“A virtual mosh-pit for Gnostics! A monthly series of lectures in Virtual Reality showcasing the Returning Adventurers of the Imaginal Realm. Come Immerse yourself in the New Abnormal!”

On the 23rd of every month in Altspace VR

Join us each month to listen to the world’s emerging mystics, thinkers, esotericists and explore their findings and theories!

Please join us for our inaugural Virtual Event

TUESDAY February 23rd in Altspace

7:00pm - 9:30pm

You will need to download Altspace onto you PC, Mac, or VR headset for this event. If you have not yet set up an account on Altspace, click the link below and you will be prompted to create an account. https://altvr.com/getaltspacevr/

Once that is done, go to your settings and enable "Beta Experiences" and "Early Access". Then click the link below and you will be taken to our custom world. Just save to favorites from phone, PC or Mac and it will be easily found on the headset or in your app.

Mt. Olympus: https://account.altvr.com/worlds/1643135974579897225/spaces/1668946661965038476

******************************************************************************************************

We posit the following conjecture: Perhaps the term “Virtual Reality” inaccurately describes the space which one enters in a VR headset. It may be better understood as an alternative reality, one in which we experience a momentary shift in perception, rearranging the threads of the fabric of our shared experiences.

When we enter VR, our reality creating faculties are momentarily hijacked by this evolution in immersive technology. As a result there is often an emergent, ethical and very legitimate concern that we may be leaving the ‘real world’. Yet for thousands of years philosophers have argued that our reality is already illusory in nature. From Plato to Foucault, the question of how much reality we actually experience is strongly under question.

And as science in the last number of decades has begun to suggest ... "Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one."

- Albert Einstein

In this talk we will discuss how an encounter with immersive technology challenges our fundamental reality-making faculties of perception, what that means for our concept of reality itself, and what such ideas and technology might mean for the future of human experience! Are we really leaving reality behind, or are we utilizing these technologies to interact with our own reality creating faculties?

Schedule:

6:30-7:30 - “Cocktail hour” - Altspace Orientation (departure lounge/launchpad)

Join us for this early entry cocktail meetup providing technical support for avatar creation, controls and spatial navigation in Altspace. this is especially helpful if this is your first time using the platform, though we welcome everyone. Please friend request"Gingerstallone" and 'Nico_Lenoir" in Altspace for additional support.

Jump on a zoom call with us from 6:30 - 7 if you require addtiional support:

https://us04web.zoom.us/j/77337940173?pwd=QTQ1NEdrckJoclJZVzBNUndXUjhHQT09

Meeting ID: 773 3794 0173 , Passcode: UfT6AC

7:30 - Lectures begin

30 min/ speaker + 15 min Q+A

9:00 - Afterparty

Speakers:

Dr. David Luke - Greenwich University/Breaking Convention

Dr David Luke is Senior Lecturer in Psychology at the University of Greenwich. His research focuses on transpersonal experiences, anomalous phenomena and altered states of consciousness, especially via psychedelics, having published more than 100 academic papers in this area, including ten books, most recently Psychedelic Mysteries of the Feminine (2019). When he is not running clinical drug trials with LSD, doing DMT field experiments or observing apparent weather control with Mexican shamans he directs the Ecology, Cosmos and Consciousness salon and is a co-founder and director and the current chair of Breaking Convention: International Conference on Psychedelic Consciousness.

https://www.gre.ac.uk/people/rep/faculty-of-education-and-health/dr-david-luke

Carl H. Smith - Ravensbourne/Cyberdelic Society

Carl H Smith is Director of the Learning Technology Research Centre (LTRC) and Principal Research Fellow at Ravensbourne University. He has 18 years experience conducting R+D into the application of hybrid technologies for perceptual and cognitive transformation. He is currently working on 4 EU projects including the Horizon 2020 project ‘[WEKIT] Wearable Experience for Knowledge Intensive Training’ which aims to create ‘Wearable Experience (WE)' – an entirely new form of media. His other projects involve Context Engineering, Umwelt Hacking, Natural Media, Cyberdelics, Sensory Augmentation, Empathy Engines, Memory Palaces, Artificial Senses and Body Hacking.

https://www.ravensbourne.ac.uk/about-us/our-people/carl-smith