Oneirosis

Into a big empty lecture hall at New York's teeming City College marched four young women, three young men one evening last week. All students, they seated themselves in the front two rows. Attached to the back of each seat was a thin metal rod from which dangled a small silver-grey ball just above each student's forehead. Lights were dimmed. A hush fell over the room. Precisely at 9:51 p. m. a tall young instructor on the platform began in a soft sing-song voice:

"Take a comfortable position--and concentrate--your eyes on the grey ball above you. I want you to relax completely--and soon you will fall into a state of oneirosis. I want you to relax completely--your hearts to beat evenly--to fall into a deeper state than you have ever fallen before. I want you to relax completely . . . relax completely . . . relax completely. ..."

One by one the youngsters' eyes closed. At 9:53 all except Mollie Schwartz were bemused. At 9:54 she too dropped off. Then the young man on the platform began to lecture about comets, meteors, eclipses, their substance, cause and significance. At 9:57 Sylvia Herman swallowed. At 10 sharp Sidney Nass opened his eyes, nodded dreamily, dropped back. At 10:09 the lecturer raised his voice, intoned: "Let that be enough for tonight--let the images dwell in your mind--but now I want you to feel well--to feel completely well. Open your eyes. Open your eyes. OPEN YOUR EYES."

The seven students opened their eyes, took pencil & paper, wrote their experiences. All but one remembered the lecture vividly. Only Frank Piovia had seen "no images at all." Sylvia Herman had seen the comet as "a strand of hair, with a bushy tail, colored like electric light."

Thus last week did Dr. Ralph B. Winn, City College psychology instructor, give the first public demonstration of his system of "oneirotic education." Each of his volunteer students, chosen for susceptibility to hypnosis, had to bring parents' written permission and a certificate of good health.

The students, explained Dr. Winn. do not go to sleep. Oneirosis, his own term, is "a type of hypnosis in which the subject retains the free activity of the mind and is oversensitive to the environment. ... I try to evoke vision after vision in the students' minds."

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