k-punk

Yes! This is spot on. Very good pic too (who?). You're right, Mark, it's not you writing, it's reason itself...cool...but, still, your output can't help but make me feel bad when all I'm supposed to be doing is producing...but this is low-level reaction! Must mutate into inspiration...yeah! Will post review soon!

Very nice Mark. I shall have to investigate this abstract ecstasy program. Perhaps next time we go out I shall go armed with a copy of Spinoza.

Heh, sneaking off to the toilets to do a line of Ethics...

So, I'm interested in how you know when you're channeling uttunul. Other than the quality of the writing, I mean, which I assume is a retrospective judgement. Does it feel different? A matter of "the juices flowing"? Are there things you do to tune in the signal? Mental exercises? Is this similar to the way a musician, like, say, R. Kelly talks about how the melodies just flow through him constantly? And why do you think this writing comes from an external source, as opposed to say left brain/unconscious?

> The Gnostics got there too, sorcerers, Burroughs, Castenada...
I was about to say :-). You're describing a meditational state, I think. See the third ed of Altered States of Consciousness, easy to dip into, should be in your library.

> And why do you think this writing comes from an external source, as opposed to say left brain/unconscious?
This is a false opposition glueboot :-).

See also:
"Everything must have a natural cause."
"Everything must have a supernatural cause."
Let these two asses be set to grind corn.

I'm asking a sincere question here. I can think of various reasons why that might be a false opposition. If you'd explain yours, that would be so much more enlightening.

You mean you don't find quotations from Liber CCCXXXIII enlightening! The point is that the description of channelling from the outside is only a way of representing the process in question, and it is the results which are interesting. More Crowley:

'Although we can invoke him [Nakhiel], we do not necessarily mean that he exists in the same sense of the word in which our butcher exists. When we 'conjure Nakhiel to visible appearance', it may be that our process resembles creation - or, rather imagination - more nearly than it does calling forth'.

Great post. Something I came to realize long before I stopped using psychedelics regularly cause they were still so much fun.

Reason is the way forward. It does help to surround yourself with an environment that is conducive to reason as well though.

Cheers John. It's a top quote.

More simplistically, we don't know whether what we encounter (whether through philosophy, meditation, or "magic") is "real" or not. Maybe it's all in our heads, maybe not. The point, from the occultists point of view, is that to quote Crowley again "From certain actions certain results follow". And those results can be pretty fucking excellent experientially and philosophically and lots of other ways.

But too many philosophy-type people just say "nah, it's magic, that's all cobblers" and for not-particularly-convincing-to-me reasons, won't try it.

Fair enough, but it's their loss :-).

What's your take, That's All Very Well?

BTW you might find further elucidation of the position in Crowley's Eight Lectures on Yoga, which you can get as a PDF at http://home.comcast.net/~qblh/Crowley/8_lectures_on_Yoga.pdf

A fave text...

My take, I suppose, is that I believe that certain effects that people call magical can and do occur. Although I myself have never personally experienced these effects, there are too many accounts throughout history for me to discount them entirely (otherwise known as the "no smoke without fire" theory). I also think, however, that the origin of these effects can be tested to some degree (and has been, to various degrees of rigorousness and conclusiveness), and in the absence of testing can certainly be speculated upon. So ultimately I find it hard to resist attempting to draw a distinction between those effects that may be "real" magic and those that are mere sleight-of-hand (even while recognizing that the deployment of the latter may be essential to create the atmosphere conducive to the appearance of the former). Which leads me to the conclusion that real magic, while possibly latent in all individuals, is not something that everyone can do, that one does have to have a certain talent for it. However, I also think most, if not all, magic is in the end rather trivial and not an end in itself. Which is why I've never had more than a passing interest in it-along with being an inherently sceptical individual, which doubtless limits my capacity to experience magic in the first place. (Just as I rather sadly believe that, while the limitations of drugs are just as k-punk enumerates them in this post, I-and most other people-will never experience such ecstasy unassisted.)

As far as magicians go, I find Gurdjieff far more compelling than Crowley and have even less time for Castaneda.

PS Picked up a copy of Deleuze's "Spinoza: Practical Philosophy" today. It is compellingly slim, so perhaps I will even read it soon.

Just as I rather sadly believe that, while the limitations of drugs are just as k-punk enumerates them in this post, I-and most other people-will never experience such ecstasy unassisted

I have a great deal of time for all sorts of drugs. I think that it is highly instructive to chemically reduce yourself to a gibbering wreck; although, obviously, it is not without its perils. That said, I take very few these days as there are some drugs I would not bother with again, and the stress that goes with procuring others tends to be not worth it. Also, if you take enough, they become boring.

Nowadays, my ability to attain various altered states of consciousness at will is pretty impressive. Perhaps this is down to brain damage, but I prefer to think that I have opened up, and learned to use new neurological pathways via the systematic (ab)use of various chemicals. Perhaps the two are the same?

This is one of the reasons why I'm not certain that cold reason is sufficient, but I'll wait for 'Psychedelic Fascism' before I dive in...

Paul meme: Agree about the magic. "Does it work?" is a far more important question than "Is it real?"

Mark: Had a conversation with some else about this years ago - equating that moment when you're on fire writing-wise with some kind of possession - "It wasn't me, guv". As we'd both had evangelical christian upbringings, this had a lot of resonance. Reminds me, haven't felt like that in a long time.

I always find it depressing when reading the Wire when the references to Magick begins. Changing the spelling just can't stop the David Nixon associations coming through. Its also depressing to see intelligent people referring to Casanada and Crowley with any respect.

"Although I myself have never personally experienced these effects, there are too many accounts throughout history for me to discount them entirely (otherwise known as the "no smoke without fire" theory)."

For fucks sake.

The fascination with magick always smacks of a middle class revolt. If you want to take loads of drugs or churn out your artistic writing feel free butdon't pretend it is of any great significance or has links to arcane and secret knowledge.

Who said anything about arcane and secret knowledge?

Yo Jim, if you bothered to read what I wrote before posting, you wouldn't make such an ass of yourself.

And k-punk gets the ILM seal of approval!

http://ilx.p3r.net/thread.php?msgid=4894353

Why would anyone want to destroy thought, or the ego, or the 'I'? It just seems stupid to me that we'd have this function that all these weirdo's like burroughs and the buddha etc seem to think is somehow 'bad'. And anyway, if you did try to get rid of the 'I' what would it be that you'd use to get rid of it? Well, the 'I' of course! Can't be done!

ego loss is the name people use to describe a specific experience. it may be a misleading term. I think the reason people chase it is cos it feels good.

...ah they're just lightweights..

While we're in the area, any ideas on the source for this:

French philosopher Michel Foucault once outraged some of his anti-essentialist admirers
when he spoke of "being bathed in the forgotten sparkle of primitive light," citing an "occult
essence" which appears as a "kind of glimmering" at the limits of experience
(from http://fcos.us/fashioning.html)

Googling turns up:

If the gnomic self of the Greek philosophers, of which I spoke yesterday evening, had to be
built as an identification between the force of the truth and the form of the will, we could say
that there is a gnostic self. This is the gnostic self that we can find described in Thomas
Evangilium or the Manichean texts. This gnostic self has to be discovered inside the individual,
but as a part, as a forgotten sparkle of the primitive light
(from http://www.cts.cuni.cz/~konopas/liter/Foucault_Hermeneutics%20of%20the%20Self.htm)

Comments:-
- I was shocked to learn that satanists are often dreary egomaniacs
- Ok, I lied; yes, I know, "Night of the Living Boyrock Theory Canon"
- Hmmm... the phrase "forgotten sparkle" has some potential. A half of bitter shandy to anyone who gets it into the script of a Disney film or the title of a popular self-help book. (Suggestion: "The force of truth - 12 steps to reclaiming your forgotten sparkle")

Old Foucault had a tab of acid on the edge of the grand canyon or in the desert somewhere - this is where he found his joy - and then he proceeded to attempt to replicate this experience by going to gay dungeons for near death orgasms. It's all a bit eighties in my view.

Shit, I did a long and erudite reply to these comments and then my exchange went down. So its four days later and no-none cares.

Jim, your skepticism keeps all of us strong mate!

>Changing the spelling just can't stop the David
> Nixon associations

Who he? Yeah there's niggling on the scene about the "K".

> Its also depressing to see intelligent people
> referring to Casanada and Crowley with any
> respect.
Castaneda I can understand, but what specifically is your issue with Crowley? Without wishing to be patronising, this comment is usually cos of the usual misonceptions being trotted out.

> The fascination with magick always smacks of a
> middle class revolt.
Take it you never met a working class occultist?

Sean:
> Why would anyone want to destroy thought, or
> the ego, or the 'I'?
Destruction is not required :-). What one learns is the relativism of the self. I mean, which "I" are we talking about? Lotta same stuff as philosophy goes for AFAICT.

> It just seems stupid to me that we'd have this
> function that all these weirdo's like
> burroughs and the buddha etc seem to think is
> somehow 'bad'.
Weirdoes? LOL, good one! The buddha's point is that too much attachment to a particular sense of self leads to suffering. Errr, that's just common sense innit?

no, they're always saying thought is very, very bad. But it's not! It's bloody marvellous! It's just not the be all and end all of everything...