Notes:
From a dialogue between
Ralph Abraham and Terence McKenna

An MP3 of this dialogue is now available for download.
It was featured in programs 19 & 20 of the Psychedelic Salon.

     As I mentioned in the dedication, this book was inspired by a dialogue that took place on the evening of August 1, 1998 at Omega Institute in Rhinebeck, New York. That evening, Ralph Abraham and Terence McKenna, who were both conducting weekend workshops at the Institute, hosted a forum titled "The World Wide Web and the Millennium." The following excerpts from that discourse are not meant to be all-inclusive, but are offered only to provide the flavor of their conversation that evening.

Abraham
The World Wide Web is part of a quantum leap greater than the Renaissance.

There is a spiritual side to the Web.

McKenna
It's a brand new world out there folks. It's as profound a shift in cultural values as the introduction of the phonetic alphabet, or urbanization, or something like that.

Abraham
The World Wide Web is a spawning ground for spiritual wisdom. A natural process of accelerated evolution.

McKenna
Information is primary. More primary than gravity, or light, or matter. Information somehow precedes all of that.

Abraham
In these special times when a big leap is happening, we have enormous power. We have leverage. As Archimedes said, "Give me a lever big enough and I'll move the world." We really have the power to move the world through small deeds right now.

It doesn't matter what you do during the 1,000 year periods. Then we might as well go get rich. But between these periods we can and must do great things through small deeds. It is important to know when we're in a big leap.

McKenna
The World Wide Web may be a landing zone for a creature made of pure information. Perhaps all advanced intelligences exist solely as information. You may catch an alien intelligence in the Web-an intelligence which may not be able to rest in the human mind or any environment other than digital.

The real issue with alien intelligence is knowing when you have it in front of you because it is alien!

Abraham
Suppose it actually mattered what we thought and what we did and what we created. That the socks we bought, and the detergent we bought, and that every single thing we did mattered a thousand-fold more than at any other time. Then it is important that we not predict the future but that we work to create the future. This is our responsibility in a millennial moment more than at other moments. So don't ask about 2012, build it! That's what we say.