Original subtitles

Now that we have some insight

into the concept of experiential space

we may consider interaction among the experiential space continua

of a highly unique group of individuals.

In general, the study of the varying dimensions of human experience

in the context of man in his society is known as human social cybernetics.

In our experiment, eight Category-A subjects

underwent pattern brain surgery, whose programme was developed

within the academy's organic computer dialectic system.

The object of surgery was to extend,

by a process called bio-chemical induction,

the natural electro-chemical network of the human brain.

This extension would provide each subject with telepathic capabilities.

A telepathist is one who can communicate with other minds

by means which do not involve perception by the senses.

Thus, telepathy is a form of extrasensory perception or ESP.

Our subjects were to be kept in isolation at the Institute for three months,

where they were to prepare for their first meeting as a group.

This meeting was to take place at the Academy sanatorium

in the Ontario Northwoods.

Telepathic dependency is an extreme form of psychic addiction.

It is essentially an electro-chemical addiction.

The dependant surrendering the autonomy

of his own nervous system to that of the object of his dependency,

and altering his patterns of electro-chemical discharge

to mimic those of his object.

When the object of dependency

is telepathically unavailable for long periods of time,

the new nervous patterns find themselves

suddenly without a constant source of electro-morphological reinforcement,

and severe psychic disorientation

begins to manifest itself in the dependant.

At its most intense level

a frustrated dependency can result

in the irreversible distraction of critical brain tissue.

In as much as the establishment of a partial telepathic dependency

of the subject upon his researcher is an unavoidable part

of the para-psychological experimental gestalt.

The means to maintain this dependency at a controllable level

must be considered an organic element forming that experimental gestalt.

During the Institute phase of the induced telepathy series,

a subject possessed of a statistically excessive

dependency susceptibility quotient

wounded himself in the forehead with a hand drill.

The wound - a hole about one half an inch in diameter -

completely penetrated the subject's skull,

and seemed to afford him the relief of imagined cranial pressures,

temporary euphoria

and electro-chemical dissociation which it sought.

It will perhaps clarify these matters

if we consider the specific configuration of the Category-A subject.

Category-A is a classification which finds its meaning

within the scientific metaphysics

of the aphrodisiast and theorist Luther Stringfellow.

It is not what is usually considered an objective classification,

based, for example, upon physical or psychological characteristics.

Category-A is rather a certain field reaction of the researcher

to an intensive period of personal interaction

with each of his potential subjects.

There is also, therefore, the element of an aesthetics of human form

in the Category-A system of subject classification.

Dr Stringfellow made his name

as an exponent of the existential organic approach to the sciences,

long before his work in the socio-chemistry of the erotic

achieved its present international eminence.

A Category-A classification is the existential organic methodology

put into practice.

Dr Stringfellow has repeatedly stressed the vital necessity

for the use of this approach,

particularly, in the new social sciences,

where variables are infinite

and complexity is of the highest possible order.

The nature of erotic research requires

that the sexual emotional involvement of the researcher with each subject

be taken to its farthest possible extreme.

It is only in this way that the researcher,

in whose consciousness a total mosaic of his particular research project exists,

can divine in each of his subjects a colour, a texture and a shape.

And so assign to that subject his proper place in the research mosaic.

It was hoped that many important questions

would be clarified, if not answered,

during the course of our experiment with induced telepathy.

Two of the eight subjects consented

to having portions of their larynx removed,

making it physically impossible for them to speak.

In addition, large portions of the speech centres

of the brains of these subjects were obliterated

so that the psychological faculty of speech itself would be impaired.

Would the maturing and strengthening

of the telepathic capacity in these speechless subjects

surpass that of the subjects who still retained the ability to speak?

It was anticipated that the telepathic experience

would be much more than simply reading another's mind.

One telepathist would perhaps be able to apprehend not only verbal patterns,

as they arose within the mind of another,

but would also encounter simultaneously the germinative layers of memory,

learning, emotional response, and psycho-physiological impulse,

which actually generate thought and language.

How dependent upon language is thought?

Is abstract logical thought even possible without language?

The essence of the telepathic bond

is the dominance of one of the particles forming the telepathic conglomerate.

Whether the conglomerate consists of two telepathists

or of a large socially cohesive group,

the principle of psychic dominance remains constant.

The dominant personality is responsible

for the suppression of the heterogeneous elements

which the conglomerate comprises.

The homogeneous elements which remain

are then driven together to form the conglomerate

by the laws of telepathic bonding implicit in the Stringfellow Hypothesis.

The principle of dominance thus provides the agglutinising impetus

which induces the initial conglomerative motion.

As Stringfellow notes in defining the nature of dominance,

the will of the newly formed conglomerate

must necessarily be a function of the will of the dominant personality.

Only after an indefinite period of symbiotic telepathic cohesion

can the dominant personality abdicate its agglutinative role

and encourage the emergence

of a truly synthetic conglomerate personality.

Stringfellow's behaviour as parapsychologist

suggests that perhaps his foremost post-operative research objective

was to intuit which among his Category-A subjects

was the one most capable of assuming the role of psychic dominant.

This subject was then provided indirectly

with certain historical and interpretive data

concerning his fellow subjects.

This data would naturally assure

the immediate social dominance of the chosen subject

within the context of the experimental, socially isolate gestalt.

The function of the dominant would then be

to select from among his fellow subjects the one psychically most vulnerable.

And by the application of subtle, social intimidations

followed by a careful series of potent symbolic gestures

draw the subject into the field of his psycho-telepathic dominance.

Once a true conglomerate exhibiting complete telepathic bonding

has been established between this primary couple,

the progression towards a larger and more complex conglomerate may begin.

In psychic research

the emotional distance between the researcher and his subject

is inevitably diminished until it is no more

than the distance between any two persons.

The acquiescence of the subject of the demands of the researcher

comes nothing more nor less,

than an individual act of faith... of love.

If there can be no love between researcher and subject

there can be no experimentation.

In conventional theories of scientific methodology,

an experiment proves its validity when it can be universally repeated

in every aspect.

In psychic research, such an approach is completely untenable.

The existential circumstances of any experiment in parapsychology

are inextricably mixed with the individuals

and the phenomological sets involved in that particular experiment

and cannot be abstracted from those individuals or phenomological sets.

The conditions of experiments in parapsychology

are unique, non-uniform and non-repeatable.

A completely non-scientific burden is therefore placed upon the researcher

for if the personal relationship between researcher and subject deteriorates

the experiment cannot continue along its natural course.

The sensitivity of the experimental parapsychological plexus

demands new methods to help maintain the emotional momentum

in certain experiments.

It will be noticed that the motto

of the Canadian Academy for Erotic Inquiry has immediate relevance

for the Stringfellow induced telepathy series.

"Amor vincit omnia. " Or: "Love conquers all."

We understand that the unique way

in which an individual perceives and reacts to his environment

is a function of his own experiential space continuum.

When object events enter

the experiential space continuum of that individual

they become an integral organic part of that space.

They are actually changed,

qualitatively modified in accordance with the creative nature of that space.

But we are now dealing with telepathists.

In theory, the experiential space continua

of two or more telepathists can merge,

can blend together to an extent far beyond

the range of normal human experience.

What would be the organic nature of communal experiential space

shared among eight psychosomatic entities?

Would one person, one mode of perception and reaction,

one experiential space continuum dominate this oversoul?

Or, would each mind participate in the synthesis

of a uniform newly created emergent space,

unlike any of its constituents?

How would the physical and social functioning

of members of this group be altered?

Or, could they function in recognisable modes at all?

There is some evidence to suggest

the potential telepathic intensity varies indirectly

as the square of the distance between two telepathists.

An increase in physical distance may therefore be used by one telepathist

as an effective defence against telepathic intrusion

on the part of another telepathist.

A far more sophisticated intrusion avoidance device

known as schizophonetic partition

was evolved by one of the female subjects

during the group isolation sanatorium phase.

In order to subvert attempts by fellow subjects

to establish potentially intrusive telepathic rapport,

she completely separated her telepathic, non-verbal self from her oral verbal self.

The telepathic self functioned as a false self,

diverting fellow telepathists from the real or true self,

which manifested itself only in occasional,

deliberately confused, verbal utterances.

She thus protected her true self from telepathic intrusion

by abandoning her telepathic faculty to a false self.

Not surprisingly, repeated telepathic probes undertaken by other subjects

could not discover the true nature of her experiential space continuum.

The danger inherent in the use of schizophonetic partition

as a telepathic intrusion avoidance device

is that the false telepathic self tends to become increasingly parasitic

on the true oral-verbal self.

The true self begins to suffocate

in as much as it is starved of contact with the outside,

and the false self gradually becomes the only self

to interact with other selves.

In the instance of our female schizophonetic subject,

the true self began to express its moribund existence

through the telepathic emission of violent images of decay:

vampirisim, disintegration and necrophilia,

which sporadically interrupted the functioning

of the telepathic false self.

The intensity and frequency of this emission

of morbid, telepathic images rapidly increased

until it began to create the same depressed mode in those close to her.

Another important function of our experiment

was to be the practical testing of the Stringfellow hypothesis.

The Stringfellow hypothesis takes the form of the following equation:

the rate of telepathic flow between two minds,

is directly proportional to the intensity

of the relationship between the two minds.

The units used to measure flow and intensity

are taken from psychochemistry.

In less mathematical terms,

we may say that this hypothesis indicates

that even between mature telepathists

there can be no telepathic communication

until some sort of existential emotional relationship has been established

in conventional sensory ways.

Thus, among complete strangers there would exist only a kind of noise,

a short wave static.

The Stringfellow hypothesis also suggests

that here the potency of human eroticism would play an important role.

A strong sexual attraction would be a substantial basis

for the establishing of a geometrically increasing rate of telepathic flow.

The politics of experience on the level of individuals

is a correlative of the politics of social groups.

The politics of telepathic experience

may be studied as a projection of the power struggles among individuals

into the extremities of psychic potency and complexity,

a projection, that is, into the future of human social evolution.

The role of the induced telepathy series,

in the total Canadian social experiment,

is theoretically secure.

That role emerges out of Dr Stringfellow's concept

of the telepathic commune,

a group characterised by the blending of experiential space continua

and the constant instantaneous exchange of data

among the nervous systems forming the commune.

Stringfellow indicates that at the most basic structural level

the telepathic unit, which emphasises acts of faith and love,

seems the most plausible replacement of the obsolescent family unit.

The communal telepathic experience

translated into the larger social national context

would presumably carry with it its intrinsic qualities

of willing reciprocal dependency and a mutual experiential creativity.

The social responsibility of telepathic prototypes

is therefore of the utmost gravity.

For it is only by their individual efforts

that the creation of the first and most critical telepathic communes

can be realised.

For those of exponentially

and maturing telepathic capacities,

the question of phenomenological refinement must inevitably become one

with the problem of the internalisation of the sensory.

The telepathist faces the obsolescence of the senses

and the possible atrophy of the human sensorium

in all but its most mundane operations.

During a certain phase in the telepathist's evolution,

the sensory will attempt to internalise to avoid its extinction

on the level of intellectuality and emotion.

This avoidance could take two forms.

One would be the forced psychic ingestion of the entire universe,

conveyed in terms of sensory information.

This would partially manifest itself

in the instantaneous translation into the vocabulary of the sensory

of all purely psychic, abstract or extrasensory phenomena.

Second form of avoidance would be the reification

of the psychic, the abstract or the extrasensory,

and its subsequent externalisation or projection.

The process begun by this objectification and displacement of the non-sensory

would find a point of equilibrium

and complete itself only with the indiscriminate return

or internalisation of both the projective non-sensory information

and its sensory screen -

the passive external world as perceived by the senses.

In both instances,

the distinction between the sensory and the non-sensory,

the concrete and the abstract, the psychic and the physical,

would be lost utterly.

These opposite poles of human sexuality

are traditionally held to be heterosexuality and homosexuality.

Yet this same bipolar structure of sexuality

is ignored when the question of normality and deviation arises.

The norm is taken to be heterosexuality

and both bisexuality and homosexuality

are considered deviations from that norm.

The primary justification for the normality of heterosexuality is reproduction.

Only a heterosexual relationship can, as yet, result in regeneration.

This argument collapses, however,

once it is demonstrated that the sexuality involved in reproduction -

represents only a very small, almost accidental segment

of the total human sexual spectrum.

Academy research has established

that both heterosexuality and homosexuality

are equally, what might be termed perversions,

relative to the potential human sexual field.

In this context, the true norm is an expanded form of bisexuality

which we term omnisexuality.

As an aphrodisiast, Dr Stringfellow proposes the use

of synthetic aphrodisiac drugs

to assist those who wish to attain a fully three-dimensional sexuality.

The proper use of psychic aphrodisiacs,

such as those being developed by Dr Stringfellow

at the Canadian Academy for Erotic Inquiry,

is not to increase sexual potency or fertility,

but to demolish the walls of psychological restraint

and social inhibition which restrict persons to a monosexuality

or to a stunted bisexual form of omnisexuality.

A telepathist then,

by virtue of the omnisexual nature of his experiential space continuum,

may readily be seen to be the possible prototype of three-dimensional man.

Certain unexpected results however,

threw the future of the project into doubt.

When preliminary confrontations

between any two subjects were arranged,

the subjects not only reported no instances

of telepathic communication but quite emphatically avoided

even the most casual sensory contact with each other.

At the same time, electro-encephalographic probes

indicated that such telepathic communication

as was denied by the subjects

was in fact taking place, and at a remarkably high rate of flow.

How could such flow exist among strangers?

In an emergency programme modification,

five of our eight subjects were combined in an enforced community study.

These five subjects,

although psycho-chemically the least volatile of the group,

almost immediately retreated into a state of self-encapsulation,

refusing to communicate in any way, with either researchers or each other.

Before further investigations could be made,

two of the five subjects committed suicide

in their residences at the Institute.

Another, pierced his skull with an electric drill,

an act of considerable symbolic significance.

Careful separation of the remaining subjects was maintained.

The study of human erotic morphology

deals more directly with this question.

Morphology is the study of form and structure.

Erotic morphology is the study of those forms

which evoke an erotic or sexual response

when they are perceived or otherwise communicated.

Not only the shape of objects or body parts,

but also the morphology of motion, of movement in certain patterns,

can convey erotic signals of a very complex nature.

Finally, the combination of shape plus motion can attain an erotic significance

which is contained in neither shape nor motion when taken separately.

But, the telepathist does not have to perceive a breast or a thigh

or sexual motion directly.

He can apprehend the thought of a breast, thigh, or erotic motion

in the mind of another telepathist.

And this thought is received with greater impact

than the perception of the actual breast, thigh, or erotic motion

would itself have been.

Thus, although both telepathists in our hypothetical confrontation are male,

they have made an erotic morphological communication

which is essentially heterosexual, or male-female.

We can begin to see why the telepathic experience

is essentially omnisexual in nature.

Why the male-female bisexual categories can no longer apply.

In the sanatorium phase of the induced telepathy series,

measures were introduced to prevent further instances of interruption

caused by frustrated telepathic dependency.

A single compact electromagnetic receiver-transmitter

was provided for the subjects undergoing primary group isolation.

The receiver-transmitter was to feed the subjects

reproductions of a variety of patterns of electrochemical discharge

unique to Dr Stringfellow, the group's common researcher.

The purpose of these transmissions from the Institute

was to ease the difficult transition

from the inevitable telepathic dependency

established individually between Stringfellow and each subject,

to a group telepathic cohesion and a group telepathic autonomy.

The necessity of sharing the transmitted electrochemical patterns,

either through the sharing of the receiver-transmitter itself

or the telepathic sharing of the experience of receiving the patterns,

would provide a basis for the formation of a telepathic commune,

which did not depend upon Stringfellow as a psychic cluster nucleus.

Dr Stringfellow indicated that he himself

entered a severely depressive psychological mode

upon separation from the induced telepathy group -

an event, suggesting that to some extent

telepathic dependency functions reciprocally,

even between telepathists and non-paranormals.

Five intensive months of work with the remaining subjects

revealed ways to gradually increase the tolerance among them,

or group exposure.

It was found that the telepathic experience

was likely to be an overwhelming and extremely exhausting one,

verging on pain and hallucination.

The most crucial problem for the telepathist

apparently was to develop within himself

the means to control and modulate the rate and quality of telepathic flow

between himself and another.

The inexperienced telepathist simply cannot cope

with the complexity and effort involved in the social telepathic situation.

The first meeting of all the subjects as a group

took place at the Academy sanatorium, somewhat later than originally planned.

The sixth subject arrived two weeks after the others,

when it was certain that he had fully recovered

from his self-inflicted violence.

It will be sometime before the data on this period

accumulated through electro- encephalographic information retrieval

can be fully evaluated.