The study of alien invasions and UFOs today

[Sam Maranto]

THIS YEAR MARKS THE 50TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE FOUNDING OF CUFOS, OR THE CENTER FOR UFO STUDIES. ON ITS SEMI-CENTENNIAL, WE’LL TAKE A LOOK AT THE HISTORY OF UFOLOGY, INCLUDING ONE OF ITS MOST IMPORTANT FOREFATHERS: THE FAMOUS NORTHWESTERN PROFESSOR J. ALLEN HYNEK. AND WE’LL TAKE A LOOK AT HOW IT CAN POSITION ITSELF TO EXPLAIN SOME OF THE WORLD’S MOST MYSTIFYING PHENOMENA. 

FROM WNUR NEWS, I’M PAUL O’CONNOR. ON THIS SPECIAL BROADCAST, WE’RE GONNA TAKE A LOOK AT ONE OF THE MOST IMPORTANT TOPICS IN AI: ALIEN INVASIONS. 

FOUNDED BACK IN 1973, THE CENTER FOR UFO STUDIES WAS SPEARHEADED BY THEN NORTHWESTERN PROFESSOR J. ALLEN HYNEK. BY THE TIME OF ITS FOUNDING, HE WAS ALREADY ESTABLISHED AS ONE OF THE NATION’S LEADING EXPERTS ON THE TOPIC OF UNIDENTIFIED FLYING OBJECTS. 

FOR INSTANCE, HE HAD WORKED ON THE AIR FORCE’S PROJECT BLUE BOOK, WHICH ACCORDING TO THE FEDERAL BUREAU OF INVESTIGATION, SOUGHT TO INVESTIGATE REPORTS OF UFOS IN THE PERIOD SPANNING 1947 TO 1969.  IN 1972, HE WROTE THE BOOK “THE UFO EXPERIENCE” PUBLISHED BY THE HENRY REGNERY COMPANY. IN THIS BOOK, HE CLASSIFIED DIFFERENT TYPES OF “CLOSE ENCOUNTERS.” HIS TERM, “CLOSE ENCOUNTERS OF THE THIRD KIND” ULTIMATELY PROVIDED THE INSPIRATION FOR STEPHEN SPIELBURG’S 1977 FILM OF THE SAME NAME. 

BY THE TIME OF THE CENTER’S FOUNDING, HE WAS LOOKING TO TAKE HIS UFO STUDIES TO THE NEXT LEVEL. 

Mark Rodeghier: [He knew that he needed to, uh, form some kind of association with his other colleagues interested in the U of ours. And the impetus for it was the UFO wave that occurred in the fall of 1973, mostly in the US, but also some overseas. And he saw cases that weren’t being investigated and that there really was a need for a UFO center to do serious research. And so, uh, that got him, you know, really going. And he started working on it right away. And by the end of 73, um, you know, the Center for UFO Studies was in existence, and he formed it as a kind of a scientific think tank.]

THAT WAS MARK ROEDEGHIER, THE CURRENT DIRECTOR OF THE CENTER. HE SAYS MUCH OF THE CENTER’S WORK FOCUSES ON PROVIDING A RELIABLE SOURCE OF INFORMATION ON UFOS.  

Mark Rodeghier: [So our three main goals, which we’ve been consistent with over the years, is first, a place for people to report sightings and to then have those sightings stored and disseminated to others. We have the largest electronic database in the world and extensive case files. Um, the second is to be a reliable source of information. And so we’ve had publications and academic journals and books we printed, right. And of course, the website. And the third was to do our own research and, and help others as well.]

RODEGHIER SAYS THAT THE PROCESS OF GATHERING INFORMATION RELIES SIGNIFICANTLY ON WITNESS TESTIMONY. 

Mark Rodeghier: [Know that we prefer, if possible, to get data from instruments or photos. Right. Or other other kinds of things that are not reliant only on people telling you what they saw, but still, 99% of the time it is.]

BUT, SCIENTIFIC DISCIPLINE AND TECHNOLOGIES GROUND THE WORM OF CUFOS AS WELL. 

Mark Rodeghier: [We’ve done large scale data analysis. We work with abductees and, and witnesses and give them psychological tests. Uh, again, we’ve analyzed data and samples in the laboratory, not just from the Delphos case I mentioned, but from from a few other samples, cases, or even things with, um, but what looks like Spider’s web is that it was called Angel’s hair that’s left by UFOs. Um, but it’s made, of course, spider web. And, um, you know, we’ve also engaged in field studies where we have worked with some other groups to design instruments to put into the field to try to, to measure characteristics about a UFO, you know, like.]

MUFON, OR THE MUTUAL UFO NETWORK, IS ANOTHER ORGANIZATION THAT ANALYZES UFO CLAIMS AND SIGHTINGS USING SCIENTIFIC DISCIPLINE. 

Sam Maranto: [Speak to witnesses, gather data. There’s physical evidence submitted for evaluation. So we get about maybe anywhere between 7 to 10000 reports a year. And of course, the majority of reports get submissions and of course, most identifications, a good 90% of them. But what trickles down, you know, as far as what’s left to that, is that that small percentile may be in the single percentile. Those are the nuggets you’re looking for. It’s like gold mining.

THAT WAS SAM MARATNO, THE STATE DIRECTOR FOR THE ILLINOIS BRANCH OF MUFON. HE SAYS THAT AN EARLY ENCOUNTER WITH A UFO WAS ONE OF THE MAJOR REASONS HE BECAME INTERESTED IN THIS WORK. 

Sam Maranto: [Well, as a child, I had this sighting in 1959. I was at my uncle’s cottage. I was up in front of their property and I was dropping. Hubble saw something down on new well ill that of course they went back by a channel. They started skipping rocks over the water. Nice shot that skipping rocks. But I was still attempting to do it. All of a sudden, there was a bright orb of light, flew my right shoulder. That was not massive, but it was something or some short flew over my shoulder, went over a fence, and then came up over the back of a tree. Well, then my aunt said she was yelling and looking for me. And I looked and she was standing there. I was like I had just woken up and it was dark, but whatever transpired scared the heck out of me. And I couldn’t talk about it for years. I came home at night and Dennis the Menace was on and the police was 7:00 at night on a Sunday. And I went right to bed.]

SIMILAR TO CUFOS, SIFTING THROUGH WITNESS TESTIMONY FORMS MUCH OF MUFON’S WORK. BUT MARANTO SAYS THAT RECENTLY, THE SCOPE OF THEIR WORK HAS BROADENED.

Sam Maranto:  [And today their focus is more so, I think, to help other organizations and their and their initiative is being involved in working with governmental agencies and getting this sort of solution, trying to get get this going again as far as some degree of disclosure to the general public, but also taking an interest from scientific evaluations, not just taking the information and giving it to select groups of contractors, but making this information available to the public at large or the scientific community at large.]

BUT, THESE ORGANIZATIONS HAVE HAD DIFFICULTY GAINING THE SUPPORT OF ACADEMIC INSTITUTIONS. THIS IS DESPITE THE FACT THAT CUFOS WAS THE PROJECT OF J. ALLEN HYNEK, A DISTINGUISHED NORTHWESTERN PROFESSOR. 

Mark Rodeghier: [Yeah, well, I actually, Northwestern did not want any part of the center. And you know, as I well known for being there at the time, Dr. Hynek wanted to have Northwestern support the center, but they did that in finding office space or anything else. And there’s an example of a stigma. Yeah, because there is Hynek will that world renowned scientist studying it. And he couldn’t get his own university to support his work.]

ALLEN HYNEK WAS ORIGINALLY INVITED TO NORTHWESTERN AS A PROFESSOR IN THE DEPARTMENT OF ASTRONOMY AND PHYSICS. IT WAS A RELATIVELY SMALL DEPARTMENT WHEN HE FIRST STARTED OUT. BUT, HIS TIME AT NORTHWESTERN COINCIDED WITH A PERIOD OF SIGNIFICANT EXPANSION FOR THE DEPARTMENT. THIS HAD PARTLY TO DO WITH ADVANCES HYNEK MADE IN THE FIELD OF IMAGE ORTHICON ASTRONOMY, WHICH IMPROVED  THE CAPACITY OF TELESCOPES TO ABSORB LIGHT. TELESCOPES WITH ORTHICON IMAGING WERE INSTALLED IN MULTIPLE OBSERVATORIES, INCLUDING THE DEARBORN OBSERVATORY IN EVANSTON. 

BUT ACCORDING TO THE UNIVERSITY LIBRARY ARCHIVES, AS HE STARTED GETTING MORE INVOLVED WITH UFO STUDIES, THE UNIVERSITY MADE CLEAR MOVES TO DISTANCE ITSELF. THIS MEANT SEPARATING ITSELF ENTIRELY FROM CUFOS, EVEN AS IT STRUGGLED FINANCIALLY. 

Sam Maranto: [The problem is it’s become a dogma. It’s also a political thing. It is It has shifted from genuine science to politics and dogma. And it’s sad because people are afraid to engage subject matter because and once you engage it, you lose. You may lose funding for research. We may even lose our jobs.]

JASON WANG IS A CURRENT PROFESSOR IN THE NORTHWESTERN DEPARTMENT OF ASTRONOMY AND PHYSICS. 

Jason Wang: [So I work on imaging and exoplanets. So those are planets orbiting other stars. So a lot of my work is about how we like the other light of the star so we can see these faint planets right next to them.]

HE SAYS THAT RESEARCH WITHIN DEPARTMENTS LIKE HIS, DON’T TYPICALLY CENTER ON THE KINDS OF QUESTIONS HYNEK ASKED ABOUT UFOS. 

Jason Wang: [I would say a lot of astrophysical research stems from understanding physical processes. So that’s less of like the oh, we see some like, you know, what kind of like these come from is harder to pose as a like a it can be pros, which is why I think there are some folks interested in this and was when they created this working group. But like in general, like that’s not kind of where the foundations of modern astronomy are offered. So that’s not usually a focus of folks that study astronomy.]

HOWEVER, HE SAID ONE OF THE MOST EXCITING WAYS EXTRATERRESTRIAL LIFE IS CONSIDERED IN THE UNIVERSITY SETTING, IS VIA BIOSIGNATURES. 

Jason Wang: [Biosignatures It’s like they’re trying to imagine, you know, what kind of life extraterrestrial life would be and what kind of signatures if we were to take a spectrum of another planet or indicate to us that there would be that this signature would point to a sign through for life or whether this planet could be habitable?] 

THE QUESTION OF EXTRATERRESTRIAL LIFE IS A DEEP ONE, SPANNING GENERATIONS. IT’S A DIVISIVE QUESTION, GENERATING FIERCE DEBATE AND EXPOSING LAYERS OF FEAR AND INSECURITY. BUT MARANTO SAYS THAT PERHAPS, THINKING ABOUT EXTRATERRESTRIAL LIFE PROVIDES AN OPPORTUNITY TO THINK A LITTLE BIT ABOUT OURSELVES. 

Sam Maranto: [It’s about who we are, what we are, and why we are. It’s about us more so than it is about them.]

FOR WNUR NEWS, I’M PAUL O’CONNOR.