Reagan had some sort of incident, did he not?
Sort of. I read his book twice and sent him some questions he did not answer. I pointed out that his concept of the "arena" (all possible configurations of all particles in the Universe) may be static but something still selects which "slice" is "now" at any "instant"--kind of like an instruction pointer in a computer. A moving instruction pointer or "instant selector" is moving...implying time. In other words, how does one define sequential selection or motion without appealing to time (or 'meta time')?
And what is "sonoluminescence"?"
An exercise for the interested student. Type it into Google.
--Boris
Ron and Nancy were expected at a casual dinner party with friends in Hollywood. Except for the Reagans, all the guests had arrived. Ron and Nancy showed up a half hour later quite upset. They stated that they had seen a UFO coming down the coast.
The second sighting occurred in 1974 while Reagan was still Governor. One week after the sighting, Reagan related the story to Norman C. Millar, then Washington Bureau chief for the Wall Street Journal, later the editor of the Los Angeles Times. Reagan told Millar:
"I was in a plane last week when I looked out the window and saw this white light. It was zigzagging around. I went up to the pilot and said, ‘Have you seen anything like that before?’ He was shocked and said, ‘Nope.’ And I said to him: ‘Let’s follow it!’
We followed it for several minutes. It was a bright white light. We followed it to Bakersfield, and all of a sudden to our utter amazement it went straight up into the heavens. When we got off the plane, I told Nancy all about it.’
The pilot of Governor Reagan plane was Bull Paynter, and he backed up Reagan’s version of the incident with the UFO.
I was the pilot of the plane when we saw the UFO. Also, on board were Governor Reagan and a couple of his security people. We were flying a Cessna Citation. It was maybe nine or ten o’clock at night. We were near Bakersfield when Governor Reagan and the others called my attention to a big light flying a bit behind the plane.
It appeared to be several hundred yards away. It was a fairly steady light until it began to accelerate, then it appeared to elongate. The light took off. It went up at a 45-degree angle - at a high rate of speed. Everyone on the plane was surprised.
Governor Reagan expressed amazement. I told the others I didn’t know what it was. The UFO went from a normal cruise speed to a fantastic speed instantly. If you give an airplane power it will accelerate - but not like a hotrod, and that is what this was like.
We didn’t file a report on the object because for a long time they considered you a nut if you saw a UFO.
Paynter added the UFO incident didn’t stop there. He stated that he and Reagan had discussed their UFO sighting "from time to time" in the years following the incident.
Reagan, in his discussion of the sighting with Norman C. Millar added that he had told Nancy about the UFO he had seen, and they had done personal research on UFOs. This research had uncovered the facts that there were references to UFOs in Egyptian hieroglyphics. Reagan was telling his story in a very animated way. This led Millar to conclude that Reagan seriously believed in UFOs. He asked him, "Governor, are you telling me that you saw a UFO?"
Suddenly, according to Millar, Reagan realized that he was talking to a reporter. "This look crossed his face," recalled Millar, "and he said let’s just say that I’m an agnostic."