Disqus - Latest Comments for pmp

Re: House Guests and Shingon

pmp — Tue, 01 Aug 2006 16:12:13 -0000

that's neat!

do you happen to know where in seattle the Shingon temple is?

Re: House Guests and Shingon

pmp — Wed, 02 Aug 2006 11:21:48 -0000

thanks!

Re: Back from Burning Man 2006

pmp — Wed, 06 Sep 2006 12:24:47 -0000

wonderful slideshow, thanks for sharing!

Re: A Little Desire

pmp — Mon, 11 Sep 2006 14:37:50 -0000

buddhism is pretty much like the borg, expanding through cultures assimilating their past religious and magical practices. i actually find its philosophy rather repulsive and very nihilistic.

however, because of this method of expansion, it has integrated a ton of very practical esoteric technology, and i find it worth studying for this reason.

Re: Folsom Street Fair

pmp — Mon, 25 Sep 2006 14:36:30 -0000

don't be too hard on TKK, they're ANCIENT. frankly, i'm amazed any of them are still alive. SUD could be their grandchildren.

Re: Oakland Victorian

pmp — Tue, 26 Sep 2006 18:46:18 -0000

what's something like that go for, in that area?

Re: An Outline of My New Thesis: The Nature, Structure, and Purpose of the Soul in the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn

pmp — Tue, 26 Sep 2006 19:02:38 -0000

i'm very interested in how exactly you see their system as more than a superficial amalgamation of disparate traditions?

that's a tough one for me...it seems that, in studying their roots, i found every single disparate tradition they incorporated to be demonstrably superior on it's own terms: Dee's Enochian, Jewish Kabballah, Greek Qabalah, etc... Thelema is a joke, Wicca is a travesty, Scientology is a nightmare, though your mother is probably rather hip.

Re: Oakland Victorian

pmp — Tue, 26 Sep 2006 19:05:38 -0000

wowzers

Re: Parallels between Vajrayana and Western Magic in the Maha-Vairocana Abhisambodhi Tantra

pmp — Mon, 09 Oct 2006 15:10:27 -0000

good stuff!
i think Jungian-style analysis of eastern magical and mystical systems really screwed up western people's understanding of this stuff. it pretty much writes off all those intricate visual descriptions as metaphorical and symbolic representations to be understood intellectually.

however, i would argue that it is something else entirely; if anything, it is much more literal than is commonly assessed from outside the system.
the degree to which the mandala is hallucinated as a virtual sensory representation would be a stronger correlate to the degree of resulting consciousness transformation than any amount of intellectual understanding and 'going through the motions,' in my opinion.

thanks for posting it.

Re: Back from Mexico

pmp — Tue, 07 Nov 2006 14:44:37 -0000

beautiful photos!

Re: Research on Speaking in Tongues

pmp — Thu, 09 Nov 2006 14:15:38 -0000

this is fascinating, i'm glad they're starting to delve into neuroimaging these mystical states.

i'm very interested in seeing the glossolalia data also contrasted with brain images of:

a. trance state during performance of a native-tongue mantra
b. as a. but induced from a non-native-tongue mantra where the meaning is known
c. same, with meaning not known
d. same, using an randomly generated gibberish mantra
e. trance state during kabalistic letter permutation exercise
f. during a long winded recital of the psalms or somesuch, from memory
g. during a long winded evocation with an artificial language like Enochian.

Re: Meditation and Neuroscience

pmp — Fri, 01 Dec 2006 18:06:30 -0000

I love this stuff,

thanks for the link!

Re: Death and Immortality

pmp — Fri, 01 Dec 2006 18:08:14 -0000

cool, i'm going to see it tonight.

i think lots of drugs will be appropriate.

Re: Death and Immortality

pmp — Mon, 04 Dec 2006 16:57:57 -0000

gawd, that was SO disappointing, and i was really looking forward to it. i hope our sarcastic running commentary ruined it for anyone in the theatre who actually thought this shit was profound, because there was absolutely nothing of value to be found in the ad-hoc collage of pretentious, pseudomystical crap.

talk about starting with a bunch of cool ideas and completely failing to tie them together in any sensible or satisfying manner. oh well, at least the visuals were occasionally compelling.

Re: Apocalypse Madonna

pmp — Mon, 29 Jan 2007 15:00:50 -0000

that's awesome!

Re: Egyptian Souls

pmp — Tue, 20 Mar 2007 14:18:54 -0000

although it certainly doesn't fit in the academic literature category, be sure to check out William Burroughs wonderful comparison, in 'The Western Lands', of the multiple Egyptian souls as various individuals working on a movie set.

Re: 93 and so long, it has been fun!

pmp — Tue, 17 Apr 2007 16:54:41 -0000

so you seek to annihilate your ego rather than expand to obscene proportions? definitely the better of the two options.

i'm really not satisfied with either path, though.

Re: Ultraculture: Aryan People Only Please

pmp — Thu, 19 Apr 2007 19:08:03 -0000

well, i'm not terribly impressed with those guys, either, but more from the perspecive that i haven't seen any useful contributions whatsoever to the technical aspects of magical practice (with the caveat that their collective writing makes my eyes glaze over within minutes so i am likely missing some buried treasure;) however, in my eyes, the fundamentals of buddhism are entirely incompatible with a magical worldview. i'd rather play with reality then escape it, dammit. chain me to the wheel of karma, baby, cause i'm here for the long haul!

buddhism, of course, contains a long and damn fine list of useful tools for mind control and magic. oh blessed paradox!

finally, yes he's right that those voodoo critters can mess you up, but it goes with the territory because they're totally mercenary. that doesn't make them a priori evil or bad, however.

so, as usual, i must respectfully both agree and disagree with your fine words. :)

Re: Reality

pmp — Mon, 30 Apr 2007 17:54:32 -0000

well said!