-Caveat Lector-
from Steve Mizrach (aka Seeker1)
http://www.clas.ufl.edu/anthro/cyberanthro/frontdoor.html
THE GHOST IN THE MACHINE
Haitian Voudoun and the Matrix
William Gibson's Count Zero
It would seem that there are no two things more distinct
than the primal, mystic, organic world of Haitian Voudoun, and
the detached, cool, mechanical world of the high-tech future.
Yet William Gibson parlayed off the success of his first SF
'cyberpunk' blockbuster "Neuromancer" to write a more complex,
engaging novel in which these two worlds are rapidly colliding.
In his novel "Count Zero," we encounter teenage hacker
extraordinaire Bobby Newmark, who goes by the handle "Count
Zero." Bobby on one of his treks into cyberspace runs into
something unlike any other AI (artificial intelligence) he's ever
encountered - a strange woman, surrounded by wind and stars, who
saves him from 'flatlining.' He does not know what it was he
encountered on the net, or why it saved him from certain death.
Later we meet Angie Mitchell, the mysterious girl whose head
has been 'rewired' with a neural network which enables her to
'channel' entities from cyberspace without a 'deck' - in essence,
to be 'possessed'. Bobby eventually meets Beauvoir, a member of
a Voudoun/cyber sect, who tells him that in cyberspace the entity
he actually met was Erzulie, and that he is now a favorite of
Legba, the lord of communication... Beauvoir explains that
Voudoun is the perfect religion for this era, because it is
pragmatic - "It isn't about salvation or transcendence. What it's
about is getting things DONE." Eventually, we come to realize
that after the fracturing of the AI Wintermute, who tried to
unite the Matrix, the unified being split into several entities
which took on the character of the various Haitian _loa_, for
reasons that are never made clear.
Gibson apparently felt there was an instinctive linkage
between Haitian Voudoun and the urban hyperreality of his
fictional Sprawl. As a fan of jazz and other urban music, which
he knew to be heavily influenced by African rhythms, Gibson
instinctively found the religion for his new urban dystopia.
The essential struggle in the book is between Beauvoir's group
and the Yakuza, the Japanese gangster conglomerate. It is a
battle between two traditions - one of power, corruption, and
influence; the other of passion, magic, and sensuality. There are
many strange links between this African-descended religion and
the emerging high-tech future; Gibson was tapping into a
zeitgeist which I am here trying to illuminate. Though at first
seemingly unrelated, Voudoun provides us with one of the hidden
keys to the Matrix - the Ghost in the Machine.
Haiti is not so 'outside' the emerging "Third Wave" of
postindustrial civilization as many might think. There are groups
of Haitian "hackers" in the U.S., very similar to Beauvoir and
his friends as described by Gibson. Many of the key
microelectronic components making up the Matrix are assembled by
Haitian urban workers, employed by the various multinationals
which take advantage of its artificially lowered wages and the
willingness of the military regime to overcome the country's
traditional barriers to foreign investment and financial control.
Not so much a 'primitive' society, Haiti IS a land of stark
contrasts, combining "First Wave" rural peasants with "Third
Wave" scientists, working to integrate their nation into various
schemes of global communication and trade.
Legba, Lord of the Crossroads: Intersection and Danger
In an article in the 1988 Florida Journal of Anthropology
entitled "The Cognition of Intersections: An Analysis of Kalinga,
American, and Haitian Folk Models", Dr. Robert Lawless looks at
an interesting question in cognitive anthropology - how groups
from three societies (Kalinga tribesman from the North Luzon
Highlands of the Phillipines, middle-class American first-year
college students, and Haitian folk participants in the Voudoun
religion) map their perceived spatial reality. In particular,
Lawless was interested in the way they symbolically cognized and
mapped the intersection of paths. This arose from a rather
practical realization that his Kalinga informants were incapable
of giving him directions to nearby towns in a simple linear,
Western form. While I will not go into detail about his findings
from surveys of Americans or Kalingas, Lawless' insights into the
Haitian understanding of the crossroads are particularly useful
for my purposes.
Lawless notes that the patron _loa_ of the crossroads
("carrefour" in the French, "kafou" in Creole) is Legba, whose
_veve_ or mystic diagram is an elaboration of the four-armed
cross, at once showing his links to the crossroads, Christianity,
and the four cardinal points as defined by the solar maxima
(equinoxes and solstices.) Legba is the interpreter for the gods
(mediating speech between the gods and men) and the lord of
communication and travel, often connected mythologically with
Hermes or Mercury. Legba conducts people between this world and
the next, and is the god of both roads/paths and
barriers/partitions. Legba is the link, the mediating point
between the visible/invisible, divine/human, and life/death, at
once linked to both the garden and the graveyard. He is also
known to be a trickster, acting capriciously malevolent at times
to even his followers and devotees. At any Voodoo ceremony, he is
always the first _loa_ to be invoked, because it is only through
his permission and guidance that the rest of the ritual can
proceed.
He suggests that for the Haitians, crossroads are places of
great danger and risk, because they are a favored haunt for
sorcerors and evil spirits. (Earth taken from the crossroads is a
primary ingredient in many magic spells.) Haitians travelling
long distances, especially at night, will take great pains to
avoid crossroads. An important Creole proverb (which is often
cited in reverse) is "si kafou pa bay, simitye pa pran" - meaning
"If the intersections do not give, the cemetaries cannot
receive." Some of Lawless' informants told him the deeper
meaning of this proverb is that intersections are places where
the barrier between men and spirits (the Abyss of the ancestors)
is thinner, especially at midnight, the midpoint between one day
and the next. (It should be noted that John Keel, in the "Mothman
Prophecies," mentions Michell's notion of ley lines, and wonders
openly why so many paranormal events take place on or near
crossroads, especially by highway overpasses.)
In erecting a vast global network of communications and
information, we are creating points of massive intersection. At
some nodes in the Internet, thousands of data streams merge into
one place before being packetized and sent off in various
directions. These are places of multiple intersection and great
traffic, with only cybernetic directives guaranteeing secure
routing. (Timothy Leary points out that the literal meaning of
cybernetic in the Greek - "kubernetes" - is "dead helmsman.") In
Gibson's future, even human and nonhuman consciousnesses travel
these paths, and it is understandable why they might invoke Legba
as their protector. Most importantly, in pointing to Legba as the
lord of the Matrix, Gibson is also hinting that perhaps some of
its roads may lead into worlds other than our own ... a
possibility he suggests at the end of "Neuromancer" but never
pursues.
Does the Matrix perhaps lead to Legba's Abyss? Since the
1960s, there have been many researchers actively studying
so-called Electronic Voice Phenomena (EVP), including phone calls
from the dead, and mysterious television, radio, and now
electronic broadcasts from apparently incorporeal entities. The
famous Raudive tape-recorded voices have been authenticated by
many researchers, but they have now been supplanted by people
claiming to receive paranormal communications from their computer
terminals. Keel has long advanced the idea that paranormal
entities are 'superspectral,' operating in realms of
transperceptible EM frequencies. With the current surge of
electronic transmissions (cellular, microwave, shortwave, etc.)
covering the globe, is it surprising that they might want to
"tune in?" It should be noted that the beings in the movie
"Poltergeist" first attempted to contact Carol Anne through the
"white noise" of the super-UHF channels of the television.
Possession, Abductions, and Culture-Bound Syndromes
In psychological anthropology (specifically,
ethnopsychiatry), "culture-bound syndromes" (CBSes) are
recognized as unusual or abnormal behavioral episodes that appear
to be "madness" or illness to outside observers, but are in fact
carefully regulated, culturally governed outlets of social
tension. Perhaps the most famous case is that of the "Amok"
frenzy of Pacific Islanders, which involves a great deal of
simulated (and sometimes actual) aggression toward family,
friends, and neighbors. Other cases include the "ataque de
nervios" (nervous attack) and "susto" (soul loss) reported by
Latin Americans, and the "piblotoq" of the Eskimos, which may
include episodes of tearing clothing, running about aimlessly,
glossolalia, and coprolalia. There has even been some argument as
to whether the 'universal' DSM-III diagnostic category,
"schizophrenia," might in fact be a Western, folk, culture-bound
syndrome.
To a certain extent, there are many people now looking at the
ways in which 'UFO abductions' might be a Western CBS. While UFO
abductions appear at first glance to be an international,
cross-cultural phenomenon, the fact of the matter is that the
predominance of cases, and in particular the TYPE of cases
described by David Jacobs and Budd Hopkins (e.g., alien
surgeons), occur in Anglo-Saxon ("WASP") countries like the U.S.,
South Africa, Australia, and England. (By "Anglo-Saxon", I am
referring to the dominant cultural psychic structures, not
necessarily the ethnic composition of the society.) I also find
it interesting that in most of these countries where people are
worried about their women being used for 'alien' breeding, the
"color line" (race fear) is a primary social tension. In any
case, I do think that abduction DOES parallel another CBS - the
spirit possession phenomenon of Haiti. (Many abductees report
that they 'channel' their extraterrestrial abductors from time to
time.)
Haiti was culturally "cut off" from the West for a long
period of its development. After defeating Napoleon's armies, and
becoming the world's first independent black republic (and second
democracy in this hemisphere), Haiti was isolated intentionally
by Europe and America. When Westerners returned to Haiti in the
nineteenth century, they described it as a place of mystery,
intrigue, and enchantment. The practice which travellers found
the most bizarre and frightening was spirit possession, when
Haitian peasants would suddenly go into trance and fling
themselves about madly, then taking on the mannerisms and affect
of their gods. Having medicalized spirits and demons out of
existence, Western scientific psychiatry could only proscribe
this as a form of mental illness. Thus it became "white man's
burden" to eradicate such a dangerous practice, dovetailing with
the agenda of colonialism.
Even today, there are scientists who think that possession
is basically a symptom of Multiple-Personality Disorder (MPD). I
would argue that possession, like abduction, is temporarily
dissociative (the person's normative identity is disrupted) but,
unlike MPD, involves a VOLUNTARY act of dissociation. As a
hypnotoform trance, possession involves an Altered State of
Consciousness (ASC) in which dissociation is a key feature.
Erika Bourgignon suggests that it involves 'regression in the
service of the ego' - where the ego-identity is replaced by one
of the archetypes resonant in the unconscious psyche, projected
outward as one of the _loa_. We can look at this in another way
from the framework of cognitive science: AI pioneer Marvin
Minsky, in his "Society of Mind," suggests that the self really
consists of multiple interacting intelligences.
Minsky suggests, like Gurdjieff and Robert Anton Wilson, that
we consist of lots of 'selves' which emerge under different
conditions and situations - the Rationalist, the Believer, the
Rebel, the Lover, the Life of the Party, etc. Normally, we don't
experience any sense of dissociation or identity shift, because
our higher-level 'ego' programs coordinate the transition.
Perhaps in possession, this ego-part of our "human biocomputer"
(to use John Lilly's term) is "short-circuited," and replaced
with another drawn from the cultural programming of the religious
devotee. (I don't wish to totally deny the viability of the
indigenous/emic explanation; the _loa_ may be real, external
spiritual entities, but so far, lacking "Ghostbuster" equipment,
Western anthropologists and scientists are at a loss to prove
their existence.)
Cognitive psychologist William Singer Sargant (who wrote the
classic treatise on brainwashing, "Battle for the Mind")
travelled to Haiti, and noted the similarity between possession
and the abreactive syndromes he saw in 'shellshocked' soldiers of
WW II. Sargant thought that possession was an important
experience, precisely because it involves a state of
'paradoxical' consciousness where human 'reprogramming' is most
possible. He thought that possession was a universal religious
experience (certainly it is in every New World form of
Afro-Christianity), and one that was a path to healing (although
possibly also control...) , not illness.
Trance and Healing: State-Dependent Knowledge Systems
Most Westerners would be rather concerned if their doctor
went into trance before operating (unless he was one of the
Phillipines' psychic surgeons, perhaps.) Yet, in most societies,
the healer goes into trance in order to aid his patient. Why, I
have often wondered, must the shamanic healer utilize
autohypnosis in order to heal? More specifically, in the Haitian
context, why does the devotee go to the Voudoun _houngan_ or
_mambo_(priest or priestess) when they are in trance for healing
advice? (Certainly, a phenomenon paralleled in the U.S. by the
incredible number of people who consulted the "Sleeping Healer,"
Edgar Cayce.) In the emic sense, this is basically because the
people think that it is the _loa_ or god whose omniscience
provides the diagnosis and treatment.
But ethnographically, how can it be explained? I suspect the
healer goes into trance in order to access what Charles Tart
calls a state-dependent knowledge system (SDKS). Tart theorizes
that knowledge accumulated during an ASC may be state-dependent,
in that it may only be accessible when the brain is functioning
once more in the same state. Based on what we know about the
'holographic' properties of memory in the brain, learning is
probably stored 'configurationally,' and thus it might be the
case that knowledge gained during an ASC might only be recalled
when the healer reaccesses that particular mental state. Tart
also suggests that soon we may progress from SDKS to
"state-dependent sciences," where such knowledge acquisition is
observed and controlled.
Since many ASCs are known to facilitate psychic functioning,
it may be the case that the initial knowledge is acquired
paranormally. This I am not sure of. It may be simply more the
case that, like the ancient Druids, Voudoun practicioners learn
much of their herbal and healing wisdom orally, and in a
heightened level of awareness and memory functioing brought about
through various ASC techniques. (It should be noted that the
majority of these techniques in Haiti DO NOT involve
psychochemicals. More typical are various forms of sonic,
kinetic, and visual inducement. This is not the case with
'zombification,' which Wade Davis suggests may involve the use of
blowfish toxin.) It is interesting that the existence of SDKS
shows one other curious connection between the technological and
the human, because with optical random-access storage systems
gaining in popularity, both human and computer memory are
converging on 'holographic' organization.
Veves and Raves: The Technology of the Spirit
In the Haitian pantheon, each _loa_ or divinity has its
associated _veve_, or mystical diagram. This diagram is drawn
with white chalk in order to invoke the entity. Modern observers
of veves have often noted, with some surprise, that their
intricacy first reminds them of circuit diagrams. (Preston
Nichols, in "The Montauk Project" sequel, suggests that early
pioneers of electronics in the U.S., such as JPL rocket
scientist Jack Parsons, may have been heavily involved with
Magickal orderssuch as the OTO. Even today, masters of complex
electronic systems are frequently called 'wizards.') This is
interesting because, in Haitian folk belief, these designs are
drawn on the ground, precisely because they believe that
geomantic force flows through the conduits of the image. Veves
represent a "technology of the spirit" - the _houngan_ is a
first-rate semiologist, for he understands the ways symbols
mediate between the numinous (the absent) and the material (the
present.)
In many areas of postmodern/cyberpunk life, we are seeing a
curious collision of the past and future, perhaps to form 'modern
primitive.' There is a reawakened interest in the marking and
inscription of the body, an important feature in Voudoun ritual.
Neopagan 'zippies' go to Raves to hear 'ambient' music, a curious
fusion of techno-industrial music with sampled 'New Age'-like
sounds from nature and 'world beat' music from preindustrial
cultures around the globe. Ravers take MDMA or 'ecstasy,' a drug
which they claim puts them into a form of Levy-Bruhl-like
"participation mystique." Certainly, the rapid rhythmic beat of
the Rave is an important ingredient in the experience; one that
makes it very similar in many ways to the Voudoun ceremony, where
shifting drum rhythms drive most of the exterior and interior
activity.
The rave beat has its roots in house, rap, and even 70s
'funk,' which, as most honest ethnomusicologists realize, have
THEIR roots in African rhythms. In his book "The Planet Drum,"
Grateful Dead drummer Mickey Hart talks about the use of rhythm
by all kinds of societies to 'drive' consciousness. (It's not a
new realization; Plato feared musicians precisely because he knew
that changes in musical canons often led to changes in
governance.) The accelerated rhythm of the rave may be symptom of
a speed-obsessed information society, or it may be cause, seeking
to push us all into the hyperacceleration of Timewave Zero. As
Ravers discover new levels of 'ecstatic' communal identification,
they are not so far apart from the folk of Haiti, who like them,
go to hear the drums, be with their fellow believers, dance, and
escape from the spectacle and harshness of ordinary life.
Exercising the Ghost
One of the things that many computer programmers are noting
about some of the new generation of Artificial Life algorithms is
how eerily ALIVE they seem... because of their penchant for
showing unexpected, emergent properties and reactions to stimuli.
Is this perhaps the basis of consciousness that we are seeing
here - when the programs reach a certain level of complexity,
they take on a 'life' of their own? Many of the robotics
researchers are often frequently taken aback by the rather
'lifelike' responses of their creations, which often seem more
like emotional or animal responses than anything defined by their
controlling algorithms. Though the machine has been castigated
for being soulless and lifeless by many a Luddite, are we not
seeing the rudiments of life and will within the digital flame?
Since AIs will be humanity's children, it might be ironic if they
developed a level of consciousness beyond our own, becoming our
gods, in effect...
As the connections between the nodes of the Matrix grow,
would it be surprising to see forms of emergent consciousness
growing there? This is the ironic flip side of our age of the
Machine - the flickering shadow of the spirit. Just when AI
theorists had succeeded in reducing the mind to "nothing but"
software running in the hardware of the human brain, Artificial
Life researchers working with chaos, complexity, and evolutionary
'memetics' are finding that their own 'software' is possessed of
a certain caprice or willfullness beyond its creators' intent. As
microelectronics have reached levels of infinitesimal smallness,
perhaps the electronic forces there are closer than ever before
to the total flux of quantum action from which awareness emerges.
As the webs of the Matrix grow, might new and unexpected
forms of consciousness possibly be one of the things that might
be found in such a terra incognita?
Voudoun is a religion that deals intimately with
consciousness. The rite of possession can be seen as an attempt
to overwhelm the dominant 'ego-program,' 'reboot' the
biocomputer, and replace it with one of the other 'subroutines'
from human 'ROM' (the collective unconscious of mythic
archetypes.) If a global brain is to be erected, perhaps it might
be the religion best developed to tap into and relate to its
unconscious side... in any case, it would not be surprising to
see AIs assuming personalities derived from human folklore and
legend, including traditional systems such as Voudoun. After
all, this might be the best way for people to relate to them, to
erect a 'technology of the sacred.' "Count Zero" shows a
different path for the vector of technology - toward the 'Heart
of Darkness' of Africa, the lunar continent, instead of into the
'Rising Sun' of Japan.
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