Chris O'Brien RIP

[Randall]

I had forgotten about the communications with non humans that he mentioned. Again, jaw drops too low to find again. Because it wasn't just simple contactee stuff he was on about....I'm still trying to square his statements with Jerome Clark's assertion that a UFO crash recovered on earth, along with alien bodies, is something so big that it simply can't be hidden from history. is that what Varinha is all about?



I think back in the day everyone was hanging with LaVey as he was throwing the best parties. What always struck me about this photo is how Aimé Michel looks like he could be LaVey's son or at least a close relative.

Vallee has always been a student of the mystical arts in all their many forms and religious associations. So many Ufologists are Rosicrucians aren't they? I remember back in high school, when the UFO bug had bit me hard, I also had a copy of LaVey's Satanic Bible on the bookshelf alongside my UFO and ghost collection and a very strange black and blank book with no exterior labels, filled with Rosicrucian protocols, that I found at a yard sale.

But to your previous point, it's not a surprise that Republicans, like Keel, are all a bunch of worried demonologists.

And yet again, ufology descends deeper into the world of weird. IMO as Vallée ran out of relatively grounded themes for his his UFO books, he started coming-up with increasingly exotic theories, to keep the presses running.

 

[SRL+]

And yet again, ufology descends deeper into the world of weird. IMO as Vallée ran out of relatively grounded themes for his his UFO books, he started coming-up with increasingly exotic theories, to keep the presses running.

Randall, what is your unvarnished opinion , as I have not the faintest of clues as to what all of this means, Is it ET's?

 

[Burnt State]

And yet again, ufology descends deeper into the world of weird. IMO as Vallée ran out of relatively grounded themes for his his UFO books, he started coming-up with increasingly exotic theories, to keep the presses running.

As these are taken from his diary entries from the first decade of this century I would say that they are the facts as he recorded them in the moment. What's exotic about it all?

As a correction to an above post in the interviews with him I understood that the 250,000 entries were the Capella database that was compiled for BAASS through government funding and then those were taken away and nothing else was done with it. His contention that a stripped down version of 50,000 good cases would be enough to bring strong analysis to in phase 2 of this database that was never completed - very frustrating.

His firm belief that these scattered castle databases are at the core of how to solve the UFO conundrum really sits polar opposite to Clark's encyclopedia. Even in its fourth edition he couldn't really say what UFO's are, acknowledged that they're probably extraterrestrial, but tied to human experience in ways that still can't be explained by current science or language.

 

[Randall]

Randall, what is your unvarnished opinion , as I have not the faintest of clues as to what all of this means, Is it ET's?

Okay — applying a healthy coat of varnish stripper, alien visitation is real, and probably, but not necessarily, extraterrestrial in origin.

 

[Burnt State]

alien visitation is real, and probably, but not necessarily, extraterrestrial in origin.

That provides some direction. Do you care to elaborate on what "not necessarily extraterrestrial in origin" might mean? Please feel free to speculate wildly and weirdly.

I know we are straying deeply from the thread focus, but in the spirit of Christopher O'Brien, who was a great creative, free thinker on this topic, I think we're doing some good work.

Chewing the fat on what UFO's could be is always an entertaining Sunday afternoon activity, along with making cabbage rolls which is what I'm heading out to do for the rest of the afternoon but I'll be checking this thread in between rolls.

 

[Randall]

. . . What's exotic about it all?

What I mean is that Vallée starts off collaborating with Hynek on classification systems for UFO reports, a relatively grounded systematic way of studying the subject, and with the success of Hynek's 1972 book, The UFO Experience, he reissues his Anatomy of a Phenomenon, has some success as well, then over time transforms the subject matter into an Enigma, on the Edge of Reality, fusing Magonia and folklore with multiple Dimensions.

I'm not saying that those works aren't valuable contributions to ufology history and culture ( they are ) — but as you can see, there is certainly a trend away from more grounded "nuts & bolts" explanations toward the exotic. In fact, I seem to recall him saying something to the effect that he'd actually be disappointed if UFOs turned out to just be spaceships.

To me, that comment reflects Vallée's personal feelings — not a particularly rational assessment. However, it's also understandable against the backdrop of books on the subject at the time. Spaceships had been done to death, and he needed something to set himself apart from the crowd that would sell — and it worked. That's not to imply that Vallée's direction was any sort of con. It was just a shift in perspective.

Because this is the COB RIP thread — I'll add that Chris' Trickster perspective parallels Vallée's thinking in some ways. I think he was a bit of a fan. I have both of Chris' Trickster books, plus Stalking The Herd — all worthy add-ons to any UFO/Paranormal library.

 

[Burnt State]

Hynek's 1972 book, The UFO Experience

This was the first ever UFO book I bought at the grocery store with my mom when grocery stores used to sell cool books and albums at the checkout. I was in grade 5 and riveted by this book!

he'd actually be disappointed if UFOs turned out to just be spaceships.

That's exactly what he said. It seems there is a trend in studying the UFO conundrum that the deeper you go into it the weirder it gets. And then the people studying it get a little weird too - it's a very destabilizing subject. I think Vallee has actually maintained a fairly critical and creatively insightful approach to it all. By comparison, Keel said they were demons, Clark says we don't have the language to describe it accurately and think of all the many contactees who go far out into Dreamland i.e. Strieber. I'm still struck by Bigelow's strange one off comment regarding aliens: "they're everywhere" suggesting the paranormal curtain is drawn all around us. You are right - it's all pretty exotic, as those tricky aliens should be.

I'd add that Chris' Trickster perspective parallels Vallée's thinking in some ways. I think he was a bit of a fan. I have both of Chris' Trickster books, plus Stalking The Herd — all worthy add-ons to any UFO/Paranormal library.

I have all these books as well and Chris' discussion on the trickster led me to Hansen 's iconic work which I think is a very important way of thinking about paranormality. I know not everyone is a fan of the sociological critique, but, historically speaking there's a lot to be gained from exploring the role of this archetype in society. It matches Vallee's thermostat theorem and it points to this role of balancing society's shifts between chaos and order. Is this all just a way of describing the human experience or is there a body that is pulling on the strings of humanity to manage us so to speak? This brings us back to Fort again. I really think it's a puzzle we will never understand.

 

[Burnt State]

@SRL+ what's your unvarnished opinion of this weirdness?

I am firmly in the non human camp, but like @Randall I vacillate between terrestrial and extraterrestrial.

There's certainly a lot of effort put on to demonstrate an extraterrestrial presence - it all feels like grand theatre to me! It's like you're driving in the middle of the woods one night and the next thing you know you've run into this off planet theatre troop who wants to mess with your mind.



But then I think about all the other Fortean material, and it all feels related or connected or like they're some kind of very large extended family here to entertain and terrify us the way good art should. Sometimes it sticks to us and things get a little weird in our lives for a while.

It really makes you think. Maybe that's what it's here to do as Barker said, (was it him?). "UFO's are here to make us think.". And my previous mentor Bruce Duensing said that good art should be like an axe to your face, smashing you into a whole new experience, making you consider another way of contemplating reality, as all good art should.

 

[Randall]

- it all feels like grand theatre to me! It's like you're driving in the middle of the woods one night and the next thing you know you've run into this off planet theatre troop who wants to mess with your mind . . .

I think that actually happened in one case I read someplace — unless it was on a Twilight Zone episode .

My way of grounding myself in the subject is to recall the words of the inimitable Stanton Friedman, who said — "I don't care about UFOs. I care about flying saucers!" Whatever else Friedman did or didn't do, he was a "non-apologist ufologist" who always kept his eye on the doughnut and not the hole. The rest, while interesting, can also be very distracting, and is ultimately just window dressing — peripheral to the central question.

 

[SRL+]

I don't discount what you have written other than why would you think Stanton's nephew would hold a differing opinion?

 

[SRL+]

I had forgotten about the communications with non humans that he mentioned. Again, jaw drops too low to find again. Because it wasn't just simple contactee stuff he was on about....I'm still trying to square his statements with Jerome Clark's assertion that a UFO crash recovered on earth, along with alien bodies, is something so big that it simply can't be hidden from history. is that what Varinha is all about?



I think back in the day everyone was hanging with LaVey as he was throwing the best parties. What always struck me about this photo is how Aimé Michel looks like he could be LaVey's son or at least a close relative.

Vallee has always been a student of the mystical arts in all their many forms and religious associations. So many Ufologists are Rosicrucians aren't they? I remember back in high school, when the UFO bug had bit me hard, I also had a copy of LaVey's Satanic Bible on the bookshelf alongside my UFO and ghost collection and a very strange black and blank book with no exterior labels, filled with Rosicrucian protocols, that I found at a yard sale.

But to your previous point, it's not a surprise that Republicans, like Keel, are all a bunch of worried demonologists.

This image is so freaky that I've spent the entire day on it, and what it means in relation to our perceived world.

 

[Randall]

I don't discount what you have written other than why would you think Stanton's nephew would hold a differing opinion?

The differences between opinions might not be as wide as is assumed. Try to look at it this way:

Few ( if any ) astrophysicists hypothesized beforehand that black holes are portals to Hell, and that therefore they should look for demons in the sky so that they'd have a clue as to where to point their telescopes.

Similarly, the USAF didn't make the hypothesis that UFOs are transports from Hell its baseline hypothesis either — especially when the general consensus was that if they're beyond Earthly tech, then they're probably not made on Earth.

This is NOT the same as declaring the ETH hypothesis as proven. It just sets a historically accurate baseline for what the phenomenon is about. From there, other perspectives have been introduced that have led different people to favor different explanations.

My guess is that all three of us ( Stanton, Paul, and I ) would all agree that this is a reasonably accurate summary of the situation. Where opinions differ are in the favored explanations, and in the ensuing debates, it seems to me that the baseline often tends to get forgotten, but Stanton was very good at reminding us about that.

It's like — Imagine that you lost your cat, so you start your search, considering everything you see down the alley as a possible cat, ( small dogs, squirrels, partridges, small children, remote control toys, teddy bears, dolls, shadows, balloons, ) until at some point you've not only forgotten what it is you're supposed to be looking for, but whether or not cats even exist, and the next thing you know, you're sitting discussing Schrodinger. That's how ridiculous ufology has gotten at times.

 

[Burnt State]

I think that actually happened in one case I read someplace — unless it was on a Twilight Zone episode .

My way of grounding myself in the subject is to recall the words of the inimitable Stanton Friedman, who said — "I don't care about UFOs. I care about flying saucers!" Whatever else Friedman did or didn't do, he was a "non-apologist ufologist" who always kept his eye on the doughnut and not the hole. The rest, while interesting, can also be very distracting, and is ultimately just window dressing — peripheral to the central question.

Ok, but he also supported, unapologetically, some pretty goofy stuff, and I'm not just talking about MJ12 docs. He was never going to back down from a position once taken even if it was so obviously not credible.

You sound a little like Jerome Clark who felt the core of the phenomena were these concrete event anomalies that has radar trace and multiple witnesses etc. There are really so few of those...

But we know that there is more ephemeral bizarre, transformational and ghost like aspects to the phenomena as well. I think the hole comes along with the doughnut and you don't have a choice unless you live in Canada where you can have Timbits where the hole of the doughnut is manifested into a reality and sometimes even has jam in the centre.



@SRL+ I hope you are just as taken by this powerful, Ufological image. Along with these Polish cigar shaped objects down below:

 

[Randall]

Ok, but he also supported, unapologetically, some pretty goofy stuff, and I'm not just talking about MJ12 docs. He was never going to back down from a position once taken even if it was so obviously not credible.

Obviously some MJ-12 stuff is highly suspect, but the idea of some high-level working group is reasonable, and the level of the psyop pulled on Friedman is evidence in and of itself that he was onto something.

You sound a little like Jerome Clark who felt the core of the phenomena were these concrete event anomalies that has radar trace and multiple witnesses etc. There are really so few of those...

More than we've been told I imagine.

But we know that there is more ephemeral bizarre, transformational and ghost like aspects to the phenomena as well. I think the hole comes along with the doughnut and you don't have a choice unless you live in Canada where you can have Timbits where the hole of the doughnut is manifested into a reality and sometimes even has jam in the centre.

Mmmm

@SRL+ I hope you are just as taken by this powerful, Ufological image. Along with these Polish cigar shaped objects down below:

Looks delish — probably very healthy too.

 

[SRL+]

The differences between opinions might not be as wide as is assumed. Try to look at it this way:

Few ( if any ) astrophysicists hypothesized beforehand that black holes are portals to Hell, and that therefore they should look for demons in the sky so that they'd have a clue as to where to point their telescopes.

Similarly, the USAF didn't make the hypothesis that UFOs are transports from Hell its baseline hypothesis either — especially when the general consensus was that if they're beyond Earthly tech, then they're probably not made on Earth.

This is NOT the same as declaring the ETH hypothesis as proven. It just sets a historically accurate baseline for what the phenomenon is about. From there, other perspectives have been introduced that have led different people to favor different explanations.

My guess is that all three of us ( Stanton, Paul, and I ) would all agree that this is a reasonably accurate summary of the situation. Where opinions differ are in the favored explanations, and in the ensuing debates, it seems to me that the baseline often tends to get forgotten, but Stanton was very good at reminding us about that.

It's like — Imagine that you lost your cat, so you start your search, considering everything you see down the alley as a possible cat, ( small dogs, squirrels, partridges, small children, remote control toys, teddy bears, dolls, shadows, balloons, ) until at some point you've not only forgotten what it is you're supposed to be looking for, but whether or not cats even exist, and the next thing you know, you're sitting discussing Schrodinger. That's how ridiculous ufology has gotten at times.

Thanks for your view, as I've grown to appreciate your perspectives, however Paul would most likely disagree with your impressions as having experiencing various synchronicities. However, I am unable to speak for him.

 

[SRL+]

Ok, but he also supported, unapologetically, some pretty goofy stuff, and I'm not just talking about MJ12 docs. He was never going to back down from a position once taken even if it was so obviously not credible.

You sound a little like Jerome Clark who felt the core of the phenomena were these concrete event anomalies that has radar trace and multiple witnesses etc. There are really so few of those...

But we know that there is more ephemeral bizarre, transformational and ghost like aspects to the phenomena as well. I think the hole comes along with the doughnut and you don't have a choice unless you live in Canada where you can have Timbits where the hole of the doughnut is manifested into a reality and sometimes even has jam in the centre.



@SRL+ I hope you are just as taken by this powerful, Ufological image. Along with these Polish cigar shaped objects down below:

Holly crap, where did you get those fingers? What have done with Shrek's family?

 

[Burnt State]

the idea of some high-level working group is reasonable, and the level of the psyop pulled on Friedman is evidence in and of itself that he was onto something.

That's not entirely correct. Stanton was not the first person to receive these docs, but as the disinfo docs were circulated around the Ufological community both Friedman and Linda Moulton Howe claimed they were totally legit without doing much by the way of due diligence.

While yes, there were many iterations of high level UFO groups that tried to figure out just what the hell these saucers are all about (as gov't's around the world did and still do with varying degrees of secrecy), this type of three letter op was really designed for a host of ulterior motives. I think the worst one is to discredit the entire field, and to discredit Ufological figures like Stanton. It's bad enough that we have/had characters like Massan doing this regularly with his fake mummies etc., but to have more esteemed figures like Friedman getting sucked into this b.s. caused the whole field to lise legitimacy, which was certainly an aim of the PTB.

 

[SRL+]

A brief non sequitur in wishing there were more than 15 minutes to edit for the mentally challenged.

 

[Randall]

That's not entirely correct.

That all depends on what you mean by "That". Without moving the goalposts the points were:

1. The idea of some high-level working group is reasonable.
2. The level of the psyop pulled on Friedman is evidence in and of itself that he was onto something.

Whether or not other similar documents were also sent elsewhere doesn't detract from either statement. If anything, it deepens the situation. Plus the stuff received by Shandera wasn't the only source. I recall Friedman saying he got some copies directly from the National Archives — In which case someone would need to have gone in there in-person and planted them.

To me there are really only two reasonable possibilities. Either Friedman & Co did it themselves in order to see whether or not they could shake anything real loose, or some rather sophisticated government insiders were pulling a disinfo operation on them — which typically means that they were trying to throw Friedman off-track and/or discredit him, in which case why bother doing that unless he was actually onto something?

IMO, from the perspective of the history of ufology research, either possibility is interesting to consider. But which one do we believe? To me it's not a simple "case closed" due to some doctored documents.

If Richard Doty can be believed, he supposedly admitted that the Former Air Force Office of Special Investigations ( AFOSI ), had him pass fake documents and false information to UFO researchers, including those focused on the MJ-12 story, during the 1980s. That would mean that Friedman at least had no part in faking the documents — and that he was a target of an Air Force perpetrated hoax.

It's well known that the art of disinformation uses a careful blend of fact and fiction to throw-off investigators, and we all know something happened at Roswell that they've been covering-up for decades. Just because it's old news in ufology, doesn't mean it should be forgotten. That's exactly what they'd just love to happen.

 

[Burnt State]

If Richard Doty can be believed, he supposedly admitted that the Former Air Force Office of Special Investigations ( AFOSI ), had him pass fake documents and false information to UFO researchers, including those focused on the MJ-12 story, during the 1980s. That would mean that Friedman at least had no part in faking the documents — and that he was a target of an Air Force perpetrated hoax.

Yes.

It's well known that the art of disinformation uses a careful blend of fact and fiction to throw-off investigators, and we all know something happened at Roswell that they've been covering-up for decades. Just because it's old news in ufology, doesn't mean it should be forgotten. That's exactly what they'd just love to happen.

Wasn't Stanton onto the same thing as most in his field - UFO's are real and they probably come from outer space? I don't see him as anything special except perhaps a little gullible in some areas.

And MJ12 will not be forgotten, nor will Roswell, but what they are of value to solving the problem is limited at best - just some concocted fake news and a tantalizingly good story.