Beyond Boundaries

Beyond Boundaries

WHAT IS THINKING?

By the time the rainy days of the tropical autumn of 1984 arrived, most Brazilians had had enough. For twenty years, their beloved country had been ruled by a vicious dictatorship, brought to power by a military coup d’état that triumphed, emblematically, on April Fools’ Day 1964. For the next two de cades the military regime built an infamous legacy, marked primarily by its rampant incompetence, widespread corruption, and shameful political violence against its own people.

By 1979, thanks to the growing popular opposition to the regime, the latest four- star general installed in the presidential palace had no alternative but to grant amnesty to the political leaders, scientists, and intellectuals who had fl ed into exile abroad. A gradual, controlled return to civilian rule had been mapped out by the generals, beginning with popular elections for state governorships in the fall of 1982.

That November, the opposition parties won by a landslide. By the next year, however, that small token of democracy had been all but forgotten. Brazilians realized they had the right and, more importantly, the power to demand more than a dictator’s political bread crumbs. They wanted to oust the military government, but not through another coup d’état. Instead, they wanted to vote it into retirement through a direct election for president. That is how, seemingly out of nowhere, a nationwide movement demanding immediate direct elections for president (diretas já in Portuguese) broke loose. The first rally took place in the tiny northeastern city of Abreu e Lima on March 31, 1983. By November, a somewhat shy crowd of ten thousand people had gathered to protest in Brazil’s most populous and wealthy city, São Paulo. From that point, the movement grew exponentially. Two months later, on January 25, 1984, the day São Paulo celebrated its 430th anniversary, more than two hundred thousand people were chanting their collective demand for immediate presidential elections. In a matter of days, gigantic crowds started to converge on the main squares of Rio de Janeiro, Brasilia, and other major cities.

On the evening of April 16, 1984, more than one million people congregated in the heart of downtown São Paulo to participate in the largest political rally ever staged in the country’s history. In a matter of hours, a river of people, most dressed in the Brazilian national colors, green and yellow, inundated the valley where the city was originally founded. Every new group of people that arrived immediately joined into an already familiar, two-word rhythmic chant that erupted briskly somewhere in the crowd, every minute or so, and spread like thunder through space: “Diretas já, diretas já” (Elections now, elections now). If you have never taken part in a chorale formed by one million people, I recommend the experience.

Excerpted from BEYOND BOUNDARIES: The New Neuroscience of Connecting Brains with Machines—and How It Will Change Our Lives by Miguel Nicolelis. Published in March by Henry Holt and Company, LLC. Copyright © 2011 by Miguel Nicolelis. All rights reserved.