An armchair cosmologist through the three decades of the golden age of astrophysics, I developed my own model little by little, but also with a lot of help from the alternative ideas brought to light by other writers, some of the deeper and harder to sift through writers who nevertheless offer amazingly imaginative visions that are not limited by the accepted theories of modern day science, if theAn armchair cosmologist through the three decades of the golden age of astrophysics, I developed my own model little by little, but also with a lot of help from the alternative ideas brought to light by other writers, some of the deeper and harder to sift through writers who nevertheless offer amazingly imaginative visions that are not limited by the accepted theories of modern day science, if they can posit plausible alternatives. In Hegel's Philosophy of Nature, he said we look into the nature of the physical world around us to examine the nature of god, to better understand the mysteries manifest all around us, to show us more about the mystery that we are made up of; so it's irresistible to look at the pioneering and penetrating visions of the universe from today's space telescopes, and to wonder for the first time in the history of humanity about the sky in ways never imagined.I think when we study the grand visions of cosmologists on what the universe is, how it's made, where it's going, it isn't necessarily about reality; of course it makes efforts to map back to reality, but we are as much studying humanity's imagination as we are the relation of the components of the universe. It's not necessarily a study of the universe as much as it is a study of visions of the universe in mankind, and the changes possible to these visions based on the unprecedented science of today.But one other reason I think the study of the object called the universe is important, though it is admittedly a very different size species of organism than our peers, is the holographic idea that we are all microcosms of the macrocosm; the study of flow has made it clear that there are principles that span space and time in this universe, and from the star to the stellar mass black hole to the super massive black hole and the quasar core of the HLIRG's (hyper luminous infrared galaxies), and right back down to human beings, there is a nature to the flow through time, a presence of grace in that flow, and an all-permeating mystery. The more clues we can get, at any scale, allow us to better model and predict all the other scales, to light up aspects of thick dark reality that were hidden from all the shamans and sorcerers of the past millennia.

After reading a few outstanding books on Taoist immortals over the years in the midst of other things, I had just moved to a new place with access to a backyard. I ended up getting myself an alchemy starter kit at Home Depot, and started communicating with the universe; I met the sun and moon, and developed a ritual, “clever and lofty”, and I’ve explained it here.After reading a few outstanding books on Taoist immortals over the years in the midst of other things, I had just moved to a new place with access to a backyard. I ended up getting myself an alchemy starter kit at Home Depot, and started communicating with the universe; I met the sun and moon, and developed a ritual, “clever and lofty”, and I’ve explained it here.Ge Hong, and Han Xiangzi: they let you make your own theories as you go through their various stories; they make no effort to preach but you end up making connections between what methods the various people used and how effective and powerful their transformation was, and you might want to be creative after that study and go invent your own method, after they’ve made you such an expert on what works, supposedly.You come up with your own theory on how you might go about this wild pursuit of “living as long as heaven and earth”, like it's a game, let's see who's ritual is most effective, whose liturgy attracts the attention and beneficence of the heaven.Taoism is a very do-it-yourself religion, the old ways only a learning trove of what might work, what's worked for others, while you twist and turn in the Way and speculate on the universe for yourself; a ritual, they said, need only be clever and lofty; there’s no pope of Taoism sending out letters of ex communication for false beliefs, or for heretical actions; they pretty much encourage that stuff.I set aside the “Ge Hong” ideas about alchemy for a few years, but then just recently I read Han Xiangzi, and I started speculating again. Fortunately this speculation led me not to consume poisons like Ge Hong’s characters, but to set up a tripod, a communication between heaven and earth. I invented my own little Taoist immortalism plot, a plan where I am initiating a 101 year study, clinical trial for mankind and the universe around him, plangence of the dark cores study, levels and depths of human kindness study, and magical Taoist ritual for the gathering, storage, and ritualistic release of chi, cosmic energy.It’s Chan or Zen Buddhism, it’s Taoist alchemy, it's Aztec Nagualism, it's an astrology updated to the modern age of cosmology and astrophysics, where all those things intersect.So I've invented an irrational little religious ritual for myself, and presented it here - a River-of- Heaven open-topped ferry-ride, all mystery and wonder.