Thursday, February 27, 2014
Wednesday, February 26, 2014
Monday, February 24, 2014
An article in the February 17/24 New Yorker by Adam Gopnik [Bigger Than Phil: When Did Faith Start to Fade?] deals with Atheism and Faith, about God, of course.
But some of writer Gopnik’s observations apply to the UFO topic, which is rife with believers and atheists (skeptics). It also allows the entry of ignorance to the matter.
Readers here know that UFO mavens consist of rabid believers and equally rabid skeptics. (I’ve dealt with this a number of times, as you know.)
What is disturbing is the raft of ignorant people and their ignorant contributions to the UFO topic, mine included, I’m sorry to write.
New Yorker writer Gopnik notes that “polemicists…[work] not to persuade but to stiffen the spines of their supporters and irritate the stomach linings of their enemies.” [Page 107]
This is obvious in the UFO contributions that clutter the internet.
But lately we’re stunned that our friends at The Anomalist, who generously acknowledge my meager efforts, have taken to lauding material that is magnificently obtuse, when Gopnik tells his readers this: “Argos, the hundred-eyed watchman might have had more sight than other giants, but he didn’t have sharper sight.” [Page 108]
That is, Anomalist seeks out the fringe, with little or no discernment for the quality, or lack thereof, of what they promote. Why? Nescience.
Gopnik offers that “The difficulty, as always with the popular chronicles of ideas, is not that ideas don’t matter; it’s that we too readily skip over the question of how they come to matter. What seeded the ground is the historian’s easy question; what made the ground receive the seed is the hard one.” [Page 108]
If atheists [UFO non-believers] underestimate the fudginess in [UFO] faith, [UFO] believers underestimate the soupiness of [UFO] doubt. [Page 110]
About Christianity ,which mimics the vicissitudes of UFO faith, Gopnik writes, “Christian rites were mocked among the Romans for their vulgarity long before they were denounced for the absurdity.” [Page 110]
This applies to “ufology” also, the skeptics adopting the Roman stance.
Gopnok cites author John Updike who wrote that “The power of materialist science to explain everything … seems to be inarguable and the principle glory of the modern mind. On the other hand …illusions composes the basic substance of our existence, and religion [UFO belief], in its many forms, attempts to address, organize, and placate these.” [Page 111]
In the theological/religious universe, atheism seems to have a foothold. And in the UFO universe, skepticism hopes to gain a foothold and may have already.
And while newbies in academia misunderstand the belief/atheistic divide, such UFO advisory groups, as The Anomalist, often misunderstand the UFO landscape.
The Anomalist noted that I think UFOs are on a downhill run and about to go belly up. Anomalist pooh-poohed my view with an aside about how many old UFO sightings still need reclamation and study.
That’s true, and I’ve listed many of the classic cases here that seem to contain elements that could lead to an understanding of the UFO phenomenon.
But the Anomalist editors – not Patrick Huyghe! – are relative UFO newbies. They, unlike CDA or me, haven’t been around during the UFO heyday, when flying saucer sightings were vibrant and arresting.
Today’s UFO sightings and reports are poor examples of what was.
And today’s commentary about UFOs are so much poorer than the writing and excitement during the early modern years of UFOs or flying saucers, evidenced by a comparison of the early UFO books and magazine articles to today’s UFO effluvia.
UFO writer Nick Redfern knows this and writes as a bona fide historian of the UFO lore, new and old.
But others, that get recognized as relevant, are anything but.
And the UFO faithful get swamped by the UFO atheists because as Gopnik sees it (about religion and the belief in or not in God), “True rationalists are as rare in life as actual deconstructionists are in university English departments …” [Page 109]
No one deconstructs UFOs, not even those that The Anomalist lauds.
The field of UFO study is awash in nescience, even by those who think they are above and beyond the epithet.
Friday, February 21, 2014
In the April 1976 Official UFO magazine, on Page 24 ff. appears an article by Raymond Fowler about crashed UFOs and bodies.
Besides the notorious Kingman, Arizona “crash” there’s a report of a crashed saucer at Mattydale, a suburb of Syracuse, New York; the report given to Fowler by a Mr. And Mrs. Marsden.
The incident happened between October 1953 and May 1954, given to Fowler in 1967.
An object about 20 feet in diameter and 15 feet high, exuding phosphorescent lights of several colors, which illuminated “quite a few men walking around the object and examining it. Some were uniformed and some were not. One man had what appeared to be a large press camera…and was taking pictures.” [Page 25]
Fowler then recounts the Kingman incident (of 1953) by an AEC project engineer, Fritz A. Werner, who was asked to help in the investigation of a crashed, super-secret Air Force vehicle:
The crashed, unknown object was allegedly studied by Mr. Werner and others; Werner providing an affidavit in which he said he glanced a “dead body of a four-foot human-like creature…The skin on its face was dark brown.” Werner was cautioned not to divulge what he had seen.
Werner was supposedly assigned to Project Blue Book later on, but Fowler wasn’t able to confirm that but was able to determine that Werner had some actual bona fides and was a credible source, who had a diary of his activity at Kingman.
(Fowler also mentions, in his piece, a Dr. Eric Wang, who figures in the memory metal that Anthony Bragalia found was studied by Battelle and NASA, and was said to come from the Roswell crash.)
So, what is the exact connection to Roswell that the Roswell Team sees? Or are their touted slides from another incident in the 1947-1953 time-frame?
Nick Redfern sees the sign that appears in the controversial photos as a possible clue to tell us where and when (perhaps) the pictures were snapped.
More to come?
RR
Thursday, February 20, 2014
If you found a treasure or the cross that Jesus was crucified on, wouldn’t you show it to your family first, before going to the media and/or the public?
Of course, if you’re a normal person.
That the Roswell Investigation Team is holding its slide information from the UFO community, its “family,” irks, and not just me.
Shouldn’t the Roswellians provide, at least, an overview of what they have found in their slides discovery?
(Personally, I don’t give a fig about the slides; they might clarify the Roswell incident but won’t resolve the UFO mystery, a phenomenon above and beyond Roswell.)
And then let me ask, did the Roswell Team run a background check on the “businessman” who possesses the slides or his sister, who allegedly found them?
That should be an important part of their investigation.
The lack of transparency in this whole slides episode is troubling.
And saying that the Team will provide their findings when “they are good and ready” adds smug insult to injury.
Why do these fellows get to call the shots, because the stumbled upon the slides?
I don’t think so.
Roswell belongs to the UFO community, not just a few frat boys, some of whom have questionable cachet as UFO cognoscenti sees it.
Wednesday, February 19, 2014
Many of you have questions about the situation with the so-called Roswell Slide(s).
Here’s what I know…
The Team doesn’t have its ducks in a row.
They know that the Kodachrome film was extant in 1947 and the photo(s) taken with it were probably taken in that time-frame, but they can’t prove that.
They also don’t know who took the photo(s); they have a guess, but that’s all they have.
They don’t know where the film was taken – locale. They think it’s near Roswell but that is a guess also.
They have no idea what the photo(s) show….a “body” apparently, but there is no way to determine what kind of body – real or simulated, or ???
The Team is trying to put together a scenario but they have no access to first-hand participants.
They have a Chicago guy who got the slides from his sister who found them in a trunk during and estate sale.
The possessor has no connection to the slides – direct or indirect. He’s just a guy hoping to capitalize on the things, hyped by Tom Carey as Roswell in nature.
Tom Carey is intrigued because he’s a Roswellian and wants to resolve that incident.
Don Schmitt wants to capitalize monetarily I think.
David Rudiak is a Roswell fanatic. He’s obsessed with Roswell and needs to keep scratching that itch.
Anthony Bragalia wants to be a UFO notable. He desires cachet and fame as a “ufologist” which I don’t get. Having UFO notoriety is anathema to persons who value dignity and common sense.
Chris Rutkowski is almost involved but a silent partner, one who should get out before his inestimable credibility is shot to hell by the Slides farce.
Kevin Randle wanted to clear up his beleaguered Roswell credibility but snookered that by playing fast and loose with the Slides story, nailed by Paul Kimball for prevaricating the issue.
So that’s where we are: the Slides will get a public airing this year, sometime, somehow.
But it will be akin to the Alien Autopsy film, in content and denouement; that is, it will end up being one more ufological joke that besmirches all involved.
RR
Tuesday, February 18, 2014
Objective UFO buffs have got to see that the UFO era is over, dead, finito, extinct.
Yes, some strange things are still seen in the sky but, for all practical purposes, UFOs as a viable topic of interest or phenomenon in need of study are so over…
Those hoping or wishing that the so-called Roswell slides will rejuvenate Roswell or UFOs are going to be sorely disappointed.
There might be a blip of interest when the Roswell slides are made public but it will only be a blip.
The slides are already compromised. They were said to be taken by a geologist who happened, with his colleagues, upon an accident or Army operation which displayed an entity of unearthly demeanor.
Now it’s said the slides show a body in a building.
The slide story, like all UFO stories, has become fuzzy.
The Roswell Investigation Team is keeping their knowledge of the slides to themselves, hoping to capitalize on them with books, magazine articles, even a movie.
But really that Team is really hoping to gain some notoriety and fame, cementing their long-time efforts to make something tangible, worthwhile, of UFOs and especially Roswell.
The public doesn’t care. News media doesn’t care. The governments of the Earth don’t care.
Yes, there might be a mild stir, if the slides are marketed sensationally, but they, like UFOs, will subside into a fringe footnote, only to be debated by the last of the UFO obsessives.
UFOs are as dead as dead can be, only seeming alive because a few UFO mavens, like us, keep providing CPR, when we know, down deep, that UFOs have had their day.
RR
Thursday, February 13, 2014
I received a ranting comment from French skeptic Gilles Fernandez, who is livid that I hadn’t provided a second posting at this blog of his loony “exegesis” of the 1896 Airship wave in California.
I had initially placed his first installment online as it was, to me, like the “outsider art” I’ve often placed here.
Monsieur Fernandez’ presentation was like that “art”: magnificently schizophrenic and errant. (I addressed his errors, as many of you know, but he didn’t refute my listings of his follies, but only came back with an offer of another litany of strange skeptical interjections about the 1896 Airship wave.)
When I chose not to clutter this blog with his manic musings, he wrote this:
“Wasn't you who said and claimed you will present in your blog the part 2 (and final one) of my humble 1896/97 airships' study. Where it is in your blog ?
You are a liar and have removed the part one! You allowed in your blog. Well that's ufology and now your blog!
If you have nothing to address / counter-arguments to this humble study excepting "Venus cant be misinterpreted as an UFO" (a totaly false claim), or Gilles enhanced Venus in Stellarium (and other stupid comments like these ones) please, forget to pronounce my name in your blog, OLD-GEEZER.”
He’s angry or mad; mad in the psychiatric sense.
Our friend Lance Moody, another skeptic, but a more rational one, has taken to try and counter comments from Joel Crook, the provider of Gaines Crook’s material, and an erudite thinker in his own right.
That Joel holds his own against Lance’s “onslaughts” is not dis-similar to David Rudiak’s push-backs at Kevin Randle’s blog when Lance begs to challenge Mr. Rudiak’s comments.
Yes, David Rudiak is rabid, while Joel Crook is moderate and restrained, academic actually.
This teases Lance, who likes to argue UFO points, but he (Lance) has found a foil that isn’t easily cowed. Mr. Rudiak usually just calls Lance and/or CDA and Fernandez a few names. Joel Crook attacks the argument.
James Oberg and Robert Sheaffer, both intelligent skeptics, also are dismissed by the UFO community, just as the angry, often nasty Philip Klass was.
The skeptics get more rattled and loopy, as Gilles Fernandez does, when UFO aficionados go forward with their belief that Roswell involved an alien airship crash, or the Hills were abducted by aliens, or the 1896 Airship wave was something more than a mistaken observation of the planet Venus.
The UFO crowd, me included, continue to speculate on the UFO phenomenon, and refuse to be sidetracked by errant and contrived attempts by the skeptical crowd to dissuade us that there’s nothing to UFOs.
UFOs, while on the wane as a topic of interest for the populace and media, generally, still hold a place in the curious heart of a few.
Skeptics hate that. And the Gilles Fernandezes of the world will have to accept that their anti-UFO arguments have not removed and will not remove the UFO obsession for some.
RR
Wednesday, February 12, 2014
This is a photo, of Venus, by Jon Shaner, meteorologist at Fox/WXMI in Grand Rapids, Michigan (from our media Facebook page):
That the military tried to say, initially, that this is what Captain Thomas Mantell chased as a UFO (subsequently reporting that it was a Skyhook balloon that gulled the pilot) and Donald Menzel often used the planet as a UFO explanation, plus French skeptic Gilles Fernandez providing reams of material to bolster his thesis that the 1896 Airship in California was a mis-identification of the planet, goes to the heart of why UFOs have been muddied from the outset of their appearance.
When academics and (usually) credible bodies (the U.S. Air force) insert such a bogus and errant explanation for a UFO sighting, it confuses the mind of media and the great unwashed (the public).
That confused mind-set has pushed UFOs into a fringe bracket of reality which prevented and prevents any real study of the phenomenon.
Does any sane observer of the night (or morning) sky really think that Venus, in all its glory, could be a UFO or airship?
The "explanation" is ludicrous.
But some still try to use it to explain UFO sightings, which shows me where the insanity of society lies.
RR
When academics and (usually) credible bodies (the U.S. Air force) insert such a bogus and errant explanation for a UFO sighting, it confuses the mind of media and the great unwashed (the public).
That confused mind-set has pushed UFOs into a fringe bracket of reality which prevented and prevents any real study of the phenomenon.
Does any sane observer of the night (or morning) sky really think that Venus, in all its glory, could be a UFO or airship?
The "explanation" is ludicrous.
But some still try to use it to explain UFO sightings, which shows me where the insanity of society lies.
RR
Monday, February 10, 2014
Copyright 2014, InterAmerica, Inc.
Anthony Bragalia has long contended that Lonnie Zamora was the victim of a college- induced hoax (in Socorro, 1964).
Mr. Bragalia has provided reams of circumstantial piffle to bolster his thesis but neglects the one clue that could prove (or disprove) his hypothesis: the Socorro Insignia:
Reading, in The London review of Books [2/6/2104, Page 25], about a college prank of 1755 involving a pamphlet called Pope ein Metaphysiker!, that involved an attempt by an anonymous writer or writers (students?) “to make fun of the learned members of the Royal Prussian Academy” accusing “them of dishonouring the memory of their found member, Gottfried Leibniz,” brings to my mind what any real hoaxer or hoaxer of the Socorro incident might do.
Reviewer Jonathan Rée, who presents the story, writes, “Pope ein Metaphysiker! Was an impudent prank at the expense of the cultural establishment in Berlin, and the perpetrators covered their tracks by suppressing their names and getting the pamphlet printed in faraway Danzig. But they seemed to have wanted to be found out in due course, and on the title page they left a riddling clue to their identity: a vignette depicting a chubby cherub holding a bearded mask to his face and startling two naked boys. Intriguing, but what could it mean?” [Italics mine]
As Curtis D MacDougall points out in Hoaxes [Dover Publications, NY, 1940/1958], there are many reasons to hoax, but it’s psychiatry that addresses the need by some hoaxers to become known, after the fact of heir hoaxing.
This is what, it seems, the “students” wanted to happen in the Pope ein Metaphysiker! incident wanted.
And I think that might be the case in the Socorro incident, if the episode was a prank or hoax.
But Mr Bragalia doesn’t pursue the Insignia. He pursues and is still pursuing the driver of the car that Officer Zamora was chasing and the co-conspirators of the prank. And he thinks he’s made some headway.
The Insignia or symbol, described by Officer Zamora and made, maddeningly convoluted by the insistence of Ray Stanford and others that the well-known drawing was a ruse and the real insignia was this:
Mrs. Zamora confirmed, for me, in a 2006 telephone call, that the commonly known insignia is what her husband saw and drew.
That’s the clue to whom created the incident or was the creator(s) of the “egg-shaped craft’ that Officer Zamora saw.
If Mr. Bragalia could nail down the insignia, as originating from or in the New Mexico Technical school, he might make his case.
But, as it stands, the connection to Howard Hughes and the CIA as the originators of the craft and the insignia have more credence, which has been addressed here and elsewhere by us and Matthew Gilleece:
RR
Sunday, February 9, 2014
I'm inserting, here, his commentary about the "event," the written account provided by Gaines Crook's son Joel. (Your thoughts, as usual, are welcome.):
Copyright 2014, Joel Crook
MEMORIES OF INCIDENTS IN MY LIFE THAT MAY RELATE TO THE ABDUCTION EXPERIENCE by Gaines M Crook
12-17-92
I was born in Ellisville in southeast Mississippi on May 7, 1923 and I never went more than 60 miles away from my birthplace until I was almost 18 years old. I lived at Ellisville until I was 10 years old. This area of Mississippi was at that time mostly agricultural and American Indian place and stream names abounded. Names like Talahoma, Talahalee, Talahasse, Bogahoma, Archusa, Chicasahay, Pachuta, Shubuta,
These incidents are not dirctly correlated with the abduction phenomena but may be found to be related if explored. I am not troubled by any sign of stress which might be related to the phenomena so I see no reason to explore them further than what I can remember.
The Doctor
When I was 5 years old (September 1928) my parents started me to school in the "Primer" which is now called kindergarten. Not more than a few weeks after school started, the County Health Dept. doctor came around to examine the children. I was born at home, delivered by a black midwife and had never seen a medical doctor in my life up to that time. My first look at the doctor was while he was looking into another child's nose with an examination instrument. I went into a total panic! I went around the corner from the room where the examinations were taking place to another room, jumped out the window and hid in the shrubbery. As I remember it, none of the children was crying or objecting to the examination, or even appeared to be afraid of it, but it caused me to utterly panic. After staying in the bushes for a while I knew I had to leave or I would be found and taken back to undergo the horror of all horrors! It has been over 64 years since that occurrence and I remember it as clearly as if it had been yesterday!
I knew almost nothing about the town where I lived but I did know where Joe Gilbreth's grocery store was. Joe Gilbreth was a friend if my Dad and I knew Dad probably would go by the store before he went home that night. Sure enough, Dad came by the store and by that time Joe had spotted me outside trying to hide as well as I could. This incident caused ny parents to decide that I was too young to start to school. I started in the first grade the next year and never had a physical examination for the whole 12 years I was in grammar and high school. In fact I was about 16 years old before I was treated by a medical doctor (for malaria).
About a year after the medical examination episode, We had moved to a house on the eastern side of Ellisville not far from where US Highway 11 was being built. I started to school that year. I remember that very well because in order to go to school I had to cross the Southern Railroad track. At about the time I went to school in the morning, a long freight train would be parked on a side track waiting for a passenger train to pass it on the single main track. The only way we could get to school was to crawl under the parked train or walk around it which would have added a mile to the trip. Once in a while the train would make a noise and give us a good scare that we would be run over!
The "Boat"
While the US Highway No. 11 was being built through Ellisville, there was a small creek that crossed the highway and so a bridge had to be built. They excavated the channel under the bridge and formed it up and poured the concrete before the road was built to the bridge. The channel of the creek was apparently changed in order to pour the concrete without being bothered by the water from the creek. When the bridge was completed, and before the creek was diverted into it, it had a basin under it and when it rained it filled with water. Some of the older boys built a "boat" which was like a box about three feet wide and five feet long, but it would float in the water with two or three small boys in it. I remember going under the bridge in the "boat" and saying to myself, "They can't get to me in here!". I have no idea within what context this statement was supposed to be. This memory did not return until over 60 years after it happened and I was reviewing some occurrences of my childhood.
The Woods
My maternal grandparents lived about a mile west of Ellisville on a 40 acre family farm. My Grandfather was a jack of all trades. He had been a blacksmith until the advent of the automobile and still had a blacksmith shop at his home. From one time to another my family would move in with my grandparents. One time also we lived in a house on a farm next door to their farm. Just north of my grandparents farm was a woods consisting mainly of old second growth long leaf pine. Us kids would go to these woods to play. There were some small hills in the woods. We would make little "sleds" by nailing a board seat and another board for a footrest on to an oak barrel stave. We would slide down the pine straw covered hills under the pine trees on the little "sleds" and the wax on the pine straw would glaze the barrel staves and make them as slick as if we were on snow. We could guide the "sled" by leaning one way or the other. We had great fun but one time we went and decided not to go again for some unknown reason. We never went back. I have no recollection of what could have happened that would have made us stop going to a place where we had so much fun.
Quitman
When I was 10 years old our family moved to Quitman, MS in Clarke County about 45 miles northeast of Ellisville. I lived there until I was 17 1/2 years old and did most of my growing up there. For the last 6 years I lived about 2 miles east of town across Archusa creek. I spent an inordinate amount of time in the woods. I would just walk through the woods, swim in the creek and sometimes paddle a boat around in the creek. I didn't like to fish unless I got hungry and then sometimes I would fish for a fish to eat, if I had some salt and something to cook it in. Sometimes in the spring the creek would flood and the water would be over 6 feet deep above the bridge and almost a mile wide. Sometimes during a flood I would paddle around in the boat and rescue small animals from tree stumps and fence posts and take them to higher ground. There was a railroad used by the Long Bell Lumber Co. to haul logs from the little town of Crandall about 12 miles east of Quitman to the sawmill at Quitman. The railroad had a trestle across Archusa creek. When the flood came the trestle was almost always out of the water so I used to walk over it to get to town during a flood. They ran a train only twice per week on the railroad. Once I had a very vivid dream that there was a flood and I was sitting on the trestle in the middle of the big expanse of water and the devil slowly surfaced out of the water. I had my .22 rifle with me and I took aim and shot him in the head and he slowly sank back into the water.
I also spent a lot of time in some high woods where there was only one very small creek. In the high woods I mainly cut firewood for the family to burn in the cookstove and fireplace as some power lines had been put through it and there was plenty of wood already cut down in the right of way. The owner was glad to get rid of the downed wood as it improved the land for cattle pasture.
The "Thing"
Years later an incident happened that could possibly be related to the abduction phenomena. I was working for the EI duPont de Nemours Co. at the Atomic Energy Commission's Savannah River Plant near Aiken, SC as an Instrument Shift Engineer at the 105-P nuclear reactor facility. his happened in April of 1954. I was married and had three small sons, Mark, 6, David, 3, and Joel 4 months.
At the time we had bought a piece of land near the intersection of county highways 37 and 39 in Barnwell County, SC just west of Springfield and were living in a house trailer at the site of where a house had burned down. The trailer was crowded and in an effort to expand the living space, I had started to build a small house about 40'X20' next to the trailer. The foundation and subfloor was finished but the upper part had not yet been completed.
I was working second shift at the time from 3pm to 11 pm. I got home after 12 midnight. My wife, Bettie, was upset because there was a strange smell present and she thought it was the Freon refrigerant leaking out of the refrigerator. The smell smelled similar to rotten oranges. She insisted that we move the refrigerator out of the trailer on to the floor of the yet unfinished house. The refrigerator was not a small trailer unit but a full size 14 or 15 cubic foot model and was very heavy. I didn't like the idea of moving it but she insisted. Well, we got it moved and it began to sprinkle rain about the time we got it moved. We finally got to bed very late.
Later that night Bettie woke up and looked toward the other end of the trailer where the children slept and saw an unbelievable sight! There floating in the air about five feet off the floor was this "thing" that glowed with sort of a golden color about the brightness of the moon and looked like a jellyfish. the central part was about 6" in diameter and it had shimmering tentacles hanging down below. She called my name trying to wake me up but I didn't wake up so she turned towards me (to the right) and there curled around my neck was another of these things! She said "Oh my God". She felt a flash of intense heat over her whole body and pulled the cover over her head. She was unconscious until we both woke up the next morning! I slept through the whole thing. She told me about what had happened and it sounded incredible to me. She was wearing a nylon hair net when it happened. The next morning the hair net was found to have melted and was matted into her hair. I had to pick it out a piece at a time! Now nylon begins to melt at about 470°F and the bits of hair net showed that they had been at a much higher temperature than the minimum temperature because of the tiny size of the droplets of nylon. The hair net appears to have exploded in an extreme burst of heat. We could not think of anything that could account for the heat flash and unconsciousness. We kept this to ourselves and didn't tell anyone about it. Several times later we smelled the same odd smell but never had any indication of a reoccurrence of a similar kind of incident and never saw the "things" again.
Saturday, February 8, 2014
I've placed them at our UFO Heterodoxy blog, where we are posting Mr. Crook's insights and musings.
Click HERE to read the latest input.
RR
Wednesday, February 5, 2014
The February 6th, 2014 London Review of Books has a review by David Kaiser of physicist Lee Smolin’s new book, Time Reborn: From the Crisis of Physics to the Future of the Universe [Allen Lane, 319 pp.]
Reviewer Kaiser opens with a look at Ernst Mach (after whom the Mach speed numbers are named).
Mach, who lived in the last years of the 19thCentury is noted for many things but especially his attacks on Newtonian physics and Newton’s laws.
Kaiser writes [on Page 27]:
“[Mach] chides Newton for losing his way, ‘cowering under the influence of medieval philosophy’, growing ‘unfaithful to his resolve to investigate only actual facts’.
What troubles him [Mach] was the array of assumptions that undergirded [Newton’s laws]. ‘The present volume is not a treatise on the application of the principles of mechanics,’ he wrote in the opening pages of The Science of Mechanics [1883]. ‘Its aim is to clear up ideas, expose the real significance of the matter, and get rid of metaphysical obscurities.’
Mach was offended principally by Newton’s notions of absolute space and time.
Mach [believed] that a proper science must be built on objects of ‘positive experience’: those which, at least in principle, could make some impact on an investigator’s senses.”
Current physicist Lee Smolin has taken a like stance when it comes to Einstein’s theory of space-time, the thrust of his new book.
Smolin believes that Time and space need to be separated – space is a thing we can move around in, backward, forward, sideways, et cetera, whereas time has a one-way flow.
Physicists, Smolin feels, could tackle the Universe more sensibly if the space-time factor is limited to space, only.
This would curtail all the nonsense of string theory or the musings of multiverses, which have befuddled physics since the Greeks and now have become so irrational that physics may be likened to conversations heard in an insane asylum.
Why do I bring this up here?
The review, along with Mach’s and Smolin’s stances about science, smacks of the position that Gaines M Crook took in the late 1990s and early years of the 2000 decade about UFOs and its practitioners.
That’s why we are presenting as much of Mr. Crook’s writings as we have access to.
His views would have had a cleansing effect on ufology had his writings not been suppressed or ignored by those in the UFO community who stifled (and still stifle) heterodox views about UFOs.
RR
Tuesday, February 4, 2014
Facebook is ten years old this month. UFOs have been “prominent” since 1947.
Facebook has more than a billion members.
UFOs have considerably less followers than that, and never had anywhere near a billion aficionados.
Facebook is on a decline; members jumping ship in droves, especially the younger set.
If Facebook – a rather recent, vital human sub-text – is already dying, how can anyone, with a straight face and ounce of sense think UFOs are still vital and alive?
UFOs, as a topic of interest, has lost its cachet with almost everyone except those of us who cling to the subject because our “addiction” has not been sated.
Even the so-called Roswell slides will not rejuvenate UFOs as a viable topic of vibrant interest.
Yes, there will be a surge among UFO mavens but that shall subside, as the slides, purporting to show an alien life-form from the alleged Roswell crash of 1947, prove to be about as valid, scientifically or forensically, as the once ballyhooed alien autopsy film.
UFOs are a non-topic in academic or scientific circles – all know that. But UFOs have become anathema in social circles too, completely ignored or shunned among polite, sensible cultured groups.
There will continue a rag-tag coterie of die-hards (me among them maybe).
But for all intents and purposes, UFOs are a dead issue.
And all of you know that.
RR
Mr. Crook was at the edge of ufology, but only because he was circumspect and heterodox in his views.
You can read his views at our blog, UFO Heterodoxy by clicking HERE
RR
Monday, February 3, 2014
Gaines M. Crook
December 29, 1991
Mr. Jerome Clark, Editor
International UFO Reporter
612 North Oscar Ave.
Canby, MN 56220
RE: Publication of Paper.
Dear Mr. Clark:
I have followed the UFO scene with interest since I first read about them in 1947. I have increasingly been dissatisfied with all sorts of reported UFO effects being called "electromagnetic effects". About a year and a half ago I decided to write a paper which was intended to examine some cases in the light of a knowledge of electromagnetics and report the results. I chose as a starting point Rodeghier's excellent "UFO Reports Involving Vehicle Interference" and added a few cases which I thought were significant. These cases were reorganized by what occurred during the sighting and then analyzed for true electromagnetic involvement (as we presently understand electromagnetics).
This paper was completed about the end of 1990 and was sent to MUFON to see if they would publish it. I received a very enthusiastic reply from Walt Andrus in January, 1991. He wanted me to divide it into two parts along with the references because it was too long to publish in one issue. I did this and sent it back to him. In this paper I discussed my disagreement with the ideas of James McCampbell both about "electromagnetic effects" as well as the statement which he made in his 1976 CUFOS conference paper "UFO Interference With Automobile Electrical systems, Part I Headlights" as follows: "--But there is no reason to assume that the mechanisms by which vehicle interference take place are beyond the capacity of contemporary science."
I heard no more from Walt until October, 1991 when I got an envelope from him with an "evaluation" of my paper by McCampbell. It turns out that McCampbell is MUFON's "Director of Research"! He was very upset with my disagreement with him and vetoed the publication of my paper. This sort of "referee" system strikes me as a little bit odd, but then so is most everything else in the UFO World!
The UFO field is at a distinct disadvantage in regard to the publication of technical papers since probably less than 1% of the readers could comprehend a genuinely technical paper. Even those with backgrounds in various technical fields would not necessarily understand the details of technical papers in another field so one is forced to write as if the paper were to be published in the popular press. On the other hand, if we try to publish in a legitimate technical journal, the staff and readership will be not only unfamiliar with the UFO literature but will also be upset at the effrontery of the author for even believing in such a forbidden subject. I had thought of attempting to publish my paper in the Journal of the IEEE Electromagnetic Compatibility Society (of which I am a member).
The quality of UFO literature is generally very poor. Some of the references quoted in some papers are stretched to the limits so the end result is that the relationship becomes no more than rumors. An example is XXXXXXX [N.B. "XXXXXXX" is not identified and so far none of the documents I have recovered make further reference to this- jc]
I have included copies of all of the correspondence surrounding this situation.
If you would like to publish the paper I would be pleased. If on the other hand you do not wish to publish it that is O.K. too. The greater benefit of writing any paper is in getting things straightened out in one's own mind. If you have any questions you may call me…
Yours truly,
Gaines M. Crook
Saturday, February 1, 2014
Gaines Crook’s material about the UFO phenomenon (online here and at http://ufoh.blogspot.com) implies, without him saying [writing] so, allows me to infer, that the use of electromagnetism by UFOs interferes with or manipulates the minds of those who are observers – something pertinent to Jose Caravaca’s Distortion theory perhaps.
Gaines Crook writes:
“The intelligence behind it is native to this Earth but is hiding behind a great masquerade.” [Mac Tonnies’ eventual conjecture]
“ … it can generate fantastic electromagnetic fields.”
“We have credible reports that it can levitate objects, bend light beams and affect the very basis of time, but this may or may not be true, due to the ‘Trickster Factor.’”
“There are some who are beginning to wake up and see that the scenarios experienced by the so called "abductees" can be compared to computer "virtual reality" which could be called the best of human trickery.”
From a philosophical point of view, for an intelligence that is reputedly able to put voices within a person's head, it would seem easier to put the sounds into the mind of the percipient.
We know that a stage magician/hypnotist can tell a person that a hand or a foot is immobilized and he will be frozen to the spot. With the ability to communicate directly to the mind of the percipient the UFO intelligence may be able to do the same thing.
Or the phenomenon is electromagnetic in itself; that is, it is, in essence or essentially, a physically but unknown electromagnetic phenomenon.
Gaines Crook writes:
“The organization of the UFO seems to include plasma phenomena. I do not mean that the UFO is a natural plasma body (a la Phil Klass) but that there are certain operational properties which appear to be plasma like.”
“The RB47 case cited by McDonald (14) is interesting because the UFO, flying sometimes at faster than the speed of sound apparently produced signals which mimicked a ground search radar.The RB47 was on an electronic warfare training mission over the south central United States when the UFO produced signals which "appeared to be similar to those of a CPS-6 radar." The frequency was stated to be about 3000 megahertz, the pulse width was 2 microseconds and PRF was 600 hertz. If I remember correctly, a CPS-6 is a 6 megawatt S band ground search radar with 30 db of antenna gain. This means that it's effective radiated peak pulse power (including the 30 db of antenna gain) is six billion watts; not a weak power source. In this case the signals observed seemed to be intended to generate confusion. It was definitely electromagnetic and the receiver displays were photographed by the crew of the RB47.”
Why I find Mr. Crook’s insights interesting lies in the nature of UFOs as reports indicate.
There are maneuvers and actions that seem intelligent in their nature. This tells me that UFOs may be an innately intelligent phenomenon or a “natural species” of some kind.
Or within UFOs resides intelligence – plants? Or a unique, alien life form from time (not space) or a life form intrinsic to Earth – The Mac Tonnies crypto-terrestrial hypothesis.
Gaines Crook provided a quasi-scientific approach to the UFO phenomenon that intrigues.
His son, Joel, is looking for more of his writings, which I hope to present here if and when they are found.
RR
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