The professional exo-mythologists, and even some of the
serious researchers commit the same mistake when they refer to UFO phenomena.
They do not tell the public that at least ninety per cent of the sightings are
identified as natural phenomena manmade artifacts or hoaxes.
The other ten per cent remain unidentified for lack of
information and research.
This information changes completely the perspective and
takes off most of the mystery surrounding the phenomenon.
Talking about serious UFO researchers as Dr. Jacques
Vallee, I want to write about coincidences and also differences.
I agree with Dr. Vallee about the improbability of the UFO
Extraterrestrial Hypothesis.
In the mid-1960s, like many other UFO researchers,(including
myself) Vallée initially attempted to validate the popular Extraterrestrial
Hypothesis (or ETH). Leading UFO researcher Jerome Clark argues that Vallée's
first two UFO books were among the most scientifically sophisticated defenses
of the ETH ever mounted.
However, by 1969, Vallée's conclusions had changed, and he
publicly stated that the ETH was too narrow and ignored too much data. Vallée began exploring the commonalities
between UFOs, cults, religious movements, demons, angels, ghosts, cryptid
sightings, and psychic phenomena. Speculation about these potential links were
first detailed in Vallée's third UFO book, Passport to Magonia: From Folklore
to Flying Saucers.
As an alternative to the extraterrestrial visitation
hypothesis, Vallée has suggested a multidimensional visitation hypothesis. This hypothesis represents an extension of
the ETH where the alleged extraterrestrials could be potentially from anywhere.
The entities could be multidimensional beyond space-time, and thus could
coexist with humans, yet remain undetected.
Vallée's opposition to the ETH theory is summarised in his
paper, "Five Arguments Against the Extraterrestrial Origin of Unidentified
Flying Objects", Journal of Scientific Exploration, 1990:
However, to deny the extraterrestrial origin of UFOs but
tell us that ufonauts are fairies, gnomes, daemons or some other inexistent
medieval superstitions doesn’t help.
In a paper written in 2003, Jacques Vallee analyzes
carefully the Aerial and Spatial manifestations.
These manifestations are so contradictory that can also
point to the possibility of UFOs as creations of our human mind. This is in
fact the Psycho-cultural Hypothesis.PCH.
For the adherents of
the PCH, the real phenomenon is not the UFO, but the human capacity of delusion
and self delusion.
The PCH sees the UFOs
phenomenon and Ufological sub-culture as a complex phenomenon combining modern
mythology, literary narrative, popular culture, and human psychology, which is
after all what we called in this blog the galaxy of memes. We should also add to
the PHC, the conspiracy theories and pseudo-science, including hoaxes.
