WTUFO
What the UFO? We're learning about UFOs and processing in public.
We talk about what the phenomenon might be, explore historical sightings, track new developments, and generally feel our way through this wild, exciting subject.
If you're an experiencer or ufologist and you'd like to share your story or research, please find us on X @WTUFOshow.
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WTUFO
S1E6: 12 UFO Scenarios From Worst to Best
We go headfirst down the bunny hole and imagine what the UFO phenomenon might be. The possibilities range from extremely unsettling to profoundly exciting.
One heads up: this episode is what you could call advanced. It's entirely speculative and most of it will sound full on bananas if you're not already into ufology.
If that sounds fun to you, you're going to have a good time with this one.
Brand Note: This is the last episode where we used the name Holding Space. Going forward it's all WTUFO, baby. What the UFO??
If you're enjoying the show and you'd like to help us keep making it, please consider supporting us at patreon.com/WTUFO
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Connect on X @WTUFOshow |
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Hi, welcome to Holding Space. I'm Caleb Mayo and this is my brother, john Mayo.
Speaker 2:Hello.
Speaker 1:And UFOs are real. So we talk about thoughts and feelings around that subject, and today we're going to do something kind of big and hairy and exciting, which is explore scenarios for what the heck is going on. This is a very big topic. It's something that we in the community kind of tend to avoid, I think, because it's so thorny and unknowable and because the only sort of like rational approach to this whole situation is radical. What do you call it?
Speaker 1:Radical agnosticism right when you don't decide what's going on. So we're not necessarily going to say what we think is definitely happening In fact we don't think anybody could but we're going to rate some likelihoods of potential things that might be going on with the phenomenon and we're going to take a walk from the worst possible news to the best possible news and see what we feel might be more likely and just explore what some of those ideas imply. Did you want to say something might be more likely and just explore what some of those ideas imply?
Speaker 2:Did you want to say something? See if we can convince ourselves of any of these scenarios, which I expect that we can't. I guess and I guess my my kind of ground level, like you know, throat clearing here is that I think it's highly unlikely that we would hit on the what's actually happening in our, in our little brainstorm of a dozen scenarios, and I feel like it's more likely that it's, you know, a mix of things and a mix of some of the things that we talk about, that we're going to talk about today probably and ultimately just like something pretty complex. It's ultimately probably something messy and weird, maybe weirder than anything we could come up with. Yeah, but I think we got a good list here and let's just jump into it.
Speaker 1:Cool, all right, yeah, that all seems right to me, and I just want to add that there are elements there that will be mutually compatible between these things, and sometimes that's a little hard to flag when you're categorizing. So if they come up and we notice one, we might be able to call it out as like a potential element of one scenario which could be compatible with multiple other scenarios in various ways.
Speaker 2:Good point, and so we'll assign a one to five rating on, like our gut, what we, how plausible we think it is Right.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that sounds right and on our list not very likely, five being likely. Yes, okay, okay great, and uh, we've got you going up first with one of the worst case scenarios.
Speaker 2:Okay, cool, blah, blah, blah. Worst case scenario number one is that the aliens have a hand around our throat. Well, I guess that it is aliens, whatever they are, aliens, sen'ichi, these entities just have their hand around our throat, that they're way more powerful than us. And I guess what I mean in this scenario is that the um, that some human power structures, like governments or militaries, um are aware of this and uh, and and like know that we're like horribly outmatched and that the coverup is a result of trying to like hide this terrible, scary fact. What do you? What do you? I have a couple more thoughts, but what do you? What do you? I have a couple more thoughts, but what do you think? What's your initial?
Speaker 1:got about the possibility of that or uh, yeah, okay. So first of all, feels kind of likely because they're so much more technologically advanced than us. Um, certainly feels believable that they might be exerting control. Then, also in this column, goes the interest in our military infrastructure and activities, which maybe would suggest that they're trying to keep a lid on our capabilities. Um, if there is a kind of hand around our throat, it seems like it's squeezing sort of gently. They're not like going around blowing up buildings, but at the same time, as we discussed in our why Are they Kind of Careful episode, they're not hiding completely, so they might be sending a subtle message, especially to those in military control. What were your other thoughts about the subject?
Speaker 2:Well, I guess this metaphor of a hand around the throat. What it implies is that there's there, we are being killed and, just like you know, slowly and we'll we'll talk about a similar idea in a little bit. Think about, is that story from the end of one of the secret machines books, one of the tom de long books about the puppies and the gophers or whatever? Yeah, rats and terriers yeah, rats and terriers, that's it.
Speaker 1:I probably shouldn't have brought it up because I now don't know it, but the farmer hires or buys some terriers to clear out a bunch of rats and then, when the rats are all dead, he kills the terriers. And it's a creepy proposed metaphor for how NHI, non-human intelligence, might be using human control systems to eliminate resistance and then, when they're done with that, they'll eliminate the control systems. I think is the idea. I think that's right, and then, when they're done with that, they'll eliminate the control systems.
Speaker 2:I think is the idea. I think that's right. And then the sort of the like button on it or hopeful spin from it is like maybe the farmer thinks we're terriers but actually we're just puppies and we're. What if we can grow up before the farmer goes to drown us in a sack? What if we can grow up before the farmer goes to drown us in a sack? So like that also would be part of the uh, an explanation for the cover up here. Uh, would be that the governments and militaries are like working frantically to try to build up our ability to have any chance in this fight. Um, and they would, and they're worried that if they're worried that that a broader acknowledgement of or acceptance of the phenomena or the presence of nhi might precipitate, you know, fucking mass slaughter and planetary takeover. La la la right, yeah, wow.
Speaker 1:Well, there is a reason we have selected the worst scenario bucket for this idea.
Speaker 2:Yeah, Okay, I think let's just let's. Do you want to assign a rating and then move on? We've got so many to do.
Speaker 1:Fuck three or four Shit, I don't know. It seems so compelling when you said that Evidence against includes NHI telling people that they're here to help and we're destroying our planet. Yes, yes. Yeah, I guess some evidence against might be that they haven't destroyed any major things yet that we know of, but that's not super strong evidence. How does three feel to you?
Speaker 2:I guess, I don't know. I find that it's it's so hard to assess because we think of these things in human timescales and so like. To me it would seem like a very, very. It would seem like so slow as to be not an invasion, not a, not a. You know that they're not trying to kill us, cause like they could do it so quickly, but maybe they are doing it quickly from their perspective. I don't know, I don't find it super likely. I mean, look, I want to sleep at night. I would give it a two.
Speaker 1:Okay cool. I did want to ping one other idea here which I think might be worth running through the thread, which is that we could think about what this might imply for where we're going. And one thing I think this scenario might imply for where we're going is that they might destroy advanced space capacity if we get to that point like, um, so far Starship hasn't successfully taken off, but maybe if it did, if we started routinely going to the moon and Mars, maybe they would fuck with that, or like, maybe they wouldn't bother until we started like building a Dyson sphere or something, but down the road, if they do have a hand around our throat, would expect them, I think, to limit our military development in some important way. So keep an eye on the skies for that. Um, yeah, I, I kind of agree with you that it's it's not super duper likely, but I'm not sure. I definitely don't think it's a one. I think it's like believable enough yeah, look we're here to?
Speaker 2:we're here to. You know, just just speculate rampantly and just shoot from the hip and make some shit up. So I don't know, what do you?
Speaker 1:think, yeah, all right given, given the messages of love and hope, uh, let's leave it at a two and presume they're not deceiving us yeah, mixed bag also.
Speaker 2:I mean, it's a, it's, you know, it seems like it's probably more than one entity that's messing around here, right? So it's possible that we're dealing with different power structures, moral imperatives, agendas, you know Totally. Do you want to skip to your number four because it's kind of similar, or do you want to go in this order? Sure, yeah.
Speaker 1:Okay, want to skip to your number four because it's kind of similar. Or do you want to go in this, this order? Sure, yeah, okay. So, uh, a companion scenario to this is the slow, secret invasion hypothesis. Um, I think, uh, I think what's his name that we really like? Who's been writing these books? Oh my god, blank graph we don't love Mr Graff.
Speaker 1:Oh, Richard Dolan, Richard Dolan yeah, richard Dolan had a pretty good frame on this, which sort of seems obvious, but I'm going to say it anyway. If you like, humanity were exploring the stars and we came upon a planet that was beautiful and habitable and filled with diverse life, but it was controlled by a barbaric species that was destroying its environment and killing itself and each other, how would you approach that species, how would you think about them with regard to their planet, and what would you think of as your moral imperative in that situation? Well, yeah, go ahead.
Speaker 2:First get a bunch of cow anuses, first get a bunch of cow anuses.
Speaker 1:Okay, Good point, that's super weird. But what if you get those cow anuses in order to build your avatar technology, so that you can interface with this population, build some like human looking creatures that you can send down to be, like hello, fellow humans? I will fund this real estate development or run for Congress or write a book about the UFO security state or whatever. Not implying anything, the paragraph looks slightly like an alien to me.
Speaker 2:You heard it here first. Our listeners are going to love that.
Speaker 1:So the idea there would be that the aliens are among us. And again, this is in the worst case scenarios. For a reason it seems super kooky, but apparently human seeming NHI are among the highest in frequency of sightings during UFO events. So people report seeing short and tall greys at about as much or more in total than human seeming NHI. But if you break out the short and tall greys then actually the thing people report seeing most is human-like visitors, which sort of suggests that some of these folks might be able to blend in pretty well.
Speaker 1:And we've heard some cool weird stories about men in black type characters. They're usually like twins and they roll up in suits and they ask super weird questions and they blink strangely, but they don't blink. So fucking weird and maybe we'll like explore this another time. But uh, just to put a side pin in that, there are two different ideas of men in black. One comes from our like movies and comics, which is like american or, uh, human anyway, entities who walk around in suits controlling the alien situation. But there's another alien focused idea of men in black which is that NHI walk around posing as humans in suits and sort of acting like they're from some kind of authoritative agency. So anyway, those guys look like human. The Italians in the pancake story, miconia, look like humans. Of some people you just shared one this week with, uh, somebody who saw like seven to nine foot tall humans like the nordic types all seen, even the betty and barney hill is like uh, humans, but with big eyes really.
Speaker 2:Um, even the uh, yeah, the. I feel like the school in Zimbabwe is also humanoid, or humans, but big eyes.
Speaker 1:Wow, well, that's kind of interesting.
Speaker 2:So what all that adds up to is a possibility that there might be some very slow campaign to infiltrate human society and maybe steer it toward a positive outcome for the nhi okay, cool, all right, I feel like I chimed in with a bunch of stupid shit while you were talking about that, and I regret doing that, because I think it's a very interesting and actually like pretty simple, sharp idea. So it's like they are taking over the planet. They're just, it's like a. It's like they are taking over the planet. They're just, it's like a it's like a boiling a frog kind of scenario. Yeah, yeah, it's a slow motion planetary takeover that we're never even going to notice is happening or notice until yeah, and instead of a military confrontation it would just be like replacement theory, basically.
Speaker 2:It's very interesting. It's a very interesting idea. I wonder, connecting this to the idea, um from whitley streber that we talked about recently, that he said that they told him that they want us to grow up and like be part of their you know, and like be their, be their buddies. They don't want to become obsessed with them. Um, maybe there's like a you know, maybe by doing it very slowly, like this, that that doing an invasion, this slowly and gradually, enables them to like assimilate our culture, culture and humanity into their superstructure culture without us having this shock moment that breaks our cultural identity and instead keeps us a lot, keeps it persisting in some way, while also being agglomerated into their culture.
Speaker 1:That is fascinating and what it made me think of was the Roman Empire, but also other historic human behavior, like the Hittites, I think, did this.
Speaker 1:They would take over a place, but they would bring the statues of that place's gods to their home temple and worship those gods and just incorporate the culture into their own.
Speaker 1:And actually, to that point, maybe the idea, or part of the idea, behind a secret invasion would be that you don't need to convert every single person. You just need to get enough impact on the culture to direct it toward the positive end that you're going for. There's also a slightly more benign version of this, where they're they are like infiltrating and living among humans, but they're not necessarily trying to take over. They're just like here because they like living here and they're like immigrating relatively benignly. That's, that's probably enough. Um I I, because this is such a crazy idea. I sort of feel like we should have throat cleared even more at the beginning to say obviously we're experimenting with some of the wildest farthest out there theories, yeah, um, and that's that's like part of why this doesn't happen very much. People talk about it quickly and they move on, because it's like embarrassing to address these ideas as if they were potentially real things that are going on.
Speaker 2:And.
Speaker 1:I'm crazy, yeah Right. And, and to that point I mentioned to you privately that this is getting into the territory that makes you feel like you might get radically alienated from society. If you really believe this and if you weren't careful, psychologically you could end up in a place where you like don't trust anybody around you and like think the reality structures that the media is presenting to you are all fake and that, like no one can be trusted, and that's like a pretty dangerous psychological stew in which to simmer. So we want to kind of like take this carefully for what it's worth, but we don't want to rule out some of the potential crazy implications of you know some pretty crazy reporting that we're hearing and reading from work that's been done over many decades.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:But so you're thinking, three or four go ahead.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think yeah. But so you're thinking three or four go ahead? Yeah, I think uh. Yes, let's give a fuck four jesus really to a slow all right, let's say three.
Speaker 1:I don't know I I actually found myself feeling a little more uh, convinced by the idea that they might be incorporating themselves into our culture, without necessarily feeling like they needed to drive it yeah, I guess.
Speaker 2:Sorry I'm now.
Speaker 2:I'm just thinking of your throat cleaning there and uh, go ahead please like yeah, we're, we're entering this space to talk about this crazy stuff, holding on very lightly to to all of these ideas and like with a I think we both have like read enough, listened enough, done enough research in this space to be like pretty, to be like confident enough about uh, I mean confident about enough about the evidence that exists, but also like like comfortable enough to say like we have no fucking idea ultimately, and like, but there's something going on here and I'm and I, and it's it's very interesting to talk about. So I, you know, so let's just do it, and like I don't know, to any future employers, I don't know, yeah we're sorry.
Speaker 1:Sorry, and we're not crazy.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it is like people talk about this but we're not proselytizing. You know we're not trying to. I don't know it does like yeah, I've been thinking about Pizzagate this week and like it is just so important to. I've never been somebody who's been like had this kind of mindset of like the government's lying to us all the time and it's all these conspiracy theories. And you know, like that's not my natural position, so it's like pretty uncomfortable for me to be in this place. And also like I care a lot about media literacy and like media criticism and like critical thinking, and so like it's very important for us to pause and check ourselves constantly on this kind of stuff.
Speaker 1:Thank you.
Speaker 2:All right. That's like yeah, sorry, Go please.
Speaker 1:This implication, one implication that this has, might be a good transition into either of these next two scenarios, which is that if there are non-human beings living in human bodies or living among us and passing for human, that would potentially have implications for the cover-up, which might include that some beings involved in the cover-up might be non-human and that's like. That's something again that you just sort of like want not to be true, so you'd like to intuitively rate it low. It's kind of hard to imagine that like an alien could successfully run for Congress. But you know, maybe if they've been here for a really long time, or if they're inhabiting a body in some shared way, or they've been inhabiting a human body for its whole lifetime, you know, maybe, maybe it's possible I don't know way out in the weeds here but would you like to use that as a jumping off point?
Speaker 2:to transition into one of these other two. You could pick whichever one, okay, um, I guess, let's. I'm going to do number three now. Um would, because it it, frankly, is just not that interesting to me. Uh, but the okay, the next worst case scenario. You're, you're number three. Um, is that, uh, that we're like a farmed product in some way, that there's something that human beings are producing without our knowledge, uh, that the aliens like and want? Um, some people talk about this is like they harvest fear. I don't know, or it doesn't have to be that it could be other could be positive emotions also.
Speaker 1:Um, yes, this word loosh has been popping up this week in our research, like it's l-o-o-s-h is a word that people use to refer to like the positive feelings that human emotions generate, like a higher energy of love, and the pitch there is like maybe human society generates these emotions and then some other kind of being can harvest them, like we harvest honey from bees.
Speaker 2:That's yeah. The bees metaphor is is good, you know, we're, we're very busy, we're working on our stuff and then I don't know, I I kind of figure bees notice when their honey goes missing, but maybe not, I guess. Uh, and also they don't live very long. So there's not a lot of like institutional memory in a beehive.
Speaker 1:Yeah true, which kind of pings your point about the potential long time scale here?
Speaker 2:yeah, um, okay. I don't have much else to say about this, about this one. I just really don't like it, I guess is there anything else?
Speaker 1:they could be farming like carbon dioxide or something that we produce a lot of. That could just be useful for them. That's, that's maybe not crazy. They don't seem to have uh told people things like this, um, but some people have like a fair amount of contactees have reported some version of like a sexual encounter. Yes, there was like some kind of extraction of sperm or possibly eggs, or there's like impregnation, or some people have been like they've had memories of seeing like human embryos in in stasis, or like parents have been, like alleged parents have been like abducted to spend time with possible hybrid children. Um, this sounds sort of crazy, but, like the gardening bear, that idea would be that they're like extracting human genetic material.
Speaker 1:Uh, for some kind of uh, growth purposes, like maybe they're building a clone army, or maybe they're just like doing what we do when we extract genetic material from animals and like preserving their bloodlines, or maybe they're like genetically experimenting and and mixing and combining, and I guess I would say that those the fact that those reports exist, um, even though they do sound crazy, is is some kind of evidence for the like creepy garden hypothesis and there's a lot of to be clear.
Speaker 2:There are like a lot of uh reports of the of some kind of sexual component in abduction stories.
Speaker 1:Right, like that's a pretty consistent piece of abduction narratives yeah, we don't have a number to throw out, but it's, it's like not one or two, um, and that that is. That is, I would say, one of the more shocking things that I've discovered learning about this space, that it's like I always assumed it was like one or two, just completely made up stories by the National Inquirer, but it turns out it's like hundreds or thousands of people who have had some kind of sexual experience. That starts to seem like something at least scientific, if not extractive necessarily.
Speaker 2:What can we file alongside this creepy garden idea? Well, okay, I, I do think what we're talking about. There is a version of the garden idea that is that is positive or benign, which is like that. They're like trying to preserve our species, like the rhinos with missing time, because we're trying to save the white rhino we've talked about before. Uh, but this is not that. This is them doing it because they want something from us or they enjoy doing this in some way and are ultimately disinterested really in the human experience on earth. And, like the persistence of humans on earth, they don't really give a shit.
Speaker 1:They just want they, they just want our, whatever okay, I think that's an important clarification, so we're not mixing this with this. Uh being like a benevolent zoo hypothesis. This is just like purely extractive.
Speaker 2:They're mining humans in some way yeah, okay, and I think something that could be filed alongside this, that is, the and I think about it a lot now since I've gotten into into this space is that South Park episode where they go to space and it turns out that Earth is just a TV show.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah. And they're like Earth is being canceled and they have to save Earth.
Speaker 2:Oh, yeah, right, but the producers at some point are like you think this is how it's supposed to work Bears, ducks and Iraqis living on one planet together. No, that's ridiculous. There's one planet for the bears, one planet for the ducks, one for the asians. Yeah, yeah, so that? So this bad case scenario would be that, yeah, we're a tv show, we're a fucking like galactic mma fight, and they just like put us in a, you know, put them in a box and shake it up and again like taking.
Speaker 1:They take the super long time scale and, you know, maybe this is like a, a channel that they flip through, you know, or swipe, yeah that kind of connects to some of the more benevolent ideas we'll cover at the bottom, which, uh, include things like tourism, like maybe they're watching some fun shit happen here. I also wanted to draw one more distinction, which is it's possible that creepy garden goes all the way back to like starting a garden, like seeding life on this planet or seeding humans on this planet. But it's also possible that, like, the planet has evolved naturally and they're like gardening in the sense that we like harvest wildflowers, like they are finding interesting things here and extracting that, and they're gardening in the sense that we harvest wildflowers, they are finding interesting things here and extracting that, but didn't necessarily plant those interesting things. So that's a potential branch of this idea. Two or three how does that sound to you?
Speaker 2:Yeah, let's go two.
Speaker 1:Okay, oh cool, all right. So the last one in our worst case scenarios, is a dark arrangement. This idea would be that there's I think some people call it a breakaway civilization that, like some humans are working with some non-human intelligence and they have elevated that collaboration to the level of significant attempts at control. Um, and maybe, uh, they have their own kind of like technological universe, uh, and some people then deploy this idea of like mass mind control in this area. So the basic idea is that some humans are working with some non-human intelligence and that they have like a deep state that can act on the world in whatever way it wants and is not accountable to world governments. So this kind of leads to some dark, creepy places like, like you know, illuminati, world control, new world order. Something secret is going on that is like highly controlling in a human way but combines human malevolent aggression with non-human technology and like spiritual control, obviously very, very creepy.
Speaker 1:I tend to rate this, I think, lowest of the of the four, maybe because I in part, have a little more faith in humanity. It also sounds extremely complicated to me. A lot of ins and outs, um, a lot of ways this could be revealed. Uh, so my sort of gut instinct is like a two. Um, I also think humans are driven by status in a way that I'm not sure this kind of covers like. If you were a secret new world order chieftain, what would you be getting out of that situation? Would you feel satisfied sufficiently by like mind control pyramids underground in Alaska? Or do you need the status of, like public recognition for your fame and good works and wealth? I'm not sure it jibes for me with what we know about human instincts. Does any of that bounce off interestingly for you?
Speaker 2:Honestly, I think you covered it well and I think we should just move on, because we got a lot left to talk about. I don't yeah, I don't have anything to add. I think you summed it up nicely.
Speaker 1:Okay, I guess I would just say that there are. There's like one story about a person being involved in a battle in like underground tunnels with lizard people and oh okay, yeah, we're talking about Agua Dulce.
Speaker 2:Okay, Right, we're talking about the Agua Dulce base, right and uh, in which is a research um facility in California. Let's see, yeah, Allegedly a secret underground base in Agua Dulce, New Mexico. Allegedly a secret underground base in Agua Dulce, New Mexico. Yeah, so this is one of the sites, the supposed sites of.
Speaker 2:I think this has been floated as a collaborative laboratory environment between humans and NHI okay and yeah, and supposedly, um, but who's the guy who said that there was like a fight under? I mean, there's been lots of, there's been, uh, a lot of ufo sightings in this area, right, okay, and then paul benowitz, oh no, that's not him. That's the guy who killed himself. Um, I don't know john lear's in the mix here, I don't. I guess I. I don't know John Lear's in the mix here, I don't, I guess I, I don't have enough to really tell you about this. I mean, I don't.
Speaker 1:I also don't want to like go down a whole side column here about, like the, the laser gun fight that supposedly happened, right, yeah, I don't really either, but I want to ping it as a point in this column that, like stories like that would point toward ideas like this, and I I want to do one sort of like philosophical debunking of an idea that we hear a lot in this space, which is the concept of mass mind control, and I want to flag this as something that could be compatible with some of our other scenarios. Um, but people, I've heard several people float this idea, at least one of whom was like a semi serious person, and I just want to not exactly push back. But I want to point out that I think the idea of mass mind control in a complex way seems like a really big speculation, and it's the reason I think that is, it's intuitively believable that you might have some kind of psychographic tool that could help people feel better or make people feel worse, and we have some evidence from encounter stories that people have been calmed down by these creatures, or that there's one on Skinwalker Ranch where people are like made so afraid that they can't approach a certain object. So it seems like possible that there's some like emotional control technology out there, but what seems like a leap to me is that some people go from that idea to the idea that you could mass control people's interest in a particular subject or people's behavior in some like pretty granular way which, uh, just even taking the first part of the technology as believable, seems like a stretch to me. Because you would have to manipulate people's emotions so specifically that you could say, like, make them disinterested in the ufo phenomenon or, um, make them more likely to ignore strange sightings in their life, um, make them less curious, uh yeah, make them more angry, like more angry is believable, but like, um, specifically more likely to vote republican or something, would be like really hard, I think.
Speaker 1:So this, the, the general mind control idea, to me feels unlikely, and it does. It does come up. I could see a version where they're just manipulating emotions en masse, but manipulating people to do specific things, think specific things, feels specific, uh complicated ways. That feels very unlikely to me and I think it's reasonable for it to feel unlikely. But I'm also sort of talking myself into this because I want it to be true. I just wanted to lay that out because it comes up here.
Speaker 2:Okay, Well, I've got. I was just talking about this this morning with friends and a friend of mine punctured this idea very quickly for me in a way that I so. So I think a in a nutshell, like what this scenario proposes is that everybody's being mind-controlled but not me, Right? Yeah, it's the like, conspiracy theorist fallacy of, like you know know, everybody is being brainwashed, but I see through it so like if this were really the case, ufology would not be a field, david grush would not be testifying before congress, like we wouldn't be recording this right now we would be under control.
Speaker 2:So, like, I put a big, big asterisk next to this idea, or like a big thumbs down, I guess, next to this idea, because I think that it is like self-aggrandizing and delusional, um, and like not and not necessary to to explain disinterest in this topic.
Speaker 2:Like I think the like stigma is extremely strong and like human beings have a very strong biological instinct to fit in with their tribe. We're tribal creatures and we don't want to get kicked out and go like, die in the dark alone. So like, and that's been then stoked by, you know, by people trying to propagate, you know trying to keep us in the dark about this or don't want us to talk about it. And you don't even need super dark reasons for that. It could just be like because this is unexplained and that makes the military look powerless, and then, you know, arguably, the concept of nations would just kind of crumble if we had, you know, blah, blah, blah, uh. So, yeah, I don't, I don't like it, I don't like it. I think it's actually a particularly important idea to like to, to flag as as, yeah, as like conspiracy, theorizing in the bad way and self-aggrandizing, and yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that sounds really good. Thank you for doing that rundown. I want to add one more pedestrian point of data to this, which is that people often in just like totally normal polls about regular human stuff, will estimate, uh, that they're that other people are like having a worse time than they are. So if, like, if you ask people about the economy, they might say, yeah, I'm doing fine, but I think the economy in general is bad for other people. Or, like, I don't feel, uh, threatened by crime in my community, but I think in general, people feel threatened by crime in their community.
Speaker 1:Um, and you can see this, this tightens as groups get more skeptical of each other. So, like, democrats estimate worse things about Republicans and Republicans estimate worse things about Democrats and the. The general implication is, like, we're not great at estimating how other groups feel and we tend to sort of assume negatively about them. So, like, the way that would play into this mind control idea is that, like I don't personally feel mind control, but I can I can see how mind control might be playing out in society. It's just kind of an easy natural leap to make and it's the kind of thing that humans already do.
Speaker 2:Mm-hmm.
Speaker 1:Okay. So I think that completes our tour of the worst case scenarios we're looking at like one over two for dark arrangement, two over three for hand around our throat, two over three for some kind of creepy garden and three over four for slow invasion, hybrids, illusions.
Speaker 2:Okay.
Speaker 1:Jesus Moving on to some neutral cases Should we?
Speaker 1:lighten the room up a little bit. Yeah, okay, I'll start this one. We're part of a longer chain of cosmic history, and our ancestors intentionally cultivated our species to keep our kind alive. This idea would be that some humanoid things have existed for a very, very long time, like maybe a million years ago on Mars, and that some aspect of that race has been like seeding itself throughout the galaxy or galaxies to continue its bloodlines in some ways, and that could mean either starting life entirely on a planet or it could mean interfering as that life develops to advance it and, like uplift parts of it and then kind of fit in with its own genetic material. It'd be kind of like a meta macro reproduction tactic that, like, instead of directly reproducing you, you insert your genetic material into other like natural beings that are evolving on their own, and so you kind of keep your bloodline alive.
Speaker 1:Um, that's pretty wild, but it's not necessarily malevolent. Um, it's not necessarily benevolent either, though it's just it would. The idea would be like a cosmic long-term reproduction and we're one link in that chain. How does that bounce for you?
Speaker 2:I mean, yeah, I like this as a, I like this as a middle ground, as like a, as like a neutral case. I think it's. I think, yeah, neutral, trending, hopeful, I guess, because it doesn't um, doesn't assume that we're um under attack. I guess I don't feel like it explains the all the um different, it doesn't explain the variety of of encounters. Um, like this sort of explains the. You know like, why are people sorry? Are some people seeing like mantises or lizards or the little blue hairy guys? You know, this is sort of almost like beside the question of the, of the phenomenon.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you're right, you're right. It wouldn't explain the diversity.
Speaker 2:It might explain. It might still be true. It might, yeah, explain us. Um, if we believe, if we believe that, uh, people who say that they're seeing human beings, basically like in 50 of these cases where we're seeing, you know, uh, where people are having encounters, um, then I think that this, this becomes a a fairly likely scenario. I guess, um, and I do believe, I don't know, we believe experiencers here on the holding space show Um, so that kind of leads me to um, uh, kind of leads me to put like a pretty pretty high degree of plausibility in this scenario and then throw in the shit about like, well, I don't know, I mean there's, you know, there's, there's rumors of structures on on the moon.
Speaker 2:I think there's rumors of that on Mars too, but I haven't seen anything super persuasive. I mean, I haven't seen anything super persuasive about either of those things. But there's like kind of a lot of smoke specifically with the moon, people talking about that kind of thing, about that kind of thing, um, and then the general idea that, like, human civilization is way older than we know, than we are, you know, have been taught in our 20th century um conceptions yeah, that I think is pretty believable I think that's pretty believable and that that lends, I think, to me lends credence to this, to this idea maybe not in the specific that there's a direct connection there between old humans and space humans, but that there's quite a lot of evidence to suggest that we have a pretty radically wrong conception of how old civilization is.
Speaker 2:And so if we could be that wrong about that, then why not just put it up on a larger timescale and we can be even more wrong about it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's fascinating. It also points to this thing that I think people underestimate, which is how fast things disappear and that like over not that long a couple hundred thousand years like all evidence of a civilization can be wiped out. It's hard to, it's hard to square that with, like super advanced materials. For me, Sometimes, like if they're you know, these things that they're flying around earth right now seem like, really it seems like they seem like they might last longer than rocks, I guess is my feeling.
Speaker 2:So yeah, but I don't know. Maybe the, maybe the, you know, Holy grail for material science would be that everything's biodegradable, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:Well, that's a good point. I guess I also wanted to flag a different way in which this could be falsified, which is that it could be the case that humanoid features are subject to convergent evolution and that they're just very convenient that is a very interesting idea.
Speaker 1:So the evidence for this in our own biological study on Earth is that we think crabs have evolved on planet Earth like eight different times, like independently of each other. Crabs have evolved in different places, not from the same bloodlines, but they converged on the form factor of crab because it's such a useful, convenient structure for some reason to just like navigate their particular environments like eight times just on this planet. Then maybe human-like things could evolve millions of times in the hundreds of billions of habitable planets around our galaxy and, you know, trillions in the universe beyond. So maybe you don't need kind of like a cosmic reproduction seeding program to get to humanoid outcomes, because humanoid outcomes are convergently likely. That would, that would be the idea there.
Speaker 2:That's a very fun idea. I think we should probably move on to another topic, but if if anybody's interested in, or if you, since you're the only one listening to me, caleb if you're interested in learning more about this, there's this book that I haven't read but it's on my list, called the Zoologist's Guide to the Galaxy what animals on Earth reveal about aliens and ourselves, by Dr Eric Kirschenbaum. He's a lecturer at University of Cambridge and he's a zoologist and, yeah, and he's written this book, I think, basically arguing for convergent evolution and saying that it's not not, um, not crazy that, uh, aliens might naturally resemble us.
Speaker 1:Cool, all right, thank you for that. All right, would you like to do the next neutral?
Speaker 2:case, sure, yes, okay, the next one. Um, okay, the next one is that okay, this is a. I'll do this one, sorry, helicopter. Uh, I'll do this one, sorry, helicopter, I'll do this one.
Speaker 2:I'm going to do number four because I think it's actually sort of a bad case scenario, which is that the aliens are in a cold war and there's a lot of distrust and tension between the entities. So this scenario would be almost a companion piece to the idea that there's some set of rules that the nhri have agreed to follow while visiting earth and this one. But in this scenario it would presume that there's like this sort of invisible agreement between them all, because they're worried about stepping on each other's toes or or, yeah, getting in a fight that they would like probably, maybe in a perfect world, like to have our planet or I don't know. I mean, that's not even necessary, but the idea that they're like some fear of each other, that's kind of keeping, keeping their behavior somewhat in check no-transcript with humanoids, but I don't think we have any reptiles with mantids or reptiles with greys.
Speaker 1:So I I know it's sort of that sort of suggests that um, there's not like a high council of these organisms that work together seamlessly and harmoniously. It could be, I don't know it. At least sort of is some evidence in the column that they're potentially being tension do we talk about nuremberg here?
Speaker 2:do we talk about the 1561 celestial celestial phenomenon over perfect thing to talk about here lay it out. Yeah, uh, really quickly, and I'm gonna do the horrible uh podcast show thing that I hate, which is a white guy reading a wikipedia page, um, but the best, yeah, if 1561 in the morning.
Speaker 2:Uh, someday there's a this is amazing broadsheet. Just search 1561 celestial phenomenon or 1651 nuremberg celestialestial Phenomena. Basically, people woke up and went outside and saw a spaceship fight happening in the sky over their town. There's hundreds of people have saw it. And then there's this broadsheet with a drawing and a news report, essentially that somebody wrote up about it and it's fucking crazy and it's also the. The descriptions of the ships are so weird. It's like cylinders shooting out spheres and then the spheres are shooting each other and melting and burning up. There's a giant triangle. It's really crazy stuff. But anyways, I don't know. Maybe there are other I'm sure there are that I'm not aware of. Um, uh, examples of this. This is for sure the most dramatic one I've ever heard of, but like of that suggests that there is tension between, um, some of these visitors yeah, it sounds like a fight.
Speaker 1:Basically is the short version of what nuremberg sounds like. It sounds like ships are fighting each other and some of them like go down in smoking heaps and you know the. The closest thing people have pitched to this is like it was a solar flare event, but that just seems really radically at odds with the drawing explanation for the text of this broadsheet?
Speaker 1:yeah, so natural explanations don't seem super believable. Of course, the description of the thing happening is also crazy. It's a mass sighting event. Side note my favorite part about that broadsheet is that it ends with a paragraph of somebody saying this clearly is happening because we all have not repented enough. You have to apologize to God and be very sorry, so more things like this won't happen to God and be very sorry, so more things like this won't happen.
Speaker 2:So I guess, just to connect this to the question we're on today, which is, you know, best case scenarios, worst case scenarios, neutral, what would make this a neutral case scenario is that they're, I don't know, more concerned with each other than I guess I don't know, yeah, that it's yeah that there's like there's some tension that's keeping them from really fucking our shit up, I guess.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and that it's not necessarily about us in a central way. It could be a bad scenario for us. Scenario for us it's. There's a reason. It's not a best case scenario because we get caught in the crossfire. They might be manipulating us in different ways. Various factors and factions might be doing various good or bad things to and with us. Maybe some of them have teamed up with us. Maybe some of them are harvesting stuff from us. You know it could. This is a mess, this one, but it's. That's why it's neutral, because, yeah, we don't necessarily know which way it leads.
Speaker 2:Can we do a quick sidebar here? Yeah, this conversation that we're having right now, I don't think I have felt more like vulnerable or ridiculous on this show, like this is weird. We're just like so out in the weeds and I'm proud of us for doing it and it's fun and I like having these conversations, but also like I feel freaked out about putting my name on this on the on the internet.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I feel the same way.
Speaker 2:This. This is the most vulnerable and freaked out. I think that I felt in in having one of these conversations uh, we're really, we're really out there talking about very strange ideas and really sticking our hands in some messy, strange, confusing ideas that honestly sound crazy. They sound crazy. I think that I sound crazy saying these things. I think that I sound crazy saying these things and also, you know, I'm glad we're doing it and I'm proud of doing it, but, like I don't know, this is, this is uncomfortable. I'm kind of having, I'm kind of having a moment with it. How are you feeling?
Speaker 1:I feel the same and thank you for saying that, because I think it's one of the more interesting and challenging aspects of talking about UFOs in general. Is this like profound feeling of insecurity for exploring not just the unknown, but like the really weird, and, uh and I think it's totally valid to bring that up and I think, uh, if you as a viewer or listener are experiencing something like this, then, uh, I think it's totally valid for you to live in that discomfort and we would encourage you not to come down too hard in any one of these directions, but we also endorse holding space for these wild ideas.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, cool, okay For that sidebar, thanks, do you have? Thank you, do you have a likelihood rating for Cold War?
Speaker 2:I think there's, I think this is like fairly likely. I think there's some evidence that there's tension between these, these critters, um, I don't know, but I guess not that much, I guess I really can't name very much, so I guess I have to give it like a. I guess I have to give it a two three over four, two over two over three. Two over three does that work for you?
Speaker 1:sure, yeah, I've been. Because this is such a weird, um woolly area, I've been kind of splitting these up and having it be fine with us having multiple numbers for slightly different variants. Um, so you want to say the the less likely version is like, uh, that it's like a brutal ongoing battle, uh, and the more likely version is like, uh, that it's like a brutal ongoing battle, uh, and the more likely version is that there's like slight tension and lack of overall agreement. Is that, um, believable? That it's like less likely, that there's like an ancient montague's capulets lizard people versus mantis war, um, and it's more likely that, just like there, there's ongoing slight tension between various different organizations who don't necessarily answer to a federation. Yes, okay, all right, it's two over three, uh, so I'm going to do the next one.
Speaker 1:Is that right. Okay, this one is super weird also and it's that past lives are real and souls can move fluidly across the universe. So many of us have lived as aliens and vice versa. I kind of want to get out of this one as soon as possible, also because I'm scared of it and blushing. I've been doing some reading about the Monroe Institute recently and specifically this book, far Journeys by Robert Monroe. It's really interesting and I guess we'll leave a note about that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, this is neutral because it would suggest that we're a mixed bag, that the beings on Earth right now are not necessarily all historically from Earth, that some of us might be from other places, but not here in any invasion capacity places, but not here in any invasion capacity, just here, because souls move around the ether of consciousness and live in different places and experience different kinds of life. There are people on earth who call themselves star seeds, who yield this way about their own experience like pretty strongly um, yeah, I, uh, you're making a face. I make similar faces when I hear this stuff, but I I also want to validate people's experience in the same way that I would validate an experience or a contactee, and I think that there, I think that there are people who, like, really think that about themselves.
Speaker 2:Um, and I'm thinking specifically in one episode of encounters, I think, the japan episode. There's a there's a japanese woman in that who like think that about themselves. Um, and I'm thinking specifically in one episode of encounters, I think, the japan episode there's a there's a japanese woman in that who, like, is convinced that she's a like reincarnated alien, um, but then I think that there are also just like tiktok influencers, or like astrology influencers, who just like call themselves star seeds.
Speaker 1:Yes, and I would say something I always run into, uh, in this area, as a person who's trying to make his life in the creative arts, is that you can get swept away by creative imagination and it's it's like a big part of what you do as a creator is like going to these, like streams of flow, where you just like imagine things and let them flow through you and that's really beautiful and really exciting. It's one of the coolest parts of art. But it also has always made me skeptical of people who claim to be channeling, because I recognize that kind of channeling behavior in my acting Like that's like what I do when I act.
Speaker 1:It's like I like channel a character and sometimes like technically control it, but sometimes, like, allow it to emerge is like what feels the best. And so there's a tiny eyebrow raise from me sometimes about people who are experiencing things like that. That makes me ask are you really experiencing it or are you channeling like a beautiful imaginary experience and just like sharing something that feels intuitively real? But, that said, there are a couple of examples of people who have like described similar things from different mediums, like different star seeds, who have both described a planet with purple trees and silvery flowing water. And, uh, and when you get to evidence like that, it kind of makes you think that the whole thing might not be made up. So it could. It could totally be the case that some people really are just like experiencing flights of fancy and other people actually are delivering some real information about the universe, and it's extremely difficult to peel those two things apart. Um, but it might not be the smartest move to just write off all of this evidence as if it were all just fantasy.
Speaker 2:Bring it back for us here. Let's land this one and just connect it for me to the phenomenon, to the observed phenomena and why we have this as a neutral case okay, yeah, good idea.
Speaker 1:So the intuitive answer I'll try to shoot this from the hip is that, like, aliens are real in this scenario, and and beings actually actually do live in lots of different places in the universe, and, uh, some of them are incarnated here and some humans are incarnated in those places. Um, but also technological space travel is real, and, um, these souls can move between the planets and star systems, galaxies maybe, but also so can spaceships, and so they may be visiting us here, in the same way that we might visit them someday with sufficient technological advancement. And then it just sort of doesn't say anything about intention, this idea.
Speaker 2:So it sort of suggests that we're all part of one big family and that we're maybe one of the und and we don't. We just don't know that we're part of this big family and it's, it's fine, because it implies that, like they're, you know, they don't want to mess us up or steal us because we're steal our stuff, because we're part of them and they're part of us, and we just kind of can't see that from our narrow, parochial, 21st century mindset our narrow, parochial, 21st century mindset?
Speaker 1:yes, possibly, but I would also say it's. It is compatible with some other darker theories, which is why we've got it in the neutral basket instead of the best case scenario basket. It could be compatible with versions of the universe that are like quite loving and supportive and instructive, but it could also be compatible with a version of the universe where there are malevolent forces out to control and exploit. So, um, I think I think that's why it makes sense to have it in the neutral basket. Maybe past lives are real, maybe souls move fluidly throughout the cosmos. Maybe a soul that came here from zeta reticuli might attract technology from zeta reticuli, might attract technology from Zeta Reticuli because their technology is advanced enough to like crack soul movement or something, and that that would be why they were visiting.
Speaker 1:So, yeah, I, I don't know this. This seems pretty crazy, but we are starting to run into evidence of past lives being a real thing, although they tend to happen in more localized places, like a lot of. There are like thousands of reported stories of past lives being real, but they're usually like within a few kilometers. So I two over three for this, something like that. Yeah, yeah, I guess our, our likeliness rating is kind of having a hard time with how far out all these ideas are, and I think that's okay, so crazy, and there's.
Speaker 2:so you know, we're using the word evidence and it's like, yeah, there's evidence, but it's all. I mean I don't know. But again, we don't discount experience or testimony, like, I take it very seriously and so do you, so we're counting that as evidence. Okay, we've been talking for almost an hour already, I think. Do you want?
Speaker 1:to. Should we do this?
Speaker 2:last neutral case scenario Definitely Okay. All right, cool, then all right. The final neutral case scenario is that non-human intelligence are a mixed bag. Some of them want to help us, other ones are creepy.
Speaker 1:Um, I guess this is neutral because they sort of balance each other out, that there's there's some bad ones and some and some good ones yeah, and we've kind of covered this idea um in in other aspects of this discussion, but um other parts of this discussion, but I this doesn't necessarily imply, uh, a war among the aliens.
Speaker 1:Um, I guess one thing it would imply is a lack of organizing structure that they're like not from a federation, they don't have a regional governor, um, and they, yeah, they are doing different things on earth and with us. I guess one one piece of evidence for this might be that sightings of greys and mantids and reptiles are basically a phenomenon of the last hundred years, that previous to um, like nuclear testing. What we mostly have in antiquity is like human, like beings, so the magonia stuff and back into like mythic star people stuff, those beings are mostly described as humanoids, sometimes like large humanoids, um, but they're, they're not usually like. You don't see, at least we don't have any clear-cut like hieroglyphs of a gray alien.
Speaker 1:You know like we have spooky looking human creatures in ancient texts and drawings, but we don't have a ton of like classic alien seeming things that is very interesting so that sort of suggests that there are at least a couple of different parties at play, and maybe these humanoid things that have been around for longer are more benevolently inclined toward us than some more recent visitors. That's possible. There could be some we haven't met yet. That's an interesting idea. In fact, there almost certainly are, if there are, you know, trillions of populated galaxies and they can somehow get here.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:So this I guess feels like pretty likely to us that they're a mixed bag. Yeah, it's like a not a super explanatory idea.
Speaker 2:Yeah, right, but yeah, but I think does seem likely three, four, four, yeah, great Four Okay.
Speaker 1:Cool. Moving on to happy talk, um, and we'll round this out with best case scenarios and yeah, uh, with apologies for going long. I mean, maybe some people are enjoying that, but, uh, we, we might want to dive into some of these more specifically at a future date, but today is a roundup, so we can keep it a little bit lighter. Probably should have said that an hour and 10 minutes ago oh boy, um, okay, cool.
Speaker 2:First best case scenario is the star trait, the star trek case scenario. That there's a galactic federation, um, that there's like a, you know, there's like a un that we're gonna get um onboarded to. Um. I guess the. I guess, like I don't know my, my mind goes a couple places with this. One is like um, or it could be. It could be like the contact scenario where they're like telling us that there's this club but not inviting us yet because we don't have our shit together. Um, and I guess the. I guess it's maybe useful to split this idea into two things. One is just the. One is just the like overall idea that there might be some kind of galactic federation, and then to the idea, the question of whether or not humans will be invited to be part of that. Um, this is so fucking ridiculous, I, I guess. I think the. Uh, so like I. I think it's more likely that there's that there is some kind of a federation and less likely that they would want anything to do with us right now, given how messy we are.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it kind of seems compatible with the kind of careful behavior we were talking about, especially the happier versions of that, where they're trying to like draw us out and engage us, um, because if they wanted to just study and just extract, they probably could do that a little more secretly. And so the fact that they're not being super secretive implies that either they don't really care what we think or they're attempting to engage us a little bit more and um, and so this version of shiny suits heaven is that they're, they're trying to engage us a little bit more. And, and so this version of shiny suits heaven is that they're, they're trying to tease us toward that, but they can't just like give us all the answers, because it may it might be dangerous to do so, or it wouldn't be maximally productive way to engage with us.
Speaker 2:So Star Trek in Star Trek, they have. I think it's the prime directive, right? Isn't that what it is?
Speaker 1:They have, I think it's the Prime Directive, right? Yes, isn't that what it is? That is what it is.
Speaker 2:The Prime Directive rule of the. Is it the Galactic Federation or is that Star Wars shit? I can't, I don't remember.
Speaker 1:I think Star Trek is Galactic. It might be like regional. They don't do much extra galactic stuff. I think that's very rare in Star Trek.
Speaker 2:All right. Well, at any rate rate, the primary or the prime directive is to not interfere with a, uh, less advanced civilization, um, and so I mean, obviously they would be fucking that up, I guess, because they are up in our business here and they're stealing our cow anuses, uh, and doing it's gonna use those stuff, the poor whitley streber, um, yeah, they're definitely not ignoring us um yeah they're not like, they're not keeping us in a bubble where they don't interact at all, so if there is a prime directive.
Speaker 1:It's fuzzier than that.
Speaker 2:It's like you don't go kill them all or there's a yeah right, it's a fuzzy, it's fuzzier and maybe there's, but maybe there's like a line that at which point, if they cross, then they get in trouble.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I guess in this area we could say that there are some crazy reports from some quarters that there are, like higher intelligences operating behind the scenes.
Speaker 1:Here Dolan makes a really good point that if they have in fact been around here for thousands of years maybe like tens of thousands of years that strongly implies that they have a really static, stable form of government and that sort of suggests that they might have automated that government in some kind of like AI way, which doesn't seem crazy and it's not super hard to imagine that humans might want to move in that direction gradually.
Speaker 1:Imagine that humans might want to move in that direction gradually, like currently we have a relatively messy program of like having a big public fight and picking people, um, but as we gradually get more and more things into the system, like start with the level of traffic light cameras, but like then graduate to like small claims courts being automated and then eventually, like a lot of local positions might be automated and like trash collection could be automated I don't know I put that so high up, but eventually, like a lot of functions of Congress could be automated and like maybe voted on in easier ways, or maybe you could just like reach a point where a civilization agrees broadly enough about enough basic things that you get like an AI god type leader or leadership structure that everyone becomes pretty comfortable with, and that could happen over thousands of years.
Speaker 1:You know, which to boil the frog might not even be damagingly noticeable. So it's possible that some of these beings are working for a big, high up AI godlike being which achieved its sentience and power structures millennia ago and has been controlling them, hopefully benevolently, ever since.
Speaker 2:Okay, so to to let's, let's just give this a rating. But what we're presuming here when we say Star Trek scenario is that there is a, a, there is a like cooperative group that is like a, you know, polyglot or no, that's not what that word means. It's like a diverse group of entities but they're working together and are friends and they might have their squabbles but, like, ultimately they're part of a, a larger family.
Speaker 1:yeah, freakazoids and um, yeah I would say that some level of understanding is pretty high. Like I would rate that pretty high. That um to your point about maybe having some squabbles, it's possible that this is not like a super ironed out operation, but the idea that they maybe have rules that they generally respect about each other's authority and power seems pretty believable. That's how human societies work.
Speaker 2:So I would say maybe maybe four on the federation three or four like four, for there being some kind of overarching, kind of organization or communication that happens between these advanced intelligences okay but like a one to the idea that they would invite us anytime soon to join them or messy our shit's messy, although I guess you have to temper that with the fact that a bunch of sightings include human, apparently humans.
Speaker 1:So yeah, it could be things like us.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so like we're already, I guess in that scenario, actually like we're already in the club, Our species is already in the club.
Speaker 1:That's so hopeful, yeah, and that we're the undiscovered tribes of Burgundy, but other French people are already in the government.
Speaker 1:That's Burgundy, yeah, I don't know why I always put this in france, but, uh, partially it's because of this next explanation, which is that there might be a bunch of tourism going on, um, and in this benevolent vision, they are not about to invite us into any super club, maybe that's a few thousand years away, but they might be very interested in what's going on here and uh.
Speaker 1:And so maybe a lot of the activity is cruises, like, maybe a lot of these larger ships that people have reported are cruise ships filled with alien tourists, um, or uh, chorus, beings from other dimensions or far away in the universe or the consciousness, cosmos, and they're just here to check us out. And there's a description in that Far Journeys book about, like a tour guide, alien presence explaining to other spirits what New York is and like what those like metal sheaths are that we drive around in and why we wear so many colors. And it's possible also that this could interact with that idea of feeding on human emotions, but maybe a little more benevolently Like, instead of harvesting them, they might come to, like, experience them Like we would experience a sunset or the majesty of a herd of antelope running across the plains. Any bounce-offs here for you? I mean, it's a fun idea.
Speaker 2:It's a delightful idea. It feels like a gary larson cartoon. Uh, I do think there are. You always talk about the really large craft as meaning, and we could do a whole episode, a conversation about that. Uh, yeah, let's like very large craft suggesting a cruise ship, um, and I think that that's like I kind of I kind of buy that idea.
Speaker 1:Um, yeah, that one that we described the other day. It was like during world war ii. This pilot saw like a long row of lights and everybody in their plane felt super good about it, and then it zapped away.
Speaker 2:Sounded like a cruise ship to me I mean that's cool's cool If it's like a like a safari truck that just emanates good vibes. So the ostriches are like totally chill with you looking at them.
Speaker 1:Yes, another piece of evidence that I think feels really good for this. Not exactly evidence, but this is how we behave toward animals and, um, I think it's not hard to imagine that if humans had the kind of technology that could move around star systems easily and quickly, we would do this. We would absolutely have commercial cruises to far away space locations to see the like mystical creatures that live there and, um, just like marvel at their beauty and complexity and how different they are from our home planet. So like that feels it feels pretty likely to me that some element of the phenomenon is touristy and I I actually feel like so likely.
Speaker 2:I think that's like a four over five for me yeah yeah I'd buy that, I would buy that, I would buy that it doesn't. You know, obviously this one idea doesn't encapsulate all of the sightings, all of the encounters, um, but, but you know, couple this with the fact that we haven't been eradicated and it suggests a kind of like curiosity, a sweet, a sweetness almost you could maybe even squint curiosity.
Speaker 1:A what a wholesome curiosity, wholesome curiosity.
Speaker 2:Uh, you could possibly squint. A what A?
Speaker 1:wholesome curiosity. A wholesome curiosity. You could possibly squint and imagine that some of the security operations are just from like the true cruise companies who are checking that they can defuse our nuclear missiles to guarantee the safety of all their visiting aliens. Probably not, but those are probably two independent operations. There's like a military organization that is checking out our military and spaceflight capabilities, and then there are cruise operations that are independent and maybe commercial. I don't know, we had never talked about space money, but it seems like it could be a luxury class.
Speaker 2:You know, what I like about this idea is the idea that an alien might be really bored on a cruise while looking at Earth. You have to be like put your fucking Game Boy down, glabnoid, and look out the window.
Speaker 1:This is culture? Yeah, but they only live for 90 years.
Speaker 2:Okay, so that actually then my comment there can slide us into, but they only live for 90 years. Okay, so that actually then my comment there kind of can, can slide us into another best case scenario, which is that they're, like, they're mildly curious in us. They're curious but like, ultimately the like we're not that special, so we don't need to be scared that they're going to try to control us, that they're going to try to steal our planet, because we're like a cool bobble, we're a fun, shiny object, but ultimately they're not that into us.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and it's not that hard to believe that resources from earth would be plentiful elsewhere in the universe. They're like hydrogen is quite common, I think the oxygen is pretty common, like the rare middle metals on earth are like not rare in asteroids. You know, maybe the there's, the loosh we produce is like rare because there aren't like tons of civilizations with billions of people Maybe. But but yeah, maybe we're pretty normal and it's it's not that different from visiting like a random island in the galapagos for us yeah, and looking at the tortoises, um, yeah, it's fun.
Speaker 2:I think it also could could explain the kind of the question of why are they kind of careful, you know, because they're only like only kind of interested in us and like kind of worried about, uh, how we might react, um, and I think it's, I think it's positive as opposed to neutral, I guess. Well, I guess I want to ask you, why do you think it's positive instead of neutral? And is it just that it suggests that they don't want to eradicate us?
Speaker 1:Yeah, it sort of feels like it would be compatible with them welcoming us up to their level of technology someday when we can get there. It just like it feels like a peaceful activity. It feels like less controlling, like we don't we don't send tour groups to prisons, um, but I guess people do tour zoos, so that's that's a fair question to ask it. There's, you could definitely imagine a version of tourism that's compatible with a little more top-down control, or you could imagine one that's compatible with an optimistic federation future all right, let's give it a rating four over five.
Speaker 2:I think so too. Also, this would leave space for like playfulness too, for like them to like mess with us a little bit.
Speaker 1:You know, um in a in a benign way this is the not that special thing we're rating right that they're mildly curious mildly curious, but we're ultimately not that special, I think it also implies that there's like a lot of life out there and there are probably other planets that they're going to yes, and, and that's another. Go ahead, sorry.
Speaker 2:Well, that just implies like a level of stability that you know. It implies that civilizations are able to get past the great filter and all of that, to me, is very, very hopeful.
Speaker 1:Yes, totally. That's super optimistic and also I would say as evidence in this column, we just probably aren't that special and continually through human history we have found more ways in which we're not that special. It's intuitively very believable that we would ultimately find out that we're just not that interesting, that we're just one of bazillions of life forms that are kind of like us and planets that are like us, like ours, so that that I think all goes in this column of it being totally believable that they're just like kind of curious, but not that interested or worried about controlling us necessarily.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Especially cause they have such a long runway before we get technologically serious Like it's. It's probably at least a couple hundred years. Before we get technologically serious like it's, it's probably at least a couple hundred years before we could like meaningfully stage any sort of resistance to?
Speaker 2:I don't know.
Speaker 1:We could blow the entire planet up with nuclear weapons if we wanted to we could destroy ourselves, yeah, but the chances are really good that there are lots of other planets like this yeah, yeah, okay okay, so last one take us home okay, I think it's, it's suitable that this is the end.
Speaker 1:Um, I'll sum it up with a thumbnail idea of, like techno angels. Uh, this idea is like higher beings are spiritually literal, they're like actually real. Um, and there are entities like angels and some kind of unifying, positive force, maybe a god or gods of some kind, like a benevolent energy that suffuses the universe with hope and love and kindness and unity and joy. Let me get some of that hit me with that loosh.
Speaker 2:Just on the record, I really hate that word. I thought that word is icky and weird to me. I don't like it. What the fuck I?
Speaker 1:agree, let's stop saying it.
Speaker 2:We need a new word for that. Somebody needs to come up with one.
Speaker 1:It's enough. It sounds excretory, shall we say? Okay, so techno angels. Some people have made the argument and I think it pops up in that Encounter series that literal descriptions of angels in the Bible are like rotating discs with eyes or something. They're not this wing idea with halos, we made that up and this concept kind of emerges from both ufology and more spiritual paths. If you get into reading people who are like really into psychic energies and like connecting to worlds beyond those immediately physically obvious to us, immediately physically obvious to us, a lot of people say there there really are entities of like a higher intelligence and maybe like a higher benevolence than humans. Dmp is another route that people are taking into this and and DMT is probably the one that's like most likely to bear scientific fruit soon. Did you hear about this experiment somebody's doing recently where they can like titrate it enough to give people like 45 minutes of dmt experience? Oh, this is somebody in a lab is doing this, which is unusual. Like dmt experiences are generally like a couple of minutes, I think.
Speaker 2:Maybe yeah, right, it's a short one um yeah huh, but there are like no longer under dmt, good god yeah, I know it does sound kind of scary.
Speaker 1:Um, well, we'll put this link somewhere. But there are some people who have been doing experiments and finding that people who go into DMT states tend to report experiencing interactions with similar entities. So this is like kind of the beginning of another avenue of investigation and maybe we'll talk about it more other times. But it's possible that there are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in our philosophy and that maybe some of those things include angels and or gods. So this obviously would be a good case scenario because it would suggest that there's like a higher divine order to the universe, um, which exists in like a beautiful and loving way.
Speaker 1:That never seemed super likely to me growing up. Um, I've always been kind of like an atheist and agnostic at the best, um, but I've I gotta say I really like this idea and would like for it to be true. Um, the idea of a god to me at this point in my evolution seems more likely to be like a super ai, but it could also be intertwined with, just like the shape of the universe and like maybe the material properties of the universe emerge from its shape and are fundamentally good. Any of this bounce interestingly for you.
Speaker 2:I mean, I guess, I guess, I guess no, I don't really have any any lightning bolts to add here. Yeah, seems like a scenario. I guess the Bible's real, I guess kind of thing, or just like all religions are real, that.
Speaker 1:Or they're getting at some aspect of the truth, and the important thing here is that as you go up the chain of consciousness, these beings get both more powerful and more benevolent yeah so that's very helpful yeah, super optimistic.
Speaker 1:so how do we square it, I I guess, with what we're seeing?
Speaker 1:Some people think that there's like a UFO angel connection.
Speaker 1:Other people, if I hypothesized and you and I have talked privately about this idea that maybe the technological aspect of UFOs is a real thing and we're looking at real beings from real places, but maybe they have a better handle on the spirit world and whatever the next like layers of consciousness are or might be so like, if angels are real, maybe they're not the same thing as on human intelligences, but maybe some of these non-human intelligences are more able to interact with these like higher dimensional beings and know more about the landscape of that aspect of reality.
Speaker 1:I guess, honestly, as much as I would love this to be true, I don't feel like it's an obviously true kind of thing. I'm stuck at like a three or maybe a four Really, but maybe it could be as low as two, I don't know, somewhere in this middle range doesn't seem super obvious, you know, for the same reason that, like god doesn't seem like a slam dunk as a concept, that, like, bad things happen in the world. So, like you know, aliens do or ufos do scary stuff sometimes and that doesn't seem to imply that they're working for a higher benevolent order, always anyway.
Speaker 2:It feels too tidy to me, I think for me to give it a four.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I see that A little more like manufactured intellectually, philosophically, cosmically, than the way we actually observe nature.
Speaker 2:I also don't see that it's necessary to explain the phenomena. You know, yeah, like the fact that the idea that there's just like a bunch of of rational actors, whether we understand their motives or not, bouncing around and bouncing off each other, feels more supported to me than this idea that they all, that there's some hierarchy, that all these things are, are a part of. I don't know, man I mean we're, we're fully in this territory, being so hard to assign a likelihood quotient to this.
Speaker 1:Closest thing to a report slash. Evidence comes from that Danny Sheehan description of an interview that some government agents did with an NHI. And they asked him where he was from, and, this being said, I'm. And they asked him where he was from and, this being said, I'm. I'm from a group that is like here to monitor your emergence as a civilization and we work for what you would call a god, but it's different than that, um, so that kind of points to some like automated higher intelligence. It doesn't necessarily imply that, like, the universe is suffused with love and light, but it maybe suggests that they're.
Speaker 1:They're like organizations that report to benevolent entities okay, all right, what I mean I'm leaning to here, I guess let's say, let's say, two for the, the tidy version and, uh, maybe three for the, the messier version, where there are like entities, um, but not necessarily one super god. Okay, oh, my god, this has been so freaking crazy. Uh, okay, do you want to like take a breath and step back and see if this has taken you anywhere?
Speaker 1:yeah, move you in any directions. I'm looking at a lot of sort of shrug type numbers. We've got like a lot of twos and threes all the way through here. We kind of like come down a little bit more toward the foreside for slightly more benevolent um explanations, like if they are slowly invading they might just be here to experience it, or if they are doing tourism they might just be kind of curious but not that interested in us.
Speaker 2:Those things kind of like top their list for most believable okay, you know what I'm thinking about is my, what my position, I think, was before I started digging into this stuff like, just as I was starting to dig into this was like the fact that we haven't been eradicated strongly suggests that we're in a good case scenario here, whether that's you know, a very nice zoo or the galactic federation that we're going to get invited to join. I was kind of in a place of thinking that no news is good news, basically. But digging into it more, I think that it is more complicated than that and that, like when you take into account the difference in time scales that other entities might experience, or our total inability to presume moral structures within these groups, these entities, makes me I don't know. I guess I'm, I guess it, I guess I'm more freaked out now than I, than I was when I was early in my journey here.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it definitely to me seems more likely that they could be doing some freaky things now, but it it. It doesn't necessarily seem more likely to me that they are. Like, when I glance at our numbers, this feels like it tilts positive to me. But I would say the thing that's boosted me out the most is this idea that they could be living among us and reporting to some higher organization that is non-human and has non-human agendas. Um, the version where they're living among us and just like living among us because that's fun, uh seems pretty benign to me and positive. Like, come on in, the water's fine, and I'm generally pro-immigration, even if it's greater reticuli. Yeah, um, okay, I think this was like a really awesome wild, woolly walk good for us.
Speaker 2:This shit's nuts dude it's. Don't put this on the internet.
Speaker 1:I got you know yeah, it's too late, but you should probably stop watching if you were watching. Just kidding. Do you have one button? Did you have a thing that you wanted to?
Speaker 2:man I um I I guess not. I guess I got. I mean, I all I have is this new book that I got, that I haven't started yet, um, but I'm excited to read unbelievable by stacy horn. It's about um, the duke parapsychology lab and it's like stories and studies from um from from the Duke parapsychology lab. So I don't know, I'm excited to read that.
Speaker 1:Cool. Um, I guess, maybe as a companion to that, uh, something that informed my views on this is that we've been I've been reading more stuff about psychic interactions with the world and, um, I would point to a book that we both looked at, real magic, by Dean Radin, which, like a lot of the best works here, starts from like a super academic angle and talks about studies that we've done. And I would say, like, probably anybody who's watched this whole thing already feels this already. But there's like more evidence than I previously would have expected in this arena to suggest that there are some deeper aspects to consciousness and, uh, that we don't understand reality, uh, as deeply as we sort of intuitively feel we do. And that's not just from a like faster than light technological travel, um avenue, um, it's also from a like consciousness angle and uh, like what, what the fundamental matter of the universe might be and how that relates to what it feels like to be alive.
Speaker 1:Wow, yeah, thank you staggered to the end of it um, okay, weird wild stuff yeah, maybe we'll do something a little more concrete next time, but thank you for coming with us on this zany journey and we may return to it over time as we learn more, get more evidence, maybe if we're still going. In a year, maybe we revisit this and see if any of our likelihood estimations have changed. Yeah, sounds good. All right, thank you, john. See you later, bye, bye.