Terence Mckenna's ideas on time have been largely dismissed due to the association with the 12/21/12 date, but this is all due to a misunderstanding of the theory, and the date being given importance which it never had. It was called timewave zero, and it was eventually given that date to coincide with the mayan calender when that was discovered. But, it's not really about the date. The date was given because it very nearly lined up with the point predicted by his attempt to graph his theories onto the history of earth, which was mathematical in nature yet at the same time impossible to have a definitive location. So the graph was defined, but it doesn't have any particular location of layout. So, he kinda slid it around to see where it lined up with actual history. And the way he figured it doing this, he later discovered, was close to the mayan calender date; and so he just chose that as the end date. It was never about the date, and Terence never would have been particularly concerned with the date. The key here is the concept. And his way of looking at things is extremely interesting. I'm not entirely sure about how he came to his specific graph, so I can't in honest truth comment too deeply in that. But I can get into the general theory, novelty theory, which is the fundamental insight. The idea is that the fundamental property of the Universe is to produce novelty. More than that, its purpose is its end. There is a culminating, transcendental point. To use a fascinating Terence Mckenna quote if you really think about it, "History is a shockwave of eschatology." Not only does the Universe produce ever-increasing levels of novelty, which build upon each other, but each new level is reached more quickly than was the previous. And it is not only that we are progressing forward through time, but there is a great attractive force which pulls at the thread of space and time. It is like an infinite which pulls time into itself, which is why he would sometimes called spacetime 'asymptotic,' if you know what an asymptote is. It's a line on a graph as it approaches infinity, getting ever closer to but never reaching the point itself, since it is infinite. History is a particular locale of the cosmos as it is called towards this transcendental object. This transcendental object is reached at the end of time, yet time itself is the playing out of pulses from this transcendental object. So there is an end of time, and the end of time is in the transcendental object. We can all observe that the history of this planet is cycles of evolution, and each new step occurred more quickly than the past. And in this conception we as humans are not just a random arbitrary blip on the historical timeline, but are at the forefront of novelty production. We, through our thinking and communication, accelerate novelty towards the transcendental object at the end of time. Now is the most novel point of all time, and we utilize all novelty which preceded us. And it will continue to accelerate through us until the transcendental object is reached.
I really thought highly of his theory at some point. The idea of increasing novelty was an attractive one. Novelty. A very interesting idea. It would seem humans are beings of novelty.
His ratings of novelty are completely arbitrary. All his "theory" is is a graph with arbitrary points plotted and then arbitrary events paired with those points. Basically, it's junk
I'm skeptical of some of TM's ideas - but not to the point where I don't appreciate many of his insights. But I'm not very adept at marrying esoteric notions of mind and human purpose with the physical nature of our brains' electrochemical abilities at producing conscious experience, as well as how the universe seems to act. I would actually expect novelty in a universe of unfolding manifestations of interacting energy. Though I certainly wouldn't expect it to be governed by any underlying "purpose", as if moving toward some culminating point or transcendental object. In terms of spacetime geometry and its implication on the "eschatology" of the universe, it currently appears that it's essentially flat on the grand scale. And flat means that the thermodynamic evolution of its energy density and spacetime expansion rate would forever approach some asymptotic limit where there is virtually no energetic interaction at all. Not the heat death associated with an eternal expansion but still, not a very exciting culmination to an otherwise fascinatingly bizarre phenomena. But I don't KNOW - it's merely the opinion of a silly dope fiend.
Tell me how you can quantify novelty in a way that can be graphed? I'm convinced the Journey is a troll. All of his posts follow a pattern "1. i have a vague idea that is mystical/revolutionary 2. This is what it means 3. I don't need to explain why it means this because it would be a waste of time"
Please explain how novelity is measured in an objective way. Also explain where the assertion that "there is a great attractive for which at the thread of time and space" comes from. Dude I'm sorry but all of T Mckens stuff that tried to be like science is BS. He said somethings that I think are valid on a sociological/cultural level but he is not a good scientist.
I think you're looking at things a little too heavy heartedly. I don't remember much of his theory, only that I enjoyed listening to him at some point. As far as I know, novelty is just the more human, intelligent aspect of entropy.
How am I looking at it "heavy heartedly"? Is that just some euphemism for critical thinking? Yeah he's fun to listen to but his theory is shit. How is novelity anything like entropy and how could one quantify it in a non-arbitrary way? You can't. It's all BS. He cherry picked some events from history that he decided were important and then he (arbitrarily) assigned values then put then next to some squiggles on a graph. It's like if I graphed my bowel movements and randomly assigned number to them. Maybe I will do this and call it shit wave zero. It would hold just as much validity as terrences theory
It sounds to me as though TM likes to just ''make stuff up'', or have ''guesses'' about things.. which is fine, but couldn't anybody do that?
If it weren't for the theory on the quantum state of shit particle transcendence duality.. we may have never found out what causes pink eye.
yeah that explains how one fart in the face can give you pink eye in TWO eyes,. Think about it its deep. I don't need to explain or provide any support either.
Tbh it is all subjective, but the idea is simply that novelty increases exponentially, and at some point, it's going to be more than it is now, which is every single point and onwards. It's obvious that any attempts to measure novelty would yield an arbitrary appraisal based upon a made up scale of measurement. But I'm sure his point wasn't to say anything other than that humans and our interactions in the world grow more complex over time. Humans themselves are a novelty yet they have made the universe infinitely more possibility for novelty than a universe without humans. The idea is to have a proper understanding of the theory, which you've proven you don't have. I asked you simply because I thought a person to deny a theory must have understood it well. It seems you don't understand it at all...
Yeah he's saying novelty increases faster and faster over time yet he offers NOTHING to support that. He just ASSERTS IT. WHY DON"T YOU understand that that is not a sound approach to creating a theory? So making up a fake graph is a good approach in your view or what? His theory is human centric also, so totally non-objective. He then threw the 2012 date in for popularity to sell books. Dude, he made money off his books, he wanted to sell as many books as he could. He just threw out shit and hoped something stuck. Maybe Terrence was truly insane or just naive, I don't know, but his time wave zero theory is shit.
I don't know anything about his graph or w.e, but I know he was pretty sincere about his idea. Increasing novelty is just entropy at work in my opinion. It makes perfect sense that novelty is increasing exponentially, one doesn't need to think to hard to realize that even human civilization and developments are occurring at a faster pace every day. I'm sure his theory makes perfect sense, I'm simply not well enough versed to establish the reasons in their entirety. As it is, I do not even claim to completely understand his theory, although I have told you what I have understood, and it makes sense.
So now you claim to not know his theory but some how you know enough to tell me I have no idea what I'm talking about? Why not just cop out entirely? You're sure his theory makes perfect sense? How? Seems like blind faith in your beloved TMcken.
I've explained it as I understand it, but I have to admit that I might not recall it clearly. Regardless, I've explained why it could make sense and is quite possibly not far-fetched at all.