Before reading this chapter please start with:
First concepts
WOB is optimal
Shamanism accompanies humankind
ever since it became conscious of itself. Shamans were the first healers, and their heritage guides also many healers today. What
distinguished a shaman from other members of his tribe was his capability
to alleviate suffering. His insight
might have originated in a serious ailment from which he recovered.
He then applied his experience to other members of his tribe. This is
how the first healer may have appeared on earth.
With time his curiosity broadened
his understanding of phenomena around him. Nature was a collection of
beings with human nature which he called spirits. Spirits were
handled in the same way as ailments.
Healthy spirits brought
prosperity, and his task was to strengthen weak spirits for the benefit
of his clan. There were no evil spirits. When evil spirits were conceived, shamans became pagans, and founded the first religion.
Shamanism is an inborn faculty
of our body.
From the medical point of view
shamanism is an inborn faculty of our body like animal behavior. Each species
has a typical behavioral repertoire, known as ethogram that is innate and may be manifested at birth or later. According
to Eibl-Eibesfeldt human behavior
is innate and preprogrammed. Konrad Lorenz
and his teacher Heinroth described in animals innate fixed action patterns which were initiated by releasing stimuli.
Belladonna
A plant by the name of Atropa belladonna, or "the
beautiful lady", (in Italian. bella donna), is a source of alkaloids
like atropine. It accompanies
humankind ever since shamans discovered its cosmetic qualities. The tincture
of belladonna widens the pupils (mydriasis) and gives greater brilliancy to
the eyes, hence the name. Whenever a female feels an affection for a male,
her pupils widen, and attract the male. Wide pupils are an important element in their mutual courtship ethograms, and the
tincture is a cosmetic attempt to improve its outcome.
Innate knowledge
A second important finding of Lorenz
concerned the early learning of young birds such as geese. For instance,
the newly hatched chick knows that its mother is waiting outside the egg shell.
Its expectations are nurtured by an a
priori knowledge that was not gained by experience. The act of mother
selection, coined by K. Lorenz as imprinting, has to be distinguished from learning from experience. E.H.
Hess demonstrated what happens when the chick's expectations are not fulfilled.
He substituted for the real mother a quacking model with a loudspeaker inside,
that moved by mechanical means. The hatched duckling followed
the model as if it were its real mother.
Other innate faculties are called instincts. Like the Language Instinct which according to
Steven Pinker accounts
for our innate capacity for language.
A smile of a baby
You smile at a baby and it returns a
smile. This marvel is hard wired in its WOB. First the baby recognizes that you smile. Its WOB then associates the change in your face with its own, activates the appropriate facial muscles and smiles. In order to achieve this feat
its WOB has to store an innate representation of its body. The smiling baby responds to a message from your WOB. It is
an unconscious response to your smile, and is a manifestation of its shamanistic
faculty.
The study of shamanism
The word shaman originated among the Siberian Tungus and literally means he who knows. From the 18th century and onward, shamanism caught
the attention of anthropologists.
However not all their descriptions
are reliable. The following pitfalls face any anthropologist:
1. In order
to please the investigator the shaman may include in the description of his
experience elements of Western
culture which he has learned from his previous encounters with
researchers.
2. Some anthropologists learn
shamanism from indigenous tribes, and communicate their experience using Western metaphors.
This is particularly true of New Age shamans, like Michael Harner.
3. We ought to distinguish between the healing
shaman and the pagan shaman. From the medical perspective only the first is relevant.
The healing shaman communicates
directly with WOB, while the pagan shaman makes more use of the mind in order to get to the WOB.
The genuine shaman
Pagan shamanism has
a profound drawback. Its healing is wrapped up in adverse metaphors which may initiate a disease
of the mind. Particularly the
notion of evil spirits which
cause evil diseases, which have to be purged,
and exorcised. A sentence like "people who are not powerful-spiritually
are prone to illness, accidents, and bad luck" initiates a slippery slope which ends in
mind diseases caused by religion.
Additional reading:
A Shaman who treats
cancer
A carpenter listening to stories on
diseases which describes a modern kind of shamanism.
The modern witches are female shamans. Like
Ishtar the witch or the inter-stellar
witch.
Hypnotism
Hypnotism is a manifestation of shamanism and was always practiced
by healers, and Asclepiads. In the 18th century it was rediscovered
by Franz Mesmer, and labeled as Mesmerism, or animal magnetism. The
hypnotized person is ready to silent
his mind and let the hypnotist communicate with
his WOB. Hypnotic induction is achieved either indirectly through the mind, or by acting directly on the WOB.
Indirect techniques include religious and
cultural rituals, or their modern versions like swinging a pendulum.
Hypnosis may be induced directly without
the reliance on rituals. Like by touching the neck, drumming, or playing a
monotonous, loud and deep sonorous tune. These act directly on the WOB and do not require
the mediation of the mind. WOB directed hypnosis is a means to influence unconscious
processes controlled by WOB, and can be applied also to a patient
in coma.
The hypnotized individual shuts out his mind and accepts the instructions of the hypnotist.
He is ready to replace his beliefs with those of the hypnotist.
Phenomena like regression, are
only moderately related with his real childhood experience. Or memories about
his previous life, which are
mere fancies created by the hypnotist. Such memories are utterly unreliable
and have been called false memories. A false memory is a memory of an event
that did not actually happen, or is a distortion of an actual experience.
False memories can be highly vivid, just like normal memories. These negative
characteristics of hypnotism cause unpleasant mind diseases.
Hypnotism is valuable for controlling
unconscious processes during illness. This facet of hypnotism is still
neglected and waits to be explored.
Placebo effect
The placebo effect is inborn and stems
from our shamanistic faculty. The visit to the doctor raises in the patient
an unconscious expectation to receive a shamanistic healing, yet the doctor is
unaware of his shamanistic faculty. Nevertheless the patient (WOB) unconsciously
regards him as a shaman. Whatever the doctor does affects WOB directly, which
is regarded by medicine as a placebo effect. During his visit to the
doctor the patient's WOB perceives the physician's body image and his nonverbal
communication. They are talking about his cancer. The physician smiles and
assures the patient that his cancer is under control. However his doubts are
unconsciously transmitted to the patient, initiating in him a
cancer of the mind.
Additional reading:
Making
placebo respectable
Placebo and Cancer
Placebo effect is the Healing force
of nature
Scientific
framework for the Placebo effect