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McKenna vs Wilson vs Wilbur

05:11 / 08.04.06

Really, I want to know what you have to say about some of the thinkers I hold dear.

Are they Perennial Philosophers; Archtypal thinkers; Sages; Fools? Do they represent factions of human experience; In presenting different views do the contraindicate one another?

How does the Wilson/Leary 8-circuit model compare to the Spiral Dynamics/AQAL model Wilbur's evolutionary model...and, more subtly, how does the humour-filled McKenna and Wilson dialog compare to the humorless-driven suggestions of Wilbur?

What they share is optimism, and that is soooo refreshing, but WHERE do they mention each other?

p.s. Any Howard Bloom fans out here?

10:23 / 08.04.06

Are they Perennial Philosophers; Archtypal thinkers; Sages; Fools? Do they represent factions of human experience; In presenting different views do the contraindicate one another?

I´ve read Leary´s Exo-Psychology, and Wilson´s texts about Leary´s eightcircuit model. And I´ve read several books by Wilber. I actually finished Sex, Ecology, Spirituality, although I´ve only read it once and did not read the annotations (another 300 pages).

To compare:
Wilson and Leary are too far out, and they knew/know it (look at RAW´s internetsite, for example). There is a reason, the Barbelith wiki says fnording is unwelcome.

Wilber has a real need to be taken seriously, but he´s more spiritual than scientific. His books in book shops around here are filed under esoteric, not philosophy.

How does the Wilson/Leary 8-circuit model compare to the Spiral Dynamics/AQAL model Wilbur's evolutionary model...and, more subtly, how does the humour-filled McKenna and Wilson dialog compare to the humorless-driven suggestions of Wilbur?

I like Wilber´s model better. Leary´s model is "looking down" on normal people, he´s calling them primates, yokels and larvae, if I remember correctly. He only sees worth in ascending and becoming enlightened.

Wilber sees himself as enlightened (that´s how I interpret his first-hand descriptions of the highest states of his consciousness model). But he sees every level of human consciousness as vital. He says the highest forms of awareness cannot exist without the lowest forms, just like a flower can´t exist without its roots. I really like his holonic model of explaining everything (consciousness, societies, nature, etc.). Leary/Wilson always sounded too sloppy for me, they were too drug culture/subculture/give the finger to the man, which to me means they were too unbalanced and biased.

What they share is optimism, and that is soooo refreshing, but WHERE do they mention each other?

I never saw them mentioning each other. Leary and McKenna was before Wilber´s time, and I never saw RAW mentioning Wilber. Wilber himself never mentioned Leary or Wilson.

He mentions McKenna in one sentence in Sex, Ecology, Spirituality.

Pyewacket The Elder

00:41 / 09.04.06

Wilson too far out?

Fnording?

do the exercises.

Pyewacket The Elder

01:21 / 09.04.06

Alot

06:35 / 12.04.06

Actually, Wilson does mention McKenna in Cosmic Trigger 1, near the end: he mentions the 2012 thing and the whole works.

I've read a little Wilbur but I find him very heavy going, in terms of writing style. I also think it's a bit of a simplification to say Leary characterises people as 'yokels and peasants'. If anything Leary was a rabid populist, a criticism made of him by Mckenna, who felt Leary's attemopts to get everyone in the world! to take LSD were a mistake. McKenna was more elitist, in effect adopting Huxley's position that use of the drug should be restricted only to a few more intelligent types in society.

I actually think the eight-circuit system is quite a good model, as long as you don't make the mistake of thinking some circuits are better than others. There's no point going 'nurr, he's just an anal-territorial type while I am teh metaprogrammor, 1!', because we all have the circuits, at least potentially. It's just we need to learn to use them.

10:10 / 12.04.06

Actually, Wilson does mention McKenna in Cosmic Trigger 1, near the end: he mentions the 2012 thing and the whole works.

If you´re addressing me here: I think you are confusing Wilson with Wilber. I know that Wilson mentioned McKenna, I said Wilber mentioned MccKenna in only one sentence.

And it´s Wilber, people.

@Crystal Rune-Dolphin
And if there´s one thing that´s mildly annoying, it´s people saying "do the exercises. A lot." So tell me, what were the positive effects on you of doing Wilson´s exercises a lot? That might really motivate people to do them instead of your curt messages.

E. Coli from the Milky Way

12:15 / 12.04.06

Just ended reading "Rational Mysticism", in wich are interviewed both McKenna and Wilber. I agree with Horgan that, sometimes, Wilber seems a little "know-it-all"; the think i like of mckenna and wilson is their trickster side (i suppose because they're more related with science that wilber, and in fact they admit technology as part of human evolution).

Another thing i don't understand is that, althought having achieved great spiritual levels, Wilber has never got into psychedelics.

So, wow ...

... what about Wilber taking the Red Pill ?

Emphrium Orange

03:31 / 13.04.06

I think Wilson does mention Wilbur in his Introduction to Israel Regardies bio of Crowley "Eye In The Triangle". Specifically when was talking about Bullshit detectors. I believe he was making the case Crowley was the real deal and Wilbur was metaphysical B.S. Probably written in regards to Wilburs early work. I like that Wilson & Leary porvided maps of a huge spectrum of expieriences and ,better still, practical experiments to get you the territories they are mapping ("Prometheus Rising" & "Game of Life" respectively). I think Wilburs strength is in providing a more sober academic style classification system for a similiarly rich spectrum of expiereinces. I just like McKennas for creating "ripping good yarns" about things that are "stranger than we can know" or usefully map for that matter.

05:41 / 24.04.06

I've read quite a bit of Wilson, one or two McKenna books and nothing of Wilber's other than his home page (not the site, just the first page). A friend of mine back in NYC is really into Wilber, but I am far too busy right now to jump in to his work.

As to doing Wilson's work, I've done some of his exercises, and also come up with some of my own. I've recently started using the chapter on e-prime from Quantum Psychology (re-printed almost in its entirety here) as a jumping off point for some lectures I'm doing where I teach. The great thing about it is this: during the lectures, people often challenge the ideas I come up with, which causes me to either rethink my ideas or strengthens my resolve (depending on the points the challenger makes). Ultimately, my own goal is to keep evolving my own ideas.

Here's the experiment I used: I'm a regular poster at another forum, which covers discussion of severything from serious debate topics to popular culture. For a period of about two weeks I decided to make all my posts in e-prime. Sometimes it was very easy. Other times it was incredibly frustrating. I found that the ideas and abstracts that I had trouble converting to e-prime were areas I very strongly identified with. E-prime became a way to discover my own mental blocks by making them glaringly clear. It was a very enlightening experience, and this is the thesis I use when presenting the material to others.

I'll post some more on these guys when I'm not so tired.

Elijah, Freelance Rabbi

17:28 / 24.04.06

I blame Wilson for my preoccupation with 23 (which I am finally starting to kick 13 years later) and whenever I think of his writing I feel a little annoyed at how easily I was brainwashed by an author.

I did enjoy the Cosmic Trigger books though, as well as Coincidence. I have read a fair bit of Leary and a little McKenna, and have no idea who the other person is.

I don't know if it was that I started reading this stuff after I read ILLUMINATUS! for the second or third time but LEary and Wilson felt really REALLY dated to a younger me, and I haven't read either in a few years.

Henningjohnathan

21:24 / 24.04.06

Now, too add more methane to the fire, RAW and PK Dick seem to have some sort of synchronicity near the end of Dick's life. Did they have the same influences? Also, RAW was obviously aware and a fan of Crowley, but what about McKenna and Wilber?

Henningjohnathan

21:25 / 24.04.06

Now, to add more methane to the fire, RAW and PK Dick seem to have some sort of synchronicity near the end of Dick's life. Did they have the same influences? Also, RAW was obviously aware and a fan of Crowley, but what about McKenna and Wilber?

09:18 / 25.04.06

I asked McKenna about this and he said he'd done some AE Waite -type stuff in his youth but never really got heavily into it.

But he was just keen on people trying mushrooms.

18:02 / 25.04.06

"Another thing i don't understand is that, althought having achieved great spiritual levels, Wilber has never got into psychedelics."

Something I don't understand is what psychedelics have to do with someone's spiritual acheivement.

Or for that matter, what acheivement has to do with spirituality.

It seems a common assumption that unless you 'take the red pill' you're some kind of square adherent to law and morality, and "just haven't seen, maaan!" and i'm not sure it's a supportable claim.

I'm sure some people make very effective use of psychedelics for their spiritual growth, but i'm also sure that a lot of people just use them for a bit of fun.

It annoys me that people assume you can't have valid spiritual experience without the use of drugs. Hell, drugs are fun, but to pretend that taking them is in and of itself spiritually worthy seems a little glib.

To say that drugs are the measure by which we value someone's spiritual practice seems like saying someone can't have a valid spiritual experience unless they are Christian...

E. Coli from the Milky Way

18:17 / 25.04.06

It annoys me that people assume you can't have valid spiritual experience without the use of drugs. Hell, drugs are fun, but to pretend that taking them is in and of itself spiritually worthy seems a little glib.

wasn't wanting to say it all. But in the other hand, a tjink drugs/spirituality aren't separated things. You can have spiritual experiencies throught exogenous drugs and also by endogenous drugs/chemicals. I think is the same world.

So the thing it annoys me on Ken Wilber is that, being a well informed, in some way a "leader" in spiritual research, avoids one of the most important sources of spirituality: psychedelics.

19:09 / 25.04.06

avoids one of the most important sources of spirituality: psychedelics

How much have you read of Wilbur? I was reading several books simultaneously at the time, but I was certain he referenced higher vMemes in relation to psychedlic experiences. History of Everything, Theory of Everything, Boomeritis... somewhere...

I'd love to contribute to this thread, but I've only read Wilbur, and I don't know enough about the others to compare/contrast.

E. Coli from the Milky Way

21:06 / 25.04.06

I've read that from an interview of a book called "Rational mysticism" by John Horgan.

i've Just surfed on "theory of everything" & "eye to eye" indexes searching for words "psychedelic", "LSD", "drugs" or "psychotropics" and haven't found anything. I don't remember having readed about these things in these books.

maybe i'm wrong and everything is my memory mistake, i don't know well

01:09 / 26.04.06

I heard an interview with Wilber on CD in which he says he has never tried psychedelics, only MDMA, when it was still legal. This sounds a little dubious to me as well, since he goes to great length to find holes in most philosopher's theories for the last 30 years, especially concerning spirituality; yet scraps the Wasson/Allegro/Graves/McKenna et al. ideas, and in some cases near-insistence, that once you experience the psychedelic experience it is easy to understand how the experience could be the grandfather of ALL religions--and some go as far as saying the experience could factor into the beginning of art and language as well.

E-prime has let me differentiate new-age books from genuine goodness in a few sentences or less.

Brainwashed by a Wilson book... I'm sure Wilson would like this, since his prime motivator is to illustrate one's programming to one's self and to get you excited about meta-programming.

All of the 3 (Wilber, Wilson and McKenna) seem very excited about the Bell's theorem non-locality of information, and use different methods and language to describe the access. McKenna is keen on psychedelics, Wiber on 20 years of meditation, Wison on both plus a variety of other techniques. Wison and Wilbur also seem SOOO much more playful than Wilber.. "You will recognize the Gods by their general hilaritas..."

I'm specifically interested in Wilber's All-Quadrant All-Levels vs- the Leary/Wilson 8-Circuit model vs Spiral Dynamics, and if anyone has attempted to reconcile these. They all seem to be models that are very important for the next step in human development...

06:31 / 26.04.06

I don't think entheogens are necessary for spiritual experience, but they do certainly have a lot to teach in that area. Also, I wouldn't say that they are even inherently spiritual. One can have many insights with entheogens that are intellectually or emotionally deep without necessarily being spiritual.

Henningjohnathan

14:42 / 26.04.06

This is tangential, but one of the theories expressed in PK Dick's THE TRANSMIGRATION OF TIMOTHY ARCHER was the idea that the Essenes and Jesus all belonged to a "mushroom clut" and that his teachings were in reference to some sort of fungal intoxication.

Was this theory based on anything? McKenna's work?

E. Coli from the Milky Way

15:08 / 26.04.06

Oh, i have a bad day: here it goes with working links. Sorry people:

Hi, i think i 've cracked up the thread. here it goes again:

Henning, maybe would be interested on James Arthur theories. His book, Mushrooms & Mankind is full of mycological-religious relationships, and it's almost fully avaliable on the web.

Henningjohnathan

15:56 / 26.04.06

Thanks for the excellent James Arthur link. I find the relationship between men and fungus (especially intoxication - isn't yeast a fungus? beer and bread). Also, I find it interesting that rings of mushrooms/fungus are also associated with both the appearance of fairies and the touchdown sites of UFO's.