Seeing and believing

PETER BROOKESMITH surveys the latest fads and flaps from the world of ufological research

NOTHING TO SEE HERE, FOLKS

It is a curious fact that no sooner have I sent off the copy for this column (as tight to press day as I dare) than something new inevitably pops up on the intertubes that would have been worth mentioning. One such, last month, was the US Navy’s release of three videos of ‘unidentified flying objects’. It’s possible, I suppose, that you’ve been hiding out from the WuFlu under a rock with your herd of pet toads and reading nothing but the sports pages of USA Today – and of course, this illustrious journal – and so have not heard this bit of news just yet. But now you have. The so-called ‘mainstream media’ reported the release as some kind of fresh revelation, but the three videos are precisely the same as those touted about since late last year by Tom DeLonge & Co, a.k.a. TTSAAS. The Dept of Defense said: “After a thorough review, the department has determined that the authorized release of these unclassified videos does not reveal any sensitive capabilities or systems, and does not impinge on any subsequent investigations of military air space incursions by unidentified aerial phenomena. DOD is releasing the videos in order to clear up any misconceptions by the public on whether or not the footage that has been circulating was real, or whether or not there is more to the videos. The aerial phenomena observed in the videos remain characterized as ‘unidentified’.” Which could mean a lot of things – see the comments on the release at www.metabunk.org/threads/explained-newnavy-ufo-videos.11234 – although it hardly invalidates the pretty thorough analyses by the metabunk gang. There’s a full list of those at the above address. Don’t read them all at once, unless you really want to go cross-eyed.

ANOTHER WHIMSY FROM WHITLEY

Here’s another one that cropped up after my deadline. Whitley Strieber has always been coy about the origin and nature of what he calls his “visitors”, and doesn’t like to call them ‘aliens’. Which is ironic, given the part the cover illustration for Communion played in cementing a certain image of the Greys that everyone else called aliens. But such is life. Now, in an excerpt from a new book, A

New World, published on ancient astronautist Graham Hancock’s website (https:// grahamhancock.com/strieberw1/), Strieber offers a suggestion that he’s found out. Or at least he has an hypothesis of sorts.

In the summer of 2019 Strieber was being driven through the Lakota Sioux Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota, where he was attending a small conference. He closed his eyes, and: “I saw movement behind my closed lids — what looked like shadowy trees and rolling hills, but not the ones we were passing. Surprised, I opened them immediately. I couldn’t understand why I’d been seeing anything at all. When I closed them again, what I saw simply took my breath away. I sat there watching an entire second landscape flow past the car. Although it seemed to be twilit rather than sunny, the effect was so vivid it was like wearing a virtual reality headset... It wasn’t as if I was in two places at once, but rather looking out the windows of my heart into two worlds that have been locked forever in a secret embrace and seeing that wonderful, sweet thing for the first time.”

There is more – loads more – detail, of course, and a long discussion of the difference between parallel and mirror universes. Strieber favours the idea that he was somehow granted visionary access to a mirror universe and (with a diversion or two into Homer’s accounts of the asphodel fields wherein dwell the Ancient Greek dead) speculates that this is where his visitors originate. Well, it’s a point of view. The possibility that all this occurs within his own brain never seems to occur to him, despite many persons having pointed out the number of fabulations in his oeuvre. Still, it’s a good eye-popping read. Make of it what you will.

RHINO ON ROAD

The excellent Jack Brewer (of The UFO Trail blog) has come up with another fine commentary, this one on the perennial presence of misperceptions in UFO sightings. But the gem in this post comes from Eric Wojciechowski, whom Brewer introduces as a speaker on UFO topics, an author, and contributor of articles to several publications. It has nothing to do with UFOs, but everything to do with seeing things that are most definitely not what they first seem. Here is Mr Wojciechowski:

“In the summer of 2011, I took my family to Atlanta, Michigan... My brother and his family joined us as well.

“One of the days, we took a trip to Mackinaw and on the way back, I was driving and my brother was in the passenger seat. It was probably around 7pm. As I’m driving, I notice in the intersection up ahead, a rhinoceros was in the intersection, making a left-hand turn. As I was about to draw attention to it, the illusion broke and it wasn’t a rhino but a car, making a left-hand turn. It was a trick of sunlight and shadow.

“However, just as my mind registered the error and I saved myself from saying anything embarrassing, my brother took off his sunglasses and said, ‘What the hell?’

“I said, ‘Did you see the rhinoceros too?’ “And as I said it, he also registered it was just a car and we both had a laugh about it.

“Somehow, the sun and shadow at that very moment made the car ahead look like a rhinoceros. I have no idea how that happened but we still laugh about it today.”

So, the next time you see a troop of UFOs cruising through the day or night sky, consider that they may be a flight of satellites... or a few cars... or just a stream of mischievous baby rhinos. Hey, why not?