Hermetic Archetypes

[Francisco Gonzalez]

I'd like to see those self-healing OSes one day. Would make my work a lot easier. So far, the promise has been all vaporware.

You know it's coming.

Yes, psychotherapy works for most disorders

Psychotherapy and most all psychology doesn't touch the toes of a true theory of mind, because a theory of mind has to also be a theory of reality. And I'm working with a pretty good one and it's awesome.

Good for John Nash! But to generalize from that one case you move onto rather uncertain ground.

It's just an observation of an EXTRAORDINARY case and a lot of people have looked into it and some have even come up with interesting insights, like the one you had; the relation between abstract thought in solving complex systems and schizophrenia. I mean, that one is a no-brainer, but it is the tip of an iceberg into some features of the mind.

My point exactly. So, does mind determine living conditions like capitalism and schooling systems, or do living conditions determine what minds can do? So far, I read you as positing the primacy of the mind, now you sound like you changed your mind?

The nature/nurture debate is the very definition of stagnation, but I digress.
Primacy is of the mind and the civilization you and I experience are a product of minds. We have faulty systems like the ones forementioned because faulty minds created them. I assume this is self evident, don't think its anything new, people already know the world leaders are insane and savages.

 

['Amir Alzzalam]

There's nothing wrong with sexual attraction though, and a considerable part of the population can fall in love without being possessive or domineering. It feels really good too. I dont think Darwinism can wave away that kind of magic.

When you have the type of 'love' that isn't romantic-ish it's generally called agape. Human love is a survival mechanism. I know, kinda cold sounding, but it is what it is.

 

[Francisco Gonzalez]

When you have the type of 'love' that isn't romantic-ish it's generally called agape. Human love is a survival mechanism. I know, kinda cold sounding, but it is what it is.

Nope, that isn't how it is. It's so much more than survival; its about THRIVING. Humans aren't machines, and life and love actually have meaning. In fact, love aiding in our survival just adds more meaning to it, not less.

 

[Cino]

You know it's coming

You still believe in sales brochures?

Psychotherapy and most all psychology doesn't touch the toes of a true theory of mind, because a theory of mind has to also be a theory of reality. And I'm working with a pretty good one and it's awesome.

What do you mean by "theory of mind", if not the technical term from psychology?

The nature/nurture debate is the very definition of stagnation, but I digress.

I meant idealism vs materialism.

Primacy is of the mind and the civilization you and I experience are a product of minds. We have faulty systems like the ones forementioned because faulty minds created them. I assume this is self evident, don't think its anything new, people already know the world leaders are insane and savages.

You lost me there.

 

[Francisco Gonzalez]

You still believe in sales brochures?

a bit of a salesman myself, but of high quality products and ideas.

What do you mean by "theory of mind", if not the technical term from psychology?

Psychologists are stereotypically useless and at best manage to drain their patients of their money and negative emotions with 50% success rate. They peddle the most lobotomizing psych pills with a vengeance, which is so very wrong and irresponsible. I rather not even think much of how messed up the whole system is.

I meant idealism vs materialism.

it's not even a match, souls/minds matter more than objects.

You lost me there.

The technology we're using to communicate originated in a mind. Mind is more powerful than environment.

 

[Ella S.]

I think you shouldn't be to modest here on my account. You sounded pretty sure of yourself when you said you completed the Great Work and were enjoying the fruits of your labor. No, I think you have something inside you that I don't have. But that is okay. I have to just be honest and admit that I have not finished The Great Work in any form, above or below. This is my true ground and I will be content with it.

I only mean to admit that there are a wide variety of perspectives on what the Great Work truly is and what it entails. It's a quasi-religious concept that's been around for centuries so it's only natural that a lot of different ideas about it would crop up. I completed the version that I set out to, but does that mean anything to the Thelemite? To the Rosicrucian? To the Typhonian? To the Setian? To the Theosophist?

Maybe. Maybe not. It depends. I think a lot can be learned by looking at where these models disagree and why. I just don't want my single perspective to dominate.

I experienced some of this when I dealt with the amoral and can assure you it is heartbreaking. This is what it means to be a toy, a plaything of our own past.

Well these things usually just further calcify us in our own positions. A mind is hard to change, just think how hard it would be with a heart. It is fascinating how far apart we are. You come to conclusions on your own and I can't do a thing on my own. Aren't we a pair.

Perhaps. Although I have changed my positions on rather large, life-changing topics a few times in my life just through study and discussion. I think a mind that earnestly seeks and prioritizes truth above all else isn't too hard to change.

For awhile, I had the exact opposite problem. I would read the Bhagavad Gita and practice some bhakti yoga and think maybe I am a Hindu. I would read Wisdom of Eosphoros and think maybe I am a Luciferian. I considered animism, polytheism, panpsychism, mental idealism, pantheism, panentheism, bitheism, ditheism, tritheism, etc.

It's only relatively recently that I gave up the notion of theism and the supernatural entirely. If you caught me two years ago I would have explained to you in explicit detail how a proper seance had to be conducted. I think Spiritism and Neoshamanism probably had the most lasting impacts on me out of everything I was involved with.

I wouldn't be surprised if my position is completely different this time next year. I hope that I've found the truth but I've had that same hope for every new path I've adopted. I think that if I change too much, though, it would probably be something very subtle by now like I would become a Preference Utilitarian instead of a Welfare Utilitarian or something but just this January I was a committed Neo-Sethian.

 

[Cino]

Psychologists are stereotypically useless and at best manage to drain their patients of their money and negative emotions with 50% success rate...

All right, but you still have not revealed what you mean my "theory of mind". In psychology, it has a specific meaning, but I assume you don't use that definition. What does it mean to you?

The technology we're using to communicate originated in a mind. Mind is more powerful than environment.

You lost me regarding the advanced vs "savage" minds and civilization.

To me, what you wrote about our political leadership is a nice illustration of "grub first, then ethics", as one German writer succinctly summarized the materialist analysis.

 

[Cino]

I only mean to admit that there are a wide variety of perspectives on what the Great Work truly is and what it entails. It's a quasi-religious concept that's been around for centuries so it's only natural that a lot of different ideas about it would crop up. I completed the version that I set out to, but does that mean anything to the Thelemite? To the Rosicrucian? To the Typhonian? To the Setian? To the Theosophist?

Maybe. Maybe not. It depends. I think a lot can be learned by looking at where these models disagree and why. I just don't want my single perspective to dominate.

So which differences do you see between your understanding of the Great Work and the Rosicrucian's (and offshoots like Thelema)?

 

[Ella S.]

So which differences do you see between your understanding of the Great Work and the Rosicrucian's (and offshoots like Thelema)?

I could maybe write a short compendium of essays on the subject with each one varying in their degree of quality but I think I'll just give you a fairly illustrative example.

I knew a few Adeptus Majors and Magisters from the O.T.O. and there was this one private chatgroup I was in specifically for discussing Thelema and related occult movements. Not everyone there was a Thelemite. In particular, there was this one guy (we can call him Norton) who refused to label himself anything (although I'm pretty sure he was a Rosicrucian) and we would get into these very lengthy debates. We never really saw eye-to-eye on anything.

Some of the major disagreements we had:

-Norton was convinced that Enochian was essentially the source code of the universe and that scrying the Enochian Aethyrs was the most important and authentic way of undergoing the Magnum Opus. Even when I believed in Enochian magic, I still thought that the system was incomplete and too dangerous to work with and I never bought that it was the "true" variation of Celestial out of the countless versions that popped up before and after John Dee.

-Norton stressed that, at the end of the Great Work, one could literally transmute matter and that the true alchemists who hold this power hide themselves in plain sight, walking among the uninitiated like ordinary people. I never really bought that.

-Norton believed that virtually every ritual and ceremony had to be performed literally and physically to the letter. I suspect that he actually had the proper medallions made of the proper metals at the specific astrological times and he explained to me how he got his lion's pelt and a white robe spun by the hand of a virgin. He believed in the importance of these elements so much that he said that real magic could never be performed without them. I never really bothered with all of that because I'm too poor, lol, but all he ever claimed to achieve through it was synchronous effects, anyway

-Norton also believed that these ceremonies were absolutely necessary for the Great Work, and that even the most rigid of the modern institutions claiming to be the A.'.A.'. have strayed from their original vision of creating the true Holy Catholic Church and purifying the apostolic line of succession, that the Magnum Opus was ultimately one's quest to achieve a degree of sainthood that conveyed nigh-omnipotence and physical immortality. I always thought that the Great Work was an internal and subtle process which was mostly about achieving a degree of wisdom in life.

-Norton believed that morality is written into the fabric of the universe and was, well, kind of alt-right in his understanding of this morality (which is a polite way of saying he was queerphobic and still perpetuated the Red Scare). He believed that only institutions with a direct and traceable lineage to holy men had the authority to speak on these matters. Only they had the wisdom and the initiated power to know the best rituals for any new followers and they held the ultimate say in matters of morality. I was an anarchist and going through my anti-organized religion phase at the time but I still wholly believe that proper study and an earnest desire to connect with whatever might be out there is all you should need if there is something out there. I doubt that it would filter itself through unnecessary middle-men. It's one of the reasons that I still don't believe in prophets or apostolic succession.

We were very night-and-day until he eventually left the chatroom because he was upset that everyone there was, in his perception, so deeply misguided that they were doomed to be eternal slaves of Choronzon who he incessantly referred to as "Mr. C."

 

[Ella S.]

Psychologists are stereotypically useless and at best manage to drain their patients of their money and negative emotions with 50% success rate. They peddle the most lobotomizing psych pills with a vengeance, which is so very wrong and irresponsible. I rather not even think much of how messed up the whole system is

I hate to say this but I actually kind of agree with you here. Well, sort of.

In America, where I live, there is a strict distinction between psychiatrists, therapists, and psychologists:

Psychologists are people who have degrees in psychology and some of them are just researchers who don't take clients.

Therapists are people who provide some form of counseling service or life coaching. There isn't really a strict enforcement on who gets to call themselves a "therapist" here and there are a few different licenses that they can have, ranging from useful licences to LPC and LMFTA to more controversial licenses in things like "spiritual counseling" and "hypnotherapy."

Psychiatrists are the people who prescribe medication.

From what I've seen, most therapists are total crap and a great number of them behave in ways that would be considered unethical or unprofessional. I had a therapist who tried to convert me to Christianity in our first session, for instance. I usually recommend that people go to a few different therapists before settling on one and, generally, they aren't really more insightful and don't give better advice than your mate at the pub would in my experience. Therapists aren't useless but you need a good one.

Psychology as a field in general infuriates me because it's a soft science and so much of their experiments seem pointless and meaningless to me because none of it comes close to the rigid empiricism expected in the natural sciences. There are so many competing fields of psychology that they read almost like religious denominations. They really struggle with forming any sort of consensus on anything. We can't even define what an "emotion" is currently; are emotions social constructs? Physiological changes? Facets of cognition? Too many competing models and no way to test any of them.

However, I have nothing but respect for psychiatry. A lot of people say that psychiatry only treats the symptoms and not the root causes and I think that's a fair criticism but psychiatry knows what it's doing. They can verify your symptoms through brainscans and blood tests if they need to and they know how their medicine alters the biochemistry of your brain to alleviate those symptoms. That's real science and it helps a lot of people. It's just like treating any other disease.

So I think people should take their psych pills but I also think that psychologists are borderline useless and therapists probably aren't very helpful in most cases.

 

[badger]

a bit of a salesman myself, but of high quality products and ideas.

Hi.....
And what do you sell?
All products have high quality if they are fulfilling a function, I think.

Psychologists are stereotypically useless and at best manage to drain their patients of their money and negative emotions with 50% success rate. They peddle the most lobotomizing psych pills with a vengeance, which is so very wrong and irresponsible. I rather not even think much of how messed up the whole system is.

Your proposed success rate of 50% is massively optimistic, but, after all, psychology is such an inexact science.
Where I live a person has to be a qualified doctor to prescribe medications for humans. Most psychologists here are not doctors.

 

[Cino]

Do the Rosicrucians have a thing for Scrying the Enochian Aethyrs and Choronzon as well? I always assumed this specific operation was very Thelema, inspired directly by "The Vision and the Voice". Anyway, this Norton character sounds like a very tiresome person.

Thanks for that fascinating glimpse.

I remember discussions from a decade or two ago, or more, actually, on the now forgotten internet institution called "usenet", when aspiring and seasoned Thelemites alike would get all worked up when someone claimed the title of Magister Templi without having gone through their curriculum - always a hilarious occasion. Evidently, they had not read their own books carefully (this degree can be claimed by anyone anywhere, at any time, according to Crowley himself). Good times...

 

[badger]

I hate to say this but I actually kind of agree with you here. Well, sort of.

In America, where I live, there is a strict distinction between psychiatrists, therapists, and psychologists:

That's the same as in the UK.

Psychiatrists are the people who prescribe medication.

You beat me to it.
Psychiatrists who tried to treat my late wife proved to me that most of them are imposts. Well paid imposts.

Psychology as a field in general infuriates me because it's a soft science and so much of their experiments seem pointless and meaningless to me because none of it comes close to the rigid empiricism expected in the natural sciences. There are so many competing fields of psychology that they read almost like religious denominations. They really struggle with forming any sort of consensus on anything. We can't even define what an "emotion" is currently; are emotions social constructs? Physiological changes? Facets of cognition? Too many competing models and no way to test any of them.

This^^^^^

However, I have nothing but respect for psychiatry. A lot of people say that psychiatry only treats the symptoms and not the root causes and I think that's a fair criticism but psychiatry knows what it's doing. They can verify your symptoms through brainscans and blood tests if they need to and they know how their medicine alters the biochemistry of your brain to alleviate those symptoms. That's real science and it helps a lot of people. It's just like treating any other disease.

Ah...... I have some respect for neurology, which is what I think that you are talking about here, but psychiatry..... I've not much respect.

So I think people should take their psych pills but I also think that psychologists are borderline useless and therapists probably aren't very helpful in most cases.

Thirty years after my late wife's death I told my doctor about the her treatment at the national experimental psychiatric clinic that had been operating beside Guy's Hospital in London. He proposed that I would benefit from counselling. The young counsellor who I visited did not advise, guide, suggest etc, but on rare occasions he would ask a question. That's all that he did, but weeks and months (and now years) after those appointments I still remember those questions and they settle my mind.... it still surprises me, how much value his few questions had.

My seething, roaring, screaming anger slowly subsided, and now I can bear those memories.
That young man did his job, and I'll not forget that service.

 

[Francisco Gonzalez]

Hi.....
And what do you sell?
All products have high quality if they are fulfilling a function, I think.

Truth

Your proposed success rate of 50% is massively optimistic, but, after all, psychology is such an inexact science.
Where I live a person has to be a qualified doctor to prescribe medications for humans. Most psychologists here are not doctors.

Yeah that's a good observation. Pollyanna might be optimistic to a fault, it's part of playing the The Glad Game.

 

[Ella S.]

Do the Rosicrucians have a thing for Scrying the Enochian Aethyrs and Choronzon as well? I always assumed this specific operation was very Thelema, inspired directly by "The Vision and the Voice". Anyway, this Norton character sounds like a very tiresome person.

I can't speak for all Rosicrucians, obviously, but I have had experience with the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn System. I'm not as much of a walking encyclopedia on it as some people are but I devoutly kept the rituals and made a few grades once upon a time.

The GD definitely had connections to Enochian. You see this in their most famous ritual, the Lesser Ritual of the Pentagram. According to traditional Hermeticism, steeped in Neopythagoreanism and Humourism, the directions for the elements go: North (Water), East (Air), South (Fire) and finally West (Earth). This is what's used in most grimoires, including the infamous Lesser Key of Solomon.

But in the GD, they changed this order. It now goes: East (Air), South (Fire), West (Water) and North (Earth). The elements start at the East and the elemental associations for North and West have been switched. This is specifically to make it mirror a specific Enochian tablet that represents the elements although I don't recall which one that was.

Thanks for that fascinating glimpse.

I'm glad you found it worthwhile.

I remember discussions from a decade or two ago, or more, actually, on the now forgotten internet institution called "usenet", when aspiring and seasoned Thelemites alike would get all worked up when someone claimed the title of Magister Templi without having gone through their curriculum - always a hilarious occasion. Evidently, they had not read their own books carefully (this degree can be claimed by anyone anywhere, at any time, according to Crowley himself). Good times...

I've seen this same issue crop up a few times to this day, ha ha ha. I think it's probably just become a staple of the culture at this point. I appreciate the anecdote.

 

[Ella S.]

Ah...... I have some respect for neurology, which is what I think that you are talking about here, but psychiatry..... I've not much respect.

I am not really talking about neurology, no.

In the US, psychiatrists have to become doctors. They learn quite a bit about biology, which includes neurology of course, as well as other medical fields. Psychiatry is treated like any other field of medicine here and I think that's proper. I see no reason to see it as less respectable than any other forms of modern medicine.

That said, neuropsychiatry is a real subject of study and maybe that's what you're thinking of?

 

[Cino]

But in the GD, they changed this order. It now goes: East (Air), South (Fire), West (Water) and North (Earth). The elements start at the East and the elemental associations for North and West have been switched. This is specifically to make it mirror a specific Enochian tablet that represents the elements although I don't recall which one that was.

You cleared up what was a great mystery to me. Thank you!

 

[Francisco Gonzalez]

All right, but you still have not revealed what you mean my "theory of mind".

Never said it was my theory. I am working with it though.

In psychology, it has a specific meaning, but I assume you don't use that definition. What does it mean to you?

The psychology usage of the word is so dumb. Empathy is defined as recognizing others mental states. Theory of mind means a theory on minds, like the theory of relativity is a theory on relativity.

You lost me regarding the advanced vs "savage" minds and civilization.

Civilizations, societies, countries are molded by the minds of the time and are a direct reflection of them. Countries (or whole Civilizations like the Mongol Empire) run by narcisists with narcissistic policies, laws and a culture are death stars that collapse on their own center of gravity since narcisists always want to get bigger and bigger. Countries run by people like Putin cause senseless wars because they are expansionists and aim for integration which never works because people in general don't like to be oppressed.

 

[Ella S.]

You cleared up what was a great mystery to me. Thank you!

It was very frustrating for me trying to perform the daily LBRP without understanding that part of it. I understood the ties to the Four Winds and how the divine names were derived from Christian Cabala but the weird elements threw me off. I found it hard to fully integrate the ritual until I was preparing for one of my grade initiations by reading the required literature that spelled it out for me.

Everything made so much more sense after that point.

 

[Ella S.]

The psychology usage of the word is so dumb. Empathy is defined as recognizing others mental states. Theory of mind means a theory on minds, like the theory of relativity is a theory on relativity.

My theory on minds can't be complete because I lost mine awhile ago. Maybe Jesus still has it. I'd have to find him again to know but I didn't like when he took the wheel. You would think he listens to a lot of Christian rock but he just played "All You Need is Love" by the Beatles on repeat for hours.

When I kicked him out he said something about not needing my car, anyway, because he has some sort of chariot or something. I was just more interested in turning the car around so I could start heading in the right direction again. He drove me halfway to Jerusalem.