Dr. John Alexander — September 14, 2014

[ryno kai]

Col. John Alexander needs no introduction. He is easily one of the most enigmatic and intriguing figures in "ufology" today. He has recently completed another in a series of world-wide journeys and we've invited him to share his thoughts on the interconnectedness of paranormal phenomena.

"There is no doubt about the physical reality of some UFOs. The hard evidence, however, suggests they are part of a far greater mystery; one that engulfs many phenomena. Traditional Western science has created blinders and ignores inconvenient facts that are accepted readily in other societies."

Alexander has firmly established UFO existence and will "explore their relationship to wonders long known to indigenous shamans all over the world."

Dr. John B. Alexander, a Green Beret combat commander, was a colonel when he retired and had a second career at Los Alamos National Laboratory. For many years he professionally and avocationally investigated UFOs and created a Top Secret study group in the field. He concludes that some UFOs are real, physical phenomena, but the topic is far more complex than we ever imagined. He will address some of the cases that present undeniable evidence supporting his conclusions. In addition, Dr. Alexander has traveled to, and made presentations on, every continent on earth. From the Himalayas to the Amazon and all across Africa and Asia he has interacted with indigenous shamans exploring their practices, some of which defy traditional science.

This year he has been with John of God in Brazil, attended Umbanda ceremonies in Vitoria, Brazil and spoken at the International Amazonian Shamans conference in Iquitos, Peru. Last month he was in Tonga swimming with humpback whales in the open ocean following up on earlier interspecies communication experiments initiated decades ago. A former council member of the Society for Scientific Exploration, past president of the International Association for Near-Death Studies, and a founding member of the board of directors of the International Remote Viewer’s Association, he is the author of UFOs: Myths, Conspiracies and Realities plus many other books and technical articles. We'll be recording this interview on Sept. 11. Please post your QUESTIONS here:

Great interview, guys! One of the best shows of the year. I'm a big fan of John Alexander and all his incredible work.

In this show I thought he maybe stumbled a few times on some great questions from Chris. His outright denial of the Dark Knight was blatantly a lie. Thanks for asking that one.

Do you know where I might find more on the Dark Knight?

 

[Randall]

Good show, and thanks to Chris for asking my question about Air Force Space Command and adding the NRO into the mix. I found his answers to be very evasive. The question was how deep Alexander was able to search the AFSPC records, not what the Commander ( who he didn't name ) had to say. In other words, it sounded like he didn't do anything but take an officer's word for it. Additionally he says he was able to enter the "Space Center", but he didn't indicate that he was able to observe live tracking ( which was the question ). Additionally, that was sort of a trick question because the AFSPC is spread out over 88 locations worldwide. He needed to be pinned down on those specifics. What Commander? What Location? What records was he able to see for himself? How much time did he spend watching live tracking ( if any ) or interviewing veteran operators and data interpreters?

Additionally, the idea that if military tracking systems detect an unknown craft doing things that none of their own military craft seem capable of, that the military would not investigate it out of fear of ridicule is the most ridiculous answer I've ever heard. We're not talking about civilian corporate pilots, ( but notice how he deflected the question into that realm in a hurry ). The fact is, anything with technology equal to or superior to that of the military is by its very nature a possible threat because assuming there are no alien craft, then only the military would have that kind of technology, and therefore when it's detected, it's the military's job to report and investigate. It's one of the main reasons AFSPC is there to begin with!

"Space control ensures friendly use of space through the conduct of counterspace operations encompassing surveillance, negation, protection and space intelligence analysis. ( Wikipedia )

"Ground-based radar, Space-Based Infrared System and Defense Support Program satellites monitor ballistic missile launches around the world to guard against a surprise missile attack on North America. Space surveillance radars provide vital information on the location of satellites and space debris for the nation and the world. Maintaining space superiority is an emerging capability required to protect U.S. space assets. " ( Space Command Website )​

Clearly the real situation with respect to the military is exactly backwards from Alexander's answers. Not reporting them, would be cause for disciplinary action. Alexander was just pulling answers out of thin air in an effort to slip past Chris' questions, and he was slippery indeed. He got away with only minor discomfort.

But let's examine this a bit deeper. If what he was saying is true, ( that the military doesn't investigate detections of alien craft because they know they're not a threat ), the logical conclusion then is that they do detect alien craft, but that they don't bother with them because they know somehow that they're not a threat! This naturally begs the question. How do they know that with any certainty? We can't be sure of the assumptions Alexander makes, like if the aliens wanted to wipe us all out that they could do it in a matter of hours.

It's entirely possible, that the alien craft are a long ways from their home world, and therefore supply lines are very long ( perhaps an order of decades or even centuries ), and the few ships that have found their way to our world may not be warships, but exploration vessels with minimal weaponry. So getting into an armed conflict with a species that has nuclear cruise missiles might give them plenty of pause. But the only way for us to know that with any certainty would be by having some kind of direct contact with them.

Basically, this interview convinces me that Alexander either doesn't actually know what's really going on, because he was never given access to the data, or he does know, and has been feeding us disinformation all along.

 

[Burnt State]

What was once a compelling story to fit neatly into our UFO narrative now may have other answers behind it instead.

The Black Knight Satellite Mystery | Astronotes

 

[junius]

I thought it was a pretty good show, I would have liked you to have asked John Alexander my question regarding consciousness as a dimension. He did raise the issue right at the end when he asked us to consider if plants have consciousness. Consciousness and intelligence are related in some ways. Look around you, what do you see? A table, chair, TV, even the computer you are currently using. All these things began life in a persons mind, the person imagined or mentally designed what they wanted and with their own and skill of others physically created that item in the real world. What I'm saying is that much of what we see in our physical world began life in the mind of a person. To a degree our consciousness plays a part in shaping that too. Now flip it around, consider UAP/UFO's whatever you want to call them. If they are alien, what does this perhaps tell us regarding not just the intelligence able to build such craft but the conscious state of these other world forms?

Is nature itself a universal consciousness? A dimension in its own right? Am I making sense?

 

[Randall]

I thought it was a pretty good show, I would have liked you to have asked John Alexander my question regarding consciousness as a dimension. He did raise the issue right at the end when he asked us to consider if plants have consciousness. Consciousness and intelligence are related in some ways. Look around you, what do you see? A table, chair, TV, even the computer you are currently using. All these things began life in a persons mind, the person imagined or mentally designed what they wanted and with their own and skill of others physically created that item in the real world. What I'm saying is that much of what we see in our physical world began life in the mind of a person. To a degree our consciousness plays a part in shaping that too. Now flip it around, consider UAP/UFO's whatever you want to call them. If they are alien, what does this perhaps tell us regarding not just the intelligence able to build such craft but the conscious state of these other world forms?

Is nature itself a universal consciousness? A dimension in its own right? Am I making sense?

Interesting post. Parts make sense. Other parts I'd be less confident about. I'm not sure if this would be the place to offer any answers, but much of what you're interested in can be sorted out by applying the associated contexts to the questions asked. For example with respect to consciousness as a dimension, what is happening is that the concepts of consciousness and dimensionality are being used synonymously, when they are two separate issues. It's sort of like asking, how do you measure fear in inches? Or insight in cubic millimeters.

This type of confusion happens when people use the word "dimensions" as a convenience term for the idea of some other place ( e.g. an alternate universe or realm ). If you really want to be clear about these issues, one cannot confuse those terms and contexts or one will run into problems. The realms between your ears will become confused with the one beyond your subjective experience, and you'll start to believe that fantasy worlds are objectively real ( when they're not ).

To sum up, consciousness is a virtual reality cooked up by our brains and sensory input and therefore although it is not a "dimension" in and of itself, it is a subjective reality. Therefore consciousness can contain virtual dimensions analogous to those that exist in the objectively real world. I like to use the example of a red Ferrari. Given my socio-economic status, the only red Ferrari I can afford is purely within my imagination, yet that imaginary image still exists. It has virtual length, height and width, and consequently volume. Therefore dimensions can exist ( virtually ) within consciousness, but consciousness doesn't exist as a dimension.

NOTE: Oddly, it seems that whenever I talk about my imaginary red Ferrari, it's only a matter of days before I cross paths with a real one driven by somebody else. The Trickster certainly has a sadistic sense of humor .

 

[junius]

Yes but I'm mindful of Jung and his theory of 'collective unconscious', stands to reason that if this hypothesis is correct, collective consciousness must also exist. Perhaps at a spiritual level without the need for any external sensory input, thus is essence a dimension for non physical entities to exist.

 

[Randall]

Yes but I'm mindful of Jung and his theory of 'collective unconscious', stands to reason that if this hypothesis is correct, collective consciousness must also exist. Perhaps at a spiritual level without the need for any external sensory input, thus is essence a dimension for non physical entities to exist.

Even if Jung's theory is true in the sense that there is some telepathic-like subconscious background noise created by peoples minds in operation ( one interpretation ), we're still talking about an environment produced by the mind and not another "dimension". It would be no different than the sea of signals produced by communications towers. That's not really another "dimension". It exists within our familiar dimensional construct as communications signals. The more reserved approach to Jung is that his collective consciousness theory was a way of describing the commonality of thought exhibited by individuals in the form of what he called archetypes. But of course I should assume, that you probably already know that. It was more of an afterthought for the readers. There's also that other word "spiritual", which seems to be another convenience term than can be moulded in a putty like manner according to the beliefs of the user to patch up the leaks in any number New Agey type theories.

 

[marduk]

Even if Jung's theory is true in the sense that there is some telepathic-like subconscious background noise created by peoples minds in operation ( one interpretation ), we're still talking about an environment produced by the mind and not another "dimension". It would be no different than the sea of signals produced by communications towers. That's not really another "dimension". It exists within our familiar dimensional construct as communications signals. The more reserved approach to Jung is that his collective consciousness theory was a way of describing the commonality of thought exhibited by individuals in the form of what he called archetypes. But of course I assume you probably already know that.

If this were true, one could conceivably isolate all information transfer mechanisms with the universe from the individual and discern a change.

This is my problem with the whole "humans aren't conscious, just receivers of the universal consciousness" meme.

The only radiation that I think can't be shielded is gravity waves, which would be a pretty crappy transmission tool given you'd have to be wiggling a sizeable part of the universe's mass to send it, and you'd need a receiver on the order of, say, the Earth. Since neutrinos don't really interact with mass, I struggle how they'd interact with our noggin.

Everything else can be shielded by some combination of emf shielding (like a faraday cage) or going down into a deep dark hole and using the Earth's crust as a shield.

 

[Randall]

If this were true, one could conceivably isolate all information transfer mechanisms with the universe from the individual and discern a change.

This is my problem with the whole "humans aren't conscious, just receivers of the universal consciousness" meme.

The only radiation that I think can't be shielded is gravity waves, which would be a pretty crappy transmission tool given you'd have to be wiggling a sizeable part of the universe's mass to send it, and you'd need a receiver on the order of, say, the Earth. Since neutrinos don't really interact with mass, I struggle how they'd interact with our noggin.

Everything else can be shielded by some combination of emf shielding (like a faraday cage) or going down into a deep dark hole and using the Earth's crust as a shield.

OK, but just to clarify, are you expressing as a sort of tangent to the discussion that you aren't a believer in the idea that, "humans aren't conscious, just receivers of the universal consciousness"? If so I would completely agree with that. That's also not to say that perhaps some sort of mind-to-mind transfer cannot take place sometimes by some as of yet unexplained physical process. Personally I have a hard time believing that it doesn't, but I can't offer any scientific evidence in support of it either.

 

[Constance]

I thought it was a pretty good show, I would have liked you to have asked John Alexander my question regarding consciousness as a dimension. He did raise the issue right at the end when he asked us to consider if plants have consciousness. Consciousness and intelligence are related in some ways. Look around you, what do you see? A table, chair, TV, even the computer you are currently using. All these things began life in a persons mind, the person imagined or mentally designed what they wanted and with their own and skill of others physically created that item in the real world. What I'm saying is that much of what we see in our physical world began life in the mind of a person. To a degree our consciousness plays a part in shaping that too. Now flip it around, consider UAP/UFO's whatever you want to call them. If they are alien, what does this perhaps tell us regarding not just the intelligence able to build such craft but the conscious state of these other world forms?

Is nature itself a universal consciousness? A dimension in its own right? Am I making sense?

I think you're making great sense. It's possible that older, more advanced civilizations in the galaxy and beyond are interested in 'our' planet in large part because our species has not yet turned our 'civilization' -- such as it is, the result of as much blind stupidity as of intelligence and insight -- over to control by artificial intelligence that would lack intrinsic, natural values. It might be that our philosophers and progressive social thinkers are of greater interest to them than our scientists and technologists. We might be protected so long as it remains possible that our species might still find a way to rational, enlightened, collective 'self'-government of the planet constructed on the values of mutuality, respect for life, nonviolence, social justice, and ecologically sound sustainability -- toward living wisely within the actual conditions of our existence.

If so, it could explain why this planet has long been observed without being colonized and ultimately taken over. It would imply a recognition of our species' deeper instinctive values, our natural desires for life lived peacefully, joyfully, and productively, which have repeatedly been repressed and deterred by the acquisitiveness of a succession of tribal and national leaderships concerned only with their own short-term goals of power and control over people, animals, and resources. It would suggest that some successful et civilizations have found the necessary psychic balance to preserve and enhance natural, existential, being rather than destroying it, and they might even seek to encourage us in that direction in ways we're not yet able to perceive.

 

[marduk]

OK, but just to clarify, are you expressing as a sort of tangent to the discussion that you aren't a believer in the idea that, "humans aren't conscious, just receivers of the universal consciousness"? If so I would completely agree with that. That's also not to say that perhaps some sort of mind-to-mind transfer cannot take place sometimes by some as of yet unexplained physical process. Personally I have a hard time believing that it doesn't, but I can't offer any scientific evidence in support of it either.

Sure on the mind to mind concept. Heck, we're doing it with technology today.

I'm commenting on the jungian archetypal and collective unconsciousness ideas.

As a sociological phenomena, sure. It's the human social condition. We pick up on memes and pass them on.

As a physical phenomena, no. If so, it would go away when we went down a mineshaft or into space where we're isolated from most physical information transfer mechanisms.

My sense is if psychic phenomena exists, it exists in the natural universe, of which the basic forces are well understood to some large approximation of reality.

In other words, a subtle but understandable phenomena that does not exceed light speed, and doesn't rely on spooky action at a distance.

 

[Randall]

I think you're making great sense. It's possible that older, more advanced civilizations in the galaxy and beyond are interested in 'our' planet in large part because our species has not yet turned our 'civilization' -- such as it is, the result of as much blind stupidity as of intelligence and insight -- over to control by artificial intelligence that would lack intrinsic, natural values. It might be that our philosophers and progressive social thinkers are of greater interest to them than our scientists and technologists. We might be protected so long as it remains possible that our species might still find a way to rational, enlightened, collective 'self'-government of the planet constructed on the values of mutuality, respect for life, nonviolence, social justice, and ecologically sound sustainability -- toward living wisely within the actual conditions of our existence.

If so, it could explain why this planet has long been observed without being colonized and ultimately taken over. It would imply a recognition of our species' deeper instinctive values, our natural desires for life lived peacefully, joyfully, and productively, which have repeatedly been repressed and deterred by the acquisitiveness of a succession of tribal and national leaderships concerned only with their own short-term goals of power and control over people, animals, and resources. It would suggest that some successful et civilizations have found the necessary psychic balance to preserve and enhance natural, existential, being rather than destroying it, and they might even seek to encourage us in that direction in ways we're not yet able to perceive.

Nice little rant there . You should do more of them . The part I'd consider a little more deeply is when you said:

"... our species has not yet turned our 'civilization' -- such as it is, the result of as much blind stupidity as of intelligence and insight -- over to control by artificial intelligence that would lack intrinsic, natural values."​

Remember that information processing is still largely dependent on a certain amount of hard wiring and programming, which means any hypothetical AI's behavior is dependent in large part on construction and programming. Therefore if these systems are constructed by builders to behave with compassion, insight, respect for the ecosystem, and other human traits, then they become extensions of the best of ourselves rather than the opposite. It may be one of the best moves we could make. After all, all the problems you are talking about were created by humans, not AIs. You haven't seen the movie Transcendence yet have you?

 

[Constance]

. . .Everything else can be shielded by some combination of emf shielding (like a faraday cage) or going down into a deep dark hole and using the Earth's crust as a shield.

Mind to mind communication through faraday cages has been demonstrated.

 

[marduk]

We can meditate and hypothesize on their motivations all we want, but until or if we make actual contact, we won't know.

At any rate, that's a social question, hence more than a little subjective.

Now the hardware and basis for propulsion, different story. The laws of physics are the same everywhere, and even if they weren't, their kit works here, so it should work for us.

Let's dupe that, and meet them on our own terms. In the neutral zone.

 

[Randall]

Sure on the mind to mind concept. Heck, we're doing it with technology today.

I'm commenting on the jungian archetypal and collective unconsciousness ideas.

As a sociological phenomena, sure. It's the human social condition. We pick up on memes and pass them on.

As a physical phenomena, no. If so, it would go away when we went down a mineshaft or into space where we're isolated from most physical information transfer mechanisms.

My sense is if psychic phenomena exists, it exists in the natural universe, of which the basic forces are well understood to some large approximation of reality.

In other words, a subtle but understandable phenomena that does not exceed light speed, and doesn't rely on spooky action at a distance.

Interesting. So you're suggesting that if telepathic-like Jungian collective consciousness exists, we should be able to shield ourselves from it like Magneto does against Xavier with that helmet he wears. I never looked at it from that perspective before. Thanks for plugging that into the picture. I wonder sometimes how much havoc all this EM radiation that's polluting our environment affects the workings of our brain, or if a natural super-subtle web of collective consciousness does exist, if it is being jammed by all the other noise now. Since the advent of massive cellular and wireless technology I have had a harder and harder time remaining focused. But then again maybe I'm just getting old. I don't know what to think for sure.

 

[marduk]

Mind to mind communication through faraday cages has been demonstrated.

Mind to mind communication has never been adequately demonstrated, no mater what Radin claims.

And Faraday cages don't block all information transfer mechanisms. Like cheating.

I've experienced ESP. But I also think there's a boundary on how we can experiment on it that we haven't considered.

 

[Constance]

For lack of time, I'm copying this post over from the C&P thread last night:

"Openness and responsiveness to the environment (a subject-object interaction) seems to be at the core of various understandings and misunderstandings [misrepresentations] of what happens in the evolution of life and even in the evolution of systems in nature. The subject side of this interaction is that which is uncomfortable for traditional scientists (no wonder since there is a reason why they have avoided the recognition of subjectivity and consciousness throughout the modern period, stuck in an objective and machine-like idea about what is real). Information theory overly influenced by computational thinking is in danger of missing the difference that arises with life and increasing subjectivity (sense of self and other arising in 'affectivity' in primordial organisms -- see Panksepp). The most interesting question is actually why nature has produced the affordances that support the development of consciousness and mind.

As Mitchell observes:

"A tacit assumption of information theory is that the meaning of information is carried in the signal. It can be easily shown that this assumption can pertain only to “intended” information, but is in general false. The meaning of information is assigned by the percipient. Even if the originator of information intended a meaning for the signal, there is no assurance that any percipient will recognize the intended meaning. Information is just a pattern of energy that requires perception to utilize and an information base (experience) from which to assign meaning. “Meaning” is internally created information which connects the perceived information to the information base residing in memory. To assign meaning is a fundamental function of “mentality”, the evolutionary component of consciousness. At very simple levels of living matter, behaviors such as the search for food, mating opportunities, predator avoidance, etc. require that information from the environment be perceived and given meaning. And since information does not carry within the signal, but is just a pattern of energy to be interpreted, assigning a meaning is an evolved, learned behavior. Learning is precisely the activity of giving meaning to information and retaining the meaning for future use. Non-local resonance allows experience to be shared."

Links to Mitchell and Panksepp to come.

https://www.theparacast.com/forum/threads/consciousness-and-the-paranormal-part-2.15224/page-37#post-203032

 

[Burnt State]

Some of the optimism expressed here in what we are capable of is simply outstanding, well excet for you, ufology. You're being a real Debbie Downer on all this imaginative positive thinking. Just imagine us, out there in the neutral zone, living by our Captain Kirk wits and emotionless, intellect. Who doesn't want to be so amazingly bright and inaginative as to be worth preserving? Sadly, we're busy fighting Ebola, fanaticism and what appears to be our most common, intrinsic desire which is to bash each other over the head with a club, rape, maim and set everything and everyone we don't like on fire.

If we could tap into a collective consciousness or begin to acknowledge any planetary universal consciousness filled with thinking flora and fauna then maybe I could see us as valuable. But while a species of great promise and potential we still have a long way to go before our consciousness expands to embrace an open dialogue with our star brothers and sisters. Still, it's nice to dream.

 

[Constance]

Remember that information processing is still largely dependent on a certain amount of hard wiring and programming, which means any hypothetical AI's behavior is dependent in large part on construction and programming. Therefore if these systems are constructed by builders to behave with compassion, insight, respect for the ecosystem, and other human traits, then they become extensions of the best of ourselves rather than the opposite.

Those traits have evolved in the long evolution of embodied consciousness demonstrating 'affectivity' even in primitive species of life. (See Panksepp) They are not abstract concepts that can be expressed in algorithms. Asimov already confronted the problem of robots so 'intelligent' that they think for themselves out of a base of limited experience and judgment that is nothing like ours. Why Bill Joy and other pioneers of AI fled the field as it developed.

 

[marduk]

The most interesting question is actually why nature has produced the affordances that support the development of consciousness and mind.

I've seen this question before, and have always thought that:
#1 it seemed to take 3.8 BY for life to randomly evolve intelligence, so not only has it not really been necessary for the continuation of life, but not really advantageous before now.
#2 it seemed to really take off when protohumans developed social structures/sexual selections that started to select for intelligence -- i.e. we helped put the pressure on ourselves to evolve it.

As Mitchell observes:

"A tacit assumption of information theory is that the meaning of information is carried in the signal.

Actually, no.

From the mighty wikipedia:

Information theory, however, does not consider message importance or meaning, as these are matters of the quality of data rather than the quantity and readability of data, the latter of which is determined solely by probabilities.

In short, meaning is a sociological or semantic layer, and is subject to speculative and subjective interpretation. Information theory (happens to be my background) is a mathematical subject, and doesn't generally like to cross into such domains.

At very simple levels of living matter, behaviors such as the search for food, mating opportunities, predator avoidance, etc. require that information from the environment be perceived and given meaning. And since information does not carry within the signal, but is just a pattern of energy to be interpreted, assigning a meaning is an evolved, learned behavior. Learning is precisely the activity of giving meaning to information and retaining the meaning for future use. Non-local resonance allows experience to be shared."

Actually this is also demonstrably not true, at least in the universal sense. We as humans may operate this way, but I highly doubt plants assign meaning to tracking the seasons; they just respond to stimuli and adjust what they do.

And if experience could be shared by non-local resonance, then in 3.8BY my sense is that nature would have found a way to exploit this by now, and we'd all be walking around with a sixth sense that allowed me to avoid the speeding ticket I just got.

And rabbits would be a hell of a lot more plentiful.