Answering John Powell's Questions and a Student's Questions

John L. Waters

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John L. Waters

April 20, 2001

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1. John Powell's Question: What is the argument for

working to synthesize the science you know with these

domains outside science? Showing how to do it is not

the same as arguing that it should be done.

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Argument one. Over the centuries, past extensions of

science have added new and useful sciences and

technologies. References: books on the history of

science and technology.

My independent research is following that historical

trend.

Over the centuries, past extensions of science into

new domains have enabled human beings to do things

which weren't possible for humans to do before.

Extending medical science into the realm where my

research goes will enable science to be successful in

ways in which science can't yet be successful.

Argument two. My research is on integrating the brain

and the body more effectively by using natural forms

and energies which cost nothing or they cost much less

than hospitals, M.D.s, medications, and other

high-cost forms of treatment. If the treatment works

for other people, the benefits are savings in

cost and the treatment is more effective in many

cases.

More testing of this method needs to be done. More

persons need to try this method of chronic disease

treatment under medical supervision, to see how well

it works for many people.

Argument three. My research promotes mathematics and

science to people who never studied these subjects

with serious intent because these subjects seemed

non-relevant or peripheral to the human interest and

the human need.

My research also promotes creativity in art, music,

writing, and other constructive activities to persons

whose mental activity and physical activity have been

focused on some activity which is less creative or

even more destructive. For example, retentive

learning in school, athletic competition, or military

service. Evidence: examine my own works and the works

of other creative persons.

======================================================

The student asks, "Evidence for what?" My answer is:

over the passage of time, examine the person's time

for relative time spent in creative activity versus

time spent in retentive learning, competition, or

destructive activity.

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My research is on education as well as on medicine.

The creative process is also beneficial to health

insofar as developing the means for being more

creative also involves reconditioning the brain and

rejuvenating the brain. In this way innovative

medicine and innovative education are related and

reinforce each other.

Argument four. My research is on exploring the

process of problem-solving and inspiration so that the

intense divisiveness and the strict exclusiveness

which is so common in present cultures and subcultures

will gradually be reduced. The full potential of a

human being includes abilities which present medicine

and present education can't explain or take full

advantage of.

For example, certain processes I use, such as

sungazing, and vegetarianism and the spontaneous

drawing movements I use are not taught in educational

institutions, in churches, or in medical centers. But

these processes have been very beneficial to myself.

(Integration of science with spiritual energy will

help bring about the long-prophesied messianic age of

true peace and understanding. However this claim

can't be proven until the actual work is being tested

and

proven in many nations at the same time.)

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The student asks: "How can you test and prove these

methods?"

For my answer to this question, go to 4.

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2. John Powell's Question:

How can you deal with the prejudices of those

fundamentalist scientists who condemn these topics as

superstitions or nonsense? I take it they are part of

an audience you want to reach, but I have my doubts.

Their dismissal may be so automatic and so deeply

engrained that reaching them is hopeless.

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My answer:

The audience I want to reach is young parents, young

parents-to-be, and other young persons or

young-at-heart persons. I'm not aiming to interest

persons who are too learned and too concerned about

the subtlest points of a subject whose starting point

isn't where my subject starts. The fundamental

assumptions and goals of a study are very important.

The only "revealed" text in the universe is the

universe itself.

There are fundamentalist scientists, fundamentalist

Christians, fundamentalist Muslims, fundamentalist

Jews and fundamentalists in other faiths. Atheists,

agnostics, and skeptics are also very firmly rooted

their particular belief and methodology of life.

Conversion is a study in itself. If your mind is set

in concrete you have a fixed pattern of thinking

which you rely on. You're satisfied that this

pattern is reliable. But when problems or phenomena

you can't explain by using this pattern of thinking

come up, you ignore these phenomena or you dismiss

them. You don't dwell on them or really investigate

them because you can't predict them, explain them, or

control them. So they make you feel uneasy and

uncomfortable. To remain comfortable you exclude

these

anomalous phenomena or strange persons from your

life and from your thoughts. For example, in the 18th

century, astronomers refused to study meteors and

meteorites because they were anomalous phenomena.

These streaks and flashes of light in the heavens

didn't fit in their astronomy.

When a conversion takes place, a true believer in one

fixed pattern is converted from one fundamentalist

camp to another. Like Anton Boisen moved from

accepting himself as a "schizophrenic" to accepting

himself as a "saved Christian." As a Christian he was

able to live outside the fixed pattern world of a

mental institution. Other men are converted from one

rigid pattern to another.

During conversion the mind is more fluid. This is the

state of mind a young child cultivates until he is

educated out of it and trained out of it. Very few

older children retain the fluidity of a much younger

healthy child. Most older people's minds become

rigidly set.

Adults who are unusually creative have more fluid

minds and imaginations like little children. These

adults are often looked up to for their creative

ability and their achievements in creative work. Also

creativity and youthful fluidity are both healthy for

the brain. And what is proven to be health-promoting

is likely to appeal to people in all nations, in due

time. And since poor health causes the unhealthy

person to experience unpleasant symptoms, unhealthy

persons are motivated to do things which improve their

health. Since my method is much less expensive than

conventional medical care, more people will be able to

use the method. Over time this will convert many

people in every nation and the old intolerances

gradually will be reduced. Of course, the first step

is for more people to test this method under the

supervision of medical experts.

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The student asks, "How?"

For my answer to this question, go to 4.

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The student asks, "So is your answer that you wish to

convert the fundamentalists after extensive testing of

your method?"

For my answer to this question, go to 5.

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3. John Powell's Question:

What arguments can you give to those who argue that

your insights are just delusion? That is, there is a

need for you to articulate things that go, This is not

just a delusion because..... Part of that might

involve answering their arguments. Are you aware of

how their thinking goes? It might be good to say what

they would say quite clearly and strongly, but then

answer them in such a way that they have to listen.

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My answer:

First of all, there is a difference between my

insights, ideas, and created works which number in the

tens of thousands and my methods, of which there are

only a few.

My basic method involves (1) spontaneous physical body

movements which lead me to new ideas (2) sunbathing

and

sungazing and using my eyes to gaze and see things

many other people don't see because they haven't

conditioned themselves, (3) vegetarianism, and (4)

the direct perception of an energy which I have called

"psychic" energy, "spiritual" energy, or "divine"

energy.

Each of these practices might be termed an irrational

or an ineffectual delusion. But I can take each of

these four aspects of the method and discuss them in

turn.

First, my spontaneous body movements, my improvisation

of music, of art designs, and my improvised writing.

Anyone can see that it is no delusion that I have

created a large number of works. A person can see

this by making an inventory of my collected works.

I've used spontaneous body movement to help me produce

new ideas and new works.

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The student asks: "How can you prove that the ideas

are the result of spontaneous movement and such rather

than the result of thinking while doing these things?

Would you be just as productive if you just sat in a

chair behind a desk and thought? Why or why not?"

For my answer to this question, go to 6.

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Second, my vegetarianism, my meditation, and my

relaxation.

What needs to be investigated are the physiological

changes which have resulted by my becoming a

vegetarian and from my learning how to meditate and

relax more profoundly while awake. I have observed

that when I lie on my back and meditate and relax,

there appears to be an increased blood flow through my

brain.

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Student says prove this.

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I deduce this because I often lie on my back and gaze

up into the sky and relax. When I do this I see

hundreds of points of white light swirling about and

I've read an opthalmological paper which states that

these light points are caused by red blood cells

hitting and stimulating retinal cells as the blood

cells pass rapidly through tiny blood

vessels. So as I am relaxing I am letting a lot more

blood flow through the retinal tissue in my

eyes.

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Student says find the paper, quote from it and give

author. I haven't been able to find the paper at

home, and my websearches haven't come up with any

medical article or paper related to this.

I will say that in his book on Wilhelm Reich, I

believe it's page 160, David Boadella devotes one

paragraph to these swirling light points, and then

drops the topic.

Furthermore, Orson Bean describes this effect in his

book "Me and the Orgone." Colin Wilson quotes Orson

Bean in Wilson's book, "The Quest for Wilhelm Reich."

However, not one of these people followed up on this

phenomenon.

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Retinal tissue is brain tissue. It makes sense to me

that since I have learned better how to relax, that

the tissues of my whole brain are getting more blood

flow. More nutrients are being supplied to my brain

and more wastes are being removed faster from my

brain. Moreover, I've observed that each time after

I've done this experiment I get at least one

significant new idea.

Third, my sunbathing and my sungazing.

There is so much publicity these days against exposing

one's body to the sun. And of course a lot of this

publicity is justified. The skin cancer rate is

rising. Of course there are lots more people. I

don't know all the details of this medical scare. But

I have studied some articles about the dangers of

suntanning and some articles about the dangers of

sungazing.

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Student says search literature and cite at least one

article.

1. Dangers of suntanning. References:

1. There is now overwhelming evidence to show that

intentional and unintentional exposure to sunlight is

linked to the development of the more common types of

skin cancer and most melanomas. Skin cancer causes the

death of 1,000 Australians each year, with a further

150,000 people presenting annually for treatment.

In 1989, the Australasian College of Dermatologists

consensus Statement - Photoaging and Photodamage as a

Public Health Concern - concluded that "There is no

safe way to tan.

http://www.health.gov.au/nhmrc/publicat/statemnt/ph6stat.htm

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2. ISCAN - Government news and views on suntanning

and

suntan products British government warnings and

recommendations for suntan bed facilities and users

http://www.healthwatcher.net/ISCAN/isgov-1.html

2. Dangers of sungazing. References:

"The patient with a classical solar burn presents soon

after exposure with a history of reduced visual

acuity, a central scotoma, chromatopsia, photophobia

and metamorphopsia (1, 20, 21)."

Focus Published by the Royal College of

Ophthalmologists 17 Cornwall Terrace,

London NW1 4QW Tel: 0171 935 0702 Fax: 0171 935 9838

Thirty-four medical papers listed as references

http://www.rcophth.ac.uk/publications/focus10.html

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I personally have found exposure to sunlight to be

very beneficial. I observed a similar effect in my

son.

He tended to be very moody and difficult here on the

foggy coast but when he went on a Boy Scout trip

inland

and spent ten days in the bright sunlight, and he got

a suntan, he came home with bright spirits. In a few

days, however, living here on the cool, damp, and

foggy coast, the therapeutic effect was gone.

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Student says, consider the phenomenon of seasonal

affect disorder as well. I need to comment on this.

======================================================

SAD or Seasonal Affect Disorder

Taken from the website

http://www.umaine.edu/counseling/sigmund/sad.htm

"For some individuals, the declining light in the fall

can usher in a form of a mood disorder that goes

beyond simple winter blahs. This form of depression,

known as Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD) affects

approximately 6 percent of the United States'

population, with 14 percent experiencing SAD. The

incidence of SAD is greater in Northern latitudes

where the decrease in light is greater."

"As with any depressive disorder, the treatment of SAD

should be undertaken under the guidance of a qualified

health professional. Exposure to bright light for

around 30 minutes each morning, using a high intensity

"light box," can be very helpful for some individuals.

These light boxes must deliver 10,000 lux of

lumination. They can be purchased or constructed at

home with a minimal investment in materials. Others

are helped through antidepressant medication and/or

psychotherapy. Simply increasing exposure to daylight,

exercising, eating healthy foods, decreasing stress

and

being with supportive, "comfortable" individuals can

be highly therapeutic."

For more information contact the Counseling Center

Rm. 125 Cutler Health Center - Telephone: 581-1392

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Moodiness tends to run in families, and not every

person may respond to sunshine in the same way. Some

persons are more susceptible to sunburn and sun

damage to their skin. In my case, I tan easily. In

all cases, when a person hasn't been getting a suntan,

he has to start slowly and expose his skin only a few

minutes a day to begin with. After a few weeks of

tanning a person can stay out for hours without being

sunburned. And with sungazing it's the same. It took

me a couple of years to really become a strong

sungazer. That was probably because here on the coast

there are so many days when a person can't practice

sungazing or sunbathing.

As for the damage of sunbathing, I think it makes a

difference what chemicals are on ones skin and in ones

skin. I think diet is important and I think what is

in the air is important. And I think what is on your

skin is important. But in the research papers on

suntanning and skin cancer I've read or heard about, I

don't think the medical scientists controlled these

parameters. I think the research was just really done

on the fly.

Cancer is more likely to occur where there is a

persistent irritation to some part of the body.

Sunlight reacts with many chemicals to produce skin

irritants. Just being in a city or close to pollution

is enough to produce irritants on the skin and in the

skin. I think it's important to try this method in a

pollution-free environment. Unfortunately these

places are getting harder and harder to find!

As far as the sungazing is concerned, it's easy to

damage your eyes by just looking right at the sun or

at some other very bright point of light. In 1980 I

damaged my right eye in this way. In time the damage

was repaired by my own body without help from the

doctors. But I learned to use means of illuminating

my eyes which kept the sunlight moving about on the

retina so there was no time for the light to burn the

retina. There are different ways of doing this.

As far as the suntanning and the sungazing being

delusions, what is needed is just for more chronically

ill persons to try this method I have used. They need

to try the method for at least one year, under medical

supervision. I have personally met two other persons

who used sunshine in the same way. But they were not

scientifically inclined.

Fourth, my direct perception of "spiritual" energy.

This is certain to be dismissed as a delusion by lots

of hard scientists, because they themselves haven't

been trained to be able to see this effect.

There are many reports in the literature of persons

who have seen this "spiritual" energy in the same way

I have seen it and felt it, and the reports are

similar. I personally experienced the "spiritual"

energy hundreds of times before I read these reports.

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(Student says expand on this area and give examples of

specific reports. I need to refer to my papers by

title.

For more information on this, visit my own website at

http://www.humboldt.edu/~jlw47

Specifically, visit these pages:

My article, "The Mystical Energy-The Basic Argument"

is at

http://www.humboldt.edu/~jlw47/themysticbasicargument.html

my article "Defining the Mystical Energy" is at

http://www.humboldt.edu/~jlw47/definthemystical.html

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I have found that persons who regularly practice

meditation are more likely to see this energy or feel

it in my presence or in the presence of a recognized

"master." I also have seen the "spiritual" energy in

trees, especially pine trees, redwood trees, and other

coniferous trees. Other trees in which I see this

energy have a lot of oily, milky, resinous, or pitchy

sap in their tissues. I have tested a number of local

persons and found that they respond in predictable

ways to exposures of large amounts of this "spiritual"

energy.

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4. The student asks: "How can you test and prove

these methods?"

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I myself have been testing and proving these methods

since 1963. There is difficulty in separating the

different techniques, for example, the vegetarianism,

the exposure to nonlinear inputs, and the spontaneous

body movement. The way to approach this matter is to

regard the entire method as a single method, just as

people regard the entire alphabet as a single method

of recording speech in a written form. The components

of this method are inter-related and inter-dependent,

in a way not unlike the letters of the alphabet

scientists use every day.

Good science predicts results better than bad science.

Astrology is bad science because it can't predict with

accuracy. Psychology is bad science because

psychologists enforce a social stereotype rather than

observe with objectivity. Rigid social conformity is

deadly to science.

Recently many rules for doing science have become

dogmatic. Each scientific discipline has worked out

certain rules which apply best to a relatively small

class of phenomena. For example, the double blind

test in medical science is geared to pills,

injections, and other artificial treatments, so

medical doctors insist on using the double blind test.

But in studying the motions of the planets, there was

no way to isolate the planets and do a double blind

study on them. The movement of each individual planet

is related to the movements of all the others. In a

storm cloud, billions of water-saturated air movements

are interacting together. When a person is inspired

or insane information-laden currents of neuro-chemical

and neuro-electrical activity are interacting

together. However the details of astronomy,

meteorology, and the science of creative inspiration

all are different. The new science has yet to be

tested by large numbers of experimental subjects.

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5. The student asks, "So is your answer that you wish

to convert the fundamentalists after extensive testing

of your method?"

No. My answer is that each person has latent

potential which was sometimes demonstrated by that

person when he or she was a year or two old.

Reclaiming lost or hidden talent is what my work is

about. This is lost brain activity which the child's

culture suppressed in the child so that this talent

was never developed. Getting sidetracked into

long-winded philosophical discussions is just

developing the talent for stimulating writing and/or

stimulating conversations. This is a human talent,

but often talking things over just diverts people from

taking some direct action.

There are firm believers in science and logic, and

these people are sure they are right. The trouble is,

all they know is what is past. Their knowledge is

past knowledge. Furthermore, their childhood is past

and many of them will not be able to reclaim either

their lost youth and their lost talent. And many of

these persons even today are in their teens. Once

childhood is outgrown, it's hard to become again as a

little child and really begin life anew.

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6. The student asks: "How can you prove that the

ideas are the result of spontaneous movement and such

rather than the result of thinking while doing these

things? Would you be just as productive if you just

sat in a chair behind a desk and thought? Why or why

not?"

My answer: The ideas, that is the melodies, the

graphic designs, the poetry, the prose writings, the

ideas I get which help people, and the other ideas I

get when I am inspired come as I let my body move

freely without any planning or forethought. When I

try to think ahead, I realize that there are way too

many factors which I can't possibly consciously keep

track of! So I give myself up to the "higher power"

that is in my body to move freely, automatically, and

spontaneously in a dance with life. Paring the

rhetoric away, peeling all the poetry away from the

core of the onion, I am left with the movement itself,

because most all the words we use are old metaphors,

that is frozen poetry.

The above paragraph is an example of this process at

work. Without any forethought I sat and typed it out.

As my body produced each word by using an electronic

computer, the word popped into view letter by letter

on the fluorescent monitor screen. The words were

produced as I was thinking them. In other words by

manipulating the keyboard with my fingers, I was able

to think. It is the same way with a musical keyboard.

The instrument itself is something like a device

inserted into a body to enable the body to function.

For example a pacemaker inside of a person's body,

which stimulates the heart so that it keeps beating.

In my case, I needed mechanical aids to enable my

special talent to work best. Without the mechanical

aids, my talent would not be apparent. This was

suggested when as a boy I could sit down at the piano

and make the sound of thunder. I could not make the

sound of thuder with my own vocal cords, nor could I

make the sky thunder. So I made the piano thunder by

slamming my forearms down on the keyboard so that all

the notes sounded at the same time. For a four-year

old that was pretty ingenious, to know that thunder is

a full spectrum of audible frequencies.

In the old days people said that a very intelligent

four year old was chosen by God. In our modern age

the meaning of "talent" and the meaning of "God" are

many. There is a full spectrum of meanings for some

words, and this indicates that there is a lot of

confusion over the meaning of these words. This

confusion suggests that a more basic and a more

effective science of human evolution and human

potential is needed.

If I just sat in a chair and thought, and didn't move

a muscle, how would you tell I was thinking? If I

started to move my mouth or my hands to speak or to

write, then I wouldn't be sitting still just thinking

anymore. What I teach is that the mind and the body

are one integrated whole in the inspired person and

that inspiration itself is the integration of the mind

and the body so that more of the brain can work

effectively to contribute to thinking and creativity.

When a person is trained to just think first and sit

still while thinking, (picture in your mind Rodin's

famous statue "The Thinker.") the motor cortex and

other parts of the brain are shut down, and so less of

the brain is functioning. If a so-called genius is

using more of his or her brain, maybe it's because the

genius is thinking all the time he or she is moving

around. After all, healthy and vigorous people do

their bodies around most of the time they are awake.

When educators force children to sit or stand

motionless, they are just teaching the little ones NOT

to be very thoughtful and creative.

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9:45PM Sunday, September 24, 2000

1:40PM Thursday, April 19, 2001

11:45AM Friday, April 20, 2001

John L. Waters

johnlwaters@yahoo.com

The information on this page represents that of John Waters and not

necessarily that of Humboldt State University. John Waters takes full

responsibility for the information presented.

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