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Dr. John C. Lilly, M.D.
January 06, 1915 - September 30, 2001

This nOde last updated April 30th, 2002 and is permanently morphing...
(3 Eb (Grass) / 5 Uo - 172/260 - 12.19.9.3.12)

Dr. John C. Lilly, M.D. (1915- ) is a physician and  psychoanalyst specializing in biophysics, neurophysiology, electronics, computer theory, and neuroanatomy.

inventor of the Isolation Tank Method
  illustrated in the film, _Altered States_

authored:

•  _Programming and Metaprogramming the Human Biocomputer_
• _Simulations Of God_
• _The Deep Self: Profound Relaxation and the Tank Isolation Technique_

collaborated with Margaret Howe on humane dolphin experiments in 1964. focus: interspecies communication.

John C. Lilly, M.D., an unparalleled scientific visionary and  explorer, has made significant contributions to psychology, brain research, computer theory, medicine, ethics,  delphinlogy, and interspecies communication. His work launched the global interest in dolphins and whales, provided the basis for the movie _Day of the Dolphin_, and stimulated the enactment of the Marine Mammal Protection Act. Lilly's interest in the nature of human consciousness led him to invent the isolation tank in the 1950s. In the early sixties,  Lilly encountered LSD and soon took his experiments with this mindchanger to the isolation tank. The hairraising experiences that resulted formed the essence of the movie _Altered States_.

Lilly's life and work at the forefronts of human knowledge encompass the major themes of the twentieth century. His  dozen books have sold millions of copies worldwide. A distinguished brain researcher even before he became a public figure, Lilly has sown the seeds of several scientific revolutions, including the theory of internal realities, the hardware/software model of the human brain/ mind, and the initiation of worldwide efforts at interspecies communications with large-brained dolphins.

Devoted to a philosophical quest for the nature of reality,  Lilly pursued a brilliant academic career among the scientific  leaders of the day, mastering one science after another and eventually achieving a perspective that transcends the  centuries-old conflict between rationality and mysticism. He  has lived in the company of associates and intimates including Nobel physicists Richard Feynman and Robert Milliken, philosophers Buckminster Fuller, Aldous Huxley,  and Alan Watts, psychotherapy pioneers R.D. Laing and Fritz Perls, spiritual teachers Oscar Ichazo and Baba Ram Dass, and a host of luminaries, inventors, writers, and Hollywood celebrities.

Today, John Lilly stands as the twentieth century's foremost scientific pioneer of the inner and outer limits of human experience. He is a relentless adventurer whose "search for Reality" has led him repeatedly to risk life and limb, but whose quests have resulted in astonishing insights into what it means to be a human being in an ever more mysterious universe.

He clears up some misunderstanding caused by the movie _Altered States_ which in some of its background writeups and releases said things like "[ Lilly ] was inundated by 'processes of immense energy, fantastic light and terrifying power' which made him fear that 'he would lose control and not be able to come back.'

Lilly: "Historically this implication ( that the experiences reported were caused by the tank isolation ) is incorrect. The history of my experiments with the tank show from 1954 to 1964 recorded no negative experiences. The isolation itself floating in water was not negative.... As long as no psychedelics, hallucinogenic, or mind-altering drugs are used in the tank, ordinary non-ill persons with "non-altered states of consciousness" in general need not fear tank isolation as a cause of "altered states" of consciousness.   "Where then does the movie's brochure quote come from? It comes from the period 1964 to 1966 when I was researching the effects of LSD-25 on myself in the isolation tank. These experiences were dramatic and quite different from non-drug use of the tank before or after that period of research.... My present use and experience of the tank is quite undramatic, restful, and restorative. As the second title of the book implies my current goal and use is for the profound relaxation which I find it very easy to allow in our Samadhi Tank." This is not to say he didn't like the movie _Altered States_.

"The film is a fine portrayal of some of my experiences in the isolation tank during the researches on my own mind with LSD-25. As my wife Toni said, while crying during the presentation, the film is "externalized poetry of the 'inner' experiences." My feeling was that everyone making that film somehow must have had similar experiences in order to do such a good representation of "altered states." The acting by the researcher and his wife to us was very moving. It reminded us of some of our own experiences written up in my book, "The Scientist: a Novel Autobiography", in which Toni saved my life several times."

track _Sensory (Deprivation)_ by Symbiosis off of _Meta_ CDb on Domestic

Interstellar Telepathy, Sirius, and the Illuminati. Many people have claimed to have received messages via interstellar telepathy. Saul-Paul Sirag, a physicist, has said that over a hundred scientists in the United States have had this experience, but are reluctant to admit it publicly, for obvious reasons. Buckminster Fuller, renowned scientific philosopher, has stated that he sometimes thinks that he has received messages from interstellar telepaths. Dr. John Lilly, psychoanalyst, neuro-anatomist, cyberneticist, mathematician, and pioneering dolphin researcher, has made allusions to contact during the early seventies from interstellar entities he terms the "Cosmic Coincidence Control Center".

"In the province of connected minds, what the network believes to be true, either is true or becomes true within certain limits to be found experientially and experimentally. These limits are further beliefs to be transcended. In the network's mind there are no limits."

 - John C. Lilly 

• John Lilly's grandfather's signature is on the 1927 ten dollar bill.
• Burgess Meredith was a life long friend (he appeard in five episodes of The Twilight Zone).
• downtempo track _Interspecies Communication_ MP3 (192k) by Lucky People Center off of _Interspecies Communication_ CD on Beverage (1995)

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