The Altered States of U.S. 

Part I

What is consciousness? How do you define it?  Materialistic science has failed to place this elusive fact of our existence into a neat little box, so it has opted to try to prove that each individual's uniqueness is simply the combination of chemical and neural activity in the brain.  This idea that we're simply evolutionary "accidents", formed from the primordial goo by chance is the basis of evolutionary theory, which has spawned many offshoots of "science" in relation to the brain, like behaviorism, psychology and psychotherapy.  It may surprise some of you that this idea of random creation is much older than Darwin.  It is the basis of the Hindu religion, which has been here for thousands of years.   

Now we are at a stage, where Eastern mysticism permeates our culture, but yet people don't think they are actually practising a religion at all. Yoga is everywhere, especially in the more "progressive" cities.  Wicca, Satanism, Santeria and a multitude of other occult groups have grown in popularity since the '60's.  The much beloved Harry Potter books/movies shows how much the occult has been accepted by the masses.  

So how did all this come to pass?  Let's find out how Freud, Jung, the Yogis of India and the New Age movement all connect.