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Famous Peter J. Carroll Quotes

“There is no part of one’s beliefs about oneself which cannot be modified by sufficiently powerful psychological techniques. There is nothing about oneself which cannot be taken away or changed. The proper stimuli can, if correctly applied, turn communists into fascists, saints into devils, the meek into heroes, and vice-versa. There is no sovereign sanctuary within ourseles which represents our real nature. There is nobody at home in the internal fortress. Everything we cherish as our ego, everything we believe in, is just what we have cobbled together out of the accident of our birth and subsequent experiences. With drugs, brainwashing, and other techniques of extreme persuasion, we can quite readily make a man a devotee of a different ideology, the patriot of a different country, or the follower of a different religion.”

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Author:Peter J. Carroll
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“It is a mistake to consider any belief more liberated than another. It is the possibility of change which is important. Every new form of liberation is destined to eventually become another form of enslavement for most of its adherents. There is no freedom from duality on this plane of existence, but one may at least aspire to choice of duality.”

LiberationOccultChaos Magick
Book:Liber Null and Psychonaut: An Introduction to Chaos Magic
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“(Q: From an outsider’s perspective, what you call “chaos magick” has a lot of rules, discipline, and order involved, and doesn’t seem very chaotic at all. What would you say to such a person?) A: I differentiate sternly between Chaos and Entropy. Only highly ordered and structured systems can display complex creative and unpredictable behaviour, and then only if they have the capacity to act with a degree of freedom and randomness. Systems which lack structure and organisation usually fail to produce anything much, they just tend to drift down the entropy gradient. This applies both to people and to organisations.”

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Author:Peter J. Carroll
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“Many scientific disciplines begin by not observing any sort of vital spark or consciousness in material events and proceed to deny that these things exist in living things, including themselves. Because consciousness does not fit into their mechanistic schemes they declare it illusory. Magicians make exactly the reverse argument. Observing consciousness in themselves and animals, they are magnanimous enough to extend it to all things to some degree—trees, amulets, planetary bodies, and all. This is a far more respectful and generous attitude than that of religions, most of whom won't even give animals a soul.”

ReligionConsciousnessMagickScientismReligion Vs ScienceScientific Materialism
Book:Liber Null and Psychonaut: An Introduction to Chaos Magic
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“Physical processes alone will never completely explain the existence of the universe , life , and consciousness . Religious answers are just wishful thinking and wanton fabrication cast over a bottomless pit of ignorance . To explain their occult and mystical experiences , magicians are forced to develop models beyond the scope of materialistic or religious systems .”

ThinkingUniverseProcessReligiousAnswersExistenceConsciousnessIgnoranceModelsCastsMysticalMagicianScopePitsOccultMaterialisticWishful ThinkingWantonFabricationMystical Experiences
Book:Liber Null & Psychonaut: An Introduction to Chaos Magic
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“The conscious mind is a maelstrom of fleeting thoughts, images, sensations, feelings, conflicting desires, and doubts; barely able to confine its attention to a single clear objective for a microsecond before secondary thoughts begin to adulterate it and provoke yet further trains of mental discourse. If you do not believe this, then attempt to confine your conscious attention to the dot at the end of this sentence without involving yourself in any other form of thinking, including thinking about the dot.”

IfsThinkingMindBelieveEndsFeelingsAbleFormDesireAttentionClearDoubtConsciousTrainIncludingSentencesObjectivesSensationsProvokingDiscourseFleetingInvolvingDotsConscious MindMaelstrom
Author:Peter J. Carroll
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“An old joke puts its thus, "when a man speaks to a god its prayer , when a god speaks to a man its schizophrenia"... Many people hear voices without suffering any of the debilitating and dysfunctional effects associated with schizophrenia, some treat these as sources of inspiration of develop religious ideas around them, others become mediums or occultists.”

PeopleMenIdeasInspirationSufferingSpeakVoiceReligiousPrayerEffectsSourceJokesTreatsMediumsSchizophreniaSource Of InspirationOld Jokes
Author:Peter J. Carroll
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“So many people seem to spend their lives trying to appear normal, predictable and consistent to themselves and those that surround them. They just end up bored with themselves, bereft of any depth of inner resources, suffocated by the inhibitions that defend their own monolithic identities.”

PeopleLifeTryingEndsSelfSeemsIdentityNormalResourcesDepthAppealsBoredLive LifeConsistentSurroundConsistencyHuman BehaviorPredictableNormal LifeNormalityInhibitionsSuffocatingBereft
Author:Peter J. Carroll
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“Ideas about a person's place in society, his role, lifestyle, and ego qualities will lose their hold as the cohesive forces in society disintegrate. Subculture values will proliferate to such a bewildering extent that a whole new class of professionals will arise to control them. Such a Transmutation Technology will deal in fashions, in ways of being. Lifestyle consultants will become the new priests of our civilizations. They will be the new magicians.”

WayPersonsIdeasWholeValuesForceLosesDealsQualityClassRolesTechnologyFashionCivilizationEgoLifestyleArisePriestsMagicianConsultantsSubcultureTransmutationNew Class
Book:Liber Null & Psychonaut: An Introduction to Chaos Magic
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“Always consider the qualifications of anyone who assumes or professes authority, what do they really know? Authorities on spirituality can rarely give a half coherent explanation of what they persuade us to believe they know. They achieve authority by stage management and then exploit audience suggestibility. Same old trick they have pulled for thousands of years.”

KnowsGivingYearsBelieveSpiritualityHalfAudienceAchieveStageAuthorityManagementAssumingTricksExplanationExploitsQualifications
Author:Peter J. Carroll
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“Apophenia means finding pattern or meaning where others don’t. Feelings of revelation and ecstasies usually accompany it. It has some negative connotations in psychological terminology when it implies finding meaning or pattern where none exists; and some positive ones when it implies finding something important, useful or beautiful. It thus links creativity and psychosis, genius and madness.”

MeanImportantFeelingsBeautifulCreativityGeniusFindingsNegativeMadnessPatternsPsychologicalRevelationsLinksEcstasyAccompanyPsychosisConnotationTerminologyGenius And Madness
Author:Peter J. Carroll
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“Space, time, mass, and energy originate from Chaos, have their being in Chaos, and through the agency of the aether are moved by Chaos into the multiple forms of existence. Some of the various densities of the aether have only a partial or probablistic differentiation into existence, and are somewhat indeterminate in space and time. In the same way that mass exists as a curvature in space-time, extending with a gradually diminishing force to infinity that we recognize as gravity, so do all events, particularly events involving the human mind, send ripples through all creation.”

WayMindHumansFormEnergyForceSpaceExistenceEventsCreationMassMovedChaosVariousAgencyHuman MindInfinityGravityMultipleTime And SpaceInvolvingRippleExtendingDensityDifferentiationSpace Time
Book:Liber Null & Psychonaut: An Introduction to Chaos Magic
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“Careful observation will confirm that virtually all spontaneous parapsychological events occur through some form of sleight of mind. It is invariably something hovering just below the threshold of awareness that initiated an unusual event or gave one a curious half sensed feeling that something was about to happen just before it did. The magician seeks to exploid this effect deliberately, but in doing so he must avoid doing it deliberately as it were. Conscious lust of result destroys magical effect, so trickery must be employed to annul it and to activate the subconscious.”

MindFeelingsHappensFormResultsHalfEffectsAwarenessEventsConsciousCarefulLustObservationCuriousUnusualSubconsciousSpontaneousEmployedMagicianThresholdActivateTrickeryHovering
Author:Peter J. Carroll
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