CategoryPodcasts

On Magick, Technology, Philosophy, and Pop-Culture

Those are my main areas of interest. It may not sound like a whole lot, but you’d honestly be surprised at the kind of mileage you can get out of recombining them and applying them as lenses through which to look at the world.

Hello. I’m Damien Williams, known by many of you as Wolven. Klint did a pretty fantastic job of introducing me, last time, so I’m not going to rehash any of that. What I want to do, right now, is to point you at a few places where you can get a decent sense for the kinds of plans I have for what we’re going to be doing, around here.

First, there is, of course, the Mindful Cyborgs interview I did with Klint.

Then there’s my presentation from Magick.Codes.

My Master’s Thesis.

My article “Fairytales Of Slavery: Societal Distinctions, Technoshamanism, and Nonhuman Personhood.

And this atemporal conversation between myself and M1K3y, over at the Cosmic Anthropology Podcast.

What I want to be doing here is taking the time to engage in conversations with multiple thinkers about philosophical, religious, political, and occult perspectives on our science fictional present, and posting the audio, video, or transcriptions of either of those. I want to do this with some major frequency, but that requires the time and space to do so.

Which brings me to my next point: A discussion of an overarching framework of where A Future Worth Thinking About and Technoccult are headed. “Protected: Thinking About the Worth of the Future: Logistics.”

To be frank, it’s a money conversation. As I say, there, “I know we’re usually encouraged to not discuss anything as gauche as cash, in Western Society, but since we’re somehow still using a system of psychologically transferred and collectively-agreed-upon value to determine who gets to eat food, I say fuck it. Let’s talk it out.”

So please take a look, there, then tell your friends.

The Technoccult Tumblr is here.

Twitter handles are @Wolven and @Techn0ccult

The Perfunctory Facebook Page is here.

You can sign up for the newsletter here.

And as always, the Patreon is here.

That’s enough, for now. I need to go get back to work on some more substantive posts. See you next time. And thanks.

Mindful Cyborgs: High Fidelity Connections and Social Media with Amy Donahue

This week Sara and I talk to writer Amy Donahue about the way that social media shapes our relationships.

Download and Show Notes: Mindful Cyborgs: High Fidelity Connections and Social Media with Amy Donahue

Mindful Cyborgs: Metta of Data

This week, Sara and I interview Chris about his experience at a week long silent meditation retreat.

Download and Show Notes: Mindful Cyborgs: Path of the Mindful Cyborg, Mett? of Data

Chris has also written a reflection on his time at the retreat:

There were no gadgets, no devices, no sensors, no talking, no books, pens, paper and no looking at each other.

All vegan meals.

Hours of meditation.

It was life altering.

Coming back “online”, I notice that so much of our world is suffering, as I often say in my talks.

Mindful Cyborgs: Magick & the Occult within the Internet and Corporations with Damien Williams

This week:

Damien Williams back on the show. This week is more about the religious and occult aspects of the information society we currently inhabit. Fresh definitions and understandings of magick and the occult, musings on the type of future we actually want to live in, and on the practice of magick and the will.

Download and Show Notes: Mindful Cyborgs: Magick & the Occult within the Internet and Corporations with Damien Williams, PT 2

For more on technology and magic, check out Damien on the “Under Its Spell: Magic, Machines, and Metaphors” panel at Theorizing the Web.

Plus, All the talks from the Haunted Machines event.

Mindful Cyborgs: A Positive Vision of Transhumanism and AI with Damien Williams

This week Damien Williams — aka Wolven — joined me to talk about pop culture portrayals of human enhancement and artificial intelligence and why we need to craft more nuanced narratives to explore these topics. Damien has been exploring the subject extensively at A Future Worth Thinking About.

Tune in next week to hear Damien talk about how AI and transhumanism intersects with magic and the occult.

Download and Show Notes: Mindful Cyborgs: Mindful Cyborgs: A Positive Vision of Transhumanism and AI with Damien Williams

Mindful Cyborgs: Meme Culture, Writing, Contemplation, and Parenting with Paul Ford

Writer and programmer Paul Ford joins us again to talk about Buzzfeed, biking as contemplation and future-proofing his kids.

Download and Show Notes: Mindful Cyborgs: Meme Culture, Writing, Contemplation, and Parenting with Paul Ford, Part 2

Mindful Cyborgs: AnxietyBox, Alerts, and Attention with Paul Ford

This week on Mindful Cyborgs we talk with former Harper’s editor and hobbyist programmer Paul Ford about AnxietyBox, a tool he built to help manage his own anxiety.

Download and Show Notes: Mindful Cyborgs: AnxietyBox, Alerts, and Attention with Paul Ford, Part 1

Plus, I’m behind on our releases. It turns out the second part of our interview with Eleanor Saitta, in which we do a deeper dive on Nordic Larp, has been up for a couple weeks:

Data-driven Introspection and Surveillance Culture with Eleanor Saitta

Latest Mindful Cyborgs:

Eleanor Saitta works professionally as a computer security expert, but more generally she “looks at how systems break” – computer, social, infrastructural, legal, and more. She comes on the show today to share a unique perspective on surveillance / security culture that we have found ourselves enmeshed in. Don’t miss this one (or part 2!).

Download and Show Notes: Mindful Cyborgs: Data-driven Introspection and Surveillance Culture with Eleanor Saitta

Mindful Cyborgs: Part Two of our Conversation with Zeynep Tufekci About Algorithms

This time around I also talk a bit about the 15th anniversary of Technoccult and my struggle to find relevancy in blogging in the 2015.

Download and Notes: Mindful Cyborgs: Algorithmic Reverberations on the Feed PART 2

Mindful Cyborgs: Zeynep Tufekci on the Consequence of Algorithms

This week Zeynep Tufekci, an assistant professor in the Department of Sociology at University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill*, talks with us about the implications of algorithmically filtering social media feeds.

Download and Show Notes: Mindful Cyborgs: Algorithmic Reverberations on the Feed

For more on the topic, check out Zeynep’s article on Facebook’s algorithms and Ferguson.

*This was recorded a few weeks ago, well before the recent tragedy in Chapel Hill, so we didn’t discuss that.

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