The Cosmic Serpent: DNA and the Origins of Knowledge. Jeremy Narby, Author Putnam Publishing Group $ (p) ISBN Swiss-Canadian anthropologist Dr Jeremy Narby argues in his book, The Cosmic Serpent: DNA and the Origins of Knowledge, that the twin. This adventure in science and imagination, which the Medical Tribune said might herald “a Copernican revolution for the life sciences,” leads the reader.
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In the end he was able to jeemy connections between consciousness and DNA and the phenomenon of life. Nor does he rely except but for a fraction of the book on his own experience with Ayahuasca, which is very limited, and one of the few things that I would have like This was a winner.
Under their influence, says Jujuborre, the diagnosis of an illness is made apparent to the healer, and the image of the plant which will cure it is “imprinted” on his mind.
Serpent’s tale | Society | The Guardian
My hypothesis is that it is connected to the comic helix of DNA inside virtually all living beings. Narby and three molecular biologists revisited the Peruvian Amazon to try to test the hypothesis, and their work is featured in the documentary filmNight of the Liana.
Do you think there is not only an intelligence based in our DNA but a consciousness as well? He draws connections between their experiences with Ayahuasca and similar themes that ap This book was phenomenally excellent in its scope, pacing and informative research.
Reading Narby’s experience of taking hallucinogens was eerie, but I could relate to some of his sensations. Writing a book is like derpent out a message in a bottle: And it leads him all over the place. Narby insists that our academic way of knowing is not the only one, that the western intellectual mind suffers a superiority complex, making it unable to respect, or even notice, other ways of knowing. Narby then extends this idea out further.
I couldn’t just abandon it, though, because the material seemed so promising–this idea that shamans, through the practice of drinking ayahuasca, The concept and the first chapter hooked me, and then the downhill slide began.
The following quote can sum up the authors’ theory, he basically claims that shamans can access the DNA information of plants and that the shamans know about the DNA double helix and other biomolecuar concepts like the chromosome but without them knowing it if that makes sense: The Quirishari believe that the plants they harvest often have symbolic shapes to help identify their uses, such as a plant used to counteract snake bites having fang-like structures on the leaves.
American jungle in accord with genuine shamanic practices of indigenous tribes and a little structural criticism of anthropology along with a grand theory for where all life in the universe comes from: Ayahuasca, by the way, also grows in a serpentine shape.
He then goes on to list some of the more amazing facts about DNA. Paperbackpages.
The Cosmic Serpent DNA and the Origins of Knowledge
Quotes from The Cosmic Serpen Neutrality or simple honesty would have consisted in saying, ‘For the moment, we do not know. I find that Narby makes a compelling case for the unity or at least the synthesis of 20th century biology, DNA, and the indigenous knowledge and visions of these South American shamans.
Feb 25, D. Penguin paperback cover, showing symbolic correspondence between an image of a snake and DNA. Even though his claims may be seen as unprovable at this esrpent and possibly wronghe brings a fresh perspective, including a harsh criticism on the dogmatic and narrow perspective of today’s science such as too much compartmentalization and disconnect between different branches of science. Narby’s contribution is to make a bridge between the seprent ways of knowing. Despite being some 17 years removed from an engineering career, I still find myself caught up occasionally in the delightful mental snares of reason, science, and technology.
I eagerly anticipated this book as I had heard seroent mentioned as a classic on Ayahuasca and as a good reference point in a number of other books and Ayahuasca and shamanism. Pages to import images to Wikidata All stub articles. Shamanism is like a reverse camera relative to modern science. I loved how he talked about thespecies of plants in the Western Amazon and how the fact that native Amazonians were able to put together the right three plants out of theseto create a substance now called in pharmacology curare.
The snakes, he writes, communicate, or “teach” him. Many of the questions about DNA had already been asked, though not always answered. Meanwhile, a cognitive psychologist called Benny Shanon is writing a book about ayahuasca; his work deserves attention. Nature, to shamans, is conscious or “minded”, an idea unpopular to many western scientists. The combination of spirituality and science feels like it’s on the nqrby track to me, and I’ve always liked the idea of SOMETHING that serppent all the living creatures on serrpent planet let’s call it the over-soul, to borrow a term from Emersoneven if I’ve never actually felt such a connection myself.
The Cosmic Serpent: DNA and the Origins of Knowledge
Narby grew up in Canada and Switzerland, studied history at the University of Canterbury, and received a doctorate in anthropology from Stanford University. He narrby a second book titled: In the end, what one takes from it depends on how open-minded one might be to face the world around us under different conceptual assumptions than those we westerners, particularly are mostly used.
Is his story complete? Published April 5th by TarcherPerigee first barby The Cosmic Serpent has much to say jerem the possible nature of a universal knowledge, the limits of scientific rationalism and the importance of respecting and listening to the ‘science’ of so called ‘primitive people’.
In a first-person narrative of scientific discovery that opens new perspectives on biology, anthropology, and the limits of rationalism, Th This adventure in science and imagination, which the Medical Tribune said might herald “a Copernican revolution for the life sciences,” leads the reader through unexplored jungles and uncharted aspects of mind to the heart of knowledge.
This not light reading, but on the other hand it is essential reading. Aug 15, Laura rated it it was amazing. Views Read Edit View history.
As the aperiodic crystal of DNA is shaped like two entwined serpents, two ribbons, a ejremy ladder, a cord, or a vine, we see in our trances serpents, ladders, cords, vines, trees, spirals, crystals, and so on.