Customer Reviews

The Invisible Landscape: Mind, Hallucinogens, and the I Ching

5 star:		(13)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

_The Invisible Landscape_ by Terence and Dennis Mckenna is a highly modernized, up-to-date version of Jungian psychotherapy with an emphasis on brain-chemistry at the molecular level. Mckenna has fascinating theories on the nuances and inner workings of the subatomic particles within the DNA molecules in the human brain. According to Mckenna, the behavior of the atoms within our DNA actually determines the very nature of our conscious existence. Specifically, the patterns in which the electrons orbit the atomic nuclei in our DNA atoms form an Analog representation of what we are seeing; the electrons themselves move in such a manner as to create a type of morse-code which translates our sense perceptions into conscious being. This "analog theory of the brain" represents the crowning achievement of this book. The vibrations of the subtomic particles in our brain create reality in the same way in which digital and analog code create images on a computer screen.

But all of this has yet to be proved. Nevertheless, _The Invisible Landscape_ is a modern masterpiece of speculative philosophy/psychology. It represents the outermost reaches of far-seeing speculative theory. It is, therefore, a welcome departure from more conservative forms of thinking. Terence Mckenna also tries his hand at claivoyant soothsaying, providing the reader with his own unique doomsday prophecy loosely based on the hexagrams of the I-Ching. This so-called "timewave zero" graph maps the cycles of cultural and social "novelty" mankind has experienced over history. Suffice it to say that this theory is still open to debate.

Overall, the analog theory of mind, along with the "holographic theory of mind", make this book worth reading. _The Invisible Landscape_ is a hidden gem of psychological theory that should not be overlooked. Even though its emphasis is on complex molecular theories, it is quite readable and entertaining. It is geared toward the literary mind as well as the scientific mind, so I would recommend it to any ambitious reader regardless of their experience in neurology or chemistry.

Terence McKenna and his brother relate their experience with a South American psychoactive plant, and the mind-blowing (mind-blown?) insights that they gained from it. The I Ching's 'King Wen sequence' of the 64 hexagrams is interpreted as a digital code, and in fractal geometry-like fashion, concatenated onto itself to create a wave function for the entirety of the universe, with its peaks and minima related to rises and falls in the rate of 'novelty' in reality as different dimensional realities interpenetrate in the McKennas' version of 'the end of the world as we know it.'

a razzle dazzle trip through math, mysticism and madness that will surely make the poet rejoice while the "rational" scientist churns. Among McKenna's work, I find this one to require the greatest stretch or leap of the imagination - which makes it one of my favorites!

To fully enjoy and understand the brilliance of McKenna, one must open up their intuition and greatest capacity for open-mindedness. We are dealing with visionaries musing at the extremes and blissing out with philosophic rapture or torture at almost every turn. These are experiences way beyond the "realities" most will ever know.

Another remarkable capacity of Terence was his ability to spin the words in a way that adventurously captures the essence of the experience while entertaining his readers literally BEYOND BELIEF!

As for the entheogen-cynics that knocked McKenna: He had more insight and made more contribution than all the cynics put together.

Long live his indomitable spirit!

I enjoyed this book tremendously. When combined with other reading materials, I think this book gaines value. The authors give a general overview into what the popular world would refer to as "mystic". This is a good book to read for a general reconfirmation of quasi-cosmology. The math is a bit strewn together, and there are many leaps of faith, but all in all the book presents a glimpse of the magic which can be harnessed by everyone one of us, but the journey is taken on by only a few. According to the authors, however, everyone will soon be aware that the journey was always taking place.

The authors have a great hypothesis regarding the relationship between consciousness, neurochemistry, quantum mechanics, and the I Ching, but they get bogged down in a writing style that seems aimed at a very narrow segment. There is no need to write in such a way as to confuse readers. If they had decided to write a book more accessible to the average reader in its style, I believe that their ideas would be more widely known and believed today. As it is, I doubt that more than several hundred people have any idea of the connections that they have made.

Overall, just a shame to lose such a great idea.

I remember feeling like the universe was handing me an amazing gift as I was reading this book. A must read for anyone interested in mind expansion.

I felt when reading this book 14 years ago that it was three books in one: the first comparing shamanism with schizophrenia, the second a chemistry text, and the third a somewhat awkward positioning of a template onto the King Wen sequence of the I Ching. The chemistry stuff was over my head, but I appreciated the fine line drawn between shamanism and schizophrenia. I learned nothing about electronic spin resonance unfortunately despite getting at least a B in high school chemistry.
Having had some struggles with both shamanistic practices and mental illness is part of the daily grind some of us go through and it is the psychiatrist who tries to come up with the magic pills to assist the processes of both.
I have done I Ching divinations in the past using 49 pennies and I am not too sure that we need to look for patterns there. Take it with a grain of salt. Same with any changes in brain chemistry due to what you ingest.

I would like to first point out that i reviewed this book on the basis that i have read the rest of Mckenna's work, and this is by far the most technical. One reason for its technicality is the fact that this book introduced the brothers' Terence and Dennis Mckenna's life long work, especially Terence's. So this work could be considered the magnum opus of their entrepreneurial psychedelic style.

The book starts off with an examination of the Shamanic enterprise of spirituality. It hits the myths, the legends, and the reality, but is also brief and readable. Then veering off the path the book takes a turn in intellectual attire and the brothers elucidate on Whiteheads orginismal thought and holographic theory of mind. It takes some decent philosophical and scientific understanding to grasp the concepts they are telling us, and like some other reviewers, even I had to chomp through this one.

In chapter 5 they discuss in great depth the molecular effects of psychedelic compounds and how electron spin resonance effects neuronal DNA and RNA. It is cool because they show in a diagram how 5HT (Serotonin)is insanely close in structure to Psilocybin, DMT, and other tryptamine based entheogens. After that the brothers lecture on the scientific, psychological, and philosophical aspects of their retreat and shamanic journey with the Amazonian natives. (See "The Archaic Revival" for more on this)

And the book closes down with Terence's life work - the development of Timewave Zero. Timewave Zero is a computer program constructed off of the King Wen sequence within the I Ching. He decodes the hexagram pattern within the King Wen to come up with a novelty theory of time. The theory basically suggests that at certain epochs in time novelty ingresses spontaneously suggesting that time is working itself out through history. But Terence is adamant it is not a theory of time in its entirety, but a working model.

The book is almost overly zealous and is probably only readable for a minority of individuals. But the brothers are so impassioned by their findings that they literally loose control, which shows the true nature of the human imagination on the edge of its cosmic seat.

A must read for the psychedelic adventurer and psychonaut.

This book is in short, in my opinion is the best book to read if your interested in the more technical aspect of hallucinogens, hard to grapple with theories of reality, and mathematical bliss on subjects which have no previous advent to! Terence and Dennis Mckenna are the foremost spokesmen's on the Psychedelic experience, Terence Mckenna being more philosophical in his understandings, and Dennis Mckenna, being a ethnobotanist, and neurobiologist, presents work on models of drug activity that should be redefining this field! They Thoroughly cover Psychedelic's in the shamanic sense, cover their trip to the amazon and the understanding that came out of that applied to these hard to conceive theories such as the King Wen Sequence as a Quantified Modular Hierarchy, and Temporal Hierarchy and Cosmology (I-Ching) Which leads me to my second rave, Terence's Timewave Zero Theory, coinsiding with the mayan calander endate, with all the mathematics in order to support his theory, its compelling what's come out of that since. Dennis and Terence are artists with complex words and ideas, presenting them into painfully easy forms of causation

"The total unity of an event can only be understood with reference to the totality of process, that is, to the whole of nature. Thus, in this view a way is cleared not only for the implicit reference to past events to be found in the formulation of scientific laws but for our own psychological unity of memory, immediate realization, and anticipation"

In a way not imposing change, but merely the vantage point on science, is that science has polarities and dogmas inherient in their own practices, and terence skillfully shows these with ease. This book perhaps to complex in chemistry, math and radical yet supported ideas for the average reader, yet i think a must read for those who have an interest in either the Mind, Hallucinogens, I Ching, Science, Mathematics, Temporal Resonance, Epistomolgy, Quantum Physics, and many others realting to these!

First of all, both McKennas openly admit that a few of the ideas in this book are slightly outdated. They wrote this when they were very young and inclded many theories they were obviously anxious to test. In my opinion, it does not take anything away from the content. The McKenna brothers are incredible writers and their teamwork is incredible. Dennis's chemical approach to the topic is masterfully blended with Terence's cultural views.

This book goes well beyond recreational use of drugs. This has some very important commentary on the use of our own brains, our evolution, and their relation to spiritual matters.

If you haven't picked it up yet, get a copy of "Food of the Gods" by Terence to go with this.