HOLISTIC SCIENCE

A Tapestry of Essays
by
Robin Wilding

5 Mystery or Mysticism

In his book on the Druids, Peter Berresford Ellis tells us that Roman and Greek writers
acknowledged the ability of their Celtic neighbours to foretell the future. The Druids were said
to “read” the entrails of animals and even those of humans sacrificed for the purpose. The
behavior of living birds was also a strong indicator or “auspice” for success in battle; the
croaking of a raven being a particularly bad sign; when the chickens were eating well it was a
good one. The interpretation of dreams was also a popular way of telling the future. Druids,
like modern witch-doctors and shammans also threw sticks and read the patterns of their fall.
The Classical writers did not dismiss the use of augury, in fact they used it themselves. They
reserved their chief criticism of of the Celts for the respect in which they held women. The
Celts also had, for those times, an uncommonly fair legal system which gave rights to the
powerless and social codes requiring honest dealing. They were a practical people, good with
horses and fearsome in battle. Yet they were superstitious about words, not illiterate, but
wary of the power of writing. Were the Druids and other pagan peoples just an ill informed lot
who could not tell the difference between fact and fantasy? Or were they more open to
mystery than their modern descendants who have “progressed” at the cost of leaving behind
the mystical?
They recognised that augury was not a common skill. The legal right to practice augury was
restricted to those who had been properly trained and presumably had some natural talent for
the task. It was important that seers made the correct prophecies as their reputation and future
depended on making few mistakes.
The practice of augury, certainly that part which required animal sacrifice has completely died
out. But here remains a small number of practitioners in England who will , for a fee, either
read Tarrott cards or simply sit opposite a client and provide advice for the future. On two
occasions I have visited such a person and been given information about my life which I had

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not provided and came as a complete surprise. My wife has had the same experience.
Other “para normal” phenomena, such as telepathy, contact with people who have died and
out of body experiences have been often reported by quite sane people. Nevertheless, most
scientists are deeply skeptical. Even when there has been careful monitored evidence of
unusual phenomena, the paranormal is usually dismissed within the establishment of science
as the product of a fertile imagination or the deception of simple minds by tricksters. There is
simply no place for the mysterious.
Yet there is a pragmatic acceptance of para-normal phenomena by those who find it useful
such as police and archeologists. There are over 100 police departments in the United States who
use the service of “intuitives” to locate the scene of a crime or a lost person when there are no

other clues. Archeologists have profitably employed people with unusual mental powers to

find hidden sites. The Edgar Chapel at Glastonbury was located with accuracy by a psychic. So was
the Library of Alexander the Great, and Byzantine ruins outside Marea. But probably the most
sustained and determined effort to develop the use of psychic powers have been in
government secret intelligence services.
Remote Viewing
The CIA provided funds for over 23 years to the Stanford Research Institute (SRI) to
investigate what is now called remote viewing. Remote viewing is a term which describes the
visualisation of some place which the subject has never been to. The story of the CIA’s race
to use remote viewing as a spying technique and the equally frantic efforts made by the Soviet
Union in the 60s and 70s has been set out in Elmar Gruber’s book called Psychic Wars. The
US Army was so interested in what was going on at SRI that it decided to run its own
research and development project for a while. In looking for likely psychics, and not wanting
to appear too alternative, they encouraged applicants from map interpreters who may have
had some successful intuitive experiences. They found what they were looking for in at least
one very powerful remote viewer.
At the SRI thousands of carefully controlled experiments were carried out, not only to
explore the extent and application of remote viewing but to examine the brain changes which
accompanied the process. The most remarkable findings were to establish beyond any
reasonable doubt, the ability of just a few “gifted” subjects to conjure up images of remote

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places they had never seen. One of the most successful of the subjects was Ingo Swann who
suggested one day, that he be given map coordinates of a remote sight and asked to visualise
it. The head of the unit, Hal Puthoff thought the idea was a waste of time but humoured
Swann and set up the experiments. The results were so successful that the CIA gave Swann
the map coordinates of a suspected Soviet missile base in Kazakhstan. Swann drew detailed
pictures of the base which corresponded to classified satellite photographs. But he described
objects inside the base, which were only seen several years later by spy photographs. Swann
decided to try and visualise a really remote object, like Jupiter. Pioneer 10 and 11 had just left
earth and would take pictures of Jupiter in about 1973 . Swann wrote a detailed report of his
close up visions of Jupiter describing in particular its Saturn-like ring. These reports were
dismissed by astronomers who reminded the SRI that there were no rings around Jupiter. But
the SRI believed in Swann and wanted to be sure about his description. So they typed up his
full description of Jupiter, sent it to many eminent scientists including astronomers and asked
them to record that they had received and read the document before Pioneer had sent back
any photographs. One eminent science writer refused to accept delivery and so did the
Committee for Scientific Exploration of the Para Normal, the science watchdog to protect the
public against spurious science.
When pictures of Jupiter came back to earth they astonished astronomers. There was a ring
around the planet and a thick layer of hydrogen surrounding it which Swann had also
described. Elmar notes that the unwillingness of the more fixed-opinion scientists to even
look at Swann’s early documents was reminiscent of those friends of Galileo who declined
his invitation to look at Jupiter’s moons through his telescope. They guessed that by looking
they could no longer deny their existence.
The experiments carried out at SRI to investigate the mental processes of remote vision were
less successful than their demonstration that indeed it did happen. Yet a significant finding
relating to process was that it was a rare capacity, not shared by everyone. It is also of interest
that this talent was found amongst those with unusual development of ordinary senses like
map interpretation. One of the collective terms used to describe remote vision and other
phenomena such as telepathy and clairvoyance is extra-sensory perception (ESP). The term is
not universally popular as it implies an acceptance that the phenomena are in fact sensory and

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not a construction of the inner mind. The term remote viewing merely describes what
happens and caries no other assumptions. But is remote viewing a sensory experience? In the
absence of any plausible alternative it seems sensible to look again at the common
assumption that we have just five senses, especially in view of the other senses we are
beginning to recognise in other mammals and insects.
Beyond human senses
In his book Sensory Exotica , Howard Hughes surveys the extra ordinary sensory abilities of
some mammals and birds. These include the echo-location of bats and dolphins, navigation
by fish and birds using the sun, stars and the earths magnetic field, and the ability of some
electric fish to sense the electrical field of their environment. Most of these phenomena were
observed long before there was any satisfactory explanation for them. It was quite rightly
assumed however that they were all sensory capacities specific to the phenomena. Biologists
looked for signals, receptors, pathways and brain centres which would explain the sensory
ability. The first step, identifying what signal an organism was detecting was dependent of the
availability of sufficiently sensitive instruments. It was know that bats could hunt in the dark
and avoid each other in a crowded cave but it was thought they must do this by feel, hence
the big feathery ears. The high pitched squeals could not be heard until sensitive recording
devices were used. When the general process was realised, deeper enquiry led biologists to
the structures which allow bats and dolphins to emit high energy sounds and to amplify and
decipher the confusion of echos which come back to them.
The capacity of foraging bees to establish the compass direction of feeding sites has been
known for some time. The informative “waggle” dance used to convey this important
information to other bees was described by Karl von Frisch in 1967. What took some time to
unravel was just how bees knew what direction they had flown in when the sun was obscured
by cloud or trees. It took careful observation of the orientation of the light sensitive
organs(ommatidia) in the bees compound eye. Some of these ommatidia are able to detect the
plane of polerisation of ultra violet light. Each specialised omatidia has a particular angle of
orientation which detects light polerised in just that angle. There is a pattern in the distribution
of ommatidia with different angles of orientation which roughly represents a map of the
patterns of polarisation that occur in the sky. So the bees eye reads the sky like a map and

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provided it knows what time of day it is, (it does have an inner clock based on a daily rhythm)
can always orientate itself to the hive and its food source. Rossel and Wehenr made this
fascinating discovery in 1985.
These two examples of sensory orientation are not shared by humans. They serve to establish
the existence of senses beyond our experience and they illustrate a familiar process of
discovery. This begins with a willingness to accept the claims made by naturalists as valid
phenomenon and to sustain for some years an uncertainty about how such mysteries could
be explained. The observations of bat sonar and bee orientation did not encounter existing
bias or prejudice that would obstruct their acceptance. Bats and bees just did these things
because they were able to. We did not have to ask whether they were attributes of the mind
because bats and bees are not supposed to have a mind. So they were safely in the realm of
the material and physical world. These phenomena reported in animals have no mystic quality
at all, although they are truly extraordinary to us humans.
We know that we do not possess either sonar equipment of bats and dolphins or the
orientation skills of bees. But there are other animal senses which may not be so foreign to us
humans.
Sensitivity to Electromagnetic Fields
Howard Hughes describes the well known but poorly understood capacity of birds and fish to
navigate thousands of miles during migrations. “Pre-migratory restlessness” is the delightfully
scientific term to describe the activity of a bird getting ready to migrate. It describes the rather
frequent hopping, only one short hop and then back, like a line dancer uncertain of which
way to move off. Provide the bird with a launching pad covered in ink, and a circular paper
cone about the pad, and there is soon a rather smudgy but general direction of tentative foot
marks. It is far too rough a direction to allow landfall on a remote ocean island but it is a start.
Birds do not migrate on their own, in fact when separated from the flock by storm winds they
frequently get lost and never find their way. Of course they are not led by any particular
leading bird who “knows the way”. The flock’s accuracy in navigation emerges as the result
of collective effort, perhaps assisted by those who have been this way before.
A diversion from birds for a moment. Elmar notes that human subjects separately trying to
“view” a remote site did better when they were allowed to consult with each other to discover

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if there were any common or shared experiences. Having all agreed, on say at least one
feature of the remote sight, they would go back to their separate efforts to describe it in more
detail and then meet again to share and record further common features. This process of
recycling feedback was far more productive than the cumulative results of isolated effort.
Brian Goodwin believes this process of recycling consensus is a powerful method of
discovery and could be developed by scientists investigating those less easily measured
phenomena requiring the use of qualitative variables. It require a willingness to interact and
allow the question to be of greater importance than the person who first finds the correct
answer. It requires team work.
Not all migrating flocks of birds are normally sociable. The North American raptors, hawks,
buzzards and eagles, are solitary hunters, each maintaining a territory which is exclusive and
hostile to other males. David Attenborough tells us that when it comes time to migrate to
South America these raptors, shift into a more cooperative mode and peacefully meet up with
thousands of other raptors at Hawk Mountain in Pennsylvania. Here, the thermals are strong,
and together, the birds begin their journey south. Are these long distance migrators getting
together so as to benefit from some version of recycled consensus, in order to increase the
accuracy of their flight path?
Birds in a flock appear to lose their individuality and become part of a single unit. A flock of
terns, perched on rocks by the sea appear to be individual birds going about their separate
business. Suddenly they will take flight and in seconds the mass of individuals are flying as
one, swooping and turning in a perfectly timed aerial ballet.
This sudden shift from individual to collective behaviour is a feature of some social animals
including birds, ants and even protozoa. It is an example of the emergence of order within
complex systems which Sole and Goodwin believe is the signature of life. The importance of
emergent order in understanding living systems will be reviewed in Part 2.
Let us return to electromagnetism and migration. A magnetic field is produced whenever
there is a flow of electricity. The earth has a central molten core of metal in which there is a
constant flow of electricity. The magnetic field set up by this flow has two opposite poles, a
north and a south pole, just like a bar magnet. Any magnetised material will align itself along
the fields of magnetic force set up by the earth’s geomagnetic field. Hence the behaviour of

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the familiar compass.
Birds who are about to migrate but kept indoors, can be predictably disorientated if
surrounded by a magnetic field which blocks out that of the earth. Homing pigeons never
arrive home if fitted with a small magnet above their heads. There are certainly other means of
navigating and some birds and fish use the sun and stars to keep them on course. The
explanation for these additional means of navigating do not appear that mysterious as birds
have good eyesight and an inner clock. But where was the inner compass?
It has not been easy to demonstrate a “compass” organ in animals. A naturally occurring
magnetic rock, magnetite has been found in homing pigeons, sea turtles and bees, even in
humans. But the missing link has been the absence of any connection between the magnetite
particles and nerve receptors. But in 1997 a paper was published in Nature by Walker and
others which established a connection between the ability of trout to navigate using a
magnetic field and the activity of a group of nerve fibres of the trigeminal nerve. This nerve
supplies the face and skull of all vertebrates including man. Walker’ team found magnetite
deposits in the trouts nose, in a layer of tissue beneath the olfactory receptors. The team set
about identifying those nerve fibres going into the brain which showed electrical activity when
the trout was responding to changes in its magnetic field. A tissue die was placed inside these
nerve roots. Normal molecular traffic going back and forth inside the nerve fibre would
transport this die out to where the receptor was activating it. The die emerged at the nerve’s
peripheral end clustered around the clumps of magnetite in the nose. The criteria for sensory
function had been met. A receptor transformed the information from the environment along
nerve fibres to a central brain area during the observed behaviour of the trout.
We can now add another sensory modality to the animal list; it now includes sonar, solar
navigation, sensitivity to magnetic fields. And now for one more, electricity.

Electro-reception
Some fish, rays and eels are able to generate a body numbing shock. They have an
electric organ which generates pulses of electricity to numb or kill their prey. There are
also fish which have electric organs but generate very weak electric currents constantly, not to
stun but to “see” their way in very muddy water. Some detect the electrical fields produced

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during muscle activity of nearby fish. Others generate an electric field around themselves and
register its distortion by nearby objects. Hughes points out that all receptor systems require a
memory of past sensory patterns so as to compare them with the new input. The new input
must also be remembered so as to learn whether it is useful or harmful. The receptor must
filter out the “noise” made by the electric organ generating the impulse, just as a bat’s sound
receptors need to block out the sound of its own squeak. And like bats, electric fish need to be
able to filter out all the “noise” made by the discharging organs of nearby electric fish. The
exquisite tuning required by the electric receptors would appear to need the equivalent of a
graphics equaliser of a sound system, but at very least resistors, diodes, capacitors and the
like. And yet it is all achieved by the arrangement of the cells lining the tuberous receptors of
electric fish. Howard Hughes writes “Electroreception appears to be a primordial sensory
system; one that has been employed since vertebrates first evolved on the planet. As might be
expected from such an ancient sensory modality, the neurobiology of electroreception has
many similarities with other sensory systems...”
Does this suggest that generation and perception of electrical fields may not be restricted to
whiskered fish in muddy water? And is the sensitivity to magnetic fields confined to
mammals, birds and fish?
Human sensitivity to magnetic fields
There is a growing concern, at least among members of the public, that cell phones and their
transmitters, overhead power lines and other sources of electromagentic fields (EMF) are
harmful. Opinion within the scientific community is divided. Some bravely maintain that
electromagnetic fields (EMF) are not only safe but have no biological effect. Others are
certain that high levels may be hazardous, particularly to developing forms of life. Magin and
others at the university of Illinois found that magnetic fields and ultrasound together caused a
reduction in foetal and postnatal growth of mice if applied at sensitive stages of development.
But an Italian study headed by Margonato found that rats subjected to a continuous exposure
had no ill effects.
In a review of the epidemiological evidence, Feychting of the Karolinska Institute in
Stockholm, finds some evidence to support an association between occupational exposure to
EMF and the risk of adult leukaemia but stress that there is a lack of consistency in the

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evidence.
These inconsistencies may be because electromagnetic fields are not themselves prime
carcinogens but they potentiate existing cancer producing agents. Juutilainen and others from
the university of Kuopio in Finland suggest that magnetic fields contribute to a the cocktail of
environmental carcinogens which collectively increase the risk of cancers. The concept that ill
health is not a linear process with a single cause, is an important shift in perspective which I
will return to in Part 2. I will also review some evidence that environmental stresses
experienced during development may have long term consequences on health although at the
time there is no sign of distress.
At an international seminar on the biological effects of magnetic fields held in Geneva in 1997
it was concluded that the available evidence does not indicate a health hazard from exposure
to low levels of magnetic fields, although there is a health hazard from EMF at high strength
levels. Repacholi and Greenebaum report that the seminar concluded that there were studies
which need replication and further research was necessary.
One such study since the seminar in Geneva has come from the University of L’Aquila in
Rome. Cecconi and others found that EMF exposure impaired the development of mouse egg
follicles. They suggest that EMF might affect mammalian female reproductivity.
EMF and ESP
The effect of EMF on the brain are easier to measure than on tissues as they are immediate
and obvious. A team at Giesen University , headed by Anne Schienle showed that brain
waves are influenced by very weak electromagentic stimulation such as occurs during
thunderstorms. Another study by this group found that the capacity of volunteers to perform
extrasesnory perception tasks decreased under the influence of EMF.
As we have seen the earth’s magnetic field is generated by electric currents in the centre of the
earth. To a much lesser degree it is influenced by variable electric fields in the atmosphere
which are in turn caused by variation in the sun’s activity. The interaction of the moon and
planets also influences the earth’s geomagnetic field.
According to Gruber, a leading authority on the influence of geomagnetic fields on the brain
is Michael Persinger from Laurentian University in Canada. Persinger reported that telepathy
during dreaming was more accurate when the earth’s magnetic field was low. Other psychic

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phenomena including hallucinations are reportedly more frequent during periods of a full
moon. The association is historical, for example we get our word lunacy from lunar.
An increase in natural geomagnetic activity alters the electrical activity in the temporal lobe of
the brain and also suppresses the production of the hormone melatonin. This hormone is
associated with depression and seizure. Persinger and O’connor found a statistically
significant relationship between epileptic seizures in adults and the intensities of the earth’s
geomagnetic field during the first two days after each individual’s birth date.

Human sensitivity to electrical fields

Elmar Gruber tells us that Masters of the Chinese art of Gigong, and many others practiced in
meditation, are able to achieve a reduced state of consciousness. Recordings using an
electroencephalogram(EEG) of the electrical activity of their brains show changes during
these states. The more dominant beta waves, associated with analytical attention become
replaced by slow waves, particularly of the alpha wavelength but also very high frequency
gamma waves. The EEG recorded from a healer Rod Cambell, showed bursts of extremely
high frequency gamma waves at very high voltages. High voltage gamma waves are also seen
in people during ecstatic pleasure. The Japanese experts in Martial arts train themselves to
emit a sudden burst of energy known as tohate. Their students have claimed to be able to
detect this energy. Gruber reports that experiments conducted at the International Society for
Life Information Sciences showed that the pupil’s EEG showed an increase in amplitude of
the alpha waves when the Master ( in a different laboratory) attempted to emit tohate. Other
Japanese researcher have established that during tohate there is a an actual burst of alpha
wave activity. Gruber cautions us that only recently have the Japanese workers in psychic
research employed the same rigorous design and analysis required in the western countries.
But reports of altered electrical activity of the brain in a “receiver” in response to the
conscious effort of a “sender” are not isolated to Japan. In three separate studies in North
America, a remote “sender” was shown a flash of light on a TV screen. A “receiver” attached
to an EEG machine recorded a shift in brain waves during the burst of light. Gruber believes

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this all suggests that what we know as telepathy is accompanied by altered electrical activity
of the brain.
Elmar Gruber suggests that the domination of gamma waves, thought to be the hallmark for
the loss of ego, is responsible for cutting off the normal sensory information and “switching
over” the brain into extrasensory and mystical experiences. Gruber goes further to suggest
that mystical and psychic experiences may be the result of inner constructions by an
unrestrained temporal lobe activity. It is sensitive to electromagnetic waves of a similar pulse
or frequency which may influence the pattern of brain waves, either to suppress or stimulate
psychic and mystical experiences.

The mysteries of the temporal lobe

Persinger believes that activity in the temporal lobe of the brain may be responsible for
religious and mystical experiences. Certainly disorders of the temporal lobe such as occur in
epilepsy are commonly associated with heightened religious experiences, a sense of deja vu
and hallucinations of smell and visual hallucinations.
Positron emission tomography (PET) is a technique which monitors blood flow. Heightened
flow indicates increased metabolic activity of nerve cells. Gruber reviews a studies in which an
association has been found between gigong activity and other transcendental states and the
activity of the temporal lobe, in particular structure within the lobe known as the amygdala
and hypocampus. A group of cells within the hippocampus have been found to be active
during psychic experiences. The nerve cells of the hippocampus respond to very slight
electrical stimulation by developing their connections via dendrites, with other cells. This is
the first step to developing memory. The temporal lobe appears to play a key role in
processing subconscious information. There is some evidence that unusual temporal lobe
activity is associated with the mysterious mental capacity of savants.
The mysterious skills of savants
Savants are people with some severe mental or behavioral handicap who at the same time
possess uncanny mental skills. For example some savants, given a date, such as the 23rd
October 1904, “know” almost immediately the day of the week on which that date fell. Other
savants are able to listen once to a complex piece of music, never heard before, and

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immediately play it, note perfect on the piano. Another display of extraordinary memory are
the detailed drawings made by another savant after a brief view of a complex city scene. The
savants who seem to have a calendar inside their heads cannot explain how they deduce the
day of the week from a date. They use no identifiable mathematical procedure. The best that
can be said, in the absence of any analytical process is that savants “know” intuitively.

Other intuitive senses

The feeling of being watched is a familiar one. But can we really sense that someone , whom
we cannot see, is looking at us? John Colwell and others believe they have demonstrated that
it is possible to detect an unseen gaze. The study was well designed with randomised non-
staring and staring tests and the data subjected to rigorous analysis.
The detection and influence of electromagnetic fields on the human brain and in particular the
temporal lobe prompt the obvious question. Is electrical activity of the temporal lobes
transmitted to others? Persinger believes that telepathic phenomena are the result of
interconnections between brains via the earths magnetic field.
Elma Gruber reviews he work of Rusian scientists who found that a stressful situation in an
isolated group of mice ( they were always short of food) had an apparently telepathic effect
on a control group with whom the starving mice had been reared. The control group started to
eat more as the starving group became more stressed and hungry. It had been suggested by
evolutionary biologist that telepathic communication could assist adaptation and survival .
Influence of mind over matter
A random event generator (REG) is a machine which is a sophisticated alternative to rolling
dice. The REG produces either a 0 or a 1 which after 1000 or more has produced exactly the
same number of each. It has been used for over 20 years to test the ability of gifted psychic
subjects to push the generator away from its statistical centre, to produce an uneven score. In
1979 Robert Jahn established the Princeton Engineering Anomolies Research Progeam
(PEAR) with the single objective of studying the interaction between human mind and
sensitive physical instruments. Gruber tells us that the data collected over many years

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confirms that the REG outputs changes in relationship to the intentions of the operator. They
are extremely small changes of the order of 1 per cent, but over many hundreds of trials
however they become highly significant. Not surprisingly, some operators are much better at
shifting the REG than others. Harder to grasp was the discovery that an operator could effect
an REG when over several thousand kilometers away. Jahn suggests that by its intentions,
consciousness shifts unstable systems. He points out that any model for the transfer of
information from one system to another includes the transfer of energy. While the energy
required to do this is minuscule, the participation of the human mind in constructing reality is
significant.
Summary
There are mysterious phenomena associated with the human mind. Yet we are not alone. Our
sensitivity to changes in the electromagnetic field around us connect us with the mystery of
animal navigation. The trout’s compass is less of a mystery than it was ten years ago, but we
did not deny that trout can navigate. Bird migration still leaves us in awe, yet there is a strong
possibility that one day we will understand it better. We will need to apply the same patient
and open investigation to the mysteries of the human mind. Perhaps the remarkable ability of
birds and ants to shift into a mode of collective behaviour, one might say collective
consciousness, is a capacity which is common to humans. Do we influence others in the same
way we influence a machine? Our human consciousness looks as though it may emerge as
merely an extension of a wider network of living organisms and perhaps even wider still, to all
material things. A Bhuddist might well quip “what took you so long!”

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