Vasilii Nalimov

"Born into the finno-ugrian ethnic minority of Komi, for whom a deep connection with nature was inseparately tied with pagan spirituality and the universe was seen as a living organism, Nalimov became a member of an esoteric order of gnostic Christian Templars in the 1920s. After spending 18 years in Stalin’s GULag prison-camps and exile, he was allowed to return to Moscow and hold an exceptionally independent position as a leading chemist and mathematician in the Academy of Science. He had the extraordinary privilege of unrestricted access to Western publications and corresponded with a wide range of scientists and philosophers (Popper, Bohm, Capra, Laszlo, Prigogine). Nalimov was one of the first to publish on cybernetics and the first to introduce the practice of meditation as an altered state of consciousness to Soviet artists, scientists and future cosmonauts. Since the 1980s, he was also allowed to travel abroad and, through the Esalen Soviet-American exchange program, met with scientists and leading personalities of the New Age and Human Potential movement in Europe and America. "