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Sinking Into a Float Tank
| Article
# : |
16668 |
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Section : |
LIFE
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| Issue
Date : |
10 / 1989 |
1,411 Words |
| Author
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J. Louis Gillis
J. Louis Gillis is a free-lance writer and photographer living
in Southern California. |
In Hollywood, where people are subject to unusual stresses like smog and film production deadlines, there is an abundance of ways to relax, most of which involve playing outdoors on sunny days. But today, I was to engage in one of the most unusual free-time activities ever devised. For one hour, I would lie naked in the dark, floating in a solution that most people only soak their feet in.
On hour spent inside a sensory deprivation tank is like going on vacation for a week, according to promoters. This promise appealed to me. After all, there would be no way to get a speeding ticket while floating in a tank containing eight hundred pounds of water and Epsom salts.
But sensory deprivation has not always been easy to come by. Consider what the tank's inventor, John C. Lilly, had to go through to get away from it all.
Lilly's First Pad
Back in 1954, Lilly was a scientist doing brain research at the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH). He wanted to find out what would happen to the brain if all external stimulation were cut off. Would the brain fall asleep? Or was it auto-rhythmic, meaning that thought would continue without external stimuli?
In trying to discover the answer, Lilly imagined a sound- and lightproof tank filled with water heated to 98.4 degrees F. Lilly talked about this idea with his superiors, who suggested he go to the National Institute of Arthritis and Metabolic Diseases to speak with Dr. Heinz
... (1968 of 7815 Characters)
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