This is slightly off-topic, but I think it's worth explaining that I don't have a "belief system", per se. I'm a deductive thinker (which I realize is weird for a programmer), so I find metaphor and allusion to be useful tools for explaining myself. Mystical language, in particular, is very rich, colourful, and goes hand-in-hand with Lisp culture, since the multi-paradigm nature of the language appeals to deductive thinkers. Obviously I have studied psychonautics and chaos magick in some depth, and I was particularly taken by the idea from these modern schools of mysticism, that belief is a tool, that can be wielded to consciously control your own mind, much like (but not exactly like) how a programmer controls a computer by writing software.

As for my own heavily transhumanist "system" of Neuro-Occultism, it's more of a philosophical framework---the basic premise is that all supposedly supernatural phenomena can be explained in terms of psychology, neuroscience, and the physical sciences; that only once you have ruled out the possibility that a supposedly supernatural experience is a purely psychological phenomenon can you begin to model a physical explanation; that the experience of supposedly supernatural phenomena are more interesting and powerful when examined in this light; and that even qualitative systems such as the human mind can be described quantitatively, by adapting research in quantum computer science and biological computation to the field of neuroscience. It's not so different from Cognitive Science, only it emphasizes that once you know that all belief systems are just paradigms, that the human mind can support multiple, simultaneous, even contradictory paradigms, and that your fundamental being is in fact a quantitative system, you can really start to put your brain to work. The problem lies with the fact that the language of the unconscious mind is purely symbolic and associative; thus, a mystical language is necessitated by the structure of our minds---even though a rigorous, mathematical model would be preferable in terms of the scientific method. Lisp, metaphorically applied to the model of the mind, brings us most of the way there.

The purpose of Neuro-Occultism is to develop such a rigorous, mathematical model of consciousness and being; and in so doing, deprecate itself. I see this as an essential aspect of the "technological singularity", both for the realization of emergent machine intelligence, and for the transfer of human consciousness to a computational system---because until such time as the human mind can be understood quantitatively, the singularity will remain science-fiction and fantasy. But then, even the idea of the singularity is a problem, a fundamental limitation of current consciousness that prevents us from seeing past the event horizon of this convergence of technology, biology, individual and social psychology; in order to both achieve the singularity and transcend it, we need to first transcend our own segmented and qualitative perception of self.

There's a lot more I'd like to say on the subject, but that would be a book of its own. Back on topic: I do realize that the heavy-handed mystical tone and Lisp proselytization currently present in the introductory text of LLTHW is useless cruft; I'm a passionate and excitable person by nature, but I recognize that it is holding back the work and interfering with Zed Shaw's methodology. Writing a book is an iterative process, and my effort has been focused on getting a complete scope in order to pump out solid, relevant exercises---so for the time being, I've simply marked the intro chapters as rejected/need-to-be-rewritten. I really hope it won't take me a few more years to finish this book though!