Charles Muses (1919–2000)

I started reading this book while a college undergraduate, having been attracted by its dealings with that historically intractable subject of consciousness. It consists of 26 essays that approach the subject from a wide variety of ways.

The essays are organized into six major categories labeled as follows: Trance (actually called "En-Trancing is the Word"); "Consciousness and Science"; "Communicational Contexts for Man"; "Mysteries of the Delic Psyche;" "Pegasus" (on poetry and the "poetic experience"); and "Some New Techniques of Awareness". Foci of individual chapters include fire- walking in Ceylon; trance induction in Ancient Egypt; ESP; The place of consciousness in modern physics; awareness in plants; the search for miracle drugs among Amazonian Indians; communication with the criminal mind; and one by Charles Lindbergh titled "Man's Potential".

I didn't get far into this book, nor much out of the six essays I read. They went too far afield for the scientist I was becoming and smacked too much of the pseudo-science and particular sort of philosophy I was growing to eschew. A case in point is the essay "Awareness in plants", which drew on experiments on Mimosa to infer... you guessed it.

I've kept this book around for several decades, despite doubting that I'd ever get back to it. I kept it out of habit, but realistically, it deserves to find another home. Perhaps the Carnegie Library would welcome it back.… (meer)