WEBVTT

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Can you hear in the back? Good, I assume so. Yes? Good.

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I'm here to be in San Francisco. This is sort of a hometown of mine, one of my hometowns.

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I've been on a tour or a rave, spoken three times and raved twice in the past five or seven days.

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This is the end, so if I'm comfortable with this stuff at all, I must be comfortable with it this evening.

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And it's nice to see a small, full house. That's the most exciting kind of audience to talk to, I think.

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So thank you all for turning out on a rainy night.

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Before I get into the main body of tonight's...

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...entertainment, I want to call your attention to the propaganda for an event in Mexico and another event in Hawaii.

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These events, in the case of the Mexico event, you get a major slice of the psychedelic community.

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You get Robert Montgomery, Jonathan Ott, Ann and Sasha Shulgin, Manolo Torres...

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...and others who unfortunately slipped my mind, at the ceremonial center of Palenque in Chiapas.

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We've been doing these events somewhere in Mayan Mexico for the past 10 or 12 years.

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Many of you are graduates, which doesn't mean you can't come again.

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But I want to invite all of you there, if you're interested in ethnobotany, shamanism...

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...ethnopharmacology, altered states of consciousness, the politics of all of this.

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This is as intense and information-packed an exposure as you can have.

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And it's straight from the mouths of the scholars and scientists and writers...

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...who have spent a great deal of time in that area.

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So I just want to invite you to that. It's also a great party.

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It's the height of mushroom season.

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There's nothing we could do about that.

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So you just are on your own.

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So when I start out on these tours, I usually have an agenda and prepared remarks.

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And then as I make my way through my venues and I hear the feedback...

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...and I feel the ambiance of the people and the throb of the zeitgeist...

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...it all sort of just simply dissolves into an ongoing commentary on our moment in space and time...

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...and the various dimensions, adumbrations and opportunities of our dilemma.

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But I want tonight to couch it for you in the context of, I guess, an extended metaphor.

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We could talk about these things many ways.

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But I find this particular extended metaphor...

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...illuminating.

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And I start by recalling an observation from someone whose name rarely falls from my lips.

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And that would be Gurdjieff.

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And Gurdjieff said at one point, or was known to comment, that people are asleep.

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He said.

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And he, by implication, suggested people awaken.

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I'm not sure if he fully grasped the implication for his own product line, had that occurred.

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But in any case, you're on it, you're with me, yes.

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It's very hard to give these lectures in such a way so that every person hears something different.

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Which is what is supposed to be going on, you know.

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Well, so thinking about this comment that people are asleep...

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...I see several implications.

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I asked myself, what is awake in my own notion?

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And I thought to myself, awake is, for me, awake is where the laws of physics are fully operable.

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You know, hurled objects shatter, electricity shocks.

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I cannot fly.

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The laws of physics are in operation.

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In that domain, I consider myself to be fully awake.

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Now, in terms of occult and spiritual traditions, the admonition to awaken always seems to imply that higher consciousness is approached through an expansion of clarity and awareness.

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And that seems obvious.

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I don't argue with it as a rationalist.

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But as somebody who has run the edges, I've noticed something somewhat counterintuitive to that teaching.

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And it's this.

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It's that to contact the cosmic giggle, to have the flow of casuistry begin to give off synchronistic ripples...

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...white caps in the billows of the coincidental ether, if you will.

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To achieve that requires...

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A precondition is a kind of unconsciousness.

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A kind of drifting.

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A certain taking your eye off the ball.

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A certain assumption that things are simpler than they are.

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Almost always precedes what Mircea Leal says.

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There's a term that God called the rupture of plane that indicates that there is an archetypal world.

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An archetypal power behind profane appearances.

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And in my own life, for those of you who are conversant with my output, when I went to the Amazon in 1971...

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...and had the experiences that are described in true hallucinations...

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...I had been, for many months before that, in Asia, smuggling, hanging out.

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And I had taken my eye off the ball.

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I had become very gentle, very relativistic in my approach to other people's opinions and behaviors.

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I was easygoing, is what I'm trying to say.

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Too easygoing.

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Uh...

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And in that situation of semi-unconsciousness and openness, the cosmic giggle approaches.

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And I compare this...

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This is closing of a theme.

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I compare this to sleep.

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Or to states that lie between waking and sleeping.

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And so, again, an odd take on this remark of Gurdjieff's.

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I remember someone, many years ago, said to me...

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They evoked the symbol of the yin and the yang.

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The two tiers folded against each other within a circle.

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And this person, who was no rishi, roshi, geisha, or guru, but simply observant, said...

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Uh...

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It's not the black side.

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It's not the white side.

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It's the interface.

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It's the edge.

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And I found, by observing sleep...

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And some of you may recall the motto in Athanasius Kircher's Amphiatrium Sapientium,

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that's chiseled over the alchemist's doorway.

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I can't do it in Latin, but it says,

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While sleeping, watch.

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While sleeping, watch.

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And I've noticed that while going to sleep,

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there is a barrier, a place in the process of going to sleep,

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that is like a mercurial edge.

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It's a river.

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It's a zone of hypnagogia.

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You often pass through it post-orgasm.

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It's a place of drifting amoeboid colored afterimage lights.

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True hallucination.

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Images, strange, transcendental or transpersonal images.

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Well, so then, so far in the context of pursuing this extended metaphor about sleep,

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I've talked basically, essentially about the individual's relationship

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to the concept, to the fact.

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But there's also a sort of...

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But there's also a social or a political, a species-wide implication.

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It occurs to me that at any given moment,

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because of the way the planet is as a thing,

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some considerable percentage of human beings are asleep.

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Always.

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And many are awake.

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And so if the world soul is made of the collective consciousness

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of human beings, then it is never entirely awake.

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It is never entirely asleep.

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It exists in...

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I guess you can hear me.

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It exists in some kind of indeterminate zone.

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And this to me is the clue to understanding something

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that is personally fascinating to me.

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And it revolves around why people believe such weird things.

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And why, either as a consequence of the approach of the millennium

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or the breakdown of traditional values

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or the density of electromagnetic radiation

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or for some reason,

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a balkanization of epistemology is taking place.

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And what I mean by that is

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there is no longer a commonality of understanding.

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I mean, for some people, quantum physics provides the answers.

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Their next-door neighbor may look to the channeling of archangels

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with equal fervor.

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I mean, if this is not a balkanization of epistemology,

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I don't know what it is.

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It is accompanied by a related phenomenon

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which is technology or the historical momentum of things

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is creating such a bewildering social milieu

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that the monkey mind cannot find a simple story,

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a simple creation myth or redemption myth

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to lay over the crazy contradictory patchwork

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of profane technology.

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There is no consumerist, post-McLuhanist,

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electronic pre-apocalyptic existence.

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And so into that dimension of anxiety

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created by this inability to parse reality

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rushes a bewildering variety of squirrely notions.

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Epistemological cartoons,

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if you will.

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And conspiracy theory, in my humble opinion,

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I'm somewhat immune to paranoia,

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so those of you who aren't,

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you know, gaze in wonder.

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Conspiracy theory is a kind of epistemological cartoon about reality.

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I mean, isn't it so simple to believe that things are run by the greys,

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and that all we have to do is trade sufficient fetal tissue to them

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and we can solve our technological problems?

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Or isn't it comforting to believe that the Jews are behind everything?

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Or the Communist Party?

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Or the Catholic Church?

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Or the Masons?

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Well, these are epistemological cartoons.

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It's, you know, kindergarten stuff in the art of amateur historiography.

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I believe that the truth of the matter is far more terrifying.

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That the real truth that dare not speak itself

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is that no one is in control.

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Absolutely no one.

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You know, you don't understand Monica.

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You don't understand Netanyahu.

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It's because nobody is in control.

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This stuff is ruled by the equations of dynamics and chaos.

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Now, there may be entities seeking control.

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The World Bank, the Communist Party, the rich, the somebody others.

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But to seek control is to take enormous aggravation upon yourself.

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Because this process that is underway,

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will take the control freak by the short and curly

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and throw them against the wall.

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It's like trying to control a dream, you see.

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The global destiny of the species

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is somehow unfolding with the logic of a dream.

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Well, now a Jungian would say, no surprise here,

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history is the collective dream of humanity.

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It is run by archetypal energies.

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It is downloaded by the zeitgeist

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into the various milieus and epochs of which it is composed.

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This seems reasonable to me.

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I don't want to give you the impression it's too linear

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to understand that what I am saying is that

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awake is good,

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asleep is bad.

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What I would rather do is explain this whole gradient

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of possible positioning vis-a-vis your life and your destiny,

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these choices that you have,

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and then have people understand that they choose,

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you choose to be asleep or partially asleep or fully awake

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or to be one part of the time and in some situations

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and one part of the time.

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And in other situations.

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Now, if in fact we exist inside some kind of morphogenetic field

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that is created by the sum total of human minds on the planet,

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and if in fact in half or more of those minds at any given moment

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the rules of the dream hold sway,

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then it is no surprise that when we make our way into society

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or just when we live our lives,

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there's an eeriness to it.

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There's a fatedness to it.

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There's a plottedness to it.

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You know, we are inside some kind of engine of narrative,

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I believe.

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You know, some science fiction writers such as Greg Egan

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and others have suggested that this could even be a form of recorded medium.

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You can see the thumb prints of editors on our reality

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if you are truly paying attention.

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I mean, if you're a devotee of the theory of stochastic

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and random unfolding of events,

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then you have to look very carefully

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at how unrandom and how mythical

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and archetypal most people's lives are.

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You know, if you take psychedelics and hurl yourself to the edge

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and spend time with strange aboriginal people

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in remote parts of the world,

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the cosmic giggle becomes your friend.

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But in fact, ordinary people's lives,

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everyone's lives,

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are touched by deep magic.

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And I've, you know, again,

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the primary datum is experience

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and then the models are built backward from the primary data

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without prejudice

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and in an attempt to transcend historical momentum.

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And when I do that, what I see is that the carrier,

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of the field of the cosmic giggle in most people's lives,

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is love.

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Love is some kind of output

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which messes with the

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entropic tendency toward probabilistic behavior

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in nature.

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What do I mean by that?

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I mean, you can be the janitor at Microsoft

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and the vice president and chief of operations,

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his daughter can bring him lunch one day

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and you can, from a distance,

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have your eye fall upon her

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and fall in love with her.

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And, you know, from that point

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to having the five children she bears you

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go off to Harvard and the Sorbonne,

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it's just a matter of running the clock forward.

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I mean, these things have,

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I mean, to you it may seem like a miracle,

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but to those of us who are students of human happenstance,

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it's inevitable.

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I mean, you can launch your story.

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And I've, you know,

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in the course of taking psychedelics

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and looking at my life and other people's lives

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and narrative,

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I think that the,

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the secret of,

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I don't want to say anything as pretentious

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as transcendence or enlightenment,

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but the secret of taking hold

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of one's destiny

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is to understand that one is a character.

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A character is a different thing

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than this model you inherit

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out of the idea that you're a three-dimensional animal

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inside a democracy with a Christian heritage

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and, you know,

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a Dewey Decimal cataloging system or whatever.

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Anyway, these are some of the notions

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that occur to me in the context of,

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of comparing dream

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on many scales.

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It's, you have to

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really struggle, I think,

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to believe that you actually live

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inside the model of reality

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that science

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and Newtonian physics

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and the mathematical analysis of nature

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have given us.

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You know, not to get too philosophical here,

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but for positivist philosophers,

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everything that is important,

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color,

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feeling,

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taste,

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tone,

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ambition,

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apprehension,

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appetition,

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these things are called secondary qualities.

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In other words, they're peripheral.

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They arise at a lower level of understanding.

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They are somehow determined

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by the presence of the animal body

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and hence dismissible

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by a theory of perception.

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It's an absolutely pure abstraction,

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which says, you know,

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what is real is spin,

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charge, angular momentum.

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None of these things are very rich concepts

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for a living human being.

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Who knows what any of these things are?

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You know?

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So, one, I mean, there,

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we don't have time in a situation like this

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to explore all the implications

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of this dream analogy that I'm pursuing.

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But one that interests me

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is the plasticity of time

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in the dream.

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And I think I would argue,

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as the devil's advocate,

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that it is the plasticity of historical time

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and the acceleration,

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the sense of an out-of-control spin-up,

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or spin-down,

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into new domains of possibility

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that is the strongest evidence present at hand

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that we are in some kind of dream.

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I've struggled my whole life with,

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I've always believed,

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or I've always felt the power

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of the statement,

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the world is made of language.

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But, of course,

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you think about this proposition

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for 30 seconds,

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and the question that arises then is,

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if the world is made of language,

24:09.950 --> 24:12.950
then why isn't it the way I want it to be?

24:12.950 --> 24:13.950
You know?

24:13.950 --> 24:16.950
Why does it have this prepotent momentum

24:16.950 --> 24:18.950
for its own,

24:18.950 --> 24:20.950
it has its own raison d'être,

24:20.950 --> 24:24.950
even if it is language?

24:24.950 --> 24:26.950
Well, I think,

24:26.950 --> 24:28.950
and it's appropriate to speak of this

24:28.950 --> 24:32.950
to an audience as digitally sophisticated

24:32.950 --> 24:35.950
as I assume you must be,

24:35.950 --> 24:38.950
I think the primary insight

24:38.950 --> 24:41.950
that has been secured

24:41.950 --> 24:44.950
here at the end of the 20th century,

24:44.950 --> 24:46.950
the primary contribution

24:46.950 --> 24:48.950
of 20th century thinking,

24:48.950 --> 24:49.950
if you will,

24:49.950 --> 24:52.950
is to have understood, finally,

24:52.950 --> 24:56.950
that information is primary.

24:56.950 --> 24:58.950
That this world,

24:58.950 --> 24:59.950
this cosmos,

24:59.950 --> 25:00.950
this universe,

25:00.950 --> 25:02.950
this body and soul,

25:02.950 --> 25:06.950
are all made of information.

25:06.950 --> 25:08.950
Information is a deeper

25:08.950 --> 25:10.950
and more primary concept

25:10.950 --> 25:11.950
than space,

25:11.950 --> 25:12.950
time,

25:12.950 --> 25:13.950
matter,

25:13.950 --> 25:14.950
energy,

25:14.950 --> 25:15.950
charge,

25:15.950 --> 25:16.950
spin,

25:16.950 --> 25:18.950
angular momentum.

25:18.950 --> 25:22.950
The world is made of language.

25:22.950 --> 25:24.950
The implication

25:24.950 --> 25:26.950
for the digerati

25:26.950 --> 25:33.230
is that reality can therefore be hacked.

25:33.230 --> 25:34.230
If

25:34.230 --> 25:36.230
reality is made of language,

25:36.230 --> 25:37.230
then what we're saying is

25:37.230 --> 25:39.230
that it's code.

25:39.230 --> 25:44.120
And if it's code,

25:44.120 --> 25:46.120
then it is far

25:46.120 --> 25:48.120
more deeply open

25:48.120 --> 25:49.120
to manipulation

25:49.120 --> 25:52.120
than we ever dared dream.

25:52.120 --> 25:54.120
I mean, we've been messing around

25:54.120 --> 25:55.120
on the desktop

25:55.120 --> 25:57.120
opening files

25:57.120 --> 25:58.120
with religions

25:58.120 --> 26:00.120
and political systems

26:00.120 --> 26:03.120
and xenophobic theories

26:03.120 --> 26:04.120
of racial superiority,

26:04.120 --> 26:05.120
all this crap

26:05.120 --> 26:06.120
that haunts

26:06.120 --> 26:08.120
the human historical adventure.

26:08.120 --> 26:11.120
It means we have not addressed

26:11.120 --> 26:14.120
the deeper levels.

26:14.120 --> 26:15.120
And in thinking about this

26:15.120 --> 26:17.120
and the relationship to dream

26:17.120 --> 26:20.120
and human culture,

26:20.120 --> 26:22.120
I have realized

26:22.120 --> 26:26.430
that cultures

26:26.430 --> 26:30.430
are like operating systems.

26:30.430 --> 26:32.430
We are like hardware.

26:32.430 --> 26:34.430
The human animal

26:34.430 --> 26:35.430
is a piece of

26:35.430 --> 26:38.430
biological

26:38.430 --> 26:39.430
wetware

26:39.430 --> 26:40.430
slash

26:40.430 --> 26:41.430
hardware.

26:41.430 --> 26:42.430
And

26:42.430 --> 26:43.430
it has been,

26:43.430 --> 26:44.430
we know,

26:44.430 --> 26:45.430
pretty much

26:45.430 --> 26:46.430
as we confront it today,

26:46.430 --> 26:51.430
for at least 140,000 years.

26:51.430 --> 26:53.430
At Klasus River cave mouth

26:53.430 --> 26:54.430
in South Africa,

26:54.430 --> 26:56.430
they have excavated

26:56.430 --> 26:57.430
homo sapiens,

26:57.430 --> 26:59.430
sapien skeletons,

26:59.430 --> 27:01.430
100,000 years old.

27:01.430 --> 27:03.430
And that person could have sat

27:03.430 --> 27:04.430
in the front row

27:04.430 --> 27:05.430
here tonight

27:05.430 --> 27:06.430
and nobody would have

27:06.430 --> 27:08.430
batted an eyebrow.

27:08.430 --> 27:10.430
So the human hardware

27:10.430 --> 27:14.430
has been in place

27:14.430 --> 27:16.430
for a while.

27:16.430 --> 27:19.430
What has changed

27:19.430 --> 27:21.430
rapidly in comparison

27:21.430 --> 27:22.430
to the rates

27:22.430 --> 27:24.430
of biological evolution

27:24.430 --> 27:26.430
is

27:26.430 --> 27:30.430
are the operating systems.

27:30.430 --> 27:33.430
The people who excavated Ur,

27:33.430 --> 27:34.430
which was

27:34.430 --> 27:35.430
at that time

27:35.430 --> 27:36.430
thought to be

27:36.430 --> 27:37.430
the world's first city,

27:37.430 --> 27:38.430
and in any case

27:38.430 --> 27:39.430
is a city

27:39.430 --> 27:42.430
seven millennia old.

27:42.430 --> 27:44.430
When they excavated

27:44.430 --> 27:46.430
the central plaza at Ur,

27:46.430 --> 27:47.430
they discovered

27:47.430 --> 27:50.430
that a black basaltic slab

27:50.430 --> 27:52.430
had been set up there

27:52.430 --> 27:55.430
by the earliest kings of Ur.

27:55.430 --> 27:58.430
And that was the cultural operating system.

27:58.430 --> 28:00.430
And if in a deal

28:00.430 --> 28:02.430
trading goats for olives,

28:02.430 --> 28:03.430
a dispute arose,

28:03.430 --> 28:05.430
people had reference

28:05.430 --> 28:07.430
to the central operating system

28:07.430 --> 28:09.430
and these things were determined.

28:09.430 --> 28:10.430
Well now,

28:10.430 --> 28:13.430
Ur 101 was fine

28:13.430 --> 28:16.430
for olives and goat trading,

28:16.430 --> 28:18.430
but it didn't support

28:18.430 --> 28:20.430
higher mathematics.

28:20.430 --> 28:22.430
It didn't support

28:22.430 --> 28:25.430
rational exploration of nature.

28:25.430 --> 28:26.430
It didn't support

28:26.430 --> 28:28.430
astrological knowledge

28:28.430 --> 28:31.430
about the movement of the stars.

28:31.430 --> 28:33.430
As we have gone forward,

28:33.430 --> 28:35.430
through culture,

28:35.430 --> 28:36.430
we have swapped out

28:36.430 --> 28:38.430
these operating systems.

28:38.430 --> 28:41.430
And at each swap out,

28:41.430 --> 28:43.430
there has been a lot

28:43.430 --> 28:44.430
of hair pulling

28:44.430 --> 28:45.430
and cussing

28:45.430 --> 28:46.430
and screaming.

28:46.430 --> 28:47.430
Anyone who has installed

28:47.430 --> 28:49.430
a new operating system

28:49.430 --> 28:51.430
is completely familiar

28:51.430 --> 28:54.430
with that sickening

28:54.430 --> 28:56.430
from the bowels

28:56.430 --> 28:58.430
kind of coldness

28:58.430 --> 29:00.430
as you realize

29:00.430 --> 29:02.430
it all hangs by

29:02.430 --> 29:06.430
a thread.

29:06.430 --> 29:09.430
Now, this situation

29:09.430 --> 29:11.430
or this operating system metaphor

29:11.430 --> 29:13.430
I think is a useful one

29:13.430 --> 29:14.430
for understanding

29:14.430 --> 29:15.430
and again,

29:15.430 --> 29:17.430
a circle closes,

29:17.430 --> 29:20.430
the balkanization of epistemology

29:20.430 --> 29:23.430
that causes me such anxiety.

29:23.430 --> 29:26.430
If you meet

29:26.430 --> 29:28.430
an aboriginal person

29:28.430 --> 29:29.430
from the Amazon,

29:29.430 --> 29:30.430
for example,

29:30.430 --> 29:32.430
they may be running

29:32.430 --> 29:35.430
Witoto 3.0

29:35.430 --> 29:37.430
as their operating system.

29:37.430 --> 29:39.430
Nicely supports

29:39.430 --> 29:41.430
animistic magic.

29:41.430 --> 29:43.430
Huge capacity

29:43.430 --> 29:44.430
when it comes to making

29:44.430 --> 29:45.430
fish traps

29:45.430 --> 29:47.430
and bird traps.

29:47.430 --> 29:49.430
Witoto is a powerful

29:49.430 --> 29:50.430
operating system

29:50.430 --> 29:52.430
for a rainforest aboriginal.

29:52.430 --> 29:54.430
In our culture,

29:54.430 --> 29:55.430
you know,

29:55.430 --> 29:56.430
there are,

29:56.430 --> 29:57.430
I have no idea,

29:57.430 --> 29:58.430
at least 10 or 20

29:58.430 --> 30:00.430
operating systems

30:00.430 --> 30:02.430
all going at the same time

30:02.430 --> 30:05.430
some will run

30:05.430 --> 30:06.430
Mormonism.

30:06.430 --> 30:08.430
Some will support

30:08.430 --> 30:09.430
Catholicism.

30:09.430 --> 30:10.430
Others,

30:10.430 --> 30:12.430
Kabbalah goes

30:12.430 --> 30:14.430
at the speed of light.

30:14.430 --> 30:15.430
Others support

30:15.430 --> 30:17.430
quantum physics.

30:17.430 --> 30:19.430
Some support econometrics.

30:19.430 --> 30:20.430
Others support

30:20.430 --> 30:21.430
political correctness.

30:21.430 --> 30:24.430
And these things

30:24.430 --> 30:27.430
are mutually exclusive.

30:27.430 --> 30:29.430
And so,

30:29.430 --> 30:30.430
looking at this

30:30.430 --> 30:31.430
and looking at this

30:31.430 --> 30:33.430
clash of operating systems,

30:33.430 --> 30:35.430
I've come to the conclusion,

30:35.430 --> 30:36.430
and some of you

30:36.430 --> 30:37.430
may have heard me

30:37.430 --> 30:39.430
say this before,

30:39.430 --> 30:42.430
that culture

30:42.430 --> 30:46.430
is not your friend.

30:46.430 --> 30:48.430
That's the final conclusion.

30:48.430 --> 30:49.430
You see,

30:49.430 --> 30:52.260
well,

30:52.260 --> 30:53.260
this came to me

30:53.260 --> 30:54.260
a few months ago

30:54.260 --> 30:55.260
when I had

30:55.260 --> 30:57.260
my yearly physical.

30:57.260 --> 30:59.260
And as I was buttoning up,

30:59.260 --> 31:01.260
my doctor said to me,

31:01.260 --> 31:02.260
he said,

31:02.260 --> 31:05.260
in the 19th century,

31:05.260 --> 31:06.260
most people your age

31:06.260 --> 31:10.240
were dead.

31:10.240 --> 31:14.240
And I realized

31:14.240 --> 31:17.240
that this was true.

31:17.240 --> 31:19.240
And that one of the,

31:19.240 --> 31:21.240
among all the revolutions

31:21.240 --> 31:23.240
that we are enduring,

31:23.240 --> 31:25.240
one of them is that we live

31:25.240 --> 31:27.240
nearly twice as long

31:27.240 --> 31:29.240
as people lived

31:29.240 --> 31:32.240
very recently in the past.

31:32.240 --> 31:33.240
Well,

31:33.240 --> 31:35.240
culture

31:35.240 --> 31:37.240
is a kind of

31:37.240 --> 31:39.240
neoteny.

31:39.240 --> 31:40.240
And I don't want to belabor that

31:40.240 --> 31:41.240
at great length,

31:41.240 --> 31:42.240
but for those of you

31:42.240 --> 31:45.240
who are not biologists,

31:45.240 --> 31:47.240
neoteny is

31:47.240 --> 31:48.240
the retention of

31:48.240 --> 31:50.240
juvenile characteristics

31:50.240 --> 31:52.240
into adulthood.

31:52.240 --> 31:54.240
It's used to describe

31:54.240 --> 31:55.240
animal behavior.

31:55.240 --> 31:56.240
For instance,

31:56.240 --> 31:58.240
I'll give the most spectacular

31:58.240 --> 32:00.240
example of neoteny.

32:00.240 --> 32:02.240
There is a kind of animal

32:02.240 --> 32:04.240
which lives in ponds

32:04.240 --> 32:05.240
in Africa,

32:05.240 --> 32:07.240
and it reproduces

32:07.240 --> 32:09.240
like a fish.

32:09.240 --> 32:10.240
It lays eggs

32:10.240 --> 32:12.240
on the bottom of these ponds.

32:12.240 --> 32:13.240
More fish-like animals

32:13.240 --> 32:15.240
come from these eggs

32:15.240 --> 32:16.240
and so forth.

32:16.240 --> 32:17.240
However,

32:17.240 --> 32:19.240
if the pond dries up,

32:19.240 --> 32:21.240
the creature undergoes

32:21.240 --> 32:23.240
metamorphosis

32:23.240 --> 32:24.240
and becomes an animal

32:24.240 --> 32:26.240
somewhat like a gecko

32:26.240 --> 32:29.240
and lays eggs,

32:29.240 --> 32:30.240
and from these eggs

32:30.240 --> 32:31.240
come creatures

32:31.240 --> 32:34.240
that are like geckos.

32:34.240 --> 32:35.240
In other words,

32:35.240 --> 32:36.240
this is an animal

32:36.240 --> 32:37.240
which actually

32:37.240 --> 32:39.240
achieves sexual maturity

32:39.240 --> 32:41.240
in two forms,

32:41.240 --> 32:44.240
depending on environmental stress.

32:44.240 --> 32:46.240
Spectacular example of neoteny.

32:46.240 --> 32:48.240
Turning to human beings,

32:48.240 --> 32:50.240
a less spectacular example,

32:50.240 --> 32:51.240
but relevant to us,

32:51.240 --> 32:53.240
is our hairless,

32:53.240 --> 32:56.240
our general body hairlessness

32:56.240 --> 32:58.240
compared to other primates.

32:58.240 --> 33:01.240
We look like fetal apes.

33:01.240 --> 33:05.240
Human beings look like fetal apes.

33:05.240 --> 33:08.240
Why?

33:08.240 --> 33:10.240
What is neoteny?

33:10.240 --> 33:12.240
Well, this is hotly debated

33:12.240 --> 33:15.240
among evolutionary biologists,

33:15.240 --> 33:17.240
but the point I want to make

33:17.240 --> 33:20.240
is a socio-political comment,

33:20.240 --> 33:23.240
which is culture itself

33:23.240 --> 33:27.240
is some kind of neotenizing force

33:27.240 --> 33:30.240
because what culture provides

33:30.240 --> 33:32.240
is a bunch of rules,

33:32.240 --> 33:34.240
so you don't have to think,

33:34.240 --> 33:36.240
and a bunch of myths,

33:36.240 --> 33:39.240
so you don't have to think again.

33:39.240 --> 33:42.240
Culture has all the answers, you know.

33:42.240 --> 33:43.240
You want to know

33:43.240 --> 33:45.240
where people came from?

33:45.240 --> 33:46.240
Well, when the sky god

33:46.240 --> 33:48.240
got out of his canoe

33:48.240 --> 33:49.240
at first waterfall

33:49.240 --> 33:50.240
and took a leak,

33:50.240 --> 33:53.240
then we, the true people,

33:53.240 --> 33:55.240
appeared like ants,

33:55.240 --> 33:58.240
and we've been living here ever since.

33:58.240 --> 33:59.240
Oh.

33:59.240 --> 34:01.240
Gee, thanks.

34:01.240 --> 34:03.240
I'm glad I asked.

34:03.240 --> 34:06.240
You know, this is what culture does for you.

34:06.240 --> 34:15.720
So, but now technology throws a curve,

34:15.720 --> 34:19.720
and the curve is that we live so long

34:19.720 --> 34:23.720
that we figure out what a scam this is.

34:23.720 --> 34:26.720
We figure out that what you're supposed to work for

34:26.720 --> 34:28.720
isn't worth having.

34:28.720 --> 34:32.720
We figure out that our politicians are buffoons.

34:32.720 --> 34:35.720
We figure out that professional scientists

34:35.720 --> 34:39.720
are reputation-building, grab-tailing weasels.

34:39.720 --> 34:42.720
We discover that all organizations

34:42.720 --> 34:45.720
are corrupted by ambition.

34:45.720 --> 34:49.720
You know, you get the picture.

34:49.720 --> 34:52.720
We figure it out.

34:52.720 --> 34:55.720
Well, then, as intellectuals,

34:55.720 --> 34:57.720
and anybody who figures it out

34:57.720 --> 34:59.720
is an intellectual, believe me,

34:59.720 --> 35:01.720
because they're slinging the programming

35:01.720 --> 35:04.720
to push you the other way.

35:04.720 --> 35:06.720
So then intellectuals,

35:06.720 --> 35:09.720
defined as people who figure it out,

35:09.720 --> 35:13.720
discover that you are alienated.

35:13.720 --> 35:15.720
That's what figuring it out means.

35:15.720 --> 35:18.720
It means you understand that the BMW,

35:18.720 --> 35:20.720
the Harvard degree,

35:20.720 --> 35:21.720
whatever it is,

35:21.720 --> 35:25.720
that this is all baloney and manipulated and hyped,

35:25.720 --> 35:28.720
and that mostly you have a bunch of clueless people

35:28.720 --> 35:30.720
who are figuring out which fork they should use.

35:31.720 --> 35:38.190
But this position is presented as alienation

35:38.190 --> 35:40.190
and therefore somehow tinged

35:40.190 --> 35:43.190
with the potential for pathology.

35:43.190 --> 35:46.190
You know, it's a bad thing to be alienated.

35:46.190 --> 35:48.190
Now let's speak for a moment

35:48.190 --> 35:50.190
in order to fulfill the promise

35:50.190 --> 35:53.190
read in the introduction

35:53.190 --> 35:56.190
about psychedelics

35:56.190 --> 35:59.190
and what are they doing in this fine situation.

35:59.190 --> 36:02.190
Well, what they're doing is forcing

36:02.190 --> 36:05.190
this maturation process

36:05.190 --> 36:08.190
by dissolving boundaries,

36:08.190 --> 36:10.190
which is what they do.

36:10.190 --> 36:14.190
They are exposing the cultural operating system

36:14.190 --> 36:15.190
for what it is,

36:15.190 --> 36:18.190
which is just a bunch of hacked together rules

36:18.190 --> 36:20.190
that evolved over time.

36:20.190 --> 36:22.190
They weren't sent from God,

36:22.190 --> 36:24.190
from Mount Sinai.

36:24.190 --> 36:27.190
It's just a bunch of hacked together rules.

36:27.190 --> 36:31.190
So psychedelics in that sense spread alienation.

36:31.190 --> 36:34.190
But what they alienate us from

36:34.190 --> 36:36.190
is preposterous,

36:36.190 --> 36:37.190
earth-murding,

36:37.190 --> 36:38.190
sexist,

36:38.190 --> 36:40.190
consumerist,

36:40.190 --> 36:41.190
shallow,

36:41.190 --> 36:42.190
trivial,

36:42.190 --> 36:43.190
inane,

36:43.190 --> 36:44.190
insane,

36:44.190 --> 36:45.190
and dangerous.

36:45.190 --> 36:49.190
And that's what they alienate us from.

36:49.190 --> 36:53.190
So again, this neotenizing thing

36:53.190 --> 36:57.190
is like the condition of unconsciousness

36:57.190 --> 36:59.190
that I described as the precondition

36:59.190 --> 37:00.190
for the cosmic giga.

37:00.190 --> 37:03.190
Glamour,

37:03.190 --> 37:06.190
acts of magical conjuration,

37:06.190 --> 37:09.190
hypnotic delusion and illusion,

37:09.190 --> 37:11.190
hysterias,

37:11.190 --> 37:12.190
fads,

37:12.190 --> 37:14.190
pseudo-revelations,

37:14.190 --> 37:17.190
strange truths

37:17.190 --> 37:20.190
whispered in every quarter.

37:20.190 --> 37:22.190
This is the character

37:22.190 --> 37:25.190
of our time.

37:25.190 --> 37:28.190
And people have seemed to believe

37:28.190 --> 37:33.190
that they were fulfilling

37:33.190 --> 37:36.190
their responsibilities intellectually.

37:36.190 --> 37:38.190
People seem to feel they are doing that

37:38.190 --> 37:41.190
when they reject the past.

37:41.190 --> 37:42.190
Say, well,

37:42.190 --> 37:45.190
that was all screwed up,

37:45.190 --> 37:49.190
but since I got with Master Shuggie,

37:49.190 --> 37:51.190
I've understood

37:51.190 --> 37:53.190
the way it really is supposed to be.

37:53.190 --> 37:56.190
No, this is just trading one set of

37:56.190 --> 37:59.190
neotenizing operating systems

37:59.190 --> 38:01.190
for another.

38:01.190 --> 38:03.190
The real hard choice

38:03.190 --> 38:05.190
that you're being pushed toward

38:05.190 --> 38:07.190
and that you might consider making

38:07.190 --> 38:09.190
before the yawning grave

38:09.190 --> 38:11.190
rings down the curtain

38:11.190 --> 38:13.190
on this cosmic drama

38:13.190 --> 38:17.190
is actually intellectual responsibility,

38:17.190 --> 38:19.190
freedom,

38:19.190 --> 38:23.190
and a devotion to

38:23.190 --> 38:25.190
what scientists call

38:25.190 --> 38:29.190
elegance of thought.

38:29.190 --> 38:30.190
You know, people say,

38:30.190 --> 38:32.190
well, how can you tell one theory from another

38:32.190 --> 38:34.190
and is science better than religion

38:34.190 --> 38:36.190
and this and that?

38:36.190 --> 38:39.190
After a lot of arm waving,

38:39.190 --> 38:41.190
it should be conceded

38:41.190 --> 38:45.190
that the final call is aesthetic.

38:45.190 --> 38:48.190
That because we are monkeys,

38:48.190 --> 38:51.190
because we are so far from God,

38:51.190 --> 38:54.190
we cannot set knowing the truth

38:54.190 --> 38:56.190
as the standard

38:56.190 --> 39:01.190
for choosing among the models

39:01.190 --> 39:03.190
we can produce.

39:03.190 --> 39:07.190
We must set our aesthetic compass

39:07.190 --> 39:10.190
towards the more true,

39:10.190 --> 39:14.190
what Wittgenstein called the true enough.

39:14.190 --> 39:15.190
And then the question is,

39:15.190 --> 39:19.190
well, how do you recognize that?

39:19.190 --> 39:22.190
Well, this is a rich field of human study

39:22.190 --> 39:24.190
called philosophy.

39:24.190 --> 39:26.190
Philosophy of science or theory,

39:26.190 --> 39:29.190
epistemology and ontology.

39:29.190 --> 39:32.190
How do we know what is real?

39:32.190 --> 39:34.190
But Plato,

39:34.190 --> 39:36.190
who all the rest of philosophy

39:36.190 --> 39:39.190
is a footnote up on,

39:39.190 --> 39:41.190
Plato said, you know,

39:41.190 --> 39:44.190
that the key lay in the concepts

39:44.190 --> 39:47.190
the good, the true,

39:47.190 --> 39:50.190
and the beautiful.

39:50.190 --> 39:53.190
The good, what is it?

39:53.190 --> 39:58.190
Tricky, tricky, tricky.

39:58.190 --> 40:01.190
The true, what is it?

40:01.190 --> 40:05.190
Trickier, even trickier.

40:05.190 --> 40:09.190
The beautiful, what is it?

40:09.190 --> 40:12.190
Easy to discern.

40:12.190 --> 40:14.190
The beautiful is easy to discern.

40:14.190 --> 40:17.190
You are going to be condemned

40:17.190 --> 40:19.190
to live out the consequences

40:19.190 --> 40:21.190
of your taste.

40:23.190 --> 40:26.190
Really, really.

40:26.190 --> 40:28.190
And if you have no taste,

40:28.190 --> 40:31.190
you know, God help you.

40:31.190 --> 40:34.190
Because you are self-condemned

40:34.190 --> 40:37.190
to an appalling nightmare.

40:37.190 --> 40:40.190
You won't be getting it.

40:40.190 --> 40:43.190
All the subtle stuff will go by you

40:43.190 --> 40:47.190
while your head is filled with

40:47.190 --> 40:50.190
can't, nonsense, foolishness.

40:50.190 --> 40:52.190
So again,

40:52.190 --> 40:57.190
the metaphor of the dream

40:57.190 --> 41:01.190
and of making choices based on beauty.

41:01.190 --> 41:06.190
And beauty is downloaded

41:06.190 --> 41:08.190
into the human cultural milieu

41:08.190 --> 41:11.190
largely through dreams.

41:11.190 --> 41:14.190
Other ideas may also come in dreams,

41:14.190 --> 41:17.190
but I think studies have shown

41:17.190 --> 41:20.190
that architects, designers,

41:20.190 --> 41:21.190
people who are actually,

41:21.190 --> 41:25.190
at the top of the pyramid

41:25.190 --> 41:27.190
in any design process,

41:27.190 --> 41:29.190
are very aware of their dreams,

41:29.190 --> 41:32.190
their reveries, their insights.

41:32.190 --> 41:37.190
So that's the way to set the compass,

41:37.190 --> 41:39.190
not toward truth,

41:39.190 --> 41:41.190
not toward the good,

41:41.190 --> 41:43.190
not because these aren't fine things,

41:43.190 --> 41:45.190
but because they're so slippery,

41:45.190 --> 41:47.190
but toward beauty.

41:47.190 --> 41:50.190
And with that in place,

41:50.190 --> 41:55.180
to my mind,

41:55.180 --> 41:58.180
life, hope follows

41:58.180 --> 42:02.180
as a natural consequence.

42:02.180 --> 42:04.180
You know, we talk a lot,

42:04.180 --> 42:06.180
and I'm sure there are people in this room

42:06.180 --> 42:08.180
who are well versed and connected

42:08.180 --> 42:10.180
into the world of virtual reality,

42:10.180 --> 42:14.180
which is a very hot topic

42:14.180 --> 42:16.180
and may have all kinds of implications

42:16.180 --> 42:18.180
for our future

42:18.180 --> 42:21.180
and the evolution of consciousness.

42:21.180 --> 42:23.180
But it's worth pointing out

42:23.180 --> 42:27.180
that we have been making virtual realities

42:27.180 --> 42:29.180
for a very, very long time.

42:29.180 --> 42:32.180
That language, spoken language,

42:32.180 --> 42:34.180
is the original code

42:34.180 --> 42:36.180
for hacking virtual reality.

42:36.180 --> 42:38.180
And when you sit the children

42:38.180 --> 42:40.180
down around the fire

42:40.180 --> 42:43.180
and begin to tell the old, old stories

42:43.180 --> 42:46.180
and the pictures rise out of the flames,

42:46.180 --> 42:49.180
that is virtual reality.

42:49.180 --> 42:50.180
And so is,

42:50.180 --> 42:52.180
and this is the point I want to make,

42:52.180 --> 42:56.180
so are all the artifacts,

42:56.180 --> 42:59.180
all the impedimentia

42:59.180 --> 43:01.180
of human existence.

43:01.180 --> 43:03.180
I mean, a virtual reality

43:03.180 --> 43:07.180
built in aluminum, stucco, steel, and glass

43:07.180 --> 43:09.180
is not immediately erased

43:09.180 --> 43:12.180
the way you clear a screen.

43:12.180 --> 43:15.180
And the cost of making it is great.

43:15.180 --> 43:18.180
But Ur was a virtual reality.

43:18.180 --> 43:20.180
The Agora at Athens,

43:20.180 --> 43:21.180
ancient Rome,

43:21.180 --> 43:23.180
Canterbury Cathedral,

43:23.180 --> 43:26.180
these are virtual realities.

43:26.180 --> 43:31.180
Men and women have toiled

43:31.180 --> 43:33.180
at agriculture,

43:33.180 --> 43:35.180
at warfare,

43:35.180 --> 43:38.180
at child rearing,

43:38.180 --> 43:40.180
at many, many activities

43:40.180 --> 43:43.180
in the long march towards self-definition.

43:43.180 --> 43:46.180
But more and more we have,

43:46.180 --> 43:48.180
and this is true even of societies

43:48.180 --> 43:49.180
that are aboriginal

43:49.180 --> 43:51.180
and without economy,

43:51.180 --> 43:54.180
when we free ourselves,

43:54.180 --> 43:57.180
we are not freed into a void.

43:57.180 --> 43:59.180
When we free ourselves,

43:59.180 --> 44:02.180
we are freed into the dimension

44:02.180 --> 44:06.180
in which art is an obligation.

44:06.180 --> 44:09.180
And this is the great turning point.

44:09.180 --> 44:12.180
I mean, I think that the design process,

44:12.180 --> 44:14.180
whatever that means,

44:14.180 --> 44:16.180
must become conscious,

44:16.180 --> 44:18.180
global,

44:18.180 --> 44:20.180
integrated.

44:20.180 --> 44:22.180
The entire human domain,

44:22.180 --> 44:23.180
which means the entire planet

44:23.180 --> 44:26.180
and its surrounding near space,

44:26.180 --> 44:30.180
should be enclosed and included

44:30.180 --> 44:32.180
in a coherent plan

44:32.180 --> 44:34.180
driven by human values

44:34.180 --> 44:38.180
and a thirst for transformational beauty.

44:38.180 --> 44:40.180
And I mention this because I believe

44:40.180 --> 44:42.180
that many of the people capable

44:42.180 --> 44:45.180
of making major contributions to that

44:45.180 --> 44:47.180
are in this room

44:47.180 --> 44:51.180
or within 100 miles of this room tonight.

44:51.180 --> 44:55.180
And we are people of immense privilege.

44:55.180 --> 44:59.180
By any way of slicing the planetary demographic,

44:59.180 --> 45:01.180
even the poorest among us

45:01.180 --> 45:05.180
who wheedled their way in here this evening

45:05.180 --> 45:09.180
are in the top 1%

45:09.180 --> 45:13.180
of the planetary social pyramid

45:13.180 --> 45:17.180
on a planet where hundreds of millions

45:17.180 --> 45:19.180
of people are starving.

45:19.180 --> 45:22.180
The obligation

45:22.180 --> 45:25.180
upon the conscious people

45:25.180 --> 45:30.180
near the control surfaces,

45:30.180 --> 45:32.180
near the levers

45:32.180 --> 45:34.180
of the human machine

45:34.180 --> 45:36.180
is immense.

45:36.180 --> 45:38.180
So with freedom,

45:38.180 --> 45:40.180
and I know this is a cliché,

45:40.180 --> 45:43.180
but hopefully not in this context,

45:43.180 --> 45:45.180
with freedom of that sort

45:45.180 --> 45:48.180
comes enormous responsibility.

45:48.180 --> 45:51.180
And it's paradoxical.

45:51.180 --> 45:54.180
Responsibility to dream

45:54.180 --> 46:02.320
and coexisting and simultaneous with that,

46:02.320 --> 46:05.320
an obligation to awaken.

46:05.320 --> 46:08.320
In other words, an obligation to make sense,

46:08.320 --> 46:10.320
be non-trivial,

46:10.320 --> 46:15.320
not to squander resources in foolishness.

46:15.320 --> 46:17.320
An obligation to awaken

46:17.320 --> 46:19.320
and an obligation to,

46:19.320 --> 46:21.320
at the same time, dream.

46:21.320 --> 46:23.320
And then, you know,

46:23.320 --> 46:25.320
the rational mind screams out,

46:25.320 --> 46:26.320
but this is impossible.

46:26.320 --> 46:28.320
This is paradox.

46:28.320 --> 46:32.320
But the subtle mind

46:32.320 --> 46:34.320
understands that

46:34.320 --> 46:37.320
we have now reached square one

46:37.320 --> 46:40.320
by openly confronting

46:40.320 --> 46:43.320
the necessity for paradox.

46:43.320 --> 46:45.320
And by openly confronting

46:45.320 --> 46:46.320
the fact that

46:46.320 --> 46:48.320
we can only

46:48.320 --> 46:51.320
enclose our dilemma

46:51.320 --> 46:53.320
by speaking

46:53.320 --> 46:56.320
in at least two modes at once,

46:56.320 --> 46:58.320
we begin to actually honour

46:58.320 --> 47:00.320
the complexity

47:00.320 --> 47:02.320
of the situation.

47:02.320 --> 47:04.320
And so tonight,

47:04.320 --> 47:06.320
the thought I want to leave

47:06.320 --> 47:08.320
with you

47:08.320 --> 47:10.320
is

47:10.320 --> 47:12.320
the simultaneous project

47:12.320 --> 47:14.320
of awakening

47:14.320 --> 47:16.320
and the simultaneous

47:16.320 --> 47:18.320
project of entering

47:18.320 --> 47:19.320
deeper into the dream

47:19.320 --> 47:21.320
for the purpose of

47:21.320 --> 47:22.320
cultivating,

47:22.320 --> 47:24.320
evoking,

47:24.320 --> 47:25.320
experiencing,

47:25.320 --> 47:26.320
remembering,

47:26.320 --> 47:27.320
transmitting

47:27.320 --> 47:32.240
and communicating beauty

47:32.240 --> 47:34.240
which feeds back into

47:34.240 --> 47:36.240
the awakening process.

47:36.240 --> 47:38.240
Otherwise, the awakening

47:38.240 --> 47:39.240
will be traumatic

47:39.240 --> 47:40.240
and demoralizing.

47:40.240 --> 47:42.240
We will awaken

47:42.240 --> 47:45.240
to an AIDS-ravaged Earth,

47:45.240 --> 47:47.240
to ecotastrophe,

47:47.240 --> 47:49.240
planetary warming,

47:49.240 --> 47:51.240
complete collapse

47:51.240 --> 47:52.240
of any concern

47:52.240 --> 47:53.240
for the destiny

47:53.240 --> 47:55.240
of future generations.

47:55.240 --> 47:57.240
This awakening

47:57.240 --> 48:00.240
must not be disempowering.

48:00.240 --> 48:02.240
And the mantle

48:02.240 --> 48:03.240
that can be spread

48:03.240 --> 48:05.240
over the awakening

48:05.240 --> 48:08.240
to counteract

48:08.240 --> 48:10.240
the possibility

48:10.240 --> 48:12.240
of disempowerment

48:12.240 --> 48:14.240
is this wish

48:14.240 --> 48:16.240
to evoke,

48:16.240 --> 48:17.240
realize,

48:17.240 --> 48:18.240
and serve

48:18.240 --> 48:19.240
the project

48:19.240 --> 48:20.240
of bringing ever greater

48:20.240 --> 48:22.240
amounts of beauty

48:22.240 --> 48:24.240
into the world.

48:24.240 --> 48:28.220
I think that's the end

48:28.220 --> 48:30.220
of the formal lecture

48:30.220 --> 48:33.220
here this evening.

48:33.220 --> 48:34.220
Thank you very much.

48:34.220 --> 48:35.220
I didn't say,

48:35.220 --> 48:37.220
we will have an intermission

48:37.220 --> 48:38.220
of about 20 minutes

48:38.220 --> 48:40.220
so you can

48:40.220 --> 48:41.220
what do you say?

48:41.220 --> 48:42.220
What do you say?

48:42.220 --> 48:44.220
And then we will get back together

48:44.220 --> 48:45.220
and undergo

48:45.220 --> 48:47.220
the more creative process

48:47.220 --> 48:48.220
and the more organic part

48:48.220 --> 48:49.220
of the evening

48:49.220 --> 48:51.220
which is Q&A.

48:51.220 --> 48:52.220
And for those of you

48:52.220 --> 48:53.220
who can't stay for that,

48:53.220 --> 48:55.220
I appreciate your attention

48:55.220 --> 48:58.220
and your concern.

48:58.220 --> 49:00.220
And thank you all very much

49:00.220 --> 49:01.220
and we'll assemble here

49:01.220 --> 49:02.220
in 20 minutes.

49:02.220 --> 49:29.880
You have shamanic use

49:29.880 --> 49:32.880
in the Andes of South America.

49:32.880 --> 49:34.880
People take,

49:34.880 --> 49:42.070
you can be a strict constructionist

49:42.070 --> 49:44.070
in the matter of psychedelics

49:44.070 --> 49:47.070
or you can cast your net

49:47.070 --> 49:49.070
widely.

49:49.070 --> 49:51.070
There are many substances

49:51.070 --> 49:52.070
in nature

49:52.070 --> 49:55.070
which alter consciousness,

49:55.070 --> 49:58.070
either stimulate or sedate

49:58.070 --> 50:01.070
or create more ambiguous

50:01.070 --> 50:03.070
and spectacular effects.

50:03.070 --> 50:05.070
I would describe

50:05.070 --> 50:07.070
the effects of detour

50:07.070 --> 50:10.070
as a delirium.

50:10.070 --> 50:14.070
Now, the shamans

50:14.070 --> 50:16.070
who use these things

50:16.070 --> 50:18.070
have special techniques

50:18.070 --> 50:20.070
both of preparation

50:20.070 --> 50:23.070
and of training

50:23.070 --> 50:26.070
that allow them to control

50:26.070 --> 50:27.070
or navigate around

50:27.070 --> 50:29.070
the more unpleasant aspects

50:29.070 --> 50:31.070
of detour.

50:31.070 --> 50:36.070
It tends to provoke memory loss,

50:36.070 --> 50:37.070
shall we say,

50:37.070 --> 50:39.070
bizarre behavior

50:39.070 --> 50:41.070
such as taking your clothes off

50:41.070 --> 50:45.070
in public and so on.

50:45.070 --> 50:48.070
And it creates a general ambiance

50:48.070 --> 50:51.070
of uncertainty

50:51.070 --> 50:53.070
about the nature of reality.

50:53.070 --> 50:54.070
And what I mean by that is

50:54.070 --> 50:55.070
you talk to people

50:55.070 --> 50:57.070
who aren't there.

50:57.070 --> 50:58.070
You smoke cigarettes

50:58.070 --> 50:59.070
that aren't there.

50:59.070 --> 51:01.070
You answer phone calls

51:01.070 --> 51:03.070
when you're standing in the woods.

51:05.070 --> 51:07.070
From the outside,

51:07.070 --> 51:09.070
it looks pretty

51:09.070 --> 51:13.890
fucked up, you know.

51:13.890 --> 51:15.890
But some aboriginal

51:15.890 --> 51:16.890
and native traditions

51:16.890 --> 51:18.890
have managed to tame this,

51:18.890 --> 51:21.890
at least in the shamanic context.

51:21.890 --> 51:23.890
I guess in this matter

51:23.890 --> 51:26.890
I'm a kind of strict constructionist

51:26.890 --> 51:28.890
in that

51:28.890 --> 51:31.890
when I say psychedelic,

51:31.890 --> 51:33.890
I have something very specific

51:33.890 --> 51:35.890
in mind that a substance

51:35.890 --> 51:38.890
or a plant should do.

51:38.890 --> 51:44.890
It should not inhibit clarity.

51:44.890 --> 51:45.890
In other words,

51:45.890 --> 51:47.890
not episodes of forgetfulness,

51:47.890 --> 51:48.890
lack of memory,

51:48.890 --> 51:50.890
passing out or confusion.

51:50.890 --> 51:52.890
It shouldn't interfere with that

51:52.890 --> 51:55.890
and it should transform thought

51:55.890 --> 51:59.870
and it should be accompanied

51:59.870 --> 52:01.870
by visual hallucinations

52:01.870 --> 52:03.870
with eyes closed.

52:03.870 --> 52:05.870
That's what I love.

52:05.870 --> 52:07.870
That's what I live for.

52:11.870 --> 52:14.870
People have said to me,

52:14.870 --> 52:17.870
you're some kind of a vision show.

52:17.870 --> 52:19.870
It's true.

52:19.870 --> 52:20.870
And usually the people

52:20.870 --> 52:21.870
who are saying this

52:21.870 --> 52:23.870
were people who were great

52:23.870 --> 52:25.870
enthusiasts of LSD.

52:25.870 --> 52:27.870
LSD, I would never argue,

52:27.870 --> 52:29.870
is not a psychedelic,

52:29.870 --> 52:32.870
but you have to take massive amounts

52:32.870 --> 52:34.870
and usually in combination

52:34.870 --> 52:36.870
with some other substance

52:36.870 --> 52:38.870
like hashish or mescaline

52:38.870 --> 52:40.870
in order to elicit from LSD

52:40.870 --> 52:42.870
what I'm after,

52:42.870 --> 52:46.870
which is cascades of Niagara's,

52:46.870 --> 52:49.870
of visual beauty in darkness

52:49.870 --> 52:51.870
with eyes closed.

52:51.870 --> 52:54.870
I have had deep psychological insights

52:54.870 --> 52:55.870
on LSD.

52:55.870 --> 52:58.870
I have had creative breakthroughs.

52:58.870 --> 53:02.870
I have had bonding experiences.

53:02.870 --> 53:05.870
But I found it difficult

53:05.870 --> 53:09.870
to get the visions like I wanted them.

53:09.870 --> 53:12.870
And the best I worked out with LSD

53:12.870 --> 53:15.870
was I would smoke as much

53:15.870 --> 53:17.870
Afghani hash as I could

53:17.870 --> 53:19.870
at the top of the trip.

53:19.870 --> 53:21.870
And then it would do the thing,

53:21.870 --> 53:22.870
in fact.

53:22.870 --> 53:24.870
It would do it.

53:26.870 --> 53:29.870
The thing that led me to psilocybin

53:29.870 --> 53:31.870
or to grow mushrooms

53:31.870 --> 53:32.870
and explore that

53:32.870 --> 53:34.870
was the descriptions of Wasson

53:34.870 --> 53:36.870
and the early workers

53:36.870 --> 53:40.870
that it was easy to visually hallucinate.

53:40.870 --> 53:42.870
And I had read the earlier accounts

53:42.870 --> 53:44.870
of Havelock Ellis

53:44.870 --> 53:47.870
and people like that.

53:47.870 --> 53:50.870
And it was about,

53:50.870 --> 53:51.870
if you've ever read,

53:51.870 --> 53:53.870
and I think it's The Dance of Life,

53:53.870 --> 53:55.870
Havelock Ellis' description of mescaline.

53:55.870 --> 53:58.870
He talks about alien buildings,

53:58.870 --> 54:01.870
jeweled ruins,

54:01.870 --> 54:04.870
fantastically efflorescent rainforests

54:04.870 --> 54:07.870
growing and transforming before his eyes.

54:07.870 --> 54:09.870
That's what I was after.

54:09.870 --> 54:11.870
I wanted not a disturbance

54:11.870 --> 54:13.870
in the optic nerve,

54:13.870 --> 54:15.870
like on LSD you get those little things

54:15.870 --> 54:17.870
that look sort of like fans

54:17.870 --> 54:19.870
that creep across the walls.

54:19.870 --> 54:22.870
That's more like something

54:22.870 --> 54:24.870
in the visual cortex

54:24.870 --> 54:28.870
than something in the mind,

54:28.870 --> 54:30.870
it seems to me.

54:30.870 --> 54:32.870
And I was fascinated,

54:32.870 --> 54:33.870
and who isn't?

54:33.870 --> 54:35.870
I mean, I never hear this question discussed,

54:35.870 --> 54:37.870
but to me it was the obvious question

54:37.870 --> 54:40.870
about these visions was,

54:40.870 --> 54:42.870
where do they come from?

54:42.870 --> 54:46.870
You know, how can I be astonished

54:46.870 --> 54:49.870
by the contents of my own mind?

54:49.870 --> 54:52.870
And astonished over and over again.

54:52.870 --> 54:55.870
Where is this stuff coming from?

54:55.870 --> 54:57.870
And I looked at Jung,

54:57.870 --> 54:59.870
and I entertained the fantasy

54:59.870 --> 55:01.870
of extraterrestrial contact,

55:01.870 --> 55:05.870
and I still haven't answered this question.

55:05.870 --> 55:07.870
But I think it's a question

55:07.870 --> 55:09.870
which the critics

55:09.870 --> 55:11.870
of the psychedelic experience

55:11.870 --> 55:13.870
haven't wanted to deal with.

55:13.870 --> 55:14.870
You know, if you read

55:14.870 --> 55:16.870
the psychedelic literature,

55:16.870 --> 55:18.870
you can tell what psilocybin does

55:18.870 --> 55:20.870
to heart beat, sperm count,

55:20.870 --> 55:23.870
to perception of tone, on and on.

55:23.870 --> 55:27.870
They never talk about

55:27.870 --> 55:30.870
the real content, you know,

55:30.870 --> 55:32.870
because it's always individual.

55:32.870 --> 55:33.870
And they say,

55:33.870 --> 55:34.870
well, science can't handle

55:34.870 --> 55:35.870
individual phenomena.

55:35.870 --> 55:37.870
We measure the properties

55:37.870 --> 55:39.870
of large numbers of people.

55:39.870 --> 55:41.870
Well, that hopelessly

55:41.870 --> 55:44.870
flattens the thing.

55:44.870 --> 55:46.870
I know this is a long answer

55:46.870 --> 55:47.870
to this question,

55:47.870 --> 55:50.870
but it's worth laying all this out

55:50.870 --> 55:53.870
because the lady's question

55:53.870 --> 55:54.870
raises issues of

55:54.870 --> 55:56.870
how do you categorize psychedelics,

55:56.870 --> 55:58.870
which are, which aren't?

55:58.870 --> 56:00.870
Are some dangerous?

56:00.870 --> 56:01.870
And to what degree?

56:01.870 --> 56:03.870
Certainly, detour is dangerous,

56:03.870 --> 56:07.870
not only because of its delirium quality,

56:07.870 --> 56:09.870
which makes you irresponsible,

56:09.870 --> 56:10.870
but also,

56:10.870 --> 56:13.870
because it dilates your pupils

56:13.870 --> 56:16.870
and you can't, you stumble around.

56:16.870 --> 56:17.870
And at higher doses,

56:17.870 --> 56:20.870
it can cause convulsion and death,

56:20.870 --> 56:22.870
which is a rare thing

56:22.870 --> 56:24.870
from what I consider

56:24.870 --> 56:26.870
the true psychedelics.

56:26.870 --> 56:29.870
There is, if we want to take

56:29.870 --> 56:31.870
an excursion here for a moment

56:31.870 --> 56:33.870
and learn a little pharmacology,

56:33.870 --> 56:35.870
there is, if you're going to talk

56:35.870 --> 56:36.870
about pharmacology,

56:36.870 --> 56:37.870
there's one concept

56:37.870 --> 56:39.870
that you should get straight,

56:39.870 --> 56:42.870
and that's called LD50.

56:42.870 --> 56:45.870
It means lethal dose 50.

56:45.870 --> 56:47.870
What does this mean?

56:47.870 --> 56:51.870
Well, you have 20 rats

56:51.870 --> 56:54.870
and you give them a certain amount of,

56:54.870 --> 56:57.870
let's say, mescaline.

56:57.870 --> 57:00.870
When half the rats die,

57:00.870 --> 57:02.870
that dose,

57:02.870 --> 57:05.870
expressed as milligrams per kilogram

57:05.870 --> 57:07.870
of body weight,

57:07.870 --> 57:09.870
is called the LD50.

57:09.870 --> 57:13.870
And when pharmacologists assess

57:13.870 --> 57:15.870
the danger in a drug,

57:15.870 --> 57:17.870
they ask the following question.

57:17.870 --> 57:21.870
What is the ratio of the LD50

57:21.870 --> 57:24.870
to the effective dose?

57:24.870 --> 57:28.870
And if the LD50 of a drug

57:28.870 --> 57:31.870
is only 20 times

57:31.870 --> 57:33.870
the effective dose,

57:33.870 --> 57:37.870
that's considered an incredibly toxic,

57:37.870 --> 57:38.870
dangerous,

57:38.870 --> 57:40.870
and dubious drug.

57:40.870 --> 57:42.870
A good drug is a drug

57:42.870 --> 57:46.870
where the LD50 is 200 times

57:46.870 --> 57:48.870
more than the effective dose.

57:48.870 --> 57:50.870
In the case of LSD,

57:50.870 --> 57:53.870
the LD50 for man

57:53.870 --> 57:55.870
has never been determined.

57:55.870 --> 57:58.870
That's how safe LSD is.

57:58.870 --> 58:01.870
And we're talking about lethality here,

58:01.870 --> 58:03.870
not, you know.

58:03.870 --> 58:05.870
But so it's,

58:05.870 --> 58:07.870
and so people say,

58:07.870 --> 58:10.870
well, are there unsafe psychedelics?

58:10.870 --> 58:12.870
And yes, you just look up the LD50s,

58:12.870 --> 58:13.870
line them up,

58:13.870 --> 58:15.870
and see which has the,

58:15.870 --> 58:17.870
which have the better ratios.

58:17.870 --> 58:18.870
By that measurement,

58:18.870 --> 58:19.870
by that standard,

58:19.870 --> 58:23.870
LSD is the most desirable.

58:23.870 --> 58:24.870
But there's,

58:24.870 --> 58:25.870
the LD50 of psilocybin

58:25.870 --> 58:27.870
is very impressive.

58:27.870 --> 58:28.870
You know, you can take

58:28.870 --> 58:30.870
100 times the effective dose

58:30.870 --> 58:33.870
of psilocybin and expect to live.

58:33.870 --> 58:35.870
Mescaline, not.

58:35.870 --> 58:37.870
Mescaline has a bad profile.

58:37.870 --> 58:39.870
As an amphetamine,

58:39.870 --> 58:40.870
if you took 20 times

58:40.870 --> 58:42.870
the effective dose of mescaline,

58:42.870 --> 58:44.870
you would probably die.

58:44.870 --> 58:45.870
Of course,

58:45.870 --> 58:47.870
an effective dose of mescaline

58:47.870 --> 58:51.870
is nearly a gram of pure material.

58:51.870 --> 58:53.870
700 milligrams.

58:53.870 --> 58:57.870
If you took 20 times 700 milligrams,

58:57.870 --> 58:59.870
you would be taking almost a complete,

58:59.870 --> 59:01.870
you know, nearly two-thirds of an ounce

59:01.870 --> 59:02.870
of mescaline,

59:02.870 --> 59:04.870
and why should you survive?

59:04.870 --> 59:06.870
After all,

59:06.870 --> 59:11.870
stupidity does have consequences.

59:11.870 --> 59:15.380
But really,

59:15.380 --> 59:17.380
people always ask the question,

59:17.380 --> 59:19.380
are psychedelics dangerous?

59:19.380 --> 59:20.380
You know,

59:20.380 --> 59:22.380
and they mean physically dangerous.

59:22.380 --> 59:24.380
What should be said,

59:24.380 --> 59:26.380
and it's recently been pointed out to me

59:26.380 --> 59:29.380
that I don't say it very often,

59:29.380 --> 59:31.380
is that the biggest danger

59:31.380 --> 59:32.380
with psychedelics

59:32.380 --> 59:36.380
is that while you are in that open state,

59:36.380 --> 59:37.380
some moron

59:37.380 --> 59:39.380
will mess with you

59:39.380 --> 59:42.380
and either lay a suggestion

59:42.380 --> 59:44.380
or plant an idea

59:44.380 --> 59:46.380
or manipulate you

59:46.380 --> 59:48.380
or scare you

59:48.380 --> 59:50.380
or turn you in a way

59:50.380 --> 59:52.380
that you wouldn't ordinarily go,

59:52.380 --> 59:55.380
and this is why psychedelic etiquette

59:55.380 --> 59:59.380
means knowing your tripping partners.

59:59.380 --> 01:00:02.380
People who take psychedelics

01:00:02.380 --> 01:00:04.380
with strangers at high dose

01:00:04.380 --> 01:00:07.380
do come back with wild tales to tell

01:00:07.380 --> 01:00:10.380
but I don't think you can do that

01:00:10.380 --> 01:00:11.380
over and over again

01:00:11.380 --> 01:00:15.380
without having some horrible thing befall you.

01:00:15.380 --> 01:00:17.380
My mind is not,

01:00:17.380 --> 01:00:20.380
I mean some people seem more resilient.

01:00:20.380 --> 01:00:21.380
I am not.

01:00:21.380 --> 01:00:22.380
You know,

01:00:22.380 --> 01:00:25.380
people often ask me to trip them,

01:00:25.380 --> 01:00:27.380
and I won't,

01:00:27.380 --> 01:00:29.380
and it's not because of concern

01:00:29.380 --> 01:00:30.380
for the legal system

01:00:30.380 --> 01:00:32.380
or the fact that I am not licensed

01:00:32.380 --> 01:00:34.380
for psychotherapy or any of that.

01:00:34.380 --> 01:00:36.380
It's because I can't stand

01:00:36.380 --> 01:00:38.380
it when people come apart

01:00:38.380 --> 01:00:39.380
on psychedelics.

01:00:39.380 --> 01:00:41.380
I am,

01:00:41.380 --> 01:00:42.380
you know,

01:00:42.380 --> 01:00:44.380
if you're interested in this subject

01:00:44.380 --> 01:00:46.380
or if you share my sensitivity,

01:00:46.380 --> 01:00:49.380
read Carl Jung's little book

01:00:49.380 --> 01:00:50.380
called

01:00:50.380 --> 01:00:53.380
On the Psychology of the Transference

01:00:53.380 --> 01:00:55.380
and then you will understand.

01:00:55.380 --> 01:00:56.380
In fact,

01:00:56.380 --> 01:00:59.380
that should be a standard tome

01:00:59.380 --> 01:01:01.380
for trippers.

01:01:01.380 --> 01:01:04.380
Understand the transference.

01:01:04.380 --> 01:01:05.380
Understand what it is,

01:01:05.380 --> 01:01:07.380
how to fight it,

01:01:07.380 --> 01:01:09.380
and you,

01:01:09.380 --> 01:01:12.380
this is psychic martial arts.

01:01:12.380 --> 01:01:16.380
Your psychic health

01:01:16.380 --> 01:01:18.380
will be immeasurably improved

01:01:18.380 --> 01:01:20.380
by understanding the dynamics

01:01:20.380 --> 01:01:21.380
of the transference,

01:01:21.380 --> 01:01:22.380
which is quite simple.

01:01:22.380 --> 01:01:25.380
The book is not that thick.

01:01:25.380 --> 01:01:29.380
Now to answer the lady's question.

01:01:29.380 --> 01:01:32.380
When I took detour,

01:01:32.380 --> 01:01:35.380
I had realities

01:01:35.380 --> 01:01:38.380
of somebody distorting strange

01:01:38.380 --> 01:01:40.380
and if I had been a personality

01:01:40.380 --> 01:01:41.380
of a different sort,

01:01:41.380 --> 01:01:43.380
I might have followed it deeper

01:01:43.380 --> 01:01:44.380
but appeared to me

01:01:44.380 --> 01:01:46.380
to be ambiguous and evil.

01:01:46.380 --> 01:01:48.380
Not evil,

01:01:48.380 --> 01:01:50.380
maybe evil.

01:01:50.380 --> 01:01:52.380
What happened to me was

01:01:52.380 --> 01:01:55.380
this was in Nepal years and years ago.

01:01:55.380 --> 01:01:58.380
Nepali shamanism is based in part

01:01:58.380 --> 01:01:59.380
on detour,

01:01:59.380 --> 01:02:02.380
the taking of the seed capsules.

01:02:02.380 --> 01:02:04.380
An English friend of mine

01:02:04.380 --> 01:02:07.380
who had the room next to mine took it

01:02:07.380 --> 01:02:09.380
and I took it in my room

01:02:09.380 --> 01:02:11.380
and it was a situation

01:02:11.380 --> 01:02:14.380
where to get to the facilities

01:02:14.380 --> 01:02:17.380
I had to walk through his room

01:02:17.380 --> 01:02:20.380
and he and I were friends

01:02:20.380 --> 01:02:24.380
but we had a very slight rivalry going

01:02:24.380 --> 01:02:27.380
for the attention of a woman

01:02:27.380 --> 01:02:30.380
and I think this woman was not aware

01:02:30.380 --> 01:02:32.380
that either of us was interested in her

01:02:32.380 --> 01:02:33.380
but we were both aware

01:02:33.380 --> 01:02:36.380
that the other one was aware

01:02:36.380 --> 01:02:39.380
and midway through my trip

01:02:39.380 --> 01:02:42.380
I decided I had to go to the bathroom

01:02:42.380 --> 01:02:44.380
and so I stepped through

01:02:44.380 --> 01:02:46.380
into this guy's room

01:02:46.380 --> 01:02:49.380
and they were in bed together

01:02:49.380 --> 01:02:52.380
having sex

01:02:52.380 --> 01:02:55.380
and I guess I went outside

01:02:55.380 --> 01:02:57.380
and then I,

01:02:57.380 --> 01:02:59.380
the next morning

01:02:59.380 --> 01:03:01.380
after sleeping many hours

01:03:01.380 --> 01:03:02.380
I,

01:03:02.380 --> 01:03:05.380
I encountered the guy

01:03:05.380 --> 01:03:08.380
and I said how was your trip

01:03:08.380 --> 01:03:10.380
and he said

01:03:10.380 --> 01:03:12.380
it was wonderful

01:03:12.380 --> 01:03:14.380
and I said yes

01:03:14.380 --> 01:03:16.380
well I saw

01:03:16.380 --> 01:03:18.380
and he said what did you see

01:03:18.380 --> 01:03:20.380
and I said well I saw

01:03:20.380 --> 01:03:22.380
that you were with Julieta

01:03:22.380 --> 01:03:24.380
and he said

01:03:24.380 --> 01:03:26.380
I thought so too

01:03:29.380 --> 01:03:31.380
but she wasn't there

01:03:32.380 --> 01:03:38.010
and so

01:03:38.010 --> 01:03:40.010
you know

01:03:40.010 --> 01:03:43.010
what conclusion do we draw from this

01:03:43.010 --> 01:03:46.010
that this stuff is

01:03:46.010 --> 01:03:49.010
well I'll tell you what took me off it finally

01:03:49.010 --> 01:03:51.010
was about a week later

01:03:51.010 --> 01:03:54.010
there seemed to be a rash of this detour taking

01:03:54.010 --> 01:03:57.010
moving through the traveler community there

01:03:57.010 --> 01:03:59.010
in this little Nepali village where I live

01:03:59.010 --> 01:04:01.010
and about a week later

01:04:01.010 --> 01:04:03.010
I was buying tomatoes in the market

01:04:03.010 --> 01:04:05.010
and I encountered a different person

01:04:05.010 --> 01:04:07.010
but this English friend of mine

01:04:07.010 --> 01:04:09.010
and

01:04:09.010 --> 01:04:12.010
he told me he'd been taking a lot of detour

01:04:12.010 --> 01:04:13.010
and I said oh well that's interesting

01:04:13.010 --> 01:04:14.010
I took it

01:04:14.010 --> 01:04:16.010
I don't think I'll be taking it again

01:04:16.010 --> 01:04:18.010
and as the conversation developed

01:04:18.010 --> 01:04:19.010
I realized

01:04:19.010 --> 01:04:22.010
he thought we were in his apartment

01:04:22.010 --> 01:04:24.010
and

01:04:24.010 --> 01:04:25.010
we were not

01:04:25.010 --> 01:04:27.010
we were in the market

01:04:27.010 --> 01:04:28.010
and

01:04:28.010 --> 01:04:30.010
you know this tells you

01:04:30.010 --> 01:04:32.010
it's time to dry out

01:04:33.010 --> 01:04:39.010
anyway I used that as a springboard

01:04:39.010 --> 01:04:41.010
to different subjects

01:04:41.010 --> 01:04:43.010
you were very patient

01:04:43.010 --> 01:04:45.010
next question

01:04:47.010 --> 01:04:49.010
I hope I can remember what my question is

01:04:49.010 --> 01:04:50.010
it's a test

01:04:52.010 --> 01:04:54.010
I agree that

01:04:54.010 --> 01:04:55.010
there's something

01:04:55.010 --> 01:04:57.010
sort of mysterious about where

01:04:57.010 --> 01:04:59.010
these psychedelic effects come from

01:04:59.010 --> 01:05:01.010
and I refer again to the sort of classic psychedelic

01:05:01.010 --> 01:05:03.010
psilocybin LSD

01:05:03.010 --> 01:05:04.010
but

01:05:04.010 --> 01:05:05.010
the fact that you

01:05:05.010 --> 01:05:07.010
generally need to take

01:05:07.010 --> 01:05:09.010
a substance or a drug

01:05:09.010 --> 01:05:10.010
it's a material thing

01:05:10.010 --> 01:05:12.010
does in some sense

01:05:12.010 --> 01:05:15.010
sort of go in a strange way to reinforcing

01:05:15.010 --> 01:05:19.010
a pretty basic scientific

01:05:19.010 --> 01:05:22.010
almost mechanistic view of the universe

01:05:22.010 --> 01:05:23.010
and

01:05:23.010 --> 01:05:25.010
I just wondered if you had thought about that

01:05:25.010 --> 01:05:27.010
or have any comments

01:05:27.010 --> 01:05:31.010
well let me try to convince you otherwise

01:05:31.010 --> 01:05:33.010
I mean I see what you're saying

01:05:33.010 --> 01:05:36.010
you're saying that because this

01:05:36.010 --> 01:05:37.010
transformative

01:05:37.010 --> 01:05:39.010
possibly spiritual experience

01:05:39.010 --> 01:05:41.010
is causally

01:05:41.010 --> 01:05:44.010
connected to the act of taking

01:05:44.010 --> 01:05:45.010
a

01:05:45.010 --> 01:05:48.010
matter of a certain type

01:05:48.010 --> 01:05:49.010
into your body

01:05:49.010 --> 01:05:52.010
that it seems to argue for the

01:05:52.010 --> 01:05:55.010
materialist proposition that

01:05:55.010 --> 01:05:57.010
mind is an epiphenomenon

01:05:57.010 --> 01:05:59.010
of the functioning of brain

01:05:59.010 --> 01:06:01.010
and so forth

01:06:01.010 --> 01:06:02.010
am I restating it right

01:06:03.010 --> 01:06:30.600
what did you say

01:06:30.600 --> 01:06:32.600
oh I see what you're saying

01:06:32.600 --> 01:06:35.600
well

01:06:35.600 --> 01:06:37.600
yes I mean

01:06:37.600 --> 01:06:39.600
this relates to what I was saying

01:06:39.600 --> 01:06:42.600
about the balkanization of epistemology

01:06:42.600 --> 01:06:45.600
it's really strange to me

01:06:45.600 --> 01:06:48.600
that science is in the act

01:06:48.600 --> 01:06:51.600
of flinging open

01:06:51.600 --> 01:06:52.600
the curtains

01:06:52.600 --> 01:06:56.600
on a staggering vision

01:06:56.600 --> 01:06:58.600
of what it is to be alive

01:06:58.600 --> 01:07:00.600
in this cosmos

01:07:00.600 --> 01:07:02.600
I mean we now can look back

01:07:02.600 --> 01:07:05.600
through the Hubble and other telescopes

01:07:05.600 --> 01:07:08.600
you know 13 billion years

01:07:08.600 --> 01:07:10.600
to within 600 million years

01:07:10.600 --> 01:07:12.600
of the primary explosion

01:07:12.600 --> 01:07:15.600
that presumptively created

01:07:15.600 --> 01:07:16.600
this universe

01:07:16.600 --> 01:07:18.600
meanwhile we're tearing open

01:07:18.600 --> 01:07:21.600
the nature of the human genome

01:07:21.600 --> 01:07:24.600
the nature of the heart of the atom

01:07:24.600 --> 01:07:26.600
science

01:07:26.600 --> 01:07:28.600
this is the great great

01:07:28.600 --> 01:07:30.600
age for the expansion

01:07:30.600 --> 01:07:33.600
of the scientific vision

01:07:33.600 --> 01:07:36.600
but the population

01:07:36.600 --> 01:07:38.600
is somehow

01:07:38.600 --> 01:07:41.600
incapable of staying up

01:07:41.600 --> 01:07:43.600
with what's going on

01:07:43.600 --> 01:07:44.600
and so

01:07:44.600 --> 01:07:47.600
we have the greatest proliferation

01:07:47.600 --> 01:07:50.600
of occultism in all forms

01:07:50.600 --> 01:07:52.600
since the 16th century

01:07:52.600 --> 01:07:54.600
it's almost as though

01:07:54.600 --> 01:07:56.600
there's a bifurcation of the culture

01:07:56.600 --> 01:07:58.600
the

01:07:58.600 --> 01:08:01.600
the scientific

01:08:01.600 --> 01:08:04.600
the makers of new science

01:08:04.600 --> 01:08:06.600
are going deeper and deeper

01:08:06.600 --> 01:08:09.600
in a direction that the rest of the public

01:08:09.600 --> 01:08:11.600
not only cannot follow them into

01:08:11.600 --> 01:08:13.600
but is actually

01:08:13.600 --> 01:08:15.600
headed the other way

01:08:15.600 --> 01:08:17.600
and it's a

01:08:17.600 --> 01:08:19.600
it's a condemnation of our

01:08:19.600 --> 01:08:21.600
educational system

01:08:21.600 --> 01:08:24.600
that people have not understood

01:08:24.600 --> 01:08:27.600
that science for all its flaws

01:08:27.600 --> 01:08:28.600
is

01:08:28.600 --> 01:08:30.600
the only tool

01:08:30.600 --> 01:08:32.600
for understanding

01:08:32.600 --> 01:08:33.600
the nature of reality

01:08:33.600 --> 01:08:36.600
that has any kind of track record

01:08:36.600 --> 01:08:38.600
whatsoever

01:08:38.600 --> 01:08:41.600
the others just have a story to tell

01:08:41.600 --> 01:08:42.600
you know

01:08:42.600 --> 01:08:43.600
the Buddha story

01:08:43.600 --> 01:08:44.600
the Jesus story

01:08:44.600 --> 01:08:46.600
fine stories

01:08:46.600 --> 01:08:48.600
but that's all they have is a rap

01:08:50.600 --> 01:08:51.600
the amazing

01:08:51.600 --> 01:08:52.600
you see

01:08:52.600 --> 01:08:54.600
why is science different

01:08:54.600 --> 01:08:55.600
somebody could just say

01:08:55.600 --> 01:08:56.600
well but isn't it just a rap

01:08:56.600 --> 01:08:57.600
well it's

01:08:57.600 --> 01:08:58.600
it's

01:08:58.600 --> 01:08:59.600
it's

01:08:59.600 --> 01:09:00.600
it is

01:09:00.600 --> 01:09:01.600
but

01:09:01.600 --> 01:09:03.600
it plays by slightly different rules

01:09:03.600 --> 01:09:05.600
than these other

01:09:05.600 --> 01:09:07.600
explanatory systems

01:09:07.600 --> 01:09:09.600
science

01:09:09.600 --> 01:09:12.600
is the only explanatory system

01:09:12.600 --> 01:09:14.600
where you get points

01:09:14.600 --> 01:09:17.600
for proving you're wrong

01:09:17.600 --> 01:09:18.600
you know

01:09:18.600 --> 01:09:20.600
I mean you form a hypothesis

01:09:20.600 --> 01:09:22.600
you publish a paper

01:09:22.600 --> 01:09:25.600
then you do further experiments

01:09:25.600 --> 01:09:28.600
you discover your conclusions in paper A

01:09:28.600 --> 01:09:30.600
were completely wrong

01:09:30.600 --> 01:09:32.600
you retract paper A

01:09:32.600 --> 01:09:34.600
and issue paper B

01:09:34.600 --> 01:09:37.600
and your fellow scientists say

01:09:37.600 --> 01:09:39.600
this guy does very good work

01:09:39.600 --> 01:09:41.600
these are careful thinkers

01:09:41.600 --> 01:09:43.600
you can bank on these people

01:09:43.600 --> 01:09:45.600
they're not flaky

01:09:45.600 --> 01:09:48.600
what religion operates like that

01:09:48.600 --> 01:09:49.600
you know

01:09:49.600 --> 01:09:51.600
can you imagine coming out of the ashram

01:09:51.600 --> 01:09:52.600
and saying

01:09:52.600 --> 01:09:54.600
having the guru say to his students

01:09:54.600 --> 01:09:56.600
well we managed to

01:09:56.600 --> 01:09:59.600
reduce that hypothesis to rubble

01:09:59.600 --> 01:10:01.600
in morning meditation

01:10:01.600 --> 01:10:03.600
didn't we

01:10:03.600 --> 01:10:04.600
so

01:10:04.600 --> 01:10:05.600
you know

01:10:05.600 --> 01:10:06.600
it's

01:10:06.600 --> 01:10:08.600
I

01:10:08.600 --> 01:10:11.600
and then let me return

01:10:11.600 --> 01:10:13.600
to answer that question

01:10:13.600 --> 01:10:17.600
based on my original misunderstanding of it

01:10:17.600 --> 01:10:19.600
and I would say this

01:10:19.600 --> 01:10:20.600
you cannot

01:10:20.600 --> 01:10:22.600
it is no reduction

01:10:22.600 --> 01:10:24.600
of the psychedelic

01:10:24.600 --> 01:10:25.600
experience

01:10:25.600 --> 01:10:27.600
to say that it is caused

01:10:27.600 --> 01:10:29.600
by drugs

01:10:29.600 --> 01:10:31.600
because they are material

01:10:31.600 --> 01:10:33.600
atomic systems

01:10:33.600 --> 01:10:34.600
and therefore

01:10:34.600 --> 01:10:36.600
we know all about them

01:10:36.600 --> 01:10:38.600
every

01:10:38.600 --> 01:10:39.600
electron

01:10:39.600 --> 01:10:42.600
is the yawning mouth

01:10:42.600 --> 01:10:43.600
of a wormhole

01:10:43.600 --> 01:10:46.600
that leads to quadrillions

01:10:46.600 --> 01:10:49.600
of higher dimensional universes

01:10:49.600 --> 01:10:51.600
that are completely beyond

01:10:51.600 --> 01:10:53.600
rational apprehension

01:10:53.600 --> 01:10:57.600
matter is not lacking in magic

01:10:57.600 --> 01:11:00.600
matter is magic

01:11:00.600 --> 01:11:01.600
I mean

01:11:01.600 --> 01:11:02.600
so when you hear these people

01:11:02.600 --> 01:11:03.600
like David Dennett

01:11:03.600 --> 01:11:06.600
and all these talk show materialists

01:11:06.600 --> 01:11:07.600
running around

01:11:07.600 --> 01:11:10.600
these people haven't gotten the news

01:11:10.600 --> 01:11:13.600
that's coming out of quantum physics

01:11:13.600 --> 01:11:14.600
I mean

01:11:14.600 --> 01:11:15.600
you see there's a

01:11:15.600 --> 01:11:16.600
there's a problem

01:11:16.600 --> 01:11:18.600
or let me describe to you

01:11:18.600 --> 01:11:20.600
the state of play here

01:11:20.600 --> 01:11:24.780
the way science works

01:11:24.780 --> 01:11:26.780
is science

01:11:26.780 --> 01:11:29.780
respects

01:11:29.780 --> 01:11:31.780
fidelity of theory

01:11:31.780 --> 01:11:33.780
to experimental results

01:11:33.780 --> 01:11:35.780
what really thrills a scientist

01:11:35.780 --> 01:11:37.780
is when you have a theory

01:11:37.780 --> 01:11:39.780
that makes a prediction

01:11:39.780 --> 01:11:42.780
down to five or six decimal points

01:11:42.780 --> 01:11:44.780
and then you perform an experiment

01:11:44.780 --> 01:11:46.780
and it's spot on

01:11:46.780 --> 01:11:49.780
down to five or six decimal points

01:11:49.780 --> 01:11:51.780
and then everybody involved in what's going on

01:11:51.780 --> 01:11:53.780
has extremely high confidence

01:11:53.780 --> 01:11:56.780
that they're on the right track

01:11:56.780 --> 01:11:58.780
well now only one science

01:11:58.780 --> 01:12:00.780
is ever that good

01:12:00.780 --> 01:12:02.780
physics

01:12:02.780 --> 01:12:04.780
macro physics

01:12:04.780 --> 01:12:06.780
by chemistry

01:12:06.780 --> 01:12:08.780
it's good

01:12:08.780 --> 01:12:10.780
but it's not that good

01:12:11.780 --> 01:12:13.780
ecology

01:12:13.780 --> 01:12:14.780
biology

01:12:14.780 --> 01:12:15.780
demography

01:12:15.780 --> 01:12:17.780
these are pretty loose

01:12:17.780 --> 01:12:19.780
they play with numbers

01:12:19.780 --> 01:12:20.780
but it's too high

01:12:20.780 --> 01:12:21.780
it's a fig leaf

01:12:21.780 --> 01:12:22.780
and by the time you get to

01:12:23.780 --> 01:12:25.780
sociology or something like that

01:12:25.780 --> 01:12:26.780
I mean these clowns

01:12:26.780 --> 01:12:28.780
have just snuck under the tent

01:12:28.780 --> 01:12:29.780
and should actually

01:12:29.780 --> 01:12:31.780
be shown the door

01:12:33.780 --> 01:12:35.780
and put back outside

01:12:35.780 --> 01:12:37.780
with the card readers

01:12:37.780 --> 01:12:38.780
so

01:12:38.780 --> 01:12:42.600
so for several hundred years

01:12:42.600 --> 01:12:43.600
you know

01:12:43.600 --> 01:12:44.600
since let's say

01:12:44.600 --> 01:12:45.600
Galileo

01:12:45.600 --> 01:12:47.600
and serious physics

01:12:47.600 --> 01:12:48.600
this is how

01:12:48.600 --> 01:12:49.600
science has been

01:12:49.600 --> 01:12:52.600
it's been a pyramid of envy

01:12:52.600 --> 01:12:53.600
directed toward

01:12:53.600 --> 01:12:54.600
the paradigmatic

01:12:54.600 --> 01:12:56.600
the paradigmatic science

01:12:56.600 --> 01:12:57.600
which was physics

01:12:57.600 --> 01:12:58.600
and which could produce

01:12:58.600 --> 01:12:59.600
this incredible

01:12:59.600 --> 01:13:01.600
congruence of theory

01:13:01.600 --> 01:13:04.600
and experimental data

01:13:04.600 --> 01:13:06.600
well so then physics of course

01:13:06.600 --> 01:13:08.600
charges forward

01:13:08.600 --> 01:13:09.600
deeper into matter

01:13:09.600 --> 01:13:11.600
asking deeper questions

01:13:11.600 --> 01:13:12.600
well once you pass

01:13:12.600 --> 01:13:15.600
below the level of the electron

01:13:15.600 --> 01:13:17.600
it's like suddenly

01:13:17.600 --> 01:13:19.600
it's like smoking DMT

01:13:19.600 --> 01:13:20.600
or something

01:13:20.600 --> 01:13:22.600
absolute madness

01:13:22.600 --> 01:13:23.600
breaks out

01:13:23.600 --> 01:13:25.600
where before you had

01:13:25.600 --> 01:13:27.600
these wonderful theories

01:13:27.600 --> 01:13:28.600
and they were feeding back

01:13:28.600 --> 01:13:29.600
this data

01:13:29.600 --> 01:13:30.600
now suddenly you have

01:13:30.600 --> 01:13:32.600
backward flowing time

01:13:32.600 --> 01:13:34.600
you have particles

01:13:34.600 --> 01:13:36.600
which appear magically

01:13:36.600 --> 01:13:39.600
on one side of an energy barrier

01:13:39.600 --> 01:13:40.600
without apparently

01:13:40.600 --> 01:13:42.600
crossing through it

01:13:42.600 --> 01:13:45.600
you have non-locality

01:13:45.600 --> 01:13:46.600
which seems to imply

01:13:46.600 --> 01:13:47.600
that every particle

01:13:47.600 --> 01:13:48.600
that exists

01:13:48.600 --> 01:13:50.600
is somehow magically connected

01:13:50.600 --> 01:13:52.600
with every other particle

01:13:52.600 --> 01:13:53.600
we now have quantum

01:13:53.600 --> 01:13:55.600
teleportation

01:13:55.600 --> 01:13:56.600
we have black holes

01:13:56.600 --> 01:13:58.600
we have singularities

01:13:58.600 --> 01:14:00.600
and don't be fooled folks

01:14:00.600 --> 01:14:02.600
what is a singularity?

01:14:02.600 --> 01:14:03.600
it's just a place

01:14:03.600 --> 01:14:04.600
where you agree

01:14:04.600 --> 01:14:06.600
that the rules are cancelled

01:14:06.600 --> 01:14:07.600
because you don't know

01:14:07.600 --> 01:14:09.600
what the hell else to do

01:14:09.600 --> 01:14:11.600
and it's fine you know

01:14:11.600 --> 01:14:13.600
it used to be in physics

01:14:13.600 --> 01:14:16.600
that they had one singularity

01:14:16.600 --> 01:14:18.600
it was called the big bang

01:14:18.600 --> 01:14:19.600
and so you say

01:14:19.600 --> 01:14:20.600
well one singularity

01:14:20.600 --> 01:14:22.600
essentially what science is saying

01:14:22.600 --> 01:14:24.600
is give us one free miracle

01:14:24.600 --> 01:14:26.600
and then we can

01:14:26.600 --> 01:14:29.600
we can run it from there

01:14:29.600 --> 01:14:35.980
but the theory of special relativity

01:14:35.980 --> 01:14:37.980
then introduced the concept

01:14:37.980 --> 01:14:39.980
of black holes

01:14:39.980 --> 01:14:41.980
and of course black holes

01:14:41.980 --> 01:14:44.980
are enormous gravitational masses

01:14:44.980 --> 01:14:46.980
so massive that neither light

01:14:46.980 --> 01:14:49.980
nor information can leave them

01:14:49.980 --> 01:14:51.980
and what do black holes have

01:14:51.980 --> 01:14:53.980
at the center of them?

01:14:53.980 --> 01:14:55.980
well a singularity

01:14:55.980 --> 01:14:57.980
well how many black holes

01:14:57.980 --> 01:14:59.980
are there in the universe?

01:14:59.980 --> 01:15:04.930
10 high 14?

01:15:04.930 --> 01:15:07.930
that's a lot of singularities

01:15:07.930 --> 01:15:09.930
if you're trying to produce

01:15:09.930 --> 01:15:11.930
a theory without singularities

01:15:11.930 --> 01:15:13.930
I mean essentially that's an admission

01:15:13.930 --> 01:15:15.930
of total intellectual defeat

01:15:15.930 --> 01:15:18.930
my god if there are 10 high 14 singularities

01:15:18.930 --> 01:15:20.930
you're not even doing science

01:15:20.930 --> 01:15:22.930
you just might as well be

01:15:22.930 --> 01:15:24.930
you know channeling

01:15:24.930 --> 01:15:27.930
Atlantis or something

01:15:27.930 --> 01:15:36.310
so it troubles me

01:15:36.310 --> 01:15:38.310
because I think this stuff is rich

01:15:38.310 --> 01:15:40.310
that physics is feeding back

01:15:40.310 --> 01:15:41.310
and that ultimately

01:15:41.310 --> 01:15:43.310
a model of consciousness

01:15:43.310 --> 01:15:45.310
will come out of studying

01:15:45.310 --> 01:15:47.310
the deeper levels

01:15:47.310 --> 01:15:49.310
of the behavior of matter

01:15:49.310 --> 01:15:50.310
but the conclusions

01:15:50.310 --> 01:15:51.310
are all going to support

01:15:51.310 --> 01:15:53.310
the non-scientific

01:15:53.310 --> 01:15:55.310
non-rational factions

01:15:55.310 --> 01:15:56.310
in other words

01:15:56.310 --> 01:15:58.310
Bell non-locality is real

01:15:58.310 --> 01:16:01.310
all matter in the universe

01:16:01.310 --> 01:16:03.310
is in contact

01:16:03.310 --> 01:16:04.310
with all other matter

01:16:04.310 --> 01:16:07.310
through some kind of higher space

01:16:07.310 --> 01:16:10.310
based on their original connectivity

01:16:10.310 --> 01:16:12.310
quantum teleportation

01:16:12.310 --> 01:16:15.310
is a possibility

01:16:15.310 --> 01:16:17.310
these violations

01:16:17.310 --> 01:16:19.310
backward flowing time

01:16:19.310 --> 01:16:22.310
and violations of rational casuistry

01:16:22.310 --> 01:16:23.310
are all real

01:16:23.310 --> 01:16:24.310
in other words

01:16:24.310 --> 01:16:26.310
science meaning physics

01:16:26.310 --> 01:16:27.310
at this point

01:16:27.310 --> 01:16:30.310
prosecuted its agenda

01:16:30.310 --> 01:16:33.310
of deconstructing nature

01:16:33.310 --> 01:16:34.310
to the point where

01:16:34.310 --> 01:16:35.310
it let loose the elves

01:16:35.310 --> 01:16:37.310
of madness paradox

01:16:37.310 --> 01:16:39.310
contradiction and peculiarity

01:16:39.310 --> 01:16:41.310
and that can now

01:16:41.310 --> 01:16:42.310
never be put back

01:16:42.310 --> 01:16:44.310
I mean the dirty little secret is

01:16:44.310 --> 01:16:46.310
that at bedrock

01:16:46.310 --> 01:16:49.310
the universe is more like a DMT flash

01:16:49.310 --> 01:16:52.310
than it is like an 18th century garden party

01:16:52.310 --> 01:16:54.310
as we were previously assured

01:16:54.310 --> 01:16:56.310
by the practitioners of science

01:16:56.310 --> 01:16:58.310
I think that's enough ranting

01:16:58.310 --> 01:16:59.310
on that subject

01:16:59.310 --> 01:17:00.310
if you want to

01:17:00.310 --> 01:17:01.310
excuse me

01:17:01.310 --> 01:17:02.310
if you want to ask a question

01:17:02.310 --> 01:17:03.310
I guess

01:17:03.310 --> 01:17:04.310
what the consensus of the group is

01:17:04.310 --> 01:17:05.310
is to go and stand

01:17:05.310 --> 01:17:06.310
or I'll point to you

01:17:06.310 --> 01:17:07.310
the reason we didn't

01:17:07.310 --> 01:17:08.310
originally say

01:17:08.310 --> 01:17:09.310
go and stand

01:17:09.310 --> 01:17:10.310
is because

01:17:10.310 --> 01:17:11.310
if you get a nut in the line

01:17:11.310 --> 01:17:12.310
there's a certain fatedness

01:17:12.310 --> 01:17:13.310
to their eventually getting

01:17:13.310 --> 01:17:14.310
to the microphone

01:17:14.310 --> 01:17:15.310
which is

01:17:15.310 --> 01:17:16.310
to the microphone

01:17:16.310 --> 01:17:17.310
which is

01:17:17.310 --> 01:17:18.310
to the microphone

01:17:18.310 --> 01:17:19.310
which is

01:17:19.310 --> 01:17:20.310
to the microphone

01:17:20.310 --> 01:17:21.310
which is

01:17:21.310 --> 01:17:22.310
to the microphone

01:17:22.310 --> 01:17:23.310
which is

01:17:23.310 --> 01:17:24.310
to the microphone

01:17:24.310 --> 01:17:25.310
which is

01:17:25.310 --> 01:17:26.310
to the microphone

01:17:26.310 --> 01:17:28.310
and if I am sensitive enough

01:17:28.310 --> 01:17:30.310
in the pointing out process

01:17:30.310 --> 01:17:32.310
could never happen

01:17:32.310 --> 01:17:34.310
so this is that

01:17:34.310 --> 01:17:36.310
we're trusting that you're saying

01:17:36.310 --> 01:17:37.310
that's why I got up here early

01:17:37.310 --> 01:17:38.310
yeah good

01:17:38.310 --> 01:17:40.310
thanks for being patient

01:17:40.310 --> 01:17:41.310
thanks Terence

01:17:41.310 --> 01:17:43.310
I have a technical question

01:17:43.310 --> 01:17:44.310
but I think it's an interesting one

01:17:44.310 --> 01:17:45.310
but I think it's an interesting one

01:17:45.310 --> 01:17:47.310
and maybe important

01:17:47.310 --> 01:17:49.310
your name has become

01:17:49.310 --> 01:17:51.310
identified with the date 2012

01:17:52.310 --> 01:17:54.310
because you have said that

01:17:54.310 --> 01:17:55.310
at a certain

01:17:55.310 --> 01:18:03.830
moment in the year 2012, an event will take place of tremendous or even

01:18:03.830 --> 01:18:10.910
infinite novelty. And this is based on your work on what you call the time

01:18:10.910 --> 01:18:16.930
wave and novelty theory and so on, which seems to indicate that around that date

01:18:16.930 --> 01:18:23.810
something extraordinary will happen. And you confirm this by saying

01:18:23.810 --> 01:18:29.130
that, interestingly and synchronistically perhaps, I'm not sure

01:18:29.130 --> 01:18:33.930
whether that's what you appeal to, but you say that the Mayan calendar also

01:18:33.930 --> 01:18:40.430
points to precisely the same date, and number three you say that at that time

01:18:40.430 --> 01:18:44.310
also an astronomical event will take place,

01:18:44.310 --> 01:18:53.250
namely, the conjunction of the winter solstice with the Galactic Center, an

01:18:53.250 --> 01:18:53.790
event, which I've done a lot of research on. Right? The world is going to

01:18:53.790 --> 01:18:58.790
only happens every 25,000 years, roughly 26,000 years.

01:18:59.010 --> 01:19:01.510
So the last time that happened, our ancestors

01:19:01.510 --> 01:19:05.170
were painting bison on the walls of caves.

01:19:05.170 --> 01:19:10.170
It's a long, long cycle, this precession of the equinoxes

01:19:10.370 --> 01:19:13.370
that brings the winter solstice around the circle

01:19:13.370 --> 01:19:16.330
of the zodiac every 26,000 years.

01:19:16.330 --> 01:19:18.350
And you say that this is going to happen

01:19:18.350 --> 01:19:20.510
again in the year 2012.

01:19:20.510 --> 01:19:25.510
What my question is concerned with is that third element,

01:19:26.810 --> 01:19:30.770
namely this precession of the equinoxes in the year 2012.

01:19:33.250 --> 01:19:37.970
As you know, the galactic center is not on the ecliptic,

01:19:37.970 --> 01:19:42.750
is not on the zodiac, but is a bit above it.

01:19:42.750 --> 01:19:46.170
And so the sun on the winter solstice will never be

01:19:46.170 --> 01:19:48.530
in conjunction with the galactic center.

01:19:48.530 --> 01:19:53.150
But an event that is linked with that,

01:19:53.150 --> 01:19:57.030
and I think far more precise and significant,

01:19:57.030 --> 01:20:01.050
is the fact that not in the year 2012,

01:20:01.050 --> 01:20:06.050
but right now as we sit here, the winter solstice

01:20:06.730 --> 01:20:09.910
is moving into conjunction with the place

01:20:09.910 --> 01:20:13.870
where the galactic equator crosses the zodiac.

01:20:13.870 --> 01:20:17.630
This is happening now, 1998, 1999.

01:20:18.530 --> 01:20:23.290
And I'm wondering why you look to this year 2012

01:20:23.290 --> 01:20:27.770
and the imprecise conjunction with the galactic center

01:20:27.770 --> 01:20:30.770
rather than the precise and remarkable return

01:20:33.350 --> 01:20:38.350
of the winter solstice to the galactic equator

01:20:38.350 --> 01:20:43.050
where it was again 25,000 years ago when the cave paintings,

01:20:43.050 --> 01:20:48.030
when the first bursts of self-consciousness were occurring

01:20:48.030 --> 01:20:49.950
in our species.

01:20:49.950 --> 01:20:53.530
And I raise this not because I think or know

01:20:53.530 --> 01:20:56.990
that there's any truth to the meaning of this,

01:20:56.990 --> 01:20:59.650
but I do find it exquisitely beautiful

01:20:59.650 --> 01:21:01.910
that this is happening right now.

01:21:01.910 --> 01:21:03.910
I'm wondering what you think about that.

01:21:05.090 --> 01:21:09.710
Well, thank you for framing and imparting

01:21:09.710 --> 01:21:12.630
an extremely intelligent question.

01:21:12.630 --> 01:21:17.630
I mean, you got it almost all right and all the details

01:21:18.030 --> 01:21:19.830
are right.

01:21:19.830 --> 01:21:26.820
And for those of you who have no idea what that was all about.

01:21:26.820 --> 01:21:29.620
I'm not, I'm not sure I can help you,

01:21:29.620 --> 01:21:33.220
but for those of you who do know what that was all about.

01:21:33.220 --> 01:21:35.180
Here's my response.

01:21:35.180 --> 01:21:38.480
First of all, your statement

01:21:38.480 --> 01:21:43.480
that the galactic center is now transiting the Solsticeal node

01:21:43.940 --> 01:21:48.100
rather than in 2012, that's the only part of,

01:21:48.100 --> 01:21:50.140
of, of the thing, you, of the twelfth century

01:21:50.180 --> 01:21:59.080
you laid out that I would, yeah, that I would disagree with and here's why.

01:21:59.080 --> 01:22:05.840
When we say the galactic center, it turns out when you turn the lights on on that concept

01:22:05.840 --> 01:22:08.980
that it's extremely slippery.

01:22:08.980 --> 01:22:13.660
The galaxy is not a basketball.

01:22:13.660 --> 01:22:24.460
It has a center of mass which we can't determine from where we are because we're out on one

01:22:24.460 --> 01:22:26.300
limb edge of it.

01:22:26.300 --> 01:22:30.700
It has a center of luminosity.

01:22:30.700 --> 01:22:33.680
It has a volumetric center.

01:22:33.680 --> 01:22:38.900
I mean how do you in fact even define what the galaxy is because at its outer edges it

01:22:38.900 --> 01:22:43.140
feathers out into extra galactic space.

01:22:43.140 --> 01:22:43.640
Now what we're.

01:22:43.640 --> 01:22:50.960
What we're arguing over here is a difference of 12 years if we accept the premise that

01:22:50.960 --> 01:22:57.920
we're trying to locate a point in time where this conjunction of the galactic center and

01:22:57.920 --> 01:23:03.000
the heliacal rising of the solsticeal sun occurs.

01:23:03.000 --> 01:23:11.800
Now if you run out and buy a program to run on your PC like Voyager and you look at these

01:23:11.800 --> 01:23:13.120
solsticeal sunrises.

01:23:13.120 --> 01:23:23.200
Over the next 14 or 15 years it actually depends on the program you buy what the contention

01:23:23.200 --> 01:23:27.620
is that is supported.

01:23:27.620 --> 01:23:37.240
This is a deep subject very interesting raises issues of bio astronomy archaeo astronomy

01:23:37.240 --> 01:23:40.120
galactic dynamics complicated issues.

01:23:40.120 --> 01:23:41.120
I mean.

01:23:41.120 --> 01:23:42.120
I mean.

01:23:42.120 --> 01:23:43.120
I mean.

01:23:43.120 --> 01:23:44.120
I mean.

01:23:44.120 --> 01:23:45.120
Because this is a very complex issue.

01:23:45.120 --> 01:23:51.660
Now a book has come out in the last six months called Maya Cosmo Genesis 2012 by John Major

01:23:51.660 --> 01:23:53.060
Jenkins.

01:23:53.060 --> 01:23:55.040
He's a fine scholar.

01:23:55.040 --> 01:24:03.360
I wrote an introduction to the book but he over hundreds of pages can educate you and

01:24:03.360 --> 01:24:10.320
bring you up to speed about these issues.

01:24:10.320 --> 01:24:12.640
If the Maya had never existed.

01:24:12.640 --> 01:24:13.640
Wow.

01:24:13.640 --> 01:24:14.640
We would still be looking at the end.

01:24:14.640 --> 01:24:15.640
Of a new world.

01:24:15.640 --> 01:24:24.440
a millennium based on the Gregorian calendar. Now, we tend to say, well, the Gregorian calendar

01:24:24.440 --> 01:24:34.220
is out of sync with the Maya, that if there is a collective unconscious, then the European

01:24:34.220 --> 01:24:42.140
mind somehow made a sloppy download of it because the Gregorian calendar is off-keyed

01:24:42.140 --> 01:24:53.540
the Mayan by 12 years. But on a scale of a thousand years, that's a difference of 0.12%

01:24:53.540 --> 01:25:02.620
or something. And on a scale of a billion years, what is being off by 12 years? On the

01:25:02.620 --> 01:25:09.960
scale of a million years, what is being off by 12 years? So it seems crazy to me to have

01:25:09.960 --> 01:25:11.920
violent factions.

01:25:12.140 --> 01:25:27.360
I mean, the point is that something, the galactic mind, the intelligence of the species,

01:25:27.360 --> 01:25:35.260
the integrated Gaian and galactic entelechy, something is trying to deliver a message.

01:25:35.260 --> 01:25:41.660
And it is writ large, this message, in our largest systems of defining and understanding

01:25:41.660 --> 01:25:42.140
time.

01:25:42.140 --> 01:25:53.540
We are at the end of a cosmic cycle. You can say a thousand years if you're a Gregorianist,

01:25:53.540 --> 01:26:03.640
or you can say a 5,300 and X year cycle if you're a Mayanist, or you can say a 26,000

01:26:03.640 --> 01:26:11.660
year cycle if you're a processionist. But the point is, we are there.

01:26:11.660 --> 01:26:22.400
We are there. We are in parking orbit around the eschaton. And it permeates our lives.

01:26:22.400 --> 01:26:30.020
All you have to do is sit down, smoke a bomber, and look, and it's there. It is pregnant.

01:26:30.020 --> 01:26:38.640
We are pregnant with this eschatological breakthrough. And people want it to arrive in the form

01:26:38.640 --> 01:26:39.640
of ships the size of Manitoba hovering over the surface of the ocean. And they want it

01:26:39.640 --> 01:26:40.640
to arrive in the form of ships the size of Manitoba hovering over the surface of the

01:26:40.640 --> 01:26:41.640
ocean. And they want it to arrive in the form of ships the size of Manitoba hovering

01:26:41.660 --> 01:26:51.180
over the oval office, perhaps offering oral sex. I'm not sure.

01:26:51.180 --> 01:26:58.480
But you see, we are such ephemeral creatures in time. We're like mayflies or something.

01:26:58.480 --> 01:27:04.820
Mayflies who only live for seven days. In other words, our temporal window perception

01:27:04.820 --> 01:27:11.180
is so extreme. People say, well, nothing much ever seems to happen. Well, 100 years

01:27:11.180 --> 01:27:15.200
A hundred years ago, there were no movies, automobiles,

01:27:15.200 --> 01:27:20.020
airplanes, telephones, internet, atom bombs,

01:27:20.020 --> 01:27:23.360
antibiotics, DNA, it's endless.

01:27:23.360 --> 01:27:25.540
So in the space of, and yet people say,

01:27:25.540 --> 01:27:28.340
nothing much ever seems to happen.

01:27:28.340 --> 01:27:33.340
An incredible ability to not register radical change

01:27:35.040 --> 01:27:37.480
seems to be a precondition of existing

01:27:37.480 --> 01:27:41.960
in the presence of radical change.

01:27:41.960 --> 01:27:46.960
Now, for those of you who care about my theories

01:27:47.240 --> 01:27:52.020
in this area of mathematics and deconstruction

01:27:52.020 --> 01:27:56.140
of the I Ching and analogizing to the Mayan calendar,

01:27:57.280 --> 01:28:01.740
it is a mathematical game, it is an intellectual game.

01:28:02.720 --> 01:28:07.460
I discern patterns in nature that cause me

01:28:07.460 --> 01:28:12.460
to believe that science, which I recently praised,

01:28:13.240 --> 01:28:18.240
has overlooked very important aspects of reality

01:28:20.160 --> 01:28:25.160
that you don't need an atom smasher, or a DNA sequencer,

01:28:25.600 --> 01:28:30.600
or a probe to Ganymede to register.

01:28:31.840 --> 01:28:34.120
And what do I mean by that?

01:28:34.120 --> 01:28:37.220
Science has overlooked two aspects,

01:28:37.220 --> 01:28:41.120
aspects of nature that as you sit here,

01:28:41.120 --> 01:28:45.280
I believe you can hear my case

01:28:45.280 --> 01:28:48.560
and that you will find in my favor.

01:28:48.560 --> 01:28:50.620
Here is what it is.

01:28:50.620 --> 01:28:55.620
The first thing which science has not taken on board

01:28:56.080 --> 01:28:59.500
is the fact that as you get nearer and nearer

01:28:59.500 --> 01:29:03.500
the moment in time that we call the present,

01:29:03.500 --> 01:29:06.460
things become more and more complicated.

01:29:07.220 --> 01:29:10.460
Now that may seem like a trivial statement,

01:29:10.460 --> 01:29:14.120
but there's no reason for the universe to work like that.

01:29:14.120 --> 01:29:17.300
Why does the universe go from simple to complicated?

01:29:17.300 --> 01:29:22.200
Why do you get, at first, moments after the big bang,

01:29:22.200 --> 01:29:25.900
an ocean of free electrons

01:29:26.560 --> 01:29:30.160
at such a state of temperature and energy

01:29:30.160 --> 01:29:33.400
that no molecular bonds can form,

01:29:33.400 --> 01:29:35.860
atomic systems can't even form,

01:29:35.860 --> 01:29:37.200
because the, the-

01:29:37.220 --> 01:29:43.000
bond strength is overwhelmed by the thermal energy in the system. Then it

01:29:43.000 --> 01:29:50.840
cools down and atoms condense, a more complicated thing than electrons, by

01:29:50.840 --> 01:29:57.680
orders of magnitude. Further cooling, further nuclear cooking of the most

01:29:57.680 --> 01:30:03.460
primitive elements, hydrogen and helium, in gravitationally aggregated masses

01:30:03.460 --> 01:30:10.820
called stars, cooks out the heavier elements. They emerge. They were never

01:30:10.820 --> 01:30:17.580
seen before until fusion began to occur in these hydrogen masses. And these

01:30:17.580 --> 01:30:28.960
fusion processes cook out iron, sulfur, carbon. Bingo! Carbon molecules! Now an

01:30:28.960 --> 01:30:32.580
order of magnitude in their complexity,

01:30:32.580 --> 01:30:33.460
greater

01:30:33.460 --> 01:30:43.220
than atoms as atoms are compared to electrons and then you know and i'm compressing 13 billion years

01:30:43.220 --> 01:30:51.140
of emergence here into 30 seconds then out of the molecular soup you get long chain polymers

01:30:51.140 --> 01:30:59.140
out of the long chain polymers you get molecular transcription systems i.e prebiotic stuff

01:30:59.140 --> 01:31:06.500
out of that you get non-nucleated dna out of that nucleated dna out of that membranes organelles

01:31:06.500 --> 01:31:14.260
organisms higher organisms differentiation of tissue our dear selves culture language technology

01:31:14.260 --> 01:31:23.460
and the eschaton now why this is so obvious i mean leaving out the eschaton if you like

01:31:23.460 --> 01:31:28.580
but all the rest of it is self is totally self-apparent

01:31:29.140 --> 01:31:34.900
why doesn't science take that on board as a major problem in the description of nature

01:31:34.900 --> 01:31:39.780
the emergence of complexity will you ask a scientist they say well you see

01:31:41.700 --> 01:31:51.460
these are separate domains of nature how atoms become molecules has nothing to do with how

01:31:51.460 --> 01:31:59.060
animals become human beings this is this is just some kind of compartmentalized

01:31:59.140 --> 01:32:05.380
thinking where you don't want to come to grips with the overarching metaphors that are working

01:32:05.380 --> 01:32:12.420
on various levels the advent of the understanding of the fractal ordering of nature now makes it

01:32:12.420 --> 01:32:20.420
clear that voting patterns in orange county distribution of anemones on the great barrier

01:32:20.420 --> 01:32:28.820
reef and the cratering of europa all follow the same power laws so that's the first thing

01:32:29.540 --> 01:32:36.420
which science has staring in its in the face and has never taken on board

01:32:37.460 --> 01:32:43.780
now i said there were two things the second thing is related to the first

01:32:47.670 --> 01:32:51.990
a double shot of espresso you're really getting your money's worth here

01:32:54.810 --> 01:33:03.690
uh the second thing which science has taken on board has refused to take on board is that this

01:33:04.010 --> 01:33:11.850
process of complexification that i just described to you as you approach the place in time called

01:33:11.850 --> 01:33:21.450
the present happens faster and faster that was not necessarily implied by the first observation

01:33:21.450 --> 01:33:26.650
the first observation was simply that there was a process which was moving from simple

01:33:26.650 --> 01:33:33.530
to complex now we have the concept of a process which is ever accelerating

01:33:34.010 --> 01:33:40.810
as it moves from the simple to the complex so uh more and more happens

01:33:41.610 --> 01:33:48.490
as you approach the present and since these processes have been running since the big bang

01:33:49.130 --> 01:33:53.850
there is no argument to be entertained that they will reverse themselves

01:33:54.410 --> 01:34:02.170
suddenly no they're not going to reverse themselves after 13 billion years duh so

01:34:04.010 --> 01:34:14.810
so then but the implication of that carried to its ultimate extreme leads to a conclusion most

01:34:14.810 --> 01:34:23.930
people find too wild to entertain if the universe is evolving deeper and deeper into complexity

01:34:23.930 --> 01:34:34.010
faster and faster and if now in a human lifetime we can see a small portion of this curve it's no

01:34:34.010 --> 01:34:39.890
longer appears flat to us because of our nearness in relation you understand I'm

01:34:39.890 --> 01:34:46.910
saying and that we can actually discern the curve and so that means I believe

01:34:46.910 --> 01:34:53.690
that by extrapolating this process we should then logically conclude that we

01:34:53.690 --> 01:35:00.070
are very near relative to the life of the universe we are very near to the

01:35:00.070 --> 01:35:05.950
place where this ramping up of complexity will become so excruciatingly

01:35:05.950 --> 01:35:11.970
rapid that more change will happen in a single week than happened in the

01:35:11.970 --> 01:35:17.690
previous 13 billion years and that then there will come a moment where more will

01:35:17.690 --> 01:35:23.290
happen in a single minute than happened in the previous 13 billion and then a

01:35:23.290 --> 01:35:29.350
moment will come when more will happen in us in six point five five times ten to

01:35:29.350 --> 01:35:29.550
the

01:35:29.550 --> 01:35:30.050
you

01:35:30.050 --> 01:35:38.150
I 23rd and erg seconds more will happen than has happened people say well but

01:35:38.150 --> 01:35:45.940
that's crazy I mean how what kind of universe is that that ramp that mmm well

01:35:45.940 --> 01:35:50.260
wait a minute what's so crazy about this let's look at what the competition is

01:35:50.260 --> 01:36:00.400
peddling what the competition would have you believe is that the universe

01:36:00.400 --> 01:36:03.820
sprang from nothing in a single

01:36:03.820 --> 01:36:11.280
moment for no reason well now whatever you think about that theory in the

01:36:11.280 --> 01:36:16.800
interests of being awake please notice that that is the limit case for

01:36:16.800 --> 01:36:23.900
credulity you know what I mean by that I mean that if you can believe that you

01:36:23.900 --> 01:36:33.300
can believe anything that is the most improbable proposition the human mind can

01:36:33.300 --> 01:36:37.240
conceive of I challenge you to top it you know

01:36:37.240 --> 01:36:41.900
I mean I know the Scientologists think God is a clam on another planet but I

01:36:41.900 --> 01:36:48.240
don't think that tops this idea that the universe sprang from nothing in a

01:36:48.240 --> 01:36:54.040
single moment for no reason that is the art that's article-of-faith number one I

01:36:54.040 --> 01:36:59.200
say no no this is if we're talking about universes that spring from nothing right

01:36:59.200 --> 01:37:01.060
I'm really thinking that it is we are talking about interactions like if there's no knew Church that does not have a story

01:37:01.060 --> 01:37:11.160
universes that spring from nothing, if we're going to talk like that, then surely such

01:37:11.160 --> 01:37:19.380
universes occur in a situation of great complexity. In other words, if we're going to look for

01:37:19.380 --> 01:37:29.060
an enormous eruption of emergent phenomena, an enormous sudden unexpected download of novelty,

01:37:29.060 --> 01:37:40.860
we shouldn't look in a domain of zero space, zero time, zero energy, zero anti-entropic

01:37:40.860 --> 01:37:47.500
organization. That's the worst place to look. That's the least likely place where such a

01:37:47.500 --> 01:37:54.440
singularity would spring out. Where should you look if you believe in this jabberwock,

01:37:54.440 --> 01:37:58.940
this chimera, this particular beast? Where should you hunt this snark?

01:37:59.060 --> 01:38:06.900
You should hunt it in domains of immense complexity, where you have matter, energy,

01:38:06.900 --> 01:38:15.860
light, chemistry, language, machines, people, cultures, intentionality, minds, minds, minds.

01:38:15.860 --> 01:38:21.980
And if you throw all that stuff together and shake it up, it's maybe not a sure thing that you will

01:38:21.980 --> 01:38:29.040
get a singularity, but you're certainly betting right. Now you've figured it out. So I'm

01:38:29.040 --> 01:38:35.760
going to go back to the idea that science is extremely hostile to the idea that the

01:38:35.760 --> 01:38:43.660
universe is complexifying and complexifying more and more rapidly. Why? It's just a matter,

01:38:43.660 --> 01:38:50.160
it's just a historical issue. It has to do with the fact that 19th century English biology

01:38:50.160 --> 01:38:57.000
was extremely hostile to what it called deism. Deism was the reigning religious paradigm

01:38:57.000 --> 01:38:58.000
of the 19th century.

01:38:58.000 --> 01:38:59.000
And it's the idea that science is extremely hostile to the idea that the universe is

01:38:59.000 --> 01:39:03.880
complex. It's the idea that God is a clockmaker, and that God made the universe and wound

01:39:03.880 --> 01:39:11.620
it up like a clock and went away. And what irked those, what irked Darwin and Lyle and

01:39:11.620 --> 01:39:17.420
those people was the idea that the universe has a purpose. You see, they thought that

01:39:17.420 --> 01:39:25.840
if it has a purpose, this somehow means there is a God. And they weren't up for that. They

01:39:25.840 --> 01:39:28.840
were trying to build rational science into a…

01:39:28.840 --> 01:39:35.900
Into a tool for understanding nature. I think we have grown beyond that. And that's a, it's

01:39:35.900 --> 01:39:43.920
foolish to wear those tight 19th century high-button shoes. We can believe that the universe is

01:39:43.920 --> 01:39:49.720
following an organizational vector. We can believe that the universe is under the influence

01:39:49.720 --> 01:39:58.480
of a strange attractor. We can believe that the universe is pulled toward a future denouement,

01:39:58.840 --> 01:40:05.500
was pushed by the unfolding of causal necessity. We can believe all of that without evoking

01:40:05.500 --> 01:40:13.000
the 19th century concept of God. Now, why do I spend so much time on this? And what's

01:40:13.000 --> 01:40:20.840
so great about all this? Here's what's so great about all this. If you will join me

01:40:20.840 --> 01:40:27.340
in this belief that the universe works as I have described, it's an engine for the generation

01:40:27.340 --> 01:40:28.340
of complexity.

01:40:28.840 --> 01:40:38.280
And it preserves complexity. And it builds on complexity to ever higher levels. If you

01:40:38.280 --> 01:40:47.960
entertain this, guess what happens? It's like a light comes on on the human condition.

01:40:47.960 --> 01:40:56.480
Who are we in my story? Well, first let me tell you who are we in science's story. We

01:40:56.480 --> 01:40:58.760
are nobody.

01:40:58.760 --> 01:41:09.880
We are lucky to be here. We are a cosmic accident. We exist on an ordinary star at

01:41:09.880 --> 01:41:19.390
the edge of a typical galaxy in an ordinary part of space and time. And essentially our

01:41:19.390 --> 01:41:25.850
existence is without meaning or you have to perform one of those existential pas-de-douxs

01:41:25.850 --> 01:41:30.130
where you confirm meaning or, you know, one of these postmodern.

01:41:30.330 --> 01:41:41.470
soft shoes. But if I'm right, that the universe has an appetite for novelty, then we are the

01:41:41.470 --> 01:41:51.530
apple of its eye. Suddenly, cosmic purpose is restored to us. We left the center of the

01:41:51.530 --> 01:42:00.150
cosmic stage in the 13th century and haven't been back since. But this idea says, no, people

01:42:00.150 --> 01:42:09.230
matter. You are the cutting edge of a 13 billion year old process of defining novelty. Your acts

01:42:09.230 --> 01:42:17.730
matter. Your thoughts matter. Your purpose, to add to the complexity. Your enemy, disorder,

01:42:17.730 --> 01:42:25.450
entropy, stupidity, and tastelessness. And so suddenly then, you have a morality,

01:42:26.190 --> 01:42:29.730
you have an ethical arrow, you have contextualization,

01:42:30.150 --> 01:42:38.130
and the processes of nature. You have meaning. You have authenticity. You have hope. You have the

01:42:38.130 --> 01:42:45.370
cancellation of existentialism and positivism and all that late 20th century crapola that people used

01:42:45.370 --> 01:42:57.070
to entertain back in the old days. So that's why I am so keen for the idea of novelty, because it

01:42:57.070 --> 01:42:58.410
seems self-evident.

01:43:00.150 --> 01:43:27.830
And, you know, we can argue about whether the eschaton will arrive in 2000 or 2012 or 3000, but I cannot believe that there is anybody in this room tonight who can, that the hardest thing to imagine is human history going on for hundreds and hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of more years.

01:43:27.830 --> 01:43:29.830
That's impossible.

01:43:30.150 --> 01:43:31.150
We have, we see around us the processes that make of history a self-limited game. The clock's ticking, folks. You think we can do gene splicing and internet and psychedelic drugs and manipulation of our genetic material and star flight and atom anti-matter and quantum teleportation and all these things? You can extrapolate that 500 years into the future? Don't be ridiculous.

01:44:00.150 --> 01:44:11.930
No, history is some kind of a phase transition. It only lasts about 25 000 years. Some people think that's a long time. Some people think it's a short time. It depends on where you stand. I think of it as snap. You know? One moment you're hunting ungulates on the plains of Africa and the next moment you're hurling a gold eternally.

01:44:30.150 --> 01:44:38.850
superconducting extra stellar device toward Alpha Centauri with all of

01:44:38.850 --> 01:44:46.390
mankind aboard in virtual space being run as a simulation in circuitry you

01:44:46.390 --> 01:44:54.450
know it's just first the one thing then the other thing but now history which

01:44:54.450 --> 01:45:02.190
lasts 25,000 years is this weird period where you're neither fish nor fowl you

01:45:02.190 --> 01:45:09.450
know you're not the hunting ape anymore but you are not yet the 16 dimensional

01:45:09.450 --> 01:45:17.430
digital god you know and and in that transition phase there is confusion

01:45:17.430 --> 01:45:23.730
there is angst but now we're at the end we have no I

01:45:23.730 --> 01:45:24.430
I know

01:45:24.430 --> 01:45:29.530
maintain anybody who's peddling angst and peddling pessimism and peddling all

01:45:29.530 --> 01:45:51.020
this stuff is just that so two minutes ago question I I heard you on the radio

01:45:51.020 --> 01:46:02.900
being interviewed a while back talking about its DMT is that the that is and that

01:46:02.900 --> 01:46:08.300
got me really interested and you you said

01:46:08.420 --> 01:46:18.560
that it was basically unavailable from me well is that your question yeah

01:46:19.360 --> 01:46:25.800
Hardman no I I was really wondering

01:46:25.800 --> 01:46:31.640
yeah I I had interpreted it would said it was pretty much unavailable period

01:46:31.640 --> 01:46:38.240
and I was wondering if in fact was available and i'm if not i mean that

01:46:38.240 --> 01:46:43.720
just sort of renewed my interest in psychedelic Glitch now you think is the

01:46:43.720 --> 01:46:49.280
second best choice well first let me say because it's an and I'd like to hear

01:46:49.280 --> 01:46:55.420
maybe just a little more about my DMT okay well first thing let me say which

01:46:55.420 --> 01:47:03.720
is a piece of practical advice the psychedelic community is is cleverly

01:47:03.720 --> 01:47:10.480
invisible because our choices in gender expression fashions over and so on have

01:47:10.480 --> 01:47:18.340
by crypto osmosis come to dominate the values of the culture we can no longer

01:47:18.340 --> 01:47:27.340
tell ourselves from from straight people so the only opportunity where we really

01:47:27.340 --> 01:47:32.800
come out of the woodwork is a thing like this and but then of course there's a

01:47:32.800 --> 01:47:40.000
tendency to fall into old think and everybody focus on the alpha male spiel

01:47:40.000 --> 01:47:40.460
my

01:47:40.480 --> 01:47:47.640
I stir at the front of the room so let me point out to you I'm leaving I'm going

01:47:47.640 --> 01:47:55.480
home to Hawaii tomorrow morning but this is your community this is your community

01:47:55.480 --> 01:48:02.980
and whatever it is that you think you need there are a dozen people in this

01:48:02.980 --> 01:48:12.010
room who can help you out and I am not one of them

01:48:12.010 --> 01:48:20.510
because I have a different assignment but look around and and of course be

01:48:20.510 --> 01:48:26.390
careful but after all this is about consciousness right I mean if you're not

01:48:26.390 --> 01:48:37.670
conscious enough to conduct that social transaction without flubbing it up

01:48:37.670 --> 01:48:42.930
that's probably God's way of telling you you shouldn't be proceeding toward high

01:48:42.930 --> 01:48:43.650
doses anyway

01:48:44.410 --> 01:48:51.360
Yeah. Oh, you wanted me to say more about it.

01:48:51.360 --> 01:48:54.930
The black and red poncho.

01:48:54.930 --> 01:48:58.930
The man in the black and red poncho.

01:48:58.930 --> 01:49:10.400
Yeah, I mean, in a way it's impossible to talk about DMT,

01:49:10.400 --> 01:49:14.400
but on the other hand it's fun to try to talk about it

01:49:14.400 --> 01:49:21.400
because it pushes the horse of language into a lather.

01:49:21.400 --> 01:49:31.450
Basically, when you smoke DMT, what happens is pure confoundment.

01:49:31.450 --> 01:49:34.450
And, you know, I'm trying to speak generally here

01:49:34.450 --> 01:49:39.450
in the sense that different people are confounded by different things.

01:49:39.450 --> 01:49:42.450
So, of course, it addresses you personally.

01:49:42.450 --> 01:49:49.450
Your level and tolerance for confoundment is a very personal thing.

01:49:49.450 --> 01:49:52.450
People have asked me about DMT.

01:49:52.450 --> 01:49:53.450
Is it dangerous?

01:49:53.450 --> 01:49:59.450
And the real answer is only if you fear death by astonishment.

01:49:59.450 --> 01:50:03.450
You know, and you deliver that line and then people laugh,

01:50:03.450 --> 01:50:07.450
except the people who've done DMT don't laugh

01:50:07.450 --> 01:50:12.450
because they understand, you know, death by astonishment

01:50:12.450 --> 01:50:16.450
is no remote possibility.

01:50:16.450 --> 01:50:20.450
Death by astonishment is right there.

01:50:20.450 --> 01:50:23.450
You know, when was the last time you were,

01:50:23.450 --> 01:50:26.450
you know, astonished?

01:50:26.450 --> 01:50:29.450
Unless I smoke DMT, it doesn't happen to me.

01:50:29.450 --> 01:50:31.450
Amazed occasionally.

01:50:31.450 --> 01:50:33.450
Astonished never.

01:50:33.450 --> 01:50:40.450
Astonishment is when your jaw hangs for a long time, you know.

01:50:40.450 --> 01:50:44.450
And DMT is simply confounding.

01:50:44.450 --> 01:50:47.450
Now, how could something be that confounding?

01:50:47.450 --> 01:50:51.450
I mean, you can imagine taking a drug and realizing that you should

01:50:51.450 --> 01:50:55.450
treat your partner better or realizing that God really exists

01:50:55.450 --> 01:50:58.450
or realizing that you should exercise more

01:50:58.450 --> 01:51:03.450
or realizing that the planet is an organized intelligence.

01:51:03.450 --> 01:51:09.450
But how could something be as confounding as DMT is?

01:51:09.450 --> 01:51:12.450
Well, I think the answer to that,

01:51:12.450 --> 01:51:16.450
and it took me a while to get to this,

01:51:16.450 --> 01:51:20.450
is that the reason it's so confounding is because

01:51:20.450 --> 01:51:30.450
its impact is on the language-forming capacity itself.

01:51:30.450 --> 01:51:35.450
So the reason it's so confounding is because the thing which is trying

01:51:35.450 --> 01:51:41.450
to look at the DMT is infected by it,

01:51:41.450 --> 01:51:45.450
by the process of inspection.

01:51:45.450 --> 01:51:49.450
So DMT does not provide an experience

01:51:49.450 --> 01:51:52.450
which you analyze.

01:51:52.450 --> 01:51:55.450
Nothing so tidy goes on.

01:51:55.450 --> 01:52:00.450
The syntactical machinery of description

01:52:00.450 --> 01:52:05.450
undergoes some kind of hyperdimensional inflation instantly.

01:52:05.450 --> 01:52:10.450
And then, you know, you cannot tell yourself

01:52:10.450 --> 01:52:12.450
what it is that you understand.

01:52:12.450 --> 01:52:17.450
In other words, what DMT does can't be downloaded

01:52:17.450 --> 01:52:19.450
into as low-dimensional a language.

01:52:19.450 --> 01:52:22.450
It can't be translated into language as English.

01:52:22.450 --> 01:52:24.450
And so you're like...

01:52:24.450 --> 01:52:28.450
I remember a bee movie I saw when I was a kid,

01:52:28.450 --> 01:52:30.450
and it was set somewhere in Mexico,

01:52:30.450 --> 01:52:32.450
and there was a big swamp,

01:52:32.450 --> 01:52:34.450
and there was a dinosaur in the swamp.

01:52:34.450 --> 01:52:39.450
And at one point, this campesino comes,

01:52:39.450 --> 01:52:41.450
who encounters the dinosaur,

01:52:41.450 --> 01:52:43.450
comes rushing out of the swamp,

01:52:43.450 --> 01:52:46.450
and the patron of the ranch is there,

01:52:46.450 --> 01:52:49.450
and this terrified guy is there in this serape.

01:52:49.450 --> 01:52:52.450
He can only point to the forest

01:52:52.450 --> 01:52:55.450
and sort of make a croaking sound.

01:52:55.450 --> 01:53:01.450
And that's what English allows you to do

01:53:01.450 --> 01:53:05.450
with the experience of DMT.

01:53:05.450 --> 01:53:08.450
You just come down a sputtering mess,

01:53:08.450 --> 01:53:10.450
if it works.

01:53:10.450 --> 01:53:12.450
You just come down saying, you know,

01:53:12.450 --> 01:53:16.450
my God, you know, it's not what I thought it was.

01:53:16.450 --> 01:53:18.450
And this is after you've done it 20 times.

01:53:18.450 --> 01:53:20.450
It's not what I thought it was.

01:53:20.450 --> 01:53:23.450
It's not what I can think it is.

01:53:23.450 --> 01:53:25.450
It's something...

01:53:25.450 --> 01:53:27.450
And I...

01:53:27.450 --> 01:53:32.720
My intellectual arrow

01:53:32.720 --> 01:53:34.720
and how I brought myself up

01:53:34.720 --> 01:53:36.720
in terms of all these things was,

01:53:36.720 --> 01:53:39.720
I am a rationalist,

01:53:39.720 --> 01:53:43.720
and I am interested in testing and verifying

01:53:43.720 --> 01:53:46.720
and proceeding to define truth

01:53:46.720 --> 01:53:48.720
by non-exotic means.

01:53:48.720 --> 01:53:49.720
In other words,

01:53:49.720 --> 01:53:54.720
no archangels, no none of that.

01:53:54.720 --> 01:53:59.720
And as I matured intellectually,

01:53:59.720 --> 01:54:04.720
I began to eliminate mystery from the world.

01:54:04.720 --> 01:54:08.720
You know, I'd look into some spiritual discipline,

01:54:08.720 --> 01:54:11.720
conclude, no, that's a bunch of crap.

01:54:11.720 --> 01:54:13.720
I'd go to some teacher,

01:54:13.720 --> 01:54:16.720
conclude, no, this guy is a weasel.

01:54:16.720 --> 01:54:18.720
I tested...

01:54:18.720 --> 01:54:20.720
I sought the weird,

01:54:20.720 --> 01:54:27.720
but with an attitude of critical skepticism.

01:54:27.720 --> 01:54:30.720
And I assumed blithely

01:54:30.720 --> 01:54:32.720
that with this flashlight,

01:54:32.720 --> 01:54:35.720
I would soon prove there were no elves

01:54:35.720 --> 01:54:38.720
out there in the darkness.

01:54:38.720 --> 01:54:40.720
Turns out, no, no.

01:54:40.720 --> 01:54:43.720
This is the way to proceed.

01:54:43.720 --> 01:54:47.720
Because stuff which is malarkey

01:54:47.720 --> 01:54:51.720
will be exposed as malarkey instantly.

01:54:51.720 --> 01:54:53.720
You know, you just go to the guru and say,

01:54:53.720 --> 01:54:55.720
what can you show me?

01:54:55.720 --> 01:54:57.720
And if the guy wants you to sweep up

01:54:57.720 --> 01:54:59.720
around the ashram for a dozen years or so,

01:54:59.720 --> 01:55:02.720
you say, no, I'm out of here.

01:55:02.720 --> 01:55:05.720
But when you get to DMT, it delivers.

01:55:05.720 --> 01:55:07.720
It delivers.

01:55:07.720 --> 01:55:13.720
It is as strange as anything can be.

01:55:13.720 --> 01:55:15.720
It is...

01:55:15.720 --> 01:55:19.720
It is not only stranger than you suppose

01:55:19.720 --> 01:55:21.720
as you sit here,

01:55:21.720 --> 01:55:26.720
it is stranger than you can suppose.

01:55:26.720 --> 01:55:30.720
And what makes me wild about this is

01:55:30.720 --> 01:55:32.720
we're not talking about something

01:55:32.720 --> 01:55:36.720
that you have to go 500 miles up a jungle river

01:55:36.720 --> 01:55:38.720
and live with primitive people

01:55:38.720 --> 01:55:41.720
and study techniques for 30 years.

01:55:41.720 --> 01:55:43.720
We're talking about something

01:55:43.720 --> 01:55:45.720
which if I had,

01:55:45.720 --> 01:55:49.720
a pipe loaded with it in my hand,

01:55:49.720 --> 01:55:54.720
each one of you would be 30 seconds away

01:55:54.720 --> 01:55:56.720
from what I'm talking about.

01:55:56.720 --> 01:55:59.720
Well, you know, you've tripped

01:55:59.720 --> 01:56:01.720
and yeah, you lived in Paris

01:56:01.720 --> 01:56:04.720
and you went to Trebizond and all these things,

01:56:04.720 --> 01:56:08.720
but nothing like this ever descended.

01:56:08.720 --> 01:56:10.720
It's not...

01:56:10.720 --> 01:56:12.720
It's so near.

01:56:12.720 --> 01:56:17.720
It's not attained by practicing tantric techniques

01:56:17.720 --> 01:56:19.720
or building up...

01:56:19.720 --> 01:56:21.720
It's none of that.

01:56:21.720 --> 01:56:23.720
It's just near, very near.

01:56:23.720 --> 01:56:28.720
One toke away is this absolutely reality-dissolving,

01:56:28.720 --> 01:56:34.720
category-reconstructing, mind-boggling possibility.

01:56:34.720 --> 01:56:39.720
And I feel like this is a truth that has to be told.

01:56:39.720 --> 01:56:41.720
I'm like the campesino

01:56:41.720 --> 01:56:43.720
running out of the swamp

01:56:43.720 --> 01:56:45.720
and saying, you know, over here,

01:56:45.720 --> 01:56:48.720
you know, the orange thing.

01:56:48.720 --> 01:56:51.720
Oh, do that.

01:56:51.720 --> 01:56:53.720
All right, that's enough about DMT.

01:56:53.720 --> 01:56:55.720
You've got to take hold here.

01:56:55.720 --> 01:56:57.720
Thank you very, very much.