For the next step in metaphase research, they proposed building quantum-driven communicators that were more consciousness-friendly than radioactive sources, devices more similar in size, operation and energy to the (purportedly) quantum synapses in human nervous systems. These devices, called “Eccles Gates” after Nobel laureate Sir John Eccles, one of the chief champions of quantum consciousness, would be composed of an array of quantum-uncertain silicon switches as much like the meat-based synaptic switches in our brains. (Update: In 2014, IBM announced a chip similar in design to this proposal).
Bob and later Nick Herbert were filling my head with these tales around 1989 through 1993, and the MPT stories started to excite some ideas I already had regarding Third Mind type experiments I was conducting in private. Using the work of William S. Burroughs and Brion Gysin as my starting point and merging that thinking with ideas such as the ritual origins of games and mathematical game theory, I was attempting to work out some sort of mechanism by which to pull seemingly random ideas out of the ether. I know that sounds rather crackpot, but remember I was influenced by avant garde art theory as well as science and magick. I’ve since moved on to work primarily with avant garde and scientific ideas, but I want to inform you of where my thinking was coming from at the time.
In the MPT experiments, I saw a model I could apply to the “mechanism” I was envisioning, a construct that would produce what I called a “living book”. Later, I would refine this meta-mechanism and name it the Metamachine. I plan on reissuing my book, Game Over? in which I outline more detail of the origins, functionality and intricacies of the mechanisms I was employing. So for now, I will defer doing a deep dive into the Metamachine theories.