The Scole Experiments

REVELATIONS FROM THE OTHER SIDE

Underground LSD Palace

THE AFTERLIFE INVESTIGATIONS: The Scole Experiments

the dream of life

the quantum self

Altered states

Notes from Cuzco, Peru ~ April 1977

On the slopes of the Andes, in a yurt overlooking a sage-green valley, I’m participating in a peyote ceremony that has taken place here for over 1,000 years. I’m collecting data for my senior thesis: ‘The neurological basis of hallucinations’. However, none of my faculty advisers know I’m here, and if they did ..they would probably deny any involvement. I’m here because I want to experience, first hand, the psychological effects of a guided peyote session the way it’s practiced by South American Indians ..and not for purposes of recreation the way I used to. I have a theory that human nature follows a cycle; it fluctuates between the need for ‘order and stability’ ..followed by the need for ‘exploration and rebellion’ against order and stability. I arrived at this theory from reading books by Aldous Huxley, as well as personal experience. I’m hardly able to sustain a committed relationship for more than a few months. Anyway, I believe that early Indian cultures had less destructive ways to deal with this cycle that didn’t involve excessive alcohol, domestic violence or broken homes. The peyote ceremony is, in a sense, a ‘guided’ exploration into altered states of consciousness ..followed by a gentle period of ‘re-entry’ that allows participants to integrate their extra-ordinary experiences with the ordinary reality of everyday life. It satisfies the need for exploration in a way that is far less disruptive, and way more conducive, to the well being of the individual and the tribe.

Exploration: The session begins ..our Guide is waving a rope of burning incense ...intended to awaken our senses. A drum beat softly repeats ..intended to strengthen our bond to the present. Tea is poured and cups ceremoniously passed between participants sitting cross-legged around a low bronze table. The simple act of sharing also helps bring us back to the present. I feel grounded and eagerly await whatever forms my altered perception may take. After experiencing several waves of nausea ..followed by tea .. images of early childhood begin to appear ..rising and falling .. over and over .. leaving me clutching at something for security (later I find my shirt lying bunched-up and wet on the floor beside me). Our Guide gently reminds us to watch these images flow until they vanish. Next, the blows of adolescence appear ..rising and falling ..leaving me feeling bruised and vulnerable until I’m barely able to hold back my tears. Our Guide gently reminds us to watch these images flow until they vanish. Now I hear someone playing a flute. Sounds soothing. Now I feel alternating sensations of tea and mango splash down my throat. Sweet and refreshing. I pass the plate from one grinning face to another. Now I’m grinning. Now it looks like I’m sitting between two huge grinning masks ..suspended in space. One of them starts laughing ..then another ..and another ..until everyone is rocking with waves of laughter. I feel a grip loosening, and worries, stretching back as far as I can remember ..lift like fog. I feel euphoric. But it isn’t long before the feeling of euphoria turns into panic. I’m looking down and there’s nothing there ..it's like I’m hanging over an abyss. Without the customary sense of worry, my psyche collapses like a house of cards. I scream and lose consciousness. When I awake, I recall lying with my head in the lap of one of the female assistants ..while she wipes my face with cool water. I’m shaking.

Re-entry: I’m listening to our Guide give instructions for re-entry (we were also given a copy of these to take with us). It went something like this: “..as you return, remember ..a river comes out of the mountains ..flowing and cohesive. Its power comes from yielding .. overcoming what’s hardest with what’s softest. As you return, remember ..follow the watercourse way ..choose harmony over quarreling. As you return, remember ..follow the watercourse way .. throw the portals of your tent open and pay homage to what’s light in the world. As you return, remember ..follow the watercourse way .. the soft quality of your mind will overcome the hardness of the obstacles you face. Remember, follow the watercourse way …the watercourse way …the watercourse way ..” and I could hardly forget. I could still hear these words echoing in my head for weeks afterward while I finished writing my thesis and submitted it for a round of grueling final arguments. I think it helped. Either that or they just caved.

A Brief, er, Short History Of Time

Oh, damn! That title is already taken. OK, I cannot compete with Dr. Hawking, nor do I wish to. My approach is less knowledgeable, less scientific than his. Mine is primarily experiential.

First, if I'm to talk about time, a definition might be helpful.
From an online dictionary:

TIME:
1. A nonspatial continuum in which events occur in apparently irreversible succession from the past through the present to the future.

2. An interval separating two points on this continuum; a duration: a long time since the last war; passed the time reading.

3. A number, as of years, days, or minutes, representing such an interval: ran the course in a time just under four minutes.

4. A similar number representing a specific point on this continuum, reckoned in hours and minutes: checked her watch and recorded the time, 6:17 a.m.

5. A system by which such intervals are measured or such numbers are reckoned: solar time.

Is that helpful?

I thought not.

When I was a kid, I used to lie awake at night speculating on what time was. Dad said that would drive me bonkers, no one understands time. He might have been right. I read H. G. Wells science fiction classic, The Time Machine. (As an aside, that opened a lifetime love of the science fiction genre) He called time a dimension


OK, definition time again.

DIMENSION:

1. A measure of spatial extent, especially width, height, or length.

2. Mathematics The least number of independent coordinates required to specify uniquely the points in a space.

3. The range of such a coordinate.

4. Physics A physical property, such as mass, length, time, or a combination thereof, regarded as a fundamental measure or as one of a set of fundamental measures of a physical quantity: Velocity has the dimensions of length divided by time.

I think the one from physics is most operative here. Now I am in deep waters. You probably know much more about physics than I do, so please just humour me, dear friend.

After reading The Time Machine, I started picturing time as a line, a number line. Could it possibly gain another dimension and curve on itself, with the intersecting points making present and future, or present and past into a single point? Does it maker any sense at all to reference time in terms of spatial dimension. Or is this a gross misuse of the venerable number line?

Somewhere along the line, I came to think of time as having three dimensions, past, present and future. This set the stage for what I experienced in an altered state of consciousness, which I will refer to as a Spiritual Experience (SE) for lack of a better term

Now, back to the mundane. Look at some object that has three spatial dimensions, say your dominant hand. It occurs to me that I don't know if you are right-handed or left-handed, so I'll picture both below. When you look at, you see those dimension, length, width and depth, but you do not - cannot! - see them as three separate properties, you see them as one organic whole, the length, width and depth each distinct and yet inseparable. Are you following me so far? Of course you are, we haven't gotten to the difficult part.

Now we get to the difficult part.

You most likely see your hand in only one dimension of time, the present. Now you need to use your imagination. Imagine looking at your hand and seeing it as it was when you were a foetus, a baby, a child, a teenager. Now, return to the present and, in your imagination, travel in the opposite direction, see your hand in ten years, then as an old person. If you have the nerve, see it as dead and decaying.

If you are following me now, we can move on to the really hard part.

Imagine seeing those three dimensions of time as an organic whole, each distinct and yet inseparable, past, present and future all existing together, so when you look at your hand, you are not seeing our usual three dimensional hand, but rather you are seeing a six dimensional hand.

Now imagine seeing the entire spacetime continuum in that way. That is my view of maya - when I am aware of maya at all - during a SE.

I am aware that this must sound science fiction, and I suppose it is. It is also something I have experienced and continue to experience occasionally.

And that is my explanation of the three dimensions of time, as best I can give it right now.

My Amazon parrot is screeching now, telling me it's time to feed her, preferably pizza, the 'Zons' favourite food.

Before I go, as I don't want to disappoint, here are parts of my three favourite time
songs, with links to the complete songs.

A Hazy Shade of Winter: (edited)
Simon and Garfunkel


Time, time, time, see whats become of me
While I looked around
For my possibilities
I was so hard to please
But look around, leaves are brown
And the sky is a hazy shade of winter

Hang on to your hopes, my friend
That's an easy thing to say, but if your hopes should pass away
Simply pretend
That you can build them again
Look around, the grass is high
The fields are ripe, its the springtime of my life

But look around, leaves are brown now
And the sky is a hazy shade of winter
Look around, leaves are brown
There's a patch of snow on the ground...

TIME IS ON MY SIDE: (edited)

The Rolling Stones (OMG! I remember buying this single - on vinyl, in the 1960s)
(Meade)

Time is on my side, yes it is
Time is on my side, yes it is

You're searching for good times
But just wait and see
You'll come running back (I won't have to worry no more)
You'll come running back (spend the rest of my life with you, baby)
You'll come running back to me

Yes time, time, time is on my side, yes it is
Time, time, time is on my side, yes it is
Oh, time, time, time is on my side, yes it is
I said, time, time, time is on my side, yes it is
Oh, time, time, time is on my side
Yeah, time, time, time is on my side

Time In A Bottle: (edited)
Jim Croce


If I could save time in a bottle
The first thing that Id like to do
Is to save every day
Till eternity passes away
Just to spend them with you

If I could make days last forever
If words could make wishes come true
Id save every day like a treasure and then,
Again, I would spend them with you

But there never seems to be enough time
To do the things you want to do
Once you find them
Ive looked around enough to know
That you're the one I want to go
Through time with