Synergetic Press was founded in 1969 in Santa Fe, New Mexico. After 39 years of publishing, we are still fiercely independent. We believe that our job as publishers is to advance the most relevant and far-reaching work we can find in the fields of biosphere science, ethnobotany, cultures. We are very pleased to announce publication of John Allen’s ME & THE BIOSPHERES: A MEMOIR BY THE INVENTOR OF BIOSPHERE 2, the definitive autobiography of one of the most luminous minds of our time. See below or click the Biospherics tab for more information. Planned for this summer is BIRTH OF A PSYCHEDELIC CULTURE, an in-depth examination of the legacy of the 1960's by the two surviving facilitators of the mind-altering Harvard experiments that touched off a revolution in psychology, Ram Dass and Ralph Metzner. We publish works that are timeless, and we keep them in print. Since our inception, one of our primary concerns has been the relationship between people and the environment. Our backlist includes books such classics in ethnobotany as VINE OF THE SOUL: MEDICINE MEN, THEIR PLANTS AND RITUALS IN THE COLOMBIAN AMAZONIA by Richard Evans Schultes and Robert F. Raffauf; WHERE THE GODS REIGN: PLANTS AND PEOPLES OF THE COLOMBIAN AMAZON, also by Schultes; and the AYAHUASCA READER: ENCOUNTERS WITH THE AMAZON"S SACRED VINE, edited by Luis Eduardo Luna and Steven F. White. There are often subtle ties between our titles. For instance, Richard Evans Schultes mentored Timothy Leary, Ram Dass and Ralph Metzner at Harvard. The classic film documentary on Ornette Coleman, ORNETTE: MADE IN AMERICA, directed by Shirley Clarke and produced by Synergetic Press’ founder, Kathelin Hoffman Gray, features contributions from some of our authors, most notably William S. Burroughs (UNCOMMON QUOTES, Audio Book) and John Allen, who also writes fiction and poetry under his nom de plume, Johnny Dolphin. The creation of Biosphere 2 by John Allen was a continuation of the pioneering work of seminal Russo-Ukrainian scientist Vladimir Vernadsky, whose essays on GEOCHEMISTRY AND THE BIOSPHERE we released in their first authoritative English translation last year. There is an active synergy between our selections: our writers inspire one another and inspire their readers. In an age of apathy and materialism, our authors challenge readers to want more for themselves and their planet and to rise to their fullest potential as mindful beings. |
Me and the Biospheres:
A Memoir by the Inventor of Biosphere 2
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Anyone suffering from the Global Warming Blues will cherish this uplifting account of the most ambitious environmental experiment of our time: Biosphere 2, a miniature Earth under glass, the world’s largest laboratory for global ecology. John Allen’s memoir, Me and the Biospheres is a rich and complex narrative, filled with rollicking adventure, exceptional camaraderie and mind-bending science. Almost as astonishing as the structure is the story of how it came to be. Back in 1969, Biosphere 2 was a mere seed in the luminous mind of writer, actor, philosopher, inventor, and scientist John Allen. He prepared for the manifestation of Biosphere 2 by assembling smaller projects: the creation of a ship to study ocean and river ecologies and cultures; a rainforest enrichment project; a theater group; a world-class art gallery and more. As awe-inspiring as the great cathedrals, Biosphere 2’s building and operation demanded the efforts of the most diverse team of scientists, engineers, artists and thinkers from around the world with whom John Allen worked closely for decades. Me and the Biospheres also is an account of the singular life John Allen has led: his travels to Egypt, Vietnam, Nepal, Tibet and India, his meetings with people like Buckminster Fuller, William Burroughs, Charles Mingus, and Ornette Coleman. From building developments in Iran to adobe houses in New Mexico, from Harvard Business School to cafés in Tangiers, from board meetings in Fort Worth to mystical moments with Sufi sages, John Allen has impacted millions of people with manifest integrity. His humorous and Whitmanesque memoir is a tribute to the ingenuity and dauntlessness of the human mind. Me and the Biospheres is a passionate call to reawaken to the beauty of our peerless home, Biosphere 1, the Earth. VISIT THE OFFICIAL BOOK AND AUTHOR SITE HERE, www.meandthebiospheres.com
Praise for Me and the Biospheres Mark Twain once famously said that reasonable men bend themselves to the ways of the world therefore it stands to reason that only unreasonable men can change it … John Allen is an unreasonable man, a visionary, a poet and a true polymath which makes him a square peg in a very round hole and this gets up the noses of people who want business as usual even if what they are doing quite plainly doesn't work. Tim Smit, Founder and Chief Executive, Eden Project, Cornwall, England
The Biosphere 2 project was surely one of the great scientific and technological enterprises of our time. Building a working model of the Earth’s biosphere is essential preparation for the coming era of space travel and manned exploration of other worlds. |
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