Industrial Civilization's Psychotic Break

http://www.collapsenet.com/blogs/entry/blogs/2013/08/07/industrial-civilizations-psychotic-break

The most deadly criticism one could make of modern civilization is that apart from its man-made crises and catastrophes, [it] is not humanly interesting. . . . In the end, such a civilization can produce only a mass man: incapable of spontaneous, self-directed activities: at best patient, docile, disciplined to monotonous work to an almost pathetic degree. . . . Ultimately such a society produces only two groups of men: the conditioners and the conditioned, the active and passive barbarians.    ~Lewis Mumford, 1951~

Until you can ‘see’ yourself, you can’t be yourself. Or perhaps more accurately, once you can ‘see’ yourself, you can’t any longer be somebody else, the person you’ve pretended to be, that you thought you were, that others want you to be, somebody you’re not.   

~Dave Pollard, “How To Save The World” Blog~

This past week I have been intrigued by several articles that have surfaced across the Internet which appear to substantiate what many of us have known for more than a decade, namely, that industrial civilization is in a rapid downward spiral of demise. In his August 2 article on Alternet, Noam Chomsky argues that “America’s Imperial Power Is Showing Signs Of Real Decline,” in which he cites an international terrorist campaign by the United States as the reason that countries around the world are viewing it with increased suspicion in general and that in particular, the US has destroyed the notion of Latin America as its reliable back yard.

Earlier this week, psychologist Bruce Levine argued in “Why Life In America Can Literally Drive You Insane,” that mental illness in our culture is now epidemic for a number of reasons, including the over-diagnosis of it by mental health professionals. Levine succinctly summarizes the pathology of modernity in this way:

Underlying many of psychiatry’s nearly 400 diagnoses is the experience of helplessness, hopelessness, passivity, boredom, fear, isolation, and dehumanization—culminating in a loss of autonomy and community-connectedness. Do our societal institutions promote:

• Enthusiasm—or passivity?
• Respectful personal relationships—or manipulative impersonal ones?
• Community, trust, and confidence—or isolation, fear and paranoia?
• Empowerment—or helplessness?
• Autonomy (self-direction)—or heteronomy (institutional-direction)?
• Participatory democracy—or authoritarian hierarchies?
• Diversity and stimulation—or homogeneity and boredom?

Similarly, in her BBC investigative video report, Reeta Chakrabarti asks, “Is Modern Life Killing Us?” which highlights the maddening pace of modern life and the toll that it takes on our bodies and souls. But as Levine points out, it is more than just the tempo of modernity that deadens us. It is also a lack of aliveness, passion, community, and autonomy.

What the scions of the Industrial Revolution and the Enlightenment philosophers before them were unable to grasp was that a society established on the principles of separation from itself and the earth community; a society that reveres the accumulation of wealth and status as its raison d’être; that pompously assumes that the earth’s resources are here for our use only and that they are infinite; that esteems rugged individualism as a hallmark of holiness; and that assumes that reason and intellect should be the fundamental guiding principles of relationships with all beings—a society based on these tenets is destined to fail miserably. Why? Because these assumptions are inherently emotionally and spiritually toxic for humans and all life forms within their purview.

Whereas in her The End Of The Suburbs: Where The American Dream Is Moving, Leigh Gallagher highlights the failed experiment called suburbia, arguing principally in terms of economic factors, Greg Greene’s 2004 documentary “The End of Suburbia,” demonstrated the irrefutable impact of peak oil on the suburban project and brilliantly connected the dots between energy and economics in a manner unprecedented since perhaps the publication of M. King Hubbert’s original peak oil thesis. Indeed, the end of suburbia is upon us, as is the collapse of industrial civilization at large.

During and after the collapse of nations and empires, the incidence of mental illness surges, almost without exception. We are currently witnessing this in Greece as did many individuals in Eastern Europe after the collapse of the Soviet Union.

Yet the collapse of industrial civilization, while now well underway, is in its early stages. And yes, the logical question is: If this is what a societal psychotic break looks like now, what will it look like in ten or twenty years? As if that question weren’t ominous enough, this past week we learned that shifts in climate have historically been associated with violent conflicts. Yes, when people are “hot under the collar” and other places, they tend to become more aggressive and violent. Thus, as climate change intensifies, it is not difficult to imagine the psychological hell that may lie ahead in a society where epidemic mental illness and violence are about to fly off the charts. This study also reveals that the violence may escalate collectively into endless wars and not merely remain personal between individuals.

What Is To Be Done?

Certainly nothing can be done to stop the collapse of industrial civilization, but much can be done to hasten its demise. I will leave that topic, however, to my friends Derrick Jensen, Keith Farnish, and Guy McPherson. Nevertheless, as I have written before, if you choose to invest your time and energy in expediting the unraveling, by all means do so, but giving industrial civilization a swift kick off the cliff, while temporarily exhilarating, is not sufficient to protect you from your own psychotic break or the precariousness of living in a world where violence escalates on a daily basis. In order to forge that kind of stability and enhance your safety, much more will be required of you.

Now is the time to hone your emotional literacy and communication skills. Those who believe that a cache of weapons and a truckload of barter items will suffice for navigating a world in severe trauma are tragically short-sighted. So are those who assume that since humans have the capacity to reason, reason will trump all hostility, reactivity, depression, rage, or passive-aggression—in oneself or the other.

My work is replete with a plethora of toolkits for fortifying yourself psychologically and refining your ability to listen and speak with others skillfully and respectfully. Additionally, working with your own personal shadow material (parts of yourself that you have disowned as “not me”—see “Our Collective Psychosis”) is critical in navigating the culture’s emotional breakdown and enhancing your own wholeness. Just as cultures of industrial civilization will ultimately be compelled to own their shadow collectively, so individuals in collapse will be challenged mightily to own theirs because our collective and individual “innocence” are likely to be pummeled in the gauntlet of collapse. (For an in-depth study of America’s collective shadow projection, I recommend Madness At The Gates Of The City: The Myth Of American Innocence, by Barry Spector.)

Amid the losses of a collapsing society, citizens in those societies who cannot accept what is actually happening to the collective and take responsibility for their part in it are more likely to become mentally ill, depressed, violent, and take their own lives. And while on the one hand, the intensity of suffering around oneself may become unbearable to the point of wanting to die to escape from it, we should not assume that suicide is inevitable or the only option. Nor should we assume that life in every region on earth will become unlivable. Furthermore, even if our fate includes death or suicide, is not awakening to the previously-untapped resources of one’s own psyche preferable to sinking into comatose madness or leaving the planet in a state of abject meaninglessness? Whatever the circumstances, death must be honored as the momentous, sacred rite of passage that it is.

Where Are We?

I’m often asked where we are in the timetable of collapse. The truest answer is that I do not know—nor does anyone else, but my intention is to read the signs that blaze across my awareness daily. Unlike five years ago, it is no longer unthinkable to use the “C” word. America is losing its imperial power; people are increasingly acknowledging that life in industrial civilization is untenable and unlivable; and as the climate warms, humans are likely to become even more violent and aggressive than they already are.

Unlike Lewis Mumford, I do not believe that humans are destined to become “passive or active barbarians.” What we must finally recognize is that our physical survival is far less important than the meaning we make from collapse and what we discover about ourselves and the other members of the earth community as humanity’s self-induced madness continues to engulf the planet. Society’s psychotic break does not have to become our own personal psychotic break. Rather, it can become a path to meaning, purpose, and a quality of heartfelt communion with others that we could only dream of while the wheels of industrial civilization were being greased by delusions of power and control. In order for that to happen, however, we must be willing to do the work that a transformative breakthrough, rather than a tragic breakdown invariably entails.

See also: 

http://philosophersbunker.blogspot.com/2012/07/another-mumford-reading-excerpt-if.html?q=lewis+mumford

Pentagon Bracing for Public Dissent Over Climate and Energy Shocks

http://www.nafeezahmed.com/2013/06/exclusive-edward-snowdens-employer-nsa.html

EXCLUSIVE: Edward Snowden's employer, NSA Prism contractor Booz Allen Hamilton, ran Pentagon war games on civil unrest due to climate, energy, economic shocks

Photo taken by U.S. Airforce Tech. Sgt. Brian E. Christiansen, North Carolina National Guard at Vigilant Guard training exercise Ft. Richardson, Alaska — April 2010

As questions are being asked about the NSA's global surveillance programmes exposed by whistleblower and former CIA IT analyst Edward Snowden, new evidence has emerged that the NSA's Prism and other domestic spying operations are linked to decades of Pentagon planning for the eruption of domestic dissent against government authority triggered by a range of potential environmental, energy or economic disasters.

In my exclusive article for the Guardian today, I report on how Snowden's employer, giant US defence contractor Booz Allen Hamilton - where Snowden accessed the NSA's IT systems including the Prism surveillance programme - has for more than a decade run US Army war games on extraordinary emergencies that might afflict the US, both at home and abroad, but particularly at home. Since 2010, these war games have focused increasingly on the potential for massive disruptive shocks in the US homeland, and their potential to galvanise widespread dissent, if not "insurgency" against US authorities.

This revelation fits into a trendline of Pentagon planning over the last decade which has highlighted the danger of extraordinary emergencies which might provoke political dissent and civil unrest - as well as an escalating targeting of peaceful protest groups and environmental activists by the intelligence community on behalf of corporate interests.

Booz Allen Hamilton's involvement in both administering the NSA domestic spying operations against US citizens as well running the Pentagon's Unified Quest programme of war games designed to help US military leaders "envision the future" - consisting of heightened complex threats to domestic order - raises urgent questions about the unconstitutional shift toward the militarisation of the US state.

This also, of course, provides hard evidence that the NSA surveillance programmes are less about terrorism, than they are about tracking and pre-empting, to quote one US Army document, the rise of "anti-government ideologies." The chorus of punditry that has attempted to defend the surveillance programmes ignores such evidence.

Please help counter such disinformation by spreading the word on this exclusive.

Excerpt:

Also in 2010, the Pentagon ran war games to explore the implications of "large scale economic breakdown" in the US impacting on food supplies and other essential services, as well as how to maintain "domestic order amid civil unrest."

Speaking about the group's conclusions at giant US defence contractor Booz Allen Hamilton's conference facility in Virginia, Lt Col. Mark Elfendahl - then chief of the Joint and Army Concepts Division - highlighted homeland operations as a way to legitimise the US military budget:

"An increased focus on domestic activities might be a way of justifying whatever Army force structure the country can still afford."

Two months earlier, Elfendahl explained in a DoD roundtable that future planning was needed:

"Because technology is changing so rapidly, because there's so much uncertainty in the world, both economically and politically, and because the threats are so adaptive and networked, because they live within the populations in many cases."

The 2010 exercises were part of the US Army's annual Unified Quest programme which more recently, based on expert input from across the Pentagon, has explored the prospect that "ecological disasters and a weak economy" (as the "recovery won't take root until 2020") will fuel migration to urban areas, ramping up social tensions in the US homeland as well as within and between "resource-starved nations."

NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden was a computer systems administrator for Booz Allen Hamilton, where he directly handled the NSA's IT systems, including the Prism surveillance system. According to Booz Allen's 2011 Annual Report, the corporation has overseen Unified Quest "for more than a decade" to help "military and civilian leaders envision the future."

The latest war games, the report reveals, focused on "detailed, realistic scenarios with hypothetical 'roads to crisis'", including "homeland operations" resulting from "a high-magnitude natural disaster" among other scenarios, in the context of:

"... converging global trends [which] may change the current security landscape and future operating environment... At the end of the two-day event, senior leaders were better prepared to understand new required capabilities and force design requirements to make homeland operations more effective."

Read the full article at the Guardian here.

Related: http://prn.fm/2013/08/04/lifeboat-hour-080413/#axzz2bcIkjXpK

The Good Germans in Government

By Robert Scheer, June 25 2013

What a disgrace. The U.S. government, cheered on by much of the media, launches an international manhunt to capture a young American whose crime is that he dared challenge the excess of state power. Read the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution and tell me that Edward Snowden is not a hero in the mold of those who founded this republic. Check out the Nuremberg war crime trials and ponder our current contempt for the importance of individual conscience as a civic obligation.

Yes, Snowden has admitted that he violated the terms of his employment at Booz Allen Hamilton, which has the power to grant security clearances as well as profiting mightily from spying on the American taxpayers who pay to be spied on without ever being told that is where their tax dollars are going. Snowden violated the law in the same way that Daniel Ellsberg did when, as a RAND Corporation employee, he leaked the damning Pentagon Papers study of the Vietnam War that the taxpayers had paid for but were not allowed to read.

In both instances, violating a government order was mandated by the principle that the United States trumpeted before the world in the Nuremberg war crime trials of German officers and officials. As Principle IV of what came to be known as the Nuremberg Code states: “The fact that a person acted pursuant to order of his government or of a superior does not relieve him from responsibility under international law, provided a moral choice was in fact possible to him.”

That is a heavy obligation, and the question we should be asking is not why do folks like Ellsberg, Snowden and Bradley Manning do the right thing, but rather why aren’t we bringing charges against the many others with access to such damning data of government malfeasance who remain silent?

Is there an international manhunt being organized to bring to justice Dick Cheney, the then-vice president who seized upon the pain and fear of 9/11 to make lying to the public the bedrock of American foreign policy? This traitor to the central integrity of a representative democracy dares condemn Snowden as a “traitor” and suggest that he is a spy for China because he took temporary refuge in Hong Kong.

The Chinese government, which incidentally does much to finance our massive military budget, was embarrassed by the example of Snowden and was quick to send him on his way. Not so ordinary folk in Hong Kong, who clearly demonstrated their support of the man as an exponent of individual conscience.

So too did Albert Ho, who volunteered his considerable legal skills in support of Snowden, risking the ire of Hong Kong officials. Ho, whom The New York Times describes as “a longtime campaigner for full democracy [in Hong Kong], to the irritation of government leaders of the territory,” is an example of the true democrats around the world who support Snowden, contradicting Cheney’s smear.

But U.S. Democrats have also been quick to join the shoot-the-messenger craze, ignoring the immense significance of Snowden’s revelations. Take Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California. Fool me once and shame on her, fool me dozens of times, as Feinstein has, and I feel like a blithering idiot having voted for her. After years of covering up for the intelligence bureaucracy, Feinstein is now chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, and clearly for some time has been in a position to know the inconvenient truths that Snowden and others before him have revealed.

Did she know that the NSA had granted Booz Allen Hamilton such extensive access to our telephone and Internet records? Did she grasp that the revolving door between Booz Allen and the NSA meant that this was a double-dealing process involving high officials swapping out between the government and the war profiteers? Did she know that the security system administered by Booz Allen was so lax that young Snowden was given vast access to what she now feels was very sensitive data? Or that private companies like Booz Allen were able to hand out “top security” clearances to their employees, and that there now are 1.4 million Americans with that status?

As with her past cover-ups of government lying going back to the phony weapons of mass destruction claims made to justify the Iraq War, Feinstein, like so many in the government, specializes in plausible deniability. She smugly assumes the stance of the all-knowing expert on claimed intelligence success while pretending to be shocked at the egregious failures. She claims not to have known of the extent of the invasion of our privacy and at the same time says she is assured that the information gained “has disrupted plots, prevented terrorist attacks. ...” If so, why did she not come clean with the American public and say this is what we are doing to you and why?

Instead, Feinstein failed horribly in the central obligation of a public servant to inform the public and now serves as prosecutor, judge and jury in convicting Snowden hours after his name was in the news: “He violated the oath, he violated the law. It’s treason,” she said.

Treason is a word that dictators love to hurl at dissidents, and when both Cheney and Feinstein bring it back into favor, you know that courageous whistle-blowers like Snowden are not the enemy.

"I can prove that it was not an airplane" that hit the Pentagon - Major General Albert N. Stubblebine

http://www.veteranstoday.com/2013/08/08/i-can-prove-that-it-was-not-an-airplane-that-hit-the-pentagon-major-general-albert-n-stubblebine/

By Ross Pittman

“How easy is it for you to shift your belief system from ‘I totally believe in my government’ to ‘Oh My God! What’s going on?’  That’s exactly where I went in all of this.” – Albert N. Stubblebine III

Albert N. Stubblebine III is a retired Major General in the United States Army. He was the commanding general of the United States Army Intelligence and Security Command from 1981 to 1984.  In this compelling interview, Stubblemine reveals the following information (what he calls dots) about the attacks on the Pentagon and the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001:

• Stubblebine initially believed the official story regarding 9/11.
• Then, he saw the hole in the Pentagon. He can prove that the Pentagon was not hit by a Boeing 757. DOT.
• All of the sensors around the Pentagon were turned off except one. That one sensor captured an image of the object the hit the Pentagon.  It looked like a missile.  But, after he went public, the imagery was changed to look like a plane. DOT.
• The collapse of the twin towers was caused by controlled demolition – not the fuel from the airplane. DOT.
• Larry Silverstein, the lease holder of the WTC complex, admitted that that building 7, which was not hit by a plane and had only a small fire, was intentionally “pulled” – which is phraseology used for controlled demolition.  DOT.
• All of the air defense systems around Washington DC were turned off that day. DOT.
• Also on 9/11, there was an exercise designed to mimic an attack on the towers by airplanes.  DOT.
• When you connect the DOTs, the picture says that what we were told by the media was not the real story.
• Stubblebine, visibly upset, describes how he felt when he realized the truth about his government after having a strong belief in his country since early childhood: “My belief system was so strong from age five when I could remember standing on a parade ground at attention with not anybody telling me to do that – at West Point.”

Below are some notes from the interview including a partial transcript. (Be sure to watch all the way to the the end, where you can see the deep hurt on his face when he recalled the moment that he realized that his government, the government that he proudly served for over 30 years, was not what he thought was):

5:15 Stubblebine hears about the 9/11 attacks: “We’re at war.”

6:00 Stubblebine said there must have been intelligence information to know that an attack was coming and we didn’t see the signals.  Somebody missed it.

6:35 He initially believed that it was terrorist attack done by other forces: “Not my government.”

7:45 Stubblebine  then saw a photo of the Pentagon showing the hole in the Pentagon supposedly made by a Boeing 757.  ”Something’s wrong. There is something wrong with this picture…”

8:30 “Well there was something wrong. And, so I analyzed it not just photographically, I did measurements… I checked the plane, the length of the nose, where the wings were… I took measurements of the Pentagon – the depth of the destruction in the Pentagon.”

 The very modest “hit point” and the clean, clear Pentagon lawn

9:05 “Conclusion: airplane did not make that hole.” 9:10” I went public at the time. I am the highest ranking officer, I believe, that has ever gone public… The official story was not true.”

9:25 “I was very careful to not say what it was because I couldn’t prove it. I was careful to say that it was not the airplane that did that, because I can prove that it was not the airplane.”

9:45 “In the hole, however, was a turbine that looked like a turbine from the missile… I can’t prove that, I don’t know. But there was something there that did not look like the engine from an airplane, but did look like a turbine from a missile.”

10:10 “Later I saw another photograph taken by one of the sensors on the outside of the Pentagon. Now, all of the sensors had been turned off, which is kind of interesting – isn’t it? That day, why would all of the sensors around the Pentagon be turned off? That’s strange. I don’t care what the excuse is.  That’s strange. There happened to be one that apparently did not get turned off. And in that picture, coming in, flying into the Pentagon, you see this object, and it obviously hits the Pentagon.  When you look at it, it does NOT look like an airplane.  Sometime later, after I’d gone public, that imagery was changed. It got a new suit around it that now looked like an airplane. But, when you take the suit off, it looks more like a missile – not like an airplane.”

11:30 “Let me go back to the next very important piece of information.  The amount of energy to melt the girders – the steel in the tower – cannot be gotten to a melt point with the fuel that was in the airplane.  Not possible!  So, any melting did not occur as a result of the hit from the airplane.  Point. I call it dot. OK?  DOT.”

12:10 “When you look at the tower coming down, what you see at each floor is successive puffs of smoke: puff, puff, puff, puff… all the way down. What are the puffs of smoke coming from? Well, they claim that they are from the collapsing floors… No. No. No. Those puffs of smoke are controlled demolitions. That’s exactly what they are, because that’s exactly how they work. And so, the fact that the airplane hit, it did, it did not cause that collapse of the building.  The collapse of the building was caused by controlled demolition.”

13:05 “Fact: Building 7 – Silverberg, I believe is the name of the owner…” (his name is actually Larry Silverstein), “…was on a video and you could see Building 7.  And, there was a fire in Building 7, there’s no doubt about that. No airplane hit it.  I assume that the fire came from some debris, but I’m not even sure of that.  But, in the lower right-hand corner of the building was a fire – not a very big fire. It didn’t appear to be out of control. It certainly was in a small part of the building.  But, then he is heard on the video and he says Pull it.  Then, the building collapsed. What does pull it mean?  Let me tell you.  That’s the order for controlled demolition.  That is the phraseology that’s used for blowing up something.” CLN

[Editorial note: Stubblebine got mixed up with his facts regarding the Siverstein video, which you can see here.  The video is a PBS interview with Silverstein that was shot sometime after 9/11.   The footage of Building 7 going down is historical footage, not live during the interview.  Nonetheless, Silverstein does say that he gave the order to “pull it.”]

15:00 All of the air defense systems in that part of the country had been turned off that day.  All of the air defense systems had been turned off… Why would you turn off all of the air defense systems on that particular day unless you knew that something was going to happen? It’s a dot.  It’s information. But, it’s strange that everything got turned off that day.  DOT.”

15:50 There was an exercise that was designed for the air defense systems that was an attack on the towers by airplanes.  Isn’t that strange that we had an exercise that mimicked what really happened?  Strange that we had planned an exercise that was exactly what happened. And, at the same time, the air defense systems were turned off.  Don’t you find that strange? I find that really strange?  DOT.  Just a piece of information.

16:50 “But how does it correlate with everything else? So, you see the dots. You have all of these dots. They’re just bits of information.  But, that’s exactly how the intelligence world works.  You get a bit of information here. A bit here, and a bit here. And, pretty soon you’ve got a picture. To me, what does the picture say?  The picture says that what we heard and were told in the newspapers, the media, was not the real story. There’s enough doubt in the official story where the story is absolutely not consistent with what happened. They paint a different picture than the one that was given to the media.”

17:45 “How easy is it for you to shift your belief system from ‘I totally believe in my government’ to ‘Oh My God! What’s going on?’  That’s exactly where I went in all of this. Because, my belief system was so strong from age five when I could remember standing on a parade ground at attention with not anybody telling me to do that – at West Point. I did it because I wanted to do it – because I believed! And then going to the military academy and serving, defending…

18:30 The real story was, I have a question I guess. The real story to me is: who was the real enemy? Who participated in this? Who planned this attack? Why was it planned? Were the real terrorists the people in Arab clothing? Or, were the real people that planned this the people sitting in the authority in the White House?

                   The plane in the Pentagon frame was too small to be a Boeing 757

Physical Evidence and Eyewitness Testimony That A Missile Hit The Pentagon – NOT a Boeing 757

The following physical evidence and eyewitness testimony is presented in detail below, most of which is video footage:

1. Analysis of the physical damage to the Pentagon and lack of debris. You can’t fit a 125 foot wide Boeing 757 into a hole 16 feet wide.  The theory that the plane vaporized is idiotic.  And, what happened to the wings that allegedly sheared off?  DOT
2. The official story of how the plane arrived at the Pentagon by making a 270 degree turn at a speed of 800 kilometers per hour is absurd.  A Boeing 757 could not possibly perform that maneuver according to experts.   DOT
3. AA Flight 77 was lost from radar as early as 8:56 a.m. and then allegedly reappeared 36 minutes later at 9:32 am. According to Danielle O’Brien, an air traffic controller at Dulles International Airport, the plane that showed up on the radar was not Flight 77: “The speed, the maneuverability, the way that it turned, we all thought in the radar room, all of us experienced air traffic controllers, that it was a military plane.”   DOT
4. No unknown aircraft are allowed within 50 miles of the Pentagon.  The Pentagon has its own anti-aircraft missiles that should have fired to protect the building. Only a military aircraft with a special IFF transponder (identifying it as a friend) would have been allowed to approach the Pentagon.   DOT
5. CNN reporter on the scene shortly after the impact saying that there was no evidence of a plane hitting the Pentagon.   DOT
6. Aerial footage showing no debris (confirming the report by the CNN reporter), plus more analysis showing the size of a Boeing 757 compared to the size of the hole in the Pentagon.  Recall also that the initial hole was only 16 feet wide and the CNN reporter said that the Pentagon structure did not collapse until about 45 minutes after impact.   DOT
7. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and 9/11 Commission Member Timothy Roemer both saying that a MISSILE was used on the Pentagon.   DOT
8. Analysis of the Pentagon video footage of the alleged Boeing 757 (it certainly doesn’t look like a Boeing 757) hitting the Pentagon that concludes it was faked.   DOT
9. A leaked video showing a missile hitting the Pentagon.   DOT
10. Expert testimony that a high radiation reading near Pentagon indicated that a “depleted uranium warhead may have been used”  DOT
11. Two witnesses who were at the Pentagon who said there was no debris or jet fuel, and another witness who “was convinced it was a missile. It came in so fast it sounded nothing like an airplane.” DOT
12. KEY POINT. Many people reported seeing a low-flying plane heading towards the Pentagon.  Thanks to a series of videotaped interviews with multiple witnesses by the Citizens Investigation Team, we find out that: (a) a plane did approach the Pentagon, but it was smaller than a Boeing 757, and it approached from a different angle than reported by the 9/11 commission; (b) the plane did not actually hit the Pentagon, but instead flew past the Pentagon at under 200 feet – immediately after the missile hit; (c) the downed flag poles at the Pentagon were staged, which was admitted by the taxi driver whose taxi was supposedly hit by one of the falling poles. DOT

Connecting the dots, a very clear picture emerges: (a) American Airlines Flight 77 (a Boeing 757) disappeared from radar and never re-appeared; (b) instead, a smaller military craft appeared on radar 36 minutes later that was capable of performing a difficult maneuver and could approach the Pentagon without being shot down; (c) a low-flying military craft approached the Pentagon but merely flew past the Pentagon immediately after the Pentagon was struck by a missile.

You Can’t Fit a Boeing 757 into Hole that is Only 16 Feet Wide

Watch this 10-minute segment of the outstanding Italian documentary titled Zero: An Investigation into 9/11, which includes analysis by Stubblebine and addresses many of the serious problems with the official account of what happened at the Pentagon:

The discrepancies that are addressed in the above video include the following:

• There is no airplane debris visible anywhere in front of the Pentagon. Examples of what you would expect to see at a plane crash site are shown. Captain Russ Whittemberg, a pilot with over 30 years in military and civil aviation, said: “I have been at some accident investigation sites in the Air Force. And I have never come across any accident scene where there is no tell-tale evidence of the plane that crashed.”
• There is no evidence that either the airplane engines or the wings impacted the building. Instead, we are supposed to believe that the 38 meter (125 feet) wide Boeing 757 fit into a hole that is only 5 meters (16 feet) wide. We are supposed to believe that the wings folded up like those of a dragon fly and squeeze into the 5 meter wide hole.
• Major General Albert Stubblebine: “One of my experiences in the Army was being in charge of the Army’s Imagery Interpretation for Scientific and Technical Intelligence during the Cold War. I measured pieces of Soviet equipment from photographs. It was my job. I look at the hole in the Pentagon and I look at the size of an airplane that was supposed to have hit the Pentagon. And I said, ‘The plane does not fit in that hole’. So what did hit the Pentagon? What hit it? Where is it? What’s going on?”
• One theory is that the Boeing 757 was vaporized due to the speed and the force of the crash. The engines are made of a titanium steel alloy that would not vaporize unless they hit a temperature of 3,286 degrees Centigrade. That did not happen. Plus, the engines would have caused significant damage upon impact. Yet, there is no indication that the engines impacted the Pentagon.
• After a period of time, various photos of airplane debris began to appear in newspapers and on the web did not appear in any photos shown in the days following the event.
• The Pentagon had numerous cameras that had complete and separate recordings of the incident. The FBI was immediately on the scene and confiscated many video tapes from the Pentagon and nearby buildings. Yet only four videos were released after 2006 when FOIA requests compelled them to release them. Only two showed any useful information. But most experts believe the white image in the videos is too small to be a 757.
• The story of how the plane arrived at the Pentagon is absurd – by making a 270 degree turn at a speed of 800 kilometers per hour.

AA Flight 77 Was Lost From Radar For 36 Minutes, Then a Smaller Military Plane Appeared On Radar That Was NOT AA Flight 77

Please continue watching the next segment of the documentary Zero: An Investigation into 9/11:

• According to the official account, the Pentagon was struck by AA Flight 77, under the control of al-Qaeda hijacker Hani Hanjour. Hanjour was known as “a terrible pilot,”  who could not even fly a small airplane.
• An experienced pilot with thousands of hours would probably require 10-20 attempts to pull off the maneuver that was performed with the Boeing 757 on its way to the Pentagon. “You just can’t do that with one of those big airplanes.” –Robin Hordon, flight controller and flight instructor
• AA Flight 77 was lost from radar as early as 8:56 a.m. and then allegedly reappeared 36 minutes later at 9:32 am. According to Danielle O’Brien, an air traffic controller at Dulles International Airport, the plane that showed up on the radar was not Flight 77: “The speed, the maneuverability, the way that it turned, we all thought in the radar room, all of us experienced air traffic controllers, that it was a military plane.”
• No unknown aircraft are allowed within 50 miles of the Pentagon.  The Pentagon has its own anti-aircraft missiles that should have fired to protect the building. Only a military aircraft with a special IFF transponder (identifying it as a friend) would be allowed to approach the Pentagon.
• The official report of the final half mile of Flight 77 before it allegedly hit the Pentagon is aerodynamically impossible. “I challenge any pilot, any pilot anywhere: give him a Boeing 757 and tell him to do 400 knots 20 feet above the ground for half a mile. CAN’T Do. It’s aerodynamically impossible.” – Nila Sagadevan, pilot and aeronautical engineer.
• The alleged hijackers had difficulty flying small aircraft, which means that there is a zero possibility that they could pull off an impossible maneuver on the first try.

CNN Reporter: “There is NO Evidence of a Plane Having Crashed Anywhere Near the Pentagon”

Jamie Mcintyre, CNN’s senior Pentagon correspondent at the time, was at the Pentagon shortly after it was hit. Here’s what he reported: “From my close-up inspection, there is no evidence of a plane having crashed anywhere near the Pentagon… The only pieces left that you can see are small enough that you could pick up in your hand. There are no large tail sections, wing sections, a fuselage, nothing like that anywhere around which would indicate that the entire plane crashed into the side of the Pentagon and then caused the side to collapse. Even though if you look at the pictures of the Pentagon you see that the floors have all collapsed, that didn’t happen immediately, it wasn’t until almost about forty-five minutes later that the structure was weakened enough that all of the floors collapsed.”

Related Posts:

• “Zero Dark Thirty”: The latest in Obama propaganda
• Media and The 9/11 Cover-Up: BBC Accused of Breaking Its Own Fairness Rules
• The BBC’s Instrument of 9/11 Misinformation
• TWA Flight 800 and 9/11
• Why Terrorism Couldn’t Be Curbed?

Extraterrestrials and the New Cosmology

http://www.siriusdisclosure.com/cseti-papers/581-2/

By Dr. Steven M. Greer
Copyright 1995

The universe is teeming with intelligent life. In fact, the universe itself is intelligent and alive. The multiplicity of life in the universe, while diverse, is essentially a singularity; beyond division, it exists in the unitive state, a marvelous, conscious Oneness. All that there is exists in its true nature as pure, undifferentiated, eternal Mind. And yet from the awareness of that which is relative, we find inner and outer, mind and body, good and evil, oneness and separation. Truth is often born from the contemplation of these paradoxes; both perspectives are true, but are dependent on the level of awareness of the observer.

As we ponder the universe and a new cosmology which accounts for the existence of advanced non-human life forms, the lesson of the paradox will visit us over and over again. But if we look intently with the eye of oneness, perhaps the cosmos will offer up a few of its mysteries.

Cosmological Confusion. This term best describes what happens when 20th century humans are confronted with the existence of advanced extraterrestrial life forms. For not only are these beings not human, they possess technologies which are inherently mystifying to us. It is unlikely that a people capable of interstellar travel will be using microwave signals for communication, or fossil or nuclear fuels for propulsion. Since a hologram or laser would appear magical to a human 200 years ago, a large measure of scientific and cosmological humility and patience will be needed for us to begin to understand these civilizations, their technology, and most importantly, the lessons on the nature of reality we may learn from them. Moreover, the co-existence of a non-linear, non-local and transcendental universe with the so-called ‘physical universe’ must not only be factored into our understanding of cosmology in general, but of the manifestations of advanced extraterrestrial people in particular.

Biological life forms, us and extraterrestrials, possess both mind and body, we each manifest a reality which is both physical and spiritual, linear and non-local, fixed in time and space yet simultaneously transcendent. And what happens when science and technology find the point of communication between the hard physical and the unitive state of mind? It would be truly confounding to both the modern physicist and the modern philosopher or theologian. For such a quantum leap in the understanding of the universe would bring into close relation the separately held realms of science and spirituality, mind and matter, body and spirit.

When you factor into this perplexing situation the existence of non-physical intelligent beings who, while not possessing a physical body, are nevertheless intelligent, sentient, and to a certain extent capable of interacting with biological humans and biological extraterrestrials. The tendency in the popular culture is to dismiss such beings as figments of one’s imagination, to belong to a primitive belief system, or to lump all such beings, whether human, extraterrestrial or purely non-biological, into a veritable smorgasbord of undifferentiated ‘entities’.

It is obvious that the risk of profound cosmological confusion rises exponentially as the multiplicity of intelligent life forms is contemplated. A new cosmology is needed if we are to understand the universe around us.

In the civilian UFO community, there is much confusion over the nature of the objects and life forms which are moving about in our time/space reality. On the one hand, we find indisputable physical manifestations, such as crashed spacecraft, radar returns, verified photos and videotapes, metal samples, and ‘flesh and blood’ biological extraterrestrial life forms. Yet on the other hand we find multiple accounts of non-linear manifestations of these same objects and beings: telepathic communication, lucid dreams, mind-matter interactions, remote viewing, bilocation, levitation and others. No objective student of the extraterrestrial phenomenon can ignore these numerous and widespread manifestations. Yet our acceptance of these manifestations really requires that we re-think our entire understanding of ‘reality’.

Some of the advanced technologies and capabilities of extraterrestrial civilizations, especially those interfacing with mind and thought, can appear in ways very similar to so- called ‘astral’ or spirit beings. In fact, the manifestations can be so similar as to lead many to say that the originating beings are one and the same. Not true. Not all that glitters is gold, and similarity of manifestation does not equate to sameness of origin.

Add to all of this the fact that certain adept humans can manifest abilities which are extremely similar to both extraterrestrial and ‘astral’ beings.

Finally, let us add one more factor into all of this. Covert military and paramilitary human groups which have developed both the technologies and innate mental abilities approximating those of both the extraterrestrial civilizations and the non-biological spirit beings.

The universe is a big, complex place. But it need not be overly difficult to understand. Its comprehension is aided by first utilizing a few simple principles and concepts. This task recalls the ancient Sufi saying, “knowledge is a single point, but the foolish have multiplied it”!

CORE PRINCIPLES OF THE NEW COSMOLOGY

• Linear, relative reality and non-local, non-linear reality both simultaneously exist as Reality. Their perception and understanding is wholly dependent on the level of consciousness of the observer. Even physical matter has an aspect of its nature which is non-local, transcendent and conscious.

• Conscious, intelligent biological life forms, whether on earth or from some other planet, have physical realities as well as spiritual realities. Pure mind, or unbounded consciousness, is innate to all such life forms. It is the ultimate highest common denominator which all life shares.

• Beings which do not have biological bodies (so-called astral or spirit beings) are also conscious, intelligent entities, and as such can interact with other conscious life forms, both biological and otherwise. On rare occasions they can even effect a physical manifestation. Once again, the highest common denominator linking these beings with other life forms is unbounded consciousness, or non-local mind.

• The universe consists of both linear and non-linear, or transcendent, aspects which, while seeming paradoxical, simultaneously exist at every point in time/space and non- time/space. From this standpoint, every point in time and space exists in every other point in time and space, through the quality of non-locality.

• The concept of God, or of a Universal, All-Knowing Being, is enhanced and magnified, not diminished, by the recognition of the vast multiplicity, infinite diversity and limitless scope of life in the cosmos.

So how does intelligent life in the universe actually manifest? While keeping the above concepts in mind, let’s review this diversity of life and how we our inner and outer senses may perceive them.

CATEGORIES OF INTELLIGENT LIFE FORMS

BIOLOGICAL: TYPES

• Humans – Intelligent, higher life form existing initially in a biological body and native to earth.

• Extraterrestrial Life Forms – Intelligent, higher life forms existing initially in a biological body and native to various planets other than earth.

• Planetary Life Forms – Non-anthropomorphic intelligent beings identified with an entire planetary body; for example, the earth as Gaia. Other planetary, solar and galactic bodies are thought to be individual conscious organisms as well.

• Other Biological Life Forms – On earth, cetaceans are highly intelligent yet non-human; theoretically, other planets may possess corollaries.

BIOLOGICAL: MANIFESTATIONS/PRESENTATIONS

(This listing describes how biological intelligent life forms may present or be perceived by both inner and outer senses)

• Physically – In physical bodily form, with or without spacecraft

• Technologically – Via radio, TV, and advanced ET technology involving technological interface with mind/thought

• Mentally – Via telepathy, lucid dreams, or other direct mind interface

• Astral Body Projection – The presentation of a human, ET or other biological life form in its subtle, non-biological component, which may be perceived by another biological life form in waking or dream state.

• Causal or Thought Body Presentation – The perception of another biological thought form in its most subtle individual aspect, the thought essence ‘body’, which may be projected without either biological or astral body components.

• Pure Mind/One Mind – The ultimate state of oneness. Any and every conscious life form is essential non-local, pure unbounded mind and may be so perceived.

TYPES OF EXPERIENCES AND ABILITIES OF BIOLOGICAL LIFE FORMS:

• Physical Senses – Sight, Hearing, Smell, Touch, Taste

• Physical Capabilities – Movement/motion, etc.with/without technology

• Mental Abilities (Traditional) – Thought, ideation, creativity, visualization, memory, sensory perception and recognition, others.

Non-Local Mental Abilities (Non-Traditional) – These involve recognition and utilization of the non-local aspects of both mind and matter:

• Telepathy – The ability to send and/or receive thought from one being to another.

• Precognition – The ability of any intelligent higher life form capable of being aware of awareness to access via non-local mind probable events of the future.

• ’Postcognition’ – The ability to perceive via non-local mind distant past events not personally experienced by the perceiver. Non-local mind can access past as well as future points in the time/space linear continuum.

• Remote Viewing (or Remote Sensing) – Here defined as the ability to see via non-local, unbounded mind distant events in space, either in real time or in the past or future.

• Dream State Abilities – The ability, while in the dream state, to experience precognitive dreams, postcognitive dreams, remote viewing and lucid dreaming.

• Celestial Perception – The ability to perceive aspects of physicobjects.

• Telekinesis – The ability to move an object through observable space via interface between subtle, non-local mind and a comparable aspect of an object.

• Teleportation – The ability to move or manifest an object a substantial distance via non-local mind and the non-local aspect of matter, which negates the linear aspect of space.

• Transmutation (Non-Technological) – The ability to convert one material object to a different element or object using the subtle interface of mind and non-local matter.

• Bilocation – The ability to manifest a body or object in two or more points simultaneously in the time/space continuum. (Example – Appearing and perceiving in two or more places at the same time.) Related ability – Bi-timing – the ability to appear in the same space in more than one point in time (so- called time travel).

• Materialization/Dematerialization (Non-Technological) – The ability of a life form to make manifest or unmanifest a material object using mind/matter interface.

• Out-of-Body Experience/Astral Projection – The ability to project at will the subtle astral or light body, to a point in time and space outside the biological body.

• Near-Death Experience – The transient separation of the subtle or astral body from the physical biological body due to bodily illness or injury. May involve perception of the so- called next world or subtle aspects of the cosmos, usually astral but advanced perceptions may involve causal or pure thought realm.

AND MANY OTHERS…

Note that all of the above abilities are innately possible in both human and extraterrestrial life forms. It is also important to remember that each of these abilities can be achieved through material technological augmentation of innate mental abilities, or totally achieved by technological advances alone.

NON-BIOLOGICAL INTELLIGENT LIFE FORMS

Adding to the complexity of the universe is the existence of realms, dimensions, and aspects of the cosmos which are entirely non-linear and non-material, as we currently define it, actually more vast and complex than the physical material universe. No cosmology can be complete without an attempt to initially assess its basic characteristics and manifestations. Because this aspect of the cosmos can interact with the physical one for both humans and extraterrestrials who live in biological bodies, it is important for us to consider it and account for how it may resemble and differ from the diverse manifestations of biological life forms as discussed above.

TYPES OF NON-BIOLOGICAL INTELLIGENT LIFE FORMS

Astral or Light Beings

• of earth origin, that is, deceased previously biological humans

• of non-earth origin, either deceased ET biological life forms,

• or those originating from the causal or astral realm.

Causal or Thought Beings (existing primarily as ‘thought bodies’)

Note that non-biological beings, of all the above types, can appear to biological life forms in the waking state, in dreams, in meditative states, etc. Depending on the culture, degree of evolution, and degree of acceptance of non-material beings, these entities may be known by this partial list as:

• Ghosts or spirits

• Spirit guides or angels

• Archangels

• Ascended enlightened beings (avatars, prophets – Christ, Krishna, others)

• Planetary Nature Spirits (known as Devas in Vedic and other traditions)

• Animal Spirits

• and others too numerous to list

TYPES OF EXPERIENCES AND ABILITIES OF NON-BIOLOGICAL LIFE FORMS

Essentially everything listed under Biological Life Forms, and perhaps others such as materializations and poltergeist activity, pertain to Non-Biological Life Forms, except that they interface less frequently with the world of matter since they exist in non-material realms. When analyzing the multitude of possible experiences humans can have, it is important to have a cosmological understanding broad enough to comprehend the diversity of the cosmos. Otherwise, we will be unable to distinguish an anomalous manifestation of extraterrestrial technology and an unusual astral or causal cosmos manifestation.

APPLES, ORANGES AND STARDUST

The preceding is simply an overview to bring us to our main focus here – the extraterrestrial presence. A universe filled with both biological and non-biological intelligent species presents a special challenge to anyone attempting to understand the extraterrestrial peoples currently visiting earth due to the areas of phenomenological overlap between quite different types of beings. Would a hologram projection of a person not be interpreted by a 17th century human as a ghost? What of the simple flashlight? Absolute magic!

For this reason, among others, a cosmological crisis dominates the ET/UFO question. This has been helped along by deliberate disinformation and psychological warfare programs of certain covert groups (more on this later). The result has been a mixing of apples, oranges and stardust – calling them all one thing. We are reminded of the movie “The Gods Must Be Crazy”, where a small plane drops a Coke bottle over a remote, primitive area in Africa where it becomes an object of great mystery, conflict, supernatural meaning and power to the indigenous people who find it. While the movie is a comedy, it contains an important, relevant message: Are we now behaving like the finders of the Coke bottle?

For example, may observers of the ET/UFO phenomenon conclude that the extraterrestrial spacecraft are actually not at all physical or material because they can at times simply ‘disappear’. Magical? Interdimensional? Or extraterrestrial technology simply allows the craft to go from hover to beyond the speed of light in one instantaneous quantum acceleration? The neural pathways of the human eye are incapable of tracking an acceleration of this magnitude, and so the object seems to simply vanish.

Three main factors contribute to this cosmological confusion. First, the innate nature of advanced extraterrestrial technology is so far advanced that it appears ‘supernatural’ rather than just super technology. For this reason (and good old fashioned scientific arrogance), even rigorous scientists are inclined to dismiss certain aspects of the extraterrestrial phenomenon out of hand, or regard it as not real, supernatural or superstitious.

Consider the development of consciousness-assisted technology (CAT). For example, rather than using keystrokes to enter data on a computer, one might simply think the command. The computer has been preprogrammed to recognize and accept your thought signature. A number of witnesses have seen extraterrestrials doing just that on board a spacecraft. Impossible? Magic? Nonsense? Be careful! A very human scientist at UNLV named Dean Radin is working on a so-called ‘psychic switch’ which is precisely what is described above. How far along this path might advanced extraterrestrials be?

The flip side is technology-assisted consciousness (TAC). Here, specialized machines assist the function of mind, thought or consciousness. A basic example is the Monroe Institute’s Hemisynch tones, designed to assist the development of deep states of relaxation, expansion and, eventually, heightened powers and abilities. A more advanced application, though bizarre to modern scientists, is the ET’s ability to use certain technologies to communicate with each other and with humans telepathically. There are literally hundreds of cases from diverse and credible people worldwide describing this.

In the case of extraterrestrial civilizations, the ability to communicate at speeds exceeding that of light becomes an essential technology. To quote the Moody Blues, “thinking is the best way to travel”. Why? Because it is instantaneous. So it really should come as no surprise that starfaring peoples would have developed thought communication rather than using radio waves. There are many cases of witnesses seeing a spacecraft who think something like, “oh, I wish that thing would come back this way so I can get a better look!” Suddenly, the craft changes direction and comes right over to the person. The high accuracy of such two-way exchanges would indicate that these craft and their occupants have technology which indeed interfaces with their thoughts and those of other life forms.

TAC may also be utilized by the extraterrestrials in teleportation, telekinesis, remote viewing and even higher states of consciousness. Once the nexus between mind and matter, and mind and space/time is clearly understood, the potential applications are almost limitless, and boggle the imagination.

The reason the question of advanced extraterrestrial technology is important to this discussion of cosmological confusion must be obvious by now. Very advanced technologies of extraterrestrial civilizations may appear similar or identical to other so-called paranormal phenomena. To discern one from the other requires insight, knowledge, patience and, above all, experience.

For example, people with ‘classic extraterrestrial abduction experiences’ who undergo hypnotic regression may subconsciously fill in details, especially to please a hypnotist with strong bias towards retrieving alleged memories of extraterrestrial abductions. So – is it real or is it Memorex? Great care must be taken when dealing with the human mind, or we will confuse those aspects of the new cosmology which have clear areas of overlap, such as non-biological intelligent life forms, humans and extraterrestrials.

A UFOlogist may jump to the false conclusion that the person who experiences a spirit or astral being almost as a hologram in the waking, dream or meditative state, has been visited by an extraterrestrial. But wait. A more holistic cosmology as outlined above would allow us to consider that it may have been a spirit guide, angel, another living human who project his/her astral body into the bedroom, a deceased relative, a hypnogogic hallucination, OR a technological or mental projection of an extraterrestrial into the room.

The point is this: If you don’t know about or accept the diversity of possibilities, you are very likely to misinterpret the phenomenon. Similarly, many people experience a myriad of unusual phenomena (PLURAL) but they will be considered as only one phenomenon (SINGULAR). The result is the mixing of apples, oranges and stardust. Adopting and understanding a truly holistic cosmology will greatly assist us in avoiding this confusion. But even then, because there are areas of profound overlap where one phenomenon will mimic another, tremendous care and repeated mature experience is required before clear discernment is possible. Otherwise, how will we differentiate between a spirit being an advanced mind/matter interaction effected by extraterrestrial technology? Or, for that matter, from human technology and experiences?

And this brings us to the third contributing factor to cosmological confusion: Human covert programs designed to confuse, mislead and deceive society on the extraterrestrial question.

It must be remembered that covert human attempts to back-engineer extraterrestrial technology have been going on for over 45 years, and more than a little headway has been made. Additionally, certain covert cells within military and intelligence agencies have been working on electronic and psychic techniques which are highly invasive, very specific and operationally effective. These technologies are much farther along than most could imagine. The real capability exists to deliberately mimic an extraterrestrial technology and events for the purpose of disinformation.

We have been briefed by trusted members of the military regarding “non-lethal defense” and related fields. They have confirmed to us that psychoelectronic technologies exist, off-the-shelf, which can target an individual or group and remotely make them have a personal conversation with their personal God. And they would so believe it was real, they would pass a lie detector test.

CONCLUSION

This is a wake-up call. The simple approach of taking all anomalous experiences on face value is not only unscientific, it is immensely dangerous. Technologies do exist which can induce personal and collective experiences which appear ET/UFO related, but which are really quite human. Like past plutonium experiments on humans and germ warfare tests on civilians, these ‘experiments’ are real, black budget activities which have been developed and perfected over the last 30-40 years. Electronic and implant technologies, all human, exist which can induce a very convincing ‘abduction’ event. The clustering of abduction experiences around military installations, and the presence of unmarked, black, electronic-filled helicopters near so-called abductees’ homes is no coincidence.

The public has been misled, and the civilian UFO research community have been quite victimized by these special projects designed to deceive, mislead and, above all, disinform the public on the extraterrestrial subject. The “Body Snatchers” fix on the extraterrestrial presence is driven by a complex plan to convince the public that there is “…an alien threat which we must all unite against and fight…”

Do not be deceived. The future of life on earth, and our emerging relationship with extraterrestrial civilizations may depend on our eyes being open.

The relevance of covert human activities to cosmological confusion must not be underestimated. Human awareness on the subject of extraterrestrials has been manipulated, played like a harp, by those who would hide the real gold under a mountain of fool’s gold. Events which look, feel and sound like extraterrestrial ones may in fact be a part of a deception of very human origins. And if we do not at least consider the role of covert disinformation programs in our list of cosmological options, then we will be doomed to misidentify and misinterpret many of these events.

The human factor which adds to cosmological confusion is not limited by covert activities. There is the usual array of misperceptions, hallucinations, delusions, wannabees, false memory syndromes, hoaxes, scientific arrogance and general human egotism. All of these contribute to a collective cosmological indigestion which is in dire need of a cure. And acknowledging the problem is the first step to healing.

Extraterrestrial civilizations. Humans. Non-biological life forms. The cosmos is a complex, diverse and fascinating place. Or Non-Place? Ultimately, education and, above all, experience, will guide us on this journey. For if we are to set sail over this vast ocean, we are in need of a rudder, a compass and a few journeys along the near shoreline first.

We must join together to gather our knowledge and experience, and with courage and resolve set sail first along the shoreline, then farther from shore and then into the vast and limitless ocean of inner and outer space. For we are not at the end of time, or of history, but rather we stand on the threshold of unbounded possibilities, a time when all that we may dream together will come to pass.