You’ve got a human being who isn’t afraid. Now . . . we
wouldn’t deny, would we, that the fear element has a chemical factor
in it? So . . . if we move the chemical out of the brain – get it
out of there – and what have you got left? This is what I am saying
and it suggests that these basic rules hold all the way through the
systems.
Now, in the H-U level – what evidence do I have here? Well,
I’ve got one piece of evidence I can’t run away from. The
electrical resistance of the skin changes significantly from any other
level. Now, I just can’t deny this. The H-U person has incredibly
different skin resistance. (Question: How much did it change?) – Oh,
my God, it becomes so high you can’t hardly get it. I’m talking
about something that is
2-3-4
standard
deviations. This thing has really jumped. The electrical resistance of
the skin goes up incredibly. Now, what do I find behaviorally in these
people?
I find what many people are attempting to achieve through
psychotomimetic type drugs. I find that the H-U person can turn off
other levels of consciousness at will. He can go out of this world and
go off into other levels of consciousness and come back at will.
Instrumentally you have that, and I’d say . . . well now, if you
have that change in the electrical resistance I think there are going
to be some other physiological things that are going to turn up with
time. . . and I think that some of them are going to be chemical.
Question
- statement:
The main thing here is this: the system that causes the
individual to go from the other levels enables him to change his
chemistry and that the actual cause of the changing from one level to
the other levels is not just the chemical change. Maybe it is some
system of change that we are not even aware of. And the individual at
the upper level can control his chemistry at will. Yogas have learned
to control their heartbeat or the output of certain endocrine drugs. .
. changing their chemistry through some type of conscious will.
Dr.
Graves:
Concerning these ideas, you and I can’t sit here today and
talk the rest of the day and get anywhere with this one . . . because
I’m saying that when the H problems come to be . . . there will be
something unique about them that we’ve never run into before. And I
don’t think I have any evidence through the first seven systems that
would say to me that the behavior differences in the eighth system
would be that the system falls apart . . . .that is, that the chemical
siphons out. I think that something new comes into the system rather
than something goes out of the system. I don’t know what that will
be. This is one of the things I’ve run into. All that one can say,
if there is any such thing to this point of view, is that new systems
will appear. They will follow this family of systems idea that I’ve
laid down - and – there will always be something unique. Something
new will appear in the systems that no one ever thought would be
before.
Question:
You once talked about the concept of – off – instead of
turning on – there can be a regressing from level to level,
something that is turning – off. Is that still involved?
Dr.
Graves:
As I said, I had trouble conceptualizing the switching business
all along. The best evidence seems to be, at the present time, that we
might use a Christmas tree as a vehicle for visualizing as you would
have strings of lights in a ladder-like form on this Christmas tree.
You have the capacity to control the amount of illumination being let
out by the
lights. So when man is in the A-N stage of affairs, the lowest chain
of lights is very bright and the others are all very dim. Now let me
move to the O system. Something comes in that dampens out the N system
and reduces it to a state of dimness less than the P, Q and R – and
O becomes the bright one. And . . . when the P system comes on it is
the brightest and Q-R-S-T systems are still dimmer. That is, something
is dampening out as a higher system comes on and the lower level
system is subordinated. At one time, I did say, and I retract that now
since the data did not support it, data from studies of other people,
that it was a switching on and off process. It is not a
switching on-off process. It is an increasing of intensity of
operation and a decreasing intensity of operation.