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To: alt.magick.tyagi,alt.magick
From: tyagI@houseofkaos.Abyss.coM (tyagi mordred nagasiva)
Subject: Re: Indecent Proposal
Date: Kali Yuga 49941031 

Quoting; |gilliam@rudkin.fccc.edu (Jon Charles Gilliam) 

|>I disagree.  I think that predictive power is a SYMPTOM of the ideal
|>goal of Science (*not* modern Science specifically).  The ideal goal
|>of Science as I see it is KNOWLEDGE (I regress to the literal root of
|>the term).

|...how do you know when you have KNOWLEDGE?  

How do you *know* that you know that you know that you have that knowledge?
Phooey.  Certainty is easily come by.  One derives an intellectual structure
and then attaches oneself to it.  So is knowledge created.  It is not a
gold calf which one may worship and make More Real.  Gnosis is self-evident.


|In science, it's when you can make predictions that are verifiable 
|by experiment.  That would make prediction fundamental, because the 
|scientific idea of knowledge is permeated by what may be predicted.  

True in the object-MUD.  In the subject-MUD it can work along predictive
lines or, if the process is subconscious, along prophetic lines.  More
often, however, I've noticed that in magical and mystical workings it
works along *SATISFACTIVE* lines.  That is, whatever works (pleases,
gives longest satisfaction) we repeat.  The same could be said for the
'predictive' things, which satisfy our desires for repetition.


|A mystic's goal may also be knowledge, but her idea of knowledge may 
|not have prediction as so central an element.

True, it can instead involve insight/Sight/Vision/prophesy.


|The point here is not that knowledge is not a goal of science,
|but rather than science's conception of what knowledge may be is
|rooted in the goal of prediction, 

Only for those who are addicted to knowing the future.


|   This brings up the issue of in what sense 'Science' can have
|goals.  You can deal with:

["Magick also, I think, can be viewed from any of these angles."]

|   - The intersection of the goals of the scientists themselves

In Science, usually certainty, except when Science becomes Gnosticism.
In Magick, usually power (which might yield certainty).


|   - The intersection of the goals that the scientists will publicly
|     admit to

In modern Science, usually 'predictive ability'.
In modern Magick, usually ecstasy and/or transcendance/transformation.
Note that there are times when ecstasy yields the Sight, prophesy, etc.


|   - Some analysis of the recorded history of Science

Depends on the historian.


|   - Some analysis of scientific textbooks as indicative of the
|     paradigm used to indoctrinate new scientists, viewing the
|     paradigm as some Hegelian entity acting through history

Depends on the theorist.


|   - The common ideas scientists have about the abstract 'entity'
|     of Science as they see it somewhat detached from the specifics
|     of their own practice

Often 'truth' for modern scientists.
Often 'true will', 'the Great Work', 'God' for modern mages, mystics.


|   - Revelation about 'Science' as an independently existing, and
|     naturally correct, way of studying nature, somewhat like a
|     Platonic ideal

In which case the goal is further study for both Science and Magick.


|>...the core ideal of Magick *includes* that of Science ...and it
|>is expressed within modern Western magical tradition in the following
|>phrases: 'Knowledge and Conversation (of the Holy Guardian Angel)' and
|>'Love is the law, love under will'.
|>
|>The first (K & C...), includes Science with its orientation to Knowledge.
|>The second (Litl...), includes Science as a mechanism of will.

I'd revise this to say Litl... includes Science as a mechanism of *love*,
in that love and *knowing* are unitive mechanisms.  Contrast Art and will.

[material deleted.]


|>There is no 'scientific view of life'.  Science is a means by which we
|>generate views and then move beyond these to a Knowledge (Gnosis) which
|>transcends any of the specific worldviews.  

|   The above values Science as some Platonic ideal, a natural and
|correct way of exploring nature.  It is in itself a scientific view
|of science, viewing science as a stable, independent-of-observation
|entity that can be studied and explained.  It's also Hogwash :^).  

As all views are bound to be.  However, there is something valuable
about recursion.  I'm sure that Go:del has something to say about it too.


|>There is no 'magical view of life'.  Magick involves both the means of
|>generating views in preparation or exercise of Knowledge and the action
|>of working with *and* within those views to manifest a Conversation.

|...A scientist practicing science is by definition not concerned with 
|manipulating the underlying concepts behind observation, or the ideas 
|about what constitutes her field of study.  

By *your* definition, no doubt.  However, as I'm defining Science here
a scientist would be *very* concerned with these things and this is why
she takes on the very important study and practice of philosophy so as
to get at these base-level concepts, ideas, beliefs, preferences, etc.


|When she begins working with these sorts of concepts, she's no
|longer practicing science -- just ask her peers!  She's being a quack.

You're referring once again to modern Science.  I'm bypassing that as
a renegade materialist cult, much like the bulk of Christianity is a
renegade Jewish cult obsessing over one particular Messiah and god.

When the mage/scientist begins working with base-level concepts then
she begins to really have an affect upon her own programming, to begin
becoming self-aware.


|...A scientist practicing science doesn't see herself as working 
|within a perspective, but rather as discovering facts and principles 
|about nature, or at least such is historically the case.

A *real* scientist (at certain levels of maturity) does INDEED see hirself
as working within strict paradigms to achieve particular purposes.  Again,
I'm not speaking of the materialist cult, I'm talking about one who is
utterly dedicated to the apprehension of Truth.

'Facts' and 'principles' will be seen for the limited and peculiar items 
they happen to be by real scientists.  Historically I don't think that there
have been very many real scientists (at least not who survived into our
history books).


|>|>|In Science, 'progress' is something that groups can come to a 
|>|>|consensus about, and can work together to accomplish.
|>|>
|>|>The Church of any religion can bring about a 'consensus'.  All it has to
|>|>do is [force it through resource-control]

[lots deleted/substituted]
 
|Values + Preference = ideas of progress.

Value -> Lack of opposition + Preference -> stability = no ideas at all.
I think I understand you, but my point wasn't so much about the progressive
ideas that Church might postulate but what we might see as imaginative and
creative consensus rather than that founded on restriction and control of
any Church (including the institution of modern Science).


|>It is also why a sequence of identified 'traditions' of Magick have emerged
|>as time wears on.  'Chaos Magicians' seek to *underscore* this variability
|>of method and doctrine -> "Nothing is true.  Everything is permitted." <-
|>even while popular authors within their midst take steps which threaten the
|>very current of the 'tradition', fixing symbols in written form and
|>prescribing ritual behavior and organizational structure.

|   The above paragraph delves very much to the heart of the issue I
|was trying to bring up -- the notion that by institutionalizing Magick,
|you must in the process relinquish part of what makes Magick what it is.

This is a very important aspect of our conversation.  How would you
relate this to Science, if at all?


|>'Consensus' within a magical group need not be some sort of agreement on
|>how to describe and understand the cosmos or any part therein.  Such a
|>'consensus' would only require an interactive sharing of the ideals
|>and reflections as they manifested to the members of the group itself.

|Aren't ideals and reflections constitutive of a personal way of
|describing and understanding the cosmos?  

Yes, and?  My point was that if the participant mages were able to
release needing others to agree with them, all sharing their own ideas
and reflections and adding them to the 'group stew' if you will, then
there is no need for some sort of 'concensus agreement' about how the
cosmos *is* or *was*.


|>Magick as it *includes* Science does not require that anyone agree with
|>the mage that the way she tends to see the cosmos (including all thoughts
|>of 'progress' or even of 'Magick' itself).  In fact this can easily
|>become a DETRIMENT to the working mage, in that such feeble intellectual
|>constructs may be given unwarranted emphasis due to shared emotional
|>attachment, the Work being lost in the fray thereafter.

|   To what extent may the Work by inseparable from the intellectual
|constructs?  I would think that to advocate philosophy as Practice,
|you must also admit to intellectual constructs as part of the Work.

Surely it *can* be, but I don't think that it has to be inseparable.
There are other dimensions to work within instead of the intellectual.
This is why Sufi Dances and zendos and zikrs come about.


|   This is getting pretty long, so I'll break here and respond to the
|rest in a separate post later on (isn't this fun? :^).

Waiting is.  Fundeed.

:> tyagi