 Jan 24 2008
 | |
Vallee & UFOs: Great News!
This is excellent news: Anomalist Books have
just republished Jacques Vallee’s classic UFO trilogy:
Dimensions, Confrontations and
Revelations. These are truly classic titles and required,
definitive reading for anyone and everyone interested in the UFO
puzzle (I’ve included, as you’ll see, the cover images of the new
editions).
Here’s
the link to the Anomalist Books page where you can find
more details, and here’s what they have to say about the Vallee
trilogy:
“Though the books were first published more than a decade ago,
Dr. Vallee views this trilogy as his ultimate statement on the
phenomenon. If you read the books when they first appeared, we
suggest you read them again to place what has happened since then in
the proper perspective; if you have never read the books and have
any interest at all in the UFO phenomenon, you owe it to yourself to
read what many consider to be the most intelligently argued
treatment of the mystery ever penned by a scientist. It’s probably
fair to say that no scientist has put in as much time and thought on
the UFO subject as Dr. Vallee. His works are chock full of field
investigations, historical analyses, and bold but logical
speculation. Dr. Vallee thinks different. Once you have read this
trilogy, we are sure you will never think about UFOs in the same way
again.”
Support Anomalist Books: they are publishing some
ground-breaking titles and giving us new access to some of the
more insightful, out-of-print and hard-to-find books.
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Thursday, January 24th, 2008 at 10:12 am and is filed under The Redfern Files, Breaking News, Eyewitness Accounts, Reviews, Abductions, Alien Encounters, UFO Sightings, Books, Close Encounters, Evidence, Contactees, UFOlogists, UFOlogy. You can follow responses via RSS
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January 24th, 2008 at 10:35 am
Very, very cool!
Thanks for the heads up, Nick
January 24th, 2008 at 11:26 am
I’m of the mind that Dimensions is probably Vallee’s best work overall. Much of it rehashes and expands on his earlier books so I don’t view it as the best in terms of new ideas but as the most coherent single presentation of “What Vallee Thinks.” I think of Dimensions a lot in regards to the question of what books to recommend to the uninitiated.
What say you?
January 24th, 2008 at 11:49 am
It’s really funny — I hadn’t clicked on the “Forbidden Science” blog post because I had assumed it was Anomalist reissuing Vallee’s book of that title! haha. Kenyon’s books are not that impressive — more along the lines of the parafaction genre (in particular reminds me of the aliens created Egypt argument).
But then ultimately Vallee is victim of the same problem — he conflates nonwestern cultures and shamanism with high tech UFO intrusions. The reason Forbidden Science is his best book is because he finally discovers that even the Blue Book project was probably a cover-up for a higher level CIA directive on psy-ops and technology. Is Forbidden Science the ultimate “Project Beta” of UFOlogy? I think so — it’s the sublime secret kernal of UFOlogy ideology.
Most informative is the gossip that Vallee was part of the occult sex scene on the West Coast which seems likely considering his writings in Forbidden Science. Again the idea that science is some “objective” reality is best exposed as a lie from this journal of one of the internet creators.
What I call “tantric technology” is just the increasing tension from higher levels of mass used to create greater energy power. What drives this dynamic is “missile envy.” Ah if only we could all have a close call with a big black flying triangle. haha.
January 24th, 2008 at 12:34 pm
Will they be reprinting Passport to Magonia also?
January 24th, 2008 at 2:02 pm
Occult sex scene on the west coast? How was this implied in his Forbidden Science? I don’t believe you, prove it to me.
January 24th, 2008 at 2:21 pm
Prove sex magick? Well if I was in California you’d have to strip and howl like a wolf while hidden in the woods, after paying me $3000, of course. haha. But instead I’m at the Minneapolis library and googling “Jacque vallee and sex magic” only leads to websites censored by this god-fearing public-funded institution.
January 24th, 2008 at 4:25 pm
RPJ: I’ve spoken to Jacques about reissuing Magonia, but he feels that it is now ‘out of date’, and that this trilogy outlines his ideas in a more up to date manner. I argued that Magonia should be available at least purely due to its historical significance, but I haven’t convinced him yet. I had to pay something like $90 secondhand for my copy of PtM (at least I got a first edition hardcover) - it would be nice if readers had better access to it though IMO, considering its importance to the UFO genre.
Kind regards,
Greg
January 24th, 2008 at 5:59 pm
You’re right Greg, that book is a classic and maybe with a little help he could even put some updates in a new editions if he feels the book needs it, just like Sagan did when they made a secondedition of his acclaimed series Cosmos.
I’m looking for a second-hand copy, and still no luck
January 24th, 2008 at 7:09 pm
Not_Anonymous:
I’d say speaking personally that the best way to look at Vallee’s work is collectively.
He, and Keel, are about the only two people who I think required reading of all their work is a must.
So, I kind of don’t have a “best” favourite - I think of them more as a collective body of “best.”
January 24th, 2008 at 8:55 pm
RPJ: I agree, but Jacques says he doesn’t have time to update the book. Hang in there, I’ll keep chipping away (perhaps a 40th anniversary edition for next year, with contributed essays from the new generation of researchers?).
Kind regards,
Greg
January 24th, 2008 at 9:49 pm
I would sell blood plasma for a new edition of P to M. My local library has a copy, and I’m sorely tempted to “lose” it and just pay the fine. But I can’t justify taking it away from some impressionable kid who might pick it up.
January 25th, 2008 at 8:07 am
Greg,
I hope you got the US first edition which has the Magonia catalogue. The UK edition by Neville Spearman failed to carry the catalogue. Magonia was influential, and it seems it exerts an influence over a new tide of ufologists. Time will tell if its a case of Vallee leading some into “the thickets of Magonia” as put by Jerome Clark. Jerry Clark desn’t like where Magonia took the subject to, and argues for a refocus on the better validated “mainstream” ufo evidence, rather than the exotic fodder of Magonia. Personally I think the stuff of Magonia is more than just unsound folklore and mythology. There are a lot of interesting intersections but caution is needed.
One of more bizarre titles in my collection is Blanche Barton’s “The Secret Life of a Satanist - the authorised biography of Anton LaVey”, wherein Vallee is described as “a close personal friend and associate of LaVey’s” but LeVey was big on name dropping people he meet. The book has a photo of LeVey in between Vallee and Aime Michel. Vallee researched consciousness and some of the fringes of the occult underworld and through it came into contact with people like LeVey. Not a real hard thing to do in California?
I recollect taking Jill Tarter to task in a lecture she gave the the Sydney Space Association. She was slagging off about Vallee’s unscientific thrust on things. I corrected her cavalier use of facts, but Vallee has always courted the fringes and made some sound homages to the UFO mainstream.
If Passport was reissued some thought to some of dubious content needs culling such as the Alexander Hamilton hoax, which he still carried in the reworkings that made up much of Dimensions. It was nice folklore but the product of a local “Liars club”, which Hamilton himself even owned up to in a letter to the editor of a newspaper. Like a lot of stuff, few read the retraction statement back in 1897, and it didn’t resurface until the diligence of Eddie Bullard in his massive “Air Ship” file.
When in California in 1984 Vallee came to a gathering at Dick Haines place while I stayed there, Paul Cerny and others also came along. At that stage Vallee told me he felt that for example he would have done Messengers of Deception differently.
Jacques Vallee has an interesting essay in the book “Alien Worlds - Social and religious dimensions of Extraterrestrial Contact” edited by Diana Tumminia (Syracuse University Press, 2007.
Regards,
Bill
January 25th, 2008 at 3:55 pm
Hi Bill,
Thanks for the comments. You basically have echoed what Jacques said to me about Magonia - there are errors in there that need fixing, which he doesn’t really have time to do.
My personal opinion is that the ‘thickets of Magonia’ need some exploring. Everything I’ve seen over the past few years keeps pointing me towards the fact that many ‘border states’ share common elements (in Darklore Volume 1 I wrote about the sounds aspect, but there are plenty of other things - smells, strange mists, etc). Jacques Vallee may not have had it exactly right with PtM, but I do think he was quite prescient in exploring the topic.
I take any rumours of JV’s association with occult groups with a grain of salt - as he narrates in Messengers of Deception, he actively visited many of these groups to investigate their workings, beliefs etc. So it would be quite easy to associate him with many of these groups. Having said that, he obviously also has an interest in the esoteric side of things (as shown in ‘Forbidden Science’).
Kind regards,
Greg
January 25th, 2008 at 6:44 pm
Hi Greg,
I agree re your points. Guilt by association would put a lot of us in with strange bed fellows, and I have felt that JV would have had to actively intersect with a lot of unusual groups and individuals. I know I certainly have over the years, but I wouldn’t see myself as having embraced “the dark side.”
I guess it comes down to what is the most productive view of the world - an occult or scientific view. There are aspects that sustain diverse positions.
The “Skinwalker” ranch affair was a strong case of “deja-vu” for me. On the Dorrigo plateau back in 1973 I got involved in a sustained display of weirdness which had large doses of solid UFO data and very strange “paranormal” dimensions. On this aspect I agree with Vallee, yourself and others, we need to look at all aspects and see where it all leads. I was writing “UFOs - the psychic connection” for Psychic Australian back in 1976. I still come across many puzzling “crossover” events that attest to this duality of “occult”/”scientific” anomalies, but progress wise I’ve felt more progress has been made when focusing some real solid and sustain science on events. Funding, resources, time etc are always problems, but from time to time progress is made, and often frustrations continue, as seen in the “Skinwalker” experiences - elusiveness and ambiguity are the potent siren calls of these phenomena we pursue. I’ve been pursuing these siren calls for nearly 4 decades and am still convinced there is a compelling core phenomenon, with some fascinating and strange intersections with what we sometimes lamely label “occult” or “paranormal.”
It is the compelling nature and consistency of this “core phenomenon” that sustains my enquiries, and the fact that mainstream science seldom engages with it in compelling ways - a litany of “lost opportunities.”
Regards,
Bill
January 26th, 2008 at 3:42 am
Hi Bill,
Thanks for the insightful comments. As an aside to your final paragraph, on another site I recently quoted Margaret Mead:
——-
“People still ask each other, ‘Do you believe in UFOs?’ I think this is a silly question, born of confusion. Belief has to do with matters of faith. It has nothing to do with the kind of knowledge that is based on scientific inquiry…When we want to understand something strange, something previously unknown, we have to begin with an entirely different set of questions. What is it? How does it work? Are there recurrent regularities?”
————
My interest is in exploring these “recurrent regularities”.
Kind regards,
Greg
January 26th, 2008 at 5:10 am
Hi Greg,
As Allen Hynek pointed out in his classic study “The UFO Experience - A Scientific Inquiry” “Science is not always what scientists do.” The real spirit and endeavour of science has rarely got a look in with the UFO phenomenon. Instead it has been marginalised by the “court of science”, often in most unscientific ways.
I’m sure Margaret Mead would have recognised that “the different set of questions” and the theme of seeking out “recurrent regularities” is at the heart of the philosophy of science. It is the skewed application and the politicisation of the efforts to examine the UFO “problem” that has largely subverted the progress of science scrutiny in this area. If the real spirit of science backed up by sufficient funding, rigour and committment, then I think we could see some real progress. Instead such matters are in the minority and we see a very pale shadow of science in the history of the UFO controversy.
Regards,
Bill
January 28th, 2008 at 7:46 pm
Greg: I’d have to counter your Margaret Mead quote with Yogananda stating that consciousness is “ever-new, ever-fresh.” To resonate with female formless awareness means reality is inherently a MISSstory — we surrender to the bliss of always being “enchanted” by formless awareness. Is there a regular, reoccurring means to always have life be “ever-new” and “ever-fresh”? Nonwestern complementary opposite harmonics. I recommend Professor Nadeau and Kafato’s book “The Nonlocal Universe” which extends the “complementary principle” of quantum mechanics to a general philosophy of science framework. It’s a really well researched book published by Oxford U Press. I don’t agree with the science but it makes for fascinating psychology — and it’s the alter-ego of my “When the Mothership Lands” book.
As Hynek states in the above cited book of his:
“violation of logic is not proof.”
EXACTLY — ufo reality inherently can not be proved because western logic is dependent on contrived technological constructs to have regular reoccurring patterns — even though this measurement process destroys ecological life on Earth (including our fresh water supply). Margaret Mead got her science research trashed — on sex in the south pacific — because it was not a “regular reoccurring pattern.” Her husband Gregory Bateson would have had some things to say about this. haha.
There’s a recent philosophy of science article called “Turning Lead to Gold” about how the “negative result of an upper limit” is a proof in science because of the technology used to measure the results. Because of this technological dependence the proof process is out of reach to social science — this is by the author of the Goldem Series, Professor H.M. Collins. Collins compares parapsychology and quantum mechanics and gravity waves in one of his earlier books. That’s essentially the extension of the complementary principle of quantum mechanics — the objective proof includes the technology that enables the measurement: There is no separate reality besides that which the math upon which the technology is built enables.
Complementary opposite harmonics — the Logos as pure logical inference — is what Edgar Allan Poe called analysis or “beyond genius.” In the East it’s called “direct perception” to female formless awareness. Western logic relies on symmetry with a one-to-one correspondence with technological geometry that inherently creates psychological disharmonic externalities popularly called “ufos.”