UFOs: the psychic component
The American magazine Psychic included, in its January-February 1974 issue, an interesting article by Dr Jacques Vallée, a personality well known to my readers. The work in question bears the title “‘UFOs: the psychic component”. Due to its extreme amplitude, I have preferred to present some excerpts from it, accompanying them with some personal considerations in this regard.
A VERY FRAGILE BRIDGE…
“No bridge has yet been established between the thousands of unexplained cases and the evidence that they exist for psychic phenomena such as psychogenesis, prophecy, and telepathy. The purpose of this article is to encourage the establishment of this bridge.”
However, most of the observations cited by Dr. Vallée are not representative of the UFO Phenomenon in general and even less of the Type 1 casuistry in particular. Although in theory the key to the UFO enigma should be found in the contact cases, we believe that we must be very careful when selecting facts to draw generalizable and valid consequences. After all, it is not proven, far from it, that a significant percentage of testimonies of reliable contact events have subsequently obtained paranormal powers. What does seem to be true is that UFOs and their occupants can cause physical effects on living beings in our world (plants, animals and, of course, humans); a large number of trustworthy cases support this. However, to affirm that such effects are produced expressly with this intention by the intelligences that manage the UFOs, is to enter the nebulous terrain of speculation.
WHAT EXPLANATION?
“If the extraterrestrials or other non-terrestrial intelligences wanted to go unnoticed by the authorities and the church, remain undetectable to the military system and not disturb the political and administrative levels of a society. At the same time implant doubts in the depths of said society far-sighted about its basic philosophical principles, this is exactly the kind of semantic note they would have to strike”. (The author has referred to a case where a suspected UFO occupant asked a witness: Am I in Italy or Germany?.)
“At the same time, of course, such a process would have to provide its own explanation to make ultimate detection impossible. In other words, it would have to project a plausible image or reason somewhat beyond the belief structure of the society to which it I believe that the current belief among most “‘flying saucer enthusiasts’” that UFOs are craft employed by visitors from other planets fits precisely into this framework, thus masking the infinitely more complex real nature of the intelligence and the technology that gives rise to the sightings”.
Well, the above is another aspect of the problem: if “they” want to stay hidden or do not want open and general contact, it makes sense for them to act as they do. We do not know the reasons for his behavior, although we intuit some possible explanation for it. And this is just as valid whether they come from another solar system, as if they come from a parallel universe, from the future, etc., etc.
In the current state of the problem, the Extraterrestrial Hypothesis is the one that presents less inconveniences from all the points of view. However, we cannot fail to say that the investigative work on the Phenomenon, deep down, is not affected by this cabinet hypothesis: it is, after all, about studying and analyzing facts, regardless of their possible origin and final explanation.
On the other hand, although the current belief among the majority of “flying saucer enthusiasts (? )” is that they come from outer space, this does not prevent some from formulating doubts about the real nature of the Phenomenon: are they How do we really see them or do “they” try to disguise themselves in each era of our history according to more or less conventional forms?
Finally, we must warn that even in the case of extraterrestrial visitors, we would find ourselves before an explanation that would not clarify the mystery at all; the key question is, in my opinion: why are they here? or what do they do on our planet?
OPINION OF THE “INVISIBLE UNIVERSITY”
The paragraphs reproduced below are not the personal product of Dr Vallée, but have been discussed in “private conversations with professional scientists who form the Invisible University of UFO research”
These are :
“1.- The things we call UFOs are neither objects nor do they fly. They can dematerialize, as some recent photographs show, and they violate the laws of motion as we know them.
2.- UFOs have been seen throughout history and have consistently provided their own explanation within the framework of each culture. In ancient times they were considered as gods; in medieval times as magicians; in the nineteenth century as scientific geniuses. And finally, in our own time, as interplanetary travelers.
3.- The current tendency to accept UFO testimonies as “evidence” of visits by space travelers is a non sequitur (does not follow). The phenomenon could be a manifestation of advanced technology in a much more complex sense, involving, for example, interpenetrating universes. If space and time are not as simple in structure as physics has hitherto assumed, then the question, “Where do they come from?” it may not even make sense.
4.- The key to an understanding of the UFO phenomenon may lie in the psychic effects that it produces (or in the states of consciousness that it makes possible) in some observers, whose lives experience a profound change and in whom extraordinary aptitudes are developed at the same time who may find it difficult to adapt. The proportion of witnesses publishing accounts of these experiences appears to be very small compared to the number of cases reported confidentially.
5.- Contact between human receivers and the UFO phenomenon occurs under conditions controlled by the latter. Its fundamental characteristic is an invariant of absurdity that leads to the rejection of history by the upper layers of the society to which they are directed and the absorption at a deep unconscious level of the symbols conveyed by the encounter. The mechanism of this “resonance” between the UFO symbol and the archetypes of the human unconscious has been amply demonstrated by Carl Jung, whose book Flying Saucers* makes many references to the age-old meaning of “the signs in the sky.”
It should be clear that I am not considering the UFO phenomenon as the uncontrollable and unknowable game of a higher order of beings. Nor is it likely, in my opinion, that an encounter with this phenomenon would add to the human being anything that he did not possibly already have at an unconscious level. Everything happens, in my opinion, as if the phenomenon were the product of a technology that follows well-defined, albeit fantastic, norms and standards, measured by ordinary human standards. The phenomenon has so far apparently posed no threat to national defense, and appears to be indifferent to the welfare of individual witnesses, leading many to believe that we may be in the presence of a yet undiscovered phenomenon of nature. A hypothesis that certainly deserves very serious consideration.
But its impact in shaping the long-term creativity and unconscious drives of Man is probably enormous. The fact that we have no methodology to study this impact is only an indication of how little we know about the weakness of our penetration when it comes to our own minds.”
Obviously, it is less ungrateful to speculate about possible parapsychological effects in some witnesses than about the physical effects (traces, marks, burned areas, blackouts, stoppages…) in plants, animals, human beings and machines or instruments built by the latter.
Are Uri Geller’s strange powers due to UFO intervention? And while we discuss the matter, “they” continue to fly over cities, industrial, military and atomic complexes, airports, rocket launch bases, war zones, planes, ships and cars, barren or sown fields, seas, oceans, rivers, lakes , mountains, valleys and deserts… with an overwhelming silence. So I think it’s time to ask a question: ¿do you really “the key to an understanding of the UFO Phenomenon may lie in the psychic effects it produces (or in the states of consciousness that make it possible”? And also: ¿Are we “facing a phenomenon of nature not yet discovered”, but detectable by radar, visible to the human eye and that can impress photographic plates and digital memories, that motivates the takeoff of fighter planes of the Air Forces of various countries and that, in short, is denounced by individuals of all social classes , cultural scales, religious beliefs, political ideas, of all races and continents, with descriptions that follow more or less variable constants? And still: if “they” seem to avoid contact with humans, but on the other hand produce psychic effects on some witnesses, how do you combine both things when you want to give more importance or generalize the second term?.
CONVINCING THOSE ALREADY CONVINCED?
It all sounds like I’m trying to convince a skeptic. And this is not the case of Dr Vallée. The only thing that has moved me to write these comments has been remembering the complexity of the UFO Phenomenon. The idea launched by Dr Vallée is not negligible. It is one more attempt to apply a human science to the Problem. Fortunately, we believe that this has been motivated more than by conviction due to the discouragement produced by the little progress that has been made with the application of other techniques.
Indeed, Parapsychology has become fashionable among some researchers and Centers dedicated to the UFO issue. And when both things are mixed, the results are usually, almost always, endless speculations that never bottom out.
I will continue working in the confidence that sooner or later new constants will be found that will help us to reconstruct this puzzle, without necessarily having the solution of the problem within reach. However, I am of the opinion that Parapsychology will not be able to help us in this endeavor.
Joan Crexells STENDEK Nº 18 Diciembre 1974.
Jacques Fabrice Vallée; born September 24, 1939) is an Internet pioneer, computer scientist, venture capitalist, author, ufologist and astronomer currently residing in San Francisco, California and Paris, France.
His scientific career began as a professional astronomer at the Paris Observatory. Vallée co-developed the first computerized map of Mars for NASA in 1963. He later worked on the network information center for the ARPANET, a precursor to the modern Internet, as a staff engineer of SRI International’s Augmentation Research Center under Douglas Engelbart.
Vallée is also an important figure in the study of unidentified flying objects (UFOs), first noted for a defense of the scientific legitimacy of the extraterrestrial hypothesis and later for promoting the interdimensional hypothesis.
