Alien and Illogical Powers:
Incubation and Other Oneiric Forces

Instructor: Rainer Henshe
Program: Transdisciplinary Studies, Critical Philosophy
Credit(s): 1
Date: January 23th, February 6th, February 20th, March 6th.
Time: 14:00-16:30 ET

Enroll – 225 USD

DESCRIPTION: At the limits of rationality, beyond the realm of the phantasmatic—whether accessed through imagination, intuition, hypnagogic states, or other transformative forces, we are able to reach and comprehend realms of knowledge that exceed logical processes and conscious understanding.

Through states like dreaming or practices such as incubation, the rational and irrational intertwine, uniting all the senses. In these moments, we reach forms of thought more powerful than mere calculative and logical thinking. This is what Nietzsche called the “alien, illogical powers — the powers of creative imagination.” He described such thought as “not ruled by measure but leaping from possibility to possibility, using each one as a temporary resting place. Occasionally, it will grasp such a resting place even as it flies.” Peter Kingsley refers to the oneiric practice of incubation as a “third type of consciousness quite different from either waking or sleeping.” But what are these alien and illogical powers? How can we access them for creative or other purposes, as thought flies unfettered by logic, seizing insights and knowledge?

Through our readings, we will explore creative premonitions, imagination, intuition, the messages of the subconscious and unconscious, and the conditions of incubation, and more. We will experiment with directly engaging these forces ourselves.

SESSION 1. IMAGINATION & INCUBATION: ILLICIT FORMS OF KNOWLEDGE.
— Friedrich Nietzsche, Philosophy in The Tragic Age of the Greeks
— Peter Kingsley, In the Dark Places of Wisdom

SESSION 2. THE IMPERSONAL, THE ALIEN, THE ELEMENTAL.
— Carl Jung, On Active Imagination (excerpt)
— Évelyne Grossman, The Creativity of the Crisis

SESSION 3 — OTHERNESS & THE INHUMAN
— Timothy Clark, Theory of Inspiration (excerpt)
— HD, Notes on Thought & Vision

SESSION 4 — EXPERIMENT & INQUIRY: VENTURING ELSEWHERE
Student project presentations. These projects can be creative or autopsies of Seminar themes within whatever media each student wishes to utilize

IMAGE: Hilma Of Klint, The Ten Largest No7 Adulthood Group IV, Detail, 1907.

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Enroll – 225 USD