Thursday, February 21, 2008
Greg Bishop at Giant Rock
In this clip I shot in September, 2007, author / researcher / historian Greg Bishop talks about Giant Rock and the Contactee Movement.
Of course, while there, I couldn't resist offering my own quick take on someone that more than a few people believe represents the modern version of contactee-ism:
In my opinion, Dr. Greer makes the original Contactee leaders look like paragons of humility and virtue (no easy feat in some cases).
Paul Kimball
Wednesday, December 19, 2007
Skylab III
Paul Kimball
Monday, December 17, 2007
X-Conference photos
The closing panel. Next to me is radio host Rob Simone.
The opening night reception. Kris and I look properly skeptical, but we were treated as VIPs, which was great.

The speakers at the closing party. Renowned British ufologist Nick Pope is in the back, and seems to have spotted a UFO! As usual, I'm ignoring everything around me as I mug for the camera!
Paul Kimball
Friday, November 30, 2007
Doing Time - The Coast review
Paul Kimball
Make Time for a Great Play
Semaphore Theatre Company's sci-fi hit
by Kate Watson
November 30, 2007 09:27 AM
[Original article here]
Time is running out to see Doing Time, a highly entertaining mystery based on a sci-fi short story by Kansas City author Mac Tonnies and adapted by the play's director Paul Kimball. It is staged in the tiny basement room of the Wired Monk Coffee Shop, which makes for a surprisingly effective space for this particular play.
The story is classic sci-fi, but you don't have to be a fan of the genre to enjoy Doing Time.
Three terrific actors elevate this play to must-see status. Kris Lee McBride anchors the work with an entirely convincing performance as the prisoner Leda. Christina Cuffari is controlled without being stiff, and does a fine job of showing the warmth beneath her character's frosty exterior. Nick Lachance is charming and funny and injects the last part of the show with a great energy.
In a season that has already had a banner crop of shows, Doing Time still manages to stand out.
Doing Time runs until Dec. 1st at the Wired Monk, corner of Hollis and Morris, at 7:30. Tickets are $8, $6 for students.
Thursday, November 29, 2007
Doing Time - Review
Submitted by Ron Foley Macdonald on 11.28.07 at 7:03pm. [original here ]
There’s something genuinely thrilling - and unsettling - about Semaphore Theatre’s world premiere of the play Doing Time. First off, it’s unapologetically hard-core sci-fi. Second, it’s a stage piece more interested in ideas that character.
For audiences who despair of the contemporary theatre’s capacity for endless navel-gazing, Doing Time is like a breath of fresh air. Adapted by director Paul Kimball and Kansas City author Mac Tonnies from Tonnies’ short story, the play dispenses with the all those self-conscious notions about the relationship between audiences and players to simply present a space-time mystery that rockets along like a great 1950 pulp sci-fi paperback.
At about one hour in length, the play follows a single young female named Leda as she is held prisoner on some kind of spacecraft. With a single unadorned set, we’re spared any attempt to visualize the ship; instead, a few hung sheets, chairs, and bed establish her cell. She’s accompanied by an aggressively chirpy attendant - Chistina Cuffari in neatly robotic role - who keeps Leda’s questions at bay for the first half of the play.
When Nick Lachance enters - as John, the ‘manager’ - Doing Time’s action picks up considerably. Lachance also injects a great deal of wry, unexpected humour into the play with his quizzical delivery and dry asides. He’s clearly having a great deal of fun with the role, defining it as a kind of slightly off-kilter existential space delivery man.
Kris Lee McBride - in the central role of Leda - modulates her performance in the central role of the piece to underplay her growing rage and exasperation. At the end of the play she achieves a striking sense of resignation that translates into a glimmer of hope, especially since she’s faced with the ultimate unknown.
Kimball’s raw, no-nonsense direction often sacrifices delicacy in order to accelerate the plot; a couple of pantomime scenes that illustrate Leda’s boredom with the voyage reflect a cinematic rather than a stage background, with brisk fade-up-and-back-to-blacks.
The only drawback to the production was the odd use of rather well-worn Bob Dylan songs (All Along The Watchtower, Lay Lady Lay) over the scene transitions. Some Tangerine Dream or Portishead might have provided something a bit more appropriately mysterious and futuristic for a show that seems suspended in some other time and space.
The inanimate basement performance space at The Wired Monk coffee shop at the corner of Hollis and Morris proved to be a surprisingly effective place to stage a play. Hanging on the walls is a rather neat series of sci-fi-like paintings that resonate with the show and warrant a separate visit by themselves.
Doing Time is small but smart production that reveals Semaphore Theatre as a substantial new player on the indie theatre scene. Aimed at wider genre-loving audiences rather than the usual jaded theatre crowd, the company has made a serious stride into a totally new direction for theatre in Halifax.
Saturday, November 10, 2007
2007 Zorgy Awards - Let the Voting Begin
Let the voting begin!
Polls will be open until 12:01 AM (AST), 1 January 2008.
Paul Kimball
Wednesday, November 07, 2007
Thursday, November 01, 2007
Kucinich, UFOs and the Media
Mac Tonnies is angry about how the Kucinich UFO question was handled at the Democratic debate. He writes:
This sad excuse of a "debate," in which Kucinich is essentially asked to apologize for seeing an object in the sky he didn't understand, typifies the mainstream response to a phenomenon that, by all counts, qualifies as a genuine scientific enigma. (For his part, Obama diverts attention from the subject at hand with consummate finesse, his condescension greeted by applause.) [entire post here].
Actually, I see it differently, and here's why:
1. The question itself wasn't looking for an apology. It was straight-forward, with the usual moderator run-on intro. If it seemed like Russert was looking for an apology, I would suggest that ufologists are a bit too touchy. They want people to ask questions, and here was a question. If there was a little bit of smarm on Russert's part (and honestly, I didn't really detect any more smarm than normal from TR), that's a small price to pay.
2. Kucinich has no hope of ever being President, but I thought he answered the question about as well as time and circumstance allowed (remember, this was a "rapid fire" round in the debate). He mentioned that a UFO is simply a UFO, and by extension not necessarily an alien spacecraft. He also got in the good line about more Americans having seen a UFO than support the president - catchy, if not quite true, at least according to the statistic Russert countered with, i.e. 14% of Americans have reported seeing a UFO. Is that stat true or not? I don't know, but as Kucinich indicated at the end, it's an awful lot of people regardless. He also name-dropped Jimmy Carter, although most people accept that Carter saw Venus, and not a genuine UFO. Still, not bad - if he was better informed, he would have added a few other names and occupations, including Kelly Johnson, Senator Richard Russell, Paul Hill, and any dozen of the scores of top USAF personnel who have reported UFOs. Better yet, he would have told people to purchase a copy of "Best Evidence" when it's out on DVD next year (yes, that's a shameless commercial plug!).
3. Mac also takes a dig at Barrack Obama's comments when he said, in essence, that we should focus more on problems down here, but what does Mac suggest that Obama (who no-one should confuse with presidential material at this point in his career - experience should count more than sound-bites and a good back-story), should have said, given the circumstances, i.e. he's trailing Clinton in the polls, and he had about fifteen seconds to answer? Besides, I happen to agree with the gist of his answer, which was "who knows what's out there, but we should focus on fixing our own myriad problems down here, which is what I'm going to do if elected President". I would probably have given the same answer, given the circumstances, and the priorities of a candidate trying to gain his party's nomination. Save the talk for manned missions to Mars, or the question of whether or not there's life out there, for another day, when you have more time, and when you might actually be in charge.
So, I think, all things considered, the debate was a good thing for "ufology" (and even for people interested in the serious study of the UFO phenomenon). Yes, there was some laughter from some in the audience, which just shows that there are Democrats who are as stupid as Republicans (did anyone who lived through the Carter presidency really doubt this?). Still, you have to walk before you can run, which in the case of the UFO phenomenon means that you're still going to have to put up with some chuckles every now and then. The way to silence the chuckles is to use facts and figures, and to point out that some very bright people have seen UFOs over the years, along with a pretty significant number of their fellow Americans.
That's not a bad place to start the process of re-building the public image of the UFO phenomenon.
I never thought I'd say or write this, but good for Dennis Kucinich.
Paul Kimball
Monday, October 29, 2007
Humanity vs... humanity?
While science and technology have the potential to create an ideal habitat for humanity over the next millennium, there is the possibility of a monumental genetic hangover over the subsequent millennia due to an over-reliance on technology reducing our natural capacity to resist disease, or our evolved ability to get along with each other. After that, things could get ugly, with the possible emergence of genetic 'haves' and 'have-nots'.

That I-Pod of yours, or that cell phone, or Blackberry, or X-Box 360, or ___________________ (fill in the blank) is taking us further and further away from the rest of the human race, bit by bit, at an ever accelerating rate. I'm not suggesting that we should give them up - rather than slowing ourselves down, we should be working harder to make sure that everyone else keeps up. Most of all, in our rush to have all of the latest gadgets, including those that may become part of our own bodies, we must not forget those who don't have access to them.
The alternative to maintaining an awareness of the growing divide within humanity, and trying to do something about it, is a bleak future for us all.
Paul Kimball
What Would ET Do?
What would Jesus do?
My answer is usually, "what a stupid question to ask".
However, in my current friendly "blog-war" with Mac Tonnies re: alien contact, I'll ask the same question, in a slightly different way, with regard to whether or not humanity is ready for knowledge of ET's presence.
In other words: what would ET do?

Given those assumptions, and given the state of affairs vis-a-vis ET (i.e. no public revelation), one can but assume that ET agrees with me. In other words, by not yet revealing themselves publicly for all of the world to see, ET has indicated that, in their view, we're not ready for contact.
Perhaps they have some version of Star Trek's "Prime Directive". Who knows?
What I do know is that they show more common sense, and understanding of the state of affairs on Earth, than the "disclosure" advocates.
Besides, if ET is smart enough to get here, and wise enough that people are willing to pin their hopes for a better future on contact with them, who are we to argue with them when it comes to the question of when that contact should take place?
In other words, if ET is out there, we'll meet them on their terms, when they figure we're ready to do so, and not a moment sooner.
Good for them.
Paul Kimball
Are We Ready for "Contact"?
He writes, in part:
I understand where he's coming from, but I think on this issue he's naive, and wrong. I replied:A large part of me is convinced that we need our paradigmatic bars rattled -- and if that means enduring the sociological sea-change likely to occur in the wake of ET "disclosure," I think it's worth the ride.
Mac:Does anybody really think that the global reaction would be one of universal joy, where people who have hated each other for centuries would suddenly toss down their weapons and embrace each other as brothers and sisters? I don't.
You and others view "contact" through that Western, educated, middle-to-upper class point of view I discussed. The vast majority of the world does not share that point of view, including many in the West. A "contact" event would, in my opinion, be disastrous in the short term, with unpredictable consequences in the long-term. We just aren't ready for it as a species, and it is the height of cultural imperialism and hubris for us to suggest that because some of us may be ready (indeed, may even want that change), the rest of the world is, or at the very least should be forced along for the ride.
If I was in charge, and knew about ET on Earth, and could keep it secret, all the while slowly seeding the technology into society as well as the "knowledge", through the media (i.e. films), I wouldn't hesitate to "cover it up".
I'm pretty sure the Aztecs would have done the same if they could have.
Perhaps the aliens, should they prove to be benevolent, would enforce peace upon the world. They would no doubt have the means to do so, at least in broad strokes. But is that how we really want to solve our problems? And where would that lead us?
How would radical religious zealots (of any faith) react?
Does anyone for a second believe that the established order would just slip away - or is it far more likely that it would further entrench itself, paritcularly if the "contact" event was not a landing, but simply a signal that confirmed what Mac and I already suspect, i.e. that we're not alone?
The one thing I am certain of, as I look around, is that we're not mature enough as a species to face that future, at least not yet.
Maybe, someday, when we grow up and solve our own problems, we'll be ready for admission into the Cosmic Kindergarten. But for now we're still stuck in the crib.
Guys like Mac, and Stan Friedman, and Steven Bassett all mean well. They all want the best, and that's truly admirable. The problem is that when they say they would welcome a landing on the White House lawn, or that they want "disclosure", they are looking to the skies for salvation, when we should be looking to ourselves. We're the problem, but we're also the solution.
To think otherwise is to be no different than the people who have spent two thousand years waiting for the return of Jesus to save us from ourselves.
Paul Kimball
Saturday, October 27, 2007
Truth Embargo? Good!

The view of people like Stan that we're ready for the knowledge of ET's existence (should ET exist and be here) is also at odds with human history, where every time an advanced society came into contact with a less advanced society, there was chaos, with the end result that the less advanced society suffered greatly as a result of that contact.
I think Stuart Miller, in a recent post at his blog Alien Worlds Magazine, hits upon the more likely outcome. Here is an excerpt:
My opinion is that there would be substantial elements of world wide hysteria which couldn’t be ignored, for it would inevitably impinge on the calmer elements. The most un-endearing quality within the psyche of the human spirit is arrogance. Our world is full of strutting little despots, be it militarily, politically, administratively, the religious realm, or even in our personal lives. People full of their own self importance and power, without humility or empathy, who would seize the opportunity to terrify and manipulate. Martial law in some quarters would be a real possibility. After all, this would be an event of a life time. [Full article here]Bingo - and as Stuart notes later in the column, this is what would probably happen if we just got a signal from SETI. It would be far worse if ET was actually here, and even worse again if ET was hostile.
Guys like Steven Bassett talk about a "paradigm shift" should the "truth embargo" ever be lifted. They're absolutely right, but for the wrong reasons. They see a sunnier future for humanity - a leap into a brave new world, where we would happily walk hand in hand with our space brothers and sisters, and all would suddenly be fine on Planet Earth.
Like Stuart, I see a different result, because I've spent years studying the world and its people, not as we might like them to be, but as they actually are. If the "government" is really covering up the "truth" about an ET presence here on Earth, I say "good - keep it up". Because as I look around, the truth is that we're not ready for it. We're not even close. And to reveal it now would be as disastrous as it would have been sixty years ago - perhaps more so.
We don't need alien "gods" to come down and solve all of our problems - we need to solve them ourselves. Only then, when all people are capable of seeing the world like Stan Friedman sees it will we be ready for First Contact, with any ET species, either here or "out there".
If ET really does exist, and is smart enough to get here from there, and is as benevolent as some

Does this mean that people should stop investigating UFO cases? No. Does it mean people should stop writing and talking about UFOs? Of course not. Because at the moment, the idea of ET UFOs are like the idea of God - maybe they exist, maybe they don't, who can say? You can believe if you want, or not. You can believe in one type of alien, or another, or none at all. You can explore other theories if you want. You can ignore the whole subject, as the vast majority of people do. You can even pretend that you're practising "citizen diplomacy" with aliens if you want. To each their own.
You can even pester the "government" for the "truth", but you'll find that it's a pretty futile slog, because they either don't know the "truth" (which is the far more likely answer, in my opinion), or, if they do and the truth is "ET is here", they aren't going to reveal it, for the reasons outlined above.
Good reasons.
Paul Kimball
Tuesday, October 23, 2007
Nazis, neo-Nazis, and UFOs
Anyway, my point here is to note that the Nazi meme is not a new one in ufology, but it has been a dangerous one, for reasons that many people have pointed out in the past, including Strange Days... Indeed commentator Dave Furlotte (see here). Neo-Nazis like Ernst Zundel have used the UFO subject in the past to lure the most gullible people into their web of hate and lies on the theory that if a person was willing to swallow the kind of bilge that Zundel and others pedaled with regards to Nazi UFOs, then they were identified as prime targets for a far more dangerous kind of bilge, Holocaust denial (anyone who wants a more detailed examination of the Zundel story should pick up a copy of Warren Kinsella's excellent book, Web of Hate; for Zundel and UFOs, see The Nizkor Project's page here).
Does this mean that all people who support the "Nazi bases in Antarctica claims" that pop up now and then are neo-Nazis? Of course not. But their kind of rank stupidity does demonstrate that there are indeed people out there who are simply incapable of separating fact from fiction - people who are so desperate to believe in UFOs as aliens, or whatever, that they will believe virtually anything else. This is just this kind of "believer blindness" that neo-Nazis like Ernst Zundel, or cult leaders like Marshall Applewhite, always count on, something that anyone interested in the study of the UFO subject should always keep in mind.
Paul Kimball
Monday, October 22, 2007
Greg Bishop's UFO Platform
Obviously, the UFO subject is not very high on the list of anyone running for public office, and it never will be, unless the phenomenon itself decides to make it important to the vast majority of the public. Elected officials need to work within the structure of military and security establishments to find out what is going on, how much is known, and what the problem would be exposing this knowledge to the public.
The way to force disclosure, I believe, is to convince those who hold those secrets that it would be in their best interests to release the pertinent information. That
would be a tall order indeed–perhaps nearly impossible. For anyone whose life is the custodianship of secrets within secrets, ad infinitum, an open approach is dead on the launchpad.No, the proper way to do it would be behind the scenes, assuring the parties involved that no one but yourself and the people hired to speak for you would be responsible for revealing whatever could be revealed. Perhaps a political runaround would be in order, where you placed the information in the hands of a political adversary or even an ally, letting him or her take the heat and/or acclaim. Working on elected officials from the outside certainly isn’t paying any fast dividends.
Because I believe (and this is only a theory) that those in charge of UFO information know little more about the origin or purpose of non-human visitors than the rest of us, I also think that a real “disclosure” is not possible, since those in possession of the story don’t really know what to do with it, except scare the rest of us into submission by leaking wild stories and controlling the rumor mill. Perhaps the best way to look into it is on an individual level–using a “bottom-up” approach, rather than asking for official permission to spout the things we claim to know already.
Most people reading this already believe that the human race has had contact with non-human entities, or at least their effects. Why do we need some “authority” to tell us something we already know, except to provide some needed data points?
I stumbled onto that by writing it. Data points (meaning officially sanctioned, reputation-on-the-line data points) may be a key. If the some of the disclosure people (and many other UFO researchers) push their “we told you so” egos out of the way, perhaps what they should really be asking for (quietly and with little fanfare) is more and better info, and not a release of the “truth” about UFOs. What you are looking for defines what you will find, and how you ask the questions.
I will now take questions from the press.
Well, that makes sense. Greg would get my vote, if I had one, and if I thought "UFO disclosure" was an issue worth devoting any serious political time and energy towards.
Paul Kimball
Sunday, October 21, 2007
NFOs
Paul Kimball
I suggest naming the category of non-investigated or uninvestigated sightings "NFO's" or Non-investigated Flying Objects (NFO's). This is an indeterminate catchall category for initial incoming sighting reports prior to any Hynek screening or investigation. Most cases will fall into this category and never get reclassified as either IFO's or UFO's. The "NFO" term falls nicely in between IFO and UFO alphabetically which is conceptually where it belongs.
For simplicity I include all conventional explanations within the scope of the term "IFO" including cases where there is no object at all, such as some hallucinations and hoaxes. I don't quibble over hypertechnicalities of the "flying" term, where purists complain that we usually don't know if the object is flying using aerodynamic principles, and celestial bodies are not "flying" at all, etc. The traditional "UFO" term uses the word "flying" and everyone has a rough idea what "UFO" and "IFO" mean and they don't take it so literally. "NFO" nicely and logically alliterates with IFO and UFO so it will suggest the others.
Trying to replace the term "UFO" because of quibbles over the word "flying" will simply lose 99% of the people who have an interest in the UFO subject.
The Hynek screening process is explained in his basic textbook of UFO science, The UFO Experience, published in 1972 and endlessly reprinted in numerous editions ever since. You can buy paperback copies on Amazon.com for less than the cost of shipping so there is no excuse for serious UFO researchers not have it and read it.
No sighting report according to Hynek should get the "UFO" label until after a scientifically competent investigation has eliminated IFO's and other conventional explanations.
Whenever it is unclear what we mean by "UFO" or if there is a possibility of some confusion then simply say UFO Unknowns or "real UFO" or Unexplained UFO's or the like, just as we now do anyway.
With this new terminology the AF Project Blue Book statistics would transform to something like this (these are extremely rough approximations subject to refinement and more thorough statistics after Will Wise's BlueBookArchives can get all the BB files online so a more thorough analysis can finally be done):
NFO's - 10,500 (approx.)
IFO's - 1,500 (approx.)
UFO's - 3,000 (approx.)
Total - 15,000 (approx.)
I am being very conservative on the number of UFO Unknowns, as 20% of the total, whereas it is more likely as McDonald estimated, about 30% to 40% or about 4,500 to 6,000 Unknowns.
UFO's thus outnumber IFO's by at least 2 to 1 when we stop bastardizing the statistics by including non-investigated NFO's. Using Hynek's definition an investigation must be scientifically competent, hence very few BB investigations would qualify in his opinion and in the estimation of McDonald and others who have reviewed BB's work.
Brad Sparks
Saturday, October 20, 2007
Greg Bishop for President

Now, the obvious candidate for President for such a party in the United States would be Nick Redfern, the king of off-the-wall cryptozoology currently living in that country (apologies to Loren Coleman, but he's from Maine, a state with no electoral clout). Alas, Nick wasn't born in the United States, so he can never be President.
Fear not, intrepid readers, for there is a perfectly good candidate waiting in the wings - Greg Bishop!
Unlike Coleman, Greg is from a state that matters when it comes to the electoral college - California.
Unlike Redfern, Greg is an American citizen, born and bred.
Like both Coleman and Redfern, Greg has spent a fair amount of time studying monsters, and he's certainly hung out with plenty of loons.
Best of all, Greg takes a truly bi-partisan point of view when it comes to all things paranormal. He keeps an open mind, and is willing to listen to all arguments, after which he generally makes an informed decision that, even if you disagree with it, you can still respect it.

Now all we need is a party name, and a running mate, and the campaign can begin in earnest!
Let's start with the running mate...
Nick Redfern's "Memoirs of a Monster Hunter"

That was an exciting trip, with all sorts of twists and turns, witnesses, weird stories, odd coincidences, and so on (in the book Nick recounts a truly eerie MJ-12 story from his trip to Puerto Rico). As with all of his stories in the book, Nick brings our adventures alive for the reader, and makes it seem as if they were along for the ride.

In a brief passage in the aforementioned Chapter 15, Nick sums up nicely why he and I do what we do:
Nick is one of those guys who gets exactly what Kerouac was talking about when he wrote:"That evening, we met in the bar for an evening of food and revelry... 'Life's never dull in this game, is it?' I asked Paul, in what was really a statement rather than a question. He heartily agreed. We toasted to a continued, productive week, and thanked God that we didn't have to work in the real world of 9-to-5. The conversation then turned to music, beer, gambling, and more, and bloodsucking vampires were forgotten about for the rest of the night."
"The only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing, but burn, burn, burn, like fabulous yellow roman candles exploding like spiders across the stars and in the middle you see the blue centerlight pop and everybody goes 'Awww!'"There are plenty of "mad ones" in Memoirs of a Monster Hunter, an engaging journey through the strange world of the paranormal... and the sometimes even stranger world of Nick Redfern. Don't miss it.
Paul Kimball
Wednesday, October 10, 2007
2007 Zorgy Award nominations now open!!
Nominations for the 2007 Zorgy Awards are now open (you can see the 2006 results here). You can send your nominations for any of the following categories to Rear Admiral Zorgrot (seen above with Canadian actor Kris Lee McBride at the San Diego Zoo) at ZorgrotOnEarth@aol.com:
1. Best UFO / paranormal website [Magazine]
2. Best UFO / paranormalwebsite [forums]
3. Best UFO / paranormal website [news summary]
4. Best UFO / paranormal blog
5. Best UFO / paranormal radio show [non-Internet]
6. Best UFO / paranormal "Trouble-Maker"
7. Best UFO Podcast
8. Best UFO / paranormal publication (print)
9. Best UFO / paranormal research website
10. Best Ufologist
11. Best UFO documentary [released in 2007]
12. Best UFO conference
13. Best UFO book [released in 2007]
14. Top UFO story of 2007
15. Top Paranormal story of 2007
16. Best cryptozoologist
17. Best cryptozoology website
Nominations for The Pelicanist of the Year Award and The George Adamski Memorial Award will be determined by Zorgy and yours truly.
Nominations close November 10th - voting will commence soon thereafter, and run until December 31st. This year there will be statues for the winners, and an Internet broadcast awards ceremony!
Vox populi!
Paul Kimball
Peter Gersten interview - Part III
As the interview continues, Gersten talks about The Program and free will.
Paul Kimball
Peter Gersten interview - Part II
My interview with Peter Gersten continues, as he expands on his theory of "The Program" and what its end in 2012 will mean for him.
Paul Kimball