Note: The following letters are reprinted with permission.

On the Forbidden Letters by Anna Pietropoli

In dedication to Margaret Rutherford and George Pollock

Dear Visitors of World Mysteries,

Allow me to present you with quotes that seem relevant to the internet-discussion on the Forbidden Letters. The quotes in part 1 deal with the speculations by the Paris 4 on the sub-atomic realm in Forbidden Letter number 5, the ones in part 2 with alchemy in general.

With my compliments to the editors of World Mysteries for bringing the Letters to the public, and my warmest wishes to you all,

Anna Pietropoli.

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Part 1

1.1

"You said in a mail that we are all connected. And we are. But even in a more dramatic way most people know. We know now through quantum physics (the realm of the microcosmic sub-atomic world, the fundament of the so called real, atomic world), that distance may well exist in the atomic Einstein world, but that it doesn't exist in the sub- atomic quanta-world.

In the Einstein-world there is one chief dirty word: simultaneous. The laws of that world dictate that every action takes time. No simultaneous reaction is therefore possible. But in the sub-atomic world, not energy is passed on to cause a reaction, but information.

But what has this got to do with the promised omnipotence to the 'sons of man' you will ask? How can anyone move a mountain, unless he posesses at least the energetic equivalent of the mountain itself? He can't of course. Unless he's deified. Because in that case you don't need energy to do your thing, all you need is to pass information through your will. You 'reprogram' the mountain, that is, the mountain in your projection (the world is my projection). For the real mountain is in the sub-atomic world, not in the atomic.

And if you are deified (the harvest) you will be able to mess with your projector.

By the way, don't take our word for it. Take the word of Mr.. Wang and Mr.. Bedford instead.

Phenomena in sub-atomic physics such as Bell's Theorem (everything that was once connected will stay connected for ever) and the Einstein Podolsky Rosen non-locality differences have led to significant rethinking of the relationship between consciousness and reality (the world is my projection (our remark)). Such thinking forms the basis for modern conceptions of magic and paranormal (psi) phenomena, in that the human mind may have a significant, but non- physical effect on material reality. Or, as Wang and Bedford put it (1985): "one of the non-mechanical aspects of causation may be will and intention."

1.2

"As Wolfgang Pauli put it, now that psychology has discovered the objective within consciousness (Jung's collective unconscious) so too physics must discover the subjective in matter. He also suggested that physics must come to terms with "the irrational in matter".

The problems that face us have been around since the dawn of philosophy but we happen to be in a particularly privileged position today. Science is producing ever more delicate information about processes within the brain.[...]

We are still victim to over two hundred years of mechanistic thinking and we work within a language that reflects and supports such a world view. As soon as we speak about mind and consciousness we find ourselves talking about objects, concepts, things, localization in space, separation and movement in time. Yet both quantum theory and Eastern psychology point to timelessness, active process and the ultimate illusion of the personal observer. It is very difficult for us, even now, to fully embrace the quantum paradigm, even the mathematics of quantum theory is still (paradoxically) expressed using space-time coordinates when the same theory predicts the break down of space-time structure. And time itself, as Prigogine points out, has never been treated correctly in physics." [F.D. Peat]

1.3

"The central question is: What is it that exists independent of the physical brain? Yet as soon as we attempt to formulate this questions we prejudice the answer through our linguistic concepts of object, location in space and so on. Current "consciousness studies" in the hard sciences assume that mind, or consciousness, emerges out of the physical brain and cannot therefore exist independent of it - although a variety of physical signals can be sent between brains.[...]

Consciousness studies also argue in favour of some sort of quantum mechanical origin for consciousness. I do not find the argument particularly satisfying or logically compelling. In its barest form it proposes that the sort of things done by consciousness cannot all be reduced to algorithmic processes and therefore mind does not have a mechanical basis. While parts of it may be hard wired it does not totally operate like a computer. Quantum theory, the argument goes, is the other thing that cannot be reduced to algorithmic form. Ergo quantum theory must have something to do with consciousness. From there researchers rush on to theories of quantum tunneling, collapsing wave functions, non-local connections and coherent quantum structures. But a variety of other explanations are possible:

That mind was present in the universe ab init[i]o. For example, in the form of a proto mind associated with even the elementary particles.

That mind is of a totally different order and makes its liaison with matter via the medium of the brain (The dualism of Popper and Eccles).

That both mind and matter (at the quantum level) arise out of some deeper level.

Or, to follow Bohm, that mind and matter form an unanalyzable whole which must be addressed through some totally different order of explanation - the Implicate Order. In this case the Cartesian cut is an illusion present only at the Explicate Order of perception and explanation."[F.D. Peat]

1.4

"This (...) implies, that consciousness and matter are so integrally bound up with eachother, that either consciousness is a property of matter, as in panpsychism, or else, as Nagel suggests, that consciousness and matter arise together from the same common source - in our terms, from the world of quantum phenomena." [D. Zohar]

1.5

"Information is another idea attracting a great deal of attention (Laszlo's Psi fields, Sheldrake's morphic fields). Historically physics first dealt with matter, then energy. Maybe at the end of the century we will be dealing with information. Information appears to transcend the divide between subjective and objective, matter and mind.[...]

Clearly information demands mathematical forms that lies beyond the concept of field[s]. Maybe, for example, information is born at the level of prespace.[...]

For Bohm, information is an activity that acts on both matter and energy."[F.D. Peat]

1.6

"(...) At the very core of the classical organism is the quantum reality (...). Potentiality is the term that Heisenberg used for the quantum reality. It is a good term for a number of reasons. It resonates with concepts like internal potency and omnipotence, which are certainly close to the center of things. Possibility has to do with the modes of actualization of that potentiality. Actuality refers to the actual event, which actualizes in nature the potentiality.[...]

Quantum theory does not allow us to ascribe reality to nature by itself, independent of consciousness, but it does allow us to ascribe actuality to nature."[S. Hameroff]

2.1

Solipsism: a theory holding that the self can know nothing but its own modifications and that the self is the only existent thing.[Merriam-Webster]

2.2

The word solipsism (Latin: solus, alone + ipse, self) is used for two related yet distinct concepts:

An epistemological position that one's own perceptions are the only things that can be known with certainty. The nature of the external world — that is, the source of one's perceptions — therefore cannot be conclusively known; it may not even exist. This is also called external world skepticism.

A metaphysical belief that the universe is entirely the creation of one's own mind. Thus, in a sense, the belief that nothing 'exists' outside of one's own mind. [Wikipedia]

2.3

"It can be easily demonstrated though that Hameroff never understood what solipsism means. He writes

'The solipsistic view is not really self-consistent. Sure, if you stick your head in the sand, there is no world, but then where did all the sand come from?'

The sand and the world are there as long as the head is projecting the sand and the world. So, as long as the head is alive. The sand is always present in the microcosmos, no matter what, and will be present in the macrocosmos too as soon as it is projected by a mind."[H. Wilson]

2.4

"People have a really hard time understanding solipsism. Here is a particularly amusing example.

'But with God, we have to start with the very basics. Does anything really exist at all? Or is the universe an illusion? The latter position is known as solipsism. In this worldview, I, the solipsist, am the only thing that truly exists. The entire world is an illusion in my mind. Solipsism is widely held to be irrefutable, but it has one flaw — it doesn’t go far enough. It fails to ask: an illusion in contrast with what? If everything is an illusion, then there is no reality to distinguish it from, and the illusion itself is the realest thing there is. Hence we still have a real universe to deal with. Which is not to say that there is no such thing as a dream, illusion, or hallucination; but we recognise dreams, illusions, and hallucinations by the fact that they don’t fit in with the rest of our “real” experience.[Copeland]'

- "Real" experience...[Pang]

2.5

"Solipsism is the crudest hammer ever wielded against objectivity. It posits that the individual mind alone is real: that the Universe Smith, [what he] thinks, sees, hears, feels, smells and tastes, is actually the creation of his own mind. [...] If Smith adopts this posture, he must view everything but his own mental process as no more than a hallucination. Even his own corporeal substance."[F. Porretto]

3.1

"If the photon has attributes of consciousness, [then] this could explain how it 'knows' when there are two slits in the double slit experiment, and the apparent non-local connections in the Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen-experiment. These units form what is described as mind, around which the brain structure is formulated. The units permeate the brain. They constitute a quantum energy wave function as waves of electricity and magnetism, originating in the pineal gland, and in conjunction with the activities of the pituitary, thalamus and thyroid, meeting in the cerebral cortex, undergo conversion - one converts the other to its nature. An essential part of this process is that the electrical impulses or currents reaching the cerebral cortex are converted through thalamic moisture or secretions."[A.I. Rosenberg]

3.2

"Is it possible that seemingly plain matter actually be psychomatter?"[E. Ransford]

3.3

"If the macrocosmos is in the microcosmos, and all matter nothing but projection, how then could matter not be psychomatter?"[E. Wellington]

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Part 2

"My father is not Adam.
My mother is not Eve.
No...

4.1

"(...) [Alchemy] was woven into symbolic imagery of the Grail legends (...) and carved into the stone structures of the Gothic Cathedrals (...)."[Baring and Cashford in the Myth of the Goddess (MG hereafter)]

4.2

"The figure of alchemy sits enthroned beneath the figure of Christ on the central pillar of the Porch of Judgement at the treshold of the Cathedral of Notre Dame in Paris."[Baring and Cashford in MG]

4.3

"The science of the transformation of the soul was hidden in an elaborate code of symbols, known as alchemy, or the Hermetic Art."[Baring and Cashford in MG]

4.4

"The Great Work of Alchemy aimed to discover the nature of Spirit and to see face to face the Body of Light that was the foundation of the human body as well as the 'matter' of the universe."[Baring and Cashford in MG]

4.5

"And at night, Isis placed the child in a fire to burn away all that was mortal in him."[Baring and Casford in MG]

4.6

"Isis originally belonged to the cosmology of Heliopolis."[Baring and Cashford in MG]

4.7

"There are two trees in ancient Greece that can be idenitified as Trees of Life who could produce the Gold of Immortality. The Golden apple-tree of the Hesperides, and the sacred tree over which is hung the Golden Fleece. Both trees are guarded by a dragon, meaning a serpent. In other words: the Kundalini-serpent."[Ming]

4.8

"Every dragon (serpent) spitting fire guarding a treasure is a metaphore for the Kundalini-snake guarding the Gate of Brahman, the gate to the central microcosmic nadi, or tube, in our microcosmic spine."[Ming]

4.9

"Two serpents intertwined as the caduceus re-emerge as the golden wand or rod of transformation of Hermes (...) while the single serpent falls to Asclepius, god of healing."[Baring and Cashford in MG]

4.10

"The Tree of Life had already been linked with the serpent or dragon (winged serpent) for over 1000 years before Genesis was written. In 2025 BC the cup of the Sumerian King Gudea of Lagash showed two winged dragons holding back a pair of opening doors to reveal a caduceus of uniting snakes.(...)"[Baring and Cashford in MG]

4.11

"Images from the mid-fourth millenium BC suggest the serpent is the power beneath the earth that makes things grow.[Baring and Cashford in MG]. - Could this mean that the serpent power is indeed the one force that figths entropy, as the CE2 say?"[Ming]

4.12

"The Goddess of Willendorf (20.000 - 18.000 BC) shows seven strata of notched circles on the top of her head."[Baring and Cashford in MG]

Note: Presented with permission