Programming and Metaprogramming in the Human Biocomputer

Metatheoretical Considerations

In general there are two opposing and different schools of thought on the basic origins of systems of thought or systems of mathematics. In a simplified way these two extreme positions can be summarized as follows:

In the first position one makes the metatheoretical assumption that a given system of thinking is based upon irreducible postulates — the basic beliefs of the systems. All consequences and all manipulations of the thinking machine are then merely elaborations of, combinations of, these assumptions operating upon data derived from the mind and/or from the external world. This is called the formalistic school. This school assumes that one can, with sufficiently sophisticated methods, find those postulates which are motivating and directing a given mind in its operations. A further metatheoretical assumption is that once one finds this set of postulates that then one can account for all of the operations of that mind.
The opposing school at the opposite end of a spectrum of schools, as it were, makes the metatheoretical assumption that thinking systems arise from intuitive, essentially unknowable, substrates of mental operations. This school states that new kinds of thinking are created from unknown sources. Further, one is not able to arrive at all of the basic assumptions on which systems of thinking operate. Many of the assumptions from this point of view must be forever hidden from the thinker. Thus in this view the origins of thinking are wide open. With this metatheoretical assumption one can then conceive of the existence in the future of presently inconceivable systems of thought.
There is an intermediate position between these two extremes in which one assumes the existence of both kinds and that each of these two extremes has something to offer. Thus one can select kinds of thinking which are subject to formalistic analysis and formalistic synthesis based upon basic beliefs. But this does not include all thinking. Some kinds continue to be based in unknown areas, sources, and methods. Metatheoretical selection is being done by selection of the formal kind of thinking from a large universe of other possibilities. This position does not state that the origins of the basic beliefs are completely specifiable. However, once some related basic beliefs are found to exist, a limited system of rules of combination of the basic beliefs giving internally consistent logical results can be devised for limited use of that system. This organization into a limited integral system of thinking and the selection of those basic beliefs which naturally fit into such systems of thinking, is a way of dividing off this territory.

Thus our major interests are in those metatheoretical positions which remain as open as possible to reasonable explanation and reasonable models of the thinking processes of the origins of beliefs, of the origins of self, the organization of self with respect to the rest of the mind, and the kinds of permissible transformations of self which are reversible, flexible, and introduce new and more effective ways of thinking.

Is one the sum and substance of one's experience, of one's genetics, genic inheritance, of one's modeling of other humans and of other animals and of plants, or is one something in addition to this? As we chip away at this major question of existence of self, as men have chipped away at this question over the millennia, we find that this kind of question and the attempt to answer it have led to new understandings, new mathematics, new sciences, new points of view and new human activities. If one attempts to conceive of one's self as having gone through another kind of evolution other than that of the human, if one attempts to conceive of himself having lived in an environment different from the social one that we have been exposed to, or if one attempts to imagine having evolved as an organism with the same (or greater) degree of intelligence in the sea or on a planet nearer the sun or farther from the sun, one realizes the essentially prejudiced nature of one's self.

We are beginning to see how the environment interlocks with our computer and changes its functioning. We are beginning to see how certain kinds of experiences with these conditions set up rules which we call physical science within our own minds. We are beginning to see how, if we change the external conditions, in a limited way within a limited piece of apparatus, that these rules must be changed in order to understand how we can model these changed conditions and the way that atoms, molecules, radiation and space behave, in our own minds. This century has seen vast advances in our modeling of radiation, material particles of matter, space, stars, galaxies, solid materials, liquids, and our small modifications of all of these. This century, however, has not seen a similar gain in our understanding of the operations of our own minds, of the essential origins of thinking, and of those conditions under which we can elect to create new thinking machines within our minds.

Introduction

The relations of the activities of the brain to the subjective life in the mind have long been an arguable puzzle. In this century some advances in the reciprocal fields of study of each aspect of the question apparently can begin to clear up some of the dilemmas. This is a report of a theory and its use which is intended to attempt to link operationally, the:

mental subjective aspects,
neuronal circuit activities,
biochemistry, and
observable behavioral variables.

The basic assumptions are as follows:

The human brain is assumed to be an immense biocomputer, several thousands of times larger than any constructed by Man from nonbiological components by 1965.
Certain properties of this computer are known, others are yet to be found. One of these properties obviously is a very large memory storage. Another is control over hundreds of thousands of outputs in a coordinated and programmed fashion. Other examples are the storage and evocation of all those complex behaviors and perceptions known as speech, hearing and language.
Certain programs are builtin, within the difficult-to-modify parts of the (macro and micro) structure of the brain itself. At the lowest possible level such programs which are builtin are those of feeding, eating, sex, avoidance and approach programs, certain kinds of fears, pains, etc.
Programs vary in their permanence, some are apparently evanescent and erasable, others operate without apparent change for tens of years. Among the evanescent and erasable programs one might categorize the ability to use visual projection in the service of one's own thinking. One finds this ability with a very high incidence among children and a very low incidence among adults. An example of a program operating without change for tens of years one can show handwriting, over a long series of years, to maintain its own unique patterns.
Programs are acquirable throughout life. Apparently no matter how old a person is, there is stil a possibility of acquiring new habits. The difficulties of acquisition may increase with age, however, it is not too sure that this is correct. The problem may not be with acquiring programs so much as a decrease in the motivation for acquiring programs.
The young newly growing computer acquires programs as its structure expands some of these take on the appearance of builtin permanence. An example of such acquisition of programs in a child is in the pronunciation of words. Once it agrees with those of the parents the pronunciation is very difficult to change later, i.e., there is really no great motivation for the child to change a particular pronunciation when it is satisfactory to those who listen.
Some of the programs of the young growing computer are in the inherited genetic code; how these become active and to what extent is known only in a few biochemical-behavioral cases, at variance with the expectable and usual patterns of development. The socalled Mongoloid phenomenon is inherited and develops at definite times in the individual's life. There are several other interesting clinical entities which appear to be genetically determined. To elicit the full potential of the young growing computer requires special environments to avoid negative antigrowth kinds of programs being inserted in the young computer early.
The inherited genetic programs place the upper and the lower bounds on the total real performance and on the potential performance of the computer at each instant of its life span. Once again we are assuming that the best environment is presented to the young organism at each part of its life span. It is not meant to imply that such an environment currently is being achieved. This basic assumption seems highly probable but would be very difficult to test.
The major problems of the research which are of interest to the author center on the erasability, modifiability, and creatability of programs. In other words, I am interested in the processes of finding metaprograms (and methods and substances) which control, change, and create the basic metaprograms of the human computer. It is not known whether one can really erase any program. Conflicting schools of thought go from the extremes that one stores everything within the computer and never erases it to only the important aspects and functions are stored in the computer and hence, there is no problem of erasing. Modifications of already existing programs can be done with more or less success. The creation of new programs is a difficult assignment. How can one recognize a new program once it is created? This new program may merely be a variation on already stored programs.
To date some of the metaprograms are unsatisfactory (educational methods for the very young, for example). It is doubtful if any metaprogram is fully satisfactory to the inquiring mind. Some are assumed to be provisionally satisfactory for current heuristic reasons. To keep an open mind and at the same time a firm enough belief in certain essential metaprograms is not easy; in a sense we are all victims of the previous metaprograms which have been laid down by other humans long before us.
The human computer has general purpose properties within its limits. The definition of general purpose implies the ability to attack problems that differ not only in quantitative degree of complexity but also that differ qualitatively in the levels of abstraction in the content dealt with. One can shift rapidly one's mind and its attention from one area of human activity to another with very little delay in the reprogramming of one's self to the new activity. The broader the front of such reprogramming the more general purpose the computer is.
The human computer has stored program properties. A stored program is a set of instructions which are placed in the memory storage system of the computer and which control the computer when orders are given for that program to be activated. The activator can either be another system within the same computer, or someone, or some situation outside the computer.
The human computer, within limits yet to be defined, has "selfprogramming" properties, and other persons-programming properties. This assumption follows naturally from the previous one but brings in the systems within the mind which operate at one level of abstraction above that of programming.
This computer has selfmetaprogramming properties, with limits determinable and to be determined. (Note: selfmetaprogramming is done consciously in metacommand language. The resulting programming then starts and continues below the threshold of awareness). Similarly, each computer has a certain level of ability in metaprogramming others-not-self.
The older classifications of fields of human endeavor and of science are redefinable with this view of the human brain and the human mind. For example, the term suggestibility has often been used in a limited context of programming and of being programmed by someone outside. Hypnotic phenomena are seen when a given computer allows itself to be more or less completely programmed by another one. Metaprogramming is considered a more inclusive term than suggestibility. Metaprogramming considers sources, inputs, outputs, and central processes rather than just the end result of the process.
The mind is defined as the sum total of all the programs and the metaprograms of a given human computer, whether or not they are immediately elicitable, detectable, and visibly operational to the self or to others. (Thus, in alternative terminology, the mind includes unconscious and instinctual programs.) This definition and basic assumption has various heuristic advantages over the older terminologies and concepts. The mind-brain dichotomy is no longer necessary with this new set of definitions. The mind is the sum of the programs and metaprograms, i.e., the software of the human computer.
The brain is defined as the visible palpable living set of structures to be included in the human computer; the computer's real boundaries in the body are yet to be fully described (biochemical and endocrinological feedback from target organs, for example). The boundary of the brain, of course, may be considered as the limits of the extensions of the central nervous system into the periphery. One would include here also the so-called autonomic nervous system as well as the CNS.
There is in certain fields of human thinking and endeavor, a necessity to have a third entity, sometimes including, sometimes not needing the brain-mind-computer; commonly this entity is defined as existing by theologians and other persons interested in religion. Whether the term "spirit" or "soul" or other is used is immaterial in this framework. Such terms inevitably come up in the discussion of the ultimate meanings of existence, the origins of the brainmind computers, the termination or the destinations of self after bodily death, and the existence or non-existence of minds greater than ours, within or outside of braincomputers. This extra-brain-mind-computer entity can be included in this theory if and when needed.
Certain chemical substances have programmatic and/or metaprogrammatic effects, i.e., they change the operations of the computer, some at the programmatic level and some at the metaprogrammatic level. Some substances which are of interest at the metaprogrammatic level are those that allow reprogramming, and those that allow and facilitate modifications of the metaprograms.
It is not intended that I be dogmatic in the new definitions of this version of the theory. Speed in the recording of the ideas is preferred to perfection of the concepts and deriving the ultimate in internal consistency. As the theory grows, so may grow its accuracy and applicability. It is intended that the theory remains as openminded as possible without sacrificing specificity in hazy generality. The language chosen is as close to basic English as possible. As the theory develops, a proper kind of symbolism may be developed to succinctly summarize the points and allow manipulations of the logic to elucidate elaborations of the argument in various cases. It is known that the common "machinelanguage" of mammalian brains is not yet discovered. The selfmetaprogram language is some individual variation of the basic native language in each specific human case. All of the levels and each level expressed in the selfmetaprogram language for selfprogramming cover very large segments of the total operation of the computer, rather than details of its local operations. Certain concepts of the operation of computers, once effectively introduced into a given mindbraincomputer, change its metaprograms rapidly. Language now takes on a new precision and power in the programming process.
Certain kinds of subjective experience reveal some aspects of the operations of the computer to the self. Changes in the states of consciousness are helpful in delineating certain aspects of the bounds and the limits of these operations. Inspection of areas of stored data and programs not normally available is made possible by special techniques. Special aspects and areas of stored programs can be visualized, felt, heard, lived through or replayed, or otherwise elicited from memory storage by means of special techniques and special instructions.
After and even during evocation from storage, within certain limits, desired attenuations, corrections, additions, and new creations with certain halflives can be made. These can be done with (fixed but as yet not determinable) halflives in conscious awareness, and can subsequently be weakened or modified or replaced, to a certain extent to be determined individually. An unmodifiable halflife can turn up for certain kinds of programs subjected to antithetical metaprograms, i.e., orders to weaken, modify or replace a program act as antithetical metapro- grams to already existing programs or metaprograms.
New areas of conscious awareness can be developed, beyond the current conscious comprehension of the self. With courage, fortitude, and perseverance the previously experienced boundaries can be crossed into new territories of subjective awareness and experience. New knowledge, new problems, new puzzles are found in the innermost explorations. Some of these areas may seem to transcend the operations of the mindbraincomputer itself. In these areas there may be a need for the metacomputer mappings; but first the evasions constructed by the computer itself must be found, recognized, and reprogrammed. New knowledge often turns out to be merely and hidden knowledge after mature contemplative analysis.
Some kinds of material evoked from storage seem to have the property of passing back in time beyond the beginning of this brain to previous brains at their same stage of development; there seems to be a passing of specific information from past organisms through the genetic code to the present organism; but, again, this idea may be a convenient evasion, avoiding deeper analysis of self. One cannot make this assumption that storage in memory goes back beyond the spermegg combination or even to the spermegg combination until a wishful phantasy constructed to avoid analyzing one's self ruthlessly and objectively is eliminated.
Apparently not all programs are revisable. The reasons seem various; some are held by feedback established with other mindbraincomputers in the life involvement necessary for procreation, financial survival, and practice of business or profession. Other nonrevisable programs are those written in emergencies in the early growth years of the computer. The programs dealing with survivals of the young self sometimes seem to have been written in a hurry in desperate attempts to survive; these seem most intransigent.
Priority lists of programs can function as metaprograms. Certain programs have more value than others. By making such lists the individual can find desired revision points for rewriting important metaprograms. In other words it is important to determine what is important in one's own life.
The basic bodily and mental function programs and their various forms dealt with in verbalvocal modes (words, speech, etc.) have been described in great detail in the psychoanalytic literature. Evasion, denial, and repression are varieties of metaprograms dealing with the priority list of programs. Metaprograms to hide (repress) certain kinds of storage material are commonly found in certain persons. Such analyses are confined to the verbalvocal-acoustic modes. Encounters with other persons in the real world are much more powerful in terms of modifications of programs than either psychoanalysis or selfanalysis.
The detailed view of certain kinds of nonspeech, nonverbal learning programs, i.e., some of the methods of introducing such programs and parts thereof, are exemplified in the work of I. P. Pavlov and of B. F. Skinner. Some of these results are the teaching and the learning of a simple code or language, a code with nonverbal elements (nonvocalized and nonacoustic) with autonomic components.
The reward/punishment dichotomy or spectrum is critically important within the human computer's operations. The fact of various CNS circuits existing as reward and as "punishment" systems when stimulated by artificial or by natural inputs must be taken into account. The powerful emotional underpinnings of "movement toward" and "movement away" must be included, as well as the acquisition of code symbols for these processes.
Various special uses of the human computer entail a principle of the competing use of the limited amount of total available apparatus. To hold and to display the accepted view of reality in all its detail and at the same time to program another state of consciousness is difficult; there just isn't enough human brain circuitry to do both jobs in detail perfectly. Therefore special conditions give the best use of the whole computer for exploring, displaying, and fully experiencing new states of consciousness; physical isolation (only with special limited stimulation patterns, if any) gives the fullest and most complete experiences of the internal explorations.
The principle of the competitive use of available computer structure has a corollary: the larger the computer is, the larger the total number of metaprograms and of programs storable, and the larger the space which can be used for one or more of the currently active programs simultaneously operating. The larger the number of actuable elements in the brain the greater the abilities to simultaneously deal with the current reality program and to reinvoke a past storedreality program. The quality of the details of the reinvoked program and the quality of the operations in the current physical reality are a direct function of the computer's absolute functional size, all other values being equal.
The "consciousness program" itself is expandable and contractible within the computer's structure within certain limits. In coma, this program is very nearly inoperative; in ordinary states of awareness it needs a fair fraction of the machinery to function. In expanded states of consciousness the fraction of the total computer devoted to its operation expands to a large value. If the consciousness is sensorially expanded maximally, there is little structure left for motoric initiation of complex interaction and vice versa. If motor initiation is expanded, the sensorial creations are reduced in scope. If neither sensorial nor motor activities are expanded, more room is available for cognition and/or feeling, etc.
The steady state values of the fractions of the total computer each devoted to a separate program at a given instant add up to the total value of one. The value of a given fraction can fluctuate with time. The places used in the computer also change.
In general there are delineable major systems of metaprograms and of programs competing for the available circuitry. The methods of categorizing these competing programs depend on the observer's metaprograms. One system divides the competitors into visual, acoustic, proprioceptive, emotive, inhibitory, excitory, disinhibitory, motor, reflexive, learned, appetitive, pleasurable, and painful. This system is used in neurophysiology and comparative physiology.
Another system of classification divides the competing metaprograms and programs into oral, anal, genital, defensive, sublimated, conscious, unconscious, libidinal, aggressive, repressive, substitutive, resistive, tactical, strategic, successful, unsuccessful, passive, feminine, active, masculine, pleasure, pain, regressive, progressive, fixated, ego, id, superego, ego ideal. This is the system of classification employed by psychoanalysis.
Another system divides the competitors into animal, humanistic, moral, ethical, financial, social, altruistic, professional, free, wealthy, poor, progressive, conservative, liberal, religious, powerful, weak, political, medical, legal, economical, national, local, engineering, scientific, mathematical, educational, humanistic, childlike, adolescent, mature, wise, foolish, superficial, deep, profound, thorough, etc. This is a classification which is employed in general by humanitarians and intellectuals.
The classifications of metaprograms and/or of programs by the above methods illustrate some useful principles to be included. There is probably a set of better schemes than any of the above ones. Such new systematizations are needed; the principles in this theory may be useful in setting them up at each and every level of functioning of the computer.

Use of Projection Display Techniques in Deep Self Analysis with Lysergic Acid Diethylamide (LSD25)

The use of the psychedelic agents (such as LSD25) in the human subject shows certain properties of these substances in changing the computer's operations in certain ways. Some of these changes are mentioned above in passing; a summary of those found in the LSD state empirically are as follows:

The selfmetaprogram can make instructions to create special states of the computer; many of these special states have been described in the literature on hypnosis.
These instructions are carried out with relatively short delays (minutes). The delays of course will vary with the complexity of the task which is being programmed into the computer. It also is a previous history of this same kind of programming: the more often it has been done the easier it is to do again and the less time it takes.
Only taboo or forbidden programs are not fully constructed: there are peculiar gaps which give away the fact that there are forbidden areas. Within realizable limits most other programs can be produced.
When one first does enter into the storage systems the way the material is held in the dynamic storage is entirely strange to one's conscious self.
Production of displays of data patterns, of instructions, or storage contents, or of current problems can be realized through such instructions. [A "display" is any visual (or acoustic, or tactile, etc.) plotting of a set of discriminative variables in any number of dimensions of the currently available materials.] The motivational sign and intensity can be varied in any of these displays under special orders.
More or less complete replays of past experiences important in current computations can be programmed from storage; the calendar objective time of original occurrence seems a not too important aspect of the filing system; the level of maturation of the computer at the time of original occurrence is of greater import.
Stored or filed occurrences, filed instructions, filed programs vary in the amount and specificity of positive and/or negative affect-feeling-emotion attached to each. If too negative (evil, harmful, fearful) an emotional charge is attached, replay can allow readjustment toward the positive end of the motivationfeelingemotion spectrum. With the LSD25 state the negative or the positive charge can be changed to neutral or to its opposite by special instructions. However, since most people wish to avoid the negative and encourage the positive once they obtain control over programming they tend to put a positive charge even on programs and metaprograms and the processes of creating them.

The following description gives examples of the successful uses of and the results with the freedom to program new instructions during the LSD state.

In some cases during the eight or so possible hours of the special states of consciousness achievable with the help of LSD25, the use of visually projected images to aid in seeing the nature of one's own defensive, evasive, and idealization mechanisms can be realized. By means of a mirror for the careful inspection of the body in the external reality (the whole body or the face alone) it is possible to induce a special state of consciousness (or a special program or metaprogram in the use of perception circuitry) in which remembered or unconsciously stored images of self or of others appear on or in place of the body image. Such stored images can be selected within certain limits, manipulated within other limits, or allowed to occur in a free association context, appearing as parallels of the current thoughtstream. The orders to self for the appearance of these phenomena may resemble the post-hypnotic suggestion instructions given during autohypnosis, the metaprogrammatic instructions to a very large computer for a certain type of display program with special content to be displayed, and the orders to a large organization to produce a play with many actors operating in one place in space, one after the other, each with an assigned role not necessarily specified in detail.

Areas of unconsciously operating taboos, denials and inhibitions are revealed (in negative, as it were) by the absence of appearance of the consciously desired and ordered projections in certain areas. Areas of unconscious elaboration show as projections of great detail and completeness even though no real remembered reality could possibly correspond to the projection.

In the proper circumstances a properly selected real person can also serve as the external reality three dimensional screen onto which material can be projected. This latter "screen" is not a passive one and may say or do something on its own which either changes the projection or invokes a new program (such as the demanding external reality program) which may abolish the whole phenomenon of projection in the visual display itself. When one sees a visual projection onto the face of another person of, say, one's true deeper feelings, the realization may come that this happens to one all the time below the levels of awareness without the special powers attributable to this substance; i.e., there is an already prepared unconscious "display" (which is here allowed access to the visual mechanism by the special conditions) which normally operates in the external reality program with other persons unconsciously or preconsciously. This first time finding can have therapeutic benefits in the consequent selfanalysis of one's human relations.

The external reality screens for the projection of the display program in the LSD state thus can be arranged in a set with various dimensions relating each to the others. Among these are: the nonselfreal persons; motion pictures of these persons in various states; still pictures of the persons; pictures of self from the past, motion and still, three dimensional and flat; the here-and-now three dimensional color image of one's face and/or body in a mirror; and finally, the eyes-open or eyes-closed blank unlighted or lighted projection screen.

The blank screen is the most difficult one to work with but is the least "driving" of the group. The blank screen interferes least with one's creative efforts; it takes more program circuitry to create those aspects which can be furnished by the other screens themselves, from the perception mechanisms directly into the projection program itself. The blank screen does not so easily show the "forbidden transitions" except by remaining blank, i.e., more relaxation and freedom to "free associate" with this visual mode is required to project on a blank screen.

When sufficient progress with the external reality projection screens of the various kinds (visual, acoustic to visual synesthetic, body image, and others), the elimination or at least maximal attenuation of all modes of stimulation from the external reality allows deeper direct penetration into the unconscious. The rationale here is that more circuitry in one's huge computer is freed up from the external excitation programs and hence more can be devoted to the internal cognitive reality and its analysis. The projection "program" is still used, but in a somewhat different way.

As one clears up more and more areas of unpleasant programs and metaprograms, the increasing amounts of pleasurable programming and metaprogramming and their control can become a very seductive evasion of one's ideal of selfanalysis. It is at this point that too frequent exposure to these conditions must be avoided. Long periods of interlock with the external reality must then be done. Sometimes this may necessitate months of outside work to integrate one's findings with the real world as one has chosen to live in it.

The easily evoked pleasure of the LSD25 state may become for some persons a major goal. To make sure that one does not get seduced by this induced state of pleasure it is wise to avoid further experiments for several weeks or several months, and reassert the natural accesses to pleasure in one's external reality. The external reality struggle to obtain pleasure from the environment has rules of its own which must be met realistically and with intelligence and balance.

As one proceeds from outer or external projection analysis to internal projection analysis, one moves the excitation of projection systems by external energies to a lack of such excitation in these systems. For example, in the profound blackness and darkness of the floatation room there is no visual stimulus coming to the eyes or the visual systems. Similarly in the profound silence there are no sounds coming into the acoustic apparatus, and similarly the other systems are at a very low level of stimulation from the external world.

One might expect then that these systems would appear to be absolutely quiet, dark and empty. This is not so. This is the area in which most subjects begin to get into trouble. It is also the area in which psychiatric and clinical judgments may interfere with the natural development of the phenomena. In the absence of external excitations coming through the natural end organs the perception systems maintain this activity. The excitation for this activity comes from other parts of the computer, i.e., from program storage and from internal body sources of excitation. The selfprogrammer interprets the resultant filling of these perceptual spaces at first as if this excitation were coming from outside. In other words, the sources of the excitation are interpreted by the self as if coming from the real world. For certain kinds of persons and personalities this is a very disturbing experience in one sphere or another; for them it is explicable only with telepathy.

One can project in the visual space living images (external reality equivalents) or blackness (the absence of external reality images). One can project into the acoustic spaces definite sounds, voices. etc. (as if external reality) or one can project silence (the absence of sound) in the external reality. One can project the body image also, flexing one's muscles, joints, etc. to reassure oneself the image is functioning with real feedback or one can have a primary perception of a lack of the body image which is the negative logical alternative to the body image itself. In each of these dichotomized situations one is really projecting external reality and its equivalents (positive or negative). In order to experience the next set of phenomena one must work through these dichotomous symbols of the external world and realize that they are evasions of further penetration to deeper levels.

Once one abandons the use of projection of external reality equivalents from storage, new phenomena appear. Thought and feeling take over the spaces formerly occupied by external reality equivalents. (In the older terminology ego expands to fill the subjectively appreciated inner universe). "Infinity" similar to that in the usual real visual space is also involved and one has the feeling that one's self extends infinitely out in all directions. The self is still centered at one place but its boundaries have disappeared and it moves out in all directions and extends to fill the limits of the universe as far as one knows them. The explanation of this phenomenon is that one has merely taken over the perception spaces and filled them with programs, metaprograms, and selfmetaprograms which are now modified in the inner perception as if external reality equivalents. This transform, this special mental state, to be appreciated must be experienced directly.

At this level various evasions of realization of what is happening can take place. One can "imagine" that one is traveling through the real universe past suns, galaxies, etc. One can "imagine" that one is communicating with other beings in these other universes. However, scientifically speaking, it is fairly obvious that one is not doing any of these things and that one's basic beliefs determine what one experiences here. Therefore we say that the ordinary perception spaces, the ordinary projection spaces, are now filled with cognition and conation processes. This seems to be a more reasonable point of view to take than the oceanic feeling, the at oneness with the universe as fusing with Universal Mind as reported in the literature by others for these phenomena. These states (or direct perceptions of reality as they have been called) are one's thought and feeling expanding into the circuitry in one's computer usually occupied by perception of external reality in each and every mode, including vision, audition, proprioception, etc.

As a pragmatic matter one should do selfanalysis in the severely attenuated physical reality without LSD25 for several exposures before using the substance. One must learn not only to tolerate but to like the experience for several hours at a time. One's fears of the unreleased unconscious programming can be attenuated and analyzed during this period.

The essential features and the goals sought in the selfanalysis are in the metaprogram: make the computer general purpose. In this sense we mean that in the general purpose nature of the computer there can be no display, no acting, nor an ideal which is forbidden to a consciously willed metaprogram. Nor is any display, acting or ideal made without being consciously metaprogrammed. In each case of course one is up against the limits of the unique computer which is one's own. There are certain kinds of metaprograms, displays, acting, or ideals which are beyond the capacity of a particular computer. However, one's imagined limits are sometimes smaller than those which one can achieve with special work. The metaprogram of the specific beliefs about the limits of one's self are at stake here. One's ability to achieve certain special states of consciousness, for example, are generally preprogrammed by basic beliefs taken on in childhood. If the computer is to maintain its general purpose nature (which presumably was there in childhood), one must recapture a far greater range of phenomena than one expects that one has available. For instance, one should be able to program in practically any area possible within human imagination, human action or human being.

As explorations deepen, one can see the evading nature of many programs which one previously considered basic to one's private and professional philosophy. As one opens up the depths, it is wise not to privately or publicly espouse as ultimate any truths one finds in the following areas: the universe in general, beings not human, thought transference, life after death, transmigration of souls, racial memories, species-jumpingthinking, nonphysical action at a distance, and so forth. Such ideas may merely be a reflection of one's needs in terms of one's own survival.

Ruthless selfanalysis as to one's needs for certain kinds of ideas in these areas must be explored honestly and truthfully. The rewarding and positively reinforcing effects of LSD25 must be remembered and emphasized; one overvalues the results of one's chemically rewarding thinking. Once one has done such deep analysis one later finds deeper that these needs were generating these ideas. One's public need to proclaim them to one's self and to others, as if they are the ultimate truth, is an expression of one's need to believe. Insight into the fact that one is enthused because the positive, start-and-maintain, rewarding sign has been chemically stamped on these ideas must be remembered. An explorer operating at these depths cannot afford such childish baggage. These are disguises of and evasions of the ultimate dissolution of self; the maintenance of pleasure and of life are insisting on denial of death. If one stops at these beliefs, no progress in further analysis can be made. These beliefs are analysis dissolvers. One might call these lazy assumptions which prevent one from pushing deeper into self and avoid expending any great effort in this deeper direction.

Summary of Experiments in SelfMetaprogramming with LSD25

Successful leaving of the body and parking it in isolation for periods of twenty minutes to two hours were successful in sixteen experiments. This success, in turn, allowed other basic beliefs to be experimented upon. The basic belief that one could leave the body and explore new universes was successfully programmed in the first eight different experiments lasting from five minutes to forty minutes; the later eight experiments were on the cognitional multi-dimensional space without the leaving the body metaprogram.

The subject sought beings other than himself, not human, in whom he existed and who control him and other human beings. Thus the subject found whole new universes containing great varieties of beings, some greater than himself, some equal to himself, and some lesser than himself.

Those greater than himself were a set which was so huge in spacetime as to make the subject feel as a mere mote in their sunbeam, a single microflash of energy in their time scale, my fortyfive years are but an instant in their lifetime, a single thought in their vast computer, a mere particle in their assemblages of living cognitive units. He felt he was in the absolute unconscious of these beings. He experienced many more sets all so much greater than himself that they were almost inconceivable in their complexity, size and time scales.

Those beings which were close to the subject in complexity-sizetime were dichotomized into the evil ones and the good ones. The evil ones (subject said) were busy with purposes so foreign to his own that he had many near misses and almost fatal accidents in encounters with them; they were almost totally unaware of his existence and hence almost wiped him out, apparently without knowing it. The subject says that the good ones thought good thoughts to him, through him, and to one another. They were at least conceivably human and humane. He interpreted them as alien yet friendly. They were not so alien as to be completely removed from human beings in regard to their purposes and activities.

Some of these beings (the subject reported) are programming us in the long term. They nurture us. They experiment on us. They control the probability of our discovering and exploiting new science. He reports that discoveries such as nuclear energy, LSD25, RNA, DNA, etc., are under probability control by these beings. Further, humans are tested by some of these beings and cared for by others. Some of them have programs which include our survival and progress. Others have programs which include oppositions to these good programs and include our ultimate demise as a species. Thus the subject interpreted the evil ones as willing to sacrifice us in their experiments; hence they and removed from us. The subject reported with this set of beliefs that only limited choices are stil available to us as a species. We are an ant colony in their laboratory.

The subject assumed the existence of beings in whom humans exist and who directly control humans. This is a tighter control program than the previous one and assumes continuous day and night, second to second, control, as if each human being were a cell in a larger organism. Such beings insist upon activities in each human being totally under the control of the organism of which each human being is a part. In this state there is no free will and no freedom for an individual. This supraselfmetaprogram was entered twice by the subject; each time he had to leave it; for him it was too anxiety provoking. In the first case he became a part of a vast computer in which he was one element. In the second case he was a thought in a much larger mind: being modified rapidly, flexibly and plastically.

One set of basic beliefs can be subsumed under the directions seek those beings whom we control and who exist in us. With this program the subject found old models in himself (old programs, old metaprograms, implanted by others, implanted by self, injected by parents, by teachers, etc.). He found that these were disparate and separate autonomous beings in himself. He described them as a noisy group. His incorporated parents, his siblings, his own offspring, his teachers, his wife seemed to be a disorganized crowd within him, each running and arguing a program with him and in him. While he watched, battles took place between these models during the experiment. He settled many disparate and nonintegrated points between these beings and gradually incorporated more of them into the selfmetaprogram.

Personal Metaprogrammatic Language

The self-metaprogrammer exerts control through the personal metaprogrammatic language. This is the language which controls the computer itself, how it operates, and how it computes as an integral whole. Each human computer has a unique private control language in its unique stored programs, stored metaprograms, and stored selfmetaprograms. This language is not all shared in the usual public domain of the language acquired in childhood.

This control language and control of the biocomputer itself can be changed as new understanding of control allows new control. This language has aspects which are nonverbal, nonvocal and can be more emotional and/or mathematical than they are linguistic.

The province of the mind is the only area of science in which what one believes to be true either is true or becomes true within limits to be determined experimentally.

For those willing to try these experiments I wish to add a suggestion: It is necessary to explore all aspects of one's body image, one's childish emotional regions, one's real body in various states and with special stimuli in addition to those from the body itself. With such explorative training one can do topological transformations which can result in stepwise changes in metaprogramming and in metaprograms themselves. Bias, prejudice, preconception and intransigence in explicit areas are seen as supraselfmeta-programs which are inappropriate. Until there can be highly motivated mathematical transformations within the areas of control metaprograms, major changes are not made.

Linguistic symbols can be used for storing symbols which represent whole areas of operations in the computer. The key is no key is a version of the actual operations which it symbolizes. The statement is in the language of the child as the young computer originally stored it. The actual operations taking place in the adult symbolized by the key is no key are a complex rendering of more advanced ideas, some of which are circuit like, some of which are topological transformations and some of which are in multidimensional matrices.

A given human computer is limited in its operations by its own acquired mathematical conceptual machinery; this is part of its supraselfmetaprograms. Maximum control over the metaprogrammatic level by the selfmetaprogram is achieved not by direct "one to one" orders and instructions from the one level to the other. The control is based upon exploration of n-dimensional spaces and finding key points for transformations, first in decisive small local regions which can result in largescale transformations.

One key in the mind is to hunt for those discontinuities in the structure of the thinking which reveal a critical turnover point at which one can exert emotional energy so as to cause a transformation in all of that region.

This exploration of the inner reality presupposes that the inner reality contains large unknowns which are worth exploring. However, to explore them it is necessary (1) to recognize their existence and (2) to prepare one's computer for the exploration. If one is to explore the unknown one should take the minimum amount of baggage and not load one's self down with conceptual machinery which cannot be flexibly reoriented to accept and investigate the unknown. The next stage of development of those who have the courage and the necessary inner apparatus to do it, is exploration in depth of this vast inner unknown region. For this task we need the best kind of thinking of which man is capable. We dissolve and/or reprogram the doctrinaire and ideological approaches to these questions.

Note on the Potentially Lethal Aspects of Certain Unconscious, Protohuman, Survival Programs

It was found empirically that certain aspects of some programs carry the ability to destroy the individual biocomputer, or at least the ability to lead the way into potentially destructive action. A metaprogram to neutralize programs with selfdestruction in them is necessary. The use of LSD25 in selfanalysis allows quick penetration to such buried lethality; a definite caution is advised in such use of this technique.

The states of the revelation of the implanted deeper programs may involve the stages of childhood plus those presumed to have led Man (as an evolving primate) to civilization itself, and finally those leading into Man's own future beyond present accomplishments. Near the beginning (and sometimes later) of the LSD25 analyses some survival programs (protohuman) may appear. These programs include expressions of strong sexuality, gluttony, panic, anger, overwhelming guilt, sadomasochistic actions and phantasies, and superstitions. These are of amazing strength and power over the selfmetaprogram. Much of this material is wordless: existing in the emotionfeeling-motivational storage parts of the computer, it usually has only poor representations in the modeling, clear thinking and verbal portions. The LSD25 allows breakdown of the barriers between the emotional wordless systems, and the word-filled modeling systems by means of channeled uninhibited feeling and channeled uninhibited action. (This is one way that the unconscious is made conscious in a sometimes too rapid fashion.) If strong enough, the modeling systems (selfmetaprogrammer) can receive the powerful currents of emotion in full force, go along with them, and eventually construct a vigorous operating model consonant with the desired ideal metaprograms but also with emotional power, builtin. If not strong enough, the selfmetaprogrammer can be temporarily overwhelmed by the protohuman survival programs.

There is an additional caution in the use of these substances; the selfprogrammer must be strong enough to experience these phenomena and not make difficult-to-reverse mistakes in reprogramming or difficult to correct errors in new commitments in the external world. This is an area of human activity for the most experienced and strongest personalities, with the right training. I do not recommend the use of these methods except under very controlled and studied conditions with as near ideal as possible physical and social environment and as near ideal as possible help from thoroughly trained empathic matching persons. The subject's shortterm and longterm welfare must control all actions, all speech, and all transactions between each pair of persons present, unconsciously and consciously.

Choice of Attending Persons During LSD25 State Used for Self Analysis

The point is underscored: any action, facial appearance, word, sentence, tone of voice, or gesture on the part of the attending person can be used by the person in the LSD25 state in the processes of penetration, elicitation, or reprogramming. Mistakes by the attending person here can have a devastating power and must be scrupulously avoided. Only mature, experienced, previously exposed persons should be allowed in the e.r. during this critical time.

The minimum possible number (1) of persons is best. This one person should, ideally, have been psychoanalyzed himself and have pursued his selfanalysis with LSD25 aid plus physical isolation and solitude. Short of this ideal, high quality professional psychoanalytic training is a minimum ideal requirement, or careful selection of attending supervisors by such professionals. An exclusion test must be done on any potential attendant or therapist; he or she should have been personally through several LSD25 sessions with the selfanalysis metaprograms as the leading motivating instructions, and have penetrated to and beyond his own buried lethality and hostility. The professional selector should be thoroughly acquainted with such a potential aide, and evaluate the stages through which he or she has passed and achieved "permanently."

There can be special cases, less than the above ideal, but consonant with the principles enunciated. Some spouses or lovers (or both) have special understanding and interlocks which allow certain kinds of deep penetrations, elicitations and reprogrammings, but not other kinds. If one of the pair has been through LSD25 selfanalysis training, it is possible (in special cases) to help the other member through a session or sessions as a standby monitor and positive loveobject in the external reality. However, there should be some form of professional psychoanalytic control over such sessions. Such controls can vary from being implicit and in the nature of tactical and strategic advisory sessions to being e.r. supervisory, depending on the egostrength and on the current stage of development of each member of the pair.

Basic Effects of LSD25 on the Biocomputer: Noise as the Basic Energy for Projection Techniques

In the analysis of the effects of LSD25 on the human mind, a reasonable hypothesis states that the effect of these substances on the human computer is to introduce white noise (in the sense of randomly varying energy containing no signals of itself) in specific systems in the computer. These systems and the partition of the noise among them vary with concentration of substance and with the substance used.

One can thus "explain" the apparent speedup of subjective time; the enhancement of colors and detail in perceptions of the real world; the production of illusions; the freedom to make new programs; the appearance of visual projections onto mirror images of the real face and body; the projections and apparent depth in colored and in black and white photos; the projection of emotional expression onto other real persons; the synesthesia of music to visual projections; the feeling of "oneness with the universe"; apparent ESP effects; communications from "beings other than humans"; the lowered Cloze analysis scores by outside scorers; the clinical judgment of the outside observer of dissociation psychosis, depersonalization, hallucination, and delusion in regard to the subject; the apparent increased muscular strength, and the dissolution and rebuilding of programs and metaprograms by self and by the outside therapist, etc.

The increase in white noise energy allows quick and random access to memory and lowers the threshold to unconscious memories (expansion of consciousness). In such noise one can project almost anything at almost any cognitive level in almost any allowable mode: one dramatic example is the conviction of some subjects of hearing-seeing-feeling God, when "way out." One projects one's expectations of God onto the white noise as if the noise were signals; one bears the voice of God in the Noise. With a bit of proper programming under the right conditions, with the right dose, at the right time, one can program almost anything into the noise within one's cognitive limits; the limits are only one's own conceptual limits, including limits set by one's repressed, inhibited, and forbidden areas of thought. The latter can be analyzed and freed up using the energy of the white noise in the service of the ego, i.e., a metaprogram analyze yourself can be part of the instructions to be carried out in the LSD25 state.

The noise introduced brings a certain amount of disorder with it, even as white noise in the physical world brings randomness. However, the LSD25 noise randomizes signals only in a limited way: not enough to destroy all order, only enough to superimpose a small creative "jiggling" on program materials and metaprograms and their signals. This noisy component added to the usual signals in the circuits adds enough uncertainty to the meanings to make new interpretations more probable. If the noise becomes too intense, one might expect it to wipe out information and lead to unconsciousness (at very high levels, death).

The major operative principle seems to be that the human computer operates in such a way as to make signals out of noise and thus to create information out of random energies where there was no signal; this is the "projection principle"; noise is creatively used in nonnoise models. The information "created" from the noise can be shown by careful analysis to have been in the storage system of the computer, i.e., the operation of projection moves information out of storage into the perception apparatus so that it appears to originate in the chosen "outside" noisily excited system. Demonstrations of this principle are multiferous: in a single mode, listening to a real acoustic physical white noise in profound isolation in solitude one can hear what one wants (or fears) to hear, human voices talking about one, or one's enemies discussing plans, etc. With LSD25 one can use two modes: one can listen to white noise (including very low frequencies) and see desired (or feared) visions projected on the blank screen of one's closed eyes. One can, in profound isolation (water suspension, silence, darkness, isothermal skin, etc., in solitude) detect the noise level of the mind itself and use it for cognitional projections rather than senseorgandata projections. Instead of seeing or hearing the projected data, one feels and thinks it. This is one basis of the mistake by certain persons of assuming that the projected thoughts come from outside one's own mind, i.e., oneness with the universe, the thoughts of God in one, extraterrestrial beings sending thoughts into one, etc. Because of the lack of sensory stimuli, and lack of normal inputs into the computer (lack of energy in the reality program), the space in the computer usually used for the projection of data from the senses (and hence the external world) is available substitutively for the display of thinking and feeling.

Summary of Basic Theory and Results for Metaprogramming the Positive States with LSD25

LSD25 facilitates the positive (reward, positive reinforcement) systems in the CNS.
LSD25 inhibits the negative (punishment, negative reinforcement) systems in the CNS.
LSD25 adds noise at all levels, decreasing many thresholds in the CNS.
The apparent strengths of programs below the usual levels of awareness increase.
Programmability of metaprograms (suggestibility) increases, allowing more programming by the selfmetaprogram and external sources.
The continuous positive state (positive reinforcement, reward, pleasure) plus inhibited negative system activity causes increased positive reinforcement of the following: a. self b. one's own thinking c. thinking introduced by others d. other persons e. the given environment (r.r.) f. any given patterned complex input (i.e., music, paintings, photos, etc.).
Subsequent to exposure, the effects fall off slowly over a two- to six-weeks period, during which period there is overvaluation of 6 (af). Residual effects can be detected up to one year.
Repeated exposures at weekly to biweekly periods for several months (years) maintain the above reinforcements if the above conditions, inputs and outputs can be reproduced. There is reinforcement of the positive reinforcements until the usual state before LSD25 becomes negative.

Coalitions Interlock and Responsibility

Von Foerster calls attention to the increasing survival times of increasingly large aggregates of connected matter which he defines as coalitions. Living systems are coalitions par excellence. A protozoan is a coalition of atoms and molecules forming membranes and submicro and micro structures which reproduce by collecting the same kinds of atoms and molecules from the environment to form new identical individuals. A sponge is a primitive coalition of protozoa with enhanced survival over any one protozoan. A man is a tightly organized coalition of cells, including some mobile protozoa (lympho-cytes, macrophages, oligodendroglia, etc.). Von Foerster says that mammalian cells of Homo sapiens may be the most numerous cells on earth, i.e., these cells with their multiple level coalitions have the longest current survival time.

The nature of matter/matter coalitions and cell/cell coalitions and organism/organism coalitions are explored by Von Foerster. For a coalition to exist between any two entities, the dyad is connected by a bond or bonds which reduce the negentropy below the sum of the negentropy of each of the two entities separated (without a linkage). In this view the two entities when in coalition reduce the physical information available externally below the levels of that available from the two entities each unlinked and separated. The coalition as it exists thus appears to be something more than the mere sum of isolated parts.

The rules within the coalitions at each level are different in that each level is somehow more than the sum of its separated individuals.

For coalitions to develop between individual humans, linkages of various sorts are developed agreements are reached and thus the sources of new information from each member are reduced. To maintain a dyadic coalition, interlock between the two human computers is developed. Each human to human interlock is unique; but also each interlock is a function of other current and other past interlocks of each member and of learned traditional models.

Coalitions between humans are immense in number and have great complexity in their operations. Each adult individual has linkages extending to literally thousands of other individuals. The amount of time spent on maintenance of linkages is fantastic. The demands on one's self by the various coalitions uses up most of one's awake hours (and possibly most of one's sleeping hours).

With vigorous current e.r. interlock, the human biocomputer is busy with information exchange at all levels (verbal and nonverbal, digital and analogic, etc.). The model projects expectations and predictions continuously as the interlock develops. The real inputs are compared with computed outputs in all modes.

The isolated solitudinous individual does not have a present coalition to work on, in, or with. He projects past coalitions and makes new models by making new coalitions, of the old ones. As such new relationships are established in his computer he settles logical discrepancies between old models and new ones, tends to abolish discontinuities of the logical consequences, his basic belief structures, and, if necessary, he changes the basic beliefs to have fewer discrepancies between the internal models.

A single human organism can have at least the following coalitions to deal with:

Parental til their death, and continuance as internal models
Male/female continuously, at all ages, especially in the marriage coalition.
Financial individual (money) income and outgo is a multiple general purpose coalition sign. The amount of money whose flow is controlled by a given individual is, in general, a quantitative measure of coalition responsibility delegated to that individual by coalitions of many other individuals. An individual can be the controller of a coalition only with multiple consents, and hence control the flow of money into and out of that coalition.
Children: exciting demanding coalitions develop with one's offspring. It is a challenge to renew and improve one's own coalition with each child as the child grows and expands his/her coalition powers.
Unconscious coalitions below the levels of awareness, one expects certain kinds of conditions in one's coalitions; some wishful thinking is expended in phantasied linkages. Contracts as written usually do not, cannot, incorporate explicit statements of unconscious commitments/desires. However, a contract can be misused in the service of wishful thinking — the courts see numerous cases of this kind.

The phenomenon of "computerinterlock" facilitates mutual model construction and operation, each of the other. One biocomputer interlocks with one or more other biocomputers above and below the level of awareness any time the communicational distance is sufficiently small to bring the interlock functions above threshold levels.

Metaprogramming the Body Image

Some of the most deeply entrenched and earliest acquired metaprograms are those of the personal body image of the human biocomputer. Among the programs of importance here are those of posture, walking stance, sitting patterns, lying down patterns and body posture during sleep. This metaprogramming interdigitates with that for acquired muscular skills of every sort, including writing, running, skiing, sports such as tennis, swimming, and so forth. These metaprograms also interdigitate with those of the use of the body during highly emotional states such as angry outbursts, sexual activities (both alone and with a partner), fright and flight patterns, and so forth.

By daily repeated regimes of reprogramming of the muscles and the joints, it is possible to begin to modify these entrenched programs. During the primary state of LSD it is possible to program in positive system activity during such exercises. Under these conditions the net effect of such stretchings and muscle exercises can be a positive system excitation and reinforcement of the new patterns. During the LSD state it has been noticed that the activities of the negative systems are attenuated and thus allow a greater range of muscle and joint stretching than without the LSD. It has also been noticed that it is possible to contract the desired muscles more fully in this state than during the usual state. Caution must be observed, however, because it is now possible to contract muscles to the point where muscles, joint capsules, ligaments, and tendons can be strained leaving residual, unpleasant local pains after the LSD primary state is ended.

During such exercises in the LSD state, it is possible to detect (by looking at the body image in a mirror during such exercises) the supraselfmetaprograms for the body image, both the positive and the negative ones. One can see the negative metaprogram, for example, as the projection of an aged and crippled body assumed to be too old to be capable of changing the body image. A positive projected metaprogram for example is that of an athletic young figure.

Programming and Metaprogramming in the Human Biocomputer - by John C. Lilly