Click here to support the Daily Grail for as little as $US1 per month on Patreon

News Briefs 24-08-2006

By Gregon

Completely geschtonkenflapped…

Thanks Bill.

Quote of the Day:

We are like caterpillars, contemplating pupation. No longer will I chew on the cabbage leaves, no longer will I spend my time moving around on the underside of the foliage. Life must be a preparation for the transition to another dimension…

Terence McKenna

Greg
Editor
Greg is the owner-editor of The Daily Grail, as well as the author of a number of books including Stop Worrying, There Probably is an Afterlife.
Related

7 Comments

    1. Your comment…
      brings to mind the image of a puppet manipulating its own strings…karma is the concept of us influencing our own destinies, no?

      As to Terence’s quote, well, no. There’s no obvious reason to suppose that having achieved a certain level Man must advance to something else, no reason to think that “Life must be a preparation for the transition to another dimension” unless one grants considerable power to Human conceit and greed.

      Cheers

      Of course there’s a spoon…get a grip.

      1. Ontologies and such
        [quote=Binro the Heretic]As to Terence’s quote, well, no. There’s no obvious reason to suppose that having achieved a certain level Man must advance to something else[/quote]

        Unless you’ve been shot like a cannon-ball through the DMT chrysanthemum to the far end of the hyperdimensional universe and been shown the underlying mechanism of reality. I think Terence had frequent flyer points…
        😉

        Kind regards,
        Greg
        ——————————————-
        You monkeys only think you’re running things

        1. At the moment,
          I’m seeing my post up twice: I apologize for that. That being said, I maintain my point: Man has evolved to his current position…I’m not seeing an obvious reason why he should make some quantum leap from his current position to something completely different.

          Evolution, as I grasp the concept, seems to develop beings to a state in balance with their environment. Consider the shark, the crocodile, a number of other species that have existed essentially without change for hundreds of millions of years…Life seems to develop creatures to a certain level and there the development stops, at the point where the relationship is balanced. The great white shark is something close to a perfect creature, the best engineering could scarcely have designed something better suited to its ecological niche; there is no sign that it will develop into something else, there is no need for it to do so, it is close to perfect as it exists.

          Greg, this should not be too difficult a concept to grasp: caterpillars do not “contemplate” pupation; they do it because it is their nature to do so and in doing so they do what they have done for a very long time and pretty much never do they change into something which they weren’t doing before…pupation isn’t an evolutionary step to a caterpillar, it’s a reproductive one and using the concept as some analogy to suggest that Man will develop to a different state is deeply flawed thinking, something rather common to what I’ve seen of McKenna.

          The notion that: “Life must be a preparation for the transition to another dimension” is at best unsupported by any rational evidence…at worst it’s bait to the gullible. It may be that I am wrong: perhaps Terence would be gracious enough to send me a post-card from wherever he winds up, but frankly I won’t hold my breath. If you place any trust at all in the notion of evolution then it would be necessary for you to ask yourself: Where do we go from here? Evolution seems to work as a cause-and-effect sort of thing; what cause would be at work here to suggest a radical departure from what we currently are?

          Apart from conceit and arrogance there’s no reason that I can see to think that Man should advance from what he currently is and as such I see such “advances” as being largely illusory; self-deception is one of our major talents. McKenna may indeed have collected frequent flier points but I tend to think that he got most of them for flying in circles…wishful thinking is largely what appears to be at work in his writing. If you have some basis for a contrary argument, have at me.

          Cheers

          Of course there’s a spoon…get a grip.

          1. Caterpillar: Eats roots and leaves
            [quote=Binro the Heretic]McKenna may indeed have collected frequent flier points but I tend to think that he got most of them for flying in circles…wishful thinking is largely what appears to be at work in his writing. If you have some basis for a contrary argument, have at me.[/quote]

            Oh no, I think Terence was, to a point, barking. But he was happy enough to acknowledge as much anyhow. My light-hearted point (via the subject and the wink), was that while you may feel one way about it, ontologies have a tendency to be experiential…and anyone who has sat in with the ‘elves’ will certainly have their take on what constitutes ‘reality’, probably in opposition to your “there’s no obvious reason”, to which I was addressing my first post. Once you’ve been shown the raw mechanism of the Universe within that framework (ie. experientially, not from an objective point), someone (eg. the late Terence) would probably suggest there is a very obvious reason, at least to them 3 minutes into their DMT trip.

            I’m just glad you didn’t take Douglas Adams to task for suggesting we can fly…
            😉

            Kind regards,
            Greg
            ——————————————-
            You monkeys only think you’re running things

          2. I was having a bit of fun too
            I acknowledge your point and didn’t actually have a problem with it…I just thought it mildly humorous to ask for external evidence of what is a very subjective sort of thing, i.e., someone may experience something that seems real to them without them being able to convey the phenomenon to others. I’ll leave aside the notion that there are many possible causes for such phenomena.

            Also may I say that I would never have at dear dead Douglas; I’m far too fond of his writing. If there is an afterlife I hope he’s safe in it and finding it to be Mostly Harmless.

            Cheers

            Of course there’s a spoon…get a grip.

    2. Your comment…
      brings to mind the image of a puppet manipulating its own strings…karma is the concept of us influencing our own destinies, no?

      As to Terence’s quote, well, no. There’s no obvious reason to suppose that having achieved a certain level Man must advance to something else, no reason to think that “Life must be a preparation for the transition to another dimension” unless one grants considerable power to Human conceit and greed.

      Cheers

      Of course there’s a spoon…get a grip.

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Mobile menu - fractal