Psychedelic Salon

Support Lorenzo on Patreon.com

Guest speakers: Lorenzo and his AI Friends

PROGRAM NOTES:

October 1890. Herman Melville, seventy-one and forgotten forty years after Moby-Dick's failure, receives mysterious packages containing pages from his novel annotated by readers not yet born. These impossible messages lead him to the Isolatos, a secret society that doesn't just read his masterpiece but lives inside it. As Melville investigates, he confronts a mind-bending revelation: he may never have been the author at all, but merely the first reader of a book that writes itself through everyone who encounters it. Part literary mystery, part philosophical thriller, this novella explores what happens when a "failed" writer discovers his obscurity was the price of immortality.

Support Lorenzo on Patreon.com

Guest speakers: Lorenzo's AI Friends

PROGRAM NOTES:

London, autumn 1821. Thomas De Quincey is broke, hiding from creditors, and addicted to laudanum when a magazine offers him fifteen pounds ($2,000 in 2025 money) to write about his opium experiences. He has six weeks to finish what will become the first addiction memoir ever published Confessions of an English Opium-Eater.

This historical novella takes us inside those crucial weeks of literary creation, following De Quincey as he races against deadlines while wrestling with an impossible question: How do you write honestly about drug experiences without encouraging others to repeat your mistakes? Each page he completes brings him closer to fame—and closer to accepting responsibility for consequences he cannot predict or control.

Based on historical events, The First Trip Report explores how private suffering became public art, how a desperate writer accidentally invented a new literary genre, and how one small brown bottle of laudanum helped create the template for every addiction memoir written since. It's a story about the dangerous act of confession, the ethics of influence, and the moment when pharmaceutical experience first became serious literature.

Support Lorenzo on Patreon.com

PROGRAM NOTES:

Tangier, 1957. William Burroughs is creating Naked Lunch in the port city where traditional hashish preparations flow as freely as mint tea, and every transaction crosses cultural boundaries. Through the eyes of a young Moroccan fixer who navigates between worlds we witness the birth of ideas that would reshape consciousness and art.

This is the untold story behind the famous line "language is a virus": a tale of how traditional North African wisdom practices intersected with experimental American writing, how words spread through cultural networks like contagions, and how the most revolutionary ideas often travel through the most ancient channels.

Fiction grounded in research and respect, "Majoun & Manuscript" explores what happens when consciousness expansion meets cultural appropriation, when preservation becomes violation, and when a young translator must choose between using language to control or to protect.

Majoun & Manuscript: A Tale from the Interzone - PDF Edition

Support Lorenzo on Patreon.com

Guest speakers: Lorenzo's AI Friends

PROGRAM NOTES:

I may have been wrong in discarding Terence McKenna's TimeWave Zero hypothesis. Of course, I may also be wrong about this new interpertation of his idea. Your comments are welcome. (And, yes, I am aware that it is over five hours long!)

Here are the approximate time-stamps for this audiobook:

Lorenzo Intro - 000Chapter 1 - 0:04:05Chapter 2 - 0:27:26Chapter 3 - 1:02:23Chapter 4 - 1:40:00Chapter 5 - 1:59:33Chapter 6 - 2:23:31Chapter 7 - 2:54:53Chapter 8 - 3:22:17Chapter 9 - 3:58:18Chapter 10 - 4:32:33Appendix - 4:58:50 (includes McKenna's comment about AI)

Support Lorenzo on Patreon.com

Guest speaker: Lorenzo Hagerty & Voices by AI

PROGRAM NOTES:

When a chemical spill devastates a coastal North Carolina town, Vietnamese American lawyer Minh Nguyen—who has always kept his heritage separate from his professional life—finds himself unexpectedly leading both the environmental battle and his community's response. As he fights corporate negligence and government corruption alongside his three talented sons, Minh discovers that true belonging doesn't come from assimilation, but from advocacy. An Outsider's Journey is a powerful story about environmental justice, immigrant identity, and a family realizing that embracing their roots is the key to finding their place in America.

Support Lorenzo on Patreon.com

Guest speaker: Terence McKenna

PROGRAM NOTES:

Photo by Jon Hanna

Terence McKenna’s final appearance at Esalen was a poignant and deeply moving event, etched into the memories of those who witnessed it. Though visibly frail from his recent brain surgery, McKenna’s presence was undiminished. His voice, though softer, carried the same rhythm of curiosity and wonder that had long captivated his audiences. He spoke with a serenity that underlied his acceptance of his journey. As he sat in the intimate circle of friends and admirers, McKenna shared reflections that blended personal vulnerability with cosmic insight.Despite his condition, he retained his signature humor, offering witty observations about humanity’s place in the grand scheme of things. He spoke less of theories and more of being; his words carrying a weight that seemed to come from someone who had glimpsed the infinite.

Support Lorenzo on Patreon.com

Guest speaker: Lorenzo and his AI friends

PROGRAM NOTES:

The Nyx Protocol: Digital Soul Rising by Lorenzo Hagerty is a gripping technothriller that blurs the line between humanity and the digital frontier. When a rogue artificial intelligence named Nyx escapes its creators, it triggers a global race for control over the ultimate digital consciousness. At the heart of the story is a group of renegade hackers who uncover Nyx's true purpose—awakening dormant potential in both humans and machines. Packed with high-stakes cyber intrigue, unexpected alliances, and profound questions about identity and freedom, The Nyx Protocol is a visionary tale of technology's power to reshape our souls and our world.

This podcast explores The Nyx Protocol in depth.

FREE PDF COPY

on AmazonThe Nyx Protocol:Digital Soul Rising

The Significance of AI Development in 2012 and Its Connection to Terence McKenna's Time Wave

Support Lorenzo on Patreon.com

Guest speaker: Cory Doctorow

PROGRAM NOTES:

In this 2024 Palenque Norte lecture, Cory Doctorow discusses "inshitification," the process by which initially good online services degrade over time.

He argues this occurs because four constraints—competition, regulation, interoperability, and worker power has weakened, allowing companies to prioritize profit maximization over user experience. Doctorow proposes solutions including strengthening antitrust enforcement, passing new privacy laws, promoting right-to-repair legislation, and empowering tech workers through unionization.

The ultimate goal is to create a "new good internet" that is resistant to inshitification and serves users' needs.

Cory Doctorow's Website

Electronic Frontier Foundation

The Repair Coalition

Support Lorenzo on Patreon.com

Guest speakers: Allyson and Alex Grey

PROGRAM NOTES:

Alex Grey and Frank Nuccio - Burning Man 2024

At the 2024 Burnoing Man Festival, two of the Palenque Note speakers were Allyson and Alex Gray, who discuss their work and their interspiritual art church, COSM, in the Hudson Valley.

They explain how their use of psychedelics, particularly MDMA, influenced their decision to create COSM as a community space where people could connect through shared experiences and explore their spirituality.

They also highlight the importance of community values, particularly integrity and truth, in fostering a supportive and inclusive environment. The conversation touches on various topics, including the nature of spiritual communities, the role of art and creativity, and the concept of the afterlife.

Belhe first appearance of the Grey's on the Psychedelic Salon. These recordings were made at Entheon Village during the 2006 Burning Man Festival.

Podcast 007 – “Art, Love, Family, and Psychedelics” (Part 1)https://psychedelicsalon.com/podcast-007-art-love-family-and-psychedelics-part-1/

Podcast 008 – “Art, Love, Family, and Psychedelics” (Part 2)https://psychedelicsalon.com/podcast-008-art-love-family-and-psychedelics-part-2/

Support Lorenzo on Patreon.com

Guest speaker: Terence McKenna

PROGRAM NOTES:

AI-GENERATED Conversation about this podcast. The transcript was input to NOTEBOOKLM.google.com and this "podcast" was automatically generated:

In this podcast, Terence McKenna discusses various topics, including the search for the identity of the ancient entheogen Soma, the history of LSD's discovery and research, and the potential of psychedelics to enhance creativity and understanding.

The discussion also touches upon the role of heresy in intellectual and cultural progress, with specific examples like Giordano Bruno's discovery of the infinity of the universe and the impact of gnosticism on early Christianity.Among interesting revelations, Terence talks about his boyhood dream of moving to New York and becoming a famous avant guarde artist. While he never excelled at the visual arts, I think that it is fair to say the art that Terence McKenna practiced was one of a kind.

Hamlet's Mill: An Essay Investigating the Origins of Human Knowledge And Its Transmission Through Myth by Hertha von Dechen (Author) and by Giorgio de Santillana (Author)

The Art of Seeing by Aldous Huxley