In Response to CoryTV re: This is an apocalypse. Please give me a few minutes of your time. I’m not selling you anything. I’m only asking for some of your quite literally valuable time.
Simply I’ve been given this writing prompt and I’m going to give it my best shot. Whatever comes out of my fingers typing away for the next 2 or 3 hours will be it. There is of course no time to waste, but this is an extremely valuable prompt and I will tell you why. First out of respect for your time I’m going to give you the structure of this writing piece right up front (or at least how I intend it to go):
I’m going to start with a preamble, some initial context to give you a hint of just how epic this stream of thought is that you have just encountered. If you read the post that I’m replying to -> This One Click Here, then you have either just barely dipped your toes in the water, or you’ve already been fully immersed and are wondering to yourself are these people legit?
Next I’m going to lay out what I can come up with off the top of my head as a sort of starting point to answer the question: Where are we now as a society, as a civilization, as a life form? I’m going to try to lay out a bit of pseudo or meta-history, and then present several problems which should hopefully make our collective situation and present challenges apparent.
Next I’m going to try to make the case that this is not only “an apocalypse”, but “The Apocalypse”. If I was able to articulate well enough in the meta-history, a picture of our potential and what we have “lost” through the long road of commodification (of life), then we will be in a good position to see progress as a failed myth and imagine ourselves rising up to the challenge of judgement day.
Finally I’m going to try to call you to action, so that it can hopefully be made even more clear where I’m coming from and what I intend to happen by participating in this kind of writing and the many emergent efforts which it has been associated with. Throughout this I’m going to try to lean towards responding to what was said in the original post, using it as a guide for the kind of examples and ideas I’m going to bring up as I weave this together.
A tiny bit of context first. I recommend putting on some traditional low-fi hip hop study beats (search youtube) for the read. I am listening as I write. I also made some green tea, and I’ve cleared my schedule for the evening (shouldn’t take you very long to read this though). Normally I would be doing other project work or doing research, but this is taking priority and you’ll find out why in a bit. I have done a lot of writing over the past 6 years since my own spiritual rebirth (awakening) experience, but project work has taken over the last couple years. I’ve been meaning to get more writing out but its difficult and I will talk about why this is, more later, as well.
Now let’s begin. Look I’m already on my 7th paragraph and rather than blasting you with schizopoetics I’ve taken some time to lay out an intro and some basic context. You’re waiting for the fireworks which were promised in the second paragraph. Hopefully that promise has carried your attention all the way down here where you are now going to start feeling it build. This has got to be some amazing shit, and so, its not something that I can just casually drop without fanfare. What you’re about to read and experience here is a product of the wild and wonderful world unfolding around you that you may or may not have noticed.
Were still just warming up but its coming. What I am about to say will have two major categories of effect, that category is dependent on the listener and their life’s experience up to this point. I may or may not get into the mechanics of perception which underlie this phenomenon, but lets just say that some of you will have a feeling that you know exactly what I’m talking about, and some of you will maybe find it interesting but determine it to be essentially saying nothing of relevance to your life, or that my facts aren’t straight, or my telling of history isn’t what “actually” happened, etc. So before I finish this paragraph I want to end it by saying that this is really for those of you who end up recognizing and deeply understanding the implications of what I’m trying to express.
Get ready. White knuckle the safety bar and clench your cheeks cause its coming. What Cory was talking about regarding an apocalypse is simply true. I have seen and read his works and what he is doing certainly is an apocalypse according to the classic interpretation of the word, which means the revealing of truth. More than that, what I have experienced of his articulations has a ring of spiritual truth to it. There is a grand narrative at play into which he is tapping. I know because I am also tapping into this.
This is what called emergence in a holarchic sense, we are both acting like radio antenna which are resonating to something unseen unless one brings their own antenna online. There is an order in our expressions and actions which emerges at a higher layer beyond “normal” spacetime and social interaction. In some ways it could be said that we are running the same code but where did this code come from? How is it that two (and many many more) people can have their own completely different experiences throughout life and come to the point of coherent emergence at a higher unseen layer of interaction?
To answer that one would have to study what I call in my research (with many others) the Strange Holarchy. This term is based loosely on the idea of a “strange loop” (Hofstadter), and a holarchy (heterarchical holonic structure). In this way by their very nature, completely separate atoms can be perceived as coming together and forming molecules, completely separate cells can come together to form a tissue, or a neural pathway. In the same way, when I make writing pieces like this, and people like Cory (or perhaps you) read them and recognize something special going on which is very different from other more mundane communications.
So yes we are still warming up. I have to butter you up real good before you’re going to see the fireworks. Those of you who already have a feeling where this is going are probably already well committed to finish reading and seeing where this is going to go (you wont be disappointed), and those who have already fallen into the other category I ask for your patience, please, we cant do this without you. Now, that’s actually a whole other matter of discussion, because we can and will do it whether you’re ready now or not. We are building what, in the future, will be so compelling to you that you will not be able to look away, and when it happens to you, you’ll want nothing more than to find others like us (like you).
You may think that I’m off the rails already, its not true, but out of respect I’m going to bring this back to my original plan. Where are we right now in history? What is our story that’s happening right now which could explain the current state of the world? How did things get like this? Great questions! And only some of us would be asking them. Lets present two more categories for simplicity of the people who may ask these questions. A very small minority might want to know the answers so that they can increase their power and dominion (control) over the life around them. This is a very tiny minority which may extremely overrepresent sociopathic tendencies (even select for them). The other vast majority is people who are suffering from the weight of social decay, disorder, suffering, pain, all around us as what seems to be an inexplicable machine, some invisible force that seems to control us and those around us.
So lets say you’re one of those who have been pushed through great suffering , running your scripts like a machine, trying harder, working harder, trying to keep your head above the water, trying to retire one day, trying to make a name for yourself, driving your body beyond its limits, driving your own mind insane. And one day you snap, you seem to lose your mind, you don’t know who you are really anymore or what you’ve been doing. Somehow a great peace washes over you, at the same time all the weight of the world is dissolving, but wait its still there. Was it real? Is it still real? Do I still need to take care of myself? (yes).
Ok so I’ve just described the sort of endpoint condition, the end of the road of this long process of commodification (as I mentioned earlier were about to get into that). This breaking point. Why did there have to be a breaking point? Why was just living normal life (for some much worse than others) something that eventually might break ones whole mind if not body? Why does life seem like such a machine like (meaningless) struggle? What is it that were trapped in which, when one looks around after becoming lucid, appears to still have an iron grip on those around us?
Its been a long road, we have a long history here that lead to this point. I’ve already sort of introduced some of the problems of contemporary society (this struggle to find meaning as a cog in the machine). There are too many problems to list but I’m going to see if I can come up with some of the most concerning to the widest swath of people on this planet. Keep in mind that Each and every single one of these problems is not insurmountable, nor hopeless, nor too far gone, though there absolutely is the possibility here of prematurely wiping ourselves entirely off the face of this planet lets not kid ourselves.
Im going to state up front, and you’ve heard this before, that the problem is not out there, its in here *points to self*. There is no strictly political solution to the many problems that we face, and actually I would assert that the only real political approach here is education itself, that is, the increased individual capacity for navigating these problems, out of which emerges (that word again) a higher order which is able to express harmony (resonance, like the antenna analogy) with the world around us including each other. It’s a very tall order, a monumental undertaking, a bigger project than any project civilization has ever undertaken. In fact, I will say this straight that what I am describing here IS the project of civilization, and we have merely fallen off the path and succumbed to decay (entropy) in so many ways. Increasing ones coherence, harmony, resonance, with the world around, including others, is the most important journey that we can be on collectively (isn’t it obvious?). This is, to use a biblical analogy, to literally be a part of the tree of life, and not cut off from it (which leads to death and destruction always and in every case without fail).
Look. I’m already almost an hour and a half into this and I’ve only just barely fulfilled the first section here which is to lay out our situation including some of the problems were facing. I don’t even know if this will have been the easy part or the hard part, but I hope you’ve been following along (please ask questions if not). This is incredibly important to myself and to many others who I have met over the years who wish so hard to be able to express themselves. Its taken me this long to get to this point and I’m still not that articulate but I’m giving it my best shot right now considering the constraints.
Were looking at a world of mass starvation (food security), of insane alienation (interacting as machine to machine, may I take your order?), extreme and in many ways irreversible damage to our environment and ecosystem (carcinogenic and other contaminants), endless war (nuclear Armageddon?, terrorism), biotechnological catastrophe (consider this coronavirus on the mild side of what could be in store), destruction of the family (atomization), vanishing retirement, incredible disease including obesity (cardiovascular) and nutritional related, and totalitarian governance. It seems bad. It seems really bad. In fact I’m not even going to shame you if you crawl back into your hole and shut the lid right now. Seriously at this moment, from my experience, I’ve just lost most of the people in that one category right now. Go ahead and say to me in a complaining and annoyed voice something like “well what can we do about it its just the way it is, this is how the world works”. Ok. Again, don’t feel bad I didn’t mean to get too real there or whatever.
Why did this happen? The reaction I mean. Its related to the commodification of life that I spoke of before. What were looking at here is a long road, and were at the end. This is why it seems like there is nothing we can do about it, like its really none of our business. Its actually scary as hell. Bringing up these things, and look how the whole world has actually just begrudgingly experienced a pandemic. Weve all experienced something for the first time maybe in our lives, which is an empty shelf, some product not there, maybe a whole isle is gone, which amounts to a broken promise of our worldview, that deal that we were born into, which we never actually agreed or even realized it was there, that we just need to do our little job, get some money, and the things will be at the store.
We have all had a mini apocalypse, maybe a major apocalypse. The whole spectrum of experience is out there. This experience has pushed many who were already wondering and thinking about the world around them over the edge, past the point where they oh so unfortunately can never go back to the way things were in their own head, believing that things are just as simple as they once were (think cypher in the Matrix). You see, if this hasn’t already happened to you, and you don’t want it to happen to you, and this writing hasn’t yet triggered this thought in you, then I assume you already took shelter two paragraphs ago as I suggested. Its ok if now is the time you’d like to excuse yourself cause I’m only gonna get more real with you. From here on out this is really for those who are having this other category of experience and if you’re not ready you don’t have to go through with it.
The Apocalypse. Many “an apocalypses” emerging out through our collective experiences. Here it is. Its certainly here for me, and its certainly here for many others who ive spoken with. This is the big one. How do I know? Actually we determine that, we can make it so, but there are many factors that are practically boosting it to certainty. There has been a war going on for at least thousands of years. Of course, we could just call it the struggle of life, but something very special happened thousands of years ago. Im going to put a heavy emphasis on the important of the standardization of the alphabet and written language which has given us this ability to externalize our memory. This could be seen as one of the key events which really kicked off our explorations into the ideal realm of forms.
This is the point that heaven made contact with earth in a really sustained way, where the abstract met the concrete, where the yang met the yin. Importantly this new tech came with a very very big challenge. One of the most significant aspects of life is its ability to adapt, and so when we have our very language literally being written into stone and tree, they speak back to us in an unchanging way, and this is one way of articulating an approach to one of the greatest challenges to face life on earth. With the oral tradition (passed between generation) there was always the living guide, another being of greater experience, available to point out the mistake of following instructions too rigidly, able to see where something has not been deeply learned but is merely imitated and repeated (seem familiar?).
I know that I don’t have time right now to elaborate on that but I hope that I’ve left enough of a pointer there that many or most who are in the recognition category will be seeing some fireworks. In the pseudo history that I’m presenting here I’m going to take a dark turn with the word priest and juxtapose it against the word shaman. I am going to use the word shaman to denote one who is able to and willing to reach into the experience and connect with another for the purpose of illuminating this dead behavior, this dead approach to life where instructions are followed (down to the deepest core of our being and who we think we are), and lead them out of the box and towards the Tree of Life. Im going to refer to the priest class who took this knowledge and commodified it, themselves becoming a cog in the machine and expendable or replaceable to some mysterious “higher machine”.
Holding the written word under close guard through both physical access control and basic encryption of sounds (obscuring vowels etc), the priest class became powerful but had already died. Enslaved themselves their position was still better than those from whom they hid an unknown truth. Out of the tribes came the city states and the commodification of land, with military, borders, war, etc. You know what im just going to cheat and paste in a couple of my favorite flavor texts for this. The details don’t matter, what you should gather from this is that it’s a long road we’ve been going down, and incremental stages can be seen, and over time we are left with less and less responsibility, and more specialization, a situation that leaves us truly helpless to find alternatives when decay (chronically unchecked entropy) triggers the cyclical slumping and collapse of reform, revolution, and eventually dissolution.
Its almost time for me to go to bed and I’m nowhere close to what I had hoped to write. I might have to make a part two tomorrow (sorry). So instead of leaving you hanging I’m going to sprint to try to quickly outline what I wanted to get to next. To do so I’m going to copy and paste some thoughtstreams put together from the not to far past of my own and one of my research partner. I was trying to rehash some of this for the purpose of this writing piece so you’ll recognize some of it from the above. Maybe it might give a bit of a new perspective. In the pseudo history we’ve laid out (ill give links for diving deeper into our models at the end), we have basically a commodification of land (no need to worry too much about defense unless you’re conscripted, or how the borders will be managed etc), then a commodification of the market, with roles becoming solidified, carpenter, cobbler, blacksmith, etc (you grow up to be a role, just pick one and that’s what you “are”), then commodification of maintenance (management roles, standardization of practices such that no one has to think anymore about how to do things), and then commodification of life itself (your future is bound to the state, your possibilities of life are constrained and conformed to the model of the state, you will work and then retire and then die for example, like how a dog is trained for a role and its future is set by the master).
Here is the flavor text, you can read it like poetry if you want:
Shamans become priests.
This commodification makes them replaceable
for hire
the myth changes to justify the circumstance
Priests generate superstition
experience is alienated from expression
expression becomes systemic
systemic expression ceases to recognize its origin,
the birth of barbarians
it was all once a lucid dream
it became a no longer lucid nightmare
erode the land, spread repeat. warfare becomes the norm. other tribes respond by either doing the same or being subjugated
an arms race
the cancer begins to spread
all for a bunch of grass.
And here is another:
the great axial war
the schism between mind and body. It broke out when memory was externalized and let loose from the constraints of oral tradition (and its natural immunity)
its been a cold war since then but I think in the last 100 years the war has gone hot for example second order cybernetics
so its like science has come full circle and admit that you cant separate the subjective observer and make these purely objective factual results
I think this is also the flood IMO (using biblical history metaphorically)
Dysmorphic social spilling out and pressing back down upon the individual
Externalized memory positive feedback loops into the meat APS
Phonetic alphabet is a pretty key constraint if you want rocks to start talking to you
Stone tablets etc
And being able to handle the complexity of spoken language
The symbols flooded out until they managed to represent al life that came before, well enough that we could slip into its reality
And the fight between these worlds is the great axial war
The war to begin and end all wars
And if yall don’t know, youre in it
Were lucky (unlucky?) enough to be alive to witness the war going hot. Its out in the open now
Many orgs will start embracing and openly admitting to being evil
As far as going hot, battle lines become more clear
Its just because we can see the paradox now its becoming pop culture, the mind body disconnect
We have gone through enlightenment, through materialism, and we are using these tools back upon what was lost with the throwing out of spirituality
This is our work
Alright. So lets just assume for now that we’ve established that life basically in its entirety has been commodified and this is why we feel like there is a complete void of culture when we awaken to the processes of life all around us. The generations have long ago been broken apart, the family is dying or dead replaced with fleeting and unfulfilling hookups, nothing sustained, and our lives atomized and isolated and alienated from one another. 100 years ago most people were self employed, did things for and with their community, sustained each other. I think its less than 4% now, and this is the very tail end of the long process. We are now being swept up into the machine. Wait till you accept basic income and give up your business or your job. This, I hope can be seen, is the final cut, the final slice which would disconnect the vast majority of the population from the earth, from having a reason to exist, to become the ultimate “useless eater”, and I assure you those who have to manage you will think of you with absolute disgust and disdain.
In 1776 the American revolution kicked off with the signing of the declaration of independence. It was already so bad even back then that people knew they had to maintain freedom from tyranny, which simply pops up in the void of responsibility. This great document along with the constitution of the USA, and even to a great extent those items established in the Canadian charter of rights and freedoms, and other similar works, try to establish a balance where the people do not simply get crushed and enslaved. But those founding fathers never expected these documents or the country itself to remain static (dead). It was well known back then that the spirit out of which these documents emerged had to be renewed and refreshed constantly or the same tyranny would creep in one way or another.
Its here again in a big way and this is the direct reason for the problems that I outlined above. We have fallen asleep at the wheel. In these documents we seemed to take care of setting up the government, but neglected ourselves, neglected this long process of commodification which now leaves us helpless to the plunder of govcorp (corporation and government [private and public] has merged see deep state). The private interests have once again overcome the public, that great idea of a republic, a sustained and significant public sphere which was enshrined and bound up in these documents. Its going away again and the world is on the verge of overt tyranny and destruction.
Those of us who know are gathering, this is an emergent work, many of us can see it clearly. We are helping each other to make this clear and to communicate our ideas. We need new documents (in addition, not replacement). Consider this part one of my attempt to introduce the work. In part two I’m going to try to outline more specifically the cognitive technology we have been developing, and the model of life that will hopefully illuminate the scope of the work to be done, to clear up who and what we are, and who and what we are together in society. To illuminate our responsibility to ourselves and each other, and to work together to restore the Great Republic. To this end I have envisioned two documents reflecting the history and power of these old works: a Declaration of Responsibility, and the Constitution of the Guild.
I assure you Ill be working on this and related projects until my last breath so by all means reach out to me if you find this interesting and lets get connected. Please sustain contact, please keep it up, you’re doing great! I hope to hear from you. Part two tomorrow? Oh and the link I promised: http://portalmounta.in/
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