Sweeny vs Bard: Shamanism in The Digital Age

[Alexander Bard]

Dear Friends

Feel most welcome to enjoy and share the first of three zoom chats between Andrew Sweeny and Alexander Bard. This first episode titled "Shamanism in The Digital Age".

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qhcsfdwz8kU&t=3s

Big love

Alexander

[Iwona Rejmus]

I'd love to!

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Iwona Helena Rejmus

I-Technology. Sociology. Interactive Arts & Events. People.

email: iwon...@gmail.com

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My quote of the week:

"(S)He attacked everything in life with a mix of extraordinary genius and naive incompetence, and it was often difficult to tell which was which." - Douglas Adams

[Alexander Beiner]

Excellent - looking forward to it!

On Mon, Feb 25, 2019 at 4:40 PM Iwona Rejmus <iwon...@gmail.com> wrote:

I'd love to!

On Monday, February 25, 2019, Alexander Bard <bardi...@gmail.com> wrote:

Dear Friends

Feel most welcome to enjoy and share the first of three zoom chats between Andrew Sweeny and Alexander Bard. This first episode titled "Shamanism in The Digital Age".

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qhcsfdwz8kU&t=3s

Big love

Alexander

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To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to syntheism+...@googlegroups.com.

To post to this group, send email to synt...@googlegroups.com.
Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/syntheism.

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Iwona Helena Rejmus

I-Technology. Sociology. Interactive Arts & Events. People.

email: iwon...@gmail.com

Blog

Facebook

LinkedIn

My quote of the week:

"(S)He attacked everything in life with a mix of extraordinary genius and naive incompetence, and it was often difficult to tell which was which." - Douglas Adams

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[Kenneth Morningstar99]

Watching this now on my lunch break.  This seems kinda similar to Terence Mckenna's the Archaic Revival (My favorite work of Terence).  Some people have told me you reject anything esoteric.  I would respond saying it is an unfair criticism of you not understanding where you were coming from.  The way I interpreted you was not that you were anti-esoteric, but that esoterism must wield something tangible for it to be relevant and not superstitious.  Like the great Rosicrucian Alchemist Giordano Bruno who's vision formed a hypothesis about the macrocosm and microcosm which still holds water today and is now scientific law.

Kenneth

"Life... The opposite of life is not death, but non-existence.  To die means having lived, but to not exist means being... NOTHING!  To live means to influence the cosmos!  One's actions.  One's presence, changes every being he meets!  The cosmos is everything!  To affect any part of the cosmos is to affect the totality!  Life is the most precious gift the cosmos can bestow." --Steve Englehart; Marvel Premier Featuring: Dr. Strange #12

[Alexander Bard]

Exactly, dear Kenneth!

What we must understand is that there are two stories involved that must not be mistaken for one another.

One is the strategic story told to hunters, warriors, et cetera in the morning. That's essentially the factual truth story we call science today.

The other is the priestly story told to the entire tribe at night to get the tribe moving the next day. This is what we call mythology.

Then factuality is secondary as the truth of mythology is the effect. When the tribe moves in the correct direction, mythology has succeeded. Then and only then.

Then we also have the esoteric as in sacred knowledge, the knowledge that requires previous knowledge to be properly understood and which must therefore "be kept until due time in the library".

But that's what monasteries have always dealt with.

Big love

Alexander

[Kenneth Morningstar99]

I am curious,

I am a fan of Ken Kesey.  One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest is my second favorite novel.  Ken Kesey was a fan of comic books.  Before he became a great literary novelist, he wanted to become a comic book illustrator.  He saw the continuity of comic books as America's modern mythology.  In Tom Wolf's the electric koolaid acid test, Ken Kesey and the Marry Pranksters would look at Doctor Strange, Green Lantern, and Silver Surfer comics while tripping on LSD.

In a way you can look at Superman as an example of the icon of the American hero.  Superman is the allegory for America.  What makes him more American is that he is an immigrant.  I look at the mythos of Superman, and can compare him with many great American activists who brought our nation closer to equality.  Just in the sense that Superman started as a liberal icon as he was created during the depression, when unemployment was at its all time high.  He would fight crooked politicians and corrupt slum lords.  As his two creators were Jewish and born from immigrant parents.  The story of Superman being rocketed to earth from Krypton was allegory of a Jewish immigrant who thrived in the country he settled in. 

However like Superman, in real life America, people like to twist the foundation of American heroes such as Henry David Thoreau, Martin Luther King Jr, John F. Kennedy, ect to their own political ends.  Superman's foundation was that of a hero fighting corruption of the state and unethical business men, as well being the allegory of a Jewish immigrant.  Yet people want to make him out to be some conservative good boy scout and will even have people dressed at Superman at rallies which are of an American nationalist right wing nature.  You can compare this with Martin Luther King who was quite a radical.  Not just for his time, but this time as well.  He actively spoke against the system of unregulated capitalism in America.  He even identified as a democratic socialist.  He caused much disruption to the establishment and was assassinated because he moved beyond just the black issue, and began extending his activism to protesting the Vietnam war, as well as fighting for the rights of workers. (no matter what color they are)  Yet how is Martin Luther King remembered today?  Well since he proved to be on the right side of history as liberals always tend to be, he has been reduced to his I have a dream speech.  When Occupy Wall Street was happening one of the things conservatives were saying to discredit the movement was "Blocking roads is not something Martin Luther King would do."  However Martin Luther King *did*block roads, as well as buildings, and would refuse to leave and got arrested several times for that very thing.  You even had Glen Beck and other conservative commentators appropriating his name saying such asinine things like "MLK would support the war in Iraq." 

So my question is, could the mythos from the American comic book superhero be a useful mythology for modern people which can help move us further?

Much love,

Kenneth

[Alexander Bard]

Correct analysis but the answer is a resounding no.

America's state religion is Cartesian Individualism. It is so axiomatic to American culture that Americans themselves don't even realize what a blind faith it is to them and their identity.

However digital will kill The Individual and force the entire globe back to Tribal. It will hurt tremendously for Americans to let go of their cherished blind faith.

They will need tons of machine intelligence to finally learn how to trust each other. Machine intelligence killing America's crazy army of lawyers would be a really good start.

But American superheroes will not mean anything to the rest of the world. "Superman" is a kid's movie in China and Europe. Exactly as it should be.

While America needs to deal with its fundamental pathology - Peter Pan Syndrome.

Best intentions

Alexander

[Kenneth Morningstar99]

While I do agree that American superheroes will not mean anything to the rest of the world in the time to come.  I will have to disagree that it is part of America's Peter Pan syndrome.  Many of the stories today are not even within a child's comprehension.  I do remember in the video your criticism of adults who like harry potter.  I think magic belongs in fiction anyway.  It is a kids story, but mythology in general is usually in the context that a child could relate to anyway.  I personally find Harry Potter too childish for my liking. 

.

But on to something more interesting about what you were saying.  About digital killing the individual and forcing the entire globe back to being tribal.  It is unfortunate that the United States has been sold the bill of goods.  This non-existent individualism which is ingrained in the American psyche  Terence Mckenna talked extensively on this, and it could be said to be the basis of his philosophy.  There are many things that the Native Americans got right.  At times their medicine works better.  They have better treatments for what the west calls mental illness.  Among most (not all) Indigenous tribes in America equality between men and women was just a no brainer.  A jacket made by intuits will last longer and get you through the cold better than a modern jacket made on an assembly line.  In this case right here, you see that not everything which we see as modern is better than ways of the old.  Terence Mckenna said in the Archaic revival that he did not believe in primitive, but more wanted to take the best parts of the past, and bring it today.  Could this elimination of the individual and shift to something tribal, though catastrophic to the American psyche, be something which could be more positive in the long term? 

I would like to share some videos I put on my youtube channel.  Criticisms are most welcome.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UF2XxmIkOOk&t=99shttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DWYf4zkvOws

Kenneth

[Alexander Bard]

Dear Kenneth

It's not so much a question of taking the best of the past and the best of today and then mix it.

It's a question of going deeper into the human soul and find out how it really works. It may have plastic qualities but the real lie is to think that the human soul is a blank slate.

Which is why both you and I converted to Zoroastrianism, the phallic reversal of Buddhism.

If we really were a blank slate, there would only be an Ahura and no Mazda. But the Mazda is what we truly worship.

Best intentions

Alexander