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  For society as a whole, perhaps the most terrifying and destructive of future drugs will be those that will relieve a person’s guilt feelings. Dr. Konrad Lorenz, one of the world’s leading psychological researchers, has said that such a drug would be insane. It would, he said, result in “the disappearance of the last safeguards that protect some of us from sadism and homicidal tendencies.” It is also easy to see that this drug will free persons under conviction by God for sin and wrongdoing. In the dark days to come, people will no longer be held back by conscience and conviction. Drugs will blot out the last vestiges of morality and restraint. The pangs of conscience will be felt no more.

  ACHIEVING GODHOOD THROUGH DRUGS

  Even more frightening is the promotion of illegal drug use by some groups as a means of altering one’s consciousness. The use of psychedelic drugs, especially LSD, is highly recommended by those who believe that through these drugs the individual can get in touch with his inner self, connect with the Universal Mind, and communicate with spirit guides. Drug highs are thought to be ideal for beginners and initiates who seek to “begin their journey to self-awareness, creativity, mind power, and godhood.”

  In The Aquarian Conspiracy, New Age author Marilyn Ferguson cautiously extols the virtues of psychedelic drugs. She suggests that more advanced students can achieve the same results, after training, through meditation and other psychotechnologies; but she hastens to add, “It is impossible to overestimate the historic role of psychedelics as an entry point.” 3

  Ferguson notes that during the 1960s, illegal drugs played a pivotal role in acquainting record numbers of persons with the transformative religious qualities of New Age thinking:

  For tens of thousands of left-brained engineers, chemists, psychologists, and medical students who never before understood their more spontaneous, imaginative right-brained brethren, the drugs were a pass to Xanadu, especially in the 1960s. As one chronicler of the 60s remarked, “LSD gave a whole generation a religious experience.” 4

  According to the accounts documented by Ferguson and other writers, many people believe psychedelic drugs help them to achieve unity with “God”—the universe. Ferguson quotes one drug experimenter as saying, “I learned from LSD about alternative realities—and suddenly all bibles made sense.” 5

  The side effects and dangers of illegal mind-altering drugs give many experimenters pause. While some continue to praise the virtues of psychedelic substances, others have turned to psychotechnology as a safer passage to god status. However, if new, safer mind-altering drugs are discovered, and if governments can be persuaded to abolish laws prohibiting their free use, future generations are increasingly likely to turn to such substances, viewing drug ingestion as a “quick ticket to paradise.” A future society—only a few decades away at most—can realistically be conceived in which only the “weirdos”—Christian evangelicals and fundamentalists and others—would refuse to take legally sanctioned, psychedelic mind drugs.

  CAN DRUGS HEAL OUR MEMORIES?

  Persons suffering from depression often turn to psychotropic drugs for relief. There are prescription drugs—antidepressants and mood-changers—that do offer beneficial relief from attacks of depression. Especially helped are acute manic-depressives, individuals who are inexplicably inflicted with deep, dark moods. There is no doubt that such drugs are needed and should be made available by physicians when medical circumstances dictate.

  However, the abuse of antidepressants or any other drug that alters mood and consciousness can prove extremely damaging to one’s psychological well-being. Chemicals—whether they be antidepressants, tranquilizers, or alcohol—can be harmful if used to erase or blot from the memory life’s disappointments and mental pains and the recollection of negative experiences. No chemical should be used simply to help one “forget.”

  A number of psychologists and psychiatrists are using drugs and shock therapy, as well as questionable psychotechnologies such as visualization and meditation, to help sufferers erase from their consciousness the thoughts in their conscious or subconscious that currently plague them. By erasing these thoughts, it is believed that “healing of the memories” will occur. Healing of the memories is even advocated by a few Christian psychologists and counselors.

  The danger in a “healing of the memories” is that the human brain is not some type of computer with memories to be erased at will and replaced only with positive information, starting over clean. Certainly we desire that memories of such tragic events as a death of a loved one, a tragic and painful divorce, or a bad deed we feel guilty for be committed to the past. Paul said, “I die daily,” indicating that though each of us faces difficulties, every day is a fresh start, another opportunity to recommit our lives to Christ and to forge a better life for ourselves and our loved ones. For the Christian, each day should be a fresh miracle.

  However, the artificially induced healing of memories is a deception. God does not wish for us to totally erase from our memories all that we’ve experienced. Surely it is far better to remember and learn from our mistakes, to stay awake and know that each day—like yesterday and the day before—we are able to renew our spirits and pledge to do good. Of course, we must guard against an overwhelming guilt that renders us unable to cope. In fact, Jesus died for us on the cross as a redemption for our sins; he took up for us the burden of guilt.

  The point is, God does not want us to have a lobotomy—literally or figuratively; he wants strength, maturity, and character to develop through the example of learning, perseverance, and overcoming. To see the beauty and greatness of flowers that grace a countryside is not to deny that also amidst the flowers might be weeds, chinch bugs, and a bundle of other negatives. The wise lover of nature dwells on the beauty—on the good—but is eager to identify and overcome the bad.

  For example, we rightly perceive that death, war, sickness, lies, and deceit are bad things—things we justly would like to alter or erase from reality. Still, they continue to exist because Satan and the evil of this world are real, and only God can create a new reality. With the aid of drugs, hypnosis, visualization, and other mind-absorbers, we might indeed begin to perceive the world differently. In this case our minds change, but the world remains the same. Some misguided persons have depended on these substances so much that they withdraw from reality altogether, in effect committing mental suicide.

  Some persons want to convince you that through the powers of the mind and through drugs you can create your own reality; but ultimately you can do no more than have confidence in yourself as a person, work to effect positive changes in the world around you, and ask God’s help in changing those negative realities that you cannot yourself alter. Each of us can work for positive change, but we can’t think it into existence. And the use of drugs to permanently alter reality or to heal memories is a dangerous alternative that renders the user little more than the victim of chemical lobotomy.

  CHAPTER FIVE: TECH TOOLS FOR THE ANTICHRIST: THE IRON CLAW OF THE BEAST

  There are many references in the New Testament to the rise of an Antichrist, an incarnation of Satan in human form, in the last days just before the second coming of Jesus. Also called the Beast with the number 666, the Antichrist is described in Revelation 13 as a being who will exercise great world power—so great that he will reign “over all kindreds and tongues and nations.” The Antichrist will perform wonders and deceive the masses by the means of these miracles. Bible prophecy tells us that, once in power, the Antichrist will usher in the tribulation period, a savage time of dictatorial rule in which Christian believers will suffer intense persecution.

  If, as the signs indicate, this is the historical era in which the Antichrist will be elevated to an earthly throne by supernatural forces, it seems clear that he will find in his pantry of terror a vast arsenal of technological tools and devices. In this chapter, we’ll take a look at some of these tech tools, but let me first issue a warning: This is not a pleasant subject. It is not fashionable today to dwell on
the potential negatives of technology—on the specter of technology gone mad in a Dark Age. But evil exists in this world, and it will not go away simply because we choose not to discuss it.

  IS “BIG BROTHER” HERE?

  In George Orwell’s chilling novel 1984, much of the world is in the grip of a leader called “Big Brother.” Strikingly similar to the Antichrist, this evil leader demands people’s total obedience, and he uses every available technological means to control and brutalize the population. In a special issue (January 2, 1984) of U.S. News & World Report, the world depicted in George Orwell’s famous novel was compared with today’s world of high technology. The magazine reported that frightening new tools are increasingly being made available—tools that a future Big Brother might easily choose to use on a tortured society. Examples of these tools include:

  Tiny radio transmitters with microphones the size of a matchhead (available now by mail order for as little as twenty-five dollars).

  Laser beams that can monitor voices through office windows by detecting vibrations from a glass pane.

  Electronic bracelets affixed to the wrists of persons under surveillance. Police are alerted whenever the person leaves his residence without permission. These are now in use in New Mexico to control and monitor the movement of prisoners on restricted parole.

  Cameras on U.S. Air Force spy satellites miles above Earth can now photograph something as small as the license plate number of an auto or the shape of a man’s beard and instantly transmit the picture to a remote screen display.

  Miniature radio transmitters, implantable in humans, that can be activated and traced by skyborne satellites.

  Two-way, interactive cable TV systems backed up by high-speed computers are now in use in a few communities and may be in general use within a decade. Newer, flat-screen TVs that can be hung on the wall will improve the usefulness of such systems.

  Technological advances continue to add new and improved devices to the inventory already available to security and police forces and others responsible for clandestine surveillance. Some are developed for benign reasons. An example is a supersensitive sound detection system recently developed by the U.S. Department of Agriculture to detect the presence of fruit-infesting bugs. The sound system is so sensitive it can detect chewing sounds made by a single day-old insect in a grapefruit. Though the intent of such a system is praiseworthy, it could be of great value in the hands of would-be eavesdroppers listening in on citizens from a remote location.

  Devices developed originally for valid military use could be used for foul purposes. One example is night vision devices. American fighting forces were the first to make use of intensified night vision technology in the 1960s. Special scopes, goggles, and other handheld devices enabled the users to spot enemy forces in near total darkness. Today, that same technology is being adapted in nonmilitary applications. Game wardens in Africa, for example, are using night vision devices to spot poachers who illegally hunt big game under cover of darkness. The devices are also being used by law enforcement agencies, by naturalists studying animal behavior, and by pilots and others who must see in the dark. The Los Angeles Fire Department, for example, fights brush fires at night with helicopters flown by pilots wearing night vision goggles. Night vision devices are also in use by private investigators to spy on citizens on the darkest of nights.

  COMPUTER TECHNOLOGIES

  Computer technologies have particularly amplified the potential for abuse. For example, a new computer chip so tiny it can barely be seen can be placed under a person’s skin with a syringe to serve as a permanent electronic coding or message system. When the chip passes through a magnetic monitoring device, it is read. Manufactured by a California company, these computer chips are currently used to assign high-tech “brands” on cattle and prevent rustling. In the future, say computer experts, they may replace credit cards and other I.D. documents. The chips could be used to identify persons making purchases and to automatically credit or debit their accounts at a financial institution.

  The firm making these identification chips is one of several companies coming out with similar systems. For example, Japan’s giant Toshiba Corporation has developed a new “smart” identification card. The new card can electronically transfer funds to stores and from banks, hold a person’s entire medical—or criminal—history, and serve as a passport, a social security card, or even register a person’s arrival and departure times at airport terminals. Now the size of a regular credit card, future technological advances will allow the card to shrink to a size which allows permanent implantation of the operating chip under the skin of the human body.

  Huge computer data banks are constantly getting bigger. The IRS, the FBI, the CIA, and a number of private firms now have access to hundreds of millions of computer dossiers. In late 1985, the super-secret National Security Agency (NSA) opened a highly classified Supercomputer Research Center in Maryland employing one hundred of the United States’ top computer experts. According to NSA’s director, Lt. Gen. Lincoln Faures, the center, costing an estimated $180 million, will provide “state-of-the-art technological sophistication crucial to the security interests and economic well-being of the United States.” This is a laudable goal. Yet, Senator William Cohen of Maine, in a recent committee hearing on computer abuses, warned, “I think we’re rapidly approaching a society in which the human voice is not going to be heard above the whir of the computer.” 1

  SUPER COPS

  In the October 1985 issue of The Futurist magazine, Dr. James R. Metts, a law enforcement expert from Lexington, South Carolina, described the many tech tools that will be in common use by police forces in the years to come. Metts notes that, “In the past, a policeman was given a badge and a gun and told to hit the streets. But tomorrow’s super cops will have an array of sophisticated devices with which to do their job.”

  Among the futuristic police devices—many are already in use—are the laser gun, a weapon that stuns a victim with electrical shock without causing permanent injury or leaving external signs of body damage, light guns, and electronic restraints. Robots are also being put to use. Novel devices include the “space bucket” and “jet pack” which will allow a police officer to soar above and around congestion and hover only a few feet above the ground. “Computer networks,” says Metts, “will provide birth-to-death dossiers, giving officers immediate field information.”

  BRAIN MACHINES

  Although the futuristic police equipment described above is being developed for worthwhile purposes, its abuse by a government less democratic than that of today’s democracies could bring terror to a beleaguered populace. However, there are other devices now being studied that hold the potential for such monumental abuse that it is reasonable to ask if experimentation should be allowed to continue. I refer to “brain machines”—proposed devices that can be hooked up to or coupled with a person’s brain to alter that person’s thinking processes.

  Dr. Jose Delgado, a Spanish neuroscientist and researcher, is experimenting with brain machines. In one experiment, he implanted electrodes in the brain of a one-thousand-pound bull. As the huge beast lunged at Delgado, the scientist used a radio signal to activate the electrodes in the animal’s brain, whereupon the bull came to a sudden halt.

  Delgado and other researchers have discovered that electromagnetic fields can seriously disrupt and otherwise affect brain activity and the body’s nervous system. Under the influence of varying electromagnetic fields, some monkeys have been successfully commanded to fall asleep while others were made to become hyperactive and restless.

  The Soviet Union is hard at work to harness the power of microwaves and other electromagnetic fields to influence the behavior of human beings. Soviet scientists have even constructed a machine that bombards a person’s brain from long distance with radio waves, producing tranquilized or trance-like states. Such machines are also being tested currently at a United States Veterans Administration hospital.

  In their book
The Mind Race, scientists Russell Targ and Keith Harary outlined some of the research under way in the Soviet Union—research actually described to the authors by the Soviet scientists themselves. In one experiment, the Soviets induced heart attacks in rats with electromagnetic generators; in another, a device put an entire hall full of people to sleep in fifteen minutes. Even more ominous was the use of an electronic oscillator. When brought near human patients’ heads by the researchers, the instrument apparently caused the patients to have “mystical or religious types of experiences.” 2

  In the United States and elsewhere, it has been demonstrated that electrical impulses fed into specific regions of the brain’s cerebral cortex can radically alter personality. In experiments, a cat became terrified at the mere sight of a mouse and an unfriendly, vicious monkey became friendly and gentle.

  “Dream machines” once were a popular topic of science fiction writers, but today such machines—attached to the human brain with electrodes or possibly implanted on a microchip—are on the threshold of becoming reality. In What Sort of People Should There Be? British scientist Jonathan Glover discusses the frightening implications of such machines. He remarks that a dream machine could be developed that will stimulate the brain so that a person has a sequence of enjoyable experiences. These pleasurable images would seem so real they would be indistinguishable from the equivalent real-life experiences. (A machine that could generate such sensations was the subject of the film Brainstorm.)

  Glover suggests that for some people, the dream machine would be an opiate, providing experiences so pleasurable that individuals would actually prefer remaining hooked to the machine to experiencing real life with all its tragedies and disappointments. The very thought of this revolts most of us, but Glover also describes the ultimate horror: the compulsory plugging of a person’s brain into a “nightmare” machine: