The Saucer Files, cont.
September 19, 2012
IN THIS previous post on UFOs, Alan responds to commenters who suggest there is credible evidence that objects seen in the sky have been spaceships from other planets. He writes:
In reply to the comments on my Saucer post:
1) Jim P. wonders why a “professional journalist” would write a book about UFOs. How about money? Fame? Notoriety? Frank Edwards, another “professional journalist,” wrote two books about Flying Saucers in 1966-’67, and one became a best-seller. He was a good storyteller. But what degree of truth his books contained is another matter. Leslie Kean says nothing in her book that Saucer Fans have not been saying for half a century.
2) Jim writes about “objects” and “things.” What “objects”? UFOs are not “objects;” they are stories, anecdotes, the stuff of imagination, illusion, exaggeration, and wishful thinking. UFO reports are a dime a dozen. But I challenge Jim (or anyone else) to produce one object. Radar is not infallible. “Ground traces” can be easily produced by hoaxers or misinterpreted by people too eager to find a mystery where none exists.
Re “extremely credible people:” No witness is credible who tells of extraordinary things without at least some substantiating evidence. Some men have claimed to have seen mermaids. Should we conclude therefore that mermaids exist?
3) To Joe A.: Learning the truth about the UFO topic does not require “trust” in UFO advocates or skeptics. Anyone can learn it by independent study. That is how I learned it. But I found the skeptics to be civil and reasonable, while I heard the advocates tell stories about events that were grossly distorted or wholly contrived.
4) Roger G. seems to be impressed by people of “stature.” Would a U. S. President qualify? Jimmy Carter reported seeing a UFO back in 1969. It turned out to be the planet Venus. (See Robert Sheaffer’s discussion, here)
5) Kevin M. cites the book Incident at Exeter. I enjoyed reading it, too, but it did not terrify me. What terrifies me are people who believe that things seen in the sky or the stories people tell about them cannot be understood without invoking Alien Spaceships. Such reasoning is Folderol. It permeates 90% of the UFO literature. Simpler, down-to-earth explanations for such things exist in abundance.
Incident at Exeter was written by John Fuller (another professional journalist). He was a good writer and his books were fun to read. But the key to understanding why UFO events are not as mysterious as they are usually portrayed is to realize what information such writers omit that may point to a solution to the apparent “mystery”. (A good discussion of likely solutions for many of the Exeter UFOs can be read here:
If people choose to believe that what are called “UFOs” are aliens from space, demons, angels, or visitors from the 9th dimension, that is their privilege. But if they assert such a belief as a truth claim, then the burden of proof is on them, not on those who doubt it.
Thomas Bertonneau cited the familiar line from Shakespeare about “more things in heaven and earth…” I propose a corollary: There are more ways for eyewitnesses to be deceived than are dreamt of by UFO enthusiasts.
Guilty as charged; I am indeed impressed by men of stature. But what does that have to do with Jimmy Carter?
Daniel S. writes:
“Except I shall see in his hands the print of the nails, and put my finger into the place of the nails, and put my hand into his side, I will not believe” (John 20:25).
Jim P. writes:
Alan’s rejoinders aren’t impressive in the least. It amounts to the same suppositions and guesswork that ultimately led him from one position to a dramatic and inflexible swing to its opposite.
Again I’ll ask, has Alan read Leslie Kean’s book? Does he know something about her personally that makes him comfortable assigning uncharitable motives other than what would compel many other writers to take on a subject. Namely that it interests her?
I don’t know anything about Frank Edwards and I’m not interested in Frank Edwards. I’m interested in the people Ms. Kean is profiling now, and what they’re willing to say while being no doubt aware of the ridicule they invite from people like Alan.
As far as I’m concerned he occupied both extremes of this interesting subject and is mistaken both times. As to why he’s mistaken on his more recent position; simply the large number of credible (yes that word means something) eyewitnesses with reputations and careers worth having and defending. I don’t understand his bringing up mermaids other than to be flippant. Can he please cite a recent instance of this claim and the identity of the person making it? Were the eyewitnesses to Christ’s resurrection to be summarily dismissed because they failed to tie him down? Were not subsequent eyewitnesses who were willing to pay a high price not persuasive in the least?
And that brings us to the metaphysical doesn’t it? Does Alan believe in the supernatural? In all the years, the many dozens of books, articles, magazines, conferences, treatments, etc. on this subject did he not one time hear any speculation on a possibly spiritual component? I’d like to hear – if he cares to continue claiming “objects” aren’t really “objects” – how his belief system evolved and what changes occurred that transformed him to a zealous adversary of the thing he believed in for so many years.
Alan must think people who read on this subject are personally vested in an outcome or a position which they can defend with their lives. What do I care if they’re demons? I already believe in them and know enough to not make overtures. What’s it to me if inter dimensional beings are part of the mix? I don’t really care; at least not in the everyday sense. What interests me are the stories of what otherwise respectable people are willing to put on record. To call them delusional or fraudulent is to witness a person (Alan) behave vehemently against people whose testimony he hasn’t bothered to read; simply because he thinks it can only be a rehash.
I wonder if the 60’s pulp included an account of a Major General in the French Air Force who was conducting interviews of fighter pilots and was himself a former fighter pilot. This is one of the interviews and is in Major General Letty’s own words:
“But one more account in particular left its mark on me. In 1979 I learned that Air Force Captain Jean-Pierre Fartek, then a Mirage III pilot, had seen a UFO. It was most unusual, because this was not while he was flying, but had taken place at his home in a village near Dijon, during the day. The object was very low to the ground, at close range. I wanted to meet him to discuss this, and I arranged to do so three months later on the Strasbourg base. On another occasion, I went to his home and visited his wife, as well, who also saw the UFO.
He told me that on December 9,1979, at around 9:15 a.m., his wife was coming down the stairs to prepare breakfast when she saw a strange disc-shaped object through the window. She called for Fartek to come and look. The object was hovering low to the ground, in front of a row of apple trees, branches of which could be seen behind it; because of that, the captain could measure the distance of about 250 meters (820 feet) from their house. It was approximately 20 meters (65 feet) in diameter and 7 meters thick. The weather was clear, with excellent visibility. I still have the notes that I wrote during the meeting in the presence of Captain and Mrs. Fartek, which say:
The object looked like two reversed saucers pressed against each other, with a precise contour, a gray metal color on the top and dark blue below, with no lights or portholes.
It was about three meters from the ground, not stabilized, and then rose to the level of the trees, while continuously oscillating, then went down again slightly and stopped. It went up a little once again, always while oscillating; it tilted and accelerated quickly to reach a speed much higher than that of a Mirage III, and disappeared.
Captain Fartek and his wife provided many other details. There was a clear delineation between the top and the bottom parts of the craft, and the difference in color could not have been due to effects of the sunlight. The clarity and precision of the shape of the object left no doubt that it was something solid and physical. The disc looked like it was revolving symmetrically around an axis, but the oscillations were slow, as if it were trying to find its balance. It moved without any sound. The witnesses could clearly see the trees towering just behind it, but couldn’t tell whether it cast a shadow. Captain Fartek carefully checked for turbulence underneath the object while it hovered, but he couldn’t detect any, and it left no trace on the ground. Its departure speed was so extraordinary that it disappeared over the horizon in a few seconds.
Captain Fartek reported this incident to the air guard station at the base. He says that other people also saw the phenomenon but didn’t dare report it, such as his neighbors and their children. At the time, the base commander instructed Fartek not to talk about this, because he was concerned about ridicule.
Captain Fartek was very upset by this experience. He told me when we met that the sighting called into question his perception of what were then called “flying saucers,” because he had never believed in them. Now, he acknowledged to me, after seeing this craft he could no longer doubt their existence.
Hearing his testimony, I, too, did not have any more doubt about the reality of the phenomenon. In fact, taken together, I found the Farteks’ testimony so disturbing that I have been preoccupied by the UFO problem ever since. In 1996, after he became a major, Captain Fartek was interviewed for the COMETA study that I initiated, and even then, after seventeen years, he was still visibly shaken by what he saw. His case was documented in our report, in the section about sightings from the ground.” (end of passage)
There are many other’s like this in the book, and note that possessing something physical in your hand was no more necessary to start the COMETA investigation than a photographer would need of a rainbow; ethereal qualities or not.
Ultimately, the burden of proof is not on people with an unsettled opinion like myself, but with people like Alan who aggressively maintain that each and every instance of this mystery can be resolved by the trivial.
Jim P. writes:
My comparison to Christ’s resurrection was admittedly over the top, I was not making comparisons to the Risen Lord but the value of eyewitness testimony; I should have been more clear.
Yes, Alan is correct that there is no physical evidence with the exception of byproducts (such as the irradiated grass I mentioned).
I think the conversation went from “there might be something to this” to Alan’s absolute certainty that people are conjuring phenomena in their minds or confusing them with planets. As I’ve said, I can’t do anymore than speculate but to say these people aren’t deeply shaken by these events is a bridge too far for me.
Andrew E. writes:
I’m finding the ongoing discussion of the UFO phenomena at your site very fascinating, so fascinating in fact it is prompting me to comment at your blog for the first time. Reader Andy has in a previous thread already mentioned that Fr. Seraphim Rose addressed the phenomena of UFO sightings in his excellent book Orthodoxy and the Religion of the Future from 1974. I have always been curious of, interested in and open minded on this subject but have not read nearly as extensively on the issue as some other readers here but Rose’s single chapter on UFO’s in his book was sufficient to settle the question for me. Among the authorities on the subject that Rose relies heavily on is the secular French astrophysicist and computer scientist, Jacques Valles, who studied the question from Europe. Valles’ position was that while it was extremely unlikely that the phenomena was a result of actual beings visiting from outer space there was nevertheless something very real taking place. He concluded that UFO sightings were the most likely the result of some kind of paraphysical and/or psychic phenomena. He was certain that what we were dealing with was some kind of a control system. And that’s when the light bulb went off in my head. A control system in the sense that mentions of UFO sightings get large groups of people into frenzies; the phenomena absorbs them, distracts them, channels them, obsesses them. The phenomena generates cults, studies, movies, books; it embeds itself into our popular culture and it makes us question and perhaps doubt the Creation and the special place of Man and the Earth within Creation. And this is where Rose takes over.
Rose, being a believing Orthodox Christian, took Valles’s conclusion further than Valles could take it himself. He saw the UFO phenomena as an extension of the unseen spiritual warfare that is constantly taking place and that is the primary reality of existence. It was no surprise to Rose that at a time of unprecedented worldwide apostasy (perhaps even the End Times in his view) that various forces of darkness would begin to manifest themselves in such ways as to aid in our turning away from God. A control system indeed. And why is seemingly advanced technology central to UFO phenomena if Rose’s thesis is true? Isn’t that incredibly easy to answer? What better way to grab and hold the attention of a world that is head-over-heals in love with and to an extent even worships technology? Rose also mentions that that same type of UFO phenomena, minus the technological aspect, can be found in much of the writings of the Holy Fathers and that at its core, the phenomena is nothing new.
Apologies. I just saw for the first time your other blog entry titled, “UFO’s and Christianity,” in which reader Daniel S. covers precisely the same ground as my earlier comment. Anyway, I second his recommendation to check out Fr. Rose’s book.
Paul writes:
Besides the shocking lack of physical evidence, the belief in aliens is refuted impliedly by the Bible. Nowhere does the Bible speak of beings from other planets or dimensions. The Bible is for man and man alone. The visits by Jesus, the Blessed Virgin, and the Angels further indicate God has nothing more up his sleeves.
God knows we are capable of handling information about beings at least as extraordinary as beings from other planets. He has already told us about demons and angels. Because the Bible is fact, the alien advocates are believing God has created other supernatural tricksy beings who simply want to observe us.
Jim errs when he attributes things to me that I did not say:
* I did not call anyone “delusional” or “fraudulent.”
* I did not write that any UFO reports “can be resolved by the trivial.”
* I did not write that “people are conjuring phenomena in their minds.”
* I did not write that “’objects’ are not really ‘objects.’”
All of these are Jim’s inventions. It is a standard tactic of zealots to misrepresent the statements of people whose views they do not share. His misattributions are straw men.
My conclusions about the UFO Myth are not based on “suppositions and guesswork”, but on my acquaintance with the night sky and experience investigating UFO reports, both of which I acquired decades ago.
Keyhoe, Hall, Lorenzen, Edwards, Fuller, Hynek, Vallee, Jacobs, Keel, and others were saying 40-50 years ago that UFOs are a Gigantic Unsolved Mystery, without providing a shred of impressive evidence. We should be floored because a feminist (Kean) has now joined their chorus? That is too funny.
People like Jim are undoubtedly sincere, but they fail to consider the absence of the naïve brain. Naïve regarding what? The Flying Saucer idea and image. After 1950, there was no one on Earth who had not read, seen, or heard about that idea and image. Modern communications technology disseminated both of them to everyone everywhere. This began even before the first “flying saucers” were reported in 1947. (The term “flying saucer” was invented by a newspaper reporter that summer.) The idea and imagery became embedded in popular culture – in books, magazines, newspapers, motion pictures, radio and TV programs, cartoons, planetarium shows, comic strips, advertising, art, architecture (some restaurants are shaped like a flying saucer), novelty records (e.g., “The Flying Saucer” on the “Luniverse” label, 1956), and food products (there was once a brand of canned pasta called “UFOs”).
As long ago as the 1950s, Americans were primed to believe that unidentified objects in the sky might be the kind of advanced spaceships about which they had read or heard. It was no coincidence that people began seeing “flying saucers” after that term was coined, not before. It was no coincidence that the French military pilot Jim cites described an object shaped like “two saucers”. So? Like everyone else on Earth, that is what the Myth prepared him to see. It is what prepared Betty Hill to imagine that a light in the sky that seemed to be following her car as she and her husband drove through the White Mountains was an Alien Spaceship.
Military pilots in the 1940s-‘50s chased stars, planets, and balloons (and in daylight) that circumstances prompted them to imagine might be Flying Saucers. Those men were not daffy or irresponsible. They were simply thinking and working under the influence of an idea that had gained currency in American culture: The idea of Flying Saucers-as-Alien Spaceships.
(Dr. Bruce Murray discussed the significance of the absence of the naïve brain in a 1975 essay.)
Half a century later, Leslie Kean and her fans ask us to believe that new generations of military pilots and other “extremely credible people” are exempt from making similar mistakes in judgment or interpretation under the even greater influence that that idea has acquired in the intervening decades.
Allen Hynek was no UFO skeptic, but he conceded that “Commercial and military pilots appear to make relatively poor witnesses…” (The Hynek UFO Report, 1977, p. 271).
If Kean’s book is so impressive, then I suggest she and Jim contact all associations of professional airline pilots immediately and warn them of the potential danger lurking in the skies in the form of Alien Spaceships (or whatever those “objects” and “things” are). After all, a military pilot lost his life while chasing a flying saucer in 1948, two others disappeared while chasing a UFO in 1953, commercial pilots have reported near-collisions with flying saucers, a helicopter crew reported nearly colliding with a UFO in 1973, and an Australian pilot disappeared after he reported seeing a UFO in 1978. If those “things” are really there, as Kean and other Saucer Advocates would have us believe, then surely all commercial pilots and air travelers ought to be warned of that potential danger. Isn’t that a reasonable precaution, Jim? How many pilots do you think stop to weigh that risk before departing on a flight?
If Saucer Believers had any evidence, they would lay it on the table and we could examine it. But since they can’t do that, they resort to impressive-sounding words like “phenomenon”, “metaphysical”, and “other dimensions”. All of that is an evasion or a smokescreen, or both.
