The Holdall

Ninety years ago, the writer Owen Barfield (1898-1997) had a short letter published in The Spectator, which it headlined “Nationalism and Economics”. The letter, about the reality of the world’s economic life and the failure of that reality to be reflected in relations between nation-states, repays attention in 2026. The states uppermost in our minds have changed. But the failure remains the same.

The first episode of The Holdall in some time.

Can we know the being of society, or if you prefer the living idea of society? How can we really experience it?

In advance of a seminar to be held by him on the weekend Friday 25th November till Sunday 27th November 2022: a conversation with Jac Hielema about society and the economy, and how to experience their being.

SHOW NOTES, including SEMINAR DETAILS: https://roryoconnor.xyz/podcast/free-equal-together-society-and-the-economy-with-jac-hielema/

I talked with Jac Hielema about Rudolf Steiner's book The Philosophy of Freedom. It's a book that helps us in our thinking, allowing us to arrive at new ideas, which we can then freely work with (or not).

Please listen in the spirit Jac talks about, when he talks about the various ways we can listen to people:

"I ask you questions, and I let your answers go into me all the way. Most of the time, if I ask a person a question, I already throw him out of me by my inner reactions to the person. So if I really want to meet you, I have to be completely open and loving, and just open my heart for you with love. And then when I ask you a question, and you answer this question, I let your answers go into me. And then I can experience your answers."

Jac has for a number of years been a teacher, giving seminars on that book. With his partner Damaris Matthijsen, he organises Economy Transformers in the Netherlands, and they are currently setting up a credit institution based on gifts in the historic home of banking, Amsterdam. He is writing a book on how to create a more human society.

An interview with Elias Davidsson about the way that the US government has not provided evidence that the named 9/11 hijackers were on the ill-fated airplanes. We also talked about the unusual Shanksville crash site and the suggestive evidence that two of the airplanes were flying past their alleged crash times. More broadly, Elias talked about international criminal and human rights law and 9/11's strategic context.

Davidsson is the author of Hijacking America's Mind on 9/11. He has also written, among others, forensic accounts of the 2008 Mumbai attack (The Betrayal of India) and, in German, of the 2016 Berlin Christmas market attack (Der gelbe Bus). He has published articles on international law, human rights law and international criminal law in peer-reviewed legal journals.

Show notes:

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A change of tone, and a personal podcast.

What the CIA is, as reflected in its declassified files on a small rainy island: Ireland. The Agency's analyses of the the first Brexit referendum in the '70s, with echoes of today and of the Irish failure to join NATO, and a hint of an operation during the IRA campaign of violence, all come up, as well as other topics.

Show notes: roryoconnor.xyz/podcast/the-cias-files-on-ireland

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Owen Barfield was a scholar of what he called the evolution of consciousness, the idea that humanity's modes of perception of reality, of thinking. and of relating to nature have evolved in the time of recorded history. He was also famously a friend of C. S. Lewis and J. R. R. Tolkien. I talked with Mark Vernon, who has written a book about Barfield, about how Barfield's ideas shed light on Christianity, the history of words, the imagination, and what a rainbow is, among other things.

Show notes: roryoconnor.xyz/podcast/introducing-owen-barfield

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How is money created? This is a report on an unconventional explanation – given by the Bank of England. Just the facts, as far as I can ascertain them, but with mentions, and explanations, of quantitative easing, and possible implications of the true picture of money creation.

Intro ends, money talk begins at 5:15 in podcast.

Show notes: roryoconnor.xyz/podcast/how-money-happens

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A weekend of smashing the system. The head-system. I talk about what ayahuasca is, the legal and medical situation, and so on, for the first 15 minutes, and then it's trip talk, but considered trip talk. As I admit, I am an enthusiast for this psychedelic / entheogen / ecodelic / substance / mind-stuff. I come clean that I don’t think one is experiencing a simple hallucination, but that something is superintending the trip; while leaving open the possibility I’m wrong about that.

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An account of the CIA's surveillance and protection from arrest of two alleged 9/11 hijackers. This story has often been told, but almost always – as in the recent TV series The Looming Tower – the most damning and incriminating facts are left out. These facts come, by the way, from US government official reports... For this episode especially, it's worth referring to the episode page, for a full list of sources.

https://roryoconnor.xyz/podcast/protecting-the-9-11-hijackers/

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