consciousness

Philip K Dick said in his paper "How to Build a Universe That Doesn't Fall Apart Two Days Later" that "two certain matters absolutely fascinate me, and that I write about them all the time. The two basic topics that fascinate me are "What is reality?" and "What constitutes the authentic human being?" Over the twenty-seven years in which I have published novels and stories I have investigated those two interrelated topics over and over again. I consider them important topics. What are we? What is it that surrounds us, that we call the not-me, or the empirical or phenomenal world?"

great questions and ones which I'm sure many people have wondered.

collating a few of Terence McKenna's books, writings, audio recordings of speeches and videos

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comments for Reality Sandwich article The Wounded Male Geek: My Vision of Terence McKenna

books : The Archaic Revival, which is a collection of essays and spoken word & also Food of the Gods

http://video.google.com/videosearch?q=eros+and+the+eschaton&emb=0&aq=f#

podcasts that are available for download - start with the lectures titled "Light of the New Millenium - Chicago/Austin"...both are quite different and cover a good spectrum of his "take" on things.

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Terence McKenna - Eros and Eschaton

a quick look at my mumbai hotel room, plus one of the quirks of Indian hotels - I'm not really complaining about them, it's almost a 'game' to work out / discover what's missing each night (yes, small things amuse me - sometimes there's not a lot to do in hotel rooms on business trips :)

I stayed in india for almost a year in 2006 then lived in other countries and forgot some of the quirks, or rather differences here compared to home, so this video just mentions a couple so I can trigger my memory again - notes to self really. I know I shouldn't think these sorts of things are a big deal & i don't really, especially when I think about how some of the people are living outside, and here I am talking about missing towels... & most of these things are very stereotypical. if I was reading them on someone else's blog I'd wonder what the big deal is. so perhaps in writing them down / videoing them it's like therapy for myself to enforce that things are just different - no better, or no worse in than home. I'm hoping they'll be a future reminder / wake up call for me to remember how lucky I am and what a priviledged life I lead and to try stop being so consumer centric when I get home and get comfy in home life again and these memories fade. the people here are really nice - some of the nicest I've ever met, and that's more important than these quirks in the end.

things like crossing the road and almost getting hit by cars every time - at least for the first couple of weeks till you get used to it then you don't notice any more and have no fear and walk in between cars & rickshaws & their traffic tetris driving skills - every day could be your last here! you get used to it and don't notice after a while, until you go away then come back. the pace is different, the value of life is different. things happen here that don't happen elsewhere.

today we had lunch at a hotel restaurant (they have better hygene standards so there's less chance of getting sick afterwards). I had a toasted cheese & tomato sandwich and some chips (thin french fries). they put tomato sauce in a little container on the table, so I spooned some onto my plate to dip. after we'd finished, I noticed they cleared the plates, but put the tomato sauce container into the cupboard where the menus are kept - I think they might reuse it for other people! this isn't probably the end of the world, but then I remembered I sacrificed my tomato sauce & mustard containers to a family of flies during lunch at the hotel pool on the weekend. there were too many flies around as I was outside and it was really hot. so I pushed the sauces over to the edge of the table and the flies went for them instead of my food (obviously I wasn't having the sauces). so I remembered this and thought "oh no, I hope they don't reuse the sauces at the hotel I'm staying at or someone's (possibly me!) is going to be dipping in sauces that flies have been walking in & eating from" - & u never know where the flies have been before that as there's plenty of horrid things for them to crawl in by the side of the road!! I had sauce tonight, but I gave it a good checking over first. I'm sure it's not reused, but when you see things like that it brings out the worst thoughts in your mind!

it's just the little things in life.

back to the video - then I show the books found in the drawers here - the Gideon Holy Bible which is pretty standard in most hotels, except those I stayed in Jerusalem which had the Torah / Tanhk instead. and the Bhagavad-gita - which is the Hare Krishna book on krsna consciousness - this is the 'as it is' version ie non-interpreted Indian version, presented 'as is'. I like the pictures :) I've been reading this out loud and recording it tonight. it's strange reading out loud - I hardly ever hear my voice, only the voice in my head reading. my pronounciations are shocking! especially of the sanskrit words (or perhaps they're hindi? I'm not sure) I thought reading out loud might help with that.

and yes, I do understand and can see the irony in posting about quirks here and then reading the krsna consciousness writings & philosophy

VloMo08 : day18 - hotel quirks + (hare) krsna consciousness

18/11/2008

blog post :
http://www.aliak.com/content/vlomo08-day18-2-hotel-quirks-hare-krsna-con...

http://blip.tv/file/1481873

I just saw the email for the upcoming Maybe Logic Academy courses - there's another by Douglas Rushkoff called Corporatized - An Alternative To Corporatism & Beyond coming up in January 2009 - scheduled for 6 weeks from January 12 to February 22. his last class "Technologies of Persuasion - From Propaganda to Paranoia" was great - the class was very popular and had a lot of people in it. the first few weeks moved really quickly, by the last few weeks it was running at a slower pace so I could try and catch up. I was doing the The Crazy Wisdom of Philip K. Dick class with Erik Davis at the same time, so I was running behind on the Rushkoff class as the PKD class was so interesting! Fingers crossed there might be another PKD class with Erik Davis too - I asked and they said Maybe! (excuse the pun :)

I think Rushkoff's new class will be really interesting, especially as in the Persuasion class he mentioned his thoughts on the global economy and how we should be using a different 'money' system & alternative currencies. He's written many books, and columns with newspapers such as New York Times & Guardian of London. He now also writes for Arthur Magazine, which I think in some ways has taken over from where Mondo 2000 and previously Reality Hackers magazines started. Arthur No. 29, May 2008 has one of his articles, Riding out the Credit Crisis which I think was very timely considering the state of economic affairs around the globe now with some regions stating they are in a recession. this month's Arthur # 31 - October 2008 has another article by Rushkoff called "No Money Down" (pages 26-27) which is worth a read too - the pdf's are available to download on their site (part A has this article). he also has a forum on his site where some of the discussions can take place & continue from previous (and I'm assuming future) MLA courses, boing boing posts, Arthur articles and his books.

from Riding out the Credit Crisis :
"Whatever the case, the best thing you can do to protect yourself and your interests is to make friends. The more we are willing to do for each other on our own terms and for compensation that doesn’t necessarily involve the until-recently-almighty dollar, the less vulnerable we are to the movements of markets that, quite frankly, have nothing to do with us."

...

"Think small. Buy local. Make friends. Print money. Grow food. Teach children. Learn nutrition. And if you do have money to invest, put it into whatever lets you and your friends do those things."

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