A 50-year-old South African man woke up inside a mortuary over the weekend and screamed to be let out — scaring away attendants who thought he was a ghost. His family presumed he was dead when they could not wake him on Saturday night and contacted a private morgue in a rural village in the Eastern Cape.

He spent almost 24 hours inside the morgue, the region’s health department spokesman told the Sapa news agency. The two attendants later returned and called for an ambulance.

The man — whose identity has been withheld — was treated in hospital for dehydration. “Doctors put him under observation and concluded he was stable,” Eastern Cape health spokesperson Sizwe Kupelo said. “He did not need further treatment.”

Mr Kupelo said the man woke up at 1700 local time (1500 GMT) on Sunday, demanding to be let out of the chilly morgue in Libode village, frightening the attendants on duty. “At first the men ran for their lives,” said Mr Kupelo.

More on BBC News

This Friday, May 20th is the last day to register at the $90 Early Bird rate for ”The Psychedelic Adventures at the Edge of the Abyss: The Ideas of Terence and Dennis McKenna.” Hosted by Dennis McKenna, the course features a special line up of close friends of Dennis and Terence who can speak with rare insight about the brothers’ legacy and their relevance for today:  Daniel Pinchbeck, Dr. Luis Eduardo Luna, Ralph Abraham, Marc Pesce, Ralph Metzner, and Erik Davis.

The series has 4 sessions and starts on June 5. You will be in dialogue with these inspirational thinkers, asking them questions, challenging their assumptions.

Dennis and his intrepid cast will recount his and Terence’s early psychedelic explorations in the Amazon, where Terence received the download that would lead to the creation of his Time Wave Theory. These courses use online video technology, which makes these the conversations feel live and immediate as you connect with visionary thought leaders in the comfort of your own home.

The Brothers McKenna are widely known to the psychedelic community.  Their ideas and adventures, explorations of inner (and perhaps outer) space, and their Amazonian odyssey in search of answers to the mysteries of time, history, and being have been well chronicled by Terence, who though he passed on in 2000, still haunts the Net as an avatar and articulator of a radical and highly unconventional perspective on humanity’s current precarious perch on the edge of the singularity.  Even the most skeptical souls can no longer deny that our species is at the threshold of an enormous and irrevocable plunge into novelty; a plunge that will change forever our understanding of who we are as a species, and our place in the scheme of a universe that is marvelous, terrifying, beautiful and puzzling in ways that we cannot begin to comprehend.

Terence, not by choice, escaped to a hyperspatial redoubt, just as humanity crossed the threshold into the third millennium of its problematic career on this planet.  His younger brother Dennis continues to grapple with the revelations and insights, perhaps delusions, that the two brothers confronted during their journey to the Amazonian rain forest in 1971 in search of exotic hallucinogens and high adventure. They found both, in spades, and it changed them, and perhaps the world, forever.

Now Dennis has determined that the time has come to tell his side of the story, and is proposing to write a book, The Brotherhood of the Screaming Abyss; the title is in recognition of the name the two brothers and their intrepid band of fellow adventurers chose for themselves, partly tongue in cheek, and partly – mostly, as they discovered – deadly serious. Dennis is using Kickstarter.com to garner the resources, and time, needed to write this work, which will be both a memoir of sorts but also a fresh examination of the revelations forced onto them at the climax of that heart-of-darkness journey. Those who may be interested can find a detailed description of this proposal on the Kickstarter web site.

The Course

This course is offered as a follow-up to the launch of the writing project and an anticipation of themes that will be explored in depth in the book, slated for release in the fall of 2012. The course will consist of four sessions, with dates set for June 5th, 12th, and 26th and July 3rd.  Using live video, each webinar session will be hosted by Dennis McKenna in wide-ranging conversations with key guests who are recognized leaders on the cutting edge of post-millennial thought: Daniel Pinchbeck, Dr. Luis Eduardo Luna, Ralph Abraham, Marc Pesce, Ralph Metzner, and Erik Davis.

Most have also been close personal friends of Terence and Dennis over many decades; they have shared Terence and Dennis’ fascination and preoccupations with the concepts under discussion and have been key players in the development, elaboration, and expression of these ideas.  Like Terence and Dennis, they lived through the social, environmental, and political changes that have characterized our ever-accelerating race toward novelty during the late 20th century and the first decade of the 21st; in many respects, they are the people who have helped to catalyze the radical changes in global consciousness that have resulted.

About the Evolver Intensives

Life-changing ideas acquire a deeper resonance when encountered through the live presentation of an inspiring teacher.  In collaboration with The Prophets Conference, we will bring some of the most brilliant and pioneering thinkers of our time to you directly over the Internet, so you can experience them as if you were together in the same room.

Using state-of-the-art video streaming technology, we will broadcast live lectures and discussions from around the world to your laptop. And you can participate in the discussion, ask questions to the course leaders, and share your thoughts with fellow students. All you need is a broadband connection and a web browser — you don’t have to download or install any software. If you can watch videos on YouTube, you can participate in an Evolver Intensives course.

To learn more, visit “The Psychedelic Adventures at the Edge of the Abyss: The Ideas of Terence and Dennis McKenna.”

Catch the early bird special - $90 until May 20.  Full price – $110.  Evolver Social Movement Members – $75.

We look forward to seeing you online!

Cheers,

Daniel, Robin, Ken, Jennifer, Chris, Annie and Bradley — the Evolver Intensives Team

The preferred tools of terror of the MIB are outright menace, far less than thinly-veiled threats, and overwhelming, emotionless intimidation. And they are relentless when it comes to following their one and only agenda – that is, to forever silence witnesses to, and investigators of, UFO encounters. Unfortunately, it has to be admitted, they have been highly successful in achieving their unsettling goal, too. Indeed, and without any shadow of doubt whatsoever, the long and winding history of UFO studies is absolutely littered with fraught, frightened and emotionally-shattered figures that have been forever menaced into silence by the Men in Black, and who, as a result, have firmly distanced themselves from the UFO controversy, vowing never, ever to return to the fold.

Like true vampires from some strange, outer edge, the painfully-thin, white-faced and sunken-cheeked Men in Black appear from the murky darkness; they then roam the countryside provoking carnage, chaos, paranoia and fear in their notorious wake, before duly returning to that same shrouded realm of unsettling weirdness from which they originally oozed forth.

Very often reported traveling in groups of three, this definitive trinity of evil seemingly has the incredible ability to appear and vanish at will, and is often seen – in the United States – driving 1950s-style black Cadillac’s, and – in the British Isles – 1960s-era black Jaguar’s, both of which are almost always described as looking curiously brand new.

Despite the passing of the decades, and of the many and varied changes in fashions, the preferred mode of dress of these bone-chilling characters never, ever alters in the slightest, at all: it always consists of a well-preserved black suit, a black Fedora- or Homburg-style hat, black sunglasses, a black necktie, black socks and shoes, and a crisp, shining white shirt. Very little wonder, therefore, that they have been given the wholly notorious name with which they are, today, most famously – or perhaps infamously – associated.

But who, or far more likely, what, exactly, are the Men in Black? In the 1997 blockbuster movie, Men in Black and in its 2002 sequel, that starred Hollywood crowd-pullers Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones, the MIB were firmly, and highly entertainingly, portrayed as being the secret-agents of a Top Secret, covert arm of the U.S. Government, whose sole role it is to hide from the general public the dark truth about a huge and intricate alien presence on the Earth. But, how much truth is there to the mega-bucks movie that spawned so much interest in these bizarre figures?

While some MIB are, without doubt, the all-seeing eyes of clandestine departments of at least several governments – including both the United States and the United Kingdom – the vast majority of these curious characters appear to be of a very different breed altogether. According to numerous, fantastic witness testimony and countless case-studies secured since the early years of the 1950s, the real MIB may very possibly be alien entities themselves, carefully and secretly working to ensure that we never successfully uncover the sensational truth about their presence, or the long-term goal of their strange and unearthly agenda, upon our very own planet.

On the other hand, however, some students of MIB history, lore and legend suggest that these non-human creatures are utterly occult-based, supernatural beings that originate in, inhabit, and with disturbing regularity surface from, strange and enigmatic netherworlds very different to that of our own, personal 3-D reality. On a very similar path, a variety of individuals suspect strongly that the real Men in Black are nothing less than definitive demons – the literal, deceptive minions of none other than the lord of the underworld: Satan himself. The intriguing fact that many of those that have been cursed by visits from the Men in Black have dabbled in occultism, with Ouija-Boards, and in devil-worship, is perceived as further evidence by some that the MIB may have origins that are far, far removed from the enigma-filled world of outer-space and highly-advanced extraterrestrials from the stars.

Meanwhile, there are those investigators of the UFO phenomenon who have put forth a truly fascinating, unique and near-revolutionary theory that has nothing whatsoever to do with aliens, flying saucers, or even the realm of the occult. It is a definitively jaw-dropping theory that posits the Men in Black may, incredibly, be time-travelers from humankind’s far-flung future. Their role, it has been suggested, may be to ensure that we remain forever in the dark about the shocking facts of what is really afoot: namely, that our “aliens” are actually us, albeit from a time centuries, or even thousands of years, from now.

Whatever their point – or points – of origin, however, there is one thing that we can say with complete confidence and certainty about the Men in Black: they are, most assuredly, amongst us, and there is absolutely nothing positive, warm or welcoming about their presence at all.

And, if your personal, particular areas of fascination are those relative to such conundrums as Flying Saucers, alien abductions, close encounters, the Roswell UFO crash of 1947, Area 51, UFOs, and a myriad of other, attendant puzzles, then that trio of mysterious, black-garbed men may very well one day be paying you a visit, too.

If, late on some dark, thunderous and chilled night, you are awoken from an uneasy slumber by a slow, deliberate and pounding knocking on your front-door, no matter how tempted you may be, do not open it – that is, unless you wish to disastrously allow into your life one of the most terrifying, soulless and definitively macabre creatures that has ever been unleashed upon us, the Human Race. Remember you have been duly warned. Beware, always, of the real Men in Black…

Nick Redfern is the author of The Real Men In Black: Evidence, Famous Cases, and True Stories of These Mysterious Men and their Connection to UFO Phenomena, published by New Page and due out June 15, 2011.  ISBN: 978-1-60163-157-2  List Price: US $15.99, Canada $18.95

Nick Redfern works full-time as an author, lecturer and journalist. He writes about a wide range of unsolved mysteries, including Bigfoot, UFOs, the Loch Ness Monster, alien encounters, the worlds of the supernatural and the paranormal, and government conspiracies and cover-ups.

He is a regular contributor to UFO Magazine, Fate, Fortean Times, and Paranormal Magazine. He has also written for Military Illustrated, Eye-Spy, the British Daily Express, Western Daily Press and People newspapers, and Penthouse.

His previous books include The NASA Conspiracies; Contactees; Memoirs of a Monster Hunter; Final Events; On the Trail of the Saucer Spies; Three Men Seeking Monsters; A Covert Agenda; The FBI Files; Cosmic Crashes; Celebrity Secrets; Body Snatchers in the Desert; Monsters of Texas; Science Fiction Secrets; There’s something in the Woods; and Strange Secrets.

Nick has appeared on numerous television shows, including the BBC’s Out of this World; Britain’s Big Breakfast; History Channel’s Mysteries of the Bermuda Triangle; Monster Quest and UFO Hunters; the National Geographic Channel’s Paranatural; MSNBC’s Countdown with Keith Olbermann; and the SyFy Channel’s Proof Positive. He has also appeared on many occasions on Coast to Coast AM radio with George Noory.

His investigations have taken him to Puerto Rico in search of the blood-sucking Chupacabras; to Roswell, New Mexico on a quest for the truth behind the famous UFO crash of 1947; and to Wisconsin in pursuit of the infamous Mothman.

Nick is the co-host, with Raven Meindel, of the weekly, paranormal-themed radio-show, Exploring All Realms. He writes a regular, weekly column for Mania.com on his investigations into mysterious creatures titled Lair of the Beasts. Nick runs the American office of the British-based Center for Fortean Zoology, one of the very few full-time groups in the world dedicated to the investigation of such unknown animals as Bigfoot, the Loch Ness Monster, the Chupacabras, sea-serpents, and the Abominable Snowman.

Originally from England, Nick Redfern lives in Arlington, Texas with his wife, Dana. He can be contacted at nickredfern.com.

I don’t know if the Condom-Mary is an old idea or not…

Here’s the complete schedule of Atlanta-based events, please RSVP on Facebook if you can make it. Hope to see you there!

EYEDRUM ATLANTA More info at www.eyedrum.org.
Date: Friday 9/3 Time: 8 PM

Graham Hancock, bestselling author of Fingerprints of the Gods and Supernatural, will be appearing at Eyedrum on Friday, September 3 in support of his new book, Entangled. Randall Carlson from Sacred Geometry Atlanta will be the opening speaker. Admission is $5.

If you can invite fifty over more people in Atlanta over Facebook to this event over Facebook your admission is free. Please contact programs [at] disinfo.com for more info.

FIVE DRAGON*CON 2010 EVENTS!!! Full schedule at www.DragonCon.org.

Panel: Hollywood vs. History History doesn’t always translate well to the silver screen — or does it? Participants discuss films in a fast-paced, round-robin format. Panelists: K. Hinds, E. Flint, S. M. Stirling, A. J. Hartley, G. D. Falksen, G. Hancock Date/Time: Friday, 9/3 5:30 PM Location: Westin International C

Panel: Far Be It From Me… A rousing debate on revisionist vs. ‘traditional’ history and the evolution of historical presentation.. Panelists: B. Linaweaver, E. Flint, S. M. Stirling, A. J. Hartley, G. Hancock Date/Time: Saturday, 9/4 4:00 PM Location: Westin International C

Panel: 2012 Theories and myths surrounding 2012 from various cultures. Is there hope? Is it real? Are we doomed? Panelists: E. Donald, E. Dunin, M. B. Weston, G. Hancock, K. Brewer, G. Baddeley, R. Carlson Date/Time: Sunday, 9/5 4:00 PM Location: Marriott L508

Presentation: Aliens, Angels and Ayahuasca Graham Hancock will take you on a mind-trip through history showing evidence that alien encounters & UFO’s are nothing new… ? Location: Westin International C

Autograph Session: Come meet Graham in person! Date/Time: Monday, 9/6 11:30 AM Location: Marriott 301–304

We will be listing more events here on disinfo.com and Facebook and look for Entangled: The Eater of Souls this fall in a bookstore near you.

Were our Stone Age ancestors stoned? Do we have alien DNA? Can a plant allow us to see dead people? These are questions Hancock addresses in his nonfiction books. From the author whose book was credited as the inspiration for the film 2012, Hancock’s first fiction novel, Entangled, continues to question the mysteries of our minds and our lost ancient past.

Graham Hancock is an international bestselling author, who has sold over five million copies of his books to readers across the world. Scottish born, Hancock graduated from Durham University in 1973, with First Class Honors in Sociology. His writing career began as a journalist for several English newspapers, including the Independent, Times, Guardian, as well as co-editor for the New Internationalist magazine.

His shift to books began in the early ’80s with travel-based books such as Journey Through Pakistan, Under Ethiopian Skies, Ethiopia: The Challenge of Hunger, and AIDS: The Deadly Epidemic.

A decade later, he began a focus on lost civilizations and ancient myths. Within fifteen years he wrote eight books: The Sign and The Seal, Fingerprints of the Gods, The Mars Mystery, Heaven’s Mirror, Underworld: Flooded Kingdoms of the Ice Age, The message of the Sphinx (titled Keeper of Genesis in the UK) and Talisman: Sacred Cities, Sacred Faith.  Underworld and Heaven’s Mirror led to television series in both the U.S. and UK.

His latest works have included themes of altered consciousness, shamanism and how such religious rituals have helped to shape the evolution of humanity.  Supernatural: Meetings With the Ancient Teachers of Mankind was published in 2005, which led him to ingest the mind-altering concoction of ayahuasca on a trip to the Amazon.

His first fiction book, Entangled, is set for publication in the U.S. and Canada in October 2010. Bestselling science fiction author Whitley Strieber describes it as “a wondrous journey into the mysteries of the human mind and our deep, lost past. Graham Hancock brings the world of the Stone Age to vivid and disturbing life, and reveals the mystery of the entanglement of souls across time, as the modern world and the very ancient world merge to fight against the mysterious force we call evil.”

More Information

Consciousness and Altered States: Interview discusses how the use of psychoactive plants in human history led to the connection of new extraterrestrial teachers, which helped civilization and culture progress:

Audio interview Part 1

Audio interview Part 2

Audio interview Part 3

Audio interview Part 4

Audio interview Part 5

Audio interview Part 6

Audio interview Part 7

Setting History Free: David Wilcock Interviews Graham Hancock.  An hour and a half discussion of Hancock’s past works, future works and his views on ancient civilizations and the nature of reality:

David Wilcock & Graham Hancock video

Graham Hancock reads aloud the first chapter of his book Supernatural: Meetings With The Ancient Teachers of Mankind:

Video of Hancock reading Supernatural

Graham Hancock reads aloud the first chapter of his new novel Entangled:

Video of Entangled reading part 1

Video of Entangled reading part 2

Trailer for Hancock’s new book Entangled:

Entangled Trailer

Graham Hancock discusses ayahuasca and its use in learning through mystical experiences:

Audio discussion on ayahuasca

Hancock discussing Supernatural and the uses and effects of ayahuasca (vine of the soul):

Audio interview Part 1

Audio interview Part 2

Audio interview Part 3

Audio interview Part 4

Coast to Coast interview with Art Bell and Graham Hancock discussing the end of the Mayan calendar in 2010:

Audio of Coast to Coast interview

Graham Hancock discusses marijuana, consciousness, and cultural behavior:

Audio commentary on marijuana in our society

Interview with Red Ice Radio from Göteborg, Sweden, discussing his novel Entangled as well as his previous works and theories:

Red Ice Radio audio interview Part 1

Red Ice Radio audio interview Part 2

Red Ice Radio audio interview Part 3

Red Ice Radio audio interview Part 4

Red Ice Radio audio interview Part 5

Red Ice Radio audio interview Part 6

Coast to Coast interview discussing Dimethyltryptamine (DMT).

Audio interview about DMT

Quotes from Graham Hancock’s book Supernatural: Meetings With The Ancient Teachers of Mankind.:

Video of quotes

Amazon Book Links

Entangled

Supernatural: Meetings With The Ancient Teachers of Mankind

Talisman: Sacred Cities, Sacred Faith

The Mars Mystery: The Secret Connection Between Earth and The Red Planet

Underworld: They Mysterious Origins of Civilization

Heaven’s Mirror: Quest For The Lost Civilization

The Message of the Sphinx: Quest for the Hidden Legacy of Mankind

Fingerprints of The Gods

The Lords of Poverty: The Power, Prestige, and Corruption of the International Aid Business

Sign and the Seal: The Quest for the Ark of the Covenant

This little bit of supernatural thinking has been floating around the blogosphere [on April 21st]:

“Many women who do not dress modestly … lead young men astray, corrupt their chastity and spread adultery in society, which (consequently) increases earthquakes,” Hojatoleslam Kazem Sedighi was quoted as saying by Iranian media. Sedighi is Tehran’s acting Friday prayer leader.

I have a modest proposal. Sedighi claims that not dressing modestly causes earthquakes. If so, we should be able to test this claim scientifically. You all remember the homeopathy overdose?

Time for a Boobquake: On Monday, April 26th, I will wear the most cleavage-showing shirt I own. Yes, the one usually reserved for a night on the town. I encourage other female skeptics to join me and embrace the supposed supernatural power of their breasts. Or short shorts, if that’s your preferred form of immodesty. With the power of our scandalous bodies combined, we should surely produce an earthquake. If not, I’m sure Sedighi can come up with a rational explanation for why the ground didn’t rumble. And if we really get through to him, maybe it’ll be one involving plate tectonics.

Read More on Blag Hag’s “In the name of science, I offer my boobs”

Two glass phials said to contain the ghosts of an old man and a young girl have sold for NZ $2,000 (U.S. $1,395 / £935) in an online auction in New Zealand. The auction attracted more than 200,000 page views on the Trade Me website.

Avie Woodbury said the ghosts had been captured in her Christchurch house by an exorcist and stored in holy water. The top bidder, an electronic cigarette company, said it was looking for ideas on what to do with the ghosts.

Ms Woodbury told bidders she had experienced “bizarre activity” in her home.

“I would get things like the jug boiling itself, touching on the back of my neck, voices from other rooms, and items going missing then turning up in weird places,” she said.

Read More: BBC News

In our age of rational science the occult has never been more in demand: Angels and demons are popular, the Da Vinci code and lost symbols fascinate audiences worldwide and Hollywood is eager to turn out more movies with a paranormal theme.

So why is it that so many of these stories seem flat, and fail to reach the level of insight into hidden structures of the world true esoteric adventures are supposed to promise?

Perhaps the answer has to do with the failure of gifted directors to come to grips with the enormity of the unknown issues of human destiny, or to pose the fundamental questions their esoteric subject would demand.

We go away charmed by artistic visions, dazzled by the pageantry of cardinals in red capes and titillated by women in black garters but the Illuminati only scare us because of the blood they spill, not the existential issues they should transcend. They behave like any other gang of thugs, even if they utter their rough curses in Latin rather than street slang, cockney or modern Italian.

The circumstances that made this point clear to me arose when I watched again two movies within a few days, namely Kubrick’s Eyes Wide Shut and Roman Polanski’s The Ninth Gate.

Read More on BoingBoing

“Not pagan Samhain celebrations or the like,” to quote Chiropteran, “but bright-orange, screaming-pumpkin, Trick-or-Treating Halloween.” It’s all about doing magic with the wild, pop mystery explosion that Halloween has become. The Universal Monsters (Dracula, Wolfman, Frankenstein, Mummy) as the spirits of the North, South, East, and West; invocations of Jack Skellington; Jack-o-lanterns as the undead spirit servants we all carve every year to protect our homes from evil.

Halloween and Black (and Orange) Magick

Chiropteran – Well, yesterday was October 1st, the official opening day (by my reckoning) of the Halloween season.

This year, as part of my overarching goal to get my magickal butt in gear, I’ve decided to do a nightly meditation/devotion/working to hammer my Halloween Magick system into shape.

(I don’t know if anyone’s interested in the particulars, but here goes anyway, for any of you who are…)

I started last night by turning the lights down and reading some H. P. Lovecraft (”The Moon-bog”). Cheesy, maybe, but it set the mood nicely. I’ll probably do this with a different horror short story or novel excerpt every night.

Then I got things rolling with the quasi-improvised Four Monsters Banishing. Basically “calling the quarters,” with Dracula to the North (air), The Mummy to the South (earth), The Wolfman to the East (water) and Frankenstein’s Monster to the West (fire). (I’ve spent a while trying out different combinations of associations, and this seems to work out best, for now.) Then I read aloud a short passage from Bradbury’s “Something Wicked This Way Comes” (the bit about the Autumn People).

As silly as it might sound, I have never had a more powerful opening to a ritual, whether solo or group. As I finished the final “call,” the air in the room charged up with an almost audible *thunk*, and my hands positively swarmed with gathered energy.

The feeling was so powerful that I almost considered charging a spontaneous working, but I decided to stick with the original plan, which was the “skull mask” meditation, the first step toward a full-blown Pumpkin King invokation.

Sobek – Yes, I think of the trick-or-treating as being the “Rade” of the fey. So I load the candy up with lots of goblin energy.

Original article. . .

Image at left: An interpretation of Cthulhu in the sunken city of R’lyeh via Wikimedia Commons.