Stanley Krippner, Ph.D.
Dreams, Dream Telepathy, Shamanism, Altered States,
Personal Mythology, Wellness, Transpersonal Psychology
Stanley Krippner, PhD is professor of psychology at Saybrook Graduate School, San Francisco,
and has conducted workshops and seminars on dreams, shamanism, chaos theory and hypnosis all over the world.
and has conducted workshops and seminars on dreams, shamanism, chaos theory and hypnosis all over the world.
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2013, Ashland, Oregon with Rolling Thunder’s grandson, Sidian Morning Star Jones
To the 1960s counter-culture, Rolling Thunder was a friend of Bob Dylan, an inspiration for the Billy Jack films, and an activist.
But to the Native tribes he served, Rolling Thunder was a healer, teacher, visionary – and even a prophet.
Saybrook University psychologist Stanley Kripper, a world-renowned expert on shamanism, has teemed up with Rolling Thunder’s grandson, Sidian Morning Star Jones, to produce a book that reconciles the two sides of Rolling Thunder’s life and presents previously unreleased teachings that were preserved by the Grateful Dead’s Mickey Hart.
“The Voice of Rolling Thunder: a medicine man’s wisdom for walking the red road” also provides Krippner and Jones’ expert commentary on previously unchronicled stories about Rolling Thunder. It details the way in which the shaman described the signs of encroaching planetary doom 30 years before anyone had heard of global warming, and campaigned for environmental harmony. It also examines witness testimony of unusual, even paranormal, activities reputed to happen around Rolling Thunder.
Richard Clemmer-Smith, Professor and Curator of Ethnology at the University of Denver Museum of Anthropology, calls The Voice of Rolling Thunder “Accessible, authoritative, and an interesting treatise on Native American Healing.” Dr. Leslie Gray, president of the Woodfish Foundation, said “This remarkable book will remind its readers of the mysterious role personal power plays in healing.”
To the 1960s counter-culture, Rolling Thunder was a friend of Bob Dylan, an inspiration for the Billy Jack films, and an activist.
But to the Native tribes he served, Rolling Thunder was a healer, teacher, visionary – and even a prophet.
Saybrook University psychologist Stanley Kripper, a world-renowned expert on shamanism, has teemed up with Rolling Thunder’s grandson, Sidian Morning Star Jones, to produce a book that reconciles the two sides of Rolling Thunder’s life and presents previously unreleased teachings that were preserved by the Grateful Dead’s Mickey Hart.
“The Voice of Rolling Thunder: a medicine man’s wisdom for walking the red road” also provides Krippner and Jones’ expert commentary on previously unchronicled stories about Rolling Thunder. It details the way in which the shaman described the signs of encroaching planetary doom 30 years before anyone had heard of global warming, and campaigned for environmental harmony. It also examines witness testimony of unusual, even paranormal, activities reputed to happen around Rolling Thunder.
Richard Clemmer-Smith, Professor and Curator of Ethnology at the University of Denver Museum of Anthropology, calls The Voice of Rolling Thunder “Accessible, authoritative, and an interesting treatise on Native American Healing.” Dr. Leslie Gray, president of the Woodfish Foundation, said “This remarkable book will remind its readers of the mysterious role personal power plays in healing.”
Dr. Stanley Krippner, Psychologist
Graywolf, Iona Miller, Dr. Krippner
Bio - http://www.neuroquantology.com/index.php/journal/article/viewFile/408/407
Stanley Krippner is internationally known for his pioneering work in the scientific investigation of human consciousness, especially such areas as creativity, parapsychological phenomena and altered states of consciousness. Prior to joining the Saybrook faculty in 1972, Dr. Krippner directed the Dream Laboratory at Maimonides Medical Center in New York and was Director of the Child Study Center at Kent State University. He has served as President of the Association for Humanistic Psychology, the Parapsychological Association and the Association for the Study of Dreams. He is also a Charter Member of the International Society for the Study of Dissociation and is a Fellow of the American Psychological Association, the Society for the Scientific Study of Sex, the American Psychological Society, the American Society of Clinical Hypnosis and the Society for the Scientific Study of Religion.
Dr. Krippner received a Ph.D. in Educational Psychology from Northwestern University. He has written over 500 articles and several books, including: Human Possibilities, Song of the Siren, Dream Telepathy (co-author), The Realms of Healing (co-author), Spiritual Dimensions of Healing (co-author), Personal Mythology (co-author), Healing States (co-author), Dreamworking (co-author), A Psychiatrist in Paradise (co-editor), Dreamtime and Dreamwork (Ed.) and Advances in Parapsychological Research (Ed.).
Dr. Krippner's diverse academic interests include clinical, educational and health issues. At Saybrook, he is responsible for developing and teaching courses in the area of consciousness studies.
Author:
Human Possibilities: Mind Research in the USSR and Eastern Europe. Garden City, NY: Anchor Books, 1980.
Song of the Siren: A Parapsychological Odyssey. New York: Harper & Row, 1976.
Shamlet: The Tragicall Historie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark New York: Exposition Press, 1971.
Co-Author:
The Mythic Path (with David Feinstein). New York: Jeremy P. Tarcher/Putnam, 1997.
A Psychiatrist in Paradise: Treating Mental Illness in Bali (with Denny Thong and Bruce Carpenter). Bangkok, Thailand: White Lotus Press, 1993.
Spiritual Dimensions of Healing: From Tribal Shamanism to Contemporary Health Care (with Patrick Welch). New York: Irvington Publishers, 1992.
Dream Telepathy: Experiments in Nocturnal ESP (with Montague Ullman and Alan Vaughan), 2nd ed. Jefferson, NC: McFarland Publishers, 1989.
Personal Mythology: The Psychology of Your Evolving Self (with David Feinstein). Los Angeles: Jeremy P. Tarcher, 1988.
Dreamworking: How to Use Your Dreams for Creative Problem-Solving (with Joseph Dillard). Buffalo, NY: Bearly Ltd., 1988.
Zwischen Himmel und Erde: Spirituelles Heilen der Schamanen, Hexen, Priester und Medien (with Patrick Scott). Dussilgen, Germany: Chiron Verlag, 1987.
Healing States (with Alberto Villoldo). New York: Fireside Books/Simon & Schuster, 1987.
La Science et les Pouvoirs Psychiques de l'Homme (with Jerry Solfvin). Paris: Sand, 1986.
The Realms of Healing (with Alberto Villoldo). Millbrae, CA: Celestial Arts Press, 1976, rev. ed., 1977, 3rd ed., 1986.
Dream Telepathy: Experiments in Nocturnal ESP (with Montague Ullman and Alan Vaughan). New York: Macmillan, 1974.
Editor:
Dreamtime and Dreamwork: Decoding the Language of the Night. Los Angeles: Jeremy P. Tarcher, 1990.
Advances in Parapsychological Research, Vols. 4, 5, 6, 7, 8. Jefferson, NC: McFarland Publishing, 1987, 1990, 1994, 1997.
Advances in Parapsychological Research, Vols. 1, 2, 3. New York: Plenum Press, 1977, 1978, 1982.
Psychoenergetic Systems: The Interface of Consciousness, Energy and Matter. New York: Gordon & Breach, 1979.
Co-Editor:
Varieties of Anomalous Experience: Examining the Scientific Evidence (with Etzel Cardena and Steven J. Lynn). Washington, DC: American Psychological Association, 2000.
Broken Images, Broken Selves: Dissociative Narratives in Clinical Practice (with Susan Powers). New York: Brunner/Mazel, 1997.
Future Science: Life Energies and the Physics of Paranormal Phenomena (with John White). Garden City, NY: Anchor Books, 1977.
The Energies of Consciousness: Explorations in Acupuncture, Auras, and Kirlian Photography (with Daniel Rubin). New York: Gordon & Breach, 1975.
The Kirlian Aura: Photographing the Galaxies of Life (with Daniel Rubin). Garden City, NY: Anchor Books, 1974.
Galaxies of Life: The Human Aura in Acupuncture and Kirlian Photography (with Daniel Rubin). Gordon & Breach, 1973.
Author or co-author of over 900 articles, chapters, and book reviews appearing in scholarly or academic publications.
Stanley Krippner, Ph.D.
Stan Krippner first caught the public imagination with the publication of his groundbreaking work DREAM TELEPATHY, Experiments in Nocturnal ESP (1973). He went on to do equally innovative holistic research in shamanism, consciousness, healing, creativity, extraordinary human potential, and human sexuality. This pioneer of parapsychology has traveled to every shamanic corner of the globe, mentored many, including myself, and brought the mystifying world back into the arena of general psychology, rather than a marginalized specialty.
Stan and I served together on the Asklepia Board
<http://www.asklepia.org/index.html>, and spoke together for the first Chaos Conference, 1992, but our acquaintance goes back decades. He published Rick Miller's HOLOGRAPHIC CONCEPT OF REALITY. This paper was presented at the First International Congress of Psychotronics, Prague, 1973. First printing was in the journal Psychoenergetic Systems, ed. Stanley Krippner, Vol.1, 1975. 55-62. Gordon & Breach Science Publishers Ltd., Great Britain. Reprinted in the book PSYCHOENERGETIC SYSTEMS, S. Krippner, editor. c1979. 231-237. Gordon & Breach, New York, London, Paris.
Stanley Krippner, Ph.D., is professor of psychology at Saybrook Graduate School in San Francisco where he designed many of the courses in the consciousness/spirituality concentration. At Saybrook, he has supervised dissertation research projects for dozens of students. He holds faculty appointments at the Universidade Holistica Internacional (Brasilia) and the instituto de Medicina y Tecnologia Avanzada de la Conducta (Ciudad Juarez, Mexico) where he helped create the certificate programs in human sexuality and in rational-emotive behavior therapy.
Over the years, Dr. Krippner has conducted workshops and seminars on personal mythology, dreams, hypnosis, and/or anomalous phenomena in Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Colombia, Cuba, Cyprus, Ecuador, Finland, France, Germany, Great Britain, Italy, Japan, Mexico, the Netherlands, Panama, the Philippines, Portugal, Puerto Rico, Russia, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, Venezuela, and at several congresses of the Interamerican Psychological Association. He is a member of the advisory board for the International School for Psychotherapy, Counseling, and Group Leadership (St. Petersburg) and has given invited addresses for the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the Russian Academy of Pedagogical Sciences, and the Artigas Foreign Service Institute in Montevideo, Uruguay.
In 2002, making his ninth trip to Russia to attend the Tenth Annual international Conference on Conflict Resolution, Dr. Krippner spoke on children’s nightmares as a sequelae to wartime trauma. This is one of several topics dealt with in his book The Psychological Effects of War on Civilians: An International Perspective, co-edited with Teresa Mcintyre. The Special Collections at the Kent State University Library houses Dr. Krippner’s archives, over one thousand books, monographs, articles, chapters, and book reviews in English and a dozen non-English languages.
Dr. Stan Krippner was influential at th beginning of the MRU saga through his mutual relationship between Ostrander and Schroeder and Dr. Carl Schleicher. Some say he secured the translations of large portions of the Soviet research, acquired the schematics for Kirlian photography, and generally supported other MRU players in a variety of ways, including publication in his popular parapsychology books, among the first of their genre of infotainment. This psychologist and professor of psychology is still (2007) an executive faculty member of the Saybrook Graduate School in the Bay Area. He was honored by the establishment of an interdisciplinary chair for the study of consciousness.Prior to this, he was director of the Kent State University Child Study Center, Kent OH, and the Maimonides Medical Center Dream Research Laboratory, Brooklyn NY.
Dr. Krippner appears as a speaker at many conferences, festivals, and cultural events, including the recent 100th birthday of Albert Hoffman (2006). He has spent decades investigating the field of human consciousness, conducting research in such areas as dreams, hypnosis, shamanism, and disassociation, often from a cross-cultural perspective, with an emphasis on anomalous phenomena that question mainstream paradigms. By "pushing the envelope" of orthodox models he has provided new models of individual and group experience, often classified as pathological, but actually representing different worldviews, paradigms, belief systems, and mythologies
At Saybrook, Krippner designed many of the courses in the consciousness/spirituality concentration. He has supervised dissertation research projects for dozens of students. He holds faculty appointments at the Universidade Holistica Internacional (Brasilia) and the instituto de Medicina y Tecnologia Avanzada de la Conducta (Ciudad Juarez, Mexico) where he helped create the certificate programs in human sexuality and in rational-emotive behavior therapy.
Stanley Curtis Krippner (1932-)
Psychologist and writer on parapsychology. Krippner was born on October 4, 1932, at Edgerton, Wisconsin. He studied at the University of Wisconsin (B.S., 1954) and Northwestern University (M.A., 1957; Ph.D., 1961). After completing his education he became the director of the Child Study Center at Kent State University in Ohio. Such interests were reinforced by contacts with parapsychologists J. B. Rhine and Gardner Murphy during his undergraduate and graduate years. While at Kent Krippner visited Rhine at Duke University and began to conduct parapsychological experiments with the children with whom he was working.
An internationally known humanistic psychologist, Krippner has explored dreams, altered states of consciousness, and paranormal phenomena for many years. His interest in such things began as a teenager on a Wisconsin farm: "When I was about 14 years of age, I had a very dramatic sense of my uncle's death at the very time that my parents received a phone call announcing his death. The effect of that was quite electrifying. Also I was an avid science fiction reader and an amateur magician, and all of these interests coalesced."
In 1964 Krippner left his position at Kent State University to become director of the Dream Laboratory at Maimonides Medical Center in Brooklyn, New York. With Montague Ullman and, later, Charles Honorton, Krippner spent ten years in a systematic exploration of dreams, including in dreams and other altered states of consciousness. Interest in consciousness studies in the early 1970s led him to explore psychedelic drugs, yoga, meditation, and other means of altering consciousness.
He also established contact and nurtured relationships with European colleagues, and in 1973 he became the first parapsychologist to become vice president for the Western Hemisphere of the International Psychotronic Research Association. He chaired sessions of the Psychotronic Congress in Czechoslovakia in 1973 and in Monte Carlo in 1975 and became editor of the international journal Psychoenergetic Systems.
In 1973 Krippner became a faculty member of the Institute for Humanistic Psychology and more recently the director of the Center for Consciousness Studies at Saybrook Institute in San Francisco. Krippner has been recognized as one of the most outstanding leaders in the parapsychological field. In 1973 he became president of the Parapsychological Association and the following year began a tenure as president of the Association for Humanistic Psychology. He also serves as editor-in-chief of Advances in Parapsychological Research: A Biennial Review. He has written extensively on parapsychology and related consciousness and psychological subjects.
Sources:
Berger, Arthur S., and Joyce Berger. The Encyclopedia of Parapsychology and Psychical Research. New York: Paragon House, 1991.
Krippner, Stanley. Dreamworking: How to Use Your Dreams for Creative Problem Solving. Buffalo, N.Y.: Bearly Ltd., 1988.
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The Epistemology and Technologies of Shamanic States of Consciousness
Stanley Krippner, Ph.D., Saybrook Graduate School
ABSTRACT: Shamanism can be described as a group of techniques by which its practitioners enter the "spirit world," purportedly obtaining information that is used to help and to heal members of their social group. The shamans' epistemology, or ways on knowing, depended on deliberately altering their conscious state and/or heightening their perception to contact spiritual entities in "upper worlds," "lower worlds," and "middle earth" (i.e., ordinary reality). For the shaman, the totality of inner and outer reality was fundamentally an immense signal system, and shamanic states of consciousness were the first steps toward deciphering this signal system. Homo sapiens sapiens was probably unique among early humans in the ability to symbolize, mythologize, and, eventually, to shamanize. This species' eventual domination may have been due to its ability to take sensorimotor activity and use it as a bridge to produce narratives that facilitated human survival. Shamanic technologies, essential for the production and performance of myths and other narratives, interacted with shamanic epistemology, reinforcing its basic assumptions about reality.
Co-author
Editor
Co-editor
Stanley Krippner
Saybrook Graduate School and Research Center
Allan Combs
Department of Psychology CPO #1960
University of North Carolina at Asheville
Self-Organization in the Dreaming Brain
Abstract
This paper approaches dreaming consciousness through an examination of the self-organizing properties of the sleeping brain.
This view offers a step towards reconciliation between brain-based and content-based attempts to understand the nature of dreaming. Here it is argued that the brain can be understood as a complex self-organizing system that in dreaming responds to subtle influences such as residual feelings and memories. The hyper-responsiveness of the brain during dreaming is viewed in terms of the tendency of complex chaotic-like systems to respond to small variations in initial conditions (the butterfly effect) and to the amplification of subtle emotional and cognitive signals through the mechanism of stochastic resonance, all in combination with psychophysiological changes in the brain during both slow wave sleep and REM sleep dreaming. Such changes include the active inhibition of extroceptive stimulation and, especially in REM sleep, alterations in the brain’s dominant neuromodulatory systems, bombardment of the visual cortex with bursts of PGO activity, increases in limbic system activity, and a reduction of activity in the prefrontal regions.
Key words: brain, consciousness, dream, self-organization, REM sleep
Sleep affords the opportunity, within certain limits, for the brain to act of itself, and dreams are the result. Edward Clarke, A Study of False Sight; 1878
There have been a variety of recent theoretical approaches to the process of dreaming. These have emphasized the cognitive aspects of dreaming (e.g., Bosinelli, 1995; Foulkes, 1985, 1999; Moffitt, 1995), the underlying psychophysiological processes (e.g., Hobson and McCarley, 1977; Hobson, Pace-Schott, and Stickgold, 2000), the neurological substrate (Jouvet, 1999) combined with psychoanalytical considerations (Solms, 1997, 1999; Ullman, 1999), as well as connectionist (Globus, 1989; Hartmann, 1999) and neural network (e.g., Antrobus, 1990, 1991; Crick and Michison, 1986; Fookson and Antrobus, 1992) models for understanding the dreaming brain. The present paper combines the psychophysiological approach with the connectionist and neural network models, leading to considerations about the cognitive structure of dreams. It views the dreaming brain in terms of dynamical neurological processes that are most accurately described as chaotic (e.g., Arden, 1996; Screenivason, Pradhan, and Rapp, 1999).
Dreaming in REM Sleep
Much research on the dreaming brain pertains specifically to REM sleep. There are two reasons for this. The first is the misconception that dreams occur only in this state. The second is that since awakenings from REM sleep are more likely to be associated with dream recall, as much as ten times more likely according to Foulkes (1962) REM itself has become a widely accepted signal that dreaming is taking place. Thus, in laboratory and clinical settings there is often an ipso facto association between REM sleep and dreaming.
The reason why dreams occur more frequently during REM sleep is not well understood, but it is evident that during the REM state the brain is especially disposed to dreaming. For one thing, however, the brain actively inhibits extroceptive sensory input during REM sleep, and also blocks motor output from the higher centers of the brain (Mountcastle, 1974). Only those motor commands that are sent to the extremities, that is, to the fingers and toes, ordinarily get through, as do those sent to the eyes. The latter results in the rapid eye movements for which REM sleep was named. There is no question that REMs occasionally follow dream gazes (Herman, 1992), though it is doubtful that they usually do (but see Antrobus, 1990). In fact, their presence is highly correlated with bursts (or "waves") of large and seemingly randomly timed “spikes” of neuronal activity which originate in the pons of the lower brainstem and travel upward to the lateral geniculate bodies, from where they proceed on to the primary visual cortex.
These pontine-geniculate-occipital (PGO) waves play an important role in the widely respected activation-synthesis hypothesis, originally proposed by Allan Hobson and his research group in 1977 (e.g., Hobson and McCarley, 1977). It stated that the arrival of this irregular PGO activity at the occipital lobe serves as a powerful unstructured stimulus in which the sleeping brain seeks meaning, finding it in the creation of the images that we experience as dreams. Since its original publication Hobson’s theory has undergone a series of revisions (Hobson, Pace-Schott, Stickgold, and Kahn, 1998; Kahn, Pace-Schott, and Hobson, 1997).
The theory has retained its original form while honing its physiological accuracy and expanding its reach toward a general theory of conscious states and the brain. The present form of the theory is abbreviated as AIM, referring to the activation level of the brain in wakefulness, REM, and NREM sleep, the source of the information that the brain processes (external or internal), and the chemical modulation (aminergic or cholinergic) of the brain (Hobson, Pace-Schott, and Stickgold, 2000).
Hobson’s theory has in its favor that the timing of PGO waves is irregular, and globally (though not precisely) correlated with REM activity. It also helps put into perspective the fact that animals compensate for lost PGO activity to a greater degree than they do for lost REM time (Dement, Ferguson, Cohn, and Barchas, 1969). And at least one "primitive" mammal, the echidna (spiny anteater), exhibits periods of PGO activity in the brainstem during sleep while showing no REM whatsoever (Finkbeiner, 1998).
The theory is not, however, without difficulties. From a physiological point of view, it elevates diffuse cortical stimulation from the brainstem to the status of optical sensory input (Vogel, 1978). This inconsistency is especially problematic if Foulkes’ (1999) contention turns out to be true that infants who exhibit a great deal of REM sleep, in fact hardly dream at all (but see Hobson, Pace-Schott, and Stickgold, 2000, for a considered counter-argument). From the psychological point of view Hobson’s approach puts dream activity under the control of seemingly random PGO bombardment arising from the oldest and lowest levels of the brain.
Hobson, however, has not pursued a relentless reductionism. In 1993 he and his colleague David Kahn published an exploration of the idea that dream experiences are in part a product of self-organizing tendencies in the brain during REM sleep (Kahn and Hobson, 1993). This paper moved beyond the notion of dreams as random brain events, but did not yet articulate the actual formative processes that might underlie dreaming. Recently the present authors have worked with Kahn to develop a more detailed understanding of the brain’s dream process, one that spans the traditional chasm between the neurobiology of dreaming and the study of the content of dreams (Kahn, Combs, and Krippner, 1998).
The Self-Organized Brain in REM Dreaming
The basic idea in Kahn, Combs, and Krippner’s papers is that the dreaming brain “relaxes” into natural patterns of self-organized activity, which often reflect the residual moods, stresses, and concerns of waking life. To understand this, recall that during dreaming the brain is immersed in something like a sensory isolation tank and cut off from the influences of external sensory input. In this situation patterns of brain activity can relax into forms that are dependent primarily upon internal conditions (e.g., Antrobus, 1990). Consider, for instance, what happens when sand is dropped onto a vibrating surface like a drumhead or orchestral symbol. It dances about forming complex patterns characteristic of the physical dynamics of the vibrating surface beneath. Such patterns have been used to study the resonance properties of instruments such as violins.
In our view, the patterns of activity that unfold over time in the dreaming brain are experienced as the narratives, which play themselves out in dreams (Combs and Krippner, 1998). We suggest that while the conditions under which these patterns unfold are different than in the waking state, the fundamental principles that underlie their creation are the same. A beginning has been made in working these out for cognitive systems (Hardy, 1998; Kampis, 1991; Port and van Gelder, 1995; Tschacher and Dauwalder, 1999), for algorithmic systems (Goertzel, 1994, 2000), and in terms of the phenomenology of the mind (Combs, 1996, Combs and Krippner, 1998). The basic idea in each case concerns complex chaotic systems that contain multiple processes which interact with each other to create new processes. These in turn interact, and so on. Out of this complex soup of interactions emerge more or less stable configurations of processes that evolve in time.
There is considerable evidence to suggest that many brain processes might be understood in terms of such dynamics (Basar, 1990; Freeman and Barrie, 1994; Halaz, 1995; Jeong, Joung, and Kim, 1998; Pribram, 1995; Robertson and Combs, 1995; Screenivason, Pradhan, and Rapp, 1999). Of course, the evolving patterns of neuronal activity in the brain and the emerging contents of the dream need only have a formal relationship with each other. To go beyond this would bring us face to face with Chalmer’s (1995) “hard problem,” the difficulty in explaining the neurochemical basis for the qualia of consciousness. More to the point, we note that Haskell (1986) has convincingly argued that the appearance of seemingly random activity in the brain, as exemplified by PGO waves, does not preclude the operation of a systematic and fully functioning cognitive system. In the present paper we propose that the experiential elements of dreams, such as thoughts, perceptions, emotions, and memories, ride on underlying brain processes, which interact to elicit new experiential elements, and so one. During dreaming this process is both constrained and facilitated by the particular conditions of the dreaming brain.
Now, returning to the role played by PGO activity in the REM dreaming brain, we suggest that this activity sets the cortical system into motion and keeps it there. PGO discharges carry with them waves of powerful cholinergic stimulation to thecortex, keeping the brain on the move, and shaking it down again and again toward relaxed configurations. In line with this way of thinking, Mamelak and Hobson (1989) have suggested that PGO stimulation is tied to the high rate of narrative or plot shifts experienced during REM dreaming. Such shifts are significantly more frequent in REM dreaming than during dreaming reported from slow wave sleep (Cavallero, Cicogna, Natalie, Occhionero, and Zito, 1992; Foulkes, 1962), and may be essential to the “bizarreness” of REM dreams (Poret and Hobson, 1986).
One of the major contributions of Hobson and his group was the discovery that during REM sleep the brain shifts away from the widespread inhibition that characterizes waking activity because of the dominance of aminergic neurochemicals (serotonin and norepinepherine). With the onset of sleep the brain comes under the influence of the cholinergic neurochemical acetylcholine, which predisposes it to easy activation (Hobson, 1988, 1994).
In other words, activity in the REM dreaming brain is less viscous and more mercurial than in the waking brain, allowing it to move easily into residual patterns left by moods and concerns of waking life. Such fluidity would also enlarge the attractors through which brain activity flows, effectively allowing easier connections to be made between feelings, memories, and the products of the imagination, all of which is to say that dream experience is open to greater novelty than is waking experience. An idea similar to this is suggested by Hartmann (1999), who notes that during dreaming the neural networks that comprise the working circuitry of the brain seem less constrained by daytime reality and more open to novel connections. The extent of agreement between Hartmann’s approach and our own is witnessed by the fact that the formal analysis of activity patterns in complex neural networks such as those found in the brain are often carried out in terms of attractors.
Studies of Brain Activity During REM Sleep
Modern brain imaging studies are beginning to provide valuable insights into the nature of the REM sleeping brain. It turns out that one important aspect of REM sleep is a significant reduction in the activation of the prefrontal cortex (Braun, Balkin, Wesensten, Gwady, Carson, Varga, Baldwin, Belenky, and Herscovitch, 1998; Maquet, Peters, Aerts, Delfiore, Degueldre, Luxen, and Franck, 1996). This region of the brain is important for a number of higher mental abilities on which we rely during wakefulness. These include working memory, which is the ability to keep important facts in mind while carrying out a task. With a reduced working memory during dreaming it is not surprising that we find the abrupt transitions in plot and location less surprising during dreaming than we would in waking life. The idea of a state-specific amnesia for working memory during REM sleep is further supported by Hobson and his colleagues, who note that such amnesia is facilitated by a reduction of aminergic modulation in the brain by 50% in NREM sleep and nearly 100% in REM sleep (Hobson, 1988; Hobson and Steriade, 1986; Steriade and McCarley, 1990).
The prefrontal cortex also plays an important role in making plans for the future. People with damage to this area often seem listless and without direction, in part because they do not think about what lies ahead. In dreaming we likewise think little about the future, simply going along with the dream narrative without question (Hall and Van de Castle, 1966; Tonay, 1991). In this vein, there seems a significant attenuation of attention during dreaming (Hartmann, 1966), as well as a loss of self-reflection (Blagrove, 1996). In waking life the prefrontal lobe may also play an important role in maintaining a sense of self-identity, and particularly an ability for self-reflection. With these abilities “off-line” during dreaming (Blagrove, 1996) the dreamer has little
ability to reflect on the situation, or even notice the strangeness of events experienced.
Recently recorded images of the sleeping brain during REM show that in contrast to the prefrontal cortex, portions of the limbic system are highly active during REM sleep (Braun et al., 1998; Maquet et al., 1996). These structures are associated with emotion, which makes perfect sense given the fact that dreams are high in emotional content. The limbic system is far from well understood, however, and research continues to disclose new aspects of its operations. Carl Anderson (1998; Anderson and Mandell, 1996) at the Harvard Medical School, for instance, is currently exploring the idea that the right and left amygdaloid complexes of the limbic system are key structures for cataloging emotional memories, and that PGO activity shared between them in REM sleep helps balance the activation of such memories to keep the brain from getting stuck in particular attractor patterns such as depression or anxiety.
For interest’s sake we also mention that images of the sleeping brain during REM show increased activity in the anteriorcingulate cortex and the right parietal lobe, both associated with the regulation of attention (Braun et al., 1998). Contrary towhat would be expected from the original activation-synthesis hypothesis, there actually seems to be a lowered level of activity in the primary visual cortex of the occipital lobe compared to that seen during waking visual activity, but relatively robust activation of the adjacent (parastriate) regions. According to some researchers (Crick and Koch, 1995; Koch, 1998; Revonsuo, 1998) the latter are involved in the processing of visual images and are essential to the conscious experience of vision. Recently, Hobson has expanded his theory to include the importance of activity in the parastriate area in dream imagery (e.g., Hobson, Pace-Schott, and Stickgold, 2000).
REM and SWS Dreaming
At this point some accounting must be made of the fact that dream reports are often obtained following awakenings from NREM, or slow wave sleep (SWS). Though the likelihood of obtaining dream reports is lower for SWS than REM sleep, in fact such reports are associated with all stages of SWS (Foulkes, 1962). On the average they indicate less vividness and clarity of imagery (Antrobus, Hartwig, Rosa, Reisel, and Fein, 1987; Arkin, Antrobus, and Ellman, 1978) and fewer plot shifts (Cavallero et al., 1992; Foulkes, 1962) than REM associated reports, but the differences are usually small and not always reliable. Tracy and Tracy (1974), for example, reported dreams of high vividness from both light (stage 2) and deep (stage 4)SWS, casting doubt on the commonly held assumption that REM dreams are vivid because cortical activation is high during REM sleep. Interestingly, however, Hobson and his colleagues (Hobson, Pace-Schott, and Stickgold, 2000) as well as Nielsen (1999) have recently undertaken extensive re-analyses of REM and NREM dream studies reported throughout the literature, leading them to reaffirm the importance of differences in dream content between these two types of sleep. A thorough review of Hobson et al.’s analyses is beyond the scope of this article, but paramount among their considerations are concerns regarding memory deficiencies associated especially with REM sleep, and the statistical methods typically used to analyze dream reports.
The authors, for example, note that longer reports, with more words, often indicate greater bizarreness, though this fact is often obscured in their statistical treatment.
At the time of this writing, the issue of differences between REM and NREM dreaming is not settled. It would appear to the present writers, however, that differences do exist and that they are important. This means that, on average, the
characteristics of NREM dreams are somewhere between those of REM dreams and ordinary waking consciousness. Such a view still leaves unanswered the question why NREM dreams occur in the first place. The simplest answer would seem to be that NREM sleep is sufficiently similar to REM sleep to support dreaming, albeit dreaming that is more like waking mentation than is REM dreaming. This idea is consistent with the observation that a significant predictor of vividness is simply the level of energy metabolism in the cortex (Antrobus, 1991; Pivik, 1991).
Beyond this, it seems likely that the process of dream production is not centered in the brainstem, but in the forebrain. Solms (1999) has recently made such a suggestion, arguing that dreaming and REM sleep are distinct in terms of the brain processes that underlie them. He supports this contention with clinical studies that show no loss of dreaming following deep brainstem lesions (but see Hobson, Pace-Schott, and Stickgold, 2000), while dreaming is lost after certain cortical lesions even when brainstem initiated REM sleep is not disturbed (Solms, 1997).
In a similar vein, Foulkes (1999) argues that dreaming is characterized by high level cognitive processes and self-awareness. He maintains that this explains why dreams are rarely reported by infants or young children, though Hobson believes this to be an artifact of REM state amnesia (Hobson, Pace-Schott, and Stickgold, 2000).
The factors that could facilitate dreaming during SWS include a relaxation of waking constraints on cortical activity brought about during sleep by isolation from outside stimulation, the cessation of ordinary rational thought, and the sleep-associated neurochemical changes mentioned above. Such factors also include the presence of residual feelings and concerns from waking life.
All this must be animated by chaotic-like perturbation (see below) that allows cortical circuits to “relax” into the inherently comfortable but ever-changing attractor patterns that underlie the dream experience. Finally, some minimum level of arousal is necessary to sustain consciousness. It would seem from Tracy and Tracy’s (1974) findings, above, that this minimum level is lower than commonly thought.
We further note that during SWS higher brain functions are evidently isolated from external sensory input to a greater degree than is usually appreciated. This is evidenced, for example, by the general failure of sleep-learning studies to obtain positive results, even when using highly sensitive verbal priming techniques during light SWS (Wood, Bootzin, Kihlstrom, and Schacter, 1992). From this it would seem that the brain in SWS is sufficiently isolated from environmental stimulation to allow
This being the case, it would seem that the cortex is primed to flow from attractor to attractor even when not in REM sleep, though not as vigorouslyas when stimulated by PGO bombardment. Brain imaging studies need to be done that recognize the importance of SWS indreaming. Preliminary data, for instance, seems to indicate a complex relationship between REM and SWS in terms of frontallobe activation (Braun et al., 1998).
Hobson’s (1988, 1994) finding of neurochemical differences in the brain between REM, SWS, and wakefulness, suggests a greater elasticity in the REM dreaming than the waking brain, with SWS falling in between, as is consistent with dream content reports. It is not surprising, however, that REM dreams evidence greater emotional intensity than do those associated with SWS (Cavallero et al., 1992; Foulkes, 1992). As indicated above, brain imaging studies point to greater limbic system involvement in REM than in SWS sleep (Braun et al., 1998; Maquet et al., 1996), though specific comparisons of SWS dreaming and non-dream SWS, are not available.
All and all, it would seem that essentially the same dream facilitating factors are at play in SWS as in REM sleep. Nevertheless, the presence of PGO stimulation in the latter, along with greater limbic system involvement, as well as differences in neurochemical modulation and decreased frontal lobe activity, render the REM sleeping brain more favorable for dreaming. As suggested by Solms (1999), however, the best guess at this point is that dreaming and REM sleep are fundamentally oincidental.
Dream Content and Sensitivity to Subtle Influences
There are two important aspects of the behavior of complex systems such as the human brain during sleep that can make such systems sensitive to subtle influences. First, systems that reside in chaotic or near-chaotic states are subject to the butterfly effect (Kellert, 1993; Peak, 1994); very small alterations in the present state of a system can lead to surprisingly large variations in its future states. There seems little doubt that the human brain with its many chaotic and chaotic-like patterns of activity, is subject to the butterfly effect. Second, and more important, under certain circumstances the introduction of noise into such a system (chaotic or not) can cause the system to respond to signals too small to ordinarily be effected by them. Termed stochastic resonance, this seemingly paradoxical effect has been demonstrated in electronic circuits as well as in nerve cells (Moss and Wiesenfeld, 1995). It results from the fact that the presence of noise, or vibration, keeps the system in motion and following the signal, rather than allowing it to become stuck.
This is an active instance of the relaxing of a system that is exposed to vibration, as described above. For instance, objects on a vibrating tabletop are sometimes seen to “walk” about, especially if the table is not level. In fact, they are following the line of least resistance down the slope of the surface, ordinarily not available to them because of friction with the top of the table. Here, we might imagine that the arrival of PGO waves has a similar effect on the higher cortical regions of the brain during REM sleep, causing activity there to “slide” in the direction of least resistance.
In the dreaming brain, isolated from daytime sensory bombardment and detached by neuromodulatory amnesia fromthose experiences that immediately precede sleep, chaotic dynamics like the butterfly effect and stochastic resonance cause thebrain to become especially responsive to subtle influences such as faint residual memories or emotional residues. Writing of similar effects in connection networks, which indeed is a similar way to characterize dynamical systems such as the brain: Globus (1989) describes the following example, taken from Freud (1900/1953, p.169); Freud happens during the day to glance at a monograph on the plant Cyclamen in a bookstore window, a seeming indifferent impression that so commonly gets caught up in a dream. That night he dreams that he has written a monograph on a certain plant; the book lays open before him and at the moment he is turning over a folded cover plate.
(p.189)
Globus continues with this example, explaining that Cyclamen are Freud’s wife’s favorite flower (Freud reproaches himself for forgetting to buy her flowers), and beyond this, that he has himself once written a monograph on the coca plant, all of which places the momentary perception of the monograph on Cyclamen in a context of existing memories and feelings. The point, however, is that a fleeting perception, which leaves no deep impression, can later set off a chain of events in the dreaming rain though evidently to do so the perception must not occur immediately prior to sleep.
This example also points to the importance of feelings, even subtle feelings such as those elicited by the Freud’s association of the monograph with his wife’s favorite flower, and his wish to bring her flowers. As noted above, the importance of emotions in dreaming, especially REM sleep dreaming, is confirmed in the observations of heightened limbic system activity.
Given a dreaming brain that is amnesiac for short-term pre-sleep events, and at the same time responsive to subtle influences such as emotions and memories, it is not surprising that dream content frequently includes fragments of old memories and once-familiar feelings from the past (e.g., Domhoff, 1996; Hall and Van de Castle, 1966). In such a hyper-sensitive system other influences might occasionally be felt as well.
For example, Smith (1986) found among cardiac patients that the number of death references in men’s dreams, and separation references in women’s dreams, correlate with poor clinical outcomes, an
aspects of human experience.
Conclusion
Bringing the above ideas together, the intent of this paper is to take a credible first step toward a reconciliation of brain-based (“process”) and content-based (“interpretative” or meaning oriented) approaches to understanding dreaming. Our discussion is based on the premise that the dreaming brain is a complex self-organizing system. Such systems can exhibit multifaceted adaptive properties that are, broadly speaking, “cognitive” in nature (e.g., Varela, Thompson, and Rosch, 1991). These arise through the interactions of their constitutive processes (Combs, 1996; Combs and Krippner, 1998; Goertzel, 1994, 2000; Kampis, 1991; Kauffman, 1993). In the case of the dreaming brain, these processes represent emotional, sensory, mnemonic, and other aspects of brain activity. Their ongoing readout into consciousness is the narrative experience of the dream.
Note, however, that we are not suggesting that a sufficient knowledge of such processes and their interactions would yield an explanation of the meaning of a particular dream in an individual’s conscious experience, or in the context of his or her life, at least not in the foreseeable future. Even if the regularities that underlie the neurological events of dreaming become well understood, they may still look quite different than those that best characterize the experiential aspects of dreaming (e.g., Haskell, 1986), which in turn set the stage for a dream’s meaning in the context of an individual’s life. Finding the precise relationships that connect the neurological to the experiential levels of dreaming is future work for cognitive neuropsychology.
Our aim here is to lay a foundation for this work by making explicit some of the important ways in which the dreaming brain engages in complex self-organizing processes which, far from random, are more than adequate in their regularity and complexity to support, at the level of consciousness, the experiential dream narratives that are the basis of interpretative approaches to dreaming.
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BOOKS by Stanley Krippner
Publications
Author:
Human Possibilities: Mind Research in the USSR and Eastern Europe. Garden City, NY: Anchor Books, 1980.
Song of the Siren: A Parapsychological Odyssey. New York: Harper & Row, 1976.
The Tragicall Historie of Shamlet: Prince of Denmark (A Literary Parody). New York: Exposition Press, 1971.
Co-Author:
Personal Mythology: Using Ritual, Dreams, and Imagination to Discover Your Inner Story, 3rd ed. (with David Feinstein). Santa Rosa, CA: Energy Psychology Press/Elite Books, 2008.
Haunted By Combat: Understanding PTSD in War Veterans Including Women, Reservists, and Those Coming Back from Iraq (with Daryl S. Paulson). Westport, CT: Praeger, 2007.
The Mythic Path (with David Feinstein), 3rd ed. Santa Rosa, CA: Elite Books, 2006.
Becoming Psychic: Spiritual Lessons for Focusing Your Hidden Abilities (with Stephen Kierulff). Franklin Lakes, NJ: Career Press, 2004.
Dream Telepathy: Experiments in Nocturnal ESP (with Montague Ullman and Alan Vaughan),
3rd ed. Charlottesville, VA: Hampton Roads, 2002.
Extraordinary Dreams and How to Work with Them (with Fariba Bogzaran and André Percia de Carvalho). Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 2002.
Sonhos Exoticos: Como Utilizar o Significado dos Seus Sonhos (with André Percia de Carvalho). Sao Paulo, Brazil: Summus Editorial, 1998.
The Mythic Path (with David Feinstein). New York: Jeremy P. Tarcher/Putnam, 1997.
A Psychiatrist in Paradise: Treating Mental Illness in Bali (with Denny Thong and Bruce Carpenter). Bangkok, Thailand: White Lotus Press, 1993.
Spiritual Dimensions of Healing: From Tribal Shamanism to Contemporary Health Care (with Patrick Welch). New York: Irvington Publishers, 1992.
Dream Telepathy: Experiments in Nocturnal ESP (with Montague Ullman and Alan Vaughan), 2nd ed. Jefferson, NC: McFarland Publishers, 1989.
Personal Mythology: The Psychology of Your Evolving Self (with David Feinstein). Los Angeles: Jeremy P. Tarcher, 1988.
Dreamworking: How to Use Your Dreams for Creative Problem-Solving (with Joseph Dillard). Buffalo, NY: Bearly Ltd., 1988.
Zwischen Himmel und Erde: Spirituelles Heilen der Schamanen, Hexen, Priester und Medien (with Patrick Scott). Dussilgen, Germany: Chiron Verlag, 1987.
Healing States (with Alberto Villoldo). New York: Fireside Books/Simon & Schuster, 1987.
La Science et les Pouvoirs Psychiques de l'Homme (with Jerry Solfvin). Paris: Sand, 1986.
The Realms of Healing (with Alberto Villoldo). Millbrae, CA: Celestial Arts Press, 1976; rev. ed., 1977; 3rd ed., 1986.
Dream Telepathy: Experiments in Nocturnal ESP (with Montague Ullman and Alan Vaughan). New York: Macmillan, 1974.
Editor:
Dreamtime and Dreamwork: Decoding the Language of the Night. Los Angeles: Jeremy P. Tarcher, 1990.
Advances in Parapsychological Research, Vols. 4, 5, 6, 7, 8. Jefferson, NC: McFarland Publishing, 1984, 1987, 1990, 1994, 1997.
Advances in Parapsychological Research, Vols. 1, 2, 3. New York: Plenum Press, 1977, 1978, 1982.
Psychoenergetic Systems: The Interface of Consciousness, Energy and Matter. New York: Gordon & Breach, 1979.
Co-Editor:
Healing Tales: The Narrative Arts in Spiritual Traditions (with Michael Bova, Leslie Gray, and Adam Kay). Charlottesville, VA: Puente, 2007.
Healing Stories: The Use of Narrative in Counseling and Psychotherapy (with Michael Bova and Leslie Gray). Charlottesville, VA: Puente, 2007.
The Psychological Impact of War Trauma on Civilians: An International Perspective (with Teresa M. McIntyre). Westport, CT: Praeger, 2003.
Varieties of Anomalous Experience: Examining the Scientific Evidence (with Etzel Cardeña and Steven J. Lynn). Washington, DC: American Psychological Association, 2000.
Mythology, Medicine, and Healing: Transcultural Perspectives. Yearbook of Cross-Cultural Medicine and Psychotherapy, 1998-1999 (with Holger Kalweit). Berlin: Verlag fur Wissenchaft und Bildung, 2000.
Dreamscaping: New and Creative Ways to Work with Your Dreams (with Mark Waldman). Los Angeles: Lowell House, 1999.
Broken Images, Broken Selves: Dissociative Narratives in Clinical Practice (with Susan Powers). New York: Brunner/Mazel, 1997.
Future Science: Life Energies and the Physics of Paranormal Phenomena (with John White). Garden City, NY: Anchor Books, 1977.
The Energies of Consciousness: Explorations in Acupuncture, Auras, and Kirlian Photography (with Daniel Rubin). New York: Gordon & Breach, 1975.
The Kirlian Aura: Photographing the Galaxies of Life (with Daniel Rubin). Garden City, NY: Anchor Books, 1974.
Galaxies of Life: The Human Aura in Acupuncture and Kirlian Photography (with Daniel Rubin). Gordon & Breach, 1973.
Author or co-author of over 1,000 articles, chapters, and book reviews appearing in scholarly or academic publications.
Bio - http://www.neuroquantology.com/index.php/journal/article/viewFile/408/407
Stanley Krippner is internationally known for his pioneering work in the scientific investigation of human consciousness, especially such areas as creativity, parapsychological phenomena and altered states of consciousness. Prior to joining the Saybrook faculty in 1972, Dr. Krippner directed the Dream Laboratory at Maimonides Medical Center in New York and was Director of the Child Study Center at Kent State University. He has served as President of the Association for Humanistic Psychology, the Parapsychological Association and the Association for the Study of Dreams. He is also a Charter Member of the International Society for the Study of Dissociation and is a Fellow of the American Psychological Association, the Society for the Scientific Study of Sex, the American Psychological Society, the American Society of Clinical Hypnosis and the Society for the Scientific Study of Religion.
Dr. Krippner received a Ph.D. in Educational Psychology from Northwestern University. He has written over 500 articles and several books, including: Human Possibilities, Song of the Siren, Dream Telepathy (co-author), The Realms of Healing (co-author), Spiritual Dimensions of Healing (co-author), Personal Mythology (co-author), Healing States (co-author), Dreamworking (co-author), A Psychiatrist in Paradise (co-editor), Dreamtime and Dreamwork (Ed.) and Advances in Parapsychological Research (Ed.).
Dr. Krippner's diverse academic interests include clinical, educational and health issues. At Saybrook, he is responsible for developing and teaching courses in the area of consciousness studies.
Author:
Human Possibilities: Mind Research in the USSR and Eastern Europe. Garden City, NY: Anchor Books, 1980.
Song of the Siren: A Parapsychological Odyssey. New York: Harper & Row, 1976.
Shamlet: The Tragicall Historie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark New York: Exposition Press, 1971.
Co-Author:
The Mythic Path (with David Feinstein). New York: Jeremy P. Tarcher/Putnam, 1997.
A Psychiatrist in Paradise: Treating Mental Illness in Bali (with Denny Thong and Bruce Carpenter). Bangkok, Thailand: White Lotus Press, 1993.
Spiritual Dimensions of Healing: From Tribal Shamanism to Contemporary Health Care (with Patrick Welch). New York: Irvington Publishers, 1992.
Dream Telepathy: Experiments in Nocturnal ESP (with Montague Ullman and Alan Vaughan), 2nd ed. Jefferson, NC: McFarland Publishers, 1989.
Personal Mythology: The Psychology of Your Evolving Self (with David Feinstein). Los Angeles: Jeremy P. Tarcher, 1988.
Dreamworking: How to Use Your Dreams for Creative Problem-Solving (with Joseph Dillard). Buffalo, NY: Bearly Ltd., 1988.
Zwischen Himmel und Erde: Spirituelles Heilen der Schamanen, Hexen, Priester und Medien (with Patrick Scott). Dussilgen, Germany: Chiron Verlag, 1987.
Healing States (with Alberto Villoldo). New York: Fireside Books/Simon & Schuster, 1987.
La Science et les Pouvoirs Psychiques de l'Homme (with Jerry Solfvin). Paris: Sand, 1986.
The Realms of Healing (with Alberto Villoldo). Millbrae, CA: Celestial Arts Press, 1976, rev. ed., 1977, 3rd ed., 1986.
Dream Telepathy: Experiments in Nocturnal ESP (with Montague Ullman and Alan Vaughan). New York: Macmillan, 1974.
Editor:
Dreamtime and Dreamwork: Decoding the Language of the Night. Los Angeles: Jeremy P. Tarcher, 1990.
Advances in Parapsychological Research, Vols. 4, 5, 6, 7, 8. Jefferson, NC: McFarland Publishing, 1987, 1990, 1994, 1997.
Advances in Parapsychological Research, Vols. 1, 2, 3. New York: Plenum Press, 1977, 1978, 1982.
Psychoenergetic Systems: The Interface of Consciousness, Energy and Matter. New York: Gordon & Breach, 1979.
Co-Editor:
Varieties of Anomalous Experience: Examining the Scientific Evidence (with Etzel Cardena and Steven J. Lynn). Washington, DC: American Psychological Association, 2000.
Broken Images, Broken Selves: Dissociative Narratives in Clinical Practice (with Susan Powers). New York: Brunner/Mazel, 1997.
Future Science: Life Energies and the Physics of Paranormal Phenomena (with John White). Garden City, NY: Anchor Books, 1977.
The Energies of Consciousness: Explorations in Acupuncture, Auras, and Kirlian Photography (with Daniel Rubin). New York: Gordon & Breach, 1975.
The Kirlian Aura: Photographing the Galaxies of Life (with Daniel Rubin). Garden City, NY: Anchor Books, 1974.
Galaxies of Life: The Human Aura in Acupuncture and Kirlian Photography (with Daniel Rubin). Gordon & Breach, 1973.
Author or co-author of over 900 articles, chapters, and book reviews appearing in scholarly or academic publications.
Stanley Krippner, Ph.D.
Stan Krippner first caught the public imagination with the publication of his groundbreaking work DREAM TELEPATHY, Experiments in Nocturnal ESP (1973). He went on to do equally innovative holistic research in shamanism, consciousness, healing, creativity, extraordinary human potential, and human sexuality. This pioneer of parapsychology has traveled to every shamanic corner of the globe, mentored many, including myself, and brought the mystifying world back into the arena of general psychology, rather than a marginalized specialty.
Stan and I served together on the Asklepia Board
<http://www.asklepia.org/index.html>, and spoke together for the first Chaos Conference, 1992, but our acquaintance goes back decades. He published Rick Miller's HOLOGRAPHIC CONCEPT OF REALITY. This paper was presented at the First International Congress of Psychotronics, Prague, 1973. First printing was in the journal Psychoenergetic Systems, ed. Stanley Krippner, Vol.1, 1975. 55-62. Gordon & Breach Science Publishers Ltd., Great Britain. Reprinted in the book PSYCHOENERGETIC SYSTEMS, S. Krippner, editor. c1979. 231-237. Gordon & Breach, New York, London, Paris.
Stanley Krippner, Ph.D., is professor of psychology at Saybrook Graduate School in San Francisco where he designed many of the courses in the consciousness/spirituality concentration. At Saybrook, he has supervised dissertation research projects for dozens of students. He holds faculty appointments at the Universidade Holistica Internacional (Brasilia) and the instituto de Medicina y Tecnologia Avanzada de la Conducta (Ciudad Juarez, Mexico) where he helped create the certificate programs in human sexuality and in rational-emotive behavior therapy.
Over the years, Dr. Krippner has conducted workshops and seminars on personal mythology, dreams, hypnosis, and/or anomalous phenomena in Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Colombia, Cuba, Cyprus, Ecuador, Finland, France, Germany, Great Britain, Italy, Japan, Mexico, the Netherlands, Panama, the Philippines, Portugal, Puerto Rico, Russia, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, Venezuela, and at several congresses of the Interamerican Psychological Association. He is a member of the advisory board for the International School for Psychotherapy, Counseling, and Group Leadership (St. Petersburg) and has given invited addresses for the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the Russian Academy of Pedagogical Sciences, and the Artigas Foreign Service Institute in Montevideo, Uruguay.
In 2002, making his ninth trip to Russia to attend the Tenth Annual international Conference on Conflict Resolution, Dr. Krippner spoke on children’s nightmares as a sequelae to wartime trauma. This is one of several topics dealt with in his book The Psychological Effects of War on Civilians: An International Perspective, co-edited with Teresa Mcintyre. The Special Collections at the Kent State University Library houses Dr. Krippner’s archives, over one thousand books, monographs, articles, chapters, and book reviews in English and a dozen non-English languages.
Dr. Stan Krippner was influential at th beginning of the MRU saga through his mutual relationship between Ostrander and Schroeder and Dr. Carl Schleicher. Some say he secured the translations of large portions of the Soviet research, acquired the schematics for Kirlian photography, and generally supported other MRU players in a variety of ways, including publication in his popular parapsychology books, among the first of their genre of infotainment. This psychologist and professor of psychology is still (2007) an executive faculty member of the Saybrook Graduate School in the Bay Area. He was honored by the establishment of an interdisciplinary chair for the study of consciousness.Prior to this, he was director of the Kent State University Child Study Center, Kent OH, and the Maimonides Medical Center Dream Research Laboratory, Brooklyn NY.
Dr. Krippner appears as a speaker at many conferences, festivals, and cultural events, including the recent 100th birthday of Albert Hoffman (2006). He has spent decades investigating the field of human consciousness, conducting research in such areas as dreams, hypnosis, shamanism, and disassociation, often from a cross-cultural perspective, with an emphasis on anomalous phenomena that question mainstream paradigms. By "pushing the envelope" of orthodox models he has provided new models of individual and group experience, often classified as pathological, but actually representing different worldviews, paradigms, belief systems, and mythologies
At Saybrook, Krippner designed many of the courses in the consciousness/spirituality concentration. He has supervised dissertation research projects for dozens of students. He holds faculty appointments at the Universidade Holistica Internacional (Brasilia) and the instituto de Medicina y Tecnologia Avanzada de la Conducta (Ciudad Juarez, Mexico) where he helped create the certificate programs in human sexuality and in rational-emotive behavior therapy.
Stanley Curtis Krippner (1932-)
Psychologist and writer on parapsychology. Krippner was born on October 4, 1932, at Edgerton, Wisconsin. He studied at the University of Wisconsin (B.S., 1954) and Northwestern University (M.A., 1957; Ph.D., 1961). After completing his education he became the director of the Child Study Center at Kent State University in Ohio. Such interests were reinforced by contacts with parapsychologists J. B. Rhine and Gardner Murphy during his undergraduate and graduate years. While at Kent Krippner visited Rhine at Duke University and began to conduct parapsychological experiments with the children with whom he was working.
An internationally known humanistic psychologist, Krippner has explored dreams, altered states of consciousness, and paranormal phenomena for many years. His interest in such things began as a teenager on a Wisconsin farm: "When I was about 14 years of age, I had a very dramatic sense of my uncle's death at the very time that my parents received a phone call announcing his death. The effect of that was quite electrifying. Also I was an avid science fiction reader and an amateur magician, and all of these interests coalesced."
In 1964 Krippner left his position at Kent State University to become director of the Dream Laboratory at Maimonides Medical Center in Brooklyn, New York. With Montague Ullman and, later, Charles Honorton, Krippner spent ten years in a systematic exploration of dreams, including in dreams and other altered states of consciousness. Interest in consciousness studies in the early 1970s led him to explore psychedelic drugs, yoga, meditation, and other means of altering consciousness.
He also established contact and nurtured relationships with European colleagues, and in 1973 he became the first parapsychologist to become vice president for the Western Hemisphere of the International Psychotronic Research Association. He chaired sessions of the Psychotronic Congress in Czechoslovakia in 1973 and in Monte Carlo in 1975 and became editor of the international journal Psychoenergetic Systems.
In 1973 Krippner became a faculty member of the Institute for Humanistic Psychology and more recently the director of the Center for Consciousness Studies at Saybrook Institute in San Francisco. Krippner has been recognized as one of the most outstanding leaders in the parapsychological field. In 1973 he became president of the Parapsychological Association and the following year began a tenure as president of the Association for Humanistic Psychology. He also serves as editor-in-chief of Advances in Parapsychological Research: A Biennial Review. He has written extensively on parapsychology and related consciousness and psychological subjects.
Sources:
Berger, Arthur S., and Joyce Berger. The Encyclopedia of Parapsychology and Psychical Research. New York: Paragon House, 1991.
Krippner, Stanley. Dreamworking: How to Use Your Dreams for Creative Problem Solving. Buffalo, N.Y.: Bearly Ltd., 1988.
*******
The Epistemology and Technologies of Shamanic States of Consciousness
Stanley Krippner, Ph.D., Saybrook Graduate School
ABSTRACT: Shamanism can be described as a group of techniques by which its practitioners enter the "spirit world," purportedly obtaining information that is used to help and to heal members of their social group. The shamans' epistemology, or ways on knowing, depended on deliberately altering their conscious state and/or heightening their perception to contact spiritual entities in "upper worlds," "lower worlds," and "middle earth" (i.e., ordinary reality). For the shaman, the totality of inner and outer reality was fundamentally an immense signal system, and shamanic states of consciousness were the first steps toward deciphering this signal system. Homo sapiens sapiens was probably unique among early humans in the ability to symbolize, mythologize, and, eventually, to shamanize. This species' eventual domination may have been due to its ability to take sensorimotor activity and use it as a bridge to produce narratives that facilitated human survival. Shamanic technologies, essential for the production and performance of myths and other narratives, interacted with shamanic epistemology, reinforcing its basic assumptions about reality.
- 2004 - Becoming Psychic: Spiritual Lessons for Focusing Your Hidden Abilities (New Page Books) ISBN 1-56414-755-X
- 1980 - Human Possibilities: Mind Research in the USSR and Eastern Europe (Anchor/Doubleday Books) ISBN 0-385-12805-3
- 1976 - Song of the Siren: A Parapsychological Odyssey (Harper & Row) ISBN 0-06-064786-8
- 1971 - Shamlet: The Tragicall Historie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark (Exposition Press)
Co-author
- 1997 - The Mythic Path (with David Feinstein). (Jeremy P. Tarcher/Putnam) ISBN 0-87477-857-3
- 1993 - A Psychiatrist in Paradise: Treating Mental Illness in Bali (with Denny Thong and Bruce Carpenter) (White Lotus Press) ISBN 974-8495-77-9
- 1992 - Spiritual Dimensions of Healing: From Tribal Shamanism to Contemporary Health Care (with Patrick Welch) (Irvington Publishers) ISBN 0-8290-2462-X
- 1989 - Dream Telepathy: Experiments in Nocturnal ESP (with Montague Ullman and Alan Vaughan), 2nd ed. (McFarland Publishers) ISBN 1-57174-321-9
- 1988 - Personal Mythology: The Psychology of Your Evolving Self (with David Feinstein) (Jeremy P. Tarcher) ISBN 0-87477-483-7
- 1988 - Dreamworking: How to Use Your Dreams for Creative Problem-Solving (with Joseph Dillard). (Bearly Ltd.) ISBN 0-943456-25-8
- 1987 - Zwischen Himmel und Erde: Spirituelles Heilen der Schamanen, Hexen, Priester und Medien (with Patrick Scott) (Chiron Verlag)
- 1987 - Healing States (with Alberto Villoldo). (Fireside Books/Simon & Schuster) ISBN 0-671-63202-7
- 1986 - La Science et les Pouvoirs Psychiques de l'Homme (with Jerry Solfvin) (Sand)
- 1986 - The Realms of Healing (with Alberto Villoldo) (Celestial Arts Press) (rev. ed. 1977, 3rd ed. 1986) ISBN 0-89087-474-3
- 1974 - Dream Telepathy: Experiments in Nocturnal ESP (with Montague Ullman and Alan Vaughan). (Macmillan)
Editor
- 1990 - Dreamtime and Dreamwork: Decoding the Language of the Night (Jeremy P. Tarcher)
- Advances in Parapsychological Research Vols. 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 (McFarland Publishing) 1987, 1990, 1994, 1997.
- Advances in Parapsychological Research Vols. 1, 2, 3 (Plenum Press) 1977, 1978, 1982.
- 1979 - Psychoenergetic Systems: The Interface of Consciousness, Energy and Matter (Gordon & Breach)
Co-editor
- 2000 - Varieties of Anomalous Experience: Examining the Scientific Evidence (with Etzel Cardena and Steven J. Lynn). (American Psychological Association)
- 1997 - Broken Images, Broken Selves: Dissociative Narratives in Clinical Practice (with Susan Powers) (Brunner/Mazel)
- 1977 - Future Science: Life Energies and the Physics of Paranormal Phenomena (with John White) (Anchor Books)
- 1975 - The Energies of Consciousness: Explorations in Acupuncture, Auras, and Kirlian Photography (with Daniel Rubin). (Gordon & Breach)
- 1974 - The Kirlian Aura: Photographing the Galaxies of Life (with Daniel Rubin) (Anchor Books)
- 1973 - Galaxies of Life: The Human Aura in Acupuncture and Kirlian Photography (with Daniel Rubin) (Gordon & Breach)
Stanley Krippner
Saybrook Graduate School and Research Center
Allan Combs
Department of Psychology CPO #1960
University of North Carolina at Asheville
Self-Organization in the Dreaming Brain
Abstract
This paper approaches dreaming consciousness through an examination of the self-organizing properties of the sleeping brain.
This view offers a step towards reconciliation between brain-based and content-based attempts to understand the nature of dreaming. Here it is argued that the brain can be understood as a complex self-organizing system that in dreaming responds to subtle influences such as residual feelings and memories. The hyper-responsiveness of the brain during dreaming is viewed in terms of the tendency of complex chaotic-like systems to respond to small variations in initial conditions (the butterfly effect) and to the amplification of subtle emotional and cognitive signals through the mechanism of stochastic resonance, all in combination with psychophysiological changes in the brain during both slow wave sleep and REM sleep dreaming. Such changes include the active inhibition of extroceptive stimulation and, especially in REM sleep, alterations in the brain’s dominant neuromodulatory systems, bombardment of the visual cortex with bursts of PGO activity, increases in limbic system activity, and a reduction of activity in the prefrontal regions.
Key words: brain, consciousness, dream, self-organization, REM sleep
Sleep affords the opportunity, within certain limits, for the brain to act of itself, and dreams are the result. Edward Clarke, A Study of False Sight; 1878
There have been a variety of recent theoretical approaches to the process of dreaming. These have emphasized the cognitive aspects of dreaming (e.g., Bosinelli, 1995; Foulkes, 1985, 1999; Moffitt, 1995), the underlying psychophysiological processes (e.g., Hobson and McCarley, 1977; Hobson, Pace-Schott, and Stickgold, 2000), the neurological substrate (Jouvet, 1999) combined with psychoanalytical considerations (Solms, 1997, 1999; Ullman, 1999), as well as connectionist (Globus, 1989; Hartmann, 1999) and neural network (e.g., Antrobus, 1990, 1991; Crick and Michison, 1986; Fookson and Antrobus, 1992) models for understanding the dreaming brain. The present paper combines the psychophysiological approach with the connectionist and neural network models, leading to considerations about the cognitive structure of dreams. It views the dreaming brain in terms of dynamical neurological processes that are most accurately described as chaotic (e.g., Arden, 1996; Screenivason, Pradhan, and Rapp, 1999).
Dreaming in REM Sleep
Much research on the dreaming brain pertains specifically to REM sleep. There are two reasons for this. The first is the misconception that dreams occur only in this state. The second is that since awakenings from REM sleep are more likely to be associated with dream recall, as much as ten times more likely according to Foulkes (1962) REM itself has become a widely accepted signal that dreaming is taking place. Thus, in laboratory and clinical settings there is often an ipso facto association between REM sleep and dreaming.
The reason why dreams occur more frequently during REM sleep is not well understood, but it is evident that during the REM state the brain is especially disposed to dreaming. For one thing, however, the brain actively inhibits extroceptive sensory input during REM sleep, and also blocks motor output from the higher centers of the brain (Mountcastle, 1974). Only those motor commands that are sent to the extremities, that is, to the fingers and toes, ordinarily get through, as do those sent to the eyes. The latter results in the rapid eye movements for which REM sleep was named. There is no question that REMs occasionally follow dream gazes (Herman, 1992), though it is doubtful that they usually do (but see Antrobus, 1990). In fact, their presence is highly correlated with bursts (or "waves") of large and seemingly randomly timed “spikes” of neuronal activity which originate in the pons of the lower brainstem and travel upward to the lateral geniculate bodies, from where they proceed on to the primary visual cortex.
These pontine-geniculate-occipital (PGO) waves play an important role in the widely respected activation-synthesis hypothesis, originally proposed by Allan Hobson and his research group in 1977 (e.g., Hobson and McCarley, 1977). It stated that the arrival of this irregular PGO activity at the occipital lobe serves as a powerful unstructured stimulus in which the sleeping brain seeks meaning, finding it in the creation of the images that we experience as dreams. Since its original publication Hobson’s theory has undergone a series of revisions (Hobson, Pace-Schott, Stickgold, and Kahn, 1998; Kahn, Pace-Schott, and Hobson, 1997).
The theory has retained its original form while honing its physiological accuracy and expanding its reach toward a general theory of conscious states and the brain. The present form of the theory is abbreviated as AIM, referring to the activation level of the brain in wakefulness, REM, and NREM sleep, the source of the information that the brain processes (external or internal), and the chemical modulation (aminergic or cholinergic) of the brain (Hobson, Pace-Schott, and Stickgold, 2000).
Hobson’s theory has in its favor that the timing of PGO waves is irregular, and globally (though not precisely) correlated with REM activity. It also helps put into perspective the fact that animals compensate for lost PGO activity to a greater degree than they do for lost REM time (Dement, Ferguson, Cohn, and Barchas, 1969). And at least one "primitive" mammal, the echidna (spiny anteater), exhibits periods of PGO activity in the brainstem during sleep while showing no REM whatsoever (Finkbeiner, 1998).
The theory is not, however, without difficulties. From a physiological point of view, it elevates diffuse cortical stimulation from the brainstem to the status of optical sensory input (Vogel, 1978). This inconsistency is especially problematic if Foulkes’ (1999) contention turns out to be true that infants who exhibit a great deal of REM sleep, in fact hardly dream at all (but see Hobson, Pace-Schott, and Stickgold, 2000, for a considered counter-argument). From the psychological point of view Hobson’s approach puts dream activity under the control of seemingly random PGO bombardment arising from the oldest and lowest levels of the brain.
Hobson, however, has not pursued a relentless reductionism. In 1993 he and his colleague David Kahn published an exploration of the idea that dream experiences are in part a product of self-organizing tendencies in the brain during REM sleep (Kahn and Hobson, 1993). This paper moved beyond the notion of dreams as random brain events, but did not yet articulate the actual formative processes that might underlie dreaming. Recently the present authors have worked with Kahn to develop a more detailed understanding of the brain’s dream process, one that spans the traditional chasm between the neurobiology of dreaming and the study of the content of dreams (Kahn, Combs, and Krippner, 1998).
The Self-Organized Brain in REM Dreaming
The basic idea in Kahn, Combs, and Krippner’s papers is that the dreaming brain “relaxes” into natural patterns of self-organized activity, which often reflect the residual moods, stresses, and concerns of waking life. To understand this, recall that during dreaming the brain is immersed in something like a sensory isolation tank and cut off from the influences of external sensory input. In this situation patterns of brain activity can relax into forms that are dependent primarily upon internal conditions (e.g., Antrobus, 1990). Consider, for instance, what happens when sand is dropped onto a vibrating surface like a drumhead or orchestral symbol. It dances about forming complex patterns characteristic of the physical dynamics of the vibrating surface beneath. Such patterns have been used to study the resonance properties of instruments such as violins.
In our view, the patterns of activity that unfold over time in the dreaming brain are experienced as the narratives, which play themselves out in dreams (Combs and Krippner, 1998). We suggest that while the conditions under which these patterns unfold are different than in the waking state, the fundamental principles that underlie their creation are the same. A beginning has been made in working these out for cognitive systems (Hardy, 1998; Kampis, 1991; Port and van Gelder, 1995; Tschacher and Dauwalder, 1999), for algorithmic systems (Goertzel, 1994, 2000), and in terms of the phenomenology of the mind (Combs, 1996, Combs and Krippner, 1998). The basic idea in each case concerns complex chaotic systems that contain multiple processes which interact with each other to create new processes. These in turn interact, and so on. Out of this complex soup of interactions emerge more or less stable configurations of processes that evolve in time.
There is considerable evidence to suggest that many brain processes might be understood in terms of such dynamics (Basar, 1990; Freeman and Barrie, 1994; Halaz, 1995; Jeong, Joung, and Kim, 1998; Pribram, 1995; Robertson and Combs, 1995; Screenivason, Pradhan, and Rapp, 1999). Of course, the evolving patterns of neuronal activity in the brain and the emerging contents of the dream need only have a formal relationship with each other. To go beyond this would bring us face to face with Chalmer’s (1995) “hard problem,” the difficulty in explaining the neurochemical basis for the qualia of consciousness. More to the point, we note that Haskell (1986) has convincingly argued that the appearance of seemingly random activity in the brain, as exemplified by PGO waves, does not preclude the operation of a systematic and fully functioning cognitive system. In the present paper we propose that the experiential elements of dreams, such as thoughts, perceptions, emotions, and memories, ride on underlying brain processes, which interact to elicit new experiential elements, and so one. During dreaming this process is both constrained and facilitated by the particular conditions of the dreaming brain.
Now, returning to the role played by PGO activity in the REM dreaming brain, we suggest that this activity sets the cortical system into motion and keeps it there. PGO discharges carry with them waves of powerful cholinergic stimulation to thecortex, keeping the brain on the move, and shaking it down again and again toward relaxed configurations. In line with this way of thinking, Mamelak and Hobson (1989) have suggested that PGO stimulation is tied to the high rate of narrative or plot shifts experienced during REM dreaming. Such shifts are significantly more frequent in REM dreaming than during dreaming reported from slow wave sleep (Cavallero, Cicogna, Natalie, Occhionero, and Zito, 1992; Foulkes, 1962), and may be essential to the “bizarreness” of REM dreams (Poret and Hobson, 1986).
One of the major contributions of Hobson and his group was the discovery that during REM sleep the brain shifts away from the widespread inhibition that characterizes waking activity because of the dominance of aminergic neurochemicals (serotonin and norepinepherine). With the onset of sleep the brain comes under the influence of the cholinergic neurochemical acetylcholine, which predisposes it to easy activation (Hobson, 1988, 1994).
In other words, activity in the REM dreaming brain is less viscous and more mercurial than in the waking brain, allowing it to move easily into residual patterns left by moods and concerns of waking life. Such fluidity would also enlarge the attractors through which brain activity flows, effectively allowing easier connections to be made between feelings, memories, and the products of the imagination, all of which is to say that dream experience is open to greater novelty than is waking experience. An idea similar to this is suggested by Hartmann (1999), who notes that during dreaming the neural networks that comprise the working circuitry of the brain seem less constrained by daytime reality and more open to novel connections. The extent of agreement between Hartmann’s approach and our own is witnessed by the fact that the formal analysis of activity patterns in complex neural networks such as those found in the brain are often carried out in terms of attractors.
Studies of Brain Activity During REM Sleep
Modern brain imaging studies are beginning to provide valuable insights into the nature of the REM sleeping brain. It turns out that one important aspect of REM sleep is a significant reduction in the activation of the prefrontal cortex (Braun, Balkin, Wesensten, Gwady, Carson, Varga, Baldwin, Belenky, and Herscovitch, 1998; Maquet, Peters, Aerts, Delfiore, Degueldre, Luxen, and Franck, 1996). This region of the brain is important for a number of higher mental abilities on which we rely during wakefulness. These include working memory, which is the ability to keep important facts in mind while carrying out a task. With a reduced working memory during dreaming it is not surprising that we find the abrupt transitions in plot and location less surprising during dreaming than we would in waking life. The idea of a state-specific amnesia for working memory during REM sleep is further supported by Hobson and his colleagues, who note that such amnesia is facilitated by a reduction of aminergic modulation in the brain by 50% in NREM sleep and nearly 100% in REM sleep (Hobson, 1988; Hobson and Steriade, 1986; Steriade and McCarley, 1990).
The prefrontal cortex also plays an important role in making plans for the future. People with damage to this area often seem listless and without direction, in part because they do not think about what lies ahead. In dreaming we likewise think little about the future, simply going along with the dream narrative without question (Hall and Van de Castle, 1966; Tonay, 1991). In this vein, there seems a significant attenuation of attention during dreaming (Hartmann, 1966), as well as a loss of self-reflection (Blagrove, 1996). In waking life the prefrontal lobe may also play an important role in maintaining a sense of self-identity, and particularly an ability for self-reflection. With these abilities “off-line” during dreaming (Blagrove, 1996) the dreamer has little
ability to reflect on the situation, or even notice the strangeness of events experienced.
Recently recorded images of the sleeping brain during REM show that in contrast to the prefrontal cortex, portions of the limbic system are highly active during REM sleep (Braun et al., 1998; Maquet et al., 1996). These structures are associated with emotion, which makes perfect sense given the fact that dreams are high in emotional content. The limbic system is far from well understood, however, and research continues to disclose new aspects of its operations. Carl Anderson (1998; Anderson and Mandell, 1996) at the Harvard Medical School, for instance, is currently exploring the idea that the right and left amygdaloid complexes of the limbic system are key structures for cataloging emotional memories, and that PGO activity shared between them in REM sleep helps balance the activation of such memories to keep the brain from getting stuck in particular attractor patterns such as depression or anxiety.
For interest’s sake we also mention that images of the sleeping brain during REM show increased activity in the anteriorcingulate cortex and the right parietal lobe, both associated with the regulation of attention (Braun et al., 1998). Contrary towhat would be expected from the original activation-synthesis hypothesis, there actually seems to be a lowered level of activity in the primary visual cortex of the occipital lobe compared to that seen during waking visual activity, but relatively robust activation of the adjacent (parastriate) regions. According to some researchers (Crick and Koch, 1995; Koch, 1998; Revonsuo, 1998) the latter are involved in the processing of visual images and are essential to the conscious experience of vision. Recently, Hobson has expanded his theory to include the importance of activity in the parastriate area in dream imagery (e.g., Hobson, Pace-Schott, and Stickgold, 2000).
REM and SWS Dreaming
At this point some accounting must be made of the fact that dream reports are often obtained following awakenings from NREM, or slow wave sleep (SWS). Though the likelihood of obtaining dream reports is lower for SWS than REM sleep, in fact such reports are associated with all stages of SWS (Foulkes, 1962). On the average they indicate less vividness and clarity of imagery (Antrobus, Hartwig, Rosa, Reisel, and Fein, 1987; Arkin, Antrobus, and Ellman, 1978) and fewer plot shifts (Cavallero et al., 1992; Foulkes, 1962) than REM associated reports, but the differences are usually small and not always reliable. Tracy and Tracy (1974), for example, reported dreams of high vividness from both light (stage 2) and deep (stage 4)SWS, casting doubt on the commonly held assumption that REM dreams are vivid because cortical activation is high during REM sleep. Interestingly, however, Hobson and his colleagues (Hobson, Pace-Schott, and Stickgold, 2000) as well as Nielsen (1999) have recently undertaken extensive re-analyses of REM and NREM dream studies reported throughout the literature, leading them to reaffirm the importance of differences in dream content between these two types of sleep. A thorough review of Hobson et al.’s analyses is beyond the scope of this article, but paramount among their considerations are concerns regarding memory deficiencies associated especially with REM sleep, and the statistical methods typically used to analyze dream reports.
The authors, for example, note that longer reports, with more words, often indicate greater bizarreness, though this fact is often obscured in their statistical treatment.
At the time of this writing, the issue of differences between REM and NREM dreaming is not settled. It would appear to the present writers, however, that differences do exist and that they are important. This means that, on average, the
characteristics of NREM dreams are somewhere between those of REM dreams and ordinary waking consciousness. Such a view still leaves unanswered the question why NREM dreams occur in the first place. The simplest answer would seem to be that NREM sleep is sufficiently similar to REM sleep to support dreaming, albeit dreaming that is more like waking mentation than is REM dreaming. This idea is consistent with the observation that a significant predictor of vividness is simply the level of energy metabolism in the cortex (Antrobus, 1991; Pivik, 1991).
Beyond this, it seems likely that the process of dream production is not centered in the brainstem, but in the forebrain. Solms (1999) has recently made such a suggestion, arguing that dreaming and REM sleep are distinct in terms of the brain processes that underlie them. He supports this contention with clinical studies that show no loss of dreaming following deep brainstem lesions (but see Hobson, Pace-Schott, and Stickgold, 2000), while dreaming is lost after certain cortical lesions even when brainstem initiated REM sleep is not disturbed (Solms, 1997).
In a similar vein, Foulkes (1999) argues that dreaming is characterized by high level cognitive processes and self-awareness. He maintains that this explains why dreams are rarely reported by infants or young children, though Hobson believes this to be an artifact of REM state amnesia (Hobson, Pace-Schott, and Stickgold, 2000).
The factors that could facilitate dreaming during SWS include a relaxation of waking constraints on cortical activity brought about during sleep by isolation from outside stimulation, the cessation of ordinary rational thought, and the sleep-associated neurochemical changes mentioned above. Such factors also include the presence of residual feelings and concerns from waking life.
All this must be animated by chaotic-like perturbation (see below) that allows cortical circuits to “relax” into the inherently comfortable but ever-changing attractor patterns that underlie the dream experience. Finally, some minimum level of arousal is necessary to sustain consciousness. It would seem from Tracy and Tracy’s (1974) findings, above, that this minimum level is lower than commonly thought.
We further note that during SWS higher brain functions are evidently isolated from external sensory input to a greater degree than is usually appreciated. This is evidenced, for example, by the general failure of sleep-learning studies to obtain positive results, even when using highly sensitive verbal priming techniques during light SWS (Wood, Bootzin, Kihlstrom, and Schacter, 1992). From this it would seem that the brain in SWS is sufficiently isolated from environmental stimulation to allow
This being the case, it would seem that the cortex is primed to flow from attractor to attractor even when not in REM sleep, though not as vigorouslyas when stimulated by PGO bombardment. Brain imaging studies need to be done that recognize the importance of SWS indreaming. Preliminary data, for instance, seems to indicate a complex relationship between REM and SWS in terms of frontallobe activation (Braun et al., 1998).
Hobson’s (1988, 1994) finding of neurochemical differences in the brain between REM, SWS, and wakefulness, suggests a greater elasticity in the REM dreaming than the waking brain, with SWS falling in between, as is consistent with dream content reports. It is not surprising, however, that REM dreams evidence greater emotional intensity than do those associated with SWS (Cavallero et al., 1992; Foulkes, 1992). As indicated above, brain imaging studies point to greater limbic system involvement in REM than in SWS sleep (Braun et al., 1998; Maquet et al., 1996), though specific comparisons of SWS dreaming and non-dream SWS, are not available.
All and all, it would seem that essentially the same dream facilitating factors are at play in SWS as in REM sleep. Nevertheless, the presence of PGO stimulation in the latter, along with greater limbic system involvement, as well as differences in neurochemical modulation and decreased frontal lobe activity, render the REM sleeping brain more favorable for dreaming. As suggested by Solms (1999), however, the best guess at this point is that dreaming and REM sleep are fundamentally oincidental.
Dream Content and Sensitivity to Subtle Influences
There are two important aspects of the behavior of complex systems such as the human brain during sleep that can make such systems sensitive to subtle influences. First, systems that reside in chaotic or near-chaotic states are subject to the butterfly effect (Kellert, 1993; Peak, 1994); very small alterations in the present state of a system can lead to surprisingly large variations in its future states. There seems little doubt that the human brain with its many chaotic and chaotic-like patterns of activity, is subject to the butterfly effect. Second, and more important, under certain circumstances the introduction of noise into such a system (chaotic or not) can cause the system to respond to signals too small to ordinarily be effected by them. Termed stochastic resonance, this seemingly paradoxical effect has been demonstrated in electronic circuits as well as in nerve cells (Moss and Wiesenfeld, 1995). It results from the fact that the presence of noise, or vibration, keeps the system in motion and following the signal, rather than allowing it to become stuck.
This is an active instance of the relaxing of a system that is exposed to vibration, as described above. For instance, objects on a vibrating tabletop are sometimes seen to “walk” about, especially if the table is not level. In fact, they are following the line of least resistance down the slope of the surface, ordinarily not available to them because of friction with the top of the table. Here, we might imagine that the arrival of PGO waves has a similar effect on the higher cortical regions of the brain during REM sleep, causing activity there to “slide” in the direction of least resistance.
In the dreaming brain, isolated from daytime sensory bombardment and detached by neuromodulatory amnesia fromthose experiences that immediately precede sleep, chaotic dynamics like the butterfly effect and stochastic resonance cause thebrain to become especially responsive to subtle influences such as faint residual memories or emotional residues. Writing of similar effects in connection networks, which indeed is a similar way to characterize dynamical systems such as the brain: Globus (1989) describes the following example, taken from Freud (1900/1953, p.169); Freud happens during the day to glance at a monograph on the plant Cyclamen in a bookstore window, a seeming indifferent impression that so commonly gets caught up in a dream. That night he dreams that he has written a monograph on a certain plant; the book lays open before him and at the moment he is turning over a folded cover plate.
(p.189)
Globus continues with this example, explaining that Cyclamen are Freud’s wife’s favorite flower (Freud reproaches himself for forgetting to buy her flowers), and beyond this, that he has himself once written a monograph on the coca plant, all of which places the momentary perception of the monograph on Cyclamen in a context of existing memories and feelings. The point, however, is that a fleeting perception, which leaves no deep impression, can later set off a chain of events in the dreaming rain though evidently to do so the perception must not occur immediately prior to sleep.
This example also points to the importance of feelings, even subtle feelings such as those elicited by the Freud’s association of the monograph with his wife’s favorite flower, and his wish to bring her flowers. As noted above, the importance of emotions in dreaming, especially REM sleep dreaming, is confirmed in the observations of heightened limbic system activity.
Given a dreaming brain that is amnesiac for short-term pre-sleep events, and at the same time responsive to subtle influences such as emotions and memories, it is not surprising that dream content frequently includes fragments of old memories and once-familiar feelings from the past (e.g., Domhoff, 1996; Hall and Van de Castle, 1966). In such a hyper-sensitive system other influences might occasionally be felt as well.
For example, Smith (1986) found among cardiac patients that the number of death references in men’s dreams, and separation references in women’s dreams, correlate with poor clinical outcomes, an
aspects of human experience.
Conclusion
Bringing the above ideas together, the intent of this paper is to take a credible first step toward a reconciliation of brain-based (“process”) and content-based (“interpretative” or meaning oriented) approaches to understanding dreaming. Our discussion is based on the premise that the dreaming brain is a complex self-organizing system. Such systems can exhibit multifaceted adaptive properties that are, broadly speaking, “cognitive” in nature (e.g., Varela, Thompson, and Rosch, 1991). These arise through the interactions of their constitutive processes (Combs, 1996; Combs and Krippner, 1998; Goertzel, 1994, 2000; Kampis, 1991; Kauffman, 1993). In the case of the dreaming brain, these processes represent emotional, sensory, mnemonic, and other aspects of brain activity. Their ongoing readout into consciousness is the narrative experience of the dream.
Note, however, that we are not suggesting that a sufficient knowledge of such processes and their interactions would yield an explanation of the meaning of a particular dream in an individual’s conscious experience, or in the context of his or her life, at least not in the foreseeable future. Even if the regularities that underlie the neurological events of dreaming become well understood, they may still look quite different than those that best characterize the experiential aspects of dreaming (e.g., Haskell, 1986), which in turn set the stage for a dream’s meaning in the context of an individual’s life. Finding the precise relationships that connect the neurological to the experiential levels of dreaming is future work for cognitive neuropsychology.
Our aim here is to lay a foundation for this work by making explicit some of the important ways in which the dreaming brain engages in complex self-organizing processes which, far from random, are more than adequate in their regularity and complexity to support, at the level of consciousness, the experiential dream narratives that are the basis of interpretative approaches to dreaming.
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BOOKS by Stanley Krippner
Publications
Author:
Human Possibilities: Mind Research in the USSR and Eastern Europe. Garden City, NY: Anchor Books, 1980.
Song of the Siren: A Parapsychological Odyssey. New York: Harper & Row, 1976.
The Tragicall Historie of Shamlet: Prince of Denmark (A Literary Parody). New York: Exposition Press, 1971.
Co-Author:
Personal Mythology: Using Ritual, Dreams, and Imagination to Discover Your Inner Story, 3rd ed. (with David Feinstein). Santa Rosa, CA: Energy Psychology Press/Elite Books, 2008.
Haunted By Combat: Understanding PTSD in War Veterans Including Women, Reservists, and Those Coming Back from Iraq (with Daryl S. Paulson). Westport, CT: Praeger, 2007.
The Mythic Path (with David Feinstein), 3rd ed. Santa Rosa, CA: Elite Books, 2006.
Becoming Psychic: Spiritual Lessons for Focusing Your Hidden Abilities (with Stephen Kierulff). Franklin Lakes, NJ: Career Press, 2004.
Dream Telepathy: Experiments in Nocturnal ESP (with Montague Ullman and Alan Vaughan),
3rd ed. Charlottesville, VA: Hampton Roads, 2002.
Extraordinary Dreams and How to Work with Them (with Fariba Bogzaran and André Percia de Carvalho). Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 2002.
Sonhos Exoticos: Como Utilizar o Significado dos Seus Sonhos (with André Percia de Carvalho). Sao Paulo, Brazil: Summus Editorial, 1998.
The Mythic Path (with David Feinstein). New York: Jeremy P. Tarcher/Putnam, 1997.
A Psychiatrist in Paradise: Treating Mental Illness in Bali (with Denny Thong and Bruce Carpenter). Bangkok, Thailand: White Lotus Press, 1993.
Spiritual Dimensions of Healing: From Tribal Shamanism to Contemporary Health Care (with Patrick Welch). New York: Irvington Publishers, 1992.
Dream Telepathy: Experiments in Nocturnal ESP (with Montague Ullman and Alan Vaughan), 2nd ed. Jefferson, NC: McFarland Publishers, 1989.
Personal Mythology: The Psychology of Your Evolving Self (with David Feinstein). Los Angeles: Jeremy P. Tarcher, 1988.
Dreamworking: How to Use Your Dreams for Creative Problem-Solving (with Joseph Dillard). Buffalo, NY: Bearly Ltd., 1988.
Zwischen Himmel und Erde: Spirituelles Heilen der Schamanen, Hexen, Priester und Medien (with Patrick Scott). Dussilgen, Germany: Chiron Verlag, 1987.
Healing States (with Alberto Villoldo). New York: Fireside Books/Simon & Schuster, 1987.
La Science et les Pouvoirs Psychiques de l'Homme (with Jerry Solfvin). Paris: Sand, 1986.
The Realms of Healing (with Alberto Villoldo). Millbrae, CA: Celestial Arts Press, 1976; rev. ed., 1977; 3rd ed., 1986.
Dream Telepathy: Experiments in Nocturnal ESP (with Montague Ullman and Alan Vaughan). New York: Macmillan, 1974.
Editor:
Dreamtime and Dreamwork: Decoding the Language of the Night. Los Angeles: Jeremy P. Tarcher, 1990.
Advances in Parapsychological Research, Vols. 4, 5, 6, 7, 8. Jefferson, NC: McFarland Publishing, 1984, 1987, 1990, 1994, 1997.
Advances in Parapsychological Research, Vols. 1, 2, 3. New York: Plenum Press, 1977, 1978, 1982.
Psychoenergetic Systems: The Interface of Consciousness, Energy and Matter. New York: Gordon & Breach, 1979.
Co-Editor:
Healing Tales: The Narrative Arts in Spiritual Traditions (with Michael Bova, Leslie Gray, and Adam Kay). Charlottesville, VA: Puente, 2007.
Healing Stories: The Use of Narrative in Counseling and Psychotherapy (with Michael Bova and Leslie Gray). Charlottesville, VA: Puente, 2007.
The Psychological Impact of War Trauma on Civilians: An International Perspective (with Teresa M. McIntyre). Westport, CT: Praeger, 2003.
Varieties of Anomalous Experience: Examining the Scientific Evidence (with Etzel Cardeña and Steven J. Lynn). Washington, DC: American Psychological Association, 2000.
Mythology, Medicine, and Healing: Transcultural Perspectives. Yearbook of Cross-Cultural Medicine and Psychotherapy, 1998-1999 (with Holger Kalweit). Berlin: Verlag fur Wissenchaft und Bildung, 2000.
Dreamscaping: New and Creative Ways to Work with Your Dreams (with Mark Waldman). Los Angeles: Lowell House, 1999.
Broken Images, Broken Selves: Dissociative Narratives in Clinical Practice (with Susan Powers). New York: Brunner/Mazel, 1997.
Future Science: Life Energies and the Physics of Paranormal Phenomena (with John White). Garden City, NY: Anchor Books, 1977.
The Energies of Consciousness: Explorations in Acupuncture, Auras, and Kirlian Photography (with Daniel Rubin). New York: Gordon & Breach, 1975.
The Kirlian Aura: Photographing the Galaxies of Life (with Daniel Rubin). Garden City, NY: Anchor Books, 1974.
Galaxies of Life: The Human Aura in Acupuncture and Kirlian Photography (with Daniel Rubin). Gordon & Breach, 1973.
Author or co-author of over 1,000 articles, chapters, and book reviews appearing in scholarly or academic publications.
Pilot Study in ESP, Dreams and Purported OBEs, Dr. Stanley Krippner
A Pilot Study in ESP, Dreams, and Purported OBEs
Stanley Krippner
ABSTRACT: In 1966, we conducted a 4-night pilot study at the Maimonides Medical Center Dream Laboratory in Brooklyn, New York. The subject was a male student who claimed to have frequent out-of-body experiences (OBEs) at night. We used a telepathy and a clairvoyance target (art print) each night, the latter having been placed in a box attached to the ceiling of the sleep room. The subject was asked to attempt discerning the clairvoyance target if he had an OBE, and to attempt dreaming about it even if he did not have an OBE. Outside judges observed few correspondences between the transcribed dream reports and the telepathy targets, but several correspondences between the reports and the clairvoyance targets. The most provocative dream report was on the final night of the study when a print of Berman's "View in Perspective of a Perfect Sunset" was randomly selected; the subject dreamed about a sunset, a content item that appears in fewer than 1 out of every 500 male dreams reports according to Hall and Van de Castle's normative data. The subject reported having had an OBE that night, and the EEG record disclosed an unusual pattern of slow brain wave activity interrupting REM sleep shortly before he was awakened for the dream report in which he mentioned the sunset. It is recommended that sophisticated brain scanning devices (e.g., CT, PET, MRI) be used with subject in an attempt to identify brain activity during purported OBEs. The expense and discomfort of these procedures have delayed their use by parapsychologists, but the advantages of these procedures outweigh the disadvantages.
A "dream" can be thought of as a series of images that occur during sleep; when it is recorded or reported, it usually takes a narrative form. It is important to note that scientists who work with dream content inevitably work with reports which might or might not accurately represent the dream as originally experienced. Sigmund Freud (1953) collected cases of purported telepathy in dreams, feeling that psychoanalysis could assist in unraveling the puzzling aspects of telepathic messages and insights, concluding that "Sleep creates favorable conditions for telepathy." If Freud was the first major figure in psychiatry to attach scientific importance to ESP in dreams, the credit for being the first psychiatrist to devise a method to test for it experimentally belongs to Montague Ullman (1969). As a radical departure from the repetitious card-guessing procedures, Ullman used art prints as targets, especially those with emotional content. In 1962, a dream laboratory was established at Brooklyn's Maimonides Medical Center where Ullman initiated formal experimental work (Ullman & Krippner, with Vaughan, 1989). I joined him in 1964, and we conducted 13 dream and ESP experiments over the next decade.
In 1966, while designing a 4-night pilot study, we decided to use both a clairvoyance and a telepathy target (Krippner & Zirinsky, 1971). The research participant (James U.) was told about the clairvoyance target but not the telepathy target. It was reasoned that if the research participant was oriented to the clairvoyance target, his dream reports would show a greater congruence with the target picture than with the telepathy target. If, on the other hand, the intent of the telepathic agent was salient to a greater degree than the orientation of the research participant, the congruence between dream reports and the telepathy target would be more robust.
The telepathy target and the agent were located in a room that was about 100 feet from the sleep room. Four laboratory staff members rotated as agents. The research participant was a student who had contacted the laboratory to discuss his personal involvement with altered states of consciousness. As a result of his immersion in Rosicrucian teachings, he claimed to have occasional "out-of-body" experiences (OBEs). Therefore, in an adaptation of a procedure originated by Charles Tart (1968), the clairvoyance target was placed in a cardboard box attached to the ceiling of the room. He was told to attempt to discern the target if he should have an OBE during the night.
Both the telepathy and the clairvoyance target were randomly selected from a large collection of art prints, each of which had been enclosed in sealed envelopes. The agent was given an envelope and waited until he reached his private room before opening the envelope. In regard to the clairvoyance target, another staff member took the sealed envelope, entered the sleep room, climbed on a chair, held up his arms, opened the envelope, and let the target picture drop into the box. In this way, no one at the laboratory had conscious knowledge as to the identity of the clairvoyance target.
The research participant went to bed with electrodes attached to his head, and was awakened about 10 minutes after the onset of each REM period. His dream reports were recorded on tape and transcribed later by a secretary who was not present at any of the sessions.
On 30 June 1966, the first night of the study, the telepathy target was a print of Manet's painting, 'The Guitarist." James U. had no dreams about musicians or musical instruments. The clairvoyance target was a print of Matisse's painting, "Details from the Red Studio." James U. reported several dreams about houses, rooms, and the color red.
On 28 July 1966, the second night of the study, the randomly selected telepathy target was a photograph, "Equipment of the Civil War." James U. had no dreams about weapons or war. The clairvoyance target was a photograph of Abbot Suger's chalice -- a silver goblet rimmed with precious stones. James U. dreamed about antiques, a bowl, and a turquoise ball.
On 11 August 1966, the third night of the pilot study, the telepathy target was a copy of Charbot's painting, "Angel Weathervane"; James U. had no dreams about angels or the weather, however one of his dream reports mentioned a meteorite shower and shooting stars. The clairvoyance target was a copy of De Chirico's painting, "Anguish of Departure" which portrays a coffin-like box with mountains in the distance. Several correspondences appeared in the dream reports for that night, e.g., a hearse, a "shriveled-up body lying in a bed," and a mountain scene.
For 18 August 1966, the final night of the pilot study, the telepathy target was a copy of Hokusai's painting, "Cranes," but James U. had no dreams about birds. The clairvoyance target was a copy of Berman's painting, "View in Perspective of a Perfect Sunset," depicting a lone figure watching a brilliantly colored setting sun. On that night, James U. reported a dream about a sunset. According to Hall and Van de Castle's (1966) table in The Content Analysis of Dreams, sunsets appear in fewer than 1 out of every 500 dream male dream reports. Excerpts of the dream follow: "It was dark outside and light inside.... It was dusk.... It was just getting dark. Sunset. Very hazy. It was hazy. It wasn't a clear day. It wasn't either foggy or cloudy. It was sort of muffled. It wasn't a clear sunset.... It reminds me of a chilly or cold winter's day which is coming to an end. A day which has been cloudy all day long and the sun is just beginning to go down."
In the morning, James U. reported having had an OBE. An inspection of the EEG record for that night disclosed an unusual pattern of slow brain waves in the theta and delta frequencies, interrupting REM sleep shortly before he was awakened for his fifth dream report. The EEG records were shown to several sleep and dream researchers who concluded that the interruption of REM sleep by slow brain waves is unusual, but not unknown (Hobson, 1988, pp. 135-137). Indeed, Hobson (1988) admits that "while the EEG is a valuable tool, it is theoretically problematic, because we still do not really know the origin of the voltages that are measured." He points out that "each electrode applied to the surface of the scalp is distant from the possible signal sources in the brain and... the EEG must be considered a relatively remote and probably pale copy of the underlying neural activity" (p. 135).
Since this experiment was conducted, a number of more sensitive indicators have been identified that may contribute more definitively to an OBE "signature" during REM. Among these are heart rate deceleration, the suppression of eyeblinks, relaxation of musculature around the mouth, inhibition of the postural musculature, and changes in pontogeniculo-occipital (PGO) waves (Kuiken & Sikora, 1993). No data exist connecting these changes to OBEs during sleep, but these may be crucial parameters for further study. Kuiken and Sikora (1993) have identified four clusters of unusual dream experiences, one of which contained some OBE reports (p. 436) and the psychophysiological correlates of these clusters could be investigated in the future.
The three outside judges who matched the dream transcripts with the pool of 8 target pictures on a 100-pont rating scale attained only random results with the telepathy targets (ANOVA F=0.01). Their matching of the dream transcripts with the clairvoyance targets attained greater accuracy; there was only 1 chance out of 10 that the results could have been due to chance (F=4.13). Although these data do not attain statistical significance, they are at least provocative given the small number of nights in this pilot study. James U. was willing to participate in a formal experimental study at the Maimonides laboratory, but was admitted to medical school. As a result, he terminated his participation and a similar research participant with a history of OBEs never surfaced.
Further research studies of this nature would do well to run a research participant on at least 8 nights in a dream laboratory, and to use a single agent (to decrease the variance from night to night based on interpersonal relations and expectancy effects). Such a study need not be limited to dreams; provocative results have been obtained in waking conditions with such research participants as Ingo Swann (in Mitchell, 1981).
In recent years, a number of sophisticated brain scanning devices have been developed (e.g., CT, PET, MRI) (e.g., Kalat, J.W., 1988; Lewine, Sanders, & Hartshorne, 1995; Posner & Raichle, 1994). Any one of these could be used in an attempt to identify the portions of the brain that are active during OBEs, their major disadvantages being expense and discomfort. CT (computed tomography) translates relative tissue densities into a structural portrait, providing a 3-dimensional representation of a brain region. Each picture is actually a composite image, crafted from thousands of x-rays taken by a scanner that revolves around the skull. PET (positron emission tomography) draws on the principles that blood rushes to the most active areas of the brain to deliver oxygen and nutrients to neurons. By injecting a subject with radioactive glucose, then scanning the brain for the gamma rays emitted as the solution metabolizes, researchers can detect active neuronal sites. For mapping both structure and activity of the brain, MRI (magnetic resonance imaging) is often used. MRI extracts clues from hydrogen atoms that are associated with water molecules in the blood.
In structural MRI, a subject's head is immersed in a strong magnetic field and then subjected to several pulses of radio waves. The hydrogen atoms' nuclei respond to by emitting signals that can be translated into an exceptionally precise 3-dimensional representation of the snapped region. To map brain activity, researchers use a process called functional MRI which detects variations in the response of hydrogen nuclei when oxygen is present in the blood By deducing which parts of the brain are being replenished by oxygen, scientists can target and then scan specific sites of neuronal activity. Superimposing EEG data over an MRI-generated blueprint of a subject's brain yields a map that combines the speed of EEG with the precision of MRI.
Gazzaniga (1992) has pointed out the advantages of MRI in allowing researchers to learn about interhemispheric communication by monitoring the commissural areas that connect the right and left hemispheres. Before the advent of MRI, it was necessary to rely on surgical notes to determine the extent and effects of commissural surgery and many errors were committed. MRI permits more accuracy and has led to some surprising findings, e.g., the transfer of visual information from one hemisphere to the other occurs easily in monkeys and chimpanzees but not in humans (p. 101). Brain lesions in humans have been found to produce serious defects in intelligent behavior (p. 104) and speech and language areas in the left hemisphere (for right-handed persons) "are under greater genetic control than homologous regions in the right hemisphere" (p. 102). These issues are pertinent to parapsychological experiments that investigate the purported "right-hemisphere location for psi ability" (Stokes, 1987, p. 179). Because MRI scanning depends, in part, on determining those brain areas which are being replenished by oxygen, the technique may also be helpful in determining "carriers" and "facilitators" for psi information, especially if it is mediated (as some literature suggests) by geomagnetic factors (e.g., Spottiswoode, 1990).
PET (positron emission tomography) scans of readers revealed that brain activity shifts from one area to another depending on whether someone is reading words or hearing or speaking them. In another PET study, schizophrenics have been observed to have less activity in the forward-lying cognitive centers than is true of non-schizophrenics. Another investigation with PET scans demonstrated more right hemisphere activity in response to musical tones on the part of subjects untrained in music, while musically knowledgeable subjects demonstrated more activity in the left hemisphere of the brain. This equipment has never been used in OBE research, and might provide important psychophysiological correlates of the experience. PET images were found to differentiate the brains of skilled computer game operators from novices; the former utilized less energy than the latter, suggesting that learning is more a function of increased neuronal activity than of effort. Indeed, people with high IQ scores show a precipitous drop in mental exertion while learning computer games (Conlan, 1993, pp. 12-17). Kalat (1988) cites other examples, concluding that "PET scans enable researchers to answer some questions that could not previously be addressed with human beings" (p. 111). One of the questions not addressed by Kalat is brain activation during putative psi phenomena.
The expense and the discomfort of these brain scanning techniques has delayed their utilization by parapsychologists studying OBEs, but their advantages may be found to outweigh their disadvantages, especially as the technology becomes less expensive and more user-friendly. Once this occurs, and once it is determined that the danger from radiation is minimal, potential OBE subjects could go through a period of accommodation to the devices before formal experimental work is inaugurated. The equipment would not have to be bought, only loaned or borrowed. In addition, an apparatus might be built that is simple, portable, and that would still provide continuous on-line recordings of physiological events. The investigation of both the psychophysiology and the phenomenology of OBEs has become a necessity. Once regarded as symptomatic of severe mental illness, the OBE has now moved into the mainstream of psychological investigation. Although not a parapsychological phenomenon per se, the OBE often serves as a vehicle for presumptive psi, just as the dream often serves a similar purpose. It is likely that there are several exceptional human experiences that qualify as OBEs; certainly the dream OBE is one of them and deserves attention from investigators interested in the paradoxes of mind, brain, and body.
References
Conlan, R. (Ed.). (1993). Mind and brain. Alexandria, VA: Time-Life Books.
Freud, S. (1953). Dreams and telepathy. In G. Devereux (Ed.), Psychoanalysis and the occult (pp. 69-86). New York: International Universities Press.
Gazzaniga, M.S. (1992). Mind matters., The biological roots of thinking, emotion, sexuality, language, and intelligence. New York: Basic Books.
Hall, C., & Van de Castle, R.L (1966). The content analysis of dreams. New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts.
Hobson, J.A. (1988). The dreaming brain. New York: Basic Books.
Kalat, J.W. (1988). Biological psychology (3rd ed.). Belmont, CA: Wadsworth.
Krippner, S., & Zirinsky, K. (1971). An experiment in dreams, clairvoyance, and telepathy. The A.R.E. Journal, 6(1), 12-16.
Kuiken, D., & Sikora, S. (1993). The impact of dreams on waking thought and feelings. In A Moffitt, M. Kramer, & R. Hoffmann (Eds.), The functions of dreaming (pp. 419-476). Albany, NY: State University of New York Press.
Lewine, J.D., Sanders, J.A., & Hartshorne, M.F. (1995). Functional brain imaging. St. Louis: Mosby.
Mitchell, J. (1981). Out-of-body-experiences: A handbook. Jefferson, NC: McFarland.
Spottiswoode, S.J.P. (1990). Geomagnetic activity and anomalous cognition: A preliminary report on new evidence. Subtle Energies, 1, 91-102.
Stokes, D.M. (1987). Theoretical parapsychology. In S. Krippner (Ed.), Advances in parapsychological research (Vol. 5). Jefferson, NC: McFarland.
Tart, C.T. (1968). A psychophysiological study of out-of-the-body experiences in a selected subject. Journal of the American Society for Psychical Research, 62, 3-27.
Posner, M.I., & Raichle, M.E. (1994). Images of mind. New York: Scientific American Library.
Ullman, M (1969). Telepathy and dreams. Experimental Medicine and Surgery, 27, 19-38.
Ullman, M., & Krippner, S., with Vaughan, A. (1989). Dream telepathy: Experiments in nocturnal ESP (rev. ed.). Jefferson, NC: McFarland.
Stanley Krippner
ABSTRACT: In 1966, we conducted a 4-night pilot study at the Maimonides Medical Center Dream Laboratory in Brooklyn, New York. The subject was a male student who claimed to have frequent out-of-body experiences (OBEs) at night. We used a telepathy and a clairvoyance target (art print) each night, the latter having been placed in a box attached to the ceiling of the sleep room. The subject was asked to attempt discerning the clairvoyance target if he had an OBE, and to attempt dreaming about it even if he did not have an OBE. Outside judges observed few correspondences between the transcribed dream reports and the telepathy targets, but several correspondences between the reports and the clairvoyance targets. The most provocative dream report was on the final night of the study when a print of Berman's "View in Perspective of a Perfect Sunset" was randomly selected; the subject dreamed about a sunset, a content item that appears in fewer than 1 out of every 500 male dreams reports according to Hall and Van de Castle's normative data. The subject reported having had an OBE that night, and the EEG record disclosed an unusual pattern of slow brain wave activity interrupting REM sleep shortly before he was awakened for the dream report in which he mentioned the sunset. It is recommended that sophisticated brain scanning devices (e.g., CT, PET, MRI) be used with subject in an attempt to identify brain activity during purported OBEs. The expense and discomfort of these procedures have delayed their use by parapsychologists, but the advantages of these procedures outweigh the disadvantages.
A "dream" can be thought of as a series of images that occur during sleep; when it is recorded or reported, it usually takes a narrative form. It is important to note that scientists who work with dream content inevitably work with reports which might or might not accurately represent the dream as originally experienced. Sigmund Freud (1953) collected cases of purported telepathy in dreams, feeling that psychoanalysis could assist in unraveling the puzzling aspects of telepathic messages and insights, concluding that "Sleep creates favorable conditions for telepathy." If Freud was the first major figure in psychiatry to attach scientific importance to ESP in dreams, the credit for being the first psychiatrist to devise a method to test for it experimentally belongs to Montague Ullman (1969). As a radical departure from the repetitious card-guessing procedures, Ullman used art prints as targets, especially those with emotional content. In 1962, a dream laboratory was established at Brooklyn's Maimonides Medical Center where Ullman initiated formal experimental work (Ullman & Krippner, with Vaughan, 1989). I joined him in 1964, and we conducted 13 dream and ESP experiments over the next decade.
In 1966, while designing a 4-night pilot study, we decided to use both a clairvoyance and a telepathy target (Krippner & Zirinsky, 1971). The research participant (James U.) was told about the clairvoyance target but not the telepathy target. It was reasoned that if the research participant was oriented to the clairvoyance target, his dream reports would show a greater congruence with the target picture than with the telepathy target. If, on the other hand, the intent of the telepathic agent was salient to a greater degree than the orientation of the research participant, the congruence between dream reports and the telepathy target would be more robust.
The telepathy target and the agent were located in a room that was about 100 feet from the sleep room. Four laboratory staff members rotated as agents. The research participant was a student who had contacted the laboratory to discuss his personal involvement with altered states of consciousness. As a result of his immersion in Rosicrucian teachings, he claimed to have occasional "out-of-body" experiences (OBEs). Therefore, in an adaptation of a procedure originated by Charles Tart (1968), the clairvoyance target was placed in a cardboard box attached to the ceiling of the room. He was told to attempt to discern the target if he should have an OBE during the night.
Both the telepathy and the clairvoyance target were randomly selected from a large collection of art prints, each of which had been enclosed in sealed envelopes. The agent was given an envelope and waited until he reached his private room before opening the envelope. In regard to the clairvoyance target, another staff member took the sealed envelope, entered the sleep room, climbed on a chair, held up his arms, opened the envelope, and let the target picture drop into the box. In this way, no one at the laboratory had conscious knowledge as to the identity of the clairvoyance target.
The research participant went to bed with electrodes attached to his head, and was awakened about 10 minutes after the onset of each REM period. His dream reports were recorded on tape and transcribed later by a secretary who was not present at any of the sessions.
On 30 June 1966, the first night of the study, the telepathy target was a print of Manet's painting, 'The Guitarist." James U. had no dreams about musicians or musical instruments. The clairvoyance target was a print of Matisse's painting, "Details from the Red Studio." James U. reported several dreams about houses, rooms, and the color red.
On 28 July 1966, the second night of the study, the randomly selected telepathy target was a photograph, "Equipment of the Civil War." James U. had no dreams about weapons or war. The clairvoyance target was a photograph of Abbot Suger's chalice -- a silver goblet rimmed with precious stones. James U. dreamed about antiques, a bowl, and a turquoise ball.
On 11 August 1966, the third night of the pilot study, the telepathy target was a copy of Charbot's painting, "Angel Weathervane"; James U. had no dreams about angels or the weather, however one of his dream reports mentioned a meteorite shower and shooting stars. The clairvoyance target was a copy of De Chirico's painting, "Anguish of Departure" which portrays a coffin-like box with mountains in the distance. Several correspondences appeared in the dream reports for that night, e.g., a hearse, a "shriveled-up body lying in a bed," and a mountain scene.
For 18 August 1966, the final night of the pilot study, the telepathy target was a copy of Hokusai's painting, "Cranes," but James U. had no dreams about birds. The clairvoyance target was a copy of Berman's painting, "View in Perspective of a Perfect Sunset," depicting a lone figure watching a brilliantly colored setting sun. On that night, James U. reported a dream about a sunset. According to Hall and Van de Castle's (1966) table in The Content Analysis of Dreams, sunsets appear in fewer than 1 out of every 500 dream male dream reports. Excerpts of the dream follow: "It was dark outside and light inside.... It was dusk.... It was just getting dark. Sunset. Very hazy. It was hazy. It wasn't a clear day. It wasn't either foggy or cloudy. It was sort of muffled. It wasn't a clear sunset.... It reminds me of a chilly or cold winter's day which is coming to an end. A day which has been cloudy all day long and the sun is just beginning to go down."
In the morning, James U. reported having had an OBE. An inspection of the EEG record for that night disclosed an unusual pattern of slow brain waves in the theta and delta frequencies, interrupting REM sleep shortly before he was awakened for his fifth dream report. The EEG records were shown to several sleep and dream researchers who concluded that the interruption of REM sleep by slow brain waves is unusual, but not unknown (Hobson, 1988, pp. 135-137). Indeed, Hobson (1988) admits that "while the EEG is a valuable tool, it is theoretically problematic, because we still do not really know the origin of the voltages that are measured." He points out that "each electrode applied to the surface of the scalp is distant from the possible signal sources in the brain and... the EEG must be considered a relatively remote and probably pale copy of the underlying neural activity" (p. 135).
Since this experiment was conducted, a number of more sensitive indicators have been identified that may contribute more definitively to an OBE "signature" during REM. Among these are heart rate deceleration, the suppression of eyeblinks, relaxation of musculature around the mouth, inhibition of the postural musculature, and changes in pontogeniculo-occipital (PGO) waves (Kuiken & Sikora, 1993). No data exist connecting these changes to OBEs during sleep, but these may be crucial parameters for further study. Kuiken and Sikora (1993) have identified four clusters of unusual dream experiences, one of which contained some OBE reports (p. 436) and the psychophysiological correlates of these clusters could be investigated in the future.
The three outside judges who matched the dream transcripts with the pool of 8 target pictures on a 100-pont rating scale attained only random results with the telepathy targets (ANOVA F=0.01). Their matching of the dream transcripts with the clairvoyance targets attained greater accuracy; there was only 1 chance out of 10 that the results could have been due to chance (F=4.13). Although these data do not attain statistical significance, they are at least provocative given the small number of nights in this pilot study. James U. was willing to participate in a formal experimental study at the Maimonides laboratory, but was admitted to medical school. As a result, he terminated his participation and a similar research participant with a history of OBEs never surfaced.
Further research studies of this nature would do well to run a research participant on at least 8 nights in a dream laboratory, and to use a single agent (to decrease the variance from night to night based on interpersonal relations and expectancy effects). Such a study need not be limited to dreams; provocative results have been obtained in waking conditions with such research participants as Ingo Swann (in Mitchell, 1981).
In recent years, a number of sophisticated brain scanning devices have been developed (e.g., CT, PET, MRI) (e.g., Kalat, J.W., 1988; Lewine, Sanders, & Hartshorne, 1995; Posner & Raichle, 1994). Any one of these could be used in an attempt to identify the portions of the brain that are active during OBEs, their major disadvantages being expense and discomfort. CT (computed tomography) translates relative tissue densities into a structural portrait, providing a 3-dimensional representation of a brain region. Each picture is actually a composite image, crafted from thousands of x-rays taken by a scanner that revolves around the skull. PET (positron emission tomography) draws on the principles that blood rushes to the most active areas of the brain to deliver oxygen and nutrients to neurons. By injecting a subject with radioactive glucose, then scanning the brain for the gamma rays emitted as the solution metabolizes, researchers can detect active neuronal sites. For mapping both structure and activity of the brain, MRI (magnetic resonance imaging) is often used. MRI extracts clues from hydrogen atoms that are associated with water molecules in the blood.
In structural MRI, a subject's head is immersed in a strong magnetic field and then subjected to several pulses of radio waves. The hydrogen atoms' nuclei respond to by emitting signals that can be translated into an exceptionally precise 3-dimensional representation of the snapped region. To map brain activity, researchers use a process called functional MRI which detects variations in the response of hydrogen nuclei when oxygen is present in the blood By deducing which parts of the brain are being replenished by oxygen, scientists can target and then scan specific sites of neuronal activity. Superimposing EEG data over an MRI-generated blueprint of a subject's brain yields a map that combines the speed of EEG with the precision of MRI.
Gazzaniga (1992) has pointed out the advantages of MRI in allowing researchers to learn about interhemispheric communication by monitoring the commissural areas that connect the right and left hemispheres. Before the advent of MRI, it was necessary to rely on surgical notes to determine the extent and effects of commissural surgery and many errors were committed. MRI permits more accuracy and has led to some surprising findings, e.g., the transfer of visual information from one hemisphere to the other occurs easily in monkeys and chimpanzees but not in humans (p. 101). Brain lesions in humans have been found to produce serious defects in intelligent behavior (p. 104) and speech and language areas in the left hemisphere (for right-handed persons) "are under greater genetic control than homologous regions in the right hemisphere" (p. 102). These issues are pertinent to parapsychological experiments that investigate the purported "right-hemisphere location for psi ability" (Stokes, 1987, p. 179). Because MRI scanning depends, in part, on determining those brain areas which are being replenished by oxygen, the technique may also be helpful in determining "carriers" and "facilitators" for psi information, especially if it is mediated (as some literature suggests) by geomagnetic factors (e.g., Spottiswoode, 1990).
PET (positron emission tomography) scans of readers revealed that brain activity shifts from one area to another depending on whether someone is reading words or hearing or speaking them. In another PET study, schizophrenics have been observed to have less activity in the forward-lying cognitive centers than is true of non-schizophrenics. Another investigation with PET scans demonstrated more right hemisphere activity in response to musical tones on the part of subjects untrained in music, while musically knowledgeable subjects demonstrated more activity in the left hemisphere of the brain. This equipment has never been used in OBE research, and might provide important psychophysiological correlates of the experience. PET images were found to differentiate the brains of skilled computer game operators from novices; the former utilized less energy than the latter, suggesting that learning is more a function of increased neuronal activity than of effort. Indeed, people with high IQ scores show a precipitous drop in mental exertion while learning computer games (Conlan, 1993, pp. 12-17). Kalat (1988) cites other examples, concluding that "PET scans enable researchers to answer some questions that could not previously be addressed with human beings" (p. 111). One of the questions not addressed by Kalat is brain activation during putative psi phenomena.
The expense and the discomfort of these brain scanning techniques has delayed their utilization by parapsychologists studying OBEs, but their advantages may be found to outweigh their disadvantages, especially as the technology becomes less expensive and more user-friendly. Once this occurs, and once it is determined that the danger from radiation is minimal, potential OBE subjects could go through a period of accommodation to the devices before formal experimental work is inaugurated. The equipment would not have to be bought, only loaned or borrowed. In addition, an apparatus might be built that is simple, portable, and that would still provide continuous on-line recordings of physiological events. The investigation of both the psychophysiology and the phenomenology of OBEs has become a necessity. Once regarded as symptomatic of severe mental illness, the OBE has now moved into the mainstream of psychological investigation. Although not a parapsychological phenomenon per se, the OBE often serves as a vehicle for presumptive psi, just as the dream often serves a similar purpose. It is likely that there are several exceptional human experiences that qualify as OBEs; certainly the dream OBE is one of them and deserves attention from investigators interested in the paradoxes of mind, brain, and body.
References
Conlan, R. (Ed.). (1993). Mind and brain. Alexandria, VA: Time-Life Books.
Freud, S. (1953). Dreams and telepathy. In G. Devereux (Ed.), Psychoanalysis and the occult (pp. 69-86). New York: International Universities Press.
Gazzaniga, M.S. (1992). Mind matters., The biological roots of thinking, emotion, sexuality, language, and intelligence. New York: Basic Books.
Hall, C., & Van de Castle, R.L (1966). The content analysis of dreams. New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts.
Hobson, J.A. (1988). The dreaming brain. New York: Basic Books.
Kalat, J.W. (1988). Biological psychology (3rd ed.). Belmont, CA: Wadsworth.
Krippner, S., & Zirinsky, K. (1971). An experiment in dreams, clairvoyance, and telepathy. The A.R.E. Journal, 6(1), 12-16.
Kuiken, D., & Sikora, S. (1993). The impact of dreams on waking thought and feelings. In A Moffitt, M. Kramer, & R. Hoffmann (Eds.), The functions of dreaming (pp. 419-476). Albany, NY: State University of New York Press.
Lewine, J.D., Sanders, J.A., & Hartshorne, M.F. (1995). Functional brain imaging. St. Louis: Mosby.
Mitchell, J. (1981). Out-of-body-experiences: A handbook. Jefferson, NC: McFarland.
Spottiswoode, S.J.P. (1990). Geomagnetic activity and anomalous cognition: A preliminary report on new evidence. Subtle Energies, 1, 91-102.
Stokes, D.M. (1987). Theoretical parapsychology. In S. Krippner (Ed.), Advances in parapsychological research (Vol. 5). Jefferson, NC: McFarland.
Tart, C.T. (1968). A psychophysiological study of out-of-the-body experiences in a selected subject. Journal of the American Society for Psychical Research, 62, 3-27.
Posner, M.I., & Raichle, M.E. (1994). Images of mind. New York: Scientific American Library.
Ullman, M (1969). Telepathy and dreams. Experimental Medicine and Surgery, 27, 19-38.
Ullman, M., & Krippner, S., with Vaughan, A. (1989). Dream telepathy: Experiments in nocturnal ESP (rev. ed.). Jefferson, NC: McFarland.
Abstracts
The Epistemology and Technologies of Shamanic States of Consciousness
Stanley Krippner, Ph.D., Saybrook Graduate School
ABSTRACT: Shamanism can be described as a group of techniques by which its practitioners enter the "spirit world," purportedly obtaining information that is used to help and to heal members of their social group. The shamans' epistemology, or ways on knowing, depended on deliberately altering their conscious state and/or heightening their perception to contact spiritual entities in "upper worlds," "lower worlds," and "middle earth" (i.e., ordinary reality). For the shaman, the totality of inner and outer reality was fundamentally an immense signal system, and shamanic states of consciousness were the first steps toward deciphering this signal system. Homo sapiens sapiens was probably unique among early humans in the ability to symbolize, mythologize, and, eventually, to shamanize. This species' eventual domination may have been due to its ability to take sensorimotor activity and use it as a bridge to produce narratives that facilitated human survival. Shamanic technologies, essential for the production and performance of myths and other narratives, interacted with shamanic epistemology, reinforcing its basic assumptions about reality.
*********************
THE CIRCLE OF SEX IN MYTHOLOGY AND FOLKLORE
Stanley Krippner, Ph.D.
ABSTRACT: According to Gavin Arthur’s “circle of sex” model, all humans fall on a continuum that allows for fluctuation in sexual disposition as well as the intensity of sexual activity. His typology of human sexual behavior avoids such pejorative labels as “abnormal,” “deviant,” and “pathological,” and introduces the terms “heterogenic,” “homogenic,” and “ambigenic” because such terms as “heterosexual” incorrectly combine Greek and Anglo-Saxon roots. Arthur illustrates his model with historical characters; or example, George V of England, the faithful husband of Queen Mary, fell at 12 noon, but Julius Caesar, known in his day as “every woman’s husband and every man’s wife,” fell into the “ambigenic category.” Sappho, the poet who lived on the island of Lesbos, was described as “three quarters homogenic” because, although she preferred Lesbian girls, she occasionally dallied with young shepherds. The writer Gertrude Stein was categorized as “homogenic” at 10 o’clock. Arthur denoted sexual intensity by putting someone in the sphere’s tropical center. Someone who has taken religious orders, however, might find himself or herself near the chilly regions of the circle. A Roman Catholic nun, who considers herself “married to Christ,” could be a 6 o’clock “heterogene." The psychiatrist, Jean Bolen, developed a model that paid special attention to the sexuality of the Greek gods and goddesses. But instead of using their sexuality as the basis for a typology as Arthur did, Bolen focused upon the deities as representing “archetypes,” “powerful inner patterns that allegedly shape behavior and influence emotions. In other words, there can be gay Ares types and lesbian Aphrodites because the archetypes they represent are broader than sexual preference. This typology may be more useful to psychotherapists than Arthur’s ingenious “circle of sex.”
Stanley Krippner, Ph.D., Saybrook Graduate School
ABSTRACT: Shamanism can be described as a group of techniques by which its practitioners enter the "spirit world," purportedly obtaining information that is used to help and to heal members of their social group. The shamans' epistemology, or ways on knowing, depended on deliberately altering their conscious state and/or heightening their perception to contact spiritual entities in "upper worlds," "lower worlds," and "middle earth" (i.e., ordinary reality). For the shaman, the totality of inner and outer reality was fundamentally an immense signal system, and shamanic states of consciousness were the first steps toward deciphering this signal system. Homo sapiens sapiens was probably unique among early humans in the ability to symbolize, mythologize, and, eventually, to shamanize. This species' eventual domination may have been due to its ability to take sensorimotor activity and use it as a bridge to produce narratives that facilitated human survival. Shamanic technologies, essential for the production and performance of myths and other narratives, interacted with shamanic epistemology, reinforcing its basic assumptions about reality.
*********************
THE CIRCLE OF SEX IN MYTHOLOGY AND FOLKLORE
Stanley Krippner, Ph.D.
ABSTRACT: According to Gavin Arthur’s “circle of sex” model, all humans fall on a continuum that allows for fluctuation in sexual disposition as well as the intensity of sexual activity. His typology of human sexual behavior avoids such pejorative labels as “abnormal,” “deviant,” and “pathological,” and introduces the terms “heterogenic,” “homogenic,” and “ambigenic” because such terms as “heterosexual” incorrectly combine Greek and Anglo-Saxon roots. Arthur illustrates his model with historical characters; or example, George V of England, the faithful husband of Queen Mary, fell at 12 noon, but Julius Caesar, known in his day as “every woman’s husband and every man’s wife,” fell into the “ambigenic category.” Sappho, the poet who lived on the island of Lesbos, was described as “three quarters homogenic” because, although she preferred Lesbian girls, she occasionally dallied with young shepherds. The writer Gertrude Stein was categorized as “homogenic” at 10 o’clock. Arthur denoted sexual intensity by putting someone in the sphere’s tropical center. Someone who has taken religious orders, however, might find himself or herself near the chilly regions of the circle. A Roman Catholic nun, who considers herself “married to Christ,” could be a 6 o’clock “heterogene." The psychiatrist, Jean Bolen, developed a model that paid special attention to the sexuality of the Greek gods and goddesses. But instead of using their sexuality as the basis for a typology as Arthur did, Bolen focused upon the deities as representing “archetypes,” “powerful inner patterns that allegedly shape behavior and influence emotions. In other words, there can be gay Ares types and lesbian Aphrodites because the archetypes they represent are broader than sexual preference. This typology may be more useful to psychotherapists than Arthur’s ingenious “circle of sex.”
Vita
Education Northwestern University, Evanston, IL, M.A., 1957, Ph.D., 1961.
University of Wisconsin, Madison, WI, B.S., 1954.
Employment Saybrook Graduate School and Research Center, San Francisco, CA, 1973-present; Professor of Psychology, 1982-present.
Maimonides Medical Center, Brooklyn, NY; Director, Dream Laboratory, 1964-1973.
Kent State University, Kent, OH; Director, Child Study Center, 1961-1964.
Richmond Public Schools, Richmond, VA; speech therapist, 1955-1956, 1960.
Community Unit #205, Public Schools, Warren, IL; speech therapist, 1954-1955.
Publications Author:
Human Possibilities: Mind Research in the USSR and Eastern Europe. Garden City, NY: Anchor Books, 1980.
Song of the Siren: A Parapsychological Odyssey. New York: Harper & Row, 1976.
Shamlet: The Tragicall Historie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark New York: Exposition Press, 1971.
Co-Author:
The Mythic Path (with David Feinstein). New York: Jeremy P. TarcherPutnam, 1997.
A Psychiatrist in Paradise: Treating Mental Illness in Bali (with Denny Thong and Bruce Carpenter). Bangkok, Thailand: White Lotus Press, 1993.
Spiritual Dimensions of Healing: From Tribal Shamanism to Contemporary Health Care (with Patrick Welch). New York: Irvington Publishers, 1992.
Dream Telepathy: Experiments in Nocturnal ESP (with Montague Ullman and Alan Vaughan), 2nd ed. Jefferson, NC: McFarland Publishers, 1989.
Personal Mythology: The Psychology of Your Evolving Self (with David Feinstein). Los Angeles: Jeremy P. Tarcher, 1988.
Dreamworking: How to Use Your Dreams for Creative Problem-Solving (with Joseph Dillard). Buffalo, NY: Bearly Ltd., 1988.
Zwischen Himmel und Erde: Spirituelles Heilen der Schamanen, Hexen, Priester und Medien (with Patrick Scott). Dussilgen, Germany: Chiron Verlag, 1987.
Healing States (with Alberto Villoldo). New York: Fireside Books/Simon & Schuster, 1987.
La Science et les Pouvoirs Psychiques de l'Homme (with Jerry Solfvin). Paris: Sand, 1986.
The Realms of Healing (with Alberto Villoldo). Millbrae, CA: Celestial Arts Press, 1976, rev. ed., 1977, 3rd ed., 1986.
Dream Telepathy: Experiments in Nocturnal ESP (with Montague Ullman and Alan Vaughan). New York: Macmillan, 1974.
Editor:
Dreamtime and Dreamwork: Decoding the Language of the Night. Los Angeles: Jeremy P. Tarcher, 1990.
Advances in Parapsychological Research, Vols. 4, 5, 6, 7, 8. Jefferson, NC: McFarland Publishing, 1987, 1990, 1994, 1997.
Advances in Parapsychological Research, Vols. 1, 2, 3. New York: Plenum Press, 1977, 1978, 1982.
Psychoenergetic Systems: The Interface of Consciousness, Energy and Matter. New York: Gordon & Breach, 1979.
Co-Editor:
Varieties of Anomalous Experience: Examining the Scientific Evidence (with Etzel Cardena and Steven J. Lynn). Washington, DC: American Psychological Association, 2000.
Mythology, Medicine, and Healing: Transcultural Perspectives. Yearbook of Cross-Cultural Medicine and Psychotherapy, 1998-1999 (with Holger Kalweit). Berlin: Verlag fur Wissenchaft und Bildung, 2000.
Dreamscaping: New and Creative Ways to Work with Your Dreams (with Mark Waldman). Los Angeles: Lowell House, 1999.
Broken Images, Broken Selves: Dissociative Narratives in Clinical Practice (with Susan Powers). New York: Brunner/Mazel, 1997.
Future Science: Life Energies and the Physics of Paranormal Phenomena (with John White). Garden City, NY: Anchor Books, 1977.
The Energies of Consciousness: Explorations in Acupuncture, Auras, and Kirlian Photography (with Daniel Rubin). New York: Gordon & Breach, 1975.
The Kirlian Aura: Photographing the Galaxies of Life (with Daniel Rubin). Garden City, NY: Anchor Books, 1974.
Galaxies of Life: The Human Aura in Acupuncture and Kirlian Photography (with Daniel Rubin). Gordon & Breach, 1973.
Author or co-author of over 1,000 articles, chapters, and book reviews appearing in scholarly or academic publications.
Honors Awards:
The Senior Contributor Award, Division 17 (Counseling Psychology), American Psychological Association, 2000.
The Contribution to Latin American Parapsychology Award, Association for Ibero-American Parapsychology, 1998.
The Outstanding Career Award, Parapsychological Association, 1998.
The Pathfinder Award, Association for Humanistic Psychology, 1998.
Member, The Council of Sages, California Institute of Integral Studies, San Francisco, CA, 1998.
Honorary Member, Fundacion Latinoamericana de Parapsicologia y Psicotonica, Bogota, Colombia, 1994.
The Dan Overlade Memorial Award, Center for Treatment and Research of Experiences Anomalous Trauma, Hastings-on-Hudson, NY, 1994.
The Charlotte and Karl Buhler Award, Division 30 (Humanistic Psychology), American Psychological Association, 1992.
Honorary Member, Pernambuco Institute of Psychobiophysical Research, Recife, Pernambuco, Brazil, 1990.
Doctor of Science (honorary), The Open International University, Colombo, Sri Lanka, 1989.
Associate, Center for a Post-Modern World, Santa Barbara, CA, 1987.
Recipient, Bicentennial Medal, University of Georgia, Athens, GA, 1985.
Doctor of Humane Letters (honorary), University of Humanistic Studies, San Diego, CA, 1982.
Recipient, Membership Service Award, National Association for Gifted Children, 1981.
Colleague, Creative Problem-Solving Institute, Buffalo, NY, 1980.
The Volker Medal, South African Society for Psychical Research, Johannesburg, South Africa, 1980.
Certificate of Recognition, Office of the Gifted and Talented, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 1976.
Citation of Merit, National Association for Creative Children and Adults, 1974.
Citation of Merit, National Association for Gifted Children, 1972.
The Service to Youth Award, Young Men's Christian Association, Richmond, VA, 1959.
Distinguished Professor:
California Institute of Human Science, Encinitas, CA, Distinguished Adjunct Professor.
Institute for Research in Biopsychophysics, Dr. Bezerra de Menezes Integral Center for Higher Education, Curitiba, Parana, Brazil, Professor Benemerito.
Visiting Professor:
Department of Psychology, John F. Kennedy University, Orinda, CA, 1980-1982.
Department of Psychology, State University of West Georgia, Carrollton, GA, 1976.
Institute for Psychodrama and Psychotherapy, Caracas, Venezuela, 1975.
College of Life Sciences, Bogota, Colombia, 1973.
Department of Psychology, Sonoma State University, Rohnert Park, CA, 1972-1973.
Department of Psychology, University of Puerto Rico, San Juan, PR, 1972.
Adjunct Professor:
Fordham University, New York; Brooklyn College, Brooklyn, NY; International University of Professional Studies, Honolulu, HI; Ontario Curriculum Institute, Toronto; New York University, New York; Rosary Hill College, Buffalo, NY; St. John's University of Staten Island, NY; University of California, Irvine, Los Angeles, and San Francisco, CA; Wagner College, Staten Island, NY; Yeshiva University, New York.
Lecturer:
Department of Psychology, Minais Gerais University, Belo Horizonte, Brazil, 1986-1987.
Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China, 1981.
Academy of Pedagogical Sciences, Moscow, Russia, 1971.
Diplomate:
American Board of Sexology, Diplomate
International Academy of Behavioral Medicine, Counseling, and Psychotherapy, Diplomate in Professional Counseling.
Fellow:
American Academy of Clinical Sexologists, Founding Fellow.
American Association of Applied and Preventive Psychotherapy, Fellow.
American Psychological Association, Fellow, Divisions 30 (Society for Psychological Hypnosis), 32 (Humanistic Psychology), and 36 (Psychologists Interested in Religious Issues).
American Psychological Society, Charter Fellow.
American Society of Clinical Hypnosis, Fellow.
Society for the Scientific Study of Religion, Fellow.
Society for the Scientific Study of Sexuality, Fellow.
Society of Clinical and Experimental Hypnosis, Fellow.
Western Psychological Association, Fellow.
Medicina Alternativa Institute, Colombo, Sri Lanka, Fellow.
Member and Listings Member:
Academy of Religion and Psychical Research, American Anthropological Association, American Association for the Advancement of Science, American Association for the Study of Mental Imagery, American Counseling Association, American Creativity Association (Charter Member), American Educational Research Association, American Psychological Association (Council Member, 1978-1980; President, Division 32, 1980-1981; President, Division 30, 1997-1998, Member of Divisions 30, 32, 36, 48, 52), American Psychological Society, American Society for Psychical Research (Voting Member; Trustee, 1987-1997), American Society of Clinical Hypnosis, Association for Applied Psychophysiology and Biofeedback, Association for Humanistic Psychology (President,1974-1975), Association for the Scientific Study of Consciousness, Association for the Study of Dreams (President,1993-1994), Association for Transpersonal Psychology, Center for Shamanic Studies, Council for Exceptional Children, Healing Council of the International Society for the Study of Subtle Energies and Energy Medicine, Institute for the Advancement of Health, InterAmerican Psychological Association, International Alliance for Learning, International Council of Psychologists, International Society for General Semantics, International Society for Hypnosis, International Society for Shamanistic Research, International Society for the Study of Dissociation (Charter Member), International Society of Transcendentology (Founding Member), International Society for Systems Science, International Union of Anthropological and Ethnological Sciences, Medicina Alternativa (Life Member), Joseph Campbell Foundation (Founding Member), National Association for Gifted Children (Vice President, 1976-1977), Parapsychological Association (President, 1982), Sleep Research Society, Society for Chaos Theory in Psychology and the Neural, Human, and Social Sciences; Society for Clinical and Experimental Hypnosis, Society for the Multidisciplinary Study of Consciousness, Society for Psychical Research, Society for Scientific Exploration, Society for the Scientific Study of Religion, Society for the Scientific Study of Sexuality, Society for the Anthropology of Consciousness, Swedish Society for Clinical and Experimental Hypnosis, Western Psychological Association, World Future Society, World Health Foundation for Peace.
Member, Board of Directors, Advisory Board, or Advisory Committee:
Albert Hofmann Foundation, Los Angeles; Bram Stoker Memorial Society, New York; Committee for the Study of Anomalistic Research, Ypsilanti, MI; Existential-Humanistic Institute, San Francisco; Foundation for Mind Research, Ashland, OR; Friends of the Czech Unitaria, New York and Prague; Hartley Film Foundation, Cos Cob, CT; Institute for Transformative Medicine, West Palm Beach, FL; Institute of Applied Consciousness Science, Wilderville, OR; International School for Psychotherapy, Counseling, and Group Leadership, St. Petersburg; International Institute for Survival Studies, Pembroke Pines, FL; The Joseph Plan Foundation, Los Angeles; Peace University of Potsdam, Germany; Portals of Wonder, New York; Rivka Bertisch Foundation, New York and Buenos Aires; Rollo May Center for Humanistic Studies, San Francisco; Rhythm for Life, Tempe, AZ; Survival Research Foundation, Pembroke Pines, FL; Syntony Quest, San Francisco, CA.
Member, Editorial or Advisory Board:
Alternative Therapies in Health and Medicine, American Journal of Clinical Hypnosis, American Journal of Psychiatry, The Behavioral and Brain Sciences, Dream Network Journal, Dreaming: Journal of the Association for the Study of Dreams, Entheos,The Humanistic Psychologist, Journal of Humanistic Psychology, Journal of Indian Psychology, Journal of Mental Imagery, Journal of Psychoactive Drugs, Journal of Trans-Human Consciousness, Journal of Transpersonal Psychology, Paranormal (Romania), Revista Argentina de Psicologia Paranormal, Science and Consciousness..
Listings:
American Men and Women of Science, Encyclopedia of Parapsychology and Psychical Research, International Who's Who of Intellectuals, Leaders in American Science, Outstanding Teachers in Exceptional Education, Who's Who In America, Who's Who in the Biobehavioral Sciences, Who's Who in the West, Who's Who in Frontier Sciences and Technology, Who's Who among Human Service Professionals, Who's Who in Medicine and Healthcare, Who's Who in Science and Engineering, Who's Who in the World.
University of Wisconsin, Madison, WI, B.S., 1954.
Employment Saybrook Graduate School and Research Center, San Francisco, CA, 1973-present; Professor of Psychology, 1982-present.
Maimonides Medical Center, Brooklyn, NY; Director, Dream Laboratory, 1964-1973.
Kent State University, Kent, OH; Director, Child Study Center, 1961-1964.
Richmond Public Schools, Richmond, VA; speech therapist, 1955-1956, 1960.
Community Unit #205, Public Schools, Warren, IL; speech therapist, 1954-1955.
Publications Author:
Human Possibilities: Mind Research in the USSR and Eastern Europe. Garden City, NY: Anchor Books, 1980.
Song of the Siren: A Parapsychological Odyssey. New York: Harper & Row, 1976.
Shamlet: The Tragicall Historie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark New York: Exposition Press, 1971.
Co-Author:
The Mythic Path (with David Feinstein). New York: Jeremy P. TarcherPutnam, 1997.
A Psychiatrist in Paradise: Treating Mental Illness in Bali (with Denny Thong and Bruce Carpenter). Bangkok, Thailand: White Lotus Press, 1993.
Spiritual Dimensions of Healing: From Tribal Shamanism to Contemporary Health Care (with Patrick Welch). New York: Irvington Publishers, 1992.
Dream Telepathy: Experiments in Nocturnal ESP (with Montague Ullman and Alan Vaughan), 2nd ed. Jefferson, NC: McFarland Publishers, 1989.
Personal Mythology: The Psychology of Your Evolving Self (with David Feinstein). Los Angeles: Jeremy P. Tarcher, 1988.
Dreamworking: How to Use Your Dreams for Creative Problem-Solving (with Joseph Dillard). Buffalo, NY: Bearly Ltd., 1988.
Zwischen Himmel und Erde: Spirituelles Heilen der Schamanen, Hexen, Priester und Medien (with Patrick Scott). Dussilgen, Germany: Chiron Verlag, 1987.
Healing States (with Alberto Villoldo). New York: Fireside Books/Simon & Schuster, 1987.
La Science et les Pouvoirs Psychiques de l'Homme (with Jerry Solfvin). Paris: Sand, 1986.
The Realms of Healing (with Alberto Villoldo). Millbrae, CA: Celestial Arts Press, 1976, rev. ed., 1977, 3rd ed., 1986.
Dream Telepathy: Experiments in Nocturnal ESP (with Montague Ullman and Alan Vaughan). New York: Macmillan, 1974.
Editor:
Dreamtime and Dreamwork: Decoding the Language of the Night. Los Angeles: Jeremy P. Tarcher, 1990.
Advances in Parapsychological Research, Vols. 4, 5, 6, 7, 8. Jefferson, NC: McFarland Publishing, 1987, 1990, 1994, 1997.
Advances in Parapsychological Research, Vols. 1, 2, 3. New York: Plenum Press, 1977, 1978, 1982.
Psychoenergetic Systems: The Interface of Consciousness, Energy and Matter. New York: Gordon & Breach, 1979.
Co-Editor:
Varieties of Anomalous Experience: Examining the Scientific Evidence (with Etzel Cardena and Steven J. Lynn). Washington, DC: American Psychological Association, 2000.
Mythology, Medicine, and Healing: Transcultural Perspectives. Yearbook of Cross-Cultural Medicine and Psychotherapy, 1998-1999 (with Holger Kalweit). Berlin: Verlag fur Wissenchaft und Bildung, 2000.
Dreamscaping: New and Creative Ways to Work with Your Dreams (with Mark Waldman). Los Angeles: Lowell House, 1999.
Broken Images, Broken Selves: Dissociative Narratives in Clinical Practice (with Susan Powers). New York: Brunner/Mazel, 1997.
Future Science: Life Energies and the Physics of Paranormal Phenomena (with John White). Garden City, NY: Anchor Books, 1977.
The Energies of Consciousness: Explorations in Acupuncture, Auras, and Kirlian Photography (with Daniel Rubin). New York: Gordon & Breach, 1975.
The Kirlian Aura: Photographing the Galaxies of Life (with Daniel Rubin). Garden City, NY: Anchor Books, 1974.
Galaxies of Life: The Human Aura in Acupuncture and Kirlian Photography (with Daniel Rubin). Gordon & Breach, 1973.
Author or co-author of over 1,000 articles, chapters, and book reviews appearing in scholarly or academic publications.
Honors Awards:
The Senior Contributor Award, Division 17 (Counseling Psychology), American Psychological Association, 2000.
The Contribution to Latin American Parapsychology Award, Association for Ibero-American Parapsychology, 1998.
The Outstanding Career Award, Parapsychological Association, 1998.
The Pathfinder Award, Association for Humanistic Psychology, 1998.
Member, The Council of Sages, California Institute of Integral Studies, San Francisco, CA, 1998.
Honorary Member, Fundacion Latinoamericana de Parapsicologia y Psicotonica, Bogota, Colombia, 1994.
The Dan Overlade Memorial Award, Center for Treatment and Research of Experiences Anomalous Trauma, Hastings-on-Hudson, NY, 1994.
The Charlotte and Karl Buhler Award, Division 30 (Humanistic Psychology), American Psychological Association, 1992.
Honorary Member, Pernambuco Institute of Psychobiophysical Research, Recife, Pernambuco, Brazil, 1990.
Doctor of Science (honorary), The Open International University, Colombo, Sri Lanka, 1989.
Associate, Center for a Post-Modern World, Santa Barbara, CA, 1987.
Recipient, Bicentennial Medal, University of Georgia, Athens, GA, 1985.
Doctor of Humane Letters (honorary), University of Humanistic Studies, San Diego, CA, 1982.
Recipient, Membership Service Award, National Association for Gifted Children, 1981.
Colleague, Creative Problem-Solving Institute, Buffalo, NY, 1980.
The Volker Medal, South African Society for Psychical Research, Johannesburg, South Africa, 1980.
Certificate of Recognition, Office of the Gifted and Talented, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 1976.
Citation of Merit, National Association for Creative Children and Adults, 1974.
Citation of Merit, National Association for Gifted Children, 1972.
The Service to Youth Award, Young Men's Christian Association, Richmond, VA, 1959.
Distinguished Professor:
California Institute of Human Science, Encinitas, CA, Distinguished Adjunct Professor.
Institute for Research in Biopsychophysics, Dr. Bezerra de Menezes Integral Center for Higher Education, Curitiba, Parana, Brazil, Professor Benemerito.
Visiting Professor:
Department of Psychology, John F. Kennedy University, Orinda, CA, 1980-1982.
Department of Psychology, State University of West Georgia, Carrollton, GA, 1976.
Institute for Psychodrama and Psychotherapy, Caracas, Venezuela, 1975.
College of Life Sciences, Bogota, Colombia, 1973.
Department of Psychology, Sonoma State University, Rohnert Park, CA, 1972-1973.
Department of Psychology, University of Puerto Rico, San Juan, PR, 1972.
Adjunct Professor:
Fordham University, New York; Brooklyn College, Brooklyn, NY; International University of Professional Studies, Honolulu, HI; Ontario Curriculum Institute, Toronto; New York University, New York; Rosary Hill College, Buffalo, NY; St. John's University of Staten Island, NY; University of California, Irvine, Los Angeles, and San Francisco, CA; Wagner College, Staten Island, NY; Yeshiva University, New York.
Lecturer:
Department of Psychology, Minais Gerais University, Belo Horizonte, Brazil, 1986-1987.
Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China, 1981.
Academy of Pedagogical Sciences, Moscow, Russia, 1971.
Diplomate:
American Board of Sexology, Diplomate
International Academy of Behavioral Medicine, Counseling, and Psychotherapy, Diplomate in Professional Counseling.
Fellow:
American Academy of Clinical Sexologists, Founding Fellow.
American Association of Applied and Preventive Psychotherapy, Fellow.
American Psychological Association, Fellow, Divisions 30 (Society for Psychological Hypnosis), 32 (Humanistic Psychology), and 36 (Psychologists Interested in Religious Issues).
American Psychological Society, Charter Fellow.
American Society of Clinical Hypnosis, Fellow.
Society for the Scientific Study of Religion, Fellow.
Society for the Scientific Study of Sexuality, Fellow.
Society of Clinical and Experimental Hypnosis, Fellow.
Western Psychological Association, Fellow.
Medicina Alternativa Institute, Colombo, Sri Lanka, Fellow.
Member and Listings Member:
Academy of Religion and Psychical Research, American Anthropological Association, American Association for the Advancement of Science, American Association for the Study of Mental Imagery, American Counseling Association, American Creativity Association (Charter Member), American Educational Research Association, American Psychological Association (Council Member, 1978-1980; President, Division 32, 1980-1981; President, Division 30, 1997-1998, Member of Divisions 30, 32, 36, 48, 52), American Psychological Society, American Society for Psychical Research (Voting Member; Trustee, 1987-1997), American Society of Clinical Hypnosis, Association for Applied Psychophysiology and Biofeedback, Association for Humanistic Psychology (President,1974-1975), Association for the Scientific Study of Consciousness, Association for the Study of Dreams (President,1993-1994), Association for Transpersonal Psychology, Center for Shamanic Studies, Council for Exceptional Children, Healing Council of the International Society for the Study of Subtle Energies and Energy Medicine, Institute for the Advancement of Health, InterAmerican Psychological Association, International Alliance for Learning, International Council of Psychologists, International Society for General Semantics, International Society for Hypnosis, International Society for Shamanistic Research, International Society for the Study of Dissociation (Charter Member), International Society of Transcendentology (Founding Member), International Society for Systems Science, International Union of Anthropological and Ethnological Sciences, Medicina Alternativa (Life Member), Joseph Campbell Foundation (Founding Member), National Association for Gifted Children (Vice President, 1976-1977), Parapsychological Association (President, 1982), Sleep Research Society, Society for Chaos Theory in Psychology and the Neural, Human, and Social Sciences; Society for Clinical and Experimental Hypnosis, Society for the Multidisciplinary Study of Consciousness, Society for Psychical Research, Society for Scientific Exploration, Society for the Scientific Study of Religion, Society for the Scientific Study of Sexuality, Society for the Anthropology of Consciousness, Swedish Society for Clinical and Experimental Hypnosis, Western Psychological Association, World Future Society, World Health Foundation for Peace.
Member, Board of Directors, Advisory Board, or Advisory Committee:
Albert Hofmann Foundation, Los Angeles; Bram Stoker Memorial Society, New York; Committee for the Study of Anomalistic Research, Ypsilanti, MI; Existential-Humanistic Institute, San Francisco; Foundation for Mind Research, Ashland, OR; Friends of the Czech Unitaria, New York and Prague; Hartley Film Foundation, Cos Cob, CT; Institute for Transformative Medicine, West Palm Beach, FL; Institute of Applied Consciousness Science, Wilderville, OR; International School for Psychotherapy, Counseling, and Group Leadership, St. Petersburg; International Institute for Survival Studies, Pembroke Pines, FL; The Joseph Plan Foundation, Los Angeles; Peace University of Potsdam, Germany; Portals of Wonder, New York; Rivka Bertisch Foundation, New York and Buenos Aires; Rollo May Center for Humanistic Studies, San Francisco; Rhythm for Life, Tempe, AZ; Survival Research Foundation, Pembroke Pines, FL; Syntony Quest, San Francisco, CA.
Member, Editorial or Advisory Board:
Alternative Therapies in Health and Medicine, American Journal of Clinical Hypnosis, American Journal of Psychiatry, The Behavioral and Brain Sciences, Dream Network Journal, Dreaming: Journal of the Association for the Study of Dreams, Entheos,The Humanistic Psychologist, Journal of Humanistic Psychology, Journal of Indian Psychology, Journal of Mental Imagery, Journal of Psychoactive Drugs, Journal of Trans-Human Consciousness, Journal of Transpersonal Psychology, Paranormal (Romania), Revista Argentina de Psicologia Paranormal, Science and Consciousness..
Listings:
American Men and Women of Science, Encyclopedia of Parapsychology and Psychical Research, International Who's Who of Intellectuals, Leaders in American Science, Outstanding Teachers in Exceptional Education, Who's Who In America, Who's Who in the Biobehavioral Sciences, Who's Who in the West, Who's Who in Frontier Sciences and Technology, Who's Who among Human Service Professionals, Who's Who in Medicine and Healthcare, Who's Who in Science and Engineering, Who's Who in the World.
Chaos & Healing
Chaos, as its name implies, is the study of chaotic phenomena, processes that are so haphazard that they do not appear to be governed by any known laws or principles but which actually have and underlying order (Langreth, 1991; Talbot, 1991, p. 176). For example, when smoke rises from an extinguished candle, it flows upward in a thin and narrow. stream. Eventually the structure of the stream breaks down and becomes turbulent. Turbulent smoke is said to be chaotic because its behavior can no longer be predicted by known scientific principles. Other examples of chaotic phenomena include water when it crashes on the bottom of a waterfall, the apparently random electrical fluctuations that rage through the brain of an epileptic person during a seizure, the dynamics of increases and decreases in animal populations, hour-by-hour fluctuations on the stock exchange,, and the weather when several different temperature and air pressure fronts collide (Talbot, 1991, p. 177).
Chaos, although apparently random, actually consists of an infinite number of different periodic motions, or orbits; usually a system will move from one motion to the other. Even the smallest change in a chaotic system will move from one motion to the other. Even the smallest change in a chaotic system can lead to a huge effect later on, a property known as "extreme sensitivity to initial conditions" (Langreth, 1991). Until recently, chaotic systems were studied by linear analyses; it was presumed that these chaotic system -- like the classical linear systems -- tended toward stable equilibrium states and that the erratic behavior found i real-life chaotic situations resulted from unidentified variables not yet detected. For example, researchers believed that the weather would be predictable if it were somehow possible to gather enough information about all the relevant variables (Goerner, 1988).
However, nonlinear dynamics is the basis of chaos theory. This is in contrast to the tradition in classical physics that started with Laplace in the 1770s. A seminal paper on chaos theory was published by Edward Lorenz in 1963. It was titled "Deterministic Nonperiod Flow" and appeared in the Journal of the Atmospheric Sciences. Lorenz won the Crafoord Prize in 1983 from the Swedish Academy of Sciences for this and related contributions. In accepting the award, he described how he was able to understand complex atmospheric events only after he understood them as "irregular dynamical systems." He described one complex quality of irregular dynamic systems as "strange attractors" which he considered "probably the features of chaotic systems which have attracted the most mathematicians to the field," an event that enabled chaos theory to develop more rapidly than would have been true had the "attractors" assumed a more commonplace form (Rossi, 1989, p. 115).
Benoit Mandelbrot (1977) was one mathematician who became interested in the field. He coined the term "fractal geometry" to describe his efforts to portray the complexity of nonlinear systems in visual form, admitting his fascination for the beauty of many fractal forms. In fractal geometry, irregular figures of fractal dimensions may fall between the traditional Euclidean whole-number dimensions. Fractals, basically, are geometric shapes with fractional dimensions (Abrahman, Abraham, & Shaw, 1990). Chaotic oscillations evolve around, and are attracted toward, an area called the attractor. The dimensions of this attractor are fractional -- not 1, 2, 3, but, say, 1.75 or 2.25 (depending upon how much of the dimensional space is occupied). Hence, fractal geometry is the geometry of chaos (Vandevert, 1990).
Two Potential Revolutions
Some enthusiasts have claimed that chaos theory will herald the third major scientific revolution of the 20th century because it reveals discontinuity in continuous speed and mass variables (Briggs & Peat, 1989; Gleick, 1987; Rossi, 1989). According to these writers, the first revolution held that an object moving far in excess of everyday speeds demands relativity theory for an explanation. The second revolution held that an object far smaller and less massive than everyday microscopic objects needs quantum theory for an explanation. The third revolution holds that an object so complex that its behavior is far less predictable and definable than everyday objects requires chaos theory for an explanation.
Each of these revolutions placed a new bound or limitation on human abilities: (1) No person can go faster than the speed of light; (2) No person can make simultaneous precise measurements of two conjugate variables; (3) No person can measure any continual variable precisely. Therefore, relativity theory eliminated the Newtonian illusion of space and time. Quantum theory eliminated the Newtonian illusion of a controlled measurable process. Chaos theory eliminates the Laplacian illusion of deterministic predictability. Thus, Newtonian dynamics no longer can take refuge in non-relativistic, non-quantal domains. However, Newtonian principles are still useful for studying the non-random orbits of slowly moving macroscopic objects.
Just as these writers hail chaos theory as the third revolution in natural sciences, humanistic psychology has been referred to as the "third force" in American psychology (Poppen, Wandersman, & Wandersman, 1976, p. 17). Seeing themselves as an alternative to the predominant schools of psychoanalysis and behaviorism, humanistic psychology has been descried by Charlotte Buhler and Melanie Allen (1972) as "revolutionary" because it presents a positive model of the human being, and believes that life is lived subjectively (p. 24). Unlike the psychoanalysts who derived much of their data from rats and pigeons and who focused on externally observed behavior, humanistic psychologists laid claim to the whole person as their domain of investigation. Indeed, Buhler defined humanistic psychology as "the scientific study of behavior, experience, and intentionality."
Models of Research
By including human intention in its domain, humanistic psychology assumed that human beings were able to make choices, to search for meaning, and to engage in self-reflection. Like chaos theory, humanistic psychology took exception to laplacian determinism which held that a superhuman intelligence acquainted with the position and motion of atoms at any moment could predict the whole course of future events, physical as well as human (Rychlak, 1977, p. 100).
While mainstream psychologists spoke of their goal as the understanding, prediction, and control of behavior, humanistic psychologists emphasized understanding and description. For them, psychology could never be a science of the complete prediction and control of behavior. In a similar manner, chaos theory holds that through amplification of small fluctuations, it can provide natural systems with access to novelty (Crutchfield, Doyne, Packard, & Shaw, 1986). Ernest Rossi (1989) sees this amplification of small functions as the process that accounts for "everything from the quantum creation of the universe our of an apparent nothingness to...free will" (p. 127). This is a far different model than the Laplacian clock the movements of which, once set in motion, could be predicted by a master intelligence.
Humanistic psychology uses a variety of research methods in its attempt to describe and understand behavior, experience, and intentionality. Amedeo Giorgi (1986), observed that the activities of most concern in the human are the least susceptible to treatment by existing research methods, and called for a "reform" in the way that science studied human beings. This "human science" would include "phenomenological research, hermeneutic clarification of meaning, life and case history studied, and a variety of studies using qualitative data and/or reconceptualized quasi-experimental designs" (p. 70).
Arne Collen (1990) identified systems science as a human science as well; this method involves the study of relationships at each level of a human system (e.g. cell, organ, organism, group organism, society, suprarational system) as well as the isomorphies that may exist between levels (Krippner, Ruttenber, Engelman, & Granger, 1985). In a similar way, chaos theory brings a new challenge to the reductionistic view that a system can be understood by breaking it down and studying each piece. Chaos demonstrates that a system can have complicated behavior that emerges as a consequence of simple, nonlinear interaction of only a few components (Crutchfield, Doyne, Packard, & Shaw, 1986).
Just as the attempt to study chaotic systems with linear analysis had yielded little -- or incorrect -- data, the attempt to use behavioral and psychoanalytic models to study complex human experiences has been unsatisfactory. An example is human creativity, thought to be mere sublimation of repressed drives by psychoanalysts and, by behaviorists, a lack of ordinary environmental reinforcement. Charlottle Buhler (1933) was one of the first to criticize the psychoanalytic concept of homeostasis as the end goal of human striving, claiming the homeostasis was only a goal in illness. She emphasized the creative processes by which humans attempt to bring values into existence, whether those values are artistic, technological, social, or spiritual. Indeed, human creativity may have an underlying chaotic process that selectively amplifies small fluctuations and molds them into coherent mental states experienced as thought (Rossi, 1989).
Research at Saybrook Institute
Saybrook Institute was founded in 1970 in order to provide graduate education and training in humanistic psychology and to foster human science models of research. Rather than emulating the methods and models of the physical and natural sciences, Saybrook emphasizes alternative methodologies so that psychologists and other scientists can study the actual world and the way that people experience it. Although traditional scientific methods are not abandoned in humanistic psychology, they are utilized in those instances where they will not result in what all too often has been isolated, arbitrary, and trivial aspects of human behavior.
The titles of some of the dissertation research in which my students are currently engaged demonstrates the width and breadth of humanistic psychology: A hermeneutic inquiry into neo-shamanic practice. A heuristic internal search towards knowing: "Imaginative intuition" in a business organization. Associations between demographic variables, afterlife belief, and euthanasia attitudes among California right-to-life and right-to-die members. A psychosocial and psychoneuroimmunological study of patients with rheumatoid arthritis. Assessing the impact of training in concentration skills on high school students' academic performance. The burden placed by schizophrenics on their families in relation to symptom severity and social support. Mutations of consciousness: A systems approach to the evolution of the psyche. The social construction of disability. Mythology, art, and healing practices in Chinese shamanism. The influence of ethanol on dream formation and its implications for sleep physiology. A phenomenological analysis of the experience of hop in seriously medically ill persons having an unexpected recovery or remission. Toward a theory base for a curriculum of evolutionary learning. Vocation and initiation: An inquiry into transpersonal experience and personal mythology. Viewing extraterrestrial abduction accounts as a dissociative phenomenon. Models for Illness and Health
By focusing on the human being's potentials for growth, humanistic psychologists have constructed a model of the healthy personality that diverges from psychoanalysis' medical model of the person. However, chaos theory has also been used to construct models of illness and health that take exception to certain aspects of medical models. For example, the standard medical model holds that a healthy body has rather simple rhythms, tending toward homeostasis. An unhealthy body, therefore, would have a more complex, less controlled tempo. But new data indicate that a healthy bodily system has a certain amount of innate variability. A departure from this healthy variability signals an impaired system. Healthy variability is not random, it is chaotic (Pool, 1989b).
The case could be made that healthy bodies prefer chaos to homeostasis (Goldberger, Rigney, & West, 1990). The healthy heart might remain within 60-80 beats per minute, but varies immensely from second to second, minute to minute, and hour to hour during the day; its complexity can not be predicted easily (Goldberger, Bhargava, West, & Mandell, 1985). On the other hand, before a heart attack, the victim's EKG is described by Pool (1989b) as "the epitome of stable regularity -- a mostly flat line interrupted every second or so by a quick up-and-down blip marking the beat" (p. 604). The nerves that carry electrical signals to the ventricles of the heart are structured in a series of branchings, much like the toot system of a plane. In other words, they display fractal structures as do other parts of the body such as the lungs and the circulatory system (p. 605).
Chaos may also play a role in other bodily systems: in leukemia the number of white blood cells changes dramatically from week to week but are more predictable than those of healthy people who have chaotic fluctuations in their levels of white blood cells. Congestive heart failure is typically preceded by a stable, periodic quickening and slowing of respiration. Further, the EEG of an epileptic is extremely regular just preceding a petit mal seizure (p. 605). Finally, Parkinson's disease may be caused by a loss of variability in some bodily systems, and aging may involve a loss of variability suggesting that youth is more chaotic than age (pp. 606-607).
The Frontiers of Chaos
To psychologists, the application of chaos theory to brain research has evoked considerable interest. Christine Skarda and Walter Freeman (1987) propose that chaotic behavior serves as the essential ground state for the neutral perceptual apparatus, and that the ensuing explanatory model of brain activity has greater utility than brain models based on the brain's purported resemblances to digital computers.
The degree of chaos in sleep and wakefulness has been evaluated from EEG recordings (Babloyantz, 1987). This latter investigation has important implications for the proposal that dreams result from the brain's attempt to bring meaning to the images evoked by a random (perhaps chaotic) stimulation of the brain's visual and motor centers during rapid eye movement sleep (Hobson, 1988).
Some researchers have suggested that chaos theory might help bring some order to the potpourri of provocative but largely unrepeatable finding in parapsychology (e.g., Blackmore, 1990; Kyriaszis, 1990). For over a century, parapsychologists have investigated have investigated such purported phenomena as extrasensory perception and psychokinesis using linear models from natural science--models that date back to Laplace.
Chaos, although apparently random, actually consists of an infinite number of different periodic motions, or orbits; usually a system will move from one motion to the other. Even the smallest change in a chaotic system will move from one motion to the other. Even the smallest change in a chaotic system can lead to a huge effect later on, a property known as "extreme sensitivity to initial conditions" (Langreth, 1991). Until recently, chaotic systems were studied by linear analyses; it was presumed that these chaotic system -- like the classical linear systems -- tended toward stable equilibrium states and that the erratic behavior found i real-life chaotic situations resulted from unidentified variables not yet detected. For example, researchers believed that the weather would be predictable if it were somehow possible to gather enough information about all the relevant variables (Goerner, 1988).
However, nonlinear dynamics is the basis of chaos theory. This is in contrast to the tradition in classical physics that started with Laplace in the 1770s. A seminal paper on chaos theory was published by Edward Lorenz in 1963. It was titled "Deterministic Nonperiod Flow" and appeared in the Journal of the Atmospheric Sciences. Lorenz won the Crafoord Prize in 1983 from the Swedish Academy of Sciences for this and related contributions. In accepting the award, he described how he was able to understand complex atmospheric events only after he understood them as "irregular dynamical systems." He described one complex quality of irregular dynamic systems as "strange attractors" which he considered "probably the features of chaotic systems which have attracted the most mathematicians to the field," an event that enabled chaos theory to develop more rapidly than would have been true had the "attractors" assumed a more commonplace form (Rossi, 1989, p. 115).
Benoit Mandelbrot (1977) was one mathematician who became interested in the field. He coined the term "fractal geometry" to describe his efforts to portray the complexity of nonlinear systems in visual form, admitting his fascination for the beauty of many fractal forms. In fractal geometry, irregular figures of fractal dimensions may fall between the traditional Euclidean whole-number dimensions. Fractals, basically, are geometric shapes with fractional dimensions (Abrahman, Abraham, & Shaw, 1990). Chaotic oscillations evolve around, and are attracted toward, an area called the attractor. The dimensions of this attractor are fractional -- not 1, 2, 3, but, say, 1.75 or 2.25 (depending upon how much of the dimensional space is occupied). Hence, fractal geometry is the geometry of chaos (Vandevert, 1990).
Two Potential Revolutions
Some enthusiasts have claimed that chaos theory will herald the third major scientific revolution of the 20th century because it reveals discontinuity in continuous speed and mass variables (Briggs & Peat, 1989; Gleick, 1987; Rossi, 1989). According to these writers, the first revolution held that an object moving far in excess of everyday speeds demands relativity theory for an explanation. The second revolution held that an object far smaller and less massive than everyday microscopic objects needs quantum theory for an explanation. The third revolution holds that an object so complex that its behavior is far less predictable and definable than everyday objects requires chaos theory for an explanation.
Each of these revolutions placed a new bound or limitation on human abilities: (1) No person can go faster than the speed of light; (2) No person can make simultaneous precise measurements of two conjugate variables; (3) No person can measure any continual variable precisely. Therefore, relativity theory eliminated the Newtonian illusion of space and time. Quantum theory eliminated the Newtonian illusion of a controlled measurable process. Chaos theory eliminates the Laplacian illusion of deterministic predictability. Thus, Newtonian dynamics no longer can take refuge in non-relativistic, non-quantal domains. However, Newtonian principles are still useful for studying the non-random orbits of slowly moving macroscopic objects.
Just as these writers hail chaos theory as the third revolution in natural sciences, humanistic psychology has been referred to as the "third force" in American psychology (Poppen, Wandersman, & Wandersman, 1976, p. 17). Seeing themselves as an alternative to the predominant schools of psychoanalysis and behaviorism, humanistic psychology has been descried by Charlotte Buhler and Melanie Allen (1972) as "revolutionary" because it presents a positive model of the human being, and believes that life is lived subjectively (p. 24). Unlike the psychoanalysts who derived much of their data from rats and pigeons and who focused on externally observed behavior, humanistic psychologists laid claim to the whole person as their domain of investigation. Indeed, Buhler defined humanistic psychology as "the scientific study of behavior, experience, and intentionality."
Models of Research
By including human intention in its domain, humanistic psychology assumed that human beings were able to make choices, to search for meaning, and to engage in self-reflection. Like chaos theory, humanistic psychology took exception to laplacian determinism which held that a superhuman intelligence acquainted with the position and motion of atoms at any moment could predict the whole course of future events, physical as well as human (Rychlak, 1977, p. 100).
While mainstream psychologists spoke of their goal as the understanding, prediction, and control of behavior, humanistic psychologists emphasized understanding and description. For them, psychology could never be a science of the complete prediction and control of behavior. In a similar manner, chaos theory holds that through amplification of small fluctuations, it can provide natural systems with access to novelty (Crutchfield, Doyne, Packard, & Shaw, 1986). Ernest Rossi (1989) sees this amplification of small functions as the process that accounts for "everything from the quantum creation of the universe our of an apparent nothingness to...free will" (p. 127). This is a far different model than the Laplacian clock the movements of which, once set in motion, could be predicted by a master intelligence.
Humanistic psychology uses a variety of research methods in its attempt to describe and understand behavior, experience, and intentionality. Amedeo Giorgi (1986), observed that the activities of most concern in the human are the least susceptible to treatment by existing research methods, and called for a "reform" in the way that science studied human beings. This "human science" would include "phenomenological research, hermeneutic clarification of meaning, life and case history studied, and a variety of studies using qualitative data and/or reconceptualized quasi-experimental designs" (p. 70).
Arne Collen (1990) identified systems science as a human science as well; this method involves the study of relationships at each level of a human system (e.g. cell, organ, organism, group organism, society, suprarational system) as well as the isomorphies that may exist between levels (Krippner, Ruttenber, Engelman, & Granger, 1985). In a similar way, chaos theory brings a new challenge to the reductionistic view that a system can be understood by breaking it down and studying each piece. Chaos demonstrates that a system can have complicated behavior that emerges as a consequence of simple, nonlinear interaction of only a few components (Crutchfield, Doyne, Packard, & Shaw, 1986).
Just as the attempt to study chaotic systems with linear analysis had yielded little -- or incorrect -- data, the attempt to use behavioral and psychoanalytic models to study complex human experiences has been unsatisfactory. An example is human creativity, thought to be mere sublimation of repressed drives by psychoanalysts and, by behaviorists, a lack of ordinary environmental reinforcement. Charlottle Buhler (1933) was one of the first to criticize the psychoanalytic concept of homeostasis as the end goal of human striving, claiming the homeostasis was only a goal in illness. She emphasized the creative processes by which humans attempt to bring values into existence, whether those values are artistic, technological, social, or spiritual. Indeed, human creativity may have an underlying chaotic process that selectively amplifies small fluctuations and molds them into coherent mental states experienced as thought (Rossi, 1989).
Research at Saybrook Institute
Saybrook Institute was founded in 1970 in order to provide graduate education and training in humanistic psychology and to foster human science models of research. Rather than emulating the methods and models of the physical and natural sciences, Saybrook emphasizes alternative methodologies so that psychologists and other scientists can study the actual world and the way that people experience it. Although traditional scientific methods are not abandoned in humanistic psychology, they are utilized in those instances where they will not result in what all too often has been isolated, arbitrary, and trivial aspects of human behavior.
The titles of some of the dissertation research in which my students are currently engaged demonstrates the width and breadth of humanistic psychology: A hermeneutic inquiry into neo-shamanic practice. A heuristic internal search towards knowing: "Imaginative intuition" in a business organization. Associations between demographic variables, afterlife belief, and euthanasia attitudes among California right-to-life and right-to-die members. A psychosocial and psychoneuroimmunological study of patients with rheumatoid arthritis. Assessing the impact of training in concentration skills on high school students' academic performance. The burden placed by schizophrenics on their families in relation to symptom severity and social support. Mutations of consciousness: A systems approach to the evolution of the psyche. The social construction of disability. Mythology, art, and healing practices in Chinese shamanism. The influence of ethanol on dream formation and its implications for sleep physiology. A phenomenological analysis of the experience of hop in seriously medically ill persons having an unexpected recovery or remission. Toward a theory base for a curriculum of evolutionary learning. Vocation and initiation: An inquiry into transpersonal experience and personal mythology. Viewing extraterrestrial abduction accounts as a dissociative phenomenon. Models for Illness and Health
By focusing on the human being's potentials for growth, humanistic psychologists have constructed a model of the healthy personality that diverges from psychoanalysis' medical model of the person. However, chaos theory has also been used to construct models of illness and health that take exception to certain aspects of medical models. For example, the standard medical model holds that a healthy body has rather simple rhythms, tending toward homeostasis. An unhealthy body, therefore, would have a more complex, less controlled tempo. But new data indicate that a healthy bodily system has a certain amount of innate variability. A departure from this healthy variability signals an impaired system. Healthy variability is not random, it is chaotic (Pool, 1989b).
The case could be made that healthy bodies prefer chaos to homeostasis (Goldberger, Rigney, & West, 1990). The healthy heart might remain within 60-80 beats per minute, but varies immensely from second to second, minute to minute, and hour to hour during the day; its complexity can not be predicted easily (Goldberger, Bhargava, West, & Mandell, 1985). On the other hand, before a heart attack, the victim's EKG is described by Pool (1989b) as "the epitome of stable regularity -- a mostly flat line interrupted every second or so by a quick up-and-down blip marking the beat" (p. 604). The nerves that carry electrical signals to the ventricles of the heart are structured in a series of branchings, much like the toot system of a plane. In other words, they display fractal structures as do other parts of the body such as the lungs and the circulatory system (p. 605).
Chaos may also play a role in other bodily systems: in leukemia the number of white blood cells changes dramatically from week to week but are more predictable than those of healthy people who have chaotic fluctuations in their levels of white blood cells. Congestive heart failure is typically preceded by a stable, periodic quickening and slowing of respiration. Further, the EEG of an epileptic is extremely regular just preceding a petit mal seizure (p. 605). Finally, Parkinson's disease may be caused by a loss of variability in some bodily systems, and aging may involve a loss of variability suggesting that youth is more chaotic than age (pp. 606-607).
The Frontiers of Chaos
To psychologists, the application of chaos theory to brain research has evoked considerable interest. Christine Skarda and Walter Freeman (1987) propose that chaotic behavior serves as the essential ground state for the neutral perceptual apparatus, and that the ensuing explanatory model of brain activity has greater utility than brain models based on the brain's purported resemblances to digital computers.
The degree of chaos in sleep and wakefulness has been evaluated from EEG recordings (Babloyantz, 1987). This latter investigation has important implications for the proposal that dreams result from the brain's attempt to bring meaning to the images evoked by a random (perhaps chaotic) stimulation of the brain's visual and motor centers during rapid eye movement sleep (Hobson, 1988).
Some researchers have suggested that chaos theory might help bring some order to the potpourri of provocative but largely unrepeatable finding in parapsychology (e.g., Blackmore, 1990; Kyriaszis, 1990). For over a century, parapsychologists have investigated have investigated such purported phenomena as extrasensory perception and psychokinesis using linear models from natural science--models that date back to Laplace.
LSD & Parapsychological Experiences, by Stanley Krippner
LSD and Parapsychological Experiences
Stanley Krippner, Ph.D.
Alan Watts Professor of Psychology, Saybrook Graduate School & Research Center
William James, the first eminent psychologist in the United States, once ingested peyote at the suggestion of his friend, E. Weir Mitchell. Instead of attaining the esthetic or mystical experience Mitchell had promised him, James developed a severe stomach ache. When he recovered from the nausea, James refused to take peyote again, telling Mitchell, “I will take the visions on trust.”
James’ experiences with nitrous oxide were more successful. After inhaling the colorless gas for the first time, he experienced a profound alteration in consciousness. Further work with “laughing gas” led James to write that normal, everyday awareness is only one type of conscious experience. Noting that other experiences exist that are worthy of investigation, the famed psychologist concluded, “No account of the universe in its totality can be final which leaves these other forms of consciousness quite disregarded.”
James was a founder of the American Society for Psychical Research, an organization that pioneered the investigation of so-called parapsychological phenomena. Parapsychologists investigate reported experiences and behaviors that appear to transcend mainstream science’s understanding of time, space, and energy, and have used such terms as “telepathy,” “clairvoyance,” “precognition,” and “psychokinesis” to describe these experiences. Some parapsychologists also study so-called “past-life experiences” and “after-death communications” from deceased people.
Even though experiences with LSD-type substances are unpredictable, and even though parapsychological experiences tend to be intangible, there are some logical reasons that suggest the former experiences might be conducive to the occurrence of the latter. Considerable research suggests that reports of parapsychological experiences occur during states of consciousness that are marked by
1. an increase in mental imagery that is unusually vivid and detailed;
2. the occurrence of transpersonal experiences that seem to transcend one’s identity;
3. an alteration in body perception, including so-called “out-of-body” experiences;
4. the incidence of dissociation, in which one’s flow of awareness is interrupted;
5. an increase in absorption and focused attention;
6. an increase in empathy and feelings of closeness with other people;
7. enhanced emotional flexibility, intensity, and fluidity;
8. an increase in alertness, attention, and awareness;
9. an increase in spontaneity and the impression that one has become more creative;
10. an increase in sensitivity to environmental changes;
11. an increase in suggestibility and responsiveness to others;
12. enhanced intuitive processes and awareness of one’s internal thoughts;
13. an increased openness to occurrences once thought to be impossible;
14. a reduction in critical faculties and skeptical thought patterns;
15. an increased feeling that space and time have been transcended.
In addition to these temporary changes that might be conducive to subjective
parapsychological experiences, it is arguable that long-term ideological alterations might occur including changes in one’s concepts of “reality” and one’s ability to utilize presumptive parapsychological skills. For example, the renowned medium Eileen Garrett asserted that the use of LSD had enhanced her sensitivity and accuracy. In the meantime, several studies have revealed a small but consistent relationship between drug use and belief in the existence of parapsychological phenomena; this was especially evident in Tart’s study of marijuana users.
Another reason for investigating the links between reported parapsychological experiences and LSD-type substances is the exploration of the accompanying brain mechanisms. Roney-Dougal, for example, has proposed a model based on the action of the pineal gland in response to ayahuasca, the Amazonian brew that contains the alkaloid harmaline, once dubbed “telepathine” because of its alleged evocation of telepathy. Strassman has hypothesized a role for DMT similar to that suggested by Roney-Dougal. He has implicated the overproduction of DMT and its effects on the pineal gland in states ranging from psychosis to mysticism. Ketamine, an anesthetic that induces dissociation, has been associated with “near-death” experiences, some of which contain purported parapsychological elements. Jansen has hypothesized that ketamine acts by binding to the phencyclidine (PCP) site of the N-methyl-D-aspartate (NMDA) receptors, blocking the action of the neurotransmitter glutamate. Winkelman has used the term “psychointegrators” to describe the way that LSD-type substances “integrate” various portions and functions of the brain and nervous system. If there are “visionary molecules” in the human brain and body, it is likely that they served an adaptive purpose in the evolution of the species. Hence, the investigation of this topic may have critical implications for biology, evolutionary psychology, and anthropology.
Anthropological Data
The anthropological and ethnobotanical literature is replete with examples of ostensibly parapsychological phenomena occurring with the traditional use of psychoactive plants. For millennia, indigenous societies have used these plant preparations to communicate with purported other-worldly realms and entities, as well as to maintain their linkages to the natural world.
The ritual use of psychoactive plants to induce purported parapsychological skills is commonplace among indigenous people from every inhabited continent. Clairvoyant states were routinely accessed among tribal groups in Morocco through ingesting extracts of a shrub containing a harmala alkaloid, and among rural communities in India through smoking or eating Cannabis derivatives. Other examples include the ingestion of pituri (Duboisia hopwoodii) among several Australian aboriginal tribes, San Pedro (Trichocereus pachanoi & Trichocereus. peruvianus)cactus among indigenous groups in Peru, amanita (Amanita muscaria) mushrooms among Siberian tribes and the Ojibwa in Canada, and psilocybin-containing mushrooms among the Mazatecs in Mexico, who also used Salvia divinorum. Thorn apple (Datura stramonium) seeds were used by some of the Delphic oracles to activate their alleged precognitive skills, and there is a long history of ibogaine ingestion among several African societies. In 1992, Schultes and Hofmann identified some 100 psychoactive plants that were employed to access visionary states by traditional people, a practice especially common among shamans and shamanic healers in hunting and gathering communities.
McGovern was one of the first anthropologists to investigate the use of ayahuasca (also called yagé, the “vine of the soul”) on an expedition to Peru. He imbibed the beverage himself in a native ceremony, noting:
Curiously enough, certain of the Indians fell into a particularly deep state of trance in which they possessed what appeared to be telepathic powers. Two or three of the men described in great detail what was going on…hundreds of miles
away….More extraordinarily still, on this particular evening, the local medicine
man told me that the chief of a certain tribe on the far away Pra Pirana [River] had suddenly died. I entered this statement in my diary and many weeks later, when we came to the tribe in question, I found that [his] statement had been true in every detail.
Another early report was submitted by Zerda-Bayon who related the case of a Colonel Morales who, after ingesting a similar substance in Peru, beheld an image of his dead father and his ailing sister, both of whom had been in good health when last he saw them. A few weeks later he received the same sad news from a messenger.
Western culture severed the connection between psychoactive plants and visionary states when Zoroaster banned the use of the haoma plant in Persia, when the Eleusinian rituals in Greece fell into disrepute, and when witches were persecuted during the Inquisition, in part because of their use of henbane, belladonna, mandrake, and datura.
A combination of changing concepts of illness, the development of sedentary societies, and the influence of monotheistic religions and colonization resulted in the virtual disappearance of traditional employment of psychoactive plants for parapsychological purposes in most of Europe and North America, and much of the rest of the so-called “civilized world.”
However, Naranjo, in a 1967 report, described his experiment with 30 volunteer participants who ingested a harmaline preparation, apparently with no knowledge of its usage in the Amazon rain forest. Many of their reports included images of jaguars, jungles, and dark-skinned men. In addition, some imagined that they were flying.
More recently, Narby introduced three Western scientists to shamanic practitioners in the Amazonian rain forest who administered ayahuasca. The scientists brought unsolved technical problems with them, and each reported key insights resulting from the session. In discussing the origins of the brew, Narby commented, "Here are people without electron microscopes who choose, among 80,000 Amazonian plant species, the leaves of a bush containing a...brain hormone, which they combine with a vine containing substances that inactivate an enzyme of the digestive tract, which would otherwise block the effect. And they do this to modify their consciousness. It is as if they knew about the molecular properties of plants and the art of combining them, and when one asks them how they knew these things, they say their knowledge comes directly from [the] plants.”
Clinical and Anecdotal Data
There are several anecdotal and clinical case studies on record in which the ingestion of LSD-type substances resulted in presumptive parapsychological experiences. For example, Grof wrote an account regarding two of his friends who were vacationing in Maine. One of them, “Peter,” went scuba diving and never returned. Consequently, his wife, “Penny,” had difficulty accepting her husband’s death; this was especially problematic for her because his body was never found. During a psychotherapeutic LSD session with Grof, Penny reported “communicating” with Peter who explained that he was, in fact, dead. Peter gave Penny specific instructions concerning each of their children and requested that she get on with her life. Peter then asked Penny to return a book that he had borrowed from a friend, giving Penny the friend’s name, the title of the book, and the location of the book in their house. All of this information was correct, and Penny returned the book to its owner. Following this dramatic experience, Penny was able to accept Peter’s death and to begin working through her grief.
A less spectacular report was contributed by Masters and Houston who described the case of a homemaker who, in the course of her LSD session with them, claimed that she could “see” her daughter in the kitchen of their home looking for the cookie jar. She further reported “seeing” the child knock a sugar bowl from a shelf, spilling sugar on the floor. When the woman returned home, she was unable to find the sugar bowl. Her husband told her that their daughter had knocked the sugar bowl from its shelf, breaking it, while looking for the cookie jar.
One evening, a psychiatrist ate an amanita mushroom in a laboratory 300 miles from the office in which she usually conducted her psychotherapeutic practice. Her experience included intense visual imagery alternating between an atomic bomb explosion and an appreciation of what she called “the power of love.” At the very time of her amanita session, a client of hers, “Jim,” unaccountably went to a grocery store and bought prepared mushrooms (which he had never cooked before), ate them with a hamburger, and later had an anxiety attack, fearing that an atomic bomb attack was imminent. Another client of hers, “Joan,” during the same evening, insisted that a close friend, “Gina’” drive her to the home of a man with whom the client was secretly in love. “Joan” sat in her friend “Gina’s” care for two hours yearning for the object of her attraction. It was only “Gina’s” vigilance that prevented her from entering the man’s house and throwing herself into his arms. Both “Jim” and “Joan” had expressed an interest in parapsychology, and both had unusually strong emotional attachments to their psychotherapist. The psychiatrist hypothesized that these two highly irrational acts by her clients might have been telepathically induced through her amanita mushroom experience.
Blewett has reported the case of a teacher who took LSD under his direction. Her experience was conceptual rather than veridical, but illustrates a worldview closely associated with parapsychological experiences. She told Blewett, “I was outside our dimensions of space and time and felt an understanding of infinity. The understanding was so broad or universal that it forestalled all questions. Questions such as, ‘What is beyond space?’ which had previously posed an intellectual problem, had no meaning for me since the answer was ‘other spaces—an infinity of them’.”
Blewett administered a questionnaire to 147 of his research participants within a week following their experience. The questionnaire posed three questions, and answers were given on a 3-point scale: “Very much,” “Little,” or “None.” About 60% of his participants answered “Very Much” to each of the three questions:
1. Did you feel that you were aware of new dimensions of thought?
2. Did you feel an awareness of several levels of awareness?
3. Did you feel that you were able to think on different levels?
The results of this survey, published in 1963, led Blewett to recommend the use of LSD-type substances in parapsychological research. He concluded, “Perhaps the greatest impact of these compounds will stem from the development of new methods and techniques designed to meet the challenge which they offer as research tools.”
Anecdotal reports involving psychokinesis (“mind over matter”) are less common than those involving telepathy (“mind to mind communication”), clairvoyance (“remote perception”), and precognition (“viewing the future”). However, Dean Brown relates an incident when he took LSD under the direction of Al Hubbard, an early advocate of the substance. While driving back to Las Vegas, following their time together in the mountains of Nevada, Hubbard asked Brown to take a dollar bill out of his wallet. Hubbard then proceeded to identify each of the ten serial numbers and letters not only of that bill, but of several others. If this report is accurate, it would serve as an example of clairvoyance. Hubbard confided that he had developed these skills through his previous use of LSD. However, Hubbard later insisted they enter a casino in Las Vegas where, according to Brown’s account, Hubbard was able to use psychokinesis to influence several gaming machines to pay off in his favor. However, Hubbard’s reputation was well-known in the casino and he was politely escorted out when his limit of earnings had been reached.
Millay has reported an incident that occurred when her young daughter, Maya, was visiting her father, Millay’s former husband, in the Caroline Islands. When Maya did not return at the appointed time, Millay ingested mescaline and attempted to “clear” her mind of any distracting influences. After four hours of “clearing,” Millay had the impression that she had made contact with Maya. Her daughter seemed to tell Millay that there had been a problem with vaccinations and transportation, and that it would be explained in a letter. She also had an image of her daughter holding an animal that resembled a raccoon. Maya’s letter arrived, as predicted, and the information about vaccinations and travel logistics was correct. What about the animal? Maya had tamed a colorful jungle pheasant and tried to smuggle it home in her backpack. When her father discovered this plan, he became angry and killed the pheasant. Both Millay and her daughter recalled that, as a child, she had bought a raccoon at a pet store, but as it grew older the animal terrorized the neighborhood. A neighbor threatened to shoot the animal, but a solution was reached in which the raccoon was taken back to the pet store.
I was one of the last participants to enroll in Timothy Leary’s psilocybin experiment at Harvard University. In 1962, Leary and his assistants administered the substance to Steve, a friend of mine, and to me, and I soon began to report images of delicate Moorish arabesques and Persian miniature paintings. I went on a whirlwind tour of France, Spain, New York, and Baltimore, ending up in Washington, DC where I found myself gazing at a bust of Abraham Lincoln. While watching the features from the side, in profile, they began to darken and someone whispered, “He was shot. The president was shot.” A wisp of smoke rose from a gun and curled into the air. Lincoln’s features slowly faded away and those of the current president, John F. Kennedy, took their place. The wisp of smoke was still emerging from the gun, and the voice repeated, “He was shot. The president was shot.” I opened my eyes because they were dripping tears. For whatever reason, the tragic premonition was confirmed the following year.
At the beginning of our psilocybin session, I attempted to administer a psychological test to my friend. After answering three questions, Steve burst out laughing and I joined him because the task seemed utterly ridiculous. In retrospect, I was able to appreciate the difficulties involved in administering parapsychological tests to a participant who was bemushroomed or psilocybinized.
A few years later, members of the rock group The Grateful Dead volunteered to participate in a telepathy study during six shows in Port Chester , New York. At the time, I was director of a sleep and dream laboratory at Maimonides Medical Center in Brooklyn, and an English medium volunteered to attempt dreaming about an art print that would be chosen randomly during each of the concerts and would be projected on a large screen placed in back of the band. Directions to the audience and the name of the medium were also projected; however, they were not given the name of a second participant who was recording her dreams at home. Each of the concerts was attended by about 2,000 persons most of whom were under the influence of psychoactive substances when the instructions were given to them. The guesses made by the medium in our laboratory were more accurate than those given by the unknown participant. For example, when a painting of the seven spinal chakras was displayed, the medium reported dreams about “natural energy,” “an energy box,” and “a spinal column.”
Experimental Data
A few experimental attempts have been made to elicit parapsychological phenomena through the controlled administration of LSD-type substances. Most of them were described as “pilot studies” and were conducted during the 1960s in various parts of the world. Specially designed decks of 25 cards containing five different symbols such as stars and circles were used in clairvoyance experiments by Whittlesey, Pahnke, Masters and Houston, Tinoco (in Brazil), Don (in Brazil), and two groups of Dutch psychologists. None of them produced statistically significant results, although Whittlesey’s group of 27 participants demonstrated lower variance during the LSD sessions than during the control sessions. One group of Dutch investigators, who utilized psilocybin, reported that the cards were guessed correctly more often during the psilocybin condition than during the control condition, but not at a significant level.
The other Dutch group conducted two clairvoyance experiments, one of which used marijuana that was “self-administered” to avoid legal problems; even so, four participants became nauseous and dropped out of the study. Under the influence of marijuana, the remaining group members obtained slightly higher scores but the investigators suggested the difference might have been due to the ratings given by the judges, one who had taken marijuana before beginning the judging task. The second clairvoyance experiment conducted by this group employed six participants who ingested psilocybin before they made their guesses as to the picture’s identity. A “buddy” system was used to deter the possibility of nausea or other complications. Out of the 12 attempts, there were 7 correct guesses, a significant result. However, this experiment did not include a control, comparison condition so there is no way of knowing whether psilocybin played a role in the group’s success. This group also designed a telepathy experiment, again using psilocybin. The overall results showed no difference between the psilocybin condition and the no-drug, control condition but the group’s psilocybin guesses were better when the picture displayed a positive emotion than when it was associated with a negative emotion. The results were the opposite in the control, comparison condition.
Puharich used emotionally-toned pictures rather than card symbols in a clairvoyance experiment involving amanita mushrooms. His 26 participants made significantly more correct guesses under the influence of the mushrooms than before or after the session. He attributed the results to the mushrooms’ activation of participants’ parasympathetic functions (for example, slow heart rate). However, psychoactive mushrooms can also stimulate rather than calm bodily functions, and so this explanation is inconclusive. Nevertheless, Puharich reported that one of his participants perfectly matched two sets of 20 unseen pictures in three seconds. Puharich also tested four Los Angeles newspaper reporters described as “skeptical”; they obtained similar results but with numbers rather than pictures. Once again, chance results were obtained before mushroom ingestion, significant results emerged during the mushroom session, and scoring returned to chance following the conclusion of the session. Unfortunately, this innovative experiment was published in a popular book rather than in a refereed journal, so the quality of the controls remains a matter of speculation.
The same criticism can be made of a telepathy study reported in a book by Masters and Houston whose LSD participants attempted to identify emotionally-charged images that had been prepared in advance, and administered toward the end of the session. Of the 62 participants tested, 48 approximated the image at least two times out of ten, while five participants’ verbal reports resembled the image at least seven times out of ten. One participant visualized “tossed seas” when the image was a Viking ship in a storm. The same participant reported “lush vegetation” when the image was a rain forest in the Amazon, “a camel” when the image was an Arab riding a camel, “the Alps” when the image was the Himalayas, and “a Negro picking cotton in a field” when the image was a pre-Civil War Southern plantation.
The best known and most highly regarded experiment was designed by two Italian investigators, Cavanna and Servadio. Color prints of emotionally-loaded photographic collages were prepared in a clairvoyance experiment that employed three participants, and both LSD (three dosage levels) and psilocybin conditions, as well as a placebo condition. Despite extensive screening, one of the participants had an anxiety attack during the first LSD session, even though the dosage was fairly low. Nevertheless, the participant returned to the study and 12 sessions were run for everyone. Their responses were compared to the color prints by five judges who generally agreed on the ratings given to each match. When compared to the placebo condition, the participants’ guesses during the LSD and psilocybin sessions were more accurate, especially during the low dose LSD condition. Indeed, no correct matches were obtained in any of the placebo sessions by any of the three participants. The overall results did not obtain statistical significance but one participant did unusually well. During a psilocybin session, he concentrated on an envelope containing a collage of a key combined with female breasts. His guess was, “a woman with bosoms and ornaments.” During an LSD session, he concentrated on an envelope containing a photograph of two hands, one large and one small; he guessed that the picture was “a hand; the five points of the huge hand come out.” The experimenters concluded that the major finding emerging from their work was the role of interpersonal relations, and sugggested that future experiments include personality assessment of both participants and experimenters.
Osis administered LSD to a number of practicing mediums who were given physical objects and asked to describe the owners. Most of the participants were so interested in the “esthetic pleasure” and the “philosophical knowledge” resulting from their LSD sessions that they had difficulty maintaining an interest in the parapsychological task. A problem common to all the experiments is the fact that imagery and feelings will not stand still. Just as a participant seeks to make an informed guess, the experience races on, and the event in question is compounded by the next event or series of events. Many of the researchers noted that participants had difficulty maintaining alertness, focus, and orientation to the task. Suggestions for future research include using experienced participants who are familiar with the effects of LSD, preceding the session with hypnosis during which time suggestions can be given to stabilize the task, and making greater use of anecdotal and clinical data by subjecting the verbal reports to content analysis.
In Retrospect
Parapsychological research is extremely difficult to fund; thus, the modicum of financial support that is available has been directed to projects with major scientific payoffs and it is apparent that the past work with LSD-type substances does not qualify. In addition to the methodological problems that are obvious to readers of these reports, there has been an almost complete lack of follow-up, in which more rigorous studies would be designed. As a result, this research project is open to a variety of criticisms, even ridicule. In fact, conventional science rejects the very notion that its concepts of time, space, and energy have been challenged by the evidence emerging from parapsychological research, with or without the aid of psychoactive substances.
Nevertheless, these data are of value for what they can teach investigators about research design, about the phenomenology of the experimental sessions, and the possible neurological mechanisms of putative parapsychological experiences. Parapsychological data as a whole may not be convincing for many conventional scientists, but most of them now admit that reports of telepathic, clairvoyant, precognitive, and psychokinetic experiences are rarely the sign of severe mental disorder. For those whose mental health is at risk, Wulff and other investigators of mystical experiences have pointed out the therapeutic potential of these experiences, whether spontaneously reported or associated with psychoactive drugs, meditation, or some other technology.
The cultural belief systems, personality traits, and brain mechanisms that underlie these reports is a worthwhile area for scientific investigation and may well reveal dimensions of the human psyche that are currently obscure. To paraphrase William James, no account of the universe in its totality can be final that disregards these experiences. And as Albert Hofmann has reminded us, the healing of our planet depends upon an “existential experience of a deeper, self-encompassing reality.”
Sidney Cohen, a representative of mainstream American psychiatry who was also a pioneer LSD researcher, stated his conviction that “intuition, creativity, telepathic experience, prophecy – all can be understood as superior activities of brain-mind function.” This is the vision shared by Albert Hofmann who wrote that "in the LSD state the boundaries between the experiencing self and the outer world more or less disappear....Feedback between receiver and sender takes place. A portion of the self overflows into the outer world, into objects, which begin to live, to have another, a deeper meaning. In an auspicious case, the new ego feels blissfully united with the objects of the outer world and consequently also with its fellow beings. This experience of deep oneness with the exterior world can even intensify to a feeling of the self being one with the universe." All worthwhile scenarios need to be incarnated, to be brought from internal consciousness into external action and daily behavior. The exploration of the relation between LSD-type drugs and parapsychology, mind and matter, between subject and object, between the individual and the universe is an ongoing process. The discoveries, contributions, and reflections of Albert Hofmann have made a significant impact to this perennial quest.
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This paper was prepared for presentation at LSD: Problem Child and Wonder Drug, An International Symposium on the Occasion of the 100th Birthday of Albert Hofmann, 13-15 January, Basel, Switzerland. Gratitude is expressed to David Luke for the use of material from “Psychoactive Substances and Paranormal Phenomena,” a chapter prepared for the forthcoming 9th volume of Advances in Parapsychological Research and to the support of the Chair for the Study of Consciousness, Saybrook Graduate School and Research Center, San Francisco, California, U.S.A.
Stanley Krippner, Ph.D.
Alan Watts Professor of Psychology, Saybrook Graduate School & Research Center
William James, the first eminent psychologist in the United States, once ingested peyote at the suggestion of his friend, E. Weir Mitchell. Instead of attaining the esthetic or mystical experience Mitchell had promised him, James developed a severe stomach ache. When he recovered from the nausea, James refused to take peyote again, telling Mitchell, “I will take the visions on trust.”
James’ experiences with nitrous oxide were more successful. After inhaling the colorless gas for the first time, he experienced a profound alteration in consciousness. Further work with “laughing gas” led James to write that normal, everyday awareness is only one type of conscious experience. Noting that other experiences exist that are worthy of investigation, the famed psychologist concluded, “No account of the universe in its totality can be final which leaves these other forms of consciousness quite disregarded.”
James was a founder of the American Society for Psychical Research, an organization that pioneered the investigation of so-called parapsychological phenomena. Parapsychologists investigate reported experiences and behaviors that appear to transcend mainstream science’s understanding of time, space, and energy, and have used such terms as “telepathy,” “clairvoyance,” “precognition,” and “psychokinesis” to describe these experiences. Some parapsychologists also study so-called “past-life experiences” and “after-death communications” from deceased people.
Even though experiences with LSD-type substances are unpredictable, and even though parapsychological experiences tend to be intangible, there are some logical reasons that suggest the former experiences might be conducive to the occurrence of the latter. Considerable research suggests that reports of parapsychological experiences occur during states of consciousness that are marked by
1. an increase in mental imagery that is unusually vivid and detailed;
2. the occurrence of transpersonal experiences that seem to transcend one’s identity;
3. an alteration in body perception, including so-called “out-of-body” experiences;
4. the incidence of dissociation, in which one’s flow of awareness is interrupted;
5. an increase in absorption and focused attention;
6. an increase in empathy and feelings of closeness with other people;
7. enhanced emotional flexibility, intensity, and fluidity;
8. an increase in alertness, attention, and awareness;
9. an increase in spontaneity and the impression that one has become more creative;
10. an increase in sensitivity to environmental changes;
11. an increase in suggestibility and responsiveness to others;
12. enhanced intuitive processes and awareness of one’s internal thoughts;
13. an increased openness to occurrences once thought to be impossible;
14. a reduction in critical faculties and skeptical thought patterns;
15. an increased feeling that space and time have been transcended.
In addition to these temporary changes that might be conducive to subjective
parapsychological experiences, it is arguable that long-term ideological alterations might occur including changes in one’s concepts of “reality” and one’s ability to utilize presumptive parapsychological skills. For example, the renowned medium Eileen Garrett asserted that the use of LSD had enhanced her sensitivity and accuracy. In the meantime, several studies have revealed a small but consistent relationship between drug use and belief in the existence of parapsychological phenomena; this was especially evident in Tart’s study of marijuana users.
Another reason for investigating the links between reported parapsychological experiences and LSD-type substances is the exploration of the accompanying brain mechanisms. Roney-Dougal, for example, has proposed a model based on the action of the pineal gland in response to ayahuasca, the Amazonian brew that contains the alkaloid harmaline, once dubbed “telepathine” because of its alleged evocation of telepathy. Strassman has hypothesized a role for DMT similar to that suggested by Roney-Dougal. He has implicated the overproduction of DMT and its effects on the pineal gland in states ranging from psychosis to mysticism. Ketamine, an anesthetic that induces dissociation, has been associated with “near-death” experiences, some of which contain purported parapsychological elements. Jansen has hypothesized that ketamine acts by binding to the phencyclidine (PCP) site of the N-methyl-D-aspartate (NMDA) receptors, blocking the action of the neurotransmitter glutamate. Winkelman has used the term “psychointegrators” to describe the way that LSD-type substances “integrate” various portions and functions of the brain and nervous system. If there are “visionary molecules” in the human brain and body, it is likely that they served an adaptive purpose in the evolution of the species. Hence, the investigation of this topic may have critical implications for biology, evolutionary psychology, and anthropology.
Anthropological Data
The anthropological and ethnobotanical literature is replete with examples of ostensibly parapsychological phenomena occurring with the traditional use of psychoactive plants. For millennia, indigenous societies have used these plant preparations to communicate with purported other-worldly realms and entities, as well as to maintain their linkages to the natural world.
The ritual use of psychoactive plants to induce purported parapsychological skills is commonplace among indigenous people from every inhabited continent. Clairvoyant states were routinely accessed among tribal groups in Morocco through ingesting extracts of a shrub containing a harmala alkaloid, and among rural communities in India through smoking or eating Cannabis derivatives. Other examples include the ingestion of pituri (Duboisia hopwoodii) among several Australian aboriginal tribes, San Pedro (Trichocereus pachanoi & Trichocereus. peruvianus)cactus among indigenous groups in Peru, amanita (Amanita muscaria) mushrooms among Siberian tribes and the Ojibwa in Canada, and psilocybin-containing mushrooms among the Mazatecs in Mexico, who also used Salvia divinorum. Thorn apple (Datura stramonium) seeds were used by some of the Delphic oracles to activate their alleged precognitive skills, and there is a long history of ibogaine ingestion among several African societies. In 1992, Schultes and Hofmann identified some 100 psychoactive plants that were employed to access visionary states by traditional people, a practice especially common among shamans and shamanic healers in hunting and gathering communities.
McGovern was one of the first anthropologists to investigate the use of ayahuasca (also called yagé, the “vine of the soul”) on an expedition to Peru. He imbibed the beverage himself in a native ceremony, noting:
Curiously enough, certain of the Indians fell into a particularly deep state of trance in which they possessed what appeared to be telepathic powers. Two or three of the men described in great detail what was going on…hundreds of miles
away….More extraordinarily still, on this particular evening, the local medicine
man told me that the chief of a certain tribe on the far away Pra Pirana [River] had suddenly died. I entered this statement in my diary and many weeks later, when we came to the tribe in question, I found that [his] statement had been true in every detail.
Another early report was submitted by Zerda-Bayon who related the case of a Colonel Morales who, after ingesting a similar substance in Peru, beheld an image of his dead father and his ailing sister, both of whom had been in good health when last he saw them. A few weeks later he received the same sad news from a messenger.
Western culture severed the connection between psychoactive plants and visionary states when Zoroaster banned the use of the haoma plant in Persia, when the Eleusinian rituals in Greece fell into disrepute, and when witches were persecuted during the Inquisition, in part because of their use of henbane, belladonna, mandrake, and datura.
A combination of changing concepts of illness, the development of sedentary societies, and the influence of monotheistic religions and colonization resulted in the virtual disappearance of traditional employment of psychoactive plants for parapsychological purposes in most of Europe and North America, and much of the rest of the so-called “civilized world.”
However, Naranjo, in a 1967 report, described his experiment with 30 volunteer participants who ingested a harmaline preparation, apparently with no knowledge of its usage in the Amazon rain forest. Many of their reports included images of jaguars, jungles, and dark-skinned men. In addition, some imagined that they were flying.
More recently, Narby introduced three Western scientists to shamanic practitioners in the Amazonian rain forest who administered ayahuasca. The scientists brought unsolved technical problems with them, and each reported key insights resulting from the session. In discussing the origins of the brew, Narby commented, "Here are people without electron microscopes who choose, among 80,000 Amazonian plant species, the leaves of a bush containing a...brain hormone, which they combine with a vine containing substances that inactivate an enzyme of the digestive tract, which would otherwise block the effect. And they do this to modify their consciousness. It is as if they knew about the molecular properties of plants and the art of combining them, and when one asks them how they knew these things, they say their knowledge comes directly from [the] plants.”
Clinical and Anecdotal Data
There are several anecdotal and clinical case studies on record in which the ingestion of LSD-type substances resulted in presumptive parapsychological experiences. For example, Grof wrote an account regarding two of his friends who were vacationing in Maine. One of them, “Peter,” went scuba diving and never returned. Consequently, his wife, “Penny,” had difficulty accepting her husband’s death; this was especially problematic for her because his body was never found. During a psychotherapeutic LSD session with Grof, Penny reported “communicating” with Peter who explained that he was, in fact, dead. Peter gave Penny specific instructions concerning each of their children and requested that she get on with her life. Peter then asked Penny to return a book that he had borrowed from a friend, giving Penny the friend’s name, the title of the book, and the location of the book in their house. All of this information was correct, and Penny returned the book to its owner. Following this dramatic experience, Penny was able to accept Peter’s death and to begin working through her grief.
A less spectacular report was contributed by Masters and Houston who described the case of a homemaker who, in the course of her LSD session with them, claimed that she could “see” her daughter in the kitchen of their home looking for the cookie jar. She further reported “seeing” the child knock a sugar bowl from a shelf, spilling sugar on the floor. When the woman returned home, she was unable to find the sugar bowl. Her husband told her that their daughter had knocked the sugar bowl from its shelf, breaking it, while looking for the cookie jar.
One evening, a psychiatrist ate an amanita mushroom in a laboratory 300 miles from the office in which she usually conducted her psychotherapeutic practice. Her experience included intense visual imagery alternating between an atomic bomb explosion and an appreciation of what she called “the power of love.” At the very time of her amanita session, a client of hers, “Jim,” unaccountably went to a grocery store and bought prepared mushrooms (which he had never cooked before), ate them with a hamburger, and later had an anxiety attack, fearing that an atomic bomb attack was imminent. Another client of hers, “Joan,” during the same evening, insisted that a close friend, “Gina’” drive her to the home of a man with whom the client was secretly in love. “Joan” sat in her friend “Gina’s” care for two hours yearning for the object of her attraction. It was only “Gina’s” vigilance that prevented her from entering the man’s house and throwing herself into his arms. Both “Jim” and “Joan” had expressed an interest in parapsychology, and both had unusually strong emotional attachments to their psychotherapist. The psychiatrist hypothesized that these two highly irrational acts by her clients might have been telepathically induced through her amanita mushroom experience.
Blewett has reported the case of a teacher who took LSD under his direction. Her experience was conceptual rather than veridical, but illustrates a worldview closely associated with parapsychological experiences. She told Blewett, “I was outside our dimensions of space and time and felt an understanding of infinity. The understanding was so broad or universal that it forestalled all questions. Questions such as, ‘What is beyond space?’ which had previously posed an intellectual problem, had no meaning for me since the answer was ‘other spaces—an infinity of them’.”
Blewett administered a questionnaire to 147 of his research participants within a week following their experience. The questionnaire posed three questions, and answers were given on a 3-point scale: “Very much,” “Little,” or “None.” About 60% of his participants answered “Very Much” to each of the three questions:
1. Did you feel that you were aware of new dimensions of thought?
2. Did you feel an awareness of several levels of awareness?
3. Did you feel that you were able to think on different levels?
The results of this survey, published in 1963, led Blewett to recommend the use of LSD-type substances in parapsychological research. He concluded, “Perhaps the greatest impact of these compounds will stem from the development of new methods and techniques designed to meet the challenge which they offer as research tools.”
Anecdotal reports involving psychokinesis (“mind over matter”) are less common than those involving telepathy (“mind to mind communication”), clairvoyance (“remote perception”), and precognition (“viewing the future”). However, Dean Brown relates an incident when he took LSD under the direction of Al Hubbard, an early advocate of the substance. While driving back to Las Vegas, following their time together in the mountains of Nevada, Hubbard asked Brown to take a dollar bill out of his wallet. Hubbard then proceeded to identify each of the ten serial numbers and letters not only of that bill, but of several others. If this report is accurate, it would serve as an example of clairvoyance. Hubbard confided that he had developed these skills through his previous use of LSD. However, Hubbard later insisted they enter a casino in Las Vegas where, according to Brown’s account, Hubbard was able to use psychokinesis to influence several gaming machines to pay off in his favor. However, Hubbard’s reputation was well-known in the casino and he was politely escorted out when his limit of earnings had been reached.
Millay has reported an incident that occurred when her young daughter, Maya, was visiting her father, Millay’s former husband, in the Caroline Islands. When Maya did not return at the appointed time, Millay ingested mescaline and attempted to “clear” her mind of any distracting influences. After four hours of “clearing,” Millay had the impression that she had made contact with Maya. Her daughter seemed to tell Millay that there had been a problem with vaccinations and transportation, and that it would be explained in a letter. She also had an image of her daughter holding an animal that resembled a raccoon. Maya’s letter arrived, as predicted, and the information about vaccinations and travel logistics was correct. What about the animal? Maya had tamed a colorful jungle pheasant and tried to smuggle it home in her backpack. When her father discovered this plan, he became angry and killed the pheasant. Both Millay and her daughter recalled that, as a child, she had bought a raccoon at a pet store, but as it grew older the animal terrorized the neighborhood. A neighbor threatened to shoot the animal, but a solution was reached in which the raccoon was taken back to the pet store.
I was one of the last participants to enroll in Timothy Leary’s psilocybin experiment at Harvard University. In 1962, Leary and his assistants administered the substance to Steve, a friend of mine, and to me, and I soon began to report images of delicate Moorish arabesques and Persian miniature paintings. I went on a whirlwind tour of France, Spain, New York, and Baltimore, ending up in Washington, DC where I found myself gazing at a bust of Abraham Lincoln. While watching the features from the side, in profile, they began to darken and someone whispered, “He was shot. The president was shot.” A wisp of smoke rose from a gun and curled into the air. Lincoln’s features slowly faded away and those of the current president, John F. Kennedy, took their place. The wisp of smoke was still emerging from the gun, and the voice repeated, “He was shot. The president was shot.” I opened my eyes because they were dripping tears. For whatever reason, the tragic premonition was confirmed the following year.
At the beginning of our psilocybin session, I attempted to administer a psychological test to my friend. After answering three questions, Steve burst out laughing and I joined him because the task seemed utterly ridiculous. In retrospect, I was able to appreciate the difficulties involved in administering parapsychological tests to a participant who was bemushroomed or psilocybinized.
A few years later, members of the rock group The Grateful Dead volunteered to participate in a telepathy study during six shows in Port Chester , New York. At the time, I was director of a sleep and dream laboratory at Maimonides Medical Center in Brooklyn, and an English medium volunteered to attempt dreaming about an art print that would be chosen randomly during each of the concerts and would be projected on a large screen placed in back of the band. Directions to the audience and the name of the medium were also projected; however, they were not given the name of a second participant who was recording her dreams at home. Each of the concerts was attended by about 2,000 persons most of whom were under the influence of psychoactive substances when the instructions were given to them. The guesses made by the medium in our laboratory were more accurate than those given by the unknown participant. For example, when a painting of the seven spinal chakras was displayed, the medium reported dreams about “natural energy,” “an energy box,” and “a spinal column.”
Experimental Data
A few experimental attempts have been made to elicit parapsychological phenomena through the controlled administration of LSD-type substances. Most of them were described as “pilot studies” and were conducted during the 1960s in various parts of the world. Specially designed decks of 25 cards containing five different symbols such as stars and circles were used in clairvoyance experiments by Whittlesey, Pahnke, Masters and Houston, Tinoco (in Brazil), Don (in Brazil), and two groups of Dutch psychologists. None of them produced statistically significant results, although Whittlesey’s group of 27 participants demonstrated lower variance during the LSD sessions than during the control sessions. One group of Dutch investigators, who utilized psilocybin, reported that the cards were guessed correctly more often during the psilocybin condition than during the control condition, but not at a significant level.
The other Dutch group conducted two clairvoyance experiments, one of which used marijuana that was “self-administered” to avoid legal problems; even so, four participants became nauseous and dropped out of the study. Under the influence of marijuana, the remaining group members obtained slightly higher scores but the investigators suggested the difference might have been due to the ratings given by the judges, one who had taken marijuana before beginning the judging task. The second clairvoyance experiment conducted by this group employed six participants who ingested psilocybin before they made their guesses as to the picture’s identity. A “buddy” system was used to deter the possibility of nausea or other complications. Out of the 12 attempts, there were 7 correct guesses, a significant result. However, this experiment did not include a control, comparison condition so there is no way of knowing whether psilocybin played a role in the group’s success. This group also designed a telepathy experiment, again using psilocybin. The overall results showed no difference between the psilocybin condition and the no-drug, control condition but the group’s psilocybin guesses were better when the picture displayed a positive emotion than when it was associated with a negative emotion. The results were the opposite in the control, comparison condition.
Puharich used emotionally-toned pictures rather than card symbols in a clairvoyance experiment involving amanita mushrooms. His 26 participants made significantly more correct guesses under the influence of the mushrooms than before or after the session. He attributed the results to the mushrooms’ activation of participants’ parasympathetic functions (for example, slow heart rate). However, psychoactive mushrooms can also stimulate rather than calm bodily functions, and so this explanation is inconclusive. Nevertheless, Puharich reported that one of his participants perfectly matched two sets of 20 unseen pictures in three seconds. Puharich also tested four Los Angeles newspaper reporters described as “skeptical”; they obtained similar results but with numbers rather than pictures. Once again, chance results were obtained before mushroom ingestion, significant results emerged during the mushroom session, and scoring returned to chance following the conclusion of the session. Unfortunately, this innovative experiment was published in a popular book rather than in a refereed journal, so the quality of the controls remains a matter of speculation.
The same criticism can be made of a telepathy study reported in a book by Masters and Houston whose LSD participants attempted to identify emotionally-charged images that had been prepared in advance, and administered toward the end of the session. Of the 62 participants tested, 48 approximated the image at least two times out of ten, while five participants’ verbal reports resembled the image at least seven times out of ten. One participant visualized “tossed seas” when the image was a Viking ship in a storm. The same participant reported “lush vegetation” when the image was a rain forest in the Amazon, “a camel” when the image was an Arab riding a camel, “the Alps” when the image was the Himalayas, and “a Negro picking cotton in a field” when the image was a pre-Civil War Southern plantation.
The best known and most highly regarded experiment was designed by two Italian investigators, Cavanna and Servadio. Color prints of emotionally-loaded photographic collages were prepared in a clairvoyance experiment that employed three participants, and both LSD (three dosage levels) and psilocybin conditions, as well as a placebo condition. Despite extensive screening, one of the participants had an anxiety attack during the first LSD session, even though the dosage was fairly low. Nevertheless, the participant returned to the study and 12 sessions were run for everyone. Their responses were compared to the color prints by five judges who generally agreed on the ratings given to each match. When compared to the placebo condition, the participants’ guesses during the LSD and psilocybin sessions were more accurate, especially during the low dose LSD condition. Indeed, no correct matches were obtained in any of the placebo sessions by any of the three participants. The overall results did not obtain statistical significance but one participant did unusually well. During a psilocybin session, he concentrated on an envelope containing a collage of a key combined with female breasts. His guess was, “a woman with bosoms and ornaments.” During an LSD session, he concentrated on an envelope containing a photograph of two hands, one large and one small; he guessed that the picture was “a hand; the five points of the huge hand come out.” The experimenters concluded that the major finding emerging from their work was the role of interpersonal relations, and sugggested that future experiments include personality assessment of both participants and experimenters.
Osis administered LSD to a number of practicing mediums who were given physical objects and asked to describe the owners. Most of the participants were so interested in the “esthetic pleasure” and the “philosophical knowledge” resulting from their LSD sessions that they had difficulty maintaining an interest in the parapsychological task. A problem common to all the experiments is the fact that imagery and feelings will not stand still. Just as a participant seeks to make an informed guess, the experience races on, and the event in question is compounded by the next event or series of events. Many of the researchers noted that participants had difficulty maintaining alertness, focus, and orientation to the task. Suggestions for future research include using experienced participants who are familiar with the effects of LSD, preceding the session with hypnosis during which time suggestions can be given to stabilize the task, and making greater use of anecdotal and clinical data by subjecting the verbal reports to content analysis.
In Retrospect
Parapsychological research is extremely difficult to fund; thus, the modicum of financial support that is available has been directed to projects with major scientific payoffs and it is apparent that the past work with LSD-type substances does not qualify. In addition to the methodological problems that are obvious to readers of these reports, there has been an almost complete lack of follow-up, in which more rigorous studies would be designed. As a result, this research project is open to a variety of criticisms, even ridicule. In fact, conventional science rejects the very notion that its concepts of time, space, and energy have been challenged by the evidence emerging from parapsychological research, with or without the aid of psychoactive substances.
Nevertheless, these data are of value for what they can teach investigators about research design, about the phenomenology of the experimental sessions, and the possible neurological mechanisms of putative parapsychological experiences. Parapsychological data as a whole may not be convincing for many conventional scientists, but most of them now admit that reports of telepathic, clairvoyant, precognitive, and psychokinetic experiences are rarely the sign of severe mental disorder. For those whose mental health is at risk, Wulff and other investigators of mystical experiences have pointed out the therapeutic potential of these experiences, whether spontaneously reported or associated with psychoactive drugs, meditation, or some other technology.
The cultural belief systems, personality traits, and brain mechanisms that underlie these reports is a worthwhile area for scientific investigation and may well reveal dimensions of the human psyche that are currently obscure. To paraphrase William James, no account of the universe in its totality can be final that disregards these experiences. And as Albert Hofmann has reminded us, the healing of our planet depends upon an “existential experience of a deeper, self-encompassing reality.”
Sidney Cohen, a representative of mainstream American psychiatry who was also a pioneer LSD researcher, stated his conviction that “intuition, creativity, telepathic experience, prophecy – all can be understood as superior activities of brain-mind function.” This is the vision shared by Albert Hofmann who wrote that "in the LSD state the boundaries between the experiencing self and the outer world more or less disappear....Feedback between receiver and sender takes place. A portion of the self overflows into the outer world, into objects, which begin to live, to have another, a deeper meaning. In an auspicious case, the new ego feels blissfully united with the objects of the outer world and consequently also with its fellow beings. This experience of deep oneness with the exterior world can even intensify to a feeling of the self being one with the universe." All worthwhile scenarios need to be incarnated, to be brought from internal consciousness into external action and daily behavior. The exploration of the relation between LSD-type drugs and parapsychology, mind and matter, between subject and object, between the individual and the universe is an ongoing process. The discoveries, contributions, and reflections of Albert Hofmann have made a significant impact to this perennial quest.
References
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Wulff, D.M. (2000). Mystical experiences. In E. Cardeña, S.J. Lynn, & S. Krippner (Eds.). Varieties of anomalous experience: Examining the scientific evidence (pp. 387-440). Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.
This paper was prepared for presentation at LSD: Problem Child and Wonder Drug, An International Symposium on the Occasion of the 100th Birthday of Albert Hofmann, 13-15 January, Basel, Switzerland. Gratitude is expressed to David Luke for the use of material from “Psychoactive Substances and Paranormal Phenomena,” a chapter prepared for the forthcoming 9th volume of Advances in Parapsychological Research and to the support of the Chair for the Study of Consciousness, Saybrook Graduate School and Research Center, San Francisco, California, U.S.A.
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Krippner Interview with Jeff Mishlove
THINKING ALLOWED
Conversations On The Leading Edge
Of Knowledge and Discovery
With Dr. Jeffrey Mishlove
COPYRIGHT
(C) 1998 THINKING ALLOWED PRODUCTIONS
PSYCHIC AND SPIRITUAL HEALING
with STANLEY KRIPPNER, Ph.D.
JEFFREY MISHLOVE, Ph.D.:
Hello and welcome. With me today is Dr. Stanley Krippner. Dr. Krippner is one of the country's foremost scholars in the field of parapsychology and consciousness studies, and we'll be discussing "Psychic and Spiritual Healing." Stanley is a professor of psychology at Saybrook Institute in San Francisco, where he is also the director of the Center for Consciousness Studies. He is a past president of the Association for Humanistic Psychology, and also a past president of the Parapsychological Association. He is the co-author, with Dr. Alberto Villoldo, of two books in the area of psychic and spiritual healing, Healing States, and also The Realms of Healing. Welcome, Stanley.
STANLEY KRIPPNER, Ph.D.: Thank you. It's a pleasure to be here.
MISHLOVE: It's a pleasure to have you here. I'm sorry I had to stop short a little bit enumerating all of your many credentials, and the numerous other books and undoubtedly hundreds of other articles that you've written. I know you have an enormous depth, particularly in the fields of psychic and spiritual healing. I think it's important, in starting out, that we point out a fact that isn't often discussed when people think of healing, and that is that paranormal forms of healing have been studied in laboratories, with impressive results.
KRIPPNER: Yes. The reason that they go into the laboratories is that there are a number of problems in studying patients who go to a faith healer, or who have been worked on by a folk healer in some foreign country. Many of these people get well, but you don't know if the recovery was due to chance, what we call a spontaneous remission; whether it was due to the powers of suggestion; or whether it was due to their work with an allopathic physician before they went to the alternative healer. So a number of experiments have been done that look at laboratory-controlled attempts to change living organisms in some way or another. The best way to talk about that is perhaps to start with the work of Bernard Grad, who is a biologist and physiologist in Canada.
MISHLOVE: At McGill University.
KRIPPNER: That's right. What he did was to take injured rats, and to have healers do a laying on of hands on the rats. He compared this with medical students who did laying on of hands with the rats, and he found out that the healers' rats recovered from their wounds much more quickly than did the medical students' rats.
MISHLOVE: Now laying on of hands would mean that the healers were actually touching these rats.
KRIPPNER: That's right.
MISHLOVE: And what we're looking at is a wound that was created surgically by the researchers, and then they measure how rapidly these wounds would heal.
KRIPPNER: That's true. Now of course it's possible that the healers had some type of chemical in their hands which facilitated the healing, and so what Dr. Grad did then was to move to simply having the healer put his or her hands around a vial of water. Usually they were wearing gloves, so whatever heat or chemical they had in their hands could not affect the water directly. Then there were control vials of water that were just left there, or that non-healers held. This water was used to water seeds, and the person doing the watering didn't know which came from the healers' water, and which came from the control water. This was done over a several-week period. Dr. Grad did several experiments, mainly with barley seeds, and by and large the results showed that the barley seeds which received the healers' water had more rootage, more foliage, and taller plants than did the control seeds, which also did well, but not as well.
MISHLOVE: It seems to me I recall another study in which he had people who were psychologically disturbed -- very depressed, even psychotic people -- try and heal the water, or treat the water, and the plants that were nurtured with that water were stunted in their growth.
KRIPPNER: Yes, that's right. That was very intriguing. Unfortunately he didn't do enough of that type of study to yield what I would call a clear-cut result. But again, anybody could try to repeat that, because the results were so intriguing.
MISHLOVE: Grad's work is still considered the classic experiments in the area of psychic healing, I think.
KRIPPNER: Oh yes, you see them referred to in many, many places. And then a quite different type of experiment was done by Dr. Justa Smith, who had a healer work with a test tube that had enzymes in it which had been damaged by radiation. Again, the enzymes were compared with test tubes that nobody held, and test tubes that a non-healer held, and a test tube that was surrounded in an electromagnetic field. When the electromagnetic field was used, the enzymes did improve, in much the same way as did the enzymes that the healer worked with. There was a similarity there.
MISHLOVE: Suggesting that the healer might somehow be influencing the enzymes with his own or her own electromagnetic field.
KRIPPNER: That's right. Now again, not all of Dr. Smith's experiments worked. All we can say is the majority of them had that effect. And then again, quite a different line of research was done by Dolores Krieger and her associates. She is a nurse and a teacher at New York University. She did a laying on of hands without touching the patient. She used real live patients in a hospital setting, and found that the hemoglobin values increased when people did laying on of hands, but not when nurses spent extra time with the patients, or simply talked to the patients, or simply sat by the patients. But if the nurses had the intent to heal, and held their hands over the patient, the hemoglobin values did improve.
MISHLOVE: Did the patients know that this was the intent?
KRIPPNER: No, they didn't really know that that was the intent. Of course the problem with this is that it is quite unusual for a nurse to do a laying on of hands, and so maybe in some subtle way this did enhance the change within the patients. There's been a long string of replications of Dr. Krieger's work by other people, and almost all of them yielded positive results. There have also been many criticisms of Dr. Krieger's work, but the study that's going on right now by Dr. Quinn has taken into account all of the criticisms of the early work, and she is now producing what I think will be the best controlled studies when she finishes sometime within the next few months.
MISHLOVE: Do you as a parapsychologist take this body of literature to suggest that what psychic healing is, in the laboratory, when it's isolated in this fashion, is some type of mind over matter or psychokinetic effect on enzymes or living tissues or biological substances?
KRIPPNER: Well, this is one way you can interpret it. Of course we don't know if that's the same way that it goes on in real life. We don't know at all. I think one of the experiments which follows from what you're saying is an experiment one of our students at Saybrook Institute did. Douglas Dean for his doctoral dissertation had healers simply hold their hands around a test tube of water or a flask of water, and he found that there were subtle changes in the water, in the ultraviolet and/or in the infrared spectrum, and non-healers could not induce that change. He has done this now with literally hundreds of healers, and the first attempted replication of his study, by Stephen Schwartz and his associates in Los Angeles, did produce similar results. So this now is a purely physiological and physical change in, apparently, molecules of water.
MISHLOVE: In the molecular bonding of the water molecules themselves, I understand.
KRIPPNER: Yes, this is what causes the difference in the way that the light passes through. The molecular bonding appears to have been changed.
MISHLOVE: So perhaps in the future researchers along these lines will actually allow us to have a picture of the mechanism by which this healing takes place.
KRIPPNER: Or at least one of the mechanisms; I suspect maybe there's more than one. So there's a little summary of some of the work that's been done. The only other one that I would mention offhand is Dr. William Broad's work at the Mind Science Foundation in San Antonio, Texas, because he has now done a dozen experiments, again having a healer work, but mainly at a distance, and very often with people trying to affect some aspect, like muscle movement or tension or relaxation or psychogalvanic skin response. His experiments have been almost always successful in terms of getting the hypothesized effect.
MISHLOVE: In other words, you might be in another room, and I might be concentrating on affecting your brain waves, or affecting your skin response, something like that. I might be getting feedback from some instruments that were connected to you.
KRIPPNER: Yes. Feedback on how well you're doing in making the change.
MISHLOVE: That's fascinating. Well, Stanley, you yourself have traveled all over the world. You've personally investigated and interacted with and become friends with healers from many, many different cultures, haven't you? Who has impressed you the most?
KRIPPNER: Oh, I would say there are a number of people who impressed me, and on the other hand, of course, there are people who haven't impressed me. As you are well aware, this field is filled with charlatans. It's filled with people who are well-meaning but deluded, who probably do more harm than good, and it's filled with people who are out to make money and don't really have the interests of their clients or their patients paramount at all.
MISHLOVE: I'm glad you brought that up.
KRIPPNER: But I think that maybe the person who has impressed me the most, for a number of reasons, would be Dr. Lawrence LeShan, and also his associate, Dr. Joyce Goodrich -- first of all because they're both psychologists and they work within the scientific paradigm; also they make it a rule not to charge money for what they do, and so all of their services have been free. Also, they have both done research in this field, and are open to further research, and they've begun to train people, so that people can go and learn the type of meditation that they feel is useful for healing. My wife has studied, for example, with them, and uses this healing training with afflicted pets and animals. It's a very beautiful meditation, because you obtain a type of oneness and a sense of love and compassion with the person or the animal that you are trying to heal.
MISHLOVE: In other words, you concentrate on merging with them.
KRIPPNER: Yes, that's right.
MISHLOVE: And LeShan finds from his clinical observations that people actually get better when another person concentrates on them in this way.
KRIPPNER: Well, at least more often than not. And again, he has done some follow-up, and has very meticulously collected some case studies on this. Now here, remember that people are coming for the healing, so we don't know how much if any psi is operating here. It might be suggestion; it might be expectancy. Both of these people are very excellent psychotherapists. It might be their therapeutic skills that are producing the change.
MISHLOVE: Psi, I might mention for our viewers who don't know, is the scientific term used by parapsychologists to refer to either an extrasensory perception effect or a psychokinetic effect.
KRIPPNER: Yes, and when you're talking about the psychokinesis, the so-called mind-over-matter effect that seems to operate in the laboratories, we don't know if this is what's happening in real life. It might be more of a telepathic effect, where the healer and the healee, or the client or the patient, are in some sort of telepathic rapport, so that the person who wants to become well is getting this message from the healer, and then is allowing his or her own self-healing mechanisms to come into play. All that we know now about the body's immune system and the endorphins and other chemicals in the brain indicates that there are many self-healing properties of the body which do much more to help a person get well than we have suspected in the past.
MISHLOVE: I imagine that when you are working with native healers in other cultures, they make use of rituals and other types of images, music, drumming, and things, that might activate these same self-healing systems, so that we needn't necessarily invoke any paranormal explanation.
KRIPPNER: That's possible. You mentioned our book Healing States a few minutes ago. In Healing States we spend quite a bit of time talking about healers in Peru and healers in Brazil, healers in Mexico and the United States,
people from native traditions. These traditions started out long before allopathic medicine came into the picture, and among poor people who have no money for allopathic practitioners these folk doctors are still available.
MISHLOVE: That's all they have.
KRIPPNER: Yes, that's all they have, and if you watch them at work you see that they're very excellent therapists. They use drama, they use suggestion, they use expectancy, they use their own charisma. And you can see that everything that they do elicits the self-healing properties of the sick person to take over.
MISHLOVE: I guess it's fair to mention that on top of that they work in a cultural milieu in which psychic functioning is not challenged necessarily; it's accepted, both by the doctor and by the patients -- which I suppose would be compatible with laboratory studies that suggest that these are psi-conducive conditions.
KRIPPNER: That's right, and in these societies all of this is taken for granted. It's not questioned. In both Healing States and The Realms of Healing, Dr. Villoldo and I spend quite a bit of time talking about Rolling Thunder, who is an intertribal medicine man who lives in Nevada. He's now retired, but when he was an active healer he would do many things along the line that you were just suggesting. One time I saw a healing ceremony where he was working with a young Indian man who was severely alcoholic. Rolling Thunder preceded the healing with ninety minutes of drumming and chanting, while that man sat in a chair, fifty people around him, all demonstrating their love for him and their care for him. And then when Rolling Thunder started to use his ceremony with the feathers and the rituals and the evoking of the Great Spirit and the sacrificial burning of raw meat, the patient really lit up, and he became very enwrapped in this whole ritualistic ceremony. And then Rolling Thunder said, "Did you hear that owl who was hooting?" Everybody said, "Oh yes, we heard that owl." I wasn't sure if there was an owl or not, but he was saying, "Well, that owl is a symbol of death, so this might be Robert's last chance to shape up. But the number of times that he hooted is a symbol of good luck, so it might be that he's going to make it this time." So that again was a superb dramatic ploy, and something that got Robert, first of all, very shaken up, and then determined that this might be the time that he had to break free of the alcoholism. And it worked. I checked into him ten months later. He was still on the wagon, and a year later he left the area and he had still not gone back to alcohol.
MISHLOVE: One of the things I notice you wrote about in Healing States was that some of these native healers will engage in the ritual chanting, and the chant may run nine solid days. It may take them years to learn a complicated chant like that. I would think that in our culture we have no idea of the kinds of states of consciousness that can be created from nine solid days of chanting a chant that takes one years to learn how to perform.
KRIPPNER: Oh yes. Some of these chants are used by Native Americans, especially for very, very serious cases of illness, and then people in the community will take turns coming and sitting with that person, and just their presence really demonstrates the care that they have for that person. I was with the Cuna Indians in Panama, from the San Blas Islands. They have many types of healers in that particular society. It's a very interesting, very complex healing system. Also they go to allopathic physicians who are in the neighborhood, so they have the best of both worlds. I talked to one of the shamans who had learned some ninety different chants, and some of those chants are so complicated they take several months to learn, and there are hundreds of chants in the tradition. He is still fairly young; he's in his forties, and he hopes that he will be able to master maybe two hundred as time goes on. There are chants for everything; some of them are several hours long. If you imagine people sitting listening to those chants, focusing on those chants, knowing that these chants are going to heal them, you can just imagine the amount of self healing that that chanting can trigger.
MISHLOVE: Up until rather recently, I would think that Western medical traditions have just sort of scoffed at all of these native healers. One gets a sense, though, that times are changing, that even mainstream Western doctors are now saying, gee, there might be something there that we should look at.
KRIPPNER: Yes. In our book Healing States we use the example of North America -- how in the early part of the twentieth century the Spirit Dance was outlawed, the Ghost Dance was outlawed, and the Sun Dance was outlawed, by the U.S. and Canadian governments. Now all the dances are back in style again; the laws have been revoked. The psychotherapists can see how these dances can keep the Native Americans from becoming alcoholics, and even can pull many of the alcoholics back into condition, after they go through these native rituals and make contact again with their roots. Also, folklorists see that here is a repertoire of very complex and very beautiful and very inspirational dance and music and ceremony that really should not be lost, just on the basic of its aesthetics, if nothing else.
MISHLOVE: Anthropologists used to say in decades past that these shamans, the healers of native tribes, were really the schizophrenic ones. Now I think they're coming around and saying no, they are in an altered state of consciousness; but they may be in a higher state of consciousness than the average person, rather than in a more disorganized state.
KRIPPNER: Yes. My friend Michael Harner has done a great deal to address that issue in his books, and we have a treatment of that issue in our book Healing States, pointing out, for example, that studies have been done with psychological tests. Many of the Native American shamans have been given psychological tests. People in their tribe have been given the tests, and you find out that shamans have more imaginative capacity than people in their tribe, but also they're more in touch with reality than people in their tribe. So they're very much at home in both worlds. That's the remarkable thing about what a shaman can do, while on the other hand the pseudo-shamans, the deluded people in the tribe who think that they're shamans but who the tribe stays away from because they don't put any trust in them, their psychological test scores are very poor. They show very poor personality integration, a very low level of functioning, and sometimes a very shaky concept of reality.
MISHLOVE: Many of the native healers, and I think across many traditions, have a kind of animistic or spiritistic world view that healing must involve removing possessing spirits from the sick person. You've observed that in Brazil and elsewhere. How do you evaluate that, Stan?
KRIPPNER: Well, exorcism is very popular among some Christian denominations in the United States. It runs rampant in the groups I've seen in Brazil, in the Afro-Brazilian movements, and there's an interesting way that you can look at that. Some of the more sophisticated of the Brazilian practitioners have told Dr. Villoldo and myself, "You know, the worst black magic is the black magic we commit against ourselves. It is the sorcery that hurts ourselves when we think negative thoughts, or we hold onto a destructive self concept, or when we allow ourself to say negative, hostile things about ourselves and the people around us, and those sentences go over and over in our mind. It is no wonder, then, that people get stomach aches and backaches and headaches with those negative thought images going around." And yes, to me that sounds like something that's sorcery, and if that can be exorcised, so much the better. If you want to call this a malevolent spirit, fine. If you want to call it negative thinking, fine. But either the spiritist or the psychotherapist, or both of them, really have to approach that negativity and get rid of it if the person's going to recover.
MISHLOVE: In other words you're taking a pragmatic point of view. If it works, then it ought to be used.
KRIPPNER: Yes, the same thing with the Brazilian belief in past lives. Most of the Brazilian healers I know do a lot of what we would call past life therapy. Now, who knows if what they're integrating is a person's past life, or a part of their current-day personality that they've distanced themselves from? In both instances a person is made whole. Something that has been repressed and has been sort of shut off is brought to attention, the value of it is experienced, and it is combined with their current level of functioning, and they become wholer and stronger as a result. Now that certainly sounds very therapeutic to me.
MISHLOVE: That might even apply in situations where the healer is actually out-and-out using fraud, such as some of the alleged cases of psychic surgery, where fraud seems to be used and then people recover.
KRIPPNER: The amazing thing is that there is a history of sleight of hand in shamanism, and sometimes the sleight of hand is used for very benign purposes. In other cases it's used to earn a buck. But sometimes, sleight of hand will be used by the shamans, especially when they do the cupping and sucking routine, and they suck on a person's skin and their mouth fills up with black fluid and they spit it out, and they say, "OK, I've sucked all the poison out of you." Usually, that's tobacco juice, and sometimes the patient knows that's tobacco juice, but that's beside the point. It's the ritual that is so important. The shaman is saying, "I have sucked that poison out of you," OK, the patient is sometimes willing to let go of what has been poisoning him or her, symbolically, and that can be very beneficial from a therapeutic point of view.
MISHLOVE: Do you think that there may be some validity to any of these unusual psychic surgery claims?
KRIPPNER: Well, the case of psychic surgery that we describe in Healing States, in Brazil with Dr. DeQuieroz, is undoubtedly surgery, because he uses a scalpel; he uses surgical instruments.
MISHLOVE: This is a medical doctor who claims that he becomes possessed by spirits, and then can perform without anesthetic.
KRIPPNER: That's right. He operates very, very quickly, and I've seen him do it. The amazing thing is, even though he uses no anesthetics, the Brazilians don't wince, they have no pain, because they know that he's a painless surgeon. Now the Americans come into the picture, who don't know this, and they writhe with pain, because they don't know that he's supposed to be painless. I've seen this happen. But in any event, it's a remarkable performance, because he works as a gynecologist three days a week, and then free of charge he works with poor people, and then some rich American tourists who do pay him, two days a week, and he does simple and sometimes more complex operations. We have a big section on him in Healing States, and that undoubtedly is surgery, although he claims it's a spirit who is directing the surgery. Some of the other stuff, like what you see in the Philippines, yes, it's mostly sleight-of-hand, but there are some cases I've seen where I would leave the question open until we can get a team of magicians, surgeons, and parapsychologists to all witness the same event and see if there's a consensus.
MISHLOVE: I think that's probably good advice -- to keep an open mind towards these possibilities. Stan, we're almost out of time now, but I wonder if in closing we can talk a little bit about what some of the common factors are in the various healing practices that you've observed, that might be useful advice or information to our own viewers.
KRIPPNER: Well, yes. I think there think there are four important factors.
MISHLOVE: We'll have to go through them quickly.
KRIPPNER: OK. We can say that the treatments are most effective when they build upon the expectation of the patient; when they use the positive personal qualities of the healer; when they empower the patient; and when the healer and the sick person share the same world view. Sometimes a technique can work if only one of those four is present. The more of those four that are present, the more quickly the person seems to recover.
MISHLOVE: I think those are very useful guidelines, because in a sense they allow a person to approach a healer from any kind of cultural perspective and see where might be value for them or for friends or other people, without necessarily having to become submerged by the belief system.
KRIPPNER: That's right, and you can take those four practices and principles, and I think they're the same with allopathic medicine. There's more in common among the alternative healers and the allopathic healers than we realize, and there's no reason why the two can't work together.
MISHLOVE: Stanley Krippner, it's been a pleasure having you with me. Thank you very much.
KRIPPNER: It was a pleasure to be here.
END
Collective Consciousness
Allan Combs and Stanley Krippner
Collective Consciousness
and the Social Brain
Abstract: This paper discusses the possibility of a neurological basis for “collective consciousness” in the strong meaning of a shared sense of being together with others in a single experience. The presence of mirror neurons in the premotor and posterior parietal cortex suggests the possibility that imitation between pre-human hominids helped facilitate the historical acquisition of empathy and language. Menant has made a persuasive case that such mirror neuron assisted exchanges facilitated the original advent of self-consciousness and finally intersubjectivity. It is not difficult to extend such ideas to include the evolution of empathy by means of the induction of parallel dynamical patterns in the emotional brain centers of individuals within families, tribes, or other groups, creating a simpatico leading to intersubjectivity in both the weak sense and the strong experiential sense. In the latter instance the issue quite literally becomes a kind of “binding problem” between individuals. Undergirding dynamical neurological processes might be influenced by even the slightest effects of other nearby brains, perhaps even demonstrating a subtle “entanglement” between individuals.
The phrase “collective consciousness” is taken here in the strong meaning of a shared sense of being together with others in a single experience. We contrast this with the weak meaning originally suggested by Émile Durkheim in 1893 to identify beliefs and attitudes shared within a society, and with the term “intersubjectivity” which usually refers to beliefs, opinions, or feelings simply held in common. Finally, we distinguish this meaning from infantile or childlike mental states prior to the appearance of individual awareness or reflective self-consciousness.
Strong instances of collective consciousness have been reported in spiritual traditions such as the Hindu Kecak chanters of Indonesia, the “gathered” meetings the American Quakers (Kelly, 1997), and have been associated with advanced states of group meditation (e.g., Dillbeck, Cavanugh, Glenn, Orme-Johnson, and Mittlefehldt, 1987; Hagelin, 1987). Collective consciousness is also described in increasing numbers of problem-solving groups in modern society (Kenny, 2004, in press), especially in the business community (Hamilton, 2004; Hamilton and Zammit, 2008). On the other hand, reports from primary cultures such as the Australian Aborigines (e.g., Hume, 2002) suggest that collective experiences are not limited to modern societies, but may in fact be more common in pre-literate and non-literate cultures. For example, Keeney (2005, 2007), who has spent a considerable time with the Bushmen or San people of Africa observed:
The Ju/’hoansi Bushman n/om-kxaosi (shamans) of Namibia and Botswana are quite familiar with “collective consciousness” and one could say that experiential unions of relationship are the heart and soul of their healing work. [In the strongest of such experiences] one’s consciousness will seem to slide or slip into another domain of being where one merges with the knowing of previous ancestors. In this domain of collective consciousness, sometimes called a “classroom” by the Bushmen, you receive knowledge. It is visionary and is directly absorbed – like being downloaded. Here songs, dances, information about plants, beadwork, and all kinds of matters are passed on. This is why the Bushmen have no written or oral custodians. They enter into domains of collective consciousness and get downloaded through a heartfelt absorptive experience. (Keeney, March 3, 2008, personal communication; also see Keeney, 2005, 2007)
The natural sciences have found no generally accepted explanation for these sorts of phenomena and for the most part have ignored them (Barušs, 1996; Cardena, Lynn, and Krippner, 2000). For our present purpose, however, it is sufficient merely to suggest the possibility that such phenomena are valid. It is not our intention here to either defend their validity against reductionist criticisms, or attempt to demonstrate that such criticisms are themselves unsound. With this in mind let us proceed to a consideration of collective consciousness in terms of the evolution of the brain.
One productive way to broach this topic is in terms of the evolution of human communication. For instance, the discovery of mirror neurons in the premotor and posterior parietal cortex (Galleseet, Fadiga, and Rizzolatti, 1996; Rizzolatti, Fadiga, Gallese, and Fogassi, 1996) suggests the possibility that imitation between pre-human hominids helped facilitate the historical acquisition of empathy and language. Ramachandran (2006; Oberman and Ramachandran; 2007) has developed this idea in some detail, both in terms of theory and actual neurological observations, arguing for a similar developmental sequence between infants and mothers. In a related vein, Menant (2004, 2005) makes a cogent case that mirror neuron assisted exchanges between early humans facilitated the advent of reflective self-consciousness and finally intersubjectivity itself. All this is consistent with Donald’s (1991) well-known emphasis on mimicry as the predecessor to modern linguistic communication.
If such ideas are valid it is not difficult to extend them to include the evolution of empathy throughout groups by means of the induction of parallel patterns of activity in the limbic and emotional brain centers of individuals within families, tribes, and other social groups. Certainly it is no secret that emotions are contagious. In a similar vein, it is not unreasonable to suspect a similar but perhaps later evolution of shared cognitive patterns, that is, knowledge, ideas, and beliefs. Indeed, Freeman (1995, 2001) among others (e.g., Brüne, Ribbert, and Schiefenhövel, 2003) has proposed that the human brain evolved in communities and might well be considered a community organ. In support of this idea anthropologists have argued that human cultural evolution requires more than disparate elements of learning among separate individuals, but rather a critical degree of cognitive coherency throughout the culture itself (Read, 2005; Ripolla and Vauclairb, 2001).
Thus we might suspect that there has been an evolutionary emergence of a tendency toward simpatico within the complex processes of individual brains in such coherent communities, a simpatico leading to intersubjectivity in both the weak sense and perhaps even in the strong sense identified above. Certainly pre-literate and non-literate societies rely on the oral transmission of cultural knowledge. Some, however, may rely on a deeper connectivity between the nervous systems of their members. As intimated in the quotation at the beginning of this essay, the San people of the Kalahari Desert seem to have maintained their cultural stories, songs, and rituals unbroken over time without either literate or oral transmission, but through direct altered state experiences unique to that culture (Keeney, 2005, 2007). Some researchers have suggested a similar transmission of the dreamtime culture common to many Australian Aboriginal tribes (Drury and Voigt, 1998). Such examples, and indeed any instance of collective consciousness of the strong type, present a kind of “binding problem” between rather than within individual brains. Murphy (1959) has made the discussion of this problem relevant to contemporary society, noting that we live through a group process and many of our pressing problems are group problems. “This makes the individualists among us squirm, but there is still a reality here to be faced: the group character, the corporate character, of the thinking process,” and asks, “Can we use this corporate character and find strength in it, rather than simply protest against it?" (p. 159).
For us to attempt to explain the vehicle by which the brains of individuals might be connected into coherent intersubjective networks would be a fool’s errand. The popular press is full of explanations of so-called “non-local” and “non-temporal” phenomena (typically described as “telepathy,” “clairvoyance,” “psychokinesis,” and “precognition”), and a number of serous theories have attempted to render general if not specific explanations. Most appeal at some point to features of quantum physics that allow separate events to demonstrate significant relationships, or to explanations involving various sorts of physical fields (e.g., Laszlo, 1995, 2003; Sheldrake; 1981; Wasserman, 1956), a “field” being conceptualized as a space in which interactions occur. These explanations include but are not limited to Bohm’s (1980) “holographic” theory, Murphy’s (1945) theory of an “interpersonal field,” Roll’s (1965) “psi field” theory, and Laszlo’s (1995) hypothetical “zero point field.” Conceivable examples said to involve individual brains include Eccles’ (1994) proposal of quantum level synaptic events and Hameroff and Penrose’s (1996) quantum entanglement theory.
It is not our intention here to solve, or even to attempt to solve, the deep mystery of the binding problem in terms either of individual or collective consciousness. For example, quantum theory applies only to extremely simple systems and small particles, and might not be applicable beyond those limits. A question of more immediate interest, however, concerns which of the several widely recognized models of brain function actually could accommodate the putative data emerging from studies and observations of collective consciousness. What seems to be needed, at least as a starting point, is a way to understand how the brain can be responsive to patterns of stimulation carried by “subtle,” very low levels of energy. The importance of low energy stimulation of some type is suggested by the fact that experiences of collective consciousness seem to occur most often during alternate states of consciousness such as trance or sleep states, as would seem to be the case with the African San peoples and Australian Aborigines, or during a silencing of the ordinary chatter between individuals and within the individual mind. A contemporary example would be the consensus emerging from modern world group problem solving sessions in which periods of silence are observed (e.g., Hamilton and Zammit, 2008).
The computational brain models popular in the 1980s and early 1990s, especially those inspired by the Turing machine metaphor (e.g., Churchland and Sejnowski, 1994; Jackendorff, 1990), aside from being in many ways outdated (e.g., Izhikevich, 2006), do not seem adequate to the task. As every computer user knows, the performance of Turing machines tends to be an all-or-none affair, meaning they are either running a program or they are not. Thus, they do not seem a likely candidate for the explanation of subtle influences and non-local interactions. Much the same can be said for neural network connectionist models that rely strictly on Hebbian cell assembly patterns of the McCulloch-Pitts variety. Though such assemblies can presumably be modified by experience (Baev, 1998), it is difficult to see how they would be significantly influenced by single occurrences of subtle stimulation. But nevertheless, as Pribram once informally remarked, the brain is unquestionably comprised of neural networks. So the problem becomes a matter of just how they actually work when collective consciousness is reported or observed.
Pribram (1991), as well as his predecessor Karl Lashley (Frank, Hebb, Morgan, and Nissen, 1960), emphasized the importance of events in and around the synapse. Pribram’s own holonomic view of the brain, supported by a reasonable research literature (e.g., Pribram et al., 2004), suggests that complex micro-level electrochemical patterns of activity in the rich dendritic fields of the neocortex and elsewhere are at the root of the malleability of brain processes. In the most general sense this conclusion seems compelling, but as they say, the devil is in the details, and considerable work is yet to be done to sort out these details. Nevertheless, if for the time being we can agree to entertain the notion that micro-level events in dendritic fields and near synapses are critical to the intelligent action of the human brain, then the next question focuses on how such events amplify upward into macro-level process of significant influence to effect the overall activity of the brain, and how might the answer to this question shed light on the topic of collective consciousness.
One model of neural action that would seem especially well suited to our needs is Freeman’s (2001) dynamical view of the brain. According to this model, networks of activity playing across significant regions of neural tissue form chaotic-like attractor patterns that constantly update and evolve as they are impacted by new experiences. Much of Freeman’s actual research has concerned sensory tissue such as the olfactory cortex of the rabbit (1991), but he makes a cogent case that these ideas apply to higher cortical processes as well (Freeman and Barrie, 1994). In this vein Pribram (1995) has described a hypothetical interactive field that would be holographically organized and composed of interference patterns that create a “holoscape” that could be represented by a contour map, similar to the familiar weather maps of temperature gradients (p. 145).
The important point here is that such dynamical patterns of neural activity are highly mutable and might easily be modified by the gentlest of patterning influences. Krippner and Combs (2000), for example, have found this way of understanding brain activity useful for clarifying how subtle residual feelings and thoughts from daytime might influence the content of subsequent nighttime dreaming. At times such dreaming may also be responsive to subtle non-local and non-temporal influences , as demonstrated in the many studies carried out by Ullman and Krippner at their laboratory at Brooklyn’s Maimonides Medical Center and reported in peer-reviewed journals (e.g., Krippner, Ullman, and Honorton, 1971; Ullman and Krippner, 1970).
An illustrative example of putative collective consciousness during a dream experiment occurred during a pilot study conducted by the Maimonides team (Krippner, Honorton, & Ullman, 1973). A research participant attempted to dream about a randomly selected art print viewed by some 2,000 people attending six rock music concerts in Port Chester, New York. The research participant spent the night in a sound-proof room at Maimonides Medical center, about 45 miles away, and only knew that the concert audience would be attempting to send him a pictorial image during the night. At 11:30PM, the light show in back of the rock group was interrupted with the announcement, "In a few seconds you will see a picture." Further instructors gave the name and location of the research participant, and a slide was flashed on the screen. The research participant's dreams were monitored by electroencephalograph-electrooculograph-electromyograph technology during the night, and he was awaked following several minutes of rapid eye movement activity. On one night, the Scralian painting "The Seven Spinal Chakras," which portrays a yogic practitioner in a lotus position with his chakras illuminated, was randomly selected (through the flip of a coin) and flashed on the screen. One of the research participant's dreams concerned "a guy ... who showed me this box ... to generate and store energy" and a another dream was about "a spinal column." Two judges, working blind and independently, attempted to match each night's dream reports against the entire collection of art prints. Their success was statistically significant, with four direct matches out of six, when only one out of six would be expected by chance. In this instance, one might conjecture that the concert audience had demonstrated collective consciousness, that the research participant had utilized intention, and that the match allowed for the non-local obtaining of information.
Non-local and non-temporal effects in dreams (if verified by additional replications in other laboratories) may be examples of dreamers’ ability to span both time and space to obtain information that is important to them. It is not surprising that such brain activity would be most effective during sleep and dreaming (Krippner, 1993; Rhine, 1954; Ullman and Krippner, with Vaughan, 2002), and possibly in certain other alternative states of consciousness (Combs and Krippner, 1998; George and Krippner, 1984; Parker, 1975; Taylor, 1983). The latter observation is consistent with Hobson’s (2004) finding that neural activity in the brain is significantly more mutable during sleep and dreaming than during wakefulness. These data suggest that the concept of the individual as an individual self may be abandoned in these alternative states when a “group mind” becomes an actual phenomenon.
An experiment combining parapsychological and psychoneurological approaches that supports the concept of collective consciousness was reported by Achterberg et al. (2005). Eleven people who identified themselves as "healers" selected a person they knew with whom they felt an empathic, bonded connection. Each of the latter was placed in an fMRI scanner and was isolated fromall forms of sensory contact with the healer who attempted to "transmit distant intentionality" at two-minute random intervals that were unknown to the recipients. Statistically significant differences between th experimental (transmit) and control (no attempt to transmit) conditions were found. The areas of the brain that were active during the experimental conditions included the anterior and middle cingulate areas, precenues, and frontal areas.
Stokes (1987) has surveyed what he has referred to as “non-local theories” in the parapsychological literature, comparing them to the union of the Atman (i.e., “individual self”) with the Brahman (i.e., “world mind”) in Hindu traditions, and the Jungian notion of a “collective unconscious” (p. 156). There are data supporting both of these constructs. In 1960, Mararishi Mahesh Yogi proposed that one percent of a population practicing Transcendental Meditation would produce measurable improvements in the quality of life for the whole population. A number of studies, published in peer-reviewed journals, have reported that when one percent of a community practiced this program, the crime rate was reduced by an average of 16 percent (e.g., Assimakis and Dillbeck, 1995; Dillbeck, 1990; Dillbeck, Banus, Polanzi, and Landrith, 1998). The authors of these studies claimed that they had controlled for age of population, ratio of police to population, seasonal effects, and other variables. However, confirmatory replication is needed by investigators not affiliated with organizations promoting Transcendental Meditation yet who follow the same experimental protocol.
A hypothetical “collective unconscious” (Jung, 1959) or the concept of a “noosphere” could be the basis for collective consciousness, whether it occurs in or outside of conscious awareness. The “noosphere,” or sheath of collective intelligence proposed by Teilhard de Chardin (1959), was one of the sources for the development of the Global Consciousness Project (GCP), an international collaboration of some 100 scientists who record continuous data from electronic devices placed in a network of 65 sites. The data collected at these sites consists of electronically generated signals that should be random, and that usually are. The exceptions are times that show unexpected coherence in the signals, and these are times of communal focus such as great celebrations or great tragedies. The composite result for a series of 244 formal tests over a 9-year time period showed statistically significant results, especially during New Year festivities, the death of Princess Diana, and the attacks on September 11, 2001. Although GCP data have been published in peer-reviewed journals (e.g., Nelson, 2002), the procedure is in need of scrutiny by outside experts as well as replications at other sites.
Needless to say, social and cultural forces play a major role in what could be conceptualized as collective consciousness. Gardner Murphy (1959), in his pioneering work Human Potentialities, proposed an “architecture of thought” that underlies historical waves of creativity (p. 159). As an example, Murphy described the Western European Renaissance that was “augmented by geographical discovery, inventions borrowed from the East or newly made, accumulation of liquid capital and of banking facilities, the reduction of the population through plagues and through the steadily siphoning off of masses to the new world in the process of empire building, and many other overlapping movements. Here…, the acceleration of the tempo of social change is evident (p. 143, italics in original). Furthermore, in every one of these periods of rapid cultural acceleration there was “some interdependence among the various styles of human expression. We take it as a matter of course that Velasquez and Cervantes appear in the same period of Spanish history. Even between artistic and scientific waves of creativeness there is often a close affiliation….The Netherlands that produced the great physicist Huygens and the great miscroscopist Leeuwenhoek was the Netherlands which produced Terborch, Vermeer, and Rembrandt." (p. 144).
The most evident fact about the great periods is that they depend upon a level of cultural achievement that has been maintained for centuries or millennia; “but then rather suddenly the culture begins to experience an exaltation, rising at an accelerated pace to a peak of brilliant creativeness. Italian painting against a background of Byzantine art moved rapidly into the magnificence of Botticelli and Michelangelo” (p. 146). Murphy concluded that implicit in this view of the creative periods is the concept that cultural discovery “rolls up like a snowball'” for the same reason that individual acquisition of tastes and skills rolls up in the learning process (p. 148). Hence, collective consciousness mirrors individual consciousness; both demonstrate principles of learning within a social and cultural milieu.
All this brings us back full circle to the idea that at a subtle level of connectivity the brains of individuals who share the weak intersubjectivity of intimate social groupings might, given optimal circumstances, also experience strong intersubjectivity supported by the neuronal processes of their separate nervous systems that fall into a simpatico or resonance, like the clicking of clocks on the same wall. This would be equivalent to a kind of entanglement of activity in individual brains and offers a possible solution to the binding problem of human collective consciousness. Needless to say, there are social and cultural factors that play a role in collective consciousness, probably the predominant role. However, the possibility that human brains may not be separate isolated entities need not be overlooked or dismissed. These interactions could have been highly adaptive in the course of human evolution and, even in an era that ignores their presence, may continue to shape the future of humanity.
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Collective Consciousness
and the Social Brain
Abstract: This paper discusses the possibility of a neurological basis for “collective consciousness” in the strong meaning of a shared sense of being together with others in a single experience. The presence of mirror neurons in the premotor and posterior parietal cortex suggests the possibility that imitation between pre-human hominids helped facilitate the historical acquisition of empathy and language. Menant has made a persuasive case that such mirror neuron assisted exchanges facilitated the original advent of self-consciousness and finally intersubjectivity. It is not difficult to extend such ideas to include the evolution of empathy by means of the induction of parallel dynamical patterns in the emotional brain centers of individuals within families, tribes, or other groups, creating a simpatico leading to intersubjectivity in both the weak sense and the strong experiential sense. In the latter instance the issue quite literally becomes a kind of “binding problem” between individuals. Undergirding dynamical neurological processes might be influenced by even the slightest effects of other nearby brains, perhaps even demonstrating a subtle “entanglement” between individuals.
The phrase “collective consciousness” is taken here in the strong meaning of a shared sense of being together with others in a single experience. We contrast this with the weak meaning originally suggested by Émile Durkheim in 1893 to identify beliefs and attitudes shared within a society, and with the term “intersubjectivity” which usually refers to beliefs, opinions, or feelings simply held in common. Finally, we distinguish this meaning from infantile or childlike mental states prior to the appearance of individual awareness or reflective self-consciousness.
Strong instances of collective consciousness have been reported in spiritual traditions such as the Hindu Kecak chanters of Indonesia, the “gathered” meetings the American Quakers (Kelly, 1997), and have been associated with advanced states of group meditation (e.g., Dillbeck, Cavanugh, Glenn, Orme-Johnson, and Mittlefehldt, 1987; Hagelin, 1987). Collective consciousness is also described in increasing numbers of problem-solving groups in modern society (Kenny, 2004, in press), especially in the business community (Hamilton, 2004; Hamilton and Zammit, 2008). On the other hand, reports from primary cultures such as the Australian Aborigines (e.g., Hume, 2002) suggest that collective experiences are not limited to modern societies, but may in fact be more common in pre-literate and non-literate cultures. For example, Keeney (2005, 2007), who has spent a considerable time with the Bushmen or San people of Africa observed:
The Ju/’hoansi Bushman n/om-kxaosi (shamans) of Namibia and Botswana are quite familiar with “collective consciousness” and one could say that experiential unions of relationship are the heart and soul of their healing work. [In the strongest of such experiences] one’s consciousness will seem to slide or slip into another domain of being where one merges with the knowing of previous ancestors. In this domain of collective consciousness, sometimes called a “classroom” by the Bushmen, you receive knowledge. It is visionary and is directly absorbed – like being downloaded. Here songs, dances, information about plants, beadwork, and all kinds of matters are passed on. This is why the Bushmen have no written or oral custodians. They enter into domains of collective consciousness and get downloaded through a heartfelt absorptive experience. (Keeney, March 3, 2008, personal communication; also see Keeney, 2005, 2007)
The natural sciences have found no generally accepted explanation for these sorts of phenomena and for the most part have ignored them (Barušs, 1996; Cardena, Lynn, and Krippner, 2000). For our present purpose, however, it is sufficient merely to suggest the possibility that such phenomena are valid. It is not our intention here to either defend their validity against reductionist criticisms, or attempt to demonstrate that such criticisms are themselves unsound. With this in mind let us proceed to a consideration of collective consciousness in terms of the evolution of the brain.
One productive way to broach this topic is in terms of the evolution of human communication. For instance, the discovery of mirror neurons in the premotor and posterior parietal cortex (Galleseet, Fadiga, and Rizzolatti, 1996; Rizzolatti, Fadiga, Gallese, and Fogassi, 1996) suggests the possibility that imitation between pre-human hominids helped facilitate the historical acquisition of empathy and language. Ramachandran (2006; Oberman and Ramachandran; 2007) has developed this idea in some detail, both in terms of theory and actual neurological observations, arguing for a similar developmental sequence between infants and mothers. In a related vein, Menant (2004, 2005) makes a cogent case that mirror neuron assisted exchanges between early humans facilitated the advent of reflective self-consciousness and finally intersubjectivity itself. All this is consistent with Donald’s (1991) well-known emphasis on mimicry as the predecessor to modern linguistic communication.
If such ideas are valid it is not difficult to extend them to include the evolution of empathy throughout groups by means of the induction of parallel patterns of activity in the limbic and emotional brain centers of individuals within families, tribes, and other social groups. Certainly it is no secret that emotions are contagious. In a similar vein, it is not unreasonable to suspect a similar but perhaps later evolution of shared cognitive patterns, that is, knowledge, ideas, and beliefs. Indeed, Freeman (1995, 2001) among others (e.g., Brüne, Ribbert, and Schiefenhövel, 2003) has proposed that the human brain evolved in communities and might well be considered a community organ. In support of this idea anthropologists have argued that human cultural evolution requires more than disparate elements of learning among separate individuals, but rather a critical degree of cognitive coherency throughout the culture itself (Read, 2005; Ripolla and Vauclairb, 2001).
Thus we might suspect that there has been an evolutionary emergence of a tendency toward simpatico within the complex processes of individual brains in such coherent communities, a simpatico leading to intersubjectivity in both the weak sense and perhaps even in the strong sense identified above. Certainly pre-literate and non-literate societies rely on the oral transmission of cultural knowledge. Some, however, may rely on a deeper connectivity between the nervous systems of their members. As intimated in the quotation at the beginning of this essay, the San people of the Kalahari Desert seem to have maintained their cultural stories, songs, and rituals unbroken over time without either literate or oral transmission, but through direct altered state experiences unique to that culture (Keeney, 2005, 2007). Some researchers have suggested a similar transmission of the dreamtime culture common to many Australian Aboriginal tribes (Drury and Voigt, 1998). Such examples, and indeed any instance of collective consciousness of the strong type, present a kind of “binding problem” between rather than within individual brains. Murphy (1959) has made the discussion of this problem relevant to contemporary society, noting that we live through a group process and many of our pressing problems are group problems. “This makes the individualists among us squirm, but there is still a reality here to be faced: the group character, the corporate character, of the thinking process,” and asks, “Can we use this corporate character and find strength in it, rather than simply protest against it?" (p. 159).
For us to attempt to explain the vehicle by which the brains of individuals might be connected into coherent intersubjective networks would be a fool’s errand. The popular press is full of explanations of so-called “non-local” and “non-temporal” phenomena (typically described as “telepathy,” “clairvoyance,” “psychokinesis,” and “precognition”), and a number of serous theories have attempted to render general if not specific explanations. Most appeal at some point to features of quantum physics that allow separate events to demonstrate significant relationships, or to explanations involving various sorts of physical fields (e.g., Laszlo, 1995, 2003; Sheldrake; 1981; Wasserman, 1956), a “field” being conceptualized as a space in which interactions occur. These explanations include but are not limited to Bohm’s (1980) “holographic” theory, Murphy’s (1945) theory of an “interpersonal field,” Roll’s (1965) “psi field” theory, and Laszlo’s (1995) hypothetical “zero point field.” Conceivable examples said to involve individual brains include Eccles’ (1994) proposal of quantum level synaptic events and Hameroff and Penrose’s (1996) quantum entanglement theory.
It is not our intention here to solve, or even to attempt to solve, the deep mystery of the binding problem in terms either of individual or collective consciousness. For example, quantum theory applies only to extremely simple systems and small particles, and might not be applicable beyond those limits. A question of more immediate interest, however, concerns which of the several widely recognized models of brain function actually could accommodate the putative data emerging from studies and observations of collective consciousness. What seems to be needed, at least as a starting point, is a way to understand how the brain can be responsive to patterns of stimulation carried by “subtle,” very low levels of energy. The importance of low energy stimulation of some type is suggested by the fact that experiences of collective consciousness seem to occur most often during alternate states of consciousness such as trance or sleep states, as would seem to be the case with the African San peoples and Australian Aborigines, or during a silencing of the ordinary chatter between individuals and within the individual mind. A contemporary example would be the consensus emerging from modern world group problem solving sessions in which periods of silence are observed (e.g., Hamilton and Zammit, 2008).
The computational brain models popular in the 1980s and early 1990s, especially those inspired by the Turing machine metaphor (e.g., Churchland and Sejnowski, 1994; Jackendorff, 1990), aside from being in many ways outdated (e.g., Izhikevich, 2006), do not seem adequate to the task. As every computer user knows, the performance of Turing machines tends to be an all-or-none affair, meaning they are either running a program or they are not. Thus, they do not seem a likely candidate for the explanation of subtle influences and non-local interactions. Much the same can be said for neural network connectionist models that rely strictly on Hebbian cell assembly patterns of the McCulloch-Pitts variety. Though such assemblies can presumably be modified by experience (Baev, 1998), it is difficult to see how they would be significantly influenced by single occurrences of subtle stimulation. But nevertheless, as Pribram once informally remarked, the brain is unquestionably comprised of neural networks. So the problem becomes a matter of just how they actually work when collective consciousness is reported or observed.
Pribram (1991), as well as his predecessor Karl Lashley (Frank, Hebb, Morgan, and Nissen, 1960), emphasized the importance of events in and around the synapse. Pribram’s own holonomic view of the brain, supported by a reasonable research literature (e.g., Pribram et al., 2004), suggests that complex micro-level electrochemical patterns of activity in the rich dendritic fields of the neocortex and elsewhere are at the root of the malleability of brain processes. In the most general sense this conclusion seems compelling, but as they say, the devil is in the details, and considerable work is yet to be done to sort out these details. Nevertheless, if for the time being we can agree to entertain the notion that micro-level events in dendritic fields and near synapses are critical to the intelligent action of the human brain, then the next question focuses on how such events amplify upward into macro-level process of significant influence to effect the overall activity of the brain, and how might the answer to this question shed light on the topic of collective consciousness.
One model of neural action that would seem especially well suited to our needs is Freeman’s (2001) dynamical view of the brain. According to this model, networks of activity playing across significant regions of neural tissue form chaotic-like attractor patterns that constantly update and evolve as they are impacted by new experiences. Much of Freeman’s actual research has concerned sensory tissue such as the olfactory cortex of the rabbit (1991), but he makes a cogent case that these ideas apply to higher cortical processes as well (Freeman and Barrie, 1994). In this vein Pribram (1995) has described a hypothetical interactive field that would be holographically organized and composed of interference patterns that create a “holoscape” that could be represented by a contour map, similar to the familiar weather maps of temperature gradients (p. 145).
The important point here is that such dynamical patterns of neural activity are highly mutable and might easily be modified by the gentlest of patterning influences. Krippner and Combs (2000), for example, have found this way of understanding brain activity useful for clarifying how subtle residual feelings and thoughts from daytime might influence the content of subsequent nighttime dreaming. At times such dreaming may also be responsive to subtle non-local and non-temporal influences , as demonstrated in the many studies carried out by Ullman and Krippner at their laboratory at Brooklyn’s Maimonides Medical Center and reported in peer-reviewed journals (e.g., Krippner, Ullman, and Honorton, 1971; Ullman and Krippner, 1970).
An illustrative example of putative collective consciousness during a dream experiment occurred during a pilot study conducted by the Maimonides team (Krippner, Honorton, & Ullman, 1973). A research participant attempted to dream about a randomly selected art print viewed by some 2,000 people attending six rock music concerts in Port Chester, New York. The research participant spent the night in a sound-proof room at Maimonides Medical center, about 45 miles away, and only knew that the concert audience would be attempting to send him a pictorial image during the night. At 11:30PM, the light show in back of the rock group was interrupted with the announcement, "In a few seconds you will see a picture." Further instructors gave the name and location of the research participant, and a slide was flashed on the screen. The research participant's dreams were monitored by electroencephalograph-electrooculograph-electromyograph technology during the night, and he was awaked following several minutes of rapid eye movement activity. On one night, the Scralian painting "The Seven Spinal Chakras," which portrays a yogic practitioner in a lotus position with his chakras illuminated, was randomly selected (through the flip of a coin) and flashed on the screen. One of the research participant's dreams concerned "a guy ... who showed me this box ... to generate and store energy" and a another dream was about "a spinal column." Two judges, working blind and independently, attempted to match each night's dream reports against the entire collection of art prints. Their success was statistically significant, with four direct matches out of six, when only one out of six would be expected by chance. In this instance, one might conjecture that the concert audience had demonstrated collective consciousness, that the research participant had utilized intention, and that the match allowed for the non-local obtaining of information.
Non-local and non-temporal effects in dreams (if verified by additional replications in other laboratories) may be examples of dreamers’ ability to span both time and space to obtain information that is important to them. It is not surprising that such brain activity would be most effective during sleep and dreaming (Krippner, 1993; Rhine, 1954; Ullman and Krippner, with Vaughan, 2002), and possibly in certain other alternative states of consciousness (Combs and Krippner, 1998; George and Krippner, 1984; Parker, 1975; Taylor, 1983). The latter observation is consistent with Hobson’s (2004) finding that neural activity in the brain is significantly more mutable during sleep and dreaming than during wakefulness. These data suggest that the concept of the individual as an individual self may be abandoned in these alternative states when a “group mind” becomes an actual phenomenon.
An experiment combining parapsychological and psychoneurological approaches that supports the concept of collective consciousness was reported by Achterberg et al. (2005). Eleven people who identified themselves as "healers" selected a person they knew with whom they felt an empathic, bonded connection. Each of the latter was placed in an fMRI scanner and was isolated fromall forms of sensory contact with the healer who attempted to "transmit distant intentionality" at two-minute random intervals that were unknown to the recipients. Statistically significant differences between th experimental (transmit) and control (no attempt to transmit) conditions were found. The areas of the brain that were active during the experimental conditions included the anterior and middle cingulate areas, precenues, and frontal areas.
Stokes (1987) has surveyed what he has referred to as “non-local theories” in the parapsychological literature, comparing them to the union of the Atman (i.e., “individual self”) with the Brahman (i.e., “world mind”) in Hindu traditions, and the Jungian notion of a “collective unconscious” (p. 156). There are data supporting both of these constructs. In 1960, Mararishi Mahesh Yogi proposed that one percent of a population practicing Transcendental Meditation would produce measurable improvements in the quality of life for the whole population. A number of studies, published in peer-reviewed journals, have reported that when one percent of a community practiced this program, the crime rate was reduced by an average of 16 percent (e.g., Assimakis and Dillbeck, 1995; Dillbeck, 1990; Dillbeck, Banus, Polanzi, and Landrith, 1998). The authors of these studies claimed that they had controlled for age of population, ratio of police to population, seasonal effects, and other variables. However, confirmatory replication is needed by investigators not affiliated with organizations promoting Transcendental Meditation yet who follow the same experimental protocol.
A hypothetical “collective unconscious” (Jung, 1959) or the concept of a “noosphere” could be the basis for collective consciousness, whether it occurs in or outside of conscious awareness. The “noosphere,” or sheath of collective intelligence proposed by Teilhard de Chardin (1959), was one of the sources for the development of the Global Consciousness Project (GCP), an international collaboration of some 100 scientists who record continuous data from electronic devices placed in a network of 65 sites. The data collected at these sites consists of electronically generated signals that should be random, and that usually are. The exceptions are times that show unexpected coherence in the signals, and these are times of communal focus such as great celebrations or great tragedies. The composite result for a series of 244 formal tests over a 9-year time period showed statistically significant results, especially during New Year festivities, the death of Princess Diana, and the attacks on September 11, 2001. Although GCP data have been published in peer-reviewed journals (e.g., Nelson, 2002), the procedure is in need of scrutiny by outside experts as well as replications at other sites.
Needless to say, social and cultural forces play a major role in what could be conceptualized as collective consciousness. Gardner Murphy (1959), in his pioneering work Human Potentialities, proposed an “architecture of thought” that underlies historical waves of creativity (p. 159). As an example, Murphy described the Western European Renaissance that was “augmented by geographical discovery, inventions borrowed from the East or newly made, accumulation of liquid capital and of banking facilities, the reduction of the population through plagues and through the steadily siphoning off of masses to the new world in the process of empire building, and many other overlapping movements. Here…, the acceleration of the tempo of social change is evident (p. 143, italics in original). Furthermore, in every one of these periods of rapid cultural acceleration there was “some interdependence among the various styles of human expression. We take it as a matter of course that Velasquez and Cervantes appear in the same period of Spanish history. Even between artistic and scientific waves of creativeness there is often a close affiliation….The Netherlands that produced the great physicist Huygens and the great miscroscopist Leeuwenhoek was the Netherlands which produced Terborch, Vermeer, and Rembrandt." (p. 144).
The most evident fact about the great periods is that they depend upon a level of cultural achievement that has been maintained for centuries or millennia; “but then rather suddenly the culture begins to experience an exaltation, rising at an accelerated pace to a peak of brilliant creativeness. Italian painting against a background of Byzantine art moved rapidly into the magnificence of Botticelli and Michelangelo” (p. 146). Murphy concluded that implicit in this view of the creative periods is the concept that cultural discovery “rolls up like a snowball'” for the same reason that individual acquisition of tastes and skills rolls up in the learning process (p. 148). Hence, collective consciousness mirrors individual consciousness; both demonstrate principles of learning within a social and cultural milieu.
All this brings us back full circle to the idea that at a subtle level of connectivity the brains of individuals who share the weak intersubjectivity of intimate social groupings might, given optimal circumstances, also experience strong intersubjectivity supported by the neuronal processes of their separate nervous systems that fall into a simpatico or resonance, like the clicking of clocks on the same wall. This would be equivalent to a kind of entanglement of activity in individual brains and offers a possible solution to the binding problem of human collective consciousness. Needless to say, there are social and cultural factors that play a role in collective consciousness, probably the predominant role. However, the possibility that human brains may not be separate isolated entities need not be overlooked or dismissed. These interactions could have been highly adaptive in the course of human evolution and, even in an era that ignores their presence, may continue to shape the future of humanity.
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Dillbeck, M.C., Cavanugh, K.L., Glenn, T., Orme-Johnson, D.W., and Mittlefehldt, V. (1987). ‘Consciousness as a field: the Transcendental Meditation and TM-Sidhi program and changes in social indicators.’Journal of Mind and Behavior, 8, pp. 67–104.
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- Advances in parapsychological research: Volume 8 Stanley Krippner - 1997 - 321 pages - Snippet view
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Chapter Introduction had just dreamed that someone was banging on the front door of her house in the middle of the night. In the dream, she walked down the hallway and saw a man in an overcoat through the front door, silhouetted by the ...
books.google.com - More editions - The psychological impact of war trauma on civilians: an ... - Page 1Stanley Krippner, Teresa M. McIntyre - 2003 - 327 pages - Preview
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books.google.com - Mysterious Minds: The Neurobiology of Psychics, Mediums, and Other ...Stanley Krippner, Harris L. Friedman - 2009 - 219 pages - Preview
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books.google.com - More editions - Dream telepathy: experiments in nocturnal ESPMontague Ullman, Stanley Krippner, Alan Vaughan - 1989 - 252 pages - Snippet view
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Introduction Elizabeth A. Rauscher The eighth volume in the Advances in Parapsychological Research series continues to document the scientific investigation of the ability of human consciousness to transcend space and time (eg, ...
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Este livro é uma leitura para as pessoas que queiram se atualizar com relação às pesquisas psíquicas e transpessoais de ponta, sérias e consistentes, que comprovam a existência de outros níveis de realidade, que estão sendo ...
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Environmental influences on Clairvoyance and Alterations in Consciousness
Krippner at 78
Stanley Krippner, Ph.D., and Michael Bova
Maimonides Dream Laboratory, Brooklyn, NY
Environmental influences on Clairvoyance and Alterations in Consciousness
Originally published in - International Journal of Paraphysics, Vol. 8, No. 2, 1974
Observations of “trance” mediums as well as investigation of spontaneous case material (e.g. dreams) has suggested a relationship between certain altered conscious states and psi phenomena (Honorton, 1970). Ludwig (1966) has defined an altered state of consciousness (ASC) as any mental state “which can be recognized subjectively …or by an objective observer … as representing a sufficient deviation in subjective experience or psychological functioning from certain general norms for that individual during alert, waking consciousness…” Ludwig (1966) notes that environmental manipulation is one of several procedures which may alter consciousness through its effects on exteroceptive stimulation. ASCs have been measured by Ludwig by means of an adaptation of the Linton-Langs Questionnaire (Linton & Langs, 1964; Ludwig, Levine, & Stark, 1971), an instrument containing items which represent changes in consciousness (e.g. “Have things felt unreal as if you were in a dream?”).
Tart (1970) has developed a self report scale so that subjects (Ss) may assess their change in consciousness at any time during an experimental session and inform the experimenter (E). High state reports (denoting greater alterations in consciousness) have been found to relate to clairvoyance in a brain-wave biofeedback experiment (Honorton, Davidson, & Bindler, 1971) as well as one involving hypnotic dreams (Honorton, 1972).
PROBLEM
It was decided to explore the effects of various environments on state reports and ESP. Specifically, it was hypothesized that significant results would be obtained from A) trials associated with high scores on the Linton-Langs Questionnaire, and B) trials characterized by high state reports. It was decided to inspect the state in each of the three environmental conditions.
SUBJECTS
Fifty unpaid volunteers (26 males, 24 females) served as Ss for this study. These individuals were selected from S waiting lists at the Maimonides Laboratory or were recruited by Es. All Ss had expressed either a positive or a neutral attitude towards the existence of psi phenomena.
DESCRIPTION OF ENVIRONMENTS
The studio of Aleksandra Kasuba, an artist, was used as the location for all experimental settings. Kasuba’s “Writing Shelter” to alter Ss consciousness consists of a wooden chair and a plain table with a tapestry over it. One of the adjoining walls is of curved white nylon, while the other two are painted dark gray.
Kasuba’s “Group Shelter” is a conical structure, the shape of which converges to a mirror mounted on the ceiling. There are no other furnishings inside but a tasseled deep pile of rug of green, purple, gold and blue, which is spread over a floor of small hill-like ridges. A white globe on the rug diffuses light throughout the area.
A narrow ramp leads up into “The Sensory” which is a spiral rising to a tall and hollow column of white stretched nylon. Inside the floor area is a mirror, on which a hand sized glass ball is placed. A light source around the perimeter of the mirror completes the interior.
Emanuel Ghent’s electronic, computer-generated music was played at low volume and could be heard in “The Sensory” and “The Group Shelter.”
TARGET MATERIALS
Postcard-size reproductions of famous paintings were used as ESP targets for this study. To create pools of target materials with somewhat equivalent content, E1 inspected over 100 art prints from local museums and art supply stores. She evaluated these materials on the following scale: A) “simplicity”: 1) very simple, 2) fairly simple, 3) complex; B)”emotionality”: 1) generates great emotional feeling, 2) generates some emotional feeling, 3) generates little or no emotional feeling; C) “vividness”: 1) very colorful and vivid, 2) fairly colorful and vivid, 3) lacking vividness.
Following EI’s evaluation, EII inspected the art prints, eliminating all prints which received one or more rating of “3.” He then selected four of these art prints for the target pool. The prints were selected to differ thematically one from the other and included: A) “The duelers” by Goya, portraying two men fighting with swords; B) “Lily and the Sparrows” by Evergood, depicting a girl feeding birds; C) “Witch doctor” by Cotlow, portraying a masked individual in a jungle setting, and D) “Battaglia” by Borra, which shows a large number of men on horseback.
Each art print was placed into a small opaque envelope which was sealed and placed in a large opaque envelope which was also sealed. Duplicate copies of the four art prints were set aside for judging purposes.
EXPERIMENTAL PROCEDURE: TARGET SELECTION
All experimental sessions were run by E 111 in the Kasuba studio. Three Ss were run at one time; each S’s experimental session consisted of three trials.
E III had prepared three cards on which were printed the numbers 123, 231 or 312, these numerals referred to the three environments previously described.
Upon each S’s arrival at the studio, E blindly pointed to a five-digit number in a random number table, added and re-added the numeral until a one-digit number was obtained, and counted down a stack of cards one or more times until locating the card which matched the one-digit number. The card was used to determine the order in which each S would enter the designated environment.
Next, E III turned to four cards contained the letters A, B, C and D; these letters referred to the four targets.
A similar procedure was used to obtain a one-digit number which was used to determine the target for each S’s first trial. Similar procedures were used to determine the targets for each S’s latter trials.
S was given the randomly selected envelope upon entering an environment. He spent 15 minutes in the environment, and then wrote his guess as to the target’s identity on a sheet of paper. He was allowed to draw a picture of his guess if he desired. As three Ss were tested at one time, all three environments were in use during the experimental session.
EXPERIMENTAL PROCEDURE: INSTRUMENTS
Upon arrival at the Kasuba studio, each S was individually told about the state report scale:
During the course of this experiment, we will be interested in the degree to which your state of mind stays the same or changes. That is, at various times, we are going to want to know what state of mind you are in. In order to make it easy and convenient for you to tell me this, I am going to teach you a rating scale. This way, when you are asked “State?” you will just call out a number to indicate your state of mind, instead of having to explain it.
Here is what the numbers are to represent: “Zero” indicates that you are normally alert, just as you are now. “One” indicates that you feel especially relaxed. In this state you may feel more at ease, and the tension in your muscles may yield to a more peaceful state. Do you know what I mean? “Two” indicates that your attention is being focused more on internal feelings and sensations. This may be associated with a shift from your surrounding environment to your internal bodily feelings. If this shift is not only recognizable but strong, you should report “three”, and if it is strong and very impressive to you, report “four”. A report of four indicates that you feel more or less oblivious to your external surroundings (Pause.) Do you get the idea?
O.K. Now, whenever I ask “State?” you should call out the first number that pops into your mind. We’ve found this generally to be more accurate than if you stop and think about what the number should be. Of course, if you feel that the number you’ve called out is way off, you may call out a correction. It is important that your state reports reflect, as accurately as possible, your internal state.
At this point, S was asked for a state report and was also asked if he had any questions about the scale.
This was followed by the presentation of a modified version of the Linton-Langs Questionnaire (Ludwig, Levine, & Stark, 1971). The form consists of 68 questions which have been found, through factor analysis techniques, to produce the following categories of ASC reaction:
Factor I: Changes in somatic reactions
Factor II: Changes in meaning
Factor III: Changes in vision
Factor IV: New insights
Factor V: Loss of control of body and/or self
Factor VI: Increased sensory perception
Factor VII: Increased happiness
Factor VIII: Synesthesia
Factor IX: Impaired thinking
Factor X: Unpleasant reactions
Factor XI: Loss of control of feelings and/or emotions
S completed a questionnaire so that he would be familiar with the type of questions asked.
Immediately after the completion of the 15 minutes spent in each condition, and the completion of S’s guess as to the identity of the target, he was asked for a state report. He was also asked to complete a questionnaire. If S said that he no longer felt the degrees of consciousness-alteration that he did when first exposed to the environment, he was told to give a state report or answer questionnaire items to reflect the highest degree of altered consciousness he felt during that particular trial.
PROCEDURE: SUBJECT EVALUATION
Once all three trials had been completed, S was given a duplicate target pool and three evaluation forms which stated:
RESULTS: QUESTIONNAIRE
It had been hypothesized that significant ESP data would be obtained from trials associated with both high questionnaire scores and high state reports.
For the questionnaire, the mean of each factor in each environment was computed; scores falling at or above the mean were designated high scores while those falling below were designated low scores. Table 1 presents the data emerging when high and low scores are compared regarding ESP hits in the three environments.
The hypothesis was confirmed in four instances. Significant results favoring an ASC (as measured by high scores on the Linton-Langs Questionnaire) were obtained for the Group Shelter (Factors III and VI), for the Sensory environment (Factor I), and for the Writing Shelter (Factor X).
For the Writing Shelter, low scores on the questionnaire were associated with ESP hits in one instance. For Factor I, low state reports produced 17 hits (out of 29 low report trials) as opposed to 11 hits (out of 20 high report trials). This finding contradicts the stated hypothesis.
RESULTS: STATE REPORTS
For the 50 trials conducted in the Writing Shelter, the mean state report was 1.50, therefore, all reports below the mean (e.g. “2”, “3”, and “4”) were designated high state reports.
For the 50 trials conducted in the Group Shelter the mean report was 2.32. For the trials associated with the Sensory environment, the mean report was 2.14. Therefore, for these two conditions, all reports below the means (e.g. “0”, “1”, and “2”) were designated low state reports while those above the means (e.g. “3” and “4”) were identified as high reports.
Table 2 presents the date emerging when high and low state reports are compared regarding ESP hits in these three environments.
On a “post-hoc” basis, data from the latter two conditions were combined, as the mean state reports suggested that an ASC was produced in most Ss by both the Group Shelter and the Sensory environment. There were 27 hits and 13 misses in high state report trials, while 24 hits and 36 misses were associated with low state report trials
(X2 = 7.26, p<.01, 1 d.f.).
TABLE 1
TABLE 2
ESP Hits vs. Misses and State of Consciousness Reports in Three Environments
EXAMPLE
S F. P. was randomly assigned to the target “Lily and the Sparrows”, during her trial period in the “Group Shelter” environment. The target depicts a girl at the window sill of a red brick building. There is a tree off to one side of the picture, and there are sparrows flying to the girl. The dominant color is the red from the building. S’s response was:
A red brick house in the country. A little old lady putting pies on the window sill to cool. Some animals like police dogs are smelling the pies. There were some trees but the color I feel most is red... there is something about this target that is frightening me.
The S gave a state report of “3” for the session.
DISCUSSION
The environments used in this study appeared to have differential effects on ESP, especially in interaction with ASCs.
However, the relation appears to be a complex one. The two environments which most altered consciousness produced clear-cut results linking high state report trials to ESP. However, the environment which least altered consciousness produced no such data; indeed, there were twice as many in high state report trials. Might it be that a facilitating environment is needed for ASCs to foster ESP?
Additional information comes from an examination of the Linton-Langs Questionnaire results. For Factor I, ASCs in the writing Shelter were associated with more ESP misses than hits. Factor 1”s questions deal with somatic changes (e.g., “Have you had any dizziness or grogginess?” “Have you had any numbness or tingling?”). The same questions were associated with ESP hits in the Sensory environment where, perhaps, they were easily integrated into the consciousness-altering effects of the mirror and stretch nylon, while at the desk, however, the same characteristics may have felt uncomfortable, thus decreasing ESP.
On the other hand, ASCs on Factor X were linked with ESP hits in the Writing Shelter. This factor involves reactions that usually are regarded as unpleasant (e.g. “Has time been passing slower than usual?” “Have you felt angry or annoyed?”). Perhaps Ss were able to cope with these types of conscious-altering feelings rather easily in an ordinary environment; being able to fully sense these annoyances may have opened the individual to ESP perceptions as well. In any event, the different findings on Factors I and X by Ss in the Writing Shelter may provide an important clue as to how ESP can be facilitated in ordinary environments in which ASC-producing techniques and materials are absent.
While in the Group Shelter, Ss attained significant numbers of ESP hits in association with high scores on Factors III and VI. Factor III contains items reflecting changes in vision (e.g. “Are you seeing imaginary colors?” “Do the objects around you look different in any way?”). These quasi-hallucinatory experiences are reminiscent of the responses which Honorton, Davidson, and Bindler (1971) found to be linked with ESP in an alpha wave biofeedback experiment. Favor VI items are remarkably similar, involving increased sensory perception (e.g. “Have you smelled any unusual or heightened odors?” “Does your sense of touch seem better?”).
More research is needed in other environmental conditions to expand upon these findings. In addition these data could be combined with psychophysiological material (e.g. EEG, EOG, EMG) through the technique of “convergent operations” (Krippner and Davidson, 1972). In the meantime the two instruments utilized in this study appear to be of considerable use in parapsychology’s attempts to define and delineate appropriate psi-favorable states of consciousness.
REFERENCES
Honorton, C. (1970). Tracing ESP through altered states of consciousness.
Psychic, 2, 18-22.
Honorton, C. (1972). Significant factors in hypnotically-induced clairvoyant dreams.
Journal of the American Society for Psychical Research, 66, 86-102.
Honorton, C., Davidson, R., & Bindler, P. (1971). Feedback-augmented EEG alpha, shifts in subjective state, and ESP card-guessing performance. Journal of the American Society for Psychical Research, 65, 308-323.
Krippner, S., & Davidson, R. (1972). The use of convergent operations in bio- information research. Journal for the Study of Consciousness, 5, 64-76.
Linton, H. B., & Langs, R. J. (1964). Empirical dimensions of LSD-25 reaction. Archives of General Psychiatry, 10, 225-234.
Ludwig, A. M. (1966). Altered states of consciousness. Archives of General Psychiatry, 15, 225-234.
Ludwig, A. M., Levine, J., & Stark, L. (1971). LSD and alcoholism: A clinical study. Springfield, IL: Thomas.
Tart, C. T. (1970). Self-report scales of hypnotic depth. International Journal of Clinical and Experimental Hypnosis, 18, 105-125.
Artwork by Philip Evergood: “Lily and the Sparrows” - oil 1939
Permission for use granted by Whitney Museum of American Art
This study was supported by a grant from the Mary Reynolds Babcock Foundation, Inc., Winston-Salem, NC. Mr. Bova’s participation in the project was made possible through a Gardner Murphy Fellowship. The authors express their appreciation to Aleksandra Kasuba who made her studio available for the experimental sessions reported in this study.
Originally published in - International Journal of Paraphysics, Vol. 8, No. 2, 1974
Stanley Krippner, Ph.D., and Michael Bova
Maimonides Dream Laboratory, Brooklyn, NY
Environmental influences on Clairvoyance and Alterations in Consciousness
Originally published in - International Journal of Paraphysics, Vol. 8, No. 2, 1974
Observations of “trance” mediums as well as investigation of spontaneous case material (e.g. dreams) has suggested a relationship between certain altered conscious states and psi phenomena (Honorton, 1970). Ludwig (1966) has defined an altered state of consciousness (ASC) as any mental state “which can be recognized subjectively …or by an objective observer … as representing a sufficient deviation in subjective experience or psychological functioning from certain general norms for that individual during alert, waking consciousness…” Ludwig (1966) notes that environmental manipulation is one of several procedures which may alter consciousness through its effects on exteroceptive stimulation. ASCs have been measured by Ludwig by means of an adaptation of the Linton-Langs Questionnaire (Linton & Langs, 1964; Ludwig, Levine, & Stark, 1971), an instrument containing items which represent changes in consciousness (e.g. “Have things felt unreal as if you were in a dream?”).
Tart (1970) has developed a self report scale so that subjects (Ss) may assess their change in consciousness at any time during an experimental session and inform the experimenter (E). High state reports (denoting greater alterations in consciousness) have been found to relate to clairvoyance in a brain-wave biofeedback experiment (Honorton, Davidson, & Bindler, 1971) as well as one involving hypnotic dreams (Honorton, 1972).
PROBLEM
It was decided to explore the effects of various environments on state reports and ESP. Specifically, it was hypothesized that significant results would be obtained from A) trials associated with high scores on the Linton-Langs Questionnaire, and B) trials characterized by high state reports. It was decided to inspect the state in each of the three environmental conditions.
SUBJECTS
Fifty unpaid volunteers (26 males, 24 females) served as Ss for this study. These individuals were selected from S waiting lists at the Maimonides Laboratory or were recruited by Es. All Ss had expressed either a positive or a neutral attitude towards the existence of psi phenomena.
DESCRIPTION OF ENVIRONMENTS
The studio of Aleksandra Kasuba, an artist, was used as the location for all experimental settings. Kasuba’s “Writing Shelter” to alter Ss consciousness consists of a wooden chair and a plain table with a tapestry over it. One of the adjoining walls is of curved white nylon, while the other two are painted dark gray.
Kasuba’s “Group Shelter” is a conical structure, the shape of which converges to a mirror mounted on the ceiling. There are no other furnishings inside but a tasseled deep pile of rug of green, purple, gold and blue, which is spread over a floor of small hill-like ridges. A white globe on the rug diffuses light throughout the area.
A narrow ramp leads up into “The Sensory” which is a spiral rising to a tall and hollow column of white stretched nylon. Inside the floor area is a mirror, on which a hand sized glass ball is placed. A light source around the perimeter of the mirror completes the interior.
Emanuel Ghent’s electronic, computer-generated music was played at low volume and could be heard in “The Sensory” and “The Group Shelter.”
TARGET MATERIALS
Postcard-size reproductions of famous paintings were used as ESP targets for this study. To create pools of target materials with somewhat equivalent content, E1 inspected over 100 art prints from local museums and art supply stores. She evaluated these materials on the following scale: A) “simplicity”: 1) very simple, 2) fairly simple, 3) complex; B)”emotionality”: 1) generates great emotional feeling, 2) generates some emotional feeling, 3) generates little or no emotional feeling; C) “vividness”: 1) very colorful and vivid, 2) fairly colorful and vivid, 3) lacking vividness.
Following EI’s evaluation, EII inspected the art prints, eliminating all prints which received one or more rating of “3.” He then selected four of these art prints for the target pool. The prints were selected to differ thematically one from the other and included: A) “The duelers” by Goya, portraying two men fighting with swords; B) “Lily and the Sparrows” by Evergood, depicting a girl feeding birds; C) “Witch doctor” by Cotlow, portraying a masked individual in a jungle setting, and D) “Battaglia” by Borra, which shows a large number of men on horseback.
Each art print was placed into a small opaque envelope which was sealed and placed in a large opaque envelope which was also sealed. Duplicate copies of the four art prints were set aside for judging purposes.
EXPERIMENTAL PROCEDURE: TARGET SELECTION
All experimental sessions were run by E 111 in the Kasuba studio. Three Ss were run at one time; each S’s experimental session consisted of three trials.
E III had prepared three cards on which were printed the numbers 123, 231 or 312, these numerals referred to the three environments previously described.
Upon each S’s arrival at the studio, E blindly pointed to a five-digit number in a random number table, added and re-added the numeral until a one-digit number was obtained, and counted down a stack of cards one or more times until locating the card which matched the one-digit number. The card was used to determine the order in which each S would enter the designated environment.
Next, E III turned to four cards contained the letters A, B, C and D; these letters referred to the four targets.
A similar procedure was used to obtain a one-digit number which was used to determine the target for each S’s first trial. Similar procedures were used to determine the targets for each S’s latter trials.
S was given the randomly selected envelope upon entering an environment. He spent 15 minutes in the environment, and then wrote his guess as to the target’s identity on a sheet of paper. He was allowed to draw a picture of his guess if he desired. As three Ss were tested at one time, all three environments were in use during the experimental session.
EXPERIMENTAL PROCEDURE: INSTRUMENTS
Upon arrival at the Kasuba studio, each S was individually told about the state report scale:
During the course of this experiment, we will be interested in the degree to which your state of mind stays the same or changes. That is, at various times, we are going to want to know what state of mind you are in. In order to make it easy and convenient for you to tell me this, I am going to teach you a rating scale. This way, when you are asked “State?” you will just call out a number to indicate your state of mind, instead of having to explain it.
Here is what the numbers are to represent: “Zero” indicates that you are normally alert, just as you are now. “One” indicates that you feel especially relaxed. In this state you may feel more at ease, and the tension in your muscles may yield to a more peaceful state. Do you know what I mean? “Two” indicates that your attention is being focused more on internal feelings and sensations. This may be associated with a shift from your surrounding environment to your internal bodily feelings. If this shift is not only recognizable but strong, you should report “three”, and if it is strong and very impressive to you, report “four”. A report of four indicates that you feel more or less oblivious to your external surroundings (Pause.) Do you get the idea?
O.K. Now, whenever I ask “State?” you should call out the first number that pops into your mind. We’ve found this generally to be more accurate than if you stop and think about what the number should be. Of course, if you feel that the number you’ve called out is way off, you may call out a correction. It is important that your state reports reflect, as accurately as possible, your internal state.
At this point, S was asked for a state report and was also asked if he had any questions about the scale.
This was followed by the presentation of a modified version of the Linton-Langs Questionnaire (Ludwig, Levine, & Stark, 1971). The form consists of 68 questions which have been found, through factor analysis techniques, to produce the following categories of ASC reaction:
Factor I: Changes in somatic reactions
Factor II: Changes in meaning
Factor III: Changes in vision
Factor IV: New insights
Factor V: Loss of control of body and/or self
Factor VI: Increased sensory perception
Factor VII: Increased happiness
Factor VIII: Synesthesia
Factor IX: Impaired thinking
Factor X: Unpleasant reactions
Factor XI: Loss of control of feelings and/or emotions
S completed a questionnaire so that he would be familiar with the type of questions asked.
Immediately after the completion of the 15 minutes spent in each condition, and the completion of S’s guess as to the identity of the target, he was asked for a state report. He was also asked to complete a questionnaire. If S said that he no longer felt the degrees of consciousness-alteration that he did when first exposed to the environment, he was told to give a state report or answer questionnaire items to reflect the highest degree of altered consciousness he felt during that particular trial.
PROCEDURE: SUBJECT EVALUATION
Once all three trials had been completed, S was given a duplicate target pool and three evaluation forms which stated:
- Examine all four targets. Remember that the title and the artist may be perceived as well as the picture and the design.
- Rank all four targets against your report. Place the picture which most resembles your report at rank #1 on this sheet. Place the target which least resembles your report at rank #4.
- When you are finished, there should be a target associated with each rank. However, there should be no ties.
RESULTS: QUESTIONNAIRE
It had been hypothesized that significant ESP data would be obtained from trials associated with both high questionnaire scores and high state reports.
For the questionnaire, the mean of each factor in each environment was computed; scores falling at or above the mean were designated high scores while those falling below were designated low scores. Table 1 presents the data emerging when high and low scores are compared regarding ESP hits in the three environments.
The hypothesis was confirmed in four instances. Significant results favoring an ASC (as measured by high scores on the Linton-Langs Questionnaire) were obtained for the Group Shelter (Factors III and VI), for the Sensory environment (Factor I), and for the Writing Shelter (Factor X).
For the Writing Shelter, low scores on the questionnaire were associated with ESP hits in one instance. For Factor I, low state reports produced 17 hits (out of 29 low report trials) as opposed to 11 hits (out of 20 high report trials). This finding contradicts the stated hypothesis.
RESULTS: STATE REPORTS
For the 50 trials conducted in the Writing Shelter, the mean state report was 1.50, therefore, all reports below the mean (e.g. “2”, “3”, and “4”) were designated high state reports.
For the 50 trials conducted in the Group Shelter the mean report was 2.32. For the trials associated with the Sensory environment, the mean report was 2.14. Therefore, for these two conditions, all reports below the means (e.g. “0”, “1”, and “2”) were designated low state reports while those above the means (e.g. “3” and “4”) were identified as high reports.
Table 2 presents the date emerging when high and low state reports are compared regarding ESP hits in these three environments.
On a “post-hoc” basis, data from the latter two conditions were combined, as the mean state reports suggested that an ASC was produced in most Ss by both the Group Shelter and the Sensory environment. There were 27 hits and 13 misses in high state report trials, while 24 hits and 36 misses were associated with low state report trials
(X2 = 7.26, p<.01, 1 d.f.).
TABLE 1
TABLE 2
ESP Hits vs. Misses and State of Consciousness Reports in Three Environments
EXAMPLE
S F. P. was randomly assigned to the target “Lily and the Sparrows”, during her trial period in the “Group Shelter” environment. The target depicts a girl at the window sill of a red brick building. There is a tree off to one side of the picture, and there are sparrows flying to the girl. The dominant color is the red from the building. S’s response was:
A red brick house in the country. A little old lady putting pies on the window sill to cool. Some animals like police dogs are smelling the pies. There were some trees but the color I feel most is red... there is something about this target that is frightening me.
The S gave a state report of “3” for the session.
DISCUSSION
The environments used in this study appeared to have differential effects on ESP, especially in interaction with ASCs.
However, the relation appears to be a complex one. The two environments which most altered consciousness produced clear-cut results linking high state report trials to ESP. However, the environment which least altered consciousness produced no such data; indeed, there were twice as many in high state report trials. Might it be that a facilitating environment is needed for ASCs to foster ESP?
Additional information comes from an examination of the Linton-Langs Questionnaire results. For Factor I, ASCs in the writing Shelter were associated with more ESP misses than hits. Factor 1”s questions deal with somatic changes (e.g., “Have you had any dizziness or grogginess?” “Have you had any numbness or tingling?”). The same questions were associated with ESP hits in the Sensory environment where, perhaps, they were easily integrated into the consciousness-altering effects of the mirror and stretch nylon, while at the desk, however, the same characteristics may have felt uncomfortable, thus decreasing ESP.
On the other hand, ASCs on Factor X were linked with ESP hits in the Writing Shelter. This factor involves reactions that usually are regarded as unpleasant (e.g. “Has time been passing slower than usual?” “Have you felt angry or annoyed?”). Perhaps Ss were able to cope with these types of conscious-altering feelings rather easily in an ordinary environment; being able to fully sense these annoyances may have opened the individual to ESP perceptions as well. In any event, the different findings on Factors I and X by Ss in the Writing Shelter may provide an important clue as to how ESP can be facilitated in ordinary environments in which ASC-producing techniques and materials are absent.
While in the Group Shelter, Ss attained significant numbers of ESP hits in association with high scores on Factors III and VI. Factor III contains items reflecting changes in vision (e.g. “Are you seeing imaginary colors?” “Do the objects around you look different in any way?”). These quasi-hallucinatory experiences are reminiscent of the responses which Honorton, Davidson, and Bindler (1971) found to be linked with ESP in an alpha wave biofeedback experiment. Favor VI items are remarkably similar, involving increased sensory perception (e.g. “Have you smelled any unusual or heightened odors?” “Does your sense of touch seem better?”).
More research is needed in other environmental conditions to expand upon these findings. In addition these data could be combined with psychophysiological material (e.g. EEG, EOG, EMG) through the technique of “convergent operations” (Krippner and Davidson, 1972). In the meantime the two instruments utilized in this study appear to be of considerable use in parapsychology’s attempts to define and delineate appropriate psi-favorable states of consciousness.
REFERENCES
Honorton, C. (1970). Tracing ESP through altered states of consciousness.
Psychic, 2, 18-22.
Honorton, C. (1972). Significant factors in hypnotically-induced clairvoyant dreams.
Journal of the American Society for Psychical Research, 66, 86-102.
Honorton, C., Davidson, R., & Bindler, P. (1971). Feedback-augmented EEG alpha, shifts in subjective state, and ESP card-guessing performance. Journal of the American Society for Psychical Research, 65, 308-323.
Krippner, S., & Davidson, R. (1972). The use of convergent operations in bio- information research. Journal for the Study of Consciousness, 5, 64-76.
Linton, H. B., & Langs, R. J. (1964). Empirical dimensions of LSD-25 reaction. Archives of General Psychiatry, 10, 225-234.
Ludwig, A. M. (1966). Altered states of consciousness. Archives of General Psychiatry, 15, 225-234.
Ludwig, A. M., Levine, J., & Stark, L. (1971). LSD and alcoholism: A clinical study. Springfield, IL: Thomas.
Tart, C. T. (1970). Self-report scales of hypnotic depth. International Journal of Clinical and Experimental Hypnosis, 18, 105-125.
Artwork by Philip Evergood: “Lily and the Sparrows” - oil 1939
Permission for use granted by Whitney Museum of American Art
This study was supported by a grant from the Mary Reynolds Babcock Foundation, Inc., Winston-Salem, NC. Mr. Bova’s participation in the project was made possible through a Gardner Murphy Fellowship. The authors express their appreciation to Aleksandra Kasuba who made her studio available for the experimental sessions reported in this study.
Originally published in - International Journal of Paraphysics, Vol. 8, No. 2, 1974