Terence Mckenna - Culture is your operating system

Heya guys, I know this vid is old but I couldn't find this specific one here on ATS and I think its probably the best thoughts this man had.

Disk Error = Format Reinstall Latest Version

I guess my OS was Windows Vista.

You don't have to do any psychedelic to will "clear your disk". I used to kinda think like him when you're escaping on cloud 9 for a longer period of time. Then once you come back down to reality without RETURNING FOR A LONG TIME, you start to think, maybe I just had an altered state of mind. Which was potentially rewarding but not some golden road to knowing everything. Take it as an experience, not the answer to the universe.


1. Look at yourself in 3rd person, view your actions like you are looking at a play or movie. Lose your ego, most important thing.

2. Have the ability to have extreme empathy, since it seems a lot of people think empathy means showing compassion, it has a much broader different definition

: the action of understanding, being aware of, being sensitive to, and vicariously experiencing the feelings, thoughts, and experience of another of either the past or present without having the feelings, thoughts, and experience fully communicated in an objectively explicit manner; also : the capacity for this

www.merriam-webster.com...

3. Have a drastic life change. Which could mean moving countries, ghetto to suburb, farm to ghetto, rich to poor, poor to rich. Particularly, I think going to bad to better is more enlightening.

Originally posted by RealSpoke
You don't have to do any psychedelic to will "clear your disk". I used to kinda think like him when you're escaping on cloud 9 for a longer period of time. Then once you come back down to reality without RETURNING FOR A LONG TIME, you start to think, maybe I just had an altered state of mind. Which was potentially rewarding but not some golden road to knowing everything. Take it as an experience, not the answer to the universe.


1. Look at yourself in 3rd person, view your actions like you are looking at a play or movie. Lose your ego, most important thing.

2. Have the ability to have extreme empathy, since it seems a lot of people think empathy means showing compassion, it has a much broader different definition

: the action of understanding, being aware of, being sensitive to, and vicariously experiencing the feelings, thoughts, and experience of another of either the past or present without having the feelings, thoughts, and experience fully communicated in an objectively explicit manner; also : the capacity for this

www.merriam-webster.com...

3. Have a drastic life change. Which could mean moving countries, ghetto to suburb, farm to ghetto, rich to poor, poor to rich. Particularly, I think going to bad to better is more enlightening.

edit on 1-4-2012 by RealSpoke because: (no reason given)

I'm stunned with enlightenment.

I always thought it was very hypocritical of John Lennin to not include culture in his song "Imagine". Let's get rid of things that divide humanity, but let's leave culture alone because hippies dig it. Sounds like wanting your cake and wanting to eat it too, to me.

mckenna was a great guy with a great heart and a brilliant mind and all but far too many people take his words and just run with them, sort of like jesus.

reply to post by RealSpoke
Lesser so towards those connection more so towards all the general metaphors he uses. Our current OS or social complex has bugs in it. In fact you could go so far as to say this society blue screened years ago :/

reply to post by RealSpoke


Terence Never said that obliterating your ego on psychedelics was the answer to the universe, in fact he said on a number of times psychedelics are very serious business and definitely not for everybody.

High doses of Psilocybin does have its way of completely obliterating your ego into atoms, then as you reassemble yourself you can get to the really hidden areas of your mind and give a good cleanse.

I love terence, he was a brilliant mind

I would like to hear an atheist try to disprove Terence McKenna about what he believes, because it wouldn't have happened while he was alive. Terence would have a very good explanation for every question related to spirituality or any question about what God is and has been believed to be. Everyone in my class was asked by the instructor(just for fun), Who is your favorite role model? I replied, "Well obviously Terence McKenna" Everyone was like, "Who the heck is Terence McKenna?"