EARTHCODE NEWSLETTER

February 3, 2006 Issue: #332

Lost Star of Myth & Time

. . . Rediscovery of the Golden Age

. . . plus Google Search Engine Inside Your Mind

. . . and NASA and a Savant's Amazing Brain

and other News, Humor & Fun Stuff

“It is the stars, the stars above us, that govern our conditions.”
--- William Shakespeare (World's most influential Playwright and Poet, 1564-1616)

* Skip to Lost Star of Myth and Time
* Skip to Google Search Engine Inside Your Mind
* Skip to NASA and a Savant's Amazing Brain
* Skip to Cosmic Quotes

Greetings!

"Ancient folklore from around the world rings with two resonating themes: History moves in cycles with alternating Golden and Dark Ages, and the slow movement of the stars across the sky, the Precession of the Equinox, is the cause and timekeeper of these cycles.

"For years we have heard that these are only myths, there was no Golden Age and precession is just a wobbling of the Earth’s axis. Now Lost Star of Myth and Time shows evidence the Ancients were not just weaving fanciful tales.

"Science is on the verge of an amazing discovery: our Sun has a companion star carrying us through a great cycle of stellar influences. If true, it means the Ancients were right and our views of space and time and the history of civilization will never be the same. More than that, it would mean we are now at the dawn of a new age in human development and world conditions." --- Lost Star of Myth and Time

The Golden Age of Planet Earth

Was there a Golden Age in our ancient past?

Will there be another Golden Age in our future?

Even though we were taught that the Golden Age was only a myth of old folklore or conjured up by eccentric philosophers, many of the world's most respected ancient texts - as well as history's most celebrated scholars - refer to a Golden Age as a very real and bygone era on Earth.

Over the years, complex technologies have been unearthed in the ruins of cultures thousands of years old - technologies that rival modern day knowledge, skill, tools and devices.

Advanced calculations of star systems; sophisticated ecological practices; superior awareness of consciousness have emerged from eras that conventional science claims were the ages of prehistoric and primitive cavemen.

The pride in not relinquishing superiority seems to out strip our sensibility when it comes to delving more deeply into the truth of earth's past: contemporary researchers are quick to debunk what they themselves have not studied, researched or discovered.

Some folks just hate to be wrong! They will defend an idea, a belief, a theory long after mounting evidence - or common sense - proves otherwise.

Walter Cruttenden, author of the fascinating book Lost Star of Myth and Time, has courageously tackled a colossal and controversial topic that may prove to be a major breakthrough in understanding the evolution of humankind. Through a tremendous amount of research on ancient cultures and the Precession of the Equinox ... Walter provides substantial data that shows how the slow movement of stars across the skies - and in particular one very significant star - not only influences our solar system but also dramatically impacts and alters human consciousness.

One brilliant star may turn out to be a forgotten companion of a vastly long and laborious binary orbit - an elliptical dance - with our own Sun.

How could a star so far away have such a powerful effect on human consciousness? How is it that ancient cultures had technology, knowledge, abilities and skills that rival - and in some cases even surpass - much of what we know and have in modern times?

Legends of super beings, creator gods and fantastic creatures are not just fairy tales for entertainment ... but may actually be real events and real inhabitants of a time on earth in which such an existence was not only possible but a normal and natural phenomena initiated by celestial influence.

Major cycles hundreds and thousands of years long were initiated by these celestial motions. Westerners will recognize these cycles as the Iron Age, Bronze Age, Silver Age and Golden Age. In the ancient Veda scriptures they are known as the Kali Yuga, Dwapara Yuga, Treta Yuga and Satya Yuga. These were ... and still are ... actual eras that were influenced by far away yet powerful objects in the sky.

Walter Cruttenden presents convincing evidence that the ancients understood the progression and influence of the ages and knew well the important star and its significant impact on human consciousness. Not only that, the ancients knew thousands of years ago that humanity would plunge into a very dark and dismal period of forgetfulness.

Could it be that long-standing monuments found throughout the world were intentionally built and left behind by the ancients as a deliberate legacy for us - their descendants?

Legacies of faded messages are finally being understood - little by little - to be far more than tales of myths and legends. They are, instead, a series of signs, of "maps", of prophecies specifically designed to lead us out of darkness and to find our way back to a peaceful and magnificient era. What better time than now to give us hope that humanity will once again awaken from forgetfulness, rise up and return to a glorious Golden Age.

Below is my interview with Walter Cruttenden. I am most grateful for his willingness to spend time in sharing his views, vision and aspirations.

Namaste' ~ Paula Peterson

* Skip to Lost Star of Myth and Time

C O S M I C Q U O T E S

"Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life.

"Don't be trapped by dogma - which is living with the results of other people's thinking.

"Don't let the noise of other's opinions drown out your own inner voice.

"And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary."

--- Steve Jobs (American Entrepreneur and Co-Founder of Apple Computer)

LOST STAR
of MYTH and TIME

An Interview with author
Walter Cruttenden

by Paula Peterson

PJP: I was totally fascinated with your book, and regretted finishing it. I wanted it to go on and on.

And so I'm eager to know what inspired you to write about this topic to begin with?

WC: When I was a boy I was especially interested in lost cities, sunken treasures and stuff like that - which I suppose most boys are interested in. Although for me, it became a near obsession to read every book I could find on the great civilizations of antiquity. My mother was understanding and very supportive. This helped a lot.

Once in school, however, I was taught that society had evolved upward in a linear fashion from a primitive state with each culture building one upon the other. But all along I had been reading about the great civilizations of the ancient past: Babylon, Sumer, Akkad, Egypt, Crete, Harappa, Mojenjodaro in the Indus Valley and others around the world. They were sophisticated cultures, yet they began a slow decline for thousands of years culminating in the great Dark Age.

This long decline did not fit with the linear progression taught in school. That set my passion in motion and I wrestled with the problem for years. I didn't see any logical solution until I was around the age of thirty when I came upon a book called "The Holy Science" by Sri Yukteswar. He was the first scholar I found who wrote that civilization was cyclical and there was a good reason for it.

The more I read, I found that there were many mythologies and cultural beliefs all around the world that referred to a grand cycle, something Plato called the Great Year. This included the myths of the Hopi and the Mayan as well as the Mithraic and ancient Vedic scriptures. This inspired me to form the Binary Research Institute.

PJP: Basically, then, you followed your heart. You stuck with your intuition and passion and you forged ahead. Luckily, you had good support that helped to move things along.

WC: Yes... I had sold my businesses so I was in a position to just have some fun. Doing this research became something I had to do.

PJP: If you have a passion you've got to live it or else your life just doesn't feel right.

WC: Yeah ... it's like air to breathe!

PJP: Have your theories been well received so far?

WC: Well ... I'd say that the new thought movement and the alternative science folks are very open because it tends to be complementary to some of their work. Take for instance the conferences we've been presenting with Graham Hancock, John Anthony West, John Major Jenkins; these are well-educated and knowledgeable men who have embraced these ideas rather quickly and have all lectured on how the ancients were so advanced.

Whereas with more traditionalists, it's moving pretty slowly due to predominant skepticism. But heck, that's not too unusual at this time.

PJP: That's why I'm moved to showcase pioneers like you on my website; highly educated and intelligent people that bring ideas to light that were once considered unbelievable or mere fantasy. When well-learned researchers like yourself back up your theories with hardcore scientific research, archeological evidence and so forth, then the strange and mysterious become far more credible to the public.

I think your work is phenomenal. And a lot of other people are going to feel the same once they take the plunge into your book.

WC: I've received some very nice messages from regular folks. I had one from a schoolteacher after she had watched our PBS documentary, "The Great Year" narrated by James Earl Jones, which introduces the subject of the Golden Age. When the documentary was over, she found herself crying and didn't know why. She then realized that when she was a little girl she had believed in the Golden Age but was taught against it in school. So her intuition had been right all along and "The Great Year" documentary validated her feelings.

PJP: Unfortunately, we're not taught to rely on our intuition. So we end up listening to everyone else tell us what to think, what to feel and how to live --- and we forget.

WC: So true.

PJP: Regarding the theory of cycles as it pertains to humanity, it takes thousands of years to go from a low age to a high age and back again. Please explain how this works.

WC: Yes, here's one way to look at it: cycles on Earth are caused by celestial motion. The Earth spinning on its axis gives us the cycle of night and day; the Earth orbiting the Sun gives us the cycle of the seasons. Of course these first two motions are well known yet few of us are conscious of how profoundly they affect all life.

There is an even larger celestial motion, heretofore unrecognized, that causes an even larger cycle. Within this greater 24,000-year cycle we are clearly rising up from the darkest era of human existence and are currently in an ascending phase. This is caused by the third motion of the Earth; the precession of the equinox.

While most now believe precession is due to the tug of the Moon upon the oblate Earth our research shows it is due to our Sun’s motion around a companion star. The result is the cycle of the Great Year. It affects consciousness as we will discuss and it was known to cultures throughout the ancient world. We are currently in the ascending cycle of the Great Year meaning we are now moving to a higher age.

PJP: Now the names for the different ages that you write about ... these are Indian Sanskrit names?

WC: Yes. The Kali Yuga, the lowest, then the Dwapara Yuga, the Treta Yuga and finally the Satya or highest Yuga. These are Sanskrit and go way back to the ancient Vedas. The Greek names are more familiar to the Western world: Iron Age, Bronze Age, Silver Age and Golden Age respectively.

The Mayans called the cycles Suns while the Hopis called them Worlds. All the different cultures talk about these cycles in a slightly different way.

PJP: Since these cycles are vast and span several thousands of years, it seems that it would take an enlightened consciousness to genuinely grasp and effectively work within such far reaching concepts. Are we evolving towards that kind of consciousness? Or is this a domain reserved only for God?

WC: Well ... I think you're hitting the nail on the head … its all about consciousness. The orbital motion causes an interaction between the Earth and another star and it changes our ionosphere, magnetosphere and probably other subtle Earth energies (that we are just beginning to understand).

This is because all stars are huge generators of electromagnetic energy, just like our Sun. There is good science to show that these can indirectly affect consciousness. It is this cyclical change in the energies of the Earth and the consciousness of living creatures that causes the various ages of the Great Year. Still, I don't think we can even conceive at this point of the tremendous difference in consciousness that takes place between a Dark Age and a Golden Age.

The higher ages are so much nicer: not because they're dramatically different physically but because we perceive ourselves so differently and the whole world reflects this higher consciousness and greater attunement with nature.

PJP: I can eagerly embrace the idea of humans achieving a vastly expanded consciousness, but many people can't - which really baffles me. Do people have a harder time conceiving of such possibilities because the density of the lower ages actually inhibits the capability of the human mind to grasp such expanded ideas?

WC: It seems so. The Cloak of Maya - the illusion of the lower ages - is pretty thick. There are good reasons for this when our Earth is so far away from certain energies but the result is that currently most people still believe that they are only a physical body and that we're living in a strictly physical universe of solid matter.

Fortunately, we've now moved out of the lowest age, or the farthest point in our orbit, and we are climbing upward into the next higher age of Dwapara and people are now realizing that matter is not so solid and even atoms and molecules are essentially made of energy. These ideas haven't quite trickled into mass consciousness yet, but I think we're getting there and some physicists are helping to lead the way.

The fact is, we are energy beings and science is finally beginning to prove this. Folks like you have this kind of important information available on your website while others are writing books on the topic. Won't that be an interesting time when we can finally recognize this as a reality?

PJP: Thankfully, we've already moved past a lot of barriers, borders and old concepts. What is the most important aspect of your work that will benefit humankind?

WC: Well, I'm trying to convey the point that the cycles are real. There is a great deal of evidence that people have known about these cycles for a very long time. And when you understand the Great Year cycle and look at history in this way then puzzling historical finds make a lot more sense.

Such as finding anomalous artifacts like the Antikythera Device: a complex, 2000-year old geared mechanism that effectively calculated the motion of stars. It should not have existed in 80BC! And then there is the ancient Babylon Batteries; these too are out of place with the current paradigm of history that teaches the battery was not invented until the 1700s by Volta.

The ancients also had an understanding of the human brain nearly 6000 years ago and archaeologists have found trepanation devices used to perform intricate brain surgery. These are just a few examples of anomalous artifacts that only make sense in the context of cyclical history. We have them, we lose them, then they come back.

Nevertheless, the world is basically Western-science oriented when it comes to these matters. That is why I put a lot of emphasis into the actual science and hard evidence behind the cycles: I want to give these ideas a broader appeal.

In the long term, I would like to see this information eventually taught in schools again. Long ago everyone accepted that there was a grand cycle thousands of years long. But when the Dark Age view took over and claimed that the world and all of creation started only 6000 years ago, much of the ancient knowledge was forgotten or purposely destroyed in medieval times.

Then the Darwinian view came into vogue, and I do believe in evolution, but because of myopic interpretation it necessitated the belief that we all evolved just recently from brute cavemen and therefore all primitive cultures must be inferior.

In its current popular form evolution does not recognize how subtle energies or cosmic movements have a cyclical influence on the Earth and man’s consciousness. But understanding the celestial motions and the cycles they cause can bring sanity back to the interpretation of world history.

PJP: After reading your book, I gather that it’s still not clear which star or planetary mass our Sun might be in a binary system with? Is there a guess or theory that it might be Sirius? Or the Pleiades?

WC: Basically there are two scenarios. First, there is the Classic Newtonian viewpoint which suggests that if we are in a binary system, then the binary object can't be very far away if the orbit period is around 24, 0000 years. Then it depends upon how heavy that other star or object is. Considering the Astronomical Units of distance between the earth and the Sun a star or object would have to be pretty close ... a lot closer than any visible star. Therefore, it’s probably a brown dwarf star, black hole or some planet type mass that is not visible to our eyes.

PJP: So it might be a mass that's not easily detected and that's why it hasn't been determined which it is yet?

WC: Yes ... according to Newtonian theory, that is. There are several scientists currently exploring facets of this very idea called Nemisis: John Anderson at JPL, Muller at UC Berkeley, Whitmire and Matese at University of Louisiana, etc.

But then there is another scenario: it could be a visible star. However, this takes us into a riskier but more fascinating theory of the universe.

The reason we can explore such an idea is due to what has been recently discovered: that gravity tends to behave more and more strangely the further an object travels beyond our own solar system. We've sent several spacecraft, such as Pioneer 10 and 11, out to the edge of our solar system.

Oddly enough, they are consistently off course by a significant amount, which indicates that gravity works differently way out there. And if gravity does indeed work differently - which might explain the quirky nature of dark matter and how galaxies hold together - then it becomes more possible to consider that we're in a binary relationship with a visible star - even a star many light years away. This, then, would coincide with many myths and folklore that mention Sirius as being in relationship to our Sun.

PJP: There does seem to be a whole lot of information in the ancient texts that point to Sirius as being most important.

WC: Sure does.

PJP: I like the idea personally!

WC: It is intriguing. Sirius was known as the all important and revered “Isis” to the ancient Egyptians: they built temples to Isis and wrote about Isis in myth and folklore: "She is the bringer of life and takes it away . . ."

Interestingly, this has been interpreted that the rising of Sirius/Isis marks the seasonal Nile River floods which annually restores life to the deserts of Egypt. However, it is possible the early Egyptians (higher age) were talking about something far grander and much larger in scale.

If Sirius is our Sun's binary companion, then it is Sirius that drives precession and indirectly awakens human consciousness and restores the Golden Age when its orbital path is closest to us - and indirectly plunges humanity into darkness once more when it moves farthest away.

PJP: How is it that these cycles and a distant star can affect our consciousness?

WC: This is a big subject and I would refer people to Chapter 6 of my book Lost Star of Myth and Time but here is a quick answer.

It was once commonly thought that the brain was completely chemical and that we're strictly biological animals. To think a thought required that the brain had to release a chemical from one side and it has to float on over to the other side and do this over and over.

Then, in the last 20 - 30 years, brain function was thought to be an electro-chemical process, instead.

Recently, some researchers are saying that our brain may function within a subtle electromagnetic field of consciousness because we can think of many thoughts very quickly. It’s more like electrical signals that zip from one side of the brain to the other. Subtle energies, waveforms and EM fields can affect these signals. Even the likes of ABC News has reported that electrical or magnetic stimulation of the brain can affect speech, depression, etc.

TMS, Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation, and the work of Valerie Hunt at UCLA and other experiments show that brain function and therefore consciousness is influenced direct or indirect EM. We know stars are huge generators of EM so we can start to see why the Sun and orbital motions could have a cyclical affect on consciousness. But this is still speculative science and we have a lot to learn to truly understand the mechanisms of the cycle. Nevertheless, there does seem to be some gravitational connection between our solar system and the nearby Sirius system. Take the Homann's experiment for example . . .

PJP: Oh yes, I read that in your book and I was totally blown away.

WC: They have been measuring the Earth’s motion relative to Sirius since the late 1980’s and were able to detect a fluctuation in the Earth's rotational speed when Sirius B - the small companion star - passed in front of Sirius A.

PJP: That is amazing that their device was able to detect this effect. Then it begins to make sense that if a star that far away affected the Earth's rotation then it could very likely affect the Earth, humankind or consciousness, too, even from very far away.

WC: It is fascinating. Plus they don't detect any precession of the Earth relative to Sirius, which is exactly what you would expect if we were in a binary system.

It’s a little complicated but let me use this analogy: if you and I are on opposite ends of the same merry-go-round, we always have the same relationship to each other as we go round and round. However, all our friends standing outside the merry-go-round seem to be whizzing by. As I look at you, their images pass quickly behind you. Or as you look at me they whiz past behind me. This is how Sirius appears to behave. It apparently maintains its position relative to our system and all other stars appear to precess across the sky. But in this model, worked out at BRI, precession is due to the geometric effect of a solar system that curves through space, not a wobbling axis.

PJP: Well ... considering all the beautiful inspiration around Sirius, its my hope that this star turns out to be our Sister Star.

Where do you see your work going next? Do you have plans to take your project even further?

WC: We are currently offering the Galileo Awards. These are cash awards given to those who do meaningful work in this area. We want to inspire students, astronomers and astrophysicist to help figure out this whole precession-binary-gravity issue. So the next step is in getting the word out. Once there is more research underway, I think it will lead to a better appreciation of ancient knowledge– and maybe eventually change our view of history.

PJP: So it has to be accomplished by some one who is passionate about it ... and does the work because they love it. What about your work excites you the most and gets you totally inspired?

WC: When there are new archeological finds that support our research or when I receive e-mails from people that have new insights on precession or the binary theory.

For example, the recent find near the coast in Peru of a group of pyramids that surround a huge plaza. It’s just massive. The Pyramids are 70 feet high and they have kiva like structures built around them. We didn't think that kivas came along until the Pueblo cultures three thousand years later. Yet here they are.

These pyramids are well carbon dated because many of the rocks were put into baskets that were made out of vines that eventually became sealed between these rocks. And so there is good plant material for dating. Further tests show that this is a vine that only grows seasonally once a year. So there is no mistaking the time it lived. They've recently nailed the date: the pyramids are 4700 years old.

The Great Pyramid at Giza is thought to be 4300 years old. So now you have pyramids in the western hemisphere that are older than the Great Pyramid. So it blows the old “Out-of-Africa” and “Cradle of Civilization or Fertile Crescent” theories: Civilization and pyramid building apparently started just as early in the Americas as anywhere else in the world.

PJP: It seems to be a continuing trend where the latest archeological findings keep blowing the old theories right out of the water.

In regards to the age of the Great Pyramid, there have been speculations that it is far older - more like around 10,000 years old. Could that be a possibility?

WC: I doubt it but it is not impossible. Not because the construction that we now see may be that much older but because archeologists are realizing that many pyramids are built on older sites. This is particularly true at Teotihuacan in Mexico, the largest pyramid in the western hemisphere. I think they've now found eleven different stages of building underneath - even one under some ancient volcanic flow.

The well-known Egyptian symbolist, John Anthony West, said that some of the Egyptian pyramids seemed to have been built on top of older sites. So the sites apparently are sacred and they're building over on top of them again and again.

And of course Robert Schoch - a well-known geologist - has some very interesting insights about the Sphinx. He points out that there are vertical water erosion marks on the Sphinx. In other words, the sides of the Sphinx cavity are deeply eroded in great trenches where they first cut out the stone to build the Sphinx. The erosion was caused by rainfall and water dripping down over a very long period of time. This is limestone and so they know from the rates of dripping water how long it would take to create this kind of erosion.

And since there hasn't been any significant rainfall there in thousands of years, it becomes a good indication that the Sphinx and possibly the base of a few pyramids are older than originally thought.

PJP: That's pretty exciting. What are they going to discover next!

WC: They keep pushing the dates further and further back. When I was a little boy we were taught that 5000 years ago man was a hunter-gatherer. Now with Hauptmann’s new find in Gobekli Tepe, Turkey, fifty ton “carved” pillars appear to be at least 9000 to 11,000 years ago. So does this mean that primitive cave men were building temples? I don’t think so.

PJP: In regards to carbon dating, does it have to be pretty specific to be accurate? And is this still pretty much the method used for dating material?

WC: Its pretty much the main method for calculating the age of things back to a certain point in near history. However, it only works if there is material available from something that had been living. They cannot carbon date rock or metal - unless there is more recent plant material imbedded in it or found alongside it. It sometimes happens that if they come across a piece of wood at a site, they can speculate that old wood was used to build the structure ... or the wood got in there by mistake. There are 101 reasons to disqualify the age of a site.

PJP: I'm very impressed with your book and very much enjoyed this interview. In closing, what more would you like us to know?

WC: Well ... we hear so much these days that the Earth is moving into a higher age of expanding consciousness but few understand why.

My hope is to bring back the ancient understanding of the Great Year cycle (seen as the precession of the equinox), so that people can know there is a cosmological reason why consciousness is expanding: As our Sun accelerates towards its companion star it carries the Earth into a region of space rich in electromagnetic beneficence.

This force, talked about in Lost Star, affects our ionosphere, magnetosphere and our very consciousness which enables us to perceive more and more. Consequently a great metamorphosis is taking place on planet Earth - we are beginning to awaken!

Although we are still much closer to the Dark Age, and have a lot to learn, I am very optimistic about the future. Certainly individuals can help or hinder the awakening, by living in tune or out of tune with the subtle energies of nature. Thus, it is important that we all make an effort.

But just as the orbiting Earth brings us into a new spring every year without our trying – so once again is the Cosmos itself, carrying us into the next Golden Age. She is so sweet!!

WALTER CRUTTENDEN is an amateur theoretical archaeo-astronomer and author of the binary theory of precession. As Executive Director of the Binary Research Institute he researches the celestial mechanics of the precession of the equinox, as well as myth and folklore related to this phenomenon.

He is the writer-producer of The Great Year, a PBS broadcast documentary film (narrated by James Earl Jones) that explores evidence of astronomical cycles of time known to cultures throughout the ancient world.

Most recently Cruttenden wrote Lost Star of Myth and Time, a book that provides an alternative view of history based on the solar system’s motion through space. It is his belief that the myth and folklore depicting a repeating cycle of Golden Ages and Dark Ages may have a basis in fact, due to the alternating stellar forces that affect Earth as our solar system moves in a 24,000-year binary (dual star) orbit.

THE SEARCH FOR THE BINARY STAR

Cruttenden frequently speaks to groups about the ancient mystery of the precession of the equinox. His talks explain how cutting edge scientific evidence challenges the current theory of precession. Due to the work of Cruttenden and others, interest in ancient knowledge and solar system theory is on the rise as more people become aware of the importance of our present Age and the potential it holds for humankind.

Cruttenden founded the Galileo Awards to further stimulate research and interest in precession and help in the search for our Sun’s binary companion. Cruttenden was featured on several television and radio programs, including CNBC, CNFN, KOCE.

Visit Walter's website:

http://www.LostStarBook.com

(The usual features - HUMOR BREAK, FUNNY PHOTOS and other FUN STUFF - are further below)

NASA Studies Savant's Amazing Brain

by Robin McKie, Science Editor

The Observer

It took Kim Peek just over an hour to read Tom Clancy's The Hunt for Red October. Four months later, when asked to give the name of the book's Russian radio operator, Peek quoted the entire relevant passage.

It was a prodigious feat. Yet for Peek - the real-life 'savant' on whom Dustin Hoffman's character in the film Rain Man is based - such recall only gives a glimpse of his powers.

He knows 9,000 books off by heart; he can direct people around US cities from maps he has memorised years ago; and he has total recall of the dates of all major world events.

Now studies of Peek's abilities are being used by scientists to shed intriguing light on the human mind, and to open the way for men and women to exploit far more of their intellectual potential, as the latest issue of Scientific American reveals.

'Kim's story tells us that the human brain is far more flexible than we had thought,' said Darold Treffert, a psychiatrist and co-author of the Scientific American paper told The Observer. 'Like many other savants, he has suffered disability in one area of his brain, but has compensated by acquiring remarkable new abilities in other areas. This shows we all have considerable hidden intellectual potential. By studying Kim and other savants, we can learn how to tap those powers.'

This potential has been of particular interest to Nasa - currently carrying out lengthy electronic scans of Kim's brain in its attempts to understand how astronauts are using their brains while on deep space missions.

Kim - now 54 - was born with a malformed cerebellum, at the base of his brain, and lacks a corpus callosum, the thick bundle of nerves that normally connects the brain's two hemispheres. As a child he was assumed to be suffering from severe mental retardation. Only later was his condition found to be more complex. He had superb abilities at arithmetic but could not deal with the abstractions of mathematics. In 1988 he was given an IQ rating of 87, well below average. Yet some of his subscores were in the genius bracket, while others plunged into the mentally retarded range.

Kim has poor physical co-ordination, cannot button his shirts but has remarkable memory power and has started to develop as an accomplished pianist in the last two years. This latest development - in a man in his 50s with large chunks of his brain missing - is particularly significant, added Treffert. 'His brain is still adapting to his condition, even in mid-life.'

One key to understanding Kim's condition is that his right and left brain hemispheres are not connected. Our left brain, in which our linguistic prowess has its centre, tends to dominate our right. That has not happened with Kim, however, suggesting the possibility that his right brain has been allowed to develop more freely and reach a greater potential than normal.

Kim displays little personal interest in people outside the arithmetical details of their lives. When I talked to him by phone in his home in Salt Lake City last week, he asked for my birthday. I told him. 'Ah, you were born on a Sunday, your next birthday will be a Sunday, and you are scheduled to retire on a Thursday,' he replied, correctly.

'He remembers 98 per cent of what he reads,' said his father Fran. 'It's like downloading data on to a hard disk - except his never crashes.'

Visit Mind Power News:

http://www.mindpowernews.com/RealRainMan.htm