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1982' S WORST SCIENTIFIC ACHIEVEMENTS THE BLACK BOX: SECRET DRUG TREATMENT OF ROCK SUPERSTARS JOHN LILLY ON WAYS OF AMUSING GOD EXCLUSIVE: Wttim BUILD-IT-YOURSELF ROBOT PLUS SCIENCE ON THE TRAIL OF SEA MONKEYS, APEMEN.AND LIVING DINOSAURS onnrui1983 JANUARY EDITOR & DESIGN DIRECTOR: BOB GUCCIONE PRESIDENT: KATHY KEETON EXECUTIVE EDITOR: DICK TERESI 3RA--ICSD RECTOR FRANK DtVINO ART DIRECTOR: ELIZAEETH WOODSON

CONTENTS PAGE

FIRST WORD Opinion Vernor Vinge to

OMNIBUS Contributors 12

COMMUNICATIONS Correspondence 14

FORUM Dialogue 16

EARTH Environment Douglas Starr 20

SPACE Comment Owen Davies 22

LIFE Biornedicine Tabitha M. Powledge 24 MIND Behavior Mike Edelhart 26

BOOKS The Arts Morton Hunt 28

FILM The Arts Roberta Grant 30

BUILD-IT-YOURSELF ROBOT Breakthroughs Gurney Williams III 32 CONTINUUM Data Bank 35

THE SLACK BOX Article Kathleen McAuliffe 44

THE MIND OF MEDEA Fiction Kate Wilhelm 52

JOHN LILLY Interview Judith Hooper 56

1982's WORST ACHIEVEMENTS Pictorial Mike Edelhart 60

SPAC ESCAPES Pictorial Rober! McCall 34

ANTIMATTER UFOs, etc. 91

ON THE TRAIL OF Article Karen Ehrlich and LIVING DINOSAURS E Lee Speigel 108 SPIRAL JETTY Phenomena Gianlranco Gorgoni 124

GAMES Diversions Scot Morris 128

LAST WORD Humor Randy Cohen 130

Don Brautigam originally created this painting tor the cover of Stephen King's book Night Shift (New American Library). Jim Plumeri developed the concept based on the story "I Am the Doorway," in wnch ahe/is ;nr;aa: the hand of an astronaut. T IAJDRD QRJirUIBU!

mni's network of stringers usually skilled brain researcher, and authority genetic engineering, and space come from the halls of academia. in fields as diverse as neuroanatomy, manufacturing will create dramatic But the unlikely channel of rock biophysics, and computer theory, Today, change. Present modes of energy, 'n' roll provides the spark of inspiration in a self-imposed exile, he works with commerce, and transportation will be behind this month's feature "Brain Tuner," computers to develop a human/dolphin outdated. The fortunes of some national which looks at a novel cure lor drug language. In this month's unique Interview, economies will falter, reshaping the addiction developed by Scottish surgeon on page 56, the man whose life was spheres of political influence. The details Dr. Margaret Patterson. It was British the model for film the Altered States tells of this revolution are chronicled in "Our rock star PeteTownshend. of the one contributor Judith Hooper about his Future Stock." an excerpt from the recently many celebrities treated by Patterson, who quantum leaps; from Catholicism to self- released book The Omni Future Almanac, tipped us off to her bizarre line of work. experimentation with psychedelics and published by Harmony/Crown. On page At least Townshend's description sounded extraterrestrial reality, from the labs of 68 Omni's editors forecast future bizarre. Patterson, he explained, uses Cartesian science to the sonar tanks incomes for emerging job markets, a little black box lo help people give up of his cetaceans. estimate the prices for commodities from everything tram heroin to cigarettes Qmnl's "Laurels (and Hardys)" were hamburgers to houses, and warn about and alcohol. The "box" was supposed inaugurated last year to commemorate the skills likely to be outmoded. to ameliorate withdrawal symptoms and renownless wizards of science who Ancient texts abound with legends of ease craving by transmitting a small invent curious machines, espouse novel sea serpents and leviathans — prehistoric amount of electricity to the addict's brain. theories, entertain the improbable, or Greatures that defy fictionalization. They Omni associate editor Kathleen McAuliffe, just plain blunder about. Mike Edelhart, suddenly appear and disappear, leaving who in the past has written on other coauthor of The Ultimate Computer Book behind iootpr nts. skeletal fragments, aspects of electrical medicine, was (Addison-Wesley, 1983), was given the and big rumors—from Central Asia to assigned to check the story out. "I was task of collecting the oddest scientific Africa's inland waterways to the American skeptical at first, because the black box achievements of 1982. Consider, for West. The International Society of simply sounded too good fo true." be example, the company that designed a Cryptozoology (Box 43070. Tucson, AZ she recalls. "But after carefully researching computer program that verbally abuses its 85733) was founded to capture and study its scientific rationale, and speaking io operator. Or the scientists who attached these atypical biological specimens. some half-dozen of Patterson's patients, I weights to the legs of cockroaches and Karen Ehrlich is a hypnotist and Human believe her therapy holds the potential made them run on treadmills. Surely Potential Trainer. E. Lee Speigel is of revolutionizing the field of drug city dwellers will welcome this new producer and hos! of The Edge of Reality. rehabilitation." For her in-deplh report, resistless breed with wiry hamstrings. a weekly WNBC radio show. Coauthors turn to page 44. In recognition of such clogs in the wheel of "Hidden Monsters" (page 108), they Dr. John Lilly is best-known the as of progress, Omni announces its awards, vividly describe expeditions of "dolphin man." His life is an odyssey, a starting on page 60. anthropologists in pursuit of such fascinating, bewildering, controversial and Within the next few decades a burst of zoological anomalies as Bigfoot, the story. He is a mental giant, a man of scientific and technological activity will Tasrnan an wolf, and Champ, from enormous talent; qualified psychoanalyst. alter our world. Automated office systems. Lake Champlain.DQ 12 OMNI .

Until the Ultimate: The sometime- visible/so metime-invisible Wizard. Trust no one.

Wizard is designed so two may play at the same time. And since all's fair in Wor, even your best friend can zap you. Now we don't want you to freak

out totally but if you're still up to the challenge, top the all-time, high And finally: The dreaded score: 99,500 by Frank Merollo Neutron Flagship. (10/82) and Buz Pryzby (8/82). GORF Gorf's not easy There's only ONE So you're hot stuff at video Can you hold up under the vulnerable spot on the Flagship. games? Joysticks melt in your challenge ot Jour different boards But don't let a little neutronium At nine different hand? Don't let it go to your in one game? bomb stop you from hitting it. head. Try mastering Wizard of levels? Try and beat the high Wor and Gorf, the two Bally/Mid- score of 32,700 by Horace Ecker- way arcade hits you can now strom (9/82). No sweat? Well, play at home. They're new from what if we told you each level CBS Video Games. was faster than the last? Next Both are made for the Atari® time you'll think before you Video Computer System™ and speak, But now you must face: Sears Video Arcade™ WIZARD OF WOR Dare you enter the Wizard's diabolic dungeon where doom lurks at every turn? Can you keep Now that you know what to your composure as the Wizard's expect, are you still up to the

. of and Gorf? henchmen iry eating you . challenge Wizard ALIVE? Fight back. Use your radar screen, Gc;--ian bombs. LETTERS cDnnruiuruicMTiarus

Read All About II Manufactured Taxpayers

I jus! finished have I reading the August was outraged when I read the article

1982 issue of Omni, and I think the Games entitled "Baby Makers, Inc.," by Allan section [on humorous headlines] is Maurer [Continuum, September 1982]. particularly funny. It reminded me of a Why does a fantastic science magazine funny story and a headline that my sister- deal with future political issues? So in-law told me about a few years ago what if the fourth most populous country about a small group of crazed women in in the world becomes the fortieth? I've Lansing, Michigan, who for some strange always thought that the government religious rite slathered themselves with is more concerned with eliminating human mustard and stole a United Parcel Service life (considering the vast escalation of truck. The police finally apprehended nuclear warheads) than with creating it. the women, and the story was printed in Oh, I get it, now. Somebody must be the Lansing paper with the headline, afraid of the fact that fewer people means MUSTARD LADY FLEES, POLICE CATCH UP. fewer taxpayers. Elizabeth Hennessey Anthony Michaels Detroit, Mich. Philadelphia

Mad about Marijuana Bad Break The fact that marijuana is illegal seems to Is 3-D TV really considered a break- have clouded the judgment of Franklynn through [Continuum, September 1982]? Peterson and Judi Kesselman-Turkel Now the car chases, the shootings, the in their report "Reefer Madness" vulgarity, and the inane commercials will

[Continuum, September 1982]. It would actually come right out of the screen be equally desirable and necessary at us, eh? to isolate and test active components I would consider it a greater break- of marijuana if it were legal. through to create a robot that would crush Have the authors forgotten the large the television sets and hand everyone number of persons who, for health or a book to read. safety reasons, cannot smoke, "four joints Sterling Johnson a day"? Would they not even try to help Palm Springs, Calif. those for whom euphoria is disorienting, unpleasant, and sometimes frightening? Baldness Concern

If the authors believe that It marijuana isn't often that I feel an urge to write to is safe and harmless, they should work to a magazine, but "Baldness Cure," by legalize it rather than attack the legitimate Eric Mishara [Continuum, July 1982], scientific efforts of researchers. deserves comment. Being afflicted with

Joseph Budd this malady (alas!), I read the report St. Simons Island, Ga. with great interest. I was happy that a member of the medical community had Afraid of the Dark? finally initiated research into this problem.

I was disappointed with the skeptical It should be obvious that no one wants attitude m the article "Butterflies in the to be bald. So far the only people who Dark" [July 1982], by Les Ericson. did anything about this problem were the Human sensory perception is not limited crooks and charlatans, with their costly to the traditional five senses. We can and ineffective lotions and preparations. imagine concepts from quark to galaxy. But all that these "miracle" hair restorers Why are telepathy and clairvoyance ever made grow were these crooks' bank considered unusual? accounts. Hair loss is a legitimate Only children are afraid of the dark. Let problem, and i feel it's about time the us move into the future with open minds medical establishment got involved with and faith and hope in mankind's abilities. finding a cure. Linda O'Kraley James Brace Madison, Wis. Sandusky, Ohio DO DIALOGUE FORunn

In which the readers, editors, and that hepatitis plays an important role in the veterans had. Mr. Schneider mentions correspondents discuss theories and the development of liver cancer. the unfortunate incident in 1969 when speculation arising out of Omni. Readers Another possible cause of veterans' 8 veterans out of 200,000 given dapsone are encouraged to debate views and illnesses is melioidosis, a bacterial disease died of agranulocytosis, a disorder pose questions to Omni, the scientific unique to certain parts of Southeast characterized by the destruction of white community, and the science-fiction Asia. Melioidosis has long been referred blood cells. This occurred in individuals establishment. The opinions published to as the "time bomb disease," or the who also were taking chloroquine and are not necessarily those of the editors. "medical time bomb." because there have quinine. Hence, dapsone alone could not been many cases in which bacteria be implicated. Dapsone has never been Agent Orange Controversy have entered the human body but in which reported to cause porphyrin problems or

I believe I have some information that no symptoms were apparent. Only years a positive reaction to the Ehrlich test. may clarify some of the conclusions later did the disease manifest itself. Mr. Schneider discusses the association drawn by Dr. Ronald Codario in the article Dow encourages you to discuss the of liver cancer and hepatitis. It should "The Agent Orange .Mystery." by Pamela agent orange issue with the Veterans be pointed out that only one type of virus Weintraub [Earth. August 1982], While Administration and the White House (hepatitis B) is associated with a greater

the article claims - that agent orange is the Interagency Work Group on Agent Orange, risk of liver cancer. In fact the risk is cause of many Vietnam veterans' medical since the plight of veterans should be 274 times as great. problems, we at Dow Chemical believe addressed by the government, which there are other chemicals and drugs that committed them to wartime service. I want to congratulate Omni magazine are the real culprits. There is no credible Phillip H. L, Schneider and Dr. Ronald Codario on exposing ihe evidence available that the health of Dow Communications Veterans Administration's position on Vietnam veterans differs significantly from Midland, Mich. agent orange. Pamela Weintraub's article that of nonveterans. explained a lot of the unexplained symp- Throughout the Vietnam War malaria Dr. Ronald Codario replies: Melioidosis is toms of my disability that V.A. doctors was the leading medical problem among indeed a "time bomb disease." In two had ignored. American troops. Malaria posed such studies of Vietnam veterans, one of 416 The V.A. position is that until medical a difficult problem of because a certain and the other of 500 men, it was found researchers definitively link agent orange strain of the disease called falciparum, that 9 percent of the participants had to the described problems of veterans, This strain produced a more serious illness elevated titers [concentrations of a sub- the V.A. will not recognize the problem. We and was resistant to all of the normal stance] consistent with exposure to the need the support of the media and the antimalaria drugs. It has that organism. been shown However, elevated titers do not public at large if we are to get the medical malaria plays a role in the development indicate active disease or even the help we deserve of certain types of cancer. tendency to develop active disease. Dr. Joseph Williams In order to control the problem of Walter Schleck, of the special pathogen Arlington, Tex. falciparum malaria in Vietnam, a new branch of the Center for Disease Control, - antimalaria drug had to be found. An has asserted that "since 1973 we have Although I am glad to see that there are extensive drug-screening process dis- less than a dozen isolnles of this organism people who are interested in helping covered such a compound—dapsone. from all sources. This would suggest Vietnam veterans who were exposed to Previously dapsone had been used for the that the actual number of culture-proven agent orange and the real culprit, dioxin, treatment of leprosy. cases is quite smalt." Although the I'd like to emphasize the point that Because of the urgency of the problem, disease may lie dormant for some time, veterans are not the only ones who have no one questioned the wisdom of using reactivation is characterized by high been affected by dioxin poisoning. dapsone in Vietnam, but we now know that fevers, with recurrent bone, lung, and My family and our neighbors have also it does produce a wide range of toxic prostate abscesses. This clearly is not been exposed to this deadly chemical, effects that closely resemble the present what the vast majority of Vietnam veterans neither . and my husband nor I ever served complaints of Vietnam veterans. Use of are complaining about and does not in Vietnam. A metal reclamation center dapsone among ground troops was explain ihe porphyrin disturbances. located in the vicinity of our home was limited in 1969, when it was learned that Dapsone is a drug that has been used producing dioxin and other pollutants. side effects were responsible for the in more than 11 million lepers' Peripheral My husband became ill with nervous death of at" least eight servicemen. nerve damage and liver disorders have disorders, like those described in your Hepatitis was the second leading been reported in only handful a of cases, article, and I suffered from dizziness, joint medical problem among American troops and these people were taking large pain, and irritability. in Vietnam. Science has demonstrated doses of the drug, not the smalt doses We contacted the Illinois Environmental m OMNI Protection Agency, which in turn con- from something, and the public owes it of Dr. Bethe's caliber on the issue of

tacted the Cook County Department ot to them to find out what it is. Having nuclear safety. The mistrust of large in- Toxicology. They found evidence of been exposed repeatedly to the herbicide dustrial utilities has put us in a position that

dioxin in both animals and humans in the 2,4,5-T, and therefore to the toxic impur- must be overcome soon if we are to

area. The plant was eventually closed ity it contains in trace amounts, I can't help compele effectively with other users/

because it had never received a proper wondering whether some other factor suppliers of nuclear technology. permit to operate. may be involved in the cases of suspected Michael Bull

To read of a possible antidote is en- poisoning from dioxin TCDD. Charleston, S.C.

couraging after we'd been told that we I first began to work with products have a "mystery illness," which we containing 2,4,5-T in 1946, and-my expo- Omni's interview with Dr. Hans Bethe was must "learn to live with." The mention of sure, in spite of all due care in handling, full of the same empty-headed rhetoric research being pursued at the Watson must have been massive compared that proponents of nuclear power and

Laboratory, in Minneapolis, gives lis hope to that of most veterans. I understand nuclear weapons have mouthed since and a line to possible help in case se- that medical histories and continuing sur- the dawn of the Nuclear Age-

• vere symptoms of this disease reappear. veillance of chemical plant workers who Thank you for printing it. It will help Mary Brown have a long history of exposure to this people understand the arrogance with

Crete, III. toxic dioxin fail to indicate any long-term which the nuclear industry practices

problems. its black arts. Perhaps it will help our Thank you for the article on the effects of The important thing is to find out what children understand how civilization ageni orange. No one seems to know is really wrong with these veterans and got itself into its present predicament,

much about agent orange, but Pamela io help them. and I hope it will show us how we can get

Weintraub's article was most informative. Keith Barrons ourselves out of it. It is inconceivable My husband has been in and out of Holmes Beach, Fla. that people in Hans Bethe's position con- hospitals ever since 1968, when he was clude that they have the right to place sent home from Vietnam after he was Nuclear Reactions all of civilization in such jeopardy. wounded in the foot. Omni's interview with Hans Bethe [Sep- Bill Evans He has been seeing a psychiatrist for tember 1982] left me frightened and Lagunitas, Calif.

the past three years. He quit his job appalled. Until now I had thought that Dr.

with the Postal Service on May 1, 1982, Strangelove was some cinema stereo- Though I am very much opposed to after working there for four years, because type, but Dr. Bethe comes across as the nuclear power and its growth in our

of mental and physical stress. His bones kind of man who is equally as unfeeling country, I found your interview with Dr.

ache, and his foot hurts all the time. and filled with dangerous contradictions. Hans Bethe very informative.

Our lives seemed to be falling apart. I guess it really isn't a surprise to hear Dr. Bethe clearly believes in the safety So my husband decided to try to get one of the pronuclear spokesmen say that of nuclear power and welcomes its

help at the V.A. office. We got the usual -he "considers everything to be a matter proliferation. However, it was not made runaround until a doctor found out that my of numbers" in regard to reactor safety clear where the waste from nuclear- husband had served in Vietnam from and declare that the German Atomgesetz power sources would be stored or even-

1966 to 1968. She told him that he should safety law is "a stupid law." It doesn't tually disposed of.

take agent orange tests. strike him as the least bit insane that the This is no small malter, and I believe Well, doctors don't tell you anything Japanese are dotting their volcanic that Dr. Bethe should have discussed the about anything, and we decided to find islands with reactors. And in almost the question. out about agent orange ourselves. Your same breath he notes, "We have tons Diane Dougherty

article was a great beginning for us. of weapons-grade material .... It is very Fortuna, Calif. Connie Goodin difficult io completely prevent any accu-

Jacksonville, Fla. mulation of fissionable material for illicit Dr. Hans Bethe may be a very intelligent purposes." Right after noting that fuels person, but he seems to lack common

I have been building up steam for a while sold to utilities would have to be kept sense. He totally ignores some very im-

on the agent orange issue. I sympathize on "a military site . . . subject to that level portant facts concerning nuclear power.

with those individuals who have been of security." It is understandable that, as a physicist,

I Dr. like his field affected, but I am uncertain about the am very disappointed that the inter- Bethe would to promote publicity the whole issue has received. Is viewer did not question Dr. Bethe about of study, but when something that is

it self-recrimination or is it hitting out solar power. If the utilities, the nuclear so potentially dangerous continues to be at those within the government who establishment, the government, and the thrust upon the environment, some made the terrible decision to use those military put half their energies into the precautions must be taken, or at least ghastly herbicides? development of clean, safe solar power, more appropriate alternatives must

I think there can be no doubt about the this planet would be safe and powered be sought. fact that the decision was a conscious for untold millennia. The laws of probability state that the

one and that it was made somewhere in But of course the established nuclear more nuclear reactors that are built,

the highesl levels of government. businesses aren't having any of that. May the more it is likely that a nuclear accident

This being the case, I can only quote a the next century's minds prove Bethe will occur.

rather appealing aphorism: "A people and his ilk to be anachronisms, which we Now I wouldn't be against nuclear

get the kind of government ihey deserve." will safely outgrow, power if I thought there were no other The issue of what has happened to Don Jordon viable alternatives. But solar power could the Vietnamese, against whom these her- Phoenix easily become the most economical

bicides were used, should not be ig- energy source if we spent even a fraction nored. What has happened to them? Excellent job! The interview with Dr. Hans of the money, time, and effort we now

Charl du Plessis Bethe was a rare treat for me. I am a spend on fission reactors. its Wynberg, Cape Town reactor operator in the U.S. Navy, and I Technology should not be used for

Republic of South Africa have participated in the operation, own sake. It must be applied to solve maintenance, and testing of many different problems, not create them. "The Agent Orange Mystery" appropriately power plants. Rick Siegfried

emphasizes that veterans are suffering , It's about lime we heard from someone Areata, Calif. DO 18 OMNI HILDREN OF DISASTER EARTH By Douglas Starr

and Ed Dennis know the Chicago confirmed the Dennises' Janice worsi few decades to acf; then it could render special anguish of parenls whose fears: Three of their five children had the lungs useless or trigger cancer. And

children have been hurt by irreversible brain damage; two probably children were most vulnerable of all. pollution. Twelve years ago the Dennises will never be able to hold a job without moved from rural Washington to Kellogg, close supervision. Only the children were These victims add their laments to Idaho, so thai Ed could work in the affected: With their nervous systems those from dozens of pollution hot spots Bunker Hill Company smelter. For two still developing, they were exquisitely throughout this country. With toxins years they lived in a small house in the sensitive to [he nerve-damaging metal. spewing into the air, seeping from the shadow of the smoking factory, which ground, leaching into drinking water, in a month could spew tons ot gray, toxic The powder, people told Cathy Scott, even passing to infants through mother's lead. "At three in the afternoon you'd was harmless as freshly fallen snow. milk, today's young face environmental have to drive with your headlights on," And so she laughed when her son Sean dangers unlike any thai existed in Janice recalls. "Sometimes you couldn't came home after rolling in heaps of centuries past. No one knows how, or breathe, the air hurt your lungs so bad." asbestos with his buddies at the Globe, sometimes even which, substances will As time passed, the Dennis children Arizona, trailer park. The community affect the next generation, says Dr.

increasingly ill, grew with maladies ranging . had been built on the site of an old Laurence Finberg, chairman of the from headaches to stomach cramps. asbestos mill; huge deposits of the American Academy of Pediatrics' En- Those symptoms, though, didn't gain material lurked beneath a thin layer of vironmental Hazards Committee. But the

meaning until 1974, when federal soil. But no one in Globe suspected young are sure to be hurt most of all. investigators reported that Kellogg had danger until the Arizona Health Children, quite simply, are more fhe worst lead poisoning epidemic in Department told them their children had sensitive than adults. Their reproductive the nation: Ninety-nine percent of fhe been playing with a potent carcinogen. cells and brain cells —fhe tissues most children living within a mile of the plant "I think the whole world collapsed likely to be injured by toxins — are stifl had abnormally high levels of lead in when they told us that," Cathy says, growing, making them likely to absorb their blood; nearly a fifth had levels high recalling the day in 1979 she heard the pollutants. Children breathe more air per enough to qualify them as victims of news. She learned that asbestos could body weight than their elders and put lead poisoning. Later a specialist in wait anywhere from a few years to a things into their mouths, bringing them in contact with a vast variety of poisons. This may seem obvious, but only recenily has the effect of pollution on children been even partially documented. Only last year, for example, did researchers at New York University show that children's lung performance is impaired by the same "safe" pollution levels adults find comfortable. Another new study shows that fhe child of a factory worker sometimes becomes sick wifh the same occupational illnesses that affect the working parent, simply from the chemicals the parent brings home on the clothes he or she wore at work. A Nova Scotia doctor found an extreme case of this in 1976, when he was called to [real a baby girl suffering from a nearly fatal case of jaundice. Nothing seemed to help, Dr. Philip Bagnell says, yet the child miraculously recovered after a few day? seoaration from her mother. The reason? A dry-cleaning solvent called tetrachloroethylene (TCE) had tainted fhe mother's milk. The mother had Children are being and leaching from the ground. frequently lunched with her husband at the 20 OMNI GET AWAY SPECIAL FINALS

By Owen Davies

^^ ^^ ake a foamed aluminum GAS package less than 20 inches across entrants have been given the option of it spelling their in greater detail: | I alloy for low-mass construc- and 15 inches high. And must be out plans ,j [ I U I iion in space. Study bone able to survive accelerations of up to 4gs, Miller cautions that plans of the winning formation in weightlessness. Prepare sound levels that would kill an unprotect- entrant will probably be changed when plastics thai cannot be formed on Earth. ed animal, and outside temperatures NASA's experts screen them for safety

These are three of the suggestions that could vary trom a high of 1 10T hazards and technical problems. But - round that have made it to the finals in Omni's to a low of 296°F— quite a bit colder judging during the second will Get Away Special Contest. than liquid oxygen. continue to weigh entries against the Test the effect of short-term spaceilight Even before facing the rigors of space, criteria we used in the first round: on fine wine and cheese; that's one the proposals must endure two rounds originality, feasibility, practical interest, suggestion that didn't. of judging. In the first, a team of space elegance, and cost-effectiveness. Last June Omni made its readers an scientists, headed by physicist Robert W. In alphabetical order, the finalists and offer that many could not refuse: Send in Bussard. inventor of the interstellar Iheir ideas are: the best idea for a scientific experiment ramjet, examined all the suggestions, Robert Arnold, Massillon, Ohio, Test to fly on the space shuttle, and we'll pick rejecting any that tailed even a single the structural properties of concrete up the tab. We will give you one of criterion. When several contestants sent exposed to the vacuum, radiation, and NASAs Get Away Special (GAS) canisters in similar ideas, the judges selected temperature changes of space. in which to carry out your plan, pay the the entries that most closely matched our Franklin H. Cocks, a professor of cost of your equipment, and then fly you" criteria. Only 16 entries survived this mechanical engineering and materials anywhere in the continental United rigorous screening. science at Duke University, in Durham, States to watch the landing of the shuttle Now the second round has begun. North Carolina. Create foamed aluminum that carries your payload. Working with NASA project manager alloys with unique stiffness properties.

It was not easy tor respondents to Donna S. Miller, we've sent each finalist a Mike Fowler. Austin. Texas. Examine devise a possible winner. The experiment copy of the GAS Experimenter Handbook, the crystal structure and properties of must offer new information of real scientific which details the technical constraints mixed plastics solidified in space. or technological interest. It mus! weigh on experiments designed to fly in a Get Harry Gilford. Sacramento, California. no more than 60 pounds and tit inside a Away Special cylinder. Remaining Study foamed metals by using a low- melting-point alloy called Wood's metal.

Leland T. Gilmore and Sheldon Ft. Pearlman, Silver Spring, Maryland. Look at the growth and movement of micro- organisms in microgravity. Margaret Joyce, Arlington, Virginia. Attempt to make a new piezoelectric material from components that cannot be mixed on Earth.

Kevin T. Keith, a pre-med student from Castro Valley. California. Study the development of a living tissue sample in microgravity conditions. Mary G. Lingua and Timothy W. Foresman, an environmental engineer and a research ecologist. respectively, from Oak View. California. Test the effect of weightlessness on embryonic growth in the California sea urchin. Gary B. Mortensen. Waseca, Minnesota. Fabricate electronic frequency-control

crystals in the vacuum of space in the hope ot prolonging their useful life. Nigel M. Parsad, a ninth-grader in Fairview, New Jersey. By exposing amino ar.-j /;, s oii cuitostjy acids to conditions in outer space, test —

PEACE PILE

By Tabitha M. Powledge

science could just invent a pill that affect human beings in the same ways. she engaging in the same behavior as a

Ifcontrolled aggression, we might have a It hasn't even been tried out on other robber who guns down a storeowner peaceful planet, a world without war primates, monkeys and apes, though such who resists him during a holdup? How do or even barroom brawls. Right? experiments are likely to begin soon. those two acts compare with a killing Wrong. But we need to understand Since mice and rats respond somewhat carried out for pay by a hitman? We might

why this notion is wrong, because differently to the drug, it is probable that call all three acts murder, and they are someone has already invented a drug other species will respond differently, too. ail clearly examples of aggression. But that looks, at first glance, like the ideal The fact that mice and rats do not have despite the identical label we apply, candidate for an antiaggression pill. identical reactions to DU 27716 is a key they are all quite different sorts of actions, Scientists in the Netherlands have to understanding why this drug— or any with different motivations and different reported, and other laboratories have other antiaggression drug—will never accompanying emotions. Different body confirmed, some remarkable antiaggression eliminate all outward manifestations chemistry almost certainly influences

properties in an experimental compound of antagonism or hostility. If the drug each one as well. This implies that no they have christened DU 27716. abolishes offensive attack in the mouse, single drug could control the behavior of

DU 27716 is remarkable because it but merely reduces the same behavior all three killers.

appears to have much more precise . iri the rat, the biochemistry underlying this This becomes particularly obvious if effects than drugs now used tor controlling response must be different in mice and we compare any one of those murderous aggression. A male mouse given DU rats, despite the close evolutionary kinship acts with another kind of killing the 27716 does not attack another mouse between these genera. killing carried out in wartime. None has introduced into his cage. This is very Even within a single species, diversity any slTiiarity to the coldly rational unmouselike behavior. The drug does not remains a fundamental characteristic calculations that motivate the commanders

merely reduce mouse offensiveness; it of aggressive behavior. Very simply, the of modern military machines. Today's

abolishes it. Its effects on rats in identical word aggression covers an immense warfare often involves attempts by two circumstances are slightly different: amount ot behavioral territory. Consider, armies to destroy each other without DU 27716 reduces offensive attack for example, a wife who knocks her the slightest personal animosity. The

dramatically, but it does not totally husband over the head with a frying pan combatants themselves would probably eliminate the response. in a moment of rage and kills him. Is much rather be somewhere else. We Within minutes DU 27716 changes can fight an even more impersonal war normal aggression patterns. Other drugs by pushbutton, with an enemy half a currently used to control aggression world away. Even if DU 27716 worked in

take days, sometimes weeks, to start humans as it does in rodents, it is hard working. Scientists are (urther fascinated to imagine that this drug or any related because the drug appears to have little compound could prevent this sort ot insti- effect on most other kinds of behavior. tutional, remote, dispassionate bloodshed. Some drugs that control aggression work Someday, perhaps even before too

1 by sedating the subject; a tranquilizer^ long, we may have drugs that can control mouse is, obviously, not a pugnacious certain narrowly defined aggressive mouse. But a mouse given DU 27716 behaviors. Perhaps DU 27716 will be is perfectly perky and puts in an appar- among them; perhaps not. ently normal mouse day. The drugs will raise troubling moral

Most important, although it has a questions about how and on whom they pronounced effect on offensive behavior. should be used, but that is a subject the drug appears to have little effect for a different discussion.

on defensive behavior, at least when The point is that curbing aggression, in

administered in small doses. A mouse all its variety, can only be slow, laborious, treated with DU 27716 will still defend and piecemeal. Each kind of aggression himself against attack by an untreated has a unique cause and requires a mouse into whose cage he has been unique solution. Moreover, some forms of placed. The drug, however, has one very aggression, such as defense, are socially considerable-drawback that has surfaced valuable and require no "solution" at in the case of rats. It ruins their sex life all. The sad truth .is that there can never (but in mafes only, not in females). be a pill that will give us peace, in the No'one knows whether DU 27716 would barroom or on the battlefield. OO 34 OMNI "

"UMORS OF THE PSYCHE RJllfUD By Mike Edelhart

Gregory's brain tumor appeared LeShan says, had a traumatic childhood the idea thai their emotions contributed when he was nine. I! defied and has a repressed emotional makeup, to their cancer are not innocuous," warns surgery and radiation and spread and his cancer appears within months Dr. Jimmie Holland, chief of Psychiatry swiftly all through his brain. The boy after he suffers some severe trauma, Service at Sloan-Kettering Memorial was considered doomed. Then, at the such as the death of a loved one. By being Cancer Center. "The patient who already Biofeedback Psychophysiology Center ol written about olten, this model has been feels guilty for delaying seeking the Menninger Foundation, in fopeka, invested with the aura of truth despite the treatment, or who is vulnerable to self-

Kansas, he was taught to visualize his fact that an imolied I nk oetween cancer doubt, may become more upset." cure mentally. and trauma is physically impossible. The Institute for Psychosocial Study, a He made his fight for life a titanic space "Cancer cannot possibly develop six to New York City-based professional battle. His cancer-killing white blood eight months after a loss is experienced," organization, points out that more and cells became a deadly fighter squadron. says Dr. Joan Borysenko. a Harvard more cancer patients are facing this He was the intrepid squad commander psychologist and cell biologist. "The time problem every day. As more people come "blue leader." His doctor was "ground since the first cell turns cancerous until to believe that emotions and attitudes control." One year later his tumor was a palpable tumor develops is eleven contribute to the development and the " gone. Now thirteen, he is still visualizing years in breast cancer and five years in cure of cancer, "patients cannot help and still cancer-free. lung cancer," she says. There is no way wondering whether the disease is the

This tale, once typical of grocery . that someone's cancer could be due to result of a personal shortcoming," one checkout tabloids, was related at a his emotional loss. Nor could such events statement from the institute suggests. prestigious medical conference sponsored be causal factors in and of themselves, "What begins as the hopeful wish to by the American Institute of Stress. The she adds. The disease is much believe in the power of mind over matter conference was convened to report too complicated to allow for such a carries the implicit fear that this on a new medical idea that has gained simple explanation. may actually be so," wide attention and credence among But worse is the fact that this uncritical As a matter of scientific lact, serious the general public: that many diseases acceptance of the stress-cancer link researchers say, a cancer victim cannot be may be abetted, even caused, by can sharpen patients' emotional suffering. held personally responsible either for psychological influences, particularly "Methods that require patients to accept his disease or for its cure. In the words of stress, and that diseases can be con- Philadelphia cancer researcher Dr. Claus quered by using the mind to overcome Bahnson, "No one is any more to blame those influences. for his illness than for the shape of the As the conference sponsor, Dr. Paul features on his face." Rosch, said, "Stress is when you're not in The rale that stress plays in cancer control of something. If doesn't matter and many other diseases is still open to what method you use [to get back in question. Most researchers agree that control] as long as you have faith in it. whatever the effect of stress, it is not

If there is a strong faith in a treatment significant and not always predictable. To mode—whether it be a faith healer, the begin with, studies have shown that shrine at Lourdes, laetrile, or nutrition- stress can inhibit as well as stimulate it creates the feeling that people are tumor growth. And even where stress controlling the situation. They are telling does seem to enhance the risk of cancer, themselves, 'I'm the boss, I'm in its impact is relatively small in humans, control here.' according to cancer expert Dr. Bernard Yet, despife the enthusiasm of Fox, of the National Cancer Institute. supporters such as Dr. Rosch, the case At the most, Fox and other experts will for stress as a direct cause for cancer only venture that psychosocial factors. is scientifically weak. And its wide may not trigger a cancer. But if you're promotion has actually harmed far more prone to develop cancer, stress will speed cancer patients and their families up the disease process. than it has helped. While serious researchers move slowly

Take, for example, the widely reported forward in their understanding of the concept of the "cancer personality" roots of cancer and what roie stress may advanced by psychologist Dr. Lawrence play, public fascination with the stress- LeShan. The typical cancer victim. disease link continues. DQ 26 OMNI —

THE ART5 By Morton Hunt

The great British biologist J.B.S. inside of the proton and the developer deftly captures co'-i the exc tement and Haldane was once asked by and director of Fermilab, the immense the tedium of scientific research, the a group of theologians what his atom- and particle-smashing laboratory; incomparable thrill of discovery, and studies of living creatures had taught Mark Ptashne, of Harvard, a principal surprisingly—the letdown that may follow him the nature of about God. He replied, developer of gene splicing and leading it. (Ptashne speaks of the "cruelty" of somewhat wickedly, that they revealed investigator of the molecular mechanisms having one's problem disappear right after God's "inordinate fondness for beetles." that start up or stop gene activity; and it has been solved.) No doubt this ruffled the feathers of John McCarthy, one of the chief creators Hilts also explores the painful awareness the audience, but it was more than of the field of artificial intelligence and and deep concern all three men have a flippant remark: It expressed Haldane's the director of the Stanford University about the impact of their various special scientific perception of reality. Artificial Intelligence Laboratory. discoveries on their society. Take Wilson, For of the million identified zoological An impressive trio — superachievers for example, who worked on the first species, three quarters are insects, and all. And oddballs all. Wilson, shy and atomic bomb. "He was naive and thought three fifths of these are beetles. It was reclusive, refuses to have a phone in his the bomb could be politically contained," Haldane's way of pointing out the irony office (he once ripped one out of the Hilts said recently. of human egocentrism. .wall and buried another in the earth "When the first one was detonated, he This kind of vision fascinates science of a potted plant). Ptashne slaves got physically ill. He couldn't stomach writer Philip Hilts, in whose new book. compulsively around the clock in the the terror he had helped create. He feels Scientific Temperaments (Simon and laboratory, yet has found the money and a sense of sin about it and has worked Schuster, 1982), the anecdote appears. time to buy and play a Stradivarius. in antinuclear-war organizations ever For several Hilts years played Boswell McCarthy can get so lost in thought that since to expiate the sin." It's a relief to to three leading American scientists; after being asked a question, he will learn that Dr. Strangelove is only a story He tagged around after them, ate and walk away without a word, then return to and that Wilson, Ptashne, and McCarthy drank with them, and asked them answer it minutes— or even days— later! are men of conscience and humanity. countless questions. The three portraits reveal much more Scientific Temperaments is a visit to Hilts chose as his three specimens than the special vision and idiosyncrasies three worlds of ideas. Hilts was so Robert Wilson, a leading explorer of the such scientists are capable of. Hilts captivated by the drama of what had been happening in each of these fields of science that for a while he felt at

war with himself; "I found the ideas so interesting," Hilts told me, "that I wanted to write about them as much as about the three men working in them." The

problem proved to be its own solution: He wrote in a kind of counterpoint, continually shifting from the personal to the general and then back again. Each profile offers its own unique

pleasures, I found it great fun to eavesdrop on Hilts's conversations with these three extraordinary people and to peep into their private lives. On the other hand, the passages on particle physics, biogenetics, and artificial intelligence excited me by making what had seemed incomprehensible suddenly clear and simple. (Well, relatively simple.)

Scientific Temperaments is filled with science writing of the highest order.

It is a reassuring book: It demonstrates that we, too, though we may not be capable of doing what the scientists do, are able to see what they see. DO FILM THE ARTS By Roberta Grant

a motion picture over five Imagine lifelike eyes— the kind taxidermists him," say's Gary Kurtz, coproducer with years in the making: a high-budget, emplace in stuffed animals—and became Henson of this film. "Such a story could be special-effects extravaganza with no fascinated with the possibility of doing set in any environment, but the advantage sign of spaceships, galactic wars, or a film about "characters that looked ot fantasy is that it allows you to abstract extraterrestrial visitors; a film telling the alive, as opposed to cartoonlike Muppets." the story enough to see its moral in a sometimes terrifying tale of youth tested by Henson dreamed of a "fairy-tale fantasy slightly different way." the responsibilities of maturity without world," and when he discovered the Kurtz cut his teeth as a big-budget using a single human actor; film a from drawings of British illustrator Brian Fraud producer on the high-tech space Master Muppeteer Jim Henson without (the coauthor of the best-selling Faeries), allegories Star Wars and The Empire one Muppet in it. Henson knew he'd found a partner. Strikes Back. What is new about The Dark The Dark Crystal is a cinematic fairy Froud and Henson began by working Crystal, and its principal challenge, Kurtz tale, more closely related in spirit to J.R.R. backward. "Normally you write a story and feels, is the obligation to make the Tolkien's Lord of the Rings trilogy than then decide how to illustrate it," Henson various nonhuman Gelflings, Skeksis, to Star Wars or E.T. But, unlike Ralph says. "But in this case we started by and Garthims emotionally compelling in Bakshi's mediocre film version of Tolkien's creating the world visually and then addifion to making them capable of Hobbit saga, The Dark Crystal is not allowed the story to grow out of that. I walking, talking, and shaking hands. "With the result of animators, human, computer- wanted to come up with creatures whose an actor, even if he's motionless, you ized, or otherwise. Neither does its magic . form would dictate the kinds of experi- can put a camera on his lace and study depend on millions of dollars spent on ences they would have." To draw the him, There's always some facial move- lavish postproduction optical effects, world of The Dark Crystal, Fraud studied ment going on. But with mechanical Dark Crystal is set in a full-scale, three- the physical structures of insects and creatures, you have to orchestrate every dimensional dramatic world inhabited reptiles as well as the artifacts of ancient movement down to the blink ot an eye. by Skeksis, Pod People, crystal bats, and even prehistoric cultures, There's nothing there when it isn't being and lithe Gelflings. As the two creators worked together, operated," Kurtz says. "When you work When Henson was invited to create their story line emerged. "A character with mechanical creatures, the problem is some offbeat characters for the original must make an irrevocable decision about to make them sufficiently versatile." Saturday Night Live TV show, he used his life and the lives of those around in one sequence, Jen and Kira, his mate, escape the terrible claws of Garthim warriors by climbing up on the backs of two Landstriders, then racing away. As drawn by Froud. the Landstriders were hideous, long-legged, swift creatures with owl-shaped faces and hairy, elephant- hide skins. "When we were originally laying out the film," Kurtz recalls, "we- thought of doing the Landstriders in miniature, using traveling mat and stop- motion photography in a traditional King

Kong style. It would have meant building a miniature swamp and a jungle." However, Henson had a different idea.

"What I wanted to do throughout the film was not rely on those kinds of techniques but instead actually

accomplish it in the studio, full-scale." Searching for a way to bring the Landstriders to life, the Henson team noticed one of their performers (the men and women who actually operate the

creatures) clowning around on stilts.

Eureka! It was not the complete solution, but now they had a structural concept. With mechanical actors, the pmdm Ultimately the Landstrider was to consist 30 OMNI CONTINUED ON PAGE 122 HEATH'S HERO BREAKTHRDUEH5

By Gurney Williams III

^^\ new domestic robot from the announcing that it's calling the police. an ultrasonic ranging system, operating M^^K Heath Company hauls small Experimenters can also hook the Hero at 32,000 cycles per second, detects m %loads, talks, senses movement, I up to home computers to carry out objects up to eight feet away. An easily light, and sound, and understands the more elaborate tasks. The robot comes accessible electronic board on the robot's binary chatter of that other domestic with an on-board microprocessor, head permits experimenters to patch servant the microcomputer. programmable through a keyboard. And in other home-designed devices, such as

Sold as a kit (for under $1 ,500], the it can take-orders from programs on heat detectors or smoke alarms.

39-pound, do-it-yourself Hero I is also cassette tape recorders, or from a hand- Heath also sells a fully constructed capable of telling held owner/builders to control device called a teaching Hero I for $2,495. Complementing the do it themselves. "I do not do windows" pendant. After one run-through ot a automaton, the company offers a 1,200- is one of 33 phrases built into the robot's sequence of tasks, the robot faithfully page, 18-unit Robotics Education Course. integrated-circuit memory. repeats the sequence down to the last The self-taught lessons cover robot

There are other things il will not do. twitch of its extendable gripper. fundamentals, sensors, voice synthesis, The robot won't carry more than 16 ounces In a test of the assembled robot, we and other topics. The $99.95 course at a time in its clawiike gripper. Nor will programmed it to pick up a plastic cup, can be taken without the robot. But Heath it climb stairs or feed its four rechargeable carry it in a weaving pattern around a (Dept. 150-125, Benton Harbor, Ml electric cells by itself, although it will carpeted room, and put it down. After 49022) says it's a lot more effective to lapse into kind of meditative it a power-down we'd helped to find its starting point, the study the lessons using Hero I as a state if battery systems fall below 10 Hero retraced its path, rolling along on teaching aid (or as a gofer for an volts. (The usual output is 27 volts.) three wheels and manipulating the cup occasional aspirin).

But its designers point out that it can appropriately to prevent spilling. NEW PRODUCTS pertorm many ot the functions of the Designers also showed off a light- family major-domo, including patrolling sensing system that converts changes in When the Baby-Temp, a new baby rooms and checking tor unexpected illumination into digital information. A pacifier, turns black, don't throw it out; movement, delivering drinks, waking its sound sensor, they explained, responds call the doctor. The Baby-Temp is owners on time, and even threatening to "explosive" noises such as hand designed to do more than pacify: A tiny, intruders by raising its gripper and claps or single-syllable words (bye), while green liquid-crystal thermometer floating in the glycerine-tilled plastic nipple turns black when the infant's temperature rises over 100°R The Baby-Temp can be sterilized just like an ordinary pacifier, and the glycerine and heat sensor are

harmless if swallowed. ($2.50, from TRP Energy Sensors. 232 Madison Avenue,

, Suite 401 , New York, NY -10016.)

It is the next best thing to a Polaroid instant camera: a portable processing

system that makes it possible to develop instantly photographs that have been taken with any ordinary 35mm camera. There's just one catch: You have to use a special Polaroid film. The Polaroid Autoprocess 35mm System includes a portable film processor, a slide cutter and mounter, and a series of slide mounts. Three types ot film are available in 12- or 36-exposure rolls: color transparency, black-and-white transparency, and a special high-contrast black-and-white line-copy film. (Under $100, Polaroid Industrial Marketing, 575 Technology

.<'.'. Gripper on Hero robot menaces intruders. '. s 'j/ :hq ;):s;vi9£ '.'.-rho'ji sprung a drop. Square, Cambridge, MA 02139. )OQ 32 OMNI coruTiniuurm

ml deem;

i his is a test. This station is conducting a test of !he Credit cards, bankbooks, and insurance policies of course go.) Emergency Broadcast System. This is only a test." Bus pickup points are also included in case you want to stick How many times has this sober message, followed around for public transportation to your host community or des- by the eerie tone of the emergency signal, inter- ignated fallout shelter. don't worry. rupted your favorite talk show or rock song? Then the reassuring, If there are no instructions in your phone bookyet epilogue: "If this had been an actual emergency, the attention FEMA has also prepared a series of informative newspaper signal you just heard would have been followed by official in- articles. The first, entitled "Knowing Nuclear Hazards Is a Key formation, news, or instructions." to Personal Survival," gets right to the point. "If the U.S. should Some time in the next year broadcast audiences nationwide be attacked, people who happen to be close to a nuclear ex- may get a preview of the rest of the test, a full-scale emergency plosion would probably be killed or seriously injured by the blast." announcement issued by the country's number one entertainer. The articles also contain do-it-yourself plans for "expedient" Ronald Reagan. In the event of a nuclear war, officials hope, fallout shelters, including one you can build right under your car emergency instructions could help save countless lives. There's in case you get stuck in a traffic jam. There is also the "snackbar just one catch 22; the likelihood that most broadcast stations fallout shelter," which you can build in your basement, enabling would be wiped off the air by the electromagnetic pulse that you to sit out the blast in the comfort of your own home. What follows a nuclear blast. about public fallout shelters marked with the familiar trianguiar The Emergency Broadcast System plays an important part in emblem? Most of these are right in the center of high-risk met- the Federal Emergency Management Agency's (FEMA) pro- ropolitan areas, the article advises. And the supplies, stockpiled posed $4.2-billion, seven-year civil defense program, which critics in them during the Sixties, have either rotted or been removed. say is really a plot to persuade Americans they can fight, sur- FEMA's salient point, the one it tries to drive home in its con- vive, and possibly even win a nuclear war. And compared to cluding article, is this: "The U.S. could survive a nuclear attack the resf of the program, the emergency broadcast test seems and go on to recover within relatively few years." Accordingly, downright useful. the U,S. Postal Service recently publicized its plans for deliv- The heart of the FEMA program is the Crisis Relocation Plan ering mail after a nuclear attack, and the Treasury Department to move 150 million Americans from the 400 or so "high-risk has come up with a contingency plan for filing income taxes. areas" to rural "host communities." Most of these communities Since records normally used to document and determine in- have already rejected the concept for fear they'll be trampled come would probably be destroyed, the Treasury suggests a by "guests." And so-called guests haven't embraced the plan, simple sales tax instead. either: Just try leaving New York City for the country at 5 pm on There is just one thing that FEMA didn't bargain on when it a steamy summer Friday, skeptics point out. If you think the came up with its master defense plan: that the American people roads are bad at rush hour, try them at Ground Zero. Luckily, would consider the idea of a "survivable nuclear war" the ulti- the plans are at this point far from complete; Congress recently mate joke. Says Dr. Robert S. Norris, an official at the Center for slashed FEMAs proposed $252-million Crisis Relocation budget Defense Information, in Washington, D.C., "We've goiten calls to about $147 million, for the last six months from little rural towns all over the country. But some of FEMA's other programs are already in the works. They want to know how they can take care of sixty thousand By 1984, for instance, emergency instructions will be included relocated people. And those questions lead to bigger ques- in phone books reaching 38 million people. Directories serving tions, like whether or not we should build the MX missile. FEMA's

Plattsburgh, New York; Limestone, Maine: Marquette County, plan backfired. It has become a great educational device that Michigan; and Austin, Texas, contain detailed evacuation maps reaches— and appalls— just about everybody." and lists of what to take and what to leave behind. (Pets stay. —PHOEBE HOBAN coniTiruuunn

So Palmer developed a HOOVER THE TALKING favorite Hooverism. And shot he says stimulates SEAL when he tires of performing endorphin production in for his guests, he just says, the brain, thereby ridding Some unsung wino on the "Get out of here." smokers of this dependency. Boston waterfront may "This is the first time The treatment starts with deserve credit for what top anyone has observed this sodium animal biologists consider kind of thing." says biologist and an unprecedented develop- Sheri Gish, of the Smithsoni- mesthetic, ment: a talking seal. an Institution, who explains of each Hoover, a ten-year-old that Hoover's pronounce-

.r and on the side of the spotted seal living at the ments fall short of true nose. The mixture is a New England Aquarium, has speech. "There is no evi- chemical irritant that tempo- startled visitors to his water- dence he understands what rarily damages cartilage, front tank with a number the words mean," she says. causing ihe body to produce of clearly articulated Aquarium officials disclaim endorphins of its own. phrases— spoken, of course, credit for Hoover's achieve- Newly treated smokers no with an unmistakable ment. They believe the longer need cigarettes. Boston accent. seal had nocturnal lessons Palmer explains, since "Hello., come over here," from some vagrant fre- they're getting endorphins Hoover tells aquarium quenting his tank. 'He from the wounded cartilage. visitors who arrive during sounds sort of disrepu- Then, as the cartilage the spring seal mating table," says Smithsonian heals, the body produces season, apparently the only scientist Katherine Ralls. less and less endorphin time the 200-pound crea- "The aquarium is not with each passing day. By ture feels moved to speech. the time the supply shuts off, "How are you?" is another in less than a week, smok- ers have been weaned away from their dependency. The treatment is 100 percent effective at "de- addiction," Palmer claims. But since smoking is a A Florida doctor has complex behavior, with many developed a radical treat- psychological components, ment for breaking cigaretfe half the patients return to smokers of their habit: He smoking, within a year. It damages the cartilage should be possible to im- in their ears and nose. prove the de-addiction rate, Dr. Robert Palmer, a Uni- he notes, by adding con- versity of Miami physician, ventional treatment. claims that habitual smokers Palmer offers his injection are actually addicted to treatment at two SmokeMed their own endorphins, those clinics in southern Florida. morphinelike chemicals Similar therapy is available produced by the body in from Dr. [vt, Dennis Mabry, response to wounds or of the Nicotine Withdrawal such irritants as nicotine. Clinic, in El Paso, Texas. Endorphins are probably —Robert Decker! 10,000 times more addictive than heroin, accounting "Modesty is of no use to a for the hold that cigarettes Hoover. There's no evidence that he understands i have on their users. —Homer his pronouncements. Still, he has a pretty goad B 3B OMNI A TEMPORAL KIND "But that's more typical of "TLE is often misdiag- OF LOVE grand mal epilepsy, in nosed." Ellison says. "With which the entire brain sends the advent of modern brain

Is your wife in the habil of out scrambled nervous scans, detecting TLE should stripping for diners ai the impulses. With TLE victims, be easier." That's crucial, corner deli? Is your husband seizures are concentrated Ellison stresses, because provoked to sexual arousal in the temporal lobes alone. victims can be helped with and trancelike states by the Attacks can include muscu- anticonvulsant drugs. sight of a safety pin? And lar contractions, but often — Charles Craig has your son reported they don't." pounding stomach pains, Since the temporal lobes "I wish I'd never woke up followed by the urge to help process emotional this morning. dress in women's clothing? and sexual stimuli, Ellison Life was easy when it was " If so, they may be af- says, TLE victims suffer boring. flicted with temporal-lobe predictable personality —The Police epilepsy (TLE), in which changes. They often develop seizures flash through the a deepening interest in CRUEL HARVEST lobes on either side of the religion and morality, TLE brain, just behind the ears. victims alsG tend to develop When the Indians of the "Most people think epi- a passion for writing and Ohio River valley gave leptics are stricken by a wide range of sexual up hunting and gathering in muscular convulsions that abnormalities, including favor of agriculture, they make them lose all control transvestitism, exhibitionism, reaped pestilence, malnutri- of their limbs," explains fetishism, and, most com- tion, and violence along James Ellison, a psychiatrist monly, a noticeable loss with their corn. at Tufts University. of the sex drive. According to Anthony Perzigian, of the University of Cincinnati, the seemingly progressive move to agri- culture punished the Indians with devastating overreii- for contagion and undernu- ance on a few low-protein trition, he adds, comes crops (corn, beans, and (rom stress markers on squash). They became at bones and teeth, Both baby once more sedentary and and permanent teeth from more bellicose, commonly the agriculturalists show dying of wounds or disease. faulty enamel and ten times Perzigian, who is both as many cavities as among an anthropologist and an the hunter-gatherers. X anatomist, examined skeletal rays of bones from ancient remains of four prehistoric agricultural societies reveal cultures that spanned the episodes of arrested period from 2500 s.c. to a.d, growth. And projectile points 1250. As the centuries embedded in bones attest passed, he found, there was to stepped-up hostilities a steady deterioration of and violence. health. Perzigian also found "Infectious diseases were signs of widespread tuber- known in the very earliest culosis, a scourge he times," Perzigian says, "but attributes to increased pop- their frequency increased ulation and decreased agriculture resistance to disease. Some fetishists may no: hsvs psychologic?! proWe^s at ail but may dramatically once simply be victims of seizures concentrated in their temporal lobes was established." Evidence — Dava Sobel —

coruTiruuurm

WORLD'S BIGGEST mosomes and descended happen to find you, tin ORGANISM directly from the original simply replace their dyii cell formed when the horse companions, multiplying Your skin, moulh. and gut was conceived. Likewise, with a vengeance as they are crawling with bits ot all bacteria are also de- fend off the drug. an invisible, immortal, world- scended from one cell: that Sonea and Panisset encompassing superorgan- first bacterium that divided compare the superorganism ism. The idea is spooky, some 3 billion years ago. to a slow-working computer but immunologists Sorin So- The researchers believe that may seek, and then nea and Maurice Panisset, that when the bacterial find, the solution to a at the University of Mont- superorganism is attacked, threat.—Mary Soderstrom real, are proposing it as a it fights back with the help new way to view bacteria. of brethren that may be MIGHTY MOTHER The bacterial world is not thousands of miles away. MOUSE a collection of different If you've ever taken species of one-celled organ- too much of the same anti- Laboratory mice are isms, they contend. Rather, biotic to tight a bacterial valued for their genetic it's a single complex entity, infection, for instance, you similarity; this is crucial if just as a horse is, True, know that the medication experiments are to be groups of bacteria differ. eventually stops working, consistent from one time But so do the cells that The reason: For every and place to the next. Now make up a horse's eyes or antibacterial agent, there some California scientists its intestine. are bound to be bacteria say they have shown that What the horse's cells that have somehow mutated every inbred mouse alive have in common, the scien- to break il down. And when arose from a single female tists note, is shared genetic these altered bacteria born hundreds, perhaps information, packaged carried around the world in thousands, of years ago. neatly in each cell's chro- water or on the wind— The researchers this conclusion after finding of the creatures revered identical strands of DMA around 1200 B.C. in the in the mitochondria of 14 lab temples of Apollo. Others mouse strains. The mito- say she can be traced chondria—tiny energy to the pet mouse trade of organs found within each seventeenth-centuryEurope. cell— contain DNA that has No matter what her origin, been passed on only by though, it's almost certain the mother, Stanford Univer- that she did indeed exist. sity geneticist Tim Ferris For, according to Ferris and

explains. So if two mice have his associates at the Uni- identical mitochondrial versity of California at DNA, they most likely have Berkeley, chances are one a common female ancestor. in 10 million that lab mice In a control group of 20 would have identical mito- wild mice from four different chondrial DNA by acci- continents, Ferris adds, dent.— Chris Christiansen he and his colleagues found tremendous variation. In fact, he says, "almost no two wild mice had mitochondrial generation can go beyond DNA exactly alike." the point reached by the Some scientists have genius cl the last genera- " Bacteria: Noi incjivtfu-ji -jot-zel'r-.d o:g^r,^ms. say tw speculated that the grand tion. gists, but a single complex entity that encircles the globe. mouse mother was one —Max Gluckman 3B OMNI. worse on spatial-ability death. Further research. aluminum workers, power tasks. The males failed to Gracy adds, should some- and telephone linemen, improve their spatial-ability day help scientists replace mot ion- picture projectionists, radio tele- scores even when a new I the defective enzyme in and even and drug was used to stimulate young and old alike. graph operators. testosterone production. — Sy Montgomery X rays and ultraviolet light

"I suspect hormones alter are already known to cause the brain circuits responsi- ELECTRIC LEUKEMIA cancer. But Milham's study ble for spatial reasoning suggests that many types before puberty," Hier says. People who work with of electromagnetic radiation, "After thai, brain organiza- high-voltage electricity on a including those long as-

tion is permanently estab- daily basis may be at greater sumed safe, may also be lished."— Eric Mishara risk of developing leukemia. carcinogenic. Only further This conclusion comes study, he says, can confirm OLD AGE ENZYME from epidemiologist Samuel or deny the danger. Milham, who recently up- — Rick Boling The elderly don't really dated a mortality study

die of old age. Instead, they for the Washington State "Should I refuse a good

succumb to colds or minor Department of Social and dinner simply because I do infections that younger Health Services. He found no! understand She proc- bodies would easily ward that those working around esses of digestion?" electric or —Oliver off. If scientists could just powerful mag- Heaviside explain this failure of the netic fields were 37 per- immune system, they'd be cent more likely than the "The function of muscle is able to help- the elderly general population to come to pull and not to push, live longer, healthier lives. down with leukemia. Those except in the case of the Now a group of biochemists at highest risk included genitals and the tongue." at North Texas State Univer- power-station operators, —Leonardo da Vinci 3D HORMONES sity say they've found the cause: a crucial enzyme that Visualizing and manipu- stops working when the lating complex three-dimen- body gets too old. sional objects has been The enzyme— called called a male talent, while triosephosphate isomerase, women are said to have or TPI — stimulates white superior verbal skills. Now blood cells to fight Infection a study at Massachusetts in the young. But in the General Hospital, in elderly, according to Robert Boston, suggests these Gracy, head of the Texas intellectual differences stem team, TPI is chemically tram biological makeup, altered: For some unknown

Neurologist Daniel Hier reason it takes on a nega- and endocrinologist William tive electrical charge and

Crowly gave a battery of becomes totally useless. It tests to 19 men with idio- lingers in aging cells with- pathic hypogonadotrophic out doing its job, the immune hypogonadism, a rare system falters, and disease condition marked by sexual sets in. immaturity and a scarcity Negatively charged TPI of testosterone. The 19 accumulates also in children scored as well on verbal with progeria and Werner's problems as normal men, syndrome, both diseases but they did 25 to 30 percent that drastically accelerate CDRJTIRJUURn

INDIAN INTERS agement, who headed TEST FOR SUICIDE a recent project to identify An extensive network of the roads. A recent discovery that ancient roads surrounding "What we do know," she suicide is related to a Chaco Canyon, in north- says, "is that the roads chemical in the brain may western New Mexico, is were definitely constructed, lead to a test that ferrets out raising questions about the and they represent a major suicide-prone people. Anasazi Indians, who built engineering effort and labor The chemical, called the. highways as well as investment." Even in places serotonin, is a neurotrans- a dozen towns and an im- where the roadbeds tra- mitter, a substance that pressive astronomical versed flat rock, she adds, delivers messages from one observatory some 1,000 the builders cut into the nerve cell to another. And, years ago. rock so thai the paths would according to Dr. Michael The roads crisscross an be clearly delineated all Stanley, of Wayne State

area of about 60,000 along the route. University, in Detroit, it square miles, connecting Theroads were built, seems to be in short supply former outlying Anasazi used, and abandoned in a in the brains of suicide communities with the ancient mere- 75 years. By a.d. 1250 victims. metropolis inside Chaco the Anasazi had lefi the Stanley compared the Canyon itself. Several San Juan Basin to seek brains of nine New York City stretches of road run more more fertile pastures else- residents who had commit- than 40 miles in length, where.— Dava Sobel ted suicide with the brains of and mas! measure a lull 30 nine people who died of feet in width. Yet the Anasa- "To serve an unintelligent other causes. The suicides' surgical way to make eating zi had no vehicles or pack man is like crying in the brains had 44 percent less feel like being full. They animals. Why would they wilderness, massaging the fewer sites where serotonin literally fill their patients' require roadways, of such body ot a dead man, plant- could attach to nerve tummies with bags of air. grandeur? ing water lilies on dry land, cells —an Indication of Ole Gyring Nieben and "It's a big mystery," whispering in the ear of reduced serotonin activity, Henrik Harboe, of the

concedes Chris Kincaid, of the deaf." It should eventually be University of Copenhagen, the Bureau of Land Man- —Panchatantra possible, says Stanley, recently used catheters to develop a blood test to to thread latex balloons identify potential suicides. down the throats and into They could then be treated, the stomachs of five obese he continues, with the women. After being inflated antidepressant trazodone to about the size of a fist, and an experimental drug the balloons floated freely for named Zimeladine, two one to three weeks before medications known to boost harmlessly collapsing serotonin production. and leaving the body. — Paul Raebum The women, who aver- aged 5'6" in height and with DIET BALLOON an average weight of 218 pounds, reported eating "Just eat less and you'll less, feeling fine, and being lose weight" is a refrain sated by the vitamin-anci- ' :. ->.> obese people hear time and protein-rich diet recom- time again. But eating less mended by the doctors. means feeling hungry, which They felt discomfort only usually leads to consuming when they ate too much. even more food. During three separate ten- Chaco Canyon's south gap: Prehis- Now two Danish doctors day periods, the first with south, well beyond the horizon- No have come up with a non- a balloon, the second 40 OMNI —

without one, and the third Canada. There he met an abundance of births in with a balloon again, the with the Reverend Siegfried late spring and late fall, women lost on the average Hettasch, who gave him Ehrenkranz says. He pfans 11 pounds. 1.1 pounds, records kept by Moravian several more trips to the and 4.8 pounds. One Church missionaries since Arctic to answer yet another woman dropped a whopping 1760, which included the question: Why do hormones 19 pounds during her first dales of 5,000 Eskimo births. produce the greatest go-round with the diet Ehrenkranz found that fertility during the Arctic's balloon.— Carol A. Johmann for 200 years Eskimo births most diverse seasons had peaked in the spring summer, with 24-hour-a-day ESKIMO BREEDING and fall, then bottomed sunlight, and winter, a time out in summer and winter. of total darkness? The Arctic wilderness To find out why, Ehren- — Carol A, Johmann had virtually no electricity. kranz set up a research telephones, roads, or even clinic in Nialn's nursing sta- POSTDOC BLUES houses, Yet to Dr. Joel tion, "I got lour Eskimo

Ehrenkranz, it was the per- hunters to come in one day Everyone knows that fect place to answer his at the beginning of every newly minted M.D.'s become question: Dp people, like season," says Ehrenkranz, hard-working, low-paid many animals, sometimes who also served as a travel- hospital interns and resi- breed according to season? ing doctor for the region. dents before moving up to

If Ihey do, he thought, it He drew blood samples from private practice and big should be most noticeable each man and looked for bucks. New science Ph.D.'s, near the poles, where changes in pineal and pitui- interested in research trapped in what NAS study temperature and day length tary hormones that affect careers in university labora- director Porter E. Coggeshail differ most drastically from fertility. tories, similarly turn to calls the "postdoctoral one season to another. "We found that the hor- apprenticeships, in aca- holding pattern," one post- In the summer of 1978 mones were well-choreo- demic lingo called postdoc- doc position after another, thai reasoning led Ehren- graphed to turn on repro- toral, or postdocs. They, sometimes without pay. kranz to the coastal town of duction in late summer and too, work long hours for Many pthers, discouraged. Nain, in northern Labrador. late winter," resulting in paltry pay, but nothing leave research. Still others awaits them in academe never enter, preferring the except disappointment. promise of an LL.D. or As the number of students M.B.A. to a science Ph.D. dwindles, budgets tighten, What will the future bring? and retirement is put off, Some authorities are pre- universities have fewer po- dicting shortages of re- sitions to offer. "The boom searchers. Others worry years of .the Sixties are about faculties growing gone," explains physicist older. Grodzins says, "There Lee Grodzins, of Massa- are fewer graduate stu- chusetts Institute of Tech- dents, fewer postdocs, fewer nology, who chaired a assistant professors in National Academy of Sci- some fields. Who is going ences (NAS) panel on to do the research?" postdocs. "Last year the — Carol A. Johmann number of new positions for assistant professors in "Have you comprehended physics, for example, was the expanse of the earth?

about one fourth what it Where is the way to the was in 1968." dwelling ol light, and where Many who wish to stay in is the place ol darkness?" academic research become —Job "

coruTiruuuRJi

SPERM BANK HEIST?

Last April 21, when a baby girl was born to Joyce Kowalski, who lives in Phoenix, the infant was the immediate focus of interna- tional attention. She was the first child artificially conceived with sperm obtained from the Repository for Germinal Choice, a nonprofit Escon- dido, California, sperm bank that accepts only No- bel laureates and other geniuses. as donors. Unfortunately, in that instance, the repository's screening was less than vigilant: Joyce Kowalski and her husband. Jack, had served time in a federal penitentiary for a 1978 fraud conviction, And earlier Jack Kowalski had been

be clipped to eyeglasses, a hat, accused of neglecting oar of a diesel engine. Joyce's two children born of a previous marriage. DOZE-ALARM When other truck drivers Even though applicants Robert Graham, the reposi-

learned of Miller's secret must now fill out a rigorous tory's cofounder and bene- Oliver "Red" Miller, a for staying awake on the ten-page questionnaire, factor. Resources manage- long -distance trucker from road, they tried in vain repository spokesman Paul ment expert Anthony Weiner Scoitsdale, Arizona, kept to talk him into selling the Smith concedes, "It's still says that in his opinion falling asleep at the wheel- hat. So Herr teamed up with possible for a couple 1 to "they should at least have Fearing that Miller would engineer Austin Elmore, a deceive us." Would organ- the level of security that serious have a accident. professional inventor. The ized crime or a power- a museum has to protect its Myron Herr, a friend of two refined the device, crazed Third World leader artworks." Miller's, built a small alarm reducing its volume to less consider stealing the re- But Smith says, "We're containing a globule of than two cubic inches, pository's Nobel sperm? merely in the business mercury and a battery- with a weight of a mere 1.5 "We've had one inquiry from of offering the best genes powered buzzer that would ounces. a foreign government." available to couples who sound whenever a pair of Called Doze-Alarm, the Smith says, "but it's friendly want children. Whether we'll electrical wires came into device is now produced by to the United States. As get caught up in some contact' with each olher. the Mariin Manufacturing for organized crime, I can outrageous intrigue in the The alarm was enclosed in Company, Bedford, imagine the mob wanting to future, I just can't say." in a tiny box sewed into Ohio.—Margaret Sachs breed some talent for their — Eric Mishara Miller's hat. Whenever Mill- future requirements." er's head began to nod "God is not dead: He is Right now 3,000 vials of "Heroes are created by forward- the mercury would alive and well and working frozen sperm are stored in popular demand, sometimes flow over the wires, creating on a much less- ambitious an underground storeroom out of the scantiest mate- " an electrical connection project. on the ten-acre Escondido rials. and setting off the alarm. —Anonymous estate of multimillionaire —Gerald White Johnson 42 OMNI i (right), restore t BRAIN TUNER

' 1 looks like a Walkman." explains Pete Townshend. the lead guitarist of and chief songwriter for the Who, the British rock band. You clip this t

from it that you attach behind I

, f tuning in to the right frequency." The thirty-eight-year-old roc' !;'0 :^:v--:'i^:-:i:,Wr* ^Patients feel only a slight tingling, yet this mild therapy subdues violent reactions.^ work by sinking a me- patients." she cautions. is far milder, in- lodic chord in the brain. "NET The Walkman look-alike volving currents at least weaker. transmits a tiny electri- twenty times cal signal that appears Patients feel only a slight tingling sensation be- to harmonize with natu- hind their ears where the ral brain rhythms and, in the process, reduce electrodes are taped craving and anxiety. Or on." Yet this "mild" ther- apy, she insists, will sub- at least it worked for violent physio- Townshend. The little due the black box. he says, logical reactions that can saved him from a nearly make "going cold tur- suicidal two-year alco- key" intolerable for even holic binge that eventu- the most strong-willed nor- ally drove him to heavy person. Though soft-spoken, Pat- tranquilizers and vir- mally tually any other drug he terson asserts unequiv- could gel his hands on ocally. "I can take anyone "The treatment works noi off a drug of abuse, no only for boo2ers." Town- matter how severe his or shend emphasizes "Us her addiction, with only helped people give up minimal discomfort," cigarettes, herom. bar- Of course, not all those biturates, speed, co- who complete the de- caine, maniuana—you toxification program re- main abstinent. Patter- name il There is a dif- " ferent frequency that works test 'o- each k nd of addiction son emphasizes that NET is most effective when backed up by Dr. Margaret Patterson (aoove), a Scollisn surgeon currently counseling, remedial training, and a supportive home environ- residing in southern California, is the owner and inventor of this ment. For many individuals, however, the treatment does appear magical device. Her black box (innards of an early model are to have long-lasting effects. If we are to believe the recidivism pictured on the page opposite) sounds suspiciously like quack- figures she cites, they are many times lower than the national ery Just twiddle a few knobs and— pre sio—you can be cured of average for every class of addictive drug. every imaginable vice. Bui the magic is real to people in the rock A glance at Patterson's credentials provides reassurance that highly 'n' roll industry, who call her a miracle worker Apparently Town- she is both serious and capable At twenty-one, she was shend is not the only celebrity who has benefited from her unusual the youngest woman to qualify as a doctor at Scotland's Aber- remedy. She is credited with having reformed more than a dozen deen University. Only four years later she obtained her Fellowship top recording slars. including ex-heroin addicts Eric Clapton and at the Royal College of Surgeons, at Edinburgh University— an the seemingly indeslruciible Keith Richards, of the Rolling Stones, elite circle that few surgeons penetrate before their thirties. And whose reckless abuse of drugs became as legendary as his mu- just before her fortieth birthday she was presented one of her sic. (For Townshend's personal account of combating drug ad- native land's highest honors by the Queen—an M.B.E., or Mem- diction with Patterson's black box, see page 48.) ber of the Order of the British Empire—lor her outstanding med-

Happily. Patterson does not fit the image of either a charlatan ical work in India. or a cult figure. She is in her fifties, slender of frame, with a kindly Colleagues and patients describe the tiny Scottish surgeon as face that radiates compassion. Her pale blue eyes are set off by warm, confident, and virtually unflappable. "You can't con her," a magnificent mane of auburn hair, which is swept up into a graceful, says one patient who had spent years cheating and lying to get oversized bun. "I hesitate to use the word cure." she says in a bigger drug prescriptions. "And if you try to put one over on her, other soft, lilting burr. "I prefer to call it a method of rapid detoxification. she won't turn her back on you like doctors." The electricity quickly cleanses the addict's system of drugs, "She's the sort of mother you always dreamed of having," says restoring the body to normal within ten days. Most patients report a female addict. Still another views her as a saintiy figure "with that their craving also subsides in the process." the selfless devotion of someone like Mother Theresa." Patterson's electrical stimulator is currently pending clinical ap- Patterson's close rapport with her patients has made some proval by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in the United professionals question whether her dazzling record in drug re- States, where she has lived since 1981. Over the last decade in habilitation is really attributable to the powers of electricity. "It's Britain, however, almost 300 addicts have received NeuroElectric her personality" is the chief disclaimer psychiatrists have at- Therapy (NET), the technical name for her Ireatment. Patterson tached to her work. "She doesn't control for psychological factors claims thatall but four left drug-free at the end of the detoxification such as people's expectations." says Dr. Richard B. Resnick, an process— a remarkable 98 percent success rate "NET should associate professor at New York Medical College, who is rec- not be confused with ECT— electroconvulsive therapy for mental ognized as an innovator in the treatment of heroin addiction. "For —

example, what happens if you iasten elec- trodes to patients' heads but don't turn on the electricity? You just talk to them and feed them chicken soup. Will they do bet- ter, the same, or worse than the group that got current?" Such skepticism is less common in Eng- land, where Patterson's clinical practice was based until recently. There, a number of doctors have already begun to obtain the same beneficial effects with her electrical stimulator model, Dr. Margaret Cameron, a psychiatrist with the National Health Service, in Somerset, England, reports that NET gives "very, very good results — better than any other treat- ment I've encountered." Since May 1981 Dr. Cameron has treated 40 alcoholics, 2 methadone addicts, 4 heroin addicts, and a few individuals with mixed addictions in- volving cocaine and barbiturates. In fol- low-up interviews conducted six months to a year later, 60 percent of the alcoholics were still oft alcoholic beverages and none of the other patients had relapsed. A pri- vate practitioner based in New Jersey, Dr. Joseph Winston, shares Cameron's enthu- siasm for NET: 'As a benign, effective technique for withdrawing people from drugs, it is virtually unmatched."

If NET has met with resistance, it is be- cause its mode of action strains the ex- planatory powers of modern science. Until recently orthodox medicine refused to rec- ognize that infinitesimal electrical currents may influence the behavior or function of living organisms. Currents less than 100 millivolts — or below the threshold for trig- gering a nerve impulse—were assumed to have no effect on biological processes. This dogmatic view had to be reassessed when accounts of such unsettling phenomena began appearing with increasing fre- quency in technical journals over the last decade. NET is, in fact, only one branch of a young, controversial discipline that is still struggling to achieve respectability the science oi electrical medicine. In the early Seventies scientists began introducing very small currents via elec- trodes to different parts of the body—with dramatic results. A rat amputee was in- duced to regrow a forelimb down to the midjoint, according to one exciting—though sometimes contested — report. In human applications, the FDA has approved the use of such currents for stitching logether stubborn -bone fractures. Recent experi- mental trials also indicate that trickling flows of electricity promote the healing of chronic bedsores, burns, and even peripheral-

nerve injuries. The external currents, it is theorized, stimulate rapid healing by aug- menting the body's internal currents. "By contrast, weak currents applied to the brain affect different physiological processes," says Dr. Robert O. Becker a pioneer of electrical medicine who re- cently retired from Veterans Administration

Hospital, in Syracuse. New York. "But I be- lieve Dr. Patterson is producing profound alterations of the central nervous system. THE MIND OF MEDEA

An odd pilgrimage so/ve.s -a biological riddle BY KATE WILHELM

Ulene frina haled the garish no. I'll fulfill my contract with hotel that looked as if il had Ch'ien Li if anyone ever comes been designed by someone to guide me lo her camp." who had glimpsed Rous- "Pick will show up." Jolly said seau's jungle images once in reassuringly. He glanced about a distant past. Harsh yellow the barroom with fondness. light, brilliant oranges, reds, "You could do worse than work blues— everything was too for me, you know. Ch'ien's vivid, loo glaring The green- crazy. You won't lasl out there ery was false, hybridized by more than a month or so. Job'll someone who believed that be here when you comeback " banana leaves were six feet She did not respond. The bar wide and bird-of-paradise was crowded: the hotel was plants len feet tall. filled with ship personnel, Jolty, the owner of the hotel. members of various explora- joined her at the entrance to tory groups, government peo- the bar and guided her to a ple, the science commitlee table, where they ordered people. Three oul of four of drinks. It was said that Jolly was them were men; mosl of them one-third man, two-thirds would never leave Medea proslhelics. It did not show. He again. Nearly all of Ihem was dressed in jodhpurs, watched her openly. boots, a pale-blue silk shirt; "The others," Jolly went on, there was even a white scarf "are working on such light tied about his throat. budgets that one more sala- "Give any thought to Ihe job ried employee would break

I offered you?" he asked them. Corum. Kuwait. Mi- She nodded. "Thanks, but chaels, all of them You'll get PAINTING BY CLIFF McREYNOLDS "

r their grasslike cover and so bored out (here with Ch'ien Li, you'll be looked like spea s whc-n 'hey folded ground with only straggly bushes, all in shades of brown. back in a month, three at the most, and wings to dive. She had read about them land, twice they de- you'll need something to do." during her indoctrination, but seeing them This was uneasy and toured around dust storms that hid the world Irina stopped listening. !t was not the was something else. salary, she knew, that had made the others Below, the ioresls had been cleared and below completely. valley appeared, wilh turn her down. She would draw no salary replaced by fields, the only visible green. Finally a deep trees were very during her live-year contract on Medea. The lush plants under ultraviolet lights woods and a river. The not tall, their leaves sand-colored, She had waived salary to ensure her return stretched north and south following the and were valley looked peaceful; no wind trip home at the end of her five years, and coastline. When they ended, the change but the stripped the trees here. 'that made her a dabbler, a mercenary in to orange, umber, red, brown was abrupt Pick said cheerfully as the eyes of real scientists. Only Ch'ien Li and complete. The car climbed higher. Then "Home again," took them into the valley. "There's camp." had not objecied, but Ch'ien Li had wanted Pick set the automatic controls and leaned he his his Irina His voice sounded loud after the long no one at all, had accepted an assistant back, with hands behind head, worn for the past only because the science committee had gazed in rapt attention at a dancing wall silence. The scowl he had meant for her, she ruled that she must. of lights, the borealis. few hours had not been storm and the near For twenty-two years Ch'ien Li had been She was roused by his voice and turned. realized, but for the hurricane-force winds. "I'm glad it's quiet living in the field, observing the creatures A cloud of liv'ng balloons was coming from strainrg the camp. that were called fuxes, or foxes. She had the north, hundreds of them in a mass. She in here," she said. :o see quiet. You'll see," published no results yet. Twenty-two years, uttered a low cry, then became silent again. He laughed. "Oh, it's color, puls- She stiftened at the mockery in his voice Irina thought coldly. If Ch'ien Li could stand The gasbags were every some others opalescent, so and looked straight ahead. She could now it for twenty-two years, she could stand it ing with light, some structures. tor five. She looked past Jolly at a boister- brilliant that it seemed they were being make out the that could ous man who had entered the bar, shout- consumed by inner fire. They were level There were five white mounds in clearing. ing greetings to the bartender. with the car, but abruptly they began to have been smooth boulders a The newcomer was heavy with immense Pick flew even lower and finally came to a of that was shoulders, abundant black hair, and a stop before one the mounds The side of swarthy complexion. He seemed to know the size of a one-story house.

it glided the car inside. everyone in the bar, stopped here and there opened, and he dazzled the glare of white light to pound someone on the back, to bear- Irina was by £The creature was mask. hug someone else, to chat and laugh, as when she pulled off her he weaved among the tables. immature, the size of a She got out stiffly and, blinking, looked about her. The dome was opaque, filled "That's your guide," Jolly said. "Paulo haif-grown cat; air. were two smaller Aranha, or Pick." with cool fresh There complex of ma- The big man saw her and charged for- it had eight legs and moved cars, scout cars, and a chinery: the power plant, air conditioners, ward until he reached the table, where he so fast that, An stopped and leaned forward to examine purifiers, other unfamiliar equipment. played back in reai time, wall a tiny her. "Irina?" His eyes were bloodshot. opening in the appeared, and woman stepped forward. "You know I am." its movements were Irina felt a jolt when she saw Ch'ien Li, He sat down, chuckling. "You're not the blurred comprehension.^ past a legendary figure on Earth. She pretty little thing I've been dreaming about, who was no larger than a ten-year-old child; her tell you that right off." was bone-white, her black hair was Irina was a tall woman with broad shoul- face was old as death. ders, a large face with pale blue eyes, pale streaked gray. She looked as eyelashes and brows. She knew she was "Here she is," Pick called as Ch'ien Li slowly. "I'm going to get some not pretty. "I expected you days ago." rise, straight up, moving together the way approached the two "Got held up. You ready to move out?" a school of fish does, changing direction sleep, Unload later." He waved to left of another small "I've been ready since my second day as a single entity. Irina watched them until women and by way in this place." they vanished in a dense cloud layer. doorway in the plastic. "Calm down. I'm here, and we'll be on "They're like Portuguese men-of-war, "You must be tired also," Ch'ien Li said. our way. Half an hour at the main entrance. except they're different," Pick said. "Filled She stopped some feet away from Irina and greet See you there." He got up and strode away. with hydrogen, with those damn append- made no offer to shake her hand or She thought he was laughing at her. ages hanging down. That's what hap- her in any formal manner. "Come. I'll take Jolly stood up, smiling openly. "You'll be pened to Jolly; one of them took him for a you to your room." short back," he said with satisfaction. "Crazy old ride and .dumped him. Ended his days as Ch'ien Li led the way through a another smaller dome. Sep- Ch'ien Li. Pick, snake vines, sting birds, a guide." He did not look at her as he added. passage into luxury. rock monsters, heat, nothing to do but watch "If one of the fuckers comes down and arate living quarters, a true Here you're the hug the ground, or there were personal furnishings: a bed, a the little fuckers . . . You'll be back." in open, you terminal. dig in if you can. Best it you can find a big chair, a desk, a computer

here if you choose, They left in an aircar that rose swiftly rock, bush, tree, something, but if you can't, "You may have meals afraid own above Medea Town with its artificial white you kiss dirt." or in the group- room. I'm my ^regular. However, you light and hard-edged shadows. Up here Fuckers, fuxes, foxes. They were the hours are very and want to share mealtime," Ch'ien the light was dull red. It reminded Irina of creatures that Ch'ien Li was studying, the Pick may Then a partial eclipse of the moon. Pick had ones Irina would study also in order to de- Li said, indicating the room. "First rest. changed also; his swarthy skin now ap- termine their intelligence. we shall discuss the work in progress." irina for a moment or two, peared Afro-black where it showed below They flew over rolling hills, mountains, a She regarded the silver half-mask he wore. She had one wide brown river, a chocolate-colored lake, her own face devoid of any expression, slightly and withdrew. just like It, for eye protection from the in- umber plains, swamps. After a brief stop then bowed frared atmosphere. for lunch, they were buffeted by storms, Like a talking dot), Irina thought. An ac- A flock of dooley birds had risen with and the ride became a lurching, stomach- tivated, old-fashioned talking doll. them, paced them; when Pick leveled off wrenching ordeal. The trees thinned out, and headed northwest, the birds began to were stunted, deformed by careless wind The foxes were a thousand yards down- even dive into the airstreams of the jets. They pruning, and there were long stretches ot river, clearly visible Irom the camp, m OMNI CONTINUED ON PAGE 96 His name is synonymous with dolphin/human communication, isolation tanks, drug-induced voyages into altered states of consciousness. Is he crazy? Or brilliant? Or both? irUTERY/IEUU

j

the ranch-style J^^bove dream houses and seafood res- of the remarkable Dr. Lilly. I finally left a message with "Charlie." #^^fctaurants along the Pacific Coast Highway the rugged, a gate guard who told me that he sometimes "sees him go in and bleached Malibu twisting roads, m » canyons, dusty scrub out." No luck. When at last I called his house in Malibu, Lilly oaks, and desert sagebrush speak a supernal language. It is a answered the telephone himself and gave me road directions that landscape of the spirit more than of the body, and Dr. John C. were accurate to the tenth of a mile, Lilly, dolphin magus and scientist-turned-seeker, seems at home Lilly's autobiography. The Scientist (1978). begins with the cre- here—where the spectacular surf down at Zuma Beach is a mere ation of the universe out of cosmic dust, but his own human chron- rim of white foam on the edge of the world. If life imitates art, Dr. icle starts in St. Paul. Minnesota, in 1915. A scholarship whiz kid Lilly should live on just such a mountaintop. at the California Institute of Technology, Lilly graduated with a

It hadn't been easy to find him. When I asked scientist ac- degree in biology and physics in 1938 and went on to earn his quaintances about Lilly's whereabouts, most of them said some- M.D. from the University of Pennsylvania, Though he became a thing like. "Do you mean, what dimension?" Someone thought he qualified psychoanalyst, his first love was brain "hardware." His worked with dolphins at Marine World, in Redwood City, just south mastery of neurophysiology, neuroanatomy, biophysics, electron- of Francisco, and, it San turns out, he does. But when 1 phoned ics, and computer theory gave him something of the technical there. I talked to a succession of secretaries who had never heard ingenuity of the genie in The Arabian Nights. From 1953 to 1958 PHOTOGRAPH BY CHRISTOPHER SPRINGMANN —— —

he held two at the National In- cells, their . posts— one among watched functioning . . drugs of any kind and drive back down stitute of Mental Health (NIMH) and one at and realized that within myself was a grand that road." Five minutes later he seems to the National Institute of Neurological Dis- of living organisms, assemblage all of which be offering me acid and K— or did I hal- eases and Blindness— both part of the added up to me," he would write of his lucinate that? Is he putting me on? What National institutes of Health (NIH), in Be- illuminations in The Centar of the Cyclone kind of game is he playing with the anon- thesda, Maryland. In his early years at the (1972). "I traveled through my brain, ymous reporter who has come to call? NIH he invented a technique that allowed watching the neurons and their activi- He tapes me wjth a matchbook-sized

scientists for the first time to take brain- ties. I ... moved into smaller and smaller Japanese fape recorder while I tape him: recordings from the cortex wave of unan- dimensions, down to the quantum levels, The phone rings and Lilly answers it, his esthetized animals. He also mapped the and watched the play ot the atoms in their face as immobile as Ihe wooden Indian that brain's pleasure and pain systems by di- own'vast universes, their wide empty guards his entryway. "Who are you?" he rect electrical stimulation of its core re- spaces, and the fantastic forces involved demands. His side of the conversation is gions. And in 1954, tackling the classic in each of the distant nuclei with their or- curt. "It was someone asking about the of puzzle what would happen to the brain bital clouds of force field electrons. ... It solid-state entities," he tells me. As our in- if -it were deprived of all external stimula- was really frightening to the tunneling see terview proceeds, I watch various expres- tion, he built the world's first isolation tank. effects and the other phenomena of the sions play across his patrician, chiseled- Floating in his dark, silent, saltwater quantal level taking place."" granite face— unexpected sweetness void — the original version of which re- By all accounts, Lilly has probably taken whenever he speaks of Toni, or of dol- quired that he wear a skindiver's mask more psychedelic substances— notably phins. (When talking about a dolphin, Lilly Lilly discovered that sensory deprivation LSD and "vitamin K," the superhailucino- always uses the pronoun he, never it) did not put the brain to sleep, as many gen he prefers not to identify— than any- Sometimes his language ;s lul.'-bodied. and

scientists had supposed. Furthermore, one else in the consciousness business. poetic; sometimes it is a private blend of tanking led him far afield from the doctrine Since the lords and overseers of establish- computerspeak and Esalenese, full of that the mind is fully contained wifhin the ment science frown on using one's own phrases like "Earth Coincidence Control physical brain, The tank, he declared, was Offices," "metaprogrammings," and "be- a "black hole in psychophysical space, a lief-system interlocks." My own questions psychological freefall," which could in- echo in my head, and Lilly seems bored, duce unusual sensations: reverie states, on the verge of walking off abruptly into a waking dreams, even a kind of out-of-the- zero-g universe of his 4/ can run my own. Possibly to get body travel. (Today, of course, isolafion rid of me for a while, he escorts me to his tanks are so much a part of the culture that computer, ski, or do just samadhi isolation tank. even straitlaced businessmen routinely about anything on In this warm, saline sea of isolation, where spend their lunch hours—and upwards of such luminaries as Nobel physicist Rich- vitamin K. I've it $20— relaxing in health-spa tranquillity been on ard Feynman. anthropologist Gregory Lilly's ' tanks based on original design.) - for as much as a Bateson. psychologist Charles Tart, and est More and more enamored of the deep, czar Werner Erhard have floated and had ri hundred days straight. You womblike peace 1 ie expe e-iced the tank. m visions, I try to sort it all out. My visions are

Lilly began to wonder what it would like don't really sleep, be disconnected, rudimentary; I am a swamp to be buoyanf all the time. Whales, dol- because you don't need to3 plant trailing its leaves on the water a fe- phins, and porpoises sprang to mind, and tus; a dolphin; a whirring brain in an inert the rest, of course, is history. By 1961, Lilly shell. An hour and a half later (one loses had resigned from the to NIH found and track of lime) I emerge and try to continue direct the Communications Research In- the interview. The problem is, in my state stitute, in the U.S. Virgin Islands Miami, and of tranquillity, I have lost interest in asking Florida, for the purpose of studying these brain and nervous system as an experi- reporterlike questions, and. besides. I feel big-brained, sea-dwelling mammals. Con- mental laboratory, Lilly today reports his Lilly retreating more and more into some vinced that dolphins are not only smarter findings in popular books instead of in remote, glacial space behind his eyes. From but more "humane" than Homo sapiens neurophysiology papers. He makes the another room a manic laugh track from what that they in and communicate a sophisti- scene at such New Age watering holes as sounds like an old / Love Lucy show floats cated sonar language— popularized, rather Esalen, in California, and Oscar Ichazo's out to us. Some time later Toni Lilly sud- inaccurately, by the baby-talking dolphins Arica training place, in Chile. He hasn't re- denly walks in, smiling and carrying bags of the film Day oi the Dolphin— Lilly began ceived a government grant since 1968. of groceries. Her husband jumps up to help a lifelong quest to "talk" to the Cetacea. When him, asked about mainstream sci- her unload the car, and I take my cue to Today he uses a "two-faced" computer entists tend to shake their heads sadly, as depart back down the mountain. system called JANUS—named after the if recalling someone recently deceased. Only later, at home in the Los Angeles two-faced Roman god to out hu- trouble — work a "The with Lilly is that he is in love lowlands, do I notice that / am altered man/dolphin language. with death." says one neuroscientist friend that for 24 hours after isolation-tanking, While Lilly was experimenting with oth- of his. "But, God, is he brilliant!" Yes, he is reality looks and feels quite different. Four erworldly states in the isolation tank, brilliant, the and, yes, he does seem to have weeks later I telephone Lilly, and we talk"

halcyon days of hallucinogenic research flirted quite flagrantly with death. Though again. The following interview is the result were underway at the NIMH. (LSD was not LSD- or K-related accidents have almosl of our afternoon together in his Malibu home to become a controlled and, therefore, killed him on at least three occasions, Lilly and of that subsequeni telephone conver- sticky substance until 1966.) Lilly, how- still keeps going back to the void, once sation.— Judith Hooper ever, did not try LSD until the early 1960s. tripping on K, he tells me, for 100 solid days

Once he did; it became his high mass. and nights. It is also true that he has al- Omni: You're probably best known as "Dr.

Mixing LSD and isolation tanking for the ways returned to Earth, however con- John Lilly, the dolphin man." What is the first time in 1964, he entered what he de- straining its boundaries, and that his wife, aim of your current dolphin research? scribed as "profound altered states" Toni. has had a good deal to do with that. Lilly: At Marine World, we're working with transiting interstellar realms, conversing with The moment I arrive at his house, having computers to develop a human/dolphin supernatural beings, giving birth to him- driven my rental car over zigzagging code, analogous to ihe Morse code used self, and, like Pascal, exploring infinities mountain roads, Lilly announces, "We have in telegraphy. The project is called macroscopic and microscopic. "I traveled one. rule in this house. Mo one can take JANUS— for Joint Analog Numerical Un-

58 OMNI CONIINULDON PAGE 74 -.-;:...!.. ; Kg *^ I M *

LAURELS (ARJDHARDY5)

"-T Some years ago a group of creative chemisls de- a trip to Stockholm. Could we do less? We could. No prize, time to let the public in on the wonder of modern felt, could equal in kind or quality the deeds of our winners, science. So they got themselves a vat. and thev boiled and stirred that is what we give them: nothing.

if chemicals. And How our chief judge, Mike Edelhart, makes his selections, v at an industrial exposition they displayed the product of their fear to speculate. But it is clear that his methods

al hundred pounds of sows' i

I the Omni Laurels alcoholic android, the psychologists who might ie uurn. Delivering this new honor into reality pioneering roach trainers, and two geophysii proved more difficult than recognizing the need for it. We pon- able new solution to the energy shortage, dered at length, for example, how to reward such achievements. These and other fabulous frays in the fabric of (. After all, the Nobel Foundation bestows thousands of dollars and ceive their just reward in the following r.

FIZZLING SYZYGY The world failed to.end last spring. That should not be isworthy, and yet a year or so ago some of our wider-eyed colleagues ~.e reporting with trepidation the arrival of the grand syzygy, or the align- lent of the planets on one side of the sun. This, they claimed, would ' passive solar flares, tidal waves, earthquakes, and genet ler or worse, California might at last'fall into the r~~ here were several things wrong with this forec K .„nets never lined up; astronomers had long know their closest, the planets were still spread across at, _,,,. The stories were based on a book entitled The Jupiter Effect, by John Gribbin and Steven Plageman, and Gribbin had retracted the prediction here " in Omni as early as June 1980. That was not enough to quell ' i ness for an exciting story, and sensational Fortunately, science writers will eventually have the themselves. Similar alignments have occurred regularly since the birth of the 'leduled for the year 2181.

[Y SCIENCE F markable, fresh perspective to the put

Funk dislikes nuc

he believes that electricity generated by I atoms is radioactive- Ontario Hydro,

minated. They very well learn in years to come hich com „contamir„

lore alarming, Fu.,., ,. that the /from the earth. ' —

DIGITAL DASTARDRY Once electronic gizmos stark.- M - 3 „,~.~., . last i before they got into trouble. Los Angeles police year spot

i/itig drunkenly around Beverly Boulevard and booked the tin man, ng under the influence ot someone under the influence, ""e, Bell Laboratories' computer- chess champion,

> officials nd technology being smuggled to the Thompson himself failed. In ; from Bell scientists, diplomats, and end it took a $600 ransom to get Belle freed. Strike one for old L"

BIOCHEMISTRY RAG Perhaps inspired by ketor or barbershop hormoney, a University of London

n rr j Glory of the Coming of ang Syr e," and "Waltzing Matilda." B ght out ifth e laboratory. From The 3attle Hymn of the Aerob

irring li es: "Mine eyes have seen If ratory ;hains. In every mitochondr embrar es/ -unctionally organized in

omains And the paean ends ( Glory, qlory, respiration/ Where electro

waders multiply, spreading through their LAURELS (AfUDHAEDYS)

LOUS PLAY The world may be pox, but medical researchers lace

plagues, resulting from recreation. Disco finger is cently diagnosed skin irritation of

lay night fever. The i

; on the fingers, co ping them to [he disco beat. Treatrr abstinence from getting down or fun' m

.v, 'V%%t- Myft §Kfcm**

sssmm. /# /s fe 1 : samples and discovered thai m X 1 the poison. So they

! samples. It was 57 days be- fore they finally informed the public. The delay allowed plenly of time for ..«„. 1't enough th;

ted us with glitches, error it

... ns. Now they can actively insuftus ABUSE is a surprisingly popular new computer pr< rms your mild-mannered micro into swaggering bully. Tu

of insults. "Do you realize your r

spoil pork?" it may ask, or "May a mangy li throw a transmission through your fac "

And ABUSE is persistent. Once it computer, there is no way to sr ig the plug. The only sure defense,

remove the disk, wrap it in aluminum toil, a moderate oven tor two hours.

: of University of California geophysi % cists say gems deep underground get converted into methane gas as they -

. ^P^A '"^1 ?*"v

mg their woi.., _ continued to drink mot

vember, adding further fizz to tl.„ „.. ,.. tigious committee reviewing the work dismissed most of the criticisms of the original study, supporting the "scientific integrity" of the- Sobells. The only firm con- <^Sk clusion was that someone's headed for a hangover B

LMUREL5 (MOD HMRDYS)

,s concluded And their finding has p - — ' the world's largest supply nor \ itific doghou 'HI % 1 msmm mwMwwm mfm

tor the year. The breeder pointed its finger i

rchers, saying they i B besa lad plans for genetic purity among mJ_ living out a city dweller's dream by fastening little ~~ weights to the legs of co~'

already legendary

;t year they managed. At \t

' ^ig Brc :

: ...... „ the alleged

etrile. The apricot-pit extract

effect, including prolongation of surviv

YES, WE HAVE NO BANANA Jell-0 Pudding Pops claim to be the tis prefer. Heaven knows why. Here is what the \ iugar, water, nonfi

salt, dextrose, sodium stearoyl lactyla crystalline cellulose, sorbitan monost lulose qum, guar qum, and

mm&S&m&mI of the bananas or beans. But they were out to

fiasco. The orbitin Im contend with a igh ech $i -million

commode that refu sed lo work. 1 clogged and polluted the c ew quarters We're happy to epo tthatsf uttle as- tronauts Henry W. Hartsfi sld and

Thomas K. Mattingly 1 ast year became the first shuttle comrr and tee m to be

,.-.., some hing we overlooked," e xpla ned a NASA spokesman, "It re quires more nan jus pulling the handle "Sc Ihe foi rth-fligh crew received ex ens from a task force of One tingly follow >ry good du A survey of jobs, new technology, and the world economy in the next millennium

During She next 50 years an incredible array of new technologies is expected to move from the lab to the world of business. We are already seeing evidence of this today. Robots are replacing humans on production lines. Microcomputers have become fixtures in offices. Biofactories are beginning to manufacture batches of engineered human insulin. To find out where these changes are leading us, the editors of Omni surveyed economic trends, interviewed the country's top futurists, pored over the massive amount ol data gathered by U.S. government agencies, such as the Department of Commerce, the Bureau of Labor Statistics, and NASA, and analyzed the projections of experts for a broad range of industries, from transportation to telecommunication. From these we have extrapolated an economic scenario for the future, one that shows that the coming decades promise to be especially volatile and exciting for American business. The expected upheaval will profoundly change not only our lives bul also those of our children and grandchildren. For the more developed nations, this era of turmoil will be marked by economic difficulties, problems with waste and pollution, and continually dwindling resources. By contrast, the underdeveloped Third World countries will spearhead a newOURindustrial age with the

BY THE EDITORS OF OMNI PHOTOGRAPH BY PETER ANGELO SIMON —

same fervor and energy thai characterized newly developed markels wil: demand of copies. The -ec pieni oers the message American industrial expansion in the days workers an understanding of sophisti- either on his screen or through his printer of VanderbJIt, Carnegie, Morgan, and cated technical information and commu- when he asks his computer for the "mail." Rockefeller. These glimpses of our eco- nications systems as well as an increased At first only internal corporate messages nomic future are taken from The Omni Fu- technical expertise. By the year 2001 basic will go electronic, but by 1990 high-speed ture Almanac, which was published last fall. skills that once were vital to business will computer advances will make office-to-of- be rendered obsolete. The spot welder on fice electronic mail cost-effective; conse- LIFE-STYLE 2001 the automobile production line, the clerk quently, the PostafServioe will be forced By the year 2001 most Americans will be typist in an office, the field worker on a to compete. First-class mail may be mostly enjoying a new prosperity. At first glance farm will go the way of the steambeat pilot electronic by 2001. this may hardly seem possible, mostly be- and the blacksmith. • Data banking. In 1981 the number of cause of our rising cost of living. Some ex- The most significant trend in years to office documents produced in the United amples: According to projections of U.S. come will be the shift from formation-type States alone amounted to 72 billion pieces, government figures, a pound of jobs (factory work office typing, to the Institute, in ham- : and gen- according Worldwatch burger in 2001 could sell for $10.50; a sim- eral clerical work) to information-type jobs 1991 the volume will increase to 250 billion ple dress with a $60 price tag in 1980 might (programming, word processing, and su- pieces. By then, more than 50 percent of be sold for 5275: and a three-bedroom pervising technical machinery). The all office documents will be stored in dig- house that cost $75,000 in 1980 could American economy will witness the de- ital computer form in electronic informa- fetch $600,000 in a 2001 market. mise of the blue-collar worker as auto- tion banks. By 2001 more than 93 percent

Bui in real cost, measured by the per- mation and robotics become more preva- of the expected 1 trillion pieces of busi- centage of the family income they absorb, lent, heralding the rise of the steel-collar ness information will be in digital form. The food, clothing, and shelter are expected to worker. Such traditional blue-collar em- storage of office information will therefore be cheaper, Housing, which absorbed ployers as General Motors and U.S. Steel constitute one of the biggest businesses about 21.3 percent of the average family have already begun to automate their fac- in the world. The systems devised to sort, income in 1980, is expected to account for store, and retrieve information dependably 19.1 percent of that same income in 2001. will stagger the mind. The average office Food will take 19.6 percent of the family manager will have instant access to more budget, as compared with 20.7 percent in information than would exist in a thousand 1980. Clothing expenses will continue to Libraries of Congress. decline, too, from 7.5 percent three years &The underdeveloped • Teleconferencing. Dismal experiences ago to 7.3 percent at the beginning of (he Third World countries will with the early picture phone will stand in next century. The urge to purchase the lat- the' spearhead a new stark contrast to the future growth of est fashions will chiefly account for such a teleconferencing industry for office func- slight decline. industrial age with the same tions. At first the teleconference may catch

Several industrial trends will help ex- ' on as an inexpensive way to reduce the - fervor and energy plain these diminished costs. Smaller, more cost of face-to-face meetings of a corpo- that characterized American energy-efficient homes designed for the ration's far-flung execuiivc-s. But the ability smaller family of the future will help keep industrial expansion to make sophisticated corporate presen- housing costs low. Agricultural innova- tations via teleconferences, together- with in the days of Carnegie3 tions—for example, a broader use of the ability to record the entire conference aquaculture, genetically engineered crops, proceedings, will lead to an even wider use and harvesting by robot farmworkers—will of the teleconference. account for relatively low prices for food. 'Machines to talk to. Machines that And for those who are immune to the latest comprehend human speech will make a fads, more durable and less expensive to'ries— a fact reflected in the swollen un- variety of feats possible. One would be an clothes, made of new synthetic fibers, will employment rolls in our industrial states. automatic translator that could take- any help keep a family's clothing budget low. By contrast, office and service jobs will spoken language and make it automati- In general, we should be able to cope be abundant, but only for those prepared cally translatable into any other language quite well .in such an economic climate. to improve their technical skills. Again it will of choice, turning the words into a printed Salaries are expected to keep pace with be automation that will displace many of document, a video-screen display, or an the cost of living, easing the press of infla- the low-skilled and semiskilled workers in electronic message to be sent to another tion. For example, the secretarial job (hat the present economy. computer; Another possibility is the voice- paid $11,000 a year in 1980 is expected to In fact, the era of the paperless office activated typewriter, which will automati- command about $45,000 in 2001; a fac- has already begun. It has been promoted cally type or display words as a speaker tory worker who had made about $25,000 by two principal developments: com- dictates them. in 1980 might expect to hold a similar job puters that process business information • Electronic blackboards. These would paying about $98,000: and the high-school and the explosive growth of telecommuni- be specially designed digitizing surfaces teacher whose salary is around $15,000 cation systems and products. This office that could be laminated onto just about now will be paid $58,000. Of course there revolution not only has changed how work everything; tables, conference- room walls, will be others who will do better, or worse, is done and information is handled but has or podiums. These surfaces will display depending on how much foresight they redefined the function of everyone who anything rendered on them— drawings, show in the choice of their careers. works in an office, from (he corporate ex- charts, or text— for transmission to other ecutive down the JOB MARKETS AND CAREERS to lowliest clerk. blackboards. Computers in the paperless office can • Video discs. The video disc, the rec- The technological revolution that will easily handle all employees' requests si- ord-album-size storage plate, has an in- prevail for the remainder of this century will multaneously. And features like executive credible capacity. Each side can hold the create jobs and professions that as little as tiering will ensure that requests from senior equivalent of 54,000 pages of information, five years ago were nonexistent. These employees receive priority response. The and new developments may raise that ca- future will bring still more possibilities; pacity by a power of ten, Therefore, an in- • From trie book The Omni Fulure Almanac, ed- Electronic mail. A message is typed into creasing number of businesses may elect ited by Robert Ws,: :£ 1982 by Omni Publications a computer, which instantly sends the let- to store their document reference mate- International, Ltd Published by Harmony Books. ter to its destination and files all requested rials, employee files, and other permanent 70 OMNI .

information files on compact video discs. engineers, and computer programmers. even export laborers all over the world. For the job hunter of 2020. scanning Indeed the human farmworker someday Unlike the natural resources of other na- classified ads will be a quick education in may. be simply the person with the phone tions, which will be nearing depletion, those how drastically the workplace will have number of the nearest robot repairman. of this vast country will be virtually un-

changed. He or she is likely to see open- touched in 2001 , and China could become GLOBAL GROWTH 2001 ings for such positions as biological his- a world economic leader, with a 9.6 per- torians, biofarming experts, computer art It is just a matter of time before the eco- cent projected growth rate in its GNP. curators, fiberoptics technicians, hybrid- nomic leadership of the world changes It will indeed be 'ahead of the rest of the airship pilots, laser operators, maser spe- hands. Already the United States, the So- world in the crucial field of energy man- cialists, remote nursing technicians, robot viet Union, Canada, Western Europe, and agement, something other developed na- retrainers. space geographers, space even Japan have to cope with the prob- tions, including the United States, will find traffic controllers, and teleconferencing lems inherent in an economy easing into painful and disruptive. coordinators, to cite but a (ew. middle age. As a result, by the year 2001 'Brazil. With a population estimated at In the entertainment industry, one en- the fastest-growing economies will be found around 205 million by the start of the cen- dangered profession will be that of the in the Third World. By then the following tury and a projected growth rate in its GNP television programmer. Since the 1950s this nations are expected to be world leaders; of 8.2 percent. Brazil will continue its ag- has been one of the most powerful jobs in 'South Korea. With a projected annual gressive exploration of its vast natural re- the United States. But even today cable GNP (gross national product) growth rate sources to fuel its booming economy. Every television has already begun to erode the of 10,1 percent and a population of about year developers will clear an area, the size mass market, and it may eventually be- 53 million, South Korea is expected to of Kansas, in the Amazon jungle to main- come the true mass medium. There will by maintain its reputation as a haven for cap- tain Brazil's position as the chief source of the year 2001 be no need tor a program- italists. The conservative government, the world's lumber and paper. The newly mer to devise and develop shows for the supported financially and militarily by the deforested regions will be turned into pas- lowest common denominator. Fiberoptics United States, will ensure that workers will tures and land for crops. The world's larg- and satellite technology will furnish cable go about making steel, building ships, and est reserve of iron ore — an estimated 18 viewers dozens of channels to choose from. assembling machines without the distrac- billion tons — in the Serra dos Carajas re- Broadcasting will become narrowcasting tions of strikes and protests. The govern- gion, will supply the metal for local industry

There will always be farms, but by the ment will also push for a higher liv no stand- and export. Companies will be dipping into next century farmworkers as we know them ard to defuse any revolutionary stirrings. the immense reserves of diamonds, gold, will be scarcer. The business of farming • The People's Republic of China. Chi- bauxite, copper, tin, nickel, and scores of will become ever more complex. With na's awesome natural and human re- other minerals waiting to be mined. computerized operations and robot har- sources (estimated population by the year Brazil will continue to encourage foreign vesters, there will be no need for unskilled 2001: 1.095 billion) could make it an eco- investment in its industries, especially by labor. The farm will be a place for people nomic giant. China will have ample num- giving foreign firms a helping hand in with training as electronic technicians, bio- bers 'of workers for its own needs and may keeping labor unions and antipollution laws weak. Its automobile manufacturing indus-

try, the ninth-largest in the world in 1981, will grow rapidly: so will steel making and other enterprises too dirty and costly for more developed nations. • Nigeria. By the year 2001 oil will con- stitute the backbone of Nigeria's growth. Any dislocations in the Middle East will make

Nigeria's oil all the more valuable and en-

able it to be the most stable and most af- fluent nation in black Africa. Nigeria will

gain immensely from this oil bonanza, with

a growth rate in its GNP estimated to reach 6.2 percent by 2001. The government is

expected to use the oil money to expand industry for its estimated 154 million peo-

ple, making its natural-gas production and its petrochemical industry among the world's largest.

Mexico. Despite its current troubled economy. Mexico is expected to prosper in the long run, with a growth rate in the GNP of nearly 5.8 percent annually by the end of this century. Its oil wilt continue to be vital to the United States, and its natural gas will help keep the homes of Europe heated in future winters. The rate of pop- ulation growth should come under control in these two decades, although by 2001 the population of Mexico will probably be 126 million, providing a cheap labor pool for Mexico's burgeoning industry. Mexican prosperity will be further but- tressed by American support. In spite of ethnic and economic friction, the United States will realize that Mexico is one of our most useful and loyal allies. DO EARTH continued mow --:;:::

dry-cleaning "ac:c -;"? ne yxec

There was cr , 5 s~a anount of ~CE «i - Ehefactcrya ^ ~; : --_-.:- ?>ocs-'S had causec :he!oxrek> accumulate in the woman's breasts- The mother, in effect. servec =e a rj:"-£--a: -5 — ar -5 She

was never aware oi the vapors : breathed, yet they neany killed her daugh- ter The incident becomes more frighten- ing when ;.;_ -sa re "ha: "CBs anc DDT have been found in mother's milk as well You'd think the very freakishness of such incidents would encourage scientists to study young victims of pollution. But is rarely the case. Love Canal is one of the most notorious environmental disasters, and yet the studies there were so tinged with politics that many scientists call much of the research a joke. Some studies found birth defects, others did not; all found mis- carriages; yet neither the state nor the fed- eral government plans to study the surviv- ing children. Similarly, in lead-poisoned Kellogg the Bunker Hill Company relo- cated families that had been most heavily exposed, yet because health officials kept no records of the departing children, those who sustained the most harm will probably never be studied, And back in Globe, Arizona, the physician who took X rays of 90 town residents has run out of state funds, to continue his work on the medical effects of asbestos. Critics say this apparent negligence has deep roots in politics. "Children don't vote," says Dr. Finberg, and there's almost no government money to study the effects of pollution on kids. Dr. William McDonnell, a research physician with the Environmental Protection Agency, argues that children are more difficult to study than adults, since getting permission from parents is often impossible. Nationally known environmen- tal consultant Barry Castleman takes the darkest view of all: He alleges that the fed- eral government caters to industry by ig- noring childhood perils, because once a hazard is admilted, parents will probably sue the offending firm. As a solution, Finberg suggests we monitor children, setting up a national sampling network to study a wide range of toxins the way the government does tests on children to took for lead. Finberg also urges more long-term study of the children of Love Canal, Kellogg, and other polluted areas throughout the nation. "For years we've exhorted the government to do this," he says. "So far we haven't even gotten back a letter for our trouble."

This silence bodes ill for a society that presumably values its young. It bodes worse for parents like Ed and Janice Den- nis or Cathy Scott, who now watch with mounting' anxiety as their children "grow. "The young are paying for the mistakes of adults," Scott says. "What a thing we've 1 done! We've poisoned our kids."DQ J sonar. Since dolphins "see" with sound in scriptive: it has also evolved abstrac- injTERV/IEUU three dimensions— in stereo you have to tions— units symbolizing things Ihai aren'-. yo..ir w:y;js 'stereophonic words.'' material CONTINUED FROM PAGE 5B make physically real, that have no com- Omni: You've said that dolphins also use position. You've written that dolphins prob- dersianciing Syslem. Like the Roman god "sonar beams" to look at the internal state ably have "ancient vocal histories that their

Janus, it has two "faces"—a dolphin side of one another's body, or that of a human young musl learn." Do you believe their and a human side. being, and that they can even gauge an- language is a symbolic system?

1 A human/dolphin language must con- other's emot'ora state that way. How does Lilly: Sure. If it weren't, they wouldn't exist. tend with the fact that dolphins communi- that work? They have to know different kinds offish cate at frequencies. ten times above the Lilly: They have a very high-frequenc"y sonar and coral, the distinction between edible

human range. While our speech falls, be- that they can use to inspect something and and inedible— that sort of thing. I suggest tween three hundred and three thousand. look at its internal structure. Say you're im- you don a doiph n suit and join them. hertz, or cycles per second, dolphins talk mersed in water and a sound wave hits Omni: You've pointed but that the bottle- to one another underwater at frequencies your body If there's any gas m your body nosed dolphin's brain is forty percent larger from three thousand to thirty thousand hertz. it reflects back an incredible amount of than ours, and the orca [killer whale] has

If you go into a pool with a dolphin and he sound. To the dolphin, it would appear as a brain four times larger.. These big-brained starts whistling, you'll hear what sounds like a bright spot in the acoustic picture. dolphins and whales a. so have a larger as- very high-pitched squeaks. So the prob- Omni: Can we ever really tune in to the sociation cortex, uncommitted to basic lem is to bring their frequency down into dolphin's "stereophonic" world view, or is sensorimotor processing and, therefore, our sound window and ours up into theirs. it perhaps too alien to ours? available for thinking. If cetaceans are

We're using a computer system to trans- Lilly: I want to. I just did a very primitive smarter than we, why do we humans as- mit sounds underwater to the. dolphins. A experiment -a Saturday afternoon-type sume we're the crown of creation 7 computer is electrical energy oscillating at experiment— at Marine World. I was float- Lilly: Because we can't talk to anyone else. particular frequencies, which can vary and ing in an isolation tank and had an under- The' highest intelligence on the planet we use a transducer to convert the elec- probably exists ir a sperm whale, who has trical waveforms into acoustical energy Yc, a ten-thousand-gram brain, six times larger could translate the wave'0'™s into any kind than ours. I'm convinced that intelligence of sound you like: human speech, dolphin- is a function of absolute brain size. Some

like clicks, whatever. years ago I solved the brain weight/body »77ie hyperspace with Omni; Do you type something out on. the weight problem, demonstrating that a large computer keyboard and have it transmit- which I've worked is one in brain cannot exist in a small body: it needs ted to the dolphins as sound in their fre- a massive body to. protect it. A brain Is very which I can jump quency range? And do they communicate fragile, and it it is rotated very fast— by a back to the computer? from one universe to another .blow to the jaw. tor instance — it tears loose Lilly: Yes, but we actually use two com- while maintaining from its moorings and kills itself by intra- puters. An Apple II transmits sol. "i as lo ','-r:. cranial bleeding. So, too. as a brain gets human size, concepts, structure, dolphins, via a transducer, from a key- larger, the head surrounding it. and its mo- board operated by humans. Then there is and memories. It's ment of inertia, must increase to prevent another computer, made by Digital Equip- dangerous rotation Maybe the human brain a domain I call Alternity* ment Corporation, that listens to the dol- can evolve further if we get control of our phins. A hydrophone, or underwater mi- genetic code. But in what direction? crophone, picks up any sounds the dolphins Omni: What has your intense acquaint- make, feeds them into a frequency ana- ance with cetaceans taught you about their lyzer, a sonic spectrum analyzer, and then character? What is their world like? into the computer. So the computer has an waler loudspeaker aose io my head and Lilly; It's mostly sonic, as I've said, since ear and a voice, and the dolphin has an an air microphone just above me. Both were they live in the water twenty-four hours a ear and avoice. The system also displays connected through an amp ifior to the dol- day and can't see at night. They have no visual information to the dolphins'. phin tank, so that they could hear me and sense of smell, but a very discriminating

On the human side, it's rather ponder- I could hear them. I started playing with taste sense. And, of course, they're buoy- ous, because we have to punch keys and sound—wh -.' '.- kj clicking and making ant, as you are in an isolation tank. One

I see letters on a screen. People have tried other noises that dolphins like. Suddenly day while I wasfioatinginthetankatNIMH,

" : it to make dolphins punch keys, but I don't "e t as j a!"' v.- ook had hit me on The I thought. "Gee, wouldn't be great to do !"." -. think dolphins should have to punch keys, head .'.e . "lis on tape, and it's List this twenty-four hours a day! "When I men-

They don't have these little fingers that we incredible. It was a cc oh n wh stle that went tioned it to a friend, he said. "Well, try the

have. So we'd prefer to develop a sonic ssssshhnhheeeeeooooo in a falling fre- dolphins." So that's how I started to work code as the basis of a dolphin computer quency from about nine thousand to three with dolphins; language. If a group of dolphins can work thousand hertz, in my hearing range. It Having voluntary respiration, dolphins are with a computer that feeds back to them started at the top of my head, expanding interdependent in ways in which we aren't: " what they just said — names of Objects arc as the frequency dropped, and showing they have a group mind. If a dolphin passes so forth—and if we can be the interces- me the inside of my skull, and went right out for any reason, his friends must wake sors between them and the computer, 1 think down through my body. The dolphin gave him up. Otherwise he'll drown. So every we can eventually communicate. [See me a three diners oral iecling of the in- dolphin is aware of where every other dol- "Talking Computer for Dolphins," Contin- side of my skull, describing my body by a phin is, just in case he's needed, "Do unto uum, August 1982.] single sound! others as you would have them do unto

Omni: How long will it take to break through I want to know what the dolphin experi- you" is one of their rules, and, unlike us,

the interspecies communication barrier? ences. I want to go- back and repeat the they follow it twenty-four hours a day.

Lilly: About five years. I think it may lake experiment in slcroo. ns;ead ol with a sin- They're also mo'e so ntuai since they have about a year for the dolphins to learn the gle loudspeaker: Since I'm not equipped more time to meditate. Try the isolation tank code, and then, in about five years, we'll like a dolphin. I've got to use an isolation and you'll see what it's like. have a human/dolphin dictionary. How- lank, electronics, and all this nonsense to Omni: Tell me the circumstances that led ever, we need some very expensive equip- pretend I'm a dolphin. you to- invent the first isolation tank ment to deal with dolphins' underwater Omni: Human language isn't merely de- Lilly: There was a problem in neurophysi- 74 OMNI LET US NOT GO OVER THE OLD GROUND, LET US RATHER PREPARE FOR WHAT IS TO COME.

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ology at the time: Is brain activity self-con- dolphin, I found he could inhibit his angry, Zen Buddhism and Hinduism, respec- tained or not? One school. oi thought said aggressive responses when 1 stimulated tively] and the Christian "states of grace" the brain needed external stimulation or it the negative systems. That was fascinat- seem to involve a constant influx of pleas- would go to sleep —become uncon- ing; With his large, eighteen-hundred-gram ure and no orgasmic climax— like tantric scious—while the other school said, "No, brain, he had enough cerebral cortex to sex. Spiritual states use these brain sys- there are automatic oscillators in the brain veto messages from the lower centers. Men tems in their service. Many philosophers, including Patanjali, the second-century b.c that keep it awake." So I decided to try a can do lhat, too. as scientists such as [Tu- sensory-isolation experiment, building a lane University medical researcher] Rob- author ot the Yoga Sutras, have said that lank to reduce external stimuli — auditory, ert Heath have shown. Once, when Heath /nana yoga—the yoga of the mind— is the visual, tactile, temperature— almost to nil. was stimulating a patient's negative sys- highest form of yoga. In this self-tran- The tank is lightproof and soundproof. The tem, the patient said, "You stimulate thai scendence one can experience bliss while water in the tank is kept at ninety-three to point again and I'll pull the electrodes out." performing God's work; only recently have ninety-four degrees. So you cant tell where Omni: Then would you say intelligence is t achieved this for days at a time. the water ends and your body begins, and a function of inhibition? Omni: In your book The Scientist you wrote, it'smeither hot nor cold. If the water were Lilly: Yes. You need a cerebral cortex of a "If we can each experience at least the is exactly body temperature, it couldn't ab- critical size, with fine fiber connections lower levels of satori, there hope that we sorb your body's heat loss, your body tern- running in both directions to the lower sys- won't blow up the planet or otherwise elim- perature would rise above one hundred six tems. That's where the middle self ("l-me") inate life as we know it." Are altered states degrees, and you might die. lives, up in that cortex— not in the lower necessary to our survival? Lilly: higher states I discovered that the oscillator school of centers. The lower centers (our lower self) Yes, the experience of thought was right, that the brain does not prod us from below, as it were, with love of consciousness, or alternate realities— states is the go unconscious in the absence of sensory or hate or fear. I think that the superself don't like the term altered — brains' input. I'd sleep in the tank it I hadn't had controls trom somewhere "above the brain," only way to escape our destructive any sleep for a couple of nights, but more in the spiritual domains. programming, fed to us as children by a interesting things happen if you're awake. disgruntled karmic history. Newborns are You can have waking dreams, study your connected to the divine; war is the result dreams, and, with the help of LSD-twenty- of our programmed disconnection from di- vine sources. five or a chemical agent I call vitamin K, you can experience alternate realities. I am writing a book about alternate real- Eleventh You're safe in the tank because you're not &~he ities called From Here to Aiternity: A Man- walking around and falling down, or mu- Commandment says, ual on Ways of Amusing God. On vitamin

I lating your perception ot external "reality." K, I have experienced states in which can "Thou shalt Omni. At the time you invented the tank contact the creators of the universe, as well weren't you doing brain research at the not bore God." The first as the local creative controllers — the Earth National Institute of Mental Health? Coincidence Control Office, or ECCO. step in not earth and Lilly: Yes. I invented a technique called an They're the guys who run the electrocorticograph. or ECG, lor implant- boring God is to set up who program us, though we're not aware ing multiple electrode arrays onto. the sur- two opposing of it. I asked them. "What's your major pro- face of the brain itself without injuring brain gram?" They answered, "To make you guys intellects, male and female3 tissue as much as previous methods did. evolve to the next levels, to teach you, to

It was the first method for taking electrical kick you in the pants when necessary," recordings from the brains of unanesthe- Because our consensus reality pro- tized animals— or even of humans. On a grams us in certain destructive directions, kind of television monilor, you could watch we must experience other realities in order the brain waves moving across the cere- Omni: Whai structures are involved in the to know we have choices. That's what I call bral cortex in two dimensions. Basically, brain's pain and pleasure pathways? Aiternity. On K, I can look across the bor- you pound a short length of hypodermic Lilly: Well, the preoptic nucleus in the an- der into other realities. I can open my eyes needle tubing through the scalp, adjusting terior hypothalamus, at the base of the brain. in this reality and dimly see the alternate it to the depth ot the bone so that the scalp is very negative. It's our main survival nu- reality, then close my eyes, and the alter- closes over it. Then you can come back cleus: If the temperature is too hot or too nate reality picks up. On K. you can tune and put electrodes down through that little cold, this nucleus treaks out the rest of the your internal eyes. They are not what is channel. brain. If there's too much sodium in the called the "third eye," which is centrally

Omni: Was' this the same technique you blood, it freaks out the brain. It's an area located, but are stereo, like the merging of used to map the brain's pain and pleasure for total fear. Then, moving downward to- our two eyes' images. Perhaps someday, systems with direct electrical stimulation? ward the spinal cord, you hit a part of the if we learn about the type of radiation com- Lilly: No, that requires putting electrodes hypothalamus that stimulates extreme pain ing through those eyes, we can simulate below the cortex, into the brain's deep mo- all over the body. If you move sideways in the experience with a hallucinatory movie tivational systems. The electrodes were the either direction in that area of the brain, camera— an alternate-reality camera. same; we just pushed them in deeper. At however, stimulation becomes incredibly Omni: What is so special about vitamin K? McGill University, in Montreal, James Olds positive. Around the preoptic nucleus, you Lilly: It's a lot more fun than LSD or any ot and Peter Milner had discovered the pos- run into. the sexual system, which, in males, the other agents, because it induces a short itive-reinforcing systems in rats' brains. [In controls erection, orgasm, and ejacula- trip and you can train yourself to the state. these famous studies, .conducted in the tion—each in a separate place—while far- Pretty soon you can take ten times as much early Fifties, rats learned to self-stimulate ther back, in the mesencephalon, the three and still walk around and talk to people, co- by activating electrodes in their brains' are integrated and fired oft in sequence. herently, in spite of the fact that reality is pleasure centers.] And H. E. Rosvold, of The brain has other pleasure systems. vibrating. I can run my computer, ski. or Yale University, had uncovered the nega- too —systems that stimulate nonsexual do just about anything on K. I've been on

it straight. tive-reinforcing systems in cats. I was the pleasure all over the body and systems as much as a hundred days You man who mapped both sides, positive and that set off emotional pleasure. That is a don't really sleep, you don't really dream,

don't to. K, I negative, and I went to a higher animal, the kind of continuous pleasure that doesn't because you need And on can macaque monkey. peak— a satori of mind. Safari and sama- experience the quantum reality: I can see enlightened-bliss in When I did the experiments again in the dhi [terms for states [eminent University of Texas physicist] John 76 OMNI —

Wheeler's hyperspace from within. film Altered Stales closely resembles your was in the hands of Bantam, the publish- Omni: Can you explain what you mean by life. What did you think of it? ers. The head of Bantam called and said, experiencing hyperspace trom within? Lilly: \ think they did a good job. The hal- "Paddy Chayefsky would like to read your

Lilly; Wheeler's hyperspace also is known lucination scenes are much better than manuscript. Will you give him your permis-

I if as a "nonlocal reality." Each of a pair of anything ever produced before. I under- sion?" said, "Only he calls me and asks photons coming from an atom knows im- stand that some ot the crew, the actors, permission." He didn't call. But he proba- mediately what the other is doing, no mat- and the producers were trained on K. The bly read the manuscript. ter how far away from each other they are. tank scenes were fine— except that in real- Omni: UCLA psychologist and drug au- You can assume the existence of tach- ity there are no vertical tanks, only hori- thority Ronald Siegel maintains that the yons— taste r-than- light particles, carrying zontal ones—and the film implied that use chemical you call K can simulate the near- tank itself out-of- death experience, proving that the near- messages— but I prefer Bell's theorem's of the would cause those is solution to the Einstein-Podolski-Rosen ex- the-body trips, which it doesn't. death experience hallucination rather than periment [which illustrated a seemingly The scene in which the scientist be- a foretaste of things on the "other side." impossible connectedness between par- comes cosmic energy and his wile grabs What is your view? ticles in two different places]. According him and brings him back to human form is Lilly: Ron and I totally disagree, though I to [John] Bell's theorem, hyperspace would straight out of my Dyadic Cyclone [1976]. like him. He is theorizing on the side of the be a region of hidden variables in which Toni did that for me. As for the scientist's law. With his belief system— that these ex- all realities are represented at a single point regression into an apelike being, the late periences are all wastebasket stuff—he and in which there is no need for mes- Dr. Craig Enright, who started me on K while doesn't know alternate realities. sages to travel. The "hyperspace" with taking a trip with me here by the isolation My experiences have convinced me that philosophy is right; that there which I've been working is one in which I tank, suddenly "became" a chimp, jump- Eastern yoga can jump from one universe to another ing up and down and hollering for twenty- is a purusha or atman [soul] for each per- for the planet, for the gal- from this reality to an alternate reality—while five minutes. Watching him, I was fright- son — one one axy, on. mathematician/philos- maintaining human structure, size, con- ened. I asked him later, "Where the hell and so As cepts, and memories: My center of con- opher Franklin Merrell-Wolff says in his book The Philosophy of Consciousness Without sciousness is here, and I can know im- mediately what's going on anywhere in the an Object, consciousness was first—be- fore the void even. When consciousness universe. It's a domain I now call Alternity, where all choices are possible. got bored and turned in upon itself, be- ^Subjectivity is Omni: What first inspired you to use psy- coming conscious of itself, creation be- chotropic drugs? nonsense. The subject is gan. He/she/it created time, space, en- ergy, matter, male, female— the whole Lilly: I never use the word drug, because an object is a It all got complicated that sneaky it leads into a legalistic morass. The Food tableau. so subject. onty to and Drug Administration has been putting The way things may go on beyond its ken.

' out bulletins lately about K, which is now - isolate subject If you get into these spaces at all, you listed as a possible "abused" drug. Be- must forget about them when you come and object is to cut off cause abuse means literally "away from back. You must forget you're omnipotent the feedback and omniscient and take the game seri- use," I prefer the term hyperuse. or "too ously so you'll engage in sex, have chil- much use." So I don't want to call it by its and destroy the system^ dren, and participate in the whole human chemical name, and I think of it as vitamin from a K anyway, because it gives me spiritual scenario. When you come back deep energy. I've never proselytized, never ad- LSD trip or a K trip — or coma or psy- vocated wholesale use of psychedelics. chosis— there's always this extraterrestrial They are not for everyone. When Timothy feeling. You have to read the directions in

Leary said, "Turn on, tune in, drop out," were you?" He said. "I became a prehom- Ihe glove compartment so you can run the

vehicle more. After I first took only a self-selecting group ever fried LSD. inid, and I was in a tree. A leopard was human once traveled to distant di- I scare acid in the tank and I did not agree with him; my use was care- trying to get me. So was trying to

I'll I cried I fully controlled investigation, not "recrea- him away." I said. "If you do that again, mensions, when came back and ." tional use kick you in the ass." He laughed. found mysell trapped in a body. I didn't

There were a lot of "LSD pushers" around Omni: Can substances like K take one to even know whose body it was at first. It

the of reentry. I felt squashed. our LSD research at the NIMH when I was lower, as well as to higher, states? Could was sadness thai of your critics have made much there in the Fifties, but I didn't take LSD one get stuck in a lower state, and is Omni: Some of the fact that intense experimentation with then. After" about ten years in the tank I a possible explanation for psychosis? decided there was something new to be Lilly: You can get into lower states— rock LSD-and K has brought you to the brink of solid-slate death at least three times. While giving learned. So 1 came out here to California, consciousness, conscious-

If there, yourself an antibiotic injection during your where a lady I knew who had access to ness, whatever. people do get stuck pure Sandoz LSD-twenty-five gave me the we would never hear from them, would we? early days of LSD experimentation, you a hypodermic containing de- LSD lor my first two trips. On my first trip I As for so-called psychosis, it's just an in- once used went through all the usual stuff: seeing my sistence on staying in altered states, in spite tergent ioam residue, which sent you into face change in the mirror, tripping out to of everyone else. Psychotics hang around a coma. Then, during a period of pro- music. During the tirst two movements of and play games with everyone around longed K use, you nearly drowned, and

it rather cruel. later you seriously injured yourself in a bi- Beethoven's Ninth Symphony, I was kneel- them; can be Anyone who ing in heaven, worshiping God and His an- has worked with them knows there's a wise cycle accident. Were these accidents healthy there, quasi-suicides collisions with your brain's gels, just as I had in church when I was and essence back and what —

it. "self-destruct programs"? seven years old On that trip I did every- you have to do is contact Of course thing I'd read in the psychedelic literature everyone's different. Some schizophren- Lilly; The whole issue of suicide is a very so as to save time and get out of the liter- ics feel pain; others pretend pain so that complex program. I've never tried to com- ature the nextji.me. During my third trip, in they'll betaken care of. mit suicide, though I've been close to death. interview for either accidents resulted from the isolation tank- in St. Thomas in 1964, -I Omni: Did Chayefsky you The near-death left my body and went into infinite dis- the book or the screenplay version of the taking something and acting in a certain tances —dimensions that are inhuman. film Altered States? way so that I ended up in great danger. Omni: The Ken Russell/Paddy Chayefsky Lilly: No. The manuscript of Trie Scientist and so I've hypothesized that the brain contains lethal programs— self-destruct programs—below the level of awareness, which LSD or K can release or strengthen. My accidents were near-death learning experiences. There's nothing like them.

They train you faster than anything I know. The year leading up to my bicycle ac-

cident in 1974, I spent in satorr, or a state

of grace. I was having a ball, mostly living in alternate realities and sometimes falling flat on my face. In The Autobiography of Ramakrishna [1836-1886, a famous Indian saint], there's a story about Ramakrishna getting ready to board a river steamer. Two of his disciples began to fight, and so Ra- makrishna went into samadhi. Since he was out of his body, his disciples had to stop fighting and carry him aboard. Weil, that in, was the sort of state I was and Toni was the disciple who had to "carry me around." Omni: In your reflections in The Dyadic Cy- clone, you seem to consider your accident as a way of paying for that year of bliss.

Lilly: It terminated that year. In our work- shops we have a saying: "If you pass the cosmic speed limit, the cosmic cops will

bust you." I got "busted." I had taken forty- two milligrams of PCP [angel dust]. I'd been out there too long and hadn't paid enough attention to my planetside trip; so the Earth Coincidence Control Office called me back

by throwing a bike accident at me while I

was on PCP I appreciate what the Control Office did. They are not cruel; they're in a state of high indifference. While my body was in the hospital and

In a coma for five days and nights, I was in alternate universes, where the guides instructed me about various planetary ca-

tastrophes. I can't make up my mind whether that was an experience of genu- ine realities or just a projection of the dam-

age to my body. In any case, I begged the

guides to let me go back. I had to say, "I

want to go back to Toni." At one point I Part Of Our

" clung to Toni for six solid hours so I could stay with her. It was very frightening. The National Heritage guides told me, "You can stay here, in which case your body dies, or you can go back."

I chose to go back to Toni, as I have cho- In 1776, Benjamin Franklin sen to go back every time. Omni: Toni has obviously been a crucial proposed that the Wild Turkey counterpoint to what you once described as the "stainless-steel computer" part of be adopted as the symbol of yourself. In your recent books you've our country. He pointed out stressed the importance of what you call the "male-female dyad." Will you please that this majestic bird is explain this idea. Lilly: That's the way the universe is con- native only to the American structed. Do you know about the Eleventh

Commandment? It says, "Thou shalt not Continent. bore God, or He will destroy your uni- It seems only fitting that verse." The first step in not boring God is to set up two opposing intellects, male and the Wild Turkey later became temale, so that neither can tell what the

other is thinking. If you totally fused with the symbol of our country's

your mate, it might be a very dull trip, intelligences. Every single greatest native whiskey. I love female cell in your body has two x chromosomes. Every cell in my body has one x chromo- WILD TURKEY'/ 101 PROOF / 8 YEARS OLD some and a crippled x chromosome, an x chromosome with an arm missing, called a y chromosome. You women are so well me, intellectually if not emotionally, was by Omni: How is it that, trained for eight years balanced with your two x's. You can be reading the "Grand Inquisitor" chapter of in psychoanalysis, you decided to devote grounded, and do the gardening, and take Dostoievsky's The Brothers Karamazov, in yourself to brain hardware instead? care of the kids and give them nurture, but which Christ comes' back to Earth, The Lilly: I'd already had enough neurophys- we males have got to go out and explore Grand Inquisitor tells him, "When we saw iological training to know there were a lot the universe, banging our heads together those miracles in the street, we knew you of mysteries in the brain. As Waelder said, and shooting one another. were back. But this time we're not giving psychoanalytic theory accounts for about

Omni: Was it really necessary for you lo you any publicity. We're keeping you in this one tenth of one percent of what goes on have the near-death experiences cell. to run you've We know how these people now." in psychoanalysis. I had to go further than 7 recounted That just knocked the church right out of that to find something more satisfying, and

Lilly: It for It me. I was was necessary to me, and by the time I was finished with found it in the concept of metaprogram- frighten the hell out of me, but many other Caltech. medical school, and psychoanal- ming the human biocomputer. people are just born right and don't have ysis, that belief system was pretty well A human being is a biorobot with a bio-

to struggle I did. I as had a Catholic back- cleaned out of me. computer in it, the brain. But we are not ground, a traumatic childhood—the whole Omni: What about psychoanalysis as reli- that brain, and we are not that body. A soul business. gion? Both use the confessional, an elab- essence inhabits us, and, under acid, un-

Omni: What was it about a Catholic back- orate rational system for structuring the ir- der K, under anesthesia, you'll find that the ground that you had to "unlearn"? rational, transference, and so on. essence isn't tied to brain activity at all. Lilly: The whole construct. I'd been taught Lilly: Well, I didn't get into the religious as- Brain activity can be virtually flat, and you by Irish Jesuits, who are very clever. They pects, as I was fortunate in having an an- can be conscious— off somewhere in an- made up multiple layers of rationality for alyst, Robert Waelder, who was tree ol the other realm. You just can't communicate the whole Catholic structure. The nice thing dogma. He had been trained by Anna Freud with people in consensus reality. about Catholicism, however, is that it in Vienna, had a Ph.D. in physics, and was Omni: In your experience, does the brain teaches you what to believe. So when you an analyst's analyst. I took psychoanalytic possess "trapdoors" into the domain of the throw it over, you know exactly what you're training under him for eight years, and he soul? For example, neuroscientist Arnold throwing over. You can say, "I don't believe would go anywhere with me. Right off, Mandell, of the University of California at in the Father Almighty," and continue right practically in our first session, I told him I San Diego, has said that chemicals such through the Apostles' Creed, the Confiteor, wanted to get a divorce [from his first of as LSD can be "pharmacologic bridges"

it, and the rest of tossing out one tenet at three wives] but that I thought 1 couldn't if to transcendence. a time. I was in analysis. "Where did you learn Lilly: I agree with Mandell. Acid — and, bet-

I believe in God, but not in the "Catholic that?" he asked. I said, "In the Freudian ter, vitamin K— set up the chemical config- God," who is vengeful. There's the whole literature." He said, "Dr. Lilly, we are not uration of your brain so as to loosen the business about guilt, "impure thoughts," here to analyze Freud, psychoanalytic lit- connection between the brain/body and going to hell if you don't do what the church erature, or other people's rules for your be- the soul essence. Then the essence can commands. this One way was solved for havior We are heie to analyze you." move into alternate realities. I call this phe- nomenon the "leaky-mind hypothesis." or the "escaping-self hypothesis." There are a lot of ideas about the soul's location in the body, of course. In Spanish, when you're scared out of your wits, you say your soul is in your mouth—you have el alma en la boca. But the junction between the bio- computer and the essence is not localized

in the brain: it's throughout the body. If you get out of your body, you can assume a fake body, an astral body, which can walk

through walls. Your essence is repre- sented in every cell in your body. Omni: Orthodox scientists accuse you of unscientific practices, and some even suggest that your consciousness-altering experiments and near-death accidents have impaired your judgment. How would you -reply to them? Lilly: Well, I'd just throw my credentials at them, and I'd ask them to sit down and read my papers. Only narrow-minded people criticize me, anyway: the broad- band people, who can move easily across boundaries and disciplines, love my work. Down in Mexico, for instance, people have been educated to respect the supersci- ence of the next century that their brujos and curanderos [sorcerers or witches and healers] are capable of calling up. My son John Lilly, Jr., who has lived for sixteen years among the Huichol Indians, has a won- derful movie about these matters. Our or- thodoxy, on the other hand, is very Ger-

manic, very European: If you can't see it,

touch it, or taste it, it doesn't exist.

I was brought up to divide science into ' .

theory and experiment, each guiding the Every other, The pure experimentalists- who at- playback is an encore. tack me lack good theory, but the theorists Stevie Wonder takes his haven't done the experiments. There are music home from, the studio really three departments to science: ex- on TDK. He knows that periment, theory, and experience. Expe- TDK tape records and rience is the part that doesn't get into the « captures everything he scientific journals. creates... and gives it back hi': v'---i.ck after play- Omni: How would you answer the charge "*""' back after playback. that your self-experimentation is subjec- '**•' TDK's advanced audio tive, and. therefore, unverifiable? "'-"•"' ffffijf ^Sg*- ". cassette technology gives Lilly: Subjectivity is nonsense. Neither sub- •*->„*#; you the full musical spec- jectivity nor objectivity exists in nature. trum. Take TDK's AD That's the mind-contained-in-the-brain ~* *>i;. * cassettes, for 'f'j:y example.

beliei of some psychiatrists and other sci- ., AD's are the bias ; : normal

' ' entists. The subject is an object is a sub- , cassettes with a brilliant ject. In a cybernetic system, you go around high end, broad dynamic range levels. in a circle, and subject and object have no and low noise jpij * They give you outstanding reality. The only way to isolate subject and at an out- object is to cut off the feedback and de- standing value. That's why It's false dichotomy. stroy the system. a Stevie Wonder wouldn't Omni; Do you believe that neuroscientists think of using any other are on the verge of explaining the mind by cassette. mapping brain chemicals and so forth?

Lilly: I haven't yet seen any breakthroughs that are worth talking about. Neurochem-

istry is interesting but not specific enough

yet, I suspect we'll tind there are a million different compounds operating in the nerv- ous system — specific compounds for specific regions and specific neurons. Caitech neuroscientist and Nobel laureate Roger Sperry's regeneration experiments [in which he rotated a salamander's eye &TDK Music lives on and the severed nerve fibers' somehow re- TDK constructed their original connections to

the optic tectum in the brain, as if they- "knew" where to go] show that there are chemotropic substances that are specific

to fiber, I Searching each don't read neuroscience

journals anymore; I depend on my friends to tell me what's going on. You know. [Kurt] Godel's theory, trans- lated, that of size says a computer a given . For Software? can model only a smaller computer, it can-

not model itself. If it modeled a computer of its own size and complexity, the model

would fill it entirely and it couldn't do any-

thing. So I don't think we can understand our own brains fully.

Omni: Is it an .extension of Godel's theo- rem, which states that some propositions neither proved nor disproved wit can be" T a logical system? Let Sofsearch

Lilly: It's the same thing. If you have a closed system, the closed system can't account The World's First for itself. A set of sets that contains itself is a set that cannot possibly replicate itself. Software Locator Service, Do We are biological computers, and what Godel said is that you cannot conceive in The Legwork For You full a computer 'the size of your own', for it "Need a trucking transportation package? How about agricultural hybridizi would take up all the space you live in. or maybe home automoiive diagnostics? Whatever your needs, Sofsearch 11 A sperm whale, with a brain six times the tind them fast." size of ours, could model a human and do "Sofsearch'" finds any type of software for all micro, mini and mainframe a pretty job of it. Since the model good puters. Best of all, our reports are processed within 48 hours- tedio would take up only one sixth of his soft- research— no lengthy wait." ware brain, he could use the remaining five Call today and let Sofsearch 1 " find your software solution. sixths to manipulate the model, predict its

actions, and bo on. The trouble is that this Call: 1-BO0-531-5955 1-800-334-2121 ICalil. Only) big computer is caught in a body that hu- 1-800-334-2122 1-800-392-4566 (Tex Only) mans can kill.

Franchise and Dealer Inquiries In A Service of Sor;e.i,-i li I nu>r national, Inc. Omni: Could you elaborate on your con- cept of programming and "metaprogram- MOST MEN AGREE CJ-- rrvng" the bioeomputer? Lilly: seen the movie Tron? You GMnflES Have you tQQG iN<-.«'E=>i TO 'JAVI ", iPa^E '28: must, because Tron is us. In it, the com- puter grabs the character played by Jeff HAPPY NEW YEAR. = lets you Bridges and takes him inside, making him I -234-56-7-89 83. a program in the computer. The Master Here is one set of formulas to find the in- Control Program revolts, takes over the tegers 3 through 25" using 1,9. 8, and 3; shave closer computer, and defies the users. So fhe users send in Tron, which is a program to 3= -1 +9-8+3 Control that is 4=1 X9-8+3 than destroy the: Master Program preaching disbelief in the users. 5=1 +9-8+3 Tron shows you things that are' very, very @=[1+{9-8)]X-3 7= -1 8-3 foam spiritual. You can think of yourself as a bio- +v'9 + computer, or an intelligent terminal, run by 8 = 1 xV9 + 8-3 a cosmic computer in the Earth Coinci- 9 = 1 +V9 + 8-3 dence Control Office. The bioeomputer 10= - 1 +9 + 8-3! 3 contains certain wired-in survival pro- II = 1 x8 + 3 D grams dealing with eating, reproduction, 12 = 1 + 8 + 3 and so on, wh ch lower animals also pos- 13= -1 +9 + 8-3 sess. But when the bioeomputer reaches 14 = 1 X9 + 8-3 a certain threshold of complexity, there are 15=1+9 + 8-3 higher-level programs in the association 16=1-9-(8x3) cortex that permit such things as making 17=19-8 + 3! models, learning to learn, choice, and so 18 = 1 +V9 + 8 + 3! forth. We have short-term choices, but God 19= -1 +9 + 8-3

help you if you go against the Master Con- 20=1 xg + 8 + 3 trol Program. A terminal cannot under- 21 = 1+9+_8 + 3

stand itself, because it lacks sulficient 22 = 1 +{V"9.x8)-3 J space, but a rep: ca o itsel- [ s n the cosmic 23 = 1 X9 + 8 + 3!

computer, which can understand it. At the 24 = 19 + 8-3 highest level, your true self (the "user" in 25=1" + (8x3)

Tron) is a cosmic game player, with access to an infinite computer—the ECCO com- OMNI TO 1983. Mrs. Halici recalls that the puter. That is metaprogramming, seif-met- letters of our logo already look like num- [2 S.C. Johnson & Son, Inc. aprog ramming. bers turned sideways. Starting with the ar- Omni: How does one contar. God? rangement at the top, she moves the seven (below): Lilly: In many cases, I didn't know whether outlined matches to get the year of OMNI I was taken on a trip by God or by one His business officers in the outer galaxy. Guides at .each level above ours pretend TIME CAPSULES. to be God as long as you believe them. When you finally get to know the guide, he says. "Well, God is really the next level up." God keeps retreating into infinity. I've

thought that I was in the mind of God- seeing rotating universes, yin and yang, male and female — but perhaps God him- WORDS. In each of these words, the last letters abbreviation self is beyond that. Have I told you about two are the zip code the "Dust-bowl God"? of a state, and the letters before them spell Omni: No, What is the "Dust-bowl God"? a city or town in that state. There is a Jack, Ava, Illinois: and so forth. Ross Lilly: In my new book I have a theory called Alabama: an Now -the magozine of the future the Dust-bowl God. God got bored with Eckler, editor of Word Ways (Spring Valley can be kept for the future. Store your this universe and the distribution of intelli- Road. Morristown, NJ 07960). says these issues of OMNI in a new find gence in it. So He made a dust bowl out are the only common words he could Custom Bound Library Cose made beyond the galaxies. In this dust cloud, in a quick trip through the Zip Code direc- of black simuloted leather. It's every particle is intelligent: on the atomic tory. If logologists could create cities as builttc last, and it will keep 12 issues there would be more interesting in mint condition indefinitely. level, each particle is as intelligent as a needed, PA, LA. The spine is embossed witha gold human being. The dust particles made postmarks such as OOMPAH OLLA OMNI logo, and in each case themselves into stars and planets and an- and AINTNO MO. there is a gold transferror recording imals and humans, and everybody knew the date. everybody; everything was totally aware SENTENCES. Hellweg calls his three sen- Ways, Au- Send your check or of everything around it. tences "chronograms" {Word the money order (S5, 95 each; Now the problem is, If every particle is gust 1982). The initial letters of words 3forS17;6torS30) equally intelligent, and greater assem- (or initial sound in the case of words be- postpaid. USA orders only. Foreign blages are even more intelligent, what are ginning "ex") spell out the Roman numer- orders S2.50 for add the traffic rules for. relations between, say, als for the year of each sentence. Thus: (1) postage and handling per case] humans and elephants? It would be nice MCMLXIX, 1969. the first lunar landing; (2) to: OMNI Library Case, to see such a universe, wouldn't it— the MCDXCII, 1492, Columbus's landing in the PO. Box 5120, Philadelphia, PA 19141. Dust-bowl Universe? New World, and (3) MDCCLXXVI, 1776, the Allow 4-6 weeks for delivery. Declaration Omni: How would it differ from ours? proclamation of the American Lilly: Right. How would it? 00 of Independence. DO At least one scheme failed for reasons of safety. This contestant suggested send- INSIGHT... ing up a 50-gallon drum of nuclear waste The Unspoken Words for disposal by ejection toward the sun. Inner Vision the iheory that primordial life arrived on Others seemed too ambilious. The Of Earth from outer space. judges agreed that a personal reentry de- Alexander D. Pavlista and A. R. Temple- vice for use by stranded astronauts would

ton, Lawrenceville, New Jersey. Study the be highly desirable but doubted that it could uptake o! chemicals by plants in space to be developed within the space available. learn whether fertilizers and pesticides can Proposals to test an ion drive and a solar be used successful. y wiihout gravity. sail, both intended to propel interplanetary James H. Sloan, an electrical engineer probes, succumbed to the same concern. in Sunnyvale. California. Try to grow algae And, though we appreciated the logic of in an extremely humid atmosphere, pos- simply letting Dr. Bussard use the Omni .sibly reducing the amount ol irrigating water GAS package to build his interstellar ramjet, that space stations must carry. that, too, seemed considerably beyond the Timothy L. Stroup, a graduate siudent in scope of the contest. biology at the University of Cincinnati. Sludy And occasionally entrants had workable bone formation in the chick embryo for clues ideas but conceded that they were not fo the cause of calcium loss in astronauts competent to carry out their project. One 'lying long missions. girl in her early teens proposed a test of Andrew Thomson, Melbourne, Australia. fertility in zero-g. then closed her letter with "If Prepare sandwiches of expanded polysty- a "P.S.": 1 could make an egg-sperm

culture if it rene and aluminum or steel to determine just to see could exist, I would, whether samples made in space are strong But I don't know the first thing about it." enough for orbital construction. One nonwinner (whose interest in Omni have heard it. Brian Tillotson, a graduate student in we could not understand) recommended LOU ' You have seen it—that electrical eng neer'ng ir: Seattle, Washing- sending up 50 kilograms of plastic explo- 'sudden flash into con- ton. Attempt to make a highly reflective sive with which to test the astronauts' abil- sciousness of a word or a aluminum film only a few atoms thick for ity to return to Earth under their own power. ital image. Its clarity is un- possible use in a solar sail. We ordinarily wouldn't reveal the names and r . mistakable.Callithunch,orintui- John Trifero. Mogadore, Ohio. Carry a addresses of losers, but if the FBI were tion, it can and does solve problems. cesium atomic clock in the Get Away Spe- interested in talking to this cretin, how could It suggests ways to accomplishment cial to determine whether it loses the amount we refuse? where all previous thought may have of time predicted by Einstein's theory of We'll make one other exception, an hon-" failed. Whence comes such light of the mind? general relativity. orable mention: P. D. Reid, of Welland, On- What mental processes generate such Good luck to alii tario. We're sorry we're unable to publish

I.' !'.' . And to those whose submissions did not the details of your intriguing proposal to these occasional and mysterious flows of make it through the preliminary judging: test psychic spoon-bending in space, but creative thought from the inner recesses Please understand that many good ideas several of us are still laughing. DO of mind? Learn how to provide the value were ruled out for technical reasons that of insight at wBl, had nothing to do with their basic merit. CREDIT Let the Rosicrucians, a worldwide or- Others duplicated the goal of an entry that ganization, prove to you, as they have to that displayed more elegance or possibility of thousands of other men and women, there is more to life than you would ordi- success. If we have another GAS con- narily suspect. Not theories, but a prac- test—we'd surely like to, though our plans tical application of cosmic laws for every- are -still far from firm—you should stand an excellent chance on the second try. FREE BOOKLET Sad to say, though, a few entries failed for reasons that might have been avoided. 310 Simon, page 40 lop, C The Rosicrucians (not a religion) Most often they simply lacked the origi- extend to you an invitation to write for nality we wanted. The contest announce- a free copy of the Mastery of Life. This ment made it clear that because ants were booklet is not for the idly curious, but already going aloft, termites surely would for those who wish for attainment and not win. We didn't think to mention house- peace profound in life. Use the coupon flies, fruit flies, honeybees, bumblebees, below. beetles, earthworms, mealworms, or flat- worms. They were still ruled out. Several ideas were interesting but could The Rosicrucians San Jose, California 95191, U.S.A. easily be carried out without the shuttle. One entry, for example, suggested taking

Kirlian photographs of plant leaves, but it i-Ordsi AMQHC did not explain why that should be done in space. Another recommended building a nitinol-powered electrical generator, a feat often attempted here on Earth. Some of the experiments involved space but seemed to offer few practical benefits. Testing the-effect of spaceflight on the fla- vor of wine and cheese, the tones of a flute and a violin, and the resilience of a base- ball fell into this category. The spirit of adventure pervades Robert McCall's SPACESCAPES

BY BEN BOVA

Robert McCall is an eyewitness to the future. Since childhood, he has been fascinated with the technology and spirit of flight, and his paint- show this duality: Impeccably detailed technology is the central focus of his extensive portfolio, yet his work is set within a milieu of soaring, exhilarating, even mysterious spirituality that expresses his

of a star-flung future for the human r; In the book Vision of the Future: The Art of Robert McCall, by Ben Bova (Harry N. Abrams), McCall's paintings serve as a tapestry of lomorrow's history, starting with the earliest spaceflighls and extend- ing iar oul into space and iime. depicting strange new worlds, robots and spacecraft, an Earth transformed by futuristic technology. McCall's great interest in the future began with some paintings tie did for Life magazine in the early 1960s, portraying a panoply ol advanced spacecraft Since then he has covered virtually every space launch, accompanying the astronauts as they suited up and riding the gantry elevator to their waiting space vehicle. Stanley Kubrick asked him to paint the advertising art for his film 2001: A Space Od- yssey, and McCall has painted vast murals for the National Air and Space Museum, in Washington. D.C., and for several NASA centers. But McCall paints more than the spacecraft and gadgetry of to- morrow, more than alien vistas of time to come. His work spans the

^McCail's paintings express his vision of a star-flung future for the human race.9 entire range of human experience in futuristic settings where our tech-

nology is used lo create a life of abundance and adventure. "It's fun dreaming up strange, out-of-this-world vehicles and envi-

ronments," he says. "Through it all is woven a feeling of wonder and excitement about the universe, an overwhelming conviction that we're

not alone, that the universe is teeming with life, and that someday we will make conlact with beings from other planets." The uniqueness ot Robert McCall's vision ot the future is that what he sees with his inner eye, he puts onto canvas in paintings that have

all the sweep and power of an inventive imagination, yet the detail and discipline to convince us that these futuristic space scenes can be constructed by human hands. DO

tit's fun dreaming up strange, out-of-this-world vehicles and alien landscapes.? •Intelligent aliens will stand upright, building their world with two arms and two grasping handsV

When Christopher ulalmg the brain; that Columbus first set in turn led to more fool in the New World, advanced technol- he was astounded ogy, which further in- at the sight of Indi- creased intelligence, ans. Tbegreat thinkers and so on, until Homo of his time, after all. sapiens evolved. had predicted a As far as I'm con- place peopled by cerned, technology monstrous creatures is essential to the de- m no way human. velopment of intelli- Modern scientists gence, no matter are now making sim- what the planet. But ilar predictions about it you're discussing an worlds yet to be dis- earthlike world, then covered in the vast- technology can be ness of space The developed only by probability ol en- creatures just about countering beings the size and shape of thai are physically human beings. similar to us, CarlSa- To sustain a tire, for gan and others sug- instance, one must gest, is near zero. feed it fuel. This re- Evolution, they con- quires humanoid tend, is a random armsand regs fo fetch process that must UFD UPDATE the logs It also create radically dif- means human size ferent creatures trom one planet to the next. and strength to support the wood as It is toted from one As a biologist studying the evolution and development spot to another. (A small creature on a world with earthlike fire of shape. I've reached the opposite conclusion: I am con- gravity couldn't carry logs large enough to keep the vinced that evolution follows stringent rules that would burning. An extremely large individual might lose its bal- operate the same way on any planer in the cosmos If ance, succumbing to the force of a single fall.) And be- that's true, we may be in for the same surprise as Colum- cause brainy, bipedal extraterrestrials would actively pur- bus. Once again, somewhere m space, we may come sue their food, their nose, ears, and mouth would be face to face with ourselves, concentrated together at a leading end. allowing them to My argument begins with simple biochemistry For life see, smell, breathe, and eat at once. The combination to exist, chemical reactions must occur rapidly, and that's would form a recognizable face. impossible without a liquid solvent such as water. But if When we finally meet the extraterrestrials, the biggest water is to keep its liquid form, it must remain at once too problem will nor be trying to figure out whether our strange cool to vaporize yet too warm to freeze. That's a tall order, friends are intelligent. Instead, the hitch might be con- and the only thing that can fill it is an earthlike planet. vincing folks back home that the guests we have brought Most experts agree that the evolution of earthly intelli- along with us really are aliens and not Leonard Nimdy or gence is rooted in the primate's upright posture, which Christopher Reeve —TRENT D STEPHENS freed the hands tor grasping and holding Versatile hands allowed protohumans to use tools and fire, thereby stlm- Trent D Stephens is a biology professor ar Idaho Slate University SMALL PEOPLE be pumped through a In the Science Citation smaller circulatory system, Index, the reference work Wonied about ihe popu- the heart's work load would that lists almost all scientific lation explosion -5 Calm be diminished and there articles, down, The burgeoning birth- would be fewer cardiac When reached at his rale will cease to be a arrests. London office John Mad- problem onee we've bred a "The technology tostirii dox, the editor of Nature, race ol humans hall normal humans." Easlon says, promptly confessed that the size. That, al least, is the "will probably be available article on longevin had prediction of Thomas Easton, within a decade. A geneti- been an April Fool's Day a theoretical biologist and cally engineered virus, joke. (Sorry, Mr Reagan.) "It technical writing teacher at carrying genes coded to was very unusual for April the University ot Maine, create small people, could first to fall on a Thursday, our "Gut people down to be placed in a reservoir weekly issue date," Maddox jout three (eet in height or released, in the air Then confided- 'And it was too good an opportunity to

pass up, It takes very little in the way of general knowl-

edge to see It was a ]Oke. Nature- magazine, the Since then we have received most respected science half a dozen articles in

journal in England, billed It the same vein, obviously as a breakthrough in anti- sent by scientists who aging research. A liny accepted the joke In the

protein named longevin, the^ spirit it was written in." publication reported, had When advised that the been isolated in carp by a longevin article was now Professor Obispo, of the logged in the scientific Stoyte Institute of Life database and would be

Sciences at Tarzarra ( cited as a reference by other In California. Longevin scientists, Maddox said.

appeared to be responsible "I doubt it."

for the remarkable longevity He'd better tell that to the of carp, which reputedly researchers who put their live to a ripe old age of 150. faith in Scisearch and a 1 ear as much everyone infected would Nature said. Moreover, the variety of other computer food," Easton says. "Cars absorb the genes and tiny protein significantly banks now broadcasting could then be the size of produce lilliputiah offspring." prolonged the lite span of news of longevin throughout little red wagons, with all the But economist Anthony mice as well. Similar treat- the world.—Robert Pattqn old gas guzzlers converted Wiener says Eastdn's fore- ment o< humans, the writer to buses. In fact man's cast is ridiculous. "In.' the implied in his article, titled MAGIC MOUTHPIECE appetite tor open space and real world." he contends, "The Elixir of Life," could raw materials would de- "you deal with the population be just years away If the muscles In your crease to match his stature. problem by reducing the The difficulty arose when arms are turning to con-

"This new breed of hu- birthrate. I expect countries Nature readers attempted to somme, the problem may be man." EastOn says, "would with a crowding problem track down both Professor your mouth So says Dr. have lar more muscle, to legislate m 11 Obispo and the science Richard Kaufman, an with the ability to run and sterilization by the year journals that had supposedly Oceanside. New York, jump almost like a cat. . Mishara published the preliminary orthodontist, who designs Reduced weight would ease findings of his resee mouthpieces for Olympic the wear on joints, cutting "All is riddle, and li- It was discovered, in fact, and professional athletes Ihe prevalence ot arthritis the- riddle is another riddle." that neither Obispo nor Kaufman and a few peers Since less blood would —Ralph Waldo Emerson the cited journals were listed believe that by correcting the LOUD UFO

On the night of June 22. had jumped from 1972, Javier Bosque, a a medium pilch, or frequency, seminal y student in Logroho, of 420 cycles per second Spain, sat in bed reading. to a screech of 4,0.00

It nearly was 2 am , and the cycles per second. local radio station had "The skeptics." Smith gone ofl the air. Suddenly, says, "were dumbfounded. Bosque claimed, the win- They obviously realized dows swung open and that only the most sophisti- a silver oval two feet in di- cated and expensive equip- ameter floated In, flooding ment could produce a the room with light. Then sound like that. It's not the Ho let outs sort of thing a seminary student in rural Spam would even attempt to take." alignment of the upper pushed a buttc But acoustics engineer and lower jaw, the mouth- nited a flat metal electrode Howard Schecrer. who guard (dubbed MORA, beneath Ihe paper. By recently analyzed the tape or mandibular orthopedic exposing ihe paper to in- for the Center for UFO repositioning appliance) can tense light, the electrode Studies, in Evanston, Illinois,

also boost an athlete's produced a photo of the That's baloney! I strength and energy aura around the fingers uld produce ihe same This claim has provoked As far as Kaufman is con- md right now, with simple guffaws among other or- cerned, the test proved etrpnic equipment. Be- thodontists, but Kaufman that subjects wearing a notes. "analyz- says he's found some new mouthpiece were stronger such extreme fluc'tua- oroof. A special "Kirlian and healthier. The reason; ,ons on an oscilloscope is camera," capable of photo- Their auras (above, at like looking at DNA with a graphing the body's eiec- left) were fuller than the magnifying glass. Iromagnetic "aura," he auras (above, right) of those "The only test that could contends, has shown that withouf the mouthguard. provide real evidence." MORAs actually do Pip, however, feels he's Schecter adds, "requires a increase vitality. jumping the gun. True, the computer and thousands in a recent study con- subjects fended off Kauf- iue fumbled for the of dollars— money that " ducted In the kitchen of Pip man's downward thrust cassette recorder stowed ufologists just don't have Merrick, program director belter when their jaws were near his bed and quickly Where does Javier Bos- 9 of the International Kirlian properly aligned, but since flicked it on, que fit into all this He was

Society, Kaufman ran sub- they knew the aim of the It didn't take long for last seen in a little village lets through an arm- experiment, perhaps they news of the resulting tape. Iri the Spanish mountains. strength test while Pip sat at were only making him happy, one of only ten in UFO When questioned about the camera's controls First And, Pip says, even dedi- recordino history, to reach the noisy UFO, he made it with the MORA, then without cated Kirlians would be Willy Smith, a retired nu- clear he had loftier con- It, each subject held an hesitant to call a fuller aura clear physicist living in cerns, "Leave me alone," he arm out at his or her side a sign of physical health Norcross, Georgia. The insisted. "I'm a priest." while Kaufman tried his or strength —Mark Teich eight-minute recording —Kathnne Jason best to push the arm down- so fascinated him, in fact, ward. Meanwhile Pip placed "Intelligence is only an that he analyzed it on his "I think that flying saucery the lingers of the subject's accidental concomitant of oscilloscope. By transform- and astrology prove one other arm atop photosensi- life and perhaps not even a ing the noise into visual thing: There's one bom every tive paper Turning the very useful one." images on a screen. Smith minute'" kitchen lights out, she then —Isaac Asimov says, the t —Patrick Moors ever, were several four- LOVE POTION confrontation with a derelict, fingered handprints, which one cocktail with her down- they promptly copied in Singles bars and boring stairs neighbor, and three plaster casts tor ongoing computer dates got you months of going-nowhere examination. They opined down 7 Barbara MacKay. an dates with a man she met at that (he prints were made by unemployed secretary a local disco. Better than a heavy, huge-thumbed turned felt stand-up comic : she'd been doing, but not creature larger and stronger that way; so she bought much to show for an incan- than a man. The evidence a candle-and-mcense ritual tation meant to bring true

fanned excitement and kit from the Mystic Eye romantic love brought throngs of onlookers occult shop, on Broadway, "It was very painiul for

to the area, But ft seems in San Francisco me," she notes.; "but I

that Buena Foot himself was MacKay cast her first love can't blame the occult, it frightened off, for no one spell at home She took a brought men. but finding has been able to tind a bath, dried off in the air the right one and making trace of him since. without any towel, then the relationship work was The police, who Joined anointed herself with evil- up to me." the search grudgingly, were smelling oil- Finally she MacKay satisfied that the monster burned some pink "passion" ence. neve'tl was really a hairy vagrant who slept in the park and howled for reasons of his own They released a photo of the man, who, they said, matched Buena Foot's description "on at least seven points." But Dennis Ruminer. of 'Special Forces declared the tramp was too short (only five feet eight

BUENA FOOT inches tall) to be Buena Foot, and he said that he In Los Angeles they sing and his team would continue of Buena Foot, a giant, their intensive search in malodorous creature thai Orange County, south of haunts the cily with menac- Los Ang.eles ing howls. Or at least he Meanwhile another bel- howled menacingly one lowing vagrant was ob- night in mid-May, when served by independent in- people saw him in a Buena vestigator John De Herrera. candles and After four rear- Park flood-control canal This one was reported to incense while chanting her end collisions with her little Over the next several days be in his mid-thirties and. just wish for amah. Toyota she bought some researchers trom Special about six feet four. The result, she says, was magic herbs for the floor- Forces Investigations, —Dava Sobel hard to interpret. "I met a boards and hasn't had dedicaied to the study of lot of men almost immedi- an accident since. "/ the paranormal, the mon- am skeptical about ately But i had gone on —Owen Davies strous, the extraterres- skepticism: write trip and One could a with Club Med. So I trial, combed the area an interesting article can't be sure how much the "How many ot our with divining rods and ven- debunking debunking. As magic helped." daydreams would darken tured 125 feet inside a with belief, so much After a subsequent dry into nightmares if there concrete storm dram m depends an the way the spell, though, she decided to seemed any danger oi ttieir hopes ot finding the crilter. mind faces." try the ritual again The coming true'" All they discovered, how- —Martyn Skinner outcome7 One cable-car —Logan Pearsall Smith idea how long the woman had been stand- came lower, and she sipped her tea again. ing behind her. "But then we realized that thoughtfully. "And then they change survive to MEDEA each metamorphoses into the next phase." Only a few out of each hundred FROM P/ neither male CONTINUED Irina stood up stiffly, ready to confront reach this phase. They are the injustice of her treatment, nor female, but have achieved true inte- more visible from an overlook perched three Ch'ien Li with older motioned her to a long gration of the two selves. They have ex- hundred feet up a rocky hill, where an ob- but the woman sat down. perienced every phase their species goes servation post had been set up. There were table, preceded her to it, and touched the food panel, and two through. They are the community judges, sensors in the foxes' village. Observation Ch'ien Li deposited be- teachers, doctors, priests, All this in less was both direct and through computer re- cups of steaming tea were has fore them, than fifteen years," she said. "Mone play, and it covered them as thoroughly as born female." she started with lived beyond fifteen years." the eye of God, Irina though!, All of Ch'ien "They are Irina remembered her tea preamble, as if unaware of Irina's im- She stopped: Li's work was in the computer: Pick taught no "At maturity they mate, and a pair and lifted the cup to her lips. Something is Irina the codes they used, Twenty-two years patience. conception takes not right., she found herself thinking. "They of work, she thought with dismay. of legs is detached when Within the placental pouch there are are too small," she said finally. "The brain "The camp is protected by an electric place. short-lived. grow and feed inside it pan is too small. They are too fence." Pick told her the first day, guiding usually twins who intelli- until they are large enough to be quite in- How could they have achieved her around it, showing her how to deacti- dependent. During this incubation the fe- gence in a lifetime so short, with so little vate it with the touch ot a button. male maintains a guard over them in a brain? It doesn't make sense." "We kill nothing here," he said. "The other incubating young, as- Ch'ien Li shrugged, her face as black charge in the guns is for stun only. The nursery with could not sisted other mothers. The mother is freed as a painted surface. "They have fence is on stun. We want to stop them, not by is very done it," she said. "However, if they are harm them. Can you fly?" from constant surveillance, and she making tools, not intelligent, then they have the most ad- He taught her to manage the aircars and active in community affairs, with other vanced instinctual social behavior of any then went on to teach her the basics of the farming, hunting, sharing time group ever observed. Either way, we must equipment in the maintenance room. rewrite many books. I must rewrite many He was always patient, never conde- books," she amended. scending, but she felt her arrival was an Irina studied her. How old was she? Over irritant to him. As soon as he was satisfied a hundred, too old ever to return to Earth, that she could manage the aircar compe- £The men turned too old probably to finish her work here, tently, that she knew what to look for if any and yet daily that frail woman climbed the of the machinery malfunctioned, he re- into foxes, and they dipped hillside to the observation post high after day he rocky sumed his own pursuits. Day their tails into over the foxes. She knew Ch'ien Li worked left in one of the small cars and did not water then began around the clock with three- or four-hour return for many hours. He was making the and pauses for sleep. What was driving her? maps, he said. He was searching for evi- chewing them off, What held together those frail bones, kept dence of older civilizations, poking around consuming themselves the blood flowing, kept her brain function- to see what there was to see. ing? This one little puzzle about the foxes? After instructing her to review the work, until only the Irina could not believe it was that simple, Ch'ien Li had paid no attention to Irina. remained^ heads and necks easily answered. The days passed slowly, and gradually that "What are my duties?" she asked Ch'ien Irina began to realize that this was what Li. "I have been tutored by Pick for weeks Jolly had meant: Ch'ien Li would drive her here as a now. Surely I am not to serve away by ignoring her, by letting boredom backup maintenance person and reviewer eat into her bones until she could stand no they of your work." more, irina went to the group room and sat young females in the nursery. When protected by the Ch'ien Li smiled gently at her. "Review before the- terminal to wait for Ch'ien Li to emerge, the young are much as you can first." she said. "It is appear. While she waited, she played entire community, but they are also inde- as schooling all there. We have tagged one hundred fif- through a tape of one of the foxes Ch'ien pendent for abou! a year, when are taught hunting, the var- teen foxes to date. Six remain alive. Five of Li had tagged years ago, begins. They are still in the main community many The creature was immature, the size of ious village skills, and so on. When the fe- them this group male mates a second time, the next pair of miles from here. One is here with a half-grown oaf; it had eight legs and the is iden- that two years ago began a journey that is moved so fast that, played back in real time, legs is detached and process or where tical, that the female becomes not yet over. We don't know why its movements were blurred past compre- except now male; her genitals drop off they "are going. We will follow until we do hension. She played it back slower and an immature brood, exposing male or- know. But until they move again, there is slower until each motion was visible. It was with the second very little to do except watch, review, med- catching insects and small crustaceans, gans. This is a very busy time for the young much to learn, They must itate." She stood up. "I am available in my using its forepaws as dexterously as any males, They have if require me. It is always the human surgeon used her hands. practice walking and running in an upright room you glide waiting that is the hardest part of any ex- For a time Irina played back bits of the position now, and they must learn to drives distribution of weight pedition, my child. The waiting is what fox at random, but then she started over all over again, as the shall drastically. become the many people back to civilization. We and let the computer show her the bits that has changed They gliding, at times ap- see. We shall see." Ch'ien Li had tagged as significant, The most adept at soaring, are very After Ch'ien Li had withdrawn to her room fox, nearly grown, weaving a basket, quickly parently achieving true flight. They of development. again, Irina continued to sit at the table. and surely, with little wasted motion. The aggressive at this stage other She swished her tea, drank it down, and same fox digging in the ground, dropping They roam in groups and ravage stared into the cup. There were no tea seeds, cultivating a row of orange plants. communities or engage in full-scale bat- leaves, but she pretended anyway. Then fighting savagely with a winged crea- tles. They learn to use more advanced and ar- "I see you in a long green dress, meet- ture twice its size, Being cared for by the weapons, spears and even bows tall dark men. and short blond men. other foxes with only four legs. rows, And then the next stage occurs, and ing

those and fat bald men. I see you watching a 'At first we thought there were three spe- they become mating machines, who furry animal fucking away." cies, closely related, of course, "Ch'ien Li's survive the fledgling period. Most do not At least, she thought, shoving the cup voice said, close to Irina's ear. Irina had no survive. And then." Ch'ien Li's voice be- 9S OMNI "

into the receptacle that whisked it sway, she had discovered the answer to the puz- zle of the creatures' names. She drummed her fingers on the table

and then went searching for Pick. She fi- nally found him working in the mainte- nance/hangar room. He didn't look up. "What are you making?"

"A still." Fascinated, Irin.a moved closer. There was a large sealed pot, and many coils of

tubing not yet joined to it. "What are you going to distill?" He chuckled. "There's always some- : tiling." "Ch'ien Li says you go to Medea Town every two months or so for supplies. Are you going soon? It's been nearly two months now." "You got any shopping to do. make a

list." He bent a pipe, measured it, bent it some more. "You could bring enough supplies for a

year at a time if you wanted to." She bit her lip when he turned his back on her. Then— she said, "If you make your own liquor "Brandy." "Brandy. You won't need to go to town to get drunk. You go for a woman, don't you?" Pick took up another section of the tub-

ing, working it with his hands. He did not look at her. "Are you getting horny?"

"Yes. And I don't want to have to go to ."

. that ghastly hotel . He whooped with laugher, and Irina found

herself laughing, too. It had been so simple

after ali, Pick put off his trip to town until they were THESE MEN can cell exactly what's happening actually running low on food, and then he stayed only three days, and when he re- inside every barrel in a Daniel's warehouse. turned, he announced that he had brought Jack enough back to last a year. He winked at Irina. Ch'ien Li nodded gravely. In the heat of summer the whiskey is expanding

One day Irina joined Ch'ien Li in a shal- into the charred inner wood of the barrel. Come low cave near the observation perch; here there was yet another computer terminal, Halloween, it's starting to cool. And inching some air cushions, and nothing else. Ch'ien Li sat on a cushion, watching the foxes its way back toward the center. Over the aging below. She was like a bat, Irina thought, clinging to a dark spot. period, this gentle circulation

"They aren't mating," irina said. "I have reviewed them since they left the city, and of whiskey is going on they have not mated at all during this jour- ney. Why?" constantly. Of course, it CHARCOAL "We do not know," Ch'ien Li murmured. can't MELLOWED 'And the young males don't make for- be perceived by the ays; they aren't fighting among themselves human eye. But after a anymore." DROP Ch'ien Li nodded. sip of Jack Daniel's, we "Kuwait is having success in making 6 contact with them." Irina said after a long believe you'll recognize BY DROP silence. "They have language. That chant- ing we hear day after day. the clicks and its importance. growls, it is language; not random."

"So it seems." Irina drew in a deep breath. Below, the

foxes were' assembled in several concen- Tennessee Whiskey 90 Proof • Distilled aid Bottled by Jack Daniel Distillery tric rings, the ground, hunched down on Lem Motlow, Prop., Inc., Lynchburg (Pop. 361), Tennessee 37352 motionless. The neuter was inside a shel- Placed in the National Register of Historic Places by the United States Government. ter made of smooth poles, covered with skins, There was no motion below, no sound three humans, but more often they chose great tides to the lake and sent mountain now, although at any moment they might the prey they knew. flood rivers into the valley. The city could entirely, begin to move again. It it was a dance, it Irina was having many dreams in almost have been swept away or perhaps made no sense to Irina; the movements every sleep period. She dreamed she wore only the sensors were destroyed." appeared too random. As one, Ihey would a flowing green gown, and stood at the 'And the other foxes that you tagged?" rise and start dashing here and there, or side of a fountain that splashed with bright "They are no longer transmitting." leap over and over, or walk zombielike in blue water. She dipped a pitcher into the Irina sipped her tea. "That leaves only no discernible pattern wherever their teet pool and poured the sparkling water into this one?" took them, turning when the spirit moved golden goblets held by multitudes of na- Ch'ien Li nodded. this them, apparently. Sometimes they kept it ked men. The men turned into foxes and "Twenty-two years of work, with only up for minutes, sometimes hours, some- dipped their tails into the water and then one left to prove or disprove anything!" Her clenched times for days, and when they stopped, it began methodically chewing them off, cup clattered to the table, and she was as abruptly as when they began. consuming themselves bloodlessly until her hands hard; Ch'ien Li would start over, "They know we're here," irina said. "In only the heads and necks remained. They she thought suddenly. She would find a the beginning they tried to approach many rose into the air and vanished, riding the new city, or colony, whatever they were, times, and you repulsed them. Why? This winds with the gasbags. She dreamed a and would tag another hundred, two is the way you observe animals, not intel- gasbag pursued her over the rough hills, hundred, and start the long observations ligent beings. They have language. We down valleys, up mountains, over chasms all over again. could learn to communicate with them. This and gorges, never gaining on her, never "We are trying to decide if Pick should is merely animal behavior technique." leaving her, and as she raced over the rocky fly back and observe the damage person-

She kept her gaze on the foxes, her body terrain, her feet bled and the flesh pulled ally. I think so. But without transmitters, rigid, waiting for the rebuff. off in strips, exposing the bones. Finally, finding the city again will be time-consum- "Who am I?" Ch'ien Li said quietly. "Ch'ien unable to run any longer, she flung herself ing. Pick will retrace our trail of two years." Li. Elizabeth Mary Barrister. Old woman. to the ground, and before her eyes there "I'll find ft," Pick said. He was watching

Scientist. Anthropologist. Ancient human Irina. "But I want to know something before being. Earthling. Leader. Mother. Sister. I leave." Daughter. Aunt. Writer. Teacher. Femali Ch'ien Li made a clicking sound. Perhaps neuter. There are more. Meat eater, "What do you mean?" Irina demanded. "I checked up on you the day you got carrion eater. Tea drinker. Without context QThey marched the question has no meaning. Without a here," Pick said. "I didn't trust you. I've mutual set of assumptions the question an- very fast, almost at a run, wanted to ask from the beginning. Who are working for? Why did you waive salary swered is the same as the question un- and when they you answered." to come to Medea? Ch'ien Li's work doesn't She regarded Irina calmly. "Until very re- reached a high point where mean a damn thing to you." cently we did not even know the four-legged the vaitey began "I have passage home," Irina said. "I ac- ones were the result of the natural devel- cepted expenses and guaranteed pas- to rise, the forward foxes, opment that all go through. Where are these sage home after five years. I couldn't get hundred going? Do any of them ever live males and females, passage and a salary." She was furious an entire life span without succumbing to that he could have been her bedmate all soared up into the air.*) disease, injuries, death by mishap? How these months and still be suspicious. can creatures with such small brains de- Ch'ien Li's eyes glittered, and a smile velop architecture? Medicine? We don't appeared and vanished so fast it might have know. Until we have an inkling ot what their been an illusion. "Ah," she said. "You in- lives are from start to finish, we do not know vested money. You will have been away for the proper questions to ask them. Ques- was an ancient fox, standing upright, its a hundred years. It will be a fortune. I see." tions without meaning, that is what we would immense eyes like black windows into in- "You see nothing!" Irina snapped. 'A for- mouth. My child," Ch'ien Li said softly, "have finity. She was sucked toward the eyes, tune! Even if I am allowed to keep a tenth is you not studied how the work of most of which grew larger and larger and finally ot it, a million dollars, what that on Earth the important researchers was invalidated were all there was. now? 1 expect to live a hundred twenty because of their active participation in the She sat upright in bed, breathless with years, possibly more. How long would such

last if very effects they were studying? I re- fear. Awake now, she felt something had a paltry fortune every day you have pulsed them," she said, turning again to wrenched loose inside her, something vital to buy again and again some fleeting relief watch the foxes. "I erected a barrier they had disintegrated without warning. With- from boredom? What is there on Earth for brain? cannot cross, and I keep myself aloof from out it, that mysterious something, she was anyone with a functioning By day night drink I in it's and gam- them. It is not enough, 1 know, but have paralyzed, set adriit a void that was a siesta, and by done my best not to interfere with their lives. drawing her away from this place, away bling, for those who can afford it. For peo- life itself. ple like any working people, there is And I have felt the terrible frustration of from me, inactivity that tortures you." Shivering hard, she left her bed and not even that much available. Within ten

Irina got up abruptly and deactivated the dressed shakily and made her way to the years I would have nothing, and then what? screen, stepped out into the dim red light group room, where she found Pick and Sift the ashes once more, rewrite the books that felt like the interior of an oven, and Ch'ien Li in conversation. yet again, teach a few dilettantes an ar- started down the hillside in defeat. "There is an emergency," Ch'ien Li said, cane subject that they will never use? No!

Overhead, high above the updrafts of her quiet tone mocking her words. "We are "No. I'll go on tour, speak, write my book, the valley, gasbags rode the wind swiftly, discussing the proper procedure." be a celebrity for a short time, and during vanished, reappeared to repeat the sport She indicated a chair at the long table, that time I'll charge the limit. And after that again and again. where she and Pick were seated. "You have I'll combine my investment and my earn-

Sometimes a ilock of birds or other flying bad dreams," she said softly. "I am sorry." ings and I'll return to Medea. And I'll be a animals appeared, attacked the foxes, who "What is the emergency?" Irina asked. Croesus! What a pity you'll be dead, my no longer (ought back, but simply retired "Our other sensors, the ones we in- dear Pick, but there will be others. Maybe to the shelter of their temporary quarters. stalled at the fox city, have malfunctioned your bastards running around barefoot in Sometimes the flying creatures made or have been destroyed. There was a ter- Medea Town, or theirs." swooping, halfhearted attacks against the rible storm, an inland hurricane that brought Pick's great hands clenched. Irina rested

98 OMNI settlement searching for a home. I one of her hands on her charger. "I would "I'll go to the observation overlook." a new child, are so restless. You have want and will have a higher significance in just as soon use il on you as any other wild "My you migration ." creature here," she said. been jjp there three times today." Ch'ien their behavior than simple She never gestures when she spoke, and They stared at each other until there was Li turned off the console she was studying made became animated, but now a faint sound from Ch'ien Li. Irina glanced and turned to regard Irina. "Have you read her face seldom revealing teeth that looked like at her. The old woman was laughing. my book on the artifacts we found on Mars?" she smiled, Irina "You decided they were two rows of polished rice. "I am quite crazy, "He is afraid that if all the other tagged nodded. foxes are dead, any accident here could not indigenous." my child. Anyone in" Medea Town will tell

I I determined that bring an abrupt end to our years of work. "Yes. And that was the push for this ex- you the same. am so creatures Financing to start over would be difficult." ploration. Mars was stranger than Medea, will impose my will on these and force into significance." Irina stared at Pick in disbelief. "You think I think. So close to home you could see them Earth shining in the sky. And all the while Pick's voice interrupted the conversa- I could sabotage valuable research?"

it, it it tion. "Here it is," he said. He sounded very "You haven't exactly kept it a secret that seeing knowing how close was, was uni- tired. monitor there appeared a you don't think this is the way, that you don't as if you had stepped into another On the of desolation. Floodwaters still think this is going anywhere." verse. I wonder if our distant cousins who scene there were Ch'ien Li raised both hands. "You will left the seas for land didn't feel the same swirled throughout a valley, but much prepare to leave as soon as possible," she thing: an unexpected freedom from some- indications that the water had been there said with finality to Pick. "Take the big car. thing you never knew was a restraint until higher than it was now. Nowhere was sign of building until the cameras The storms may still be very bad." it was gone." a a Irina stood up. sat down, panned the hillsides around the valley, and "What if there is trouble that I can ease? had Now she and for the next hour Ch'ien Li talked about here and there a solitary dwelling re- Should I try to save any of the tagged ones expedition on which she mained. They appeared sturdily built of if they are still alive?" Mars, about the camera stopped on "You do nothing," Ch'ien Li said flatly. had been as subordinate as Irina now was. wood and stone. The "Like you," Ch'ien Li said, "I was bored a small group ot foxes of mixed ages who digging with metal tools in the rubble. In the beginning Ch'ien Li had t were neuters?" Ch'ien Li asked. all the unusual behavior, but gradually a "The program had been developed tor the com- "No trace. I think there are fewer than five hundred survivors, and many of them puter, and it had been able to take over that task of comparative analysis of the have left the area, dragging a few posses- &lrina felt a jolt minute-by-minute, second-by-second ac- sions along with them." Ch'ien Li was silent; her reaction was that tions. If one of the foxes sneezed, the com- when she saw Ch'ien Li, who of defeat, Irina realized, not knowing ex- puter would flag it, and Ch'ien Li and Irina was a legendary would study that part of the continuing rec- actly why. The old woman sagged now, her ord. But the days passed and nothing was figure on Earth. She was no face caved in, her eyes dulled. out of the ordinary "It was not foreseeable," Pick said with ; no behavior larger than a But no one s noted; the foxes ate, slept, formed their some force. "The storm, sure. ten-year old child; her face there rock rings, and went through their dances. could have known would be a mountains. The slide Irina had not realized how much she had was bone-white. slide high up In the caused a flash flood when a lake was come to rely on Pick to relieve the monot- looked as old as deaths She here, it ony of the camp. They had not talked very dumped. That's what happened much, but he had recounted his mapping wasn't just the storm." expeditions from time to time, and he had 'Are you certain?" New life had come to straight complained about the air conditioners and Ch'ien Li's voice. Her back was forward In her chair. the lights and the food, and in that silent again. She leaned place his complaints had passed for con- with rehashing the same work others had "No mistake about it." Pick. home. You versation. And he had been a very good done quite thoroughly. How I longed for a "Come home. Come bedmate. Often Irina and Ch'ien Li sat si- new civilization to be uncovered, a whole deserve a rest."

it that were aware lently for hours in the group room, each new people to unriddle. And we had to go "Why is important they preoccupied, Irina with the endless review to Mars to find them. Only to find that they of the approaching storm?" Irina asked after of the past twenty-two years and Ch'ien Li had not been from Mars at all. This need Pick's report. years of observation have with the minutiae of various episodes that for what is new, for the undiscovered, I "In our we surprised storm, or had stood out as extraordinary. wonder, is it a sign of intelligence after all? never seen them by a solar flare, or any natural phenomenon. The foxes had started this journey over Or is it merely another Instinctual behavior a high two years ago. When they traveled, they pattern? Where is the boundary?" They are always safely inside, or on have moved very fast, but each such advance Irina laughed. "Your work was of the ground, or otherwise protected. They was followed by weeks, even months, of highest intellectual order. Every award an ability to interpret signals that are not the same kind of inactivity that had stalled possible was bestowed on you. No one apparent to our equipment, not merely them here. They had traveled through the ever doubted for a moment the magnifi- barometric changes, but more than that. It temperate forests, over mountains, across cence ot your discoveries." is one of the puzzles." rivers, through the tropics, and now were Ch'ien Li looked at her for a moment, from sleep on the edge of the great central desert, then shook her head. "I made a guess that That night Irina was roused the of her terminal, and when which was the heart of the continent. They I wanted to be true and then went on to by beep-beep Ch'ien Li planted nothing on their trip; they hunted find the proof. Hardly scientific. Totally ir- she got to the group room, was and gathered wild foods. Their only other rational. Intuition, wish-fulfillment, fantasy. already there. Her hair was down her back requirements from the land were space to These have been the basis of my work." to her buttocks, the first time Irina had seen intricate assemble shelters and water, which they Irina felt a great weariness numb her. it so. Always before it had been in her head. collected in skin bags. The building ma- 'And this research''" she asked, and did braids wound and rewound on Ch'ien Li terials they had. brought with them. not care what the answer was. "The next phase has started," Irina realized that for a long time she had "The same." Ch'ien Li said. "Exactly the said, and her voice betrayed excitement. foxes formed two lines and were not seen what was on the screen. She could same as the rest. I want them to be intel- The had the valley. In the center of I of remember no thoughts at all, as if she had ligent, not merely instinctual creatures. marching out fallen asleep with her eyes open. want this journey of theirs to be more than the lines the old neuter walked, sur-

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Li she had fully recovered, she now pushed rounded by a dozen young males. Many first Irina assumed that Ch'ien had up, but the herself away from the (able and stood up. of the tones wore harnesses, some in tan- stopped to pick something woman There was a touch of unsteadiness in her dem, and they pulled carts loaded with their continued immobility of the other movements; none at all in her voice when possessions. Every structure had been dissolved her glow of self-satisfaction, and she spoke again: "Go get your things to- dismantled; every hut, every shelter, every she turned toward her. to Ch'ien Li, gether now. Only what you will need in the trace of their residence in the valley had "What is it?" She went back next two or three days. We should catch been removed. They marched very fast, Ch'ien Li's face was like putty, her eyes chair near, then helped up with you before then, but if we are de- almost at a run, and when they reached a closed. Irina pulled a something you layed, you should be prepared. We will high point where the valley began to rise, her into it. "There must be break up camp here and bring everything the forward foxes, males and females, take," she said, "Where?" put her head else with us." soared up into the air and rode the winds "Hypo. My room." Ch'ien Li "I can't leave you alone!" above the others—a procedure that was down on her arms on the table. for instruc- her found the hypo, "You will do as I say! Report to be repeated throughout their march. Irina ran to room, before you leave. And you will not High above the entire group gasbags and ran back. She examined the instru- tions this." Irina shook her head, it held a premeasured dose. Work- mention When darted, as" it in curiosity, defying the pre- ment; the button Ch'ien Li said, "Very well. When Pick re- vailing winds, to maintain a second level ing swiftly now, she depressed foxes under Ch'ien turns, tell him I am keeping the of observation. that released a sterilizing spray on of the in- observation. He will know what to do. And "You must follow them," Ch'ien Li said. Li's arm and then held the end for a count of on his arrival, you will transport yourself to "Keep them under observation in the small strument against the spot what else to do, she Medea Town in the other small car." car. We must not lose any part of their jour- three. Not knowing Li held ney. Pick says you are very competent in kneeled on the floor by Ch'ien and far in her arms while they waited Soon there were no more trees as as the car. When you are ready, I'll instruct the old woman mis- for medicine to take effect. She was she could see. There were scattered, you. Go now. Get dressed. I'll start dis- the shapen shrubs or cactuslike plants that mantling equipment here." startled by the frailness, the thinness of the Li stiff, and grew horizontally inches above the ground. Irina could not deny Ihe small feeling of body she held. Ch'ien was very There were rocks, sand, and lava beds, satisfaction the old woman's words gave only gradually did the rigidity leave her. Ch'ien Li said; and nothing alive except the double col- her. Pick had never told her she was com- "You will not mention this," of foxes trotting through the wilder- petent. He had grunted and had gone on her voice was thin and wavery. umns ness, and above them soaring foxes, and to other lessons without comment. She "What is ft?" above them otherf lying creatures that would nodded and starled to leave the group "It doesn't matter. I became excifed and sorry." called vultures on Earth, and here might I be room. In her" peripheral vision she saw forgot to take my medicine. am finally above its as she be altogether different; and Ch'ien Li clutch the table as she passed it Her voice regained firmness but all, the gasbags, more of Ihem now, and on her way to her own room and for several spoke. Her face was still gray-white, too behaved like vultures gathering moments remain there, hunched over. At her.eyes were alive again, and, as if to prove they 102 OMNI for a feast that was not quite ready. carts and took to the air to slide on the Irina knew this was a land of deception; wind, hauling the carts across, and then many of the rocks were really rock de- resumed their progress. uiilock im mons, creatures that would come alive and None of the airborne predalors or car- move with startling ease to capture prey; rion eaters ventured very close, and Irina some of the bushes were not vegetable, wondered whether foxes on the march were m but another animal species that could as- viewed here much the same way as mother sume halt a dozen shapes and move rap- bears with cubs were viewed on Earth. 1(5 idly when prey approached. Irina dis- The motion of the small car was a dart missed the dangers on the ground and forward, a hovering while the foxes drew

concentrated on the foxes. up even and then passed it, another dart They unerringly avoided any confronta- forward. At no time were the foxes out of tion and maintained a steady trot, even range of the many scanners and sensors though the land varied considerably in that recorded their every movement, every roughness; in some places il was covered sound. When the car hovered, Irina could with jagged rocks, in other places with deep stir, replay in slow motion the bits that sand, then again with lava. The soaring showed the incredible soaring maneuvers, DISCOVER SELF MASTERY foxes rode the wind easily, with grace and eat. bathe, but she could not relax. WITHOUT SELF SACRIFICE beauty. She had never thought of them as Was it merely a lemming march, or was Stop Unwanted Habits Lose Weight Enjoy Batter Health beautiful before, but out here, at ease with there a plan behind it? She bit her lip and With SCWL Subliminal Techniques you the steady hurricane-force wind, hands tried to choose one or the other answer. go beyond your greatest expectati outstretched as if they were diving, they The intensity of the. wind increased, and used their fingers as delicately and pre- now the foxes were obviously suffering from able principle of these new Behavioral Scii cisely as a concert pianist to test the flow, the constant whipping of wind and wind- Techniques SCWL has now become and the response of the thick, tough mem- driven sand, but they did not slow their choice ot Doctors, Professional Athletes men and women from. all walks of life. Why? branes was instantaneous, a ripple, or a pace, and their rest periods were no longer dip, or a sudden tautness or relaxation. than four hours after each eight- to ten- TALENTS! They were soaring, singing, making music hour run. Irina needed stimulants, and when REVEAL HIDDEN Explore your inner creativity that will sp that no living creature other than those per- the rest periods came, she-needed seda- forming would ever hear. tives to counteract the stimulants and per- mailing ideas. With SCWL Techniques you When the foxes abruptly halted and be- mit her to sleep. She lost count of the rest gan making preparations for a rest period, periods—four or five, possibly six—and she SCWL TECHNIQUES she was startled. It had seemed but a few no longer reviewed the material in the YOUH KEY TO PERFECT MEMORY minutes since they had left the valley; ac- computer but sat doggedly at the Controls, his SCWL Technique alone could prove

tually nine hours had passed. She had little when it was time to move, she did. so. and

sense of fatigue until she swept the ground when it was time to hover and wait, she did wiih the electric charge, waited until three that and trusted the machines to do what- rock demons flashed out of sight, and set- ever else was necessary. tied the car. She turned on the electric cur- They had been climbing for a long time, lain and only then felt her aching muscles sometimes going partway down the other GAIN TOTAL CONTROL slieve Stress - Overcome Nervousness and her throbbing eyes. She became aware side of a hill they had just climbed, but Become More Self-Conf Idem again ol the howling wind that rocked the generally moving upward. The radarscan car from time to time. showed mounlains; they were not visible The foxes erected wedge-shaped shel- .to her unaided eyes. ters, the openings away from the wind, and Periodically she reported back to Ch'ien SCWL Techniques <, they vanished inside, leaving half a dozen Li, and at one point she learned that Pick guards on duty. Irina found herself adding had returned and they were on their way the interpretation without volition. They were to meet her. They would home in on her USE THE MOST guards, she told herself firmly, and she signal; there was nothing she should do POWERFUL SOURCE stretched out to nap while she could. except carry on. Science has proven your only limitations . that of your conscious thought — self-imposed She was awakened three hours later by She was deplaning from a transport that the beeping of the computer, and now she had taken her home from Africa, where she happiness, your personal well-being, succ or failure. SCWL Technique* simply rele was fully aware of her fatigue as she pulled had studied for two years. Outside, snow herself up and watched in disbelief while had fallen early, and she was eager to feel the foxes took down the shelters and pre- the wind in her face, smell the clean wet pared to resume their race to something snow. She had to wait—someone had to she could not anticipate. They had trotted inspect the cargo—and while she waited, for nine hours, rested for less than four, she strolled through a garden and clipped and were ready to go again. the heads off all the red flowers she saw.

The next ten hours were like the first nine. She noticed a small doorway, went to it, The foxes moved steadily, avoided the rock and opened the heavy metal door. She saw demons, the pseudo-bushes, and other a winding passage, without lights. Glanc- W aibkiKA re*«M«te objects that Irina flagged for attention later ing about quickly to make certain no one when there would be time for detailed ex- was there to stop her. she slipped into the amination of the record. During their rest passage and shut the door. period they had eaten; while they were on A blast of hot air shook her. and the wind the move they neither ate nor drank any- shrieked in her ears. She staggered back, thing; they did not pause, or slow down, or shaking violently, and slammed the door hesitate at any -of the obstructions they en- of the aircar. She hurried to the controls countered. When there was a cliff to climb, and saw that she had landed the car on a

.they zigzagged up it; where there was a plateau. The foxeswere all on top of it now, chasm to cross, they fastened ropes to their not yet too far from the sensors. Still shak- b^ ^U it to university I had attended, ing, she lifted and moved forward, and only then whirled into a vortex that sucked the same

' the lexts :eved the same afier she stopped, hovering this time, did down harder than it had been lifted. studied same be she consider what had happened. Pick turned to Ch'ien Li, waited. She was theories. I applied for this. Raoul tried to report, but it She had dreamed so vividly that she had watching the foxes "prepare camp. They stop me. He turned in a bad it ignored. acted upon the dream. She had halluci- had halted in a hollow between massive was so patently biased that was there was comparative Or else no one cared about the quality of nated. It was the effect of the drugs she boulders where Medea. was taking, she knew, and found no con- quiet. The summit of the mountain was two the people who were being sent to

I still don't know wfiich is true." solation in the knowledge. or three marches away. Progress had been slowed the roughness oi the terrain here "The first," Ch'ien Li said. "There is a It was becoming harder to control the by of adequately trained an- aircar; updrafts were stronger here, and and by the heat and the wind. The foxes severe shortage one of the crosscurrents of wind caused unpredict- looked exhausted and woebegone, their thropologists. That had become able turbulences. -She could see nothing fur matted and filthy; some of them limped dead sciences before my time even. Your Viking ma- but the rocky, peaks, wind sculptures in badly, and at least twenty had been aban- ancestors were the infamous terrible ships across stone, and, down the slopes, swirling sand. doned along the steep climb. rauders sailing their seas. Their compatriots stayed 'Pick and Ch'ien Li caught up with her Irina was scanning the mountain slowly; uncharted of the during one of the rest periods. Irina heard she stopped, backed up, and studied an home and trembled at the thought those the voices insisting, insisting, but she could area on the console. "Pick," she said, "could great unknown and looked down on Li who sought it as immature, naive, ignorant, not make out what it was they wanted her we get to that hollow?" Pick and Ch'ien selfish. Little except the means. to do. She told herself to sleep unlil the looked. "If we can anchor the car there, in changes ourselves and the others beeper sounded- she ic c herself the voices the hollow, out of the wind, we could climb We keep telling that to acquire were part of her dream. But reluctantly "she up and put sensors here, and here." Irina who stay behind we need for its own sake admitted them to consciousness and pointed at the spots. knowledge, tha: knowledge only have, lie. Un- stumbled up and to the console. She turned "We could even observe them visually is the goal we and we for part, because we, off the electric screen and unlocked the for the rest of the climb," Pick said. consciously the most words. have in- door to admit Pick. too, believe those We in "Whew!" he said, studying her: "Come vented the whole miracle of language is irrational our on, sack'timeforyou. Let's go." order to rationalize what — He was talking cheerfully, killing' time to own actions." console and watched allow her to reorient herself from sleep to She looked at the

mysticism. it is they will turned off the alarm she had set to alert leap over and over, or symbolic Whatever do when Ihey have achieved the pinnacle, her if the foxes broke camp early, and then walk zombielike in below. Sacrifice of looked around dully to see whether there they could have done no discernible pattern religious pe- was anything else to do. When Pick took the eldest? A ceremony? A suicide? There her by the arm and guided her from the turning wherever riod of meditalion? A group followed obediently. The hot wind is nothing they will do here that they could car, she the spirit moved them.^ easily and more stung her, shocked her awake. not have done below more She needed no more sleep, she pro- economically, and if we asked them, if we perfect understanding of their lan- tested to Ch'ien Li, who steered her toward had them, no the rear of the car. where bedding was re- guage and put the question to answers that would leased from the wall, a curtain partition was doubt they would have logical correct." unstrapped, and there was no motion at all While Pick slept. Irina and Ch'ien Li sound very and "My from the wind. Ch'ien Li helped her un- shared duties. There was little to do now Irina shook her head in annoyance. clear and simple," she said. dress, the first time since she had left the except wait. Above the hollow the wind reasons are "I shall very rich and then live ex- camp, and tucked her into the airbed, which screamed, but it seldom reached into the become

what I want, yielded, adjusted to her body temperature, opening among the -ocks where the aircar actly as I choose, do exactly interests is and soothed her. was moored, The sensors were in place, do the research that me. That "You were a great comfort to me, my faithfully recording every tortured step up- quite simple. And understandable." Ch'ien Li smiled. She said nothing, and child," Ch'ien Li said softly. "I knew I could ward the foxes made, did to apply for Me- her silence was more annoying than any trust you, and now Pick knows it also-. I did "When you decide service?" Ch'ien Li "Every- phrase she could have uttered. the unpardonable. I slept instead of work- dea asked. Ch'ien Li ing to ready the camp for our departure. thing of public importance is in the dossier, Pick joined them, and withdrew still thinking about the Pick was further delayed, and you were left everything but the interesting parts. When? to sleep. Irina was alone far too long. You did a good job, my Why?" She-laughed lightly. "Our curiosity conversation she had had with Ch'ien Li. explorations. child. Tell me, were you bored?" becomes simple impertinence." Security and intellectual that the issue. Ch'ien Li Irina could no longer keep her eyes open. Irina shrugged. "I don't mind. I was in Irina thought, was her not have both, Ch'ien Li's voice seemed to come from a Africa, studying with Raoul Claude. I was was telling she could great distance, and she listened to the his protegee, his star pupil, and we be- and Ch'ien Li was wrong. realized there "I'm going out," Pick said suddenly. rhythmical cadences rather than the words. came lovers. After ten years I "No," she said with great effort. was nothing new in our work, that he was She had been vaguely aware of his rest- of the content with his research just as it was. less movements within the confines our car, but she had paid no attention. She "We can't go much higher in this car," When I mentioned my doubts about Pick said alter three more rest periods. work, he accused 'nee- naivete and youth!" shared his restlessness, she thought irri- relieve It They were high on the flank of the moun- She paused and reflected for a moment. tably, but it was childish to try to out into that oven. tain, and up here there were no more pla- "He was right. I was young and naive by going on his belt teaus, no more -flat places for the car to enough to believe there was more than we Pick hung a small hammer him on a screen rest, and the wind blew with such turbu- were doing, studying a village that had been and left her. She watched rock wall that made lence that each lift now was questionable. studied countless times already, using an as he examined the up one side of the protected spot they were It seemed the wind lifted with the car and interpreter from the village who had gone 104 OMNI in. Pick, she thought, of course; he was a trained geologist. She kept forgetting thai. The riches of the coast lands had made his work unprofitable. The board had cut

off his funds, and finally he had given il up to be a guide and work for Ch'ien Li. She had read his background material in Jol- ly's hotel, ages ago. With a start she real- ized that she had been with Ch'ien Li and Pick for nearly eight months. How disap- pointed Jolly must have been when she had not reappeared, hat in hand, to beg for the job she had scorned. She stiffened, watching the console. Something new was happening finally. The foxes were stopping. Here and there some had found places where they could sit or crouch safely, and they were not moving. Others were still searching, climbing, and when new ones found roosts, they stopped. Irina hesitated. Ch'ien Li would want to

know, but if she didn't rest, she might have

another attack, and so far it seemed point-

less to rouse her, at least until all the foxes

had come to a halt. Most were still moving. Irina checked the sensors to make cer- tain nothing was being left out of the rec- ord, and then she went out to tell Pick. To her surprise the heat was not as intense

here as it had been down lower. The screaming winds sucked air from the crev- ice, and the updraft was dry and steady enough to act like a natural fan, evaporat-

ing perspiration as it formed, cooling the skin, although the air was many degrees

hotter than [he skin it cooled. She told Pick of the foxes' new activity, and together they went to the end of the cul-de-sac that protected them and watched the foxes. Only one continued to climb now, the old neuter, as the rest set- tled themselves in niches and on ledges. When finally only the small figure of the neuter still moved. Irina returned to the car

to awaken Ch'ien Li. Now the three of them stood outside to watch the neuter make the final ascent of the mountain. They were high among pin- nacles here, and the last climb was almost straight up a basalt spire that tapered as sharply as a church steeple. Above everything the wind shrieked; gasbags flashed by, caught by the rush of wind, carried out of sight in seconds. The neuter continued to struggle up-

ward. At times it seemed the wind would

whip the small figure away, fling it up into the sky out of sight, but the fox clung to the rack and gained an inch, another inch, then another. A gasbag came in lower than the others;

as if was swept past the peak, it whipped out a tentacle and caught hold, and at the

same moment the bag deflated. It streamed up and away from the peak like a pennant, but now the creature was anchored se- curely. The neuter continued its laborious climb upward.

Irina heard Pick cursing in a low, savage voice. "Not now, you bastard." Often in the lowlands a gasbag lifted a fox, carried it up hundreds of feet, a thou- it vanished inside ihe gasbag, and leaving." When she did nol respond, he sand ieet, and then dropped it, and the fox upward; jerked her around. it, or I'll haul her glided to land in a long, sweeping joy ride. the bag whisked out of sight. Frowning, "Do load of laundry strap her Irina's hands clenched at her sides. Not she played through another tape, this time inside like a and with other down and take off. Tell her we're out of now, she echoed. The fox climbed. It was one that showed, the sky the anything." within an arm's length of the tentacles. gasbags flashing in and out of range. The water, that you're sick, "She won't go. doesn't have time to Suddenly in a blur of flailing limbs and haze enveloped several of them, and they She whipping tentacles the gasbag seized the glowed deeper and deeper, their colors in- start over, don't you see? So close, to come ." this close . . fox and released its own hold on the jag- tensifying. This tape did not show the star-

it it "It was a goddamn failure! That creature ged rock. Its bag was instantly inflated, and burst effect, but was evident when hap- The within range-pulsed is dead! There's nothing up here for her if was swept up and put of sight. pened. gasbags to shake her. in stunned silence the three hurnans wildly for a few seconds, then streamed now." He began frightened, she realized. stared al Ihe barren peak, then at the foxes away. Irina played it over again. Salisfied He was very cried softly. huddled on ledges, on boulders, in niches; finally, she went outside and joined Ch'ien "You do understand," she "You cul-de-sac. know she can't leave here yet." the foxes sat as if stunned also. There was Li at the end of the said sav- no movement anywhere except that of the "The fox went deliberately," she said. "I understand all right," he agely. to die! You've hated furious wind and the sweep of a gasbag "I know." "You want her way they all this, her, this project. You made it clear as it flashed into and out of sighl over them. "It wasn't dangling, not the gone, you'll able Finally Ch'ien Li turned and began fo usually do when the gasbags take them enough. When she's be or to to Kuwait or Corum. That's what make her way back to the car, her head up for a ride. It was eaten, or absorbed, go over start. Only you bowed, her shoulders sagging. Irina looked something." you've been after from the get it this from her to Pick, who was staring at the Ch'ien Li nodded, as if she had known won't way!" from him, and he empty peak. She followed Ch'ien Li. that also. She wrenched away followed, his to hers. "You can't Inside the car Ch'ien Li sat down and "That's what they came up here for, wasn't face close her!" looked blankly at the floor. Irina glanced at it?" Irina asked. "For a ... a sacrifice," deny how you've hated the console, then looked harder, frowning. She shook her head. Hated? Loved? Both; neither. They did not apply. Words The tagged fox was still registering, still was nothing rising in the air high over the mountain, but had become useless. There even as she watched, the dot of light was she could say to Pick, nothing she could to spreading, becoming a haze instead of the say to Ch'ien Li, nothing she could say QA blast of hot herself, that would make any sense. starlike point it had been. "Look!" she cried then. "What's hap- air shook her, and the "Do you know what her name means?" whispered. Pick looked startled and pening to it?" she shrieked in wind the Creative, and Fire. That's Ch'ien Li came to her side, and together wary. "It means they watched the haze take shape, the her ears. She staggered what she is, that is how she comes to un- everything. Fire that consumes shape of a small gasbag. Irina pressed back, shaking derstand and permits Pick's signal button, and soon he stood and destroys and illuminates violently, and slammed beside ihe two women, and they walched the creative to erupt like a sun. She chose the globular haze expand. Other sensors the door. She her name when she returned to China as student. She the cost and the dan- were still focused on the foxes waiting on a knew hurried to the controls.3 it from her now. their ledges and perches. Simultaneously ger. You can't take away can." turned away from him they all stood up and turned their muzzles Mo one She pacing ten paces, toward the sky with their eyes shut. and watched Ch'ien Li, The globe continued to grow until sud- back, again, and again. Pick brought tea to Irina later and took denly it erupted like a skyrocket, sending another cup to Ch'ien Li, who seemed un- streaks of light in all directions. Then it was "For what purpose?" the old woman of until he touched her arm. and all gone; the screen was blank. murmured. "Always there is purpose be- aware him Now Ihe foxes moved. They began to hind a sacrifice, To make crops grow, to then she staggered slightly. He led her to leave the mountaintop. quiet a volcano, to still the storms. For what a rock, and she sat down on it, accepted

it. kneeled by her, Irina sat down hard, and when she looked purpose?" the tea, sipped He earnestly, his voice inaudible to around, Ch'ien Li and Pick were also seated. "I don't know," Irihasaid. "We don't know speaking No one spoke. The foxes were moving out enough. Why did the other gasbags come? Irina. He returned alone, Ch'ien Li still her, ap- of range of the sensors; one screen after What did the rest of them get out of it? Why seated on the rock, her tea beside parently forgotten, another was lett with only rocks and blow- didn't they all grab a fox? They were wait- Pick sat the ing sand to show where they had been. ing, just as the other foxes were waiting. Hours passed. Irina and on watching the old Pick left to collect the sensors. Neither Then they all went away, just like the foxes." ground side by side, pacing. of the women had moved while he was "What do you mean?" woman, who had resumed How gone. "You have to look at the tapes," Irina said can she keep it up? Irina thought dully. She collapsed. Where did she get "Going down will be easier than coming helplessly. "I don't even know if it could should have up," he said. mean anything." the strength to move her muscles? To keep

"Not yet," Ch'ien Li said. "We can find "But you intuit that it does. Yes. We will blood pumping? slept with- them later. They will rest as soon as they look at the tapes again." Irina realized she must have slumping. felt reach Iheir last camp." out closing her eyes or She could not The remaining screen with a fox in view "It doesn't mean a damn thing!" Pick disoriented and for a moment think or why. With a start went blank. Pick turned off all the con- yelled. "Tell her il doesn't mean anything, where she was Ch'ien Li longer soles, looked at Irina, then at Ch'ien Li, who and let's get out of here." she realized that was no stood up and went outside. Irina began to Irina shook her head. They were all out- there. She jerked, and beside her Pick replay- the final episode of the agonizing side, and Ch'ien Li was pacing slowly, ten roused. .?" . drag- . himself up, saga in such slow motion that she could paces, turning at the rock wall, ten paces. "What He pulled see the fox blink-its eyes against the wind. One hand cradled the other behind her ging her up also. She watched the fox reach out, watched back; her head was bowed in thought. "Look!" Ch'ien Li was climbing the wall at the far it close its eyes as soon as it was securely "She's sick. She made me promise not at her, held by the tentacle. The fox was drawn to tell you," he said. "You can talk her into end. Already the wind was whipping 106 OMNI molding her clothes to her body. She With her mind's eye Irina glimpsed an said. Pick laughed, and she laughed also. paused halfway up the wall and rested, her image of a plain broken with racks, clumps "Remember what happened to Jolly," he forehead pressed against the rocks. She of low growth, some hills in the far dis- reminded her. was not wearing her face mask. She re- tance, and beyond them mountains blend- "That was different. He didn't know; so sumed the climb. ing into haze. Across them, not perceived he wasn't ready" Above her was a ledge with another as- but calling, was the goal. She felt herself "I'm not ready yet. either," Pick said eas- cent beyond it. It was very narrow, with stretch out to reach it, and that line binding ily. The car lurched in an eddy, and when only enough space to stand, none to move her to her goal was the path. It was hers, he regained control, he was whistling softly. about in. When Ch'ien Li reached it, she the way would follow. She knew both the Irina relaxed. She would write Ch'ien Li's crouched as if lo catch her breath, to rest image and the thought were Ch'ien Li's, biography, of course, correct in every de- again. Maybe she had had another attack, but also hers now. The image yielded, tail. If she made a mistake, Pick would cor-

Irina thought, and involuntarily she moved moved aside when she willed it. There were rect it. She could almost see the years as toward her. Pick caught her hand in a hard, other images, alien images, that needed mileposts along the line that stretched unyielding grip. Neither moved again. examination, but later. She smiled as she across the unmarked plain. One of Ch'ien Li's braids had come loose thought of the gasbags trying to make They would tag more foxes and follow in the wind and was snapping about her sense of the new images they had sud- them, and the next time there was a cer- face, unwinding. Slowly she got to her feet; denly acquired. emonial procession to the mountaintop, they

.she had to move to one side to cling to a They lifted and were buffeted by the wind would participate. A smile kept forming it- jutting column. instantly. A gasbag sped by, "I wonder self on her lips, and when she glanced at A gasbag flashed into view, snapped out whether we could tag one of them," Irina Pick, he was smiling also. DO a tentacle, and caught the same rock Ch'ien Li clung to. For an instant Ch'ien Li did not move. Then she reached out her free hand, and a tentacle caught it; another wound about her waist. She released her hold; that hand was taken, and she was lifted. The bag inflated, and it rose so fast it was an iridescent blur. BEWARE Irina closed her eyes against a blinding flash, even though she knew it had no out- of all-in-one tape care products. side source. She was rising, rising, and now she could see two small figures dwin- dling below her, dwarfed by the peaks and boulders, lost among them. Her head was swelling, growing; every event of her ... a life was accessible, identified, sorted, ex- perienced. There was a surging sea, and there was a frozen wasteland, and a pan- orama of forests and swamps. There were constellations and flares and comets and meteorites, and there were singing lights that swelled into a chorus, climaxed on an impossible note, faded; there were other ways of (hinking. She lived a lifetime, many lifetimes, and all the while her head grew larger and filled with pain that was pleasure beyond en- durance. Everything became brighter until that, too, was beyond endurance. All she had known of joy, every thrill she had known with her body, had known with her mind, faded to insignificance as this new union, this new kind of coupling, reached its cli- max. When she flew apart, each part was the whole, each was complete. Sometimes they try to do too much!

Irina became aware that she was on the The Discwasher tape care philos- The Discwasher® C.P.R.™ is engineer-

. ground, drawn into a tight, fetal ball. She ophy , . two specific problems re- ed to clean the critical drive system of moved cautiously, drew her legs Out from quire two separate products. your cassette deck, preventing tapes under her. sat up. from being "eaten". Pick starting to was move; he, too, had The Discwasher® Perfect Path™ is Discwasher, the world leader in record drawn into a ball on the ground. He stood, designed to thoroughly clean tape care technology, now offers looking around, his face half-hidden be- heads, restoring true sounds. unparalleled tape care hind his mask. He reached a hand toward her. and she took it. Both of their hands were trembling. 'Guide to Tape Care" write: They went back to the aircar without speaking, hand in hand. Silently Pick did the checkouts before discwasher liftoff. Like the foxes, like the gasbags, they were ready to leave; there was nothing else for them here. MONSTERS

quest for apemen, aquatic <

' KAREN CHRLICH AND L

he pygmies br; choked paths, venorr the placid shore of i roofed huts, Ihe lake lay without a ..,.,.. 'er's edge, amid emerald bul launched their tree-trunk csi

'ening crash. Then the water surged

high monsters v necks, and darting reptilian heads.

Convinced they were in danger of being killed, it- pygmies raced back to land and began felling I

perimeter of the lake, forming a I

roasted it over open flan

irely perish. Pygmies do not seek out the wra

: stalked the creature for dec- rerno-nber that Natural History, in Washington, D.C. Finally, few people when ades. In 1913, and again in 1938. German seum of room, not far from the duckbill platypus was first collected, scientists sought out reports and foot- In a small conference of met with an em- scientists were suspicious of fraud and be- prints of the monster deep in the rain for- the Hall Dinosaurs, they with scientists to establish the lieved it to be an artifact. Even a spec- ests of the Congo and Cameroon. In 1976 inent group of reconcile its Society of Cryplozoology, imen in hand, they couldn't crocodile expert James Powell, Jr., trav- International bizarre or hid- apparent idiosyncrasies—the fact that one eled through Gabon lo question the Fang dedicated to the quest for avian, The study of strange crea- animal combined mammalian, and people, who live in dread of a mokele- den animals. long the reptilian characteristics. Today of course mbembe-like animal they call n'yamala. tures, Mackal points out, has been entrepreneurs and its existence is no longer contested, and Powell found that when- he showed natives business of circus animal collectors. But evi- the controversy surrounding the discovery the sketch of a long-necked brontosaurus- commercial few dec- of the platypus is conveniently forgotten. dinosaur, thought to resemble mokele- dence gathered over the past like complete. has convinced him and his col- This list, moreover, is hardly mbembe, they identified it as the tyranni- ades "unbelievable" beasts from With millions of square miles at least par- cal n'yamala. leagues that real. tially unexplored, dozens of new animals Powell's findings come as no surprise to apemen to sea serpents may well be year. Belgian : has contin- turn up each passing And as University of Chicago 7oolog st Roy Mackal. Absurd? Maybe, but man unknown species. In the zoologist Bernard Heuvelmans points out, While most of Mackal's colleagues doubt ually discovered instance, reports of a "In the waterways of the world, anything that mokele-mbembe exists, he himself early 1800s, for f elike an.mal with horns may be possible." claims the creature may actually be a living cloven-hoofeo ghaf its legs and hindquarters dinosaur, a bizarre relic of the planet's pre- and stripes on LAKE MONSTERS rain forest. What historic past. came out of the Congo mythical creature The animals cryplozoologists hope to ivory-tower theorist, Mackal has twice may have sounded like a No beasts fascinated Sir Harry H. Johnston snare next, in fact, are 30-foot-long risked his life trekking through African to many planet's deepest child. As an adull. he pursued the allegedly cruising the swamps in search of mokele-mbembe. as a the the animal the natives called lakes. The most famous of these is During his first venture, in February 1980. rumors and elusive creature said to haunt Scotland's he set out with Powell and a team of pygmy Loch Ness. porters for the Congo's Epena district, ru- Evidence tor Nessie dates from A.d 565. mored to hide the beast. The great swamp when St. Columba reportedly spied a long- between them and their destination was necked monster skimming the loch's sur- thick with insects and poisonous snakes. ^They readied their face. International awareness of the ani- But the crew plowed through, going "twelve mal, though, didnt begin until 1933, with miles a day for three days." on a trip that lines and bait, when suddenly the completion of a modern roadway along Mackal says "made The African Queen look surged the water the lake's northern shore. From that point like fun." the shore, on. hordes of monster hunters and scien- When the group arrived, they were backward from on the loch in hopes ' tists have descended greeted by Bantus and pygmies who - revealing a pack of catching the beast. pointed to the monster's stomping ground of ten-foot-high monsters Today's premier Loch Ness explorer, en- along the River of Grasses. The team also gineer and attorney Robert Rines, still re- saw a cave alleged to have sheltered a with lashing members the trip he took to Scotland some mokele-mbembe until just aboul six weeks reptilian heads} tails and 30 years ago. Driving past the lake, an ex- before their arrival. pansive stretch of blue surrounded by jag- Out of strength, time, and money, Mackal ged piles of rock, he imagined summoning finally left for home. But he returned with the mythical creature from its watery den. University of Arizona anthropologisi Rich- But he knew that even it he glimpsed a ard Greenwell in October 1981. This time misadventures, an head, say, or a fin. he. still couldn't prove they chose to go during the rainy season, okapi. After many and disaster, a his vision real. when rivers would swell high enough to expedition that nearly ended in director secured in 1906. So in 1970, when Rines, by then drift them and their heavy tracking equip- live okapi was finally living of New Hampshire's Academy of Applied ment through hundreds of miles of un- Johnston's okapi turned out to be a fossil Science, learned that a group of scientists Palaeotragus , known from the record charted swamp. If anything, the second extinct for million to 40 from the University of Chicago were em- trip was even rougher than the first. and believed 20 sought "prehistoric" animal to- barking on a Loch Ness mission, he "We got lost for a day in a vast sea of million years. This permission to go along, His contribution lo floating grass," Mackal says. "We had to day abounds in modern zoos. could "long-lost" animal turned up on the trip was sonar equipment that push through it an inch at a time." Another December 24 1938. when fishermen send sound waves through the water, then Greenwell adds, "One day I wenl to look fish of coastal Afri- monitor echoes to detect structures below. for gorillas. There was mud up to my knees hauled an unusual out Marjorie During the course of that trip, he and and water up to my chest. There could have can waters. J. LB. Smith and beyond New Hampshire sonar manufacturer Mar- been hundreds of dinosaurs lurking in the Courtenay-Latimer were excited they tin Klein detected several large, moving swamp near that river and we would never all ichthyologists' dreams, because Exultant. Rines that, in their hands, they objects with the equipment. have known it." were convinced This relic returned in 1972 with a special strobe-light When Mackal and his troupe left Africa held a recently living coelacanth. Professor Har- the fossil record, was camera developed by MIT in December, the closest they had come fish, known from be- for million to 70 mil- old Edgerton. With the camera trailing to mokele-mbembe was a 16-month-old trail supposedly extinct 60 this neath the boat, he managed to photo- of possible footprints. Disappointed? A bit, lion years. When information about graph what appeared to be a six-foot-long though from the beginning they had known monumental discovery was communi- Smith moving flipper attached to a large body. the odds were against them. Discour- cated to the scientific establishment, Then, on another journey in 1975, he suc- aged? Not these intrepid explorers. Mack- and Courtenay-Latimer received a rather a long serpen- Scientists insisted that it was ceeded in photographing al's new strategy is to wait until he gets a cool reception. partially tine neck and body and got a close-up of ho! tip that his quarry is in a specific area. only a distorted fish that had been refused even what seemed like a head. Then he'll grab his camera and antivenom eaten by other animals and then, Rines says, his photos have it. it is an accepted fact Since and fly there on a moment's notice. to look at Now been less than spectacular: Nessie-like Last January Mackal and Greenwell sur- that the coelacanth has somehow persist- shapes at the very edge of pictures or faced at the Smithsonian's National Mu- ed into modern times. amorphous blobs so far from the- camera weghs 500 ;o 300 pounds, and ex. ides a He rushed back to the Foresi Service post he can't make out their form. sharp, unbearable stench, and related the tale to his superiors, who trail of begins centuries quickly went to investigate. They found I! current methods don't soon yield the the Bigfoot ago footprints, answer, Rines and his academy will bring in the legends of the American Indians, who nearly 21 14-inch-long pressed inch into hard ground. Pouring the cameras still closer to the monster wiih believed the apemen. dubbed sasquatch, an deep the the help of dolphins. While one dolphin re- were the progeny of giant warriors long plaster Into the tracks, they made casts of prints. mainsbehind in a holding tank, its mate- since destroyed. Then, beginning with the the mosf prominent will set out, wearing a special lightweight first non-Indian report in 1811, traces of Anihropologist "Krantz was traveling sonar machine and camera. Trained to fol- footprints and sightings of the animal through Ihe People's Republic of China low the echoes ot the sonar, the animal will throughout most of the United States and when he happened to pick up an English- track Nessie down and perhaps snap pic- Canada mushroomed into'the voluminous language paper and read the news. Hav- tures of the creature. Then, mission com- accounts that exist today. ing long been interested in Bigfoot sight- rumors considered just that ings, vowed. to study the prints as soon plete, it will race home, proof in flipper, to But the were he the call of its waiting mate. until 1967. when Roger Palferson, aWash- as he got home. •Though the search for Nessie has tem- ington State rodeo rider, took his famous When five plaster casts arrived in his lab porarily slowed, other lake monsters are film, Pafterson and a colleague were on some weeks later, he was astounded: The yielding more promising evidence. horseback, tracking Bigfoot in the forest toes contained thousands of dermal ridges Hundreds of people, for instance, say region of Bluff Creek. California. They had (fingerprintlike lines), in an intricate pri- they've noticed "Caddy," a sea serpent just entered a clearing when the horses mate pattern. Ridges on opposite feet were supposedly living off the North American suddenly reared, throwing the men, Pat- almost exact mirror images. And at least west coast, near British Columbia. Last May terson grabbed his camera in time to cap- one of the toes was deformed. "Only an several guests at a dinner party beside lure, on 28 feet of color film, a large, hairy, expert engraver could have forged some- Chesapeake Bay, in Maryland, were gaz- bipedal creature that appeared as startled thing like that," Krantz contends, "Anyone ing out the window when they spotted a at the sight of humans as they were at Ihe that gifted should be counterfeiting coins." long, serpentlike creature with pock- The point Krantz likes to make is that marked skin. The host, businessman Rob- Bigfoot is a "perfectly expectable animal," ert Frew, grabbed his video camera to tape one that may be distantly related to man, the even!, producing what some scientists somehow persisting all these millions of civilization. say may be the first authentic film of years on the fringes of Could mAfter careful of "Chessie." And just last fall oceanogra- the creature be a survivor Gigantopithe- pher Paul LeBlond, of the University of Brit- examination he reached the cus, an allegedly exlinct species of ape- link, ish Columbia, analyzed the picture of an man? Or the missing a common earth-shattering 9 object alleged to be "Champ," the infa- ancestor of man an; ape Krantz says either mous monster-of Lake Champlain. The rip- conclusion that the beast might be the case, noting that "anatomi- this human and simian ples and waves uhotographea around the was a six-ton cally thing has both partly submerged object, LeBlond con- characteristics. It stands upright, but in- octopus, possibly the hugest tellectually it's an tends, indicate it was alive— and at least ape." 24 feet long. invertebrate ever What would the discovery of a sas- The identity of these lake monsters,- re- quatch mean? Krantz says, "It would dis- reported in the Western world3 ported in water troughs around the world, prove a major anthropological tenet, for all that a bipedal is still up for grabs. Most scientists believe showing once and these oversized creatures are optical illu- stance and freeing of the hands did nor sions created by leaves, partially sub- automatically give early man intelligence, merged logs, strings ot birds, even excep- tool making, and speech." line tionally large octopuses. Others suspect sight of it. Turning once ro look back si As with lake, monsters, the bottom ihey're marine dinosaurs called plesio- Patterson, the anmg walked briskly out of here will be finding the creature itself. And saurs.But Mackal has a different theory, the clearing and into ihe forest. The entire that may be difficult, for skeptics point out The sightings, he says, may turn-out to be event lasted about a minute. that even the best Bigfoot evidence is hardly primitive whales called zeuglodons, pre- Here, finally, was a piece of evidence airtight. Many critics remain convinced that sumed extinct for the past 20 million years. that could be closely scrutinized. But the Freeman, or someone else, planted the The majority of sightings, Mackal adds. verdict was' mixed. Skeptics said the for- sasquatch footprints on purpose. And not were in rivers and lakes through which ward motion of this Bigfoot looked almost long ago a retired Washington State logger salmon pass to spawn. And these fish could too human lo be anything but a man in a admitted that during Ihe Tweniies and Thir- provide any hungry zeuglodon with an ad- costume. After more than 50 viewings and ties he forged r nNes of Bigfoot prints with equate food supply. repeated frame-by-frame measurements, gigantic feet whittled from alderwood. Both Mackal and his critics agree the however, anthropologist Grover Krantz, of MAMMALS AND OTHER STRANGERS issue wont bo absolutely seiiled until a lake Washington. State University, was "reason- monster is captured lor study. Since even ably convinced" that the Patterson film was Public attention has focused mostly on ardent believers admit this may never hap- legitimate. A large, bipedal primate, he lake monsters and Bigfoot. but other crea- pen, cryptozoologists are stalking other contended, would possess a humanlike tures have also eluded scientific confir- types of creatures as well. gait. And. he noted, Patterson swore to the mation. Perhaps the most slippery of all authenticity of !he film on his deathbed. are the mammals— an assortment of pri- BIG FOOT _• Unfortunately for Bigfoot fans, the ques- mates, bovines, felines, and canines—that

Their second important quarry is the tionable Patterson film long remained their may haunt more than just our dreams. for apeman known as Big.fo.ot, which suppos- biggest coup. But this past summer the Roy Mackal and Richard Greenwell, edly lurks in the forests of North America. most thrilling Bigfoot evidence ever instance, have high hopes of finding aquatic

r in the chilly Arctic. If alleged eyew tnessss a e right, the hairy emerged out of the Pacific Northwest. "monkeys" and "cows" creature has a gorillalike tace on a. heavy- U.S. Forest Patrolman Paul Freeman was In support of this theory, Mackal points set body, with ospec ally long and massive making his rounds in the mountainous re- to the writings of Georg Wilhelm Steller, who arms. Like the Aoommab e Snowman said gion east of Walla Walla. Washington, when, explored the Aleutian Islands with Vitus Steller, nat- to inhabit the towering Himalayas, it walks he claims, he chanced upon an eight-foot- Bering in 1741. an acclaimed upright on a seven- to eight-foot-tall frame, tall.Bigfoot, not more than 65 yards away. uralist, had been gazing out to sea when

112 OMNI he supposedly spied a five-foot-long crea- ture with a seallike body and a monkey's face. This flipperless animal, dubbed the

sea monkey, had a forked tail, a doggish

head, and "whiskers that made it look like a Chinaman." Many months later Steller was shocked to see yet another unknown mammal, this time a dark brown "sea cow" with leathery skin and, he later learned, breasts full of milk. The enormous finned creature. Steller'claimed, spent its days pasturing on seaweed near the coast. Once Steller's reports leaked out. though, the creature was relentlessly hunted by Rus-

, sian fur merchants until its presumed ex- tinction in 1759. Mainstream scientists who respect Stel- ler's meticulous journals say that sea mon- keys and sea cows have surely perished from the face of the earth. But Greenwell and Mackal point to the many Soviet fish- ing trawlers that occasionally report cow- like creatures in Ihe Bering Strait. And, they add, the animals' .potential habitat— the Aleutian Islands and much of Ihe Siberian coast—is almost entire y unexplored. Meanwhile hundreds of people. in a more civilized area—Tasmania— are claiming encounters with fierce marsupial dogs. (Marsupials, such as kangaroos, lack a placenta and carry their young in a pouch.) A number of local scientists say the re- ports are bogus, but University of Tas- mania zoologist Eric Guiier has launched a lull-scale hunt for the creatures, called Tasmanian wolves. "The wolves were common in the early days of the country," Guiier explains. "But they gained a reputation for killing sheep. So in 1838 officials hired someone called the Tigerman to wipe the wolves out." There were a series of tigermen for the next sev- eral decades, and by 1930 the Tasmanian wolf was designated extinct. Through the decades, though, Tasmani- ans have insisted that the creature per- sists. To Guiier, who's interviewed many of the witnesses, the claims make sense. To prove that, the professor has asked the World Wildlife Fund of Australia to help him place cameras around the bush in hopes of photographing one of the animals. Though he's had 15 cameras and two men scrulinizing the field for three years, how- ever, no wolves have ever been seen. "We just haven't been lucky," Guiier as- serts. 'And until we've got a photograph, no one will believe us."

If Guiler's having a rough time, so are his neighbors to the north in Queensland, Australia. They claim they're being in- vaded by marsupial tigers, supposedly extinct since the Pleistocene Era 15,000 years ago. Disturbed by reports of huge, black, cat- like animals roaming the region's rain for- Gordons and Tonic. est. Alan Bartholomai and his stalf at the Queensland Museum, in Brisbane, de- The pleasure is cided to investigate. After scouting the area. crystal clear they recently found a cat skin- that meas- ured three feet in length from the tip of the nose to the front toes.

IN PAGE 1.20

patients remained BRAIN TUNER symptom-free tor pe- behind the ear over the mastoid bone to riods of longer duration. be more effective than the lung point. But, CONTINUED FROM Pi The results of Wen's first study with 40 of all the variables explored, electrical fre- opiate addicts were published in the Asian quency quickly emerged as the single most The psychological sel lhal makes a person Journal of Medicine the following spring. important element for success. Those ad- become an addict seems to disappear." Of this group, 39 were drug-free by the dicted to narcotics and sedatives pre- Researchers are now starling to eluci- time they lell the hospital roughly two weeks ferred frequencies within the 75-hertz to scientific rationale, date NET'S winning over after starting treatment. When Patterson 300-hertz range, barbiturate addicts re- converts new from the more conservative returned to England in July 1973, however, sponded to lower Teauencios. and still other ranks of the medical profession. In the she found that addicts there were far less addicts, especially those dependent on process, Patterson's black box is helping enthusiastic aboul the procedure. The cocaine or amphetamines, benefited most to unlock the mysterious inner workings of Chinese loved acupuncture; the British from frequencies as high as 2,000 hertz. that other black box: the human brain. The hated it. "As bizarre as it may sound," Pat- "Musicians," she fondly recalls, "really stimulus goes in and the response comes terson explains, "Westerners— even those helped to strengthen my guesswork dur- out, bul seldom are we afforded a glimpse who mainlined drugs— often had an aver- ing those early days. They invariably found of what happens in between. By probing sion to the needles." the correct therapeutic setting right away. NET's effects on experimental animals, in- There was another reason not to use It was as if their brains were more attuned vestigators are shedding light on the un- needles. Patterson had suspected from the to frequency." derlying mechanisms that control every- outset that acupuncture was essentially an A further refinement of the therapy was thing electrical from addictive behavior to our mosl phenomenon. Even the tradi- prompted by still another fortuitous dis- basic drives and emotions. As Dr. Becker tional explanation hinied that this might be covery: A heavy abuser fell asleep with the surmised, the stimulator does indeed cause so. The ancient practice revolves around electrical stimulator on and awoke 30 hours "profound alterations of the central nerv- the notion that all living things possess vital later, well-rested and eager to take Patter- ous system." Underlying consciousness is energy, called chi, which circulates through son's children ice skating. From that mo- an intricate orchestral arrangement of tril- ment onward, Patterson advocated con- lions of brain cells, firing in concert. Like tinuous current application in the initial different instruments in a symphony, sub- phases of treatment. She began the search populations of neurons are now believed for more comfortable electrodes that could to produce frequencies within a specific be worn during sleep and for smaller elec- &From the moment range. Frequency, so to speak, is the mu- trical stimulators that could be clipped onto sic of the hemispheres. the electrodes were put belts, permitting mobility during the day. Like penicillin and X rays, NET was born on my head, By 1976 Patterson had transformed of scientific serendipity. It began with an electroacupuncture into an exciting new accidental discovery in the fall of 1972. At my craving immediately experimental treatment mode that she that time Patterson was head of surgery at diminished. When christened NeuroElectric Therapy. In her Hong Kong's Tung Wah Hospital, a large first clinical study, which was reported that charity I had passed the three-day institution with a poor clientele. A year in the U.N. Bulletin on Narcotics, opi- neurosurgeon colleague, Dr, H. L Wen. had mark, I felt ate addicts given NET as in-patients were just returned from the People's Republic all found to be drug-free an average of no craving : ten of at all3 China, where he had learned the tech- months after completing treatment. In con- nique of electroacupuncture. Primarily in- trast, opiate addicts who received NET only terested in its usefulness in the suppres- during the day as out-patients did not fare sion of pain, he began testing it on patients as well: 47 percent were drug-free at the with a variety of ills. Dr. Wen, however, did time of the follow-up, not know that almost 15 percent of his pa- the body by way of a network of channels, Because this preliminary investigation tients were addicted to heroin or opium of or "meridians." Sickness was seen to be was limited to 23 patients, her results could extremely high purity. At that time the drugs the result of disharmony, manifested by an not be extrapolated to a larger cross sec- were easily affordable at a daily cost of obstruction in the flow of chi, which the tion of addicts. To provide better informa- less than a pack of cigarettes. needling was thought (o remedy. tion about the long-term effects of NET, "One day," Patterson says, "an addict Was chi the ancients' concept for what and also to assess its value in the treat- approached Dr. Wen, announcing that the modern man now recognizes as the inter- ment of other kinds of addictions, Patter- electroacupuncture had stopped his with- nal currents that course through the body? son was recently awarded a research grant drawal symptoms. 'I felt as if I'd just had a Could it be that the Chinese, more than by (he British Medical Association. shot of heroin,' he said. Wen initially thought 2,500 years before the discovery of elec- Last fall, at a Washington, D.C., sym-

nothing of it, but a few hours later a second tricity, had intuitively sought to alter this life posium sponsored by the American Holis- addict reported a similar experience, force in an atlempl to a lev. ate pain and to tic Medical Association, Patterson pre- equating the electroacupuncture with a cure disease? Perhaps, Patterson rea- sented the findings from this follow-up certain dosage of opium." soned, the twirling of needles generates a evaluation, which tracked the progress of Further inquiries revealed that a few al- tiny electrical voltage. Viewed in this light, patients treated between 1973 and 1980. coholics and cigarette smokers in Wen's the more recent practice of electroacu- Data were obtained from confidential experimental group had also been freed puncture was simply a more intense form questionnaires and, when possible, from from their craving. To the eye, however the of the original twirling technique. If so, the personal interviews. Fifty percent re- electroacupuncture produced the most electrical signal would be of crucial sig- sponded to the survey, and these re- dramatic - response in the narcotics addicts nificance in the treatment of addictions. spondents included 66 drug addicts deprived of their drugs. The characteristic Years of clinical trial and error eventually (mostly mainline heroin or Toihadone users runny nose, stomach cramps, aching joints. confirmed her hunch. First Patterson re- and mixed-addiction cases), 9 cigarette feeling of anxiety and usually disappeared placed needles with surface electrodes. smokers, and 18 alcoholics. At the time of after 10 to 15. minutes of stimulation by Then she went on to compare direct cur- the follow-up, total abstinence was said to needles inserted inside the hollow of the rent with alternating current, while varying be achieved by 80 percent of fhe drug ad- external ear, at the acupuncturist's lung the voltage, shape, and other aspects of dicts, 44 percent of the cigarette smokers, point. At first these good effects lasted only the electrical signal. Next she altered the and 78 percent of the alcoholics who stated a few hours. But with repeated treatments. electrode placement, finding a position just abstinence to be- their goal. An additional Q: What is the hardest thing in the world? A: Tearing yourself away from an EPYX game.

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7 alcoholics whose goal on admission was So NET seems to achieve in a few weeks alternatives: the highly structured and in- of residential controlled drinking all reported success. what few. if any. orthodox treatments can sulated environments such (As Patterson herseli cautions, however, accomplish after months or years. homes as Daytop Village, Phoenix House, these iigures probably represent too fa- Not everyone, however, is convinced by and Odyssey House or out-patient clinics, services. vorable an outcome since patients who re- the report's conclusions. A look at the his- which provide daily counseling lapsed, especially alcoholics, may have tory of drug reform in the. United States As many as 30 to 40 percent of the people pro- been less likely to reply to the survey.) Of shows that their cynicism is not ill-founded. who enroll in these community-based those who were successfully weaned from Consider the gove'n.-neil s e'forts to curb grams remain absfinent a year after leav- of these their dependence, 68 percent said they narcotics use. The first U.S. Public Health ing treatment. But to enter most never or only rarely experienced craving. Service hospital tor heroin addicts opened programs, one must first detoxify in a hos- percent don't 15 percent said they occasionally felt crav- in Lexington, Kentucky, where 16,000 pa- pital. And here's the hitch: 64

it withdrawal ing, and another 17 percent said they fre- tients were admitted between 1935 and make past the acute phase quently felt craving. 1952. All except some 7 percent of the to qualify for further treatment. Interestingly, none of the drug addicts at alumni promptly relapsed after dismissal "It is still not understood why simple de- facts the time of reporting had substituted al- from the institution— a dreary record that toxification is so ineffective, but the Dr. Avram cohol for their earlier addiction—a finding other institutions scarcely improved upon are clear and inescapable," says thai contrasts sharply with the figures cited in subsequent decades. Goldstein, professor of pharmacology at

University. "As I it, the reason in other studies. In one national survey, for By the 1 960s heroin addiction had spread Stanford see example, 60 percent of addicts who had like cancer through inner-city ghettos. To for the dismal failure ... is that the newly given up narcotics became heavy drinkers control the expanding epidemic, health detoxified addict, still driven by discom- or alcoholics. Equally noteworthy was the professionals turned to methadone, a syn- fort, physiologic imbalance, and intense extremely low dropout rate' of all addicts thetic opiate that is legally prescribed. To- craving, cannot focus attention on the nec- enrolled in the program: Only 1.6 percent day thousands of clinics throughout the essary first steps toward rehabilitation, but did not complete detoxification. nation dispense methadone to certified soon succumbs and starts using heroin." writer, re- All things considered, the success of addicts, and those maintained in these Jean Cocteau. the French who after Patterson's patients is probably most re- programs show higher rates of employ- sumed smoking opium medicine had markable from the standpoint of fhe brief ment and fewer criminal offenses than be- "purged" him of the habit, put it another

I feel duration of the therapy, which, including fore fhey began treatment. But metha- way: "Now that I am cured, empty, counseling, rarely extends beyond 30 days. done, alas, is even more addictive than poor, heartbroken, and ill," patients are said According to a large si jcyc~ drug abusers heroin. As one medical authority points out In sharp contrast, NET admitted to a variety of government-spon- "The tragedy of methadone is that we can- to emerge from treatment feeling healthy, sored programs, addicts treated less than not get people off methadone." energetic, even cheerful. Dr. Joseph Win- three months did not fare any better than For narcotics addicts who aspire to a ston, the American physician who collab- treatment of those in a no-treatment comparison group. drug-free existence, society offers two main orated with Patterson in the 116 OMNI Keith Richards, recalls that [he musician

"came to us terribly ill. He was literally green. Blithe slept eighteen hours the first day, and ten days later he was playing tennis, i Speak Spanish and the group said he had not looked so good in years." If Patterson's findings seem at total var- like a diplomat! iance with the bulk of the clinical literature, What sort of people need to learn a The FSI's the firsthand accounts of NET patients may foreign language as quickly and effec- Course corn! help explain why. shipped in a andsome library Stuart Harris started shooting heroin as -sonne/, that's who. Members of America's diplomatic corps are assigned '_; a sixteen-year-old cadet in the Royal Navy, Volume I; Basic. 12 to U.S. embassies abroad, where they cassettes manual, and 464-p.tex; Sil'i. By the time he underwent NET in the spring must be able to converse fluently in _ Volume II: Intermediate, 8 of 1981, he had been addicted to heroin c< (1 1 % hr.), manual, and 614-p. text, $98. 15 years, and for 11 ol those years he had Now you can learn to speak Spanish just as these diplomatic personnel do — (Conn, and N.Y. residents add sales tax) also injected methadone intravenously. "I with the Foreign Service Institute's Pro- had the sweats very badly," he says of his grammatic Spanish Course. You'll learn Latin American Spanish recorded by experience on NET "You're emitting all this To order native speakers. by mail, clip this ad and send bad grunge trom your body, and you feel with your name and address, and a The U.S. Department of State has check or money order — or charge to like you're speeding [on amphetamines]. spent thousands of dollars developing your credit card (AmEx, VISA, Master- there's withdrawal this course. It's by far the most effective But no at all. That much Card, Diners) by enclosing card number, way to learn Spanish at your I'll say for it. I mean when they told me expiration date, and your signature.

about it. I just took it The Foreign with a pinch of salt— The ci Service Institute's Span- ish course is unconditionally guaran- another treatment they've fobbed off on the , and accompanying textbook. teed. it for three Simply follow the spoken and written Try weeks. If you're not poor junkies. But believe me. if I was get- convinced it's the fastest, instructions, listening and repeating. By easiest, most ting any pain as I used to have with with- the end of the course, you'll be learning nSpar penny y> drawals. I wouldn't have stayed there, and speaking entirely in Spanish! y Order today' This I course turns your cassette player 'cause was a voluntary patient. When I 81 courses in 26 other . discharged myself into a "Teaching machine." With its _ from hospital. I didn't available. Write us for free unique "programmatic" learning method, , catalog. Our 10th y. go searching out for drugs as I would nor- you set your own pace — testing your- mally have done in the past, say. after self, correcting errors, reinforcing Audio-Forum accurate responses. methadone reduction or narcosis (that's Suite 58-C when they sedate you up to your eyeballs On-the-Green, Guilford, CT 06437 on sleeping pills). After completing all the auDia-FQRum I (203) 453-9794

other methods. I felt so uptight ail the time. ^^^r visit ou^Jew York saies office: 145 E. 9th St., New York. M.Y. 10017 (212)753-1 783^.

The tirst thing I wanted to do was have a massive great fix. But. after NET. all you" really want to do is sleep. Everything is so

easygoing. I can't -say that it [heroin] doesn't drift into my mind. Like the other day. I fan-

cied a fix. But it passed over in a few min-

utes. Before, if I'd felt the slightest urge for a fix. off I'd go to London. Something has FOR changed. You feel calmer. You can accept the ups and downs." A man in his thirties, who requested an- FUTURE RffTERENCE onymity, had injected heroin for eight years, combining this dosage with prescribed Moving? We need 4-6 weeks methadone during the last five years of the annrui notice of of Fill period He received NET in 1974. "The o chonge address. RO. Box 5700, Bergenfield, N.J. 07621 in the attached treatment was rough." he says. "I felt as if form. Please chock r'.'Q opp.'apnat^ t"sr» oelo-.v I had a mild case of the flu, combined with New Subscription or Renewal? Payment r-|_S" c-:cc~oc:rt, -tc :.,- short periods of feeling spaced out— even year is $24 in One of Omni the U.S. D. New Sjbscr^ption Renewal a bit euphoric. My anxiety and craving $34 in Canada and overseas, Please re subsided right from the beginning, but a Please enclose a check or money •.! iv; .; 1 '. : .' later : - _: tew weeks my craving for heroin went I Ihis '-'O r order for the appropriate amount back up again. I wanted logo out and score. and allow 6-8 weeks for delivery And. as a matter of fact I did. But it was different. It wasn't satisfying. It didn't make Listing/Unlisting Service? Omni me feel that great I know this treatment makes the names and addresses

changed my head, I never thought because of its subscribers available to other about heroin again after that. You see, I publications and outside com- had gotten off heroin for as much as a panies. The publications and month, even two months, at a stretch. But companies selected are carefully the whole of that time I would be thinking screened for of heroin and nothing else." their acceptability A twenty-eight-year-old man. who also and quality of their offers. If you requested anonymity, combined a high level would like, your name removed of alcohol and "marijuana consumption with from this mailing list please check a cocaine habit of two- to six grams each the oppropriate box on the week for more than seven years. (The co- coupon. caine alone usually cost him more than $1,000 a month.) He agreed to speak to ments. Why then do so many patients ex- cause such a swing toward euphoria? Omni immediately alter completing NET perience such a metamorphosis? As fate would have it, a scientist who treatment in the summer of 1982. "Until this The treatment, Patterson believes, sim- had taught Patterson years earlier, Dr. Hans therapy," he says. "I couldn't go three days ply sets ihe stage tor further growth. "Be- Kosterlitz, would once again serve as her without teeiing an enormous craving for cause they feel so good," she says, "they mentor by illuminating the mainspring of drugs. Cocaine and. to a lesser degree. are better able to face the sort ot problems euphoria in the brain. While working with alcohol would always be on my mind. But that drove them to addiction in the first Dr. John Hughes at the University of Ab- from the moment the electrodes were put place. You see, most people who come off erdeen in 1975, Dr. Kosterlitz identified an on my head, my craving immediately di- drugs without NET enter a phase .of pro- endorphin, a natural brain chemical, with dysphoria: suffer fearful a molecular structure very similar to the minished. When I had passed ihe three- longed They from pessimism. can't eat. opiates. For this outstanding discovery, the I day mark, I felt no craving at all, and still depression and They don't. Drugs never enter my mind. Now that They can't sleep. They have no energy. This investigators later received the prestigious last for six months in the case of her- Lasker Award, revered as America's I remember what it's like to feel good—to can Nobel Prize in medicine. be clearheaded alter all these years— I'm oin, and even longer in cases of metha- equivalent of the NET Almost overnight their finding triggered an certain that I won't go back on drugs." done and barbiturate addiction. But Rachel Waite, a heavy smoker for five restores physiological normaliiy within ten explosion in the understanding of the bio- years, was treated for her cigarette addic- days, which enormously reduces the chemical basis of behavior, opening a new tion in June 1981. "For the first three days amount of time needed for readjustment." vista on the. controlling factors behind ad- heroin, morphine, other on NET," she recalls, "I still had the urge If anything, Patterson thinks that eu- diction. Opium, and

lit phoria is to blame when related drugs owe their potency to what to smoke, and I probably would have up — not dysphoria— had a cigarette been handy. However, by rehabilitation fails. The newly detoxified Avram Goldstein calls "one of nature's most point bizarre coincidences" their uncanny re- being , the end of the treatment I definitely did not addict is optimistic to the of — elated slate," Pat- semblance to the endorphins. want one. When I took an experimental puff. overconfident. "In their

it will Over the succeeding years researchers it was a different sensation altogether. It terson says,, "they think be easy to of other brain tasled foul, and there was no hit whatso- stay off drugs and then end up stumbling, uncovered evidence myriad they don't of an at- hormones that mimic psychoactive drugs, ever. It was as if I was drawing on hot air." because make enough Surprisingly, many patients who go on tempt to change their ways."' from Valium and angel dust to hallucino- every mind-altering sub- to build drug-free lives do not receive any As if obeying Newtonian mechanics, the gens. Almost formal counseling beyond that provided black box appears to counter one mood stance, it is now assumed, has an ana- during the briel de:oxficat;cn program. Yet shift with an equal swing in the opposite logue in the brain. And the precise mixture cocktail NET, by itself, cannot remove the- root direction, until the emotional pendulum fi- of neurojuices in this biochemical the difference between tripping, causes of addiction, nor can it replace years nally comes to rest Is the black box, in can mean of maladaptation with healthy skills for reality, an electronic substitute for a chem- speeding, crashing, or seeing the world coping with life's stresses and disappoint- ical high? How can a physical treatment through sober eyes.

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These insights immediately suggested vious Like a citizen s-band transmitter that how the addict becomes trapped infiltrates ODOR-FREE in a television frequencies, the black nightmarish cycle of dependency. In the box must broadcast through brain fre- initial phases of narcotic use, for example, quency channels. And just as a TV re- LITTER BOX the individual is assumed to have normal ceiver can pick up transmissions CB from Powerful charcoal air levels of endorphins in the brain. Injecting a passing truck, the brain undoubtedly re- eliminates all odor! heroin causes a sudden and drastic ele- sponds to the foreign-generated signal as

vation oi opiates, if which is subjectively in- it originated from within its own commu- terpreted as ecstasy.- If, through repeated nication network. use. the brain is regularly flooded with opi- "As far as we can tell." says Dr. Capel, ates, it redresses the imbalance by cut- a rugged Welshman with a melodic' voice ting back on the production of its internal "each brain center generates impulses at supply. Hence, the well-known condition of a specific frequency based on the pre- tolerance develops. The addict steps up dominant neurotransmitters it secretes. In his dosage, and the brain further compen- other words, the brain's internal commu- sates by calling a massive shutdown of nication system -ils language, if you like production. Eventually, according to the- is based on frequency." ory, the addict is shooting up solely for the Unfortunately, neuroscientists are not yet purpose of "feeling normal," Should the fluent in this new tongue. "NET is still a drug supply be cut off at this stage, the very blunt tool." Cape! acknowledges. opiate shortage cannot be instantly rem- "Presumably, when we send in waves of edied. Drought ensues, unleashing with- electrical energy at. say, ten hertz, certain drawal symptoms. cells in the lower brain stem will respond, If an exogenous drug depletes the brain because they normally fire within that fre- of its natural counterpart, it seemed logical quency range- As a result, particular mood- that NET might quite literally |uice up the altering chemicals associated with that re- system, rapidly replenishing the scarce gion will be released. That's what we hope

neurochem ca . Might certain frequencies is happening. In reality, however, much of of current catalyze the release of different the signal may be lost before it actually BOODA PRODUCTS brain hormones? Patterson wondered. reaches the target "'" cells. We just don't know. DETROIT ' To find out. she conducted animal ex- But if we can tine-tune the signal, I am Con- --.ANGELES. periments in collaboration with biochemist fident our results will steadily improve." Dr. Ifor Capel at the Marie Curie Cancer At her small, two-bedroom home in Co- Memorial Foundation Research Depart- ronadel Mar. Patterson has begun testing ment, in Surrey, England. Simply by mon- a hew, improved model of the stimulator. itoring the blood of NET-treated rats, the Her goal— and the ma]or impetus behind investigators discovered low-frequency her decision to come to the United States currents can indeed cause as much as a >s to obtain funding for the establishment threefold elevation of endorphin levels. of a center where human and animal re- In another experiment the researchers search can proceed in tandem. Until FDA examined NET'S effects on rats rendered clearance is given, however, she cannot unconscious by massive doses of barbit- begin treating addicts on a routine basis. urates. Once asleep, all the animals had Will NET open a new route to salvation electrodes clipped on to their ears, but only for the millions of Americans who each year half the group actually received electrical flock to Alcoholics Anonymous. Smoke current. The result: At one particular fre- Enders. and methadone maintenance clin- quency—ten hertz -the experimental ics? Clearly the final verdict is contingent group rapidly regained consciousness, upon replication of controlled studies. But sleeping on average 40 percent less'than if a feeble electrical current can truly curb the rats that received no electricity. the mind's excesses—from uncontrollable Why is the detoxification process has- lusts to extremes of mood- its impact is tened? One clue surfaced when the rats' sure to be tar-reaching.

brain tissue was It analyzed: was learned "Addicts may represent only a tiny frac- that the ten-hertz signal speeds up the tion of the people who will eventually be production and turnover rate of serotonin helped by NET." Capel predicts. "In all (a neurotransmitter that acts as a stimulant likelihood it will find an enormous range of to the central nervous system). uses, especially in the area of pain con- Similar experiments have now been re- trol." In one preliminary trial, terminal pa- peated on rats, made unconscious by in- tients suffering from chronic pain found NET jecting them with alcohol or ketamine (a just as effective as their daily dose of mor- cousin of angel dust). In almost every in- phine. "By stimulating the brain's own stance the frequencies that reduced painkillers, we didn't have to administer sleeping time had earlier been proved drugs," Capel marvels. therapeutic in the detoxification of human Early data also indicate that NET may addicts. "Virtually every single parameter prove highly promising in the treatment of

of current that I had stumbled upon during mental disorders. The frequencies that in- my clinical work was corroborated by the duce euphoria and reduce tension, ac- rat studies," Patterson declares, with barely cording to Dr. Cameron, of Britain's Na- concealed excitement. tional Health Service, "seem to work How a weak electrical current can open wonders for patients sut'eimg from severe the floodgates of the mind is still a matter depression and acute anxiety." Though it of conjecture, but the implications are ob- is far too soon to draw any conclusions. —

Working from his current lab at New York she notes that "a tew of the half-dozen University, Gennaro cut a snippet of tissue chronic depressives we've treated have MONSTERS from the Smithsonian sample. Then he re- found fhemselves jobs- after years of un- tissue from a whale, a 60-year-old employment." moved director, giant squid preserved in formaldehyde, an As for Patterson, she hopes eventually Bartholomai, the museum's believe the skin comes from the ordinary squid, and an ordinary octopus, to broaden her practice to include behav- doesn't each sample with a he's it too. Carefully labeling ioral addictions, from overeating and com- long-lost tiger. Instead, convinced pussycat. number, he sent the batch off to Mackal at pulsive gambling to video-game lanati- was torn from the back of a giant the University of Chicago. cism. Absurdity aside, these wider "Domestic cats may have escaped to the speculates. Without knowing the real identity of the applications follow -a certain logic, "Her rain forest decades ago," he through the process of natural se- samples. Mackal conducted a biochemi- ideas make perfect sense if one accepts "Then, frightfully cal analysis of each. They were all more or the idea that behavioral addictions have a lection, they may have grown less similar, he "found, except for.one con- chemical basis," says Dr. William Regel- large to survive in the new terrain." taining huge quantities of the supportive son, at the Medical College of Virginia. "It G I AV" OCTOPUS substance known as collagen. That sam- is very likely, for example, that all activities The Queensiarc cat may seem big, but ple, of course, turned out to be from the vital to survival—from sex to physical ex- behemoth beached at St. Augustine. it before could the world's .ercise— are physiologically addictive. 1! is pales what be said As far as Gennaro is concerned, these now thought that the phenomenon called hugest invertebrate—a six-ton octopus Florida coast. results combine wifh Webb's detailed de- jogger's high is actually endorphin-me- to lurk" off the to light November scriptions to indicate fhat the monster was diated. In all probability, eating also re- The beast came on indeed a giant octopus. Without any inter- leases some kind of pleasurable molecule. 30, 1896, when two boys cycling along the explains, an octopus grown 7 in St. Augustine, Florida, discov- nal skeleton, he After all, why do we crave food Low blood- beach large would need huge amounts of colla- sugar levels don't explain why. The truth is ered a huge carcass buried in the sand. medical gen to give if support. Whales, with strong that we feel abnormal when we haven't eat- News of the find soon reached naluralist DeWitt Webb, who internal skeletons, and squid, which use a en in a while. Some chemical in our brain doctor and substance called elastin for support, would has become depleted. We become rest- rushed to the scene, expecting a whale. examination he reached have no such requirement, even if they did less and agitated, and, after extreme dep- But after careful conclusion that the beast weigh five or six tons. rivation, we suffer withdrawal symptoms the astonishing If any kin of the giant octopus still roam commonly known as hunger pangs. The was a giant octopus, the first ever glimpsed the sea, Gennaro says, they would count only way to relieve our discomfort is to get by a scientist. help of a Yale professor named among the ocean's gref-.i1esl beasts. "If it's more food. It's a fix— plain and simple." With ihe know," he A. E. Verrill, an expert on the giant squid, anything like the octopus we If basic drives are addictive, then drugs adds, "it lays hundreds, even thousands, are an ingenious means of shortcutting the Webb did further studies on the creature. of eggs at a lime. There could be more elaborate scheme nature devised to en- Verrill himself eventually published ac- sci- than just a few of them, but they'd be harder sure that we maintain health and repro- counts in local newspapers and a few reaction of their peers? to find than lake monsters. The ocean is a duce ourselves. Merely by popping a pill, entific journals. The of blub- pretty big loch." we can top off our neurochemical reser- Outrage. Webb had found a mass voirs with no sweat expended. Instant or- ber, they charged— nothing more. there but Monsters are a part of our heritage. The gasm without any foreplay. A cheap thrill. The_ story would have ended sailors believed that if they didn't fall But can't the same be said of NET? "Is for a chance find in 1957 by Forrest Wood, first newly appointed curator at Marineland of off the edge of Ihe earth, a man-eating sea it not, after all, an electronic fix?" asks Re- serpent would devour them alive. Reports gelson, who fears the black box may be- Florida. Wood was going through some of to this predecessor = papers wnen he discov- of leviaihans and mermaids continue come addictive in its own right. Patterson his describ- day. Most of these, when examined, turn has kept her eyes open to any signs that ered a yellowed newspaper clip out lobe mistaken identi' cations of known her patients are becoming physically de- ing the beast— a six-ton octopus sfretch- animals. Yet every once in a while a rumor pendent on the equipment. But she rules ing 150 feet tentacle tip to tentacle tip. intensive inves- turns out lo be something extraordinary: a out the possibility that there will ever be a Amazed, he began an final ciscoverng a jar filled with previously unknown animal. As in the case black market in black boxes, because in- tigation, y pygmy hippopotamus, For years na- dividual models can cost upward of samples of the 60-year-old carcass stowed of the Smithsonian Institution. Then tives in Africa talked about these miniature $1,000—a hefty sum to cough up for purely away at the hippos, and no one believed ihem— until recreational use. Besides, she has not en- he recruited the help of his friend and fel- Jr.. one was finally captured. countered a single instance of electronic low marine biologist Joseph Gennaro, of Yale University biologist Alvin Novick addiction in her ten years of practice. The of the University Florida. - to doubts lhat cryptozoologists will uncover explanation, she believes, "is that drugs- Gennaro persuaded the Smithsonian of flesh back to anything significant. "There are far more for the very reason that they are foreign let him take a few pieces work. important challenges to biologists, and far upset the brain's chemistry. NET, on the Florida, and soon he was hard at analysis of the tissue, more important uses for large expendi- other hand, simply coaxes the brain to re- Doing a microscopic talent," he says, that it resembled neither whale tures of time, money, and store its own chemical balance. The body he found tissue. Instead, the cells "than seeking marine apes in the Aleu- heals itself." blubber nor squid dark and light tians, Sea serpents in Maryland, or zeu- The intuitive feelings of her patients sup- formed a broad pattern of octopus. and glodons in Vermont, Belief in these crea- port this view. As reformed heroin addict stripes seen only in the He in Natural tures is nothing more than a reflection of it Wood published their account Stuart Harris says, 'At first I thought would 1971. only to receive anxiety in the modern world of science, be fun to wire up the human race, so we History magazine in inter- letter from the Smithsonian. How and an obvious extension of current could all go whizzing about. But after the a nasfy the tissue anything est in the paranormal." initial buzz, you feel, well, normal. Frankly, dare they suggest was whale blubber, ihe institution de- To Richard Greenwell,. though, the future all NET does is help you face reality." but that relurn of cryptozoology is bright: "From a statis- Patterson concurs: "All we can do is give manded, requesting Gennaro sample at once. tical perspective alone," he contends, people a. chance. We can get them off the borrowed "some of these animals just have to be real. whatever drug they're hooked lo, but it's Gennaro ignored the request, and just recently he conducted yet another study The field won't all crumble on one claim; up to them to fill the void, They've got to Bigfoot, right that the tissue was in fact we may be wrong aboui and find a. constructive substitute for the drugs suggesting about Loch Ness."'OQ that have dominated their lives. "DO something totally unique. 120 OMNI IM

I NUF:jF=OV1^ACF30 | CON

of one performer using his hands and legs lo operate four stilts. It took 15 minutes to get inside the creature. The designers cre- ated an entire skeletal structure that the. performer strapped on, so that when the legs stretched, for example, underneath the latex skin one could see bone movement. "Operating the larger creatures was such a physical workout," Henson explains, "that we started training a team of performers eight or nine months before we began shooting, to get their bodies in shape." Kurtz adds, "It was almost like a reper- tory company. We had a group of mimes and regular performers who rehearsed for eight or ten weeks to learn the various nec- essary movements. They were trained by Jean-Pierre Amiel, a Swiss mime, who was very good at analyzing an overall move-

ment and then isolating it into little bits to be worked on." For every creature in front of the camera, there were usually three to five performers

making it work in a lifelike manner. "One person was designated the primary per- former," Kurtz says. "It was his or her re- sponsibility to generate the personality of that character." "Sometimes the person inside did the body's moves only, and other people were doing the face," Henson says, The primary performer also spoke the dialogue and usually controlled one of the hands, but hands are enormously difficult to operate convincingly, as he and Kurtz discovered while bringing Empire's Yoda to life. "They're especially difficult when you're trying to operate them from a distance," says Kurtz. "It's almost like looking in the mirror and trying to cut your hair. Every- thing's reversed. The performers re- hearsed in front of mirrors and video mon- itors, so they would be able to ad-lib and know where the hand was going. "In some scenes," Kurtz continues, "we had up to twenty creatures onstage, which meant sixty people scattered about, op- erating them." By using radio-control mechanisms to open and close eyes, and mechanical linkage devices for hands, eyebrows, and facial expressions, the Henson team solved ils problem of logis- tics. According to Kurtz, radio-control mechanisms are "still a bit crude. You're transferring your movement to electrical energy, then. back again to a servo motor, to a mechanical movement. They have a tendency to jerk slightly." Mechanical link- age had the advantage of being directly linked to the performers' hands. The de- vices, somewhat like bicycle brakes, were made even smoother by adding hydrau-

lic fluid to the tubes around the wires. Tubes, wires, and skillful performers are responsible for bringing The Dark Crystal

to life. "The whole picture is one long spe-

i cial effect." Kurtz claims. "But we hope you won't notice that as it unfolds." DO

I '

1 : " ':'.'.":.-- : i' ..

IMS^gca*3 IISBBIiim Iii the more avant-garde architects of the twentieth century. Alter c_ Spiral Jelly, Smithson died in a , crash while superv aijaaaBP Puzzling in the new year, blind cubing, and oughtagraphs

By Scot Morris

Several months ago we asked how long school kid in Mexico City who can do cube to Ideal Toys, which will market it

faster than I can." later this year as a follow-up to the it would be before someone claimed this much Rubik's Revenge. Ideal will call to be able to solve Rubik's Cube while Indeed. It wasn't more than two weeks 4x4x4 invention, blindfolded We believe that our challenge before we heard from David Singmaster this cube another "Rubik" it. working has been met. in London, about John White, a student at but don't believe Meffert has a 6 x 6 x cube, which will Paul Hertzel, thirty, of Waconia, Min- the University of Warwick. White, he model of a 6 has designs on paper nesota, was the first claimant to come reports, can study a scrambled cube for come next, and for the 7x7x7. to our attention. He studies a mixed-up about ten minutes, then solve it behind little over minutes. cube for an hour or two, noting which his back in a two HAPPY NEW YEAR subcubes need to be moved where, then So we've had the first Rubik's Cube dons a blindfold or holds the cube divorce (as predicted in September Is it possible to write the digits from 1 inserting only and behind his back and starts twisting. After 1980), and now there's blind cubing. to 9, in order, and, by + — that equals about five minutes and up to 200 What next? We're waiting to hear about signs, make an equation while juggling We don't think so. Don Hastings, of rotations, it's done. someone who solves a cube I9S3? first with Detroit, who is interested in such things, We haven't seen Hertzel perform this it. We expect this will be done ball) juggled says that the next date obtainable by feat, but his description of how he does it two cubes (or a cube and a - reassures us there's nothing superhuman in one hand while the other hand does this method (and not allowing a in front to a three- of the first figure) will be 2012. The last about it. But how does he "memorize" the twisting. Then we move so many rotations? He doesn't. "It's easier object cascade, solving first one cube, was J967, then two, then three simultaneously. We Reaching S3 is easier; there are at than it sounds," Hertzel explains. "If least 13 to it. For example, you were to jot down as one number all don't expect this last challenge to be ways do the number sequences you have met before 1985. 1-2-3+4-5 + 6-7 + 89 uses seven inserted symbols; 12-3 + 4-5 + 6 + 78-9 memorized, it would be a very large and your uses six. There is only one way to reach impressive number. Starting with MAGYAR POSTA if - symbols, birth date, social security number, 83 you use just four + or address, zip code, phone number, office Hastings says. Can you find the unique formula? phone, and so forth, it wouldn't take play to long to compile a 100-digit number that Some people take this number would appear random to anyone else. extremes. M. Emrehan Halici, an electrical engineer in Ankara, Turkey, To reel off the whole number, all you wonderful numerical need do is concentrate on the order of sent us a strange and the subsets. You don't have to labor ode to 1983. It includes, for example: to recall your phone number, only its Ways to represent the integers from 1 1, 9, 8, and placement in the listing." to 25, using the numbers "Cubists," similarly, have already 3, in order, and inserted symbols. (He memorized whole sequences. There's allows the four standard functions, Rubik's Maneuver, a 12-step process including an initial minus sign, factorial root.) Here are to flip two edge-cubes over without exponents, and square integers: disturbing the rest of the cube; another Scientists at Battelle Institute's Pacific sample formulas for the first two = 12-step combination exchanges two sets Northwest Laboratories have created 1 -1-9+8+3 of corner subcubes without affecting Cubot, a cube-solving robot. Cubot scans 2=-1 x(9-8) + 3 anything else. The blindfolded cubist need a scrambled cube with its optical system How many formulas can you find for are on only remember which combinations are (eye); then its microcomputers (brain) numbers 3 through 25? (Answers needed to restore a cube, and in what direct mechanical grippers (hands) to page 82.) formulas yield order. In some cases even this order is perform the necessary twists to solve the In addition, there are to flexible, but the individual moves are cube. "Cubot can solve any scrambled 7983 that use one digit repeatedly, but performed by rote. cube in less than four minutes," said exactly ten times. Halici sent nine with starting "My memory isn't exceptional," Hertzel Dr. Michael A. Lind, a spokesman for the formulas, naturally, these two adds. "I suspect someone with a better research group, "but we hope to reduce the list: short-term memory could cut the study this to about two minutes." (1 +1)"-11 x(1 +1+1)1 + 1=1983 higher-order cubology, Meffert. (22 x2) 5 + (2 + 2)! + (2 + 2)! -2/2 = 1983 time down to ten or fifteen minutes. I In Uwe last there were five different ways to assure you, it won't be long before you the puzzle designer we featured Then hear of some guy in Paducah or some October, has sold his design for a 5 x 5 x 5 represent 7983 that use one 1, nine 9's, 128 OMNI &~\ iH»e- c^- j^itfA^fosW eight 8's, and three 3's, in order: ways to VERBAL VEXERS words knowledge and ignorance, which do it with ordered digits (e.g., -1 -2 can be read as either word, depending on

+ 34x56-7 + 89-1983); ways to do it WORDS. The words below are unusual. where one divides the letters (April 1980). by using the letters in the name Omni They share a common property, and Scott is a television screenwriter, (which, sideways, appear as 0, 3, 2, and in fact are the only common English words specializing in those animated Saturday 7) as exponents. We can't print the or names we know of that have this morning cartoon shows (he has done whole collection here, but we'll make property. What is it? nearly 200 scripts for Superfriends.. copies for interested readers who send a JACKAL Spider-man. Spider-woman, and Thun- self-addressed, stamped envelope to AVAIL darr the Barbarian). Most recently he 1983 Formulas, Omni. 909 Third Avenue, LEEKY developed and wrote the animated New York, NY 10022. (We were going THORIA Pac-Man series. to say, "Space limitations prevent us from VICTORIA Recently Scott sent us the signatures ." printing , , but, frankly, that wouldn't be SENTENCES. What is the significance of shown on this page, which he calls the whole truth. There are other limitations the following sentences devised by Paul "oughtagraphs." These are the signatures as well. We're just glad to know that the Hellweg: we'd like to see, the way certain famous formulas are there if we need them.) 1. Man can make lunar excursions in people should have signed their names. Space limitations don't prevent us from extravagance. We present them here as inspiration printing this coda on the theme, from 2. "Made certain discoveries for our latest competition. Haiici's wife, Uger. Set out 29 matches extraordinaire.'" Columbus informed Send us one original oughtagraph for like this: Isabella. any personality, living, dead, or fictional. 3. Modern democracy created certain The grand-prize winner will receive laudatory experiment extolling virtuous $100: runners-up (2-10) will receive $25 l~l ! I 1 n independence. each. Neatness definitely counts. All entries become the. property of Omni. COMPETITION #26: OUGHTAGRAPHS~ None will be returned. Send entries Readers may recall our Competition (postmarked by February 15. 1983, from Mrs. Haiici's challenge: Move #9 for calligraphic wordplay, or within the United States, or by March matches around in this design to produce "designatures." A runner-up in that 1, 1983, from other countries) to: Omni 1983. What is the minimum number competition was Jeffrey Scott, of Los Competition #26, 909 Third Avenue, New of moves needed to accomplish this? Angeles, with his clever rendering of the York, NY 10022. DO i '

Randy. Cohen is a compulsive letter writer Of a previous:-- \:^-'Y:-r,' .-ownies.-O' ' and v;h:m$ica; seeder 0/ truth. These mammal! and if.'s.got triangular ifeeth. are letters he-has written and received. Wowi They say in ins papers that- it's'- a iitfie like the mids and little Dr. Richard Halfgren' 'ike theKue ;s definitely .*'' Director neither: the plot thickens--: -''-.

! gather- Na-onai Weather Service 1 dp have a auewiicn. that Re- naming of a new species is.fhs privilege Oearpr.Hailgren: its discoverer and that -in moshcases:,. rrv What about weather songs. [hat's what the 1s k i not? However. -Td Jike- to s'ugoes ! want to know. The President nas made and' why

VV-..;n : ': it clear that improving our productivity is another angle on- this thing, y.oi

a prime national priority, and that means be willing to name it for my. giritosnd? She techncloaioal improve me ms. Despite Is a wonderful-woman, anti.lt is nearly rliis clear patriotic statement 0! American her birthday. I've been searching around

tor right ". goals, our songs aboul iho wea:her are . the gift, and a new mamma!' sell n 5 nn-nit.ve stale. f-"oi examole: would De just the ticket "A Foggy Day in London Town'' 'Wha!,doyou.-th;nk?.S-ari we.work-' .. I'd "Somewhe-e over the Rainbow" something-gut?!; if would help, be.-.. ,: -details ''Raindrops Keep -alko on rV.y Heac . glad io send along many more Old-fashioned? You bet! Its time aboul her. By. the way; this specie's

I me.. someone did something about t. say nomenclature business is new to Doe that our weather songs should .embody 'he money usually change hands?- > technical sophistication that your agency look -erwaid : hea' r.g rem yc;j

T i- other bungs to .is work. hus. ! urge tn a Weather about this, because you've made

Bureau to hire a few songwriters to cre- name plans. I rnay-haveto'-buyhera.'

' ::..' ati ... i i 'i n: >ngs Here book or a record or something; IAJDRD are a tew i-nos io hco you get started: Randy Cohen "'.A Partly Cicudy Day ;\ilh a 60 "''.' ' Percent Probabilit; of Precipitation .Dear Mr. Cohen: .- Fteridy Cohen By : in London Tovjn" Thank you for your generous expre>-

Her is Rising sicn of interest .in dur-vdiseoye'rypf the' -.

' iOur songs : Down in Dixie" earliest known mammalian fauna irr'--

'-

. '- about the weather "Tempera'uie Inversion in Pans' (he New World; ry./y )

"..' ,'< Got a Sateiit'e Phoio 0! Our icve" I have given serious consideration to are still ina What do you think'?- Are you ready to your proposal that 1 name the new. primitive state, t urge 1 .mammaiinhonordtyourgirlfhend.Wlrhgf take up the challenge' i would be :v.ore

the Weather than happy to provide you wim the knowing -her name. 1 turned to . names o; several excellent American contemrja tfia Bureau to hire writers songwriters. (Here's one: Stephen information you did provide ! should to create state- Sondheim.j In addition, fcl be qu>ie eager .chc derivation being as follows: genus-. Cohen of-the-art weather songs5 lo participale >r e tlrectlv flandy Cohen plus amata. ttle.-pef fec't. passive participlt

of amare, '-'to love." meanirigi'Th'e one- Dear Mr. Cohen: (female) loved by Cohen"; species. m.irabiiis, or "wonderful"' (indeed, your 1 rnusl admit I never realized there was sucti.a-cfear 'connection between prime letter asserts she is a wonderful woman) national pnonfy and weather songs. The Regrettably, however, Sam dissuaded concept £ letrcshmg. .from thisappeilaiion on two grounds. the lias 1 am sure vou wr.l agree -.win ;he many Everywhere, press touted my cozens and i£r< payers of our great statement thai this l3G-rn;l;ion-year-.o!d' nation, who rely on the National Weather fossil must have been shrswiiKe in' Ss'vioe (a.'V'VS). that issuing wea:he-r proportions and- in habit. Surely it would,

: : warnings and forecasts is serious be a most unhappy b^'h.daypreSec't - „

; ' O'jsiness What resources are available fo: : n to the NWS io iuriiil its mission must be Secondly, t would ne'ver.-beateiedo .- wisely spent in this era of austeniy provide my'c.Oileagues with a- rational.' Thank you. tor your ideas and interest explanation for my action. The ensuing.

; .-. . Maybe a pnvaie meteorological concern scandal would envelop us all;' ': of - would have an inlerect In weafhe" songs However, 1 am not. Li.nmindf.ul your and !• n -a ieoHmg to attract a larger audience. plight in -selecting:. a birthday present,

' . agree -with [he implication in ' (would ' Robert L Sorey kteeoioloqca: Division ..your letter iha! records-arid books a.re-a'

'. National Weathef'Service. bit of a bore. Toward this end i. am ssndln

a piece oi the-rock In which the- .fas-si I:

Dr. Fariah. Jenkins ' was found: huna on a suitable bold chain

.- Department of Paleontology it ought -to be aT least a very: unusual.-. Harvard University pendant. And I'm also sending. ar\:6"-K.-rO-'