Left unstated is just what symbol should be chosen for the logocracy. The rigid hierarchy and scale-free sameness of the Sierpinski gasket certainly seems appropriate for pathocracy, which is incapable of producing anything new - to the contrary, its pitiless order is a form of death, or at any rate anti-life.
I'd suggest the Mandelbrot set to be the appropriate symbol of logocracy. It never repeats itself: no matter how deep into it one goes, one will never find precisely the same pattern. This seems more in keeping with the infinite possibilities of a logocracy, which does not seek to impose, but rather to facilitate an unfolding. Further, it is generated not by iteration of a simple pattern that repeats at all scales, but by a function that either converges to a finite quantity or diverges to infinity: inside the boundaries of the set the function is trapped, outside it is free, and within the set it is indeterminate. That seems to mirror the gnostic tension between matter and spirit, with humanity and the world at the interface of the two.
Aug 29, 2022·edited Aug 29, 2022Liked by Harrison Koehli
What a long strange trip that was! You went from Plato to the Cathars, did a quick spin on the Sierpinski Triangle and ended up in Joe Biden's America. That being said, my favorite part was the link to "Somethin' ain't right". I bow to your analysis and computer skills. That essay had more turns than the Nurburgring.
I'm glad you found that easter egg. LOL. And that you enjoyed the ride. I didn't originally intend to go to so many crazy places--just kind of happened. ;)
Satan was a fallen angel. That satisfies any theological debate about God being conflated with him. And as for his minions, he successfully seduced a third of God’s angels to join him when he threw his temper tantrum that being God’s favorite was not enough—he wanted to be God himself. He and his minions have been wreaking havoc ever since. The end (but not really, thank God).
And the broad strokes of that were essentially what the Cathars thought, before they exchanged moderate dualism for absolute dualism. The still thought Yahweh was evil though.
Augustine is worth mentioning as another ponerological? rat who tried to square the circle on the question of metaphysical evil and proclaimed Yahweh the one and only god and a good one to boot.
Though I am sure this is well thought out and well-informed, it was a little thick for me.
I don't have the knowledge (and the burden?) of a careful study of the ancients in philosophy or theology or the classicists in psychology. But I have been informed by the discovery of the reality of past life experience (which can be expressed with several different terms). Though I am still wading through a body of work on this subject that I have decided to study, there are certain benefits to understanding people from this point of view that are already obvious.
First, you get a much larger space in which to watch human personality develop. The materials I am studying measure that space at anywhere from 76 to 200 trillion earth years big. But even a billion years would be a huge game changer compared to trying to figure out how all the amazing variations in human personality developed on one planet during the time that "we" have lived here.
Second, you get an explosion in social experience and lives lived in other societies using other technologies. This gives us a certain cyclic aspect to what we see happening on Earth now. In other words, similar things have happened to us before, in other places and times. Further, you get a new appreciation for the difficulties that thinkers on this planet had in attempting to understand themselves, their fellows, and life on this planet.
Beyond all that, what research along this line indicates could only be described as unbelievable when we compare it to even the worst Earth experiences, such as being attacked by one of those ancient torture devices. We have experienced psychic damage so extensive and overwhelming that it is amazing any of us still value individuality and a sense of freedom.
The message I bring to those studying human history and trying to make sense of what is going on now is that if you are looking in the direction of PP and similar works that find the spiritually broken (psychopaths) as the prime movers in the drive towards societal suicide, you are looking in the right direction. The mystery of how the psychopathic personality developed and was nourished in certain situations resides in the depths of time. A recognition that the personality has survived for billions of years gives us that depth. Some of us did OK, most of us not so good, and a few more came through totally broken.
But it follows, doesn't it? that if people reincarnate then there might be a way to find out about their past experiences. Hubbard used his Dianetics techniques with a new electronic meter; many others used hypnotic regression, and some use remote viewing which can't (yet) date events.
I'm just reporting some of the results I have read about.
I know I risk blanket rejection of these ideas, but I am aware that more thoughtful people have now heard about the reincarnation research and the other work being done by Tucker's group. And I'd like them to be aware of what else lies outside the perimeter that we have been allowed to study. I personally am so glad I learned about this when I was young. I don't know what I would have done if I were an academic, but I lead a very interesting life because of this data, which it seems to me is the least you can ask of a lifetime.
I hear you. I consider such things too. But when it comes to such things as the "Akashic records" (a la Cayce), or regressed past lives, or the whole range of crazy stuff accessible in the "imaginal" realms of the sub/supraconscious, David Ray Griffin had a point. He said something like this: If the Akashic records record everything, presumably that includes all humanity's imaginings, and all unrealized possibilities, all potential pasts. If so, how would we be able to distinguish an actual event, recalled with accuracy, from a possible event which didn't in fact occur? Or occurred in another dimension?
My personal take on the whole New Age movement is that it is mainly there to confuse people who are interested in off-limits subjects. The concept of the Akashic Records became a part of theosophy ideas around the turn of the last century. Brown believes his remote viewers access something like this. But Hubbard addresses personal memory only, as did most of the hypnotists (Dolores Cannon standing out among them, though in the end she became a sort of guru). Both these approaches depend to a large extent on the emotional reactions (and in Hubbard's case, also meter reaction) of the person being studied to separate "real" past events from delusion.
Of course, any activity, including even the legal system and some forms of scientific investigation, that relies on human memory has the weakness that any given memory could be incorrect. But, if you consult enough people and use the techniques honestly and well, you should be able to build up a pattern of similar memories among many individuals that could be interpreted as some ancient system or activity that was experienced by many people.
Therapists will also point to the success of their work in giving their patients some measure of emotional release (or freedom). In the humanities, how insistent can we be that our data be perfect and obvious? Often times, the best we can hope for is that if our data are correctly applied, some desired result is often achieved. This has been achieved to a certain extent in the fields of propaganda and marketing. Why not in human activities of a more positive intent?
Totally agree. Lobaczewski has a little section on what he calls "drug- and disease-induced characteropathy." He limits it to discussion of a few drugs and brain-damaging infections, but the range is a lot greater than that, and has only gotten worse over the past 30 years. I've seen so many people's minds clear up after just changing their diet (e.g. maybe eliminating grains and dairy, most carbs).
In my more cosmic conspiratorial moments of paranoia I see the operation of the other god. Could be a coincidence that modern drugs and diet recommendations seem designed to destroy our bodies and minds. But either way, getting physically healthy is at the top of the list.
Left unstated is just what symbol should be chosen for the logocracy. The rigid hierarchy and scale-free sameness of the Sierpinski gasket certainly seems appropriate for pathocracy, which is incapable of producing anything new - to the contrary, its pitiless order is a form of death, or at any rate anti-life.
I'd suggest the Mandelbrot set to be the appropriate symbol of logocracy. It never repeats itself: no matter how deep into it one goes, one will never find precisely the same pattern. This seems more in keeping with the infinite possibilities of a logocracy, which does not seek to impose, but rather to facilitate an unfolding. Further, it is generated not by iteration of a simple pattern that repeats at all scales, but by a function that either converges to a finite quantity or diverges to infinity: inside the boundaries of the set the function is trapped, outside it is free, and within the set it is indeterminate. That seems to mirror the gnostic tension between matter and spirit, with humanity and the world at the interface of the two.
The Council has deliberated, and the Mandelbrot set has been set into doctrine as the official symbol of logocracy. Ever it was and ever shall it be.
What a long strange trip that was! You went from Plato to the Cathars, did a quick spin on the Sierpinski Triangle and ended up in Joe Biden's America. That being said, my favorite part was the link to "Somethin' ain't right". I bow to your analysis and computer skills. That essay had more turns than the Nurburgring.
I'm glad you found that easter egg. LOL. And that you enjoyed the ride. I didn't originally intend to go to so many crazy places--just kind of happened. ;)
Satan was a fallen angel. That satisfies any theological debate about God being conflated with him. And as for his minions, he successfully seduced a third of God’s angels to join him when he threw his temper tantrum that being God’s favorite was not enough—he wanted to be God himself. He and his minions have been wreaking havoc ever since. The end (but not really, thank God).
And the broad strokes of that were essentially what the Cathars thought, before they exchanged moderate dualism for absolute dualism. The still thought Yahweh was evil though.
Fascinating.
Augustine is worth mentioning as another ponerological? rat who tried to square the circle on the question of metaphysical evil and proclaimed Yahweh the one and only god and a good one to boot.
Could be. I don't know enough about Augustine to say for sure.
I wish I could like this several times because you mentioned Marcion.
What a terrific read (and education, I had to look up some words.. "chiliasic"...). The denouement for me brings to mind two concepts:
Moloch https://slatestarcodex.com/2014/07/30/meditations-on-moloch/
and
Egregors https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Egregore
Though I am sure this is well thought out and well-informed, it was a little thick for me.
I don't have the knowledge (and the burden?) of a careful study of the ancients in philosophy or theology or the classicists in psychology. But I have been informed by the discovery of the reality of past life experience (which can be expressed with several different terms). Though I am still wading through a body of work on this subject that I have decided to study, there are certain benefits to understanding people from this point of view that are already obvious.
First, you get a much larger space in which to watch human personality develop. The materials I am studying measure that space at anywhere from 76 to 200 trillion earth years big. But even a billion years would be a huge game changer compared to trying to figure out how all the amazing variations in human personality developed on one planet during the time that "we" have lived here.
Second, you get an explosion in social experience and lives lived in other societies using other technologies. This gives us a certain cyclic aspect to what we see happening on Earth now. In other words, similar things have happened to us before, in other places and times. Further, you get a new appreciation for the difficulties that thinkers on this planet had in attempting to understand themselves, their fellows, and life on this planet.
Beyond all that, what research along this line indicates could only be described as unbelievable when we compare it to even the worst Earth experiences, such as being attacked by one of those ancient torture devices. We have experienced psychic damage so extensive and overwhelming that it is amazing any of us still value individuality and a sense of freedom.
The message I bring to those studying human history and trying to make sense of what is going on now is that if you are looking in the direction of PP and similar works that find the spiritually broken (psychopaths) as the prime movers in the drive towards societal suicide, you are looking in the right direction. The mystery of how the psychopathic personality developed and was nourished in certain situations resides in the depths of time. A recognition that the personality has survived for billions of years gives us that depth. Some of us did OK, most of us not so good, and a few more came through totally broken.
Not sure about the trillions of years thing, but on reincarnation, for sure. Ian Stevenson and Jim B. Tucker's work pretty much convinced me of that.
I know; it sounds ridiculous.
But it follows, doesn't it? that if people reincarnate then there might be a way to find out about their past experiences. Hubbard used his Dianetics techniques with a new electronic meter; many others used hypnotic regression, and some use remote viewing which can't (yet) date events.
I'm just reporting some of the results I have read about.
I know I risk blanket rejection of these ideas, but I am aware that more thoughtful people have now heard about the reincarnation research and the other work being done by Tucker's group. And I'd like them to be aware of what else lies outside the perimeter that we have been allowed to study. I personally am so glad I learned about this when I was young. I don't know what I would have done if I were an academic, but I lead a very interesting life because of this data, which it seems to me is the least you can ask of a lifetime.
I hear you. I consider such things too. But when it comes to such things as the "Akashic records" (a la Cayce), or regressed past lives, or the whole range of crazy stuff accessible in the "imaginal" realms of the sub/supraconscious, David Ray Griffin had a point. He said something like this: If the Akashic records record everything, presumably that includes all humanity's imaginings, and all unrealized possibilities, all potential pasts. If so, how would we be able to distinguish an actual event, recalled with accuracy, from a possible event which didn't in fact occur? Or occurred in another dimension?
My personal take on the whole New Age movement is that it is mainly there to confuse people who are interested in off-limits subjects. The concept of the Akashic Records became a part of theosophy ideas around the turn of the last century. Brown believes his remote viewers access something like this. But Hubbard addresses personal memory only, as did most of the hypnotists (Dolores Cannon standing out among them, though in the end she became a sort of guru). Both these approaches depend to a large extent on the emotional reactions (and in Hubbard's case, also meter reaction) of the person being studied to separate "real" past events from delusion.
Of course, any activity, including even the legal system and some forms of scientific investigation, that relies on human memory has the weakness that any given memory could be incorrect. But, if you consult enough people and use the techniques honestly and well, you should be able to build up a pattern of similar memories among many individuals that could be interpreted as some ancient system or activity that was experienced by many people.
Therapists will also point to the success of their work in giving their patients some measure of emotional release (or freedom). In the humanities, how insistent can we be that our data be perfect and obvious? Often times, the best we can hope for is that if our data are correctly applied, some desired result is often achieved. This has been achieved to a certain extent in the fields of propaganda and marketing. Why not in human activities of a more positive intent?
Superbly traced out and described. Kudos...
I will stop reading this blog if you describe blood-curdling images again.
Thanks for letting me know.
Totally agree. Lobaczewski has a little section on what he calls "drug- and disease-induced characteropathy." He limits it to discussion of a few drugs and brain-damaging infections, but the range is a lot greater than that, and has only gotten worse over the past 30 years. I've seen so many people's minds clear up after just changing their diet (e.g. maybe eliminating grains and dairy, most carbs).
In my more cosmic conspiratorial moments of paranoia I see the operation of the other god. Could be a coincidence that modern drugs and diet recommendations seem designed to destroy our bodies and minds. But either way, getting physically healthy is at the top of the list.