Book Review: "Jadoo" by John Keel

I had wanted to read John Keel's Jadoo: The Astounding Story of One Man's Search into the Mysteries of Black Magic in the Orient for a very long time. Out of print, and sometimes hard to find, I finally picked up a reasonably priced copy of it. Running roughly 250 pages, it is one hell of an interesting read. Keel is known, of course, most famously for The Mothman Prophecies, and overall as a UFOlogist. But this book is before all that. Published in 1957, this was his debut, and chronicles his life traveling around the Middle East in search of unusual stories. He delves into the secrets of snake charmers and mystics. He learned the rather interesting Indian Rope Trick. He searches for a Yeti in the mountains near Tibet. He does all this by the seat of his pants, with almost no money, and encounters plenty of problems. It's a very entertaining read, and through it all, despite his overall skepticism, he finds some truly unexplainable things out there. At the same time, you can really feel what he is describing, from the squalor of certain areas, to the majesty of others. It's a look at another culture that you don't often see from our world. 

This is a home movie that he took of the snake charmers he talks about in the book...

Kind of interesting that it exists, especially since he had to sell all his equipment to have money to live on shortly after this. Would love to see more footage from the events in the book.

In short, if you like Keel's style, his frank, and humorous approach, you will like Jadoo, and I would highly recommend tracking down a copy.

A Secret History of Consciousness by Gary Lachman

A Secret History of Consciousness is a fascinating book. I came across this book browsing Borders a few years back, sounded interesting, then I noticed it was written by the former bass player from Blondie. Luckily, it wasn't something that made me NOT want to read it. Plus the Intro by Colin Wilson didn't hurt.

It took a while, but eventually I sat down and started to read this. It took a while to get through the whole thing due to my reading habits of jumping from book to book, but none-the-less, I was never disappointed in this. I do think it started better than it ended, it was more, open, at the beginning. Overall it is a wide exploration of various ideas in consciousness and metaphysics. From Blavatsky to Kant to Colin Wilson, do not enter into this reading unless you have a very open mind and a willingness to at least try some very unusual ideas. It even got me to accept Julian Jaynes work a bit.

Overall, the book explores the way consciousness may have evolved over time... and for that matter, where it may be going. It suggests the various ways consciousness may have perceived reality over time, and the aspects of perception that have changed over aeons. It goes into purely speculative realms, as well as exploring things in a more scientific, or at least philosophical manner. Near the end, he seems to be trying to pull some of the stranger ideas together as a true history, and that is the only part which I feel wasn't as interesting. The ideas are speculations, interesting ones, to be sure, but just ideas. There is no reason to validate them over any others.

I think Gary does an excellent job at least engaging your ability to think about where consciousness has been, and where it may be going. Not to mention the various states of consciousness that we are already capable of, even if we aren't aware of them. I haven't read the works of people like Blavatsky and Immanuel Kant in many, many years, and, as least in the case of the latter, it reminded me of just how much I liked his work. In the case of the former, it allowed me to re-consider the value of her work, and also enlightened me to other thinkers are authors that I have not known as of yet.

Overall, this is highly recommended, and I am glad that I decided to pick this up. The thing about the physical book store, is that you can find things like this, things you weren't looking for. Things you didn't know you wanted. I love being able to find just about anything on a site like Amazon, but it is far less likely that I will come across something like this at random.

Near Death, UFO's, and The Rethinking of Reality...

“I believe there is an perichoresis, an interpenetration. It is possible, indeed, that we three are now sitting among desolate rocks, by bitter streams.

…And with what companions?”

- Arthur Machen

When most people think of Near Death Experiences, they think of a tunnel of light, meeting heavenly beings, etc. A good number of people also think it’s bullshit. Those are the people who have never actually researched the subject. Does a NDE prove life after death? No. Absolutely not. However it is a genuine mystery that a few brave scientists over the years may have finally made some headway into.

Make no mistake NDE’s are a joke among conventional scientists, not because there is nothing to them, but because they fall into that fringe that they stay far away from. That fringe starts to unravel accepted theories, and is really just inconvenient. So the mainstream scientists stay far away. There are however, doctors who often starting out as skeptical, eventually admit that there seems to be something to the experiences. Michael Sabom wrote a book back in the late 90's called, Light and Death about a particular case that can’t be explained by accepted theories. But this case is not unique, often people who are dead on the operating table find themselves hovering over their bodies and can describe in detail what was happening on the operating table, or in other rooms nearby. The standard explanation for this is that they are just hearing it and their brains are making up the rest. There was a cardiologist, whose name escapes me at the moment, who after hearing numerous stories of NDE’s, and being completely skeptical, decided to mount his own study. What he did was this, over the coarse of a year or so, every patient he worked on was asked to fill out a questionnaire. Said document asked IF the person had a NDE, as well as questions about what happened during the procedure. What he discovered after many 100’s of patients was interesting, and turned him away from being a skeptic (a common thing for cardiologists who actually do any research on the subject). He found that, as we already knew, not everyone who died had a NDE. BUT, he also discovered that some people who did not die, and weren’t even near death, DID have a NDE. He also found that the people who had NDE’s could describe in clear and precise detail what was happening in the operating room, not just conversations, but actions, tools, etc. The people who did not have NDE’s, also filled out this portion, and he found that what they thought was happening could not have been more wrong. This disproved the idea that people were just making up what was happening in the operating room or just dreaming about it. Every indication is that these people were seeing what was going on in the room, even when all brain activity had ceased. There is, of course, also the famous story of the woman who, while having a NDE, floated out of the operating room, was able to recount a conversation, that was verified, happening in the waiting room, and then finally floated outside the building. In the last part, she saw a red shoe sitting on the ledge. When she woke up and told the doctor about it, she decided to check it out. She went to where the shoe was supposed to be, and sure enough, there it was, just as described. What was more, the shoe was not in a location anyone would have been able to casually see it.

All of this, however, does not say anything about an afterlife, what it displays is the probability that consciousness can move without the body. Now that we have established certain facts about NDE’s, we have to look at other research.

There were studies done at a certain point using Ketamine, and it was shown that under certain conditions, the drug could create visions similar to NDE’s. The problem with this, however, is that there is no known mechanism for the body to create Ketamine naturally. This did not stop various skeptics from latching on to the theory that somehow Ketamine explained away NDE’s. After all, when your only goal is to dismiss something, and you have already made up your mind, any explanation will do. Skeptics don’t use facts, they use belief. The very people who did the study said that they did not believe that this explained NDE’s in any way. Yet it was sighted repeatedly as the solution to NDE’s.

On the other hand, Dr. Rick Strassman, who was the only doctor since the 70’s allowed to do research on hallucinatory drugs, found that DMT, which is naturally occurring in the human body, also created experiences similar to NDE’s. Not exact, but he theorized that the circumstances may also be a factor, and that we don’t know what a natural release of DMT may do. Some of the experiencers also reported encounters very similar to alien abduction scenarios. He was not prepared for any of this, and after years of research he finally concluded that DMT didn’t cause hallucinations, per se. He felt that what was more likely happening was that DMT was re-tuning the brain, allowing consciousness to interact with a different reality. He termed our reality, channel normal, comparing the re-tuning to a TV set. In his book, DMT: The Spirit Molecule: A Doctor's Revolutionary Research into the Biology of Near-Death and Mystical Experiences, he shows, in detail, why he doesn’t feel that what people were experiencing on DMT were mere hallucinations. There was too much consistency between trips, and between the patients. Hallucinations simply don’t work like that.

But this makes a strange connection, that of alien abductions and NDE’s. Oddly enough, Dr. Kenneth Ring made the same connection back in his 1992 book, The Omega Project: Near-Death Experiences, Ufo Encounters, and Mind at Large. Originally, Dr. Ring’s research was into the NDE. In this book, he expanded his research to not only explore the after effects of the Near Death Experience, but also to explore the alien abduction phenomenon. What he found was stunning, and rather confusing. He found that the aftereffects of both experiences had similar effects on the experiencer. Dr. Ring identified various value and belief changes associated with people who have had either experience. Some of these changes in personality involve having a greater appreciation for live, higher self-esteem, more compassion, a better understanding of life, as well as a sense of purpose, a desire to learn new things, an increase in spirituality (do not confuse this with religion), and many other things, including a raising of IQ. On the other hand both experiences can also create negative effects, where people have trouble dealing with the experience and life afterwards. But what stands out in this research, aside from the similarities, are the verifiable changes in the people who experience these things. Hallucinations do not cause core changes in a person, these experiences do. The late John Mack also dealt, on the abduction side, with these personality changes in great detail. He was, of course, ostracized for even attempting to study such a field. Again, his research confirms what Dr. Ring discovered. That there are changes to the individual, and that both experiences seem to have some common core.

One of the things that Dr. Strassman did not find, were any kind of long lasting personality changes in the individual. It is possible, however, that the amount of DMT, or the setting may have been to blame. Or maybe DMT is not the catalyst. But there is more.

As I said at the start, not everyone who dies has a Near Death Experience. This would seem to be a puzzle. On explanation may be, that only some remember it. Like dreams. Everyone dreams. Everyone. However, it is not hard to find people who rarely or never remember their dreams, or who believe they do not dream. Dreaming is also an altered state of consciousness, so perhaps there is a connection. Dr. Ring’s research led him to the idea of the Encounter Prone Personality. The EPP is someone who is more likely to have a paranormal experience. Could this be connected to DMT? Dr. Strassman wonders the same thing. Could it be that some people have more DMT running through their systems than others. Or maybe some people’s bodies create DMT more easily, then allowing them to access another reality. It could even be an environmental factor that sets it off. Consider that UFO sightings often happen in flaps, or flap areas. Paul Devereux has his Earth Lights theory (Earth Lights Revelation: Ufo's and Mystery Lightform Phenomena : The Earth's Secret Energy Force), which shows that such lights, perhaps generated by the Earth itself, happen most often along fault lines. All of these things may be connected. The same mechanism that causes Earth Lights, may have an effect on certain people, whose brains then release a dose of DMT, allowing them to access another world, or have an alien abduction experience, whatever it really is. This theory seems rather effective. There is only one problem. There are many UFO encounters with physical evidence. Granted never enough to fully claim the UFO Phenomenon as real to many people, but take for instance, there was a UFO landing case, where the witnesses watched a bright object come down and land in their woods. They went out to investigate. When they got there, it shot off and disappeared. It broke some of the tree limbs, and left a white circle on the floor of the forest. The mother of the group, reached out and touched the circle, and lost all feeling in her hand. It never returned. The area where the circle was is now, still, dead, decades later. Nothing can grow there. What does this prove? Nothing but that something odd happened. There are enough of these cases, enough radar traces, and other tantalizing pieces of evidence to rule out a purely mental phenomenon. At the same time, there is no evidence that UFO sightings like this are in any way extra-terrestrial. What they are is a total mystery.

I could go on for days about examples to back up all of the above. What it boils down to, though, is that there is more going on here than we currently can comprehend. A Near Death Experience may have nothing to do with what actually happens when we die, any more than UFO’s looking like saucers mean they come from outer space. They may have more to do with each other than most suspect. There is a legitimate mystery here, and one that may need a complete reorganization of our view of reality to even begin to process.

One take could be this. These experiences allow us access to another world. Another dimension. Under the right circumstances, we can interact and access that world. The above DMT theory would allow for this to happen. However, the inhabitants of that world, may also be able to come here, maybe not fully, but just enough to create the type of odd UFO sightings and such that occur, occasionally leaving puzzling evidence. This would account for all the evidence. It is not currently provable, and may be completely wrong, but at least it takes everything into account.

Lets look at one more piece of the puzzle. In his book Supernatural: Meetings with the Ancient Teachers of Mankind, Graham Hancock suggests that the alien abduction scenario, the fairies and elves of the past, and shamanic experiences are all of the same ilk. Jacques Vallee had previous, in Passport to Magonia: On UFOs, Folklore, and Parallel Worlds, and DIMENSIONS: A Casebook of Alien Contact, shown the link between fairies, UFO’s, Fatima, and more. Graham goes a bit further and shows how the ancient cave paintings are not of hunted animals, but of shamanic journeys. All of these factors collide to create a rich and varied picture. Vallee shows that this phenomenon, whatever it truly is, has been with us throughout history. Graham adds into the picture the Shamanic element, which then aligns with the DMT research. When all is said and done, we are looking at something that has interacted with and been of part of the foundation of mankind throughout time. Some, like John Keel, feel that this phenomenon may not have our best wishes at heart. Mack and Hancock show that with bad experiences, growth comes, so maybe what Keel sees as dangerous, may eventually be beneficial. Or maybe, like us, some of what is there is helpful and some is not.

So let us look again at the NDE, in this new light. What do we know? Well, the out of body experiences suggest that consciousness is not confined to the body, and MAY survive death. It does not, however, necessarily show us what death is like. This reminds me though, of another strange connection between the UFO phenomenon and NDE’s. One of the common elements of the NDE is meeting of dead relatives when they go towards or reach the light. There have been numerous abduction accounts of people on ‘ships’ meeting dead relatives aboard. Whether or not these are their actual dead relatives in either case, is an open question, but the appearance of said factor in UFO accounts is very strange. Whatever is happening has a common factor. The experiences may be different, but yet, not so much at times. The other interesting thing is the personality changes that NDE and UFO experiencers have. As mentioned above, a simple hallucination does not cause this, nor does the DMT doses that were given by Strassman. I find the raise in IQ especially interesting, as being dead should not expand your intelligence, if anything, one would think small amounts of brain damage would likely be more common. Current science can not explain any of this. Nor will it even address the subjects. Death may have nothing to do with NDE’s, but the near death state may open up doors in some people.

It is easy for the skeptic to dismiss this data, they will never accept it anyways, so proving anything to skeptics is pointless. They have made up their minds. Luckily, there are those open minded skeptics, who are willing to do open and honest research and not dismiss things out of hand. It is because of these people that we may have finally reached something NEW about these types of experiences. For the foreseeable future, I suppose we will all find out when we do die. What happens will happen. I often wonder how these closed minded skeptics (and atheists for that matter) react when they die and their consciousness continues. Do they stop and look back, realizing how ignorant they were? On the other hand, if they are right, and when you die that is it, well, we won’t know anyways, now will we. I believe that there is more than enough evidence to suggest the independent nature of consciousness without the body, as well as the idea that consciousness is not a by product of matter, but that matter is a creation of consciousness. A very eastern idea, that western science is slowly finding itself having to deal with. Ah, but that is another subject...

“We are not human beings having a spiritual experience. We are spiritual beings having a human experience.”

- Teilhard de Chardin

Book Review: DMT - The Spirit Molecule by Rick Strassman, M.D.

DMT: The Spirit Molecule: A Doctor's Revolutionary Research into the Biology of Near-Death and Mystical Experiences by Rick Strassman M.D.

There are people who feel that science and the paranormal cannot co-exist, usually forgetting that many things were paranormal until explained by science. In today's world, talk of things like Alien Abductions and Near Death Experiences often get one ridiculed by people who are more, scientific. In DMT, The Spirit Molecule, Dr. Strassman proceeds in a completely scientific manor to investigate the effects of DMT on various volunteers. The results though, may help to identify certain mechanisms that may be involved in such ridiculed events such as Alien Abductions. Make no mistake, this is not a New Age book. Dr. Strassman is an accredited and peer reviewed scientist, who did not set out to deal with the subjects that he eventually did. Like any good scientist, he followed the data. It led him to very surprising places.

DMT Experiences, although often unique, also have certain common qualities to them. One of them is meeting ‘beings’, and experiencing some of what happens in an Alien Abduction. Dr. Strassman, as much as he seems to have resisted it, eventually had to admit that the experiences did not bear the markings of being just an hallucination. The fact that DMT occurs naturally in the body, being secreted by the Pineal Gland, makes it even more interesting. The book itself is very well, written, very scientific, and quite enjoyable. Just reading about all the hoops he had to jump through to get to do the research in the first place is amazing.

It has made me wonder about paranormal experiences in new ways. For example, anyone who studies UFO’s seriously will point out that DMT can’t explain multiple witness sightings, radar tracking, and physical traces. But what if we are dealing with two different things. What if the only connection between the odd lights in the sky and the alien abduction scenario is that whatever causes the ‘physical’ UFO, sets off a release of DMT in the observer, who then has an internal experience? I think this could be a potential breakthrough in the study of UFO’s. It doesn’t explain what causes the lights, but if whatever does, affects people in the right way, it may lead to an encounter that is not ‘of’ those lights. Like a heavy wind blowing open a door you didn’t know was there. The wind and the room beyond may not be directly related, but one unlocked the other. It could also be that the beings that are contacted via DMT are also trying to come here, and they do so in what appear to us as UFO’s (and possibly other unexplained phenomena).

I have never been sure what to make of implants in UFO abduction cases, but people in DMT studies receive implants. There is no physical implant in these people, but plenty of abductees have claimed to have found physical implants right where they say they were implanted. Some of these implants, when removed, seem to be, at the very least, odd. Now, as I said, I am not sure what to make of this. There isn’t enough conclusive evidence one way or another, but I would say that Dr. Strassman’s research into DMT may be a very important clue in understanding the UFO Phenomenon, as well as consciousness and the human condition in general.

If any of this even vaguely interests you, I highly recommend picking up a copy of this book. You can look at it as DMT causing hallucinations or as DMT tapping into another realm, either way, the book is very interesting and opens up all new avenues of questions. Personally, I believe that it retunes us to another world. How much so probably depends on the situation and amount of DMT received, either naturally or by design. Dr. Strassman uses the analogy of the brain as a television, tuned by default to ‘channel normal’. DMT tunes it to other wavelengths.

I would like to thank Dr. Rick Strassman for the courage to see this study through and the strength it took him to actually get to do it. If you read this, you will understand what I mean. His research may have broken new ground in various fields, but only time will tell.

The Light and the Moon...

Standing at the end of the path, fields surround. The moon, bright in the sky, casts everything in a beautiful glow. Quick moving clouds skirt across the sky, in patches dimming the glow occasionally, but none the less, there is a beauty to it all. A breeze, comes across from the West, guiding the clouds on their way. As I watch, I notice a light in one of the fields, strange that, as there is nothing out there to create a light. It is at first, though, only a passing interest. Despite my severely clear sense of consciousness, things start to happen... First a flash, like someone taking a picture. The flash is there, but without a sharp climax, and then an odd decay. Interesting, and hard to focus on, like it comes from somewhere we don't normally have access to. Then, oddness becomes outstanding. As I gaze up at the clouds starting to cover the moon, the lunar body suddenly bursts through the thick clouds and shakes wildly. Clearly a hallucination. I look away, at that odd light in the field. It blinks on and off at regular intervals. I look up and the moon is normal again, for a moment, then it starts its impossible dance. Bewildered I look away. I look inward to examine my seeming clarity of mind, and find that it still seems to be intact. That light is still there. I stare at it, and it goes out and doesn't come back on. Odd. I look at the bizarre lunar dance again, and once again, it seems like it should at first, then it performs it's convulsion. If it was an optical illusion, would that not be there as soon as I look? I notice the light is back, I look at it, trying to determine something, anything, about it. It goes out and stays out. Frustrating. I wait and it fails to relight. I look away, and from the corner of my eye, it returns. Like a game. I watch it from the corner of my eye, and it blinks on and off every seven seconds. Fine, I think, so there is a pattern to this seemingly out of place luminosity. As it ignites, I look at it, it stays on seven seconds, goes out, and does not come back... Till I look elsewhere, then it resumes it's blinking. Now how can that be. It is a good distance away, yet it seems to be interacting with me. It is not unusually bright and it stays perfectly still. What sense can be made of this. If I look when it is out, it stays out till I look away. Subtle, yet, so striking in it's action. I look up, the moon, free of clouds seems like it should, but the flashes on the landscape remain on occasion. I wonder if I should feel scared by all this? Worried about my own sanity, yet I know, this is something that is definitely there, this is not a mental hallucination.

I recall that at Fatima, the sun was said to fall from the sky and fly around. I think about our need to believe in ghosts or aliens, or something else that we can somehow fit into our idea of logic. Perhaps, though, the world does not play by those rules. Perhaps that light is always there, but it takes a certain state of mind, or state of earth, or alignment with something, somewhere, for me to see this. And there it is. And more than anything, it wants contact. And maybe it has caused these other things, the flashes and the dancing moon, only to direct my attention to it. But what then. If a person were to sit in that lonely field and wait for perhaps me to wander this way, even with some nice night vision goggles and motivation, they could not detect the slight change in my vision that provokes the light to respond. It knows when I am looking at it, and it is telling me so. The clouds are passed, and the sun is coming soon. The light remains. I bid it farewell and return from where I came, with a great sense of wonder, invigorated by something so simple, yet so profound. Not a ghost, nor an alien, nor anything else we can fully comprehend in our world of logic and order.  Perhaps, though, something that seeks contact, something so strange to us, that we can't yet see what it truly is. Perhaps we lack the facilities to, the senses to. And if it is so strange to us, how can we even guess it's motivation? It's awareness is likely to be so foreign and alien to ours that how can we hope to really communicate. We are closed minded and arrogant. Yet it tries. We can not hope to apply to something our limited views and behaviours to it and hope to make any sense of them. It has been here, trying, for as long as we know. We have assigned it different faces, angels, demons, aliens, ghosts, fairies... But these were the illusions, which we provided as it tries to get through on some level. A light in a field, where there is no light, that responds in ways it can't. It's seems so trivial and small.

Clearly, though, it is patient.

Books I am Reading Right Now...

I read too many books at once, and I always want to do reviews of them, but never get around to it. Actually, sometimes I can't even remember the beginning of a book once I get to the end cause it may have been a year or so since I started it. Seriously. It's not from lack of interest, it is just that I will suddenly decided I want to read one thing or another and jump around, so I figured maybe I would just comment on some of the stuff I am reading now.

Lost Cities of North and Central America (The Lost City Series) by David Hatcher Childress. You can see David as a regular on Ancient Aliens currently (History Channel I believe), and I really have to say I love his books. He is a story teller and explorer. He is not out to prove anything, and he is no armchair theorist. He has traveled the world, and his books relate those travels with both personal stories, legends, theories, and just pure speculation. His books are just filled with crazy amounts of information about ancient cultures, and legends of pre-history, and, well, fun. He will often just run off on rides of wild speculation, and they are enjoyable rides. I am about halfway through this book, and the first half deals mostly with Central America as David travels about and explores ancient ruins, and relates legends about them. He often spends time off the beaten path trying to track down some of the more obscure legends, and never fails to enlighten me to something that I have never heard of before. That is one of the things that most books fail to do, and when an author can repeatedly do such a thing to me, they quickly become one of my favorite authors, as David Hatcher Childress has.

Our Haunted Planet net by John Keel. Published back in 1971, the late John Keel is easily one of my favorite authors. Like Childress, he has traveled the world, has related odd legends and little known information, and is a fantastic story teller. What sets them apart is that Keel does have theories that he supports, and they were way ahead of his time. His primary focus has always been the UFO Phenomenon, but he is one of the very early proponents of the idea that UFO does not mean Extra-terrestrial. Keel very much believes that UFO's are Ultra-Terrestrial, and may very well not be benevolent. Over the years I find myself agreeing with Keel less than I used to, and in some cases it is just a matter of time having proven some of his theories wrong. On other things however, he has shown himself to be dead on. Our Haunted Planet is a collection of strange events and research. Keel is never one to shy away from High Strangeness, and instead feels that the key to things lie in the strangest accounts, not the more 'acceptable' one. This is the second time I have read this work of his, and I find that I am enjoying it the second time through far more than the first for some reason. I lent my first copy to someone and they never returned it, so getting my hands on another I felt it deserved a re-read, and it has been well worth the time to do so.

DMT: The Spirit Molecule: A Doctor's Revolutionary Research into the Biology of Near-Death and Mystical Experiences by Rick Strassman, M.D. I haven't gotten very far in this one, but my interest was peaked while reading Graham Hancock's Supernatural. So far, this is a fascinating book talking about the odd properties of DMT, and recounting the history of research into psychedelic drugs. Very thorough and interesting as Rick relates the accounts of DMT experiments that he was able to conduct, and his theories on what they may really mean. DMT is particularly interesting in that it is produced in the human body, and yet still an illegal substance. Even slightly higher than normal doses of DMT have been shown to cause hallucinogenic states. The question that Rick eventually starts to address, is if these states may have some reality of their own, and not just be in the mind. His theory is akin to retuning a Television set from what he calls 'Channel Normal' to another channel using drugs like DMT. Since DMT is also produced in the human body, another theory is that people who are 'sensitive' may already have slightly elevated levels of DMT, allowing them to tune into alternate realities while still connected to a normal consciousness level. As I said, haven't made it too far into this book, but so far, well worth the read.

The Murder of Christ by Wilhelm Reich. A truly brilliant man. I have never read any of his stuff before. Published back in 1953, Reich was highly persecuted in his time, eventually dying in prison and having all his books burned. Reich suggested that there is another energy field called Orgone, and it is powered, in essence, by sexual energy. In the 1950's, you can see why this may not have gone over so well. He had various experiments proving his theories, and his history and ideas are well worth checking out. This book, however, is not so much about that. In a deep, and slightly hard to read way, Wilhelm explores the life of Christ through his eyes, seeing the repression of sexuality and other psychosis as the main problem in today's society. A view WAY ahead of it's time. The Murder of Christ is the repression of the life force, which Christ wanted us to revel in, not repress as our Western culture in particular does to such a huge degree. Reich was a strange man, and his work is fascinating. I haven't read very far into this yet, in part because it's not such an easy read, he writes in a slightly tedious manner, but it is worth slowly working through so far.

Invisible Residents: The Reality of Underwater UFOs by Ivan T. Sanderson. The Reality of Underwater UFO's is the subtitle to this book, originally published in 1970. USO's as they have often been called are a little known variation of the UFO Phenomenon. There are actually a very large number of UFO sightings where the UFO has been seen to come from or go into the water. Ivan recounts many variations of these, and theories as to what it may mean. It is a bit tedious at times, but interesting none-the-less. The book opens relating a story of an Antarctic expedition where a long silvery object suddenly burst through "no less than 37 feet of ice" causing huge chunks of steaming ice to come crashing down all around them and the water from whence it came to boil. There are quite a lot of interesting stories, and Ivan's theory that there may be a vast underwater civilization that pre-dates ours seems a bit outrageous at first glance, but you never really know. I mean, we have explored so little of our oceans, that we really don't know what is down there. And if there was a civilization down there, and they wanted to not be found by us, they may be able to hide well, especially if they have such a high technology. I don't personally think that is the answer to the UFO mystery, but I also find the idea worthy of thought. This is considered a classic and has been republished by David Hatcher Childress' book company, Adventures Unlimited Press.

A Secret History of Consciousness by Gary Lachman. Gary is the former bass player for Blondie. He is also a intriguing author. I picked this up not sure what to expect, and have been blown away by the novelty of information contained. On the one hand, it is an exploration of the history of theories on the nature of consciousness, but on the other hand, it takes a different turn and looks at the idea that perhaps consciousness was not always what it is today, and where it may evolve to. In parts it suggests that consciousness has evolved in ways we can't even imagine, and not in far antiquity, but even in the last few thousand years. For example, perhaps the reason we can not understand the way the pyramids were built, relates more to the consciousness that built them, not just the technology. It is fascinating and unique. A pleasant surprise for something that I picked up spontaneously at Borders one day. Some of the book reminds me of metaphysics that I have not read in 20 years, and other stuff I have never encountered before. Until I read this, I had all but forgotten the theories of Immanuel Kant, but the reminder was refreshing. I would say, though, there was more stuff here that I have never heard of before than stuff I have. Awesome book.

This isn't all of them. but these are the books I am reading most recently. I may do a full review when I finish them, or maybe just another blog of this sort as I start reading more, or pick up some that I have neglected lately. I also signed up as an Amazon affiliate, so if you think you may buy any of these through Amazon, please use my links.  

Olmecs and The History Channel

The Olmecs were an ancient South American civilization that predates the Mayans and Aztecs. We know almost nothing about them aside from aside from the fact that they made these enourmous stone heads, that have distinctly negroid features. So lets take a look at how both archeologists and The History Channel take this subject on.

First up, archeology. What do they deduce from the Negroid features? Well, since they know, yes, know, that people from Africa could not have crossed the Atlantic, then the features must not be Negroid. Yes, that is how it works, denial is king. They know no such thing, and instead of looking at this as potential proof of such a journey, they go the other way, the illogical way, because they don't like to have to rewrite history. Now, the history channel's narrator states that the Olmecs are the first structures society in south America, that they just walked out of the jungle and there they were. They state this as fact, despite knowing nothing about them. What I mean by that is this, we have no idea if there were earlier cultures. To be factual, it should be stated that the Olmecs (and if I remember right, we have no idea what they called themselves, we named them the Olmecs) are the earliest South American Culture that we know of. Oftentimes in this field, and especially when the media gets involved, 'facts' are thrown around that simply aren't facts. There may have been earlier cultures that we have yet to discover, or may never discover, that the Olmecs may have evolved from. If all we have from them are their megalithic heads, then who knows how many cultures were there before them that may not have made such lasting structures.

Now, since all we have are the heads, how do they make this subject last an hour? Well, speculation of course. So they have these huge heads, they know they moved them to where they are, and they have no idea how. So they start by talking to archeologists who tell them that we don't know how the Olmecs moved their heads. We have absolutely no idea. Followed by, well, maybe to speculate we should look at how other cultures moved large stones. Well the Egyptians moved their large stones with large amounts of slave labor. (Ok, problem number one. They did not. This is a theory that is thrown around but has been disproved over and over, in fact the idea that there was widespread slavery in Egypt is wrong, much less that they were used to move their massive stones. Simply wrong) So now let's take this wrong assumption and bind it to our current dilemma.  Now let's test this on much smaller stones. Hey, large amounts of people can move much smaller stones. Great, really doesn't prove or explain anything, but they can treat it like a discovery because it's TV. So, they come back from commercial doing just that, they state that they now know that the Olmecs moved these large heads with large amounts of human labor, as they have now proved. The wording is so important. If you don't know much about this stuff, you will walk away thinking that you know something you don't, because in essence, they are lying to you. They are telling that, that because a whole lot of people can pull a 1/2 ton stone a ways, that the Olmecs did this to move their 20 ton heads, they just used more people. There is no evidence that this is what they did. None. Yet, now, according to this show, Digging for the Truth, we now know how it was done. They don't state that MAYBE it could have been done this way, the narrator says, "We now know that they used many people to pull the stones along..."  But we don't. That is simply a lie.

When they come back, they are talking to an archeologist about how they moved the stones across the water. He tells them, clearly, that they have no idea. They speculate that MAYBE they used boats, but since absolutely nothing of said boats has survived, they can only guess. So with this guess, they make a boat out of the resources that the Olmecs would have had available to them. They barely get their ½ ton stone on three boats lashed together. On the up side, they did not claim that this is definitely how they did it, this time. But they then ‘did the math’ and stated that it would only take 14 much larger boats lashed together to hold one of the 20 ton heads. Yeah, only 14 boats. On top of this, they could barely get the ½ ton rock on the boat, yet clearly you just need more people to get a 20 ton rock up on a boat, right?

I admit, I find these shows interesting. They talked about a dig where they found the heads, and some floors of buildings they found and how one the heads was intentionally buried, a fact that I knew, but had forgotten. The problem with archeology, and oftentimes cosmology, is assumption. For example, the place where they found the heads is the center of the Olmec culture. This is what they state, yet, having found no trace of it anywhere else, how can you really say that. The same with saying that they were the first real culture in South America. They state this as if they know for sure, because it fits with their other theories about human migration. They, however, ignore the facts that don’t fit, like the distinct negroid cast to the heads, implying that they are not part of the typical migration into the area. This is the same behavior that causes Egyptologists to ignore the water damage to the Sphinx, because it disrupts their theories with those pesky facts. And then you let the media get a hold of this information, and it gets cast into a whole new light, despite the FACT that we know little to nothing about the Olmecs, we now have discovered all this new stuff while filming this show. We now know they dragged them like the Egyptians (didn’t) and they made incredibly massive boats to float them down rivers. Yet, despite having the know how to make these massive vessels, they never ventured off into the oceans or anywhere far from home, because people back then simply couldn’t. Despite the fact that I sometimes enjoy these shows, the problem with the misdirection of information, the lying, the assuming, makes them pretty useless. A casual viewer won’t know that, and then they will further on these lies and such. Some of these shows are worse than others. Some episodes are worse than others. So really, if this type of thing interests you, pick up various books on the subject, from various sides. Compare the information and make your own decisions. Sadly, like most other television, even the ‘historical’ documentaries are flash and garbage for the most part now.

Five Points...

So, I happened across this article on Digg earlier.

I felt after reading it, that it needed some commentary.

Number One, Lake Monsters. More often than not, I dismiss Lake Monsters. If one exists, ok, but evidence against them is rather strong, at least as far as what we expect them to be. That does not mean that people aren’t seeing monsters, just that perhaps they are not flesh and blood creatures, there may be a very good, and possibly more interesting explanation. However, number one holds some merit, good.

Number Two, Hoaxes. Also, good point, hoaxes at this point in time are so easy, not to mention the amount junk we have in our environment that may be misinterpreted. I find the UFO (read that as Unidentified Flying Object, NOT as Space Ship) sightings prior to our ability to fly sometimes more interesting because we know it couldn’t be us. There are plenty of those. Nowadays, hoaxes are so damned easy, and easy to make them look really good. So they are right that hoaxes are a problem, but they don’t argue against paranormal phenomenon, just a fact of culture and technology that it becomes a problem in determining real from fake.

Number Three, Unclaimed Large Cash Rewards. Here is where they lose ground. The problem with said cash awards is this, the die hard skeptics that offer them, make sure that no one will ever pass their tests. Of course they are unclaimed, they are more of a publicity stunt than anything else. If you live in New York City, and one day offer $100,000 to anyone who can bring you a live Moose in the next 5 minutes, good chance no one will, but that doesn’t mean that Moose are not real. Yet that is the logic of such cash prizes. Closed minded skeptics, like James Randi, mentioned in the article, will never see anything as proof. Nothing. Period. They have already made up their minds. No one will ever get the money, because no matter how much someone proves, it will not be enough. So on this point they fail miserably. This is not evidence against the paranormal, this is more a psychological exercise for the closed minded. Being an open minded skeptic is probably the best way to be, but a closed minded one will never learn anything new because they think they know it all already. It is not doubt that they have, but certainty.

Number Four, The Fermi Paradox. If we were to argue that space aliens were here, this may or may not add or detract from the argument. Basically, it is hypothetical. Everything in this point is hypothetical. What if. Sure, Richard Dawkins will tell you he is right, but that’s because he falls into that closed minded skeptic category. He already knows he is right about what he believes, so you can’t really make a point to such a person. Anyways, this is obviously an attempt to dismiss UFO sightings. Not only doesn’t it work on various levels, but any real analysis of the phenomenon does not point to ET, but something altogether stranger and more passive. And when that is comprehended, this whole point is, well, pointless.

Number Five, The God Helmet. This one is interesting. It proves that electromagnetic energy can produce interesting effects on the brain. This is a good point against the paranormal. Other things must be considered, though. Ok, so using this helmet can replicate certain paranormal mindsets. Feelings of others in the room with you, for instance. Two things must be worked out. One, are there? Just because we can’t see them in a normal state of being, by tweaking our brain, the brain in the case assumed to be a receiver, like a television, we tune to something outside the ‘norm’. Two, by pressing on certain nerves, you may feel like a part of you, which is not being touched at that time, is being touched. Does that mean that when it is really being touched it is just an illusion? Of course, you could go deep with this question, but I think we will stay on the shallow side for now. Research has been done that suggests that Ketamine can induce something that resembles a Near Death Experience. That is interesting. However, when someone has a real NDE, there is no trace of Ketamine in their system, so it really doesn’t work as a explanation, now does it? Just because something resembles the effects of something else, doesn’t mean that it is now explained. The people who did the initial research were pretty clear at the end that they did not think that Ketamine was in any way responsible for NDE’s, but that didn’t stop the skeptic army from eating that up and spitting it in everyone’s face. So, is the God helmet interesting? Hell, yes. Does it explain all spiritual states and paranormal experiences? Not even remotely. It is, however a tool that may be used for further understanding about the way our brain interacts with this reality that we share.


The problem with the paranormal is, for us to begin to understand it, takes a whole new concept of reality. As long as people try to squeeze it into our current conceptions of how things are, we will not understand. Our narrow belief in how things are does not accommodate many of these phenomenon, which is why you have people arguing that UFO's are space ships, while others arguing, that, despite the evidence of something going on that is causing these experiences, they are somehow not real (aka hoaxes, or hallucinations, or whatever). Both sides are operating in a narrow band of which the true UFO Phenomenon supersedes. That is what the term paranormal means, really. Outside the norm. Someday we may evolve the wisdom to understand many of these things, and then we will look back on what we believe now and laugh at how primitive we were...

Pieces and Perceptions

We perceive the world in pieces. This is something that doesn’t occur to most, but it is very true of everyone. We don’t see a complete picture, our brain selects what it will show us, and ignores 99% of the rest. It does this to avoid an overload of information. It is a useful thing, as we would never be able to process everything around us all the time. Because we process everything in pieces, though, we all perceive different things. There is an old story of the three blind men and an elephant. I forget now an exact version of it, but the basics will do. Three blind men are asked to describe an elephant, and one touches the trunk, one the body, and one the tail. They all describe three completely different animals. Yet, despite the fact that their descriptions seem completely wrong to each other, they are all correct in their perceptions. The large snake like trunk is just as right as the bulky large animal, which is just as right as the wispy tail. All three are correct for the pieces they are examining, and oftentimes arguments break out over differences like this. We may say that the one feeling the body is most correct, but that is not actually true, he is only correct for his piece. For someone with vision, their piece is different, they see the whole animal. It doesn’t mean that what they see is any more correct. People get caught up on things like this. People like to be right. And on some level our perceptions are always right. If someone says, “Hey, I heard something…”, and someone else says, Well, I didn’t.”, neither person is wrong. One did hear something, whether it was something outside them or something generated internally, they heard something. They are not wrong, but neither is the person who heard nothing. In another way, if I was to describe what I see, being someone very familiar with the insides of computers, when I open up a desktop computer, versus someone who has never opened up a computer and knows nothing about them, the descriptions would vary greatly. In fact, so greatly, that if you didn’t know we were describing the same thing, you may never realize it. I would be looking at something familiar and ordered, whereas the other would be looking at something strange and messy. Their brains would not isolate out what is important simply because they don’t know. This is true of all facets of life. Life is a selection of pieces. No one sees everything. We can’t.

If you want to take it a step further, what we all really see is waveforms. Vibrations. The physical objects we think we see are not what are really there. And since we can’t jump behind someone else’s perceptions, we don’t know if what we call a couch looks anything like what they call a couch. Their red may be our green, we just agree that such a vibration is the same. If we were behind their perceptions, we may see what we see as green when looking at something red. If that makes sense. Reality is agreement. Those vibrations are red. That is a chair. Somewhere inside our brains convert perceptions of waveforms to vision, sound, feel, smell, etc. We have no idea how this happens, but it does. Our reality is a loose agreement between us. Right and wrong perceptions mean that much less in that understanding.

We all know the type of people who think they know everything. You bring up a subject and they will comment or criticize despite their obvious lack of knowledge. Once again, though, this is a perception. When someone, lets say, less than very self aware, which is most of the planet, gets enough information to form an opinion, they then think, quite innocently, that they now know something about said subject. With some people, this is enough for them to comment, argue, whatever, but it falls to a level of perception again. There are subjects for which, if you look at them for the first time, one may say, well there is not much to learn about that. So they learn a little and feel like they have a grasp of it. The problem comes when the initial perception is wrong. They may have learned 5%, not realizing that there is another 95%, and will readily argue with someone whose knowledge of said subject encompasses 50%. No one can ever be at 100%. The assumption that ones knows more than they do it common. It usually takes a certain amount of wisdom to truly understand how much we all don’t know. This comes with age, sometimes. Too often, it never comes. A 22 year old who has some life experience thinks they know it all. It is common, and understandable from their perspective. They don’t realize that instead of 90%, they experience encompasses 2%. From their perspective, they have experienced a lot. From a 50 year olds’ perspective, they have experienced nothing. Schooling is not a substitute for life experience, but from the perspective of one who has had lots of schooling, they may see it that way. Look at all they know! Look at all they have been told and remembered! Unfortunately, only experience can gain a level of wisdom, remembering what someone taught you does not. Ever. We often dismiss elderly people, we think they have nothing of value to us, because they don’t get that the young already know everything. Culture may change, but that doesn’t invalidate experience and wisdom. Someone in their 50’s may really not understand why there are people who post their entire lives online. In detail. They may also believe this is a very bad thing to do. A kid doing it thinks that they don’t get it. That they are just out of touch. Until someone robs their house when they post online that they won’t be home for a week. Until someone starts easily stalking them because they are posting where and what they are doing every minute. Until they get turned down for a good job because of their facebook page. Until they get their identity stolen. Suddenly the wisdom of the 50 year old who clearly didn’t get it becomes a bit clearer. They’re had much more time to learn their lessons in this world. Good and bad. Their perspective is wider and richer than a 20 year olds’. You can’t skip that part of life, there is no shortcut. Life is pieces, at 20, your piece of perception is so much smaller than at 60.

For anyone who truly wants to understand other people, these things are mandatory. Understanding the difference in pieces and perception, and not trying to force yours on others. People care about different things, perceive differently, assess differently. The trunk of the elephant is very different than the body, but describing either still correctly describe part of an elephant despite their obvious contradictions. There would be far less arguing in the world if we truly sought to see the others perspective. To see what part of reality they are focusing on. One may say, hey that is red, and someone may pipe up and say, no, it’s magenta. Neither is wrong. The former is just focusing on the general color, the latter on the specific shade of that color. Yet an argument may break out about it. We share this reality, on loose agreement, and that is something we need to understand and accept, and remember.

In Silence...

Names have power. You can call those names again and again, and no one answers. The key is, it's not just the names, it's the passion behind them. The vibrations are different, and that is where the power is. Many things have been misunderstood through the ages, castrated in some cases. Turned into meaningless rituals, all passion carefully and completely removed.

It seems at times that the vibrations are stronger in the darkness. Maybe it is just a trick of the mind, perhaps it’s the absence of those burning rays from the sun. You call the names into the pitch blackness, powerful, and sometimes the black becomes liquid. To touch it, to feel that new substance is unique, yet comforting... At least to some of us. It can be a door, but beyond that door, there is no simple way back, not as you are.

It can be that demons torment us in our sleep. No, they torment us in our dreams. There is a difference. They chase us down dark hallways, through ever narrowing passages, and we think we manage to escape. We are the intruders though, not they. We are the ones reaching out our minds, they are not coming to us. What is it that we really fear in them?

I sat once, at the shore of a dark lake, full moon above, reflecting the cool perfect surface. I could hear them sing, faintly, off in the vast distance. I lost part of myself, crashing down to the rocks I sat upon. I watched omni-dimensional beings poke through the surface, begging me to feel, and lose a bit more...

Led into a cave, where the music was loud. So loud. They sang in such mesmerizing beauty, such perfection, and such sounds, like nothing one can really hear. They resonate with your soul. Reminding you of something long lost, long forgotten.

There is a tipping point. Between here and there. A tightrope to be walked. You can call the names, and bring it closer to you. You can risk it all, and move closer to them. Risky, though, as the demons are always lurking. Any doorway will do.

The moon can shake the sky, and balls of fire drip down like rain. Images in the sky are never what they seem, they are always hiding another dimension, another reality to themselves. There is a magnificent view from the tightrope. Startling. Ineffable. Our minds are limited, more so than we know. There in lies the pleasure of it all, the expansion, the limitless creativity and exploration. So often one in the same. From that tightrope, up so high, there also lie the trappings of madness. You have to be mad, to walk across at all. The fall, drops you to the furthest reaches of the abyss.

So call the names all you want. It is stale and hollow without the spirit of the thing. Without the fire and passion. Without the understanding. A dragon’s breath, however, opens doors, and a trek through the underworld is good for the soul. Torn to shreds, assailed from all sides, and worn through. Ripped away and left, dead and dying… as it should be. Learn the gates, learn the names, and learn the proper meaning of sacrifice. Else, say nothing. In silence. Remain.