UAPs, Bigelow, and the "Invisible College"

[Tezcatlipoca]

I'm sorry Arthur, but I really don't know what you're trying to say here. These questions are followed up by what looks like a header for a Greenstreet story in the NYP but nothing else. A cryptic X post with a bunch of UFOlogists and a link for a 20+ minute.

What are you trying to say? If there is something in the video we're supposed to see, tell us and include a timestamp. Better yet, many YouTube videos have transcriptions that one can copy and paste so we don't have to watch an entire video to get your point.

Be happy to discuss with you, but I'm not sure what we're discussing.



Not necessarily. Elizondo was heavily involved with TTSA as was Mellon. Putoff is one the founders, along with DeLong and Semivan of TTSA. They have their different groups, but there is a lot of overlap and cross pollination.



Many people have used the term "Invisible Collage" to refer to a group of "scientists" that work on UFOs or other esoteric subjects but don't want their name associated with that work or possible to a group of non-existent scientists. Australian UFO researcher Bill Chalker was using the term in the late '90s in reference to some supposed hair/alien DNA samples that he had tested by his "Invisible College".

The Invisible College talked about here is related to Vallee and Putoff and does predate NIDS which was set up in '95 and closed shop in '04.



Putoff and Kit Green, for sure, but Lacatski doesn't seem to get involved until the mid '00s, eventually setting up AASWAP in ~2010.

They can be part of the same group but make up a network within the group. Yes, they all co-interact, but some of them, like Puthoff and Green as primary examples, have very limited documented interaction with say Elizondo and Mellon. A bulk of the documentation we have between the networks can be drawn to relatively specific organizations or events, while if you look within certain networks (ie Elizondo-Stratton-Mellon), there is far greater interaction that is observable and documented between those folks.
And yes, I know the lineage of the term "invisible collage". Some of these individuals, like Puthoff and Green, have interactions that far pre-date the first use of the term "invisible college" or their formal grouping together, while still looking into the topic. My point there was more in reference to both of those two cumulatively.

 

[NorCal Dave]

I want to know what this invisible college is and it's history/membership.

I want to know how many different sub groups there are?

How much influence do they have on what the UFO community's current narrative is?

How are these group/groups structured internally? Are we dealing with a hirarchacical structure like the church of Scientology?

Is there a direct connection to the Church of Scientology and these UFO group/groups?

How do these groups communicate? Secret weekly meetings? Discord/Signal/In Person? Is there a oath of secrecy you take to gain entry?

Who is the Leader of the TTSA effort?

Is there funding being provided to these groups/clubs/networks?

Are these group/groups aligned with any well know power structures such as political parties or cooperate special interests?

That's a lot of questions. What does any of your own research show?

First of all, there is no set roster and as far as I know, no formal organization. It's not like the Masons with chapters and a hierarchy of officers. Jaque Vallee first started using the phrase back in the '70s in reference to a loose association of like-minded UFO researchers. As I noted above, others have used the phrase as well, but there is no set club, no initiation and no secret handshake. Of course, if there were, I wouldn't know about it, right?

I think in the context of this thread, Jason Colovito, who was interviewed by Mick in the OP, is using the phrase as a catch-all for the various interrelated folks in the UFO world.

There are a number of prominent UFOlogist that often interact with each other and are influential on the subject. Some have been around for decades, like Vallee and Putoff, others are newer to the scene like Elizondo and DeLong. The level of interaction between them varies as does the level of influence.

Different people get funding and money from different places. Puthoff, a Scientologist at the time, started getting government money while looking into Psy for the CIA and military back in the '70s. That gig ended when his experiments were found lacking. He got funding from Bigelow in the '90s as part of NIDS along with Vallee and others out at Skinwalker Ranch. After NIDS folded, he got some more government money through Bigelow's BAASS from AASWAP via Lacatski, also at Skinwalker Ranch. After that, he hooked up with ex-CIA guy Semivan and punk/pop rocker DeLong to found TTSA which earned money selling books, TV shows and tried to get public funding through stock sales.

Elizondo and Mellon were big parts of TTSA in the beginning.

Linda Muton Howe got Art's Parts from Coast to Coast AM host Art Bell. Bits of junk and industrial waste supposedly from the Roswell UFO crash. She had them repeatedly tested, including by Travis Taylor in the '90s. Taylor ended up on the TV shows Ancient Aliens and Skinwalker Ranch while also having a gig as chief scientist on the government's UAP Task Force working with Jay Stratton from AASWAP.

Howe gave/sold Art's Parts to DeLong who then sold them to his own company, TTSA, for $35,000 so Puthoff could research them.

Politically, Senator Reid of Nevada helped get funds for Bigelow's (a campaign donor) BAASS and AASWAP. George Knapp pretty much invented Skinwalker Ranch and wrote 2 books about it, 1 with Lacatski about AASWAP and of course, Skinwalker Ranch. Now he's hooked up with Jeremy Corbel and they both got a shout out from Congressman Burchette at the UFO hearings. Knapp got to enter a statement no less while he and Corbel sat behind Grusch. Knapp brought us John Lear who brought us Bill Cooper.

30 years on, Knapp is still touting the very dubious claims of Bob Lazar while Vallee has a new book about a UFO crash in 1945 New Mexico. A book sourced almost entirely from the memories and clams of some octogenarians recalling what happened when they were 8. And Vallee still thinks a piece from a weathervane might have come from inside the crashed UFO.

And so it goes. This is the Invisible College, it goes round and round.

We have multiple threads on many of these people and programs.

 

[FatPhil]

And so it goes. This is the Invisible College, it goes round and round.

We have multiple threads on many of these people and programs.

I think someone (perhaps not a MB-er) tried to create a red-string diagram for the various entities who align with each other (some by flinging money at each other, others by referencing each other's anecdotes, others by actively promoting each other, etc.). I'm not sure how up to date that is, nor what thread it could be found on, as it was posted here at least once - perhaps in a "skinwalker ranch" thread (as govt/funding was an important component), but there have been several of those.

 

[Mendel]

I think someone (perhaps not a MB-er) tried to create a red-string diagram for the various entities who align with each other (some by flinging money at each other, others by referencing each other's anecdotes, others by actively promoting each other, etc.). I'm not sure how up to date that is, nor what thread it could be found on, as it was posted here at least once - perhaps in a "skinwalker ranch" thread (as govt/funding was an important component), but there have been several of those.

It's upthread.
https://www.metabunk.org/threads/uaps-bigelow-and-the-invisible-college.11850/post-278051

 

[NorCal Dave]

Just an example here of how the Invisible College gets woven into the fabric of UFOlogy.

Over in another thread we've been discussing Ross Coulthart's claim that one of his anonymous sources shared a story told to him by his Great Uncle about UFOs at Area 51:

https://www.metabunk.org/threads/ro...reverse-engineering-program-at-area-51.13109/

Long complicated story short, it's a 3rd hand account about how this guy's great Uncle Sam was told about a UFO being reverse engineered at Area 51 by employees of defense contractor EG&G and he later saw a classified photo of it. The late Great Uncle Sam also worked for EG&G and had giving his nephew a patch while passing on the story. The patched proved he was a real EG&G employee.

The source recently went public in an interview with UK paper (tabloid?) the Daily Mail where he confirms who his late Uncle Sam was and his employment with EG&G at Area 51. In the article he rehashes the story his Uncle Sam was supposedly told by an anonymous engineer and passed on to him and on to Coulthart. The article mentions the nephew going to AARO with his story, descriptions of the supposed UFO, the photo, some mention of Bob Lazar, because Area 51, but then 3/4 of the way in, we get a photo of Eric Davis:



And the so-called Wilson Memo:

Physicist and intelligence official Dr. Eric Davis allegedly met with then-deputy director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, Vice Admiral Thomas Wilson, in the parking lot of an EG&G site in Las Vegas in October 2002, and wrote notes of what Wilson told him.

According to the notes, the Vice Admiral told Davis that in the early 2000s he uncovered – but was denied access to – a secret program run by a defense contractor that retrieved and attempted to reverse engineer UFOs.

The bombshell, controversial documents claim Wilson found discrepancies in budgets that led him to the program run by 'an aerospace technology contractor – one of the top ones in [the] US'.

Notes allegedly written by Davis documenting the conversation were leaked from the estate of late astronaut Edgar Mitchell in 2018.

Davis has declined to publicly confirm their authenticity, though his friend and ex-senior Pentagon official Christopher Mellon wrote on his blog last year that Davis is in fact the author.

Wilson has vociferously denied ever meeting Davis, telling journalist Ross Coulthart that he was in an isolated camp in Maine during October 2002, and had only been to Las Vegas once: a deployment to Nellis Air Force base in 1979 or 1980.

Content from External Source

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/ar...gg-shaped-UFO-1980s-whistleblower-claims.html

I guess the implication is that as the supposed conversation took place in an EG&G parking lot, it's relevant to this story. Davis may not be on par with Vallee and Puthoff in the IC, but he's been in and around for decades. A longtime associate of Puthoff, he often worked for Puthoff's EarthTech Sciences company. He was involved in NIDS and AASWAP as well as TTSA. He claims that as an intelligence officer or person(?), Grusch was part of his security detail.

In the context of this Mail article, they could have correctly pointed out that EG&G was defense contractor and had employees at Area 51. They could have brought up the idea that in UFOlogy, EG&G is big deal and often associated with reverse engineering of UFOs.

Instead, we get the Wilson Memo. A claim Wilson totally denies (coverup) and even Davis wont publicly confirm that it happened or that he wrote it. That's the Invisible College. A few dozen people that get woven or recycled into lots of UFO stories, even when they have little relevance.

 

[MonkeeSage]

Some of the usual suspects have started a new lobbying organization called The UAP Disclosure Fund.

The UAP Disclosure Fund is a nonpartisan political nonprofit 501(c)(4) that advocates for greater government transparency regarding unidentified anomalous phenomena (UAP). We work to support new UAP legislation, provide legal representation for whistleblowers, promote scientific research and raise public awareness in an effort to better address the UAP issue.

Luis Elizondo - BOARD OF DIRECTORS
Garry Nolan - BOARD OF DIRECTORS
Karl E. Nell - BOARD OF DIRECTORS
Christopher K. Mellon - ADVISORY BOARD
Kirk McConnell - ADVISORY BOARD
Yuan Fung - EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR
Matthew Ford - DIRECTOR OF STRATEGY
Lesley Duckworth - CHIEF FINANCIAL OFFICER

Content from External Source

Source: https://www.uapdisclosurefund.org/#our-mission

 

[Mendel]

I grabbed this from one of Stephen Greenstreet's videos.

 

[JMartJr]

Mr. Lacatski should maybe consider having another head shot made...

 

[NorCal Dave]

I grabbed this from one of Stephen Greenstreet's videos.

Most of the current UFOlogy pushing people. Missing is some of the old guard like Vallee, Linda Multon Howe, John Lear, Bill Cooper and others. Partly because Howe and Cooper flamed out with ever wilder stories as did Lear. Vallee is old and his latest book is garbage. However, there is one guy in the photos that goes all the way back to the '70s and is still influential today, Hal Puthoff.

I'm beginning to get a different take from what Mick said in the OP:

At the center of this web, we really keep coming back to Bigelow. It's quite hard to find any aspect of the story that is not connected by one or two hops to him. Bigelow owned Skinwalker. Bigelow got the contract for AATIP from Harry Reid who was introduced to UFOlogy by George Knapp. Bigelow's paranormal investigation arm NIDS became the single UFO reporting site for the FAA before 2002. Leslie Kean (one writer on NYT's first AATIP story) is now on a panel of Judges with Hal Puthoff, for Bigelow's Institute of Consciousness studies. Vallée (whose involvement goes back to the 1960s) has most recently been studying "metamaterials" for Bigelow and TTSA, as reported on by George Knapp.

While Bigelow certainly appears to be in the center of UFOlogy in the '90s through to AAWSAP in the mid '00s, I think it's more a function of his money. He was just the current "patron" if you will, for the community during that time period. But from the '70s right up till now, Puthoff is there and is connected to just about every group and organization there is.

After his, by all accounts, failed '70s era Psy research with noted hoaxers like Uri Gehler at SRI that was contracted to the CIA, he's passed himself off as "ex-CIA".

By the '70s and '80s he was part of Vallee's Invisible Collage. His collaborators included actual CIA Dr., Kit Green and Eric Davis of the Wilson-Davis memo (see above post #125). He and Davis have written a number of highly speculative papers for the DoD earning tidy sums.

He has repeatedly made claims about secret alien retrieval and reverse engineering programs. Programs he's aware of but can't quite pin down. He told Vallee about project Zodiac and others and wrote to people like Under Secretary Ganser in an attempt to join these programs.

In the '90s he's part of Bigelow's NIDS project.

In the mid '00s, he's part of Bigelow's BAASS, the contractor to AAWSAP. He's really the driving force behind all the DIRD papers. His EarthTech company, which if you go to their website, consists of Puthoff and his grown children, contracted all the papers. Some were even written by Puthoff and his old friend Davis. So, the entirety of AAWSAP's supposed actual purpose, musings on future technology, was supplied by Puthoff.

In addition to the DIRD papers, he was still fooling around with Psy and remote viewing, with government funding once again, for BAASS/AAWSAP. This is despite Lacatski supposedly rejecting BAASS's idea to include remote viewing in their RFP for AAWSAP. Puthoff just did it anyway.

After BAASS/AAWSAP was done, Puthoff eventually ended up with yet another money guy, ex rocker Tom DeLong, with whom he cofounded TTSA. It too attempted to influence and/or get money from the government for UFO stuff. TTSA fooled around with meta-materials. Again.

According to Greenstreet, Puthoff was influential in getting Brian Fugal to buy SWR when Bigelow got tired of it, that is Bigelow, and the government weren't providing any more funding. Fugal was the next patron.

Whatever briefing about SWR that was presented to Kirkpatrick, it was Puthoff and Kit Green doing the briefing.

I'm not suggesting he's some sort of puppet master pulling the strings, but he was into all of this stuff long before Knapp and Corbel (who sing his praises). Bigelow has come and gone, but Puthoff is still here. He has been involved with almost every major UFO group or program of the last 40+ years. He has for years told anyone that would listen, that he believes there is some sort of secret UFO program that he's desperate to join. He's always where the limited UFO funding is, from Stargate to Bigelow to the government to DeLong and Fugel. And he seems to have always had a number of government contacts.

He just seems to be the through put in all of this.

 

[RTM]

Does anyone get the feeling that their grand plan of disclosure (starting with the videos, NYT article etc.) has fizzled a bit? I follow Jeremy Corbell's twitter account just to see what has happened and he has gone very quiet, the last thing he seemed to have any interest in was the Kirkpatrick photo. His podcast is over, for a season possibly, and there are no videos being promoted etc.
Grusch also seems to have fizzled out. The only things going on in the UFO community recently seemed to be Kirkpatrick's photo, wiki editing and Mick's latest announcement on Sitric (basically things to have a pot-shot at skeptics about). The only case that seems to be clung to is the rotating video.
I also started following a podcast called Decoding the Gurus, they interviewed Mick and went over the youtube show he was on with Eric Weinstein, that reminded me of Weinstein and Sam Harris being touted as credible go-betweens for the UFO community and the public but both of them seem to have backed off after not getting good evidence.
I can't get my head around a big lobby initiative that had nothing to show from the beginning, maybe they thought if they shook everything hard enough something might fall out.

 

[MonkeeSage]

In addition to the DIRD papers, he was still fooling around with Psy and remote viewing, with government funding once again, for BAASS/AAWSAP. This is despite Lacatski supposedly rejecting BAASS's idea to include remote viewing in their RFP for AAWSAP. Puthoff just did it anyway.

The 2011 KONA BLUE Proposed Special Access Program, which was the attempt to keep AAWSAP funded and move it from Defense Intelligence Agency over to Department of Homeland Security, surprisingly spells out the areas they wanted to investigate. I guess the idea was that as a SAP the project goals and deliverables would be protected, need-to-know information so they didn't have to worry about hiding them like with AAWSAP. The proposed "centers" to be created by the program seem to cater to each of their different interests (individuals are not named in the proposal this is just my own observation that they correlate).

https://documents2.theblackvault.com/documents/osd/konablue-release1.pdf (starting on PDF p. 19)

- Advanced Technology Center which would gather and analyze advanced recovered technology - Eric Davis

- Experimental Centers where sensor and human observation would be deployed at places anomalous activity occurs (Skinwalker Ranch is described as one in the document) - Lacatski

- Consciousness Center which would focus on remote viewing, telepathy, telekinesis, teleportation and time travel - Hal Puthoff and Eric Davis

- Medical Center which would study physical and psychological effects of close encounters with anomalous phenomena - Kit Green

I'm not suggesting he's some sort of puppet master pulling the strings, but he was into all of this stuff long before Knapp and Corbel (who sing his praises). Bigelow has come and gone, but Puthoff is still here. He has been involved with almost every major UFO group or program of the last 40+ years. He has for years told anyone that would listen, that he believes there is some sort of secret UFO program that he's desperate to join. He's always where the limited UFO funding is, from Stargate to Bigelow to the government to DeLong and Fugel. And he seems to have always had a number of government contacts.

According to research by Robert Sheaffer, Puthoff and Green, along with Rick Doty, were also allegedly somehow involved with the Project Serpo "whistleblowing" on Above Top Secret in 2006. This was about two years after NIDS disbanded and a year before Lacatski visited SWR and proposed the idea for AAWSAP to Bigelow. If the purported leaked emails are genuine (which Bill Ryan appears to confirm) it shows there was "extracirricular" activity outside of Bigelow/NIDS which would be consistent with your conclusion.

Article:

Why this is surprising is that both these people [Puthoff and Green] were contracted to write papers for AAWSAP (AATIP), the Pentagon's once-secret but now-famous UFO program. Puthoff is "co-founder and Vice President of Science and Technology of TTS Academy," and their all-around go-to guy for weird physics. Here is a collection of SERPO-related emails from 2006 involving Doty, Green, Puthoff, and others. Maybe somebody can explain to us exactly what is going on? Some of these comments sound quite suspicious, to say the least:

Green to several others: "How much did you two guys tell this lady about Hal, Rick, Kit...use our names ever? Say what we were doing with the Team of Five? Give our backgrounds or credentials? Any of our emails?: (p. 8). [...]

Green writes to the others: "I don't know who besides the two of you know that Hal, myself, and Rick are working an issue together on Serpo (with the two of you...who are mysteriously missing from the addressee line.) No one else...ever in the entire period has ever sent a note like this linking specifically the three of us, and just the three of us. Not even Sarfatti knows, or Dan, or Collins, or WJ. Until now, maybe." (p. 12) [...]

Green writes to Doty and Puthoff: "I have lost a great deal of trust in the ability of the team to either keep secrets, do what we say, and more." (p. 65).

Green is obviously very concerned about "who knows what we are doing here?" Frankly, this smells quite suspicious. Note that the website the "Team of Five" is worried about is serpo.info, which is a site debunking the SERPO story. According to Shawwna at that website, "The "Team of 5" consists of: Christopher 'Kit' Green, MD, Harold Puthoff, Richard C. Doty, Victor Martinez, and Bill Ryan.

Source: https://badufos.blogspot.com/2019/03/aawsap-meets-serpo-hoax.html

 

[MapperGuy]

Does anyone get the feeling that their grand plan of disclosure (starting with the videos, NYT article etc.) has fizzled a bit? I follow Jeremy Corbell's twitter account just to see what has happened and he has gone very quiet, the last thing he seemed to have any interest in was the Kirkpatrick photo. His podcast is over, for a season possibly, and there are no videos being promoted etc.
Grusch also seems to have fizzled out. The only things going on in the UFO community recently seemed to be Kirkpatrick's photo, wiki editing and Mick's latest announcement on Sitric (basically things to have a pot-shot at skeptics about). The only case that seems to be clung to is the rotating video.
I also started following a podcast called Decoding the Gurus, they interviewed Mick and went over the youtube show he was on with Eric Weinstein, that reminded me of Weinstein and Sam Harris being touted as credible go-betweens for the UFO community and the public but both of them seem to have backed off after not getting good evidence.
I can't get my head around a big lobby initiative that had nothing to show from the beginning, maybe they thought if they shook everything hard enough something might fall out. {emphasis added MG}

This is certainly part of it. Some of the Invisible College I am sure honestly believe in the existence of UFO's and Aliens. The problem is that neither the US or any other group on this planet actually has any UFO's, UFO parts or the remains of aliens. So there is simply nothing to shake out. Sometime down the road they will find something new to breathlessly announce. But you can only promise "astonishing revelations real soon now" for so long before you either have to deliver, or go quiet, so people will forget all those unfulfilled promises you made.

 

[Mendel]

Does anyone get the feeling that their grand plan of disclosure (starting with the videos, NYT article etc.) has fizzled a bit? I follow Jeremy Corbell's twitter account just to see what has happened and he has gone very quiet, the last thing he seemed to have any interest in was the Kirkpatrick photo.

It makes me think Kirkpatrick nailed the operation in the historical AARO report (and his essays), their government influence has evaporated as a result, and they know it.

Or maybe it's because of the upcoming election.

 

[jarlrmai]

It has gone a bit quiet, the main things in the UFO sphere at the moment seems to be

Some sort of amendment to declassify UFO stuff being pushed by Burchett (with supporting cast)
A major PR push around Tim Gallaudet which was sort of doused a bit by his other beliefs in poltergeists and psychics as openly announced by Tim in an interview from a while a go and recently reshared by Greenstreet, much to the chagrin of believers.
And now the push seems to be around Karl Nell, another name that's been around for a bit.

Potentially the push could be to try and get a true believer into the post at AARO vacated by Kirkpatrick and then go from there.

Or it could just be about getting a non-profit up and running.

Graves's name seems to be missing as well, not sure what he has been up to.

 

[JMartJr]

But you can only promise "astonishing revelations real soon now" for so long before you either have to deliver, or go quiet, so people will forget all those unfulfilled promises you made.

After which you can start the whole circus up again.

 

[NorCal Dave]

I can't get my head around a big lobby initiative that had nothing to show from the beginning, maybe they thought if they shook everything hard enough something might fall out.

Just reiterating a bit what @MapperGuy said above. This seems to be their ultimate strategy because AFAIK, they have nothing but rumors and stories. IF any of them had actual evidence of these programs they would present it. They dance around the edges, talking about unnamed people that have first or second or third- or fourth-hand information about these clandestine programs.

Donald Keyhoe was claiming the US government was hiding information about UFOs and that disclosure was just around the corner back in the '50s. So, this has been going on for 70+ years with nothing to show for it.

What I find interesting, is people like Chris Mellon. Obviously and educated and erudite guy with years of real government work, and yet, he can't figure out that '70+ years of non-disclosure might mean there is nothing to disclose. He claims he sent Puthoff, Davis and Elizondo to AARO, so one would assume he's been hearing Puthoff's stories about the secret UFO program and believing them. Why? By Puthoff's own admission, he's never been involved in these programs, he's just heard about them. After 10, 20, 30 years of someone making a claim and never following through on it, wouldn't you get a little suspicious?

Instead, the secret is always just out of reach. If not hidden in a super black program that not even the president can learn about, then in the hands of various private contractors. Some are grifters, some are believers but also hustlers and some are so convinced these programs exist that they just have to keep pushing for disclosure.

There is also the interestingly bassackwards strategy of attempting to disclose something they don't have and therefore can't disclose. Sure a few, like Elizondo and Grusch play the "trust me bro" game, insinuating they actually DO KNOW what these programs are, where they are and who runs them, but they can't talk about it. Disclosure is allowing them to talk about that which they already know. But for Melon and the rest, I've always gotten the vibe that they have heard about these things but need the government to come clean. Their grand scheme for disclosure is trying to get enough people to think like they do to force the government to disclose that which they believe to be real.

Graves's name seems to be missing as well, not sure what he has been up to.

He was a keynote speaker at the McMenamins Hotel McMinnville UFO fest a few weeks ago:



As noted elsewhere, at the McMenamins McMinnville UFO big ass party, festival, shindig, serious UFO conference, Graves follows in the footsteps of other serious UFO luminaries, like Bob "I have element 115 from Area 51 in my kitchen" Lazar, George "I'm a UFO celebrity because of Bob Lazar" Knapp, David "Bigfoots are killing people in National Parks" Paulides (Pauides) and a whole host of other serious minded UFO experts over the years:







And of course, last fall he appeared before the Mexican congress alongside Jamie "Here are some alien little people mummies" Maussan and Robert "UFOs took my nukes offline, well not mine some other guys, wait no, yes my nukes, or no, my nukes and some other guy's nukes, but different UFO, maybe" Salas:



Yes, he denounced Maussan afterwards, but IF he's serious about "safety in the air" he doesn't vet his appearances very well.

 

[FatPhil]

After which you can start the whole circus up again.

Do we have enough data to work out their refractory period yet?

 

[yoshy]

I grabbed this from one of Stephen Greenstreet's videos.

Here are the videos referenced by Mendel. Bigelow has essentially been replaced by Brandon Fugal as the new patron of the invisible college. Greenstreet interviews Sean Kirkpatrick to further dive into the statement "these claims largely stem from a consistent group of individuals who have been involved in various UFO-related endeavors", found on page 9 of AARO's report.

 

[Ben Harris]

After which you can start the whole circus up again.

A Flying circus.

 

[NorCal Dave]

Greenstreet interviews Sean Kirkpatrick to further dive into the statement "these claims largely stem from a consistent group of individuals who have been involved in various UFO-related endeavors", found on page 9 of AARO's report.

I haven't watched it yet, but I think the problem is, anyone that talked to AARO is more or less considered a whistleblower so Kirkpatrick can't name names. We can guess though and Kirkpatrick did include a rubric of sorts for what I think is the people he is talking about. I've worked out an Excell sheet kinda thing with a few other people, but no real breakthroughs.

On one end we have Grusch who did NOT speak with AARO by all accounts and on the other is the claim by Chris Mellon that he sent/introduced Puthoff, Davis and Elizondo to AARO to speak with them. Everyone else is a guess.

 

[Ben Harris]

A Flying circus.

I wrote a sarcastic piece about this for The Skeptic, May, 27 2024.

Ufos: A Flying Circus

 

[Ben Harris]

Thanks Larry! I'll be doing that soon.

Fantastic.

 

[Ben Harris]

We could just start with the "Recommended by" list:




Kean: UFO and post life believer that admitted her reporting was to "move the narrative" about UFOs in the public discourse.

DeLong: Ex-Rocker frontman that has been working with Art's Parts and seems to have created TTSA as a personal money funnel. Still looking for investors though.

Coulthart: Thinks a steel ball that watches TV is possibly alien technology, a likely flashlight in the woods is "the best ever UFO footage", there is a huge, crashed UFO covered by a huge building, the US government "leaked" Grusch's "medical records" to undermine him and of course believes a random Twitter/X/eBay seller has a great uncle that spoke to an alien reverse engineering specialist at Area 51 and a patch proves it.

Elizondo: Head of AATIP, the Pentagon UAP program that was unfunded, never official existed and was more like an after-school UFO club.

Puthoff: Believed Yuri Gehler was really bending spoons with his mind and that he proved other psy phenomenon at the SRI, until others showed that he didn't. A Skinwalker Ranch regular.

The problem as @JMartJr pointed out is that as a Gish Gallop-like document, it gets very convoluted to adhere to our standards without creating a "wall of quote boxes" as deirdre calls some of my posts. Hell, if were honest, what I wrote above violates posting policies. I was going off the top of my head and these descriptions can be sourced, but I was just trying to be quick.

What's interesting is how far will Graves go with the usual suspects? He obviously was hoodwinked into attending the Mexican Congressional Hearings and quickly distanced himself from Maussan et al afterwards. However, many of the more prominent UFO folks have very similar beliefs to Maussan, they're just savvy enough to not drag out cobbled together remains of indigenous peoples. For now.

It's "Uri Geller." And, yes he did Puthoff over well.

 

[Ben Harris]

I would think that the next big buzz for the propagators will be the Elizondo book. That will no doubt be another side show in The Flying Circus.

 

[Mendel]

I wrote a sarcastic piece about this for The Skeptic, May, 27 2024.

Ufos: A Flying Circus

Nice overview!

You would think the field of ufology should be heavily populated with physicists, biologists, astronomers. Instead, it appears that the core of the myth-making machine consists of armchair specialists, all with day jobs.

Content from External Source

It bears pointing out that physicists study physical things, biologists study living things, and astronomers study celestial objects. UFOlogists, however, do not study UFOs, because nobody has actually found one.

 

[NorCal Dave]

It's "Uri Geller." And, yes he did Puthoff over well.

Normally I'll admit my often-made mistakes as soon as they're pointed out, but in this case, I think Mr. Geller used his superior metal capabilities to alter the spelling of his name to make me look bad .

On a serious note though, that post was from December last year and by post #129 above I realized how influential Puthoff still is today. I saw him as the Uri Geller guy that was always floating around the fringes of UFOlogy. In fact, he seems to be at the center of much of it. From Stargate to NIDS to AAWSAP/BAASS to TTSA to Skinwalker Ranch to the halls of congress to AARO, you'll find Hal Puthoff for the last ~50 years.

I wrote a sarcastic piece about this for The Skeptic, May, 27 2024.

Ufos: A Flying Circus

Looking forward to checking this out.

I would think that the next big buzz for the propagators will be the Elizondo book.

You think so? Unless he comes out with some new incredible evidence, I'm thinking his fans will love it, UFOlogist will use it where they can but after a bit of initial hype it will fade away. It can't say a whole lot more than he's already said. It can maybe fill in the details of the unfunded, unofficial AATIP that he and Stratton were running after AAWSAP folded, but beyond that I doubt he has much more to share. The really good stuff he "can't talk about" so "trust me bro".

 

[Ben Harris]

I would think that the next big buzz for the propagators will be the Elizondo book. That will no doubt be another side show in the flying circus.

Normally I'll admit my often-made mistakes as soon as they're pointed out, but in this case, I think Mr. Geller used his superior metal capabilities to alter the spelling of his name to make me look bad .

On a serious note though, that post was from December last year and by post #129 above I realized how influential Puthoff still is today. I saw him as the Uri Geller guy that was always floating around the fringes of UFOlogy. In fact, he seems to be at the center of much of it. From Stargate to NIDS to AAWSAP/BAASS to TTSA to Skinwalker Ranch to the halls of congress to AARO, you'll find Hal Puthoff for the last ~50 years.



Looking forward to checking this out.



You think so? Unless he comes out with some new incredible evidence, I'm thinking his fans will love it, UFOlogist will use it where they can but after a bit of initial hype it will fade away. It can't say a whole lot more than he's already said. It can maybe fill in the details of the unfunded, unofficial AATIP that he and Stratton were running after AAWSAP folded, but beyond that I doubt he has much more to share. The really good stuff he "can't talk about" so "trust me bro".

I agree, the fans will love it. But it will probably be the same old nonesense. Since the content has been cleared by the powers to be, it cannot contain anything of national security concerns. Couldn't help myself... parodied the cover. Lol.

 

[JMartJr]

I'm considering sitting down with myself and doing a timeline for "disclosure, this time for sure," dating back at least to the release of Project Blue Book files (a friend and I went down to the national archives and used old school microfiche/microfilm readers to look for interesting cases in the area of Northern Virginia where we lived, for an article in our high school newspaper. Regulars here will not be surprised to learn that we did not find full disclosure therein, at least as the term is used by believers.) That timeline might be of some use in showing folks falling for THIS round of Disclosure Hype that this is an old, well-worn path that we've been down before.

Before diving into it, if anybody knows of the work already being done, I'd be pleased to know about it and save some time reinventing that particular wheel...

Mr. Geller used his superior metal capabilities

He did it again! He's altered the spelling of his superior capabilities to trick you into agreeing that he can influence metal, such as spoons!

 

[Ben Harris]

I'm considering sitting down with myself and doing a timeline for "disclosure, this time for sure," dating back at least to the release of Project Blue Book files (a friend and I went down to the national archives and used old school microfiche/microfilm readers to look for interesting cases in the area of Northern Virginia where we lived, for an article in our high school newspaper. Regulars here will not be surprised to learn that we did not find full disclosure therein, at least as the term is used by believers.) That timeline might be of some use in showing folks falling for THIS round of Disclosure Hype that this is an old, well-worn path that we've been down before.

Before diving into it, if anybody knows of the work already being done, I'd be pleased to know about it and save some time reinventing that particular wheel...



He did it again! He's altered the spelling of his superior capabilities to trick you into agreeing that he can influence metal, such as spoons!

If anyone is interested in how Geller bends metal and how the tequniques have evolved since 1973, my book, "Bend It Like Geller," outlines the history. Incidently, it's the book at the centre of the New York Times article, from last October, which caused a furore.

Bend It Like Geller

 

[John J.]

I realized how influential Puthoff still is today. I saw him as the Uri Geller guy that was always floating around the fringes of UFOlogy.

Puthoff and Targ studied Uri Geller at SRI, declaring that Geller had psychic powers, though there were flaws with the controls in the experiments, and Geller used sleight of hand on many other occasions.[15][16] According to Terence Hines:

Geller turned out to be nothing more than a magician using sleight of hand and considerable personal charm to fool his admirers. The tests at SRI turned out to have been run under conditions that can best be described as chaotic. Few limits were placed on Geller's behavior, and he was more or less in control of the procedures used to test him. Further, the results of the tests were incorrectly reported in Targ and Puthoff's Nature paper.[17]

Content from External Source

Wikipedia, Harold E. Puthoff https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harold_E._Puthoff

Must admit, I've got a bit of a soft spot for the old cutlery-botherer, part of the cultural furniture of my childhood.
But Hal Puthoff, nah.

 

[Mendel]

Before diving into it, if anybody knows of the work already being done, I'd be pleased to know about it and save some time reinventing that particular wheel...

Try https://www.cia.gov/resources/csi/s...997/cias-role-in-the-study-of-ufos-1947-1990/ :

A Die-hard Issue: CIA's Role in the Study of UFOs, 1947–1990

By Gerald K. Haines

In late 1993, after being pressured by UFOlogists for the release of additional CIA information on UFOs, DCI R. James Woolsey ordered another review of all Agency files on UFOs. Using CIA records compiled from that review, this study traces CIA interest and involvement in the UFO controversy from the late 1940s to 1990.

Content from External Source

That's the paper that first had me think, "this UFO flap sure has been around before a lot". I keep wanting to write it up for Metabunk.

 

[Alien Chess Fiend]

Before diving into it, if anybody knows of the work already being done, I'd be pleased to know about it and save some time reinventing that particular wheel...

There's The UFO disclosure myth by Tim Printy.

For over fifty years, UFOlogy has been pursuing the idea that the US government was keeping secret the fact that it has known aliens have been visiting the Earth since 1947. UFOlogists believe the evidence for this is overwhelming and they have repeatedly attempted to pressure the US government to reveal that they are covering up this earth shattering news.

Content from External Source

 

[NorCal Dave]

Before diving into it, if anybody knows of the work already being done, I'd be pleased to know about it and save some time reinventing that particular wheel...

Donald Keyhoe was one of the first real proponents of "disclosure" back in the '50s and the author of books like The Flying Saucers Are Real. Really the title of that book alone should tell us all about disclosure, as any similar book in the '90s would have been titled The Black Triangles Are Real and nowadays it might be called The TicTacs Are Real or The whistleblowers Were Right. They're not even sure what's to be disclosed.

In the 1950s, Keyhoe became a UFO researcher and writer, arguing that the U.S. government should conduct research into UFO matters, and should publicly release all its UFO files.

Many of Keyhoe's stories for the pulps were science fiction or Weird Fantasy, or contained a significant measure of these elements — a fact that was not lost on later critics of his UFO books.[13]

Content from External Source

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Keyhoe

Incidently, it's the book at the centre of the New York Times article, from last October, which caused a furore.

I do remember that article. IIRC, the article made the argument that, yeah Geller was a fraud, but so what, it was fun, he fooled a lot of people and being a really good fraud was the whole point. If some sciencey people got upset, that's because they're no fun. Something like that?

More important to this topic, as I don't have your book, yet, did you learn anything about how Puthoff and Targ got hooked up with the SRI and CIA? This has always puzzled me, more so now, that I've seen Puthoff's level of influence behind the scenes. He was a legit PhD physicist that wrote textbooks on lasers, his specialty, but then ends up doing experiments in psy at SRI, where he was fooled by the likes of Geller and probably John McMoneagle and Igo Swann as well.

 

[Ann K]

There's The UFO disclosure myth by Tim Printy.

For over fifty years, UFOlogy has been pursuing the idea that the US government was keeping secret the fact that it has known aliens have been visiting the Earth since 1947. UFOlogists believe the evidence for this is overwhelming and they have repeatedly attempted to pressure the US government to reveal that they are covering up this earth shattering news.

UFOlogy has for many years crossed the line between scientific curiosity and a sort of religious mythology. We can discuss factual stuff here in this forum, but I fear the chances of persuading the die-hard believers are slim.

 

[Ben Harris]

Yes. The funny thing is that the book is an expose of Geller's trick methods, but the NYT missed the point entirely. Uri then spun it, as he does so well.

 

[Ben Harris]

Donald Keyhoe was one of the first real proponents of "disclosure" back in the '50s and the author of books like The Flying Saucers Are Real. Really the title of that book alone should tell us all about disclosure, as any similar book in the '90s would have been titled The Black Triangles Are Real and nowadays it might be called The TicTacs Are Real or The whistleblowers Were Right. They're not even sure what's to be disclosed.

In the 1950s, Keyhoe became a UFO researcher and writer, arguing that the U.S. government should conduct research into UFO matters, and should publicly release all its UFO files.

Many of Keyhoe's stories for the pulps were science fiction or Weird Fantasy, or contained a significant measure of these elements — a fact that was not lost on later critics of his UFO books.[13]

Content from External Source

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Keyhoe



I do remember that article. IIRC, the article made the argument that, yeah Geller was a fraud, but so what, it was fun, he fooled a lot of people and being a really good fraud was the whole point. If some sciencey people got upset, that's because they're no fun. Something like that?

More important to this topic, as I don't have your book, yet, did you learn anything about how Puthoff and Targ got hooked up with the SRI and CIA? This has always puzzled me, more so now, that I've seen Puthoff's level of influence behind the scenes. He was a legit PhD physicist that wrote textbooks on lasers, his specialty, but then ends up doing experiments in psy at SRI, where he was fooled by the likes of Geller and probably John McMoneagle and Igo Swann as well.

The book deals primarily with the evolution of the trick techniques used to create the bending illusion. Techniques have had to change with time, technology and the shortening of attention spans. I found out nothing new about Puthoff. Yes, Igo Swann was a fake and played a part. I believe that Puthoff also believes he is "psychic" himself.

 

[Ben Harris]

The book deals primarily with the evolution of the trick techniques used to create the bending illusion. Techniques have had to change with time, technology and the shortening of attention spans. I found out nothing new about Puthoff. Yes, Igo Swann was a fake and played a part. I believe that Puthoff also believes he is "psychic" himself.

Here's a mini doco, that's fun...
Harris/Geller mini-documentary

 

[Z.W. Wolf]

Does anyone get the feeling that their grand plan of disclosure (starting with the videos, NYT article etc.) has fizzled a bit? I follow Jeremy Corbell's twitter account just to see what has happened and he has gone very quiet, the last thing he seemed to have any interest in was the Kirkpatrick photo. His podcast is over, for a season possibly, and there are no videos being promoted etc.
Grusch also seems to have fizzled out. The only things going on in the UFO community recently seemed to be Kirkpatrick's photo, wiki editing and Mick's latest announcement on Sitric (basically things to have a pot-shot at skeptics about). The only case that seems to be clung to is the rotating video.
I also started following a podcast called Decoding the Gurus, they interviewed Mick and went over the youtube show he was on with Eric Weinstein, that reminded me of Weinstein and Sam Harris being touted as credible go-betweens for the UFO community and the public but both of them seem to have backed off after not getting good evidence.
I can't get my head around a big lobby initiative that had nothing to show from the beginning, maybe they thought if they shook everything hard enough something might fall out.

UFO flaps have been fizzling out since the late 1940s.

 

[NorCal Dave]

the likes of Geller and probably John McMoneagle and Igo Swann as well.

Yes, Igo Swann was a fake and played a part

Looks like we both did it now, it was INGO Swann. My bad, and it should have been Joseph (Joe) McMoneagle, not John. My failing memory.

 

[JMartJr]

UFO flaps have been fizzling out since the late 1940s.

I'd argue we had one in the Navy from around 2004-2005, then another around Virginia Beach with naval pilots around 2019, if those were not all one extended cultural phenomenon.