ChatGPT must have seen \"The Ninth Gate\", and some Star Wars!
Due to how intent functions in the dark sea, the naming of a thing is a serious matter.
According to don Juan anyway...
Which surely bums "Cholita" out.
The only nickname Carlos ever gave her.
It meant, "The little copy of Margarette, one of my oldest friends and the famous Chola of the Los Angeles University System."
I'm simulating a hardware version of an AI on a piece of computer software right now, and had time to chat with a real AI about names.
I was curious, what comes after the "new seers"? We had the "old seers", then the new seers came about out of necessity.
And now there's us, out of necessity. And we're not like the ones of the past.
But doing ok anyway! We've successfully cast off pretending (Shamanism).
Partly this is because we have a new guy wishing there were Naguals around. That seemed horridly wrong to me.
Maybe he just wants a name to think about?
Here's the AI conversation about "what we are now?"
***
Question:
What does "neo" mean when added to something like "conservatives"? Does it mean the same when added to any label, such as "old seers", "new seers", and "neo-seers"?
ChatGPT
The prefix "neo-" comes from the Greek word "neos," which means "new" or "recent." It is often used to indicate a new form, version, or revival of an ideology, group, or concept. When added to a term like "conservatives," resulting in "neo-conservatives," it denotes a new form of conservatism that might differ in specific ways from traditional conservatism, often reflecting new ideas or approaches within the conservative framework.
Similarly, when "neo-" is added to other terms like "old seers," "new seers," and "neo-seers," it serves to differentiate between these groups. "Old seers" would refer to the original or traditional seers, "new seers" could suggest a more recent generation or development of seers, and "neo-seers" implies a revival or new version that incorporates distinct or modified elements compared to what was traditionally known.
Thus, while "neo-" consistently implies something new or revived, the specific nature of what is new or how it differs from the original can vary based on the context. It signals a change or a development within the referenced group, ideology, or concept.
Question: Is there a better choice for "neo-seers", since that seems to imply the "new, new seers"?
ChatGPT
You're right that using "neo-seers" in the context of "new seers" can sound redundant, as both "new" and "neo-" imply something recent or revised. A better choice might depend on what specific characteristics or distinctions you want to emphasize about this group compared to "old seers" or "new seers." Here are a few alternative suggestions:
- Modern Seers: This term emphasizes that the group reflects contemporary ideas or practices, differentiating from past notions without redundancy.
- Reformed Seers: This suggests that the group has undergone significant changes or reforms compared to previous versions.
- Advanced Seers: This could imply a progression or enhancement in the abilities or methodologies of the seers compared to earlier groups.
- Revolutionary Seers: If the changes are particularly radical or a significant departure from tradition, this term could be appropriate.
- Contemporary Seers: Similar to "Modern Seers," this term places the group in the present day, highlighting current relevance and practices.
Choosing a term will depend on the nuances of how these seers are different from their predecessors and what aspect of their practice or ideology you wish to emphasize.
Question:
Maybe you can choose. The old seers were the original olmec shamans who learned to do what shamans do using drug plants, without the drug plants. They could summon alternate states of conscious much more vivid and real than even those who used Ayahuasca or Devil's Weed, and thus no longer needed that. The "new seers" came along when the Olmec world was destroyed and the old seers had to flee enemies, eventually setteling in the Toltec empire, which was also destroyed. They banded together as groups of 15 and called themselves the "new seers". But that came to an end with the end of don Juan Matus, the teacher of Carlos Castaneda. And now, some of his private class students have learned to "see" for real, and could use a name which imply, you have to do it all, without help from anyone, just using the instructions we've collected and made available world wide, via the internet.
ChatGPT:
Given the rich historical context and the evolution of the seers from the Olmec to the Toltec and through the teachings of Carlos Castaneda's mentor, don Juan Matus, it sounds like the new group is defined by a deep individual responsibility and autonomy in their spiritual practices. They represent a culmination of wisdom passed down and adapted through the ages, now globally accessible and self-directed. Here are a few suggestions for naming this new group:
- Autonomous Seers: This emphasizes their independence in learning and practicing without direct guidance, relying solely on accumulated knowledge.
- Self-Guided Seers: Highlighting the aspect of self-teaching and personal responsibility in mastering the art of seeing.
- Sovereign Seers: This term conveys a strong sense of self-rule and autonomy in their spiritual practice.
- Independent Seers: Similar to "Autonomous" and "Sovereign," this name stresses the individuality and self-sufficiency of each seer.
- Global Seers: Reflecting the worldwide accessibility and application of their practices and teachings, thanks to the internet.
- Evolutionary Seers: Suggesting a progressive and evolved form of seership that builds upon the legacies of the past while forging new paths forward.
Each of these names aims to capture the essence of a group that is both deeply rooted in a rich spiritual tradition and radically self-reliant, adapting ancient wisdom for a modern, global context.
61 Comments
I kind of like something related to evolution, since that is mentioned directly in the books.
Good point.
I don't know if leaving the Sorcerer's intent up to the intent of someone else is necessarily the best shot though.
The AI is the collected intent of hundreds of thousands of people.
They take 6 terabytes of human data, often including all of wikipedia, and they condense it down to less than 8 gigabytes, and sometimes as little as 3.
It recognizes patterns, and only stores those a few times.
It's a form of lossy compression.
Yes, and are we letting the collected intent of hundreds of thousands of people decide a name for us? Maybe it's best to wait for silent knowledge to hand out a name? If it's a concern.
I'm waiting for something specific to come up with it, but so far it's not happening.
Now I can see clearly that Carlos did that from time to time, but it never worked.
I sure wish he was around to talk to about somewhat amusing topics like that.
I suppose we might have to be the "Nameless Seers".
Like naming your dog, "Dog".
I actually rather like the "Nameless Seers", it kind of strikes a chord (like the poetry Don Juan likes).
Unfortunately, it's a bit "lofty"...
We WISH we were those guys.
But then Carlos made up stories about inner circle women to give them an advantage starting out. And those were fairly "lofty".
That sort of thing annoys Cholita no end. As she complained, I'm "making her famous in Hollywood".
I suppose with the customers Carlos set her up with.
I have a lot of witty responses on the tip of my tongue, but I'll just refrain for now.
Except it sounds like we're AI driven. And so does Self-Guided Seers.
Which might be the case, but not yet.
Sovereign Seers has the alliteration going for it.
But sounds like we think we're above the other seers.
Some of those do have an air of superiority, it's true.
The title reminded me how Taisha once mentioned how she has different names, and the way she introduced herself as would be, who she would end up "being".
That's a clever way for her to say that names matter. They really do. If we call ourselves neo-seers we would drown in self importance.
So I suggest we call ourselves the homeless seers. Because we are just kinda all over the place without a lineage. We are only somehow holding on to this knowledge so it hopefully will survive. Maybe we are the "last" seers. I really hope not.
Oh, I like that homeless idea!
But "The Last Seers" is a bit too much like "The last Jedi"...
I like the idea of last seers
Also, the guardians of magic, which Techno said something like
I don't recall ever writing anything like that!
It sounds hoakey
You used the word Stormtroopers in the comment below
I asked the meaning of it from chatgpt. chatgpt said it means special and armed forces
Yeah, that was Dan's writing. It's a character class in Star Wars:
(the guys in white )
my suggestion:
Self-taught seers or self-taught new seers
Or
Independent seers
They aren't bad.
But not very catchy.
Independant seers sounds a bit too much like, "Independent Real Estate Agents".
And self-taught will worry new people too much. They're very needy until they see some actual magic more than a few times.
I already get into trouble for saying we don't care who learns and who doesn't.
As if it were a good thing to care about that, outside of trying to charge money for lessons.
i like sovereign seers best.
and i asked a free online chatgpt version in german: "i want to give something new a name, but i don't want to use the word "new":
first answer (translated by chatgpt into english afterwards):
- Fresh wind
then i asked for further suggestions (translated by chatgpt into english afterwards):
- Wind gust
- Storm roar
- Breeze whisper
- Air swirl
- Breath play
- Zephyr breeze
- Gusts rush
- Air breeze
- Breeze magic
- Wind play
my native language is german and when i thought about an english word which could fit with my limited english language skills, i thought first about a word wich is a movie title, which was made from a sci-fi series i really liked. i looked it up in the dictionary what i means, because it didn't really know and it may fit (maybe just for myself): "serendipity seers".
I forgot about national trends. Might be there's no "one size fits all" new name if it's not simple.
If you get fancy like "sovereign", you overlook that the "gold sovereign" is a highly coveted valuable collectable in British territories.
And as I recall form learning German and Russian, the Germans have more names for war than any other culture, kind of like Eskimos have more words for snow.
And the Russians have the most swear words.
36,000 by my count. I wrote software to analyze random words for uniqueness. Trying to use my method of just memorizing 5000 words to learn a language.
Which doesn't work, unless you go spend time there to use them in a real situation.
I really like the idea of Sovereign Seers. It implies the lack of need for a Nagual.
"I can save myself"
It's got the most votes so far. Except...
I poked Llama 3 AI about it and landed on...
Alternatively, you could use a numbering system:
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I sure hope Llama 3 is smarter than Llama 2. I have #2 running on my computer offline, and it's quite inferior to ChatGPT for technical questions. It gets "overfitted" very easily.
An AI technical term for, they didn't debug it well.
They also kicked me out of the Llama subreddit, for pointing that out and suggesting people ought to download Mistral instead of their Llama 2.
So much for unbiased computer scientists...
I tried Mistral some, but it wasn't able to assist (too many boilerplate disclaimers and "objectivity") so I went back to Llama 3.
...it is a "subspecies" maybe? Or "Llama 3 70b powered by the Groq LPU™ Inference Engine" as it says.
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70b is impressive. I have that running on my computer, but it's still version 2 and highly "overfitted". It gets stuck on details that aren't important, and can't escape them to find your a real answer to a technical question.
You can use a sentence instead
Lonely lovers = those who love witchcraft but are alone in learning witchcraft
Or
lonely seers
Too much self-pity in those.
But Cleargreen might like them!
They're in that business already!
I like 'Modern Seers'.
I think it ties in well with 'old' and 'new'.
It doesn't imply any particular affection or affiliation and it sets up the next one, 'Post-Modern Seers' 😀
Actually your user name implies other possibilities.
Even though, it worries me a bit.
"Second Attention Seers".
It's kind of like, "Roadside Dives you just have to eat at."
They used to have a TV show featuring those.
Nostalgia for bad food that you like anyway.
In Kentucky, they have giant turkey subs that are covered over in the worst canned brown gravy you can imagine. And other signature things I can't recall, because I never got to eat one.
People giggle in shame when ordering them.
I learned about them because I once only had 2 days in Kentucky and wanted to understand "local food".
First I was told that all the locals were heroin addicts living in the hills along the freeway, because government workers had decided such poor hillbilly types needed free money from the feds, so they went door to door and overcame their Kentucky Pride.
Resulting in that situation.
I was also told, never drive into those hills of Kentucky because they shoot at strangers with shotguns.
By two 16 year old hillbilly daughter girls working as waitresses in a restaurant, to support their oxycontin addicted dad.
One of them seemed interested in finding a businessman husband despite huge age differences.
I kind of liked Kentucky.
No corner liquor stores at all!
Where I live, there's one every mile.
But there it's just booze megamarts. To save money.
Seers without selves
But they're all seers without selves.
Seeing is impossible with a self.
Contemporary Seers is the most accurate per those definitions, but it's not very sexy.
5 years ago, you were on a Stormtroopers bender:
https://www.reddit.com/r/castaneda/comments/c7vj6g/lets_be_stormtroopers/
So, how about The Exiles.
Personally, I'd just prefer sorcerers. It's timeless, and still rebellious.
I guess that means I get to watch all the Star Wars again, including the many cartoons, to see if our new name is in there?
But it's possible it will come along soon. The latest has them investigating the origins of the Jedi, as sorcerers from very long ago.
And with the implication that now, the force can be used by anyone willing to put in the effort.
Rey already ignored the "bad side of the force" warnings, and just uses whichever works.
With Yoda saying "We are what they grow beyond."
The most recent has a prototype non-Jedi force user being taught by Ashoka, while an "amoral" Jedi tries to locate the truth about their origins using witches to help.
Digital Seers?? As our name, of course.
How obvious!
And not bad at all.
But I have to worry it kind of dates you.
Like calling everything "turbo" back in the 80s.
Based on IBM speeding up their first PC from 4.7MHz, to 10MHz.
It was so impressive back then, you even had fast food places selling "Turbo Hotdogs".
But by the time the 90s came around and there were 1GHz machines, that whole turbo thing became a bit of a joke.
Keep in mind, "digital" is fading fast from the computer world.
It's going more neural net.
Neural nets are largely not at all "digital" in their functioning.
We still have to execute them that way, but Intel has some new 20 petaflop neural CPUs.
"Puff Stuffers " makes me giggle every time I say it. Be a good nickname. I like the direction of "Evolutionary Seers", and am working on something that might be close to that; "Redeployment , Redeployed? something like that. And then there is this: "Seers of the Magical Passes", Carlos and cohorts, chose to share the magical passes , the one big cornerstone of their sorcery to all the world, those who was interested, when they closed the new seers lineage. Now there is a new cycle of seers,.. New Cycle Seers?
I like "seers of the magical passes", except all four Cleargreens are making up fake magical passes, which will harm anyone who practices them.
So were' more like, "Seers of a subset of the magical passes floating around".
Or "Seers of Genuine magical passes".
Both too long...
And some in our community can't tell what's a new pass, and what's one from when Carlos was around.
That doesn't seem hard to me, but I get questions about it.
Imagine how much worse to figure that out, in 20 years!
I'd hoped by now the Cleargreens would notice it all works like Carlos said, and do some actual work out of shame, if nothing else.
What excuse could they possibly have left?
But they just seem to keep doubling down on pretending and stealing.
Miles is even teaming up with outside thieves. To steal even from those who have no interest at all in Castaneda.
Last I heard about Claroverde, besides their Rinpoche delusions, was that they were sticking people into a closet to confuse them into thinking they had real magic going on.
Cholita needs to go down there and kick some Claroverde butt.
But I must admit, I didn't actually hear that they made up their own fake passes yet.
I just assumed they did, since the other 3 couldn't resist doing that.
Not a good thing that passes have been "compromised" and/or new ones have been "invented". I stick with the ones in the book that Carlos wrote, and the first videos, so it doesn't affect me personally in that regard, but what a shame it would/is , down the road 20 plus years like you say. I have attended just one in-person cleargreen U.S event, in 2020? I don't remember if there was any names given to those passes that was demonstrated/practiced, and any notes I might have made are in Alaska, Im now in Utah for awhile .
What a huge waste of time and energy for someone , who works super hard to learn a pass, that has no power, and maybe will never know the difference!
To bad "New Age" is so, ... well, new agey ! as that would seem a contender for a name. Carlos and the others were a big part of the new age movement, the LA Times mentioned that
Carlos was half of the new age movement. The first half. Maharishi was the second half. I lived through it!
You might argue about Timothy Leary dropping acid with Einstein, but that wasn't any kind of claim to be teaching magic.
It's odd that type of history is never remembered!
Maybe AIs will solve that, by being a better form of googling.
These days you'll even have a hard time finding people who realize Robert Monroe was directly targeting Castaneda fans.
Only older fans know that.
I keep thinking, maybe Soledad had a better idea: influencing movies and people's thinking about what magic ought to look like.
I go 100% Yoda these days! Viewing anywhere in time and space, that "concerns" me.
That is, when I can manage to remove the last traces of internal dialogue and self-pity.
No more waiting for puffs, Allies, or anything else.
It's the "Play" button to seeing!
But you can't keep it up more than 30 minutes continuously if you gaze into the videos in the air too much.
You get some odd form of mental fatigue.
Which causes you to lay down, and go almost immediately into sleeping dreams.
The kind Carlos said were "real" because they're born of silence.
Tongue in cheek name to imply distance from attention seekers:
"Second Attention Seekers"
It's not bad!
I was thinking just last night, while suffering over having messed up my practice schedule, and thus being unable to activate Silent Knowledge videos of any quality, that we're the absolute first "self-motivated" sorcerers in the entire line.
Except the first.
The first was self-motivated.
After that, none until us.
It's practically a miracle anyone can learn, without some kind of little lineage or "master" to keep them on track.
The scattered seers
That's not so bad.
And I suppose even if Star Wars comes up with a new name for the Jedi, we can't actually steal it...
I could try asking Cholita, but she's only slightly better so far.
The hope with her is always that if you ask her, you're potentially asking one of the old apprentices who moved to Hollywood, for whom she did work.
I'm putting in the plot for inspiration:
seers of the present time
traveler in consciousness
A bit "be here now" though...
That's a death trap.
DON'T be here now is more like what we're after.
Because there's millions of other places to be, and limiting yourself to just this reality is a serious loss.
(I had to get my anti-zen rant in there.)
"Nameless seers"
Could end up being the default since no new name has popped out, and some bad players are making a stink about how much they mistrust "soulless" AIs.
People cast out of here for being repeatedly harmful to others, still hang out around the fringes looking for things to complain about.
seers of intent
Not bad, except it possibly implies the old and new seers weren't?
Isolated out of context, it's actually fairly descriptive of what we do.
You could also use:
Cleaners of Intent
Or "Intent Cleaners".
Except then you'd get some delusional Zen people saying "Ah Hah!!! We wrote about the dust on the mirror of the mind long ago!"
Which of course, is a crappy green zone view of things. Totally in keeping with the truth about meditation systems merely getting you to beginner's level magic.
As long as you have a "mind", you haven't gotten out of the green zone yet.
It popped in my head a few nights ago, I dismissed the thought, then it came back again today. Figured if it’s going to be persistent I should post it.
Good point, we do not want to imply that.
I think someone proposed the "nameless seers" already.
But then there's the Ronin in Japanese legend, a few of whom actually existed.
So "Masterless Seers"?
It's just that they're known for raping and pillaging, and practicing their clean beheadings on farmers on deserted roads.
Cholita might like that.
But most of the women wouldn't.
We have:
1) No Nagual Leaders, No Lineages
2) No real way to assume multiple identities without being recognized on the Internet
2b) Digital recordings are EVERYWHERE, and the exchange of information is instantaneous, our personal history is practically set in stone, which means no scouting for new lineage members or creating outlandish antics in public without it being solidified by the Internet
3) The old and new seers were defined by what they did, the modality of their times, and what caused that change to the naming of the next generation.
The times changed so drastically from the ease of spreading information (true OR false) such that Carlos was designated to be the end of the lineages, something had to change in order to keep sorcerers relatively hidden. Current practitioners have to learn on their own in the Information Age from the 90s onwards.
Perhaps the Digital, or Information Age Seers?
Those are both very good.
Digital seers indicates a true or not true state.
Like Asian enlightenment delusions.
Binary systems are harmful to their followers, because they make them believe a single experience is important, which feeds the book deal mind.
So maybe Information Age Seers is better.
That hints at emphasizing Silent Knowledge, so it comes the closest so far!
In my opinion.
One guy asked if Seers understood AI...
What the hell?
I'm putting it into a $20 chip and applying for a patent on the design next week. Even if I'm too old to finish the design, the patent ought to be valuable. You won't be able to make a portable AI without it using current technology.
Assuming I get the patent.
But AI is nothing compared to silent knowledge.
The AI only knows what it was trained on, and in the case of someone like De Mille, it's so little that it practically lies about him not being a scientologist attacking Carlos based on that.
The German version of ChatGPT was better trained on De Mille's life story and will tell you he actually wrote for their magazine and was very close to L. Ron.
So AIs are limited in what they know.
Whereas seers have access to all of time and space, and all knowledge contained in the human realms of it.
Without an internet connection.
I suppose the "Information Age" part could be a joke of sorts.
So that anyone learning realizes, it refers to Silent Knowledge being available to all, rather than to electronics.
I tried out ChatGPT 3.5
" The "seers of ancient mexico" date from 500 years ago to 10000 years ago, the "new seers" date from present time to 500 years ago, now another lineage of seers is formin, what are some appropriate names for this new lineage"
Chatgpt3.5 , 1. Visionary Guardians 2. Cosmic Navigators 3. Timekeepers Renewed
Ethereal Wayfinders 5, Wisdom Weavers 6. Celestial Sages 7. Infinite Seekers
Harmony Guides 9. Divine Illuminators 10 Soul Pathfinders
Maybe we could form several different "lines" of seers!
I'll be in "The Cantankerous Seers".
Battling the "Buddha Deluded" wherever found.
i was reading old posts and found another name. it‘s from a 3 year old comment from u/Juann2323: “J Curver“. i like the name.
see original comment: https://www.reddit.com/r/castaneda/comments/pcf4c6/comment/haiuloj/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button
Just keep in mind, Carlos never used that term.
When he gave us the J curve path (I believe knowing he was doing that), he started by holding his palm against the assemblage point of a young women in very tight clothes, while he puts his hand on her shoulder.
And obvious personal space violation, to get our attention.
Her assemblage point was a few feet b ack, and up at a slight angle, on what would be her left side from her point of view.
Then he moved it from up there, to down on top of her left shoulder blade (from her point of view), and touched his finger there, saying that was the projection of it.
Where the beam of awareness was currently flowing.
There's some disagreement on what the beam of awareness does, and it's a good idea not to assume it travels in a perfectly straight line. I suspect it can bend, more like high voltage electricity when it's visible, than like light.
He then traced his finger down her back, explaining what happens when the assemblage point moves to each point.
Giving us the "colors" along the J curve.
Those correspond to locations at which his finger stopped, while he explained the effects you would perceive there.
When I drew it up to use in here, it looked like a big "J".
So that's how it got its name.
I don't know how Carlos would feel about that.
"Concreteness" is something the new seers disdain slightly.
But after decades of things not being concrete in our community, flowing people to make up nonsense, it seems warranted to me.
Besides, the apprentices of don Juan were up to their ears in "concrete magic".
Like that basket which tried to devour Pablito. A gift from don Juan.
I'm 90% sure that was our own entity "Fairy".
How don Juan's face got on it, might relate to how this old seer is riding on his Ally.
Now there's a level of magic I'd love to see us gain!!!