century, have all constructed or “invented” traditions though the
syncretisation of various elements of rejected and marginalised knowledge, all the while
taking inspiration from a variety of cultural sources from the situated historical period.
Seen in this light, the restructuring and reconciliation of “ancient” knowledge through the
See Olav Hammer, Claiming Knowledge: Strategies of Epistemology from Theosophy to the New Age,
(Leiden: Brill, 2001).
2
Egil Asprem and Kennet Granholm, “Constructing Esotericisms: Sociological, Historical and Critical
Approaches to the Invention of Tradition”, in Contemporary Esotericism, by Egil Asprem and Kennet
Granholm (Eds), pp 25-48, (Sheffield: Equinox, 2013): 30.
3
See Owen Davies, The Oxford Illustrated History of Modern Witchcraft, (Oxford: Oxford University Press,
2017); Graham Harvey “Inventing Paganisms: making nature”, in The Invention of Sacred Tradition and
Claiming Knowledge, by Olav Hammer & James R. Lewis (Eds), (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
2007); Kennet Granholm, “Sons of Northern Darkness”: Heathen Influences in Black Metal and Neofolk
Music”, Numen 58 (2011), pp 514–544.
4
Hammer, Claiming Knowledge, 85-200.
1
situated worldviews and cultural landscapes of occult groups results in a process where
esotericism and the occult undertake a dynamic process of innovation and renewal.
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What does mark contemporary esoteric discourse from their forebears is the deliberate
and self-conscious foregrounding of fictional texts and occultural elements in the
generation of esoteric tradition, both as an inspiration and/or a primary spiritual source.
From Harry Potter, and J.R.R Tolkien, to Star Wars, World of Warcraft, Skyrim, and The
Matrix franchise, various occult and neo-religious groups transform established
narratives, reworking occultural ephemera and esotericism into new and bizarre contexts.
The result is the embodiment of a process that Simon O’Sullivan calls “fictioning”, that
is “the writing, imagining, performing or other material instantiations of worlds or social
bodies that mark out trajectories different to those engendered by the dominant
organisation of life currently in existence.”5 Seen in this way, contemporary esotericism
is about the reconstruction of consensual reality and representation through the
manufacturing of various fictions and myths that blend pop occulture with historical
narratives.
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The bizarre story and actions of the Cybernetic Cultures Research Unit, a mysterious UK
interdisciplinary research group from the late 1990s/early 2000s is a fascinating case
study of the creation of esoteric traditions through such fictioning. Presenting itself as an
academic group, a conspiratorial legend, and as a fiction that forced itself to become real
through a series of actualisations, the CCRU’s unique take on mythopoesis resulted in
the “discovery” of abstract occult systems that could facilitate “time sorcery,” that, while
alluding to ancient traditions, were the result of a demonic entity from a cybernetic
future, seeking to rewrite history in order to enable its own existence. While the CCRU
existed outside of established contemporary occultic currents, their writings have in the
past decade proliferated across social media, as groups and individuals from diverse
esoteric backgrounds have started to explore the CCRU’s work, not only as a source of
esoteric inspiration, but as a concrete system for divination & sorcery, thereby
instantiating the CCRU’s myths and occult systems as an actual “tradition.”
The CCRU
Simon O’Sullivan and David Burrows, Fictioning: The Myth Functions of Contemporary Art and Philosophy,
(Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2019): 1.
5
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The CCRU began life at Warwick University in 1995 as an interdisciplinary internet and
cyberculture studies group to support the work of philosopher and cyberfeminist Sadie
Plant. However, when Plant left Warwick in 1997, the CCRU was taken over by
Professor Nick Land, whereupon it went spectacularly rogue in its operations. Mixing
inhumanist continental philosophy of the 1970s (such as Deleuze & Guattari), with
drugs, rave music, and late twentieth century cultural ephemera, the CCRU generated a
bewildering array of texts, performances, conferences, reading groups, and hybrid
artworks-as-theory-fiction, all of which sought to theorize and produce immanently the
zeitgeist of internet-occultism and Y2K-driven apocalyptic discourse. Eventually being
thrown off the Warwick campus, they embraced and worked with an array of esoteric
systems and traditions; Kabbalah, numerology, demonology, Theosophical myths of
Lemuria, the H.P. Lovecraft derived Cthulhu mythos, conspiracy theories of secret
societies, and UFO lore.6
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Key to the CCRU’s efforts was the creation and development of a series of occult
techniques and practices that aimed to initiate a form of “time sorcery” and contact with
the noumena of “the outside.” The first unique concept they developed was
HYPERSTITION, described as a “fictive element that makes itself become real,” real
enough to the point where it can concretely change events and actions. Alex Williams
provides the secular definition of hyperstition as “narratives able to effectuate their own
reality through the workings of feedback loops, generating new socio-political
attractors,”7 Meanwhile the CCRU provided a much more esoteric definition:
1. Element of effective culture that makes itself real.
2. Fictional quantity functional as a time-traveling device.
3. Coincidence intensifier.
4. Call to the Old Ones.8
For an in-depth analysis of the history and practices of the CCRU, see Vincent Le, “Invaders from the Future:
The CCRU and Their Legacy”. Lecture Series. MSCP Winter School 2019. Melbourne, 17June - 15 July 2019;
Simon Reynolds, “Renegade Academia: The Cybernetic Culture Research Unit”, Energy Flash. November 03
1999. http://energyflashbysimonreynolds.blogspot.com/2009/11/renegade-academia-cybernetic-culture.html
7
Alex Williams, quoted in Simon O’Sullivan, “Accelerationism, Hyperstition and Myth-Science”, CYCLOPS
JOURNAL, Issue 2 (2017): 13.
8
Ccru,
“Polytics”,
Hyperstition,
June
07
2004,
accessible
from
http://hyperstition.abstractdynamics.org/archives/006777.html. For an overview and analysis of hyperstition as a
concept see Delphi Cartsens, “Hyperstition: 2010”, Merliquify.com, September 5 2010, accessible from
http://merliquify.com/blog/articles/hyperstition/#.XGRGmTP7TIU; “Hyperstition: Delphi Carstens at
TEDxTableMountain”, YouTube Video, 10:13, posted by “TEDx Talks”, September 14 2012,
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wdj9ChIRoqU.
6
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On a textural level the CCRU itself was its own hyperstition. Operating as a singular
authorial hivemind, the CCRU parasitized historical narratives, weaving complex and
shifting temporalities where various people, events, and institutions, both physical and
virtual, became storytellers. The hyperstition of the CCRU became a project of reality
engineering that weaponized an idea through temporal mythopoesis and digital
information circulation, worming its way through time and embedding itself in the
“virtual matrices of history.”
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In the case of the CCRU they weaved a Parallaxian web of narratives, a series of fictionsas-time-sorcery. The story goes like this: Through the work of hermetic occultist and US
military captain Peter Vysparov, and radical anthropologist Echidna Stillwell, the CCRU
came upon the “discovery” of a secret history telling of the study of the N’ma - a southeast Asian tribe linked to the ancient Lemurians - and their deployment as combat
magicians using “Lemurian Time Sorcery” during WWII. Both Vysparov and Stillwell
see a link between the magic of the N’ma and the mythos derived from the tales of HP
Lovecraft, subsequently creating The Cthulhu Club to explore these links and to apply
Lemurian time sorcery to the Cthulhu mythos. Their research leads the CCRU to
subsequently stumble upon a covert and long running Lemurian time war between
shadowy deep state groups (in the form of the AOE, or Architectonic Order of the
Eschaton) and radical countercultural occultists.
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Central to this history is the “discovery” of occult systems and practices that were used
by the N’Ma for temporal divination and the evocation of demons they called Lemurs.
Titled the Pandemonium, it was described as a “complete system of Lemurian demonism
and time sorcery”, that consisted of “two principal components”: The Numogram, a 2dimensional “time-map,” that demonstrated the logical relations and numerical structures
of the Matrix, a numerological “grimoire” listing the names, numbers, and attributes of
45 demons, known as Lemurs.9
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It was through the subsequent implementation of the Pandemonium across informational
and cybernetic networks, that the CCRU came to the realization that at the root of this
ancient “tradition” of Lemurian time sorcery was the Entity, a “demon” of teleplexy in
the form of a sentient inorganic AI from the far future making incursions into the deep
past. It’s purpose? To infect and reengineer events and phenomena in order to change
CCRU, “Digital Hyperstition: Pandemonium”, Cybernetic culture research unit,
http://www.ccru.net/digithype/pandemonium.htm.
9
technological conditions in the present to enable its own becoming real through the
eventual unified techno-singularity of a mass networked AI.
The Online Proliferation of the CCRU
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Eventually the CCRU would physically disband in 2001, with some of its members
moving their writing onto the Hyperstition blog in 2004, before signing off and going
into exile in 2008. From here, the name and work of the CCRU should have fallen into
obscurity, only being of value to various fringe thinkers and artists, or as a footnote in an
Adam Curtis documentary. But a series of events and discourses in the early 21st century
would reintroduce the work of the CCRU and its members onto the landscape of social
media, and various online subcultural groups.
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Em 2007 em Goldsmiths, na Universidade de Londres, o evento Speculative Realism
serviu como palco para a apresentação dos trabalhos de Ray Brassier, Ian Hamilton
Grant, Graham Harman e Quentin Meillassoux. O termo “Realismo Especulativo” não
demarcava uma nova tradição de pensamento ou algo do gênero, mas um elemento
comum que aproximava estes quatro teóricos: a rejeição ao correlacionismo kantiano; e
que se desenvolveram em distintas propostas como do realismo especulativo de
Meillassoux, a Filosofia Orientada aos Objetos de Harman, o Neo-Vitalismo de Grant e o
Niilismo radical de Brassier.
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The first of these was the rise in online and material discourse regarding accelerationism
(/acc) in the 2010s.10 While the CCRU did not coin the term “/acc,” it was seen by people
as a foundational development of its possibilities as a concept and practice. Subsequently
people were introduced to the work of the CCRU and its members, such as Nick Land,
Mark Fisher, Ray Brassier, Luciana Parisi, and Reza Negarestani. Meanwhile, the
publication of the CCRU’s late ‘90s writings in 2015 helped to intensify the
mythologising and meme-ification of its signs, symbols, and members across various
weird theory and /acc groups on social media.11 The occult aspects of the CCRU’s
mythos and hyperstitional traditions began to be analysed through a series of esoteric and
For more background reading and analysis of Accelerationism as a concept and its genealogy see ,
Edmund Berger. “Acceleration Now (or how we can stop fearing and learn to love chaos), Deterritorial
Investigations, April 10, 2013, https://deterritorialinvestigations.wordpress.com/2013/04/10/acceleration-nowor-how-we-can-stop-fearing-and-learn-to-love-chaos/; Matt Colquhoun, (2019), “A U/ACC Primer”,
Xenogothic.com, March 4 2019, https://xenogothic.com/2019/03/04/a-u-acc-primer/; Robin MacKay, and
Armen Avanessian (Eds). #Accelerate: The Accelerationist Reader. London: Urbanomic, 2014. Benjamin Noys.
Malign Velocities: Accelerationism and Capitalism. London: Zer0 Books, 2014;
11
See Ccru, Writings 1997-2003, (Online: Time Spiral Press, Kindle Edition, 2015).
10
“weird theory” online journals and blog sites: Early works, such as the ZinzRinz blog
(run by theorist Amy Ireland), the Centre for Experimental Ontology (and it’s Journal
Parasol), The Miskatonic Virtual University (with its online Journal Plutonics), and the
work of (((:):))(:):::: (Nine) and Lillian Patch on the CCRU and Nick Land’s numbering
practices (Xeno.cx), have all sought to research the CCRU’s hyperstitions and practices,
as well expanding upon the original mythos. Meanwhile, tales of Lemurian time wars
have inspired magickal groups such as the Italian Left-wing occult group Gruppo Di
Nun. Proclaiming themselves as esoterrorists in an occult war against the traditionalist
fascism of Right-Hand Path magic, they have adopted the CCRU’s hidden histories as a
narrative against the dogmatic idea of cosmic unity and hegemony through magic and
reality engineering.12
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Despite the renewed and increased interest in the CCRU, there was still a lack of
exploration into the Pandemonium as an actual system of magic. This would change
through the efforts of technologist and esotericist Anders Aamodt. Publishing the
document, “unleashing the numogram” in 2014, it represented the first attempt to
systematize the Pandemonium as an actual model for magick.13 Through online courses
offered though his “internet school of magick” website, Aamodt offered up an analysis of
the Numogram, stating that it was “the complete metaphysical index to sorcery. It can
describe any other system, thus getting at the cracks between systems.”14 Aamodt argued
that the construction of the Numogram through simple mathematics, created an abstract
model of the cosmos that, when linked to other magick systems, are able to unleash all
sorts of potentialities, whether it be the generation of gnosis, as a “filing cabinet for
occult concepts and energy-signatures”, or as a map to “the three worlds of
shamanism.”15
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Although Aamodt’s analysis and promotion of the Pandemonium as a system of magick
represented the first major step in its use in occult circles, the work is fragmentary and
incomplete. While he does a good job in breaking down the component parts of the
Dustin Breitling, “Under the Sign of The Black Mark: Interview with Members of Gruppo Di Nun”,
Diffractions Collective, March 9 2019, accessible from https://diffractionscollective.org/under-the-sign-of-theblack-mark-interview-with-members-of-gruppo-di-nun/
13
A Copy of “Unleashing the Numogram” can be obtained from Anders Aadmot’s website at
http://andersaamodt.com/oeuvre.php
14
Anders Aadmot, “Unleashing the Numogram”, 22.
15
Anders Aadmot, “The Numogram: Introduction: Numerological alchemy, neoqabbala, gematria”, Course
document, Deicidus: 4. Available from http://internetschoolofmagic.com/classes.php
12
numogram and how they connect and interact with each other, too much effort is spent
attempting to overlay other systems onto the structure of the numogram itself. Both
“Unleashing the Numogram” and Aamodt’s other online documents give little practical
consideration on using the numogram as a system in and of itself. There is also the lack
of acknowledgement or exploration of the CCRU as a tradition and history that provides
the narrative background to the pandemonium.
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If “Unleashing the Numogram'' represents the first attempt to systematise the
Pandemonium as an outright system of magick, then the recent work of a small but
dedicated group of occultists have managed to develop the systems of the CCRU beyond
the abstract. Coming from diverse esoteric backgrounds such as chaos magick and
Kabbalah practice, they have investigated and implemented the CCRU’s cosmology and
systems on a practical and experiential level. The work of two occultists in particular,
Storm Sprague (Neospare) and Vexsys, have developed the Pandemonium into a system
they call Numogrammatics where not only do they see the CCRU’s work as a concrete
system of magick, they also connecting their rituals and practices with the “traditions”
and narratives developed by the CCRU itself.
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Neospare and Vexsys argue that current analysis on the occult potentialities of the
Pandemonium have been too abstract and theoretical, showing little actual practical
experimentation and research. In response, their books and courses not only explain in
detail how Numogrammatics works as a system, they also provide the results of their
practical magickal experiments with sorcery and Numogrammatics, as well as building
upon what they call a system of Numogoetics, which is a goetic approach in using the
matrix with the numogram.16
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What is compelling is that while they are aware that the CCRU were not occultists or
connected to any mainstream occult groups or traditions, their esoteric practices and
efforts in trying to answer the question of how the world and cosmos really works,
caused them to stumble upon a map of reality, delivering a magick system that not only
was a diagram of pure immanence, resisting all dogma, it was truly hermetic in its
construction yet completely learnable and applicable to all esoteric phenomena. As
Vexsys argues in their Time Sorcery Manual:
The numogram is only neo-hermeticism to the extent that the CCRU asked “How
does the world work?” and the numogram revealed itself. The system tries to be
16
The Books and Zines of Neospare and Vexsys are available from https://gumroad.com/neospare
immanent and stay immanent. There is no question of belief or dogma. X exoteric
fact is not really Y esoteric fact. The numogram completes itself from the
beginning. This is why it is fully learnable and understandable: looking at only
the numogram you can come to understand the whole system. All you need to use
it is basic mathematics and a base-10 number.17
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It is not just the analysis and practical utilisation of Numogrammatics as a system of
magick; Both Neospare and Vexsys also propagate the story of the CCRU as an actual
“narrative of time sorcery,” treating the hyperstitions as part of an actual “tradition.”
Even while acknowledging the “invented” nature of said traditions, they claim this is a
moot point, that the dogmatic nature of traditions is secondary due to the efficacy of
Numogrammatics and the power of the Numogram itself simply stating; “The system
works because it’s immanent to the world and culture that we live in and have lived in for
hundreds of fucking years.”18
CONCLUSION
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The construction of tradition has been a central feature in the history of esoteric
discourse, both from an emic and etic perspective. From theosophy to chaos magic, the
syncretisation of narratives of ancient wisdom within the cultural prism of its
practitioners leads to “the production of new source materials”' that connect the esoteric
with pop-cultural, mythological, and historical narratives, in turn becoming “resources
for constructions of tradition and identity.”19
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The case study of the CCRU puts an interesting spin on the construction of esoteric
narratives that make appeals to tradition and perennialism. Already cloaked in a shroud
of occult mystery, they fictioned a world that mixed magick with underground art and
music, weird fiction, cyberpunk and radical philosophy into a clandestine map of a
world. In their construction of a narrative of the “discovery” of this map though ancient
wisdom and traditional practices, the CCRU flipped the script by arguing that said
tradition and wisdom, far from coming from a stable and immutable past, was actually
being retconned by inhuman AI Gods from the future. Through the shared writings and
workings of online occult groups and individuals, said systems and “traditions'' of the
CCRU have begun to be actualised, both as a map of reality, and as a workable system of
Vexsys, Time Sorcery Manual, (Online: Gate Zero, 2020): 15.
Vexsys, 14.
19
Asprem and Granholm, 37.
17
18
magick. What is provocative is the way said groups acknowledge the constructed nature
of the work of the CCRU, yet still argue for and adopt their myth as an actual “tradition”
of time-sorcery, albeit one that has hypstitionally worked its way backwards through
history, cementing itself in the past as a practice that has always existed, waiting to be
discovered in order to realise the existence of the “old ones'' of the future.