Where is Time?

"We have never encountered poor engineering in nature" --Albrecht-Buehler

It's 1978 and I'm sitting at a workbench, electronic test equipment arrayed all around me on shelves -- oscilloscopes and 'bit boxes', the tools of my trade.   It's the night shift and the factory is 'cooling fan' quiet, almost like sitting in my living room -- at least in comparison to the buzzing of the day shift when the isles are full of managers and engineers...  office types, disturbing my otherwise silent technical devotions.   And just like in my living room, I light up a 'righteous' cigarette and lean back on my swiveling chair, contemplating a problem with a printed circuit board I'm troubleshooting -- trying to put some 'soul in the machine' -- but it won't initialize -- stuck in a loop. I take a puff (menthols!) and exhale up toward the high industrial ceiling. When my eyes come back to the problem I glance at the scope and notice a straight line on the screen but one that is fuzzy somehow -- they are never really straight. Only moments before it had been an incomprehensible blur, racing at megahertz speed and I had barely been able to sync it up so as to bring the blur into focus. Now, as I rest the probe at my side the screen is quiet -- in keeping with my surroundings -- relaxed at 'zero' volts.

It is my habit when I am stuck -- when I have no place left to look -- to absently rub my thumb back and forth across the tip of the scopes probe as if rubbing a genie bottle -- unconsciously 'wishing' perhaps that an answer will pop into my head. Whenever I practice this ritual the line will jump and its tiny, unseen curves are amplified somehow -- you can see it. The 'fuzz' gets louder. The dance of this noise distracts me somehow -- mesmerizes me into neutral like a brief 'reset', for a moment, till I'm ready to take up the loop again. Loops are the worst... no hooks to get a handle on. The rack of unfixed boards on the shelf behind me is predictably full of the ones with loops -- cut to ribbons with exacto knives in futile attempts to isolate the problem. No one likes them. They are always saved for last, undesirable scraps set aside for nights like this when the work flow slows to a trickle and we have nothing else to do.

When I'm done with my smoke I lean forward and place the tip of the probe on the lower right pin of a 16 pin chip... the ground pin (Earth!) and it jumps again. Noise. Same noise. It's everywhere.

Fast forward about 25 years and I'm sitting in my cube -- I am an 'office type' now (tobacco free!... and no degree!) and an email has arrived on my UNIX workstation from an author whom I have been in intermittent contact with about esoteric topics that occasionally pop into my mind  -- when I'm stuck. It's a sort of 'smoke break' to distract me from my otherwise absorbing design gig.  He's sent a link -- a link to a scientific paper -- a paper about noise. Noise... and the brain!

Timeout.

It's written by a researcher from a prestigious university and it's the usual incoherent 'code talking‘ (to the unwashed like myself) but one phrase jumps out at me like a left hook and I flinch -- it's the essential point of the whole paper, boiled down to one very uncharacteristically brief little sound byte -- a sort of Sesame Street moment in an otherwise convoluted read.  The brain, according to this distinguished professor... feeds on noise... pigs out on it in fact... can't operate without it! Slops it up and spits it out as signals -- signals in the AM & FM bands -- like a damn TV!  And like a contented cow, it grazes all day (and night!) -- not in a field of clover... but in a field of noise!

As it turns out, the brain and I had not been on speaking terms for some years now for I had been singing the praises of 'energy' to anyone who would listen. Any mention of anything thicker than a nadi was dismissed in my steel trapped mind as an artifact of the primary subtle source code and as such, an irrelevant distraction -- not worthy of my valuable time. But here was something that hit home in a way that I couldn't dismiss... I mean this was engineering... or more accurately, reverse engineering.  It was right in my under educated wheelhouse, in a language I could relate to. Suddenly, in my mind, the brain had been 'elevated' somehow.  No longer so easily dismissed, it was now an 'organ of respect!' -- an unbelievably sophisticated and counterintuitive bio-electric genius, its underlying mechanism having gone under reported in an otherwise 'Big-Pharma's' field.    And it had been doing a 'rope a dope' -- with noise! the scourge of the electronics world, right 'under' my nose the whole time... Damn!  I was impressed!

And in addition this paper just happened to come complete with a handy Block Diagram -- just like the ones on my desk. And like all block diagrams this one had something that was visually revealing about it -- but not so much in what it 'said' -- but in what it didn‘t ‘say'.  The brain, according to the usual suspects (i.e., the experts) was supposed to be the storehouse of memory -- of all memories.  Except this diagram had no large scale caches -- only 'data paths' (parallel bus's) and multiplexers! (millions to one!).  It was all about movement and feedback (i.e., amplification and signal conditioning) not massive static storage.  And like any good multiplexer it funneled down each of the many neurons' massively parallel signals into individual serial signals -- ones that we could, potentially (I would assume!) "select"... and "see!"... and "hear!"

Yikes!  Somebody change the channel!!   This was too much...

Or was it?

Rewind to a few years earlier -- stuck again! -- and I had come across an article by a Phd by the name of James L. Oschman, author of the ground breaking book Energy Medicine -- The Scientific Basis. Oschman was a biologist who'd done a tour at the prestigious Wood‘s Hole Oceanographic Institute and he was describing his own metamorphosis from a traditional western scientific view to what could only be described as a full blown empirically derived 'energy view' of the human body-mind (and cosmos).  All of this had been precipitated by an aching back which had led him, eventually, to a paradigm changing encounter with a practitioner of the art of Rolfing who took the time to bring him up to speed on the subtle world.  Fascinated, he took it upon himself to unearth the scientific evidence to substantiate it all and it turned out to be voluminous. For the newly initiated Oschman, the scalability and intelligence of this amazing 'human energy system' was elegance itself -- a thing to behold, but he was curious why there was no talk of it in the scientific community.  Eventually he found himself contemplating a sort of 'McKenna's Dilemma' -- no one else seemed to want it!  He was alone in line at the Buffet!  And to 'top' it all off, despite all the 'Surf & Turf' on his plate, he found that it all 'boiled' down to water.

As it turns out, one of Oschman's colleagues at 'the Hole' was a Hungarian scientist of worldwide repute by the name of Albert Szent-Gyorgyi, the discoverer of vitamin C.  It was Szent-Gyorgyi who initially postulated that proteins are more than just 'proteins' but only when saturated with water, at which point -- like biological comic book Super Heros -- they 'transform' into semiconductors! His observation was that water, a conductor, was what made electrons (energy!) mobile throughout the body's intricate collagen network (protein!) and that this was responsible for the flexibility, speed and subtlety that combined to help facilitate what he referred to as the 'living state'. And this network reached into literally every single one of our cells, right down to our DNA.  So the body not only had a 'wireless' network but collagen 'land lines' as well! His term for this dynamic combination was 'Electronic Biology' and Oschman referred to his discovery of this system thusly:

Breakthroughs in cell biology now enable us to describe the scientific basis of this system. The first of these breakthroughs was the discovery that the molecules of which the body is formed are semiconductors. Conductors, such as the wires that go to a light or a toaster, carry useful energy. The wire to your telephone carries information. Semiconductors can convey both energy and information, and can do other things as well. Semiconductors are used to store information and to process signals -- to make choices or decisions. Semiconductors are used to make sensitive detectors of energy fields. Semiconductors can transport large amounts of power. Semiconductors are the essential components of our modern electronics industry, and make possible the miracle of the computer we are using to write this article.

In living systems, semiconductors probably play the same roles we have assigned to them in our technology. Living systems undoubtedly have developed additional tricks that have not yet been discovered by the electronics industry.

I had been contemplating this technological stew for a number of years when one more juicy ingredient arrived on my laptop in the form of a link to a video called "Thunderbolts of the Gods".  It was about a theory that the 'quantumized' and sterile, disconnected 'gravity in a vacuum' idea of the cosmos (with mysterious spots of so called "dark energy" lurking about) is a 'dead short' so to speak. This 'new' view of the cosmos is actually a hundred years old and is referred to as the 'Electric Universe' and it talks of a ubiquitous primal universal force trillions of times more powerful than 'gravity' (and a lot less mysterious) -- i.e.,  electricity.  Nice... And of course, where there is electricity there is magnetism ("for every force there is an equal and opposite...")  Nice...  And as it turns out, all the billowing clouds of 'stuff' out there have the qualities of plasma which is a nebulous fourth state of matter where particles are suspended in a soup of free floating electrons (i.e., energy) -- perfect for the conduction of electric currents.  No dry 'dust', these currents have a name -- Birkeland currents -- and they have been recorded for decades.  And these currents travel through space primarily in paths that resemble 'twisted pair' wires (long preferred in the computer industry for their ideal conducting properties) -- i.e., they are spiraling! -- like our DNA. And these currents form a huge network -- literally -- between all the planets and stars in the Universe like some kind of crazy cosmic web (imagine that!). So it's alive... it's electric... and the whole thing is buzzing like Yankee Stadium on opening day!  And the entire model is completely scalable and has been reproduced in supercomputers that can replicate the whole process while it forms spiraling galaxies -- something the standard model has never been able to do. Imagine that!

So it was all coming together 'nicely' now... electromagnetic signals in the mind coursing through an electromagnetic body inside an electromagnetic cosmos.  Electromagnetic universe, electromagnetic mind, electromagnetic body!  Waves, waves, waves!  It's a veritable sea of noise... one big Cymatic cacophony of a world, all joined together through a single ubiquitous universal web -- complete with user friendly 'wireless' and 'hard wired' connections at every level. It's a Wide Wide Wired World...  the World Wide E-web...  wired from the furthest galaxy right down to our teeth!... now imagine that!

The Gods must be smiling.

Now it's difficult to talk of time -- as we know it -- without talking about space -- as we know it.  Although in the end, both may be subsets of absolute Time and absolute Space, the point of this discussion is to analyze the former as the latter is beyond words and quite frankly, not an obstacle to understanding in the way that time and space (as we know it) have become.  In fact, the answer lies in the absolute but in order to get to the answer it first helps to define the problem -- or at least come up with a useful abstract working model of the problem to be used to turn over the crust of confusion and reveal the fertile top soil of reality.  Concepts are useful in defining the problem. After that, the answers tend to get revealed by themselves.

One such method for turning soil is to employ a 'thought experiment'.  A thought experiment is not a statement of empirical fact but a means of employing useful imagination to uncover possible hidden mechanisms (i.e., moving parts) which could then be assembled in the mind as a sort of working model which can then be employed by the mind as a visualization tool.  It's what virtual reality used to be.  It's an experiment with imagination instead of a test tube.  But instead of gathering data, we're gathering possibilities.  So when we employ a thought experiment we are still quite possibly a long way from the facts but one has to start somewhere and that is especially so in this case as there is scant empirical evidence to begin with. Time -- as we know it -- is short on hooks and handles.

One major obstacle that a seeker encounters in uncovering the absolute is that the individual has to deal with a layer of paradox which is created by the limited view of the intellect.  Without an overlay of intuition the intellect simply isn't up to the job of 'understanding' as true understanding includes a simultaneous view of both the temporal and the absolute which by default resolves the misunderstandings of the intellect with the non-verbal knowing 'overview' of one's being. You could say that intuition, like water, fills in the 'cracks between concepts'... connecting 'things'... so to speak.  So our model will attempt to address this symbiotic relationship.

According to at least one ancient occult view, time was tied only indirectly to space.  Temporal time, to these ancients, was the mind's interpretation of movement in space which is a slightly different view than the contemporary one but it's the one that we'll employ here. As it turns out, the contemporary and the ancient may be closer than they first appear.

Any seeker who has had even an inkling of a 'timeless' moment knows that movement continues in spite of the apparent absence of 'time'. So it would appear that movement in space is a trigger -- it triggers an assumption in the mind which we interpret as 'time'. Thus the oft-referred to 'continuous moment of timelessness' would be, in our model, one where movement 'continues' in the absence of this assumption about time.

In order to help decouple movement from time in our minds though it will help to redefine it and in this case we'll rename movement and instead, refer to it as a 'sequence'.   So timelessness -- as we know it -- could then also be defined as a 'continuous moment' when all 'sequences' in space have been 'decoupled' in the mind from the assumption of 'time' as we know it. This will be a primary assumption in our experiment.

If the world as we know it is based on waves then it might be useful to make another assumption, for our model's sake, and that is that space (as we know it ) is also a wave.  So our experience of it would then be the mind's interpretation of a wave-like phenomenon, except this wave only takes 'shape' so to speak in the brain. But these are not just ‘waves' -- they carry information -- information that is modulated onto them -- like in the AM & FM bands. Such waves that carry modulated information are called carrier waves, so in our experiment we are going to refer to space (as we know it) as a primary carrier wave produced inside the brain.

One reason carrier waves were developed was to distinguish one signal from another when they shared a common conductor by giving each piece of 'information' on that conductor its own unique 'carrier' frequency -- as in a telephone line or modem.  Thus the carrier waves of 'space' in our model would serve to distinguish one sequence from another by not only creating 'space' between individual competing sequences but also by helping to create a series of sequences -- with 'spaces' between them, so to speak. Thus sequences as we know them, whether in the guise of thoughts or images, would be the modulation of information waves onto the primary carrier waves of 'space' -- as we know it -- inside the brain.  Also, in our model, this innumerable sea of sequences (information waves) outside the brain would then be referred to as noise... a field of noise -- Cloud computing if you will... like an electromagnetic fog.

So if we look back on what we've seen and discussed so far, it appears that the brain has a genius for creating modulated serial signals -- in the AM & FM bands -- from a sea of noise. Thus it takes a massively parallel phenomena (noise) and creates from it a set of sequences which are offered up to us -- in series -- as movement... movement in the form of a series of thoughts and images. And it is this presentation of the information in series -- that gives the impression of a 'series of sequences' in our mind -- like a damn TV.   So in our model we'll assume that the mind in its reasoning mode has little choice but to interpret this sequence as such.   Only one thing then, in our model, can override such an overwhelming presentation and that is to reintroduce noise back into the sequence -- in parallel with the sequence... massively parallel noise in the form of knowing, timeless intuition introduced into the mix as an 'overlay' of higher perception.  Since the sequence appears to be a product of the neural net we can assume that we can't look to it for help here so this introduction of noise would have to come from an independent agent of the brain.  So we'll say that this agent -- or backdoor savior -- is something like the pineal gland, which no doubt has its own twist on things.  Thus in our model, this noise would then be re-introduced on the 'back end of the process', downstream of the neural network where the original noise was 'sifted' and then presented as a series of sequences.  So the pineal gland would then be 'rope a doping' the sequence... so to speak... in our model.

So in our experiment, when left to its own devices, the mind has no choice but to interpret the serial presentation of sequences as a sequence in serial time.  And the only thing that can overrule this logic is an introduction of something so overwhelming that the mind has no choice but to drop its assumption about this serial sequence of time and bow to the truth of the situation.

Thus in our model, the default reasoning of the mind's interpretation of the sequence as serial time can -- at times, be 'overshadowed' by the overwhelming evidence of the timeless knowing which is the default mode of the massively parallel noise of the world beyond the narrow multiplexing funnel of the neurons.  Belief (and doubt!) would then be a product of the 'series' and 'knowing' a product of the noise.  So knowing would, by its massively panoramic nature, 'trump' serial belief (and doubt!) and put it in it's proper perspective, while leaving the sequence of thoughts and images intact.  Thus when the noise is present (on the backend of the process) we would 'see through' the belief in the sequence even while making practical use of it.  We're not fooled by it. So when working in parallel with both the sequence and the panoramic noise, the necessary belief in the useful everyday things we need to have presented to us as a sequence would be 'seen through', so to speak, by the knowing timeless noise of the greater universal mind, while still being put to use, for practical purposes.  You could call this multidimensional experience a form of 'moving meditation' or a 'continuous moment' of real time. Nice.

Now so called 'movement' in the sequence is a relative term as noise itself is movement.  But the difference is that when the highly amplified series of sequences is exclusively presented it naturally gets our undivided attention.  The squeaky wheel gets the grease.  So in the brain, our attention is compelled to focus exclusively on the highly amplified series of sequences -- like a damn TV -- whereas in the vast sea of noise our attention would be diffused across the entire vista. So in our model, it's the exclusive attention on the amplified, high amplitude squeaky wheel of the serial sequence that creates the single minded impression of time -- as we know it.  Likewise, any diffusion of attention over the vast sea of noise would disperse this single minded focus and create a much 'broader' view... a more 'timeless' view.  So when the two are occurring simultaneously -- as in our description of a walking meditation -- we would have the impression of being 'in the world, but not of it'... so to speak.   That is... in our model.

Thus in a way 'time' (as we know it) and 'space' (as we know it) would go hand in hand in our minds like 'fellow travelers‘. One is tied inevitably to the other -- but one is not necessarily the other.

And all of this happens... 'between the ears', so to speak, because in our model, it doesn't matter what we see and what we hear 'out there' ---- it's what we think and what we imagine 'in here'.   You see, when it comes to time -- as we know it -- we don't "know it" at all... not  the way it actually is... just the way we think it is.  And what we 'think'... what we assume... is what we believe.  And what we believe is a direct result of what we place our single minded inner attention on... and then we project that out... onto whatever we place our outer attention on.

So to the ones with the 'eyes to see' everything that happens 'out there' is happening in a single moment of time.  Thus these 'ones' see a multiplicity of movement occurring in a 'Singular time'... whereas we see a series of movements -- and equate that with a series of times.  Likewise, such ones may or may not see wondrous things, with their eyes... but they would all see through things... with the 'eye of knowing' -- in real time -- the only time there is.

So ironically, in our model, the brain would, in a sense, be a... "Time Machine".   Only not in the way we normally think of it. It would be responsible for time 'as we know it'... but that doesn't have to prevent 'that which attends' from seeing time... as it is.

We live in a divided world... one of conflicting beliefs and confusion, doubt and double messages.  We can't seem to concentrate on anything anymore for more than a moment.   And that's just between the ears.   Even our attention is divided (think about that).  It's a prescription for distraction... by design.  In fact, in our model, this world wasn't just ‘designed‘ for distraction... it was engineered that way.   So is it any wonder we don't know what time is?

Technology (as we know it) has become a beast of mythic proportions.  Like a many headed Cyclopian Hydra, it is often seen as a ubiquitous 'all seeing eye' from hell that is portrayed (via technology!!) as a transistorized vehicle for the death of us all (even at times to some of those who helped to design it).   And not for 'no good' reason -- dealing with its health effects alone has become like a second job for many, even while we use it to search the world -- and the web, for the latest remedy.  It's enough to 'drive' you crazy.   It contributes to every major problem of the modern world (and some solutions!!)... while seeping into every pore of our existence... into our very own 'wireless networks' and the 'land lines' to our DNA!    It's a 'fix' to fix us and a fix for our 'fix'!   A loop!   (like the mind!!)   Damn!

But there is an another view of technology that says that technology's real purpose is not 'just' to torture us... that its creation is our attempt to simultaneously reveal our selves to our selves... like a self created late model demon.   Thus if seen correctly, it ceases to become just 'the problem' and instead it then has the potential to transform itself before our eyes into a lesson book -- from our selves to our selves (from our 'engineer'... to our 'engineer'!!!) about the hooks and handles inside us and the universe around us... a mirror of the mechanism of our perpetual dilemma.   As such, when seen correctly, technology (and our universe) can become a tool for liberation from the unconscious mechanical patterns that are the fabric of our habits.   And the first step in breaking any habit is awareness of the habit... and then of its mechanisms.   Loops can be instructive.   They do have a message.   And they can be 'rope a doped'... with inner attention.

The ancients taught that gazing at the world correctly was a spiritual practice, especially  when the universe was viewed the way it truly is. This is why we are attracted to its mysteries even while attempting to shove it all away.  So with 2012 approaching and the looming possibility of the end of time -- as we think we know it  -- perhaps we have something to look forward to after all... in a time that‘s larger than any loop.

Postscript

For an excellent look at the chemical side of the brain (which I conveniently brushed under the rug!) as well as the effects of electromagnetic fields on the brain click here. The piece appeared  recently on Reality Sandwich and it is an excerpt from the book "Revolution 2012" by Dieter Broers called "2012" and Electromagnetic Effects on Consciousness.   It raises many excellent points outside the narrow scope of this piece including possible future electromagnetic Solar scenarios in 2012 and sage advice on how to prepare for them.

Another point conveniently ignored in this piece is the 'past' and 'future' (oh that!).  I can only offer up my own individual opinion for what it's worth and that is that in our model here, both would then be seen as being 'simultaneously and continuously' available to the individual amongst the panoramic noise of Mind at Large at any given moment in 'real time'.   More on that, perhaps at another 'time'.

And to carry the model to the next level, as in 'out of body' experiences, one could speculate that in cases such as Robert Monroe's instantaneous 'thought ball' transmissions, the usual 'serial thought sequences' experienced inside the body would then have been 'massively short circuited' so to speak, outside the body... by instantaneously available 'massively panoramic noise' that is no longer sifted by the neural networks in the brain.  Examples of this abound such as in the cases where individuals outside the body report hearing the thoughts of several individuals simultaneously and on up to universal consciousness.  In other cases, such as in the classic Autobiography of a Yogi by Paramhansa Yogananda, chapter 43... "The Resurrection of Sri Yukteswar" he gives an example of how a potential temporarily manifested 'subtle body brain' might work as well as in other anecdotes scattered through the narrative such as the bi-location of one particular yogi, (not to mention the ubiquitous presence of the ethereal Babaji) a feat not unheard of in the literature of India, as well as in other cultures around the world. Perhaps the difference would be determined by the conscious intent and experience of the individual.  But this would be pure speculation on my part.

For some interesting links on space as a wave and time as motion see the GOOGLE search on the topic...  The WSM pages (Wave Structure of Matter) include an Aristotle quote implying that time is either the equivalent of motion or some 'effect' of it.  Nice... There is also the proposition that all motion (time) are waves of and in space thus you could make an argument that all waves in space are essentially 'modulated' onto space itself, merely by their existence as space itself would be the 'common carrier'.  There isn't room here obviously to dissect all of that but clearly in this model the terms 'modulation' and 'carrier' are relative terms!  To conclude, we could speculate here that 'timelessness' then is the experience of a 'massively diffused panoramic inner attention' which overshadows the singular impression of time as we know it, while we're enjoying -- or consciously suffering through -- the outer sequences in all their amazing varieties.  It's simple.  (Whooa!)

Note:  In our model. the degree to which belief (and doubt!) would reign over knowing would then be known as the 'sequence to noise' ratio.  Thus degrees of awareness would be a fluctuating 'analog function' -- and not some static state -- except... in the ultimate  ‘state'... wherever that is.

The Wave Structure of Matter pages are found here. 

Note:  Another interesting 'view' from the point of view of our model comes from Robert Monroe and his 'Focus levels' as a means of altering our perception of time, space and other dimensions.   See the Overview of Focus levels from their website here.

One last 'loose end' to tie is the implication of this 'Electric Universe' and its ubiquitous web of currents -- from the furthest Galaxy right down to our DNA!   More on that as well at another 'time' as it is a subject with vast implications in every area of our existence and there is no way to do it justice in this piece.  In fact, just to even contemplate it is enough to 'drop ones jaw'... so to speak.  To be continued...

Note:   If the reader takes exception to my characterization of the standard model of the Universe that's understandable.  It's just that I was never quite able to wrap my mind around it in a way that left me smiling.  Since then I have put together a short list of qualifications that I filter any cosmological theory through and that is this:   Is it simple?  (Occam's razor and common sense);   Is it scalable?  (as above so below);    Is it satisfying? (moi!).   The Electric Universe fits all 3 IMO so I'm 'satisfied' with it for now.   In fact I could even add a fourth:  Does it spiral?   but in interest of 'simplicity' I'll leave it at 3.  No doubt I'm not the first to come up with such a cosmological 'short list' as all 'roads' seem to lead to it eventually.

The DVD on the Electric Universe mentioned above, "Thunderbolts of the Gods" can be found here, along with other excellent DVD's on this subject.

For an excellent website on the Plasma Cosmos see here. 

Note:  I've lost touch with the original paper about noise and the brain but several follow up studies are out there.  So if you look for them online you may want to keep in mind that many are in Adobe pdf format.  Also in your string search you'll want to include the phrase "stochastic resonance" as this is a key to understanding how noise works in the brain and possibly as a factor in Cymatics as well.  It's also important to note that there is a fine distinction (in my mind) between noise in the brain and the noise of Mind at large.  The noise in the brain would then be -- in our model -- an intermediate step between the panoramic noise of Mind at large and the serial sequence.  See GOOGLE search.

Note:  To say that James Oschman was 'alone at the Buffet'... well, I would have to qualify that as clearly he is reporting a slew of evidence reported by other interested and courageous scientists.  But where he stands alone is in his reminding us of it all by compiling these discoveries in one place and reporting on them in a comprehensive fashion with language that the layperson can relate to.   In doing so he placed a very bright spotlight on a field that had nearly been scattered to the winds by the power of conventional science to ignore it.

The quote by Albrecht-Buehler found at the head of this piece was from page 189 of James L' Oschman's book Energy Medicine -- the Scientific Basis.

The quote about water and proteins forming semiconductors came from an article by James and Nora Oschamn called "How Healing Energy Works".  In it they also mention that Albert Szent-Gyorgyi received the Nobel for his discovery of vitamin C.   They also employ a slew of technological analogies in their model of the human energy system. See here.

For an excellent interview with James Oschman see here.

For an interesting look at the conventional western scientific view of the purpose of water in "proteins" see here. 

Although I use TV as a loose analogy in this piece,  the quote below is interesting as both AM & FM signals would need to be present in Analog TV -- as are present simultaneously in the brain... kinda makes ya' wonder!

"Analog TV uses an amplitude-modulated (AM) signal for pictures and frequency modulation (FM) for audio."

The seekers 'double-life' dilemma between thought and being -- the path of Reason -- was summarized by Paul Cash in the quotes below from an article called 'Beyond the Maps'.   It was written as a posthumous tribute to Paul Brunton, one of the early proponents of Yoga in the West....

"One of Brunton's most frequently repeated themes is that the thinker within us and the mystic within us need each other desperately: both the ability to think deeply with great precision and the ability to withdraw at will from thinking must be cultivated. And, most importantly to the philosophic approach, all must be turned in the direction of altruistic service to humanity at large."

In the same piece, Cash gives an example of Brunton's direct view of the 'practical mystical' state which he often referred to as an experience of the continuous presence of the 'Overself'...

"The mystical stages of this process involve a gradual displacement of the individual's mind's exclusive fascination with its own thoughts as 'the whole of one's identity' shifts to a higher plane. When this displacement is complete, or in parallel with its development, the philosophic stage begins. This stage involves reembracing of the thinking processes in a radically different way by a vastly deepened continuous self-awareness."

See here.

The Notebooks of Paul Brunton can be found here.  

Endless...

Time... endless time...

no excuse.

Long train running... no caboose!

Thought not the problem... attention the key.

Un-trained attention... running over me!

Retraction of attention from report card on I

produces space... endless space...

for train of whole new dimension!

And finally... 'Where is time?'   Well, if it's like everything else... it's probably going to be found in the last place we'd ever think to look for it!

Image by frostnova, courtesy of Creative Commons license.