UFOs - Out of the Closet?

You've probably seen them on late night TV. Crazy-eyed UFOlogists prattling on and on about how the government has space aliens on ice and has signed a treasonous treaty with foul "Grays" determined to use us for spare parts. Like most people, you probably think this stuff is pure National Enquirer bunk, although you may be one of the people who sat in the back of the room when UFOlogist Stanton Friedman came to UF and then prayed none of your friends saw you there. If that's not bad enough, skeptics like Carl Sagan will occasionally pop up from time to time in Parade magazine to remind you forcefully that the same people who see UFOs are also likely to see Jesus in a taco or plateful of spaghetti. But, if like me, you suspect there is a huge "excluded middle" in this debate, you may wonder if there's anything between these two points of view.

The fact is, these two camps have dominated UFOlogical discourse for the last 40 years. One camp claims the darn things are extraterrestrial vehicles, and people would have realized this by now if the government wasn't employing a huge crack squad of black cadillac-driving guys in dark suits and wraparound sunglasses (the so-called Men in Black) to hush the matter up. The other camp claims that anybody who has seen a UFO is probably a liar, hoaxer, or hallucinating or delusional; if that's not the case, then they are assumed to be unable to tell the difference between Venus and their armpit, and thus to have mistaken an easily identifiable object (whether swamp gas, meteor, advertising blimp, or car headlights) for something mysterious or unknown.

Truth is, the skeptics have the evidence on their side. Probably 80 to 90% of UFOs are simply mistakenly identified natural phenomena or aerial objects of prosaic origin, and most of the major organizations admit this. A light seen in the sky could be just about anything. However, they also admit (even in the 1969 Condon report) that there is an "unclassified residuum" of sightings that remain, simply, unidentified. It's what to do with those unclassified cases, and the well-popularized "close encounter" cases where structured objects and/or occupants are encountered, that both sides have puzzled over. But they've both made their minds up; it's either an extraterrestrial invasion or too much of that demon rum.

Most people are unaware that there are a diverse group of theories attempting to explain the UFO phenomenon besides the Extraterrestrial Hypothesis (ETH) and the Null Hypothesis ("there's no such thing.") These theories include the subjective/psychological (fantasy-prone personality, etc.); the subjective/projection (collective unconscious, etc.); the natural/fortean phenomenon (ball lightning, tectonic stress, plasma vortices, etc.); the human origin/deception (we build 'em, or build things that look like 'em to fool people); and the far-out time travel, parallel universe (ultraterrestrial), and occult/supernatural origin theories. Since these other theories do not seem to be as 'nuts and bolts' as chasing for crashed saucers, and less likely to offer that crucial 'hard' evidence, they often go ignored by "the UFOlogy establishment."

As an anthropologist, I'm particularly interested in psychosocial/folklore (cultural) hypotheses regarding UFOs. Some commentators have noticed the similarity between purported UFO "abductions" and typical shamanic initiations in so-called "primitive" societies. I've pointed out, and so have others, that UFO abduction narratives parallel earlier social "panics," such as the "white slavery" epidemic of the early 20th century, or the "witch-hunting" craze of the 15th-18th centuries, which focused on the reproductive activities of women with 'outsiders.' Others have examined the ways in which the 'culture' of science fiction (esp. the pulps like Amazing Stories in the 40s) helped provide the basis of most UFO narratives, or how the UFO panic fit into the paranoid atmosphere of the Cold War. UFOlogists like Vallee have examined the ways in which the morphology of UFOs always seem to anticipate the next great (human) aerospace innovation - thus the 'great airships' seen in the 1890s, the 'ghost rockets' of the 1940s, or the 'flying saucers' of the 1950s.

Clearly, as Carl Jung suggested, the UFO is a mythic symbol, functioning as a mandala of sorts, reflecting a change in the "archetypal dominants" (governing myths) of our age. We no longer believe in gods on cloudy thrones, but all-wise space brothers are easier to believe in in an era where mankind has set foot on the moon and Star Trek is a mega-cultural phenomenon. People interested in UFOs should spend less time chasing for unusual Geiger readings or space potatoes, and perhaps take a closer look at the alleged witnesses and the cultural framework in which the phenomenon is embedded. Studying UFOs may not be of "scientific value" if we hope to discover some new extraterrestrial element, because they may not be from "out there"; the key to their nature might be from "in here." We might learn a lot more about inner than outer space.

I write for a 'zine out of Austin called Crash Collusion. The big topics for this "quarterly guide to the fringe" usually turn out to be psychedelics, occultism, and UFOs. These things may at first glance seem to be unrelated. But close observation shows some uncanny resemblances between such things as psychedelic visions, Near-Death Experiences (NDEs), and 'dissociative' states such as spirit possession in 'primitive' societies. These may be all variations of a basic kind of experience - what anthropologists call an Altered State of Consciousness (ASC), but don't be thrown off by that word. It doesn't involve you turning to slime in a sensory-deprivation tank, and you have one of them (an ASC, I mean) every night, when you enter an REM state during sleep. What triggers these experiences (physically and socially) - and what they actually mean neurologically and psychologically - is still being explored by curious scientists.

Carl Sagan may turn out to have been partially right. The same people who see UFOs often also claim to have also talked with their dead cousin Earle or to have met the Virgin Mary. They often have a long history of paranormal experiences. Most 'debunkers' have looked for neurological causes (usually mental illness, such as temporal lobe epilepsy), but I would be more interested in the sociocultural ones... instead of focusing on the phenomena and whether or not they are 'real,' we should deal with the people who claim to be experiencing it. Some are undoubtedly, quite simply, B.S. artists who hope to make a quick buck off New Age sappiness and credulity. But we may learn a lot about the others who are not. Is there a connection between social status deprivation and paranormal experience rate? This hypothesis should be of interest to U.S. social scientists, but few have bothered to test it.

It, and similar hypotheses, languish because people do not consider the subject 'respectable.' If you ask to do your master's thesis on UFOs, your advisor may laugh you out of the room. (Especially in astronomy.) It belongs, in his mind, in the same category with phrenology, parapsychology, pyramid power, and the Easter Bunny. But there are a small "invisible college" of researchers doing an honest, open examination of the UFO phenomenon from non-traditional perspectives. One is former Indiana professor Thomas Bullard, a folklorist. Another is computer network scientist Jacques Vallee. Many of them have concluded, like me, that even if the UFO phenomenon is simply the greatest mass delusion of the 20th century, it is still "worthy of scientific examination." Perhaps even social-scientific examination.

I urge people to read up on the subject. But not the unflinching skeptics or the true believers. Like Republicans and Democrats, they commit the "fallacy of bifercation" (methinks I have seized onto this phrase, including its peculiar spelling...) and reduce the debate to a simplistic either/or. There is a body of 'respectable' academic literature on the topic, including David Jacobs' scholarly investigation of the history of the UFO phenomenon in the U.S., and the writings of sociologist Marcello Truzzi. It's certainly more worth your time than another academic 'analysis' (spectacle) of Madonna or the OJ Simpson trial. Check it out, even if you still are afraid to tell your roomies that you really dig the X-files.

Steve Mizrach