“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

(Jane had no questions, relying instead upon Seth to come through with pertinent information about her present physical condition, which continues to show improvement. She continues and extends her walking each day, her exercises, etc.

(Seth goes into a couple of other topics also, which I’ll do notes for at the time of mention.)

(“Good evening, Seth.”)

(Here Seth refers to an article by Donald Hebb, a Canadian psychologist, who wrote in Psychology Today for November, 1978 about the decline in his own cognitive abilities. He was busily tracing these out as he aged—he’s now 74—in order to prove out his own theory of aging and senility, about which he’s evidently written extensively. He makes no reference in his writing to the part the negative suggestions he constantly gives himself may have to do with his growing forgetful state—rather amazing, we’d say. The man is regarded as a leading authority, unfortunately; we wonder how many students he’s inculcated with the same negative thinking over the years of his teaching career. The article is on file.)

There are developments nearly ready, and I want him to remember once again the playfulness of creativity at all levels, including the physical. Peoples’ problems may be source material, but you must not dwell on them. They must be turned off, so that the creative abilities can transform them in their own way.

(Seth’s information on President Carter was unexpected by us, since we hadn’t asked for anything like it. However, it fits in with much of our questioning of late, in connection with the Middle East peace talks these past few months, and the behavior of the three who met at the summit, held at Camp David: Carter, President Sadat of Egypt, and Prime Minister Begin of Israel. Recently Jane and I found it the height of irony that Begin and Sadat were jointly awarded the Nobel Peace Prize—evidently, we sarcastically concluded, because after thirty years of fighting Israel and Egypt weren’t shooting at each other—at least for the moment.

(Another point I want to mention in connection with Seth’s material earlier in the session on psychology: His reference on page 3 to “evolutionary science” stems probably from our reading lately an article on Robert Jastrow, an astronomer connected with NASA. Jastrow cites the big bang theory of the creation of the universe as a proven fact, whereas it’s only the latest theory, as far as we know. The article, in Penthouse for November 1978, is on file. In it Jastrow goes on to talk about how silicon-based computer life is going to replace man and his messy emotions—theories quite in keeping with current “scientific” thinking about man’s innate worthlessness and his accidental creation. Jastrow thinks we’ve reached a dead end in terms of evolution. A note: Seth gave an excellent answer to Jastrow’s kind of thinking two years ago in either chapter 7 or 8 of Psyche.