Be Courageous

Oh, there were endless roadblocks along the way in this. Professors in my psych department, many of them were rat runners. They were behaviorists. They didn't believe in experience. They didn't believe in consciousness. So they didn't like me. They hated my guts. I wanted to do brainwave training there. Permission to use the electrophysiologic equipment denied. Nobody who's interested in consciousness, he wrote, could possibly be serious about pursuing a degree in physiological psychology. However, if you will abandon this nonsense and submit to me, I will design a program of research which will lead to a PhD. And I looked at it, I almost laughed. My thesis advisor scheduled my public defense for a time when the two most hostile professors were leading seminars and were not able to attend, and so they sent hostile questions, but you answer the question and then there's no hostile follow-up.