THE PARACAST NEWSLETTER
June 4, 2017
www.theparacast.com
Cutting-edge Thinker Greg Bishop Reflects on the State of the UFO Field on The Paracast
The Paracast is heard Sundays from 3:00 AM until 6:00 AM Central Time on the GCN Radio Network and affiliates around the USA, the Boost Radio Network, the IRN Internet Radio Network, and online across the globe via download and on-demand streaming.
SUPPORT THE SHOW AND ENJOY A PREMIUM PARACAST EXPERIENCE! We have another radio show and we’d love for you listen to it. So for a low subscription fee, you will receive access to After The Paracast, plus a higher-quality version of The Paracast free of network ads, and chat rooms when you sign up for The Paracast+. We also offer a special RSS feed for easy updates of the latest episodes, the Paracast+ Video Channel, episode transcripts, Special Features, Classic Episodes and there’s more to come! We’ve just begun to add podcasts and videos from Paul Kimball’s “Other Side of Truth.” Check out our new lower rates, starting at just $1.49 per week, plus our “Lifetime” membership and special free print and eBook book offers! For more information about our premium package, please visit: Introducing The Paracast+ | The Paracast — The Gold Standard of Paranormal Radio.
This Week's Episode: Gene and Chris present a reality check for the UFO field with none other than Greg Bishop of "Radio Misterioso." Greg's latest book, "It Defies Language," illustrated by noted blogger and artist Red Pill Junkie, is a collection of essays about the UFO subject and related phenomena. During this segment, Greg will join the panel in providing a hard look at the toxic state of the UFO field and what ought to be done to take research to the next level, a way to actually find solid answers to what is really going on. Gene will also bring up recent problems involving MUFON.
Chris O’Brien’s Blog: Our Strange Planet
Radio Misterioso: Radio Misterioso | In-depth conversations on the paranormal alternating with weird music. Live on Sundays (usually) 8-10 PM Pacific.
After The Paracast -- Available exclusively to Paracast+ subscribers on June 4: Very special guest Greg Bishop speaks of his use of drones before he joins Gene and Chris in discussing the “hidden” files from an old UFO group, the Aerial Phenomena Research Organization (APRO), which have, for years, been kept inaccessible in a number of file cabinets. Gene recounts the sad history of another notable UFO group of days gone by, the National Investigations Committee on Aerial Phenomena (NICAP). The group set itself up a lobbyist, trying to get Congressional hearings on UFOs. After those hearings resulted in the controversial Condon Report, NICAP faded away amid scandal after the firing of their Director, Major Donald Keyhoe. So what is Greg’s image of the ideal UFO research club? What about funding individual researchers to go off and do their thing?
Reminder: Please don't forget to visit our famous Paracast Community Forums for the latest news/views/debates on all things paranormal: The Paracast Community Forums.
Appealing to the Lowest Common Denominator
By Gene Steinberg
Maybe you saw one of those rare TV news stories about someone seeing a UFO. Or maybe you caught a reference to the subject on a cable TV show. Indeed, on a recent episode of “60 Minutes,” hotel and space flight billionaire Robert Bigelow confessed that he believed in UFOs, and favored the alien connection.
Indeed, on the June 4th episode of The Paracast, Chris and I, along with guest Greg Bishop, speculated on whether there was more in Bigelow’s brief comments than might have been apparent at first blush. When he spoke of aliens being “right under people’s noses.” was he referring to beings that came from other worlds? Or was he referring to beings who, in fact, were living among us, so-called “tenants in the building”?
It’s certainly more convenient to go with the first conclusion, and maybe that’s what he meant. He even counts his grandparents as among the witnesses and claims to have spent “millions and millions of dollars” investigating the subject.
It is not that Bigelow has necessarily been forthcoming about the specifics of that evidence. There may indeed have been real gems among the sightings he’s probed, and not just the case involving his relatives.
Now perhaps his attempt to buy MUFON’s services to do some of his research might have borne fruit. But that deal simply fell apart, in part, at least, because that organization failed to do its job.
Indeed, it presents a real dilemma facing people who want to find out what UFOs are all about. So America’s largest UFO group, MUFON, got its start as a splinter group to APRO in 1969. In those days it was the Midwest UFO Network, and the first name was changed a few years later to Mutual in order to reflect its national and perhaps international focus.
If you join MUFON, you’ll receive a monthly magazine that, for many years, bore a close resemblance to something published by a local club of some sort. I often referred to it as a “Rotary Club” approach. The design has since been spruced up, and you can opt for the digital version if you want to join at a lower rate.
So a “Basic Level” membership for MUFON costs $4.99 per month, paid annually ($59.88), and it entitles you to entry-level member benefits such as the monthly “e-Journal.” If you want a printed copy, it’s $29 more for the year. At one time, the printed magazine was part of the membership, but costs are no doubt rising.
What you don’t receive, however, is any evidence that MUFON has actually done very much more than collect sighting reports, publish some of them, and hold meetings. It’s not as if actual research is being done to find out what UFOs really are.
Perhaps part of that is driven from the top. So Executive Director Jan Harzan once admitted on The Paracast that he was rooting for the ET answer. He seemed to have forgotten MUFON’s alleged mission, which is “to discover the true nature of the phenomenon.”
Indeed, MUFON acts as if it has already discovered their “true nature,” and it’s all about being visited by extraterrestrials. The disconnect between goals and belief systems is apparently being overlooked.
Also being overlooked is the fact that the sighting reports gathered by MUFON’s investigators are heavily focused towards the event and not the eyewitnesses. They play a subordinate role to the presence of mysterious objects in the skies, as if you were simply reporting the passage of an airplane. The airplane would be the same regardless of the personality or belief system of the person watching that aircraft. It’s a separate tangible object, and thus finding out more about a witness is not on their radar.
Indeed, when I’ve asked MUFON officials why they aren’t interested in such matters as family histories, and whether the experiencers have had other encounters with the unknown, not necessarily involving UFOs, the response is rarely satisfactory. So if the witness volunteers such information, fine and dandy. If not, well, they still have the sighting report that goes into one huge database.
Now perhaps independent researchers might use that database as a tool with which to examine the evidence. Even though the sightings largely ignore family histories and prior experiences, there is certainly lots of data to chew over.
Unfortunately, the database, in its present form, is essentially useless. The database engine appears to have existed unchanged for more than 20 years. It is slow to access, and you are limited to 50 records, or sighting reports, at a time. You cannot even click a “More” link to call up additional reports.
When MUFON stages a public presentation, it doesn’t seem that they spend a lot of time vetting guest speakers. Or maybe they are only seeking the ones who fill seats regardless of the merit of their presentations. I have mentioned a few of these questionable guests on the show, and I don’t have the patience to revisit those comments.
MUFON was even lucky enough to attract someone to produce a TV reality show allegedly based on their work, “Hangar 1.” But in its two seasons on the History Channel, the show developed a nasty reputation for presenting fanciful versions of actual events, along with nonexistent evidence.
It almost strikes you as an effort to emulate the “ripped from the headlines” approach taken by some TV dramas, such as “Law & Order: Special Victims Unit.” The story is fiction, but it’s loosely based on something that really happened.
But wasn’t “Hangar 1” supposed to be a TV show that presented just the facts without embellishment? It’s not as if MUFON seems to care, since the show no doubt helped boost member sign-ups.
In recent months, MUFON has weathered some scandals, such as accusations of taking a sexist approach towards women. More recently, a State Director was axed after it was revealed that he was posting offensive white supremacist and racist comments online. While people are entitled to their personal opinions, someone representing MUFO ought to be on their best behavior.
Such shenanigans barely obscure MUFON’s failure to conduct meaningful research into a phenomenon that continues to perplex humankind year after year.
Some researchers actually prefer not to work under an organizational banner, but to do their own research, and perhaps share notes with a handful of colleagues. They aren’t constrained by group structures and politics, or the need to fund officer salaries with memberships and other money-making ventures.
Instead of attempting to fund a UFO club to help him with his research, monied individuals such as Robert Bigelow would do better to seek out some of those independent investigators and see if a well-placed grant might help to advance their work.
Or perhaps his work is done. He has his answers and, perhaps some day, he’ll decide it’s the right time to let us in on the secret. Surely all the millions of dollars he’s spent over the years have delivered at least some positive results.
But maybe we’ll never know.
Copyright 1999-2017 The Paracast LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Privacy Policy: Your personal information is safe with us. We will positively never give out your name and/or e-mail address to anybody else, and that's a promise!
June 4, 2017
www.theparacast.com
Cutting-edge Thinker Greg Bishop Reflects on the State of the UFO Field on The Paracast
The Paracast is heard Sundays from 3:00 AM until 6:00 AM Central Time on the GCN Radio Network and affiliates around the USA, the Boost Radio Network, the IRN Internet Radio Network, and online across the globe via download and on-demand streaming.
SUPPORT THE SHOW AND ENJOY A PREMIUM PARACAST EXPERIENCE! We have another radio show and we’d love for you listen to it. So for a low subscription fee, you will receive access to After The Paracast, plus a higher-quality version of The Paracast free of network ads, and chat rooms when you sign up for The Paracast+. We also offer a special RSS feed for easy updates of the latest episodes, the Paracast+ Video Channel, episode transcripts, Special Features, Classic Episodes and there’s more to come! We’ve just begun to add podcasts and videos from Paul Kimball’s “Other Side of Truth.” Check out our new lower rates, starting at just $1.49 per week, plus our “Lifetime” membership and special free print and eBook book offers! For more information about our premium package, please visit: Introducing The Paracast+ | The Paracast — The Gold Standard of Paranormal Radio.
This Week's Episode: Gene and Chris present a reality check for the UFO field with none other than Greg Bishop of "Radio Misterioso." Greg's latest book, "It Defies Language," illustrated by noted blogger and artist Red Pill Junkie, is a collection of essays about the UFO subject and related phenomena. During this segment, Greg will join the panel in providing a hard look at the toxic state of the UFO field and what ought to be done to take research to the next level, a way to actually find solid answers to what is really going on. Gene will also bring up recent problems involving MUFON.
Chris O’Brien’s Blog: Our Strange Planet
Radio Misterioso: Radio Misterioso | In-depth conversations on the paranormal alternating with weird music. Live on Sundays (usually) 8-10 PM Pacific.
After The Paracast -- Available exclusively to Paracast+ subscribers on June 4: Very special guest Greg Bishop speaks of his use of drones before he joins Gene and Chris in discussing the “hidden” files from an old UFO group, the Aerial Phenomena Research Organization (APRO), which have, for years, been kept inaccessible in a number of file cabinets. Gene recounts the sad history of another notable UFO group of days gone by, the National Investigations Committee on Aerial Phenomena (NICAP). The group set itself up a lobbyist, trying to get Congressional hearings on UFOs. After those hearings resulted in the controversial Condon Report, NICAP faded away amid scandal after the firing of their Director, Major Donald Keyhoe. So what is Greg’s image of the ideal UFO research club? What about funding individual researchers to go off and do their thing?
Reminder: Please don't forget to visit our famous Paracast Community Forums for the latest news/views/debates on all things paranormal: The Paracast Community Forums.
Appealing to the Lowest Common Denominator
By Gene Steinberg
Maybe you saw one of those rare TV news stories about someone seeing a UFO. Or maybe you caught a reference to the subject on a cable TV show. Indeed, on a recent episode of “60 Minutes,” hotel and space flight billionaire Robert Bigelow confessed that he believed in UFOs, and favored the alien connection.
Indeed, on the June 4th episode of The Paracast, Chris and I, along with guest Greg Bishop, speculated on whether there was more in Bigelow’s brief comments than might have been apparent at first blush. When he spoke of aliens being “right under people’s noses.” was he referring to beings that came from other worlds? Or was he referring to beings who, in fact, were living among us, so-called “tenants in the building”?
It’s certainly more convenient to go with the first conclusion, and maybe that’s what he meant. He even counts his grandparents as among the witnesses and claims to have spent “millions and millions of dollars” investigating the subject.
It is not that Bigelow has necessarily been forthcoming about the specifics of that evidence. There may indeed have been real gems among the sightings he’s probed, and not just the case involving his relatives.
Now perhaps his attempt to buy MUFON’s services to do some of his research might have borne fruit. But that deal simply fell apart, in part, at least, because that organization failed to do its job.
Indeed, it presents a real dilemma facing people who want to find out what UFOs are all about. So America’s largest UFO group, MUFON, got its start as a splinter group to APRO in 1969. In those days it was the Midwest UFO Network, and the first name was changed a few years later to Mutual in order to reflect its national and perhaps international focus.
If you join MUFON, you’ll receive a monthly magazine that, for many years, bore a close resemblance to something published by a local club of some sort. I often referred to it as a “Rotary Club” approach. The design has since been spruced up, and you can opt for the digital version if you want to join at a lower rate.
So a “Basic Level” membership for MUFON costs $4.99 per month, paid annually ($59.88), and it entitles you to entry-level member benefits such as the monthly “e-Journal.” If you want a printed copy, it’s $29 more for the year. At one time, the printed magazine was part of the membership, but costs are no doubt rising.
What you don’t receive, however, is any evidence that MUFON has actually done very much more than collect sighting reports, publish some of them, and hold meetings. It’s not as if actual research is being done to find out what UFOs really are.
Perhaps part of that is driven from the top. So Executive Director Jan Harzan once admitted on The Paracast that he was rooting for the ET answer. He seemed to have forgotten MUFON’s alleged mission, which is “to discover the true nature of the phenomenon.”
Indeed, MUFON acts as if it has already discovered their “true nature,” and it’s all about being visited by extraterrestrials. The disconnect between goals and belief systems is apparently being overlooked.
Also being overlooked is the fact that the sighting reports gathered by MUFON’s investigators are heavily focused towards the event and not the eyewitnesses. They play a subordinate role to the presence of mysterious objects in the skies, as if you were simply reporting the passage of an airplane. The airplane would be the same regardless of the personality or belief system of the person watching that aircraft. It’s a separate tangible object, and thus finding out more about a witness is not on their radar.
Indeed, when I’ve asked MUFON officials why they aren’t interested in such matters as family histories, and whether the experiencers have had other encounters with the unknown, not necessarily involving UFOs, the response is rarely satisfactory. So if the witness volunteers such information, fine and dandy. If not, well, they still have the sighting report that goes into one huge database.
Now perhaps independent researchers might use that database as a tool with which to examine the evidence. Even though the sightings largely ignore family histories and prior experiences, there is certainly lots of data to chew over.
Unfortunately, the database, in its present form, is essentially useless. The database engine appears to have existed unchanged for more than 20 years. It is slow to access, and you are limited to 50 records, or sighting reports, at a time. You cannot even click a “More” link to call up additional reports.
When MUFON stages a public presentation, it doesn’t seem that they spend a lot of time vetting guest speakers. Or maybe they are only seeking the ones who fill seats regardless of the merit of their presentations. I have mentioned a few of these questionable guests on the show, and I don’t have the patience to revisit those comments.
MUFON was even lucky enough to attract someone to produce a TV reality show allegedly based on their work, “Hangar 1.” But in its two seasons on the History Channel, the show developed a nasty reputation for presenting fanciful versions of actual events, along with nonexistent evidence.
It almost strikes you as an effort to emulate the “ripped from the headlines” approach taken by some TV dramas, such as “Law & Order: Special Victims Unit.” The story is fiction, but it’s loosely based on something that really happened.
But wasn’t “Hangar 1” supposed to be a TV show that presented just the facts without embellishment? It’s not as if MUFON seems to care, since the show no doubt helped boost member sign-ups.
In recent months, MUFON has weathered some scandals, such as accusations of taking a sexist approach towards women. More recently, a State Director was axed after it was revealed that he was posting offensive white supremacist and racist comments online. While people are entitled to their personal opinions, someone representing MUFO ought to be on their best behavior.
Such shenanigans barely obscure MUFON’s failure to conduct meaningful research into a phenomenon that continues to perplex humankind year after year.
Some researchers actually prefer not to work under an organizational banner, but to do their own research, and perhaps share notes with a handful of colleagues. They aren’t constrained by group structures and politics, or the need to fund officer salaries with memberships and other money-making ventures.
Instead of attempting to fund a UFO club to help him with his research, monied individuals such as Robert Bigelow would do better to seek out some of those independent investigators and see if a well-placed grant might help to advance their work.
Or perhaps his work is done. He has his answers and, perhaps some day, he’ll decide it’s the right time to let us in on the secret. Surely all the millions of dollars he’s spent over the years have delivered at least some positive results.
But maybe we’ll never know.
Copyright 1999-2017 The Paracast LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Privacy Policy: Your personal information is safe with us. We will positively never give out your name and/or e-mail address to anybody else, and that's a promise!