Where is UFOlogy at in 2015?

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Re: Where is UFOlogy at in 2011?

Postby barracuda » Fri Aug 05, 2011 6:49 pm

AhabsOtherLeg wrote:Just wanted to agree that Volin's post was great.


Thirded. It's a classic tale of sound and fury.
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Re: Where is UFOlogy at in 2011?

Postby Nordic » Fri Aug 05, 2011 8:31 pm

I'm curious how much major media events had on this timeline as presented by DrVolin.

Such as "Close Encounters of the Third Kind" and Whitley Strieber's "Communion".

I was never into these circles, but it seemed to me that these two particular media "hits" had a major impact on the public's perception of UFO's and abductions etc.

Or are we talking about groups of people to whom these events had no impact?
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Re: Where is UFOlogy at in 2011?

Postby DrVolin » Fri Aug 05, 2011 8:42 pm

As far as I can tell, those sorts of high visibility media events generally lag about 15-20 years behind 'the field'. I remember commenting to friends on X-Files in the early 90s that it would have been cutting edge in the mid-70s.
all these dreams are swept aside
By bloody hands of the hypnotized
Who carry the cross of homicide
And history bears the scars of our civil wars

--Guns and Roses
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Re: Where is UFOlogy at in 2011?

Postby AhabsOtherLeg » Fri Aug 05, 2011 9:24 pm

Dr. Volin, can I ask you a question that will reveal just how big of a n00b I am in this sphere?

In a lot of the (mostly mainstream) UFO documentaries I've seen, the ones that try to present an overview of the phenomenon rather than concentrating on a single incident or aspect of it, a certain anecdote recurs. It's the one where Reagan, after viewing a White House presentation of "Close Encounters of the Third Kind", turns to one of his advisors or Rear Admirals or CIA bigwigs or NASA dudes or whatever and says: "How does he know all this stuff?"

Meaning, how does Spielberg know about the reality of alien craft and contact/abductions. The implication being that it's a state secret, but quite widely known about among the high-ups.

Has this anecdote ever been confirmed, denied, proven, or debunked, to your knowledge? I know this kind of mainstream stuff is probably boring to the hardcore UFO researchers, the real deep divers in this area, a bit like a nuclear physicist being asked by a kid how a light-bulb works, but I've been wondering about it for a while. Cheers.
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Re: Where is UFOlogy at in 2011?

Postby DrVolin » Fri Aug 05, 2011 10:41 pm

According to Spielberg, Reagan said it with a straight face (http://www.gigwise.com/news/63829/Steve ... T-Was-Real). But Spielberg is a film maker and Reagan was an actor, so the deadpanning of the line itself wouldn't mean much. Neither would it mean much if the whole thing was made up. In any case, this is a fairly new revelation to me. In the 80s, Reagan was much more notable for his alien threat UN speech (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ag44dRO8LEA) combined with his strong advocacy of the Star Wars missile shield. There were quite a few who were convinced that he knew something was about to hit us and that he was preparing the defence as fast as he could.
all these dreams are swept aside
By bloody hands of the hypnotized
Who carry the cross of homicide
And history bears the scars of our civil wars

--Guns and Roses
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Re: Where is UFOlogy at in 2011?

Postby elfismiles » Sat Aug 06, 2011 12:27 am

search.php?keywords=spielberg+reagan

Ronald Reagan: "E.T. is 'absolutely true'"
viewtopic.php?f=8&t=32306

Hollywood Director confirms Spielberg Reagan UFO Story
http://www.presidentialufo.com/ronald-r ... -ufo-story

Spielberg's Saucer Secrets
Written by Robbie Graham & Matthew Alford
http://www.presidentialufo.com/steven-s ... er-secrets
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Re: Where is UFOlogy at in 2011?

Postby elfismiles » Sat Aug 06, 2011 12:39 am

ImageOne of the earliest UFO mythos related memories I have is of being in San Antonio at my grandmother's house (this was around or before the time of the parade shooting) and receiving the CE3K bendy action figure and being told by my other step-grandmother about her radio station back in New York (WRKL) where she had repeatedly featured an artist and UFO investigator who reported that multiple people around the world had experienced the same encounters and described the same beings. That investigator was of course Budd Hopkins. This was a seminal experience along my path to UFO obsession. That and STAR WARS, COSMOS, HANGAR-18 and BATTLESTAR GALACTICA.

Communion came towards at the end of my high school school experience around the same time I was discovering shrooms and shortly thereafter, McKenna; Strieber led me to Vallee.

Nordic wrote:I'm curious how much major media events had on this timeline as presented by DrVolin.

Such as "Close Encounters of the Third Kind" and Whitley Strieber's "Communion".

I was never into these circles, but it seemed to me that these two particular media "hits" had a major impact on the public's perception of UFO's and abductions etc.

Or are we talking about groups of people to whom these events had no impact?
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Re: Where is UFOlogy at in 2011?

Postby Stephen Morgan » Sat Aug 06, 2011 2:40 am

I like that Westall documentary.

I saw a couple of UFOs, also, which were within a mile of one of the places the Templars were held for trial.

ETA: which was the same place that bad King John died, while we're talking about James I and royal blood, and near to where James I had a local pickpocket executed without trial on his way to take the throne, and a few miles from where his son Charles I surrendered, and is also the same place which Edward VII robbed.
Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake in the day to find that all was vanity; but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act their dream with open eyes, and make it possible. -- Lawrence of Arabia
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Re: Where is UFOlogy at in 2011?

Postby Wombaticus Rex » Sun Aug 07, 2011 9:36 pm

Nordic wrote:I'm curious how much major media events had on this timeline as presented by DrVolin.

Such as "Close Encounters of the Third Kind" and Whitley Strieber's "Communion".

I was never into these circles, but it seemed to me that these two particular media "hits" had a major impact on the public's perception of UFO's and abductions etc.

Or are we talking about groups of people to whom these events had no impact?


UFO Evidence used to host a fascinating document that tracked public opinion polls re: ET life and UFO's over the past 50 years. Cannot find the file but I have faith it can be tracked down. I used it to flesh out a chronology notebook but that's part of my infamous Lost Pile.
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Re: Where is UFOlogy at in 2011?

Postby barracuda » Sun Aug 07, 2011 9:45 pm

Nordic wrote:I'm curious how much major media events had on this timeline as presented by DrVolin.

Such as "Close Encounters of the Third Kind" and Whitley Strieber's "Communion".

I was never into these circles, but it seemed to me that these two particular media "hits" had a major impact on the public's perception of UFO's and abductions etc.

Or are we talking about groups of people to whom these events had no impact?


If it's any help, here's a chart correlating British UFO sightings with science-fiction media milestones.
The most dangerous traps are the ones you set for yourself. - Phillip Marlowe
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Re: Where is UFOlogy at in 2011?

Postby Attack Ships on Fire » Mon Aug 08, 2011 12:55 am

I have pretty good memories about what I was reading pre-Close Encounters (1979) about UFOs. I may have been a little kid back then but I was fascinated by accounts of aliens and flying saucers. Read into that what you will, but I like to think I was just a curious kid that was very interested in outer space and mysteries, and UFOs were from both of those worlds.

The made-for-TV movie that chronicled the Betty & Barney Hill case was around. If you caught it on TV that airing night or during repeats, then you may recall that the aliens in Spielberg's movie were nearly identical to the depiction of the aliens in that TV movie. Grey, thin, small slit mouths -- and big eyes, but unlike Streiber's aliens, these ones had pupils and whites around their irises.

I also remember that there was a bit of a fad about the paranormal back in the mid-to-late 1970s. You had TV shows and cheap pseduo-documentaries about the Bermuda Triangle, Bigfoot, strange PSI and psychic events, as well as a rash of popular occult films (most likely sparked by The Exorcist in 1973 but followed by Carrie, The Omen, The Fury, The Car, etc.) It was also back in 1977 that Howe released her doc "A Strange Harvest".

In short, high strangeness could be found in a lot of places in the pop culture at the time. I still have a comic book that depicted true life encounters with flying saucers and aliens, like the Skippy the horse case or Lonnie Zamora's egg-like UFO encounter.

What wasn't around back then in the mainstream UFO culture were the apocalyptic visions and stories told by Streiber's night visitors. Those came about with the Budd Hopkins accounts in the mid-80s, followed by Streiber and then Mack's work in the early 90s.

Changing the conversation back to where I think Ufology is at today, the problem is that no one knows where to focus the conversation. The subject matter has given up precious little to base any true foundation for a grand theory, thus we still have a cacophony of "experts" all arguing that they know the true picture of what the shape behind the curtain is. Some say hostile space aliens, others say ultraterrestrials, Greer says space brothers, Streiber just flings paint at his canvas and leaves the hard work up to his readers. Even Mac Tonnies was advocating that our visitors are cryptoterrestrials from under the earth.

My own personal and constantly evolving theory is that we're dealing with different aspects of otherness and strangeness and possibly alienness, and with different levels of perception. Some may be using technology, others advanced consciousness and some both. Undoubtedly the military is also involved with their own psyops game, that's all but proven. I also think that they have a good grasp at what the true shape behind the curtain is, and it suits their best interest to not come out and confirm the existence of these things to the public. The fact of the matter is, if the government admitted that UFOs are real, I don't think that they could explain what all of the UFOs we're seeing are.

I also think that if you come out and admit the validity that some UFOs are real, and nuts and bolts, piloted by different beings than us, you open Pandora's Box. And if you can't answer every nagging question in the mind of the public, then it's better to not admit that any of it is real.

Put another way: suppose the gov't says UFOs are real, and they're piloted by what we believe are ETs. Then suppose we have another Point Pleasant/Mothman flap, which clearly goes far beyond what the general public understands as mysterious phenomena. Do you think the public is ready to accept that tulpas could be real, or that they now need to consider that there can be these things called ultraterrestrials when they're just getting a grip on the existence of extraterrestrials?

I don't think that you can pull apart and explain the UFO mystery anymore without accepting that it's deeply connected with certain areas of high strangeness. That's why I think present day ufology has struck a wall and isn't moving forward. It can't because we need to pull back to see the bigger picture, and since it's so strange to comprehend, it's going to take more time for ufologists to start to see beyond the weirdness and examine it from a more grounded perspective.
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Re: Where is UFOlogy at in 2011?

Postby DrVolin » Mon Aug 08, 2011 7:15 am

ASoF, very nice to see you posting again. Agreed on all points.
all these dreams are swept aside
By bloody hands of the hypnotized
Who carry the cross of homicide
And history bears the scars of our civil wars

--Guns and Roses
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Re: Where is UFOlogy at in 2011?

Postby MacCruiskeen » Mon Aug 08, 2011 8:56 am

AhabsOtherLeg wrote:
Searcher08 wrote:At the start of the year, I became very interested in (for want of a better word) high quality physical contact physical (not astral / channeled) experiences.

There seem to be very very few. I tried to find good researchers and found very very few.
It was a case of trying to 'triangulate' good reports. Wendelle Stevens (who passed last year) seemed to do his best to find and document these high quality contacts.


I have no stake in where UFOlogy is "at" as a culture/subculture - as far as the researchers and their followers and theories and feuds go, I could care less. The reality of defence and intelligence infiltration/subversion of their work and ranks is fascinating, but their internal spats aren't.

Speaking of high quality physical contact cases, though, I am intrigued by the Dechmont Law Incident, or the Livingston Incident as it might be more widely known. A forestry worker, Robert Taylor, claims to have been gassed and knocked out by a funny-looking spherical UFO with a ring around it's middle, which had two independent small craft/robots looking like WW2 naval mines inside it/near it, which attacked him.

Image

The case is unique (so far as I know) in three main ways:

1/ It is the only close-encounter I'm aware of that was investigated as such by the police - the incident
was even listed as a "common assault", which means charges could potentially be brought against whoever/whatever did
it in the courts. (!!!)

2/ There was quite a lot of physical evidence, for once - unusual tears in the clothing of the victim, and quite extensive
markings on the ground - and all of this was logged not by the victim, or UFO researchers, or local journalists, but by the
police themselves, who back up the victim's story in it's entirety. There has been an attempt to preserve the area it
happened in.

3/ The victim, Robert Taylor, seemed wholly reliable and pretty motiveless if he was lying, and was otherwise totally
uninterested in UFOs beyond this one incident. He never changed his story in any way over nearly forty years, never
asked for payment or courted publicity (tried to avoid it in fact), and was believed by pretty much everyone who heard him tell the tale, which he didn't often.

This video, despite having very bad sound syncing, is a decent short recounting of what happened:



I hope those torn trousers were tested for radioacivity.

Here's a programme made later in his life, with the story still unchanged.



It also helps that all the counter-theories to explain what happened in a "sceptical" way are wholly ridiculous, but we'll come to that if anybody wants to talk about Dechmont Law. Wikipedia is actually a pretty good starting point on it: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Taylor_incident

As for whether the defence crew have won the UFO culture wars, I'd say yes, and they probably won in about 1945.


Thanks very much for those links, Ahab. I had heard of that very strange incident but never seen that fascinating three-part 30-minute documentary film. What struck me was the modesty and seriousness and credibility of Robert Taylor, his doctor, his colleagues and bosses, the cops, the astronomers, and the filmmakers themselves, and by how strongly all this contrasted with the sheer silliness and typical self-importance of that "rationalist" and "sceptic" Steuart Campbell (author of "The UFO Mystery SOLVED" [sic]).

It is amazing the lengths some people will go to in insisting that there's nothing they cannot explain - even when that "explanation" involves postulating (without any supporting evidence whatsoever and against all the actually available evidence) a unique "astronomical mirage" PLUS a once-in-a-lifetime epileptic fit PLUS a team of mysterious scrap-metal hoarders armed with giant pickaxes.

Other than that, I have nothing to contribute to this thread except to thank Dr. Volin and AsoF (hello ASoF!) and everyone else who knows more about the history of the UFO phenomenon than I do, which is nearly everyone.
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"Science is the belief in the ignorance of experts." - Richard Feynman, NYC, 1966

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Re: Where is UFOlogy at in 2011?

Postby Joe Hillshoist » Mon Aug 08, 2011 10:34 am

Attack Ships on Fire wrote:Put another way: suppose the gov't says UFOs are real, and they're piloted by what we believe are ETs. Then suppose we have another Point Pleasant/Mothman flap, which clearly goes far beyond what the general public understands as mysterious phenomena. Do you think the public is ready to accept that tulpas could be real, or that they now need to consider that there can be these things called ultraterrestrials when they're just getting a grip on the existence of extraterrestrials?

I don't think that you can pull apart and explain the UFO mystery anymore without accepting that it's deeply connected with certain areas of high strangeness. That's why I think present day ufology has struck a wall and isn't moving forward. It can't because we need to pull back to see the bigger picture, and since it's so strange to comprehend, it's going to take more time for ufologists to start to see beyond the weirdness and examine it from a more grounded perspective.


Yeah true. Very true.

And there's drugs.

Try talking to a UFO researcher about tryptamines and alien motifs. They back away with their hands up... And ok I can understand that to a point. Someone needs to make a series of documented attempts to get large groups of people focusing on manifesting ufos over public areas with high visibility, while they're tripping on shrooms. That'd be the next real step forward in UFOlogy
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Re: Where is UFOlogy at in 2011?

Postby elfismiles » Mon Aug 08, 2011 11:04 am

Joe Hillshoist wrote:
Someone needs to make a series of documented attempts to get large groups of people focusing on manifesting ufos over public areas with high visibility, while they're tripping on shrooms. That'd be the next real step forward in UFOlogy



Image

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