Separabis terram ab igne, subtile ab spisso, suaviter, magno cum ingenio. (Thou shalt separate the earth from the fire, the subtle from the gross, suavely, and with great ingenuity.) — Emerald Tablet of Hermes (Tabula Smaragdina Hermetis)

Surfing the interface of mind and time and space. — Heldon, “Only Chaos Is Real”

Legs to walk and thoughts to fly
Eyes to laugh and lips to cry
A restless tongue to classify
All born to grow, and grown to die
— Townes Van Zandt, “Rex’s Blues”

The gulls on the beach, I think a long time ago those were flying birds, not just walking ones like now. I’m sure of it although I’m not sure how I’m sure. They must feel something like the way I do. — Russell Hoban, notes from Riddley Walker

My profile
Psychonaut + Cybernaut = Psybernaut

Liber JAM is Joshua’s directory and repository of ideas having to do with anything not covered in one of his other libers. Joshua Madara is the name of his “real life” persona.

Residence: Seattle, Washington

Day job: software quality assurance engineer, industrial information systems

Night job: amateur cybernetician-cum-magician, cybrarian

Dream jobs: roboparapsychologist, Kwisatz Haderach

Interests: Most of my interests are found in analytical synthesis and synthetic analysis of cybernetics and magic, and include a variety of subjects as deep as it is wide. Recurring themes include:

  • anomalous phenomena
  • artificiality
  • autopoiesis
  • behavior
  • closure, complexity, and coupling of nervous systems
  • cognition
  • feedback
  • form and function
  • intelligence sans representation
  • interfaces
  • memory
  • metaphor
  • modeling
  • occult anatomy
  • perception and volition
  • plasticity
  • ritual
  • sensor-actuator/motor systems and the amplification and attenuation of their requisite knowledge and variety
  • states of (sub/super)consciousness
  • symbolism and symbology
  • threshold phenomena

Cybernetics […] solved the paradox of how fictional goals [cf. statements of intent in magic rituals /jam] can have real-world effects by showing that information alone (detectable differences) can bring order to systems when that information is in a feedback relation with that system. This essentially bootstraps perception (detection of differences) into purpose. — Psycho-Ontology.Net

Articles on cybernetics and magic

Education

  • 1997.06 to 1999.11 National Radio Institute (NRI Schools i.e. poor man’s MIT) for industrial electronics and robotics (to learn how language translates in-to mechanical activity, and computational process control)
  • Autodidactic trivium (grammar, logic, rhetoric) and quadrivium (arithmetic, geometry, music (harmony), astronomy)

Affiliations

Hobbies: robotics, mixed/multi-media art, electronic music, martial arts, hiking, entomology, etymology, collecting ephemera & wind-up tin robots & spaceships

Tools: AABBYY FineReader Sprint, Antenna Web Design Studio, Audacity, AudioStrobe, AutoGK, Blender, BrainWave Generator, C-Thru, Cardworks, CDex, Dia, Dremel, DVD Decrypter, FreeMind, index cards, Inkscape, Jahshaka, Korg, Lafuma, MaxMedia Pro, Mod Podge and other Plaid products, Moleskine squared journals, newsprint, Notepad++, OpenOffice, PowerDirector, PowerProducer, Qavimator, Sharpie, StreamRipper, TurboSonix, VirtualDub & VirtualDubMod, VUE, Wavosaur, WD-40, X-Acto, Zome

Spiritual interests: Chaotic and Hermetic (esp. alchemy and Kabbalah) magic, Buddhist (esp. Tibetan/Bön and Zen) and Christian (esp. Catholic) mysticism, Celtic and Mesoamerican shamanism, hatha and raja yoga, hoodoo and voodoo (esp. Louisiana)

Influences: Antero Alli, William Ashby, William Atkinson, Robert Bartlett, Gregory Bateson, Henri Bergson, Niels Bohr, Reginald Cahill, Peter Carroll, Paul Case, Leonard Cohen, Aleister Crowley, Gilles Deleuze, Nevill Drury, Mircea Eliade, Philip Farber, Gilles Fauconnier, Enrico Fermi, Gotthard Günther, Heraclitus, Jesper Hoffmeyer, St. John of the Cross, Carl Jung, Wassily Kandinsky, Louis Kauffman, Arthur Koestler, Paul Laffoley, George Lakoff, Bruce Lee, Humberto Maturana, Yair Neuman, John von Neumann, Paul Pangaro, Gordon Pask, Steven Pinker, Richard Riedel, Lionel Snell, Jesper Sørensen, Herbert Spencer, George Spencer-Brown, Edward Tufte, Mark Turner, Victor Turner, Heinz von Foerster, Alan Watts, Alfred Whitehead, Norbert Wiener, Edward O. Wilson

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