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Another meaning of "dissipative system" is one that dissipates heat, see heat dissipation.

A dissipative system is a thermodynamically open system which is operating out of, and often far from, thermodynamic equilibrium in an environment with which it exchanges energy and matter.

A dissipative structure is a dissipative system that has a dynamical régime that is in some sense in a reproducible steady state. This reproducible steady state may be reached by natural evolution of the system, by artifice, or by a combination of these two.

Overview[link]

A dissipative structure is characterized by the spontaneous appearance of symmetry breaking (anisotropy) and the formation of complex, sometimes chaotic, structures where interacting particles exhibit long range correlations. The term dissipative structure was coined by Russian-Belgian physical chemist Ilya Prigogine, who was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1977 for his pioneering work on these structures. The dissipative structures considered by Prigogine have dynamical régimes that can be regarded as thermodynamically steady states, and sometimes at least can be described by suitable extremal principles in non-equilibrium thermodynamics.

Examples in every day life include convection, cyclones, hurricanes and living organisms. Less common examples include lasers, Bénard cells, and the Belousov–Zhabotinsky reaction.

One way of mathematically modeling a dissipative system is given in the article on wandering sets: it involves the action of a group on a measurable set.

In control theory[link]

In systems and control theory, dissipative systems are dynamical systems with a state x(t), inputs u(t) and outputs y(t), which satisfy the so-called "dissipation inequality". Given a function w on U×Y, with finite integral of its modulus for any input function u and initial state x(0) over any finite time t, called the "supply rate", a system is said to be dissipative if there exist a continuous nonnegative function V(x), with x(0) = 0, called the storage function, such that for any input u and initial state x(0) the difference V(x(t)) − V(x(0)) does not exceed the integral of the supply over (0,t) for any t (dissipation inequality). Dissipative systems with supply rate w= u.y, where . denotes the scalar product, are "passive systems"; equivalently such systems satisfy the inequality: dV(x(t))/dt less or equal u(t)·y(t). The physical interpretation is that V(x) is the energy in the system, whereas u·y is the energy that is supplied to the system. This notion has a strong connection with Lyapunov stability, where the storage functions may play, under certain conditions of controllability and observability of the dynamical system, the role of Lyapunov functions. Roughly speaking, dissipativity theory is useful for the design of feedback control laws for linear and nonlinear systems. Dissipative systems theory has been discussed by V.M. Popov, J.C. Willems, D.J. Hill and P. Moylan. In the case of linear invariant systems, this is known as positive real transfer functions, and a fundamental tool is the so-called Kalman–Yakubovich–Popov lemma which relates the state space and the frequency domain properties of positive real systems. Dissipative systems are still an active field of research in systems and control, due to their important applications.

Quantum dissipative systems[link]

As quantum mechanics, and any classical dynamical system, relies heavily on Hamiltonian mechanics for which time is reversible, these approximations are not intrinsically able to describe dissipative systems. It has been proposed that in principle, one can couple weakly the system – say, an oscillator – to a bath, i.e., an assembly of many oscillators in thermal equilibrium with a broad band spectrum, and trace (average) over the bath. This yields a master equation which is a special case of a more general setting called the Lindblad equation that is the quantum equivalent of the classical Liouville equation. The well known form of this equation and its quantum counterpart takes time as a reversible variable over which to integrate but the very foundations of dissipative structures, imposes an irreversible and constructive role for time.

See also[link]

• Non-equilibrium thermodynamics
• Extremal principles in non-equilibrium thermodynamics
• Self-organization
• Autocatalytic reactions and order creation
• Dynamical system
• Autopoiesis
• Relational order theories
• Loschmidt's paradox

References[link]

• Davies, Paul The Cosmic Blueprint Simon & Schuster, New York 1989 (abridged— 1500 words) (abstract— 170 words) — self-organized structures.
• B. Brogliato, R. Lozano, B. Maschke, O. Egeland, Dissipative Systems Analysis and Control. Theory and Applications. Springer Verlag, London, 2nd Ed., 2007.
• J.C. Willems. Dissipative dynamical systems, part I: General theory; part II: Linear systems with quadratic supply rates. Archive for Rationale mechanics Analysis, vol.45, pp.321–393, 1972.

External links[link]

• The dissipative systems model The Australian National University

This article includes a list of references, related reading or external links, but its sources remain unclear because it lacks inline citations. Please improve this article by introducing more precise citations. (October 2010)

Ilya, Viscount Prigogine (Russian: Илья́ Рома́нович Приго́жин, Ilya Romanovich Prigozhin) (25 January 1917 – 28 May 2003) was a Belgian physical chemist and Nobel Laureate noted for his work on dissipative structures, complex systems, and irreversibility.

Biography[link]

Prigogine was born in Moscow a few months before the Russian Revolution of 1917, into a Jewish family.^{[1][2][3][4][5][6]} His father, Roman (Ruvim Abramovich) Prigogine, was a chemical engineer at the Moscow Institute of Technology; his mother, Yulia Vikhman, was a pianist. Because the family was critical of the new Soviet system, they left Russia in 1921. They first went to Germany and in 1929, to Belgium, where Prigogine received Belgian citizenship in 1949.

Prigogine studied chemistry at the Free University of Brussels, where in 1950, he became professor. In 1959, he was appointed director of the International Solvay Institute in Brussels, Belgium. In that year, he also started teaching at the University of Texas at Austin in the United States, where he later was appointed Regental Professor and Ashbel Smith Professor of Physics and Chemical Engineering. From 1961 until 1966 he was affiliated with the Enrico Fermi Institute at the University of Chicago. In Austin, in 1967, he co-founded what is now called The Center for Complex Quantum Systems. In that year, he also returned to Belgium, where he became director of the Center for Statistical Mechanics and Thermodynamics.

He was a member of numerous scientific organizations, and received numerous awards, prizes and 53 honorary degrees. In 1955, Ilya Prigogine was awarded the Francqui Prize for Exact Sciences. For this study in irreversible thermodynamics, he received the Rumford Medal in 1976, and in 1977, the Nobel Prize in Chemistry. In 1989, he was awarded the title of Viscount in the Belgian nobility by the King of the Belgians. Until his death, he was president of the International Academy of Science and was in 1997, one of the founders of the International Commission on Distance Education (CODE), a worldwide accreditation agency. In 1998 he was awarded an honoris causa doctorate by the UNAM in Mexico City.

Prigogine was first married to Belgian poet Hélène Jofé /in literature Hélène Prigogine/(son Yves 1945). After their divorce, he married Polish-born chemist Maria Prokopowicz(-Prigogine) in 1961 (son Pascal 1970).^[7]

Research[link]

Prigogine is best known for his definition of dissipative structures and their role in thermodynamic systems far from equilibrium, a discovery that won him the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1977. In summary, Ilya Prigogine discovered that importation and dissipation of energy into chemical systems could reverse the maximization of entropy rule imposed by the second law of thermodynamics, which only applies to closed thermodynamic systems with no exchange of energy or entropy with the environment.^[8]

Dissipative structures theory[link]

Dissipative structure theory led to pioneering research in self-organizing systems, as well as philosophical inquiries into the formation of complexity on biological entities and the quest for a creative and irreversible role of time in the natural sciences.

His work is seen by many as a bridge between natural sciences and social sciences. With professor Robert Herman, he also developed the basis of the two fluid model, a traffic model in traffic engineering for urban networks, in parallel to the two fluid model in Classical Statistical Mechanics.

Prigogine's formal concept of self-organization was used also as a "complementary bridge" between General Systems Theory and Thermodynamics, conciliating the cloudiness of some important systems theory concepts with scientific rigour.

Work on unsolved problems in physics[link]

In his later years, his work concentrated on the fundamental role of Indeterminism in nonlinear systems on both the classical and quantum level. Prigogine and coworkers proposed a Liouville space extension of quantum mechanics aimed to solving the arrow of time problem of thermodynamics and the measurement problem of quantum mechanics.^[9] He also co-authored several books with Isabelle Stengers, including End of Certainty and La Nouvelle Alliance (The New Alliance).

[edit] The End of Certainty

In his 1997 book, The End of Certainty, Prigogine contends that determinism is no longer a viable scientific belief. "The more we know about our universe, the more difficult it becomes to believe in determinism." This is a major departure from the approach of Newton, Einstein and Schrödinger, all of whom expressed their theories in terms of deterministic equations. According to Prigogine, determinism loses its explanatory power in the face of irreversibility and instability.

Prigogine traces the dispute over determinism back to Darwin, whose attempt to explain individual variability according to evolving populations inspired Ludwig Boltzmann to explain the behavior of gases in terms of populations of particles rather than individual particles. This led to the field of statistical mechanics and the realization that gases undergo irreversible processes. In deterministic physics, all processes are time-reversible, meaning that they can proceed backward as well as forward through time. As Prigogine explains, determinism is fundamentally a denial of the arrow of time. With no arrow of time, there is no longer a privileged moment known as the "present," which follows a determined "past" and precedes an undetermined "future." All of time is simply given, with the future as determined or undetermined as the past. With irreversibility, the arrow of time is reintroduced to physics. Prigogine notes numerous examples of irreversibility, including diffusion, radioactive decay, solar radiation, weather and the emergence and evolution of life. Like weather systems, organisms are unstable systems existing far from thermodynamic equilibrium. Instability resists standard deterministic explanation. Instead, due to sensitivity to initial conditions, unstable systems can only be explained statistically, that is, in terms of probability.

Prigogine asserts that Newtonian physics has now been "extended" three times^{[citation needed]}, first with the use of the wave function in quantum mechanics, then with the introduction of spacetime in general relativity and finally with the recognition of indeterminism in the study of unstable systems.

Publications[link]

• Prigogine, Ilya (1957). The Molecular Theory of Solutions. Amsterdam: North Holland Publishing Company. 
• Prigogine, Ilya (1961). Introduction to Thermodynamics of Irreversible Processes (Second ed.). New York: Interscience. OCLC 219682909. 
• Glansdorff, Paul; Prigogine, I. (1971). Thermodynamics Theory of Structure, Stability and Fluctuations. London: Wiley-Interscience. 
• Prigogine, Ilya; Herman, R. (1971). Kinetic Theory of Vehicular Traffic. New York: American Elsevier. ISBN 0-444-00082-8. 
• Prigogine, Ilya; Nicolis, G. (1977). Self-Organization in Non-Equilibrium Systems. Wiley. ISBN 0-471-02401-5. 
• Prigogine, Ilya (1980). From Being To Becoming. Freeman. ISBN 0-7167-1107-9. 
• Prigogine, Ilya; Stengers, Isabelle (1984). Order out of Chaos: Man's new dialogue with nature. Flamingo. ISBN 0-00-654115-1. 
• Prigogine, I. "The Behavior of Matter under Nonequilibrium Conditions: Fundamental Aspects and Applications in Energy-oriented Problems: Progress Report for Period September 1984--November 1987", Department of Physics at the University of Texas-Austin, United States Department of Energy, (7 October 1987).
• Prigogine, I. "The Behavior of Matter under Nonequilibrium Conditions: Fundamental Aspects and Applications: Progress Report, April 15, 1988--April 14, 1989", Center for Studies in Statistical Mathematics at the University of Texas-Austin, United States Department of Energy, (January 1989).
• Prigogine, I. "The Behavior of Matter under Nonequilibrium Conditions: Fundamental Aspects and Applications: Progress Report for Period August 15, 1989 - April 14, 1990", Center for Studies in Statistical Mechanics at the University of Texas-Austin, United States Department of Energy-Office of Energy Research (October 1989).
• Nicolis, G.; Prigogine, I. (1989). Exploring complexity: An introduction. New York, NY: W. H. Freeman. ISBN 0-7167-1859-6. 
• Prigogine, I. "Time, Dynamics and Chaos: Integrating Poincare's 'Non-Integrable Systems'", Center for Studies in Statistical Mechanics and Complex Systems at the University of Texas-Austin, United States Department of Energy-Office of Energy Research, Commission of the European Communities (October 1990).
• Prigogine, I. "The Behavior of Matter Under Nonequilibrium Conditions: Fundamental Aspects and Applications: Progress Report for Period April 15,1990 - April 14, 1991", Center for Studies in Statistical Mechanics and Complex Systems at the University of Texas-Austin, United States Department of Energy-Office of Energy Research (December 1990).
• Prigogine, Ilya (1993). Chaotic Dynamics and Transport in Fluids and Plasmas: Research Trends in Physics Series. New York: American Institute of Physics. ISBN 0-88318-923-2. 
• Prigogine, Ilya (1997). End of Certainty. The Free Press. ISBN 0-684-83705-6. 
• Kondepudi, Dilip; Prigogine, Ilya (1998). Modern Thermodynamics: From Heat Engines to Dissipative Structures. Wiley. ISBN 978-0-471-97394-2. 
• Prigogine, Ilya (2002). Advances in Chemical Physics. New York: Wiley InterScience. ISBN 978-0-471-26431-6. http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/cgi-bin/bookhome/93517918/ProductInformation.html. Retrieved 2008-07-29. 
• Editor (with Stuart A. Rice) of the Advances in Chemical Physics book series published by John Wiley & Sons (presently over 140 volumes)

See also[link]

Systems science portal

• Autocatalytic reactions and order creation
• List of Jewish Nobel laureates
• Systems theory

References[link]

• Karl Grandin, ed. (1977). "Ilya Prigogine Autobiography". Les Prix Nobel. The Nobel Foundation. http://www.nobel.se/chemistry/laureates/1977/prigogine-autobio.html. Retrieved 2008-07-24. 
• Eftekhari, Ali (2003). "Obituary - Prof. Ilya Prigogine (1917-2003)" (PDF). Adaptive Behavior 11 (2): 129–131. http://www.ait.ac/papers/eftekhari/AB11-129.pdf. 
• Barbra Rodriguez (2003-05-28). Biography "Nobel Prize-winning physical chemist dies in Brussels at age 86". University of Texas at Austin. http://order.ph.utexas.edu/people/Prigogine.htm Biography. Retrieved 2008-07-29. 

External links[link]

• Biography and Bibliographic Resources, from the Office of Scientific and Technical Information, United States Department of Energy
• Nobel Lecture, 8 December 1977
• The Center for Complex Quantum Systems
• Emergent computation
• Hostile notes on Ilya Prigogine by Cosma Rohilla Shalizi
• Video of Ilya Prigogine talking about complexity
• An interview of Ilya Prigogine with Giannis Zisis

Charles Griffin
Maj. Gen. Charles Griffin
Born	(1825-12-18)December 18, 1825 Granville, Ohio
Died	September 15, 1867(1867-09-15) (aged 41) Galveston, Texas
Place of burial	Oak Hill Cemetery Washington, D.C.
Allegiance	United States of America Union
Service/branch	United States Army Union Army
Years of service	1847–67
Rank	Major General
Commands held	V Corps
Battles/wars	Mexican-American War American Civil War First Battle of Bull Run Peninsula Campaign Second Battle of Bull Run Battle of Antietam Battle of Fredericksburg Battle of Chancellorsville Battle of Gettysburg Overland Campaign Siege of Petersburg Battle of Five Forks Appomattox Campaign

Charles Griffin (December 18, 1825 – September 15, 1867) was a career officer in the United States Army and a Union general in the American Civil War. He rose to command a corps in the Army of the Potomac and fought in many of the key campaigns in the Eastern Theater.

After the war, he commanded the Department of Texas during Reconstruction. He proved to an ardent supporter of the Congressional policies of the Radical Republicans and of freedmen's rights, and controversially disqualified a number of antebellum state officeholders in Texas, replacing them with loyal Unionists.

Early life and career[link]

Griffin was born in Granville, Ohio, the son of Apollos Griffin. He attended the nearby Kenyon College in Gambier, and graduated from the U.S. Military Academy in West Point, New York, placing 23rd out of 38 in the Class of 1847.^[1] Commissioned as a brevet second lieutenant, he served with the 2nd U.S. Artillery during the final campaign of the Mexican-American War.

He was promoted to first lieutenant in 1849 and served in the New Mexico Territory against Navajo Indians until 1854, when he left the Southwest frontier. He then taught artillery tactics at West Point, forming an artillery battery from the academy's enlisted men shortly after the Southern states began seceding from the Union.

Civil War[link]

Captain Griffin led the "West Point Battery" (officially designated as Battery D, 5th U.S. Artillery) at the First Battle of Bull Run in July 1861. He received a brief furlough from the army and married Sallie Carroll, the scion of a prominent Maryland family, on December 10, 1861.

Griffin commanded his battery during the early part of the 1862 Peninsula Campaign. He was promoted to brigadier general on June 9, 1862, and assigned command of a brigade of infantry. He served with distinction at Gaines' Mill and Malvern Hill. During the Second Battle of Bull Run, his brigade was held in reserve. His men were also lightly engaged at the Battle of Antietam. Griffin's irascibility frequently led to conflict with his superiors, but his leadership abilities brought steady promotion.^[2]

General Griffin and his staff

Assigned command of a division in the V Corps, he served at the Battle of Fredericksburg and during the Chancellorsville Campaign. Stricken with illness, he turned over command of the division to a subordinate and did not accompany it during the early part of the Gettysburg Campaign. Arriving as the Battle of Gettysburg was winding down, his return was widely celebrated by his men. The popular officer led the division throughout the year, including during the Mine Run Campaign. Griffin participated in most of the major battles of the Army of the Potomac in 1864, including the Overland Campaign and Siege of Petersburg.

Griffin was promoted to brevet major general in the regular army on March 13, 1865, for his service at the Battle of Five Forks, and to major general of volunteers on April 2, 1865.^[1] He assumed command of V Corps during its final campaign and was present when Robert E. Lee surrendered at Appomattox Court House. In August, he was assigned command of the district of Maine, with his headquarters in Portland.

Postbellum[link]

After the war, Griffin's rank reverted to colonel in the regular army, in command of the 35th U.S. Infantry. He briefly commanded the Department of Maine before being sent west to Galveston, Texas. He served as assistant commissioner of the Freedmen's Bureau for Texas in 1867, serving under Philip H. Sheridan.

He became entangled in political issues and registered both black and white voters under the Reconstruction Acts in the spring of that year. He strictly enforced the ironclad oath of allegiance (forcing men to publicly swear that they had never served the Confederacy) as the basis for jury selection. Dissatisfied with the performance of appointed Governor James W. Throckmorton, Griffin persuaded General Sheridan to remove him from office and replace him with a Republican and loyal Unionist, Elisha M. Pease. Together, they used their power and position to remove several Democratic antebellum state officeholders who had supported the Confederacy, replacing them with other Unionists.

Griffin was assigned command of the Fifth Military District, replacing Sheridan, and was ordered to report to New Orleans. However, before he could leave for Louisiana and his new headquarters, he died in an epidemic of yellow fever that swept through Galveston. He is buried at Oak Hill Cemetery in Washington, D.C..

Fort Griffin on the Texas frontier was later named in his honor.

See also[link]

	Biography portal
	United States Army portal
	American Civil War portal

• List of American Civil War generals

Notes[link]

References[link]

• Eicher, John H., and Eicher, David J., Civil War High Commands, Stanford University Press, 2001, ISBN 0-8047-3641-3.
• Charles Griffin from the Handbook of Texas Online

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Charles Griffin

• Antietam on the Web
• History Central
• Charles Griffin at Find a Grave

Terence Kemp McKenna

Born	(1946-11-16)November 16, 1946 Paonia, Colorado, United States
Died	April 3, 2000(2000-04-03) (aged 53) San Rafael, California, United States
Era	20th century philosophy
Region	Western Philosophy
School	Metaphysics, phenomenology
Main interests	shamanism, ethnobotany, metaphysics, psychedelic drugs, futurism, primitivism, environmentalism, consciousness, phenomenology, historical revisionism, evolution, ontology, Mind at Large, virtual reality, dominator culture, criticizing science, the Logos
Notable ideas	Novelty Theory, The "Stoned Ape" Theory of Human Evolution, Machine elves
Influenced by psychedelic drugs, Marshall McLuhan, Alfred North Whitehead, Teilhard de Chardin, Aldous Huxley, I Ching, William Blake, Riane Eisler, James Joyce, Vladimir Nabokov, Heraclitus
Influenced Rupert Sheldrake, Robert Anton Wilson, Ralph Abraham, RU Sirius, Cliff Pickover, Timothy Leary

Terence Kemp McKenna (November 16, 1946 – April 3, 2000) was an American philosopher, psychonaut, researcher, teacher, lecturer and writer on many subjects, such as human consciousness, language, psychedelic drugs, the evolution of civilizations, the origin and end of the universe, alchemy, and extraterrestrial beings.

Biography[link]

Early life[link]

Terence McKenna grew up in Paonia, Colorado.^[1] He was introduced to geology through his uncle and developed a hobby of solitary fossil hunting in the arroyos near his home.^[2] From this he developed a deep artistic and scientific appreciation of nature.

At age 16, McKenna moved to Los Altos, California to live with family friends for a year. He finished high school in Lancaster, CA.^[1] In 1963, McKenna was introduced to the literary world of psychedelics through The Doors of Perception and Heaven and Hell by Aldous Huxley and certain issues of The Village Voice that talked about psychedelics.^[1][3]

McKenna claimed that one of his early psychedelic experiences with morning glory seeds showed him "that there was something there worth pursuing."^[1] In an audio interview Terence Mckenna claims to have started smoking cannabis regularly during the summer following his 17th birthday.

Studying and traveling[link]

In 1965, McKenna enrolled in the University of California, Berkeley^[4] to study art history.^[1] In 1967, while in college, he discovered and begun studying shamanism through the study of Tibetan folk religion.^[5] That year, which he called his "opium and kabbala phase"^[6] he also traveled to Jerusalem, where he met Kathleen Harrison, who would later become his wife.^[6]

In 1969, McKenna traveled to Nepal led by his "interest in Tibetan painting and hallucinogenic shamanism."^[6] During his time there, he studied the Tibetan language and worked as a hashish smuggler, until "one of his Bombay-to-Aspen shipments fell into the hands of U. S. Customs." He was forced to move to avoid capture by Interpol.^[6] He wandered through Southeast Asia viewing ruins, collected butterflies in Indonesia, and worked as an English teacher in Tokyo. He then went back to Berkeley to continue studying biology, which he called "his first love".^[6]

After the partial completion of his studies, and his mother's death from cancer in 1971,^[7] McKenna, his brother Dennis, and three friends traveled to the Colombian Amazon in search of oo-koo-hé, a plant preparation containing dimethyltryptamine (DMT). Instead of oo-koo-hé they found various forms of ayahuasca, or yagé, and gigantic Psilocybe cubensis which became the new focus of the expedition.^[6] In La Chorrera, at the urging of his brother, he was the subject of a psychedelic experiment which he claimed put him in contact with "Logos": an informative, divine voice he believed was universal to visionary religious experience.^[6] The voice's reputed revelations and his brother's simultaneous peculiar experience prompted him to explore the structure of an early form of the I Ching, which led to his "Novelty Theory".^[6] During their stay in the Amazon, McKenna also became romantically involved with his translator, Ev.^[6]

In 1972, McKenna returned to Berkeley to finish his studies.^[4] There he decided to switch majors to a Bachelor of Science in ecology and conservation, in a then new experimental section of the same university called the Tussman Experimental College.^[1] During his studies, he would also develop techniques for cultivating psilocybin mushrooms with Dennis.^[6]

In 1975, he parted with his girlfriend, Ev, when she left him for one of his friends from Berkeley. Their parting left him "tormented with migraines and living alone".^[6] He graduated in 1975.^[8] That same year, he began a relationship with Kathleen Harrison, whom he had met in Jerusalem.

Soon after graduating, McKenna and Dennis published a book inspired by their Amazon experiences, The Invisible Landscape: Mind, Hallucinogens and the I Ching. He also began lecturing.^[4] The brothers' experiences in the Amazon would later play a major role in McKenna's book True Hallucinations, published in 1993.^[6] In 1976, the brothers published what they had learned about the cultivation of mushrooms in a book entitled Psilocybin - Magic Mushroom Grower's Guide under the pseudonyms "OT Oss" and "ON Oeric".^[9]

Later life[link]

In the early 1980s, McKenna began to speak publicly on the topic of psychedelic drugs, lecturing extensively and conducting weekend workshops. Though associated with the New Age and human potential movements, McKenna himself had little patience for New Age sensibilities. He repeatedly stressed the importance and primacy of felt experience, as opposed to dogma.^[10] Timothy Leary once introduced him as "one of the five or six most important people on the planet."^[11]

He soon became a fixture of popular counterculture. His growing popularity culminated in the early-to-mid-1990s with the publication of several books: True Hallucinations, relating the tale of his 1971 La Chorrera experience; Food of the Gods; and The Archaic Revival. He became a popular personality in the psychedelic rave/dance scene of the early 1990s, with frequent spoken word performances at raves and contributions to psychedelic and goa trance albums by The Shamen, Spacetime Continuum, Alien Project, Capsula, Entheogenic, Zuvuya, Shpongle, and Shakti Twins. His speeches were, and are, sampled by many. In 1994 he appeared as a speaker at the Starwood Festival, documented in the book Tripping by Charles Hayes. His lectures were produced on both cassette tape and CD.^[13]

McKenna was a colleague of chaos mathematician Ralph Abraham, and biologist Rupert Sheldrake, creator of the theory of "morphogenetic fields", not to be confused with the mainstream usage of the same term. He conducted several public debates known as trialogues with them from the late 1980s until his death. Books containing transcriptions of some of these events were published. He was also a friend and associate of Ralph Metzner, Nicole Maxwell, and Riane Eisler, participating in joint workshops and symposia with them. He was a personal friend of Tom Robbins, and influenced the thought of many scientists, writers, artists, and entertainers. His influences include comedian Bill Hicks, whose routines about psychedelic drugs drew heavily from McKenna's works. He is also the inspiration for the Twin Peaks character Dr. Jacoby.^[14]

In addition to psychedelic drugs, McKenna spoke on the subjects of virtual reality, which he saw as a way to artistically communicate the experience of psychedelics; techno-paganism; artificial intelligence; evolution; extraterrestrials; and aesthetic theory, specifically about art/visual experience as information representing the significance of hallucinatory visions experienced under the influence of psychedelics.

In 1985,^[8] McKenna co-founded Botanical Dimensions with his then-wife Kathleen, a nonprofit ethnobotanical preserve in Hawaii, where he lived for many years before he died. In 1997 he and Kathleen divorced.^[15] Before moving to Hawaii permanently, McKenna split his time between Hawaii and Occidental, located in the redwood-studded hills of Sonoma County, California.

Death[link]

A longtime sufferer of migraines, in mid-1999 McKenna returned to his home on the big island of Hawaii after a long lecturing tour. He began to suffer from increasingly painful headaches. This culminated in three brain seizures in one night, which he claimed were the most powerful psychedelic experiences he had ever known. Upon his emergency trip to the hospital on Oahu, Terence was diagnosed with glioblastoma multiforme, a highly aggressive form of brain cancer. For the next several months he underwent various treatments, including experimental gamma knife radiation treatment. According to Wired magazine, McKenna was worried that his tumour was caused by his 35-years of smoking cannabis; though his doctors assured him there was no causal relation.^[15]

In late 1999, Erik Davis conducted what would be the last interview of McKenna.^[16] During the interview McKenna also talked about the announcement of his death:

McKenna died on April 3, 2000, at the age of 53, with his loved ones at his bedside. He is survived by his brother Dennis, his son Finn, and his daughter Klea.

Library fire[link]

On February 7, 2007, McKenna's library of rare books and personal notes was destroyed in a fire which burned offices belonging to Big Sur's Esalen Institute which was storing the collection. An index maintained by his brother Dennis survives, though little else.^[18]

Ideas[link]

Terence McKenna advocated the exploration of altered states of mind via the ingestion of naturally occurring psychedelic substances. For example, and in particular, as facilitated by the ingestion of high doses of psychedelic mushrooms, and DMT, which he believed was the apotheosis of the psychedelic experience. He spoke of the "jeweled, self-dribbling basketballs" or "self-transforming machine elves" that one encounters in that state.

Although he avoided giving his allegiance to any one interpretation (part of his rejection of monotheism), he was open to the idea of psychedelics as being "trans-dimensional travel"; literally, enabling an individual to encounter what could be ancestors, or spirits of earth.^[10] He remained opposed to most forms of organized religion or guru-based forms of spiritual awakening.

Either philosophically or religiously, he expressed admiration for Marshall McLuhan, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, Gnostic Christianity, Alfred North Whitehead and Alchemy. McKenna always regarded the Greek philosopher Heraclitus as his favorite philosopher.^[11]

He also expressed admiration for the works of James Joyce (calling Finnegans Wake "the quintessential work of art, or at least work of literature of the 20th century")^[20] and Vladimir Nabokov: McKenna once said that he would have become a Nabokov lecturer if he had never encountered psychedelics.

"Stoned Ape" theory of human evolution[link]

In his book Food of the Gods,^[21] McKenna proposed that the transformation from humans' early ancestors Homo erectus to the species Homo sapiens mainly had to do with the addition of the mushroom Psilocybe cubensis in its diet - an event which according to his theory took place in about 100,000 BC (this is when he believed that the species diverged from the Homo genus). He based his theory on the main effects, or alleged effects, produced by the mushroom. One of the effects that comes about from the ingestion of low doses, which agrees with one of scientist Roland Fischer's findings from the late 1960s-early 1970s,^[22] is it significantly improves the visual acuity of humans - so theoretically, of other human-like mammals too. According to McKenna, this effect would have definitely proven to be of evolutionary advantage to humans' omnivorous hunter-gatherer ancestors that would have stumbled upon it "accidentally"; as it would make it easier for them to hunt.

In higher doses, McKenna claims, the mushroom acts as a sexual stimulator, which would make it even more beneficial evolutionarily, as it would result in more offspring. At even higher doses, the mushroom would have acted to "dissolve boundaries", which would have promoted community-bonding and group sexual activities-that would result in a mixing of genes and therefore greater genetic diversity. Generally McKenna believed that the periodic ingestion of the mushroom would have acted to dissolve the ego in humans before it ever got the chance to grow in destructive proportions. In this context, he likened the ego to a cancerous tumor that can grow uncontrollable and become destructive to its host. In his own words:

Wherever and whenever the ego function began to form, it was akin to a cancerous tumor or a blockage in the energy of the psyche. The use of psychedelic plants in a context of shamanic initiation dissolved-as it dissolves today-the knotted structure of the ego into undifferentiated feeling, what Eastern philosophy calls the Tao.

—Terence McKenna, Food of the Gods

The mushroom, according to McKenna, had also given humans their first truly religious experiences (which, as he believed, were the basis for the foundation of all subsequent religions to date). Another factor that McKenna talked about was the mushroom's potency to promote linguistic thinking. This would have promoted vocalisation, which in turn would have acted in cleansing the brain (based on a scientific theory that vibrations from speaking cause the precipitation of impurities from the brain to the cerebrospinal fluid), which would further mutate the brain. All these factors according to McKenna were the most important factors that promoted evolution towards the Homo sapiens species. After this transformation took place, the species would have begun moving out of Africa to populate the rest of the planet ^[21] Later on, this theory by McKenna was given the name "The 'Stoned Ape' Theory of Human Evolution".^[23]

Novelty theory[link]

McKenna's Timewave zero is a numerological formula that purports to calculate the ebb and flow of "novelty", defined as increase over time in the universe's interconnectedness, or organized complexity. ^[24] According to McKenna, the universe has a teleological attractor at the end of time that increases interconnectedness, eventually reaching a singularity of infinite complexity in 2012, at which point anything and everything imaginable will occur simultaneously. He conceived this idea over several years in the early to mid-1970s while using psilocybin and DMT.^[24]

McKenna expressed "novelty" in a computer program which purportedly produces a waveform known as "timewave zero" or the "timewave". Based on McKenna's interpretation of the King Wen sequence of the I Ching, ^[15] the graph appears to show great periods of novelty corresponding with major shifts in humanity'sbiological and sociocultural evolution. He believed that the events of any given time are recursively related to the events of other times, and chose the atomic bombing of Hiroshima as the basis for calculating his end date of November 2012. When he later discovered this date's proximity to the end of the 13th b'ak'tun of the Maya calendar, he revised his hypothesis so that the two dates matched. ^[25]

The 1975 first edition of The Invisible Landscape refers to 2012 (but no specific day during the year) only twice. In the 1993 second edition, McKenna employed Sharer's date^{[Note d]} of 21 December 2012 throughout. ^[26]

Bibliography[link]

• 1975 - The Invisible Landscape: Mind, Hallucinogens, and the I Ching (with Dennis McKenna) (Seabury; 1st Ed) ISBN 0-8164-9249-2.
• 1976 - The Invisible Landscape (with Dennis McKenna, and Quinn Taylor) (Scribner) ISBN 0-8264-0122-8
• 1976 - Psilocybin - Magic Mushroom Grower's Guide (with Dennis McKenna: credited under the pseudonyms OT Oss and ON Oeric) (2nd edition 1986) (And/Or Press) ISBN 0-915904-13-6
• 1992 - Psilocybin - Magic Mushroom Grower's Guide (with Dennis McKenna: (credited under the pseudonyms OT Oss and ON Oeric) (Quick American Publishing Company; Revised edition) ISBN 0-932551-06-8
• 1992 - The Archaic Revival (HarperSanFrancisco; 1st edition) ISBN 0-06-250613-7
• 1992 - Food of the Gods: The Search for the Original Tree of Knowledge - A Radical History of Plants, Drugs, and Human Evolution (Bantam) ISBN 0-553-37130-4
• 1992 - Synesthesia (with Timothy C. Ely) (Granary Books 1st Ed) ISBN 1-887123-04-0
• 1992 - Trialogues at the Edge of the West: Chaos, Creativity, and the Resacralization of the World (with Ralph H. Abraham, Rupert Sheldrake and Jean Houston) (Bear & Company Publishing 1st Ed) ISBN 0-939680-97-1
• 1993 - True Hallucinations: Being an Account of the Author’s Extraordinary Adventures in the Devil’s Paradise (HarperSanFrancisco 1st Ed) ISBN 0-06-250545-9
• 1994 - The Invisible Landscape (HarperSanFrancisco; Reprint edition) ISBN 0-06-250635-8
• 1998 - True Hallucinations & the Archaic Revival: Tales and Speculations About the Mysteries of the Psychedelic Experience (Fine Communications/MJF Books) (Hardbound) ISBN 1-56731-289-6
• 1998 - The Evolutionary Mind : Trialogues at the Edge of the Unthinkable (with Rupert Sheldrake and Ralph H. Abraham) (Trialogue Press; 1st Ed) ISBN 0-942344-13-8
• 1999 - Food of the Gods: A Radical History of Plants, Drugs, and Human Evolution (Rider & Co; New edition) ISBN 0-7126-7038-6
• 1999 - Robert Venosa: Illuminatus (with Robert Venosa, Ernst Fuchs, H. R. Giger, and Mati Klarwein) (Craftsman House) ISBN 90-5703-272-4
• 2001 - Chaos, Creativity, and Cosmic Consciousness (with Rupert Sheldrake and Ralph H. Abraham) (Park Street Press; revised ed) ISBN 0-89281-977-4 (Revised edition of Trialogues at the Edge of the West)
• 2005 - The Evolutionary Mind: Trialogues on Science, Spirit & Psychedelics (Monkfish Book Publishing; Revised Ed) ISBN 0-9749359-7-2

Spoken word[link]

• History Ends In Green: Gaia, Psychedelics and the Archaic Revival, 6 audiocassette set, Mystic Fire audio, 1993, ISBN 1-56176-907-X (recorded at the Esalen Institute, 1989)
• TechnoPagans at the End of History (transcription of rap with Mark Pesce from 1998)
• Psychedelics in the Age of Intelligent Machines (1999) 90 minutes video
• Alien Dreamtime with Spacetime Continuum & Stephen Kent (Magic Carpet Media) (CD) video
• Conversations on the Edge of Magic (1994) (CD & Cassette) ACE
• Rap-Dancing Into the Third Millennium (1994) (Cassette) (Re-issued on CD as The Quintessential Hallucinogen) ACE
• Packing For the Long Strange Trip (1994) (Cassette) ACE
• Coast to Coast AM with Art Bell, broadcast on May 22, 1997, Five hour interview covering various topics
• Global Perspectives and Psychedelic Poetics (1994) (Cassette) Sound Horizons Audio-Video, Inc.
• The Search for the Original Tree of Knowledge (1992) (Cassette) Sounds True

Discography[link]

• Re : Evolution with The Shamen (1992)
• Terence McKenna & Zuvuya - Dream Matrix Telemetry (1993)
• Alien Dreamtime with Spacetime Continuum & Stephen Kent (Magic Carpet Media) (DVD)
• 2009 - Cognition Factor (2009)

Notes[link]

• ^d Coe's initial date was "24 December 2011." He revised it to "11 January AD 2013" in the 1980 2nd edition of his book, ^[27] not settling on 23 December 2012 until the 1984 3rd edition.^[28] The correlation of b'ak'tun 13 as 21 December 2012 first appeared in Table B.2 of Robert J. Sharer's 1983 revision of the 4th edition of Sylvanus Morley's book The Ancient Maya.^[29]

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Terence McKenna

• Terence McKenna Land at Deoxy.org
• Terence McKenna at Levity.com
• Erowid's Terence McKenna Vault
• Botanical Dimensions
• Rotten.com bio
• FloatingWorldWeb's McKenna Pages
• Terence McKenna's Last Trip 2000 Wired Magazine article by Erik Davis
• "Mind contagions" (2001) at disinfo.com
• Psychedelics, Evolution & Fun 2008 essay by Patrick Lundborg
• Machine Elves 101, or Why Terence McKenna Matters - Reallity Sandwish by Daniel Moler
• Transcription from 1991 interview regarding cannabis

Audio and video resources[link]

• Terence McKenna's interview Conducted by John Hazard in October 1998
• Audio and video archive at Deoxy.org
• Terence McKenna media archive at EROCx1.com
• FutureHi.net MP3 Downloads - Terence McKenna, Albert Hoffman, Robert Anton Wilson, and more
• McKenna at the 1999 Entheobotany Seminar - Audio Podcast
• Psychedelics in the Age of Intelligent Machines - Video samples from the 1999 DVD
• McKenna Video on FloatingWorldWeb - McKenna Video Portal
• Over 100 podcasts of Terence McKenna talks - Audio Podcast

Transcripts[link]

• MindofMcKenna - McKenna audio excerpts, transcriptions and quotes

v t e Recreational drug use Major recreational drugs Opioids Buprenorphine (Subutex · Suboxone) Codeine Dextropropoxyphene (Darvon · Darvocet) Diamorphine (heroin) \ Morphine (Opium) Hydrocodone Hydromorphone (Dilaudid) Methadone Mitragyna speciosa (Kratom) Oxycodone Depressants Barbiturates Benzodiazepines Ethanol (Alcoholic beverages) GHB Kava Nonbenzodiazepines Stimulants Amphetamine Arecoline (Areca) Betel Caffeine (Coffee Tea) Cathinone (Khat) Cocaine (Coca) Ephedrine (Ephedra) Mephedrone Methamphetamine Methylphenidate Nicotine (Tobacco) Theobromine (Cocoa) Entactogens MDA MDMA (Ecstasy) Hallucinogens Psychedelics Bufotenin Psychoactive toads Vilca Yopo DMT (Ayahuasca) LSA LSD-25 Mescaline Peruvian Torch Peyote San Pedro Psilocybin \ Psilocin (Psilocybin mushrooms) Dissociatives DXM Inhalants Nitrous oxide alkyl nitrites – poppers, such as amyl nitrite Ketamine MXE Muscimol (Amanita muscaria) PCP Salvinorin A (Salvia divinorum) Deliriants Atropine and Scopolamine Datura Deadly Nightshade Henbane Mandrake Dimenhydrinate Diphenhydramine Cannabinoids JWH-018 THC (Cannabis Hashish Hash oil) Oneirogens Calea zacatechichi Silene capensis Drug culture Cannabis 420 Cannabis cultivation Cannabis smoking Legal history of cannabis in the United States Legality of cannabis Marijuana Policy Project Medical cannabis NORML Religious and spiritual use of cannabis Stoner film Psychedelic Art Drug Experience Literature Music Other Club drug Counterculture of the 1960s Dance party Drug paraphernalia Drug tourism Entheogen Hippie Party and play Poly drug use Rave Self-medication Sex and drugs Problems with drug use Abuse Dependence Prevention Opioid replacement therapy Rehabilitation Responsible use Drug-related crime Fetal alcohol spectrum disorder Illegal drug trade Long-term effects of cannabis Neurotoxicity Overdose Date-rape drug Passive smoking (of tobacco or other substances) Legality of drug use International 1961 Narcotic Drugs 1971 Psychotropic Substances 1988 Drug Trafficking Cannabis reform at the international level State level Drug policy Decriminalization Prohibition Supply reduction Policy reform Demand reduction Drug Policy Alliance Harm reduction Law Enforcement Against Prohibition Liberalization Students for Sensible Drug Policy Transform Drug Policy Foundation Drug policy by country Australia Canada Germany India Netherlands Portugal Sweden Switzerland Soviet Union United States Just Say No Office of National Drug Control Policy School district drug policies California Colorado Maryland Virginia Other Arguments for and against drug prohibition Capital punishment for drug trafficking Designer drug Drug court Drug possession Drug test Hard and soft drugs Illegal drug trade in Colombia Mexican Drug War Narc Opium production in Afghanistan Politics of drug abuse War on Drugs Zero tolerance Lists of countries by... Alcohol consumption Cannabis legality Annual use Lifetime use Cigarette consumption Cocaine use Opiates use