Part One: Bill Meacham on Consciousness and Human Excellence

The study of consciousness can be approached from a first-person point of view that is analagous to objective scientific study in its rigor and methodology. Phenomenology is the attempt to examine one’s own experience exactly as it is experienced, without bias or presupposition, and to report one’s findings to a community of practitioners. Phenomenological investigation reveals structures of experience that are corroborated by neuroscience and that have a certain unassailable impact on the investigator him- or herself. Having originary evidence of the workings of one’s own mind gives one great assurance — we might almost say certain knowledge — of the deep anatomy of one’s very being. Each of us is constituted as Being-in-the-World. We are ineluctably co-present with the objects of our experience and cannot help but participate in their formation as experienced. In doing so we constitute our own self as well. Knowledge of the nature of that self is the ultimate goal of the philosophical quest. Both the method and the findings of phenomenology yield important insights into the nature of human beings and how we can live a fulfilling life.

Background information.

You may download the article that accompanied that talk through these links:

• Article- INACS-PUB-Consciousness and Hypnagogia (.doc)
• Article_INACS_PUB_Consciousness (.pdf)

Thanks to Anne Beversdorf for recording and hosting the audio files for this podcast at her website, www.Stariel.com

May 2010, Dr. Sirley Marquez Bonham on Hypnogogic states.

Experiences of Consciousness Beyond Hypnagogia:

Using introspective experiences to develop skills like Remote-Viewing, Lucid-Dreaming, Out-of-body Experiences, or for the development of Spiritual Experiences

Hypnagogia is a generic label given to sensorial perceptions that happens “automatically” – without conscious control – while falling asleep, or while awakening from sleep. Hypnagogia may also happen while a person is meditating – or while in trance-like situations.

In this talk we will explore what can be learned from the perceptions we encounter during the sleep/awake thresholds, and from trance-like situations usually encountered in introspection practices like, for example, meditation and hypnosis. The most common and accessible skills that can be developed through situations of hypnagogia are lucid-dreaming and out-of-body experiences. However, remote-viewing frequently makes use of perceptions “on the threshold of consciousness,” which is obviously within the realm of hypnagogic perceptions. Remote-viewing may also make use of a conscious interaction with the subconscious mind, done while fully awake. Therefore, while working on developing these skills, we willingly or unwillingly tend to encounter experiences that are considered spiritual, and may be used for personal and spiritual development. We will discuss various examples of situations where the explorer discovered him or herself in contact with something that could be interpreted as our higher-self, or by a surprising meeting with a spiritual teacher or guide to help along the way. 

This talk expands on the former talk presented through INACS in May 2007, titled:

Consciousness and Hypnagogia:

Dream imageries, reveries, and the development of a relationship with the “unconscious” mind

By Sirley Marques Bonham, Ph.D.

You may download the article that accompanied that talk through these links:

• Article- INACS-PUB-Consciousness and Hypnagogia (.doc)
• Article_INACS_PUB_Consciousness (.pdf)

About the Author:

Sirley Marques Bonham is a Ph.D. physicist by education, but due to her long time involvement with the subject of consciousness, she also considers herself somewhat of a neuroscientist. She was born in Brazil and first came to the US in 1986 to follow post-doctoral research with the Astrophysics Group at the University of Chicago and the NASA-financed Theoretical Astrophysics Group at Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory (Fermilab), located in Batavia (IL), near Chicago. Her main scientific work was done in an extension of Einstein’s unified field theory, but she has also worked in neuroscience research at the University of Texas at Austin, and in biophysics for the US Air Force in San Antonio, Texas. She has also taught at universities in Brazil, South Africa, and the US.

Dr. Bonham’s involvement with the phenomenon of Consciousness, as viewed by neuroscience, started in 1992 through a group of scientists at the University of Texas Health Science Center in San Antonio, followed by a brief work with a group for research in neuroscience, specifically in the processes of memory and learning, at the University of Texas at Austin. Though she has learned about the paranormal through her father’s interest in this area, it has been her practice to approach this science strongly rooted in a scientific perspective, which has influenced her personal self-experimentation with the phenomenon of awareness during sleep, represented by the modern approach to the so-called out-of-body experiences, and the recently developed techniques of lucid-dreaming.

Dr. Bonham came to live in Austin, Texas, in 1993. She presently is a visiting scholar at the Center for Relativity at the University of Texas at Austin, and is a member and scientist of the Institute for Neurosciences and Consciousness Studies (INACS). Her writings can be accessed at her website: www.TheConsciousDreamer.org

WHEN: Tuesday, May 11th at 7pm

WHERE: Austin Center for Spiritual Living
4804 Grover Ave
Austin, TX 78756

Consciousness Connections Meeting

Tuesday, March 9, 2010

6:30p Social, 7:00-9:00p Program

Austin Center for Spiritual Living

4804 Grover

Note – New Location

Visitors are welcome, the meeting is free.

Book donations are welcome.

Documentary and Panel Discussion

“God on the Brain”

From BBC Horizon (2003)

Rudi Affolter and Gwen Tighe have both experienced strong religious visions. He is an atheist; she a Christian. He thought he had died; she thought she had given birth to Jesus. Both have temporal lobe epilepsy.

Like other forms of epilepsy, the condition causes fitting but it is also associated with religious hallucinations. Research into why people like Rudi and Gwen saw what they did has opened up a whole field of brain science: neurotheology.

The connection between the temporal lobes of the brain and religious feeling has led one Canadian scientist to try stimulating them.  80% of Dr Michael Persinger’s experimental subjects report that an artificial magnetic field focused on those brain areas gives them a feeling of ‘not being alone’. Some of them describe it as a religious sensation.

“…a high probability [Ellen White] had temporal lobe epilepsy” says Prof Gregory Holmes, Dartmouth Medical School. His work raises the prospect that we are programmed to believe in god, that faith is a mental ability humans have developed or been given. And temporal lobe epilepsy (TLE) could help unlock the mystery.

What side are you on, science or spiritualism? Be prepared to defend your position.

The documentary will be shown followed by a discussion. Is Illumination, cosmic consciousness, Kundalini and various religious sensations a spiritual manifestation, or is it simply the neurological manifestation of the brain? If there are volunteers from the audience, a panel will be selected for a debate and Q & A. Please prepare for a lively debate.

Resources:

Great article:

www.dana.org/news/cerebrum/detail.aspx?id=24068

Good articles:

www.cognitiveliberty.org/neuro/neuronewswk.htm
findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1058/is_3_116/ai_53739125/?tag=content;col1

A few others:
blogs.usatoday.com/oped/2009/06/this-is-your-brain-on-religion-.html
www.livescience.com/culture/090309-brain-religion.html
www.religionlink.com/tip_050425.php

Recommended Reading…

Why God Won’t Go Away

Brain Science and the Biology of Belief

Authors

Andrew Newberg, Eugene A’Quili, Vince Rause

Over the centuries, theories have abounded as to why human beings have a seemingly irrational attraction to God and religious experiences. In Why God Won’t Go Away authors Andrew Newberg, M.D., Eugene D’Aquili, M.D., and Vince Rause offer a startlingly simple, yet scientifically plausible opinion: humans seek God because our brains are biologically programmed to do so.

Researchers Newberg and D’Aquili used high-tech imaging devices to peer into the brains of meditating Buddhists and Franciscan nuns. As the data and brain photographs flowed in, the researchers began to find solid evidence that the mystical experiences of the subjects “were not the result of some fabrication, or simple wishful thinking, but were associated instead with a series of observable neurological events,” explains Newberg. “In other words, mystical experience is biologically, observably, and scientifically real…. Gradually, we shaped a hypothesis that suggests that spiritual experience, at its very root, is intimately interwoven with human biology.” Lay readers should be warned that although the topic is fascinating, the writing is geared toward scientific documentation that defends the authors’ hypothesis. For a more palatable discussion, seek out Deepak Chopra’s How to Know God, in which he also explores this fascinating evidence of spiritual hard-wiring. –Gail Hudson –This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

The Brain in the Soul

The Cerebral Basis of Language, Art, and Belief

By

Michael R, Trimble, M.D.

“There have been a flurry of books recently on God and the brain, written either from the cold hard world of a neuroscientist or the more abstract but less brain-informed pulpit of a spiritual leader. Trimble tackles this most important topic with his unique knowledge and perspectives gained as a knowing and caring physician, a critical neuroscientist, a gifted historian, and a superb storyteller. He fuses these fields to address the simplest and most important questions: Why do we cry when we listen to music, or pay money to go and weep in the theater? This book is a remarkably new approach to understanding why we behave, think, and feel as we do.” — Mark S. George, Medical University of South Carolina

Inspired by the writings and reflections of his patients — many of whom have epilepsy, psychosis, or affective disorders — Trimble asks how the human species, so enamored of its own logic and critical facilities, has held from the dawn of civilization strong religious beliefs and a reverence for the arts. He explores topics such as the phenomena of hypergraphia and hyper-religiosity, how religious experiences and poetic expression are neurologically linked with our capacity to respond to music, and how neuropsychiatric disorders influence behaviors related to artistic expression and religiosity by disturbing brain function.

NeuroNews – A Toyota Unbash

Toyota technology has brain waves move wheelchair
The Associated Press

TOKYO – Toyota Motor Corp. says it has developed a way of steering a wheelchair by just detecting brain waves, without the person having to move a muscle or shout a command. Toyota’s system, developed in a collaboration with researchers in Japan, is among the fastest in the world in analyzing brain waves, it said in a release Monday.

Past systems required several seconds to read brain waves, but the new technology requires only 125 milliseconds , or 125 thousandths of a second. The person in the wheelchair wears a cap that can read brain signals, which are relayed to a brain scan electroencephalograph, or EEG, on the electrically powered wheelchair, and then analyzed in a computer program.

Research into mobility is part of Toyota’s larger strategy to go beyond automobiles in helping people get around in new ways. The new system allows the person on the wheelchair to turn left or right and go forward, almost instantly, according to researchers. Coming to a stop still requires more than a thought. The person in the wheelchair must puff up a cheek, which is picked up in a detector worn on the face.

Japanese rival Honda Motor Co. is also working on a system to connect the monitoring of brain waves with mechanical moves. Earlier this year, Honda showed a video that had a person wearing a helmet sitting still but thinking about moving his right hand. The thought was picked up by cords attached to his head inside the helmet. After several seconds, Honda’s boy-shaped robot Asimo, programmed to respond to brain signals, lifted its right arm.

Neither Honda nor Toyota said it had any plans to turn the technology into a product for commercial sale as each said they are still developing the research.

www.philly.com/philly/wires/ap/features/high_tech/49426247.html

INACS News…

Benefits of an INACS membership include but are not limited to Quickstart grants, the NeuroNews newsletter, monthly meetings related to consciousness (Consciousness Connections), and attendance at quarterly research and educations meetings. Membership is $25 a year and can be paid through Paypal on the INACS website  www.INACS.org

For those of you that have a project that is consistent with the INACS mission, and need financial assistance, a Quickstart Grant might be available.

The INACS NerveCenter space is available for classes and lectures. Call 704-8167 for information.

INACS The Organization…

The Institute for Neuroscience and Consciousness Studies, Inc.

Or INACS, is an Austin-based, 501 (c) 3,

nonprofit, scientific, Research, and educational institute,

incorporated in the State of Texas.

Vision

Our vision is to contribute to the positive development of our local, national, and international communities, as well as the other-than-human communities with whom we share the earth, by supporting scientific inquiry and hosting educational opportunities for the study of consciousness in all its forms.

Mission

INACS’ mission is to expand, deepen, and enrich our understanding of brain functioning and the phenomenon of “consciousness,” and to develop innovative, practical applications of this understanding for public benefit. INACS will pursue its mission by:

• Conducting scientific research on the human mind/brain system.
• Promoting closer cooperation among consciousness researchers through publications, conferences, and similar activities.
• Offering educational opportunities to mental health professionals and the public.
• Investigating PSI and related phenomena

Current Research Projects

EEG correlates of Human Subtle Energy Vibrational States

Robert F. Price PhD

Psycho-Grapho Correlation Study

Raymond Hawkins PhD, Marcus Barnes

QEEG Correlates to Motor Tasks – Baseline Studies

James King, Jan Six, PhD

Finding the Golden Key to Every Kid (Quick Start Grant)

Roberta Shoemaker-Beal, ATR-BC

12593 Research Blvd., Suite 302, Austin, Texas 78759   www.INACS.org

The Consciousness Groups…

ACA (Austin Creativity Association)

A forum for professionals seeking to explore and develop creative ideas and technologies.

www.amcreativityassoc.org

Austin IONS (Institute of Noetic Sciences Community Group)

Consciousness research & education group founded by astronaut Edgar Mitchell

www.ionsaustin.org 258-9878

Anomaly Archives

Library of scientific anomalies located in the INACS Nerve Center

www.anomalyarchives.org

INACS (Institute for Neuroscience and Consciousness Studies)

Consciousness research and education group located in NW Austin on Research Blvd.

www.INACS.org 425-0822

Jung Society Austin

Promoting the study of Carl Jung’s psychological works

www.jungsociety.com 366-2357

MUFON – Mutual Unidentified Flying Objects

www.austinmufon.org 250-1167

What if it Really Works

Internet radio featuring the spiritual and metaphysical

www.whatifitreallyworks.com 673-7051

Austin IONS January 26th. Movie Premier: Beyond Belief by Austin filmakers, Becky Hays and James Holtzknecht. Embark on a journey of expanded awareness with interviews of leaders in the conscousness movement.

Austin Center for Spiritual Living, 4804 Grover Ave, just south of 49th street and just east of Burnet Road.

7 PM Free and open to the public.
Go to …. www.IONSAustin.org for more information.
www.beyondbeliefthemovie.com/bbproject.html

Save the date Jan 26th, Tuesday next week, for the Austin IONS~INACS combined meeting will be a movie premier, of Beyond Belief: the movie. Check out the trailer. See the press release below.

DVD’s of the film will be available for sale.

The producers of Beyond Belief are committed to empowering individuals and organizations to achieve their maximum potential.

IONS~INACS will be in our NEW event location:

Austin Center for Spiritual Living
www.AustinCSL.org

PRESS RELEASE: BEYOND BELIEF

Present Course Media L.L.C. Releases an Inspiring
Self-Empowerment Documentary

Present Course Media LLC is proud to announce the release of Beyond Belief, a compelling documentary film that will change your life. The DVD will be available in time for the holidays! The release is scheduled for December 15, 2009.
———————–
Embark on a journey of expanded awareness Beyond Belief. This innovative film reveals the role beliefs and the subconscious mind play in creating your experience. Uncover the source of limiting beliefs that stop you from having what you want.

Beyond Belief provides tools to release limiting beliefs and remove obstacles that are blocking you. Discover the powerful resources you have buried deep inside. Unleash the potential of your creative mind.

Wake up…to your dream life.
————————–
Beyond Belief features some of the top authors, researchers, scientists, teachers, psychologists, personal transformation experts, healers, and spiritual leaders in the world. Experts from the films The Secret and What the Bleep Do We Know join inspiring leaders in delivering a powerful message that will transform your life.

Featured Experts:

Jack Canfield, Julia Cameron, Robert Dilts, Bob Doyle, Jonathan Ellerby, Stewart Emery, Timothy Freke, Amit Goswami, Christina Hall, David R. Hamilton, Maisha Hazzard, Elaine Hendrix, Tad James, Adriana James, Bruce Lipton, Brad Morris, Judith Orloff, Greta Sesheta, Marci Shimoff, Sandra Anne Taylor, James Twyman, Joe Vitale, Cheryl J. Ward, Dr. Darren Weissman

Produced and directed by Becky Hays and Jim Holzknecht, Beyond Belief is an invaluable resource for anyone who truly wants to create the life of their dreams.

For More Information:
www.beyondbeliefthemovie.com

Click here to view the embedded video.

THE SHIFT – A Movie Being Made by a Movement

This coming Tuesday, December 9th, a joint INACS & Austin IONS community event is happening at the First Unitarian Universalist Church of Austin at 4700 Grover at 6:30pm CST.

12/08/09: The Shift Movie – www.IonsAustin.org

Part One: R. Craig Hogan on “Your Eternal Self”

Contact: R. Craig Hogan, Ph.D.
The Business Writing Center
2 Payne Place, Normal, IL 61761

800 827-3770  r.craig.hogan@businesswriting.com

Thanks to Anne Beversdorf for recording and hosting the audio files for this podcast at her website, www.Stariel.com

July 09 INACS Lecture:  R. Craig Hogan on “Your Eternal Self”

Part Two: R. Craig Hogan on “Your Eternal Self”

This presentation will show why we know for a fact that the mind is not in the brain. The evidence has existed for decades, but people just don’t know about it.  Thousands of normal, everyday people can see objects thousands of miles away just by closing their eyes and focusing on them.  A mind confined to a brain couldn’t do that.  Studies show people’s bodies respond to disturbing images before the images are even selected by a computer to be shown, proving the mind sees before the brain can even have access to images. Thousands of studies show that someone sitting in one room can see what another person is looking at in a distant room with no contact between them.  Brains confined in skulls can’t do that.  These are commonly known facts among researchers today. And there’s much, much more.  We know our minds are not in our brains.

And since the mind isn’t in the brain, when the brain dies, the mind goes on blissfully, reunited with all the loved ones who have sloughed off the body, living in another realm we call the afterlife. Carefully constructed and executed research studies by physicians, psychologists, physicists, neuroscientists, and others whose credentials and methods are impeccable have demonstrated that consciousness survives the transition called death, and people now living in the afterlife communicate regularly and clearly to those remaining on Earth. This presentation will explain some of the vast amount of scientific evidence proving without a doubt that we are eternal beings having a brief physical experience.

Bio:

R. Craig Hogan, Ph.D., co-authored Induced After-Death Communication: A New Therapy for Healing Grief and Trauma with Allan Botkin, Psy.D. (Hampton Roads 2005), describing the use of eye-movement desensitization and reprocessing (EMDR) in inducing after-death communication with patients in psychotherapists’ offices.  Over three dozen psychotherapists have now induced thousands of after-death communications during sessions with patients.

Dr. Hogan is the author of Your Eternal Self (Greater Reality Publications, 2008) presenting the scientific evidence that the mind is not confined to the brain, the afterlife is a reality, people’s minds are linked, and the mind affects the physical world.  The book is hailed as “number one from the standpoint of offering the reader the full gamut of phenomena supporting the survival hypothesis in clear and concise language” (Michael Tymn, managing editor, The Searchlight) and “an eye-opening look at the pseudo natural and everything related to the human mind—highly recommended for anyone into the science beyond the mundane world” (“Reviewer’s Choice,” Midwest Book Review, June 2008).

He is author of “Applying the Science of the Afterlife” (Journal of Spirituality and Paranormal Studies, January 2009), and is a board member of the Academy of Spirituality and Paranormal Studies. He co-authored the Personal Styles Inventory (HRDQ, 2001) based on Carl Jung’s work, wrote two books on business writing, co-authored a book training supervisors in schools to more effectively work with teachers, and developed several Web sites devoted to business writing and spiritual understanding. R. Craig Hogan has also written: The Little Book of the Big Bang: A Cosmic Primer

He has been a professor of business communications at three universities, curriculum and training administrator at two universities and a medical school, and director of his own online business writing school, The Business Writing Center. Check out the interview on line: Your Mind is not your Brain. www.skeptiko.com/blog/?p=28

Contact: R. Craig Hogan, Ph.D.
The Business Writing Center
2 Payne Place, Normal, IL 61761

800 827-3770  r.craig.hogan@businesswriting.com

Thanks to Anne Beversdorf for recording and hosting the audio files for this podcast at her website, www.Stariel.com

July 09 INACS Lecture:  R. Craig Hogan on “Your Eternal Self”

NeuroNews

Consciousness Connections Meeting

Tuesday April 14, 2009 7:00p-9:00p

Unitarian Church, Room 11

4700 Grover

Visitors are welcome, the meeting is free –

Book donations are welcome

Stalking the Wild Pendulum:  Remote Dowsing Baseline Studies

Description:

In the 1970s, physicist Harold (Hal) Puthoff, engineer Russell Targ, and psychic Ingo Swann were recruited by the Central Intelligence Agency to do research on psychic abilities with the general intention of verifying the phenomenon and adapting some methods of eliciting it to military purposes.  After several years of research at Stanford Research Institute (SRI), a process termed Remote Viewing was developed and eventually adopted by the United States Army Intelligence service.  Based in Fort Meade, Maryland, military remote viewers carried out a program of intelligence gathering which proved quite successful in obtaining information about activities and personnel in known, remote, often inaccessible, locations.  An active program was carried on by Army Intelligence for over 20 years.

One aspect of the program proved problematical, however:  while information was readily available from known locations, it proved exceedingly difficult to obtain the location of a person or persons known, but at an unknown location.  Likewise, it was almost impossible to remote view numbers.  A complementary method was eventually developed by the scientists at SRI which allowed the intelligence officers to obtain information revealing the required locations and/or numbers.  This method was termed by the military “Remote Dowsing”.

The object of INACS‘ Remote Dowsing study will be to develop methods of understanding the cognitive functions involved in the process, elicit event-related potentials accompanying successful practicing of the dowsing skills and to develop methods of automating the process so that real-time tracking of moving targets may be accomplished.  The current presentation will describe the initial  portion of that study – baseline analysis.   Jim will discuss the rationale behind performing such an analysis and the advantages of having such information available prior to performing the actual dowsing experiments.

NOTE:  Dr. Puthoff was one of the founding board members of INACS when it was originally chartered as the Center for the Study of Consciousness (CSC) in 1990, and he is on our Advisory Board.  He is currently an advisor on this research project.

Presenter: James King

Founder and Trustee of INACS - A former realtor and independent computer consultant, Jim has had a lifelong interest in the study of consciousness.  His personal research interests currently focus on mental imagery, cortical scanning, remote dowsing and viewing and brain-computer interfaces.  He has had a lifelong interest in anomalies associated with consciousness, as well as their implications for understanding physics and the natural world.

Jim received a B.S. in Psychology from the University of Houston in 1972, and has completed 15 graduate level hours in psychology and education.  He has 20+ years of experience in data processing, computer programming and technical writing, and has owned his own consulting business.  He has also been involved in community volunteer activities, including past and present service on the Boards of Directors of other non-profit organizations.

Jim originated the concept of INACS, recruited the Board of Directors and Research Director, and has enthusiastically championed the project from its inception.  He has devoted much time and energy into planning activities, funding, strategic planning, and budgetary matters. Jim considers the facilitation of consciousness research his life’s work and intends for INACS to make a major contribution to the scientific understanding of the human mind.

Project Principal Investigator: James King

Scientific Consultant: Jan Six

References: See the attached – reviewing the references will prepare for a more interesting discussion.

The meeting will consist of a 30 to 45 minutes synopsis of the subject matter, with the remainder discussion and Q & A. This will be a great opportunity to learn about Dowsing and its applications in addition to finding water.

Recommended Reading_______________________________________

The Art of Dowsing

The Complete How-TO Book on Dowsing

by

Richard Webster

With plenty of expert guidance and inspiration you’ll better your life in dozens of practical ways by dowsing. Locate valuable hidden items, detect harmful radiation in you environment, diagnose and treat ailments, develop your intuition – dowsing’s applications are nearly limitless. You’ll even learn to dowse anywhere for anything in the world without leaving your living room by using the most versatile dowsing technique around – map dowsing. Healing, hidden treasure, answers to difficult questions, discover the many ways dowsing can help you, then put it to work for you instantly. From the book jacket.

My favorite concept in this book is –It is not like the sticks move by themselves. The implication of this is that anyone using dowsing as a diagnostic tool, to find water or to find a particular dysfunction in the body of someone who is ill, already knows where the water or problem is. They are just using the sticks, a pendulum or their hands to amplify what on some level they already know. For more information on using dowsing as a diagnostic health tool see. Kimberley Burnham (West Hartford, CT)

The INACS project will attempt to determine whether dowsing is a real phenomenon, and the effects of a subject dowsing as determined by EEG changes on the brain.

INACS News_______________________________________________

Nerve Center II

In January INACS moved into a new headquarters in Northwest Austin on Research Blvd (183) between Oak Knoll and McNeil. The new NerveCenter II is more spacious and will better serve the needs of INACS. The libraries of the Scientific Anomaly Institute (SAI) and the Jung Society of Austin (JSA), have been moved to the Consciousness Center and will be ready for lending shortly. INACS members are excited about the change and look forward to expanded research and education.

The Center is available for activities to INACS members. The meeting room can accommodate 15 people, a maximum of 20. Use of the space is free for Non-profits – a nominal fee will be charged for use for income generating activity. For information call 258-9878.

International Conference on Science and Consciousness

INACS members Bob Price, President, Owen McAleer, past President, and myself have made several road trips to the International Conference on Science and Consciousness in Santa Fe, NM. In each case we have encountered certain anomalies or unexpected happenings. This would include but not be limited to subtle energies in the body evoked by a Yahweh chant played at one of the presentations, and the unfortunate stabbing at the Conference of renowned lecturer Rupert Sheldrake. The latest trip and conference experience is related by Bob Price.

Don Switlick

A Question Answered

As I abruptly awoke to the sound of my chattering teeth and peered out the car window at the still falling snow, I wondered aloud whether this trip would prove worth it.  I briefly recalled some of the great talks I had attended at last year’s International Conference on Science and Consciousness in Santa Fe.  Then I recalled last night’s journey from Austin—nightfall in Lubbock, the barrage of horizontally hurtling tumbleweeds in Clovis, the first of the snowfall as I turned north at Fort Sumner, and the rapidly deteriorating blizzard-like conditions on I-40 as the traffic slowed to a crawl and then a complete stop.  After an hour the traffic had started to once more creep along on the ice, and I had managed to get off the highway and into the truck stop at Cline’s Corner, but with no motels nearby, sleeping in the car rapidly became the only viable option.

Sunrise was slow to appear as I awoke every 20 minutes to start the car and blast the heater for a few minutes.  But it did finally appear, and after brushing several more inches of snow off the windshield, I hit the trail once more.  The rutted ice and snow were still treacherous, but once the sun came up, the gorgeous scenic mountains covered in new-fallen snow reflecting the sunlight lent a mystical quality to the remainder of the journey.  Within a couple more hours I arrived at the Buffalo Thunder Resort on the northern edge of Santa Fe, and quickly showered before heading downstairs to the volunteer orientation.

Over the coming five days, I would once again attend many excellent presentations by leaders in the field of consciousness—Peter Russell, Judith Orloff, Jean Houston, Russell Targ, Freddy Silva, Raymond Moody, and Richard Moss.  I would be inspired to translate their insights into practical research studies examining the nature of human consciousness.  I would be entertained by that merrily musing musical mystic himself, Greg Tamblyn.  I would dance like my tribal ancestors must have danced around the roaring fire to the ancient West African drum beats of Onye.  I would receive the healing quantum energies of Richard Bartlett, and would walk away amazed that the chronic pain in my right arm and shoulder had vanished.

On the last night of the conference, I would watch with tears in my eyes the moving video tribute to the founder of the Message Company, James Berry, who had developed the consciousness conferences and who had succumbed to a serious illness this past year.  His brother Ken and Ken’s wife Marcia have decided to carry on the conferences in James’ memory, but it will require much determination, drive, help from other like-minded souls, and a bit of luck to keep the conferences going.  (I encourage you all to help out by attending any of the three conferences whenever you can.)

As I made the long drive home to Austin the day after the conference ended, and recalled the question that had formed in my mind that stormy night a week ago, I realized—yes—it had certainly been worth it!

Bob Price

President, INACS

The Institute for Neuroscience and Consciousness Studies, Inc.,

Or INACS, is an Austin-based, 501 (c) 3,

nonprofit, scientific, Research, and educational institute,

incorporated in the State of Texas

TRUSTEES

Robert Price PhD

Miles Lewis

Don Switlick

Roberta Shoemaker-Beal

James King

James B. Beal

Marcus Barnes

Dillon McKinnsey

OFFICERS

President:  Robert Price PhD

Vice-President: Miles Lewis

Treasurer: Don Switlick

Secretary: Roberta Shoemaker-Beal

STAFF

Research Director:  Robert F. Price, PhD

Webmaster: Miles Lewis

Education & Executive Director:

Don Switlick, BS

Research Associate: James King

ADVISORS

Barry Beyerstein, PhD

Leonard Bough, PE

Ravi Brijbassi, PhD

Betty  Sue Flowers, PhD

Raymond Hawkins, PhD

Raymond Hyman, PhD

Stanley Krippner, PhD

Harold E. Puthoff, PhD

Jan Six, PhD

Jason Worchel, MD

Sirley Bonham, PhD

Current Research Projects

EEG correlates of Human Subtle Energy Vibrational States

Robert F. Price PhD

Psycho-Grapho Correlation Study

Raymond Hawkins PhD, Marcus Barnes

QEEG Correlates to Motor Tasks – Baseline Studies

James King, Jan Six, PhD

Finding the Golden Key to Every Kid (Quick Start Grant)

Roberta Shoemaker-Beal, ATR-BC

12593 Research Blvd., Suite 302, Austin, Texas 78759 www.INACS.org