Here’s good intro lecture to Terence’s work. Here he talks about our prehistorical psychedelic connection
Part 1 (59 min)
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-6088867521723616224&q=terence+mckenna&total=488&start=0&num=10&so=0&type=search&plindex=1
Part 2 (43 min)
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-3721378281014589551&q=terence+mckenna&total=488&start=0&num=10&so=0&type=search&plindex=7
Some post-historical future possibilities
Culture is not your friend…and how to be incomprehensible to the machines
http://youtube.com/watch?v=eOy3H4yyocQ (3 mins)
(Afterculture anyone? http://art.afterculture.org/)
Breaking down our current culture to replace it with something better, something smarter.
http://youtube.com/watch?v=9c8an2XZ3MU (8 mins)
Entheogens (natural plant psychedelics) will help humans get back in touch with their animal souls and the Earth’s spirit
I don’t think he’s altogether right right about the future, but certainly, the archaic revival is here!
well, he’s certainly not perfect…not everyone can be like Bear Grylls all the time you know
Cheers to that! ;D
passes mushroom
how do you introduce the ideas to wider audiences? what inroads do you make? what ideas do you find challenging to grasp/share?
Well, you can begin by having somewhat of an understanding of what attracted Terence to these subjects. He was a college student during the height of the 60’s. I remember in Ishmael, the idea being that the people in the 60’s rebelled against the system; but they didn’t have a practical plan to enact. Terence is basically taking that 60’s rebellion into something more practical; which is why he advocated anarcho-primitivist ideals.
The drugs come into it because so many tribal societies use psychoactive plants for ceremonial, initiatory, and medicinal purposes…but I’m sure many people here are aware of this. And taking the premise that, shamanism is one the main cornerstones for many tribal societies, then it would be these shamanic tools to help break people out of the civilization-trance.
This is basically what happened in the 60’s…but in a negative way. People where taking a lot of synthetic drugs, didn’t respect the drugs, and didn’t have a plan to enact; which lead to the downfall the 60’s rebellion. But if natural plant based psychoactives, treated with shamanic respect and proper procedures, it would be a very helpful means of rebellion; the analogy would be like (for a civilized person) what the red-pill did for Neo in the movie the Matrix. Taking natural entheogens in nature is a truly beautiful and enlightening experience. It can help integrate our psyches with nature in ways we may have never thought possible.
Now as far as bringing it to a wider audience, it’s one of the difficult subjects I’m sure people here are already familiar with. We can’t save everyone on this planet to change their modern lifestyles into a neo-tribal one. The taker culture is way too ingrained in their minds; so it’s up to the few of us with the knowledge to save the friends and loved-ones we come in connect with…and natural psychoactive plants are tools from Gaia, that may help dissolve the taker culture and further our cause.
The Red and Blue pill do have deeply symbolic values.
The blue pill is the warmer pill, the pill of tighter and more rapid wavelengths.
The red pill is the cool pill, the pill of widening and less rapid wavelengths.
The red pill entheogenically would be represented by the Amanita Muscaria family, that unbiquitous teacher.
The blue pill entheogenically would be represented by the psilocybin family, another world-wide fungi.
Today, Santa Claus and his bag of polk-dot presents represents the northern, cooler, state of mind, reminiscent of travelling siberian shamans dressed as they are bringing much more powerfully potent substances to people of the south.
Today, the Alien is the figure of the Blue nation, represented by the equitorial forces and the warming of the earth and it’s people.
these are two forces, two choices of mankind, two opportunities of both shame and human development. The inuit are a people of the extreme cool who harvest energy wisely and do not discriminate. The european is also a cool people who continue to make poor energy choices.
the polar and the equatorial are two forces of nature, and two paths of man. think of the pantheon of the equatorial peoples, and why the one true god seems to live in a desert…
hmm, reminds me of how Sun is feminine in Norse myth (well, until the introduction of Baldr), but masculine in equatorial pantheons…
“This is basically what happened in the 60’s…but in a negative way. People where taking a lot of synthetic drugs, didn’t respect the drugs, and didn’t have a plan to enact; which lead to the downfall the 60’s rebellion. But if natural plant based psychoactives, treated with shamanic respect and proper procedures, it would be a very helpful means of rebellion; the analogy would be like (for a civilized person) what the red-pill did for Neo in the movie the Matrix. Taking natural entheogens in nature is a truly beautiful and enlightening experience. It can help integrate our psyches with nature in ways we may have never thought possible.”
Neosapian, I think your take on the “60’s rebellion” is partly correct but one thing I would like to say is that this kind of rebellion is a personal thing that happens within individuals. Your not talking about politics here. Political ideologies come and go and are easily manipulated and basically are located in the head where they are subject to being twisted and perverted.
I think the kind of rebellion we are talking about happens in every cell of our body and is not such a cereberal thing. That only happens when a person is ready and no amount of reading, studying, thinking or wanting it will bring about the transformation, because it’s a matter of spirit. (Sorry, putting this into words is difficult and I hope the words don’t carry too much baggage). Those things are like the “pills” that you talk about. They only lead us to a place, or open a door. That is not the experience though or the transformation.