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Taking UFOs Seriously
Psychology Today ^ | Feb 05, 2019 | Glenn C. Altschuler Ph.D.

Posted on 02/11/2019 10:02:05 AM PST by BenLurkin

In American Cosmic, D.W. Pasulka, a professor of religious studies at the University of North Carolina, Wilmington, draws on a six-year ethnographic study and the work of Carl Jung (Flying Saucers) and Jacques Vallee (Passport to Magonia and The Invisible College) to explain the widespread belief in aliens. Pasulka identifies three aspects of UFO inquiry: physical evidence (crash sites and artifacts); testimonials made by experiencers; and the persistence of belief whether or not there is verifiable evidence to support it.

Pasulka also challenges the view that UFO believers are uneducated, fringe members of society. Some very well-regarded scientists, she indicates, are convinced that non-humans have visited Planet Earth; they have chosen to remain anonymous to protect their professional reputations.

Using a method common among anthropologists, Pasulka maintains she neither believes nor disbelieves but insists that testimonials are, in important ways, “real.” This approach allows her to gauge the impact and internal logic of a “thriving belief system.”

Pasulka regards them as “heroes,” who have “the guts and ability” to take on skeptics, and are “fighting the good fight for the right reasons”: because they believe, and “they would say,” because they know.

Pasulka turns her attention to television shows and movies. Models of “events” can be conflated, she asserts, even when one “representation” is real and the other is fictional. The likelihood of putting a model in “the wrong bucket” increases when producers (whose clients include National Geographic, The History Channel, and The Smithsonian) use a genre called “specialist factual programming” to fuse archival material and special effects to create realistic montages, with “documentary” in the title.

These productions influence memory, Pasulka emphasizes; “they contribute to belief in fabricated UFO phenomena.”

(Excerpt) Read more at psychologytoday.com ...


TOPICS: Health/Medicine; Science; TV/Movies; UFO's
KEYWORDS: aatip; americancosmic; carljung; dwpasulka; fringe; glenncaltschuler; jacquesvallee; nationalgeographic; northcarolina; ohsomysteriouso; psychologytoday; thehistorychannel; thesmithsonian; ufo; ufos; wilmington
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To: BenLurkin

Paging von Daniken?


21 posted on 02/11/2019 10:57:22 AM PST by buckalfa (I was so much older then, but I'am younger than that now.)
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To: BenLurkin

UFOs are indeed real. What they actually are and who is in possession of them is still up for debate.

A. Extra Terrestrials?
B. The Military?
C. From the Future?
D. Another dimension?
E. All of these?


22 posted on 02/11/2019 10:59:27 AM PST by Openurmind
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To: Dilbert San Diego

Blue Book has been released! actually quite some time ago. You used to be able to buy a copy. What classification there was, was not due to the UFO but due to revealing the existence & capability of the “national intelligence/defense asset”.

There’s just a handful of mysterious “sightings” that are hard to explain. When I say mysterious it just means no one has come up with an explanation that fits all the supposed known “facts” of the events. The Braxton County WV Monster is still one I am happy to say!

There is a lot of upper atmosphere physical phenomena we very poorly understand & some we very rarely see. (There is just has to be the right sequence of physical events to cause it!). That’s still the way to bet until some better & more numerous facts come along.


23 posted on 02/11/2019 11:01:23 AM PST by Reily
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To: Openurmind

Clearly, UFOs are military aviation. The air force followed UFO reports for two reasons. First, to know if there planes were being spotted and identified despite being cloaked. Also, to see if any Russian aircraft were able to fly over sensitive areas.

The distance between solar systems is so absurdly far away, that it’s impossible for a life form to travel from one solar system to the next within their lifespan or mechanical lifespan. To argue otherwise is junk science and silly stuff that makes me roll my eyes...


24 posted on 02/11/2019 11:02:02 AM PST by Professional
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To: rjsimmon

Very much agreed.


25 posted on 02/11/2019 11:06:33 AM PST by wally_bert (You're bringing The Monk down, man!)
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To: Professional

I agree that what we see know is military. But I also think they were originally Extra Terrestrial. As far as travel time? Inter-dimensional is almost instant. I am sure that to think the earth is still flat with this topic is a mistake.


26 posted on 02/11/2019 11:08:59 AM PST by Openurmind
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To: BenLurkin

I’ve seen “something” twice in my life.

Once by myself in the daytime in my backyard - a silver, flying disc maybe as big as a schoolbus appeared overhead out of the forest behind the house (circa 1966), and

Once with at least a dozen others at night, a huge triangle shape, between the coal power plant and Indian Point on the Hudson River - 1984.

Both close to West Point fwiw.


27 posted on 02/11/2019 11:10:35 AM PST by CaptainPhilFan
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To: BenLurkin

Had an interesting discussion with someone a few weeks (months? time flies) back. Claimed to have seen them. More than one type.

According to this fellow, they’re in cahoots with the gubmint and hanging out at secret bases underground, connected by tunnels. Long tunnels. With trains. Fast trains.

The story is that they’re preparing our species for contact with the greater galaxy, but a) our technology level is too low and b) our society is dysfunctional.

So, in a classic application of carrot and stick, or at least carrot anyway, as our society makes progress toward a one-world socialist utopia, they reward us from time to time with a technological carrot. Transistors, computers, cell phones, Elon’s underground choo-choo, that sort of thing.

All until someday we achieve our global techno-socialist utopia and are ready to join the galactic society. Or something like that.

If you believe it.

Is it science? Is it religion??? I dunno.

If nothing else, it would somewhat explain the pseudo-religious fanaticism exhibited by the left, in their worship of a failed political ideology.

Or he might have had too much to drink, and it’s a shovelful of bunk.

I’m more inclined to the latter, but it does make for a rather amusing story, don’t you think?

Perhaps some aspiring sci-fi author should get on the case. Or maybe they already have.

:)


28 posted on 02/11/2019 11:13:26 AM PST by Kommodor (Terrorist, Journalist or Democrat? I can't tell the difference.)
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To: samtheman

Agreed,
100%.


29 posted on 02/11/2019 11:15:04 AM PST by Big Red Badger (Despised by the Despicable!)
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To: brownsfan

“If they are that advanced, we would be to them what chimps armed with guns would be to us.”

This is not necessarily true. Often, great advances in physics or technology are stumbled upon during the course of some other research.

I’m not saying this is what happened, but it is entirely *possible* that aliens may have a state of technology very similar to our own but just happened to stumble upon a practical near-light or faster-than-light means of travel. Yet, in other technologies they may even be behind us.


30 posted on 02/11/2019 11:20:27 AM PST by pjd
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To: plain talk

I suspect that there is a way to travel faster than light (hyperspace jumps, wormholes slipstream, wormholes, warpdrives, etc). We are still a very primitive species and we might come up with a completely novel idea.

Add quantum entanglement for instantaneous communication across the light years, artificial gravity, and finally inertial dampeners and you got a fully capable star crossing species. Scientists have theorized that all of the above technology is plausible. We just don’t understand it yet. Give us ten thousand years.


31 posted on 02/11/2019 11:21:01 AM PST by BushCountry (thinks he needs a gal whose name doesn't end in ".jpg")
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To: Reily

WV Monster,,,
I’ll look it up.


32 posted on 02/11/2019 11:22:21 AM PST by Big Red Badger (Despised by the Despicable!)
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To: BenLurkin
I take some UFO sightings seriously. On the one hand, perhaps they don't land and establish contact because we are on some intergalactic 'tour', not unlike when we visit the zoo or go on safari. You go to look, not communicate.

Then, too, I wouldn't have much respect for any beings advanced enough for interstellar travel who would bother with Earth. Maybe they DID colonize in the past and periodically check out their 'experiment'. Maybe Bigfoot can be explained as a stranded alien.

Sightings have been recorded for a long(to us) time. Maybe we're getting more interesting. We are certainly no threat to their crafts. Unless, and until, they make a violent move I say just wave. Maybe they're looking for aomething worth visiting. In that case they will be doing flybys for a long time. We haven't even revisited our moon.
So, no worries, unless a mothership looms or some battle station approaches. Not that I think NASA would tell us.
33 posted on 02/11/2019 11:22:29 AM PST by ClearBlueSky (ISLAM is the problem. ISLAM is the enemy of civilization.)
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To: Openurmind

If any life form was ever capable of instant travel, they’d have come here already and taken all of our vital resources, and the hot chicks.


34 posted on 02/11/2019 11:22:51 AM PST by Professional
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To: Dilbert San Diego

Project Blue Book was contrived by the Air Force to be an exercise that would debunk weak UFO cases in order to ease public anxiety on the subject. Then as now the best cases were separated out and reported separately to a secret investigative unit while being publicly disparaged and denied.


35 posted on 02/11/2019 11:23:42 AM PST by Rockingham
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To: Openurmind

F. Demons from Hell? Fallen angels? Nephilim? Some seriously believe that. Unless proven otherwise, no one can say for sure.


36 posted on 02/11/2019 11:23:55 AM PST by Telepathic Intruder
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To: Professional

I seen a UFO once but I couldn’t find my really crappy out of focus camera to record it in time.


37 posted on 02/11/2019 11:25:06 AM PST by BushCountry (thinks he needs a gal whose name doesn't end in ".jpg")
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To: BenLurkin

I don’t know what they are, but there is something. Based on on how the Air Force reacted to the something I know about, that something has to be damn interesting. NASA Mission Control center lockdown and downlink tapes confiscation in 1996.


38 posted on 02/11/2019 11:27:00 AM PST by StolarStorm
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To: Telepathic Intruder

All ancient names for the same. First written about by the Sumerians who believed them as their creators. They lived much longer than we do now. :)


39 posted on 02/11/2019 11:29:54 AM PST by Openurmind
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To: Big Red Badger

Also known as the Flatwoods Monster

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flatwoods_monster


40 posted on 02/11/2019 11:30:01 AM PST by Reily
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