| Your note reminded me of a 3 day lecture I took several years ago
and although I have not read the book referenced by you, I thought
you might be interested in this particular talk.
I believe it was about 5 years ago. The speaker was Alex Tanos,
"world renouned" and all that. (I must admit, I had never heard
of him before). The subject covered several areas of work that
he had partaken of. One of these areas is work that he claimed
to do directly for and with the approval of the United States
Government.
Apparently there is more attention being paid to parapsycology and
the "cold war". Alex stated that he had, while being photographed,
been able to literally be in two places at one time. This was done
under strict guidelines and scrutiny of our government-type officials.
As a type of "trading of information" with the USSR, Alex went to
Russia and did his stuff.
As I mentioned, this was talked about all of five years ago, so
therefore it had to have occured prior to that. Therefore, it would
appear that this has been done and the governments of both countries
are aware of it. They have "chosen" not to do anything with it
so far, or so it would appear.
Alex also spoke of his finding Atlantis, speaking directly to Einstein,
and working around the 3 main pyramids in Egypt. He mentioned one
particular television show covering his works, and I am sure he
must have written about these experiences also, although I have
not seen books authored by him in my travels.
A personal side note, I had a bit of "stand offish" feelings about
Mr. Tanos. He was presented and recommended by a personal friend
and world known psychic, Ramona Garcia from the New England area.
Alex presented his material in a much animated, interesting manner;
but I still had some warning bells go off inside. I believe his
small ego had gotten a bit on the hefty side, which for me, takes
away from his credibility. One way to find out for yourself is
to check it out.
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| RE: .0
I actually enjoyed Monroe's second book a bit more simply because
the book wasn't cluttered with attempts to prove the validity or
reality of what he was doing.
I feel that the people who didn't want to believe in the ideas brought
forth in his first book would remain equally unconvinced, had he
attempted to do the same in his second book.
I'm not at all sure that scientific evidence of Astral Projection
or other spiritual things is what it will take to eventually bring the
world around to the state described in 'Far Journies'. This area
is so non-physical that proof via physical means just becomes a
burden to the process.
BTW, if you enjoyed Far Journies, and the lack of proofs didn't bother
you too much, you might like to check out the book 'The Guide Book'
published by Gateway Books. I got my copy at the local occult/new-age
bookstore. It's subtitled 'Ourselves, Our Planet, Our Universe'.
Kak
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| RE: .0 and .3
<<Experimental confirmation of OBE>>
The experiment you describe has been done -- with rather mixed results.
A related experiment, where the experient (person experiencing the
OBE) tries to influence things where (in this case) he "travelled"
to, was also somewhat mixed.
First though, a minor nit -- when the term Out-of-body experience
was first introduced by parapsychologists it was acronymized as OOBE,
and this term was picked up by various other groups interested in
these phenomena in various forms. It was soon realized that OOBE
was a mis-formed acronym for English: one normally leaves out
prepositions (and articles) when forming acronyms. Therefore, OOBE
was dropped and OBE is now almost universally used by
parapsychologists.
Anyway...
First we have to distinguish two types of OBEs. In one, the experient
perceives themself as out-of-the-body but still within the "normal"
universe. In the other, the experient perceives themself as in
another "reality". Frequently an experience starts with the first
and transitions to the second. My personal preference is to reserve
the term OBE for the first and use the term astral projection for
the second -- but this is not standard usage and has the problem
that it leaves no overall term covering both clearly related phenomena.
Your test is applicable only to the first type of experience. Charles
Tart has discussed possible tests for the other type of experience
(essentially -- leaving out details -- in noting correlations not
attributable to psychological factors in independent journies to
the "same place"), but, as far as I know, these have never been
done. I suspect that he had Monroe's journies to various "heavens
hells, and elsewheres" in mind, though he didn't mention this
specifically.
Many people have attempted the experiment you propose (myself included)
with a rather low rate of success (i.e., no convincing evidence
that any information is brought back). However, there have been
a few individual spectacular successes, and one successful systematic
set of experiments. Keith Harary was both subject and co-experimenter
in this latter set of experiments (I believe Stanley Kripner was at
least one of the other experimenters, but I wouldn't swear to it).
Keith demonstrated an ability to return from his journies with some
accurate information about where he had been. In absolute terms
his results were only occasionally impressive but were pretty
consistently well above what could be explained by chance.
It seems to me that the "projection" hypothosis predicts that one
would do very well indeed (perhaps not a good as if one were there
"in body" but very much better than chance) virtually all the time.
On the other hand the purely conventional hyphothosis would predict
that one would not be able to return with any information not otherwise
knowable.
I think that the only hypothosis which really fits the facts are
as follows:
1) An OBE occurs when an Altered State of Consciousness (ASC)
causes the experient to relate to their perception in a
different way. This shift in perception is quite real --
it is a different way of relating to the universe. This
shift in perception (literally, viewpoint) is *interpreted*
quite naturally as a shift in the (seemingly physical) place
from which one observes. This is, I think illusional. If
you remember events which you have experienced, I think that
you will find that in many of them your mental "picture"
of what took place has *you* in your field of sight. This
is a useful way of remembering things, but it does not mean
that you were experiencing an OBE at the time. An OBE
represents this same externalization happening for perceived
events rather than remembered ones.
2) Very different ASCs can produce OBEs. An analogy is that
a sore throat may be caused by a variety of different diseases
(*NOT* in any way to imply that an ASC is a disease or that
an OBE is a symptom of disease).
3) Some OBE producing ASCs are also psi-conducive (i.e., make
whatever psi abilities the experient has more effective).
Information collected by ESP, in these cases, are then
integrated with other souces of information in forming the
views perceived in the OBE.
There is quite a bit of evidence that OBEs are psychological in
origin. Much of it is pretty technical. One example which isn't,
however, is pretty easy to understand (though, of course, not
conclusive by itself -- nothing ever is). Things which the experient
knows, or can guess, or expects at the target location are generally
seen pretty clearly (generally *very* clearly, as described), even
when they are wrong. Things which the experient knows that they
don't know are fuzzy or shaddowed or hard to focus on or otherwise
indescribable.
Even the successful psi perceived targets in Harary's tests came
through with the usual symbolic encoding and distortion that is
typical of subconscious processes and specifically of free-response
ESP without any OBE involved.
In other words -- OBEs are ways of journying to places inside your
own head, where you can find many marvelous things -- including
things which conventional science says "can't" be there. They are
marvelous experiences and opportunities for growth if they are taken
for what they are.
Topher
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| Thanks for your reply,I am glad to hear that tests have and are being
done on OBE'S ;^).
I am always nervous to give personal experiences but I am going to relate
a couple of the OBE'S experiences I had and some guesses on my part.Such
things I feel have to be discussed to gain an understanding of them.
I was not in my field of sight when I had my OBE experiences.
The first one occurred while I was dreaming, I was going up stairs and
suddenly I saw two people in front of me with laundry baskets blocking
my path, at about the same time as my encounter with these people in my
dream, I realized I was dreaming.I now felt I was out side of myself even
though I felt awake and was still floating in the stair way.The people were
still not letting me go by.I was now starting to panic and the two
then let me go by, it seemed to me at the time that they intentionally
delayed me so that I would realize I had been off some where.I dove back
into myself with a little difficulty and finally got up.
Skipping now to the one I found most interesting. I realized I was dreaming
and was in a very strange shop an art shop I guessed, there were wood carvings
of people made of small pieces of wood put together like a puzzle really
nice.I couldn't remember ever seeing anything like it.I thought about
waking up and did after a bit.About a month latter I went into a art shop
I had wanted to go to for a long time but had never gotten around to,
when I walked inside I immediately recognized the place and the wood sculptures.
I have come to believe that when I have this experience I am waking up
before my body does.Because I don't have any sensations from my body
I feel out side of it.I also lean toward the OBE being a psychological
event.I think my mind is giving me an interpretation.But the retrieval of
information raises questions.
I almost didn't post this but I got a little nudge.
George D.
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