QUESTING THE TRUTH

Those who do not remember their history are condemned to repeat it. (George Santayana)

This essay deals with the challenge that we all sometimes experience to some degree – that is of determining reality, or truth, in situations that are vitally important to us and to those that we care for.

The main problem in determining reality relates to the nature of memory. For some time it was thought that memories were “stored” in specific locations in the brain in the form of neuronal “engrams” [similar to memory storage on the magnetic ribbon of a recording cassette - the theory being 1 memory = 1 engram]. In the 1960s, Stanford neurophysiologist Karl Pribram was drawn to the holographic model by the puzzle of how and where memories are stored in the brain, since for decades numerous studies had shown that rather than being confined to specific locations, memories are fragmentarily dispersed throughout the brain. It was Pribram’s conclusion that memories are encoded not in neurons, or small groupings of neurons, but in patterns of nerve impulses that crisscross the entire brain in the same way that patterns of laser light interference crisscross the entire area of a piece of film containing a holographic image. In other words, Pribram saw that the brain is itself a hologram.

Pribram's theory also explained how the human brain can store so many memories in so little space. It has been estimated that the human brain has the capacity to memorize something on the order of 10 billion bits of information during the average human lifetime (or roughly the same amount of information contained in five sets of the Encyclopedia Britannica). Holograms also possess an astounding capacity for information storage. Simply by changing the angle at which the two lasers strike a piece of photographic film, it is possible to record many different images on the same surface. It has been demonstrated that one cubic centimeter of film can hold as many as 10 billion bits of information.

How is the brain able to translate the avalanche of frequencies it receives via the senses (light frequencies, sound frequencies, etc.) into the seemingly concrete world of our perceptions? Encoding and decoding frequencies is precisely what a hologram does best. It is thought that the brain comprises a lens and uses holographic principles to mathematically convert the frequencies it receives through the senses into the inner world of our perceptions by mathematically constructing a sense of “hard" reality via input from a frequency domain. There are some troubling ramifications, though: for instance - if the apparent concreteness of the world is but a secondary reality constructed by us from what is "out there" which itself is but a holographic blur of frequencies, and if the brain itself is also a hologram and only selects some of the frequencies out of this blur and mathematically transforms them into sensory perceptions, then what aspects of objective reality are we missing?

The East Indian consciousness researcher and teacher, Gopi Krishna, observed:

“the brain is only an apparatus, like a television set, to translate the incredible energy waves of Life coming from the broadcasting station of the Cosmic Mind into moving images and sounds. Without the waves, the instrument would show no animation, think no thoughts and emit no sounds. At the same time, without the instrument the waves – though active all around – would not be perceptible to any of our 5 senses, nor would they manifest themselves in any way cognizable by our mind. When a body is struck down by death, the animating spark of Life continues to live on in its pristine glory and form. Only the broken apparatus now no longer shows the signs of animation.”

In his book ‘A New Science of Life’, the Cambridge biochemist Dr Rupert Sheldrake observes:

“I reject the idea that the brain is a warehouse for memories - it is more like a radio receiver for tuning into the past. Memory is not a recording process in which a medium is altered to store records, but a journey that the mind makes into the past via the process of morphic resonance” [frequency fields]

And the neuroscientist Ernest Lawrence Rossi says:

“memory does not operate like a tape recorder in which we simply play back exactly what we learned. Memory is always a constructive process whereby we actually synthesize a new subjective experience every time we recall a past event.”

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The foregoing points to the miraculous complexity of reality and consciousness. Yet the plot deepens. Dr. Charles Tart, recently retired from UC Davis, California, after specializing for 35 years in psychology and parapsychology – in a paper entitled Emergent Interactionist Understanding of Human Consciousness, Tart presents a dualistic theory of Mind and Brain, wherein the mind “reads” the outputs from the brain’s sensory system as the body surveys its environment. Then from that read-out, the mind instructs the brain as to what action to take.

“The B system (brain, CNS and motor functions), for example. should automatically fill in a message from the [Mind/Life] M/L system that is a little incomplete and, in cases of doubt, fill it in along lines which are most relevant to biological survival. For example, if an ambiguous pattern seen in some bushes could be a tiger, it is highly adaptive for the simulation of the environment to make you perceive it as a tiger and take fast action, rather than ignore it because you aren't sure it's a tiger. The receptive function of the B system, then, for auto-PK [instructions to the brain from the mind], is likely to be elaborative as well as efficiently receptive, and, by being elaborative, it can be prone, like any similar communication system, to produce incorrect outputs……the elaborative aspects of the B system's receptivity to auto-PK [from the M/L system] means that there is a strong probability that the psi message will tend to be elaborated/distorted in ways which fit the ongoing, survival-oriented simulation of the immediate physical environment being continuously constructed by the B system.”

In real time it is therefore sometimes necessary to connect-the-dots so as to deal with one’s environment, by filling in or elaborating sensed reality. Perception itself is largely an internally constructed process. And when it comes to remembering things, consider again the above quote by Rossi “Memory is always a constructive process whereby we actually synthesize a new subjective experience every time we recall a past event.” To remember the past, it is necessary that each time we form the memory, our minds re-create the whole dynamic from frequency waves resonating within us, with incremental elaborations and distortions included each time, either because of frequency corruption or psychic aversion to painful findings. And not only are we susceptible to our own memory failings, in interpersonal dynamics it is often very difficult to sense what is – or is not – being communicated between individuals in the moment. [Sometimes the messages are intentionally ambiguous, if not deceptive]. It can therefore be appreciated that reality is a rather tenuous and fragile concept, and that memory – the ultimate time-space machine – is fallible.

In interpersonal transactions there has to be a base-line (consensual) reality implicitly shared by those in relationship, and it is necessary for all concerned to share their truths and agree on their consensual truth. People may survive being manipulated and victimized by another, but as indicated in the lead quote by Santayana above, it is best to realize the truth sooner rather than later and then to remember one’s lessons, and let others know that the relationship will be damaged if re-offence occurs. Otherwise transactional momentum is established, attitudes firm up and, to quote Emerson “things are in the saddle and ride mankind”. There is no depression like that of seeing too late that one had been held in such low esteem by another and duped for so long.

So how to deal with critically sensitive matters? Especially where there have been trust concerns with the person in the past, or one is aware of one’s own rose-tinted glasses? Data is data (whether truthful or not), and must be taken as given and stored as soon as possible in a veridical manner – committed to a journal/ time-line notational format. Whether the data fully makes sense in the moment or not, if it is stored it is then available for subsequent review and comparison with other noted incidents involving this person. In the business world, a therapist or banker interviews a subject carefully at the time, knowing that the key findings will be charted by himself at an early moment. Then prior to the next interview with the client the previous notes are reviewed and the new interview can be engaged with no confusion at one end, at least. A bonus is that over a few interviews, PATTERNS will be revealed through the recorder’s study of his notes. Firstly, those of the client’s attitudes and sincerity [or otherwise]; critical logical processes [or chaotic thinking]; ethical value base; and truth coherence – the client’s remembered sense of what had been confided previously. Secondly, PATTERNS of the recorder’s own biases and vulnerabilities may also be noted by him; how keen he was in forcing the truth to the front; and whether or not he is truly detached in guiding the session, testing all statements or choosing to hear only what he wants to hear. Tests are the life-blood of relationships, and to-day’s test is data for tomorrow. And thirdly one will be able to discern from one’s notes the actual PATTERNS imbedded in the relationship itself. Is there deep manipulation going on? This aspect is usually compensated for in a professional setting through the interviewer’s critical role, plus independent fact-checking. However, in a personal relationship this third pattern becomes all-crucial in that one doesn’t have the critical buffer of arms-length tools – and without a journal record, it may be most difficult to see that the other is demeaning one by withholding information essential not just to one’ self, but to others who will be affected by the presence (or absence) of goodwill and integrity between those present.

The importance of journaling critical situations cannot be over-stressed. As Socrates stated to the Athenians at his trial, “An unexamined life is not worth living”. The same can be said for relationships. If a relationship and issues are important enough, then it is necessary for all concerned that the Truth be established, and whether it is thought kosher or not by others, it is much better to tangibly care enough to take a few moments to “document the file” for future reference than try to wing it on the basis of months-later reconstructed memories corrupted by whatever wishful thinking, omissions and elaborations that one allows in, aside from those reality spins which others may helpfully contribute to the consensual reality.

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Aside from consensual reality, Charles Tart found that a lot of things we take for granted in our ordinary state don't have to be that way, that there are alternative ways of perceiving, thinking, and feeling. These alternative ways he defined as discrete altered states of consciousness (d-ASC), such as those involving the hypnagogic and hypnopompic states (the transitional states between sleeping and waking), normal dreaming, auto-hypnosis, meditation, lucid dreaming, self-remembering, reverie, biofeedback-induced states, and intoxication associated with marijuana, LSD or alcohol. Surprisingly, Tart also found that strong emotional effects, such as strong fear/ duress, strong anger, and deep depression, were also d-ASCs. It thus follows that another may not intentionally set out to deceive, but being in an emotionally loaded d-ASC he may distort or withhold through a sense of ego self-protection/ self-justification. Further, the insights conveyed when one is in these states may not be later accessible to one in his normal state of consciousness – neither the person himself (when later in his base-line state of consciousness), nor others may be able to understand nor even remember things said or done when in the a-ASC.

On the plus side, Tart observed that

“I have experienced emotionally induced ASCs, e.g., in which I felt more empathic and so better able to understand another person…. The perceptions and logics are only understandable to self and (perhaps) others when in that altered state. While there is memory from one episode of the altered state to the next, the memory of the altered state in the ordinary state is poor, so the knowledge of the ASC is state-specific.”

In other words, being in an altered state of consciousness (ASC) has its own reality – its own truth – and truths acquired in ASC’s – as in ordinary consciousness – are mixtures of pluses and minuses, insights and delusions, genuine creativity and misleading imagination, so the observations and insights from ASCs need to be subjected to empirical test, just as those of ordinary consciousness.

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So as to get to the truth solitarily, some people use various forms of meditation to get past their energy-charged emotional attachments; some use pendulum or tactile “dowsing” on the theory that one’s body is an antennae connecting with target, and the device itself is a psychomotor amplifier through which both attention and intention can be focused. Some people employ “reverie”, and some the hypnopompic state between sleep and awakening. Most of these techniques involve firstly physical relaxation as a prelude to stilling the mind, after which the issue of concern can be explored with detachment so as to determine the truth. There is thought to be a deep connection between mind and heart, and that with relaxation of the “body armour” and then bypass of normal physical and thinking demands on the heart, a portal may be opened to deeper intelligence and insights. Some, though, are concerned that the “truth” results derived through some of these techniques are only as good as the practitioner is experienced, but that emotional attachments and biases and wishful thinking can still - for many – distort their “signal lines”, and the truth revealed is but confirmation of what the individual wanted to believe. As Tart cautioned:

“the experience of feeling that one has grasped a great truth is data, it's one part of what happens. Whether that insight is indeed an actual better understanding of the way reality works is a separate question, to be tested empirically”.

On a more scientific level, the HeartMath “Freeze-Framer” computer software helps people see the mind-body graphically in real-time, and train them to be able to control heart-rate and emotions. This system employs a finger-worn photo-plethysmograph sensor that graphically tracks changes in the pulse rate, as distinct from the galvanic skin response (GSR) meter-tone signals of biofeedback systems. Knowing oneself and controlling one’s own states is the precursor to objectively “reading” those of another.

For the lay person, journaling has been the time honoured process, and has a direct advantage in that the mere fact of writing/typing up key interpersonal finds embodies (muscle memory) one’s truth in the moment, as a later memory stabilizer, pattern definer and test guide.

On a cautionary note: if a journal concerning discussions with a loved one has to be sealed and temporarily left in another’s safekeeping, it is of crucial importance to ensure that such recipient be trustworthy and of unquestioned integrity.

Posted 24-03-06

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