Chapter 9

Ontolo^
SVCry re\\q\on has, explicitly or implicitly, tried to answer the question: What is reality? Most theologies have held that reahty is defined by the dogmas and rules of the priesthood. Certain great Ori- ental philosophers and some mystic Western sages have understood that reality is an unified, complex, myriad maya play of all energies, which cluster and organize into transient structures called matter. And that what one believes to be real simply reflects the relativistic perspec- tive of the beholder.
God #6 is the neurologician. The Sixth God is
the neurological engineer ^ the reprintable brain
that rebuilds neural realities. The Sixth Craft of
God is psychopharmolocology to dial
and tune ones own brain.
These prescientific intimations of ontological relativ- ity remained mystical until the neurological and pharma- cological advances of the 20^^ Century. The brain, for so long a taboo organ, shrouded in mystery, was now recognized as the seat of consciousness , the tool for
AO YourdrainhGod
fabricating reality. We realize that everything we experi- ence is computed by the brain; that we can go outward into the universe or inward to study the nucleus of the atom only as far and precisely as our neuro- receptive, neuro' associative , and neuro- transmission intelligence allows us.
God the Neurologician
As long as we rely on our brains to know, then inevitably we shall define the universe as an enormous brain. Each flick of energy, stellar- galactic or nuclear- atomic, is seen as information. The universe is a web of intelligence mediated by our brain. The smarter we become, the more intelligent the universe will be- come. The more skillful we become in managing our own brains — our reality tools, the more skillful we shall imiiiiin^^j^^i^ become in fabricating, managing uni- Thc smarter verses. The smarter we become, the WC \?CCO\T\C smarter God will become, the smarter Recent scientific discoveries have God indicated how imprinting creates the
bsCOmeS. chessboard of our realities and how ■■■■■■i conditioning keeps the social, intellec- tual, emotional, and survival games going. The suggestion that humans can systematically reimprint, rebuild their realities has, for the first time in human history, raised the intelligence of our species to the level of self- mastery and self- control, by the indi- vidual, of hir own neural realities.
Chsptart)
Evolution
(^1^ heoriea of O/dut\0r\ or devolution are built / into almost every religion. Hinduism teaches -^ that life spins in long cycles or ages — kalpas — winding down from the most harmonious to the apoca- lyptic end, and then begins all over again. This, like most Oriental philosophies, is a pessimistic, quietist, makes- no- difference doctrine of devolution. Why bother because everything is terrible and the future is going to get worse? The only thing to do is cool out and try to get off the wheel of existence.
God #7 is the geneticist-sociobiologist. The
Seventh God is the Geneticist accomplishing the
routine tasks of divinity -create life, improve lifcy
attain immortality. The Seventh Craft of God
is management of DNA.
God the Geneticist- Sociobiologist
Western monotheisms have generally denied the theory of evolution. A jealous God built the universe
42 Your dra\nh God
and created mankind, and the stages to come depend on how obedient you are to His priests. There is no sense of how we have evolved and certainly no specific notion that we are still evolving into a better future. Indeed, the concept of a future which could be predicted or constructed is of very recent origin.
According to biologists, the flame of life that moves every living form, including the cell cluster you call your self, was seeded as a tiny single- celled spark in the lower Precambrian mud, then unfolded in steady, preprogrammed transformations to more complex forms. But the single cell is still thriving, thank you. Next, your ancestral fire glowed in seaweed, algae, flagellate, sponge, coral — about 1 billion years ago; then scorpion, millipede, fish — about 600 million years ago.
Every cell in your body traces back — about 450 million years — to the same light life flickering in our amphibian ancestors — and what a risky mutation migra- tion to leave the sea! From the shoreline, the mastery of ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ terrestrial environment
Higher has always been accelerated into four- foot the trajectory of mammalian intelligence- intelligent solution, stronger, fiercer, faster. ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■■ Then the great moment
when we stood erect freeing throat and hands for signalling and manipulation — and started climbing trees. Higher has always been the trajectory of intelligent evolution. From the trees we developed gesture and rudimentary language. Watch out for that lion! Piss on that tiger!
Then the development of a tool- culture, agricul- ture, trade, cities organizing enormous insectoid cul- tures. And next recently, now, the development of that greatest tool of evolution — The Self, mastering the body, the brain, and now DNA — the code of evolution itself.
Timothy Leary 43
Recapitualting the Cycle
Most wonderfully, each of us has recapitulated this sequence of evolution in our own personal lives. We were single- celled creatures when we were conceived and we retraced in our mothers' wombs, the same genetic stages — embryonic fish, embryonic furry ani- mals, finally being bom as larval primates.
In our early postnatal years we recapitulated this cycle once again. As amoeboid babies, floating and sucking in our mothers' arms, we had neither the neu- rology nor musculature to handle gravity. Then as crawling infants we retraced the amphibian stage. As toddlers and running cubs, we recapitulated the mam- malian steps. As parroting, mimicking children and as kids hanging out in gangs , we relive the neolithic and hunter- gatherer stages of our species past
Psychedelic Recapitualting
Experiential recapitulation of these genetic stages can be found in the reports of almost every LSD tripper — the experience of being a one- celled «»««■»■■
creature ter^aciously flailing the Experiential
singmg, humming sound oflife recapitulation
exfoliatmg; you are the DNA code ^^ ^^ -^
spmnmg out multicellular esthetic a^^^ri^ ^y^o
solutions. You directly and imme- ^^^^ -^ ^
diately experience invertebrate ^ ^SP trippers,
joy — you feel your backbone form- ^^^^^^^^^ ing; gills form. You are a fish with glistening gills, the sound of ancient fetal tides murmur- ing the rhythm of life. You stretch and wriggle in mam- malian muscular strength, with loping, powerful, big muscles; you sense hair growing on your body as you leave the warm broth of water and take over the earth.
44 Your ^rain Is God
The easiest interpretation is psychiatric: "Oh, every- one knows that LSD makes you crazy, and your delu- sions can take any psychotic form. " But is it entirely inconceivable that our cortical cells or the DNA mol- ecules inside the cellular nucleus "remember" back along the unbroken chain of bioelectrical transformations to that original seeding in the Precambrian mud, for which our language has few or no descriptive terms.
Recent breakthroughs in physics, genetics, and neuro' logic are eliminating impersonal change and blind accident from the philosophy of science and substituting intelligent choice. Physics, always highest, fastest, quickest among the sciences, provides the gifts of rela- tivity, singularity, multiple reality, mental choice , quantam indeterminacy. Bohr' s atom really is his own idea. Now, after the Golden Age of Physics, comes the Golden Age of Biology.
Gaia Theory
The Gala theory, first presented by John Lovelock and Lynn MarguUs in 1978, defines one Life Organism with a DNA brain and a spherical shape, which covers, surrounds , roots itself in the geosphere — the rocky planet. This glorious conception suggests that a Life Intelligence deftly, confidently, intelligently creates and maintains the Biosphere , the film o{ slime which sur- rounds this round rock in antiseptic — almost — space.
The Biosphere is an incredibly delicate, intricate, cybernetic, ecological web in which evolution precisely unfolds. Organisms equipped with nervous systems capable of attaining higher altitudes, velocities, and communication systems, eventually allow lifepods to blow off the planet, like seed blossoms, and thus dis- seminate Gaia around the galaxy.
Timothy Leary 46
Gaia' s strategy is clear- cut and straightforward. First you land seed pods on a lifeless, rocky planet. Next create an atmosphere — air- ocean — in which life can infiltrate and surround the geosphere. The atmosphere fabricatedby Gaia includes the ozone, the air, the oceans, the water cycle, and the topsoil — all results of biological processes. The Biosphere, the spherical film of life, then keeps temperature viably constant, and con- tinually stirs up and co- mingles biotic and organic mol- ecules from the crust elements, using wind currents and water movements as arteries.
Preprogrammed into Gaia' s ^ggggggg^iggg^^ DNA brain are the codes for Gala 3 etratcqy \
building more and more mobile ClCar -CU u a\^Q
organisms, which can perform *otra\QuXAOV\Nam. all the above maintenance and ■■■■■■■■■■■■■■ dissemination functions more efficiently. Gaia evolves faster, stronger, and more intelligent forms, which eventually develop escape velocity sufficient to leave the planet. These seed- blossom space packets — of which the early, crude forms were Apollo, Soyuz, Skylab, Shuttle- Rocket — are structurally more intelligent and efficient because in a space capsule the geosphere sur- rounds protects the inner Biosphere and atmosphere. Gaia thus constructs mini- worlds in which s/ he moves us all around the galaxy.
Philosophized
In the 1960s, over seven million Americans took LSD and activated circuits in their brains that provoke heightened sensuaUty, understanding of the neural- nature of reality, and genetic, evolutionary ruminations. The first results were confusing — millions of instant philosophers babbling about God and love and
46 Ycxir^rain Is God
bliss and space and reincarnation. Now, decades later, we are harvesting the fruits of this disorganized, mass brain- scrambling.
The highest incidence of psychedelic drug use was in the universities. Today research centers and laboratories are filled with scientists whose brains were philosophized while experimenting with LSD in college and who are now developing new methods,
mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm new hypotheses , new theories
Reeearch centers which are liberating humanity and laboratories from the dogmatic rule, supersti-
are filled with tious religion, conservative, scientists whose pessimistic science. While cell
brains were biologists have been learning how philosophized while Gaia moves personnel and mate- experimenting rial around the planet, with L5P in micro- geneticists and DNA college. researchers have succeeded in
■■■■■ deciphering the genetic code.
Recombinant engineering allows humans to create new life forms , to correct malfunction- ing genes, to clone, to effect DNA repair, to under- stand and manage the genetic signals which cause aging and death.