Arthur C. Clarke famously said, "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic," a provocative statement to which Robert Anton Wilson brilliantly responded: "Any sufficiently advanced magick is indistinguishable from technology." Both have never been truer in today's age of artificial intelligence, the explosion in psychedelic therapy, and bizarre breakthroughs in physics that call into question the nature of reality. — Read the rest
The following is from my newsletter, The Magnet. There's a free version and a subscriber version. I hope you'll check it out! — Mark
That feeling from being the only one in a building is called kenopsia. The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows defines kenopsia as "the eerie, forlorn atmosphere of a place that's usually bustling with people but is now abandoned and quiet." — Read the rest
Spoken Word with Electronics is an audio series delivering to you a two side recording of unusual stories paired with vintage modular electronic sounds
THIS WEEK:
Episode #4: "To Forget to Remember"
Welcome back to Spoken Word with Electronics. — Read the rest
Over at Medium, BB pal Douglas Rushkoff explores how today's propaganda — born in the 17th century to propagate the Catholic faith and reborn in the 20th century as "public relations" — is no longer about convincing people to believe in whatever story the source happens to be selling. — Read the rest
Author, activist, and self-described "investigative satirist" Paul Krassner died at the age of 87 today in Desert Hot Springs, California. He was a personal friend and an early supporter of Boing Boing when it was a zine. — Read the rest
In Hermann Hesse's novel Steppenwolf we visit a mysterious and strange magic theatre, where some pretty weird things happen. Meant for madmen and madwomen only, the price of admission is nothing less than one's mind. In High Weirdness, you are invited to enter another kind of magic theatre. — Read the rest
In 1963 Attorney General Robert Kennedy prosecuted Eros magazine publisher Ralph Ginzburg for violating federal obscenity laws when Eros ran 8-pages of photos of a naked black man and naked white woman embracing each other (see page 72 of the fourth and final issue of Eros). — Read the rest
This eBoy-esque procedurally generated city brings to mind short story by J.G. Ballard called "Report on an Unidentified Space Station," which appeared in one of my favorite science fiction anthologies, Semiotext(e) SF which was edited by Rudy Rucker and Robert Anton Wilson. — Read the rest
How a scholarly hippie got pulled into the orbit of the psychedelic revolutionary whom then-President Nixon labelled “the most dangerous man in America”
I first encountered Grant Morrison at the Disinfo.com conference of 2000, organized by Disinfo's founder, media magician, Richard Metzger [founder of Dangerous Minds]. As I walked upstairs from the basement hangout zone of NYC's Hammerstein Ballroom, at the beginning of his now legendary lecture, I heard Morrison's bone-chilling scream into the microphone, which reminded me of another Morrison, and thought "Who the fuck is this guy?' — Read the rest
A young man with a VR headset does not want to part with an inflatable torso dressed up as an anime character.
I interviewed Robert Anton Wilson for bOING bOING (the zine) in 1988 and he told me he was not concerned about virtual reality sex because people who favored it over real sex would be weaned from the gene pool. — Read the rest
When Steve Jobs departed the world, he had One Last Thing for those who attended his memorial service — a copy of Autobiography of Yogi by the Hindu guru Paramhansa Yogananda, the man who introduced America to yoga and meditation. It wasn’t as paradoxical of a gift as it might have seemed. By Jason Louv
"There is very little difference between wild primates in the jungle and the average domesticated primate in a large city. We are literally living on the Planet of the Apes. Once you realize that, there's no point in being angry about it anymore. — Read the rest
A group of dedicated disciples of bOING bOING contributor Robert Anton Wilson are orchestrating a stage production of RAW's "Comsic Trigger: Final Secret of the Illuminati," a fantastic memoir of high weirdness that had a massive influence on my own life. — Read the rest
Jon Lebkowsky writes, "EFF and EFF-Austin, working with the amazing Maggie Duval, put together this celebration of the 90s Internet and cyberpunk memes. On stage: Gareth Branwyn, Bruce Sterling, Cory Doctorow, William Barker (Schwa), Chris Nakashima-Brown, Aaron Jue from EFF, and yours truly. — Read the rest