No worries.

Since “the truth” is hidden from most of us, how do we know what it is?

We are enslaved to a global corporate nightmare, but that’s something we can all understand because it’s part of human nature (the bad part of course) to be greedy. Not everyone has had experience with UFOs and aliens, whatever they are, so that requires a bit more convincing for most people.

As far as underground UFO bases, how do we know that those stories aren’t lies to cover up something else? Where does it end? I am not a fan of infinite regress.

The only way I could know about all of this for sure is if I had some sort of omnipotent view of things which is available to very few, if any people on this planet. I make very few assertions and doubt almost everything, which doesn’t keep me from thinking about things.

I did not joke about the Contactees by calling them an art movement. It was a serious attempt to look at them from a viewpoint that I hadn’t seen before. The mind control theme has been done before and has just as much validity as my mental exercise, in my opinion.

We could go on with each other ad infinitum!

I don’t quite understand what you’re trying to say, but I didn’t even mention abductees in the post.

Abductees to me are almost completely separate from the Contactee movement. The circumstances are different, and I do think that something strange is happening to at least some of these people–something that may have more to do with contact with extra-human consciousness than the Contactees ever experienced.

If you have a mainline to “THE TRUTH” I have nothing more to say. Perhaps some day I will receive incontrovertible evidence which knocks me off the metaphoric fence, but I will also realize that trying to convince others of this TRUTH will be an impossible task. Best to keep it to myself or communicate with others who have had similar experiences.

For now, I prefer to leave the question open, but that will never satisfy some people.

Some of the files on contactees have been released and I think some are available at the FBI website.

Don’t you think it’s kind of hilarious that some of them are conmen? What colorful people! If I were a fiction writer, it would be fun to come up with a kind of Jonathon Lethem-Philip K Dick-crime noir centering around these conmen. How hard would it be to find & read these FBI files on the conmen?

Sorry you couldn’t make it. I also had problems with seeing other lectures as I had to be at the book table most of the time.

Solid answers in the UFO field are not only no fun, they close us off to the mercurical nature of the phenomenon.

I try to guard myself against anthropocentric views of “aliens.” There are FBI files on many of the contactees, which indicate that some were conmen and had a history of scams to their credit. Some though, seemed to truly believe what they were saying.

They were discussing their frustration with my seeming “fence-sitting” on the issues. As I have said, dogmatism will get one in hot water very quickly in the UFO subject. Also, it’s not as fun as speculation.

Good one! It must have been Heiser, who I think I spoke to briefly at Roswell. I’ll have to thank him.

Haven’t read Bennett’s book, but I think I have it on the shelf. Have to do that now.