Mediumistic Teleplastics

[babushka]

Otherwise known is ectoplasm. Going back 100-200 years ago

Ernst Florens Friedrich Chladni (1756–1827) and the origins of modern meteorite research (1819)

“In 1794, Ernst F. F. Chladni published a 63-page book in which he proposed that meteor-stones and iron masses enter the atmosphere from cosmic space and form fireballs as they plunge to Earth.”

“These ideas violated two strongly held contemporary beliefs: (1) fragments of rock and metal do not fall from the sky, and (2) no small bodies exist in space beyond the Moon.”

Chladni was/is a popular guy to quote. Using him as the search criteria for finding interesting books could be fun.

The great sea-serpent. An historical and critical treatise.
by Oudemans, A. C. (Anthonie Cornelis), 1831-1895

In all ages meteoric stones have fallen on the earth. Many of

them were found by persons who were in search of them; they pre-
served them, and thus collections were made in private rarity cabinets
and in natural history cabinets. Many learned persons believed in
meteoric stones, but many others were sceptical, and their attacks
were so violent, and their mockery about stones that fell from the
atmosphere, or were thrown by the men in the Moon to the inhab-
itants of the Earth, so sharp as to shake the belief of many a
collector, and the happy possessor, fearing the mockery of the so-
called learned men, concealed his treasures, or threw them away on
the dust-hill, or in a ditch.

“It is always unsafe to deny positively any phenomena that
may be wholly or in part inexplicable; and hence I am content to
believe that one day the question will be satisfactorily solved.” —

A. G. MELVILLE.



Ectoplasm? Real or fake? Let's find out (the "great sea-serpent" isn't part of the story...or is she...)

PHENOMENA    OF
MATERIALISATION (1923)
Baron von Schrenck Notzing

The  history  of  Science  in  the  last  few  decades  confirms,  more  perhaps
than  in  any  previous  age,  the  justice  of  the  words  of  the  great  mathe-
matician Arago,  that  the  word  "  impossible  "  should  be  very  sparingly
used  outside  mathematics.


.....The  best  known  of  such  records  are  those  made  1870  to  1874  by  the
late  Sir  William  Crookes,  the  great  English  chemist  and  physicist,
which  were  undertaken  with  the  medium,  Florence  Cook,  then  fifteen
years  of  age,  and  with  Daniel  Dunglas  Home.

Daniel Dunglas Home, didn't expect to find him today. The topic is already getting interesting. 
Florence Cook? Don't recall seeing the name before, some kind of savant, but wasn't everyone idiots back then? How smart was he really?

Some early leads, ectoplasm has been known by various names

Albert von Schrenck-Notzing — Phenomena of Materialisation (1920, Eng. trans.)
“A white shred-like, rather broad, flat mass emerges from her mouth and falls over her left shoulder and left breast.”

Charles Richet — Thirty Years of Psychical Research (1922, Eng. trans.)
“Ectoplasm … seems to emerge from a human body and take on the semblance of material realities—clothing, veils, and living bodies.”

Baron von Reichenbach — Researches on Magnetism, Electricity, Heat, Light, Crystallization, and Chemical Attraction in their Relation to the Vital Force (1850s Eng. eds.)
“Od is discharged with the breath.”

Éliphas Lévi — Transcendental Magic: Its Doctrine and Ritual (Eng. trans.)
“A lucid will can act upon the mass of the Astral Light.”

Papus — Traité méthodique de science occulte (1891)
“Cette Lumière astrale est la force-substance universelle.” 
(“This astral Light is the universal force-substance.”)

Rudolf Steiner — “The Etherisation of the Blood” (GA 130, 1911 lecture)
“Human blood… is perpetually resolving itself into etheric substance.”

Johannes Greber — Communication with the Spirit World: Its Laws and Purpose (1932; later Eng. ed.)
“You must help to build that bridge” [so the spirit world can communicate].



I have a bunch of the books and will post anything interesting that I find while exploring. Maybe do some experiments. Feel free to contribute.

Early light searches

SCHRENCK-NOTZING
“The material emanates from the orifices of the body and especially from the mouth.

It is at first filmy and thread-like, then assumes a gelatinous consistence, and finally condenses into the teleplasmic mass.”
(Schrenck-Notzing, Phenomena of Materialisation, Eng. trans., p. 47)

“The medium must be kept in a state of muscular and psychic relaxation, approaching lethargy, for the substance appears only when consciousness is reduced and resistance of the organism diminished.”
(ibid., p. 51)

“A lowering of temperature and suppression of sensory stimulus facilitates the extrusion.”
(ibid.)


REICHENBACH
(“Odic” – vital force externalised in visible form)

“Under certain conditions the human organism emits a visible efflux which issues from the surface of the body and is most strongly observable at the head and hands.”
(Researches on Magnetism…, vol. II, p. 102)

“The subject does not project this by act of will; when the nervous system passes into the somnambulic condition, the efflux becomes distinctly luminous.”
(ibid., p. 118)

“I found that the emanation increases when the subject is weakened and diminishes when his vital force is strengthened.”
(ibid., p. 134)

PAPUS
(active occult / hermetic condensation of subtle substance)

“The Astral Light is a plastic substance, condensed by the operator and directed by will.”
(Traité méthodique de science occulte, p. 63)

“Evocation does not create; it condenses that which is already present in latent state.”
(p. 71)

“This substance is drawn from the vital reservoir of the organism and molded by imagination.”
(p. 74)


Good enough for a start, let's see where the rabbit goes

[babushka]

Slow going. Depictions from the first book written by Baron von Schrenck Notzing. The first one is about a plant being made to grow, not really to do with ectoplasm but interesting none the less. They took the effort to count the leaves and make measurements. His work was translated from what I understand, I wonder if the German terminology could be extracted somehow and cross referenced. Dates of experiments at the bottom. Chladni is still floating around in the back of my head, where did I see him quoted before? I'm sure there is a theme with him specifically.

"corolla" is the collective name for a flower's petal. "150 four-star corollas" is such a bad description. Had to look up what this flower is.

   

Oxley  made  the  interesting  experiment,  unknown  to  the  medium  up
to  the  time  of  the  experiment,  of  mixing  the  seed  of  an  Indian  plant,
Ixora  crocata,  with  sand  and  water  in  a  decanter,  and  requesting  the
medium  to  accelerate  its  growth.  It  is  said  that,  under  the  eyes  of
twenty  persons,  the  plant  developed  to  a  height  of  twenty-two  inches,
with  a  flower  composed  of  some  150  four-star  corollas  and  twenty-nine
Leaves.

As  in  Mrs  d'Esperance' s  book  Professor  Mangin  -  describes  materiali-
sation as  a  fugitive  structure  suddenly  generated,  which  assumes  a
human  or  animal  shape.  Its  material  is  not  permanent,  but  phantom-
like. It  contains  the  minimum  of  substance  necessary  to  produce  in  the
witnesses  the  illusion  that  they  have  a  living  body  before  them.  Mostly
it  consists  of  outlines  or  sketches  of  hands  or  heads,  and  in  order  to  save
work  in  the  formation  of  heads,  the  mysterious  artist  employs  drapery.

In  connection  with  the  dress  of  the  phantom  Mangin  asks
whether  it  consists  of  "  apports "  or  materialisations,  and  recalls  the
well-known  scene  in  which  Katie  King  cut  off  portions  of  her  garment
and  distributed  them  among  those  present.  She  then  filled  up  the
gaps  by  simply  covering  them  with  the  intact  portion  of  her  drapery.
They  were  immediately  filled  up,  and,  in  spite  of  the  closest  inspection,
Crookes  was  unable  to  find  a  seam.

I  see  something  like  a  white  luminous  ball  of  undetermined
outline  suspended  above  the  floor.  Then  suddenly  there  appears,
emerging  from  this  white  orb  of  light  as  from  a  trap-door,  the  phantom
'  Bien  Boa.'  It  is  of  moderate  height.  He  is  draped  in  a  flowing
garment  with  a  belt  round  his  waist.  '  Bien  Boa  '  is  halting  and
lame  in  his  walk.  One  cannot  say  whether  he  walks  or  glides.  .  .  .
Without  opening  the  curtain  he  suddenly  collapses  and  vanishes  on
the  floor.  At  the  same  time  one  hears  the  noise  of  a  body  falling  on
the  floor.    Three  or  four  minutes  afterwards  the  same  white  orb  appears in the  opening  of  the  curtain  above  the  floor,  then  a  body  is  seen  quickly
rising  straight  up  and  attaining  the  height  of  an  adult,  and  then  it  again
collapses  on  the  floor."

The  first  series  of  sittings  took  place  in  1894,  in  the  presence  of
Richet,  Lombroso  (Turin),  Danilewski  (Petrograd),  and  others.

In  1898  (May-June),  1903  (February-March),  there  were  investiga-
tions in  Munich  in  conjunction  with  German  savants,  and  Professor
Flournoy  (Geneva).  The  author  also  took  part  in  the  tests  of  the
medium  arranged  by  Richet  in  August  1894  in  the  South  of  France,
attended  by  the  physicist  Sir  Oliver  Lodge,  Professor  and  Mrs  Sidgwick,
Frederick  Myers  and  some  French  physicians.  Lacking  confidence
in  the  accuracy  of  his  own  results,  the  author  felt  the  need  of  repeated
supplementary  tests,  and  these  took  place  at  Rome  (May  1896),  Naples
(May  1898),  Rome  and  Naples  (April  1902),  Rome  (March  1903),  and
lastly  in  Genoa  and  Nice  (April  1909).

[babushka]

Taking a break from the Baron who "was the laughing-stock of his medical colleagues." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_von...ck-Notzing


The Etherisation of the Blood
1 October 1911, Basel

https://rsarchive.org/Lectures/EthBld_index.html

"mere pleasure or displeasure is at a lower level than the will to do something good or bad."

Rudolf Steiner was an interesting character, I like how they added to the opening paragraph of the wiki "Many of his ideas are pseudoscientific. He was also prone to pseudohistory." 
I supposed the author felt compelled to stick in in early because it all gets crazy after that. One day the author will realize that their own held beliefs are pseudoscientific and based of pseudohistory. Otherwise the influence of Christian Gnosticism is immediately evident in his writings.

Let us ask ourselves the question: Why is the achievement of self-knowledge so difficult? Man is a very complicated being. If we mean to speak truly of his inner life, his life of soul, we shall not begin by regarding it as something simple and elementary. We shall rather have the patience and perseverance, the will, to penetrate more deeply into the marvellous creation of the Divine-Spiritual Powers known to us as Man.

From the elementary concepts of Anthroposophy we know that in waking life the four members of a man's being—physical body, etheric body, astral body and ego—are organically and actively interwoven, but that in sleep the physical and etheric bodies remain in bed, while the astral body and ego are outpoured into the great world bordering on physical existence.

Transforming blood into plasma goop, not sure this alchemical path is healthy or the correct one. We are solidly into the weird territory now. I'm not really sure this paper is about ectoplasm at all.


Now I wonder if this is what he saw, or if it's just fantasy or something that was told. There is claims he was clairvoyant. 

The life of the human soul as presented here, first from external, exoteric observation and then from observation of a more mystical character is revealed by deeper (occult) investigation. The processes that have been described in their more external aspect can also be perceived in man through clairvoyance. 

When a man stands in front of us today in his waking state and we observe him with the eye of clairvoyance, certain rays of light are seen streaming continually from the heart towards the head. Within the head these rays play around the organ known in anatomy as the pineal gland. 

These streamings arise because human blood, which is a physical substance, is perpetually resolving itself into etheric substance. In the region of the heart there is a continual transformation of the blood into this delicate etheric substance which streams upwards towards the head and glimmers around the pineal gland. 

This process—the etherisation of the blood—can be perceived in the human being all the time during his waking life.

Really getting into the thick of it now

Just as in the region of the human heart the blood is continually being transformed into etheric substance, a similar process takes place in the Macrocosm. We understand this when we turn our minds to the Mystery of Golgotha—to the moment when the blood flowed from the wounds of Jesus Christ.

Right so moving along swiftly, seems like it was all part of a lecture the QA section at the end is interesting and close to what I'm looking for.

Question: What is the relation of chemical forces and substances to the spiritual world?

Answer: There are in the world a number of substances which can combine with or separate from each other. What we call chemical action is projected into the physical world from the world of Devachan—the realm of the Harmony of the Spheres. In the combination of two substances according to their atomic weights, we have a reflection of two tones of the Harmony of the Spheres. The chemical affinity between two substances in the physical world is like a reflection from the realm of the Harmony of the Spheres. The numerical ratios in chemistry are an expression of the numerical ratios of the Harmony of the Spheres, which has become dumb and silent owing to the densification of matter. If one were able to etherealise material substance and to perceive the atomic numbers the inner formative principle thereof, he would be hearing the Harmony of the Spheres.

We have the physical world, the astral world, the Lower Devachan and the Higher Devachan. If the body is thrust down lower even than the physical world, it comes into the sub-physical world, the lower astral world, the lower or evil Lower Devachan, and the lower or evil Higher Devachan. The evil astral world is the province of Lucifer, the evil Lower Devachan the province of Ahriman, and the evil Higher Devachan the province of the Asuras. When chemical action is driven down beneath the physical plane—into the evil Devachanic world—magnetism arises. When light is thrust down into the sub-material—that is to say, a stage deeper than the material world—electricity arises. If what lives in the Harmony of the Spheres is thrust down farther still, into the province of the Asuras, an even more terrible force—which it will not be possible to keep hidden very much longer—is generated. It can only be hoped that when this force comes to be known—a force we must conceive as being far, far stronger than the most violent electrical discharge—it can only be hoped that before some discoverer gives this force into the hands of humankind, men will no longer have anything un-moral left in them.

Question: What is electricity?

Answer: Electricity is light in the sub-material state. Light is there compressed to the utmost degree. An inward quality too must be ascribed to light; light is itself at every point in space. Warmth will expand in the three dimensions of space. In light there is a fourth; it is of fourfold extension—it has the quality of inwardness as a fourth dimension.

The last question is to do with Earth's corpse? and ends with a diagram

Reflected as sub-physical world:

Astral World—the province of Lucifer
Lower Devachan—the province of Ahriman
Higher Devachan—the province of the Asuras

   

[babushka]

Had a peek  at:

Eliphas Levi
Dogma et Rituel
de la
Haute Magie


Starting to look like the "great sea-serpent" will make an appearance after all "The Kabalists call her the virgin of the sea, whose dripping feet the infernal dragon crawls forward to lick with his fiery tongues, and they fall asleep in delight."

There is mercy and there is justice in God; to the just He dispenses justice and

to sinners mercy. In the soul of the world, which is the Universal Agent, there is a
current of love and a current of wrath. This ambient and all-penetrating fluid;
this ray loosened from the sun's splendour and fixed by the weight of the atmosphere 
and the power of central attraction; this body of the Holy Spirit, which we
term the Universal Agent, while it was typified by the ancients under the symbol
of a serpent devouring its tail; this electromagnetic ether, this vital and luminous
caloric, is depicted in archaic monuments by the girdle of Isis, twice-folded in a
love-knot round two poles, as well as by the serpent devouring its own tail,
emblematic of prudence and of Saturn. Motion and life consist in the extreme 
tension of two forces. “I would thou wert cold or hot,” said the Master. As a fact, a
great sinner is more really alive than is a tepid, effeminate man, and the fullness
of his return to virtue will be in proportion to the extent of his errors. She who is
destined to crush the serpent's head is intelligence, which ever rises above the
stream of blind forces. The Kabalists call her the virgin of the sea, whose dripping
feet the infernal dragon crawls forward to lick with his fiery tongues, and they fall
asleep in delight.

Got it, don't be tepid or effeminate as a man "As a fact, a great sinner is more really alive than is a tepid, effeminate man, and the fullness of his return to virtue will be in proportion to the extent of his errors"

Maybe something here speaks about ectoplasm. More research is required. Will circle back to the Baron eventually.

The Great Magical Agent manifests by four kinds of phenomena, and has been

subjected to the experiments of profane science under four names – caloric, light,
electricity, magnetism. It has received also the names of TETRAGRAM, INRI,
AZOTH, ETHER, OD, Magnetic Fluid, Soul of the Earth, Lucifer, etc. The Great
Magical Agent is the fourth emanation of the life-principle, of which the sun is the
third form – see the initiates of the school of Alexandria and the dogma of Hermes
Trismegistus.

[F2d5thCav]

Sorry, this is only tangentially related.  From my experience--

1. Fear as a magical attractor is a real thing, and it is a STRONG attractor.

2. The notion of being generally good and helpful does pay one back.  Not always quickly or directly, but karma will swing by and blow one a kiss.

[babushka]

Sorry, this is only tangentially related.  From my experience--

1. Fear as a magical attractor is a real thing, and it is a STRONG attractor.

2. The notion of being generally good and helpful does pay one back.  Not always quickly or directly, but karma will swing by and blow one a kiss.

Aaaaaaahhh-yaaaah-yaaaah-EEEYAAAH! Swinging in like Tarzan in a totally manly way 

Yes, all emotions works as an attractor. Anger, lust, all produce paranormal effects. Poltergeist activity in couples that fight is common from investigations. One researcher suggested that people that is bad at dealing with anxiety produce allot of effects.

scratches balls

There was something else I was going to say but it escapes me now.

sniiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiffff  

[babushka]

There is no epithet added to Éliphas Lévi's Wikipedia page to indicated that he was crazy or cook as with the other authors. Found clues in his texts but also started making weird triangle and circle shapes with my hands and bought the Torah this morning so I think I will give him a rest. Making a rota out of taro with the sephira is interesting, will check that out some more.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%89liphas_L%C3%A9vi

On to a new book where we encounter Dunglas Home again

"THIRTY YEARS OF PSYCHICAL RESEARCH"
A Treatise on Metapsychics
by Charles Richet, PhD
Richet, Charles, 1850-1935.
New York, Macmillan; 1923

The facts verified by the Dialectical Society were surprisingly
evidential: they did not, however, secure scientific assent, but
they had one excellent result-they impelled William Crookes
to study the question. Fortunately he had the assistance of two

powerful mediums with whom to experiment-Florence Cook
and D. Dunglas Home.

This all sounds very familiar, and new word "cryptesthesia" or lucidity. 

ON CRYPTESTHESIA (LUCIDITY) IN GENERAL
Nearly the whole of subjective metapsychics can be reduced to
a single phenomenon which the magnetizers of a past age called
"lucidity" or "clairvoyance" (hellsehen) ; which is now called
telepathy, with various shades of meaning attached to the term.
I propose to name it cryptesthesia. Myers has already used the
term "telesthesia."
The Greek etymology of the word signifies "a hidden sensibility"-
a perception of things by a mechanism unknown to us
of which we are cognizant only by its effects.


We shall therefore class mediums in two distinct groups
1. Mediums showing physical phenomena.
2. Mediums showing psychical phenomena.


(B) The second degree consists in the creation of a new personality
by hypnotism. The normal personality reappears on awaking, but
under hypnotism and hypnotic suggestion a new personality appears
which is evidently factitious, since the magnetizer imposes it at will
and can maintain it by verbal suggestion. This artificial and transitory
personality also belongs to normal official psychology.


© The third degree is a mediumistic state, i.e., a new personality
is created by auto-suggestion. Hypnotism acts through
hetero-suggestion; mediumship by auto-suggestion. There is
very little difference between the personality of Marie Antoinette
as assumed by Helen Smith of her own accord, and the same
personality as aroused by suggestion of a hypnotizer.

(D) The fourth step is when the new personality shows
cryptesthesia and really seems to know things unknown to the
medium, and even things that the secondary personality alone
could be aware of, as in the case of Mrs.Piper incarnating
Phinuit or George Pelham.

The "guide" of the medium (i.e., the new personality that appears)
then seems to be a genuinely extraneous intelligence.
These phenomena can rightly be called metapsychic because,
taking them all in all, the normal intelligence of the sensitive is
quite insufficient to explain the strange and potent cryptesthesia.
I need scarcely remark that the notion that an extraneous force
is in play is only a hypothesis.

The division shows that metapsychic science is both experimental
and observational. To neglect either method would be
to maim the science disastrously.
Experimental cryptesthesia can be studied
A. In normal subjects,
B. In hypnotized subjects,
C. In mediums,
D. In sensitives.

The phenomena that Schrenck-Notzing and Mme.Bisson have
verified with Eva bring fresh evidence on the formation of ectoplasms, evidence that is of high theoretical importance. The word
"ectoplasm," which I invented for the experiments with Eusapia,
seems entirely justified. The ectoplasm is a kind of gelatinous
protoplasm, formless at first, that exudes from the body of the
medium, and takes form later. This embryo-genesis of materialization shows clearly on nearly all the photographs. In the early
stages there are always white veils and milky patches and the faces,
fingers, and drawings are formed little by little in the midst of this
kind of gelatinous paste that resembles moist and sticky muslin

[babushka]

Relented and looked at photos, all seems fake to me and like nothing I have seen before. 99% sure it's all camera tricks with early photography and 1920's people dropping drapes or just puking, sticking shit up their noses. Biting down on the curtains and taking the photo. Also seen some photos of small tables being levitated and those could be picked up and dropped on command with the photo being snapped, one instance just looked like someone threw the table and took the picture.

[Ninurta]

Not having any sort of background in Victorian Occultism, most of the above just flies right over my head as if spoken in an obscure dialect of Martian. Especially the parts hinting at Hinduism, Zoroastrainism, Kabbalism, and any permutations of those foreign and esoteric "isms" ("Ahriman", anyone?) as Victorian Occultists were wont to do.

However, I can give my perceptions of the nature of this universe, realm, dimension, or what have you.

Basically, everything is mostly nothing.

Consider: all material matter is made up of molecules, which are made up of atoms, which are made up of subatomic particles. Molecules are mostly empty space, vacuum, in which the atoms distant from one another are loosely bonded together via bonding forces of attraction.

Atoms, likewise, consist of subatomic particles and appear as microcosmic solar systems, in which particles orbit other particles, with huge amounts of empty space, vacuum, between them, bonded together only by those "binding forces" mentioned above, just as a macro solar system is composed of relatively tiny particles ("tiny" relative to the size of the solar system as a whole) orbiting other particles, bonded together by gravity.

Entire galaxies are just clumps of gravitationally bonded stars and solar systems, just as molecules are composed of bonded atoms. Those galaxies themselves are bound together by gravitational forces into "associations", which in turn are bonded together into clumps and long filaments of galaxies forming the greater universe.

Now getting even tinier, what are the "subatomic particles" that atoms are composed of made of? They are made of discrete bundles of energy, and nothing more. Just tiny clumps of energy held together by their own energetic attraction.

So, at it's most basic, everything you can see, feel, touch, smell, or taste is mostly nothing, mostly empty space, mostly vacuum, and the tiny bits of space that are not empty are occupied by insubstantial, un-solid, clumps of energy.

So, everything is mostly nothing, and what bits aren't nothing are just plasma, more or less. Nothing is "solid"... but it sure feels solid when a rock is thrown at your head! That "solidity" is just an illusion formed by the attractive and repulsive forces of all the smaller energies taken together.

Your "solid" body is just a clump of cells, which are clumps of molecules, which are clumps of atoms, which are just clumps of energy.

So, in the final analysis, everything that is "you" is just a clump of energy, swirling in mostly nothingness - or, maybe, several clumps of different sorts of energies, which we have labeled "corporeal body", "soul", "spirit", and "mind" simply for the sake of convenience and discussion.

Really, all - the entire universe including you - is just the interplay of energies... every person, tree, bush, plant, rock, radio wave, light wave, and gravity wave.

.

[babushka]

Not having any sort of background in Victorian Occultism, most of the above just flies right over my head as if spoken in an obscure dialect of Martian. Especially the parts hinting at Hinduism, Zoroastrainism, Kabbalism, and any permutations of those foreign and esoteric "isms" ("Ahriman", anyone?) as Victorian Occultists were wont to do.


Really, all - the entire universe including you - is just the interplay of energies... every person, tree, bush, plant, rock, radio wave, light wave, and gravity wave.

.

Sounds to me like you understand just fine. Nothing these authors say is unique to them, it's the same stuff a million other people has written about or said since the dawn of time.

I did actually find the method written down, the issue is if I say do this and that and it looks so and so and what not then immediately others copy it and make up stories and the whole thing gets diluted into pseudo whatever. Sometimes I wonder if it's done on purpose to discredit people.

Ectoplasm is just a name made to describe a phenomena, so is mist or light beings or shadow entities. We don't know what the "stuff" is so we just give it the name we have as a description (or make one up). It's an attempt at rationalizing the irrational. We don't refer to each other as made of flesh, we refer to persons and leave the rest up to the proverbial gods and assume the learned ones knows a thing or two more, the spirit is not plasma it's a spirit. We all know what flesh is, what it tastes like what it looks like how it works..no we don't know how it works, we look and we just find more questions, a bit of the puzzle here and there but never the whole. We fail at that and then try and apply the same failed process to the ethereal.

[Ninurta]

Sounds to me like you understand just fine. Nothing these authors say is unique to them, it's the same stuff a million other people has written about or said since the dawn of time.

I did actually find the method written down, the issue is if I say do this and that and it looks so and so and what not then immediately others copy it and make up stories and the whole thing gets diluted into pseudo whatever. Sometimes I wonder if it's done on purpose to discredit people.

Ectoplasm is just a name made to describe a phenomena, so is mist or light beings or shadow entities. We don't know what the "stuff" is so we just give it the name we have as a description (or make one up). It's an attempt at rationalizing the irrational. We don't refer to each other as made of flesh, we refer to persons and leave the rest up to the proverbial gods and assume the learned ones knows a thing or two more, the spirit is not plasma it's a spirit. We all know what flesh is, what it tastes like what it looks like how it works..no we don't know how it works, we look and we just find more questions, a bit of the puzzle here and there but never the whole. We fail at that and then try and apply the same failed process to the ethereal.

They should probably start thinking in terms of interacting energy clumps rather than in terms of concrete matter, because matter at it's most basic level is not really solid like they seem to be thinking.

An example: science has been arguing for decades on what "consciousness" is. Many brain scientists, probably the vast majority, are thinking in terms of concrete matter, which leads them to the conclusion that "consciousness" is generated in the brain, by action of neurons. They can't explain HOW that works, but just claim it does.

I don't think "consciousness" - what make you uniquely you - is generated in the brain at all. I think it exists outside the body, in the aether if you will, and the brain is just a translation organ to facilitate communication between the consciousness and the body, and by extension the rest of the physical world. The brain and body allow us to interact with "reality"as we know it, the physical world, but it does not actually contain us per se.

If that's the case, then certainly there are other "consciousnesses" out there, without benefit of brain or body, just floating around, existing, and only rarely stumbling upon some alternate mechanism to interact with the physical world. Some of those probably exist in this universe, or dimension, or what have you, but others... others may be crossing different universe or dimension boundaries through some mechanism that we, being bound to this one by our brains and bodies, cannot fully comprehend.

Notice I said "bound" by our brains and bodies, not "limited to" by them. Some people have a spark of an ability to detect those others, whether in this universe or crossing universal boundaries. That ability is not "paranormal", it's more "hypernormal" - extending beyond the normal most of us can detect into other "normals". It's not "supernatural" as in above nature,  it's "hypernatural", extending into all areas of nature that some others either can't, or won't detect.

Discussions of ectoplasm seem to be mainly confined to the Victorian Era, among occultists and spiritualists. I've never seen a photo of it from that period that I am willing to trust as genuine, but that don't mean that some "fakers" weren't trying to represent, in a limited way, some real phenomena that other folks were actually observing with their own (made of energies, detecting other energies) sensory apparatuses.

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[babushka]

Notice I said "bound" by our brains and bodies, not "limited to" by them. Some people have a spark of an ability to detect those others, whether in this universe or crossing universal boundaries. That ability is not "paranormal", it's more "hypernormal" - extending beyond the normal most of us can detect into other "normals". It's not "supernatural" as in above nature,  it's "hypernatural", extending into all areas of nature that some others either can't, or won't detect.

Discussions of ectoplasm seem to be mainly confined to the Victorian Era, among occultists and spiritualists. I've never seen a photo of it from that period that I am willing to trust as genuine, but that don't mean that some "fakers" weren't trying to represent, in a limited way, some real phenomena that other folks were actually observing with their own (made of energies, detecting other energies) sensory apparatuses.

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"can't, or won't detect" a little bit of both. I take a utilitarian view on it, we need a semblance of normal to survive. I'm not in a position to discount the supernatural but I do think generally we are capable of doing just more. Some of the ESP and PK effects are just as you said hyper-normal and it's that way until it becomes normal.

Rudolf Steiner so far is the most interesting person and I need to checkout the other authors, but I feel the 'ectoplasm' topic is pretty much dead from my side. If I find anything interesting from the others I will post.

My main grievance with 'ectoplasm' is that the methods described are not for producing ectoplasm because I happen to know those practices and the photo's just seems fake and not matching lore. If it looks like cheesecloth, it's probably cheesecloth and the gross look is the contents of the persons stomach that swallowed it or whatever they do. It was described in one account as coming out like a string and then later became gross..

[babushka]

The occult observer is able to see a continual streaming from outside into the brain, and also in the reverse direction, from the brain to the heart. Now these streams, which in sleeping man come from outside, from cosmic space, from the Macrocosm, and flow into the inner constitution of the physical body and etheric bodies lying in the bed, reveal something remarkable when they are investigated. These rays vary greatly in different individuals. Sleeping human beings differ very drastically from one another, and if those who are a little vain only knew how badly they betray themselves to occult observation when they go to sleep during public gatherings, they would try their level best not to let this happen!

https://rsarchive.org/Lectures/EthBld_index.html

Rudolf Steiner

This was one of the passages that stuck out to me. I have seen some crazy things fly in out of people while they sleep, most disturbing, couldn't agree with him more.