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''or Evolving Magico-Spiritual Techniques of Consciousness-Making'' by Manie Eagar

''or Evolving Magico-Spiritual Techniques of Consciousness-Making'' by Manie Eagar

'''Abstract''' -  With the expansion of [[consciousness]] comes new ways of seeing [[reality]]. The hypercontextual  pretexts,  contexts  and  subtexts  created  by  the  new technologies of virtual, immersive and cyber realities create boundaryless [[experience]]s that are analogous to the archaic techniques evolved through [[shaman]]ic journeys designed to [[transcend]] all [[human]] boundaries.  

'''Abstract''' -  With the expansion of [[consciousness]] comes new ways of seeing [[reality]]. The hypercontextual  pretexts,  contexts  and  subtexts  created  by  the  new technologies of virtual, immersive and cyber realities create boundaryless [[experience]]s that are analogous to the archaic techniques evolved through [[Shamans|shamanic]] journeys designed to [[transcend]] all [[human]] boundaries.  

The magico-spiritual [[imagination]], far from disappearing in our supposedly secular age, continues to feed the utopian dreams, apocalyptic [[vision]]s, digital phantasms, and alien obsessions that populate today’s ‘technological unconscious’.  The  [[language]]  and  [[ideas]]  of  the  [[information]]  [[society]]  have slipped into and even transformed the myriad worlds of contemporary [[spirituality]]. What is emerging is a networked framework for grappling with some of the impulses that are currently tearing us apart: [[spirit]] and the [[machine]], modernity and nihilism, technology and the human. ‘We find ourselves  trapped  on  a  cyborg  sandbank,  caught  between  the  old, smouldering campfire stories and the new networks of programming and control’ (Davis 1998: 131). We are ‘beached’ between the archaic sea of our magico-spiritual ancestors, freshly emerged from our proto-modern past, and spawned into the [[postmodern]] reality of fragmented selves, networked options, downloadable digitized consumerware and ‘technologies of [[ecstacy]]’.  

The magico-spiritual [[imagination]], far from disappearing in our supposedly secular age, continues to feed the utopian dreams, apocalyptic [[vision]]s, digital phantasms, and alien obsessions that populate today’s ‘technological unconscious’.  The  [[language]]  and  [[ideas]]  of  the  [[information]]  [[society]]  have slipped into and even transformed the myriad worlds of contemporary [[spirituality]]. What is emerging is a networked framework for grappling with some of the impulses that are currently tearing us apart: [[spirit]] and the [[machine]], modernity and nihilism, technology and the human. ‘We find ourselves  trapped  on  a  cyborg  sandbank,  caught  between  the  old, smouldering campfire stories and the new networks of programming and control’ (Davis 1998: 131). We are ‘beached’ between the archaic sea of our magico-spiritual ancestors, freshly emerged from our proto-modern past, and spawned into the [[Contemporary Philosophy|postmodern]] reality of fragmented selves, networked options, downloadable digitized consumerware and ‘technologies of [[ecstacy]]’.  

<blockquote>Reality is under construction (Ernesto Barros Cardoso)</blockquote>

<blockquote>Reality is under construction (Ernesto Barros Cardoso)</blockquote>

The [[power]] to evoke images in one’s [[mind]] - to see and believe something that is very different from what one normally sees and believes, or what one thinks one should see and believe - is a [[process]] of coming to new [[knowledge]]. When one’s view of how things happen is temporarily challenged and suspended, a doorway opens - a doorway where anything seems possible. The shaman is someone who lives permanently in a state of [[wonder]], and tries to understand these [[things]] without  fear.  With  understanding  comes  knowledge,  and  with knowledge, power.   

The [[power]] to evoke images in one’s [[mind]] - to see and believe something that is very different from what one normally sees and believes, or what one thinks one should see and believe - is a [[process]] of coming to new [[knowledge]]. When one’s view of how things happen is temporarily challenged and suspended, a doorway opens - a doorway where anything seems possible. The shaman is someone who lives permanently in a state of [[wonder]], and tries to understand these [[things]] without  fear.  With  understanding  comes  knowledge,  and  with knowledge, power.   

For the [[shaman]], [[seeing]] is an active power and imagination is a [[sense]], which brings information on different dimensions of reality. Common reality is as much a function of one’s imagination as dreams are. The shamanic [[adventure]] works on all levels of reality.  

For the [[shaman]], [[vision|seeing]] is an active power and imagination is a [[sense]], which brings information on different dimensions of reality. Common reality is as much a function of one’s imagination as dreams are. The shamanic [[adventure]] works on all levels of reality.  

Dreams take place outside of [[spacetime|space and time]] - therefore are perceived as ‘unreal’ - a liminal arena in which no-space and notime and now-space and now-time overlaps.  

Dreams take place outside of [[spacetime|space and time]] - therefore are perceived as ‘unreal’ - a liminal arena in which no-space and notime and now-space and now-time overlaps.  

==Modern technologies of knowing and reality manufacture==

==Modern technologies of knowing and reality manufacture==

Excerpted from ‘Shamanism is the original neurotheology’ article on Dr. Winkelman’s homepage located at http://www.public.as u.edu/~atmxw/neur o.html.

Excerpted from ‘Shamanism is the original neurotheology’ article on Dr. Winkelman’s homepage located at https://www.public.as u.edu/~atmxw/neur o.html.

Shamanism, then, represents a series of individual performances in a dynamic complex across space and time, a going beyond (Luna and White 2000). A key aspect of shamanism from ‘both worlds’, from the landscapes of the Southern African San Bushman and the Amazonian ayahuascero, is that it is a way which embraces a deep relationship with nature.   

Shamanism, then, represents a series of individual performances in a dynamic complex across space and time, a going beyond (Luna and White 2000). A key aspect of shamanism from ‘both worlds’, from the landscapes of the Southern African San Bushman and the Amazonian ayahuascero, is that it is a way which embraces a deep relationship with nature.   

Parallel consciousness takes on another dimension for physicist Fred Alan Wolf - altering the way in which we see reality alters reality. Existence as we know it is a subset of reality which is unknowable. Our minds are tuneable to these multiple dimensions or multiple realities (Wolf 1991).  

Parallel consciousness takes on another dimension for physicist Fred Alan Wolf - altering the way in which we see reality alters reality. Existence as we know it is a subset of reality which is unknowable. Our minds are tuneable to these multiple dimensions or multiple realities (Wolf 1991).  

From her online ‘Immersense’ exhibition notes: http://www.immerse nce.com/immersenc e_home.htm.

From her online ‘Immersense’ exhibition notes: https://www.immerse nce.com/immersenc e_home.htm.

==Em-bodi-ment (mind/body alchemy)==

==Em-bodi-ment (mind/body alchemy)==

==Manufacturing reality==

==Manufacturing reality==

‘Experience Design: And the Design of Experience’ by Erik Davis. Paper published on the Internet at: http://www.techgnosis.com/experience. html. This piece will appear in a forthcoming issue of the Australian magazine Arcadia.

‘Experience Design: And the Design of Experience’ by Erik Davis. Paper published on the Internet at: https://www.techgnosis.com/experience. html. This piece will appear in a forthcoming issue of the Australian magazine Arcadia.

Altered states of consciousness are real, and as our media technologies get better at drawing us in and out of them, artists and other non-coercive proponents of the human spirit (or whatever you want to call it) need to become familiar with these states, not simply as a source of inspiration, but as modes of expression, communication, and confrontation itself. By recognizing that the material that we are now focused on is not technology but human experience itself, then we take a step closer to that strange plateau where our inner lives unfold into an almost collective surface of shared sensation and reframed perception  -  a surface on which we may feel exposed and vulnerable, but beginning to awake.  

Altered states of consciousness are real, and as our media technologies get better at drawing us in and out of them, artists and other non-coercive proponents of the human spirit (or whatever you want to call it) need to become familiar with these states, not simply as a source of inspiration, but as modes of expression, communication, and confrontation itself. By recognizing that the material that we are now focused on is not technology but human experience itself, then we take a step closer to that strange plateau where our inner lives unfold into an almost collective surface of shared sensation and reframed perception  -  a surface on which we may feel exposed and vulnerable, but beginning to awake.  

#Barbour, J.B. (2000), The End of Time: The Next Revolution in Physics, New York: Oxford University Press.   

#Barbour, J.B. (2000), The End of Time: The Next Revolution in Physics, New York: Oxford University Press.   

#Bateson, G. (1976), ‘Invitational Paper’, CoEvolution Quarterly,  http://www.oikos.org/batdual.htm. Bateson, G. (1978), Steps to an Ecology of Mind, London: Granada.  

#Bateson, G. (1976), ‘Invitational Paper’, CoEvolution Quarterly,  https://www.oikos.org/batdual.htm. Bateson, G. (1978), Steps to an Ecology of Mind, London: Granada.  

#Bateson, G. (2000), Steps to an Ecology of Mind, Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Calvino, I. (1993), Time and the Hunter, London: Picador.  

#Bateson, G. (2000), Steps to an Ecology of Mind, Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Calvino, I. (1993), Time and the Hunter, London: Picador.  

#Carroll, P. (1987) Liber Null and Psychonaut: An Introduction to Chaos Magic, USA: Weiser. Connerton, P. (1989), How Societies Remember, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Davis, E. (1998), Techgnosis: Myth, Magic and Mystery in the Age of Information, UK: Serpentstail.  

#Carroll, P. (1987) Liber Null and Psychonaut: An Introduction to Chaos Magic, USA: Weiser. Connerton, P. (1989), How Societies Remember, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Davis, E. (1998), Techgnosis: Myth, Magic and Mystery in the Age of Information, UK: Serpentstail.  

#Davis, E. (2000), ‘Adventures in Inner Space: Meet the Psychonauts’, first published in the Drugs Issue of American Feed Magazine, 6 November 2000. Paper can be found on the Internet at http://www.techgnosis.com.

#Davis, E. (2000), ‘Adventures in Inner Space: Meet the Psychonauts’, first published in the Drugs Issue of American Feed Magazine, 6 November 2000. Paper can be found on the Internet at https://www.techgnosis.com.

#Eagar, M. and Potgieter, E. (2002), ‘Exploring the contours of mind & consciousness through  Magico-spiritual  techniques’,  in  NeuroTheology:  Brain,  Science, Spirituality & Religious Experience, California: University of California Press.   

#Eagar, M. and Potgieter, E. (2002), ‘Exploring the contours of mind & consciousness through  Magico-spiritual  techniques’,  in  NeuroTheology:  Brain,  Science, Spirituality & Religious Experience, California: University of California Press.   

#Harner, M. (1990), The Way of the Shaman, San Francisco: Harper SanFrancisco.  

#Harner, M. (1990), The Way of the Shaman, San Francisco: Harper SanFrancisco.  

#Metzner, R. (ed.) (1999), Ayahuasca: Human Consciousness and the Spirits of Nature, New York: Thunder’s Mouth Press.  

#Metzner, R. (ed.) (1999), Ayahuasca: Human Consciousness and the Spirits of Nature, New York: Thunder’s Mouth Press.  

#Robinson,  J.M.  (ed.)  (1990),  The  Nag  Hammadi  Library,  revised  edition,  San Francisco: HarperCollins.   

#Robinson,  J.M.  (ed.)  (1990),  The  Nag  Hammadi  Library,  revised  edition,  San Francisco: HarperCollins.   

#Rohrer, T. (1995), ‘Boundless Paradox: a discussion of Heraclitus, Anaximander and Gorgias’, paper posted at:  http://philosophy.uoregon.edu/metaphor/psabstr.htm.  

#Rohrer, T. (1995), ‘Boundless Paradox: a discussion of Heraclitus, Anaximander and Gorgias’, paper posted at:  https://philosophy.uoregon.edu/metaphor/psabstr.htm.  

#Sutin,  L.  (1995),  The  Shifting  Realities  of  Philip  K.  Dick:  Selected  Literary  and Philosophical Writings, New York: Vintage.  

#Sutin,  L.  (1995),  The  Shifting  Realities  of  Philip  K.  Dick:  Selected  Literary  and Philosophical Writings, New York: Vintage.  

#Tart, C.T. (1969), Altered States of Consciousness: A Book of Readings, USA: John Wiley.  

#Tart, C.T. (1969), Altered States of Consciousness: A Book of Readings, USA: John Wiley.