#ouroboros – @nickkahler on Tumblr

The alchemists, who in their own way knew more about the nature of the individuation process than we moderns do, expressed this paradox through the symbol of the Ouroboros, the snake that eats its own tail. The Ouroboros has been said to have a meaning of infinity or wholeness. In the age-old image of the Ouroboros lies the thought of devouring oneself and turning oneself into a circulatory process, for it was clear to the more astute alchemists that the prima materia of the art was man himself. The Ouroboros is a dramatic symbol for the integration and assimilation of the opposite, i.e. of the shadow. This 'feed-back' process is at the same time a symbol of immortality, since it is said of the Ouroboros that he slays himself and brings himself to life, fertilizes himself and gives birth to himself. He symbolizes the One, who proceeds from the clash of opposites, and he therefore constitutes the secret of the prima materia which ... unquestionably stems from man's unconscious.

Carl Jung, "On the Ouroboros," c. 1930 (via crystal)

nickkahler

In playing up artificiality for so long and in so many arenas, we busied ourselves by putting a frame around a frame around a frame. And it seemed that this weird ouroboroslike meta freight train would just chug forward forever on its cultural-feedback loop, its Mobius-strip-shaped track, ad infinitum, amen. Then came metadata. From the bowels of our military-industrial wormhole, meta has re-emerged as metadata: humorless, phlegmatic, oppressive. It morphed from its jokiness, its playfulness, its metaphysical possibilities into something harsh, stern and unyielding. Metadata is implacable, unreasoning, unironic. As abstract as meta once was, metadata is painfully, unamusingly, unentertainingly real, even while it’s also unfathomable and therefore abstract. It’s an abstraction made concrete by its implications: the data, whatever that data is, can be used against us. It’s threatening, but we’re not sure exactly why. It’s endless; we can only stop it if we ourselves cease existing.

Devon McCann Jackson, "When Meta Met Data," 2013

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nickkahler

Alchemy is the art of liberating parts of the Cosmos from temporal existence and achieving perfection which, for metals is gold, and for man, longevity, then immortality and, finally, redemption. Material perfection was sought through the action of a preparation (Philosopher's Stone for metals; Elixir of Life for humans), while spiritual ennoblement resulted from some form of inner revelation or other enlightenment.

H.J. Sheppard, The Ouroboros and the Unity of Matter in Alchemy, c. 1962

#ouroboros #matter #quote #cosmos #gold #longevity #immortality #material #philosopher's stone #elixir of life #spirit #enlightenment #alchemy #h.j. sheppard #pseudoscience #history

nickkahler

H.J. Sheppard, The Ouroborus and the Unity of Matter in Alchemy, c. 1962

'The Ouroboros often symbolize self-reflexivity or cyclicality, especially in the sense of something constantly re-creating itself, the eternal return, and other things such as the phoenix which operate in cycles that begin anew as soon as they end. It can also represent the idea of primordial unity related to something existing in or persisting from the beginning with such force or qualities it cannot be extinguished. While first emerging in Ancient Egypt, the Ouroboros has been important in religious and mythological symbolism, but has also been frequently used in alchemical illustrations, where it symbolizes the circular nature of the alchemist's opus. It is also often associated with Gnosticism, and Hermeticism. Carl Jung interpreted the Ouroboros as having an archetypal significance to the human psyche.[citation needed] The Jungian psychologist Erich Neumann writes of it as a representation of the pre-ego "dawn state", depicting the undifferentiated infancy experience of both mankind and the individual child.'

#h.j. sheppard #ouroboros #matter #alchemy #diagram #triangle #star of david #symbol #sign #dragon #opus #carl jung #psychology #philosophy #history #drawing #popular