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 | 1964-1968 My career as an undergraduate concentrated on the study of English literature, the history of art and modern history. Robert Fredrickson was my tutor in creative writing and inspired me to appreciate the arts of language and to strive for a cutting edge of originality. Dan Morrill lectured on modern history, Russian history and the twentieth century and delivered up a challenging and nihilistic vision of a past dominated by violence, madness and, ultimately, chaos. While describing the colonial period of American civilisation, Ed Perzel inculcated the importance of attempting to discover the origins of historical trends, the ontologies of history, in spite of the challenges presented by philosophers. John Robbins presented a compelling and revolutionary reinterpretation of American history, based on his revision of the origin of the Civil War, which he viewed as a conflict over human rights, rather than a contretemps over the rights of the state. The history of art and archaelogy was revealed to me by Maude Gatewood, a remarkable historian as well as a highly accomplished artist. Robert Rieke opened the doors of intellectual history, historiography, textual exegesis and the role of ideas in shaping civilisation in the evolutionary process we understand as history. Loy Witherspoon introduced me to comparitive religion and anthropology, which gave me a new and more powerful methodology for the investigation of the past. 1969-1970 The period following my graduation from university was dominated by research in intellectual history, especially the history of philosophy. I read the works of modern philosophers: Bertrand Russell, Alfreed North Whitehead, Friedrich Nietzsche, Edmund Husserl, Ludwig Wittengenstein and Godel, as well as the classics: Plato, Aristotle, Bacon, Hobbes, Descartes, Locke, Rousseau, Kant, Hegel and Emerson. Extracurricular activities centered on the peace movement, civil rights, environmental protests and work for the political campaigns of liberal candidates. Robert Rieke emerged as my principal mentor, and I continued to consult Fredrickson, Morrill, Perzel and Robbins. 1971-1979 Through experimentation with psychoactive substances, I recognised both: the objective falsification of Cartesian duality and the relevance of shamanism to the history of science. Carlos Castaneda's work, which is frequently criticised by academic authorities who have misread and misintrpreted his writings, provided me with a series of important references. 'M' emerged as my principal informant in the field of parapsychology, who demonstrated objective evidence that the mind encompassed far more experience than the presupposed properties of the brain. I focused my research on the history and philosophy of science, while reading the works of: Newton, Darwin, Einstein, Freud and Heisenberg. I read the works of Alexander Koyre, Thomas Kuhn and Karl Popper, as well as Paul Feyerabend and Imre Lakatos. During this period, I began my readings of the vast alchemical corpus. I read a good deal of contemporary science and was drawn to gravitational biology. I pondered the the physical properties of time and the potential connection between relativity and evolution. Always fascinated by the stars and planets, I spent many evenings engrossed in naked eye and telescopic observations of celestial events, frequently in heightened states of consciousness. I observed many meteor showers, occultations, lunar eclipses and journeyed to Canada, to the point of maximum totality of the solar eclipse of July, 1972. NASA's exploration of the solar system was well under way with the Pioneer and Viking programmes, and I examined the history of space exploration. Fascinated by the debate raging between catastrophism and uniformitarianism, I corresponded with both Immanuel Velikovsky and Carl Sagan. I studied the catastrophe theory of Rene Thom and the work of the morphogenetic biologists, D'Arcy Thompson and Conrad Waddington. I planned to write a monograph on the physical properties of time. In 1979, I wrote to the Committee on Space Research (COSPAR), proposing a simple series of experiments to investigate the effects of relativistic phenomena on organisms. My proposal was brusquely rejected, but a few years later, I was amused to learn that experiments similar in detail but identical in theory to my proposal were being conducted by NASA. Later in 1979, while examining the poetry of Taliesin, I discovered that the Welsh bards had observed standard shamanistic practices and used powerful drugs. I became fascinated by this unanticipated discovery, which led me to an investigation of the intellectual history of psychoactive substances. 1980-1985 With this new perspective on history, I turned to the classics and discovered a myriad of direct references to psychoactive drugs in antique sources. I read the works of: Homer; Virgil; Ovid and the Bible and realised that there was an esoteric tradition of the shamanistic practice of psychoactive substances that predated classical civilisation. At Duke, I met Weston La Barre, who had written a magisterial analysis of the origin of religion, The Ghost Dance. La Barre suggested that a multi-disciplinary approach to the origin of science would be a prerequisite to an analytical treatment of the subject. I read the works of J. G. Frazer and Lynn Thorndike in the libraries of Duke and Chapel Hill. La Barre introduced me to R. Gordon Wasson, who had been the first to publish a personal report of the psychoactive properties of certain species of mushroom. I visited Wasson's home on several occasions, where we would spend days poring over books, works of art and scientific reports of the use of psychoactive substances in classical and early scientific sources that had been ignored, hitherto. La Barre and Wasson encouraged me to relocate to Europe to investigate the primary sources available in the rich manuscript collections in several leading European libraries. In London, I read the manuscripts of Dr. John Dee, Walter Raleigh and the Ripley Scrolles, which are the Rosetta Stone of alchemy. In Cambridge, I examined the alchemical manuscripts of Isaac Newton, which elucidated his experimentation with psychoactive substances. In Oxford, I discovered a plethora of direct references to the use of psychoactive substances in the alchemical manuscripts bequethed to the University by one of its greatest benefactors, Elias Ashmole. The magnitude of the Ashmolean Collection required a prolonged stay in Oxford, and I have made my home in this marvellous mediaeval city. To read more about Michael Carmichael's research, click here 2000 MICHAEL CARMICHAEL - Alchemy Online. All Rights Reserved. | ||
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