When the Impossible Happens (36 page)

Unfortunately, Dr. Dockstader did not have much understanding for my unorthodox quest. He did not respond to my credentials as psychiatrist and consciousness researcher and insisted that I had to abide by the museum rules, like everybody else. Dr. Dockstader’s resolute refusal effectively ended my pursuit of the crystal skull. Many years later, I sublimated my frustration by channeling some of my interest in the crystal skull into my fledgling science fiction novel entitled
Call of the Jaguar.

THE WONDERS OF SYNESTHESIA: Hugo Zucarelli and the Holophonic Sound

In the late 1960s and early 1970s, I had the privilege to be part of a small group of people who formulated the basic principles of transpersonal psychology. Abraham Maslow called this new discipline the Fourth Force, because it historically followed behaviorism, Freudian analysis, and humanistic psychology. It was an attempt to create a vastly expanded model of the human psyche by bringing in observations from modern consciousness research and from the great spiritual traditions of the world. By recognizing spirituality as a legitimate and critical dimension of human nature, the new psychology corrected serious omissions and misconceptions perpetuated by academic circles.

Transpersonal psychology was culturally sensitive in that it treated with respect ritual and spiritual traditions of ancient and native cultures, as well as various esoteric systems and mystical schools of thought. The theoretical revisions that it introduced into psychology reflected also the revolutionary observations and paradigmatic challenges from psychedelic research, anthropology, experiential psychotherapies, meditation studies, and other areas of research exploring holotropic states of consciousness.

One of the major challenges in the early stages of the fledgling discipline was the fact that its basic tenets were incompatible with mainstream scientific thinking, which was dominated by the Cartesian-Newtonian paradigm and philosophically anchored in monistic materialism. It thus was very vulnerable to accusations of being unscientific, irrational, and even “flaky.” Convinced about the legitimacy of their endeavors, pioneers of transpersonal psychology therefore followed with great interest revolutionary advances in other scientific disciplines, seeking support for their vision and developments that would help them to close this conceptual gap.

None of the developments in new paradigm science attracted more attention for its potential to provide solid scientific basis for transpersonal psychology than the discovery of principles operating in optical holography and their applications in various fields. More specifically, it was Karl Pribram’s holographic model of the brain and David Bohm’s theory of holomovement. These two systems of thought threw new light on mystical experiences and many transpersonal phenomena by revealing a previously unknown and in conceivable paradoxical relationship between the part and the whole.

At the time of great enthusiasm concerning holographic thinking, Marilyn Ferguson, author of the bestseller
The Aquarian Conspiracy,
published in her
Brain/Mind Bulletin
a report about a sensational addition to the holographic paradigm, the discovery of holophonic sound technology by Argentinean Italian inventor Hugo Zucarelli. Excited by Hugo’s work, Marilyn invited him to the United States, making it possible for those of us who were interested to spend a weekend with him in an estate in Millbrae, near San Francisco. This seminar attracted many prominent representatives of the transpersonal field and turned out to be an extraordinary experience.

Hugo began the seminar by sharing with us a memory of an incident from his early life that inspired the discovery of holophonic sound. He traced his interest in acoustic perception to an event when, as a little boy, he was almost killed by a truck. At the time of this incident, he was sitting on the side of a road with his back turned to the oncoming vehicle. The driver diverted the truck to the shoulder of the road to avoid collision with another car. Hugo was able to save his life by a last-moment impulsive evasive movement.

Following this event, he often thought about it and wondered how he was able to accurately localize the sound of the approaching truck and respond to it by an appropriate lifesaving maneuver. This led to Hugo’s fascination with the mechanism that different species use to localize sound. By careful study and analysis, he came to the conclusion that the existing theories of hearing are not able to account for certain important characteristics of human acoustic perception and the ability to accurately localize sounds.

He noticed that the crocodile, an animal that lacks a flexible, mobile neck, has to turn the upper part of its body to localize where various sounds are coming from. Birds have to rotate their heads to accomplish the same task. Mammals use for this purpose their ability to change the configuration of their ears. But humans can accurately localize the source of incoming sounds without moving their heads or changing the shape of the earlobes (a feat that most of us cannot even do). Moreover, they can accurately localize sound even if they have just monaural hearing.

All this suggested to Hugo that current theories that tried to explain stereophonic hearing and capacity to locate sounds by comparing the input from the right and left ear were inaccurate. He concluded that to account for all the extraordinary characteristics of acoustic perception, it was necessary to assume that the human ear was not only a receiver, but also a transmitter, and that it used holographic principles to localize sounds. According to him, individuals suffering from tinnitus—pathological ringing in the ears—actually hear the sound emitted by their ears. Carefully avoiding any technical details that would give away the secret of his discovery, Hugo explained that he had developed the technology of the holophonic sound by simply replicating this mechanism.

The critical part of Hugo’s mysterious technology was a facsimile of a human head, to which the inventor affectionately referred as Ringo. It harbored the recording devices, which were built into it in the areas corresponding to ears. Ringo was permanently cloaked in a bag of thick, dark fabric that protected it from the eyes of curious and frustrated audiences. A cable emerging from Ringo was connected to a box with ten outlets for headphones. After this brief introduction, Hugo proceeded to the actual demonstration. Ten of us at a time were able to put on the headphones and listen to Hugo’s experimental tape of holophonic recordings.

We could not believe what we were experiencing. Hugo’s recording had an uncanny capacity to reproduce acoustic qualities of a large spectrum of sounds with such vividness, accuracy, and precision of localization that it was virtually impossible without constant visual control to distinguish the perception of recorded phenomena from actual events in the three-dimensional world. A typical example of it was the sound of an oncoming truck, echoing Hugo’s childhood experience. When we listened to it with our eyes closed, our bodies instinctively rolled to the side to avoid the impact.

But that was not the whole story. To our surprise, listening to Hugo’s holophonic recordings tended to engage other senses and produced a rich panoply of synesthesias. Synesthesia is a condition in which one type of sensory stimulation creates perception in another sense. The most common form of synesthesia is called “colored hearing,” in which a person experiences a visual sensation when receiving an auditory signal. However, synesthesias can involve any other sensory area. Hugo’s experimental tape not only involved all the senses, but it did it in a way that conveyed information about other aspects of the situation that produced the sound.

Thus the sound of scissors simulating a haircut conveyed a realistic sense of one’s hair being cut, the hum of an electric hair dryer produced sensations of the stream of hot air blowing through one’s hair, and listening to a sound of a match striking a matchbox transmitted the vision of its flame and a distinct smell of burning sulfur. Similarly, the sensual voice of a woman whispering into one’s ear made one feel her warm breath. Needless to say, we were very impressed by what we had experienced.

In the discussion following the demonstration, several people who had had previous experience with holophonic sound shared with other participants an even more interesting example of the potential of this technology, indicating that it was capable of transmitting not only experiences of other senses, but also emotions, including mystical feelings. They described an experiment in which a group of them had taken a psychoactive amphetamine derivative, the entheogen MDMA, known to the young generation as Ecstasy or Adam, gathered in a circle, and collectively chanted the Indian mantra “Om.” They claimed that people who listened to the holophonic recording of this event experienced entheogenic effects of this substance, such as visions of numinous light and feelings of cosmic unity.

As the lively discussion continued, the excitement in the group was rapidly growing. Some people pointed out that the extraordinary effects of holophonic technology seemed to throw new light on the important role of sound in various spiritual traditions and esoteric schools. They referred to the mystical and magical properties that the Hebrews and ancient Egyptians ascribed to the sounds of their alphabets, to the relationship between the acoustic frequencies or seed syllables and the chakras in Kundalini yoga or nadayoga, the crucial importance of sound in Tantric science, art, and ritual, and even the cosmogonic power that Indian mythology attributes to the om sound.

Others discussed the important theoretical and practical implications that the discovery of holophonic sound might have for the technology of virtual reality, for physiology and pathology of hearing, for psychiatry, psychology, and psychotherapy, for film, television, and other forms of entertainment. And all of us were excited about it as the latest addition of another piece to the expanding mosaic of the new paradigm in science, providing conceptual support for transpersonal psychology.

However, it soon became obvious that Hugo’s rigid ideas about the future of holophonic technology might represent a serious obstacle in its widespread use. He was determined to maintain full control of the way his invention would be used, by whom it would be used, and for what purpose. He wanted to be absolutely sure that no forms of abuse would occur. It was clear that this otherwise admirable position was not very realistic and that it would get in the way of his negotiations with companies interested in bringing holophonic sound to large audiences.

Hugo’s concerns were greatly amplified when Marilyn Ferguson took him to the preview of the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer science fiction movie
Brainstorm,
for which Christina and I served as consultants for special effects sequences. As described earlier in this book,
Brainstorm
is a story about two scientists, a computer wizard and a brilliant brain researcher, who developed a device capable of recording human experiences and allowing other people to share them. The helmet that made this possible could easily be seen as a much more complex and sophisticated version of Hugo’s own technology.

In the
Brainstorm
movie, this phenomenal invention was very rapidly expropriated by the wrong people for commercial and military purposes. Watching the movie reinforced the already existing fears that Hugo had concerning the abuse of his revolutionary device. Whether or not Hugo’s rigid attitude was the main reason for it, his extraordinary device has not received the enthusiastic reception in the world that those of us who had participated in the Millbrae seminar expected and hoped for.

GATEWAY TO THE ABSOLUTE: The Secret of the Toad of Light

In the minds of most people, the original source of psychedelic substances is the vegetable kingdom. Since time immemorial, native cultures have used plants with powerful mind-altering properties, “flesh of the gods,” as the main vehicle for their ritual and spiritual life. Much has been written about soma, the legendary visionary plant of the Vedas, different varieties of cannabis, the pre-Columbian sacraments peyote and magic mushrooms (teonanacatl), the sacred shrub eboga used in rituals of African tribes, as well as the South American jungle brew yajé or ayahuasca, and many others.

It is much less known that psychedelic compounds can also be found in the animal kingdom. In 1960, Joe Roberts, a photographer for
National Geographic
magazine, described an intense psychedelic experience with many elements of science fiction, following his ingestion of the meat of
Kyphosus fuscus.
This fish, found off Norfolk Island in the South Pacific, has a reputation among the natives for causing powerful and often nightmarish visions.

The most remarkable contribution of the animal kingdom to the repertory of psychedelic users and spiritual seekers comes from the genus
Bufo.
The toad skin, which contains the psychoactive compound bufotenin, was a regular ingredient of the brews that the witches used in the Middle Ages for inducing the visions of the Sabbath. In the late 1960s, the psychedelic grapevine spread the news about a strange new way of achieving a psychedelic state—by licking the skin secretions of a giant Arizona desert toad,
Bufo alvarius.
This species can be found only in the Sonoran Desert, stretching over the southern half of Arizona and south to Sonora in Mexico.

Being semiaquatic, these toads must remain in the vicinity of dependable water sources in order to survive. For this reason, their principle habitat is within the drainage of permanent rivers and streams of the Sonoran Desert. Their lifestyle is also supported by the fact that more than one thousand years ago, the Hohokam Indians began diverting water from the Gila River and created a complex system of canals to irrigate the and soil. But even all that would not be sufficient.
Bufo alvarius
features specialized glands, located particularly on the neck and the limbs. They produce a viscous milky-white secretion that protects them against the heat of the Arizona desert, as well as against enemies.