Self-declared “race realist” Nathan Cofnas receives an appointment at UGent

December 28, 2025. In a discussion on the social media platform X, Nathan Cofnas is accused of being a perpetual student without a job. The American philosopher does not let that go unanswered.

“I finished my PhD in a normal amount of time, was employed for 3 years by Cambridge (the University of Cambridge, ed.), and have been hired for a job at another university,” writes Cofnas. The new employer of the controversial philosopher appears to be a Flemish university. Cofnas, who is known internationally as a tireless defender of “race science”, has found refuge in the department of Philosophy and Moral Sciences at UGent. 

Cofnas will shortly begin work as a postdoctoral researcher on an ongoing project supervised by the Dutch professor Bouke de Vries, titled Liberalism’s Fertility Problem. This project seeks to answer how a liberal society can respond when the proportion of “non-liberal” citizens increases. 

Controversial (yet again)

According to the Telegraph, Cofnas is “one of Britain’s most controversial academics”

Professor de Vries’ research project, which Cofnas will collaborate on, is not without controversy. In 2025, De Vries came under fire when Apache reported that he promoted racial theories and eugenics in his teaching practice – for which he was slapped on the wrist by the university’s Programme Committee  – and in his publications, in which he cites problematic authors (including Cofnas). 

Later, Apache revealed that De Vries took part in a secret conference for pseudoscience on race and eugenics held in the Hungarian capital, Budapest.

Fighting back as white people

Race scientist Nathan Cofnas “Those who truly value diversity should favor the preservation of racial distinctions”

The discontent among members of the department of Philosophy and Moral Sciences as a result of the De Vries affair threatens to grow much larger with the appointment of Cofnas. That is a direct result of the fact that he proudly describes himself as a “race realist”.

Against all scientific evidence, so-called race realism proposes the theory that nominal “human races” are objectively “real”. According to the same theory, there are significant differences among these human races, primarily with regard to IQ.

Cofnas attempts to provide an appealing facade for this belief in the aforementioned blogpost from 2024: “Those who truly value diversity should favor the preservation of racial distinctions. There must be some barriers set up between races in order for each one to express its own unique genius. And in the case of group conflict, racial tribalism can sometimes be the key to solving collective-action problems. If whites are attacked qua whites, it makes sense for them to fight back as whites.”

Nathan Cofnas: “With the aid of non-woke or conservative donors and politicians, we can create new centers or departments at universities that will represent a different point of view”

Cofnas wants to fight back against the bogeyman of woke. For him, wokeness is an ideology with which “the left” will “take over” the academic world and the whole of society. To effectively combat woke, according to Cofnas, it is essential to give the concept of race a biological underpinning. As a result, academia is the battleground par excellence.

According to Cofnas, once supporters of “race realism” are appointed to the university, woke academics will be systematically thinned out. Cofnas writes that “With the aid of non-woke or conservative donors and politicians, we can create new centers or departments at universities that will represent a different point of view.” According to Cofnas, applying race realism on a large scale will lead to the end of wokeism. 

Less honest, more violent

Cofnas places no stock in the idea that people are equal. According to the American, “woke” unjustly propagates exactly that sort of egalitarianism.

Just how far Cofnas will take things in his reasoning about the inequality of the human races is clear from a second infamous quotation from the blogpost. It provides insight into Cofnas’ rabidly racist ideology.

Under a colorblind system that judged applicants only by academic qualifications, blacks would make up 0.7% of Harvard students. (Even that might be an overestimate, since high-school credentials are sometimes given a boost by affirmative action.) In a meritocracy, Harvard faculty would be recruited from the best of the best students, which means the number of black professors would approach 0%. Blacks would disappear from almost all high-profile positions outside of sports and entertainment.

Not only does Cofnas promote pseudoscientific race theories, but he also has close ties with the racist Human Diversity Foundation (HDF), which was founded by the Danish white supremacist Emil Kirkegaard. Kirkegaard is known for writing even more provocative statements about genetics and race. He claims that black Americans are both less honest and less intelligent than white Americans, and that “Africans” are more prone to violence. 

Recently, Kirkegaard described Cofnas as “the best living conservative philosopher”. In a podcast by the HDF’s online magazine, Aporia, which serves as a mouthpiece for race scientists, Cofnas revealed his ideas about the fight against “woke”. For his part, Cofnas regularly praises the pseudoscientific Kirkegaard. In a post on X, he described the self-styled Danish race scientist as “a race realist who does actual academic work”.

In the X post in which Cofnas adulates Kirkegaard, he also refers to the extreme right British vlogger and Youtuber Edward Dutton, who is a core member of the Human Diversity Foundation alongside Kirkegaard.

Dutton and Kirkegaard’s names are also known to Bouke de Vries. In 2024, Kirkegaard personally invited De Vries to take part in the secret, racist London Conference on Intelligence (LCI) in Budapest, together with Dutton and others. According to the programme brochure that Apache was able to examine, that edition of the LCI appears to have been a homage to Richard Lynn, who is known as the godfather of modern race science. 

“Favor one’s own tribe”

By recruiting Cofnas for his own project, De Vries has demonstrated how the network of race scientists serves itself both inside and outside of academia. The American Craig Willy is working on a doctoral dissertation within the same project. While at KU Leuven, Willy wrote a master’s thesis on eugenics and regularly publishes in the HDF magazine, Aporia. He frequently communicates on X with other proponents of race science and regularly posts pro-eugenic messages. 

According to Faria, Anomaly, and Willy it is time to leave the modern, liberal political order behind, and to return to “tribal politics”

The clique of race scientists works closely together, and makes no effort to hide their admiration for each other’s opinions. The Portuguese philosopher, Felipe Nobre Faria shared on his personal website that he is an advisor on De Vries’ project. Together with the self-declared eugenicist, Jonathan Anomaly, Faria wrote the controversial article Can Liberalism Last, which is required reading for first-year students in De Vries’ political philosophy course, and which led to a reprimand from the Programme Committee. According to Anomaly and Faria, the “large numbers of (especially low-skilled) immigrants from Africa and the Middle East” - particularly to Sweden – has resulted in a decline in social trust. They claim that such influxes constitute a threat to liberal societies. 

The links between the four scientists are demonstrated in various publications. In the acknowledgements of Anomaly’s pro-eugenics book, Creating Future People, he thanked Faria and Cofnas, describing the latter as a “good friend”. Together, Faria, Anomaly, and Craig Willy wrote an article titled Enlightened tribalism, which is a clear echo of the tribalism that Cofnas referred to in his blogpost. The article proposes that modern liberal cosmopolitanism is doomed to fail. According to Faria, Anomaly, and Willy, humans evolved to distrust people outside “one’s own tribe” and to cooperate strongly with, and rely on, fellow tribe members. According to them, it is time to leave the modern, liberal political order behind, and to return to “tribal politics”.

Cofnas describes himself as a “philosopher of biology”

Faria and Willy then wrote another article together about “techno-natalism”, which is a euphemism for the use of eugenics in the political struggle among nation-states. Willy had previously written about this subject in Aporia, in which he praised Israel as a shining example of the practice. 

Cut out for the job

Insiders have reasonable doubts as to whether Cofnas is the most qualified academic to work on a project concerning political philosophy. Cofnas describes himself as a ‘philosopher of biology.’ In his list of publications, we cannot find any articles that could be categorised as political philosophy, nor any articles on liberalism and birthrates, which are the subjects central to the project at UGent. 

The news of Cofnas’ appointment came in the middle of a lecture series on the dangers of eugenics organized by the department

Cofnas’ lack of demonstrable expertise appears to indicate that De Vries’ project is more ideological by nature, even if the research question is left open with regard to how liberalism’s problem should be dealt with. 

Does the appointment of Cofnas indicate that “racial distinctions” or eugenic “strategies” – such as embryo selection, for example – will be considered potential solutions for what the research project calls the fertility problem of liberalism?

When Apache questioned Maarten Boudry last year concerning his research on De Vries’ project, he did not appear to connect the “problem” of fertility with ethnicity, or make a link between IQ and genes. However, supervisor Bouke de Vries and his doctoral student, Craig Willy, do that in their academic work. Considering Cofnas’ reputation for pseudoscience, it appears that he will be inclined to do likewise. 

The news of Cofnas’ appointment came in the middle of a lecture series on the dangers of eugenics organized by the department. The lectures were meant to be an academic response to the commotion that arose last year surrounding De Vries’ (pseudo)scientific and pedagogical trajectory, in which eugenics and race theories have been given a façade of scientific validity. Last Tuesday (3/3), the renowned British anthropologist Rebecca Sear criticized De Vries and Cofnas’ articles in the context of the lecture series, although she did not name the scientists. 

Academics at UGent think that the university has double standards

In an earlier editorial, at least thirty academics affiliated with the department expressed their displeasure over the pseudoscientific ideas that their colleague defends. And while they did not mention Bouke de Vries by name, they did devote a passage to Nathan Cofnas, who De Vries has cited multiple times - and who they could not have suspected would ever become their colleague. According to the authors, Cofnas is somebody who “participates in philosophy in order to lend racist pseudoscience an appearance of academic credibility”. 

The Pettit case and how to proceed

Department chair Erik Weber expects no problems with Cofnas’ appointment because all approved procedures were followed. Nevertheless, various academics at UGent think that the university has double standards. 

The Free University of Brussels (VUB) found itself in a difficult position due to its planned appointment of the British social geographer, Harry Pettit. The VUB withdrew Pettit’s appointment following a tweet in which he described Ayatollah Ali Khamenei as someone who until his death fought against the “US-Israeli paedophile cabal”.

At UGent, it appears that Pettit was not welcome from the outset at the department of Conflict and Development due to his “prior history” of extreme political opinions. Cofnas seems to have been subjected to a less meticulous screening.

Patrick Loobuyck (University of Antwerp), who is a guest professor of political philosophy at UGent, wrote in an editorial in De Morgen that the VUB should have evaluated the situation with more care, and would have done better not to have accepted Pettit. Concerning De Vries, Loobuyck was non-committal.

By permitting Cofnas’ candidature to pass without comment, the university appears careless with regard to the danger that pseudoscientific theories will gain ground in the academic world. Just like Pettit, Cofnas makes concerning social media posts, and one can debate whether these are covered by freedom of expression, but he also deals in outright pseudoscience.

The De Vries affaire was not on the official agenda of any of the Department of Philosophy and Moral Sciences meetings, although department members did speak out during the “various items” segment, Weber says. During the last departmental meeting on Wednesday (4/3), there was no room for questions concerning De Vries and Cofnas. 

Many find it hard to accept that De Vries has not been asked to clarify his links to race scientists following Apache’s articles. De Vries’s colleagues have repeatedly asked him to comment on the subject. Yet De Vries consistently refuses to answer their questions, and has not appeared at department meetings since the publication of the first Apache article about him. 

Apache asked the rectorate whether Cofnas’ problematic academic track record constituted a possible stumbling block during the solicitation procedure. We have published their response in its entirety below. 

For the third time in a row, De Vries refused to respond to questions from Apache. Among other things, we asked him how he regards contested theories like those of Kirkegaard and Cofnas, why he considered Cofnas suitable to carry out research on a project about liberalism, and how he reacts to Rebecca Sear’s criticism. Cofnas did not respond to questions concerning his appointment either.