Biscorbians and Hangers On (FSH!) (tch.)

Aleister Crowley's Psycho-Spiritual Philosophy for a New Æon @ UCB -

2009-10-21T15:33:22Z

This class is currently being offered at UCB. One of the participants in the course has brought their syllabus to Occult.Digital.Moblization's forums, and one of the course's instructors has joined in the discussion to add any clarifying details.

If you've an interest in Crowley's New Æon philosophy, this may be a great way to "formally" expand your understanding, or to increase the understanding of others.

Bob Dobbs on Finnegan's Wake

2009-10-15T02:38:20Z

http://www.venicewake.org/ZeroPoint/BIOS.html
no, the REAL Bob Dobbs...

10/6 -mad hatter day of course

2009-10-07T02:47:53Z

http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~ari/madHatter.html

Black Iron Prison

2009-06-14T21:30:21Z

Has anyone here ever checked out Black Iron Prison? http://www.blackironprison.com/index.php?title=Main_Page

It's a pretty sweet Discordian wiki, and also has links that branch off into other Discordian Internet communities. Upon joining this group, I feel the need to read the Principia again. I'll have to do that soon.

HAIL HAIL HAIL HAIL HAIL

ERIS ERIS ERIS ERIS ERIS

eristicmystics @ 2009-05-16T21:43:00

2009-05-17T01:43:52Z

Sorry for advertising

http://izmaragd.blogspot.com/

Many great books, articles, journals are being made available online for the first time!

Contributions are welcome.

New Saint?

2009-02-20T00:44:16Z

The Mysterious Case of Ireland's Worst Driver

The mystery of Ireland's worst driver
-BBC News

Details of how police in the Irish Republic finally caught up with the country's most reckless driver have emerged, the Irish Times reports.

He had been wanted from counties Cork to Cavan after racking up scores of speeding tickets and parking fines.

However, each time the serial offender was stopped he managed to evade justice by giving a different address.

But then his cover was blown.

It was discovered that the man every member of the Irish police's rank and file had been looking for - a Mr Prawo Jazdy - wasn't exactly the sort of prized villain whose apprehension leads to an officer winning an award.

In fact he wasn't even human.

"Prawo Jazdy is actually the Polish for driving licence and not the first and surname on the licence," read a letter from June 2007 from an officer working within the Garda's traffic division.
"Having noticed this, I decided to check and see how many times officers have made this mistake.

"It is quite embarrassing to see that the system has created Prawo Jazdy as a person with over 50 identities."

The officer added that the "mistake" needed to be rectified immediately and asked that a memo be circulated throughout the force.

In a bid to avoid similar mistakes being made in future relevant guidelines were also amended.

And if nothing else is learnt from this driving-related debacle, Irish police officers should now know at least two words of Polish.

As for the seemingly elusive Mr Prawo Jazdy, he has presumably become a cult hero among Ireland's largest immigrant population.

found a 17/23 in aristotle (according to the scholarly page divisions), discuss

2009-02-10T17:13:54Z

"Since the object of our inquiry is knowledge, and we do not think we know a thing until we have grasped why it is so (where this is to grasp its primary cause), it is clear that we must also find this in the case of coming to be, perishing, and of all natural change, so that when we know the principles of things we can endeavour to refer what we are seeking back to these principles." Physics 194b17-23; cf. Meta. 983a25

the latest Bavarian TV Chef

2009-01-02T00:05:41Z

my wife had to verify her humanity today and the random words the web form put together were "Discordia Childs"

eristicmystics @ 2008-12-23T00:07:00

2008-12-23T05:07:23Z

see famous look-a-like faces

23-17

2008-10-29T17:24:47Z

Boy is 23rd child abandoned at Neb. hospital
The Associated Press - 1 hour ago
OMAHA, Neb. (AP) - A 17-year-old boy was confirmed Wednesday as the 23rd child abandoned under the state's unique safe-haven law, as the governor prepared to address changes in the law.

Word Cloud

2008-10-29T09:30:56Z

The 170 most common words in the Principia Discordia, give or take:

The meaning of Life

2008-10-24T03:22:49Z

Today I thought of an idea that made me literally, IRL, squee with excitement. I shall attempt to explain, but it will take some background info first.

I've been re-reading "Quantum Psychology" by Robert Anton Wilson. Now, his philosophy in that book was a melting pot of Existentialism, Phenomenology, Ethnomethodology, Pragmatism, Instrumentalism, Operationalism, The Copenhagen Interpretation, General Semantics, Transactional psychology, and his own ideas. And, as such, his general point was that humans, as conscious beings, cannot experience anything objectively. Humans have perspectives, and perspectives are subjective, and so anything and everything we experience, we experience subjectively. And our tools don't change this, because our tools (computers, cameras, etc) are extensions of ourselves and so are extensions of our perspectives and our subjective reality. This means, of course, that nothing meaningful can be said about objective reality, because regardless of the source of that information, we interpret it subjectively. Our brain creates a model of reality based on the data. Example = Look at your hand right now. What you are actually seeing is not your hand, but your brain's best idea of what your hand looks like with the limited data it has. I say "limited" because our eyes don't see the entire spectrum, and even if they did, even having all the information available about one's hand, the image the brain makes is still just a model. The example Wilson gives in the book to best describe this is that we are all blind kings ruling our kingdom from inside our castles using information given us by our subjects (our senses) who, while not blind, have other limits on their experience of reality.
Or, put another way, the map is NOT the territory.

It then occurred to me as I re-read this today that any being that collects data (either passively, actively, or both) about its reality and interprets that data, making models in its brain (or other similar thinking center) of that reality, is therefore a conscious being. And as such, has perspective and can only experience its subjective reality. Animals and even plants thus can only know their own subjective realities.

I go further. My definition of life is "anything made of energy." And since even matter is made of energy, and since I believe that there are energies permeating all of space that we haven't learned how to detect yet, I believe that everything - rocks, metal, computers, fire - is alive in their own way. And ultimately, everything that exists makes up the body and the mind of God/Source/Universe/The All.

Now if you think about it, even if you don't believe that The All was human-level-or-greater intelligent (after now to be known as HuLoGI) before HuLoGI beings first evolved, you figure it must be by now. But even if it was a lower-level intelligence, it was alive. All living beings collect data about their reality and interpret it in their own way; just because we can't see where they think with doesn't mean they don't think, even if just barely. I am of the school of thought that everything is ultimately made of the same raw material as pure thought.
Anyway, within this worldview I submit that everything in existence is alive, and that all living beings are conscious to some degree or other. And so, being conscious beings, none of them could say anything meaningful about objective reality because they all experience reality subjectively. However, I do not subscribe to the view that there is no objective reality. Obviously there IS an objective reality, because we exist. However, conscious beings simply cannot experience reality objectively, we only experience it subjectively.

Now chew on this: God/The All/Collective Consciousness/Whatever you want to call It is, however you slice it, in some way a conscious being. As such, I submit that as a conscious being it has perspective. Think about it... if God is all knowing and all seeing, that is a perspective. If God is only partially knowing and partially seeing, that is also a perspective. If God somehow managed to be both omniscient and partially-knowing (experiencing both the view of the forest from the sky AND the view from the trees, so to speak), even THAT is a perspective. So there is no escaping the fact that God (or whatever you want to call it) is a conscious being (or several conscious beings) and has a perspective. Being conscious and therefore having a perspective, then even God cannot experience anything objectively. It is impossible, because all conscious beings have a perspective, and a perspective is a subjective view of reality. Go ahead, try to disprove it. I tried disproving it myself, but there's no way out of it.

So, if not even God can say anything meaningful about objective reality, if even God can only speculate on the objective truth, if the truth about Objective Reality is hidden even from God, then I submit that God exists to try to make sense of existence, and that as parts of God (whether God made us or existence made God), that is our function as well. Or, put another way, the meaning of Life is to figure out what the meaning of Life is.

I mean this on several levels. This is a refinement of my previous ideas. I've long known that the meaning of our lives is to make our own meaning, but now I see a greater Truth: that by living our lives and seeking our own answers, we are helping God do the same. I already knew God was living vicariously through us for a number of reasons, but this reason is new to me. And I love this idea so much! By seeking meaning in/giving meaning to our lives, we help God refine its own ideas about the meaning of Life. Though of course, as I have said in this post, I believe knowing anything objectively about objective reality is impossible. We can neither prove nor disprove anything, so long as we are in the trap of consciousness. And since ultimately everything in existence IS conscious to some degree, there is no escaping this fact. Nothing can be known objectively, not even by God.

I can't decide whether to call this philosophy Gnostic Agnosticism or Agnostic Gnosticism or something else.

Feeling philosophical for once in a long time.

2008-10-21T06:53:55Z

Feeling philosophical for once in a long time. Haven't had a good philosophical idea to mull over in ages. (To help explain the following, I am a syncretist who has Paganism, Christianity, and "Conversations With God" by Neale Donald Walsch in my path, among other things.)

Okay, so I sent this comic in the email to several people, because I agree with the sentiment Agnes's grandmother says in the middle block. And saharris replied, "And yet... there are some people who aren't confused at all and experience crystal clarity. We're confused until we're not. LOL So... sounds like it's true for you and not for everyone. ;) How have you been?"

Which spawned this response from me:

I guess I'm biased. One of my Goddesses is Eris, Ancient Greek Goddess of Chaos and Confusion. Confusion is a sacred state of mind for me. :-) I like to induce it in other people.

Yeah, there are the people who get those moments of crystal clarity. But those people are rare, and people who live in a constant state of such sublime clarity are even more rare. It's been my observation that most people who are sure of things are indeed delusional or being self-deceptive. People who genuinely "get it" are a minority. And since dogma is so restrictive (Robert Anton Wilson said "When dogma enters the brain, all intellectual activity ceases."), those people who achieve genuine clarity most often got there by means of Confusion delivering them from dogma.

But Confusion cannot be avoided. I too have experienced moments of clarity, too, and to me they stem from confusion and finding an answer that feels perfect and joyful and awesome. But to believe that idea completely could eventually turn to dogma, so I go by the philosophy that "Well, this seems like it's True. Dunno if it is, and given that reality is relative it won't be True for everyone, but it feels True to me, so I'll accept it as True to me and keep an open mind." I am a spiritual agnostic, essentially. Those times I've felt absolutely certain of things, I've been proven wrong later. So I don't believe in Absolute Truth. I say things like this:

* And quoth Jesus, "Because! The Ultimate Truth is like an acid trip--never the same way twice!" ( http://fayanora.23ae.com/Discordian/CBOBS.htm )

* " She huffed angrily at this Goddess. "Okay, then, tell me what this cave is. Where are we? Why does the sky look different?"
"Ask Me no questions just yet, for I will tell you no lies."
"What? Why won't you answer those questions? Surely it can't hurt to answer where I am?"
Goddess smiled. "Keep asking questions, for they are good. It has been My experience, though, that it works best to have people answer their own questions if they can. For I could tell you the truth from My perspective, but that would not be the truth for you. You came here, you answer yourself why." " ( http://fayanora.23ae.com/wisdoms.html ; also it's a quote from my novel, "I'll Tell You No Lies.")

* "These are the Waters of Truth. When the universe was young, there were three powers. The Black, from which all arose, as I told you; The Wellspring of Light, which is Order; and My realm, The Heart of The Chaos, The Vital Spark of Life. When the light came out of these caves, these three forces came together to make existence as we know it, and The Black formed a cave from which flows Truth. These waters are pure Truth. Drink of these waters and a Truth shall be revealed to you.
"But before you drink of the Waters of Truth, you should be aware of the nature of Truth. Truth is a mischievous mistress that hides in the shadows, and even when you see it in the full light of knowing, not everyone sees it the same way. The Truth is like a shape-shifter---even if two people see it in basically the same way, perspective makes subtle differences. Whatever Truth you see from the Waters is yours and yours alone. It comes from your soul, the waters merely open the door to it. Though you may share it if you wish, but it will be a different truth for others. Do you understand?" (From the same source as the above quote)

So yeah. Knowledge and perspective change how one perceived Truth. Knowledge and Perspective change one another, as well. I believe it is possible to know things in many ways, even from direct communication with The Divine, but even with knowing "everything," continuing experience and thought changes the Truth one perceives about it. I can't even tell you how many times I've thought I'd exhausted every way of looking at a thing and finding a new perspective on it weeks or even years later; new information comes in, often times unrelated to the original idea, and suddenly a mutation appears and I see something in a new light.

This attitude of mine is very much a reflection of the way my mind works. My mind is naturally in a constant state of thought, new information and old information mixing together. Things I haven't thought of for years suddenly pop up at random. It's a chaotic laboratory of thought experiments in my brain, pretty much anything goes. Anything from my past or present can relate to anything, can link to anything else and create mutant thoughts that, in turn, also link to anything else. And most of it happens without my even being aware of it. I cannot begin to count all the times I've suddenly had an idea and had absolutely no clue who its parents are. Add to this nine different minds in one body, and it's quite spectacular in there if I do say so myself. Nothing that comes into my sensory awareness is immune from being added to the melting pot of ideas in my head. And there seems to be no limit to size, either. I've had entire poems or pieces of prose float up to the surface of my mind, already fully planned and complete, without any idea that any part of my mind had been thinking about such things. (Although that's kind of rare for entire poems or prose pieces to suddenly surface. More often than not, a stanza or two will float up.)

So yeah, my ideas about things are constantly changing. Which explains why I'm a spiritual agnostic of sorts. I think we can get information about things directly from The Divine, and so there's Truth, but there's no such thing as Absolute Truth. Because not only do no 2 people see things the exact same way, one person doesn't see things the same way from one minute to the next.

*Hee hee* Then in a comment on the ArcaMax site (replying to the comic), I said, "If there is an Absolute Truth, it is impossible for humans to know. Perspective and knowledge change each other and change one's Truth, how one perceived The Truth. Actually, technically it is impossible for any sentient being to know The Ultimate Truth. All sentient beings have perspective, and even knowing everything, one's ideas about a thing might still change. I think that not even God can know the Absolute Truth entirely, if for no other reason than that Truth shape-shifts constantly for mortals. There can be no certainty without a lack of change, and since the only constant is Change, there can be no certainty.

But I think this is a good thing. I think there was certainty at the beginning of Creation, and it was extremely boring. So God created the Relative Worlds (like the Mortal Coil and other dimensions) so that there would be change. Because change is interesting, and lack of change - stagnation - is boring."

LOL! Along those kinda lines, kengr emailed me this: http://maskedretriever.com/other_comics/simon2/

Which spawned this response from me:

every act, no matter how cruel, would only be a form of communication

That is precisely how things are. Cruelty is a label, and we're all just communicating Who We Chose To Be in order to figure out Who We Really Are.

I'm not guilty of hitting you, you consented to being hit.

Hmm... I've always had a problem with that part of it. I suppose one's soul having a vastly different perspective on mortal reality means that at the soul level one can consent to things like that even if they don't on an ego level, but it doesn't really fit with the "every act is a form of communication" thing. I mean, I could communicate whatever I want to and assault your ears and that doesn't mean you consented to it. It just *happened*.

Besides, the whole "you consent to shit on a soul level" thing implies planning ahead, which implies some kind of fate. Now there is some degree of planning before one is born, with the soul making a general "To Do" list before being incarnated, but it doesn't always work out as planned. Not everything on the list gets done just as one doesn't necessarily always get everything on one's shopping list when they go to the market. ("Damn, I forgot to experience gambling addiction in that life!") And then a lot of stuff happens that wasn't planned.

Though of course, there is also another thing to consider: thoughts and actions can magically attract shit to you. Magic is one of those constants, you can't escape it; everything you think, do, and say performs lots of minor magics on the universe. So there is some degree of attraction of things both "good" and "bad." Still, that's not necessarily consent, even on a soul level. For all we know the ego could be attracting, say, a mugging, and the soul might be up there being all like "God dammit, NO! NO NO NO NO NO!"

It implies multiple gods, hence multiple realities

"Thou art all Gods." All people are gods in miniature. The soul is very close to God/Source. For all intents and purposes, one's soul IS one's God.

She argues that mysticism doesn't imply a subjective reality--only a subjective meaning.

Hmmm... kinda goes along with what I was telling Sandi earlier about how, even if there is an Ultimate Truth, It is an elusive mistress, never revealing all of herself to anyone, because perspective and knowledge change one's view of Truth. And since we can only know reality through our own subjective lenses as sentient beings, not even God (also a sentient being) can have the whole picture. In fact, experiencing everything from everyone's POV simultaneously - though seeming like it would be Ultimate Reality - would in fact not be so, because being omniscient God would have access to information that mortals don't, which is a different perspective than all those individual perspectives combined.

And even assuming omniscience COULD find Ultimate Truth, every soul is omniscient at its highest level, and every soul would have a different personal perspective on all that it sees. So an Ultimate Reality, if it exists, is impossible for even God to know. See this post: http://fayanora.livejournal.com/335589.html and read "Quantum Psychology" by Robert Anton Wilson.

esozone discordians

2008-10-14T03:54:25Z

Yesterday's discordian caucus at Esozone drew precisely 23 participants, apparently including a reporter from High Times.

I got home from closing down the venue last night at 3AM to find sixteen discordians in my living room.

Fun and Freaks at Esozone
Sunday’s EsoZone Photo Feed

EsoZone is for Domesticated Monkeys

2008-10-08T18:54:12Z

illuminating interview with "fnord" graffiti writer (note the date)

2008-09-26T20:53:45Z

http://thebollard.com/story_news/fnord_10.23.05.html

Supermarket seeds lead to pot plant

2008-09-08T03:41:53Z

Supermarket seeds lead to pot plant
LIVERPOOL, England (UPI) -- A 3-year-old girl in the British city of Liverpool now has a cannabis plant after buying an organic seed mix at a supermarket, her father says.

Danny Williams said his young daughter, Lois, planted seeds from a bag of health food mix that was purchased at a store in Huyton and now a healthy marijuana plant sits in their backyard, the Liverpool Echo said Friday.

Williams said his daughter had been attempting to follow in his gardening footsteps by planting the seeds.

"She wanted to plant something of her own like I do, so we just chucked some seeds into the soil," he told the Echo.

"Two months on and there was a cannabis plant in my garden. I could not believe it."

Another shock for the unsuspecting father was the fact his daughter has been eating the seed mix since they purchased it, the newspaper reported.

Copyright 2008 by United Press International

This news arrived on: 09/05/2008

http://www.arcamax.com/uknews/s-405943-898177

Plant your seeds! LOL!

local discordians! (and others of much ilk)

2008-08-19T00:41:09Z

This Saturday is the International Day of Discord, not that the world needs much help lately. What it amounts to is discordians leaving the house and meeting each other. Crazy, huh?

Check to POEE forum to see what's happening in your area, or get something started yourself.

PDX Day of Discord
The Portland, OR version is a potluck barbecue in the park, hosted by me and telarus. Folks from all over the Pacific NW or anywhere else are invited, but it's up to you to find a place to crash if you're not local.

Remember, sticking apart is more fun when we do it together.

What do you do?

2008-08-01T18:39:48Z

You are slumbering blissfully, dreaming of things that were, things that are, things that will be, and things that never will be. Your fantasy slides gently from the normal into the unbelievable, then pirouetting back into normality as dreams are wont to do.

A perfectly boring fourth-grade math lesson is disrupted by your teacher's transformation into a clown, who proceeds to blast the classroom full of marshmallows with his rainbow-colored rifle. Your friend Danny gobbles up the candy with uncanny speed, then finally swallows the clown. Danny explodes in a puff of pink smoke, and through the wisps you see your teacher once again.

After class you find yourself flying with your friend Danny, soaring through the sky on leathery wings, on your way towards Dinzyworld... What a summer it will be! You make a broad loop through a cloud, singing with joy, when suddenly...

BZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ

You are woken up by the buzzing of an alarm clock. You open your eyes and blink in the morning light streaming in from your window, the dreamy haze quickly dissipating into oblivion. You're still very tired...

To hit the snooze button, go to Page 2... "Just another ten minutes, mom...."
To get up and jump out of bed, go to Page 3... "Let's get this day started RIGHT!"

This is a light, silly Discordian Project. Your assistance is requested. Help make new pages, and help spread the word!

Controversial scientists

2008-06-05T11:21:09Z

I'm currently reading a book called "Wilhelm Reich In Hell" by Robert Anton Wilson, and in the introduction he mentions some controversial scientists who, like Dr. Wilhelm Reich, had problems with the US government censoring their work and/or legal battles with the US. (Wilhelm Reich, in particular, had all his books and notes seized and burned by the US government in 1957.) I'm already familiar with Dr. Timothy Leary and his work, as well as with Immanuel Velikovsky. However, there are a couple here that I'm not familiar with and am having trouble finding information about:

* Dr. William Ivy, "formerly a respected physician and a member of the staff of University of Chicago Medical School, was engaged in an extensive legal battle, which lasted eight years and cost him a small fortune, before he was vindicated."

* Dr. Rupert Sheldrake, a biologist. A British scientific journal called Nature suggested, in the early '80s, that his books should be burned.

That's all the information I have about them so far. Any help is greatly appreciated. Thanks much!

eristicmystics @ 2008-05-23T13:26:00

2008-05-23T20:26:39Z

Happy 5/23!!!

Discordian Cyberspace Masquerade

2008-05-19T18:38:32Z

So I got this e-mail about something cool going on. I think it's such a great idea that I'm taking it upon myself to tell LJ about it.

I hadn't even realized it was Discordia's 50th (or 49th) anniversary. This is cool 'cause we get to celebrate the 50 year mark for two years in a row. It's our Golden Apple anniversary. =)

I love the idea of an online party which brings together Discordians from all sections of the web. It's also cool that it's anonymous. It'll make communication really interesting. I hope to swap some of my ideas with other people's ideas, and maybe get a page or two written for the book PDF thing they're putting together.

Anyway, there's not a lot of time until the party starts, so I'm trying to pass the invite around as quickly as possible. If you have any ideas for where else we should advertise, please post! Or optimally, you should go there and get some buzz going.

PLEASE post to your blogs, facebook groups, forums, whatever, wherever Discordians hang out.

I'll see you guys at the party! Hail Eris and Hail Yes!

RAW books in libraries

2008-05-13T07:40:24Z

The Multnomah County Library has a few Robert Anton Wilson books in its collection, but not "Wilhelm Reich In Hell." So I decided to inter-library loan it. Guess how many libraries have that book? Give up? Well, there are nine. Nine! IN THE ENTIRE FREAKING COUNTRY. Only nine libraries in all the USA have a copy of "Wilhelm Reich In Hell"!

Some day, when I am rich and famous (crosses fingers in hope), I am going to start a trust fund like Carnegie did, only instead of the money going to build libraries, it will go toward getting books into libraries that ought to be in libraries. Books that a lot of people would be interested in, but which the people who are interested in them are scattered around the country. Like occult books, and controversial titles.

Cross posted to heck and back.

Innocent kids juices: A visual poem.

2008-05-09T02:55:37Z

you should see what i didn't post.

KallistiCon 2008!

2008-05-08T20:17:05Z

From a secure location beneath New Alamut,
Left Coast, Turtle Island, Earth
Fool's Day 2008

Discordians, Dysnomians, Erisians, and others of much ilk...

Get up! (Get on up!)

KallistiCon 2008 is coming - June 20-22!

Every year this millennium, we've gotten together in the Bay Area in California. We're not just rehashing gags from the Principia - we're moving forward, practicing chaos in the world.

For the last seven years, we've eaten and drank together, we've made friends with strangers in traffic, we've had rituals and blessings, we've been weird in public, and we've been human with each other. We’ve found the freaks who thought they were the only ones, and taught them - and ourselves - what tribe is supposed to mean.

Some of you will say: "But Discordians are supposed to be disorganized."

Didn't you know that's just a put-on?

Some of you will say we’re doing it wrong, and only you know the right way to follow Eris.

That's OK. Just quit talking about it and start doing it.

Some will no doubt repeat the tired cliche: "We Discordians tend to stick apart."

Of course we do, but sticking apart is more fun when we do it together.

Throw out your old memes. Greg and Kerry are gone, Bob Wilson is gone, Camden Benares and the other old-timers are gone. Let's honor and respect them. Let's learn from their lives and their teachings. But let's stop trying to be them.

The Principia is your grandma's Discordia. Being an inside joke on the net is your daddy's. What's yours? And who are you doing it with?

gabba gabba
we accept you
we accept you
one of us

http://www.kallisticon.com
June 20-22, 2008
Redwood City, California
RSVP by June 15!
Contact: email stmae@discordian.com