What's New
The Transmodern Alchemist by Iona Miller
What's New with My Subject?
THE TRANSMODERN ALCHEMIST by Iona Miller 2009
New Renaissance Psychophysics / Alchemical EDGEucation
"Quaro non pomo, nihil hic determino dictans; coniucio, conor, confero, tento, rogo..."
"I inquire, I do not assert; I do not determine anything with final assurance; I conjecture, try, compare, attempt, ask..."
FIELD & FLOW
"There is a generic process in nature and consciousness which dissolves and regenerates all forms. The essence of this transformative, morphological process is chaotic -- purposeful yet inherently unpredictable holistic repatterning. The Great Work of the art of alchemy is the creation of the Philosopher's Stone, a symbol of wholeness and integration. The liquid form of the Stone, called the Universal Solvent, dissolves all old forms like a rushing stream, and is the self-organizing matrix for the rebirth of new forms. It is thus a metaphor or model for the dynamic process of transformation, ego death and re-creation." (Miller, 1992, "Chaos As the Universal Solvent")
Transmodern Alchemy & Chaos THE MODERN ALCHEMIST, (1994) describes the process of individuation -- the transformation of personality and Self. Searching for the hidden structure of matter, the alchemists discovered that of the psyche. Depth psychology continues to redefine itself beyond postmodern notions as new research emerges in nonunitary consciousness, the fractal nature of archetypes and complexes and new models in microphysics mirroring cosmos and co-creator. The alchemical process is its own solution. Transmodern alchemy is a new Renaissanc science-art -- a treasury of psychophysical meaning. Alchemists sought the experience of Unus Mundus, the one world united through material, emotional, mental and spiritual aspects. Science illuminates the spiritual quest, and spiritual tech illuminates the deep nature of matter and our nature. Universal Meta-Syn Alchemy is a metanarrative, a way of framing all our experience. Alchemy begins and ends in the quest for eternal life. It is a spiritual technology of rebirth using natural methods that in their effect transcend nature by amplifying that which is immortal within us. It does not exist in nature but must be prepared by Art. Art is a form of manifesting, making and objectifying the world - spiritual physics. Artists and mystics are aware of their own internal space and thus able to enter it, playing the mindbody like a musical instrument. Looking inside, they see the true nature of reality and can express that literally and symbolically. We all possess the creative potential. All creative acts are a marriage of spirit and matter, reaching down into the body as the source of our essential being and becoming. Today, we might describe this resonance as accessing energy that regenerates the mindbody. Healing is an aspect of creativity; nature is within and without us. The Magus does not dominate reality but develops embodied psychophysical equilibrium, clarity, wisdom and compassion. Creative work originates in the body and is projected out into the world. The projections are then internalized into awareness. The bodymind of the artist is an alchemical vessel containing the creative flux and lux during the process of transformation. Awareness and consciousness form a continuous alchemical movement. The creative gold is generated and embodied in the alembic of the mindbody. The mindbody is the same substance as the Cosmos and contains and reveals its mysteries. Alchemy reduces all to the first state, the ground state of being - original experience that is timeless, infinite. The classical Void, the quantum vacuum is a carrier of information. The energy body or the field body, along with the scalars of our holographic blueprint, connect us directly with the negentropic potential of the zero-point field. Radiant light literally emerges from this mystic void. Primordial structuring processes are common to both psyche and matter, working in the gap or empty interval between intention and action. So, alchemy refines the way the mindbody generates and processes inherent light as medicine. It refines the aspirant's ability for tapping and amplifying Medicine Light. This primordial state is the luminous ground of our being, hidden deep in the heart of things. All other goals are subordinate to this prime directive which includes meditative techniques for continuing consciousness after death. This Philosopher's Stone is also the Universal Medicine, the regenerative Elixir of Life. The greatest mystery is Life After Death: we don't die but continue in transcendent form. This is the secret of man and nature. Paradoxically, when we look into the depths of matter, we look into the depths of ourselves. Scientists and mystics report similar phenomena in their models and phenomenology. Spiritual technologies, the software of sacred penetration and amplification, virtually predicted the fine nature of matter as nothing but a complex illusion - what we have come to understand as a hologram. Mystics have also always emphasized the primal nature of Light, and claimed that we are in fact made of light itself. Science has confirmed this in numerous ways. The many theories of reality are the Post-Millennial version of the alchemical PEACOCK'S TAIL that heralds the beginnings of integration, the Unus Mundus -- the Grand Unified Theory or Theory of Everything in physics. The search for the Stone is a long rite of initiation, culminating in the cauda pavonis which signals the perfect transmutation. It is a dazzling synthesis of all qualities and elements much like rainbow colors unite as white light. The iridescent tail represents all the colors of light while the "eyes" symbolize all potential universes. The Peacock's Tail is the central part of the alchemical process. The myriad eyes in the tail suggest the highly-chromatic view includes multiple perspectives of imaginal vision. The kaleidoscopic vision is a metaphor for the spiritual rebirth that awakens the Third Eye and consciousness of the deeper subtle and field bodies. The universe informs our awareness and being. Sometimes the universal laws of nature lead us beyond ordinary science. Subjects in isolation don't provide enough to accurately describe our complex world. More disciplines, more tools, better technologies. In theoretics we build up and tear down relentlessly, questioning our own underpinnings, adhering to no stale theory: "Solve et Coagula." Since matter remains a paradox, our Work, comprehending the spirit of matter, means learning more than the Standard Theory of physics. Both orthodox and heterodox theories stimulate our imaginative and spiritual perception. Energy and information fields, not just genetics, drive human psychophysiology. Libido (psychic energy) drives the imagination. When we speak of Mercury, Sulpher and Salt, we mean our spiritual, energetic and physical bodies as well as the elements.
Alchemy is a science-art and tradition of participatory wisdom. Medieval alchemy was couched in the archaic language of its time, but we are not limited to that, nor to theological, Hermetic, Masonic, Theosophical or New Age jargon. Philosophies and sciences evolve in articulation, theory and practice. New discoveries and statements of meaning inform our practice at all levels. In many cases, alchemy anticipated them.
Like the cryptic tomes and dense texts of alchemy, unfamiliar scientific or philosophical theories require thoughtful reflection until they take root in our awareness. Models from many disciplines weave together to amplify the meaning of alchemical process and patterns. Old experiments can be revisioned in a new light while new dynamical phenomena remain to be discovered. We can even revision the alchemical formula for surviving death.
Each technical or symbolic language seems like learning a foreign language, but becomes second-nature once we sense the overall gestalt. It takes contemplation and consideration of implications. We unpack them one metaphor at a time as we descend into finer domains of existence, from particles to the subquantal world of the microcosm.
Motivation theory suggests if we adopt a mastery orientation to our subjects, we exhibit all the productive learning behaviors we know will work. If we believe we have the natural ability to learn something, we adopt a mastery orientation even if challenged in that area. As in alchemy, we simply keep at it and understanding grows. Simple concepts, not mathematical details, from dynamics and physics are all that is required for illuminating alchemical practice.
Our worldview has evolved to include quantum physics and dynamics in our models of reality. As in the alchemical dictum, "As Above, So Below," a satisfactory theory must explain both cosmogenesis and microphysics. In the 20th Century, Carl Jung described alchemy in terms of depth psychology and the physics of his day, shedding new light on an old science.
Jung's notions of a heroic, striving Self have been transcended with imaginal, nonlinear models of consciousness, archetypes as strange attractors and metanarratives as healing fictions. If new theories in astrophysics, quantum physics and depth psychology supersede the old, can we expect any less from 21st century alchemy itself? The esoteric pursuit for the arcane nature of matter continues.
THE TRANSMODERN ALCHEMIST hacks the undifferentiated potential, exploring the theoretical usefulness of Dynamics for modeling processes in the alchemical art. Dynamics is an organic model, an alternative to mechanistic or cyber- models of process. It prioritizes life as the root science. Alchemy is a multidisciplinary pursuit focusing on mystic technologies, spagyrics, healing, life sciences, metallurgy, chemistry, dynamics and physics.
Light is an excitation of empty space. "Aether" means shine in Greek. Scalar physics tells us the ambient void is omnipresent, yet inherently nonobservable -- it is an omnipresent field of radiant energy potential emanating from every zero-point in the cosmos. But we can observe and infer results of this virtual vacuum fluctuation. Quantum Mechanics demonstrates no discrete particle or solid chunk of anything exists in metric space -- the whole Physical Universe.
Everything is made of Light. Only light matters. Nothing arises but standing waves from the seething zero-point field created by cosmic beings like ourselves. How we do so is a mystery to ourselves. But we are getting closer to non-religious descriptions of reality that curiously have profound mystical overtones.
The properties of mass, inertia, charge and gravity -- and those who observe them -- are the result of space resonances produced by zero-point scalar waves. At zero-point, waves pass through waves without interference. We come from, are sustained by, and are returning to to the radiant light of our mass. All electromagnetic force is mediated by virtual photons.
The void is not devoid. In the absence of "solid" matter, we can take a revolutionary view of today's alchemy as dynamic process using Chaos Theory, and related sciences to inform our search. We are indivisibly wedded to our earthly and cosmic environment through zero point field phenomena and resonance. Could consciousness order the world?
Alchemy's prima materia and 'sensitive initial conditions' of chaos are the same. Initiation recalibrates our "initial conditions" and sets transformational "butterfly effects" in motion. The potential of enfolded time energy is transduced into dynamic spatial energy as cosmic jitter (ZPE, Isotropic Vector Matrix). Zero represents the Cosmic egg, the primordial Androgyne merging positive and negative charge - the Plenum. Zero point creative process manifests cosmos, nature and consciousness from roiling quantum flux.
Biophysics tells us we are brilliantly disguised photonic humans -- Homo Lumen -- if we but realize that awareness. The quantum vacuum is a radiant sea of light, encrypted information waves, a dynamic matrix of energy exchange. Our bioplasmic energy pulsates along with this matrix. Because it is ubiquitous, inside and outside, we are blind to it. It is the groundstate of our being.
Transmodernity is the synthesis of modernity and postmodern philosophy, reflected in alchemical notions of transcendence, transformation and transmutation. It transcends the construction and deconstruction of recent historical eras by re-enchanting the Millennial world. So what might a chaos-informed Transmodern Alchemy look like? First and foremost our existential state space is in flux. We arise from an infinite ocean of quantum foam. Phenomena no longer correspond with old-paradigm frameworks. Anomalies, the strangest phenomena have the most to teach us.
Philosophy can be part of everyday life. Alchemy sought the hidden structure of matter. Our inner emptiness is full of promise. Trans- is the prefix that guides the vision of reality as virtual and fluctuating. At the subquantal range of virtual photon flux, this is literally true and the metaphysical substrate of manifestation. At the virtual level, the fiction of ‘reality’ as substantive is revealed and the transparent veil is ripped away.
Nonlinear Recursive Process
Paradoxically, chaos is the essence of order. That order is inherent. Dynamics has successfully explained many natural phenomena and been heralded as a new scientific paradigm. The quintessence is now found in nonlinear dynamics, the holographic field and the virtual vacuum of absolute space. Only when we comprehend the groundstate of being can we fathom reality. It fundamentally changes our alchemical and scientific notions about transformations in ourselves, matter, systems, patterns and structure.
Psychology and neurology now recognize the psyche and brain as a dynamic dissipative system. Therapeutic techniques lead to reorganization of the individual at a higher level of order. Medicine realizes chaos is essential to health. Biophysics recognizes the primacy of light in life processes. The artworld recognizes the aesthetic appeal, rhythm and beauty of fractals. But the poetic science of alchemy made a workable theoretical and experimental system in which chaos was central centuries ago. Each era views nature from the paradigm of its time.
Chaos Theory has been associated with every aspect of human behavior. Alchemy is an irreducible fusion of mysticism, science and art that also happens to be therapeutic or growth-promoting and tantalizingly hints at illumination. The process begins with doubts and lack of conviction but time spent on self-knowledge, experiments and spiritual exercises is amply rewarded. Chaos keeps the process fluid. Alchemy calls chaos the "universal solvent." Virtual Physics describes jitterbugging quantum subspace plasma as a superconducting superfluid.
Alchemy is a nonlinear organizational framework, a model to make sense of our experience, and a means of facilitating transformation. The universe without and within is our alchemical laboratory. The fire is kindled and stoked in the ‘magic theatre’ of the mind and the retort vessel of the body. Alchemy plants virtual fractal seeds in the gaps or intervals of consciousness. We are the portal for the fractal seed to unfold its liberating potential. But we must remain open.
Cosmic Zero
The universe is our "parent fractal" from the cosmological to microcosmic scale. Matter and consciousness share deep unity. The outer world we observe through our senses is nothing more than a consistent series of mental images that exists in our mind. Matter itself is an image in the mind, and mental images are the natural phenomena of consciousness. Mining the soul, we disassemble ourselves to reorganize in more refined form, reintegrating at a holistic level.
Alchemy calls Chaos the prima and ultima materia. The prima materia is ubiquitous, everywhere all the time. As we practice spiritual and practical alchemy, we come to understand the deep nature of chaos as the source of all transformative energy. In this chaosophical philosophy, all systems emerge from and eventually dissolve back into chaos.
Solve et Coagula: Chaos is the essence of self-organization. Chaos Theory allows us to follow the Hermetic Spirit deep into the heart of matter and beyond into the subquantal realm in our quest for Nature's secrets. The undecomposable domain of Chaos is not an emptiness, but a rich, generative source -- a bornless nothingness from which all form emerges.
Consciousness, like creativity, is an emergent phenomenon patterned by strange attractors which govern the complexity of information in dynamic flow. Our consciousness appears co-temporaneously with our embodiment, creating the imaginal flux of representational and nonrepresentational perception - the stream of consciousness. The cosmic trinity of chaos, matter, and attraction appears at the heart of modern chaos theory and alchemy.
The Vedas identify all creative intent and substance as a manifestation of primal consciousness, which is considered the basis of all manifestation. In this worldview, there is nothing but consciousness. Complex dynamics is implicated in the energetic translation of "waves of unborn nothingness". Healing is the biological equivalent of creativity. The more complex a system, the more stable and self-correcting it is.
The objective (Sol, Frater) and subjective (Luna, Soror Mystica) are not divorced from one another, anymore than the left and right hemispheres of the brain. They marry in the mystic, in entanglement with Cosmos. Science adapted the artist’s sense that the detail of nature is significant. Like yin and yang, they rely on one another in a dynamic meld that transcends the tension of opposites. Synthesizing and transcending opposites is the theme of alchemy.
Truth of the Matter
Alchemy, quantum mysticism and the holographic paradigm reveal the secrets of nature's subquantal realm. Metaphors are instructive. They are a Way of leaping the chasm between old and new knowledge, old and new ways of essential being. We can tap the source of creativity, healing and holistic restructuring through imagination and metaphor. They can be deeply transformative -- more than mere language. They are a technology for changing our behaviors, feelings, thoughts, and beliefs -- our spirit and soul.
Alchemy is a science-art, a tool to describe and mold reality using experimental and meditative techniques. As an art medium, alchemy helps us illustrate nature and our own nature in contemporary terms by creating new paradigms and environments.
Matter has lost its central role in physics to dynamics. Alchemy can be informed by this new physics. There is aesthetic pleasure in finding likenesses between things once thought unalike. It gives a sense of richness and understanding. The creative mind looks for unexpected likenesses, through engagement of the whole person. Organic metaphors of quantum physics, field theory, and chaos theory illuminate the alchemical art.
Engineering the Vacuum
Process Physics more than hints at outrageous alchemical potentials that may be just over our scientific horizon. Local vacuums are tunable in both frequency and signal to noise ratio. Information is relative to signal to noise ratio. Squeezed vacuums lead to potentials for energy extraction, quantum computing, fine-tuning quarks and Higgs fields, engineering the vacuum to manifest virtually any "thing," and to even engineer consciousness.
