According to him, there are no such things as answers. Each of us have our own reality tunnels that change and writhe like flickers on the walls of Plato’s cave. How can you stay mad at someone when it’s impossible to see their reality? Maybe just calm down a bit and don’t take yourself so seriously. This is the nature of the wasteland of hope in Prometheus Rising. Nothing is sacred … unless you want it to be. But in that case, the jokes on you.
This is a novel that purports to be a manual for the human mind. What I like about this silly book is that it actually gives you exercises at the end of every chapter that will drive a thinking man mad and a mad man to think. Now I’ll admit that with my magick and Buddhist training, the exercises seemed kind of rote, but to the novice, these are fundamental. If you wish to dally in the world of the psychonaut, then this book is a sexy little toe dip into the looking glass. Just don’t fall in. Try the exercises. You’ll find you really can levitate from a lotus position (lol).
Dr. Leary of acid trip hippy fame, while at Harvard, created
a theory about psychological circuits that attempts to define and explain
anthropological progression of a human mind from birth to its ultimate cosmic potential.
These are individualistic but also representative of the species as a whole. There
are eight circuits in Dr. Leary’s model. These circuits consist of:
1.
The oral bio-survival circuit– the basic BIOS of the human animal. Imprinted in infancy, it’s concerned with eating, safety, survival, and familial (maternal) imprinting. Akin to the Oral stage
in Freud. Basically the cigarette, candy, cuddle experience.
Think of this as an intractable fixation mode.
2. The
emotional–territorial circuit – A level of firmware sitting on top of the
oral BIOS, this circuit is concerned with limbic development involving
emotional and territorial imprinting typically occurring in the toddler stage. Think
domination verses submission and how people tend to align with one or the other
or in some cases a combination of both (i.e. I’m ok, you’re ok).
3. The symbolic or
neurosemantic–dexterity circuit – Think of this as the operating system. It
is concerned with the function of the symbol system, with language, with
calculation, with culture. Think adolescence into adulthood. This is the mental
“map” we are all compelled to build and refer back to throughout our lives. The
monkey mind that the Buddhists seek to quiet and transcend. The finger pointing
at the moon (not the moon itself). This is also the circuit that is memetically
transferred generationally until it takes on an independent life of its own
(egregore). Burroughs called words a “virus.”
4. The domestic or
socio-sexual circuit – This one is obvious by the title. It’s the function
of socio-sexual morality, religion, tribal mores, and sexual pleasure. Most
people never move beyond activation of this circuit.
5. The neurosomatic
circuit – After the first four circuits, shit gets interesting. The fifth
circuit is the creation of neurosomatic feedback loops, that when activated,
introduce a feeling of rapture or mystical bliss. This is the circuit of
Aristotle’s aesthetic or Plato’s divine forms. It is the entry level budding
awareness of consciousness beyond linear time and physical body. Think yoga,
meditation, runner’s high, intense prayer or fasting.
6. The neuroelectric
or metaprogramming circuit – This is when it starts to get really weird.
This circuit is the beginning of self-awareness and meta programming of the
nervous system. Think grades of enlightenment in Alchemy or Hermeticism. Think
the Great Work in western magickal traditions. In Christianity this is known as
the process of divinization (theosis) or the transforming process by grace of
becoming like God.
7.
The neurogenetic or morphogenetic circuit– As you might have guessed this circuit takes your consciousness global. This is the movement beyond the individual awareness and into the realm of eternal genetic memory. Think DNA-RNA-brain feedback loops that
remove your sense of “I” or at least transcend basic
individual awareness. The Buddhists call this sunyata or emptiness or void. The
Hermeticists call this union with your Holy Guardian Angel. The Christian
mystics call this union with God. The Greeks equated it with the great god Pan
or the Gaia consciousness. Think Akashic records or hacking into the collective
unconscious of all life and memory. In cybernetic theory this is the full flow
of information without contingency of artifact.
8. The psychoatomic
or quantum non-local circuit (Overmind) – This one’s totally fucked. It
remains indescribable. God consciousness comes close. Some mystics throughout
history have been rumored to have attained this incredible state of being. Think
kundalini awakening, or kensho, or sudden satori.
Wilson uses this model to wax poetic on the human condition
with a detached humor that truly sets him apart from most other “popes.” Each
chapter builds on a circuit so the presentation is from one circuit to the next
in order. The exercises at the end of each chapter are designed to help you
open or activate the circuit at hand. But calm down. This is some totally weird
shit and he almost constantly pokes fun at himself and admits to the entire
work being conjecture at worst or truth at best. After all reality is what you
can get away with …
It helps that he and Leary were dear friends and worked on
the theories together. It also helps that he ties in Freud and Jung, and almost
all known philosophers and mystics throughout history to illustrate his point.
So well in fact that it is eerily accurate in some ways and shockingly stupid
in others. Some of the shit he says is so off the wall that you almost can’t
help but wonder if he’s just fucking with you (spoiler alert, he is).
This work is like a house of cards within a house of cards.
Simple on the surface but so chock full of references from almost all walks of
life and thought, that one can’t help but marvel at his great mind and
abilities at synthesis.
Perhaps my favorite part about Uncle Anton is his genuine curiosity. He is a lover of life and of humanity. He’s utterly tolerant. He refrains from labeling anything permanently. It’s one of the most freeing experiences to view the world in this fashion. I’ve read this work multiple times and still sometimes practice the exercises when I’m bored. Just for kicks. But like any good raft, you should
probably leave it behind once you get to the other side of
whatever river you’re crossing.
Don’t forget everyone is a pope (even you). Solid fresh.
By Matt Cowart
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