Wikipedia | An entheogen ("God inside us,"[4] en εν- "in, within," theo θεος- "god, divine," -gen γενος "creates, generates"), in the strict sense, is a psychoactive substance used in a religious, shamanic, or spiritual context.
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Yeah PK Dick's characters keep zoning out and seeing ancient Rome around them, which sounds pretty much right to me. I dunno if I'm with you on the entheogens though, broski. | Aight then, you tell me what was going on in the mysteries, across time, cultures, languages, and a fairly sizeable geography - that bound all of these up together in a continuous skein of dying god symbolism, values, and praxis? |
34 comments:
:) Alright, I'm reading at least!
Prejudices: The entheogen ethanol hasn't been the kindest to my fam or from what I hear to my Disneyfied pretend ethnic sub-group. The entheogen weed has afflicted several scientist friends with technical 'insights' that were wrong, nonsensical and annoying.The graphic, pictures of that guy always just make me stare. Man, a guy who slit defenseless people's throats ... and it appears it was the right thing to do in the circumstances. You can see St. Peter just shrugging and waving him in.
P.K. Dick is now considered one of the best writers of the second half of 20th Century. He favored the Greek interpertation of the Sacred Scriptures, and he has predicted much of what we see today with the co-creation of robots and simulators. That the natural world and the virual world is just life.
http://www.philipkdick.com/films_intro.html
As usual they want to make a religion out of http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panpsychism; I agree with Doc, we just have to tell the story that needs to be told. I will also include the crime of making the goddess a sin of temptation, by anal Bishops.
"Will localizes us, thought universalizes us."Henri-Fredic Amiel
Nana, He was great. Yeah, I've tried to follow up on his Gnostic stuff, and it's surprisingly hard to get at actual information. Almost like it's behind a firewall. Which would plug right into Dick's worldview I think.
It was a relief the other day to read you guys talking about atheism being just as dumb and stubborn as clinging to the English words of the KJV. So many people insist on picking between those two very oddball positions w/r/t an incredibly difficult question.
No, CNu, so, yeah, no, ok. I'm going to start a new blog finally. Maybe your challenge is a way out of the blind alley I've been in on the personal side at Autopref.
reenchantment of the world.--David Hockney Which, Hockney himself is both a visionary and a bit of a kidder, imo; even the quotation I think he lifted from somewhere else. Still.
I've tried to follow up on his Gnostic stuff, and it's surprisingly
hard to get at actual information. Almost like it's behind a firewall.
Bingo!!!
The itch that cannot be scratched. Rome, the Church of Rome, the Reformed Church of Rome, Alchemical/Illuminatist/Traditionalists, et all - have all worked so very hard at keeping the "Gnostic stuff" as profoundly occulted/forbidden as anything I've ever observed in my entire life. Didn't/doesn't even matter what side folk were on, hell, the gnostics themselves busily and systematically occulted their mysteries - so the authorities didn't have to work that hard to conceal what was already by its nature "concealed".
As the better part of my adult/professional life has been focused on fine art of flagrantly defying "access-denied" material - you can extrapolate for yourself the extent to which this state of affairs perturbs me like no other.
It was a relief the other day to read you guys talking about atheism
being just as dumb and stubborn as clinging to the English words of the
KJV.
Atheism is a literalist response to literalism. Silliness incarnate.
Esoterism and traditionalism represent a clear alternative to literalism, but as soon as the esoterist or traditionalist reaches matters ineffable - you can pretty much rest assured that bullshit is soon to follow. Something about the nature of your species predisposes it addictively to the never-ending bullshit saga, the mystery, like Santa Claus and other tall tales woven to captivate children - New Age gobbledygook.
I'll have none of it.
If you explore the ergodic literature for even just a little while, it ONLY makes sense if it is pointing toward and written under the influence of ergotic agents. That ergotic agents have themselves been prohibited for a very long time, occulted, hidden from common knowledge, access, and use - accounts for much of the rest. That there is a liturgical component to religious praxis, i.e., what do we all do together when we're tripping balls, to bind together our awareness and direct experience "religare" accounts for all the rest.
It's the only sensible explanation for what I find to be an overwhelming body of evidence.
Pffft. Atheism most succinctly means, from it's root words, without a belief in god(s). Seems pretty reasonable to me. Unfortunately it has be defined through contrast to theism. I personally like your statement of being "more materialistic than a materialist."
Unfortunately it has be defined through contrast to theism.
Really? And to which specific strains of "theism" has it become so parasitically attached?
Reason I ask is because I have yet to see atheist/agnostic expression defined by contrast to what I keep telling you.
"more materialistic than a materialist."
That's Gurdjieff magne. Why I put his picture up on this post, as well.
What specifically do you suppose/propose as "more materialistic" than entheogenic gnosis?
@Tom http://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/story.asp?sectioncode=26&storycode=416347&c=1
Experience is both local and non-local - one of P.K. Dick's theme as he used the word half-life in Ubik which I just re-read, where you didn't know who was the died and living, and the going baack to 1920's. Seem like a big pull in our nation today to live in the 1920's.
http://neuroself.com/
I really like this person line of thought - What is the Self? Don't we project on to the world, things that mean nothing to the working of the universe.
http://neuroself.com/2011/06/15/the-loneliness-of-the-aardvark/
Experience is both local and non-local
Nana, please provide an example of what you mean by non-local?
What is the Self?
We already know the answer to this question: http://subrealism.blogspot.com/2011/05/consciousness-come-after-language.html
Got a better, more comprehensive, and more persuasive answer - please bring it?
Don't we project on to the world, things that mean nothing to the working of the universe.
Language is generative and mathematical thought is non-computable. Are these limitations or defects of language or do they indicate something very meaningful about the world and how it works?
Quantum (probabilities in most science fields)
there is no local without non-local even in the body of neurons. Again, I hold
that to be true to this thing we call consciousness. Sometimes it appears
magical or counterintuitive, yet for you; on a philosophical working theory
what is the problem? Since you can quote a man who on the web in filtered as a
mystic/sufi. I have never gotten an answer for that and I will leave it as
agreed to disagree.
On the framework of “fundamental forces” it has to
affect and be an antecedent to self - this thing we call mindfulness, inductive,
or conscious. I am working with it, myself.
Are these limitations or defects of language or do they indicate something very meaningful about the world and how it works.
101 of a entheogen experience is that language is a weak form to express reality, poetry and music are better forms, why delicate and consciousness folks graviated to the mythpoetic forms. Romance is better than argumentative any day. Really what we have done in the last 40 years is that we are better students of nature and virual than our parents not necessary smarter. One thing I learn long ago - the wise person wears a Mask in public, why they know evil well
Nana interesting links. I absolutely believe we're projecting things that mean nothing to the working of the universe.
And but also we project some things that somehow do get some traction, but nobody knows why, or how much we're missing. You can count your aardvarks, and later on that quantity is useful. And I'm thinking about Stanislaw Lem and His Master's Voice. Just about my favorite sci fi. We do get something, but disappointingly little.
There was some philosopher, called the stuff we perceive but don't understand 'excreta.' Like the stuff we eat but our bodies don't use.
Really? And to which specific strains of "theism" has it become so parasitically attached?
All. "Theism" is superstitious, silly nonsense. So, it therefore cannot be ascribed positively to a materialistic, ergodic system of understanding.
What specifically do you suppose/propose as "more materialistic" than entheogenic gnosis?
Like Tom, I have similar concerns. What if those visions are nothing more than the mental equivalent of signal crosstalk on uninsulated wires?
On the other hand, the amount of data that our senses can process is mind-bogglingly huge. Clearly, only a minisculely tiny bit of it is available to our awareness. Entheogenic substances have been known to evoke synaesthesia. Which to me, indicates it could also create a synaesthetic pathway for some of that data not accessible to our consciousness. I therefore think that entheogenic gnosis is promising but with caveats.
uh..., not to put anybody on front street, but, am I correct in concluding that neither one of you has any first-hand knowledge of that which you speak?
leave it as you like Nana, but to be taken seriously - come equipped with macro-scale quantum phenomena to back up your otherwise totally unfounded speculation - or at the very least an anecdotal example of that which you speak.
poetry and music are the preconscious vessels for Ur-language..., not something that the frail gravitate to after the fact.
the statement was; Language is generative and mathematical thought is non-computable.
the kwestin posed on this statement of fact; Are these limitations or defects of language or do they indicate something very meaningful about the world and how it works?
Right, I have none.
So ok I'm kind of being ridiculous here.
No sir, not I.
"Quantum" As I recall, the theory of quantum mechanics applies only at the sub-atomic scale. That is to say, it offers a very different look at the physical world than, say, Newtonian mechanics. But you can only "see" the "quantum POV" at the very, very small scale. Similar to relativity's usefulness only at velocities approaching lightspeed.
The way you, Nana, are using quantum in your posting here is poetic. I'm a big fan of poetry, and I do appreciate the sentiment. But quantum is not poetry.
The sense I get is that the non-conscious mind is incredibly rich, as much as the conscious mind. But the conscious mind is unable to communicate with the non-conscious part. That makes the non-conscious part mysterious, at least to the conscious part. Tapping that non-conscious richness involves practices every bit as disciplined, useful, and powerful as analysis is on the conscious side.
Seems like one of the effects of entheogens is to make the two parts, conscious and non-conscious, a bit more accessible to each other. It can be startling, but doesn't have to be. Both parts, after all, are (part of) you. And once you can figure out how to START tapping the non-conscious, it opens new universes, right here within us. Liminal, indeed.
BINGO!!!
This is where Penrose and Hameroff run into a brick wall.
Penrose has done a fine job in my estimation of proving that mathematical thought is non-computable - however - Hameroff has been somewhat less than successful in proving that room temperature macro-scale orchestrated objective reductions serve as the physical substrate for the qualities that Penrose has propositionally delineated.
Language is a beast!
Physics and physiology, however, remain significantly impenetrable to the extant language-based interrogation...,
Rembom mostly, kinda, apparently. But nobody knows how that 'scale' thing works. You can see laser speckle or a photo of electron interference with your eyes, or you can hold on to a magnet to feel the magnetic field from a superconducting loop. You apparently can not get a basketball to go into a state where it's spinning in both directions at once. Nobody really knows why not.
Have you or Doc read the page I left? Have you read the thinkers the Doctor puts on his page, re-freshing. Something tells me deeply that Doc Cnu is doing what he accuses others of doing. There is no real difinition of self. I was re-reading Mills from the page great overview. It took them over 40 years to prove one of Einstein theories. And that is Relativity. The laws of probablity can not only apply at the sub-atomic scale. We wouldn't have the study called the Black Swan. Please read some from the link and then give me specific areas where you think it is just poetic, and the man says that the laws of phsyics applies. Like been apllied to your cell phone and this computer system.
What we observe is not nature itself, but nature exposed to our method of questioning
Werner Heisenberg
Our knowledge can only be finite, while our ignorance must necessarily be infinite. Karl Popper
Did you read "Chance" by Lem - the whole terrorist process today was predicted in that story
Nana no I haven't read that one. I don't think I'd even heard of that one. I'll put it on the list ....
Something tells me deeply that Doc Cnu is doing what he accuses others of doing.
and uh..., what exactly is it that I "accuse" others of doing Nana?
There is no real difinition of self.
lol, leastwise none that validates the specially concocted brand of magical thinking that you kinda, sorta, sketchily and ambiguously profess...,
Many folks are afraid Ambiguity are you? Does who separate Art from Science still hold on to old meme
Logic has often been called the Art of Reasoning. Awriter3 who has done more than any other person to restore thisstudy to the rank from which it had fallen in the estimation ofthe cultivated class in our own country, has adopted the abovedefinition with an amendment; he has defined Logic to be [018]3 who has done more than any other person to restore thisstudy to the rank from which it had fallen in the estimation ofthe cultivated class in our own country, has adopted the abovedefinition with an amendment; he has defined Logic to be [018][018]the Science, as well as the Art, of reasoning; meaning by theformer term, the analysis of the mental process which takes placewhenever we reason, and by the latter, the rules, grounded onthat analysis, for conducting the process correctly. There canbe no doubt as to the propriety of the emendation. A rightunderstanding of the mental process itself, of the conditionsit depends on, and the steps of which it consists, is the onlybasis on which a system of rules, fitted for the direction of theprocess, can possibly be founded. Art necessarily presupposesknowledge; art, in any but its infant state, presupposes scientificknowledge: and if every art does not bear the name of a science,it is only because several sciences are often necessary to form thegroundwork of a single art. So complicated are the conditionswhich govern our practical agency, that to enable one thing tobedone, it is often requisite to know the nature and properties ofdone, it is often requisite to know the nature and properties ofmany thingshttp://neuroself.files.wordpress.com/2011/06/a-system-of-logic-js-mill.pdfmany things.many things.
What on GAWD'S green earth are you talking about Nana?!?!?!?!
My religion consists in the direct and objective verification and application of EVERY single thing I practice and believe.
I have no truck with handwavy ambiguity, and the totality of my faith abides in my unwavering certainty about my ability to verify and implement.
everything else is frivolous conversation....,
Nana, Re: "Have you or Doc read the page I left". "The loneliness of the aardvark", yes, I read it. I pretty much agree with its author. He's just pointing out some well known problems with worshiping at the alter of hyper-reductionist analysis. Logical arguments have to start with an assumption (the A part of "If A, then B"), and the validity of that assumption/axiom cannot be known by logic. Basic limitation.
On quantum mechanics, I'm only pointing out that science and science fiction are not the same thing. The language of quantum is mathematics, and at that level there isn't much dispute. Interpreting what the math means is where the dispute comes in, e.g., Einstein's "God doesn't play dice with the universe". Talking about quantum in anything but mathematical terms is to move away from it. Sci fi is pretty damned far from differential equations. The rules that define science are much more rigid than those for sci fi. Applying quantum concepts while slipping the rules that define those concepts, that's simply not quantum mechanics.
I'd like to point out that the non-conscious plays a big role in the practice of logical analysis. I've personally experienced a strange but familiar example many times. Sometimes when trying to solve a technical problem, I'll get stuck, hit a wall. If I've done all my homework, but the problem proves stubborn, the prescribed course is to put it down, relax and do something totally different for awhile, preferably non-analytical. Having done so, when I come back, the problem will look a bit different and I'll make some progress where none was to be had before. What happened in the meantime? I don't know, but I do know it works. I discovered this in college, but it took a long time. In an environment where tooling is what has worked for you, and you literally can't afford to fail, just walking away from a tough brain problem for awhile was hard to learn to do.
Peace.
Been trying to imagine it. We might have had the requisite wisdom to manage or avoid our resource constraints, and...wow, who knows?
Here's one for you. What effect do you think mind expansion would have on BD?
Yes but the verifying and the implement is unconscious, also can be bias, if centered from self and thougth.
And I place this site here that actually agress with your original premise that there is no verified theory on consciousness or mindfulness, even in the emprical study we have now; there is Working Theories. If this is the case then you agree with being comfort with ambiguities in your daily life, for you are quite bright.
This goes back to the question on language which I don't understand your position, for Penrose is a smart person. Mills to me was raising the issue of Art and Science and its relationship which includes, Language, in the framework of Logic and why the unity of science and art is a great leap in the field of observation and study of objects. Today, we must place our understanding of quantum in the Art of reasoning if we don't have that agreement then I am lost.
Quantum as a term has entered into all fields as, a vital etymolgy, ergo; the term in itself takes on analogies in other fields of sciences which is a good thing, for the soft sciences needed this hard science framework.
Example:
On the news of the beatdown of a white boy in NJ by a break out group fist fight. He states: "Crime of Opportunity and alcoholic play a big part" Now small city policeman in 2011 is talking of opportunity. It reflects in the trope on the common language, compared to the one I hear back in the 1960's into the 21st Century?
Given his age, BD facing the contents of his unconscious and the collective unconscious to which it is attuned for the first time......, YIKES!!!!!!
But with LOTS of professional psychiatric set, setting, and supplemental assistance - even BD could get the watch out http://youtu.be/RKuDYbnXBJQ
As best I can gather, most of the documented insanity related to the alkahest resulted from its non-consensual use on subjects(victims);
1. In the military (chemical warfare agent)
2. Subjects (victims) of mind control experiments
3. Subjects (victims) of CIA detention/interrogation
The CIA and the military abused it for fifteen years or so before it made its way out of covert psychiatric research into avant garde psychiatric research and therapy and into the hands of elites such as Betsy Drake http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betsy_Drake, Cary Grant http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cary_Grant#Personal_life - and from there into the public sphere and subsequent illegality.
Mills to me was raising the issue of Art and Science and its
relationship which includes, Language, in the framework of Logic and why
the unity of science and art is a great leap in the field of
observation and study of objects.
Nana, I see and take your point about how culture evolves metaphors - bearing in mind that there are probably more evolutionary blind alleys than evolutionary success stories. Probably more than any other reason I rode you so hard about Penrose. Penrose's books sit at the threshold of professional technical precision and popular science - and no one else that I'm aware of outside of Jaynes - has gone to the trouble that Penrose has to accomodate both audiences and communicate something of great consequence to each - while simultaneously avoiding becoming a popularizer of erroneous notions.
Today, we must place our understanding of quantum in the Art of reasoning if we don't have that agreement then I am lost.
So long as we adhere to a Penrosian standard of precision and excellence, I'm with it, OTOH if we get loose with its use, then we might very well find ourselves on the Dawkinsian slippery slope http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Selfish_Gene of engendering more popular confusion and error than understanding, and THAT'S what gets me worked up about this topic.
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