Clown World Chronicles: What Is 'Solipsism'?

Clown World Chronicles: What Is ‘Solipsism’?

Clown World is a mess for many reasons: physical, emotional, economic, political, spiritual. Some of the reasons are philosophical. These philosophical reasons relate to popular delusions that have arisen as a result of faulty logic. One of the most harmful of those delusions is solipsism.

Solipsism is the belief that the only consciousness that exists is one’s own. To the solipsist, the material world may or may not be real, but other people are not conscious. All other humans are what is called a philosophical zombie – a non-conscious being.

There is soft solipsism, which is the belief that the existence or otherwise of other consciousnesses is unknowable. There is also hard solipsism, which is the belief that it is known for certain that other consciousnesses don’t exist.

Solipsism is a major philosophical issue, for reasons that become apparent when one thinks through the implications.

Developmental psychologists believe that infants are born solipsistic, and this explains why they are so selfish. Most of them, however, grow up to assume that other people are conscious. This assumption is made by way of analogy. I have a body, and I am conscious. Other people have bodies, therefore they must be conscious too.

When most people reach what Jean Piaget called the formal operational stage, at the start of adolescence, they gain the ability to start thinking in abstract terms. When they do, they often question previous assumptions. If they do this, they soon realise that they don’t actually have any hard proof, whatsoever, that other people are conscious.

The realisation that consciousness has never been detected or measured by any scientific instrument leads to the realisation that no-one really knows if other people are conscious. One’s own consciousness might be entirely alone in this universe, surrounded only by shadows. This is arguably the most terrifying existential thought of all time.

Some people respond to this thought by becoming a variant of solipsist, i.e. someone who believes that they might be the only consciousness in the world. These people believe that other bodies might exist, but those bodies are not conscious and so there is no-one who experiences the suffering or joy of that body.

Others adopt a strange kind of balance position. Other bodies exist, and those bodies may or not be conscious, and so there may or may not be anyone who experiences the suffering or joy of that body. Therefore, that suffering doesn’t need to be taken as seriously as one’s own, because one knows for certain that one’s own suffering is experienced.

The degree to which a person discounts the suffering of other people is the degree to which they are a danger to those others. These beliefs – that one might be the only consciousness in the world, or that only one’s own consciousness is valuable – lie behind all kinds of atrocities and crimes.

If one thinks about it logically, a person’s level of empathy is related to whether or not they think other people are conscious. If other people aren’t conscious, or if their consciousness is of a lower quality, then there’s no reason to take their suffering into account when making decisions. Any measure that decreases the suffering of conscious beings while increasing the suffering of non-conscious beings is permissible.

This logic underpins exploitation of all kinds, from that of animals to that of people considered subhuman. The idea that animals/women/black people aren’t conscious (usually expressed as the idea that they don’t have souls) has underpinned exploitation since the beginning of civilisation. Today, exploitation continues under the logic that, although animals/women/black people may be conscious, the quality of that consciousness is significantly lower.

A psychopath acts as if theirs was the only consciousness that existed. This leads them to act as if other people’s suffering doesn’t matter. As a result, they take decisions that are characteristically psychopathic, such as causing great suffering to other people for marginal benefit to themselves. All exploitation is quasi-psychopathic in nature, and solipsism encourages this exploitation by justifying it.

Solipsism, then, is a major social issue. An increase in solipsism will lead to people making more selfish decisions, which will in turn lead to an increase in suffering. Social decline and solipsism follow each other. If everyone was a solipsist, this world would be hellish, because no-one would ever take other people’s suffering into account. It would be purely dog-eat-dog.

In a normal, healthy state of reality, living beings can sense the consciousness of others. This leads them to behave in ways that minimise the suffering of those others. In Clown World, people are so self-obsessed that they might as well be solipsists. Materialism and spiritual decay have led us to a state where many people are indifferent or oblivious to the suffering of other people. The result of this apathy is Clown World.

There are two ways to solve the problem of other minds.

The first is faith. This is the way that most people overcome solipsistic dilemmas. One simply has faith that other people are conscious. With sufficient faith, questions about whether the brain generates consciousness don’t need to be asked. The risk is that faith wavers, which can lead to ‘solipsistic crises’ where the existence of other consciousnesses is doubted.

The second is gnosis. This way is extremely difficult, and very few have done it. Gnosis involves knowing that other consciousnesses exist. To realise this requires stepping outside the bounds of ordinary consciousness and having a mystic revelation. The risk here is that one can stray too far from normal society. It’s difficult to live the mystic truths and not be considered insane by the masses.

The advantage of the gnosis method is that it leads to a life that’s in tune with the Tao. The person who has achieved theognosis knows that God self-expresses as the multitude of different beings that inhabit this world (and more). As such, the enlightened consciousness regards all other beings as expressions of God, their suffering equally meaningful as one’s own.

This article is an excerpt from Clown World Chronicles, a book about the insanity of life in the post-Industrial West. This is being compiled by Vince McLeod for an expected release in January 2021.

If you enjoyed reading this essay, you can get a compilation of the Best VJMP Essays and Articles of 2019 from Amazon for Kindle or Amazon for CreateSpace (for international readers), or TradeMe (for Kiwis). A compilation of the Best VJMP Essays and Articles of 2018 and the Best VJMP Essays and Articles of 2017 are also available.

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Clown World Chronicles: Spirituality In Clown World

As a society declines, usually the first thing that disappears is spirituality. Once a society loses touch with God, and starts adopting superstitious religion in place of genuine spiritual tradition, it’s only a matter of time until they lose everything else. Spirituality is the cornerstone that we’re missing in Clown World, and the lack of it causes many of our problems.

The elementary problem is what can be described as the Clown World Fork: either worship Jesus as God, or not believe in God. This is the fundamental spiritual dilemma facing the denizens of Clown World. Because the spiritual foundations of the West are rotten with Christianity, the spiritually inclined have great difficulty finding an alternative to Jesus-worship.

Those who are born into Christianity have the option of worshipping Rabbi Yeshua ben Yosef in place of God, thereby opening themselves up to a lifetime of doubt and confusion. All of them who have a spiritual sense will intuit that they are worshipping an idol, and this will lead them into misery and despair, and usually away from the religion.

Those who are not born into Christianity, or who reject it, have the option of becoming atheists. Such people tend to be big fans of Richard Dawkins (who, while a genius evolutionary biologist, is no theologian). This atheism brings with it the belief that consciousness is extinguished upon the death of the brain, and consequently also leads to misery and despair.

Worshipping God as God is not permitted. Understanding that the material world is an illusion and that consciousness survives the death of the physical body is right out. Any such genuine spirituality is dismissed – or worse. This has led to an immense dissatisfaction among the more open-minded people. Anyone with an innate spiritual sense is all but guaranteed to suffer from the Clown World Fork.

Most cruel of all, there is no easy way for these people to get solace. Back in the day, spiritual misfits were able to find others of their kind in secret societies, or were at least able to disconnect from the world in monasteries, but today they are simply flung into the void – if they’re lucky. They might also get directly persecuted by a psychiatric system that is almost entirely staffed by hard-core materialists.

In Clown World, all talk of genuine spirituality is considered mental illness. Not only has science proven that God doesn’t exist, but psychiatric science has advanced to the point where we know that anyone who believes in God is mentally ill. Anyone who speaks of direct knowledge of God is considered to be on the verge of losing their mind completely.

In the opinion of the mental health system, anyone speaking of God is psychotic and therefore a danger to themselves and others. They probably need to be medicated until they come back into their bodies again and realise that there is no God. At this point, they will once again feel the yawning existential despair that marks normality.

This approach is why entheogens such as LSD and psilocybin, the latter of which has been used for millennia to reconnect with God, are considered to be psychotogenics rather than spiritual sacraments. It’s true that consuming these sacraments can be a bad idea for the wrong sort of person, but for a person who is properly prepared, an infinitude of spiritual insight can be gained.

Being properly prepared is a matter of doing the correct spiritual work, which in practice means a lot of meditation and wrestling with one’s shadow. But spirituality in Clown World seldom recognises either as avenues to spiritual wisdom. In fact, the remnants of Abrahamism tend to dismiss meditation as an avenue to demonic possession. Sitting still and peaceful with a headful of propaganda and advertising jingles is not easy, and in Clown World there are few with the requisite capacity for delaying gratification.

In Clown World, spirituality has degraded to such a point that all discussion about life after death is terrifying. So terrifying that it’s traumatic to raise the subject. If a person starts talking about taking a psychedelic and having an ego death experience, they are liable to trigger panic attacks among their listeners.

It’s common for people in Clown World to have never devoted any real time or thought to the question of their demise, inevitable though it be. Most people go from work to television to bed then back to work, with very little time devoted to contemplation. The few groups that are contemplative are dogma-bound.

Despite this, the need for spirituality is as great as ever. The yearning for answers still expresses itself, in several ways.

We may have killed the Christian God in the late 19th Century, but superstitious behaviours remain. Christianity has been reborn as social justice warrior culture. Instead of flagellating ourselves, we degrade ourselves with struggle sessions. Instead of having original sin because of our lust, we have original sin because of our racism. Instead of fighting heathenry, we fight white supremacy.

Things are so desperate that some are even turning to Islam as a solution to Clown World’s degeneracy problems. This desperation is encapsulated in the phrases “Islam is right about women” and “Islam is right about homosexuals”.

The suffering caused by the fear of death and by nihilism is immense. It’s the primary reason why we live in such a shabby and plastic world. Clown World spirituality leaves no-one fulfilled, and does more to mislead than it does to assuage anyone’s torment. The first sign of Clown World ending will be the introduction of a new spiritual tradition.

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VJMP Reads: Free Speech Under Attack III

This reading carries on from here.

Chapter Seven in Free Speech Under Attack is ‘Banning a Political Pamphlet’ by Tim Wikiriwhi. This is a polemic against Andrew Little’s efforts to introduce hate speech legislation and to ban the 1Law4All pamphlet about the Treaty of Waitangi. Here, Wikiriwhi – himself Maori – supports the sentiments of the pamphlet by agreeing that the British settlement of New Zealand was a net positive for the Maori people.

This essay is quality in its invective, describing Peter Dunne as an “obsolete politician” and making use of the adjective “ham-fisted”. It demolishes the social justice warrior case that British colonisation lowered the quality of life in New Zealand, and makes an impassioned case for the value of free speech. The SJWs won’t be able to scream “Racist!” at Wikiriwhi, so they will likely ignore him.

The Treaty of Waitangi and British colonisation, bringing the advantages and restraints of civilised government to New Zealand for the first time, were the best things that ever happened to New Zealand and the Maoris benefitted enormously from them.

Chapter Eight is ‘Islam and Free Speech’ by Robert Stanmore. This essay discusses the various measures taken by Muslims to shut down free speech in the guise of preventing blasphemy. Stanmore recounts Muslim attacks against free speech in several Western nations, whether by using violence, intimidation or the law. He (correctly) points out that the Koran encourages Muslims to kill non-believers.

Stanmore encourages us here to learn from the example of Britain and Canada, where Muslims are numerous enough to influence the law by threat. In the vast majority of cases, Muslim immigrants show no sign of willingness to conform to the expectations of their host nations, and show every sign of willingness to force their hosts to conform. This is a danger we should be extremely wary of.

Chapter Nine continues in a similar vein. This short chapter is called ‘The Fraud of Islamophobia’. Here, Stanmore recounts the multiple admonitions to violence found in the Koran, and how Muslims are reluctant to reject these verses. Disappointingly, he ignores the violence inherent in the Bible, and the murderous way that Christianity itself has spread.

Stanmore even makes the laughable assertion that Christianity is inherently a peaceful religion akin to Buddhism or Hinduism. Despite these errors, he is able to list a number of scriptural horrors within the Koran that suggest Islam is not compatible with a modern Western way of life. A “religious hatred” law is unacceptable.

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Clown World Chronicles: Who Is Tyrone?

He can be seen shuffling along, his pants low, his limbs elastic, his head bobbing to some random tune. Something remarkable occurs, and he cries out “Sheeeeeittt!” He is Tyrone, one of the many demigods of the Clown World pantheon.

Tyrone is the archetype of not giving a fuck anymore. Mostly because of early childhood trauma, but also perhaps for natural reasons, Tyrone doesn’t think beyond the immediate future. If something happens, he simply reacts to it. Tyrone likes to live in the now, reasoning that there’s something inhuman about scheming for a future that may never come.

Legend has it that Tyrone was conceived when his mother offered her pussy up for a rock of crack. His father then disappeared, never to be heard from again. No-one ever invested in Tyrone’s education, and as such he is an exceptionally unrefined being. Tyrone couldn’t pass the marshmallow test no matter what the schedule of rewards was.

Although many mock Tyrone for being low-IQ, there’s more to him than that. He also represents the spontaneity that brings joy to life. Humour always follows in his wake (even if it’s of the slapstick, wacky variety). Tyrone loves laughing, eating, partying and he especially loves fucking.

Not even Chad enjoys busting a nut as much as Tyrone does. For Tyrone, getting his end away is to ascend into heaven. The excitement of getting laid is so great that the possibility of it gives colour and meaning to all of life. Every attractive woman gets a “Sheeeeiiittt”.

Many a Clown World denizen summons the power of Tyrone to decrease their sexual anxiety. These magicians hold in their minds an image of the person that they would like to make love to and think “Sheeeeeiiittt!” This allows them to relax and to see the sexual encounter as an opportunity to create a lifelong memory.

In the Clown World pantheon, Tyrone represents the space between the Great NPC and Doomer, between the Negative Fundamental Axis and the Negative Masculine Axis. As such, he is more of a demigod than a real god. In a sense, he is a double negative masculine energy, combining the mindlessness of the Great NPC with the nihilism of Doomer.

One consequence of representing double negative masculine energy is that Tyrone commits an enormous amount of sex crimes. The tyronic mentality considers weakness and passivity an invitation. He doesn’t care if a woman is drunk, underage, or incapacitated in some sense – he just ploughs in.

Fitting with this sexual recklessness, Tyrone has a great number of illegitimate children. He is infamous for his hit-and-run mating style. Any citizen of Clown World who does not know their father could be said to possess some tyronic energy. This energy can cause them to behave like Tyrone, making short-term decisions.

The appearance of Tyrone is usually a bad omen. It commonly means that violence and disorder are about to come to one’s neighbourhood. Tyrone has an extremely casual attitude to property crime, which causes him to acquire things without due consideration. His followers have similar attitudes.

However, the appearance of Tyrone can also mean good times and hilarity is coming one’s way. Tyrone is a demigod of disorder, and this can bring much-needed levity. Many people experience a crushing, suffocating sense of excess order in Clown World, thanks to the fact that everything has been monetised down to the last detail, and that every last second of time is accounted for. Tyrone promises release from these strictures.

Tyrone is in it for a good time, not a long time. As such, he’s usually up for any wack-brain scheme that someone comes up with. He is willing to take massive risks for minimal or even negative reward. When it all goes horribly wrong, he just cries “Sheeeeeiitttt.” He never seems to sustain the serious injuries that one expects him to.

Some of the funniest stories in the Clown World pantheon result from the Merchant’s attempts to win the loyalty of Tyrone. The Merchant wants to send Tyrone after his enemies, to destroy their neighbourhoods and perhaps even kill them. But Tyrone, not being pure evil, never fully trusts the Merchant, and so can never totally be controlled.

Other funny stories involve Tyrone trying to impress Stacy, but ending up with Karen. Somehow, Karen got it into her mind that Tyrone has an gigantic penis, so she hooks up with him, hoping that his irrepressible lust will make her feel young again. Sometimes she has to trick him, which can lead to all kinds of consequences.

Tyrone is far from evil – he also sells weed to anyone who might need it. An international traveller who just turned up in a new city might get quality drug hookups from befriending him. Tyrone’s just loose. This looseness can create great joy for those who feel that Clown World is excessively restrictive.

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