133 - The Cyber Society

Program Notes

Guest speakers: Dr. Timothy Leary and Eldridge Cleaver

[NOTE: The following quotes are by Dr. Timothy Leary.]

“We know that typically the real changes in human nature, the changes in human politics and economics and society, are brought about by two things: By people who have a map or a vision or a model of where we’re going to go, these are the philosophers. And then the technicians, the people who get together the printing presses, or the compasses, or the high technology that can take us where we want to go.”

“Viewed in the 1930s, when Einstein came to America, he was considered as far out as a crack dealer.”

“Heisenberg taught us to take the universe very personally … in both senses of the word.”

“So who? Who’s gonna prepare a civilization of factory workers and farmers and people who haven’t even got the Model T Ford yet? Who’s gonna prepare them for an Einsteinian, relativistic, quantum physical, ever-changing, probabilistic universe? Who? Well you know who you can count on at every time in human history when we had to make a big philosophic lurch forward. Who always came to the front and saved the day and made us feel happy and comfortable with a new future? I’m talking about those friends of ours who have always been around when we needed them, the musicians, and the artists, and the poets, and the writers, and the bards, and the performers, and the storytellers, and, OK, the minstrels, the rock n’ rollers. Right! The actors, the script writers.”

“The whole 20th Century, to me, is the story of how artists and writers prepared us to be comfortable in a quantum-physical world.”

“We’re talking about a generation of people who, since the time they were born, have been inundate by data, electronic data. To the Baby Boomers and subsequent generations electronic data is the ocean they swim in.”

“Of course, everybody got down on the poor doctor [Benjamin Spock]. He was blamed for the excesses of the sixties, ha ha. I was glad to have him get blamed otherwise I would have gotten blamed.”

“The psychedelic pudding hit the fan in the sixties when the Spock kids hit high school and college, and they wanted a gourmet education, and they wanted connoisseur sex. … Gee, we said you’re the best, but we didn’t realize that you guys would take us seriously.”

“The Cyber Society is a society made up of individuals who think for themselves, linked up with other individuals who think for themselves.”

“The Sixties were the adolescence of the Baby Boom.”

Following the talk by Dr. Leary I play a short personal message from Eldrige Cleaver to Timothy Leary that was recorded on January 7, 1995. The message Cleaver was so intensely trying to convey to his friend, Tim Leary, was that he believed it was imperative that the U.S. elect a woman president in the year 2000. Unfortunately, neither of these two important historical figures are alive today, and thus we can only speculate as to what they would think about the state of affairs in 2008.

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Transcript

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Greetings from Cyberdelic Space.

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This is Lorenzo, and I’m your host here in the Psychedelic Salon.

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This is Lorenzo, and I’m your host here in the Psychedelic Salon.

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And I want to begin today’s podcast with a huge thank you to Max K., Derek J., and Tor L., who made very generous donations to help offset the expenses of these podcasts.

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Max, Derek, and Tor, I really appreciate your help.

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Thanks a lot, you guys, and I hope you enjoy today’s program,

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which I’m thinking of as Tim Leary with a twist,

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which you’ll understand better after we hear today’s talk.

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Lately, I’ve been spot-checking various recordings from the Timothy Leary Archive,

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which were sent to me, by the way, from the Futique Trust,

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who provided these materials under the same Creative Commons license that I use here in the salon.

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And I also want to acknowledge the fact that it was actually through the good graces of our friend Bruce Dahmer that these recordings actually made their way to me.

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You’ve heard Bruce on several podcasts here,

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but what you should also know is that Bruce is the person most

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instrumental for me being able to use all of this wonderful Leary material, and he’s

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also the person who secured the use of the trialogue recordings from Ralph Abraham.

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I don’t mention his name very often, but I do want you to know what an important role

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Bruce Dahmer continues to play here in our salon.

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Anyway, I’ve been trying to find some good examples of Dr. Leary’s thinking about psychedelic substances

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and that also have a good sound quality.

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Eventually, I plan on getting all of these recordings podcast,

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but for now, I want to first give you a sampling of the wide range of his thinking.

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So, instead of one of his more esoteric talks,

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today I’m going to continue my little mini-history lesson about the cultural transformation that took place

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as the mind-numbing 50s were replaced by a less rigid frame of mind.

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Actually, the talk we’re about to hear was recorded in late March of 1987

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at a conference titled, The Sixties, Leaders and Legacies. And Dr. Leary’s talk was titled,

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and it really isn’t fully clear which was the official title, but it was either The Cyber

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Society or The Counterculture. And let me get one of my pet peeves out of the way here.

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I refuse to let those screwheads in our nation’s capitals call us the counterculture.

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We are the culture, the human culture.

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They’re the ones who are bucking the trends of humanity

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with their counterculture of fast food and conspicuous consumption.

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Sorry about that.

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But I just think it’s about time we take back our sense of place in human society.

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Actually, I didn’t mean to sound so angry just now.

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The truth is, I really get a kick out of laying that rap on my Republican friends.

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And it can be a real mind-opener for these conservatives

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to begin to see that they aren’t really in the majority anymore.

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They really are the counterculture and you can almost see their heads beginning to explode when the truth hits them.

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For most of them, such an aha moment can maybe be their first psychedelic experience and on the natch at that.

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Now how did I get so far off track? All I intended to say just

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now was that we’re about to hear another talk that is more about the journey we’ve taken to

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get to this place in time than it is about lessons learned on a deep psychedelic journey. In a way,

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I think it’s always good to pause once in a while and take a look back to see whether or not we’ve been traveling down the right road and if we’re actually going forward.

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Now, please keep in mind that this talk was given over 20 years ago.

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You know, back in the day when Pac-Man and Centipede were the hot games.

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Back before the iPod.

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Back even before Tim Berners-Lee came up with his idea for the World Wide Web.

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You know, a lot has taken place since this talk was given.

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So now let’s join the famous and infamous Abbie Hoffman as he introduces Dr. Timothy Leary for a Sunday morning talk on March 22, 1987,

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which makes it almost exactly 21 years ago that this talk was originally given.

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Oh, and I better warn you,

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there are a few places where Timothy gets really excited and pounds his fist on the podium.

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Not only is it a little disconcerting if you’re listening to this on your headphones,

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but it also jiggled the microphone contact and adds some static to the pounding.

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And it’s really a nice effect once you get used to it.

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And I might as well also let you know right now that this tape came to quite a sudden and very unexpected end.

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And so far, I haven’t been able to locate the rest of it.

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and so far I haven’t been able to locate the rest of it.

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And actually, you might even find some kind of strange significance in the abrupt ending.

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Now, how’s that for a teaser?

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Okay, I’ll be quiet now.

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Let’s join Abby Hoffman.

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In the post-60s world of holistic medicine,

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at a time when we talk about self-help and ancient herbal remedies and spiritual healing and things like this,

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one of our local institutions that seems to typify the exact opposite of it is the Kaiser Medical Facilities that proliferate around here.

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Our next speaker, and this may be hard for you to believe, was a director of psychological research at the Kaiser Foundation Hospital in Oakland for something like 16 years.

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I’m talking, of course, about Timothy Leary,

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who went on from Kaiser to Harvard University

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where he began experimenting with things like the sacred mushroom and LSD

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at the Center for Personality Research,

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for which he was balanced from Harvard in 1963.

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Fortunately, he did not go back to Kaiser.

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Timothy Leary has written widely about his experiences.

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The best place to start, if you don’t know much about it, I would recommend his autobiography,

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a book called Flashbacks, that was published a few years ago by Torture Books.

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It’s a very good book.

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flashbacks that was published a few years ago by Torture Books, a very good book.

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And I’m always struck when I look at that book at the enthusiasm, the passion that underlay the early research in mind-changing drugs.

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It’s the same kind of enthusiasm and scientific adventure that you find when you read Watson’s

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book, The Double Helix, about scientific research on DNA.

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There’s a tremendous enthusiasm and belief in possibilities. Of course, the rest of the world

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didn’t see things like that. And for his troubles in research and various experiments

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and outrageous behavior, Timothy Leary was bounced around this country in a lot of directions

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including prison, from which he escaped at one point, went off to Europe,

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hid out with Eldridge Cleaver in Algeria for a while

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and eventually returned to America and made good.

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He is today the president of a computer software company called Futique, which is the opposite of Antique, you may have guessed.

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Does the counterculture live? How so? Let me introduce to you Timothy Leary.

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Thank you. Thank you.

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I was happy to be back in Bay Area.

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As we learned this morning, I spent many a year in this area, considered home.

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Well, we’re looking back and forward today.

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I must say, a lot of things have changed.

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A lot of things have changed. But one thing hasn’t changed, and that is my basic bumper sticker, my basic T-shirt, my basic compass reading.

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It remains the same.

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It can be summarized in the five wonderful American red, white, and blue words,

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T-F-Y-Q-A.

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Think for yourself and question authority.

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And it is my pleasure and my obligation today to encourage you and possibly help empower you to think for yourself. Because thinking for yourself is not only the greatest thrill that can come to a member of our species, Homo sapiens sapiens, but it’s also kind of risky.

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of our species, homo sapiens sapiens,

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but it’s also kind of risky.

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As you well know, there are many institutions that go back thousands of years

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and are apparently stronger today than ever

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that are totally dedicated to the proposition

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that human beings are not supposed to think for themselves.

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Now, I wanted to raise a basic question

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that came up in my mind and I bet it came up in your mind, too.

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I’m not being cosmic when I say,

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why are we here today?

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Now, the more cynical will say,

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I think of all the sea reasons, that we’re here for cash.

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Well, that’s not really true, because I want you to know that all the speakers that came here,

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most of them, of course, all of them are getting half, maybe a third, maybe a fifth of what they would ordinarily demand

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if they talked to the public out, the rest of the country.

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So there’s something special about San Francisco

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that brought Dr. Benjamin Spock up from St. Thomas

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and the rest of us from around the world.

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I think one of the reasons for me, and maybe for many of you,

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is just plain, good old-fashioned curiosity

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to see how we’ve all changed in the last few years.

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I debated Abby Hoffman

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twice in the last two weeks,

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once with Hunter Thompson.

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That’s a thrill and a half.

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Hunter hasn’t changed.

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We debated Eldridge Cleaver in Toronto. Eldridge is saying it’s got to be militant. Hunter hasn’t changed.

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We debated Eldridge Cleaver in Toronto.

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Eldridge is saying,

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it’s got to be militant.

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You’ve got to be tough.

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You’ve got to have everyone in uniform.

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You’ve got to fight the enemy.

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The enemy’s got to do this and that.

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If you’re not part of the solution,

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you’re part of the problem.

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He was saying the same thing today he was saying 15 years ago,

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except then it was

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the good guys were Marxist-Leninism

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and the bad guys were the Republicans.

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And now, well, there’s a Republican

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Christian, but still the same old message.

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So he hasn’t changed.

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Of course, Abby hasn’t changed.

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Thank God.

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The more I see of Abby,

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I’ve seen him often in the last 20 years.

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I’m just grateful to have been around at a time when he’s been around.

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He’s been a failing beacon, source of energy and wit and sharp crusading zeal.

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Now, I disagree with Abby about 1% of the time.

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99% of the time, we’ve got the same enemies out there.

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It’s what our solutions are concerned.

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Naturally, his solutions are different from mine.

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But it’s always a great pleasure to be around Abby.

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I think I should mention something about Harry Edwards.

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As you probably know, there was some sort of misunderstanding yesterday,

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and Mr. Edwards did not speak at this group. I don’t pretend to know anything about the

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rights and wrongs of the situation, but I do want to honor

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what Harry Edwards has done in the past, that time in 1968 in

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Mexico City when it was Tommy Smith and

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those two young American individuals stood up there and told

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the world that they were unhappy with what’s going on.

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That goes down in history.

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My book is one of the great examples of individual, peaceful, dramatic, cybernetic signal sending.

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And, you know, of all places, the Olympic Games, folks, oh, jeez, there’s supposed to

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be carnivals and celebrations of nationalism, huh?

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And as individuals get up and express their opinion, oh, my God, we’ve got to stop that

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sort of stuff.

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I don’t know what the issue was yesterday. I feel that many changes have taken place in America in the last 20 years,

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but certainly our record on race relations is abysmal and deplorable and disgraceful,

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and I think that if in any way his action yesterday would remind us that,

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oh, we haven’t even begun on that issue. I thank him for that.

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Now, the title of my talk, at least as I have it in my mind, is as follows.

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Got it?

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You ready?

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I’m going to be talking about the cyber society.

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Colon.

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The popularization and personalization of high-knowledge technology in the roaring 20th century.

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Okay?

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I’ll run it through one more time.

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I start with roaring 20th century.

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Well, listen, folks.

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I’m 66 years old.

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I’ve been around

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seven decades.

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So for me,

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all this talk about

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the 60s decade

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and the 50s and the 80s,

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come on, that’s kiddie stuff.

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Let’s back up a little

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and get the perspective

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of centuries.

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Then you get to see

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that these decades

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are little waves,

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they’re little ripples

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of something that the pattern emerges maybe over eight or nine you get to see that these decades are little waves, they’re little ripples of something

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that the pattern emerges

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maybe over eight or nine

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or ten or twelve

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of these decades,

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particularly fast-moving decades

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like the ones

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we’ve been through

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in the roaring 20th century.

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So,

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from this panoramic viewpoint,

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I can tell you

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that the 20th century

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was roaring.

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It’s taken us

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seven or eight

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brief decades

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from a

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civilization

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of robot

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assembly worker

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Newtonian

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factory people

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into what’s

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the beginning

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of the new thing

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you call it

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the information age

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communication age

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the golden age

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of psychology

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the age of individual

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cyberpunk

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cybernaut

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millions of names

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we don’t have the right names yet

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but we all know

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that’s happening

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and it’s been my pleasure in the last 66 years to have surfed almost every one of these wonderful decade waves.

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Now, it all began, in my viewpoint, very conveniently around the turn of the century.

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We know that typically the real changes in human nature, the changes in human politics and economics and society,

00:15:55 ►

are brought about by two things, by people who have a map or a vision or a model of where we’re going to go.

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map or a vision or a model of where we’re going to go.

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These are the philosophers. And then the technicians, the people that get together the printing presses or the compasses or the high technology

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that can take us where we want to go. At the turn of the century, we had some magnificent

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philosophic navigators peering into the future. Einstein,

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Einstein, of course, and again, Einstein probably didn’t

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say this, but it’s what we think Einstein said

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and what a lot of people are afraid Einstein said

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when he talked about relativity

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that in order to understand yourself

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you have to understand the other point of view

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the other perspective

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and that my velocity and location

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can be determined only in terms of someone else

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I mean that is heavy duty stuff

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and all the monotheisms

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and the fundamentalist religions

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philosophy couldn’t handle that

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you know that in

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1930 when Einstein came to America

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he was considered as

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far out as a

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crack dealer.

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Really, really. The bishops

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and priests would say

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relativity, they sensed that

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Einstein had somehow let loose

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all the solidities and the stabilities

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the idea of relativity.

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They knew, as Jerry Falwell knows today, that cultural relativity or ethical relativity,

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you’re determining the right and wrong, so the situation depends upon the other situation.

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Hey, that’s something that the boys cannot let happen.

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So Einstein deserves a great deal of credit for stirring things up.

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But that was nothing.

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Max Planck and the quantum physicists said,

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sorry, Newton, all these theories about heavy-duty material world of force

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and momentum and energy and work

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and all those Bank of London heavy-duty conservative energy concepts.

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That works in a narrow, narrow range.

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But listen, Isaac,

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the basic elements of reality

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from galaxies to quarks

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are clusters and probability waves

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of off-on things called quanta

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or bits or bytes or yin-yang.

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Oh, in other words,

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now is that scary?

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Talk about a bad acid trip.

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The poor Farmer Brown,

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or the poor guy in the turn of the century,

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his wife, they’re trying to get together.

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It’s all a word.

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Suddenly, Einstein says,

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it’s all relative.

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And the quantum physics,

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hey, every place you put your fingers,

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it’s, you know, that’s unsettling.

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And then Heisenberg came along

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and did the most incredible,

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incredible thing.

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He said,

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you never know anything

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about what’s going on out there

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except as you determine it

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by your technology,

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by your instruments,

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and by your thoughts

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and by your perceptions.

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So, in other words,

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it’s a very,

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Heisenberg taught us

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to take the universe

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very personally

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in both senses of the word.

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Now, if that’s true,

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that if my reality is determined by my technology,

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it’s a drop of blood,

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and I eyeball it,

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and you look at it through the microscope,

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and you look at the electron,

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we’ve got three different versions of reality.

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Hey, oh, poor Farmer Brown,

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he’s got a headache.

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How could he possibly become comfortable

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and happy and enjoy life in a world made up of

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changing relative parts of the closest things and where you make up your own mind about it?

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Well, the physicists were no help at all. Those guys are running around with the technology and

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knowledge technology that was paleolithic. They were on the cave walls. They were using chalk.

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in knowledge technology that was paleolithic.

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They were on the cave walls.

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They were using chalk.

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Amazing.

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Isn’t that amazing?

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Suppose Einstein had Pac-Man.

00:19:31 ►

Or Niels Bohr had, you know,

00:19:33 ►

one of these centipede games

00:19:36 ►

where he was moving things around the screen.

00:19:38 ►

Anyway, they didn’t.

00:19:39 ►

So, the man and woman in the street,

00:19:42 ►

you know, heard these guys make these,

00:19:43 ►

you know, formula,

00:19:45 ►

made no sense. So, so who who’s going to

00:19:48 ►

prepare a civilization

00:19:49 ►

of factory workers and

00:19:51 ►

farmers and people that haven’t got the model

00:19:53 ►

T4 yet who’s going to prepare them for

00:19:56 ►

it Einsteinian relativistic quantum

00:19:58 ►

physical ever changing

00:20:00 ►

probabilistic universe who

00:20:01 ►

well you know who you can count on

00:20:03 ►

at every time in human history

00:20:05 ►

when we had to make

00:20:05 ►

a big philosophic lurch forward.

00:20:08 ►

Who always came to the front

00:20:09 ►

and saved the day

00:20:10 ►

and showed us

00:20:11 ►

and made us feel happy

00:20:12 ►

and comfortable

00:20:12 ►

with the new future?

00:20:14 ►

I’m talking about

00:20:15 ►

those friends of ours

00:20:16 ►

that have always been around

00:20:17 ►

when we needed them.

00:20:18 ►

The musicians

00:20:18 ►

and the artists

00:20:20 ►

and the poets

00:20:21 ►

and the writers

00:20:22 ►

and the bards

00:20:23 ►

and the performers

00:20:24 ►

and the storytellers and the, you know, hey, the minstrels, the rock and the writers and the bards and the performers and the storytellers

00:20:26 ►

and the, you know,

00:20:26 ►

the minstrels,

00:20:27 ►

the rock and rollers,

00:20:29 ►

right?

00:20:30 ►

The actors,

00:20:31 ►

the script writers,

00:20:32 ►

sure.

00:20:35 ►

The whole 20th century

00:20:36 ►

to me is a story

00:20:38 ►

of how artists

00:20:39 ►

and writers

00:20:40 ►

prepared us

00:20:41 ►

to be comfortable

00:20:42 ►

in a quantum physical world.

00:20:44 ►

For example, just

00:20:45 ►

during the century, the artists took Newtonian reality and they totally demolished it. The

00:20:50 ►

expressionists, you know, the impressionists, just panes of light coming out, hitting your

00:20:56 ►

eyeball. That’s television, really. And then the pointillists, you know, Sorrell was literally painting in dots of, like your Amiga computer, pixels.

00:21:07 ►

The serialists, the Dada people, for 20, 30, 40 years, all these artists were telling Farmer Brown,

00:21:18 ►

hey, it’s not what you see there, not what you touch, but, and gradually, then the commercial people took it over.

00:21:23 ►

And the advertising people produced it.

00:21:23 ►

touch but and gradually then the commercial people to get over and the advertising pretty soon we’re all fairly comfortable dealing in a Salvador Dali

00:21:27 ►

world where watches go over the end and Cubism ourselves yeah hey big step

00:21:33 ►

forward we owe a great great debt to certain audio physicists who came up to

00:21:41 ►

Mississippi they were afro-american descent and taught us how to demolish the old

00:21:45 ►

musical standards. I’m talking about

00:21:47 ►

the black jazz musicians

00:21:49 ►

that really blew the old

00:21:51 ►

19th century music. In the 19th century,

00:21:53 ►

it was all factory music. You had

00:21:55 ►

Beethoven, you had 17th

00:21:57 ►

violins, and you had nine cellos over here.

00:22:00 ►

And occasionally a soloist

00:22:01 ►

could do the

00:22:03 ►

prescribed, you know prescribed individual stuff.

00:22:07 ►

But the jazz musicians got out there,

00:22:09 ►

and they taught us improvisation and syncopation and innovation,

00:22:13 ►

and you never heard the same thing.

00:22:15 ►

And not only was I encouraged to innovate and improvise,

00:22:18 ►

but you were going to be listening to me and not lay off back,

00:22:20 ►

and then you’d take over and improvise.

00:22:21 ►

So pretty soon, instead of just one of us improvising,

00:22:23 ►

there were three, four, five, eight of us improvising.

00:22:25 ►

Now we’re talking Marshall McLuhan talk

00:22:27 ►

when we do that.

00:22:30 ►

Then the

00:22:31 ►

writers, I’ll tell you about James Joyce

00:22:33 ►

and most of the poetry of the 20th century.

00:22:35 ►

Again, breaking the word line, breaking the

00:22:37 ►

grammatical line.

00:22:39 ►

Radio was a great help. Radio was

00:22:41 ►

fabulous by 1920s and 30s

00:22:43 ►

when Farber Brown and his wife could

00:22:46 ►

turn the dial of that little box

00:22:48 ►

and suddenly mystical

00:22:50 ►

magical waves come in

00:22:51 ►

and they could hear Amos and Andy.

00:22:54 ►

That was very comforting.

00:22:56 ►

Or Lowell Thomas every

00:22:57 ►

evening. Or, believe it or not,

00:23:00 ►

Farber Brown could watch the king of

00:23:02 ►

England, he’d listen to the king of England

00:23:03 ►

renouncing his throne for the woman he loved. or they could hear Hitler, Nuremberg,

00:23:07 ►

that really made it live, or they could hear Franklin Del Roswell declaring

00:23:11 ►

World War II, was it? Yeah.

00:23:17 ►

That was not the Sony War, was it?

00:23:19 ►

No, that was the Pearl Harbor War. I’m kind of keeping straight here.

00:23:26 ►

All right.

00:23:27 ►

Then, of course, screens.

00:23:29 ►

The old black and white films.

00:23:33 ►

That was amazing, you know.

00:23:34 ►

It was amazing.

00:23:35 ►

Once you got going,

00:23:36 ►

you wouldn’t predict it,

00:23:38 ►

but Farmer Brown and Mrs. Brown

00:23:39 ►

actually accepted the reality

00:23:41 ►

of jittery little figures on a screen.

00:23:44 ►

Indeed, those realities of Clara Bow and Clark Gable were more real than the people that they lived with.

00:23:50 ►

Interesting sign.

00:23:51 ►

The culture is getting softened up to see things in a screen, quantum, physical, electronic way.

00:23:58 ►

Well, World War II brought a sonar radar, television television

00:24:06 ►

the baby boomers

00:24:08 ►

by the time they were

00:24:11 ►

three or four years old, every day

00:24:13 ►

with their little chubby hands

00:24:14 ►

turning the boob tube

00:24:15 ►

every day

00:24:19 ►

they experienced more data

00:24:21 ►

more bits and bytes, more information

00:24:23 ►

more panoramas, more geography more history, more bits and bytes, more information, more panoramas, more geography, more history, more hype, more bullshit, you name it.

00:24:28 ►

In one day, they experienced more.

00:24:30 ►

They took in more data than the greatest Marco Polos in history before.

00:24:35 ►

So we’re dealing here with a new culture and civilization and new species.

00:24:40 ►

I don’t know.

00:24:41 ►

We’re talking about a generation of people who, since the time they were born,

00:24:45 ►

have been inundated by data, electronic data. To the baby boomers and the subsequent generations,

00:24:52 ►

electronic data is the ocean they swim in. It’s the mother’s milk they sucked in.

00:24:56 ►

It’s the stuff they peeped and pooped in their little plastic diapers. Data, data, data.

00:25:01 ►

They popped it, snorted it, snuffed it. Talk about a new generation.

00:25:08 ►

Now, the baby boomers, of course, are interesting for many reasons.

00:25:11 ►

They dominated the last half of the 20th century.

00:25:13 ►

And I found it a great pleasure to be in this room yesterday.

00:25:17 ►

I’m down at a bar in San Francisco later on yesterday afternoon where I could really talk to Dr. Benjamin Spock.

00:25:24 ►

I consider him to be one of the most influential philosophers of all time. later on yesterday afternoon where I could really talk to Dr. Benjamin Spock.

00:25:26 ►

I consider him to be one of the most influential philosophers of all time.

00:25:29 ►

Now, he may not agree with that.

00:25:31 ►

You know, it’s an interesting thing

00:25:32 ►

that sometimes people express things

00:25:34 ►

they’re not aware of.

00:25:35 ►

Maybe, I don’t know,

00:25:36 ►

I don’t realize how important.

00:25:38 ►

He’s such a modest man.

00:25:40 ►

What he did

00:25:41 ►

was give us a Bible

00:25:44 ►

of the 21st century,

00:25:46 ►

the information age.

00:25:47 ►

You had to have Dr. Spock

00:25:48 ►

telling parents,

00:25:49 ►

see, that’s the thing,

00:25:50 ►

he’s not talking to high school kids,

00:25:51 ►

he’s talking to parents.

00:25:54 ►

And that Bible was

00:25:55 ►

a common sense book

00:25:56 ►

of child and baby care.

00:25:58 ►

And he told parents,

00:25:59 ►

I was one of them

00:26:00 ►

after World War II,

00:26:01 ►

we all walked around with this book.

00:26:03 ►

He’ll deny it,

00:26:03 ►

he’ll say he didn’t say that in any book. I don’t care what he actually said. What we thought he said.

00:26:10 ►

Much more important.

00:26:13 ►

Treat your kids as individuals.

00:26:18 ►

Treat your kids as individuals.

00:26:20 ►

Yeah. The cliche is demand feeding.

00:26:24 ►

You don’t feed them. In a factory civilization, there can cliche is demand feeding. You don’t feed them when…

00:26:25 ►

In a factory civilization,

00:26:26 ►

there can’t be demand feeding.

00:26:28 ►

You can’t feed people individually.

00:26:29 ►

You got to line up there

00:26:30 ►

and you got to put that screw in

00:26:31 ►

every time the hubcap comes along.

00:26:33 ►

You can say,

00:26:34 ►

hey, Cheech, I’m going to eat.

00:26:36 ►

Get back there, Chong.

00:26:37 ►

You can’t eat.

00:26:39 ►

What kind of eat, man?

00:26:41 ►

We have to eat at 12 when the bell rings.

00:26:43 ►

Well, I’m hungry now.

00:26:44 ►

Well, you can’t. You got to eat when the bell rings well I’m hungry now well you can’t

00:26:45 ►

you gotta eat

00:26:45 ►

when the bell rings

00:26:46 ►

in a factory civilization

00:26:47 ►

but here comes

00:26:48 ►

Dr. Spock

00:26:49 ►

telling hey

00:26:49 ►

feed them when they’re hungry

00:26:51 ►

basically

00:26:58 ►

of course everybody

00:26:59 ►

got down on the poor doctor

00:27:00 ►

he was blamed

00:27:01 ►

for the excesses

00:27:02 ►

of the 60s

00:27:02 ►

haha

00:27:03 ►

I was glad to have him

00:27:04 ►

get blamed otherwise I would have gotten blamed.

00:27:21 ►

What’s the opposite of that?

00:27:30 ►

They did?

00:27:31 ►

What happened yesterday?

00:27:34 ►

They shut it down?

00:27:40 ►

Oh, you’re the dread couple from Houston.

00:27:41 ►

Oh, my God.

00:27:49 ►

Let’s make a deal, all right?

00:27:52 ►

You’ll get three minutes, huh?

00:27:54 ►

Later on, you get three minutes, okay?

00:27:56 ►

One and a half each, okay?

00:27:57 ►

All right. Think about that. Thank you. deals are kind of hard, aren’t they? Anyone else got a comment or anything? Okay, we’re

00:28:26 ►

talking about Benjamin Spock and this whole thing he did. Basically, you know, you could

00:28:32 ►

say that he started the consumer society. Now, I know that left-wing people and a lot

00:28:39 ►

of new age people think it’s terrible about the materialistic consumer society. But, you know, basically it’s letting the individual decide what she or he wants

00:28:48 ►

and giving them a fair shot at getting it.

00:28:51 ►

I’m a great, great supporter of the consumer society.

00:28:55 ►

And by the way, I think Andy Warhol was an incredibly important American.

00:28:58 ►

How about you know about Andy Warhol?

00:29:03 ►

I’m not a great admirer of Rolling Stone magazine,

00:29:07 ►

but the current issue of Rolling Stone magazine

00:29:10 ►

has a wonderful article about Andy Warhol.

00:29:13 ►

He lays down some of the stuff that Andy was saying.

00:29:16 ►

See, Andy was your first television kid.

00:29:19 ►

Andy said, gee, gee,

00:29:21 ►

life is like a television show.

00:29:24 ►

Talk about soap operas.

00:29:26 ►

Come on over to my place.

00:29:29 ►

And Andy, you know, could never get terribly involved

00:29:33 ►

because he was tape recording everything.

00:29:35 ►

And the badder it got, the crazier it got around him,

00:29:39 ►

the better show he had taped.

00:29:40 ►

I mean, that’s a powerful, powerful concept of human lubrication, you know.

00:29:47 ►

When you think about it, Andy was suggesting that anybody, you can do it.

00:29:51 ►

You can get a $30 t a p erecor d er an d a$ 40 Polaroid and you’re in Andy Worrell’s business.

00:29:57 ►

You can record everything that happens to you.

00:29:59 ►

And all the people that give you a bad time or a good time, you got all the, you know.

00:30:02 ►

All the people that give me a bad time or a good time.

00:30:11 ►

You know, the concept that you’re the director and producer and photographer of your own life film.

00:30:15 ►

You know, Andy would never say that because all Andy ever said was, great.

00:30:19 ►

Great.

00:30:26 ►

Anyway, Dr. Spock, you know, in a sense, symbolizes the notionock you know in a sense symbolizes the notion you know

00:30:26 ►

hey

00:30:27 ►

Pepsi generation

00:30:28 ►

Wheaties

00:30:29 ►

they’re just champions

00:30:30 ►

you’re the top

00:30:32 ►

go all the way

00:30:32 ►

you’re entitled

00:30:33 ►

you’re American

00:30:34 ►

hey

00:30:34 ►

don’t settle for anything

00:30:35 ►

go out there

00:30:36 ►

that’s heavy duty

00:30:37 ►

stuff to tell the children

00:30:38 ►

of a factory civilization

00:30:40 ►

that they can go

00:30:41 ►

and get the best

00:30:42 ►

but anyway

00:30:42 ►

that’s what we thought

00:30:43 ►

he said

00:30:44 ►

now the that they can go and get the best. But anyway, that’s what we thought he said.

00:30:51 ►

The whole thing was fine when we as parents were building primary schools

00:30:54 ►

or building high schools and colleges

00:30:57 ►

and selling the kids hula hoops and all that.

00:30:59 ►

But the psychedelic pudding hit the fan in the 60s when the Spock kids hit high school and college

00:31:10 ►

and they wanted a gourmet education.

00:31:13 ►

They wanted connoisseur sex.

00:31:15 ►

They wanted a connoisseur selective war

00:31:19 ►

or not war in Vietnam.

00:31:20 ►

They wanted gourmet drugs.

00:31:26 ►

I mean, gee,

00:31:27 ►

we said you’re the best,

00:31:29 ►

but we didn’t realize that you guys would take us seriously.

00:31:32 ►

I actually want it.

00:31:38 ►

You know, I don’t think Benjamin Spock understood that.

00:31:40 ►

I didn’t understand it.

00:31:41 ►

He didn’t understand what would happen

00:31:43 ►

when children who’ve been treated as

00:31:47 ►

individuals suddenly hit

00:31:48 ►

adolescence and sexual

00:31:53 ►

blasphemy and all that.

00:31:56 ►

Okay.

00:31:59 ►

I’ve been

00:31:59 ►

talking to you about

00:32:01 ►

knowledge technology.

00:32:03 ►

Remember I talked about art and I talked about poetry and I talked about jazz and I talked about movies

00:32:10 ►

and I talked a little about computers and then, of course, not about computers but about television.

00:32:15 ►

In 1976, though, a real wave happened and it was born, not in a manger in Bethlehem, but in a garage in Silicon Valley, where St. Stephen I and St. Stephen II brought us the personal thought appliance, the home computer.

00:32:38 ►

And they called it, Apple, after the first member of our species, Homo sapiens, the first person to think for herself, of course, Eve in the Garden of Eden,

00:32:47 ►

who ate the unauthorized fruit.

00:32:59 ►

I’ve been involved in computer adventure, the computer experience, for about four years now.

00:33:08 ►

And I was brought into it by a man named Buddy Diamond.

00:33:11 ►

Buddy, where’s Buddy?

00:33:12 ►

Buddy is from St. Paul.

00:33:14 ►

He did the NFL challenge anyway.

00:33:16 ►

Buddy picked me off of a plane going from St. Paul to New York and said,

00:33:20 ►

you’re going to have a career, boy, in software.

00:33:23 ►

He’s a strong-minded man.

00:33:24 ►

Here I am. I’ve been involved in software for He’s a strong-minded man. Here I am.

00:33:25 ►

I’ve been involved in software for about four years now.

00:33:28 ►

And we’re all very disappointed.

00:33:30 ►

We’re all very disappointed in ourselves and the culture.

00:33:33 ►

Why?

00:33:33 ►

Because we know these personal computers,

00:33:35 ►

now the Amigas and the enhanced color and graphics,

00:33:38 ►

can put on your screen stuff better than you’ve seen it on the big movie screen.

00:33:43 ►

You can literally be the director or producer of your own films. I mean, there’s simply

00:33:46 ►

no end to the

00:33:47 ►

thought classification and thought processing

00:33:50 ►

and changing it. And yet

00:33:52 ►

it hasn’t happened. Why? Why?

00:33:54 ►

Why don’t we have…

00:33:55 ►

My wife, Barbara, is a very intelligent person,

00:33:58 ►

a very sophisticated person. And I have a 13-year-old

00:34:00 ►

boy who’s very intelligent.

00:34:01 ►

Neither one of them would look at a piece of

00:34:04 ►

software.

00:34:06 ►

They went through Pac-Man, they went through it five years ago, but they’re going to play

00:34:09 ►

Pac-Man for the rest of their life.

00:34:12 ►

There is simply no software for intelligent, college-educated, book-reading, movie-reading,

00:34:19 ►

people who like to be electrostimulated.

00:34:22 ►

Sure, there’s word processing and there’s accounting sheets, but I mean,

00:34:25 ►

what is there

00:34:25 ►

that would really

00:34:26 ►

take the place

00:34:27 ►

of a great book?

00:34:28 ►

Well,

00:34:29 ►

when we tear our hair

00:34:30 ►

and say,

00:34:30 ►

geez,

00:34:30 ►

how have we failed?

00:34:32 ►

You realize

00:34:33 ►

that this whole profession

00:34:34 ►

is only 11 years old.

00:34:37 ►

See,

00:34:37 ►

Wozniak and Jobs

00:34:38 ►

didn’t invent it,

00:34:39 ►

but they put it together

00:34:40 ►

and merchandised it

00:34:41 ►

in 1976.

00:34:42 ►

So,

00:34:42 ►

we’re only an 11-year-old kid.

00:34:44 ►

Now,

00:34:44 ►

I believe in recapitulation.

00:34:45 ►

I believe ontogeny repeats phylogeny.

00:34:48 ►

I think cosmology repeats biology.

00:34:51 ►

I think electronics recapitulates everything.

00:34:56 ►

We’re only 11 years old.

00:34:58 ►

First we had Pong.

00:35:00 ►

That was little baby stuff.

00:35:01 ►

And then we got Pac-Man.

00:35:02 ►

That’s kind of baby stuff.

00:35:03 ►

And then we got, what was it, Donkey Kong, we learned how to walk around.

00:35:07 ►

Then we got Donkey Kong Jr., we could swing like a primate, that’s getting up there.

00:35:11 ►

When Activision, Infocom, came out with a game called The Leather Goddesses of Phobos last year,

00:35:21 ►

leaving aside the sexist implications, or the kinky sex implications, but the very thought

00:35:27 ►

that the software public was getting interested in things like boys and girls is a good sign

00:35:33 ►

in the wind.

00:35:34 ►

So maybe you’ll have some…

00:35:37 ►

I’m proud to say that I have done a shakedown cruise of the software industry, and I have

00:35:42 ►

located a few intelligent, sophisticated people in software.

00:35:46 ►

And one of them is in the audience tonight, Stuart Bond from Electronic Arts.

00:35:49 ►

Where’s Stuart?

00:35:51 ►

Hey, there he is right there.

00:35:52 ►

He’s produced my product, Mind Mirror, Electronic Arts.

00:35:58 ►

And he’s one of the rare and special people in the field.

00:36:02 ►

Tim Mott of Electronic Arts and Brenda Laurel of Activision.

00:36:06 ►

By the way, I’m working on a software program

00:36:09 ►

which I think is very relevant

00:36:10 ►

to a discussion about the 60s and the future.

00:36:13 ►

It’s a program based upon a book called Neuromancer.

00:36:16 ►

How many of you have heard of the book Neuromancer

00:36:17 ►

by William Gibson?

00:36:19 ►

You’ve got to think about this.

00:36:21 ►

William Gibson, Neuromancer.

00:36:22 ►

It has started a new genre of literature called cyberpunk, if you’re ready for that. Neuromancer is a science fiction book. It won all three awards, the Hugo, the Nebula, and the prestigious Philip Dick Award.

00:36:42 ►

but it’s not science fiction it’s more science fiction

00:36:43 ►

it’s the way the world is going to be in ten years from now

00:36:45 ►

like it or not

00:36:46 ►

you can even see it around the corner

00:36:47 ►

if you know where to look

00:36:48 ►

a very interesting world

00:36:50 ►

which I’d like to tell you a little about

00:36:52 ►

and very comforting

00:36:53 ►

because it’s a world that’s post-political

00:36:54 ►

post-partisan politics

00:36:56 ►

almost totally post-religion

00:36:59 ►

it’s an interesting world

00:37:01 ►

that Gibson lays out in this book

00:37:03 ►

so we’re doing a software program called Neuromancer.

00:37:09 ►

Now, the key concept here is cyber, cyberpunk.

00:37:14 ►

You’re going to hear a lot about cyberpunk.

00:37:15 ►

I’ve got an article in Spin Magazine this week about cyberpunk.

00:37:19 ►

The word cyber is a wonderful word.

00:37:21 ►

It’s my key to the early 20th century.

00:37:24 ►

Cyber.

00:37:25 ►

Now, I hate the word cybernetics.

00:37:27 ►

Cybernetics was developed by Norbert Wiener in 1948.

00:37:29 ►

He said, cybernetics is the science of control and feedback of biological human processes or biomechanical.

00:37:38 ►

Control, control, control.

00:37:40 ►

But you look up the word cyber, and the word cyber comes from the Greek word pilot

00:37:45 ►

Wiener made it

00:37:50 ►

governor or made it steersman

00:37:52 ►

pilot

00:37:53 ►

see

00:37:55 ►

the Greeks were sailors

00:37:58 ►

and they were out there sending their little craft around the Mediterranean

00:38:00 ►

and they couldn’t get any

00:38:02 ►

radio

00:38:04 ►

instructions from headquarters.

00:38:05 ►

There was no manual

00:38:06 ►

or book or Bible

00:38:07 ►

to tell them what to do.

00:38:08 ►

They had to weave their way

00:38:09 ►

through the islands

00:38:09 ►

and they had to check the,

00:38:10 ►

they didn’t have any

00:38:11 ►

navigational stuff,

00:38:12 ►

tour maps,

00:38:12 ►

and get their way back.

00:38:14 ►

They had to think for themselves.

00:38:15 ►

T-F-Y-Q-A.

00:38:16 ►

You sure had to do that

00:38:17 ►

if you were a Greek pilot.

00:38:19 ►

And it’s no accident, perhaps,

00:38:20 ►

that once those pilots

00:38:21 ►

got back on land,

00:38:23 ►

they developed

00:38:24 ►

the great,

00:38:25 ►

great moments of human philosophy where everyone was running around thinking for him or herself.

00:38:30 ►

The philosophies in Athens were thrilling. Everybody thought they had the right to work

00:38:34 ►

out their own philosophy. See, the word steersman comes from the Latin word stare, which means

00:38:42 ►

to stand or it means to stuck a stand on.

00:38:45 ►

That leads to status, state,

00:38:47 ►

prostitution, constitution, institution.

00:38:49 ►

Get it?

00:38:50 ►

The Roman word,

00:38:51 ►

the Romans were not out there,

00:38:53 ►

individuals piling their boats.

00:38:55 ►

The Romans were in galleys, right?

00:38:56 ►

The Romans were building aqueducts,

00:38:58 ►

building enormous roads

00:39:00 ►

which they’re marching all their release.

00:39:01 ►

So to them,

00:39:02 ►

a steersman is someone

00:39:03 ►

who’s steering legions down that.

00:39:07 ►

Very different from the word pilot.

00:39:12 ►

So if cyber means pilot, see, that ties into Heisenberg.

00:39:16 ►

Because Heisenberg is basically saying, everyone, physicists or not,

00:39:20 ►

you’re kind of crafting, you’re navigating your own way through reality.

00:39:30 ►

And the word cyber suggests that have a model that if enough people become pilots of their lives we could have what’s called a cyber society and I

00:39:33 ►

remember remember that was a title of my talk the cyber society the right major

00:39:37 ►

forget didn’t I okay we made it okay thought I was rambling, didn’t you? The cyber society is a society obviously

00:39:55 ►

made up of individuals, individuals who think for themselves. Linked up with other individuals who think for themselves.

00:40:06 ►

So, what does this mean?

00:40:07 ►

According to, in Gibson’s world, of course, it’s all knowledge.

00:40:13 ►

People don’t work in the near future, except in countries where they want to work,

00:40:18 ►

because it’s insulting, humiliating for any human being to be forced economically to perform

00:40:26 ►

a behavior that can be done better

00:40:28 ►

by a robot or

00:40:30 ►

computer.

00:40:32 ►

So, oh my God, if we don’t

00:40:34 ►

work, what about the Protestant ethic?

00:40:36 ►

Ha ha ha!

00:40:38 ►

What about the worker’s paradise, the Soviet

00:40:40 ►

Union? Yeah, what happened to that?

00:40:42 ►

If we’re not going to work, what are we going to

00:40:44 ►

do? Because after all, the aim of life is to work. Freud said it. And my what happened to that? If we’re not going to work, what are we going to do? Because after all,

00:40:45 ►

the aim of life is to work.

00:40:47 ►

Freud said it.

00:40:48 ►

And my daddy told me that too.

00:40:50 ►

Work is the key.

00:40:51 ►

If we don’t work,

00:40:52 ►

what are we going to do?

00:40:52 ►

Well, number one,

00:40:55 ►

you’re going to pilot, navigate.

00:40:57 ►

Number two, you’re going to perform.

00:40:59 ►

Number three, you’re going to,

00:41:00 ►

you know, you’re going to work

00:41:01 ►

in an information center.

00:41:04 ►

Interestingly enough, you know, there’s a lot more fun and a lot more challenge, a lot more to do if you’re not a worker. Because if you’re going to work in an information set that interestingly enough, you know

00:41:05 ►

there’s a lot more fun and a lot more challenge

00:41:07 ►

a lot more to do if you’re not a worker

00:41:09 ►

because if you’re a worker, you’re just doing what you’re told

00:41:10 ►

but if you’re out there navigating, piloting, charting

00:41:13 ►

figuring out, maneuvering

00:41:15 ►

through this new world of information, there’s a lot to do

00:41:17 ►

another thing about

00:41:20 ►

the cyber society that

00:41:22 ►

Gibson and his friends

00:41:24 ►

portray is a tremendous individual choice.

00:41:29 ►

There’s no more complaining about the government or about what happened to persecution.

00:41:35 ►

In an age of affordable beauty, you can be as beautiful as you want.

00:41:40 ►

Now, we know that a lot of people that become pretty fanatic and angry about life are people that don’t think they’re good-looking.

00:41:47 ►

You know, I mean, think about it.

00:41:49 ►

You look in the mirror and you don’t like what you see there.

00:41:51 ►

You’re going to be a pain in the ass for the rest of the day if you ask me.

00:41:54 ►

So, now, you see, this is a heavy concept.

00:41:57 ►

Remember, the Catholic Church wants everybody dressed the same.

00:42:00 ►

And under Maoism, everyone wore the same wonderful psychedelic black robe. It was heavy

00:42:06 ►

duty. Well, you can wear a little color. No shit color. Well, you can raise the skirts a little,

00:42:11 ►

or you can change it. I mean, I can wear anything I want to wear. Hey, that’s pretty revolutionary,

00:42:16 ►

isn’t it? Well, if you can do that, then maybe I can have my hair the way I want it to. Yeah,

00:42:21 ►

maybe I can put on makeup or not. Even men? No, not men.

00:42:25 ►

Oh, yeah, sure.

00:42:29 ►

Well, if I can change the way I look and I dress and all that,

00:42:30 ►

and cosmetics,

00:42:32 ►

then get surgery.

00:42:34 ►

Facial surgery?

00:42:35 ►

Yeah, why not?

00:42:36 ►

Then you get into muscle implants.

00:42:37 ►

What do you want?

00:42:38 ►

Play for the Lakers?

00:42:39 ►

Okay, baby.

00:42:39 ►

You want two more feet?

00:42:40 ►

Hey, boy, give this girl two more feet.

00:42:44 ►

You can literally, there’s girl two more feet you can literally

00:42:46 ►

there’s no excuse anymore

00:42:47 ►

you can literally

00:42:48 ►

be the person

00:42:49 ►

you want to be

00:42:49 ►

of course that’s

00:42:50 ►

the looks

00:42:50 ►

is the least important

00:42:51 ►

it’s the mind

00:42:52 ►

the ability

00:42:52 ►

to maneuver

00:42:53 ►

and manage

00:42:55 ►

your mind

00:42:56 ►

then the word

00:42:56 ►

cyber

00:42:57 ►

cyber is no longer

00:42:59 ►

00:43:00 ►

it’s PSY

00:43:01 ►

get it

00:43:02 ►

yeah

00:43:03 ►

because in the future everyone’s got to be a psychologist.

00:43:07 ►

You’ve simply got to be a psychologist.

00:43:08 ►

You’re not a psychologist.

00:43:09 ►

You’re not able to keep up with what’s going on.

00:43:14 ►

Oh, yeah.

00:43:15 ►

So, race, racial problems.

00:43:18 ►

Presumably, they’ll be diminished in a world where you can be any color you want for as long as you want to.

00:43:24 ►

Go for it.

00:43:27 ►

Make a statement.

00:43:33 ►

Politics.

00:43:34 ►

That was kind of interesting.

00:43:35 ►

See, nationalism is finished.

00:43:38 ►

The people who run the world,

00:43:40 ►

talking about the Swiss and the Japanese, of course,

00:43:46 ►

simply don’t want to have Russia and America bombing each other

00:43:48 ►

because Japan owns America

00:43:50 ►

and don’t destroy all that real estate

00:43:53 ►

so nationalism is pretty

00:43:55 ►

beyond

00:43:56 ►

pale in the next

00:43:59 ►

20 or 30 years

00:44:00 ►

there are no police

00:44:04 ►

very much because you see in a society where

00:44:08 ►

scarcities are all artificial we know that you know where there’s less

00:44:11 ►

scarcity you don’t need police that way the police the main police are that

00:44:15 ►

brain police the mind police the scientific police every big the big big

00:44:19 ►

multinational combines that control most of the world they want to control they

00:44:24 ►

have their own police forces that kidnap

00:44:25 ►

scientists, you know, or kidnapping techniques

00:44:28 ►

and so forth. And there’s a tremendous

00:44:30 ►

police force to protect

00:44:31 ►

your data. So you’re not protecting territory

00:44:34 ►

anymore. You’re protecting the

00:44:36 ►

structures and the

00:44:38 ►

edifices of data.

00:44:41 ►

See,

00:44:42 ►

data,

00:44:44 ►

cyberspace data

00:44:45 ►

is a new

00:44:46 ►

continent

00:44:46 ►

that we have

00:44:47 ►

to explore

00:44:47 ►

you know

00:44:47 ►

anyway

00:44:48 ►

I won’t get

00:44:48 ►

too far

00:44:48 ►

into that

00:44:49 ►

but

00:44:49 ►

the

00:44:51 ►

people that

00:44:53 ►

run things

00:44:54 ►

it’s a very

00:44:54 ►

pragmatic

00:44:55 ►

society

00:44:56 ►

information society

00:44:57 ►

like Andy Warhol

00:44:58 ►

see Andy Warhol

00:44:59 ►

doesn’t really

00:45:00 ►

care that much

00:45:01 ►

about what you do

00:45:01 ►

not going to

00:45:02 ►

try to

00:45:02 ►

order you around

00:45:03 ►

the people that run things don’t care about drugs or sex they’re not going to try to order you around.

00:45:08 ►

The people who run things don’t care about drugs or sex or anything like that.

00:45:09 ►

See, as long as you’ve got to consume.

00:45:13 ►

And there’s an enormous, enormous underground in Gibson’s world.

00:45:18 ►

I mean, there’s enormous jungles where people are selling hot DNA chips and black market brain implants from Tokyo.

00:45:24 ►

And the people who run things like that.

00:45:26 ►

Because, see, most of these moralities and crusades

00:45:31 ►

come from, you know, feudal people

00:45:32 ►

that can’t handle the notion of the information society.

00:45:36 ►

Well, what else?

00:45:38 ►

Oh, theology.

00:45:39 ►

There’s a tremendously, tremendously fascinating theology

00:45:42 ►

in Gibson’s stuff about the next level of higher intelligence or God,

00:45:50 ►

or I don’t care what you want to call her.

00:45:53 ►

The feudal God is a shepherd God.

00:45:58 ►

The Lord is my shepherd. He makes me lie down.

00:46:01 ►

And the Pope of Rome is the big shepherd.

00:46:05 ►

And he takes care of his flock.

00:46:06 ►

I mean, can you believe that?

00:46:07 ►

They’re still saying that today.

00:46:10 ►

In the industrial age, of course, God is the Newtonian engineer that runs everything and so forth.

00:46:16 ►

But the higher intelligence in an information age, psychological age, of course, like pure intelligence,

00:46:33 ►

Of course, like pure intelligence, it’s a very dignified, kind of amusing concept of higher intelligence that Gibson portrays.

00:46:34 ►

Well, now, wait a minute.

00:46:37 ►

What else can I possibly do in an hour?

00:46:40 ►

I’ve taken you through the wrong 20th century.

00:46:42 ►

I’ve explained physics, art, jazz.

00:46:45 ►

I’ve explained, what have I left? Politics, religion, jazz. I’ve explained… What have I left?

00:46:46 ►

Politics, religion, sex?

00:46:48 ►

What have I left?

00:46:54 ►

The 60s?

00:47:00 ►

Oh, the 60s were the adolescence of the baby boom.

00:47:03 ►

Each decade of the last half-century 20th century just marks a stage, a phase

00:47:06 ►

a metamorphic interlude

00:47:09 ►

in the baby boomers

00:47:12 ►

how many of you in this room

00:47:13 ►

between the ages of 25 and 40

00:47:15 ►

see the power

00:47:18 ►

I’m talking power

00:47:19 ►

friends, that’s power

00:47:21 ►

76 million baby boomers

00:47:23 ►

you totally monopolized

00:47:27 ►

American industry

00:47:28 ►

when you were in the Eisenhower days

00:47:30 ►

every time you whimpered

00:47:32 ►

the industry gave you what you wanted

00:47:34 ►

but you’ve never had any power politically

00:47:37 ►

it’s true that you elected

00:47:39 ►

a hippie president

00:47:41 ►

in 1976, Jimmy Carter

00:47:43 ►

howdy doody, That was pretty hot.

00:47:46 ►

Jimmy Carter with a sleeping bag and Bob Dylan records and lust in his heart, boy.

00:47:53 ►

Talking about peace and love.

00:47:56 ►

Human rights.

00:47:57 ►

Hey, give me a break, Jimmy.

00:47:58 ►

Smoke another joint.

00:48:00 ►

Peace and love.

00:48:02 ►

Oh, hey, you invited the Egyptian and the Zionist guy over there?

00:48:06 ►

Give peace a chance, Menachem?

00:48:09 ►

All you need is love, Sadat.

00:48:11 ►

You got rid of him.

00:48:12 ►

Anyway, see, the 60s, I’m glad you brought the 60s.

00:48:18 ►

The 60s started in the year 67.

00:48:21 ►

You remember that.

00:48:22 ►

Nothing much was happening in the year 64, believe me.

00:48:32 ►

The 60s started in 67. They peaked in 76 year 67. You remember that. Nothing much was happening in the year 64, believe me. The 60s started in 67. They peaked in 76 with Carter, gotta say that. And the 60s came to a lurch exactly, exactly where this tape cut off.

00:48:55 ►

But in a way, the strange ending to Dr. Leary’s talk has given me the sign that I should add one more short soundbite to this podcast.

00:49:04 ►

But first, I’d like to say a few things about the talk we just heard.

00:49:09 ►

There is a lot I’d like to say about it, but I’ll try to keep it to a few generalities.

00:49:14 ►

For one thing, I thought it was very touching of Dr. Leary to give Andy Warhol such a nice tribute.

00:49:20 ►

And if the dates in Wikipedia are correct, Andy had just died one month before

00:49:25 ►

this talk.

00:49:27 ►

So when you recall what Timothy said just a few minutes ago about artists being the

00:49:32 ►

ones we can always count on to pull humanity through its dark hours, well, it was a nice

00:49:38 ►

touch to have Andy Warhol mentioned and memorialized at the same time.

00:49:44 ►

Also, he mentioned his dream of the end of the Protestant work ethic.

00:49:49 ►

And if that topic is of interest to you,

00:49:52 ►

then I highly recommend a little book by Pekah Himinen titled The Hacker Ethic.

00:49:58 ►

And even if you aren’t into high tech and what you may think of as hackers,

00:50:03 ►

I think you’ll be surprised at the amazing philosophy contained in that little volume.

00:50:09 ►

Now, if you don’t come away with anything else after listening to one of Timothy Leary’s talks,

00:50:15 ►

I hope you come away with his mantra,

00:50:18 ►

think for yourself and question authority.

00:50:21 ►

Now, the example I’m about to use may seem really trivial at first blush, but my point in mentioning it is that even in the tiny little details of life, it can be interesting to think for yourself.

00:50:34 ►

And what I’m thinking about is a t-shirt that I saw a person wearing in the gym recently.

00:50:40 ►

I couldn’t make out the name of the company on the front, but on the back it read, Live Generously.

00:50:46 ►

Now that’s a nice thought, I thought at first.

00:50:49 ►

And then I noticed the little TM next to the phrase.

00:50:52 ►

Yep, those generously living people who made that shirt also trademarked the phrase, Live Generously.

00:51:01 ►

Which means that for saying it several times just now, I suppose I owe them some money.

00:51:06 ►

So I thought for myself and figured out that those people probably weren’t very generous themselves.

00:51:12 ►

They just want us to be generous so they can charge us for the idea.

00:51:16 ►

I know it’s a trivial example, but if you don’t think for yourself about these little things that assault our senses a thousand times a day.

00:51:25 ►

We will continue to be swept along in this mad commercial sea of advertising and consumption.

00:51:31 ►

Think for yourself about what things you really need and question all authority.

00:51:37 ►

All authority, particularly any authority types you might come across here in the salon, I might add.

00:51:43 ►

Think for yourself and question authority.

00:51:47 ►

And since I’m already off track, I also want to bring up Hunter S. Thompson, who Dr. Leary

00:51:52 ►

briefly referred to in the talk we just heard.

00:51:55 ►

While I’m sure that most of our fellow salonners are very familiar with Hunter Thompson’s work,

00:52:00 ►

there may be a few who haven’t read him yet.

00:52:02 ►

So I want to give you my recommendation on a book of Thompson’s that you might like.

00:52:07 ►

And that is his collection of short stories titled The Great White Shark Hunt.

00:52:12 ►

I won’t go on because I could talk about Thompson for a long time.

00:52:16 ►

But if you’re in the mood for some good laughs, well, just stop by your local library or bookstore and check out a copy.

00:52:23 ►

I’m sure the ghost of old Hunter will see that you

00:52:26 ►

are well entertained. Now one of the reasons I’m playing this particular talk of Dr. Leary’s today

00:52:32 ►

is that I’d like you to think about how excited he was with the state of technology at that

00:52:38 ►

particular moment in time and then think about how much things have changed during the course of the 21 years since he gave this talk.

00:52:46 ►

If you get a chance, you might want to go back and re-read Gibson’s Neuromancer Trilogy.

00:52:52 ►

I did just that not too long ago, and discovered that we may now be closer to the mad world of Gibson’s fiction

00:52:59 ►

than we are to the Ozzie and Harriet fantasy of the 50s.

00:53:03 ►

And here is one more example, maybe a little strained on my part,

00:53:07 ►

but after listening to the short 12-minute soundbite I’m about to play for you,

00:53:13 ►

well, I don’t know how to describe it, really.

00:53:16 ►

Maybe it’s just me and my connection to the news that was always playing in the background

00:53:21 ►

during those years that draws me to listen to this little clip again.

00:53:26 ►

But I guess you’ll just have to be the judge of this for yourself.

00:53:30 ►

In the introduction to today’s talk, we heard Abbie Hoffman mention Eldridge Cleaver.

00:53:36 ►

And then we heard Timothy Leary mention Cleaver as well.

00:53:39 ►

And since most of our fellow slaughters already know this history, I’ll try to be really brief.

00:53:45 ►

And this comes mainly from Wikipedia.

00:53:48 ►

Leary went to prison in January of 1970, and in September 1970, he escaped.

00:53:55 ►

Leary claimed his nonviolent escape was a humorous prank and left a challenging note for the authorities to find after he was gone.

00:54:06 ►

note for the authorities to find after he was gone. For a fee paid by the Brotherhood of Eternal Love,

00:54:13 ►

the weatherman smuggled Leary and his wife Rosemary Woodruff Leary out of the United States and into Algeria, where he sought the patronage of Eldridge Cleaver and the remnants of the separatist USA

00:54:19 ►

Black Panther Party’s government in exile. And after staying with them for a short time, Leary claimed that Cleaver had attempted to

00:54:28 ►

hold he and his wife captive or hostage.

00:54:32 ►

But in 1971, Leary fled or he escaped or whatever from Cleaver’s control and was on the run

00:54:39 ►

for a while before eventually returning to prison.

00:54:42 ►

Now, on some levels, Tim Leary’s life is really an amazing adventure story,

00:54:47 ►

and my recommendation for the first place to begin learning about it

00:54:51 ►

is from Dr. Leary’s own autobiography, which he titled Flashbacks.

00:54:56 ►

And it’s really a great read if you haven’t done so yet.

00:54:59 ►

But what I want to do now is to play a tape for you

00:55:02 ►

that I found in the Timothy Leary archive, and for some

00:55:06 ►

reason I can’t quite identify, it has struck a strange chord in me. As I just mentioned, there

00:55:12 ►

was a time in Tim Leary’s life when he didn’t think so highly of Eldridge Cleaver. Even as late

00:55:18 ►

as 1987, when the talk we just heard was given, I don’t think he sounded that close to Eldridge.

00:55:26 ►

Now, flash forward about eight years to January 7, 1995,

00:55:32 ►

and what you are about to hear is a private message that Eldridge Cleaver sent to a person he obviously considers a dear friend,

00:55:40 ►

Tim Leary.

00:55:42 ►

Now, this message is only about 12 minutes long, and in it, Eldridge Cleaver,

00:55:47 ►

the fiery former information minister for the Black Panther Party,

00:55:51 ►

is attempting to enlist Leary in his plan

00:55:54 ►

to help get a woman elected president in the year 2000.

00:55:59 ►

And as you listen to this very intimate message,

00:56:03 ►

just think about the fact that this very prominent and proud man of color believed a woman would be able to make it to the White House before a black man would.

00:56:13 ►

A little over three years after this recording was made, both Tim and Eldridge had died.

00:56:20 ►

So one can only wonder about what they would think about the election campaign now taking place here in the States.

00:56:27 ►

But right now, here is what Eldridge Cleaver was thinking on January 7th, Timothy.

00:56:53 ►

This is Eldridge Cleaver.

00:56:56 ►

I’m sending you a message to go along with the letter that accompanied this tape.

00:57:01 ►

I’m doing this in a public place, so there’s a lot of background noise.

00:57:06 ►

I’m at the Ex-Caravansary, which they now call the Expresso Roma Cafe. It’s on the corner

00:57:16 ►

of Ashby and College in Berkeley. This is my favorite spot that I come to. Timothy,

00:57:28 ►

spot that I come to. Timothy, I’m so happy to see you and talk to you and be back in touch with you.

00:57:45 ►

And I have a project which I beg you to participate in with me. I was thinking of this when I said to you that we can now crown our careers, you know.

00:57:51 ►

The struggle that we have both been involved in for many years definitely was aimed at creating a better world.

00:57:55 ►

And we are at a juncture now, both of you, you and myself,

00:57:59 ►

we are at a point in our lives now where we don’t have a lot of more time, a lot of more

00:58:05 ►

things to do, but as a result of the way that this country has been going politically, I

00:58:13 ►

believe that we are faced with a very major crisis, and I believe that you and I are well

00:58:21 ►

situated. We have been prepared to really do something very powerful and very useful for our country and for the world.

00:58:31 ►

I’ve spelled it out in some detail in the letter,

00:58:35 ►

but it has to do with the aspiration and the dream of America

00:58:41 ►

for the equality and the fulfillment of our national destiny

00:58:47 ►

and i believe that

00:58:49 ►

you and i can launch

00:58:51 ►

a movement

00:58:53 ►

that will result in the election of a woman

00:58:57 ►

to the presidency of the united states in the year two thousand the election of

00:59:00 ►

the year two thousand

00:59:02 ►

bill clinton stumbling around with his dick hanging out

00:59:05 ►

of his pocket, fucking up at every turn, weak, he is dissipating all of the influence and

00:59:12 ►

power on the Democratic Party and to the left of that. And we now have looming on the horizon

00:59:22 ►

this jerk Newt Gingrich and all that he represents and all the garbage.

00:59:26 ►

I’m sure that over the next couple of years until we get to 1996, which is the next presidential election year,

00:59:33 ►

we’re going to see this country being provoked and stirred up in a very unwholesome manner

00:59:40 ►

with the very strong possibility that we might end up either in 96 or in the year 2000

00:59:46 ►

with that jerk newt gingrich running for president or becoming president

00:59:50 ►

i don’t think he’ll be able to do it in 1996 but i’m sure he’s looking at that he’s also looking

00:59:56 ►

to 2000 well i believe that we can preempt the field by taking the action that I have spelled out in this paper.

01:00:05 ►

I don’t want you to misunderstand me.

01:00:08 ►

I am not talking about you and I having any kind of organizational responsibility.

01:00:15 ►

That’s why I said we would godfather the project.

01:00:18 ►

That is, we would launch it and put it out there.

01:00:21 ►

And then the women and the type of women that i mentioned on the list that i gave there

01:00:26 ►

these are the people that we can call together and i ask you to add some names to the list

01:00:35 ►

or delete some but we need a core group of women that we can meet with and nail down this project

01:00:42 ►

with and get them going on it and send out the call to

01:00:45 ►

America that we elect a woman president of the United States in the year 2000 to save

01:00:51 ►

this country from this old boy network which I have described very good I believe in the

01:00:57 ►

document and I am asking you to join with me in doing this.

01:01:02 ►

I will come down to LA and then we will have

01:01:06 ►

the press release to make out and then the pink paper, the position paper to draw up

01:01:12 ►

and the rest of it you and I are quite capable of handling at the press conference. We just

01:01:17 ►

have to announce this purpose, call the country to this emergency and sing up.

01:01:25 ►

We will publicly state the invitation to these women,

01:01:28 ►

but we will also send them a special invitation by mail.

01:01:33 ►

And then we have to decide on all these dates.

01:01:36 ►

I don’t know if there’s enough time to do this before the President’s State of the Union message.

01:01:42 ►

I’m quite willing to do it after.

01:01:44 ►

We would have to give it at least two weeks after he makes that speech

01:01:47 ►

because they’re going to be chopping that up for eons.

01:01:51 ►

And we might have to do it in February.

01:01:55 ►

But I would like to get it going as soon as we possibly can.

01:01:59 ►

I’ll come down to L.A. and huddle with you for a few days.

01:02:03 ►

And then we’ll call together some aides.

01:02:06 ►

We’ve got a group of aides who will help us at the press conference,

01:02:09 ►

and we’ll have to think about exactly how we do that and where we do it.

01:02:13 ►

I’d like to see it done in a first-class manner at some impressive location.

01:02:20 ►

It doesn’t have to be the Hotel Bonaventure.

01:02:22 ►

Maybe you have a better idea, and I’ll be willing to do it wherever you say.

01:02:26 ►

And let’s please get this thing in motion,

01:02:31 ►

because I think that when you look at all the problems that confront the United States,

01:02:37 ►

the main problem is the bad relationship between men and women.

01:02:41 ►

And it really goes back to the Inquisition,

01:02:45 ►

relationship between men and women, and it really goes back to the Inquisition, when the women were subjected to a holocaust by the Catholic Church, by lawyers and by doctors

01:02:53 ►

who were jealous of their power. The doctors and the lawyers framed up the evidence to

01:03:00 ►

support the charge of witchcraft, and then the Catholic Church put them on trial in the Inquisition tribunals.

01:03:09 ►

And they publicly executed over 100,000 women.

01:03:14 ►

They confiscated their property and sullied their name.

01:03:18 ►

These women were high priestesses of the goddess religion that goes back before recorded time and these people

01:03:29 ►

were respected by the masses they didn’t trust these doctors they did trust lawyers and they

01:03:34 ►

were very pissed off at the Catholic Church because of all of the atrocious shit that the

01:03:39 ►

Catholic Church was doing and the Dominican order were the ones who were like the court clerks in the Inquisition tribunals

01:03:50 ►

and they recorded what took place and the words and all that stuff

01:03:55 ►

and then after the tribunals were closed down in 1550

01:03:59 ►

the Pope ordered the Jesuits to take control of all of the education

01:04:04 ►

to suppress all memory of this procedure The Pope ordered the Jesuits to take control of all of the education,

01:04:08 ►

to suppress all memory of this procedure.

01:04:11 ►

And when the Jesuits went out to destroy the records,

01:04:15 ►

the Dominican order wouldn’t give them their files because they didn’t like the Jesuits for good reason.

01:04:18 ►

They didn’t trust them.

01:04:19 ►

They knew about a lot of dirty shit that the Jesuits had been doing.

01:04:22 ►

So they would not give them their records of the tribunal.

01:04:26 ►

And you may have heard of this theologian by the name of Matthew Fox

01:04:30 ►

who’s been censored and silenced by the Vatican a couple of times.

01:04:34 ►

He’s a member of the Dominican Order.

01:04:36 ►

He’s recently resigned because of all the repression that’s taken place in the church.

01:04:41 ►

And when you hear the Pope continually repeating that women cannot be ordained as ministers, it is because

01:04:46 ►

he fears

01:04:47 ►

what will happen if women are ever

01:04:50 ►

empowered again and to

01:04:52 ►

restore their respect and their

01:04:54 ►

stature, that there will be a

01:04:56 ►

vital threat to

01:04:57 ►

the male supremacy throne

01:05:00 ►

of the Pope. And you know

01:05:02 ►

men establish masculine

01:05:03 ►

supremacy over women masculine

01:05:06 ►

superiority I should say through brute force you see the image of the caveman

01:05:10 ►

dragging the woman by her hair into the cave this kind of shit but women didn’t

01:05:14 ►

believe in that a lot of men didn’t believe in that but the Catholic Church

01:05:17 ►

took the initiative to establish a theology, an ideology of masculine supremacy,

01:05:31 ►

preaching God the Father and the male Messiah Jesus.

01:05:35 ►

And this totally obliterates the logical necessity that our Creator must be both male and female.

01:05:40 ►

Otherwise, He could not have done what…

01:05:43 ►

I don’t like to say He about God,

01:05:47 ►

because God is not a He or a she. God is an us. God is not some fucking human being running around here.

01:05:52 ►

An old man on the clouds with a beard. That’s bullshit.

01:05:55 ►

And the world needs to be liberated from this.

01:05:58 ►

And I believe that when we take this step and deal with the gender healing by supporting these women,

01:06:07 ►

I think it will go a long ways to help break up this old boy network

01:06:10 ►

and put a woman’s heart in our politics

01:06:14 ►

so that we can stop bucking over the children, destroying the educational system,

01:06:18 ►

and playing these games that boys play with war toys and shit.

01:06:23 ►

We have an opportunity.

01:06:26 ►

We have a great challenge.

01:06:32 ►

The United States has a responsibility to straighten this fucking world up and nail it down and get this shit out of the way

01:06:34 ►

and get these punks out of the way and keep running around stirring up the water.

01:06:39 ►

We’re inundated by bullshit right now, Timothy.

01:06:42 ►

And you and I don’t have to try to control this organization.

01:06:48 ►

We only need to be members if the women invite us to be.

01:06:51 ►

I’m not talking about setting up an all-women’s organization,

01:06:54 ►

but I think that the kind of women that I have named here,

01:06:57 ►

the movers and the shakers, need to be at the heart of it, at the core of it.

01:07:01 ►

And if they want us on the board of directors, they can invite us.

01:07:04 ►

We can talk to them. But I’m not worried about that. I want them to pull together

01:07:09 ►

a large central committee or board of directors, whatever they want to call it, that would

01:07:14 ►

be staffed with qualified people who can then draw up their own documents and so forth, their procedures, and then begin the work now of establishing offices in every

01:07:30 ►

city of the United States and begin the process of propagandizing for the election of a woman

01:07:37 ►

in the year 2000.

01:07:39 ►

Which woman?

01:07:40 ►

I don’t know, but there are a lot of qualified women out there and we might take newt gingrich’s uh

01:07:47 ►

vocabulary and call for the election of a because i think the woman he called a is quite

01:07:54 ►

capable of doing the job but we’ll leave those details to the shaking our process it’s not for

01:07:59 ►

you and i to determine who this woman will be what you you and I can do, and it will be to our credit, it will be a great credit to the United States because we both have a lot of influence

01:08:11 ►

and respect upon millions and millions of people in the United States, and we put out

01:08:16 ►

the initial call to take this action, and then we will be in a supporting role from

01:08:22 ►

then on. We will support these women. We can brainstorm.

01:08:26 ►

I’m sure that you will have a billion ideas about how to put this out there and get it

01:08:31 ►

in circulation. And we have five years to make it work. We can do it, Timothy. Let’s

01:08:37 ►

do it. Please consider what I’m saying here. And then, after you read this stuff let me know

01:08:45 ►

give me some dates

01:08:46 ►

when we can sit down

01:08:47 ►

and talk

01:08:48 ►

and I’ll come down there

01:08:50 ►

and we’ll get this shit straight

01:08:51 ►

and we will change history

01:08:54 ►

as we have done

01:08:55 ►

considerably already

01:08:57 ►

but this time

01:08:58 ►

we will do a monumental task

01:09:00 ►

that no one is really

01:09:01 ►

talking about right now

01:09:02 ►

and let’s be the first ones

01:09:04 ►

to put this out there on the right now and let’s be the first ones to put this out

01:09:05 ►

there on the practical table and let’s make it happen all right tennessee hope you receive this

01:09:12 ►

i’m going to put in the mail right now and really looking forward to you digesting this

01:09:17 ►

and responding god bless you brother love you right. Talk to you later.

01:09:28 ►

Well, what can I say after that?

01:09:35 ►

Maybe you have to have lived through the days when Leary and Cleaver were in the news every night in order to get the full impact of this interesting message from the grave.

01:09:41 ►

Actually, I’ve been hesitating to play this little historical tidbit during the current

01:09:46 ►

U.S. election cycle because I most certainly don’t want to do anything to give the impression

01:09:52 ►

that I am in any way supporting the current woman candidate for president. I most definitely do not

01:10:00 ►

support the idea of having yet another Bush or Clinton family member continue to control the White House,

01:10:06 ►

as they have already done now for almost 30 years.

01:10:10 ►

As you know, I do my best to keep politics out of this podcast,

01:10:14 ►

and that will continue to be my goal.

01:10:17 ►

But I want to make it very clear that, yes, this old cynic,

01:10:22 ►

the guy who voted for Leonard Peltier in 2004,

01:10:26 ►

has actually been impressed by what Barack Obama is doing.

01:10:30 ►

Particularly among the most important and yet the least represented generations,

01:10:36 ►

those 35 years old and under.

01:10:38 ►

These are the people who are going to have to live with the consequences

01:10:42 ►

of continuing on the obviously irrational path that the

01:10:46 ►

U.S. has been on these past seven years, thanks in no small measure to our own inbred version

01:10:52 ►

of Caligula going ever more insane right before our eyes.

01:10:57 ►

Do I agree with everything Obama says?

01:10:59 ►

Of course not, and I doubt if many of his supporters do either.

01:11:03 ►

But when I was in college, I heard Kennedy give his inaugural address, and I doubt if many of his supporters do either. But when I was in college, I heard

01:11:05 ►

Kennedy give his inaugural address, and on the radio I also heard Dr. King’s famous

01:11:10 ►

I Have a Dream speech. And I can still remember many of the emotions that swept through me

01:11:16 ►

on those rare occasions. Now maybe I’m just morphing from a hardened cynic into a sentimental

01:11:22 ►

old man, but even if that’s the case,

01:11:29 ►

well, I’m sure it’ll seem like an improvement to my closest associates.

01:11:34 ►

But I have to tell you, particularly our fellow salonners who don’t live in the U.S., that there is something different about the spirit that this young, half-black, half-white politician

01:11:40 ►

is invoking in his audiences.

01:11:43 ►

While Mrs. Clinton struggles to get 800 people to attend

01:11:46 ►

her big rallies, Obama packs 18,000 more into auditoriums and turns more away at the door.

01:11:53 ►

I have no idea of what this is all about or where it’s leading, but I can tell you from my own

01:11:58 ►

experience that there’s an energy coming alive today that I hope is going to make the 60s look boring.

01:12:06 ►

So, as I think the captain of the Enterprise said, words to the effect of, make it so.

01:12:13 ►

Okay, enough. Sorry about that.

01:12:16 ►

But it sure felt good to get it off my chest.

01:12:19 ►

So there you have it. Lorenzo the Cynic is voting for Obama.

01:12:23 ►

Even if I have to write in his name

01:12:25 ►

on my ballot this November. And hopefully this will be my last political outburst, at

01:12:31 ►

least for a long time. Now let’s close with some feedback from a few of our fellow slaughters,

01:12:37 ►

and I’m trying to pick a couple of comments that represent the thoughts of several others

01:12:42 ►

as well. This is from Jeff M. who writes,

01:12:46 ►

I stumbled upon the Dopecast about four months ago,

01:12:50 ►

and luckily about two months ago,

01:12:53 ►

I came across, while listening to KMO on one of the early episodes of Psychonautica,

01:12:58 ►

your psychedelic salon.

01:13:00 ►

At first I was completely overwhelmed with all of the new information

01:13:04 ►

that I had come into contact with, and I had no clue where to go first.

01:13:09 ►

I had no idea that such a community even existed.

01:13:13 ►

I must admit that living in a predominantly white middle class area can be absolutely horrifying at times, not to mention pretty lonely.

01:13:26 ►

times, not to mention pretty lonely. However, after realizing that I am by no means alone in my worldviews and appreciation of these beautiful medicines, my life has become a lot more tolerable

01:13:32 ►

and much more enjoyable. Well, Jeff, thank you so much for bringing up the fact that while the

01:13:38 ►

psychedelic community is huge on a worldwide basis, the problem is that a good many of us feel like Thank you. friend my age who also used psychedelics and smoked a little grass, but we didn’t have

01:14:05 ►

any contact with others of like mind, primarily, I guess, because of where we were living.

01:14:11 ►

And then I went to an entheobotany seminar in Palenque, Mexico, and within six months

01:14:17 ►

I’d quit my job and moved to Southern California, where I now find myself surrounded by like-minded

01:14:22 ►

people.

01:14:24 ►

But not everybody can do what I did.

01:14:26 ►

At the time, my youngest child had already finished college.

01:14:31 ►

I was living alone and had no strings attached.

01:14:34 ►

You know, it was the perfect time for me to make a radical change in my life.

01:14:38 ►

In fact, such opportunities hardly ever happen to most people.

01:14:43 ►

So I figured that the next best thing to relocating physically is that a bunch of us could relocate in cyberspace for an hour or so each week

01:14:52 ►

and recharge through what I fantasize as eventually a 24 by 7 group mind of some kind.

01:15:00 ►

And we may be approaching the time when no matter when you are listening to one of these podcasts

01:15:05 ►

there will be several other people listening to the psychedelic salon also

01:15:10 ►

I have no way of monitoring the mirror sites and radio stations that are rebroadcasting these podcasts

01:15:17 ►

but on our own two servers I know that there’s never a minute of the day

01:15:22 ►

that several people aren’t downloading copies of the salon.

01:15:25 ►

So the chances are that no matter when you are with us here in the psychedelic salon,

01:15:30 ►

that there are some of your fellow salonners here with you.

01:15:34 ►

Now, getting back to reality, here is what else Jeff had to say.

01:15:40 ►

Your fantastic energy and incredibly informative work has deeply inspired me beyond words.

01:15:46 ►

I’m so grateful that people like yourself have gone to the lengths that you have to provide all of this information for free.

01:15:52 ►

Alas, I’m a student and have little to no income whatsoever.

01:15:56 ►

But I’d like you to know that if you keep doing what you’re doing into the following years, I will definitely be sending donations your way.

01:16:03 ►

I’m sure you get emails like this all of the time, but I really felt it just necessary be sending donations your way. I’m sure you get emails like this all

01:16:05 ►

of the time, but I really felt it just necessary to send something your way. Thanks for the kind

01:16:11 ►

words, Jeff, and I do admit to getting a lot of messages from students and people of all ages who

01:16:17 ►

have practically no disposable income, and yet they feel bad about not being able to make a

01:16:22 ►

donation to the salon. First of all, let me say that I’ve never had to ask for donations to meet our expenses

01:16:29 ►

because they just seem to always arrive at the right moment.

01:16:33 ►

It’s really amazing that some weeks there won’t be a donation and then several come in all at one time.

01:16:39 ►

And so I don’t have any concerns about keeping these podcasts going,

01:16:43 ►

and you shouldn’t worry about it either.

01:16:45 ►

Believe me, I know what it’s like to be strapped for cash, and if you aren’t careful, it can really wear you down.

01:16:52 ►

So I think I’m speaking for all of the people who have made financial donations to the salon

01:16:57 ►

and saying that one of the reasons they have made these donations is to help get these podcasts out to people

01:17:02 ►

who couldn’t afford to go to Mind States or to Burning Man or a conference or someplace like that. Thank you. I haven’t planned for this program to go on so long, so I’ll just read part of one more message I received recently.

01:17:28 ►

It’s from our friend Dharma Built, who says, among other things,

01:17:32 ►

Hi Lorenzo, I’m glad that you’re feeling better.

01:17:35 ►

And by the way, thank you to all of you who have also passed that thought along.

01:17:40 ►

And yes, I’m feeling great.

01:17:43 ►

Dharma Built goes on,

01:17:44 ►

I’ve been listening to your latest, McKenna slash Palomary,

01:17:48 ►

and thoroughly enjoy both.

01:17:50 ►

Notice that I didn’t use the past tense,

01:17:52 ►

as I tend to listen to these a few times,

01:17:54 ►

always catching something on each play.

01:17:57 ►

It definitely helps the day go by

01:17:59 ►

as I plug away in a corporate environment.

01:18:02 ►

I’m a freelancer, though.

01:18:03 ►

I trade income security and health benefits for freedom. It’s a struggle, but I haven’t been able to find the right

01:18:09 ►

thing quite yet, so this is a reasonable solution. Well, as I just said a few minutes ago, I

01:18:16 ►

was 56 years old before I finally broke free of the corporate world, so let’s hope that

01:18:21 ►

you won’t have to wait so long. Dharma Built goes on.

01:18:25 ►

I’m also trying to see my way clear to take a trip to Amazonian Peru

01:18:29 ►

for shamanic work with various sacred medicines.

01:18:32 ►

I’ve got some experience, but not in that context

01:18:36 ►

or with the specific plants that this area is known for.

01:18:39 ►

I know and respect the reasoning that you don’t make a recommendation

01:18:44 ►

or give advice in this regard.

01:18:46 ►

But perhaps you could give me a general indication.

01:18:50 ►

I would love to go to Luis Eduardo Lunas, but it’s a little too pricey for me.

01:18:56 ►

If you opt not to respond, I completely understand and respect your position.

01:19:01 ►

Yeah, this is really a tough situation.

01:19:05 ►

First of all, let me mention what I see as the light at the end of the tunnel.

01:19:09 ►

In my own case, it took me about ten years of searching before making a connection with a practicing and reputable Iowa Scarrow.

01:19:18 ►

And for nine years now, I’ve been a member of a small group who journeys together several times a year,

01:19:24 ►

and they are actually the light at the end of your search, your group,

01:19:28 ►

the one you finally end up feeling at home with and participating with on a regular basis.

01:19:35 ►

They will eventually materialize, I’m sure of that.

01:19:38 ►

Now, for what small amount of practical advice I can give you,

01:19:43 ►

besides a warning to beware of people who claim

01:19:46 ►

to be Iowa Scaros, but who have few credentials to back up their claims. I found my group after

01:19:52 ►

years of interacting with people I met at various conferences. And as I said, I was lucky because I

01:19:58 ►

had a high-paying job and the leisure time to afford to go to those conferences. So what do

01:20:04 ►

you do if you’re poor?

01:20:08 ►

It’s hard to say because poor is different for different people.

01:20:13 ►

But the one thing that I believe will give you the best chance of making the connections you’re looking for is to somehow, someway scrape up the money and time to attend one

01:20:19 ►

of Alan Shoemaker’s shamanism conferences in Iquitos, Peru.

01:20:23 ►

And I’ll try to remember to put up a link to those conferences

01:20:27 ►

along with the program notes to this podcast.

01:20:30 ►

And if you decide to go, it would be really cool of you to make your reservation

01:20:34 ►

through my friend and fellow podcaster, KMO,

01:20:37 ►

who gets a little commission from Alan for kind of watching out

01:20:42 ►

for our fellow salonners down there at the conference.

01:20:45 ►

You know, I think these conferences are in July,

01:20:47 ►

but for sure this would be the first place I would go right now if I were you.

01:20:53 ►

Well, I guess that had better be it for today.

01:20:57 ►

And as always, I want to close by saying that this and all of the podcasts from the Psychedelic Salon

01:21:02 ►

are protected under the Creative Commons Attribution

01:21:05 ►

Non-Commercial Share Alike 3.0 License.

01:21:08 ►

And if you have any questions about that,

01:21:10 ►

you can click the Creative Commons link

01:21:12 ►

at the bottom of the Psychedelic Salon webpage,

01:21:15 ►

which you can find at www.psychedelicsalon.org.

01:21:20 ►

And that’s also where you’re going to find

01:21:22 ►

the program notes for these podcasts.

01:21:25 ►

And for now, this is Lorenzo signing off from cyberdelic space.

01:21:29 ►

Be well, my friends.

⚗️ alembic

Explorer

133 - The Cyber Society

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Program Notes

Previous Episode

Next Episode

Similar Episodes

Transcript

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