SubRosa_Issue1-Spread.pdf

ROBERT SCHOCH

ON THE SPHINX

QUANTUM

C ONCIOUSNESS

TERENCE

MCKENNA

DONNIE

DARKO

Sub Rosa | June 2005 1

Editorial

GREG TAYLOR

H ello, and welcome to the ﬁrst issue

Editorial

of Sub Rosa magazine. I hope you

get as much enjoyment from reading

the magazine as we did in putting it

together. Please feel free to contact us with your

thoughts about our new baby. And it is a baby

– each issue we intend to add more content and

new features to this newborn. I hope you stay

with us as we watch it grow.

Why the name, I hear you ask? Well ﬁrstly,

because it just popped into my head without

any logical analysis, and I always tend to trust

my intuitive side (on the odd occasions when

it graces me with its presence). Secondly, I ﬁnd

it very apt: the name originates in the Roman

myth of Cupid giving a rose to Harpocrates (the

baby Horus) as thanks for his ability to keep a

secret. The Romans decorated the ceilings of

banquet rooms with roses to remind guests that

what was spoken within was ‘sub rosa’ (under

the rose) – that is, in conﬁdence.

Certainly, the magazine is not about secrecy

– I hope it ﬁnds its way into the hands of as

many enquiring individuals as is possible. But

throughout the ages, it has been necessary to talk

about our subject matter – hidden history, esoteric

traditions, and new paradigm science – in hushed

tones, due to the extreme personal danger that

came with such heretical views. And while these

days we may not be burned at the stake, there

is still much opposition from both organised

religion and orthodox science. So in the spirit of

the past we meet here, within the pages of this

magazine, ‘sub rosa’.

Also, with our dislike of following the well-

beaten path, we are trying new things with Sub

Rosa . If you have a constant Internet connection,

you’ll ﬁnd you can click on links within this

PDF and be taken to that page in your web

browser. If you are interested in any of the

books, CDs or DVDs we mention then simply

click on its image and you will be taken to the

relevant page at Amazon. Also, for those with

broadband connections, you can click on movie

or audio icons where applicable to access that

content (for example, click on the “What the

Bleep DVD” icon to view the trailer).

The design of the magazine is by the

abundantly talented Mark James Foster, of

Artiﬁce Design. I’m your host, Greg Taylor. And

each issue we’ll have contributions from some

of the leading lights of the ‘alternative’ scene

– this issue you’ll ﬁnd columns by Ian Lawton

and Michael Grosso, and a great piece by Philip

Coppens on the legendary Terence McKenna.

Needless to say, it takes quite a bit of work to

put together a magazine like this, so we look for-

ward to working with any sponsors who might

wish to be a part of the project. We will soon

be releasing a rate card for advertising within

the magazine – please contact us if interested. I

believe that we’ve got the beginnings of some-

thing great here – fascinating content, beautiful

design, and best of all it’s free. Read on, and feel

free to send us your feedback!

News

Columns:

Greg Taylor

Ian Lawton

Michael Grosso

Cover Story:

Schoch To The System

Editor:

Art Director:

Columnist:

Writer:

Greg Taylor

Mark James Foster

Michael Grosso

Ian Lawton

Philip Coppens

Proﬁler:

The Hyper-Dimensional

Ambassador: Terence

McKenna

by Philip Coppens

Credits :

We use public domain images and artistic

tools, or gain necessary permissions

where appropriate. If you have a query

regarding our artistic content, please do

not hesitate to contact us. Our thanks go to

the following:

Feature: 30

Steven Grifﬁn for the cover image

Caroline Davies ( carolinedavies.com)

Stephanie Shimordla ( obsidiandawn.com)

Spirit Sighs ( drenched-in-wine.net)

Roy Vered ( veredgf.fredfarm.com)

Reviews

To submit content or feedback, please

email us at subrosa@dailygrail.com

Ars Gratia Artis

June 2005 | Sub Rosa

Sub Rosa | June 2005 1

June 2005

The Quantum Mind Of

Stuart Hameroff

News

Figures Predate Nazca Lines

Geoglyphs found to be centuries older than

Nazca ﬁgures

News Briefs

A South American archaeolo-

A series of studies has

shown that pessimists are

more at risk of catching

the common cold, suf-

fering heart disease and

even premature death

than optimists.

‘X-ray’ Girl Causes

gist has claimed that a group

of about 50 drawings of gi-

ant ﬁgures, recently discovered in

the hills of Peru’s southern coastal

desert near the city of Palpa, pre-

date the nearby Nazca Lines by

four centuries. Johny Isla said the

geoglyphs appear to have been

created between 500 and 400BCE,

while the more famous Nazca Lines

have been dated to a time after

50 BCE.

The ﬁgures vary in size from

10 metres to more than 50m across,

and are composed of images of

humans, monkeys, birds and cats.

“These new ﬁgures are deﬁnitely

different and older than those of

the Nazca culture,” said Mr Isla,

who went on to note the differenc-

es between them.

“First, the Paracas ﬁgures

were drawn on the slopes of the

hills, while the Nazca images were

drawn in level areas,” he said. “Sec-

ond, the Paracas ﬁgures are small-

er and were made in a naturalistic

style, while the Nazca ﬁgures are

bigger and stylised. Third, the Pa-

racas ﬁgures are mostly arranged

in groups, while the Nazca ﬁgures

are arranged individually. Finally,

it is important to note that not one

of the Paracas ﬁgures were repeat-

ed in the Nazca iconography.”

Nobel Prize Winner Disputes

CSICOP Testing Procedure

German scientists have

suggested that surges of

solar activity may cause

whales to beach them-

selves, possibly by dis-

rupting their internal

compasses.

over the claims of a Russian girl who claims

to be able to see inside the human body. Nata-

lia Demkina – known as the ‘Girl with X-ray eyes’

– says that she can also spot internal injuries just by

looking at a photograph.

Tests in London and New York led to mixed

conclusions. British scientists found evidence to

support the girl’s claims, but a test by the Discov-

ery Channel in the US found that she could not sat-

isfy the conditions set to indicate a successful trial.

Demkina correctly picked four out of seven medical

conditions, which was marked as a failure by the

investigating team. However, Nobel Prize winner

Brian Josephson criticised the American tests, say-

ing the criteria for a successful trial was not based

on scientiﬁc principles.

“The initial decision to consider a score of 4 hits

out of 7 as ‘failure’ when the probability of getting

such a score is less than two per cent (i.e. odds of

50 to 1 against) is hardly in step with normal scien-

tiﬁc practice,” Dr Josephson said in a report on his

website. He also questioned the motives of the in-

vestigating team, as they were lead by well-known

skeptics Paul Wiseman and Ray Hyman, who are

both afﬁliated with the Committee for Scientiﬁc In-

vestigation of Claims of the Paranormal (CSICOP).

“Wiseman, when questioned about this, ap-

peared to know about the 50 to 1 statistic, but

would not accept that the cutoff point had been set

wrongly,” said Dr Josephson. “He admits that the

result is ‘interesting’, but is then quoted as saying:

‘At best, she’s done this a lot and she has a real ex-

pertise at being able to look at people and make rea-

sonably accurate diagnoses.’ Perhaps realising that

this statement might not quite convince, he goes on

Climate change research-

ers have detected the ﬁrst

signs of a slowdown in

the Gulf Stream — the

mighty ocean current that

keeps Britain and Europe

from freezing.

(Source: www.theepochtimes.com)

to suggest that perhaps Natasha cheated, a handy

way to evade the issue.”

Dr Josephson made his feelings clear: “Ma-

nipulation of concepts such as ‘failure’, and the

abuse of statistics, are commonplace in the world

of propaganda. Is that what is happening here, or

honest science?” More recent tests have supported

Dr Josephson’s claims, with researchers at Tokyo

University ﬁnding that Demkina does seem to have

some paranormal ability – although they dispute

the idea that she has ‘X-ray eyes’.

The latest experiments were carried out by Pro-

fessor Yoshio Machi at Tokyo University, who spe-

cialises in studying anomalous human abilities. “We

did a whole range of tests, and the strangest thing

was that we found she could also use her abilities

on photographs, even on tiny passport photos,” Dr

Machi said.

“She was able to look at them and apparently

see what the problem was. Her ability is not X-ray

vision, but she deﬁnitely has some kind of talent

that we can’t explain yet.”

Immortal by 2050?

Futurist believes we’re close to the ‘Matrix’

A doctor has claimed that

single malt whisky can

beat the threat of cancer,

thanks to high levels of a

powerful antioxidant that

kills cancer cells.

dicts that by the year 2050

humans will be able to down-

load their mind into a machine,

rendering them virtually immortal.

However Ian Pearson, head of the

futurology unit at British Telecom,

says that it will take a further three

decades for lower-class individuals

to be able to afford it.

“If you draw the timelines, re-

alistically by 2050 we would expect

to be able to download your mind

into a machine, so when you die it’s

not a major career problem,” said

Pearson. ‘If you’re rich enough then

by 2050 it’s feasible. If you’re poor

you’ll probably have to wait until

2075 or 2080 when it’s routine. We

are very serious about it. That’s how

fast this technology is moving: 45

years is a hell of a long time in IT.”

Pearson, a graduate in ap-

plied mathematics and theoreti-

cal physics, has spent the past 20

years working in optical networks,

broadband network evolution and

cybernetics in BT’s laboratories. He

believes that within 15 years we

will begin moving into a ‘Matrix’-

like environment. “We will spend

a lot of time in virtual space, using

high quality, 3D, immersive, com-

puter generated environments to

socialise and do business in...it’s

impossible to believe that won’t be

the normal way of communicating.

NASA scientists believe

the Voyager 1 probe is

getting very close to the

edge of the Solar System

– launched in 1977, the

craft is now some 14 bil-

lion km from the Sun.

Modern technology has

been utilised to unveil

erased writing on an an-

cient manuscript which

had held treatises of the

Greek mathematician

Archimedes.

(Source: www.ananova.com and www.tcm.phy.

cam.ac.uk/ )

(Source: www.observer.guardian.

co.uk/)

June 2005 | Sub Rosa

Sub Rosa | June 2005 3

Controversy

S cientiﬁc testing has failed to settle the debate

B ritain’s leading futurist pre-

News

Meditation Beats Death

News Briefs

Runestone Returns

Researcher claims inscription is a code

News Briefs

Quiet Your Mind And Live Longer

O ne of the ﬁrst long-term

A geologist and an engineer

studies of Transcenden-

tal Meditation has con-

cluded with surprising results.

Researchers found that the prac-

tice of meditation was associated

with signiﬁcantly lower rates

of death.

“This is the ﬁrst to show that

in a rigorous, long-term study,”

said Robert Schneider, director

of the Center of Natural Medi-

cine and Prevention at the Maha-

rishi University of Management

in Fairﬁeld, Iowa. The results

were published in the American

Journal of Cardiology. However,

other researchers not associated

with the study have cautioned

against accepting the results at

face value, and recommend larg-

er studies to conﬁrm or deny the

positive results.

“Intuitively it makes sense

that relaxation may have a beneﬁt

on cardiovascular disease mortal-

ity,” said Theodore Kotchen, who

is also currently conducting trials

on the effects of Transcendental

Meditation. Kotchen, a professor of

medicine at the Medical College of

Wisconsin, added: “It is provoca-

tive and very encouraging...(but) it

certainly is not a deﬁnitive study.”

Transcendental Meditation,

patented by Beatles guru Mahari-

shi Mahesh Yogi, is one of several

meditation techniques.

London detectives have

ofﬁcially concluded that

Italian banker Roberto

Calvi – known as “God’s

Banker”, for his close ties

with the Vatican Bank

– did not take his own life

and was in fact murdered

in 1982.

have claimed that the true

message of the Kensington

Runestone may be concealed by

a secret code. The piece of rock,

found more than a century ago, is

considered by some as evidence

that Norwegians beat Columbus to

the Americas.

It was found by farmer Olaf

Ohman, and bears an inscription

that places Norwegians in Minne-

sota in 1362. Carved in runes, the

message reads: “Eight Goths and

22 Norwegians on an exploration

journey...10 men red with blood

and dead...14 days journey from

this island...year 1362.”

Orthodox historians claim that

Ohman authored the inscription

himself, and say that the language

on the rune stone is too modern

and some of the runes are made

up. However, geologist Scott Wol-

ter says that tests prove the stone

had been carved well before Ohm-

an found it. “If this is a hoax, he

lied to his two sons, he lied to his

family, lied to his neighbors and

friends and lied to the world.”

Wolter says that he also found

one of the so-called invented runes

in a medieval text, refuting the ex-

pert’s view. Beyond those ﬁndings

though, some of the anomalous

runes may hold a bigger secret. Wol-

ter and Texas engineer Dick Nielsen

believe that two crossed runes may

be a pointer to a concealed code.

“Maybe they’re saying, ‘Pay atten-

tion to me,’” Wolter said.

Wolter and Nielsen surmise

that the runestone may have been

left by Templars, and that the true

message may be related to the enig-

matic group of knights. “I’m sure a

lot of people are going to roll their

eyes and say, ‘Oh, it’s “The DaVinci

Code,’ and if they do, they do,” said

Wolter. “This is the evidence, this

is who was there, this is what the

grave slabs tell us. It is what it is.”

A British Museum ofﬁcial

has suggested that half of

the 40 iconic items looted

from the Iraq National

Museum still had not

been retrieved, and 8,000

pieces are missing from

its storerooms.

Archaeologists have un-

covered a gravesite at Pe-

ru’s ancient ruins of Pach-

acamac, which includes

mummy bundles contain-

ing whole families.

New tests on the 5,300-

year-old mummy of “Ötzi

the Iceman” have shown

suspicious grey spots,

which could be the begin-

nings of decomposition.

The Boxing Day Sumatran

earthquake, measuring

9.3 on the Richter Scale,

“unzipped” an 800-mile

stretch of the planet and

released twice the energy

ﬁrst thought, according

to a series of studies.

Genuine time-travelers

have failed to show up

at a special convention

at MIT in May, which in-

vited people of the future

to travel back in time to

prove the feasibility of

the technology.

(Source: www.jsonline.com)

Wormholes Unusabl say there could be problems with

the paper’s conclusions. One re-

searcher argued that the underly-

ing physics of wormholes is not in

doubt – the real challenge is how to

engineer wormholes big enough to

be of practical use.

Albert Einstein and Nathan

Rosen were the ﬁrst scientists to

publish a paper on wormholes, in

1935. Hence, wormholes are also

often referred to in scientiﬁc circles

as Einstein-Rosen bridges. Michio

Kaku has explained the worm-

hole concept by the analogy that

the shortest distance between two

points on a sheet of paper is not

in fact a straight line – it is when

the points are brought together by

folding the paper on top of itself.

thrown doubt over the pos-

sibility of using ‘wormholes’

as a method of traversing space

and time. Stephen Hsu and Roman

Buniy, of the University of Oregon,

say that the hypothetical creation

and use of a wormhole would re-

quire that it be both stable and pre-

dictable. However, Hsu and Buniy

say that in the case of wormholes,

each are mutually exclusive – you

can either have stability, or predict-

ability, but not both.

“We aren’t saying you can’t

build a wormhole,” said Dr Hsu.

“But the ones you would like

to build – the predictable ones

where you can say Mr Spock will

land in New York at 2pm on this

day – those look like they will fall

apart.” However, other physicists

Scientists in the UK have

succeeded in levitating

some of the heaviest ele-

ments in nature, such as

lead and platinum, by us-

ing liquid oxygen and a

strong magnetic ﬁeld.

(Source: www.wcco.com)

A child who lived in the

infamous Amityville

Horror house says the

portrayal in the movie

is wildly inaccurate, al-

though he does conﬁrm

that paranormal events

deﬁnitely occurred.

Acupuncture Support

Ancient technique found to be ‘more than a placebo’

New computer simula-

tions have credited Jupi-

ter and Saturn as playing

a major role in the forma-

tion of the Solar System.

have found proof that acu-

puncture works, and suc-

cessful results are not due to the

placebo effect.

Researchers at University Col-

lege London and Southampton

University used brain scans and

experiments to separate the place-

bo effect from any actual positive

results. They employed positron

emission tomography (PET) scans

to monitor the brains of patients

undergoing acupuncture treat-

ment for arthritis pain.

Sarah Williams of the British

Acupuncture Council said: “This

is very positive news for acupunc-

ture and this latest research is an

exciting illustration of what acu-

puncturists have known for a long

time – that acupuncture works

and its effectiveness goes beyond

the placebo effect.”

NASA has offered a

$250,000 prize to the ﬁrst

person or group of re-

searchers that turns lu-

nar soil into breathable

oxygen.

New rules for British tele-

vision forbid broadcasters

from showing purported

paranormal events before

9pm.

(Source: www.news.bbc.co.uk)

June 2005 | Sub Rosa

Sub Rosa | June 2005 5

A new scientiﬁc paper has

S cientists in the UK say they

Columns

GREG TAYLOR Columns

GREG TAYLOR

The Science

Of Doubt

I just being pedantic to feel that the joke didn’t really

work because ﬂight recorders are made out of titanium

and that if you made planes out of titanium rather

than aluminium, they’d be far too heavy to get off

the ground in the ﬁrst place? There was no way of

deconstructing the joke that didn’t rely on the teller

and the audience complacently conspiring together to

jeer at someone who knew more than they did. It sent

a chill down my spine and it still does.

philosophy or worldview. To be sure, religion

takes a large portion of the cake when it comes

to that topic. But so does modern science – and

if you don’t believe me, try raising your personal

doubts about Darwinian evolution, the age of the

Sphinx, or the capabilities of the human mind

with the relevant groups of scientists.

Science needs challenging, and all topics

should be fair game. If you’re a scientist and

you’re frowning right now, then I rest my case.

Our knowledge of the Universe and ourselves

can only grow when we live in doubt about all

claims, fringe or orthodox. Otherwise, science is

just the new religion.

I ’m a big fan of Douglas Noel Adams. Despite

Actually, it’s quite easy to deconstruct the joke

to its basic humour: irony. We rely on an inde-

structible piece of equipment within an object

to help us understand why it was destroyed. I

certainly don’t feel like I’m laughing at science

when I react to that joke – although I do laugh at

scientists or authors who might feel that it would

be wrong to do so. So why did Adams react

so strongly?

What this illustrates is that Adams is wrong

in saying that only religion has this untouchable

sanctity. In reality, as I hinted above, this sanctity

arises out of the individual’s attachment to any

intimidatingly bad reviews, I faithfully

attended the showing of The Hitchhikers Guide

To The Galaxy at my local movie theatre –

knowing full well that it would be an impossibility

to recreate the literary and comic genius of DNA

on the big screen. In fact, I’d go so far as to say

that his books have been a formative inﬂuence on

my personal philosophies.

That’s not to say I agree with everything he

had to say (Adams tragically passed away in May

2001, aged just 49). He was an atheist; I’m more

of a deist (though with a strong

thread of Gnosticism thrown in).

And later in his life, he became

a vigorous defender of science.

I, on the other hand, think sci-

ence needs to be challenged

regularly – for reasons which I’ll

outline below.

A number of Adams’ miscel-

laneous articles, unpublished writings and mus-

ings were released to the public in the post-hu-

mous anthology The Salmon of Doubt . The topics

range from the beneﬁts of whisky to the dangers

of climbing a mountain dressed in a rhino suit;

the tone from zany to serious. And as would be

expected of an avowed atheist, more than one of

the essays delves into the subject of religion.

In the essay “Is There An Artiﬁcial God?”

(actually a transcript of a 1998 speech), Adams

queries the sanctity of religion as a topic of debate

and criticism:

how much of a furor Richard [Dawkins] creates

when he does it! Everybody gets absolutely frantic

about it because you’re not allowed to say these

things. Yet when you look at it rationally, there is no

reason why those ideas shouldn’t be as open to debate

as any other.

Proﬁle

Greg Taylor is the owner/editor of

the online alternative news portal, The

Daily Grail , and is also the editor of Sub

Rosa Magazine. He is interested and

widely read in topics that challenge the

orthodox worldview, from alternative

history to the mysteries of human

consciousness.

Greg currently resides in Brisbane,

Australia, and has recently published

his ﬁrst book. Da Vinci in America is a

guidebook to the esoteric history and

locations likely to be included in Dan

Brown’s next book, The Solomon Key .

I couldn’t agree more. I might qualify his com-

ments by saying that, in my opinion, the reason

for the sanctity is because the topic of religion is

one which affects a person to their deepest core

- their philosophical framework and worldview

has often grown out of that very

subject. That certainly doesn’t

make it exempt from debate

– we could only wish that more

people challenged the Nazi ide-

ology before it reached critical

weight – only that we should at

least recognise the reason behind

an individual’s sensitivity to the

subject of religion.

What really surprised me about the senti-

ments expressed in this speech, however, is that

just a few pages earlier in an article titled “Turn-

coat”, Adams had expressed his disgust at a co-

median making fun of scientists – recalling it as

the moment when he “fell out of love” with the

idea of making fun of science (which he read-

ily admits was a part of The Hitchhikers Guide to

the Galaxy ). The comedian had just told the joke

about why aeroplanes aren’t made of the mate-

rial which the virtually indestructible ‘black box’

is made from:

Science needs

challenging, and

all topics should

be fair game

Amazon US

Religion...has certain ideas at the heart of it which we

call sacred or holy or whatever...we are used to not

challenging religious ideas, but it’s very interesting

Amazon UK

The audience roared with laughter at how stupid

scientists were...but I sat feeling uncomfortable. Was

June 2005 | Sub Rosa

Sub Rosa | June 2005 7

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