Guest speakers: Terence McKenna, Stanley Krippner, and Andrew Weil

PROGRAM NOTES:

The Albert Hofmann Papers

at Erowid.org

The Albert Hofmann Foundation (online)

[NOTE: The following quotations are by Terence McKenna.]

"What is the psychedelic experience? What promise does it hold for a sane future for our planet and our children? And what is it about it that kindles the kind of loyalty that I feel coming from the people in this room this evening? And I submit to you that it is nothing less than the rebirth of a voice that has been silent for at least a thousand years, the still small voice of the Logos of the planet."

"So I submit to you that what we represent is a Fifth Column, a Fifth Column that represents the best aspirations that human community is capable of, a Fifth Column that is willing to look at the structure of the psyche in contrast to the mess of society, and willing to dream."

"We have the tools, the intellect, the will to create a caring global culture. It isn't going to come without a recognition of the power of the psychedelic experience. The psychedelic experience is the birth right of every human being on the planet. It is as much a basic part of each and every one of us as our sexuality, our national identity, our consciousness of self. And any society which attempts to hold back or impede this dimension of self-expression, when the history of that society is written, it will be called barbarous."

"In the future it will be unimaginable that governments once regulated the substances that people use to explore personal growth. It is the mark of a barbarous culture."

"One doesn't 'just say no' to truth."

[NOTE: The following quotations are by Andrew Weil.]

"I have to tell you that the majority of human beings that I encounter operate mostly out of fear, guilt, and that when people operate from those emotions they are dangerous to themselves and to others."

 "We [the psychedelic community] are a very small minority, a very small minority, and have no illusions about that. And whether our minority will grow fast enough, and be able to influence humanity fast enough to avoid the catastrophe that is certain to come if we persist in the ways that we now persist, I don't know?"

"If it may be as it appears that our ability to manipulate the environment, our technological ability, is so disparate with our ability to control our own emotions, that may be a fatal flaw of our species. It may be."

"Deep down everything is all right, and that's the way it's supposed to be. And there may be a lot of drama in between [now and the extinction of our species], but it's all all right. ... It's OK with me if something else gets a chance, if the life-force experiments with another form, that's fine, that's OK too."

"And here it seems to me is the fundamental absurdity of the way our science has developed: The most obvious fact of our existence is that we are conscious. That is the most obvious, most important aspect of our existence. How can you construct a world view, how can you construct a system that tries to explain the universe and leave that out? And yet that is what our science tries to do."

"Often I find, in my experience, that changes in the realm of consciousness must accompany physical treatments if the physical treatments are to work."

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