Looking Back Over 60 Years

by William C. Gough

(April, 2012)

I have been pondering your question regarding what events have had the most impact upon me since I graduated from Princeton. The impact of multiple experiences of the mind/matter interaction changed my belief system. As background, I graduated with a BS and MS in electrical engineering and had adopted the traditional belief system of science. My work in the 1960s and '70s focused upon the new energy source of fusion power and the social and environmental issues we would encounter in the next century. The problems we would face were clear and they are now manifesting. Potential solutions could be predicted. I published articles proposing solutions in both technical journals and magazines like Scientific American. The technology required an understanding of the coupling between new clean energy systems, resource depletion, environmental pollution of the air/water/land, and the need to move from an open cycle economics towards a close cycle economic system. At the time I had faith that society could tackle this major challenge like we did in World War II and the Man to the Moon effort. Although there were no known physics laws blocking solutions, very little happened and I concluded that "We had met the enemy, and it is us." I still participate on research for advanced fusion power systems and technology for closing the material cycle from use to reuse (Fusion Torch).

However, my belief change came as I became fascinated with the interaction between our mind, thought, and intentions and the ability to alter physical reality. As I explored this area my belief system gradually expanded from the traditional scientific model. The first event occurred when my wife, Marion, got sick. I took her to Dr. Gray, a World War II Army doctor. He said she had pneumonia in the left lung. However, the x-ray lab had closed so I took Marion home. I had been studying the work of Dr. Elma Green of the Menninger Foundation with spiritual practitioners in India. That night I tried a heart felt healing on Marion using a small brainwave device to enter the proper brainwave state. Marion experienced a feeling of warmth coming into her lung area. The next day I brought Marion for the x-ray. When he looked at the x-ray I saw his face drop. He said out loud "I know she had pneumonia!" My investigation of the mind/matter interaction turned from an intellectual curiosity to a personal quest for deeper understanding.

When we moved to California in the late 1970's we set up the non-profit Foundation for Mind-Being Research. Many more personal experiences then occurred. They included learning to dowse, seeing auras, research of contacts on the "other side," and doing an out-of-body trip back in time to the Nazca Lines in Peru. Although I had never read about the Nazca Lines what I had observed was confirmed when I visited there. However, the next two experiences were the ones that really changed my physics belief system.

To explore our potential to affect physical structure through intention, I was introduced to Dr. Lawrence Kennedy. He invited our family to a demonstration of macro-psychokinesis (PK) in which he promised to bend dinner utensils using just his mental intention. We brought our own spoons and joined a small group of about a dozen people. While he was showing pictures of his own 12-year-old son bending, the spoon in our 12-year-old son's hand started to bend spontaneously. I then gave him two of our spoons that he held, one in each hand, and without touching the tops they both bent over. I walked out of the demonstration confused -- my physics belief system was in stress. Kennedy came running after me and said that I must take his course and learn that I have the same capability that he just demonstrated.

I accepted the challenge. My wife, son and I attended, and we all successfully did PK on our tableware. Early one Sunday morning soon after this experience I was lying in bed and heard a loud bang in the kitchen. I ran out to the kitchen and saw my son holding the handle to one of our large brass serving spoons -- the head had blown off and was on the floor! My mind flashed back to the structural materials laboratory at Princeton where I had run a large hydraulic strength-of-materials testing machine. This equipment would exert tremendous forces upon metal samples of about the diameter of that serving spoon. If they were ductile material they would neck down; if they were brittle they would suddenly break with a large bang. Our 12-year-old son had just accomplished the same feat and created the same sound by his mental intention! My physics belief system was beginning to change.

Now consider the impact on one's belief system when physical law is suspended before one's very eyes, even when there is no evidence of conscious intention. At about the same time as my PK experience, I received an invitation from the Co-Founder of our Foundation, Virginia Gyure Cates, to meet a professor from San Jose State in machine design, Warren White, who was willing to demonstrate how to levitate a table. So together with my wife and son we went to Virginia's home. I set up the card table in the living room, and in normal room light four of us sat around the table. Our hands were held above the table. The table tipped upward with two of the legs high off the floor. Warren said that my family and Virginia must now do it by ourselves and he sat down across the room. Even though I trusted everyone around the table, Warren said that we must convince ourselves that no one could possibly be using their knees; we therefore rotated positions. The table still tipped up. I was trying to remain neutral and non-judgmental about what was happening. However, my scientific curiosity got aroused, and I decided to push down on the table that was rising up in from of me. When I did I found that I was pushing against a real force. What was happening to the force of gravity in the local area of the table? We invited Warren to our home, and with our table and a different group of people, we photographed and a friend videoed the same phenomena.

The phenomenon of levitation has been reported in every age and culture. Unlike other forms of PK, it is an either/or type of experience and offers probably the most severe challenge to the conventional scientific paradigm. Especially when the phenomenon is experienced personally by one trained in modern science.

The result of this quest to understand the bridge between science and metaphysics has changed my belief system. It has provided me with a deeper meaning for love and empathy. You "know" that we and every thing else on this planet are all interconnected. We have abilities beyond what we originally assumed to heal ourselves and others. There comes an understanding that we are more than our physical bodies -- aspects of us persist after death. The "laws" of physics are malleable within limits. There really is an all encompassing dynamic spirit of which we are a tiny part -- like the cells in our body which are all replaced every seven years, but "we" remain.

Princeton gave me the confidence to know the science of the physical world -- yet have the openness to explore the unknown world beyond the physical. I learned to appreciate and value the simple things in life and the power of feeling the emotion of love and positive thoughts. This quest has become a lifetime journey that I am still enjoying.