Sunday, December 30, 2007

Trippin' & Clueless in the Mosque & Media (12.30.10)

Probably no time to come up with a post, let alone sprinkle a bit of freakin' fairy dust on the bastard. But we'll try.

As we were saying yesterday, free will is not an either/or proposition, but a lengthy process of acquisition or realization that goes hand in hand and head in heart with what we call spiritual growth. It's like when liberals say "everyone's a racist." If they could just say "I and my fellow liberals are all racists," we'd agree with them wholeheadedly. Likewise, when someone says "free will doesn't exist," I want to say "in your case, I couldn't agree more."

Now, the question is, what is the main thing that interferes with freedom, and how do we eliminate the former and illuminate the ladder? I know what I think, but does anyone else in the world agree with me? I think I've found one. According to Bolton, the process of realizing freedom consists "in a progressive elimination, or at least subordination, of the alien causes which commonly manipulate the will, and a corresponding ascendency of what is owing to the will alone" (italics mytalics).

Alien causes which commonly manipulate the will. That sounds an awful lot like MIND PARASITES, those foreign agents and sinister minsters of propa' and impropaganda that we have internalized and mistake for ourSelves. You know, all of those agenda-driven hostile forces that hijack the machinery of the host or hostess -- that would be you -- and use it to crank out their own dysfunctional and anti-evolutionary thoughts, emotions and actions. You could say that the personification of the sum total of these parasites is what folks call Satan, and you wouldn't be wide of the mark.

Whatever the case may be, these "alien causes" block freedom and therefore spiritual growth. These are the machine-like parts of ourselves that are not really alive. Like viruses, they are something in between life and matter. If you could see one, you'd be horrified. It reminds me of a comment by Schuon, that "the lowest animal species, those that repel us, manifest most directly the quality of ignorance (tamas); they are repugnant to us because they are like 'living conscious matter' whereas the law of matter is precisely unconsciousness."

Other forms of matter, such as Al Sharpton, shock us for the opposite reason, for they are like a man deprived of what makes him one, which is to say, higher consciousness. Such disturbing individuals are like "decentralized" or "dissipated" consciousness. As Bertie Wooster said in another context, looking at the Reverend Al is like watching a snake egg about to hatch.

Back in the 1960s, when it was legal to study the effects of LSD, a lot of interesting psychological research was conducted on the subject of mind parasites. It was thought that by administering LSD to a patient in a controlled setting with adequate therapeutic support, you could bypass all of the ego's usual defense mechanisms and see the parasites directly, so to speak, and therefore process and work through them more rapidly.

I remember a book by Stanislav Grof -- here it is, Realms of the Human Unconscious: Observations from LSD Research -- in which he discusses how patients under the influence of LSD could actually draw pictures of their mind parasites in order to try to understand and work through them. I don't have time to dig out the book, but I remember one particular lady who drew a monstrous looking spider that had her in its grip. Of course, the mind parasite isn't actually a spider. Rather, that's just the mind's representation of the internalized hostile force which is otherwise invisible. Our minds are like "symbol making machines," so this is essentially identical to how our dreams use images to represent conflicts, impasses, and various hostile entities.

Carl Jung wrote of how the medieval pseudo-science of alchemy was actually a way to talk about mind parasites and their eradication. Bolton agrees that this process "can be envisaged in alchemical terms as a removal of the [parasitic] 'dross' which allows the [spiritual] 'gold' concealed in it to appear in pure form." What can be underemphasized, however, is that the "dross" is not a just an object, so to speak, but a subject with a will of its own -- or, to be perfectly accurate, something that can only operate in the world by taking over the human will.

When you think about it, this is not that different from how the Creator operates in the world, at least for the most part. That is, in the absence of human coupperation, it is as if God's will is "paralyzed" in the world. The traditional view is that human beings are the living bridge, or link, between God and nature, or spirit and matter, or freedom and determinism, however you want to conceptualize it. Therefore, when we say "thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven," we mean this quite literally, don't we? This is just another way -- perhaps overly saturated for some -- of saying that the purpose of life is to manifest truth, or love, or beauty on this plane.

It's no different looked at from the opposite direction. "Satan" is a paradoxical entity, being that he represents the "center of dissipation," so to speak, and spiritual dissipation by its very nature can have no center -- no, not even the Keith Olbermann show. The point is that both mind parasites and Satan can have no ultimate reality, since they represent the internalization or personification of the negations of the good, true, and beautiful. Rather, only the perverted human will can -- and does -- make them "real": thy will be done, on earth as it is in hell or in Keith Olbermann's head, so to speak.

Let's consider this fellow Allah, for example. I won't speak to the question of whether or not there is a non-parasitic Allah and what to do about it. That is for Muslims to discover for themselves. But clearly, the Allah of the popular collective mind of much of the Muslim world is nothing but a giant mind parasite. I mean, it's so obvious that it provides a particularly vivid object study of the reality of the processes we're discussing today. Instead of blogging or writing books about it, imagine if you could just drop LSD and draw a picture of it. Personally I'd like to see Victor Davis Hanson try this.

Look, when a voice in your head tells you to load up a baby with explosives and hand it to a lady who wants to bring liberal ideals to Pakistan, you can be pretty sure it's not God. That's called a "clue." When that same voice tells you to slash off your daughter's clitoris with a rusty hood ornament, I'd say that's a hint that you're not dealing with the Creator of the Universe. When the voice tells you to force women to live in bags or to cut your daughter's throat because she doesn't want to marry that malodorous 53 year old toothless letch with all the goats in his dowry -- nope, not the real God. I know, I know, that's a lot of goats, but God has more important things on his mind than selling your daughter to the highest bidder.

So what is this sadistic and suffocating entity? It sounds like a very bad acid trip, which, in a way it is, because there's no coming down. Hell, you can't even tell them they be trippin' or they'll just trip out more, like the witches and warlocks of Hizb'Allah, Hamas, and CAIR, who say "don't wake us from our nightmare, or you'll soon be in it, my pretty!" Whether it be angry jihadis in Khartoum or jihadis angry about a cartoon, they always trippin'.

Trippin' and clueless. That's what it is. And that is a very bad combination. In fact, you can look it up in just about any history book. Almost all the real evil in the world is caused by people who are trippin' and clueless, like Hitler or Stalin or bin Laden or the liberal media. As Bolton writes, in human beings, "freely-willed and unfree actions mingle in all proportions, because external causes can condition one's will in proportion to one's lack of self-awareness" (mytalics again).

You will immediately note that this is why the left is obsessed with so-called external barriers to freedom, when the real barriers -- at least in the contemporary U.S. -- are nearly always interior. Furthermore, when you eliminate these external barriers, it doesn't really do any good, because you aren't giving people real freedom, which they will still have to cultivate once the external barrier is removed. This is why racial quotas don't work. They eliminate the external barrier but ignore the interior ones, so failure is simply deferred. Liberals just kick the can't down the road. Daniel Patrick Moynihan is just about the last liberal who tried to discuss the interior barriers -- i.e., cultural mind parasites -- but he was lynched for it by the left. Trippin' and clueless, as always.

Well, that's all for today. We'll continue this line of thought tomorrow. Bob has baby-sitting responsibilities this morning, and I pretty much have to go where he does.

31 comments:

walt said...

"...by administering LSD to a patient ...you could bypass all of the ego's usual defense mechanisms and see the parasites directly..."

I have a family member who had asthma from the time he was a young child. All while growing up, he had "attacks," took pills for it, and genuinely suffered with it.

In his early 20s, he told me one day that he no longer had asthma. I asked how that had occurred. He said that he had "dropped acid, crawled up inside my head, looked around until I saw what was causing the asthma, and took it out."

He has never had asthma symptoms since.

(This is a report, not a suggestion, BTW!)

Gagdad Bob said...

Yes, Cary Grant said that it worked for him as well, and that he only achieved piece of mind after LSD. Let's face it, magic mushrooms (of which LSD is a synthetic version) couldn't have been unknown to our shamanic furbears.

walt said...

It's not that hard to get careless and eat some moldy bread ...

Not that I ever did, of course!

Gagdad Bob said...

peace of mind....

julie said...

"Bob has baby-sitting responsibilities this morning..." I suppose it's too cold and too early for pizza streaking this time; whatever will you do to keep him entertained? ;)

robinstarfish said...

At the risk of being blatantly obvious, that's how I...no, that's blatantly obvious. ;-)

Man In the Moon
painted porcelain
on earth as it is below
migrating blackbirds

Anonymous said...

LSD is actually known to be useful in stopping drug addiction.

Anonymous said...

There's one hallucinogen out there, I can't think of the name, but it's synthetic and extremely powerful and known by its chemical acronym, MCB or something like that. It's smoked and the high only lasts for thirty seconds or so but it's ultra intense. It's reportedly like being transported to a fictional but fully-detailed other world. In fact, the other world is so fully detailed and plausible seeming that some users aren't entirely convinced it's fictional.

The strangest thing about it is that during the trip, trippers have a very particular common experience, which is that they meet an entity who's come to be known in MCB circles as the Green Goddess. The hallucinatory setting is usually hi-tech -- the tripper experiences himself as being in a kind of computerized techno realm -- but the Green Goddess who inhabits the place is associated with vegetation. She's a forest fairy of some sort, like one of those art nouveau absynth fairies with the viney filligree and all that. They say she's benign and acts as a guide.

Weird huh? Strange that they would all meet this same green chick. I wonder if it's just that the legend of her has gotten established and tends to steer people's trips in that direction -- ie that they expect to see her and therefore their imagination creates her -- or if they really are encountering something. Either way, weird wild stuff.

Anonymous said...

that is weird, wild and wacky stuff.

Gecko said...

Brilliant post once again for which I offer thanks especially for starting the day listening to my husband's roar of laughter reading your take on allah.

NoMo said...

Great post, Bob.

Since I got nuthin', I'll just say how pleased I am to have started today digitizing some of my old vinyl to CDs. First up was John Mayall - The Turning Point. Second was Van Morrison - Avalon Sunset. Third, TBD...got a long way to go.

Now, back to kickin' the can up the street!

IrOnY RaGeD said...

Walmart Shopper,

I couldn't find any reference to a "green goddess", but it sounds like DMT.

"Dr. Rick Strassman, while conducting DMT research in the 1990s at the University of New Mexico, advanced the theory that a massive release of DMT from the pineal gland prior to death or near death was the cause of the near death experience (NDE) phenomenon. Several of his test subjects reported NDE-like audio or visual hallucinations. His explanation for this was the possible lack of panic involved in the clinical setting and possible dosage differences between those administered and those encountered in actual NDE cases.

Several subjects also reported contact with 'other beings', alien like, insectoid and reptilian in nature, in technological environments where the subjects were 'probed', 'tested' and sometimes even 'manipulated' by these 'beings' (see Abduction phenomenon)."

IrOnY RaGeD said...

Well that provoked some interesting reading. I'm almost tempted to try it, except for the fact I'm getting to damnned old!

IrOnY RaGeD said...

In case anyone is interested in some fascinating reading...

LOL

Anonymous said...

Found this piece on psychedelic healing linked at American Digest.

IrOnY RaGeD said...

Cool!, There's "Rick Strassman" again. Evidently still at the U of NM.

It IS fascinating reading...

The topic of LSD as a treatment for alcoholism is interesting. As I recall from my younger daze, booze doesn't have much effect while tripping. A couple of tabs and you could drink a case of beer and never feel the effects of it.

IrOnY RaGeD said...

Back to a more pertinent topic, Has anyone read either Yada Yahweh, or Prophet of Doom by Craig Wynn?

Anonymous said...

Yep, it was DMT. I didn't see the Green Goddess mentioned in any of the user experiences at your link. A couple do mention female "guides" though, which is in the same ballpark.

I found this as I was link hopping, written by Terrance McKenna about DMT. It is hilarious:

http://deoxy.org/timemind.htm

His word for the beings he encountered is Tykes.

IrOnY RaGeD said...

Good Link Walmart!

If you go to the homepage there is quite a bit more depth to the site as well.

Anonymous said...

Oh great, the trippin' & clueless have seen Gaia. No doubt it's in hope of pleasing her that Greenies et al do the whacky things they do. Pre-modern sacrifices by neopagans to appease a capricious entity. Oh Lord.

The Coonafesto talks about group mind parasites & they how they work. I've started digging for other sources that discuss this phenomena.

Has anybody read:
"Extraordinary popular delusions and the madness of crowds" by Mackay, Charles, 1814-1889. ?

First published in 1841, Extraordinary Popular Delusions studies the psychology of crowds and mass mania throughout history including accounts of classic scams, grand-scale madness, and deceptions.

Can anyone recommend other titles I should look for? Surely there are lots out there & any input from ya'll would be greatly appreciated. I want to fine-tune the parts that make up what I can see as a discernable pattern.

AT has a piece today that fits in with this whole 'free will vs mind parasites' entitled :
"Did Bhutto Martyr Herself?"

"Refusing protection is consistent with her imperious and risk-taking personality.
... by Muslim standards, her life obligation was to seek vengeance to restore the family honor. That may have been half conscious, but it is still embedded in the Pakistani culture of tribal vendetta.
Benazir Bhutto was a modern woman in her conscious thinking; in all other ways she was deeply attached to a premodern psychology in which the individual must die out of loyalty to family."

http://www.americanthinker.com/2007/12/
did_bhutto_martyr_herself.html

Anonymous said...

jwm here:
My first post in forever, and it 's on- oh, well...
As one who has hopped down these bunny trails many times, I would implore the curious to have nothing to do with DMT in any of its forms. From the nasty preparations of ayahuasca vine (which last for hours), to smoked extracts of the active chemical( which still last 20-30 minutes) the most common report of the experience is terror. Trippers often have to be restrained from injuring themselves in screaming fits, the experience is so intense, and so frightening. Check Erowid, and see for yourself.

and while you're there at Erowid, look at the salvia divinorum vault. Unlike anything else in the world. (this is the 5-10 minute experience) Very very strange. But it's the real deal. You will have no doubts about trans-dimensional reality, because you will live it firsthand. As an odd sideline- many people report the experience as being the best, most fun trip they've ever done, yet no one ever goes back for a second experience. odd.

JWM

Mizz E said...

"Alien causes which commonly manipulate the will. That sounds an awful lot like MIND PARASITES, those foreign agents and sinister minsters of propa' and impropaganda that we have internalized and mistake for ourSelves. You know, all of those agenda-driven hostile forces that hijack the machinery of the host or hostess -- that would be you -- and use it to crank out their own dysfunctional and anti-evolutionary thoughts, emotions and actions. You could say that the personification of the sum total of these parasites is what folks call Satan, and you wouldn't be wide of the mark."


Pazuzu: What an excellent day for an
exorcism.*

Father Damien Karras: You would like that?

Pazuzu: Intensely.

Father Damien Karras: But wouldn't that drive you out of Regan?

Pazuzu: It would bring us together.

Father Damien Karras: You and Regan?

Pazuzu: You and us.
__________________
*What an excellent idea!

Anonymous said...

>>Alien causes which commonly manipulate the will. That sounds an awful lot like MIND PARASITES<<

Gotta believe this was the original meaning of the term "sin" - anything that prevented the divine from manifesting through human consciousness.

Over the centuries, however, the term "sin" took on a more, shall we say, picturesque, shall we say again, *lurid* aura, one in which "sin" was relegated basically to physical, material activities, and not to the psychological, mind-parisitical origins of real sin. "Sin" became a matter of image. In fact - let us be honest - it became a rather attractive image. In other words, "sin" itself became a mind parasite. Here's hoping that new translations of the word can help in reestablishing it's actual meaning.

>>These are the machine-like parts of ourselves that are not really alive. Like viruses, they are something in between life and matter<<

It's said that concentrated, collective mind parasites really do achieve a half-life of sorts - pagan gods, in a way. Nazism, with its Nuremberg rallies, etc., almost seemed like a conscious attempt (on the part of some) to create such a ruling half-entity, one that would dictate to the collective, ensuring a constant state of passionate insanity.

I'm reminded of the Id Monster in the film Forbidden Planet.

Anonymous said...

rendition of a mind parasite



/\ /\
/ \---/ \
* *
^
^^^^^^

Anonymous said...

. . that didn't turn out too well . . . or maybe it did . .

Brian H said...

Hm, so Gagdad is Bob's mind parasite? This bears some thinking about ...

Anonymous said...

Try not to wear it out.

Van Harvey said...

Ximeze,
I haven't read Charles Mackay, but Eric Hoffer has a very good study of that with 'The True Believer: Thoughts on the nature of mass movements'

As a longshoremen in the 1950's, he was in a very good position to study it. Self educated, he made quite a splash in the 50's & 60's, writing several books but kept to his day job.

(Thomas Sowell gives him a big thumbs up too)

Van Harvey said...

Playing catch up again, another good.

"...free will is not an either/or proposition, but a lengthy process of acquisition or realization that goes hand in hand and head in heart with what we call spiritual growth... the question is, what is the main thing that interferes with freedom, and how do we eliminate the former and illuminate the ladder? I know what I think, but does anyone else in the world agree with me? "

Yep, Mind Parasites... Call the Orken Man!

Anonymous said...

Thanks Van.
If you & Sowell give it the thumbs-up, that's enough for me. Just reserved it from the library.

I'm currently reading 'Good calories, bad calories' by Gary Taubes. What an eyeopener! All Coons who care about their health should read this book - not just those who already have had heart-attacks or are diabetic. This guy speaks 'science geek' & has done his homework, tracing the items that make up 'conventional wisdom' back to their source & tells the truth. So far has explained all kinds of things that are empirically evident & cannot be accounted for by the prevailing models.

In addition to the nifty info, what really stands out for me is the 'mechanics' of the way these dis-information thingies get started & then build til they take on a life of their own.

Man-made climate change being another. Hey you morons, if you'd been listening in 7th grade science class instead of passing notes in the back of the room the whole year, you'd have known that this was bogus based on the way got the numbers to start with. Now everybody wants to argue the CO2 issue..... hey, morons: check out sun activity.

Was lead to Taubes by a Rush comment back in the fall & the article that was linked by Rush led via links to (I disremember) Schopenhauer, I think, who discussed the mechanics these memes.

Sound at all familiar to you?

Better get a more comfortable chair here, I've got some reconstruction to do. Oh, my eyes already hurt in anticipation.

Anonymous said...

Bingo!

Information Cascades and Rational Herding:
An Annotated Bibliography and Resource Reference

http://www.info-cascades.info/

vw: yippbg (if you can believe)

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