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Part two of conversation with Branko Malić, contemplating the nature of evil, where did the devil come from, the power of beliefs, fragmentation & wholeness, when the mind turns into what it grasps, evil’s mask of goodness, the will to good, evil as parasite, turning the gaze below, philosophical Satanism, reaching the acausal realm, the lowest common denominator of Man, absolute below, Heidegger, the left and right hand path, the Hadron collider and atom-smashing, the innocuous violence of science, pure egoism, Platonism, Ray Kurtzweil’s singularity madness, the transhumanist disconnect, a journey through delusion, fear of death, mind and body, culture and nature, building hell, transgender & transhumanism, compartmentalization, networks of depravity, Faceborg & transformation of awareness, complicity or conspiracy, back to the devil, Rene Girard, Fabianism, the evil of masking evil, reality distortion & getting a false map of the territory.
Songs: “The Kommema and his Religion” & “Of the Lakes” by SunWalker; ” “Kak je Stef videl Majku Bozju” & “Je Kumi” by Cinkusi; “Devoiko Mome Mrena Ribo” by Blato Zlato.
Hello Jasun, first time caller.
I’m not 100% sure I’m a post or transhumanist but I’ll decloak here as being somewhat sympathetic to what I understand of the subject.
Firstly, why would someone that way inclined listen to your podcast (apart from your excellent taste in music)?
I have always been extremely curious about the nature of existence and it just seems to be a topic that almost nobody is willing to discuss, despite it being (for me) the most important question to ask and my main preoccupation. To get any kind of discussion about themes like this, you inevitably end up delving into themes like the paranormal, ufos and conspiracies but unfortunately, most people involved in those realms seem to be not particularly intelligent, often delusional and generally suspicious. So, when I find someone who seems to genuinely have more than half a brain, people such as yourself or Gordon White, I listen avidly. Because I want to believe.
I think what drives all of us seekers is a fear of death. I fear death, we are witnessing the most exciting story in the universe unfold before our eyes, a future full of unbelievable wonders, but that’s not for us. We will never see the earth from space or inhabit indistinguishable virtual worlds, we only get to read to the end of the chapter.
But some people claim it isn’t so, that they have experience other realms and beings that give them the 100% surety that our materialist idea of the universe is definitely wrong. There is more after this life, in fact, this life is mere torture compared to the universal love beings which we will soon become. Most of these people don’t seem to stand up scrutiny. As Terence Mckenna said, ‘examine the messenger’. So mostly I have given up hope of a non-materialist reality. I’ve done the drugs, the meditation, the sigils and the results have been sparse, not zero, but not enough to reject the idea that these witnesses are highly imaginative, deluded or on the con.
So, if there is no comfort or certainty to be found in religion or the occult or the paranormal, then there is a second zone of comfort which can be embraced. Maybe I can continue to witness the unfolding on this earth, in my material body. New treatments may halt the ageing process. If the brain is the seat of consciousness, then why not have the ability to back yourself up on the off chance you get flattened by a self-driving steamroller.
I envy the certainty that many people in this field have, the pure certainty that life is greater than the sum of its parts. But I have learnt to trust nothing and no one except my own experience and judgement and I remain open to the idea but give it maybe only a 20% chance of having any grounding i reality. It really rankles when those with certainty regale those of us who are unconvinced with words like short-sighted, deluded or depraved. God, there is nothing I would like more than to have an undeniable experience, to become immortal as Gordon White would have it. But some of us just aren’t willing to take the testimony of podcasters and occultists at face value. But I truly remain open-minded which I think many of the converted completely fail to realise about those of us who remain sceptical.
Maybe I’m one of the only listeners who feels this way, Peter Watts was on the podcast a while back, I’m pretty sure he and I wouldn’t be so far apart, I would love to know how your orbits crossed. Is he a listener too?
hi Andrew. You raise some interesting points. I am interested for example in the point at which open-mindedness becomes in service not to a ceaseless inquiry into reality (reality-checking) but to remaining inside a dissociated fantasy realm, such as, in my opinion, transhumanists or those who believe in a digitalized afterlife seem to be hopelessly lost in.
The platitude of “anything’s possible” and “what do we really know?” is one that can be applied to every last absurdity, and so at a certain point, we have to refer to what we do know, or at least have observed, about human beings and make a judgment call based on that. I notice there isn’t much reference to psychology in your summation of the seeking path.
You say that what drives all seekers is a fear of death, but what about a love of life? Fear of death drives culture regardless of whether there is any seeking involved, at least besides seeking distraction, convenience, or increased comforts. I am not in sympathy with Gordon White, BTW, what I know about him, or occultists in general (whether they are closet ones like Levenda or open ones like White), with their infantile dreams of immortality. I think they are driven by the same constructed identity death-fear/will to power as fuels culture at large, capitalism, space colonization, & transhumanism.
Having said that, it’s true that fear of death also drives people like me to write books and make podcasts; but the question is, how much do these activities bring us into a more accepting, connected, and responsible place in our lives, and how much do they propel us further in the dissociated phantasy realm that all trauma victims seek? I have yet to encounter any kind of truly creative thinking in transhumanist ideals, it seems to me to be just the same old religious fantasies transposed onto a secular, scientistic worldview.
Nor do I think that we are seeing an especially exciting story now, as you say, unless you equate darkness and distortion with excitement, which I guess we all do (good stories need good villains and lots of destruction). Or perhaps I should say that most forms of excitement are themselves symptomatic of numbed out trauma victims trying to feel alive, creating a world that is endlessly “stimulating” (and rife with carnage). Myself i wish I could sepnmd mre time watching my cat for excitement. None of the best things in life are new.
As far as I know, Peter Watts is not a listener (I would be very surprised); we hit it off when we talk because we can both riff endlessly on intellectual scenarios about consciousness; but I think our worldviews are worlds apart.
Consider the possibility that you are already immortal; and that preservation of the traumatized ego identity construct beyond death is the foundation of Hell, a religious phantasy which humans, in their unstoppable bid to exert control over their experience of existence, have now managed to render as a temporary sort of metaphysical reality. The next step is bringing it all the way into form on this planet, hence MKULTRA-cum-transhumanism. And this is probably why my sympathy seems to be more with Christians than secular folk, even tho I see myself as more scientifically minded than most transhumanists – allowing that psychology is also a science.
Sorry, I just read through my comment and there were some errors (I detest reading through what I have written). Please feel free to amend any basic grammar mistakes.
This was a great conversation. As of late I occupy a liminal zone between psycho-spiritual esotericism and Catholicism (the religion of my upbringing), so this hit a particular sweet spot. What I find interesting Jasun is just how close you have been veering toward religion in moral disposition and spiritual outlook but seem firmly allergic to it nevertheless. It’s a tension point that I’ve been navigating and we all have to find our own native soil. The balance I’ve struck is embracing the archetypal images and myths of Christianity and disregarding any historical literalism, instead understanding them as valid doorways to the transcendent for my particular soul. Simply because this is what resonates with me on my deepest level due to imprinting (as I discovered that the ego cannot simply will a new imprinting), in addition to my believing/experiencing in the reality of a personal soul (which is not at all taken for granted by every religious tradition).
What also occurred to me since you were speaking to a Catholic is your sacred, soulful orientation to the mind-body POV, and what you might read into that wild Catholic claim that the future paradise is not simply as disembodied souls or spirits but with new resurrected bodies. Again, not as a literalism, but as some sort of metaphorical representation of movements of the soul. Perhaps as some kind of ‘before enlightenment, chop wood and carry water, after enlightenment, chop wood and carry water’?
My view of eternal life is I think related to the sense that time itself is an illusion and that we, as these bodies here and now, are always here and always will be, that soul, like Christ, is both eternal and temporal, God & Man, but that it can only experience existence as a discreet individual via embodiment. This bodily temporal experience is like a protruding tip of an infinite and eternal soul-iceberg that includes our ancestors (and descendants if we have any), those we have bonded (i first wrote “boned,” ha) with in this life in deep love, and beyond that, all sentient life…
Well, “boned” is what keeps the wheel of embodiment going round. 😉
I have definitely sensed that soul-iceberg, particularly in times of deep fragmentation when the inner, deeper aspects of the Self are trying to heal the pieces up on the ‘surface,’ ie the personality.
Your response also reminds me of something I read in a book on mysticism, this from Judaism: “The purpose of the soul entering this body is to display her powers and actions in this world, for she needs an instrument. By descending to this world, she increases the flow of her power to guide the human being through the world. Thereby she perfects herself above and below, attaining a higher state by being fulfilled in all dimensions. If she is not fulfilled both above and below, she is not complete.’
Would be interested to know if Branko is familiar with, and what he thinks of, the work of Guillaume Faye. Faye is an author very much associated with the new or alt Right that espouses a concept (perhaps ideology) he calls Archaeofuturism. Jasun’s take would be intriguing as well. While I’m positive both, and most listeners – myself included, can’t swallow all of Faye’s notions – he does aim for a balance that doesn’t always seem far off from the middle way many of us are trying take. From the publisher abstract: “Faye believes that the future of the Right requires a transcendence of the division between those who wish for a restoration of the traditions of the past, and those who are calling for new social and technological forms – creating a synthesis which will amplify the strengths and restrain the excesses of both: Archeofuturism. Faye also provides a critique of the New Right; an analysis of the continuing damage being done by Western liberalism, political inertia, unrestrained immigration and ethnic self-hatred; and the need to abandon past positions and dare to face the realities of the present in order to realise the ideology of the future. He prophesises a series of catastrophes between 2010 and 2020, brought about by the unsustainability of the present world order, which he asserts will offer an opportunity to rebuild the West and put Archeofuturism into practice on a grand scale.”
Don’t know, but movements are a real drag. As I once said, once something becomes a movement, it ceases to move.
I have an early childhood memory of standing before the house in which my best friend lived, at the age of 6 or 7, and calling out his name. I eagerly anticipated seeing his flaxen hair burnished and golden in the tropical sun. At the same time, as I called his name, I knew that I’d never been born to human parents, that I’d always been here on this earth with a suspended sun that never moved passed the palm tree that framed the house that my friend eternally lived in.
John Michael greer pointed out recently that the world has been a Neptunian place , and is due to become a more Ouranian place . Some where in the transition , certain forces of darkness given expression by ourselves have pulled things down into this Saturnine Satanic place where the crusty lord of time and matter devours his children and seeks immortality .
The Ouranian world rejects one size fits all approaches and rejects estabished convention. The planet rotates on its side and alternately one pole is swathed in darkness , the other light . Its discovery was heralded by the emergence of the romantic poets and the french revolution .
In the occult parlance , Our way there lies through nature , red in tooth and claw .
In the latest Prometheus movie the droid was portayed as a Byronic , though evil figure , hostile to those bent on uncovering natures secrets .
Jasun you have always reminded me of a romantic poet .
I know your views on these occult matters and i present it here as fascinating metaphor of big supernal collective trends , which is the focus of your work .
I felt sad reading Andrew ps comments above about ” why not back yourself up in case a ( relativist satanic ) steamroller flattens you ( horizontally)
The fact you are even considering these ideas means you still have some hope.
Cheers
Letitia Landon
A lot of these discussion points seem to echo themes from the book, “My Big Toe” by Thomas Campbell (www.my-big-toe.com) and the books of remote viewer Joseph McMoneagle– ie., that time is an illusion, that we are actually all living in a virtual reality universe which is one of many virtual reality universes that may have totally different ground rules… Have you read any of these materials? I’d be interested to see what comments, if any, you would have about them.
Jason & Malić.
Best thing I’ve listened to in ages.
Wonderful stuff.
I’m rushing out for a pint but will be typing more a substantial post to you very soon.
You both have a brand new devotee.
With love and respect.
RC.
thanks Russ