Ketamine, a derivative of phencyclidine that was developed in the 1960s, is an anesthetic and analgesic with hallucinogenic effects. In this paper, the pharmacological and toxicological effects of ketamine are briefly reviewed. Ketamine possesses a wide safety margin but such a therapeutic benefit is somewhat offset by its emergence phenomenon (mind-body dissociation and delirium) and...
Abstract This chapter profiles three notable twentieth-century occultists—Dion Fortune, Austin Osman Spare, and Rosaleen Norton. All three can be regarded as key bridging figures linking earlier generations of magical practitioners with the contemporary neopagan movement. Dion Fortune (1890–1946) studied psychoanalysis at the University of London. Through her friend Maiya Curtis-Webb, Violet...
This study tested the hypothesis that the degree of psycho-physiological development is related to performance level in world-class athletes. We compared physiological and psychological patterns of 33 Norwegian world-class athletes to patterns in 33 average performing athletes. The subjects were matched for gender, age, and type of sport. Electroencephalography activity was recorded to measure...
This study had two aims: (1) to explore the inner experiences associated with increased production of gamma brainwaves in an initial neurofeedback experience; and (2) to measure and compare neurofeedback-enhanced increased output from the prefrontal cortical region of meditators and non-meditators, using the Peak Brain Happiness Trainer(™) neurofeedback system. This was a controlled pilot...
The Life of St. Teresa of Jesus is the title customarily given to the autobiography of Teresa of Ávila. Begun around 1562 and revised a few years later at the urging of her confessors, both as a way to examine her spiritual development and to spread the story of God's work in her life, the book traces her religious experience from early childhood to the time of writing. As such it was both a...
This thesis proposes a unified theory for reading and interpreting Leaves of Grass (1891-92), by American poet Walt Whitman (1819-1892). This theory proceeds from the premises that spiritual themes are foundational for the poems, and that Whitman's chief poetic aim is to lead readers toward a spiritual understanding of human experience. This theory proposes that the material and spiritual...
This comparative analysis of Freudian psychoanalysis and Jewish mystical writing examines the thematic preoccupations, hermeneutic strategies, and discursive structures that link these two bodies of thought. It maintains that early Kabbalist writing and Freudian psychoanalysis share an inherently Jewish episteme, with a fundamental consistency and common ethos. The analysis argues that Jewish...
Specific Daoist adherents and communities emphasize the importance of corporeality and physicality, specifically one’s body as the Dao as sacred locale. But the “Daoist body,” as those who are familiar with the work of such influential scholars as Kristofer Schipper, Livia Kohn, and Catherine Despeux know, is multidimensional. It is not simply the anatomical and physiological given of...
My analysis demonstrates Luigi Pirandello’s application of spiritual modes of thought ranging from Eastern mysticism to the modern Western movements of Theosophy, Spiritualism and Parapsychology. Using Antonio Illiano’s seminal work, Metapsichica e letteratura in Pirandello (Metapsychics and Literature in Pirandello) as a point of departure, my research incorporates the various philosophical,...
The pragmatist turn in Philosophy in the late XIX century and XX century was a serious attempt to refuse the privilege of the representational elements of the conscious- ness in the production of knowledge. Such privilege has its roots in Ancient Philosophy, in some consequences of the Platonic heritage, but was toughened by Modern philosophers of empiricist or aprioristic lineages within the...