#

Cap.

PP.

13

Invisible Mind

97 to 102

14

Cracking the Egg

103 to 110

15

Lost World

110 to 125

16

Non-cerebral Consciousness

126 to 136

17

The Split

137 to 149

#

Cap.

PP.

25

Ascent of Mt. Ventoux

217 to 231

26

Structures of Consciousness

232 to 247

27

Mental-Rational Structure

248 to 255

28

Integral Structure

256 to 267

13

Invisible Mind

97 to 102

"No thought has ever "raced."

There is no "stream" of consciousness.

One's mind is neither "closed" nor "open.""

p. 99

"In Living Time, the psychologist Maurice Nicoll, a disciple of P. D. Ouspensky, makes the curious remark that we, our "true selves," are really invisible. We can see people's faces, hear their voices, watch their movements, and feel their touch, but we can never

p. 100

actually see them.

And the same is true of ourselves. ... The "real you" is that stranger who inhabits your inner world (another metaphor)".

p. 101

"As Bergson said, consciousness is something we are aware of so intimately and immediately that it requires neither proof nor definition. The immateriality of consciousness ... argues very persuasively that we are beings who inhabit two worlds : one of ... matter ..., and another of ... "spirit" ..., "consciousness.""

14

Cracking the Egg

103 to 110

p. 104

"As Erich Neumann and Marie-Louise von Franz have shown, practically all creation myths -- stories explaining "the creation of the world" -- can be read as accounts of the rise of consciousness out of the primal depths of the unconscious." (O&HC; CM)

{Instead (because such myths all trace the origin of the material universe to the transcendent deities), such myths can more reasonably be read as accounts of the downgrading of the superconscious to the level of the merely conscious.}

p. 106

"As Neumann writes, "Man's task in the world is to remember with his conscious mind what was knowledge before the advent of consciousness."" (O&HC, p. 24)

{Rather, because what was before the advent of mere mortal mind, was the divine superconsciousness, therefore it is the task of mortals to humble themselves in worship before the praesence of the divine transcendent sublimity, in order to become worthy of some pitying acknowledgement of their plight by the majesty of the divine world.}

"The available evidence suggests that the appearance of self-consciousness is a relatively recent event."

{So-called "self-consciousness" (another name for "selfishness") is at least as old as consciousness itself (i.e., since at least the Cambrian geological epoch). It is altruistic selflessness that is a recent development.}

"Mitchell argued in books like The View Over Atlantis (1969) that places like Stonehenge, Glastonbury, the Sphinx, and other sacred sites were linked through a network of "ley lines." ... A similar idea has informed a spate of more recent, highly successful books arguing that civilization is much older than the official account".

15

Lost World

110 to 125

p. 112

"In a series of brilliant books written in the 1970s and 1980s, the psychologist Stan Gooch argued that ... Neanderthal man (Homo sapiens neanderthalensis) lived in... a kind of "civilization." ...

p. 113

At a Neanderthal site at la Quina in the Dordogne,

seventy-six absolutely perfect spheres were found,

{There are 76 kriya-s in Kun.d.alini yoga : goddess Kun.d.alini herself being coiled around a linga (which is sometimes depicted as a sphaire). The praehistoric stone sphaires at Grab in Bosnia are said ("RS") to be "wedding-guests crushed" [shades of the "ones in three" stopped (according to Coleridge) by the "Antient Mariner"!], while the stone sphaire at Rano Raraku on Rapa Nui is said to influence "the statues and make them “walk” around the island".}

p. 114

as well as a carefully shaped flat flint disk".

p. 115

"the Pleiades or Seven Sisters" "In ... Cities of Dreams, Gooch sets forth the evidence ... .

p. 116

For example, for the ancient Greeks ... : Orion the hunter ... chasedthe sisters through the wood for five years ... . Strangely, a very similar myth exists among the Aborigines of Australia. Wurrunna the hunter ... came upon a group of seven girls. ... However, the trees of the forest ... suddenly grew to a tremendous height; the five free sisters climbed to the sky".

p. 120

"Rudgely echoes Gooch by remarking on ... the Seven Sisters ... in ... ... North America, Australia, and Siberia."

"In The Long Trip : A Prehistory of Psychedelia (1997), Paul Devereux suggests that the curious forms found in Neolithic cave art at sites like the island of Gavrinis of the coast of Brittany may be the result of our ancestors' use of psychedelic substances.

{Psychedelic herbs (such as were ingested by European "witches") always take the user into realms of composite deities (animal-headed humanoids, etc.) -- none of which appear on such Neolithic art (though they are characteristic of Kemetic, Sumero-Akkadian, and Etruscan arts).}

One curious thing about this site and othes like it is that the forms -- swirling, curvilinear lines ... -- are very much like the kinds of patterns associated with what are known as "entopic forms," the swirls and curls of light produced by rubbing one's eyes."

{This is reasonably plausible explanation of such Neolithic art.}

"During a visit to Callanish, Thom realized that the main north-south axis was aimed directly at the Pole Star. He also knew that at the time the stones were erected, the North Star was not in its present position, which meant that to align the stones to geographic north without the Pole Star as a guide would have been an extremely complicated business, requiring a highly sophisticated engineering ability... ."

{Any position of the pole in the sky will point to the same identical geographical north, regardless. The author (G.L.) and his source (Th.) were evidently quite ignorant of basic astronomical principles, not to be aware of this fact.}

"Olduvai Gorge in 1911, Reck came upon an anatomically human skull in a layer of earth at least 800,000 years old."

{The grave-diggers were moderns, who dug down into an antient stratum for their cadaver's grave.}

16

Non-cerebral Consciousness

126 to 136

"Hancock, author of a best-selling book about the lost ark of the covenant,

{As is historically well-known, the "ark of the covenant" was never "lost", but instead was carried off by the Roman army to be displayed at a triumph in Rome. Perhaps Hancock was involved with trying to create an interest in the ark with an intent to re-create it for historical re-enactments (a somewhat worthy cause).}

was intrigued by Schwaller's remark (which he came across in West's book) that except for the head, the Sphinx showed clear signs of water erosion."

{All discernable erosion (which is quite severe) to the Sphinx is horizontal (due to horizontally wind-blown sand). Schwaller's motives (though perhaps commendable, for they involved Rosicrucian and Masonic themes) involved something other than strict historical accuracy.}

17

The Split

137 to 149

"In The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind (1976), the Princeton psychologist Julian Jaynes ... writes, "The picture is one of strangeness and heartlessness and emptiness. We cannot approach these heroes ... ."" (OCBBM, p. 75)

{The Iliad is a book of political satire, exaggeratingly depicting the titled hereditary nobility as exemplars of that "strangeness and heartlessness and emptiness." It was such an effective satire that it in short order managed to help the pro-democracy movement to eliminate virtually every wanax (king) in all of Akhaia/Hellas.}

25

Ascent of Mount Ventoux

217 to 231

p. 222

"Jean ["he changed his name from the German Hans to the French Jean" (p. 225)] Gebser was born in Posen, Prussia, {Poznan` in Poland} in 1905 ...

p. 223

into an aristocratic family who had lived in Thuringia ... for centuries".

p. 225

"In 1931, Gebser decided to settle in Spain. ... In the late winter of 1932/33, he experienced a kind of insight, a "lightning-like inspiration" which later crystalized into the central theme of

p. 226

his magnum opus ... The Ever-Present Origin ... . ... in the fall of 1936, Gebser left Spain for the French border twelve hours before his Madrid apartment was bombed. ...

p. 227

In August 1939, Gebser entered Swiss territory two hours before the borders with France closed. ...

p. 228

In 1941/42, he wrote Abendlandische Wandlung (Transformation of the Orient) in which he argued that changes in the sciences ... showed clear indications of a major shift in human consciousness. In ... the parapsychological investigations of J. B. Rhine and the depth psychology of his friend C. G. Jung, Gebser saw a break with the ... mechanistic ... worldview, and a new awareness and expression of the "aperspectival consciousness" arising in the Western mind. ... Convinced ... that human consciousness was experiencing a breakthrough, Gebser turned his eye to ... looking for evidence of ... transformations. The result was Foundations of the Aperspectival World, the first part of his major work, published as part one of his major work, published as part one of The Ever-Present Origin in 1949. Part two, Manifestations of the Aperspectival World : An Attempt At the Concretion of the Spiritual, was completed soon after and first published in 1953."

p. 231

"Gebser died on May 14, 1973".

26

Structures of Consciousness

232 to 247

p. 232

"The Ever-Present Origin is a massive work of some six hundred pages, filled with charts, illustrations, a dense etymological appendix ... . ... It scope covers religion, mythology, philosophy ..., psychology, and ... the paranormal. ... Gebser, like Martin Heidegger, uses ... words in an unfamiliar way ... recurring terms like ... "aperspectival," "waring," "integrality," ... "diaphaneity," ... and many more. ... the indispensible glossary ... Georg Feuerstein has appended to his sympathetic, insightful ... introduction to Gebser's ideas, Structures of Consciousness."

p. 233

"Sites devoted to Gebser's ideas can be found on the internet, and a school of "integral philosophy," including the works of scholars and philosophers like Allen Combs and Noel Barstad".

p. 236

"Origin," according to Georg Feuerstein, is "the ever-present reality ... by nature divine and spiritual" out of which the different structurations of consciousness unfold" (SC, p. 271). ...

The origin, for Gebser, ... is "sheer presence," a primal spiritual radiance whose luminosity is obscured by the lesser light of the consciousness structures that proceed from it."

p. 237

"Like Steiner, Gebser believes that the development of consciousness has proceeded ... away from its source, origin. ... But also like Steiner, Gebser believes that the ultimate unfolding of the consciousness structures ...

will mean a return to the origin, to the spiritual sources of being.

{cf. Mircea Eliade : The Myth of the Eternal Return. BOLLINGEN SERIES, 46. Pantheon Bks, 1954.}

For the Viennese satirist Karl Kraus, "Origin is the goal." And for Kraus, as well as for Gebser and other thinker-poets like

p. 238

Goethe, being "original" means dawing one's creative energies from the primal source."

p. 239

""Dreamless sleep" is precisely what Gebser assigns to his archaic structure. He quotes [E-PO, p. 44] the Chinese philosopher Chuang-tzu, who lived ca. 350 B.C., as evidence :

"Dreamlessly the true men of earlier ages slept.""

{These are mythic ideal sages.}

p. 240

[According to Feuerstein,] "Archaic hominids ... were ... telepathic ... . ...

{In actuality, archaic hominids would have been no more telepathic than are apes.}

Lacking a self, they also lacked memory".

{No species of animal is lacking a "self", and certainly not lacking a "memory" : accordingly, archaic hominids would have lacked neither.}

"Gebser's remark that magical acts require a "sacrifice of consciousness" is reminiscent of the occult author Gustav Meyrink's aphorism that "Magic is doing without knowing." ...

{"Man of Knowledge" is the literal meaning of the term for 'shaman' used in many Amerindian and other languages. Shamanhood is a matter of highly technical knowing, and of keen awareness.}

In chapter twenty of his voluminous "confessions the notorious Aleister Crowley ... writes that ... "Even the crudest Magic eludes ... conscious comprehension, very much as one makes a good stroke at cricket or billiards.

{One cannot play billiards nor any other game of skill without mental concentration; nor can a shaman function without mental attentiveness, either. The concentration/attentiveness required for shamanic work is much greater than is needed for ordinary tasks of daily living.}

One cannot give an intellectual explanation of the rough working involved."" (O, p. 353)

{What may not be readily explained is how the deity (or deities) who actually performed the "magic" for the "magician" manageth to do so. But how the "magician" is able to contact that deity (or those deities) is quite describable.}

"Where we recognize an abstract principle -- "fruitfulness," "wisdom," "stability" -- the consciousness of the mythic structure perceived ... gods. The gods did not "symbolize" the various aspects of the world associated with them : they were those aspects."

{Or rather more accurately, the deities who are involved control those aspects of the world.}

"to know,

{to know that Christianity/capitalism must needs be abolished}

to dare,

{to dare to undertake the task of abolishing Christianity/capitalism}

to will, and

{to will (pray, with rituals) for the abolishing of Christianity/capitalism}

to be silent."

{to be silent about one's undertaking of this abolition, when in the praesence of Christian clergy and of capitalist-stooges}

27

Mental-Rational Structure

248 to 255

"For Gebser, the early stage of the mental-rational structure -- which ... he locates at around 1225 B.C. -- brings the first intimation of the emergence of directed or discursive thought.

{Any use of grammatical language is a matter of "directed or discursive thought". Humans have probably used grammatical language for some hundreds of thousands of years, beginning with the Acheulian if not with the Chellean or earlier.}

Whereas mythical thinking ... was a shaping or designing of images ... discursive thought is fundamentally different." [E-PO, p. 75] ...

{Mythical thinking is largely a matter of social satire (joking about some deity's socially inept behaviour), the narrator of the myth eliciting laughter in the audience (as, among Amerindians etc.). [Did Gebser intend to exclude social satire from the category of "directed or discursive thought"?]}

This is the beginning of what Owen Barfield calls "alpha-thinking," thinking about.

{Even wild beasts (and also domesticated ones) are "thinking about" whatever they are doing while they are doing it.}

It is also the beginning of what he calls "idolatry," the habit of consciousness to forget that the representations it ponders have their origin in consciousness itself." {This very misleading allegation is likely copied by Barfield from some slander by Protestants of Catholic/Orthodox idol-veneration; or else by Muslim eikonoklasts.}

{So-called "idolatry" (which is a feature of Roman Catholic, Bauddha, and Jaina religions) is a matter of employing ritually consecrated statuary to engage in communication with deities (and with saints/buddha-s/tirthankara-s), which deities/saints (who abide in various of the heavenly divine worlds) are expected (on account of the consecration of the statuary) to heed any ritual supplications performed in the vicinity of such statuary. The consciousness of the deities themselves is the point at issue here (that is, their heedfulness to the ritual supplications), and if any tendency "to forget" may need to be countreacted, it would be forgetfulness on the part of the deity in heaven to take note of the rituals being performed in the vicinity of that deity's consecrated statuary on Earth.}

28

Integral Structure

256 to 267

/diaphaneity/ : "The "diaphainon," according to Feuerstein, is [quoting SC, p. 214] "that which 'shines through', namely the ever-present spiritual origin.""

{The meaning of /diaphaneity/ is 'a propensity for shewing-through' < /dia/ 'through' + /phanein/ 'to shew' -- not "that which 'shines through'".}

"the "sheaths" or "layers" of consciousness that have obscured

{These layers of "sheaths" are the kos`a-s enclosing the atman. They are more like subtle-bodies than like consciousness.}

the "uncreated light" become transparent and are seen as integral parts of the ongoing "presencing" of origin".

{The term "uncreated light" can refer to that of the Transfiguration ("UE"; "DUL"; UL).}