I just got out of the "Minority Report" at the Lyric Theater in the west end. Oof.

The story was pretty shaky and boiled down to obvious beats and the acting was absolutely horrendous. Like, high school production bad. The staging was sort of cool, though.

There was a lot they could have worked with on this - the paradox of prophecy, the inherently fascist pieces of thought crime, free will, etc, but it was just a really trite, boiled down cyberpunk-like mishmash. Stay away from this stinker.

Obvious why I'm asking it, also what would his reaction be to Mordern open world games or even better ARGs and those 4th wall breaking videogames

Recently I discovered a game called the harvester where you play in a disturbing 1950s town doing weird things but in the end it's revealed that you're in a simulation in the 90s and are being trained to be a serial killer in the ending you are given the choice of killing your lover and then being set free in the real world, or save them and live with them forever in the simulation but being rendered dead in the real world

Hello friends, I am trying to remember a PKD short story that involved a world where people worked on different days of the week and the rest of the days they were kept in... cryopods, essentially. And a man who worked on Mondays sees a woman in her pod and falls in love with her and so jumps through all the hoops to get his day changed to her day. I can't remember the ending, but either she also switched her day (to be with him? Like a Gift of the Magi situation), or for some reason he can't be with her.

I can't recall the name of the story and at this point it may not even be a PKD story, but to my best recollection I read it in a collection with The Exit Door Leads In. Could anyone point me in the right direction?

Saw this in a dutch bookstore, PKD books with the I Ching

So, after having read, watched and listened to articles and videos regarding the novel (adding other thoughts at various times), I can say that, beyond the explanations linked to the post-apocalyptic elements, the human condition, drugs - considering that I tried to interpret the text in a metaphysical-religious way - I can say that:

1. Palmer Eldritch is the form in which the essence of the Proximians is anthropomorphized, in the largest and most insidious alien invasion planned by an extraterrestrial species in the era of the facts, in view of the very powerful galactic empire of human colonies.

2. According to the brilliant interpretation of Riccardo Valla (which I recommend you watch in case you are interested), the two drugs (Can-D/Chew-Z) can allude to "Can Do" and "Choose", in relation to the abilities of the two stimulants to generate transition effects, although different, accessible and manipulable on two completely different power levels.

"Can Do" for Can-D allows a possible, however limited, interaction in a reality linked to a totemization of reality, in which elements of consumerism are idolized and linked symbolically - and psychedelically - to the terrestrial reality accessible from extraterrestrial colonies . Literally, a "you can do", but already in his word, it takes on a limitation like "you can do this, but not anything else".

"Choose" for Chew-Z is, however, a concept close to existentialism (this is my interpretation of Valla's interpretation), in which the subject, free to choose in a vastness of worlds, morals and possible realities and achievable APPARENTLY by himself, he finds himself in an existential discomfort that the drug alone, once taken, can lead him to complete an action that satisfies his need - which he believes in the short term, now infatuated with Can-D and from its "controllability" - into a higher religious experience, in which it venerates an unsolicited entity, an unwanted guest in which each user incarnates.

3. Palmer Eldritch is the first form of manifestation of an artificial God, created specifically for the human race and aimed at its control, in the form of perpetuation of shared cognitive elements (minds collectively united in a single individual) and catalyzed in a form of purely psychological power, in terms of collective and psychedelic illusions.

4. Probably the most curious, extremely symbolic and somewhat sneaky (I noticed it practically 2 weeks after finishing the novel, if not more, despite it being literally before my eyes), is the possible etymology of the same name as Palmer Eldritch , not at all causal:

- a Palmer is a pilgrim, often associated with one who returned from the Holy Land with a palm branch or leaf as a sign of having undertaken the pilgrimage (literally the Chew-Z from his journey to Proxima Centauri)

- "Eldritch" can be translated as "strange", "sinister" or "SPOOKY", signifying his transcendent, immaterial, intrusive and never corporeal form.

4. Furthermore, I focused on the possible hidden meaning of "Proxima Centauri":

- "Proxima" literally means "next", the closest" and, in our Solar System, the closest star to the Sun is a red dwarf (Alpha Centauri) in the constellation of Centaurus, whose possible planets orbiting around it have a good probability of being hit by the X-rays of one's star to a lesser extent than similar planets orbiting the sun, estimating any favorable life prospects according to some scientific approximations

- "Centauri" is instead linked to the centaur, a mythological being half man and half horse, whose greatest representation is given by Chiron, son of Cronos, titan of time, who is associated with the "Cronos syndrome", a psychic pathology of a father who desires/executes the murder of his own son (in the case of Palmer Eldritch, to perpetuate his own existence, sacrificing the bodies of other human beings for his own benefit)

The constellation of Centaurus is considered the brightest point in the Earth's sky thanks to the globular cluster Omega Centauri (formerly mistaken for a star), among the largest known, with approximately one million solar masses.

I just watched Episode 1 of the Amazon series Fallout and I saw a lot of similarities with the PKD novel The Penultimate Truth. Has anyone else here? Seen the series? What are your thoughts if you have?

Had a dream (more of a nightmare) of being trapped in a dentist’s office. Woke up today, stumbled upon Philip K Dick, who had some of his more famous revelations after a trip to the dentist, I have heard.

Hello Dickensians!

As per subject, I am trying to recall the name of a short novel by PKD.

The plot is along these lines : a father comes back from outer space to assist the birth of his firstborn.

As the baby is delivered, we find out that in the future, children are raised by androids to avoid any contact and/or negative influence from their parents, until they are adults.

Any inputs?

Thanks in advance for your help!

The changing information which we experience as World is an unfolding narrative. It tells about the death of a woman (italics mine). This woman, who died long ago, was one of the primordial twins. She was one half of the divine syzygy. The purpose of the narrative is the recollection of her and of her death. The Mind does not wish to forget her. Thus the ratiocination of the Brain consists of a permanent record of her existence, and, if read, will be understood this way. All the information processed by the Brain—experienced by us as the arranging and rearranging of physical objects—is an attempt at this preservation of her; stones and rocks and sticks and amoebae are traces of her. The record of her existence and passing is ordered onto the meanest level of reality by the suffering Mind which is now alone.

If, in reading this, you cannot see that Fat is writing about himself, then you understand nothing.

If you read any of PKD's biographies, you can see how deeply the death of his sister affected him, even though he was too young to remember her. He kind of blamed his mother for it, and the two of them had a pretty toxic and co-dependent relationship. I think the death of his sister and his complicated relationship with his mother led to the endless difficulties he had with women and relationships.

This was a pretty surprising mind-fudge of a movie. I spent most of it very confused until the end, and even afterwards as well. I've made peace with almost all of my questions as I've digested it and looked into some explanations, but I have a single big one that's been bugging me:

If Substance D was so dangerous and the government was so sure it was being produced by New Path, why didn't they just raid one of their farms and collect evidence that way instead of going about it in such a roundabout way? What stopped them from being more direct, especially since high tech surveillance abounds? Is this elaborated on more in the book?

The plot seems really tight altogether but I don't understand this bit.

I’m sure this has been discussed— but I just re-listened to A Scanner Darkly on audiobook. I also re-watched the movie, which has been a favorite for years.

Man, linklater and crew really nailed it, in my opinion, despite normal small issues with adaptations. I mean, they literally put almost every major scene into the movie. Amazing work of condensing it into a couple hours without losing almost anything.

Just thought I’d say that I had forgotten what a great job they did. Always worth a re-read + re-watch!

Just finished Scanner Darkly (soooo good). Trying to find somewhere free to listen to my next pick but I can't decide which novel to go with next. any suggestions?

Are there any particularly good audible reads of Dicks work?

There is a scene in Time Out of Joint where >!a man is in a room watching a tape and repeating what people are saying. I know most of the story takes place in a constructed reality, but what would be the benefit of repeating things said from a recording!<? Was that a training video?

About Ragle: His personality and the conversations he has with his sister and her husband reminded me of Jack Isidore in Confessions of a Crap Artist.

Last but not least: It's amazing and funny when there are ties between the book I'm reading and things going on in real life. I read this while on vacation in the south Pacific, and stopped by an island where WW2 guns had been mounted by the US military - the SeaBees. Ragel>! mentioned having being stationed in the South Pacific. We learn the SeaBees set up the fake simulated town in Wyoming.!< And, ultimately, what I interpret as "moral" of the story, if there is one, is that it is good for people to travel and see places they've never been. Of course, I have to then ask myself if anything I experienced was a simulation.

If we wanted to focus the events in "The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch" through a uniquely theological-biblical lens, especially on the figure of Eldritch himself and the "cult" that he manages to create around himself, fundamentally, everything that happens in the book is an historical analogy.

Projected into a dystopian and science fiction future, the Eldritchian religion is nothing more than a formal alter-ego of the Christian religion, which in a time of barbarism and heresy, of pure theological confusion in which everyone is satisfied with a "bitheism" (polytheism) imparted by the Perky dolls Pat and Fran, induced by collectivized rituals and pitied through Can-D. However, this religion is limited by its need to plastically and materially adhere to an artisan product that represents reality itself, which in this complex becomes its simulacrum.

​

Palmer Eldritch emerges from the Genesis obtained through the conjunction with the Proximians at Proxima Centauri, the true demiurges of the Universe who, through the exquisitely human manifestation (therefore close to humans, as sagaciously grasped by Anne Hawthorne in the novel) of Palmer himself, manage to impart its power, albeit acting on men indirectly. What happens then is the competition between the two faiths, cleverly narrated by Dick in a war in the drug market, in which the two main messiahs clash to cause a schism in the faith of OTC hallucinogens: however, Eldritch is extremely powerful precisely because, from the beginning of the novel, despite being dead he is actually alive, at least not physically as one might think - in a conventional way.

He "lives through" the human lives that come into direct contact with him, through the Eucharistic ritual in which his verb, the Chew-Z, becomes body and blood, bread and wine, of the Eucharistic practice of the users, who in using it allows us to conceive Eldritch's act of transubstantiation: from the drug to the mind, from the mind to the body; from bread and wine to body and blood.
And, since then, part of Eldritch becomes part of the life of Chew-Z users, just as part of them enters Eldritch, who is nothing other than a superior being, a divine ether that transcends physical experience, because pure energy, pure spirituality, which acts "potentially, if not actually". This explains the "prolonged hangover" from Chew-Z, the effects of which persist even months, if not years, decades after the last intake, although this perception is manifested over a period of a few minutes, and this also explains why the narrative moves in multiple space-time planes, in terrestrial and extraterrestrial dimensions; from past to present and future.

Palmer, thus gaining the ability to transfer from one body to another, if not remaining in multiple bodies at the same time (acquiring God's characteristics of ubiquity and transcendence), he remains alive as long as his host lives: as a “parasite” yes, but as will and power, he acts through them sometimes to help, sometimes to wear down, but in any case he does it as he pleases. However, this will not allow him to escape total death, oblivion, since even living for millions of years in many different living beings, sooner or later he will have to face the total death of life, of every living being.

This ability to "be" is explained perfectly in the story of the cat and the steak proposed by Anne Hawthorne (who in the text is considered the most orthodox, the most sensitive, the perfect faithful - also close to the concept of "desirable woman" as " woman with long black hair”, a female ideal-type for Dick), in which, based on the perspective from which one and the other are observed, they cannot exist at the same time since in reality they have the same essence; we cannot know this, but we can understand that both the cat and the slice of meat are different ways of an essence manifesting itself to us in a different form. And then the entity that governs Eldritch's real power could be one of the many ways of manifesting his essence in the form closest to man, more acceptable and familiar to men, who have always considered Eldritch a man, but which in reality may never have existed, and has until now lived in the collective imagination as it is endowed with exquisitely human categories; On the contrary.

What distinguishes him from a normal man are precisely his bodily modifications: his "stigmata", his artificial implants - the robotic hand, the metal teeth and the Luxvid optical implant - (exactly 3 like the 3 stigmata of Christ - the marks of the nails on the hands and feet and the side pierced by the spear), which represent - just like the stigmata in Christianity - a modality through which the divine manifests itself in reality through man, symbolizing the perfect symbiotic union, which in Eldritch's case occurs first mentally, then through the vision of his implants on his own skin.
Furthermore, Chew-Z can be considered as the verb, the means through which Palmer Eldritch carries out his transubstantiation, which unlike bread and wine, as is pointed out in the text, is not limited to two objects, but to the reality (or realities) from which Eldritch draws all his power; therefore, he has no limits.

In conclusion, we can still think that Eldritch - although he cannot resemble the God of the Christian Bible, ontologically good - is ONE God, but evil, malevolent towards those who venerate him: first of all because he MAKES himself venerated even indirectly, unconsciously, since he permeates every space of reality (and various realities), as well as the minds of men (both with Chew-Z and in the collective imagination, making it a self-fulfilling prophecy), and because he, unlike the benevolent God who sacrifices himself to save his children, on the contrary, he allows his children to perish so that he, selfishly, can perpetuate his metaphysical existence by transferring from one body to another, carrying out a metamorphosis without however changing in essence.
This explains why every consumer of Chew-Z, initially a "pure and innocent" living being, becomes a bearer of sin, since this drug is the Apple of Eden whose sin of having been consumed precludes a psychophysical atonement from which every sinner needs to purify oneself through death; but not a death like the others, but a death "mediated" by the comparison with a metaphysical existence, with an involuntary and unwanted coexistence with an unknown guest, who is nevertheless strong enough to take possession of any body he wants (and this makes him evil because he is an exploiter) until his death, which is the shell of his perpetual living.

The only awareness that consumes Eldritch, however, is what drives him to realize himself; it is probably the very motivation for which he lives and was conceived: the inevitability of a destiny which he cannot escape and which, over time and slowly, will lead him to die.

I’ve only listened to three PKD audiobooks (Three Stigmata, Ubik, a Scanner Darkly). Also a few short stories (We can remember it for you wholesale, beyond lies the wub, the defenders) Everyone raves about this and I’m wondering if I should read or listen to audio version of this. Maybe there’s not much a difference…

I started reading A Scanner Darkly back in december (I usually read on the way in to work, which I do twice a week) in english, I’m not native speaker.

The read and the story has been so far really long, dragged out and I’m not really invested in the characters, or the story. I’m like 50 pages in, around the time when Bob Arctor has to investigate / spy on himself.

I read Three Stigmata and Ubik, in english, I really enjoyed them both, but their start was also very slow to me (so I still wonder if ASD will “start” soon).

Should I keep reading and power myself through believing that it will get better, or abandon it and return to it maybe later? If so, do you have any other title suggestion?

Ok this is not actually spoiler as it's revealed in like the 3rd page, but Horselover Fat is Philip K. Dick. The name origin is explained much later, but regardless.

I'm stilll confused as when each person is talking. Half the time you read discussions between first person and Horselover fat, who is the first person. I'm still lost. Is he talking with himself? Or is he just jumping between the two because he is confused?

EDIT Finished the book, understood a lot more by the end

Hello.

I am neither an expert on Philip K Dick nor do I normally write TV Show reviews, and I assume the TV show has been discussed here at length before.

But I wrote something about how Amazon's adaptation of "The Man in The High Castle" changed the perspective of the books in a disturbing way, and thought it might be of interest to this sub:

https://medium.com/@wolfhf/the-appeal-of-evil-amazons-colossal-misunderstanding-of-the-man-in-the-high-castle-e297fbf0dfaa