Outlands Community USA

ROY:  I think that it's a good idea to "get out among the world" as we've been doing.  I've never thought of carrying on conversations with established groups online.

LLAM:  My idea was that it was time to talk with other groups of different stripes, different individuals as well.  The Outlands Community has done well in our opinion but it's also insular.  You attracted a comment from a chaos theorist recently, I was impressed by that.

ROY:  You were?

LLAM:  (somewhat surprised)  Yes.  Also that you got replies from that fellow with the blog and from the rep of that futurist group.  Very nice.  I know that you can talk and write but honestly I thought that they would ignore you.

ROY:  As long as they're not too busy they'll usually reply.  This goes back to the 1980's, I used to write to people who'd written books.  I got a letter from R. Gordon Wasson once, although it was a disappointment.  He said that my idea was too hard to follow.

LLAM:  (smiling) Was this a case of you being as clear as mud?

ROY:  Possibly.  He was 87 at the time and said that he was failing.  I was giving The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind a fresh reread and this after going through some of the ancient Semitic law texts - the Hammurabi code, the Assyrian Laws, the Bible.  All of them had prohibitions against shamanistic practices.  My thought was that shamanism there at that time possibly included the use of some kind of psychedelic.  I wanted his opinion.

LLAM:  You're going to re-present it to the Julian Jaynes Society?

ROY:  When I get my sources together, yes.  It's twenty years later and there is now good circumstantial evidence that some of the Biblical writers used an ayahuasca-type of substance.  Back in the 1980's all that we had was John Allegro's book The Mushroom and the Cross.

LLAM:  Which I've heard you say is right for all of the wrong reasons.

ROY:  Well, yeah, it is.  I do not know to this day how common the Amanita mushroon is in Palestine, if it even grows there.  (Makes note to research "fungi in Palestine)   Or if it ever did.  Or if it ever grew in Egypt.  Allegro was a linguist and he proposed dozens of words in Sumerian, which is really going out on a limb.  All of them tried connecting words for 'semen' and 'mushroom juice,' 'phallus' with 'mushroom.'  His work was roundly denounced by fellow linguists as untenable, but that threw the baby out with the bathwater.  The fact remained, at least to me, that some Biblical writers used psychedelics.

LLAM:  According to Mike Archontas, they did.  Hemp among them.

ROY:  I suppose that I'd better consult with him, he was there.  But I guess that we've gotten off-track here.  If we've recently joined your organization or forum, we're going to be taking part in your discussions. 

LLAM:  Welcome to the Outlands!

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