Cleve Backster - Primary Perception And The Consciousness Of Plants
Audio Clips from The Jeff Rense Program
Review of the book "Primary Perception" by Hal Fox
 If you are a medical doctor, a physician or surgeon, or a
professional who deals with human beings and their problems, this
book is a must-read. For the rest of the intelligent population,
this book is a should-read. Personally, this reviewer highly
recommends that you buy and read this interesting report by Cleve
Backster about Cleve Backster's life's work.
This reviewer's first information about Cleve Backster came from
reading about his early work in Peter Tompkins and Christopher
Bird's The Secret Life of Plants. It was amazing to me then,
and still is, that a person skilled in the use of a polygraph
(equipment used for lie-detection) would think to hook up the
polygraph to a plant to measure the plant's response. Backster
was about to water a Dracaena plant in the office and
wondered whether he could measure the movement of the water into
the plant leaves. From such an initial thought came a life's
work and changes in the way we must view universal life. You
will enjoy the story as told by Backster. From viewing the
traces of the polygraph sensor, the results were different than
Backster expected and he noted a surge response that was somewhat
like one would measure when questioning a person. As Backster
relates: "Well, if this plant wants to show me some people-like
reactions, I've got to use some people like rules on it and see
it I can get this to happen again."
Later Backster decided to try something that the plant could really feel
like using a flame to burn a leaf. It was astonishing to note that it
was the THOUGHT of burning a leaf to which the polygraph showed an
immediate response! From this bit of history, it must be stated that
science now has years of data on plant, animal, and even microscopic
life forms and their ability to respond to thought processes.
One interesting example was Backster's observation of a plant's reaction
on the polygraph when he poured boiling water down the sink. What could
hot water going down a sink have to do with a response from his
measurements? The answer led into a new series of investigations. It
had to be that live microscopic organisms in the drain were killed by
the hot water - thus the response. Astonishing that bacteria could emit
signals that could be received many feet away by another life form.
As a scientist I can understand why it has taken so long for the
enormously important discoveries being made by Cleve Backster to
begin to be accepted by the scientific community. It is strongly
a part of science's understanding of life that some type of a
brain or nervous system would be required to respond to (or emit)
stimuli. How could a plant, an egg, a cup of yogurt, or just
some white cells from a person's mouth either respond to or
emit detectable stimuli?
Cleve Backster's book is both a trail of discovery and the slow
and grudging partial acceptance by some scientists of the fact
that all living cells appear to have some sensitivity to the
well-being of other life forms. Science has not, as yet,
accepted Backster's discoveries. A scientific fact is best
defined as: A series of observations of the same phenomena.
This definition implies replication. Backster's book reports on a
variety of replications of his work both by other investigators
and by military laboratories.
At the beginning of Chapter 8, Backster includes the following
quote from Max Planck: A new scientific truth does not triumph
by convincing its opponents and making them see the light, but
rather because its opponents eventually die and the new
generation grows up that's familiar with it.
Unfortunately, even the best of scientists among us have some
problems with accepting dramatic changes resulting from new
discoveries. This author is well acquainted with the difficulty
of "teaching old dogs new tricks." We become so immersed in
making incremental advances in our own scientific specialties
that we often lose sight of the dramatic changes that are being
discovered and, hopefully, gradually accepted.
Backster ends with a discussion of what is needed for the further
development and acceptance of biocommunication. What is needed
is inexpensive monitoring devices (so that high school students,
for example, can replicate and/or extend some of Backster's
work). Simple sensing devices are pretty well developed. Yards
of chart paper is expensive and so are chart-type recorders.
This reviewer suggests that the use of some of the megabytes of
computer memory can store an enormous amount of data and should
be used for recording and display of sensory changes.
In the Secret Life of Plants, this reviewer read about how a
carrot being sliced could emit signals that could be picked up by
another life form being monitored. However, if prayer was first
used, then the carrot did not emit such signals. Perhaps, the
bible has some interesting reason for suggesting that one prayer
over the food. Do you pray before slicing your carrots? You may
want to after reading Cleve Backster's life's work. Backster
also indicates how some cells also go silent under some other
circumstances. This effect sometimes makes it more difficult to
replicate a given experiment.
Again, this reviewer strongly recommends that you read about
biocommunication. It may just change the way you view all of the
living world. You may become nicer to your plants.
Review of Primary By Brian O'Leary
Cleve Backster is no ordinary scientist. His path to discovery, so well
described in his autobiographical book Primary Perception, brings
together both the human and objective elements into a gripping detective
story, leading to insights many scientists would not
want to touch because the implications are so profound and in some
respects contradictory to the materialistic world view that grips
contemporary science.
The subtitle well expresses his breakthroughs: Biocommunication with
plants, living foods and human cells. Backster's courage and humility in
breaking out of the traditional box of Western science provides an
inspiration for the rest of us.
As a physics faculty member at Princeton University during the 1970s, I
began to have some experiences that shattered my own materialistic
paradigm. I became hungry for experiments which would reveal the
mysteries of consciousness, of measuring communications of intent with
other living beings as a force that transcends ordinary physics and
biology.
When Backster's experiments came to my attention, I spent time in his
laboratory verifying the extraordinary phenomena on the influence of
human intent on the electrical activity of target cells. I was so
inspired, I used Backster's work in the lead to my book, Exploring Inner
and Outer Space.
The process of Backster's discoveries revealed in Primary Perception is
required reading for anyone interested in how science could be done in a
better world. Ironically, the humility with which he took on the task
made him better qualified to do the work than prestigious scientists at
leading universities who have vested interests in traditional science
and have avoided this kind of research for fear of being ostrasized by
their peers.
It takes great courage to break out of the old, comfortable modes of
research (I call it the box of materialism) and go for the truth for
what it is, rather than for more limited truths inside the box.
Backster's independence is a key to his success, because he is not
trying to impress anybody or placate funding sources; he's an authentic
truth-seeker, intelligent, honest, transparent, generous with his time,
childlike in his sense of awe and wonder with
the phenomena, and willing to take the path of discovery wherever it leads.
This book can be easily understood by almost anyone. It's a great read
and an essential addition to any library on new science.
Brian O'Leary, Ph.D.
Brianoleary.com
former astronaut and professor of astronomy
Co-founder, International Association of New Science
Founding president, New Energy Movement
More reviews here: http://www.primaryperception.com/page4.html
Read More: http://www.primaryperception.com
http://www.backster.net/
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