Adam Dew... Wrong Again!

"Roswell slides" promoter Adam Dew. Photo by Robert Sheaffer.

Roswell slides promoter Adam Dew has been doing a fair bit of media lately to gin up interest and sales for the May 5th reveal event of the slides in Mexico City, hosted by paranormal con promoter Jaime Maussan, and along the way he has made a number of statements that are simply wrong. For example, he identified the military "witness" to the dead alien as a Lieutenant in his film trailer when in fact he was a Private First Class, Eleazar Benavides.

Another egregious example can be seen in Dew's oft-repeated statement that nothing in pop culture looked like the small bodied big-headed alien prior to 1947. In a recent interview with Open Minds, Dew states, "People in the late 40s were not staging aliens, as far as I can tell. That image of the big head and skinny body didn’t become popular in pop culture until the 60s. So we know that it is not a fake staged alien, as far as I can tell.”

This is Dew responding to a straw man of his own creation. Nobody is suggesting that the bodies depicted in the slides were faked in 1947. Therefore, his argument is irrelevant. Making matters worse, however, is that it is also incorrect. In fact, big-headed small-bodied strange creatures were indeed a staple of science fiction and pop culture well before 1947. If someone had wanted to fake an alien body in 1947, they could have easily drawn upon this meme.

As just a couple of examples, here are two covers from the popular pulp magazine Thrilling Wonder Stories, both from the 1930s, and both featuring alien creatures with big heads and much smaller bodies.

Thrilling Wonder Stories, Vol. 8, No. 1, August 1936

Thrilling Wonder Stories, Vol. 13, No. 3, June 1939

There are plenty of other examples for anyone willing to look. Here are two from 1940.

Thrilling Wonder Stories, March 1940

Thrilling Wonder Stories, August 1940

Again, this is all an irrelevant sideshow to the basic question of whether the slides were hoaxed or not, because when people talk of a con or hoax they are invariably referring to either someone who created the slides much later than 1947, a la the "alien autopsy" film of Ray Santilli, or of someone who has used actual slides of a mummy-like human figure that may have been taken around the late 1940s and represented them as space aliens today. But Dew and his fellow slides promoters want you to focus on the straw man suggestion that what skeptics are saying when they talk of a hoax is that someone hoaxed them in 1947, which is not the case at all. However, even if it was what skeptics were suggesting, then it is clear that Dew is wrong in his assertion that there was nothing in pop culture that a hoaxer in 1947 could have drawn upon to come up with such a hoax.

In short, even when Dew is making irrelevant arguments, they seem to have a tendency to be flat-out wrong. The only question people are left to determine is whether this is the result of incompetence, or dishonesty. Given the crowd with which Dew has chosen to associate himself, either option is plausible.

Paul Kimball

The Morality Pill

Apropos of Evolving Consciousness, Empathy and Advanced Hon-Human Intelligence, a post I wrote back in late April, there's a thought-provoking opinion piece in today's Globe and Mail that I recommend to everyone - Would We Swallow A Morality Pill, by Guy Kahane, who is deputy director of the Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics at the University of Oxford. Kahane asks the following question: Should we use our growing scientific understanding of the basis of human morality to try to make people morally better?

Here's an excerpt:

It would be ideal if individuals could freely explore different ways to improve themselves, whether by practising mindfulness, reading moral philosophy or, yes, by taking a “morality” pill. But it’s also true that, although some people are eager to take pills that make them feel better, it’s not so obvious that people would want to take pills that would make them morally better. It’s not clear people really want to be morally better. And those who, like the psychopathic Alex [of A Clockwork Orange], need the most help are probably those who would want it least.

Well worth a look, and then consideration, less so for the idea that an actual "morality pill" might be invented than for the question that Kahane leaves the reader with:

"Will we want to take them if they ever become available? And what does it say about us if we won't."

Paul Kimball

Recreating the Past from the Future

Alternate history is a popular genre of fiction consisting of stories that are set in a words where history has diverged from what actually happened. One of my favourite examples is the Robert Harris novel Fatherland, which the author creates an alternate history in which the Allied landings on D-Day failed, and by 1964 Hitler remained in power, locked in a stalemate with the USSR and a cold war with the United States.

But as much fun as it may be to read, or even to create, or it's all still fiction... right?

Well, maybe for us it is, but what about our descendants, far in the future (or perhaps not so far...), who may develop time travel?

The biggest problem with traveling backwards in time, as I pointed out yesterday, is what happens if you change something. Now, if you're going back solely as an observer, and could be certain that nothing would change (i.e. you couldn't actually interact with the people of the time period you were visiting or observing), then that's fine. But what if you wanted to interact, and change things? Well, you could, but then it would change your own reality, wouldn't it? Go back and kill your grandfather, and all of a sudden you don't exist.

Hence, the grandfather paradox. You can't travel back in time and change your own reality.

But what if you didn't want to change your reality; what if you wanted to create an entirely new reality?

That's a different story altogether. The branching universe hypothesis holds that there are infinite number of universes, all-together known as multiverse. If a person travels back in time and changes something, he would create a new reality, divorced from his own from that point in time onwards. Thus, in one world D-Day succeeds, and things play out as they have for us; in another, you could wind up with Harris' version of reality.

D-Day is set on a pretty big scope, however. That might be difficult to change (although perhaps not so difficult if the Germans could be convinced that the Allies were going to land in Normandy). Easier to influence would be single smaller events - what if, for example, you could prevent Lincoln's assassination? Or Kennedy's? Or what if Hitler had been killed during the Beer Hall Putsch? And so forth.

All of which leads one to consider the following question: are we living in one of those realities?

What if in the future, when time travel is achieved, our descendants, whether for amusement, or intellectual curiosity, or a combination of the two, decide to travel back in time and create new realities by changing key events, and then watching what happens?

Philosopher Nick Bostrom points out why an advanced civilization might engage in such an activity. Once we fix the world and remove all the things that we don't want, then we will have to find "something more inspiring", as Bostrom puts it, or something more challenging, as I might put it.

Now, Bostrom doesn't go as far into the future as I have in my speculation, to a world where time travel is possible. But the principle which he outlines is applicable.

Indeed, with the rise of interactive video games where the player can make more and more decisions, and therefore find more and more possible narrative outcomes, we're already seeing people in ever growing numbers in technologically advanced societies playing around with the idea of changing worlds.

Someday in the future, maybe that's exactly what people are doing. Perhaps they are changing our world all the time, and creating all sorts of new worlds. And while the pop histories tend to go for the big picture, so-called world historical figures, like Hitler, and Lincoln, and Caesar, maybe our future selves are more like those historians who concentrate on people's history, where you and I are just as interesting and important, in our own ways.

Would any of it matter to us?

Perhaps not, I suppose, because we wouldn't be aware of it. But it does make one think about the cherished notion of free will. Maybe things that happen to us, both big and small, really do happen for a reason, and we're all just NPCs in a real-life game of "change the world".

Whereas in Dungeons and Dragons, you can create and play a 8th level bard, or a 5th level mage, perhaps in the future, they can play "lawyer Paul", or "police officer Paul", or "historian Paul"... or any of the other paths I could have taken.

Maybe someone is "playing me" right now.

And maybe they're playing you too.

Paul Kimball

Films require funding...

Speaking of Time Travel...

Speaking of time travel, it may or may not be one of the themes in the film The Grey Wall, which has just gone through development with my company and looks good for production later this year (or early 2012, depending on scheduling). Not to give too much away, but here is an excerpt that touches on the idea of time travel... sort of:

SAM

How long have I been here?

Lawrence sits down opposite him.

LAWRENCE

Ahh... an interesting question.

Lawrence pulls a small piece of paper from his pocket, and places it flat on the table in front of Sam.

LAWRENCE (cont’d)

You see time like this piece of paper, flat, with edges, and defined parameters. Past, present, and the future. From one edge of the paper to the other, with a distance that is clear.

Lawrence points at an edge of the paper, and then starts to draw an imaginary line between the two with his finger.

LAWRENCE (cont’d)

Here is what has happened...

He points to the center of the paper.

LAWRENCE (cont’d)

Here is that which is happening now...

He points to the opposite edge.

LAWRENCE (cont’d)

And here is what will happen. But what if...

He folds the paper in two, so that the opposite edges touch against each other.

LAWRENCE (cont’d)

... you could bridge the gaps.

He pauses, and then slowly crumples the paper in his palm.

LAWRENCE (cont’d)

What if there were no gaps at all...

He opens his hand, and the paper is gone.

LAWRENCE (cont’d)

... just a road, circling back on itself, like a wheel in motion. An eternal now - where what once was may not be what is, or what will be.

(pause)

Does that answer your question?

SAM

I have no idea what you’re saying.

Lawrence pauses for a moment, and then smiles.

LAWRENCE

Proper thing.

Sam thinks for a moment.

SAM

Who are you?

Lawrence opens the palm of his other hand, to reveal the paper, which is folded once, and places it in front of Sam.

LAWRENCE

A friend.

Sam picks up the paper, and starts to unfold it. Written on the paper is a number...

“6164”

SAM

What is this?

LAWRENCE

Some would call it a deus ex machina.

(pauses, smiles)

I’d call it an address.

We're casting now... but one role is already covered - that of co-lead "Sarah", which will be played by one of Canada's great young up-and-coming actresses, Christina Cuffari, who has also been with Doing Time since its first theatrical run here in Halifax back in 2007.

The Grey Wall will be out just in time for the 2012 apocalypse!

Paul Kimball

Advanced Intelligence... Without Art?

Continuing my riffing on the question of a possible advanced non-human intelligence and art, as originally posed by Rich Reynolds, one can look to science fiction for some clever, and I think realistic, speculation about how such an intelligence could evolve and be totally devoid of a need or use for anything even remotely resembling what we would call the arts.

Perhaps Doctor Who has covered it best over the years, with the creation of two classic villainous races, the Daleks and the Cybermen.

And of course there are the Borg from Star Trek, perhaps the greatest villain that the series ever had, because it was the one which represented a completely alien and truly existential threat to the Federation in a way that Klingons, Romulans and the Dominion did not - at least until the writers ruined it all by trying to make the Borg more... well, human. The Borg appeared as cybernetically enhanced humanoid drones of multiple species, organized as an interconnected collective, the decisions of which are made by a hive mind, linked to subspace domain.

They were scary, because they spoke to our fears about mechaization, artificial intelligence, and our own possible future someday.

None of these sci-fi villains would have had any use for art - the Borg and the Cybermen were concerned with assimilating technology, and humans to replenish their ranks, not culture, whereas the Daleks were bent on simple conquest, and all other species were considered inferior.

The point is that if we project into the far future (or is it really that far?), we can imagine such a cybernetic reality for ourselves, or any other advanced species... or perhaps a world where our creations have superceded us.

Indeed, the late Mac Tonnies was hardly alone in his fascination with the idea that someday we may be able to transcend our humanity, and become posthuman. But would such a species have any use for "the finer things" of life, particularly art in all of its myriad forms?

What use would Debussy string quartet be to a Dalek, or a Cezanne painting to a Cyberman, or the works of Bertolt Brecht to the Borg?

There is a very real possibility that art would be of no use at all. Indeed, for beings that in all cases came from "organic" origins, one might expect that they would view any form of art, with its attendant appeal to "humanity" and "emotion", as an abomination - an affront to the perfection of being that they had achieved.

Of course, this is just one possible answer to the question Rich raised about why ET doesn't seem interested in our art and culture, should it exist "out there" and be coming here. In fact, if life "out there" has developed beyond the biological form into something that we would call "artificial", it might well be that "they" have no use for, or even concept of, art and culture at all.

A sobering thought, particularly as it might also be a portent of our own bleak, emotionless future as a species.

Paul Kimball

The Doctor

It should probably come as no surprise to anyone that I am a major-league science fiction fan, to the point of uber-geekdom. Some of the best science fiction has appeared on television over the years, from the original Star Trek to Battlestar Galactica (the remake), and The X-Files to The Twilight Zone. But my choice for the best series, bar none (with an admiring nod in the direction of the wonderful Babylon 5), is Dr. Who.

Now, the Doctor has had his ups and downs over the years (that's what happens when you've been around as long as he has), but from the thrill of watching Jon Pertwee and Tom Baker as a kid, to the absolute joy of seeing the series properly re-booted in the past decade, he's never disappointed. He's made me think, and opened my mind to new worlds and new possibilities.

Thus do I appoint Dr. Who as the official science fiction series of The Other Side of Truth, which seems only fitting, as I often refer to myself, amongst friends, as the Twelfth Docor!

And now, for the record, my picks for...

Favourite Doctor - The Fifth Doctor (played by Peter Davison), with a hat tip to the Tenth Doctor (played by David Tennant).

Favourite Companion - Peri Brown (played by Nicola Bryant), with a bow to Rose Tyler (played by Billie Piper).

Favourite Villain - The Daleks, of course, with a respectful nod to The Weeping Angels.

And while I really like the Tenth Doctor's catchphrase of "allons-y", I have adopted the following as my own - "why not?"

Paul Kimball

ET in Hollywood - Keyhoe vs. Sagan

The new film Battle: Los Angeles represents a Hollywood version of extraterrestrial life that mirrors the views of Donald Keyhoe and those who have followed him (just about every modern pro-ETH researcher), which is to say the people who would have us believe that aliens are only slightly more technologically advanced than we are, and basically act with the same motivations as us.

This modern version of the "aliens-as-us-in-flying-saucers" meme, while admittedly more nihilistic and violent, is more or less the same as classic 1950s sci-fi epics like The Day The Earth Stood Still.

For the most part, the views that Hollywood have given us of aliens mirror those of the pro-ETH UFO research community. What once might have seemed imaginative has long since been revealed as wholly unrealistic from a scientific sense. Hence the term "science fiction", which applies equally to Keyhoe-ian UFO research as it does to Hollywood blockbusters.

But every now and then, a film comes along that offers a different and possibly more realistic view of what an encounter with an extraterrestrial intelligence will be like, and what it will mean for humanity. Here is one of my favourites - Contact:

The film wasn't perfect, of course - few films ever achieve that standard. But the issues it raised, and the way it raised them, provide a better glimpse of what might lie ahead than a film like Battle: Los Angeles, or even a classic like The Day The Earth Stood Still.

For that we can thank Carl Sagan, who might not have had much use for the UFO phenomenon, but had a much better grasp than do most UFO researchers and  Hollywood films in terms of what to expect from an encounter with an extraterrestrial civilization.

Paul Kimball

The Big Picture

A 2005 lecture from Dr. Susan Clancy in which she talks about her research into "alien abductions", and her conclusions.

The blurb:

Abducted: How People Come to Believe They Were Kidnapped by Aliens

They are tiny. They are tall. They are gray. They are green. They survey our world with enormous glowing eyes. To conduct their shocking experiments, they creep in at night to carry humans off to their spaceships. Yet there is no evidence that they exist at all. So how could anyone believe he or she was abducted by aliens? Or want to believe it?

To answer these questions, psychologist Susan Clancy interviewed and evaluated 'abductees' – old and young, male and female, religious and agnostic. She listened closely to their stories – how they struggled to explain something strange in their remembered experience, how abduction seemed plausible, and how, having suspected abduction, they began to recollect it, aided by suggestion and hypnosis.

Clancy argues that abductees are sane and intelligent people who have unwittingly created vivid false memories from a toxic mix of nightmares, culturally available texts (abduction reports began only after stories of extraterrestrials appeared in films and on TV), and a powerful drive for meaning that science is unable to satisfy. For them, otherworldly terror can become a transforming, even inspiring experience. 'Being abducted,' writes Clancy, 'may be a baptism in the new religion of this millennium.' This book is not only a subtle exploration of the workings of memory, but a sensitive inquiry into the nature of belief.

An important work that most UFO researchers either passed on at the time, or simply accepted the "party line" that was put forward by the leaders of the "alien abduction cult" when the book was released. I also recommend my interview from September, 2010, with Kevin Randle, about his book, The Abduction Enigma.

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To all of those UFO researchers who are still inclined to defend the practices and ridiculous "theories" of these cultists, answer this one question:

If aliens from other worlds have technology sufficiently advanced to allow them to travel the vast distances between the stars (and even in our own "neighbourhood", those distances boggle the mind), and abduct people here, there and everywhere when they get here, then what kind of person would believe that a plucky little bunch of "abduction researchers" (artists, associate history professors, and so on) could manage to beat these aliens at their own game, and defeat their technlogy and discover their plans?

It's laughable, and it has always been laughable.

In the meantime, people who probably needed real psychiatric help have wasted their time going to these "cultists" for help. Serious UFO research has suffered, and been tainted by this ridiculous circus. Finally, if there really is some sort of paranormal aspect to a few abductions (and I don't rule that out, anymore than I rule out the possibility that some people have direct experiences with a non-human intelligence in any context, "God" being the pre-dominant manifestation throughout human history), then any opportunity to discover such an intelligence has been squandered for decades.

UFO researchers wonder why they get no respect from the mainstream media?

Some even talk in dark tones of a conspiracy.

It's a conspiracy, all right - a conspiracy of self-marginalization by men and women who live in a fantasy world of mediocre 1950s science fiction.

All the while, the real mysteries remain - ephemeral, a bundle of possibilities which, if real, are far more exciting than anything UFO researchers (with a few notable exceptions) have been able to conjure up in the past sixty years. It's not just that they don't have the answers; they don't even have the imagination to ask the right questions.

Paul Kimball

Babylon 5 and the "Ant Analogy"

At its best, science fiction can serve as a populist springboard for ideas, and new ways of thinking. Babylon 5 is among the best science fiction series ever made, and in this excerpt from the episode "Mind War" in the first season, Ambassador G'Kar offers an analogy about extraterrestrial intelligences that mirrors my own thoughts on any ET that may be out there, and how we would stand in comparison to them... thoughts that have been expressed by many others with a far higher "scientific pay-grade" than me, including Michio Kaku when I saw him speak in London in 2009.

Paul Kimball