re: NY Times: Pentagon’s UFO Program - aerospace/esoteric/quantum mechanics/future

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Part of this shift is what Jacques Vallee calls the “Invisible College,” the network of credentialed, well-placed researchers seriously investigating the phenomenon. “The phenomenon” is Vallee’s carefully neutral term for the collection of commonly attested events and effects that make up “UFO” sightings. The term is useful for those trying to apply a scientific or scholarly framework, because it makes no claims about the origins. And in fact, Vallee does not believe that what people commonly identify as extraterrestrials actually come from space. Vallee is agnostic on their actual origins, but at various points has posited that they may be some sort of window into another dimension, or an illusion created for psychological manipulation.

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The social credibility of the “invisible college” could potentially lend a valuable gravitas to belief in the phenomenon, if they were to come forward. But for now, stigma or the protocols of the member’s work enforce silence and anonymity. At a moment where the UFO is betwixt and between — almost, but not quite ready for uncontroversial discussion in polite society — Pasulka finds that circumlocution, pseudonymity, and privacy militate against the academic virtues of transparency and exact citation trails. This dynamic creates a frustrating opacity for the reader: it’s often unclear which of the wilder parts of Tyler’s story she has confirmed independently. However, none of this secrecy necessarily suggests a conspiracy, unless it’s the same conspiracy that has dogged every system that moved from marginal belief to massive social leverage. To decent Romans, Christianity was a weird and possibly sorcerous cult practiced by rednecks and illiterates — until suddenly it was the force behind the empire. The Mormons were unwelcome freaks who believed in seer stones, indigenous American Israelites, and polygamy. Now they’re the face of clean-cut American success west of the Rockies.

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“In religious studies, this would be a miracle, either a miraculous object or a miraculous event, such as a healing. Of course, this is not how Tyler and James would speak about the site, but it is my assessment. The sites in New Mexico function as the sacred sites of a new religion… They are the places of a hierophany, where non-human beings descended to earth and left us a ‘donation’ as James, chuckling, once called it.” A hierophany is a revelation of a sacred being, and Pasulka is not the first to make the connection between the descent of glowing saucers and glowing angels. Erich von Dänikan’s Chariot of The Gods gave rise to the cheerfully mendacious Ancient Aliens, which re-interprets almost every major ancient civilization’s religious and cultural legacy as the work of visiting extraterrestrials.

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Adherents point to the Bible’s more bizarre manifestations of divine presence as indications that the Abrahamic religions are built on misidentified extraterrestrial encounters. For instance, Ezekiel’s wheel, traditionally believed to be revelation of the ineffable and awful Lord of hosts, is better understood as a spaceship.

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WAS EZEKIEL DESCRIBING EXTRATERRESTRIAL VISITORS IN THE BIBLE?

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4I looked, and I saw a windstorm coming out of the north—an immense cloud with flashing lightning and surrounded by brilliant light. The center of the fire looked like glowing metal, 5 and in the fire was what looked like four living creatures. In appearance their form was human, 6 but each of them had four faces and four wings. 7 Their legs were straight; their feet were like those of a calf and gleamed like burnished bronze. 8 Under their wings on their four sides they had human hands. All four of them had faces and wings, 9 and the wings of one touched the wings of another. Each one went straight ahead; they did not turn as they moved.” – Ezekiel 1

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“15 As I looked at the living creatures, I saw a wheel on the ground beside each creature with its four faces. 16 This was the appearance and structure of the wheels: They sparkled like topaz, and all four looked alike. Each appeared to be made like a wheel intersecting a wheel. 17 As they moved, they would go in any one of the four directions the creatures faced; the wheels did not change direction as the creatures went. 18 Their rims were high and awesome, and all four rims were full of eyes all around… 22 Spread out above the heads of the living creatures was what looked something like a vault, sparkling like crystal, and awesome.” – Ezekiel 1

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Or, like Tyler, you can develop a personal protocol that will allow you to “interface” with a higher intelligence and creative source. “I basically believe, and there is evidence for this, that our DNA is a receptor and a transmitter,” he claims. “It works at a certain frequency — The same frequency, in fact, that we use to communicate with satellites in deep space. Humans are a type of satellite, in fact. So, in order to receive the signals and to transmit the signals, we have to tune our physical bodies and DNA. Because of this, I make sure I sleep really well… I rarely drink alcohol, as it interferes with my sleep, and I never drink coffee. Coffee really messes up the signal.”

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