My Library

Two new circumstances now arose, almost overnight: the very powerful student campus riots against academic participation in any military-industrial activity; and the Consciousness Movement itself. The campus riots proceeded for the next five years, and were to prove serious business. The Consciousness Movement is still going on today, albeit with several changes in formats and in many derivative directions. One of the important fallouts of all of this needs to be pointed up because few today will recognize if not. Prior to the 1967-68 period, the existence of Consciousness had never been considered meaningful, and in fact was hardly ever referred to -- except possibly within the contexts of Eastern mysticism. This is an area with which I am exceedingly familiar. And so I can say with confidence that even within mysticism, occultism, psychical research and parapsychology -- in whose arenas one would expect to find consciousness an important topic -- such is actually hardly the case. The term was occasionally used, of course, but not with the meanings and relevance attached to is because of the 1967-68 events and circumstances. This is to say that in the West, and especially in the United States, the concept of Consciousness was not recognized as a thing in itself, not recognized as a thing which transcended the brain-mind relationship.