Preface

At the time of Isaac Newton’s invention of the calculus in the 17th century, the mechanical clock was the most sophisticated machine known. The simplicity of the clock allowed its movements to be completely described with mathematics. Newton not only described the clock’s movements with mathematics, but also the movements of the planets and other astronomical bodies.

Because of the success of the Newtonian method, a mathematics-based model of reality resulted.

In modern times, a much more sophisticated machine than the clock has appeared: the computer. A computer includes a clock, but has much more, including programmability. Because of its programmability, the actions of a computer are arbitrarily complex. And, assuming a complicated program, the actions of a computer cannot be described in any useful way with mathematics.

To keep pace with this advance from the clock to the computer, civilization should upgrade its thinking and adjust its model of reality accordingly.

This book is an attempt to help smooth this transition from the old conception of reality - that allowed only mathematics to describe particles and their interactions - to a computer-based conception of reality.

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Introduction

A reality model is a means for understanding the universe as a whole. Based on the reality model one accepts, one can classify things as either possible or impossible.

The reality model of 20th-century science is the mathematics-only reality model. This is a very restrictive reality model that rejects as impossible any particle whose interactions cannot be described with mathematical equations.

If one accepts the mathematics-only reality model, then there is no such thing as an afterlife, because by that model, a man only exists as the composite form of the simple mathematics-obeying common particles composing that man’s brain - and death is the permanent end of that composite form. For similar reasons, the mathematics-only reality model denies and declares impossible many other psychic phenomena.

Alternatively, the older theological reality model grants the existence of an afterlife, and other psychic phenomena. However, that model is unscientific, because it ignores intermediate questions, and jumps directly to its conclusions.

For example, the theological reality model concludes the existence of an intelligent super being, but ignores the question of the particle composition of that intelligent super being. As part of being scientific, a reality model should be able to answer questions about the particles composing the objects of interest.

The approach taken in this book is to assume that deepest reality is computerized. Instead of, in effect, mathematics controlling the universe’s particles, computers control these particles. This is the computing-element reality model. This model is presented in detail in chapter 2, after some groundwork from the science of physics is described in chapter 1.

With particles controlled by computers, particles can behave in complicated, intelligent ways. Thus, intelligent particles are a part of the computing-element reality model. And with intelligent particles, psychic phenomena, such as the afterlife, are easy to explain.

Of course, one can object to the existence of computers controlling the universe, because, compared to the mathematics-only reality model - which conveniently ignores questions about the mechanism behind its mathematics - the computing-element reality model adds complexity to the structure of deepest reality.

However, this greater complexity is called for by both the scientific and other evidence covered in this book.

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1 - Particles

This chapter considers particles.

• First, the idea of particles is examined.

• Then follows a brief history and description of quantum mechanics.

• Last, several experiments that place constraints on any reality model of the universe, are described.

1.1 The Philosophy of Particles
The world is composed of particles.

The visible objects that occupy the everyday world are aggregates of particles. This fact was known by the ancients: a consequence of seeing large objects break down into smaller ones.

The recognition of the particle composition of everyday objects is very old, but the definition of what a particle is has evolved. For example, the ancient Greek philosopher Democritus popularized what became known as atomism. In Democritus’ atomism, the particles composing everyday objects exist by themselves independent of everything else, and these particles are not composed of other particles.

Particles that are not composed of other particles are called elementary particles. Philosophically, one must grant the existence of elementary particles at some level, to avoid an infinite regress. However, there is no philosophical necessity for the idea that particles exist by themselves independent of everything else.

And the science of physics has found that this idea of self-existing particles is wrong.
 

1.2 Atoms
In the early 20th century, a major effort was made by physicists to explain in detail the experimentally observed absorption and emission of electromagnetic radiation by individual atoms. Electromagnetic radiation includes light waves and radio waves. The elementary particle that transports the energy of electromagnetic radiation is called a photon.

The atoms of modern science are not the atoms of Democritus, because what today are called atoms are not elementary particles. Instead, atoms are defined as the different elements of the periodic table. The atoms of the periodic table are composite particles consisting of electrons, neutrons, and protons. The neutrons and protons of an atom reside at the atom’s center, in a clump known as the nucleus. Unlike the electron, which is an elementary particle, both protons and neutrons are composite particles, and the elementary particles composing them are called quarks.

The simplest atom is hydrogen. Hydrogen consists of a single proton and a single electron. Because of this simplicity, hydrogen was the logical starting point for theoretical explanation of experimentally observed electromagnetic effects.

However, the early efforts, using classical methods, were unsuccessful.
 

1.3 Quantum Mechanics
The solution to the problem came in 1925: Werner Heisenberg developed a new mathematical approach called matrix mechanics, and Erwin Schrödinger independently developed a wave function.

Heisenberg’s approach presumed particles, and Schrödinger’s approach presumed waves. Both approaches worked equally well in precisely explaining the experimental data involving electromagnetic radiation.

The work done by Heisenberg, Schrödinger, and others at that time, is known as quantum mechanics. However, quantum mechanics actually began in 1900, when Max Planck proposed that electromagnetic radiation could only be emitted in discrete units of energy called quanta.

Briefly, the theory of quantum mechanics retains the quanta of Planck, and adds probability. The old idea of the continuous motion of particles - and the smooth transition of a particle’s state to a different state - was replaced by discontinuous motion and discontinuous state changes.

For the particles studied by physics, the state of a particle is the current value of each attribute of that particle.

A few examples of particle attributes are position, velocity, and mass. For certain attributes, each possible value for that attribute has an associated probability: the probability that that particle’s state will change to that value for that attribute. The mathematics of quantum mechanics allows computation of these probabilities, thereby predicting certain state changes.

Quantum mechanics predicts experimental results that contradict Democritus’ notion that a particle is self-existing independent of everything else. For example, there is an experiment that shoots electrons toward two very narrow, closely spaced slits. Away from the electron source - on the other side of the partition containing the two slits - there is a detecting film or phosphor screen. The structure of this experiment is similar to the classic experiment done by Thomas Young in the early 1800s, to show the interference of light. In that experiment, sunlight was passed through two closely spaced pinholes.

In the above experiment, by shooting many electrons at once toward the slits, one sees a definite interference pattern on the detector, because electrons have a wave nature similar to light. When shooting only one electron at a time, it is reasonable to expect each electron to pass through only one slit, and impact somewhere on the detector in a narrow band behind that particular slit through which that electron had passed: no interference is expected, because there is no other electron to interfere with.

However, the result of the experiment is the same: whether shooting many electrons at once, or only one electron at a time, the same interference pattern is observed. The standard quantum-mechanics explanation is that the single electron went through both slits at once, and interfered with itself. The same experiment has been done with neutrons, and gives the same result.

Such experiments show that Democritus’ notion - that a particle is self-existing independent of everything else - is wrong, because for the particles studied by physics, particle existence, knowable only through observation, is at least partly dependent on the structure of the observing system.
 

1.4 Instantaneous Communication
The theoretical framework of quantum mechanics was laid down in the 1920s, and received assorted challenges from critics soon afterward. One serious point of disagreement was a feature of quantum mechanics known as non-locality. Briefly, non-locality refers to instantaneous action-at-a-distance.

In 1935, a type of experiment, known as an EPR experiment (named after the three physicists - Einstein, Podolsky, and Rosen - who proposed it), was offered as a test of the non-locality feature of quantum mechanics. However, the EPR experiment they suggested could not be done in 1935, because it involved colliding two particles and making precise measurements that were beyond the available technology.

In 1964, John Bell presented what eventually became known as Bell’s theorem.

This theorem, and the associated Bell inequalities, became the basis for a practical EPR experiment: The new EPR experiment involved the simultaneous emission, from an atomic source, of two photons moving in opposite directions. The total spin of these two photons is zero. After the photon pair is emitted, the photon spins are measured some distance away from the emission source. The spin of a photon is one of its attributes, and refers to the fact that photons behave as if they are spinning like tops.

In the EPR experiments that were done - first by John Clauser in 1972, and then more thoroughly by Alain Aspect in 1982 - the instantaneous action-at-a-distance that happened was that the spin of either photon, once measured and thereby fixed, instantly fixed what the other photon’s spin was.

The non-locality feature of quantum mechanics was proved by these EPR experiments, which show that some kind of instantaneous faster-than-light communication is going on.
 

1.5 Constraints for any Reality Model
In summary, quantum mechanics places the following two constraints on any reality model of the universe:

1. Self-existing particles, that have a reality independent of everything else, do not exist.

2. Instantaneous communication occurs.

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2 - The Computing-Element Reality Model

This chapter presents the computing-element reality model.

• First, the computing-element reality model is described.

• Then, how this model supports quantum mechanics is considered.

• Last, the consequences of this model are discussed, and the essential difference between common particles and intelligent particles is explained.

2.1 Overview of the Model
Just as a rigid computing machine has tremendous flexibility because it is programmable, so can the universe have tremendous flexibility by being a vast, space-filling, three-dimensional array of tiny, identical, computing elements.¹

A computing element is a self-contained computer, with its own memory.

1 The question as to how these computing elements came into existence can be posed, but this line of questioning faces the problem of infinite regress: if one answers the question as to what caused the computing elements, then what caused that cause, and so on. At some point, a reality model must draw the line and declare something as bedrock, for which causation is not sought. For the theological reality model, the bedrock is God; for the mathematics-only reality model, the bedrock is mathematics; for the computing-element reality model, the bedrock is the computing element.

A related line of questioning asks what existed before the universe, and what exists outside the universe - for these two questions, the term universe includes the bedrock of whichever reality model one chooses. Both questions reduce to wondering about what lies outside the containing framework of reality as defined by the given reality model. The first question assumes that something lies outside in terms of time, and the second question assumes that something lies outside in terms of space.

One solution is to simply assume that nothing lies outside the containing framework of reality. But if one does not make this assumption, then the question of what lies outside the containing framework of reality is by definition insoluble, because one is assuming that X, whatever X is, is outside the containing framework of reality; but one can only answer as to what X is, by reference to that containing framework of reality. Thus, a contradiction.
 

Each computing element is connected to other computing elements, and each computing element runs its own copy of the same large and complex program. Each elementary particle in the universe exists only as a block of information that is stored as data in the memory of a computing element.

Thus, all particles are both manipulated as data, and moved about as data, by these computing elements.

In consequence, the reality that people experience is a computer-generated virtual reality.
 

2.2 Components of the Model
Today, computers are commonplace, and the basics of programs and computers are widely known.

The idea of a program is easily understood: any sequence of intelligible instructions, that orders the accomplishment of some predefined work, is a program. The instructions can take any form, as long as they are understandable to whatever mind or machine will follow those instructions and do the actual work. The same program has as many different representations as there are different languages in which that program can be written.

Assuming a nontrivial language, any machine that can read that language and follow any program written in that language, is a computer.

Given the hypothesized computing elements that lie at the deepest level of the universe, overall complexity is minimized by assuming the following: Each computing element is structurally identical, and there is only one type of computing element. Each computing element runs the same program, and there is only one program; each computing element runs its own copy of this program.

Call this program the computing-element program. Each computing element can communicate with any other computing element.

Regarding communication between computing elements, different communication topologies are possible. It seems that communication between any two computing elements is instantaneous, in accordance with the non-locality property of quantum mechanics described in section 1.4. Since apparent communication is instantaneous, the processing done by any computing element - at least when running the quantum-mechanics part of its program - is also instantaneous.²

Regarding the shape and spacing of the computing elements, the question of shape and spacing is unimportant. Whatever the answer about shape and spacing might be, there is no obvious impact on any other question of interest. From the standpoint of what is esthetically pleasing, one can imagine the computing elements as being cubes that are packed together without intervening space.

Regarding the size of the computing elements, the required complexity of the computing-element program can be reduced by reducing the maximum number of elementary particles that a computing element simultaneously stores and manipulates in its memory.³ In this regard, the computing-element program is most simplified if that maximum number is one.

Then, if one assumes, for example, that no two particles can be closer than 10^–16 centimeters apart - and consequently that each computing element is a cube 10^–16 centimeters wide - then each cubic centimeter of space contains 10⁴⁸ computing elements.^4,5

2 A message is a block of information that is transmitted from one computing element to another. The communication topology describes how the computing elements are connected, in terms of their ability to exchange messages. For example, a fully connected topology allows each computing element to directly exchange messages with any other computing element.

An alternative and more economical communication topology connects each computing element only to its nearest neighbors. In this scheme, a message destined for a more distant computing element has to be transmitted to a neighbor. In turn, that neighbor routes that message to one of its neighbors, and so on, until the message is received at its ultimate destination. In such a message-routing scheme, if the message’s routing is conditional on information held by each neighbor doing the routing, then it is not necessary that the sending computing element know exactly which computing elements should ultimately receive its message. An example of such conditional message routing appears in section 2.3, where the collapse of the quantum-mechanics wave function is discussed.

3 Throughout the remainder of this book, the word particle always denotes an elementary particle. An elementary particle is a particle that is not composed of other particles. In physics, prime examples of elementary particles are electrons, quarks, and photons.

4 In this book, very large numbers, and very small numbers, are given in scientific notation. The exponent is the number of terms in a product of tens. A negative exponent means that 1 is divided by that product of tens. For example, 10^–16 is equivalent to 1/10,000,000,000,000,000 which is 0.0000000000000001; and, for example, 3x10⁸ is equivalent to 300,000,000.

5 The value of 10^–16 centimeters is used, because this is an upper-bound on the size of an electron.

Although instantaneous communication and processing by the computing elements may mean infinite speed and zero delay, there is probably an actual communication delay and a processing delay. It is possible to compute lower-bounds on computing-element communication speed and computing-element processing speed, by making a few assumptions:

For example, assume the diameter of the visible universe is thirty-billion light years, which is roughly 10²⁶ meters; and assume a message can be sent between two computing elements across this diameter in less than a trillionth of a second. With these assumptions, the computing-element communication speed is at least 10³⁸ meters per second. For comparison, the speed of light in a vacuum is about 3x10⁸ meters per second.

For example, assume a computing element only needs to process a hundred-million program instructions to determine that it should transfer to a neighboring computing element an information block. In addition, assume that this information block represents a particle moving at light speed, and the distance to be covered is 10^–16 centimeters.
 

With these assumptions, there are about 10^–26 seconds for the transfer of the information block to take place, and this is all the time that the computing element has to process the hundred-million instructions, so the MIPS rating of each computing element is at least 10²⁸ MIPS (millions of instructions per second).

For comparison, the first edition of this book was composed on a personal computer that had an 8-MIPS 386 microprocessor.
 

2.3 Program Details and Quantum Mechanics
Chapter 1 described some of the experimental evidence that self-existing particles, that have a reality independent of everything else, do not exist.

And this same conclusion is a natural consequence of the computing-element reality model: particles, being data, cannot exist apart from the interconnected computing elements that both store and manipulate that data.

In the language of quantum mechanics - which applies to the common particles known to physics - a particle does not exist as a particle until an observer collapses its wave function. The wave function for a single particle can fill a relatively large volume of space, until the collapse of that wave function and the consequent “appearance” of that particle to the observing system.

Quantum mechanics offers no precise definition of what an observer is, but the observer is always external to the particle, and different from it.

A particle in the computing-element reality model exists only as a block of information, stored as data in the memory of a computing element. The particle’s state information - which includes at least the current values of the particle’s attributes - occupies part of the information block for that particle. Assume that the information block has a field that identifies the particle type.

For a computing element holding a particle, i.e., holding an information block that represents a particle, additional information is stored in the computing element’s memory as needed. For example, such additional information probably includes identifying the neighboring computing element from which that information block was received or copied.

Among the information-block fields for a particle, assume a simple yes-no field to indicate whether a particle - or more specifically, a particle’s status - is active or inactive. When this field is set to active, a computing element runs a different part of its program than when this field is set to inactive.

A description of the basic cycle - from inactive, to active, to inactive - for a common particle known to physics, and the correspondence of this cycle to quantum mechanics, follows:

1. A computing element that holds an inactive particle could, as determined from running its program, copy the information block for that inactive particle to one or more neighboring computing elements. This copying corresponds to the spreading in space of the particle’s wave function.
    

2. A computing element that holds an inactive particle could decide, as determined from running its program, that the held particle’s status should be changed to active. That computing element could then send a message along the sequences of computing elements that copied that inactive particle.⁶

    

   The message tells those computing elements to erase their inactive copies of that particle, because the message-sending computing element is going to activate that particle at its location. This erasing corresponds to the wave function collapsing.
    

3. Once a computing element has changed a held particle from inactive status to active status, it becomes the sole holder of that particle. That computing element can then run that portion of its program that determines how that particle will interact with the surrounding information environment found in neighboring computing elements.

    

   This surrounding information environment can be determined by exchanging messages with those neighboring computing elements. Information of interest could include the active and inactive particles those neighboring computing elements are holding, along with relevant particle state information.

    

   The actual size of the neighborhood examined by a computing element depends on the type of particle it is holding and/or that particle’s state information.

    

   This step corresponds to the role of the observer. Once the computing element has finished this step, it changes the held particle’s status back to inactive, completing the cycle.

6 Sending a message along the sequences of computing elements that copied an inactive particle, is both easy and efficient, if each computing element that holds a copy of that inactive particle maintains what is known as a doubly linked list, so that the sequences can be traversed in either direction. Specifically, assume that each computing element holding a copy of that inactive particle maintains a list of all computing elements that copied to it, and a list of all computing elements to which it copied.

This method of a doubly linked list efficiently uses the available resources when compared to other methods, such as broadcasting the message to all computing elements regardless of their involvement with the inactive particle. However, there are other issues regarding this change-to-active-status algorithm that are not considered here, because reasons for selecting among the different design choices are less compelling. For example, there is the issue of arbitration logic when two or more computing elements both want to activate the same particle.

 

2.4 Living Inside Virtual Reality
In effect, the computing-element reality model explains personally experienced reality as a computer-generated virtual reality. Similarly, modern computers are often used to generate a virtual reality for game players.

However, there is an important difference between a virtual reality generated by a modern computer, and the ongoing virtual reality generated by the computing elements. From a personal perspective, the virtual reality generated by the computing elements is reality itself; the two are identical.

Put another way, one inhabits that virtual reality; it is one’s reality.

For the last few centuries, scientists have often remarked and puzzled about the fact that so much of the world can be described with mathematics. Physics texts are typically littered with equations that wrap up physical relationships in nice neat formulas.

Why is there such a close relationship between mathematics and the workings of the world?

This question is frequently asked.

And given the computing-element reality model, the easy and likely answer is that many of the equations discovered by scientists are explicitly contained in the computing-element program. In other words, the computing-element program has instructions to do mathematical calculations, and parts of that program compute specific equations. Modern computers handle mathematical calculations with ease, so it is reasonable to assume that the computing elements do at least as well.

Now consider what the computing-element reality model allows as possible within the universe. Because all the equations of physics describing particle interactions can be computed, either exactly or approximately, everything allowed by the mathematics-only reality model is also allowed by the computing-element reality model.⁷

7 Equations that cannot be computed are useless to physics, because they cannot be validated. For physics, validation requires computed numbers that can be compared with measurements made by experiment.

Also, the mathematics-only reality model disallows particles whose interactions cannot be expressed or explained with equations.

By moving to the computing-element reality model, this limitation of the mathematics-only reality model is avoided.

2.5 Common Particles and Intelligent Particles
A programmed computer can behave in ways that are considered intelligent.

In computer science, the Turing Hypothesis states that all intelligence can be reduced to a single program, running on a simple computer and written in a simple language. The universe contains at least one example of intelligence that is widely recognized, namely man.

The computing-element reality model offers an easy explanation for this intelligence, because all intelligence in the universe can spring from the computing elements and their program.

At this point one can make the distinction between two classes of particles: common particles and intelligent particles. Classify all the particles of physics as common particles. Prime examples of common particles are electrons, photons, and quarks. In general, a common particle is a particle with relatively simple state information consisting only of attribute values. This simplicity of the state information allows the interactions between common particles to be expressed with mathematical equations. This satisfies the requirement of the mathematics-only reality model, so both models allow common particles.

Besides common particles, the computing-element reality model allows the existence of intelligent particles. In general, an intelligent particle is a particle whose state information is much more complex than the state information of a common particle. Specifically, besides current attribute values, the state information of an intelligent particle typically includes learned programs (section 4.6), and data used by those learned programs.

Regarding the movement of an intelligent particle through space, the most simple explanation is that this movement is a straightforward copying of the particle’s information block from one computing element to a neighboring computing element, and then erasing the original. Specifically, assume this copying is done without producing the multiple inactive copies that were assumed (section 2.3) for the common particles of physics.

As explained, the state information of an intelligent particle is much more complex than the state information of a common particle. In general, because of this complexity, including their learned programs, expressing with mathematical equations the interactions involving intelligent particles is impossible.

This explains why intelligent particles are absent from the mathematics-only reality model.

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3 - Biology and Bions

This chapter presents some of the evidence that each cell is inhabited and controlled by an intelligent particle.

• First, the ability of single-cell organisms to follow a chemical concentration gradient is considered.

• Then follows a description of cell division, and an examination of the steps by which sex cells are made.

• Last is a brief consideration of development.

3.1 The Bion
The bion is an intelligent particle that has no associated awareness.¹

1 The word 'bion' is a coined word: truncate the word 'biology', and suffix 'on' to denote a particle.
 

Assume there is one bion associated with each cell. For any specific bion, its own association, if any, with cells and cellular activity, and biology in general, depends on its specific learned programs.

Depending on its learned programs, a bion can interact with both intelligent particles and common particles.
 

3.2 Cell Movement
The ability to move, either toward or away from an increasing chemical concentration, is a coordinated activity that many single-cell organisms can do. Single-cell animals, and bacteria, typically have some mechanical means of movement.

Some bacteria use long external whip-like filaments called flagella. Flagella are rotated by a molecular motor to cause propulsion through water. The larger single-cell animals may use flagella similar to bacteria, or they may have rows of short filaments called cilia, which work like oars, or they may move about as amebas do. Amebas move by extruding themselves in the direction they want to go.

The Escherichia coli bacterium has a standard pattern of movement when searching for food: it moves in a straight line for a while, then it stops and turns a bit, and then continues moving in a straight line again.

This pattern of movement is followed until the presence of food is detected. The bacterium can detect molecules in the water that indicate the presence of food. When the bacterium moves in a straight line, it continues longer in that direction if the concentration of these molecules is increasing. Conversely, if the concentration is decreasing, it stops its movement sooner and changes direction. Eventually, this strategy gets the bacterium to a nearby food source.

Amebas that live in soil, feed on bacteria. One might not think that bacteria leave signs of their presence in the surrounding water, but they do. This happens because bacteria make small molecules, such as cyclic AMP and folic acid. There is always some leakage of these molecules into the surrounding water, through the cell membrane. Amebas can move in the direction of increasing concentration of these molecules, and thereby find nearby bacteria.

Amebas can also react to the concentration of molecules that identify the presence of other amebas. The amebas themselves leave telltale molecules in the water, and amebas move in a direction of decreasing concentration of these molecules, away from each other.

The ability of a cell to follow a chemical concentration gradient is hard to explain using chemistry alone. The easy part is the actual detection of a molecule. A cell can have receptors on its outer membrane that react when contacted by specific molecules. The other easy part is the means of cell movement. Either flagella, or cilia, or self-extrusion is used. However, the hard part is to explain the control mechanism that lies between the receptors and the means of movement.

In the ameba, one might suggest that wherever a receptor on the cell surface is stimulated by the molecule to be detected, then there is an extrusion of the ameba at that point.

This kind of mechanism is a simple reflexive one. However, this reflex mechanism is not reliable. Surrounding the cell at any one time could be many molecules to be detected. This would cause the cell to move in many different directions at once. And this reflex mechanism is further complicated by the need to move in the opposite direction from other amebas. This would mean that a stimulated receptor at one end of the cell would have to trigger an extrusion of the cell at the opposite end.

A much more reliable mechanism to follow a chemical concentration gradient is one that takes measurements of the concentration over time. For example, during each time interval - of some predetermined fixed length, such as during each second - the moving cell could count how many molecules were detected by its receptors. If the count is decreasing over time, then the cell is probably moving away from the source. Conversely, if the count is increasing over time, then the cell is probably moving toward the source. Using this information, the cell can change its direction of movement as needed.

Unlike the reflex mechanism, there is no doubt that this count-over-time mechanism would work. However, this count-over-time mechanism requires a clock and a memory, and a means of comparing the counts stored in memory. This sounds like a computer. But such a computer is extremely difficult to design as a chemical mechanism, and no one has done it.

On the other hand, the bion, an intelligent particle, can provide these services.

The memory of a bion is part of that particle’s state information.
 

3.3 Cell Division
All cells reproduce by dividing: one cell becomes two. When a cell divides, it divides roughly in half.

The division of water and proteins between the dividing cell halves does not have to be exactly even. Instead, a roughly even distribution of the cellular material is acceptable. However, there is one important exception: the cell’s DNA. Among other things, a cell’s DNA is a direct code for all the proteins that the cell can make. The DNA of a cell is like a single massive book.

This book cannot be torn in half and roughly distributed between the two dividing cell halves. Instead, each new cell needs its own complete copy. Therefore, before a cell can divide, it must duplicate all its DNA, and each of the two new cells must receive a complete copy of the original DNA.

All multicellular organisms are made out of eucaryotic cells. Eucaryotic cells are characterized by having a well-defined cellular nucleus that contains all the cell’s DNA. Division for eucaryotic cells has three main steps. In the first step, all the DNA is duplicated, and the chromosomes condense into clearly distinct and separate groupings of DNA.

For a particular type of cell, such as a human cell, there are a fixed and unchanging number of condensed chromosomes formed; ordinary human cells always form 46 condensed chromosomes before dividing.

During the normal life of a cell, the chromosomes in the nucleus are sufficiently decondensed so that they are not easily seen as being separate from each other. During cell division, each condensed chromosome that forms -  hereafter simply referred to as a chromosome - consists of two equal-length strands that are joined. The place where the two strands are joined is called a centromere.

Each chromosome strand consists mostly of a long DNA molecule wrapped helically around specialized proteins called histones. For each chromosome, each of the two strands is a duplicate of the other, coming from the preceding duplication of DNA.

For a human cell, there are a total of 92 strands, comprising 46 chromosomes. The 46 chromosomes comprise two copies of all the information coded in the cell’s DNA. One copy will go to one half of the dividing cell, and the other copy will go to the other half.

The second step of cell division is the actual distribution of the chromosomal DNA between the two halves of the cell. The membrane of the nucleus disintegrates, and simultaneously a spindle forms. The spindle is composed of microtubules, which are long thin rods made of chained proteins. The spindle can have several thousand of these microtubules.

Many of the microtubules extend from one half of the cell to the chromosomes, and a roughly equal number of microtubules extends from the opposite half of the cell to the chromosomes. Each chromosome’s centromere becomes attached to microtubules from both halves of the cell.

When the spindle is complete, and all the centromeres are attached to microtubules, the chromosomes are then aligned together.

The alignment places all the centromeres in a plane, oriented at a right angle to the spindle. Now the chromosomes are at their maximum contraction. All the DNA is tightly bound, so that none will break off during the actual separation of each chromosome. The separation itself is caused by a shortening of the microtubules. In addition, in some cases the separation is caused by the two bundles of microtubules moving away from each other.

The centromere, which held together the two strands of each chromosome, is pulled apart into two pieces. One piece of the centromere, attached to one chromosome strand, is pulled into one half of the cell. And the other centromere piece, attached to the other chromosome strand, is pulled into the opposite half of the cell. Thus, the DNA is equally divided between the two halves of the dividing cell.

The third step of cell division involves the construction of new membranes. Once the divided DNA has reached the two respective cell halves, a normal-looking nucleus forms in each cell half: at least some of the spindle’s microtubules first disintegrate, a new nuclear membrane assembles around the DNA, and the chromosomes become decondensed within the new nucleus.

Once the two new nuclei are established, a new cell membrane is built in the middle of the cell, dividing the cell in two. Depending on the type of cell, the new cell membrane may be a shared membrane. Or the new cell membrane may be two separate cell membranes, with each membrane facing the other.

Once the membranes are completed, and the two new cells are truly divided, the remains of the spindle disintegrate.
 

3.4 Generation of Sex Cells
The dividing of eucaryotic cells is impressive in its precision and complexity. However, there is a special kind of cell division used to make the sex cells of most higher organisms including man. This special division process is more complex than ordinary cell division.

For organisms that use this process, each ordinary non-sex cell has half its total DNA from the organism’s mother, and the other half from the organism’s father. Thus, within the cell are two collections of DNA. One collection originated from the mother, and the other collection originated from the father.

Instead of this DNA from the two origins being mixed, the separateness of the two collections is maintained within the cell. When the condensed chromosomes form during ordinary cell division, half the chromosomes contain all the DNA that was passed by the mother, and the other half contain all the DNA that was passed by the father. In any particular chromosome, all the DNA came either from the mother or from the father.

Regarding genetic inheritance, particulate inheritance requires that each inheritable characteristic be represented by an even number of genes.² Genes are specific sections of an organism’s DNA. For any given characteristic, half the genes come from the mother, and the other half come from the father. For example, if the mother’s DNA contribution has a gene for making hemoglobin, then there is a gene to make hemoglobin in the father’s DNA contribution.

The actual detail of the two hemoglobin genes may differ, but for every gene in the mother’s contribution, there is a corresponding gene in the father’s contribution. Thus, the DNA from the mother is always a rough copy of the DNA from the father, and vice versa. The only difference is in the detail of individual genes.

Sex cells are made four-at-a-time from an original cell.³

The original cell divides once, and then the two newly formed cells each divide, producing the final four sex cells. The first step for the original cell is a single duplication of all its DNA. Then, ultimately, this DNA is evenly distributed among each resultant sex cell, giving each sex cell only half the DNA possessed by an ordinary non-dividing cell. Then, when the male sex cell combines with the female sex cell, the then-fertilized egg has the normal amount of DNA for a non-dividing cell.

The whole purpose of sexual reproduction is to provide a controlled variability of an organism’s characteristics, for those characteristics that are represented in that organism’s DNA. Differences between individuals of the same species give natural selection something to work with - allowing, within the limits of the variability, an optimization of that species to its environment.⁴
 

2 The exception to this rule, and the exception to the rules that follow, are genes and chromosomes that are sex-specific, such as the X and Y chromosomes in man. There is no further mention of this complicating factor.

3 In female sex cells, four cells are made from an original cell, but only one of these four cells is a viable egg, having most of the original cell’s cytoplasm. The other three cells are not viable eggs, and they disintegrate. There is no further mention of this complicating factor.

4 The idea of natural selection is that differences between individuals translate into differences in their ability to survive and reproduce. If a species has a pool of variable characteristics, then those characteristics that make individuals of that species less likely to survive and reproduce tend to disappear from that species. Conversely, those characteristics that make individuals of that species more likely to survive and reproduce tend to become common in that species.
 

To help accomplish this variability, there is a mixed continued on next page selection in the sex cell of the DNA that came from the two parents. However, the DNA that goes into a particular sex cell cannot be a random selection from all the available DNA.

Instead, the DNA in the sex cell must be complete, in the sense that each characteristic specified by the DNA for that organism, is specified in that sex cell, and the number of genes used to specify each such characteristic is only half the number of genes present for that characteristic in ordinary non-dividing cells. Also, the order of the genes on the DNA must remain the same as it was originally - conforming to the DNA format for that species.

The mixing of DNA that satisfies the above constraints is partially accomplished by randomly choosing from the four strands of each functionally equivalent pair of chromosomes. Recall that a condensed chromosome consists of two identical strands joined by a centromere.

For each chromosome that originated from the mother, there is a corresponding chromosome, with the same genes, that originated from the father. These two chromosomes together are a functionally equivalent pair.

One chromosome from each pair is split between two sex cells. And the other chromosome from that pair is split between the other two sex cells. In addition to this mixing method, it would improve the overall variability if at least some corresponding sequences of genes on different chromosomes are exchanged with each other. And this exchange method is in fact used. Thus, a random exchanging of corresponding sequences of genes, along with a random choosing of a chromosome strand from each chromosome pair, provides good overall variability, and preserves the DNA format for that species.

Following are the details of how the sex cells get their DNA: The original cell, as already stated, duplicates all its DNA. The same number of condensed chromosomes are formed as during ordinary cell division. However, these chromosomes are much longer and thinner than chromosomes formed during ordinary cell division. These chromosomes are stretched out, so as to make the exchanging of sequences of genes easier.

Once these condensed stretched-out chromosomes are formed, each chromosome, in effect, seeks out the other functionally equivalent chromosome, and lines up with it, so that corresponding sequences of genes are directly across from each other.

Then, on average, for each functionally equivalent pair of chromosomes, several random exchanges of corresponding sequences of genes take place.

After the exchanging is done, the next step has the paired chromosomes move away somewhat from each other. However, they remain connected in one or more places. Also, the chromosomes themselves undergo contraction and lose their stretched-out long-and-thin appearance.

As the chromosomes contract, the nuclear membrane disintegrates, and a spindle forms. Each connected pair of contracted chromosomes lines up so that one centromere is closer to one end of the spindle, and the other centromere is closer to the opposite end of the spindle. The microtubules from each end of the spindle attach to those centromeres that are closer to that end.

The two chromosomes of each connected pair are then pulled apart, moving into opposite halves of the cell. It is random as to which chromosome of each functionally equivalent pair goes to which cell half. Thus, each cell half gets one chromosome from each pair of what was originally mother and father chromosomes, but which have since undergone random exchanges of corresponding sequences of genes.

After the chromosomes have been divided into the two cell halves, there is a delay, the duration of which depends on the particular species. During the delay - which may or may not involve the forming of nuclei, and the construction of a dividing cell membrane - the chromosomes remain unchanged. After the delay, the final step begins.

New spindles form - either in each cell half, if there was no cell membrane constructed during the delay; or in each of the two new cells, if a cell membrane was constructed - and the final step divides each chromosome at its centromere.

The chromosomes line up, the microtubules attach to the centromeres, and the two strands of each chromosome are pulled apart in opposite directions. Four new nuclear membranes form. The chromosomes become decondensed within each new nucleus. The in-between cell membranes form, and the spindles disintegrate. There are now four sex cells, and each sex cell contains a well-varied blend of that organism’s genetic inheritance which originated from its two parents.

A species is characterized by the ability of its members to interbreed. It may appear that if one had a perfect design for a particular species, then that species would have no need for sexual reproduction. However, the environment could change and thereby invalidate parts of any fixed design.

In contrast, the mechanism of sexual reproduction allows a species to change as its environment changes.
 

3.5 Bions and Cell Division
As one can see, cell division is a complex and highly coordinated activity, consisting of a sequence of well-defined steps.

• Can cell division itself be exclusively a chemical phenomenon?

• Or would it be reasonable to believe that bions are involved?

Cells are highly organized, but there is still considerable random movement of molecules, and there are regions of more or less disorganized molecules.

Also, the organized internal parts of a cell are suspended in a watery gel. And no one has been able to construct, either by designing on paper, or by building in practice, any computer-like control mechanisms made, as cells are, from groups of organized molecules suspended in a watery gel.⁵

Also, the molecular structure of cells is already known in great - although incomplete - detail, and computer-like control mechanisms composed of molecules have not been observed. Instead, the only major computer component observed is DNA, which, in effect, is read-only memory. But a computer requires an instruction processor, which is a centralized machine that can do each action corresponding to each program instruction stored in memory. And this required computer component has not been observed in cells.

Given all these difficulties for the chemical explanation, it is reasonable to conclude that for any cell, a bion controls the cell-division process.
 

3.6 Development
For most multicellular organisms, the body of the organism develops from a single cell. How a single cell can develop into a starfish, tuna, honeybee, frog, dog, or man, is obviously a big question.

Much research and experimentation has been done on the problems of development. In particular, there has been much focus on early development, because the transition from a single cell to a baby, is a much more radical step than the transition from a baby to an adult, or from an adult to an aged adult.

In spite of much research on early development, there is no real explanation of how it happens, except for general statements of what must be happening. For example, it is known that some sort of communication must be taking place between neighboring cells - and molecules are typically guessed as the information carrier - but the mechanism is unknown. In general, it is not hard to state what must be happening.

However, the mathematics-only reality model allows only a chemical explanation for multicellular development, and, given this restriction, there has been little progress. There is a great mass of data, but no explanation of the development mechanism.

Alternatively, given the computing-element reality model and the bion, multicellular development is explained as a cooperative effort between bions. During development, the cooperating bions read and follow as needed whatever relevant information is recorded in the organism’s DNA.⁶
 

5 The sequence of well-defined steps for cell division is a program. For running such a moderately complex program, the great advantage of computerization over non-computer solutions, in terms of resource requirements, is discussed in section 4.3.

6 As an analogy, consider the construction of a house from a set of blueprints. The blueprints by themselves do not build the house. Instead, a construction crew, which can read the blueprints, builds the house. And this construction crew, besides being able to read the blueprints, has inside itself a great deal of additional knowledge and ability, related to the construction of the house, that is not in the blueprints, but is needed for the construction of the house.

For a developing organism, its DNA are the blueprints, and the organic body is the house. The organism’s bions are the construction crew.

The learned programs in those bions, and associated data, are the “additional knowledge and ability, related to the construction of the house, that is not in the blueprints.”

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4 - The Bionic Brain

This chapter presents evidence that bions give the brain its intelligence.

• First, the basics of neurons, and the cerebral cortex, are described.

• Then, arguments for bion involvement with the brain, including arguments for the computerization of the mind, are presented.

• Then the location of memories is discussed.

• Last, the basic mechanisms by which learned programs come about are explained.

4.1 Neurons
Every mammal, bird, reptile, amphibian, fish, and insect, has a brain.

The brain is at the root of a tree of sensory and motor nerves with branches throughout the body. The building block of any nervous system, including the brain, is the nerve cell. Nerve cells are called neurons. All animal life shows the same basic design for neurons. For example, a neuron from the brain of a man uses the same method for signal transmission as a neuron from a jellyfish.

Neurons come in many shapes and sizes. The typical neuron has a cell body, and an axon along which a signal can be transmitted. An axon has a cylindrical shape, and resembles an electrical wire in both shape and purpose. In man, axon length varies from less than a millimeter to more than a meter in length.

A signal is transmitted from one end of the axon to the other end, as a chemical wave involving the movement of sodium ions across the axon membrane. During the wave, the sodium ions move from outside the axon to inside the axon. Within the neuron is a chemical pump that is always working to transport sodium ions to the outside of the cell. A neuron waiting to transmit a signal sits at a threshold state. The sodium-ion imbalance that exists across the axon membrane, waits for a trigger to set the wave in motion. Neurons with a clearly defined axon can transmit a signal in only one direction.

The speed of signal transmission through an axon is very slow when compared to electrons moving through an electrical wire. Depending on the axon, a signal may move at a speed of anywhere from ½ to 120 meters per second. The fastest transmission speeds are obtained by axons that have a myelin sheath: a fatty covering.

The long sensory and motor nerves that connect the brain through the spinal cord to different parts of the body are examples of myelinated neurons. In comparison to the top speed of 120 meters per second, an electrical current in a wire can move more than a million times faster. Besides speed, another consideration is how quickly a neuron can transmit a new signal. At best, a neuron can transmit roughly one thousand signals per second. One may call this the switching speed.

In comparison, the fastest electrical circuits can switch more than a million times faster.

One important way that neurons differ from each other, is by the neurotransmitters that they make and respond to. In terms of signal transmission, neurotransmitters are the link that connects one neuron to another.

The sodium-ion wave is not directly transferred from one neuron to the next. Instead, the sodium-ion wave travels along the axon, and spreads into the terminal branches which end with synapses. There, the synapses release some of the neurotransmitter made by that neuron.

The released neurotransmitter quickly reaches the neurons whose dendrites adjoin those synapses, provoking a response to that released neurotransmitter. There are three different responses: a neuron could be stimulated to start its own sodium-ion wave; a neuron could be inhibited from starting its own sodium-ion wave; a neuron could have no response.

In the human brain, there are many different neurotransmitters. Certain functionally different parts of the brain use different neurotransmitters. This allows certain drugs to selectively affect the mind. For example, a drug imitating a neurotransmitter can stimulate signal activity in that brain part that uses that neurotransmitter as a stimulant, thereby increasing the relative “loudness” of that brain part in the ensemble of the mind.

Conversely, if the imitated neurotransmitter has an inhibiting effect, the relative “loudness” is decreased.
 

4.2 The Cerebral Cortex
There is ample proof that the cerebrum’s thin, gray, covering layer, called the cortex, is the major site for human intelligence. Beneath this cortex is the bulk of the cerebrum. This is the white matter whose white appearance is caused by the presence of fatty sheaths protecting nerve-cell fibers - much like insulation on electrical wire.

The white matter is primarily a space through which an abundance of nerve pathways, called tracts, pass. Hundreds of millions of neurons are bundled into different tracts, just as wires are sometimes bundled into larger cables. Tracts are often composed of long axons that stretch the entire length covered by the tract.

As an example of a tract, consider the optic nerve, which leaves the back of the eye as a bundle of roughly a million axons. The supporting cell bodies of these axons are buried in the retina of the eye. The optic tract passes into the base of a thalamus, which is primarily a relay station for incoming sensory signals. There, a new set of neurons - one outgoing neuron for each incoming neuron - comprises a second optic tract, called the optic radiation. This optic radiation connects from the base of the thalamus to a wide area of cerebral cortex in the lower back of the brain.

There are three main categories of white-matter tracts, corresponding to those parts of the brain the tracts are connecting. Projection tracts connect areas of cortex with the brainstem and the thalami. Association tracts connect, on the same cerebral hemisphere, one area of cortex with a different area of cortex. Commissural tracts connect, on opposite cerebral hemispheres, one area of cortex with a different area of cortex.

Altogether, there are many thousands of different tracts. It seems that all tracts in the white matter have either their origin, destination, or both, in the cortex.

The detailed structure of the cortex shows general uniformity across its surface. In any square millimeter of cortex, there are roughly 100,000 neurons. This gives a total count of roughly fifteen billion neurons for the entire human cortex. To contain this many neurons in the cortex, the typical cortex neuron is very small, and does not have a long axon. Many neurons whose cell bodies are in the cortex do have long axons, but these axons pass into the white matter as fibers in tracts.

Although fairly uniform across its surface, the cortex is not uniform through its thickness. Instead, when seen under a microscope, there are six distinct layers. The main visible difference between these layers is the shape and density of the neurons in each layer.

There is only very limited sideways communication through the cortex. When a signal enters the cortex through an axon, the signal is largely confined to an imaginary column of no more than a millimeter across. Different areas of widely spaced cortex do communicate with each other, but by means of tracts passing through the white matter.

The primary motor cortex is one example of cortex function. This cortex area is in the shape of a strip that wraps over the middle of the cerebrum.

As the name suggests, the primary motor cortex plays a major part in voluntary movement. This cortex area is a map of the body, and the map was determined by neurologists touching electrodes to different points on the cortex surface, and observing which muscles contracted. This map represents the parts of the body in the order they occur on the body. In other words, any two adjacent parts of the body are motor-controlled by adjacent areas of primary motor cortex.

However, the map does not draw a good picture of the body, because the body parts that are under fine control get more cortex. The hand, for example, gets about as much cortex area as the whole leg and foot. This is similar to the primary visual cortex, in which more cortex is devoted to the center-of-view than to peripheral vision.

There are many tracts carrying signals into the primary motor cortex, including: tracts coming from other cortex areas; sensory tracts from the thalami; and tracts through the thalami that originated in other parts of the brain. The incoming tracts are spread across the motor cortex strip, and the axons of those tracts terminate in cortex layers 1, 2, 3, and 4.

For example, sensory-signal axons terminate primarily in layer 4. Similarly, the optic-radiation axons terminate primarily in layer 4 of the primary visual cortex.

Regarding the outgoing signals of the primary motor cortex, the giant Betz cells are big neurons with thick myelinated axons, which pass down through the brainstem into the spinal cord. Muscles are activated from signals passed through these Betz cells. The Betz cells originate in layer 5 of the primary motor cortex. Besides the Betz cells, there are smaller outgoing axons that originate in layers 5 and 6. These outgoing axons, in tracts, connect to other areas of cortex, and elsewhere.

Besides the primary motor cortex, and the primary visual cortex, there are many other areas of cortex for which definite functions are known. This knowledge of the functional areas of the cortex did not come about from studying the actual structure of the cortex, but instead from two other methods: by electrically stimulating different points on the cortex and observing the results; and by observing individuals who have specific cortex damage.

The study of cortex damage has been the best source of knowledge about the functional areas of the cortex. Localized cortex damage typically comes from head wounds, strokes, and tumors. The basic picture that emerges from studies of cortex damage, is that mental processing is divided into many different functional parts; and these functional parts exist at different areas of cortex.

Clustered around the primary visual cortex, and associated with it, are other cortex areas, known as association cortex. In general, association cortex borders each primary cortex area. The primary area receives the sense-signals first, and from the primary area the same sense-signals are transmitted through tracts to the association areas.

Each association area attacks a specific part of the total problem. Thus, an association area is a specialist. For example, for the primary visual cortex, there is a specific association area for the recognition of faces. If this area is destroyed, the person suffering this loss can still see and recognize other objects, but cannot recognize a face.

Some other examples of cortex areas are Wernicke’s area, Broca’s area, and the prefrontal area. When Wernicke’s area is destroyed, there is a general loss of language comprehension. The person suffering this loss can no longer make any sense of what is read or heard, and any attempt to speak produces gibberish. Broca’s area is an association area of the primary motor cortex. When Broca’s area is destroyed, the person suffering this loss can no longer speak, producing only noises.

The prefrontal area is beneath the forehead. When this area is destroyed, there is a general loss of foresight, concentration, and the ability to form and carry out plans of action.
 

4.3 Mental Mechanisms and Computers
There is a great deal of wiring in the human brain, done by the neurons. But what is missing from the preceding description of brain structure, is any hint of what the mental mechanisms are that accomplish human intelligence.

However, regardless of how the computers are composed, human intelligence is most likely accomplished by computers, for the following three reasons:

1. The existence of human memory implies computers, because memory is a major component of any computer. In contrast, hardwired control mechanisms - a term used here to represent any non-computer solution - typically work without memory.
    

2. People have learning ability - even single-cell animals show learning ability - which implies the flexibility of computers using data saved in memory to guide future actions. In contrast, hardwired control mechanisms are almost by definition incapable of learning, because learning implies restructuring the hardwired, i.e., fixed, design.
    

3. Beyond a very low level of problem complexity, a hardwired solution has tremendous hardware redundancy when compared to a functionally equivalent computers-and-programs solution. The redundancy happens because a hardwired mechanism duplicates at each occurrence of an algorithmic instruction the relevant hardware needed to execute that instruction. In effect, a hardwired solution trades the low-cost redundancy of stored program instructions, for the high-cost redundancy of hardware. Thus, total resource requirements are much greater if mental processes are hardwired instead of computerized.

4.4 Composition of the Computers
Human intelligence can be decomposed into functional parts, which in turn can be decomposed into programs using various algorithms.

In general, for the purpose of guiding a computer, each algorithm must exist in a form where each elementary action of the algorithm corresponds with an elementary action of the computer. The elementary actions of a computer are known collectively as the instruction set of that computer.

Regarding the composition of the computers responsible for human intelligence, if one tries to hypothesize a chemical computer made of organic molecules suspended in a watery gel, then an immediate difficulty is how to make this computer’s instruction set powerful enough to do the actions of the many different algorithms used by mental processes. For example, how does a program add two numbers by catalyzing some reaction with a protein?

If one tries to assume that instead of an instruction set similar in power to those found in modern computers, that the instruction set of the organic computer is much less powerful - that a refolding of some protein, for example, is an instruction - then one has merely transferred the complexity of the instruction set to the algorithms: instead of, for example, a single add-two-numbers instruction, an algorithm would need some large number of less-powerful instructions to accomplish the same thing.

For those who apply the mathematics-only reality model, confining themselves to a chemical explanation of mental processes, there has been little progress. As with the control mechanisms for cell movement, cell division, and multicellular development, all considered in chapter 3, there is the same problem: no one knows how to build computer-like control mechanisms satisfying cellular conditions. And the required computer component, an instruction processor, has not been observed in cells.

Alternatively, the computing-element reality model offers intelligent particles. Each neuron in the brain is a cell, and is therefore occupied by a bion. To explain the intelligence of one’s own mind, it is only necessary to assume that bions in the brain perform mental functions in addition to ordinary cell functions. Brain bions are in a perfect position to read, remember, and process the sodium-ion signals moving along their neurons from sensory sources.

And brain bions are also perfectly positioned to start sodium-ion signals that transmit to motor neurons, activating muscles and causing movement.
 

4.5 Memory
Normal people have a rich variety of memories, including memories of sights, sounds, and factual data.¹

1 The conscious memories of sights, sounds, and factual data, are high-level representations of memory data that have already undergone extensive processing into the forms that awareness receives (see the discussion of awareness in chapter 7).
 

Regarding memory, the whole question of memory has been frustrating for those who have sought its presence in physical substance. During much of the 20th century, there was a determined search for memory in physical substance - by many different researchers. However, these researchers were unable to localize memory in any physical substance.

An issue related to memory is the frequently heard claim that neural networks are the mechanism responsible for human intelligence - in spite of their usefulness being limited to pattern recognition. However, and regardless of usefulness, without both a neural-network algorithm, and input-data preprocessing - requiring memory and computational ability - neural networks do nothing. Thus, before invoking physical neural networks to explain any part of human intelligence, memory and computational ability must first exist as part of the physical substance of the brain - which does not appear to be the case.

In the latter part of the 20th century, the most common explanation of memory is that it is stored, in effect, by relative differences between individual synapses. Although this explanation has the advantage of not requiring any memory molecules - which have not been found - there must still be a mechanism that records and retrieves memories from this imagined storage medium.

This requirement of a storage and retrieval mechanism raises many questions.

For example:

1. How does a sequence of single-bit signals along an axon - interpreting, for example, the sodium-ion wave moving along an axon and into the synapses as a 1, and its absence as a 0 - become meaningfully encoded into the synapses at the end of that axon?
    

2. If memory is encoded into the synapses, then why is the encoded memory not recalled every time the associated axon transmits a signal; or, conversely, why is a memory not encoded every time the associated axon transmits a signal?
    

3. How do differences between a neuron’s synapses become a meaningful sequence of single-bit signals along those neurons whose dendrites adjoin those synapses?

The above questions have no answer. Thus, the explanation that memory is stored by relative differences between individual synapses, pushes the problem of memory elsewhere, making it worse in the process, because

synapses - based on their physical structure - are specialized for neurotransmitter release, not memory storage and retrieval.

Alternatively, given bions, the location of memories is among the state information of the bions that occupy the neurons of the brain. In other words, each memory exists as part of the state information of one or more bions.
 

4.6 Learned Programs
Regarding the residence of the programs of the mind, and with the aim of minimizing the required complexity of the computing-element program, assume that the computing-element program provides various learning algorithms - such as learning by trial and error, learning by analogy, and learning by copying - which, in effect, allow intelligent particles to program themselves.

Specifically, with this assumption, each program of the mind -  such as the program to recognize a face - exists as part of the state information of those bions occupying that part of the brain that is the site for that program’s operation.

For reasons of efficiency, assume that the overall learning mechanism provided by the computing-element program includes a very high-level language in which learned programs are written. Then, to run a learned program, the computing-element program interprets each high-level statement of that learned program by executing the computing-element program’s own corresponding low-level functions.

Regarding the type of learning used by the brain bions to construct the various programs of the mind, at least some of the learning may be copying from other minds.^2,3 Once a specific learned program is established and in use by one or more bions, other bions can potentially copy that program from those bions that already have it, and then over time potentially evolve that learned program by using any of the learning methods.⁴

Regarding learned programs within moving particles, absolute motion through space is the norm for particles. And as an intelligent particle moves through space, each successive computing element that receives that intelligent particle continues running that intelligent particle’s learned programs, if any, from the point left off by the previous computing element.⁵

 

2 Given the discussion of rebirth in section 7.3, at least some of the various programs of the mind may simply be retained from the previous life and reused.

3 Given the common observation that children typically resemble their parents, and given the more specific observation made by Arthur Schopenhauer in the 19th century - that general intelligence seems to be inherited from the mother, and personality from the father - it follows that in the typical case there is at least some copying from the minds of both parents, before and/or after birth.

Schopenhauer made another interesting observation, regarding the basis of sexual attraction: Each person has within himself an inborn mental model of what an ideal person should look like. And the extent to which that person deviates from that internal model, that is the extent to which that person will find correcting or offsetting qualities attractive in the opposite sex.

4 In effect, learned programs undergo evolution by natural selection: the environment of a learned program is, at one end, the input data-sets which the learned program processes; and, at the other end, the positive or negative feedback from that which uses the output of that learned program: either one or more learned programs in the same or other bions, and/or the soliton described in chapter 7.

It is this environment, in effect, that determines the rate of evolutionary change in the learned program. The changes themselves are made by the aforementioned learning algorithms in the computing-element program. Presumably, these learning algorithms use the feedback from the users of the output of the learned program, to both control the rate of change, and to guide the type and location of the changes made to that learned program. Within these learning algorithms, negative feedback from a soliton (described in chapter 7) probably carries the most weight in causing these algorithms to make changes.

Note that evolutionary change can include simply replacing the currently used version of a learned program, by copying a different version of that learned program, if it is available, from those bions that already have it. The sharing of learned programs among bions appears to be the rule - and, in effect, cooperative evolution of a learned program is likely.

5 It is reasonable to assume that each intelligent particle has a small mass - i.e., its mass attribute has a positive value - making that intelligent particle subject to both gravity and inertia. This assumption frees each intelligent particle from the computational burden of having to constantly run a learned program that would maintain that intelligent particle’s position relative to common particles.

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5 - Experience and Experimentation

This chapter considers psychic phenomena and the related subject of meditation.

• First explained is how the computing-element reality model allows commonly reported psychic phenomena.

• Then, after identifying the obstacles to observing bions, an ancient meditation method - which promotes out-of-body experiences, including bion-body projections - is described.

• Last, the meditation-caused injury known as kundalini is considered.

5.1 Psychic Phenomena
Unlike the mathematics-only reality model, the computing-element reality model is tolerant of human experience, because much more is possible in a universe with intelligent particles.

For example, ESP: When an object is within the accessible information environment of the bions of a mind - the accessible information environment is all of the surrounding information environment whose content can be directly examined by a learned-program perceive statement, which one can assume the computing-element program offers - that object can be directly perceived by those bions.

The actual selection and processing of the perception depend on the learned programs of that mind.¹

 

1 ESP is an acronym for extrasensory perception. Broadly, ESP is perception by psychic means. Most often, ESP refers to the ability to feel what other people are thinking or doing. An example of ESP is the commonly reported experience of feeling when one is being stared at by a stranger: upon turning around and looking, the feeling is confirmed.

Remote viewing is one consequence of ESP. The parapsychology literature has many examples of subjects “seeing” objects that are thousands of kilometers distant. Thus, the accessible information environment of a bion is a sphere with a radius of at least several thousand kilometers. More precisely, given that objects on the other side of the Earth have been remote-viewed, the accessible information environment of a bion is a sphere with a radius greater than the diameter of the Earth.

For remote viewing, “numbers and letters … were nearly impossible to remote-view accurately” (Schnabel, Jim. Remote Viewers: The Secret History of America’s Psychic Spies. Dell Publishing, New York, 1997. p. 36). Because remote viewing is based on a scan of a volume of space, and given that numbers and letters are typically very thin layers of ink, then one likely reason for the inability to remote-view them is that the scan and associated processing is not fine enough to resolve them. Also, even if the scan were fine enough, that scan data would still have to be specifically processed for the identification of writing and its symbols.

As with other mental abilities - depending on the fine detail of the relevant learned programs and associated data - the ability to remote-view varies from person to person. For remote-viewer Pat Price, who seemed to be the most talented, “When he was going after a target, he could often read numbers or words on pieces of paper, or names on uniforms, … It wasn’t easy, and he wasn’t always right, but it could be done.” (Ibid., p. 126)

Claims of time travel by remote viewers - viewing alleged past or future events - are sometimes made, but are necessarily erroneous. The computing-element reality model does not support time travel. Instead, at best, time travel can, in effect, be simulated by the mind, by applying imagination and inference to whatever data is available on the subject in question.

Precognition is another consequence of ESP. For example, when a person feels the telephone about to ring, bions in the mind of the caller have probably perceived the mind of the person being called, and then communicated notice of the impending call. As another example, when a person anticipates an accident, such as a train wreck caused by equipment failure, the information could have, for example, originated in the mind of a mechanic or similar person who works with the relevant equipment, and who unconsciously used ESP to detect the relevant flaws, and then unconsciously estimated the time of failure. That person then unconsciously used ESP to perceive the other minds to whom that person then communicated the danger. Eventually, as the warning is unconsciously passed along, one or more persons may consequently avoid the danger.

Synchronicity or coincidence is another consequence of ESP. Because the mind’s bions can “see” unobstructed by intervening objects, within a much larger volume of space than the physical senses, and communicate with other minds, arrangement by the mind’s bions of meaningful coincidence is easy.


In contrast to the computing-element reality model, the mathematics-only reality model cannot accommodate ESP. With only common particles to work with, ESP cannot be explained, and the mathematics-only reality model states that ESP does not exist.

Besides ESP, there are many reported experiences that are denied by the mathematics-only reality model. However, these experiences are explained by the computing-element reality model. For example, psychic phenomena such as the afterlife, materialization, psychokinesis, out-of-body experiences, and communication with the dead, are all allowed by the computing-element reality model. Brief explanations follow:

An afterlife is possible, because the bions occupying the body and brain are elementary particles. In general, the breakdown of a structure leaves intact the elementary particles composing that structure. Because human memories are stored as particle state information, they too can survive the destruction of the body.

Materialization is possible, assuming that the computing-element program offers learned-program statements that allow a learned program to generate into other computing elements new information blocks that represent common particles.

Psychokinesis is possible, because bions can interact with common particles.²

Specifically, assume there is a learned-program move statement, for moving particles to other computing elements. Other than for moving common particles, an intelligent particle can use this learned-program move statement to move itself; and by this means, any intelligent-particle being - such as a man projected in a lucid dream (section 6.2) or in a bion-body (section 6.3), or a Caretaker (section 8.6) - can move and “fly” about.

Out-of-body experiences are possible, assuming at least some of the bions in the brain can neglect their cell-care duties for at least a short time without causing unacceptable damage.

Communication with the dead is possible, because both an afterlife and ESP are possible. Regarding the communication channel for transferring data between intelligent particles, assume that the computing-element program offers learned-program send and receive statements, that allow a learned program to send and receive data.

This type of communication must always be consensual between the sender and receiver, because reception by the receiver is dependent on the receiver using the necessary receive statement to receive the data.

Then, even if data is received, it can be discarded, filtered, or otherwise processed, depending on the learned programs on the receiving side.³

2 Psychokinesis is the ability to move objects by psychic means. For example, the poltergeist phenomenon which has been linked to children and adolescents who were experiencing emotional upset at the time, is characterized by psychokinetic activity. Psychokinesis, as commonly understood, is rare. However, cell-occupying bions are engaged in psychokinetic activity as they care for their cells.

3 The author has an anecdote that illustrates the consensual nature of communication between intelligent particles: I once went to a psychic fair offering readings by professional psychics. Interested in a personal demonstration, I selected one of the available psychics. To avoid helping her during the reading, I did not ask questions, give personal information, comment on her reading’s accuracy, or even look at her. Nevertheless, the reading she gave was a personally convincing demonstration of direct communication between minds, where the received communications were brought to awareness in the mind of the psychic.

The point of this anecdote is that after the reading was over, the psychic remarked that I was very easy to read, and that sometimes she gets very little or nothing from the person being read. The explanation follows: During a reading, bions in the psychic’s mind are receiving information communicated by bions in the mind of the person being read. If that person’s mind refuses to communicate, or is unable to, then that psychic draws a blank and must either admit defeat or rely on some secondary means, such as interpreting tarot cards according to fixed rules, and/or making guesses based on whatever clues are available. Thus, a skeptic who wants “proof” that a psychic is fake can get “proof,” by unconsciously refusing to communicate, or by communicating false information.

Psychic readings, when genuine, offer one a means to consciously learn about hidden plans and expectations in one’s own mind, circumventing the normal paths to awareness which are restricted and heavily filtered. Channeling, when the source is not merely the channel’s own mind, is a closely related talent which many psychics have. When a psychic channels communications from another mind, such as from the mind of a dead person, the same consensual communication between intelligent particles is taking place. For some psychics, channeling and doing a psychic reading are the same thing, in which the mind of a dead person acts as an intermediary who telepathically talks to the psychic and provides information about the person being read; the psychic then repeats more or less what the intermediary said.

Regarding the various props that psychics use, such as tarot cards, tea leaves, crystal balls, astrological charts, personal effects held by the psychic (psychometry), etc.,

“I read tarot cards for people one-on-one, in person, or over the phone. They’re just a point of concentration. I could use a crystal ball or goat innards, but tarot cards are lighter than a ball and less messy than the goat innards!” (Cooper, Paulette, and Paul Noble. The 100 Top Psychics in America. Pocket Books, New York, 1996. p. 266), and, “Sometimes I use cards because then the person doesn’t become preoccupied with ‘Where the hell is she coming up with this stuff from?’ It’s easier to blame it on the cards.” (Ibid., p. 250).

Regarding what is brought to awareness in the mind of the psychic, this depends on the psychic and the circumstances - or, more specifically, the received communications and the way those communications are processed - but, in general, “pictures, sounds, and symbols that the psychic verbalizes” (Ibid., p. 297).

 

Using send and receive statements, data is transferred as a message - or, for example, as a stream of messages in the case of telepathic voice communication - from whichever computing elements contain the sending intelligent particles, to whichever computing elements contain the receiving intelligent particles.
 

5.2 Obstacles to Observing Bions
Experimentation is an important part of the scientific method.

Because bions are particles, one might expect to observe bions directly with some kind of instrument. However, observing an intelligent particle with an instrument made of common particles is difficult in practice. This is because an intelligent particle is selective about how it interacts with common particles.⁴ For example, if an intelligent particle chooses to ignore an instrument such as an accelerator, then that accelerator will not detect that particle.⁵

4 Of course, the computing-element program decides all particle interactions - either directly, in the case of common particles, or indirectly, through learned programs, in the case of intelligent particles - and all particles are blocks of information manipulated by the computing elements that run the computing-element program. However, as a literary convenience, intelligent particles will sometimes be spoken of as having their own volition. This avoids excessive repetition of the details of the computing-element reality model.

5 In computational terms, ignoring other particles and not interacting with them is always easiest, because interaction requires computation, whereas non-interaction requires none. Thus, for example, bions passing through a wall is computationally easier for those bions than being repelled by that wall.

And bions remaining invisible to ordinary sight is computationally easier for those bions than reflecting and/or absorbing and/or emitting light and being seen.

Being partly composed of intelligent particles, it is possible for a man to be his own instrument to observe bions.

However, because of the fragility of the physical body, and its overriding needs, most people cannot directly observe bions without some kind of assistance, such as by meditation.
 

5.3 Meditation
The ancient books of Hinduism are collectively known as the Vedas. It is not known with any certainty when the Vedas were written, but typical estimates are that the oldest books were written 3,000 years ago.

Among the Vedas are the Upanishads, a collection of ancient writings which embody the philosophy of Hinduism. The Upanishads speak clearly about a means to experience psychic phenomena. It is an amazingly simple method: mentally repeat, over and over, the sound Om, which rhymes with the words Rome and home. The o sound is short, and the m sound is typically drawn out.

Robert Hume, in his book The Thirteen Principal Upanishads, translates from the original Sanskrit:

The word which all the Vedas rehearse,

And which all austerities proclaim,

Desiring which men live the life of religious studentship - 

That word to thee I briefly declare.

That is Om!

That syllable, truly, indeed, is Brahma!

That syllable indeed is the supreme!

Knowing that syllable, truly, indeed,

Whatever one desires is his!
 

That is the best support.

That is the supreme support.

Knowing that support,

One becomes happy in the Brahma-world.6

The above verse is from the Katha Upanishad. In this verse, one sees the praises heaped upon Om. There is also a promise of desires fulfilled and happiness attained.

The word Brahma is a technical term which occurs frequently in the Upanishads, and often refers to the experiences one can have as a result of using Om.

Taking as a bow the great weapon of the Upanishad,

One should put upon it an arrow sharpened by meditation.

Stretching it with a thought directed to the essence of That,

Penetrate that Imperishable as the mark, my friend.

The mystic syllable Om is the bow.

The arrow is the soul.

Brahma is said to be the mark.

By the undistracted man is It to be penetrated.

One should come to be in It, as the arrow [in the mark].⁷

The above verse is from the Mundaka Upanishad. The syllable Om is identified as a bow in the fifth line, and in the first line the bow is called the great weapon. By this bow-and-arrow analogy, the power of Om is expressed.

A straightforward interpretation of this verse is that the use of Om can launch the awareness into an out-of-body experience.

As the material form of fire when latent in its source

Is not perceived - and yet there is no evanishment of its subtile form - 

But may be caught again by means of the drill in its source,

So, verily, both are in the body by the use of Om.

By making one’s own body the lower friction-stick

And the syllable Om the upper friction-stick,

By practicing the friction of meditation,

One may see the God who is hidden, as it were.⁸

6 Hume, Robert. The Thirteen Principal Upanishads, 2nd ed. Oxford University Press, London, 1934. pp. 348–349.
7 Ibid., p. 372. (The bracketed note on the last line is by the translator, Robert Hume.)
8 Ibid., p. 396. (The word subtile on the second line is an obsolete synonym of the word subtle.)


The above verse is from the Svetasvatara Upanishad. It uses an outdated analogy, as did the previous verse.

Before matches and lighters, man started fires by such means as rapidly spinning a stick of wood called a drill, the pointed end of which - surrounded by kindling - is pressed against a wooden block; the heat from the friction then ignites the kindling. The beginning of the verse is scientifically inaccurate; it is saying that fire exists in wood in some subtle form. This mistake is excusable, given that the Upanishads are pre-scientific writings.

The meaning of this verse starts with the fourth line. The first three lines make the claim that fire has both a visible form and a subtle hidden form. The remaining lines make the claim that there is something similarly hidden in the body. Normally, this something is hidden, as the writer of the verse supposed that fire is hidden in the stick. But by using Om, one can draw out this hidden something, and make it known to one’s own awareness.

Referring to the computing-element reality model, this hidden something is the population of bions inhabiting the cells of the body.

Whereas one thus joins breath and the syllable Om
And all the manifold world -
Or perhaps they are joined! -
Therefore it has been declared to be Yoga.⁹

9 Ibid., p. 439.

The above verse, from the Maitri Upanishad, defines yoga as involving the use of Om.
 

5.4 Effects of Om Meditation
If one wants to meditate using Om, and risk the injury described in the next section, then the typical procedure seems to be the following:

• Lie down comfortably on a bed - preferably at night before sleeping.

• The room should be quiet.

• Then, close the eyes and mentally repeat the sound Om, over and over, at whatever seems like a normal pace; do not say the sound aloud.

• Avoid stray thoughts, and try not to feel the body.

• Although movement should be avoided, do move if it will correct any physical discomfort.

• During the meditation, the attention has to settle somewhere, and a good place to focus the attention is the center of the forehead.

There is no guarantee that the use of Om will produce results. The results of Om meditation have a high threshold. A single sounding of Om is useless. Instead, it must be repeated many times. Many hours of using Om, spread over many days, may be necessary before there are any results.

The following are some of the effects that may result from Om meditation:

1. Upon waking from sleep, there is an enhanced clarity and frequency of dream remembrance.

2. During sleep, there is lucid dreaming. A lucid dream is when one is conscious within what appears to be a surrounding dream world, and in that dream world, one can freely move about. As is discussed in chapter 6, lucid dreams are out-of-body experiences.

3. During sleep, there is an onset of consciousness, and a direct perception of a nonphysical body. Often, this bion body, which is a body composed solely of bions, is either coming out of or reentering the physical body. This tangible, nonphysical body - which is capable of movement independent of the physical body - convinces those who experience it that they are truly exterior to the physical body.

4. Something is felt in the body during the Om meditation. This may be a vibration, or a loss of sensation in the limbs, or a shrinking feeling.

Of these four effects, the first occurs upon awakening, and the next two occur during sleep.

If one is going to have unusual perceptions, the best time for them is when one is asleep. When asleep, the body has the lowest need for the services of the mind. If part of the mind were to wander off and leave the body alone, then hopefully the body will not miss it.

However, regardless of whether one is asleep or not, the primary limitation on any out-of-body experience - and the primary limitation on its duration - is the extent to which the bions involved can neglect their cell-care duties.
 

5.5 The Kundalini Injury
Although Om meditation has the potential to promote unusual perceptions, it also has the potential to cause a very painful injury. Om meditation, and meditation in general, can, after long use, cause the devastating injury known as kundalini.

This injury, which appears to be nonphysical, happens during the actual meditation. Briefly, the cause of the injury is too much meditation. Specifically, it seems that excessive meditation can cause a neuron-inhabiting bion in the lower spine to self-program, causing an alteration or corruption in one of its learned programs; and the ultimate consequence of this reprogramming is the burning pain of the kundalini injury.

The details of the kundalini injury are as follows:

• At some point during meditation, and without any warning, there is a strong sensation at the spine in the lower back, near the end of the spine.

• There is then a sensation of something pushing up the spine from the point of the original sensation.

• How far this sensation moves up the spine is variable.

• Also, it depends on what the person does.

• He should immediately get up, move around, and forswear future meditation.

Doing so can stop the copying of the learned-program corruption, if that is what the felt movement up the spine is:

a side effect of the corruption-originating bion copying to neighboring neuron-inhabiting bions, and those neighbors copying to their neighbors, and so on up the spine.

The onset of the pain is variable, but it seems to follow the kundalini injury quickly - within a day or two. Typically, the pain of the kundalini injury is a burning sensation across the back - or at least a burning sensation along the lower spine - and the pain may also cover other parts of the body, such as the head. The pain is sometimes intense.

It may come and go, during a period of months or years, and eventually fade away, or it may burn incessantly for years without relief.

The common reaction by the sufferer to the kundalini injury is bewilderment. Continued meditation seems to aggravate the kundalini injury, so the typical sufferer develops a strong aversion for meditation.

The Indian, Gopi Krishna, suffered the kundalini injury in December, 1937, at the age of 34. He had a habit of meditating for about three hours every morning, and he did this for seventeen years. Apparently, he did not practice Om meditation. Instead, he just concentrated on a spot centered on his forehead. In his case, the sensation rose all the way up his spine and into his head. The pain he suffered lasted several decades.

The Indian, Krishnamurti, who had been groomed as the World Teacher of the Theosophical Society, suffered the kundalini injury in August, 1922, at the age of 27. He had been meditating.

His suffering lasted several years, and the pain would come and go.

In one of his letters of 1925, Krishnamurti wrote,

“I suppose it will stop some day but at present it is rather awful. I can’t do any work etc. It goes on all day and all night now.”¹⁰

Such are the hazards of meditation.

10 Lutyens, Mary. Krishnamurti: The Years of Awakening. Avon Books, New York, 1983. p. 216.
 

Back to Contents

6 - Mind Travels

This chapter considers two kinds of out-of-body experiences: lucid-dream out-of-body experiences, and bion-body out-of-body experiences.

• First, the difference between internal dreams and external dreams is considered.

• Then, lucid-dream out-of-body experiences are examined, followed by bion-body out-of-body experiences.

6.1 Internal Dreams and External Dreams
Dreams need no introduction, because dreaming is an experience most people have. However, there has long been the question as to the location of dreams.

Some past cultures believed in a separate dream world, which exists around the dreamer: when a person dreams, the mind of that person is moving about in that dream world. Call this kind of dream an external dream (what is commonly known as a lucid dream, is an external dream). The alternative is that dreams are spatially confined to the dreamer’s head; call this kind of dream an internal dream.

The mathematics-only reality model cannot explain external dreams, and according to that model, all dreams are internal. In contrast, the computing-element reality model allows both kinds of dreams.

For an internal dream, the imagery and sounds of that dream are generated by brain bions, without using substantial sensory input.

That the mind can generate high-quality images and sounds, without sensory input, is a certainty.

• First, most people can imagine or recall low-quality images and sounds while awake.

• Second, psychedelics, such as LSD and DMT, can provoke a torrent of high-quality images while the person is awake.

• Thus, the mind is fully capable of internal dreaming.

For most people, internal dreaming is the rule, and external dreaming is the exception.

However, if the mind uses ESP, and/or receives communications from other minds, then a given internal dream can incorporate direct perceptions of external objects and/or communicated information from other minds. Thus, even an internal dream can have an external component.

For an external dream, the imagery and sounds of that dream are generated using substantial sensory input -  by brain bions that have collectively left the body for a short time.

However, the common particles normally observed during an external dream are different from the common particles observed when one is awake.

In other words, the common particles observed during an external dream are a different class of common particles than the electrons, quarks, photons, and other elementary particles of physics. For convenience, call the common particles of physics p-common particles, and call the common particles observed during an external dream d-common particles. And these d-common particles do not interact with p-common particles.

Those brain bions that have collectively left the body for a short time, call a mind-piece. The word piece is used, because at least some brain bions are necessarily left behind with the body.¹
 

1 The various molecules of a cell are more or less stable. Thus, typically, a cell without its bion soon reaches a stable state where chemical reactions cease, and the structure of the cell just before that bion’s departure remains mostly unchanged -  succumbing only slowly to environmental stresses from outside the cell. This quasi-stability means that a bion can leave its cell for at least a short time, and, upon return, find its cell in much the same state as when it left it (in effect, a bion also “leaves” its cell each time it sleeps - see section 10.3 - and this periodic sleeping of a cell’s bion has probably been a contributing factor in the evolution of the cell’s stability).

However, because there is so much interdependency in the human body, subpar performance by cells whose bions are absent - depending on how many bions are absent, for how long, and from which cells - could have a cascading effect that ultimately causes sickness or possibly even death. It seems that to avoid these dangers, the bions are collectively careful about staying with the physical body. For the typical person who has out-of-body experiences, the bions apparently maintain comfortable safety margins for those experiences.

 

The sensory input for an external dream comes from the interaction of the roving mind-piece with its surroundings. These surroundings typically include other minds and/or mind-pieces, and d-common particles.
 

6.2 Lucid-Dream Projections
Regarding out-of-body experiences, many good accounts have been written in Europe and America. Many people have had isolated out-of-body experiences, and some of these experiences have been collected and published by researchers.

However, there are also books written by individuals who have had many out-of-body experiences, without the aid of meditation, drugs, or other means. They are called projectionists, because they are self-aware while projected away from their bodies; and they remember their experiences long enough to record them.

In 1920, the personal account of Hugh Calloway - who used the pseudonym Oliver Fox - was published in a British journal. About two decades later, he wrote the book Astral Projection, which recounted his experiences more fully.²

Fox was a lucid dreamer.

Fox had his first lucid dream at the age of 16, in 1902. He dreamed he was standing outside his home. In the dream, the nearby ocean was visible, along with trees and nearby buildings; and Fox walked toward his home, and looked down at the stone-covered walkway. Although similar, the walkway in the dream was not identical in appearance to the real-life walkway that it imitated. During the dream, Fox noticed this difference and wondered about it.

The explanation that he was dreaming occurred to him, and at that point he became self-aware. His dream ended shortly afterward.

After that first lucid dream, lucid dreaming became a frequent occurrence for Fox. He would be asleep, and dreaming, and at some point he would become conscious in the dream. Fox noted two interesting things about his lucid dreams: he could move about within the dream, such as by gliding across an apparent surface; and the substance that formed the objects in the dream could be molded by thought.

Fox’s lucid dreams were typically short, and he did his best to prolong them. But he would feel a pain in his dream-head, and this pain signaled the need to return to his body. As this initially weak pain grew, he then experienced a dual perception consisting of his dream sensations and his body’s sensations. A sort of tug-of-war resulted, with the body winning.

Unlike Fox, most lucid dreamers never report having a choice about returning to their body, because at some point the lucid dream just ends without any warning, and the dreamer awakes.

Presumably, in Fox’s case, the perceptions he felt of his physical body were communicated from bions still in his brain, to bions in his mind-piece, using the learned-program send and receive statements.

Similarly and conversely, the communication can be from the mind-piece to bions still in the brain, as demonstrated by sleep-lab experiments in which the physical body can show various movements and other responses, that correlate with events in the lucid dream.³

2 Fox, Oliver. Astral Projection. Citadel Press, Secaucus, 1980.
3 LaBerge, Stephen. Lucid Dreaming. Ballantine Books, New York, 1987. pp. 82–95.


Fox had wondered what would happen if he resisted the warning-pain signal, and delayed the return to his body. He decided to experiment.

About a year after his first lucid dream, he became self-aware in another of his walk-around-the-town dreams. He felt the warning pain and ignored it. The dual perception occurred, and he successfully willed to retain the dream perception. Next, the growing pain in his dream-head peaked, and then disappeared. At that point, Fox was free to continue his lucid dream.

As Fox’s lucid dream continued, he soon wanted to awake, but nothing happened; his lucid dream continued. Fox then became fearful and tried to concentrate on returning to his body. Suddenly, he was back in his body, but he found himself paralyzed. His bodily senses were working, but he was unable to make any movements.

Fortunately, this condition did not last long, and he was soon able to move again. However, immediately afterward he was queasy, and he felt sick for three days. This experience deterred him for a while, but a few weeks later he again ignored the warning-pain during a lucid dream, and the same pattern resulted. He says the sickness was less this time, and the memory of the dream was lost.

After this second experience, Fox no longer fought against the signal to return.

Fox remarks that years later, he learned that if he had only relaxed and fallen asleep when he was paralyzed in his body, then the subsequent sickness would have been avoided.

If the mind-piece is away from the brain for too long, then some time may be needed for that mind-piece to restore to par performance those brain neurons that it normally inhabits. Hurrying this restoration process, and possibly ending it prematurely, may explain the sickness Fox experienced.

During his teens and twenties, Fox continued having lucid dreams, and he noticed a pattern. Often, his lucid dreams never reached the warning-pain stage, because he would do something that would cut the dream short, and cause him to awake.

Fox gives some examples of what he means: After ordering a meal in a restaurant, and then eating it, trying to taste the food he was eating caused him to awake. While watching a play in a theater, a growing interest in the play would cause him to awake.

If Fox encountered an attractive woman, he could converse with her, but when he thought of an embrace or such, he would awake.

In general, to prolong a lucid dream,

“I may look, but I must not get too interested - let alone touch!” ⁴

4 Fox, op. cit., p. 44.

Because the mind-piece of a lucid dreamer is not the complete mind available to that person when awake, when the lucid dreamer tries to think or act in a way that requires involvement of the missing mind part, the two mind parts are, in effect, rejoined to fulfill the functional request. The two mind parts are the mind-piece and the remainder of the mind left behind with the brain. A rejoining, of course, means a return to the body.

Sight and hearing are the two senses of the lucid dreamer that work as well in the lucid dream as they do in the body. The typical lucid dreamer sees clearly in color, and can hear and talk by means of telepathic communication - although conversation during a lucid dream is typically infrequent. In contrast to sight and hearing, the other senses are noticeably absent.

The lucid dreamer has no sense of taste, touch, or smell. And any attempt to use these senses during a lucid dream causes an automatic rejoining of the split mind.

In addition, apparently absent from the mind-piece is the ability to understand writing.

For example, Fox remarks that he always had trouble reading whatever writing he encountered. He could see the writing, and he knew it was writing, but he could not read it - except occasionally and with difficulty. According to Fox, other people told him that they had this same inability to read lucid-dream writing.

Instead of being an idle spectator watching the world go by, the lucid dreamer is frequently in motion. He may be moving slowly, by walking or floating, or moving more quickly by flying. However, the most spectacular motion for the lucid dreamer is a sudden acceleration to a great speed.

At first, the lucid dreamer may be at a relative standstill, or flying, when this sudden acceleration begins. As the acceleration quickly builds, the sight goes black, and there may be a loss of consciousness. The next thing the lucid dreamer is aware of, is a change in the location of the dream. Apparently, the sudden acceleration happens when a large distance has to be traveled.

The lucid-dream literature has many lucid-dream stories in which transcontinental and transoceanic distances are quickly traveled by the lucid dreamer. Thus, there is reason to believe that the projected mind-piece can quickly accelerate to a speed of roughly several hundred kilometers per second. In general, for any movement of the mind-piece, the motive power of the mind-piece is the learned-program move statement, used by the intelligent particles composing that mind-piece.

Although the motion of the lucid dreamer is an impressive clue that there is an external dream world, additional evidence comes from encounters with persons known to the lucid dreamer. These dream encounters are sometimes independently confirmed when the awakened dreamer later talks with that person.

For example, Fox tells the following story: He was discussing dreams with two friends. The three of them then agreed to meet together that night in their dreams. Fox remembered meeting only one friend in a dream that night. The next day the three friends compared experiences. The friend whom Fox met in the dream also recalled meeting Fox. Both Fox and this friend agreed they never saw the third friend, who claimed to have no memory of his dreams that night.

The experience that most convinced Fox that there is an external dream world, involved a girlfriend of his, when he was 19 in the summer of 1905. Fox had talked about his lucid-dream experiences with her, but her attitude was that such things were wicked. Fox tried to overcome her objections by claiming that she was ignorant and he could teach her. However, her reaction was that she already knew about such things, and could appear in his room at night if she wanted to. He doubted her claim, and she became determined to prove it.

That night, Fox had what he calls a False Awakening - where he becomes self-aware, very close to his body, having both his lucid dream vision and lucid-dream hearing. While he was in this condition, his girlfriend made a sudden, dazzling appearance in his bedroom. She appeared fully formed, wearing a nightdress. She said nothing, but looked about the room. After a while, Fox tried to speak to her, but she disappeared, and Fox awoke.

The following day, Fox met with his girlfriend to compare experiences. She greeted him enthusiastically with the news of her success. Without having been in his room before, she successfully described both its appearance and content.

The description was sufficiently detailed to convince Fox of the reality of her visit. Fox remarks that his girlfriend said his eyes were open during the visit.

In describing his projections, Fox often shows an apparent confusion between dream-world objects and physical objects. For example, he seems to think his girlfriend saw his physical bedroom, and that is why he makes the remark about her saying that she saw his eyes open during the visit. He is quite sure that his physical eyes were closed. He finally concludes that she probably saw the open eyes of his dream appearance.

It seems to be a rule that the things seen during a lucid dream are objects composed of d-common particles. When Fox’s girlfriend visited his room that night, she was having a lucid dream; and she saw a d-common replica of his room, which occupied the same space as the physical room.

In a lucid dream, d-common objects often duplicate the shape and coloring of physical objects.

For example, the appearances of other people seen during a lucid dream, are typically imitations of the physical appearances of those persons. When Fox’s girlfriend made her appearance that night, probably the only thing in that room that was her was the mind-piece. If Fox had seen only the real her that was present, he probably would have seen a small “cloud” of particles, which he would never have recognized as his girlfriend.

A valid question is what causes d-common particles to assume shapes and colorings that imitate physical objects?

Probably what shaped, colored, and clothed Fox’s girlfriend during her visit, was the girlfriend’s mind-piece. Specifically, the bions of the girlfriend’s mind-piece constructed out of d-common particles the appearance that Fox saw. The observed replica room was probably part of a larger replica house or building. Probably these replicas are constructed by the bions of those persons who are associated with the physical objects in question. The replica of Fox’s room was probably done by Fox himself, unconsciously.

Fox mentions the existence in the lucid-dream world of an entire city - an imitation London which he visited and explored. By analogy with Fox’s replica room, which shared the same space as his physical room, the imitation London which Fox visited probably shared the same space as the physical London.

Besides imitation buildings that looked familiar, there were also buildings and monuments that Fox knew had no equivalent in the real city of London. Fox says it was his experience that his repeated lucid-dream trips to the same town or city showed the same buildings and monuments - including those that had no counterpart in the real town or city.

Once made, a d-common object seems to remain in the same location, and retain its form - until intelligent particles move, change, or destroy it. Although the actual manipulation of d-common particles is normally done unconsciously, sometimes a lucid dreamer consciously wills a change in some nearby d-common object, and sees the change happen.

In spite of often similar appearance and location, there is no linkage between d-common objects and p-common objects. For example, an experiment that is often reported by lucid dreamers is that they successfully move some d-common object that they think corresponds to a familiar physical object; but once they are awake, and check the physical object, they always find it unmoved.

Fox remarks how the memories of his lucid-dream projections were fleeting. To counter this, he would often write down an account of his projection as soon as he was awake. In his book, Fox wonders why such memories are not more permanent. Of course, for most people the memory of ordinary dreams is very fleeting, too.

Occasionally, a projection or dream makes an impression on long-term memory, but that is the exception, not the rule.

It seems that the learned programs that manage the mind’s memory, when deciding long-term retention, assign a comparatively low priority to both dreams and lucid dreams.
 

6.3 Bion-Body Projections
Overall, Fox was primarily a lucid dreamer.

His bion-body projections, in which the mind-piece is incorporated in a bion body, seem to have been very infrequent. In general, the projected bion body can vary in its mass and substantialness - depending on how many bions are withdrawn from the physical body. It seems that Fox never had a bion-body projection in which his bion body felt substantial. During his bion-body projections, Fox was unable to directly sense physical objects. Instead, when Fox was projected in his bion body, it always seems to have been a flimsy bion body; and his senses were lucid-dream senses.

Sylvan Muldoon was born in America in 1903, and spent his life in the Midwest. In November, 1927, he sent a letter to Hereward Carrington, a well-known writer on paranormal subjects.

Muldoon had read one of Carrington’s books, and he wanted to let Carrington know that he, Muldoon, knew a lot more about projection than did the sources Carrington had used in his book. Carrington was so impressed by Muldoon’s letter, that he wrote Muldoon back and invited him to write a book, which he, Carrington, would edit and write an introduction for.

The result was The Projection of the Astral Body, published in London in 1929.⁵

5 Muldoon, Sylvan, and Hereward Carrington. The Projection of the Astral Body. Samuel Weiser, New York, 1980.
 

Overall, lucid dreams are more common than bion-body projections.

But Muldoon had only bion-body projections. And his projected bion body was much more substantial than in the case of Fox and similar projectionists, who often have lucid dreams, and only occasionally have bion-body projections. In its main elements, Muldoon’s account is consistent with the many other accounts in the literature of bion-body projections.

The main elements of agreement are:

• a complete and unchanging bion body that comes out of the physical body and then later reenters it

• an inability to contact or otherwise affect physical objects

• the relatively short duration of the projection experience, sometimes punctuated by brief returns to the physical body

Where Muldoon’s account differs from the standard account, each of the differences is attributable to either the greater density of his projected bion body, or to the presumed details of whatever learned programs regulated his projections.

Muldoon was only 12 when he had his first projection experience. His mother had taken him to a camp of gathered spiritualists, in Iowa, because she was interested in spiritualism.

Muldoon slept in a nearby house that night, with other persons from the camp. He had been asleep for several hours, when he awoke slowly. At first, he did not know where he was, and everything was dark. Eventually, he realized he was lying down on his bed - but he could not move. Muldoon soon felt his whole body vibrating, and felt a pulsing pressure in the back of his head. Also, he had the sensation of floating.

Muldoon soon regained his sight and hearing. He then realized that he was floating roughly a meter above the bed. This was his bion body floating, although he did not yet realize it. Muldoon still could not move. He continued to float upward. When his bion body was about two meters above the bed, his bion body was moved upright and placed onto the floor standing. Muldoon estimates he was frozen in this standing position for about two minutes, after which the bion body became relaxed, and Muldoon could consciously control it.

The first thing Muldoon did, was turn around and look at the bed. He saw his physical body lying on it. He also saw what he calls a cable, extending out from between the eyes of his physical body on the bed. The cable ran to the back of his bion-body head, which is where he continued to feel some pressure. Muldoon was about two meters from his physical body. His bion body, being very light, was not firmly held down by gravity, and it tended to sway back and forth, despite his efforts to stabilize it.

Not surprisingly, Muldoon was both bewildered and upset. He thought he had died - so he resolved to let the other people in the house know what had happened to him. He walked to the door of the room, intending to open it, but he walked right through it. Muldoon then went from one room to another, and tried to wake the people in those rooms, but was unable to.

His hands passed through those whom he tried to grab and shake. Muldoon remarks that despite this inability to make contact with physical objects, he could still see and hear them clearly. Muldoon says that at one point during his movements in the house, he both saw and heard a car passing by the house. Muldoon also says that he heard a clock strike two. Upon looking at the hands of the clock, he verified that it was two o’clock.

Muldoon gave up trying to wake the other people in the house. He then wandered around in the house for about fifteen minutes.

At the end of this time, he noticed that the cable in the back of his head was resisting his movements. The resistance increased, and Muldoon soon found himself being pulled backward toward his physical body, which was still lying on its bed. He lost conscious control of his bion body, which was automatically repositioned, as before, above his physical body. The bion body then lowered down, began vibrating again, and reentered the physical body.

Upon reentry, Muldoon felt a sharp pain. The projection was over.

Muldoon concludes his story by saying,

“I was physically alive again, filled with awe, as amazed as fearful, and I had been conscious throughout the entire occurrence.” ⁶

6 Ibid., p. 53.

Over the years that followed, Muldoon says that he had several more projections similar to the first one, in which he was conscious from the very beginning of the projection until its very end. In addition, Muldoon says he had several hundred other projections, where he was conscious for only part of the time during the projection.

Typically, he would become conscious after the bion body had moved into a standing position a short distance from the physical body. As far as he could tell, the order of events established by his first experience, was always maintained. His situation, in terms of his sight, hearing, bion body, and cable connection, was the same from one experience to the next.

The cable that connects the bion body with the physical body is more commonly called a cord, and has been noticed by some but not all bion-body projectionists.

What is this cord and what does it connect to?

The cord is composed of bions. Back at the physical body, the cord is connected to the bions that are still with the physical body. In a sense, the cord does not exist as a separate structure.

Instead, there are two body-shaped masses of bions, which are connected by still more bions in the shape of a cord. Potentially, bions can collectively assume any shape, such as the shape of a cord, by individually using the learned-program move statement to make changes in position relative to each other. Similarly, by using the move statement synchronously to move together, bions can maintain the appearance of being connected.

During a bion-body projection, it often happens that, at regular intervals, the bion body briefly returns to the physical body. During each such brief return, a kind of pumping sensation is sometimes felt.

• First, the bion body quickly reenters the physical body.

• Then, during the brief period of a few seconds when the bion body is with the physical body, the projectionist may feel the whole bion body pumping.

Muldoon, and other projectionists, have interpreted these brief returns as a recharging, or reenergizing, of the projected body. This is the fuel-is-low and batteries-are-run-down kind of explanation.

Actually, the likely reason for the brief return of the bion body to the physical body, is the need of at least some of the bions in the bion body to get back to their cells. The reported pumping sensation is probably caused by bions both leaving, and joining, the bion body - synchronously, in droves.

During the brief return, those bions whose time is up can leave the bion body and re-associate with their cells. Simultaneously, among the bions currently associated with their cells, some may leave and join the bion body. In other words, an exchange of used for unused bions takes place. If, during a return, there are not enough available unused bions to replace the used ones, then the whole projection experience probably ends at that point.

The consistent shape of the bion body suggests its origin. The bion body is always a match of the physical body in terms of its general outline. No projectionist ever reports an incomplete bion body, or - aside from ordinary movement such as the bending of limbs - a bion body that alters or transforms its shape.⁷ This is different from what is possible during a lucid dream.

The apparent body of a lucid-dream projectionist is constructed on the spot out of d-common particles, which have no connection to the projectionist’s physical body.

Thus, lucid-dream projectionists sometimes report having no body - or an incomplete body, or a nonhuman body. Also, they sometimes report seeing someone else undergo a transformation of their apparent human form. However, such variability is never reported for the bion body.

Instead it seems that the projected bions retain more or less the same relative positions that they have in the physical body.⁸
 

7 In medical literature, there is the related subject of phantom limbs. Amputees typically experience sensations in their missing limbs, such as position sensations and pain sensations. Also, phantom limbs seem to play a role in the use of artificial limbs. The phenomenon of phantom limbs answers the question: what happens to the bions occupying a body part, if that body part is severed? At least some of those bions remain in their old position with the remainder of the body. In the event the severed body part is reattached, those bions can reoccupy it at that time. Overall, phantom limbs demonstrate the tenacity of the bions to stay together for the good of the physical body.
 

8 When it comes time for a projected bion to return to its cell, a possible return mechanism is that the bion navigates back to the correct cell by remembering, prior to its departure from that cell, its location relative to neighboring bions, and then, after the bion body has returned en masse to the physical body - perhaps by contraction of the cord, if there is a cord - the bion communicates with whichever of those neighboring bions are currently with their cells, and then uses triangulation to control its movement back to its own cell. Given this mechanism, it follows that there must always be at least some bions left with the physical body, but this is already known to be the case. Also, in the case of cells that exist within moving fluids, such as blood, probably the bions of such cells never project, because stable reference points allowing safe return to those cells are lacking.


The typical bion-body projectionist finds himself in a flimsy bion body. These projectionists make no connection between physical health and bion-body projections - unless to claim that good health promotes projections. Muldoon, of course, was not the typical bion-body projectionist.

When compared to other projectionists, his bion body was consistently dense; and his projections were sometimes long lasting, such as the roughly twenty-minute duration of his first projection. It is interesting that Muldoon takes a very decisive position on the relationship between physical health and projection ability. He claims that sickness promotes projection, and health has the opposite effect. His basis for this claim was his own experience: Muldoon was often sick.

According to Carrington, Muldoon wrote his book from his sickbed.

Muldoon’s identification of sickness with projection ability may be accurate in his case. Muldoon’s opinion was that sickness comes first, and then the projections follow. However, Muldoon’s projections kept many bions away from their cells, and sometimes for comparatively long periods of time. Therefore, it seems more reasonable to suppose that the projections came first - followed by the sickness.

Regarding the vibration of the bion body, the bion body is known to vibrate at times. The typical literature of the 20th century has an erroneous explanation for this vibration of the bion body, based on the premise that there are different invisible planes of existence. The phrase planes of existence is a figure of speech, used in the literature to suggest separateness.

According to the erroneous explanation, these planes operate at different frequencies, and the vibration rate of the bion body can match these different frequencies. Thus, according to this explanation, the vibration rate of the bion body determines which of these invisible planes becomes visible and accessible to the projectionist.

There are three reasons why this erroneous explanation came about.

• First, bion-body projectionists report that when they feel the vibrations increasing in frequency, then separation of the bion body from the physical body will happen. Conversely, when they feel the vibrations decreasing in frequency, then re-association of the bion body with the physical body is likely. Thus, it was argued that there is a correlation between low vibration frequency and the physical plane of existence.

• Second, projectionists often report experiences that are very different from each other. It was argued that this suggests different planes of existence. For example, lucid dreams are happening on one plane, and bion-body projections are happening on a different plane.

• Third, vibrations are easily described with mathematics. Thus, a vibrational model of reality appealed to those who were influenced by the mathematics-only reality model.

The correlation of decreasing frequency with physical re-association, and increasing frequency with physical disassociation, suggests that when the bion body is separated from the physical body, and the projectionist does not feel any vibration, then the bion body is nevertheless vibrating, but at a frequency too high to be felt or otherwise noticed.

Probably this vibration of the bion body is a consequence of the process that keeps the bion body together when it is away from the physical body. However, regardless of the specific cause, the vibrations have nothing to do with tuning in alternate realities - as though the bion body were a radio-or television-tuner switching stations and channels, instead of being what it really is: a population of cooperating intelligent particles.

After the onset of the vibrations, Muldoon felt himself floating. As he was floating upward, his senses of hearing and sight became active. That Muldoon could see and hear physical objects is unusual. Most bion-body projectionists see and hear physical objects either poorly or not at all. Instead, they see either darkness or d-common objects. Also, they can see their own bion body - typically as a darkness-enveloped, grainy, gray-looking, wispy body - when they look at it. To try to understand what Muldoon’s senses were like, here are a few quotes:

When the sense of hearing first begins to manifest, the sounds seem far away. When the eyes first begin to see, everything seems blurred and whitish. Just as the sounds become more distinct, so does the sense of sight become clearer and clearer.⁹

9 Ibid., p. 233.

As is often the case, everything at first seemed blurred about me, as though the room were filled with steam, or white clouds, half transparent; as though one were looking through an imperfect windowpane, seeing blurry objects through it.

This condition is but temporary, however - lasting, as a rule, about a minute in practically all conscious projections.¹⁰

Once you are exteriorized, and your sense of sight working, the room, which was dark to your physical eyes, is no longer dark - for you are using your astral eyes, and there is a ‘foggish’ light everywhere, such as you see in your dreams, a diffused light we might call it, a light which seems none too bright, and yet is not too dim, apparently sifting right through the objects of the material world.¹¹

10 Ibid., p. 255.
11 Ibid., p. 204.


The primary difference between Muldoon and most other bion-body projectionists, was the high density of his bion body.

There were many more bions in Muldoon’s projected bion body than most bion-body projectionists have in theirs. Bions interact with the p-common particles of one’s cells, and it appears that some of the bions in Muldoon’s projected bion body were collectively sensing p-common particles.

By sensing photons, and the atoms and molecules of the air, data is available that can be processed into sight and sound perceptions of physical objects. Apparently, the greater density of Muldoon’s bion body meant that there were more bions available that could do the sensing and processing.

Although Muldoon’s sight perceptions could have been constructed from ESP of the nearby physical objects, without having to sense photons, there is a complexity cost. Specifically, to get results and accuracy comparable to algorithms using photon data, the processing algorithms using ESP data would have to be much more complex, because of such complications as having to determine visible surfaces, perspectives, and, most difficult, colorings and/or grayness.

Thus, for simplicity, assume photon sensing. Specifically, Muldoon’s ability to see physical objects in an otherwise dark room, suggests an extremely sensitive light sensor and/or a sensor that measures more of the electromagnetic spectrum than just the visible-light portion.

The cord that Muldoon noticed during his first projection, was a common feature of his later projections. He often studied this cord when he was projected. For Muldoon, out to a somewhat variable distance of a few meters from his physical body, his cord remained thick. As long as the cord appeared thick, his bion body was strongly influenced by his physical body. Within this range, Muldoon felt happenings to his physical body reproduced in his bion body.

For example, once a pet dog jumped on the bed and snuggled against Muldoon’s physical body, while he was projected within range. He felt this dog as though it were pressing against his bion body. Besides feeling his physical body’s sensations, Muldoon could also control its breathing when within range.

Either these communications between the projected Muldoon and his physical body were being directly communicated from brain bions to mind-piece bions, and vice versa, in the same manner as during a lucid dream - in which case cord thickness and communication ability correlated only because the learned programs regulating Muldoon’s projections made them correlate; or, these communications followed an indirect path along the cord, conditional upon the cord’s thickness.

As Muldoon moved further away from his physical body, the cord became very thin, like a thread. Muldoon claims that the cord kept its threadlike thinness out to whatever distance he moved to - even to a distance of many kilometers. Perhaps the cord is, in effect, a life line, guaranteeing that the bion body can get back to its cells in a timely manner.

However, there is no evidence for any kind of cord during a lucid-dream projection; a likely explanation for this difference is that the mind-piece has a sophisticated collection of learned programs for such things as ESP and inter-mind communication, which support an independent return capability - whereas the bions in the bion body have a more limited and less autonomous return capability.

One might wonder if there is a limit on how far away a bion body can move from the physical body, because of the trailing cord. Although there are many stories of lucid-dream projectionists moving thousands of kilometers away from their physical bodies, there is no good evidence that a bion-body projectionist has ever moved such a distance away.

Thus, it is probably safe to say that the range of the bion-body projectionist is substantially less than the range of the lucid-dream projectionist.

During Muldoon’s first projection, he tried to make contact with the other people in the house. He saw their physical bodies lying in bed, but his bion-body hands passed right through them. There seems to be a fair-play rule involved here.

Broadly, the fair-play rule covers all the restrictions imposed on bions for the sake of organic life.¹²

12 The fair-play rule exists primarily in a negative sense, in terms of what is missing. Given the fragility of organic structures, the bions concerned with organic life have evolved their learned programs so as to avoid any heavy-handed use of those learned-program statements, such as the move statement, that could damage those fragile structures.

For those learned-program statements that cannot directly affect p-common particles - such as the perceive, send, and receive statements - there is no direct danger to organic structures. Thus, in the human population with regard to psychic phenomena, one would expect to see a higher incidence of those phenomena that are physically harmless. And this is indeed the case. For example, both ESP (which uses the perceive statement), and direct communication between minds (which uses the send and receive statements), are much more common than psychokinesis (which uses the move statement), and materialization.

Still, overt displays of ESP and inter-mind communication are not widespread, and it appears that different evolutionary forces are at work to suppress such physically harmless psychic phenomena. For example, social forces are at work: In Europe, during the Middle Ages, women who were overtly psychic were murdered as witches by the religious establishment.
 

For example, a consciously controlled bion body can contact other bion bodies, but it cannot contact the bions within physical bodies, and it cannot contact physical objects. However, because d-common particles have no part in organic life, bion manipulation of d-common particles, as was indicated in section 6.2, is apparently unrestricted.

Muldoon remarks how frustrated he was that he could never make contact with physical objects. In the many projections he had, his bion body never made contact with a physical object while he was conscious. However, there were a few instances when Muldoon knew that his bion body had made contact with a physical object while he was unconscious.

For example: On the night of February 26, 1928, Muldoon had a serious stomach sickness, which caused him great pain. At near midnight, he was overcome with pain, and called out to his mother for help. She was asleep in an upstairs bedroom, and did not hear him. Muldoon struggled out of bed, still calling, and he fainted from the pain and effort. He regained consciousness, only to struggle and faint again.

The next time he regained consciousness, he was projected in his bion body. His bion body was moving without conscious control up the stairs, through a wall, and into the room where his mother and small brother were sleeping. Muldoon saw both of them sound asleep on the bed. Then Muldoon lost consciousness for a brief period. Upon regaining consciousness, Muldoon saw his mother and small brother excitedly talking about being rolled out of bed by an uplifted mattress.

After witnessing this scene, Muldoon’s bion body was drawn back and reentered his physical body. Back in his physical body, Muldoon called to his mother. This time she heard him, and came downstairs. Ignoring that he was lying on the floor, she excitedly told him how spirits had lifted the mattress several times. And she was, of course, frightened by it.

That the bion body is restricted from physical contact - and from contact with other bions in a physical body -  is obviously for the common good. It seems that the only contact allowed is what may be called fair contact. And the only fair contact for a projected bion body, is contact with other projected bion bodies, or contact with bion bodies that have no physical-body connection.

Because they are meeting on equal terms, the two bion bodies can make contact with each other. Most bion-body projectionists eventually have encounters with other bion bodies. Struggles and fights are often reported. These encounters can be both frightening and painful. Muldoon gives one example of this kind of encounter:

In 1923, Muldoon listened to a conversation between his mother and another woman who lived in town. This other woman described what an awful man her husband, who had just died, had been. Because of the stories the woman told, Muldoon became angered against that man.

That night, Muldoon had a projection. Upon turning to look at his physical body, Muldoon was shocked to see the bion body of the dead man talked about earlier in the day. Muldoon describes this man as having a savage look, and being determined for revenge - and he quickly attacked the projected Muldoon. There was a fight, and Muldoon was getting the worst of it - as well as being cursed at.

However, the fight soon ended when Muldoon was drawn back into his physical body. Once he reentered his physical body, Muldoon no longer felt or heard the attack of his enemy.

Muldoon remarks how his attacker clung to him and continued his attack while Muldoon was being slowly drawn back toward his physical body. However, the attacker was unable to prevent Muldoon’s reentry.

This chapter has considered in detail both lucid-dream projections and bion-body projections. A third kind of projection is covered in chapter 7.
 

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