In 1994, a number of European UFO researchers and authors met at the Santo Espíritu del Monte monastery in the Andalusian city of Valencia, Spain. Many of them couldn't help feeling like conspirators plotting the overthrow of an unreasonable political regime: they had gathered at this retreat for the purpose of furthering an alternative approach for the study of the UFO phenomenon. Admittedly, this was hardly innovative, but it was their intention to officialize their intention as a declaration, much in the same manner of those patriots who met in Philadelphia in 1776.

The Project Delphos Manifesto, as it would come to be known, hoped to promote among its signatories the adherence to a single line of research aimed at proving that a considerable number of UFO sightings were of an interdimensional or paraphysical nature -- directly the opposite to the tenets of the ETH or Extraterrestrial Hypothesis.

The initiative was spearheaded by French investigator Pierre Delaval, whose group, the Comission d'Etudes Ouranos, has long championed the belief that mankind has long been under the scrutiny of a non-human intelligence from another dimension or level of existence; Spain's Pedro Valverde and Ramón Navía, co-sponsors of the initiative, expressed the belief that "an extraplanetary force interferes in human affairs and with human minds, thwarting natural evolution since the beginning of time."

Project Delphos intended to go farther than any other research initiative ever had before, setting for itself the almost impossible goal of discovering the manner in which non-human intelligences had evolved on their respective dimensions and how it was possible for them to affect our own physical reality. In order to achieve this, a number of multiple fronts would have to be opened -- everything ranging from psychotronics to channeling -- in the hopes that "the invisible might be made visible," as stated by the organizers. But the use of these tried methods (albeit questionable) would not suffice for these purposes. It would be necessary to develop a new generation of technological devices capable of assisting in the detection of all manner of alterations (electromagnetic, thermal, etc.) which would assist in the physical detection of the phenomenon.

Ramón Valverde summarized it thus: "an intelligence that needs a certain mental activity and a support-vehicle-body that isn't necessarily a dense physical structure [...] these intelligent creatures have taken advantage of our need to believe in something greater than ourselves, and our belief in a spiritual level, in order to usurp its functions. If we manage to understand their goals, it may be possible to avoid being manipulated by them."

The Ten Commandments of Project Delphos

1. The UFO phenomenon is partially or wholly alien to the problem of extraterrestrial life, to which it has been associated almost always. 2. Many manifestations of the UFO phenomenon enter the realm of the paraphysical, a level whose highly-subjective nature can elude conventional scientific analysis.

3. Large networks of researchers in both America and Europe have managed to gather enough information to prove that many of the phenomena classified as UFO belong to the realm of the paraphysical.

4. There is a sufficiently abundant case history of phenomena that can be classified today as UFOs, and which constitute a protohistory of the phenomenon within the framework of ancient mythologies and the origin of religions which have become institutionalized in the present.

5. These manifestations are merely one of the multiple facets of a plane of existence or hidden universe, alien to our material world, that is subject to the laws of space-time.

6. Their interference in human affairs must be inserted within the context of a real occult conspiracy, possibly aimed toward a new world order.

7. It can be concluded that the UFO phenomenon and other unexplained manifestations occur within the parameters of a vast plan of deception.

8. It can be concluded that this plot or conspiracy has interfered, and continues to interfere with, humanity's normal evolution and that of our psychic ability by means of trivializing the occult in a strategy essentially aimed at the young.

9. This course of action encompasses psychic manipulation, altered states of consciousness, personality modification, telepathic control, etc.

10. The continued presence of the UFO phenomenon and its interference throughout history is proof positive of an intention and a strategy at the command of a force. The line of action proposed by the members of Project Delphos seeks to counteract this subversive action, which takes place at both the physical and mental levels.

Interdimensionality Examined

For all its lofty goals, many observers of the UFO scene will remain unimpressed by Project Delphos, and will find fault with the items set forth in its manifesto, particularly the a priori judgements of the existence of a global occult conspiracy, the avowedly hostile aim of the phenomenon, etc. which have not been kindly viewed by U.S. researchers and are generally consigned to the vast pile of "crank" literature available on the subject.

But the fact of the matter remains that this initiative by European researchers offers an organized counterweight to the mechanistic nuts-and-bolts alternatives which have come to prevail in ufological debates since the early 1980's. Nevertheless, pursuing such an effort is tantamount to performing a high-wire act, trying to maintain a balance between the status-quo ETH (extraterrestrial hypothesis) and the "UFOs as demons" view espoused by extremist religious groups.

The first order of business is necessarily tackling the concept of "other dimensions" or "planes of existence" -- a relatively simple task for the science fiction author or fantasist, but a considerably harder job when trying to apply such concepts to the physical world.

For purposes of this article, it will be assumed that the reader is aware of the properties of the first, second and third dimensions (the latter which is our own). A dimension can be defined as being the magnitude measured in one direction -- width, length or thickness -- employed to define a position in space. The oft-mentioned fourth dimension is a dimension of time as it applies to length, breadth and thickness in a space-time continuum.

As illustrated charmingly in Edwin Abbott's Flatland, a tale of life a two dimensional universe, it is easy for us to imagine how a two dimensional world would look like and how its inhabitants would react to the incursion of a visitor from our own reality. Conversely, it is hard for us to imagine what the fifth, sixth, seventh or higher dimensions would look like, much less its inhabitants. The late Carl Sagan presented viewers of his Cosmos television program with a lucite representation of the fourth dimension known as a tesseract or hypercube, but even this falls far short of illustrating such a reality.

The interdimensional theory of UFOs asks us to believe in the existence of creatures from these improbable points of origin. This seemingly unreasonable request is somewhat tempered by the global belief in another dimension or level of existence generally known as "heaven" and the less pleasant one known as "hell". Renowned researcher Dr. Greg Little has masterfully identified each of these places as the ultraviolet and infrared ends of the electromagnetic spectrum, respectively.

Ufologist Salvador Freixedo prefers to speak of "planes" or level" since he admits being confused by the thought of dimensions. His layman explanation of the concept remains the most satisfying to the unspecialized reader: he envisions reality as a high-rise apartment building, with each level or dimension being a floor in the building. Occupants may share the structure, but ready access from one level to another is possible only through clearly defined communication paths (elevators, stairwells). It is only upon occasion that occupants of the different levels coincide with one another, such as when they are in the building's lobby or entrance. He argues that certain places on our world, which boast heavy paranormal activity, are precisely those points in common which we share with the denizens of other realities.

Freixedo takes his argument one step further, stating that we could not possibly guess what the nature of the errands of these other dimensional creatures could be. He cleverly invokes the image of a squirrel running along a telephone wire, completely oblivious to its nature and the myriad phone calls it handles every day, the crews which monitor it, etc. The squirrel merely sees is as a convenient means of getting from one place to another. When human eyewitnesses see UFO occupants engaged in strange maneuvers, are we reduced to the role of the unsuspecting squirrel?

Perhaps nothing can sum up this situation as the following quote from another Spanish paranormalist, Juan G. Atienza: " The UFO laughs at all of this, as we would laugh if we could see the desperate two-dimensional figures on the surface of a piece of paper. The UFO heals the sick, creates messiahs, brings messages of peace, removes the contents of skulls, sneers at supersonic aircraft and carries in its belly an entire zoo of beings ranging from Apolloesque, Hyperborean angels dreamed up by a devotee of Aryan philosophies to the elemental chimeras of childrens' tales and hagiographical accounts involving small demons with horns and even spiked tails. Technology? How absurd!"

Greetings from Another Dimension

While the stage of the modern UFO era was set by clearly physical events, such as the Kenneth Arnold sighting and the putative Roswell Crash, subsequent sightings and encounters would indicate that the phenomenon might not be as substantial as it originally seemed. Ufologist Allan Hendry concurred with this position when he enumerated the "alternate mechanisms to the ETH in the realm of the paranormal" ("The UFO Message-Part II", Saga UFO Report, Feb.1980). These events included UFOs and their occupants having the ability to disappear, more akin to ghosts than solid vehicles; reports of transparent, ghostly humanoids; instances of telepathic communication with UFO occupants; psychic experiences arising from UFO sightings or contact with occupants; instances of levitation by UFO occupants and/or their instruments; the ability of UFO occupants to walk through solid matter, and the sudden physical paralysis experienced by UFO witnesses in certain cases. We shall strive to provide a few examples of these in the following paragraphs.

In his book Situation Red - The UFO Siege, the late Leonard Stringfield included a case of a morphing UFO which remains a classic: on September 3, 1975, in Tujunga, California, a couple known as the Cromwells heard a helicopter flying overhead. Mrs. Cromwell took this as a warning that a brush fire had erupted in the area and remained watchful of the developments. Both she and her sister-in-law managed to see the helicopter in question and notice that a bright, circular object appeared to hover over its rotors. Using binoculars, the women were able to distinguish a "light pattern" whose colors were bluish-green at the top and bright red at the bottom. To compound the strangeness of the situation, the object remained motionless in the sky while the helicopter maneuvered below. The object then proceeded to change shapes, from circular to diamond, to chevron and then into a classic "flying saucer" configuration. As it departed, the helicopter followed.

The questions which arise here are obvious: was the helicopter a military aircraft intercepting the UFO? Was it a projection of the UFO, or was it also a cleverly concealed UFO? All three hypotheses have been considered in a number of books and magazine articles, and while we may think along the lines of the clever "cloaking devices" which have become part and parcel of science fiction movies, questions about the solidity of these devices still remain.

Much the same happened in a Swedish case from 1959 told by Anders Liljegren in the UFO-Sweden Newsletter.Gideon Johansson ran out into the night to see if he could ascertain the reason an area-wide power failure in Mariannelund. He witnessed a glowing object making a slow descent through the trees and coming within a few feet of the ground. The startled onlooker was able to see that it was a craft of some sort, having a high transparent dome which revealed the presence of two occupants "with high-crowned heads and big, beautiful eyes." Tge occupants appeared to engage in what Johannson took to be repairs and the object soon disappeared "like a ghost in the night".

Some of these putative vehicles from an intelligent civilization on another planet have a propensity for exhibiting behavior best associated with poltergeist phenomena. Researcher Peter Guttilla mentions the case of one Grace Groswalther of Salyer, CA, who witnessed a "glowing hat-shaped UFO" fly silently over the treetops before losing itself in the direction of another nearby town. According to Groswalther, the effects of the flyover manifested themselves as houselights switching on and off, dead telephone lines, and violent, incessant pounding sounds against her home's walls and roof. Phenomena of this type are often encountered by parapsychologists.

In October 1973, a number of Native American fishermen belonging to Canada's Quamichan tribe on Vancouver Island were witnesses to a strange object a few hundred feet away from their position. According to testimony appearing in the Canadian UFO Report, the object had three red lights rotating on its upper "deck" and intermittent lights moving counterclockwise on its lower surface. A white beam of light, resembling a searchlight, moved up and down the surface of the Cowichan River, terrifying the onlookers. But what truly astounded the Quamichan fishermen was the fact that the discoidal object changed shape into that of an airplane, making the characteristic engine sounds of an aircraft. It flew over the witnesses vanished beyond the treeline.

The Mind-Benders

While morphing UFOs may lead us to question the solidity of the entire phenomenon and its interplanetary nature (disregarding Arthur C. Clarke's Third Law which states that the technology of any sufficiently advanced will be indistinguishable from magic), the occupants which often emerge from these vehicles hardly resemble what human logic would consider to be teams explorers from another planet.

In 1975, during a particularly heavy period of UFO activity in Puerto Rico, Orlando Franceschi, an ambulance driver for a Catholic hospital in the city of Ponce had returned home after 8 p.m. on the evening of April 17 when he realized that "something" was roaming around his back yard. Whatever it was, it caused Franceschi's dog to jump into the air in a furious attempt at jumping over the fence and away from the patio. Thinking that some children may be playing a prank on him, Franceschi went outside to take a closer look, arming himself with a shovel. The curious homeowner was soon faced by a creature he would later describe as a "zombie." The entity allegedly had long, pointed ears, a long nose, lipless mouth and appeared to have grayish, ashen skin. It had black spots for eyes, and a jawline reminiscent of an ape's. It ambled toward the human with a jerky, stiff gait.

Taking no chances whatsoever, Franceschi struck the five foot tall intruder with the shovel. The creature suffered no ill effects from what Franceschi himself considered to have been a terrific blow. It merely backed off, allowing the human to strike it a second time with the garden tool, also without visible effect. When the ambulance driver was about to deliver a third shovel-blow, he felt himself becoming paralyzed and helpless. The zombie-like creature disappeared before his eyes.

This high-strangeness case might cause proponents of the ETH to cry foul, since there was no UFO present during the event. However, its importance lies in showing that whatever the creature was, it was solid enough to resist two blows from a gardening implement and insubstantial enough to disappear before the eyes of its assailant. The following case is almost similar, but throws in a UFO.

On June 4, 1972, a group of young men and women visited Wallacia, in Australia's New South Wales, for a lakeside picnic. At around 6 p.m., when they decided to reenter their vehicle to depart, they found themselves looking at a surprising object, resembling two saucers joined at their edges and with three landing struts, in a stationary position not far from their automobile. The craft pulsated with glowing lights.

Panic seized the four men and two women in the group: some experienced piercing headaches and others heard an increasingly loud hum coming from the object. To worsen the situation, their car's engine erupted in flames, causing them to flee from the scene. But as the frightened picnickers tried to run for safety, they found themselves confronting a large, indistinct figure heading toward them: it had broad shoulders and arms ending in pointed "hands". In a last desperate effort, the humans concealed themselves in the grass as the creature glided past them, vanishing into thin air when it reached their stricken automobile.

Since the late 1980's, researchers into UFO abduction experiences have been challenged by the increase in reports of tall reptilian creatures known by a variety of names such as Reptoids, Dracos or Alligator Men. This order of beings differs from the ubiquitous Greys and more elusive Nordics (the former impersonal and aloof, the latter greatly concerned with abductee welfare) in their outright hostility and highly sexual nature. Certain researchers have tried to establish links between these entities and those which have traditionally contacted by means of black magic in many cultures. Reptoids have been characterized as masters of illusion and disguise, passing themselves off as Nordics, Greys or even human beings, before reverting to their true form. Investigator Eve Francis Lorgen has expressed her belief that such creatures are interdimensional rather than extraplanetary, and further adds that many of the abductees she has dealt with believe that certain Reptoids --clad in black hooded robes or capes--are indeed the hidden controllers behind the abduction phenomenon. This belief has been echoed by other students of the phenomenon who have gone as far as to claim that human evolution has been directed by the Reptoids.

The exploits of these unknown quantities transcends national borders. Mexican ufologist and author Luis Ramírez Reyes, who has had his share of unusual experiences, discusses a case brought to his attention in the early '90's by a colleague who visited the town of Tepoztlán (now a prominent New Age destination) and heard the following story: an elderly woman, Concepción Navarrete, had lost her teenage son to reptilian creatures who traditionally haunt Tepozteco Hill, a forested summit crowned by a small pyramid.

Mrs. Navarrete's son enjoyed running up to the top of the hill since his earliest childhood, particularly when the presence of strange nocturnal lights caused blackouts in Tepoztlan. He finally vanished altogether one day, never to be seen again, and his mother was certain that his disappearance was related to the presence of the strange lights. One morning, she noticed a "very strange being" standing not far from her modest home. It had its back to her, and gave the impression of being "a giant iguana", standing erect and over six feet tall, with green scaly skin.

The reptilian creature made a sudden about face, presenting an entirely different appearance. "He resembled a blond, friendly American" explained Navarrete, who was terrified out of her wits. The shapeshifting Reptoid told her not to be afraid; no harm would come to her and that her son was safe and well-cared for. Navarrete turned to a passing man to cry for help, and when she turned back to look at the shapeshifter, it had disappeared.

Noted ufologist Linda Moulton Howe has gathered information on the interdimensional nature of a possible conflict between these non-human factions. Several of her sources indicate that the hostilities between the Greys and the Nordics have led the latter to seek refuge in "other dimensions inaccessible to the Greys." In a 1989 article appearing in UFO Universe, Dr. Jean Mundy best summarizes the interdimensional nature of these entities: "Some of the many creatures that inhabit the universe are native to the physical dimensions we are familiar with...Other creatures inhabit paraphysical realms, usually alluded to as "etheric". These realms consist of physical matter, but in forms that are less dense, more malleable, and more durable than matter in the chemical universe...These interpenetrating universes have been recognized for millennia world-wide by the esoteric traditions of every major religion and school of thought." Conclusion

Veteran UFO researcher and author Jacques Vallée suggested the possibility that the UFO phenomenon could have an earthly nature without being related to any human agency, or even extraplanetary without involving the need for any conveyances. This seemingly contradictory notion can be explained through developments in physics which account for the elusive "dimensions" which are the occultist's stock in trade. Vallée cites the work of scientists such as Michio Taku and Jennifer Trainer, who manifest the need that traditional physics requires the existence of five dimensions in order to account for the Big Bang theory. Theoretical physics believes that our universe originally had ten dimensions, six of which collapsed or "curled up", leaving us with the four dimensional one in which we exist.

In his book Alien Agenda, author Jim Marrs quotes as statement made by a leading physicist: a number of investigators claim to have found evidence of the existence of what they have come to term the "top quark", providing a model for a ten-dimensional universe in which time travel into the remote past is a possibility and in which holes in very fabric of space enable travel to other parts of the universe. According to the article, the seemingly immovable and eternal visible universe in which we all live may simply be one of many universes existing side by side "like so many soap bubbles in a cosmic froth." Can we even begin to guess at what kind of intelligent life may have developed in any of these parallel dimensions or other universes?

While it is true that our notion of what bona fide interplanetary explorers should behave has been conditioned by the literary genre of science fiction, the entities involved with the UFO phenomenon hardly resemble the ambassadors of an advanced galactic society: their vehicles have radiation leaks that cause damage to their landing sites; the purpose of dentures, clocks or other items appears to elude them; they perform crude operations on terrified abductees with implements that do not match the capabilities that a society capable of crossing the voids of space should rightfully possess.

Perhaps we would do well to heed the admonition--smacking of gallows' humor--offered by Arthur C. Clarke in his book Report on Planet Three and Other Speculations: it's not a flying saucer unless you can see the Mars license plate.

source & references: