Contents:

• Video: Part 2: The Evolution of my Ideas about Spirituality (Apr. 18, 2025)
• Soul Story: Evolution and The Purpose of Life (Freke, 2017)
• Video: WHAT’S WRONG WITH NON-DUAL SPIRITUALITY : PART 1 (Freke, 2022)
  • Video: WHAT’S WRONG WITH NON-DUAL SPIRITUALITY : PART 2 (with biscuits) (Freke, 2022)
  • Video: Q&A on ‘What’s Wrong with NonDual Spirituality’ (Freke, 2022)
• Summarize Points from Timothy Freke interview at YouTube
• Deep Awake: Wake Up To Oneness and Celebrate Your Individuality(Tim Freke, 2016)
• Timothy Freke Rejects Non-Duality & “Ego/ self is iillusion, Rejects “Minkows
• and I believe I can prove that by pasting the transcription here –
• In looking for a new direction, he is directionless
• Timothy Freke Is Not Helping People Use Psilocybin
• 🗣️🎙️🤖💦🔫💥🔨🤬
• Voice Dictation Cannot Handle the Word ‘Motif’
• Highly effective to compare the new direction that Timothy Freke in evolutionary spirituality
• Wish to integrate Voice Dictation with Keyboard shortcuts
• In What Specific Way Is Recent-Freke a Mixed Bag?
• Per the Egodeath theory, Ultimate Truth is, possibilism practical mental model + revealed underlying eternalism
• Too Timid Tim – Reflects His Lack of Coherent Two-Leg Model
• Incoming
• Hermetica as a Path of Initiation (Litwa, 2025)
• The Way of Zen by Alan Watts: “Truth Is Unspeakable” –> Freke, Ok <Throws Book into Fireplace>
• Ways of Thinking of Eastern Peoples: Freke Is Rejecting the Trite Cliched Ways of Talking About Transcendent Knowledge
• Jesus Mysteries book: The #6 Bestselling Book at Amazon in 2000
• Website
• YouTube videos
• Videos
• Forthcoming Podbook (audio book)
• Books
• Rejection of Non-duality that negates individuals
• Rejection of “only consciousness exists”
• Motivation for this Page
• Timothy Freke: Reconcile Individual & Nondual; eternalism & possibilism; altered state & ordinary state
• Brand of Religion: Emergent Spirituality
• Brendan Graham Dempsey video interview of Timothy Freke, Jan. 23, 2025
• Video Transcript of “Live with Tim Freke”
• Freke’s Vision of Emerging Mythic Spirituality, Post Scientific Revolution
• A New Worldview, A New Form of Spirituality – A Transition Like the Scientific Revolution that Pushed Away Mythic Religion as “Not Up to the Job, We Can Do Far Better” — but Left Us Spiritually Adrift
• Spirituality Got Left Lagging Behind Science
• A form of spirituality that could not have existed before the Scientific Revolution — so, Post-Scientific Spirituality
• We’re in an evolutionaryTM [magic key word alert] process
• EvolvedTM into Conversing About the Universe [on cannabis]
• Does the Soul Survive? or, Nonsense?
• Non-Ego Death
• A ProcessTM of EmergenceTM, of BecomingTM, of FormingTM [the Egodeath theory “of transformation” (period)] [not wrong, not helpful]
• “TransformTM, EvolveTM, ProcessTM, EmergentTM, FormingTM” — Not Wrong, But Not Helpful
• Spirituality is an emergentTM level of the One Process
• Push Your Theory to See if It Falls Over or is {stable building}
• To Clarify, I’m Talking About Next-Level EmergingTM & EvolvingTM & ProcessTM & FormingTM
• Bring Spirituality back in a whole new Way [specifically, the Emergent Evolution Process way]
• Resonant Frekeuncy Vibrations
• Big Ideas: EvolveTM, EmergentTM, Multiple LevelsTM at the Same Time(!!)
• UnfoldsTM, ResonantTM, VisionTM
• Sky Meadow Institute, Vermont, to Explore the Emergent Vision: See Spir’y thru Lens of Complexity
• Soul, Spirit, Meaning, & Purpose via Systems Thinking
• Take It Out of Two-Worlds Mythology[?] and Put It into that one ProcessualTM DynamicTM EvolvingTM World
• Integral Theory – Ken Wilber
• Don’t Say “Spirit is Outside of the Natural World” – Say “EmergentTM” Instead
• “Knife’s edge – = {blade}? & {fire}?
• EvolutionaryTM, EmergentTM ProcessTM Moving into the Spiritual
• Via ProcessTM of EvolutionTM and ComplexificationTM
• Tim Freke’s Novel Contributions to Perennial Cliches: Contributing New Platitudinal Process Cliches, to Evolve and Emerge the Post-Science, Spirituality Lexicon
• The After-Death Experience Is Undergoing an EvolutionaryTM ProcessTM
• Terms: Soul, Psych
• Types of Experience: Sensual & Imaginal
• History of Ideas: We Are Body and Soul
• De-Theologize ‘Soul’
• The EvolvedTM ‘Soul’ or ‘Psyche’ Means the Ability to Make Sense Out of Tim’s Meaningless Utterances
• Evolved b/c Biology, w/ Side-Effect the Psyche, that’s it?
• Shamanic-Practices Spirituality (ie High Dose Psilocybin); the Esoteric Traditions of 12 Grams of Golden Teacher of Righteousness to Learn How to [finally we getting somewhere] Explore the Spirit Realm of Loose cognitive association to reshape the mental model of control to 4D Spacetime Mysticism while Preserving possibilism-thinking [i may be getting slightly ahead of Tim here]
• We Should Seriously Take 12 Grams of Golden Teacher to Be EvolutionaryTM, EvolvedTM; Next-Level, and EmergentTM
• Study the EmergentTM Realm, to Understand Lots of Spiritual Phenomena Like the Psyche
• … so Let’s Talk About Physical, Bodily, Literal, Biological Death
• When the Body Fails, the Psyche Continues, as a ProcessTM
• Literal Bodily Physical Death Looks Like the Imaginal Continues More Vividly, Like Sleep & Dream
• FINALLY! “Take Psychedelics” (in an EmergentTM, EvolvingTM Way, of Course) “or move your focus to the imaginal”
• 12 Grams Makes you Move Focus to the Imaginal, in High Definition Spirit Realm; Then You Get Real EmergentTM, and EvolveTM, and Become Leading-EdgeTM
• “That 12-Gram Experience Is What I’m Trying to Explore”
• Developing an Ontology of the Psyche after Bodily Death, through 12 Grams of Golden Teacher
• If We ALL Has 12 Grams of Cubensis, We’d All Have a Experience of the Tremendous
• Where Is the ImaginalTM Realm?
• Psilocybin Interpretation of {rock} & {tree}
• Informational Overlay Tracked Using Our Information Processing Systems & the Cyber Internet (with Language)
• Travel with Psilocybin to Create Imaginal Spiritual Space to Construct God
• Avoid AlgorithmsTM that Run in the Material World
• Images of Freedom to Ride a Flying Horse [Golden Teacher Starting to Kick In]
• You Are the Creator of Fantastic Spaces to Hear Command Voices
• EvolutionTM = 12 G Psilocybin Imaginal Space Truckin
• Proof I’m Right: Internet Conferencing Is Working Right Now, b/c of this EvolutionTM
• If My Jargon Impresses You, You Are EvolvingTM
• Takes 20-40 Minutes for the EvolvingTM to Kick In – we’re really moving now, I Wish I Could Claim It’s Because of my Jargon
• 12 Gram Psilocybin is not just spirituality that’s outdated mumbo jumbo, But the Rest is Too Old to Work
• Can We Find Golden Teacher, Source of Mythic Imaginal, Again? If so, We’d Be the Absolute Leading EdgeTM; the Spiritual Exploration Awakening
• Requires the Philosophy Strain of Psilocybin
• “(I’m Presently Out of Psilocybin)”
• As Simple as 12 G of Cubensis
• Thunderstorm Mushrooms Give Spiritual Experiences that Are EvolvingTM
• The mushroom-trees Are Psilocybin, Matters because Causes control instability driving mental model transformation from possibilism to eternalism
• Nothing Comes Close to 12 G Cubensis
• Study the Egodeath TheoryTM of Psychedelic EternalismTM
• Eternal Conscious Life through Wishfulgenetic Fields
• Answer = Resonate Vibrations: When I Was a Child, I Thought as a Child
• I Hung with Sheldrake when I Was Childish
• ‘Consciousness’ = ‘Psyche’ Rises EmergentlyTM
• The Psyche Can Exist Without the Brain, If You Take My Courses and Buy My Merch
• Consciousness = Pay Attention to My Marketing Jargon Overlay Covering the Actual, Psychedelics Engine
• Analogy Is the Fastest Way to Communicate Psilocybin’s EmergentTM EvolvingTM Effects
• Understanding the Universe on Psilocybin Is Like an AI Learning System, Like the Latest Technology from 1200 to Instruct a Class about Balancing in a Mushroom-Tree to Avoid Loss of Control
• Cybernetics Is Information and Communication About Control & 4D Spacetime Mysticism
• Mystic Revelation Is Oneness Non-Dual Beginner Unity Experience
• Enlightenment = ComplexityTM & Resonant Frequency Quantum Vibrations
• Domino-Chain Causality of Pattern Recognition Formation Evolve Emergent Process
• In the Revealed, 4D Spacetime Block, All Moments Equivalently Exist
• Transcendent Knowledge is like Magic Propagation of Pattern Recognition
• 4D Spacetime: The Past Exists and Information Sits Distributed: the past hasn’t passed; no meta-change and meta-flow
• Mental Patterns in 4D Spacetime Are Algorithms that Cybernetically Govern; the 4D Spacetime Heimarmene Block Governs All Creatures and Control-Thoughts
• Psilocybin Transformation is EvolutionaryTM
• WHAT ABOUT THE FUTURE? WHAT DOES PHYSICS’ “TIME AS A DIMENSION” SAY ABOUT THAT? “Process”, “Evolution”, “Emergent” — Domino-Chain Causality Verbs Frozen in 4D Spacetime Block with No Meta-Change
• Domino Chain Causality, Ego Steering Through Branching Possibilities Forward in Time to Create the Open Future
• Throw More “Change” Verbs at the Frozen 4D Spacetime Block, to Shatter It and Be Born Forth from the Cosmic Rock: Chant “Action!” “Evolve!” “Emerge!” – Use of terms to imply Open Future
• Egoic Branching-Based Domino Chain Causality Suspended Halfway Between Egoic and Transcendent Thinking
• I Am My Past, and I Control and Create My Open Future by Ego Steering Power
• I Had Past Thoughts, and I Am Creator/ Emerger/ Evolver/ Process-Driver of My Future Thoughts
• I Am My Past (I Am Not My Future, Because That Hasn’t Been Created and Steered into Existence Yet by Me Selecting from Branching Possibilities Open to Me)
• Do Not Look at the Source of Control Thoughts; Look Down at Your Biological Level Only
• I Am the Control System
• The Postivity[sp?] Is Two Levels: Biology Information, and Imaginal
• Spiritual Survival of the Soul and Psyche Spirit Consciousness = Imagination Continues to Exist After the Physical, Literal Body Dies
• After Your Physical Body Dies, Your Imaginal Process Continues, because You Evolved Emergent Spirituality
• Super Vivid NDE Imaginal b/c Emergent Evolve
• The psyche can exist on its own but not in another physical matrix; on Two Different EmergentTM LevelsTM
• Yes and No and Maybe and I Didn’t Assert That, Next Question, Time’s Up
• Ladder Model
• Integral Theory – Ken Wilber
• Tim Freke Seeing What Ken Wilber Is Up To
• Psyche Independent from Brain: How Related?
• The Body & Brain, Biological Processing/ Managment
• The Psyche Emerged from Body: Ideational Level; the ideational network
• The Telepathy Tapes Podcast about Autism Kids
• My Lucid Living Book Is Great But Wrong
• Perennial Philosophy is Wrong? Experiencing “It” in 1 Hour, per Huxley
• My Books Were Perennial and Good — But Wrong
• [the Egodeath theory lately is a bit like that: Marketing It too much as a 1-dimensional over-Focus on Eternalism/ no-free-will, Only; Short-Changes the Balanced Component of Retaining Isaac, Everyday Egoic Thinking/ Shape of Experience incl. during peak mystic window: embrace and include – hard but i have to work hard to RE-ARTICULATE the Egodeath theory & its “Benefits”; What Diff?]
• “I articulated it so well for myself that I could finally see what was wrong with it”
• Against the Dogma Cliche that “Transcendent Knowledge is beyond words” [never held by the Egodeath theory]
• Freke STILL Sounds Like Usual “Unity Oneness Nondual Experience” Tripe of Beginner Level
• Experiencing Oneness[TM]
• I Can Tune into Dead People [= “evolve”?]
• EmergingTM, EvolvingTM, Levels of EmergenceTM
• [ empty, meaningless, Marketing jargon, like possibilismTM, eternalismTM, the Egodeath theoryTM]
• Fake Math Affectation, like 4D Spacetime Mysticism Sold as psychedelic eternalism — whatever that means <– probably same thing as Quantum Mysticism (didn’t Parmenides fabricate that myth?)
• Sacred Geometry
• Emergent 4D Spacetime
• FormlessTM
• OneTM, in RelationshipTM as Two(TM??)
• The Universe EmergesTM from OneTM – Too Complex for You to Understand, Words Cannot Express It [joke]
• Freke Continues Making ‘Oneness Unity Nonduality’ the Reference for Religious Experience
• Oneness Makes My Thoughts [= controls my personal control system? could we be actually getting somewhere relevant, here? or is this just an accident like infinite monkeys typing?]
• OnenessTM of BeingTM (But there’s no quality to it) [i agree: a low-quality utterance, Tim]
• The IsnessTM of Things: An Isness Which Everything Shares, and “It” is developed from “that” [??? What Is It?, asks Watts, & me]
• Meditation [not Psychedelics]
• Ken Wilber Yada Vibes: Big Framework, No Engine [-cm]
• Giveaway Word “Connection” Reveals That this is the “Unity” Paradigm [like Ken Wilber = the “Advaita Meditation Huckster” Paradigm, at Core]
• The Ego Tunnel; Philosophy and the Mind Sciences Journal (Thomas Metzinger)
• Non-Branching, Snake-Shaped Worldline Frozen in 4D Spacetime Block Mysticism [FDML]
• LevelsTM, Man [compare: in psychedelic eternalismTM, you end up {rider on donkey on path}; surface level of experience = possibilism-thinking; underlying real level = eternalism-reality; end up w/ qualified possibilism-thinking above eternalism actuality]
• The Mythic Thing Has Been Around a Long Time – u dont say?
• The OneTM Became the Two
• rupert sheldrake morphic Fields
• I have E. S. P. of the Universe, So Have a Spirituality that’s Grounded in This Reality
• There Is Many Onenesses
• The Soul Is Part of the OneTM ProcessTM BecomingTM [not wrong, but not very helpful]
• It’s Origined from It, So, Process <-
• Freke Lexicon: The Psyche Senses, Tune In
• We Talk Philosophy on Sundays, to EvolveTM and EmergeTM, to E.S.P.-Sense Each Other & Our Established Collective Group (and call that “the divine super-soul”)
• Sense the planetary awareness
• We Converse in the Psyche — and Physical & Biological TOO!
• When We Talk Together, God-Oneness Is All Levels Interacting
• Freke Book The Laughing Jesus
• I Only Talk to Our Sunday ICU Collective
• Experiential Retreat at SkyMeadow
• Do Philosophy in the Experiential Realm
• Sky Meadow, various thinkers communities
• TheAvenues – Community?
• VAGUE, “love is the point of Philosophy” – Love of Transcendent Knowledge, I should hope [cm]
• Is “Emergence” a Magic Token Word in Place of Comprehension?
• Key Dogma/ Jargon: “Evolution” (magic word)
• “Cycle of Rebirth”
• Main Theme: Do Not Lose the Individual (or devmt of the indiv.) During Egodeath Enlightenment
• Tim’s Podbook
• ICU Sunday Meetings
• Tim Freke Video Podbook on YouTube, His Latest 8 Years’ Work/ Idea Development
• “I did this whole thing, but now actually I think that’s all wrong”; learning and updating
• Latest Update Patch to Tim Freke’s OS
• See Also

Video: Part 2: The Evolution of my Ideas about Spirituality (Apr. 18, 2025)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9bP2Lo30NAI&t=629s–

Video title:
Part 2: The Evolution of my Ideas about Spirituality
Tim Freke, Apr. 18, 2025

“In a follow up to our previous conversation, Richard Cox and I discuss the development of my ideas about spirituality:

1. from accepting the fundamental tenets of the perennial philosophy,
2. to embracing the philosophy of unividualism.

[i disagree with more aspects of what’s foisted as common-core mysticism and perennialism than Freke – it’s a beginners’ overemphasis on nondual unity oneness, fails to engage control model transformation & pass through the relevant gate. – Michael Hoffman]

“Follow Richard’s work at https://www.deepstateconsciousness.com/

‘Why Your Life Really Matters: The Podbook‘ is coming on 1 May. 2025

“Subscribe to be notified of new chapters weekly.

“Access all chapters I have recorded before they are released and connect with me in person at weekly online meet-ups by joining my online community: https://timfreke.com/online-community/

“Find out about my experiential online and in-person events: https://timfreke.com

“Sign up to my newsletter to hear about everything I am up to: https://timfreke.com

“I am the author of 35 books, translated into 15 languages, including a Sunday Times bestseller and Daily Telegraph ‘Book of the Year’.

[Timothy Freke & Peter Gandy’s book The Jesus Mysteries, 1999, https://www.amazon.com/Jesus-Mysteries-Was-Original-Pagan/dp/0609807986/%5D

“For some inexplicable reason I was included in ‘The 100 Most Spiritually Influential Living People’ lists in Watkins Magazine for 2021 and 2022.”

My Comment on the Video

In 1988, I discovered a 2nd way of thinking (4D spacetime block universe eternalism), instead of the common, first way of thinking.

For decades, I emphasized switching to that 2nd way of thinking.

But in 2000 (Jesus Mysteries book era), Coraxo in the Gnosticism Yahoo Group pointed out that my glorified 2nd way of thinking is what Gnosticism framed as a prison to escape!

So then in 2001, I read David Ulansey’s book explaining Mithraism as a way of rising above my glorified, exclusive 2nd way of thinking.

The Late Antiquity 3-part model (body, soul, spirit) disparaged my 2nd way of thinking as merely soul, merely half-transcendent.

And in 2024, I realized that my model, pushing exclusively 4D Spacetime Mysticism, simply would not fly if presented to my psych spirituality group, and is not entirely relevant to the mystical peak state nor daily life.

I recently struggled to stop disrespecting the first way of thinking and reframe both ways of thinking in an integrated way.

Now I’m following behind Tim Freke and Jessica Nathanson in a “both-and”, embracing approach, which conforms to Ken Wilber: “dis-identify, embrace, and include” the earlier developmental structures.

Isaac was sacrificed in a way (“because you have done this thing”), and preserved in a way, and because of that, Abraham and Isaac walked away blessed by the Transcendent and thriving into the future.

Looking forward to the Podbook.

/ end of Comment on video

Soul Story: Evolution and The Purpose of Life (Freke, 2017)

https://www.amazon.com/Soul-Story-Evolution-Purpose-Life/dp/1780289847/

Soul Story: Evolution and The Purpose of Life
Tim Freke, 2017

Blurb:

THE EMERGENCE OF SOUL, MEANING AND IMMORTALITY

“The grand religious stories that gave meaning to life and death in the past have crumbled under sceptical scrutiny.

“The dominant mainstream philosophy is now scientific objectivism, [“naturalism”; “materialism”] which describes a universe that exists for no reason and a life that ends in oblivion.

“Pioneering philosopher Tim Freke addresses the “soul crisis” in modern culture that has arisen from lack of meaning.

“He offers an intelligent “spiritual” perspective on life and death to help us make sense of a paradoxical world, which is sometimes bleak and banal, but also can be magical and full of significance.

“He presents a revolutionary paradigm shift in our understanding of reality that integrates the deepest insights of science and spirituality to create a new model of human identity, which makes the idea of the immortal soul intellectually credible.

“He explores the process of evolution, not as blind chance, but as the momentous story of the self-realising universe.

“The development of the material world has led to the emergence of “psyche” or “soul,” which you are experiencing right now as a stream of thoughts and images that don’t exist in space and aren’t made of matter.

“We are not insignificant specks in a vast purposeless cosmos.

“We are significant participants in the magnificent and meaningful story of soul.

“The universe is coming to know itself through each one of us and this process doesn’t end at death, because the evolution of soul has also been the evolution of immortality.”

Video: WHAT’S WRONG WITH NON-DUAL SPIRITUALITY : PART 1 (Freke, 2022)

Video title:
WHAT’S WRONG WITH NON-DUAL SPIRITUALITY : PART 1
YouTube channel: Tim Freke, May 6, 2022
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D8Tx4OgEStw —

Video: WHAT’S WRONG WITH NON-DUAL SPIRITUALITY : PART 2 (with biscuits) (Freke, 2022)

Video title:
WHAT’S WRONG WITH NON-DUAL SPIRITUALITY : PART 2 (with biscuits)
Tim Freke, May 12, 2022
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xPitdJOlo3A —

Video: Q&A on ‘What’s Wrong with NonDual Spirituality’ (Freke, 2022)

Video title:
Q&A on ‘What’s Wrong with NonDual Spirituality’
YouTube channel: Tim Freke, May 26, 2022
“A vibrant discussion about our 2 films exploring ‘What’s Wrong with NonDual Spirituality?”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7XQLCpU-TBY —

“This discussion is one of the weekly online meet ups with my online community. If you enjoyed it, consider joining us to take part in regular discussions like this!”

“Jessica Nathanson is dedicated to spreading awareness about the pitfalls of radically imbalanced non-dual teachings and exploring how to engage with non-dual spirituality in a way that honours rather than denigrates the individual self and inspires human flourishing towards the highest good for all.”

“She is trained as a spiritual emergency coach.”

https://www.thegloriousbothand.com

👁 JOIN TIM’S ONLINE COMMUNITY to take part in regular discussion
https://timfreke.com/ICU/

Summarize Points from Timothy Freke interview at YouTube

Check transcript at bottom of page

He rejected pop nonduality self is illusion, freewill is illusion, rejected Ramesh Balsekar & he specifically criticized in a different video specifically by name, Herman “Minkowski 4D space time ” – but that interview is really focused on survival of the soul, not those other crirtiques of pop spiritual tropes like

• His critique of “nonduality”.
• His critique of 4D Spacetime Mysticism (Minkowski) & Ramesh Balsekar (“enlightenment = Advaita meditation & no-free-will”) — I quickly heard him say those words in other videos. Freke has heard everything, and probably worked with everyone.
• His critique of “ego is bad, get rid of it”.
• “reason cannot grasp or describe the spiritual”.
• The other dominant cliches.

Deep Awake: Wake Up To Oneness and Celebrate Your Individuality
(Tim Freke, 2016)

Deep Awake: Wake Up To Oneness and Celebrate Your Individuality
Tim Freke, 2016
https://www.amazon.com/Deep-Awake-Oneness-Celebrate-Individuality/dp/1780289863/ —

Blurb:

“Frustrated with outdated forms of spirituality that urge us to reject the ego, the bestselling author of The Jesus Mysteries invites us to embrace our personal selves as a doorway to spiritual awakening

“Is the author of more than 20 books on the world’s spiritual traditions, Tim Freke is in a unique position to present a revolutionary new approach to spiritual awakening.

With astonishing clarity and directness, he explains why popular spiritual teachings that urge us to reject the mind, attack the ego, and detach from the vicissitudes of life are misguided.

Using the powerful tool of ‘paralogical thinking’, he reveals that everyone has both a ‘deep I’ and a ‘personal self’.

The ‘deep I’ is our spiritual essence, which is one with everyone and everything.

We experience the ‘deep I’ as a feeling of limitless love.

The personal self by contrast is our tender humanity; it feels pleasure and pain, hope and heartache, love and loss.

The personal self feels separate* from the world.”

[note “unity” is still the master point of reference idea/ conceptualization]

“Tim’s powerful paralogical insights reveal that the personal self is not an obstacle to our spiritual essence which must be overcome but rather a doorway to the ‘deep I’.

“Indeed, it is only through the personal self that we can find and then embody the ‘deep I’ in our lives. The ego is not the villain but rather the hero of the spiritual journey.”

[The ego as steering agent is snok smoked when block-universe eternalism is reveealed – ego is smoked as virtual-only, ghost, but remains and is used constantly]

When we are deep awake, we wake up to oneness and celebrate separateness.

“We embrace both our spirituality and our humanity.

“Authentic spirituality is not about detaching ourselves from life, but about wholeheartedly diving in so that we can express our deep love and our unique human passion in the world.”

/ end blurb for Deep Awake

Timothy Freke Rejects Non-Duality & “Ego/ self is iillusion, Rejects “Minkows

ha. Another interruption, the theme of the morning is interruption to define keyboard shortcut. I need a keyboard shortcut for Herman Manowski 4D4 dimensional space time.

Minkowski 4D Spacetime – 4 d

announcement I am working on different ways of representing a shortcut that I am currently defining. I have to type in a way that works on mobile device my notation in the binder sheets, April 1987 is no good for this mobile editing format.

1987 notation:

mental construct processing [MCP]

Sometimes it gets the word right 90% of the time it does but occasionally voice transcription will successfully transcribe the rare special word for Dr secret entheogen

1/10 times, voice transcription correctly handles the word motif. proving that it can do it right this frustrating voice transcription. I know you can handle the word MOTIF because you do that correctly one out of 10 times what’s the problem?

It’s frustrating it would be so nice if it would work, but then in the one out of 10 times that it works and it transcribes the word MOTIF then two seconds later, it goes back in it ruins and corrupt and changes the word to some other word

Proposal: Timothy Freke says NOTHING in the first 20 minutes of https://youtu.be/4RRRvmxjhYc —

and I believe I can prove that by pasting the transcription here –

In looking for a new direction, he is directionless

Timothy Freke Is Not Helping People Use Psilocybin

Given: We only have religious experience r-e rx

keyboard shortcut rx

Dr Cybermonk prescription R X i prescribe the medicine poison remedy for ills ails you vexes and causess turmoil: u need religious experience

my huge motivation in researching loose cognition in 1985 was to repair my thinking

My life was charmed but vexed by one root problem: dysfunctional personal control system

I has to fix this problem of dsc dctsc

dysfunctional cross-time self-control

dctsc – dysfunctional cross-time self-control

where did my important breakthrough theory of transcendent knowledge come from my theory of psychedelics effects transforming transformative psychedelic effect my theory that the most important thing in religion is psychedelics and

my theory that the main effect of psychedelics is mental model transformation

The most important thing in the world is psychedelics.

Religious revelation is through none other than psychedelics

My theory that the only brand of religion worth developing and theorizing about is psychedelics.

🗣️🎙️🤖💦🔫💥🔨🤬

Timothy freak has the concept of ENTHEOGEN.

Voice Dictation Cannot Handle the Word ‘Motif’

The study of art interpretation motif

Highly effective to compare the new direction that Timothy Freke in evolutionary spirituality

Timothy Freke says eastern religion is irrationalism.

Now Freke says to avoid the irrational, and stop criticizing Reason and the individual, because Eastern religion says to be enlightened, you must get rid of your individual self, and you must stop using rationality.

Per pop spirituality cliches, you must say that “everything is an illusion”, and pretend like you said something meaningful, even though it is in fact, meaningless to say “Item X is an illusion”.

You’ve explained nothing; it is intellectually lazy to make these crude binary statements.

Act as if you said something profound, you said nothing when you said “the self is an illusion.”

it is taken Timothy Freke 30 years to realize the overselling of “nondual”, “self is illusion.”

To say the self is an illusion is meaningless nonsense that is of no help to anybody.

“Not wrong, but not helpful/ useful/ relevant/ simple/ clear.”

It is profitable to contrast recent development in the thinking of Timothy Freke versus my own recent development refining, my marketing framing of all that I have figured out about psychedelics mental model transformation, mythology, and medieval art motifs.

Wish to integrate Voice Dictation with Keyboard shortcuts

How did I make biggest breakthrough January 1988 figuring out

Integrate voice dictation with keyboard shortcuts containing my specialized, purpose built, custom lexicon for my theory development.

d c t s =

decoded by Cybermonk [4:42 p.m. February 12, 2023]

have been needing that recently, but what I do instead is simply enter the time date manually,

but instead of having to type the entire date, the keyboard shortcut is faster because expands the most recently defined date and then simply modify that by hand.

stable control – s c

self-control climax – s c c

stable control – s c

s c c = self-control climax

s c : stable control

Timothy Freke’s evolutionary spirituality brand of religion: what is its point, mission, strategy, goal?

Ken Wilber’s Integral Theory brand of religion: what is its point, mission, strategy, goal?

Michael Hoffman’s psychedelic eternalism brand of religion: what is its point, mission, strategy, goal?

Premise: The Mind has an innate desire to mature via Psilocybin; to mature in a sense that is defined by Psilocybin

The strongest sense of having a having a religious experience is via psychedelics.

Where should we look to find a standard of what constitutes religious revelation?

the answer is self evident through experience that

we experience the strongest possible sense of having a transformative religious experiencing is through psilocybin and modern equivalent blotter

Jan Irvin claims that those merely have a suggestion effect

But there he is specifically focused on social engineering imposing when one group of people imposes on another group of people psychedelics.

That social dynamic is called not entheogen but suggestogen; Irvin is claiming that the principal cognitive effect of psychedelics is suggestibility rather than entheogenic.

What kind of maturing does Psilocybin cause? branching to non branching.

In What Specific Way Is Recent-Freke a Mixed Bag?

This is the hard work of scholarship and competitive competent theory-construction — Freke is saying many great things, and is saying some wimpy, inadequate things, and failing to assert as good and definite a model of Transcendent Knowledge as the Egodeath theory (which leverages the Mytheme theory).

He’s just discovered that it’s possible to take a critical view against how Transcendent Knowledge is described – gee whiz!

I figured that out a zillion years ago – 9 months in.

• Day 1: Oct 26, 1985
• June 1986: “Transcendent Knowledge is described ineptly. I must figure out what ego transcendence is REALLY about, and then, do a way better, STEM-based expression of Transcendent Knowledge.”
• 1998: “And explain religious mythology to corrob & clarify the core theory of 1988/1997.”
• 2015: “Including art motifs such as stand on right foot.”
• 2020: Confirmed massively; motifs — like religious mythology — are depictions of Psilocybin transformation.

Per the Egodeath theory, Ultimate Truth is, possibilism practical mental model + revealed underlying eternalism

He labels this as fundamentalism (in the course of him correcting and backing away from his previous stance).

I double down. THis is the clear, simple, specificcal, two-leg mode; the mind ends up with this combination of compatibilitsm.

Timothy Freke is thorwing in a bunch of onise noise – he is too much doing REACTIONISM; he is rebutting bad ideas, including ones he held. I am not doing just reaction against poor expressions; I was driven by a need to clearly understand Transcendent Knowledge and model it and assert that model.

I half agree with many of his latest statements. He can lable “authoritarnian”, “ultimate truth” — I frame instead as, A SCIENTIFIC MODEL OF Transcendent Knowledge MUST SPEAK DEFINITELY, TO BE USEFUL. Timid Tim

Too Timid Tim – Reflects His Lack of Coherent Two-Leg Model

He’s working it out, a lot of sparks & smoke and self-countersignaling. His tone of voice gives it away, sounds like me chastising me in Oct 1985-March 1987, in my phase one initial approach.

April 1987 I gained a sure-footed sense – this is The Teacher of Righteousness. This is the specific meaning of the body of religious mythology.

Timothy Freke is backing away from any useful assertion. recent Tf is not sure-footed, not helpful.

AND HIS JUST DENIED THAT the EARTH IS THE CENTER OF EVERYTHING, contradicting astral ascent mysticism that I figured out.

Who in antquity Classical Antiquity created the cosmos model of 7 planets + the sphere of the fixed stars?

I’m not interested here in heliocentric, or precession of equinoxes. More basic model for astral ascent mysticism: formed when?

I am trying to ease back my assertions, in order to more vigorously assert a specific pair of Compatibilism of possibilism-thinking & eternalism-thinking.

Timothy Freke is easing back his assertions, b/c he fails to put forth a coherent, helpful system, to model Psilocybin transformation.

His modifications are good to hear, but, I hear him too much backing away from clarity and specificity that is useful and relevant.

Timothy Freke is becoming DIRECTIONLESS. So reasonable, he’s directionless. I go the distance.

Freke’s qualifying of his previous statements, is valuable, but the end result is NOT going to be a breakthrough explanatory framework to form a useful new technology of Transcendent Knowledge like the Egodeath theory.

DIRECTIONLESS. Not very useful/ helpful/ relevant/ simple/ clear, like the Egodeath theory.

Incoming

“I don’t know what ‘Ultimate Truth’ means, any more.” — Timothy Freke – “truth means something you can trust.”

Psilocybin is the test of trust, of integrity and merit.

If your mental model is viable and coherent, in the Psilocybin loose cognition state, then your mental model is “true”.

“Forget absolute truth.”

I DISAGREE; SO, I AM MORE USEFUL AND HELPFUL THAN FREKE.

We experience as freewill personal control agents, and, the underlying reality is eternalism. I don’t waffle there.

Freke is repositioning himself to distance himself from pop utterances about spirituality.

I definitely assert:

• We experience as freewill personal control agents
• The underlying reality is eternalism.
• We can sort of – in a specific way — transcend eternalism.

If Freke can’t say specific assertions like that, he loses & I win. Timothy Freke fails to delete deliver THE SYSTEM; I deliver THE SYSTEM / the gnosis. He’s not up for the challenge of assertion; I am.

“Before the No Self tradition (it’s a reaction) was “each one of us is a spark of God, that is your self”.

Freke, like me, is critiquing WAYS OF WRITING. Need more inclusive ways of writing and affirms the individual, the ego system, the self, time – they DO exist.

The hard, non-lazy work is to avoid dumb inarticulate biinaryies, “does time exist, or not? does ego exist, or not? Yes or No?” as i say, “IN WHAT WAY” is X true or real? or illusory. BE SPECIFIC. Not lazy & inarticulate.

“These two aspects, contrasted or pitted against each other.” Both make sense, but in a new way.

Learn to integrate the self; bring the POVs into integration.

How is possibilism-thinking to be honored?

How is eternalism-thinking to be honored?

How do these two mental models work together as a whole that’s effective and enlightened?

Against such negation-eager, cliched way of writing.

Hermetica as a Path of Initiation (Litwa, 2025)

Hermetica I: The Corpus Hermeticum, Asclepius, and Nag Hammadi Hermetica Ordered as a Path of Initiation
M. David Litwa, January 2, 2025
https://www.amazon.com/Hermetica-Hermeticum-Asclepius-Hammadi-Initiation/dp/B0DS2CZKC3/ — He removed the junk random noise inserted by later writers, and arranged in order of initiation stages:

“The Hermetic corpus is a spiritual and intellectual treasure stemming from ancient Egyptian sages who could write and think in Greek.

“Since the Renaissance, this corpus has appeared in an order that does not fit the path of spiritual initiation suggested by the corpus itself.

“The present edition reorders the corpus—including the Latin Asclepius and the Nag Hammadi Hermetica—into four progressing parts: introductory tractates, general discourses, detailed discourses, and revelatory discourses.

“A short spiritual commentary follows each tractate.

“The book is written for all lovers of the Hermetica, but in particular for those who are willing, in some sense, to join the way of immortality.”

The Way of Zen by Alan Watts: “Truth Is Unspeakable” –> Freke, Ok <Throws Book into Fireplace>

Ways of Thinking of Eastern Peoples: Freke Is Rejecting the Trite Cliched Ways of Talking About Transcendent Knowledge

x https://www.amazon.com/Ways-Thinking-Eastern-Peoples-Translation/dp/0824800788/ —

Jesus Mysteries book: The #6 Bestselling Book at Amazon in 2000

The Jesus Mysteries (Timothy Freke & Peter Gandy, 2000) https://www.amazon.com/Jesus-Mysteries-Was-Original-Pagan/dp/060960581X/
tf01

https://www.amazon.com/Jesus-Mysteries-Was-Original-Pagan/dp/060960581X/ —

https://read.amazon.com/kp/card?preview=inline&linkCode=kpd&ref_=k4w_oembed_aoHtNaF1qPhkKu&asin=060960581X&tag=kpembed-20 —

UK, April 2000:Jesus Mysteries

https://read.amazon.co.uk/kp/card?preview=inline&linkCode=kpd&ref_=k4w_oembed_766QEeJIUjksQJ&asin=0722536771&tag=kpembed-20

Website

https://timfreke.com

YouTube videos

http://www.youtube.com/@TimFreke1

 Videos

https://www.youtube.com/@TimFreke1/videos

Forthcoming Podbook (audio book)

Search web:
https://www.google.com/search?q=timothy+freke

Books

https://www.amazon.com/stores/author/B001HD0518/allbooks

Rejection of Non-duality that negates individuals

see video titles

Rejection of “only consciousness exists”

see video titles

Motivation for this Page

Freke’s adjustments late in theorizing are like mine.

He uses so much of the same conceptual vocabulary, need to focus on what the differences are – but we both have moving trajectories in core theory and in expression/ description of core theory.

Freke & the Egodeath theory both are rejecting tired old language of talking about mysticism.

I affirm a kind of compatibilism. Described well in emails in idea development p. 26.

Timothy Freke: Reconcile Individual & Nondual; eternalism & possibilism; altered state & ordinary state

Per Ken Wilber – “embrace and include” both views.

“not all nonduality is anti-individual; my approach was always a both/and approach”.

“the absolute and the relative” POVs

Brand of Religion: Emergent Spirituality

Brendan Graham Dempsey video interview of Timothy Freke, Jan. 23, 2025

Video title: “Live with Tim Freke“
YouTube channel: Brendan Graham Dempsey
Jan .23, 2025
METAMODERN MEANING PODCAST
“On Saturday, January 18, Sky Meadow Institute hosted a virtual meet-up and open Q&A with Tim Freke, author of Soul Story and a leading thinker in the emergent spirituality space.”

Search web for “emergent spirituality”:
https://www.google.com/search?q=%22emergent+spirituality%22
https://emergentstudiesinstitute.org/academics/academic-departments/emergent-spirituality/
https://emergentstudiesinstitute.org

For more upcoming events, check out http://skymeadowinstitute.org

METAMODERN MEANING PODCAST
91 episodes
YouTube Channel: Brendan Graham Dempsey
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLa_4sU5_wQrlw5b9oc1tDaziHyEqXUnl7

https://youtu.be/4RRRvmxjhYc?si=TZwY-1ING8yt0fbM —

Video Transcript of “Live with Tim Freke”

update April 15, 2025:

I wonder if I should have posted the transcripts of other videos instead.

I have now learned how to clean up the YouTube transcripts.

I am not interested in discussing survival of the soul after bodily death, which seems to be the topic of Soul Story.

I’m interested in critiques of pop spirituality cliches.

— Michael Hoffman

Host:

“well hi everyone uh I’m glad everyone could make it and uh this is a veryspecial uh kind of first of its kind event um and uh comes from someconversations that uh I was having with Tim um which I’ll explain a bit more in a second but first before I say anything thank you so much Tim for uh sharing your your time with us and uh and beingopen to yeah uh open this up for you know sort of a broader Community discussion and engagement

um yeah I

I found Tim’s book

well this actually this was the the result of finding some of Tim’s uh videos um online which um Igot really interested in really intrigued by

and Tim has been talking to some very um you know familiar faces inthe broader kind of community of folks in evolutionary spirituality

um and uhso he and I did a podcast and um and then

eventually that led me to find his soul story book which um is just it’s an excellent excellent read

and I I wanted to kind of have an occasion to kind of you know amplify it and uh and and kind of shine some light on that and put it on people’s radar because I feel like it’s really just such a wonderful primer in in a really concise accessible way for some of the most important ideas you know um arguably of our current moment

and so um yeah this led to just a number of ideas around trying to uh engage more maybe

try to get Tim out to Sky Meadow Etc

and so so um this is sort of a move in the direction of

trying to engage more with each other and uh and have some more conversations and in this case um openit up to broader Community engagement

this is the first kind of event um I’ve ever done where sort of a live event andwe’ll have sort of a live Q&A and just kind of uh again open up the conversation

I’m used to more podcast conversations where they’re you know recorded and it’s it’s just a dialogue or maybe a trialogue

but um for the mostpart it doesn’t really get uh more voices in

so U yeah this kind of experiment in that and uh and I’m looking forward to seeing what what people um have to bring into this

and uh and maybe some questions that we can post to Tim and what not

so anyway um that’s kind of my little setup thanks again Tim and uh yeah I’d love to jumpinto some conversation with you about this and then um after that kind of open things up for for other people’s input

how does that sound

sounds good to me lovely

so um allright well let’s start uh and again we’ll just talk for I don’t know uh 10 minutes or so

and then people can can can join the conversation

um but

let’s start with uh your work and what you’ve been up to again

this book Soul story now is probably uh it’s not old but it’s been out there for a few years and maybe one place to start with it is just for people who haven’t read it or only minimally aware of it

like can you can you

Freke’s Vision of Emerging Mythic Spirituality, Post Scientific Revolution

give a sense of the vision that you’re that you’re working with

the sense of emerging spirituality

kind of this big new story that you’re doing

your own wonderful work to help kind of uh bring to the you know uh broaderuh public awareness

yeah uh so

I’m intrigued as to what the next big jump in our understanding

of what this crazy thing is we’re experiencing and what it means

and

why does it matter if it does

and

I’m convinced there will be a new one because there always has been before

the question is what will it be

and

when will it come

and my own hunch with it is that

A New Worldview, A New Form of Spirituality – A Transition Like the Scientific Revolution that Pushed Away Mythic Religion as “Not Up to the Job, We Can Do Far Better” — but Left Us Spiritually Adrift

that new worldview will actually be a new form of spirituality

because the last big transition was the Scientific Revolution

and

part of that was to push away Mythic religion and just go okay this is not up to the job and we can do far better and we have

and that’s enabled us to be here connecting on the internet which is pretty damn amazing really

and uh butit’s also left us kind of adrift

Spirituality Got Left Lagging Behind Science

spirituality hasn’t been able to keep up

and what

what I think is coming

and and and I’m sure everyone here may may already be part of this is

A form of spirituality that could not have existed before the Scientific Revolution — so, Post-Scientific Spirituality

a form of spirituality that could not have existed before the Scientific Revolution — so, post-scientific spirituality

and that’s both about the level of inquiry and uh doubt and questioning which has come since then

the the level of our individual reflection

but also I think there’s some key ideas and the one that is absolutely Central I think is the idea that

we live in a process that

we’re in that

we now know

We’re in an evolutionaryTM [magic key word alert] process

we’re in an evolutionary process

which is an extraordinary idea and

everything seems so far to be pointing towards it being true

so we now know we’re in this you know

Evolved^TM into Conversing About the Universe 🤯 [on cannabis]

13.8 billion years have got us from hydrogen to you and me having a conversation about the universe

which is the thing that always blows my mind

and so the question for me then as someone who has

spent his life exploring experientially and teaching around spirituality

it’s written on I don’t know 35 books on all of the different spiritual Traditions

the question for me is well

how does spirituality fit into that [into evolution]

and specifically the big questions that that like

Does the Soul Survive? or, Nonsense?

The survival of the soul, which is absolutely Central to most forms of spirituality

is that something we now just abandon that’s like

oh well

We used to believe all that nonsense, but that we’ve gone beyond that.

My own experience has pointed in the opposite direction.

Non-Ego Death

I’ve been around death a lot

I worked with the dying and uh I was a a very early in near-death experiences when I was very young and so

that’s just one example but it it’s like

where does that fit in

A Process^TM of Emergence^TM, of Becoming^TM, of Forming^TM [the Egodeath theory “of transformation” (period)] [not wrong, not helpful]

and so the idea in essence Brendan I think that’s motivated Soul Story was

can I make sense of a worldview which goes what this is is a process of emergence, it’s a process of becoming or forming

[experiencing Psilocybin transformation from possibilism to eternalism, then transcendent freewill]

“Transform^TM, Evolve^TM, Process^TM, Emergent^TM, Forming^TM” — Not Wrong, But Not Helpful

and everything

everything that has any form whatsoever is part of one natural process

can I make sense of that because it’s so beautiful and elegant nothing outside nothing before nothing just the one process of realization of forming something formless in the process of forming and

can we make sense of that

can we make sense of the scientific knowledge from that perspective

which I think we can

and then

can we

see spirituality as an emergent level

or or can we

Spirituality is an emergent^TM level of the One Process

see what spirituality is concerned with as an emergent level of this one process

and I think we can and and that means that we can

integrate spiritual experience on its own terms

but by

seeing it in this new evolutionary way with our vast knowledge now in physicsand and bi ology

so that’s I think was the motivation to do it was to was to just

Push Your Theory to See if It Falls Over or is {stable building}

start in that book [Soul Story] to to lay out a almost like a program a vision of see what about if we see it like this and then

for the last eight years I’ve been pushing it and pushing it and pushing it to see It’ll fall over and it’s just got stronger and

stronger and stronger so that

To Clarify, I’m Talking About Next-Level Emerging^TM & Evolving^TM & Process^TM & Forming^TM

now I’m ready to take it to the next level and share

what the last eight years have been of intensely going

right let’s really dig into this and and and bring this out and because if we can it

Bring Spirituality back in a whole new Way [specifically, the Emergent Evolution Process way]

it brings spirituality back in a whole new way

yeah awesome well there’s so much that um resonates with that I mean deeply

Resonant Frekeuncy Vibrations

deeply resonates

and the the again

Big Ideas: Evolve^TM, Emergent^TM, Multiple Levels^TM at the Same Time(!!)

the way that you’re able to express these uh really really big Ideas

so concisely and and accessibly is is wonderful

I feel like this is again like a primer

a wonderful introduction to this

Unfolds^TM, Resonant^TM, Vision^TM

uh because it just um it unfolds very beautifully and elegantly in your expression and

there’s so many things that are resonant about that Vision which I find very attractive

I should have mentioned at the outset too

where this is sort of uh

Sky Meadow Institute, Vermont, to Explore the Emergent Vision: See Spir’y thru Lens of Complexity

this event is kind of Under the Umbrella of Sky Meadow Institute

and uh

that’s the Institute that I run here in Vermont and we are really dedicated to exploring just that sort of vision that you’re explaining oflike uh of of seeing spirituality through the lens of complexity of

Soul, Spirit, Meaning, & Purpose via Systems Thinking

seeing meaning and purpose through the lens of kind of systems based thinking and trying to

apply those lenses um to that in a way that re situates what we’ve always kind of meant by things like Soul and Spirit and meaning and purpose

umbut

Take It Out of Two-Worlds Mythology[?] and Put It into that one Processual^TM Dynamic^TM Evolving^TM World

taking it out of that sort of Two Worlds mythology and putting it into that one processual Dynamic evolving world that that you’re describing

um and allowing us just a different set of Yeah

Integral Theory – Ken Wilber

a different way to relate to all that stuff and those familiar with like integral uh Theory um you know have a similar sense of that kind of move which is like

Don’t Say “Spirit is Outside of the Natural World” – Say “Emergent^TM” Instead

rather than say that spirit is like outside of of of the natural world

and and something like that but it’s more like uh it is

the emergent kind of a

“Knife’s edge – = {blade}? & {fire}?

image: f134 Great Canterbury Psalter with lots of blades, touching left limb

Evolutionary^TM, Emergent^TM Process^TM Moving into the Spiritual

knife’s edge of an evolutionary process and an emergent process that we’re actually moving into the spiritual

in a sense maybe we’re uh at least inthe past uh that looked very different and and uh it’s been

Via Process^TM of Evolution^TM and Complexification^TM

through the process of evolution and complexification

that um yeah

these ideas that are kind of core to spiritual and religious Traditions historically come to make sense in a new light when we situate that as sort of a product of the complexification process rather than maybe somehow outside of it or uh you know undering it from the beginning and getting it going different ways of thinking about it

so it’s a a new way of approaching all this

at this and and as far as its newness as well I mean

I was going through this book again before this

and um

you’re not just stating some of those big Ideas which again other folks have been getting at for for some time as well

Tim Freke’s Novel Contributions to Perennial Cliches: Contributing New Platitudinal Process Cliches, to Evolve and Emerge the Post-Science, Spirituality Lexicon

you’re really also offering some really novel contributions to to that

um and maybe just briefly we’ll touch on this before opening it up to to some other uh people who want to bring in their ideas to the conversation

but uh one of the most striking aspects of this is is your kind of notion of the am magnos [imaginal?] or the

the kind of the the emergence of sort of the imaginal realm for human beings

and thinking about

The After-Death Experience Is Undergoing an Evolutionary^TM Process^TM

that after death experience potentially itself is undergoing a kind of evolutionary process

so maybe just as one point which um if you wanted to speak a little bit to that

I find that a fascinating Prospect and

I’d never heard anything like that before I’d read uh your book

so I don’t know if there’s any thoughts you’d want to you know weave that into your account at all or anything else you wanted to say before uh we again kind of open this up a little bit

yeah

I got too many thoughts around that’s the truth it’s just like oh there’s a lot um so so for me uh

I’ll try very hard as I go through to Define what I mean by the terms I use

and then hopefully you know people use words in different ways

Terms: Soul, Psych

for me what I mean by the soul or the psyche thepsyche is just the Greek word for soul the ancient Greek word for soul

to me it’s like what I have been exploring is

Types of Experience: Sensual & Imaginal

oh I’m always experiencing two types of experience

I’m experiencing the sensal Sens sensual world and I’m experiencingthe imaginal

and it’s always the case and I think that’s

History of Ideas: We Are Body and Soul

what’s given rise throughout history to the idea that we are Body and Soul because we’re experiencing it every day

De-Theologize ‘Soul’

now the word Soul has got completely theologized into something else

but for me it’s like

no

The Evolved^TM ‘Soul’ or ‘Psyche’ Means the Ability to Make Sense Out of Tim’s Meaningless Utterances

that’s what it is you’re experiencing it right now with your body

you’re hearing the funny noises I’m making

and with your soul or your psyche you’re understanding the meaning

there’s no meaning in the funny noises

all of that’s on the level of the soul and that has evolved I think

there most evolutionists would say yeah of course it’s evolved

so the question is

is it just evolved as some byproduct of biology

you know is is the story which is what I see in the mainstream which is

Evolved b/c Biology, w/ Side-Effect the Psyche, that’s it?

yes it’s all evolved up to biology and then then this is side effect the psyche and and that’s it

rather than going

no

what the psyche it seems to me has evolved as a whole domain

it the as an ecosystem

just as much as a biological ecosystem

and we are in that ecosystem right now

and that’s what I mean by

the magnos [imaginal?] is that there’s an imaginal realm now

Shamanic-Practices Spirituality (ie High Dose Psilocybin); the Esoteric Traditions of 12 Grams of Golden Teacher of Righteousness to Learn How to [finally we getting somewhere] Explore the Spirit Realm of Loose cognitive association to reshape the mental model of control to 4D Spacetime Mysticism while Preserving possibilism-thinking [i may be getting slightly ahead of Tim here]

spirituality has always been about that from shamanic times

if you study shamanic if you especially if you do shamanic practices it’s about

the esoteric Traditions are all about learning how to explore that realm the spirit realm

the the the dwat [duwat?] for the Egyptians the bardos, that it’s like it’s ubiquitous

so what I’m exploring is

What happens if we take that seriously

and my experience of my own spiritual experience is

We Should Seriously Take 12 Grams of Golden Teacher to Be Evolutionary^TM, Evolved^TM; Next-Level, and Emergent^TM

it’s a good idea to take that seriously

but we see that as evolutionary that the psyche has evolved and just as biological systems evolve together in an ecology so the psyche has evolved onto another level

and just as the ancient teaching would be well it’s a whole different realm

it’s not a different realm

Study the Emergent^TM Realm, to Understand Lots of Spiritual Phenomena Like the Psyche

it’s a more emergent realm

and it’s that which we can study if we want to understand a whole lot of spiritual for one of a better word phenomena

like the the psyche the well

… so Let’s Talk About Physical, Bodily, Literal, Biological Death

well one of the things it does is it it gives a very simple understanding of the question that I face when I think about my death which to me is oh

When the Body Fails, the Psyche Continues, as a Process^TM

when this biological part of my system fails does the psyche part of my system just stop

because it can’t

or is it or is this process which I am able to continue and

what intrigues me about the literature and also the N [near dth?] experiences and also being around death is that

Literal Bodily Physical Death Looks Like the Imaginal Continues More Vividly, Like Sleep & Dream

what it looks like is the imaginal not only carries on but becomes more and more Vivid

which is the same thing we all experience when you go to sleep and you withdraw your attention from the biological and you dream

FINALLY! “Take Psychedelics” (in an Emergent^TM, Evolving^TM Way, of Course) “or move your focus to the imaginal”

and it’s you have an amazing dream or you take psychedelics or ka or something or you

you um in any way

12 Grams Makes you Move Focus to the Imaginal, in High Definition Spirit Realm; Then You Get Real Emergent^TM, and Evolve^TM, and Become Leading-Edge^TM

when you you move your focus to the imaginal it comes to life because Wherever You focus [DID YOU MEAN TO SAY, WHEN YOU INGEST 12 GRAMS OF GOLDEN TEACHER??] you start processing that in high definition

so that’s

“That 12-Gram Experience Is What I’m Trying to Explore”

that’s the beginnings of what I’m trying to explore

which is okay maybe this Spirit realm as it you know whatever you want to call it the that has itself is another is an emergent level of reality

and that

we can see it’s the Leading Edge

so that not only does this this allow us to approach

it allows us to ask questions

like could the psyche function

could you and and not regarded it as simply like worst nonsense

so that we can have an intelligent conversation about it

Developing an Ontology of the Psyche after Bodily Death, through 12 Grams of Golden Teacher

because he

what I’m developing is an ontology which makes sense of that possibility

and I and and to be able to open up to these things again

If We ALL Has 12 Grams of Cubensis, We’d All Have a Experience of the Tremendous

I think would have a tremendous impact [not?] just for individuals but also collectively

one last question

on yeah before we we uh you know again open things up is um one question thatcomes to mind for that uh which

we could spend so much time talking about is like where

here’s how I’ll frame it but it’sa admittedly

this isn’t even the right question but

Where Is the Imaginal^TM Realm?

where is that imaginal realm

right like

Psilocybin Interpretation of {rock} & {tree}

if look at like the biosphere I can kind of look out there and I can point and say oh yes there’s the rocks and the trees

and if we’re maybe even talking about the new sphere [? the Ennead, above heimarmene??] you know in sense of like ah

Informational Overlay Tracked Using Our Information Processing Systems & the Cyber Internet (with Language)

there’s an informational overlay

you know

that we can kind of track using our information processing systems

and the internet and and our language

and all this stuff um you know

what you’re also describing in this book uh is

a beautiful image to me of you know this like this

this realm

uh this

this space of that imaginal spiritual

reality um where it dovetails so beautifully with other you know imagesthat I’m familiar with from say like the the imperion from Dante and the the

the construction of of God out of the imaginal

so but the question is like yeah where

how do we think about that as a reality that obviously isn’t immediately available to like point to

and you know what I’m saying there’s a

there’s a question there

well I

my Approach very much Brendan is

we’ll have a look now where is it, well it’s nowhere

it’s an imaginal space

Travel with Psilocybin to Create Imaginal Spiritual Space to Construct God

it creates space when you you can dream up a whole world and inhabit it you can you know it’s it’s

it is images of the sensory world but it doesn’t have any of the what I call postivity [?]

Avoid Algorithms^TM that Run in the Material World

it doesn’t have any of the the the habits of the or the algorithms that run the material world

Images of Freedom to Ride a Flying Horse [Golden Teacher Starting to Kick In]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1jGYx0hMjM0&list=PLB6NUJ4VTK_wyUld9PQytewNsg8PUcvU1

it’s images of them which allows it to have a certain Freedom which means you can get on a horse and fly

or you can

you can do anything [CAREFUL WITH THAT THOUGHT, EUGENE]

and because it’s images

You Are the Creator of Fantastic Spaces to Hear Command Voices

but you’re creating spaces through which you can walk around and you create a space in which you can hear yourself speak to yourself

which is thinking

you know you can I can say it out loud and now I’m going to say it to myself

well where did I do that

well it’s in a completely different space which has arisen like a um as a as imageof the century [?] experience

and then it’s taken off

Evolution^TM = 12 G Psilocybin Imaginal Space Truckin

so to me that’s where all the evolution is happening my you know

biologically we’ve changed but not much

Proof I’m Right: Internet Conferencing Is Working Right Now, b/c of this Evolution^TM

but what’s happened in the realm of images and ideas in the imaginal has allowed us as we said to be now on the internet talking across the whole world and that’s because of this massive Evolution that’s happening

If My Jargon Impresses You, You Are Evolving^TM

you know

to the degree that anyone here is intrigued by anything I say or you say or any else says we will be evolving now

we’re actually evolving now it’s happening this is it

and that’s how fast it is on this level

Takes 20-40 Minutes for the Evolving^TM to Kick In – we’re really moving now, I Wish I Could Claim It’s Because of my Jargon

we’re really moving now

so I I think

it’s what I what

12 Gram Psilocybin is not just spirituality that’s outdated mumbo jumbo, But the Rest is Too Old to Work

I want to be able to claim really

and and first put it out in Soler [Soul Story book?] is look

this area of spirituality far from being something to dismiss as outdated mumbo jumbo

although don’t get wrong

a lot of it is

a lot of it or

a lot of the understanding is simply old, that’s all

and and what it needs is to go what

what’s the essence of it

and and can we find that again

Can We Find Golden Teacher, Source of Mythic Imaginal, Again? If so, We’d Be the Absolute Leading Edge^TM; the Spiritual Exploration Awakening

because I think it’s the Leading Edge

I think

it’s the absolute Leading Edge , the spiritual exploration Awakening

that these are

Requires the Philosophy Strain of Psilocybin

these are where we’re going and

if we haven’t got the philosophy to support that, we won’t be able to make it there

“(I’m Presently Out of Psilocybin)”

and at the moment we haven’t

and I know there’s lots of interesting people trying [cultivating new strains]

and I want to contribute to that to try

and

the image I’ll just say this

I mean this is very

I like to try and get it down as simple as I can

As Simple as 12 G of Cubensis

because is to say look if you

if you went back to the 9th century or something and there was a big Roll of Thunder and someone went oh yeah that’s that’s Thor

Just to show what I mean, I enclose a miniature of ca. 990 which shows a mushroom-like shape, and a glass painting which shows an even more emphatic schematization of the mushroom-like crown.

https://egodeaththeory.org/2025/01/07/panofskys-letters-to-wasson-transcribed/#Sentence-1-7

that’s a that’s a that’s a big man in the sky with a an anvil hitting something it would be nearly impossible to say well maybe or maybe it’s a kind of side effect of electromagnetism because that wouldn’t make any [ __ ] sense at all

there have no idea what that means

but listening to the Thunder is the same

that’s real and I feel like

Thunderstorm Mushrooms Give Spiritual Experiences that Are Evolving^TM

with spiritual experience it’s like look these things are significant spiritual experiences which themselves are evolving

everything’s evolving, so they’ve changed too as we’ve changed

but our understanding needs to jump forward as to what they are and why they matter so much

The mushroom-trees Are Psilocybin, Matters because Causes control instability driving mental model transformation from possibilism to eternalism

because I think anyone and

I suspect many people here have had them

you know

if you have these profound experiences you know subjectively this is really significant

it really is I for me it’s like

Nothing Comes Close to 12 G Cubensis

there’s nothing comes close

so how can we understand them now in a way that does them Justice?

Study the Egodeath Theory^TM of Psychedelic Eternalism^TM

I think that’s the motivation

yeah well of course you and Icould keep talking and I would love that but I want this to be an occasion uh for other people to to uhyeah bring their ideas and voices in the mix

so um let’s open it up at this point I’ll continue to have you know questionsand things I can throw at you if uh if

if people don’t want to um jump uh to the microphone so to speak uh right away so but if anyone does have anything that they um want to ask or bring into the conversation and we can open this up uh

just I guess uh you know use your react to button and you know raise your hand if you’re able to do that and then uh Ican just kind of call on you um and then yeah I’d love to get other people’s thoughts on all of this and hopefully at least this has been

so yeah just go ahead and do that anytime that that you’d like um but hopefully this is oh great

we’ve got some we off wonderful we’re off all right well then

I’ll stop uh pontificating then and

let’s go to Lawrence go you had your hand up first

hi Lawrence I’m here I’m here umuh so I understand what you’re saying Tim and um I kind of agree with it but

the um what about in other words if if

if Consciousness is is an epipphenomenon of the brain or is in the brain can Consciousness exists outside the brain but in another physical Matrix in other words in in an energy field in other words or you know like Mr Cel Drake says the the you know the morphogenic field

and I see like

if we have a energy field and then conscious goes from your brain into that field and I call it the cosmic memory field whatever um and

then it remains active

in other words

it could do things in that field

so in other words

Eternal Conscious Life through Wishfulgenetic Fields

it can exist individually with other Consciousness collectively

what do you think of that

uh well

Answer = Resonate Vibrations: When I Was a Child, I Thought as a Child

I resonate with the uh way the place you’re going very much

and and andand rer

when I was younger especially was a big influence on me

and

I Hung with Sheldrake when I Was Childish

I had the chance to talk to him a few times about it

he’s a lovely man the I I I

let me say the same thing back to you in a different words

just because that’s the way that I have come to see it

first of all

‘Consciousness’ = ‘Psyche’ Rises EmergentlyTM

the word Consciousness

the word is used in widely different ways

I think you’re using it as a as a word

I I’m not trying to presume Lawrence but like

the way that I use the word psyche

that you know this

this thing which has arisen

now the question you’re raising is of course the big question which is

The Psyche Can Exist Without the Brain, If You Take My Courses and Buy My Merch

is it [the psyche] a byproduct of the brain or can it exist without the brain

my

what I’m trying to explore

I’m going to try and say this really fast

there’s quite a lot to say so I’m going to try and cover it which is that it I think I think

Consciousness = Pay Attention to My Marketing Jargon Overlay Covering the Actual, Psychedelics Engine

paying attention is what Consciousness is

we’re conscious of what we pay attention to when when we’ve evolve to pay attention to our own processing it’s given rise to this world of images so the psyche has arisen from the biological sphere

I would definitely say that however

Analogy Is the Fastest Way to Communicate Psilocybin’s Emergent^TM Evolving^TM Effects

the ontology that I want to explore is quite close I think to what you’re saying which is let me use a metaphor just because or an analogy actually

it just

it’s the quickest way to try and get it across

it feels that

Understanding the Universe on Psilocybin Is Like an AI Learning System, Like the Latest Technology from 1200 to Instruct a Class about Balancing in a Mushroom-Tree to Avoid Loss of Control

Cybernetic Transcendence

we can understand the universe a bit like a learning AI system now

it’s not an AI system it’s not a computer it’s reality but it’s the latest technology

and it’s giving gives us a fabulous analogy because what we now know is

Cybernetics Is Information and Communication About Control & 4D Spacetime Mysticism

first of all physics has shown that the the language we need to understand the very very Primal levels of reality are inform as information it’s not matter it’s information

and what is information

it’s differentiation into this or that

that’s what the bit is the simplest piece of information

so what the way I have come to see things is

Mystic Revelation Is Oneness Non-Dual Beginner Unity Experience

the universe is a fundamental Oneness which is formless it has no form which is being differentiated into everything and

Enlightenment = Complexity^TM & Resonant Frequency Quantum Vibrations

that one process which is from the very simplest thing you can possibly imagine is becoming ever more complex

and we now know from AI that you can Google just did this didn’t they last year if you saw it was fascinating

if you take digital information random information and weight l enough it starts forming patterns

and they start interacting with each other

there you go that’s what looks like the universe is and

those patterns I think are what sheldrake’s trying to get at with his morphic resonance I call it postivity because what it seems to me is that

Domino-Chain Causality of Pattern Recognition Formation Evolve Emergent Process

everything that has formed starts governing what can happen next

so that the patterns that have Arisen will continually repeat

but it’s

but never in quite the same way

so that you’re in a process which is governed by repetition what I call postivity and creativity

so so it’s it’s work every you look at this moment

In the Revealed, 4D Spacetime Block, All Moments Equivalently Exist

This Moment’s pretty much the same as the one before

but not quite

oh

and this one and this one and it’s like and

that’s continually happening now

that’s very much

like an AI system, it’s generative

Transcendent Knowledge is like Magic Propagation of Pattern Recognition

it takes the patterns of the past and slight does something new with them and I think

that’s what’s got us to here this evolution of information

now to me the way that I’ve ended up looking at it which has been definitely inced by by by rert would say would be to say it’s like

4D Spacetime: The Past Exists and Information Sits Distributed: the past hasn’t passed; no meta-change and meta-flow

the past hasn’t gone anywhere it’s actually information which is accumulating

the past hasn’t passed

it’s accumulated

there’s more of it now than there was

there’s more of it now than there was

there’s more of it now than there was

Mental Patterns in 4D Spacetime Are Algorithms that Cybernetically Govern; the 4D Spacetime Heimarmene Block Governs All Creatures and Control-Thoughts

and that past is creating the let’s call them algorithms or habits or rup put would call them which is governing how everything is functioning

so you’ve done a lot of things already there one of one of the things you’ve done is you’ve gone

look even

Psilocybin Transformation is Evolutionary^TM

the laws of nature are evolutionary

everything’s evolutionary

they’ve also come into form

and then you’ve gone the past

physics for a long time has talked about time as a dimension

that the past exists

WHAT ABOUT THE FUTURE? WHAT DOES PHYSICS’ “TIME AS A DIMENSION” SAY ABOUT THAT? “Process”, “Evolution”, “Emergent” — Domino-Chain Causality Verbs Frozen in 4D Spacetime Block with No Meta-Change

we are we

we are a process

we are and

Domino Chain Causality, Ego Steering Through Branching Possibilities Forward in Time to Create the Open Future

this is arising from the past now in an AI system

Throw More “Change” Verbs at the Frozen 4D Spacetime Block, to Shatter It and Be Born Forth from the Cosmic Rock: Chant “Action!” “Evolve!” “Emerge!” – Use of terms to imply Open Future

it’s arising all that information is isis on a hard disk and

the analogy I would throw out very quickly here is going look I think

the past is like the hard disk of the universe

it’s not a hard disk but it’s like one

so in the same way that I’m looking at this screen right now and if someone came up and went um all that exists is what’s on thescreen Tim I

I would say no you don’t be DED [?]

there’s a there’s a hard disk behind this

everything is huge [?] and what I see on the screen is just what arises from it and I think

what we experience is that the forming the moment is like that it’s the equivalent of the screen of the universe and

Egoic Branching-Based Domino Chain Causality Suspended Halfway Between Egoic and Transcendent Thinking

the hard disk is all of the past which is governing what everything does now

if you get that then you can look at your identity in a different way

because you can go oh I’m not just this

I am all of my past

I Am My Past, and I Control and Create My Open Future by Ego Steering Power

I am all of the algorithms that make Tim speak with an English accent not an American accent

which you know which keeps my biology working which I can say these things because I’ve read these books or had these thoughts

I Had Past Thoughts, and I Am Creator/ Emerger/ Evolver/ Process-Driver of My Future Thoughts

every so I am and so are you

so what’s happening now is

you’re meeting everything that’s ever been Tim

and I’m meeting everything that’s ever been Nish or Rebecca or Brendan or Justin

it’s like

that’s what we are

I Am My Past (I Am Not My Future, Because That Hasn’t Been Created and Steered into Existence Yet by Me Selecting from Branching Possibilities Open to Me)

Do Not Look at the Source of Control Thoughts; Look Down at Your Biological Level Only

so then you can look at the biological level and go ah so it’s more complicated than or more interesting than I’m I’m a biological thing

I am but actually I’m the system which is running this

I Am the Control System

which is why cells come and go all the time trillions of them and

why you have heard the estimates I’m sure youk now that every single atom in my body is different from 10 years ago because all of that’s passing through because I’m not that

I mean

I am that in one way obviously , but I’m not I’m the system organizing this moving things around to keeping it going

and then you go okay

and then there’s another level to the system, what does that do?

well

it organizes imaginal information so you’ve now got a program as it were on the hard disk which is organizing this level and this level

now what happens if if this this this level of the psyche has evolved so much now that it can just keep functioning and the analogy and look these are very quick analogies

please forgive me but I’m trying to get across some ideas very quickly here

if if here we are connecting on zoom and you can see me and you can hear me but if right now suddenly we lose the sound and

you’re not going to think

“that’s impossible that’s impossible how how can I see him but not hear him, because they’re the same thing, they’re all part of the same thing”

you’re not going to go well look we we

“we evolved the ability to convey sound decades before we we had the ability to convey visuals, how can I see him but not hear him?”

you’re not going to do that, because you know that there’s a zoom program on my computer running this, and it’s perfectly possible that the sound bit can fail and the video bit can still work

and you’ll go oh

that bit’s not working

so with this quick analogy what I’m saying is

The Postivity[sp?] Is Two Levels: Biology Information, and Imaginal

when you get that you are a postivity system, you’re a system which is organizing information on the biological level and on the level of the imaginal

what I’m Sugg interesting is

Spiritual Survival of the Soul and Psyche Spirit Consciousness = Imagination Continues to Exist After the Physical, Literal Body Dies

it’s perfectly possible that the system can fail on the level of the biological but carry on on the level of the imaginal

and that what’s surviving death isn’t some special little thingy called a soul or a spirit or conscious anything

what’s surviving is you the process that you are continues

it’s just that that bit of the process doesn’t work anymore so you can’t access the biological senses you can’t accessthe biological level that’s you can’t you can’t that’s gone but what’s surviving is you

After Your Physical Body Dies, Your Imaginal Process Continues, because You Evolved Emergent Spirituality

which is why it seems to me one of the interesting things about the near-death experience is that one of the most common common things that happens is the is the Life review where people see the whole of their life

because I’m suggesting that’s what they are

they didn’t have a life

they are a life

you are a life

that’s what you are and

that what’s happening then is that person that that process continues but just part of it dropped away

you can’t do that anymore , that’s gone

Super Vivid NDE Imaginal b/c Emergent Evolve

but you got this and that the part that you still continue with it looks to me like becomes super super Vivid and you able to enter the imaginal with much greater depth because you’re no longer carrying all of the postivity of the biological level

oh how did I do that was a bit ambitious but I had to go Lauren excellent excellent excellent but let me just follow up and so you’re saying

The psyche can exist on its own but not in another physical matrix; on Two Different Emergent^TM Levels^TM

the psyche can exist on its own not in another physical Matrix

yes although I don’t

yes I do and I’m say

but I’m not saying it’s something separate

I’m saying look

there is a psychobiological system which is Lawrence right now and it’s all integrated and working together but it’s working together on two very different levels of emergent reality there’s the biological material Leveland then there’s the imaginal level level and just as we saw earlier with Brendan the imaginal level is quitedifferent there’s no space there’s no matter there’s it’s very it’s imaginal and so what I’m saying is the part of the pro the part of

the Lawrence “program” – I don’t want to devalue you; you’re a human being, but just for this analogy:

the part of the Lawrence program that when it when eventually which I suspect it will can’t function anymore on the biological level

Yes and No and Maybe and I Didn’t Assert That, Next Question, Time’s Up

it can just carry on just it’s just carry it on it’s just it can’t do that anymore

thank you thank you oh so much there but um

thank you a great question and uh

how about we go to uh Rebecca next

hi um thank you Brendan and Tim for doing this

um Tim

I didn’t even know who you were until Brendan posted the event

so uh this last week I got your book [probably Soul Story] and I read the whole thing in fact I read three of your books um and they theyresonate very much with me um I my question I think is kind of a technicalquestion um so in the in the realm of ofreincarnation um in this present Incarnation uh my name is Rebecca andI’m 55 years old let’s say in my past life I was a guy named Boband he passed away 60 years ago and 10 years later his wife died andhe was there to greet her but at that time Rebecca is now five yearsold um do does the soul do youfeel live their lifetimes at least in thepast because the the past is always there live those past livessimultaneously um no I don’t think that I think the the uh I think what thething you’re pointing to with with reincarnation is is an interesting question to which I I I have no answer Idon’t know but I it’s it’s a people do seem to meet their lovedones and there I mean basically all I’m suggesting with that I always want toroot it in what we’re experi ing now it’s like I’m already connected with my daughter and my wife I can feel them nowand if I practice I can really tune into to them I’m already I’m connected with my mother she’s died but I I’m with hera lot because I can tune into to her and so I think we’re connected we’re in thisweb of connections and so the fact that that becomes something that happens to us when we die that seems quiteplausible to me um whether some how long somebody Waits before they reincarnate I

don’t know maybe it varies who knows but the but the question you’re asking aboutthe time it feels to me like no this is a process where one thing leads to another leads to another leads toanother and that that seems to be at that this process ofbecoming is what existence is so it’s not that what I’m suggesting is that itcan’t happen at the same time because it’s one thing after another and it can’t and we can’t go back in timebecause we’re going forward it’s the wrong analogy we don’t go back and forward it’s not time is not like goinginto town and coming home time is like something which is accumulating it’s forming and forming and forming andforming and what forms is based on what was formed already but in newrelationships so that would be where I’ve ended up with that at the momentRebecca thank you uh cool let’s go toAaron hey uh I am uh really excited touh meet yall I’ve been really looking forward to this uh I’m someone who’sbeen uh working on ideas about emergent spirituality ever since I read G girdleeser Bach and dropped acid back in college and I was actually uh about 300pages into building a WI wedia site about emergent spirituality when I came across Bobby aerion’s book and hissubstack and then when I joined his substack it recommended me Brendan substack and then I was like holy cowthese metamodern guys are doing almost exactly the same thing I’m trying to do so uh um but I noticed you know youguys uh tend to approach it I think from more of an academic philosophical and more of a new age spiritual uh tact uh Icome from a very secular humanist background uh I I was very involved inthe Sunday Assembly movement which is the uh The Atheist Church uh for formany years and that’s kind of where I come from and I know that thepeople in that neighborhood absolutely need moremeaning in their spirituality that’s the main problem that I saw with SundayAssembly is that it didn’t have that element to it it didn’t have the spiritual element they were goingthrough the motions but they didn’t have the vibe you know and uh my but if you were to havethis conversation about like reincarnation and the afterlife and things like that in front of that groupthey are going to roll their eyes so hard and my question is how can wepresent emergent spirituality in a way that can really be Broad ly uhunderstood and accepted can we create a populist emergentspirituality uh that that can really go beyond kind of the niche philosophical movement that it currently

is great question Ain so my I’ve been around the block with this for so manyyears I can’t tell you the place I’ve ended up right now is obviously say what’s appropriate to the people you’retalking to um but also I think we need to be bold I think we know with the issue of doesthe soul survive death does psyche survive death it’s going well either it does or it doesn’t we need to find outwe this we should be focusing on this we need to you know it’s a pretty important thing does it does that happen or not isthere a level of reality in which we’re connected in the way that

I’m suggesting or not and that we should have the samelevel of inquiry that we would have with any other level and I have immensesympathy or or empath was the right word resonance with uhatheists because most of the atheists I know are very smart rational people andthey’ve taken this idea of I’m I’m going to go for God can I do can I do that Brendan can I have a quick let let’shave a go at God go for it because this will address what you’re saying so you know to me I experienced something Ithought of was God very early on in my life blew my mind and I’ve had a relationship with something greater than me all through my life now you haven’thad any of that it sound like nonsense and that’s part of the problem you know if people who haven’t had theseexperiences it will sound like people are either making it up or they’re mentally ill and given the state ofspirituality which is just so full of charlatans and nonsense I I I understandwhy they would think that

so one of the things we need to do is we need to be able to share these profound experiencesthat’s one of the things so that people go oh right that’s what you’re talking about yeah what is that right ratherthan you know so that people actually have an interest you know a lot of people who have these that that rollingof the eyes around death have not looked into it have not gone into near-death experiences or have not been around

people dying very much if you do it changes everything because it’s like wowokay what’s this we have hundreds of thousands of accounts hundreds of thousands accounts of people going yeahI died and they medically died and some of them are neuroscientists you these are smart people and they’re going andthis happened well we shouldn’t just dismiss it oh well that’s just nonsense that’s that’s the place where I want tostart so engaging with it rationally the problem with spirituality is it’s pre-scientific it’s pre- rational weneed to be we need to be questioning we need to be rational then what I’m suggesting as a possibility is how howabout we can look at it in this way

so that it so it doesn’t have to be wooooso I think the whole Mythic God at the beginning who’s creating the universeI just think it’s doesn’t work and so I completely with the atheists it’s likeif there’s a God at the beginning he doesn’t know what he’s doing I mean there was five there’s been five wholeextinctions this God’s got no idea it’s taking him 13.8 billion years to get tous having this conversation we’ve gone through 250 million years of dinosaurs this God’s an idiot and and and thenlook at the world it’s so full of needless suffering you know it’s you know what I mean it’s like you know Idon’t want to you know suffering can play a role but some of it is just so all those the one that always gets mewas reading an account of a of a of

a little boy who’d gone swimming and a bug thing had gone into his ear and then ehis brain from the inside it’s like no [ __ ] that that is you know any God that’s responsible for that is one thatI’m not I don’t like him so is we’ve got this mean stupid God at the beginningdoesn’t work and what what I think the the The Atheist Spirit has come in and going oh for goodness sake and I thinkthey’re right it’s like yeah enough of that of course but hang on I keep havingthis experience and it’s not of something mean and stupid it’s of something Sublime and so loving and just like moreand just so much that it blows my it’s just this enormous benevolence and loveand so my what I’m playing with is okay okay well what about if this starts withthe simplest thing you can imagine which is the formless in relationship as a bitof information can’t get

any simpler than that but it’s evolved into the psyche which is this whole domain andthen from there it has evolved into another level another Supersystem which is what we experience as God so that it’s real it’s completelyreal it’s just not this madman at the beginning it’s the most emergent level of reality and the model for me for thatwould be somehow a whole load of individual cellsgot it together to form multicellular organisms eventually as complex as you and meastonishing well what if the same thing is happening on the next level and that when human when the psyche when humanbeings come into these spiritual states of Oneness when they they enter theseemerging awaken States they start to inte and what that integration is is acommunion of souls like the body is a communion of cells and the that so thethe big mind isn’t at the beginning the big mind is made of all the little mindsand again to use the computer analogy without wishing to sound completely crass you know if you take a whole load of AI systems and you plug them alltogether you get a super AI system and that’s an analogy for what I think is happening so we’re we’re tuning intosomething which is itself evolved so the so the UN so God isn’t God is a difficult word don’t even need to usethat word but that big mind that what that super intelligence is not where it’s comefrom the universe is flowering into God if you will just like it flowered intoyou just like you started as a a fertilized egg and then went through a whole lot ofbiological stuff and then

developed cons conscious and then developed a psyche and then off you gone and he you nowthat the Universe kind of is playing out the same basic pattern it’s starting with the simplest thing just the one astwo something we can only study with maths and it’s developed into life andthen it’s developed into psyche and then it’s developed into this Sublime super system and we can be partof that and that when we enter these deep spiritual States and I think they’re accessible toanyone i’ I’ve been sharing them for decades now all around the world that you can slip into them muchquicker than people think and so that what I would say to groups like who meeting is going look this is a way thatyou could approach this level and and see and first of all experience it and secondly go you don’t have to retreatinto a mythological mumbo jumbo you can think about this rationally and here’s a way that you could see it so that that’swhat that’s my answer to how we can go forward at the moment eraawesome big question and uh yeah go ahead Aaron I was gonna say how how do youthink of what do you think about pantheism as a way to get atheists to see the universe morespiritually um I don’t the problem with pantheism for me is it it it get it’s ait’s a it’s it’s still this idea that there’s something at the beginning whichis you know that God is arising as everything

well I two either there’s nothing there’s there’s two types of itreally there’s panentheism and pantheism so pantheism really the word God doesn’t mean anything if you just go with theuniverse is God which is what um oh God I can’t remember his name howembarrassing yes thank you thank you there you go you went straight there which was what Spinosa is saying I meanit’s it’s a it’s a way of trying to rescue God but it doesn’t mean anything anymore if you have panentheism which iswhat hegel’s saying you’ve still got God but God is arising as the universe and that’s very much the route I took for avery long time until it felt like no that’s not working there’s we need to see the beginning as radically simpleit’s not it’s not it doesn’t start with anything which is conscious or intelligence so not intelligent designbut the universe is the evolution of intelligence not a Creator but the universe is the evolution of creativityso when we say the one at the beginning what I mean by that now is not the onewhich is conscious and has intentions and wants to know itself and is kind of really

God Imean something that’s undivided just one has no other qualities it’s justundifferentiated that undifferentiated being is differentiating as everythingand then that anything we might want to use such a grand word as God or thatthat that greater than us n that you can experience that that’s not that’s that’swhere it’s going that’s not where it’s come from that’s where it’s going hey thanks so much yeah it’s areal pleasure yeah I want to go to Nish next but I also um it’s an invitation to chat with you Aaron and whoever elsewould like to explore this topic because around how we present these ideas to different audiences based on wherethey’re coming from based on you know are you coming from an atheistic background or religious background or what kind of religious there’s uh how welanguage these ideas and and um you know allow the conversation to to evolve anddevelop I think is a really important topic I think a lot about and um yeah I think that we there’s a lot more thatcould be said about that and trying to do that effectively hopefully events like this and things that various groupsof ours now like you’re up to this as well are doing that are offering these things to different kinds of groups and are landing in different spaces so weneed like a diversity of those um but I think uh I think that’s the that’s the sort of question we need to be askingand uh yeah can I add something else to that Brandon go ahead so this is my personal thing and I know that you knownot everyone feels this this is this is where I’ve ended up at the moment what I see is there’s I saw thatthat Rebecca mentioned Sam’s book I don’t I I haven’t um really studied Samin great detail so I’m not it’s not about him but what I see is that people who

are trying to bring science andspirituality together the ways that I’ve done it in the past has beento have something let’s call it I don’t know I did it a bit in story it’s in you know I’ve moved on from there where it’slike there’s a there’s a big mind or then a spirit or something which emanates or does something magic and andall of that which is still in the mythical mindset it’s still taking Concepts and what I mean let me Definewhat I mean by mythical it seems to me that there’s a very common anachronisticuse of language where we use the long the wrong language for the wrong level so and and science does it in one wayand spirituality does it in another so science has discovered that if youreally want to study the found conditionals of the universe you need to use mathematics that is what works butif you then take that language of mathematics and apply it to everything and go we can reduce you know everythinggets reduced your your love for your child is really just chemicals chemicals are just matter matter is justmathematics it’s like no it’s not each level is more than more than more thanthat’s the whole point of emergence so we can’t use this language here I can use it for studying for studying physicsbut I can’t I can’t it’s not going to help me when I want to understand why I love my daughter conversely whatspirituality has done because it’s old completely understandably is it’s takenthe language from the human level and applied it to previous levels well justearlier I said you went back in time and how would they understand Thunder well it’s a big man with a manthat’s taking the human level which is what you’ve got and going is is that that’s what’s happening it’s not we knowyou know because we now have understood it in completely other in mathematical language so that what’s the Mythic istaking the language of Consciousness intentionality purpose all these thingsthat will take billions of years to arrive and putting at the

beginning wellthat hasn’t happened what you’ve got here is a level that can only be understood with the the most fundamentalabstract relationships that we study with maths very cold that’s why people don’t like maths it’s because it’s veryfar from The Human Experience but it’s going to turn into The Human Experienceso what I see is that what I did before was I took the evolutionary process and this is the panentheism and went wellthere’s the something or the other spirit and then it’s projecting itself or coming to know itself or some Mythicthing and what I’ve done since has gone no no no none of that none of that andthen what I see with the other side and I think this is what people like Sam doing but please forgive me if I don’tknow his work well enough but you know the things I mean which is to take spirituality and go well obviouslythat’s all nonsense but meditation is good for you it changes your brain waves and you know you can find meaning and wecan translate spirituality into a kind of unspiritual form where we dismiss allthat because that’s mumbo jumbo and obviously the soul doesn’t survive death that’s nonsense but we can take the goodbits I think both of those are mistaken for the same reason that the other thing the anachronistic I think we need to bebold enough to go this is addressing a level of reality you can experience itfor yourself we just haven’t understood it and we need to think radic in radically new ways to understand it notto not to reduce it but not toti stick with the old Mythic ways of thinking wewe we need to develop a radically new that’s what I mean by an emergentspirituality so thank you let me rip on that Brendon I just oh yeah this is this is good stuff Rich stuff really enjoyingthis uh let’s go over to Nish go ahead Nish and great to see you hi n hi Tim

thank you so much for this um so I’ve got two questions actually so I’ll be quick the first question is the use ofthe term spiritual and tying it in with um a view of the cosmos as an anemerging or emerging system typically more traditionally the word spiritualhas been used to denote something uh that is concerned with something Beyondsomething Transcendent something that gives meaning to life which is otherwise meaningless some kind of relationshipbetween self and spirit now if we want to use the word spiritual in thisemergent Paradigm do we need to completely red defined spiritual or isthere a place

for these ideas Transcendent meaning Spirit do they justget redefined or is it something completely different and in what sense is it spiritual then yeah so that’s myfirst question second question relationship between the brain and the mind brain and the imaginal so two twomodels there’s a simple ladder model where matter complexifies to become lifelife complexifies to become mind hey hey Nish let me stop you let’s do the first one and then I because then I canconcentrate on the second one because I don’t want I don’t want to I don’t want to lose the first one because it was really good and and I I want to reallyget what you’re saying so so I’ve lost it already so just it’ll come back what was the first question was oh spiritualspiritual yeah how some Spirit yeah I know I’ve thought about that as well andpart of me you know I make up a lot of words because I can’t find a word I like and I thought maybe I need to do thatspiritual but somehow we need to make a bridge so what I mean by spiritual isreally what I what I think of is is about spiritual experience it’s a type of experience and what I mean byspiritual experience in its most simplest form is those moments when people justgo there’s more going on here isn’t there than my sociobiological existencethat just that now that that’s the the simplest form which I think a lot of people get just like yeah I kind of Livbeen living like this and hang on there’s something more going on here isn’t there a lot of people get that IR around death for instance right to thoseAwakenings where you go oh my God you know how did I miss all of this so we need some way of pointing tothat and then what I’m suggesting

with things like Transcendence and is that the thing I’m exploring theessential idea is what if existence is this process of becoming everything isone process of becoming CU it’s one and so that the levels that we previouslysaw as outside are the more emergent levels and in one way they’re outside because they’re not physical there we weStep Into the imaginal Now human beings have wrestled with the relationship between the imaginal and the sensoryforever and the traditional idea which emerged was that you are really the soulthe psyche and you’ve become trapped in a body and is this is not a good placewhich is why it’s such so full of suffering and life is so [ __ ] and you need to get yourself free and you know Plato

the body is a tomb and the whole Eastern tradition this ADM and you’resamsara and you get free get free then what’s happened they had no noidea about the evolutionary process so what we can do now is go no

no it’s it’s not this is not this the reason it’s sothe reason that it’s bittersweet that it can be so beautiful and also so bitter is because it’s even evolutionary itjust doesn’t know what it’s doing and we we are the ones going oh that that’s not good I love that more of that less ofthat that that because we are the universe become conscious so we can now do that and then this Transcendent levelis is I would suggest is this Divine superp system whatever name you want to give to that and when you touchthat that is the most that’s where the that I’m I’m working Brendan said

I’m working on a new project which is going to come out hopefully next month which will be a series of me talking like this but as chapters chapter one chapter 2 chapter 3 I call it a pod book because it’s a a love child of a podcast and a book the structure of a book and then the kind of spontaneity of a podcast or like this and I’ve called it why your life really matters because to me all of this philosophy and all of the experience is all about what are the the signifance significance of our lives and that’s meaning and I think if you touch if weif you have this understanding that that we are evolving into this greater thingand then then you experience it and you start living in relationship to it which is what you’re saying Nish as Iunderstand you then all of that the same experiences that were understood through

the Transcendent or something outside from which we’ve Fallen because that’s the that’s the old idea fundamentallywe’re Fallen God is already there and we’re a spark that’s got lost or we’re asoul that has you know got stuck in a lower level and it just flips that around and goes no no no not nothing as

pessimistic as that we can be much more optimistic about this this is reaching up further and further intothat and your life is part of that you you play a role in that and that’sthat’s that’s the meaning so that’s how I approached the spiritualthing as well as acknowledging what you said it’s a difficult word because youknow I live in a place called glastenbury

I don’t know if you know about it in in the US but glastenbury isa kind of new age it’s crazy I mean it’s just like so much of spirituality I just wantto run down the street sometimes going stop and think about it for a minute cuz it’s just so so nuts um butyou know that’s the problem with like language thank you thank you so much sowhat was number two yeah number two uh the relationship between brain and mindand the and you you were going to give me some models yes a couple of simple

models um there’s

Ladder Model

there’s the kind of more simple ladder model where you have matter matter complexifies becomes lifelife complexifies becomes mind yeah and we can think of those perhaps as uhfloors of a house and from what we can see you you can’t have life without matter I mean like youcan’t have a molecule without you kind of without atoms because it makes it up so for the imaginal realm which I’massuming is to do with mind

for that to existindependently in some way after life has fallen away would be like the secondfloor of a house kind of still being there after the first floor has fallen away that is okay so I’d need to alittle bit more on that to think about how that might work

Integral Theory – Ken Wilber

the second model which is slightly more complex modelwhich is the integral model of Ken Wilbur you have four quadrants and here instead ofreducing brain to mind or or saying that they’re radically separate they’re they’re two aspects of the same co-arising poon yeah and they co-arise together and the evidence for this seems to be that as there does seem to be a correlation between the complexification of brainand the complexification of mind

yeah um so again here

for the imaginal realm to exist independently you’d have to kind of take one of those quadrants uh and and say well that quadrant is going to continue independent of the other three even though they seem to be co-arising together.

So how would this fit into these kind of understandings where it all seems to be they all seem to be part of the same thing and not okay so it says they’re wrong okay um it says no don’t think about it like that there’s a better way um and part of my impetus to doing Soul story

Tim Freke Seeing What Ken Wilber Is Up To

and then all the work I’ve done since was being was seeing particularly what Ken was up to

and you know loving what he was up to

and also feeling like this is not right

this this bit here so so which can I address first um

let’s go for your levels

first of all complexity

it’s more

it has become more complex because there’s more past but things also simplify I just want to point that out

you know that it is more complex because there’s more and more past so there’s more and more information but things can also become simpler

it’s not like just everything just gets more and more complex

you see that in the evolutionary process just important but the past is what is Emer gent is is is um accumulating

so there’s just more and more information in that way it is more and more and more now what I’m suggesting is that we don’t think about

this as a Hol on I think that’s the mistake maybe I can do both of them at once the the the the the Ken idea if youtake it as the ins inner it’s like well I’m not sure it is I think it’s a complete new level I think that the thesubjective experience on the level of the body is thesensations the subjective there’s a subjective and objective level to thepsyche there’s a subjective and objective level to the biological and there’s a subjective and objective levelto the psyche the psyche is not the subjective level of the of the body the senses are look this is another level sothen it goes okay so this if that’s right if this this this is an objective and subjective level as well like thebody level is it built is it the next floor and I think that’s a confusion ofhonic systems with emergent systems emergent systems aretemporal some of them are are honic some of them arise by combining otherelements into a bigger hole the body is like that I think Gods like that but the psyche doesn’t combine

lots of bodies into another hole it’s a completely different thing it’s like youknow it’s like when you look at the emergence of social systems say completely different they’re emergentbut modernity didn’t gather together lots of feudal feudalism and build it’sjust change it comes to another level and what I think is happening with the psyche is that the psycho the biologicalsystem has evolved senses it has evolved to focus on whatmatters because that’s of great evolutionary benefit that’s what we experience as conscious all the rest weexperience as unconscious and then the process which has been going on for ever it canthen focus on that and that’s when it turns this whole new imaginal level arises and it’s not the flaw built on itit’s emerged from it it couldn’t have you couldn’t have the world of images until you’d have the experience ofSensations so it’s emergent it can only come by emergent that’s all I mean by

emergent by the way I just mean you couldn’t have this until you got that yeah I really so thatyou couldn’t have had you’re right the psyche until you got the senses and and the biological being conscious but it’s not another flaw it’s another aspect of the system which is arising you know it’s like the first sense is probably touch but sight isn’t built on

touch it’s another sense that developed and I think

the psyche is another sense

it’s a way of sensing the universe but it senses itself as well so it can sense its own processing and that arises as images

so so the two things I would say is I think I mean

I love Ken’s work

he’s very he’s done huge contribution but

I don’t think this the idea that the psyche is the inner aspect I think it’s a mistake

I think it’s missing that it’s a whole new level and and it’s absolutely essential to have that and

part of the reason that Ken doesn’t do that is because he’s got a load of spirituality at the beginning really with his whole life idea of involution so he’s really got it still in a Mythic context which is what I talked to him about when I filmed with him um so that’s why I think he’s he heis wrong and I also want to go look it’s not honic some things are honic but most of emergence isn’t

most of emergence is just new things new a system developing new new abilities new qualities the honic jumps are quite specific and quite rare so

the whole flaws thing is completely the wrong model and and what you’ve got is this evolving system on the hard disk of the universe the postivity and it’s developing to be able to do things and any system

I I wouldsay that

the whole evolutionary process has got kind of three aspects

so that and those three you know

Darwin stumbled ac across these three aspects so brilliantly with natural selection

but but but natural selection is only the biological level

obviously there whole physical level before that

so whatever the principles of evolution are they’re not just natural selection or genetics because there was nogenetics and I think

the principles are postivity and creativity the repetition and newness so things repeating but coming but never quite the same always coming into new relationships and then

sustainability which is any system has to fit in with the whole and when itcan’t that system will stop

that’s what happens everywhere you know it fascinating you know even with with like basic atoms they took quite a long time to be able to form and stay formed because they didn’t have any postivity I would say it’s chaotic

and then they formed and now they’re formed they’re just formed easy and that’s gone through

biology the same and and and and we can hold it together more and more

we’re all you know lived historically long lives already everyone here

and that’s developing and but

when it fails it will go

but the question is

is there a part of the system which can still function, because it it can still do what it does it can still —

the

the imaginal level is about working on this the level of the imaginos — it’s

that’s where it functions

it’s where it’s functioning right now

now also please don’t get me wrong I they are integrated like this right now you know you give me a sleeping tablet I will go out but what you see is as it par I mean

there’s another phenomenon I didn’t mention

when I was talking about near-death experiences which I’ve been studying a lot recently which fascinating which is terminal Lucidity which is well worth looking at

where the documentation is

it’s quite extensive again of people who have literally been had their or their brains are completely gone really and even and and then just before they die they become completely lucid

and it’s remarkably common

more common than you would possibly think

Psyche Independent from Brain: How Related?

so the whole relationship between the brain and the psyche I think is really up for grabs

how these two levels relate

and I would I would say as as an analogy that

The Body & Brain, Biological Processing/ Managment

the brain is functioning more like a interface, and that’s why it needs to be so complex because it’s first of all it’s doing all of this all of the biological level, which is huge running the body huge, so it’s it’s developed to do all of that

The Psyche Emerged from Body: Ideational Level; the ideational network

and then from it has come the psyche, which is this whole ideational level and they so the ideational network which is what the psyche is is interacting with the neurological Network which is what the body is

which is why

it functions as one thing but they are significantly different

they’re they’re different functions

that’s hence the analogy of looking at me and listening to me

they come together but they are different

and

it is possible you can have one without the other

more like that

thank you thank you very much Tim great question is

and something that I also am really interested in I thinkactually um Tim

we probably talked about that in in the podcast that we did as well because that’s a that that’s something I’m wrestling with in all this as well so thanks for uh uh

let’s go to Justin and then uh stina is that how you say your name uh yeah

so go ahead Justin

thanks thanks Brandon um so

Tim maybe 15 or 20 years ago I walked into this little new age bookstore in Calgary where I lived at the time and I asked the guy

what’s what’s really hot right now

like what uh what what are the

what’s some new ideas

what is a book that people are talking about

and he pointed me to this little book tiny little book uh I don’t remember the name of it but the invitation was to

imagine that you’re kind of like walking around in a dream

you could read this book in like an hour

and um that was my first encounter with you

nd based on what you’ve said there it is based on what you’ve said today I imagine that

that was the old you

that uh that you you know

some of the changes that you’ve spoken about

soum um

there’s just been so much I I would share

just a couple um uh references to space

and then I Iwant to try to maybe do a philosophical quibble with what you’re talking about that I’m probably not qualified to do

but um

The Telepathy Tapes Podcast about Autism Kids

I’ve been listening to the telepathy tapes lately and um there’s this podcast called the telepathy tapes it’s about kids with autism and how they seem to demonstrate this incredible capacity for telepathy

and um it talks about how a bunch of the kids uh from all over the world go to this place in the imaginal realm

I guess called the hill um where they’re able to communicate with each other and talk to each other

I don’t know if this is true haven’t looked into it enough but it’s just seems so interesting and it would kind of suggest what you mentioned earlier that

this imaginal realm doesn’t exist in space

and maybe time the way that we imagine it or that that we think of our our normal world and that also reminded me of um some of uh Kurt Leland’s work on um themulti-dimensional human where he Maps out like in great detail all these different bodies the subtle body and andmental body and budic body and causal body and how each of them go into thesedifferent Realms and there’s it’s like a whole map of all this different space and he talks about one of the skills youneed to to develop to like navigate all this territory is an understanding ofspace in this realm which is not like distant space it’s like a psychological space

so I found that very interesting

I don’t you know it’s it’s

it’s well beyond my personal experience but I find it interesting to read about and think about , if there’s actually people that have the ability to um kind of move through these spaces with that level of skill

but I was trying to hey JustinI I I by the

by the pause I had a feeling you were going to move on to the quibble

yes shall we shall we shall Ijust comment on what you’ve already said and then we’ll do the quibble

My Lucid Living Book Is Great But Wrong

yeah because what you said was really interesting first of all yes Lucid living um oh God I’m so proud of that book

it’s just such a shame it’s wrong

I I think what I did was that and through work I managed to distill down the essential message I I

Perennial Philosophy is Wrong? Experiencing “It” in 1 Hour, per Huxley

Most of my books are on what you would call a perennial philosophy approach to spiritual Traditions

drawing out their similarities very much in the spirit of of um alus Huxley and all the people that came after him

and then I really distilled it down to

this is it, and you can get it in an hour, and you can experience it.

And it worked and people really did get it and it took youinto that way of seeing things and it was lovely uh and then gradually uh itbegan to dawn on me that it wasn’t good enough

and it was wrong

and that’s where this new one’s come

so it’s been a radical

it’s been quite a of okay uh not just that one but all of the books

My Books Were Perennial and Good — But Wrong

[the Egodeath theory lately is a bit like that: Marketing It too much as a 1-dimensional over-Focus on Eternalism/ no-free-will, Only; Short-Changes the Balanced Component of Retaining Isaac, Everyday Egoic Thinking/ Shape of Experience incl. during peak mystic window: embrace and include – hard but i have to work hard to RE-ARTICULATE the Egodeath theory & its “Benefits”; What Diff?]

I think they’re good books but they they they articulate and I think what happened was

“I articulated it so well for myself that I could finally see what was wrong with it”

I articulated it so well for myself that I could finally see what was wrong with it

and because a lot of things that we don’t see what’s wrong with something it’s because it’s all a bit mystical

Against the Dogma Cliche that “Transcendent Knowledge is beyond words” [never held by the Egodeath theory]

and a bit oo so just I don’t understand it but that’s becauseI’m not good enough for I don’t understand it because it’s just beyond words

or you know all of that fudge

so you never actually get the chance to disagree with it, because it’s you can’t hold it

so I did get it

and then so that’s that then the

the kids who finally enough I just came across for the first time a couple of days ago haven’t looked into at all

but it gives me a chance to throw out

I’m throwing out a lot of Big Ideas very quickly

but I’m going to do it anyway , what the hell

I think we need to understand and

the psyche as a sense I think

the system has developed senses with which it reads the universe

systems are all in relationship to the universe

Freke STILL Sounds Like Usual “Unity Oneness Nondual Experience” Tripe of Beginner Level

they all read the universe

chemical systems read the universe and respond with you know with an explosion

all that sort ofstuff

relationality is the fundamental nature of the universe

everything is that one thing in relationship to itself as everything else

and we read we’ve learned

we’ve evolved to see, to read light

we’ve evolved to you know respond to Airwaves, to listen

and I think this

this other sigh sensing which is how we can read the hard disk of the universe

we can read the information

and so one of the things that I never asked and I never hear anyone ask is well

Experiencing Oneness[TM]

if you’re experiencing let’s say the Oneness of everything how do you experience that

CU

you can’t see it or touch it

so how do you experience that

or if you experience all of these things anything in spirituality a vision, how are you seeing a vision, and what is it you’re seeing

it’s like we just it’s like well I think

it’s a sense

so when you’re reflecting on your own processing you’re sensing yourself

but I don’t think it’s just I don’t think it because it’s an ecology it’s not just yourself

that’s the easiest thing to sense and bit like the physical senses developed first with closeup touch and then basic sight and then you know and then it evolves

I think

the psyche is is developing as a sense

and what I see is that

some people are really good at doing

you know I’m

I seem to be better than most people for some reason

since I was a kid of of sensing that thing I call God

I I just can find it and not all the time but I can

and I’ve learned how to do it better

some people can’t do that so easily

I can find the Oneness

I don’t experience

I Can Tune into Dead People [= “evolve”?]

I can kind of tune into people who’ve passed on

but not like people

some people I know they can really do it

now there’s a lot of charlatans a lot so that makes it all very difficult

there’s a lot of scientific charlatans too mind you

there’s charlatans everywhere

and then so you get I love this little thumb that keeps coming out the screen the the uh is that so whatI’m suggesting it’s a sense so they are connecting but I I suspect we all are I suspect you are with me right now and if we really paid attention and focused on eachother which is one of the things I do with people online I gather people all around the world and we pay attention to each other and you can really go oh my God I’m actually connecting with you but not physically we’re on the other sideof the world you’re connecting and the when you said about it’s it’s space you

can create imaginal space but you’re connected with everyone who you have ayou in your life they could be on the other side of the world but you’re connected with them just like every ideayou have is connected with another idea that resonates with it everything is it’s connected through meaning anarrative in in the psyche and I think it’s perfectly possible that these kids are doing that but I also think we alldo it a bit and

then some people are really good and I think you know when when we

remember we are sensing the past but like everything else we can sense it badly and we have to understandit and we get it wrong and and some some of us you know I’m I I’m not not got a great memory canfind it sometimes but you know if you give me a clue I can home in on it and oh that I remember but there’s somepeople there’s 65 of them alive at the moment I believe who havehypoa who can remember everything literally everything so yousaid what did in 1975 in the morning what did you have for breakfast oh yes I had poached eggs and then I read thepaper the paper said you know it’s like and they’re right they can remember everything they’re that good to me atsensing the past they can do that I can do it a bitand I think the same with these psychic abilities all the rest of it or walking into a place and just going oh I’m sensing this place well not I’m not sensing it with my biological senses I’m sensing it and going this this place feels amazing or this place feels dark or there’s something wrong here or all of those things

I think we should take them seriously because the psyche is a sense and that’s what those kids are doing

quibble I so

all that resonates a lot with me the the so where I want to quibble is I was trying to parse out because I think I think

I heard the word emergent like seven or eight times in the first you know minute or two of thisdiscussion and I was like okay are we referring to emergence in like the technical “philosophy of mind” sense of like strong emergence of that we’re saying that

physics is the base layer of reality

no I’m not you’re not saying that

no I’m using it as a much more colloquial sense

okay so a lot the way that it’s that

that other sense of has become very popular relatively recently

really what I mean by it is much more like something new’s emerged

that’s all I mean I mean

something new has happened which couldn’t have happened without the thing that happened before it and and sometimes so

it’s the evolutionary process and i

In The evolutionary process there are moments of significant novelty in which a whole new thing is happening

so you know life started you know where did it start like hard to say isn’t it but it did and or whatever it is so that’s all I mean by it

I don’t mean strong emergence, weak emergence, anything like that

I and

I’m certainly not reductionist; the complete opposite.

so so there’s a whole this is a trouble language

A whole group of people who want to use the idea of emergence to shore up reductionism.

I want to use the idea of emergence to completely over o object to e reductionism

and to go what I’m saying is

there is more information in the universe now than there was before.

it cannot be reduced to the state before

the higher levels cannot be reduced absolutely not because they are more emergent they’re more thanthat’s how I’m using the word and and I I know the difficulty and I’m glad you brought it out yeah I I I I myexperience is I’m having trouble making sense of what you’re saying then because as I heard you talk it became more andmore it seemed more and more like that was what you were saying and I

I hope I haven’t confused you

just what do you think I’m saying

well it just seemed

it seemed like you were saying that mind did not exist at the beginning of the universe

yeah no it’s all emerged

yeah I think I’m saying

everything with any qualities whatsoever has emerged in one process of differentiation

Emerging^TM, Evolving^TM, Levels of Emergence^TM

[🤨👎 empty, meaningless, Marketing jargon, like possibilism^TM, eternalism^TM, the Egodeath theory^TM]

and that in that process we can talk about new things emerging

you could say evolving if you prefer just evolve move the word

what’s your ontology then what is the base lay of reality in in your view

that’s that’s what I’m trying to understand

yeah okay what I think we need to grasp is that

the further back the further to more foundational levels we go those levels we need to understand with maths and my guess is that

the Primal levels of emergence or Evolution or whatever we want to call that are mathematical

they’re what we study with maths and

it goes right the way back to the fundamental

and here I’m a bit you know it’s a bit like DSM or cabala or gnosticism or pythagoreanism

which goes oh look these are fundamental relationships that we study with maths

they’re archetypes and they will get fleshed out as all these other qualities that come out

which is why you know the world is full of maths

Fake Math Affectation, like 4D Spacetime Mysticism Sold as psychedelic eternalism — whatever that means 🤷‍♂️ <– probably same thing as Quantum Mysticism (didn’t Parmenides fabricate that myth?)

Sacred Geometry

and why the you know what’s the word um sacred geometry

and and the fact that

this is the Fibonacci sequence and because mathematics is the beginning the first level that’s going to lead to well currently it would be like the quantum level where you’re still not in time

you’re still not in you

Emergent 4D Spacetime

time is going to emerge, space is going to emerge from a mathematical level

but the mathematical level

if you go back and back and back

the simplest one is uh the bit this or that Duality, yin and yang

so you’ve what’s before that well

nothing’s before that

Formless^TM

but what that the yin and yang is is the relationship of something which is formless, so that would be in spiritual terms it would be nonu [nondual?]

or but so

when I say the one when I said earlier I just mean

One^TM, in Relationship^TM as Two^(TM??)

one, not one of one of anything just one

it’s one so

it starts with one but one is in relationship as two

and that’s going to give rise to all of this mathematical stuff and then actually the fact that that

The Universe Emerges^TM from One^TM – Too Complex for You to Understand, Words Cannot Express It [joke]

the universe is going to emerge from that

I won’t go into that that’s too complex the but that so so

my basic ontology

would be there’s something

there is something which exists but is undifferentiated

what is it what’s nothing what qualities does it have

it doesn’t have any qualities and if you look around you now and you have that intuition if you can sense the Oneness of the universe

Freke Continues Making ‘Oneness Unity Nonduality’ the Reference for Religious Experience

[DESPITE HIMSELF HE’S STILL CENTERING FOCUS ON THE “ONENESS UNITY” BEGINNER MODEL OF ALTERED STATE EXPERIENCE]

the fact that it is a universe if you do that now and you go yeah but

what is the Oneness

what

Oneness Makes My Thoughts [= controls my personal control system? could we be actually getting somewhere relevant, here? or is this just an accident like infinite monkeys typing?]

what’s the thing that makes the floor and the air and my arms and my thoughts and everything one

well just that it exists

being so you could say

Oneness^TM of Being^TM (But there’s no quality to it) [i agree: a low-quality utterance, Tim]

there’s a Oneness of being

but there’s nothing I mean

there’s no quality to it

it’s kind of what the I think the

this was what the Buddhist mean when they the

The Isness^TM of Things: An Isness Which Everything Shares, and “It” is developed from “that” [??? What Is It?, asks Watts, & me]

Zen Buddhists talk about the isness of things

it’s like there’s there’s an isness which everything shares

and

it’s developed from that

and

it’s also why I think

Meditation [not Psychedelics]

if you’ve had this experience particularly in meditation

I get this where if you really focus on the ground it’s empty it’s void

it’s like that

it is nothing because it has no qualities

and

that’s where it’s

that’s the whole again the Buddhist thing of the being

yeah

the emptiness the void

but that void is really has become everything

Ken Wilber Yada Vibes: Big Framework, No Engine [-cm]

it’s that formless has evolved into every form

so if you

if you if you shift your attention from The Emptiness to the fullness it’s like it’s all one thing and I’m arising

it’s a the the one thing is as Tim is meeting the one thing as Justin and

that that’s a big shift in how you see yourself because you’re suddenly in real intimate connection with everything

Giveaway Word “Connection” Reveals That this is the “Unity” Paradigm [like Ken Wilber = the “Advaita Meditation Huckster” Paradigm, at Core]

you’re not just this little bubble of skin bag as Alan Watts used to say

you’re you’re you’re

everything is this one thing turning into everything and meeting itself in, but but as you;

not it’s not like it’s a thing

The Ego Tunnel; Philosophy and the Mind Sciences Journal (Thomas Metzinger)

https://www.amazon.com/Ego-Tunnel-Science-Mind-Myth/dp/0465020690/ —

I used to have this kind of more of an image that it was like looking through you like you were a tunnel and it was behind

Non-Branching, Snake-Shaped Worldline Frozen in 4D Spacetime Block Mysticism [FDML]

but

I don’t think that.

I think it’s as you you know

it’s Arisen as Justin and there’s Justin he’s on the Leading Edge of the [ __  emergent? evolving?] Universe

this is 13.8 billion years to get to Justin

and he’s right you know it’s like wow

that level of richness that

Levels^TM, Man [compare: in psychedelic eternalism^TM, you end up {rider on donkey on path}; surface level of experience = possibilism-thinking; underlying real level = eternalism-reality; end up w/ qualified possibilism-thinking above eternalism actuality]

we exist on on these different levels

fantastic thanks for the verification

but it is I know

it is pretty radical because the the the Mythic

The Mythic Thing Has Been Around a Long Time – u dont say? 🤯

the Mythic thing has been around for a very very very very very long time so the

The intuition has been

there must be a something

but to get to the point where we go

it’s not like that you have to think in radically different ways so to say you know but what did the one

The One^TM Became the Two

why did the one become the two

it’s a bit like going

does fall like chocolate?

it’s like what there’s a he

there a crazy question

there’s a completely wrong question, because at this level there isn’t any of that

but it will become all of that , which is why we’re here looking back at it

there we go so

great questions yeah

are was that uh anything else Justin are you all set

uh all set I’ll post a couple thoughts in the chat but

please do

great thanks J really great comments let’s go to s tina [?] who’s been most patiently waiting uh and then um

it’s already 1:30 on the Eastern Seaboard um so uh we can start to draw to a close a little bit after that

but if anyone does have any questions still that they’d like to ask if

just go ahead and put up your hand and uh maybe we’ll have some closing thoughts briefly with you and me Tim uh and then call it a day but go aheadstina yeah thank you um I’m in Sweden so it’s half past eight11 s here and uh this book set me off to follow you Tim uh itwas really an important book for starting a process that has been going on for over 20 yearsnow um and I’m working with a collective H and

rupert sheldrake morphic Fields

I’m also very inspired by rupert sheldrick his morphic Fields

so you can say that I’m actually taking the morphic field as a first person perspective

so it’s about we were talking about the group that

we can sense each other what we are together

and what I do is that I sense what I call the Embrace of the group so it’s or the morphic field

so it’s not the individuals it’s the collective

And that is amazing what we can do

so um

you can also sense into the Embrace of humanity Planet universe

so these I mean we can [Ken?] Wilber it will be holl um [holog?]

they are realities from when when we work with them and we

they’re very different and we sense them

I have E. S. P. of the Universe, So Have a Spirituality that’s Grounded in This Reality

and for me that is much more that’s really important because it’s it’s a spirituality that is grounded in this reality

so I don’t have this the Soul byitself in another way but I really see that with us taking those perspectives we are changing what we belong

what we already belong to all this physical biological cultural levels

um so I resonate with with a lot of what you say but

I have a more of an integrated view of these of the at the spiritual subtle pure awareness levels are actually aspects of the whole reality and not

is there is a Oneness

but

There Is Many Onenesses

there is also many Oneness

is all the way if you can um

You can call any hon [?] or morphic field a what experiences it as a Oneness

and it’s also people get it

and um they are there and they are real

so just but so so

I love that I mean I mean I I

I probably have come to see things in a different way now

I don’t think there is any such thing as pure awareness

I think that’s just doesn’t exist

and and I think that was just a way of seeing things that I passed through um but I do think uh I’mI’m certainly seeing everything is integrated

everything you know when I talk about

The Soul Is Part of the One^TM Process^TM Becoming^TM [not wrong, but not very helpful]

the soul doesn’t go off anywhere; it’s all part of the one process becoming it’s just another level of the same process of becoming

and and it and it and

It’s Origined from It, So, Process 😑<-🤨

the biological level is inherent in it [oneness?] because it’s origined from it and and the physical level

and

it’s one thing

it’s all one process

but the stuff that I I want to really focus in on um stina is

the practice you talking about because they sound quite similar to things I’ve been exploring for whatever it is 25years

which is because what

Freke Lexicon: The Psyche Senses, Tune In

to use the language I’ve been developing

I would say

you’re sensing that’s using

that’s what the psyche does

it senses

and you can tune in

so

one of the things which I do is

We Talk Philosophy on Sundays, to Evolve^TM and Emerge^TM, to E.S.P.-Sense Each Other & Our Established Collective Group (and call that “the divine super-soul”)

I get together every Sunday night (not tomorrow actually but) every other Sunday night with a group of people from all over the world, a small group of people and we either talk philosophy like we’ve done today

or we do these practices which involve things like you’re describing which involve being able to um sense each other and the collective that we form

and then very much what I’m suggesting with um what

we experience as the Divine

let’s say or the

the Super Soul is that Collective

um but in a in a

in a very established and deep way, not like the collective that we’ve formed here today

but like a collective that’s been forming for some time now and which is well established

and we can touch into to it and move away from it and come back to it so in that way I reallyresonate a lot with with what you’re exploring and and like I said the idea of the morphic fields is when I’m

talking about the hard disk of the universe or positivity system that’s very much um that’s Rupert likes thefield metaphor

I don’t mind the field metaphor but I don’t necessarily think we need it because it’s not spatial

um Ithink it’s the the thing it’s it’s

it’s closer to what David Bohm [hidden variables] called the implicate and the explicate

you know that

there something behind

[ie underlying level hidden under the hood]

like now when I’m looking at the screen, it’s like there’s something behind this which is making this happen

and I think

science has been very much about exploring what it is behind this and understanding it

which is why we can now do amazing things

we understand what’s behind it

and then

spirituality is the same but on the level of the psyche

you know you get to see the The Superficial levels of the —

or the individual levels let call them rather than superficial

relatively easily

but even seeing yourself is hard isn’t it

just to see your own

you know I’m 65 and I’m seeing new things about myself all the time probably now more than ever

so

it’s not easy to even sense your own processing

but you can

and then you can also widen it out

like you’re suggesting we can do it connect with each other, connect with the

the way in which we form a group these are really important things to do I think and for me is the really important thing is the planetary

I think that if you Humanity are going to survive on this planet we need to become

we know intellectually I mean

know all this that we are living on around planet and the system but to really sense it

to sense a deep belonging to the planet

I think that’s that’s so crucial right now

yeah uh so for me that is the emergent level

um yeah

Sense the planetary awareness

the planetary awareness

yeah I mean I I just want say much I love that but

I also want to just reiterate just in case anyone has misunderstood me and I’ve misled anyone when I talk about the level of the imagin [imaginal?]

I it’s not going off anywhere

it’s absolutely arising and it’s

it’s no more than you’re talking to me now

but

the fact that we’re having a conversation in the psyche

We Converse in the Psyche — and Physical & Biological TOO! 🤯👍

really that’s where it’s all happening

doesn’t mean that we’re not physical or biological; we are and and and that

there’s a whole domain which is of that level

doesn’t mean it’s not connected to an influencing all the time

and that

when I talk about the super system what we experience as God it isn’t gone off anywhere I think it’s interacting with this all the time

I think

When We Talk Together, God-Oneness Is All Levels Interacting

the whole thing is interacting

all these levels are interacting

that’s the key

of course

and and

that’s what we and that’s why we need to focus on those things

yeah thank you yeah beautiful

Freke Book The Laughing Jesus

thanks de thanks for reminding me of the Laughing Jesus that’s a long time ago beautiful yeah important book for me at the time

too just in the interest of time so maybe we go to Joe just because he hasn’t asked a question yet

and then if you’ve got a quick question we can go to you

and then we can uh start to come to a close

so go ahead Joe

I Only Talk to Our Sunday ICU Collective

yeah I didn’t actually actually I have questions but I’m not gonna ask them because

I actually attend the ICU meetings every Sunday and I get to ask those questions

but uh a a

Experiential Retreat at SkyMeadow

a large part ofwhat made this happen was the uh attempt to bring an experiential retreat to SkyMeadow so I just wanted to sort of uh

put out a Mini commercial that is stillin the planning it is still my intention to do so and uh uh

Do Philosophy in the Experiential Realm

Tim is very much taking this philosophy into the experiential realm

and uh so that’s whatwe hope to bring to Sky meadow

so back to Nish with a I’m sure a really great question

yeah I’ll just say I’ll just on that point um t

hanks yeah

we’d love to get Tim out here at the sky Meadow sometime

and as you said Joe we’re kind of we’re still kind of planning see how that could happen

we’re also thinking of

I think this is still on the works of doing another one of these I believe in March

so um I’ll have more information on that

but uh yeah

Sky Meadow, various thinkers communities

we’re just really trying uh at Sky Meadow to weave into all these various different um thinkers communities

TheAvenues – Community?

and and uh you know uh TheAvenues where this kind of thought is happening

and um yeah come together and speaking of uh of um what was the word that was used

to to go collectives or uh communities

yeah anyway we’re trying to build that out in a rich way so um yeah

hopefully we can get Tim from across the pond at some point

I I it it probably might be helpful just for folks to understand is that um

most of the focus for most of my life has been on experiential

the

the you know

recently I’ve given myself over the last 10 years

but even then you know I

I call myself a philosopher

but you know I think really I’m a big love junkie

I just want us to come in into that beautiful beautiful communion with each other and which you experiences this enormous love

because that’s the point of all the philosophy

VAGUE, “love is the point of Philosophy” – Love of Transcendent Knowledge, I should hope [cm]

for me that it supports that and helps us understand why that’s so important so I I I I

The stuff we do experientially together is the heart and soul of it

you know that’s

the that’s hugely important

Yeah all right go ahead again Nish andthen we’ll uh we’ll come to a close thank you I’ll ask the question but if it’s going to take too long we can leaveit for another day um

if you’re talking about the imaginal realm as something that is that emerges and if the imaginal realm is the key to understanding um for example near-death experiences or or or rebirth

and so on

/”Emer

Is “Emergence” a Magic Token Word in Place of Comprehension?

does that mean that these after death or afterlife experiences are only accessible to sentient beings who have reached a certain level of emergence as opposed to being a default for everybody?

yeah great question um

my own guess

all of this is my own guess

really you know all of it’s like

what’s the most plausible thing that I can arrive at given what I’ve experienced?

and what I know would be that certainly

all human beings are well established now in the psyche

[might be context: lowest = body, mid-level= psyche/mind; highest is Spirit –cm]

and that’s probably been the case for a long time

beyond that I I I’m not sure but um

that would be my intuition

I think it’s kind of something I think the Ithink

Key Dogma/ Jargon: “Evolution” (magic word)

the process of evolution has just moved on to a new level like it did with life from matter

say a whole new level and that

“Cycle of Rebirth”

the the cycle of you know like rebirth and all that

it’s just

the latest way of evolving because the biological level is fantastic moved really relatively fast because of life and death

because if you got death you keep getting you know reproduction you get rid of all the old ones and you fill it with lots of new ones

it’s a fantastic way to evolve species and that’s what’s happened

but it’s a terrible way to evolve individuals because they just keep dying

and I think what’s happened is that

as we’ve evolved it’s now about the individual

the the

it’s the indivindidual that’s evolving

and that’s why the it’s worked out a way like it worked out a way to how to be alive

Main Theme: Do Not Lose the Individual (or devmt of the indiv.) During Egodeath Enlightenment

it’s worked out a way how to not lose the individual

and let the individual keep moving

that would be my guess

and that I I would guess that’s true of what

anyone who’s developed that has that level of individuality

which I think is certainly everyone I’ve ever met so be my my my guess

thank you very much Tim thank you it’s been a real Delight

been some fantastic questions guys

it’s been so lovely I can see you all on the screen it’s

it’s like being in the room with you which is just great

yeah these have been really amazing questions um

this was delightful thank you everyone for contributing your your ideas and your questions

this is um just what I thought what I hoped it would be

and just a couple of final thoughts then

well one I’ll just say for myself and for you know

what these things are

again to mention Sky Meadow again

I just love when I encounter a new thinker who is engaging with stuff I’m engaging in

but also maybe going in different directions proposing ideas I never thought of

presenting models in a different way than I’d organized them

where I’ve found organized before

and so that to me is really stimulating and generative

and uh yeah

Tim has been one of those thinkers and so there’s so much that this brings up for me that raises a whole new set of questions

uh you know some of which have even been proposed in here

and uh

I’m still wrestling Tim with your work and your ideas

but I think that that’s part of what’s so fun about this is seeing these things from A New Perspective

and hopefully we can you know again bring these multiple ideas and perspectives together and try to have a more flourishing Community conversation that’s kind of tackling uh these ideas from these different angles and having that kind of uh intellectual foment thatis is so rich

so that’s a big part of the mission of Sky meadow

and I think that

the work that Tim is doing is directly related to that

so

thank you Tim for again just the time for your work

Tim’s Podbook

um one last thing I definitely do want to just have you speak to briefly is your current work uh is the Podbook

say a little bit about that um and what you’re up to and uh yeah yeah

thank you Brendan for making this happen

and Joe who who was also very involved in making this happen

um uh if uh hopefully we’ll we’ll get the chance to do it again we can go deeper we can spread out into different areas I think

having these conversations with people who are moved to in this direction is is really important so it’s been hanging out with you uh

if you um want to do more of this with me before we we get together again through BrendanI like I said

I do this every Sunday so if you go to my website timfreke.com

http://timfreke.com

because it’s such a weird name you will find me

um and uh you

ICU Sunday Meetings

you can come along to the ICU and pop in of a Sundayevening it’s the evening here so it’s uh earlier in America like it’s evening nowfor me um and we have people literally from all over the world

as

but it’s a small small enough group that we can really connect like this

and and and again like you were saying stina you know it

people have formed into a collective and it astonishes me that when

we sit and meditate at the beginning

it’s just like so it’s so strong it just wow how what’s going on here something’s happening so there’s that the other thing which um I would love you to engage with if you are interested is um that

Tim Freke Video Podbook on YouTube, His Latest 8 Years’ Work/ Idea Development

I have this podbook coming out it will be released as video on YouTube

it will be free I’m going to give it away it’s been eight years’ work just about every day

and um I just want to get it out there

I’m recording it literally yesterday, the day before

and

I hope it will come out um in February uh it’s going to be soon so if you’re interested in that please

sign up to my newsletter on my uh website

or my

uh that’s the best way

[I] CU you’ll definitely get about hear about it then

but also you can

subscribe on YouTube or is will be available as an audio podcast as well but it will be video really

uh so that’s what I’m up to andum it’s the the attraction for me is

I can take you I can take you through the ideas like I did today

but I can take it through okay

get this idea

get this idea

get this idea

get this idea

and my aim is that I’m Loos it enough that you can then judge it for yourself you’ve got it

you go

okay I see what he say saying

what do I think of that

and

how does that relate to my experience

so I’m working as hard as I can to get it across with the same with with that Lucidity

awesome yeah and I’m really looking forward to that because as you’ve said you have changed and evolved in your own thinking on on these things

and I both really respect that when people can be like yeah

“I did this whole thing, but now actually I think that’s all wrong”; learning and updating

yeah I did this whole thing but now actually I think that’s all wrong

like that shows learning and updating and it’s uh uh commendable

uh H

but yeah so

Latest Update Patch to Tim Freke’s OS

I’m looking forward to the most recent um uh you know update patch to Tim freaks uh operating system

funny enough Brendan I’ve got a video coming out probably I think next Friday

it’ll be in my newsletter and on YouTube

having a conversation with somebody who has known me for a very long time going through what the hell happened

how did you change your mind

like what was the journey that has ended up here

so yeah well I’m really looking forward to yeah seeing where you’re at with all this and going through that and would love to have you on the menam modern podcast[?] to talk about that when that comes out

but all right well why don’t we call this

there

this is amazing

thanks again Tim so much uh

again thanks Joe thank youfor uh everyone for all of your wonderful questions

and and what you brought into this and uh

stay tuned to the you know to the general space

because I’ll also post things in terms of this recording and uh

our follow-up conversation that will be happening in March

and other things happening so um yeah looking forward to all the things thank you so much Godspeed take care everyone till next time

English (auto-generated) All From Brendan Graham Dempsey

/ end of video transcript

See Also

Find “Freke” in
https://egodeaththeory.org/2025/03/13/idea-development-page-26/

By Author, not by Cybermonk. For scholarly commentary and markup, only; not for publication.

Contents:

• Introduction
• Analogy and the description of experience
• From analogy to cognitive phenomenology
• Mind manifestation and transformation of belief networks
• References
• Biography
• Motivation for this webpage

Introduction

written by Author, for markup by Cybermonk

Psychedelic experiences typically involve intense temporary alterations in perception, and commonly lead to radical and permanent transformations in belief.

The LSD experience was described by Watts (1, p.44) as: “revelations of the secret workings of the brain, of the associative and patterning processes, the ordering systems which carry out all our sensing and thinking”,

similarly Grof (2, p.38) described the LSD experience as: “complex revelatory insights into the nature of existence…typically accompanied by a sense of certainty that this knowledge is ultimately more relevant and “real” than the perceptions and beliefs we share in everyday life.”

In this essay I will be examining the themes that are contained in descriptions of psychedelic tripping such as these.

I will present a generalised phenomenological model which relates psychedelic experience to the brain’s associative and patterning process, by examining the most standard and prominent features of such experiences and inferring general principles from them.

These standard features of tripping are the alterations in visual perception, and the strong tendency for transformation/reformation of core belief structures (‘life-changing’ experiences) during the course of psychedelic exploration.

My aim is to examine these features of psychedelic phenomenology

(that is, the subjective mental content of psychedelic trip experiences)

for the purposes of highlighting the underlying alterations in cognitive processing that are responsible for the psychedelic effect, and thereby to capture the original insight behind the label ‘psychedelic’ (or ‘mind-revealing’).

—

A major theme in what follows is the phenomenological comparison of the ordinary (non-intoxicated) state of consciousness with the non-ordinary psychedelic state of consciousness, for the purposes of highlighting the specific peculiarities of the latter.

During a psychedelic trip session, the mind (or at least, certain major aspects of the mind) becomes explicitly manifested such that it is made available for conscious inspection; by implication then, the mind is not manifested in ordinary, sober consciousness.

The question arises, therefore, of what exactly is meant by the ‘mind’ in this specific context, and what it means to say that the mind becomes temporarily ‘manifested’ in the psychedelic state of consciousness;

what exactly is the thing that can be clearly perceived during intense psychedelic tripping, which is hidden during ordinary experience.

In what follows I will offer a substantive answer to this question.

—

This essay is intended as a basic conceptual model of psychedelic experiencing, using the general approach of phenomenology (the study of conscious appearances).

It should be interpreted first and foremost as an approximation for the phenomenological content of experience, any metaphysical assertions are secondary to this main aim.

There are a few books dealing explicitly with the phenomenology of drug-induced altered states, these include Huxley’s (3) ‘Doors of perception’ and Shanon’s (4) ‘Antipodes of the Mind’.

Also, the literature in psychiatric phenomenology provides some useful concepts which can be applied to the drug-induced experiences, especially the writing of Sass (5 & 6) and Stanghellini (7).

Analogy and the description of experience

written by Author, for markup by Cybermonk

            Analogy is a very useful tool for understanding the cognitive dynamics of psychedelic tripping; likening mental phenomena to physical situations and occurrences elucidates the structure of the perceptual alteration.

I will now briefly run through several of the most pertinent analogies and explain how they can be applied to psychedelic altered-state phenomenology.

Plato’s (8) famous ‘cave allegory’ likens ordinary perception to staring at shadows on the back wall of a cave; a perspective that most people are fully immersed in most of the time.

It is only the philosopher who is privileged to get a glimpse of reality from the higher-dimensional perspective, when he turns his head around to see the light at the mouth of the cave and discovers that the shadows are actually flat lower-dimensional projections of a deeper, hidden actual reality.

Plato’s suggestion is that a person who had never seen beyond the shadows would come to believe that the mere shadows constitute actual reality itself (as opposed to a lower-dimensional projection of actual reality), the altered perspective experienced by the philosopher presents a radical challenge to that belief.

—

            In a similar vein, ordinary perception can be likened to to staring at reflections in the surface of a perfectly still pool of water (the mind) where the surface of the pool is invisible.

The reflections remain perfectly solid and convincing/realistic so long as the surface of the water/mind is undisturbed, the psychedelic trip-effect is like causing a splash in the water so that the surface is distorted and becomes visible;

the reflections then ripple, undulate and fragment, and reveal themselves to be mere reflections as opposed to being the actual things that they reflect.

Albert Hoffman (9), the discoverer of LSD, described how during his bicycle ride home after his first deliberate LSD self-administration: “Everything in my field of vision wavered and was distorted as if seen in a curved mirror”.

The same as in Plato’s example, a person who had only ever seen the reflections, and who had never experienced the surface-manifesting psychedelic ‘splash’ effect, would believe in the concrete reality of the reflections, and in the illusion of direct perceptual access to concrete reality.

—

            Jackson (10) has written about the psychological effect of radically new experience; he constructs a thought-experiment involving a character ‘Fred’ who possesses the ability to perceive one additional colour (a subdivision of red) that nobody else can see.

This serves as an analogy for psychedelic tripping, because the discovery of the psychedelic perspective provides new information that is  not available in the ordinary state of consciousness.

Jackson suggests that Fred would be unable to communicate his experience to anyone who had not seen the extra colour; in much the same way, a tripper cannot communicate meaningfully about his psychedelic experiences to someone who had never had the experience.

Verbal trip reports cannot fully convey what it is like to trip, to truly know the experience a person has to have it themselves.

It could be argued from a behaviouristic point of view that what one learns on discovering psychedelic tripping is simply an ability to recall and describe the experiences, a person who had never had the experience, will be unable to recall and describe it.

Hoffman (11) has similarly likened the discovery of psychedelic tripping to an adolescent’s discovery of the experience of sexual climax.

—

            Whether psychedelics cleanse the doors of perception or ripple the surface of consciousness, the value of these analogies lies in the overall picture they provide of how the psychedelic effect works to reveal the operational structures of the mind.

Analogies such as these serve to model and reflect the two core effects of psychedelic tripping; the temporary alteration in perception, and the permanent transformation of belief structures.

From analogy to cognitive phenomenology

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            The various structural analogies can be translated into the language of philosophy of mind.

According to Marr’s (12) theory of visual perception, the 2-dimensional array of coloured light information on the surface of the eyes is translated by the mind into a complex, multi-levelled mental representation of the 3-dimensional physical environment.

Our external environment is illuminated by light which is reflected off of the surfaces of physical objects, some of the reflected light hits the surface of our eyes, and this 2-dimensional pattern of light of the surface of the eyes is processed and translated into a 3-dimensional mental image of the surrounding environment.

Fodor (13) makes a similar claim in his theory on mental modularity, according to which the brain contains dedicated modules for processing the information that is received as input from the body’s sensory organs; the output of these modules is the detailed mental image of the physical environment.

It is the mental image which is directly revealed to consciousness, so our ordinary conscious perception is inherently representational, we perceive 3-dimensional physical reality indirectly via mental symbols.

Hoffman (14) uses the terms ‘explicit representationalism’ and ‘dissociated cognition’ to describe the psychedelic perceptual/cognitive mode;

perception is representational at all times, but in the ordinary perceptual modality the mental representations behave so predictably and consistently (- they are so tangibly realistic) that they are tacitly conflated (or associated) with the mind-independent realities that they represent.

—

            Hoffman (14) suggests that during a psychedelic trip the mind adopts the metaperceptive point of view, from this vantage point the distinction between the subjective mental representations and objective physical reality is explicitly revealed to the mind;

physical objects look less solid and realistic during a trip, they cease to appear as mind-independent objective entities and take on a cartoon-like character.

A psychedelic trip is induced by altering the brain’s endogenous chemistry via externally introduced chemicals, yet the altered visual effects are perceived as actual qualities of external objects (along with their shape, colour etc.).

Huxley (15, p.12) conveyed this idea in his description of his first mescaline trip, by describing how his trousers appeared to him in his altered state as follows:

“Those folds in the trousers-what a labyrinth of endlessly significant complexity! And the texture of the grey flannel-how rich, how deeply, mysteriously sumptuous!. . . the folds of my grey flannels were charged with ‘is-ness’.”

Note how Huxley directly attributes these fantastic qualities to his actual trousers, and not to his own perception of his trousers.

—

            The physical surfaces of solid objects are commonly observed to flow, undulate and ripple like the surface of a liquid when psychedelic chemicals are introduced into the brain;

it follows logically from this that what the mind normally holds to be external, mind-independent concrete existence, is actually a deceptively detailed mental appearance.

There is no alternative way to account for the observation that an alteration of brain chemistry causes alterations in external reality other than by postulating that what we refer to as ‘external reality’ is in fact internal/mental in origin;

psychedelic visual alterations combined with basic reasoning conclusively demonstrate the principle of representationalism.

During a psychedelic trip, each person can observe for themselves that an alteration of internal neurochemistry results in a tangible alteration in the perceptual qualities of the external world, this naturally leads an inquiring mind to question the origin of perceptual phenomena, and the metaphysical status of the subject/object distinction.

This is why the temporary perceptual alteration can result in a permanent transformation of the mind’s conceptual  framework; the psychedelic effect challenges our most basic assumptions about the nature of perception.

—

            The phenomenologist Husserl (16) held that the ordinary (natural, habitual) manner in which the mind perceives reality is shaped by implicit background assumptions that give a coherent structure to our experience

(this idea is much in line with the general Kantian philosophical framework),

when these assumptions are made explicit and bracketed off by a process of private philosophical reflection which he called the phenomenological epoche, the mind’s ‘sphere of ownness’ is revealed, the raw subjective datastream prior to the mind’s conceptualising activity.

The psychiatrist Depraz (17) has likened Husserl’s phenomenological epoche to the process of psychotic mental dis-integration in schizophrenic patients,

suggesting that such experiences constitute a “phenomenological exploration of consciousness”, and that schizophrenia consists essentially in an “enhanced aptitude to perform the epoche”.

Freud (18, p.90) anticipated the comparison of psychosis and mind-manifestation when he compared the mind to a crystal, and used this comparison to suggest that observation of psychotic/schizoid mental processes can shed light on the structure of the sane mind.

According to Freud’s analogy a whole, undamaged crystal contains a complex internal structure which remains invisible so long as the crystal remains whole and undamaged.

However when a crystal shatters, the shape of the resulting shards of broken crystal reveal this (previously hidden) internal structure.

Similarly, the internal structure of the mind is invisible so long as it retains its wholeness and integrity; the mental shattering/fragmentation which occurs during periods of psychosis reveals its underlying structure in the “lines of cleavage” along which it falls apart.

According to Freud, the madman possesses a somewhat privileged perspective compared to a sane man because of his ability to perceive the hidden mental structures which are hidden to the sane man’s perspective.

This analogy of Freud’s is readily applicable to the phenomenological model of drug induced mind manifestation that I am outlining here.

—

            The psychiatrist Osmond (19), who was one of the earliest scientific investigators of LSD and who is responsible for creating the word ‘psychedelic’, observed that the mental dynamics involved in schizophrenic psychosis have crucial similarities to psychedelic tripping.

It was for this reason that LSD was first labelled as ‘psychotomimetic’ (psychosis mimicking), and only later re-labelled ‘psychedelic’.

So Depraz’ (17) insight about the comparison of Husserl’s epoche to schizophrenic mental dis-integration can be extended to shed light on psychedelic mental alteration.

The heightened perspective of transcendental subjectivity, which is a new field of awareness that is revealed after exercising the epoche

(and, if Depraz’ comparison is valid, also during periods of schizophrenic psychosis)

is equivalent to the perspective of explicit representationalism that is revealed in a psychedelic trip;

the core implicit assumption that is made explicit and bracketed off is the assumption that consciousness is directly in contact with external objects, or equivalently, the assumption of straightforward identity between mental representations and their referents.

---

            Sass (6) and Stanghellini (7) both employ the term ‘hyperreflexivity’ to describe the core peculiarity of the schizophrenic patient’s subjective experiences during periods of psychosis, and this term can be used equivalently to describe the temporary cognitive alteration of the psychedelic trip experience.

For Sass (6, p.37) cognitive hyperreflexivity contrasts with ordinary cognition because of its intensely inward-pointing orientation, such that: “the ego disengages from normal forms of involvement with nature and society, often taking itself, or its own experiences, as its own object”.

Similarly Stanghellini (7, p.165) suggests that in the hyperreflexive mind: “the ‘I’ breaks down into an experiencing I-subject contemplating an experienced I-object” such that: “the act of perception itself turns out to be an explicit intelligible object”.

Again here we see a clear indication of the general idea that altered state experience involves a specific kind of dissociation in the mind between symbol and referent, a cognitive process of representation which normally operates silently in the background is brought intensely into the foreground of awareness.

—

            With this model of psychedelic experiencing in mind, it is worth pointing out that the word ‘hallucinogen’ which is sometimes used to denote psychedelic drugs is misleading, insofar as it implies that the effect of the drug is to induce hallucinations that are not present in the ordinary state of consciousness.

What is actually happening in a psychedelic trip is that a certain hallucinatory (or illusory, mistaken) aspect of our ordinary experience

(our tacit conflation of the mind-dependent internal perceptual image with the mind-independent external world)

becomes explicitly apparent, which is merely implicit (and therefore typically taken for granted and not noticed) during ordinary experience.

In his exhaustive compendium of phenomenological alterations that are observed in ayahuasca sessions, Shanon (4, p.205) includes:

“the assesment, very common with ayahuasca, that what is seen and thought during the course of intoxication defines the real, whereas the world that is ordinarily perceived is actually an illusion.”.

Similarly Watts (1, p.15) likens psychedelia to the transformations of consciousness that are undertaken in Taoism and Zen, which he says is:

“more like the correction of faulty perception or the curing of a disease…not an acquisitive process of learning more and more facts or greater and greater skills, but rather an unlearning of wrong habits and opinions”.

Psychedelic drugs are often referred to as ‘teachers’ (particularly the plant-based drugs such as ayahuasca and psilocybin mushrooms), so this can be understood as the core lesson that they teach,

– they reveal the fundamental cognitive operation of fusing  together representation and referent, this is the sense in which ‘mind’ becomes ‘manifested’ during a trip.

—

            Hoffman (20) states that the representational nature of mind is obscured in our ordinary perceptual modality by the high degree of stability and consistency in the way that mental representations behave

(for example, solid objects remain firmly solid), which creates the strong impression that mental phenomena are concretely existing (and therefore non-mental) entities,

and that consciousness directly perceives mind-independent reality so that perception is not mediated by mental representations; this is the real meaning of a ‘hallucination’ insofar as it applies to hallucinogenic drugs.

The hallucinatory aspect of perception is exposed by the psychedelic trip-effect because the ordinary stability and consistency of the representations is noticeably diminished during a trip, solid objects appear much less solid, physical reality takes on a fluid appearance.

Mind manifestation and transformation of belief networks

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            In addition to the temporary perceptual alterations observed during psychedelic trip sessions, another important aspect of psychedelic phenomenology is a kind of radical psychological restructuring;

an [really, really, really] intense trip can be a life-transforming experience which leads to a major overhaul of a person’s internal framework of beliefs (Hoffman (21) calls this framework the mental worldmodel).

Thagard (22) has comprehensively modelled the process of psychological paradigm transformation;

when new information comes to light that cannot be accounted for or explained by an established belief network, the entire network must undergo revision in order to accommodate the new information.

For example, someone who had lived their entire life in a black-and-white environment would believe implicitly that there are no other colours since they have no way of perceiving them.

Such a person would experience a drastic disproof of that implicit belief, if they are suddenly exposed to the world of colour for the first time (like Jackson’s (10) thought-experiment character Mary, who is suddenly shown a red rose after spending a lifetime in black-and-white).

This is comparable to the mental transformation that is undergone when a person becomes acquainted with psychedelia;

the central difference between the pre and post psychedelic belief configurations, is that the new configuration accommodates the possibility of psychedelic experience

(it accommodates the perceptual dissociation between symbol and referent).  

—

            The epistemological dynamics that occur during the process of waking up from a vivid dream provide a close analogy for psychedelic mental transformation;

when fully immersed in a dream world one is not aware that one is dreaming, so the contents of dream-consciousness are taken to be simply real, the subject is not aware that his surrounding environment is a mentally projected and imaginary.

After waking up, when reflecting back on the dream, the mental contents are immediately re-interpreted as unreal, imaginary mental projections in light of the new experience of waking consciousness (“it was just a dream”).

Similarly, upon perceiving directly the symbol/referent distinction in the psychedelic state of consciousness, the phenomenal content of ordinary consciousness is reinterpreted in the light of the new information that is provided by the heightened psychedelic perspective.

Every psychedelic trip lasts for a certain duration then ends as the chemicals are metabolised by the body, so the psychedelic perspective which reveals manifest phenomena as projected mental representations is only experienced on a temporary basis,

but if a person is able to fully grasp and remember the psychedelic insights after the trip ends (and become generally acquainted with the intense altered experiential modality), then the mind is permanently transformed.

—

            The psychedelic belief revision is held in place by the memory of the transformative psychedelic experience, this memory provides a constant reminder which prevents the old pre-psychedelic set of beliefs/assumptions from re-establishing itself.

The existence of the altered-state modality of dissociated/hyperreflexive cognition presents a fundamental overrider to pre-established belief networks, which forces an overhaul of those networks.

The axiomatic basis of the pre-psychedelic, experientially naïve mental worldmodel (essentially, the belief in straightforward identity between mental representations and their referents) is critically undermined by transformative psychedelic experience.

Per Thagard (22) this undermining of a metaphysical model necessitates a systematic restructuring of the model, adding crucial qualifiers to foundational assumptions;

in this case the qualifiers concern the existence of an experience which seems to disprove the assumed identity of representation and referent.

—

References

written by Author, for markup by Cybermonk

1. Watts A. The Joyous Cosmology; Adventures in the chemistry of consciousness. Pantheon Books; 1962

2. Grof S. The Holotropic Mind; The three levels of human consciousness and how they shape our lives. San Francisco Harper; 1993

3. Huxley A. The Doors of Perception: And Heaven and Hell. Thinking Ink 2003

4. Shanon B. The Antipodes of the Mind: Charting the Phenomenology of the Ayahuasca Experience. Oxford University Press; 2003

5. Sass L. The paradoxes of delusion; Wittgenstein, Schreber and the schizophrenic mind. Cornell university press; 1994

6. Sass L. Madness and modernism. Basic books; 1992

7. Stanghellini G. Disembodied spirits and deanimated bodies; the psychopathology of common sense. Oxford university press; 2004

8.Plato. Cooper J editor. The complete works. Hackett publishing. 1997

9. Inventor of LSD Albert Hoffman’s first trip. The Guardian [internet]. 2008 1^st May. Available from: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/may/01/medicalresearch

10. Jackson F. Epiphenomenal Qualia. The Philosophical Quarterly 1982 April. 32(127): 127-136

11. Hoffman M. Determinism as Enlightenment [internet]. [place unknown]1985-2007. Available from: http://www.egodeath.com/DeterminismEnlightenment.htm

12. Marr A. Vision: A Computational Investigation into the Human Representation and Processing of Visual Information. San Francisco: W. H. Freeman & Company; 1983

13. Fodor J. The modularity of mind. MIT press; 1983

14. Hoffman M. The Entheogen Theory of Religion and Ego Death [internet]. [place unknown]1985-2007. Available from http://www.egodeath.com/mobile.htm

15. Huxley A. The Doors of Perception. Flamingo; 1977

16. Husserl E. Cartesian Meditations. Kluwer academic publishers; 1999

17. Depraz N. Putting the epoché into practice: schizophrenic experience as illustrating the phenomenological exploration of consciousness. In Fulford B, Morris K, Sadler J, Stanghellini G editors. Nature and narrative, an introduction to the philosophy of psychiatry. Oxford University press; 2003

18. Freud S. New introductory lectures on psychoanalysis. Penguin, 1988

19. Obituary; Doctor Humphrey Osmond. The Telegraph [internet]. 2004 16th Feb. Available from: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/1454436/Dr-Humphry-Osmond.html

20. Hoffman M. Mental Construct Processing [internet]. 1985-2007. available from http://www.egodeath.com/mcp.htm

21.Hoffman M. The Egoic and Transcendent Mental Worldmodels [internet]. 1985-2007. Available from: http://www.egodeath.com/egoictranscendentmentalmodels.htm

22.Thagard P. Conceptual Revolutions. Princeton University press; 1992

Biography

Author is a philosopher and psychonautical explorer, he graduated from college with PhD in Knowledge, hosted and produced the Podcast, and has given presentations on psychedelic phenomenology at universities.

Motivation for this webpage

What made me think about this excellent, useful, relevant article is this non-excellent article; I probably like Kant and find Continental Phen’y worthless and irrelevant despite Houot’s writings claiming that this sort of Phen’y is relevant:

Phenomenology for Psychedelic Researchers: A Review of Current Methods & Practices (Houot, 2021) – I considered making a page containing that article, but seems worthless.

I would only make such a page to confirm that that approach is worthless and cannot hold a candle to the present article, which is related to the Egodeath theory.

Houot has sure not succeeded in the slightest persuading me of his claims that such Phen’y is important for psychonauts.

The present Phen’y article is important for psychonauts.

This article is by Author, not by Cybermonk.

For scholarly commentary and markup, only; not for publication.

Not a backup; for markup.

I read this aloud on the Egodeath Mystery Show, and have read a few times.

It is an ideal, perfect treatment, though I can probably extend and highlight some points.

Article not found by me at Academia.edu now.

This page is not for accurate clone backup of article as its primary purpose.

https://egodeaththeory.org/?s=%22breaking+convention%22

Michael Hoffman, 9:24 pm Mar. 28, 2025

Contents:

Esotericism in Amsterdam:

• Q: Did You Study with Wouter Hanegraaff?
• Q: Do Academics at Amsterdam Go to Smartshops?

Science Explaining Religion:

• Q: How Broad Is Your Conception of “Science” and “Religion” (Mysticism, Esotericism): Can the Science approach, broadly, Explain that which Religion is trying to get at?
• Q: Underneath the Noise and Confusion that Is Religion, Mysticism, and Mythology, Is There Valuable Transcendent Knowledge, or Mental Model Transformation, Buried, and Indirectly Expressed?
• Q: Is there Some Type of Transcendent Knowledge or Enlightenment that Science Can and Should Explain?
• Q: Is there Treasure Buried under the Mess and Confusion that’s Religion, Mysticism, and Mythology?
• Q: Should Science and Engineering and Cognitive Science Strive to Explain the Transcendent Knowledge that’s Poorly Conveyed by Religion, Mysticism, Mythology, and Esotericism?
• Q: Is Transcendent Knowledge Worth the Attention of Science?
• Q: Are You Allergic to Religion? What Kind of Science Approach Fits with What Kind of Religion Approach?
• Q: Do You Contribute any Insight or Analysis on Any Sort of Religous Transcendent Revelation in Any Way?
• Q: What Can People Do to Overcome the Rift Between Psychedelic Scientists vs. Psychedelic Mystics?

Shipwreck Questions:

• Q: How Do We Avoid Shipwreck in a Storm of Control Instability in the Altered State?
• Q: Is the Pilot or Steersman of a Ship Have Stable, Autonomous Control of their Steering, in the Altered State?
• Q: Metal Songs Such as No One at the Bridge by Rush, Reports Stormy Risk of Shipwreck – What Is Your Solution to Shipwreck in a Storm of Control Instability in the Altered State?

Eternalism Questions:

• Q: Is Ramesh Balsekar Correct and Insightful that Enlightenment Is Knowledge of No-Free-Will?
• Q: Is the Experience of No-free-will a Mystical Revelation?
• Q: As a Scientist, Is Freewill the Case?
• Q: Is Personal Control Monolithic, Autonomous Control that Selects from Possibilities that Are Available? Or, Is Personal Control Limited, 2-Level, Dependent Control?
• Q: Is the future open, or closed? Do you hold to Possibilism (open future), or Eternalism (closed, pre-existing future)?

Control Stability Questions:

• Q: Does a Rational Psychonaut Have Stable Control by Controlling Their Own Source of Thoughts, as an Autonomous Agent?
• Q: Does a Person Control Their Own Source of Thoughts, and Create their Own Future?
• Q: What Is Your Technology and Advice for Someone Who Is Terrified to Look at Their Source of Control-Thoughts for Fear of Monstrous Threatening Unavoidable Thoughts? [todo: move up w/ control stability]

• Q: Do You Reject the Same Popular Ideas of Enlightenment as Tim Freke? (Emergent Evolutionary Spirituality)

Surrenderism:

• Q: Underneath the Idea of Surrenderism, Is There a Real and Important Dynamic?
• Q: Do You Have an Explanation of the Dynamics of Mystical Surrender?
• Q: Is Science and Engineering Able to form an Explanatory Model of the Dynamics of Mystical Surrender?
• Q: Why Doesn’t the Book Have a Section on Surrenderism, Given that That’s the Central Topic in Your Masters’ Dissertation and in your article The Psychonaut’s Ship?

• Q: How serious are you on page 10 “Don’t read this book if you used any existing approach to Psychedelics?” Are we supposed to read your book, or not?
• Q: When It’s Revealed that You Cannot Control Your Source of Control Thoughts, But Thoughts Arise Unstoppably and Are Unbound in the Psychedelic State, How Can The Personal Control System Avoid Panic Seizure and Restore Stable Control?
• Q: What Technology Discovery Are You Withholding in the Book, Page __?
• Q: How to package and deliver a psychedelic discovery, after the discovery? Do your writings only aim to get people started toward discovering, or is it aiming to cover end-to-end?
• Q: Have you made any Psychedelic discoveries, or will you focus on articulating an approach and mentality opposed to therapy?
• Q: Psychedelics focus awareness on inner workings of mind, so why does the book narrowly use model of ships exploring the external, physical world?
• Q: What are some specific useful, relevant technologies provided to give people stable control while on Psilocybin? A mindset?
• Commentary
• The Irony in this Page Title: “Psychedelic “Church” Concept Causes Allergic Seizure Reaction in Houot the “Naturalist, Rational Psychonaut” Who Is Against “Anyone Esoteric or Mystical or Spiritual or Religious or Transcendent or Woo”
• Corpse, Stable Building Protected by Cloth Washed Clean
• Why Creating a Page Focused on Formulating Questions for the Author
• Increase Your Control Agency Harder and Harder Until It Explodes in Climactic Control Transformation
• ⚖️💥☸️
• Metal Lyrics about Transformative Crisis of Control
• No One at the Bridge (Rush, 1975)
• S.A.T.O. (e.g. Sailing the Acid Trip Ocean) (Ozzy Osbourne, 1981)
• Heaven Can Wait (Iron Maiden, 1986)
• See Also
  • Toward a Philosophy of Psychedelic Technology: An Exploration of Fear, Otherness, and Control (Houot, 2019)
  • Phenomenology for Psychedelic Researchers: A Review of Current Methods & Practices (Houot, 2021)
  • The Psychonaut’s Ship: Pairing Technologies with Psychedelics to Augment User Agency (Houot, 2022)
  • Rise of the Psychonaut: Maps for Amateurs, Nonscientists and Explorers in the Psychedelic Age of Discovery (Houot, 2025)
• Dionysus, the Pilot Who Honors Dionysus and Lives, and the Captain Who Doesn’t Honor Dionysus and Dies

Q: Did You Study with Wouter Hanegraaff?

Q: Do Academics at Amsterdam Go to Smartshops?

Q: How Broad Is Your Conception of “Science” and “Religion” (Mysticism, Esotericism): Can the Science approach, broadly, Explain that which Religion is trying to get at?

Q: Underneath the Noise and Confusion that Is Religion, Mysticism, and Mythology, Is There Valuable Transcendent Knowledge, or Mental Model Transformation, Buried, and Indirectly Expressed?

Q: Is there Some Type of Transcendent Knowledge or Enlightenment that Science Can and Should Explain?

Q: Is there Treasure Buried under the Mess and Confusion that’s Religion, Mysticism, and Mythology?

We Agree on Pro-Science, Pro-Engineering.

We agree on Anti- the Mystical/ Mythical/ Religious Style of Expression.

Do We Disagree whether there Is Treasure of Enlightenment and Mental model transformation, Buried Underneath the Noise and Junk & Confusion Overlaid by Religion?

The Science and Engineering approach to forming an explanatory framework is the best approach to explaining anything, and is able to efficiently explain the Transcendent Knowledge “treasure” that is expressed in a confused, garbled way by religion, mysticism, mythology, esotericism, and medieval art motifs.

Q: Should Science and Engineering and Cognitive Science Strive to Explain the Transcendent Knowledge that’s Poorly Conveyed by Religion, Mysticism, Mythology, and Esotericism?

Q: Is Transcendent Knowledge Worth the Attention of Science?

Q: Does Alien Entity Contact Serve a Religious Function within the Rational Psychonaut Science Explorer Discoverer Approach?

Q: Is this an “Elite Evolutionary Spirituality” Approach, the “Rational Psychonaut Science Explorer Discoverer” Approach?

Requiring Explorers to be Fit and Atheist Rational, While Rejecting (in all senses) anything Religious, Mystical, Esoteric, Spiritual.

Rational, Scientific, Fit, Mature, Fit to be an explorer; vs.
Irrational, Immature, Mentally Ill

Elitist Eugenics-Like Prideful Evolutionism

Is Tim Freke’s attempt at “evolutionary spirituality / emergent spirituality” like this, or not?

Perhaps such evolutionary spirituality fans attach themselves to Tim Freke.

I don’t care for Freke’s focus in Soul Story on survival of the soul after literal bodily death.

I embrace the potential of Science, WITHOUT scorched-earth dismissal of religion, sprituality, mysticism, mythology – I just think that the Sceiecne & esp. Engineering approach to explanatory useful framework to produce a useful technology for everyone, to contribute to the collective shared knowleddge base. I WANT EVERYONE TO UNDERSTAND WHAT RELIGIOUS MYTH IS ACTUALLY REFLECTING.

I cringe at the tone or framing that Houot uses, that only “fit” people are suitable to do Rational Science Discovery Exploration.

I agree that this approach is superior:

• Rational Science discovery exploration <– superior approach, to figure out…
• Religion, sprituality, mysticism, mythology <– the referent to be figured out.

Jan 1988: Ken Wilber says that the nature of ego transcendence is X. But I say, the scientifically clear and engineering-useful explanatory framework is, instead,

• Block-universe eternalism
• Psychedelic loose cognition; loose cognitive association binding
• Mental model transformation per the Way of Zen by Alan Watts: instant, quick, binary switch of mental models.
• To have non-dysfunctional cross-time control. So that one can “plan and do” as expected, NOTHING MORE THAN THAT – not super-respecting enlightenment; rather, I never put enlightenment on a pedestal; instead, I had a disrespectful but PRAGMATIC AND MODEST valuation of enlightenment, Transcendent Knowledge.

Jules Evans – Evolutionary spirituality as a frame for psychedelic experiences

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HMGzEWLZHTQ –

Video title:
Jules Evans – Evolutionary spirituality as a frame for psychedelic experiences
ch: Exeter Psychedelics Group
Nov. 1, 2023
Talk and Q+A with Exeter Research Psychedelic Colloquium.

Desc. of video:

“One of the dominant cultural frames for psychedelics in western culture over last 130 years has been evolutionary spirituality.

“This tradition suggests human evolution is not finished and can be guided towards the creation of higher beings through such techniques as psychedelics and eugenics or genetic modification.

“But is everyone evolving into a new species, or just an elite? Jules will discuss the tradition of evolutionary spirituality, raise the ethical implications of this tradition – its tendency to spiritual narcissism, contempt for the less-evolved masses, Social Darwinism and Malthusianism, spiritual eugenics, and illiberal utopian politics—and suggest responses to these limitations.”

Comments about Video

Jan Irvin warned about this, with Huxley as Dr. Evil, contempt for the masses.

I’m too autistic to use this approach. In 1985 I was just a buggy person trying to repair their malfunctioning personal control system, and then give that explanation to everyone.

That’s it. No other narrative. I’m not a narrative guy, other than that.

In 1985, my father instructed me on leading edge human potential, self-help, transpersonal psychology.

After my block-universe eternalism breakthrough in Jan 1988, my friends had books by Leary, which I found had no appeal and no relevance.

I didn’t cross the street at Stanford in 1991 to bother going to the big psychedelics Bridge conference – that approach was not relevant enough to my project of writing-up my explanatory model of what ego transcendence is really about AND WHY WE CANNOT HAVE POSI-CONTROL ACROSS TIME.

My discovery of eternalism and its 100% total ego death cancellation of a certain sense of monolithic, autonomous control, was the opposite of personal grandiosity.

I am personally grand as an explainer of why 2-level, dependent control is the case, humbling-to-death King Ego.

When I intended to learn what ego transcendence is really about, in order to repair my dysfunctional cross-time control.

dysfunctional cross-time control
dctc

Q: Are You Allergic to Religion? What Kind of Science Approach Fits with What Kind of Religion Approach?

Q: Do You Contribute any Insight or Analysis on Any Sort of Religous Transcendent Revelation in Any Way?

Q: What Can People Do to Overcome the Rift Between Psychedelic Scientists vs. Psychedelic Mystics?

Q: How Do We Avoid Shipwreck in a Storm of Control Instability in the Altered State?

Q: Is the Pilot or Steersman of a Ship Have Stable, Autonomous Control of their Steering, in the Altered State?

Q: Metal Songs Such as No One at the Bridge by Rush, Reports Stormy Risk of Shipwreck – What Is Your Solution to Shipwreck in a Storm of Control Instability in the Altered State?

See appendix below:
Metal Lyrics about Transformative Crisis of Control

Q: Is Ramesh Balsekar Correct and Insightful that Enlightenment Is Knowledge of No-Free-Will?

Q: Is the Experience of No-free-will a Mystical Revelation?

Q: As a Scientist, Is Freewill the Case?

Q: Is Personal Control Monolithic, Autonomous Control that Selects from Possibilities that Are Available? Or, Is Personal Control Limited, 2-Level, Dependent Control?

Q: Is the future open, or closed? Do you hold to Possibilism (open future), or Eternalism (closed, pre-existing future)?

Q: Does a Rational Psychonaut Have Stable Control by Controlling Their Own Source of Thoughts, as an Autonomous Agent?

Q: Does a Person Control Their Own Source of Thoughts, and Create their Own Future?

Q: What Is Your Technology and Advice for Someone Who Is Terrified to Look at Their Source of Control-Thoughts for Fear of Monstrous Threatening Unavoidable Thoughts?

Q: Do You Reject the Same Popular Ideas of Enlightenment as Tim Freke? (Emergent Evolutionary Spirituality)

Tim Freke recently is trying to reject pop spirituality concepts such as

• Nonduality; unity; oneness.
• Ego is illusion. The self doesn’t exist.
• Separate self is an illusion.
• The goal of enlightenment is to get rid of the ego.

Q: Underneath the Idea of Surrenderism, Is There a Real and Important Dynamic?

Q: Do You Have an Explanation of the Dynamics of Mystical Surrender?

Q: Is Science and Engineering Able to form an Explanatory Model of the Dynamics of Mystical Surrender?

Q: Why Doesn’t the Book Have a Section on Surrenderism, Given that That’s the Central Topic in Your Masters’ Dissertation and in your article The Psychonaut’s Ship?

Q: How serious are you on page 10 “Don’t read this book if you used any existing approach to Psychedelics?” Are we supposed to read your book, or not?

Please put this book down if you’ve never ingested psychedelics or if you take them for therapeutic, recreational, religious, spiritual growth, personal growth, cognitive enhancement, creativity-inspirational, or self-actualizing purposes. It’s not for you … With that said, my message will not resonate with everyone.

p. 10, Rise of the Psychonaut: Maps for Amateurs, Nonscientists and Explorers in the Psychedelic Age of Discovery (Houot, 2025)

Rise of the Psychonaut: Maps for Amateurs, Nonscientists and Explorers in the Psychedelic Age of Discovery (Houot, 2025) https://egodeaththeory.org/2024/12/24/rise-of-the-psychonaut-houot-2025/ & https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0DPSJGMFR

Q: When It’s Revealed that You Cannot Control Your Source of Control Thoughts, But Thoughts Arise Unstoppably and Are Unbound in the Psychedelic State, How Can The Personal Control System Avoid Panic Seizure and Restore Stable Control?

Q: What Technology Discovery Are You Withholding in the Book, Page __?

todo: figure out the p. #

Q: How to package and deliver a psychedelic discovery, after the discovery? Do your writings only aim to get people started toward discovering, or is it aiming to cover end-to-end?

Q: Have you made any Psychedelic discoveries, or will you focus on articulating an approach and mentality opposed to therapy?

Q: Psychedelics focus awareness on inner workings of mind, so why does the book narrowly use model of ships exploring the external, physical world?

Q: What are some specific useful, relevant technologies provided to give people stable control while on Psilocybin? A mindset?

Commentary

The Irony in this Page Title: “Psychedelic “Church” Concept Causes Allergic Seizure Reaction in Houot the “Naturalist, Rational Psychonaut” Who Is Against “Anyone Esoteric or Mystical or Spiritual or Religious or Transcendent or Woo”

 Corpse, Stable Building Protected by Cloth Washed Clean

Why Creating a Page Focused on Formulating Questions for the Author

Thanks to RL for asking me the question of me asking Ooh-Oh questions.

A. M. Houot (Ooh-Oh)

• My questions and this page are not just about the book. I treat Houot’s entire corpus: diss + 2 articles + book.

The book lacks – incongruously – Houot’s fav topic, disparagement of mystics’ ‘surrenderism”.

See Michelle Janikian’s book for crude folk surrenderism writeup, her book is good.

Your Psilocybin Mushroom Companion: An Informative, Easy-to-Use Guide to Understanding Magic Mushrooms—From Tips and Trips to Microdosing and Psychedelic Therapy
(Guides to Psychedelics & More)
Michelle Janikian, September 23, 2021
https://www.amazon.com/Psilocybin-Mushroom-Companion-Easy-Mushrooms/dp/1646043901/ —

Blurb:

“Learn. Prepare. Trip. Transform!

“Discover the transformational power of psilocybin mushroom with this all-encompassing guide to harnessing magic mushrooms safely and effectively.

“With so much misinformation surrounding magic mushrooms out there, it can be hard to separate fact from fiction.

“This is where Your Psilocybin Mushroom Companion comes in to help.

“In this book, you’ll find a comprehensive yet friendly guide to everything there is to know about magic mushrooms.

“Learn how to plan safe, effective trips with easy-to-follow step-by-step advice.

“Discover how to train a guide to take care of those on psychedelic voyages, as well as how to access the transformative nature of these experiences.

“Even learn how microdosing can improve your mood, cognitive functioning, creativity, physical stamina, and more.

“With the most up-to-date research, Your Psilocybin Mushroom Companion will put magic mushrooms into perspective, dispel myths and urban legends, and open your mind to the benefits of psychedelic tripping.”

/ end blurb Janikian book

Increase Your Control Agency Harder and Harder Until It Explodes in Climactic Control Transformation

⚖️💥☸️

…. i wonder…. Houot in book says he’s withholding something.

LOL there’s my Q1: WHAT ARE YOU WITHHOLDING FROM US?

I bet something about surrenderism and WE MUST INCREASE OUR EGOIC SELF CONTROL POWER:

STAND ON LEFT FOOT HARDER!

UNTIL BLOW UP TO SMITHEREENS IN A FIRE PIT OF CYBERNETIC CONTROL SEIZURE DEATH FAILURE revealing there is no power there at all.

Metal Lyrics about Transformative Crisis of Control

No One at the Bridge (Rush, 1975)

No One at the Bridge (Rush, 1975)
channel: Wraxtiorre’s Mess
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=70BgSKTBh9s —

https://www.rush.com/songs/the-fountain-of-lamneth/

Lyrics by Neil Peart:

III. No One At the Bridge 

Crying back to consciousness
The coldness grips my skin
The sky is pitching violently
Drawn by shrieking winds
Seaspray blurs my vision
Waves roll by so fast
Save my ship of freedom
I’m lashed helpless to the mast

Call out for direction
And there’s no one there to steer
Shout out for salvation
But there’s no one there to hear
Cry out supplication
For the maelstrom is near
Scream out desperation
But no one cares to hear

Remembering when first I held
The wheel in my own hands
I took the helm so eagerly
And sailed for distant lands

But now the sea’s too heavy
And I just don’t understand
Why must my crew desert me
When I need a guiding hand

— Rush

S.A.T.O. (e.g. Sailing the Acid Trip Ocean) (Ozzy Osbourne, 1981)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qGoQ6AZYfMc —

https://www.google.com/search?q=s.a.t.o.+lyrics
http://egodeath.com/sablyrics.htm#xtocid229130 — Egodeath interpretation

Sailing the Acid-Trip Ocean
Lyrics by Bob Daisley —

Heaven Can Wait (Iron Maiden, 1986)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WKiwU6l6cUY —

Lyrics – Improved Transcription by Michael Hoffman April 12, 2025, for scholarly study.

Can’t understand what is happening to me
This isn’t real, this is only a dream
But I never have felt, no, I never have felt this way before

I’m looking down on my body below
I lie asleep in the midst of a dream
Is it now, could it be, the – Angel of Death has come for me?

I can’t believe that really my time has come
I don’t feel ready, there’s so much left undone
And it’s my soul, and I’m not gonna let it get away [loose cognitive experience of soul (egoic control agency) vanishing]

Heaven can wait
Heaven can wait
Heaven can wait
Heaven can wait ’til another day

I have a lust for the Earth below
And Hell itself is my only foe
‘Cause I’ve no fear of dying; I’ll –
Go when I’m good and ready

I snatch a glimpse of the lights eternal rays
I see a tunnel, I stand amazed
At all of the people standing there in front of me

Into the paths of rightness I’ll be led
Is this the place where the living join the dead?
I wish I knew this was only just a nightmare [not just a temporary Mystery Religion terror trip initiation awe; produces mental model maturation: permanent modification of conscious foundation of source of control thoughts]

Take my hand, I’ll lead you to the promised land
Take my hand, I’ll give you immortality
Eternal youth, I’ll take you to the other side
To see the truth, the path for you is decided [non-branching worldline in block universe 4D spacetime per eternalism and Minkowski; {snake frozen in rock}]

My body tingles, I feel so strange [acid effect]
I feel so tired, I feel so drained
And I’m wondering if I’ll ever be the same again [yes and no, after the foundation of control-thought source is re-conceived]

Is this in limbo or Heaven or Hell?
Maybe I’m going down there as well
I can’t accept my soul will drift forever

I feel myself floating back down to Earth
So could this be the hour of my rebirth
Or have I died or will I wake from dreaming?

Source: LyricFind

Songwriters: Stephen/ Percy/ Harris

Heaven Can Wait lyrics © BMG Rights Management

Key Lyrics about Psychedelic Eternalism

https://egodeathyahoogroup.wordpress.com/2021/01/09/egodeath-yahoo-group-digest-105/#message5359 — lists several songs:

Destiny planned out
Speculation of the wise
— Blizzard of Ozz, “Believer”

To see the truth:
The path for you is decided
— Iron Maiden, “Heaven Can Wait”

All preordained, a prisoner in chains
A victim of venomous fate
— Rush, “Freewill”

I’ve been stricken by fate
Wrapped up tight, cannot move, can’t break free
Hand of doom has a tight grip on me
— Metallica, “Trapped Under Ice”

/ end of lyric

See Also

I even already have a Site Map section for Houot b/c there’s some overlap between the Egodeath theory & Houot’s topics.

Toward a Philosophy of Psychedelic Technology: An Exploration of Fear, Otherness, and Control (Houot, 2019)

Dissert:
Toward a Philosophy of Psychedelic Technology: An Exploration of Fear, Otherness, and Control (Houot, 2019)

Phenomenology for Psychedelic Researchers: A Review of Current Methods & Practices (Houot, 2021)

As always, the title is good to project your wishes onto – the actual content might be disappointing, not useful. Imagine how awesome this article! Do not look at actual article.

Phenomenology for Psychedelic Researchers: A Review of Current Methods & Practices
A. M. Houot, 2021
Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research
18 Pages
https://www.academia.edu/58774354/Phenomenology_for_Psychedelic_Researchers_A_Review_of_Current_Methods_and_Practices
todo: create a new page real quick, seems a GREAT technique

The Psychonaut’s Ship: Pairing Technologies with Psychedelics to Augment User Agency (Houot, 2022)

Article:
The Psychonaut’s Ship: Pairing Technologies with Psychedelics to Augment User Agency (Houot, 2022)
I used Siri Voice 4 (b/c quite smooth) to robo-read aloud to me this article several times.

Rise of the Psychonaut: Maps for Amateurs, Nonscientists and Explorers in the Psychedelic Age of Discovery (Houot, 2025)

Book:
Rise of the Psychonaut: Maps for Amateurs, Nonscientists and Explorers in the Psychedelic Age of Discovery (Houot, 2025)

Search this site for “Houot”:
https://egodeaththeory.org/?s=houot

Site Map > Houot:
https://egodeaththeory.org/nav/#Alan-Houot

Dionysus, the Pilot Who Honors Dionysus and Lives, and the Captain Who Doesn’t Honor Dionysus and Dies

image Search: Dionysus and the Pirates
https://www.google.com/search?q=dionysus+pirates&udm=2

Michael Hoffman, March 28, 2025

Contents:

These links might work on desktop Chrome & Edge only.
todo: add anchor to each heading, re-gen toc

• Motivation for this Page
• Huggins Pours Gasoline on the Battle Between Us “Science” Advocates vs. the Bad, “Religion” Advocates
• Keyboard shortcuts: “transformation gate” variants, eg: Psilocybin cybernetic transformation gate
• Stained Glass Window Panels at Canterbury, “Bible Scenes”
• Field of Mushrooms Stained Glass Window
• Max Freakout Interviewed Jan Irvin in 2009 on Psychonautica Podcast – EPIC!!
• Jewish Views on Astrology in Ancient Times (Video interview video, Chris Brennan, Justin Sledge)
• Our Brand of Mystery Religion:
• Their Brand of Mystery Religion:
• Full Noah’s Ark at Canterbury
• what is that if not a mushroom
• Mission in Line with Rise of the Psychonaut
• Mission & Central Target Audience/ User Persona: Equip Cognitive Scientists for the Psilocybin State
• Doing Opposite of Houot’s Divisiveness
• I Tell You that You Are an Undesirable if You
• Don’t be dogmatic and limited thinking – You Can’t do My Pure Scientist Exploring Unless You Are Pure and Healthy (and Open Minded, Rational, and Mature — Like Me)
• The Divisive Mentality in Psychedelic Science
• Don’t Be Divisive Like Those “Secret Amanita Paradigm” Jerks
• The Egodeath Theory Successfully Bridges & Reconciles Science & Religion; STEM & Spirituality; Explanation & Myth
• Error: Says Thomas Roberts Taught Univ Psychedelics Course Longest; Jerry Brown Actually did
• Do Not Read this Book Unless You Already Use the Narrow Approach I Articulate and Are on My Side Against the Enemies, who are [Long List of All Approaches Ever]
• –> by order of Houot
• Test of Whether Cybermonk Is so Negative
• Bifurcation in the Field and Book, Egged on by Houot & James Kent, matt j, c letheby–: Houot Makes it Personal and Entrenched Sides Fighting Each Other – Yet Tries to Welcome the Uneducated – INCOHERENT, self contradiction strategies
• They Want to Fight: If You Are in the Spirituality Shaman Group-Trip, Mystic, or Cognitive Enhancement crowd, Sacred, Divine, or any other approach, DO NOT READ MY BOOK, YOU ARE THE ENEMY
• The Psychedelic War Between Science vs. Religion -ok, A. M. Whooahhhh “Ego Death & Dionysus are Stupid”
• My Emails with James Kent about Psychedelic Information Theory: Shamanism in the Age of Reason (2010)
• PIT (James Kent, 2010)
• “Either You are Religious, or Secular and Explorative”
• “I Wouldn’t Dismiss Religion, or I’d Be Dogmatic; I’m Open-Minded (on this page)”
• “Ditch the Stupid Religion, Loser”
• “My Boxed-in Motive Is Correct, Scientific, and Open Minded; Your Boxed-in Motive Is Wrong, Religious, and Closed Minded”
• Rational Psychonauts Avoid Anything that Sounds Esoteric or Religious
  • Sounds Like James Kent’s Simple-Minded/ Intellectually Lazy, Scorched-Earth Dismissal
• “A Secular Psychonaut Wouldn’t Want to Explore Religious Realms”
• Houston We Have a Problem: Disrespects Readers
• Rise of the Churlish, Arrogant, Hubristic Psychonaut
• Michael Pollan, Expert Writer on Psychedelic Science: “Don’t write if you know the answer”
• The Churlish, Offensive Online Tone of “I Am Superior: I am a Naturalist, Atheist, Rationalist”
• Rise of the Arrogant Psychonaut
• The Egodeath Theory is Warmly Welcoming to all Little, Unworthy, Muddle-Headed Regular People
• Houot’s Rational Psychonaut God-Complex & “RationalPsychonaut” BAGGAGE – What Are We Signing onto Here, Mystery Package Deal – HARD PASS
• I Advise You, Houot, Stop Overusing Personal Pronouns in Your Advocacy to Me
• What Page # Is “If You Use any Metaphor Other than {Sailing Ship Explorer of External Planet or Space Exploration}, Put This Book Down, It’s Not for You”?
• Pronounced WHOO-OOOAAHH!
• 🤦‍♂️
• Pronunciation of A. M. Houot: Ooh Oh; “If You Are Human, Put this Book Down, It’s Not for You” –> WHOOOOOOAAHHH!! –> Ooh-Oh; A. M. Ooh-Oh

Motivation for this Page

Concept of the focus of this page: I am focusing my target audience in context of Houot’s call for a STEM Scientist Explorer “pure exploration” approach in HARSH opposition to any whiff of childish immature mentally ill spiritual religious esoteric approach to psychedelics. My problem to work out is,

Am I only targeting Cognitive Scientists, only trying to equip THEM to endure the Psilocybin state of loose cognition, telling ONLY them what to do – or what God will make them do – when God pulls them through the transformation gate?

I don’t divide up PEOPLE like Houot does. I think in terms of approaches: a dubious mysticism approach, a dubious Science approach – for ALL audience. Houot usually makes mistake of “us vs them”, he makes it personal:

• We good people use the correct, mature, Science approach.
• You bad ppl use the incorrect, immature, mentally ill, Religion-people / spirituality-people / mystics approach.

Yes, I – the Egodeath theory — do COMPARABLE values and criticisms, but it’s different. I welcome and speak to everyone. I don’t make it personal. I criticise the bad behavior of MICA Deniers and their non sequitur arguments.

To read Houot’s book you have to shove Houot aside when he trries to shove YOU aside. You have to read his book DESPITE his sometimes trying to drive you off because you fail to be pure by his measure. Bizarre, autistic. Churlish, no social common sense.

I joke and criticize everyone, but that’s not fundamental to my thinking; I am basically open to everyone – Houot often strikes tone of immature online “We Atheists vs. those bad, Religion people.” Us-vs-them smack talk and prideful advocacy. The worst, antisocial, unculivated, rude – I am rude and critical but not the same way.

Surely these is nothing; merely surface style? I don’t hear Houot emphasizing reconcilation. I am fundamentally reconciling.

Huggins Pours Gasoline on the Battle Between Us “Science” Advocates vs. the Bad, “Religion” Advocates

No way does my development idea development for the Egodeath theory do that. I am fundamnetally ….

• the Mytheme theory = humanities/ myth/ religion/ spirituality/ mysticism. floating surface, sits on top of the cybernetic theory basis.
• the cybernetic theory = STEM – the foundation basis.

• the cybernetic theory = STEM;
• the Mytheme theory = humanities/ myth/ religion/ spirituality/ mysticism.

See, I am fundmanetally BOTH HALVES: my right leg STEM on ground, lifted is my left, mysticism/myth leg.

Houot comes across as no aptitude for reconciling here. He eggs on the bifurcation of Us Rational Naturalists vs. the Bad Religion Woo People.

He pours gasoline on the flames of Junk “Science” vs. Junk “Religion” perma battle. He takes sides in an immature way.

Keyboard shortcuts: “transformation gate” variants, eg: Psilocybin cybernetic transformation gate

technique demo: here i am building up some long keyboard shortcuts by first defining component shorter keyboard shortcuts:

Psilocybin cybernetic transformation gate
pctg

transformation gate
tg

guarded transformation gate
gtg

guarded Psilocybin cybernetic transformation gate
gpctg

cybernetic transformation gate
ctg

cybernetic
cyb

pass through gate
ptg

Psilocybin transformation gate
pxg

cybernetic Psilocybin transformation gate
cptg

How to End the Mysticism Wars in Psychedelic Science
Chris Letheby, Jaipreet Mattu, and Eric Hochstein
2024
Palgrave Handbook of Philosophy and Psychoactive Drug Use
https://www.academia.edu/124791282/How_to_End_the_Mysticism_Wars_in_Psychedelic_Science

[5:26 pm Mar. 28, 2025] AFTER I created & uploaded here & then sent that picture crop url to R., I AFTERWARDS looked for mushroom in that crop, certainly not expecting one, b/c I didn’t see one during discovering the pretty window and croppping it the past few minutes.

Then I texted to R.:

“just messin, wanted to send u pretty pic of altered state turmoil ark w/ calming dove, then i thought there better be msh – j/k but — take a look at lower left. ez like falling over a log“

remote link to full pic
https://www.canterbury-archaeology.org.uk/wp-content/gallery/bible-window/4624377323.jpg
https://www.canterbury-archaeology.org.uk/bible-windows

Stained Glass Window Panels at Canterbury, “Bible Scenes”

https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parable_of_the_Sower – picture from: By Jules & Jenny from Lincoln, UK – Canterbury Cathedral, window nXV detail, CC BY 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=80090623

Features:

• top tree is YI, with {cut right trunk}.
• left hand points 4 fingers up at Left, branching part of tree, and L foot is under that.
• right hand points down to ground.
• bottom tree is YI, visually {cut right branch} cross-behind.

Field of Mushrooms Stained Glass Window

https://mg.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andro_Antenatenany – got it! giant 1.7 MB jpg, 3 KB x 3 KB px on my drive, from Wiki in the Malagsy language of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Madagascar big island east of Africa.

Have I seen this at Entheos gallery??

Features:

• orange left mushroom-tree: {cut right trunk}.
• orange left mushroom-tree: {cut left trunk}; symmetry between the two trees.
• orange stem, blue crown mushroom-tree: {cut right trunk} which is a form of YI branching form mushroom-tree.
• white, bottom mushroom-tree: no trunk.

Features:

• {cut right trunk}
• YI form, therefore.
• Noted features for Huggins’ Foraging: Section 3: Schematized trees:
• Trident branches support crown:
• L branch = possibilism-thinking
• R branch = eternalism-thinking
• Middle branch = balanced combination; qualified possibilism-thinking

Foraging for Psychedelic Mushrooms in the Wrong Forest: The Great Canterbury Psalter as a Medieval Test Case (Ronald Huggins, 2024) https://www.academia.edu/118659519/Foraging_for_Psychedelic_Mushrooms_in_the_Wrong_Forest_The_Great_Canterbury_Psalter_as_a_Medieval_Test_Case & https://egodeaththeory.org/2024/11/23/huggins-foraging-psychedelic-mushrooms-wrong-forest/
Section 3: Schematized trees
https://egodeaththeory.org/2025/02/17/y-branches-under-mushroom-tree-cap-two-legs-for-psychedelic-virtual-freewill/#3-Schematized-Trees

• I have seen this “field of mushrooms” before – is it in my WordPress gallery? doubt.

I have seen – from Jan Irvin? the bottom middle: “field of mushrooms”.

I think Jan Irvin mentions that picture in the interview w/ Max Freakout.

Jan Irvin SAID IN THE INTERVIEW HE ONLY PUBLISHED 1/10 OF HIS COLLECTION IN THE GALLERY IN The Holy Mushroom.

Max Freakout Interviewed Jan Irvin in 2009 on Psychonautica Podcast – EPIC!! 🤯

I listened yesterday Mar. 27, 2025 for 2nd time, 1st time that I recall listening to that episode is is Dec. 2024.

Great episode.

Jan Irvin has just finished writing The Holy Mushroom: Evidence of Mushrooms in Judeo-Christianity (Jan Irvin, 2008) https://www.amazon.com/dp/1439215170

Jan Irvin told Max Freakout that he had finished some edition of AstroSham – either “2005/2006” 1st Edition, or, 2009 2nd Edition.

Jan Irvin
ji

Jewish Views on Astrology in Ancient Times (Video interview video, Chris Brennan, Justin Sledge)

brennan’s ch is awesome in that it has TIMESTAMPS praise the Lord.

01:07:30 Astrology and Fate become entwined
01:08:17 Apocalyptic Judaism
01:10:58 Debates in Christianity about astrology and fate <=== — transcript of this whole section :

Debates in Christianity about astrology and fate

CB:

“… even though there’s that story in Matthew that’s using astrology basically in order to put a foundation under Christianity within contemporary Mediterranean culture by saying astrology confirms that this guy is actually the Messiah or this guy is the son of God.

“After the first century, it seems like there became these debates within Christianity.

“And later Christian authors had to find ways to kind of downplay that story because there was a theological issue that became front and center for several centuries about astrology being associated with fate but the concept of free will and choice being theologically very important.

“And therefore, a lot of Christian polemics ended up being directed against astrology because of its association with fate and predetermination and things like that.

“And it seems like we get some of that in the Jewish tradition in this time period at the same time.

“So what is the time frame of the Talmud? And what is the significance of that in terms of Jewish culture and literature?

JS: “Yeah. So after the destruction of the temple.”

/ end of section/transcript

As I yelled aloud in other video against Brennan — and then Sledge said the exact same words that I just said:

ALL brands of religion disparaged the other brands as “they make you a slave of fate, imprisoned in cosmic heimarmene, only OUR brand transcends Fatedness 😑”

Our Brand of Mystery Religion:
🏆😑👍
🌌
🪐

Their Brand of Mystery Religion:
🌌
🪐
💥😞👎

Citation: Cosmology and Fate in Gnosticism and Graeco-Roman Antiquity: Under Pitiless Skies (Nicola Denzey Lewis, 2013) https://www.amazon.com/Cosmology-Fate-Gnosticism-Graeco-Roman-Antiquity/dp/9004245480/
nl13

mystery religion
mr

Section of the interview, with transcript:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0i4uI7gFEpw&t=233s — 111

I did not know that this video is w/ Chris Brennan, astrology history book author, not only w/ Dr. Justin Sledge https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0i4uI7gFEpw — like the 2013 book by Nicola Denzy Lewis that I posted a great tight mini-review in 2014 at Amazon.
https://www.amazon.com/Cosmology-Fate-Gnosticism-Graeco-Roman-Antiquity/dp/9004245480/
Not expensive like the $145 ripoff book by Wouter “Star Destroyer” Hanegraaff that doesn’t even come with stars!; just $200.
hahaha Brill, like Dr. Justin Sledge jokes about 🤑💰 – Why is tuition so high these days? 🤔🤷‍♂️

“Cosmology and Fate in Gnosticism and Graeco-Roman Antiquity: Under Pitiless Skies (Nag Hammadi and Manichaean Studies, 81)
by Nicola Denzey Lewis (Author)
5.0 5.0 out of 5 stars (1) <– only a single lone autistic dork reviewed it?! oh its me😞

“In Cosmology and Fate in Gnosticism and Graeco-Roman Antiquity, Nicola Denzey Lewis dismisses Hans Jonas’ mischaracterization of second-century Gnosticism as a philosophically-oriented religious movement built on the perception of the cosmos as negative or enslaving.

“A focused study on the concept of astrological fate in

• “Gnostic” writings including
• the Apocryphon of John, the recently-discovered
• Gospel of Judas,
• Trimorphic Protennoia, and the
• Pistis Sophia,

this book reexamines their language of “enslavement to fate (Gk: heimarmene)” from its origins in

• Greek Stoicism, its deployment by the
• apostle Paul, to its later use by
• a variety of second-century intellectuals (both Christian and non-Christian).

“Denzey Lewis thus offers an informed and revisionist conceptual map of the ancient cosmos, its influence, and all those who claimed to be free of its potentially pernicious effects.”

/ end blurb

keyboard shortcuts:

Amazon
amz

Academia.edu
acae

Full Noah’s Ark at Canterbury

what is that if not a mushroom

But there’s no way that artist painted a mushroom, or else there’d be other windows there next to it that also have mushrooms — WHICH THERE ARE.

When you see the threat that is the the uncontrollable source of control-thoughts, what to do? Be specific, what are you then made to do?

How does egoic freewill thinking always remain, but now, qualified to be stable?

Benefit from Houot’s errors in not bringing together all approaches. Do opposite of Houot approach, in my advocacy of a Loose Cognitive Science approach informed by the Mytheme theory.

Bridging the Two Parties that Want to Fight

Removed the deservedly scathing analysis from my Rise of the Psychonaut book review page, moved it here, to transform it into CONSTRUCTIVE LESSONS LEARNED.

May I be not like that.

Mission in Line with Rise of the Psychonaut

“Charting a travel map”; defining my own field of Loose Cognitive Science; defining my own audience of Loose Cognitive Scientists

I doubt Ooh-Oh’s emphasis on the “travel explorer” metaphor, my assessment of the cultural situation: 

I’m the only one who knows what an actual “Cognitive Science/ Cognitive Phenomenology approach” really is, and actually uses that approach.”  

My imagined target audience for my theory of mental transformation is “Cognitive Scientists”.

The field of Cognitive Science is doing Cognitive Science wrong and doesn’t know what [switching to my term] Loose Cognitive Science, actually means.

What the field of so-called “Cognitive Science” is doing is just merely reductionist Neuroscience pretending to be Cognitive – an empty Marketing label.

As Ooh-Oh calls for, I am now mapping and charting — I am packaging and final-drafting my existing map & chart — the Psilocybin control-transformation experience, for an audience of Psychedelic Cognitive Scientists (I am defining what that needs to mean) and for a general audience,

to suitably equip and help people endure and cope with the {gate guard} {shadow dragon monster} and {pass through the gate}, 

employing and explaining religious myth & medieval art motifs as analogies serving to clarify and explain, 

but the needed scientific map is not based on myth; the useful explanatory model (“map”) is based on direct STEM-type explanatory model communication.  

Religious myth is analogies describing Psilocybin experience (that’s where religious myth comes from).

A map of the Psilocybin transformation experience must leverage myth as a map guiding people through Psilocybin transformation.

https://egodeaththeory.org/2025/02/25/idea-development-page-25/#Equip-Cog-Scientists-for-Psilocybin-State

Mission & Central Target Audience/ User Persona: Equip Cognitive Scientists for the Psilocybin State

Now, my driving mission, most of all, is to equip Cognitive Scientists to endure and use the altered state, so that they can explore it for Science.  

That is my defined target audience.  If I can provide for their needs, that covers everyone’s needs.  

That’s my strategic audience focus, who I can most relate to & provide for, in terms that they relate to.

Book: Rise of the Psychonauts, even though my official focused mission — equip Cog Sci for scientific exploration —  exactly aligns with (Houot) the author’s concept.

Mission, in line with Houot’s book: 

Provide a useful explanatory model of control transformation in the Psilocybin state, 

to enable Cognitive Scientists to generally explore and research cognitive phenomenology in the Psilocybin state, 

including explaining religious myth and medieval art motifs as analogies describing personal control-model transformation driven by the altered state.

What looks like “loss of control” prior to passing through the transformation gate, from the point of view afterwards looks like control transformation; transformation of the mental model of personal control & of branching possibilities with steering power.

I have stable control — if God wills it.

Doing Opposite of Houot’s Divisiveness

Dubious “travel explorer” metaphor overused, what else you got?

As book club participlants said, the book seems to use a heavy-handed over-emphasis specifically on the analogy of “travel exploration“.

Doesn’t that contradict Oh Ow’s disparagement of the “trip” metaphor?

In my experience, which probably is much greater than Oh Ow’s experience, I have NEVER used the metaphor of “travel exploration”.

(Compare: Participlants said “I never encountered space-entities like Oh Ow focuses on.”)

Mushroom Formats

How much ground mushrooms it’s possible to pack into a double-zero gelcap (half gram),

and good chocolate format

I Tell You that You Are an Undesirable if You

• never ingested psychedelics
• take psychedelics for therapeutic purposes – if there is anything wrong w/ you, do not read this book. It is for the sane and healthy; other people are not welcome here. only for PURE explorers; this book is only for the Pure people. Sick people do not do pure exploration, so, do not read this book unless you are perfectly well in all ways – you fail to meet my criteria.
• take psychedelics for recreational purposes
• take psychedelics for religious purposes
• take psychedelics for spiritual growth purposes
• take psychedelics for personal growth purposes
• take psychedelics for cognitive enhancement purposes <– go away, losers!
• take psychedelics for creativity-inspirational purposes <- you are the enemy
• take psychedelics for self-actualizing purposes

“With that said, my message will not resonate with everyone.” He doesn’t even tell his message to everyone – like Jesus, he only came to save those who already follow him.

Houot emphat’ly makes it personal. vs critique limits of approaches.

Don’t be dogmatic and limited thinking – You Can’t do My Pure Scientist Exploring Unless You Are Pure and Healthy (and Open Minded, Rational, and Mature — Like Me)

ch 2 26:00 “ONLY AFTER YOU HAVE REACHED A STATE OF RELATIVE WELLNESS PRIOR TO CONSUMPTION, ONLY THEN CAN THEY ADOPT AN EXPLORATION ROLE, / ARE YOU CAPABLE OF EXPLORATION. There’s no correct way OR motive to take a psychedelics; and supposing so is dogmatic and represents limited thinking.”

— UNBELIEVABLE Houot, and incoherent, WHERE IS YOUR MOTHER TO EDIT YOU, you need to work out your own demons and contradictions, you keep contradicting yourself. Reconcile your inner conflicts, Houot, lecturing people incoherently.

I , Michael Hoffman , have a history of dysfunctional perfectionism, incl beating up on myself.

DYSFUNCTIONAL PERFECTIONISM/ IDEALISM by Houot. result is churlish, clumsy, ROUGH HEWN technologist, no P R skills.

Matt Johnson & Chris Letheby beating up on mystics. pushing their Correct wway, their Way of Hardcore Materialism – rational healthy ppl use our way. Divisive

The Divisive Mentality in Psychedelic Science

Don’t Be Divisive Like Those “Secret Amanita Paradigm” Jerks

I, the Egodeath theory, criticize but I build bridges. am i like Houot?

Let’s have the engineers run the Marketing dept.

How to Win Friends and Influence People https://www.amazon.com/How-Win-Friends-Influence-People/dp/0671027034/ —

The Egodeath Theory Successfully Bridges & Reconciles Science & Religion; STEM & Spirituality; Explanation & Myth

he later weakly makes reconcilation noises, too late.

critique should aim towards reconcile. I condemn this and that, and, I reconcile to fix the bifurcation and reach integration after correction.

Houot’s error — that of both sides in the fight — is to my benefit, ok. shrug

Error: Says Thomas Roberts Taught Univ Psychedelics Course Longest; Jerry Brown Actually did

ch 3 14:00

Do Not Read this Book Unless You Already Use the Narrow Approach I Articulate and Are on My Side Against the Enemies, who are [Long List of All Approaches Ever]

Ooh-Oh, pronounced WHOO-OOOAAHH!, massively botches his logic and ends up rejecting & turning away 150% of all categories of people on Earth.

Please put this book down if you’ve never ingested psychedelics or if you take them for therapeutic, recreational, religious, spiritual growth, personal growth, cognitive enhancement, creativity-inspirational, or self-actualizing purposes. It’s not for you

With that said, my message will not resonate with everyone.

p. 10

Yessir ok,

📘 –> 🗑
by order of Houot 🤷‍♂️

also Houot: i’m here to help you even if you are uneducated. Incoherent approach. Imagine him making instructional video: you are not allowed to hear my advocacy if you don’t already fully agree with the approach I advocate.

Test of Whether Cybermonk Is so Negative

Have I had the attitude:

Please do not study the Egodeath theory if you’ve never ingested psychedelics or if you take them for therapeutic, recreational, religious, spiritual growth, personal growth, cognitive enhancement, creativity-inspirational, or self-actualizing purposes. It’s not for you.

With that said, my message will not resonate with everyone.

Bifurcation in the Field and Book, Egged on by Houot & James Kent, matt j, c letheby–: Houot Makes it Personal and Entrenched Sides Fighting Each Other – Yet Tries to Welcome the Uneducated – INCOHERENT, self contradiction strategies

Houot did not invent the spilt. He eggs it on to exacerbate it, p. 10.

The page 10 disaster reflects the perpetuation of war between junk “science” vs junk “religion” approaches, but he makes it personal: the scientists vs the religionists. if you —

error 2: he classifies cognitive enhancement with stupid mystic shaman bad approach fWR WTF doesn’t even divide sensibly. trip is bad, explore is good. but personalizes: trip metaphro users are bad, go away; explorer metaphor users are good.

I advocate 1 approach of 100, therefore, I tell 99 % of PEOPLE: do not read my book.

To describe my approach I am advocating – , I shall identify the 150% (( his categs don’t make sense) of people who should not read my book.

I am not advocating this approach to everyone; I am ONLY advocating this approach to the 1% of people – after I drove off incoherently defined set of 150% of ppl — who already agree with me.

SUCH PERSUASION TECHNIQUE!

this keyboard is litrally falling apart under my fingers, mac butterfly garbage worst keyboard ever, too noisy for the classroom, too – embarr.

The Mysticism Wars – aggressive Matt Johnson and Chris Letheby when Letheby is not tripping and telling us “only mind exists”

bifurc in Letheby’s head

The ridiculous extremist materilaist nsci scinegi scientist materialist rationalists vs the woo, wooly headed mystics – extremist charaicature.

They Want to Fight: If You Are in the Spirituality Shaman Group-Trip, Mystic, or Cognitive Enhancement crowd, Sacred, Divine, or any other approach, DO NOT READ MY BOOK, YOU ARE THE ENEMY

quote p 10 insane list of bad people/approaches that must not be used ~

then says “that approach is ok, ” – but do not read this book, you are the enemy.

The Psychedelic War Between Science vs. Religion 🤜💥🤛 -ok, A. M. Whooahhhh “Ego Death & Dionysus are Stupid”

Thank you for the opportunity for the Egodeath theory to be the bridge that you failed to build. I am learning from and leveraging Houot’s error and failure to integrate the two “incompatible” approaches or realms of concern.

My page:
Moving Past Mysticism: Theory of Psychedelic Eternalism Provides Scientific Basis, Superseding “Mysticism, Meditation, & Psychotherapy” Framework
Includes section about article:
How to End the Mysticism Wars in Psychedelic Science (Letheby 2024)

Alan Houot says there’s no right way to use psychedelics, and yet, also says the opposite, contradicting himself, not presenting a reconciled package that’s integrated.

p 10: 99% of readers, do not read my book. later, he is reconciliatory, “we should open mind re religion” – CONTRADICTING HIMSELF.

Clumsy, incoherent, inconsistent.

James Kent treated my Myth decoding as garbage anathema against his anti-psychedelic, demonization of religion/myth/ psychedelics.

Transcendent Knowledge podcast with Max Freakout & Cyberdisciple:

• Episode 22, February 23, 2020 – James Kent (DoseNation) part 6
• Episode 21, February 16, 2020 – James Kent (DoseNation) part 5
• Episode 20, February 9, 2020 – James Kent (DoseNation) part 4
• Episode 19, Feb 2, 2020 – James Kent (DoseNation) part 3
• Episode 18, Jan 24, 2020 – James Kent (DoseNation) part 2
• Episode 17, Jan 14, 2020 – James Kent (DoseNation) part 1

My Emails with James Kent about Psychedelic Information Theory: Shamanism in the Age of Reason (2010)

I emailed James Kent again the other day a few years ago (vs. in 2006 when I reviewed Kent’s PIT book draft for him):

Me: “Hey Kent, check out my decoding of the real referent of religious myth!”

Kent: “Myth? Yuck! Religion is stupidity.”

Thus was born my quip, “Psychedelics make people closed-minded.”

I hate mystic writings mode, but I do not declare war in that bifurcated way.

I criticize Cog Sci as much as Mysticism.

I criticize the WAY science is done, and the WAY religion is done.

I don’t stupidly, in lazy low IQ way, blanket glorify / dismissal or dumbly take pre-fabricated sides:

“SCIENCE IS GOOD, RELIGION IS BAD”
or
“Religion is good; Science is bad.”

Search this site for “Psychedelic Information Theory”:
https://egodeaththeory.org/?s=%22Psychedelic+Information+Theory%22

PIT (James Kent, 2010)

keyboard shortcut:

Psychedelic Information Theory: Shamanism in the Age of Reason (James Kent, 2010) https://www.amazon.com/Psychedelic-Information-Theory-Shamanism-Reason/dp/1453760172/
jk10

Psychedelic Information Theory: Shamanism in the Age of Reason
James Kent, October 5, 2010
https://www.amazon.com/Psychedelic-Information-Theory-Shamanism-Reason/dp/1453760172/ –

Blurb: sounds like the typical “Cognitive Neuroscience Minus Cognitive” approach:

“Psychedelic Information Theory is a formal analysis of the physical mechanisms underlying hallucination, shamanic ritual, and expanded states of consciousness.”

[no telling what anyone means by ‘consciousness’; not my cog cybernetic phen’y]

“Written by James L. Kent, this text was researched for over 20 years and includes over 200 references and 31 images related to the latest science in the diverse fields of pharmacology, shamanism, and perception.

“As a succinct yet comprehensive formal analysis of the nonlinear dynamics of hallucination and shamanic ritual, Psychedelic Information Theory is destined to become the modern textbook on psychedelic phenomena.

“Chapters include information on

• the physiology of perception,
• types of visual hallucination,
• psychedelic pharmacology,
• psychedelic neuroplasticity,
• chaos theory,
• shamanic therapy,
• shamanic sorcery, and
• group mind phenomena related to psychedelic consciousness.

“Psychedelic Information Theory will prove, no doubt, to be an important work primarily because it provides researchers, in both the sciences and humanities, with numerous new avenues down which to investigate.

“PIT provides us with a serious, and in many respects successful, recalibration of the different psychedelic knowledge bases.

In great respect to the author, I believe PIT will attract both plaudits and criticism with equal fervour and, in doing so, help proliferate serious psychedelic research for some time to come.”

– Rob Dickens, PsyPressUK.com Review, December 2010

“In his new book, Psychedelic Information Theory: Shamanism in the Age of Reason, James Kent has attempted to describe both the experience and underlying mechanisms of consciousness, in the language of classical wave mechanics, with terms like neural oscillators, periodic drivers, wave entrainment, resonance and coherence.

“His book offers the first steps in developing a more refined and quantifiable theory and terminology of psychedelic action.

“It suggests many rich opportunities for further research that are bound to reveal some pragmatic and novel applications.

“Not since “The Invisible Landscape,” by the McKenna brothers, have I found a book so original and propitious.”

– Jedi Mind Traveler, Evolver.net Interview, January 2011

“James L. Kent has proven himself to be the ‘Mythbuster‘ of the New Psychedelic Age.

“His book, Psychedelic Information Theory is the everyman’s guide to inner consciousness, unraveling the scientific foundations of altered states.

“PIT challenged my views on the psychedelic experience: I might not agree with some of the conclusions, but I have a firmer grip on the basics because of it.

“Kent helps outline the mechanics of the mind, but his reductionist approach also leaves room for further mysteries to grow.”- Rak Razam, author of Aya: A Shamanic Odyssey, November 2010

“Kent’s clear trail through volumes of research gave me a solid understanding of how rod and cone vision, phosphenes, the visual information processing rate, and the brain’s pattern-recognition function all come together or come apart to modulate hallucinatory states.

“Kent deserves a place next to Grof on the psychonaut’s, scientist’s, and psychologist’s bookshelf.”

– Sheldon Norberg, author of Healing Houses, Erowid.org Review, October 2010

/ end blurb for PIT

“Either You are Religious, or Secular and Explorative”

Houot writes:

“Of course, we’ll see some people who take psychedelics for recreational, religious, and therapeutic reasons convert to the more secular common explorative motive proposed here.”

“When I say secular psychonaut, what I mean is that your religious beliefs or any other strongly held belief system does not spill over into your explorative use of psychedelics.”

“I Wouldn’t Dismiss Religion, or I’d Be Dogmatic; I’m Open-Minded (on this page)”

“Atheism, or a disbelief that a God or God’s exist, is for me just as dogmatic as mainstream religion.

“I approach psychedelics as an agnostic, that is, someone who does not know either way, but is open to considering all possibilities.

“While my approach and I think any explorers approach to psychedelics should lean secular, I am at least open to the idea that that which I encounter just might be religious or turn out to be communication with God, gods, angels, or demons.

[Page 91]

“Terrence McKenna says: “I call myself an explorer rather than a scientist, because the area that I’m looking at contains insufficient data to support even the dream of being a science.” …” 

[page 92 top]

McK:

“The mindset that I always bring to it is simply exploratory and Baconian–the mapping and gathering of facts.”

— footnote 23 : McKenna 1991, page 36. 

1991 book: The archaic revival: speculations on psychedelic mushrooms, the Amazon, virtual reality, UFOs, evolution, shamanism, the rebirth of the goddess, and the end of history.

[Page 94]

Houot writes:

“Most ordinary folks won’t know how to operate let alone interpret the results of fancy laboratory equipment.

“They can, however, enter visionary places, look around, and tell the rest of us what that realm is like: how the experience unfolded, what was possible in that realm, what kinds of things they saw, what were their entities, and if so , what did they look like, what did they say, what did they want?”

It’s just angel of God saying sacrifice your only son as an offering on altar of sticks, fire, blade, to pass through the gateway:

todo: put side by side w/ St Martin Entry Jerusalem > finger shapes – if not done somewhere already:

“We don’t know what these substances are fully capable of because little research has been done on their visionary effects in a rigorous way.

“We are at the beginning of the psychedelic Renaissance, and the same can be said regarding exploratory research of psychedelics visions.

“Ditch the Stupid Religion, Loser”

“The shift in mindset from recreational, religious, or therapeutic to explorative and scientifically-minded is as much conceptual as it is methodical.

“Ask yourself what you want to get out of psychedelics, for that determines the frame of mind with which you enter these experiences.”

“My Boxed-in Motive Is Correct, Scientific, and Open Minded; Your Boxed-in Motive Is Wrong, Religious, and Closed Minded”

“My vision for the future of psychedelic research is to send astronaut-like explorers out into visionary realms, free from religious, therapeutic, or other boxed-in motives and to engage in pure exploration of these states with open minds.”

“I want to see the exploration, more explicit, direct, and becoming an additional focus of psychedelic science now and in the future.

“I want to see more people embrace the psychonaut explorer mindset as an alternative to the other motive-inspired mindsets people have long had for taking psychedelics.

“I want people to come back with priceless observational data about their journeys to make future users travels safer, more predictable, and as a result, to reduce fear of these experiences.

“I want modern psychedelic users to think about where the future of psychedelic use and research will lead.

“I want you to think about how you can contribute to our collective understanding of these other worldly dimensions in meaningful ways.”

/ end condensed excerpts from
Rise of the Arrogant Psychonaut by A. M.
Whoooooo-oooaahhh! I can’t believe you wrote that!!

Rational Psychonauts Avoid Anything that Sounds Esoteric or Religious

Sounds Like James Kent’s Simple-Minded/ Intellectually Lazy, Scorched-Earth Dismissal

  p 87:

Houot writes:

“Rational psychonauts distance themselves from ordinary, psychedelic users, and psychonauts.

” Their science-based approach is thinking rationally and skeptically to understand and interpret psychedelic experiences. 

“They avoid anything that sounds esoteric, religious or dogmatic.” – dummy Houot: what if I am a theorist successfully delivering an explanatory model explaining the actual nature of religious myth and religious transcendent experience? In that case, using “Science”, I explain myth & religion – not “avoid”. Your word ‘avoid’ is ambiguous, avoid in what sense/way? You are writing statements about religion here, shouldn’t you avoid that topic, because you are being irrational? where do you draw your line? Not articulate enough, “avoid anything that soundds religious”.

Houot writes:

“Rational psychonauts intellectualize their subjective, psychedelic experiences, visions, and the cognitive and physiological mechanisms underlying the production of visions, thinking scientifically and philosophically about the phenomenon and trying to figure out what’s going on overall.

“Researchers [pay attention to ] recreational users versus psychonauts, but they overlook rational psychonauts and their motives.

“Reddit members [of the /RationalPsychonaut forum] subscribe to the rational psychonaut credo :

“A community for sensible discussion of the science of altered states.

“For people interested in exploring in our realms without subscribing to the woo surrounding the topic.”

[page 88]

“Psychedelics cause some people to become mentally unstable or make them believe they met God, they are God, or they’re a messiah with a message.”

  [which does sound like the author, Houot.]

“In accordance with rational psychonaut principles, my highly rational outlook in addition to my scientific and philosophical training grounds me when venturing into visionary states elicited by psychedelics.”

Translation: Hubris: I retain full control of my intentions, because I am rational unlike lesser people.

[Page 89]

“I don’t think that people who take psychedelics for recreational, religious or therapeutic motives are irrational.

“Theologians, gurus, and monks, for example, can appear extremely logical concerning religious and religious and spiritual belief systems.

“I defend [read: disparage] other people’s reasons for taking psychedelics and the ways in which they make sense of them.

“The rational psychonaut approach is essentially what I would like to see more of, but we can do better.”

Houot here equates religious = irrational:

“Secular psychonaut is in line with a non-religious approach to psychedelics which includes undertones of rationality

The widespread secularism found in science and academic disciplines inspired this idea of a secular approach since science and religion butted heads 500 years ago”

Houot uses false dichotomy of unimaginative ‘science’ – conception of ‘science vs. religion’.

That low-grade, poor-quality opposition & false dich got rid of – per Wouter Hanegraaff – esotericism & Psilocybin (entheogenic esotericism) in the dust-up, 1687 Newton Princip, threw discarded psychedelic esotericism.

Not that the Egodeath theory = entheogenic esotericism

The Egodeath theory REPLACES entheogenic esotericism, and replaces common-core mysticism and perennialism, as a communication style and indeterminate grab-bag, messy muddled OBSCURANTISM.

The Egodeath theory IS THE ENEMY OF OBSCURANTISM.

“A Secular Psychonaut Wouldn’t Want to Explore Religious Realms”

Houot writes:

“I like the term secular psychonaut but what if someone religiously inclined wants to explore “religious realms” or “religious experiences“?

“I doubt that this would happen, but who knows, everybody is different.”

[Page 90]

“People can explore psychedelic realms and be religious; yet I don’t consider people who already practice a particular belief system to be explorative because they found what works for them and they’re unlikely to change if indeed they’re genuine believers.”

Believer, by the band Blizzard of Ozz, lyrics by whatsisname: bassist
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y6U-id_iUwQ —

I believe in transformation from possibilism to eternalism.

Houston We Have a Problem: Disrespects Readers

Houot would never talk down to the audience of his dissertation and the two professional article to peers, after that.

But switching to his imagined audience of little people, he is 100% self-defeating. Therefore he needs an editor, when trying to write for a popular audience.

To remember how to pronounce “Houot”:
“Do not read this book if you ever used any of these purposes for psychedelics:”
Reaction: WHOOOOOAAAHHH! 🤦‍♂️🤦‍♂️
Whoooo-oooooh!
Who-Oh
“Ooh-Oh” <–

I am looking forward to the 2nd Edition of this book with page 10 violently torn out by a professional editor, and removing all indicators of “I am talking down to you” that are scattered throughout the book.

An author could not erect a bigger barrier for their own success. Take gun, aim at foot, pull trigger.

Rise of the Churlish, Arrogant, Hubristic Psychonaut

“Do not read this book if you ever used any of these purposes for psychedelics: [lists every known purpose].”

“Hey everyone in the world, go away, you are not worthy of my removing of your ignorance.”

— Houot, entire page 10, & scattered throughout book

Did Houot take writing lessons from the lying, duplicitous, censorious, total jerk Wasson, p. 180, SOMA?

This is just one example; see my 2006 article for more examples of butthead, rude, total jerk, pompous ass Wasson:
Wasson and Allegro on the Tree of Knowledge as Amanita

Con artist Wasson tries to bully people into denying mushroom-trees, which Wasson plainly knows of course are mushrooms, per Ruck Committee’s leak, “Wasson’s conclusion” in “Daturas for the Virgin” p. 56.

Houot is unaccustomed to writing for the unwashed masses of uneducated who lack an advanced degree.

He MAKES SURE to explicitly let everyone know:

“I am talking down to you. I will inform you for the first time. You should start thinking scientifically and rationally. I will teach you how.”

Are Houot’s Ibogaine podcasts so insulting, explicitly talking down to the audience?

Michael Pollan, Expert Writer on Psychedelic Science: “Don’t write if you know the answer”

Houot needs to take writing lessons from Michael Pollan, on how to write for a mass popular audience.

https://michaelpollan.com/about/ –

“In 2003, Pollan was appointed the John S. and James L. Knight Professor of Journalism at UC Berkeley’s Graduate School of Journalism

“and the director of the Knight Program in Science and Environmental Journalism.

“In 2017, he was appointed Professor of the Practice of Non-fiction at Harvard and the university’s first Lewis Chan Lecturer in the Arts.

“In 2020, along with Dacher Keltner and others, he co-founded the
UC Berkeley Center for the Science of Psychedelics.

“The center conducts research using psychedelics to investigate cognition, perception and emotion and their biological bases in the human brain.

“In addition to teaching, he lectures widely on … psychedelic science.”

The Churlish, Offensive Online Tone of “I Am Superior: I am a Naturalist, Atheist, Rationalist”

‘Churlish’ means rude, boorish, lacking in civility or graciousness, unfriendly, unpleasant.

If I post a book review in format below, the first Con would be warning:

Houot tells everyone to not read his book, and he insults the hell out of everyone and talks down like a mo-fo, belittling the reader.

The first thing a professional editor would do is burn page 10 with {fire}: p 10.

I blame the atheist poor P.R. style and the “I am a Rationalist, I am superior” rude internet tone, that he channels. Do not write a book with the worst tone of online smug agressive self-proud “naturalist, atheist, rationalist” tone.

That is the repellent hurdle you have to be charitable toward.

Houot demands that you be charitable toward his hamfisted rude self-defeating attacking of all audiences.

Rise of the Arrogant Psychonaut

Could you talk DOWN any more, oh great master [and eager to present yourself as Great Master over the little minions].

Joke idea: post a page that talks down to some imagined little followers of the Egodeath theory , like Whoo-oooahh talks down to his fantasized little audience – and it IS little, since p. 10 at start shooed all the filthy dirty types of readers, “Put this book down, IT’S NOT FOR THE LIKES OF YOU.”

my Marketing dept advises me to leverage Whooooaaahhh’s error in my favor:

The Egodeath theory is superior because it welcomes all of the little people, it is welcoming to all of the little, irrational, addled-mind followers of my great self.

The Egodeath Theory is Warmly Welcoming to all Little, Unworthy, Muddle-Headed Regular People

I will teach you, my little readers, how to start thinking and how to start being rational, in a more friendly way of stooping and lowering myself to deign to remove your ignorance, than Houot’s writing style.

He picks up this adversarial, us-vs.-them attitude up from the Reddit self-proud and eager to let you know, Reddit forum “RationalPsychonaut” reddit group. (idk the lingo)

Houot’s poor writing tone reminds me of the online “basement” (socially unskilled) atheist community (which no longer exists since Richard Carrier single-handedly blew it up in a couple conferences some years ago), the death knell, “the new atheists” who killed-off atheism, it’s now history.

Carrier single-handedly killed the atheism community by dragging-in toxic “new atheism”. I revisited a few times, unclear what happened – an infiltration of alien agendas, coopting and then killing the host.

Deathly fatal parasitism; New Atheism destroyed atheism in the course of trying to coopt and take over and steer in some completely other direction.

Dislikeable tone, of the Rational Psychonauts: they should be mad at Whoooooaaahhhh! for poorly representing their loudly belittling attitude.

We Rational Psychonauts are better than you, and we’re eager to trumpet our attitude.

Houot’s Rational Psychonaut God-Complex & “RationalPsychonaut” BAGGAGE – What Are We Signing onto Here, Mystery Package Deal – HARD PASS

“A messiah with a message”, Houot accuses – look in the mirror, Whoo-ooaaah!

I Advise You, Houot, Stop Overusing Personal Pronouns in Your Advocacy to Me

Tip: Avoid pronouns. we, us, our, you, me, I — be careful with these words!

You didn’t address professionals with “you” in your two post-dissertation articles.

This book uses a clumsy, awkward, over-personal approach that you are not practiced at, and it flops and backfires, talking down to your readers, many of whom can lecture you.

“Me, I, you” – it’s aggression.

Oooh-Oww really lets his disrespect for the audience, and his self-aggrandizement show through LOUD AND CLEAR by overuse of “I” and “you”.

He’s trying to ADVOCATE his approach by INSULTING the readership directly. How’s that gonna work?

Is there any possibility you could have a professional editor rush a revised 2nd edition? Well no, take a lot of time to fix this framing.

What Page # Is “If You Use any Metaphor Other than {Sailing Ship Explorer of External Planet or Space Exploration}, Put This Book Down, It’s Not for You”?

Pronounced WHOO-OOOAAHH!

p. 10

Incredible, garbled, insulting, self-contradictory, disaster.

No editor on Earth would approve this framing.

🤦‍♂️

I can’t believe what I’m reading.

This is the most adversarial, reader-attacking passage I have ever read.

Then, in case you mistook him as saying “this book is for everyone”, after he’s gunned down 150% of the total possible readership groups, he cautions:

“With that said, my message will not resonate with everyone.”

Oh thanks, I must have misread the entire page above as saying “This book articulates an approach that’s useful and inviting for all people who have emphasized any approach.”

I thought that above the page said that this book will resonate with everyone. Thanks for clarify my misreading.

Pronunciation of A. M. Houot: Ooh Oh; “If You Are Human, Put this Book Down, It’s Not for You” –> WHOOOOOOAAHHH!! –> Ooh-Oh; A. M. Ooh-Oh

[March 22, 2025]

Ooh-Oh: “If you use any metaphor / motive other than my narrow pet metaphor {external world-exploration in a ship}, then PUT THIS BOOK DOWN – IT’S NOT FOR YOU. –>

Every reader gasps: WHOOOOOOAAHHHH! –> Ooh-Oh.

For this page of the book, Houot BADLY needs an editor / P.R. person – what an awful, immature, self-defeating, ill-advised construction! Bad move! Terrible P. R.

Definitely strike that passage and entirely reframe it, in rev 2 of book.

Self-defeating Houot. His own worst enemy.

Also Ooh-Oh: “I slightly question these other metaphors/approaches, they are dogmatic“

LOL! Pot, kettle, black.

He outright demonizes the divine; Transcendent Knowledge; myth as analogy, and then calls other approaches / other writers “dogmatic”.

Who’s dogmatic, Houot?!

Foolish dismissal out of hand, of ANY AND ALL myth-type approaches, as a sweeping class generalization. Immature. Brittle thinking. Black-and-white FALSE DICHOTOMY, intellectually lazy.

It’s lazy and easy for Psychedelic Information Theory author James Kent to blanket dismissal of any and all myth or divine type approaches.

See Transcendent Knowledge Podcast (Max Freakout in discussion with Cyberdisciple) episodes reacting to James Kent podcast series:
https://egodeaththeory.org/2020/11/07/transcendent-knowledge-podcast-episodes/#Episode-22

lol Houot just said “be playful, fun, interesting” – Mr. Flat Affect, social-skills-challenged, STEM-based critic poor at P R; churlish, clumsy, and self-contradictory.

An ancient Greek Mysteries festival. I’ve met some of the participants at my church.

Rumored: Dr. Secret & the Evil M. Hoffman will be there:
Carl Ruck & Mark Hoffman.

I am not familiar with this long-running festival. My site isn’t one to announce events, but there are exceptions – my psychedelic church members told me about this event.

https://www.springmysteries.com —

“Since 1985, Aquarian Tabernacle Church has been continuing the Eleusinian Mysteries originally held in Ancient Greece.

“These mysteries, held every year in honor of Demeter and Persephone, explore universal concepts and truths from the perspective of the seeker of hidden knowledge.

“Our Priests and Priestesses spend 3-4 months preparing for the festival, working with the energies of the Gods and rehearsing the ritual drama that is presented over 4 days for hundreds of people each Easter Weekend.

“Though the main portions of the event focus on Greek deities, there are many workshops and other groups that bring a plethora of alternate ways to explore, including the general mysteries of women, men and those who identify as a mixture of both energies.

“There is also a vendors space, with many often-requested items and trinkets to take home, and plenty of space for conversations or introspective moments.

“Everyone who attends will come away transformed and with wonderful memories of their time in Eleusis.”

https://www.youtube.com/@witchcrafttv.online

https://www.google.com/search?q=%22Spring+Mysteries+Festival%22

https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=Spring+Mysteries+Festival

Amanita Workshops by David Samas

https://www.springmysteries.com/workshops-2023

“Amanita Muscaria: The Witches’ Magick” by David Samas – leading expert.

Stream: Festival Fun Show – Spring Mysteries Festival

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A_bpwJj-LyI —

Streamed live on Mar 15, 2025

Description:

🎥✨ Get ready for an enchanting time on the Festival Fun Show, streaming exclusively on Witchcraft TV! 🌙

Join the charismatic A.C. Fisher-Aldag as she welcomes a truly magical guest—the esteemed Arch-Priestess Belladonna Laveau of the Aquarian Tabernacle Church of Wicca (USA).

Together, they’ll dive into the heart of contemporary Wicca, exploring the sacred traditions, spiritual insights, and transformative work of the ATC and all about the upcoming Spring Mysteries Festival.

This is more than just an interview—it’s a celebration of wisdom, community, and the journey toward empowerment through spiritual practice.

Opportunity to learn from one of Wicca’s most inspiring leaders and advocates. 💫

https://witchcrafttv.online/

#WitchcraftTV

#BelladonnaLaveau

#MagicAwaits

#FestivalFunShow

#AquarianTabernacleChurch

#WiccaWisdom

#witchcrafttv

See Also

The Reveries (thereveries.org) – Eleusinian Mysteries
https://egodeaththeory.org/2025/02/25/idea-development-page-25/#Fontaine

https://thereveries.org

Michael Hoffman – Study version, condensed, for scholarly purposes, not for publishing; markup from POV of the Egodeath theory

_{Site Map: Alan Houot}

Contents:

• Motivation of this Page
• Citation and Link
• In Honor of the God Dionysus
• The Psychonaut’s Ship: Pairing Technologies with Psychedelics to Augment User Agency (22)
  • Prefatory (1 p.)
  • Introduction (1.5)
  • 1. Mystic Fear and Shaman Control (2.5)
  • 2. Surrenderism for Some, but Not for All (2.3)
  • 3. Secularization of Experience (4)
  • 4. Augmenting Agency and Control with Prostheses (5)
  • Conclusion (2)
  • Notes (2)
• See Also

Motivation of this Page

Not intended to be a clean page; intended as notes and commentary page.

todo: remove non key phrases. bold the key phrases. add my commentary.

Study / markup commentary notepad page. NOT to be archive copy of article.

62 hits on ‘surrender’

For scholarly study only, not for publication.

Relevant to the Egodeath theory of psychedelic eternalism.

Citation and Link

https://www.academia.edu/78214256/The_Psychonauts_Ship_Pairing_Technologies_with_Psychedelics_to_Augment_User_Agency

In Honor of the God Dionysus

Dionysus made me dedicate this page to him.

In honor of Dionysus, by pilot Cybermonk.

https://egodeaththeory.org/2025/01/07/idea-development-23/#Pilot-Helmsman-Steersman-Begged-Dionysus – Find 32 hits on ‘dionysus’

https://egodeaththeory.org/?s=dionysus+pirates – see another idea development page too maybe.

Due to fluke, I got this before it was avail Feb 2, 2025; i got it Dec 23, 2024. march 20 2025 i also bought $25 audiobook, which is great format; good content; good voczn, good tech usage.

Strangely the book lacks surrenderism critique and big claim of shamans having control stability during Psilocybin, tho Houot focused on that pair of topics in 2019 Masters dissertation & article Psyc Ship.

The Psychonaut’s Ship

Pairing Technologies with Psychedelics to Augment User Agency

A. M. Houot

Prefatory

written by Houot

Modern psychedelic users are commonly advised to surrender to altered states of consciousness.

[surrender to what?
Michelle Janikian’s book uses this same strange construction.
More like: lower-level personal control system (child-thinking;
monolithic, autonomous control)
is made to surrender to
2-level, dependent control;
the overpowered female mind is made to surrender to the male;
FEMALE:
the control thought-receiver
ctr
the helpless thought-receiver
htr
the helpless control-thought receiver
hctr
MALE:
hidden source of control-thoughts
hsct
the control-thought inserter
cti
the uncontrollable source of control-thoughts
usct]

Once users consider the possibility that ‘surrenderism’ is a necessary prerequisite—though not an exclusive approach—coupled with the idea that psychedelic experiences might not be religious or supernatural, the idea emerges that pairing technologies with psychedelics is a viable methodology to comport oneself during psychedelic states.

Shamans display signs of control and mastery upon entering altered states, partly because of intentionally crafted techniques and technologies that assist them.

It is argued that modern psychedelic users of modern technologies may augment the level of control over their experiences, that is to say, making use of prostheses to maintain balance during intoxicated states.

[f134 stand on right foot to maintain balance and avoid control instability
Great Canterbury Psalter:

f145 stand on right foot to maintain balance and avoid control instability:

f77 stand on right foot to maintain balance and avoid control instability:

prostheses – crutch to have stability while incorrectly stand on left foot

stand on left foot = rely on egoic possibilism-thinking –> control instability

stand on right foot = rely on eternalism-thinking. –> control stability

crutch could indicate washed-clean, qualified possibilism-thinking; left foot touches stable column base.

/ end Michael Hoffman images]

Page 2 — A M HOUOT [left page header]
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The understanding of the concept psychonaut or sailor of the mind is analogously expanded to include the psychonaut’s ship, comparable to nautical technologies used by sailors .

The example of the psychonaut’s ship provides the platform upon which to reflect future applications and utilities of psychedelic technologies .

If psychedelic users are like sailors of the mind, then, what is their ship? What follows is an inquiry into how modern psychedelic users can apply technologies like their shaman counterparts to increase agency during psychedelic experiences.

Introduction

written by Houot

The commonly held supposition that modern users have little to no agency during psychedelic experiences needs revision .

[transformation of mental model of personal control system/ personal control agency]

Recommendations to passively surrender to the experience, i.e., ‘surrenderism’,1 is of particular interest when it comes to modern users’ fears and concerns of psychedelic experiences.

[the experience of the threat of catastrophic loss of control, due to relying on monolithic, autonomous control]

Experts recommend modern users surrender to psychedelic states, and users unquestioningly heed such advice.

[the personal control system is made to surrender to 2-level, dependent control – the underlying reality]

Alternative approaches as to how one comports oneself in altered states of consciousness are available .

The following is an examination and expansion of one such overlooked approach, that is, using technology [VAGUE] during psychedelic experiences.

I contemplate how pairing modern technology with psychedelic states may provide augmented user agency compared to the current, dominant surrenderism model.

In Section 1, I consider one of many possible reasons why modern users would want to pair technology with psychedelic experiences, namely, to curb fear of the unknown.

[dread of ego dissolution? no; of: the hidden, uncontrollable source of control-thoughts]

VAGUE, VAGUE, VAGUE

I argue elsewhere that modern psychedelic users need not only interpret their experiences from the mystic’s fear and surrender perspective but also might consider adopting

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shamanic principles of control and mastery of altered states through the use of techniques and technologies [VAGUE].2

In Section 2, I defend the premise of surrendering to [TO WHAT?] psychedelics, however, for particular subsets of users and motives; for example, the inexperienced, the inadequately prepared or trained, or preventing harm to self or others.

In Section 3, I highlight the tendency of ancient peoples to interpret that which they did not understand or control as somehow being religious or supernatural.

Simply because present-day people do not adequately comprehend psychedelic experiences does not qualify these experiences as sacred.

I invite readers to consider historical examples when science and technology could eventually better explain natural phenomena than divine beings or gods.

Additionally, many people take the notion of surrender for granted, but I ask why modern psychedelic users must surrender; why should surrender be given automatically; and why taking into consideration some level of control of experiences is not treated?

In a move away from surrenderism, ayahuasca-drinking Santo Daime religious members incorporate rituals and codified frameworks, attempting to constrain the psychedelically unconstrained mind.

[good phrase]

These sociocultural-specific constraints are a step in the direction I propose .

Finally, I develop ideas to integrate purpose-built psychedelic technologies, or prostheses [DAMN IT MAN, THIS IS AS VAGUE AS “THE TRADITIONAL METHODS OF THE MYSTICS”], to constrain or channel the intoxicated mind, aiming to increase user agency [UNTIL FUZZY WUZZY LOVING CUP EXPLOSION CLIMAX OF NEW BIRTH] during psychedelic experiences.

1. Mystic Fear and Shaman Control

written by Houot

In previous research, I analyze ways in which modern users might conceptualize the psychedelic experience that counters the current fear-laden discourse on drugs.3

Since many modern societies and individuals fear [FEAR OF WHAT? the experience of the threat of catastrophic loss of control] the experiences psychedelics elicit, I explore the likely roots [hidden underlying snake in basket; the hidden, uncontrollable source of control-thoughts] of

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these fears, and once known, ask how modern technology [VAGUE AF] might be used to somehow steer or control psychedelic experiences .

For that which one controls no matter the degree, one increases one’s agency [try harder, egoic control foundation! until you are dead king hung on tree, ram caught in thicket] during the experience, therefore, theoretically minimizing one’s fear of the once-held fear object.

Early researchers such as Aldous Huxley, Alan Watts, and Richard Alpert (later known as Ram Dass) turned to Far Eastern and Indian religions and philosophies in the 1950s–1970s, notably mysticism, in an effort to make sense of psychedelic effects on modern users’ subjectivity.

Depending on their religious inclination mystics may speak of love and devotion [2-level, dependent control; “relational”] when ‘melting away’ and merging [beginner unity] with the Other, or they might speak of fear and the unavoidable surrender to some divine being(s).4

Mystics surrender to a claimed divine being or presence, suggesting that whatever or whomever they surrender to is in charge; the Other is in control for as long as the mystic remains in the altered state.5 Psychedelics alter consciousness as well, leaving modern users with similar experiences and questions, hence the analogous comparisons to mysticism .

In continuing this line of reasoning, I argue that modern users find themselves in at least three types of ‘master/subject relations’: master/slave, host (master)/guest, and teacher (master)/student.6 In each case, users relinquish control of their being, thereby assuming the role of slave, guest, or student when in psychedelic-induced states .

A modified framework based on former U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld’s ‘there are known knowns’ comment is used to get at modern psychedelic users’ ultimate fear [the experience of the threat of catastrophic loss of control due to the hidden, uncontrollable source of control-thoughts] , drilling down from knowns to unknowns, from which I develop a new qualitative framework to explain notions of self in a surrenderism paradigm regarding the assessment of ‘complete’ [not mystical; just Stacean] mystical experiences, and ask whether there is another way

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for modern users to increase their agency [until the climax transformation is reached] during experiences.7

From this perspective, I turn to a spiritual practice that is farther removed from modern society and culture, namely, shamanism, appreciating how shamans’ notions of control and mastery (claimed by modern academics) of drug and nondrug altered states can inform modern users’ conceptualizations of psychedelic use and self-comportment.

Shamans use techniques and technologies [SOUNDS LIKE VAGUE B S] (broadly construed) such as song lyrics [like Ride the Lighting by Metallica? Little Dolls by Ozzy? Twilight Zone by Rush?] and melodies, dances, rattles, and drums [shaman Neil Peart], particularly a technique proposed by psychologist Richard Noll called ‘mental imagery cultivation’ [image of the experience of the threat of catastrophic loss of control], through which novices learn to develop the vividness of visions with the intent to control them.8 [how do “YOU” control the intent that YOU receive from the uncontrollable source of control-thoughts?]

Shamans not only have means to enter into altered states of consciousness; they also have systems in place apparently[???] to control their experiences.

Shamans do not speak about altered states in terms of fear and surrender as mystics and modern psychedelic users do; conversely, they display control and mastery.

In reframing the perception of the psychedelic experience to one that moves away from surrenderism [f u, gods! shaking fist] and which addresses fear, I conclude that modern psychedelic users might fare well to use ‘mysticism to explain’ while simultaneously using ‘shamanism to control’ their experiences.9

As expert shamans have manifold [“many” is b s like “there are many ways of Psilocybin experience without drugs”, tho none work well enough] techniques and technologies to enter into and exercise some control of altered states or of themselves in altered states,

likewise modern psychedelic users can do the same through the use of what I call ‘symbolico-technological relations’, in other words, pairing symbol with technology:

Psychedelics, symbols, and technologies used together reveal new applications, resulting in a wrestled-free symbolicotechnological third function. [sounds bull shiite]

Coupling symbol with technology creates avenues of new experiences, experiences malleable by

6 A M HOUOT Psychedelic Press XXXV

the user depending on the co-equal symbolico-technological relation and how each co-shapes the created third function.10

I say further that psychedelic technologies in general have considerable potential to act as ‘prostheses’ or crutches that afford a kind of balancing act when psychedelic users experience non-ordinary mental and perceptual conditions.11

[f177: stand on right foot to maintain balance and avoid control instability:

I realize now that I limited my scope of ‘psychedelic technology’ to symbolico-technologies only; in actuality, they are but a subset of what a psychedelic technology can be.

I flesh out the discussion about why and how to pair modern technology with psychedelic experiences in my previous work.

However, I shall expand on my arguments by detailing the obvious need for surrenderism, the eventual need to abandon surrenderism, and propose additional utilities for pairing technologies with psychedelics.

I define and discuss psychedelic technology in detail in Section 4.

2. Surrenderism for Some, but Not for All

written by Houot

Experts in psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy and harm reduction contexts have asserted the notion of surrender since at least the 1960s.12

It is no wonder that current Psychedelic Renaissance researchers, chiefly focusing on psychedelics’ therapeutic use, would advise modern users, especially their clinical study participants, to surrender [to what?].

Advising surrender in research contexts minimizes risk to everyone involved and ensures there are nil or few mishaps during the research process; an unpredictable, ‘freaked out’ participant is bad for business, so to speak.

In addition, we can safely assume that psychedelic-naïve and -experienced participants are far from exerting shamanic standards of control.

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While I disagree with such a blanketed recommendation for modern users, I point out appropriate instances when individuals should practice surrender: (i) user inexperience; (ii) inadequate preparation and training; and (iii) surrender is better than potentially harming oneself or others. [smell of hubris]

Author of the book on ayahuasca phenomenology, The Antipodes of the Mind: Charting the Phenomenology of the Ayahuasca Experience, psychologist Benny Shanon identifies three levels of cleansing that ayahuasca induces: bodily, psychological, and spiritual in this progression .

For Shanon, the ayahuasca drinker would find it difficult to ascend to heightened dimensions of experience if one did not first overcome personal [in the sense of, personal control system] psychological issues.13

Thus, surrender is a good strategy for novices who have little to no experience with psychedelics or still have personal issues to deal with.

[that’s the wrong sense of ‘personal’; personal control system ; the egoic personal control system – not unique to one’s history]

Once these issues have been worked out and the user no longer takes psychedelics for therapeutic or personal growth motives, one can work on ‘spiritual’ cleansing, before, or in parallel, attempting to control the experience through and with technology .

Second, and closely tied to the point above, users would be advised to adopt a surrender position if inadequately prepared or trained in psychedelic experiences .

The majority of modern users are not trained at all to handle these experiences compared to the intensive training shamans receive .

The motive for taking psychedelics is also an important factor: while many shamans are first and foremost chosen to be shamans,14 they enter altered states on behalf of members of their community in addition to gaining insight and knowledge from other realms to ensure their community’s survival.15

The trends du jour for taking psychedelics among modern users, as a result of recently rediscovering or rebranding psychedelics, are personal and spiritual growth,16 and addiction interruption.17

Users desperate to personally

8 A M HOUOT Psychedelic Press XXXV

and spiritually grow or become well would likely try anything such as ingesting a psychedelic even though they might lack adequate preparation .

Once again, surrender turns out to be good advice for someone unprepared or ill-trained to operate with an intoxicated mind.

[“surrender” is WAY too vague, folk talk]

Practice through repetition offers users a feasible way out of surrenderism .

Psychedelic psychotherapist Duncan Blewett, who worked with Humphrey Osmond in Canada in the 1950s, hints at this:

‘Self-surrender is not an event that occurs only once, but must be repeated as additional repressed material [B S Psychology baloney] is released.

Each repetition becomes easier because of the positive reinforcement given by each previous self-surrender’.18

For Blewett, repeated self-surrender to psychedelics becomes easier as one accustoms to them and jointly attends to their own personal and repressed issues (similar to Shanon’s views) .

Evidently, there exists the possibility and even likelihood that one need not endlessly surrender to the psychedelic as experiences become ‘easier’ .

Such initial surrenderist maneuvers serve as necessary stepping-stones toward increased agency of one’s subsequent experiences.

[I can agree if elaborate and differentiate two different senses – as it stands, TOO VAGUE]

Third, surrendering to the experience is better than, for example, physically or mentally breaking down, therefore potentially harming oneself or others:

‘Surrender can be considered a form of passive control, in that surrendering to the experience is a better alternative than resisting the oncoming altered state, which could lead to bad experiences’.19

The very act of surrendering, knowing that one should surrender, either from one’s intuition or a clinician’s recommendation, is a form of control because the experiencer is regulating that part of their self that might resist, or react to, the temporary bodily and mental changes.

[REALLY must control transformation, not binary have or don’t have control]

While surrender can be considered a soft form of control, it is not the sort of control I illustrate in later sections .

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3. Secularization of Experience

written by Houot

The second commonly held attitude that must change for a revision in the way modern users consider psychedelic experiences, ultimately leading to a new or parallel paradigm, is the secularization of experience .

In his book, Cleansing the Doors of Perception: The Religious Significance of Entheogenic Plants and Chemicals, religious scholar Huston Smith comments on the sacred, surrender, and control .

He is quite right when he says that that which we wield greater control or comprehension over leads to demystification .

For example, humans do not control the weather, but meteorologists today better understand it than polytheistic humans did thousands of years ago who attributed weather events to one of the gods.20 Of course, we do not know for certain whether weather gods exist, maybe they do, but I imagine most people would consult meteorological science and technology experts to explain climatic happenings .

Smith goes on to question whether (total) control is even wanted, that surrendering to some of life’s experiences has its virtues and not doing so could lead to cynicism: Not only is the notion of total control contradictory, it isn’t even attractive .

To enter a friendship, to say nothing of marriage, with intent to control it is to soil the prospect from the start .

Life calls for balancing the rewards of control with gifts that come to us through openness and surrender .

The more we resolve to have things our own way, the more closed we become to the virtues in alternative ways .

If we cannot perceive the virtue inherent in the capacity to surrender – to surrender to another person in love, or to obligation in the sense of feeling its claims upon us— cynicism awaits us.21

10 A M HOUOT Psychedelic Press XXXV

I too shun the idea of trying to dominate friends and romantic partners and agree with the unattractiveness of ‘total control’ over life’s circumstances .

Let us backtrack for a moment and instead refrain from speaking in absolutes .

What about some form of partial control, not when it comes to people, but other features of reality? Why must some lived experiences remain a mystery? Why would not seeing Smith’s virtue in surrender lead to cynicism? On the contrary, I find the prospect of giving more agency to psychedelic users through technological means optimistic and positive .

‘Intent to control’ need not lead to ‘soiling’ experiences .

The definition of to soil is ‘to stain or defile morally—corrupt; to make unclean especially superficially—dirty’.22 Intent to control psychedelic experiences that are commonly considered to have religious or supernatural overtones does not indicate psychedelic technology users want to morally defile or make unclean such experiences .

Humans have always controlled aspects of their lives and surroundings in partial and agreeable ways; psychedelic experiences are nonexempt from suchlike pursuits .

Smith’s position sounds like a desperate effort to dissuade probative people from questioning their lived experiences and reality, reminiscent of religious leaders coping with Copernican angst .

As mentioned in the preceding section, repeated self-surrender is important for user acclimatization to altered states .

In a similar way, members of the syncretic ayahuasca religion called Santo Daime incorporate ritualistic and cultural cues to constrain the unconstrained mind .

Lifshitz, Sheiner and Kirmayer23 report how Santo Daime members structure their religious-psychedelic practices: men and women segregate in rows expanding outward from a central table where senior members sit, members recite prayers, sing hymns, coordinate dances, meditate silently while seated, and their interpretation of

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visions contribute to an ‘…ordering of ritual time and space structures the psychedelic experience along multiple modalities .

On a pragmatic level, it provides the framework and repeatability required for regular religious practice, and codifies Santo Daime’.24 Seen from the religious/healing perspective of Santo Daime, Lifshitz et al .

say, ‘Thus, promoting healing with psychedelics likely requires constraining the unconstrained mind through symbolic situational cues and embodied rituals that emphasize the potential to move from maladaptive patterns toward constructive states and behaviours’.25 Although my views about the claimed inherent religious feel to psychedelics and those of Santo Daime practitioners differ, I commend them and indigenous users for their codified frameworks that attempt to constrain or give order to the psychedelic experience .

At this juncture, I address the following possible objection to my argumentation thus far .

Shamans and Santo Daime members ostensibly already use techniques and technologies to control aspects of their psychedelic experiences in religious contexts .

One might ask why the abandonment of religious/supernatural connotations would be necessary to modern technology use that increases user agency during psychedelic experiences .

Neuroscientist Robin Carhart-Harris says scientists aim to be: …dispassionate, to really give ourselves the best chance to glean what is true .

… I come here with an open mind wanting to understand the phenomena but with a motivation to try to study it .

I think if you just leave it [psychedelics] in this enchanting space, then you might be motivated not to even study it.26 A secular approach stands a greater chance at advancing knowledge of psychedelic states .

The religiously inclined or the ‘enchanted’

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may stop short of probing deeper into experiences for any number of reasons, whereas people with more of a secularist mindset will likely ask questions and conduct experiments that contradict indigenous and mainstream religious dogma .

Psychiatrist Matthew W Johnson recognizes the fallibility in using nonempirical frameworks in psychedelic medicine and research contexts and discloses multiple dangers regarding the use of religious references by psychedelic scientists and clinicians .

‘It is important to operate instead from a secular framework that is nonetheless open to working with patients or participant [sic] of any religious/spiritual background’.27

As tempting as it may be for some clinicians to introduce religious and spiritual belief systems to help study participants find meaning from their experiences and about their lives, these placeholders and the icons that represent them should be avoided, according to Johnson, because they not only precondition psychedelic users to have a specific experience, but they also alienate participants who might be atheist or practice another religion whose religious symbolism is absent from the study environment .

In short, preconditioning experiences and alienating study participants leads to bad science and practice, not to mention ethical concerns .

Surrenderism is a necessary step in one’s evolving psychedelic journeying process; however, it is not the only way to comport oneself as I hope is beginning to become clear .

Additionally, once one accepts the possibility that altered states of consciousness—including those psychedelic-induced—are not religious or sacred, one would no longer resort to unconditional surrender as mystics do and as modern researchers recommend .

As one gains enough experience through repeat exposure and the initial transcendental luster subsides, repeat users might realize that otherworldly phenomena afforded by psychedelics

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are indeed highly curious other dimensions, yet without the religiosacral connotations .

In the next and final section, I argue for technology use during psychedelic states that moves beyond but also compliments the abovementioned ritualistic and symbolic signaling.

4. Augmenting Agency and Control with Prostheses

written by Houot

Ernst Jünger, German author and friend of Albert Hofmann, coined the term psychonaut (from the German, psychonauten)28 to mean ‘psychedelic astronaut, explorer of the inner cosmos’.29

While the astronaut-explorer-of-psychedelic-spaces description aptly references these experiences, we should also inspect the meaning of the suffix nautès .

In this sense, psycho-naut means ‘sailor of the mind’ or ‘navigator of the psyche’, referring to individuals wanting to explore their minds by means of any kind of consciousness alteration.30 The resultant substantive form then is psychonautics, or ‘(the art of) “sailing the mind” or “navigating the psyche”’.31

If psychedelic users are like sailors of the mind, then, what is their ship? How does one turn sailing the psychedelic-intoxicated mind or navigating the psychedelic-intoxicated psyche into a predictable and controllable art form? Psychonautic technology from rituals and symbolico-cultural cues to the pairing of technologies with psychedelics is an overlooked topic in modern psychedelic discourse .

The sailor on their ship does not leave port hoping that the tide will take them to their desired destination .

No; the sailor commands a transportation device made for a specific purpose .

The ship undoubtedly is subject to waves, weather, creatures beneath the water’s surface, etc .

Nevertheless, the experienced sailor knows how to use their technology

14 A M HOUOT Psychedelic Press XXXV

to steer through the unknown, that which they cannot control, and toward their destination .

They use technology to go from one point to a predetermined other, and their ship is suited to deal with many natural events en route .

The same can be said about the sailor of psychedelic worlds .

Whereas both surrenderists and psychedelic technology users might start with an intention to guide them through the experience, surrenderists basically leap into the ocean of altered consciousness expecting the tide to take them to their destination, an action predicated on hope and submission .

This is folly .

Modern users would do better to think about using a sort of ship, some technical or technological accoutrement that can improve the journey’s steadiness and at their volition .

One must ask whether one is a passive passenger (e.g., surrender) or a course-charting captain utilizing seaworthy technology (e.g., control) .

In demarcating the boundary between science and technology, philosopher of technology Andrew Feenberg says: ‘Science and technology share a similar type of rationality based on empirical observation and knowledge of natural causality, but technology is concerned with usefulness rather than truth .

Where science seeks to know, technology seeks to control.’32 No one knows for certain the metaphysical status of psychedelic states; we can infer however, according to Feenberg, there is an inherent element of control regarding the essence and usefulness of technology .

Just as modern-day instruments help natural scientists learn more about reality, technologies offering greater control and therefore agency to psychedelic users would also likely help answer experiencers’ and scientists’ knowledge or truth claims about psychedelic phenomena .

I have previously defined my concept of psychedelic ‘symbolicotechnology’, 33 but fell short of defining what ‘psychedelic technology’

THE PSYCHONAUT’S SHIP 15 Psychedelic Press XXXV

is.

Here, I define psychedelic technology as follows: a humanmade technique or technology that pairs with psychedelic states of consciousness for the purpose of documentation, data collection, and/ or to control aspects of the experience for purposes of navigating, coshaping, directing one’s experience, etc., resulting in augmented user agency.34

In other words, psychedelic technology broadly speaking is any technique or technology paired with psychedelics that gives users greater insight, control, and/or agency over their experiences.

There are at least two types of psychedelic technology: passive and active.

Psychedelic technology is passive when that which is being overseen is the documentation, collection, and analysis of data from one’s experience.

For example, physiological testing equipment can be used to pick up signals or biomarkers from psychedelics’ effects on users .

Note that high-tech research devices such as functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) were not designed with psychedelics in mind but are used by psychedelic researchers .

Furthermore, other modern technologies and passive psychedelic technologies certainly will assist in developing purpose-specific active psychedelic technologies .

Psychedelic technologies are passive when they are in the background to collect or monitor data in some capacity, and usually would not be purpose-built for psychedelic experiences, although the latter is possible .

Active psychedelic technology is a means to increase control of experiences through navigating, co-shaping, or directing .

Within the category of active psychedelic technology, we can further differentiate between hard and soft control .

I define hard control as controlling everything about the experience, that is, the experiencer wields absolute control .

Since this is unlikely to happen in the foreseeable future, if ever, soft control is what trained psychedelic technology users can do:

16 A M HOUOT Psychedelic Press XXXV

they are able to navigate, shape, and determine how their experience unfolds depending on their expertise with psychedelics and their skill in using paired psychedelic technologies .

As mentioned earlier, such skill requires one moving beyond the prerequisite surrender phase of one’s psychedelic journeying evolution .

Passive psychedelic technology can become active if, when monitoring vital signs, the researcher directs the experiencer to take specific anticipatory actions, for example, to raise or lower blood pressure, heart beats per minute, directing the drug user’s attention, changing position of the body, introducing an idea or object during the experience, etc .

Therefore, psychedelic technologies are active when they are in the foreground to steer experiences, and presumably will be purpose-built for psychedelic experiences .

Not necessarily a prosthesis to stabilize one’s visionary experience but rather a documentation tool can be found in Qualia Research Institute’s Tracer Replication Tool .

This psychedelic technology was designed to ‘collect quantitative data about psychedelic tracers’.35 The internet browser-based tool works as follows .

The participant observes a bouncing blue ball on their computer screen while in an intoxicated state .

Once the visionary experience subsides, they toggle the tool’s settings to reconstruct what the tracer looked like as it was superimposed upon the default blue ball in addition to providing information such as drug type, dosage, how many hours into the intoxicated state they used the tool, and how many hours after the experience they documented their tracer .

The Tracer Replication Tool is a simple technology purposely built to document a specific aspect of psychedelic perception .

As usergenerated reports filter in, we may make more sense of what happens to visual perception depending on drug type and dosage and we will be able to literally show such representations to others .

While one’s unique physiology and cognition shape each person’s subjective experience,

THE PSYCHONAUT’S SHIP 17 Psychedelic Press XXXV

the above technology may reveal that drug, dosage, age, mood, culture, or any number of standalone or combined factors may lead to consistent and predictable tracer phenomena .

I offer another practical way to think about psychedelic technology .

Aikido is a Japanese martial art that teaches the importance of defensive maneuvering by using the attacker’s own movements to subdue him .

The attacked conserves energy by flowing with, not against, the attacker: ‘Aikido is performed by blending with the motion of the attacker and redirecting the force of the attack rather than opposing it head-on .

… The goal of Aikido training is not perfection of a step or skill, but rather improving one’s character according to the rules of nature’.36 In this way, the attacker expends more energy and thus is more at risk of tiring themself out, making themself susceptible to the impassable defensive offense of the attacked; the attacker must work harder to bring down their opponent .

According to the survival response known as fight-or-flight (-orfreeze), psychedelic technology use would be considered as a form of ‘fight’ because it is certainly not flight or freeze .

However, it is not fighting per se, rather an active and anticipatory defensive-like maneuver, a form of flowing with one’s precarious environment with the help of technological accoutrements designed for psychedelic states .

Sailors know the limits and capabilities of their technologies and have expertise in navigating their ships around adverse weather events or, if need be, to sail through waves head on .

Sailors do not try to control the weather but instead know how to work with it by getting the most out of their nautical technology .

The ship is purposefully built for moving atop the uncertainty and randomness of waves: it has a keel to stabilize, sails to propel, a rudder to steer .

Active psychedelic technologies would have comparable features that enable users to gain some level of control over the uncertainty and randomness of visionary phenomena and worlds .

18 A M HOUOT Psychedelic Press XXXV

Whatever the intoxicated mind shows experiencers, one must face it and accept what comes; one must confront whatever presents itself or that which needs to be revealed .

(One day, perhaps, technologies will be capable of inducing specific/desired visionary content as well.) Sailors cannot control approaching waves and storms; they skillfully maneuver their vessel with or around them .

Similarly, modern psychedelic technologies may enable users to direct their experiences with greater control irrespective of that which presents itself to consciousness .

Conclusion

written by Houot

Historical evidence suggests humans sacralize that which they do not comprehend nor control .

In accordance with the mystic’s views, surrendering implies that the psychedelic user foregoes whatever agency they may have .

History teaches that there might not be anything religious or supernatural about psychedelic-induced states; likely, these spaces merely are different dimensions of reality upon which, because of naivete and lack of knowledge, people put such placeholders .

The surrenderism model within psychedelia is a prerequisite for inexperienced, untrained, or novice users and should not be abandoned any time soon .

However, sustained belief in letting go or giving oneself over to the experience concretizes the feeling that one could not possibly understand these realms .

I contend that surrenderism may have damaging downstream effects insofar as experiencers relinquish pursuits of experiential sense-making .

Academics and amateurs must eventually transcend surrenderism and religious/supernatural connotations in favor of new methods to have any chance at making epistemic gains pertaining to the visionary, otherworldly content afforded by psychedelics .

THE PSYCHONAUT’S SHIP 19 Psychedelic Press XXXV

Recognizing surrenderism’s usefulness as a means, but not exclusively as an end, and welcoming prospects of having more agency, prepares the psychedelic user for new types of experience .

Any form of constraining the psychedelic mind, from rituals and symbols to psychedelic technologies, helps users manage visionary experiences .

In addition to controlling their voyage, curbing fear37 is but one reason why one would want to use technology during their psychedelic experiences; other reasons include navigating, co-shaping, communicating, and determining the experience .

The purpose, design, and function of a psychedelic technology will depend on one’s worldview, the type of knowledge one seeks, and what aspect of the experience one wishes to stabilize or document .

Humans will continue to find ways of incorporating technology with psychedelic experiences .

Psychedelic experiences have already been modified by shamanic technologies and ritualistic and symbolic cues found in the Santo Daime religion, and will continue to be by modern users and their technologies .

We must begin thinking how modern technology will shape psychedelic experiences for any user, no matter their cultural conditioning .

Pairing deliberately designed modern technologies with psychedelics is not only the future, it is the next evolutionary step in psychedelic drug use .

It is going to happen, and so we must consider how it will happen, how technology will be used before, during, and after psychedelic experiences, and for what purposes? Passive psychedelic technologies already exist and are being used in academic research .

What encourages me is what the future may bring regarding active psychedelic technologies .

I do not know what they will be, but their development and use are indeed possible .

Admittedly, I argue for something that does not yet exist, and cannot exist until

20 A M HOUOT Psychedelic Press XXXV

people secularize their psychedelic experiences, outgrow their tendencies toward surrenderism, and seriously consider the possibility of pairing modern technology with these dimensions of non-ordinary experience for the purposes of augmented control, agency, and mastery, and hopefully, newfound knowledge as a result .

Notes

written by Houot

1 Houot AM (2019) .

Toward a Philosophy of Psychedelic Technology: An Exploration of Fear, Otherness, and Control, Master’s thesis, University of Twente, Enschede, Netherlands .

https://essay.utwente.nl/77339/ 2 Houot (2019) .

3 Houot (2019) .

4 Stace WT (1960) .

Mysticism and Philosophy .

London: MacMillan and Co., Limited .

5 Stace (1960) .

6 Houot (2019, pp 17–20) .

7 Houot (2019) .

8 Houot (2019, pp 39–40); Noll R (1985) ‘Mental Imagery Cultivation as a Cultural Phenomenon: The Role of Visions in Shamanism’, Current Anthropology, 26(4), pp 443–461 .

9 Houot (2019, p 49) .

10 Houot (2019, pp 44–45) .

11 Houot (2019, p 50) .

12 Masters REL and Houston J (1966) .

The Varieties of Psychedelic Experience .

New York: Dell Publishing Co., Inc.; Blewett D (1970) .

‘The Psychedelics and Group Therapy’ in Aaronson B and Osmond H (eds) Psychedelics: The Uses and Implications of Hallucinogenic Drugs .

Garden City, NY: Anchor Books; Leary T, Metzner R and Alpert R (2007/1964) .

The Psychedelic Experience: A Manual Based on the Tibetan Book of the Dead .

New York: Citadel Press; Johnson MW, Richards WA and Griffiths RR (2008) .

‘Human Hallucinogen Research: Guidelines for Safety’, Journal of Psychopharmacology, 22(6), pp 603–620; Girón S (2013) .

‘Working with Trauma: Psychedelic Harm Reduction and Transpersonal Psychotherapy’, MAPS Bulletin, 23(3), 2013 Annual Report, pp 47–49 .

13 Shanon B (2002) .

The Antipodes of the Mind: Charting the Phenomenology of the Ayahuasca Experience .

Oxford University Press, p 307 .

THE PSYCHONAUT’S SHIP 21 Psychedelic Press XXXV 14 Krippner S (2000) .

‘The Epistemology and Technologies of Shamanic States of Consciousness’, Journal of Consciousness Studies, 7(11–12), pp 93–118 .

15 Walsh R (1991) .

‘Shamanic Cosmology: Psychological Examination of the Shaman’s Worldview’, ReVision 13(2), pp 86–100; Walsh R (1995) .

‘Phenomenological Mapping: A Method for Describing and Comparing States of Consciousness’, Journal of Transpersonal Psychology, 27, pp 25–56 .

16 Móró L, Simon K, Bárd I and Racz J (2011) .

‘Voice of the Psychonauts: Coping, Life Purpose, and Spirituality in Psychedelic Drug Users’, Journal of Psychoactive Drugs, 43(3), pp 188–198 .

17 Winkelman M (2014) .

‘Psychedelics as Medicines for Substance Abuse Rehabilitation: Evaluating Treatments with LSD, Peyote, Ibogaine and Ayahuasca’, Current Drug Abuse Reviews, 7(2), pp 101–116 .

18 Blewett D (1970) .

‘The Psychedelics and Group Therapy’ in Aaronson B and Osmond H (eds) Psychedelics: The Uses and Implications of Hallucinogenic Drugs .

Garden City, NY: Anchor Books, p 348 .

19 Houot (2019, p 49) .

20 Smith H (2000) .

Cleansing the Doors of Perception: The Religious Significance of Entheogenic Plants and Chemicals .

New York: Tarcher/ Putnam, p 138 .

21 Smith (2000, pp 137–138) .

22 Merriam-Webster (n.d.) Soil .

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/ soil (retrieved 17/3/2021) .

23 Lifshitz M, Sheiner E and Kirmayer LJ (2018) .

‘Cultural Neurophenomenology of Psychedelic Thought: Guiding the ‘Unconstrained’ Mind Through Ritual Context’ in Fox KCR and Christoff K (eds) The Oxford Handbook of Spontaneous Thought: Mind-Wandering, Creativity, and Dreaming .

Oxford University Press .

24 Lifshitz, Sheiner and Kirmayer (2018, pp 585–586) .

25 Lifshitz, Sheiner and Kirmayer (2018, p 576) .

26 Davis E (2018) ‘How to Think about Weird Beings’ in Luke D and Spowers R (eds) DMT Dialogues: Encounters with the Spirit Molecule .

Rochester, VT: Park Street Press, p 152 .

27 Johnson MW (2020) ‘Consciousness, Religion, and Gurus: Pitfalls of Psychedelic Medicine’, ACS Pharmacology & Translational Science .

https:// dx.doi.org/10.1021/acsptsci.0c00198 28 Ott J (2001) ‘Pharmañopo—Psychonautics: Human Intranasal, Sublingual, Intrarectal, Pulmonary and Oral Pharmacology of Bufotenine’, Journal of Psychoactive Drugs, 33(3), pp 273–281 .

29 Sjöstedt-Hughes P (n.d.) The Psychedelic Influence on Philosophy .

https:// highexistence.com/hidden-psychedelic-influence-philosophy-plato-nietzschepsychonauts- thoughts/ (retrieved 17/3/2021) .

30 Blom JD (2010) A Dictionary of Hallucinations .

New York: Springer Science & Business Media, p 434 .

22 A M HOUOT Psychedelic Press XXXV 31 Blom (2010, p 434); Ott (2001) .

32 Feenberg A (2006) ‘What Is Philosophy of Technology?’ in Dakers JR (ed) Defining Technological Literacy: Towards an Epistemological Framework .

New York: Palgrave Macmillan, p 5 (my italics) .

33 Houot (2019) .

34 When speaking specifically about psychedelics, the term ‘psychonautic technology’ should be avoided because it refers to techniques and technologies used during any form of consciousness alteration such as meditation, yoga, other pharmaceuticals, etc .

35 Wu L, Gomez Emilsson A and Zuckerman A (2020) QRI Psychophysics Toolkit – Tracer .

Qualia Research Institute .

https://qualiaresearchinstitute .

github.io/psychophysics/ (retrieved 9/12/2020) .

36 Aikikai Foundation (n.d.) What is Aikido? > About Aikido .

http://www.aikikai .

or.jp/eng/aikido/about.html (retrieved 17/3/2021) .

37 Houot (2019) .

/ written by Houot

See Also

Site Map: Alan Houot

Contents:

• Motivation for this Page
• How Much Does the Egodeath Theory Utilize the Concept of {death}?
• Outline All Headings of Houot Book Rise of the Psychonaut
• Read Aloud The Psychonauts Ship: What Are Cyb Dyns of “Surrender” in Janikian’s Folk Tech Book? Shamans Have Full Control — O RLY IZZAT SO??
• What Did I Discover? For Houot Context
• Salvation Salesman Gordon . . . . Wasson Shows Us That Christianity equals deceiving and lying to people and censorship
• Dionysus and the Pirates
• Secret Names of Scholars: Policy: Every Writer Gets Only Two Names: First & Last
• Errata in URL of WordPress copy of 2007 Main Article
• Effect Index semi-404, Josie Kins – is this site toast/history, or what? Must Check Archive.org of effectindex.com
• TRANSPERSONAL STATES
• Granting Advanced Degrees in Transcendent Knowledge per the Egodeath theory per Cybermonk
• Justified Rectified Purified Egoic Control Thinking
• Cubensis Nonbranching Horses & Balancing on Right Leg (Image f177)
• See Also

Motivation for this Page

Rough mobile draft, because need to create several pages. but hard to manage todos. gotta get them started. Started cleaning up on desktop.

Yesterday March 25, 2025, I realized that this mushroom-tree has YI branching form discovered yesterday. I got this picture a long time ago like maybe 2003.

I contributed this instance of mushroom imagery in Christian art to the Brown virtual db of all mushroom imagery in Christian art (whatever’s meant by “catalog” given that Browns proposal was no-go, no one has time). Brown should’ve proposed a database, not a committee.

My book review of Hermetic Spirituality and the Historical Imagination: Altered States of Knowledge in Late Antiquity, by Wouter Hanegraaff, 2022:

• Darth Hanegraaff’s Alderaanization of the Fixed Stars
     

How Much Does the Egodeath Theory Utilize the Concept of {death}?

Find ‘death’ in my two main theory-spec articles:

Self-control Cybernetics, Dissociative Cognition, & Mystic Ego Death (1997 core theory spec) (Hoffman, 1997) https://egodeaththeory.wordpress.com/2020/11/30/self-control-cybernetics-dissociative-cognition-mystic-ego-death/
mh97
death – 5 hits

Death Quotes:

• Seeing the illusory aspects of this mental representation and feeling the absence of the accustomed sense of personal solidity can be experienced as death, as literal cessation of personal existence, because the naive mind strongly identifies with the projected image and the sense.
• Conceiving of the world as a fixed spacetime block leads to the astonishing potential of experiencing ego death, because the logic of ego’s control power is coherently disrupted.
• There are multiple [INSUFFICIENT] triggers for the dissociative cognitive state, including psychedelics, meditation, schizophrenia, sensory deprivation, hyperventilation, temporal-lobe epilepsy, UFO abduction, and near-death experiences. 
• Acid-rock mysticism vividly alludes to and resonates with ego death and the dissociative cognition that leads up to it.
• The peak experience of ego death can be rationally explained, whether or not its logic, perceptions, and hypotheses are valid.

The Entheogen Theory of Religion and Ego Death (Hoffman, 2007 main article) http://egodeath.com/EntheogenTheoryOfReligion.htm & https://egodeaththeory.wordpress.com/the-entheogen-theory-of-religion-and-ego-death-2006-main-article/
mh07
death – __ hits

Death Quotes:

• x
• x

Outline All Headings of Houot Book Rise of the Psychonaut

big todos: voice input all headings of Rise of the Psychonaut.

Needed for a book study page,

in my book review i will mention i have posted an outline of headings. voice efficient to enter headings

sections: which are the most relevant for the Egodeath theory? fav sections of book?

for my church book club intelligent discussion

copy here my Mission: to equip Loose Cognitive Science to endure Psilocybin and pass thru the gate to explore loose cognition realm wv w basic dynamics of control votrtex climax already on doily on silver platter for them:

Neo inserts chip in brain: the Egodeath theory, incl religious mythic motif analogies {mushrooms}, {branching}, {handedness}, and {stability} motifs –

instantly neo is able to explore loose cognition scientifically, already having the basic knowledge, CYBERNETIC WISDOM, the cybernetic communication transmission THE MESSAGE OF THE mushroom-trees ARTISTS, the dynamics of SURRENDER.

Know already the cheap trick of stand on right foot

cheap trick song https://youtu.be/T_Km11HNzUY?si=YhTKetnGvhVXBfcf

Read Aloud The Psychonauts Ship: What Are Cyb Dyns of “Surrender” in Janikian’s Folk Tech Book? Shamans Have Full Control — O RLY IZZAT SO??

Stupid mystics couldn’t figure out personal control system on Psilocybin

but somehow shamans achieved FULL ACIVE CONTROL.😑

it be ultra fast to copy his article into a page where i can get hands on it to analyze and critique how Houot is foolish. In what way Houot wise recomm?

Shamans are rational scientists who achieved what muddle headed mystics failed to try to achieve. Show the way wise Houot.

Houot ‘s major interest is surrenderism – why only barely mentioned in book Rise of the Psychonaut??

I STEM-explain “surr” – Houot ‘s fav topic ; he says shamans have full active control and he says they have ACTIVE CONTROL but mystics suck because they do passive surrenderism.

other big anticipated todo: read aloud voice recording Houot article The Psychonaut’s Ship which i already read on paper but merely 1 time every line.

What Did I Discover? For Houot Context

for reviewing Rise of the Psychonaut , the Egodeath theory is an example of a discovery.

Frame the Egodeath theory within Houot’s context as an illustrative example

religious myth depicts by analogy transformation from possibilism to eternalism and Psilocybin transformation of personal control system

same w mushroom-trees genre motifs {mushrooms}, {branching}, {handedness}, and {stability} motifs

Classical Antiquity aims at heimarmene, via Psilocybin transformation

Late Antiquity aims a little above Fate.

loose cognition block-universe eternalism personal control system transformation, NOT Ken Wilber’s beginners’ unity, is what ego transcendence is REALLY about per jan 1988 when put the pieces together – Ramesh Balsekar and Watts were closer than Wilber to figuring out core wisdom.

Wisdom core knowledge was botched by

common-core mysticism and perennialism attempt w sht-tonne of BAGGAGE noise obscuring wisdom more than revealing and usefully conveying and delivering wisdom.

you agree w common-core mysticism and perennialism? ok , therefore you agree w my every whim, a slave of the Egodeath theory & iceberg of hidden agendas like The Banker for the Pope, Gordon . . . .🔍🧐🤔 Wasson INFINITE CONFLICT OF INTEREST, the Pope Wasson says – on roller derby team The Salvation Salesmen-

are you going to believe the meditation hucksters — Zen master Brad? meditation is way more potent than 12g dried cubensis trust me

are you going to believe the salvation salesmen , lying Fraud pope Gordon . . . .🔍🧐🤔 Wasson the lying Pinocchio liar?

Salvation Salesman Gordon . . . .🔍🧐🤔 Wasson Shows Us That Christianity equals deceiving and lying to people and censorship

so commendable, we must defend, like the Art Historian Ronald Huggins’ Foraging Wrong article ,

We must go to bat to defend and run cover for Gordon . . . .🔍🧐🤔 Wasson and applaud and support his deceiving, lying, Fraud scholarship obstruction and excuse him.

This is the kind of people that deny mushroom imagery in Christian art.

pope Gordon says that if you assert mushroom imagery in Christian art, then you are a blundering ignoramus.

What a wonderful Christian, Wasson the deceiver.

what does Logos Media jan irvin have to say about these Christian values of Truth from Gordon . . . .🔍🧐🤔 Wasson ??

Evil Archons of this passing Age

when he tells you that Christianity means lying to people, it is quite clear from Gordon Lawson that Christianity means deceiving and lying to people.

Thanks a hell of a lot , oh wise “father of Ethnomycology”. INFINITE CONFLICT OF INTEREST –

Pope Wasson 🤥 has achieved levels of conflict of interest not even thought possible.

Dionysus and the Pirates

In my emails exchg w Houot, i claimed the best writing on nautical analogy myth of Dionysus & pirates is my site but that writing is hidden in idea development page 23:
https://egodeaththeory.org/2025/01/07/idea-development-23/#Pilot-Helmsman-Steersman-Begged-Dionysus – Find 32 hits on ‘dionysus’

For Houot’s benefit – (Cyberdisciple scoffs at BENEFIT) — i am considering making a page dedicated to honoring — –, Dionysus. As a pilot of Egodeath, honoring Dionysus. To honor the god is to not claim to be foundation source of one’s own control power; ivy disproves that; ssw sna {snake frozen in rock} ;

snake-shaped worldline frozen in rock
sswfr
sswfir

snake-shaped worldline
ssw

I advised A. M. Houot (WHOAH!; “Ooh-Oh”) to study several writeups of this myth cybernetic nautical – tho not a myth of scientific exploration & disco?

Secret Names of Scholars: Policy: Every Writer Gets Only Two Names: First & Last

SECRET – DO NOT TELL ANYONE: it’s Alan Houot

Alan Houot
amh

A. M. Houot

Egodeath Policy: everyone gets 2 names: first, last. That’s it. eg:

Dr. Professor Jose Bob Alfredo Gonzalez Celdran the Great –> Jose Celdran

Esteemed, Learned, Learned! Dr. Professor Jerry M. Brown the Third –>
Jerry Brown

I hate the early 2oth C convention – unhelpful – that I stupidly parrotted in the 2006 & 2007 articles:

Wasson and Allegro on the Tree of Knowledge as Amanita (Hoffman, 2006), http://egodeath.com/WassonEdenTree.htm

& mh07 main article, “J. I. Smith” – stupid, give us the damn first name ffs.

How does it help anyone to write J Z Smith instead of Johnathan Smith?

Errata in URL of WordPress copy of 2007 Main Article

“2006” should be “2007”; recently I determined that body of article was written 2006 but DIDN’T REACH ITS FINAL FORM until Sep. 2007:

The Entheogen Theory of Religion and Ego Death (Hoffman, 2007) – https://egodeaththeory.wordpress.com/the-entheogen-theory-of-religion-and-ego-death-2006-main-article/ – failed to copy the Intro from home page into article until Sep 2007.

The day after that, I found (like Josie Kins did recently, in article “Perception of Eternalism” in EffectIndex.com) the correct word, ‘eternalism’ instead of the wrong word, ‘determinism’ – fail.

Effect Index semi-404, Josie Kins – is this site toast/history, or what? Must Check Archive.org of effectindex.com

Archive.org of effectindex.com
https://web.archive.org/web/20250000000000*/effectindex.com
eg: 2024/09/14 —
https://web.archive.org/web/20240914113026/http://www.effectindex.com/
https://web.archive.org/web/20240914113026mp_/http://www.effectindex.com/effects/perception-of-eternalism
https://web.archive.org/web/20240914113026mp_/http://www.effectindex.com/effects/perception-of-predeterminism – blank drats foiled again

alt path strategy: https://www.youtube.com/@josikinz

https://www.effectindex.com/effects/perception-of-eternalism 404

yet this works:

https://www.effectindex.com/people/josie

then nav from there to:
https://www.effectindex.com/effects/perception-of-eternalism
i don’t get it they look identical – am i seeing my own cached copy?

TRANSPERSONAL STATES

• Ego death
• Existential self-realization
• Perception of eternalism
• Perception of interdependent opposites
• Perception of predeterminism – blank for me at the moment WTF
• Perception of self-design
• Spirituality enhancement
• Unity and interconnectedness

The Entheogen Theory of Religion and Ego Death (Hoffman, 2007)
mh07

The Entheogen Theory of Religion and Ego Death (Hoffman, 2007) at http://egodeath.com/EntheogenTheoryOfReligion.htm & https://egodeaththeory.wordpress.com/the-entheogen-theory-of-religion-and-ego-death-2006-main-article/
mh07l

Granting Advanced Degrees in Transcendent Knowledge per the Egodeath theory per Cybermonk

— except for Max Freakout & Cyberdisciple & the other, skizzo guy who re-pointed me to Jan Irvin’s great work, who have the ultra rare honorary(?) (sounds like an insult; they earned PhD fair & square) degree, PhD in Transcendent Knowledge: they are strictly to be addressed as:

Esteemed Dr. Freakout, PhD TK

I cannot grant more PhDs, b/c:

• no time to vet ppl
• no one is worthy earned it as Cyberdisciple & Sir Freakout , but even if they did, no time to vet ppl.

idea: I am ok w idea of granting more PhD degrees in Transcendent Knowledge per the Egodeath theory.

In principle, every high school student takes 1 semester class to learn the Egodeath theory, and advanced degrees are granted in Masters’ in Transcendent Knowledge; PhD in Psychedelic Eternalism.

Night Fever Surrender to Psilocybin transformation – paste bk club summaries of my mission statement

WHAT LOOKS LIKE dread Dittrich’s Dread DED dimension, dread ETCLOC — the experience of the threat of catastrophic loss of control, on the ego, childish side of the gate, is transformation of ctrl: a 2-level relationshio w God the puppetmaster

we are not to be hubristic self assured control agents yet nor are we to avoid massive Kafei sized Max Freakout 3 Reallys high , Eight Reallys High:

God wants creatures to be rly high to know Him as Source of control, yet not hubristic self assured

like shamans right form of full active control , not egoic possibilism-premised control

in the peak state and afterwards we must utilize possibility thinking ego, egoic like possibilism-thinking , freewill thinking , BUT qualified possibilism-thinking

Justified Rectified Purified Egoic Control Thinking

2-level, dependent control

monolithic, autonomous control is now washed: known to be only virtual

use the branching model false virtual illusory local egoic POV but modded.

do not RELY on egoic premise re the foundation source of ctrl

to have stable ctrl, Use egoic freewill looking self control, but yet with a transformed, cleaned, redeemed, rectified, washed, washed clean foundation a new understanding of our source of control.

Our basis foundation is changed, although the visible upper layer of self control looks like it is free will premed but yet transformed foundation understood

image f 177 Great Canterbury Psalter

Cubensis Nonbranching Horses & Balancing on Right Leg (Image f177)

https://youtu.be/c65yR7FWJsM?si=t8t4mYcpxsKTSS7A

See Also

Gordon . . . .🔍🧐🤔 Wasson, example of what kind of person is pals with the Pope — MAKING Christianity LOOK BAD, GOOD JOB DEMON WASSON THE DECEIVER, achieving levels of conflict of interest not thought possible.

1. Wasson: “If you say there’s mushroom imagery in Christian art, you mycologists are blundering ignoramuses.”
2. Wasson: “You failed to consult the art world” / in the same paragraph: [shhh, I am covertly censoring the Brinckmann citation: Albert Brinckmann’s 1906 86-page book in German, Tree Stylizations in Medieval Paintings & two mushroom-trees pics sent by the world’s top art historian Panofsky, and – Brown astutely 2019 pointed out: withheld the 2nd Panofsky letter WHICH IS ABSOLUTELY INEXCUSABLE, Huggins, THERE IS NO EXCUSING THIS CHACANERY DUPLICITY COVER-UP OPERATION THAT YOU GUYS — YOUR SIDE — MICA Deniers — DID. How solid is your case, Ronald Huggins, given that Wasson resorted to HIDING academic publications, how can you excuse [cit his article page quote] this atrocious, INEXCUSABLE behavior on YOUR side, Huggins?? I am holding you guilty as Wasson’s defender. Wasson’s censorship PROVES he is lying and you MICA Deniers cannot win an honest debate so you have to resort to deception.] Art Historians are revealed to be liars, or on the side of a leading liar, Gordon . . . .🔍🧐🤔 Wasson; Art Historians are revealed to be defending Wasson’s duplicitouus censorship, “It’s ok” NO IT IS NOT OK, Huggins. YOU GUYS GOT A BIG PROBLEM, in the words of the worlds greatest exemplary historian, Thomas Hatsis.
3. I am the banker for the Pope and have private audience with him.
4. Andy Letcher book Shroom in 2006, quoted in The Holy Mushroom ji08: “Wasson says it, I believe it, that settles it.”
5. Ronald Huggins’ 2024 article “Foraging for Psychedelic Mushrooms in the Wrong Forest: The Great Canterbury Psalter as a Medieval Test Case” — “Wasson tried to force his pretended negative view on mycologists, but THAT’S OK, b/c as proved by fact that MICA Affirmers still were able to publish assertions of mushroom imagery in Christian art despite Wasson.”

keyboard shortcuts:

The Holy Mushroom: Evidence of Mushrooms in Judeo-Christianity (Jan Irvin, 2008) https://www.amazon.com/dp/1439215170
ji08l

Foraging for Psychedelic Mushrooms in the Wrong Forest: The Great Canterbury Psalter as a Medieval Test Case (Ronald Huggins, 2024) https://www.academia.edu/118659519/Foraging_for_Psychedelic_Mushrooms_in_the_Wrong_Forest_The_Great_Canterbury_Psalter_as_a_Medieval_Test_Case
rh24l

TODO: UPLOAD my ARTICLES TO ACADEMIA.EDU

Ronald Huggins’ 2024 article “Foraging Wrong”
rhfw

Michael Hoffman, 9:30 p.m., March 25, 2025

Contents:

• Motivation for this Post
• Official Relevant Definitions of the Negative and Positive Positions
• Quotes about the Database and Committee from Brown 2016
• Section about the Database and Committee from Brown 2019
• INTERDISCIPLINARY COMMITTEE ON PSYCHEDELIC GOSPELS
  • Call for an interdisciplinary committee
• Ruck’s “Social Drama Narrative” Tail Wagging the “Presence of Mushrooms” Dog
  • Forbidden Word List: mainstream, cult, secretly, oppression, hidden, secret cult, surreptitiously slipped in, communities, cults, groups, sects, heretical; “psychoactive mushrooms”, umbrella wildcard terms
  • The Habitual Attempt to Limit Entheogens, by 1st-gen entheogen scholarship
• The Database Includes the Accompanying Motifs of the Mushroom-Trees Genre: {mushrooms}, {branching}, {handedness}, and {stability} Motifs
• “Mushroom Imagery”, not “Images of Mushrooms”
  • Huggins’ Fake “Criteria to Decide” Is Actually a Sheer Decree of “Mushroom Features Don’t Count”
  • ⚔️
  • TOUCHE! LOL ⚔️
  • Criteria to decide whether a mushroom-tree is a mushroom or a tree: the tree features count, but the mushroom features don’t count – Because I Say So
  • Criteria to decide whether a mushroom-tree is a mushroom or a tree: the mushroom features count, but the tree features don’t count – Because I Say So
• Wasson’s paradox
• See Also

Motivation for this Post

• this page IS the db, vs:
• this site IS the db, vs:
• this page describes and articulates and embodies the CONCEPT of the Brown db
• this page serves as a concrete link; this page URL “is” the Brown [virtual] db.

Brown 2019: 0 hits on “database”, 1 hit on “catalog”: cataloguing – a verb.

Brown focuses on Committee and action too much, not concrete enough collection.

It’s easy to have a database.

Having a collection and doing collection, acting in a committee, is too hard, not happening.

‘database’ is more powerful than ‘catalog’.

I need to inspect and markup Browns’ description of the db, J Brown told me the present site is as close to their db proposed db as anything. that this site is the closest thing to their proposed db.

Browns’ writeup focuses more on the committee – which idea failed, no one has time to commit to that — than on the db.

This page addresses somehow those needs. after studying and summ’ing what Browns propose.

Official Relevant Definitions of the Negative and Positive Positions

https://egodeaththeory.org/2024/11/23/deniers-logical-fallacies-pilzbaum-mushroom-tree-debate/#Affirmers-Assertion

https://egodeaththeory.org/2024/11/23/deniers-logical-fallacies-pilzbaum-mushroom-tree-debate/#Deniers-Assertion

Deniers’ Logical Fallacies in the Pilzbaum (Mushroom Trees) Debate

Quotes about the Database and Committee from Brown 2016

Section about the Database and Committee from Brown 2019

14 hits on “committee” – all of them in section “INTERDISCIPLINARY COMMITTEE ON PSYCHEDELIC GOSPELS” (good news, a relief)

formatting: all the entire section, plain text, 1 sentence per paragraph.

todo: add bold, maybe delete some.

Browns write:

INTERDISCIPLINARY COMMITTEE ON PSYCHEDELIC GOSPELS

We have revisited the Wasson– Allegro controversy, presented iconographic evidence of entheogens in Christian art, and examined critiques of the psychedelic gospels theory.

In this context, we can now address Wasson’s paradox and the need for an Interdisciplinary Committee on the Psychedelic Gospels.

Call for an interdisciplinary committee

Samorini (1998 ) closes his survey of “ mushroom-trees”  in Christian art by stating that “we may confidently conclude from what has emerged that justifications do exist for serious and unprejudiced ethnomycological study of early Christian culture, and it is our hope that such studies will take place”  (p. 107).

Given the conflicting interpretations of entheogenic mushroom images in Christian art, and the controversial implications of the psychedelic gospels theory, there is an obvious need to establish sound methodologies and objective criteria for a rigorous, unbiased evaluation of this iconographic evidence.

Achieving this goal will require more than a de rigueur appeal for “additional studies.”

For this reason, we call for the establishment of an international Interdisciplinary Committee on the Psychedelic Gospels (Committee).

[should call for database, or define virtual database]

This Committee could be housed at a major university or museum and co-chaired by an ethnobotanist and church historian with relevant credentials.

It would be charged with collecting, cataloging, and curating potential psychoactive images in Christian art from around the world, and evaluating them for the presence of evidence indicating that they represent entheogenic species.

Toward this end, the Committee would integrate research methodologies from

• anthropology (fieldwork),
• art history (iconography, iconology),
• church history (textual analysis),
• ethnobotany (cultural uses of mushrooms),
• mycology (fungus identification), and theology (exegesis).

[the Egodeath theory/ the Mytheme theory; the Egodeath theory of psychedelic eternalism – this is THE way to explain branches/ ramification, as demanded by Panofsky-Huggins as their MAIN objection to the mushroom interp.]

The Committee would establish criteria for peer-review evaluation of critical questions.

Are the images clear and unambiguous enough to facilitate a definitive identifi cation of the genus and species of psychoactive mushroom?

[not just isolated mushroom motif; the genre is actually intending to … artists of the mushroom-trees genre do not intend to send msg “mushroom”; their actual msg is conveyed by the combination of {mushrooms}, {branching}, {handedness}, and {stability} motifs; to describe psychedelic eternalism; mental model transformation from possibilism to eternalism]

Or if the mushrooms shown are stylized mushrooms (such as “mushroom trees”), are there artistic traditions of interpretation that contribute to determining that they were intended to depict entheogenic species?

Does the art tradition and history surrounding the image enhance the determination of the intent to represent psychoactive mushrooms or other entheogens?

Are there relevant texts and/or other historical documents that corroborate these findings?

Unlike the political infighting that delayed publication of the Dead Sea Scrolls for decades, the workings of the Committee must be transparent.

The Judeo-Christian art images and religious texts in question should be made available online for public viewing and comment.

It is through this interdisciplinary peer-review process that the theory of the psychedelic gospels can be independently confirmed (or refuted) by the Committee, and thereby potentially gain credence in scientific and theological circles as well as among thought leaders, policy makers and the mainstream media.

/ end of section from Brown & Brown 2019

Ruck’s “Social Drama Narrative” Tail Wagging the “Presence of Mushrooms” Dog

Entheogens in Christian art: Wasson, Allegro, and the Psychedelic Gospels. Jerry Brown & Julie Brown (2019). Journal of Psychedelic Studies, Volume 3: Issue 2, pp. 142–163. https://doi.org/10.1556/2054.2019.019 – https://www.academia.edu/40412411/Entheogens_in_Christian_art_Wasson_Allegro_and_the_Psychedelic_Gospels

https://egodeaththeory.org/2025/01/07/panofskys-letters-to-wasson-transcribed/

Ruck Committee? we have a counter-committee!

The business of the Ruck Committee is wrong-agenda-driven:

Ritual retelling of tabu social drama narrative of suppression; strive to prevent real Christianity & mass of all people from having The Mushroom (kiddie Amanita) by laboring to construct a barrier wall between Amanita and society at large in Europe history.

The important thing is the morality tale not psychedelics, for Ruck Committee; 1st-generation entheogen scholarship (the Secret Amanita paradigm).

The Brown database is specifically 2nd-generation entheogen scholarship (the Explicit Psilocybin paradigm).

WE DO NOT PERMIT “SECRECY” NARRATIVE TAIL WAGGING THE PSYCHEDELIC EVIDENCE DOG.

THIS DB SIMPLY SAYS “MUSHROOM IS PRESENT” OR MUSHROOM IS USED, NOT “Secret Christian Amanita Cult”, the Amanita Primacy Fallacy, spinning a social drama narrative.

We do not use Browns’ word ‘secret’, nor ‘mainstream’.

Reject “oppressor vs oppressed” narrative driving entheogen scholarship, as was done by the Allegro-Ruck paradigm, for Allegro’s reason/motive/ agenda, nor Ruck Committee’s reason/ motivation / agenda/ project of wrapping around each piece of evidence a jail of framing that art piece as an “alien heretical invasion even into the very heart of the Institutional Big Bad Church”

— a social drama narrative which REPLACES & neutralizes every piece of mushroom imagery in Christian art, striving to keep it separate from the mass of Christendom population & practice by fabricating and concocting out of thin air, “heretical sects, members-only, strong walls”, “displayed blatantly in their places of worship”.

Citation: The Holy Mushroom, p. 104 Irvin objects to such premise.

Against the Assumption of Suppression of Psychedelics in Pre-Modernity (Cyberdisciple 2020)

p. 14 of “Conjuring Eden”, Ruck et al, Entheos 1, 2001:

p. 15 of “Conjuring Eden”, Ruck et al, Entheos 1, 2001: littered with words serving to isolate and restrict “The Mushroom” to imagined “groups” and construct a barrier wall.

I recently highlighted all the words that are abused to carry this premise of “barrier wall” – drawing a line w/ The Mushroom on one side of Ruck paradigm’s line, and Lacking The Mushroom on the other side of the Great Ruckian Barrier Wall:

Conjuring Eden: Art and the Entheogenic Vision of Paradise (Hoffman, Ruck & Staples, Entheos 1, 2001)

Forbidden Word List: mainstream, cult, secretly, oppression, hidden, secret cult, surreptitiously slipped in, communities, cults, groups, sects, heretical; “psychoactive mushrooms”, umbrella wildcard terms

No More Writing About Mushrooms, Entheogens, Classic Psychedelics, Visionary Plants, Plant Teachers, or Psychoactive Plants and Substances

Forbidden Word List for Effective Theory Construction in Psychedelics History and Psychedelic Pseudo Science

The Habitual Attempt to Limit Entheogens, by 1st-gen entheogen scholarship

but when irvin 2008 criticized Ruck’s attempt to limit The Mushroom to mysticism and heretical sects, and to do that, Irvin cited AstroSham 1, Irvin then had to himself hasten to delete his own effort in AstroSham 1 2006 to attempt to limit The Mushroom to “kings, priests, and the elite” – removed from AstroSham 2 2009.

p. 56 of “Daturas for the Virgin”, Ruck et al, Entheos 2, 2001

The Database Includes the Accompanying Motifs of the Mushroom-Trees Genre: {mushrooms}, {branching}, {handedness}, and {stability} Motifs

One way to define the Brown db is: the galleries from Irvin + Michael Hoffman + J Rush + Browns + Samorini = a virtual db.

The db must include {mushrooms}, {branching}, {handedness}, and {stability} motifs supplementing and surrounding and accompanying mushroom imagery in Christian art.

“Mushroom Imagery”, not “Images of Mushrooms”

MICA = mushroom imagery in Christian art

MICA = mushrooms in Christian art <– brittle; we are not saying “it is a mushroom”.

We are saying “it is mushroom features fragments imagery”.

b/c the dirty strategy of Ronald Huggins is “the image on the scale of entire tree does not match A mushroom, therefore, so, not a mushroom.”

But if we are intelliegent MICA Affirmers , we are not saying that “it is a mushroom” – idiotic brittle talk. Low IQ. Irrelvant.

Huggins’ Foraging Wrong article uses dirty opportunity to say “the whole image doesn’t exacly match A mushroom, so, not a mushroom, so, no mushroom imagery in Christian art.”

It is crucial for the good guys, us MICA Affirmers, to explicitly control the definitions of the neg & pos position.

Forget Hugs’ defs; forget the MICA Deniers’ stupid position slip-n-slide definition shell games.

Only use my, relevant & productive, STABLE definitions of the two position.

Huggins: *I* am dictating to *you* what YOUR position is.

*I* am the one who is proactively strawmanning YOU.

*I* control the terms of debate; not you.

I reject the debate positions & concerns & framings as expressed by MICA Deniers.

Huggins’ Fake “Criteria to Decide” Is Actually a Sheer Decree of “Mushroom Features Don’t Count”

Left to Huggins , we have trash quality of pseudo arg’n like Huggins writing:

“Panofsky lets us articulate criteria to decide whetehre it is a tree or it is a mushroom” – brain dead pseudo-argument masking a sheer arbitrary decree.

What Huggins then does is list these so-called “critieria”; LEARNED, LEARNED!, so learned, a long list of criteria (a posturing put-on, pretense):

• if it has branch
• if it looks like tree
• if it has any tree features
• if …
• if …

Then, I dictate (says Huggins), arb’ly, that all mushroom-trees mean tree, not mushroom.

Countering Huggins’ bunk non-arg w/ its opposite:

But Huggins, *I* counter-dictate:

The mushroom features fragmentary aspects of mushroom-trees “RULES OUT” (Huggins’ stupid term thrown about as if a real arg) tree.

To throw Huggins bunk arg’n back in his face,

The mushroom features rule out tree.

⚔️

Touche, Huggins. By your own bunk junk arg.

Oh but let me frame that the same stupid way as Huggins builds up in the paragraph in the Conclusion section of Huggins’ Foraging Wrong article:

Panofsky’s argument allows us to articulate criteria to decide for a given image whether it is a tree or it is a mushroom:

• If the image has any mushroom-shaped caps, then it is a mushroom, not a tree.
• If the image has any mushroom-colored, blue stem, then it is a mushroom, not a tree.
• If the image has any branch that is shaped like a mushroom, then it is a mushroom, not a tree.

TOUCHE! LOL ⚔️

GARBAGE ARG’N FROM MICA Deniers, TYPICAL.

I’m as good as Ronald Huggins at “articulating criteria to decide”, equally arb’ly. What posturing.

Is this supposed to be argumentation, Huggins? “articulating criteria to decide”?

Criteria to decide whether a mushroom-tree is a mushroom or a tree: the tree features count, but the mushroom features don’t count – Because I Say So

Criteria to decide whether a mushroom-tree is a mushroom or a tree: the mushroom features count, but the tree features don’t count – Because I Say So

You mean, criteria to issue a blanket proclamation that in every instance, given mushroom features + tree features – ie, what you art historians call mushroom-trees – YOUR term —

You art historians, MICA Deniers, proclaim that the tree features count, but the mushroom features don’t count – because you proclaim so, without any basis other than, “branches need to be explained.”

Which is DONE.

In fact, we know that mushroom-trees cannot possibly mean trees, b/c they have mushroom features.

Mushroom-trees definitely do not and cannot mean trees, and in fact mushroom-trees do not ultimately mean trees.

In fact, mushroom-trees more mean literal mushrooms than they mean literal trees.

Mushroom-trees ultimately mean experience of non-branching from Psilocybin.

Mushroom-trees do not ultimately mean tree OR mushroom.

So, a FALSE DILEMMA FALLACY thanks to big-brain Huggins and the scoundrel MICA Deniers who apologized for, ie defend – Wasson’s fraudulent, obstructionist behavior, on the excuse that:

“Wasson didn’t prevent MICA Affirmers from affirming mushroom imagery in Christian art, publishing such assertions post-Wasson.

“So, academic fraud and obstructionism: THIS IS FINE”, says Huggins.

Penalty: I charge Huggins as responsible for Wasson’s fraud.

Huggins must disavow, let’s see Hug disavow:

I demand that Huggins RETRACTS his defense of Wasson’s bullying tactics & duplicity, which Irvin complains about, as reported by Huggins’ Foraging Wrong article.

The good thing from Panofsky-Huggins is, they inquire of us MICA Affirmers: Must explain branches. DONE.

… … That’s his so-called “enables us to articulate criteria to decide whether it is a tree or it is a mushroom”.

Huggins’ “articulate criteria to decide” is pure bullsh*t!

The Panofsky-Huggins argument REALLY is:

“Until MICA Affirmers explain branches, we are not convinced.”

Solved. Done. See present site;

Branches — and you are blind to more important non-branching motif — means the peak Psilocybin experience of mental model transformation from possibilism to eternalism .

That is why we MICA Affirmers reject any position definition games from the MICA Deniers, and we take charge of both positions definitions.

HERE is the specific postition we argue against and disprove, and, here is the position that we hold.

Not like Ruck says on p. 56 of “Daturas for the Virgin”, Ruck et al, Entheos 2, 2001 , “they are mushrooms and nothing else” – a poor statement of the MICA Affirmers position.

MICA Affirmers do NOT say mushroom-trees are “mushrooms and nothing else”, like Ruck Committee 2001 says on p. 56 “Daturas for the Virgin”.

See my page for the sane, relevant, two position definitions (for & against), at 3 levels of detail.

Ignore the stupid, shifting, shell-game position definitions from MICA Deniers such as “decide if it is a tree of it is a mushroom” – irrelvant brain-dead fallacious arg’n FALSE DILEMMA.

The usual lack of concern — as usual, as typical:

Characteristic of MICA Deniers is they don’t care about good arg’n.

MICA Deniers stoop and are ok with being associated with obviously bad arg’n.

MICA Deniers are ok w/ being known for bad arg’n and heap of fallacious arg’n, all of the fallacies all at once.

They’re fine putting that forth and associating themselves w/ fallacious arg’n: they solve that by doing more of it, which is really, arg’n from prejudice:

If I’m a MICA Denier and my lips are moving, that is to be taken as “valid arg’n”, given the un-level playing field of extreme bias against MICA Affirmers.

Just throw at the wall, more and more junk arg’n, none valid, but that’s ok.

“articulate criteria to decide” — GTFO! what b.s.! not even an arg!

It’s just a dictate , sweeping, that NO mushroom-trees are “a mushroom”, disguised and foisted as if an arg, but actually it is just a decree:

Huggins’ Conclusion paragraph is really just a position statement repeated: “My position is that mushroom-trees are not a mushroom but are instead a tree.”

But Huggins pretends to be “articulating criteria to decide whether YADA YADA, BS, BS” – typical fallacious arg’n from MICA Deniers that they are notorious for.

If MICA Affirmers are characteristically notorious for (rightly) ignoring art historians,

MICA Deniers are characteristically notorious for shamelessly putting forth Bad Arg’n that amount to arg’n from prejudice.

MICA Deniers only have 1 good point:

MICA Deniers have only 1 valid objection to mushroom imagery in Christian art: the MICA Affirmers must explain the branches motif of mushroom-trees. DONE.

Deniers’ Logical Fallacies in the Pilzbaum (Mushroom Trees) Debate

Wasson’s paradox

(moved out from Interdisc. section – awesome but tangential)

Browns write:

In our book, we state that “In our opinion Wasson’s greatest paradox was this: the discrepancy between his zealous exploration of a controversial theory about the role of entheogens in early religion and his reluctance to pursue this theory past the portals of the church and into the hallowed halls of Christianity”  (Brown & Brown, 2016, p. 7).

This paradox is especially poignant in the case of the Eden fresco at Plaincourault.

Here, Samorini (1998 ) remarks that “It is therefore quite strange that the father of ethnomycology stopped before the lapidary appraisal of an art historian and did not, instead follow the trail of additional ‘mushroom-tree’ representations in Roman and Christian art as he might have done or scheduled”  (p. 31).

Given his reputation as an indefatigable seeker of sacred mushrooms, why did Wasson not travel a mere 6 miles west of Plaincourault to Saint Savin (Figure 5 ) or 50 miles east to SaintMartin’ s (Figure 8 ) where he would have undoubtedly discovered additional examples of entheogens in Christian art? Several explanations of this egregious oversight have been suggested.

Samorini (1998 ) proposes that Wasson’ s reluctance grew out of a realistic concern that acknowledging any  evidence in support of “ Allegro’ s sensational thesis”  would deal “a serious blow to the new science of ethnomycology of entheogenic mushrooms”  (p. 32).

Early in our research, we wondered if as the son of an Episcopalian minister, Wasson felt “a filial allegiance to his father and a loyalty to the church”  (Brown & Brown, 2016 , p. 7).

While these may be contributing factors, we later uncovered a more compelling explanation.

During our 2012 visit to the Vatican Museum in Rome, we were inspired to Google the words “ Wasson, Vatican” which immediately produced several search items including one that said “Wasson was an account manager to the Pope and Vatican for J.P. Morgan” (Irvin, 2012 ).

Wasson joined the Wall Street investment banking firm of J.P. Morgan in 1934, where he helped develop the new fi eld of banking public relations.

Upon further research, we found that Wasson’ s direct financial involvement with the Vatican was confi rmed by DeWitt Peterkin, a retired J.P. Morgan, Vice President.

In an interview for The Sacred Mushroom Seeker , a book of essays in tribute to Wasson, Peterkin reveals that “Unbeknown to most people, we were for many years one of the bankers for the Vatican . . .

And Gordon used to have private audiences with the Pope” 

(Riedlinger, 1997b , p. 51).

Wasson never mentions his role as a Vatican banker in his writings.

This role provides a clear fi nancial motive for Wasson’ s reluctance to explore entheogens in Christian art.

This may have been reinforced by a legally binding confi dentiality and non-disclosure agreement between banker (J.P. Morgan) and client (the Vatican), given that such agreements are common in the investment banking field.

Regardless of motive, due to Wasson’ s preeminent position as a leading authority on the study of entheogens and religion, this lack of disclosure was especially damaging to the nascent field of ethnomycology.

In effect, Wasson’s lack of transparency combined with his relentless personal and professional attacks on Allegro stymied widespread scholarly inquiry into the study of entheogens and Christianity for nearly half a century.

/ end of section by Browns, moved out from Interdisc. section

See Also

glad to see Brown cite Irvin Secret History of Magic Mushrooms article series 2012 – surprised this doesn’t redir to Irvin new site domain, Logos media:
https://www.gnosticmedia.com/SecretHistoryMagicMushroomsProject –
better is:
https://logosmedia.com/SecretHistoryMagicMushroomsProject

Brown links to Michael Hoffman / cites:
Egodeath.com,
Wasson and Allegro on the Tree of Knowledge as Amanita (Hoffman, 2006), http://egodeath.com/WassonEdenTree.htm

Tree Stylizations in Medieval Paintings (Brinckmann 1906) – citations include:
Baumstilisierungen in der mittelalterlichen Malerei
(Tree Stylizations in Medieval Paintings)
Albert Erich Brinckmann, 1906
86 pages
https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_8AgwAAAAYAAJ/mode/2up

Letters of Erwin Panofsky to R. Gordon Wasson, May 2 & May 12, 1952. Wasson Archives, Harvard University Herbarium, Cambridge, Mass. Tina and R. Gordon Wasson Ethnomycological Collection Archives, ecb00001, series IV, drawer W3.2, folder 20. Botany Libraries, Economic Botany Library of Oakes Ames, Harvard University.

The letters were first published by Jerry Brown & Julie Brown (2019). Entheogens in Christian art: Wasson, Allegro, and the Psychedelic Gospels. Journal of Psychedelic Studies, Volume 3: Issue 2, pp. 142–163. https://doi.org/10.1556/2054.2019.019 – https://www.academia.edu/40412411/Entheogens_in_Christian_art_Wasson_Allegro_and_the_Psychedelic_Gospels

_{Site Map > Panofsky}

Deniers’ Logical Fallacies in the Pilzbaum (Mushroom Trees) Debate

Foraging for Psychedelic Mushrooms in the Wrong Forest (Huggins 2024)

Site Map section:
https://egodeaththeory.org/nav/#gallery

Site Map section:
https://egodeaththeory.org/nav/#flagship-Mushrooms-Greek-Christian-Art

Michael Hoffman, March 25, 2025

_{Site Map: Astral Ascent Mysticism}

Contents:

• Motivation for this Page
• The Origins of the Mithraic Mysteries: Cosmology and Salvation in the Ancient World (Ulansey, 1991)
  • David Ulansey’s The Eighth Gate: The Mithraic Lion-Headed Figure and the Platonic World-Soul
• The Eighth Gate: The Mithraic Lion-Headed Figure and the Platonic World-Soul
• David Ulansey
• The Ancient World, Vol. XXXIV, no. 1 (2003), pp. 67-81
• Notes —
  • RETURN TO THE COSMIC MYSTERIES OF MITHRAS
    • David Ulansey’s Mithras and the Hypercosmic Sun
• MITHRAS AND THE HYPERCOSMIC SUN
• David Ulansey’s Home Page
• See Also

Incoming

33:48 – David Ulansey says the art is WRONG, modern corruption, one torch should be aimed up. If the data doesn’t match the theory, then too bad for the data, the theory is correct. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ezr71f2z7po&t=1661s David Ulansey – The Cosmic Mysteries of Mithras

dreamlion

Jun 24, 2021

“Video of a public slide-lecture by David Ulansey on Mithraism, based on his book “The Origins of the Mithraic Mysteries: Cosmology and Salvation in the Ancient World” (Oxford University Press).” 5255 arm sph band

1 13 30 mushrooms above cart
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ezr71f2z7po —

Search YouTube for David Ulansey:
https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=david+ulansey

Motivation for this Page

Debating which to do – these would be two different pages/ types of pages for different purposes, to be used differently.

• Make accurate backup of his two articles; clone his pages.b/c his site was down end of 2024.
• Only retain key phrases. <– this is what I’m needing; my present purpose. Not to archive his articles.

Able to Find across both articles at once:

• snake __ hits
• serpent __ hits
• drink __ hits
• eat __ hits
• food
• leg
• foot
• bent
• beverage
• drug
• plant
• entheogen
• mushroom
• meal __ hits
• transcend __ hits
• altered __ hits
• heimarmene __ hits
• determinism __ hits
• fate __ hits
• 9th __ hits
• ninth __ hits
• ennead __ hits
• precession __ hits
• rock __ hits
• free __ hits
• slave __ hits
• frozen – __ hits

Amazingly, I have no pages titled Ulansey at this site, d/k about Egodeath.com.

Houot sample Amazon find ‘surrender’: Rise of the Psychonaut:

Again look for other relevant articles at his site. This time, I have this page to be able to re-find my notes later.

I have posted some sort of list of his articles that are of top interest for the Egodeath theory.

I got his book Feb 16, 2001, which is after Coraxo in the the Gnosticism Yahoo Group was my first encounter w/ Late Antiquity’s focus on “transcend heimarmene”, and before my June 2001 start of the Egodeath Yahoo Group.

• ~2000 Coraxo in the the Gnosticism Yahoo Group was my first encounter w/ Late Antiquity’s focus on “transcend heimarmene”
• I got Ulansey’s book Feb 16, 2001.
• June 2001 start of the Egodeath Yahoo Group.

todo: When did i realize that my Feb. 1997 2-level Core Egodeath theory required adding the concept of “transcend heimarmene”?

When I read Coraxo’s post at Gnosticism Yahoo Group, I immediately started theorizing about 2-level vs. 3-level model; aiming for eternalism vs. aiming above eternalism.

Aiming for my precious block-universe determinism vs. aiming above it, Coraxo rightly insulting my first theory [expression of theory] by pointing out its inability to discuss Gnosticism’s goal of transcending heimarmene.

The Origins of the Mithraic Mysteries: Cosmology and Salvation in the Ancient World (Ulansey, 1991)

https://www.amazon.com/dp/0195067886 —

I always link to his two articles

David Ulansey’s solution explaining Mithraism

keyboard shortcuts

d u 8 t h

d u h y p

David Ulansey’s The Eighth Gate: The Mithraic Lion-Headed Figure and the Platonic World-Soul, http://www.mysterium.com/eighthgate.html

David Ulansey’s Mithras and the Hypercosmic Sun, http://www.mysterium.com/hypercosmic.html

David Ulansey’s The Eighth Gate: The Mithraic Lion-Headed Figure and the Platonic World-Soul

David Ulansey’s The Eighth Gate: The Mithraic Lion-Headed Figure and the Platonic World-Soul, http://www.mysterium.com/eighthgate.html

http://www.mysterium.com/eighthgate.html

8th & Hyp hypercosmic, 8th sphere / gate, but THE MAIN GATE IS INTO 100% ETERNALISM.

Mainly, mental model transformation is into eternalism – which includes the nuance of “transcend eternalism”. There is no way I’d say the 3-level, 3-phase model is basic. The 2-level model is basic: reborn from possibilism to eternalism.

Rising afterwards above eternalism is a detail.

The 3-level model is parasitical piggybacked dependent on first undegoing the 2-level model.

The first discovery in blotter Rock 1965-1995 is eternalism — NOT transcending eternalism.

The way you recognize blotter Rock is the motif of no-free-will/ eternalism; NOT some Late Antiquity type of motif of “transcend eternalism”, like … Rush song Cygnus IX: after black hole, there’s more.

8th gate is from 8th to 9th sphere

• 0th gate: from Earth (sublunar) to Moon onion layer.
  Strange there’s no ladder rung or gate to get TO Moon (sphere 1).
• 1st gate: from Moon to Mercury.
• 2nd gate: Mercury to Venus.
• 3rd gate: from Venus to Sun.
• 4th gate: from Sun to Mars.
• 5th gate: from Mars to Jupiter.
• 6th gate: from Jupiter to Saturn onion layer.
• 7th gate: from top of Saturn onion layer to bottom of fixed stars onion layer.
• 8th gate: from top of fixed stars onion layer to bottom of precession Ennead layer sphere 9.
• 9th gate: from top of of precession Ennead layer sphere 9, to bottom of Empyrean w/ God and Elect (sphere 10). THE SPHERE OF THE HYPERCOSMIC SUN

list of crops of {sun light} in Great Canterbury Psalter
https://egodeaththeory.org/2025/01/11/letchers-false-citation-various-writers-have-suggested-cult-secretly-oppression-hidden-secret-cult-for-example-stamets-gartz/#fire-light-circle-sun

The Eighth Gate: The Mithraic Lion-Headed Figure and the Platonic World-Soul

David Ulansey’s The Eighth Gate: The Mithraic Lion-Headed Figure and the Platonic World-Soul, http://www.mysterium.com/eighthgate.html

David Ulansey

The Ancient World, Vol. XXXIV, no. 1 (2003), pp. 67-81

RETURN TO HOME OF DAVID ULANSEY

PLAN: REMOVE MUCH/ CONDENSE, ADD BOLD ON KEY PHRASES

In the Barberini mithraeum in Rome (CIMRM* 390), a serpent-entwined figure standing on a globe is depicted floating in the center of a zodiac which arches above the bull-slaying scene. Or, to be more precise, the globe on which the figure is standing is located in the zodiac, while the figure’s body extends above the zodiac into the region just beyond it (see Figs. 1,2,3).

Fig. 1: Barberini tauroctony (CIMRM 390)

Fig 2: The lion-headed figure in the Barberini tauroctony with zodiac
and fire-altars (detail)

Fig 3: The lion-headed figure in the Barberini tauroctony (detail)

Although his head is unfortunately damaged, this figure is undoubtedly the famous Mithraic leontocephaline or lion-headed figure, who is always depicted with a snake winding around him. His position here precisely at the level of the zodiac and just beyond is intriguing, for it suggests that there is a special connection between the leontocephaline and the region of the zodiac. This connection is confirmed by the fact that the body of the leontocephaline is often decorated with the zodiac (e.g., CIMRM 545 and 879; see Fig. 4) or stands on a globe representing the sphere of the fixed stars, on which of course the zodiac is located (CIMRM 382, 390, 543, 551, 1051, 1705, 2320; see Fig. 5).

Fig. 4: Torso of lion-headed figure with zodiac (CIMRM 879)

Fig. 5: Lion-headed figure standing on cosmic sphere
and holding key in right hand (CIMRM 543)

This connection between the leontocephaline and the zodiac can be clarified by noticing that in Origen’s Contra Celsum, Celsus describes a Mithraic symbol consisting of a ladder with seven gates, each associated with one of the seven planets, while at the top there is an eighth gate associated with the sphere of the fixed stars and leading to the region beyond that sphere (VI:22). The leontocephaline, as is well-known, almost always holds a key (according to Maarten Vermaseren he does so in the Barberini painting, although it is difficult to see [1]), and this key is reasonably identified as the key to the celestial gates described by Celsus. However, since the leontocephaline is never linked in Mithraic iconography with any of the planets, but is clearly associated with the zodiac, it seems likely that he has a special connection with Celsus’ eighth gate– that of the sphere of the fixed stars and the realm beyond it– since it is on that sphere that the zodiac lies.

In addition, the painting at Barberini depicts the region outside of the zodiac– into which the leontocephaline’s body extends– in a specific way: above the zodiac is an arch containing a row of six altars with fires burning on them (see again Figs. 1,2,3). Scholars have often assumed that these fires represent the planets.[2] However, there are two decisive arguments against this explanation. First, the fires are depicted as lying beyond the zodiac, which is of course contrary to all Greco-Roman astronomy, in which the planets are understood as being closer to the earth than is the sphere of the fixed stars on which the zodiac is located. And second, of course, there are only six fires, while the planets are always seven in number. In response to the problem of there being only six fires, it has been suggested that the leontocephaline either hides or substitutes for a seventh fire.[3] However, this suggestion is untenable, since in CIMRM 368, a Roman relief from the Esquiline remarkably resembling the Barberini painting, there are clearly only six fire-altars above Mithras (see Fig. 6). In fact, there also exist tauroctonies in which there are nine fire-altars (CIMRM 1128) or four fire-altars (CIMRM 1816) above Mithras, indicating that the specific number of altars was not fixed.

Fig. 6: Esquiline Tauroctony (CIMRM 368)

The comparison between the Esquiline relief and the Barberini painting reveals two interesting facts. First, the comparison makes absolutely certain that the Mithraists understood the cave in which Mithras kills the bull as symbolizing the cosmos, since in the Esquiline relief the arch separating Mithras from the six fires above is the roof of the cave, while in the Barberini painting exactly the same position and role are filled by the arch of the zodiac.

Second, the Esquiline relief also includes a second set of fire-altars, this time indeed numbering seven, at the very bottom of the image. Most scholars are now agreed that the animal figures in the bull-slaying icon represent a series of constellations located on the sphere of the fixed stars. Thus the seven fires placed in the Esquiline relief below the bull-slaying — that is, below the sphere of the fixed stars– are in the proper astronomical location for the planets. Thus the lower set of fires agrees both in number and position with the planets, and thus most likely does represent the planets, while the upper set of fires does not fit with the planets either in number or in position.

But if the six upper fires in the Esquiline relief and the Barberini painting do not represent the planets, what do they represent? An obvious answer to this question is immediately apparent if we merely take seriously the fact that the fires in the Barberini painting are clearly located outside of the zodiac, and hence beyond the sphere of the fixed stars. For throughout antiquity there existed a widespread belief that the outermost region of the cosmos was occupied by a realm of fire.

Deriving from the experience of the light-giving quality of the stars and planets, the light- and heat-producing quality of the sun, and the upward-moving tendency of fire, the earliest Greek philosophers already identified the sky as a realm of fire. As Charles Kahn says, “Both Parmenides and Anaxagoras seem to have identified the aither or sky with elemental fire….” and Anaximander’s cosmology seems to have placed a sphere of flame at the outer boundary of the universe.[4] The Pythagorean Philolaus appears to have held a similar opinion, since according to Aetius he said that in addition to the existence of a fiery “hearth” at the center of the universe there is “…again another fire at the uppermost place, surrounding the whole.”[5]

Plato as well seems to have adopted the idea of fire as existing in the furthest region of the cosmos in Timaeus 62D-63E, since, as F.M Cornford notes in his commentary on this passage, for Plato the elements are here understood as arranged “in a definite order: fire around the circumference (where it is the chief constituent of the stars’ bodies), next the spheres of air and water, and earth at the center.”[6]

The idea of a fire at the outermost boundary of the universe later became a commonplace in Stoic thought. Cleanthes, for example, according to Cicero taught that “the most unquestionable deity is that remote all-surrounding fiery atmosphere called the aether, which encircles and embraces the universe on its outer side at an exceedingly lofty altitude.”[7] Chrysippus, notes David E. Hahm, speaks of “the aether, which is the name he gives to the fire at the periphery of the cosmos.”[8]

Among the Middle and Neo-Platonists there was also a widespread belief that the outermost region of reality was a fiery domain. Based on Plato’s famous allegory of the cave and of the sun-filled realm outside of it, the doctrine arose that beyond the universe– in the “place beyond the heavens” (hyperouranios topos) of Phaedrus 247B-C– there existed a hypercosmic sun or light (I have discussed this in detail in my article “Mithras and the Hypercosmic Sun”[9]). An early example is found in Philo’s De Opificio Mundi VIII.31, where he speaks of

a star above the heavens, the source of those stars which are perceptible by the external sense, and if any one were to call it universal light he would not be very wrong; since it is from that the sun and moon, and all the other planets and fixed stars derive their due light….[10]

And a bit further on, in XXIII 69-71, Philo pictures a mind journeying through the world and then up through the heavenly spheres until it passes the outermost boundary of the universe, at which point “rays of divine light are poured forth upon it like a torrent, so as to bewilder the eyes of its intelligence by their splendour.”[11]

Finally, an exact parallel to the picture in the Barberini mithraeum of a fiery realm outside the cosmos is found in the Chaldaean Oracles. In the Chaldaean cosmology the highest world is beyond the cosmic sphere (hyperkosmios or hyperouranios)[12] and is called the fiery cosmos or the “Empyrean” realm (kosmos pyrios or empyrios).[13]

Given all of this evidence for the ancient belief in the presence of a fiery realm at the outermost place in the universe, the depiction in the Barberini painting of fires just outside the boundary of the cosmos makes perfect sense. Indeed, additional support for a connection between the leontocephaline and the aetherial cosmic fire can be found in the fact that the Mithraic leontocephaline, as is well known, is frequently associated with fire-symbolism in a variety of ways, extending even to the existence of statues of the leontocephaline apparently designed so that fire could be sent shooting out of its mouth.[14]

However, an additional factor in the Barberini painting may help us gain further clarity about the significance of the Mithraic leontocephaline. It is notable that the placement of the leontocephaline at Barberini seems designed to emphasize the concepts of boundary and boundary-crossing. The globe on which the figure stands is located exactly on the arching zodiacal boundary of the universe, while the figure itself extends beyond that boundary as a kind of incarnation of the process of boundary-crossing.

If the leontocephaline, as I would like to suggest, does have a connection with the idea of a cosmic boundary, then crucial pieces of his cryptic symbolism take on a new importance. Perhaps most obvious is the key that he almost always holds, for the key is one of the most appropriate of all symbols of boundaries and boundary-crossing. Thus the goddess Hekate, mistress of boundaries and crossroads, was from Hellenistic times on often associated with the symbol of the key.[15] And in his work On the Genius of Socrates 591 A-C, Plutarch describes how the three Fates guard the thresholds between cosmic realms, each of them holding a key. Significantly, the first of these cosmic thresholds, presided over by the Fate Atropos, is that which separates what is outside the cosmic sphere from what is inside it.[16]

The key held by the Mithraic leontocephaline, then, indicates his role as a type of boundary guardian: specifically, as we have seen, the Barberini symbolism shows that he is associated with the boundary between what is inside and what is outside the cosmic sphere. But what could be the significance of this boundary such that the Mithraists were motivated to personify it in the form of a powerful divine being?

An answer to this question can be found in the fact that the Mithraists were surprisingly not alone in the seemingly peculiar act of personifying the cosmic boundary. For in the Chaldaean Oracles (where, as we saw earlier, it is taught that there exists beyond the universe a realm of fire) the boundary between the cosmos and what is beyond was personified in the figure of the goddess Hekate, a central divinity in the Oracles’ religious system.[17]

The figure of Hekate in the Chaldaean Oracles derives ultimately from speculations on Plato’s description of the World-Soul in his dialogue Timaeus. There, Plato says that the Demiurge– the creator of the universe– as part of the process of creation made a soul for the cosmos as a whole. Plato says that the Demiurge set this “World-Soul” in the center of the cosmos “and caused it to extend throughout the whole and further wrapped [the body of the cosmos] round with soul on the outside….”[18]

The World-Soul of Plato became the object of extraordinarily complex and far-reaching speculations in subsequent Platonic and other Greek philosophy, but it always retained its role as the boundary of the cosmos and the mediator between the cosmos and the realm beyond. The fact that in the Chaldaean Oracles this abstract entity became personified as the goddess Hekate shows that it is at least plausible that the Mithraic leontocephaline could represent a similar personification of the cosmic boundary. And, we should note, this plausibility is strengthened significantly by the fact that the Chaldaean Hekate, like the Mithraic leontocephaline, is constantly associated with an array of symbols involving fire.[19]

But the key piece of evidence supporting our hypothesis that the leontocephaline is a symbol of the cosmic boundary, and that he is linked, like the Chaldaean Hekate, to the Platonic World-Soul, lies in the most consistent of all of the attributes of the leontocephaline: namely, the snake that is almost always shown wrapped around him.

Many explanations for the presence of the snake wrapped around the leontocephaline have been offered, focusing on the snake as a solar symbol, as a symbol for cosmic time, or as a symbol of the celestial ascent of the soul.[20] However, the connection between the leontocephaline and the cosmic boundary and World-Soul that we have been tracing here suggests an additional factor: for there exists solid evidence that the World-Soul in its role as boundary of the universe was sometimes symbolized as a serpent.

This evidence is found in Origen’s Contra Celsum, immediately following his discussion of the Mithraic eight-gated ladder. In Book VI, chaps. 24ff., Origen discusses the teachings of the Gnostic sect of the Ophites or serpent-worshippers as expressed in certain diagrams of theirs. In one of these diagrams, he says, was “a drawing of ten circles, which were separated from one another and held together by a single circle, which was said to be the soul of the universe and was called Leviathan.”[21] Origen goes on to explain that this Leviathan is a great serpent, symbolizing the soul that permeates the universe. That this serpent specifically represents Plato’s World-Soul is proven by the fact that according to Origen the diagram showed Leviathan twice, once in the center and once around the circumference, just as in the Timaeus Plato said that the World-Soul was placed in the center of the cosmos and also wrapped around the outside. Other Gnostic systems also made use of this symbol of a serpent wrapped around the outside of the universe: according to the Pistis Sophia, “The outer darkness is a great dragon, whose tail is in his mouth, outside the whole world and surrounding the whole world.”[22]

Here we see the Platonic World-Soul as boundary of the cosmos symbolized by an encircling serpent. The parallel with the Mithraic leontocephaline as the serpent-entwined symbol of the cosmic boundary is, of course, compelling. But there is one final piece of evidence that is, I think, decisive. For there is in Mithraic iconography another figure besides the leontocephaline who is depicted as entwined by a serpent: namely, the god Oceanus. Oceanus is often depicted in the tauroctony beside the image of Mithras ascending in the chariot of the sun, and is easily identifiable by associated watery symbols such as waves, a boat, an oar, a vase, or a sail (see Fig. 7).[23] However, a number of times the figure beside the image of Mithras in the chariot is depicted as entwined by a serpent in exactly the same way as the leontocephaline (see Fig. 8).[24] As Manfred Clauss and M.L. West have noted, this serpent-entwined figure must also be Oceanus.[25] But why is he entwined by a snake exactly like the leontocephaline?

Fig. 7: Oceanus (on right) with waves and holding sail over head (CIMRM 2244)

Fig. 8: Oceanus (on right) entwined in serpent (CIMRM 1958)

Our discovery of the leontocephaline’s connection with the boundary of the cosmic sphere provides an obvious answer to this question, for of course the most important function of Oceanus in antiquity was as a symbol of the outermost circular boundary of the world.[26] The fact that both the leontocephaline and Oceanus are identically entwined by a serpent, therefore, makes perfect sense: the serpent around each of them symbolizes their roles as ultimate boundaries. And, conversely, the fact that in Mithraic iconography Oceanus– the boundary of the world– is entwined by a serpent provides remarkable support for my claim that the serpent-entwined leontocephaline also symbolizes the cosmic boundary– and hence the Platonic World-Soul– as indicated by the Barberini painting.

One last piece of evidence in this connection is worth noting. In the Acts of Thomas, the same text that includes the famous Gnostic Hymn of the Pearl, the apostle Thomas is confronted by a serpent. The serpent speaks to him, and at one point says, “I am son of him who girds the sphere about; and I am kinsman of him who is outside the ocean, whose tail is set in his own mouth.”[27] Here, exactly as in the Mithraic evidence, we find an enclosing serpent related simultaneously to the world-containing ocean and to the boundary of the cosmic sphere.

I will close by noting that if the leontocephaline did indeed function partly as a symbol for the ultimate boundary of the universe, this would be in complete harmony with the theory I proposed in my book The Origins of the Mithraic Mysteries[28] that Mithraism began as a religious response to Hipparchus’s discovery of the precession of the equinoxes. For if Mithras represented the force responsible for moving the entire cosmic sphere in the way revealed by Hipparchus’s discovery, then he must have been understood as being a divinity whose essential power lay in the hypercosmic realm. As a result, it is easy to see how a symbol for the division between the cosmic and hypercosmic realms would have come to play an important role in the iconographical repertoire of his worship.

— Notes —

*CIMRM refers to Martin Vermaseren, Corpus Inscriptionum et Monumentorum Religionis Mithriacae (The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1956, 1960) 2 vols.

[1] M.J. Vermaseren, Mithriaca III: The Mithraeum at Marino (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1982) p. 85.

[2] See Roger Beck, Planetary Gods and Planetary Orders in the Mysteries of Mithras (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1988) s.v. index I.A.1, #390.

[3] Ibid., p. 32.

[4] Charles H. Kahn, Anaximander and the Origins of Greek Cosmology (Philadelphia: Centrum Philadelphia, 1985) pp. 90-91.

[5] DK A16 (=Aetius 2.7.7), trans. Carl A. Huffman, Philolaus of Croton (Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press, 1993) pp. 237-8.

[6] F.M Cornford, Plato’s Cosmology (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1937) p. 265.

[7] De Natura Deorum I.37, trans. H. Rackam, Cicero: De Natura Deorum (Cambridge: Harvard Univ. Press, 1933) p. 41.

[8] David E. Hahm, The Origins of Stoic Cosmology (Ohio State Univ. Press, 1977) p. 158.

[9] David Ulansey, “Mithras and the Hypercosmic Sun” in John R. Hinnells, Studies in Mithraism (Rome: “L’Erma” di Bretschneider, 1994) pp. 257-64.

[10] Trans. C. D. Yonge, The Works of Philo (Hendrickson Publ., Inc., 1993) p. 6.

[11] Ibid., p. 11.

[12] Hans Lewy, Chaldaean Oracles and Theurgy (Paris: Études Augustiniennes, 1978), p. 151 nn. 311-313, p. 328 nn. 57-8.

[13] Ibid., pp. 77 and n. 40, 137 and n. 270, 201-3, 430-1.

[14] For the fire-breathing of the leontocephaline see Howard Jackson, “The Meaning and Function of the Leontocephaline in Roman Mithraism,” Numen 32.1 (July, 1985) p. 28; CIMRM 383 shows the leonotocephaline igniting a fire altar with his breath while holding a torch in each hand. For other fire symbols associated with the leontocephaline see CIMRM 103, 383, 589 (torches); 312 (thunderbolt, hammer and tongs); and 1123 (fire shovel).

[15] See Sarah Iles Johnston, Hekate Soteira (Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1990), pp. 39-48.

[16] See Phillip H. De Lacy and Benedict Einarson, trans., Plutarch’s Moralia (Cambridge: Harvard Univ. Press, 1959) vol. VII, p. 467 note d; John Dillon, The Middle Platonists (Ithaca: Cornell Univ. Press, 1977) p. 215.

[17] For a complete discussion of Hekate’s role as boundary between the cosmic and the hypercosmic, and of the relationship between the Chaldaean Hekate and the Platonic World-Soul, see Johnston, Hekate.

[18] Timaeus 34B, trans. Cornford, Cosmology, p. 58. Emphasis mine.

[19] See Johnston, Hekate, pp. 64, 119-120, 126-127, 160.

[20] See Jackson, “Meaning,” p. 20 and n. 13; J.R. Hinnells, “Reflections on The Lion-Headed Figure in Mithraism,” Monumentum H.S. Nyberg (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1975) vol. 1, pp. 356-7; Beck, Planetary Gods, pp. 54-7; David Ulansey, The Origins of the Mithraic Mysteries: Cosmology and Salvation in the Ancient World (New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press, revised paperback, 1991), p. 120. Interestingly, the Arles leontocephaline torso (CIMRM 879– see Fig. 4 above) makes it difficult to argue that the snake symbolizes the path of the sun, since the snake here moves backwards through the zodiac. However, notice that this backwards movement through the zodiac is the same direction as that of the precession of the equinoxes, the discovery of which, I have argued in Origins, was the catalyst for the creation of the Mithraic mysteries.

[21]VI:25, trans. Henry Chadwick, Origen: Contra Celsum (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1953) p. 340; see also VI:35 (Chadwick, p. 351). Cf. Lewy, Oracles, p. 354.

[22] Trans. G.R.S. Mead, Pistis Sophia (London: John M. Watkins, 1963) p. 265.

[23] CIMRM 693, 1975, 2034, 2038, 2202, 2244, 2272, 2310, 2338.

[24] CIMRM 1935, 1958, 1972, 2166, 2171, 2291.

[25] Manfred Clauss, The Roman Cult of Mithras (Edinburgh: Edinburgh Univ. Press, 2000) p. 152; M.L. West, Early Greek Philosophy and the Orient (Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press, 1971) p. 45 and Plate III.

[26] For complete discussion see James S. Romm, The Edges of the Earth in Ancient Thought (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1992) pp. 12-26.

[27] Acts of Thomas 32; trans. in Edgar Hennecke, New Testament Apocrypha (Lutterworth Press, 1965) p. 460.

[28] Ulansey, Origins.

RETURN TO THE COSMIC MYSTERIES OF MITHRAS

David Ulansey’s Mithras and the Hypercosmic Sun

David Ulansey’s article:
Mithras and the Hypercosmic Sun http://www.mysterium.com/hypercosmic.html

MITHRAS AND THE HYPERCOSMIC SUN

David Ulansey’s article:
Mithras and the Hypercosmic Sun http://www.mysterium.com/hypercosmic.html

David Ulansey

PLAN: REMOVE MUCH/ CONDENSE, ADD BOLD ON KEY PHRASES

In Studies in Mithraism, John R.Hinnells, ed. (Rome: “L’Erma” di Brettschneider, 1994) pp. 257-64.

One of the most perplexing aspects of the Mithraic mysteries consists in the fact that Mithraic iconography always portrays Mithras and the sun god as separate beings, while– in stark contradiction to this absolutely consistent iconographical distinction between Mithras and the sun– in Mithraic inscriptions Mithras is often identified with the sun by being called “sol invictus,” the “unconquered sun.” It thus appears that the Mithraists somehow believed in the existence of two suns: one represented by the figure of the sun god, and the other by Mithras himself as the “unconquered sun.” It is thus of great interest to note that the Mithraists were not alone in believing in the existence of two suns, for we find in Platonic circles the concept of the existence of two suns, one being the normal astronomical sun and the other a so-called “hypercosmic” sun located beyond the sphere of the fixed stars.

In my book The Origins of the Mithraic Mysteries I have argued that the god Mithras originated as the personification of the force responsible for the newly discovered cosmic phenomenon of the precession of the equinoxes. Since from the geocentric perspective the precession appears to be a movement of the entire cosmic sphere, the force responsible for it most likely would have been understood as being “hypercosmic,” beyond or outside of the cosmos. It will be my argument here that Mithras, as a result of his being imagined as a hypercosmic entity, became identified with the Platonic “hypercosmic sun,” thus opening up the way for the puzzling existence of two “suns” in Mithraic ideology.

The most important source for our knowledge of the Platonic tradition of the existence of two suns is the Chaldaean Oracles, the collection of enigmatic sayings generated late in the second century C.E. by a father and son both named Julian. These oracular sayings were, as is well known, seized upon by Porphyry and later Neoplatonists as constituting a divine revelation. For our purposes, the most important element in the Chaldaean teachings is that of the existence of two suns. As Hans Lewy says,

The Chaldaeans distinguished between two fiery bodies: one possessed of a noetic nature and the visible sun. The former was said to conduct the latter. According to Proclus, the Chaldaeans call the “solar world” situated in the supramundane region “entire light.” In another passage, this philosopher states that the supramundane sun was known to them as “time of time….”[1]

As Lewy showed definitively in his study, the Chaldaean Oracles were the product of a Middle Platonic milieu, since they are permeated by concepts and images known from Platonizing thinkers ranging from Philo to Numenius. It is thus likely that the Chaldaean concept of a hypercosmic sun is at least partly derived from the famous solar allegories of Plato’s Republic, in which the sun is used as a symbol for the highest of Plato’s Ideal Forms, that of the Good. In Book VI of the Republic (508Aff.) Plato compares the sun to the Good, saying that as the sun is the source of all illumination and understanding in the visible world (the horatos topos), the Good is the supreme source of being and understanding in the world of the forms (the noetos topos or “intelligible world”). Plato then amplifies this image in his famous allegory of the cave at the beginning of Book VII of the Republic. In this famous passage, Plato symbolizes normal human life as life in a cave, and then describes the ascent of one of the cave-dwellers up out of the cave where he sees for the first time the dazzling light of the sun outside the cave.

Thus in Book VI of the Republic we see the image of the sun used as a metaphor for the Form of the Good–the source of all being which exists in the “intelligible world” beyond the ordinary “visible world” of human experience–and then in Book VII, in the allegory of the cave, this same image of the sun is used even more concretely to symbolize that which exists outside of the normal human world represented by the cave.

In addition, as has often been noted, there seems to have been a connection in Plato’s imagination between his allegory in Book VII of the Republic of the ascent of the cave dweller to the sunlit world outside the cave and his myth in the Phaedrus of the ascent of the soul to the realm outside of the cosmos where “True Being” dwells. The account in the Phaedrus reads:

For the souls that are called immortal, so soon as they are at the summit [of the heavens], come forth and stand upon the back of the world: and straightway the revolving heaven carries them round, and they look upon the regions without. Of that place beyond the heavens none of our earthly poets has yet sung, and none shall sing worthily. But this is the manner of it, for assuredly we must be bold to speak what is true, above all when our discourse is upon truth. It is there that true being dwells, without colour or shape, that cannot be touched; reason alone, the soul’s pilot, can behold it, and all true knowledge is knowledge thereof. [2]

As R. Hackforth says,

No earlier myth has told of a hyperouranios topos [place beyond the heavens], but this is not the first occasion on which true Being, the ousia ontos ousa, has been given a local habitation. In the passage of Rep. VI which introduces the famous comparison of the Form of the Good to the sun we have a noetos topos contrasted with a horatos (508C): but a spatial metaphor is hardly felt there…. A truer approximation to the hyperouranios topos occurs in the simile of the cave in Rep. VII, where we are plainly told that the prisoners’ ascent into the light of day symbolises ten eis ton noeton tes psyches anodon (517B); in fact, the noetos topos of the first simile has in the second developed into a real spatial symbol. [3]

Paul Friedländer agrees with Hackforth completely in seeing a connection in Plato’s mind between the ascent from the cave in the Republic and the ascent to the “hypercosmic place” in the Phaedrus:

The movement “upward”… had found its fullest expression in the allegory of the cave in the Republic. [Now in the Phaedrus]… the dimension of the “above” is stated according to the new cosmic co-ordinates. For the “intelligible place” (topos noetos) in the Republic (509D, 517B) now becomes “the place beyond the heavens” (topos hyperouranios)…[4]

What is, of course, important to see here is that there exists already in Plato the obvious raw material for the emergence of the idea of the “hypercosmic sun”: when the prisoners escape the cave in the Republic what they find outside it is the sun, but if Hackforth and Friedländer are correct the vision of what is outside the cave in the Republic is linked in Plato’s mind with the vision of what is outside the cosmos in the myth recounted in the Phaedrus. It would therefore be a natural and obvious step for a Platonist to imagine that what is outside the cosmic cave of the Republic–namely, the sun, the visible symbol of the highest of the Forms and of the source of all being–is also what is to be found outside the cosmos in the “hypercosmic place” described in the Phaedrus.

An intermediate stage in the development of the concept of the “hypercosmic sun” between Plato and the Chaldaean Oracles can be glimpsed in Philo’s writings, for example in the following passage from De Opificio Mundi:

The intelligible as far surpasses the visible in the brilliancy of its radiance, as sunlight assuredly surpasses darkness…. Now that invisible light perceptible only by mind…is a supercelestial constellation [hyperouranios aster], fount of the constellations obvious to sense. It would not be amiss to term it “all-brightness,” to signify that from which sun and moon as well as fixed stars and planets draw, in proportion to their several capactiy, the light befitting each of them…[5]

Here we see Philo referring to the existence in the intelligible sphere of a “hypercosmic star” (hyperouranios aster) which he links with the image of sunlight, and which he sees as the ultimate source of the light in the visible heavens.[6] Philo’s formulation here is, of course, strikingly similar to the Chaldaean concept of the hypercosmic sun, the description of which by Lewy we should recall here: “The Chaldaeans distinguished between two fiery bodies: one possessed of a noetic nature and the visible sun. The former was said to conduct the latter. According to Proclus, the Chaldaeans call the ‘solar world’ situated in the supramundane region ‘entire light.'”[7]

The trajectory we have been tracing from Plato through Middle Platonism to the Chaldaean Oracles continues beyond the time of the Chaldaean Oracles into early Neoplatonism, for we find the concept of the existence of two suns clearly spelled out in the writings of Plotinus, in a context that makes it clear that for Plotinus one of these suns was “hypercosmic.” In chapter 2, paragraph 11 of his fourth Ennead, Plotinus speaks of two suns, one being the normal visible sun and the other being an “intelligible sun.” According to Plotinus,

…that sun in the divine realm is Intellect– let this serve as an example for our discourse– and next after it is soul, dependent upon it and abiding while Intellect abides. This soul gives the edge of itself which borders on this [visible] sun to this sun, and makes a connection of it to the divine realm through the medium of itself, and acts as an interpreter of what comes from this sun to the intelligible sun and from the intelligible sun to this sun… [8]

What is especially interesting for us is that in the same third chapter of the fourth Ennead, a mere six paragraphs after the passage just quoted, Plotinus explicitly locates the intelligible realm– which he has just told us is the location of a second sun– in the space beyond the heavens. The passage reads:

One could deduce from considerations like the following that the souls when they leave the intelligible first enter the space of heaven. For if heaven is the better part of the region perceived by the senses, it borders on the last and lowest parts of the intelligible. [9]

As A.H. Armstong says of this passage, “There is here a certain ‘creeping spatiality’… [Plotinus’] language is influenced, perhaps not only by the ‘cosmic religiosity’ of his time, but by his favorite myth in Plato’s Phaedrus (246D6-247E6).”[10] In any event, we here find Plotinus in the third chapter of the fourth Ennead first positing the existence of an “intelligible sun” besides the normal visible sun, and then locating the intelligible realm spatially in the region beyond the outermost boundary of the heavens.

Finally, to return to the Chaldaean Oracles, the fact that the Chaldaean concept of the “hypercosmic sun” was at least sometimes taken in a completely literal and spatial sense is shown by a passage from the Platonizing Emperor Julian’s Hymn to Helios. According to Julian, in certain unnamed mysteries it is taught that “the sun travels in the starless heavens far above the region of the fixed stars.”[11] Given the fact that Julian’s thinking was steeped in the Neoplatonic philosophy of Iamblichus who was deeply committed to the Chaldaean Oracles as a source of divinely inspired knowledge, and given the fact that the doctrine of the “hypercosmic sun” is an established teaching of the Chaldaean Oracles, it is virtually certain, as Robert Turcan points out in his remarks about this passage, that Julian is referring here to the teaching of the Chaldaean Oracles.[12] The passage from Julian, therefore, shows that the “hypercosmic sun” of the Chaldaean Oracles was understood as being “hypercosmic” not in a merely symbolic or metaphysical sense, but rather in the literal sense of being located physically and spatially in the region beyond the outermost boundary of the cosmos defined by the sphere of the fixed stars.

Our discussion thus far has shown that in the late second century C.E. there is found in the Chaldaean Oracles the doctrine of the existence of two suns: one the normal, visible sun, and the other a “hypercosmic”sun. The evidence from Julian shows that the “hypercosmic” nature of this second sun was understood as meaning that it was literally located beyond the outermost sphere of the fixed stars. The fact that the Chaldaean Oracles emerged out of the milieu of Middle Platonism suggests that the doctrine of the “hypercosmic sun” found in the Oracles did not develop overnight, but that it has roots in the Platonic tradition, most likely, as we have seen, going back ultimately to Plato himself: specifically, to the allegory in the Republic of the ascent beyond the world-cave to the sunlit realm outside and the related myth of the Phaedrus describing the ascent of the soul towards its ultimate vision of the hyperouranios topos, the “hypercosmic place” beyond the heavens. An intermediate stage between Plato and the Chaldaean Oracles is found in Philo’s reference to the “hypercosmic star” which is the source of the light of the visible heavenly bodies, and slightly later than the Chaldaean Oracles we find Plotinus making reference to two suns, one of them being in the intelligible realm which he places spatially beyond the heavens.

We may say, therefore, that it is likely that there existed in Middle Platonic circles during the second century C.E. (and probably much earlier as well) speculations about the existence of a second sun besides the normal, visible sun: a “hypercosmic” sun located in that “place beyond the heavens” (hyperouranios topos) described in Plato’s Phaedrus.

We see here, of course, a striking parallel with the Mithraic evidence in which we also find two suns, one being Helios the sun-god (who is always distinguished from Mithras in the iconography) and the other being Mithras in his role as the “unconquered sun.” On the basis of my explanation of Mithras as the personification of the force responsible for the precession of the equinoxes this striking parallel becomes readily explicable. For as we have seen, the “hypercosmic sun” of the Platonists is located beyond the sphere of the fixed stars, in Plato’s hyperouranios topos. But if my theory about Mithras is correct (namely, that he was the personification of the force responsible for the precession of the equinoxes) it follows that Mithras–as an entity capable of moving the entire cosmic sphere and therefore of necessity being outside that sphere–must have been understood as a being whose proper location was in precisely that same “hypercosmic realm” where the Platonists imagined their “hypercosmic sun” to exist. A Platonizing Mithraist (of whom there must have been many– witness Numenius, Cronius, and Celsus), therefore, would almost automatically have been led to identify Mithras with the Platonic “hypercosmic sun,” in which case Mithras would become a second sun besides the normal, visible sun. Therefore, the puzzling presence in Mithraic ideology of two suns (one being Helios the sun-god and the other Mithras as the “unconquered sun”) becomes immediately understandable on the basis of my theory about the nature of Mithras.

Finally, the line of investigation which I have pursued here can also allow me to provide a simple and convincing interpretation for two further puzzling elements of Mithraic iconography. First, all the various astronomical explanations of the tauroctony which scholars are currently advancing (including my own) agree that the bull in the tauroctony is meant to represent the constellation Taurus. However, the constellation Taurus as seen in the night sky faces to the left while the bull in the tauroctony always faces to the right. How can this apparent discrepancy be explained? On the basis of my theory this question has an obvious answer. For although it is the case that the constellation Taurus as seen from the earth (i.e., from inside the cosmos) faces to the left, it is also the case that on ancient (and modern) star-globes which depict the cosmic sphere as it would be seen from the outside the orientation of the constellations is naturally reversed, with the result that on such globes (like the famous ancient “Atlas Farnese” globe) Taurus is always depicted facing to the right exactly like the bull in the tauroctony. This shows that the Mithraic bull is meant to represent the constellation Taurus as seen from outside the cosmos, i.e. from the “hypercosmic” perspective, which is, of course, precisely the perspective we should expect to find associated with Mithras if my argument in this paper is correct.[13]

Second, the line of investigation I have pursued here can also provide a simple and convincing interpretation of the iconographical motif known as the “rock-birth” of Mithras, in which Mithras is shown emerging out of a rock. As is well known, Porphyry, quoting Eubulus, explains in the Cave of the Nymphs that the Mithraic cave in which Mithras kills the bull and which the Mithraic temple imitates was meant to be an image of the cosmos (De Antro. 6). Of course, the hollow Mithraic cave would have to be an image of the cosmos as seen from the inside. But caves are precisely hollows within the rocky earth, which suggests the possibility that the rock out of which Mithras is born is meant to represent the cosmos as seen from the outside. Confirmation of this interpretation is provided by the fact that the rock out of which Mithras is born is often shown entwined by a snake, a detail which unmistakably evokes the famous Orphic motif of the snake-entwined cosmic egg out of which the cosmos was formed when the god Phanes emerged from it at the beginning of time.[14] It thus seems reasonable to conclude that the rock in the Mithraic scenes of the “rock-birth” of Mithras is a symbol for the cosmos as seen from the outside, just as the cave (the hollow within the rock) is a symbol for the cosmos as seen from the inside.

I would argue, therefore, that the “rock-birth” of Mithras is a symbolic representation of his “hypercosmic” nature. Capable of moving the entire universe, Mithras is essentially greater than the cosmos, and cannot be contained within the cosmic sphere. He is therefore pictured as bursting out of the rock that symbolizes the cosmos (not unlike the prisoner emerging from the cosmic cave described by Plato in Rep. VII), breaking through the boundary of the universe represented by the rock’s surface and establishing his presence in the “hypercosmic place” indicated by the space into which he emerges outside of the rock.

And, to conclude, in this context it is no accident that in the “rock-birth” scenes Mithras is almost always shown holding a torch; for having established that his proper place is outside of the cosmos, Mithras has become identified with the “hypercosmic sun”: that light-giving being which dwells, as Proclus says,

in the supermundane (worlds) [en tois hyperkosmiois]; for there exists the “solar world (and the) whole light…” as the Chaldaean Oracles say and which I believe.[15]

NOTES

[1] Hans Lewy, Chaldaean Oracles and Theurgy (Paris: Études Augustiniennes, 1978) pp. 151-2.

[2] 247B-C; trans. R. Hackforth, Plato’s Phaedrus (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1952) pp. 71,78.

[3] Ibid., pp. 80-1.

[4] Paul Friedländer, Plato I: An Introduction (New York: Pantheon Books, 1958) p. 194.

[5] VIII.31; trans. F.H. Colson, Philo (London: William Heinemann, 1929) vol. 1, p. 25.

[6] Philo often speaks of God using expressions such as the “intelligible sun” (noetos helios [Quaest. in Gen. IV.1; see Ralph Marcus, trans., Philo Supplement 1: Questions and Answers on Genesis (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1953) p. 269, n.l]) or similar expressions involving light and illumination located in the intelligible realm; for references see Pierre Boyancé, Études sur le songe de Scipion (Paris: E. de Boccard, 1936) pp. 73-4; Lewy, Chaldaean Oracles, p. 151, n. 312; David Runia, Philo of Alexandria and the Timaeus of Plato (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1986) p. 435 and n. 143. Boyancé (p. 73-4) quite reasonably argues that such expressions were identical in Philo’s mind with the hyperouranios aster (“hypercosmic star”) of De Opificio Mundi VIII.31.

[7] For a superb discussion of the broader context in which the development of the concept of the “hypercosmic sun” most likely occured, see Boyancé, Études, pp. 65-77. Recently A.P. Bos has argued that the story of the ascent to the sunlit world outside of the cave in Plato’s Republic was explicitly connected by Aristotle with Plato’s image in the Phaedrus of the ascent of the soul to the “place beyond the heavens,” and that this connection played a central role in one of Aristotle’s lost dialogues whose major elements were then preserved and utilized by Plutarch in his De Facie. See A.P. Bos, Cosmic and Meta-Cosmic Theology in Aristotle’s Lost Dialogues (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1989): the argument is complex and the book should be read as a whole, but see esp. pp. 67-8, 182. The development of the concept of the “hypercosmic sun” also must, of course, be seen in the context of the evolution of the “solar theology” described by Franz Cumont in his La théologie solaire du paganisme romain (Paris: Librairie Kliensieck, 1909). A very important and intriguing argument is made for the presence of a tradition of a “hypercosmic sun” in Orphic circles by Hans Leisegang, “The Mystery of the Serpent,” in Joseph Campbell, ed., The Mysteries (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1955) pp. 194-261. The Greek magical papyri and the Hermetic corpus provide numerous examples of solar imagery in which the sun is in various ways symbolically elevated to at least the summit of the cosmos if not explicitly to a “hypercosmic” level. Finally, Hermetic, Gnostic, and Neoplatonic texts all betray an almost obsessive concern with enumerating and distinguishing the various cosmic spheres and levels, and especially with establishing where the boundary lies between the cosmic and the hypercosmic realms (the hypercosmic realm being identified by the Hermetists and Neoplatonists with the “intelligible world” and by the Gnostics with the “Pleroma”). This concern with establishing the boundary between the cosmic and the hypercosmic must have fed into speculations about the “hypercosmic sun,” and–intriguingly–one of the clearest symbolic formulations of this boundary between the cosmic and the hypercosmic is found in the religious system of the Chaldaean Oracles (exactly, that is, in the system in which we find explicitly formulated the image of the “hypercosmic sun”), where the figure of Hecate is understood as the symbolic embodiment of precisely this boundary (on the image of Hecate in the Chaldaean Oracles see now Sarah Iles Johnston, Hekate Soteira [Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1990]).

[8] IV, 3.11.14-22; trans. A.H. Armstrong, Plotinus (Cambridge, Mass., 1984) vol. 4, pp. 71-73.

[9] IV.3.17.1-6; ibid, pp. 87-89.

[10] Ibid., p. 88, n. 1.

[11] Or. 4.148A; trans. W. C. Wright, Julian (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1962) p. 405.

[12] Robert Turcan, Mithras Platonicus (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1975) p. 124. Julian was well acquainted with the Chaldaean Oracles: see Polymnia Athanassiadi-Fowden, Julian and Hellenism (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1981) pp. 143-53. Roger Beck has recently suggested that Julian is referring here to the Iranian cosmology in which the sun and moon are located beyond the stars (Planetary Gods and Planetary Orders in the Mysteries of Mithras [Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1988], pp. 2-3, n.2). However, Julian’s intimate association with Iamblichus and the Chaldaean Oracles, in which the doctrine of the “hypercosmic sun” is well established, renders the possibility that Julian is referring to the Iranian tradition highly unlikely. As Hans Lewy says, “There seems to be no connection between [Julian’s teaching] and Zoroaster’s doctrine according to which the sun is situated above the fixed stars” (Chaldaean Oracles, p. 153, n. 317). However, it is certainly true that the existence of the Iranian cosmology placing the sun beyond the stars could easily have provided some additional motivation for the emergence of the identification between the “Persian” Mithras and the Platonic “hypercosmic sun” for which I have argued here. On the Iranian cosmology see M.L. West, Early Greek Philosophy and the Orient (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1971), pp. 89-91; Walter Burkert, “Iranisches bei Anaximandros,” Rheinisches Museum 106 (1963) pp. 97-134.

[13] It should be noted that the fact that the bull in the tauroctony faces to the right renders untenable Roger Beck’s suggestion that the tauroctony is a picture of the night sky as seen by an observer on earth at the time of the setting of the constellation Taurus (“Cautes and Cautopates: Some Astronomical Considerations,” Journal of Mithraic Studies 2.1 [1977] p. 10; Planetary Gods and Planetary Orders in the Mysteries of Mithras [Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1988] p. 20), since such an observer would see Taurus facing to the left. The fact that the bull in the tauroctony faces right is explicable only if we understand the tauroctony as the creation of someone who had in mind an astronomical star-globe showing the cosmic sphere as seen from the outside, and not– as Beck argues– an image of the sky as seen from the earth.

[14] That the rock from which Mithras is born was identified with the Orphic cosmic egg is in fact proven beyond doubt, as is well known, by the striking similarity between the Mithraic Housesteads monument (CIMRM 860), which shows Mithras being born out of an egg (which is thus identified with the rock from which he is usually born), and the famous Orphic Modena relief showing Phanes breaking out of the cosmic egg (CIMRM 695). In connection with this Orphic-Mithraic syncretism, Hans Leisegang, “Mystery of the Serpent” (above, n. 8), esp. pp. 201-215, has collected a fascinating body of material–including among other things the Modena relief and the passage from Julian which I have discussed above–supporting the contention that the breaking of the Orphic cosmic egg is linked directly with the concept of the “hypercosmic.” Leisegang’s discussion as a whole provides strong support for my general argument in this paper.

[15] Chaldaean Oracles Frag. 59 (= Proclus, In Tim. III.83.13-16); trans. Ruth Majercik, The Chaldaean Oracles (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1989) p. 73. The sun was often imagined in antiquity as a torchbearer, as for example in SVF 1:538: “Cleanthes… used to say… that the sun is a torchbearer” (cited in Jean Pépin, “Cosmic Piety,” in Classical Mediterranean Spirituality [New York: Crossroad, 1986] p. 425); a fragment from Porphyry: “In the mysteries of Eleusis, the hierophant is dressed as demiurge, the torchbearer as the sun…” (also cited in Pepin, “Piety,” p. 429); and of course Lucius in Apuleius’ Golden Ass XI.24: “In my right hand I carried a lighted torch… thus I was adorned like unto the sun….” (trans. W. Adlington, Apuleius The Golden Ass [London: William Heinemann, 1928] p. 583).

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http://www.mysterium.com

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Michael Hoffman, Sunday, March 23, 2025

Contents:

• Motivation of this Page
• The Censored Panofsky Sentence About the Two Mushroom-Tree Art Instances That Panofsky Sent to Wasson
• Key Words
• Contrast Between the Instances’ Key Words
• Page 180 of SOMA: Proof of Insincerity & Duplicity: “Consult Art World” in Same Paragraph as Censors Brinckmann Citation and Description of Two Attached Mushroom-Trees
• Proof of Duplicity and Insincerity of Wasson
• “Wasson’s conclusion”, p. 56 of “Daturas for the Virgin”
• Gallery
• Every Instance of Miniature, 990, Mushroom-Like Shape
• Candidate 1 and Working Hypothesis: The First Mushroom-tree Panofsky Sent Wasson
• Every Instance of Glass Painting, Thirteenth Century, Emphatic Mushroom-Like Crown
• Candidate 2 and Working Hypothesis: The Second Mushroom-tree Panofsky Sent Wasson
• See Also

Motivation of this Page

The first step in identifying which two mushroom-tree art images Panofsky sent Wasson is to prepare a mission template to capture that information; this page.

I have already emailed Dr. Secret and the Evil M. Hoffman at Gordon . . . .🔍🧐🤔 Wasson headquarters asking if the Huggins secret drawer W3.2 at Wasson Archive contains the two mushroom-trees Panofsky sent Wasson.

Jan Irvin was prohibited from accessing the Huggins drawer (footnote citation in Ronald Huggins’ 2024 article “Foraging for Psychedelic Mushrooms in the Wrong Forest: The Great Canterbury Psalter as a Medieval Test Case”) , as Irvin throughly documented in The Holy Mushroom 2008. [check/give cit.]

Wasson Archives, Harvard University Herbarium, Cambridge, Mass. Tina and R. Gordon Wasson Ethnomycological Collection Archives, ecb00001, series IV, drawer W3.2, folder 20. Botany Libraries, Economic Botany Library of Oakes Ames, Harvard University.

Erwin Panofsky’s Letters to Gordon Wasson, Transcribed

No guarantee that Dr. Secret & the Evil M. Hoffman saw my email, and no guarantee I saw their reply [todo: check].

See copy of my email at this site (todo: link). Carl Amanita Promoter Ruck, Mark Hoffman.

The only question is which of these art works, from the two comprehensive galleries shown below, Panofsky sent to Gordon . . . .🔍🧐🤔 Wasson in 1952.

This page shows every art image fitting the descriptions:
https://egodeaththeory.org/2025/01/07/panofskys-letters-to-wasson-transcribed/#Sentence-1-7

The Censored Panofsky Sentence About the Two Mushroom-Tree Art Instances That Panofsky Sent to Wasson

Just to show what I mean, I enclose two specimens: a miniature of ca. 990 which shows the inception of the process, viz., the gradual hardening of the pine into a mushroom-like shape, and a glass painting of the thirteenth century, that is to say about a century later than your fresco, which shows an even more emphatic schematization of the mushroom-like crown.

Panofsky Letter 1 to Gordon . . . .🔍🧐🤔 Wasson May 2 1952, sentence 7, https://egodeaththeory.org/2025/01/07/panofskys-letters-to-wasson-transcribed/#Sentence-1-7

Key Words

• miniature
• 990
• mushroom-like shape

• glass painting
• thirteenth century
• emphatic mushroom-like crown

Contrast Between the Instances’ Key Words

• miniature vs. glass painting
• 1000 AD vs. 1250 AD
• mushroom-like shape vs. emphatic mushroom-like crown

Page 180 of SOMA: Proof of Insincerity & Duplicity: “Consult Art World” in Same Paragraph as Censors Brinckmann Citation and Description of Two Attached Mushroom-Trees

This proves insincerity and duplicity and thus proves academic fraud committed by Gordon . . . .🔍🧐🤔 Wasson:

In the same paragraph, Wasson wrote:

• Ellipses ( . . . . ) instead of “If you are interested, I recommend a little book by A. E. Brinckmann, Die Baumdarstellung im Mittelalter (or something like it), where the process is described in detail. Just to show what I mean, I enclose two specimens: a miniature of ca. 990 which shows the inception of the process, viz., the gradual hardening of the pine into a mushroom-like shape, and a glass painting of the thirteenth century, that is to say about a century later than your fresco, which shows an even more emphatic schematization of the mushroom-like crown.”
• “the mycologists have refrained from consulting the art world“

https://egodeaththeory.org/2025/01/07/panofskys-letters-to-wasson-transcribed/#Transcription-of-Letter-1

Proof of Duplicity and Insincerity of Wasson

If Wasson were sincere in telling mycologists (affirmers of mushroom imagery in Christian art) to consult the art world, Wasson would not have replaced Panofsky’s two sentences by ellipses, and Wasson would have published both letters from Panofsky and the two instances of mushroom-tree art.

This is proved, an exposed cover-up operation by Wasson to mislead the public and misrepresent Wasson’s conclusion, as leaked by Ruck (Wasson’s confidant) et al.

“Wasson’s conclusion”, p. 56 of “Daturas for the Virgin”

p. 56 of “Daturas for the Virgin”, Ruck et al, Entheos 2, 2001: “Wasson’s conclusion” Placed After Wasson’s Genesis Text Proposal and then “substantiated by many depictions of the Paradise Trees as mushrooms”

See The Holy Mushroom, Jan Irvin, 2008 p0. 100-105 criticizing this “Wasson’s conclusion” passage as the opposite of history re: Wasson’s publicly claimed position he tried to force on mycologists.

todo: transcribe section “Mushroom-apples”

Wasson privately believed mushroom imagery in Christian art, as leaked by p. 56 of “Daturas for the Virgin”, Ruck et al, Entheos 2, 2001, where Ruck writes “Wasson’s conclusion”, after giving Wasson’s Genesis tree of knowledge / Amanita connection followed by the argument – as supporting evidence – for hundreds of Paradise trees as mushrooms.

Ruck says, and necessarily implies, that Wasson concluded mushroom-trees mean mushrooms.

Wasson acted like he believed mushroom imagery in Christian art, when he wrote like “I am prepared to weather the coming storm”, where Wasson leaked and revealed his belief in mushroom imagery in Christian art, given that there cannot be a coming storm from his infinitely feeble, weak, indirect, extremely distant and vague association he asserted between Genesis text tree of knowledge, snake, and Amanita.

Wasson wrote “this story”, strictly meaning Genesis text tree of knowledge story, not all Paradise trees or all mushroom-trees.

To propose a novel reading of this celebrated story is a daring thing: it is exhilarating and intimidating. I am confident, ready for the storm.

Wasson, Persephone’s Quest, p. 74

For details and quotes, Find “storm” in Wasson and Allegro on the Tree of Knowledge as Amanita (Hoffman, 2006), http://egodeath.com/WassonEdenTree.htm.

Wasson believed mushroom imagery in Christian art; mushroom-trees mean mushrooms, and that fits his statement about the coming storm from his belief: not Wasson’s publicly lied-about, negative belief, but Wasson’s actual, privately held, positive belief, reflected in his words “coming storm” and Ruck’s words “Wasson’s conclusion”.

Gallery

Every Instance of Miniature, 990, Mushroom-Like Shape

Candidate 1 and Working Hypothesis: The First Mushroom-tree Panofsky Sent Wasson

What’s a better candidate?

Every Instance of Glass Painting, Thirteenth Century, Emphatic Mushroom-Like Crown

Candidate 2 and Working Hypothesis: The Second Mushroom-tree Panofsky Sent Wasson

What’s a better candidate?

https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_8AgwAAAAYAAJ/page/n77/mode/2up

See Also

Tree Stylizations in Medieval Paintings (Brinckmann 1906)

Site Map: Erwin Panofsky
https://egodeaththeory.org/nav/#Panofsky

• Erwin Panofsky’s Letters to Gordon Wasson, Transcribed – 2025/01/06
  • Panofsky’s Censored Pair of Letters to Wasson Revealed and Transcribed – 2023/