Fringeology

Lost Civilizations & Secrets of the Past

2011-12-17T15:56:00.001-05:00

Edited by Michael Pye and Kirsten Dalley

This book of essays by such luminaries as Erich von Däniken, Micah Hanks, William Bramley, Nick Redfern, and others is a splendid read.

The essays include:

Archeological Scandals by Frank Joseph

The Cosmology of the Afterlife: Hamlet’s Mill, the Star-Strewn Path, and the End of Days by Adrian G. Gilbert

Atlantis: The Lost Walhalla by Philip Coppens

Oppenheimer’s Iron Thunderbolt: Evidence of Ancient Nuclear Weapons by Micah A. Hanks

From the Pyramids to the Pentagon: The U.S. Government and Ancient Mysteries by Nick Redfern

The AB Intervention Hypothesis: The Truth Behind the Myths by Paul Von Ward

The Time Machines by Erich von Däniken

And eight others.

I like to think I’m well-read and surfeited with information that is esoteric, but right off the bat, Frank Joseph’s Archeological Scandals showed me just how much I do not know about such interesting topics as the Kensington Rune Stone or the Bat Creek Stone and how the Smithsonian and establishment archeologists dismissed those artifacts for reasons that had nothing to do with science or truth-searching.

The iconic John Wesley Powell is uncovered as a bigoted fraud; Ivan Sanderson is lauded.

Mr. Joseph doesn’t spew vile accusations; he substantiates his views with details and facts that have been hidden from public view.

The Chapter is an eye-opener, indeed. [Page 7 ff.]

Philip Coppens provides a wealth of information about the Megalithic Civilization (Vikings, Celts, et al.) influenced and were influenced by Egypt and the fabled Atlantis in his Atlantis: The Lost Walhalla. {Page 75 ff.]

Mr. Coppens doesn’t just trot out the clichéd Atantis myths but, rather, provides material that links some Norse tales and activities (viz: Stonehenge) using the research and hypotheses of Belgium historian Marcel Mestdagh and English writer John Michell.

Oberon Zell allows that Atlantis was part of Paradises Lost, which included Lemuia, and the Garden of Eden. [Page 31 ff.]

Following the Atlantis theme, Pat Chouinard presents his account, Clash of Giants: The Untold Story of the Lost Atlantean Race[Page 163 ff.]

Paul Von Ward takes readers into the Ancient Astronaut world with his Chapter on The AB [Advanced Being] Intervention Hypothesis: The Truth Behind the Myths [Page 181 ff.]

PVW doesn’t offer the usual schlock about extraterrestrial intervention of humanity and human evolution. He uses ancient texts, DNA remnants and the fossil record to support his view that Earth was colonized by advanced beings [ABs].

Nick Redfern, as usual, uses his research into government archives and secrets to tell readers that governments are intensely interested in the arcanity that this book deals with.

Mr. Redfern’s From the Pyramids to the Pentagon…[Page 131 ff.] elaborates, by citation and fact, on government intrusions into the world of Fortean mysteries and the lives of those who study such things.

It’s a chilling resumé, and one that buffs of the topics in the book would do well to heed.

William Bramley covers UFO Cults [Page 211 ff.] and Thomas A. Brophy lays out A Symbolic Landscape: The Mystery of Nabta Playa and our Ancient Past [219 ff.], both essays offering unique appraisals of topics covered not so well by others.

I’ve merely touched on the many gems and goodies in this book.

I’m not a devotee of many of the topics but I did find them intriguing, and interesting, to say the least.

The writers are superb, intelligent and cautious with their hypotheses and thoughts.

You won’t find the hysteria that the topics are immersed in elsewhere.

The paperback sells for $15.99, has 254 pages of fascinating thinking, and much information that you didn’t know.

It’s a New Page Book, which is a Division of The Career Press, Inc., Pompton Plains NJ.

You can read more about it and find other books of like character at:

http://www.careerpress.com

http://www.newpagebooks.com

And the book can be purchased online at Amazon.com, Powell’s, Anomalist.com, and Barnes and Noble of course, as well as at offline bookstores.

RR

Zombies scare James Clark?

2011-10-18T16:04:00.001-04:00

Our friend from across the seas, James Clark, has posted a new article for The Morton Report about zombies.

Click HERE to read Mr. Clark's latest foray into the scaranormal.

10 Things that might Indicate your house is haunted

2011-10-17T12:39:00.003-04:00

October 17, 2011 (Monroe, Ct)

For over 50 years, Lorraine Warren and her late husband, Ed, have been nationally recognized as America's foremost experts of the supernatural realm.

The Warrens have investigated over 5,000 hauntings and have written 10 books on their findings, including their highly acclaimed work The Demonologist. National television credits include Good Morning America, Today Show, 20/20, Entertainment Tonight and Primetime.

Their more famous cases have been dramatized in such movies as The Amityville Horror and A Haunting in Connecticut. The film rights to Ed and Lorraine's life story have been acquired by Newline Cinema for production into a major motion picture.

Additionally, Lorraine and fellow psychic researcher and son-in-law, Tony Spera, are featured regularly in advisory roles on such shows as A&E's Paranormal State, Unsolved Mysteries, A Haunting,Ghost Adventures and most recently, Travel Channel's Mysteries at the Museum.

As Halloween approaches, our minds tend to wonder about those things that go bump in the night. Are ghosts actually real? If so, how do we know the difference between an overactive imagination and something truly otherworldly? Tony and Lorraine offer some useful indicators to aid paranormal novices in figuring out if spirits are present in their homes:

1. You are being watched. You have an uneasy feeling that somebody or something is watching you. This could be an indication that a spirit may have set up residence in your home.

2. Cold temperatures. There are definite "Cold Spots" in the home. Areas that suddenly feel as if the temperature has dropped 20 or 30 degrees.

3. Peripheral sighting. You catch a glimpse of something out of the corner of your eye. It's almost as if a shadow or a mist has suddenly darted by.

4. Dramatic dreams. You begin to have unusually strange dreams and thoughts that you never had before. This could be the beginning sign of spirit oppression.

5. Unexplained noises. Unusual noises, knocking, scratching or pounding sounds. You might hear footsteps in another room and then, rush in only to find no one there.

6. Offensive odors. Putrid smells or odors appear suddenly, and then vanish just as quickly. This could be an indicator of something more sinister in nature.

7. Person-associated odors. A familiar odor, such as a deceased loved one's perfume or smoke from their cigar may appear suddenly and then, just as suddenly, vanish.

8. Audible whispering. You hear voices but can't quite make out what they are saying. This phenomenon is known as "magic whispering."

9. Physical contact. You are touched, groped, or shaken by an invisible hand and are not able to come to an alternative rational explanation of how this might have occurred.

10. Visual occurrence. You actually see a materialization of a spirit. It may appear as a fog-like substance, or as a full materialization, as solid as you.

About Lorraine Warren and Tony Spera:

For over half a century, Lorraine Warren and her late husband, Ed, have been the unquestioned leaders of supernatural and occult investigation. Their son-in-law, Tony Spera, has worked with the Warrens for over 30 years, and as a former police officer, he looks at possible haunting phenomena with a critical and skeptical eye. Lorraine is best described as a clairvoyant and light trance medium, which means she can sense, hear and feel things through a "sixth sense". She also has the ability to see a person's "aura".

Lorraine has been tested at UCLA under the watchful eye of Dr. Thelma Moss, and her abilities are well documented. After Ed's passing in 2006, Tony Spera took the reins as Director of The New England Society of Psychic Research, founded by the Warrens in 1952. Tony and Lorraine routinely travel across the country and around the world leading investigations, lectures and other events that facilitate the Warrens' continued mission of delivering their esteemed knowledge and assistance to those in need.

Provided by (and contact information):

Jessica Hoy
NeuProfile
Jessica@neuprofile.com
646.842.0438

The World’s Creepiest Places by Dr. Bob Curran

2011-09-29T10:04:00.002-04:00

A book that might have been better titled The Worlds’ Creepiest Stories is by Dr. Bob Curran, a writer and world traveler who seeks out those places where horrible things happen to people, mostly children.

Dr. Curran’s 203 page book is replete with tales and histories that present the worst in humanity and how the evil actions they committed afflicted their locale or venues, such as:

Bachelor’s Grove in Chicago, Illinois
Capuchin Cemetery in Palermo, Sicily
Dragsholm Castle in Denmark
Gore Orphanage Road in Cleveland, Ohio
Leap Castle in County Offaly, Ireland
Mortemer Abbey in Normandy, France
Waverly Hills Sanatorium in Louisville, Kentucky
Yumbulagang in the Yarlung Valley, Tibet
And seventeen other sites.

If you’re a reader who seeks after human depravity and/or spooky places created by awful inhumanities, Dr. Curran’s book is for you.

A story about children injected with fluids, by a Dr. Kroh, that swelled their heads, creating grotesque monsters who end up killing the insane scientist, will put you off your lunch. [Page 65 ff.]

A story about wayward magic at a rectory in Warleggan (Bodmin Moor, England) is a bit more tepid than others, but is still spooky enough to give a reader chills. [Page 155 ff.]

A story about a phantom wagon, driven by a skeletal being, who when asked where he was going in such a hurry said “To Hell” is recounted in a Chapter about ghosts and hauntings in Africa. [Page 136 ff.]

The book is chock full of tales that indicate the world is full of spooks, and bad people.

Such stories aren’t this readers cup o’ tea but we have friends who feast on such ghastly offerings, and this book will serve their needs for fright more than adequately.

The book is $15.99 and may be purchased at fine bookstores, and at internet venues such as Amazon.com or Powell’s and Barnes and Noble.

The book is published by New Page Books, a division of The Career Press, Pompton Plains, NJ.

RR

James Clark notes paranormal credibility

2011-09-20T13:15:00.002-04:00

James Clark, one of our favorite international writers about things strange, notifies his fan base that a paranormal group has gotten an imprimatur from the British government.

Click HERE for James' column/blog for The Morton Report

Ghosts Everywhere!

2011-09-08T10:35:00.004-04:00

Two books about ghosts and haunted places have landed on my desk, and I have no idea why or where from.

I’m not a ghost-guy, although I have had a few run-ins with ghosts at our Fort Wayne operation.

But that’s neither here nor there.

I have Jim Harold’s Campfire: True Ghost Stories and Jeff Belanger’s The World’s Most Haunted Places to suggest to you ghost hunters and ghost aficionados.

Mr. Harold’s spicy accounts of ghost encounters replicate what others have bumped into on those rare occasions when a ghostie-thing is cavorting around.

Mr. Harold provides 256 pages, give or take, of personal accounts with ghosts, related to him by his podcast listeners. (Mr. Harold has two very popular webcasts: Campfire and The Paranormal Podcast.)

Each Chapter, there are 71, is a ghost tale, from listeners of Mr. Harold’s podcasts.

As I read them, I got chills from many – and I’m not a guy who chills easily.

Chapter 9 (Page 37), The Girl in the Attic, was particularly spooky; a Lindsay from North Carolina tells that she and a playmate ended up playing games with a girl who turned out not to be there. (The account is much better, of course, than my paraphrase.)

Chapter 22 (Page 77), The Shadow Knows, from Jeff in Indiana, tells about a shadow that had no source, but appeared to him, his wife, and others, while they were pursuing anomalist activity in an old building.

Chapter 33 (Page 116), The Thing in the Woods, related by Tim in Nevada, presents an incident that UFO aficionados might find intriguing, along with those who think the woods harbor strange and mysterious entities, of which Tim’s is one: a small light that transmogrified into a ten by fifteen foot tall Predator-like (from the movies) creature.

Chapter 53 (Page 180), Mr. Synchronicity, from Steven in California, provides a slew of events that go beyond coincidence.

Mr. Harold closes the listener-offered stories with what he “says” is the spookiest story of all – offered by LeAnn in Utah, involving an Ouija board, a Lava lamp, and Lucifer, the devil. (Page 247-8)

I’m not, as I wrote above, a big ghost story fan, but I liked this book and found the stories given to Mr. Harold by his fans to be credible and charming, in an “I’m not there” way; that is, I was spooked, like a person who visits a carnival’s haunted house, but knew I was safe, as the ghosts and spookies were just in the book, and not in my bedroom, where I read the book.

(Although at 4:30 a.m. I was awakened by a bump in the night which, after reading Mr. Harold’s book, brought my covers over my head. Yep.)

The book is published by New Page Books, a division of The Career Press, Inc., Pompton Plains, NJ and can be found at Amazon.com or Powell’s (online) and other book venues, or via www.newpagebooks.com.

Jeff Belanger’s The World’s Most Haunted Places [Revised] lists thirty-three places or sites where ghosts haunt humans, continuously, places such as The Queen Mary (ship), Hibbing High School, The Alaskan Hotel, Empress Theater, Suicide Forest (in Japan), The Tower of London, and more.

Mr. Belanger supplements his tales with historical references and citations, making his 285 page book a fount of certified ghost episodes.

Mr. Belanger is a superb writer, scholarly in his approach, which weighs heavily with me.

I was entrapped in the stories, and found that ghosts, or whatever they are, show up in the oddest places and the usual places where one might expect to find ghosts: The Catacomb Museum, The White House, The Skirrid Mountain Inn, Muncaster Castle, and the Waverly Hills Sanatorium.

Mr. Belanger writes that Boggo Road Gaol, in Brisbane, Australia has had occasion to experience ghosts – prisoners and guards alike.

”A guard killed in 1966 has been spotted in the jail by guards and visitors alike.” (Page 201)

And Ernest Austin, a convict who murdered an 11-year-old girl, went to the gallows, in 1913, even chuckling as he swung at the bottom of the 13-foot rope that killed him.

His laughter is said to be heard in the early mornings in the jails cellblocks. (Page 199)

The Skirrid Mountain Inn also had many hangings, promulgated by Protestant Squire John Arnold who emulating an Anti-Papist Judge working at the behest of King James II in 1685, hanged many Catholic and Catholic sympathizers at the Inn, many of whom still haunt the place to this day. (Page 157).

Big Nose Kate’s Saloon in Tombstone, Arizona has ghosts breaking drinking glasses on a regular basis. (Page 87 ff.)

And the Whaley House (museum) in San Diego, California, where the Whaley family, in 1856, built their dream house, on the site of hangings of ne’er-do-wells, suffered family tragedies of their own: child-deaths, a child suicide, child poisoning.

The ghosts of the family and some of those ne’er-do-wells continue to haunt the premises to this day. (Page 241 ff.)

Mr. Belanger presents a plethora of ghost accounts, all bolstered by historical notes that provide credibility for the tales imparted.

I found myself as intrigued by the historical asides as much as the ghost tales, maybe more so.

The book is awash in interesting stories, human-interest stories as news-media might put it.

It’s a good read, but also a nice reference book for those who like the outskirts of history.

It can be found at Amazon.com, of course, Powell’s.com, and other book sellers, plus online at www.newpagebooks.com, the publishers site.

For more information, about the authors and the books, you might access www.warwickassociates.net

If you like ghost stories, these two books will please you (and maybe scare you) plenty.

RR

Freudian or Jungian UFOs?

2011-09-02T09:57:00.001-04:00

Matthew J. Graeber’s “article” from Magonia 52, May 1995 about UFO mother-ships or airships posits the idea that the cylindrical ships spotted since early times right up into the modern era may have a sexual psychical component.

You can access Mr. Graeber’s thesis by clicking HERE

As readers here know, or should, we do not think UFOs are psychical projections or quantum creations, although we have conjectured that quantum mechanics seem to have a bearing on the ‘tangible” objects we designate as “flying saucers” and quantum theory may help explain UFOs, as they appear today.

(Triangular UFO craft, for us, are military prototypes, and don’t factor into our conjectural observations here and elsewhere.)

As for Mr. Graeber’s sexual symbolism for airships, the idea is not anathema to us, but it is a psychological stretch, just as Carl Jung’s hypothesis was in his book Flying Saucers: A Modern Myth of things Seen in the Skies [Princeton University Press, 1978].

And even though the current thrust in many UFO circles is toward the concept that UFOs are projections of the human psyche or mental impressions coming into the minds of select individuals (from extraterrestrials supposedly), for purposes as yet unknown, we think that persons who imagine UFOs or see them mentally when they don’t exist in any tangible, real form are in need therapy of a serious psychological kind.

However Mr. Graeber would disagree:

Although we might expect to make little headway towards resolving today’s UFO enigma by comparing it to past mysteries, we may, nevertheless, examine both present and past UFO events as being comprised of optically perceived images or imagery that occasionally have an extraordinary effect upon the individual(s) who either observe or come into close proximity with them.

Mr. Graeber’s views are both Freudian and Jungian.

But if UFOs or mother-ships resonate as a sublimated sexual symbol with someone, as Mr. Graeber delinates in his piece, we think that that person should hie themselves off to a psychiatrist immediately. They have serious terrestrial problems.

Nonetheless, Mr. Graeber’s views should have a hearing or reading; they are pondered sensibly and unsensationally.

He closes with this:

Perhaps we have discovered enough about the mythical, sexual, and marked psychic background of the god-ships to determine that their origin is most likely the human unconscious, and not some alien planet situated at the edge of the cosmos. For it seems highly unlikely that a visiting alien intelligence would be so human-like as to possess similar intrapsychical processes regarding the development of their technology, their exploratory aspirations, and their myth-making tendencies.

Not a view we espouse necessarily, but a cogent suggestion by Mr. Graeber.

RR

Are Alien Abductions a kind of Spiritual Reverie?

2011-08-31T22:29:00.001-04:00

Allogenes is a Sethian Gnostic text from the New Testament apocrypha. The main surviving copies come from the Nag Hammadi library…A small fragment also survives in the more recently discovered Codex Tchacos…[Wikipedia]

The passages presented here are two of many, in the Allogenes text, which mimic some alien abduction scenarios, if not in exact wording, at least in an imagined or real emotional sense:

My soul went slack and I fled and I was very disturbed. And [I] turned to myself and saw the light that [surrounded] me and the Good that was in me, and I became Divine. And the all-glorious one, Youel, contacted me again and empowered me…

When I was seized by the eternal light, by the garment that was upon me, and was taken up to a pure place whose likeness cannot be revealed in the world…Allogenes (XI, 3)

While the abduction phenomenon is controversial, I do know people, credible persons, who have experienced what they consider an abduction but, maybe, what they really experienced was a transcendental event, not unlike that enumerated in Richard Bucke’s work, Cosmic Consciousness.

Yes, there are multiple accounts which are hardly transcendental, horrifying actually.

But those accounts may be tempered by the physical and psychological vicissitudes that accompany transcendent events, which would be traumatic for some individuals, those with shaky morals, much like those who have Near-Death experiences that take them to Hell rather than a more pleasant place, which most NDExperiencers relate.

Abductions, per se, have little to do with the UFO phenomenon, to my way of thinking, but it has become a peripheral element in many ufological circles, and will always remain connected to UFOs and the discussion of UFOs.

That aside, it might be time for those who have experienced an “abduction” to weigh the possibility that they’ve had a spiritual crisis or moment of enlightenment, which have occurred to saints and sinners alike; e.g. Saul of Tarsus (St. Paul). Thomas Aquinas, and Malcolm X.

RR

James Clark on ghosts and ghost-hunting

2011-08-30T12:06:00.002-04:00

Journalist James Clark provides an article on the papranormal activity of ghost hunting for The Morton Report.

Click here to access his article

Is Earth an alien zoo?

2011-08-24T12:57:00.001-04:00

A new study says that Earth is home to (approximately) 8.7 million species.

Click her for news-story

There has, almost from the beginning of the modern UFO era (1947), been a few hypothetical thrusts saying that Earth might be a zoo where species have been brought or created and dispersed for extraterrestrial purposes which remain totally hidden.

The idea may seem fanciful at first glance, but isn’t outside the realm of possibility,

The idea, along with the penal colony thesis, can be elaborated upon and made sensible when one examines the idea that an alien species from other worlds, should there be any, could very well use the Earth as a laboratory or park containing animals, plants, humans, insects, reptiles, and other elements of life.

This would explain the vast array of UFO visitations over the years, and supports the hypothesis that alien beings have taken a particular interest in the Earth as regards atomic or ecological devastation, both of which having the potential to destroy eons of lab work or eliminating an extraterrestrial “vacation venue.”

Earth could be the lab-source for species meant to be seeded throughout the galaxies or, at least, one of the lab-sources.

Wikipedia has a succinct review of the Alien zoo hypothesis ,which may be read by clicking HERE.

For me, the zoo idea is not as zany as many other hypotheses which have pummeled UFO devotees of the years.

What do you think?

RR

Nick Redfern reviews Paul Screeton's book John Michell: From Atlantis to Avalon

2011-08-16T15:38:00.001-04:00

Click here for Nick's review

Snake in Rome

2011-08-13T13:25:00.003-04:00

Some time ago I found this passage in a book about the Shroud of Turin by Ian Wilson.

The passage fascinated me, but I couldn't find anything more about the snake incident, searching everywhere for something more definitive.

I even had several journalists look for something thta might elucidate the episode.

Recently I submitted a query and the book excerpt to Chris Aubeck's Magonia Exchange, and got (only) this reply:

The reference from Magonia might be the incident, but the time-frame is wrong, unless Wilson's date of 846 A.D. (or CE if you prefer) is wrong.

So, I'm asking if any one of our intrepid readers knows more about the alleged panic in Rome by a snake -- any date, any place in the city?

N.B. Chris Aubeck has provided what appears to be the answer to my query above. I thank him profusely for that and offer the link HERE that clarifies.

However, a member of Chris Aubeck's Magonia Exchange provides this:

I don't think the passage above (Regulus and the snake) has any relation to the episode mentioned by the original poster, the date is way too early (3rd century BC) and I doubt such a confusion is possible.

However a quick check in all the relevant medieval chronicles I could think of, didn't bring anything either. Even though the date of 846 AD is quite eventful for Rome which suffered that year an attack by the Saracens, no chronicle mentions an incident with a snake. Should it have happened that same year, I doubt the chroniclers would have missed mentioning it, if only to put in perspective with the invasion.
Thus, unless the incident is mentioned in a single obscure source, I would tend to believe that the date mentioned by Wilson is wrong.

It might be worth mentioning though that Gregory of Tours mentions in his Historia Francorum (book X) a somewhat similar incident which happened in 589 A.D. (Source: Guadet, J. (ed.) Histoire ecclesiastique des Francs..., vol. 4, Paris, 1838, p.4):

Anno igitur quinto decimo Childeberthi regis diaconus noster ab urbe Roma sanctorum cum pigneribus veniens, sic retulit, quod anno superiore, mense nono, tanta inundatio Tiberis fluvius Romam urbem obtexerit, ut aedes antiquae deruerent, horrea etiam eclesiae subversa sint, in quibus nonnulla milia modiorum tritici periere. Multitudo etiam serpentium cum magno dracone in modo trabis validae per huius fluvii alveum in mare discendit; sed suffocatae bestiae inter salsos maris turbidi fluctus et litori eiectae sunt. Subsecuta est de vestigio cladis, quam inguinariam vocant.

In the fifteenth year of [the reign] of king Childebert [note: 590 A.D.], our deacon returning from the city Rome with relics of the saints reported that in the ninth month of the previous year the river Tiber so flooded the city of Rome that ancient buildings were destroyed and the storehouses of the church were overturned ; several thousand measures of wheat in them were lost. A multitude of snakes, and among them a great serpent [draco] like a big log, passed down into the sea carried away by the waters of the river, but these creatures, smothered among the stormy and salty waves of the sea, were rejected on the shore. Immediately after came the plague named inguinaria.

I don't know whether the two incidents are related but Gregory of Tours' story is the closest I could get to Wilson's mention. I'll keep looking though.

Best,
Y.D.

-------

RR

Nick Redfern lightens the "darkness"

2011-08-11T09:11:00.001-04:00

Nick Redfern's new blog has fun with things strange.

Click here to visit

The Master Game by Graham Hancock and Robert Bauval

2011-08-10T09:23:00.004-04:00

Noted authors Graham Hancock [Fingerprints of the Gods] and Robert Bauval [The Egypt Code] have written a new, 636 page book in which they “document” the influence of the Freemasons on human society, almost from time immemorial.

This reviewer is not inclined to put much stock into most theses that small groups of persons, banded together for purposes of controlling society or elements of society, are rife and accomplished.

The early Christians pulled off a kind of societal coup, with the help of a rabid psychotic, St. Paul and an emperor of Rome, Constantine. And Martin Luther, with the help of a king, Henry the Eighth created a blemish that removed the Catholic Church from its almost total domination of religious culture in Western Civilization.

But a small group of men, a sect or cult of secrecy, such as the Freemasons, ruling society, the World? The idea is fraught with incredulity.

But Hancock and Bauval make a more-than-circumstantial case for exactly that.

The Master Game is surfeited with little known facts and tidbits that enlighten, without forcing readers to adhere to the book’s primary raison d’être; that is, Masons and Freemasonry created cities and sites around the world as symbols of their purpose to control mankind.

The sub-title of the Hancock/Bauval book is “Unmasking the secret rulers of the world” – a sub-title that mimics previous hypotheses and theories, about such groups as the Illuminati, the Templars, the Rosicrucians, Opus Dei, and even the mafia.

Joel Levy’s “The Secret Societies Bible” [Firefly Books, Buffalo, NY, 2010] is a preamble to the Hancock/Bauval book, and covers most of the same material with as many or more illustrations as those found in The Master Game.

Yet, Hancock and Bauval provide details from ancient history and connect dots that others have missed or ignored, such as the Hermetics with the [Christian] Gnostics and later on, Giordano Bruno and Napoleon, on to the Founding Fathers of The United States of America.

The book culminates in a raft of accusations that Al Qaeda and the Arab World are primarily attacking the Freemasonry-oriented nation of Israel and Zionists, using the odious Protocols of the Elders of Zion, as the mandate for terrorism, ostensibly against Masonic-Zionism and those who adhere to the hidden Masonic practices that underlie Western governments.

The thrust of the book is this, according to the marketing materials: Iconic cities, Paris, Rome, Washington D.C., New York, London, were designed and created as giant temples with the intent of immersing residents in Masonic ideals.

Is such a thing possible, credible? You can read the book to see if the case has cachet. I remain skeptical, but have to admit that the supporting material and information make a believable case, if you are a person inclined to think that machinations by minority groups can control the bizarre vicissitudes of humankind, in toto.

The book is published by The Disinformation Company, Ltd., NY, 2011, Softcover, $24.95, and can be found at most bookstores, or online at Amazon, Powell’s, Barnes and Noble, et cetera.

RR

What on Earth? Inside the Crop Circle Mystery – A Suzanne Taylor film

2011-08-08T11:25:00.000-04:00

I’m not an avid follower of the crop circle phenomenon, but I have to admit that the “constructions” have a kind of rarified, transcendental even, beauty.

The DVD we received...

is a splendid introduction to the crop circle phenomenon and some of the people who are enthralled by the constructs.

The film-maker, Suzanne Taylor, pictured here…

has created an artful, objective documentary, about her search for the truth about crop circles.

The DVD/film is replete with images of crop circles:

It’s also replete with people who are absolutely fascinated by the things.

And Ms. Taylor takes into account the blokes who tried to say they were responsible for crop circles – making them in the dead of night. (They are loony.)

The DVD has a tribute to the late John Mack (whom I had the pleasure of communicating with by phone and e-mail a few weeks before he was killed in an automobile accident in England).

The documentary may be accessed and/or bought by going to:

http://passionriver.com/titles.php?id=539

RR

Lamont Wood’s Out of Place in Time and Space

2011-08-06T12:12:00.002-04:00

Lamont Wood, a journalist and freelance writer presents “inventions, beliefs, and artistic anomalies that were impossibly ahead of their time” as the cover of his new book indicates.

The litany of “anomalies” Mr. Wood provides intrigue and fascinate.

His premises for those “anomalies” are based in anachronisms, which he lists this way:

1. The first kind involves objects, beliefs or practices from our present that show up in the past.

2. The second kind involves objects, beliefs, or practices from our future that show up in our past.

(The explanation of what he means shows up in his Introduction, but was, in my estimation, a bit abstruse, and his encouragements “to read on” or “to read the book” were redundant, not annoying, but slightly excessive. After all, I had the book in hand and got it to read, didn’t I?)

As Mr. Wood presents many weird happenstances and bizarre items, such as a painting of the baby Jesus and his mother, with Jesus holding a toy helicopter – the painting done in 1460, well before Leonardo’s drawings of proto-helicopters and, obviously, much before helicopters became a part of modern aircraft [Page 17 ff.] -- one rushes to read his other finds.

He gives readers accounts of death rays, used by the Romans in 214 B.C., during the siege of Syracuse. [Chapter 4], the use of modern-like surgery practices on England’s Prince Hal (King Henry V) from a war wound in 1402 [Chapter 15], the Voynich Manuscript – that bizarre book of strange, unearthly drawings and an unknown language, from [circa] 1420 [Chapter 11], and UFOs in 1350 A.D. as depicted in a fresco from that date [Chapter 37].

He discusses Saturn’s mystery moon [Chapter 38], a paintings from the Middle Ages that have what-seem-to-be images resembling UFOs, as described by modern witnesses [Page 161 ff].

He shows a 1602 map from China that pre-figured map renderings not used until 1906 [Chapter 16].

I could go on, about The Internet in 1945 [Chapter 31] or a 19th Century French cartoonist, Albert Robida, whose 1882 book, Le Vingtième Siècle (The Twentieth Century) presented prescient images and mentions of flat-screen televisions, cell phones, and nations that declare bankruptcy(!), among other modern items and services:

But you might want to discover this wealth of intriguing anomalies yourself, by getting the 220 page book from bookstores or internet venues such as Amazon, Powells, and the book publisher itself, New Page Books, a division of The Career Press, Pompton Plains, NJ – www.newpagebooks.com or www.careerpress.com

Lamont Wood is a facile writer who wishes to enlighten and entertain. He has done so with this book.

RR

Bigfoot: What to do with the thing when it's caught

2011-07-31T08:26:00.004-04:00

What happens when Bigfoot is found?

Nick Redfern provides comments -- Click here to read them

Nick Redfern is "haunted"

2011-07-29T15:41:00.003-04:00

Nick Redfern provides a chapter in Ghosts, Spirits, & Hauntings, a New Page book about things that go "clank" in the night and at other times too.

Click here for more about Nick's contribution

What on Earth? Inside the Crop Circle Mystery

2011-07-27T16:37:00.003-04:00

A new documentary about the crop circle phenomenon is available.

Click here for more information

A full review will follow, upcoming.

Nick Redfern on Men in Black (once more)

2011-07-19T11:24:00.001-04:00

Click here for Nick's latest on the MIB....

Must reading material? Maybe....maybe not....

2011-07-14T12:44:00.001-04:00

Visitors here are well-read (sometimes), but not completely so, as comments indicate.

So we continue to provide what we think are some pertinent papers that impact the interests of those visitors.

Here are two (PDFs) -- click to access:

UFO Abduction Reports: The Supernatural Kidnap Narrative Returns in Technological Guise Author Thomas E. Bullard

The Origins of the Space Gods Ancient Astronauts and the Cthulhu Mythos in Fiction and Fact By Jason Colavito

Are we a simulation?

2011-07-11T10:28:00.001-04:00

In John D. Barrows book “One Hundred Essential Things you Didn’t Know You Didn’t Know: Math Explains the World” [W. W. Norton & Company, Inc., N.Y. 2008], Barrow presents a chapter [19] Living in a Simulation, from which I’ve culled these passages:

“Once you take seriously the suggestion that all possible universes cab (and do) exist then you have to deal with another strange consequence. In this infinite array of universes there will exist civilizations far more advanced that ourselves, that have the capability to simulate universes…the would be able to watch the evolution of life and consciousness within their computer simulations.” [Page52/53]

“With in these universes, self-conscious entities can emerge and communicate with one another.” [Page 53]

The physicist Paul Davies suggests that there is a high probability that we are living in a simulated reality, and is there a way to find out the truth? [Page 53]

“Even if the simulators were scrupulous about simulating the laws of Nature [in their created world or universe], there would be limits to what they could do.” [Page 54]

“They may know a lot about the physics and programming need to simulate a universe, but there will be gaps or, worse still, errors.”[Page 54]

“…gradually…little flaws will begin to build up.” [Page 54]

“…logical contradictions will inevitably arise and the laws in the simulations will appear to break down…The inhabitants of the simulation…will occasionally be puzzled by the observations they make.” [Page 54, italics mine]

“Mysterious changes would occur that would appear to contravene the very laws of Nature…” [Page 55]

“…if we live in a simulated reality, we should expect to come across occasional ‘glitches’ or experimental results that we can’t repeat or even very slow drifts in the supposed constants and laws of Nature that we can’t explain.” [Page 55]

Don’t these observations by Dr. Barrow resonate – when it comes to quantum theory and the UFO mystery (or even paranormal events themselves)?

Dr. Barrow’s musings were the province of Mac Tonnies blog and interest, and are the pressure points for persons who visit here, such as Bruce Duensing.

That we may be a simulation doesn’t grab this writer but it's an imaginative hypothesis that can’t be dismissed out-of-hand.

Plato, Descartes (somewhat) thought, and many current physicists accept the possibility, that we do live as a simulation.

The UFO phenomenon seems to provide a substantiation for Dr. Barrow’s method(s) to discern if we live as a simulation or not.

The possibility intrigues, but that is all it does….(for me).

RR

Nick Redfern reviews Monsters of Wisconsin

2011-07-10T12:33:00.004-04:00

Nick Redfern reviews Linda Godfrey's new book, Monsters of Wisconsin.

http://www.mania.com/lair-beasts-monsters-wisconsin_article_130422.html

Paul Kimball's state of mind...

2011-07-05T11:48:00.000-04:00

We consider Paul Kimball a friend, and we follow his blog and Facebook musings regularly.

Lately he has been absorbed by what he sees as synchronicity-like happenings that afflict him.

We think he and his followers might like to see an alternative view.

Click here for a precis on Apophenia

Nick Redfern responds to Cryptomundo readers

2011-06-07T16:04:00.002-04:00

Drawing from http://www.nataliedee.com

Nick Redfern is a controversial bloke, as you know.

Click here to see one of his back-and-forths about Bigfoot and other monsters of the ID.

Nick Redfern's The REAL Men in Black: A Paranoiac's Handbook

2011-06-06T09:37:00.000-04:00

Nick Redfern’s latest effort is one of his best; he never fails to satisfy or enlighten, and
he doesn’t this time either.

The RMIB, as I’ll call it, takes readers through the mystery commonly known among UFO aficionados and paranomalists as “the men in black” – a term derived from weird circumstances involving a UFO “researcher” – Albert Bender – and a cohort of his, Gray Barker in the 1950s.

Mr. Redfern provides exquisite details about the Bender/Barker “affair” which is a textbook case about paranoia and madness more than anything else.

But Mr. Redfern doesn’t stop there. He presents a host of other MIB episodes, which also, to this reader, showcase mental aberrations of various kinds, all psychotic in nature.

Chapters 4 through 12 provide a litany MIB cases or related events that psychiatry would have a field day with:

“It was a blistering hot day when Jane’s attention was drawn to three tall, golden-skinned, bearded men. They were dressed in black suits, black hats, black shoes, and very heavy, woolen full-length coats that…were also black in color…

A few weeks later…Jane was listening to a radio talk show…when one particular caller related her own…UFO experience…The caller’s encounter was followed by a visit from three men dressed completely in black clothing…This story gave Jane a jolt…[and she] wondered if she hadn’t been ‘marked or implanted’ by the aliens and if she was being followed.” [Pages 113-114]

Then in Part II of the book, Mr. Redfern gives readers all, and I mean all, the theories that have been proffered for the MIB phenomenon, including hallucinations, hoaxes, archetypal “tricksters,” G-men, and time-travelers among others.

The deep mental disfigurations are implied by Mr. Redfern, but he refrains from going so far as to say that MIB experiencers are nuts.

Mr. Redfern, if I’m reading him correctly, leans towards the “paranormal” aspect of MIB visitations, which makes sense even to those, like me, who think MIB events are products of the ill-mind.

Paranormality can account for some MIB instances, since a few persons visited by the black-clad personages have a semblance of sanity about themselves.

What always surprises me about Mr. Redfern’s forays into the unknown is his encapsulating accounts of demons and devils, since he is non-believer in things with a religious patina. (And I don’t think he believes in God.)

Mr. Redfern, in The Real Men in Black, gives readers, as is his wont in all his writings, between-the-lines insights and details, not minutiae necessarily, that can take readers to other areas of paranormality, which are touched on, and subliminally relevant to the whole panoply of the fringe reality.

So, if you’re a seeker of truth, and want a manual about one element in the weird world of UFOs and the paranormal, get Mr. Redfern’s book.

You will not be disappointed.

The book is published, nicely, by New Page Books, a Division of Career Press, and can be found at Amazon, among other booksellers, and can be had via NewPageBooks.com I surmise.

RR

Nick Redfern searches for Elusive Monsters....

2011-06-04T11:05:00.002-04:00

Nick Redfern may search for elusive monsters of the ID or paranormality, but doesn't expect to find them

Click here to see why

Nick Redfern's New Book: The REAL Men in Black

2011-05-26T10:20:00.000-04:00

Nick Redfern's new book, The REAL Men in Black, is about to appear on internet and store book shelves....get it when it does.

Nick has provided a publicity-offered page from the book. Click HERE for that page.

(Image from UFO Era)

Nick Redfern on Richard Thomas' book, Para-News

2011-05-24T14:20:00.002-04:00

Nick Redfern wrote the foreward and also a review of this book -- not a conflict of interest, if one knows Nick Redfern.

Click here for both the review and the foreward

Wallaby?

2011-05-19T10:11:00.002-04:00

Nick Redfern addresses wallaby sightings that occur in odd places.

Click here for his take

Nick Redfern and the Hounds from Hell!

2011-05-11T18:35:00.000-04:00

Nick Redfern addresses the (present day) phantom black-dog phenomenon, in his inimitable way.

Click here for his take on the dogs from hell

Nick Redfern reviews an old, eye-opening book

2011-05-09T15:24:00.003-04:00

This book is a must-read for anyone interested in things at the fringe of reality, writes Nick Redfern.

Click here for Nick's "review" (if you want to find insights that you missed and need).

Nick Redfern lauds Bart Nunnelly's The Inhumanoids

2011-05-09T12:22:00.002-04:00

Nick Redfern provides the Foreword for the book pictured here.

And also provides the publicity information,which you can reasd by clicking here

Frankenstein's Monster and Roswell

2011-04-20T10:18:00.001-04:00

Christopher Allen [CDA], a Roswell skeptic and the story’s most intellectual debunker, often points out that Roswell was dead almost immediately after it came to light in 1947.

And he’s right, of course.

The headline(s), touting a captured flying disk, moved from the front pages of newspapers to those newspapers’ morgues, within hours of the original outing.

Roswell’s flying saucer incident remained moribund for thirty years, until it was resurrected by a few opportunistic writers and UFO “researchers” – including Stanton Friedman, Charles Berlitz, William Moore, Kevin Randle, and a few others.

The story was dead until those mad men raised it from the grave in the late 1970s.

And ever since, the original story has been accreted or enhanced by a slew of UFO mavens, among them David Rudiak, a full-blown Roswell extraterrestrial supporter/believer.

Christopher Allen’s scenario of a dead story brought to life by men with an agenda to “prove” extraterrestrial visitors crashed near Roswell reminds this writer of Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley’s gothic tale Frankenstein: or, The Modern Prometheus.

In the Shelley story, as you know, a body is created by Dr. Frankenstein putting together a creature from dead body parts, some human, some not.

Frankenstein comes to loathe his creation, just as some UFO investigators [Kevin Randle?] have come to loathe their initial Roswell ET support.

But the creature – Roswell – lives on imbued with a life that isn’t easily snuffed out, no matter how hard intelligent people like CDA try to kill it.

The Roswell creature is composed of all kinds of mouldering additions, each with a history and one-time life, but none salient as a living, true experience, only alive now because of their creative addition to a form that was dead but is now alive by alchemical-like machinations.

Killing Roswell is as daunting as it is in the original story and every film or story that has followed Ms. Shelley’s 1818 tale.

Nick Redfern gets "bitten" by a crocodile?

2011-04-19T14:45:00.002-04:00

Nick Redfern has another bizarre experience that he investigates in his unique way.

Click here for details

Real Contactees?

2011-04-19T11:43:00.002-04:00

A man, Wilbur J Wilkinson, provided this script, claiming it was from a race using the moon as a way-station for its people from the planet Maser.:

Here’s the almost unknown story as recounted by Jerome Clark in one of his books:

Hunrath and Wilkinson account

In the script above, nothing registers, except the word Enlil, which represents, in Sumerian “theology” the Lord of the Air and Lord of the Command (whose mother was Ki).

Yes, the story is goofy on the face of it, but the disappearance of the two men, like the mysterious disappearance of pilot Fredrick Valentich, is intriguing.

Valentich YouTube video

The contactee stories, while mostly fictional, should not be dismissed out of hand.

There may be a truth or a reality inside them, somewhere….

UFO and abduction antecedents: The Betty Hill account

2011-04-08T14:03:00.001-04:00

That there are precedents for flying saucers and alien abduction-medical procedures is a given.

Here are three, from just before the 1940s onslaught of UFO events:

From 1908

From 1935

From the 1930s

How memory clasps on to such images is covered in the psychological literature as you know. For instance, items seen or experienced, as those above, reside in memory and are recalled when associative material is suggested. The problem in retrieval is that a confluence of memory alters or distorts the attempted retrieval item, and it is remembered with all the (similar) accoutrements that have surrounded it over the years. [Psychology Today, CRM Books, Del Mar, California, 1970, Page 347 ff.]

...memory seems to evolve over time. Items [are] not lost or recovered at random. Rather, material that was more foreign to the subject, or lacked sequence, or was
stated in unfamiliar terms, [is] more likely to be lost or changed substantially in both syntax and meaning. [The hippocampus and declarative memory: cognitive mechanisms and neural codes by Howard Eichenbaum, 2001]

and is never accurate:

According to much of the recent psychological literature on memory, Bartlett
should be credited with the insight that remembering can never be accurate
but is, instead, more or less of a distortion. [MISREMEMBERING BARTLETT: A STUDY IN SERIAL REPRODUCTION by James Ost and Alan Costall]

For example, here’s how we conjectured, early on at this blog (in the archived postings) Betty Hill’s “star map.”

We suggested that she recalled, under hypnosis, a map that hung in her place of employment. This is that map:

When she was hypnotized, she recalled and drew this now (infamous?) map:

Betty Hill grasped from her Long Term Memory, an image that meshed with the story she was endeavoring to relate.

Why the map at all? We surmise that Betty Hill has an associative attachment to the map, for some emotional reason, and brought it forward to assuage her feelings about what it represented.

Was Barney Hill in the service during WWII, or one of Betty Hill’s relatives? A father, a brother, an uncle, anyone with an emotional connection to Ms. Hill?

(We also suggest that Betty Hill saw the alien medical scenario above, which appeared in materials that she was said to read.)

This is all hypothetical cogitation on our part, but it is the kind of rumination that needs to be applied, more judiciously of course, to all UFO events, Roswell in particular.

This posting is an attempt to push (younger) bona fide researchers into a modus that gets the study of UFOs out of its laughable rut.

We can only hope that some will pursue the topic accordingly….

Ascensions and Levitations: A UFO Connection?

2011-04-06T12:59:00.001-04:00

Outside the alien abduction scenario there is a history of “ascensions” (brought to the fore by the impending Easter season and the alleged ascension of Jesus after his resurrection).

Ascension means to ascend -- to go up, to heaven or somewhere above.

This has been a staple of religious and mythological storytelling since the beginning of history, and is part and parcel of many UFO reports (which we’ll cite below).

Some Biblical accounts:

Enoch was said to have been taken by God [Genesis 5:24] and Elias (Elijah) “went up by a whirlwind into heaven” via a fiery chariot and fiery horses [4 Kings 2:11].

Ezechiel (Ezekiel) was lifted up [Ezechiel 11:1] and Jesus “was taken up into heaven” [Mark 16:19], and “was carried up into heaven” [Luke 24:51].

In mythology, Heracles (Hercules), upon his death, a cloud passed over his body and bore it away, to Olympus.

Aeneas, a hero of Troy, after setting up a new home for the Trojans, was killed in battle, and was lifted up to heaven.

Diomedes, king of Argos, and one of the Epigoni -- the sons of the Seven against Thebes – was murdered by King Daunus, and divinely spirited away.

In Catholic legend, Mary, the mother of Jesus, was lifted, body and soul, upon her death to heaven.

The Roman Catholic Church recognizes many ascensions or levitations, ascribing them to acts of God.

Here is a list of some of the saints and persons so elevated:

St. Edmund, then Archbishop of Canterbury circa 1242.

St. Teresa of Avila in Madrid during 1680.

Sister Mary an Arabian Carmelite nun in Bethlehem circa 1700.

St. Adolphus Liguori in Foggia during 1777.

Father Suarez at Santa Cruz in Southern Argentina in1911.

But what spurred this posting, aside from the upcoming Ascension Holy Day, are two accounts that I stumbled across, which most of you may be familiar with…

The David Lang and Oliver Larch disappearances (from Wikipedia):

According to the stories surrounding him, on 23 September 1880, Lang, of Gallatin, Tennessee, was walking across the grounds of his farm to meet Judge August Peck who was approaching his farm in a horse and buggy, when Lang vanished mid-step and in full view of the judge, his wife Chanel and his two children, and the judge's brother-in-law. The ground around where Lang had been walking was searched in case he had fallen into a concealed hole, but no trace was found. The story further states that Lang's children later called out to him, and heard a disembodied voice calling as if from a great distance.

The story of David Lang was published in Fate magazine by journalist Stuart Palmer, who claimed that he had been told the story by Lang's daughter. However, no trace of David Lang nor his family (including his apparent daughter) was ever found in any records of that period, and the entire article was later determined to be a hoax likely inspired by the short story "The Difficulties of Crossing a Field" by Ambrose Bierce (1909), collected in his book Can Such Things Be? In 1999, the modern composer David Lang based an opera on Bierce's story. (The story has also become a popular urban legend).

The story of Oliver Larch (Sometime known as Lerch or Thomas) follows a similar pattern to that of David Lang. According to the narrative, Larch was on his way to collect water from a well one winter when he vanished, leaving nothing behind but a trail of footprints in the snow which terminated abruptly, and a series of terrible cries for help such as "Help, they've got me!" that appeared to come from above. Larch's story was later found to be a variation on "Charles Ashmore's Trail", published in 1893 by Ambrose Bierce. In some versions, Larch's story is set in late 19th century Indiana, in others, it is set in North Wales. One particular recurring variation was an Oliver Thomas of Rhayader, Radnorshire, mid-Wales with the date given as 1909.

For a skeptical clarification and implied hoax explanation, click here

In UFO lore, there are many UFO stories based upon ascending, all usually gathered within the abduction category, but not correctly, I think.

Betty And Barney Hill (1961)

Hickson/Parker (1973)

Carl Higdon (1974)

Travis Walton (1975)

Kelly Cahill (1993)

While UFOs do not factor in to most of these accounts, in the stories where they do, however, the descriptives of the ascensions, levitations, and upliftings to the crafts come close to that provided in the stories noted above.

Is there an interdimensional aspect to these events, theorized by M-Theory (string theory)?

Or are physical laws just suspended in some circumstances?

And are UFOs merely omens of dimensional shifts or some other physical quirk?

In Bruce Duensing’s ruminations at his blogs, there is an interconnectedness of all these things.

UFOs may only be one (tangential?) aspect of a reality that is intertwined with elements paranormal, prosaic, and transcendental – a reality too bizarre and complex to explain, no matter how hard we humans try.

Perhaps….

N.B. John Mack’s study of “abductees” indicated that “out-of-body” experiences were prominent in the accounts he monitored.

In the Lang and Larch stories, family members heard voices from above the spot where the men allegedly disappeared.

(In ancient times, sailors approaching an island near the mouth of the Ister River claimed to have heard the voice of Achilles, who had been slain much earlier.)

Thomas Aquinas, who had a transcendental experience that caused him to stop writing – what he saw made his efforts as so much straw in the wind – was said, by G. K. Chesterton, in a work on Aquinas, to have been seen to levitate while saying mass, near the end of his life.

Nick Redfern's take on the Flatwoods incident of 1952

2011-04-01T17:40:00.003-04:00

There can be few very people within the realms of cryptozoology and ufology that have never heard of the so-called Flatwoods Monster, or Braxton County Monster, of 1952 - a story that is told in-depth in Frank Feschino's 2004 book, The Braxton County Monster: the Cover-Up of the Flatwoods Monster Revealed.

And as Feschino notes in his book: "On the night of September 12, 1952, a shocked American public sought answers when strange unidentified objects were seen flying through the sky over Washington, DC, and the eastern United States..."

He continued: "One of the strange objects crash-landed on a rural hilltop in Flatwoods, West Virginia..." Feschino also noted that a group of schoolboys were witness to the descent of the device and, with two adults, "...headed off to look for the object. Soon a twelve-foot tall being from the downed craft terrified these innocent people."

So, what was the monstrous entity? A cryptid? An alien? Some form of definitively Fortean beast? Or something else? Over the years, a whole range of theories have surfaced, and, as with so many such cases, the debate continues.

Indeed, check out this link and you'll see that over at UFOMystic, good friend Greg Bishop has dug deep into this puzzle, and has addressed another angle - namely that relative to the involvement of Remotely-Piloted Vehicles of a definitively terrestrial nature.

And, on this latter point of the Machiavellian hand of officialdom possibly playing a role in the Flatwoods affair, I stumbled across something the other day that makes me wonder if it may well have some bearing on what was seen at Flatwoods.

Call me crazy (and doubtless some will!), but I think the following data - which is directly relative to the use of superstitions and paranormal entities and ideas in warfare - may well have a bearing on the diabolical beast of Flatwoods.

A couple of days ago, I obtained a copy of an April 14, 1950 RAND publication titled The Exploitation of Superstitions for Purposes of Psychological Warfare, written by Jean M. Hungerford, for the the U.S. Air Force.

The 37-page document is a truly fascinating one and delves into some very strange areas. But, what really caught my eye, was a section of the document that quoted from a book titled Magic: Top Secret, which was written in 1949 by one Jasper Maskelyne, a fascinating character (as the name-link demonstrates) who was up his absolute neck in new and novel ways to fool the enemy.

Hungerford quotes the following from Maskelyne in her report, which concerns a truly alternative psychological warfare operation that occurred during the Second World War, and less than a decade before the Flatwoods Monster was seen:

"Our men...were able to use illusions of an amusing nature in the Italian mountains, especially when operating in small groups as advance patrols scouting out the way for our general moves forward. In one area, in particular, they used a device which was little more than a gigantic scarecrow, about twelve feet high, and able to stagger forward under its own power and emit frightful flashes and bangs. This thing scared several Italian Sicilian villages appearing in the dawn thumping its deafening way down their streets with great electric blue sparks jumping from it; and the inhabitants, who were mostly illiterate peasants, simply took to their heels for the next village, swearing that the Devil was marching ahead of the invading English."

Hungerford continued to quote from Maskelyne's book in her report: "Like all tales spread among uneducated folk (and helped, no doubt, by our agents), this story assumed almost unimaginable proportions. Villages on the route of our advance began to refuse sullenly to help the retreating Germans, and to take sabotage against them; and then, instead of waiting for our troops to arrive with food and congratulations of their help, the poor people fled, thus congesting the roads along which German motorized transport was struggling to retire. The German tankmen sometimes cut through the refugees and this inflamed feeling still more, and what began almost as a joke was soon a sharp weapon in our hands which punished the Germans severely, if indirectly, for several critical weeks."

There are a number of issues worth noting here. First, the height of the Flatwoods Monster and the British Army's devilish scarecrow were the same: 12-feet. In addition, the cover of Frank Feschino's book shows the Flatwoods Monster emitting lights. And the 12-foot scarecrow in Italy gave off "frightful flashes and bangs" and had "great electric blue sparks jumping from it."

Second, the RAND report that specifically refers to this Italian escapade - that Jasper Maskelyne described in his Magic: Top Secret book - was prepared for psychological warfare planners in the U.S. Air Force. And, in his book on the beast of Flatwoods, Feschino notes that the Air Force took careful interest in the Flatwoods affair and what was being reported on the affair by the media.
The RAND report was submitted to the Air Force in April 1950, and Flatwoods occurred in September 1952. Is it possible that in this two-year period USAF psychological warfare planners created their very own - albeit updated and modified - version of the British Army's 12-foot-tall flashing monster to try and gauge what its reaction might be when unleashed upon an unsuspecting populace?

There's also the settings, too: the British Army's operation was focused on little, isolated villages in Italy. And Flatwoods is a little, rural town in Braxton County, West Virginia that, even as late as 2000, had a population of less than 350.
Those who suspect the the Flatwoods Monster was some form of cryptozoological creature, Fortean entity, or alien being, may well scoff at my speculations and musings.

However, when we can say for sure that the British Army was using 12-foot, illuminated scarecrow-style critters for psychological warfare reasons in the Second World War, is it really a stretch to think that the USAF might have tried something similar in 1952 with their very own 12-foot-tall freak?

One final thing: the foreword to Frank Feschino's book was penned by acclaimed ufologist, Stanton T. Friedman, who wrote the book Top Secret Majic (with a "j"). This should not be confused with Jasper Maskelyne's Magic Top Secret (with a "g)!

Nick Redfern's Not-So-Hidden Thoughts

2011-04-01T12:56:00.001-04:00

Nick Redfern opines on all things weird and/or paranormal.

Click here to read what he has to impart

Nick Redfern also needs a cedar chest

2011-03-30T12:13:00.001-04:00

Nick Redfern continues to be bugged by Mothman.

Click here to read about it

Nick Redfern makes a deal with the Devil?

2011-03-30T11:23:00.000-04:00

Nick Redfern flirts with the forces of Evil (or someone does).

See what he means by clicking here

Is Nick Redfern adrift, near Monster Island?

2011-03-27T11:52:00.003-04:00

Nick Redfern is an explorer looking for the Chupacabra, everyhere....

Click here for his latest adventure

Monster(s) of the ID?

2011-03-26T16:51:00.005-04:00

Nick Redfern copes with monsters and other denizens of a deeper reality.

Click here for his take on the Chupacabra, or monster from the ID (as we see it).

Nick Redfern on The End of Things!

2011-03-26T16:07:00.002-04:00

Nick Redfern is interviewed about the end of the world.

Click here to read his insights

Nick Redfern and The Vengeful Djinn

2011-03-08T19:36:00.003-05:00

Nick Redfern sees a connection (perhaps) between the demon-believers in his book Final Events and the genies in a new book by Rosemary Ellen Guiley & Philip J. Imbrogno: The Vengeful Djinn: Uncovering the Hidden Agenda of Genies

Click here for Mr. Redfern's take on the possible connection

Nick Redfern looks for bodies!

2011-03-08T08:56:00.002-05:00

Nick Redfern is on the case, searching for corpora!

Click here for the details

THE FABRICATION OF ALIEN ABDUCTION: MY CONVERSATONS WITH DR. JOHN MACK by Anthony Bragalia

2011-02-27T14:58:00.002-05:00

Copyright 2011, InterAmerica, Inc. [Permission needed to post this material outside of Fair Use]

Recent and disturbing revelations about UFO abduction researchers Budd Hopkins and David Jacobs have been made by Hopkins’ ex-wife Carol Rainey. She is concerned about the questionable quality and professionalism of the two’s work in the field. There are allegations that the two were incompetent and gullible in their investigations. This has shaken those segments of the UFO community that believe that extraterrestrials take humans into their craft (usually without human concurrence) to perform invasive “experiments” on them.

The time is appropriate to now reveal my early experience with a famed UFO abduction researcher. I am unhappy to report that I share Rainey’s concerns about such “research” in light of my discussions with this psychiatrist and abductionist. These conversations were with someone that I had hoped could apply the rigors of scholarly research to these bizarre nocturnal events that were being reported by so many at the time. This individual was the late Harvard psychiatrist Dr. John Mack.

In these talks it became evident that this unquestionably great thinker was not a critical thinker. Wide-eyed and lacking true discernment, Mack was as susceptible to the suggestion that ET “takes us” as were his patients. His lack of historical perspective on UFOs was alarming. What Mack said to me left me genuinely shaken. It is with some reluctance -but without regret- that I now relate here what I know to be the truth about such abduction “research.”

DR. JOHN MACK

John Mack was a New Yorker who came to Cambridge in 1955 and earned his medical degree from Harvard Medical School, specializing in adult and child psychoanalysis. Mack would later teach and research psychiatry at the same school from which he graduated. Through the years Mack would also become noted for his more non-traditional work in areas such as Holotropic Breathwork, consciousness studies and more privately with Dr. Stanislav Grof, psychedelics. Mack was awarded a Pulitzer Prize in 1977 for his biography and exploration of the life of British Officer T.E. Lawrence.

Much later in his career, beginning in the early 1990s, he began a 10 year quest to study what he called “Experiencers” – those who have encounters with alien entities resulting in a spiritual or transformational experience. In 1993 Mack founded a non-profit center of study to further exploration of the abduction phenomenon which he named PEER (Program for Extraordinary Experience Research.) He maintained small offices in Cambridge and sometimes convened events at the Harvard Divinity School. After meeting Mack, for many years I received solicitation mailings from PEER.

Mack wrote extensively on the phenomenon, including the bestseller Abduction: Human Encounters with Aliens as well as Passport to the Cosmos: Human Transformation and Alien Encounters. In September of 2004 while he was in England Mack was fatally and tragically struck by a drunken driver while walking from a friend’s home. Since his death, another non-profit arose to carry Mack’s message, “The John Mack Institute” in Boulder, CO. They acknowledge that “elements of PEER’s work may be found within many of our initiatives.”

IN SEARCH OF ABDUCTION ANSWERS

In the early 1990s I was fortunate to meet Dr. Mack, converse with him on the phone several times and share dinner with him (with a small group of skeptics.) Living in Boston at that time, I occasionally attended the meetings of a small assembly of skeptics who were supporters of the national skeptics organization CSICOP. Much later a New England Skeptics Society was established which has no relation to this early informal group. Though I am not a “skeptic” in the common sense of the word (and am a vocal proponent of the reality of the visiting extraterrestrial) I do value the learned opinions of those who question mine.

I took the opportunity to reach out to Dr. Mack (who was in Cambridge, where our meetings were held) to invite him to meet with us to discuss his recent UFO and abduction research. The other group members had thought it a good idea and agreed to be respectful and civil in their questions of Mack. They recognized that he would be going into a potential “lion’s den” and I wanted to make sure that this did not happen.

Mack graciously accepted the invitation to meet for dinner with us at a highly-rated Asian restaurant off of “Mass Ave” in Cambridge in the early evening. The ensuing event was peppered with lively debate and Mack certainly held his own. He was not an argumentative type though and did not attempt to “convince.” And the feared “lion’s den” did not happen- everyone was on best behavior, even humorous and light-hearted at times. Of course talk got around to abductions and many of the questions and interest surrounded this topic.

THE DISAPPOINTING ABDUCTIONIST

It is with reluctance that I report this because Dr. Mack is not here to speak to what I am about to say. Nevertheless, this early insight into his work helps us to understand the dynamics of what was going on at the time. We all wanted answers about this strange thing called “abductions” but it became clear to me that Mack would never find them. Among other things, he was not asking the right questions.

One of the first things that Dr. Mack asked me was what I did for a living. At the time, I was in the environmental consulting industry. As he obviously knew, I also had an interest –and a belief- in “things ET.” It was then that he perked up. It was as if a light bulb went on in his head. I could sense that he felt this was somehow “profound.”

He said to me, “Do you know that concern about the environment is a recurring theme with those that tell me of their encounters? The beings tell them that they are concerned about the threats to our environment such as pollution and radiation. They are warning us that we are doing harm to Earth.” He then waited for me to respond to this, but I merely acknowledged what he said in a general way. Then he asked me if I felt that my work in the environmental field had anything potentially to do with my interest in the UFO phenomena. I replied that the two were entirely independent. I was not working in environmental advocacy or anything like that- rather I was a management consultant who happened to be working with client corporations who were major players in the environmental industry. And I told him that my interest in UFOs began very early on- and certainly well before my environmentally-related work.

He seemed very disappointed that my UFO and environmental interests were not in some way “connected.” This was the first sign or red flag to me that Mack may be “shaping” and “overly interpreting” others’ experiences. He brought it up yet again later- he simply could not seem to reconcile that I had no deeper connection to “the environment” and that my UFO experiences and interests were not related to it. I told him that though I am “eco-conscious”- my environment-friendly attitudes about this had no link to concern about aliens warning us that we are destroying our planet.

I had many “background” questions of Mack. I began by asking him about the UFO “Contactees” of the 1950s and about the New Age “Channelers” of aliens in the 1980s

Though Mack had done an outstanding and detailed historical analysis of a military figure (and even was awarded a Pulitzer for it) it became quickly obvious to me that his historical analysis of the UFO phenomenon was sadly lacking. He did not possess a command of other such alleged human-alien encounters from the past. He knew of early contactee George Adamski for instance. But names such as Daniel Fry, Truman Bethurum, Howard Menger, Wayne Aho and others apparently did not ring a bell with him.

In a similar vein to Contactees, I asked him about his thoughts on Channelers. I mentioned “Ramtha” and also I later had mentioned “Ashtar.” Neither of these seemingly “rang a bell” with him either…

Mack was investigating alien abductions and was linking human consciousness with alien encounters. For Dr. Mack to have not completed deep analysis of these before psychoanalyzing his patient “abductees” concerned me. Though we eventually got around to discussing the abduction phenomenon, his apparent lack of historical reference and perspective on such things was bothersome to me. How could an esteemed Harvard doctor be so lacking in knowledge of such essential elements of the UFO phenomenon’s past? How could he not see that the dynamics of those Contactees and Channelers provide precedent for his study of “Experiencers”?

Clearly this was a man who was just now gaining information about UFOs. Here was a man trained and working as a Professor of Psychiatry who was going to write books about UFOs. My immediate fear was that here before me stood a man of some renown who would hypnotize and regress patients to elicit memories about personal penetration by aliens! His need for more understanding about things UFO was obvious. He was a “career transition” MD who had yet to learn valuable lessons of UFO history that could have helped him in his assessment of this abduction “phenomenon.”

During another conversation I had with Dr. Mack I brought up the ever-present prospect of “hoaxing.” After all, we were in the midst of Cambridge- the quintessential “college town” with young MIT science students always devising pranks. In fact, just some years prior, MIT students has somehow placed a life-size cow figure (stolen from a steak house) atop the famous MIT Dome building on Mass Ave without being seen (where Mack and I had before had dinner.) He had to have been aware of the propensity of people to hoax. Had he ever studied this or considered it relative to those claiming abduction? Was he aware of UFO hoaxes from the past that supposedly included human-alien encounters and communication? Though he had heard of UFO /alien hoaxer Billy Meier (and offered no opinion on the authenticity of his contacts and photos) Mack had not apparently ever heard of such people as Carlos Dias or of Paul Villa when asked. I really wonder if Mack realized that some of his patients (called “Experiencers”) simply never had such an experiences because –consciously or unconsciously- they made it up!

Mack struck me as someone who was open of spirit and overly trusting. He seemed to want to find the positive in things. He believed that all things had a meaning. Because of this I could easily see how he could be easily deceived by others and indeed by himself.

Again, I was astounded at Mack’s credulity and his lack of completing essential “homework.” Dr. Mack could not see that hoaxing –making things up- was something that should always be heavily considered when considering things strange, including alien abductions. He seemed perplexed that this would happen. I was crestfallen that he had never examined the “hoaxer mentality” or that he had not done an intense study on the history of UFO hoaxing.

Incredibly, just a few years later in 1996, my fear that Mack did not understand the hoaxer dynamic came true! One of Mack’s former patients, Donna Bassett, admitted to a NOVA television documentary team in Boston that she had made up the alien and UFO encounters that she had once told Dr. Mack. She based her story on her understanding of what others had said and written about the abduction phenomenon. Mack had never suspected it. He was entirely “taken in” by the woman’s fabrication.

In the end, I realized a lot about Dr. Mack:

- He was relatively new to the world of UFOs. He was not at all well-versed in its strange and long history, and he should have been given his position and what he was seeking to accomplish.

- He was a ”researcher of the mind” yet he never examined what made a Contactee’s or a Channeler’s mind tick, or even knew much about them at all. But like abductees, they too made claims of personal mental communication and interaction with UFO entities. Someone who is studying the human mind and alien interaction should have had some background knowledge of this.

- Though a perceptive man in some ways, he was not astute enough to be aware of hoaxers, even those that were within his own midst. He seemed oddly non-committal about hoaxes and abductions when I discussed the history of hoaxes and things alien and UFO.

- He suggested to me links that did not exist between my “interest in the alien” with my work in the environment. He was “overanalyzing” me. He tried to make ‘connections” that simply were not there. He dearly wanted me to agree with him.

- He seemed to me to be far too academic and cerebral to be engaged in this type of “work.” He was not someone I felt that had ever spent a lot of time in the “real world”- and especially to be cognizant of the motivations behind some in the UFO industry. He lived and worked in the bubble of Harvard Square for far too long to understand the larger world.

- He displayed a naiveté about the intrinsic reliability of humans, what they report and why. He did not seem to be an “investigator” who vetted what others told him. He seemed compelled to assign a ‘higher meaning’ to anyone we talked about that made UFO or alien claims.

A CLOUDED QUEST FOR TRUTH

This information is not given as a condemnation of the abduction phenomenon. It is well beyond my scope to offer a determination of the causes, meanings or essential truth about alien abductions. And I do not mean this piece as a “Mack attack.” I believe that Dr. John Mack was genuine in his pursuit. He was an honest man- but he did not look at the abduction phenomenon honestly. He was a brilliant man and I share with him some of his concepts on consciousness. But I am frankly today conflicted about what I see as his clouded quest for truth.

Did he somehow encourage the fantasy-prone or those suffering false memories or paralyzing sleep disorders? Did he understand the potential for contagion within the phenomenon? Did he unwittingly enable the hoaxers and the fantasists? The delusional? The psychologically needy? Or were some of his patients indeed the “real deal?”

One thing for me is certain- though an MD, Mack did not have the proper credentials to make his “diagnosis.” For so many reasons, he should never have been offering such “treatment.”

A Nick Redfern Review

2011-01-24T15:38:00.002-05:00

Nick Redfern reviews Stan Gordon's new book, Silent Invasion: The Pennsylvania UFO-Bigfoot Casebook.

Click here for Nick's review

Adventures of an Earthling

2011-01-22T13:06:00.001-05:00

Noted documentary filmmaker Mishara Canino-Hussung and her equally noted filmmaker husband Bill Hussung have produced “Adventures of an Earthling” – an investigation and film about some strange sightings that occurred in the Hudson Valley area by residents there in the early 1990s, one of whom is Bill Hussing’s mother.

Skeptical Bill Hussung, while wary of the encounters delineated by his mother and others, including a sighting of a giant space ship, does what any respectful son would do: treat the stories as authentic. After all, why would his mother, a smart, successful woman in her own right, make up such a story. And, he asks, why would she seem so terrified when she recounted the sighting(s)?

To read more about this intriguing tale and other UFO encounters and to get a DVD of Ms. Canino-Hussung’s quite wonderful “documentary,” visit the Boom Potato Films web-site:

http://boompotatofilms.com

From what we’ve seen, the encounters that Bill Hussung’s mother recounts can’t be dismissed out of hand. We’ll be checking further into the sightings.

Nick Redfern reviews Paranormal America

2011-01-20T16:30:00.002-05:00

That Nick Redfern can't help himself -- he just has to examine everything paranormal, in America, and the world.

Click here for his review of a new book, Paranormal America

GENeration eXtraTERrestial by Aurelio O'Brien

2011-01-19T10:01:00.006-05:00

Aurelio O'Brien provides a look at his new book (fiction) that some might find interesting and/or an enjoyable read.

Click here for the free introduction to his novel

Nick Redfern see dead animals....

2011-01-18T11:41:00.003-05:00

Nick Redfern sees dead animals/birds as connected to National Security somehow.

Read that "somehow" by clicking here

The Moth Man continues to gnaw

2011-01-14T11:34:00.003-05:00

Nick Redfern directs us and you to a new book about The Moth Man, which Nick shall be reviewing soon.

Click here for Nick's note

Nick Redfern deals with Owlman? Who?

2010-12-30T11:04:00.002-05:00

Nick Redfern, again, manages to find weird things. This time it's an "owlman." (We don't make this stuff up.)

Click here to Read Mr. Redfern's note about Jonathan Downes book,The Owlman and Others, along with Mr. Redfern's musings on related birdy things.

Nick Redfern's The NASA Conspiracies

2010-12-25T11:25:00.000-05:00

Nick Redfern’s latest effort at deriving truth from within the corridors of government and other bureaucratic constructs involved the National Aeronautics and Space Administration: NASA.

His book, The NASA Conspiracies: The Truth Behind the Moon Landings, Censored Photos, and the Face on Mars, [New Page Books, Pompton Plains, NJ], is replete with information readers will think they are familiar with but will find out they are not.

Mr. Redfern’s forte isn’t just ferreting news from FOIA documents. He actually has accumulated first-hand information, via face-to-face interviews with persons privy to the inner workings of NASA, the military, and other relevant agencies – insiders.

He has done this again for his NASA book, with a fellow named John, from Bloomington, Minnesota about Area 51 (page 57 ff.), Nick Pope, former U.K. Minister of Defense staffer about contactees, et cetera (Page 97 ff.), Matthew Williams, an investigator with the U.K.’s Customs & Excise Agency about crashed UFOs in the Britain (Page 125 ff.), and a NASA employee with NASA’s Public Affairs office about the Gary McKinnon affair (Page 199 ff.).

Mr. Redfern also presents incredible stories about alleged alien abductions (Sharon, Page 146 ff.) and persons who have experienced mothman-like creatures in and around NASA facilities (Hilda Walker and Frank Shaw, Chapter 13, The Monsters of NASA, Page 153 ff.).

Mr. Redfern also offers a kind of paean to Sci-Fi writer and UFO maven Mac Tonnies, who died recently but left a legacy of hypothetical thought that is unique and provocative, about the so-called Face on Mars (Chapter 9, Page 101 ff.) and cryptoterrestrials, a concomitant, hidden Earthian civilization that interacts with human beings who share this planet with “them.”

Mr. Redfern also provides illuminating minutiae about Roswell, the Moon landing, and the Frank Scully Aztec story.

His ruminations about the Space Shuttle and NASA’s astronauts, some of whom who are believers in extraterrestrial visitation, offer grist to those who believe that the UFO phenomenon is ET oriented.

But most of all, Mr. Redfern confirms for the rational observer that NASA and other U.S. agencies (such as the CIA and FBI) harbor secrets that would be explosive if revealed.

The NASA Conspiracies is a must-read for those who would like a heads-up on the agency that is at the fore-front of our Space exploration and efforts, including the next trips to the Moon and Mars (and beyond).

What does NASA know now, and how would that “secret” information, if made public, impact humanity, and human civilization? Mr. Redfern gives readers some insightful clues.

Mr. Redfern’s book may be had via Amazon.com or from Career Press, Inc., 220 West Parkway, Unit 12, Pompton Plains, NJ 07444 (careerpress.com or newpagebooks.com).

Nick Redfern is Ubiquitous!

2010-12-20T12:46:00.004-05:00

Nick Redfern will make an appearance at The Truth Event, Saturday, February 26, 2011.

Click here for more information

Nick will provide relevant updates to his best-selling book, Final Events.

Nick also made an appearance on Jeff Ritzmann's Paratopia "radiocast."

Nick provides a link to the show which you can hear by clicking on this link:

Nick Redfern on Paratopia, talking about Final Events, and other things

Nick Redfern, on the radio

2010-12-14T20:05:00.003-05:00

Nick Redfern will be talking about his book The NASA Conspiracies on several radio shows upcoming.

Click here for the list of shows and broadcast dates

Nick Redfern on strange flying thingies

2010-12-13T13:36:00.001-05:00

Nick Redfern addresses things that fly and are scary/weird, such as the Mothman.

Click here for Nick's musings

The NASA Conspiracies by Nick Redfern

2010-12-08T14:02:00.003-05:00

Nick Redfern's latest book is getting attention.

Click here for more on The NASA Conspiracies

Click here for a review by Paranormal News

Nick Redfern reviews Man-Made Monsters by Dr. Bob Curran

2010-11-29T16:34:00.001-05:00

Click here to read Nick's review of the book

The NASA Conspiracies: The Truth Behind the Moon Landings, Censored Photos, and the Face on Mars by Nick Redfern

2010-11-24T15:31:00.003-05:00

Nick Redfern announces his latest, new book:

Click here for Nasa book cover

This week, I'm pleased to announce, New Page Books have published my new book, The NASA Conspiracies: The Truth Behind the Moon Landings, Censored Photos, and the Face on Mars. I was asked to write an article about the book as part of the publicity campaign, and I am attaching that article for you, in Word format.

Click here for the article (in WORD format)

If you would like to reproduce this article at your website, magazine, or blog, you are very welcome too. I am also attaching the book cover image (see above), which you are also very welcome to reproduce.Click here for the article (in WORD format) Some of you on this list will be receiving copies of the book direct from me.

However, if I have not yet contacted you about that, and you would like a review copy of the book for your blog, website, magazine or radio/TV show, please contact Amanda at Warwick Associates at: warwick@vom.com and title the email "Nick Redfern's The NASA Conspiracies," and include your mailing address, and details of your site/radio show etc, Amanda will be pleased to mail you a review copy.

Nick Redfern's affected by the Full Moon?

2010-11-23T09:56:00.002-05:00

Nick Redfern reviews Linda Godfrey's The Michigan Dogman

Click here to read Mr. Redfern's review

Crypto-Rats??

2010-11-21T12:53:00.001-05:00

Nick Redfern says,[This is] "one of the strangest tales I've ever come across, and I've come across some strange ones!"

Link to the strange tale

Nick Redfern and Texas Chupacabras on TV!

2010-11-11T23:21:00.004-05:00

Nick Redfern recently traveled up to Oklahoma to film a segment for the local Fox News channel on a sighting there of a so-called "Texas Chupacabras."

"As noted in the segment, there's no doubt at all that these animals are canine, but there do seem to be some genetic anomalies going on too. For example, take a look at the photograph that appears in this film segment, and you'll see how the front limbs look extremely short, which is typical of a number of witness reports."

Click here to see the Fox report

Nick Redfern's FINAL EVENTS

2010-11-02T11:15:00.001-04:00

Many of you have read, we assume, Nick Redfern’s recent “best seller” FINAL EVENTS and the Secret Government Group on Demonic UFOs and the Afterlife [Anomalist Books, NY and San Antonio, TX, 2010].

If not, you should, and we’ll enumerate why here.

The thesis of Mr. Redfern’s book is that there exists (or existed) a governmentally-initiated group called The Collins Elite which was obsessed with the idea that UFOs were demonic entities (angels, as it were) who were gulling people and agencies into believing UFOs were extraterrestrial when in fact the operatives – the UFO entities –were paranormal entities out to “capture the souls of human beings.”

Yes, the concept is staggeringly bizarre, which is grist for Mr. Redfern, who often presents obtuse conjectures about UFOs, as he did with his book about Roswell, Body Snatchers in the Desert.

Now if you’re inclined to dismiss the demonic UFO hypothesis and Mr. Redfern’s book, you’d be missing out on what Mr. Redfern does best, and that’s present peripheral information and material that enlightens those who have limited knowledge about things germane to UFOs and human existence itself.

For instance, in FINAL EVENTS, Mr. Redfern provides a succinct dissertation on philosophy’s view of the soul [Chapter 16; Demons, Souls, and Fallen Angels].

He also gives background on some UFO players who get short shrift, if any shrift at all, in the UFO literature: Jack Parsons, L. Ron Hubbard, Aleister Crowley, Theodore von Karman, et al.

He also references UFO researchers with acumen and cachet but don’t get a lot of play in the States: the U.K.’s David Clarke and Andy Roberts and America’s own Michael Heiser who has a few terrific web-sites or blogs dealing with UFOs and Religion -- http://www.michaelsheiser.com/ will get you to those blogs and sites.

Mr. Redfern also presents a précis about the Hebrew concept of the Golem, which is an intriguing story worthy of a book all by itself.

You will also get introductory but insightful views of contactees (those flying saucer reprobates that Mr. Redfern, and others now, find worthy of another look).

Mr. Redfern does what other good writers do. He provides asides that illuminate items that might be of interest to readers. (James Bond’s creator, Ian Fleming, was extolled for doing the same thing in his books about the British secret agent.)

For instance, Mr. Redfern allows information about oft-excoriated UFO persons or things (Bob Lazar and MJ-12) that fill in lacunae which may be important in the over-all UFO mystery.

His Chapter [20] on U.S. President Ronald Reagan tells much that news media has glossed over about the ex-President; information that makes clearer what Mr. Reagan’s presidency was about, in large part.

And the Biblical detritus should thrill anyone who has a predilection for things theological, and arcane, such as the mysterious Book of Enoch, which tells religious mavens what the early Jews believed about God and his celestial plans for humanity.

Now, this “reviewer” is not enamored of The Collins Elite scenario, nor is Mr. Redfern I assume. But it is an idea that Mr. Redfern presents thoroughly and objectively, as usual.

And one that can’t be dismissed out-of-hand, if one considers Mr. Redfern’s remarkable accumulation of circumstantial information that bolsters the Collins Elite thesis.

Get the book – via Amazon or Anomalist Books (online) – and give yourself a treat, one that will be intellectually stimulating in many, many ways….

RR

Nick Redfern Discusses BIGFOOT

2010-10-30T14:02:00.005-04:00

Author Nick Redfern provides a mini review of a Bigfoot conference he attended and spoke at in October 2010.

Click here for Mr. Redfern's review

Nick Redfern's CRYPTO Blog

2010-10-26T08:18:00.003-04:00

Nick Redfern notes, at his Crypto blog, a new book about that ever ubiquitous Bigfoot thing and "its" connection to UFOs.

Click here to access Mr. Redfern's blog and the new book

Nick Redfern reviews Andy Roberts' book "UFO DOWN?"

2010-10-21T18:54:00.005-04:00

Andy Roberts is one of Ufology's premier investigators, a noted researcher in the U.K.

Nick Redfern reviews Mr. Roberts newest book, UFO DOWN?.

Click here for Nick's review

Nick Redfern reviews a new book from Gary Cunningham and Ronan Coghlan, entitled Mystery Animals of Ireland

2010-10-21T16:41:00.008-04:00

Click here to read Nick's review
.

Nick Redfern on Fox (and he's not even a Tea Party guy)

2010-10-18T15:01:00.004-04:00

Nick Redfern was interviewed by Fox about the pending expedition to China to search for the Chinese yeti -- the Yeren.

Click here for link to interview

The new Paratopia web-site is up and running

2010-10-08T14:44:00.001-04:00

Jeff Ritzmann informs us that his podcast ventures now make way to the internet via a new web-site.

Click here to access the splendid, informative Paratopia web-site

Nick Redfern: A Kind of Cryptozoological Bio

2010-10-06T15:36:00.008-04:00

Nick Redfern's interview by Paranormal The Other Side, the British web-site, tells us more about Nick than we should know (perhaps).

Click here to access the interview

Nick Redfern gets a jump on Halloween

2010-10-04T14:16:00.005-04:00

Author Nick Redfern attends Lake Worth Monster Bash and provides a report.

Click here for Mr. Redfern's account of his weekend "in the woods."

Nick Redfern extends his writing presence

2010-09-29T15:21:00.002-04:00

Mr. Redfern will be writing in TAPS Paramagazine (a news-stand publication) under a new column "Realm of Monsters."

The first effort deals with mermaids -- yes, mermaids.

Click here to let Mr. Redfern tell it.

Nick Redfern -- Strange-Game Hunter

2010-09-29T15:04:00.001-04:00

Nick Redfern has been on a Chupacabra hunt.

Click here to read his account

Soul-Harvesting by UFO aliens?

2010-09-27T16:19:00.001-04:00

Nick Redfern gets futher immersed in the "demonic" aspect of UFOs (which we are a bit loath to accept at the moment).

But visitors here can decide for themselves.

Click here for Mr. Redfern's take

Nick Redfern on a religious charade?

2010-09-27T16:18:00.001-04:00

Nick Redfern addresses an issue related to the topic(s) in his recent book, Final Events.

Click here for the commentary

Nick Redfern reviews Real Monsters, Gruesome Critters, and Beasts from the Darkside.

2010-09-27T08:01:00.002-04:00

Nick Redfern provides a review of Brad Steiger's latest book.

Click here for Nick's review

Great Web-Site: UFO Comet

2010-09-23T16:06:00.001-04:00

A new, for us, paranormal site -- UFO Comet -- has much about UFOs and some fine forums.

Check it out and sign up:

http://www.ufocomet.com

Nick Redfern and the Flatwoods Monster

2010-09-23T13:27:00.001-04:00

Nick Redfern confronts the Flatwoods Monster.

Click here for more

Bigfoot, Sex, and Nick Redfern

2010-09-21T12:00:00.001-04:00

Nick Redfern gets in bed with Bigfoot.

Read about it by clicking here

ALIENS AND CONSERVATIVES: THE RIGHT WING VERSUS ET by Anthony Bragalia

2010-09-19T22:32:00.001-04:00

The recent and frightening re-emergence of the hard religious right as a political faction will have an impact on all of us. Whether or not such "Jesus-driven" candidates as Sarah Palin, Mike Huckabee, Christine O'Donnell and Jan Brewer actually win elections to "govern by God," their fanatically held political and social beliefs will have repercussions for all of us who promote the study of things ET.

The words and actions of this frightening faction show that they oppose the Alien. They would never want extraterrestrial contact as they reject so many things that are "different" from them. They have repeatedly demonstrated their difficulty with inclusion of those who are not the same. And nothing could be more "different" that ET. Their near-racist opposition to Muslims and immigrants demonstrates their likely fear and loathing of extraterrestrial Visitors. As both history and current events reveal, extreme evangelical Christians even believe that ET are "demons."

GOING BACK TO PAT: "STONE THE ET BELIEVERS WITH ROCKS"

In July of 1997 religious right extremist Pat Robertson (of the "700 Club") issued a public statement on aliens and UFOs. He planned his proclamation to coincide with the news of the July 4th Mars Pathfinder landing that year. In a rambling diatribe, Robertson said that aliens and ET are in reality "demons" that are attempting to steer people away from Christ. So grave is the offense to study ET, Robertson maintains, that it is "God's word" that such people should be put to death!

Robertson says, "The Bible says the Earth belongs to man, but the heavens belong to the Lord. He has given us the Earth." Robertson warned of ET, "these things are at best lifeless nothings, intelligent and demonic. They are not a host of heaven, they are fallen angels."

Robertson, who still retains millions of followers to this day, continues, "Can a demon appear as a slanted-eyed, funny-looking creature? Of course he can, or it can. Of course they can deceive people. They can lead people away from the true God." Quoting Deuteronomy, Robertson instructs us what to do with those who study saucers: "stone to death that man or woman with stones." Note Robertson's racist and ignorant words to describe others not like us: "Slanted-eyed and funny-looking creature."

Deceased ultra-right wing conservative Christian (and founder of the "Moral Majority") Reverend Jerry Falwell echoed Robertson's sentiments that when "playing with ET, you are playing with the devil." Both Robertson and Falwell had a major impact on the political thinking and positioning of rightist Republicans and extreme conservative politics that continues to reverberate to this day.

CHRISTIAN SYMPOSIUM 2009: "ALIENS ARE DEVILS!"

A Christian outreach ministry led by Roswell resident Guy Malone preaches a strange mix of counter-cult evangelism, Biblical perspective on UFOs and what Malone describes as "Alien Resistance." During the annual Roswell UFO Festival last year, Malone organized an "all Christian speaker symposium" which included pastors, ordained ministers and pastoral counselors who came from around the nation to deliver papers. From the Best Western Ballroom, these men of the cloth lit the torch of ignorance. They explained to the exceptionally gullible that we are in "spiritual warfare" with these unwanted Visitors. Some they say, are demon abductors. The ET utter false New Age gospel and the messages to contactees are from Satan.

Presentations from the conference included such topics as: "Communication with Non-Terrestrial Beings: Biblical Warnings" and "Why an ET God Appeals to Today's Culture." as well as "ET's Message to Humanity: A False Gospel." Speakers included those from such places as Creation Ministries International and Evangelical Ministries. Such topics would be humorous if they were not so dangerous.

Such thinking of course is exclusionary in the extreme. Not only do these extreme rightists believe that they have the gift to "discern demons" - they believe that those who believe that ET is another species from another planet are anathema, and that to think that is dangerous and immoral.

A REPUBLICAN GOVERNOR AND ET

Former Governor, Minister and Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee apparently has also weighed in on the ET issue. When the late TV journalist Tim Russert asked Huckabee about UFOs while moderating a 2008 presidential debate, Huckabee spelled out his reply. He said that he preferred "G-O-D" over "U-F-O" to audience applause. A volunteer for the Huckabee campaign, John Jones Nichols, was quoted at the time that "UFOs are really demons disguised as spaceships." Nichols added that he was "sure that the Governor agreed with the bibical experts" on this.

DEMONS AS ALIENS IN 2010

Over the centuries, many things have been ignorantly viewed as demonic. Things that change the way we live -and that give us a wider expanse of knowledge and viewpoint- are always first feared. People believed for centuries that physical disease could be caused by demon possession. They did not know of the world of microbial life. It was at one time considered sacrilegious to consider that the Earth is not the center of the Universe.

But what is so profoundly disturbing is that these notions of demonic ETs is so prevalent today in 2010, well into the new millennium. A Google search using key words "Alien" + "Demons" yields over 1,500,000 matches. Countless websites warn of the connection between UFOs and Satan. Aliens, they proclaim that ETs are "Fallen Angels."

Right-wing Christian blogger Jefferson Scott said recently on his website: "I believe UFOs, aliens, abductions and animal mutilations are all real and that the American Government maintains relations with these beings." But then Scott alarmingly adds: "But I believe that the whole thing is demonic."

Scott is recycling a decades-old meme. It is a theme of extreme conservative Christians that maintains that Earth is "number one," that the Earth was gifted to humans by God- and that ET that come here are not of God. They are not welcomed. They are undesired intruders who are of the devil himself. The demons are disguised as aliens. But Scott also reflects a paranoia and distrust of "Government" that has reached irrational proportions in the recent political climate.

These "fundamentalists against flying saucers" extend this extreme mistrust of anything in government to the point of believing that some of those in Military and Intel really cavort with ET devils!

FINAL EVENTS

Author Nick Redfern's new book "Final Events" discusses this potential infiltration of elements of US military and intelligence by extreme Christian fundamentalists. This fundamentalist faction believes that extraterrestrials are demonic in nature. Redfern describes a specific group within US military and Intel that has even named itself: The Collins Elite.

Some of these demon-fearing government groups have apparently been operating since the late 1940s. Some have even dreamt up scenarios where even the Roswell "memory metal" is seen as a "plant" by demonic forces. The material was created through "demonic alchemy" and placed in the desert by these evil entities as a devil's Trojan horse" for man to open doors best remained closed. That such religious fantasies may be held by those entrusted to protect our country is a frightening thought.

Though I have yet to delve into "Final Events" I do know that "evangelical infiltration" of our US Military and Intel has occurred. One only has to visit the Christian Embassy website to see how the corridors of power are infested by religious rightists who believe their mission is divinely inspired. The organization gives new meaning to the admonition: "Onward, Christian Soldiers!"

OBAMA AS ALIEN: FEAR AND PREJUDICE AGAINST CHANGE

Such reactionary, divisive and rightist thinking is troublesome, even creepy. I cannot help but make this analogy:

Many of these misguided are the very same types that believe that President Obama is not really who he says that he is. They believe that he is not an American. They scream that he is not a U.S. citizen. In veiled terms they hint that he is "not like us." They lie about his religion. One yelled out during a McCain speech that Obama was "an Arab." Others rant that he is in fact the Anti-Christ.

Obama is "Alien" to these groups.

And the "fear of change" would be profound if such reactionary religious conservatives had to accept the visiting extraterrestrial. The perceived threat to their "order of things" would be too great for the bigoted and narrow-minded. Such people wish to restrict the immigration of Muslims and the construction of mosques in this country. The Christian Conservatives would rally strenuously against the construction of an alien's place of worship. They would no doubt take up the Palin call to violence: "Don't Retreat, Reload."

Rather than recognize that extra-solar planets likely teem with sentient life, they say that such things are Demons from Hell. They do not see that ET represents the splendor of God's diverse creation made evident throughout the universe. Like the delusional Florida pastor who called out to burn the Koran, they would no doubt burn ET's bibles. And just as they treated the "witches" of yore, such fanatics would falsely accuse ET and seek to destroy them.

Nick Redfern on Paranormal Warfare

2010-09-18T12:28:00.000-04:00

Nick Redfern addresses, in his weekly column at Mania.com, how the military uses creature legends in warfare…..yep.

Click here for Mr. Redfern’s take…..

Nick Redfern reviews Christopher Dell's MONSTERS

2010-09-17T14:27:00.001-04:00

Click here for Mr. Redfern's review

Nick Redfern interviewed about Final Events

2010-09-16T07:56:00.003-04:00

Mike Clelland (whose excellent artwork can be seen in Mac Tonnies' book "The Cryptoterrestrials") interviewed Nick Redfern 9/15 about my new "Final Events" book.

The interview lasted about an hour and a half, and Mike has now posted the interview to his blog.

Click here to access the interview

Early Crop Circles and Official Interest by Nick Redfern

2010-09-15T11:11:00.002-04:00

Precisely who, or what, is responsible for peppering the British landscape with the now-familiar Crop Circles, as well as the fantastically elaborate Pictograms – as they have come to be known – is a matter of deep conjecture, and one that has been hotly debated for several decades. Numerous theories have been advanced to try and explain the phenomenon; but opinions remain sharply divided. For some, Crop Circles are the work of benign extraterrestrials.

Others see the spirit of the Earth itself – calling out to the people of the planet to change their destructive ways – as being wholly responsible. Then there is the notion that all of the Crop Circles have man-made origins. Whatever the ultimate truth of the matter, the phenomenon is one that shows no signs of disappearing anytime soon.

But one of the most genuinely intriguing aspects of the affair is the extent to which British authorities have taken an interest in such formations.

Can the tales about official, government interest in Crop Circles be validated? Do governmental, military and intelligence files exist on this particularly emotive topic? The answer is most certainly: yes, to a degree, at least.

Under the terms of the British Government’s Freedom of Information legislation, a number of files concerning the wartime activities of MI5 – an arm of British Intelligence - have been declassified and made available for inspection at the National Archive, London, and which tell a notable story.

According to one MI5 document:

“The early days of 1940 and 1941 produced an avalanche of reports about the spies and fifth columnists who many people thought were roaming the land unhindered. Each village boasted of enemy agents in their midst, and it is only by recapturing the atmosphere of those days that one can see the matter in its proper perspective.

Everyone had heard of the activities of fifth columnists on the continent and of the alarmingly successful part they had played in the overthrow of France and Belgium. It was therefore natural with everyone tense for the threatened invasion that so many reports came in. Each had to be investigated, even if only to put the minds of the public and the services at rest.”

The report continues, and outlines the nature of its content: “This account is not concerned with the activities of fifth columnists such as sabotage, capturing airfields and key points, and harassing he defending army, but in the methods used in communicating to each other and to the enemy. Reports from Poland, Holland, France and Belgium showed that they used ground markings for the guidance of bombers and paratroops (and of lights by night).

Such ground markings might be the cutting of cornfields into guiding marks for aircraft.”

On this intriguing matter, MI5 elaborated that from interviews conducted with personnel who had taken part in the hostilities in Poland, it had been determined that one of the ways that Nazi spies were communicating with German Luftwaffe pilots was by “beating out signs, twenty meters in diameter, on harrowed fields or mowing such signs on meadows or cornfields.”

Crop Circles, in other words.

Notably, however, despite the widespread discovery of such formations, no definitive evidence ever surfaced to suggest that the strange creations found all across Europe were indeed the work of the Nazis. In other words, this was merely a theory to try and explain a tangible mystery and nothing more. The files also reveal that MI5 agents were dispatched throughout the UK to examine similar crop formations found in British fields in the early 1940s, in an attempt to determine if they, too, were linked with the activities of the Nazis.

And while the investigations did not confirm this hypothesis, the files are a perfect example (and, more importantly, an officially- documented example) of the fact that Crop Circles are not just a phenomenon of the modern era; but were reported to - and investigated by - high-level government departments seventy years ago.

The extent to which similar investigations may have been undertaken by British authorities in the modern era of the mystery, however, is an issue that still has many researchers of the puzzle going, quite literally, around in circles.

Nick Redfern on Chupacabras (in Texas?)

2010-09-11T12:23:00.002-04:00

Nick Redfern's latest weekly "Lair of the Beast" at Mania.com deals with a "Texas Chupacabra."

Click here to read Nick's take

Nick Redfern interviewed about Final Events

2010-09-10T12:28:00.001-04:00

Nick Redfern is interviewed about his latest book, Final Events.

Click here for the interview

UFOs, Zamora, Zamorro, Big Foot, and ?

2010-09-09T10:15:00.001-04:00

The tale in a clipping we found in our batch or UFO stuff intrigues in several ways.

Click here to see clipping

Lonnie Zamora saw a UFO with two beings near by. Zamorro saw a “saucer” with a Big Foot creature near by.

What’s our point?

That observations of UFOs and other paranormal artifacts (ghosts, sea monsters, fairies, et al.) are connected by synchronous delusions, variegated by the mind-sets of the observers, posing a psychological or neurological link amongst witnesses to UFO events, as we and Paratopia’s Jeff Ritzmann would have it.

UFOs, while having, sometimes, a tangible effect on materiality, the residue or remnants of that original tangible effect are lost or muddled in the observational aftermath.

UFOs have remained elusive for millennia. Collected data has provided no distinct clue as to what they are.

Ritzmann, among others, think that UFOs alter their presence or appearances to correspond to the cultural/societal conditions at the time they are observed.

That is, UFOs adopt the technological attributes of the period in which they are seen or witnessed.

No, it’s not a matter of interpretation by witnesses – such as chariots of fire in the early historical records of humankind or the 1890 airships. What is seen or reported is exactly what is seen; the UFO (or flying saucer) manifests itself precisely as witnesses have reported them.

The “saucers” of the 1950s, the occupant-sightings too, were geared to the mind-set of the observers.

The zeitgeist determines how UFOs will look -- their apparent construct.

But as the old philosophical saw goes – if a tree falls in the forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound? – applies: if a UFO is in the vicinity of humans, but no one is around to see it, does it produce a tangible presence (for cameras, radar, et cetera)?

It seems that real UFO incidents need humans to perceive them, directly or indirectly.

And when humans perceive the UFO(s), they do so with all the aggregate mental detritus that suffuses their mind or memory.

Is there a UFO reality that is concrete or uniform? Apparently not.

UFOs alter themselves – we’re suggesting a living attribute obviously -- or are altered by the mental configurations of those perceiving them.

There is no one UFO presence, no one UFO reality. UFOs are all things to all people, manifesting their reality dependent upon the mental make-up of the person or persons taking in their presence, in the air, on the ground (as in previous years, more so than today), or via technology (radar, for instance).

And those who refuse the reality are also determinant mentally. They refuse the “reality” or “delusional reality” of others because they are saddled with mind-sets of a restrictive kind.

Until neurology, psychology, sociology, and other disciplines tackle the UFO phenomenon within the parameters of human mental vagaries, the mystery will remain elusive.

Hypothesizing about UFOs with an extraterrestrial orientation seems a futile enterprise. The folkloric aspect, propounded by Jacques Vallee or Dr. David Clarke, is a sensible approach.

But one shouldn’t eschew the ET interpretation out-of-hand. It remains a possibility, in the great scheme of things, but it shouldn’t becloud other interpretations, as it has for the past 60 years or so….

Nick Redfern's new book: Final Events

2010-09-07T10:03:00.001-04:00

Nick Redfern presents material outlining a government study group's “obsession” with a demonic aspect of UFOs and the Afterlife too.

Click here for Mr. Redfern’s site about his new publication

GhostsStory.com

2010-09-05T18:21:00.001-04:00

Sure, this isn't about UFOs, per se but it is a site we recommend highly.

And there is a tangential connection to UFOs, as you know.

Click here to go to GhostsStory.com

Ufology and The Perversity or Criminality of Beards

2010-09-02T10:25:00.001-04:00

Copyright 2010, InterAmerica, Inc.

If you wish to avoid lies, subterfuge, and intellectual deviance in life and the UFO community, make it a point to avoid or eschew persons with beards and writings by persons with beards.

The current thinking in psychology is that persons with beards are using facial hair to cover or disguise mouths that spew lies (or have engaged in perverse activities of an oral nature).

We have always been wary, instinctively, of those ufologists who are heavily bearded, and find that those instincts compare favorably with the prevailing thinking of psychiatry nowadays.

Here’s what Wikipedia has to say, in part, about beards and those who sport them:

In the course of history, men with facial hair have been ascribed various attributes such as … filthiness, crudeness, or an eccentric disposition.

In a general way, in Rome at this time, a long beard was considered a mark of slovenliness and squalor. The censors L. Veturius and P. Licinius compelled M. Livius, who had been banished, on his restoration to the city, to be shaved, and to lay aside his dirty appearance, and then, but not until then, to come into the Senate.

From the 1920s to the early 1960s, beards were virtually nonexistent in mainstream America. The few men who wore the beard or portions of the beard during this period were frequently either old, Central Europeans; members of a religious sect that required it; in academia; or part of the counterculture, such as the "beatniks".

Many Hindu priests are unshaven as a sign of purity.

Vaishnava men, typically of the ISKCON sect, are encouraged to be clean-shaven as a sign of cleanliness.

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints

Modern Mormon men are strongly encouraged to be clean shaven. Formal prohibitions against facial hair are given to young men entering their two-year mission service. Those entering the church-sponsored universities are asked to adhere to the Church Educational System Honor Code, which states in part: "Men are expected to be clean-shaven; beards are not acceptable."

The U.S. Army, U.S. Air Force, and U.S. Marine Corps justify banning beards on the basis of both hygiene and of the necessity for a good seal with gas masks. The U.S. Navy did allow beards for a time in the 1970s and 1980s, following a directive from Chief of Naval Operations Elmo Russell Zumwalt, Jr., but subsequently banned them again. The U.S. Coast Guard allowed beards until 1986, when they were banned by the Commandant, Admiral Paul Yost. The vast majority of police forces across the United States still ban beards.
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Our experience has been that those in the UFO camp who sport beards are crude, as indicated above, or sexually perverse.

Moreover, what they have to say about UFOs is tempered by us as we have found that such hirsuted persons will lie, through their teeth (as the old caution puts it), to achieve any nefarious end that benefits their personal psychopathology.

If you come across anything written or said by a person with a beard – the bigger the beard the worse will be the affect – either eschew the material or receive it with a large dose of skepticism.
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N.B. Reginald Reynolds: Beards: Their Social Standing, Religious Involvements, Decorative Possibilities, and Value in Offence and Defence Through the Ages (Doubleday, 1949) (ISBN 0-15-610845-3)

James A. Brussel, M.D.: Casebook of A Crime Psychiatrist (Bernard Geis Associates, [Grove Press], 1968)

Charles G. Costello (Editor): Symptoms of Psychopathology: A Handbook (John Wiley and sons, Inc. NY, 1970)

Leland E. Hinsie, M.D. and Robert J. Campbell, M.D., Psychiatric Dictionary [Fourth Edition], (Oxford University Press, London, 1970)

Nick Redfern reviews Hilary Evans' new book "Sliders"

2010-09-01T15:42:00.002-04:00

Click here for Mr. Redfern's review