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Armagedda-rama

Skeleton Camera

23:03 / 04.01.04

This stems from my massive rereading of older posts and the current
"Predictions" thread. Greetings, by the way. I'm Seamus and I'm new
here (very brief intro in the Conversation).

I have a soft spot - though not a well-liked spot - for apocalypticism and an
impending doom over the world. Grew up with nuclear bombs around the
corner and a distinct sense of "alone-and-helpless"...go figure. At any rate,
the validity of such ideas is oft-debated and my personals may well be a
bunch of memes that need ousting, but let's entertain them at any rate...

Is there "an" Armageddon, or "an" Apocalypse? Or are they constant patterns of
change within time, rippling throughout manifest reality? I take to this idea, almost
the Apocalypse as an archetypal event - perhaps change itself. In which case, hysteria
over the subject is invalid (if you can flow with change).

But we are in precarious place in space-time right now. It bubbles with potential, that is,
unmanifest energy - which is gradually emerging (as always?) for both good and ill.
Those being OUR goods or ills, natch. As the world's population skyrockets so does
its carnage level...so does anything change? Is it constantly Apocalypse-time, or is
there a big End of History waiting down the line in 8 years?

And, of course, the practical version: waddaweDOOOO??? If anything over and
above our usual activity...

Fire away....

08:01 / 05.01.04

Well, there may or may not be some kind of ecological apocalypse just down the road depending on who you read - there's certainly a loss of bio-diversity and massive concerns about resources - witness the recent Iraq War (largely about long term control of resources IMO).
However, I don't know if this equals the apocalypse in any meaningful way - I see the worst consequnces of our treatment of the enviroment and overconsumption as slow degradation rather than a "big bang" - increased flooding, a slow drop in standards of living, mass starvation and poverty in the third world equalling more tension due to immigration, that kind of thing. I think this process in likely to drag on over and beyond the course of my lifetime, rather than reach any resolution of climatic end point within it.

I realised as I wrote that, this is actually what I think about the future. I see precious few signs that we're going to change as a species. Perhaps I should stop being such a pessimist and "opt for optimism" in 2004?

I do find it interesting that this sense of doom took over from the Nuclear threat, perhaps we do have a need to future project this big apocalyptic scenarios. However, I personally don't believe in any big metaphysical Magickal End of Time in 2012 or afterward. I think these are normally people's own processes writ large as cosmic drama. There have been lots of false prophets after all, and I don't see why Terence McKenna should be regardedas any different from the Jehovah's Witnesses on this score.

Skeleton Camera

15:50 / 05.01.04

One's personal process "writ large" as cosmic drama is probably behind
much of apocalyptica, including my own (?) And it does seem that an
apocalyptic mood usually does hinge around a personal issue about to
explode and/or be resolved...
What I continue to get hung up on, though, is the relationship between
a micro-pocalypse and a macro-level event. There may not even be
such a relationship, but given the indivisibility of macro and micro
events, I think there is. If you genuinely believe that history will end and
the world will be transformed in 2012, then won't it - at least in your
own tunnel? Apocalypticism as a tool for personal change...I should've
seen it going here.
However, macro-apocalypse also can refer to ecosystemic collapse or
an asteroid careening into our planet, which would result in a lot
more than personal change. But even in an event like this, all issues
regarding one's mortality aside, the final effect would be change -
most likely a reworking of the evolution of life.

17:23 / 05.01.04

If you genuinely believe that history will end and
the world will be transformed in 2012, then won't it - at least in your
own tunnel?

Well, there's plenty of excult members Jehovah's Witnesses about who've lived through prophsied apocalypses. And don't the Jehovah's Witness keep moving the goalposts every couple of years? You'd have to look at these people and see how they survied it.

17:30 / 05.01.04

The world already ended —on Emergency Day. Happy Millenium! What a better way to signify the fever pitch of accumulation, the birth of the hypertextural zeitgeist, and the postmodern devastation of universal meaning than with towers falling?

We're all living in the future! Let's make it amazing!

06:38 / 09.01.04

I've often wondered if we aren't approaching a magickal critical mass. There have been several books written that young kids are showing more and more psi ability. I've wondered that if this is actually occuring, whether the snowballing practice of magick might have something to do with that. That there are enough persons practicing magick that we may actually be starting to change consensus reality, at least in our little area of the universe. We may be approaching a time when our belief in magick reaches a point where it produces an effect amplification. This could be really cool, but then again, people can behave quite crappy, and many of us have not learned to control our tempers. Could get rather ugly. Apocalypse anyone?

08:06 / 09.01.04

Tommyknockers, by Stephen King. Or "Forbidden Planet." If you want Biblical Armageddon that borders on porn and don't have the patience to wade through the "Left Behind" books, try to find "666" and "1000" by Salem Kirban, from the early 1970s. Or, closer to hand, try Apocamon.

Spyder Todd 2008

23:19 / 13.01.04

If by "the apocalypse" you mean the extinction of man, or perhaps the destruction of the planet, then yes, it will happen. Humanity will continue to evolve and change, leaving "humanity" for a next stage of improved evolution or mutation. Or we will face a crisis on the cosmic level (asteroids, anyone?) and die out. And, eventually, Sol will burn out and collapse, causing a shockwave rippling through the solar system, even as the collapse of gravity sends the Earth hurdling towards the former star. No matter what, these events will probably happen. If you mean on a biblical level, with like, angels and dragons and such humanity meets its doom, then I... not exactly...

I think Chesed's comment is interesting. We are living in the future. Change is constant, and one must flow with it or die out. Humanity is evolving at an rate that seems accelerated from that of the past few thousand years. Psychic abilities are up, precognice and clairvoyance in particular. I hope pretty soon to hear about someone being born who shots lasers out their eyes. The mutant race is coming...
Or something. Its not like I know everything.

I can say this, though. Recorded human history is only about six thousand years long. Earth is six billion years old. I don't think any of this is new. As stupid and crazy as it sounds, I really think all of this has happened before. Everything ends, and fossils are not particularly precise.

Anyway, this post has quickly become quite more odd than I expected it to be. I better stop now before a giant lizard eats me.

Skeleton Camera

01:51 / 15.01.04

Critical mass moments, like all units of change, have their own gravity.
And whether or not they are truly "earth-shaking" - or, in the case of
apocalypticism earth-shattering - depends on one's relation to the change
unit and one's detection of the gravity. I've gone through many personal
changes that have hinged upon an event or point in time that I have been
able to ease into and accomplish before said event, and then the event is
much less tumultuous than expected.
Obvious, despite the psycho-babble? Sure. But may it not apply to 2012 and
"the future is now" thinking? If there is enough magic in the aire to change
consensus reality, any cataclysm (man-induced or natural) could in effect
become undone and eased through... surfing on time, it's all about surfing...

That got interesting.

Harold Washington died for you

02:22 / 15.01.04

About the Witnesses and the other apocalyptic cults who see the doom that never comes...maybe someone is saving the world? You know, like superheroes, or elite special-forces elements, or Angel and company. I bet we miss an ELE at least once a year.

And Apocamon is the best web site ever.

18:45 / 15.01.04

Apocemon is fucking amazing.

Jack Van Impe should get some funding together and get Apocemon MADE. It'd be so funny and smart and ironic and PopCulturey the masses would love it.

And I want a T-Shit with the bloody Lamb on it.

19:30 / 15.01.04

maybe someone is saving the world?

My impression of Y2K was, after years of apocalyptic buildup, that things could go one of two ways. It was like a moment of Great Choice. Cause it was the sort of thing where once the riots started, they weren't likely to ever stop until it was all burned down. But dispite it all, with lot of breath holding and possible computer meltdown, the world as one gave a big cheer and partied down in the biggest party EVER. We're talking global here, with the fireworks going off every hour as it became 2000 in some other time zone. There was so much energy looming over that it was just rediculous, and all it would have taken is one spark in the right place to send it all flying apart. But instead, Y2K related problems were at an amazing low. The weather was even beautiful just about everywhere. It was near 70F round my ways, which is just impossible for that time of year. It felt to me that the world had the choice of tearing it all down or continuing, and chose to live. And if ever there was a time the world was saved by the magickal intentions of individuals, it was every one of us nutters waiting around with shotguns while we poured the champaign that grit our teeth and insisted that it would all work out ok that pulled it through.

So yea, I think we've already seen it, and passed whatever test we were supposed to pass. I can only expect the same thing to happen again in 2012, fueled by the ferver of every apocalyptic nut who insists this is surely the Day of Judgement. Events like this are global level magickal workings. Human consciousnes operating on a unified global scale. We've set them up for centuries, like giant firecrackers waiting to go off. And on them its every person who puts their will towards everything NOT going up in flames that can consider themselves to have helped save the world.

And that's why I am so against fear filled hysteria about Days Of Doom to come. Cause if there's anything to this magick stuff at all, it'll be us that panic ourselves into our own apocalypse if it ever happens at all, and I'm not one for helping that along.

This is also why I consider partying as hard and as well on NYE as possible to be a sort of religious obligation, but that's another matter

00:36 / 26.01.04

As far as I understand, the original meaning of apocalypse was along the lines of "a Violent Revelation", so as far as that goes, I think there's probably always going to be one going on around the corner.

I have no clue about Armageddon.

20:27 / 26.01.04

I like that definition of Apocalypse very much. Do you know where you might have found/heard it?

23:41 / 26.01.04

The Apocalypse acts as a convenient means of goetic terror gnosis, total paradigm shifter then paradigm buster! Look at timewave zero and the Mayan end of their calendar-system. I find that the world going down the poopchute as through envoirenmental reasons and mebbe pole-shift possiblities - now that's Spooky McLoopy!!! I say we need to colonise outer space or else...........

15:37 / 27.01.04

Its Greek, Hunterwolf. Apocalypse = Revelation, with the connocations Severanti gives above.

17:12 / 27.01.04

Quote : About the Witnesses and the other apocalyptic cults who see the doom that never comes...maybe someone is saving the world? You know, like superheroes, or elite special-forces elements, or Angel and company. I bet we miss an ELE at least once a year.

Call me mad but i really think that theres truth in this. If i'm right then whoever IS saving us must of met some pretty strange weirdos. I also agree that this all depends on how much we as a race want to change things. If enough energy is projected towards say, 2012 and something is set up to happen if enough of us believe in it, then we could see some strange stuff. I'm looking forward to it.

05:33 / 28.01.04

Cheers cusm, bet me to it!